Text 7275, 189 rader
Skriven 2006-08-29 18:22:00 av Robert E Starr JR (7772.babylon5)
Ärende: Re: My presidential pick
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* * * This message was from Angelika Tobisch to rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.m * * *
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Vorlonagent schrieb:

>> Note that I wasn't actually assigning any values there. You were asking
>> for labels beside anti-American, and I made a few suggestions. They're
>> all based on arguments you might hear and while you might not agree with
>> some or all of them, none are anti-American.
> 
> I'll take some issue with that.  Especially "anti-Republican".

Anti-Republican equals anti-American if and only if Republican equals
American.

>> What you call "narrow, focused hostility", I call democracy at its best.
>> I wish more people would get off their a..es more often. I don't know
>> about the US, but the police here know how to deal with this kind of
>> stuff. I'd be willing to bet good money that a lot more people needing
>> emergency treatment have died because of traffic jams and budget cuts
>> than demonstrations.
> 
> Without a doubt.  Just on the rarity of that big a demonstration alone,
> you'd have to be right.  But that misses the point by equating a protest
> stoppage with the 5:00 rush hour.
> 
> Demonstrations are voluntary.  A group of people got together and decided to
> stop traffic.  It was a voluntary among any number of different means
> available to get one's point across.  The organizers either didn't consider
> that they'd be blocking first-responders or didn't care.  Regardless,
> they're responsible for the damage their demonstration causes.  I take from
> that a spectrum that runs somewhere between incompetence, inattention and
> fananticism.

Peaceful demonstrations are part of a living democracy. If they indeed
cause parts of a city to totally collapse then that city/region/state
obviously lacks the knowledge of how to handle them.

Berlin has its fair share of huge demonstrations/parades/festivities
blocking parts of the city and yet it works. So obviously it can be
done. In fact, during the soccer worldcup a major street in the middle
of Berlin was blocked on the length of almost 3km to create a place for
public viewings and the like. Guess what - no chaos ensued.

> I choose "fananticism" because of a 2003 Dr Phil Show my mother taped and
> showed me.  Phil had a professional activist on the show to talk about the
> demostrations.  Phil asked her in about as non-confrontational a way as one
> could about the Dallas demonstration.  He pointed out that among the blocked
> cars were, IIRC, at least four ambulences and asked the activist what she
> thought.
> 
> She refused to address the question.  She went on about how tough she had
> it, eating, drinking and sleeping the impending horror of war, how she
> wanted to shout out "Noooooooo" about the war.  Phil tried to get her to
> addrsss the issue twice to no avial.  That woman was a fanantic.
> 
> Now I can't in all fairness take this one incident as indicitive of the
> majority of liberal activists.  Taken by itself all that one Dr. Phil show
> can do is, at best, show that the activist Phil had on was a fanantic, and
> even that is theoretically open to debate.  I've made my decision.  I came
> away with "fanantic", but someone else might not.
> 
> I choose fanatic because of what I've seen since then.  Look at some of the
> crazy stuff people though *would* happen over the Valerie Plame outing.
> People on the left seriously thought that Karl Rove would be convicted of
> treason for saying "he heard that" Plame was a CIA agent.  There's plenty
> more and it seems epidemic in the extreme left, which I belive is the base
> from which activists come.

Sorry to say, but you're delving far too deep into US internal politics
for me to follow.

>>>> Babylon 5 is US. Star Trek is US. JMS, Martin Luther King, Jr., the Red
>>>> Hot Chili Peppers, New Line Cinema (and therefore the LOTR movies), Neil
>>>> and Louis Armstrong, Meryl Streep, the Grand Canyon, Blizzard
>>>> Entertainment, Gavin Newsom, the space shuttles, Tom Sawyer, Carl Sagan,
>>>> the X-Men all are US and don't stop being so whenever someone in the
>>>> White House makes questionable decisions.
>>>>
>>>> No, I'm not anti-US. Actually, I'm not anti-any-country. I'm
>>>> anti-certain-people, anti-certain-ideologies, anti-coconuts and all
>>>> kinds of things, but not anti-any-country.
>>> Republicans are the US too.  So's President Bush.
>> So? Are you even trying to get my point? I can dislike some things
>> American without being anti-American. I may not be above putting people
>> in boxes, but I at least try to have a lot more than two.
> 
> I think I do.
> 
> Like?  yes.  Dislike?  sure.  Be my guest.  By all means process your world 
> and come to conclusions about what's in it.  Really and truly.  Independent 
> and unbiased thinking is something this world needs desperately and can 
> never get enough of.
> 
> Now let's see if you get my point.
> 
> We live in a world where  you are asked to give unthinking loyalty to the 
> left and unblinking hatred to the Right and it's coming at you from many 
> directions.
> 
> People have allowed you to come to at least one false conclusion, and 
> probably out of sincerity.  You once posted that Bush ignored all his 
> advisors when he ordered the invasion of Iraq.

I did not. I implied Bush had been lying about the reasons for going to
war, you objected and then someone else wrote the statement you're now
referring to.

I'm really not well enough informed about US internal politics to
comment on Bush's advisors. However, he obviously either did ignore his
advisors or didn't choose them very wisely. Both possibilities make me
seriously question his abilities as a leader.

I believe Bush was lying for one simple reason: If he really had
believed Saddam was as dangerous as he was portraying him, he'd never
gone in like that and risked massive losses caused by those WMD. I
realize I'm working on assumption here, but it's based on my own
observations of the world I live in and it's good enough for me. And
believe it or not, I came up with that on my own.

> That's a massive 
> simplification of the actual state of affairs, where Bush actually chose the 
> view the majority of his advisors had.  He ignored a minority that 
> questioned whether Iraq had the weapons that it was thought to.  Nobody on 
> this board has question the accuracy of this assertion on my part.

While we're talking about false conclusions and massice simplifications:
Earlier on you stated the following:

<quote>
The worst you can say is Bush ignored a minority opinion.

The majority of Bush's advisors believed, as the majority of the world
governments (including the UN) believed, that Iraq was producing
chemical weapons, possibly biological weapons, and was actively pursuing
nuclear weapons.
</quote>

Now I don't know what news you have been watching, but the UN was not
convinced. China, Russia, France, Germany all were not convinced. The
inspectors were practically begging for more time. Whether you agree
with these positions or not, to call them a "minority opinion" is a
really amazing feat.

> When you start to think in black and white, all or nothing ("all Bush's 
> advisors"), you become prey to wild rumors and Big Lies that play to what 
> you already believe.  In 2001, one left-leaning friend I had was sure that 
> Bush was going to build concentration camps for gays.  This plays to the 
> fears gays would have of a Republican adminsitration.  It could have been 
> circulated maiciously but could also have materialzed spontaneously out of 
> the gay community's anxiety.  When you step back from the crushing fear that 
> infuses such an assertion, you can see how incredibly remote the notion 
> really is.  Beware absolutist wording and emotion-overcharged rhetoric.  If 
> you see it in my rhetoric, beware me too.  Take two critical thinkings and 
> make a decision in the morning.

I try to do that all the time and don't see that I have given cause to
doubt that.

It does seem mildly hypocritical to call Bush-skeptics "anti-American"
and talk about the world supporting Bush's decisions in 2003 and then
urge me to beware absolutist wording and emotion-overcharged rhetoric.

> Simply put, don't think my way.  Don't think the way any political movement 
> wants you to (and they do).  Think your way.  And be aware of who you're 
> giving credence to, what they're telling you and try to figure out what 
> they're not telling you.
> 
> If you think Amy's book recommendation is a good choice, by all means read 
> it.  I'd recommend books on rhetoric, and rhetorical fallacy ahead of 
> anything partisan.  That and psychology books that detail mind control 
> techniques, how to recognize them and how to defeat them.  I don't have any 
> titles for you, sorry.
> 
> I think we've gone about as far as we can.  If you have any last points 
> you'd like me to respond to, I'll reply one more time.  For all others, I'm 
> done with this thread, barring something revolutionary.

Last point: I don't have the slightest idea what drove you to lecture me
like that while I was busy telling _you_ not to jump to conclusions
regarding people's feelings towards the US.

Angelika
         
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