Phil Robertson/nsa

[God the Father]

respond above; comment below

[CrossCuT]

Lies

[Socrates]

Hard to say.  While the immediate issue of Phil Robertson and Duck Dynasty is itself trivial, I find the current climate where people can be punished simply for holding un-pc religious beliefs to be troubling.

 

While disgusting, sadly, NSA's violation of the Constitution hardly comes as a shock, as today government agencies and politicians blatantly violating the Constitution has become the norm, rather than the exception.  It's just one example of very, very many.  Our federal leviathon has become utterly lawless, and its power-drunk members don't give a poo about constitutional checks and balances

 

 

Of course, we can count on the leftists to properly denounce anyone who would question Holy Mother the State or hold it to any constitutional restraints as idiots/liars/sexual deviants/fat/choose-your-ad-hominem.

 

 

 

 

[4588686]

Hard to say.  While the immediate issue of Phil Robertson and Duck Dynasty is itself trivial, I find the current climate where people can be punished simply for holding un-pc religious beliefs to be troubling.

 

While disgusting, sadly, NSA's violation of the Constitution hardly comes as a shock, as today government agencies and politicians blatantly violating the Constitution has become the norm, rather than the exception.  It's just one example of very, very many.  Our federal leviathon has become utterly lawless, and its power-drunk members don't give a poo about constitutional checks and balances

 

 

Of course, we can count on the leftists to properly denounce anyone who would question Holy Mother the State or hold it to any constitutional restraints as idiots/liars/sexual deviants/fat/choose-your-ad-hominem.

 

 

Sometimes I think that we've reached the depths of your ignorance.  But you always manage to prove me wrong.  Leftism is extremely hostile to the state.  That's why leftist have long been involved in causes against abusive state practices.  Like police brutality, the war on drugs, imperialism et cetera.  The Journalist who broke this story, Glen Greenwald, is a sodomit and a leftist.  Of course these corrections presume that you have either the capacity or the inclination for intellectual honesty and you clearly have neither.

[havok579257]

Sometimes I think that we've reached the depths of your ignorance.  But you always manage to prove me wrong.  Leftism is extremely hostile to the state.  That's why leftist have long been involved in causes against abusive state practices.  Like police brutality, the war on drugs, imperialism et cetera.  The Journalist who broke this story, Glen Greenwald, is a sodomit and a leftist.  Of course these corrections presume that you have either the capacity or the inclination for intellectual honesty and you clearly have neither.

 

 

if you honestly think the current american leftest are against government intrusion, then your blind.  As long as there is a leftest president in power, most leftest will agree with government intursion.  Only when a republicans get into power will they all then complain together.

[An Historian]

The American right is hardly any better than the American left, both are completely hostile to the Social Kingship of Christ and the one true Faith.

[4588686]

if you honestly think the current american leftest are against government intrusion, then your blind. As long as there is a leftest president in power, most leftest will agree with government intursion. Only when a republicans get into power will they all then complain together.

Barack Obama is not a leftist. He's a center left liberalish Democrat.

[Ice_nine]

Hasan I know you went to college and learned all of this sophisticated nomenclature involved in politics but what use is it really when the larger segment of society (the politically uneducated) doesn't use these words "rightist/leftist/liberal etc" as proscribed by academia? I'm not trying to be rude, just asking a genuine question.

[4588686]

Hasan I know you went to college and learned all of this sophisticated nomenclature involved in politics but what use is it really when the larger segment of society (the politically uneducated) doesn't use these words "rightist/leftist/liberal etc" as proscribed by academia? I'm not trying to be rude, just asking a genuine question.

That's not just jargon in academia. The Democratic Party does not and never has identified itself as a 'leftist' organization. Leftist a do not identify the Democrat Party as a leftist organization.

I think it's important because the persistence of the idea that the political Universe can be captured within the spectrum of the Democratic and Republican Party limits the political imagination of Americans and makes it all the less likely that we'll ever be able to break out of our current two party straight jacket.

[PhuturePriest]

That's not just jargon in academia. The Democratic Party does not and never has identified itself as a 'leftist' organization. Leftist a do not identify the Democrat Party as a leftist organization.

I think it's important because the persistence of the idea that the political Universe can be captured within the spectrum of the Democratic and Republican Party limits the political imagination of Americans and makes it all the less likely that we'll ever be able to break out of our current two party straight jacket.

 

You don't support the two party straight jacket?

 

Communist.

[Socrates]

[Ad-hominen garbage . . .]  Leftism is extremely hostile to the state.  That's why leftist have long been involved in causes against abusive state practices.  Like police brutality, the war on drugs, imperialism et cetera.  [ . . . more ad hominem garbage]

 

While I won't waste time responding to your sophomoric and boring ad-hominem attacks, the statement quoted above actually raises some interesting points.

 

While certain leftist theorists may indeed profess anarchism and hostility to the state (it seems you use an extremely narrow definition of "leftist" to suit your purposes), when actually put into practice and gaining political power in the real world, leftism nearly always results in tyranny, and an extremely powerful state.

 

Communism is universally acknowledged as a movement of the far Left (though not all Leftists are Leninists or communists), and Communist states are among the most brutally repressive and tyrannical in human history.  It's also a fact that historically, many leftist thinkers in the U.S. and Europe have been quite sympathetic to Communism and Communist regimes.

You can try to deny this all you want by trying to disassociate Communism from "real Leftism," but that would not be intellectually honest.

 

It seems you also want to claim that what is known as "the left" or "liberalism" (really Fabian socialism) in America has nothing to do with "true leftism," but that also seems a bit of a dodge, as you've yet to say anything substantial of how your "real leftism" works in practice..

 

But we really don't even need to discuss Communists and such.  Unless my memory fails me, you yourself (a self-described "leftist") generally defend socialized medicine (which involves the State forcing citizens to buy certain products which it dictates), favor of massive increases in federal spending and taxation as a cure to our economic ills, adamantly support all kinds of increased environmental regulations and punitive taxation by the government, and generally advocate increased involvement by the state in most areas of public life, attacking or belittling anyone who wants the State to butt out in these areas.

 

While you may try to argue that such statist policies are good or necessary, they still involve increases in the power, scope, and size of the State.  Arguing for such increases in State power while claiming to be against the State makes as much sense as arguing for going to war while proclaiming oneself a strict pacifist.

 

It seems you and other Leftists are only hostile to the State when it does things that go against your own particular ideology - otherwise, the more State power, the merrier.  Some form of socialism or another is at the core of all forms of Leftism, and this involves the forced redistribution of wealth, which in practice can only be done with a powerful State (or at least some form of powerful coercive authority, whether you choose to call it a "state" or something else).

 

Leftist ideology remains self-contradictory (though destructive) nonsense.

[Socrates]

That's not just jargon in academia. The Democratic Party does not and never has identified itself as a 'leftist' organization. Leftist a do not identify the Democrat Party as a leftist organization.

I think it's important because the persistence of the idea that the political Universe can be captured within the spectrum of the Democratic and Republican Party limits the political imagination of Americans and makes it all the less likely that we'll ever be able to break out of our current two party straight jacket.

 

For that matter, the Republican Party does not identify itself as a "right-wing" organization, nor do most conservatives.

 

Politically, "right" and "left" are by nature pretty vague and imprecise terms, which don't have any real single, fixed definition.  (The term "right-wing" has been used to describe everyone from libertarians to Nazis.)

 

But "leftism" does describe a spectrum with a greater or lesser tendency towards socialism and hostility to tradition, ranging from modern "liberalism" to outright communism.

 

I'm not a fan of the two-party straight-jacket either, but would like a return to limited constitutional government.

[NotreDame]

Barack Obama is not a leftist. He's a center left liberalish Democrat.

 

"Stalin is not a leftist.  He's a center left liberalish Democrat" - Trotsky

[CrossCuT]

Can we all just stfu about left and right?  :bounce:  

[PhuturePriest]

Can we all just stfu about left and right?  :bounce: