Right Wing Nut House » ‘SILENCE EQUALS ASSENT:’ WHY POINTING OUT CONSERVATIVE LUNACY MUST BE DONE

9/29/2009

‘SILENCE EQUALS ASSENT:’ WHY POINTING OUT CONSERVATIVE LUNACY MUST BE DONE

Filed under: Decision '08, Politics, conservative reform — Rick Moran @ 10:51 am

I have taken a lot of grief over the years because on several occasions, I have used this website not to attack the left (something I do with great regularity and enjoyment) but because I also highlight some of the lunacy on the right we regularly get from talk show hosts, activists, and other prominent conservatives.

It is not an urge to purge that drives me to expose these clowns, charlatans, mountebanks, and just plain goofs. It is rather an effort, in my own very small and insignificant way, to stand up for what I know is right; that employing reason and rationality to fight Obama and the liberals is far superior to the utter stupidity found in the baseless, exaggerated, hyperbolic and ignorant critiques of the left and Obama that is passed off as “conservative” thought by those who haven’t a clue what conservatism means.

Yes, I usually find myself being almost as unhinged in my criticism of these kooks as they are in criticizing Obama. So be it. Trying to argue rationally with someone who believes Obama is a Nazi, or a Communist is akin to arguing with a stone wall. And at least the wall is smart enough not to keep opening its mouth and further proving how irrational it is.

I reject arguments that one shouldn’t criticize one’s own side and “do the left’s dirty work for them” (the silly and simple minded argument that I am somehow “jealous” of a talk show host’s or a pundit’s success are so laughable that I never bother to respond). I believe that one of conservatism’s major problems these last few years has been a failure of self-examination - and I include myself in committing that sin. Unless one constantly challenges one’s beliefs by examining the underlying assumptions of what we truly believe, testing them against what is happening in the real world, and using the logic and reason granted us by our humanity to determine if they still pass muster and are consistent with our principles, we fall into the trap of being inconsistent in the application of our philosophy.

You don’t have to be an “intellectual” to accomplish this. All it takes is to read and listen to opposing viewpoints once and a while. To close one’s mind to alternative points of view is, by definition, unconservative. And to take the position automatically that liberals have nothing of interest you want to hear is beyond illogical - it is ignorant.

And yet, this is the de facto position of most of my many detractors - that somehow, my mind has been polluted because I quote some liberal every once and a while or I agree with something a liberal says about conservatives. This is nuts. And if anyone would take 10 seconds to think about it, most rational people would agree.

Where does this close mindedness get us?

In the past weeks you’ve heard me talk about the How to Take Back America Conference being held in St. Louis this Friday, Sept. 25, and Saturday, Sept. 26, with speakers like: Gov. Mike Huckabee, “Joe the Plumber,” U.S. Reps. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., Trent Franks, R-Ariz., Steve King, R-Iowa, Tom McClintock, R-Calif., Dr. Tom Price, R-Ga., and Three-Star Gen. Jerry Boykin. But someone who’ll be there that you didn’t hear about is Kitty Werthmann. Kitty was 12 years old when Adolf Hitler took over Austria.

She is 83 with a “vivid memory” of what happened in her homeland next. She witnessed the government take over the banks and the auto industry. Sound familiar? In the last nine months, Obama and the Democrats in Congress have successfully orchestrated the government takeover of Chrysler and General Motors along with countless banks.

She witnessed the “compulsory youth” service and indoctrination. That sounds a little like Obama’s call for “mandatory volunteerism” for America’s youth.

The government takeover of the schools immediately replaced crucifixes with pictures of Hitler and Nazi flags. “All religious instruction was replaced with physical education,” said Werthmann. No prayer was allowed. That all happened here decades ago. It is interesting, however, that Obama’s speech to the captive audience in the government schools – complete with the essay assignment about how students could help him achieve his political goals – was replaced once the American people got wind of it. And speaking of government control of education, if the Senate agrees, all student loans will be government issued, according to a bill that passed the House last week.

Before commenting on the substance of what the author actually believes is solid evidence that Obama wants to set up a Fourth Reich, I want you to look at that list of Republicans who will be giving their imprimatur to a conference that features such idiocy. Those are not “fringe” players. They are all considered “mainstream” conservatives. Should they be taken to task for attending a conference that features such off the wall lunacy?

If it was the only such session that featured, they might be given a pass. But here are a few other sessions that many would see as extreme and many more would see as batsh*t crazy:

HOW TO DEFEAT ATTACKS ON SOVEREIGNTY BY U.N. TREATIES AND NORTH AMERICAN UNION (Just tell me where those black helicopters are)

HOW TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEM OF SUPREMACIST JUDGES (um…elect more Republicans?)

HOW TO DEFEND AMERICA VS. MISSILE ATTACK

I would urge you to click on some of the links to other, more sedate sounding seminars like “How to Counter the Homosexual Extremist Movement” or “How to Understand Islam” to understand why I condemn any so-called “mainstream conservatives” who participated in this nuthouse of a conference.

A description of Mrs. Werthmann’s “seminar:”

At the How To Take Back America Conference last weekend, conservative speaker Kitty Werthmann led a workshop called “How to recognize living under Nazis & Communists.” Announcing the panel in a column preceding the conference, talk show host Janet Porter gushed how Werthmann’s description of Austria in the 1930s is a “mirror to America” today — noting “They had Joseph Goebbels; we have Mark Lloyd, the diversity czar.” The room was packed over capacity to hear Werthmann, who grew up as a Christian in Austria and serves as Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum South Dakota President.

During her session, Werthmann went through a litany of examples of how President Obama is like Adolf Hitler. She noted that Hitler, who acted “like an American politician,” was “elected in a 100% Christian nation.” Although she failed to once mention Antisemitism or militarism, Werthmann explained how universal healthcare, an Equal Rights Amendment, and increased taxes were telltale signs of Nazism. Werthmann also warned the audience:

If we had our guns, we would have fought a bloody battle. So, keep your guns, and buy more guns, and buy ammunition. [...] Take back America. Don’t let them take the country into Socialism. And I refer again, Hitler’s party was National Socialism.

[...]

And that’s what we are having here right now, which is bordering on Marxism.

Is there any way to logically address Mrs. Werthmann’s points? The answer is no. And the reason is because she is living in a different reality than the rest of us. To 95% of the world, what Obama and the Democrats are doing you can agree or disagree with, but it is being done by the all-American way of Congress proposing, and the president disposing. Even Obama’s executive grabs like taking over private business finds precedent in American history among presidents. Obama is dead wrong. But he is not a Marxist, or Nazi, or even a socialist. He is a far left American liberal which, by the way, puts him considerably to the right of the Euro-left.

To casually toss about the terms “Marxist” and “Nazi” shows that those who do so are wildly exaggerating what the liberals are doing. Mrs. Werthmann may be a witness to history but her analogies are childlike in their logic. Exaggeration is not argument. It is emotionalism run rampant. And at its base is simple, unreasoning fear. Fear of change, fear that the powerlessness conservatives feel right now is a permanent feature of American politics, and, I am sorry to say, fear of Obama because he is a black man.

The emotional state of conservatism now coupled with the hyper partisan atmosphere in the country (and the already excessive ideological nature of the opposition to Obama) is a combination that afflicts the reason centers of the mind and is proving to be a block to thinking logically. What is there to “fear” about Obama and the Democrats? They are proposing the same liberal crap that the left has been promoting for more than 30 years. We have fought them before using reason and logic. What is so different now?

I agree with the left to a certain extent that the right - especially on the internet - has become something of an echo chamber (it’s true on the left too but their crazies have already been marginalized). This has resulted in what might be termed a “negative feedback loop” where the more exaggerated claims about dastardly Democrats go around and around, becoming ever more outrageous and illogical, until we get overflowing crowds at a seminar where the most fantastically stretched and mangled analogies to Nazis and Communists are taken seriously.

I don’t know how to say it any other way; those conservatives who don’t see a problem with this, or don’t think it “representative” of a significant portion of the conservative movement, or who don’t believe this sort of thing should be taken out, examined, and criticized as forcefully as possible are fooling themselves into believing this kind of thinking doesn’t matter. It is poison coursing through the body of conservatism and we either use reason and logic as an antidote or it will end up killing us.

To my mind, there is no alternative. Ignore it and it only gets bigger and more outrageously out of touch with reality. This is why I write about it. This is why you should join me in condemning and marginalizing these crazies, inoculating conservatism against contracting this plague on rational thought.

73 Comments

My sentiments exactly.

Comment by Richard bottoms — 9/29/2009 @ 11:16 am
My dad was born in 1932 in Germany so he witnessed the Third Reich. The comparison is so laughable that it shouldn’t even deserve a comment. For starters in 1934 there was the ‘Ermaechtigungsgesetzt’ giving executive power to Hitler. By that time people like Rush, the teabaggers would be rounded up and headed to Dachau or Buchenwald (Alaska would probably be an attractive place I guess). Obviously this is not happening under Obama. No need to explain Stalin.
If you don’t like what Obama is doing, get active in politics, support your favorite candidates and rest assured that you will still be able to do that in 3 or 7 years. Everyone who claims otherwise is a total moron in my opinion.

Comment by funny man — 9/29/2009 @ 12:12 pm
“to stand up for what I know is right”

That’s the best we can do.
That should be sufficient cause for stating whatever you believe is right.

You shouldnt be held to account for what someone else beleives, that is them not you.
I don’t fall for the ‘guilt-by-association’ aka McCarthyism claims, that because the right has a fringe therefore the whole right is wrong. The left has its fringe, the Castro/Chavez-loving crowd, the ‘kill all SUVs’ eco-extremists, the anti-population nuts, the impeach Bush BDS folks, the Socialist Democrats. If the other shoe fits, then the entire Democrat party is a bunch of communists … which gets us back to the kinds of hyperbole you are (rightly) objecting to.

Methinks you are proposing a level of self-policing that the left and the Democrats have never done and never do. That may be good but … The left can call out the right fringe but the right cant call out the left fringe? Some on the right object to that double standard. In my book, holding the whole movement responsible for what some on the fringe say is a wrong conclusion on both sides.

Nor is it sufficient to simply say ‘this is crazy’ and walk away. The essay itself seems to overuse argument ad hominem. That’s IMHO the wrong approach. Just as you are simply stating what you believe, so are these right-wingers, including this old woman who survived the Nazis and sees parallel with Obama. Is this insane? Probably not at all. She just has a perspective and a life experience. I know from my own life experience that I once developed an inability to sleep when it was raining. Crazy? Not really. I was a landlord and got woken many times by roof problems, and after a while my brain got stuck/fearful of rain hitting rooftops. Our brain works that way. This woman has the totalitarian experience seared in her brain.

This month, I spoke with a woman who escaped Hungary in 1950s … same exact view, she sees Obama as one of those she escaped, and is now desperate to get politically active to save America from what Eastern Europe fell into for 50 years. She is not crazy, she is concerned.

It’s about how people are trying to make sense and frame developments that are new. So if its wrong, pick apart what in fact is wrong - rationally and calmly. These refugees from
socialist hellholes are not crazy, but are canaries in the coalmine. If their fears are over-wrought, which some are and others not, we can calmly go through why or why not.

Many of the Nazi/Mao/Castro/Communist analogies wrt Obama do have legs, but only as analogies - from the cult-of-personality aspects, to the ‘vampire economy’ aspects of industrial policy manipulations, to complacent media, etc. - not because he is literally a totalitarian, but the techniques of control, whether in the economy or in the media, are similar. The latest video of kids singing the Hussein songs, the folks apparently worshipping Obama … is it wrong to compare this junk to Mao’s Cultural Revolution Red Guards? Not to my thinking. It’s creepy stuff that deserves to be mocked in such ways, to get people to wake up and realize its not healthy for our Republic.

“What is there to “fear” about Obama and the Democrats? They are proposing the same liberal crap that the left has been promoting for more than 30 years.”
The leftwing Democrats have more power and control now than at any prior time in our nation’s history. Even LBJ’s majorities included many southern conservative Democrats. Today the left has a surer lock-hold on Congress and the media than ever before *and* they control institutions that have been in the past 30 years captured by leftwing ideologues.

Our freedoms are lost by increments.
We ought not to pretend there is no threat to our freedom, prosperity and future from the left-liberals in power. That much is very real.
Unity, reason, and holding firm to real ground of actual inflictions against our liberties - and not the imagined fears of slippery slopes - is the right way to respond to the Obama / Democrat deluge.

JMHO.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/29/2009 @ 12:15 pm
Freedoms truth,
if you really think that whatever some kid is singing has anything to do with the Chinese cultural revolution you must not know history very well. Millions were sent to ‘reeducation’ camps and died there. My mom left communist East Germany in 1951. There is nothing in the Obama presidency to suggest he will lock you up for dissent now is there? Not true in 1951 in East Germany or in Hungary in 1956 after they crushed the uprising. That is the big, big difference. So why do you throw these comparisons around?

Comment by funny man — 9/29/2009 @ 12:31 pm
How to defend America vs. missle attack sounds like it might actually be a useful seminar. With Russia, China, and others upgrading their nuclear arsenals and the means to deliver them unless we improve our own defenses, as well as our offensive capabilities, we may be subject to nuclear blackmail by these powers.

Comment by B.Poster — 9/29/2009 @ 1:37 pm
What is there to fear about Obama and the Democrats? Nothing that cannot be stopped by the application of reason and rationality. I think it will take more than that. Professional demagogues wielding the right slogans and catchwords reverberating incessantly through a one-sided media ought to win the election. That and overwhelming financial backing.

Obama wishes to put us under an authoritative government bureaucracy so effective as to control nearly every aspect of our lives. Liberty is simply to be squeezed out. Compliance will be enforced by fines, penalties and taxation. It will costs us dearly. Call it what you will, does it really matter?

Comment by Mike — 9/29/2009 @ 2:18 pm
Obama wishes to put us under an authoritative government bureaucracy so effective as to control nearly every aspect of our lives.

And in your scenario the Supreme Court does what? Goes on an extended fishing vacation?

It’s silly. It’s paranoid. And it will keep independents thinking the GOP is full of crackpots, which from my perspective is a good thing.

The only downside I see coming is another Oklahoma City, which is not inconsequential.

Comment by Richard bottoms — 9/29/2009 @ 3:08 pm
Rick — I was with you 100 percent up to the point where you attributed rightie fears to Obama’s race, adding words to the effect that Obama and today’s Dems are pushing pretty much the same agenda as their counterparts have for decades.

But this is manifestly not a fact — and it is Obama’s (and the House Democrats) pushing the envelope with their radicalism that has aroused the far right and not incidentally disturbed people like me in the center.

For much of our recent history, leading Democrats such as FDR, Truman, JFK, LBJ and Hubert Humphrey were proud American nationalists and determined anti-communists. More recently, Bill Clinton, for all his foibles, was a centrist. Whether out of conviction or opportunism, Clinton would not have been caught dead associating closely with the likes of Bill Ayers or Rev. Wright.

Of course, Clinton was elected by a sub-majority plurality and his party’s control of Congress was less decisive. So he may have been more cautious for purely political reasons. But I think Clinton’s commitment to, among other things, free markets and free trade was both genuine and expansive.

Clinton took a shot at healhcare but there the similarity rests. Obama’s domestic agenda is far more aggressive — and his large Hill majorities make enacting it likely, if not assured. In foreign affairs, there is simply no comparison. Obama seems intent on forging a “post-American” internationalism.

That’s more than enough to trigger paranoia and random kookiness on the right. Obama’s race is irrelevant.

Comment by John Burke — 9/29/2009 @ 3:35 pm
Obama wants to move the United States more toward France or Germany. I don’t agree with that but it’s not that far out like the world is going to end. Germany now is nothing like 70 years ago or even 20 years ago in East Germany. Gotta keep perspective a little bit.

Comment by funny man — 9/29/2009 @ 4:17 pm
“if you really think that whatever some kid is singing has anything to do with the Chinese cultural revolution you must not know history very well.”

I know my history quite well thank you and I stated clearly there is an analogy to the techniques, not a carbon-copy. Mao, Jim Jones cult, Branch Davidians, whatever … cults use techniques and have certain cult-of-personality features and dissent-suppression methods. I am appalled by some of what the Obama minions are doing on both scores. You should be too.

Putting analogies aside, should this be happening in America? …

http://www.redstate.com/susannah/2009/09/26/this-shouldnt-happen-in-america/

or this …
http://www.stoptheaclu.com/2009/09/29/hey-lets-all-pray-to-the-obamessiah/

or …
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/09/29/indoctrination-watch-how-your-tax-dollars-are-training-students-to-be-union-organizers/

or stuff like this …

http://michellemalkin.com/2009/09/24/whats-the-jamestown-project-plus-finding-your-inner-obama/

http://exurbanleague.com/2009/09/24/confirmed-kids-praising-obama-an-official-public-school-activity.aspx

“So, a public school had an official lesson using impressionable children to praise Barack Obama. The song they used even co-opted lyrics from “Jesus Loves the Little Children” with Obama’s name inserted in place of God.”

Neato … putting Obama, just a newly minted President, barely in office long enough to break his campaign promises, and he’s in the place of Jesus in songs to Kindergarteners…

This cult-of-personality behavior is, at least to me, disturbingly un-American and … shall I say, weird.

“There is nothing in the Obama presidency to suggest he will lock you up for dissent now is there?”
No, but there were calls from the White House (orchestrated by Van Jones!) to hurt Glen Beck and get him off the air. There are the sabre-rattling of ‘fairness doctrine’ leftists, obviously discontent with the very existence of Fox News, Rush and other right-wing talkers, sufficient to call for their downfall. The majority of the Democratic Congressional caucus has voted for and SUPPORTS this violation of First Amendment freedom.

There was the ‘fishy’ email scam. And then the suspicious call for a work order to have the comments about the White House monitored on social networks. Innocuous? Or maybe just a matter of seeing what they can get away with in terms of media and populace manipulation.

Many conservatives, whether in academia, schools, Hollywood, or in Govt agencies, already live in a ‘hostile work environment’ when it comes to their beliefs. We already have people fired in America for expressing certain views, and of course racist expressions are on that list of “forbidden statements”. Equating opposition to Obama as racism is *extremely incendiary*, it basically is telling people who work in the above environments and/or in big corporations: “You oppose Obama? You are evil, you are dirt, and if we can find a way, your livelihood will be threatened.” Consider the NAACP protest against a Richmond bar owner over his Obama “joker” poster display. They want to force him to take it down.

Dissent suppression is out there. Intimidation and name-calling is out there.

” Not true in 1951 in East Germany or in Hungary in 1956 after they crushed the uprising. That is the big, big difference. So why do you throw these comparisons around?”

Yes, big differences. Acknowledged. I was not throwing comparisons originally, but I was explaining why it was that some people are doing so, either from presonal experience or grappling for historical analogies. At least to me the analogy of Red Guards robotically reciting praise of Dear Leader fits.

If you think the litany of things the Obama administration and their kool-aid drinking followers (oops, another forbidden analogy!) are doing vis a vis abusing Government to advance their ideology, I think you are being far too complacent.

There is a degree and many elements of Obama-worship, radicalism, cult-of-personality, dissent-suppression, and media manipulation that go outside the envelope of the American experience and take us more in the orbit of historical despotisms and dictatorships.
THAT is ultimately where the ‘freaking out’ of the right is coming from and why it is happening.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/29/2009 @ 4:37 pm
I agree whole-heartedly with the comment about reaction to Obama like being in an echo chamber. I have frequented Breitbart.com comments to almost everything Obama and the comments which are not totally vulgarly racist merely ditto Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, and Beck.
As I see it: Conservatives quote conservatives who write conservative pieces based on conservative idea spread by conservatives to conservatives.

It is a little like the preacher preaching to the choir then having a choir member get up and repeat what the preacher said then another choir member gets up and repeats what the choir member repeated.

Comment by Tilted to the left — 9/29/2009 @ 4:43 pm
“Obama wants to move the United States more toward France or Germany.”

I would say that is a now an understatement. I would take Angela Merkel or Nickolas Sarkozy over Obama in a heartbeat. Even as non-Americans, they could take better care of America than Obama is.

Both are clearly more understanding of a nation’s requirement to stand up for its own interests and both have a better understanding of market economics and the need for policies that keep prosperity going. Both are gently edging their respective nations towards free-markets, digging their respective countries out of the hole of the failures of European welfare-state socialism of the latter 20th century.

Meanwhile Obama wants to hurtle us towards that failed welfare-state socialism model as fast as possible, sinking us with $9 trillion of new deficits, not even counting the trillions in new liabilities that ObamaCare would give us (it is scored at about $800 billion over ten years, but if you look closely, its more like a $1.7 trillion true 10 year cost).

If Obama gets his way, the USA of 2016 would be to the *LEFT* of most of the European states - larger Government, higher taxes, tighter regulations, less freedoms than EU countries.

When France is tougher diplomatically than we are on a Muslim nation, you know we’ve entered a ‘new era’.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/29/2009 @ 4:47 pm
“As I see it: Conservatives quote conservatives who write conservative pieces based on conservative idea spread by conservatives to conservatives.”

That is no different on the left. You’ve just describe the proggo-sphere in reverse.

Name a real conservative published in the NY Times.

Echo chambers abound.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/29/2009 @ 4:50 pm
When you’re tracking a highly dangerous animal-say, a grisley–you first pick up disturbances on the ground or bushes. As you follow the weak signs, they tend to get fresher and more definitive: the outlines of pawprints become clearly forced into the soil, and the broken branches are quite new and dripping sap. Then you may hear grunts and snarls. If you persist, suddenly rising before you to his full 12-foot height stands the grisley bear, and his intentions are now quite clear indeed. You are his next meal. No escaping now: such bears can run at 35 mph, and I do not think you are that fast.

Experienced trackers would have picked up that it was a grisley very quickly, and would have made proper preparations in case of an encounter with this most fearsome animal in the North, including retreating to the truck to get a high caliber rifle and pistol, asking others to accompany them to provide even more firepower, and walking in a skirmish line to give everyone a good shot.

I see your so-called kooks as amateur trackers that have picked up early signs of the bear, but have little idea what they need to do next. The professionals are not on site yet, but the bear is lurking around, for sure, snorting often (too often!), and making his presence known, although at some distance.

These anateurs know well that they could lose their lives to the bear, so they make noise, shout, wave their hands wide and all those things that just might scare the bear off. None of them had the wisdom to carry a good weapon in the midst of grisley country. Of course, they look like bumbling fools and idiots to an observer that is blissfully unaware of the bear signs and sounds that provoked those people.

But, the grisley bear is really there, and will be for the time being…

Comment by mannning — 9/29/2009 @ 6:02 pm
Sorry the grisly bear analogy doesnt work. For a start Obama is not going to kill you, your amateurs such as beck may inspire nut jobs with guns however, secondly more than half the population is on the side of the grisly.

Finally where in your analogy do you place the w’tards who are arguing for the closing of the federal reserve, the storing of ammo and the total abolition of a womans right to choose?

Comment by yoyo — 9/29/2009 @ 6:47 pm
Freedoms Truth,
I would disagree with your assessment. In what regards is Obama to the left of France or Germany? Both have universal health care, a much stronger federal government, strict gun laws, woman’s right to choose etc. His foreign policy is still tougher than Germany’s or France’s. Just look at Afghanistan. Anyway, we can argue about that and that is fine. However, the point I was making is that neither France nor Germany are totalitarian regimes resembling Stalinist Russia or Nazi Germany and there is absolutely no indication Obama is going there. Hey, you are not worried posting your comments but you would be if you had lived in those countries (smile).

Comment by funny man — 9/29/2009 @ 7:27 pm
How does a yoyo know that ObamaBear is not out to kill off the population, fry our guts, AND FEED THEM TO THE WHALES? No yoyo does.

The bear is FEAR, ah, personnified, sort of (animalsonnified?). And fear, they tell us, WILL KILL you. …FEAR ITSELF, as good ‘ole FDR said it.

Overworking this thing would be sinful, such as to try to satisfy all of the rantings of yoyos around the world. I refuse, ever so politely!

Comment by Mannning — 9/29/2009 @ 9:05 pm
@John Burke:

“Rick — I was with you 100 percent up to the point where you attributed rightie fears to Obama’s race . . . but this is manifestly not a fact — and it is Obama’s (and the House Democrats) pushing the envelope with their radicalism that has aroused the far right and not incidentally disturbed people like me in the center.”

So the jigaboo posters, the blackface cartoons, the monkey and gorilla jokes, welfare-and-watermelon signs . . . all just completely objective and reasoned critiques on loan privitization policies? I totally get that.

Look. You aren’t racist. Rick isn’t racist. I’m not racist. Teh Right isn’t racist.

But there are obviously some nimrods out there that ARE racist. God bless ‘em, this is America. They can be as ignorant and pathetic as they want. But to be standing next to them at the Tea Party and say “what is this ‘racist imagery’ of which which you speak? I’ve never heard of it before! You say depicting a black man as a big lipped, big eyed, po’-and-barefoot, fried-chicken lovin’, white woman chasin’, country rube is considered offensive to some people? That doesn’t sound right . . .” … it’s just not credible.

With all respect, I don’t believe that you are so ignorant of iconic imagery in America that you didn’t know those are “racist-associated” images. Instead of saying something like ‘any racist idiots that hate Obama don’t have anything to do with the Right’s legitimate complaints’, you say that race is “irrevelant”.

If I criticize a Jewish President and joke he’s a hook-nosed, money-theiving, greedy, probably-Illuminati-joinin’, mishapen-skull havin’ . . .” then I can’t act suprised when somebody says “that was racist”. If I’m protesting against that President and you are protesting against that President (for entirely unrelated and justifiable reasons), if you stand next to me while I’m handing out the Jew Cartoon pamphlets people are going to think (a) I’m a racist and (b) you are sympathetic to my (percieved) racist appearance. I’m not saying that’s correct, or fair, or appropriate, or whatever — but it IS going to happen. People are funny like that.

If the next day someone walks by and says “there was some racist stuff at the protest last night” and you jump in to wonder how anybody could possibly think that, there wasn’t even a hint of a suggestion of a single racist thought . . . ” . . . well, a person could well take that kind of extreme factual denial as a tacit confirmation of how bad the problem is. Acknowledgeing it doesn’t endorse or condemn it, but denying the existence of pretty indisputable facts is often subconciously associated with a guilty conscience.

When employees of the Republican State offices do it publicly . . . when “respected” public faces of the Republicans make “what could possibly be considered racist?” responses . . . I have to tell you that’s not good PR.
Maybe it was only a few Catholic preists that molested boys, maybe it was only one or two minor-level church officials that let it slide or just ignored it, maybe the Church itself is 99.99% kid safe, but if the Church dealt with the issue by continuing its “what molesting children situation?” denial, that would have been exponentially worse for them (fair or not) in the eyes of the people.
For the Republican Party, as a political agent for the government and policies you want, to have power they need non-republicans to vote for their candidates. Having racist images at Party functions or by Party members is bad PR. Denying that racism and racist imagery are “relevant” to the racist imagery, or that the racist items simply don’t exist, is worse.

Comment by busboy33 — 9/30/2009 @ 12:03 am
Half the reason your site is so good is because you spend time criticizing the right, but from the inside. When you read lefty critiques it is sometimes hard to learn anything because of how smug they are and how differently they often view the world. When you’ve got someone critiquing you that generally agrees with Burke and Kirk, it tends to be a lot more useful.

Comment by Alex — 9/30/2009 @ 12:49 am
[...] DAYS IN MAY MEETS COME NINIVEH COME TYRE THE RICK MORAN SHOW: ROMAN POLANSKI - VICTIM OR PERVERT? ‘SILENCE EQUALS ASSENT:’ WHY POINTING OUT CONSERVATIVE LUNACY MUST BE DONE DEFENDING POLANSKI: ‘IT’S NOT RAPE-RAPE’ WHY IS THE PRESIDENT GOING TO COPENHAGEN [...]

Pingback by Right Wing Nut House » SEVEN DAYS IN MAY MEETS COME NINIVEH COME TYRE — 9/30/2009 @ 5:52 am
Thank you!!!! OMG, I pray this is the beginning of a new trend among Conservatives. I’ll say up front that I’m a lefty liberal, but I truly believe that a responsible, productive voice from the right is helpful (and vice-versa when power balance is reversed). What’s happening now in the GOP is freakish and dangerous. I had a family FULL of Republicans, but many of them are leaving the party because of this radical right turn into lunacy. I’ve been stunned by the silence of moderate conservatives and this Nazi/Marxist bit (which is historically so stupid that it is case-and-point to Obama’s desire to focus on education) is truly out of line. Not only is it hyperbole designed to make people afraid, it is an affront to the millions who suffered/died under Nazism and Soviet “communism.” PLEASE, non-crazy Conservatives, get this dialog back on track!! We have huge problems facing our country, and looking to Glenn Beck or Joe the Plumber is not a good way to go. We need intelligent discussion, robust debate (productive and professional), and solutions! Where are the Chuck Hagels and the Colin Powells of the party? Why are Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin the new face (and substandard intellect) of the GOP?

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 6:07 am
I want to add a couple of things (I’m so excited to see a forum of reasonable conservatives): First off, Obama is not as radically Left as many on the Right claim–I can say that because those of us who are truly liberal are quite frustrated with him. Secondly, why are you all using our closest allies to bash Obama? Even Israel has public healthcare–it’s just not the Marxist monster everyone wants it to be. Europeans read our news too and they’ve noticed how they’re used as examples of what our country will become if we’re not careful of evil socialist Obama. We should be so lucky to have the stability of Germany or Sweden…

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 6:16 am
By the way, as perhaps the token liberal on this thread, I want to say that I wrote to Rep. Grayson to express my complete displeasure at his antics on the floor yesterday–no better than Bachmann or any of those other poorly behaved pinheads in Congress.

This is interesting and along the lines of this topic: http://www.irshadmanji.com/moral-courage-project

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 8:35 am
“Thank you!!!! OMG, I pray this is the beginning of a new trend among Conservatives. I’ll say up front that I’m a lefty liberal”

You should then also long for the day when a leftie is brave enough to engage in enough introspection to call out the lunacies of dKos, Olbermann, Media Matters, brass-knuckles Rahm, etc. 8 years of lunacy, lies and hyperbole from the BDS left has trained some on the right to imagine that it’s how the opposition is *supposed* to behave.

Your disapproval of Rep Grayson’s hyperbole is … progress!

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/30/2009 @ 10:52 am
“I would disagree with your assessment. In what regards is Obama to the left of France or Germany?”

I was speaking of a trajectory that if continued might get crossed by 2016, should they tack right and we race left. I am speaking of trajectory not current position.
America’s heritage of freedom, and previous 28 years of Governance that has been overall centrist has kept us from trending left … but Obama is outside that historical envelope, and is seeking to move USA to a place we’ve never been.

And I think the assessment that Obama is racing USA to the left, to a massive Federal Government more bloated than any Government in history, is accurate. Disagree?

Perhaps you are unaware of how gargantuan ObamaCare, even with the Baucus all-pain-no-gain version, will be. The true ten-year cost once the program is fully loaded is about $1.7 trillion (not the $800 billion 10 year number they tout). That’s the CBO estimate, or as best we can get, since the Senate is arrogantly going to forge ahead without even the legislative language required to enable a real scoring.

Perhaps you haven’t accounted for the 50+ agencies that bill will produce, the squeeze on the entire healthcare industry it will create.

Perhaps you haven’t added in the added pestilence of “Cap and Trade” on industrial America, adding regulations, taxations and bureaucracies galore. That bill will shift another $200 billion per year through the Federal Govt over time, taxing/punishing some and rewarding others. This is another $2000/ year per family, or more, of either direct cost or Govt redistribution, depending on how the Govt set it up - and Govts get sticky fingers.

Perhaps you haven’t noticed that our deficit this year is - for the first time sine WWII - in double digits of GDP, and that the *lowest* deficit that Obama projects over the next 5 years is higher than the last Bush+republican budget in 2006.

Perhaps you havent noticed that every year the Pelosi Democrat Congress has passed budgets, they have increased discretionary spending by double digits. Perhaps you havent noticed that the Federal budget is a higher percentage at any time in USA’s history than in the last 50 years, jumping from historical 18-20% levels to over 28% of GDP.

Perhaps you havent noticed that if you take that higher number and include state and local Governments, the share of Government to GDP is now eclipsing the ratio in many of the European nations, exactly the metric some would use to assure us we are not as ’socialist’ as Europe.

Perhaps you haven’t considered the tidal wave of additional welfare state obligations that are inherent in Obama’s proposed amnesty legalization of 12-20 million illegal aliens, who will be on track for a plethora of Government assistance programs which they are currently legally excluded from.

And last but not least, perhaps you are not noticing the collapse and the discrediting of the left in Europe, the rise of conservative and right-wing / liberal-economics parties in that continent.

“woman’s right to choose”
Women have the right to choose how to invest their social security funds? They can the schooling for their child? They can choose their healthcare insurance company? They have the right to choose to own a gun? Fascinating.

Meanwhile in USA, President Obama says that his ideal Justice is a leftwing agitator on the Supreme Court by the name of Ruth Bader Ginsburg; she has disallowed the right of states to democratically protect unborn human life in law, and such judicial legislation will remain in force is so long as Obama nominates similarly leftwing Judges.

“His foreign policy is still tougher than Germany’s or France’s.”

Not really. Bush’s foreign policy trajectory continues, and I give credit to Obama for not bugging out on Iraq or Afghanistan (yet), but almost everything Obama has done new has been in the direction of weakness. His missile defense giveaway was positively Carteresque. I have France’s own Sarkozy in my corner on this, and any cogent reading of Obama’s dreadful UN speech backs up this assessment:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471504574441402775482322.html
http://theeprovocateur.blogspot.com/2009/09/sarkozy-on-obama-naive-and-grossly.html

Obama is a naif, Sarkozy a realist.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/30/2009 @ 11:22 am
@Freedoms Truth “8 years of lunacy, lies and hyperbole from the BDS left has trained some on the right to imagine that it’s how the opposition is *supposed* to behave.”

Seriously? You are blaming the left for how the right is acting? That is ridiculous. Maybe the left originally learned how they were “supposed” to behave from the right? Makes as much sense as your statement.

I just love how you absolve the right of any responsibility for their current actions. Wow. I’m amazed.

Comment by Hugh Larious — 9/30/2009 @ 11:36 am
I don’t watch Olbermann (and I’ve called him out in the past), don’t read dKos, disagree with you on Media Matters, am disappointed in Rahm, and do not follow a party ideology (many of us on the left don’t). I only recently rejoined the Dems and am leaving already again–will likely support the Green Party again as well as fair-minded independents. My political beliefs are deeply rooted in our amazing founding documents which spoke of equality and fairness for all. I’m VERY active in our democracy and I see it in true peril due to horrifying levels of financial corruption. I’m also a Jesus fan–perhaps the most liberal figure in history (strangely hijacked by the fringe of the right). Moral of the story: Don’t paint the left with a broad brush stroke since you don’t like it either.

I found this definition of “liberal” online. It fits me and many like me to a T, and I also think it reflects the principles upon which our country was founded. I cannot for the life of me figure out why you all find it to be such a terrible label (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/liberal):

–adjective
1. favorable to progress or reform, as in political or religious affairs.
2. (often initial capital letter) noting or pertaining to a political party advocating measures of progressive political reform.
3. of, pertaining to, based on, or advocating liberalism.
4. favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum individual freedom possible, esp. as guaranteed by law and secured by governmental protection of civil liberties.
5. favoring or permitting freedom of action, esp. with respect to matters of personal belief or expression: a liberal policy toward dissident artists and writers.
6. of or pertaining to representational forms of government rather than aristocracies and monarchies.
7. free from prejudice or bigotry; tolerant: a liberal attitude toward foreigners.
8. open-minded or tolerant, esp. free of or not bound by traditional or conventional ideas, values, etc.
9. characterized by generosity and willingness to give in large amounts: a liberal donor.
10. given freely or abundantly; generous: a liberal donation.
11. not strict or rigorous; free; not literal: a liberal interpretation of a rule.
12. of, pertaining to, or based on the liberal arts.
13. of, pertaining to, or befitting a freeman.

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 11:39 am
It is amazing to read the posts and comments on this site. Most of those that do write here are flat out clarivoyant. They KNOW what lurks in the minds of men. They especially know the most daring, most controversal, and most intimate thoughts and plans of OUR LEADER. They say so! Obama is not a….

They know for a certainty that any President of the United States is not, and cannot be a humanist, a socialist, a communist, or any other ist on the list, except leftist. Can’t even have shades of thought in any of those dirty directions, or they would be detected! MUST be a simple ist, a friendly ist, a manageable ist, one that citizens voted for, right?

How do they know this? They just KNOW!

And yet, we are daily appalled by the moves of this strange man, the statements he makes, and the really isty implications of all that he does amd says that are a total embarassment to our nation.

Marvellisty!

Comment by mannning — 9/30/2009 @ 11:40 am
As if on cue to make my point … One of the features in tax law that distinguishes us from Europe is our lack of VAT, a distinction that keeps our Govt from growing as large as Europe’s …. and here we have Obama’s supporters proposing a Federal VAT!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125426937758851077.html

“As progressives we need to debate the policy merits and likelihood of enacting a range of options — including designing a small and more progressive value-added tax, changes to the corporate tax code, and taxing upper income earners beyond reversing the Bush tax cuts,” Mr. Podesta said in a statement Tuesday.

White House economic adviser Larry Summers and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner refused to rule out middle-class tax increases during Sunday talk-show appearances over the summer. “We have to bring these deficits down very dramatically,” Mr. Geithner said on ABC’s “This Week.” “And that’s going to require some very hard choices.”

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/30/2009 @ 12:04 pm
@Freedoms Truth “8 years of lunacy, lies and hyperbole from the BDS left has trained some on the right to imagine that it’s how the opposition is *supposed* to behave.”

“Seriously? You are blaming the left for how the right is acting? That is ridiculous.”

It’s not at all. I’ve heard and read comments from some on the right indicating exactly that thinking. A ’sauce-for-the-goose’ attitude.

“Maybe the left originally learned how they were “supposed” to behave from the right?” Nope. Street theatre and agitation was a New Left (1960s) invention, and the politics-of-personal-destruction is straight out of Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals.

Some on the right are reading Alinsky and taking the tactics of the left seriously.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/30/2009 @ 12:07 pm
“I found this definition of “liberal” online. It fits me and many like me to a T, and I also think it reflects the principles upon which our country was founded. I cannot for the life of me figure out why you all find it to be such a terrible label”

It’s a wonderful label, and us classical Jeffersonian liberals are ticked off that the leftists and socialists stole it from the real classical liberals way back when. (New Deal era?) Then again, leftists and socialists are natural thieves, hijacking labels left and right.

“4. favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum individual freedom possible, esp. as guaranteed by law and secured by governmental protection of civil liberties.”

The people who hold to this position are today called libertarians and/or small-Government conservatives.

Those who want this country to adhere to the ideals of our founding fathers have been standing up and telling the politicians to read the Constitution and follow it.

Maybe if you reread your founding father documents again, you will realize that you are deep down a *classic* liberal and not a modern ‘liberal’ (aka socialist).

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 9/30/2009 @ 12:13 pm
FT, our tax system is a nightmare. I don’t love European VAT for sure, but I envy the simplicity of taxes there. I think that it’s pretty darned hypocritical though for conservatives to rail against raising taxes to pay down the deficit when it was the GOP that dug this giant hole in the first place–your boy Bush and his GOP Congress made Libs look like misers. They bloated the government (adding whole new branches) and started 2 wars which we’re still stuck in and which have and will continue to cost us bizillions. And don’t forget, it was Bush and Paulson that constructed TARP, and nobody even knows where that $700 billion went!

I totally agree with funny man (7:27am, comment #16)

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 12:18 pm
Rick,

Thanks for your sensible commentary. I’m a progressive who is hoping that the GOP can get a grip and reclaim its status as a responsible partner in the political conversation. At present the Republican Party is not to be taken seriously– a party that tries to put a nitwit like Sarah Palin in the White House sacrifices its own credibility. The GOP has made the mistake of defining itself by hatred of Obama, rather than putting forth a positive agenda of its own. The Right is gripped by fear– fear of taxation, fear of gays, fear of government, fear of colored people, fear of just about everything. This is not a good foundation for a political party. It’s a breeding ground for delusional types who will resort to violence someday.

If GW Bush had proposed exactly the same healthcare reform that Obama is pushing for, the crazies on the Right would have hailed it as the greatest policy proposal in history, because they are clueless about the specifics of the policy itself– they are simply reacting to the black messenger.

Comment by old yankee — 9/30/2009 @ 12:56 pm
You have shown great courage in publishing this, and I hope you don’t get skewered by the loudmouths for it. (And there’s a lot of them out there, some with their own television/radio shows.)

It is a shame, really, that the GOP has allowed itself to be taken over by reactionaries with loony ideas. These people are simply preying on the fears of so many Americans when they are out of work, pissed off, and afraid for the future. And, let’s not kid ourselves - plenty of people, when fed a steady diet of paranoia and wild ideas, and encouraged to violence - will resort to it to achieve notoriety or answer some “call”. They already have.

Calling out the crazy is an excellent idea, and calling out the media when they focus on it is another good plan. The news outlets are so desperate for eyeballs that they put the most outrageous people on display, and waste everyone’s time with distractions when they should be asking tough questions and providing us with information.

Keep up the good work. Lefties such as myself need good, intelligent opponents to fight the good fight.

Comment by Marge Gunderson — 9/30/2009 @ 1:30 pm
Typical liberal nonsense.

GET A BRAIN!

Moran.

GO USA!

Comment by Mike Toreno — 9/30/2009 @ 2:10 pm
A very good piece. The problem with the GOP today is leadership; who’s driving this bus, anyway? Who is the leader of the GOP? It is certainly not Boehner or McConnell…It’s not the last President, Bush…it’s not the last nominee, McCain…it’s not Sarah Palin, or Mitt Romney, or Mike Huckabee…so who is it?
As long as the party remains without a leader, it will continue to be defined by what everyday Americans see in the videos from the tea rallies: President Obama depicted as a lower primate, eating watermelon and fried chicken, and strung up in a noose. Former President Carter didn’t say that “ALL” of those opposed to the President do so because they are racists; he said “SOME”. It’s not ALL and it’s not NONE. So it’s somewhere between 1% and 99%. But those “SOMES”, many of which will call the President a n##### on national television, are the face of the GOP right now.
Perhaps the GOP “leadership” prefers to let these “SOMES” do all of the dirty work, ginning up dissent and working up the base. However, as noted Republican and former NASCAR champion Darrell Waltrip likes to say, it’s a “short-term gain but a long-term loss”. The people that are turned on by this racial hyperbole tend to be more elderly, and won’t be voting in all that many more elections. The people who are turned off, however, are much younger, and will be voting in at least 10 or 15 more presidential elections. And a good number of them are multiracial, just like President Obama.
I predict a schism is the GOP. How on earth will Tim Pawlenty or Charlie Crist be able to stand next to Sarah Palin at a GOP Primary debate? If they agree with her positions, they can chuck the general election out the window. If they call her out as the extremist she is, thier base will crucify them, and on Election night they will be picking up extra bucks as a talking head on one of the networks. Since President Obama will probably have very little in the way of 2012 primary opposition, the whole counrty will be tuned in to watch the Republicans fight it out. The only way for both sides of the GOP to get thier way is to split…the “Tony Lama” Republicans can go one way, and the “Florsheim” Republicans can go another. The only question is, who leaves to strike out on thier own? If the Florsheims leave, they could form the “Conservative” or even “Progressive” Party. If the Tony Lamas leave, they would almost certainly call thier camp the “Christian Party”.
Bottom line: the Democrats do police thier own fringe, that’s why there was no impeachment of Bush, why single-payer is not part of the Healthcare Reform discussion, and why Dennis Kucinich can run for President until he’s blue in the face but will never win the nomination. If the GOP expects to survive in the face of a Democratic President who is extremely smart (they don’t give away Harvard Law Degrees in cereal boxes), a master strategist (he did beat the most powerful Democratic operation of the second half of the 20th century, the Clintons), and yes, is an everyman (take a look around, multiracial people are everywhere), they had better tamp down the rhetoric and start to actually present a credible alternative.

Comment by M Beranek — 9/30/2009 @ 2:49 pm
Let’s sum up Freedom Truth’s ideas:

When the Left does something bad, it’s because the Left are bad people.

When the Right does something bad, it’s because the Left are bad people.

Are the gumdrop trees in bloom yet over there in FantasyLand?

Comment by busboy33 — 9/30/2009 @ 3:07 pm
[...] not to keep opening its mouth and further proving how irrational it is." More at source: Right Wing Nut House ? ‘SILENCE EQUALS ASSENT:’ WHY POINTING OUT CONSERVATIVE LUNACY MUS… __________________ “You can’t just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done.” (B.H.Obama) [...]

Pingback by ?silence Equals Assent' - Southern Maryland Community Forums — 9/30/2009 @ 3:50 pm
For all of the reasons stated above in the original post, I am, today, a former republican, now registered as an independent. As for my GOP bona fides: worked for a GOP senator and congressman, two GOP presidents and spent 9/11 in the WH bunker with NSA Rice and VP Cheney. I didn’t leave my party, my party left me. Barbara Bush once said “the hardest job in politics is motivating a moderate.” The increasingly unhinged right wing is, today, doing, quite successfully, “the hardest job in politics.”

Comment by anna perez — 9/30/2009 @ 4:23 pm
@Manning:

“They know for a certainty that any President of the United States is not, and cannot be a humanist, a socialist, a communist, or any other ist on the list, except leftist.”

No. That’s not what anybody said. No one claimed it was physically impossible for a Communist to be elected President. They are saying Obama isn’t one.

How do they KNOW? Because he hasn’t done anything Communist.

How do I KNOW Dick Cheney doesn’t bugger sheep? He likes his privacy. So do people that bugger sheep! He spend time in nature dealing with wild animals . . . just like sheep fu@kers! He breathes, and for a pervert to bugger sheep they need to first breathe. It’s the first step to buggery!
Are you going to tell me that you KNOW he isn’t? Are you psychic? Why would anybody just assume that he isn’t, after you look at all of those worrying trends?

Because there’s no credible evidence he buggers sheep. There is no evidence that Obama is anything except a Democrat. A Liberal. Liberal does not equal Communist, anymore than Republican equals Totalitarian Fascist. If your definition of “Communist”, “Socialist”, “Nazi”, or “other bad -ist” is essentially “not Republican”, then by definition any person who is not a Republican that holds political office in America is nation-destroying threat that merits armed revolution.

That’s just unreasonable. And it dilutes any legitimate criticism of Obama by painting critics as irrational. I may have a legitimate gripe against Cheney, but if I voice them along with “and he also buggers sheep and drinks the blood of Jews”, then people will assume I’m crazy and by extension my “legitimate” criticisms are crazy too.

It does absolutely no good for the Republican Party or its goals to expouse that Obama, in 1 year, has demonstrated himself the most dangerous, subversive, CommunistSocialistNazi America has ever seen. A Democrat is trying to improve the social safety net! Just like Hitler!

That’s uncredible.

Comment by busboy33 — 9/30/2009 @ 5:24 pm
2 things;

1) To ‘John Burke’ who is offended by the charge of racism, you’re so right. I mean, just because some people who happen to be racist viciously attack the first black president doesn’t mean their criticism is due to their racism. Got it. After all, racism disappeared on 1/20/09! Any assertion to the contrary is, well…racism!

2) And to all of those who are quaking in their boots because “Obama did away with Bush’s missile shield,” how can you manage to ignore the facts?

What facts? These;

Bush’s missile shield was not even deployed

It was based on still experimental technology

It was not even scheduled to be deployed

It didn’t even have a PROJECTED date for testing, let alone deployment

The Joint Chiefs had doubts that it would ever work

It was actually replaced in favor of a sea-based Aegis missile shield

The new shield, based on proven technology, will provide more coverage

The change was made on recommendation of the Joint Chiefs and Sec of Def

Per the military it will be more flexible thanks to being sea-based

It it favored by Israel because it provides better protection for them

Or maybe we just going to be a bunch of Glenn Becks and treat facts as optional!

Glenn Beck just claimed the Vancover Olympics lost a billion dollars when they were held. Even the White House has now pointed out that the Vancover Olypmics, THE 2010 VANCOVER OLYMPICS, haven’t even happened yet.

Sheesh.

Comment by David — 9/30/2009 @ 6:20 pm
David, your response will be too logical for many: Once people have decided to be angry and afraid, it’s hard to change their mind. Weird that the GOP talks about security and that GWB puffed his chest out for 8 years, yet all they have to offer is FEAR!

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 7:15 pm
BRAVO!!

Finally someone has the guts to question the hame that has become repulican party/conservative movement. You did not go far enough. We have subscribed to things that used to dumbfund us when they happen in developing countries. Why? Because we lost an election. What has the democrats or Obama proposed that should unhinge us. A bail out of the economy? For eight years, we all kept silent while our guys drove the country over the cliff. Regulation of Wall Street/Banks? We looked the other way, while banks/wall street duped our parents,siblings and friends to lose their only product acomplishment - their houses. Two wars? We matched in lockstep and precipitated the country in wars that is bankrupting us and the country. We labeled critics of Bush as unpatriotic, yet we claim ingnorance while advocating assisnation of our president and violet overtrow of a US Govt. Has any of us lived under a military dictatorship? Even our so called interlectuals are calling for more wars. Are conservatives going to declare war on any country that offend us. Tell me what conservatives will do when Germany decides, that enough time has elasped and they need to provide their own protection unbrela. Or Japan decides that with more than 60 years of heuing to the world, they now must control their security. Or the BRIC countries decide that they are well-off and strong enough not to let their peace of mind reside in America’s hand. Are we going to declare war on all these countries? Because, mark my words, soon they will take their security into their own hands. Health Care reform? We created Part. D for seniors and 100 of our members of congress voted this year to privatize Medicare. Yet we acuse the outside of trying to gut Medicare, even though know no one has proposed any such thing. We defend torture and yet want to tell other countries how to behave. This list goes on and on.

The republican party and conservative has become a third world country. Shame!

Comment by Cemmee — 9/30/2009 @ 8:11 pm
“How do they KNOW? Because he hasn’t done anything Communist.”

busboy!
Listen to yourself! “They” Who is they? They say he hasn’t done anything communist? or socialist, or….So you believe them. How do you know? “They” could be shilling for him.

People here take the word of others, probably unknown, that all is well and good, and no laws broken, or ist thoughts leaking out. So you buy into second or third-hand information, or worse, just like the rest of us must! OK fine, that is all you have to offer. Your opinion, but no facts. None. Just trying to set proper view.

Now, you must be aware that I have not called Obama any of that litergy of ists, except leftist, as did Moran in his post. How would I really know?
I don’t.

That is the point. We are all dealing with Nth handed information, and cannot claim such certainty for our opinions. Some do, however. They think they have the good skinny, the truth, the correct view and proclaim it on high as if—AS IF–it were the truth. It isn’t necessarily so.

I am simply skeptical as hell that this man is leading us in the right path, and maybe I will invent an ist for it!

Comment by Mannning — 9/30/2009 @ 8:36 pm
First they came for the Sarah Palin, and I did not speak out—because I was not Sarah Palin;
Then they came for Fox News, and I did not speak out—because I did not work at Fox News;
Then they came for the World Net Daily, and I did not speak out—because I did not work at World Net Daily;
Then they came for all conservatives, and I did not speak out—because I was a moderate;
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Comment by Petruk — 9/30/2009 @ 8:42 pm
Re: Petruk #44

No one is coming to take Sarah Palin. She’s nuts, but not certifiable.

No one is coming to take Fox News even though it would be in the interests of every one with the exception of true fruitcakes if they were gone.

It would be wonderful if they came for World Net Daily as those guys are totally nuts.

If all of the above were taken, then you and your views (assuming they had some relationship to reality) would be much better off.

Imagine it: A discussion on health care reform where ideas could be discussed rationally and then decided by the politicians who got elected in a democratic process.

If you don’t like that idea, then you’re not a democrat.

zpvicoa8xgm4a93a

Comment by Shel — 9/30/2009 @ 9:30 pm
. . . aaaaaaaaaaaand Godwin’s Law kicks into effect on post #44. Given the topic of the thread, I’m impressed it took so long. Well done everybody.

Comment by busboy33 — 9/30/2009 @ 10:27 pm
I agree with Shel’s response to Petruk #44 (Was that meant to be serious??)

The Right now lives in a world of paranoia, slamming events that haven’t happened. Nobody has come for anyone (unless you count the Bush years), nobody is imposing a nondemocratic form of government (although there are many on the Right advocating the overthrow of our democratically elected government), nobody’s guns have been taken away (unfortunately), and on and on. From and anthropological point of view, it’s an interesting study in mass hysteria. However, as a citizen of the country being ripped apart by this mess, I hope it ends soon.

Comment by Todd — 9/30/2009 @ 10:45 pm
You need to look up Godwin’s Law again, busboy! LOL! And then read again!

A false application of the law loses!

Comment by Mannning — 9/30/2009 @ 10:54 pm
???

Godwin’s Law:
“[Usenet] “As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.”
http://www.answers.com/topic/godwin-s-law

What did I miss? This wasn’t the first Nazi related comment, but its my understanding that when the topic is actual Nazis, the reference doesn’t “count”.
I thought Petruk used the famous phrasing of a concentration camp victim to compare the (whack-a-doodle) Right to Nazi victims, which seemed to imply that Obama and Teh Left were Nazis. Thus, Godwin’s Law. Did I misunderstand the analogy?

Comment by busboy33 — 10/1/2009 @ 2:11 am
@Manning (re:#44):

You are right that there is no information to make an opinion as to whether any of the oderous labels accurately apply.

Then why would anybody jump to them?

When I meet someone at a dinner party, I know nothing about them. They could be a serial killer. They could be a Mafia kingpin. They could be the resurrected Christ.

What does it say about me if I meet someone and say “bet he’s a child molester”? To me, it says I have some serious issues that I need to work out before I engage in meeting people again. “Well, you can’t prove he’s NOT a child molester!” isn’t helping my case.

Let me re-phrase my comment like this: I don’t see a dramatic difference between Obama and pretty much any other Democratic Administration for the last few decades. I do see what appears to be a massive difference in the opposition to it. While previous Democratic Administrations were bad-mouthed (as were Republican Administrations), and while previous administrations were accused “in extremis” (as were Republican Administrations), it appears to this outsider that the acceptance of the extreme screaming is far, far, FAR more accepted and encouraged against Obama by the body of Reds than against any other one.

Am I wrong? Is the bat$h!t insanity simply par for the course and I just never noticed?

If I’m not wrong in thinking the Obamahatred is more extreme, far sooner in his Administration (hell, it was apparent even before he took office) . . .then what is the explanation? Did a huge percentage of Republicans all go friggin insane at the same time?

Conservatives by and large seem to take offense at allegations of racism. To me, that actually is a comforting explanation. Xenophobia makes sense. It is a common human failing. I don’t know a single person, myself included, that doesn’t suffer from it to some degree. That would explain logically what has been happening for the last 18 months or so. I like logic. I like explanations. “Everybody just spontaneously decided to go nuts in the same way at the same time” makes me very uncomfortable.

You say (and have said) you see communistSocialistOppressive signs in Obama and the Administration. Did you see them in Clinton? In Carter? Did you fear for the future of America then? Aside from the tenor of the debate . . . what is different?

I am certainly capable of missing obvious things, so if there IS an explanation I’m all ears. But if there isn’t then at least under the rules of courtesy I was raised under, you don’t presume the worst about someone without just cause. I am not a fan of most Republican politicians. I think for the most part they are liars and wrong in their positions. But I DON’T start from a posiiton of assuming they are demonic harbingers and then requiring them to prove otherwise. If they do something “Republican” I shake my head and say “God-damn Republican stupidity” . . . I don’t scream “Hellspawn! You’ll never have my children!!”

A sitting President wanted to speak to schoolchildren . . . and Conservatives compared it to North Korean Totalitarian Brainwashing. BEFORE he said anything. That’s just insane. Every President does that, and I never heard anything close to this , especially before they said anything. That kind of behavior is seriously wrong from my perspective. It’s bad for the Country.

Either this is standard operating procedure (the mainstream acceptance of the crazy by the opposition party), xenophobia being manifested in a different form, mass hysteria, or something else. My best guess is xenophobia, but if it isn’t that what else is it? Is this level of crazy normal? If it isn’t what changed?

Comment by busboy33 — 10/1/2009 @ 3:05 am
busboy, thanks for the link–I hadn’t heard about that I find it really sad that so many people call Obama a Nazi and Communist when the two are diametrically opposed. The Nazi movement was a hardcore right-wing movement in Germany and the Nazis imprisoned thousands of Communists and exterminated most of them along with the Jews, Gays, Gypsies, etc. Also, the original socialist revolution in Russia was completely anti-central government: The revolutionaries (aided by Kronstadt sailors) deposed (bloodlessly) the Czar and set up a series of councils called soviets. Each soviet was run by and was responsible to its members. In a way, it was the ultimate democratic system and was based in freedom for all and peace (they immediately wanted to withdraw from the war with Germany and the Axis Powers). It wasn’t until the Bolsheviks, lead by Lenin, introduced Marxist ideology that it began to go awry (partially because Marxism was completely incompatible with an agrarian society like Russia and the other republics). When the White Armies (which later included some US soldiers) and Red Army started fighting, Lenin was able to consolidate his power and later turned on the Kronstadt soldiers (after he survived an assassination attempt by one of the original revolutionaries). Stalin came to power after Lenin’s death and what had been leftist attempt at a just and peaceful society became a totalitarian police state due to paranoia and fear.

As an educator, I’m pretty depressed at the sheer ignorance of history in the US. There are buffoons on TV hurling Nazi, Communist, secret Muslim, etc. all in the same sentence and they have NO clue what any of it means. It gets everyone riled up though, and then you have the obscene posters of the 9/12 protests and people carrying guns to peaceful rallies and wackos writing articles advocating military coups. Tragic, the whole mess.

Bit of irony: I’m about to get ready to go to a German beerhouse on Lenin Avenue.

Comment by Todd — 10/1/2009 @ 6:01 am
[...] has stepped up to call out those who on “his side”. I read this great post by Rick Moran at Right Wing Nut House that gives me more than a glimmer of hope. For the first time since the election last year, I [...]

Pingback by Is the Right Starting to Get a Grip on Reality? : Gay News from Gay Agenda – GayAgenda.com — 10/1/2009 @ 7:10 am
Todd, you’re absolutely right. Fascism and Communism are mutally exclusive, as they occupy opposite ends of the political spectrum. The reason so many who hate the President use these terms is because they sound scary to people who don’t know the true definitions. It’s always been very easy to fool people who refuse to educate themselves.
Republicans should follow the advice of Dean Vernon Wormer: “Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.”

Comment by M Beranek — 10/1/2009 @ 9:38 am
Unfortunately, I don’t know what happened to the Republican party and can’t imagine how you get it back. The Democrats are closer to old style Goldwater or Eisenhower Republicans. The republican party now is certainly not a small government or fiscally conservative party-look at the deficits accumulated D vs R. This evangelical “christian”-not like any Christians I know- takeover of the republican party-really, it’s driven by these nuts who certainly don’t represent the majority. It’s gone on so long(Jerry Falwell-the 70’s and 80s) and just gets worse-scare ‘em and make ‘em behave.

From here, one of three things happen.

Moderate republicans speak up loudly and you get rid of the right wing fringe takeover(don’t see that happening, anyone who complains is obviously a damn liberal blah, blah, blah)

The crazy stuff works and we have all the crazies running the US. Everyone is scared and not happy and there are a few large corporations running everything.

The democrats in power for the the forseeable future-I’m a liberal but also a capitalist and the competition of a smart republican party would be good for everyone.

And where were the republicans with the Bush deficits and the patriot act and the financial modernization act? They were once capitalists, they stayed out of people’s private bedrooms. They were fiscally conservative. They are gone. You may the last one standing.

Comment by Laura — 10/1/2009 @ 12:20 pm
Reading these batsh*t crazy comments makes me realize Democrats are now moderate, and the republicans are beyond comprehension. Republicans: keep seceeding your power to the religious fundamentalists and nuts like Beck, Hannity and Limbaugh. Keep talking about ACORN, Ayers and Wright, and Obamacare. Keep using words like fascist, socialist and pinko commie. Keep comparing Obama to Hitler. Whatever you do, don’t listen to this writer. He makes too much sense to be logical!

Comment by katie — 10/1/2009 @ 1:27 pm
M Beranek, comment 53, thanks. Your quote is not unlike my 6th grade math teacher: He was a big fat black guy with a jerry curl (1980) who would bellow, “don’t just sit there lookin’ fat, dumb, and happy,–solve the problem!” God bless you, Mr. Grady–you were wiser than you knew…

G’night from Siberia…

Comment by Todd — 10/1/2009 @ 2:17 pm
As a skeptic, I do view with skepticism those that are in the limelight for any reason. As a conservative I try to listen with my inner ear to what the next politician is attempting to sell, in order to classify him as on my side–or not. Obama long ago convinced me that he would be extremely bad for the nation, and that opinion has been reinforced a hundredfold since the election–he is not on my side, and he is, in my opinion, taking the nation down the road to insolvency very rapidly indeed.

This is the line of reasoning and opinion that millions of people have signed up to recently, and more are coming to the same position every day.

Now you get to the question of what to do about it? While fringe groups with this opinion and this fear yell and scream and make vile comparisons, perhaps to try to move the problem along (in their view), the majority of like-minded people are simply gearing up to defeat the Democrats in the next elections, and to attempt to influence their representatives concerning the flood of spending that is going on.

It is not unusual that some choose invective to make their points, especially when they discover that they are not being very effective at staunching their tax money flow into smelly ratholes around the country. So they gather for comfort and to take heart that so many others are in the same position; some go over the line in expressing their discontent as people are wont to do. But then, so has the opposition done the same thing in past years, with similar results and similar invective. Out of 100,000 people there will inevitably be 100 to 500 that are more charged up than the rest, and that are more susceptable to yelling and screaming, and waving flags and signs of all kinds, whether misguided or not. Of course, the opposition seizes upon these high energy demonstrators to attempt to make them representative of the party! This is typical political behavior–and decidedly dishonest as well–but we are stuck with it.

So, instead of taking these energetic people to task, and bemoaning their absolutely terribe influence on the fate of the party, cooler heads should be working very hard to redirect this group energy into far more constructive avenues: towards defeating the Democrats at every turn. Once these people receive good guidance and direction they become an effective political force instead of a gaggle.

I have found no one yet that has taken up this challenge to form the opposition and direct it along winning paths, and an individual that has made a real impact.

Comment by mannning — 10/1/2009 @ 2:24 pm
Did I see signs of ists in the Carter or Clinton eras?

The only one that comes immediately to mind was the push for Hillarycare, which was really alarming. Bumbles and Slick were rather terrible Presidents in my view, but they did not set off ist alarms and signs the way or to the same extent Obama has done.

I must admit, however, that the production of sheer booboos has outdone the ist alarms, and I am not prescient enough to be certain that the booboos were really that or something more sinister and motivated by ist intents downstream.

Why is Obama insulting and shunning the UK representatives he encounters? Why does Obama act subserviently to Saudi Royals? Why does Obama insist on interfering with the constitutional processes in Honduras? Why does Obama choose to attack Israel for its settlements in the west Bank, rather than enormous and pressing subjects of a more serious nature, such as Iran?

These, and many more actions of similar import leave me cold and wondering what is going on. I have seen no adequate explanations for such acts, and I believe the American people are due some. Instead, I perceive a “go to hell!” attitude.

But, then, these are not in themselves earthshaking matters, but merely indications of a mindset that is diametrically opposed to what I believe is right and proper. So I take points away. Lots of them!

Closing up the channels of information to the public is well underway, I believe. Example: name the 30-odd Czars on Obama’s staff, and explain their responsibilities and authority in their areas, and then tell me what their precise relationship is to the Cabinet Members in the very same areas. Can you do it without significant difficulty? I doubt it. Then tell me where each of them came from and what their contribution to the nation has been that qualifies them to hold their positions. This reminds me of Czar Nicholas’statement that he didn’t rule Russia, 10,000 clerks did.

Comment by mannning — 10/1/2009 @ 3:45 pm
Let me work backwards here . . .

“Closing up the channels of information to the public is well underway, I believe. Example: name the 30-odd Czars on Obama’s staff, and explain their responsibilities and authority in their areas, and then tell me what their precise relationship is to the Cabinet Members in the very same areas. Can you do it without significant difficulty? I doubt it.”

So . . . you task me with naming 30-government employees, their exact job description, the legal authority for the position, and the precise hierarchy between each of the 30 and the Cabinet?

You are right . . . I can’t do that without significant difficulty. Actually, let me strike that. I CAN do it without difficulty. I CAN’t do it without effort. 30 people, 30 job descriptions, 30 legal explanations, 30 government interrelations — at the very minimum I’m looking at 120 seperate pieces of data. If each took me 5 minutes to find (and the legal explanations would take FAR longer), you’ve tasked me with 10 hours of labor. That’s tedious. But difficult? No.

I’ll do one as an example:

(starting search at 4:38 PM. Went to Yahoo, search term “US Government Czars, picked first one that caught my eye)

Drug Czar: R. Gil Kerlikowske

Official Title: Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy

Authority (personal): almost four decades in law enforcement, working in several States. Last position was as Chief of Police for Seattle, a position he held for almost a decade. Full bio at http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/about/director.html

Authority (legal): Originally, it came from the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988. Legislation and Executive Orders have maintained it and expanded it since then (most recently The Office of National Drug Control Policy Reauthorization Act of 2006). The explicit authority for there to be a director for this Office comes in 21 USC 1701, Section 102. http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=109_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ469.109.pdf

http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/about/authorizing_legislation.html (lists the authorizations, a link to the data, and a brief summary of what impact each had on the Office in its entirety)

“The principal purpose of ONDCP is to establish policies, priorities, and goals for the Nation’s drug control program. To achieve this, ONDCP is charged with producing the National Drug Control Strategy. The Strategy directs the Nation’s anti-drug efforts and establishes a program, a budget, and guidelines for cooperation among Federal, State, and local entities.”
http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/policy/index.html

time – currently 4:53 PM. Before I proceed, I’d like to note that all of the legislation, all of the authorizations, all of the executive orders . . . Obama didn’t do any of them. The Department (and therefore the Director of the Department) was created in 1988. So shall we blame Regan or Bush the Elder?

Where did I find all of this information? The information that is being hidden from me because the Administration is “[c]losing up the channels of information to the public”? Government web sites. If they are trying to keep me in the dark, they are doing a piss poor job about it.

Legislative relationship with relevant Cabinet Member: Now we’re getting tricky. Here’s a list of all cabinet officials currently:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/cabinet/
Does drug policy fall under Department of Justice (Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr.), Department of the Interior (Secretary Kenneth L. Salazar), or Department of Health and Human Services (Secretary Kathleen Sebelius)? Apparently, some of its responsibility was previously under the Department of Homeland Security (????), but was shifted to ONDCP under the 2006 re-authorization act. Also, even though the Office is legislatively under the authority of the Executive Branch, the 06 Reauthorization Act expressly allows Congress full access to its personnel, data, research, and pretty much whatever the hell else it wants. The Office isn’t run by Congress . . . but they are shielded from it either.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode21/usc_sec_21_00001702—-000-.html

I have to stop here. To fully roadmap the legislation will take me probably a week. But all the information is there. Freely available. No sleuthing required, just reading.
Time: 5:18PM (40 minutes). Not difficult, just tedious.
All of that information that is being hidden from you by the Administration isn’t being hidden at all. It’s right there. If you want to tell me that the Federal Government is a tangled, confusing mess . . . I agree. But what does that have to do with Obama?

Obama is hiding information? You know what I have access to now? White House visitor logs. You know who hid them from me? The last President. Are you saying that Obama is more secretive than past Presidents? I’m going to have to respectfully ask for an example or two, because I don’t see that supported by the facts. At all.

You find the “Czars” suspicious. The first one was Nixon’s energy chief, and the term apparently was a nickname the media gave him.
http://www.modbee.com/opinion/national/story/864609.html
So “Czars” have been a part of American politics since Nixon. How you can get to suspicion of Obama from that is blowing my mind.

“Why is Obama insulting UK representatives?” – I didn’t hear anything about this. What are you referring to? And if Obama did insult a UK representative . . . so what? What’s suspicious about that? Bush gave Merkel a massage at a public meeting of world leaders. It was unbelievably offensive and a clear breach of protocol. It marked him as a jerk, but that’s it. If Obama insulting somebody indicates for you a sinister hidden design . . . what is it? And how does insulting a representative from the UK further that plot?

“Acting subversive to Saudi Royals” – you mean, more subversive than walking around with them holding hands like BFFs, or having the FBI help arrange for Saudis (including a Royal) to fly the hell out of here after 9-11? Did Obama do anything other than bow too deeply (bow required by protocol)?
Our country has kissed royal Saudi ass for decades. What has Obama done (aside from a deep bow) that distinguishes the current Administration? What act has he taken that subsumes our interests to that of the Saudis? I honestly can’t think of any. Educate me.

“Interfering with Honduras” – And he did that how? By saying the Presidential ouster by the Court and military was illegal? I disagree with him, but how is that interference? Have we sent troops? Black Ops? Expelled diplomats? Trade sanctions? Forbidden travel? Have we as a country done ANYTHING aside from voice disagreement? If we haven’t done anything, how are we interfering? He also criticized the Iranian elections, but you blame him for NOT interfering in Iran. I honestly don’t know what you are talking about with this.

“criticizing West Bank settlements” – how dare he? I mean, its not like part of the agreement between Israel and the Palestinians was to stop expanding the West Bank settlements. Didn’t the last Administration criticize Israel for the exact same thing in 2003?
http://www.redorbit.com/news/general/6444/abbas_says_israel_must_keep_commitments/index.html
In 2005?
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/05/05/MNM210GO3Q.DTL&type=printable

I repeat the question . . . what about Obama is different than any other President?

Comment by busboy33 — 10/1/2009 @ 7:01 pm
correction:

“subservient” to Saudis . . . not “subversive” to Saudis.

and manning . . .
I hope, with all of the conversations we’ve had here at Rick’s Funtime HappyLand, you know that I do honestly respect your opinion. I may rarely agree with you, but you clearly do think about your ideas and beliefs (unlike many people, both here and elsewhere). There are many people in the world I don’t mind slighting or outright insulting. However, you are not one of them, and if my tenor suggests that sometimes . . . well, I’m a jerk. I try to control it, but sometimes it slips out when I’m on a roll. So if I’m getting rude, it’s not intentional and I’m sorry.

You’re still wrong, though.

Comment by busboy33 — 10/1/2009 @ 11:41 pm
“Conservatives by and large seem to take offense at allegations of racism. ”

Yes, just as Liberals by and large seem to take offense at allegations of being child rapists.

There’s something about incendiery defamations that just gets people’s back up.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 10/2/2009 @ 1:28 pm
Busboy, #37, you misstate completely my point.
I have already agreed with much of Rick Moran’s point.
I have said if someone engages in political hyperbole that is their fault, nobody else’s. That’s individual responsibility, folks on right and left should re-adopt it.

My point has been that the Left has successfully used certain tactics in the past 8 years and prior, and that some on the right are picking up on those tactics. For anyone NOT to see these clear and obvious parallels and borrowings is quite ignorant. It’s whats HAPPENING.

You are free to only condemn right-wingers for frothing in manners that ape what left-wingers were doing in the previous Bush administration if that is your wish.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 10/2/2009 @ 1:36 pm
“The Democrats are closer to old style Goldwater or Eisenhower Republicans. ”

Someone please clue me in on when the Goldwater or Eisenhower Republicans ever:
- Appointed a NAMBLA-supporting radical in charge of ’safe schools’
- Put a guy in favor of race-based quotas in charge of the DOJ
- Decided to mandate/tax everyone in America who chose not to buy health insurance and advocated a huge expansion in the Govt reach into healthcare sectore
- Proposed massive tax increases and regulatory schemes on energy
- passed a Federal budget that swallowed more than a quarter of GDP and adds $9 trillion in deficits, doubling our debt load
- pushed takeovers of car companies and shovelled billions in tax dollars out the door with a giveaway for old cars
- Pushed for bills to be passed hurredly without even reading them
- Called those who disputed portions of his agenda proposals ‘liars’ for daring to point out troubling provisions in them
- Called critics of the President ‘racist’

Democrats in DC today are a clown show of leftists, liberal elitist social engineers, Chicago Boy corrupt operators, and party hacks with knee-jerk animus to ‘flyover’ conservative America. Any resemblance to the reasonableness of either party of 40 years ago is a figment of hope over change.

The Republican right has lose that veneer of politesse and noblesse oblige that made them nice losers to the Democrats. If that’s a vice, it’s a minor one compared to the bullying of the Democrats. And, as Goldwater said “extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice”. He’d be supporting the Tea Party crowd if he was around to witness it.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 10/2/2009 @ 1:57 pm
“The only one that comes immediately to mind was the push for Hillarycare, which was really alarming. Bumbles and Slick were rather terrible Presidents in my view, but they did not set off ist alarms and signs the way or to the same extent Obama has done.”

Dittos on this, 100%.

There is a clear ideological bent to Obama and his administration that was not in evidence in Clinton’s triangulating administration, even though CLinton clearly tacked to the left on some things and put liberals in courts, etc.

It was clear the Democrats THEMSELVES picked up on this, as Obama got Kennedy endorsements and picked up the more progressive/left-wing votes, and Hillary the more ‘traditional Democrat’ votes when the primary became a 1on1 fight.

For Democrats to pretend otherwise NOW - AFTER the LBJ/FDR ‘things won’t be the same again’ claims - is to be too cute by half. They HOPED for Obama to be a major shift to the left for the whole country.

Now, after he has ALREADY proposed the largest power grabs in American history, they are going to pretend he’s not a leftist but a moderate?

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 10/2/2009 @ 2:03 pm
“Republicans: keep seceeding your power to the religious fundamentalists and nuts like Beck, Hannity and Limbaugh. Keep talking about ACORN, Ayers and Wright, and Obamacare.”

Katie: So Republicans talking about ACORN - an organization which these ‘nuts’ have exposed as enablers of illegal activities - makes you support Democrats more?

and Obamacare? So a Republican or conservative pointing out all the taxes, controls, mandates, lack of oversight, lack of CBO scoring, and complete political powermongering to shove this bad bill through the Congress, makes you jump on the bandwagon to support it?

Your comment makes no sense at all. Totally illogical.

Methinks some Obama voters are trying to ex post rationalize their mistaken votes by shutting out criticism of the President. Keep the fingers in your ears, O-philes.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 10/2/2009 @ 2:11 pm
“Fascism and Communism are mutally exclusive, as they occupy opposite ends of the political spectrum.”
That is completely wrong. Fascism=National Socialism and Communism=international socialism. NAZI stood for National Socialist Workers Party.
Under Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin and Mao these forms of govt in operation were twins in the totalitarian firmament.
Both fascism and commnism Featured: one-party rule, control of the media, control of the economy via central planning, youth movements centered around the party, Party operatives in military and govt positions to maintain control, and sending to camps those they disfavored (dissidents, troublemakers, wrong ethnic groups).

” It’s always been very easy to fool people who refuse to educate themselves.”
This is ironically true.

Comment by Freedoms Truth — 10/2/2009 @ 2:18 pm
@FreedomsTruth:

Communism is not the same thing a Socialism.

Comment by busboy33 — 10/2/2009 @ 2:56 pm
FreedomTruths#62:

“My point has been that the Left has successfully used certain tactics in the past 8 years and prior, and that some on the right are picking up on those tactics.

You are free to only condemn right-wingers for frothing in manners that ape what left-wingers were doing in the previous Bush administration if that is your wish.”

So the bad behavior from the Left is because they are the originators of the bad bad behavior. The bad behavior of the Right is aping the bad behavior of the Left — so the behavior from the Right has its genesis in the Left.

Left bad = Left bad.

Right bad = Left bad.

No, I think I read you right.

Comment by busboy33 — 10/2/2009 @ 4:52 pm
It’s reassuring to see there is some intelligence left in your country. The seemingly mainstream Obama bashings and illogical comparissons to communism and nazism have reached us all the way down in Australia, completely baffling us. It’s so refreshing to see someone expressing an opinion rationally.

Comment by Liza — 10/2/2009 @ 9:31 pm
@Freedom Truth, National Socialism was NOT like Communism in that the underlying ideology was very different. I’m well aware of what NSDAP stood for as I speak fluent German. Nazism was a far-right movement–Communism a far left movement. Also, as was pointed out by busboy (#67), socialism is yet another thing. People call Obama a socialist–sadly, he’s not…definitely not.

Comment by Todd — 10/3/2009 @ 12:16 am
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Jules Morrow. Jules Morrow said: An intelligent conservative takes on the OBAMA=HITLER crowd http://bit.ly/19HwBc Sad how much he stands out from the crowd (via @ChasLicc) [...]

Pingback by Tweets that mention Right Wing Nut House » ‘SILENCE EQUALS ASSENT:’ WHY POINTING OUT CONSERVATIVE LUNACY MUST BE DONE -- Topsy.com — 10/3/2009 @ 8:28 am
@FreedomsTruth (one last time):

“I don’t fall for the ‘guilt-by-association’ aka McCarthyism claims, that because the right has a fringe therefore the whole right is wrong. The left has its fringe, the Castro/Chavez-loving crowd, the ‘kill all SUVs’ eco-extremists, the anti-population nuts, the impeach Bush BDS folks, the Socialist Democrats. If the other shoe fits, then the entire Democrat party is a bunch of communists … which gets us back to the kinds of hyperbole you are (rightly) objecting to. ” (comment #3)

“That is no different on the left. You’ve just describe the proggo-sphere in reverse.” (comment #13)

“Some on the right are reading Alinsky and taking the tactics of the left seriously.” (comment #30)

“It’s a wonderful label, and us classical Jeffersonian liberals are ticked off that the leftists and socialists stole it from the real classical liberals way back when. (New Deal era?) Then again, leftists and socialists are natural thieves, hijacking labels left and right.” (comment #31)

I won’t bother with the rest. I have no doubt that what I’m trying to point out is completely escaping you, but perhaps some other readers of this thred might notice what I noticed.

Comment by busboy33 — 10/3/2009 @ 8:48 pm

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