Friday, March 4, 2011

Rational Discourse And A Plea To Huck Supporters

A friend of mine recently wrote to me that "few people on the blogosphere are interested in facts. They want to express themselves and have people listen to them." If that is true, then what we do here is a complete waste of time. However, I can think of at least two times that I have had to adjust my thinking because of responses from Right Wingnut.

The first instance was when I implied that Sarah Palin had no thoughts or muddy thoughts about Egypt. Right Wingnut showed me the rest of Palin's comments that I had missed. When I saw the evidence, I quickly wrote another post making the necessary changes. The other instance was when I implied that only four Republicans have spoken about the need to reform entitlements. Again, Right Wingnut provided evidence that Palin had promoted vouchers and later had endorsed Paul Ryan's Road Map. While we can still debate about the level of importance that each politician attaches to entitlement reform, I simply could no longer say that Palin has never voiced her opinion about such reform. She has. And again, I had to retract my previous thoughts with another post.

I can also say that the Palin crowd shaped my thinking regarding Palin and the Arizona tragedy. At first, I knew that the tragedy was not related to Palin but I still attacked her for irresponsible language. As the national debate moved forward, I began to see Sarah Palin's side of the story (as given by the Palin crowd) and became actually a little sympathetic towards the treatment that Palin was getting.

The examples that I just gave are the reason why we blog. We should be led by facts, regardless of how it affects our favorite candidates. If somebody has a better argument than me, then hopefully I can be man enough to admit it. So, I ask, are we are seeking truth or (like my friend said) just trying to be heard?

In the past week, there has been a lot of negative posts regarding Huckabee. I have also noticed that the Huckabee supporters have pretty much vanished. They won't admit that Huckabee lied about his Kenya gaffe. They won't admit that he deceitfully misused statistics in an effort to make Romneycare look bad. They won't take up my challenge to find one instance where Huckabee has called Obamacare "socialized medicine." Instead, they just vanish and continue to worship the ground Huck walks.

I, myself, am still a little unsure about who I am going to support (Romney or Daniels). Yet, I have criticized both on numerous occasions and I just wish that the Huckabee crowd would do the same with their guy.

If you really think about it, why on earth should we blog if we are just going to be a bunch of irrational, personality cult followers who refuse to let our love for said personality diminish? If we are just going to be a circle of cavemen yelling at each other, then we should probably all pick a new hobby.

4 comments:

salty said...

Maybe some bloggers have an agenda with a specific goal in mind.

What's wrong with that?

Pablo said...

salty,

If the blogosphere is made up of people like that (which it might be) then we are all wasting our time. However, if it is made up of rational people that are moved by facts and reason, then we may not be wasting our time.

Anonymous said...

Salty, of course we all have an agenda in mind. That is to get others to agree with us. But if we can't have rational discourse, then we will never get anyone to agree with us.

I have come and gone from the blogosphere a few times, taking months long breaks. I leave, each time, for the very reason Pablo's friend states. I hate to put a lot of effort in writing something if it is only going to fall on deaf ears.

Since 2008, when I started reading various blogs, I have changed my views pretty dramatically on immigration, defense, and the rightside LSM (fox news and talk radio). So I know that arguments can sink in eventually. At least with some people.

Anonymous said...

Good post, Pablo. You're always fair and intellectual honest.

I realize I'm a Romney cheerleader, but I'm not so dense that I can't admit that RomneyCare is an issue, and that Mitt has changed some positions and pandered. (Most, if not all of the other candidates have done likewise, but the label stuck to Mitt like glue.)

I can live with these weaknesses in Romney because I think his strengths far outweigh them. I don't think MassCare is something he should regret at all--to the contrary. At the time, it was a solution that had conservative support, and made sense.

What I won't support is a candidate who flat out lies repeatedly, or someone who is constantly sowing division and tossing out inflammatory rhetoric. Both Palin and Huck suffer from these flaws, and more.

I just hope that if it's not Romney, we choose someone who can get elected, and do the job. We're learning more about Daniels and Pawlenty, and it appears that they aren't perfect either--surprise! Any of these 3 are fine enough for me.

-Martha