Hypocrisy and Right vs. Left Wing

[SoCalRC]

I believe the rules place that burden on you.

Sorry, I was thinking of the Golden Rule. Numerous false claims about me have been made in this thread. I asked for evidence, and received none.

On the other hand, you know full well that estesbob has professed that the GOP is the source of all good on the abortion front. Further, he, like you has described Catholics who do not agree with him exactly on the issue of abortion as “sideline Catholics” (to be exact, I think you prefer the term “couch potato Catholics”).

Of course, the imporant rules to me are the Catechism, which seemingly would put some burdens on someone who was aware of the truth…

However, in the interest of complience, try the thread “Bush isn’t pro life and I have the numbers to prove it”. Several other threads have been deleted.

 

[estesbob]

SoCal- EstesBob has said no such thing.

Now you know why I long since quit responding to him. I glance at his post to see what his republican outrage of the month is and skip over the rest. He is so consumed with hatred for the GOP it colors every post he makes.

 

[rlg94086]

Sorry, I was thinking of the Golden Rule. Numerous false claims about me have been made in this thread. I asked for evidence, and received none.

I guess I’m confused. Your application of the Golden Rule seems to have it in reverse - do unto others as they have done unto you.

Estesbob has clearly stated on multiple threads that he would not compromise on the non-negotiables and would vote third party or not vote, if a pro-choicer was on the ballot in both major parties.

Use the search function…it shouldn’t be too difficult to find. Perhaps you are thinking of me. I do believe in voting for the best candidate who will further pro-life causes, even if they aren’t 100% on the non-negotiables.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Sorry, I was thinking of the Golden Rule. Numerous false claims about me have been made in this thread. I asked for evidence, and received none.

On the other hand, you know full well that estesbob has professed that the GOP is the source of all good on the abortion front. Further, he, like you has described Catholics who do not agree with him exactly on the issue of abortion as “sideline Catholics” (to be exact, I think you prefer the term “couch potato Catholics”).

Of course, the imporant rules to me are the Catechism, which seemingly would put some burdens on someone who was aware of the truth…

However, in the interest of complience, try the thread “Bush isn’t pro life and I have the numbers to prove it”. Several other threads have been deleted.

So instead of meeting your burden, you just throw in more blather?

 

[Ridgerunner]

If you wish to cut me down with sharp wit, then I would suggest attacking an argument that I have made. I have stated that I think that socio economic disparities have no bearing on rightousness. I also consider all to be children of God.

I simply pointed out that, although Bama is willing to proclaim the moral superiority of his state’s residents, there is no tangible, secular, evidence to support his claim.

Highly unlikely. I have never voted for a pro-choice candidate and cannot envision starting this cycle. The difference is not pro life/choice, the difference is that I believe that the Church’s assertion of non negotiable principles is correct. I believe that compromising the right to life in the name of abortion is, ultimately, counter productive.

You, seemingly, disagree, but do not seem willing to explain why.

I admit that I have been avoiding directly responding to your posts, convincing myself that I was addressing most aspects in posts to others. But, to be frank, your constant assertion to know my heart and mind, assigning me even secret motives in contrast to my stated words, strike me as distinctly un Christian. The Catechism instructs us to view the statements of others in the most charitable light. In this, I inevitably fail. I am, after all, just another sinner. But, with your posts in this thread, I fail more spectacularly than usual.

My thought had been that, by avoiding you, I would be less tempted to answer in what I would perceive to be ‘like’ ways. However, after praying over the matter (and for you), I have concluded that dismissive silence is already the sin I have been trying to avoid. So, I will endeavor to answer any further questions you pose, with the exception that I will not bother to correct any addition gross mistatements about what I have stated or aspirtions about my truthfulness or integrity as a fellow Catholic.

Peace

I’m sorry if I offended you. But you have made very broad negative statements about southerners, conservatives, Republicans, evangelicals and Catholics as well. Perhaps I overreacted and highlighted them unduly, but I will confess it did seem a bit breathtaking to me to see someone condemn conservatives as being undiscriminating “pattern thinkers”, and then to lay patterns around with abandon.

As far as the religiousness of the people in Bama’s state is concerned, I guess that research can be done. Maybe I’ll even do it myself if I get the time. But I am reminded of Flannery O’Connor’s judgment of southern fundamentalists (that they have more in common with Catholicism than with Protestantism, and will, in time, be the richest convert source in America) and, knowing a goodly number of them, am inclined to think of them more as fellow Christians who, by and large, truly believe, and I, at least, find them not in the least bit less Christian in the main than leftists. I’ll side with Ms. O’Connor on this one.

“Highly unlikely” you’ll vote for one of the abortion candidates? Just “highly unlikely”?

No one disagreed with you here about the Church’s principles that I could tell. What people disagreed with you about is your seeming to put all of them on the same level of importance. If you really believe that abortion is the killing of innocents, it is wrong to put that on the same level as waterboarding terrorists, let alone wage levels. I am not saying torture is morally okay, though I’m not altogether certain what the Pope considers “torture” versus hard interrogation. Never saw him address waterboarding specifically. But it is the very nature of waterboarding that the subject survives the experience. Not the same as killing at all, let alone deliberate killing. You seemed to be arguing that killing and waterboarding are of equal moral gravity. Perhaps you did not mean to say that. But no one on here, to my knowledge, has said he supports torture per se.

As to the 100 detainees who you say have been murdered, I don’t see that a proper foundation was laid for that conclusion. I doubt anyone here would think it proper to murder a detainee. But a person dying while in detention is not necessarily murdered, either. Perhaps you could give the case histories, or at least a credible source, rather than simply assert the conclusion.

It’s unchristian to attempt to know the heart and mind of one who is engaging in a debate about morals? Why is it unchristian to want to know more about the beliefs of one who voluminously expresses them? If I want to speak on here, perhaps someone would want to know what motivations I have for saying what I do. You want to know who I intend to vote for? Just ask. It’s not something that’s under confessional seal or anything. Such information helps a listener put together the full picture of the case being presented. People do that all the time. You, yourself, have already judged me in asserting that I am motivated to cast aspersions on your motivations. You have judged that it is somehow sinful to adopt my (presumably sinful) ways in “like” manner. All I wanted to know was who you intend to vote for, not the state of your soul. You, it seems, have already decided you know the state of mine.

I did not cast aspersions on your truthfulness or integrity as a fellow Catholic. Those are subjective things. I admit I do not personally believe a person can support Dem candidacy in this presidential election cycle consistent with Catholic morality. But certainly a person can, without lying, maintain otherwise. You have been awfully “party line” in here, and it’s not all that strange to think of you as a person who supports the Dem party sufficient to cause you to vote for the Dem candidate notwithstanding its dedication to abortion.

 

[vern_humphrey]

I’m sorry if I offended you. But you have made very broad negative statements about southerners, conservatives, Republicans, evangelicals and Catholics as well. Perhaps I overreacted and highlighted them unduly, but I will confess it did seem a bit breathtaking to me to see someone condemn conservatives as being undiscriminating “pattern thinkers”, and then to lay patterns around with abandon.

And he didn’t even give us credit for being able to sing and dance.

 

[ribozyme]

Here is some support for SoCalRC’s assertions about conservatives:

berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2003/07/22_politics.shtml

I wonder if there is any research on the *g *factor and conservatism. Also, I think liberals in general have a higher score in the O in OCEAN. I do not have any evidence for these speculations though, so do not assume I asserted anything.

 

[BamaRider]

A clip cut and pasted from Ribo’s link-

Conservatives don’t feel the need to jump through complex, intellectual hoops in order to understand or justify some of their positions, he said. “They are more comfortable seeing and stating things in black and white in ways that would make liberals squirm,” Glaser said.

He pointed as an example to a 2001 trip to Italy, where President George W. Bush was asked to explain himself. The Republican president told assembled world leaders, “I know what I believe and I believe what I believe is right.” And in 2002, Bush told a British reporter, “Look, my job isn’t to nuance.”

I’d say that pretty much sums it up. I really liked it when he said my job isn’t to nuance, :clapping: I bet that Brit reporter didn’t understand* that. *

Now I know why ya can’t get a lib to give ya answer without a weather report. HIS BUSY READING THE UC BERKLEY NEWS!! You talk about a place with NO sense of reality, they don’t have a clue about the real world. Nobody on that campus has EVER had a JOB. LOL.

So why ya up so late?

 

[Ridgerunner]

The U.C. Berkely article is amusing. They never do define their terms. Seems that in their effort to define conservatives as people who seek certitude (an assertion of certitude all its own) they felt compelled NOT to be certain in their conclusions by maybe/maybe not defining Stalin as a conservative.

“…at the core of political conservatism is the resistance to change and a tolerance for inequality…”

Completely aside from the fact that this is a “pattern thinking” assumption for which no foundation is laid, Ronald Reagan, whom they call a conservative, would be a liberal under this definition, as “change” was what he was really all about, and a person more interested in equality of opportunity would be hard to find. Margaret Thatcher would be a liberal under this quasi-definition, being an agent of change and a promoter of the breakup of the established division of the British citizenry into “rich” and “poor”.

Hitler and Mussolini, whom they wish to define as conservative were, of course, revolutionary socialists who promoted a romantic, egalitarian (mythical) collectivist notion of the “volk”. When it comes to abortion and statist solutions, American leftists are staunch defenders of the status quo, therefore “conservatives”.

This article doesn’t tell anything worth knowing about conservativism or liberalism, but it tells a lot about the prejudices of the article’s writers.

 

[estesbob]

This article doesn’t tell anything worth knowing about conservativism or liberalism, but it tells a lot about the prejudices of the article’s writers.

It is very telling that supposedly intelligent people so quickly buy into the unsupported nonsense that was laid out in thi article. It is also amusing that ribeye embraces it-especialy the -part about Convervatives tolerating ineqaulity, You may remember that when it was pointed out to ribeye that conservatives as a whole give far more to charity than liberals he resonded that since giving to the poor didnt make him feel good he didnt see much use to it.

 

[SoCalRC]

I guess I’m confused. Your application of the Golden Rule seems to have it in reverse - do unto others as they have done unto you.

I did, instead of false claims, I responded with questions about what was actually said.

Estesbob has clearly stated on multiple threads that he would not compromise on the non-negotiables and would vote third party or not vote, if a pro-choicer was on the ballot in both major parties.

But notice that, when asked, I provided an example of a thread where he made the statements I indicated. Further, look at this thread. He started by making a reference to my past comments about Saipan.

The USCCB (as well as numerous human rights groups) identified Saipan (a US protectorate) as a problem spot in slavery and forced labor. As if that was not horrible enough (modern forms of slavery are one of the non negotiables identified by the Vatican), the labor camps used forced abortions to keep the female workers productive.

A bipartisan effort was launched in Congress to clean this horrible mess up (again, a US protectorate - the slave made garmets are stamped “Made in the USA”), but it was blocked, for years, by the GOP majority. We also know why - because of millions of dollars in illegal funds, which finally led to multiple convictions. But the money trail, and influence touched the leadership in Congress, and the Bush White House.

I am against both forced and procurred abortions, and once asked Estesbob if he was as well. He labelled it all (including, presumably, the USCCB) as leftist propoganda…

 

[Ender]

Consider the situation we have now. We have 100+ torture deaths of detainees over the last five years.

Where do you come up with this stuff? If you’ve provided the link before please point me to the right post, if not please post it now.

Further, if we examine the Catechism we will find that the torture or mistreatment of detainees is absolutely prohibited in war. Its presence invalidates a just war argument.

Your conclusion is sophistry. Individual misbehavior (assuming it even exists as you claim) in no way invalidates the just war argument.

So, casualties, particularly civilian casualties (which are already prohibited under the Catechism) become murder. Which, again, is held to be infallibly immoral.

If this were so then the pope and all the bishops are complicit in that they have not made this clear to all Catholics serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. Either that or your interpretation is flawed.

{Republicans claim} they have the legal right to torture and mutilate even innocent children

I’d like your source for this claim as well, please.

I will not compromise on principles that the Church has indicated are non negotiable in my public life. For all the sneering and false witness, I haven’t heard anyone explain why they, in good concience, disagree.

Perhaps if I believed all the claims against the Republicans that you believe I might walk away from both parties as you appear to have done. I don’t accept that your charges against them are true.

Ender

 

[SoCalRC]

The U.C. Berkely article is amusing. They never do define their terms.

The principle problem is that the terms themselves are not static. What is considered ‘conservative’ today is significantly different from what was considered ‘conservative’ in the past.

Seems that in their effort to define conservatives as people…

One concept that is hard for people not involved in the hard sciences to grasp is that there is a big difference between mesaurements, or ‘data’, and causal theories, or ‘hypothesis’.

What we can measure are things like mastery of objective data. When asked about measurable details for things like health care, economics, foreign policy, etc. Conservatives are, statistically (ie, as a group) considerably less likely to know, well, the detailed facts.

This is not something that has been measured once or twice, but something that has shown up in professional polling for many years and a dozen or more academic studies. So the question arose, why?

Theories fall into two basic camps, exposure to information and process of thought. The research investigating these theories seems to suggest that both have some influence. For example, as the level of coverage about the Iraq war dropped (number of stories about the war per month in the print and broadcast media), the number of Americans who could correctly answer the question ‘How many US troops have been killed in Iraq (rounded to the nearest 500)?’ dropped. So it is reasonable that a group that principally watches Fox News or listens to conservative talk radio - both of which rank dead last (fewest number of stories, period) in coverage of war news, are the folks most likely to get the question wrong (which is what we find).

Similiarly, this could explain the lack of knowledge on more complicated things, like Iran’s complex ties to all Shia groups in Iraq, including the US backed government. But, we also have other reserach.

If we put self described conservatives in front of a screen and ask them to identify letters of the alphabet, they are most likely to get the question wrong. If we show them patterns of symbols and then break the pattern, they are most likely to miss the break in pattern. This is ‘sensory integration’ at a very basic level, strongly suggesting fundemental differences in mental processes.

You appear to bristle at this suggestion, but look at Bamarider’s own comments. He has stated that he does not closely read my comments, but asserts that it is drivel - the outcome is fixed and the content is not relevant to him.

Further, he, like you, extrapolated things from his beliefs which he (like you) asserted as ‘facts’ (he counted them off). Most of these turned out to be false, and had zero basis in any of my actual comments.

And, just a few posts ago, he applauded the comment about ‘nuance’ and expressed amazement that the reporter did not ‘get it’.

This would strongly suggest that Bamarider and I place dramatically different emphasis on measurable reality in our thinking. I cannot convince myself that I am indisputably pro life, in the Catholic sense, if I turn a blind eye to things like beating a 50-60 year old man to death in a sleeping, or torturing a younger man and then subjecting him to death by crucifixion.

Likewise, I cannot turn a blind eye to profiteering from slavery and forced abortions. Nor can I support the sort of people that would proudly proclaim not only that they are a law unto themselves, but that their powers include the right to torture and mutilate innocent children. I’m sorry, in my world, rightous people do not proclaim their right to crush the testicles of children.

Most importantly, I cannot make the mental leap, that seems to come effortlessly to folks like Estesbob, that my actions are correct, regardless of the measurable outcome. Case in point, largely because of conservative support, the GOP were handed all branches of government. 5 GOP appointed Catholics sit on the Supreme Court, and we have had zero measurable progress on abortion. Abortions dropped faster under Clinton, and places like Oregon, which has been labeled the most abortion friendly state in the nation, is a national leader in reductions today.

But, this does not plant doubt in some minds. They are so confident that they have repeatedly claimed that anyone who disagrees with their appoach to abortion is, in fact, an inferior Catholic.

This does not make me right and them wrong, but it is a very different way of thinking.

 

[SoCalRC]

Where do you come up with this stuff? If you’ve provided the link before please point me to the right post, if not please post it now.

As of last year, the death count was at 108. I linked to a report on it already above. I’ve given you specific cases (Hamadi, etc.), in the past. I linked to the Yoo torture memo, complete with crushing children’s testicles, above.

There is no link that will convince you that reality is real. It simply has a different place in your thinking.

Your conclusion is sophistry. Individual misbehavior (assuming it even exists as you claim) in no way invalidates the just war argument.

And, again, reality has no place in your ideology. I’ve already posted a report, above, that torture of detainees was discussed and approved at the highest levels of the US government. The government took the steps to prepare a brief, which I linked above. The brief includes a footnote indicating that the fourth amendment was also considered suspended.

The President and especially the Vice President, have publicly defended the need for torture (though the most often cited torture ‘success’ story turned out to be a massive intelligence failure).

The President and a GOP congress specifically put in an immunity cover for torture and domestic prosecution for war crimes in two large bills. Similiarly, the president has refused to sign an intelligence bill unless it includes immunity for fourth amendment violations for telcoms. Note that the Telcom’s own tradegroup does NOT support the immunity. The immunity is not to protect the companies but, of course, the actions of the government.

Let’s see, the government withholds names of detainees from the Red Cross (secret detention), it sets up secret detention sites, it acknowledges using extraordinary rendition, it does not prosecute interogators in torture death, it destroys video tape evidence, supressed a report on torture in a detention facility, and it writes secret briefs telling itself it can torture children. The heads of state go on TV and tell everyone that the gloves are ‘off’, and that “torture saves lives” - but we have no reason to suspect it is anything but a few bad eggs.

Very logical.

If this were so then the pope and all the bishops are complicit in that they have not made this clear to all Catholics serving in Iraq and Afghanistan…

Two popes have publically stated that they believe that the standard for just war was not met. The Vatican has repeatedly brought concerns to President Bush about human rights violations in Iraq, particularly the persecution of fellow Catholics. The USCCB had been raising the same issue even before the Vatican.

So many US Bishops were concerned about the war that they even asked if Catholic politicians voting to support it met the standard of CIC 915 (ie, should those politicians be denied communion).

Again, that seems like pretty strong rejection to me, but of course you find my interpretation ‘flawed’. We differ on the Dogmatic Authority of the Pope. Consider your first comment here - that the Church’s position on “right to life” was inherently contradictory.

 

[SoCalRC]

So instead of meeting your burden, you just throw in more blather?

I stuck in a reference with the quotes at the end. Another example of you replying to pre-conception vs. identifiable reality perhaps?

 

[SoCalRC]

So all this means you won’t be voting Democratic this fall. Thank you.

Correct. It also means that I won’t be voting GOP. Non negotiable means non-negotiable.

 

[rlg94086]

Here is some support for SoCalRC’s assertions about conservatives:

berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2003/07/22_politics.shtml

I wonder if there is any research on the *g *factor and conservatism. Also, I think liberals in general have a higher score in the O in OCEAN. I do not have any evidence for these speculations though, so do not assume I asserted anything.

In assessing the *g *factor and the O score in OCEAN, you have to figure in the *b *factor of the authors/researchers of those studies (i.e. the ratio of bologna in proportion to gray matter within their cranial cavities).

 

[SoCalRC]

If some wacko has info about a nuke being popped off in Atlanta, I support our military and intelligence in whatever they have to do to prevent it. End of story.

Macho, but, of course, stupid. Torture people and they tell you want they think you want to hear. Anything to make it stop. That is why we reject.the veracity of confessions given under torture.

The same has proven true in the war on terror. Some of our most spectacular intelligence failures over the last 7 years have been the result of taking information derived from torture seriously.

I don’t buy the premise our soldiers are killing and torturing innocents as a policy.

Good, because no one has asserted that is the case. Yes, we have examples of soldiers acting badly, but that is an indirect result of policy. Stop loss, and perpetual extended deployements place a tremendous emotional strain. We are also so desperate for warm bodies that we are issueing waivers for convicted violent felons and the emotional disturbed at a record rate.

However, the torture of detainees is official US policy, written up. I’ve even given you links to some of it. You won’t believe it, of course, because, as we have established and you have proudly proclaimed, reality alone cannot override what you know, with seeming certainty, to be ‘true’.

 

[SoCalRC]

Bama,

You see, it is that new math.

Millions of innocent killed via aboritons is morally less than a handful of suspected terrorists being held.

In any criminal justice system, there will be a small percentage of people who are wrongly accused or treated poorly.

File this under “false equivocacy.”

No, it is Catholic math. We believe that each human person is a unique creation of God, infinitely loved. So life is precious to us at “every stage” and in “every condition”.

We also believe in certain inalienable rights of the human person. These, like our very right to life, cannot be abridged by anyone or any entity.

You can disagree, but at least our belief system is consistant. Those poorly treated innocents where once unborn life. As were the most vile felons, guilty of their crimes. You seem to treasure them before they are born, but feel vindicated, by the scope of abuse, after they are born.

Tell me, using your logic - deserving versus undeserving, and relative attrocity by scale, would it be OK to abort ‘bad’ people if we could detect it in the womb? After all, if it is OK to abuse them later, why not early on, before they can do any damage?

For Catholics, this is wholly reprehensible. Eugenics is an abandoment of our belief of infinite value, infinite love, regardless of stage or condition. But it seems like to might fit your world view.

 

[SoCalRC]

In re-reading a number of the posts here I find myself even more coninved of the ‘different type of thought’ explanation for the so-called “reality gap”.

Today, the news is full of even more revelations on the US use of torture as an approved policy:

news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080411/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/interrogation_tactics;_ylt=Ar_4eep.66QARByt3Ir.NHms0NUE

As we can see in the little side bar, the smoking guns, in the forms of memos and testimony, have become so overwhelming that it makes it on to Fox News (there is a link to a video clip).

Yet, folks here still state, with certainty that it is only a few ‘bad eggs’, or something they will ‘never believe’.

Ultimately, it is not my place to judge a different type of thought. Reality may, in fact, be highly over rated. But, again, it does help to explain why so little meaningful dialog occurs. In, say, science, interpretations are hotly debated, but all sides agree that their opinion must be in keeping with the data, or measurable facts. But once reality is unabashedly disconnected from utter conviction, there is no common ground at all.