Burn a Koran day 9/11

I see your ignorance is well cultivated. I suppose that's the way you have to live your life in order to believe that England won the World Cup in 1966 fair and square.

 

And I'm sorry that you continue to quantify events with party affiliation. That was the whole point of my question, to point out that you continually do so and that you hold different groups to different standards. Well done, way to promote equality and accountability.

But, neither Conservatives nor Liberals have a principled reason to oppose it if they support the First Amendment, as any reason to oppose it would conflict with this ideal.

And for what is worth, the definition on my mac: forgiving; esp toward someone less powerful than oneself i.e. I'm more powerful than you; i.e. I'm greater than you.

 

Let idiots be idiots and don't pay attention.

 

Fantastic. So why was so much attention paid to the Ground Somewhere Non-Mosque protesters by anyone and everyone, including politicians trying to score points?

 

Entertainment. baseball is boring. the world cup is over. football season hadn't yet started.

Idiot...

 

Hey, it's the most honest answer I've yet to see on this.

 

Now where's the fun in that?

I think they should buy more Korans just to burn them. You know, so they inadvertently fund terrorism.

 

I've asked before, but is there some sort of copyright on a thousand year old text? Or some sort of Koran licensing agreement that dictates royalties be paid?

 

Last night, in fact, during AJE's broadcasts from their Washington desk (with the inimitable Shihab Rattansi anchoring), they spent probably their longest segment of the half-hour repeated news bulletin ON THAT VERY THING.

They showed and ran audio of the big old interfaith meeting of holy dudes and dudettes who ended up forming as result of this controversy and aired their statement in response to this and all other nutjobs who have been soiling themselves over the whole thing and acting erratically.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that people continue to harbor these out-of-whack notions about Al Jazeera since most providers either don't air it or stick it on horrendous lefty channels way down the program guide (and even there they only air a half-hour to an hour a day). If it were offered as its own news channel (that you didn't have to pay $15/month for) it would instantly become the highest quality news channel in the US. Hell, its US bureau is already a better news organization than any of the native ones, as far as I can tell. Even Russia Today's Washington desk is an improvement over most of Fox or MSNBC's bullshit.

 

Nor General Electric.

 

Oh my f-in god. First, I did not mention "party affiliation". I'm sorry that you think it would help your argument if I did, but I didn't.

Second, I, and people should, critically analyze those in public life who associate with conservatism or liberalism (or something else) to determine if the views they are espousing are principled based on core ideological beliefs, or if they are simply espousing a view that is politically expedient.

So for example, take a person who claims to be and/or generally associates himself with Social conservativism like Sarah Palin. Generally, a social conservative will have a very different view of the First Amendment than a Progressive Liberal. For example, a social conservative will normally say that flag burning is not a constitutional right guaranteed by the First Amendment. If you were an adult in the late 80s and early 90s, you will know something about this in a practical sense. now if Sarah Palin tweets against a flag burning, it might be politically expedient, but also I believe she will actually genuinely believe, as a social conservative, that this conduct is not or shouldn't be protected by the Constitution.

However, if she is silent when someone wants to burn a Quran, what does that tell us? As a voter and member of the American public, does that tell you anything steve-o? It tells me that her silence is mere political expedience, and not based on principled and consistent intellectual ideas. In other words, she has no integrity on this particular issue.

You can do the same analysis, except backwards, with Keith Olbermann. He is a person who I'm sure has an expansive view of the first amendment and indeed the Bill of Rights. A view that is anathema to social conservatives. So when he starts harping on how important it is not to burn the quran for the troops sake, he's being disingenuous, he is showing no integrity on the issue. Because I am sure he would be the first to defend my right to protest a war even if the generals said it was a bad idea. So he is using this issue for political expediency.

What you are trying to do is the opposite of equality and accountability. You want to treat all ideas and all political persuasions as the same, but they of course, as any non simple minded person would know, they are not. But in doing so, you are judging people and their ideas unequally because you are actually denying that -- to use another example -- a fiscal conservative would be hypocritical for supporting deficit spending during economic peaks while a progressive liberal might not be. This is the opposite of accountability, it is the opposite of equality.

And for what it's worth, you were wrong twice about the meaning of the word magnanimous.

 

That's four words.

 

Pastor Dipshit was on Nightline. Said he will be armed on Saturday. Unsurprisingly he's gotten death threats

I think this church is in bad financial shape. Maybe someone will quietly pay off their debts and that will be God telling him to call this idiocy off

 

You're right, you didn't say "party affiliation," but you have repeatedly used liberal and conservative. You are affiliating an action, an ideal, with a political party. Today, it is quite clear that political ideology is synonymous with party affiliation.

So, you don't see a problem with the two conflicting views and the current divide between Republicans and Democrats, I mean, conservatives and liberals?

Sarah Palin is wrong to oppose flag burning, just as Olbermann is wrong to oppose burning the Quran. Now, that doesn't mean that they both can't say that either form of protest is stupid, or counter-productive. That is where your disconnect is, that saying something is stupid is opposing it altogether.

"Its stupid, but its well within your right to act in such a manner, go right ahead..."

You continually say that I'm wrong about the meaning of the word. I have posted multiple definitions. You have posted nothing, care to back up what you say?

 

You don't see the difference between philosophical ideology and political party? Really truly?

Western democracy has thrived because it has been able to, by and large, accommodate competing ideologies in the marketplace of ideas. The problem isn't ideology. A problem arises when politicians put disingenuous political expediency before ideology, and when political power is put ahead of principle.

"Conflicting views" are natural and democratic (small "d"). What Obama has been talking about -- to his credit -- is that right now in our democracy, expediency is trumping policy, craving for power trumping trumping principle. And THAT is the problem.

Your view, that any conservative/liberal, or republican/democratic divide is somehow false is incredibly naive, not just politically but intellectually. There is no fundamental american truth, as Glenn Beck would have you believe.

 

Given his posting history, why in the world would you think that he understands that difference?

Good rest of the post though...

 

Hey all, Gainesville resident here. Until now, I have never lived in a place that was attracting so much national and international attention.

The Dove World Outreach Center, despite the fact that their congregation is only 50 or so "mouth breathers," to borrow from a poster earlier in the thread, has made quite a splash in the community. They sent their kids to school in shirts that say "Islam is of the Devil"-- this is largely responsible for the fact that Gainesville Public Schools now require school uniforms for the first time in decades, if ever. They also send their agitators onto the University of Florida campus from time to time.

Gainesville is certainly not embracing these nutjobs. This is basically a university town, so it's fairly liberal, especially for northern Florida. The city and other churches in town have organized a multitude of counter-events, from interfaith prayers to community gatherings downtown. We are a city that recently elected an out gay man as mayor, so that right there is a pretty good sign that the Dove World idiots are anathema to the majority of Gainesville residents. There will no doubt be scores of college students and others who park themselves across the street from Dove World in order to counter-protest-- I would guess that far more will counter-protest than will actually burn Korans.

I wish that the national media was making it more clear that this is NOT a popular church, and it is looked down upon by the rest of the community. However, as many of you have pointed out, that won't matter to people who will take this as an excuse to act irrationally.

I wonder if Terry Jones bothered to get any Korans in Arabic-- because if not, you COULD argue that he's not ACTUALLY burning any Korans, since it is still viewed as legitimate word of God only in Arabic. Just sayin'.

 

Well said. I'm sure it isn't making other Gainesville residents all that happy to be looped in with this Koran-burning church.

I think they ran a South Park episode years ago highlighting the humorous gutted opposition people in this country have. Not quoting SP as true, but they showed us attacking Iraq and at the same time protesting it, which inevitably rationalized our fighting there.

You got to love free speech, but when you are placing targets on our soldiers' backs, you better think twice about exercising it.

 

Now be fair. He may have meant that he was going to get on an airplane, call someone else on the plane, not identify himself, and say "bomb."

 

As a snobby, superior new yorker, allow me to tell you that neither I, nor anyone I know see this asshole as being a reflection of Gainseville, Florida, or the south generally.

Don't get me wrong, I still think you're a bunch of rednecks, but not this.

 

Yes. But in today's media and political climate, they are one in the same.

That was my point. That partisan politics have taken hold and what I took form your original post was that a Conservative being silent can only be construed one way, a Conservative voicing and opinion can only be construed one way, and vice versa for a Liberal.

I never said it was false, I said it is currently part of the problem. Maybe I didn't make myself clear.

When you answer my question about why small business should be subject to tax cuts and not large corporations, then you can talk.

This

 

And that is why it's critical, absolutely critical, to put anyone's alleged ideology to the test. That is the only way we can break through the media and political hype.

But you see that as "discrimination". You want to do the opposite. That's idiotic.