Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Here is the new reality: While we once understood that the great uninformed mass of idiots who make up so much of this country would not vote for an uninformed idiot to represent them, those idiots have come to realize that candidates with actual knowledge didn't vote like the idiots they represent (mostly on social issues, but now it's become every issue the uniformed are told they care about). So today, it makes almost no difference whatsoever whether you are an idiot candidate who says incredibly stupid things. All that matters is that uninformed idiot voters recognize that their uninformed idiot candidates are "like" them or will vote down the line based entirely on religion or conservative views on social issues. Therefore, and here's the rub, any media exposure--no matter how harmful it would seem to anyone with half a brain--is beneficial.

O'Donnell would never ever have gained traction 10-20 years ago. She would have been ignored by the media as an idiotic kook and the uninformed would not have cared. Now, she can say "I pray every day about why the elite want to separate church and state" and that message will be carried to her base of uninformed idiots. She cares not whether people understand that she's a moron on this or any other issue because the people who actually understand the substance of any given issue wouldn't vote for her in the first place. She just wants to be a household name, like Palin, which ensures an increasing number of votes the longer she remains so (no matter what she says).

“Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature has made them.”

- Bertrand Russell

This is not offered in support of an argument that O'Donnell isn't stupid, but it does explain a lot about W and Palin's rhetoric. Making them out to be stupid merely endears them to their base.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

This could be some of the dumbest shit you've ever written.

Both parties attract stupid people because there are lots of stupid people in the world, yes. But if you think the Tea Party's followers aren't among the stupidest people on the face of the Earth, I have no use for you. The simple fact that their candidates are almost all brain dead morons is enough evidence. But I really don't want to waste my time discussing this with you. Based on every single argument you've ever made when it comes to politics, taxes (interchangeable for you, I know), class, race or anything not related to tits and ass (the two things on which we mostly agree), you're not capable of convincing me your take on anything is mostly correct. Sorry.

TM

Uh, my point was, yes, the Tea Partiers are absolutely among the dumbest people in the world. A distinction they share with millions and millions of Obama voters, among many others.

There is no monopoly on stupid.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

And if you're thinking that Democrats are on course to kill this country, you're really saying more about your own febrile imagination and fears than you are about the budget. All the bond traders say you're wrong, and they're betting a lot of money on it.

how short term are the bonds? don't those guys have a link to realclearpolitics, with the reace predictions?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

Small little fly in your ointment: tea baggers, in large numbers anyway, are also entitlement minded voters.

That's covered by the term "greedy." I would never suggest otherwise about a group of people idiotic enough to cry about medicare cuts while demanding small govt.

[Penske 2.0]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Fixed that for you.

Translation: Like Ty, I've never run a business either.

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Nope. But I think you're both refusing to address my point, which I don't really feel like repeating.

TM

It's the new identity politics. Idiots identify with idiots, and people canny enough to come across like idiots. And the country gets a little bit stupider every year,* so there's always a bigger pool of people just bright enough to find their way to the voting booth. I suppose it'll suit the Republicans for a while, but Sebby's friends just better hope they never turn on them.

*When, that is, people aren't just actively filling the textbooks with lies.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

That's covered by the term "greedy." I would never suggest otherwise about a group of people idiotic enough to cry about medicare cuts while demanding small govt.

So we have two groups of stupid people, one of which just votes for Dems because they they sure like their entitlements and the other of which (apparently) votes for Rs because they sure like their entitlements? And this is evidence of intellectual equivalence?

[Penske 2.0]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

This could be some of the dumbest shit you've ever written.

Both parties attract stupid people because there are lots of stupid people in the world, yes. But if you think the Tea Party's followers aren't among the stupidest people on the face of the Earth, I have no use for you. The simple fact that their candidates are almost all brain dead morons is enough evidence. But I really don't want to waste my time discussing this with you. Based on every single argument you've ever made when it comes to politics, taxes (interchangeable for you, I know), class, race or anything not related to tits and ass (the two things on which we mostly agree), you're not capable of convincing me your take on anything is mostly correct. Sorry.

TM

On an IQ basis, I would bet that they are no more or less stupid than the dummies on the left.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

So we have two groups of stupid people, one of which just votes for Dems because they they sure like their entitlements and the other of which (apparently) votes for Rs because they sure like their entitlements? And this is evidence of intellectual equivalence?

Nice rope a dope. I have to give that to you. The tea partiers are a few points dumber in that regard.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

How can you say she doesn't have traction? She won the nomination.

Fair enough, but she's down by 18 points in the polls. In a GOP year.

I don't disagree with any of this. But my point was, not that long ago she would have been laughed off the stage, ignored on any ballot and wouldn't have been taken seriously enough to have won the nomination anywhere. And this is the direction in which we are headed. It no longer matters whether you understand the issues--in fact, you can be completely ignorant on all of them. What matters now is whether a moron can identify with you enough to pray with you. And that's the Bush-->Palin legacy. How far will this go? Will that jackass in Alaska win the Senate while refusing to answer one question and handcuffing reporters who try to get him to answer questions?

I guess I have two responses to this. One is, you're absolutely right.

The other is, the economy is REALLY REALLY bad for a lot of people, but that fact really hasn't penetrated the consciousness of the country's elites. People who have graduate degrees and money just aren't feeling the effects in the same way, and so the political and media elites whose discourse becomes the national conversation just haven't had to come to grips with how bad things are. That kind of climate gets you this kind of election, where people want to throw the bums out, and will elect morons if that's what it takes. It amazes me, for example, that people are basically content that the Federal Reserve Board is fiddling while Rome burns. Inflation is below the targets, millions of people are unemployed, and .... nothing. There's just no sense of urgency. So, people react. (And the Republicans who are about to get elected are basically going to pour gas on the file. Things are going to get uglier.)

[Penske 2.0]

Originally Posted by Atticus Grinch

“Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature has made them.”

- Bertrand Russell

This is not offered in support of an argument that O'Donnell isn't stupid, but it does explain a lot about W and Palin's rhetoric. Making them out to be stupid merely endears them to their base.

I bet all three of them make more money in what should an intellectual pursuit (politics/public policy) than any combination of 3 posters on this board in 2011. In that context I wish was (a) stupider; and (ii) able to use my stupidity to greater effect.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Penske 2.0

On an IQ basis, I would bet that they are no more or less stupid than the dummies on the left.

only one party ever dragged out "our voters didn't understand the ballot. let's figure out whom they meant to vote for?"

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

This is too stupid for you to have authored. But I'll grant you points for attempting to spin the analogy back on me. You kept it within the parameters of a comparison to "business," and it's my fault for leaving you the opening to do so.

When you buy stocks, do you just pick whichever stock pays the biggest dividend? Of course not.

[Penske 2.0]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

only one party ever dragged out "our voters didn't understand the ballot."

This guy was a D:

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If you ran a business, you would not pay current expenses on credit just because you could, on the chance that some you might not have to pay the bill. It's no way to run a business, or a country.

Actually, that's exactly what almost every business does. They take as much money out as they can and then borrow to handle expenses from payroll to inventory purchasing and (basically) hand control of their business over to the banks in the form of a credit agreement that limits their ability to do really stupid shit to the company.

But that is neither here nor there. I agree 100% with you. Sebby wants to live like an investment banker, which is rational. Greedy and selfish, but rational. Try as hard as you can to get credit for everything you do (whether you've done it already or are pretending that it will happen the way you set it up in the future) in the form of up front bonuses. Then, who gives a shit if everything blows up. Already got mine!*

TM

*(Yes, I'm about to digress.) And this is why everyone who says "We should have let the banks fail" have it wrong. The assumption behind that argument is that the banks will be punished, won't survive and will never come back with such a proven careless business model. But that's bullshit. Banks aren't run by people in it for the long run. They are run and populated by people who are trying their best to take out as much money they can as soon as possible. It doesn't harm them to have the bank fail. They're not being punished. They already got theirs. And if anyone thinks that the next big banks to emerge after we let all the current banks fail won't be set up the exact same way by the exact same people with the exact same pay structures, they're completely fucking delusional.