Jophiel wrote:
I've started several threads off the top of my head that have complained about decisions made my Democrats.
Not really true. You've started several threads in which you complained about something that happened in our government (at whatever level). When it's clear from the article/whatever that you sourced, it's *always* critical of Republicans. When it's unclear, you don't seem to put any effort into figuring out who's responsible (much less pointing out who you might think is), and are perfectly willing to allow anyone who reads your post to assume it was Republicans (which "magically" seems to be the first assumption of the board members as a whole). And, if it turns out that it was really Dems behind it all, you kinda shrug and downplay it. You accept a "non-partisan" position only when you've already made a stink about something and later discovered it was Dems/Liberals behind it. Kinda convenient that...
Look. I'm not aiming this directly at you and you alone. I did not name you in my original statement. I was referring to the typical reaction of the board as a whole. One needs only look at the linked thread about the SCOTUS decision to see this in action. When the makeup of Justices for/against the decision was unknown, there were a number of attacks against the Bush administration and Republicans in general. Lots of statements like "We'll see more of this now that Georgie is in power". Strangly, once it was pointed out that it was Liberal Justices who did it, I did not see *one* single statement about how it's a good thing Republicans got to appoint replacements for O'connor and Rhenquist rather then Dems (based on the obvious realization that this would further the strength of the New London side of the issue). Ok. Aside from *me*, that is. In fact, even afterwords, we still got posts like this one:
Quote:
Even the evil repubs/cons can think straight sometimes. Doesn't change the fact that they worship capitalism/corporatism with a blind faith that is rivaled only by the christian conservatives worship of christian mythology.
So. The poster accepts that this time it wasn't the Republicans who did this, but he's not willing to actually blame the side that did, and he's going to spin it off into a general diatribe about how horrible Republicans are. You wonder why I get so frustrated about the typical membership of this board? It's blindly partisan statements like that one. And it's hardly the exception. Whenver the Republicans do something "bad", it's splattered all over the forums. When they don't do something bad, they get blamed anyway. When it's pointed out that they didn't do it, it's responded with "but they're bad anyway".
The degree to which my "you all" statement applies to you is based on how much you believe you fit the criteria of what I was talking about. If you didn't identify yourself with that group of posters, then don't be offended by my statement. You are definately one of the more moderate posters Joph, but you still exhibit a degree of bias quite often. Nothing wrong with that, but don't get offended when someone points it out (doubly so when they aren't even talking about you in particular).
Quote:
I've never once claimed to be impartial. I've even said before that I'm not impartial. But, yes, I'm certainly more open minded than you are. And, yes, I'd still think it was a stupid comparison.
Sure. But would you have created a thread about it if a Dem had made the statement (or a similar one)? That's all I was talking about. That "you all" tend to only bash these kind of statements when they are made by a Conservative. Of course, I'm also quite sure that had a Dem made a similar comment, the story written about it would have been quite different, with less of an attack aspect in the first place.
After all, the article bashes Rumsfeld for comparing people to **** appeasers. But it doesn't say that he's wrong. Isn't that the key issue here? The article is trying to rile people up based on the words being used (and note again that Rumsfeld did not use the word ****, the article writer did). Meanwhile, missing the real point which is that the appeasement process going on right now is a really stupid course of action.
Ignore the **** comparison Joph. Do you, or do you not think that the process of appeasement of states like Iran, and groups like Hezbollah is a good idea? Because that's the point that matters. And if you think that appeasement is a bad idea, then you're put in the odd position of agreeing completely with Rumsfeld's argument, but somehow bashing him for it because of the way the story was presented to you in a newspaper.
Isn't that a stupid reason to bash someone? I'd think that taking a position on a global reaction to a nation like Iran is vastly more important then frittering on about what words were used in a statement (or not used, but later injected into the issue). Don't you? But apparently, the fluff matters the most...
Quote:
But tell us again about that one time no one else can remember six years ago when someone called you a liberal in OOT.
Doesn't matter Joph. My MO is that I don't blindly attack people based on the words they say, or an interpretation of the surface level of an issue. I look at what really matters. What does a ruling by the SC mean? What does a position by the administration really mean? How significant is a president getting a ******** really? I don't react to the rhetoric. I react to the facts of the issue. And that means that I point out when others are using pure rhetoric while ignoring facts. The fact that this puts me in the position of defending the Bush administration quite often has far less to do with my personal political affiliations, and far more to do with the posts that others make. You'll note that I don't start very many threads. I tend to wait to see what others have to say about an issue, and then inject my opinion. And most of the time, my first post is to point out some misdirection that is occuring in the thread and attempting to point out the parts that actually matter.
Just as with this thread. I was pointing out that the knee-jerk reaction to Rumsfeld's statement had less to do with what he actually said, and mostly to do with what party and position he held. I stand by that observation. The observation Rumsfeld made was absolutely correct. The fact that he's being bashed for it based on semantics is where the partisan aspect creeps in.
If I appear to be a hard core right winger, it's only becasue the vast majority of political threads on this forum consist of attacks on the Bush administration based quite often on completely flawed logic and/or purely rhetoric based analysis of statements. And yeah. I'm going to point that out. I do the same whether it's a right or left issue. I bash folks who argue for prayer in school just as much as I bash folks who say that Bush lied to us about WMD in Iraq. The difference is the number of posts bashing Bush are overwhelming...
