In response to my earlier post, David Sirota, again writing at the Denver Post blog, characterizes the exchange thus:
[David Harsanyi, in a follow-up post linking to PW] […] invokes Michael Moore’s name for no apparent reason, and then lazily refers readers to this guy [yours truly], who makes the argument that essentially says that because – theoretically – there exists someone in America somewhere who calls themselves a member of “the Left†and who doesn’t want America to win the war, that all Democrats and progressives in America are hoping as many American troops are killed in Iraq as possible and that our country “loses†the war. This guy [again, yours truly], of course, provides no actual “evidence†of his charges other than saying “I’m convinced†its true.
[my emphases]
Question: does that even approximate my argument?
First, Sirota is so interested in dehumanizing the opposition that he refuses even to utter my name — as if doing so would cause Barry Goldwater to claw his way out of his grave and bitch slap ol’ Dave with a copy of the Federalist Papers.
Second, as those of you who actually read my argument know, the Michael Moore allusion — which we’re told Harsanyi invokes “for no apparent reason” — comes directly from my post, a post whose argument Sirota presumes to encapsulate without, evidently, having bothered even to read the thing.
Probably because of all the words. And besides, if a conservative wrote it, it must necessarily be unsourced (forget the numerous hyperlinks — they’re for show, you see) and reducible to tendentious nonsense.
Ironically, some of the commenters to the original post actually chided me for not grouping all left-liberals and progressives into the camp of willful defeatists. In fact, I believe I used the term “fringe” to describe those who actively seek a defeat (in the service of transnational progressivism, which they wish to see establish itself as the new world governing order) — but I suppose it’s possible that “fringe” means something different in that Other America many on the left are endlessly going on about. In fact, I hear that over there, the poverty fighters charge $50K to speak on poverty, but not until they have themselves a $400 haircut…
As for the “evidence” Sirota claims he longs for, well, the people who outwardly wish for our defeat are, we’re told, not representative of the left (even though they self-identify as leftists, and speak from positions of (often) academic authority; cf. Churchill, Ward). And honestly — how does one go about “proving” what is, by its very nature, a speculation, namely, that there are those (beyond the select few who have outwardly admitted as much, subsequently marginalized as faux leftists), who think the US would benefit from losing the war, but are too wary of public opinion to come right out and say it.
Not exactly the kind of thing politicians advertise, for instance, so using the absence of such direct statements as proof that the sentiment doesn’t exist — particularly when you allow yourself to dismiss direct statements from fellow travelers as “non-representative” — seems a bit too precious, I think.
Sirota is, of course, welcome to read and comment on my post. But what he is not allowed to do is to reduce it to its opposite in order to dismiss it out of hand. Or rather, he can do so — but it just makes him look intellectually dishonest.
Particularly, let’s add, when his own argument suggests that it is somehow untoward for conservatives to “blame Leftists” for certain observable problems the Administration has dealt with in conducting the war — without bothering to consider, for a moment, that these conservatives (or “neocons”: he tends to use the two interchangeably) may have legitimate reasons for making the argument, reasons that my post points to, and that are traceable back to a certain worldview that, regular readers know, I have discussed at great length.
Clearly, Sirota is not familiar with “this guy.”
Hell, by referring to me as “this guy,” in fact, I think it’s fair to conclude that Sirota didn’t even make it through the first paragraph of my post; otherwise, he would have been reminded that i was one of the blog “all stars” he is supposed to be working with.
Such respect. Oh well, perhaps if I let him know I’m Black…
If this is the level of discourse — agitprop, dehumanization, dismissal — that the Denver Post is seeking to promote from its “all stars,” I’m happy to beg off and wait for the Rocky Mountain News to start a blog.
At least Mike Littwin has the excuse of being a 60s holdover.
****
More, from David Harsanyi.
Oh I read your post indeed – though mild incoherence is difficult to get through. Your reference to Moore was as nonsequiturish as Harsanyi’s, which is why I wrote what I wrote. And your argument does boil down to saying that people on “the Left” who are critical of the war really want America to lose the war – and I’m sorry, but that kind of McCarthyish argument is not worthy of any kind of respect whatsoever. Luckily, when Republican elites in Washington made that argument in the last election, the American public rejected it. Americans, you see, are a lot smarter than you conservatives think. They’re not falling for it anymore.
Aw crap ! Outta popcorn .
Easily the best part of Sirota’s response is his manipulation of Jeff’s post.
Jeff accurately describes the fact that there are several members of the left who absolutely want to see us lose in Iraq so as to either a.)get re-elected, or b.)see the US get knocked down a peg or two from our “Imperialist warmongering Neocon Perch”.
This apparently equates to “all Democrats and progressives in America are hoping as many American troops are killed in Iraq as possible” um, how exactly?
Attention Mr. Sirota, Jeff was being kind. Many of us are terrified by some on the left right now, and I suggest you read http://www.zombietime.com/ for further enlightenment.
Mr. Sirota,
Not all people on the Left who are critical of the war want America to lose. Many, however, do demonstrably have that desire–simply because this war is a Republican-initiated effort and the war’s loss can bring the Democrats and that party’s Leftist allies back into power.
Mr. Goldstein may not have said the above. I, however, assert it to be true.
The war is LOST. Would it kill all of you to just get out of the way and let the genocide start now, like maybe BEFORE the primaries? You guys are just delaying it cause you’re so damn cynical.
Let’s see…whiny, lazy, shallow, intellectually dishonest, largely non-responsive, substandard reading comprehension. This Sirota guy sounds like a weak troll, even by PW standards. Since when do “all-star teams” mix rookie ballers like this clown in with the major leaguers?
TWs: which teams — EXACTLY!
“Americans, you see, are a lot smarter than you conservatives think.”
So…you’re saying that conservatives aren’t Americans? Just wondering which neat little box you’re trying to stuff me into.
TW: what kind of freaking word is sembly anyway?
Methinks Americans are a lot smarter than Mr. Sirota could ever imagine.
“Your reference to Moore was as nonsequiturish as Harsanyi’s, which is why I wrote what I wrote.”
Or as “nonsequiturish” as your reference to Darth Vader?
No, I think it’s clear that you wrote what you wrote because you don’t understand common literary devices. Jeff also “invoked” the names of Donny and Marie. Was that OK, or did that “nonsequiturish” line offend your bizarre “no cultural references allowed” policy, as well?
And your argument does boil down to saying that people on “the Left†who are critical of the war really want America to lose the war
Uh-huh. Let us know when you decide to actually debate JeffG rather than that third-rate Ray Bolger simulacrum you’ve concocted.
Hint: you might start by providing a link to his original post so your readers can see it for themselves.
Hint #2: Dissembling about what someone has said on the web doesn’t work nearly as well as it does in the old-school print media, even if you do avoid linking it. Sorry about that.
Wow. Watch David squirm!
Let’s break this down, bit by bit.
David writes:
What was incoherent about the post, David? We need evidence, remember?
Sorry, but your self-serving and dismissive assertion just won’t cut it — though I realize you consider yourself the final arbiter on what passes intellectual muster.
For the record, though? You ain’t.
Well, what you wrote was the Harsanyi invoked Moore “for no apparent reason.” I would say that linking to a post that included it, and using it as a headline tease, bespeaks a recognizably “apparent reason.” So either you don’t know what an apparent reason is, or else you’re bullshitting us.
Not being a progressive, I’m content to let the people decide.
Funny, here’s what I ACTUALLY wrote:
— note the qualification —
Now, not only did I qualify the “leftists” to which I was referring, but I noted why it is fair to make the assertion. I gave only three examples, sure. But I was writing a blog post, not a dissertation, and my three examples put me, well, three examples ahead of your supporting “evidence.”
I realize it is comfortable and easy to pretend my argument says something it does not — and then to dismiss it as not worthy of “respect” (even as I’m sure you believe your own, “rightwingers blame the failure of the war on the LEFT!” is a feat of great intellectual prowess), but you’re mistaken to think that anyone with any intellectual honesty will fall for such a thing.
But then, maybe your skills at paraphrasing or summarizing are as rickety as your skills at defending your own tendentious claptrap.
The last election that had anything explicitly to do with Iraq was the 2004 Presidential election.
You may believe that the 2006 Congressional elections redounded to “Do You Believe the Left is Hurting the War Effort? Check [D] for no” — but I don’t believe that for a second.
And you may want to check those Congressional approval ratings, before you go on about how the American people rejected this and provided a mandate for that.
Again. Pitiful response, David.
And “this guy” ain’t feeling the sting you evidently hoped to deliver with it.
David Sirota – When did they Left begin utilizing this tactic of taking someone’s words, applying your own meaning to them to the point that they no longer resemble the original meaning, and then flog the shit out of the position that your ideological opponent never had, and at the same time, pretend to hold some moral high ground. Jeff will clean your clock, but you will not have the stones to actually debate him, as he will call BS every single time you pull one of your Leftist stunts, leaving no rhetorical arrows in your useless quiver.
They never learn, Jeff. Assertion, supported by unfounded opinion, and what they consider to be common knowledge are their tools.
TW : 39-40 velocity, which clearly references the speed of that softball that Sirota floated across the center of the plate, belt high.
“Oh I read your post indeed – though mild incoherence is difficult to get through.”
“Incoherence” is Left-ese for “too many big words.” Look, I’m sure Jeff can dumb it down for the remedial “Bush Bad!” drones if they need it (I mean, we all got it just fine, right?), but I’m concerned that this guy’s continued petulance is just going to end up with, errrrr, someone getting rhetorically, wellllllll, slapped by…something which shall not be named.
It already happened, BBR…. in the rhetorical, my-blogpost-just-bitchslapped-your-twatwaffle-ass-into-next-week sort of way.
TW: explosives self
Uncanny.
Hey, genius! Do you know who James Clyburn is? Are you familiar with the title “House Majority Whip”? What would you think about such a guy who says that a report denoting progress and/or success in Iraq would be a really big problem for us? I’ll tell you what I think, and you tell me where I’m getting it wrong: He wants us to lose because it will help his party (the Democrats, btw, in case you’re not clever enough to suss that out) politically.
When your head explodes, I want video.
Funny thing is? That link is included in the post, Pablo.
Those orange words — they’re so pretty. Tell me, do they mean anything? Or are they simply ornamental?
Methinks Senor Sirota is new to the blogosphere.
We like to like, totally link stuff, and fact check and stuff. Like, you know?
{this post was written by a 13 year-old version of Tman in order to relate to Sirota}
“At least Mike Littwin has the excuse of being a 60s holdover.”
That excuse got old a long time ago.
It’s cute…
If these guys spend half the time trying to educate themselves as they did slapping around in their own angry fecal puddle of American self loathing, we probably wouldn’t be having this oh so entertaining conversation.
He strikes me as the kind of guy who googles a couple of words, reads the first an last paragraph, and rolls out his “Jumping to Conclusion Board”. Then links it on his site, berating the dull intellect of the neocons, while announcing via bullhorn his endless wit in a mastrubatory fit of “I know you are, but what am I”.
People like him make people like us look good.
I feel a large mushroom bruise coming on !!!!!!!!!!!!
Methinks Jeff just jave a reactionary leftist a major league cock-slapping.
TW: bandies treason,
Eerie I tell ya, downright scary.
JD beat me to it.
Now Jeff, We don’t want to lose you to the Rocky. And as I’m sure you’ve noticed we abandoned the “All Stars” brand, because, well, it was just silly. As you’ve surely also noticed, Sirota and I played nice for about a half hour before I was accused of being a young immature neoconservative parrot or some such thing. I was hurt … after all, I’m not that young. But more importantly, we still want you.
Hey David, how about making sure Jeff gets TIMELY log on info for any future blogger gathering/conclaves? This is like the second or third time he has been asked to participate in some-such thing and not been given the logon/password to ACTUALLY participate.
Not that your part of some left-wing scheme to silence the right… or anything.
TW: assigns process
OK. I just pooped my pants on that one…
I think now would be a good time to note that while Sirota rips the judgment and credibility of O’Hanlon, this is the same David Sirota whose judgment about the Democratic Congress on Iraq funding turned out to be entirely wrong. Applying Lefty-logic, he has no credibility.
Holes . There are rules about how to dig them , long read tho …
Sorry , not rules , advice .
Heh. Thanks, Karl. I’m wrong on things that I speculate about, but I soldier on anyway. But I try to admit my mistakes when I make them.
Dewclaw —
David Hirsanyi is a full-blooded libertarian with conservative leanings. He’s not responsible for getting me the login info.
I get a sense that at the conference call where we introduced ourselves, I should have given my CV rather than said, “stay at home dad.”
Sirota, for his part, has written books. And received a glowing write up in the Post. About his dogs. And his passion.
The world, it is an unjust place.
mild incoherence is difficult to get through
It’s only incoherent if you can’t read complex, nuanced arguments. Let me put this in terms that you can understand, Mr. Sirota.
Don’t misread Jeff’s prose. [prose, prohz, n. the ordinary form of spoken or written language, without metrical structure, as distinguished from poetry or verse.]
The least he will do is wipe the floor with you.
At worst? He’ll turn you into an Internet verb.
TW: through his rapier wit. No joke; that’s what it said.
Unjust, perhaps. Usually, it takes quite a while for brilliance to be noticed for what it is. In Sirota’s case, stupid is readily apparent.
“Sirota, for his part, has written books.”
As have Gary Coleman and Jose Canseco. I’m sure theirs don’t make you feel stupider for having read them, though.
Apparently, BBR, you have not read either book. Even a ghost writer could not make Jose Conseco’s book readable. My IQ fell approximately 10 points a page, and I quit when I was no longer able to figure out how to turn a page to proceed.
I did not read Gary Coleman’s because he is a dwarf/midget/small person.
That depends on whether you a) read far enough to see them and b) click them and read what comes up.
I was apparently too far ahead of the curve.
I was actually directing that toward Mr Sirota, Pablo. You are forgiven, based on past performance.
I was directing that toward Mr. Sirota as well, and I plead having read the post before you got your linky thing on, as you well noted. Sirota, I’ll wager, just never got that far.
And of course, if Sirota were paying any attention whatsoever to what he appears to see himself as some sort of expert on, he wouldn’t have needed the link.
Sirota finally got his hot throbbing liberalism on… who are we to stop him?
Besides, the money quote will be a few days along the line where he reveals that he more or less does want us to lose in Iraq.
TW: 1884 pursuit !
I figured a non sequitur was more a function of the reader’s ability to follow rather than a writer’s ability to lead. Perhaps Jeff could start footnoting his posts for the allegorically impaired, like Sirota.
For example:
(1) Michael Moore is fat. A Ring Ding is a snack food. Consider the effort Michael is likely to expend holding onto a Ring Ding should somebody seek to remove it from his grasp.
River Cocytus – Guys like Sirota do not have the stones to admit to that. Clyburn, to his credit, laid it out on the table. Sirota will stick with his supporting the troops by supporting a policy of not funding the war or withdrawing to Okinawa, and declaring victory. Meanwhile, millions of brown people will be slaughtered, but the Left will have won their pissing contest.
Sirota (whom I will affectionately refer to as “that guy”) is like Mike Nifong in that he seems to believe that if he never sees or reads the truth, it must not exist. “That guy” knows that if he actually reads your posts and related links he will have no excuse for being a blathering idiot.
“that guy”, when you immediately attack the messenger without addressing the message, you make yourself kind of irrelevant.
Cut from the same cloth as dear Mr. Caric.
It’s a good thing for the ladies and gents of the left that you’re pretty much done with reading comprehension tests after college. They seem to have some kind of psychological mechanism that suppresses their opponent’s actual text and replaces it with straw-man arguments. They seem t believe that this allows them to ignore the complete argument and fling ad hominem in response.
It’s so stunningly clear in Sirota’s pissy comment: they are going mad before our eyes.
Aww, this is no fun. You haven’t pointed out that David Sirota’s group, Progressive States Network, is funded by the Sorosphere. Instead, you are addressing yourself directly to his ideas or lack thereof. No fair.
History does have a way of repeating itself, doesn’t it?
TW: Revolution stir. Now cut that out!
“…mild incoherence is difficult to get through…”
I know what you mean, man, like one time I tried to read The Federalist Papers in the original English and it was like, holy shit dude, those cats must have been on drugs or something!
Swen – Does it not strike you as remarkable that we are looking at the impending slaughter of possibly millions of people, and the Dems are willing to sacrifice that for their political pissing match? This slaughter, should we turn tail, has been predicted by almost all sentient creatures, and is a logical and entirely forseeable result of our lack of political will to finish that which we started. This apparently is a cost that they are willing to bear to score a political victory. Fuckers.
Alice, I can dig your righteous outrage about the word ‘sembly’, although I missed the context, but I am holding out for ‘nonsequiturish’ myself.
Now THAT’s a word.
Sirota is a tool who stands for nothing other than being a partisan hack.
But was his little book an Amazon best-seller? Has anyone read his little book into the Congressional Record?
GOOD DAY, SIR!!!
Bender Bending Rodriguez: “Incoherence†is Left-ese for “too many big words.â€Â
Now, now. That’s not always the case. Sometimes it means “There are too many words”. (vide Caric, infra), and sometimes it means “I can’t follow anything that isn’t presented in Comic Sans font inside little white word balloons” (videHenley, infra).
Yeesh!
David Sirota posted:
“Oh I read your post indeed – though mild incoherence is difficult to get through. Your reference to Moore was as nonsequiturish as Harsanyi’s, which is why I wrote what I wrote. And your argument does boil down to saying that people on “the Left†who are critical of the war really want America to lose the war – and I’m sorry, but that kind of McCarthyish argument is not worthy of any kind of respect whatsoever. Luckily, when Republican elites in Washington made that argument in the last election, the American public rejected it. Americans, you see, are a lot smarter than you conservatives think. They’re not falling for it anymore.”
I guess I was dreaming when I heard Harry “Moron” Reid say, fifteen seconds after he had voted to give “the surge’ until September before he would make a judgement, that we had “LOST THE WAR”!
Your kind of thinking is very intriguing(?)( Where is SpellCheck when you need it?). The “people on the left” that I know of, have been saying that we have lost the war for about four or five months before it even began.
Yup.
Let’s compare the USA, where your own choices determine your destiny, and the F’ing Islamo-Fascist states where your destiny is governed by the length of your beard, or whether you have breasts (The lack of the first, and the visual confirmation of the second can get your whole family killed). “Homos (i.e. those without beards) and sluts (i.e. Those without Burkhas) must die!!!!
dAVID S- whoever-the-“F” you are. You need to wake the fuck up. Do you honestly believe that Senator (chuckle) Robert Byrd is going to save your ass from seventh century animals? Or Chucky-Ucky Schumer? These idiots care nothing about the safety of our country, they only care about moving us as quickly as possible towards Marxism – i.e. equal misery for all, even if you ARE willing to work your ass off 60 or 70 hours a week. Marxism/Stalinism will quickly put an end to ambition, and reward for ambition.
The government will take 90% of the fruits of your labor, and leave you standing in line for six hours to get a kilo of bread and a half kilo of meat. GOOD IDEA! Don’t you think?
Why don’t you e-mail Richard Pearles’ wife?
Or is she a reactionary asshole, too?
Yeah. If Pearle hadn’t been Jewish, he would be alive today, right?
I’m sorry to say that you appear to have a major ideological phlegm block.
Bring it on, my leftist friend. You have absolutely no facts to support your arguments.
But I know you FEEL it, regardless of the truth. “FEELING IT” used to get me laid when I was SDS in 1967. Unfortunately, it eventually occurred to me that these leftist women wer even stupider than I was!
What scares me is that intellectually lazy (“But I FEEL it!)pre-teens like you are giving my little boy his view of the world.
Fuck the facts. “It matters more how I THINK IT SHOULD BE!”
I hope that you are one of the first to face the Jihadists when they kick our ass because people like you refuse to believe what THEY THROW STRAIGHT IN YOUR FACE!!, and it would probably be like “Dawn of the Dead” when you try to convince them that they shouldn’t cut off your face with a piano wire.
You and your’s are tiring.
“Utopia” is a great concept, but for the whole of human history, it has been a fantasy. Only people who are emotionally 18 years old or less (and can’t factor in human nature) believe in this cup of poison.
Wake up. Smile on your brother, but make sure he isn’t scamming you. Every “leftist”/Marxist that I have ever met has been a full of shit power tripper.
If you actually have a brain, you should try to use it sometime. Good and bad are somewhat subjective, but don’t EVER tell me that right and wrong are “subjective.
You may deny it, but we are all born with the innate sense of right and wrong. Just because God doesn’t strike you dead for doing wrong, don’t think that nobody holds you responsible. The only person who really knows the truth is YOU, and you can’t escape eating a piece of your own soul whenever you delude yourself. Every lie you tell eats your soul a little bit more until you are nothing but a soulless fish looking for whoever throws you the bait of “Utopia”.
And no, I am not a bible thumper or even a Christian in the modern sense of the word. I am someone who found out the truth of this the hard way.
Maybe someday you will too, but be ready for the scariest ride of your life if you ever have the balls to confront the truth of our existence.
NOBODY but you can deal with your life for you, and the hated USA is about the only place on the planet that acknowledges this.
You live and die by YOUR OWN CHOICES, yet you wish the government to make your choices for you?
I feel sorry for my 7 year old son who is learning that he can’t take care of himself. Only the government can.
The founders are finally and truly gone, only to be replaced by morons who have convinced half the country that they are too stupid to run their own lives.
David Sarota –
I salute you as a centurian of the new millenium!
You can’t fool me, but you seem to be able to fool yourself.
Once, on an Easter Sunday, I was in a bar with a rest room by one corner, away from the door. A friend went in and came out, and another man who was waiting entered immediately.
About three seconds later, the door opened explosively, and the man came out and said to my friend: “Sir! I salute you!”
The whole side of the bar emptied within about 15 seconds.
Every time I hear the left moaning about “inequality”, I think of this episode, because thed left’s arguments smell at least as bad as the end of that bar on that Easter Sunday.
Yup! We on the other side are full of hate and bile, aren’t we?
Apparently, so were the founders, those “old white men”, who believed in equality of opportunity.
But now, the left is trying to convince me that our founders wanted equality of misery.
“Oh please, Hillary (Obama,Breck Girl, Dennis Kucinitch[?]), save me from having to make decisions. Please make me miserable no matter what decisions I make!
Babble Babble Babble
Or is it Babel Babel Babel?
Sorry to my friends here. It’s been building for a while…
The WAY Lost Dog
Sirota and Caric are illustrative of the effect of surrounding themselves with people that simply nod in agreement when they come up with some intellectually dishonest BS. I am sure that when Sirota is amongst his buddies at the peace institute, his drivel is accepted without criticism or question, thus creating a mindset that there is no good faith opposition to his positions. Only when he ventures outside the walls of his liberal domain does he encounter contrary points of view, which he breezily dismisses as being made in bad faith, since he has already established the veracity of his position with his like minded brethren.
Caric functioned in the same way. Nobody in academia would question the tripe that he lays out. It is established truthiness. Only when he leaves the hallowed halls does he encounter differing opinions, which are just as easily dismissed as racist, sexist, and homophobic.
The media functions in a similar manner, which was illustrated by Goldberg’s book.
They simply have not learned to play well with others.
“Sirota, for his part, has written books.â€Â
The guy got lucky flipping a couple houses and ge thinks he knows a thing or two.
Lost Dog,
Fantastic rant, except that it’s Daniel Pearl, not Richard Pearle.
TW: debtors fenianism
Scary, that thing is.
Baldilocks –
You’re right, but I think I got the “Richard” from seeing “R-ed”
Sometimes when my son is present, I just get nutty.
I can’t believe the crap he is learning in school, and it is really a challenge to try and open his mind to all possibilities.
I guess I am just getting old and snarky. It appears that sometimes I go ballistic with people who prefer feelings over facts.
Thanks for the edit.
You’re welcome.
Sometimes I’m glad I don’t have kids. I’m PO’d enough about the way things seem to be going.
TW: retouching aim
– Shorter everybody….When you reside at the bottom of the political food chain, like all bottom feeders, the smallest admission of “teh stupid” is impossible to accept gracefully.
– As I posted yesterday, and a possible vector to understanding Obama’s sudden LeftyHawk oratory, the Left cannot win if Iraq is any sort of reasonable success, or, the candidates can convince enough of the electorate that they are actually aggressive warriors at the 11th hour. Obama is relatively unknown, so I suppose there’s an outside chane he might pull off the latter, going with the former is just going to result in another 2008 failure for the cult of the collective.
“Mild incoherence”–OK, that doesn’t even work. It’s like “sort of stupid.” Draw your own conclusions as to my referent. Lefties are just not good with the whole dichotomy vs. continuum thing.
For every bad idea from the last 200 years, we have the David Sirota’s of the world to thank for the policy justifications; claims of novelty when repackaged in clam shell plastic (soon to be a thing of the past in a Burge/Goldstein administration), and; rationalizations when the failure points are inevitably reached.
At the risk of unseemingly picking at the already-looted corpse of Sirota’s argument, that was a remarkably flimsy strawman he’d set up there.
Jeff – I think you should ask the poor fellow to give you your boot back. If not because you look funny wearing one boot around the house, because the poor bastard probably hasn’t been able to sit down for awhile. And while we should be able to expect intellectually integrity, we nonetheless don’t want to come off as sadists. This is sort of like getting into a bar brawl with a 4th grader. Just wait til I have facial hair! Then they’ll all be sorry.
When I’m feeling downhearted, and I just don’t understand what’s become of our representative government, I take myself back to the days when it was about the words, man. When a man could talk his way out of anything, and with the insertion of a few flowery adjectives, and a forceful punching of the air with a white-knuckled fist could change a country’s destiny.
So I pop in the VHS of Robert Byrd’s speech before an empty chamber that was on C-Span last night. I think he said “paintedly” for patently. He has mad oratory hops.
TW: senates aliens. Now I’m creeped out.
This is why I started reading PW. While I love the insight and detailed positions Jeff lays out on a wide array of subjects, it’s the shiny floor left behind after a ‘debate’ — I use the term loosely, when considering the weak efforts by both Caric and Sirota — with a challenger that just makes this place so damn bloody cheery.
I’d actually be interested to see Jeff tear apart someone like Chomsky whom, I would think, would at least have the intellectual capacity to understand Jeff’s arguments.
“the already-looted corpse of Sirota’s argument”
Gawd, I LOVE this place!!
Again, leftists have to ignore alot of well documented recent history in order to peddle their particular brand of stupid.
mmmmmm hops….
Hops… beer…
mmmmmm….beer…
“sufficient pink” – mmmm pink icing…. donuts… mmmm donuts.
David Sirota – When did they Left begin utilizing this tactic of taking someone’s words, applying your own meaning to them to the point that they no longer resemble the original meaning, and then flog the shit out of the position that your ideological opponent never had, and at the same time, pretend to hold some moral high ground.
Uh, I think Lenin and Stalin were pretty good at it, and so was Walter Kronkite and both Clintons, one of whom, if you recall, actually changed the meaning of fellatio (it is now not considered to be a sexual act, unless it involves sex with a minor or between minors, if you live in Georgia). That old National Socialist Adolf Hitler was pretty good at it, too, come to think of it.
Big-government advocates need to own meanings to own narratives to achieve what no American majority really wants. The blogosphere is making owbership more difficult, thank God.
Shorter Sirota:
JD, I was referring to the left’s last great victory, Vietnam, where millions of brown people were slaughtered after our premature exit. I fear we’re on the virge of another great victory for the left in which millions of brown people will be slaughtered, thus my comment on history repeating itself. Unfortunately, I no longer find that remarkable. A few million bodies here, a few million bodies there, mheh, it’s all in a good cause. Besides, the outcome doesn’t matter if your intentions are good, right?
Mkay, so strikeout isn’t working. Draw a little imaginary line through PATRIOTISM above.
By Gawd, that guy (Sirota) is someone to be reckoned with. His depth of knowledge and experience certainly qualifies him to comment, with brushes broad, on who and what conservatives are and what they think. He even worked for converted Democrat Red Ned Lament’s campaign one of whose supporters was that notorious hater Jane Hamster. Yet the precocious fuckstick was not even old enough to vote for Clinton in his first presidential campaign. Even so, he can feel the pain of liberals down through the ages, such is the bond of collective victimhood that binds.
So he read it but didn’t understand it. Shocking.
Pablo, try reading context. Oh, and try posting to that blog (Denver Post) again. Apparently, you comment was offensive and removed….
Clyburn said that a good report would make it difficult to push through the legislative agenda his party wants in the House. I know what Sean Hannity said, but I also read what Clyburn said. If you think the House Democrats are going to be swayed by “Our initial plan was to create political progress with security. There hasn’t been any political progress, but Anbar’s a garden spot, where you can vacation” then you’re dumber than I thought. They majority of Americans and the majority of House Democrats want a troop drawdown.
If you need to declare victory to get in line with everyone else, Pabs, then declare away. But stop embarrassing yourself around Mr. Sirota.
Timmah, if you think X is the right thing to do, then what does it matter if everyone else thinks it’s a bad idea?
This really brought back some memories:
http://instapundit.com/archives/012499.php
Nope, no mixed feelings about victory from that end of the spectrum. Sirota badly mischaracterized Jeff’s argument, period. There are clearly some people who see political advantages in either the humiliation of the U.S. or the paralysis of the Bush Administration. I’m not sure how one could deny that.
David?
*tumbleweeds*
Mr Sirota. Heh.
He’s a pup, Timmy. Just because he’s in with the rest of the cutouts being pushed by the progressives as a new brand of “thinkers” doesn’t mean you need to bow before him justs yet.
Besides, don’t you still have Caric ass all over your tongue?
Timmah wrote:
And what agenda would that be, other than withdrawal? From the WaPo:
So when Timmah responds to Pablo:
Timmah really should be directing that attempted snark to Clyburn, though I suspect that Clyburn — as Democratic Whip — just might have a better read on the House Dems than Timmah.
tw: Churchill summed. But not by Timmah.
Thanks, Dr Steve. Have incorporated that link into my Sirota posts. For evidentiary value.
Caric says he’s going to respond; it was in the comments section somewheres, yesterday.
TW: promising arise. Jesus, this thing is scary.
Threads and argumentation like this remind me that some people just aren’t used to being disagreed with.
Necessarily speculatively, I can only imagine that Sirota is used to his audience nodding and agreeing whenever he talks some line of crap about “those neocons”, because they know even less about what he’s misrepresenting* than he does.
Not being used to people having links to sources, and having read them in detail, and calling him on his representations, he’s befuddled. Maybe he’ll respond by being more rigorous in the future. Well, a man can hope, right? Besides, again, this is all speculation – nobody but Dave Sirota knows how accurate it might be. (Unless Riviera’s mustache has powers beyond mortal ken, which I can’t rule out.)
* Misrepresentation because plainly inaccurate; I stress, however, that Sirota may well believe himself to be accurately representing the “essence” or “deeper meaning” of what he misrepresents. He may even, for internal mental reasons I cannot comprehend, believe himself to be accurately representing them at a literal level or a level of plain decoding.
Where’s Umberto Eco when you need him to perform some crack semiosic analysis?
Sigivald – Check out #52. Great minds think alike ;-)
TW : Some degenerate – I think captcha is trying to tell me something.
Why yes, I called him a genius and dropped Clyburn on him.
Terrible, ain’t I? Or perhaps it’s the leftist policy of just deleting that which destroys your argument. Like this fucknut did.
Makes you pine for a delete button, doesn’t it, Timmah!? It’s what to do when you know you’re full of shit but you’re hoping to hold on to some shred of credibility.
Me too, Pablo!. Maybe we’re as smart as the other guy has always claimed?
Capthca says “nude assembling” Will Jeff denounce as attacking MAtt Sanchez also?
Uh, no. I’ve commented 2 or 3 times at Caric’s, and always under my own name. You see, I stand behind what I have to say.
As for Sirota, it seems all the comments are deleted, supporting my assertion. So what was that you were saying about mine, fool?
I was saying you are witty and an original thinker…the same stuff you always say about me! it was similar to above where my take on Clybrun is that he favors withdraw and so do the majority of his caucus and the American people, because some sort of redeployment/withdraw is in the best interests of America and Iraq. You think he means crass election victory and I don’t.
With that said, I’m not sure he’s ready for prime time. It’s akin to saying “I voted for the $87 billion before I voted against it.” True, and this sound bite makes him sound as dopey as Kerry. The media is a fundamentally lazy institution. You got to spell it our for them so they can’t boil it down to something stupid Hannity can misconstrue.
Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled program: You stink, Pablo.
Timmah!, you couldn’t be more full of shit if you tried.
Good to know you stayed on script. In that spirit, let me just say, I could more full of shit if I were a dead-end right-winger believing all bad news from Iraq is a lie and that the entire Democratic Party was one giant terrorist appeasing traitorous mass. In other, I could be more full of shit, if I were you, Pablo.
“believing all bad news from Iraq is a lie and that the entire Democratic Party was one giant terrorist appeasing traitorous mass”
Timmah–beam…mote…pot…kettle…that line of thought. Just pointing you in the general direction of discovering what a braying ass you made out of yourself on this thread.
Rearead my last, Timmah. It is the truth. And save that rant for Maliki.
As I reloaded this page repeatedly in search of a truly witty, incisive and eerie CAPTCHA to include along with my comment, it struck me that I was engaging in an act not dissimilar to that which the TNR’s of the world have been committing as of late, namely: ignoring all possible outcomes that do not suit my own self image and inflated sense of worth and retooling the situation until its rough outlines match the profile I ultimately seek to put forth.
GAZE UPON THE HYPOCRISY! For lo!, I am seeking approval from a piece of computing code.
TW: Spam assessment? Pretty good, my chess-playing Turkish friend.
I think the barber followed up by saying it was actually a $1250 haircut.
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