About this time in his presidency wasn’t President Clinton a murderer and his wife an active lesbian or something?
How can I disprove this assertion? Or better yet, how can you prove it? I’ve known tons of conservatives over the course of my life, and I’ve read my fair share of conservative viewpoints and journals and books and websites. And yet the only place I hear about these crackpots and what they’re saying is here or from the liberal media. Why is that?
There are loons on each side of the political equation, but again going back to the “liberals have bad ideas; conservatives are bad people” observation, it seems to be primarily liberals who believe that most conservatives (i.e., our “base”) are loons, whereas we on the right have no trouble recognizing that liberalism’s loons do not define the majority.
ETA: Okay, this has been fun and all, and I’ve spent a lot more time posting tonight than I intended but the hour grows late and the sandman beckons. Goodnight, luci. Goodnight, Hector, whereever you are! Goodnight, Zoe, if you’re still reading me. And goodnight all.
Cheers.
Personally, I don’t feel you’ve shown why there’s such a big difference between your view of countries with UHC and the view of people actually living in those countries. What reason does the average citizen (i.e. not the government, since I assume we don’t have any government officials here on the SDMB) have for lying or punching up their satisfaction ratings? Why do you think they don’t seem to have long litanies of “health care bankrupted me” or “insurance refused to cover me” stories that Americans seem to? Basically, it seems to me that if we did have the best system, we’d be seeing glowing reports from here and horror stories overseas, while the opposite seems to be true. At the very least, polls about UHC would be a lot more tilted than the ones I’ve seen seem to be. Wherefore lies the reasons?
And finally, because you’ve probably mentioned this in another thread and I missed it, can you link me to a post where you describe what you think is wrong about the current system, and how you think those problems should be fixed?
I do deny this.
Well, first off, you need to quit holding this board up as a microcosm of society at large, because it isn’t. Right wingers on this board have pissed and moaned for years that they’re a tiny minority here, and they’re right. This board leans left; what are you gonna do about it? Second, no, the right-wingers on this board absolutely do not behave the way you’ve claimed. Here’s the first hit I got for searching for “liberals” in the bbq pit:
Now, naturally, that’s not representative and it might be unfair to cite that as my only example, but I am quite confident that if I wanted to spend 10 minutes searching (and if the pile of shit search function worked without making me wait 300 seconds), I could find plenty of examples, probably some from yourself, where conservatives attacked liberals as stupid, anti-american, communist, morally lacking to the point of damaging society, etc.
I mean, this quote right here seems to want to mock liberals as stupid people who simply want to prevent people from having “more” out of spite:
If you really want to raise the level of discourse as you claim, ask yourself if the thoughts you’re attributing to those liberals are really as evil and spiteful as you portray them, or if they simply have a different opinion from you about how to make the country a better place for everyone.
You’ve created a nice little bubble for yourself here. If I attempt to criticize in generalities the current crop of the conservative movement, you can say “see! you’re hating conservatives and assuming we’re bad people and making my point!”
I have no doubt there are principled, intellectual conservatives out there who aren’t filled with ignorance and hate. I am one - depending on your definition of conservative.
But the base - the common conservative - is currently frenzied to a state of ignorance and anger that I have personally never before witnessed in my lifetime, and nothing even close. I’ve encountered many people who feel comfortable in the company of strangers calling for the killing of the president and calling him a nigger. In public places, amongst people they don’t know the leanings of, and I’m not even in bumfuck Arkansas.
I see elected officials, not random loons with a blog, insinuating that Obama is conspiring to cover up that he’s not an American citizen. I see them shouting “you lie!” in an address to Congress. I see mainstream conservative media asking seriously if Obama is the Antichrist. I see polls that say that 15% of conservatives think he is.
There’s widespread sentiment that he’s a marxist - not left of center, not even european style socialist, but who are utterly convinced he’s hoping he can turn us into the USSR. Or that he’s a secret muslim. Or that there’s just something evil and nefarious.
I see blind ignorance and hatred.
You are not the majority of the conservative base, or even close. I generally find you to be arrogant and obtuse, and yet you are amongst the fleeting minority of conservatives who are willing to think and discuss and not hate and lie. As imperfect as you are, you are above the level of the common every day “conservative” I see in this country, who are fueled by ignorance and hatred more than principle and reason. You do not represent the base. The people who watch Glenn Beck are the people we’re talking about here.
And I am not a liberal. This isn’t just some partisan bashing. If you look up my posting history over the years, it’s clear that I have a libertarian anti-government bent that more people would classify as conservative than liberal, although I don’t like either label. I used to feel as though to some degree conservatives were my ideological peers, and I have seen the movement collapse from what was once, at least in part, principled and reasoned, into a movement where an elite few rile up the ignorant base with propoganda. I am utterly ashamed to see how the group I once considered to be basically on the same side as me to a large degree has fallen into their current pathetic, hateful, spiteful, damaging state.
Dang it. I really do need to get to bed and I knew better than to check back in here, but I did and so here I am.
I don’t have time to address your entire post right now but I thought I’d mention this one thing as it goes to much of what we’re both saying. Glenn Beck, at his current peak of viewership, pulls an audience of 2.8 million viewers. Upthread I estimated that this country probably has at least 70 million conservatives, and that’s a, ahem, conservative estimate. My guess is that the true number is in the 80 to 100 million range, but I digress.
Now, assuming a conservative population of 70 million, that means Beck is pulling in an audience equal to 4% of the country’s conservative population. And then you have to take into account the fact that just because these people are watching him, it in no way follows that they agree with everything he says. In fact, I’d be surprised if any significant percentage of his viewership is in lockstep agreement with him on any specific issue, let alone all of them. Hell, I don’t even agree with me all the time! 
So it’s far from clear that Glenn Beck or his viewers represent the U.S.’ conservative population in the main, or that he even represents his own viewers to anything more than a cursory degree.
I suspect that you are just drinking in far too easily the claims of those who are critical and condemning of conservatives and who have a vested interest in convincing people that the country’s conservatives have become a bunch of wacked out loons, and the fact is it just ain’t so!
Most of the country’s conservatives are busy with their jobs, their family, paying bills, grocery shopping, attending their kids ball games, mowing their lawns, etc. They believe in small government and individual responsibility and that the government has no place in the redistribution of income and, looking at how the government has handled and operated every other social program over the last 80 years, they are scared to death to have management of their health care put in the hands of the federal government.
So, when election time rolls around they go to the polls and pull the Republican lever, and apart from that they go about their lives as I just described.
Those are America’s typical conservatives, not the allegedly rabid followers of Glenn Beck or any other conservative media spokesman.
And just for the record, I don’t believe for a moment that 15% of the country’s conservatives believe that Obama is the Antichrist. It’s hard to get 15% of the population to agree on any one specific thing, much less that the evil Biblical being who will take over and rule the world is a thin black man from Chicago who has two sweet and adorable kids and a wife with terrible fashion sense.
I mean, I know he’s a lawyer, but still…
Huh. So when the liberals in the 50s and 60s civil rights struggle went on the freedom bus rides, and the conservative sheriffs and upstanding citizens beat them till bloody or dead, that was the civility of the conservatives you are advocating? When the police had to be called so that students - after a ruling from court - could enter High School? Yes, I can sure see how the conservatives are good decent and civil people who want simply to discuss things, and need Limbaugh only after the bad liberals have attacked them.
The rest of us lives in the real world.
I don’t see what’s wrong with that sentence. Everytime somebody defends or explains his/her conservative opinion or position, it stems from a cruel, hateful, egoistic attitude and ethic towards other people, together with misinformation about what works in the real world. So conservatives want to cut welfare because the “welfare queens” are abusing it - without knowing basic facts about it - from the position that their money shouldn’t be used to give other people an easy time.
The opposition to the Healthcare blows the same horn.
Liberals may often have naive and impractical ideas, but at least they start with the ethics of wanting to help people with bad luck and lower starting positions to also get at least a decent humane way of life. They are also more inclined to measure success not only in numbers on your bank account or paycheck, but other measures, so that more people can become happy instead of a very select few stinking rich while the rest starve. And because liberals are less authoriatarian types, they are ready to accep that the world isn’t black and white with easy solutions and following the leader, but complex, needs many solutions and adult responsible cititzens.
That also makes them more open to accept facts and adapt solutions if reality doesn’t work the way they expected.
When reading conservatives points, I often remember the old joke about communists in an adapted version:
A conservative can never be three things at once: intelligent ( in the sense of well-informed), honest and caring (in the sense of empathic)
If he’s honest and caring, he’s not intelligent.
If he’s honest and intelligent, he’s not caring.
If he’s caring and intelligent, he’s not honest.
If he’s caring and intelligent and honest, he’s no conservative.
In Germany, of course, all medical costs relating to pregnancy are covered by the insurance. Because our secular state has in the constitution that the state shall protect the family, so our “socalist” insurance of course pays for it.
What are your so “family-oriented” Republicans doing for the normal family in the US, besides forbidding gay marriage? Apparently, not one finger.
Mothers also get 6 weeks before delivery and several weeks after off from work to recover, and the law protects their workplace during that time.
Then there’s the 1 1/2 year during which either or both parents can take off from work with protection to bond with their infant , before it later goes into Kindergarten.
And the immunisation and pre- and postnatal child checks, to see if the baby is developing correctly, or if measures need be taken. All free.
So maybe you should come over here?
Outside The Underfed One’s reality, discourse from the right was always froathing at the mouth:
Nice article by Rick Perlstein on the long history of right-wing craziness in America:
It doesn’t make it any more acceptable, but sometimes the long-term view helps.
Some more articles:
An excellent article which not only details the frightening insanity the Republicans have fallen into, but starts to address what to do about it:
http://www.southernstudies.org/2009/08/post-66.html
A lot of the ruckus is political theater, but the Republicans have been stirring up the crazies for years, and some of them are going to get violent– just as they did in the ’90s.
While we’re at it, here’s what the craziness looks like to a British observer. Both links via Agto.
Links taken from zompist: there are also some editorials from zompist himself.
These games are sort of silly. I was attempting to paint a picture, and that was one example. Yes, obviously not all conservatives follow Glenn Beck. Most people are generally apolitical and indifferent and lazy - you could pick any given source of information and cause and say “only a tiny fraction of the people of group X are involved with that”, but it doesn’t necesarily refute the points I was trying to make. Glenn Beck is just an example. You want to play the “yeah, sure, we’ve got crazies on the right, but everyone has crazies” and my point is that the crazies on the right are far more mainstream and widespread than they’ve ever been in my (relatively short) lifetime, from any political persusion.
Even so, though - since not every person watches him every day, 2.8 million viewers actually indicates a viewership base that’s much larger. Even if it’s “only” a few million, it shows how fucking widespread the looney shit is.
Getting back to the original point, I don’t doubt what you say is true, that you think for the most part liberals are well intentioned but naive and ultimately foolish. I’m saying that you are not a typical modern day “conservative” (and I’m beginning to hate the term - in what way is the modern American conservative movement actually conservative?). You may not make an assumption of ill intent based on someone’s political leanings, but most of your ideological allies do.
It bugs me that the remaining principled, intellectual conservatives have to pretend that their movement around them isn’t turning into a rabid frenzy of ignorance and hate. I have a very hard time believing that you don’t see it. Denying reality doesn’t help anyone - and in fact you would gain credibility in my eyes if you said “yep, the conservative movement in America is getting fucking nuts, but I’m still going to defend a certain ideology because I think it’s correct”.
What the hell are you talking about? Do you think I saw a Michael Moore film one day and became convinced of the evil of conservatives? I spent most of my adult life as extremely anti-socialist, anti-government, and advocating fiscal conservative policy and government restraint. My attitude largely hasn’t changed (it has on some specific issues as I’ve learned more about them) - but one of two things happened along the way.
Either the conservative movement went badshit crazy over the last decade or so, or they’ve always been bat shit crazy, saying the right things but doing the wrong things, and I haven’t really seen it for what it is. I suspect it’s more the former than the latter. I think the utter failure of the 2000s under the Republican government has inflicted cognitive dissonance on people. They feel a need to blindly support their side, but their side has betrayed them in terms of what they said they stood for vs what they actually stood for - and it’s very difficult to be introspective and admit you were wrong so instead so instead you ramp up the hatred in the hopes that it distracts them from the potential internal crisis they could face.
I’ve never identified myself as a full on theocrat/neocon type conservative, but generally people with libertarian leanings were traditionally considered conservatives, so I felt that if indeed I had to limit myself to picking one of two factions, then I was ideologically conservative. No one told me what to think of conservatives - I watched in horror as they gained control over the government and made the decade a clusterfuck, and in response to this, their base, rather than jumping ship or attempting to get the train back on track, actually rallied behind them, and became even more ignorant and hateful. I am utterly disgusted by the behavior of those I once loosely considered allies.
Maybe. The hateful loons are a much higher percentage of the general population, probably by orders of magnitude, than anything I’ve ever seen.
Either way - the people you describe, even if they lack ill intent, are complicit for what they’ve done. If you blindly pull the voting lever for a party regardless of how evil it is, you are part of that evil.
From here.
I forgot that this was a relatively small poll in one state.
This poll was taken in New Jersey, so it’s not a nationwide poll. On the other hand, NJ runs relatively liberal - if they ran the poll in Texas, I’d imagine the numbers would be even higher. I mean - only 70% of self-identified conservatives don’t believe that obama is the LITERAL FUCKING DEVIL. That goes about 10 steps beyond “politician I don’t like” into complete fucking retard looneyville.
The ignorant and hateful are not a tiny minority. They are the republican base. They are the mainstream.
I’m not using this to attack your sincerity. I said in my earlier post that I believe you’re on a different level of ideology than these idiots. I think you fail to realize - or at least acknowledge - that you’re in the minority, and what most of the movement has become.
This is even worse than what Starving Artist did. He declared assumption of ill intent from people that disagree with you as a defining characteristic of liberals, but now you’re saying it’s utterly impossible for someone to have an honest conservative ideology that they feel accomplishes the most good.
You did notice that I said it’s an old joke? But yes, I do believe it points to the root of the problem. The conservative ideology is not about accomplishing the most good, it’s about helping the rich keep what they want. The people who hold that view may be misguided in that they believe Fox news over real news, that they believe Republicans actually stand for less taxes and smaller government -but then they fall into the “honest and caring, but not intelligent” category above.
Show me a honest conservative ideology that’s not based on the “let poor people get what they deserve, which is nothing, because it’s their own fault they are poor” fallacy. It doesn’t have to be a complete or long ideology (I don’t have a lot of time anyway), just a simple point.
You fool, they were Democrats! You liberals are all racists!
Representative Alan Grayson (D-FL) summed up what seems to be the predominant Republican health care strategy fairly well. In short:** “Don’t get sick. If you have insurance, don’t get sick. If you do have insurance, don’t get sick.”**
That damn commie [del]Morton Downey Jr.[/del] Father Coughlin!
___ _____^
time-traveling
Well, this WAS an interesting debate/discussion on healthcare. I haven’t read many of the posts on this page because I don’t care in the slightest about US American political name-calling.
NTucker, I’m very sorry to hear about your fights over things that absolutely should be automatically covered. (You probably won’t want to hear that parents get a full year of maternity leave in Canada either, I’m guessing. 
)
And double (one year each) if twins.
Is that paid maternity leave?
wiki link. I expect more “Canuckistan” stupidty from American talking heads when that gets more widely known.
And we did not have to argue with anyone about a bill when my son was born. There was no bill.
(and no, I’m not saying that it was free. I paid through MSP monthly fees and taxes. And right now, I’m probably paying for someone else’s child to be born. The horror! I’m paying for someone else’s medical services! Oh no!)