When did the "thinking" end?

**Cst.SB** · 06-05-07, 12:10 AM

Any ideas anyone??

Harry Reid & The End of Liberal Thought
By Dennis Prager

The highest-ranking Democrat in America, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, described the Senate bill making English the national language of the American people as "racist." And the New York Times editorial page labeled the bill "xenophobic."

Welcome to the thoughtless world of contemporary liberalism. Beginning in the 1960s, liberalism, once the home of many deep thinkers, began to substitute feeling for thought and descended into superficiality.

One-word put-downs of opponents' ideas and motives were substituted for thoughtful rebuttal. Though liberals regard themselves as intellectual -- their views, after all, are those of nearly all university professors -- liberal thought has almost died. Instead of feeling the need to thoughtfully consider an idea, most liberal minds today work on automatic. One-word reactions to most issues are the liberal norm.

This is easy to demonstrate.

Here is a list of terms liberals apply to virtually every idea or action with which they differ:

Racist
Sexist
Homophobic
Islamophobic
Imperialist
Bigoted
Intolerant

And here is the list of one-word descriptions of what liberals are for:

Peace
Fairness
Tolerance
The poor
The disenfranchised
The environment

These two lists serve contemporary liberals in at least three ways.

First, they attack the motives of non-liberals and thereby morally dismiss the non-liberal person.

Second, these words make it easy to be a liberal -- essentially all one needs to do is to memorize this brief list and apply the right term to any idea or policy. That is one reason young people are more likely to be liberal -- they have not had the time or inclination to think issues through, but they know they oppose racism, imperialism and bigotry, and that they are for peace, tolerance and the environment.

Third, they make the liberal feel good about himself -- by opposing conservative ideas and policies, he is automatically opposing racism, bigotry, imperialism, etc.

Examples could fill a book.

Harry Reid, as noted above, supplied a classic one. Instead of grappling with the enormously significant question of how to maintain American identity and values with tens of millions of non-Americans coming into America, the Democratic leader and others on the Left simply label attempts to keep English as a unifying language as "racist."

Another classic example of liberal non-thought was the reaction to former Harvard University President Lawrence Summers' mere question about whether the female and male brains were wired differently. Again, instead of grappling with the issue, Harvard and other liberals merely dismissed Summers as "sexist."

A third example is the use of the term "racist" to end debate about race-based affirmative action or even to describe a Capitol police officer who stops a black congresswoman who has no ID badge.

"Phobic" is the current one-word favorite among liberal dismissals of ideological opponents. It combines instant moral dismissal with instant psychological analysis. If you do not support society redefining marriage to include members of the same sex you are "homophobic" -- and further thought is unnecessary. If you articulate a concern about the moral state of Islam today, you are "Islamophobic" -- and again further thought is unnecessary. And if you seek to retain English as America's unifying language, you are not only racist, you are, as the New York Times editorial describes you, "xenophobic" and "Latinophobic," the latest phobia uncovered by the Left.

There is a steep price paid for the liberal one-wording of complex ideas -- the decline of liberal thought. But with more and more Americans graduating college and therefore taught the liberal list of one-word reactions instead of critical thinking, many liberals do not see any pressing need to think through issues. They therefore do not believe they have paid any price at all.

But American society is paying a steep price. Every car that has a bumper sticker declaring "War is not the answer" powerfully testifies to the intellectual decline of the well educated and to the devolution of "liberal thought" into an oxymoron.

**SANDMAN** · 06-05-07, 12:18 AM

It's not just words now.

If you fly the Union Jack the British Flag your looked at as a racist now thanks to the (BNP) British National Party.

**Terminator** · 06-05-07, 12:33 AM

I liked Hillary's little lie during the Democratic debate last night on CNN. She said she was against English as an official language because it would mean that people who speak other languages couldn't do things like vote, because we couldn't put their language on a ballot. What a play on words. Any legal immigrant is required to pass a citizenship test, which requires them to speak English. In otherwords, Hillary is full of shiot!

**Cst.SB** · 06-05-07, 12:47 AM

What a slippery slope we're on, when we lose our national identities. And we can no longer engage in intelligent conversation without the fear of being called a racist.

Ironically, in the case of the UK and the flag, people from the countries that (other than your own) probably still have a great affinity for then birth countries and have no problems flying their flags.

The BNP exists for a reason. Because the pendulum has swung way to far to the left and the government isn't doing enough to ensure a British Identity. And when that identity vacuum exists something ugly is going to fill it.

Though, I have to say I admire the vigilance of your police and intelligence service. But man, they have their work cut out for them, when over 20% of the british Muslim population thought that 7/7 bombings were totally deserved.

**Rhino** · 06-05-07, 12:48 AM

Good article. Liberal means you follow your feelings. Conservative means you follow logic. It's really gotten to that point.

**Cst.SB** · 06-05-07, 01:00 AM

Originally Posted by Rhino

Good article. Liberal means you follow your feelings. Conservative means you follow logic. It's really gotten to that point.

Well said.

I've noticed that when talking to a liberal minded person, that the sentences usual start with "I feel....... "

And so many times there is nothing that follows it of factual substance.

The other problem is the absolute refusal to admit an error. Well, probably because they never believe they are wrong.

You can provide all the source info, titles of books, documentaries, scientific articles, news articles, and it all comes back too - "Well, I feel you're wrong, or I disagree with you." Literally mountains of evidence, and they will absolutely refuse to look at it.

Why, because if Paris Hilton or a "Clinton" didn't say it was true, or it was show on Entertainment Tonight, it can't be real.

**BEB** · 06-05-07, 01:06 AM

I think the documents of a nation should be recorded in a single language for clarity. Since legalize hinges on the placement of a coma or the interpretation of a word the confusion and inaccuracies incurred by keeping multiple sets of books would be enormous. So no Spanish driver's manual and no plumbing codes in French.

The election commission should print up one set of ballots. If you can't read them, for whatever reason, then I guess you'd better take your voter's guide with you to match up. If you can't be bother to do that I can't be bothered to care you didn't get to vote.

Beyond that I don't support an official language.

**SANDMAN** · 06-05-07, 01:12 AM

Originally Posted by Cst.SB

What a slippery slope we're on, when we lose our national identities. And we can no longer engage in intelligent conversation without the fear of being called a racist.

Ironically, in the case of the UK and the flag, people from the countries that (other than your own) probably still have a great affinity for then birth countries and have no problems flying their flags.

The BNP exists for a reason. Because the pendulum has swung way to far to the left and the government isn't doing enough to ensure a British Identity. And when that identity vacuum exists something ugly is going to fill it.

Though, I have to say I admire the vigilance of your police and intelligence service. But man, they have their work cut out for them, when over 20% of the british Muslim population thought that 7/7 bombings were totally deserved.

There is a family in our street that has flown the British & US Flags since to war started and won't bring it down till every last British and US soldier is home.

They have had there windows put out and there car sprayed with RACIST remarks. They flags are there for the love of the countries not the color of someones skin.

Our Government needs to unbury there heads from there asses and fix this fast

The UK is vastly becoming the UN's dumping ground. The Government is letting anyone and everyone in.

In 03 when we went into Iraq quiet a few British Born Muslims went over to Iraq to fight against us, then when the main part of the war finished they came home. Now if they lived under our freedom fall all there lives and did that to us they should of.

1, been brought back and tried for Treason against the Crown.
2, denied entry back into the UK and there families deported along with them.

**kay88** · 06-05-07, 01:51 AM

Originally Posted by Terminator

I liked Hillary's little lie during the Democratic debate last night on CNN. She said she was against English as an official language because it would mean that people who speak other languages couldn't do things like vote, because we couldn't put their language on a ballot. What a play on words. Any legal immigrant is required to pass a citizenship test, which requires them to speak English. In otherwords, Hillary is full of shiot!

A legal immigrant cannot vote. Only a citizen has that right (Kai knows plenty on this). And like you said Brad, you have to know English to become a citizen. Interesting, she must think she's speaking to a bunch of idiots....

Originally Posted by SANDMAN

In 03 when we went into Iraq quiet a few British Born Muslims went over to Iraq to fight against us, then when the main part of the war finished they came home. Now if they lived under our freedom fall all there lives and did that to us they should of.

1, been brought back and tried for Treason against the Crown.
2, denied entry back into the UK and there families deported along with them.

They shouldn't have been let back. That's not fair one bit to fight against countrymen for a cause and then expect to come back and get all your old freedoms back. Your options should have been the only options for them.

**countybear** · 06-05-07, 02:19 AM

Originally Posted by Rhino

Good article. Liberal means you follow your feelings. Conservative means you follow logic. It's really gotten to that point.

Excellent summation.

Someone cover his rep for me please, I've exceeded my 24 hour limit.

**kay88** · 06-05-07, 02:20 AM

Originally Posted by countybear

Excellent summation.

Someone cover his rep for me please, I've exceeded my 24 hour limit.

Consider it covered.

Definitly a good summary

**gozling** · 06-05-07, 12:17 PM

Interesting.
Liberals like to be reductionist and try and claim the moral high ground with as little thought as possible. Dennis Miller talked about all the social programs for people and asked....
"Isn't the most demeaning thing you can do to another person is to ask absolutely nothing of them?"
It is simplistic thinking at it's worst because it comes with judgment
unproven. Their default is to make it an emotional issue, mainly because everyone, especially me would agree that war is bad,peace is good, etc. but then you bring in reality and their arguments don't hold water.
I never try and argue facts with liberals, it upsets them and they
default to ten measures of emotion to try and overcome one measure of fact.

Just my own opinion, I could be wrong.

I have to counter the homophobic argument with the idea that
people who don't like pedophiles are "pedophobic" no they aren't afraid, they just don't like them.

I will go hide now.

**Willowdared** · 06-05-07, 09:29 PM

Politics these days is all about sound bites, and hot topic issues.

How much would politics change, if we declared that no election would be cerified as valid, if less then 60% of registered voters cast a ballot? Would our elected officials make an effort to reconnect with their constituents?

I'm pretty disgusted with both the major parties right now. They both pander too much to special interests.