When is it a lie
Sometimes I take a look at left-wing sites to see what they're up to. When I first did so, it was out of the desire to understand a point of view generally contrary to my own. Or see if there might be facts I had missed in forming my personal opinions on issues.
Taking another look today hasn't changed anything. The left-wing sites still prefer hyperbole over substance, feelings over facts, and an amazing prejudice against all things conservative.
Some examples:
The left is into Global Warming. Big Time. Al Gore is their hero.
They still believe some sort of conservative conspiracy culminating at the Supreme Court subverted the Florida results to steal the Presidency for Bush. I think this is at the core of what seems to be an irrational hatred on their part for GWB. Even to the extent many of them believe the same conspiracy re-elected him in 2004. It seems they would be OK with Hillary or Barack, but their dream candidate for next year is Big Al.
The emotional Global Warming argument is roughly that we need to "do something" immediately or face global catastrophe. Of course, for them the argument is settled: Global Warming is real and it is caused by humans. Scientists who question their alarming predictions are vilified as incompetents or hacks hired by the oil industry.
They are also into conspiracy theories about Bush and Company. It's mind-boggling. Forget the old news - Iraq was about enriching Cheney and Halliburton, 9/11 was an inside job, Katrina was a global warming related catastrophe that the Bushies either allowed or helped destroy New Orleans. Even before the story of the bridge collapse yesterday in Minnesota was written, the unhinged lefties were eagerly crafting new conspiracy theories blaming that on Bush.
Looking for rational debate on the issues of our times, I have been sorely disappointed. One item I read was a diatribe against Rush Limbaugh, for example. The premise of the item was that Limbaugh's such a huge liar. So I decided, OK, tell me what lies he is telling.
Strangely, most of their examples went back to his books, which came out back in the early 90's. I couldn't even find an example of something he said recently that they wanted to refute. Even with the old items from his books, they would print a phrase they wanted to refute. Most of those were about old environmental comments attributed to Rush, which they labeled lies and used as their "proof" a quote from some scientist they like. Rush cited scientists for his comments in many cases, so the accuser would dismiss his scientist as incompetent or irrelevant or associated with some right-wing advocacy group.
That got me thinking, so any scientist expressing skepticism about the popular belief in man-made global warming is incompetent or paid for by the right, does that mean that all scientists supporting the global warming belief are completely neutral politically and affiliated with no special interests that could benefit from the politics of global warming? Not likely.
So a quick poll on other key issues:
Abortion: Women need birth control, and opponents want to enslave them and deny them quality healthcare. Wow, really?
Economy: The "Bush economy" only benefits the super-rich. Everybody else continues to lose ground, with the gap between rich and poor widening dramatically. Just curious - are the poor actually worse off than they were 30 years ago? Doesn't seem that way to me - I was very poor during the Carter presidency, which was the worst economy since the Great Depression. If the rich are richer today, wouldn't that naturally mean the gap is bigger between them and the poverty class? Didn't the biggest explosion in the poverty class occur during Johnson's Great Society and contribute to the bad times through Carter?
Iraq: No need to rehash that one. Bush lied. The way they put it, if one didn't know better it sounds like our troops have killed millions of innocent Iraqi citizens. It sounds as if there are no terrorists in Iraq, just "freedom fighters" trying to rid their country of the evil American occupiers. As if they will then live happily and in peace if only our troops would go away. Really strange fantasy going on there.
Religion: As a Christian, I find their hatred toward me very disturbing. Apparently, Christians are a bigger threat to America than Radical Islam. I'm still trying to figure out what Christians have been blowing up gays, or letting women die in childbirth for lack of abortion services (birth control), or any number of other horrific abuses of gays, blacks, women, atheists, or maybe just liberals.
Taxes: They're pretty easy to understand on this one. Stop funding Iraq and the military in general, tax the evil rich, let the Left run the government and all will be well.
Healthcare: See Taxes. Free healthcare for everyone. Except the evil rich, of course, who should pay extra.
As I said, I went searching for well-reasoned arguments and came away disappointed.
Taking another look today hasn't changed anything. The left-wing sites still prefer hyperbole over substance, feelings over facts, and an amazing prejudice against all things conservative.
Some examples:
The left is into Global Warming. Big Time. Al Gore is their hero.
They still believe some sort of conservative conspiracy culminating at the Supreme Court subverted the Florida results to steal the Presidency for Bush. I think this is at the core of what seems to be an irrational hatred on their part for GWB. Even to the extent many of them believe the same conspiracy re-elected him in 2004. It seems they would be OK with Hillary or Barack, but their dream candidate for next year is Big Al.
The emotional Global Warming argument is roughly that we need to "do something" immediately or face global catastrophe. Of course, for them the argument is settled: Global Warming is real and it is caused by humans. Scientists who question their alarming predictions are vilified as incompetents or hacks hired by the oil industry.
They are also into conspiracy theories about Bush and Company. It's mind-boggling. Forget the old news - Iraq was about enriching Cheney and Halliburton, 9/11 was an inside job, Katrina was a global warming related catastrophe that the Bushies either allowed or helped destroy New Orleans. Even before the story of the bridge collapse yesterday in Minnesota was written, the unhinged lefties were eagerly crafting new conspiracy theories blaming that on Bush.
Looking for rational debate on the issues of our times, I have been sorely disappointed. One item I read was a diatribe against Rush Limbaugh, for example. The premise of the item was that Limbaugh's such a huge liar. So I decided, OK, tell me what lies he is telling.
Strangely, most of their examples went back to his books, which came out back in the early 90's. I couldn't even find an example of something he said recently that they wanted to refute. Even with the old items from his books, they would print a phrase they wanted to refute. Most of those were about old environmental comments attributed to Rush, which they labeled lies and used as their "proof" a quote from some scientist they like. Rush cited scientists for his comments in many cases, so the accuser would dismiss his scientist as incompetent or irrelevant or associated with some right-wing advocacy group.
That got me thinking, so any scientist expressing skepticism about the popular belief in man-made global warming is incompetent or paid for by the right, does that mean that all scientists supporting the global warming belief are completely neutral politically and affiliated with no special interests that could benefit from the politics of global warming? Not likely.
So a quick poll on other key issues:
Abortion: Women need birth control, and opponents want to enslave them and deny them quality healthcare. Wow, really?
Economy: The "Bush economy" only benefits the super-rich. Everybody else continues to lose ground, with the gap between rich and poor widening dramatically. Just curious - are the poor actually worse off than they were 30 years ago? Doesn't seem that way to me - I was very poor during the Carter presidency, which was the worst economy since the Great Depression. If the rich are richer today, wouldn't that naturally mean the gap is bigger between them and the poverty class? Didn't the biggest explosion in the poverty class occur during Johnson's Great Society and contribute to the bad times through Carter?
Iraq: No need to rehash that one. Bush lied. The way they put it, if one didn't know better it sounds like our troops have killed millions of innocent Iraqi citizens. It sounds as if there are no terrorists in Iraq, just "freedom fighters" trying to rid their country of the evil American occupiers. As if they will then live happily and in peace if only our troops would go away. Really strange fantasy going on there.
Religion: As a Christian, I find their hatred toward me very disturbing. Apparently, Christians are a bigger threat to America than Radical Islam. I'm still trying to figure out what Christians have been blowing up gays, or letting women die in childbirth for lack of abortion services (birth control), or any number of other horrific abuses of gays, blacks, women, atheists, or maybe just liberals.
Taxes: They're pretty easy to understand on this one. Stop funding Iraq and the military in general, tax the evil rich, let the Left run the government and all will be well.
Healthcare: See Taxes. Free healthcare for everyone. Except the evil rich, of course, who should pay extra.
As I said, I went searching for well-reasoned arguments and came away disappointed.
posted by Dan S. at 1:15 PM
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