Stupid is as stupid does and stupidity votes Obama

[Wezil]

... it would gut itself anyway.

Like those cows in the midwest?

[Asher]

No, that's medicare, and they're not gutting it, they're making it solvent. If you want to consider that gutting it, fine, but it would gut itself anyway.

Ah, they're not gutting it. They're just cutting funding. My mistake. That's not gutting at all.

But you're right that they're also trying to gut medicare.

The Compassionate Republicans are at it again.

[giblets]

God ****ing damnit, you are the dumbest sack of **** I've ever met.

You asked me if marriage commissioners should be free to decline to do gay marriages, I responded Yes, then you quoted me saying yes and now you are pretending like I said no.

You are too stupid to live.

Any statements or facts that conflict with what he already believes get discarded.

[Guynemer]

TCBY. ICBM. TLDR. YMCA. TGIF. XKCD!

OMGWTFBBQ

[Guynemer]

That's how the Heart of Gold works, after all.

Oh, that poor, poor whale.

[Aeson]

Exactly. The US GOP is uniquely pro-market. So why is the US the richest country in the world? Is that in spite of the GOP?

There are a lot of reasons. They will vary depending on whether we are talking absolute wealth, or relative wealth. The GOP is not always on the right side in these situations, even "free market/trade" ones. Sometimes neither party is on the right side, or both are, depending on your perspective. It's not as simple as Rs are for the free market, or the free market being the sole reason for our lead.

Free market (within reason, we're not always there) and free trade (generally uninhibited) are of course good. Rs are more likely to support these than Ds, but not always.

The most important reason is the land. Easily defendable, sparsely populated and unexploited until relatively recently, and extremely rich in natural resources and great climate (in general).

We have exploited our natural advantage in agricultural capacity to keep other developing nations from being able to develop properly in some cases. Subsidies and tarrifs have been employed to protect the American farmer to the detriment of much of the rest of the world. It is decidedly not a free market or free trade approach, but it has worked out well for us if you look at it from a relative standpoint. (Badly from an absolute wealth standpoint.) The easy agriculture helps every other area of development by freeing people up to go into other professions. We trailed in this for a while to start the Industrial Revolution, but we had far more potential due to the land at our disposal. Not a D or R issue for the most part. Both sides have factions that would screw agriculture up. Either extreme of exploitation of the land will make it less productive over the long run. Neither side has shown a significant movement towards ending the subsidies and tariffs.

Our immigration policy early on helped create a society that was largely composed of those where were most innovative and enthusiastic about bettering their lives from other parts of the world. Again, this had a lot to do with the land. Sparsely populated (by people we were willing to observe their rights to the land), we could offer something nowhere else in the world really could ... free and very fertile/rich land. We've turned it into a negative in recent times, preferring to stagnate and limit competition in the workplace. Not surprisingly this started happening as the fertile/rich land was all taken up. Rs and Ds can't really take any credit for the positives as they weren't the same parties when it happened, and both share in instituting and maintaining the later negative situation. I suppose we can thank small pox and a lack of regard for the native population for this? :wary:

WWII. We came out the winner WWII, just about everyone else of note was damaged far more than we were. Again, this is largely because of our land (location). We didn't have to worry about running out of steel or oil. Who knows if we'd even have been pulled into the war (until it was a much worse situation) if the Japanese could have said the same. At the end of the war we still had all our industrial capacity, we had many of the German scientists, we had nukes to leverage into politics and economics, we had the gratitude of much of the rest of the world, and have been front-running ever since. WWII was very destructive in regards to the wealth of the world, but relatively speaking favored us vs everyone else. It's not a D or R issue.

The Cold War. Somewhat like Ds and Rs helping to support each other by creating a dichotomy (thus forcing one or the other), the competition between the US and USSR created a dichotomy between our Capitalism and their Communism. We won of course. It made us the defacto leader of the world not just politically, but as far as spreading our (generally self-serving, even if it helps others as well) economic policies. The Cold War was hugely destructive to the wealth of the world, but relatively speaking favored us vs everyone else.

I'm sure there are a lot of other things we could come up with. It would be interesting to see what would have happened if Europe had been peaceful throughout the 20th century and not dependent on us vs the USSR, but still went with more social programs. (They would have all ended up fascists though ) Probably close to the same. We still had better land and had already siphoned off the most industrious/independent of the working class from them.

Perhaps a better question would be how much of the world would speak Japanese if we had swapped land with them.

[Imran Siddiqui]

So what's your take on the forgiveness thing? What if, in his final hours, Joseph Stalin returned to Orthodox Christianity? (a faith for which he was initially in seminary before becoming a dictator.) What if he deplored his actions as much as you or I do? What if he wished for all the world that he could just do some kind things before he left this world, to try to begin to make up for all his meanness and sin?

Would he belong to the Kingdom of Heaven or not? I think the literature is pretty clear that he would, but does that bother you too much to accept?

Do you not understand the term "universalist"

And, in that vein, no that doesn't bother me at all.

[Ben Kenobi]

Yes, because I don't think everyone has to believe the same thing I do. Such a man who would decline to do gay marriages is, however, a bigot.

Then it's not bigotry. One or the other, Asher. Bigotry doesn't mean 'an opinion to which I disagree'.

So you disagree with the Corren agreement, then? Teachers shouldn't have to make a choice between their conscience and teaching history in British Columbia. What relevance does teaching homosexuality is ok have to the independence of Italy and Prussia? To the formation of the province? To, say, Vimy Ridge? To McRae's Flanders fields? To the construction of the transcontinental railroad?

What relevance does it have Asher?

Shouldn't I, as a teacher - not say anything at all about present controversies that have nothing to do with the subject I am trying to teach? Isn't that the ideal of impartiality?

I am not asking to teach Catholic theology. All I ask is to be able to teach the history of the province and the nation - such as it is.

What relevance does it have Asher?

Answer me that, please.

[Ben Kenobi]

I repeat my question: what does this have to do with anything?

Is it bigotry that would cause a Doctor to refrain from doing abortions?

Is an essential component of the Catholic faith bigotry - because it contradicts what secular society believes?

That's really what this whole conflict is about. There are two worldviews here - people are trying to straddle both, but we both know that's a lie. You believe that one is very, very wrong, and you're trying to use the state to force compliance.

Catholics are a minority too. Always have been in the US and Canada.

[Asher]

If you're on the public dole, you bow to the public's wishes. If you don't like it, you can find a job in the private sector.

By the way, it IS bigotry to oppose gay marriage.

Bigotry is the state of mind of a bigot, defined by Merriam-Webster as "a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially: one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance".[1] Bigotry may be based on real or perceived characteristics, including age, disability, dissension from popular opinions, economic status, ethnicity, gender identity, language, nationality, personal habits, political alignment, race, region, religious or spiritual belief, sex, species, or sexual orientation.

Why can't you tolerate our equality?

[Ben Kenobi]

Let me put it another way.

The crux of the conflict is that you, Asher, everyone on one side of the issue - believes that your conduct, what you do is an essential part of who you are.

The Catholic church is not saying that gay people are less persons than anyone else. They believe that gay people should have the same rights as everyone else - they are not saying that gay people should be enslaved - that they are less than fully persons. They are not attacking what they perceive to be the nature of gay people - that we perceive to be no different then the rest of us. They are not saying what the segregationists said. They are not asking for separate but equal bathrooms. They are not barring gay people from entering university.

Catholics aren't dragging young gay men behind their trucks and lynching them on a regular basis.

All the components for bigotry are just not there.

The argument boils down to this - what is the nature of a person? What qualifies as a characteristic that is intrinsic to the person? Catholics believe that race is an accident - that the substance is the exact same. We also believe that what a person does is not who they are. This is why one can be forgiven of sins - and why opposition to what a person does is not the same thing as opposition to the person in and of himself.

Edit - anticipated Asher's reply. This should answer his questions.

[Ben Kenobi]

Why can't you tolerate our equality?

Because we believe you already are equal and that you don't need to change marriage in order to be equal. We don't believe in changing what marriage is to accommodate things that we believe are sin - and are extrinsic to the person and who you are.

I don't see you as Asher the gay man.

I see you as Asher - the very angry and troubled young man who doesn't really understand himself most of all. I've typed many words to you - over the years, I was wondering if it would shine some lights on and say - look - you are more than this.

I see a very talented young man that does not know that or believe that and is kicking against something that isn't going to change and still hasn't accepted this as a fact. Who wants very badly the same things that I do - that I suffered without for a very long time.

We are not so different - Asher - HC perceives something that I've felt for awhile now. I'm sure I'm not the only one here who feels the same.

[Aeson]

Is it bigotry that would cause a Doctor to refrain from doing abortions?

Is an essential component of the Catholic faith bigotry - because it contradicts what secular society believes?

Would it be bigotry to deny a doctor a license to practice medicine just because they were Catholic? Would it be bigotry if a member of the Church of Homoabortionism (I hope I'm just making this up ... ) thought it should be illegal to practice medicine if you were Catholic?

[giblets]

If you're on the public dole, you bow to the public's wishes. If you don't like it, you can find a job in the private sector.

By the way, it IS bigotry to oppose gay marriage.



Why can't you tolerate our equality?

Because equality makes baby Jesus cry.

[Ben Kenobi]

Would it be bigotry to deny a doctor a license to practice medicine just because they were Catholic? Would it be bigotry if a member of the Church of Homoabortionism (I hope I'm just making this up ... ) thought it should be illegal to practice medicine if you were Catholic?

Yes - because it's an intrinsic part of Catholicism. You cannot be a Catholic and disagree on this point. It's not just gay marriage- it's tied in with quite a few other things, our understanding of the human person and the relationship of the person to sin in general. If this isn't sin - then what is sin?

And - btw- this comes up for Catholic pharmacists as well. A Catholic pharmacist should be able to refer a customer seeking contraception to the pharmacist down the road.