How this: The reason conservatives are winning elections these days is because for the most part, conservatives seem to take national defense and the war on terrorism seriously, and for the most part leftists do not take these things seriously.

And I don't even have a degree from UCal!

Make sure it all goes to the cause, don't use it for administration, communication, infrastructure, or career development.

Fair point, I guess. The media does it for them.

'We're giving you $25,000, but don't waste a penny of it.

Are we talking about the same Left?

Ahh, so it is the conservatives who don't give a hoot about the details of spending and the liberals who are the watchdogs.

All these years I thought it was the other way around.

so they spend "several million" on "tv studios" and intellectuals. God knows the left is practically devoid of people who consider themselves intellectual.

Maybe this guy is pissed off because no one is paying him for his opinion, although im sure he spends more time refining opinions than paying attention to his actual job as professor in linguistics. Hoked on ebonics, anyone?

Republicans are from Mars, Democrats are from Venus!

Wow, the left has truly lost it.

George Lakoff, The Richard & Rhoda Goldman Distinguished Professor in the College of Letters & Science says:

Even the new Center for American Progress, the think tank that John Podesta [former chief of staff for the Clinton administration] is setting up, is not dedicated to this at all. I asked Podesta who was going to do the Center's framing. He got a blank look, thought for a second and then said, "You!" Which meant they haven't thought about it at all.

ROTFL! Meaning if they had thought about it they would have chosen someone else?

Gee George for someone who is a self-proclaimed genius at "framing" you sure fucked that one up.

Like I said before, Thanks for the link Jewels (aka Julian). Is it any wonder why the "progressive" think tanks stink?

#6 NC

Dhimmicrats are from Mianus.

I thought it was illegal to smoke that stuff in California without a Doctors prescription.

So facts, eloquently put, are better than emotions during a debate? Who would have thought that?

I loved the part about progressives seeing people as basically good; this is hilarious, given that so much of the PC agenda assumes that people are inherently racist, seixst, etc., and must be purged of these harmful traits through reeducation.

#6 NC

Republicans are from Mars, Democrats are from Venus!

More like, Republicans are from Earth, and Democrats are from some planet in a distant galaxy where lizardoids run the place.

The Left (TM)'s highest value is helping people who need help?

That must be why they are so good at creating so many people who need help.

It's only a matter of time before some LLL discovers that the conservative onslaught is being funded by the Jooos...

Its the same old "I FEEL your pain" vs. the "let's get something DONE" comparison. The left thinks that if you feel the right way and say the right words, then that's it, mission completed.

kayawanee (#13),

and Democrats are from some planet in a distant galaxy where lizardoids run the place.

Yes, the Democrats were pests that stowed away we we came to this galaxy (hence our desire to eradicate them), but you don't have to tell everyone. :-)

Well he's right, the conservative "strict father" business ethic is more effective than a "progressive" approach.

"set aside money to buy a lot of books to get them on the best-seller lists"

Yeah, that's right. The only reason that books by conservative writers are on the best seller lists is that think tanks buy up all the copies before they go to the stores. No one ever actually buys them and reads them, right?

/sarcasm.

I wonder how many tinfoil hats this guy has in his closet.

In a twisted way, this Professor may be correct to some extent.

He may well have identified yet another reason why Liberal thinking is a failure. His thesis basically posits that Conservatives build on structure, and Liberals build on feelings.

Of course, he has applied his own value judgement to it (structure bad, feelings good), but that's just his Liberal bias.

Yup, I think I agree with this professor. Structure is more lasting than feelings.

It's always a hoot when leftist intellectuals reveal their bigotry with cheap shots and academic elucidation when trying to outline what the "average American" is thinking.

In their pointless efforts to dissect, compartmentalize and understand a population outside the Berkley circles, they can only come up with an explaination such as this. God forbid they turn that methodology and examination skills on themselves. What could they learn about their own subculture, these guardians of academia?

But what do I know? I'm just some yokel from Texas!

"[conservative foundations]...buy a lot of books to get them on the best-seller lists.."

I call shenanigans on this as well as most of his other points. He's just spouting off, with his triple double half-caf latte in his hand.

Getting tenure apparently means never having to reconsider the assumptions underlying your increasingly untenable worldview.

This is an example of academic endeavor on a par with Koran memorization.

This is an example of academic endeavor on a par with Koran memorization.

Classic! I love it.

I wish George Lakoff's father would tell him to shut up and stop talking like a girl.

OT --

Military historian John Keegan live on C-SPAN II for 3 hours, taking phone calls. It just started.

Watch online here...

[Link: www.c-span.org...]

Wonder how Prof. Moonbat's gonna "frame" this little tidbit:

New York City crime levels drop to 1963 levels:

[Link: news.bbc.co.uk...]

Under two Republican "strict father" mayors.

Of course, Professor Moonbat doesn't care, because he doesn't have to live in a high-crime neighborhood. Only all those poor people he's itching to "nurture" have to suffer under the "progressive" pro-criminal agenda.

Strict Father?

What a silly way to characterize government. It just goes to show you that liberals are so out of touch, they think conservative voters see the government as any kind of parent at all.

It's actually, do you want a "nurturant parent" in charge, or a "government" in charge that builds roads, keeps the peace, and otherwise stays off your back?

I don't think the word "nurture" actually appears in the constitutition, does it?

I love to see the intellectually enlightened, such as in academia, seeethe about the cunning of evil conservatives and ignorance of the great unwashed. It's amusing.

The sad thing is, he probably thinks he's really clever "framing" the government like a country club, "framing" Arnold as nothing more than a strict father figure, "framing" conservative book success as dishonest.

What an idiot.

And there isn't any "left-wing" talk radio because as someone said "any trucker with a cell phone can shoot their arguments full of holes."

28 Rube 11/2/2003 09:25AM PST

It just goes to show you that liberals are so out of touch, they think conservative voters see the government as any kind of parent at all.

That is Liberal framing. Government is the "parent."

And we need to accept that as fact, and decide if we want a strict father or nurturant mommy. Those are your choices.

The problem is that the leftist vaginocracy is dominated by feelings, whereas calssical liberalism (now known as conservatism) is dominated by thought. Therefore, when the vaginocracy tries to analyze itself, it is reduced to using feelings to analyze feelings, which is known to you married men out there as "hell," a place where logic and reason are powerless.

There are a lot of really evil people out there who want to kill us. The Left wants to appease them, which will not work. The Right, whatever its other failings, understands evil when it sees it and wants to fight back. Until the Left accepts this basic reality, it will get its ass kicked as it did in 1972, 1980, 1984 and 1988.

which is known to you married men out there as "hell,"

LOL

#20 Neo_Con

In a twisted way, this Professor may be correct to some extent.

Have to agree. The extent is fairly minimal, but it's there nonetheless.

#10 john clark

I thought it was illegal to smoke that stuff in California without a Doctors prescription.

Smoking, nothing. I think our man Lakoff has been drinking house paint.

-dg

#10 john clark 11/2/2003 09:01AM PST

I thought it was illegal to smoke that stuff in California without a Doctors prescription.

Do you know Israel_Commando?

This startling piece of news just in from the bbc

"France, in actuality, is smoking Marlboro Lights - or perhaps Superkings - and watching awful telly."

Hugh Schofield, in an article on the choice of a new Marianne

And we Americans thought the French read Voltaire, went to see plays by Racine, and afterwards sat in cafes discussing Sartre or Fanon.

Turns out, sans the cigarettes, they're just like us. Now if they could just substitute nachos for those butts and stop thinking of Israel as a "shitty little country" and...

Also, did everyone notice that Mr. Lakoff had his photo taken at the Free Speech Movement Cafe?

It's a good thing, too: Anywhere else, those devious conservatives could have stolen his language and oppressed him with it.

-dg

wotta pack of loons, neh?

38 dexter green 11/2/2003 09:39AM PST

Also, did everyone notice that Mr. Lakoff had his photo taken at the Free Speech Movement Cafe?

It's ironic that he'd be at a cafe with that name considering he's a professor at Berkeley, the seat of pc language control.

Lakoff says – “Meanwhile, liberals' conceptual system of the "nurturant parent" has as its highest value “helping individuals who need help.”

Leftists and socialists care about helping the poor and underprivileged, but they don’t care about the victims of crime or terrorism. In Europe, labor unions trash the economy and terrorize the population. The crime rates are rising, and their cities have more graffiti than a subway station. The government shows more sympathy to the aggressors than to the victims, especially if the bullies are in one of the favored 'oppressed' groups.

These attitudes have always been there, in the European and American left, but they’ve become really obvious lately. That’s why people have been turning away from the left – it’s obvious that they don’t care about helping a larger part of the population - the potential victims of terrorism. Not a very nurturant parent at all.

Pretty funny article. Well, this strict father would like to warn all his children to avoid contributions to PBS and don't pay to see the new movie starring Penn and Robbins. Because it seems to me a lot of nurturing parents are pouring money into the media cesspool.

With this kind of mental masturbation, he should change his nme from Lakoff to Jakoff.

I saw one study that stated that in the last 5000 years, there have been about 15,000 wars, during which about 3 billion people have been killed.

But wait a minute! That can't be! People are born good! Not violent! They just need to be nurtured!

I would love to see VDH debate this starry-eyed idealist from Berkeley.

Does his strict father = Repubicans and nurturing parent = Dhimmicrats formula mean that the LLL are all a bunch of momma's boys?

32 Bob G -

Hilarious and beautifully put.

#42, David2

I did see the new Penn-Robbins film, but only because it was directed by Republican "Strict Father" Clint Eastwood.

A little slow, not bad though.

#25 BobG LOL! Awesome :-) My dad used to say that to me--and I am a girl! still LOL

#42 mary

The government shows more sympathy to the aggressors than to the victims, especially if the bullies are in one of the favored 'oppressed' groups.

An aunt of mine lives in Belgium. A neighbour of hers was burgled five times in a year. One night, he hears sounds downstairs, takes his shotgun and shoots the burglar in the leg.

He's been in prison for three years, for "attempted manslaughter" (oxymoron?).

wordwarp:

Does his strict father = Repubicans and nurturing parent = Dhimmicrats formula mean that the LLL are all a bunch of momma's boys?

Yes, the LLL forms the nefarious VAGINOCRACY that imagines it is being oppressed, when it is actually oppressing us all. For it is written: when government does something FOR you, it does something TO you.

#41, mary

"Leftists and socialists care about helping the poor and underprivileged, but they don't care about the victims of crime or terrorism."

True. But would it also be true to say:

"Conservatives care about the victims of crime and terrorism, but they don't give much of a damn about helping the poor and underprvileged?"

Shouldnt true conservatives, to conserve what's best in Western civilization, care about both? I don't see too many who do, and I think that is a pity.

BobG---hey, hey, hey! I'm the rational one in my family;maybe that's what my dad was up to--trying to do a brother a favor :-)

Therefore, when the vaginocracy tries to analyze itself, it is reduced to using feelings to analyze feelings, which is known to you married men out there as "hell," a place where logic and reason are powerless.

#48 Colt

I'm almost afraid to ask, but ... what happened to the burglar?

#52 Thom

The victim of that atrocious attack walked.

Limped, would be more accurate ;-)

#50

Nothing has lifted more people out of poverty than the discovery of how wealth is created in a free society. Nothingh else comes close.

vaginocracy

Like a theocracy, only... ;-)

Colt (#48),

That's truly disheartening.

And I'm assuming the perpetrator is on full disability for life?

50 observer 11/2/2003 09:51AM PST

Shouldnt true conservatives, to conserve what's best in Western civilization, care about both? I don't see too many who do, and I think that is a pity.

If you have FRAMED "helping the poor and underprivileged" as creating bloated government programs, then you win.

But Read Marvin Olasky's book, "The Tragedy of American Compassion", and see how conservatives have frame "helping the poor".

Both libs and conservatives are moral, it's the methods on which we disagree.

Remember, it's about FRAMING.

#48 Colt

An aunt of mine lives in Belgium. A neighbour of hers was burgled five times in a year. One night, he hears sounds downstairs, takes his shotgun and shoots the burglar in the leg.

He's been in prison for three years, for "attempted manslaughter" (oxymoron?).

Well, naturally. After all, it's your aunt's neighbor's fault that the man was so financially strapped that he had to resort to burglary. The burglar was clearly reacting to the unjust treatment the neighbor had been perpetrating -- a real freedom fighter, if you will.

(Sorry. I seem to be in a sarcastic mood this morning. More than usual, even.)

-dg

#53 Colt

He didn't go to jail for "attempted burglary" or "breaking and entering"?!

That's pretty effed up.

#56 Geepers

Thankfully, no. He'll probably try to sue for lost earnings, though. I'm not kidding. That's what happened to Tony Martin. He shot two teenage burglars. One died, the other went on to be a drug dealer and petty criminal. Then he decides to sue Martin.

#50 Observer,

Well I care about the poor and the underpriviliged and I'm a conservative who once was one of the poor and underpriviliged.

My beef with The Left (TM) is that their oh-so-caring "solutions" often don't work. And when it's shown that their "solutions" don't work, they respond with, "Oh it'll work if only we apply more of the same" (ie more socialism, more public spending, more highly paid government "experts", more government control).

Crime is going DOWN in the US.
Welfare rolls are going DOWN in the US and welfare recipients are getting jobs thanks to Clinton's welfare reform program.
Teenage pregnancies are going DOWN in the US, thanks to Clinton's (continued by Bush's) teen abstinence promotion programs.

All of the above trends benefit the poor. And all because of "conservative" solutions that this mental midget from Berkeley would seek to overturn.

Ordinary people are just now waking up to the lies that we have been told by the left for the past 35-40 years.

#58 dexter green

Well, naturally. After all, it's your aunt's neighbor's fault that the man was so financially strapped that he had to resort to burglary.

Exactly. This was just "redistribution of wealth" at a local level.

#59 Thom

A warning. Leniency for getting shot.

A BBC report on US talk radio stated that 'Right wing ideas are more simple so do better on radio', that's right folks.. I quote the BBC.

These people live in little, mostly rich White, middle/upper class bubbles, they can't understand why normal people vote Republican/Conservative.

But isn't that the whole basis of Socialism? The superior, intelligent civil servant taxes the individual then spends his money for him, as he knows better.

I once travelled in circles like this idiot academic, but left the Left's fold, as I became more mature, as I realised the Left's creed was more cult than culture.

I found Right wing thinkers more responsible, informed and interesteding, Left wing thinkers have sad, Messianic leanings, believing themselves to be the saviours of mankind, thus able to tax and spend on others' behalf.

But then... the Left is not known for its achievment... although the Soviet union did produce good gymnasts.

Geez, this is more great news! They still don't get it. There ideas are out there and quite well known to the public, who has been rejecting them more and more. But the liberal illuminati have to cling to their religious belief that it's all the doing of the evil other side, and the failings of the voters to appreciate their perfection.

"Strict father?" "Nurturing parent?" Give me a break. Damn shame this prof is allowed to bring something in from his fifteen yr old daughter's journal and pass it off as his own work. Today's conservatives would rather be and "aloof sheriff" that says "Do as you will, but there's a price to pay if you cross over into hurting others." The liberals are more like Joan Crawford from "Mommy Dearest," full of spastic rage, irrationality, and above all a need to control. Sure, that was lame, but it was at least as good as this other dreck.

What we've really got with the Dems is, well to be polite I'll call it a "celebrity movement." Take the rise of a huge celeb, and see how it plays out in the public. Michael Jackson had been awesome for years, and everybody loved him. Never a bad word was said about him in the industry, the press, or on the streets. At the peak, he could have worn a block of lucite with chihuaua and half a stalk of celery in it as a hat, and the public would have either thought it cool, or tried their damndest to convince themselves it was cool.

But after a while... the clothes, the surgeries, the bleaching, the hyperbaric chamber, the elephant man's bones, the boys, and most importantly the weak musical outings... and the whole thing collapsed. And by that point in time, it wasn't enough to just let him slip into what would have been a well-earned retirement out of the public eye. No, he had to keep pressing for more and more, and the fed-up fans mocked and despised him.

The liberals likewise were living large off cultural and political victories, and core constituencies. The press loved them, the unis loved them, the cocktail party chatterers loved them, so never was a dissenting word ever heard. Drunk on their own popularity and political successes, they took it too far, over and over again. And as they did, all criticism was either dismissed or crushed without giving it a moment's thought.

So PETA sets animals free to be eaten by predators. NOW defends a serial abuser of women and sexual harrasser. The ACLU tries to strip away liberties. Colleges try to strip away free speech and academic freedom. The Sierra Club is an advocate for endangering forests and the animals that live there, while fighting against the use of the ultimate renewable resource. Civil rights groups insist upon treating people differently because of the color of their skin, and insist minority children be doomed to stay in corrupt and failing schools. Labor unions lose jobs and our social safety nets are strained to the breaking point as they shill for massive illegal immigraton.

JFK wouldn't stomach these bastards for a minute. And yet they're walking down the streets wearing a vinyl jacket with a million zippers, a sequined glove and a surgical mask, all the while wondering why everyone's too ignorant to "get it."

Why are you ridiculing this guy? If you read the whole article, he makes perfect sense. He acknowleges something perfectly legitimate, and he also points out that in order for the Left to become effective, they have to start emulating the Right.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

#65 KatyL

The point is, Americans know what the Left wants to do. And rather than sit down and think about why the ideas don't attract, this guy writes a study on the delivery of those ideas. The ideas themselves couldn't possibly be to blame.

#53 Colt

The wheels of European justice are square.

I have heard similiar stories in Ireland and Germany.

#50, BobG.
#57, Neo-Con

I'm not against creating wealth nor for "bloated government programs.

I am for more vigorous ways of bringing more people into productive work and decent living conditions.

According to the Agriculture Department, the number of households in America experiencing hunger and worried about their ability to buyfood increased for the third year in a row. as our pols say, can't we do better trhan that?

#67 Buckeye Abroad

Wanna hear something really scary about Belgium? The Arab populations are now the majority, or large minority, in the cities. Hence, they now (or will soon) control the city councils.

#62 Colt

Lovely. Leniency for getting shot.

I think the British have a lot to answer for. Recently, my local cable TV system picked up BBC America. Watching it last night I came across a comedy called "My Hero" about a mild-mannered man who is really a superhero called "Thermo Man" in a red suit and cape with a gold football helmet and black visor.

WTF is up with that?!

;)

#67 Buckeye Abroad

The (dare I say it?) good news is that Belgian youth is becoming quite anti-Arab in their outlook. The bad news is that local councils are letting Arabs who aren't even Belgian citizens vote, and a large proportion can't write or even speak French.

#69 Colt

That's scary. Got a source?

>Crime is going DOWN in the US.
Welfare rolls are going DOWN in the US and welfare recipients are getting jobs thanks to Clinton's welfare reform program.
Teenage pregnancies are going DOWN in the US, thanks to Clinton's (continued by Bush's) teen abstinence promotion programs.

Crime is going UP in the UK since the socialists took over, we are the crime capital of the West.

Welfare has doubled in the UK in the last 6 years, since the socialists took over, from 89billlion to £200 billion

Teenage pregnancies and sexual diseases are UP in the UK.

Folks.. if you want to see a conuntry go from being the power house of Europe and one of the world's top countries, to a sad, crime ridden, filthy failure, keep an eye on Britain.

#70 Thom

Of all the things, the Beeb chooses to export that?

"My Hero" is on a par with Lyse Doucet, in terms of abuse of taxpayers' money.

What I find interesting about the Professor is that he not only fails to understand governance, he also fails to understand parenting; thus misreading both sides of his analogy.

Good parents never treat all their children the same; the secret is to treat each child as an individual. The Left is so caught up in "group rights" that they fail to notice that no such thing exists.

From the article: "It's not just about what you call it, if it's the same "it." There's actually a whole other way to think about it."
"It".
Or famously, "Is".
Progressives will continue to lose as long as they continue to discuss the meaning of two letter words.
Keep 'framing' the discussion; we'll keep 'doing' what needs to be done.

Orwell, anyone?
"Reframe the terms of political debate to make a progressive moral vision more persuasive and influential."
[Link: www.rockridgeinstitute.org...]

"Political language — and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists — is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."

Observer,

hungry people is bad, for sure. But we've learned to distrust Liberal solutions over the last 30 years. They have caused more harm than good. That's all I'm saying.

#65 KatyL

Why are you ridiculing this guy?

For starters, see: #3, #4, #11, #12, #14, #19/22, #30

And on top of everything else, the article's author seems to think that, "acknowledge[ing] something perfectly legitimate," as you aptly put it, is some sort of major coup on Professor LLL's part -- a new set of stone tablets coming down the mountain, if you will.

-dg

Oops, hit 'post' too soon.

"Political language..."
From "POLITICS AND THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE", George Orwell
[Link: orwell.ru...]

Yup, Terry, #73, I know all about it. I read the Brit press and blogs quite frequently. And seeing what's happening in Britain, has, more than anything else, turned me into a "conservative."

There but for the Grace of God, go we. (Shudder.)

#72 K.

My Belgian aunt. She was a nurse in Saudi Arabia for a while.

I can't cite anything on the net for this one, either:

On a day off, she was called from the hospital to treat three kids who'd been badly burned. The hospital sent a car to collect her, and they sped off.

Only it was evening prayer.

So the driver pulls over, gets his mat out, and does his thing.

By the times she arrives, the kids are dead.

#74 Colt

I'm pretty underwhelmed with this channel so far. I know the BBc has far better/more interesting stuff than "My Hero" and "House Invaders". {sigh}

#68 observer: You illustrate the problem, even if unintentionally. "Can't we do better?" with no specifics. Why yes, we can throw money at people, we can even provide them food to eat. And in the future, people who were on the edge of deciding if they would be productive or dependant will see that dependency is pretty lucrative, with none of the risks or "icky feelings" of productivity.

FYI, I'll have to dig it out, but a lot of those governmental statistics are very misleading. One definition for "hunger" is missing two meals a month. Hell, I miss that weekly, and am in no danger of being carried away by a stiff breeze. But hey, you get to go around lamenting the plight of "the hungry." If you are an able-bodied and minded adult who was offered 12 years of free education, you can afford to feed yourself. If for some amazing reason you can't afford to feed your kids, put them up for adoption.

I'm a charitable guy. Americans are charitable people. Less of our money going to the gubment will mean more charity available for the few, true hardship cases. And I'll gladly buy any man a meal who needs one. But, for my money, I'd be very interested in knowing what keeps him unable to buy a damn sandwich for years on end.

Observer – I’m not a conservative – I used to be a real lefty. I thought that Rudy Giuliani’s zero-tolerance for crime was a terrible idea. I thought that Bill Clinton’s efforts to get people off welfare was a disaster – thousands of poor children would be lining the streets begging.

I was totally wrong. Zero-tolerance turned New York into a nice place to visit and live. Clinton’s welfare plan worked.

Mordred (#61) said it best – the left’s oh-so-caring "solutions" often don't work. Even if they did care about the victims of terrorism and crime, their solutions would be ineffective. You don’t have to be a conservative to realize that the left has failed, you just have to be a pragmatist.

I should clarify: my aunt isn't Belgian, but lives in Belgium. I think of her as Belgian anyway :-)

Mary #84,

I co-sign everything you said. I used to swallow the left's lies hook line and sinker too. I believed them when they said that putting more criminals in prison would do nothing to reduce our crime rates. I voted the straight Democratic ticket for 23 years.

Of course, there is still a lot to be done. We have to take control of the educational system and kick out all the politico-social engineering crap they've been doing to our kids for the past 35-40 years. Reintroduce strict educational standards and strick standards of responsibility.

Then there's the Homeless Lobby.

I pray the Republicans stay in power long enough to fix everything to the point where people can see the difference, and not reflexively fall for the Left's happy pretty lies just because they SOUND good.

#82 Thom

It does, but not often. Is it free? If not, I'd save yourself the money.

#69 Colt

Shiria law coming to a Belgian town near you! Subscribe today!
/sarcasm

I have/had an American friend and his wife living in Brussels, but unfortunately I have not had contact with him for over a year. His last email said he hated the place and cannot wait to get out. Some of the tripe he was exposed too after 9-11 was the breaking point.

Germany scored an all time low on the international student evaluations. What the exams don't tell you is that 25% of Germany's students are not from there. There command of the language is pretty weak, resulting in abysmal test scores nation wide. 50% of German parents have only one child, and the birth rates are in a free fall (accept for the immigrants of course).

Also, there has been a worry about reports of Germany's best educated slipping away to other countries due to better pay and opportunities.

Ah, the joys of living in a time bomb.

#87 Colt

It's "free" in the sense that it comes with the package I'm already paying for. :)

Conservatism is your local 2 page news too.

In your local town: Are cops arresting the criminal who robbed 7-11 last week? Or are they taking in a dissenting political prisoner, and the video footage they have of them robbing the bank is just the government's lookalike stooge? Depends on how insane you are.

Truth is, Prof. Jackass, the law is created for responsible citizenry, and upheld by responsible citizenry. They don't want to elect some totalitarian hippy asshole who thinks he knows better then them.

From John Rosemond, parenting guru:
"If you truly respect a child, you expect a lot of the child. Respecting and expecting go hand-in-hand. Consider then, that since the 1960s, America's parents and America's schools have expected less and less and still less of children as they praised and rewarded them more and more and still more. That explains, I think, why so many of today's kids have an abundance of self-esteem and very little self-respect."

[Link: www.rosemond.com...]

#88 Buckeye Abroad

My aunt was telling me that she went to the town/city hall to register for something or other (I forget what). She was the only white person there. Fine. But when she got to the kiosk, she was told to sign a certain form by the official, who wasn't looking at her. There was no pen, just an ink pad. So she rummaged through her purse for a pen, and the official looks up.

"Oh, excuse me, you can write. Here you go."

{Hands her a pen}

The Arabs had been signing with a thumb print.

Back on topic, the projection in this piece is astounding. One of the great myths is that conservatives are all sitting around in tuxedos smoking $50 cigars, while liberals are all poor to middle class, just trying to get buy under the thumb of us robber barons. In fact, the GOP gets many more small campaign contributions from the little guys, while the Democrat party gets fewer contributions of larger amounts from the very rich. Think Michael Moore, Barbra Streisand, Ben and Jerrys, Apple, etc.

Abuse of the language? What does "unilateral" mean, when applied to scores of countries? What does "blank check" mean, with an itemized $87b congressional bill? Has anyone ever explained "affirmative action" in a way that ruled out race-based quotas? "Massacre" means a half-dozen war criminals shot for opening fire on armed forces. "Quagmire." "Resistance." Give me a break.

And of course while owning 80-90% of the media and schools, liberals need more to combat the "extremist right-wing cabal" that somehow dominates it all. Remember, corporations aren't just evil, they're so greedy they'd sell their families into bondage for an extra nickel of profit, right? But the wildly popular messages of liberal talk shows don't stay on the air because? The evil greedy CEOs are turning down all that advertising revenue? Is that like how I can make billions in any industry by chosing to only hire women, who "are only paid 70% for equivalent work?" There wouldn't be an unemployed woman in the nation, if that were true. Unless the evil and greedy CEOs somehow feel like paying needless extra money to their employees, which of course is the opposite of the liberals usual claims.

Anyone who thinks money donated to one of the many liberal outlets and think-tanks doesn't go to lining the pockets of the party faithful is smoking some primo shit. Just ask Terry McAuliffe or Jesse Jackson. I'm just delighted that these people are in such a state of denial that they can't even see the writing on the wall.

The progressive foundations and donors give their money to a variety of grassroots organizations. They say, 'We're giving you $25,000, but don't waste a penny of it. Make sure it all goes to the cause, don't use it for administration, communication, infrastructure, or career development.' So there's actually a structural reason built into the worldviews that explains why conservatives have done better.

So this left wing prof wants us to believe that "progressive" donors are more likely to insist on cost-efficient methods and financial accountability than conservatives? It's the conservatives that are concerned about getting the most bang for the buck. The left likes to promote an image of folding chairs and linoleum floors, but Greenpeach, Sierra Club, ACLU, NARAL and the rest of them have nice offices in NYC and DC and spend plenty of money on salaries and infrastructure.

Since many of the left's favorite programs are essentially make-work activities, Lakoff is obviously in deep denial. I wonder what the folks who teach in Berkeley's Communications and Marketing programs think of Lakoff's theories.

#89 Thom

Do you get BBC News24 with it? Or any other British news channel? We get CNN International, and it's terrible. Most of it is adverts, and only one update per hour, on the hour. Over here, it's constant news.

I found a report on someone's blog the otherday that analyzed and collated crime stats from 23 industrial countries. The US came in at 13th place for crime stats, Australia, England and Wales, were the worst of the countries.

Well, now I know why I became a conservative. Spank me, Daddy!;-)

Seriously, I agree with Modred. Not long ago, I read a short story by Ian McEwan about a guy whose mother refuses to let him grow up - she feeds him baby food, changes his diapers, plays baby games with him, doesn't teach him to read or write well into his teen years. Of course, he ends up being utterly unable to deal with adult life.

That's what I think of when I look at the "compassionate liberals." Their position depends on making minorities feel like racism is everywhere and they need endless programs and help (from liberals) or else they can't make it in the real world. They don't want people to grow up and accept responsibility - if minorities do, they might leave the Democrats behind and liberal power will be gone! That isn't "nurturant" behavior - it's actually monstrously selfish.

#32 O come now Bob G. So many men are emotional vampires and so many women are forced to be utterly rational (the not- pretty ones and so on). Lets not go all goofy on that feelings thing.

Model4 (#64),

Brilliant.

/p>

Spank me, Daddy!;-)

;-)

Since it's Lefty Logic Day on LGF:

Democrats Call for Boycott of American Products

#95 Colt

On PBS {spit!} we get BBC World News which I watch fairly regularly. That's about it for BBC news in this neck of the woods. NPR {spit! spit!} also has some BBC news programming but it's on too early in the morning for me to catch it.

Donna V and Mary: if you want to really see a good analysis of the horrors of the welfare state's infantilism of poor people and minorities, check out the writings of Theodore Dalrymple, a UK prison doctor who has worked amidst the "underprivileged" for 30 years. Many of his essays can be found online just by doing a google search on his name.

He doesn't think much of Islam or "multi-culturalism" either.

#101 Geepers

From your link:
The DNC said it will devote about $100 million to the boycott campaign, using consultants and talent from other countries as much as possible.

Hmmm... I wonder from which countries the DNC will rely on for consultants, talent and funding.

Treacherous. Hang them high.

Colt, I knew you'd pick up on that one!;-)

pbird, you're correct. While I certainly think there is such a thing as sex-based differences, generally speaking, I've always found the assumption that women are slaves to their feelings insulting. I value reason just as much as any guy out there (and much more so than the LLL guys I've known).

Hmmm, I hear some sort of chanting coming from a distance. Sounds like the Perpetually Indigant are having a demonstration about something nearby. Well, it's raining out, and I have no eggs or rotten veggies in the frig, so I guess I won't join them.

#77, Neo_Con
#83, Model4
#84, Mary

Not every liberal is a bleeding heart, not every conservative a heart of stone---agreed.

Let us forget the so-called "Left." They have not had an intelligent idea and have been bereft of decency for almost two decades. They are screamers now, mean-spirited and deceitful.

What I miss from thoughtful conservatives and liberals alike is that neither side seems to be able to free itself from scolding the other for the "failure" of each others' "solutions." We need more of a historic view of societies, less of the managerial mindset. FDR had some very sound answers for America's ills in the early 1930s. That does not mean we must continue to apply them today. That shouldn't be news. But I don't seem to see, on either side, an evolving "political philosophy," which might ask--what kind of a society do we want to help shape?

Hanson's "Mexifornia" paints a picture of the transformation of one piece of America. He's not happy about it. How do we see other parts, in 50 years, and who's gonna do what about it?

The Left isn't going to contribute anything useful But conservatives and liberals could. Whoi's asking? Who's talking?

Mordred:

I'd put Theodore Dalrymple up there with VDH, Steyn, and Krauthammer as one of the great anti-idiotarians of our time.

I recall listening to him on a (believe it or not) NPR interview, and he was talking about elderly working class people in England. He said here are people who lived through the Depression and the Blitz, fought in WWII, worked hard in factories, and now they have to fear getting pushed around, or even getting the crap beaten out of them by young thugs when they're waiting for the bus or on their way home from the grocery store. There was a lot of genuine compassion in his voice - not the fake compassion of "progressives" who save their sympathy for the thugs.

#97 Donna V. Amen. A conservative hears a pleading junkie on the street, and will give a cabbie $20 to take him to a shelter to maybe get some help. A liberal gives the junkie $100 of someone else's money, and a packet of free syringes. Which scenario helps the street person more? But of course the liberals somehow get the credit for "caring more."

I was laughing my ass off at California a while back (ok, easy target) because they were actually having a raging debate over whether human beings should be allowed to take a shit on the sidewalks. Of course you know which side the liberals were on. It's to the point that I really don't know if their leaders are that ignorant, or if they just automatically decide that whatever's bad for the nation/society is what they need to support.

What the country's going through right now does not seem sustainable to me. Too much individual energy is being sapped away into the world of politics, which is not how things are supposed to work. I'm coming to believe that Fred Barnes might be right when he said we're heading toward a "realignment," where today's "compassionate conservative" GOP becomes the dominant paradigm for American voters. People will get tired of all the crap, and just throw in with the side they think best represents them, and vote blind party line thereafter so they don't have to worry about the details of politics so much.

This happened before in the Dems favor. And while I didn't see it coming like Barnes has gone out on a limb in suggesting, it does look more and more plausible. The Dems could at this point keep parity by moving back toward the center, but anecdotal evidence says there's no way in hell they'll do this.

Personally, I do hope it happens, as it will make the Dems reform into a pro-American party. It will also be good for stabilizing the world, and great for our economy. It'll also send a message and results that European nations will be unable to ignore, unless they want to further accelerate their slide into relative obscurity. There's very little a unified America can't influence.

What the hell is this guy talking about when he says liberals don't have infrastructure? What about the UC Berkeley campus, the Jimmy Carter Library, and Jane Fonda's fake tits?

The fact that their infrastructure is cheesy and low-quality is due to their poor work ethic, which is nobody's fault but their own.

[BTW - the "strict father/nurturing parent" schtick is a total rip-off of P.J. O'Rourke's thesis: "Conservatives believe in God, Liberals believe in Santa Claus." Lawsuit, lawsuit!]

They're such busy little beavers over at Berkeley. Last time is was that study that demonstrated Conservatives are dumber because they see things in moral absolutes, whereas Leftists are smarter because they appreciate the nuances and grey areas of life.

Now they're saying that Conservatives are nefarious because they manipulate language in an effort to "get on the best seller list."

After perusing the NYT bestseller list for this week, I have three things to say to this idiot:
1. Al Frankenfurter
2. Michael Moore
3. Molly Ivins

Donna V,

If you don't know already, you can find the collected essays of Dalrymple online for free at Judd Brothers. I didn't know that, and paid $12 for his "Life at the Bottom". However, it's nice to know he's getting the royalties as I don't think he makes much money from his journalism career.

Another one for Lefty Logic Day,

Except this guy is serious:

"A Miserable Failure"

With one phrase Dick Gephardt has defined the issue to be decided next November. Can a "miserable failure" of a president win re-election? Bush's victory would testify to a civic failure more dangerous to the American future than any policies implemented or continued during a second Bush term. A majority would have demonstrated that democratic accountability is finished. That you can fail in everything and still be re-elected president.

Sheez. It's one long continuous LLL rant, with every Bush=Bad canard in the playbook.

Here is P.J. O'Rourke explaining in three paragraphs what it took hundreds of pages of PoMo blither for Doctor Lakoff to express: On God and Santa Claus.

Secretly, of course, a lot of those LLLers pine for some TLC (hold the T) from a dominating Daddy. Or Mommy. Leather optional but BYOW (bring your own whips).

A bit OT but a response to some of the posters accounts of the sub-standard immigrants into Europe supposedly there to make up for the birth rate deficit. The whole thing about declining birth rates is a crock. Look at Japan or better still look at China which controlled the birth rate with a draconian policy and is becoming an economic power house by reducing not increasing its population. The same applies to India where reduction in the birth rate was voluntary not enforced. Importing unskilled and marginally civilized populations is the most stupid policy imaginable. Europeans should get out their mops and dusters and do their own dirty work instead of opening their doors to a lot of impossible to assimilate immigrants.

What Make's a Liberal? by Dennis Prager:

How, then, can decent and often very smart people hold liberal positions?

There are many reasons, but the two greatest may be naivete and narcissism. Each alone causes problems, but when combined in the same person, they are particularly destructive.

At the heart of liberalism is the naive belief that people are basically good. As a result of this belief, liberals rarely blame people for the evil they do. Instead, they blame economics, parents, capitalism, racism, and anything else that can let the individual off the hook.

A second naive liberal belief is that because people are basically good, talking with people who do evil is always better than fighting, let alone killing, them. "Negotiate with Saddam," "Negotiate with the Soviets," "War never solves anything," "Think peace," "Visualize peace" -- the liberal mind is filled with naive cliches about how to deal with evil.

Indeed, the very use of the word "evil" greatly disturbs liberals. It shakes up their child-like views of the world, that everybody is at heart a decent person who is either misunderstood or led to do unfortunate things by outside forces.

"Child-like" is operative. The further left you go, the less you like growing up. That is one reason so many professors are on the left. Never leaving school from kindergarten through adulthood enables one to avoid becoming a mature adult. It is no wonder a liberal professor has recently argued that children should have the vote. He knows in his heart that he is not really an adult, so why should he and not a chronologic child be allowed to vote?

The goverment as the "nurturant parent" ... or if you will... Im from THE Goverment and Im here to help you!

Which most sane people respond to with screaming and running away

Donna V. #105 - re: sexual differences; if you were a guy, you could urinate on them with some accuracy :-P

observer #106 - "Let us forget the so-called "Left." They have not had an intelligent idea and have been bereft of decency for almost two decades."
What is 'so-called' about the Left? And I question whether the Left has ever been decent.

I do appreciate that you distinguish between the Left and so-called 'liberals'. I don't seem to see many liberals. I see plenty of Leftists.

"But I don't seem to see, on either side, an evolving "political philosophy," which might ask--what kind of a society do we want to help shape?"

Try this:
[Link: www.rnc.org...]

#106 observer: What are you smoking? I know it sounds very fair-minded and reasonable to say that "both sides are equally wrong, we need to talk and come up with solutions." However, it simply isn't true. You said you wanted ideas from conservatives. How about addressing the ideas from conservatives that are already out there, that liberals have been actively blocking?
---
Use timber as a renewable resource, and plan it in such a way that catastrophic fire prevention and containment results.

Utilize our own energy resources instead of insisting they always be purchased from abroad.

Private owners of land are more responsible stewards than the government.

The T-rex went extinct and the biosphere didn't collapse. Human beings shouldn't be forced off their land or prohibited from using it because some sub-species of grub lives there.

Prevent frivolous and unlimited lawsuits for pain-and-suffering that punish business, jack prices up for customers, force medical providers out of their professions, and primarily enrich trial lawyers.

Provide a strong and well-funded military and intelligence agencies.

Require teachers to be demonstrably competent enough to pass tests written on the eigth grade level.

Introduce competition and choice to our children's education, to rescue the future work-force and leadership from ignorance and poverty.

Quit treating human beings differently based on skin color.

Flatten and reduce the tax rate, increasing prosperity both for individuals and the treasury.

Eliminate punitive barriers to business formation and growth.

Allow choice in privatization of health care and social security benefits.

Get people off the dole who are capable of working.

Get the judiciary out of the legislative business by appointing judges who belive in the legitimacy of our country's founding, and will interpret, not revise, the Constitution.

The Second Amendment means what it says.

Religious freedom is a right, everytime, everywhere.

Utilize the private sector wherever possible to do needed work, as it increases freedoms and is more efficient than government employees.

Punish criminals, protect the innocent.

Punish people for crimes, not what they may or may not have been thinking while committing them.

You are not a victim, you are an individual, who has responsibilities as well as rights. You are responsible for yourself, and to your family and community.

Free speech includes unpopular and non-PC speech.
---

Honestly man, what on earth prompted you to say "I don't seem to see, on either side, an evolving "political philosophy," which might ask--what kind of a society do we want to help shape?"

106 observer 11/2/2003 11:12AM PST

But I don't seem to see, on either side, an evolving "political philosophy," which might ask--what kind of a society do we want to help shape?

Again, you are "framing" the terms of the discussion.

Even the concept of "shaping a society", as you put it, is the Left's greatest failure. The Left has been primarily about social engineering, and it has basically resulted in the chaos you see today, chaos on multiple levels I might add. And it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

How about just letting people live, offer them a hand when they need it, but basically stay out of their lives? No "shaping" required.

I know this simplistic approach doesn't appeal to the Jackoff's of the world. It makes their Phd's a waste. It means common sense joe blow needs his language redefined so he can start "thinking" like the nihilistic ivory tower elite.

But guess what, sound society existed well before the social engineers arrived on the scene. It had it's problems, because human nature has problems. But what we see is social disintegration.

I'm from THE Government and I'm here to help you!

You've just described the system that exists in most of Europe as well as, sad to say, my own country, Canada. Big Daddy controlling you from cradle to grave.

Mordred and Mary,

I agree with most of what you've said in your several posts, but you're driving me nuts with all the praise of "Clinton's welfare plan," that has worked so well.

It's true that two of Clinton's best lines in the '92 campaign were that he'd, "end welfare as we know it," and that welfare shouldn't be, "a way of life." He also promised a middle class tax cut, over and over, a main part of his '92 campaign.

I agee with those who say Clinton was one of the most skilled politicians ever. They don't call him Slick Willie for no reason. In '92, he knew the Dems had lost most of the recent presidential elections because they were far too liberal for most Americans. He helped found the DLC, or Dem. Leadership Conference, to move the party back toward the center to improve its chances in presidential elections.

However, after he won in '92, and had a Democrat majority in the house and senate to work with, he did nothing on welfare reform, and pushed through, not a middle class tax cut, but one of the largest tax increases in history.

Then, after Hillary's disastarous attempt to give gov't control of our health care system, and other indications that Clinton was far from the new Democrat he campaigned as, the Dems lost control of the house and senate for the first time in 40 years.

Only after the Republicans had control of both houses was anything done on welfare reform. The Reps pushed through two welfare reform bills which Clinton vetoed, then he finally signed a third one. The Reps had forced his hand and he'd have looked very foolish to continue vetoeing after all his reform talk during the '92 campaign.

I never believed he had any intention of reforming welfare, but only made promises to try and win the election, knowing the Demo majorties in congress were unlikely pass any sort of welfare reform.

I'd call it Republican welfare reform, with Clinton kicking and screaming and vetoing until he had to sign something rather than look very foolish.

The balanced budgets during his terms also occurred only after the Repubs gained control of congress.

#116 Millie Woods

Once the flood gates have been opened, its alot harder to close them. Besides, most of the EU have open borders now and its alot of illegal immigrants are simply driving over the border.

The biggest problem is the lack of political will to actually stop the influx of migrants, but there are so many problems surfacing right now in germany that this is not a high concern (if Schroeder is still in power next year, I will be surprised).

I have a German friend of mine who is cop. Since the open borders, they (german police) stop and inspect all cars along the road side rests with eastern European plates. YES, THEY PROFILE AND IT WORKS. They have been confiscating AKs and RPGs out of the trunks of cars. Theft rings from back east (eg. Romania) blow into town and randsack several houses and move to the next town until the get caught (and sent back) or they leave until next summer (usually summer months when most Germans are on holiday).

Millie Woods #116 - "becoming an economic power house by reducing not increasing its population". Look what the 'Black Death' did for Medieval Europe: ended Feudalism, created more leisure, increased the price of labor, etc.

If you want to see some smug self-righteous leftists take Lakoff's thesis and do a circle-jerk with it, check this out.

Andrea also has a criticism that I missed - these "feminists" are basing their analysis on the most reactionary stereotypes about women and men! I am a feminist and people like this hi-jacked my movement.

Where did anyone come up with the notion that liberals see people as "basically good?" If anything, that's a conservative notion, which is reflected in the philosophy of limited government. Of course you have to have laws to punish and deter those who want to take advantage of their freedoms. Such people have ever and will always exist. Conservatives believe evil must be stood up to, but that man is basically good.

Now who wants to disarm you? To limit what, when and where you can say (and think) what you like? To tell people how they should do business and what they should produce? Whom they must hire? To indoctrinate instead of educate? To controll all aspects of public infrastructure down to the local level from on high in DC? To trust us to spend and invest our own money in our own interests?

No, liberals see the common man as evil, or at least horribly inept. They see themselves as the enlightened who have risen above the human condition, fit to dictate every aspect of our lives to save us from ourselves. In fact, brutal totalitarians are the lesser evil than increased freedom of thought, action or movement being granted to the man on the street.

#120, Model4

Look, of the 20 ideas you present, many I completely endorse. (Not treating people differently on the basis of skin color; that free speech includes unpopular and non-PC speech (try that one at Brown or UC Riverside--I'll help as a bodyguard!) most of your ideas on education...)

I don't quite share your faith in the private sector. If you think many corporations have the interests of their country or communities at heart, try again. I worked for eight years at a huge defense contractor--they viewed their military customers as foes--to be outwitted at contract negotations, low-balled and then jerked around when it came to delivery and price.
Not all businesses, of course, are like that.
But you say private owners of land are more responsible stewards than the government, for example. Well, sometimes yes, sometimes not--see Monsanto and the toxins it illegally dumped rivers etc etc. I don't know if I'd generalize on this issue.
I don't quite see how the private sector "increases freedom?" Which freedom(s)? For whom?
And, when is religious freedom in the USA is not a right? Can't you or I worship at church, synagogue or mosque whenever we please? Who's stopping you or me?

Many conservative ideas (cultural, educational)especially) I have not the slightest hesitation in embracing. I'm just not as smitten with the good intentions and sense of responsibility you seem to grant the private sector.
I don't smoke, but like Guinness, especially fresh. Cheers

Neo-con wrote:

Even the concept of "shaping a society", as you put it, is the Left's greatest failure.

Bravo! I wrote a long post saying basically the same thing in much less eloquent terms before I decided the whole thing sounded like crap and erased it.

This is where my libertarian streak kicks in. The idea that government needs to shape society and provide us all with some sort of meaning smacks of lefty longings for utopia.

It's framing the question, as you say, because politics has become the secular religion of the Left. For the folks marching or chanting or whatever the hell they're doing on a miserable Sunday not far from my house, well that's their church service. They derive their identity from carin' and sharin' and paradin' around, and, I think, can not quite believe that those who do not belong to the Progressive congregation may have legitimate cause to set other priorities.

Leaving people alone and letting them decide for themselves what gives meaning to their lives is a foreign concept to the LLL, because they have the One True Faith. So society has to be "shaped" and we witless masses have to have our "conciousness raised" so we see the light. Of course, once in power, the Left is quite happy to perform forced conversions if persuasion doesn't work, as the history of the 20th century shows.

(Note: I don't put Observer in the LLL category. But as neo-con says,she or he is starting off from liberal assumptions.)

#126 Yehudit,

Thanks for the link. I couldn't get passed this piece of tripe:

"We need mature men and women who know how to co-operate, how to bring the community together so we're all contributing."

COMMENT: Umm, yeah, like the divisive racial politics and "celebrating diversity" tripe the Left has been using to divide our society for decades?

"We need leaders who can get others to work with us, because when you have real, dangerous, complicated problems, the more people you have on your side, the better off you are."

COMMENT: Yeah, The Left (TM) is an excellent model of promoting community cooperation. NOT! I'm old enough to remember when Americans joined community service clubs like the Kiwanas, Lions, Shriners in huge droves. Kids from all economic levels joined Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Campfire, Candystripers, etc.

Then came the great outbreak of "coolness" promoted by The Left (TM) in the late '60s and '70s. Joining service clubs was the uncoolest thing you could do. I was a kid who looked forward to joining the Girl Scouts just like my three older sisters, but guess what? By the time I was old enough to join, Girl Scouts were mercilessly ridiculed and lampooned. No self-respecting kid in that era would be caught dead in a Girl Scout uniform. Membership rolls of service clubs for men, women and children declined precipitously.

The Left (TM) wanted everybody to work for the great socialist revolutionary utopia. If you just wanted to pick up trash alongside the road, or help sponsor a vision drive by the Lions, you were only participating in perpetuating the Evil White Male KKKapitalist Power Structure.

The Left (TM) tries its darndest to kill off community groups, then brags about how THEY are the ones who believe in community cooperation.

Just like when they enact pro-criminal law enforcement policies, then point to rising crime rates as "proof" that the Evil White Male KKKapitalist Power Structure doesn't work.

when your world view consists of thinking that life's a fairy tale mostly peopled with mr. rogers and snow white your gonna lose to the "bad" kids who want to beat up the boogie man instead of inviting him in for tea and sympathy

observer #128 - "I worked for eight years at a huge defense contractor--they viewed their military customers as foes--to be outwitted at contract negotations, low-balled and then jerked around when it came to delivery and price."

Sadly, I've seen this behavior (bastards); usually not from the engineers or production people. Out of curiousity, on what systems did you work?

#19, DonnaV.

Thanks for not exiling me into LLL hell. A few of my "assumptions" may indeed be liberal--in the old-fashioned meaning of that word, I hope. But why shouldn't someone like me, who endorses many conservative ideas, not question others? I'm un-PC, wherever the P stands.

i tend to agree with lakoff. conservatives are known to have the strict moral outlook whereas liberals seem to be fuzzy.

he writes:

"The citizens are children of two kinds: the mature, disciplined, self-reliant ones who should not be meddled with and the whining, undisciplined, dependent ones who should never be coddled.

America is seen as more moral than other nations and hence more deserving of power; it has earned the right to be hegemonic and must never yield its sovereignty, or its overwhelming military and economic power. The role of government, then, is to protect the country and its interests, to promote maximally unimpeded economic activity, and maintain order and discipline."

a more elaborate article on the topic

Yehudit (#126)

From your first link. The author states about their work:

I admit it's not very good.

I'd agree with that. :-)

#128 observer: I don't expect you or anyone to agree with all of those ideas. I have problems or quibbles with a couple myself. However, you said that conservatives weren't offering a political philosophy that can shape the kind of society we live in. That is, in my opinion, untrue.

Please don't mistake me for a libertarian. As has been said, they always end up having "too many rules." They go too far in assuming the perfection and good will of all men, and many are hard to distinguish from adolescent anarchists in their philosophy.

The beauty of the private sector is the "Invisible Hand." It isn't that it is inherently noble, but out of all approaches achieves positive results in spite of our greed. Or we can it say takes advantage of it.

Yes, a car company can produce a cheap death-trap and increase their bottom line briefly. But relatively basic economics says that their products will never be purchased by anyone again, at least for a generation. So it's a case of a private company hurting itself knowingly for no conceivable reason. An unavoidable but ultimately manageable situation. Especially barring a better system that doesn't require perfect humans with perfect knowledge taking over all aspects.

I've also have some insight into defense contractors, and know of them getting fined for jerking the DoD around, or for the DoD to just drop them seemingly out of the blue after being fed up. The DoD also does a bit of manipulation for their own ends.

The private sector increases freedom because politicians don't control how it operates. If most of a sector is state-run, party leaders can say "Vote for our candidate, or I guarantee to block any pay raises you might get." Legislators from states big in the vaccuum tube business could say "You are not allowed to use transistors in making radios." Common sense improvements are at best delayed awaiting government approval. Soviet cars never developed much of a following here for a reason.

One only has to look at the communists, and how they failed in industry and society compared to the West to see that capitalism is ultimately better all around. That said, I'm not a purist who believes that the larger abuses should be totally ignored. But the pendulum has swung not just too far, but way too far in America, and our liberals openly advocate purist socialism as sound policy.

Yehudit:

That pisses me off mightily. Somebody please tell me what separates "difference feminism" from Victorian ideas about the emotionalism and inferior reasoning capacity of flighty females. The big difference, I suppose, is that these dipshits think that being yanked about by your feelings is a sign of superiority and denigrate reason.

In the same way, leftists perpetuate old stereotypes about minorities. I remember an education major at GW University telling me that black students need to be taught differently than white kids because their "tradition" is less focused on logic. I caught myself before I fell off my barstool and told this nimrod that Jefferson Davis and John C. Calhoun would undoubtably agree with his estimate of black abilities. A good comeback, I thought, but somewhat spoiled by the fact that I had to explain who Davis and Calhoun were. Then it was his turn to nearly fall off the barstool.

"You're comparing me (young Boston progressive) with racist slaveowners!"

Yeah, honey, I am.

>But hey, you get to go around lamenting the plight of "the hungry." If you are an able-bodied and minded adult who was offered 12 years of free education, you can afford to feed yourself.

I really don't understand this statistic.

America has the CHEAPEST FOOD of any country on the planet, as proportion of income...

I once gave a lift to a youg black guy, fit as a fiddle, he was on the way to the food bank.. he could have got a job.. I wonder how many other people are like that.

I also wonder where these statistics come from, Lefties in Universities?

A few baked potatoes and a few cans of tuna can be a meal for a family..what does that cost... $4?

If someone's hungry in America its because they're stupid, lazy, or (in rare cases) misfortunate.

#132, Bourgeois Observer

Right--it was not the engineers or production people. "My" company produced nuclear subs, cruise missiles, tanks and fighter aircraft. I was at HQ.

#136, Model4

Fair enough--but I haven't heard any "purist socialism" (except by the likes of Alexander Cockburn--nuff said)--would't fly even in Vermont. (Maybe in the People's Republic of Berkeley, but they'd vote Shining Path if they could.)

#138 Terry

I once gave a lift to a youg black guy, fit as a fiddle, he was on the way to the food bank.. he could have got a job.. I wonder how many other people are like that.

Your point could have been made without regards to the young man's race.

The "Left" is entirely about controlling language, about rhetoric as the root of all power.
This is why the language of discourse becomes a primary issue for them in any exchange.
How many times have you seen the moonbat power-freaks shift the subject from the issue at hand to the specific language being used to discuss that issue?
For instance: "dismissing those who work for peace as 'moonbat power-freaks' demonizes all dissent and stops all thought."
At the same time, since the opposition does not engage in similar diversionary tactics, the LLLs are free to employ any language that suits their purposes. Essentially, they will not engage in any discussion if the terms are not loaded in their favor.

Yesterday, a moonbat troll came here, referred to this operation as a "circle-jerk", among other obscene dismissals, then essentially demanded a fully rational rebuttal of her claims.
Nobody called her out on this double-standard. This kind of hypocrisy is the heart and soul of the Left's power: riot in the streets, burn flags, spew ad hominems and demonization, publish lies, but demand that the opposition confine itself only to terms and methods that the Left will permit.
In rational terms, for instance, anti-American agitation in Europe is based on attitudes that are indistinguishable from common bigotry, yet they are seldom recognized as such. We must recognize this and confront it. Do not allow them their double-standard.

Sort of OT

Here's a recent quote from Peter Jackson describing the theme of the next Lord of the Rings movie:

"As the story gets bigger and the stakes get higher, the intimacy of the storytelling and emotions get tighter and smaller, until you end up with two beings literally on their hands and knees, struggling to defeat an enormous evil... There is tremendous value to standing together for a common cause at times of great risk and looming destruction."

These movies came a just the right time.

#41

"dismissing those who work for peace as 'moonbat power-freaks' demonizes all dissent and stops all thought."

Well, no.

Calling them moonbat power-freaks is simply accurate and more efficent than fisking every sentence.

Observer: I think Model4 sums up, in his terrific post #136, my views better than I can:-) I don't buy the entire conservative (or libertarian) view hook, line, and sinker either, and really try to fight dogmatism in my thinking, but I find I agree with the right these days far more often than I do with the left.

I used to say I was a libertarian (coming from the left, it was far easier for me to apply the libertarian to myself than the dreaded C-word. I got over it.) However, like Model4, I've come to think strict libertarians are just as naive as the LLL when it comes to the existence of evil. The caterwauling of some of the Cato Institute people about the WoT last winter sounded indistinguishable from what the idiotarians were saying.

Whay...those mean old conservatives...actually using language, reason, and logic to persuade us!

No fair! I'm gonna hold my breath and turn blue until Mummia is free.

#144

I consider myself to be libertarian on many issues but I find the hard core libertarians have their heads in the clouds as they try to cram all problems into their one-size-fits-all solutions. They do seem to be oblivious to the darker aspects of human nature.

That pisses me off mightily. Somebody please tell me what separates "difference feminism" from Victorian ideas about the emotionalism and inferior reasoning capacity of flighty females. The big difference, I suppose, is that these dipshits think that being yanked about by your feelings is a sign of superiority and denigrate reason.

I know, I know. This has been pissing me off since about 1974. :-)
And it pisses me off even more that people who should know better stereotype the entire feminist movement instead of making the same kinds of distinctions they make between the Loony Left and yr average liberal Democrat. (This includes several of you on this blog.)

#139 observer:

I haven't heard any "purist socialism" (except...

Privitization of the entire health care industry? Not by some low-level fringe nut, but by very high-level politicians and candidates. We're even talking about telling providers where they could live and work. And in the '90s millions of acres were seized by the state, who would determine what the can and cannot be used for. Progressive taxation with the goal of elimination the rich and (in theory) elevating the poor to exactly the same level? Extending to one full year of unemployment benefits, on top of the welfare programs we already have?

Perhaps I did go too far with that claim. But their agenda is certainly radical.

Donna V. -

I remember an education major at GW University telling me that black students need to be taught differently than white kids because their "tradition" is less focused on logic.

I'll bet everybody has a story about something an education major once told them.

For example, an education major once told me that girls need lots of harsh discipline and criticism, while boys should be praised and pampered. This will encourage girls to achieve while having the opposite effect on boys, thereby evening things up and reducing social inequality.

The dead-serious militant expression on her face while she said this made me feel sorry for any little girl that gets near her.

#143
Indeed.
Speaking of which, veteran moonbat saboteur ("longtime peace activist") Michael Poulin of the "Peace and Justice Action League" has been arrested for attempting to sabotage high-voltage transmission towers in the Northwest.
Poulin, whose history of violence for peace ("direct action" as his fellow moonbats describe it) dates back to 1971, naturally represents himself as the innocent target of Bushitler oppression, and expresses the fear that he will end up at Guantanamo. We can only wish.

Per usual, the left has got it backwards. The conservatives are the progressives. It is the neo-cons who are thinking outside the box and that has appeal. Lakoffs framing theory is a symptom of the left's failure. Q. Who frames an argument? A. The one that wins it.

Yehudit #126 - thanks for the links. Re: feminism - I'm more of a Betty Friedan feminist. She and I lived in the same building in WDC - she is a great lady. I think that feminism got hijacked by the Left in the 1970's.

And re: "I am a feminist". Maybe I shouldn't have your site bookmarked in a folder named "Chicblogs".

observer #139 - I've worked with some subsidiaries that weren't that bad (BIW - DDG, LPD; NASSCO - TAKR). How's life in the country (NoVa)?
[Link: www.generaldynamics.com...]

129 Donna V. 11/2/2003 12:23PM PST

Leaving people alone and letting them decide for themselves what gives meaning to their lives is a foreign concept to the LLL, because they have the One True Faith. So society has to be "shaped" and we witless masses have to have our "conciousness raised" so we see the light. Of course, once in power, the Left is quite happy to perform forced conversions if persuasion doesn't work, as the history of the 20th century shows.

Bravo right back. You have expanded very nicely on my statement that the LEFT CRAVES TO SHAPE SOCIETY.

And yes, the religion of the Left is politics, and their eternal quest is heaven on earth. And the more devout they are, the less they can be reasoned with.

#147 - Yehudit

Okay, be fair now. You say Glenn Reynolds doesn't distinguish between reasonable and unreasonable feminists. But since when do feminists in general make such distinctions, by saying something like "Barbara Kingsolver doesn't speak for the rest of us, by the way" or maybe "Shulasmith Firestone was really full of crap" or "Susan Brownmiller needs to get professional help"?

Maybe somebody is saying this, but they better not say it too loud. Do you consider Christina Hoff Sommers a feminist? Just try bringing up her name in a conversation.

And furthermore, what good does it do for the Fund for a Feminist Majority (or the itsy-bitsy "Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan") to criticize the Taliban when they're dead-set against doing anything about the Taliban, because they're afraid it might help George Bush politically?

The Feminist Majority is glad to point at the Taliban as a bunch of typical males, but when it comes to kicking ass they go AWOL. And RAWA, so far as I'm concerned, is completely on the other side.

While the left has very little sympathy for the victims of genuine crime, they believe that oppressed groups are made up of victims of one sort or another.

Like the Belgians who throw someone in prison for shooting a thief, like the Europeans who believe that fighting terrorism is a ‘threat to world peace’, these leftists don’t believe that you should fight back – you should just whine as loud as you possibly can.

Feminism used to be about empowerment and equality. Now it’s all about how women are victimized by men. Like Yehudit said, they’re just recreating those old stereotypes.

The worst thing the left has done is to hijack the word ‘liberal’. Old-style liberals were anti-authoritarian, anti-Fascist and anti-dictatorship. Under the new definition, liberal is synonymous with the extreme left - socialist, anti-war, identity politics. Like ‘feminist’, the left took a good word and ruined it.

Old-style liberals, old-style conservatives, neo-cons, liberal hawks and libertarians prefer pragmatic, workable solutions – they’re moderates, and have more in common with each other then they do with the extremists on the right and the left.

When Observer says ‘The Left isn't going to contribute anything useful But conservatives and liberals could.” I’m guessing that he’s talking about getting ideas and input from moderates.

As we’ve seen, the left (and the extreme right) hate pragmatic, workable solutions. If I make a reasonable suggestion, like, maybe we should fight terrorism - a lefty will call me Ann Coulter and an extreme libertarian will call me a socialist. Moderate conservatives and liberals aren’t trying to use language to dominate politics – the extremists are.

Glen Wishard

Do you consider Christina Hoff Sommers a feminist?

Let's see using the NOW computer: I'm a dude, I think she makes some good points...the punch card comes out: no

OT but great: an indictment of "multiculturalism":

[Link: www.spectator.co.uk...]

--From Melanie Phillips' bog

Maybe I shouldn't have your site bookmarked in a folder named "Chicblogs".

Oh that doesn't bother me.

Glen - the point I was making is that many feminist groups have been working directly with 3rd world women to improven their conditions and to challenge the sexism in their societies for decades. Before it was fashionable.

There have been enormous debates in the feminist movement about "essentialist" or "difference" feminism (women are different from men and better, porn is inherently oppressive) and the other kind (which also has an academic name but I forget what it is) (there are more individual differences within genders than between the two, stereotypes limit people, woman can decide for themselves if they like porn and make their own) - but the mainstream press lazily tars all with the same brush just like they do with any political movement.

Just because you haven't heard the condemnations doesn't mean they weren't made.

However, the essentialist feminists did pretty much capture the power center of the movement, unfortunately.

from another professor a bit south of Berkeley:
UCLA Rabbi Accused of Kicking Woman.

I only read this today. I just went to a talk by this guy yesterday - I'm glad I didn't sit in the front row, as I did challenge him a few times.

(His talk was the usual drivel: "Jews are not perfect yet, so if we hold the Palestinians to any moral standards that's a distraction from nit-picking ourselves to death." It was worse than moral equivalence.)

Glen Wishard: I believe P.J. O'Rourke once said "Anybody who doesn't think there's an education crisis in this country hasn't f**ked an education major."

BTW, did anyone see Zell Miller on "Meet the Press" this morning? Now there's a Dem I could vote for. Russert asked him about Dean's remark about getting votes from people with Confederate flags on their trucks and Miller drawled out, "Howard Dean knows no more about the South than a hog knows about Sunday."

PS The woman he kicked.

PS i got this on mary's blog which is a great blog.

Victor Davis Hanson does it again:

“Those Jews”

You see, in our mixed-up world those Jewish are not a "people of color." And if there really is such a mythical monolithic entity in America as the "Jews," they (much like the Cubans) are not easily stereotyped as impoverished victims needing largesse or condescension, and much less are they eligible under any of the current myriad of rubrics that count for public support. Israel is a successful Western state, not a failed third-world despotism. Against terrible oppression and overt anti-Semitism, the Jewish community here and abroad found success — proof that hard work, character, education, and personal discipline can trump both natural and human adversity. In short, the story of American Jewry and Israel resonates not at all with the heartstrings of a modern therapeutic society, which is quick to show envy for the successful and cheap concern for the struggling.

This fashionable anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism — especially among purported intellectuals of the Left — reveals a deep-seated, scary pathology that is growing geometrically both in and outside the West. For a Europe that is disarmed, plagued by a demographic nightmare of negative population growth and unsustainable entitlements, filled with unassimilated immigrants, and deeply angry about the power and presence of the United States, the Jews and their Israel provide momentary relief on the cheap. So expect that more crazy thoughts of Israel's destruction dressed up as peace plans will be as common as gravestone and synagogue smashing.

For the Muslim world that must confront the power of the patriarch, mullah, tribe, and autocrat if it is ever to share the freedom and prosperity of the rest of the world, the Jews offer a much easier target. So expect even more raving madness as the misery of Islamic society grows and its state-run media hunker down amid widespread unrest. Anticipate, also, more sick posters at C-SPAN broadcast marches, more slips by reasonable writers, and more anti-Israeli denunciations from the "liberals."

Yehudit:

Just because you haven't heard the condemnations doesn't mean they weren't made.

Actually, I think I have heard some of them. My point is, the people who make them - or even suggest them - get treated like Goldstein in 1984.

For example, at the famous HHS conference a couple of years ago, when Christina Hoff Sommers criticized the "Girl Power" program (a prime example of "difference feminism"?) a male psychologist on the panel told her "Shut the f--k up, bitch" and the audience cheered.

#102 Thom

Where's the "{spit}" after BBC?!

#105 Donna V.

It was just waiting there. Someone had to ;-)

#111 bigel

Just the whole situation in Belgium. Bad in terms of Arab population and government reaction/assistance. Encouraging in terms of the typical Belgian reaction to what's going on. They might not be out of the fight just yet.

Donna #160
"I believe P.J. O'Rourke once said 'Anybody who doesn't think there's an education crisis in this country hasn't f**ked an education major.'"
LOL!
Reminds me of something I used to hear when I was a student at (a formerly prestigious Ivy League institution):
"You'd only (have carnal knowledge of) an education major if you're too lazy to (masturbate).

#158 Yehudit:

...the mainstream press lazily tars all with the same brush just like they do with any political movement.

I'm not convinced. Liberals believe in the power of numbers, to the exclusion of limiting the damage attempting to include everyone does to a movement.

Vocal Episcopalians are standing up and expressing their dissent with the church leadership. Catholics did the same. Bush denounced both Lott's and Boykin's remarks. Conservatives bash Buchanan for some of his views. Conservatives bash Bush for some of his liberal leanings. Examples abound of people criticizing their own which we're well aware of through even casual media consumption.

You have to really be in the know and dig deep to find liberals who criticize each other, same with feminists. Even the Jew-baiting going on by Congressmen is met with "Well, Tim, I personally didn't hear those remarks, so don't know that I care to comment on them." Or maybe "I don't want to discourage free speech, and am sure that in the appropriate context those remarks have a different meaning than what we hear on the surface." Follow-up? Never comes.

An internal fight is a natural to get media coverage. Which means that either the fights really aren't happening on a large enough scale, or the media is purposefully spiking such stories. It ain't laziness. Until then, I expect to see the liberal bigwigs happily coexisting with the Jesse Jacksons, Cynthia McKinneys, Michael Moores, Susan Sarandons and Robert Fisks. They call themselves liberals, the Dems call themselves liberals. If they're not willing to draw the distinction themselves, I see no reason that John Q. Public should have to do it for them.

#161 Iron Fist

Clinton is unquestionably the most thoroughly unprincipled individual ever to hold the Presidency.

I think LBJ is a close second. I knew a secret service agent who was around him in the 60's. One of the most vain men he ever met.

#165 Colt

{spit!}

#164 Glen

...a male psychologist on the panel told her "Shut the f--k up, bitch" and the audience cheered.

You got to be kidding me?! I hope someone taped it and sent it to his clinic/his patients and the local TV network? Nothing like profesional standards... especially when sitting on a panel.

Model4 -

Even the Jew-baiting going on by Congressmen is met with "Well, Tim, I personally didn't hear those remarks, so don't know that I care to comment on them."

I decided not to mess up my weekend by watching Meet the Press. Did somebody say this?

Buckeye Abroad -

You got to be kidding me?!

Have you ever known me to kid about anything?
Here is a brief account of the whole sordid, taxpayer-funded affair.

#161 IronFist
#168 Buckeye Abroad

And where, in your Pantheon of unprincipled Presidents, do you rate Tricky Dick? Third? In the top ten?
Inclusiveness, fellows. The tent surely is big enough to include someone from the Grand Old Party.

#171 Glen Wishard: LOL, I don't know. But those are the kinds of remarks I've heard liberals give when one of their own jumps way over the line. The "Well, Tim" is a Daschleism like "concerned" and "outrageous." Ack, I can hear them now!

OT:

1. Indulgence of muslims in Florida prisons. Muslims are passive when they are behind bars.

[Link: www.2theadvocate.com...]

2. Paul Wolfowitz (Deputy Defense Secretary) condemns muslim madrasas, for inciting terror. His speech deserved more attention than it received.

[Link: www.azcentral.com...]

Speaking of Dasshole, I like the, "I'm saddened..." stuff he pulls out.

observer #173 - Richard Nixon, the Republican socialist, ranks #25 on C-SPAN's Historian's Survey. LBJ #10; Clinton #21. Number 1 is of course, the best Republican of all time, Abraham Lincoln.

[Link: www.americanpresidents.org...]

I remember in HS and college guys getting beat up for hitting girls.
-smack- YOU -smack- JUST -smack- DON'T -smack- HIT -smack- WOMEN -smack-

Buckeye Abroad: One of my professors in college was George Reedy, who was LBJ's press secretary for a time. The LBJ stories he told were many and jaw-dropping. The one I remember is about how Johnson used to call staffers into the bathroom while he was sitting on the throne. Reedy or whoever it was Johnson wanted to talk to would sit on the edge of the tub and talk to the President of the United States about Vietnam or whatever while Johnson was sitting there with his pants around his ankles.

Strikes me as an even more serious blow to Presidential dignity than Clinton's Boxers vs. Briefs remark.

I don't think Reedy lasted a year - Johnson went through press secretaries like - well, like toliet paper. Reedy was a nice man with a gentle manner. LBJ chewed him up and spat him out, I'm sure.

Sorted by 'Moral Authority' Clinton is in last place. Nixon next to last.

You divide the whole world into US and THEM. When THEM are depicted as having horns and all the other attributes of nightmares, and bark, too; when US have all the answers and are always always right, never wrong, it sure makes it easy for you. Have fun in your hermetically sealed world, losers.

#181, GAZE!!!

Gaze away...

Cue the clevver, "oh a cute little moonbat! How ignorant he is in the enlightened ways of our civilization. He needs to be killed."

... or better yet, BLOCKED BY IP# because Charles cannot stand to have his feewings huwt.

#181 This Blog is STILL a circle jerk: Ah yes, the liberal paradox, thank you. "I judge you all guilty of lumping others together and judging them." Thanks for the enlightenment, Scooter.

A cute little moonbat! How ignorant he is in the enlightened ways of our civilization. He needs to be killed.

Wow. That's uncanny.

Hey circle jerk

Ever read the fatwa by Bin Laden? The Hamas convenent? Ever listened to US professors talking about how there is "no such thing as American culture", or Western culture being nothing but dead white men? What about the Leftist chic of multi-culturalism that holds all cultures superior to Western culture ("what, who are WE to judge female genital mutilation as 'bad'? Don't we allow circumcision or ear piercing?")

don't know where you've been, but it IS Us vs Them

If that disturbs your child-like Liberal psyche, may I suggest you move to France.

Liberal paradox my ass. You LGFers take pride in being cheerleaders. You are cited in OED next to "Groupthink" and you sound so tough "nuking Mecca", so enlightened dismissing everyone who disagrees as a troll, morlock, moonbat, anti-semite (there are more words on Newt's list you could use...) and eager to dismiss any disagreement as being "rude" when any rudeness (see above) that keeps the troops on message is encouraged.

By the way, is Charles out cycling? Why can I still post?

#185--have i got a guy for you!! janis meet rob-rob-dont shake her hand, she's been doing stuff with it that isnt nice

Darleen, thanks for proving you can stay on message. I never doubted you and you have nothing to prove to me. Here's your tax cut and the ears of ten liberals.

Hell, the moonbats ain't worth wasting ammo on. I don't want to kill them. I just enjoy laughing at them and listening them make up ridiculous theories about why the American people don't love them.

As Camille Paglia (who is spectacularly wrong about some things and spectacularly right about other things) said about Michael Moore and Al Franken: "Big babies! Wah, wah, wah!!"

(She also said Clark reminds her of Kier Dullea in 2001 - same frozen face.)

circle jerk

I've been around here quite a bit, and the only "nuking Mecca" comments that pop up come in the form of accusations against the regular posters.

Excuse me while I go get some pom poms to shake ... what with me being a cheerleader and all.

I don't represent a side, I represent me.

Oh good lord, a poster from jr. high.

When you wish to cut out the juvenile inanities by which you wish to avoid actually taking a stand on issues, let me know.

Of course, there's NO circle-jerking going on at DU or Indymedia. And if you think so, you're a fascist racist!! (Or is it a racist fascist? I'm trying to get the LLL lingo just right.)

When all else fails, denigrate your opponent as young, naive, dumb, on drugs, mentally retarded, or communist.

I guess its easy for you to take a stand on issues because you are always right and "the other side" is always wrong. I know you don't like making moral equivalancies and being touchy feely and all that, but it still doesn't mean you are always right. Of course, if you shake yer pom poms here, you always will be.

Jerk... jerk... jerk...

#199 circle jerk

It's really easy to be never wrong or never judged

NEVER take a stand and possess no standards.

Is that what you want to make clear? Your amorality?

By the way, is Charles out cycling? Why can I still post?

Good question.

My goodness. The adolescents are really raving today, aren't they? Go away, little moonbat. The adults are trying to have a conversation.

Afternoon Charles!

I think circle jerk is very instructive, s/he reveals the core of the Leftist/contemporary American Liberal 'mindset'

Rather than having any standards of their own, save for the religious dedication to 'feelings' and 'egalitarianism of all cultures', they particularly hate anyone one that actually has standards, especially those that defend Western civilization.

Darleen (200): Very good, to the point post.

#207,
So If there is this "Islamonazi" army...

Denial is an ugly thing. Didn't you hear about what happened on 9/11/01? It was in all the papers.

#204 circle jerk

Again, you've just revealed your basic amorality. One can take stands on basic philosophical issues without being totally informed of any ad hoc event.

Must you know the particulars of any one females genital mutilation before condemning it out of hand?

190 This Blog is STILL a circle jerk 11/2/2003

You are cited in OED next to "Groupthink" and you sound so tough "nuking Mecca", so enlightened dismissing everyone who disagrees as a troll, morlock, moonbat, anti-semite

Actually, the only time you'll hear "nuke mecca" on this blog is when insane trolls such as yourself come in here and accuse people of saying "nuke mecca.

And as far as LGF dismissing everyone as troll, morlock, etc., that too is an insane accusation. Just ask Observer if he's been called any names. He came in here and disagreed, but was civilized, didn't insult his hosts, etc. And in return we shot his arguments to pieces, but treated him with respect.

As for your insane self, you're a troll and insane, plain and simple.

When all else fails, denigrate your opponent as young, naive, dumb, on drugs, mentally retarded, or communist.

You mean "and".

Darleen: yes, sometimes I deliberately leave laughable hate spewage like that up, because it's self-discrediting.

But you know, a little bit of that goes a long way. Just as with a hyperactive child, sometimes you have to send these creeps to their rooms without dinner -- or they'll just keep acting out.

#199
Where did all else fail?
Go listen to your shitty vegan punk rock and smoke your happy leaves you mentally challenged filthy communist.

This one must be coming down from Ecstasy or something.

#212 zulu

IMHO, in regards to the paranoia, nastiness and ego-centrism

I'd put my bet on meth.

In 1941, the average American Joe didn't know about Auschwitz. He didn't understand what Japanese Shintoism was all about. He had no idea of what "root causes" made the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor or the Nazis invade Poland.

And yet, hell, there we went, barging into a war without knowing all the facts. We should have sat it out and tried to figure out "Why do Hitler and Tojo hate us?"

One thing I don't think many people seem to grasp is that it makes no difference if your rights are being trampled by the state or by a corporation. It's not a matter of being against regulation, it's about being against the concentration of power. Certain portions of teh media are attempting to exercise powers normally reserved for fascist dictators (and stalinist dictators if you consider them a seperate category) A world where the private sector restricts the flow of information is just as bad as one in which the government restricts the flow of information, assuming equal sucess at censorship. Our higher educational system, to the degree that unthinking leftist hacks are turned out, is no better than a palestinian madrassa. Enron is as bad as Watergate (or perhaps the teapot dome scandal would be more appropriate) Dare I use the term, there is a moral equivalence between swindling taxpayers and swindling consumers and a moral equivalence between turning out splodeydopes and turning out mindless drones without the wits to tell good from evil. Not only is the left-right line a plane, it's a cylinder. The only difference between the extreme left and the extreme right, is that in the extreme right the state has stockholders.

Darleen (#213)

Whatever it is, it's an ugly one. Stinky!

By the way, that was the idiot who calls himself "Patriotboy". He knows he's going to get deleted and thrown out again, but he just keeps coming back. Like Wile E. Coyote, but dumber.

The trolls have a Glenn Close-like fatal attraction when it comes to LGF. Bunny boilers, the lot of them.

#225 CCR: good points. One reason why I don't call myself a libertarian is because I recognize that businesses and corporations can abuse power. When I was a legal assistant, I worked on the Lincoln S & L case back in the late 80's -early 90's. (For the prosecution). I saw enough of Charles Keating and Co. up close and personal to make me see that businessmen can be a socially destructive force.

However, there is a self-correcting mechanism in capitalism and there are courts to prosecute scumbags like Keating and Lay. What concerns me more these days is the power of the media and the PC universities - who checks them? And how do you check them without violating freedom of thought and speech?

The only way I can think of battling their speech with ours - the reason I think Charles and other bloggers are providing such an invaluable service.

#173 Observer

And where, in your Pantheon of unprincipled Presidents, do you rate Tricky Dick?

Dick learned from the best-- he learned from the Dems. after being screwed out of the presidency in 1960. Nice guys finish last in love and war. Cook County, IL, had dead people voting in droves-- this is a well known fact. JFK was so worried that Nixon would challange this, he came out with hat in hand to have a "talk". Nixon did not want to embarass the executive office with the scandal of cheating at the polls and let it go (most people never learned those little tid-bit of information in their US history class). Kissenger even said that this convinced Dick how it was and what you needed to do to suceed in politics. He also said, its a shame America never forgave Nixon, G-d knows he paid for it over and over again.

Clinton and/or LBJ were far worse, but they both share something in common...

zulu: "Bunny boilers?" Is that a South African term? (You made me go look up "winky" the other day! A new one on me!)

Sheesh, I go away for a while and a clueless moonbat shows up to prove everything I said in #141.
Its posts display a profound ignorance of logic and even of rhetorical technique; a mishmash of name-calling, clairvoyant strawmen, and unsupported authoritarian pronouncements, as though LLL insults and hostility alone were enough to persuade us to change our beliefs.
The last, of course, betrays a totalitarian mindset, the very thing that this creature attempts to deny.
For the troll itself: your hostility and contempt do not carry the weight of authority, at least not until your side gains the power it so desperately craves.
Sorry, that's how it is.
As Charles said, it is self-discrediting.
Now, FOAD.

I was really hoping that janis was back. Instead we get cj: young, naive, dumb, on drugs, mentally retarded, and / or communist.

Iron Fist - you used the 'viewer' survey, I used the 'historian's' survey.

CCR #215 - other than HUH?, your description that in the "extreme right the state has stockholders" is incorrect. If I understand you to be describing a form of fascism, you should know that it is still a form of socialism and therefore "Left" economically, not "extreme right". The nationalistic aspects of fascism DO place it to the right of internationalist communism, but there is an economic system in which the state does not control capital which is even further 'right' than any form of socialism.

Can it be any plainer than this?

We cannot defeat the Islamist threat without the same degree of faith fanatical Muslims have. That is why most Europeans have capitulated to the anti-liberty Muslims in their midst and to the Muslims in the Middle East who seek to annihilate Israel, the state in their midst that venerates liberty.

But in Israel, the Islamists have come upon an enemy many of whose people believe in their religion as deeply as the Islamists do in theirs. This is a major reason Israel is isolated along with America as the Islamists' main enemy. America and Israel have believers. The defeat of one or the other will render the Islamists' goal -- a Muslim world governed by Islamic laws -- probable, if not inevitable.

That is why this battle is a battle of civilizations. One civilization believes in liberty and one does not. The problem is that the civilization that has liberty has not produced anywhere the depth of belief in liberty that the opponents of liberty have produced. That is why most Europeans (and their supporters in America on the Left) see dying or killing for almost anything as pointless. When you don't believe in anything except not dying, you don't really believe in anything. For this reason, European civilization is in peril.

The great question mark is America. America is already in the midst of a civil war, thankfully still non-violent. It is between those who fervently believe in America and in Judeo-Christian revelation and those who fervently believe in neither.

If the former win, the Islamic totalitarian threat, like the totalitarian threats before it, will be vanquished. If the latter -- as represented by the Left, many Democratic Party leaders, pacifists, the cultural elite, and academia -- win, liberty will have been nothing more than an aberration that lasted a few hundred years.

[Link: www.townhall.com...]

Iron Fist-innerestin'-were you in a militia or what?

Donna V. (#222)

Sorry about the winky fiasco, I'm still blushing :-)

"Bunny boiler" is something my friends and I use when someone gets obsessive. You know how sometimes a guy will go nuts on you, stopping just short of stalking? That's a bunny boiler (comes from the bunny boiling scene in "Fatal Attraction"). Of course we've been known to do some "bunny boiling" of our own ;-)

Wow, love that phrase zulubaby. What's a winky?

#178 Donna V

LBJ had Congress award him the Silver Star for combat in WWII on 2 occassions (for the same supposed action). Unfortunately the Army did not have any record of LBJ earning the Silver Star, but whats a trivial detail when the man "feels" he earned it regardless of facts.

LBJ Sivler Star Fraud

Also I heard LBJ was buying munition stocks in his wife's name all the while escalating his war in S.E. Asia-- but thats a rumor (sorry no links).

#219
I'll bet my next paycheck against your allowance that you are yet another DUper/Indymediot attempting to breathe life into one of your moth-eaten strawmen by posting it here under what you fantasize to be false colors.
I do not condemn this in and of itself, since I have inundated your sacred authorities (nazimedia and du) with false-flag messages over the last two years.
Mine pass muster among moonbat moderators, however, and serve their subversive purpose; while yours is laughably lame and obvious to everyone here.
You have not advanced either your nominal cause, socialist authority, or you real one, a future career in advertising, media, or academic activism.

Re: LBJ - C-SPAN radio (WDC) aired the LBJ tapes a few years ago. LBJ called the president of Farrah slacks to suggest that they make the pockets a little deeper because his change was falling out. Plus, he wanted them to lower the crotch to give his "nuts" more room.

evariste and his ululating technicolor harpy (#230)

What's a winky?

Well, I see this is going to follow me around for a while. It all started with this post. Of course, Colt just had to notice (Geepers came to the rescue though, thank G-d! :-)

#233 Iron Fist

I was curious why the testimony of the surviving Davidians were never given full air time after the trial. I did read that the jury wept when the judge through the book (ten years) at those survivors charged with violating federal weapon laws. They did not know it was punishable upto that amount of time.

Why did Reno think she would actually have a chance running in Florida? What a wonk.

Iron Fist:

When I sorted by Moral Authority, Warren G. Harding was between Nixon and Clinton.

This is very unfair. Warren G. Harding was a better poker player than either man, could drink both of them under the table, and would have been a better administrator than either if he hadn't been busy drinking and playing poker.

Also: Warren G. Harding cared about people other than himself (something Nixon and Clinton would find inexplicable). He pardoned a lot of the people who had been locked up by that crazed fascist schoolteacher, Woodrow Wilson.

zulu: I'll have to remember bunny boiler. It's perfect! (Not to beat a dead, er, whatever, but I'm sure a woman thought up "winky." "Mummy, what's that odd thing little baby brother has?" "Why, honey, that's little Johnny's er, winky."

I can't imagine any self-respecting man would refer to his almighty Love Muscle as a "winky."

Donna V. (#239)

I can't imagine any self-respecting man would refer to his almighty Love Muscle as a "winky."

LOL! Men who give their "Love Muscle" a name should be banished altogether, if you ask me.

Actually, I nominate "winky" as the insult of choice for male moonbats. "Prick" has a maculine force to it that they clearly don't possess.

LBJ was a prick.
Michael Moore is a winky.

Donna V,

I've always found the assumption that women are slaves to their feelings insulting.

Hmmm. Are you being deliberately ironic here? ;-)

Michael Moore is a winky.

Should be Michael Moore has a winky (it has to be tiny, don't you think?)

After reading the perfesser's drivel, I had a thought:

This blather is L-Bonics, the LLL equivalent of e-bonics.

When you start wih the certainty you are always right, then life consists of trying to figure why everybody else is wrong.

Iron Fist, CCR, et al.

I agree about corporations having too much power, but the trick is not to pass that power to Government. I had a VERY conservative professor in college explain more than 30 years ago that he thought that the error was when the courts decided (in the early 1800's) that a corporation was a PERSON before the law, endowed with legal rights as a human being is. I must admit that I don't understand all the nuances of that, but it has a certain logic to it.

I think in the future free men will limit the power of corporations, maybe under another government, but it will happen, just as we now understand the power of the Church, military, and political authority must be limited.

Wherever a seat of power exists ruthless, ambitious men will be drawn. That's another of the problems with socialism (besides the fact that it does not work and is immoral), socialism cannot function without power. Men like Stalin and his ilk are drawn to power like green flies to s**t. They will always outcompete better men in a power struggle.

Donna V.,

I can't imagine any self-respecting man would refer to his almighty Love Muscle as a "winky."

I refer to mine as my "Reason For Living!"

P.S. - No, I'm not stalking you! I promise. Really.

right said fred from AL #247 - I think that considering a corporation to be a person (legal entity separate from officers / shareholders) is the root of corporate evil. Removing accountability from people and assigning it to a perpetual entity invites abuse. Blame the British and the Dutch East India Company! Aren't those the same people who gave us Tinky-Winky?

The idea that corporations have rights (like 'free speech') instead of chartered privileges is wrong. That's about as Left as I get.

HA: Well, "Reason for Living" suits me fine. Life would be pretty dull (for us too!) if the RfL did not exist:-D

And don't worry: I didn't take you for a bunny boiler:-)

Donna V #239

I think most guys would be comfortable with winky up until about age five.

If winky is so bad, do you think I should take it as an insult that the women call mine "dinky"

/self-deprecating humor off...

Right Wing Conspirator (#252)

You do know what dinky means, right? This is not good news.

...liberals' conceptual system of the "nurturant parent" has as its highest value helping individuals who need help.

Liberals hate individuals. They only help members of groups. Recipients of liberal largesse (usually using other people's money, taken by force) rate assistance by virtue of membership in "oppressed" groups, not as individuals.

#253 zulubaby

You do know what dinky means, right? This is not good news.

LAA LAA LAA I Cannot Hear You LAA LAA LAA
LAA LAA LAA It is still something good LAA LAA LAA
LAA LAA LAA Why would they lie to me LAA LAA LAA

:-)

Right Wing Conspirator (#255)

LOL! You're a brave man to make that public -- kind of endearing really :-)

Do they also tell you that size doesn't matter? 'Cos that one's right up there with "the checks in the mail".

#256 zulubaby

Do they also tell you that size doesn't matter? 'Cos that one's right up there with "the checks in the mail".

It...doesn't...right???

Anyway, I was, uh, talking about someone I know, uh, not that I would know of course, but, uh, umm, it is what someone told me.

And I just have to post this, and yes zulubaby I know that you are a female, but it is still funny:

How metrosexual are you (quiz)

I dress like a slob and can't cook but I am straight as an arrow so that is OK. :-)

Please vote for Little Green Footballs for Chester of the Week! LGF has a slight lead but they need your votes!

The site is The Poll is on the left hand side! Thanks. Brendoman.com

Brendoman.com

But what's a "chester"?

Dr. Lakoff makes a very salient point - liberals treat symptoms, while conservatives prefer to treat the disease.

Make sure it all goes to the cause, don't use it for administration, communication, infrastructure, or career development.' So there's actually a structural reason built into the worldviews that explains why conservatives have done better.

so, if someone gets hit by a car, by him a band-aid, don't build a cross walk so he doesn't get hit next time. and be sure to attack anyone who might build a cross-walk as an 'evil conservative'.

Model4 #120 -- where do I send the $$ for your campaign? I am a sucker for your 'framing' and think I've got a frame of my own for your campaign (derived from your post #64). You should run as the

No More 'No More Wire Hangers!!!' Party

candidate.

#244 zulubaby--I won't speculate on the size of Moore's winky but will say with certainty that he hasn't been able to see it for years.

I'm kind of sorry to have missed patriotboy (aka circle jerk). It had been a while since I viewed the lonely psychotic episode he calls a blog, so I checked it out. Seems like he took most of the year off to "get people excited about Howard Dean."

So I hope all of us are really excited about Howard Dean now.

Right Wing Conspirator (#257)

I can't take that quiz, it's for men -- I'm 100% woman.

I dress like a slob and can't cook but I am straight as an arrow so that is OK. :-)

All is well in the world ;-)

Melissa (#262)

LOL! Eeewww ... I really don't want to even think about that.

"Nurturant"?

Conservatives use language, while the left uses... I'm not sure what that is.

This Blog is STILL a circle jerk

I am outraged -- outraged, I say -- at the homophobia implicit in the way you reduce such a wholesome and convivial pastime as circle-jerking to a pejorative metaphor.

Goodness, I had George Lakoff as a teacher in graduate school there. His speciality, by the way, is metaphors. He used to be married to Robin Lakoff Tolmach, who also teaches at Berkeley. She is also a linguist, but her speciality is the politics of words. And yes, George would spend 200 pages saying what could probably be said in 25, without the metaphors.

#126 Yehudit: If you want to see some smug self-righteous leftists take Lakoff's thesis and do a circle-jerk with it, check this out.

Heh! For sheer self-parody, it's hard to top the author's worrying-out-loud about unintentionally excluding gay men from the ''masculinity metaphor'':

But real masculinity is more complicated and includes women. (Well, heterosexual masculinity anyway. There's an obvious flaw in my metaphor here, and I don't want to feed anti-gay stereotypes while trying to fight anti-female ones

Never mind that it is just a metaphor, whose referent is U.S. political parties, and which aspires simply to summarize the author's worldview in a quick, pithy way -- not to encapsulate the full spectrum of human sexuality. This is one step above complaining that Aesop's Fables contribute to lesbian invisibility because we're never told about how the Tortoise and her female life partner went on to co-found a women's athletic guild.

P.S. Andrea's ''hen and capon party'' is a fantastic turn of phrase. But that reminds me: What's the deal with capons, culinarily speaking? Are they supposed to have a distinctive flavor that you don't get with hens, or a different ratio of white/dark meat, or what? The other day I noticed that one of the supermarkets near me had capons specifically labeled as such in the poultry section.

"Marriage" is about sex.

Clearly this guy has never been married...

Throbert -

I believe that capons are more tender, like steers. The lack of testosterone keeps the muscles from developing too much. Kind of like the Democrats on foreign policy.