I think that the internet has been for years on the path to creating what is essentially an electronic Necronomicon: A collection of blasphemous unrealities so perverse that to even glimpse at its contents, if but for a moment, is to irrevocably forfeit a portion of your sanity.
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Irond WillWARNING: NO HURTFUL COMMENTS, PLEASE!!!!!Cambridge. MAModeratormod
I can see how Biden came off sounding arrogant to you guys, but he also impressed me as knowing what he was talking about.
Imagine with me. A competent President. Is America ready for such a thing?
Well, this is basically what Kerry was running on. It didn't really seem to catch the country on fire.
Because Kerry became Bush-lite during the national election, especially on foreign policy. Watch him on Meet The Press from '04, pretty much all he talks about is how "tough on terror" he would be. He also fell into Rove's framing trap. When asked about his liberal record, instead of saying "there's nothing wrong with my record" which was pretty much all he had to do, he said "No, no, I don't have a liberal record." Implying that "liberal" is a bad word. He also got blindsided by the flip-flopper and swift-boat accusations in a manner most unbecoming of any competant politicians (again, simple issues that should have been cleared up immediately, but gained authenticity in the eyes of the public thanks to campaign floundering and ineptitude).
Stupid democrats ><
I missed the debate, sadly, about to start the mp3.
Irond WillWARNING: NO HURTFUL COMMENTS, PLEASE!!!!!Cambridge. MAModeratormod
edited December 2007
That swiftboating and childish playground shit like "flip-flopper" and "serial exaggerator" and "liberal" is tough to competently eliminate. Republicans have been using it to good effect since probably Carter 1980, and it's depressingly effective. I'm not going to say that Kerry handled it well, but it's really a rougher trap than it immediately appears.
Wow, NPR owned the candidates on the Chinese toys issue:
"So far, in 2007, far fewer than 1/100th of one percent of China's toys exports to the U.S. have been recalled. A majority of the recalled toys had U.S.-made design problems, not Chinese-made manufacturing problems. There has not been a single publicly known instance of a child being killed or even made ill by Chinese-made toys. In short, it's hard to see exactly why this issue has risen to the level of such intense presidential-candidate scrutiny. China does make about 80 percent of U.S. toys.
A total ban on Chinese-made toy exports would probably mean severe shortages of toys in the U.S. for some time, as capacity is built elsewhere. In times of severe shortage, markets generally become so distorted that black markets appear and safety standards disappear. Banning Chinese-made toys would almost certainly lead to a huge rise in unsafe toys."
I never really understood what happened with Kerry. He slaughtered Bush three times in debate. He was a good speaker. He was a fucking war hero. And America should have already known exactly how shitty a President Bush was.
Too much "communists olol" rhetoric being flung around, and Bush had some extremely ardent supporters.
Wonder_Hippie on
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Irond WillWARNING: NO HURTFUL COMMENTS, PLEASE!!!!!Cambridge. MAModeratormod
edited December 2007
Also, living in "Serious Times" with a losing war going on and huge governmental ineptitude wasn't enough to whet the appetite of "swing voters" for childish character attacks.
Bush was a sitting President in a time of war. Not being re-elected would have been unprecedented. The fact that it was so close is pretty astonishing for Kerry. Also, most of the major snafu's are recent revelations. Katrina, Gonzo-gate, &c. weren't there in '04.
That's true. If you weren't paying atttention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that terrible. If you were, you were trying to cockslap the people that weren't, because fuck them for the past four years.
That's true. If you weren't paying atttention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that terrible. If you were, you were trying to cockslap the people that weren't, because fuck them for the past four years.
Even if you were paying attention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that bad unless you were a liberal. He made good on many conservative promises domestically, and the war at that point still seemed very winnable. Now, if you want to say that Bush's first term was horrible for left-wing principles, fine. But the idea that Bush was so objectively bad his first term that only a complete idiot could've missed that fact is just lazy revisionism.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
That's true. If you weren't paying atttention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that terrible. If you were, you were trying to cockslap the people that weren't, because fuck them for the past four years.
Even if you were paying attention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that bad unless you were a liberal. He made good on many conservative promises domestically, and the war at that point still seemed very winnable. Now, if you want to say that Bush's first term was horrible for left-wing principles, fine. But the idea that Bush was so objectively bad his first term that only a complete idiot could've missed that fact is just lazy revisionism.
Really, Bush's second term has been invaluable for me. It's not often you get to see core ideologies perfectly implemented in policy. Watching many bedrock conservative policies crash and burn was fairly informative. While it didn't shake any of my basic principles, it sure as fuck shook my ideas about the best way to convert them into actions.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
That's true. If you weren't paying atttention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that terrible. If you were, you were trying to cockslap the people that weren't, because fuck them for the past four years.
Even if you were paying attention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that bad unless you were a liberal. He made good on many conservative promises domestically, and the war at that point still seemed very winnable. Now, if you want to say that Bush's first term was horrible for left-wing principles, fine. But the idea that Bush was so objectively bad his first term that only a complete idiot could've missed that fact is just lazy revisionism.
I'm not saying idiots missed it. Lots of idiots pay attention to politics. I was just trying to say that, if you weren't concerned with politics at the time, it seemed fine.
But yeah, it probably only felt so terrible because I became so liberal during his first term.
That's true. If you weren't paying atttention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that terrible. If you were, you were trying to cockslap the people that weren't, because fuck them for the past four years.
Even if you were paying attention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that bad unless you were a liberal. He made good on many conservative promises domestically, and the war at that point still seemed very winnable. Now, if you want to say that Bush's first term was horrible for left-wing principles, fine. But the idea that Bush was so objectively bad his first term that only a complete idiot could've missed that fact is just lazy revisionism.
I'm not saying idiots missed it. Lots of idiots pay attention to politics. I was just trying to say that, if you weren't concerned with politics at the time, it seemed fine.
But yeah, it probably only felt so terrible because I became so liberal during his first term.
I think a lot of people became liberal during his first term.
George Bush is extremely responsible for me being a straight ticket voting Democrat.
No, the preservation of individual rights is a core part of conservative philosophy. It's just that most modern "conservatives" really aren't.
Another core feature of conservatism is a fair share of pragmatism and favor for what works over what sounds nice. Something like, say, the ban of automatic weapons is a very conservative position, because it recognizes that while the right to own a gun is valuable, a prevalence of automatic weapons is stupid and results in more harm than good.
Social conservatism in its modern implementation isn't very conservative at all. And fiscal conservatism nowadays is just code for "let's spend a fuckload of money and cut taxes because Laffer Laffer olol".
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
BTW, just one question - was your name chosen from the band, the software tool, the city, or the musical?
I chose it years ago before the internet was huge as a character name for some short story. I was looking up words in a foreign language - English dictionary I believe (I can't remember what language - Turkish maybe). Anyway, I had no idea at the time that the word was in usage in English. When I did find out, I just decided not to change it. And yes, using some weird word I found as a translation seemed like a good idea to a middle-school student.
I thought Bush's term became a disaster the minute he announced he wanted to invade Iraq. It seemed obviously disastrous to me.
Ditto. Hell I was in High School and even I was like "Waitaminute, how are an ethnically segmented people completely unfamiliar with contemporary democracy and conditioned by an authoritative regime supposed to both establish and maintain their own government?"
Part of me hoped that the people in the administration were smarter than I was, or that they had some piece of magical information that I didn't. The part of me that knew that all wasn't true was deeply saddened when it realized it was right.
No, the preservation of individual rights is a core part of conservative philosophy. It's just that most modern "conservatives" really aren't.
Another core feature of conservatism is a fair share of pragmatism and favor for what works over what sounds nice. Something like, say, the ban of automatic weapons is a very conservative position, because it recognizes that while the right to own a gun is valuable, a prevalence of automatic weapons is stupid and results in more harm than good.
Social conservatism in its modern implementation isn't very conservative at all. And fiscal conservatism nowadays is just code for "let's spend a fuckload of money and cut taxes because Laffer Laffer olol".
ITT Jeff tries to hang on to conservatism by defining as whatever makes sense to him.
Man, I've pretty much always defined conservatism like that.
Moreover, nothing I said there is in opposition to Kirk's six canons of conservatism.
So, like, neener.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
Man, I've pretty much always defined conservatism like that.
Moreover, nothing I said there is in opposition to Kirk's six canons of conservatism.
So, like, neener.
Maybe you didn't get the memo, Jeffe, but on September 12th, 2001, they changed the definition of "conservatism." It now reads:
con·serv·a·tism /kənˈsɜrvəˌtɪzəm/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[kuhn-sur-vuh-tiz-uhm] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1. America! Fuck yeah! So lick my butt, and suck on my balls.
2. America! Fuck yeah! What you gonna do when we come for you now?
Another core feature of conservatism is a fair share of pragmatism and favor for what works over what sounds nice. Something like, say, the ban of automatic weapons is a very conservative position, because it recognizes that while the right to own a gun is valuable, a prevalence of automatic weapons is stupid and results in more harm than good.
Conservatism has no definition beyond its opposition to liberalism. As liberalism evolves, conservatism evolves to oppose it.
Also, I disagree completely with your characterization of the assault weapons ban, but would agree that it is naturally a conservative position. The positions around gun control are weirdly reversed because of an accident of demographics.
Conservatism has no definition beyond its opposition to liberalism. As liberalism evolves, conservatism evolves to oppose it.
I'd have to say that, for the longest time, this wasn't true. The Conservative values during the turn of the century (which, to me, is the time when the two ideologies started actually, you know, being different) was a lot more moderate by todays standards. Back when religiousness was a bad thing, you had all sorts of pluralist governments. What I'm trying to say is that that's what conservatism has become in America, but that's not the way it has to be.
Another core feature of conservatism is a fair share of pragmatism and favor for what works over what sounds nice. Something like, say, the ban of automatic weapons is a very conservative position, because it recognizes that while the right to own a gun is valuable, a prevalence of automatic weapons is stupid and results in more harm than good.
Conservatism has no definition beyond its opposition to liberalism. As liberalism evolves, conservatism evolves to oppose it.
The same could easily be said of liberalism. You can't have an avante garde/counter culture without a status quo to charge ahead of/rebel against and abloo bloo bloo.
Another core feature of conservatism is a fair share of pragmatism and favor for what works over what sounds nice. Something like, say, the ban of automatic weapons is a very conservative position, because it recognizes that while the right to own a gun is valuable, a prevalence of automatic weapons is stupid and results in more harm than good.
Conservatism has no definition beyond its opposition to liberalism. As liberalism evolves, conservatism evolves to oppose it.
Also, I disagree completely with your characterization of the assault weapons ban, but would agree that it is naturally a conservative position. The positions around gun control are weirdly reversed because of an accident of demographics.
That's true. If you weren't paying atttention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that terrible. If you were, you were trying to cockslap the people that weren't, because fuck them for the past four years.
Even if you were paying attention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that bad unless you were a liberal. He made good on many conservative promises domestically, and the war at that point still seemed very winnable. Now, if you want to say that Bush's first term was horrible for left-wing principles, fine. But the idea that Bush was so objectively bad his first term that only a complete idiot could've missed that fact is just lazy revisionism.
I agree.
Perhaps, I feel that it was obvious what a fucking fake he was even from the conservative perspective. He is conservative only as long as it doesn't hurt big business.
About the Bush thing, remember that a lot of the scandals and troubles really started building up after he was reelected.
He was scandalizing just 10 days after he got into office. And you can bet your sweet ass that he had plans long before he ever became president to do so.
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Meet Barack Obama
BTW, just one question - was your name chosen from the band, the software tool, the city, or the musical?
If you ever need to talk to someone, feel free to message me. Yes, that includes you.
Well, this is basically what Kerry was running on. It didn't really seem to catch the country on fire.
The format was wonderful, no strict time limits, moderators that actually called people on BS and a definite decrease in pandering among candidates.
Too bad it won't happen.
Because Kerry became Bush-lite during the national election, especially on foreign policy. Watch him on Meet The Press from '04, pretty much all he talks about is how "tough on terror" he would be. He also fell into Rove's framing trap. When asked about his liberal record, instead of saying "there's nothing wrong with my record" which was pretty much all he had to do, he said "No, no, I don't have a liberal record." Implying that "liberal" is a bad word. He also got blindsided by the flip-flopper and swift-boat accusations in a manner most unbecoming of any competant politicians (again, simple issues that should have been cleared up immediately, but gained authenticity in the eyes of the public thanks to campaign floundering and ineptitude).
Stupid democrats ><
I missed the debate, sadly, about to start the mp3.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
They posted fact checks on some of the claims the candidates made, which is cool.
This more or less guarantees that Republicans will refuse to show up to any NPR debates.
"So far, in 2007, far fewer than 1/100th of one percent of China's toys exports to the U.S. have been recalled. A majority of the recalled toys had U.S.-made design problems, not Chinese-made manufacturing problems. There has not been a single publicly known instance of a child being killed or even made ill by Chinese-made toys. In short, it's hard to see exactly why this issue has risen to the level of such intense presidential-candidate scrutiny. China does make about 80 percent of U.S. toys.
A total ban on Chinese-made toy exports would probably mean severe shortages of toys in the U.S. for some time, as capacity is built elsewhere. In times of severe shortage, markets generally become so distorted that black markets appear and safety standards disappear. Banning Chinese-made toys would almost certainly lead to a huge rise in unsafe toys."
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
Hurr that Kerry he's a flip-flopper hurr.
Even if you were paying attention, Bush '00 to '04 wasn't that bad unless you were a liberal. He made good on many conservative promises domestically, and the war at that point still seemed very winnable. Now, if you want to say that Bush's first term was horrible for left-wing principles, fine. But the idea that Bush was so objectively bad his first term that only a complete idiot could've missed that fact is just lazy revisionism.
I agree.
I'm not saying idiots missed it. Lots of idiots pay attention to politics. I was just trying to say that, if you weren't concerned with politics at the time, it seemed fine.
But yeah, it probably only felt so terrible because I became so liberal during his first term.
I think a lot of people became liberal during his first term.
George Bush is extremely responsible for me being a straight ticket voting Democrat.
Magic Online - Bertro
Am I missing something or is the preservation of individual rights and checks & balances pretty much a core part of conservative ideology?
Another core feature of conservatism is a fair share of pragmatism and favor for what works over what sounds nice. Something like, say, the ban of automatic weapons is a very conservative position, because it recognizes that while the right to own a gun is valuable, a prevalence of automatic weapons is stupid and results in more harm than good.
Social conservatism in its modern implementation isn't very conservative at all. And fiscal conservatism nowadays is just code for "let's spend a fuckload of money and cut taxes because Laffer Laffer olol".
Meet Barack Obama
Ditto. Hell I was in High School and even I was like "Waitaminute, how are an ethnically segmented people completely unfamiliar with contemporary democracy and conditioned by an authoritative regime supposed to both establish and maintain their own government?"
Part of me hoped that the people in the administration were smarter than I was, or that they had some piece of magical information that I didn't. The part of me that knew that all wasn't true was deeply saddened when it realized it was right.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
ITT Jeff tries to hang on to conservatism by defining as whatever makes sense to him.
Moreover, nothing I said there is in opposition to Kirk's six canons of conservatism.
So, like, neener.
con·serv·a·tism /kənˈsɜrvəˌtɪzəm/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[kuhn-sur-vuh-tiz-uhm] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1. America! Fuck yeah! So lick my butt, and suck on my balls.
2. America! Fuck yeah! What you gonna do when we come for you now?
Also, I disagree completely with your characterization of the assault weapons ban, but would agree that it is naturally a conservative position. The positions around gun control are weirdly reversed because of an accident of demographics.
I'd have to say that, for the longest time, this wasn't true. The Conservative values during the turn of the century (which, to me, is the time when the two ideologies started actually, you know, being different) was a lot more moderate by todays standards. Back when religiousness was a bad thing, you had all sorts of pluralist governments. What I'm trying to say is that that's what conservatism has become in America, but that's not the way it has to be.
The same could easily be said of liberalism. You can't have an avante garde/counter culture without a status quo to charge ahead of/rebel against and abloo bloo bloo.
I'm pretty sure that's exactly what Hayek argued.
No, they were building up before he was re-elected. They blew up afterwards.
PSN ID : HBoxx
Perhaps, I feel that it was obvious what a fucking fake he was even from the conservative perspective. He is conservative only as long as it doesn't hurt big business.
If you were in the non-retarded region of the political spectrum, this is pretty much where you gave the Bush administration the finger.
He was scandalizing just 10 days after he got into office. And you can bet your sweet ass that he had plans long before he ever became president to do so.
And then there's this.