Just what you want a president to be thinking about after thousands are murdered.
Everyone else is on this so I may as well be, too. The New Yorker article about Obama, the one with the cover showing him in a turban and Michelle toting a gun (LOL moment right there), finally gives us a glimpse into his deep thought processes eight days after 9/11. It’s comforting to know that he was so worried about embittered children in Latin America during those days, instead of killing terrorists dead.
We must also engage, however, in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness. The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others.
Such a failure of empathy, such numbness to the pain of a child or the desperation of a parent, is not innate; nor, history tells us, is it unique to a particular culture, religion, or ethnicity. It may find expression in a particular brand of violence, and may be channeled by particular demagogues or fanatics.
Most often, though, it grows out of a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair. We will have to make sure, despite our rage, that any U.S. military action takes into account the lives of innocent civilians abroad. We will have to be unwavering in opposing bigotry or discrimination directed against neighbors and friends of Middle Eastern descent.
Finally, we will have to devote far more attention to the monumental task of raising the hopes and prospects of embittered children across the globe—children not just in the Middle East, but also in Africa, Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe and within our own shores.
It’s really not so difficult to engage in the task of understanding the source of such madness that killed 3,000 people seven years ago. It’s called the Koran.
I wonder if the U.S. would have helped win WWII if they’d sat around whining about teaching “empathy” to the Japanese a few days after Pearl Harbor instead of deciding to kill as many of them as possible. Because that’s what’s really important eight days after an act of war, understanding the root causes of why some people want to destroy you and everything you stand for.
Vote Obama ‘08! So the next time we’re attacked, we can sit around in a kumbaya circle and talk about feelings. Hopechange doubleplus good.
Google some of these “Obama Supporters”.
EEKS. Talk about kumbaya circle …
July 14th, 2008 at 1:03 pmThere’s another false premise involved. Most of the 9-11 hijackers were middle class or professionals. The abortive flaming car attack on a British airport was carried out by employees of their National Health Service. Ayman al-Zawahiri is a surgeon, and Osama bin Laden was an extraordinarily wealthy man.
Many of these terrorists were exposed to western culture and affluence, and under the influence of jihadism they radicalized anyway.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:04 pmThis is what I don’t get….Do liberals really think that the fanatic muslims have the slightest desire for our empathy? And if they do think that, how do they really expect to approach said muslims?
July 14th, 2008 at 1:09 pmAnd live –?
I wonder if he can throw his past self under the bus for this?
July 14th, 2008 at 1:10 pmIn short, no.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:11 pmMore Obama idiosy. Shall we start to call them “Obamaisms” since the left has their “Bushisms?” What a complete waste of human life….
July 14th, 2008 at 1:18 pmPoverty-stricken, helpless, desparate people are probably more likely to kill themselves than spend millions on training like-minded individuals to kill others.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:21 pmI’m writing in Stalin’s festering carcass for president. It’s got to be better than the two complete and utter MORONS who are running today!
BTW - on a separate note… Rachl, check your email. I be needs your address so I kan mails you kool shit.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:26 pmIf you’re wondering what modern Liberals are thinking about I’d watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaE98w1KZ-c
It’s about 48 minutes long. If that’s too long, here’s the awesome take away quote:
“The modern liberal looks back on … 50,000 years, a 100,000 years of human civilization and knows only one thing for sure: That none of the ideas that mankind has come up with; none of the religions; none of the philosophies; none of the ideaologies; none of the forms of government; none have succeeded in creating a world devoid of war, crime, poverty, and injustice. So they’re convinced that since all of these ideas of man have proved to be wrong, the real cause of war, crime, poverty, and injustice must be found, can only be found, in the attempt to be right. See if nobody ever thought they were right, what would we disagree about? And if we didn’t disagree, surely we wouldn’t fight. If we didn’t fight of course we wouldn’t go to war. Without war there’d be no poverty, without poverty there’d be no crime, without crime there’d be no injustice. It’s a utopian vision. And all that’s required to usher in this utopia is the rejection of all fact, reason, evidence, logic, truth, morality and decency.” — Evan Sayet
July 14th, 2008 at 1:32 pmIf poverty causes terrorism, why aren’t there more African terrorists and why are all the most famous terrorists middle or upper-class?
Obama is right about one thing: The failure of empathy is not innate. Where he goes wrong is saying that it is not unique to a particular religion, culture, yada, yada. Wrong. There are all kinds of examples where groups of people are not considered to be fully human.
Islam - Jews, infidels, women, gays
Nazis - Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, Jehovah’s witnesses, mentally handicapped, blacks
Communists - Jews, capitalists, farmers
African muslims - Christians, animists
The list could go on for pages and pages.
I get what Rachel is trying to say: Obama is an idiot. This is true, but it doesn’t matter. His supporters will not be swayed by facts and logic. You can’t reason someone out of an opinion that he wasn’t reasoned into.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:55 pmIt’s good that I refreshed the page before posting. I deleted what I wrote and instead will just say,
“What Snowdog said.”
July 14th, 2008 at 2:00 pm“The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others.”
It’s their ability to imagine the suffering that lead them to such acts. That’s why it’s called terrorism.
July 14th, 2008 at 2:20 pmWe’re Fucked ‘08!
Load up all the ammo you can and run for the hills.
July 14th, 2008 at 2:21 pmThis is worse than Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, and they were pretty bad.
I’ve been absolutely amazed at the lightweight that the Dems chose to represent them in this election cycle. I’m not happy with the Rep. candidate, either - but at least he has some experience and will vigorously defend the country.
That anyone could blame poverty for 9/11 is asinine. The “root cause” is religious fanaticism of people who want to KILL us and our children. All it takes is just a little bit of research to confirm this. Obama is supposedly a lawyer, one of the things they are supposed to learn is to research…so…? Did he sit out of class that day??
On the cover, well…it’s interesting. Takes a bunch of stuff that a number of people feel about the Obamas and makes an effective visual. Supposedly satire. The reason people believe such things about the couple in question can be directly laid at their doorstep, through both their actions and inactions. And it’s not nearly as harsh as some of the “satirical” cartooning done to Condi Rice.
July 14th, 2008 at 2:28 pmI got your empathy right here.
No more like him I guess.
July 14th, 2008 at 2:30 pmThe hell? Having no empathy for people sufficiently different from you as to be “not fully human” IS innate. It’s the fucking human default, which is why there are still tribes in backwater jungles that make a sport out of killing the guys in the next valley because THEY’RE Not One Of Us and therefore Not Really Human. The entire magic trick of civilization is socializing children to make the possibility of empathizing with someone really different even exist.
For that matter, projecting the causes of someone else’s violence (i.e. the desperate poverty the hijackers and Bin Laden never knew) into something that makes sense to YOU is a pretty clear sign that you haven’t got much functioning empathy of your own.
July 14th, 2008 at 2:39 pm@ Elven -
Obama is supposedly a lawyer, one of the things they are supposed to learn is to research…so…? Did he sit out of class that day??
He was there, I’m sure. He probably listened as closely as he listened to twenty years of Revvum Wright’s sermons.
July 14th, 2008 at 3:11 pmThis is a perfect example of “gotcha politics”.
July 14th, 2008 at 3:15 pmOk, number one, Snowdog, can I quote you - “You can’t reason someone out of an opinion that he wasn’t reasoned into” - On the money!!
Number two, the more I hear from B.O., the more I doubt we could pool enough money to buy the guy a sufficient clue.
July 14th, 2008 at 3:33 pmI giggle whenever I see the ‘Anger Management ‘ ads.;)
July 14th, 2008 at 3:36 pm14 Karat, that looks like a month’s supply of birth control pills.
No doubt if Barack Obama is elected president, we will have “peace in our time.”
July 14th, 2008 at 3:45 pmHi Rachel.
Has Steven Weber ever ghost written an Obama speech? Cuz that sounds so condescending and pompous like so many liberals do. He may as well say “I love people so much more than anyone else is capable of. I am a lightworker.”
July 14th, 2008 at 3:56 pmHe is a pathetic moron.
I’m ashamed that so many people - and especially the mainstream media are fawning over him.
There is no “there” there…..
July 14th, 2008 at 3:57 pmThe Dali Bama has spoken. Peace, Hope, Change and Empathy be unto you.
Blech. May the fleas of a thousand camels infest his armpits.
July 14th, 2008 at 4:11 pmIf you click on it, it’s like a LIFETIME supply of birth control, because after you read it, procreating becomes IMPOSSIBLE!
July 14th, 2008 at 4:44 pmActually, I agree with part of what he said, though I am in no doubt that it was not what he meant.
We do need to understand them, to help fight and destroy them. We study serial killers and other criminals, not to come to an understanding with them, but to foreshorten their time of freedom to commit such acts.
We need to spend far more attention on downtrodden people around the world. But, not actually doing anything about it like removing a brutal dictator, or say a surge to bring stability and security to an internecine slaughterhouse.
We will have vigorous diplomacy though, whatever that means.
Gotcha Senator.
July 14th, 2008 at 5:20 pmAn interesting thing about the obamassiah’s statement is that it was issued on 9-19. It took him eight (8) days to come up with what he considered an adequate response to the worst terrorist act ever perpetrated. And then it was some smarmy touchy-feely bullshit that a committee came up with.
July 14th, 2008 at 5:31 pmWhat is his response going to be when (yes, when - not if) the islamonazis set of a dirty bomb or even a full-fledged nuke in one of our cities? And how long will it take him to even “issue a statement”?
There is no mystery about hussein. He’s not an enigma or a (God forbid) Lightworker. All that he is is right out there for everyone to see.[I am personally amazed that I saw it about him a long time ago] The obamassiah is a garden-variety, old-style, down and dirty POLITICIAN. That’s all. No hope! No change! No new deal! He’s just a socialist/communitarian politician who is bought, paid for and controlled by people who want to see the destruction of the United States more than anything on Earth.
How the obamabots can keep swallowing the swill that he vomits and how they keep making excuses for him is beyond me.
Obama seems to think we should have gotten all warm-n-fuzzy on Islam the worldover. Hold hands. Pray together. Can’t we all just get along?
I don’t necessarily disagree with the idea of getting warm-n-fuzzy with them - but my idea leans more to hellfire missiles and nothing left behind but a stain.
July 14th, 2008 at 5:39 pmThe idea that poverty is responsible for terrorism has been proven to be utter bullshit.
So how long does he want to talk, negotiate and hold hands with these morons? how many people have to die before he realises that terrorists are not really people who are just angry about their circumstances and offended at being so disenfranchised etc, etc, but are actually people who enjoy hating anyone who doesn’t share their stupid, misogynistic and infidel-hating belief system.
When will he be willing to fight rather than set a campfire, hoping that people who have often been brought up from birth to hate Americans, Israelis, and anyone else who don’t believe in making women dress in tents, will suddenly turn up and sing “kumbiyah” while embracing in tearful hugs?
They won’t. So what are you going to do about that, Barack? Oh, I forgot. You don’t need actual policies; you just need to shout things like “Hope! Change! Yes, we can!”
That makes everything OK, then.
July 14th, 2008 at 5:40 pmWhy a stain to clean-up? Why not just a smoking crater to douse and fill? : )
.
July 14th, 2008 at 5:43 pm“It’s really not so difficult to engage in the task of understanding the source of such madness that killed 3,000 people seven years ago. It’s called the Koran.”
Spot on, Rachel. Anyone who’s done any kind of reading of the Koran will come to that conclusion. It’s the ramblings of an evil man, who found the locals gullible and easily led by a religion he invented. Hmm, sounds like quite a few other ‘messiahs’ we’ve seen throughout history.
July 14th, 2008 at 6:16 pm“children not just in the Middle East, but also in Africa, Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe and within our own shores.”
Oh, so Obama doesn’t care about poverty stricken children in Australia! the bastard.
Its not a bad idea to want to understand the root causes of why someone went to war against you, not so you can cater to them, but to make sure you can deny them.
July 14th, 2008 at 7:38 pmCaldfyr wins, and wins big:
“It’s their ability to imagine the suffering that lead them to such acts. That’s why it’s called terrorism.”
This is brilliant and succinct.
July 14th, 2008 at 7:55 pmEvidence indicates it is best to try and understand the madness of your enemies AFTER you’ve defeated them. Case in point: WW2, all the good scholarship happened AFTER the war, not during the war. During the war we were trying to kill the Germans/Japanese/Italians/Fascists because they were trying to conquer/kill us. We had the luxury to ask why after Pearl Harbor. If someone is trying to kill you, you don’t try and understand why they’re trying to kill you, YOU KILL THEM RIGHT BACK.
Anything else I can say on the subject can be reduced to ARGH!
July 14th, 2008 at 8:06 pmI have no idea why but I just laughed until tears ran down my face over this comment … and I still dissolve in a paroxysm of giggles every time I read that phrase!
thanks, dfwmtx
July 14th, 2008 at 8:10 pmFor once, in my reformed Liberal life. I agree with you.
Mark your calender, it don’t happen often.
-Pat
July 14th, 2008 at 9:13 pmI guess we’re just going to blast Obama the way the Liberals blasted Bush every single day of his Presidency. How sad for us. I hope like hell that Obama loses, I actually admire McCain, but I just hate that we’re so crass now on our side, just like the Liberals are . Stupid names, stupid attacks, it’s just cheap and unsophisticated.No I’m not referring to Rachel’s post, it was fine.
I’m losing hope for a decent working country no matter who wins, we’re all just angry sports fans now, just jeering the other side, just because they are not us. We’re just stupid, barking dogs, we bark because thats all we know now, we forgot how to speak to the other side a long time ago, and our ability to speak to each other is creeping towrds grunts with every election cycle. The Liberals have won the communication battle, we now all speak their language, the dialect of thoughtless opposition, blind loyalty, and low standards.
Those who control the language also control what is said in that language. The Liberals stole the language of debate and turned it into an episode of Jackass, now we’re all grunting like primates. Stupid stupid primates.
July 14th, 2008 at 9:24 pmPara– please elaborate on this theory, are you talking about the media? Because yes, the media is biased on the left side, but that doesn’t make the right barking dogs.
(I’m seeking a little clarification on your comments, they’re a bit vague.)
July 14th, 2008 at 11:23 pmI don’t care what the context is. Here is my perception of the reality he is portraying of the American people as infidels. This is what I have truly come to believe, as much as I loathe doing so. It hurts my heart to see anyone nominated as the leader of the the free world who carries such notions.
I can’t remember it being anything but absolute for anyone to focus on anything else, even those of us in the other Washington, during the events of 9-11. As was discussed recently regarding distances in Europe, my state might just as well have been in Timbuktu distance-wise, but some of our guys still went to ground zero proudly.
I am truly beginning to hate this bastard in a most singular fashion. This brings to mind the plot of the novel “The Dead Zone”, in which the main character is compelled to kill the not-quite-elected-but-soon-to-be incoming president in order to disrupt the flow of events leading to an imminent nuclear holocaust.
Ack. Blecch and enough. Why can’t this bullshit just go away already?
WARNING. CONTENT NOT SUITABLE FOR THE TENDERHEARTED. PLEASE DO NOT SUBJECT YOURSELF IF YOU BELIEVE 9-11 WAS A CONSPIRACY OR IF THE PEOPLE FORCED TO JUMP HORRIFIED YOU.
July 15th, 2008 at 12:34 amPerhaps Obama would care to explain why it is that the men who perpetrated 9-11 were wealthy, well-connected and well-educated men. That they preferred to kill people rather than do their part to fix their societies speaks volumes about the culture of these countries. Maybe, just maybe, that even explains why they have their problems in the first place (an elite that would rather kill than create).
Islamic terrorism is instructive for the West because it turns Marxist assumptions about class warfare on its head, with the elites, not the poor, being the ones that overwhelmingly want to kill people and break things.
July 15th, 2008 at 8:05 amBecause, silly, there is oil there.
What is vague? Para believes that the right has sunk to the same levels of slime and blind hatred that the left sank to during the entire Bush administration. I mainly agree with him. The left did get hold of the language, and blind accusations with no support and no consequences for lying combined with PC correctness to cover their faults with a veneer that reads ‘your faults’ are now where the word battlefields are engaged.
I ‘mainly agree’ with him because I do believe the left only barks (look at their utter lack of real strategies for any solutions and poster boy type candidate), but I do believe there are many voices of conservatism that still speak ideas rather than dog noises. Maybe this is because they do not have a real candidate… I admit that Republicans I otherwise respect get rabid in their anti-Obama rants, but can’t say that many positive things about McCain. Para is right though, the Dems/libs/MSM said let’s play down in the sewers with the evil clowns and the Republicans replied ‘hmm, OK’.
July 15th, 2008 at 8:22 amOh nonsense.
The problem was never that liberals were blasting Bush “every single day of his Presidency”. The problem was they were using blatant lies, deliberate mischaracterizations, and outright hysteria to do it.
So unless you’d care to explain how anything Rachel said amounts to blatant lies, deliberate mischaracterizations, or outright hysteria, I suggest you retract your comment.
July 15th, 2008 at 9:31 am14 Karat: that graphic scares the hopechange right out of my loins. I have to hopechange my shorts now as I’ve hopechanged right in my chonies.
July 15th, 2008 at 9:41 amMighty,
Go read my post, I said I specifically was not referring to Rachel’s post, that it was fine.
I am referring to the people who simply dismiss Obama’s nonsense by just saying “He’s a moron” rather than really explainig how his ideas are dangerous. I relate it to the way that people just say “”Bush is evil” or “Bush is a moron” without even being able to explain exactly what about his policy is against thier political agenda.
When we say “Obama is a moron” and stuff like that makes us sound just as dumb and shallow as the democrats we’ve been disgusted with for 7 years.
So No, I will not retract my post
AND
I told you not to speak to me again.
Tuerqas,
thanks for getting it,
July 15th, 2008 at 10:03 amYou must be reading different sites than I am, Para, because the only times I see something like, “Obama is a moron”, without accompanying explanation, is when the explanation has already been done by someone else.
On the other hand, the Left keeps up the mantra of “Bush Lied”, “Bush is a war criminal”, “Bush is turning the country into a fascist state”, etc, with either lies or no data to back them up. I definitely see a difference there.
July 15th, 2008 at 10:33 amFair enough, I apologize. I should have been reading more carefully.
However, I say my point still stands. There is a world of difference between calling President Bush a moron because he bumbled a few words and calling Obama a moron because he advocates moronic policies, holds moronic beliefs, and advances moronic ideas.
If you ask a BDS-afflicted moonbat to explain why they think Bush is a moron, you’ll get an explanation like “He says ‘nukular’ and ’strategery’!” If you ask a conservative to explain why they think Obama is a moron, you’ll get an explanation like “He favors gun control, Affirmative Action, and welfare, he wants to pull out of Iraq, he flip-flops constantly, he associates with racists and criminals…” and so on in that fashion.
Big difference.
Sure, sometimes we make fun of Obama bumbling his words but I don’t see anything wrong with a little payback after eight years of liberals making fun of Bush’s verbal gaffes. And most of the time when we ridicule Obama for a verbal gaffe it’s for perfectly legitimate reasons, such as when he lied about his uncle liberating a Concentration Camp, or how his position changes depending on popular opinion and who he happens to be speaking to at the time.
So I say again, your characterization is nonsense. We are not, by any definition, “blasting Obama the way the Liberals blasted Bush every single day of his Presidency.” Our blasting of Obama is entirely different from the way liberals blasted Bush. That is abundantly clear. Are there a few people who are using petty attacks and cheap shots against Obama? Sure there are. But there will always be people like that and they are hardly the majority.
If you don’t want someone to speak to you, then don’t speak. If you come in here trying to start an argument, you can’t exactly get all indignant when I decide to argue right back.
July 15th, 2008 at 11:12 amHere’s some quotes from this very thread, Wayne:
More Obama idiosy. Shall we start to call them “Obamaisms” since the left has their “Bushisms?” What a complete waste of human life….
“I get what Rachel is trying to say: Obama is an idiot. This is true, but it doesn’t matter.”
“(Obama) is a pathetic moron.”
“the obamassiah”
“The Dali Bama”
I just hate to see us acting like Democrats. Look at the cover of the New Yorker, just a pathetic attempt at making Obama look like a victim of evil white american men. Will we be pulling stunts like that soon? I hope not.
July 15th, 2008 at 11:44 amM Sam, you (probably wittingly) hit the nail on the head. “Ask a conservative…” Ask a Republican, however, and you will all too often get a rant. Similarly, there are quite a few liberals who still use their brains, most often on blogs, but very few people who characterize themselves as Democrats before liberals that can put two intelligent sentences together when it comes to politics. Unfortunately, liberals and Democrats overlap a lot more closely than conservatives and Republicans.
Taking out blogs, and the MSM and dirt campaigners are both in full mud sling mode already. Both sides know their platforms suck or have very unpopular implementations if not ideals, so they get elected the only way left to them, making the other person look worse than they do. That is the essence of what (I think) Para was saying and I agree fully that the negative campaign is a rotten, pathetic way to get elected. Number 1, you are not (necessarily) electing anyone with any ability, you are electing the person who looks cleaner. Policies and platforms mean nothing anymore, because politicians have found a good record does not get you elected, (you have two Senators running from a Congress with the lowest approval ratings in History…how do you spin that to a positive?) looking less repugnant gets you elected.
July 15th, 2008 at 11:56 amCompare and contrast: 09/14/2001
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/print/20010914-9.html
4:40 P.M. EDT
CROWD: U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. I want you all to know —
Q Can’t hear you.
THE PRESIDENT: I can’t talk any louder. (Laughter.)
I want you all to know that America today — that America today is on bended knee in prayer for the people whose lives were lost here, for the workers who work here, for the families who mourn. This nation stands with the good people of New York City, and New Jersey and Connecticut, as we mourn the loss of thousands of our citizens.
Q I can’t hear you.
THE PRESIDENT: I can hear you. (Applause.) I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you. (Applause.) And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon. (Applause.)
CROWD: U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
THE PRESIDENT: The nation sends its love and compassion to everybody who is here. Thank you for your hard work. Thank you for making the nation proud. And may God bless America. (Applause.)
CROWD: U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
(The President waves small American flag.) (Applause.)
July 15th, 2008 at 12:46 pmNOW look who needs to go back and read the post! Here’s what Wayne said, again:
Do you or do you not see the difference between calling Obama a moron and being prepared to back it up with facts and logic, and calling Bush a moron based on lies, mischaracterizations, and hysteria?
July 15th, 2008 at 3:45 pmMaybe so, but I would argue that merely reporting the facts and making logical and coherent arguments is hardly “negative campaigning”.
It’s ironic that just as you and Para complain that the left has taken control of language and public discourse, Obama seems to have taken control of you. According to Obama, any criticism of him, no matter how small, no matter how true, is a “distraction” or a “smear” or a “negative personal attack”. And here you are now making essentially the same argument.
Is “Obama’s tax hikes will wreck our economy” a negative campaign or a factual statement? Is “Obama flip-flops on his positions at every turn” a negative campaign or a factual statement? Is “Obama attended a racist church for 20 years” a negative campaign or a factual statement?
Also, you say that you despise negative campaigns. But really, you can’t get around the fact that complaining about negative campaigns is, itself, a type of negative campaign. A politician who complains about “negative campaigning” by his opponents is implicitly saying “my opponent is a jerk, don’t vote for him”. By your definition, that in itself is a type of negative campaign. Perhaps a sneakier method of negative campaigning, but still a negative campaign.
I don’t deny that ridiculing Obama’s intelligence is a type of “negative campaign”. Where I disagree is with Para’s statement that this is exactly the same as what the left has been doing to President Bush. Because it isn’t. If asked I would be prepared to explain, using evidence and logic, precisely why I think Obama is a moron. But if you asked a leftist to explain why he thinks George Bush is a moron, the best answer you can expect is “He says ‘nukular’ instead of ‘nuclear’!”
Is that the same as saying “Obama is a moron because he thinks high taxes are good for the economy when hundreds of years worth of evidence says precisely the opposite”? No it is not.
July 15th, 2008 at 4:34 pmMighty,
You argue just to argue. Your points are pointless, going on and on just to counter whatever I say.
I told you, don’t bother to respond to me. You are not a decent person to talk with. You are a petty contrarian, who disagrees just to get noticed. You live on this website and scold people here like it’s yours.
This is the last time I will tell you, I do not bother with your kind. I am not intimidated by your “comeback” that “He’s just afraid of the truth”. It has nothing to do with that. You’re a pushy annoying pest, and in real life I wouldn’t have anyting to do with you either, and you would never be so brazenly rude if you were standing face to face with me.
I have been one of the people on this site to have a consistent message: Be decent to other people, have respect, mind your business, and if you make a stink about something know what you are talking about.
That applies to calling Presidential Candidates stupid names, attacking gays, or McCain’s record.
I am done with you, you are not the kind of person I wish to discuss things with, you are neither witty ( like 14K and Lance) nor thought provoking ( like Rachel). Being a visitor here does not mean I have to talk to you. You are not Rachel’s bouncer, now go away.
July 15th, 2008 at 6:12 pm“We must also engage, however, in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness. The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others.”
First thing I thought of when I read this was Michael Dukakis answering Bernie Shaw in that 1988 debate:
“Governor, if Kitty Dukakis were raped and murdered, would you favor an irrevocable death penalty for the killer?
DUKAKIS: No, I don’t, Bernard. And I think you know that I’ve opposed the death penalty during all of my life. I don’t see any evidence that it’s a deterrent, and I think there are better and more effective ways to deal with violent crime. We’ve done so in my own state. And it’s one of the reasons why we have had the biggest drop in crime of any industrial state in America; why we have the lowest murder rate of any industrial state in America. But we have work to do in this nation. We have work to do to fight a real war, not a phony war, against drugs. And that’s something I want to lead, something we haven’t had over the course of the past many years, even though the Vice President has been at least allegedly in charge of that war. We have much to do to step up that war, to double the number of drug enforcement agents, to fight both here and abroad, to work with our neighbors in this hemisphere. And I want to call a hemispheric summit just as soon after the 20th of January as possible to fight that war. But we also have to deal with drug education prevention here at home. And that’s one of the things that I hope I can lead personally as the President of the United States. We’ve had great success in my own state. And we’ve reached out to young people and their families and been able to help them by beginning drug education and prevention in the early elementary grades. So we can fight this war, and we can win this war. And we can do so in a way that marshals our forces, that provides real support for state and local law enforcement officers who have not been getting that support, and do it in a way which will bring down violence in this nation, will help our youngsters to stay away from drugs, will stop this avalanche of drugs that’s pouring into the country, and will make it possible for our kids and our families to grow up in safe and secure and decent neighborhoods.”
Dukakis dropped from 49% to 42% in the polls THAT NIGHT.
July 15th, 2008 at 6:28 pmPara,
I think I understand what you’re saying regarding the name calling and empty rhetoric–and not stooping to lower levels. For the record, I made the “Dali Bama” comment. I did it purely for comedic effect–often I fail at that. Was it sophomoric? Of course it was. But I was reading about empathy and discrimination and for some reason thought of the Dali Lama–and Dali Bama instantly came to mind. Just trying to be clever and add some humor–not making a profound statement–but the fleas can still migrate there because I can tell you why I don’t like him… : )
Frankly, I make pretty much the same argument as you are with others I know. In my circle of family, friends, coworkers, etc. I’d say that I was much more informed on current events than 98% of them. I spend a lot of time reading, watching, and thinking about it. It frustrates me when my mother, who has BDS, makes some of the statements she does, and when I ask her why she spouts the same old platitudes as everyone else, her answer ends up being more of the same. On occasion my fiance does much the same thing in the other direction–she dislikes Obama intensely and says so. Often, to my chagrin, I find myself actually defending him on some things, because I’ve taken the time to find out about them. Recently a friend started spouting “Bushisms” and obviously wanted to engage in a bashfest. So I asked her why she thought those particular things—and the statements themselves were the end of her thinking. She wasn’t interested in facts, only feelings and cliches.
When I hear or read something I agree with, I make the effort to find out about the opposing point of view. It doesn’t necessarily change my mind, but at least I’ve tried to look at issues from more than one side. I may have made a sophomoric statement in a poor attempt at humor–but it doesn’t necessarily mean that that’s the pinnacle of my thoughts. I do apologize if it came off that way. : )
July 15th, 2008 at 8:35 pmCloudfish,
Man, no need to apologize. I’ve been reading a lot of stuff lately that shakes my confidence that we , folks like you and me, can hold the higher ground on any level, intellectual, moral, political, whatever.
I know there’s a lot of humor on this site, don’t begrudge you maintaining the same comdeic tone Rachel so masterfully infuses on her blog.
I’m just getting bummed, looking for hope, no , not Obama hope, hope that the Libertatians don’t go the way of the Liberals.
July 15th, 2008 at 8:42 pmObama is a serious intellectual. He was asked a question and he replied in a thinking mans fashion, this does not mean he is a wimp or anything else. If it comes to violent response, Barack Obama can summon the furies and scortch Islam into the abyess. Everyone wants a president who will kick ass, great! But do you want another G W Bush who believes whatever BS his VP gives him? With Obama we might get a lot of fancy talk, but when he goes for the kill it will be effective and we will agree with it.
July 16th, 2008 at 12:32 amThe Bush administration treated us like fools, Obama will never resort to such trash politics.
David,
Can you please provide some examples as to how he has done this in the past?
And some examples of this?
I genuinely would appreciate hearing some concrete evidence regarding both of these isues.
Thanks!
July 16th, 2008 at 9:17 amM Sam,
For myself now, I will answer your last comment. I did not misread Para’s comment at first and took his word to disregard this blog as to his comments. Further, I discounted blogs entirely in my own comments and was focusing my criticisms on the MSM and the campaigns themselves. In general, the McCain campaign has fallen to the same level of ‘hitting back’ on BOs attacks and jumping on every misspeak or mistake BO makes no matter what it is, justified or not. As I said earlier, I understand why it is being done, it is just a sad thing to see.
As far as Obama having taken us over, well you couldn’t be much more wrong. The real meat, such as the example criticisms you gave are being ignored for the petty image and word slights by both sides and that was my point, at least. Both sides want big tax hikes, McCain’s is just structured differently so he can’t really bring it up. We can on blogs like this, but real substance things get no publicity in a negative campaign about age, race, etc. from national media sources, so all Joe blow hears is ‘McCain is too old, see these examples’, ‘Obama can’t speak well and he has big ears and was Muslim, see?’
Para went a bit further and suggested that even in intelligent discussion, we can’t help slurring Obama and BDSers love to call McCain a Bush clone and I agree with him there too.
That last part talking about negative campaigns just supported our whole argument, but you made it sound like it was a dissonant… not sure what you meant there.
July 16th, 2008 at 11:12 am“Even as I hope for some measure of peace and comfort to the bereaved families, I must also hope that we as a nation draw some measure of wisdom from this tragedy. Certain immediate lessons are clear, and we must act upon those lessons decisively. We need to step up security at our airports. We must reexamine the effectiveness of our intelligence networks. And we must be resolute in identifying the perpetrators of these heinous acts and dismantling their organizations of destruction.”
The above is the beginning of Obama’s statement. I believe it’s a bad sign that the majority of Obama’s speech wasn’t about taking action. However, he did advocate tracking down and destroying the terroristic organizations. In my opinion it was disingenuous of the hotair website to cut his response to make it appear otherwise.
July 16th, 2008 at 3:41 pmYeah, but #1 in the recent poll wasn’t on it until two days after you …
July 17th, 2008 at 2:27 pmOh yeah!