Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

[vt]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

My beef with reporting is that the press on both sides goes after the extreme examples. They never bring up what THEIR side is doing wrong.

I hear Koch brothers on the right all the time, but most of the press never brings up Soros on the left (a major FIRE beneficiary by the way).

I feel the great majority of the public, if informed of the Kochs and Soros, would condemn both and what they stood for.

As Shakesphere said: a pox on both your houses.

Woody, I respect your views; you bring up real issues. But why don't you ever mention specific problems with the left?

[Woodsman]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

It's simply unbelievable.

Why is it unbelievable? NR is like a GOP newsletter. An official organ is not going to criticize the great leader and the five year plan. If this were a parliamentary system, could Boehner survive a no confidence vote? Is not everyone with a pulse and interest aware of the drubbing the GOP took? But what else are they going to say?

This is what happens when politics gets so out of whack that Peter King of New York is described as a "moderate" and far right wingers like Rohrabacher are portrayed as sensible guys.

[Woodsman]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

Woody, I respect your views; you bring up real issues. But why don't you ever mention specific problems with the left?

Why is it so important that I do that here?

As far as I can tell from about two years of near daily reading, there are plenty of vocal critics here for the problems of the left. Seeming endless streams of criticism (and plenty of vitriol, too) can be found, and among it you'll see where I've talked about bad ideas from the left in specific and general terms. I've been a vocal and plain spoken critic of the liberal class here, so I'm not exactly sure what the heck some people are so exercised about.

In terms of specific policies or ideology realized in law and expenditures I'm also not entirely sure what "left" and "liberalism" they're talking about, really. Welfare to Work, the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, the ACA? I'm not seeing it from Democrats and I don't look for it from the GOP, so where is it? What politician of any note anywhere can rightfully be held up as heir to the uniquely American progressive political tradition? The propagandists on the right wing are fond of trotting out the corrupt freak show of what's become of a once diverse and effective Democratic party and liberal intelligentsia like it's some sort of totem.

I'm required to take it very seriously, I know.

Well, I don't. I don't accept the terms of the right wing as representative of what's real in history and current politics. What the right wing and even responsible conservatives fail to notice is that they've won the argument world wide, even if it took a fair bit of violence to settle things. They've held the political high ground since the first Nixon administration and the conditions that exist today are largely of their making. What is trotted out by the propagandists as The Eeevilll Left I understand as a barely recognizable remnant living out its last days like Tiberius in Capri; a cultural island relegated as a consolation prize to the losers.

Me, I resent being compelled to live up to what self-described GOP partisans and ideological conservatives define as fair and balanced. To achieve such balance and thus credibility I'm expected to dedicate most of my energy to matching the sins of left and right in perfect tu quoque symmetry. Well, I'm not going to do that and if it makes some people irritated or dismissive then I will either live with it or get bored and stop posting. Anyway, I'm here for EJ's work.

Heck, I don't even believe in the left/right paradigm anymore and clearly the terms are largely useless in communicating any serious meaning outside the current political context. But try and have that conversation with people who insist that Obama and the Democratic party are socialists, which by the way is a mainstream opinion on the American right and a majority opinion among people who identify with the Tea Party. It's not too unwelcome a view here in the forums, I might add.

[flintlock]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

Makes sense to me. And what about those who won't believe the negative data or their own eyes? What do we make of their impediment? My point is yours, flint, only it's the Tea Party affiliates who are the ones being manipulated by propaganda. And that propaganda is funded and developed not in support of the interests of the good burghers in the Tea Party, but the interests of amoral billionaires like the Kochs. If everyone is okay with that, then I'm a happy minority of one on this issue.

So no, I don't see these folks as exactly the good burghers the right wing press makes them out to be. I think if things get mad max-y here at home, the Tea Party will be the perfect medium for growing all sorts of peculiar ideologies. There is no similarly organized movement on the left save occupy whatever and I did say "organized." Note also whose necks were being stepped on and which cohort was under the baton during the Occupy summer. Contrast that with the reaction to the Tea Party theater and at least consider if that difference might have any bearing on how the TPTB view the Tea Party?

Seeing the Tea Party as a source of concern and looking at them warts and all doesn't make me or anyone else who shares the opinion either gullible or foolish. If anything, it's a marker of realism and historical understanding. What's wrong with recognizing that the mindset of the TP aligns almost perfectly with the worst social and economic ideas of the GOP, which in turn aligns further with some of more discredited ideas rooted in the experience of the American South. If that makes someone foolish or gullible, what does ignoring it make one?

We seem to think we are immune from this in America, but just look at the reaction we see here in this most erudite of forums when some right leaning folks are confronted with ideas that most everywhere in the world are unremarkable and centrist propositions. If hackles get up here in our oasis of civility, oh brother what is the Tea Party like!

Understood, but showing videos like the woman who thinks Obama is an Arab and offering her up as a typical Tea Party member is no different than showing videos like this as representing the average Democrat.

So who believes the first video is truly representative but not the latter? Vice versa? That's gullible.

Do you believe there are no corresponding "Koch brothers" on the Left??

Are you suggesting the Tea Party organizing is wrong? That Americans have no right to form political parties? Or is it only wrong because you think the Liberals have no corresponding party? ( which is untrue) Or is it merely heresy to suggest there is an alternative to our corrupt dual party system?

Most people today get their information filtered through a media that is almost always politically biased one way or another. Not just biased but financially controlled by political forces. Its unfortunate people feel they have to chose sides because they are simply being played as suckers when they fall into that trap. Its like the Crips and the Bloods. You pick a side and then fight to defend it no matter how wrong they may be. Just blind defense of your team. The Tea Party has some valid points but I have heard enough crap there to make me wary of them too. Like all ideologues, you pick your team and then spend all your effort defending it. Normal decent Americans are getting sucked into the politics of the extreme wings of both parties. If they would open their minds they would find out they are not that far apart. But then that would require independent thought.

[flintlock]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

My beef with reporting is that the press on both sides goes after the extreme examples. They never bring up what THEIR side is doing wrong.

I hear Koch brothers on the right all the time, but most of the press never brings up Soros on the left (a major FIRE beneficiary by the way).

I feel the great majority of the public, if informed of the Kochs and Soros, would condemn both and what they stood for.

As Shakesphere said: a pox on both your houses.

Woody, I respect your views; you bring up real issues. But why don't you ever mention specific problems with the left?

Agree. You'd get more cred if you didn't come off as a leftist spokesman. Cough.. Fair and balanced... cough!

Doesn't that Fox tag line make you want to puke! Its like the lawyer ads on TV "For the people".

[BK]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

Democrats vs Republicans - the differences are only rhetorical.
Exhibit 1: Governor Chris Christie - this guy is such a good republican POLITICIAN that my solidly Democrat friends from Vermont love him.
Gov Christie has lots of fiscally conservative speaking points, yet he chooses to run a special election for Senatorial race in order to get Corey Booker out of the news which cost New Jersey $10 -$20 Million.
My point is itulip forum is best when it stays away from political topics because ultimately both parties are on the same ship and the heeding hasn't changed no matter which party is governing.
I'll change my opinion when a Paul Ryan denounces his Congressional pension or a Gov Chris Christie denounces is Governor pension or any of the there benefits they garner through political office that our country cannot afford.

[photon555]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

Are we itulipers just arguing over labels? Are there real issues on which we have differences, and are those differences hidden or distorted by the labels we fire at each other? Perhaps we need to agree on the definition of the labels we use so we can have constructive debate. Dcarrigg has made a start by offering his ideas on what the definitions might be, but we should have a general agreement. Is there a way to do this? That is, to allow anyone who wants to to propose a definition or a change to the definition of someone else. Does anyone else believe this would be a worthwhile use of our time and effort?

I propose that the definitions be posted as a sticky and perhaps copied to any threads where they would be useful. I also propose that we choose new labels so that we can leave behind the past history of bad feelings. Perhaps if we used flowers as our labels it would remind us to be considerate of other points of view. I think it would be hard to be rude to someone who identifies as a Rose just because we are an Orchid. Of course, we are all Tulips, and just what should that mean? I personally think that the Banksters, the elite financial class, should be labeled as Crabgrass.

[shiny!]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

Are we itulipers just arguing over labels? Are there real issues on which we have differences, and are those differences hidden or distorted by the labels we fire at each other? Perhaps we need to agree on the definition of the labels we use so we can have constructive debate. Dcarrigg has made a start by offering his ideas on what the definitions might be, but we should have a general agreement. Is there a way to do this? That is, to allow anyone who wants to to propose a definition or a change to the definition of someone else. Does anyone else believe this would be a worthwhile use of our time and effort?

I propose that the definitions be posted as a sticky and perhaps copied to any threads where they would be useful. I also propose that we choose new labels so that we can leave behind the past history of bad feelings. Perhaps if we used flowers as our labels it would remind us to be considerate of other points of view. I think it would be hard to be rude to someone who identifies as a Rose just because we are an Orchid. Of course, we are all Tulips, and just what should that mean? I personally think that the Banksters, the elite financial class, should be labeled as Crabgrass.

Devilthorn. They start out as cute little yellow flowers, but the seed thorns are viable for decades and the poison stings long after you pull them out of your foot.

[lektrode]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

Devilthorn. They start out as cute little yellow flowers, but the seed thorns are viable for decades and the poison stings long after you pull them out of your foot.

kinda like 1st termers, 'tenderfoots', as they are called in some circles...

but yeah, thats a purrrfect nicname for em (most of the political class) ms shiny!
since this stuff IS The Weed From Hell, if there ever was!

have become... uhhhh... intimately familiar with it on several sep occasions!!! (typically in the middle of the night, going to the...
ummm.... head, and 'finding one' buried in the carpet, the hard way, IYKWIM ;)

so.... my new landscaping hobby?

absolute 100% eradication - (IF only, we could do this with the political aristocracy...) no matter what it takes, no matter how much eeeeeevilly poisonous herbicide(s) it requires (or how many bugs that eat this GD stuff i hafta buy/replicate)
I WILL take out every last one of these GD 'goatheads' - if i hafta make my patch glow-in-dark visible from the space station, with the herbicides (or FIRE/flame-throwing, scorched-earth, mother-of-all-battles, as in: its either IT or ME, 1way, or another, IT goes, or I go - and i dont give up easy.... funny thing about boatguys, or at least those of us who WORK on em....

(scuse the ad)

[shiny!]

Re: Tea Partiers Know Science Better Than Liberals?!?

kinda like 1st termers, 'tenderfoots', as they are called in some circles...

but yeah, thats a purrrfect nicname for em (most of the political class) ms shiny!
since this stuff IS The Weed From Hell, if there ever was!

have become... uhhhh... intimately familiar with it on several sep occasions!!! (typically in the middle of the night, going to the...
ummm.... head, and 'finding one' buried in the carpet, the hard way, IYKWIM ;)

so.... my new landscaping hobby?

absolute 100% eradication - (IF only, we could do this with the political aristocracy...) no matter what it takes, no matter how much eeeeeevilly poisonous herbicide(s) it requires (or how many bugs that eat this GD stuff i hafta buy/replicate)
I WILL take out every last one of these GD 'goatheads' - if i hafta make my patch glow-in-dark visible from the space station, with the herbicides (or FIRE/flame-throwing, scorched-earth, mother-of-all-battles, as in: its either IT or ME, 1way, or another, IT goes, or I go - and i dont give up easy.... funny thing about boatguys, or at least those of us who WORK on em....

(scuse the ad)

Love that song. It has often popped into my head when weeding my rose beds!