Well, Scylla, maybe you’re just not in the right fram of mind.
Imagine that Hillary Clinton had been elected President. Imagine that the Democrats have a majority in both houses of Congress and have appointed a majority to the Supreme Court. Imagine there’s been some national emergency and Hillary’s been given emergency powers to protect our nation. Imagine that the courts have said it’s okay to detain people in military prisons without due process as long as the government says it’s for reasons of national security. Imagine that Hillary has the police going around in any city she travels through and has them round up anyone on the streets who’s complaining about the way she’s running things. Imagine that Hillary has said that she’s doing all of this for America and that she’s a great patriot. Imagine somebody saying that another person should be elected President and the Democrats say that would be unpatriotic. Imagine that there’s a government study discussing the possibility that the presidential elections might be postponed indefinitely if there’s an emergency and Hillary get’s to decide what the emergency is. Imagine the day before the election you get a note in the mail. It’s unsigned but it says “We know you’re a Republican. We’ll be watching you tomorrow to see if you go to vote. The police are on our side and they’ll be arresting people at the polls. Maybe you should play it safe and stay home.”
It’s the simplistic “if you’re not with us you’re against us” mentality of the Bush Administration that I find among its most annoying aspects. Ever since 9/11 public debate has been tinted with ever-present fear of speaking against the prevailing view, for fear of being labelled either a terrorist, a terrorist sympathizer, or a spineless liberal. That’s the real reason that almost everyone and the mother in Congress voted to give Bush the carte blanche he asked for in dealing with Iraq. And ever since, Bush and his cronies have attempted to capitalize on our citizenry’s apparent inability to grapple with issues with any degree of complexity. (Yes, it was and remains possible to be ‘against’ terrorism while still having grave doubts about the way the United State has conducted its ‘war’ on terrorism.)
The recent slew of comments by members of the Republic leadership, insinuating that those who support Kerry are either unpatriotic or running the risk of bringing down another terrorist attack simply sickens me. This is the basest form of fear-mongering, a tactic which may win votes but is hugely destructive to our political system, our national psyche, and the security of the world. I have to restrain myself from writing more…
You know everything I wrote is real, Scylla. It may be easy to dismiss these things now because you happen to like the current results and trust the current administration not to abuse their power. But keep in mind one of two things is eventually bound to happen. Either the tide eventually turns and someday the Democrats will be back in power; if so, they’ll be playing by the same rules that the Republicans are now enacting. Or the Republicans decide the Democrats won’t be given an opportunity to get back in power; and the only way that’ll happen is if everything the OP’s worrying about comes true.
rjung, she wasn’t arrested for wearing an anti-Bush T-shirt you Pit-worthy string of horrible adjectives, she was arrested for being a jackass in public and boo-hoo-hooing about her dead son, who I might point out was a volunteer (the U.S. Army doesn’t conscript anyone, much less its officers) and died in the line of duty he chose to be in.
But then, the Bush campaign has always been hostile to anyone who doesn’t parrot their views, while the Kerry folks don’t mind, as John Prather demonstrated last month.
How is he a traitor, or is it a joke? He hasn’t sold any secret stuff to foreign governments or sabotaged any military bases, or anything else I can think of. If i’ts a joke, bear with me - it’s been a long week.
Well, no. It’s not real, Nemo. It’s imaginary. It’s imaginary in terms of the perspective that frames it. You and the OP are looking at this in terms of Democrat vs. Republican, as Bush as the oppressor and you as the oppressed.
This is a self-centered, narrow, and incorrect viewpoint.
The correct viewpoint is that we are at war with Islamic fundamentalism and terrorists both here and abroad.
You are free and should feel free and consider it your duty to disagree with the way this war is being pursued should you feel we are doing it poorly, or making mistakes. However, it is not about you, and the inconveniences it causes or the excuses to paranoi that are brought forth.
The classic example in this thread is the demonstration thing. People are complaining that their right to free speech, demonstration, and congregration is being hindered.
The fact of the matter is that it’s being hindered in only two of ways. The first is that you have no right to congregrate demonstrate and make speech with the purpose of hindering someone else’s rights. You don’t have a right to disrupt a Bush gathering or a Kerry one. They don’t have to put up with it, if you try.
The second is simply in terms of security. There are terrorists out there, you know? They’ve attacked us before. These major events are prime targets. Chaos needs to be kept at a minimum to make them secure and protect the safety of everyone.
Choosing to interpret these necessary effects of the situation we are in as a personal affront is what makes your argument an “imaginary world.”
I supported Clinton’s bombing of Iraq as necessary. I didn’t think he was wagging the dog. To think otherwise is simply a facile and self-serving, if easy argument.
I case you missed it, I’ve been a registered Republican since I turned 18 in 1979. When I express my disagreements with the current administration, a large part of it stems from the damage they are doing to my party.
You say that we’re at war with terrorism. I heard; it was in all the papers. But saying there’s a war on doesn’t mean that one elected official can say,“I’m against terrorism. So by definition everything I do is against terrorism and everything I oppose is in favor of terrorism.”
You know very well that John Kerry and the Democrats don’t support terrorism. They are just as opposed to it as George Bush and the Republicans are. Their methods for combating terrorism may differ but this election hasn’t been a debate on methods. The Bush administration has sought to turn this election into a referendum on terrorism while claiming they are the sole claims to the “anti” side.
Saying you oppose terrorism doesn’t explain why American citizens are being arrested for holding up signs in a public street. The Republican National Convention was held inside a building. The protestors outside on the street were not going to be heard inside that building. But they might have been heard by reporters and shown on the news. These people were not arrested because they might have disrupted a rally; they were arrested because they might have made the evening news.
And again, stop pretending these things are “imaginary” when they happened. The only imaginary part was I changed the names. Everything else is fact.
I think Kerry is very weak on anti-terrorism. I personally do not support a more “sensitive” war on terror, nor do I support his stance of reacting appropriately to terrorist attacks after they occur.
Your opinion. Me. I think it’s bullshit.
It rains and I can’t mow the lawn, my tennis match is cancelled, so I say God hates me. The rain is real, the tennis match cancellation is real. God hating me is a figment of my imagination.
Scylla this makes no sense whatsoever. I described actions that were being taken by people; you counter with a natural phenomenon. I guess this is your way of saying, “these things happen, what are you going to do?”
I understand that nature doesn’t have a motive. Do you understand that people do?
As for how terrorism should be fought, you say “sensitive”, I say “intelligent”. After all, we can only speculate (at this point) on how effective a Kerry administration would be in the War on Terror. But the numbers are in on the Bush record; more Americans have been killed by terrorists during his term of office than in any other President’s. I’m surprised he’s still trying to make the primary campaign topic out of an issue where’s he’s failed so spectacularly. But that’s just my view. I guess there are people who believe George Bush is a success because George Bush tells them he’s a success. If Al Gore had been elected and done the exact same things Bush has done, the Republicans would be denouncing him for losing the war against terror and calling for his impeachment.
What, you’re afraid Kerry will cynically exploit the threat of terrorism to invade a country that poses no threat to us, thus diverting our resources and giving the terrorists time to regroup?
Or are you afraid that said country will become a breeding ground for new terrorists, thus compounding our problems and making us more vulnerable than ever?
Or perhaps you’re afraid that, during all this, he’ll run up record deficits to finance a tax cut for the wealthiest 1% of the nation?
Or maybe – just maybe – you don’t know what the frag you’re talking about and can’t do anything more than mindlessly parrot right-wing talking points?
A few of my close friends on here have remarked that at times this board comes off as Republican bashing with a huge tilt towards liberal Democrats.
This thread proves that to be ludicrous.
We’ve got out usual suspects who are belittling the OP and making claims that too much is being made out of this, or that it’s being blown out of proportion…
Excuses, excuses, excuses.
The current public face of the Republican party tries to quash dissent. If it isn’t a shrill bitch like Ann Coulter calling people traitors, Rush Limbaugh demeaning people and saying all illegal drug uses should be in jail(except HIM), or ‘Free Speech’ zones which are kept far from the site being protested, it’s a bunch of absolute sycophants to the elephant trying to tell everyone else that they’re wrong and should shut up.
Ummm, No. How about “Getting detained for interrupting a rally”. At least try to represent the story you link to correctly. The person who got arrested did indeed have an anti-Bush shirt on. She also interrupted a rally where Mrs Bush was speaking. She was detained for and charged with defiant tresspass and then released.