U.S. Politics: lt's not hard

[DanteGabriel]

It's pretty self-evident what my point was since I went into rather specific detail on what I was referring to in the posts immediately following the one that initiated this conversation. It's just pitiful that this needs to be spelled out for people because they chose to dodge the substance of remarks for their presentation....which in 3-4 threads now has been a hallmark of DG and Ap's posting. The argument you and several others are making now is simply straw man.

This is the Internet. All we have to judge by are the words used. We don't have body language or knowledge of your actual opinions. So nothing is self-evident unless you are clear about it. You were quite clearly making some absolute statements that you now try to say you didn't fully mean. But we didn't know that at the time. If the initial posts were hyperbolic, all you had to do was say those posts were hyperbolic, and then explain in greater detail what you actually meant. Instead you treated it like we were idiots for simply taking your words at face value. Words are important. Use the words you mean. Because when you say "Bush and Obama are identical," yes, you sound like an idiot. If you say, "Obama's policies in these specific matters are a continuation of Bush," you wouldn't get this reaction, and a lot of people would agree with you.

But instead of acknowledging the hyperbole of your earlier statements, you simply dug in, insulted the intelligence of those who simply read what you wrote, and then in the most snivelly way possible built yourself some rhetorical outs. The change in tone of your posts has been well documented.

Further, you misunderstood something I wrote, and continued to attack me on it after I clarified. I said the Republican Party advances Christianist positions. You took that to mean I was talking about all Republicans, when it was clear from my words I did not.

You express yourself sloppily. You read sloppily. You don't back down even when confronted with your own mistakes. That's where most of this has come from.

I know insulting someone's reading comprehension is a common dig here, but really -- you need to work on your clarity of expression and your reading comprehension, because almost this entire thread has come from your poor communication skills and your inability to even consider how your posts come across.

I'm not the only one who interpreted your posts in the way I did. And it wasn't just the reliable board liberals who did. When you find yourself arguing with a whole room, it might be rational to take a long look at what you were doing instead of accusing everyone else of being too dumb or biased to understand what you really meant.

[TrackerNeil]

It's an indicator of just how much Stag Country's unassailable logic has totally upset the Liberal Hive Mind that I am willing to invoke a fellow liberal's name in vain...

Stag does not yet realize it, but his time on the board as it has been is over. We will add his philosophical and intellectual distinctiveness to our own. He will service us.

[Lord Mord]

Stag Country,

It's pretty self-evident what my point was since I went into rather specific detail on what I was referring to in the posts immediately following the one that initiated this conversation. It's just pitiful that this needs to be spelled out for people because they chose to dodge the substance of remarks for their presentation....which in 3-4 threads now has been a hallmark of DG and Ap's posting. The argument you and several others are making now is simply straw man.

When you say that your point is self-evident, I"m not sure to what you're responding. What I see is you stating emphatically and more than once that Obama and W are -- well, what you said was exactly and in every way identical, but presumably what you meant was -- basically the same, and then when people mock your absolutism, you decry them for not being willing to accept any similarities. It seems like you have an utterly reasonable point: there are strong points of similarity that anyone, right or left, should find outrageous. So why don't you wipe the slate clean and say that instead?

I also don't know what argument you think I'm making. I've made an observation, and I suppose you disagree with it, but I don't really see where there's even room for a straw man.

[DanteGabriel]

On actual differences between Obama and Bush -- I think Bush would have gotten us deeply entangled in Libya and Syria. I'm not comfortable with the level of Obama's engagement in Syria, and I especially don't like the possibility that there was some Iran-Contra-like shit going on from Libya to Syrian rebels, but I do believe Obama has been more restrained in the Middle East than Bush or McCain or Romney would have been.

[Lightsnake]

LIghtsnake,

Two things:

Who said the President had only to snap his fingers? Stag's premise is only that the President could have done it if he'd wanted to. What about that requires magic fingertips?

Stag's point is "Obama could have closed it if he wanted to." My rebuttal to that is the fact he did try. The problem is the President is not a unilateral decision maker if Congress decides against him on a particular issue.

[Merentha]

It blows my mind that Stag hasn't yet realized if he'd said "in a lot of ways, Bush and Obama have been very similar in foreign and economic policy, and many of the observable differences in those areas are cosmetic, minor, or both" he would have gotten quite a lot of agreement from most of the people he's currently arguing with. Instead, he had to double-down on "they're identical!" and then blame everyone for not reading his mind or assuming that naturally, the only fields people mean when they discuss the quality of a president are foreign and economic policy.

That's it, SC. All you had to do was walk back the rhetoric and hyperbole when everyone went "uh, what the fuck are you talking about" and just rephrased your sentence into what you meant.

edit: Hell, I'll admit to backing out when I was accused of using words improperly. You're right, recession does have a meaning, pointless as I think it is for many people, and we're not in one anymore.

[TerraPrime]

It blows my mind that Stag hasn't yet realized if he'd said "in a lot of ways, Bush and Obama have been very similar in foreign and economic policy, and many of the observable differences in those areas are cosmetic, minor, or both" he would have gotten quite a lot of agreement from most of the people he's currently arguing with. Instead, he had to double-down on "they're identical!" and then blame everyone for not reading his mind or assuming that naturally, the only fields people mean when they discuss the quality of a president are foreign and economic policy.

Yup. And there were leftist boarders attacking Obama's policy on the economics, especially in the days of negotiating the extension of the Bush tax cuts for prolonging the unemployment benefits. He's also been criticized by others here for his favoritism to big banks and corporations. There are plenty of willing allies from the left to criticize him on many issues. If only Stag County had not framed everything in such absolutism.

[Seli]

...

How so? As I recall Obama actually avoided the issue in the run up to 2008, and I can't honestly recall what McCain's position was without looking it up (I stopped listening to him after he rolled out Palin), presumably he supported DOMA. He only had a couple of speeches devoted to it where he kept referring to his evolving position on DOMA and civil unions. Do you have any exit poll samples that suggest it was a big issue for voters?...

My apologies, I thought it would be clear I was talking about the first bit of your statement ie 'Because the point of the comment was regarding economic voter motivations, the two biggest issues in this last election were the economy and foreign affairs.'; that really does not seem to fit the way women voted according to the exit polls, the way young people voted, the way a lot of minorities voted (in the 2012 elections, I don't remember such details the 2008 exit polls, but they might have been similar).

I did not remember seeing similar data that might relate to DOMA/prop 8/same sex marriage/DODT, but the larger pattern did seem to indicate it is likely. But a quick search finds me these pages http://elections.nyt...dent/exit-polls http://www.foxnews.c.../2012-exit-poll, which of course does not correct for any confounder effects but seems to indicate adherence to that pattern.

From that last table:

Should your state legally recognize same-sex marriage?

Total Obama Romney

Yes 49% 73% 25%

No 46% 25% 74%

Are you gay, lesbian or bisexual?

Total Obama Romney

Yes 5% 76% 22%

No 95% 49% 49%

[Ser Greguh]

LOL. Right. Funny you don't apply this logic to everyone, seeing as how the only error I've evidently committed here....according to you......is in defending my point and offering insight why I don't agree with his/her statement.

No, it's that in the "defense" of your point you have repeatedly and unabashedly made use of fallacy after fallacy, most notably in your repeated shifting of goalposts, specifically to redefine the words you used to make your argument so that they fit. It is a dishonest, scummy, and ultimately useless and circular form of argumentation, and one that is often used by people who are more concerned with showing how "right" they are than with developing a nuanced view of the issue they are discussing.

[WrathOfTinyKittens]

I like that there have been two posts quoting pretty clear evidence that SC shifted the goalposts of his argument and he didn't bother to address either one.

[Lightsnake]

I also enjoy that when he's wrong about something he admits it and all is well. When I'm wrong, and other boarders rightfully called me out for such, I'm 'fabricating' evidence.

[lokisnow]

Pretty impressive post illustrating just how much Bill Clinton's tax policy did to attack poverty in this country. It makes me reconsider some of my distaste for extending all of the Bush tax cuts. It also illustrates how Bush's policies increased poverty.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/08/06/the-tax-system-is-keeping-2-2-million-people-out-of-poverty/

So what happened? Refundable tax credits happened! Kamin estimates that 60 percent of the change is attributable to increases in the Earned Income Tax Credit. The 1993 Clinton budget made childless people eligible for the EITC, and increased the maximum credit for parents. It was also expanded in the 2001 Bush tax cuts and the 2009 stimulus package. Another 30 percent of the change, meanwhile, is due to the Child Tax Credit, which was created in 1997, and expanded in both the 2001 cuts and the stimulus.

What this means, among other things, is that the poverty rate is hugely sensitive to changes in tax policy. Kamin estimates that, had the fiscal cliff been allowed to take effect, the federal tax system would have started increasing poverty again in 2013, by about 0.5 percentage points. But because of the deal that was reached, and in particular due to the extension of the stimulus’s expansions of the EITC and the CTC, the tax system is still reducing poverty, to the tune of 0.7 points, only slightly less than the 0.8 point reduction under 2012 policy:

[sToNED_CAT]

On actual differences between Obama and Bush -- I think Bush would have gotten us deeply entangled in Libya and Syria. I'm not comfortable with the level of Obama's engagement in Syria, and I especially don't like the possibility that there was some Iran-Contra-like shit going on from Libya to Syrian rebels, but I do believe Obama has been more restrained in the Middle East than Bush or McCain or Romney would have been.

I highly doubt Bush would have attacked Gaddafi, since he negotiated peace treaty with him. To attack Lybia was an Iraq class stupid decision, the only difference is that US lost no soldiers and little money, but politically it was dumb and morally it was even worse (because Gaddafi was pacified contrary t Saddam and Obama didn't even bother to ask Congress for agreement with US involvement).

[DanteGabriel]

I highly doubt Bush would have attacked Gaddafi, since he negotiated peace treaty with him. To attack Lybia was an Iraq class stupid decision, the only difference is that US lost no soldiers and little money, but politically it was dumb and morally it was even worse (because Gaddafi was pacified contrary t Saddam and Obama didn't even bother to ask Congress for agreement with US involvement).

Eh? Saddam was pretty pacified at the time of the Iraq invasion, and formerly a good buddy of Bush's SecDef, so I don't see how past relationships would have insulated Khaddafi from being the next Arab Dictator We Must Crush For Maximum Justice and Planting the Seeds of Democracy.

[Stag Country]

No, it's that in the "defense" of your point you have repeatedly and unabashedly made use of fallacy after fallacy, most notably in your repeated shifting of goalposts, specifically to redefine the words you used to make your argument so that they fit. It is a dishonest, scummy, and ultimately useless and circular form of argumentation, and one that is often used by people who are more concerned with showing how "right" they are than with developing a nuanced view of the issue they are discussing.

Whatever, you're just terrible at a following forum. There hasn't been any shifting of positions. So feel free to highlight the 'fallacy' that I'm committing here.

[Shryke]

Whatever, you're just terrible at a following forum. There hasn't been any shifting of positions. So feel free to highlight the 'fallacy' that I'm committing here.

You mean like he did already 1 or 2 pages ago?

[awesome possum]

There hasn't been any shifting of positions.

No? So changing from stating Bush and Obama are "carbon copies" and you "can't take anyone seriously who thinks they're different" to "I meant foreign policy and economics" isn't shifting of positions at all?

[Mlle. Zabzie]

Pretty impressive post illustrating just how much Bill Clinton's tax policy did to attack poverty in this country. It makes me reconsider some of my distaste for extending all of the Bush tax cuts. It also illustrates how Bush's policies increased poverty.

http://www.washingto...out-of-poverty/

To get back to substance in this thread, while this may be true, is it really appropriate that the tax code should be used as a social saftey net? I propose that it shouldn't, and that the evolution of the Code as means of delivery socio-economic programs and the IRS as an administrator of these programs is a hugely negative development and has led to a (i) enforcement nightmare (as resources get redistributed from audit to administrating refundable credits etc.) and (ii) a tremendous amount of additional complexity. The purpose of the tax code should be revenue raising not advancing social policy. That doesn't mean that social policy shouldn't influence things like the progessivity of brackets, etc., but using the tax code as a direct means to alleviate poverty is bad tax policy overall.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-we-don-t-have-domestic-spying-program_745680.html

Obama says "we don't have a domestic spying program"

He went on to add that War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, and Ignorance is Strength.

[lokisnow]

Well, raising Revenue is clearly important, but the agency has Service in its name. so you could say that Clinton put the Service back in the IRS. (cribbed this quip from Dukakis).

Snark aside, I largely agree. Unfortunately, I doubt we'll ever get reform of the tax code again, Republicans have become too extreme and so far polarized from democratic overtures that you can't find a coalition of 217 that would agree to reform.