All of a sudden liberals have become the reigning experts on the nature of conservatism.
From the frothy left (Sidney Blumenthal) to the academic left (Bruce Ackerman and Cass Sunstein) to the Democratic mainstream (Sen. Joe Biden) comes the new mantra that only “mainstream” conservatives are acceptable as judicial nominees.
According to Robert Novak today, liberals have been successful in making themselves the arbiters of the meaning of conservatism: “Sen. Kennedy has succeeded with the news media in establishing a new standard of ‘mainstream conservatism’ for a justice.”
“Mainstream,” of course, generally means conservatives who vote with liberals with some regularity. Sometimes, however, when liberals let their guard down and don’t choose their words carefully, it is clear that to them “mainstream” means a conservative-free zone. Thus today David Broder writes that
many Democratic senators feel passionately that Bush has abused the system by going outside what they regard as the mainstream to stack the courts with conservative judges.
Query: Why should members of a party that has had increasing difficulty locating the mainstream and appealing to voters in it be given exclusive franchise to define what it means?
“Query: Why should members of a party that has had increasing difficulty locating the mainstream and appealing to voters in it be given exclusive franchise to define what it means?”
Probably has to do with why they don’t stop beating their wives.
That has to be either a ridiculously ad hominem statement, or incoherent babble. Either way, what a worthless comment.
WOOSH!
whoosh (hwūsh, wūsh, hwʊsh, wʊsh) pronunciation also woosh (wūsh, wʊsh) n.
1. A sibilant sound: the whoosh of the high-speed elevator.
2. A swift movement or flow; a rush or spurt.
“The post was a brilliant arrow to the heart of the opposition point and all asstush can do is make a swift movement toward the exit.”
You’ve never heard WOOSH in the context of something going over your head?
Now that you have pointed that out, I get it. I always hate it when I am slow on the uptake. Oh well. The
“The
Taking you at your word (always risky) let us examine your contention.
“Query: Why should members of a party that has had increasing difficulty locating the mainstream and appealing to voters in it be given exclusive franchise to define what it means?”
” Is their evident difficulty getting worse? That small issue is beside the point of the question. ”
That small issue is the beating their wife part.
Look at dubyas polls and tell me about reaching the mainstream again.
The question is full of assumptions which one can either sit down and untangle — like you do. or assume by answering yes no. Thats the beating your wife part.
Lets discuss the mainstream, and how o’connor and gonzales and earl warren and thomas fit into it. Lets discuss what people think about abortion, about roe and casey. This BS about increasing difficulty reaching the mainstream at a time with bush polls declining? :eave that to the dirty tricks people.
Er
Look at dubyas polls and tell me about reaching the mainstream again.
I will state this slowly and clearly for those who have trouble understanding simple things. George Bush was just elected President of the US. He got more votes that his opponent. The majority of the electorate favored him. That would seem to place him in the mainstream, now wouldn
Well, it’s possibly just sophistry, but it could be that the mainstream is NOT represented by W but the mainstream voted for him in lieu of Kerry. I know that some would have voted for a candidate further from the mainstream than W in order to avoid electing Kerry.
” The majority of the electorate favored him. That would seem to place him in the mainstream, now wouldn
I guess I didn’t speak s-l-o-w-l-y enough for some people. Mainstream, as used by the NT Times, does not mean that you do not have the support of the majority the electorate. It means that your views are so way out that 90% of the electorate would find your views abhorrent. Even Howard Dean would not fit that description yet.
but the problem is that the numbers now don’t look so good. and are increasingly not looking so good.
So what you are telling us is that if his poll numbers don
“So what you are telling us is that if his poll numbers don
It is impossible to have an intelligent discussion with you actus because you simply ignore facts that are inconvenient to your argument. The concept of being in the so-called mainstream has no validity when we are talking about the person who was just elected President of the US for the second time eight months ago and who has not changed any of his political positions that he took before the election. The fact that some polls indicate that Bush has lower numbers, assuming that the poll numbers had any validity, would only indicate that he was less popular, not that he was out of the so-called mainstream. It is reprehensible that the NY Times or you would try to delegitimize someone that you disagree with politically. The only place where that is done is in a totalitarian society where one gets purged when he falls out of favor with the government. You are like Humpty Dumpty in Alice in Wonderland
“It is impossible to have an intelligent discussion with you actus because you simply ignore facts that are inconvenient to your argument”
they’re just inconvenient to the whole discussion. Instead of talking about the kinds of justices that people want, we end up talking about whether approval polls or elections measure the mainstreamness of a candidate. Just like the polls, the election could be about things other than judicial philosophy. It could be about terror and iraq, or the economy, or the swift boat veterans or social security.
“and who has not changed any of his political positions that he took before the election. ”
I gave you one that he did. You are right to ignore it for the purposes of judicial nominations though.
“The fact that some polls indicate that Bush has lower numbers, assuming that the poll numbers had any validity, would only indicate that he was less popular, not that he was out of the so-called mainstream.”
Then I don’t know what your mainstream is if approval ratings don’t indicate it.
“You are like Humpty Dumpty in Alice in Wonderland
Then I don’t know what your mainstream is if approval ratings don’t indicate it.
There you go again. I just went through a discussion of the meaning of mainstream and you totally ignored it. It is not that I expect you to agree with my argument, but I don
“I just went through a discussion of the meaning of mainstream and you totally ignored it.”
I told you it was inconvenient to the entire discussion. If electoral results are to gauge the mainstream, then bush is really as mainstream as kerry, because it was close. But these results don’t. And the whole beef with the question asked is that its a ‘beating your wife’ type of question to set up the situation where the democrats are supposedly the ones out of the mainstream.
“No actus you do not confuse me. I understand you all too well. There is no sense in trying to have a discussion with you because you have no respect for the other person.”
You were confused as to what I meant when I used an admittedly ambiguous term, for which I apologized. I have no idea how this is disrespectful: anyone could be confused by the ambiguous term. That’s kind of what it means to be ambiguous.