There’s something we need to keep in mind about this disgraceful display: ain’t nothin’ “mainstream” about it.
This was strictly a Tea Party event, the audience was carefully chosen from members in good standing, no moderates need apply. It was iike Woodstock for the intellectually constipated, the radical right getting together with the radical right to congratulate themselves on their radicalism. They were primed to cheer the most extreme position.
And there is a tendency amongst conservatives generally to be anxious that they are not seen to be weak, they would much prefer to be seen as hard-headed “tough guys”. So they were already primed to cheer raucously for Perry’s execution record, they were waiting for it. Same thing with the stuff about letting people die.
I cut them this much slack, they are not sophisticated thinkers, complex issues annoy and confuse them. The people exploiting them are far more culpable, they are professional cynics with vast financial resources, and they know exactly what they are about.
There is a lot of stupid, but not that much evil. But the stupid are being misled by the evil. So you got a lot of stupid, an elite cadre of evil, but very very few who are both stupid and evil.
While I have no doubt that you are correct, my question then is:
Why the hell did they put it on TV, where those moderates were likely to actually see and hear the cheers for death? You’d think they would keep these sort of events a bit more under wraps - town halls and the like, instead of showcasing their nasty thoughts to the entire country.
I’d so love to believe you, but the popularity of Bachmann, Perry, Paul, Cantor, Ryan, etc. unfortunately casts great doubt on this theory. The very-near-undoing of the government in August was a clear testament to the power and influence of the Tea Party.
Even if you’re right that they’re not a numerical majority of conservatives, they evidently wield the most power, making them the de facto mainstream.
Because they don’t understand how vile they are. They think they’re decent people. Like torture supporters, or those who think it’s okay if poorer Americans die through a lack of access to health care if doing something about it may affect their own personal fortunes, amen. It’s a corollary to that there theory mentioned in the science denialists thread, the one concerning people who aren’t just wrong but too stupid to understand they’re wrong.
If you didn’t want to watch your dog burn, you should have invested in flame-retardant treatments for your dog. Everyone knows that it’s possible even for puppies to be set on fire. You have only yourself to blame for his flammability.
Created by Fox News, and led by its employees. And, after all this time, still lacking a coherent agenda other than “Government sucks, we have to cut spending on something or other (don’t ask us what) and Obama is anti-American”.
Incoherence is the least worrying thing. It ought to be more concerning that this is a well-considered position by Mr. Paul after losing someone under these circumstances.
Please; he’s basically a black Reagan politically. He’s not even close to liberal; he’s at most a moderate conservative.
He certainly seems to be. Were you under the impression I liked him?
:rolleyes: No, that was me pointing out the mirror position of all the women who say that it’s perfectly reasonable to treat every man as a potential rapist and murderer. And got labeled a “woman hater” by people like you, because that’s what happens when you express resentment at being labeled a potential rapist and murderer because you are a man.
No, I was under the impression that all Republicans are evil and stupid, and now you are expanding conservative liberals (or is it liberal conservatives?) onto that pile and labeled Obama as such. I didn’t know goalposts had 8 legs and moved faster than a race horse until now.