revprez

Do any of those other initiatives have a constituency comparable to that behind the flag amendment? Rev Prez

The question followed your stated disinterest in the question. Why would I ask you the same question a third time if you decided not to address it? Not even you can believe that. Good, now that you've gotten that off your chest I'll get back to my question. What's so noble about eminent domain for "public use?" And for those who may be missing the context, it was in response to another member's view that eminent domain that serves private interests is unjust. Rev Prez

I didn't ask whether its in the Constitution. I asked what's so noble about it? Why is that scary at all? Condemnation of blighted areas happens all the time and I rarely hear anyone here complaining about it on principle. Then if you don't like it, and you believe you have a cache of support in your community, run for office or organize behind a candidate you think can do something about it. Can you tell us what you have against these developers other than the alleged conflict of interest? Rev Prez

"The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States." The Courts have already ruled that flag desecration in general is protected speech; what makes you think they'll read this amendment more broadly than necessary? Rev Prez

If you're going to quote in context: "And I agree totally with you that the Lord has protected us so wonderfully these 225 years. And since 1812, this is the first time that we've been attacked on our soil and by far the worst results. And I fear, as Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense, said yesterday, that this is only the beginning. And with biological warfare available to these monsters - the Husseins, the Bin Ladens, the Arafats--what we saw on Tuesday, as terrible as it is, could be miniscule if, in fact--if, in fact--God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve." Where's the apology? Yes, I am going to defend it, largely because the abortion and homosexual rights activists, the ACLU, and secularists easily fit into a leftist fifth column. Are their homosexual conservatives? Sure, are their pro-choice folks sick of liberals undermining the security of the country, sure. So what? Politics isn't waged with respect to handfuls, and the fact remains that the other major political party in the United States is the party of a program abortion rights, gay marriage, Godlessness, and internationalism arising from liberal principles. We can argue whether the fringe on any given issue is culpable of supporting the whole by supporting the part. I'm saying that the country is divided between liberals and conservatives, and that Moleke's view to the contrary is easily refuted by the polling data. Why not? Liberalism is well-defined in political science circles. We can predict the political preferences of people abiding by the philosophy. We can even determine the unstated preferences of shallow folks who attach to no manageable set of political principles and instead, as Moleke does, go by their guts simply by gauging their responses on a series of issues. That's why it's easy to break down moderates into liberals and conservatives, even when they don't self-identify as such or register with a major party. There is evidence that liberals and conservatives are psychologically distinct. Liberalism and conservatism are well understood American political philosophies which in model successfully predict the positions taken by organized players. In the Congress and state legislatures, we can use interest group ratings to determine median attitudes and find that there is very little variance within parties; only across party lines. And finally the vast majority of Americans cast their vote for one party or the other at all levels of government. I never did limit conservatism to the Bush crowd, although its something to say that better than four fifths of Bush's voters actually supported their candidate rather than voted against Kerry. Rev Prez

And how is it my bullshit as opposed to something you just made up? Where did I state that gay marriage and tax cuts were contrary positions? No, I said: "I chalk it up to some defense mechanism whenever someone declares they honestly believe critical thinking includes the ability to hold two generally contradictory positions." Perhaps you'd like to start from the top. Um, on tax cuts I agree that's a conservative position. How is advocating gay marriage a liberal position? Really? Where? Rev Prez

Explain. Here's the text of HJ Res 10 if you need it.

The tone has changed.

Then ask somebody who's interested. You believe they are? If by logical divide you mean that most Americans fall into two categories with a distinct set of views derived from liberal or conservative political philosophies, then I already have shown that's the case using the polling data. If you're suggesting I've argued that Republicans are rational and Democrats are not, then you're way off base. And why should that interest me? Rev Prez

The question wasn't directed to you personally the first time I ask it. What makes you think it was the second and third time? You argue that this law is necessary because something needs to exist to address these cases. That's an 'if and only if' condition. Rev Prez

I don't think you didn't fool anyone into believing your treatment was comprehensive. Your entire argument boiled down to ED is justified because: "it would, without eminent domain, be possible for suitably stubborn individuals to simply prevent anything from happening." Of course, then you went through a list of things that were either necessary or would enjoy wide public support. At no time did you write that ED where public necessity was not an issue is unjustified. In fact, you haven't even defined public necessity. So I ask again what's so noble about ED for "public use?" You didn't even argue whether most ED cases were valid, ethical or otherwise good. So either you were unclear, or simply being facetious. Either way, we still have a question as to whether ED for public is use is noble. In fact, if so is it more or less noble than ED used to the benefit of a private interest? That's a pretty strong claim. 1) Really? Is MLK Day necessary? 2) "The law" in "[n]ecessity is clearly not an active principle in the law" refers to eminent domain. States, towns and cities primarily use it to condemn property in order for new private development to take hold. There is no test to determine whether it is necessary to tear down a condemn building. A developer simply submits a plan to the relevant agencies who markup for whatever legislative or regulatory body handles such things; and damn the people who may live there. Rev Prez

I'm pretty sure I haven't. That's probably true. And I'm saying that a mixed bag of contradictory political positions is not a consequence of critical thought. For example, there is a shallow quality about how you self-describe yourself as "liberal" and yet hold a libertarian political program. Either it reflects an indefensible hostility towards to the standard definitions or an indefensible ignorance of them period. Either way, critical thought has nothing to do with it. No, it doesn't have to. But it does anyway; we can correlate self-identification with survey data on electoral and other political questions. Party ID went for the party candidate about 90 percent of the time. Liberal and conservative self-identification went for the corresponding candidate 85 percent of the time. Self-described moderates gave 99 percent of their vote to one of the two major candidates. When we cross correlate according to religiosity, region, views on moral, economic and health issues and most importantly (as far as this thread is concerned) views on the War on Terror and the Iraq War, the fact is we have only two significant groups worth considering--liberals and conservatives. So either you haven't thought it through or you have some odd grudge against the labels; either way it's immaterial to the discussion. Who'd care if some neo-Nazi on message board wanted to be a called a social democrat? You'd probably be wrong. All of the talent is in the two major parties. I wonder where all the apathy lies? Also, why is it you seek weak rationalizations rather than evidence to advance this argument? I mean the point is entirely empirical. And that's probably the depth of so-called "independent" political thought. Positions arise from nothing more than gut reaction. And that's a very shallow position to take. That's not to say anyone else doesn't on any number of issues. Hell, I occasionally begin with a good "I personally believe yada yada yada." But at least I try to restrict personal opinion to unempirical matters. No, they're not. An example of contradictory thoughts would be your "present" opposition to eminent domain to support private interests. In short, you seem to avoid spelling out any underlying principles that others could use to evaluate the substance and boundaries of your positions. You haven't arrived at a conclusion. You've simply stated that based on some nebulous personal experience and "education" that people who hold a mix bag of views are generally better critical thinkers. That doesn't mean your wrong, but it does mean you could at least explain why majority of the most well organized and informed players at any level of politics are partisans. That would be your defense of mixed bag political positions on principle. Which is on its face an odiously useless observation. We're not talking about marginal disagreements over the amount of judicial discretion under strict constructionism, but measurably significant differences on which labels can be applied. I haven't argued against it, anymore than I've argued against the notion that people may be genetically different to some degree from one another. I have. I've pointed out that liberal and conservative are labels applied to the two politically significant groups in American politics. The polling is pretty clear on that point. Ok, let's examine your total failure to do this for one simple point. Read up on strawmen and get back to me, Professor. Rev Prez

Did you get warm fuzzies after writing that? Rev Prez

And I say so what? So long as an alderman or a supervisor or a mayor can survive politically, why not? Rev Prez

You pick a select few sweet-sounding cases and refuse to justify the rest. Necessity is clearly not an active principle in the law. For a less fluffy example than the list you provided, Robert Byrd wants to build a new old folks community center on your land and name it after himself. Nobody outside your small neighborhood really cares, but you're going up against a well financed interest group, a popular US Senator and you've never organized for political action in your life. The town supervisors, city council, or whatever approves. Hell, put it up for a vote and only a quarter of registered voters--skewed heavily towards the older demographic, comes out to support the plan. So I ask again, what's so noble about eminent domain for "public use?" Rev Prez

Simply pointing out that something plays a role isn't very useful. How big a role do each of these individual attack dogs play? How powerful a voice is Ann Coulter compared to Walter Cronkite? How much political power do pundits have compared to officials on Sunday news talk? Realignment is twenty years old, and we have huge first order events like the Vietnam War, rececessions, the cutting of the upper tax bracket, the end of the Cold War, hyperwar in the Gulf twice over, and GDP growth from $2 trillion to $12 trillion in constant dollars. So exactly how big a role do you think the talkies actually play in shaping the electorate? I have nothing to say about the rest of your remarks until I get an answer to this. If you really think a bunch of political junkie geeks smothering or smearing each other on TV and talk radio are the dominant political power players in the long term, then let's see the money. Rev Prez

I'm sorry you were offended. 58 percent of American self-identify as either liberal and conservative when actually asked. 99 percent of American voters in the last election voted for either Kerry or Bush. Its fair to apply the labels liberal and conservative exhaustively and exclusively to the significant players and constituencies in this game; the independents are a second order consideration. I don't go around tossing folk wisdom as biology. Maybe you should stop doing the same in a discussion on politics. It is a plain fact that people do hold contradictory positions. I'm sure you have at some point; and I know I have. It is not an exercise in critical thought, it is an inevitable consequence of intuition. Your defense of shallowness and ignorance as intellectual virtue is as fatuous as it is boring. Stick to the subject at hand. Hamilton said or wrote no such thing, but more to the point it isn't even one of the many definitions actually used by political scientists today. Either way, your quote is non sequitur. I never said you couldn't hold contradictory positions. I said doing so is not the consequence of critical thought. Two mutually exclusive positions, if held, amounts to simple contradiction. Perhaps you should try doing a little research. In what fantasy world do you live? Rev Prez

So the Swedes are hostile to private property and the entrepeneur. We already knew that. Let's try a less fluffy list of things governments can do with stolen property. They can build Robert Byrd museums, spotted owl refuges, prisons, public landfills, and office space for tax agencies. Not one of these will put up a cent to the dollar a strip mall can breath into a town's economy. So what's so noble about eminent domain for "public use" anyway? Rev Prez

Well, for one, these aren't models. They don't predict or explain anything. Its just a system for assigning labels, a proposed measurement standard, whatever. Only the Eyseneck chart is an actual model, it proposes to correlate authoritarian with political preference measured independently, hence RWA syndrome. Even so, Eyseneck is accused of observer bias and successor research, most recently Jost et. al. in "Political conservatism as socially motivated cognition," has also come under fire [1]. Rev Prez

First of all, Rove didn't say there were just two sides. He said their were liberals and their were conseratives and that generally these wto groups hold dichotomous views on issues of national security. One of these views he rightly derided. And even so, in general the middle ground is insignificant compared to the constellation of views unique to conservatism and liberalism. That's why the labels are useful. No they don't, just as all people who post in Relativity do not think alike. The point is that libertarian opponents of the Bush doctrine are so politically insignificant they barely warrant discussion. Just like the academic gravitas of people passionately railing against special relativity is so miniscule there's no reason to take them seriously. Rev Prez

Would that include Karl Rove's remarks in your view? Rev Prez

Someone who lives in Europe; specifically the majority that identifies with the liberal world view. Rev Prez

I'm specifically referring to the French. Rev Prez

Nobody said you "couldn't disagree with the military." You just better be prepared both on the facts and the ethics before you attack Americans' most beloved (and rightly so) institution. Don't pick a fight about Malcom X in a Black neighborhood and whatnot. If the United States invaded Britain tomorrow, I'm sure you'd here a lot of outrage long before you start complaining; including the very quick and brutal politicization of the military into minority "why the hell not?" and majority "screw this" camps. And not everyone does. But once again let's step back into reality. Who really cares what you think when the vast majority of the actives, Guard and reserve are behind the war? Because the comparison is accurate and meaningful. Hussein's Iraq and Hitler's Germany were brutally run police states that murdered on a mass scale, invaded their neighbors, and if left unchecked would grow to dominate a region of the world vital to US security interests. Exactly what the hell do the US and Nazi Germany have in common that Richard Pyror or tens of millions of NASCAR fans don't? Durbin needed to apologize, and did, for two reasons. First, we learned this week that the Dems had lost on Gitmo; that's going to be a lovely little issue in 2006. Second, Durbin should've apologized because his comments--recorded, copied and distributed globally--may be used in misinformation campaigns by the enemy. We already have to deal with a continent of off-shore losers in Europe who chide the US by day and bully Muslims by night. Last thing we need is a US Senator making their case for them. Rev Prez

There isn't, because Rove doesn't risk anything except pissing off the Upper West Side, the Left Coast, and their ambassadors to fly over country. And few if any Republicans actually listen to Democrats anymore unless--as is in the Senate--they absolutely have to. Durbin, a US Senator, is now in the Congressional Record equating allegations of American mistreatment of detainees to that of Nazi, Soviet, or Khmer Rouge abuses. More importantly, he's one shrill voice in many that is willing to validate the worst propaganda of America's overseas critics and enemies in an effort to shutdown a camp that 80 percent of Americans agree is run well and run with purpose. Rev Prez