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I find it puzzling that I consistently see the same wrongheaded argument being presented to me by my Democrat friends in their desperate efforts to excuse the excesses of the Obama administration. I'll bring up something like massive troop deployments in Afghanistan and Pakistan or unprecedented deficit spending and corporate bailouts, and their rote reply seems to be that I can't criticize Obama because of all the terrible things that Bush did. Further, because I'm a Republican I must be complicit in whatever crimes Bush committed and therefore am disqualified from questioning or criticizing Obama.
What they seem to miss here is that if the things Bush did were wrong, then aren't the same things still equally wrong when they are done by Obama? Aren't they even more wrong when they are done by Obama on a larger scale? Bush overspent and created deficits. Obama has already doubled his spending in a few months. Bush deployed hundreds of thousands of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, where our interests are at best debatable. Obama has done the same and is talking about a deployment more than double the size of Bush's biggest commitment to the region. I defy any Obama supporter to identify a qualitative difference between the excess spending and troop deployment of the Obama administration and that of his predecessor. There is certainly a quantitative difference. Obama has dramatically spent more money and put more lives at risk for less reason. If I'm disqualified from criticizing Obama because of Bush, then why aren't Democrats disqualified from criticizing Bush because Obama has done the exact same things and worse?
Their second error is the repeated assumption that because I bear the "Republican" brand I must have supported every Republican and every act of a Republican going back to my infancy. Apparently I have to shoulder the blame for everything both Bushes did wrong and presumably for the sins of Reagan, Ford and Nixon as well. Never mind that I actively protested Nixon's administration, wrote scores of articles critical of Bush and his policies during the last 8 years, and voted Libertarian in every presidential election since 1980. Does this mean that conversely they are going to accept responsibility for the Carter's loss of the Panama Canal, the Drug War, Vietnam and Jim Crow laws? Somehow I doubt it.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Ruvy
Aw, poor baby. Dave, to a lot of Chinese, all us white devils look alike. To people who aren't in the GOP, you all look alike. And to a lot of Republicans, all those jackass Democrats are alike, too.
Having been in both parties as a activist, I know.
Couldn't you have spent three pages on something else - like how it is getting to look more and more as if the Sri Lankan government is murdering off its own civilians - and nobody gives a shit because they're all huffing and puffing and whining their pathetic asses off about the "poor Palestinians?"
2 - Dave Nalle
Good lord, Ruvy. The Sri Lankan government has been murdering its own citizens for 20 years. It's not exactly a revelation. Plus it helped MIA launch a nice singing career.
I think there's some value to trying to sort out the current political polarization in the US. It's a hell of a lot easier an issue to address than man's inhumanity to man in Sri Lanka.
Dave
3 - Cindy
Dave your comment didn't show up in Ruvy's thread. But yet, it goes to the last page as if it is there. Too bad I wanted to reply based on what little I saw in 'fresh comments'. Maybe it'll come around tomorrow.
4 - Dr Dreadful
"If their party isn't homogeneous, why do they assume that all Republicans are the same?"
If 'their' party isn't homogeneous, what kind of question is that?
5 - Zedd
Dave,
You didn't quite flesh out what the "wrong" was.
Bud, for starters, I don't think that the issue with Bush was that he spent money. Just a thought.... Also you write assuming that it is universally accepted that government spending is WRONG.
= What the heck is this article about?
6 - Clavos
I don't think that the issue with Bush was that he spent money...
Then why do the Dems keep bringing it up?
And in any case, it was definitely an issue for those who favor conservative fiscal policy and small government.
In that respect, Bam's administration is a case of jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire.
7 - Lumpy
For me the issue with both administrations certainly comes down to the insane spending which has doomed the US even if some fools want to pretend there is some magical way out of the great black abyss of debt.
The article does mention other issues like foreign wars. and I coild bring up others where this double standard applies.
But worse than this common hypocrisy is the absolute blindness of many democrats to the devils bargains they have made with unions and globalists and others whose interests are directly contrary to those of the US public. They will whine all day about the evils of corporate lobbyists while embracing union lobbyists who are as bad or worse.
8 - Jordan Richardson
The fact is that King Barry has brought non-violent fascism with a smiley face to this nation.
The fact is that you have't the foggiest fucking idea what fascism is, champ. The notion that you'd compare ANY American president to such a political system is hilarious and continues to show your utter lack of perspective and respect for history.
Not that I'm the least bit surprised, of course, but come on. What about your life is so God-awful that you continue to spew such hatred, Arch? What exactly has gone wrong with you, specifically? Are you missing meals? Have you lost your job? Are your children starving to death in your arms? Is your home being shelled by rocket fire night after night? Are your friends being raped and shot in the head in the middle of the street?
I know I'm a broken record 'round these parts, but from my point of view the majority of BC Politics posters seriously lack perspective. Hell, I know I do. At least I can admit it.
There's an Ameri-centric point of view here that's just gone hog wild in a world that has moved far, far beyond these elements. Generally non-contentious issues like health care and environmental issues become "political issues" where people take sides and damn the scientific facts. It becomes less about helping people and more about being right.
So again, Arch, what exactly do you have to be so fucking wound up about? You post comments on a website with others you've never seen face to face, you probably sit in a nice comfortable chair and have probably polished off a pretty decent meal. You probably have a pretty decent bed to sleep in, maybe even a few friends to hang out with from time to time when you aren't frothing at the mouth with raw fury. You probably have some spending money, too, and maybe can buy a book or a beer or maybe even both whenever you feel like it. Sure, the guy you want running things isn't in office...but do you REALLY believe that everything in your world is going to go to shit? Or do you, in a strange and eerie way, kinda hope it does just so that you can be proven right?
Sometimes I think a good majority of people that comprise the regular posters in this section would rather be right than happy. I guess that's why it's generally always the same crew, always chirping about the same things with the same lines drawn in the sand. And hell, I'm no better when I drop by here and put in my own two Canadian cents.
You say "Fuck Obama!" That's fine. But what about "Fuck Ignorance!" or "Fuck Fear!" or "Fuck Paranoia!" or "Fuck Sandals with Socks!" or "Fuck Poverty!"
There are so many better, more important things to be angry about, Arch. Like Hugh Jackman, for starters.
9 - Dave Nalle
Are you missing meals? Have you lost your job? Are your children starving to death in your arms? Is your home being shelled by rocket fire night after night? Are your friends being raped and shot in the head in the middle of the street?
Jordan, you illustrate brilliantly the disconnect between the complacent left and the principled right. People like Arch and I may disagree on many things, but we agree on the fact that life is more than being fed and housed and not being killed. If that's your standard for existence, then you are a sad and pathetic drone who deserves the world which Obama wants to create for you.
I'd like to know what the "better, more important things to be angry about" if liberty and individual rights are of no interest to you.
Dave
10 - roger nowosielski
Dave,
It's not quite the contrast you're painting: "principled right and the complacent left?"
Be serious now. The Left has been nothing if not complacent about human rights - and that's a principled stand. The disagreement has to do with how far those rights ought to be applied - universally or only to SOME Americans, as Archie and his crew would have it.
Roger
11 - Dave Nalle
I don't see where Archie suggested that only some Americans should have basic rights. And I certainly don't believe that. What is inescapable fact is that this administration, even more than the last one, is hell bent on taking away a great many rights from most Americans and people like Jordan are happy to accept that if their bellies are full and they get 350 channels of cable.
Dave
12 - roger nowosielski
It's implicit, Dave, in much of the conservative view: it's all about America and fuck everybody else. And on the more radical version of it - it's all about some Americans and fuck the rest of them (because either they're lazy, or idiots, or whatever).
Roger
13 - roger nowosielski
BTW, Dave,
There's one thing that started to dawn on me since I started posting on BC: human rights and freedom - as universally applied as possible - are more important values to me than anything else. And I believe the New Left, properly understood, is more about that than anything else - or at least ought to be. And I do view this as a very principled position.
The Right would do itself a great favor if it made a serious move towards extending human rights and freedom to all parts of the globe. It's one important, if not the most important, area where they ought to join forces.
Roger
14 - roger nowosielski
You must be kidding.
15 - STM
Jordan asks: "So again, Arch, what exactly do you have to be so fucking wound up about?"
Mate, Arch and Dave are worried about rights.
They think they're going to lose some.
The main right Arch is worried about - from what I can gather - seems to be the right to want to pay through the nose for getting sick.
Also, the possibility of bankruptcy brought about by a hospital stay seems like a peculiarly American right, especially when accompanied by things like job loss and debt crystallisation and falling living standards generally as we tackle the global financial crisis.
But hey, IMO, $1000 a month out of your kick for basic health care cover that doesn't cover everything ... that's the price of liberty!
16 - roger nowosielski
"Also, the possibility of bankruptcy brought about by a hospital stay seems like a peculiarly American right, especially when accompanied by things like job loss and debt crystallisation and falling living standards generally as we tackle the global financial crisis."
Exactly, we regard these rights as unalienable. And we're proud of them.
17 - Cindy
Mate, Arch and Dave are worried about rights.
They think they're going to lose some.
They find greed to be an important 'right'. (Dave also cares about the right to liberty, as long as it shuts the fuck up and doesn't try to outdo greed.)
18 - Cindy
It's only natural that Dave's top priority is the 'right' of the greedy to exercise their liberty to use everyone else.
19 - Baronius
Republican administrations have been spreading rights to the Warsaw Pact, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan. Dems have been sucking up to oppressors like Cuba, Egypt, and North Korea. You want to talk about human rights?
20 - Cindy
Dave, I have to admit I didn't actually read your article yet. Or even the comments. I just felt like yelling at a Libertarian, for some reason.
21 - Baronius
OK, let me be fairer. There are two different conceptions of human rights. Look at FDR's "Four Freedoms" and you'll see what I mean. Freedom of expression and freedom of religion are traditional Bill-of-Rights-type human rights. When the right talks about human rights, that's what they're thinking of. The third freedom is freedom from want, and that's typically what a leftie thinks of as freedom. (Both sides pretty much agree on freedom from fear.)
So when you start complaining about human rights, ask yourself, do you mean the right to education and health care or the right to speak and pray as you choose? Reagan pushed for the rights of Russian Jews. Carter praised the Cuban health care system.
22 - Dave Nalle
There's one thing that started to dawn on me since I started posting on BC: human rights and freedom - as universally applied as possible - are more important values to me than anything else. And I believe the New Left, properly understood, is more about that than anything else - or at least ought to be. And I do view this as a very principled position.
It's an irrational position, because the set of "rights" the left wants to protect is very limited and does not include the most basic and fundamental rights on which our republic was founded. The three rights are life, liberty and property. They have taken life and associated needs and placed them above all the others on the assumption that people will give up liberty and property rights if their life is made more comfortable and safer. It's a good bet politically, but it is an incomplete, inadequate and ultimately oppressive vision of the rights to which all men are entitled.
The Right would do itself a great favor if it made a serious move towards extending human rights and freedom to all parts of the globe. It's one important, if not the most important, area where they ought to join forces.
So you advocate world conquest and forced liberation of other nations? Although I understand that viewpoint, increasingly the libertarian right has come to reject the idea of international interventionism. It may be a mistake, but I think there are limits to what America can justifiably do to liberate others by force.
Dave
23 - Dave Nalle
They find greed to be an important 'right'. (Dave also cares about the right to liberty, as long as it shuts the fuck up and doesn't try to outdo greed.)
Cindy, you've confused a love of greed with the belief that people should have the right to benefit from the fruits of their labor. I suppose you prefer that people should work hard and have all of their production seized by the state for forced redistribution?
It's only natural that Dave's top priority is the 'right' of the greedy to exercise their liberty to use everyone else.
Again you seem confused. I believe in the right of everyone to use everyone else - if you interpret voluntary mutual exchange of goods and services to be "use".
Dave, I have to admit I didn't actually read your article yet. Or even the comments.
Because self-righteous ignorance is the best defense against thinking.
I just felt like yelling at a Libertarian, for some reason.
Not surprised. Anarchists find Libertarians threatening, because our philosophy can actually work in the real world and theirs never can.
Dave
24 - roger nowosielski
Dave,
"fundamental rights on which our republic was founded."
You presume those to be the alfa and omega, I only a starting point. America may have been a starting point, but it's definitely not that end all and be all.
So yes, I do believe in universal health care and other such things you may regard as inconsequential and secondary. What does it say for us as a nation when we allow the least of us fall by the wayside?
Also, I wasn't taking about any military intervention but more in terms of setting an example.
As to Baronius's trying to press for a distinction without a difference - Why should the right to pray or worship whatever god be contradictory or antithetical to health care, among other things? As usual, Baronius is very keen about highly abstract rights such as freedom of speech or the freedom of one's convictions, but he fails very miserably when it comes down to the nitty-gritty, the concrete, the matter of improving the lives of the many. It's a high moral stance but applicable only from a far. Because on Baronius's view of things, those who don't somehow measure up deserve everything they get: those are the wages of all those who don't do well in the capitalist system. So let them rot.
25 - Arch Conservative
"The main right Arch is worried about - from what I can gather - seems to be the right to want to pay through the nose for getting sick."
You're right STM. I'd much rather have the right to die of brain cancer while waiting 8 months for an MRI while King Barry, with his shit eating grin tells me every day on MSNBC just how great he is and how great our new healthcare system is.
What am I so wound up about? The fact that our current president is an asshole. Say what you want about Bush but he wasn't the petty, narcisstic, arrogant, condescending douchebag that Eight Ball Barry is.
The guy's a fucking world class jerkoiff and there's no getting around that.
Wether he's hamming it up with Hugo Chavez or wastefully spending yet another billion dollars he never ceases to piss off millions.
1-20-13