This Joe Wilson outburst has gotten me thinking. The new mantra of the right is holding themselves to the standards that outspoken liberals did when Bush was in office. Fair enough, tit-for-tat, eye-for -eye. Your cock is small, so you feel the need to make sure you get your comeuppance (God forbid one side in this ridiculous political system take the high road.) Knock yourself out proving how different your party is from the other. But where is all the outrage about how unpatriotic this is? Because I know there is a very large constituency out there that would've had a field day had someone besides a 'family values conservative' done such an act. It is terribly predictable that only one side is outraged, and the other is shrugging their shoulders. I can see it now "Harry Reid outburst has conservatives fuming over lack of respect for president." Before this turns into an us vs. them (NO CONS ARE THE WORST...NO LIBERALS ARE FUCKS) beauty contest. Lets establish that dissent is not a bad thing. Constructive dissent. That means, you know, respecting certain settings. One of those would be a presidential address to congress. Another would be a press conference (shoe throwing incident). Just a few examples. Be dissentful, but for fucks sake get ahold of yourself if you are an elected official. Hypocrisy among our electorate and elected officials is maddening. Blow the whole damn thing up as far as I'm concerned. Instead, lets make this a bit more constructive. Should elected officials be able to act like children, just like most protestors do when they get up on their soapbox? Is this an elected official following the lead of his constituency? Go with it where you want...but this thread isn't intended to showcase specific examples of hypocrisy, we all know both sides are fucked in their own wonderful way.
Good thread. It is disheartening for anyone, regardless of you position on the issue, to see how openly worried and polarized our government is. No one can be happy to know our government can't work together, and respectfully debate real issues instead of spreading fear and contempt.
Yes, as I feel this is starting to go beyond just the proper size of our government, and the effectiveness of small vs. big government policies...this is entering territory of will we ever get shit done? Or is everything going to be this polarized (or gulp...worse) for the rest of our lives regardless of how small or big the government may be.
The Republicans and Democrats already do work together, they accomplish the same things and have the same policies. On the outside, however, most people can't see this. We're too caught up in the media portrayal of differences. When it comes down to it, Republicans support socialism/fascism/corporatism (authoritarianism) just as much as the Democrats. The reason they don't openly admit to this is because if they were truly "working together" that would only make clear their shared philosophy and open up the opportunity to a third party that was in opposition to the Republicrat agenda, which is the authoritarian centralized super state. Remember Bush? Was he a conservative? No. Did people call him conservative? yes.... And I believe heckling among politicians is normal in European countries, where they don't revere their representatives as omnibenevolent God-Kings, but the current flavor of the meek. So don't cry too hard over this.
Great points, especially about the republicrat agenda. the general tone of my post was more against the ignorance that seems to infest all things politically related in this country. In all fairness, your point about european politics being structured like that is nice, but a little too hypothetical...of course other political structures operate with different cultures, norms, etc. On one hand our politicians have too much power, and are revered more than they ever should be...there should still be a certain amount of trust that doesn't exist. But in essence, yes...a guy does something that is considered completely out of line, and our black vs. white political environment turns it into "US AND THEM, SEE!" It is all too hilarious.
As usual aaronman makes some good points. Just to emphasize what he is saying, being liberal actually used to have something to do with personal freedom, or liberty. It's hard to remember that though when the current Democratic party (as well as Republican) institutes policies completely antithetical to the notion of personal freedom. Regulation, bailouts, stimulus money - these things all come with stipulations that end up limiting our freedom and privacy. And that's if we limit the playing field to what the media tells you about.