I'm sorry, but the rhetoric from BOTH sides is over the top, and unproductive.

[cherokeeprogressive]

In my 48 years, I have NEVER seen the divide between left and right this bad, and having had two uncles in Vietnam, I was paying attention a lot earlier than most people my age. I was still a single digit midget when they left. I watched the news every day with my parents and grandparents and was subjected to the things they believed. My mom put a Nixon/Agnew button on my shirt one day for god's sake, and I was only in third grade. Needless to say, my teacher took it off. I didn't even know what it meant.

What I'm getting from BOTH sides is something like "We're angelic, and THEY'RE evil". Now I KNOW I'm not the brightest bulb on the board, sharpest knife in the drawer or tool in the shed, shiniest hubcap on the car, or however the fuck you choose to phrase it. What I am is concerned that sooner or later, there WILL be ideologically driven violence.

I think if one were able to put ideology aside, and look at both parties objectively, it would be evident that we're largely the same in a lot of ways. We decry what THEY do when they're in power, and in some strange way we feel justified in doing the same thing when WE'RE in power.

We wanted to march with torches and pitchforks when the rethugs instituted the Patriot Act. Yet, when OUR guy is in power, when OUR party is in power, and it gets extended? Well... it needed to be. When George Bush was President, I saw posts nearly every day about warrantless wiretapping. When OUR guy is President? Not so much. Daily posts about Guantanamo Bay. Now? Not so much. Escalation in Afghanistan? Needed. Killing 22 people with a missile from a drone in an attempt to kill ONE Taliban leader? Sucks, but hey, we got our guy. Today, their words are hate speech gone over the line of treason. Back then? Our words were reasoned and just when we were calling for George Bush's arrest if he travelled overseas.

It isn't going to be a "class war" when it starts. It's going to be an ideological one. WE have just as many millionaires/billionaires/gazillionaires as they do. We have people who are money/aires and profit from war just like they do. There are even stockholders in war driven stocks here at DU; I'd bet on it.

I'm sad, and I'm scared. Scared for what the future holds in a country where the only two viable parties who, ideology aside are so alike that their hatred of each other causes them to purposely widen the gap between right and left.

How many posts are there on rw sites where we're ridiculed and called traitors, practitioners of treason, America haters, or the like? I don't know, because I don't read RW hate sites, listen to Rush, Hannity, Beck, or other right wingers as often as some DU'ers. I'm betting though that at DU, we give as good as we get.

I don't know if there's a "happy medium". One day not long ago, I thought there might be. Now? The hatred from each side for the other makes me think that someday soon, there will be a regrettable period of violence pitting us against them.

I thought this country was better than that.

[BlooInBloo]

1. Fastest runner in the race? Brightest bulb of the bunch?

:D

[cherokeeprogressive]

18. Fastest car, brightest star, biggest rock in the barrow...

smoothest road on the map, hippest rhyme in the rap. I ain't none of those.

Hey Bloo I haven't seen you post as often as you used to. Good to see you back. I almost started one of those Leonard Nimoy type threads; "Whatever Happened To", but... well... never found the motivation.

That you decided to weigh in on a thread of mine is a feather in my cap (and mine's a cap of few feathers), even if it didn't address my point.

[BlooInBloo]

80. "hippest rhyme in the rap" - hahahahah! I'm stealing that.

As to the topic: the false equivalence thing was dumb, but the overall gist was good. And it was decently written. 7/10.

edit: To be explicit, *truth* and *falsity* break the superficial symmetry you think you perceive.

[anigbrowl]

2. Glad to give the first k&r to this excellent, insightful post. nt

[omega minimo]

3. How could anyone be a Republican? R Lite, Reagan Dems and Republicans have DESTROYED THE NATION

:evilfrown:

[cherokeeprogressive]

21. The nation hasn't been "destroyed".

Last I looked, it's still here.

When I wake up tomorrow, it will still be a federation of states. There will still be those who disagree with us. Put up your evidence that our nation has been "destroyed".

[omega minimo]

22. wake up and smell the corporatism

[treestar]

47. They did come close to destroying the spirit of the nation

in 2001-2005 when they used terra and they clearly attempted to use 911 as a Reichstag fire type of thing, to legally undermine our real freedoms. Every time they posed the idea of another atrocity of that kind, they invoked 911.

Who knows how far they'd have gotten had we not stopped them on 2006 and 2008. They were happy they were on a roll. They had us at "war" and they knew the Constitution gives the executive more power in times of war.

We've forgotten too soon what they tried to do with Padilla - assert they could detain someone on US soil, who was a US citizen, and hold that person indefinitely without trial and without access to counsel, without charge. They would have built on that until they had turned this country into a police state. And they were fine with our loss of freedom then. Remember them saying what good is freedom if you are dead?

[Winterblues]

52. Jose Padilla

Just for starters...Waterboarding...Dick Cheney....Blackwater....Katrina...Patriot Act...."War on Terror".. the list of "evidence" is really quite long.. America once was a better nation than it has evolved into over the last decade.

[Demoiselle]

55. To continue...

People dying because they don't have health insurance, families going bankrupt because of medical expenses (60 percent of all personal bankruptcies). Wall Street types very nearly destroying not just our economy but the world's, and blithely waltzing away with buckets of cash. People who crash airplanes into office buildings because they hate the IRS, and the people (elected officials) who rationalize said crashing into office buildings as justified because the IRS is so terrible. The parlous state of our public "education" system and the willingness to blame teachers for all the problems.

Then there's the fact that we sat and watched people steal a presidential election and did nothing about it. The fact that we have quite possibly the dumbest journalists/tv commentators/reporters in the Western World. And the fact that we listen to some elected officials tell us that Obama is a Socialist/Terrorist/Muslim, that the mildest social reforms will destroy our world as we know it, that voting is tyranny and that the majority should always bow to the minority, and YET we don't laugh these people all the way into Canada.
Not that Canada would want them.

I'll stop ranting now.

[hfojvt]

66. Wounded knee, Nagasaki, internment, Tuskegee airmen, my lai, slavery

Jim Crow, women couldn't vote, Dresden, Kent State, ...

There's always been plenty of bad if you wanted to look for it and pretend that it is the only thing.

[Bandit]

72. All of those things were addressed and the USA was made a better place for it

Can you say the same for the other list? It is one thing for the USA to have had atrocities in the past. The USA went in the direction of correction. When we decide to torture people as a nation or deny Americans their constitutional Rights by decree we are actually destroying the fabric of our society and all the good we have accomplished..

[FrenchieCat]

4. You equating the two sides as being the same is ridiculous,

and is the exact same meme the media is cramming down the public's throat.

Fuck that.

[saracat]

13. Actually I have to agree with some of what he says. It is hypocritical to

finds acts committed by one party acceptable when committed by another. the patriot Act is no more acceptable by a democratic president than a Republican. And the violence ensuing from the reactions of either side are wrong.

[dionysus]

58. LOL... where's all the lefties calling for violence? you're funny.

[saracat]

83. I don't say they are. I say it appears we excuse some of the same things in a Dem Admin we find

unacceptable in aGOP Admin. That has NOTHING to do with your statement whatesoever.

[wiggs]

48. Agree. There's a difference. nt

[Zoeisright]

91. [phone]

Exactly. There were NO widespread threats of assassination against representative's CHILDREN after they voted for the Iraq War.

Or after the Patriot Act vote. Or after warantless wiretapping.

Anybody equating both sides is a complete idiot.

[marmar]

5. Sorry, but the dog-whistle effect doesn't seem to be the same on the left....

nt

[Egnever]

6. And so goes human history

Cool post though

[begin_within]

7. The whole left/right thing is just a distraction, a smoke screen designed to obfuscate

the very real fact that the ruling class is screwing over everyone else, mainly through the use of the capitalist economic apparatus. The more heated the rhetoric, the more smoke generated and therefore the more effective the smoke screen. This latest uproar over so-called health care reform is all designed to hide the fact that it's yet another giveaway to corporations, this time with the beneficiaries being the insurance companies, privatizing increased profit while socializing their risk. As with NAFTA, telecommunications, all those bailouts, etc., what really happens is that a small segment of American society reaps great benefits while everyone else fights over so-called "left" and "right" issues that never get resolved, meanwhile the U.S. debt piles up ever higher and the have-nots get screwed yet again. This would still keep going on even if there was a "happy medium" or the public sector was ruled by so-called "centrists."

[Oregone]

12. +1

[sabrina 1]

15. Excellent post n/t

The rightwing antics have totally obscured the real threat to this country and while everyone is focused on that, they are preparing for the next takeover which imho will be Social Security. Those funds have been targeted for privatization for a long time.

I wonder how they'll get people on board for that one? I guess it depends on who gets the job. If it's Obama, the usual suspects will be here cheering for 'reform'. But if they feel he has used up his political capital on this last transfer of public funds into private hands, and the job goes to a Republican, the same 'suspects' will be screaming about 'fascism'. And that is why the ruling class gets away with what they do. They can count on the loyalists from both sides, to distract from what they are doing, but turning it into a sports event where all that matters is whose team wins.

[inna]

95. +1

Excellent post.

[sandnsea]

8. Sorry, they are unhinged and irrational

I have yet to meet anyone on the left who has come up with as ridiculous an assertion as the birthers. There are 100 other examples as crazy as that one, but you hang around here enough to know what they are.

The Patriot Act passed by George Bush was not extended. Wiretapping regulations have increased. Guantanamo is in the process of closing. These are not the same policies as under Bush. Regardless of that, I don't see how you could have missed the daily attacks on Obama by people who distort these policies the same way you do.

And I don't see remotely how you could miss the Afghanistan objections, they're posted more often than just about anything else.

Yes, there are drastically different ideologies in this country, wildly different. George Bush passed healthy forests and said he was doing tree thinning. If Obama passed a forest plan to make our forests healthy, and it centered on tree thinning, would you say they were doing the same thing? Would you criticize people who didn't attack "our guy", or do you know that the "thinning" under Bush really meant logging.

We know they used all these Orwellian terms to mask their agenda. Why would you pretend you suddenly can't tell the difference between their weasel words and what is really going on today.

You should be scared. If those nutballs ever get real control in this country, We Are Fucked.

[hack89]

29. 911 Truthers?

Lets not forget how Philip Berg, one of the first Birthers, got his start.

[WCGreen]

9. I think you are confusing the weight of history with the power of ideology...

Look, the reason the republicans were so vehemently opposed to Health Care Reform is the same reason liberals were against the Patriot Act. Both side know that once an article of ideology, whether it be something onerous or even something benign become law, it is virtually impossible to remove.

Once a program or practices gets going it is legislatively and bureaucratically unstoppable. Even our whole adjudication process is based on precedent with little consideration for the actual fact. This is why people falsely believe the US is a conservative nation.

The ebb and flow of government is based almost entirely on the election cycle. Big things happen in the first two years of a presidents term or they never happen. The so-called Peace and Prosperity of the Clinton Era was mainly cobbled together with changes in how financial matters were regulated here and abroad. Conflicts were fought over exchange rates and import and export policy. Clinton never had a clear political mandate in the eyes of his opposition which included large swathes of the media.

Bush was floundering because the country knew he was an accident and didn't take him seriously until 9/11. After that, the hardliners surrounding the dimmest bulb ever to occupy the oval office controlled his agenda with a big happy nod and a wink from the media.

What am I saying? situations and election cycles have always mattered more than ideology.

If anything, the US is a pragmatic nation that will accept sweeping change when they feel the time is right and the leadership is believable. We haven't had that in this country since, I hate to say this, Reagan's first term. I loath the man and everything he stood for but he was able to capture the mood of the country at the right time. It's good to see that Obama is growing into his presidency with a keen eye and ear for process. a vibrant intellectual curiosity and a healthy belief in the ability that you must take advantage of your time.

Sorry for the rambling.

[saltpoint]

10. The Tea Baggers are very loud and effectively psychotic. They're also

uninformed and proud of it. And they make bad signs.

An ideological war IS a class war when class distinctions drive the anger that the far Right feeds on, given that they are union-busters from way back.

[handmade34]

27. they make bad signs n/t

:fistbump:

[gleaner]

11. Excellent post ....

What I am taking away from it is that no matter how your ideas start, you pull closer to the other end of the spectrum as you become more extreme. As in both fascist and communist countries imprisoning intellectuals and killing them, because they question the status quo and seek positive change instead of spewing hatred and fear at the other side as a life time avocation. You are right.

The Weather Underground in the 60s advocated violent revolt against the government as did the right wing militias from their inception. Each had their own ideas of "correctness" to fuel their hatred and justify their actions. When it got down to a division though, they seemed to merge in their desire of repression for those who were different from them even if they chose different targets.

The more divided we become the less ability we have to communicate non violently to solve problems which exist for all of us. The more violence and intolerance people witness the more fearful they become for themselves, their families and loved ones and for their futures.

You can't say the whole problem is with the left or the right. I have more difficulty with conservative ideology because I don't like my life and my thoughts crammed into someone else's definitions of what I should be doing, feeling or thinking. Still when I am attacked in a post for expressing a dissenting view about this administration I get the same feeling. To a different degree, but still a push to conform and abandon my own mind which I don't do very well. And if someone shoots you for a cause you are just as dead no matter what side they started on or what rhetoric they use to justify it. I have no idea what to do about it, do you? I'm asking all of you not just OP.

In the meantime OP, you are an exceptionally bright and insightful individual and your fear is sensible. If we continue to let ourselves spiral out of control, the end results will not be what any of us want.

[laughingliberal]

62. +1000 nt

[Name removed]

14. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[FrenchieCat]

16. Exactly!

[B Calm]

28. BINGO!!! There's your answer!

[Name removed]

39. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Emit]

59. I missed it

what did the poster say?

[B Calm]

63. Nothing that the mod should have removed. Basically just said

what others have been posting about republicans threatening our politicans and their families lifes.

[Skinner]

69. Sorry. That's wrong.

The deleted post told the OP to "sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up".

If that's not a violation of our civility rules, then nothing violates our civility rules.

The moderators were correct.

[B Calm]

85. If not for that one sentence, the rest of the deleted post was spot on.

My apologies, I forgot all about that sentence.

[HughMoran]

87. lol

If not for the nuclear bomb...

[Mojeoux]

30. Total 100% Agreement (nt)

[JTFrog]

33. Thank you for telling it like it is.

:thumbsup:

[Spazito]

34. Well said! n/t

[shellgame26]

38. deleted too soon

What did he say?

[Lasher]

17. Democrats are finally starting to fight back in a war Republicans have been waging since 1980.

Wingnuts have grown accustomed to Democratic complacency after the past three decades and now they're going nuts. The whole time we have had only two choices: Fight back or continue to go along. Well it's about time we started pushing back and I hope to see more of it. A lot more.

I don't care if Rebublicans are happy or not. We've wasted way too much time and energy worrying about that. Fuck 'em.

[stevea66]

19. True, but...

I recall the anger over GW stealing the election. They threw eggs at his limo. I'm sure there were many other things, but here's the difference. GW stole an election.

The rest is history. GW lied his way into Iraq, killed more innocent Iraqi's than Saddam ever did, wore a jump suit with the "Mission Accomplished" banner behind him, instituted a torture program. That hardly compares to health reform.

Heck, the righties were calling Obama a terrorist 24 hours after he announced his candidacy.

This does go to show you, though, that we can rise above lies. Obama seems to have.

[FrenchieCat]

20. Welcome to DU.....

There are many differences, and you have named but a few.
Bush is the one that stole our resources and treasures.
If we were "the same" than that would have been us out there
protesting on September 15, 2008 with signs and shit. Instead,
we waited till November 4, 2008 and then we voted.

[Lord Magus]

23. Just say NO to false equivalency.

The right-wing nuts of the "Tea Party" are more hateful and violent than even the most extreme fringe of the left was during the Bush years.

[Turborama]

24. Very well put

Nice and succinct.

Welcome to DU.

:hi:

[gleaner]

88. If you limit it to the Bush years, that is correct ...

If you go further back in history to the 60s with the Weather Underground or the 50s in the Soviet Union when Stalin was confining his enemies in gulags and "reconditioning" them it is not. Those were extremists on the left side of the spectrum. This is not just an American phenomenon. It is a global mindset. Many countries have been down this road before and many have crashed while traversing it. I believe that was the point OP was trying to make.

Barry Goldwater. the preeminent conservative of his time used to say, "Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice." Look around at the people making the threats and taking violent actions and going crazy out in the streets and tell me if you think that is true. That is extremism. And you are seeing its face first hand. This time it is the right wingers. Next time it could as easily be someone with different political ideas. The conservative ideas are life hating to begin with in my opinion, but that doesn't mean that people with different ideologies could not act the same way if they felt sufficiently threatened. Right now the left is more rational, but we are not particularly extreme in our beliefs and we are concerned both for this country and the people who live here.

The point where concern passes being a strong push for reasonable action and slides into extremism and hate crimes is the point where we would become like them. That is the point OP was making. Be civilized. Be humane. Allow for difference and diversity and keep working hard to make this country an inhospitable place for all stripes of extremism.

[Cronus Protagonist]

25. No, you ARE the sharpest knife in the tree

Don't put yourself down so much.

[madokie]

26. The difference is we talk amongst ourselves

anger voiced is anger defused someone once said. They on the other hand are making threats, totally different.

-1

[AnOhioan]

31. K&R Although your post will not be popular here

[NWHarkness]

32. Blame the victim, huh?

There is no equivalence in the situation. Any objective observer would admit that one side's behavior has been much more egregious than the others.

When Dems impeach a GOP president on no legitimate grounds, steal a presidential election, ramrod through an illegal war and roll back civil liberties, all the while snaring and spitting at anyone who disagrees with them, then come back and talk to us about how both sides are guilty of the same behavior.

[muriel_volestrangler]

35. No, I think there is a difference in degree and intent

Yes, DU said "this is outrageous", "Bush is a traitor" and "Bush/Cheney/etc. should be impeached" a lot. But we didn't advocate violence or revolution - or when a few idiots did, the mods removed it. And if someone on DU had done the equivalent of what Palin just did - tell people to 'reload' with a picture of gunsights aimed at the districts of Democratic politicians - that would have been deleted too, I think.

The difference is that the kind of rhetoric that DU used is now coming from mainstream Republican elected politicians. And the websites, like Free Republic, are advocating violence and revolution. And the readers of those websites are smashing windows and cutting gas lines. Or flying planes into IRS buildings. Things have gone to a new level - the kind of thing that DUers said on the internet now has its right wing equivalent said by national politicians on TV. And that has increased the response by the fringes of their groups (and Palin is part of their fringe).

Free Republic is out of control. If you haven't been reading it or similar site recently, then you need to, rather than guessing about what they're saying.

[mmonk]

36. There isn't much of an equivalence though I understand what you

are saying. One side is batshit crazy, prone to act on violence, and misinformed.

[depakid]

37. Two words apply in the context of these times: Cop Out

In other times, your post might have been better received.

But- based on the evidence and nature of the deal, not today.

And not reasonably foreseeably in the 2010's.

[Kahuna]

40. Dems have their crazies, but there is no comparison when it

comes to the level of dangerous behavior and rhetoric. I never heard any Dem, whether or leader or a constituent threaten bush's life in any way.

[mitchum]

41. Your concern is noted

[fascisthunter]

51. lol

[Tsiyu]

42. If you think both sides are "over the top"

you don't know what "over the top" means.

I'm 51, pal, and I can tell you that in all MY years, i have never read anything less truthful than your OP.

Most Americans want PEACE.

Most who would call themselves "conservative" want peace.

Only the small fringe of lunatics want violence and bllodshed and civil war.

THEY are the ones pushing the envelope.

Anyone who wants to excuse them by claiming 'both sides are equally to blame" is either living in a fantasy world or is a bagger himself - trying to soothe his own guilty conscience - in my opinion.

[JHB]

43. Krugman touches on this today, but he doesn't agree with OP

Both (or all) sides have a hothead contingent, as well as people who aren't usually hotheads but are worked up about things. But one big difference between the parties is that the Democratic party leadership does not condone that sort of talk and behavior. Even a place like DU, which has no direct affiliation with the party and part of whose founding purpose was to provide a place to vent, has rules limiting how far such talk can go and usually has (or at least had in the past) another contingent that challenged such heated rhetoric.

Contrast that with the Republicans: Newt Gingrich rose to prominence on heated rhetoric which reviled compromise and addressed his opposition in terms designed to evoke anger and disgust in his audiences. He actively campaigned for others to use the same tactics, and they did. Rush Limbaugh became their unofficial national ward captain for rallying them after their '92 defeat. They've only gotten worse since then, and it is accepted, condoned, and encouraged at the highest levels of the Republican party and of the conservative movement.

And there is no "happy medium" when that is the situation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/26/opinion/26krugman.html
All of this goes far beyond politics as usual. Democrats had a lot of harsh things to say about former President George W. Bush — but you’ll search in vain for anything comparably menacing, anything that even hinted at an appeal to violence, from members of Congress, let alone senior party officials.

No, to find anything like what we’re seeing now you have to go back to the last time a Democrat was president. Like President Obama, Bill Clinton faced a G.O.P. that denied his legitimacy — Dick Armey, the second-ranking House Republican (and now a Tea Party leader) referred to him as “your president.” Threats were common: President Clinton, declared Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina, “better watch out if he comes down here. He’d better have a bodyguard.” (Helms later expressed regrets over the remark — but only after a media firestorm.) And once they controlled Congress, Republicans tried to govern as if they held the White House, too, eventually shutting down the federal government in an attempt to bully Mr. Clinton into submission.

Mr. Obama seems to have sincerely believed that he would face a different reception. And he made a real try at bipartisanship, nearly losing his chance at health reform by frittering away months in a vain attempt to get a few Republicans on board. At this point, however, it’s clear that any Democratic president will face total opposition from a Republican Party that is completely dominated by right-wing extremists.

For today’s G.O.P. is, fully and finally, the party of Ronald Reagan — not Reagan the pragmatic politician, who could and did strike deals with Democrats, but Reagan the antigovernment fanatic, who warned that Medicare would destroy American freedom. It’s a party that sees modest efforts to improve Americans’ economic and health security not merely as unwise, but as monstrous. It’s a party in which paranoid fantasies about the other side — Obama is a socialist, Democrats have totalitarian ambitions — are mainstream. And, as a result, it’s a party that fundamentally doesn’t accept anyone else’s right to govern.

[lumberjack_jeff]

56. Conservatives only respect power and the liberal exercise thereof.

LBJ was the last Democrat they treated as an equal.

[Dappleganger]

44. Why is it that Democrats always seem to find a way to beat themselves up when they're in the right?

:banghead:

[treestar]

45. I really don't think we were like this

And the media certainly was not supportive as they are to the right wing.

And we had a legit grievance - an unnecessary war that killed people and an Administration full of people trying to, if with "legal" means, undermine the very foundations of our republic with claims of a "unitary executive" and claims they could detain without trial, anywhere in the world, by claiming the US itself was part of the "battlefield" of the "war" on terror, that they could detain people without access to lawyers, indefinitely, and based on less than a standard of probable cause that a crime had been committed. All of that may sound boring and legalistic, but it had real results.

These people are just afraid they may pay a few dollars in taxes that may be used to help someone else. They are even against something that will help themselves, just to be spiteful that there is a black President. Did they whine this much when social security passed, or try to be so violent?

[Fumesucker]

46. Oh please...

When an armed liberal walks into a right wing church with the express aim of killing as many conservatives as possible you might have a point..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knoxville_Unitarian_Universalist_church_shooting

On July 27, 2008, a politically motivated fatal shooting took place at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States. Motivated by a desire to kill liberals and Democrats, gunman Jim David Adkisson fired a shotgun at members of the congregation during a youth performance of a musical, killing two people and wounding seven others.

[seabeyond]

49. i like to be as balanced as i possibly can, and it is dishonest to compare dems and repugs....

there is absolutely total evidence and fact that support the right uses hate, anger, aggressive behavior as opposed to dems.

i walked away from the repugs and christians in 2003 because of the escalation of dishonesty (lies), hate, being fed by christian right and repugs. unless they are actually called on it, unless the repugs themselves, and christians stand up and speak out, these groups can never come to a balance. to a place that you are actually looking for from what you type in your OP.

you are only enabling them to take it further with rhetoric that both sides do it.

[madokie]

89. exactly the way I see it too

you've done a much better job of saying it than I did on my own.
Democrats do not do this shit that the pukes are doing now ever. We don't work that way, period. :hi:

[seabeyond]

90. yes. and to shift blame to both sides is to null and void discussion and allow to fester. i am

more angry at the people that refuse truth, bury head in sand to try an appease than the people actually ignorant about facts so angry adn violent. the appeasers JOB in understanding issue should be to bring forth the truth. it is not painful, hurtful.... but truth hey... wtf, ... can set all of us free.

i really really am bothered by those that want to end it with.... both sides do it.

[fascisthunter]

50. BOTH sides? I don't think so...

what a bunch of bullshit

[Uzybone]

53. Nonsense. Chock full o RW talking points

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

54. You know, this barrage of false equivalence BS got old long ago.

It's the right who's acting crazy. The left is NOT. Period.

Please stop.

[B Calm]

57. Real old! It's like the OP has been visiting right wing web sites a little too much.

When did liberals threaten the lifes of the children of republican congress critters?

[Kahuna]

60. But..but..but..Eric Cantor and Fox sez so, so it must be true!

:sarcasm:

[JVS]

77. You speak the truth!

[Beetwasher]

61. You Are Out Of Your Fucking Mind

There is not a single shred of anything in your posts that would equate what is going on now with what happened under Bush.

We had millions marching in the streets, with not a single brick thrown through a window or threat on a politicians life. There were MILLIONS more of us against Bush's insane, MURDEROUS policies, but nothing that even approaches the vitriol, hate and TERRORISM that is being unleashed by this tiny minority of rabid freaks.

And our leaders in the Democratic Party would never use the type of inflammatory rhetoric filled with violent, murderous imagery that the Repubs are using. NEVER in a million years.

You are out of your goddamn mind if you think there is a shred of equivalency.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

68. No, I think the OP's mind works perfectly fine.

Look for other explanations.

[DevonRex]

64. Good grief. Unrec. nt

[hfojvt]

65. as a demonstration you seem to have been villified

for daring to suggest that Jets are not angels and Sharks not demons
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/hfojvt/122

[fishbulb703]

73. +1 nt

[Marr]

67. You should read Bob Altemeyer's "The Authoritarians".

It's not some kind of political screed-- it's a well sourced bit of sociological research.

What it really boils down to is this: you have authoritarian followers, who have trouble reasoning, follow authority without question, and possess a little well of anger bubbling inside them. And you have social dominators, who are basically amoral and will do or say anything to hold power. He found a much higher incidence of social dominators in right-wing politics, and a far, far higher incidence of authoritarian followers amongst their supporters. It makes sense, because if you were an amoral seeker of power, of you're going to go after the people who have trouble reasoning and respect authority simply for being authority.

Anyway, all that is to say the two sides are not the same at all. Not in this respect, at least.

People always try to see two sides in any fight as being equally to blame, but it's just not generally the case. You usually have one group that's anxious to engage in violence.

[DailyGrind51]

70. Any negativity was generally limited to posts, no threats or direct acts of violence occurred.

Even in 2000, when Bush was selected by a decision of the Supreme Court, despite Gore receiving the majority of the popular vote, protests from "the Left" were extremely mild.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

71. Standard two sides fallacy.

It's like claiming because people called Bush a chimp, therefore it's OK to call Obama a chimp.

[Common Sense Party]

74. Excellent common-sense post, which is why it's being unrecced.

You won't find a happy medium here, nor at Freeperville. By definition, these two sites are the extremes, or close to it.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

82. I daresay suggesting any site is comparable to FR is an insult.

And you did just that with DU.

[kctim]

75. Intelligent post

complete with responses that prove you're point.
It's THEM, not US. THEY are wrong, WE are right. Its all THEIR fault. THEY are worse. WE know best.

The exact same excuses and results you would get by posting something similar on a rightwing site.

This country WAS better than that, until the fringes took over.

[samsingh]

76. i hate when people say 'both' sides are responsible

the repugs are the ones screaming things like 'baby killer', socialist, destruction of our way of life.

what have we said? Health care is important to cover tens of millions of uninsured Americans. How are the two sides even remotely equal?

[amborin]

78. K&R this mayhem is serving the elite well: they're foisting this corporate

subsidy (aka health care "reform") on us, all the while the masses are too distracted to explore and comprehend the real ramifications of this hcr bill (of goods)

dems are suddenly "united" in condemnation of right wing madness and progressives are thoroughly silenced

[JVS]

79. False equivocation fail.

[MadBadger]

81. I think the rhetoric from our side is unproductive at times, but not over the top

[muffin1]

84. K&R

While I do believe they 'out crazy' us, you make some valid points regarding how some here react differently to almost identical policies. I will never understand how the Patriot Act is somehow better, escalation in Afghanistan is now OK, and GLBTers still not having equal rights is no big deal. These things would have NEVER been called 'chess' when bush was in office, and they shouldn't be called 'chess' now. Some people here are just refusing to see the truth. Too much emotional investment, maybe?

[HughMoran]

86. Your post foments the left versus left antagonism here

I don't even think you realize that.

[kestrel91316]

92. Compare the levels of violence, the number of dead victims of the right vs the

left and then please do rethink your comparison.

There is a huge difference between them and us: we haven't made a habit of killing and injuring them and directly threatening them with violence.

They are terrorists. We are not.

[Posteritatis]

93. (insert offensively hyperbolic statement here)

;)

Seriously though, the polarization scares me as much as the threats of violence at times.

[grantcart]

94. Disagree friend

Comparing blogosphere is a false comparison.

We can only compare elected officials who are accountable not random anonymous shouts.

Now compare Obama/Pelosi/Reid with the other side - its no comparison in civility.

How many Democratic Representatives have yelled something like "you lie" or "baby killer" from the floor of the House?

The Republican leaders have embraced the rabid hatred of the President, they wanted it to go on and never disavowed it.

This time it has been all on one side.

The irony is that it is uniting the Democrats and dividing the Republicans.

Now if you want further proof look at AZ where the standard bearer of the party is getting primaried.

The other thing that you have missed is that the Rightwing media is making money and is fanning the flames.

Again the irony is that after a while they get tired of attacking Democrats because the Democrats just ignore them.

For the last 2 years KFI in LA (largest right wing/Limbaugh station in the country) has been running attacks on the Republicans who will vote to pass any budget in the state.

They call it "heads on a stick"

Now where on the left would you find a commercial enterprize of this size conducting itself like this.


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