Pitting The Republican for no reason whatsoever

The BBQ Pit
61

do you want a tissue for all of your issues? What argument have you put forth?

Seems to me it went a little something like this:

Well, as the prologue to your “argument” you are off to a great start. Having carefully crafted the premise, you segue into

Okay, I meet your challenge: There are more conservatives than liberals on the board, thus more conservative dipshits. A single liberal usually debates half a dozen conservatives. I have presented evidence equal to your own for the worthy assertions of this particular argument.

Your next offering is that you decided to listen to Rush Limbaugh, and found him to be 98% accurate (trust you, because one has to pay to access the data). You determine that Ann Coulter exists due to fertile ground, yet somehow conclude that “demonization” is a tool of the left. (Check that assertion for its inherent contradictions).

In short, you have presented no argument to refute. You have presented your opinion of the relative numbers of conservative and liberal posters and their engagement and styles of debate, your opinion of the nature of the response that The Republican received to his unsupported arguments, your opinion of rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, and the demonizing democrats. I, in turn, provided my opinion as to why you would perceive being outnumbered and treated unfairly: What do you expect from a pig but a grunt. Fashion some sort of argument, and I will be happy to meet you. Keep whining, and I’ll get out my violin and buy stock in Kleenex.

62

Minty:

Ok, so according to you 1 out of five points was discussed, and you concur that there was a lot of “noise” in the thread. I take it that “noise” is a euphemism for ad hominem attacks.

It appears to me that you’ve directly supported what I said. Why you are saying I am incorrect and have a mote in my eye, I don’t understand.

And, you missed the fact that point #2 was discussed and partially conceded by TR.

So, actually it’s two out of five.

Thinking that others are stupid or pointless is fine. But, wouldn’t you agree that that should be demonstrated rather than just stated as opinion or used as an excuse to attack?

“This argument is stupid” is an opinion without place in GD. We have a forum for that.

“This argument is stupid because…” is a debatable statement.

Lot of the former, few of the latter.

Two out of five is a poor track record.

Frankly, I think you’ve demonstrated my point and based on your post I don’t see what rationale for disagreement you have with me.

63

Uh oh. He’s brought out the dreaded “I’m Rubber and You’re Glue” Riposte. I would retreat if I were you, Hentor, he likely has a “So’s Your Old Man!” held in reserve.

64

Indeed you have. Now we are getting somewhere.

I have made my statement because I beleive it is self-evident to most posters and does not require any specific proof or evidence.

You have chosen to challenge it.

Seeing as you have done so, I will be happy to present proof in the form of numerous examples.

Of course, I strongly suspect that you are being facetious with your assertion. In other words, you are just being a difficult asshole for the point of being a difficult asshole.

I suspect this because you have a history of being a difficult asshole just for the annoyance factor of being a difficult asshole.

So, if I am going to take the trouble to refute your asinine statement you are going to need to show me that you are not just being a difficult asshole.

You will need to swear to me and this board that you well and truly believe the statement I have quoted from you above.

You will need to tell me that the above statement is the one that we should judge you by for your veracity and intelligence.

You will need to tell me that there are more Conservatives than liberals on this board and that a liberal in a political debate is typically outnumbered by a half a dozen conservatives, and that I, Hentor warranty that this is true and verifiable to the best of my knowledge, so help me God, and that everyone should henceforth judge me forevermore by the veracity of this statement.

Show me that you are just not being a difficult asshole and I will take you seriously and go forth and demonstate the obvious.

65

Ack! Not that! NOOOOOO!

I concede. We liberals overwhelm the board. In fact, we are paid to be here. We’re so mean and largely unthinking. We go to classes together just so we can get smart enough to “demonize” kindly, saintly, and hyperintelligent conservatives. (I had to go back to class twice because I kept trying to Damon-ize them. I kept yelling, “How do you like them apples!”) If we see someone post any sort of argument that challenges even these meager abilities (Demon! Demon! Demon!), we activate the network so that a dozen of us can leap upon the helpless yet heroic conservative, swarming over him or her like locusts. The fact that you, Scylla, in particular has toiled on in the face of such overwhelming odds keeps nearly all of us up nights, marveling at your superhuman strength, jealous of all that you are and all that you represent, and praying for the day that you will be taxed at a higher rate.

I yield to you, oh most powerful one. Just don’t “So’s your old man” me. Please.

66

Andros:

Actually on second thought you may have a point.

Hentor is pretty much demonstrating that some people don’t merit refutation, and are better off ignored.

67

And if we are to take you at your word, you could solemnly swear that you sincerely believe that the leftward tilt of the SDMB is due primarily to lefty people attracted by the Readers reputation as an underground paper?

You sincerely believe that, right? Find it entirely plausible?

You’re going to demonstrate it? How, pray tell, would you go about doing that? Sure, it seems obvious to me that there is a slight preponderance of lefty, but seeing you demonstrate that as a fact would be worth the price of admission.

As amusing as that might be, the rigors of my ethics preclude me from urging Hentor to make any such oath. Nor, indeed, am I suggesting any such thing. Nosir. Wouldn’t dream of it.

68

Well, I feel that you are likewise being a difficult asshole. My experience is that you typcially are a difficult asshole, based on my participating early on in my history here in a long thread which included you spinning and fabricating and admitting that you did so for the purposes of arguing, which for nostalgia purposes I think I’ll go back and look up. Subsequently, I challenged the emperor’s clothes in a nasty little piece of racist vitriol that you wrote in homage to your grandfather, furthering my lovely image of you.

However, I’ll meet you halfway. Yes, my statement was facetious, not because I desire to be a difficult asshole, but because I believe the proposition to be moronic to assert in the first place because it seems to me impossible to empirically verify. So let us start by your laying out some reasonable methodology for investigating your claim. Subsequently, I agree to submit the following statement, which I believe to be true, to an agreed upon method of examination: “The board is representative of the spectrum of political belief in roughly equivalent proportions to the population as a whole” (although whether that population should include the US, North America, or the world is not clear to me). I further define “roughly equivalent” to mean “not significantly different from.”

What is your methodology to test this hypothesis.

69

Well, I feel that you are likewise being a difficult asshole. My experience is that you typcially are a difficult asshole, based on my participating early on in my history here in a long thread which included you spinning and fabricating and admitting that you did so for the purposes of arguing, which for nostalgia purposes I think I’ll go back and look up. Subsequently, I challenged the emperor’s clothes in a nasty little piece of racist vitriol that you wrote in homage to your grandfather, furthering my lovely image of you.

However, I’ll meet you halfway. Yes, my statement was facetious, not because I desire to be a difficult asshole, but because I believe the proposition to be moronic to assert in the first place because it seems to me impossible to empirically verify. So let us start by your laying out some reasonable methodology for investigating your claim. Subsequently, I agree to submit the following statement, which I believe to be true, to an agreed upon method of examination: “The board is representative of the spectrum of political belief in roughly equivalent proportions to the population as a whole” (although whether that population should include the US, North America, or the world is not clear to me). I further define “roughly equivalent” to mean “not significantly different from.”

What is your methodology to test this hypothesis?

70

I’m sorry but that won’t do. That’s an entirely different statement from the one you made facetiously.

The actual issue is whether liberals tend to outnumber conservatives in political threads in GD, and if so, by how much.

That is easily verifiable by a simple methodology.

  1. Choose a sample (say the first page of GD)

  2. Seperate the political from the non political threads.

  3. Count the number of unique posters debating a conservative viewpoint versus the number debating a liberal standpoint.

  4. Tally the results.

Your sample of course may be any particular timeframe you choose depending on how much legwork you wish to do.

But since you admit you were being facetious (which I read as pointlessly difficult asshole,) why should I bother?

71

Count again. #1 was discussed. #2 was discussed even though it was essentially incapable of substantive discussion. #3 was incapable of discussion, and #5 wasn’t really a point at all, just a slur on the intelligence of anyone who dared to disagree. Thus, the only thing that really could have been discussed and wasn’t was #4, the Katherine Harris junk. Now, are you really going to claim that TR has been sorely mistreated because the mean ol’ liberals declined to address a single point, at the bottom of a very long OP, that has been discussed ad nauseum for nearly three solid years?

Not so. It’s quite possible to criticize a poster’s rhetorical approach without descending to “ad hominem attacks.” Any number of people did precisely that, including several conservative posters. That doesn’t address the scant substance of TR’s OP, so it’s “noise,” but it damn sure ain’t personal attacks.

I never asserted otherwise.

Huh? Nobody spoke about the remaining issue (Katherine Harris) at all. They either ignored it or pointed out that it’s been done before.

It is perfectly appropriate to post that an issue has been discussed over and over again without repeating everything that’s ever been said about it. I drop in links to past threads all the time without substantive comment, even on issues I’ve argued at length multiple times. Other people routinely advise new posters to use the search function to find the relevant threads. There is no obligation to say the same damn things over and over again, you know. We’re not Lynyrd Skynyrd, obligated to play the long version of “Free Bird” every time some lout screams the title.

That’s an excellent description of TR’s election OP, especially if you take half a moment to consider the content-free nature of his “because . . .” stuff.

72

Actually, if someone like Ann Coulter were to suggest that the sky is blue, I’d go outside and check.

As to Rush, well . . . I won’t bother dissecting anything of his to try to prove my opinions of him. But the only way I’m “condemn[ing]” him is with my realization that he has an agenda he wants to push at the expense of objectivity and strict honesty. Therefore, I assume that everything he says that touches on that agenda is tainted, and can be either despun as I listen to it, or simply ignored.

But in a discussion, I don’t see the point in despinning people past a certain point, especially is they have a pattern of dishonesty. Since we’re in the Pit, and I’m a dick, I’ll name some names for examples. I know that Seige is Christian, and I know that much of her writing is colored by that. But it’s not difficult to allow for that in my reading of her posts, because it’s not a dramatic spin, and based on her history I have no reason to think her Christian spin is intended to deceive. Even someone with a little more obvious agenda coloring, like rj or Lib, or yourself for that matter, has not shown a habit of using rhetoric as a hammer, or of lying to make a point.

Someone like Svt4Him, OTOH, also has a lot of Christian spin. However, in his case it’s based in a pattern of documented misrepresentation of fact, as well as shoddy thinking and deceptive tactics. I’m not willing to despin his posts to debate what truths might be at the core–and because of his past posts, I assume everything is spun. Even the stuff that just seems like plain truth. Someone like Svt, or H4E, or Wildest Bill (since I’m already bashing on fundoes and I am, as I’ve said, a dick) . . . well, I’ll be checking the sky with them, too.

I guess it just comes down to trust in some ways. I trust you to generally be a reasonable and rational person, and I’m willing to listen to you. I don’t trust the habitually deceptive trolls not to pull out the same deceptive trolling they’ve used in the past. So I don’t bother.

73

I made the statement to parallel yours. I acknowledge that mine was facetious. I offered an honest statement to be subjected to your test. Note that it still differs significantly from yours, which is that conservatives are vastly outnumbered (on the order of 6 to 1, unless you were being an asshole when you said that). Was yours facetious, or is it an affirmative assertion of yours?

This differs significantly from your original statement, which was:

Why now are you talking about GD, when you weren’t before? Remember, your assertion was that the board was liberal because the parent publication was the Chicago Reader? Were you being facetious when you made your original statement, or are you just an asshole? Don’t wait for the translation, just answer the question!

So, having made an affirmative statement, it appears that you are wussing out. But your methodology is for shit. It requires a subjective judgment about which threads are political, which viewpoints are conservative and which are liberal, and which should apparently be excluded for not falling into those categories. But having put the assertion out there, go for it. Justify and reference your assertion. Document your methods. Should be easy if it is truly “self-evident.” Or is this merely another example of a conservative spouting evident truths only to be found out later to be waving an empty file folder about instead of any evidence?

74

Minty:

Ok. I see where you’re coming from, and I’ll concede that the issues were discussed that you pointed out, and I was in error to assert otherwise.

At this point we are down to a matter of opinion. It is my belief that TR was dealt with harshly and unfairly and with quite a bit of unjustified ad hominem style postings when the same could have been accomplished without them, and this is a particularly discourteous way to treat a newbie making his initial foray onto the boards.

Your opinion (if I’m understanding you,) is that because the OP really sucked, was old hat and not up to standards the thrashing he got was either justified or, if it was still wrong, the wrongness was mitigated by the Op’s level of… umm. suckitude.

If that is your stance then we’re down to personal opinion and I see nothing further than to agree to disagree.

75

Andros:

You’re right and I’m wrong. That’s just been demonstrated to me.

76

Hentor:

I told you that you would have to demonstrate to me that you were not simply fucking around, playing games and wasting my time.

In response you have conceded that you were being facetious.

Why then are you still fucking around, playing games and wasting my time with this bullshit?

77

I’ll loan you my copy of The Way Things Aren’t: Rush Limbaugh’s Reign of Error. It’s a bit dated, but since Rush has repeatedly failed to address his distortions and deceptions brought up in the book, I think it’s still a credible resource.

Well, I’d hope not! I’ve got enough to do just speaking for myself; if I’m going to be speaking for other people as well, I expect to get paid for it! :wink:

78

Let’s say I want to be a “Convservative”, for whatever reason. Is there some sort of manual I can read?

79

Start with “The Road To Serfdom” by Friedrich Hayek. Then read “Free To Choose” by Milton Friedman. That’s a good start.

80

You made a statement. You offered a demonstration of your hypothesis. Do it.