Conservative economist and author Bruce Bartlett summed up the results of this recent DailyKos/Research 2000 poll as follows
"I can only conclude from this new poll of 2003 self-identified Republicans nationwide that between 20% and 50% of the party is either insane or mind-numbingly stupid."
The results of this poll are somewhat alarming, but they have little to do with stupidity. They, instead, have everything to do with blind loyality to a team, or an ideology, or both! They are also the product of an intentionally cultivated fanatical willingness to believe (or at least entertain - notice the extremely high percentage of "don't knows") any claim that supports "the cause."
"Intentionally cultivated fanatical willingness to believe any claim that supports the cause." That sounds like American Evangelical Christianity to me.
Joe H
Posts
The Years Of Writing Dangerously
9 years ago
2 comments:
It's interesting how polarizing some politicians are to people of opposing political views. I used to think that many liberals were crazy for the things that they used to say/still say about George W. Bush (i.e. 9/11 was an inside job, etc.).
Personally, I believe that Obama has definitive Socialist tendencies, but his agendas are being held in check by the beautiful balance of power afforded by our political system.
Given the job that he's done so far, I don't think that it would've been too much of a stretch to think that Sarah Palin could've possibly done a better job, that is if John McCain had passed away since he would have actually been president.
Based on your own comments, it's possible that you might even believe that Obama should be impeached based on his unwillingness to end the wars and prosecute the torcherers.
The secession question is pretty funny, but that's probably a deep rooted southerner thing (how many people do you meet from Texas that always mention that Texas is the only state that can lawfully break away from the United States?)
I do agree though that there are a lot of fanatics on the Republican side that just blindly believe these things. I would equate that to all the Democrats who try to push forward all these "nice to have" policies that without any real way to pay for/implement them.
It's definitely a crazy system that we have, but to quote Parker Posey in the movie "Best in Show":
"That's why it works"
Justin,
Obama definitely has socialist tendencies - almost all of us do. Consider our system of public education. Why do we have it?
We have it for one very simple reason - there are millions of children who cannot be profitably educated at a price their parents can afford. An unregulated market for pre-college education would price many people out - just as all markets do.
For most goods, this is desirable. But, for a variety of well understood reasons, allowing millions of our fellow citizen to remain uneducated, or undereducated, is unacceptable.
So we remove this particular good from a market and socialize the project. We essentially have a socialized educational system.
Conservatives say they want to change this, but they really don't - they want to change the way education is socialized by empowering individual consumers to vote with their voucher dollars. That seems less socialistic, but it is not. It is less beaucratic, but no less socialistic. The project is still collectivist in nature.
So, for the most part, we don't disagree that socialism is appropriate with regards to some issues. We disagree over which issues these are.
As for my belief that Eric Holder is failing to fulfill the obligations of his office, read the Convention on Torture, a treaty that was signed by our president and ratified by our senate - making it bind American law. The Convention provides no prosecutorial discretion when a an official is confronted with credible allegations of torture.
President Bush and Vice President Cheeny have publicly admitted authorizing conduct that we have prosecuted as torture in the past.
The convention expressly rules out defenses such as national security.
Eric Holder is acting contrary to his legal obligations under U.S. law. That is, and always has been, grounds for impeachment.
I'm not saying I don't understand their reluctance to investigate and/or prosecute. I'm just saying that Holder is violating the law by refusing to do so. And he's the top law enforcement official in the country.
To be honest with you, the law would be better served if we simply acknowledged this and withdrew from the Convention on Torture and the Geneva convention. At least that way we'd preserve the integrity of the rule of law.
Best wishes,
Joe
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