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Baseball Primer Newsblog— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Monday, July 02, 2012
My favorite play in baseball is the second base steal. In the play, the base runner watches the pitch, and at just the right moment, he sprints toward second. The catcher snatches the pitch, springs up and rockets the ball to the second baseman who snags it and tries to tag the runner as he slides into the base. As the dust clears, all eyes are on the second base umpire who, in a split second, calls the runner safe or out. When the play is over, the players dust themselves off, and the game goes on.
Some on the field may disagree with the umpire’s call. However, the umpire’s decision is final, and arguing can get you ejected. To stay in the game, great teams simply adjust their strategy based on the umpire’s call.
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That's fair, and the idea that Tibet is forced to exist in the union rather than voluntary union members has resonance (though it bears mentioning that simply means we're taking Tibet's argument at face value and ignoring any other argument as untrue, a priori.)
I'm not a secessionist. I'm just interested in seeing how people justify one breakup of big into smaller, but refuse it elsewhere.
While calling liberals liars for doing the same
and same-sex marriage
While going on and on - unless you've changed your view from a past thread - that marriage refers specifically to men and women. Did you change that one?
And yet, the entire impetus for Lassus's hilarious "Where are the conservatives?" comment was that there are few conservatives here.
Considering the dismissing we get for high-fiving and living in cocoons I was legitimately curious if anyone who thought so would recognize that people here, on this board and the target of these indictments, actually take great care in reading and learning what the other side thinks.
("Hilarious"?)
As opposed to some other place on Earth that newcomers came to?
When the first immigrants (those so-called "Native Americans") first came over, they usurped the places of those before them, if they had to--or they were forced to abide elsewhere. If not then, that dynamic late took place. Native Americans were pushing each other around a long time time before the Europeans got here. That is all too often the way change takes place everywhere and at all times. The grudge some bear toward the country that gives them sustenance seems to emanate from a source within us that thin,s that we, unlike everyone else, have committed he unforgivable sin of excelling. We should have found a way to keep paradise, such as it was, intact. This is a Disney version of the primeval and the noble savage.
So do lots of liberals, but nobody would call me one.
The pro-life position and the opposition to same-sex marriage are core conservative positions, and it's dishonest of you to suggest that these have no bearing on whether one is a conservative.
Besides, I notice that you didn't include the part of my comment where I wanted to slash 80% of government.
I see no reason not to call this out for what it is: dishonesty on your part. A lack of good faith.
It is impossible to have a national career as a conservative politician and not be opposed to abortion. You may not mean it, or actually DO anything about it while in office, but you damn well better pay lip service to it.
I'm sure there are individual conservatives who are pro-abortion, but there are also plenty of conservatives who have no problem with the government providing or expanding healthcare. Lots of Tea Party types love them some Medicare. Also, has Snapper really been forgotten so quickly?
When you bash conservatives let's say 20% as much as you bash liberals, I'll stop calling you a conservative.
Slashing government is what the Tea Party wants. They are conservatives, and so are you.
Despite what Ray says about dishonesty, I'd agree with this, easily. However, Ray is not running for office.
Ray isn't a standard line social conservative (though as Lassus points out, he tends to say the same sorts of things about "hangers on" and "nonproductive members of society" that so-cons say) but it's a little much of splitting the hair to argue that you're not really X when you consistently bunker down with X for the sake of battle.
If somebody said, "I'm not a liberal! I support tax cuts for the rich and I oppose abortion rights!", would you call ######## because "So do lots of other liberals."?
So is this your coming out party as a lefty?
If I was an erotica writer, 50 Shades would piss me off. It's not particularly well-written, not more or less explicit than any other erotica on the market, and suddenly it's selling billions of copies. I don't understand it. It's not as if it has suddenly become OK to suggest that people read/watch porn, other than 50 Shades. I'm teaching a summer class this session, and it's my SOP to ask students what books they've read lately-- about 1/3 of them listed 50 Shades. If Emmanuelle in Space was one of the last few films I'd seen,i doubt I'd be volunteering that information publicly.
You don't have words for what I am, but I am consistently opposed to the revanchist neoconfederates who drive the policy base of the modern GOP/TP. Make of that what you will.
BTF seems to have a large number of guys who are economic/fiscal conservatives, like, for example, mrams, who along with Tripon, started this "who do you read" thing and a who post occasionally in worldview threads. It also has a lot of guys who go with "Don't label me; I believe some of this and some of that and don't like the major parties"--sort of what I would call Bill James politics.
In terms of guys who flat-out support the GOP in a more partisan way, there are HW, Esoteric, Jason Epstein, Joey B, and a few others, who don't post much.
What BTF lacks are social conservatives, and I would say that is because the demographic here is so tight: white male, urban, professional, post-grad education, ages 21-49. Even BTF's outspoken social conservative, snapper, lives in NYC and hits every other point in that profile.
So-cons are not a big internet presence.
Well, like Lassus suggests, your snark and personal attacks are directed at Liberals 99.9% of the time, both here and when you talk about the larger world. Own it, Ray. Own it.
I wish I could agree or disagree, but getting to that from what Ray said and then what MCoA said in response is a moebius strip I'm unable to decipher, seriously. I will admit being confounded.
I think that Sam saying he's not liberal is nearly as ridiculous as Ray saying he's not conservative, however. Does that help?
Nah, I get you. You're a contrarian who had the bad luck to be born a bit smarter than the other fellas down the holler. If you were from the northeast, you'd either be a Jesus freak or a libertarian.
The last time it can be said to have been done on a large scale without thorough violent subjugation was after WWII in Germany and Japan. And these countries were simply literally beaten to the ground (and Germany was caught between an alternative that included the prospect of completely being at the mercy of a power, the USSR, that would have had no mercy toward it—that indeed looked forward to brutalizing it). Japan is the ideal for radically restructuring a society—but there was an element that wanted it (which MacArthur masterfully exploited), and an element that genuinely felt the spoils of victory entitled the victors to work their will.
The hanging of Lee and Davis, though--well, of Lee, anyway--just wouldn't have done anything but re-conflagrate the war, and, man, everyone had enough of that. Even the victorious Northern generals had enough. When Johnson right after Lincoln's assassination seemed to favor trying Lee, Grant went to him and flatly told the President that he, Johnson, wasn't going to do that because that would be making a liar out of him, Grant, and if Johnson insisted on that course of action, he would resign his commission and if he resigned his commission Sherman would do the same. I don’t know if a military man in the US ever laid it on the line like Grant did to Johnson.
I am thinking more along legal/political lines of reforming the system of government—or acknowledging that reformation was achieved by war. It should have been made clear beyond all doubt that the rebellious states were only being accepting back into the Union conditionally. They must pledge unqualified fealty to the Union, and, in fact, they must bend their knee to federal hegemony. State Rights and Federalism did not contemplate the states being sovereign except to the extent the federal government allowed it. The extent it would be allowed was strictly a political matter. Federal law took precedent in all matters.
Probably not, but a decent gloss on the narrative nonetheless.
The idea that wanting to cut 80% of government is evidence you aren't an American conservative is funny. Among the people who want to cut 80% of government, maybe 0.5% of them are lefty anarchists, and the rest are all on the right.
I've spent hours and hours online interacting with Ray DiPerna. (What this says about me, well, I'll just leave y'all the set-up hanging there.) Ray is quite conservative is his attitudes about social issues even though he is consistent enough in his skepticism of government to oppose government intervention on many of those topics. Ray's libertarianism has a strong law-and-order streak (which is an odd thing) and he is much, much less interested in the surveillance state, the "war on terror", and criminal justice / liberty issues than, say, Dan Szymborski. Ray is broadly supportive of neoconservative foreign policy initiatives and recently defended the Iraq War. Ray commonly repeats right-wing memes from blogs and talk radio and defends them in good faith. He can be counted upon to support Republican candidates and major initiative and to attack Democratic candidates and major initiatives. He's a right-winger with a libertarian streak. (Much like Good Face.)
That's a good parlor trick.
But really though, I'm the farthest thing from a foreign policy neocon or supporter of the War on Terror/surveillance state.
As I understand it, your opposition to neoconservative foreign policy is rooted in a classical conservatism - something not too far from Daniel Larison's deep distrust of liberal internationalism. I take you as coming from the intellectual tradition which sees neoconservatism as the ne plus ultra of liberal internationalism. It's certainly more than possible to be rooted in conservative traditions and oppose the US' military adventurism over the past decade.
Sure, it'll look that way, when you define liberal as "anyone who disagrees with me", especially, since you are pretty much always wrong about everything.
And as support that you are wrong again, I will offer that I participate in these threads*, and am neither a liberal, nor a libertarian, nor a conservative.
*against my better judgement
Rastafarian?
Unfortunately I'm not robinred and I don't keep count of those things a la BB-Reference, but E.J. Dionne has been one of the most reliable defenders of the communitarian ethic versus the rampages of unchecked individualism as you can find anywhere. And of course there's Krugman and Ezra Klein, neither of whom buy into the "Social Security is going bankrupt" myth.
Conversely, how many times have we seen them defend any initiative to combat climate change, besides maybe relative trivia like tighter CAFE standards and better light bulbs? Serious discussions of climate change are virtually non-existant in the national discourse, and I sure as hell don't see the E.J Dionnes of the world trying to force the issue. As a group, they're far more likely to make a joke about Al Gore than they are to discuss anything he says.
I'd like for you to show me some evidence of that.
Our national discourse is in tatters, and that's the liberals' fault as much as it is the conservatives. I mean, wake up and smell the ####### coffee.
I'll agree with the first part, but the second part is far more a function of the space** they get in the MSM than it is any great failing of vision on their part. The truth is that in order to get longer and more elaborate versions of the standard talking points on all sides, you have to go beyond the MSM and into magazines, journals, books, and the internet. But that's the fault of their would-be MSM editors, not the commentators themselves. And if I were a non-wingnut conservative or libertarian, I'd be making the same complaint.
**meaning column inches and airtime
EDIT: And Brian, the larger (and unfortunate) point is that the audience for serious political discussion is distinctly marginal. It could conceivably become bigger if some adventurous souls in the MSM were to push the envelope, but when you look at the circulation numbers for the more serious political magazines, you can see concrete evidence of the upper range of potential readers and / or viewers. The most blatant example of this point is the way that serious political discussion by political candidates has been almost completely obliterated. I think we can pretty much see who's most responsible for that sad state of affairs today, and thanks in great part to Citizens United it's only going to get worse.
----------------------------------------------------
It depends on whether you mean "participants" as in "number of people" or as in "number of posts." Ray being Ray seems to think the fact that Lassus, Andy, and MCOA post all the time and annoy him all the time means that BTF is "85% liberal."
When 3 liberals make 100 posts, Ray counts it as 100. When he and David and Good Face make 100 posts, Ray counts it as 3.
In terms of guys who flat-out support the GOP in a more partisan way, there are HW, Esoteric, Jason Epstein, Joey B, and a few others, who don't post much.
And for the most part, with the obvious exception of Joey, those other three partisan GOPers are far more rational in their comments, much more willing to consider countering evidence, and less obsessed with slaying the liberal dragon than our local "non-conservative" (ho, ho) libertarians.
Well, like Lassus suggests, your snark and personal attacks are directed at Liberals 99.9% of the time, both here and when you talk about the larger world. Own it, Ray. Own it.
That's another thing about Ray: He's about as likely to admit something like that as a standup guy is likely to squeal to the cops. I think in his view that makes him a standup guy.
We're really getting it coming and going. Support foreign wars? You're a neocon and thus conservative. Oppose foreign wars? You're a classic conservative and thus conservative.
While paleocons and many libertarians share a position here, it does not make libertarians paleocons, or vice versa.
LA Times
Where a country is ruled by one group, and actively oppresses/mistreats/steals from another distinct group- which distinct group (distinct linguistically, or ethnically or by religion...) forms a majority in some coherent geographic reason- then such group may be able to justify secession - example East Timor, Tibet, South Sudan...
However, where a region wants to break away because it is pissed off at losing control of the entire nation's legislature, and rather than being oppressed, is upset at possibly losing the ability to oppress another group- well then secession is not justified. example- I'll let Sam fill in the blank.
Of course, matters are rarely as clear cut as East Timor being justified in secession or the Confedercy (or Alaska) not being justified.
Look at Bosnia... once a part of Yugoslavia... a plurality (40-50%) were Bosniaks (meaning they spoke Serbo-Croatian but were moslem), some 30-35% were Serbian (meaning they spoke Serbo-Croatian, were Serbian-Orthodox and used the Cyrillic alphabet) and about 15-20 were Croatian (meaning they spoke Serbo-Croatian, were Catholic and used the Latin alphabet.) Each group for various historic (and not so historic) reasons hated and feared the other...
Yugoslavia broke up along ethnic lines... The Bosniaks wanted Bosnia to be an independent country- but half the country wanted no part of a country where the Bosniaks were going to be running things... Under those circumstances were the Bosniaks justified in seeking secession from Yugoslavia? Were the Bosnian Serbs justified in seeking secession from Bosnia?
Ok... but then the Serbs behaved badly, very badly, they stockpiled arms and with aid and assistance from what was left of Yugoslavia began a rebellion against the local/Bosnian government - killing non-Serbs and ethnically cleansing Bosniaks out of regions the Serbs intended to carve out of Bosnia (while it describes behavior that Humans have engaged in for millennia I think the Bosnian Serbs may actually have coined the phrase "ethnic cleansing")...
I've never been entirely clear on what the consequences of a "Yes" victory would have been in 1995. Another 0.5% and things would have gotten interesting.
Canada would as a whole would likely have not been impacted too badly, Quebec could have devolved into a queer little French speaking nation practicing some form of Apartheid-Lite..
My 9th-grade Econ teacher speculated at the time that it would lead to BC and maybe AB wanting to break away themselves and try to become US states. I have no idea if that was even remotely possible but it sounded awfully far-fetched to me even then.
using the time honored method of saying that anyone to my left (on most matters) is liberal, anyone to my right (on most matters) is conservative, and that anyone who calls himself a libertarian* is a libertarian, I think:
40% liberals, 15% libertarians, 5-10% conservative, 25-35% other/hard to place
*except Sam, he says he's libertarian and there are such creatures as leftish libertarians, but for this exercise I'm sticking him on the Liberal side.
Probably not far off...though I meant more the immediate consequences. I'm sure the separatists would take the referendum result as making an independent Quebec a democratic necessity. Whereas I'm sure the federal government wouldn't have said "well, looks like you're a country now".
In light of the discussion of how these things happen that's been going on the past 100 comments or so, I'm just wondering about the legal follow up to a "Yes" victory.
Just spit-balling, but I can see this being more likely with the Maritime provinces. I have family there and it seems like culturally they have a lot more ties with New England than the rest of Canada.
Alberta does seem to make a lot of whining noises about Quebec getting special treatment, so why not them? But they're just the angsty 15 year old of Canada...sure they'll threaten to pop a bottle of sleeping pills every now and then, but all they really want is attention.
(Can you tell I spent several years in Saskatchewan?)
I disagree. There would be essentially no land communication between the Maritimes and the rest of Canada. There's no modern example of such a geographically divided nation maintaining its territorial integrity. A breakup would be inevitable.
George Wallace isn't going to let them darkies in the schools either.
That's a good reason (among many other excellent reasons) to return to personal dynastic states. Hapsburgs forever!
Pre-Dubya/Iraq it was remotely possible...
Newfoundland was not part of Canada until 1949, prior to that they had bee a "self-governing dominion," but in reality much of the time it was run from the UK- especially during the Great Depression and WWII when local government was dissolved... some conventions were held and referenda on the fate of Newfoundland were set- up- it seems that large part of the "dominion" were in favor of joining the US of A (unlike Canada, Newfoundland was never invaded by the US- had no hard feelings towards the US, the Newfies spoke English, but were/are separated from English Canada by Quebec, Newfoundland had stronger economic ties to the US than to Canada...)- but that sentiment freaked out the Brits, who refused to allow that option on any ballot- when a "final" referendum was held, no option got a majority, a plurality picked union with Canada... A run off vote was held, and by a 52-48% vote, the Newfies became Canucks...
Of course this was an odd situation- no outcome was going to lead to armed conflict or war-
Joining Canada- those opposed were not violently opposed- and accepted it
Full independence- those opposed (whether to stay with the UK, join Canada or join the US) were not violently oppsed and would have accepted it
Full independence- and the joining the US after the UK could not longer veto referendum topics- the limeys woudl ahve been a bit red in the face, but no one would have done anything...
Really? The Canucks and the Quebecers would have blockaded each other? Don't see it, if Canada broke up it would have gone the Czech/Slovak route not the Yugoslavia route.
The Maritimes would have been separated from the rest of Canada in essentially the same way Alaska is separated from the rest of the US.
40% liberals, 15% libertarians, 5-10% conservative, 25-35% other/hard to place
There's a much simpler way of determining this. If the election were being held today, and you were casting the deciding vote in the state that would decide the winner, would you vote for Romney or Obama? That cuts to the chase by mostly eliminating the coy answers coming from Primates who live in solidly red or solidly blue states.
And for those who answer "Ron Paul" or "Ralph Nader" or some other clown candidate with no chance of winning, the tiebreaker is "Would you extend the Bush tax cuts to all taxpayers, or cut off the extension at the $250,000 household income level? The answer to that question also says it all.
You could then either add up the raw totals, or weigh them according to how often each candidate's supporters post in these political threads.
It's funny that there this comes up in a thread that very recently linked to Bleeding Heart Libertarians*, this year's branding of the whole "liberaltarian" creature feature.
*you're getting warmer, but I'm a wascally wabbit.
Krusty's got my vote again this year.
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos ...
I'd like to know what that amounts to in specific examples, other than the oft-noted phenomenon of hypocritical practice versus preaching on both sides**, which I don't think is what you're really talking about.
But here on BTF, as long as people answer those two questions in #1443 honestly, I doubt if you'll find too many sheep winding up among the goats, or vice versa. I can imagine a conservative (like George Romney) voting for Obama, but not the sort of conservatives who generally vote in Republican primaries these days. And I can't even begin to imagine a liberal who would vote for the party of Karl Rove and the Koch Brothers under any circumstances.
**tightfisted liberals, philandering conservatives, etc.
Would there be a good, principled reason to be against adding a new state? (I mean the type of thing that would have the slightest chance to happen -- Puerto Rico, DC, a breakaway Canadian province -- not Somalia or something.) The main reason I can think of someone objecting would be if they knew the new state would vote against their political orientation (eg, a Republican might well be against DC statehood since DC would be overwhelmingly Democratic). While I certainly understand that logic, it's not something a politician could even explicitly say in public, and it isn't really "logic" per se. Why not add new states? New states are cool!
I guess people might object to PR because PR would presumably want to maintain Spanish as their official language. That could be a reason other than pure partisanship.
Anyway, as far as I'm concerned, Canada should totally join up. Even Alberta.
Well many GOPers are on record as against statehood fro DC, because that is contrary to the founders original intent :-)
there has been some sporadic talk of ceding the residential areas of DC back to Maryland/Delaware- but if that idea started to gain traction the Rovites would undoubtedly oppose that too...
If PR voted for statehood, methinks the GOP would find a way to reject it- likely by conditioning it on accepting English as the only official language or some such BS
Back in the 40s/50s there was open opposition to Hawaii based upon race.
I think you're just afraid to commit.
I think at this point in time, talk is cheap. The opt-outs only last as long as the individual governors, after all. I think that the Medicaid expansion will be completed inside of ten years. There will be big pressure for states to opt-in at that point.
In addition, I don't believe that healthcare can keep on being such a big issue for Republicans. McCain also paid lip service to the idea that he wanted to cover everyone, after all. This idea that universal coverage is a D only idea is, I think, a temporary thing, caused in part by the recession/depression and the weird anti-Obama political climate, that I don't think can be sustained.
Also, arguing about what percent of BBTF is liberal? Have we scraped the bottom of the conversational barrel?
hmmm... possible candidates:
DC
Puerto Rico
United States Virgin Islands
Northern Mariana Islands
Guam
American Samoa
Navajo Nation*
long shots:
some part of Canada (if Quebec seceded, some type of economic collapse... the conservatives out west grow further apart from the rest of Canada...
some part of Mexico (if Mexico goes the way of the USSR...)
*Apparently the Navajo raise this every now and then to [poss off/scare the Hope...
It started when Clinton was President... way back in the 1960s/70s Nixon had been kicking the idea around... basically the GOP became adamantly anti-universal coverage as a tactic against Clinton- that tactic metastasized into something more than a mere tactic, it's akin to a core belief now.
The other day I saw a Cherokee Nation license plate. If a language is just a dialect with an army and a navy, then a state is just a tribe with its own license plates :)
There are definitely lots of folks reading this who lived in a US with fewer than 50 states
When I was born, there were 49 states. There are probably not a lot of folks reading this who can say that …
Probably. I'm also quite keen on that old Marxism about not wanting to join a club that would have me as a member.
My problem is that I'm about half paleocon - deeply mistrusting of anything that even smells slightly of populism, near monarchical/noblese oblige paleocon; and the other half is social-anarchist/anarcho-syndicalist.
My critique of basic American liberalism is that it is a dilettante in a swank black cocktail dress at a knife fight.
My critique of American "conservatism" is that it's just neoconfederate religious nationalism wrapped up in trampy wall paper images of bald eagles crying.
My critique of libertarinism as it is practiced in the real world is that it's just a bunch of wanna be poseurs, pseudo-anarchists without the balls to commit to a real engagement with radical freedom, and thus forever falling back on their statist crutch of "the law." (So-called "libertarians" who fall back on Natural Law theory as if it's not a complete undermining of their proclaimed beliefs are the bane of my existence.)
My critique of unashamed fascism (as opposed to the coy language games the neoconfederate religious nationalists play with their fascism-by-any-other-name) is that it's generally occupied by the most boring, ignorant ############# you'll ever run into.
There. Is that commitment?
Yes, we've been well aware of the United States desire to annex Canada since the 18th century. You'll never take us alive!
...except for Alberta, you're welcome to that.
Dear Canada, Thank you for all of your oil. xoxo, America (the real one)
I just watched The Grey. I'm pretty sure all of Canada is just wolf infested snow and trees, now.
Uh...not that I should be surprised, but this is incoherent.
if you guys had been around before the civil war you would recognize these types of conditions.
I respect a man who still refers to Missouri as a territory, Harvey.
What's with the tiny seed of doubt in that comment?
This is accurate. Candidly, I simply don't have enough time to really dive into some of the political debates, even if I would be game in other circumstances. I think other than the Scott Walker thread (a Craig Counsell thread), I don't really dive into things here. As one of these econ/fiscal conservatives, I can count on one hand the number of elected officials (fed/state level) that I really care about, otherwise I loathe both parties. I do not like grenade throwing partisans and have no time for the Auburn v Alabama type posturing and framing of every issue and perfected by cable news. I've never voted D in a Presidential election, probably never will, but have voted for Ds several times in local races, mostly because there were zero Rs on the ballot when I lived in Milwaukee. I held my nose when voting for McCain (probably the toughest lever I've ever pulled).
I am a shameless supporter of Walker, even though I don't live in the state anymore, he took on, IMO, one of the most counterproductive/destructive forces in the country today and lived to tell. Otherwise, I only actively support (donations) very local candidates and frankly every single one of them are expendable to me, this includes guys I like (today) including Walker.
I do enjoy the banter here, just have work, two little girls and need to play some golf and go fishing every now and then. BTF doesn't go with me.
A man without commitment is a thing to be pitied.
In other words the ACA template was never a "This is our conservative plan" it was always "This is our alternative to Single Payer."
The Republican reactions then make much more sense (and are less cravenly hypocritical and more garden variety political). Of course that doesn't excuse the lies about death panels and such.
FWIW, I would also not join a club that would have you as a member.
Yeah, but nobody has been around that long these days, other than Julio Franco.
That was actually my first guess. I do think that strain of thought is pretty recognizable from your posts.
One of the reasons the Occupy movement was interesting for a bit, when it was concerned with occupying physical space, is you have a lot of people steeped in alternative theories of governance trying to govern together-- trying to build a movement that's both inclusive and goal-oriented without being monolithic. That's a real challenge, and their hyperawareness of questions about governance brought some of the problems/advantages of decentralized political mobilization to the forefront.
There. Is that commitment?
I guess your thoughts on the nihilists ended up on the cutting room floor. But this'll do, as a placeholder.
Against the Club that Would have You
Hey what is this dogs abuse Al. Well mister it seems to me like I should offer you a knuckle samwich do you want hole wheat or Gladden Free.
But I just saw this from Maine Gov LePage -- he had called the IRS the "new Gestapo" in his weekly radio address last weekend and when asked today about called for apologies from various Jewish groups, he said "“It was never intended to offend anyone,” LePage said. “And if someone’s offended, then they ought to be ####### mad at the federal government.”
Add that to recent kerfuffles from Allen West equating Social Security with slavery and Joe Walsh basically saying "Why won't Tammy Duckworth STFU about her missing legs already" --
I know there certainly some less than scrupulous Democrats in congress -- but I honestly have a hard time seeing anyone since Cynthia McKinney on the D side who makes such draw-dopping WTF statements as either of those three... and McKinney got primaried out of office 10 years ago.
Maybe liberals are preachy, maybe liberals are elitist, maybe liberals are whatever -- but I just have an awfully difficult time finding anyone on the left, much less three elected officials, who manage to be as in-your-face "I hate you and everything you stand for" as these three...
Oh yeah? Does the name SAUL ALINKSY ring a bell???? #newtwuzhere
"Everyone does it," "Both sides are equally bad," etc. is utterly not supported by any factual understanding, today. USA politics is at a weird, historically nontypical place right now, with one of the major parties vastly more insane, less grounded on anything other than fire-breathing orthodoxy, than the other.
OK - I'll give you Grayson.
Alaska and Hawaii voted for the first time in 1960. Times have changed.
In 2012 Silver gives Romney a 98.7% chance of winning Alaska
In 2012 Silver gives Obama a 100% chance of winning Hawaii
In 1960 Alaska went for Nixon by less than 2%
In 1960 Hawaii went for Kennedy by .06%
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And in Andy's "you cast the deciding vote" scenario I absolutely vote for Obama. In 2008 I voted for Obama because I was actually interested in what he might be able to change. IN 2012 I will vote for him - at least in the scenario where my vote matters to the election - because he and his party are at least not completely insane.
And because on January 21st we can then begin the Big Roundup.
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1455 - I am not sure I agree. Well the history is right, but I think the reasons are off. The Conservatives have always been pulling for the least governmental healthcare solution possible. When full on public option looks possible then something like ACA is much better. As soon as the threat of Public Option went awaythen national support for for an ACA type plan disappeared. Once ACA looked possible (and no real threat of Public Option) then heck Mandates are BAD!
In other words the ACA template was never a "This is our conservative plan" it was always "This is our alternative to Single Payer."
I'm not sure whether that was the case for ex-Governor Romney, who at the time seemed fairly convincing in his sincerity about Romneycare. All he's doing now is Etch-a-Sketching to his base.
But I do think you're right about Republicans and conservatives in general. What's striking about the way you describe their shift is that this is exactly the sort of strategic retreat that conservatives and Dixiecrats tried to pull off between 1954 and 1964. First they favored state segregation laws, then when those got thrown out, they pulled back to "freedom of choice" (for schools**) and trespass laws that enforced segregation at privately owned establishments that advertised to the public. It took them about 15 minutes to switch from supporting mandatory state segregation to howling bloody murder that the federal government was going to strip private establishments of their sacred "choice" to screen their customers, a choice that these same conservatives and Dixiecrats never gave them 15 minutes earlier. Sounds just like the Republicans' gymnastics when it came to health care.
**with state subsidies for segregated "private" schools that sprung up like wildfire after 1954
Well, OK, since I was actually born and raised in a place that was part* of the Cherokee Nation between the 1830's and the 1900's, a smidgen of history.
The land runs (and lotteries - they weren't all done the same way) of the 1880's and 1890's left white settlers in charge of the western half of what had been Indian Territory, and the Five Civilized Tribes (Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Seminole) in charge of the eastern half. Each half separately organized - Oklahoma Territory in the west, Indian Territory in the east - and in the 19-aughts, both territories separately petitioned Congress for admission as states. Congress refused both petitions, and the power-that-were (I don't really know who that was - my sense of the politics in D.C. at the time is pretty vague) forced the two territories to merge (along with a leftover strip of No Mans Land in the far west) into a single state, which was admitted as the State of Oklahoma in 1907 as state number 46. If you want to presume that the merger might not have been in the best interests of the Indians ...
*The outer edge of the Cherokee Nation, about as far from Tahlequah as you can get, and inhabited in the late 19th century by more Delawares than Cherokees.
I'm sympathetic to the classical conservative position on foreign affairs, so I guess it could be I use both. Not a big deal, since they often wind up taking you to the same place in different ways. When we discussed the US involvement in Libya last year at BBTF, my position was essentially "We're killing people who are no threat to us. That's bad and we shouldn't do it.", which is very much a libertarian position. The paleocon position was more along the lines of "We're going to wind up making a real mess over there. That's bad and we shouldn't do it." I agreed with that at the time as well and still do.
I've been hearing moderately similar sentiments about the aftermath of the conquest of Quebec for a long time. Why didn't the victors outlaw French and save us from the current unpleasantness? (Because the British didn't care. They got a fairly docile territory out of their generous peace terms. Pretty much what you want of a conquered territory.)
I figured as much, I just didn't want to miss the opportunity to get my patriotic hackles up.
I did have a rather extensive dream soon after I moved to the UK where the US annexed Canada while I was overseas and due to my principled opposition to this I became effectively nation-less. I then quickly found myself in a Canadian version of the film Red Dawn. I think perhaps yet another sign that my masochistic fantasy streak is becoming far too dominant.
Wow, that would be some maskarova. You wouldn't be able to tell the invaders from the citizens!
Depending on what you mean by harsh peace terms. Off the top of my head William the Conquerer pretty harshly removed Anglo-Saxons as a ruling class. Though perhaps you're more referring to nation-states. In a sense, the harshest peace is the most effective. There are probably numerous nations and peoples that don't exist today because they got pretty raw deals after a war. Or to take another route the Aztecs and Incas were pretty harshly dealt with by the Spaniards and they (the Spanish) were probably happy with the outcome for a couple centuries.
I suppose I'd say if you're going to go harsh, then you better go ####### HARSH! I would think it's more difficult to execute that properly. You need the full support of your nation, some kind of massive technological advantage over the enemy, and a real ruthless streak. Seems like in most cases you'd be better off with the British in Quebec model.
I think Arizona, Texas and pretty much the whole of the rural south can go ahead and secede if they want to now.
However, if I were Obama-for-life I would totally fund and arm Mexico to invade them.
The Ukraine (and Belorus) has always been part of the Russian empire, except for a brief period of independence after the 1917 revolution...
Tibet and Ukraine (along with many other ethnic states) are sort of interesting cases. Tibet has been part of China for as long as there was a "China", although there have been many times when it (along with most of the hinterlands) was ruled by independent
contractorswarlords. But certainly since 1750 or so (when it was made a protectorate of Chein' China). When that dynasty collapsed in 1911, Tibet was made a british protectorate (maybe a few years later).Speaking of Civil Wars, I have been holding this factoid for a while - we all know the ACW in 1861. Most American casualties in any war (about 600-700,000 deaths). In China around that time they had a Civil War too - although I am not sure you can tour the battlefields. 25,000,000 deaths (estimated obvious, and much of it from famine). I think that goes along way to explain Mao.
In other words: I come down on the liberal side on a number of social issues.
As Lassus says - and I agree - I get there from a different path than liberals do. But I still get there, to places that true conservatives don't.
Some issues:
* Same-sex marriage: I support it. Even though I believe the word "marriage" means man and woman. (I mean, I don't think it's "marriage" within the true meaning and usage of the word but I don't care and I'm happy to call it that.)
* Assisted suicide: I support it.
* Drug laws: I want to wipe them off the books.
* Gambling laws: I want to wipe them off the books.
* Prostitution laws: I want to wipe them off the books.
* Censorship: I am against it.
* Abortion rights: I support them. Even though I believe Roe was decided incorrectly. But it's not an issue I get worked up about per se - have one, don't have one. I do get animated when I see bad arguments for it and general denial that most abortions are for convenience.
* This is not an "issue" but I'm not religious and so don't follow the religious right on much, certainly not their absurd "family values" crusades.
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* Gun rights: I support them.
* Capital punishment: Not an issue that I get worked up about. I could go either way.
* Global warming: A way for liberals who don't know what the eff they're talking about to seek further control over people.
* Taxes/fiscal issues/government intervention/the ACA: We all know where I stand on these things: closer to the conservative side. Though, again, I want to slash 80% of government, and that is simply not a conservative position (even though MCOA will wave his hands about it being "on the right" side of things).
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I'm more interested in criminal justice/liberty issues than you give me credit for.
I didn't really "defend" it; I asked if the people in Iraq were better off for it.
Just one little detail: how come there are big important U.S. Army bases that large numbers of soldiers train at with names like Fort Hood, Fort Bragg, or Fort Polk?
It's not really a good question, because not all of us are so tribal. I've voted for candidates from four different parties in my life, but of course between Romney or Obama I'd choose Obama - if the Republican was, say, Huntsman, then I might reconsider, but there hasn't been a good Republican president since Nixon - not my fault. Run a good conservative, and I'd vote for them. Run a bad liberal, and I won't. You might dump me in with the liberals, but the liberal momma bird will push me outta the nest the moment I say "there's no such thing as instrinsic rights", or whatever else ("Maybe we should outlaw organic food", for instance).
A lot of real people pick their political opinions by aligning with whatever party, but they're not the ones who discuss politics beyond trying to shout down those not of their tribe. In a context like this, of course binning people is bound to fail.
I named two places.
The old seniority system in Congress?
It's not really a good question, because not all of us are so tribal. I've voted for candidates from four different parties in my life, but of course between Romney or Obama I'd choose Obama - if the Republican was, say, Huntsman, then I might reconsider, but there hasn't been a good Republican president since Nixon - not my fault. Run a good conservative, and I'd vote for them. Run a bad liberal, and I won't. You might dump me in with the liberals, but the liberal momma bird will push me outta the nest the moment I say "there's no such thing as instrinsic rights", or whatever else ("Maybe we should outlaw organic food", for instance).
Brian, my question wasn't an attempt at anything more than a bit of shorthand. I'm not meaning to lump all Romney supporters (or Obama supporters) into two groups of uniformly opposing worldviews, because in the real world of intraparty politics, there's plenty of disagreement among "tribesmen". For instance, I'm skeptical of much of identity politics, especially when it casually throws out charges of "racism" without any real evidence. My only complaint against capital punishment is the impossibility for correcting its mistakes. My complaints about Vietnam were purely pragmatic, and I never for a minute romanticized any Communist insurgency. I largely agree with snapper's views on the importance of the nuclear family, even if I completely disagree with his prescriptions for how to encourage them. And so on.
But when I see one candidate wanting to rip what's left of our social contract into shreds, then yes, that will tend to arouse my tribal instincts. And much as I can also respect the anomalous sane Republican like Huntsman or the Romneycare version of Romney, in the long run their party is always going to force any candidate into the pathetic Scrooge McDuck caricature that Romney is today. Which brings us back to square one.
Could the same thing have happened during Reconstruction? It could have, but aside from the occasional Thaddeus Stevens (who died in 1868, anyway), there just weren't many Northern leaders who had the patience and willpower (and true commitment to human rights) to make it happen. "Harshness" would not have helped, in the sense of hanging Confederates or permanently denying them any part in the system. But keeping troops around to make sure the 15th Amendment was enforced for the next half-century would have been extremely helpful in short-circuiting a century of segregation and "re-enslavement."
Of course, to many white Southerners, even seeing a black person at the polls was inhumanely "harsh." Hence their near-fanatical resistance to Reconstruction.
Was Fort Bragg not named for Darren?
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