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BanthaSamantha -> RE: Can You Guess Without Googling? (11/19/2011 10:32:43 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: FirmhandKY
You are still not seeing it, are you?
I just trying to get you to see that there are at least two sides to the issue. While you will acknowledge that both parties are responsible, at the end of the day you do indeed place the blame on the Republicans:
And what I want you to understand is that there are rarely ever only two sides to an issue. This junk about there being two sides to every issue is a product of a weak mainstream media that has a pair of partisans scream at each other for an hour. The fact remains that not everyone in this world is either a raging liberal or a die-hard conservative. You're going through great pains to fit me into the former characature that you're willfully twisting my words.
Yes, I thought Republicans did a bad thing. And yes, I thought the Democratic reaction was also a bad thing. Both parties are to blame. And yet, through some verbal legerdemain, you're trying to make it sound like I blame the Republicans the most.
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I pointed out that it could be viewed as the Democrats attempting to push their legislative agenda to maintain a failed spending policy.
The truth is, both are correct interpretations, but how you see it as to where the "fault" lies says much about your internal biases (that's not a dig, we all have them. The question is whether or not we recognize them).
There's nothing inherently wrong with a party pushing their legislative agenda; that's what we'd expect political parties to do. As Depeche Mode would say: parties are parties. It only really became a problem when the debt ceiling vote came into play.
Correct or otherwise, I'd point out that my interpretation hews pretty closely to the S&P's interpretation, while yours does not.
quote:
Your view that Republicans are at fault is obviously present in your example, as well:
Republicans were wrong for holding someone hostage at gunpoint. Democrats were wrong for not going, "Easy now, we'll comply with your demands as long as you don't shoot."
In this analogy, it's again the Republicans who are "the evil-doers" and it's simply a minor fault that the good-hearted Democrats had poor negotiation skills.
I think you took my analogy too literally.
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A counter-analogy:
The Democrats were wrong for selling our kids into future debt slavery. The Republicans were wrong for not stepping up sooner.
Both fit your "if/then" logic, but it obvious that each one is sympathetic to a particular point of view. Yours appears to be sympathetic with the Democratic side, and laying primary blame on the Republican side.
Your analogy relies on judgement calls and opinions as to which party has better policy proposals; mine does not. That's the main difference.
Imagine, for instance, that it was the Democrats that refused to pass the debt ceiling extension without also passing one of their legislative priorities (chai lattes in the water fountains, perhaps). And, likewise, it was instead the Republicams whom refused to work with the Democrats on this point.
What we have here is a completely opposite scenario from the one that actually happened. My opinion on the matter would change; I'd blame the Democrats instead of the Republicans for pulling the pin, and I'd blame the Republicans instead of the Democrats for the subsequent recalcitrance. It doesn't matter which party did the wrong action, they still did something wrong.
Regarding your counter-analogy, that wouldn't happen. Even in the exact opposite scenario, you could still apply your same analogy. That might have been why the S&P didn't bring you in to their advisory meetings.
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