The last sentence, sure. The rest? Your position. Claiming it is “literal truth” doesn’t make it so.
Enjoy,
Steven
thats bullshit. And the vatican has NOT given moral support to either the PA or Iraq. You keep saying this but do not give any evidence, other than bloggers who you agree with.
which completes the december plan, after weasling back and forth and getting into semantical quibbles, he wanders back restates his original position as if nothing else had occured.
IOW, Mtgman is correct. You are again asserting as ‘literal truth’ your personal opinion, which is what gets you all this attention in the pit.
you’ve failed to demonstrate how meeting with someone offers ‘moral support’ for their position of killing Jews.
december, I’ll reiterate my point made on page one of this very thread: you are an idiot.
That is all.
Funny, that last sentence could be accurately applied to the Bush Administration’s push for war as well. But I digress.
You mention consequences, december. Specifically what consequences has the Pope’s meeting with Aziz actually had? Your argument essentially rests on this point; you say that this meeting “proves” the Pope is supporting Iraq, and yet you’ve provided no hard evidence. The consequences are at issue here. I ask you now, what have those consequences been? Citing opinions or blogs here will not suffice, you’d better be able to define specific consequences in the form of hard evidence, or get off the box.
Saying your statement is “literal truth” doesn’t make it so, december, but in saying so you do much to prove Guin’s opinion of you.
I just wanted to say that I didn’t use to think this. Ideologically-challenged, certainly, but an idiot? No.
But to follow the same familiar pattern of unsupported assertions and obfuscations after it’s been pointed out that that’s what you’re doing is hardly likely to strengthen your position. And to persist in the same assertions after they’ve been shown to be based on assumptions so flimsy that even Rush Limbaugh wouldn’t touch them with a ten-foot barge pole…well, it’s starting to look a lot like idiocy to me.
Ummmm, so are we to assume that your personal representatives were in the room with the Pope, and that you know everything that was said in the audience? Or even better, that you have personally discussed the issue with His Holiness and kow what he thinks? If so, then perhaps you’d deign to share the content of said “moral support.”
and may I take a moment to ask of all the december appoligists - do you still not understand why he gets pitted? It’s entirely possible that we don’t wait for the 15th weaseling/flat out contradiction again, since we’ve seen this same exact pattern often enough that it can be charted. But should we bother waiting? the first several thousand times he did this, we all were patient, but by this time, we’ve been down this road over and over again and get tired of the bs.
specifically, weirddave you see what happened when he was taken to task for the specifics - he qualified and weaseld and re-defined commonly used words to achieve his goals, and finally, simply again restated his unsupported opinion as if it had been fact. Had that statement appeared in GQ, would it have flown? hell no. It’s quite obviously an opinion, which he again literally displays as ‘truth’. Do you (WD) see why some of us decide to not bother with ‘answering’ his points? why the fuck should we, since when his back is to the wall, he does the equivalent of sticking his fingers in his ears and chanting nana-boo boo?
Not quite. I’m saying the meeting itself had the effect of supporting and legitimizing the Ba’ath regime, although I don’t believe that was its intent. The meeting was the support.
Ask yourself this: Would the Pope meet with Timothy McVeigh in order to encourage a negotiated compromise between him and the US? Of course not. If he did, that would covey some legitimacy to McVeigh.
Well, the Ba’athists have killed and tortured thousands. They have consistently lied to the UN and the civilized world. But, the Pope’s meeting conveyed the impression that this regime could be treated as reasonable, that it could be trusted as a negotiating partner. It gave an impression of the Ba’athists continuing to rule Iraq indefinitely.
The Pope is a world leader. When he treats Saddam with undue respect, his followers are apt to do the same. Look at the anti-social behavior of France, Germany and other Security Council members, who are failing in their duty to world peace. I think the Pope’s stand has contributed to some degree.
wring, I didn’t say that meeting with Aziz “offers ‘moral support’ for their position of killing Jews.” I said it offers moral support for the Ba’ath regime. And, separately I said that the Ba’ath regime kills Jews. Of course, the Ba’ath regime commits so many atrocities that killing Jews is minor for them. It’s more major to us Jews, of course.
My friend Don Louria got into a somewhat parallel situation a few years ago. Don, a noted research physician, opposed food irradiation, because the process tends to destroy some nutrients. His point is scientifically valid, although I don’t think that’s enough reason to ban a valuable preserving process. Anyhow, most food irradiation opponents are crackpots, with scientifically invalid reasons. Don wound up getting associated with them. As a result, he was blasted in a lead editorial in the Wall Street Journal. They argued that by standing with them, he conveyed an underserved respectability to these crackpots, even though his reasons differed from theirs. The saying that covers this is, “When you lie down with the dogs, you get up with the fleas.”
**Coldfire[/]b, you’re so cute when you’re angry. 
Good point and something your apologists would do well to remember.
It is unfortunate that even your occasionally interesting point inevitably goes down in a hail of bullets. But your standard operating procedure is so well known that the messenger has become the message.
Bad analogy (again!). Tim McVeigh is one man, not a representative of a nation. However, if the Pope were in a position to “talk down” a lone nut before he took violent action that killed hundreds or thousands, you don’t think he’d take that opportunity? I think you don’t understand the Pope very well.
What is with you and your crap analogies, december?
So you say. You’ve yet to prove this assertion, anymore than you’ve proven it as regards Aziz/Iraq.
Here you make your assertion again. We know this is what you think, but you can’t seem to prove it. Oh wait…
Is this meant to be your proof? If so, it’s laughable. First of all, those nations may be fulfilling their own duty to world peace as they see it. But of course, you’d never see that point of view because you don’t agree with it. Second, to what degree has the Pope’s meeting with Aziz affected these nation’s own stances? You say you “think” that there has been an effect “to some degree.” – Weasel words if ever I’ve heard them. Can you identify in what ways these nations are basing their decisions on the Pope’s meeting with Aziz? Do you have a cite that is factual, not an opinion or a blog?
If this is your attempt at proof, december, it’s pathetic. Stating that you “think” something is not proof of anything, especially given the low quality of thought you’ve displayed here.
Well, perhaps then a) you should define your use of the term “moral support,” and b) IMHO you should speak for yourself when you say “[killing Jews] is more major to us Jews.” Personally, I don’t think a Jewish life is superior to a Kurdish life, or a Sunni Iraqi life, or a Shi’ite life, or any other kind of life that is categorized purely on the basis of religion/ethnicity.
Not necessarily. The Pope has met with dictators before-Castro comes to mind, and the Pope is NO fan of Castro.
It can sometimes be a way of admonishing or castigating someone. A confrontation, if you will.
Originally posted by december
It’s more major to us Jews, of course.
Bullshit, as usual.
I would think you would have learned not to attempt to speak for anyone else around here by now.
You just can’t resist lying, can you? Even when your tactics are the focus of the conversation, you must persist in them. Either you’re truly unable to recognize them, which would be the sign of a mind so rigid it could shatter at the next doorbell, or you figure it’s the best way to draw attention away from the hollowness of your argument.
I still maintain that dealing with the issues at hand rather than the poster in question is the entire point of “fighting ignorance”. That being said, december is doing a poor job of defending his position, I agree. There is one crutial point that I’ve been waiting for him to make, but he has thus far failed to do so.
What is it? I can use some help here. I’m out-numbered.
Yes you are, but that’s the least of your worries.
You’re also out-witted, out-cited, and intellectually relegated by those who do prefer true facts rather than presenting their opinion as such.
You have yet to prove you assertion that he treats Saddam with “undue respect”.
I would also like to see you respond to Guin’s point of the Popes meeting with Castro. Does he now “morally support” the Cuban government?
The Pope gave a lengthy audience to Tarik Aziz, as a representative of Saddam. If the Pope had any complaints about Iraq’s torture, executions, financial support for terrorists, violations of UN obligations, acquisition of WMDs, etc., there was no public mention. From the POV of public perception, it would appear that the Vatican gave Saddam a pass on these awful acts.
Tarik Aziz was accorded the unusual priviledge of holding a press conference on Vatican grounds. That was the press conference where he rudely refused to answer a question from an Israeli reporter. That press conference strengthened that impression that the Vatican was giving Saddam a pass on his atrocities.
I think his meeting with Castro had the side-effect of morally supporting Castro’s rule, although that was surely not the Pope’s intent. This is a close question. No doubt the Vatican would say they were merely recognizing the reality of Castro’s rule. They were dealing with him because he is a leader, whether he’s morally worthy or not.
This is a moral dilemma for many, not just the Pope. When an evil organization has power, what do you do? Do you deal with them because they have the power? Or, do you shun them, because they’re evil?
Enough lies, december. From the Vatican:
Press releases, statements on the Vatican website, etc. do constitute “public mention”. Perhaps the Pope should have sent you an e-mail. Write to him and complain.