About
Content
Store
Forum

Rebirth of Reason
War
People
Archives
Objectivism

Post to this threadMark all messages in this thread as readMark all messages in this thread as unreadBack one pagePage 0Page 1Page 2


Sanction: 9, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 9, No Sanction: 0
Post 40

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 4:38amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Re: post #12

Jesus Fucking Christ, Marotta!

Re: post #14

Thank you, John Armaos.


Post 41

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 5:43amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Jon L wrote:

I think all can see the way that it is misleading, we get it....

“Twisting,” “manipulating,” and “anti-American” are just plain unfounded.


Misleading means "twisting" and "manipulating", in fact as I just found in a thesaurus, these words are synonyms. Perhaps then you can explain why you think it's unfounded the statistic was "twisting" or "manipulating" the truth but just "misleading". It seems you have a problem with the way the words "manipulating" and "twisting" sound, not with their actual meaning. And how "misleading" someone about a statistic that groups the United States with some of the worst regimes on this planet cannot be construed then as "anti-American" is beyond me. What would it take to label something "anti-American" for you?





Post 42

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 7:52amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit

Fine, John. It’s horrendously anti-American. My point is that Michael is anti-government, and certainly anti-death penalty. I don’t think he’s anti-American. Regarding “a statistic that groups the United States with some of the worst regimes on this planet,” those are the facts! No one made up some arbitrary criteria that put the US at number four in that list of terrible places. It’s a FACT that the US government killed that number of people that year.

I’ll say again, you did a great job analyzing those facts, especially the obvious point that the US’s wrongful killings are always mistakes but not so for the monsters running the other countries.

Your interest in what it would take for me call someone anti-American is flattering. I already indicated Sam Roth, and Chris Baker is another. I’ll let you know when I see more. Should I send weekly reports?


Post 43

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 10:22amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit

Jon L., you first claimed that they were just facts, and said there was no manipulation or twisting you could see. Of which I pointed out how it was presented was misleading, to which you eventually begrudgingly conceded that it was misleading. Then you stated it makes a good case for abolishing the death penalty since if the mullahs have the power to execute, it’s just as scary for any government to have that power, to which I pointed out a country like the United States that is completely honest and open about its justice system, and Iran, which lies all the time and executes for absurd reasons in some of the most grotesque fashions (stoning, hanging from a crane for 45 minutes before death) again you seemed to begrudgingly concede it’s not just as scary. But that certainly didn’t stop you from pointing out if you are innocent and on death row in America, it’s just as scary.  (as if I didn’t think this scenario would be scary) Then after you state the statistic is misleading, but not manipulative or twisting, I point out to you these words have the same meaning. To which you now begrudgingly concede.

 

Now in apparent frustration, you sarcastically say “Fine, John. It’s horrendously anti-American”, I wonder how I should be expected to react to this? A fact that you now agree the way a statistic about America’s involvement in capital punishment was presented was manipulative and twisting, and now at best, begrudgingly accept it might be construed as anti-American, makes me wonder why I should not be the one that is showing frustration here? It seems from the get-go you were determined to discredit my assertions that Marotta and Amnesty International are guilty of morally equating the US with regimes like Iran and Saudi Arabia by blatantly manipulating the truth. And yet post after post, I feel I am expected to defend my assertions and do, and have to once again, fight the pitfalls of moral relativism I often observe.

 
At any rate thank you for your compliments on my statistical analysis. It is all I did while studying Economics in college.


Sanction: 5, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 5, No Sanction: 0
Post 44

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 11:11amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit

You are right, John, I have vacillated as you describe. I’m not focusing because I really don’t care. I’ll focus more now, and feel free to ask if I am still not clear about what I want to say and what I actually think.

I don’t care about the death penalty in the US. As we use it, I have no problem with it. As those other countries use it, obviously bad. If we banned it, that would be fine too. We can make murderers suffer without it.

I am willing to make excuses for Michael in this case because I do not think he is aiming for anti-Americanism. His thrust is anti-death penalty. I do concede that the 80% grouping thing is misleading, intentionally so. You see anti-Americanism as the motive while I do not. I think the motivation is to scare the reader into thinking, “Holy shit, look at the company we keep on that score!” (Death impositions) In hope that it will jar the reader, make him stop and think: “If there are no nice, classical liberal western free nations on that list, then I am going to think more about the legitimacy of the death penalty per se.”

I don’t like to see people get attacked. Attack his ideas—he often makes it easy. If you can catch him being unmistakably anti-American, go for it, point it out and I’ll join you. I don’t think he is. Did you see his Praising the Rich paper the other day? He praises rich capitalists, Bill Gates, etc.


Sanction: 8, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 8, No Sanction: 0
Post 45

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 4:58pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
John, Jon, a general observation:

I notice too much of a tendency in anarchist-type argumentation that plays right into the hands of anti-American sentiments.  It was something that Rothbard was doing during the Cold War -- and that is making some abstract perfection the enemy of the good.  It leads to an anti-conceptual approach to modern-day political conflicts, and -- whether intended or not, sometimes more explicit than others -- moral-equivalence-type comparisons between the U.S. and truly bad regimes.  This approach blinds these highly-rationalistic arguers to some political realities, and throws them into arbitrary fits without concern for rational assessment of facts, like what we got in this very thread putting the U.S. right up there with Iran and China.  Why do it?  Why jump so easily to mix the U.S. right in there with these other countries?  If the aim was some argument against the death penalty, there are other ways of doing it.  I can't read Mr. Marotta's mind, but it was so goddammed irresponsible and far too typical of the mentality I see in anarchist-type arguments.  Somehow, in their anti-state fervor, they latch onto the U.S. state as the one pushing the most weight around and able to commandeer the most resources, and fly fight into their fit of saying that the U.S. is thereby the biggest and baddest government around.  Gee, no other countries go around spending hundreds of billions on a controversial war, so the U.S. must be the leading trouble-causer.  Gee, the U.S. has more nuclear weapons stockpiled than everyone else, so it poses the biggest nuclear threat.  Gee, the U.S. federal government has a 3 trillion dollar budget, so it plunders the most wealth from producers than anyone.  Gee, this big bad government puts people to death, moreso than Iran does (or reports, anyway).  Gee, this is the only government ot nuke large civilian populations.  And on and on and on, and it pisses me off to see it.

There are ways of going about criticizing U.S. policies, criticizing the death penalty, and so on (if you hadn't noticed, Rand herself did plenty of that), without playing right into the hands of the propaganda of the anti-Americanists and moral equalizers.  I think everyone already knows or has good ideas of where the U.S. needs its fixing-up, but it has next to nothing to do with how America stands in regard to the rest of the world and how it conducts itself in places like the Middle East.  This is not bowling, with its rules.  Pacifism is not something to hide behind.  This has to do with conduct of foreign policy against outright enemies -- in this case, quite-savage enemies.  The anarchist-types seem most frustrated that in the reality of this situation, the standards of their paradise aren't being met, and they lash out irresponsibly.

Some folks apparently haven't learned their lessons from the past.  We were attacked by Japan, and by the time it was over, Japan lay in ruins.  We didn't play nice with Japan, not at all.  Some may have even feared that if we did them really badly, we'd stir up too much trouble for ourselves.  And yet Japan got itself civilized and became an ally.

We know that states sponsor terrorism.  We know which state is a chief culprit.  We also know that this state is unequivocally on the side of evil, as this thread's leading article demonstrates.  The only question remaining is not whether we have a moral right to end that regime, but whether it's optimal from a strategic vantage point to do so.  In Japan, it was.  Here, I don't know.  There's this fear that if we got tough and ended this regime, it would only foment more hatred and jihad against U.S. interests.  I can only wonder how much that could happen without the aid and harboring of certain state regimes.  It's because this whole terror-war is being conducted by these states through covert back-channels that apparently some folks are confused as to what to do about it.  Do we want to punish all the poor folks in these states by ending their regimes in an ultra-violent manner?  We didn't seem to be hung-up by this hand-wringing in the case of Japan.  (Then again, the anarchist-types probably thought we shouldn't have done anything about Japan, either.  Just don't get involved in any wars, and preferably just dismantle state institutions, period, and the problems will go away.  Islamists infiltrating the territory formerly known as the U.S. and instituting Sharia law?  Nah, wouldn't happen.  Anyway, what could be worse about it?  The U.S. already puts more people to death as it is....)

Chris


Post 46

Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 7:33pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit

Good points, Chris. I still do not think Michael is anti-American. Your elaboration helps me better understand why his post would be received that way.

I do happen to favor taking the Iranian regime down. In 2003 I made myself a bumper sticker: “Bush in ’04, Iran by ‘06” Someone scratched it off, so I made a new one. This time I started with one the liberals were using. It had a red stripe with the words,
“Regime change in DC,” a white stripe that was blank, and a blue stripe that read,
“Remove Bush/Cheney.” I scissored the blue stripe off and wrote onto the white stripe,
“Write-In Rumsfeld.”


Post 47

Monday, July 31, 2006 - 10:20amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
It's Monday and the last day of July, and you begin to think more and more about all the various facts and viewpoints on this issue. You hear the buzz of the screen and notice your keyboard, then you think even deeper on the subject.

As you look even more into the different colors on the screen and become aware of your heart beating, you find yourself understanding even more the words before you. The black text of the words becomes more real and self-evident to you. Your desire to learn grows, and you see the wisdom and brilliance of the words before your eyes.

It is a glorious time to be alive, and you are at peace.

Chris


Sanction: 7, No Sanction: 0
Sanction: 7, No Sanction: 0
Post 48

Monday, July 31, 2006 - 3:51pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit

You become aware that much time has passed, you are still holding the bong…it is tilting now, water pouring into your crotch.

Post 49

Monday, July 31, 2006 - 7:33pmSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
What water - it evaporated.....

Post 50

Tuesday, August 1, 2006 - 5:53amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
Chris, the people here can see right through your NLP hypnotic embedded commands.

Post 51

Wednesday, August 2, 2006 - 9:30amSanction this postReply
Bookmark
Link
Edit
You become aware that much time has passed, you are still holding the bong…it is tilting now, water pouring into your crotch.
I don't really want to think about the implications of this post.

Chris


Post to this threadBack one pagePage 0Page 1Page 2


User ID Password or create a free account.