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Author Topic: "Obamacare"
Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Again, think about what you are saying. If it is true that even with enormous advantages, the Democrats just can't stand up to the Republicans even though the Democrats aren't messing up at all, why would I ever want to put my faith in them, even if I thought they were trying to do the right thing?
Let us say that I tell a blatant lie about you, and I use a lot of resources to make this lie sound plausible. You fight back against it, but due to the internal mechanisms of manipulation that populations have that I've utilized (FUD, for instance) about half of all people now think the lie is true. Do I get to use this wanton spreading of misinformation as an excuse to say 'why would anyone want to put their faith in you?' just because it has succeeded with about half of the receiving population? Is it irrelevant that this number of misinformed will dwindle significantly over time?
Missing from this is, I believe, something I tried to bring up with the voting for the lesser of two evils thing. That is, the Democrats are not, by any stretch of the imagination, the good guys.
In this instance it's not even a 'lesser of two evils' thing. It is a contest between a side that is largely telling the truth and is offering a reform plan which is vastly better than the morass that we constantly avoid fixing, and another side which is largely propagating lies and factual innacuracy, attempting to keep the unsustainable status quo. This is not a lesser-of-two-evils thing. It is a choice between information and misinformation. In this case, at least, there is no near equivalency between the parties. You are choosing between mostly truth (our system is broken and in need of reform) and mostly lies (our country has the best healthcare in the world, and Obama will give us death panels).
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MrSquicky
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BB,
In that case, I wouldn't combat them in this strategy. They're irrelevant.

That is to say, I've already identified the two things I'm focused on. I'd ask the criticizer to explain how they impact the inflation of health care or the death spiral, as the two things we agree are of the highest importance here. Other than that, they don't get addressed in health care talks.

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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
In that case, I wouldn't combat them in this strategy. They're irrelevant.

Oh?
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MrSquicky
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quote:
In this instance it's not even a 'lesser of two evils' thing. It is a contest between a side that is largely telling the truth and is offering a reform plan which is vastly better than the morass that we constantly avoid fixing, and another side which is largely propagating lies and factual innacuracy, attempting to keep the unsustainable status quo. This is not a lesser-of-two-evils thing. It is a choice between information and misinformation. In this case, at least, there is no near equivalency between the parties. You are choosing between mostly truth (our system is broken and in need of reform) and mostly lies (our country has the best healthcare in the world, and Obama will give us death panels).
I think it's sad, but by no means surprising that that is how you see it. There are not only two sides to this issue.
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kmbboots
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Samprimary, I would agree if all the Democrats had been on board with that. Sadly, too many of them were solidly in the pocket of the insurance lobby.

ETA: Or in "Republican" seats and scared.

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Chris Bridges
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Me, I'd hire the Daily Show writers, or the folks from The Onion.

Coming back with outrage won't work. The Republicans own that technique.
Coming back with facts won't work. Too many voters respond to scare tactics over reason.

But what works nicely is mockery. Not of the politicians themselves, never the people, but the ideas, the constant shifting of the goalposts without every admitting it, the obstructionism for obstructionism's sake, the insistence on pushing for tax laws and legislation and regulation-easement that were proven to be harmful during the last administration, all of that is fair game. Get people laughing at their blustering and they lose a lot of their power.

If that's not feasible, and it probably won't be, Obama needs to hire a speech editor. Not a writer, he's fine on that on his own or whatever staff he uses. But he needs to change his style.

First, cut every speech in half, at least. Oratory is his strength, and many of his speeches will live on in history as powerful statements. But they drag on when you're listening to them.

Second, give up on bipartisanship. Consider the phrase, "That's a damn lie." You can't placate or compromise with the foe whose stated goal is to destroy you.

Third, learn to give effective bullet points. "Blankety-blank Americans have no health care. Why should you care? Because they go to the emergency room, and you pay for it. Andf because they have no coverage, they wait till the last second to go, so you'll be paying even more for their care. The new health care plan will put cover everyone so that overall costs -- costs that are coming out of your paycheck anyway, and getting higher -- will be lower." Etc.

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MrSquicky
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quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
Okay. Then, yes. If the team came up with short, easy to understand messaging that appealed to people's anger and fear and distrust of government then it would probably be effective.

That wouldn't be my primary means of motivation.

The current health reform has not been embraced by the public because it was framed as as a social services give-away. People see this as more taxes to give services to people who aren't paying for them now.

The fundamental focus of the message I'm talking about is "If you want to know where your money is going, it is going to inflation of your health care and insurance."

The main selling point is that you will get to keep more of your money.

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kmbboots
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Then it won't be as motivating as anger and fear. The people I am talking about would rather have their money go to inflation (already too complicated an idea) than to immigrants or bums.

ETA: They can even recycle the footage of vaguely brown people climbing over a fence into a backyard.

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MrSquicky
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quote:
The people I am talking about would rather have their money go to inflation (already too complicated an idea) than to immigrants or bums.
What people are those? I'm talking about basically the entire middle class of the United States.
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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
There are not only two sides to this issue.

For the purposes of this, yes. There is. The people who are pushing the reform, and the people who want to kill the reform. It isn't split perfectly along party lines.

quote:
The fundamental focus of the message I'm talking about is "If you want to know where your money is going, it is going to inflation of your health care and insurance."

The main selling point is that you will get to keep more of your money

This was actually a major selling point of not only healthcare reform, but of bills before it (TARP, etc). Obama spent months saying that the time had come for reform precisely because the savings were needed direly. It's countered easily by FUD. Everything you are proposing is. You offer a promise of savings, the counter is to point hysterically at the front-loaded cost of the bill and equate that to a net loss. Which is exactly what happened.
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natural_mystic
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
The fundamental focus of the message I'm talking about is "If you want to know where your money is going, it is going to inflation of your health care and insurance."

The main selling point is that you will get to keep more of your money.

How do you get them to believe you?

I think you're buying into the current narrative about how the only reason everything isn't wondrous is because Obama is too 'detached' and 'professorial'. Really
1. Changing the status quo is always hard. One of the reasons health care reform had not happened.
2. ~40% of the country will loudly object to anything Obama does with scant regard to truth. There is basically no message that will change their minds.
3. The Democratic party is so big tent that congress was far from a rubber stamp
4. Most importantly the economy sucks.
5. Corollary to 4., many of those who would benefit from the changes had bigger things to worry about, and so did not have anywhere close to the enthusiasm of those against.

I am very disappointed in Obama in some respects. Gay rights is probably #1 on that list. Not on health care, though.

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kmbboots
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I am talking about the people who are generally against health care reform now. The Tea Party folks for example.
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kmbboots
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quote:
Originally posted by natural_mystic:


I am very disappointed in Obama in some respects. Gay rights is probably #1 on that list. Not on health care, though.

Guantanamo, warrantless wiretapping, executive privilege...
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natural_mystic
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quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
quote:
Originally posted by natural_mystic:


I am very disappointed in Obama in some respects. Gay rights is probably #1 on that list. Not on health care, though.

Guantanamo, warrantless wiretapping, executive privilege...
They're on my list; just not #1.
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kmbboots
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Just filling it out a little. [Frown]
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MrSquicky
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quote:
I think you're buying into the current narrative about how the only reason everything isn't wondrous is because Obama is too 'detached' and 'professorial'. Really
I'll say it again. I'm talking about the failure to sell the health care reform to the American public.

Not the Tea Party. Not the Fox News hardcores. The vast majority of the American middle class is not behind "Obamacare".

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kmbboots
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Those people make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than we want to believe.
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BlackBlade
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From the Washington Post in an interview with Obama,

quote:
You have to give the Republicans credit, just from a pure political perspective, that they used every instrument available to them in the Senate to prolong the process in such a way that helped drive down support nationally, that gave everybody a sense that somehow Washington was broken," he told me. "At a time when everybody was worrying about jobs, for us to have to spend six to nine months on this piece of legislation obviously was not helpful.

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Hobbes
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As someone who was not nearly as informed as most of the posters here (and thus has the perspective of the poorly informed voter [Smile] ) it seemed to me that the main advantage the Republican message had was that it was better thought out and coordinated. They had the simple message for sound-bites that most of America heard (the one everyone here seems to love about fear of government), the middle sized one with a few numbers and examples, and then the in depth ones. Even if they were outright lies they had a coherent message for every spectrum of interest and it was consistent enough that you would hear it multiple times at the level you were at (and thus remember it). The Democrats didn't seem to be coordinated at all, and didn't have anything short of a middle-length message at best. This is neither here nor there but it seems like the last 10 years or so that's been the Democrat's major problem: they just can't coordinate together on talking points, they're all over the map.

And just because I often come across as a conservative-only person here I'll say that while I was not on board in entirety with the Democratic health-care plan, I was in favor of it over both the status-quo and anything the Republicans came up with. I just agree with Squick that it was very poorly sold.

Hobbes [Smile]

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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
Those people make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than we want to believe.

They sure do! [Smile]
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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
The vast majority of the American middle class is not behind "Obamacare".

I'd need to see a source for that. I'd be unsurprised if it was Rassmussen.
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capaxinfiniti
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
The vast majority of the American middle class is not behind "Obamacare".

I'd need to see a source for that. I'd be unsurprised if it was Rassmussen.
id need to see a source to the contrary. id be unsurprised if it was fivethirtyeight.
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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
id need to see a source to the contrary. id be unsurprised if it was fivethirtyeight.

Yes, I do tend to use credible sources. Aren't you clever!
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Blayne Bradley
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quote:
Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:
I think you're buying into the current narrative about how the only reason everything isn't wondrous is because Obama is too 'detached' and 'professorial'. Really
I'll say it again. I'm talking about the failure to sell the health care reform to the American public.

Not the Tea Party. Not the Fox News hardcores. The vast majority of the American middle class is not behind "Obamacare".

Isnt that mostly because it doesnt go far enough?
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kmbboots
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quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
Those people make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than we want to believe.

They sure do! [Smile]
Did you miss that I was talking about people who are motivated by fear and anger and who respond to sound bites rather than facts and complicated ideas? Why would you think that is a good thing?
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Tresopax
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quote:
President Obama had the biggest bully pulpit in the world. He didn't use it effectively.
The ironic thing is that so many predictions in 2008 were that Obama would be good at convincing but bad at actually doing anything. And yet the reverse happened - he accomplished a lot, but failed to sell it.
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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
Those people make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than we want to believe.

They sure do! [Smile]
Did you miss that I was talking about people who are motivated by fear and anger and who respond to sound bites rather than facts and complicated ideas? Why would you think that is a good thing?
Unless I misread you (it looked like you were responding to Squicky, directly above your post. If you weren't, my apologies)... it looked like you were saying that Tea Partiers and fans of Fox News make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than you ("we") want to believe.

If I read you right, then yes, I agree that they do in fact make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than you'd like. And yes, I do think that's a good thing. [Smile]

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kmbboots
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I was responding to more than just that post. We were talking about peope who didn't understand health care reform because they needed simple messages and responded to fear and anger rather than facts and ideas. Whatever overlap there is with Fox watchers and Partiers is left to the observer.
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Dan_Frank
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My mistake, then. I apologize for misinterpreting you.
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kmbboots
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I should have been more clear.
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Samprimary
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Here we go, everyone, let's talk about this whinging waste of flesh.

quote:
It's worth dwelling for a moment on the reaction of Rep. Andy Harris, an incoming legislator who staunchly opposes the new health-care law and ran promising its repeal, to news that he'd had to wait a month for his government-funded health-care benefits to kick in:

Republican Andy Harris, an anesthesiologist who defeated freshman Democrat Frank Kratovil on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, reacted incredulously when informed that federal law mandated that his government-subsidized health-care policy would take effect Feb. 1 – 28 days after his Jan. 3rd swearing-in.

“He stood up and asked the two ladies who were answering questions why it had to take so long, what he would do without 28 days of health care,” said a congressional staffer who saw the exchange. ... “Harris then asked if he could purchase insurance from the government to cover the gap,” added the aide.

Awwwww, like .. some sort of, say, 'public option?'

Republicans are professional trolls.

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Samprimary
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(this is to say that you can tap a forest and regenerate a republican)
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Destineer
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quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
Those people make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than we want to believe.

They sure do! [Smile]
Did you miss that I was talking about people who are motivated by fear and anger and who respond to sound bites rather than facts and complicated ideas? Why would you think that is a good thing?
Unless I misread you (it looked like you were responding to Squicky, directly above your post. If you weren't, my apologies)... it looked like you were saying that Tea Partiers and fans of Fox News make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than you ("we") want to believe.

If I read you right, then yes, I agree that they do in fact make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than you'd like. And yes, I do think that's a good thing. [Smile]

Dan, I don't understand this perspective (or at least one aspect of it). You seem like a thoughtful guy. Why would you be happy to see people become fans of a blatant propaganda machine like Fox News?

I mean, I'm liberal, but if one of my friends told me he was a "fan of MSNBC," I'd tear him a new one.

It's not a good thing when people thoughtlessly parrot the ideas you hold for well-thought-out reasons.

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MattP
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In politics you first want people to agree with you. Having them agree with you for the right reasons is a secondary goal.
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Destineer
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
(this is to say that you can tap a forest and regenerate a republican)

Good one!

(Although there are trolls that regenerate for B or R as well)

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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
(this is to say that you can tap a forest and regenerate a republican)

Good one!

(Although there are trolls that regenerate for B or R as well)

(and one troll that costs R but regenerates for B! Ah, Sedge Troll, how conditionally useful you were.)

quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by kmbboots:
Those people make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than we want to believe.

They sure do! [Smile]
Did you miss that I was talking about people who are motivated by fear and anger and who respond to sound bites rather than facts and complicated ideas? Why would you think that is a good thing?
Unless I misread you (it looked like you were responding to Squicky, directly above your post. If you weren't, my apologies)... it looked like you were saying that Tea Partiers and fans of Fox News make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than you ("we") want to believe.

If I read you right, then yes, I agree that they do in fact make up a bigger chunk of the middle class than you'd like. And yes, I do think that's a good thing. [Smile]

Dan, I don't understand this perspective (or at least one aspect of it). You seem like a thoughtful guy. Why would you be happy to see people become fans of a blatant propaganda machine like Fox News?

I mean, I'm liberal, but if one of my friends told me he was a "fan of MSNBC," I'd tear him a new one.

It's not a good thing when people thoughtlessly parrot the ideas you hold for well-thought-out reasons.

I'm not particularly convinced that Fox News is nothing but a propaganda machine. Not particularly attached to the station overall, but I'd like to see some compelling evidence that did not, itself, seem incredibly skewed. The whole "reality has a liberal bias" attitude doesn't fly with me, sorry.

But overall, I was actually mostly reacting to the mention that had been made of Tea Partiers, which make up a huge percentage of the middle class, and whom I do have strong (positive) opinions of.

All this is sort of invalidated by the fact that I misinterpreted kmbboots, of course. But there you have it.

PS: Thanks for calling me a thoughtful guy! [Smile]

PPS: The quote vortex is just for you, Samp.

PPPS: Edited to add PSes.

[ November 19, 2010, 08:31 PM: Message edited by: Dan_Frank ]

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Samprimary
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quote:
I was actually mostly reacting to the mention that had been made of Tea Partiers, which make up a huge percentage of the middle class, and whom I do have strong (positive) opinions of.
What is this huge percentage of the middle class? 20%
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capaxinfiniti
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
I was actually mostly reacting to the mention that had been made of Tea Partiers, which make up a huge percentage of the middle class, and whom I do have strong (positive) opinions of.
What is this huge percentage of the middle class? 20%
you really need to start producing some credible numbers of your own. you spew enough liberal blogoshpere rhetoric on this forum that i dont even need to leave this site in search left-wing propaganda.
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Destineer
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quote:
I'm not particularly convinced that Fox News is nothing but a propaganda machine. Not particularly attached to the station overall, but I'd like to see some compelling evidence that did not, itself, seem incredibly skewed. The whole "reality has a liberal bias" attitude doesn't fly with me, sorry.
You're not convinced by the numerous examples Jon Stewart has brought to light, like the use of footage from a different event to make a Tea Party rally look larger, or accusing the Park51 mosque of "terrorist ties" through their ties to one of Newscorp's own biggest shareholders, or misrepresenting the content of the Nuclear Posture Review?

None of this assumes any liberal bias to reality. But these examples show that Fox has displayed a clear bias against reality.

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Dan_Frank
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Those are definitely some good examples of Fox misrepresenting things. I'm a little disappointed, though not terribly surprised. I was familiar with the ground zero mosque clip, but not the other two (as I said before, I don't really watch TV news in any variety myself.)

I may look into these issues independently to see if Stewart is misrepresenting anything himself, but unless I get around to that I'll certainly concede that Fox engages in their fair share of propagandizing.

I'm also curious if Stewart (or anyone) has done this re: any of Fox's actual news programs, as opposed to it's op-eds.

PS: Thanks for showing me these. [Smile]

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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
I was actually mostly reacting to the mention that had been made of Tea Partiers, which make up a huge percentage of the middle class, and whom I do have strong (positive) opinions of.
What is this huge percentage of the middle class? 20%
Sure why not.
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Blayne Bradley
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I believe the consensus was that Fox's actual NEWS portion of their show was just about as biased/unbiased as any other news show, the problem is that its only like 30% of their lineup with about 50% being op eds disguised as news and the remaining 60% being openly op eds.
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capaxinfiniti
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quote:
Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:
I believe the consensus was that Fox's actual NEWS portion of their show was just about as biased/unbiased as any other news show, the problem is that its only like 30% of their lineup with about 50% being op eds disguised as news and the remaining 60% being openly op eds.

which op-eds in the fox lineup are being disguised as news?
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Blayne Bradley
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How about that time they completely overblown and misrepresented the issues surrounding Konami and Atomic Games making 'Six Days in Falluja' completely screwing over both the troops and the gaming community because the media are vultures.
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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
you really need to start producing some credible numbers of your own. you spew enough liberal blogoshpere rhetoric on this forum that i dont even need to leave this site in search left-wing propaganda.

This always happens: i say something which you dislike, personally. You have the option to counter, to offer assertions of your own, but going on like 13 times now, all you do instead is give me a backbite post. Like this. It's just useless whinging.

To borrow a page from your book, I could call it "conservative blogosphere whinging" or, you know, whatever. I'm not really good at simpering.

Here's an idea, though: how about you try something different, so you wouldn't be so lamentably patronizable. Here, I could come up with a post for you!

quote:
Hey samprimary, Where do you come up with that 20% figure? I don't buy it.
See? It's so easy, you don't even have to leave the liberal blogosphere left wing propogandizer machine I'm apparently part of.
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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:
I believe the consensus was that Fox's actual NEWS portion of their show was just about as biased/unbiased as any other news show, the problem is that its only like 30% of their lineup with about 50% being op eds disguised as news and the remaining 60% being openly op eds.

Well, Fox News may be filled with propaganda, but on the other hand they've shattered the laws of reality and filled their station with 140% content!

So, that's pretty impressive.

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capaxinfiniti
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
you really need to start producing some credible numbers of your own. you spew enough liberal blogoshpere rhetoric on this forum that i dont even need to leave this site in search left-wing propaganda.

This always happens: i say something which you dislike, personally. You have the option to counter, to offer assertions of your own, but going on like 13 times now, all you do instead is give me a backbite post. Like this. It's just useless whinging.

To borrow a page from your book, I could call it "conservative blogosphere whinging" or, you know, whatever. I'm not really good at simpering.

Here's an idea, though: how about you try something different, so you wouldn't be so lamentably patronizable. Here, I could come up with a post for you!

quote:
Hey samprimary, Where do you come up with that 20% figure? I don't buy it.
See? It's so easy, you don't even have to leave the liberal blogosphere left wing propogandizer machine I'm apparently part of.

so this is what you post because you cant come up with the numbers? come on. dont get your feelings hurt because someone is beating you at your own game. your arguments have a tendency to boil down to nothing more than 'your wrong!' stated in an unnecessarily obtuse or condescending manner. as far as assertions go, someone suggest 20% and you disagree with them yet you offer no honest rebuttal. you dont even enlighten us with a more realistic samp-friendly number. next time just say 'no' and we will know what you mean and that you have no desire to present a tenable opinion.
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capaxinfiniti
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quote:
Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:
How about that time they completely overblown and misrepresented the issues surrounding Konami and Atomic Games making 'Six Days in Falluja' completely screwing over both the troops and the gaming community because the media are vultures.

most news outlets tend to sensationalize the content they run. i do believe this is detrimental and not in the publics interest. but fox news isnt the only offender as can be see. their presentation of news stories could be done in such a way that they are actually giving the viewer/listener a less-than-objective portray of the events. this can even be done with seemingly minute details such as word choice. still i cant think of a fox op-ed program that they have dress up and let masquerade about as news.
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Samprimary
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quote:
so this is what you post because you cant come up with the numbers?
If you had asked about the number, we'd be having a different conversation. That's why I tried to show you how you could ask about the number. You just jumped straight to whinging about how I'm spewing liberal propaganda blogosphere rhetoric in a pretty obviously frustrated post that I'd like to see you pretend was designed to elicit an 'honest rebuttal.' No, you were frustrated and you were backbiting. You can grow up a little, kiddo, and then you'll give me questions I can respond to. [Smile]
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Blayne Bradley
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quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:
I believe the consensus was that Fox's actual NEWS portion of their show was just about as biased/unbiased as any other news show, the problem is that its only like 30% of their lineup with about 50% being op eds disguised as news and the remaining 60% being openly op eds.

Well, Fox News may be filled with propaganda, but on the other hand they've shattered the laws of reality and filled their station with 140% content!

So, that's pretty impressive.

Watching Axis Powers Hetelia would make you more informed than watching Fox News.
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