Buh bye Cecil

Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
61

The distinction is between ‘can’ and ‘should’.

Yes, he can do whatever he wants. Including setting up rules by which he does not need to abide, like ‘no partisan debates in General Questions’, or banning people for espousing conservative opinions, or for no reason at all.

But he set up a website which purports to give the Straight Dope, without fear or favor, and puts forth the only main rule as “don’t be a jerk”. If he then begins publishing his own opinion as if it were fact, and responds to being called on it with “nyahh nyahh, this is my website and there’s nothing you can do about it”, this is being a liar and a hypocrite - in other words, acting like a jerk.

There are always those who will swear up and down that the SDMB is not biased towards the Left. This is a rather clear piece of evidence that it is.

Are the laws really:
[ul]
[li]General Questions are for factually answerable questions (and liberal opinions presented as fact).[/li][li]Cecil’s columns give you the real facts (and liberal opinions presented as fact).[/li][li]Don’t be a jerk (unless you are a liberal jerk). [/li][/ul]
I have been a member of other messageboards where the moderators would simply ban anyone who disagreed with them too strongly. I have seen more than a little complaint on the SDMB about those messageboards. It is not my experience that those messageboards have unassailable evidence in favor of their position, which no reasonable person can refute.

Unwillingness to defend a position with other than arbitrary acts of authority is not generally a sign of strength, but of weakness. If Cecil had presented a column on why the war was stupid, and presented his evidence that established the position, that would have been one thing.

But slipping it into the last sentence of his column, and refusing to defend it in any way besides “I can do whatever I want, and you can’t stop me”, is dishonest. He has presented an opinion, which he is afraid to defend. Does that strike you as a mark that he feels the opinion to be beyond doubt?

It’s the liberal equivalent of creationist argument. “This is so because the Bible says so, and anyone who thinks differently can shut up.”

Not, as I say, usually the sign of a strong position.

Regards,
Shodan

62

As a cooperative and healing gesture, I suggest that Cecil’s supporters collect enough money to construct a huge statue of Unce Cece in front of the Chicago Reader World Headquaters, which would be pelted with shoes by Cecil’s detractors. The shoes would next be collected and given to charity.

I also wonder if Cecil was misquoted – any chance that he actually said “damn fool gry”?

63

Okay… Facts comin’ at ya:

Here is a NY times article:
The New York Times The New York Times Washington November 28, 2002

Judge Again Bars Effort to Keep Cheney Files Secret
By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE

WASHINGTON, Nov. 27 — A federal judge today again rejected Bush administration efforts to protect as confidential documents from Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy committee.

The 36-page ruling is the latest step in a lengthy procedural dispute between the White House and Judge Emmet G. Sullivan of the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia.

Nothing of substance was resolved in the ruling. The White House has ignored Judge Sullivan’s rulings, going over his head by asking a higher court to exempt Mr. Cheney from having to comply with the judge’s orders over the last five months to turn over the documents.

The judge set Dec. 12 as the next time for the administration to meet back in court with the two groups, the Sierra Club and Judicial Watch, that brought the case. The earlier order compelling the White House to release the documents by Dec. 9 remains in effect.
The case is also in two other forums, and either could see action before Dec. 9.

First, the administration has gone directly to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to appeal Judge Sullivan’s earlier orders that require it to produce nonprivileged documents or explain in detail why it does not want to.

Second, the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, is suing Mr. Cheney, arguing that the White House has to disclose whom Mr. Cheney met as he formulated energy policy and what they discussed.

The Sierra Club suit says the administration violated the Federal Advisory Committee Act by refusing to tell the public how it developed that policy. Environmental groups say energy companies that were big contributors to the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2000 wielded undue influence in formulating the policy.

The administration says that it has made public 36,000 pages of documents and that releasing additional files would jeopardize the ability of advisers to speak candidly with the president and vice president.

A spokeswoman for the Justice Department, Monica Goodling, said: "What is at issue at this point is a limited number of additional documents from the president’s closest advisers, the disclosure of which would raise serious constitutional concerns.

“We believe that the president’s constitutional authority to gather candid advice from his advisers is so important that we are appealing this issue through the court of appeals and an application to the D.C. Circuit.”

A lawyer for the Sierra Club, Sanjay Narayan, said the administration had not produced any of the documents that his group sought.

“The question is whether the White House is subject to discovery at all,” Mr. Narayan said. “The administration says the White House is beyond the court’s reach and can’t be asked any questions. The judge has rejected that. So they went to the Court of Appeals, saying that what Judge Sullivan did was so extraordinary that it requires their immediate intervention.”

In his ruling today, Judge Sullivan said the administration’s merely disagreeing with his opinions was not a sufficient basis for circumventing his court.

“Sullivan,” Mr. Narayan said, “basically said he doesn’t want to hear this anymore and that he thinks they are basing their arguments to the Court of Appeals on mischaracterizations of the law and of the record.”

64

And here’s a whole slew of infor on it:

And, I retract that Cheney is suing people. The truth is Cheney is forcing people to sue him for this info

65

Not really, because there was no serious challenge to monarchy in his time. You might as well call Jimmy Carter a rabid (small-d) democrat or (small-r) republican. But he was a determined legitimist, as were nearly all thinking Englishmen in the shadow of the Wars of the Roses.

There’s a big difference. The case can certainly be argued that people who talk to politicians have a right not to have everything they say broadcast.

66

True, but this was an engery for Americalike debate. The whole problem with the Bush Cheney machine is their oil connections and their clandenstine operations.

Cheney’s holding of an energy conference on the taxpayer’s bill, and then not telling any of us what it was about, who was there, and what was discussed is certainly suspect at the very least.

And the fact that the actual government comitee that was made to look into such things, was denied the abilty to see this info, is even MORE suspect.

And then we go and invade IRAQ to ‘liberate’ their oil, er, um… people.

67

Dammit, Frumpy and everyone encouraging you, take it to Great Debates! The argument over motivations for the war have nothing to do with the column, and only a passing resemblance to the topic of this thread. It doesn’t belong in this forum.

Shodan said:

You’ve got a misconception that Cecil has any real connection to this board. Cecil runs a newspaper column. The Chicago Reader runs an internet web page that runs the columns as well, and an internet message board to discuss the columns and apparently anything else that comes up. The board is under the watch of Ed Zotti. Cecil only occassionally shows up here on the boards to throw a few insults (so people can fawn over him for it) and address specifics. The administration of this message board and the policies in place do not apply to the columns that Cecil writes. Not one bit. If Cecil wants to start a great debate or whine incessantly or even be a jerk in his column, that is his prerogative and does not violate the rules of the message board, because his column is not part of this message board.

No, it is not evidence that the SDMB has any biases. It may be evidence that Cecil is biased to the left (in the same way his Was Bush a Nazi column is evidence he’s biased to the right), but it had no reflection on the SDMB. The SDMB is not Cecil. Cecil is not the SDMB. Letting Cecil say anything he wants in his column has no reflection upon the SDMB, because the column is not part of the SDMB, and the SDMB has no authority over Cecil’s columns. Ed Zotti has some authority over Cecil’s columns as Cecil’s editor. The Chicago Reader has some authority over Cecil’s columns as Cecil’s employer and the owner of the columns. But the SDMB is neither Ed nor the Chicago Reader.

Afraid to defend? And your justification for that remark is that he hasn’t responded on the message board. Sorry, but Cecil barely hangs out at the message board and has no requirement to justify anything here. Sometimes he does reply, especially when the criticism is over the factual content of his columns. Guess what? This criticism is over the opinion in his column.

Look, nothing about the rules of the SDMB apply to Cecil’s columns - he can say whatever he wants. You can disagree with him. You can voice your disagreement with him. You can decide that because you disagree with him on the topic, he’s not worth reading any more. Heck, I don’t even care if you complain that he put his opinion in the column. But that would only be your opinion that his opinion doesn’t belong in the column. It certainly isn’t any rule by his employer or editor, and it doesn’t violate any SDMB policies.

68

Irishman,

You asked for evidence, didn’t you?

I won’t choke up the topic with any more proof that you asked for.

But, in my defence, The info about Cheney lends support to Cecil’s statement.
:slight_smile:

69

And the name of the forum in which we are currently posting is? Is it not part of the SDMB messageboard?

No, the column on “Was Bush a Nazi” was facts presented as facts. The comment on the war was an opinion presented in a column purporting to be facts.

Evidence of bias comes from presenting your opinions as facts, not from presenting facts as facts.

Regards,
Shodan

70

That, as a matter of fact, is a lie.

71

Where is this response? I don’t recall any thing from Cecil saying anything even remotely like this. But I don’t read every message. Maybe I missed it.

Again, where has Cecil said "I can do whatever I want, and you can’t stop me”? In fact, the only response I can see from Cecil is this post: reply from Cecil (if that doesn’t jump directly to Cecil’s post, it’s about half way down the page) which seems to be the exact opposite of what you’re saying his response has been.

72

Does anyone have a clue as to WHY, outside of SD this is so hush-hush and downplayed?

My roommate says that what Cec had to say is all baloney - if what he wrote were true, it would be news everywhere - not just on anti-bush sites and the SD.

I’ve been to the AWOLbush website - are there more mainstream articles to use as proof?

Does anyone think this could become a campaign issue (for the first time, really) in 2004?

jw

73

Boxer Dude,

What, exactly are you talking about? There’s about a gazillion posts before yours. WHich post are you referring to?

74

I think BoxerDude is referring to the info itself about Bush the Younger going AWOL in his Air Guard days. The answer to his roomate is that, as Cecil himself reports in the factual part of the column, the issue HAS already been brought up, and was deemed “not as big a deal as it seemed” by almost everyone who counts but the most rabidly partisan.

75

I agree with JRDelerious to a degree – Bush’s AWOL hasn’t been made into a bigger deal because no politician has made a big fuss over it, so it’s pretty much ignored. The press doesn’t bother to highlight the issue because they take their leads from the politicos; today’s political journalist doesn’t want to risk pissing off the wrong politican for fear of losing access to the White House and Congress (just take a look at the softball, pre-screened questions from GW Bush’s last press conference for an example).

Sadly, the days of hard-hitting, Watergate-style political journalism are behind us now – today’s press is perfectly content to regurgitate whatever talking points they’re given, without question.

76

I don’t read them all either, which is why I did not see it.

You are correct, and I was not. Cecil was not stonewalling, and I apologize for stating that he did.

I stand by my assertion that expressing such an opinion in a column purporting to be purely factual was inappropriate, but he has at least been forthcoming in a defense of his opinion.

Discussions, debate, and defense of an opinion are entirely appropriate on the SDMB - indeed, much of it exists for no other reason. Unfortunately, it is so large that sometimes I miss it even when people do the right thing, and for that I am sorry.

Regards,
Shodan