Rep Bachmann should have been more careful. She had to have known that, if pared down on both ends, the intent of her statement could be purposely taken out of context and used against her.
True, she may not have intended her use of “armed and dangerous” to mean, literally, that she desired her constituency to take up arms against the government. But had she been more careful with her choice of phrasing, there in the middle of her sentence, she wouldn’t be coming under attack.
We must stop giving the left ammunition. Which we can do by keeping our mouths shut entirely.
Textualism. Pragmatism.
‘Tis a pity. If she had meant that I’d know exactly whom to support for president in 2012.
The wisdom of using martial metaphors in political rhetoric has of course been a subject of hot debate over the past week.
How long before one of the Dems declares a war on political hate speech?
Yeah, we need a war on high-caliber metaphors. Someone needs to shoot down all those martial-sounding phrases.
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I am going to guess a correction will not be coming from Krugman.
Paul Krugman? Lying? Time to break out the award again…
Of course, there’s nothing wrong with being literally armed and dangerous. That’s the whole purpose of the 2nd Amendment.
“The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.”
“When the people fear the government there is tyranny, when the government fears the people there is liberty.”
But if do we give the left ammunition, how can they use it when violence is not the answer?
I do believe that this country has been driven into a madhouse where real discussion and dialog has been made off-limits, because you never know what words will turn out to be (dare I say?) “trigger” events that are used to derail the actual underlying principles that were the point of the discussion.
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david frum’s gadsen flag
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One of the other things that’s been driving me up the wall this week is the repeated claim that we’re using “tit-for-tat” or “you did it first” arguments. Such is not the case.
When we note that people on both sides of the aisle routinely use martial metaphors, and routinely put targets on maps, it’s not meant as a “he did it first!” cry to mommy. It’s meant as an illustration that these metaphors and images are a part of everyday political language, and that it’s truly stupid, to the point of being delusional, to claim that one specific instance of such language is “uncivil,” while ignoring a long and well documented history of such language in regular use.
It’s not that “you did it first.” It’s that everybody does it, all the time, and have been for years and years. So I’m not asking that Krugman & Co. apologize for “doing it first,” I’m demanding that they acknowledge that there’s nothing for anyone, on either side, to apologize for. Simultaneously, I lose patience with the “surveyor’s marks” crowd, because they’re tacitly admitting that using actual targets would be wrong. And it’s just not.
If we’ve learned just one lesson from this site and this community over the years, it’s that we need to keep our eyes open, and to push back against this sort of bad-faith argumentation whenever it occurs.
Want to see some new gratitous hating in this new Age of Civility on Palin?
She has the AUDACITY to be addressing a GUN!!!11!!1!! on Jan 29.
she has infallible political instincts and it’s about time she paid attention to nailing down the NRA vote before Romney scooped it up
So, Wonkette is still in business and cranking out lefty talking points. I did not know that.
wow looks like our failshit president bumblefuck pushed BP into the arms of the Russians
he’s truly a brilliant brilliant man – I heard that motherfucker went to Harvard
hf
let me understand you …
so Palin needs to give up hunting/fishing or addressing a group of hunters and fishers …
CUZ OF THE OPTICS!!!1!!!
no she for sure needs to reach out to them this is a great time for her to shore up her base since everyone else thinks she’s stupid with possible violent tendencies
sarah is an honorary member of violent femmes don’tcha know
“[since] everyone else thinks she’s stupid with possible violent tendencies”
– ‘Everyone else’ defined as whom feets….your fellow lefties?
– Ah yes, the infamouse, anal-sex loving Wonkette. I haven’t seen her write anything in years. She seems to have an endless supply of cabana boys to do her dirty work now.
love the femmes just not the part about old mother reagan and her crew took away from me and you wish she’d go far away
– I’m probably going to hate myself for asking this feets, but just WTF did Pa;in ever take away from you personally that evokes your endless bitter agitation against her?
That group includes you, yes?
mostly it’s this ludicrous notion she has in her head that she should be president. I believe there’s no more sure route to four more years of bumblefuck’s vile molestations of our despoiled little country than for the most blinkered and nastily tribal factions of Team R to anoint this overwhelmingly lightweight souffle of a woman as the nominee of Team R in 2012.
Oh, did she announce? I did not know that.
– So then. After countless tirades against her, you simply don’t like her for some reason you’re unable to articulate?
to be clear Mr. Hunter I think she’s a sure loser because independent voters find her repulsive
Remember, BBH, image is everything to happyfeet. You’d almost say he’s being very pragmatic :) He is correct, to a degree, that she is repulsive to many independents, because these people are not serious people. Afterall she said that she could see Alaska from her front porch, though she never actually said that. But these same people get their news from Jon Stewart, thus they think that SNL is a 60 minutes type show.
“to be clear Mr. Hunter I think she’s a sure loser because independent voters find her repulsive”
You know who independents love? That McCain fella. Also Meg Whitman and Mike Castle.
Sarah should just sit down, shut up, and let someone more pragmatic have a shot.
not more pragmatic just someone not repulsive to the voters
– Sarah Palin is the very epitome of independence, and you’re saying she’s repulsive to independents in general. That idea makes no logical sense.
– What I hear you saying in reality, is that a city metrosexual has a snobbish bigotry against country folk.
– But maybe it’s just me.
“just someone not repulsive to the voters”
alot folks out there throwing mud. but are these sources “credible” anymore?
“just someone not repulsive to the voters”
That’s not very specific seeing as we’ve had murderers and thieves the public has found acceptable.
I have a cold
If nothing else, we’re going to get some nifty terms added to the Blogosphere’s Common Lexicon because of the Tucson Massacre (though Tuscon Massacre isn’t nifty at all):
anosognosia— (an-o?so-no´zhah) n. Lack of insight into one’s disability or illness.
Deftly put to purpose by Tom Smith at the link above, to wit:
Oh, the applications “anosognosia” will have in our future, the places it will go…
FTFY.
All the rest of it was unnecessary.
newrouter, the last paragraph of your cite at #9 is what I’ve been saying for years. My only quibble is that search through history as I might, I can’t find a single example of a tyranny being rolled back without at least a credible threat of violence. The meek may inherit the earth, but it tends to be in small chunks, about 6 ft by 3 ft by 6 ft deep.
And there’s this: If you’re going to have the reputation of being a bunch of violent killers (or an imperialistic warmongering country) regardless of the actual facts, then why not indulge? At least you get rid of some of the more egregious examples (acquire all the oil needed for $1 a gallon gas). You haven’t lost anything from your enemies POV, and they just might get the idea that there’s a limit to the shit you’ll put up with.
Help me out guys. Sheriff Dupnik claims that bigotry is rampant, Holder says we’re a nation of cowards in regards to racism, etc. etc. ad nausea.
How much did this rhetoric contribute to the white New Jersey cop being shot execution style yesterday by the black 20 year old who is now on the run?
I ask, because no one is speculating about that on the news. What am I missing?
What we need is a ban on high-capacity magazines! Time only has 72 pages, that ought to be enough for anyone!!