Commenting on the sale of a script based on the life of Rush Limbaugh, Mark Hemingway quips, “his opponents sure are obsessed with Limbaugh’s alleged personal motivations. I guess that’s easier than engaging his actual arguments.”
Does to seem to be theme current in the critics of conservatives and conservatism. Instead of engaging our ideas, they engage in armchair psychoanalysis, often with a prejudiced idea of their subject and a limited understanding of psychology.
As conservatives, you put on these glasses formed by your personal psychology. It only seems to allow you to view things a certain way and no amount of “engaging your ideas” seems to make any difference. When I reply here challenging you on your ideas, I’m almost always responded to with vindictive personal attacks as are most progressive posters here. Either people agree with your posts or they’re dismissed as liberal whackadoodles.
Just the fact that you’ve waxed poetic about Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed and now defending Rush Limbaugh in the last few days is as clear a window into why you say what you say as any “armchair psychoanalysis.”
It would be delightful to enage you and your commenters on actual issues if the conversation didn’t so quickly become rankled vindictiveness. But it always comes back to certain memes which to everyone but yourself is evident:
* Progressives must tolerate the intolerances of conservatives as a basis for conversation
* Progressives must never speculate on the psychology or motivations of conservatives even though there is no other basis for consideration
* Progressives must pretend that the points raised by conservatives actually have some basis in reality and begin the conversation there
What you never, ever address, which is such a fundamental point about conservatism, is that the basis of conservatism is Belief. Conservatives start at a point of moralistic “should be” – government should be this way, people should act that way, etc. – and then selectively find any shred of evidence that supports that. It’s like the scientific method inverted. It’s like trying to tell a child a purple kangaroo doesn’t really live in their closet. It doesn’t matter how much you tell them it’s not real, because the kangaroo is in their head and nowhere else. So too with conservatives, your ideas are fully within your own minds, not in the realm of reality, not pragmatism based on what is rather than what you think should be. Maybe if you started by acknowledging that first, others could then have an actual reasoned conversation about good public policy with you. Even acknowledging your idealistic zealotry once in a while would be a step in the right direction.
Otherwise, you’re attacking the critic without considering the critique. How is this any different than what you’re asking people to do with conservatives?
Nah, I just assume Rush was high at the time. LOL
As conservatives, you put on these glasses formed by your personal psychology.
As opposed to whom, exactly?
When I reply here challenging you on your ideas, I’m almost always responded to with vindictive personal attacks as are most progressive posters here.
Do you want the violins or the cello? We can do both.
Progressives must tolerate the intolerances of conservatives as a basis for conversation
Please, gov’nah, have ye a question to spare?
What you never, ever address, which is such a fundamental point about conservatism, is that the basis of conservatism is Belief.
That’s a nice glass house. I hope it didn’t cost much.
I’ll take your side, Dan.
Leftists usually have an inflated sense of ego and their opinions. When you are so sure everything you believe is 100% correct, then people who hold differing opinions aren’t merely disagreeing, but must have something wrong with them to ever believe something other than you in the first place.
Also, it’s intellectually easier to attack people and character than ideas.
Oh so in a critique about Rush Limbaugh the author asserts is dissmissable because of “armchair psychoanalysis,” Rush does not “have an inflated sense of ego” or opinions, doesn’t assert that everything he says is 100% correct, that people with “differing opinions aren’t merely disagreeing, but must have something wrong with them to ever believe something other than you in the first place?”
Projection much?
And of course, you don’t.
And of course, you don’t, like we see in this example:
Translation of Countervail to English:
– All conservatives are intolerant
– All conservatives have nothing but evil and selfish motivations
– No conservative thought or point is ever based in reality
Ace again summed up “progressives” like Countervail quite nicely.
That passage is so good, and it’s so obviously true, as we see from the example of Countervail.
For example, if you oppose writing people blank checks for welfare, Countervail insists that you want poor children to starve to death. Countervail cannot comprehend how it is possible that writing people blank checks for welfare could be wrong or less effective than something else because it is what Countervail wants.
It’s no different than a child screaming because their parents refuse to feed them nothing but ice cream; the child is not capable of understanding that there are other options and that, indeed, the option they have chosen is not the most effective one, so they vent emotionally, screaming “I hate you”, claiming their parents are abusing them, and so forth.
Shall we make a list of examples of how liberals are divorced from reality?
How ironic the near direct opposite is true, the one you’re obviously avoiding. Isn’t is a clear example of how you are not “engaging on ideas” as is one if the largest memes here?
Conservatives love being instructed that their opinions are not conservative at all, because if their opinions are conservative, that implies a choice has been made, and if there ever was in fact a choice, that implies (though it does not prove) that another choice was possible and even legitimate, and conservatives are not fond of acknowledging that opinions contrary to their own have some merit.
They prefer being instructed that their opinions are not opinions at all, but facts and/or simple common sense and/or the manifestly just and right way to view the world.
They do not usually acknowledge their politics as matters of morals, in which one’s responsibilities, duties, and rights depend upon one’s starting societal assumptions about what is to be more or less highly valued, which is, in itself, largely a belief-based (and highly arguable) choice.
People can choose to adhere to morals.
They prefer to view their politics as a matter of strict black and white morality in which their view is not arguably the more belief-based or historically-dominant one, but in which their view is Good (capital G optional), and the opposite politics are Evil (capital E required.)
One can debate such moral dilemmas such as whether it’s better to disregard the Constitution in favor of actions to combat terrorism.
One can’t argue, really, whether or not it’s better to do Good than it is to do Evil.
Conservatives favor the latter formulation. And because they’ve had 60 year of stultifying reinforcement of their prejudices by lockstep religiosity and folksiness, they’ve gotten quite accustomed to that formulation, and actually tend to get emotionally angry when it’s suggested they’ve not really chosen Good over Evil so much as their idiosyncratic and arbitrary preference for one good (no capital g) over another, arguably just-as-valuable good.
It’s no different than a child sulking because their family isn’t like the ones they see on TV or read about in books, where there is a perfect father and mother, where everyone gets along because of their hard work and faith in family and God; the child is not capable of understanding that those outlets are not real life, that their desire for a perfect reality is a fantasy at best, so they vent trying to force the Utopian ideal they only know from these source onto everyone else.
Go for it, because I’m confident I could counter every one and make a list twice as long for conservatives.
Actually, Countervail, I am engaging on ideas.
You have put forth the following postulates:
And I am engaging by demonstrating how these postulates are based in intellectual rigidity, an inability to objectively assess or review ideas that run contrary to your own, and an emotional response rather than a logical or intelligent one.
You simply are making it easier by posting ideas that are clearly not your own, but ones that you are taking and twisting out of anger, hatred, and spite to “prove” your bigoted postulates.
The family remark was particularly amusing. Why do you have such hatred for a two-parent, heterosexual family? Why do you mock conscientous mothers and fathers? Why do you try so hard to tear down something that has worked so well?
Answer: Because your promiscuity and your sexual orientation do not support it, so therefore it must be wrong. Again, you demonstrate the point of liberalism: if something is not convenient for you, it must be inconvenient and bad for everyone else.
At least Elton doesn’t conform to the gay left concerning Rush, at least when it comes to a paycheck.
“Go for it, because I’m confident I could counter every one and make a list twice as long for conservatives.”
Why don’t you get the party started, smart guy? Since we’re responding to your original
blatherpoints?Start listing them out…you opened the can of worms.
Correct, NDT, but let’s take it a little further…
Liberals suffer from the stultifying and thoroughly delusional certainty that even Moses and Jesus themselves paled in comparison to their own moral authority. Altruism, egalitarianism, social justice and global warming as not only religions to be embraced and proselytized, but the basis of laws to enforced at the point of a gun, if necessary.
Of course, I find amusement in their oftentimes deliberate ignorance to the proven consequences of their ideals, but I confess to a considerable amount of fear in the passion in which they so fervently wish to go marching off the cliff. Being an Objectivist, I do not wish to concern myself with the petulant self-destructiveness of these unfortunate and truculent children, nor do I have any particular interest in their activities. However, I do not recall ever volunteering to regard them as dependents, or even friends, so when they profess that they are somehow my responsibility,, that is the moment I begin to assert that they are, indeed, completely deranged.
But again, theirs is a mission easily scuttled, the beginnings of which have already begun. The majority of individuals in this country already realize that being instructed as to what constitutes “right” vs “wrong” is inherently socialist, and despite being shamelessly manipulated into electing a shameless manipulator, appear to be awakening from their torpor.
However, it is the unabashedly deluded sense of intellectual superiority with which the American left approaches the raucous din and sophomoric mockery they laughingly refer to as discourse with conservatives. They have no interest in discussing anything, only contradicting every word we write, speak or think. To them, we conservatives are simple-minded rubes, incapable of making rational decisions, fair choices and honest appraisals of our environment, and the more we insist otherwise, the greater the vitriol is leveled at us.
Fortunately, the line has been drawn in the sand. When an American president purports to instruct me that he has in mind a certain point at which I’ve “made enough money,” I am left to conclude that there truly is no more discussion to be had with either this man, nor his ideological followers.
I am a 49 year-old gay man, a father and a capitalist. I have worked ceaselessly to build an exceptional career, and am mere months away from retiring and enjoying the plentiful fruits of my labor. I sought no help in my work, and offer no opprobrium for my subsequent rewards.
I do not need to justify my beliefs to anyone, given that my beliefs do not require me to act in any way in conflict with the Constitution, nor violates the rights of another. However, I do have every right to demand that you justify your belief that you have a right to make decisions FOR me. This is the central relationship of a citizen with his government. Unfortunately, this administration and it’s disciples have stopped recognizing this, and have assumed that because I am an untrustworthy just-yesterday-evolved primate, they have every right to make evermore intrusive decisions for my own good, and to protect others from my lack of trustworthiness and enlightenment.
As such, I would respectfully request that those who seek to live their lives in accordance with a worldview that seeks to interfere, impede or take umbrage at any aspect of MY life go sniff a bus seat.
See you in November.
NDT, as per your modus operandi, you deliberately misrepresent what I say. If you were truly committed to having a dialogue, you’d reconsider your comments. But until then, let me point out where you’re inaccurate (not that nuance means much to you).
“All conservatives are intolerant” – This is absolutely NOT what I said. If you look above, I stated that conservatives expect progressives to tolerate their intolerance. Intolerance, generally though, is an overriding feature of conservatism. There is a mindset there of certain expectations for individuals and society, one that is simply intolerant of that which doesn’t conform to those expectations, to that logic, to that idealism. So it should actually read “conservatism is intolerant.” Individual conservatives have proven to be intolerant of a variety of things the only difference which offends me is the meme that because progressives are bleeding hearts or some such nonsense, they should be expected to tolerate whatever intolerance is shown by conservatism or conservatives.
“All conservatives have nothing but evil and selfish motivations” – again, not what I said. There does seem to be an overriding sense in conservatism that putting self above others is a better way to be rather than cooperative exercises, e.g states’ rights above federal laws, no taxes and relying on the goodwill of individuals to lubricate the workings of economy and society, advancement of a singular Christian ideal as the religious base for the country, etc. There are many conservatives promoting their selfish interests in the advancement of public policy, their way is the best way, the only. There are also a number of conservatives who are similarly like-minded but they focus the onus of their beliefs on themselves and not others. But generally, conservatives do have selfishness at heart in their beliefs, first what’s best for them, then their family, then their city, county and state, then the nation, then the world in that order. The evilness of it is in how it affects others negatively, an imbalance and imposition on public policy that tries to account for all people.
“No conservative thought or point is ever based in reality” – It may eventually be the case, but conservatism is a philosophy of ideals, not of pragmatism or real life. So a better way to state that is “no conservative thought or point is ever originally based in reality” or “some conservative thought or point is based in reality” or probably more accurately is to say that “conservative thoughts or points attempt to change reality.” For example, a conservative ideal is the nuclear family. What’s the support for that? What’s the scientific finding to promote such a situation? Can other scenarios exist equally as well? Since such families continue to dwindle in number, how can conservatives be sure? Ad naseum. But rather than look at the facts surrounding such a postulate, conservatives continue to base public policy on the ideal of the nuclear family rather than promote good families. Gay marriage is another one. There will continue to be gay men and women that want to be recognized as legitimate partners that will never reconsider their gayness and want the same rights and responsibilities as other citizens of the US. Conservatives, rather than considering how this is beneficial to the concept of the marriage have determined that it somehow tears down the construct, and all without any factual basis especially in light of data from other countries showing no negative impact to marriage in general. Same with the penal system. We know from study after study that the way the US justice system works right now, it neither deters crime or rehabilitates criminals, but conservatives are sure it works great and actually want more of the same.
I do not mock nuclear families, being a well-adjusted outcome of one, but I also know that simply being a nuclear family does not make it a positive family environment. Nor do I mock heterosexual families, but again simply being straight does not guarantee a positive family environment. You again try to explain, through your posterior, that you KNOW what I’m saying without either asking or truly examining what I am saying. My “promiscuity” would be amusing to my partner of 10 years, as well as being gay as a negative to a family life would be to my friends who are raising their adopted son and daughter (he just qualifying for regents classes, she the belle of the ballet school) after their meth-addled heterosexual mother abandoned them. Your comments would be insulting if they weren’t so glaringly wrong and pathetic. You, in fact, prove my points, that conservatism is intolerant, and that you know your self-realized ideals are somehow the best even though there’s no basis for your assertions.
Eric, just a quick question. Was the “fruits of your labors” something tangible that you as an individual could account for? Did you perform manual labor of some highly prolific skill to realize your net worth for example? Or did your career involve some kind of capital enterprise that relied on the cooperative talents of many individuals assisted by government frameworks to allow you to achieve your “financial independence?” If you were a delivery man for example, did you run the business completely by yourself on your own roads?
I love when conservatives think that one makes money in a bell jar. Just one more example of everything I’ve been saying.
Countervail,
With the exception of your last paragraph at #15, you are completely and utterly wrong, relying once again upon the broadest of generalizations and deliberate misstatements of the so-called “progressives” who have come before you.
Whereas history screams over and over with examples of your ideology gone horribly wrong, resulting in the deaths and suffering of untold millions, you choose instead to parrot the annoyingly predictable WE’RE not the intolerant ones – YOU conservatives are!” meme.
I grant you this: every single mortal who has ever walked the planet has been intolerant at one time or another, so rather than engage in yet another exchange of anecdotal evidence, suffice to say that all have fallen short of the glory of whatever they hold greater than themselves.
What I do wish to point out here is your having substantiated my assertion that liberals assume that mankind is incapable of conducting itself in a manner that does ultimately result in it’s destruction. This delusion of grandeur is inherently stupid, and despite the election of Obama, has only resulted in the awakening of the self on a scale that terrifies those such as yourself who remain convinced that we’re all out to screw everyone else over, and will take to the streets with torches in order to lynch those we do not like. Your perception is not only flawed, but reflective of the college student who knows nothing of the world, but everything of it, according to his professor.
You mention pragmatism, yet you present a school of thought that professes anything BUT common sense, for what is sensical about professing to control others?
You “progressives” never cease to amuse me in your hypocrisy, self-involvement and projection.
Again, Countervail, you demonstrate my point.
For example, this statement:
Followed immediately by:
So again, you state that all conservatives are intolerant and that intolerance is an overriding feature of conservativism.
And again:
Followed by:
The hilarity just keeps getting greater. You are stating, flat out, that conservativism is always wrong, that conservativism always affects people negatively, that conservativism always results in evil.
And what was stated above?
The best example:
I can think of one right off the bat.
So it would seem that, if the government’s job is to reduce child poverty and put children in much better of a situation, as “progressives” like yourself seem to think it is, that you would be all in favor of promoting and supporting the nuclear family, which suffers one-sixth the poverty.
But again, the problem is that the nuclear family is a “traditional” and “historical” solution, which is anathema to “progressives”. Because of your worldview that you are the only smart people who have ever existed in history and that everyone who came before you is an idiot, you have convinced yourself that families don’t matter, that the nuclear family is awful and evil, and that single parenting and whatnot is just as good — with catastrophic results.
Sure, Countervail.
Now, while you spin fairy tales, let’s show what REAL “progressive” gay and lesbian families consider normal behavior and what you support and endorse.
Think that’s good for children, Countervail? Hm? Oh, we know you do — it would be “close-minded” to think otherwise, right? Sexual progressives like yourself know that dressing children as sexual slaves and taking them to a sex fair is “educational”, and that it’s only old, dusty, religiosity and black-and-white “morals” that makes it wrong, both of which you would never agree with.
You know absolutely nothing about me other than what I chose to share.
Again, you prove my point; having nothing to offer ideologically, you turn to mockery in a childish attempt to “score points.”
It is an entertaining little bit of circular logic, Eric.
“Progressives” abolish religion and tear down morality because they believe that humans are innately good and that whatever decision they make will be right.
Then they impose a massive regulatory state that dictates everything down to the color of paint because they don’t trust people to make the right decisions.
Once you observe “progressives” like Countervail and Barack Obama in action, what you realize is that they really aren’t opposed to monarchy, dictatorship, fascism, or whatever other sort of totalitarian rule you might impose; they’re simply opposed to any sort of setup in which they don’t have complete and absolute authority.
Well first of all, there’s you. You usually come along and pop off with the usual Current Truth from the moonbatshit crazy liberal left. Today, however, you’ve packaged your bullshit in hifalutin words and long posts hoping that makes you sound smarter or people with short attention spans will give up.
All of which prove that you’re divorced from reality and you really have no clue what the f-ck you’re talking about.
Gentlemen,
All I have to say is reiterate the last sentence of my first comment. I think it says it all.
Not true…
We just ask that you are at least honest with regard to the fact that liberals believe man (especially the conservative) is a savage beast in need of a more enlightened master.
…And we would quote the work of those up the thread. Your final piece of childishness is when you roar in with the most vicious of slurs and then wonder why we’d connect the slurs with the adultolescent spewing them and then respond in kind.
Liberalism, past the age of thirty, is a political maturity disorder. (TM)
That’s because your “reply” is usually a huge pile of bullshit and you want to be loved for it.
Yes Eric, you caught me. I really believe “man (especially the conservative) is a savage beast in need of a more enlightened master.” What the hell does that even mean in the first place? Really?
And could someone please enlighten me what horrible slurs I used against conservatives? That I said conservatism is intolerant, ego-centric and based in theory? I did not ascribe those particulars to any of you in particular. I didn’t even ascribe those features negatively. And for that I’m called in return “promiscuous,” that I “hate heterosexual families,” I’m “bigoted,” that I’m somehow OK with taking children to sex fairs, I’m childish, moonbatshit crazy, divorced from reality, don’t know what the f-ck I’m talking about, hypocritical, self-involved, etc.
How is any of your responses anything but intolerant, ego-centric, and your ideas based in theory? Where are the slew of posts and examples about efforts of tolerance, selflessness and conservatism in reaction to actual life situations?
This is what absolutely renders me speechless. The endless calls for pity for the poor misunderstood conservative and when the mirror is held up to your faces you claim it’s nothing but an ugly painting that you go on fits and tears about attempting to denigrate anyone who sees you in a different light than yourselves. It renders the original post all the more hollow and makes me glad that gay conservatives are nothing but a small minority of a small minority.
What the hell does any of your comments today even mean? Really?
The proverbial shoe would seem to fit.
Ugh. If only.
Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out. Bruce hates ass prints on his door.
Countervail (#9) proves that Aristotle was correct when he said that all logical “arguments” must be based on the willingness of the participants to disagree. If you disagree with a premise, you can not proceed to a logical argument. Therefore, I present for your consideration these jewels of imbecilic horse manure:
These sophisms make Countervail a practitioner of the modern school of sophistry in which “hope and change” and “yes we can” become political platforms.
Why, pray tell, would a gay choose marriage when marriage is nothing less than a form of morality?
Since you can not argue Good v. Evil why the “rules” about STD’s? Isn’t carrying your lust partner’s gifts of giving just an innocuous result of not being bothered by morals and being a total bystander in the Good v Evil circular non argument?
Countervail: go to your room and play with yourself. You are restricted from the gene pool.
I’d be happy to answer your question, if only you had asked one that was at least intelligible. It’s called grammar. Look into it.
As I’ve already explained, given that the conservative ideology doesn’t mandate forced egalitarianism and re-distribution of income, nor the intrusion of government into as many aspects of the lives of Americans in the name of “social justice,” you have absolutely no place demanding we justify ourselves. On the contrary, considering that the central tenet of YOUR particular worldview is the furtherance of altruism and statism by any means necessary, I’d say that the onus is upon you to explain why I shouldn’t refer to your by your proper name: socialist.
Oh, that that were true…
Pardon me, young man, but please point out an example of that rather asinine observation. I don’t recall any conservative EVER calling for pity, nor do they make a habit of whining about being “misunderstood.” What I do observe is the blowback the left is experiencing after having deluded itself into believing that the American people would welcome your intrusion into their lives with open arms. You simply fail to accept that not everyone thinks you’re the smartest people in the room, and even fewer are willing to surrender themselves to the blissful ignorance and dangerous short-sightedness required for such a leap of faith.
Therein lies the crux of your predicament. Unable to articulate even YOUR ideology, and therefore at a loss for anything more thoughtful, you arrive at the inevitable leftist response: “Your entire opinion is bullsh*t, and there’s only a handful of you, anyway, so there.”
Such a myopic attitude is already destroying this administration and it’s disciples. Please, do continue…
http://www.pjtv.com/?cmd=mpg&mpid=80&load=3155
Explaining LIBERALISM… I enjoy PJTV and some of the entertainers there. You may want to check it out!
Except that you did.
So there’s one failed spin.
Next up:
Except that you did.
So now that’s two.
And now for three.
I provided you a linked, referenced, scientific paper that made it clear that, in real life situations, children in nuclear families were six times less likely to be suffering from child poverty.
The problem here is that this runs directly opposite to your promiscuity-based liberal ideology that paints the nuclear family as outdated and repressive and insists that other “families” are just as good. Hence, you ignore it and start whining about how mean conservatives are to you.
Do you all truly not realize how out-of-touch and vindictive you all sound here? Conspiracy-fantasizing, deliberately taking things out of context, assumptive… there’s not much you’ve done to understand anything I’ve said except to psychoanalyze me from a prejudiced point of view.
Hey wait a minute, didn’t the original post say something like:
Interesting, no?
And by the way NDT, seems the”promiscuity-based liberal ideology” of lesbian parenting isn’t too bad after all.
http://www.webmd.com/parenting/news/20100607/kids-of-lesbian-parents-are-well-adjusted
And again, you demonstrate the point, Countervail; no, there is no way whatsoever that you could have in any way acted unfairly, or made negative statements, or mistakes. It’s all everyone else’s fault; you behaved perfectly — or so you think.
LOL….oh, the hilarity.
This study took handpicked “volunteer” lesbians with children and compared them to the national average, which would include “meth-addled heterosexual mothers”.
So that’s very impressive, Countervail; by taking a non-random and biased sample that is completely unmatched or controlled for income, race/ethnicity, and region of residence, you were able to make lesbians look like capable parents.
You are making it clear that the best lesbian parents are only as good as average heterosexual parents. That means the better heterosexual parents are clearly better than the lesbian parents, and anything less than the best lesbian parents are WORSE than the average heterosexual parents.
Again, this is no surprise; the height of intelligent parenting for gays and lesbians is taking children to sex fairs dressed as sexual slaves for educational experiences. When you have parents that stupid, shallow, self-centered, and perverse, you’re starting at a hell of a disadvantage in the first place.
Sorry, but this has flown way too far over the cuckoo’s nest for my understanding.
Countervail, you have sunk so deep into moral relativity that you get to arbitrate right and wrong from your perspective alone at the moment you choose and we are supposed to go along with your self-centered righteousness. Get a clue.