The GOP convention and Isaac

[bae]

Now, my question to you is, how much collateral damage do you want to impose on those of us who point out such things?

History provides us the answer to that as well.

"Let one hundred flowers bloom..."

[Gregg]

I am offended by this and call on the moderators to take action. This is in essence calling the op, and by extension liberals, marxist leninist maoist stalinist communists. I am really sick of the double standard around here and if you want a prime example of toxic and out of bounds rhetoric here it is. I am dead serious about this.

***MOD HAT ON***

Rosebud, the forum rules of etiquette in no way attempt to limit opinion, only personal attacks and directly offensive language related to them. Granting others the right to hold and occasionally voice opinions in opposition to yours is a necessary evil in this open (free?) setting. If you feel the "double standard" applies to the moderation of this forum, or the lack thereof, you are welcome to post examples publicly for all to discuss or to contact me directly or to contact NRM administrators. Until that time I will consider the roughly equal number of comments from each end of the spectrum accusing the mods of imposing said double standards to be evidence that none exist. And the somewhat tongue in cheek exchanges that are common here should, IMO, remain in the harmless and occasionally thought provoking category of banter.

[Gregg]

History provides us the answer to that as well.

"Let one hundred flowers bloom..."

Lol. My Dad always taught me that if snakes are sleeping in caves its best to just stay out of those caves, but then again he was a Libertarian.

[ApatheticNoMore]

rosebud: if you want to fight fire with fire, you make a long post about the horrors of the Pinochet regime (guess you don't, so I will ). While the death toll from Pinochet isn't in the Soviet/Chinese Communist range, the amount killed and tortured (mosly tortured, boy did they love their torture) was over 40k, so it's not small potatoes. Their economic policies were mostly learned from the Chicago school (Milton Freidman and so on). They also had CIA support. And all this because the people might democratically elect a socialist (this is why democracy had to be thrown out the window for a coup), a bloody torturing murderous dictatorship HAD TO be imposed on them to save them from the possibility of left wing dictatorship! Perfectly logical huh? What are you going to do with a bunch of socialists anyway, clearly just kill and torture them. So they killed, tortured, and implemented Republican economics, ah I see. Quite honestly, and I mean this: all those free market Chilean economists COOPERATED with death and torture, in order to implement some free market ideas - there's no excuse for that ever - they have blood on their hands (not theoretical "bloodlust" blood, but REAL blood). Then you post pictures of some dead people with a caption: "Republicans ideas and killing - they go together" (and see other than being a way overextended generalization saying this about Chilie is not untrue strictly speaking is it?). It is sure to garner many LOLs. Oh that's so hilarious, nothing funnier than dictator references. OMG ROFLOL.

Meanwhile back in the present moment, these are some of the lead market economies in our market world: modern (not Mao's) China which is STILL of course a dictatorship and is known to punish political prisoners, and the U.S. which grows more like 1984 (the surveilence etc.) by the day. Wow freedom in bloom all over indeed. I just knew neoliberalism would take us there (snark).

[Yossarian]

rosebud: if you want to fight fire with fire, you make a long post about...

Irrelvant info? Try to focus. As pointed out previously, lots of bad things are done by bad people for a variety of reasons. What happened here is people on this board wished for bad things to occur to other people to further their own political aims. The fact that other people have done bad things for whatever crazy religious or economic motivation doesn't imply anyone here who objects to that has those ambitions, nor does it mitigate the impropriety of the original statement. The debate is not a right/left dichotomy as you have envisioned it. It is between those that would have others suffer to further their political ideas and those who view those views as objectionable. So ironically your post is not a rebuttal but rather another exampe of the same point.

[LDAHL]

One silver lining of the cloudy weather: Joe Biden has cancelled his trip to "the belly of the beast" (http://spectator.org/archives/2012/0...sh-distraction).

[ApatheticNoMore]

The debate is not between some right/left dichotomy as you have envisioned it

So then statements like this (that were used directly with the pictures): "Pfffftt!! Anyone who'd let a little collateral damage ruin their blood lust is not worthy of their progressive bona fides!" aren't really meant to have any left/right meaning? I just invented a left/right dichotomy out of whole cloth if I saw progressives as meaning those on the left? (actually that term is used mostly to mean "Obama supporters" these days which is why I'd stay miles away from it, but that's another story, twasn't me who introduced the term here). Well I think that's self-evidently absurd, so I don't know what argument I can make against things that are on the face of them ridiculous (ie progressive really doesn't introduce a political dynamic etc.).

[ljevtich]

My first thought on the hurricane and the convention when I first heard of it was actually: well if climate change is supposed to make hurricanes more likely and more virrulent then maybe it will get that party to take climate change more seriously! (in truth both parties, the Democrats talk a good game, possibly lesser evil, but especially with the President it's mostly talk - we know Romeny is for it but does anyone know where Obama really stands on the keystone pipeline, I know he's delayed it until after the election but ...). So climate change, that's my first thought on hurricanes and politics but I guess noone elses first thought on the matter of hurricanes and politics. The amount of hurricanes was actually pretty low this year, lower than average, which no does not disprove man made climate change much less climate change as such given all the other data on everything else (like actual record temperature data).

The hurricane season is really, just getting started. And NOAA has changed the prediction level mid-season, to increase the amounts of hurricanes.

I too thought that the Repubs might change their tune when a hurricane disrupts their convention, that maybe they would wake up to the fact that there are new normals now, huge droughts, massive rain, warmer temps in the winter, more bugs moving in, and therefore more wildfires. But no, they keep going with the same old same old. Yet the science is staring them in the face, but they do not either care or want to believe.

I rarely go on the Policy forums but if you notice, it seems to have the most pages of conversations.

But it does look like Louisiana is going to be hit again, not really Florida. But my friends in Everglades had to get out at least for today and tomorrow. Then they will go back in, clean up and work.

The Repubs Convention will go on, but they will be sharing the air time with those listening in about the hurricane. Hopefully it will just be a Category 1, not too painful for anyone, and give some needed rain for those that need it. At least that is what I hope for.

[ljevtich]

Oh and Bae - where are those "indoor" gardens? Pretty neat picture!

[Yossarian]

So then statements like this (that were used directly with the pictures): "Pfffftt!! Anyone who'd let a little collateral damage ruin their blood lust is not worthy of their progressive bona fides!" aren't really meant to have any left/right meaning?

I took them as merely contextual to the people who were making the asinine comments, not a statement that all liberals or progressives hold those views. YMMV.