I see no reason to demand condemnation ... conservatives have their nutcases, and so do liberals. Demanding that you condemn your nutcase distracts from the point at hand.

--|PW|--

Bullshit, Penny.

I know conservatives who condemn Ann Coulter, who think Rush Limbaugh is a joke, who can't stand Michael Savage, and are happy to do so.

And good for them, for they damn well should. Such people poison political discourse. I can't stand Rush Limbaugh or his dittohead hoardes, and I will not stand by while people on the left condemn them and then laugh and applaud at a hatemongering piece of garbage like Michael Moore.

Honor, decency, honesty--do these things mean nothing to people on the left anymore?

Oh yeah, and how about integrity?

Dean:
I think you're misinterpreting what I said. Let me try again. Say you decide to hit Michael Moore for an exaggeration in Fahrenheit 9/11. In turn, a liberal shows up at your blog and says, "Well, why aren't you condemning Rush Limbaugh for exaggeration X, Y, or Z?"

What that liberal is doing is throwing up a smokescreen; whether you choose to condemn Limbaugh or not is ultimately irrelevant to whether you choose to call Moore on the carpet for his exaggeration.

--|PW|--

Okay, sorry, I did misinterpret you.

Yes, you're right, it is a smokescreen, and a way to change the subject. Even if I was a Rush Limbaugh fan and a dittohead (which I'm certainly not) it wouldn't be relevant. What would matter would be the truth or falsehood of my allegations.

Of course it would be fair to say "yeah he's awful but he's not the only liar." Then we have the start of useful discussion about dishonesty in political rhetoric.

There are a few leftists who can be honest about Moore. But most are too busy taking pleasure in the attacks against Bush, honest or not.
Leftists have many of the characteristics of babies. If babies could pick up a gun and kill you for annoying them, they would. Impulsivity.

True. If you say "Michael Moore did X, Y, and Z, he's bad," and then I follow up with "But you aren't condemning Dick Cheney for cursing Leahy," I'm attacking you without addressing your central point.

On the other hand, if I go, "Yeah, Michael Moore's awful, but did you check out Dick 'F'in' Cheney?" I'm building on the discussion -- conceding your point and asking your opinion on Cheney.

Like you, I'm interested in seeing more civility in public discourse, and I've blogged about it on a couple occasions. I've got a theory about what's happening, based on some op-eds I've read (op-eds, citing to studies, etc.) The picture that emerges is fairly telling.

Your blog post is spot on. As near as I can tell, the moderates have tuned out, and the politically engaged have gotten more shrill. The art of argument seems dead.

On a similar vein: One of the more frustrating things I run across is that I'll present what seems a fairly cogent case, and then an extremist, instead of painstakingly refuting my points or assaulting a weak spot in my argument, will instead launch some sort of ad hominem attack or else lapse into the talking points of the day.

At the risk of coarsening political discourse, I have to say that when I encounter one of these echo-chamber babies, I am often tempted to slap that person silly, curse at him, call him names, and demand, "What is WRONG with you, MAN!"

The alternative, it seems, is to follow the example of Wonko the Sane.

Dean,
“Yes, you're right, it is a smokescreen, and a way to change the subject. Even if I was a Rush Limbaugh fan and a dittohead (which I'm certainly not) it wouldn't be relevant.”

Speaking of integrity, that’s isn’t necessarily so. For those who see your blog as relentlessly partisan in favor of Bush and the Republicans and hear you regularly claim to be non-partisan, asking where is the equal outrage at Coulter or Limbaugh seems like a reasonable question. And those who have asked it are perfectly willing to characterize F911 as political, we’re just taken with your out-sized outrage. So where are those dozen or so threads castigating Coulter and her fans’ “extremism”?

BTW, before us Dems become too “dominated by extremist groups”, do you know if the good Revs. Pat Robertson, and Sun Myung Moon are available for moderating influence?

Partisans on both sides of the Republican-Democratic divide enact this little dance consisting of one meaningless verbal volley followed by its counterpoint. The result is that their partisan bases get activated, while the rest of the electorate leave the dance early: they don't vote. And so, we observe public officials being elected by smaller and smaller numbers of voters.

Lost in much of the analysis and hagiography-as-journalism that attended the recent death of Ronald Reagan was the fact that, in spite of being a conservative, the Gipper was the last major presidential candidate who sought to reach beyond his partisan base. (He had to; unlike today, the Democrats enjoyed an edge in party registration across the country and the Congress was mostly controlled by the Dems throughout his two terms.) Both of the Bushes and Bill Clinton were minority presidents who got elected by activating the true believers and largely ignoring the rest of the country, the moderate majority.

Neither party has had a truly new idea in a long time. They haven't had to have new ideas. They simply bang the old drums and actually count on the revulsion of those voters not primarily motivated by hollow ideology.

This can't be good for democracy!

If ideas had mass, fairness could be measured with certainty. Unfortunately, they don't.

And if there's one thing people are poor at, it's adjusting for personal bias.

Is Dean non-partisan? Who knows? Create an objective measuring stick with little marks delineating non-partisanship, and anyone can figure it out. But if you don't have that, you don't have any more reason to criticize Dean's partisanship as he has to disclaim it.

It's like the war, in some respects. People ask for perfect adherence to some standard written in the dust. Silence, inaction, passivity: these are the true virtues. Speak, and you are forever tarnished by your violation of the rule that, strangely, didn't seem to be here a few minutes ago.

I have little use for any of this, as little as I have for people who defend Moore's cavalier attitude towards correctness. It is his right to be so, just as it is others' right to continue to continue to trust him in spite of the evidence. But let's call such trust what it is: blindness. We may continue to let the blind give us directions, but we certainly should not follow them.

Shep:

http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/004409.html
http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/005559.html
http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/000290.html
http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/000395.html
http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/000936.html
http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/000160.html

Those are just the Ann Coulter mentions - I can't even begin to list all Dean's comments on her.

Nice try Rosemary,

1. Reasonable Coulter critique: she’s not literary enough to be Dowd and is more properly categorized as Michael Moore of the right – but absolutely missing the anti-Moore bile.

2. Cutesy apology for saying Coulter’s “too skinny” – no sale (she is too skinny, though).

3. Dowd bash where “Ann Coulter looks like a cross between Aristotle and Nelson Mandela – come on!

4. Non-Coulter post in which, in the discussion, Dean says: "Ann Coulter is no more obnoxious than Maureen Dowd, who actually wins Pulitzers. She's also no worse than Molly Ivins, Paul Krugman, James Carville, Michael Moore, or a whole host of left-wing pundits I could think of.” Tough stuff.

5. Coulter = Krugman. OK, for you and Dean that probably is an ugly charge.

6. Krugman slam which compares him to, “Ann Coulter, Maureen Dowd, or Paul Begala”.

My question still stands.

BTW, Mark, I disagree with your thesis about Reagan being “the last major presidential candidate who sought to reach beyond his partisan base”. Bill Clinton’s rhetoric and policies were consistently non-partisan. But don’t feel bad, most of the political right also missed that completely.

I'm not sure which question you think is unanswered, shep. Dean and others regularly castigate Coulter as a polemicist, do they have to also castigate "her fans' extremism" in the same post to count?

As for the Robertson/Moon question that followed, do you honestly think they and their ilk (Falwell, et al, before they get dragged in here as 'but what about's) "dominate" the Republican Party, as your question implies? Because if you're that ignorant about the realities of the Republican Party, I'll just avoid responding to any of your future comments.

Bill Clinton’s rhetoric and policies were consistently centrist Democrat, not non-partisan, although they would look like such to a lefty. Bush's rhetoric and policies are consistently centrist Republican, not non-partisan, although they look like such to this righty.

Bill Clinton wasn't confused about being a committed Democrat, and we shouldn't be either. Non-partisan! I don't buy bridges, even if you show me the post card.

Yours,
Wince

Bush....centrist..... snort!

I'm not sure where he is. Actually he's all over the map. But he sure ain't in the center!

Tho I agree, Clinton was definitely in the centrist Democrat camp. NOT non-partison.

Once again, I note that people are trying to make me the subject rather than Moore, MoveOn, and violent people on the left.

I have noted many times that I intend to vote for Bush. I have also specifically disclaimed and condemned the irresponsible criticisms of John Kerry, especially those calling him a murderer and a traitor.

But if defending the President from the most slanted charges makes me a partisan, fine. So what? That does not change in any significant way the substance of my criticisms of left-wing extremists. And I repeat: if someone came to me with a list of documented fabrications by Rush Limbaugh, I would never respond by just saying "oh yeah well Michael Moore lies too!"

Try again, Shep. People who defend the President (or his opponents) are not automatically to be dismissed based on their voting habits. This is an irrelevancy, a bait and switch. Talk about the subject please, and stop making me the subject because I'm not on trial.

In fact, I'm gonna make this easy: any further comments which attempt to make this discussion about ME rather than hatemongering extremists simply gets that person banned. It's disingenuous and distracting and I've had enough of it.

Dean has called Coulter an "anorexic crone" and a "vile, foul, rotten-fish-smelling ----", "disgusting", and "loathsome", and making him feel ashamed to vote for any Republican (which he will anyway this year). That doesn't sound namby-pamby to me. Sounds rather "extreme" to me. Good! Perhaps Dean is an "extremist" in defense of the truth.

I agree. I condemn the fascism of Coulter, the Communistic mendacity of Moore, the totalitarianism of MacKinnon and of Marcuse, of Santorum and of Bork.

I am an extremist -- proudly.

"We are told that we must choose between a left and a right. But the truth is, there is no left or right, only up or down: up to the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant-heap of totalitarianism."
-Ronald Reagan, 1964

"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."
-Barry Goldwater, 1964

"There can be no compromise on basic principles. There can be no compromise on moral issues. There can be no compromise on matters of truth, of knowledge, of rational conviction.
"If an uncompromising stand is to be smeared as 'extremism', then that smear is directed at any devotion to values, any loyalty to principles, any profound conviction, any consistency, any steadfastness, any passion, any dedication to an unbreached, inviolate truth -- _any man of integrity_."
-Ayn Rand, "Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal" (1967)

Sorry, Dean, that comment of mine was _not_ intended as a slap at you, but rather a defense of you and of integrity and values as such. I was composing it while you were writing your reply to Shep.

shep, I have to call you out on this one. I think you are being deliberately dishonest in how you characterize Dean's severe criticsms of Rush, Coulter, et. al.

Dean has made it more than clear that he has no use for Limbaugh, and less for Coulter. Apparently you won't be happy until he calls for the boiling oil and flaying knives...

The problem is not that Dean defends Bush; it's that he defends rational intercourse. There have been several articles posted where I (personally) consider Dean to have cut Kerry far too much slack, but you don't find me accusing him of being a "Kerry apologist."

Naturally shep's first repsonse to this will be to tally up the number of "pro-Bush" vs. "pro-Kerry" articles, then argue that the greater number of the former indicate a bias. Um, no. It indicates the fact that Bush has been the President of the United States for the past three and a half years, hence more articles would have been written about him. Kerry's rise to national prominence has been of shorter duration, hence fewer articles here.

Me, I generally don't gad about "attacking" or "denouncing" the Limbaugh/Coulter/Buchanon types, mainly because my first reaction is always "I can't believe anyone takes these people seriously." I recall when Limbaugh kept pushing the "Vince Foster was murdered" meme, not to mention the bizarre tale he spun during the Florida 2000 controversy wherein he claimed that the entire affair was a conspiracy to put Hillary in the White House in '00. I kid you not! Who takes this stuff seriously!?

Same thing with Coulter. I'm not too fussed about her now infamous "kill them all, or convert them" crack, since it was posted just after 9/11. What happened was enough to tempt nearly anyone to say intemperate things. (I'd like to take a moment to point out to the "Bush==Hitler"/"Bush=Worst.President.Ever." crowd that he was one of the few tolerant voices heard immediately following 9/11. He asked citizens to visit their Muslim neighbors, and go out with them in public, in order to protect them from the "kill a raghead" crowd.)

But still, I may have been remiss in not vigorously denouncing such tripe.

Of course, part of the problem is that shep absolutely (key word) refuses to admit that any part of his anti-Bush dogma might be flawed. Now me, I've never been as optimistic as Dean has been about the "Democratize Iraq" project. I would have probably been just as happy to have dropped a nuke on Hussein's head after the Afghan invasion. But then I'm the type would prefer that 90% of our overseas troops come back home, while retaining strategic pre-positioning packages abroad.

I would have strongly preferred a declaration of war for both Afghanistan and Iraq, and consider the lack of such a dangerous precedent, not to mention muddying the legal waters. I am also not nearly as dismayed as many other pro-war bloggers have been about recent court decisions regarding due process and terrorist detainees. The United States has survived a helluva lot worse, the past 200 years, and I am more worried (again) about legal precedents. We've lost more than enough personal liberty the past fifty years.

In other words, I am in no way a mindless Bush "ditto-head" supporter.

With that in mind, I have to say that most of the bash-Bush crowd prefers to demonize Bush given every opportunity; to declare that event X "proves again that Bush is the Worst. President. Ever!!!"

Feh. This is a foolish as the "Bush==Hitler" absurdity. Bush bears absolutely no resemblance to any Nazi, and he's certainly not the worst President, etc. These are merely the ravings of the historcially challenged. I present as evidence President Grant, and, well, real Nazis.

Real Nazis hate Jews. Real Nazis are miserable, hateful creatures who never quote the Bible, nor advocate any sort of tolerance. Real Nazis assault minorities and kill their opponents. I might add that Hitler would be most comfortable in Berkely today, since he didn't smoke, was a vegetarian and a devout believer in astrology, opposed animal experimentation, and held a deep respect for the "spirits" of the German Volk.

Alas, shep and company will eschew rationality, and continue to insist on demonizing the oppposition.

Dean,

While I agree that Savage is just a bully and that Coulter does go over the top in her denuciations of liberals and leftists, I'm still waiting, 15 years on, for someone to bring to my attention a lie by Rush Limbaugh - meaning a clear statement of a known falsehood; you know, something along the lines of Moore's assertion that a gas pipeline was central to our invasion of Afganistan in 2001. I also hear it frequently stated that Rush shouts - I've never heard him shout on the air.

Rush, of course, is primarily an entertainer - he gets on the radio three hours a day, five days a week and entertains his audience by providing them a commodity they wish to consume. No obscenities are uttered, no violence is done - its just a guy mouthing off his opinions in a very slickly produced radio program which has built up a seemingly indestructable core of listeners.

I hadn't listened to Rush much from about 1996 until just last year when I decided to tune in again during another flurry of "Rush lies" stories making the rounds; it was the same show I had listened to fairly regularly from 1988 until 1996. To this day, I still don't get the animosity Rush gets hit with - except to understand that he's making people mad by simply existing.

pennywit,

Still the happy warrior, I see; its people like you that keep my faith alive.

That said, you've got a bit too much of the rose-colored glasses on - especially as it relates to people of your general political pursuassion (sp?...I'm always getting that word wrong).

A while back ago, Dean took me to task for describing the left in terms of "junior-league Leninists"; I think their actions over this past year have more than amply proved my point - the American left has become a "baby-out-with-the-bathwater, we're-always-right" bunch of Leninist thugs - both intellectual thugs (anyone who disagrees is a Nazi, eg) and physical thugs (the recent assault on a unconvinced movie-goer at Moore's flick).

You and I have discussed how left and right talk right past each other these days - I've taken it further now; the left isn't even in the same society I belong to...I can't recognise them anymore; they certainly aren't my fellow Americans, regardless of what their ID's say. I don't know how this will all play out over the next decade, but the one thing I don't see is the left calming down or gracefully admitting defeat.

It's been a long time since I've listened to Limbaugh. He's simply not on my radar screens. Indeed, I know only one person who listens to him regularly: Ara Rubyan.

Back when I did listen to him, however, I can recall things he said that seemed sensible but that, in retrospect, qualified as deceptive in my book. And he's certainly been quoted in recent years from his radio show, strongly hinting at and implying things he doesn't actually say outright, for example, implying that Hillary might kill some of her political opponents within the Democratic Party. Implying that she was part of offing Ron Brown and Vince Foster, too.

Not saying it. Implying it, in the same sort of dishonest way that Moore implies all sorts of cockamamie and hateful crap.

Limbaugh really is not an idiot, but he is a clown with a habit of making nasty insinuations. I remember I was a moderate fan of his back in the early 1990s--I disagreed with him about half the time but thought he was funny and clever. The more time went on, the less I could stand him, and I finally completely stopped paying attention to him.

Since Leninists kill people routinely as a matter of policy, I'm not fond of the comparison. Smacks too much of the "Bush=Hitler" nonsense.

That said, I must confess to having reached a point where there are people on the left who I no longer understand or recognize as inhabiting the same planet I do. I mean, using reasoning that's so foreign, so wonky, and so weird, I literally don't even understand it. I don't mean disagree with it, take issue with it, but which actually comes across like, "2+5=yellow custard." In other words, so full of nonsequiturs and bizarre conclusions that I'd think they're joking, only they aren't.

I find this more than a little disturbing. I don't know if it's me or them or something in between. I know I'm not a conservative, but I'm not one of them anymore either. Either I"ve gone insane or they have, but I just don't get it.

Any time I theorize aloud in an attempt to understand it, I get accused of bashing them. So increasingly I just keep my trap shut and advocate for the things I believe in and let it go. But I have people, actual friends, who I feel like I can't even have a conversation with anymore, not because we disagree--I disagree with people all the time--but because it's like there's simply no core belief there about anything except that Republicans are evil and wrong and must be defeated and that's all there is to say period.

It's just weird. And depressing. It seems like a form of mass madness, it really does. Unless I'm the mad one....

Slightly OT: How do we judge what is Mainstream vice Extreme? Simple majority?

Well, that's a good question. I don't know.

I do know that the word "liar" usually is a red flag for me. Calling someone a liar usually requires strong proof of a lengthy series of willful deceptions that can't be marked down to simply being wrong or having a difference of opinion.

Then there's the nature of the claim. When someone asserts something, could a reasonable person say, "Well you know there's a more simple explanation for that?" than what the person is claiming?

A lot of it's common sense.

Dean

Dean,

You might be surprised to discover that I have a half-sister (product of my Mother's first marriage) who is a very Marxist professor who teaches at Columbia University in New York City - to keep the peace, I just don't bring up politics with her; not much point, as we're obviously not going to agree and as I love my sister and want to have a good time when I visit, getting into a political argument just doesn't appeal. We do prove, however, that people of very different opinions can be on good terms with each other.

I use the term "Leninist" to describe the left because I think it apt - its not, in my view, over the top political polemics...remember, Lenin had nothing but contempt for the Socialist Revolutionaries who carried out terrorist attacks against Czarist's in pre-revolutionary Russia; his contempt for these murderers did not, of course, prevent him from murdering by the million. Just because our American junior-league Leninists haven't piled up mountains of corpses doesn't disprove my point..Lenin didn't start piling them up until rather late in his career (a good 20 years as a committed revolutionary before he ordered his first murder), but only because he wasn't able to do so...I'm quite certain that the foaming-at-the-mouth people who we see on the left today would order my death in a heartbeat if they only had the power to do so. Unless you really want to call people like the KKKers and neo-Nazis people of the right (and given that we so-called "neo-cons" are all supposedly dominated by The Jews, I don't see how a Nazi can be considered right wing these days), you just can't find a rightwing analogy to people like the membership of MoveOn or ANSWER.

Of course, my perceptions are colored by my beliefs - as a conservative, I take a dim view of anyone of a revolutionary bent...and taking one thing with another, the sum total of the left triumphant would be the revolutionary destruction of all I hold dear...so, seeing as each time the left has emerged triumphant there has ended up rather large piles of corpses, I think I can be forgiven for making the statement about "junior-league Leninists".

As for Rush, I'll even dispute your more mild exceptions to him - I don't recall him ever insinuating that Vince Foster was murdered, by the Clinton's or anyone else - though, of course, I never did sit by the radio for the full three hours intently listening to every word out of Rush's mouth...I do recall him having a field day with Clinton's quick-change of emotional facade at the Ron Brown funeral, but thats hardly unfair comment on the part of Rush. Essentially, the Clinton's were (and are) so entirely full of shit there's no need to make up stuff about them - they are a walking, talking charicature of pols on the make. You view them more gently than I do, but the one thing I can't forgive is dishonesty - keeping in mind that a dishonest man is not necessarily the thief or the grafter, but the person who says an untruth while knowing its not true and further knowing that everyone listening knows its untrue, but defying them to nerve themselves to call the liar what he is to his face; most people when faced with a bald-faced lie simply will not call the liar on it, and the Clinton's know this and use this fact of humanity to their advantage - "I didn't inhale" sums Bill Clinton up. Don't feel bad, though; Clinton is in august company - on this level, he's just like Bismarck or FDR, who never told the truth if there was a lie handy.

Mark: Not long ago, on this blog, my wife found a quote from Rush in which he strongly insinuated that Hillary would murder people who get on her way politically. The quote in question is strong enough that I don't think there's any mistaking Limbaugh's intent.

Of course, Limbaugh's wingnut comment was then spun by th blogosphere's Resident Moonbat Intellectual, Dave Neiwert, into a far-flung generalization about Republicans that I won't even try to get into.

But it does raise the point that I'm trying to make: when you generalize to great extremes about the left or right, what you wind up with are... what's the opposite of reductio ad absurdum? Yes the left is dominated by Junior League Stalins, and in the meantime the Right is dominated by Junior League Torquemadas while the Libertarians are all secretly Anarchists seeking to destroy civilization and so on and so forth.

Yes, I have no doubt, no doubt at all, that there are people on the left that would, were they put into power, kill endlessly. Yet there are people on the right who would do the same, and they aren't always identifiable. I've met people on the right who would outlaw mothers being allowed to have careers while fathers stayed home. I've met conservatives who would imprison homosexuals. Are they rare? Of course. What of it?

If we go through life defining ourselves by what the most extreme element on the other side will do, we can make the world seem a mighty scary place.

What's bothering me about today's left is just how rabid and apparently irrational some of them have become. It seems more common at the moment. Now it may simply be that this is to be expected, that if things were just a little different we'd be up to our gills with righty nonsense dominating. Goodness knows the Clinton years gave us some doozies....

Mark:
Leninist? Hoo boy. When people toss around words like "Leninist" to destroy the opposite side, it becomes a bit harder to govern, doesn't it?

But, then again, it's a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy, isn't it? Sorry to harp on the talk show/wingnut faction of the Republican Party, but I've noticed something on the infrequent occasions when I've listened to Rush Limbaugh and Hannity; they both (Limbaugh especially) have a habit of quoting Democratic Underground as if it's the anthem of the liberal movement.

I've visited the Democratic Underground. They're loonies. So what happens that perceptions shift, and suddenly people believe that all Democrats are like that. You probably encounter something similar with your own crazies.

I will admit to a slight tinge of rose-colored glasses here. I have the funny idea that law and process are far more important, in the end, than petty debates about the policy of the day. Whether Social Security is privatized is far less important, in my view, than whether Congress votes on it in a proper manner.

You and yours have encountered the worst side of me and mine. Don't think that the worst characterizes all of us.

--|PW|--

I like Rush Limbaugh, I think he is full of shit, but he is entertaining as hell and he does manage to get some things right. I have paid good money to see his live show on two occasions. I have only paid to see one Michel Moore movie.

I'm not a fan of Ann just because I don't find her all that funny but different strokes, you know. I would be interested in hearing about how the campaign finance laws the Democratic Party in particular, more vulnerable to being dominated by extremist groups. Campaign ads are a cesspool of lies, half truths and mendacity yet you seem to want to make it easier to finance that swill. While the current campaign finance have loopholes a mile wide in them and are not very good, the fact is that you would advocate a system were it is easier to raise money for these ads, how exactly is that going to help? You want “lies” Go to factcheck.org, they have documented “lies” that the Bush campaign has put into their ads here, here, here , here , here

(of course you can find just as many Kerry “lies” there as well so it establishes their non partisan credentials)

But the point is Dean that by giving so much effort and time over to one guy, while giving only lip service to of all the spin, misinformation and mendacity that is out there in the political arena you expose a lack of intellectual rigor. Michael Moore is not the problem, he is the symptom; the problem is the tribalism in US politics. The only reason that Moore is even on your radar screen is because his movie didn’t crash and burn at the box office and your ox is getting gored. If FH911 would have been a dismal failure you would have put out a few posts on how that “proves” that Moore is a no-talent gomer and he would have been written off as a moon bat oddity.

And why would I want to get involved with Democratic politics? I can’t sand them much more then I can the Republicans. The only difference between the parties are the constancies to whom they pander.

As for extremism I agree, but you sound as if it exists more on the left then on the right, or that the Left is accepting Moore uncritically, not only is it not true but there are dozens of so called “liberal” publications that are writing off Moore’s movie as little more then the political cartoon it is. You have linked to some of them and in the process you rebut your own inference that “the left” is embracing Moore. That is simply not the case.

I don’t agree that the left "embraces" it's Bomb throwers more then the right does, I think it’s too close to call. The political bomb throwers are the shock troops of our political system. Asking the left to give up Moore and not asking the same of the right is analogous to unilateral disarmament. I would not want the left to give up Michael Moore until the right gives up the Limbaugh’s and the Coulter’s, and the Savages and Liddy’s and the Hannity’s and Ingrum’s and the rest of the people on the right who have done as much to “poison” discourse over the last ten years as Moore has done.

Frankly I believe in the marketplace of ideas, let them all spout and challenge them on there ideas. Better yet, ignore those who don’t make any sense at all. But all of the caterwauling over Moore only proves one thing, that the left has finally done what the right has been so good at over the last 10 years and the right is uncomfortable with having to look in the mirror. Kind of ugly isn’t it.

I don’t “embrace” Moore, I don’t agree with a lot of the things he puts in his films, the same way I don’t agree with much that Rush Limbaugh has to say (who get an un rebutted hour a day on Armed Forces radio, supported by my tax dollars to spread his version of the Michael Moore treatment, imagine how you would feel if they put Moore on for an hour a day unrebutted). But the fact is Rush is pretty funny at times and, like Moore, he is a daily 3 hour long political cartoon preaching to the choir. Nor do I “associate myself” with Michael Moore, if Moore says something I agree with I’ll admit it, if he says something I don’t I’ll call him on it, and I have.

But I don’t go on a multi post tear about Rush or Moore or anyone else because they are not worth my time. I don’t hold people who defend the political bomb throwers to some kind of litmus test of fealty to “proper” political discourse. Unfortunately there is a giant swath of people out there who look at campaign ads and don’t understand that what they are looking at is propaganda, just as many listen to Rush and watch Moore’s movie and don’t understand that what they are seeing is propaganda, and there is another group that doesn’t seem understand that propaganda is the stock and trade of political discourse in this country and always has been, so unless you have the ability to see it for what it’s worth your too stupid to get involved in politics.

I will denounce Moores mendacity on a point by point basis as I do anyone on the right. I will not denounce those things he says which are true and nether should you. To deny the truth is every bit as reprehensible as embracing the lies.

In closing, Dean, if you were really serious about elevating political discourse I would agree with you 100%, but from what I can tell you're much more interested in attacking Michael Moore and engaging in the fallacy of guilt by association. Until we arrive at the utopian ideal of reasoned public discourse we need the Moore’s and the Limbaugh’s, and the Ivans’s, and the Coulter’s, and the Krugman’s, and the Savage's, and the Dowd’s, and Liddy’s, and the Conason’s and the Hannity’s and Ingrum’s because without them very few will pay any attention at all.

And that is the truth

Here endith the sermon.

Mark: Not long ago, on this blog, my wife found a quote from Rush in which he strongly insinuated that Hillary would murder people who get on her way politically. The quote in question is strong enough that I don't think there's any mistaking Limbaugh's intent.

Well, I heard him say it, and you're right, there was no mistaking his intent.

He was trying to make people laugh.

And with me he succeeded. Because I knew he wasn't serious about "implying that Hillary would kill people who get in her way."

Jeez, if she were that kind of person, Kerry, Dean and Al Gore would all be pushing up daisies. And they'd never have found Bill's body.

So, to sum up, Rick, you think the solution to misinformation is more misinformation, because the stupid masses won't pay attention to anything else?

And this is your justification for defending Moore?

Even more amazingly, you criticize Dean for being partisan immediately after asserting that crazed partisanship is "the way it is" and sufficient grounds for defending Moore?

Dean,

That is called a joke - there's also plane crashes for whomever winds up with Hillary as his Veep...after all, even Johnson, accepting JFK's VP slot, mused that a lot of Presidents had died in office. You'd have to come up with a much more direct statement vis a vis such a subject before I'd say that Rush stepped over the line - innuendo and sly references to past events aren't the same as such verbal savagery as claiming we're fighting in Iraq for Haliburton's profits.

I'm sure you've met conservatives who want to lock up homosexuals...but have you met a senior conservative politico who asserts that Kerry's business tax plan is predicated upon pumping up Heinz stock so his own wealth will be inflated? There's a difference, you see, between a marginalised nut spouting off and a non-marginalised nut who is considered a mainstay of a major political party...the right long ago excised its lunatic fringe while the left has become more and more under the thrall of its lunatics - its junior-grade Leninists, in my view.

pennywit,

As long as law is observed in its exactitude, then we're always ok - technically, even under a one-man dictatorship we'd be ok provided the dictator obeyed his own laws (as long as you know where the law is, you can work around it - its when things become arbitrary that you get into trouble). If a constitutional majority of my fellow citizens elect John Kerry as President on November 2nd then he'll be the President and I'll support him as such - all the while working for his defeat in 2008, it goes without saying, but providing him the same forebearance I've shown President Bush in his war policies (some of which I actually have disagreed with) and Bill Clinton with his war policies.

There's been a poison in the left for quite a while now, and its been exacerbated by the results of 2000....I had hoped that passions would fade over that (after all, the letter of the law was followed and we changed Presidents entirely in accordance with the constitution), but it seems that 2000 was an unforgiveable affront to the left - since then they've just degenerated into hate-filled fanatics who have amazingly come down in favor of US military defeat as long as President Bush goes down with it.

The worst part about it all is that this unreasonable anger on the part of the mainstream left has allowed it to be infiltrated and now co-opted by the lunatic left...I knew we were in for trouble when ANSWER was welcomed into the political mainstream...a person starts making common-cause with people who lauded the Tienamen Square massacre and he's got some serious problems.

Our problem, as I see it today, is to deflect this poison of the left - to so defeat it on November 2nd that it will be once-again marginalized...because if these junior-league Leninists are not utterly crushed, they will simply become stronger.

Mark:
I'm not just talking about electing presidents. I'm also talking about such things as due process (both substantive and procedural), equal protection, and even parliamentary procedure. All of these things were put into place for reasons. I've seen more than a few instances where the current government -- both in its Republican and Democratic components -- has chosen to either abuse procedure, circumvent it, or ignore it.

Both the left and the right have their poisons, as I've mentioned, and it seems to be reaching a crescendo for both sides. My greatest worry is that a senator's going to have to get caned a la Sumner before we get a hold of ourselves.

Mark -- check this out. It's my own reflection on the polarization we've got going on. It's time for the adults -- people from both sides who can confront the other side without frothing at the mouth -- to take back control from the wingnuts ... on both sides.

--|PW|--

P.S. And, yeah, I'm probably going to see that Michael Moore flick eventually. Not happy about it, but as a card-carrying liberal blogger I'm supposed to satch the damn thing. (Memo to self: Buy card that says "Pennywit: Liberal Blogger.")

This is an _extremely_ interesting thread on "extremism".

Dean wrote:
"But it does raise the point that I'm trying to make: when you generalize to great extremes about the left or right, what you wind up with are... what's the opposite of reductio ad absurdum? Yes the left is dominated by Junior League Stalins, and in the meantime the Right is dominated by Junior League Torquemadas while the Libertarians are all secretly Anarchists seeking to destroy civilization and so on and so forth."

That's an extremely interesting triangular spectrum. Yes, I've often thought of it that way myself. And, yes, Anarchy or zero government is the logical extreme of my own position. Anarchy is a noble ideal but, unfortunately, is impossible or impractical given the way things are, so I must settle for a stringently limited Constitutional government instead. The ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order.

I freely admit that there plenty of kooks and crackpots in my quadrant of the spectrum or spectrums, probably more disproportionately, and probably I'm one of them.

An accurate description of the totalitarians of the Left would be Marcuseans. Herbert Marcuse was all the rage on the "New Left" when I was coming of age in the late 1960s and early 1970s. "Marx, Mao, Marcuse" was a favorite slogan of the Left back then. He seems to be largely forgotten now, but it was his theory of "repressive tolerance" that laid the foundation for today's Political Correctness.

I must say, though, that I myself don't spend much time fisking the Marcuseans because, quite frankly, they bore me. Also, as I noted in a comment in the Queen's blog last night, I don't believe that they are ever going to be able to take over here in the United States, due to the inherent nature of the Left, which has been in steep decline and accelerating worldwide since at least the 1980s, and due also to the historic circumstances of America, which has been on the rise since World War II. The radical Left can only rage impotently against "imperialist AmeriKKKa". They cannot rule.

As you have probably guessed, both my preferred allies and my preferred enemies are on the Right. The Right is, by its nature, more powerful and has better _style_. The only question for me, then, is: which kind of Right will rule? The totalitarian Right that wants to imprison homosexuals, censor sexuality, and force everybody into a common mold -- or the individualist Right that opposes that and that upholds the sacredness of sexuality and of the self? Ultimately, it will be one or the other. That's the way I see it.

Steven,

But I want to censor sexuality - if by that you mean I'm with the Noble Lady who opined "it doesn't matter what you do, just don't do it in the streets and frighten the horses". I long for public decorum - heck, I'm even offended when I see a jogger sweatily making his way down my street without a shirt on, or some teenaged girl dressed like a streetwalker...so let me continue to work on my constitutional amendment to bring back frock coats, ok?

Mark:

Well, I want to censor it in _that_ sense, too, pretty much. Keep some sense of privacy, taboo, mystery. Keeps it more interesting that way.

Jeff,

No, that was a very poor summery of what I said and very Moore-esq of you.

McGee and Mark,

That is exactly what Moore defenders say, he is making comedy, and it's all very funny, some how you just don't get the joke. And since when is ANSWER part of the political mainstream? Did you just come up with that, how Moore-esq of you.

You guys are doing exactly what you are criticizing Moore for doing, unbelievable.

If a constitutional majority of my fellow citizens elect John Kerry as President on November 2nd then he'll be the President and I'll support him as such - all the while working for his defeat in 2008

One last thing, this statement is a clear indictment of your knee jerk partisanship, befor the guy is even elected you * know * that his presidency will be an utter failure and you will start working for his defeat. He might turn out to be the best president of our generations but that doesn’t matter one whit to you because you have already made your decision. And how exactly will you work for his defeat and support him at the same time? You can’t, you will criticize every decision and initiative because you have already vowed to defeat him.

Don’t you dare lecture anyone about the poison of “the left”, you’re filled with it yourself. That’s why I come here to laugh at the walking contradictions.

Rick,

I'll dare just about anything - but don't be quite such an ass all the time, if you can avoid it.

I'd work for Kerry's defeat in 2008 because given the set of policy prescriptions he advocates, he's dead certain not to garner my support for his re-election. Outside of something really bizarre, like the GOP nominating Kinko the Clown or some such, there's just zero chance I'd be supporting the re-election of an uber-liberal like John Kerry.

As long, however, as Kerry is commanding American military forces engaged with the enemy, he will have my unwavering support in such efforts even if I think the particular military policies he is pursuing are incorrect - I don't do this for Kerry, but for my country and the men and women of our armed forces who have an absolute right to expect me to back them up when they are sent into battle, regardless of who actually sends them in. Herein lies the difference between me, a very hard-right person, and the hard-left of 2004 - they are actually hoping for and working for an American military defeat, not so much because they dislike the war, but because they dislike President Bush as a person.

Additionally, ANSWER has been brought into the mainstream by the anti-Bush zealots - they are present here, there and everywhere anti-Bush/anti-war people gather.

And, finally, Moore is only now saying he was making a comedy - but the movie was released as a documentary...ie, it claimed to be telling the unvarnished truth as Michael Moore saw it...now that its being ripped to shreds because of its manifest and manifold lies, Moore is changing his tune.

I'd vote for Kinko the Clown over either Kerry or Bush. The Libertarians _did_ nominate Kinko the Clown, and I'm going to vote for them anyway. Either that or the Personal Choice candidates. Or else write in Leonard Peikoff. Or (if he shuts up about the FMA) vote for Bush just to keep Kerry out.

Thinking about it some more, the best choice may be to vote for Bush to keep Kerry out while at the same time voting for Democrats for Congress. When Clinton was President and Newt Gingrich was Speaker of the House, Gingrich shut down most of the federal government for a while. Good! Gridlock is good. I hope both parties block or at least slow down each other's legislation. I hope both parties block or at least slow down each other's judicial appointments, especially to the Supreme Court. Gridlock, i.e., checks and balances, is what the Founding Fathers had in mind. Government governs best when it governs least.