Will Beck run off the Teabaggers now?

Ziggurat said:
Why on earth would you do that immediately after I had already said it was nonsense? Did you not believe me?
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Because you are notoriously hyper-literal when backed into a corner. I was asking you to explicitly verify your position that a relative measure was nonsensical.

Which you did. Thank you.

I now look forward to hearing what the value of this threshold you mentioned is. (hint, hint) I've asked it of several people who have made similar claims and never got a concrete answer.
 
Ziggurat said:
Hey, I'll gladly give up both social security and medicare, if you'll stop taxing me for those things.
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Right, but are you a leader of the Tea Party? Why isn't the Tea Party populated with people like you? Instead, it's populated with the hypocrits that Karate described. This thread isn't about you. It's about how frikkin stupid Glenn Beck is and how he might be stupid enough to lose his fan base of stupid Tea Baggers.
 
Upchurch said:
I now look forward to hearing what the value of this threshold you mentioned is. (hint, hint) I've asked it of several people who have made similar claims and never got a concrete answer.
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You can figure out the value of that threshold as well as I can.
 
Upchurch said:
Well, since "quadruple the deficit" is a relative term, you would agree that it is nonsense to use that as a complaint?

What, then, is the numeric value of the threshold you mention and how was it calculated?

(I ask these questions rhetorically. Zig has long since put me on ignore because I kept calling him on his assumptions. Silly me. Careful, GreNME, or you might be next)
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The numberic value threshold is 1.



One black President.
 
Ziggurat said:
The same thing didn't happen under Bush. The threshold isn't about relative fractional increases (why would it be? going from no deficit to $1 deficit is an infinity-fold increase, but nobody would care much), it's about the actual deficit level. Which is much higher under Obama than it ever was under Bush. Is that honestly so hard to understand?
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No, I understand shifted goalposts just fine. I mean, I find it funny that you're now arguing that one inconceivable number is the threshold for angry, venomous, vitriolic speech while another inconceivable number goes by without a peep, but considering how it's obvious you're looking for an excuse for the Tea Party popping up about 8 years too late I guess it's understandable that you'd search for any straw you can grasp at.
 
thaiboxerken said:
Right, but are you a leader of the Tea Party? Why isn't the Tea Party populated with people like you? Instead, it's populated with the hypocrits that Karate described. This thread isn't about you. It's about how frikkin stupid Glenn Beck is and how he might be stupid enough to lose his fan base of stupid Tea Baggers.
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If you want to constrain conversation to the topic of that first post alone, then Karate's description of the hypocrisy of the tea party is also off-topic. So why are you getting your manties in a bunch over my post?
 
Ziggurat said:
If you want to constrain conversation to the topic of that first post alone, then Karate's description of the hypocrisy of the tea party is also off-topic. So why are you getting your manties in a bunch over my post?
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Why do you defend the Tea Party with your OWN values, when you know they don't share them?
 
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Upchurch said:
Well, since "quadruple the deficit" is a relative term, you would agree that it is nonsense to use that as a complaint?

What, then, is the numeric value of the threshold you mention and how was it calculated?

(I ask these questions rhetorically. Zig has long since put me on ignore because I kept calling him on his assumptions. Silly me. Careful, GreNME, or you might be next)
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It's okay, I already have Ziggy on my ignore list (for reasons totally unrelated to this topic) so that I can filter when I should bother replying to him already, so it would only be fair if he did the same.

The point is that the Tea Party assertion that quadrupling the deficit is somehow a sensible reason to come out against Obama while staying quiet during the Bush years is hypocrisy at worst, and disingenuous at best. The "Tea Party" is as I described it earlier: a movement meant to take an ideological stance (or set of ideological stances) and essentially wage a holy war on an administration they want perceived as an enemy of the state. That's not an opposition platform, that's an outright obstructionist platform. It was a poor tactic to take when the Dems took the House and Senate in 2006, and it's now downright poisonous in the hands of the Tea Partiers.
 
Ziggurat said:
Ah yes. It's all about race. Nothing else to see here. Move along.

Funny, though, I can't seem to find Obama's race anywhere on this graph:
http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2009/03/21/GR2009032100104.gif

Can you help me find it?
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So do you think the Tea Party based their arguments off that graph? Is their argument that Obama wasn't born a USA citizen on that graph? What about death panels? What about white slavery? You're trying to convince me that the Tea Party is about fiscal responsibility. IF that was true, why would they have all of these other non-fiscal related accusations?
 
Ziggurat said:
You can figure out the value of that threshold as well as I can.
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I figure that threshold is arbitrary. Your refusal to actually address that question supports my calculation.


and you...
Ziggurat said:
Edited by LashL: 
Removed hotlinked image from quote
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...are making an argument that the relative change in deficit is the problem.
 
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Upchurch: it's quite clear that the threshold is a Democratic POTUS.
 
I've actually interacted with the Tea Party people, in person, giving them lip service as if I were one of them. The racism is definitely there. If I were black, I'm sure they wouldn't have said things to me that they did. Sure, it's anecdotal, but I don't know how to determine if the Tea Party is made up of mostly racists unless there was a study or poll of some kind that asked the questions.

Going back to the fiscal argument. Why did the people in the Tea Party decide that a budget deficit is ok? Before Bush, Clinton had eliminated the deficit.
 
thaiboxerken said:
So do you think the Tea Party based their arguments off that graph?
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For a lot of them, yes.

Is their argument that Obama wasn't born a USA citizen on that graph?
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What do you mean, "their argument"? I don't think that's what the majority of tea partiers believe.

What about death panels?
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What, you've never seen inflammatory political rhetoric before?

Look, one of the central positions you've tried to take is that the timing of the rise of the tea party indicates that it wasn't about what it claims to be about. But the "death panels" issue came up much later than the start of the tea party. So it's not even relevant to the central argument you've been trying to make up until now.

You're trying to convince me that the Tea Party is about fiscal responsibility. IF that was true, why would they have all of these other non-fiscal related accusations?
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Ever go to an anti-war rally? Ever seen the random junk that gets included?

Large protest movements attract other causes. That always happens. In addition, once people stake out one position, they tend to adopt "accessory" arguments as well. If they've got a target fixed, they'll use any ammunition they can find to attack it, even if it's not why they picked the target in the first place. Hell, you're doing something pretty similar yourself. We all do.
 
thaiboxerken said:
Going back to the fiscal argument. Why did the people in the Tea Party decide that a budget deficit is ok? Before Bush, Clinton had eliminated the deficit.
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Who ever said it was OK? But people tend to tolerate things they don't like, if they aren't bad enough, if doing something about them takes significant effort, and if it seems futile to act. But as things get worse, people become more willing to act, and as they see other people beginning to act, their own actions seem less futile. So a tipping point can be reached pretty quickly. Which is what seems to have happened.
 
I find it very unbelievable that they'd only protest about fiscal responsibility only after the next guy took office. They protested even before Obama legislated anything.
 
Upchurch said:
and you...

...are making an argument that the relative change in deficit is the problem.
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Why on earth would you say that? Because that graph shows deficit relative to GDP? If so, you're badly mistaking my argument. And my previous response to GreNME should have demonstrated what I meant. Let's take a look back so I can hopefully clarify for you:

GreNME said:
Ziggy, you claimed that the whole "quadrupled the deficit" thing was the threshold
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Note: quadrupled refers to the deficit having increase by a factor of four over what it had been.
Ziggurat said:
The same thing didn't happen under Bush. The threshold isn't about relative fractional increases (why would it be? going from no deficit to $1 deficit is an infinity-fold increase, but nobody would care much), it's about the actual deficit level.
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Note that I talked about an infinity-fold increase in going from zero deficit to $1 deficit. Relative to GDP, $1 is still negligible. But relative to past deficit, it's and infinity-fold increase. In other words, when I was talking about relative increases being irrelevant, I meant relative to what the deficit had been. Just as when SoT said that the deficit increased by a factor of four, he meant relative to what the deficit had been. In fact, I even edited that post quite some time ago to include the word "fractional", with the express purpose of trying to clarify that point. Measuring relative to GDP (versus in dollar amounts) isn't at issue here, especially since the GDP hasn't varied by that much, so the large changes in deficit-to-GDP ratios have also been large changes in dollar amounts. Either of those measures will tell the same story: the deficit exploded in 2009.
 
thaiboxerken said:
I find it very unbelievable that they'd only protest about fiscal responsibility only after the next guy took office. They protested even before Obama legislated anything.
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What, you think his legislative agenda was a secret?

If you want to influence legislation (which is kinda the point, isn't it?), why would you wait until after that legislation has been signed into law?
 
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