NYCmetsfan
Banned
I'm done with the greenwald stuff. I don't like him and think his reporting as been suspect in certain important aspects. That's about it.
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PoliGAF 2013 |OT3| 1,000 Years of Darkness and Nuclear Fallout
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So you're worried that internet rage will encourage a malicious leaker (like an ideological spy?) and you're blaming Greenwald for that?
I don't know man, I think your personal dislike of Greenwald is getting to your argumentation ability
.Good, he was never the issue.
I definitely agree, though in my mind that responsibility is first and foremost to report the news accurately and completely. As many other outlets proved before the Snowden disclosures put them in a bind, you can rack up page after page of neutral, fair, balanced headlines and still somehow miss what news can be and can do.
PhoenixDark
Banned
The vitriol and hate Greenwald receives on the left is pretty crazy. I don't think anyone is like that here, but search his name on twitter and you'll see some crazy stuff. Better yet, google "Greenwald racist" for some lols.
NYCmetsfan
Banned
I know I said no more but I remembered this Chait piece sums up why I dislike Greenwald and his style.
The debate over domestic surveillance is not a debate about what we think about Glenn Greenwald. But Greenwald is a fascinating character. His resemblance to Ralph Nader is not one that, so far as I can tell, anybody has thought to make. But the resemblance is striking. It’s not a resemblance of historical place — Greenwald is neither going to lead a new regulatory wave nor get a Republican elected president. The resemblance is characterological and ideological.
For Greenwald, like Nader, the lawyer is the key protagonist in his political drama. Political victory is a series of successful lawsuits. He is wildly litigious:
In 1997, Achatz and Greenwald filed another lawsuit for broken elevators in their building. (They lived on the 32nd floor.) They later moved into another building in Midtown Manhattan, and countersued after being sued by that landlord for having a dog that weighed more than 35 pounds. They sued American Airlines and its parent company for not placing the right number of miles flown in their frequent-flier account.
Greenwald, like Nader, marries an indefatigable mastery of detail with fierce moralism. Every issue he examines has a good side and an evil side. Greenwald, speaking not long ago to the New York Times, said something revealing about his intellectual style:
“I approach my journalism as a litigator,” he said. “People say things, you assume they are lying, and dig for documents to prove it.”
That is a highly self-aware account. Of course, the job description of a litigator does not include being fair. You take a side, assume the other side is lying, and prosecute your side full tilt. It’s not your job to account for evidence that undermines your case — it’s your adversary’s job to point that out.
I won’t pretend to be neutral here — I’ve tangled with Greenwald numerous times. So, for instance, he called me a “McCain worshiper,” and it is true that I have written some highly favorable things about John McCain. I’ve also written some highly critical things. I pointed out to Greenwald that, when I have called McCain, among other things, a “dangerous sociopath,” it would at least complicate the picture in such a way as to preclude me from being called a “worshiper.” But no, Greenwald dug in deeper, assembling all the evidence he could muster for his side and ignoring all the evidence pointing in the opposite direction.
Greenwald, like Nader, does not believe in meliorist progress. If you are not good, you are evil. Even at the heyday of his career, when he was one of the most powerful figures in America and his brand of crusading regulation reigned nearly unchallenged, Nader was constantly denouncing congressional liberal allies for failing to pass sufficiently pure iterations:
In 1970, Nader championed a report by his staff savaging Ed Muskie, the liberal senator from Maine. Muskie, who helped engineer the Air Quality Act of 1967, had a reputation as an environmental ally, but Nader's report called the act "disastrous," adding, "That fact alone would warrant his being stripped of his title as 'Mr. Pollution Control.'"
That same year, the Senate overwhelmingly passed a bill to create a Consumer Protection Agency (CPA), what Nader called his highest legislative goal. But, just days after praising the bill, Nader turned against it, saying that "intolerable erosions" had rendered the bill "unacceptable." As Martin writes, "Without Nader's backing, the bill lost momentum" and died in committee. The pattern repeated itself, as the CPA passed either the House or the Senate five more times over the next six years, but Nader rejected every bill as too compromised.
That is the echo of Greenwald’s suspicions of the Democratic agenda. President Obama scaled back some of the Bush administration’s anti-terror policies — torture, warrantless wiretapping — but kept in place others. One could make the case that he did not change enough, but that is not a Greenwald sort of argument. He insists that Obama is worse than Bush. Obama’s health-care reform was not just a step along the way to Greenwald’s ideal, it was a monstrous sellout that probably did no good at all (“there is a reasonable debate to be had among reform advocates over whether this bill is a net benefit or a net harm.”
This way of looking at the world naturally places one in conflict with most liberals, who are willing to distinguish between gradations of success or failure. Nader and Greenwald believe their analysis not only completely correct, but so obviously correct that the only motivation one could have to disagree is corruption. Good-faith disagreement, or even rank stupidity, is not possible around Greenwald. His liberal critics are lackeys and partisan shills. He may be willing to concede ideological disagreement with self-identified conservatives, but a liberal who disagrees can only be a kept man.
For Greenwald, like for Nader, the evils of liberals loom far larger than the evils of conservatives. The most annoying question in the world is the one posed to them most frequently: Aren’t the Republicans worse? They are loath to give their critics the satisfaction of an affirmative response, which they fear will justify ignoring their urgent denunciations. So much of their intellectual energy is devoted to formulating complex chains of reasoning as to why just the opposite is true. “The only difference between [Gore and Bush] is the velocity at which their knees hit the floor,” said Nader. Greenwald insisted that “even if Obama is the lesser of two evils, he’s the more effective of two evils.” Statements like this make their putative allies more nervous, or even provokes them to break with them altogether. But this only convinces them all the more deeply of their uncorruptable virtue.
JesseEwiak
Member
There's also no evidence Greenwald actually believes in any of the causes of the left, or at the very least, he'd happily abandon them to destroy the NSA and being all the troops home from every foreign military base. See this post from Lawyers, Guns, and Money (http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2012/06/my-challenge-to-glenn-greenwald).
As APK posted, Greenwald isn't interested in the reality of what you can do in modern American politics. Which is fine, as somebody whose in Brazil. But, as somebody who has to balance the fact that Obama is terrible on some civil liberties (of course, that's only if you agree with the libertarian notion that the only civil liberty that matters is privacy), but much better on every other issue than Rand Paul/Gary Johnson/libertarian of the day.
Oh, I don't know about that. He was one of the few people who was adamant in arguing for the public option during the HCR debate.
Can we stop talking about NSA stuff? That shit's so booooooooooooooooooring.
zero shift
Banned
Who gives a fuck about Greenwlad?
Oh I tell you who, people who would rather talk about him than the NSA, it's a deflection technique, nothing more, nothing less.
This technique isn't new either, it's as old as dissent.
Yeah, let's talk about how Christie polls against Clinton in Iowa.
You know, the important stuff.
Heard you were sick of spy stuff, have s'more spy stuff: http://valtinsblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/cia-cannot-confirm-or-deny-having-files.html
Not quite a Paperclipper, not quite a stranger?
I wish we had some policy to talk about, damn that congressional gridlock!
We can talk more about why Obama hasn't passed a jobs bill that would magically make it through congress.
empty vessel
Member
Can we stop referring to Democrats as "the left"? It makes the conversation difficult to follow. Democrats are the center right.
We coulda been talking about the latest reactions to the news on BENGHAZI BENGHAZI BENGHAZI.
It's a subject worth talking about, not in the retarded partisan framing that Issa and the likes are pushing though.We coulda been talking about the latest reactions to the news on BENGHAZI BENGHAZI BENGHAZI.
Uh, no. It seems to me that that would just confuse the conversation further for everyone who is not you.
Ted Cruz opens mouth. Shit falls out. As per usual.
It looks like Ted Cruz is also going to become a FULL AMERICA. He is in the process of renouncing his Canadian citizenship.
What is with these idiots and feeling they need to renounce their duel citizenship? It's just all show and tell.
It looks like Ted Cruz is also going to become a FULL AMERICA. He is in the process of renouncing his Canadian citizenship.
What is with these idiots and feeling they need to renounce their duel citizenship? It's just all show and tell.
NYCmetsfan
Banned
Why not just do away with directional politics? Where not in Jacobin france
Left and right give no useful information.
And democrats aren't center right.
In many (most?) western democracies they would be center right (and full on right wing on certain issues).
NYCmetsfan
Banned
In some aspects. In others they'd be to then left of the center left party (gay marriage is one, as are abortion rights, as well their positions on austerity in the current economic climate. Civil rights is another, there are more).
They are captialist,don't have a Marxist history and are more hawkish (though the french and british center left parties seem to point to that not being a left right thing) that's the major difference I see.
empty vessel
Member
When people talk about "the left" criticizing Greenwald, it is definitely confusing. The left is not criticizing Greenwald. Democrats are. Greenwald is of course to the left of Democrats, at least on the issues about which he concentrates. He is criticized from the right.
TacticalFox88
Banned
Anyone know the core reason of why LBJ didn't just say "Medicare for All" instead of just doing the elderly? Seems like a huge missed opportunity.
I guess you're right, but I still think think that if you make a party with the Democratic platform in most of the western world, it would be considered center right.
LBJ wanted a single payer system, so did FDR and Truman, it was just politically impossible.
It took all of Johnson's political genius (the man was a legislative superhero) to pass medicare and medicaid.
RustyNails
Member
Greenwald is good people. His coverage of the wars deserves a medal. He is a Dennis Kucinich liberal though, so sometimes he cant make out friend from foe much like Kucinich couldnt, like championing brutal asscrabs like Col. Qaddhafi over western efforts.
The Librarian
Banned
Planned to go to my local SSA office and the NC DMV. Got to both places and they were packed. Guess I'll try again next week.
NYCmetsfan
Banned
Maybe so but I've found direct cross country comparisons lacking. I also don't only look at what the party has done in power to judge it.
There is no doubt the last 3 democratic presidents have been playing on republican turf but they've all run campaigns based on the social safety net, taming the wild excess of wall st, expanding medical coverage, a more restrained foreign policy and won. Their policies in office haven't always matched up, but that misses the other forces that prevent them from waving a magic wand. Entrenched ideas about self reliance, cold war history, racial issues, and a generally slow moving political system, these all prevent many of the perfered policies of democrats from becoming law. The same thing happens in Europe and other developed nations where certain 'progressive ideas' can be blocked due to a political culture that prevents them (abortion in Ireland, religious freedom in France, etc)
And yes there are polictians in the party who sometimes don't match up with the party platform but I don't think having DSK head the IMF makes the Parti Socialiste center right.
The democratic party is based on the idea that the government has a large role to play in the economy, that people deserve help to have a fair shot and the fight for civil rights isn't over. That's center left
zero shift
Banned
For the most part yeah. However the Democratic party does support many things the center-left parties in Europe only tend to support. Such as Keynesian economics, anti-austerity, and gay marriage.
The Librarian
Banned
Leaner government, maybe, but I wouldn't say smaller. And lower taxes doesn't apply to the rich.
empty vessel
Member
I think that's right but I wasn't really trying to make any point about or impugn the party. I genuinely felt it confusing to say Greenwald was being criticized by the left because the more left one is the more one supports his reporting. That some Democrats are critical just reflects that many Democrats aren't on the left. Which I don't think is a controversial thing to say.
The Librarian
Banned
Guess that means I ain't no liberal lefty.
As expected, Republicans were really quick to decry the NYTimes report on Benghazi.
I swear, these people couldn't give a flying fuck how many soldiers are dying in needless places like Iraq and Afghanistan, but they will keep harping on the fact that four "true americans" died and it's all Obamallamababymamadrama's fault.
I swear, these people couldn't give a flying fuck how many soldiers are dying in needless places like Iraq and Afghanistan, but they will keep harping on the fact that four "true americans" died and it's all Obamallamababymamadrama's fault.
NYCmetsfan
Banned
People can be on the left and criticize people that deem themselves on the left. Its not a purity contest. This is no true Scotsman stuff
There is no arbiter of who is really left or not, not the least of them being EV. And foreign policy doesn't fall on left-right lines most of the time.
Aaron Strife
Banned
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/israel_subsidized_abortions
Cue GOP calls to defund Israel in 3, 2
Also a likely possibility.
RustyNails
Member
I think I saw a Democrat in that chorus too.
JesseEwiak
Member
The difference between center-right and right-wing parties even in Israel and America.
?
That's ALWAYS been the narrative. The Republican "establishment" are the nice, grown up not insane at all people, but it's the mean old Tea Party who's giving them a bad name.
Seems Obamacare is contagious.
empty vessel
Member
Meant to reply to this yesterday. That's true, but it is counterproductive because it reinforces harmful believes about the government's fiscal powers.
Instead of endorsing the conservative framework about debt and deficits (bad, always bad!), here is how JFK approached it:
If our Federal Budget is to serve not the debate but the country, we must find ways of clarifying this area of discourse. Still in the area of fiscal policy, let me say a word about deficits. The myth persists that Federal deficits create inflation, and budget surpluses prevent it. Yet sizable budget surpluses after the war did not prevent inflation, and persistent deficits for the last several years have not upset our basic price stability. Obviously, deficits are sometimes dangerous—and so are surpluses. But honest assessment plainly requires a more sophisticated view than the old and automatic cliché that deficits automatically bring inflation.
There are myths also about our public debt…debts public and private are neither good nor bad in and of themselves. .... There is no simple slogan in this field that we can trust.
The stereotypes I have been discussing distract our attention and divide our efforts. These stereotypes do our nation a disservice not just because they are exhausted and irrelevant, but above all because they are misleading—because they stand in the way of the solution of hard and complicated facts. ...
We cannot understand and attack our contemporary problems…if we are bound by traditional labels and worn-out slogans of an earlier era.
But the unfortunate fact of the matter is that our rhetoric has not kept pace with the speed of social and economic change. Our political debate, our public discourse on current domestic and economic issues, too often bears little or no relation to the actual problems the United States faces.
What is at stake in our economic decisions today is not some grand warfare of rival ideologies which will sweep the country with passion, but the practical management of a modern economy. What we need are not labels and clichés but more basic discussion of the sophisticated and technical questions involved in keeping a great economic machinery moving ahead.
The national interest lies in high employment and steady expansion of output and stable prices…The declaration of such an objective is easy. The attainment in an intricate and interdependent economy and world is a little more difficult. To attain them we require not some automatic response but hard thought.
I am suggesting that the problems of fiscal and monetary policy [today] as opposed to the kinds of problems we had in the Thirties demand subtle changes for which technical answers—not political answers—must be provided. ...
How can we generate the buying power which can consume what we produce on our farms and in our factories?
How can we take advantage of the miracles of automation with the great demand that it will put upon high-skilled labor and yet offer employment to the half a million of unskilled high school dropouts every year who enter the labor market?
How do we eradicate the barriers which separate substantial minorities of our citizens from access to education and employment on equal terms with the rest?
How, in sum, can we make our free economy work at full capacity, that is, provide adequate wages for labor and adequate utilization of plant and opportunity for all?
These are problems that we should be talking about, that the political parties and the various groups in our country should be discussing. They cannot be solved by incantations from the forgotten past.
There are myths also about our public debt…debts public and private are neither good nor bad in and of themselves. .... There is no simple slogan in this field that we can trust.
The stereotypes I have been discussing distract our attention and divide our efforts. These stereotypes do our nation a disservice not just because they are exhausted and irrelevant, but above all because they are misleading—because they stand in the way of the solution of hard and complicated facts. ...
We cannot understand and attack our contemporary problems…if we are bound by traditional labels and worn-out slogans of an earlier era.
But the unfortunate fact of the matter is that our rhetoric has not kept pace with the speed of social and economic change. Our political debate, our public discourse on current domestic and economic issues, too often bears little or no relation to the actual problems the United States faces.
What is at stake in our economic decisions today is not some grand warfare of rival ideologies which will sweep the country with passion, but the practical management of a modern economy. What we need are not labels and clichés but more basic discussion of the sophisticated and technical questions involved in keeping a great economic machinery moving ahead.
The national interest lies in high employment and steady expansion of output and stable prices…The declaration of such an objective is easy. The attainment in an intricate and interdependent economy and world is a little more difficult. To attain them we require not some automatic response but hard thought.
I am suggesting that the problems of fiscal and monetary policy [today] as opposed to the kinds of problems we had in the Thirties demand subtle changes for which technical answers—not political answers—must be provided. ...
How can we generate the buying power which can consume what we produce on our farms and in our factories?
How can we take advantage of the miracles of automation with the great demand that it will put upon high-skilled labor and yet offer employment to the half a million of unskilled high school dropouts every year who enter the labor market?
How do we eradicate the barriers which separate substantial minorities of our citizens from access to education and employment on equal terms with the rest?
How, in sum, can we make our free economy work at full capacity, that is, provide adequate wages for labor and adequate utilization of plant and opportunity for all?
These are problems that we should be talking about, that the political parties and the various groups in our country should be discussing. They cannot be solved by incantations from the forgotten past.
If it seems foreign to hear a politician speak in those terms, it's because our country has changed a lot, and not for the better.
JesseEwiak
Member
But JFK was a conservative. Bill O'Reilly told me so!
cartoon_soldier
Member
They will somehow blame it on Obama and his peace talks/Iran deal initiatives.
What are they saying?
Not hitting the target number; not enough young, healthy people signing up; everyone's premiums are going to go up. The usual GOP scare tactics talking points. Pointing out the fact that the GOP may step up its game to try and keep young, healthy people from signing up in the first place.
This seems like the wrong time to be doubling down on the fear mongering when the writing is on the wall. There is no chance of repeal or major change before it is all in affect, and it sounds like the numbers are getting where they need to be both in insurance and Medicare(cade?) signups.
Fox should be putting distance between themselves and this rhetoric and moving onto the next thing. Whatever that is.
Well, it's either this or the NYTimes report, which they are actively trying to discredit with all their might.
They are better off with the NYT thing. In that case at least there is enough mystery, conflicting reports, and distance that they won't ever be definitively proven wrong and can continue to happily shout "liberal media" or "that's just what the government wants you to think" in defense to anything. They have less ability when the impact of ACA will run through every household (for better or worse).
But I do note they are thin on the ground for problems or scandals to play up. Unemployment numbers are lowest in years, government deficits are lowest in years, stick markets are strong, taxes are "low", no major conflicts in progress, no short term chance of a government shutdown, Healthcare.gov issues being resolved, action being taken in NSA, and the War on Christmas is done for another year.
When presidential selfies are a scandal, you know they are scraping the bottom of the barrel.
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