Who's more annoying, the hardcore right or the hardcore left?

The dude is just a straight up racist hate monger.

some facts. wrote:

I just read over that link. If you find that a compelling piece, then I have no more need to respond to you. I think Bush is an idiot. But comparing him and his administration to Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Pinochet, Goebbels, Nazis, stasi and gulags is asinine and disrespectful to the people who lived and died under such tyrants and systems. If you think they are the same or even similar, then you have no appreciation for history.

I will start buying into that drivel after I see things like:

Bush staying in office beyond 2008

Those civil society leaders - opposition leaders, labor activists, clergy and journalists arrested and sent to Gitmo.

Real gulags opening up

So then you are saying that none of the information contained in that article is true? If you can tell me that the current administration has not done the things that were described, then the author has no legitimate position. But if these instances are all real, then I don't see what there is to "buy into".

I notice you said, "read over", not "read", so I wonder if perhaps you skimmed the piece and found several mentions of Hitler, Pinochet, Mussolini, etc. and dismissed it as hyperbole. I want to hear you make a convincing argument that the author's examples of the Bush administration's actions are in fact NOT similar to steps taken by other authoritarian governments during their rise to power.

The author even admits that a totalitarian state like Nazi Germany or fascist Italy is not likely to arise in America, stating that it would be "impossible" for the media to be completely controlled or shut down. But given the current administration's policies, are you prepared to say that America is not becoming less and less a free democratic society?

I live in a bastion of what I guess you'd call liberalism, and not one person I know ever visits moveon.org or mentions George Soros, and my guess is over half of them don't know who he is. Which is somewhat variance with a certain Right Wing Talking notion that moveon and Soros are propelling an agenda on the Left. I would say, umm...no, they are not.

Awesome - this is exactly what I'm talkin about. Like I said, I'm not saying he necessarily does or doesn't make up sh#t, all I'm saying is don't start spouting things (far Left & Right included), that aren't based on fact. The whole pt of my original post was to say, 'Look, so many on the left say OReilly is full of sh#t, but when I ask for examples they pull something from friggin 4yrs ago'.

Hell, if you taped what I've said for 2hrs /day for the past 5yrs I'm sure there are snipets that make me sound like a racist (my views on Sharpton), pedofile (any HS girls track meet), sexist (The View is full of hens), etc....

Look fwd to hearing the result & please don't just get your info from a leftist site/blog.

AmazingIdea wrote:

Hell, if you taped what I've said for 2hrs /day for the past 5yrs I'm sure there are snipets that make me sound like a racist (my views on Sharpton), pedofile (any HS girls track meet), sexist (The View is full of hens), etc....

So, you're a dick, and you're a little creepy. Cool. We figured that out from your first post.

Maybe if more moderate democrats really knew the truth about Soros,moveon, dailykos etc they would be more inclined to turn more conservative. That is what happened to me. Soros Moveon etc are very antiamerican and believe in a socialist/communist way of life. They are trying to change America and are using the democratic party as their vehicle. This does not mean all dems are anti american or socialists. They just are not aware of their party being hijacked by Soros and his cohorts.

Couldn't find any recent transcripts. But here is his recurring opinion column.

After reading the immigration piece (http://www.creators.com/opinion/bill-oreilly.html?columnsName=bor), and the atheism piece (http://www.creators.com/opinion/bill-oreilly/beyond-belief.html), I don't think he's distorting any facts here. To be fair, he's not really relying on facts as this is an op-ed piece, but at least he's not distorting them.

What I will say is that he comes across as smug, and maybe that's why people don't like him. In the atheism piece, for example, I agree with some of his points - that "people of faith should be challenged and think about their beliefs. Critical thinking in all areas makes the mind sharper, and your philosophy stronger" or that atheists, as with those who do believe in religion should be protected by the Constitution. Right on.

But digs like, "atheism is chic, it's cool, it's the latest craze" (which belittles atheism), "I stopped him in the fourth round with this right hook" (which then not a knock-out a punch, simply a statement of the centuries old cosmological argument), and "the atheists never get it" (suggesting a lack of understanding or brainpower) are juvenile. I guess you have to sell newspapers, and being smug is entertaining, but I can see why people don't like him.

I'm sure I can find smug things written by lefties, but O'Reilly does project an "I'm right, you're dumb" attitude.

AmazingIdea wrote:

Look fwd to hearing the result & please don't just get your info from a leftist site/blog.

I'm about to take a look at the links posted a few posts above yours. Sorry, I'm not going to completely disregard them just because they may be leftist. I plan to evaluate whatever I find there based on it's own relevance/merit, not the presenter of the material.

Amazingidea, I side with you for the most part. However, your statement that OReilly never makes absurd comments is, ironically, absurd. He is an embarrassment to conservatives everywhere because of his remarkably uneducated and oftentimes completely incorrect statements. Read "Worst Person in the World" for many many many many many many examples, and yes, many of them are very recent. While this book is by Olbermann it relies entirely on quotes and can't really be pick apart, even by a contrarian like you. Pick it up, read the part pertaining to your dear old Bill, come back and apologize for capitalizing SPECIFIC like 20 times.

and why the emphasis on recent. let's say (hypothetically) that there weren't any recent examples of things he's made up, but the first 10 of his 12 years on the air he made everything up. would you say "no, no, i want recent examples".

Postmodern Fatigue wrote:

I'm not convinced we have a real far right in this country either. This business of the evangelical base is a new thing and not as powerful as people make it out to be, and is fleeting. I don't see any evidence that the "far right" is dominating millions of leftists, do you? Seems like the two moderate sides just talk through each other without much actual conflict or a clear "winner." What are your "obvious" reasons for seeing the far right?

I suppose you're right in your assertion that I may be reading too much into the Evangelical movement. I am very leery of them and it is the number one reason that I believe there to be the far right in this country. They would like to change the curriculum in education, the belief systems of non believers, control the media and I wouldn't put having a militant wing beyond their reach.

I just don't see that level of conviction on the "middle-left". Sure they want to tax the rich, but not so much so that they become middle class. Sure they're some liberals who would like to see the captains of industry pushed off their perch and, more likely than not, be replaced by themselves but that is a small minority.

Supposedly the Evangelicals are making up more than a small minority in the US and even a bigger force in US politics (ergo the Republicans selling out to them). I also throw the Ruby Ridgers and other backwoods militants into the far right. But more likely than not they are just wanting to be left alone as opposed to systematically changing the hearts and minds of Americans.

From the media matters website, in the past week I don't see anything he lied about. I see some distasteful comments -

"In my opinion, CNN and especially MSNBC delight in showing Iraqi violence because they want Americans to think badly of President Bush." Obviously he is assigning motives here where there may be none. And the use of the word "delight" is a little morbid, and I would say insulting to CNN and MSNBC.

"Secular progressives are going to basically tell children to use drugs, to have indiscriminate sex, do what you want when you're 14 years old, never mind what your parents think." That's some hyperbole there, and again, he's putting words in the mouth of people.

Going back a little further there is some "misinformation", as this website calls it.

From 10/11/06,

"South Dakota, as you know, has voted to outlaw abortions unless the mother's life is in danger, which is never the case, because you can always have a C-section and do those kinds of things." And later "Forty-five percent of Americans, according to a new CNN poll -- 45 percent say all abortions should be outlawed unless the mother's going to die -- or catastrophic health consequences, which again, is never the case -- never."

Obviously this is wrong. There are legitimate times when a mother's life may be in danger. Many people know this. But is he lying to try to sway that person who doesn't know or is he simply mistaken?

Beyond that, some of the misinformation quotes get older, which you specifically did not want. There seem to be a lot from 2004. My conclusion from this little bit of research (I don't have all day to sit here) is that he seems to create a lot of strawmen. He says things that are extreme and maybe unfounded, then assigns to them to whoever he disagrees with. He thereby comes out the victor.

Are these mistakes or dishonesty? Decide for yourself. He seems to be pretty intelligent to me, so I'm leaning toward dishonesty.

One problem with O'Reilly is his amazing need to generalize and pigeonhole and label people. For example, because he doesn't like a couple of things that have happened in Boulder lately, suddenly Boulder is a bastion of far Left liberalism. Considering that Boulder is actually one of the places that was a stronghold of the Promise Keepers, and a place where the University of Colorado has instructed students to hep identify people who show up at marijuana rallies, I'd say the city is pretty much up for grabs ideologically.

Sorry - I must have missed that....where did you see ME say he never makes absurd comments?

I can't fault you for being leery of them. But look at it this way: a statistical minority with no coherent ideology (the political left in the U.S.) is keeping them relatively in check. How powerful can they be if this is the case? Sure, their desires are unsettling, but they don't have the means to see them through. Because of this I don't think they're anything to fear in the long term. Again, though, just my take.

This is the problem with the current American press - virtually every media conglomerate is biased toward one side or another. Sure there is still the independent press - mainly on the internet, but the vast majority of people still get their news from TV and its all skewed. The solution - I have no idea, but something needs to be done so that people get unbiased actual information

Even though I'm a Liberal, I'm more annoyed by the VERY FAR left than the very far right. Getting too far right makes one evil -- that much is a given, so the ones who are REALLY far right are just more evil than those who are 80% of the way to all the way right. Right-leaning and even voting individuals aren't necessarily evil.

The far left people bother me so because they give a bad name to liberals. Rosie O'Donnell and Bill Mar should just tell their jokes and leave the politics to people who know something. Not sure why comics and movie stars think we're all glady giving them a platform to spew their crap. Rosie O'Donnell knows nothing about anything. She couldn't even get basic info about Donald Trump right.

Ann Coulter on the right is a baffoon though, so at least she balances out the far left people.

I think a Hilary Clinton-Obama ticket is shaping up. That will be weird.

Other than the people who seemed to populate her studio audience, I don't know many people who would ever take their political cues from Rosie O'Donnell. I'm on the Left, but I also am a person who believes in absolutely no conspiracy theories. And when Rosie says fire cannot melt steel (how does she think it was MADE in the first place), or that 650,000 Iraqis have been killed in the current war (that's at least three times as high as any reliable estimate, which is bad enough), I just cringe. The problem with some people is not their ideology - it's thweir sloppiness and hyperbole.

As for Bill Maher, you should remember that before this current Bush administration, he was pretty evenhanded, actually tilting Right on a number of issues. And he had several regular) panelists from the Right, including Floyd Brown, Dana Rohrbacher, Bob Dornan, Kellyanne Fitzpatrick (now Conway), and Ann Coulter. But he's just found Bush too appalling. So have most genuine conservatives, for that matter. Jeffrey Hart, a founding editor of the National Review and a lifelong pal of William F. Buckley, has called Bush the worst president in American history.

Have you watched Bill Maher (Mar to you) recently? It's some of the best political conversation anywhere, TV or otherwise. He knows exactly what he's talking about, and he's far from an idealogue, as a matter of fact, he identifies himself as a libertarian. He may seem liberal to you though because he points out the absurdity of Bush and his ilk. You should pull your head out of your ass if you think you or any other TV pundit is more qualified to talk politics than Bill Maher.