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|11.23.04 @ 11:49AM|#
Cathy is a marvelous mediator and conciliator.
|11.23.04 @ 11:52AM|#
If Cathy had presented this as a celebrtiy death-match, I think Bill Nye the Science Guy is losing out to the Reverend Fallwell and Co. Let's face it, there's a certain passion and mysticism that goes along with having God on your side. and In the red-as-can-be Inland Empire, I see a helluva lot more bumper stickers depicting a "Jesus Fish" eating a "Darwin Fish" than I do see of a "Darwin Fish". Which to me is a measure of reason, or lack of it.
|11.23.04 @ 12:55PM|#
Of course, pox on both houses, unless one should point out that both houses deserve the pox...
"Let's face it, there's a certain passion and mysticism that goes along with having God on your side."
could also very easily be,
Let's face it, there's a certain passion and mysticism that goes along with having (compassion, the interest of the common good, the poets, celebrities, the UN, ad nauseam) on your side.
|11.23.04 @ 12:58PM|#
When religious zealots are in office, we get "Under God" in a few statements, and the 10 Commandments splattered in a few public buildings.
When secularist zealots are in office, we get ATLA, OSHA, EPA, . . . .
http://www.whitehouse.gov/government/independent-agencies.html
Guess which are more permanent?
|11.23.04 @ 2:17PM|#
The problem with "pox on both your houses" is that too many H&R commenters can't just leave well enough alone. (Gee, sounds like our government ;) They have to point out how one side deserves a much more extreme pox than the other. joe should be here any minute now to argue that the left merely deserves a particularly nasty case of canker sores while the right deserves black plague.
Me, I'm perfectly content to agree that, at least with regards to the particular issues that Cathy is addressing in her column, both sides suck worse than Celine Dion singing that song from Titanic.
|11.23.04 @ 2:19PM|#
sure wellfellow. those secular humanists are on the march, aren't they?
fyodor|11.23.04 @ 2:28PM|#
Either joe's got writer's cramp or he's starting on his turkey early!
|11.23.04 @ 2:33PM|#
Back in Reno NV, the people I was staying with were about as fundamentalist Bush haters as any member of any cult that I have seen. Any discussion where I pointed out a fact contadictory to their opinion, they was answered with "I don't believe it".
By the way Thoreau, is it me or are you losing your left wing edge? I seem to remember much more in league with Joe and Jennifer, and now you are more like Ruthless and the other dude whose name begins with an 'r'(who is also hostile to both parties, and whose name I can't remember right now).
You seem much more agnostic about both the major parties. Is it me or are you more disenfranchised with the Dems than you used to be?
|11.23.04 @ 2:57PM|#
Is it me or are you more disenfranchised with the Dems than you used to be?
I think the word you're looking for is "disenchanted."
I still think the Democrats are a lesser evil, but that's all I think. I still consider them unacceptable and worthy of mockery. But my pragmatic side recognizes that even an unacceptable party may be worthy of (grudging) support as a lesser evil.
If I seem more disenchanted, it's because (1) pragmatism doesn't stop me from enjoying a good "pox on both your houses!" article, (2) with the election over there's no pragmatic reason to support the Democrats, (3) I've heard disappointed Democrats complain about the election defeat and most of their complaints make it even harder for me to say nice things about Democrats. Instead of hearing them bitch about the Patriot Act or run-away spending, they're complaining about tax cuts or predicting the end of Social Security.
|11.23.04 @ 2:57PM|#
trainwreck,
You almost got it. If you meant that to be figurative, about the marching, than yes, it applies to those who claim knowledge of what is the "common good" or what is "compassionate" and extort my income for their ends. It also applies to those that attempt to validate an arguement by declaring one body or other to "be on their side" while eschewing reason. Can some of these people be secular humanists? Yes. Can some be religious? Yes. In other words, I reject your strawman.
|11.24.04 @ 6:20AM|#
Yep,
Disenchanted is the better word.
I hope they are right about the end of Social Security, but I doubt any republicans or libertarians that bold would ever get elected.
|11.24.04 @ 9:49AM|#
I'm happy to see Cathy's comments about the religions of the left. Read some lefty blogs for 10 seconds and you get the same spiel:
"Bush, and red staters in general, are anti reason. Look! They don't believe in evolution! See how much he talks about his faith? Crusades and Inquisition are what we have elected! AAAAAIIIII!"
I'm not a believer myself, and I think it is philosophically silly to deny evolution as a mechanism at this point in history. That said, where is the 'reality based community' when they run on a foreign policy platform that depends on John Kerry's ability to do the Jedi Mind Trick? What is reality based in the notion that there is nothing whatsoever wrong with Social Security? What could be more faith based than the belief that throwing money at the public school system will make it better? Nearly every economist on Earth agrees that outsourcing is a net boon to the economy, so why does the Blue Party of Reason keep trying to stop it?
Maybe, just maybe, these things have nothing to do with one party's ability to reason. Just as a counter proposal, how about the notion that parties have to deliver goodies to their coalitions, and justify their positions on a post hoc basis?
|11.24.04 @ 2:21PM|#
(If this already posted, I apologize for the double post. I just got an error message from the posting software, so I'm inserting my apology now to avoid a third post.)
Maybe, just maybe, these things have nothing to do with one party's ability to reason. Just as a counter proposal, how about the notion that parties have to deliver goodies to their coalitions, and justify their positions on a post hoc basis?
I agree. People frequently believe whatever they need to believe so they can continue to cling to the notion that their party is always right, or at least that the other party is always wrong. Some of the fallacies that Cathy Young attributes to one side or the other may actually be debatable rather than outright false (I'll toss that one bone to the partisans) but none of them are the hard truths that partisans perceive them to be. Partisans on both sides all too frequently will cling to the most absurd notions because to believe otherwise would undermine their whole world view.
Denial--it ain't just for alcoholic families anymore!
|11.25.04 @ 1:56PM|#
I still would have voted for Kerry/Edwards had they promised I could throw a brick at their teeth every week.
I'm serious.