Ignorant Thinking
This is the type of ignorance that gripes my butt. Blue State Losses Give Moral Authority For Protests. The blogger states : "You need only look at the sheer number of Iraq war dead hailing from the West Coast, Illinois, Michigan and the Northeast, from Pennsylvania to Maine, to see that it is predominantly Democratic areas that are bearing the biggest human cost of Bush's war."
It looks fairly equal to me. This kind of logic is hypedumb. Equivalent to claiming that most all of the war casualties are democrats. And has anyone suggested we don't have a "moral right" to protest?
10 comments:
"Now take a look at the map showing county-by-county voting in the 2004 presidential election."
I see the Red/Blue map makes sense. Yes it does seem more "blue" voters are dying ( Not to be confused with being sent). I think an overlay would have hightened his point more.
Bushco has been financially punishing the Blue states, cutting back on federal aid and closing bases. Matter of fact some of the theories about closing Walter Reed and outsourcing beltway jobs involve moving from Blue to Red jurisdictions.
Oddly enough this is similar to what happens with prisons. Urban males get sent to predominantly suburban prisons. If the family chooses to visit they have either a long drive or a move. Many move. This tends to break up areas of Blue minority voters and shift the same minorities to suburban areas that were mainly white. An underhanded redistricting in a sense.
I have to hand it to Republicans when they choose to give you shit they go all out and use every means possible to punish one.
Are prison inmates eligible to vote? Lets not forget that the Dems offer little resistance to the changes BushCo makes, hence are equally guilty for what's going on in America.
Counterpunch or a similar site, can't recall offhand, had a better breakdown of the red/blue map which basically melds into purple. I don't think we can say who is paying heavier costs in human life from something like this map. Nor should we even try as we're paying collectively as a nation.
I'm the author of the Yellow Dog Blog and a reader told me you were trashing me here. I've revised the referenced piece slightly to reflect the fact that the plotting of a scatter chart would by definition be less concentrated than the county-by-county election map -- and thus the comparison of the two maps may not have been the best way to illustrate this point.
But I agree with you on one thing: This kind of ignorance (yours) gripes my butt too.
1. The numbers behind the maps support the contention that blue states/counties are suffering disproportionate losses in this war, and...
2. To imply that nobody has questioned our moral or ethical right to protest suggests that you are horribly uniformed for a blogger. I suggest you do some reading on the counter protests recently held in Crawford and the vote taken at the American Legion convention in Honolulu last week.
Finally, I'll consider this the first salvo fired at me and my blog -- and I'll let it go at this. If you want us to start bashing each other, let me know.
Frankly, I believe we have bigger fish to fry and that liberal bloggers should not spend time trashing each other.
I hope you'll reconsider this unfortunate action before posting something like this again. My blog has grown so rapidly because I've made many friends in our community -- not because I've gone out of my way to make enemies.
Bob Geiger
Yellow Dog Blog
Bob,
I'm not a liberal by today's definition, nor a conservative.
There will never be a day when my "moral and/or ethical rights" are defined by Bushistas using magic markers to write slogans on horses or by men so mindless they fart dust for a bygone era of horror and romanticized war. They can question my rights all they want and I can tell them to bite a big one.
As for your blog, I'll only comment on same when I run into it and either strongly agree or disagree with you. I will not speak against only conservatives b/c in my view the liberals use similar tactics and feel just as righteous about it. And if that's the way I see it, that's the way I call it.
Congratulations on your growing blog.
"Are prison inmates eligible to vote?"
No but their families are. If you move a family of four or five from their Blue urban environment to a Red suburban environment, blue loses that many voters. So a couple of million people in prison loses far more votes.
Yes Dems are the other problem. Both sides drink from the same trough. I've seen the Dem cheerleader blogs who police Republicans before cleaning up their own party. At least posters at Democratic Underground are honest about their own party. More than can be said for people like Atrios who want to sit at the Dem public table and cheer lead.
Liberals, by todays definition are still liberals although they have been so cowed they now call themselves progressives. Only the definition of conservative has changed.Modern conservatives now support big government and erosion of civil rights.
Liberals ( real ones) have not changed.
I'm a proud liberal.
Not many families of inmates can afford to move to suburbia. As minorities dominate the prison system, I don't think there has been an influx of minorities to the 'burbs.
I'm a proud independent, we don't have many party members.
"Not many families of inmates can afford to move to suburbia. As minorities dominate the prison system, I don't think there has been an influx of minorities to the 'burbs."
http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=1218
"What sorts of communities do prisons create? Most obviously, felons have families, who often move near the prison. Some of these families are hard-working, law-abiding citizens, the kind of people we’d be glad to attract.
But others, with the breadwinner in the slammer, will be on welfare. Or crime may be their way of life, giving us more assaults, burglaries and car thefts."
"I'm a proud independent, we don't have many party members."
Actually Independents are the fastest growing political registration group.
http://www.kinkyfriedman.com/news/detail.php?id=26
"Mainstream speculation about the 2008 presidential election has ignored the pivotal influence of the fastest-growing group of voters in America -- independents.
Over the last 10 years alone, their ranks have increased almost 300% in states that register voters by party."
that fatality map says home of record which doesnt mean much. i live in tx, now stationed in california, but my home of record with the military still says illinois where i enlisted.
"What sorts of communities do prisons create? Most obviously, felons have families, who often move near the prison. Some of these families are hard-working, law-abiding citizens, the kind of people we’d be glad to attract."
Interesting opinion piece but hardly proof of minority flight to the 'burbs to be near felonious loved ones.
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