Sorry mon frer. But the Constitution that you held your hand up and swore to protect covers everybody. It covers the speech of the deluded and the ignorant just as much as it covers the novel and the brilliant. And saying that we should run leftists out of town -- sounds frighteningly like what Pol Pot and his ilk did. First get rid of the ideologically impure, then the teachers, then the police... anyone who would oppose them or contradict them about little matters like fact
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Sorry mon frer. But the Constitution that you held your hand up and swore to protect covers everybody. It covers the speech of the deluded and the ignorant just as much as it covers the novel and the brilliant. And saying that we should run leftists out of town -- sounds frighteningly like what Pol Pot and his ilk did. First get rid of the ideologically impure, then the teachers, then the police... anyone who would oppose them or contradict them about little matters like fact.
I did not recommend violating anybody's Constitutional rights. One does not have a Constitutional right to a job with a major university or media outlet. Still less does one have a Constitutional right to keep on winning elections or gaining appointments to office. If firing people "sounds frighteningly like what Pol Pot and his ilk did," then you have read a very sanitized version of his atrocities, indeed
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Sure, what you say is true - nobody has a right to any sort of employment whatsoever. Hey, we can take this a step further too and tell every company that does business with the govt that if they wish to keep doing govt business, they'll fire everyone of their employees who are in the Republican party. Ooops, I meant fire everyone whose in the Democratic party. Actually, both will be right depending on who is in charge that particular date I suppose. But hey, if it's okay for you to do it to X then it's okay when X does it to you. Fair is fair is fair
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Sure, what you say is true - nobody has a right to any sort of employment whatsoever. Hey, we can take this a step further too and tell every company that does business with the govt that if they wish to keep doing govt business, they'll fire everyone of their employees who are in the Republican party. Ooops, I meant fire everyone whose in the Democratic party. Actually, both will be right depending on who is in charge that particular date I suppose. But hey, if it's okay for you to do it to X then it's okay when X does it to you. Fair is fair is fair.
Yes, we can do these things- we, that is, you and I as individuals. We can tell these companies whatever we want, and spend our money in ways to incentivize them to listen.
It looks like you're reading Jordan as encouraging the government to do these things via force of law, which is not at all what I understand him to be saying. Is that true, or am I misreading you?
We don't laugh people out of town the way we should.
When Obama talked about 'spreading the wealth' to Joe the Plumber, he should have been laughed out of town and not received another primary vote of any kind.
Once again, the vote came down to shit and crap. A lot of voters who normally would have voted for McCain voted for Obama because Sarah Palin made them say, "Oh, HELL no!" to the McCain option.
Now, when people say, "A lot of voters/feminists/liberals do X," I usually challenge them with, "Name two." (I used to say "Name six" but that never worked out. George Will, William Buckley Jr, and at least one editor of the "National Review" said they were voting for Obama for this reason. So get your head out of your butt; the GOP did this to themselves.
... there was a time (within the lifetime of my parents) when all of these ideas would have seemed alien, absurd, and repulsive to most people - at best, the beliefs of a nutty left-wing fringe, and at worst instruments of deliberate subversion intended to destroy the American way of life.
What do the rest of you think?
I remain optimistic. I cannot think why. Perhaps it's force of habit.
It's in the bone, deep in the marrow, it ain't coming out: we'll have it with us until we die.d
The up-coming elections will put a check on the trend. People like you will sing out the truth.
Unfortunately, optimism tends to rob one of the urgency needed to drive one on to fix the problem. Not pessimism, nor yet optimism, but a determined focus on what must be done is in order. Jordan provides that in this post, for which thank God and Jordan.
How about mocking all the idiots into oblivion, no matter what ideology they espouse? This election cycle is really bringing home the truth that human stupidity is truly bottomless.
Jordan, I concur with you that "postmodern" thought is idiotic. However, postmodernism itself was a 1990's fad that has since been discredited and relegated to the fringes of academia, the left-wing blogosphere, and some of the nuttier fringes of the New Age. (When I say "postmodernism," I mean the idea that every idea is equal to every other idea. Taken to its logical conclusion, ideas like "We must not judge what Hitler did, because judgment is wrong" are spewed up.)
Raymond has some fantastic moments of moral lucidity. As do Christopher Hitchens and Steven Den Beste, on the rare occasion he essays.
I believe all three are pretty firm atheists, so they may be dismayed to discover that Christian Revivalism is likely the only force that will likely keep America out of the brink.
We're seeing the beginnings of a close cousin to Christian revival, the related revival of the American Civic Religion, whose core tenant, you could say, is that God is on the side of the American Way.
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I did not recommend violating anybody's Constitutional rights. One does not have a Constitutional right to a job with a major university or media outlet. Still less does one have a Constitutional right to keep on winning elections or gaining appointments to office. If firing people "sounds frighteningly like what Pol Pot and his ilk did," then you have read a very sanitized version of his atrocities, indeed ( ... )
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Yes, we can do these things- we, that is, you and I as individuals. We can tell these companies whatever we want, and spend our money in ways to incentivize them to listen.
It looks like you're reading Jordan as encouraging the government to do these things via force of law, which is not at all what I understand him to be saying. Is that true, or am I misreading you?
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We don't laugh enough.
We don't laugh people out of town the way we should.
When Obama talked about 'spreading the wealth' to Joe the Plumber, he should have been laughed out of town and not received another primary vote of any kind.
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Alex, I'd like racism for $1,000.
Once again, the vote came down to shit and crap. A lot of voters who normally would have voted for McCain voted for Obama because Sarah Palin made them say, "Oh, HELL no!" to the McCain option.
Now, when people say, "A lot of voters/feminists/liberals do X," I usually challenge them with, "Name two." (I used to say "Name six" but that never worked out. George Will, William Buckley Jr, and at least one editor of the "National Review" said they were voting for Obama for this reason. So get your head out of your butt; the GOP did this to themselves.
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What do the rest of you think?
I remain optimistic. I cannot think why. Perhaps it's force of habit.
It's in the bone, deep in the marrow, it ain't coming out: we'll have it with us until we die.d
The up-coming elections will put a check on the trend. People like you will sing out the truth.
It will be a moment in the fall.
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Jordan, I concur with you that "postmodern" thought is idiotic. However, postmodernism itself was a 1990's fad that has since been discredited and relegated to the fringes of academia, the left-wing blogosphere, and some of the nuttier fringes of the New Age. (When I say "postmodernism," I mean the idea that every idea is equal to every other idea. Taken to its logical conclusion, ideas like "We must not judge what Hitler did, because judgment is wrong" are spewed up.)
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I believe all three are pretty firm atheists, so they may be dismayed to discover that Christian Revivalism is likely the only force that will likely keep America out of the brink.
We're seeing the beginnings of a close cousin to Christian revival, the related revival of the American Civic Religion, whose core tenant, you could say, is that God is on the side of the American Way.
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