Michele Bachmann

[Moontanman]

franklin raines

 

 

 

 

For the others http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/fanniemae.asp

 

 

This points to an ongoing problem of disinformation being spread about politics, from what I've seen the conservatives are far worse than the progressives but I admit to a possible sampling bias in this.

 

No matter who does it this is blatantly dishonest, dishonorable, and should be illegal but our current culture of only wanting to read or see things that confirm our own world view has lead to this mess, news shows that don't just slant the news one way or another but actually make stuff up, often outrageous stuff that you would think that most people would at least give it a bit of skepticism but as long as it confirms their world view it is swallowed hook line and sinker...

[rigney]

This points to an ongoing problem of disinformation being spread about politics, from what I've seen the conservatives are far worse than the progressives but I admit to a possible sampling bias in this.

 

No matter who does it this is blatantly dishonest, dishonorable, and should be illegal but our current culture of only wanting to read or see things that confirm our own world view has lead to this mess, news shows that don't just slant the news one way or another but actually make stuff up, often outrageous stuff that you would think that most people would at least give it a bit of skepticism but as long as it confirms their world view it is swallowed hook line and sinker...

I recant my accusation concerning these "three donkeys" being in Obmas employee. I received it from what I thought to be a reliable source and without researching it, added fuel to the fire. My sincerest apology. Edited July 16, 2012 by rigney

[imatfaal]

This points to an ongoing problem of disinformation being spread about politics, from what I've seen the conservatives are far worse than the progressives but I admit to a possible sampling bias in this.

 

No matter who does it this is blatantly dishonest, dishonorable, and should be illegal but our current culture of only wanting to read or see things that confirm our own world view has lead to this mess, news shows that don't just slant the news one way or another but actually make stuff up, often outrageous stuff that you would think that most people would at least give it a bit of skepticism but as long as it confirms their world view it is swallowed hook line and sinker...

 

I suffer from the same sampling bias - and I agree whole-heartedly with you. It has got to a stage that most of what one sees on the tv is worth double-checking if you are intending to use it as the basis for making up your mind. We have it easy here in the UK compared to the media-maelstrom that is the USA - but it is getting worse here

 

I in turn recant my accusation concerning these "three donkeys" being in Obmas employee. I received it from what I thought to be a reliable source. My sincere apology.

 

There is so much crap about - makes it hard to find the facts. I would always use snopes.com to check any email information like that - there is a deliberate campaign to obfuscate the truth and bewilder the electorate.

[rigney]

I suffer from the same sampling bias - and I agree whole-heartedly with you. It has got to a stage that most of what one sees on the tv is worth double-checking if you are intending to use it as the basis for making up your mind. We have it easy here in the UK compared to the media-maelstrom that is the USA - but it is getting worse here

 

 

 

There is so much crap about - makes it hard to find the facts. I would always use snopes.com to check any email information like that - there is a deliberate campaign to obfuscate the truth and bewilder the electorate.

Heck of it was, I received it from a friend that has always been reliable. Believe me, I've been on his butt all day; especially since Moon straightened me out.

[Moontanman]

Heck of it was, I received it from a friend that has always been reliable. Believe me, I've been on his butt all day; especially since Moon straightened me out.

 

 

Everyone is getting sucked into this stuff rigney, I get so much of it it's demoralizing to think people would rather deceive the electorate than actually have a platform to stand on.

 

Many times I've come across such "letters" and the wording is subtly changed to make it more difficult to look up online.

 

I think it's despicable...

 

The importance of being elected has surpassed any possibility of an honest campaign being feasible much less important...

[John Cuthber]

"Can you name some? I expect that they do exist but I'd like to see some proof that right wing groups exist that take funding and direction from foreign powers. "

Ooh! What happened there? did someone somehow redefine "traitor" as meaning those that "take funding and direction from foreign powers. "?

 

Lets go back to the dictionary shall we?

Traitor: a person who betrays another, a cause, or any trust.

 

So, for example, that might mean anyone who says the health service is safe in their hands, but, having got into power, seeks to privatise it.

How about the current Prime minister of the UK?

 

He was, I think it's fair to say, involved in right wing groups as a student.

[Moontanman]

"Can you name some? I expect that they do exist but I'd like to see some proof that right wing groups exist that take funding and direction from foreign powers. "

Ooh! What happened there? did someone somehow redefine "traitor" as meaning those that "take funding and direction from foreign powers. "?

 

Lets go back to the dictionary shall we?

Traitor: a person who betrays another, a cause, or any trust.

 

So, for example, that might mean anyone who says the health service is safe in their hands, but, having got into power, seeks to privatise it.

How about the current Prime minister of the UK?

 

He was, I think it's fair to say, involved in right wing groups as a student.

 

 

i agree, the definition of traitor has to be taken within the context of the people involved. In the USA it seems the right s uses the idea of anyone who disagrees with them is a traitor and then conflates it with the idea that anyone who is not a conservative is a traitor to the our country..

 

They define their own terms for their own benefit... Liberals don't seem to be aware of this or want to be above it somehow...

[rigney]

franklin raines

 

 

 

 

For the others http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/fanniemae.asp

I appreciate you posting this link and I feel like an idiot for taking a friends word for the "garbage" I posted. I make mistakes at times through ignorance, but to make on through stupidity takes away my credibility. I apologise to those who read my trash post, relating to the three Fannie Mae stooges, Winkin, Blinkin and Nod. I aplogise especially to JohnB to whom I posted it. Edited July 17, 2012 by rigney

[JohnB]

"Can you name some? I expect that they do exist but I'd like to see some proof that right wing groups exist that take funding and direction from foreign powers. "

Ooh! What happened there? did someone somehow redefine "traitor" as meaning those that "take funding and direction from foreign powers. "?

 

Lets go back to the dictionary shall we?

Traitor: a person who betrays another, a cause, or any trust.

 

So, for example, that might mean anyone who says the health service is safe in their hands, but, having got into power, seeks to privatise it.

How about the current Prime minister of the UK?

 

He was, I think it's fair to say, involved in right wing groups as a student.

 

Nice try on the bait and switch. I only used traitor in connection with one definition. I provided you with a list of 200 people who took money and direction from an inimical foreign power during the Cold War but that wasn't "good enough". So I supplied you a direct link to the NSA where you could peruse the documents and see for yourself. Similarly I gave you a list from the US Attorney General of "front" organisations that were operating in the West while funded and directed by Moscow.

 

And the best you can come up with in a response is a politician who doesn't keep a promise? Shit, would you like some of ours? We've got a Prime Minister that could stand in the shade of a corkscrew. Hell, take the redheaed twit and we'll throw in 5 scottish union organisers for free.

 

You asked me to "name names" and I did. How about you providing some proof of right wing groups that werre or are operating in Western nations with funding and under direction by a foreign power. Come on mate, you're a Pom. You seriously don't think that a group in say, 1941, that was recieving funding and direction from Berlin wouldn't be considered "Traitor"?

[John Cuthber]

"Nice try on the bait and switch. I only used traitor in connection with one definition."

Indeed.

But since it isn't the one in the dictionary, it's not a lot of use.

So I used the right definition when I answered.

 

I haven't checked their data yet but if the NSA are calling people "traitors" because they redefine the word then I'm not going to waste my time doing so.

I'm going to ask you (again) to name the people who actually harmed either the USA or its citizens.

 

"Come on mate, you're a Pom. You seriously don't think that a group in say, 1941, that was recieving funding and direction from Berlin wouldn't be considered "Traitor"? "

That would depend entirely on what they actually did. I might call them a resistance movement if they acted in support of the Jews in Germany at the time.

 

(Incidentally I think a "who has the most useless politicians?" competition would be difficult to judge because we all have some staggering contenders, and it's off-topic anyway.)

[Moontanman]

(Incidentally I think a "who has the most useless politicians?" competition would be difficult to judge because we all have some staggering contenders, and it's off-topic anyway.)

 

 

Yes but it might make an interesting thread, it might be interesting to start such a competition in a bar and then watch from the side lines as people tore at each other over whose politicians were the most profoundly stupid

[JohnB]

But since it isn't the one in the dictionary, it's not a lot of use.

So I used the right definition when I answered.

 

Incorrect. I gave the dictionary definition back in comment #20 in this thread. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean you get to substitute another meaning and run a strawman. Just to refresh your memory as to the definition I've been using every time;

One who violates his allegiance and betrays his country; one guilty of treason; one who, in breach of trust, delivers his country to an enemy, or yields up any fort or place intrusted to his defense, or surrenders an army or body of troops to the enemy, unless when vanquished; also, one who takes arms and levies war against his country; or one who aids an enemy in conquering his country. See Treason.

 

I haven't checked their data yet but if the NSA are calling people "traitors" because they redefine the word then I'm not going to waste my time doing so.

I'm going to ask you (again) to name the people who actually harmed either the USA or its citizens.

 

Stop trying to move the goalposts. My argument has at all times been that those who were knowingly in the pay and under the direction of Moscow during the Cold War can be called traitors. Whether they did harm or not is immaterial to that. Note that Americans have a term for a traitor "Benedict Arnold", his actions were considered treasonous even though his plan to surrender the fort at West Point did not come to fruition. All that is required under the definition is to "aid an enemy in conquering his country" even if the attempt fails. Regardless of success or failure it is the act of aiding that defines the traitor.

 

If you aren't going to check the references, then why ask for them? First you ask for names and I supplied them. But you didn't like the place that collated the names so I supplied a direct link to the documents so that you could read the originals for yourself. That you haven't bothered to even look at them is obvious since if you had you would know that the majority of the links are to the translations of the actual intercepts themselves and not to the NSA evaluations of those intercepts. So they don't show who the NSA define as agents or traitors, they show who Moscow themselves named as agents and therefore traitors. If straight from the horses mouth isn't good enough for you, then don't bother people with requests for proof.

 

That would depend entirely on what they actually did. I might call them a resistance movement if they acted in support of the Jews in Germany at the time.

 

Yes, I'm sure the regime in Berlin would have been funding such organisations in 1941. And Lord Haw Haw was a british patriot.

 

(Incidentally I think a "who has the most useless politicians?" competition would be difficult to judge because we all have some staggering contenders, and it's off-topic anyway.)

 

You brought up useless politicians as a supposed proof of right wing groups operating in a similar fashion to the left wing front organisations and it blew up in your face. I ask again, can you name a single right wing front organisation that was operating in Western nations and recieving funding and direction from an inimical foreign power?

 

And just to be absolutely clear and prevent any further conflating of different groups, even at the height of the Cold War being a socialist or even hard line Stalinist Communist in America or anywhere else in the West does not make a person a traitor or treasonous. That is nothing more than a political difference of opinion. It is the act of taking funding and direction from the foreign power that crosses the line into treason.

Edited July 19, 2012 by JohnB

[Moontanman]

I have to ask JohnB, you say only or mostly left wing organizations accept money from foreign powers but I ask you since Hitler was defeated what right wing foreign power is there? Hitlers Germany most certainly did have right wing groups here they were paying, they weren't any more successful than left wing groups have been, still a small percentage of the total right wing group members but the extreme right still marches around and worships Hitler... neo NAZIs are still with us and there is some hint of foreign support for them, Argentina maybe? my point is that there is no right wing type power trying to subvert us I know of but I sure these extreme right wing groups would take the money if it was offered...

[JohnB]

my point is that there is no right wing type power trying to subvert us I know of but I sure these extreme right wing groups would take the money if it was offered...

 

I think I'd have to agree Moon, at least to a point.

 

Left wing groups were in the pay of a foreign power and the argument was that there were right wing groups doing the same. As you point out, there aren't any right wing regimes trying to subvert us so we are now left with the argument that "The right wing would do it too if it got the chance." Yet all of this is nothing more than an attempt to hide from the fact that some left wing groups were treasonous. They acted to subvert their own country and were in the pay and under the direction of an inimical foreign power.

 

If WW2 had finished as a draw with Hitler in charge of Western Europe and Russia still standing the situation might be different. You'd probably have both left and right wing groups being paid by Moscow and Berlin respectively attempting to influence the US. The fun part would be that they would be trying to infiltrate each other at the same time, which would have been entertaining.

 

The other thing to remember is that the left wing is more likely to be traitorous. That's not to say that everybody on the left is a traitor, just that in a group you would be more likely to find one. The reason is not left/right but progressive/conservative. Since conservatives don't want change they aren't about to join groups demanding change, are they? However progressives and the foreign power have something in common, they both want the nation to change, maybe not in the same way, but the aim of "change" is the same. Since this puts the progressives and the foreign power "on the same side" as it were, it is more likely that there will be a small percentage who will see nothing wrong in taking money and "advice" from the foreign power.

 

By the same token your extreme right is a mystery to me. (And, I suspect, most people with an IQ larger than their shoe size) Sometimes they come across as your average run of the mill religious nutjob and then there is some strange cross breeding of the religious nutjob with the neo nazi. (and how that works I just don't get) Britain and us both have some neos, down here they are generally shunned and/or ridiculed but they have more in common with skinheads. The very last place you'd find them is in church singing pious hymns.

 

The bottom line of course is that if you have a large enough group of people then some of them will take the money, regardless of which side they are from. You could almost say that it's just "bad luck" that there hasn't been a market for right wing subversives for some time and so all the cash has gone into buying left wing ones.