Did I miss the part where Republicans have been in control of the White House for 8 years?
I assume you like the progress that’s been made and don’t want someone mucking it up (and I don’t mean to make that supposition under any snarky pretenses).
It looks to me like a place where millions upon millions of peoples’ live have been ruined by the widespread adoption and glamorization of drugs; where criminals freed by liberal judges and correctional systems roam the streets with thirty-five convictions under their belts; where 25% of teenage girls and who knows how many boys have STDs; where crudeness, crassness and belligerence characterizes societal behavior; where AIDS was spread through wholesale gay promiscuity that was so politically protected that, at least in my town, entire city parks were virtually turned over to them at night so they could bang like bunnies with no interference from the authorities; etc., etc.
In other words, millions of people have died as a result of crime, drugs, and AIDS, (not to menion the many more millions of the family members and loved ones of these people whose lives have been ruined too) all of which have flourished as a result of leftie politics in this country.
Now, I’m not saying these things were the goal of leftie politics; what I’m saying is that they are and were the predictable results (AIDS apart, that is). Most of the things you mention that are better now could still have been acheived with a more common-sense approach which may have taken somewhat longer but which would also have resulted in keeping much of what was good in society while still throwing out the bad, and we’d all not only be much better off now, and millions of people would still be alive and millions of their loved ones’ lives wouldn’t have been ruined either.
So, given that that isn’t possible and that you guys are perfectly happy to turn a blind eye to consequence and throw the baby out with the bathwater when it comes to social change, I’m damned well determined to do whatever I can to stand in the way of you guys being in charge, no matter what it takes, because you can’t be trusted to create social change in ways that don’t fuck things up worse in a lot of other ways.
Enjoy your obsolescence, sir, and give Mr. Faubus a hearty hello for me when you meet him in that metaphorical doorway.
For one thing, presidents don’t control how people behave, and the things I’m unhappy about have been going on for 40 years no matter who was president.
What presidents can do is allow legislation proposed by congress to become law, and they can appoint judges on the federal level and to the Supreme Court. Each of these entities can and do have a tremendous effect on that conservative/liberal direction that society takes, though they are far from the only determining factors.
Society as a whole, based on a wide number of factors, is guided by what the media (i.e., how they get print, audio and visual information) and how everyone else is acting, particularly those they like or want to emulate.
What presidents can do is try to facilitate or to block the effect of these societal pressures, but they themselves don’t set the course that society follows.
Here’s another interesting punt:
Where:
I see. So I guess that since things have been so fucked up for so long that they have come to be seen as a normal part of life, one should just turn a blind eye to them and go along with the flow?
Typical.
Well you’ve convinced me. Anne-Marie Slaughter should be running for Vice President, not Sarah Palin.
Incorrect. It is not for him to admit what she did or did not know, as she asked for clarification. It may appear that she didn’t know, but that is just a guess by whomever is of that opinion. Could she have handled the question better? Absolutely. Would it have been better if Gibson defined it before he asked it, Absolutely. Helpful in that he would have received the information he felt it was important to get. Instead, he tried to make her look bad. He succeeded. Bravo. Another mighty testament to the impartiality of the fourth estate.
What solutions would you suggest? Seriously. What’s your plan? Or is it just a wishful thinking “If we only went back to the way things were way back when everyone conformed to rigid gender and class roles and anyone who didn’t conform was jailed or shunned!”?
And frankly, I’m kind of shocked that anyone is still flogging the “amoral liberals ruining civilization” horse. I’d thought all the righties had migrated to the “Get your greedy liberal hands off of my money” group, the “God wants us to kill the fags and dykes” group, or the “we can only hold power if we rabble-rouse about money and fags” group.
Hey, you can’t spell “Slaughter” without “laughter”.
I’ll answer this and then I’ll have to go.
There are no solutions that are workable at this time. The thrust of the part of society that is largely controlling has to come around to not only acknowledging that these things are fucked up (which so far they seem little inclined to acknowledge as even significant problems) but interested in taking steps to correct them. IMO, that stage is several decades off if it ever occurs at all.
All those such as I can do for the present is to try to hold off putting people in power who are sympathetic to the very people who have screwed these things up so badly to begin with. (And btw, the only people around here saying I want to go back to the fifties are you guys. I’ve never said it; it would be silly to do so. What I advocate is a return to the positive aspects of that society and not a wholesale return to everything that existed then.)
I’m not surprised you think this way. But you’re wrong on both counts. The “liberals are ruining civilization” horse is still galloping, though he adopted a more silent stride; and as for the rest of this screed of yours, it’s utter horseshit…which is appropriate since we’re talking about horses anyway.
I know you said you’re going, but I’m responding because I assume that you’ll be back at some point.
What are the positive aspects of that era, in your opinion? What aspects do you want to return to and how do you propose to do that?
I’d like to share how I view that era. It was an era where people like me had to hide ourselves or face jail, ostracism and/or commitment to mental institutions. It was an era when women had to have their fathers or husbands or adult sons sign contracts for them. It was an era when your skin color barred you from jobs, relationships, neighborhoods and constitutional rights. It was an era when censorship was pervasive.
What were the positives? I don’t see many…maybe people were more civil to each other…if they were both white. Maybe there was less drug use and teen pregnancy and STDs…or maybe they were just well hidden in that whitewashed world.
Thank you for falling on your sword.
I would have nearly zero problems with Palin in her new role, if she was the same Palin who was the mayor of Wasilla and the governor of Alaska. If she was being as straight-forward and transparent as those two Sarahs, she might even get my vote. That former Sarah Palin would have said “Ya know, Charlie, I’m really not qualified at this point to be VP, but I’ll tell you this: I’ll work harder, longer and faster than anybody else could to learn the job; I’ll hire the best advisors I can find and I’ll educate myself quickly and thoroughly to make myself a good public servant.” Instead, she immediately prostitutes her values to the RNC and becomes the good little robot. She comes across as ill-informed and unqualified, but worse, as insincere. I have no use for her at this point.
Have we covered the"20% of the US energy" crapola yet? Its crapola, is the important part. Palin ad McCain tout her energy expertise and support it with the drivel that Alaska provides 20% of the US energy, which, it turns out, is horseshit.
Now, take a deep breath, tighties R. I’m posting a link to a decidedly lefty site. I hereby aver, attest, and swear its because they’ve got all the needful links included, and I’m too damn lazy to sort them out, copy and paste. Standard anti-cooty protocol should be all you will need.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/09/13/palin-alaska-energy/
Just another one. Not really bigger than any of the other ones, ho-hum. Ths is just Saturday’s.
The media does not control society, as you somewhat acknowledged. As you’re likely well aware, the media isn’t some monolithic entity run by a cabal that meets every few weeks. There’s local media, national media, and international media. All of them have the power to push and pull some public opinion and attitudes, but given the widespread diversity out there (even before Fox News), there is no societal consensus about any one issue. Did the media create or popularize the “free love” sexual revolution of the late '60s and '70s or did they just depict in the news, books, movies, and music of what was already going on? Has the media popularized gay marriage or has the simple exposure to more gay and lesbian people in day-to-day life made the idea of gay marriage acceptable to more people than before?
If you can’t even define what it is that is causing society to change or public opinion to change over time, it’s probably fair to say that government won’t be able to stop it either. Particularly a representative government that is, in theory, representative of the people in their communities and states - in other words, the society that is changing.
Why should Gibson have to define the Bush Doctrine for Palin? His job was not to make her look good or bad. His job was to reveal Sarah Palin to his audience. If that question was too tough for Palin, that counts against her, not him. If the question had been an unfair one, that would have been different. Yes, he had a mission. Should he have thrown her only soft balls? I think asking her the doctrine of the current Republican president is a fair and square question to ask the candidate for the Vice Presidential office of that same party. Don’t blame him for knowing that she is in over her head.
By the way, she still didn’t reflect the Bush Doctrine, but she seemed to think that she did.
Keep in mind that the McCain campaign chose Charlie Gibson and ABC to give her first interview to. Apparently they trusted Gibson to give her a fair interview and I think that’s what she got.
It is not his fault if she just can’t pass muster.
3 point of rebuttal to your rebuttal.
- Media exposure is different than a one sided discussion. Obama has certainly received his share of free press and I don’t have a problem with that.
- Biased political dialogue at public expense is inappropriate use of public funds and an abuse of power.
- Participation in a biased discussion by a debate moderator is inappropriate.
I didn’t mention the Gibson interview in my post. My comments were directed at PBS. I did watch the interview and Gibson’s questions were valid but his demeanor was dismissive and condescending. It was unprofessional for a seasoned journalist who should know better.
I don’t blame him for asking questions, or even that question. But when someone asks for clarification, he should give it. He revealed himself to be more interested in “Gotcha” than discerning her views on an important subject. Disappointing behavior, to say the least. But I guess that’s only true if you expect someone in his position to be unbiased and not doing what he can to make her to look bad.
This is probably true - I certainly got the vibe that Gibson hit a nerve. On the other hand, the Bush Doctrine has mutated over the years, and even experts on foreign policy can’t agree quite what it is.
What is possible is that she did what a candidate is supposed to do when hit with a question that you are unsure of - ask for clarification or change the subject. You never guess. You never state “I don’t know”. Now, she may know roughly what the Bush doctrine is, but she might be unsure of the nuances, or not sure what it means today, since its meaning has changed repeatedly. So she asked for clarification. Or, she may not have had the foggiest notion.
I suspect that’s probably also true, in the sense that A) she hasn’t had years in Washington debating foreign policy and sitting through umpteen zillion hearings on various foreign policy issues, and B) she’s not a scholar on foreign policy. So she’s probably got the same foreign policy knowledge of a bright, engaged citizen, plus whatever she gets through whatever international dealings in trade and such she has to do in Alaska. i.e. not much.
Here’s what pisses me off - I can’t remember any other candidate being harassed like this over foreign policy. I don’t recall Bill Clinton having to sit and be given 20 questions on foreign policy, despite also lacking experience in Washington and being the governor of a state. I don’t recall Geraldine Ferraro having to do it, despite being one of 435 members of the house when she was chosen to be VP.
Also, these supposed horrible gaffes are nothing compared with the consistent wrong-headedness of Joe Biden, who absolutely should know better. Biden’s gaffes (such as thinking Iranians are Arabs), should be inexcusable in someone with a track record as long as his. At least Palin is probably capable of learning this stuff, whereas Biden appears to be unteachable.
And yet, you guys gave him an instant pass as an expert and someone you’d be comfortable with as president.
In any event, neither Biden or Palin are running for President. Her lack of foreign policy experience wouldn’t bug me that much because she’s obviously smart, and if she had to step into the presidency in 2 years, she’d at that point have plenty of foreign policy experience and she’d hit the ground running with McCain’s foreign policy team.
Obama/Biden worries me a lot more, because Obama has very little experience himself, and he’s tied himself to a Jedi Master who has a habit of constantly burning himself with his light saber.
Is this serious? I never get Party Political people, their boy or girl is always going through sthing the other side “never” went through, and its genuinely always pure bollocks… the claim that is.
I mean come on, watching from afar, it seems here that O boy got himself a questioning, although he had longer lead up. I recall watching the Quayle fiasco, and that fool got questioned. Bush Jr as well, the whole bloody Cheney selection was to pull some of that sting, I believe is widely written, and rightly so (the analysis).
Reminds me of the complaining about the Clinton critiques that O boy supporters were doing here, crying a river over nothing much at all. Party political disingenuity or self blindness that was.
If you’re actually “mad” get a bloody grip, it was a wholly ordinary interview of a newcomer to international stage…
Everyone’s losing their bloody grip in the heat, imagine October is going to be loony.