I do not want to be distracted by it, except in this way-if I give up no one's freedoms or real time and attention to snag those anti-human bastards, I'm for it. clean de-fund. NOw the circus? well-if this isn't the circus, there would be another one. and if PP were pro-life, they'd be offering total female reproductive care, including pre-natal. they do not and they encourage teens to act without parental consent. bad all around. There are bigger fish to fry right now, I agree. If PP can make it without fed funding-well then.

Indeed there are many others. For now, I am satisfied that my little corner of the world is a nice place to be. The effect of the rest of America has not gotten so big that I am "forced to look elsewhere" ... yet.

New York is one of the worst, but there are many others. Should we give California back to La Raza in a "two state solution"? :(

(Eudamonia routinely suppressed all my posts in his emotional outburst, it has nothing to do with content.)

It is a fact and many of the religious conservatives are defensive about the controversy over their actions. They know what they are doing, but of course deny they are "discrediting" the tea party. They think they are supposed to be dominating it despite its origins as a secular revolt against statism and over fiscal matters.

Whether or not you understand that, this has nothing to do with "ad hominem arguments". A simple assertion presented as a statement of fact is not argument at all, let alone an ad hominem. Eudaimonia's accusations are false. Those who understand what the meaning of the principle of the fallacy of the ad hominem argument will ironically find it in his own rationalizations for his overtly tyrannical, punitive behavior. It's not even an ordinary, clean ad hominem, it fabricates the irrelevant premise as well.

I have found that the biggest threat from the religious zealots in politics for now has not been a matter of getting away with imposing their agenda, let alone a full blown theocracy, but rather to create such an embarrassment to the legitimate right and the best elements of the 'tea party' as to slow down or halt progress. In a few cases, conservative politicians with ability and who showed promise have underminded themselves. So I think we agree on that. But I don't know what you mean by counting on the "demographics" because the politics is fundamentally being driven by ideology, and I don't see that substantially improving in any age group. It's why we're here, still trying.

You're right about the Planned Parenthood controversy as a surrogate for anti-abortion and the latest defunding controversy over it. The world is in decline all around us and we have conservative politicians in Washington concentrating on lynching PP. They are funding Obama with more controls, taxes and spending, but they are making a "shutdown" war over PP the central battle. They aren't even trying to reduce spending over it, only shift the funding to similar groups under an Alinskyite nihilistic tactic of "RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” It's shear anti-intellectual agitation and chaos for a religious agenda. Robert Tracinski wrote a good analysis of the organized hysteria over PP in its early stages, but I don't know if he's followed up http://www.tracinskiletter.com/2015/0...

I do not "go on rants" and do not gratuitously bring up religion. I respond to false and inappropriate comments. It is not "rhetoric". Take your personal attacks somewhere else.

5 ....

http://www.plusaf.com/_troll-pix/trol...

Great point. We have no one. The goal should be to publicize King's apostasy. We didn't beat Boehner. But he's packing it in. It's not much, but it might be all we've got.

I certainly agree that offense only exists if we choose to be offended. Jefferson made an observation to the effect of if it neither robs my purse or breaks my arm, it's of no moment to me.
A while back, I too dared to question some premises and was banished to the Outer Darkness by the originator of the thread. Who cares?
At the end of the day, it's nothing more than words on a screen, so why be troubled by it?

Well, Salty, when I took the est Training three times, it dawned on me that "offense is in the mind of the alleged offendee" and that seemed, and still seems to be a reasonable, workable way for me to motor through life.

See, for example, The Bill of No Rights (google or on my site at http://www.plusaf.com/lessons/noright...

I am not 'choosing to offend people's cherished beliefs.'

I am choosing to question assertions by others which seem illogical to me. I'm challenging their positions, so if that's 'offending people's beliefs' that's their problem and they can call off the discussion on their own and I will respect that.

I don't like Eudaimonia's style of 'my way or the highway' or 'it's my thread so follow all of MY rules... or Else!' including his Three Strikes Rule.

My 'three strikes rule' is that, when i realize that a discussion HAS faded into ad hominem 'logic' and 'Reason and Logic haveLeft The Building', I'm also free to 'take my ball and go home' and leave the playing field... even if I'll be accused of 'losing the argument' by people with whom it's just become 'no fun to play with any more.'

And, frankly, I've seen way more of that here than I like.

Thanks for your comment.
Cheers!

Please consider, my dear Plusaf, that if you choose to offend people's cherished beliefs, some may strike at yours as well. I haven't been around perhaps as long as some, but I haven't seen any of the professed Christians on these boards coming out with guns blazing screaming, "where are those dirty atheists? Lemme at 'em!".

Both are nice areas. New Smyrna is about an hour north of me.

LOL, Golly, jb, can you please not jettison NY into some lost corner of the space-time continuum until I have a chance to get out of it first? Yes, the region is awash in leftist statism and pure political idiocy (mainly due to the high -in all senses of that word- population of NYC and Albany, not the whole State), but there are a few of us Upstaters still surviving here until we can devise a decent exit strategy. The general State is definitely a downward flushing vortex, but there are some pockets of decent living still around. The missus and I haven't made the final decision yet, but Eastern Tennessee or New Smyrna Beach area of Florida are looking good.

King is looney. Why are Trump, Fiorina and Carson the top three in position for the Republican nomination for President right now? Because Republican voters are sick of voting for leaders who claim that they will take a principled stand against Obama and the Democrats only to be betrayed by the leadership of Boehner and McConnell. Boehner leaving is a good first step only if someone like Meadows (Gohmert and Gowdy have already said they will not seek the Speakership) takes over. Let's see who is going to replace Boehner before we start calling this a major victory.

Since you mention it, you bring up religious beliefs and go on religious rants far more than anyone else on these boards. Perhaps if you toned that rhetoric down a bit, you might find people more willing to discuss things with you.

Yours to decide.

Unfortunately for Peter King, the "Crazies" are the lunatic "moderates" that have been the lapdogs who are perfectly happy to hand the Republican party over to Obama and the Democrats! Let's be clear, Mr. King is an "Establishment" type who has grown way too comfortable by "infesting" the DC Beltway for so long! He actually has forgotten why he was sent to Washington in the first place and, more importantly, who he is working for!!!

Are you suggesting that the leading conservative politicians shouldn't be allowed to harp on religion if they so choose? In truth, a politician 'harps' on any subject at his or her own peril. If you don't like it, that's certainly your prerogative and you can as a citizen vote accordingly. And so can everyone else.

Actually that's a stated opinion on your part, ewv, and not a statement of fact. Neither you nor I nor anyone else for that matter can make a blanket statement like that and claim it's fact.

While I wish New York State were no longer part of this nation, let alone this universe, it is. ewv did not deserve a downvote on this one.

For the record, abortion came up a lot during the first debate.

https://reason.com/blog/2015/09/17/th...

jdg, I had not seen Reason's analysis of the videos. If you have a link, I would be interested in reading/viewing it.

I, like you, also do not think that the RINOs are the Religious Right. The RINOs, for the most part, want nothing to do with the Religious Right.
It makes for an odd mix:
- the RINOs have Huckabee, the Conservatives have Santorum - both of whom I consider to be men of faith who let their faith get in the way.
- the RINOs have Romney, the Conservatives have Cruz - both of whom I consider to be men of faith who do not let their faith get in the way (at least not to the point of a Huckabee or Santorum)
- Only the Conservatives have Rand Paul
- Only the RINOs have Jeb Bush

I think that the Tea Party has not veered from its initial mission. What I see instead is some people with too stringent a litmus test in which any level of personal faith equates to potential theocrat. I think that those assertions are unreasonable. And because of that, I think that too stringent a litmus test is also unreasonable.

The sad fact is that we already live under a theocracy. Karl Popper claimed that Marxism is a religion. I think that he is correct in this. And if he is correct, we are already there. So why are we quibbling about potential theocrats when we have actual ones in office forcing their will on us daily?

Abortion has come up plenty of times in the debates. But right now it's being disguised as "the Planned Parenthood scandal" and as calls to defund that NGO.

Reason has repeatedly documented that the anti-PP videos are doctored to deceive, and that PP has done nothing wrong in its disposal of waste from its operations. But the pro-life side persists in screaming about those things in order to distract the (mostly pro-choice) media from covering "progress" the pro-life side has made -- including both the Federal ban on abortions after 20 weeks (now pending in Congress) and requirements for hospital admission arrangements that have successfully shut down most clinics in places like Texas and Mississippi.

But Eudaimonia is partly right here -- the Religious Right are losing on most issues, mostly because they are old people and are not recruiting as fast as they are dying of old age.

What makes me ROFL is the assertion that the Religious Right are RINOs. This depends on what beliefs you think make someone a "real Republican", but for many years, religious conservatism was the correct answer to that question. It's primarily the influence of big spenders like Huckabee and Romney, and the big money donors who back them, that has made the GOP move away from religious (and small-government) conservatism to the point that the Tea Party movement was needed to save the GOP. At which point, a lot of libertarians like myself, who had earlier written off the GOP as hopeless, felt we now had hope because there aren't enough religious conservatives to keep control, either of the Tea Party movement or of the GOP if and when the movement takes over the GOP.

Now, like ewv, I would prefer that the Tea Party movement's main focus be on liberty (or at least cutting spending) rather than the Bible. But I'm not afraid of the Bible thumpers because there is no way the Tea Party will ever get a chance to implement their agenda (in the ways it differs from the libertarians' agenda). Demographics are winning this battle for us, so it need not be fought.

"Was King so closely allied with Boehner and his manipulations that he is in danger?" Yes, they are quite closely aligned. All that you said is correct.

Mark Meadows, a non-RINO congressman, has been digging away at the roots to Boehner's power and has finally gotten his first treasure. Whether he can topple the entire RINO establishment remains to be seen.

The last statement about the original point isn't clear to me. He ties his own success to wanting the party to be in power, but what does that aspect have to do with Boehner?

Was King so closely allied with Boehner and his manipulations that he is in danger? I don't see any sign yet that the establishment is thinking of giving up real power to the insurgents. They typically will go down with the ship they sink rather than give up their own power, like in Atlas Shrugged. Insider establishment power politics has run the House for a very long time. It didn't start with Boehner and won't end with his resignation . I don't think we have anywhere near the whole story on why Boehner resigned. It doesn't seem to be like the straightforward resignation from the Senate by Olympia Snowe for the reasons she gave, even though their public statements are similar. As Speaker, Boehner has been under different kinds of pressures and I wonder if he really quit only out of discouragement as a failed Pragmatist dealing with increasing contention between adamant factions.

(The 'downvotes' and 'hiding' regardless of content have come from a personal vendetta trying to be deliberately punitive.)