Premise: Lefties reading right-wing articles will enhance bipartisanship thru understanding thought

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(MarinJohn @ Jan 23 2007, 12:15 PM) [snapback]379551[/snapback]</div>

I think it's worthwhile. Supplying a real link, so that there was a hint to the subject matter, instead of just the raw URL might make it more useful for the reader, but it's easy for me to ask you to do more work. I already read some of these sites, but I'm always interested in the news or interesting articles.

And a hint for the sites like New Republic that require a registration to read the articles: http://www.bugmenot.com is your friend.

 

Remember when GWB, upon being asked if he'd seen 'An Inconvenient Truth,' made a comment to the effect that he'd not seen it, and (here's the point) wasn't planning to...?

This, I think, is the crux of the problem hobbling this Country...demonstrated with eloquence (eloquence?!?!) by our very own Decider.

My vote: please continue. I'm behind the idea 100%, and continue to believe that the 'truth' of democracy (and, dare I say, in Life, too) lies in the dialogue itself -- in the process -- and not in the seach for absolutes.

 

Definitely some good reads in there, keep it up! But like stated, giving some context before the link would be nice, so we know what to expect

 

Thanks, looking forward to them.

 

Thanks. Looks like some interesting reading.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Pinto Girl @ Jan 23 2007, 09:24 AM) [snapback]379558[/snapback]</div>

Yep, cause we all know that his only source for information on Global Warming is Al Gore.

Wildkow

p.s. amazing the contrived crap you have to wade through just so the Left can bash Bush. Not that he doesn’t deserve some PG but this isn’t one of them.
<_<

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(MarinJohn @ Jan 24 2007, 12:13 PM) [snapback]380110[/snapback]</div>

I agree. I suspect that we are all much more in the center than either party would like.

 

The extreme left wants me to read their literature so I can better understand them.

The extreme right wants me to read their literature so I can better understand them.

It doesn't work that way. The people in both extremes have their political beliefs intermingled with their personalities. It's like telling the extremes that their personalities can change by reading a few books written by those with opposing beliefs.

The rest of us are in that broad moderate range. The leftists see those of us who are moderate as conservative, and the far right sees us as liberals. They're both wrong. I've read the literature from both. I'll never understand why the liberal extreme is so idealisic, unrealistic, and absolutely un-pragmatic (can't they see the realities of life?). The liberal view seems to be willing to sacrafice the whole in order to satisfy the individual. On the other hand, I'll never understand why the very conservative group believes so strongly in the Ayn Rand survival of the fittest approach (there's no such thing as a free lunch, the poor can pull themselves up by their bootstraps, society has no responsibility to those who are unable to make it on their own - p.s. - a conservative will quickly correct me by replacing the word unable with unwilling). The conservative view seems cold and uncaring with respect to the individual. To them, if you help the big guys, the little guys will benefit (trickle down economics). Unfortunately greed isn't figured into that equation.

As I see it, the liberals can't seem to see the forest through the trees, while the conservatives seem to see only the forest. From a moderate perspective, you can't have one without the other - there must be balance fed by open-mindedness and a broad perspective view.

No, I have no desire to read any more propaganda from either extreme. I'll follow the reading path that my intellect dictates. I'll continue to search on my own for undistorted truth.

 

I guess that I must have read a couple of the not well thought out articles because what I read seemed to me like pure opinion without backing from any reliable source.

I also guess that you could say that I am decidedly left-leaning - whether that has anything to do with this is, IMHO, debatable.

The thing I saw that was lacking in the articles that I read was that they cited no reputable sources on which to base their argument. I.e., their argument had no foundation other than the writer's opinion. It is this type of argument, i.e., "believe me just because I say that what I am saying is true" is the kind of argument that anyone, regardless of politics, should be extremely wary of. It is precisely this kind of "because I said so," attitude that will only win those who know no better. For whatever reason, I have seen this kind of article many times recently, and maybe it is only my imagination that those kind of articles have mostly come from those who would normally be associated with the "right-wing."

Personally, I don't have the time to read all the articles you cited. So, maybe the articles that I read were bad choices, but to me, they represent something that I see as beening emblematic of many right-wing arguments. Perhaps the left is guilty of this, too, but it seems as though the way the "left" tends to approach issues is to present some sort of argument that is backed by a consensus of some sort.

So, maybe this goes both ways. To that end, I'll post this one link. http://www.kilowattours.org/

All I'll say is that it goes farther than "believe me because I say what I say is true," and the film that the site represents presents some startling evidence based on consensus and facts that all is not as well as those all of us might hope.

It seems that paying attention to Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunctions and bickering between left and right serves to divert people from doing the right thing. IMHO, doing the right thing is to leave as little imprint as possible where ever you go, for starters.