Comments on: Looking Glass Lessons Learned

By: Marianne Matthews

Marianne Matthews — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 02:33:02 +0000

Bad BobDeux … You’re going to give everyone here a distaste of you if you accuse Lex and his commenters of being “hacks and jingoists.” This sounds like code for accusing them of racism, that universal and tired meme that liberals use instead of reasoned argument.

Personal ad hominem insults are a poor substitute for respectful differences of opinion. Grow up. It’s time.

Marianne

By: lex

lex — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 00:42:44 +0000

Oh. You're back. Never get tired of playing the fool, do you?

By: lex

lex — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 00:33:23 +0000

BBD, if I were to say that you were a disagreeable pedant and gasbag, that might – potentially – be a smear. To note that a person is what in fact she is cannot, by definition, be such. Such behavior is to commit a category error and is the hallmark of a weak intelligence and/or characteristic of those who feverishly erect strawmen, the better to demolish them. And feel even better about themselves afterward, if that’s possible.

I suppose it’s cheaper than therapy.

Guppy said:

Sure, Ms Hotta is off the mark so it is right that you criticize her form. But you miss the mark yourselves. Don’t you Americans know or understand that your president’s unilateral approach to solving problems have made you highly unpopular is many societies? Don’t think so? Think again. Even your “European allies” don’t like you very much.

Putting aside the notion of unilateral actions with the facts cited at #44 above, our president, as even his domestic critics concede (the ones worth listening to, anyway) acted in what he understood to be the national interest. A constitutionally sufficient majority of both houses of Congress agreed with him. France and Germany, for reasons of their own national interest, no doubt, did not. Her implication is a false syllogism which concludes that our European “allies” liking us is more important than our own national interest.

So, as for “reading skills,” well: Something about motes and beams comes to mind.

By: BadBobDeux

BadBobDeux — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 23:41:57 +0000

Lex: The giveaway, after your misreading of the Hotta article, was your attempt to smear Ms. Hotta for being Japanese and an academic.

Such behavior is a hallmark of hacks and jingoists.

Regarding Guppy’s comments; nowhere did he (or she) suggest US interests should be ‘subordinated’ to those of other countries. Again, your poor reading skills should not be used as an argument or rationale.

By: Mongo

Mongo — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 19:30:38 +0000

@ AW1: And no one can dispute the million lives that were spared by not having to invade the home land. That would have been horrific on both sides.

The nukes saved the day…hell, the whole war.

Lex: Not to mine either.

By: lex

lex — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 18:36:00 +0000

I’d be inclined to take offense at your characterization, did not the smugly superior tone convince me that little that I might write or think would pierce your armor of supercilious self-regard.

War was “inevitable” because sanctions weren’t handled in a more sympathetic manner to an aggressive, militaristic regime that had already invaded three countries, committing barbarisms along the way?

Well, maybe. After all, Hitler’s annexation of Austria and the Sudetenland certainly whetted his appetite for more of the same. Peace in our time, and that. “No more territorial ambitions” in Europe.

Guppy raises important points to those who believe that our national interest should be subordinated to the national interests of others.

Have as much of that as you want, it’s not to my taste.