XBOX 360 2668

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"Their goal is to limit economic freedom" sounded to me like an imputation of malice; if that's not what you meant, okay, never mind.

I agree that many of the newly (and oldly) monied appear to be arrogant people who don't know much about work. My observation, however, has been that many of them take a different position from what you describe -- "the rich deserve their wealth, and the poor deserve to be poor, and therefore there is no good reason for the rich to give up any of their hard-earned money to help people who don't deserve it anyway." Sure, some of the wealthy got that way by working hard and making good decisions, and some of the poor got that way by taking the opposite approach to life, but it's not always that way.

And the point of acquiring wealth, when someone else is going to tell you how to spend it, is what, exactly?

I'm not going to pursue this; you seem to be siding with the Republicans and "economic liberty good, other liberty not so important", and I take the other side, and I'm not optimistic about further debate being productive.

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What myth are you referring to here? the one about independent counsel not being able to buttemble enough evidence to press charges? I got that from a series of articles from the Washington Post. Is it not true? I'm inclined to think that if the evidence had been there it would have been found; Kenneth Starr seemed pretty determined to ferret out wrongdoing. So what we have is one person saying one thing (claiming innocence) and others saying something else, and in those circumstances I think it's reasonable to say "we may never know for sure."

Probably, but I'm too much of a cheapskate to pay for cable, and anyway much too lazy to spend more of my free time than I already do trying to keep up with national news.

I'm not saying that because one side engages in some revolting practice it justifies the other side doing it too. I'm just saying that as far as I can tell the Democrats have no monopoly on abusing power. Nor do they have a monopoly on corruption. (I'm fairly sure that when you talk about insbreastutionalized corruption here you're referring to something the Democrats have done or are doing, and not to the in-the-news-these-days stuff about lobbyists and Republicans in Congress.)

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Ah yes, "we are at war." How do we know that? As far as I can tell, we're supposed to trust that our elected leaders are telling us the truth about the existence and strength of the enemy, what measures are needed to fight them, and so forth. Maybe they are. But ....

If the situation were reversed -- if it were President Gore, or President Kerry, or President Clinton, telling you that he (or she) needed to temporarily suspend some part of the Consbreastution in order to fight an ill-defined enemy -- would you really not be just a little suspicious that he-she was exploiting the situation for his-her own ends?

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"Of course it's new"? Let's be clear that when I say "that's a new one" I mean "that's a claim I had not heard before." I wouldn't believe that there's any truth behind it without investigating further.

I suppose you could actually be saying that no one claims this, except you, and you made it up to demonstrate how people are willing to believe anything .... ?

Do you suppose they'll get to the point where it works for them as well as it works for the Republicans (minus the "start the rumor in Europe part)? What percentage of the US population believes that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9-11? And where did they get this idea?

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"Sigh"?

I have no idea what you think I'm saying here -- it almost sounds as if you think I *believe* these myths-claims I'm describing. I admit sometimes I'm not as skeptical as I should be about claimed facts that support my biases, but I do try to practice whatever critical thinking skills I have, and in any case, I find this particular claim (about Jews being bad) both offensive and, well, silly.

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I don't know what you mean by "nationally debated", but I have heard plenty of people claim that invading Iraq was a huge favor to Al Qaeda -- that it makes it all the easier for their recruits to believe that the US is trying to wipe out their religion, or something along those lines. I don't know whether this is true, or another of those myths you talked about earlier, or what, but it's being said. Are you not hearing the same claim, or does it not count as debate?

It has? I didn't notice that one either. Clearly the "I can't keep up" is worse than I thought. Sort of a :-).

Anyway. Nah. I don't really have anything to say about whether what Bush is fighting his war on terror in a way that will produce good results in the long term -- I'm skeptical, but I'm also biased.

Now here's a thread drift that appeals to me more ....

It can be interesting to track the origins of one's working vocabulary. Someone I work with responds to particular kinds of situations with a flat-tone-of-voice "that's exciting." The first time I caught myself saying the same thing .... :-), I guess.

As for what part of the anatomy should figure in a phrase for ugliness .... who knows. "Ear-ugly" doesn't sound quite right, though.

-- B. L. Mbuttingill ObDisclaimer: I don't speak for my employers; they return the favor.