What really bothers me about this election...

[sir drinks-a-lot]

What is it with Republicans and Tu Quoque and the intense desire to deflect the charges against your guy?

I should copy your strategy.

Sir drinks-a-lot: "Don't vote for Obama!! He's rich and he's a liar!!"
Gullible randi.org political forum poster: "Romney is rich too, and he's a liar!!"
Sir drinks-a-lot: "Enough with the Tu Quoque!"

 

[RandFan]

OK, so we have something like this:

Concerned with Obama lies: NO
Concerned with Romney lies: YES
Concerned that Obama is rich: NO
Concerned that Romney is rich: YES
Offended when Obama is called a Rich Black Guy: YES
Offended when Romney is called a Rich White Guy: NO

But mommy, they do it too....

 

[RandFan]

I should copy your strategy.

Sir drinks-a-lot: "Don't vote for Obama!! He's rich and he's a liar!!"
Gullible randi.org political forum poster: "Romney is rich too, and he's a liar!!"
Sir drinks-a-lot: "Enough with the Tu Quoque!"

As well you should. Two wrongs do not a right make.

 

[R.Mackey]

OK, so we have something like this:

Concerned with Obama lies: NO
Concerned with Romney lies: YES
Concerned that Obama is rich: NO
Concerned that Romney is rich: YES
Offended when Obama is called a Rich Black Guy: YES
Offended when Romney is called a Rich White Guy: NO

Offended when some schmuck is just here to troll: YES

Shoo. Plenty of other threads here for you to crap in.

 

[332nd]

OK, so we have something like this:

Concerned with Obama lies: NO
Concerned with Romney lies: YES
Concerned that Obama is rich: NO
Concerned that Romney is rich: YES
Offended when Obama is called a Rich Black Guy: YES
Offended when Romney is called a Rich White Guy: NO

Need a tissue?

 

[SezMe]

Are any of you concerned about Obama's lies?

Entirely off topic. Go find another thread. Or better yet, start your own with a clearly stated topic.

In the meantime, scram.

 

[not_so_new]

Offended when some schmuck is just here to troll: YES

Shoo. Plenty of other threads here for you to crap in.

Exactly, SDA never seems to add anything positive to the discourse, it's always just attack without evidence.



As to your original post, I agree with many of your points. I think this is a real problem, it's more than just "all politicians lie".... this is a different level and type of lying.

As to your question, why is Romney even running?

I don't know if Romney is actually as interested in running the country as he is in just being able to say he runs the country.

If the stories of his past are true, it leads me to question if he is trying to prove something to his peers (I FULLY admit this is complete and absolute conjecture on my part). The story of his bullying for example leads me to wonder if he is really covering up an inferiority complex of some degree. For example..

People who suffer from inferiority complex try to compensate for their feelings of inferiority by making achievements. They always have the need to achieve in order to compensate for their inferiority and that's why you shouldn't be surprised when you know that a great number of achievers who changed the world suffered from inferiority complex.

... and ...

Superiority complex is a feeling where a person tries hard to overcome his inferiority complex. In such cases a child tries hard to be perfect and thus by boasting or in any other way makes a fine attempt of escaping his incapability. What a child exactly does is in regards to seem perfect in front of others they create his own self supreme image which is least bothered with criticism he receives from children around him. Such children are least bothered about others and in an attempt to look perfect present themselves in a worst manner in front of others unlike children with inferiority complex. A child with superiority complex may even hurt others just to prove his superiority. Few qualities found in children with this complex include egocentricity, boastfulness, exaggeration, bluffing, hurtfulness, aggressiveness, criticism and hatred.

from here.... and here

He doesn't need the money. He doesn't hold a strong position on anything at all so he isn't running because he has a desire to make things "better" based on ideology. He doesn't look particularly comfortable in social situations nor does he appear to be the type to crave the spotlight (Bill Clinton seems to relish this for instance).

I think it is fair to speculate that his desire to run the nation could very well be an extension of his need to achieve a position that ultimately proves his self worth to others.

 

[thaiboxerken]

What is it with Republicans and Tu Quoque and the intense desire to deflect the charges against your guy?

They are trying to convince people that Obama is telling just as many lies. Republicans are desperate to make the case that the lies, deception and hyperbole is coming, in equal doses, from both sides. Of course, that is just another lie.

 

[Aridas]

OK, so we have something like this:

Concerned with Obama lies: NO
Concerned with Romney lies: YES
Concerned that Obama is rich: NO
Concerned that Romney is rich: YES
Offended when Obama is called a Rich Black Guy: YES
Offended when Romney is called a Rich White Guy: NO

Heh. To go with the debate, we've got 27 issues with Romney for the debate. On the other side, we've got 12 issues with Obama. This is, of course, from opposing sides of the spectrum. The cases for a couple of each are contradictory, unsurprisingly, as both seem to rest on twisting things. I'm not really seeing equivalent honesty here, though.

That said, to address your list directly... I'm concerned with the lies and bad arguments on both sides. It seems very much like the Republican side is much further in dishonest territory, though. As for rich? Why would I care that either is rich? Regardless, I have yet to see a single statement from Democrats of either offense or concern that either is rich. What I have seen is concerns about how well one or the other fits into specific stereotypes about wealthy people. What I have seen is a desire that the people in question "pay their fair share." It's hardly surprising, after all, that people who are living paycheck to paycheck are concerned when they are paying, say, double the percentage of their income in taxes as a multimillionaire.

 

[Frank Newgent]

I hope that Obama is re-elected and has a great four years.

Only on his last day in office, then, to call a news conference and shake his Indonesian birth certificate at the cameras.

Where would he get an Indonesian birth certificate? He was born in Kenya.

Duh... Kenya, Sulawesi.


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You're welcome.

 

[R.Mackey]

So, it's been a day and a half since I posted this...

Since then, three erstwhile Republicans have shown up. Their responses were one obvious troll, one tu quoque, and one that boils down to "didn't read / didn't watch LOL." Not what I'd call a stirring defense of Romney, or any kind of rebuke to my interpretation.

Please nominate better candidates in the future. I mean it. Politics only works if its a contest of ideas, not an attempt to run from them.

 

[Caper]

However, the strategy of lies coming from Romney's campaign does, I believe, represent something new and unwelcome.

Is Obama's lying thus old and welcome?

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

So I looked at the Daily Kos post and it counts this as a lie:



Apparently that's a lie because:

Ooooookay.

Yes, it's a lie to say they didn't pass a farm bill when what you mean is that you disagree with what's in the farm bill they passed.

What this particular lie does is to recast a difference of opinion as if it were an objective claim of fact.

Whether or not a farm bill was passed is an objective matter of fact. Whether or not it was a good farm bill is a matter of opinion.

If you assert an opinion, the burden is on you to argue in favor of that opinion. A fact can be used in argument to support a conclusion but is not itself a conclusion that needs to be supported by argumentation.

Yes, this is a scurrilous rhetorical technique.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

And that's a "lie" because there are loopholes in the words "legislation", "familiar", and "agenda".

“There’s no legislation with regards to abortion that I’m familiar with that would become part of my agenda.”

It's a lie because it completely mischaracterizes Romney's agenda wrt to abortion. Yes, I understand that the Mexico City Gag Rule would not be legislation but an executive order. He's safe there on a technicality.

However, is Romney planning to veto the next budget that Congress passes with the Hyde Amendment in place? Surely accepting the Hyde Amendment is on his agenda. What is his position on the Ryan-sponsored bill that would make the Hyde Amendment permanent law rather than a rider to every budget?

Is his excuse here that he's not familiar with these pieces of legislation? If so, that sounds like a good argument against his fitness to be president. If not--as is almost surely the case--then he's lying about his position on abortion.

 

[Monketi Ghost]

I think both parties have done enough analysis of the way the public mind can be moved such that they can manipulate, and like the OP I have a disturbing sense that the Republicans are cynically using this against the rest of the country in a way that the Democrats generally don't.

In the case of Romney in particular he's talking out of both sides of his mouth and seems to be unconcerned about whether what he says is in fact true. Maybe he says things that are calculated to be "true in a sense that spin will soften after the fact".

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Please nominate better candidates in the future. I mean it. Politics only works if its a contest of ideas, not an attempt to run from them.

Amen!

And I would point out that this is also a reason why Al Gore was a poor nominee. In 2000, he was trying to cast himself as a better Republican than the Republican nominee, and he lost an election that was virtually handed to him on a platter. I understand his running from the Democratic platform wasn't done by lying about his record, so it was a somewhat different approach than this one. Romney seems to think he cold get elected based on people not understanding what his platforms are. I suppose there could be a legitimate means justifying ends argument, but I doubt very much that's what he's thinking. I think he just tries to say what he thinks each audience wants to hear. He thinks he can re-define himself repeatedly during the campaign (the Etch-a-Sketch strategy).

 

[Grizzly Bear]

They are trying to convince people that Obama is telling just as many lies.

This better referred to as confirmation bias based on party loyalty. Everyone has political bias, some have it so extreme that one candidate is like a knight in shining armor incapable of lying or playing scare games while the other is an avatar of all the wrongs in society, and these are usually the people that vote for their party no matter what situation there is.

To suggest that Democrats exhibit the same behavior and fail to acknowledge that fact isn't a "tu quoque" argument; suggesting it's okay for the other side to do it because they do is. Sadly, most of the threads between both camps do the latter to the point that I feel nothing but contempt for the voting block in this country and the obvious political polarization.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

To suggest that Democrats exhibit the same behavior and fail to acknowledge that fact isn't a "tu quoque" argument;

Actually it is if the issue is whether or not Romney's lies are acceptable. (It is entirely possible that lies by both candidate are unacceptable. That's why tu quoque is a fallacy. To the question of whether or not Romney's lies are acceptable, Obama's lies are irrelevant.)

At any rate, I don't think anyone has even established that the Obama campaign is based, as Romney's seems to be, on hiding from his stated platform positions. Is there a pattern of Obama denying his own stated platform positions as there is with Romney?

 

[RandFan]

To suggest that Democrats exhibit the same behavior and fail to acknowledge that fact isn't a "tu quoque" argument...

Often it is at best a false equivalency and worst a red herring.

 

[carlitos]

So, it's been a day and a half since I posted this...

Since then, three erstwhile Republicans have shown up. Their responses were one obvious troll, one tu quoque, and one that boils down to "didn't read / didn't watch LOL." Not what I'd call a stirring defense of Romney, or any kind of rebuke to my interpretation.

Please nominate better candidates in the future. I mean it. Politics only works if its a contest of ideas, not an attempt to run from them.

I didn't comment, because I didn't watch the debate. I suppose I still consider myself a Republican, but I'm not happy with the nominee to the point where I have completely tuned out. I haven't been this disinterested in politics in years. I would prefer a socially liberal, fiscally (more) conservative candidate of either party.

ETA - I can't wait for the elections to be over, if for no other reason than some of my good friends have lost their minds. Why can't my generation be civil when politics are involved? It seems worse than it's ever been.