I largely agree with you, Pizza. adaher seems relatively soft-spoken, has moderate views, and is often better informed than most Republicans who post here.
But I do find him irritating. My reasons may be different from others, so I’m speaking only for myself.
First and foremost, adaher makes up facts. Like many of the Republican politicians he admires, true statistics or recall is irrelevant to him – he considers it his “opponent’s” job to find the lies, by which time adaher has moved onto new lies. Best is to ignore any factual content in an adaher post unless it’s accompanied by a cite. As you’ll imagine, this gets frustrating.
What the Board really needs is a sincere, intelligent, moderate Republican. But these are few and far between. The “best” of the lot are “fiscal conservatives”, but in post-rational American diction a “fiscal conservative” is no longer a budget-balancer, it’s someone who wants to lower spending AND taxes to Starve the Beast. Setting aside the [del]Beast Starvers[/del] “fiscal conservatives” :rolleyes: and Hyper-Libertartians, what we’re left with on the far right are adaher, Blowhards and Clowns.
We centrists and leftists delight in Clowns like Clothahump and Terr - they reinforce our sense that the GOP caters to stupidity. We don’t want to insult them too much, lest they go away and stop amusing us. Yet, almost everyone who posts at SDMB has a three-digit IQ; many of the stupidest-sounding Republiopathic Clowns here may have successful careers which rely on intellectual achievement.
Then come the Blowhards like Bricker and Sam Stone, with just as twisted a grip on reality as Clothahump, but capable of much more erudite expression. Frankly I greatly prefer an honest (“I hate niggers and faggots”) sort of Republican over an insincere champion of rhetoric like Bricker. Stone twisted his panties into a knot when I demonstrated his ignorance about Braess’ Paradox, but he’ll soon be back spouting his infantile view of libertarianism.
One thing that exasperates me about an adaher, is that he often seems well-informed and moderate. One wonders why he aligns with the Republiopaths. Is it just tradition? He supported the GOP when they were a moderate right-wing party and hasn’t grasped that they’ve turned into the party of lunatics and hypocrites? No, he seems happy to embrace the hypocrisy himself, if not the lunacy.
Recently in an Elections thread, adaher asked which Republican candidate for President centrists “might even support.” This shows a brain completely disjoint from reality; at this point any rational-thinking American would support a Democrat for President no matter what.