The reason the Left’s tactics have gained such abhorrent double-standards isn’t because we’ve failed to respond in kind;
it’s simply because we’ve TOLERATED it.

We don’t have to stoop to their lousy tactics to beat them. We just have to call them out on the floor for it. The answer isn’t to start tolerating liberal tactics in our own ranks; that’s what they WANT. That FEEDS their double-standard.
The answer is to STOP PUTTING UP WITH THEIR CRAP.

Gentlemen can fight just as well as any thug, and they look a heck of a lot better when they win.

When you encounter someone like this who is so chauvinistically partisan that their own side can do no wrong beside being “too nice” there is no point in even trying to have a rational argument, they are beyond reason’s reach.

Time to get some BRRRAIIIINNNZZZ there, zombie.

Really ? That’s why Barack disdainfully said that to rich San Franciscans (never expecting that those private remarks would become public, BTW) ?

The job of government is to “provide collective action when local conditions make it impossible”* ? and the people in Penn. were bitter clingers because the government had let them down ? I didn’t know either of those things, but, accepting your thesis for a second, what has changed for Pennsylvania’s bitter clingers under the Porkulus and Barack?

Maybe you could point to some Constitutional provision, state or national, where that “providing collective action” is laid out as the role, job or purpose of government. Or at least give me some examples of how the bureaucratic mess known as “government” might go about effecting that, since everything the federal government has immersed itself in in my lifetime (most notably, education & medicine) has turned to sh!t through bureaucratic interference and loss of local control.

Obama might have deigned to acknowledge on his world tours that America has come to the aid of Muslims many times, most notably & recently while Europe sat on its fanny while the carnage in the Balkans took place on its doorstep.

He did not, preferring to bow obsequiously to the Saudi King and to give one of the worst abusers of democratic process on the planet, Oogoe Chavez, the time of day.

You never did point to anything concrete & specific the man has accomplished in his life, something that would explain and merit your devotion.

Venividivici, I take your point about identity politics and the politics of victimization. In fact I largely agree. But I think you’re wrong to conclude that the project of American liberalism is a top-down social revolution. All strands of American politics partake in our native pragmatism, which has generally curbed the worse impulses of the right and the left in America. Along with being a country whose creed is an idea of human freedom, this pragmatism is our greatest claim to exceptionalism.
See, there’s common ground here. We can disagree in good faith, it doesn’t make us enemies. E pluribus unum

I never mentioned the 2nd amendment, Nick. As for guns, first Obama supported the DC gun ban (under that law, you could have guns in the home but they couldn’t be assembled !) and then, following the Supreme Court’s decision against the DC law, Barack flipped and found a Constitutional “right” to gun ownership. (how generous of him)

So exactly where the dude might be going on “guns” is somewhat difficult to determine. If I had to guess, I’d say more restrictive legislation is in the pipeline. It’s gonna be damn hard to repeal the 2nd amendment, but I wouldn’t put it past these people trying. After all, the opposition looks to be essentially castrated these days.

Barack flipped slopped around on NAFTA, he told different things to different audiences, he told rich San Franciscans that pathetic you bitterly clings to guns and religion (weren’t you offended ?), he flipped on his grandmother who raised him (she was useful for a point about “race”) he flipped on his 20 year long pastor who he had previously stated he could no more disown than his own father …

I listened to him for 2 years and don’t know what the hell he stands for, beyond the growth of national government, always making excuses for “having” to do it along the way. One week before being inaugurated, he stated (one of those off the cuff Joe the Plumber moments) that the federal government was the “only” entity capable of fixing the mess. Poor baby, forced to spend trillions we don’t have on things we don’t need in a bill nobody read. Just today Nancy Pelosi asked for 94 billion more in emergency funds. (for wot, Nancy ?)

Can you tell me where all these billions and trillions keep going ? Please ?

Generally, I find President Obama to be cautious, pragmatic, and well attuned to the difficulties of repairing the damage done to the United States in the past decade.

Not very specific there, Nick. I was hoping for a little more detail.

Generally, I find Obama to be an empty mirrored suit, onto which people like you can project what they want to see. As an American President owning all of American history (good and bad), he factually doesn’t have the right to travel about the world, bashing the place. You might call his Apology Tours, “reparing the damage”. I think the Europeans might have been laughing as they applauded the Basher in Chief.

Using your word, on the subject of the integrity and intelligence of Barack Obama, I remain “unconvinced”. Highly.

I cited Heidegger’s analysis of Nietzsche as a metaphysical thinking to point out the inherent contradictions within Nietzsche’s writings on the status of “convictions” and “truth”. On a practical, political level, I do prefer Arendt to Heidegger. Her analysis of “totalizing” political discourse is very on point and, I would argue, is precisely one of the problems facing the left today. Certainly, the impulse on the left to claim rights for individuals who had typically been denied them, in the context of a country (the US) that is defined as a constitutional republican regime providing equal protection under the law, was a valid impulse by nearly anyone’s reckoning, save for some virulent racists and sexists. However, morphing that impulse into a form of collectivism based on identity politics, as well as ascribing a form of collective guilt to the non-historically-victimized white male citizens of this country was certainly a step in the wrong direction for the left. And, now we’ve reached an impasse where unless the left can come back from the brink (which I doubt they will, because they smell blood, by which I mean, they smell a chance to re-order society in their image of what “justice” looks like), I don’t see any reason why political ties between the left and right should continue to exist.

By the way, my whole point is that we shouldn’t be reading books to be told what what to think we should be reading books that teach us hw to think. I would submit that this is a fundamental intellectual difference between people of different political persuasions.

I never read a book to be told what to think. I always read books to see what someone else thought. If I agreed, I agreed and I was never shy about giving an author credit for saying something I agreed with and saying it well. If it didn’t sit right with me, I would think about why. As I thought about why, I would also consult other books to see what those authors thought about the original book I read. That I ended up focusing on liberty and the individual as the primary ethical concerns of any humane political thought is a result of the interplay between all of the intellectual forces I encountered, as well as the history I saw laid out behind me, having been, as Heidegger would put it, “thrown” into the world following the various holocausts of the 20th century. When I argue that the country should be split, it’s in an attempt to avoid such episodes repeating in the future.

Hey, everyone, there’s another tea party this weekend. It’s . . . oh, darn it . . . it’s . . . somewhere . . . where is it again? I’m not sure, Fox hasn’t advertised it yet, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to be really funsy and specially and patrioty. And Joe the Plumber is gonna be there! (And yes, ladies – and gUys – Joe’s still horny!) See you there, wherever it is.

May 1, 2009 – 8:06 am

Sheesh,

Guessing from the tone of your comment and loose use of vocabulary you are one of the leftist we are talking about. What is that supposed to mean about Joe being horny? I suspect it may just be wishfull thinking on your part. You seem to have a big “thing” for Joe. Why? Because he asked a question? Or is it more about how Obama responded than the question that was asked. It seems to me that people who take issue with Joe are the ones most in favor of limiting free speach (especially his and those who think like him). Maybe I am too simple to understand things like you do. I would like to know, though, what your problem with Joe is?

What is so awful with being “funsy and specially and patrioty” (I translate that as snobby left speak for fun, special, and patriotic). Do you shun get togethers that are patriotic or display patriotic things. As a leftist I thought that you of all people would see what a beautiful thing a demonstration can be. After all the news has been full of marches, demonstrations, and protests for the last eight years. Of course, being against those things I am sure you have never held a sign.

Also, in case you are wondering,about where the upcomming tea parties will be, the answer is everywhere and comming soon to a location near you. It is a growing thing, and no one person, party, or company can claim ownership. It is owned, operated, staffed, and attended by WE THE PEOPLE, which is more than I can say for either political party today.

Have a nice day…..Peace, and all that jazz….