# I am in despair **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 6, 2002, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521 "2002-11-06T07:53:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/121 "2002-11-08T19:48:29Z")
Stoid: > [@](#): > > Well, Rick, when someone makes even the slightest case for how my vision of Bush and The Pubbies agenda is grossly mistaken, I’ll consider your point. While past performance is no guarrantee of future returns and your mileage may vary, the historical evidence of 4528 posts would suggest that this is an untruth. > [@](#): > > See, two years ago, when everyone decided that I was being “paranoid” and “hysterical” about Bush, it was safe and easy to brush me off, because there was no evidence. > > Now, sadly, that is no longer true. No. It’s still true. Everybody still thinks that. 😉 > [@](#): > > My fear? Bush would chip away at the separation of church and state. See “Office of Faith Based Initiatives” It’s irrelevant to SOCAS. All sorts of special interest groups do good works. It was a violation of SOCAS to treat those groups with religious affiliations different than those without. > [@](#): > > My fear? Bush would chip away at our constitutional protections. See John Ashcroft. A blatant falsehood. Bad guys are trying to kill us. In case you didn’t notice, bad guys have killed quite a few of us. Certain aspects of our country are becoming tighter and stricter in order to catch those bad guys and stop them from killing us some more. It’s not like he’s Janet Reno, and just wantonly burning women and children, or stealing children out of their homes at gunpoint you know? > [@](#): > > My fear? Bush would make a mess of the economy. > See the deficit. You’re right. We should have just let that pile of rubble that was the World Trade Center sit where it was. We should not have cleaned it up. And, we shouldn’t be fighting a war on terror. That costs money. What are mere lives of US citizens when compared to money? btw: you spend your way out of recessions. > [@](#): > > My fear? Bush would make war. > See “Iraqi Resolution” Lays out the path to **averting** war, and protecting lives, both here and abroad. Whether or not we have war does not depend on Bush. > [@](#): > > Up to now, all I’ve seen is people telling me I’m hysterical, insane, wrong, and paranoid. About what? How? I’ve laid out precisely what my fears are about Yes. You’ve laid them out. That doesn’t mean their still not hysterical, insane, wrong, and paranoid. > [@](#): > > and not a single word has been said in refutation of my assessment That’s just wrong insane and hysterical. Refutations abound. Would but she who exclaims “I cannot see” stop shouting of blindness, she would need only open her eyes to let the clear liquid light of wisdom fill her with its beauty. > [@](#): > > pardon me if I don’t see the light in that. Alas. Thou canst only be pardoned if you don’t see the light when your eyes are open. Stop squinting. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/122 "2002-11-08T19:53:43Z")
Stoid: > [@](#): > > Oh, and since it’s pretty obvious that no one can reasonably refute my concerns, I’ll let you off the hook and clarify for you what the problem really is. True. But not for the reason you think. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/123 "2002-11-08T19:55:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Stoid \* > **Well, Rick, when someone makes even the \* slightest \* case for how my vision of Bush and The Pubbies agenda is grossly mistaken, I’ll consider your point. Until then, you are living in the past and you need to move up to the present.** Oh, please. Despite your ranting and raving, the Constitution still stands, John Ashcroft or no. It will still stand ten years from now, and will be more or less as string as it is today, as it was ten years ago, and as it was forty years before that. Nothing happening now is any worse than a jillion stretches of government power that have happened in the past under both Republican AND Democratic Presidents, and anyone who says otherwise is a liar. For every offense against the Constitution you can name under this administration, I can dig up one that occurred while Clinton was President. (And while Bush 1.0, Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon et al. were President.) I haven’t seen federal officers burn down buildings full of children while Bush was President. Do you really want to do an inventory of offenses? For all your ranting and raving, the U.S. has as much separation now between Church and State, by any reasonable measurement, as it did in 2000, “Office of Faith-Based Initiatives” be damned. There is no state religion, like there is in the United Kingdom. Everyone is free to follow their own faith. For all your ranting and raving, there isn’t any war in Iraq. No more than there was under Clinton, anyway, and less than there was (obviously) under Bush 1.0. This administration has been no more warmongering than any other, and so far is probably the LEAST warmongering since Carter. Reagan had Libya, Grenada, Beirut, and others; Bush 1.0 had Panama and Gulf War 1.0; Clinton had Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, and was kind enough to blow up a medicine factory in the Sudan. Bush has Afghanistan, and I don’t think you can blame him for starting that one, unless you’re an idiot who also thinks he was behind 9/11. For all your ranting and raving, the current recession is not what I would call an economic catastrophe, and has very little to do with who is or isn’t President, just like all the other ones. > [@](#): > > Up to now, all I’ve seen is people telling me I’m hysterical, insane, wrong, and paranoid. About what? I never said you were insane. Stoid, there is such a thing as lying by degree. You’re lying by degree. Saying “Bush is a bad President and I disagree with X, Y and Z, plus I think he’ll do A, B and C” is fine. I happen to agree he’s a bad President. Saying “I weep for my nation; all is lost; our freedoms will be taken from us, Bush is evil, the evil Republicans will ruin everything” is idiotic, and that’s essentially what you’re doing. If it’s raining, it’s true if you say “It is raining.” It is dishonest to say “Fire and brimstone is raining from the sky and will destroy the earth.” > [@](#): > > Regarding lieu’s remark… you have gotta admit, blaming Monica Lewinsky’s lips for 9/11 is pretty damned insane and hysterical I guess it would be, if he’d said that. He didn’t. > [@](#): > > Then there’s Moto’s trying to blame the crushing of Solidarity on Carter and Co. Jesus… it’s the conservatives in this thread who are being illogical and reaching. “Blah blah blah blah blah the conservatives blah blah blah.” Keep demonizing the opposition. I’ll keep laughing at your ignorance. You sound like a football fan: “The Packers RULE!!! The Vikings SUCK, man!” Notice I’ve never suggested “Democrats are hysterical” or “liberals are illogical.” You, individually, are. And one of the sure signs of being a partisan fool is complaining about your partisan opponents as a group. Pull yourself out of the muck and get some perspective, for Christ’s sake. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/124 "2002-11-08T19:59:28Z")
> [@](#): > > There is nothing hysterical or paranoid or illogical in what I believe about George Bush and the Republican agenda, as I’ve shown. I understand it clearly, and I do not accuse them falsely. You know, generally, the only place where you hear people proclaim that they are not paranoid, hysterical or delusional is at the nuthouse. ---
**Author:** ![Jodi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7feea3/32.png) [@Jodi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jodi)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/125 "2002-11-08T20:02:57Z")
Y’know, if you generally posted so rationally – “I’m concerned the administration with erode constitutional rights, take us into war, and hurt the economy, for reasons X, Y, and Z” – then people might take you more seriously. But contrast that with your original post in this very thread for all the proof you should need for why people do _not_ take you seriously. Instead, because you tend to post like a partisan lunatic, people think you _are_ a partisan lunatic on this subject and therefore dismiss out of hand everything you say. Sure, _now_ you say you’re not hysterical, paranoid, and insane, but believe me: that’s exactly how your OP – and dozens others just like it – make you sound. Ask yourself if you have truly been an effective advocate for your cause and your point of view, if all you’ve managed to do is convince a great number of people that you’re irrational and hysterical, at least where this subject is concerned. Take that as mean ol’ conservative name-calling if you must, but don’t let that prevent you from considering whether or not it’s true. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/126 "2002-11-08T20:07:01Z")
> [@](#): > > You sound like a football fan: “The Packers RULE!!! The Vikings SUCK, man!” Whenever some one implies that the Vikings don’t suck, the terrorists win. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/127 "2002-11-08T20:07:23Z")
Heh, I think Monica’s lips are responsible for 9/11? You, woman, need to do stand-up. You’ve certainly got great material. Dammit Stoid, quit making me smile at you. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/128 "2002-11-08T20:16:10Z")
Heaven knows I don’t want to seem like an idiot. I’m sorry if I screwed up the dates. FTR, though, there was political unrest in Poland from at least the mid-70’s, culminating in the Solidarity movement. I can’t blame Afghanistan and Poland on Carter. I can, however, blame them on the Soviets and postulate that the Democrats weren’t doing enough about it. If you say I’m concentrating on ancient history, I’m sorry, but that argument won’t fly. This was the most recent period in American history where the Democrats ran the whole show for more than a couple of years, and Stoid had made an assertion that bad things would not happen if this happened again. Besides, the Democrats haven’t done enough changing since 1980. They’re the same muddled batch of loopy ideas they were then. ---
**Author:** ![Toaster52](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/50afbb/32.png) [@Toaster52](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toaster52)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/129 "2002-11-08T20:41:09Z")
**Stoid** _“I’m sure Pubbies everywhere came in their pants when they saw the election returns on Tuesday night.”_ Damn…missed the party. Sounds like it was a good one… ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/130 "2002-11-08T21:30:33Z")
> [@](#): > > It’s not like he’s Janet Reno, and just wantonly burning women and children, or stealing children out of their homes at gunpoint you know? You’re not seriously flogging this old horseshit are you? > [@](#): > > It’s irrelevant to SOCAS. All sorts of special interest groups do good works. It was a violation of SOCAS to treat those groups with religious affiliations different than those without. Except he’s making distinctions between “good” religions and “bad” religions. he’s giving my money to only those religions which he, in his dimwitted fundy fog, deems legitimate. This is tantamount to an official endorsement of those religions, thus violating the establishment clause of the first amendment. > [@](#): > > A blatant falsehood. Bad guys are trying to kill us. In case you didn’t notice, bad guys have killed quite a few of us. Certain aspects of our country are becoming tighter and stricter in order to catch those bad guys and stop them from killing us some more. Irrelevant, irrelevant irrelevant. The constitution does not have an asterisk that says “The AG may piss all over this document if the ‘bad guys’ are trying to kill you.” It’s also hypocritical since he won’t touch the 2nd amendment with a ten-foot pole. > [@](#): > > You’re right. We should have just let that pile of rubble that was the World Trade Center sit where it was. We should not have cleaned it up. And, we shouldn’t be fighting a war on terror. That costs money. What are mere lives of US citizens when compared to money? We had plenty of money before W gave it all away to his rich corporate friends. > [@](#): > > btw: you spend your way out of recessions. Nope, we TAX our way out of recessions. You guys just wallow in them. > [@](#): > > Lays out the path to averting war, and protecting lives, both here and abroad. Whether or not we have war does not depend on Bush. Hitlerseque doublespeak. Show me some fucking EVIDENCE that Iraq is a threat. > [@](#): > > That’s just wrong insane and hysterical. Take another look at your statements concerning Janet reno. Christ, Shodan, you’re a PACKER fan? That explains a lot. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/131 "2002-11-08T23:10:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RickJay \* > \*\* > Stoid, there is such a thing as lying by degree. You’re lying by degree. Saying “Bush is a bad President and I disagree with X, Y and Z, plus I think he’ll do A, B and C” is fine. I happen to agree he’s a bad President. Saying “I weep for my nation; all is lost; our freedoms will be taken from us, Bush is evil, the evil Republicans will ruin everything” is idiotic, and that’s essentially what you’re doing. If it’s raining, it’s true if you say “It is raining.” It is dishonest to say “Fire and brimstone is raining from the sky and will destroy the earth.” \*\* I’m working so I can’t address everything yet, but I simply must address this. You start by accusing me of lying by degree… \* and then you lie about what I have said to “prove” it! \* Good lord! You want to show me the error of my ways by \*\* lying \*\* TO me ABOUT me when my words are preserved for all to see?? And on what planet would that be considered logical or effective? I get so very tired of this. I say one thing, and people come along and say I said something else, or I meant something else, or you know what I really mean/think/believe blah blah blah. I’m simply not going to defend or explain or address things I did not say as though I said them. What I did say was that I was afraid and that I felt dispair. I have since specified the source of my fears, which are all, again, based in Bush’s own words and actions up to this point, not anything I’ve imagined. My opinion of the results of what he has done and what he intends to do is my opinion. Again… you like it, it distresses me terribly. We \* feel \* differently about something, there is no “right” or “wrong” in that, and how ridiculous of you to act as though there is! Many people feel that nothing ever changes, who cares, it’s all the same, no biggie, la dee da. Other people care passionately and do see a difference. Reasonable people can and do fall into both categories, I fall into the latter. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/132 "2002-11-08T23:12:04Z")
Sorry, you don’t like it, you said he was a bad president. You are not terribly concerned about it, it doesn’t cause real distress in you. It does me. We are each entitlted to our responses, and neither of us is right or wrong. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/133 "2002-11-08T23:39:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Stoid \* > \*\*You want to show me the error of my ways by \*\* lying \*\* TO me ABOUT me when my words are preserved for all to see?? \*\* Oh, Jesus. Are you the only human being on Earth who took that as a direct quote? What’s wrong with you? Is this the same brain sprain that caused you to interpret lieu as saying the Monica Lewinsky scandal caused 9/11? I’m sorry the use of quotation marks to highlight a rather obviously facetious comment confused you. I’ll let you get back to your shrill, partisan gibbering. :wally ---
**Author:** ![Hickory6](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ecae2f/32.png) [@Hickory6](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hickory6)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/134 "2002-11-08T23:39:33Z")
Here’s why I voted Republican and expect to continue so doing: Because too many Democrats/Liberals lack any moral perspective whatsoever. Too many of them haven’t figured out that Osama is a bigger threat to American lives and liberties than Ashcroft. All you have to do is identify where liberals spend their time and money and political capital. Is it fighting Osama? No. It’s fighting Ashcroft. Feh. No wonder you guys lose elections. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/13edae/32.png) [@Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Cheatem_Undhow)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2002, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/135 "2002-11-08T23:57:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Diogenes the Cynic \* > \*\*Nope, we TAX our way out of recessions. You guys just wallow in them. \*\* The sheer ignorance of this statement is mind-boggling. **Scylla** is right: you spend your way out of recessions. The debate between left and right is whether that spending should come from the government (“priming the pump” to use the Keynesian term) or from private enterprise. While additional taxation might be necessary for the former approach, it’s the spending, not the taxing, that fixes things. Hell, **Diogenes** , why don’t we just jack our rates to 100% and tax our way to prosperity? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2002, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/136 "2002-11-09T00:19:08Z")
Go get 'em, **Hick**! Yessiree, Bob, once we flatten Baghdad, that will sure as heck show that Osama Hussein. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2002, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/137 "2002-11-09T01:37:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by elucidator \* > \*\*Go get 'em, **Hick**! Yessiree, Bob, once we flatten Baghdad, that will sure as heck show that Osama Hussein. \*\* Ha! That shows how much you know, you stupid liberal. Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein are two different people. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2002, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/138 "2002-11-09T03:02:15Z")
Cite, please. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2002, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/139 "2002-11-09T03:36:34Z")
Oh? Have you seen them both in the same country at the same time? Speaking of nutbars, anybody else see the guy on Crossfire tonight, demanding an investigation of the connection between Iraqi Intelligence and Timothy McViegh? Didn’t say anything about black helicopters and cattle mutilations, but holy guacamole, Rocky! The truth is out there. Way, _way_ out there! ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2002, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521/140 "2002-11-09T12:39:53Z")
I have two questions: 1. How _exactly_, in detail, with cites, did Bush, with no assistance from Congress (half of which was _Democratically controlled_) “destroy the economy”? 2. How did the Iraqi Resolution get passed in a Congress, _half of which was Democratically controlled_? And why does the Senate, _which was Democratically controlled_, receive no blame whatsoever in your rants? You can’t have it both ways. You can say that the Iraqi Resolution, in your opinion, is a horrible thing leading us on somehow to “war”. But you cannot blame Bush for the Democrats in both the House and the _Democratically controlled Senate_ who voted for it. And if you had been a liberal who had even the slightest shred of intellectual honesty, you would have included them and their part in your castigation of Bush, without reservation. The fact that you persistently refuse to do so shows your blind, hateful, irrational partisanship. In fact, it is nothing more than the rhetoric of Pure Hate. And you know what? This post can be equally directed to at least three or so people. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-am-in-despair/135521.md?page=8)