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Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Friday, September 25, 2009
Ignore the Idiots. Seriously.
How to talk to complete idiots
By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Friday, September 25, 2009
SF Chronicle
There are three basic ways to talk to complete idiots.
The first is to assail them with facts, truths, scientific data, the commonsensical obviousness of it all. You do this in the very reasonable expectation that it will nudge them away from the ledge of their more ridiculous and paranoid misconceptions because, well, they're facts, after all, and who can dispute those?
Why, idiots can, that's who. It is exactly this sort of logical, levelheaded appeal to reason and mental acuity that's doomed to fail, simply because in the idiotosphere, facts are lies and truth is always dubious, whereas hysteria and alarmism resulting in mysterious undercarriage rashes are the only things to be relied upon.
Examples? Endless. You may, for instance, attempt to explain evolution to an extreme fundamentalist Christian. You may offer up carbon dating, the fossil record, glaciers, any one of 10,000 irrefutable proofs. You may even dare to talk about the Bible as the clever, completely manufactured, man-made piece of heavily politicized, massively edited, literary myth-making it so very much is, using all sorts of sound academic evidence and historical record.
You are, of course, insane beyond belief to try this, but sometimes you just can't help it. To the educated mind, it seems inconceivable that millions of people will choose rabid ignorance and childish fantasy over, say, a polar bear. Permafrost. Rocks. Nag Hammadi. But they will, and they do. Faced with this mountain of factual obviousness, the bewildered fundamentalist will merely leap back as if you just jabbed him with a flaming homosexual cattle prod, and then fall into a swoon about how neat it is that angels can fly.
But it's not just the fundamentalists. This Rule of Idiocy also explains why, when you show certain jumpy, conservative Americans the irrefutable facts about, say, skyrocketing health care costs that are draining their bank accounts, and then show how Obama's rather modest overhaul is meant to save members of all ages and genders and party affiliations a significant amount of money while providing basic insurance for their family, they, too, will scream and kick like a child made to eat a single bite of broccoli.
Remember, facts do not matter. The actual Obama plan itself does not matter. Fear of change, fear of the "Other," fear of the scary black socialist president, fear that yet another important shift is taking place that they cannot understand and which therefore makes them thrash around like a trapped animal? This is all that matters.
This is why, even when you whip out, say, a fresh article by the goodly old Washington Post -- not exactly a bastion of lopsided liberalthink -- one that breaks down the rather brutal truth about the real cost of health care in this country, it will likely be hurled back in your face as an obvious piece of liberal propaganda. Go ahead, try it. Or better yet, don't.
Option two is to try to speak their language, dumb yourself down, engage on the idiot's level as you try to figure out how their minds work -- or more accurately, don't work -- so you can better empathize and find a shred of common ground and maybe, just maybe, inch the human experiment forward.
This is, as you already sense, a dangerous trap, pure intellectual quicksand. It almost never works, and just makes you feel gross and slimy. Nevertheless, plenty of shrewd political strategists believe that the best way for Obama and the Dems to get their message across regarding everything from health care reform to new environmental regulation, would be to steal a page from the Glenn Beck/Karl Rove/sociopath's playbook, and start getting stupid.
It's all about the bogus catchphrases, the sound bites, the emotional punches-to-the-gut. Death panels! Rationing! Fetus farms! Puppy shredders! Commie medicine! Gay apocalypse! Forced vaccinations! Exposed nipples during prime-time! Let one of these inane, completely wrong but oh-so-haunting verbal ticks bite into the below-average American brainstem, and watch your cause bleed all over the headlines.
The big snag here is that the Dems, unlike the Republican Party, aren't really beholden to a radical, mal-educated base of fundamentalist crazies to keep them afloat. Truly, the political success of the liberal agenda does not depend on the irrational, Bible-crazed "value voter" who's terrified of gays, believes astronomy is a hoax and thinks Jesus spoke perfect English and really liked giving hugs.
In other words, there really is little point in the liberals adopting this strategy, save for the fact that the major media eats it up and it might serve to counterbalance some of the more ridiculous conservative catchphrases. What's more, it could also give the whiny, bickering Dems something slightly cohesive to rally around -- because the truth is, the Democratic Party isn't all that bright, either.
And now we come to option three, easily the finest and most successful approach of all. Alas, it also remains the most difficult to pull off. No one is exactly sure why.
The absolute best way to speak to complete idiots is, of course, not to speak to them at all.
That is, you work around them, ignore them completely, disregard the rants and the spittle and the misspelled protest signs and the fervent prayers for apocalypse on Fox News. Complete refusal to take the fringe nutballs even the slightest bit seriously is the only way to make true progress.
This also happens to be the invaluable advice of one Frank Schaeffer, noted author and a former fundamentalist nutball himself, who made a simply superb appearance on Rachel Maddow's show recently, wherein he offered up one of the most articulate, fantastic takedowns of the fundamentalist idiot's mindset in recent history. It's a must-watch. Do it. Do it now.
Now, you may argue that, while Schaeffer may be dead right and also rather deserving of being quoted far and wide, it's also true that calling people stupid is no way to advance the debate, and is itself rather childish and stupid. And you'd be absolutely right.
But you'd also be missing the point. When you ignore the idiots completely, you are not calling them anything at all. You are not trying to advance any sort of argument, because there is no debate taking place. You are simply bypassing the giant pothole of ignorance entirely.
You are not kowtowing to the least educated of your voting bloc, like the GOP is so desparetely fond of doing. You are not trying to give the idiotosphere equal weight in the discussion. As Schaeffer says, "You cannot reorganize village life to suit the village idiot." By employing option three, you are doing the only humane thing left to do: you are letting the idiotosphere eat itself alive.
Do it for the children, won't you?
By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Friday, September 25, 2009
SF Chronicle
There are three basic ways to talk to complete idiots.
The first is to assail them with facts, truths, scientific data, the commonsensical obviousness of it all. You do this in the very reasonable expectation that it will nudge them away from the ledge of their more ridiculous and paranoid misconceptions because, well, they're facts, after all, and who can dispute those?
Why, idiots can, that's who. It is exactly this sort of logical, levelheaded appeal to reason and mental acuity that's doomed to fail, simply because in the idiotosphere, facts are lies and truth is always dubious, whereas hysteria and alarmism resulting in mysterious undercarriage rashes are the only things to be relied upon.
Examples? Endless. You may, for instance, attempt to explain evolution to an extreme fundamentalist Christian. You may offer up carbon dating, the fossil record, glaciers, any one of 10,000 irrefutable proofs. You may even dare to talk about the Bible as the clever, completely manufactured, man-made piece of heavily politicized, massively edited, literary myth-making it so very much is, using all sorts of sound academic evidence and historical record.
You are, of course, insane beyond belief to try this, but sometimes you just can't help it. To the educated mind, it seems inconceivable that millions of people will choose rabid ignorance and childish fantasy over, say, a polar bear. Permafrost. Rocks. Nag Hammadi. But they will, and they do. Faced with this mountain of factual obviousness, the bewildered fundamentalist will merely leap back as if you just jabbed him with a flaming homosexual cattle prod, and then fall into a swoon about how neat it is that angels can fly.
But it's not just the fundamentalists. This Rule of Idiocy also explains why, when you show certain jumpy, conservative Americans the irrefutable facts about, say, skyrocketing health care costs that are draining their bank accounts, and then show how Obama's rather modest overhaul is meant to save members of all ages and genders and party affiliations a significant amount of money while providing basic insurance for their family, they, too, will scream and kick like a child made to eat a single bite of broccoli.
Remember, facts do not matter. The actual Obama plan itself does not matter. Fear of change, fear of the "Other," fear of the scary black socialist president, fear that yet another important shift is taking place that they cannot understand and which therefore makes them thrash around like a trapped animal? This is all that matters.
This is why, even when you whip out, say, a fresh article by the goodly old Washington Post -- not exactly a bastion of lopsided liberalthink -- one that breaks down the rather brutal truth about the real cost of health care in this country, it will likely be hurled back in your face as an obvious piece of liberal propaganda. Go ahead, try it. Or better yet, don't.
Option two is to try to speak their language, dumb yourself down, engage on the idiot's level as you try to figure out how their minds work -- or more accurately, don't work -- so you can better empathize and find a shred of common ground and maybe, just maybe, inch the human experiment forward.
This is, as you already sense, a dangerous trap, pure intellectual quicksand. It almost never works, and just makes you feel gross and slimy. Nevertheless, plenty of shrewd political strategists believe that the best way for Obama and the Dems to get their message across regarding everything from health care reform to new environmental regulation, would be to steal a page from the Glenn Beck/Karl Rove/sociopath's playbook, and start getting stupid.
It's all about the bogus catchphrases, the sound bites, the emotional punches-to-the-gut. Death panels! Rationing! Fetus farms! Puppy shredders! Commie medicine! Gay apocalypse! Forced vaccinations! Exposed nipples during prime-time! Let one of these inane, completely wrong but oh-so-haunting verbal ticks bite into the below-average American brainstem, and watch your cause bleed all over the headlines.
The big snag here is that the Dems, unlike the Republican Party, aren't really beholden to a radical, mal-educated base of fundamentalist crazies to keep them afloat. Truly, the political success of the liberal agenda does not depend on the irrational, Bible-crazed "value voter" who's terrified of gays, believes astronomy is a hoax and thinks Jesus spoke perfect English and really liked giving hugs.
In other words, there really is little point in the liberals adopting this strategy, save for the fact that the major media eats it up and it might serve to counterbalance some of the more ridiculous conservative catchphrases. What's more, it could also give the whiny, bickering Dems something slightly cohesive to rally around -- because the truth is, the Democratic Party isn't all that bright, either.
And now we come to option three, easily the finest and most successful approach of all. Alas, it also remains the most difficult to pull off. No one is exactly sure why.
The absolute best way to speak to complete idiots is, of course, not to speak to them at all.
That is, you work around them, ignore them completely, disregard the rants and the spittle and the misspelled protest signs and the fervent prayers for apocalypse on Fox News. Complete refusal to take the fringe nutballs even the slightest bit seriously is the only way to make true progress.
This also happens to be the invaluable advice of one Frank Schaeffer, noted author and a former fundamentalist nutball himself, who made a simply superb appearance on Rachel Maddow's show recently, wherein he offered up one of the most articulate, fantastic takedowns of the fundamentalist idiot's mindset in recent history. It's a must-watch. Do it. Do it now.
Now, you may argue that, while Schaeffer may be dead right and also rather deserving of being quoted far and wide, it's also true that calling people stupid is no way to advance the debate, and is itself rather childish and stupid. And you'd be absolutely right.
But you'd also be missing the point. When you ignore the idiots completely, you are not calling them anything at all. You are not trying to advance any sort of argument, because there is no debate taking place. You are simply bypassing the giant pothole of ignorance entirely.
You are not kowtowing to the least educated of your voting bloc, like the GOP is so desparetely fond of doing. You are not trying to give the idiotosphere equal weight in the discussion. As Schaeffer says, "You cannot reorganize village life to suit the village idiot." By employing option three, you are doing the only humane thing left to do: you are letting the idiotosphere eat itself alive.
Do it for the children, won't you?
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Glenn Beck, Rush Limbagh and Michael Savage ARE ALL RACIST!!!
(ARTICLE TAKEN FROM THE UK - WORLD NEWS)
JIMMY CARTER SPEAKS UP ABOUT RACISM! YOU GO JIMMY.
In a blistering attack on the Right after watching Mr Obama endure a summer of hostility, the former US president singled out Joe Wilson, the congressman who shouted “You Lie!” while Mr Obama was making a speech on health care to the US Congress last week.
That attack, Mr Carter alleged, was also “based on racism”.
In comments that could provoke a contentious debate on race the White House is eager to avoid, Mr Carter went further than African-American congressmen who had begun to make the connection between Right-wing attacks on Mr Obama and his election as America’s first black president.
“I think that an overwhelming proportion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, he’s African American,” Mr Carter, 84, told NBC.
“I live in the South, and I have seen the South come a long way,” said the native Georgian. “But that racism inclination still exists, and I think it has bubbled up to the surface because of a belief among many white people, not just in the South but across the country, that African-Americans are not qualified to lead this great country.”
The comments mean that Mr Carter has become the most prominent voice to level a direct charge of racism at Mr Obama’s critics.
It has emerged since last week that Mr Wilson was among a small group of Republicans who supported a campaign to keep the Confederate flag flying over South Carolina’s capitol building.
The flag is regarded by African Americans and many others as an offensive symbol of the pro-slavery South. Mr Wilson was also once a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which racism watchdog groups regard as a “neo-confederate” organisation.
But Mr Wilson’s son, Alan, said: “There is not a racist bone in my dad’s body. He doesn’t even laugh at distasteful jokes. I won’t comment on former President Carter, because I don’t know President Carter. But I know my dad, and it’s just not in him.”
During months of raucous protests against his health care reform plans and other initiatives, Mr Obama has been compared to Hitler, the Joker from the Batman films and the anti-Christ.
Opponents have called him a Nazi, a socialist, a communist and questioned his nationality. Demonstrators toting guns have appeared outside the president’s town hall appearances while a handful of preachers have led congregations in prayers that Mr Obama would die.
“Those kind of things are not just casual outcomes of a sincere debate on whether we should have a national programme on health care,” said Mr Carter. “It’s deeper than that.”
Robert Gibbs, the White House spokesman, has been forced to address the race issue, telling CNN: “I don’t think the president believes that people are upset because of the colour of his skin.”
His remarks demonstrated the administration’s keenness to bury a debate that would divert attention from the president’s already overloaded agenda.
Organisers of the conservative “tea party” protests against the president have insisted their opposition is based merely on dislike of the president’s “big government” policies.
Brendan Steinhauser, a co-ordinator for FreedomWorks which organised the first large-scale protest against Mr Obama in Washington over the weekend, said accusations of racism were nothing more than a ploy to muffle dissent.
“It is an intimidation tactic. When you make that attack and call someone racist or homophobic it is a way to kind of silence them,” he said. “The idea that people are trying to bring race into this is absolutely ridiculous.”
Charles Rangel, a veteran black congressman from New York, said earlier this month: “Some Americans have not gotten over the fact that Obama is president of the United States. They go to sleep wondering, ’How did this happen?’ ”
For other Democrats, Mr Wilson’s unprecedented breach of decorum during an address by the president to a joint session of Congress led them to express what they had been feeling for weeks.
Mike Honda of California, chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said: “There’s a very angry, small group of folks that just didn’t like the fact that Barack Obama won the presidency.”
JIMMY CARTER SPEAKS UP ABOUT RACISM! YOU GO JIMMY.
In a blistering attack on the Right after watching Mr Obama endure a summer of hostility, the former US president singled out Joe Wilson, the congressman who shouted “You Lie!” while Mr Obama was making a speech on health care to the US Congress last week.
That attack, Mr Carter alleged, was also “based on racism”.
In comments that could provoke a contentious debate on race the White House is eager to avoid, Mr Carter went further than African-American congressmen who had begun to make the connection between Right-wing attacks on Mr Obama and his election as America’s first black president.
“I think that an overwhelming proportion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, he’s African American,” Mr Carter, 84, told NBC.
“I live in the South, and I have seen the South come a long way,” said the native Georgian. “But that racism inclination still exists, and I think it has bubbled up to the surface because of a belief among many white people, not just in the South but across the country, that African-Americans are not qualified to lead this great country.”
The comments mean that Mr Carter has become the most prominent voice to level a direct charge of racism at Mr Obama’s critics.
It has emerged since last week that Mr Wilson was among a small group of Republicans who supported a campaign to keep the Confederate flag flying over South Carolina’s capitol building.
The flag is regarded by African Americans and many others as an offensive symbol of the pro-slavery South. Mr Wilson was also once a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which racism watchdog groups regard as a “neo-confederate” organisation.
But Mr Wilson’s son, Alan, said: “There is not a racist bone in my dad’s body. He doesn’t even laugh at distasteful jokes. I won’t comment on former President Carter, because I don’t know President Carter. But I know my dad, and it’s just not in him.”
During months of raucous protests against his health care reform plans and other initiatives, Mr Obama has been compared to Hitler, the Joker from the Batman films and the anti-Christ.
Opponents have called him a Nazi, a socialist, a communist and questioned his nationality. Demonstrators toting guns have appeared outside the president’s town hall appearances while a handful of preachers have led congregations in prayers that Mr Obama would die.
“Those kind of things are not just casual outcomes of a sincere debate on whether we should have a national programme on health care,” said Mr Carter. “It’s deeper than that.”
Robert Gibbs, the White House spokesman, has been forced to address the race issue, telling CNN: “I don’t think the president believes that people are upset because of the colour of his skin.”
His remarks demonstrated the administration’s keenness to bury a debate that would divert attention from the president’s already overloaded agenda.
Organisers of the conservative “tea party” protests against the president have insisted their opposition is based merely on dislike of the president’s “big government” policies.
Brendan Steinhauser, a co-ordinator for FreedomWorks which organised the first large-scale protest against Mr Obama in Washington over the weekend, said accusations of racism were nothing more than a ploy to muffle dissent.
“It is an intimidation tactic. When you make that attack and call someone racist or homophobic it is a way to kind of silence them,” he said. “The idea that people are trying to bring race into this is absolutely ridiculous.”
Charles Rangel, a veteran black congressman from New York, said earlier this month: “Some Americans have not gotten over the fact that Obama is president of the United States. They go to sleep wondering, ’How did this happen?’ ”
For other Democrats, Mr Wilson’s unprecedented breach of decorum during an address by the president to a joint session of Congress led them to express what they had been feeling for weeks.
Mike Honda of California, chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said: “There’s a very angry, small group of folks that just didn’t like the fact that Barack Obama won the presidency.”
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Fired up - Ready to Go!! (Health Care Rally, Minn.)
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Shame on you Joe Wilson!
While Senate rules on decorum do not prohibit personal references to the president, House rules do. According to section 370 of the House rules manual, members may not:
* call the President a "liar."
* call the President a "hypocrite."
* describe the President's veto of a bill as "cowardly."
* charge that the President has been "intellectually dishonest."
* refer to the President as "giving aid and comfort to the enemy."
* refer to alleged "sexual misconduct on the President's part."
(Hard to imagine how many members were in violation of the House rules during the Bill Clinton impeachment debate in 1998, but we digress.)
House Democratic leaders clearly view Wilson's outburst as a violation of the rules. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told our colleague Ben Pershing Wednesday night that Wilson's behavior was "contrary to the rules of the House."
But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested Thursday there should be no formal punishment of Wilson. "The episode was unfortunate," Pelosi said. "Congressman Wilson apologized, and it's time to turn our attention to health care."
House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) didn't suggest a specific form of possible punishment for Wilson but he did say Thursday morning on the Bill Press Show that Wilson "ought to man up" and apologize to Obama in person. Clyburn said Wilson's release of a written apology late Wednesday night was "cowardly."
"I share counties with him ... these are people who may have political conservatism but they do have good manners, and I do believe that the first sign of a good education is in fact good manners," Clyburn said on Press's radio show.
Appearing on the same program, Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) suggested the House should "reprimand or censure" Wilson, later repeating his call on Twitter.
Retired Major General Paul Eaton, who has become a de facto Democratic spokesman on national security issues, says Wilson, a retired Colonel, may have violated military codes of conduct as well.
Writing on The Huffington Post, Eaton takes exception with Wilson's defenders who say Wilson is stressed out because his kids are serving in the military.
"Every parent whose children are serving -- as all three of mine are -- can respect the strain Col. Wilson might be feeling, and thank him for his sacrifice," Eaton writes. "Yet I would never expect to hear anything but the greatest respect for the elected President of the United States from these men and women, regardless of their political persuasion."
Meanwhile, Wilson's Web site was down and his phone lines were clogged.
* call the President a "liar."
* call the President a "hypocrite."
* describe the President's veto of a bill as "cowardly."
* charge that the President has been "intellectually dishonest."
* refer to the President as "giving aid and comfort to the enemy."
* refer to alleged "sexual misconduct on the President's part."
(Hard to imagine how many members were in violation of the House rules during the Bill Clinton impeachment debate in 1998, but we digress.)
House Democratic leaders clearly view Wilson's outburst as a violation of the rules. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told our colleague Ben Pershing Wednesday night that Wilson's behavior was "contrary to the rules of the House."
But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested Thursday there should be no formal punishment of Wilson. "The episode was unfortunate," Pelosi said. "Congressman Wilson apologized, and it's time to turn our attention to health care."
House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) didn't suggest a specific form of possible punishment for Wilson but he did say Thursday morning on the Bill Press Show that Wilson "ought to man up" and apologize to Obama in person. Clyburn said Wilson's release of a written apology late Wednesday night was "cowardly."
"I share counties with him ... these are people who may have political conservatism but they do have good manners, and I do believe that the first sign of a good education is in fact good manners," Clyburn said on Press's radio show.
Appearing on the same program, Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) suggested the House should "reprimand or censure" Wilson, later repeating his call on Twitter.
Retired Major General Paul Eaton, who has become a de facto Democratic spokesman on national security issues, says Wilson, a retired Colonel, may have violated military codes of conduct as well.
Writing on The Huffington Post, Eaton takes exception with Wilson's defenders who say Wilson is stressed out because his kids are serving in the military.
"Every parent whose children are serving -- as all three of mine are -- can respect the strain Col. Wilson might be feeling, and thank him for his sacrifice," Eaton writes. "Yet I would never expect to hear anything but the greatest respect for the elected President of the United States from these men and women, regardless of their political persuasion."
Meanwhile, Wilson's Web site was down and his phone lines were clogged.
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