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  #31  
Old 12-19-2005, 04:26 AM
sweetjazz sweetjazz is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

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In spite of that, I think it is a shame that your summary is all you took out of Bush's speech, or at least that is the attitude you chose to convey. While I think there are legitimate criticisms of Bush's speech, it also had some valid points and was a move toward improving the quality of the debate about Iraq and trying to build a consensus.

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Yes, consensus building typically revolves around taking your critics out to the woodshed and calling them defeatists.

The quality of debate has clearly improven if you're a strident right-winger, as the President said exactly what you wanted to hear: vocal critics are mere dishonest defeatists, who criticize for their own sheer 'partisan uses' in a way that 'is not justified by the facts'.

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You've mastered one of Bush's (and moveon.org's) common techniques: taking quotes out of context and trying to suggest that they say something other than what they did.

He did not say that all vocal critics are defeatists, but said that some are. I believe he hides behind this criticism too much, but unfortunately the hardcore prominent leftists keeps strengthening his case here by making criticisms that are so over the top that they have lost credibility to moderates.

He dismisses the extreme leftwing criticisms of the war, and he is right to do so. Unfortunately, he does try to use that as a rhetorical tool to downplay the legitimate criticisms of people who take the time to try in good faith to understand his perspective and still find it flawed.

Still, you have selectively quoting only what you wanted to hear and see. The reality is that while the Bush speech still had some serious flaws, it was better than previous ones and was the most significant concession of error he has made to this point. He made a limited and perhaps begrudging move toward opening the door for well-developed criticisms that accept what the situation in Iraq is, regardless of whether they agree we should have been there in the first place.

I am a Bush critic. I just care about developing better policies and convincing others to support them, and I find it both intellectually lazy and practically counterproductive to dwell on my personal feelings toward Bush. Your hatred and fervor toward Bush is no less irrational than that of conservatives towrards people like the Clintons.
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  #32  
Old 12-19-2005, 05:19 AM
DVaut1 DVaut1 is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

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The reality

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Apparently 'reality' is now just synonymous with 'my opinion'; I suppose we can forgive the occasional human tendency to disregard the distinctions between the two, but keep in mind that 'reality' probably has a narrower definition than your use of it here.

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I just care about developing better policies and convincing others to support them, and I find it both intellectually lazy and practically counterproductive to dwell on my personal feelings toward Bush.

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Your hatred and fervor toward Bush is no less irrational than that of conservatives towrards people like the Clintons.

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So I'm engaged in dishonest tactics by 'taking quotes out of context' -- and yet you're debating 'honestly' by levying the charge of me having an irrational hatred of President Bush, despite the fact that no where in this thread (or any thread) have I said anything that could legitimately be construed as demonstrating a 'hatred' for the President.

1) I don't hate President Bush. On a personal level, he seems like a rather decent person for whom I have absolutely no qualms with.

2) You claim to find 'developing better policies and convincing others to support them' intellectually stimulating and highly productive; and yet your conduct throughout this thread has has been to lament about the disingenuous debating tactics of others by engaging in your own brand of unfounded demagoguery (yes, making exaggerated claims about your opponents over-emotional irrationality is an act that needlessly adds emotion to a debate). So it seems as though you find hypocrisy to be intellectually stiumlating and highly productive as well.

Again, to answer your concerns: I have absolutely no emotional disagreements with President Bush - I think he's a fine person, I just disagree with his policies. I too find dwelling on my own personal feelings to be intellectually lazy and practically counterproductive, which is why I haven't bothered (up until now) discussing any of my personal feelings.

May I suggest ending the moral posturing, as lame faux-intellectual moralizing is tedious, and come join the rest of us in the mud. It's not all that shameful. Truth be told, you're already here, as you've shown absolutely no hesitation to levy unfounded criticisms against those you disagree with; so just do fairness a favor and end the hypocrisy.

Respectfully, DVaut1 (I noticed the abrupt end to the 'respectfully' signatures you were ending your posts with; what happened?)
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  #33  
Old 12-19-2005, 05:27 AM
DVaut1 DVaut1 is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

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You've mastered one of Bush's (and moveon.org's) common techniques:

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So let's have a little inquiry into common debating techniques. Perhaps we can shed some light on this:

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He dismisses the extreme leftwing criticisms of the war, and he is right to do so.

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1) Which 'extreme leftwing' criticisms has he/did he specifically dismissed/dismiss? One common technique in debates is to pretend as if you've dismissed your opponents points when you've actually just presented a strawman or red herring (for instance, constantly implying that Iraq had something to do with 9/11 when questioned about the wisdom of going to war, when no compelling evidence for such a claim exists)

2) Why are they 'extreme'? (because, as I'm sure you know, referring to opponents as 'extreme' is a common rhetorical technique that's used to cast opponents in an unpleasant light, while attempting to add some measure of credence that the arguer's position is more widely agreed upon or popular -- not that you would stoop to that hackneyed technique, though)

3) Why is he right to do so? (another common debating technique, again as I'm sure you're aware, is to present opinions as if they're fact and need no further explanation)

I'd hate to see you get too bogged down in details, as empirical evidence which helps form the foundation of the premises that aid in making our arguments compelling can often get in the way of a nice, opinion based rant - but just humor those irrational Bush haters like me and the rest of the resident MoveOn crowd.
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  #34  
Old 12-19-2005, 06:01 AM
DVaut1 DVaut1 is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

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If the public debate stalls at petty name-calling

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Yeah, doesn't it stink when debate stalls at name-calling? Let's examine, shall we?

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"There is a difference between honest critics who recognize what is wrong, and defeatists who refuse to see that anything is right."

I get so frustrated by the many people who are in the latter category -- and I think your post and that of the OP post are suggestive of that attitude.

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So you hate petty-name calling -- but RussianBear and I are defeatists who refuse to see that anything is right.

Yes, it's quite apparent you really disdain name-calling.

Let's look deeper into the many ways you've raised the level of debate:

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The approach of angrily denouncing Bush and using cheap arguments

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I suspect you probably just hate Bush so much

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I really fear that the rise of a leftwing outlets like moveon.org have encouraged the same lazy and sloppy thinking that the Rush Limbaughs brought to rightwing zealots in the 90s (and continue to supply).

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Yeah, I just hate name-calling too, and all those stupid, lazy, and intellectually spurious MoveOn folk and their right-wing zealot counterparts are just lazy name-callers who don't engage in hightened debate -- such as calling others zealots who are engaged in lazy and sloppy thinking.

Like I said, I just hate all those douchebag name-callers too. What dickheads those name-callers are.

I fear hypocrisy much more than I fear partisan outlets, and it's not even close.
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  #35  
Old 12-19-2005, 08:12 AM
Exsubmariner Exsubmariner is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

"being my naturally defeatist self"

The President said it, you said it. Now, you obviously feel it's not true. So prove it wrong.

Begin.
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  #36  
Old 12-19-2005, 08:20 AM
DVaut1 DVaut1 is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

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"being my naturally defeatist self"

The President said it, you said it. Now, you obviously feel it's not true. So prove it wrong.

Begin.

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I don't feel this war is a lost cause, nor do I feel we were destined to lose it; nor do I hope we lose it, either. In regards to the latter, I do not know anyone who hopes we lose this war, or hopes that it turns out badly. As for the former, perhaps others felt this war was a lost cause or we were destined to lose it; I'm not one of them.

The "being my naturally defeatist self" comment was sarcasm.
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  #37  
Old 12-19-2005, 08:24 AM
Beer and Pizza Beer and Pizza is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

Let Me Paraphrase President Bush's speech tonight:

"We are winning, and the democrats know we are winning. (If they thought we were losing, they'd be quiet and let me self-destruct) And how do I know the democrats know we are winning? Two words: wire taps." [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]
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  #38  
Old 12-19-2005, 08:25 AM
Exsubmariner Exsubmariner is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

Mike,
You seem to be willing to spend copious amounts of verbage on this discussion. To offer my two bits, after having discussed this extensively with a large number of people whom I feel are more politically astute than your average college professor, I firmly believe that the course of history would have been exactly the same if Al Gore won.

Consider it. As far as Iraq is concerned, the continued situation with the UN was not acceptable, the intelligence coming out about WMD's would have been the same no matter who was in office & as we all know, John Kerry voted for the war before he voted against it, as did many other wafflers on the left, and combine that all with the gutted intelligence operative capacity of the CIA, and there was simply no other alternative for a Iraq policy than going to war.

At least we have a President who is willing to do what is necessary, in his view to finish the job of firmly planting Democracy in Iraq, regardless of what the poll numbers say. Other Presidential contenders may not have done the same.

(Que Yoko Ono leading "give peace a chance")

FWIW,
X
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  #39  
Old 12-19-2005, 08:42 AM
DVaut1 DVaut1 is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

[ QUOTE ]
Mike,
You seem to be willing to spend copious amounts of verbage on this discussion. To offer my two bits, after having discussed this extensively with a large number of people whom I feel are more politically astute than your average college professor, I firmly believe that the course of history would have been exactly the same if Al Gore won.

Consider it. As far as Iraq is concerned, the continued situation with the UN was not acceptable, the intelligence coming out about WMD's would have been the same no matter who was in office & as we all know, John Kerry voted for the war before he voted against it, as did many other wafflers on the left, and combine that all with the gutted intelligence operative capacity of the CIA, and there was simply no other alternative for a Iraq policy than going to war.

At least we have a President who is willing to do what is necessary, in his view to finish the job of firmly planting Democracy in Iraq, regardless of what the poll numbers say. Other Presidential contenders may not have done the same.

(Que Yoko Ono leading "give peace a chance")

FWIW,
X

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By claiming that any Democratic president would have done the same -- does that not imply that things are going badly? I can't quite figure out why right-wingers try to claim it; it seems to be saying something along the lines of:

"This war is all [censored] up, but Dems would have done the same".

I think it could, in some way, be trying to demonstrate that we had no other alternatives other than war; but merely claiming that Democrats would have done the same doesn't prove there were no other alternatives.

Am I wrong? I don't quite understand.
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  #40  
Old 12-19-2005, 08:45 AM
Exsubmariner Exsubmariner is offline
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Default Re: Let Me Paraphrase President Bush\'s speech tonight:

I can think of several people in the national dialogue who I feel have every fibre in the core of their being and their political futures invested in hating the war until it fails. Their tactics are to go against their own statements of support before the war started, to critize every miniscule setback until they are blue in the face, create public farce which fuels the the Al Jeezera Anti-American propaganda machine, and generally behave like politik worms are apt to do by putting their own interests over that of the country.

Why, O, Why Dvaut, do you put yourself in their defense by making posts like this thread if you disagree with their postion. Most of the country feels the way about the course of the debate that the President does. In fact, I've heard many comments after the speech (coming out of the evil talk radio establishment, which obviously isn't mainstream because the ratings are in the toilet and no body listens to it or pays hosts enormous sums of money to advertise on their programs) that the President was finally saying what he needed to say.

Most of the right wing beef with the man is over other issues, not the war.

Now if you oppose the President's labeling of his critics as defeatists on the basis that it's simply name calling, how do you feel about the use of every label that has been hung on the President by the same people (liar, racist, theif, corrupt, Hitler, stealer of elections, hijacker of the government, etc, etc, etc)? Is turnabout fair play, or not?
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