Ann Coulter

[MarcATL]

Yes, I am against her and her ideas. I have seen her on television, heard some of her radio interviews, read articles both by and about her, and read other of her materials. Anyone who has experienced Ann Coulter in any one of those mediums should be able to get the gist of where she stands pretty easily. I just haven't read this particular book.

And I do have some idea of what she said in the book, based on the summary I gave above. However, I don't claim to know every point she made in the book or all the reasoning she gave for her assertions, which was the point of starting this thread - to find out from someone who has read it and agrees with it. Maybe if someone can offer me up some good points, I will change my opinion that her assertion in this book is ridiculous. I didn't start this thread with a closed mind...what would be the point of that?

And it actually WOULD be an efficient method of debate, if I could find someone who is willing to back her up.

I shouldn't even be bothering to defend my reasons for starting this thread to two people now, when I explained them pretty clearly in the first post.

Monica Crowley is quickly trying to follow in her footsteps. Except she has a slight intellect twist to her brand of hate. Have you had the displeasure of seeing/hearing her?

 

[JakeStarkey]

Ann could play the role of Helen Sanchez in Joe Kidd, when he tells her to not rate herself so high, that she was "for cold nights, and lonely afternoons." Now she is a leathery faced, vampiry shaped toothy ho who looks as if she could glide on the city night breezes for liberal victims to drain of blood.

 

[ScreamingEagle]

What is with you guys? Are you just completely opposed to rational discussion? All you do is villify those who speak ideas you don't like. Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, etc. You dont actually deal with a single solitary argument you make. It's all personal attacks.

What's even more amazing most of you hate these people without listening to a single word they say or reading a single word they wrote. So you dont want to give your money to them. Go to the library. I didnt want to give my money to Ann, i went to the library. I didnt want to give my money to Obama, I went to the library.

You have to read things you dont necessarily agree with to actually speak intelligently on the subject. Ive read countless points of view from various people good and bad. Some of the ideas have been vile. But even being well read, I am not going to pretend fully understand what they are saying. They are the only ones who ever will. Yet you guys know what they say and villify them without knowing a thing. It's mindboggling.

So call Ann all the names you want. Call anyone else whatever names you wont. They arent going to make you any smarter. They arent going to convince anyone that you are correct. They will just make you look cowardly and stupid.

So what's this slick?

When that book first came out I used to go to the libray and read it.

I think I read about the first 4 chapters.

After that I skimmed the rest.

Very vile, although in an entertaining manner.

People who are actual fans of Coulter are the most hateful people in the world IMO.

I also watch FOXNews...a lot (actually watching it right now) I know what's coming from The Right. Its MOSTLY fear and hate peddling. And lies, lots and lots and lots of lies. This has been proven time and again.

Name some.

 

[iagainsti]

So NO ONE is willing to defend or even just explain the reasoning behind Ann Coulter's argument that liberalism is a religion?! Come on.

Monica Crowley is quickly trying to follow in her footsteps. Except she has a slight intellect twist to her brand of hate. Have you had the displeasure of seeing/hearing her?

I haven't, but if you're right about the slight intellect twist, that puts her a giant step above Coulter in my book so I'll have to check her out.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

I'd never buy the book for the same reason you stated.

Try the library though. Most will track it down and have a copy for you even if they have to borrow it from another library.

Although fair warning! Nothing that immoral woman has to say is worth the time for reading.

I'm sure this isn't the first thread about her.

To sum up my feelings about Ann Coulter...I feel the world was a much better place during the time her jaw was wired shut (even though she could still write, unfortunately). And I don't even consider myself a liberal!

Here's an excerpt from the back cover of "Godless: The Church of Liberalism":

Though liberalism rejects the idea of God and reviles people of faith, it bears all the attributes of a religion. In Godless, Coulter throws open the doors of the Church of Liberalism, showing us its sacraments (abortion), its holy writ (Roe v. Wade), its martyrs (from Soviet spy Alger Hiss to cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal), its clergy (public school teachers), its churches (government schools, where prayer is prohibited but condoms are free), its doctrine of infallibility (as manifest in the "absolute moral authority" of spokesmen from Cindy Sheehan to Max Cleland), and its cosmology (in which mankind is an inconsequential accident).

And an excerpt from the book itself:

"Liberals love to boast that they are not 'religious,' which is what one would expect to hear from the state-sanctioned religion. Of course liberalism is a religion. It has its own cosmology, its own miracles, its own beliefs in the supernatural, its own churches, its own high priests, its own saints, its own total worldview, and its own explanation of the existence of the universe. In other words, liberalism contains all the attributes of what is generally known as 'religion.'"

Unfortunately, as I don't want Ann Coulter to earn any money from me, I haven't purchased this book or any of her others, even though I would be very interested to read them.

So, I'd love to hear from someone who has read this book and agrees with (and can possibly offer further evidence and/or reasoning to support) the claim that "liberalism" can be considered a religion, because I for one think this has to be one of the stupidest things I've ever heard (and I've heard some pretty stupid things).

How many of her books have you read? My guess is none, yet you've already concluded that whatever she's written isn't worth reading. It's good to see you're not being the least bit bigoted.

Perhaps you should read one of her books before you make such an asinine judgement. Although I don't agree with everything she says, she does make some excellent points.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

So NO ONE is willing to defend or even just explain the reasoning behind Ann Coulter's argument that liberalism is a religion?! Come on.

Monica Crowley is quickly trying to follow in her footsteps. Except she has a slight intellect twist to her brand of hate. Have you had the displeasure of seeing/hearing her?

I haven't, but if you're right about the slight intellect twist, that puts her a giant step above Coulter in my book so I'll have to check her out.

The religion of political liberalism has three principal canons:

Nationalization of charity. Humanitarian endeavors cannot be effectively performed, nor equitably supported unless they are done by government agencies. This has the virtue of insulating its adherents from real moral claims on their personal resources. In effect, the political-moral stance that begins with the phrase-- “I support….(you can fill in the blanks with a liberal cause here)” becomes the equivalent of “I gave at the office.”


Social Marxism. This stance (going by various other names of course) dictates that a doctrine of (pretended) social equality substitutes for the now discredited ruthless redistribution of all wealth. This stance (which was really the ur-source of political correctness) allows its adherents to accomplish (or at least favor) the humiliation and social repression of those whom its shifting fashions might choose to label oppressors. This is a low cost approach to egalitarianism and protects those whose sophisticated hedonism would otherwise be criticized. The appropriately expressed politically correct bromides are the camouflage of “undeserved” well off.


Collective Expiation of guilt. Social survivor guilt, the inevitable result of a sense of “unearned” well being, is expiated by this religion’s ritual practices. These rituals, for the most part, consist of bumper stickers, public gestures, cocktail party banter, and occasional political activity in support of liberal causes.


The psychological strength of the liberal religion derives from four related developments in the human condition, mostly confined to the highly developed and prosperous communities in Europe and the Americas:



(1) The collapse of traditional religious and other transcendent moral claims on the individual among the dominant intelligentsia of the developed world;

(2) The persistent, nagging voice of residual conscience, still suffered by those anti-traditional secularists who have not yet succumbed to outright nihilism;

(3) The emperor-has-no-clothes fragility of the whole act, such that any invalidation or repudiation of a part of the doctrine threatens the whole;

(4) The deep psychological dread of any prospective return to individual accountability measured by an authoritative moral system.

Political Liberalism as Secular Religion

 

[garyd]

So check it out at the library douche bag.

 

[rdean]

Hey, I'm tired of you people ragging on Ann. She has had a really hard time. Ever since her fiance left her for a woman.

 

[Polk]

What is with you guys? Are you just completely opposed to rational discussion? All you do is villify those who speak ideas you don't like. Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, etc. You dont actually deal with a single solitary argument you make. It's all personal attacks.

People running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany" aren't worthy of having rational discussion with. If you want to be treated like an adult, be one.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

What is with you guys? Are you just completely opposed to rational discussion? All you do is villify those who speak ideas you don't like. Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, etc. You dont actually deal with a single solitary argument you make. It's all personal attacks.

People running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany" aren't worthy of having rational discussion with. If you want to be treated like an adult, be one.

List the names of those in this forum that are guilty of "running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany"".

 

[Polk]

What is with you guys? Are you just completely opposed to rational discussion? All you do is villify those who speak ideas you don't like. Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, etc. You dont actually deal with a single solitary argument you make. It's all personal attacks.

People running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany" aren't worthy of having rational discussion with. If you want to be treated like an adult, be one.

List the names of those in this forum that are guilty of "running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany"".

I was referring to Coulter et al. but this forum has a sizable number of them as well.

 

[Dr Grump]

BOOOO!!

heh, heh, heh......

 

[Intense]

So NO ONE is willing to defend or even just explain the reasoning behind Ann Coulter's argument that liberalism is a religion?! Come on.

Monica Crowley is quickly trying to follow in her footsteps. Except she has a slight intellect twist to her brand of hate. Have you had the displeasure of seeing/hearing her?

I haven't, but if you're right about the slight intellect twist, that puts her a giant step above Coulter in my book so I'll have to check her out.

Your God is The State. Your End All is The State. Your solution to every problem is mandate, which just creates more problems. The Never Ending Story.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

People running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany" aren't worthy of having rational discussion with. If you want to be treated like an adult, be one.

List the names of those in this forum that are guilty of "running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany"".

I was referring to Coulter et al. but this forum has a sizable number of them as well.

Then it should be easy enough for you to make a list.


I'll wait.

 

[Intense]

List the names of those in this forum that are guilty of "running around going "Obama is Hitler" and "He's turning America into Nazi Germany"".

I was referring to Coulter et al. but this forum has a sizable number of them as well.

Then it should be easy enough for you to make a list.


I'll wait.

Why encourage them? I can see Polk and Huggy breaking down doors at 2:00AM.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

I was referring to Coulter et al. but this forum has a sizable number of them as well.

Then it should be easy enough for you to make a list.


I'll wait.

Why encourage them? I can see Polk and Huggy breaking down doors at 2:00AM.

You make a good point. Although I wish they'd try to break down my door. I'd make Joe Horn look like a choir boy.

 

[iagainsti]

How many of her books have you read? My guess is none, yet you've already concluded that whatever she's written isn't worth reading. It's good to see you're not being the least bit bigoted.

Perhaps you should read one of her books before you make such an asinine judgement. Although I don't agree with everything she says, she does make some excellent points.

It's good to see you read so thoroughly:

Unfortunately, as I don't want Ann Coulter to earn any money from me, I haven't purchased this book or any of her others, even though I would be very interested to read them.

Doesn't sound to me like I said that whatever she's written isn't worth reading. On the contrary, the whole point of this thread is to try to understand what she's saying since I haven't had the chance to read...wait, this would be the third time I've defended my reasons for starting this thread to someone who didn't even bother to read all of what I wrote. Forget it.

 

[iagainsti]

The religion of political liberalism has three principal canons:

Nationalization of charity. Humanitarian endeavors cannot be effectively performed, nor equitably supported unless they are done by government agencies. This has the virtue of insulating its adherents from real moral claims on their personal resources. In effect, the political-moral stance that begins with the phrase-- “I support….(you can fill in the blanks with a liberal cause here)” becomes the equivalent of “I gave at the office.”


Social Marxism. This stance (going by various other names of course) dictates that a doctrine of (pretended) social equality substitutes for the now discredited ruthless redistribution of all wealth. This stance (which was really the ur-source of political correctness) allows its adherents to accomplish (or at least favor) the humiliation and social repression of those whom its shifting fashions might choose to label oppressors. This is a low cost approach to egalitarianism and protects those whose sophisticated hedonism would otherwise be criticized. The appropriately expressed politically correct bromides are the camouflage of “undeserved” well off.


Collective Expiation of guilt. Social survivor guilt, the inevitable result of a sense of “unearned” well being, is expiated by this religion’s ritual practices. These rituals, for the most part, consist of bumper stickers, public gestures, cocktail party banter, and occasional political activity in support of liberal causes.


The psychological strength of the liberal religion derives from four related developments in the human condition, mostly confined to the highly developed and prosperous communities in Europe and the Americas:



(1) The collapse of traditional religious and other transcendent moral claims on the individual among the dominant intelligentsia of the developed world;

(2) The persistent, nagging voice of residual conscience, still suffered by those anti-traditional secularists who have not yet succumbed to outright nihilism;

(3) The emperor-has-no-clothes fragility of the whole act, such that any invalidation or repudiation of a part of the doctrine threatens the whole;

(4) The deep psychological dread of any prospective return to individual accountability measured by an authoritative moral system.

Political Liberalism as Secular Religion

Well, I was hoping for Coulter's reasoning on the subject, but in a way this is even better. This guy outlines his ideas a bit more eloquently than what I've seen of Coulter's writing, and although he takes almost as many jabs at those who think differently as she does, his are more articulate.

Here goes:





"For purposes of this essay, I’m applying the term “political liberal” to the partisan liberal left, those people for whom being a “liberal”: (a) is kind of a calling, in which some one’s declaration that “I’m a liberal” sounds very much like “I’m a Seventh Day Adventist” (my apologies to all SDA’s – this is just an illustration); (b) the liberal self-identification is meant to immediately imply a specific litany – dare I say catechism -- of specific doctrines. In general these are the positions that are shared by the left wing of the Democratic Party and the Green party."

The same could easily be said of the partisan conservative right. Saying "I'm conservative" also generally implies a "litany of specific 'doctrines'" shared by the Republican party, does it not? Declaring yourself either liberal OR conservative, or declaring allegiance to any particular political party, implies taking up certain positions on certain issues. Anyone who declares themselves partisan on either side is declaring that they are, as he later says, "unwilling to deviate from 'doctrine,'" or unwilling to go against party lines on any issue.

"Beyond these silly caricatures, the same minds tend to view all military and police as small minded, atavistic brutes, and see conservatives as living in trailer parks (or as having been somehow trained in them, retaining their trailer park values as they have become indecently wealthy by selling cars). In these same minds, concern for sexual freedom and female autonomy get turned into a general doctrine that decries any attempt to regulate what adult people do with their sexual and reproductive organs. Even discussions about regulating very late term procedures to terminate an unborn fetus (whose heart is actually beating), or attempts to control children who want to escape from the “sexual tyranny” of their parents are ruled out of bounds. We must not even entertain these thoughts, lest we – God forbid – practice right wing zealotry."

As though conservatives don't have their own stereotypical views of liberals (he reveals a few of his own in this same paragraph as well as throughout the essay).

"My point here is not to debate the merits of the public policy issues that make up the catechism of the left, but to explore the notion that, collectively, these views are a catechism."

Finally, the argument itself?

"There is no better explanation for the extreme resistance of the “political liberal” group to all rational argument."

That is a wide generalization that could just as easily be (and has been) made by liberals about conservatives, and I don't see its relevance to the argument.

"The political liberal mindset is dominant in a number of parts of this country. It is held by self-styled “sophisticated and thoughtful” people who vigorously reject the very idea that their belief system constitutes an ideology. Of course, when they deviate from the main doctrine, they tend to speak very softly indeed."

Again, the same could be said about partisan conservatives who deviate from the main conservative doctrine...oh, wait, conservative views are not "doctrine," although he has not yet explained why they are not while liberal ones are.

"Liberalism in this form is a secular religion. This religion originated, innocently enough, as an attempt to off-load the entire charitable and humanitarian enterprise to the regulatory and social action agencies of government. Somehow, it has survived the demise of national and international socialism by appealing to some of the very groups who were threatened by the former ideologies."

Again the statement that liberalism is a religion, but no clear reasoning yet as to why partisan liberal views should be seen as akin to religious views.

For the rest of the essay, he goes on to explain the canons of liberal religion and why he thinks the liberal religion has such a strong hold on its "followers," which is the part that you posted. This elaborates on his view of the liberal religion, but does not offer any argument as to WHY liberalism should be considered a religion.

This part, although it also does not constitute an argument, is really interesting and is also the only part of the essay that I think I might agree with.

"The last point raises a particularly frightening scenario for those liberals who lack refuge in “Plan B” (i.e., the resort to the supporting infrastructure of a transcendent, stable belief system supported by a community of co-believers, in effect, to religion). For these minds, having rejected the classical tradition and lacking the safety net of ordinary religion (which has been rejected by liberalism-as-secular-religion as the construct of atavistic superstition), the prospect of such a return to individual (as opposed to collective) moral accountability represents either of two unacceptable alternatives:

(5) A return to a moral system in which one’s own conduct is seen again as “sinful” or

(6) A condition of moral free fall in which civil order is threatened. Either choice threatens the comfortable cocoons of protected, gentile hedonism in which the followers of liberalism-as-religion hope to live out their anxious lives."

However, all this is really saying is that liberals don't want to answer to an actual religious authority because that would mean answering to a moral authority other than their own. This is debatable and would require going off on a long tangent.





The main thing that bothers me about the argument that he didn't make, but very much implied, is this: all liberals are not atheists, just like all conservatives do not believe in God. To generalize either in this way would be a fallacy of logic. The entire argument of liberalism being a religion seems to me to rest on the idea that liberals do not believe in God, and therefore adhere to their political beliefs as though they were religious beliefs, while conservatives all answer to a higher moral authority because they are all God-fearing individuals.

Also, to claim that liberalism is a religion you must specify what qualities constitute a religion, which he did not. The idea of liberalism, or any political identity for that matter, being classified as a religion rests very strongly on how you define "religion."

What bothers me about your post as a whole is that you copied and pasted this dude's argument without explaining why it makes sense to you or backing it up with any of your own points, which wasn't really what I was looking for...although his essay is an interesting read and I'm glad you linked to it. It seems like you do have some strong opinions on the matter, though, and I'd be interested to hear them, and also what you make of my response to his essay.

 

[Intense]

The religion of political liberalism has three principal canons:

Nationalization of charity. Humanitarian endeavors cannot be effectively performed, nor equitably supported unless they are done by government agencies. This has the virtue of insulating its adherents from real moral claims on their personal resources. In effect, the political-moral stance that begins with the phrase-- “I support….(you can fill in the blanks with a liberal cause here)” becomes the equivalent of “I gave at the office.”


Social Marxism. This stance (going by various other names of course) dictates that a doctrine of (pretended) social equality substitutes for the now discredited ruthless redistribution of all wealth. This stance (which was really the ur-source of political correctness) allows its adherents to accomplish (or at least favor) the humiliation and social repression of those whom its shifting fashions might choose to label oppressors. This is a low cost approach to egalitarianism and protects those whose sophisticated hedonism would otherwise be criticized. The appropriately expressed politically correct bromides are the camouflage of “undeserved” well off.


Collective Expiation of guilt. Social survivor guilt, the inevitable result of a sense of “unearned” well being, is expiated by this religion’s ritual practices. These rituals, for the most part, consist of bumper stickers, public gestures, cocktail party banter, and occasional political activity in support of liberal causes.


The psychological strength of the liberal religion derives from four related developments in the human condition, mostly confined to the highly developed and prosperous communities in Europe and the Americas:



(1) The collapse of traditional religious and other transcendent moral claims on the individual among the dominant intelligentsia of the developed world;

(2) The persistent, nagging voice of residual conscience, still suffered by those anti-traditional secularists who have not yet succumbed to outright nihilism;

(3) The emperor-has-no-clothes fragility of the whole act, such that any invalidation or repudiation of a part of the doctrine threatens the whole;

(4) The deep psychological dread of any prospective return to individual accountability measured by an authoritative moral system.

Political Liberalism as Secular Religion

Well, I was hoping for Coulter's reasoning on the subject, but in a way this is even better. This guy outlines his ideas a bit more eloquently than what I've seen of Coulter's writing, and although he takes almost as many jabs at those who think differently as she does, his are more articulate.

Here goes:





"For purposes of this essay, I’m applying the term “political liberal” to the partisan liberal left, those people for whom being a “liberal”: (a) is kind of a calling, in which some one’s declaration that “I’m a liberal” sounds very much like “I’m a Seventh Day Adventist” (my apologies to all SDA’s – this is just an illustration); (b) the liberal self-identification is meant to immediately imply a specific litany – dare I say catechism -- of specific doctrines. In general these are the positions that are shared by the left wing of the Democratic Party and the Green party."

The same could easily be said of the partisan conservative right. Saying "I'm conservative" also generally implies a "litany of specific 'doctrines'" shared by the Republican party, does it not? Declaring yourself either liberal OR conservative, or declaring allegiance to any particular political party, implies taking up certain positions on certain issues. Anyone who declares themselves partisan on either side is declaring that they are, as he later says, "unwilling to deviate from 'doctrine,'" or unwilling to go against party lines on any issue.

"Beyond these silly caricatures, the same minds tend to view all military and police as small minded, atavistic brutes, and see conservatives as living in trailer parks (or as having been somehow trained in them, retaining their trailer park values as they have become indecently wealthy by selling cars). In these same minds, concern for sexual freedom and female autonomy get turned into a general doctrine that decries any attempt to regulate what adult people do with their sexual and reproductive organs. Even discussions about regulating very late term procedures to terminate an unborn fetus (whose heart is actually beating), or attempts to control children who want to escape from the “sexual tyranny” of their parents are ruled out of bounds. We must not even entertain these thoughts, lest we – God forbid – practice right wing zealotry."

As though conservatives don't have their own stereotypical views of liberals (he reveals a few of his own in this same paragraph as well as throughout the essay).

"My point here is not to debate the merits of the public policy issues that make up the catechism of the left, but to explore the notion that, collectively, these views are a catechism."

Finally, the argument itself?

"There is no better explanation for the extreme resistance of the “political liberal” group to all rational argument."

That is a wide generalization that could just as easily be (and has been) made by liberals about conservatives, and I don't see its relevance to the argument.

"The political liberal mindset is dominant in a number of parts of this country. It is held by self-styled “sophisticated and thoughtful” people who vigorously reject the very idea that their belief system constitutes an ideology. Of course, when they deviate from the main doctrine, they tend to speak very softly indeed."

Again, the same could be said about partisan conservatives who deviate from the main conservative doctrine...oh, wait, conservative views are not "doctrine," although he has not yet explained why they are not while liberal ones are.

"Liberalism in this form is a secular religion. This religion originated, innocently enough, as an attempt to off-load the entire charitable and humanitarian enterprise to the regulatory and social action agencies of government. Somehow, it has survived the demise of national and international socialism by appealing to some of the very groups who were threatened by the former ideologies."

Again the statement that liberalism is a religion, but no clear reasoning yet as to why partisan liberal views should be seen as akin to religious views.

For the rest of the essay, he goes on to explain the canons of liberal religion and why he thinks the liberal religion has such a strong hold on its "followers," which is the part that you posted. This elaborates on his view of the liberal religion, but does not offer any argument as to WHY liberalism should be considered a religion.

This part, although it also does not constitute an argument, is really interesting and is also the only part of the essay that I think I might agree with.

"The last point raises a particularly frightening scenario for those liberals who lack refuge in “Plan B” (i.e., the resort to the supporting infrastructure of a transcendent, stable belief system supported by a community of co-believers, in effect, to religion). For these minds, having rejected the classical tradition and lacking the safety net of ordinary religion (which has been rejected by liberalism-as-secular-religion as the construct of atavistic superstition), the prospect of such a return to individual (as opposed to collective) moral accountability represents either of two unacceptable alternatives:

(5) A return to a moral system in which one’s own conduct is seen again as “sinful” or

(6) A condition of moral free fall in which civil order is threatened. Either choice threatens the comfortable cocoons of protected, gentile hedonism in which the followers of liberalism-as-religion hope to live out their anxious lives."

However, all this is really saying is that liberals don't want to answer to an actual religious authority because that would mean answering to a moral authority other than their own. This is debatable and would require going off on a long tangent.





The main thing that bothers me about the argument that he didn't make, but very much implied, is this: all liberals are not atheists, just like all conservatives do not believe in God. To generalize either in this way would be a fallacy of logic. The entire argument of liberalism being a religion seems to me to rest on the idea that liberals do not believe in God, and therefore adhere to their political beliefs as though they were religious beliefs, while conservatives all answer to a higher moral authority because they are all God-fearing individuals.

Also, to claim that liberalism is a religion you must specify what qualities constitute a religion, which he did not. The idea of liberalism, or any political identity for that matter, being classified as a religion rests very strongly on how you define "religion."

What bothers me about your post as a whole is that you copied and pasted this dude's argument without explaining why it makes sense to you or backing it up with any of your own points, which wasn't really what I was looking for...although his essay is an interesting read and I'm glad you linked to it. It seems like you do have some strong opinions on the matter, though, and I'd be interested to hear them, and also what you make of my response to his essay.

The Root of Conservatism V.S. the Root of Liberalism.

Conservatism is Rooted in Inalienable Rights, Government by The Consent of the Governed. Madison Type Federalism, with Strong State and Individual Identities.

Liberalism is Rooted in Government of The Empire being the End All to every concern. The People satisfied with conforming to the edicts of their betters, in the Governing body, whom arbitrarily set policy. Religion is aloud, only as it conforms and Submits to Government First Policy. The Individual Must Surrender to The Society as a Whole, which submits to Government as a whole. The Individual is nothing outside of Society. In short Hamilton Type Federalism.

The Saga continues.

 

[Justin Case]

I love Ann Coulter



and I can help ya out but it's late, good night

Fuck me, do you know how badly I want to make love to Ann Coulter.

It would be like the perfect storm, the sex would kill thousands, nay I say it would kill hundreds of thousands, the passion would ignite a new ideology capable of making humankid rant in orgasmic bliss.

Where are you Ann?

Where are you?

I could do some great things with Ann between the sheets, in the car, on the floor, on the table.....pretty much anywhere!