Republican Unreality

[courseofhistory]

The republicans might have a few good ideas if they were based in reality. Or is it a case of not caring about the general welfare of US citizens as stated in the Preamble to the US Constitution?

Mitt Romney’s choice of Paul Ryan as his running mate is the latest episode in a story of conflict within the Republican Party that has many chapters. It has been said a thousand times that, in the long competition between the party’s radical base and its slightly less radical leadership (there are no moderates anywhere in sight in the GOP these days), the choice of the extreme budget-cutter Ryan represents a shift toward the extreme base, and that is certainly true. But it is also a development in another, related story.

The record of the last decade or so suggests that the party these days is animated by two main goals. First, it seeks unchallengeable, absolute power. Its modus operandi for achieving that goal has been to use institutional power—the power of corporations, courts and legislatures—to acquire more institutional power. A recent case is the drive in Republican-dominated states around the country to disenfranchise Democratic-leaning constituencies, such as the poor and minorities, by legislating onerous requirements for voting.

The other goal has been a less familiar one. More and more, Republicans have exhibited a strong desire to take up residence in an imaginary world, an alternate reality—one in which global warming is found to be a fraud perpetrated by the world’s top scientists, Obama turns out to have been born in Kenya and is a Muslim (and a socialist), budgets can be slashed without social pain, firing government employees reduces unemployment, tax cuts for the wealthy replenish government coffers, and so forth. Perhaps it seems odd to identify such an objective as a political goal, but past ideological movements of the left as well as the right offer many examples of the power of such a longing.

Conscientious fact-checkers in the media have rebutted individual items that make up the GOP’s factitious universe. Such efforts are always worthwhile but are likely to backfire with the believers. When ideology takes over from reality, fantasy is not a disadvantage for the believers; it is the source of appeal. The deceptions are then popular not in spite of their untruthfulness but precisely because of it. When the target of the insurrection is not only some hated rival or establishment but the factual universe, with all its unwelcome restrictions and psychological burdens, then the more flagrant the violation of truth, the keener the thrill.

...

LINK

 

[beretta304]

You could just as easily substitute the Democrat Party there.

 

[Oddball]

The Nation...Nothing to see here.

 

[beretta304]

The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, it is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.

Garbage in, Garbage out!

 

[courseofhistory]

The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, it is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.

Garbage in, Garbage out!

So let me be sure to get this straight. Anything published in a leftist publication is to be discounted but everything from the right is the gospel? Gotcha'! What a way to debate! I'll have to remember that response! Kind of cuts discussions short!

 

[ItsjustmeIthink]

The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, it is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.

Garbage in, Garbage out!

So let me be sure to get this straight. Anything published in a leftist publication is to be discounted but everything from the right is the gospel? Gotcha'! What a way to debate! I'll have to remember that response! Kind of cuts discussions short!

Whhhy of course! Anything from a non-right leaning source is garbage, junk, useless and irrelevant information with no basis of reality. Its all made up, partisan nonsense.

Everything from right leaning sources on the other hand, is the truth and nothing but the truth...

...conservatives have mastered the use of the double-standard.

 

[Charles_Main]

The republicans might have a few good ideas if they were based in reality. Or is it a case of not caring about the general welfare of US citizens as stated in the Preamble to the US Constitution?

Mitt Romney’s choice of Paul Ryan as his running mate is the latest episode in a story of conflict within the Republican Party that has many chapters. It has been said a thousand times that, in the long competition between the party’s radical base and its slightly less radical leadership (there are no moderates anywhere in sight in the GOP these days), the choice of the extreme budget-cutter Ryan represents a shift toward the extreme base, and that is certainly true. But it is also a development in another, related story.

The record of the last decade or so suggests that the party these days is animated by two main goals. First, it seeks unchallengeable, absolute power. Its modus operandi for achieving that goal has been to use institutional power—the power of corporations, courts and legislatures—to acquire more institutional power. A recent case is the drive in Republican-dominated states around the country to disenfranchise Democratic-leaning constituencies, such as the poor and minorities, by legislating onerous requirements for voting.

The other goal has been a less familiar one. More and more, Republicans have exhibited a strong desire to take up residence in an imaginary world, an alternate reality—one in which global warming is found to be a fraud perpetrated by the world’s top scientists, Obama turns out to have been born in Kenya and is a Muslim (and a socialist), budgets can be slashed without social pain, firing government employees reduces unemployment, tax cuts for the wealthy replenish government coffers, and so forth. Perhaps it seems odd to identify such an objective as a political goal, but past ideological movements of the left as well as the right offer many examples of the power of such a longing.

Conscientious fact-checkers in the media have rebutted individual items that make up the GOP’s factitious universe. Such efforts are always worthwhile but are likely to backfire with the believers. When ideology takes over from reality, fantasy is not a disadvantage for the believers; it is the source of appeal. The deceptions are then popular not in spite of their untruthfulness but precisely because of it. When the target of the insurrection is not only some hated rival or establishment but the factual universe, with all its unwelcome restrictions and psychological burdens, then the more flagrant the violation of truth, the keener the thrill.

...

LINK

More Pure Partisan Hackery from the Guy who initially tried to pretend he was a Right winger who had suddenly decided to Vote for Obama.

lol

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

You could just as easily substitute the Democrat Party there.

You didn't read the OP.

 

[Oddball]

You could just as easily substitute the Democrat Party there.

You didn't read the OP.

Yeah, that screed of straw man arguments, unattributed sources, hyperbole, projection and plain old fashioned demagoguery was read...It's just standard fare from the hacks at The Nation, whose born-with-a-silver-enema-nozzle up her ass publisher hasn't visited reality in her entire life.

IOW, nothing to see here.....

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

You could just as easily substitute the Democrat Party there.

You didn't read the OP.

Yeah, that screed of straw man arguments, unattributed sources, hyperbole, projection and plain old fashioned demagoguery was read...It's just standard fare from the hacks at The Nation, whose born-with-a-silver-enema-nozzle up her ass publisher hasn't visited reality in her entire life.

IOW, nothing to see here.....

1. global warming is found to be a fraud perpetrated by the world’s top scientists
2. Obama turns out to have been born in Kenya and
3. is a Muslim
4. (and a socialist),
5. budgets can be slashed without social pain,
6. firing government employees reduces unemployment,
7. tax cuts for the wealthy replenish government coffers,

#1, #4, #6, and #7 are believed by the overwhelming majority of righties