Contributors

Friday, April 08, 2011

An Illustrative Slice

The following question was asked of me recently in comments.

How do you manage to get such a undeservedly high opinion of your own judgement?

In order to answer this one, let's take a look at the recent fight over the budget. As I am writing this, it seems like the sticking point is Planned Parenthood. Let's take a look at what each side has to say about it.

The Democrats say that the GOP is holding out so they can prevent poor women from getting cancer screenings.

It's a spin filled way to make a point and takes a page from the fear mongering play book. But it is technically true. The GOP wants to defund Planned Parenthood and PP does provide health care for people with lower incomes.

The GOP says that the Democrats want to use taxpayer money to fund abortions.

Not only is this statement filled with fear mongering, it's also inaccurate. They Hyde Amendment prohibits federal funds from being used for abortions. But, being the scorched earth paranoids that they are, the GOP want Planned Parenthood destroyed.

As you can see, it doesn't take a genius to make a judgement call on which of the two parties lives in a fantasy land. We (as in our entire country) could move forward if we didn't have to spend time managing their fantasies.

This would be one of the primary reasons I have this blog: to call them on their bullshit. Democrats have bullshit too but it's not anywhere at the level of the GOP these days. Liberals, by their very nature, are more reflective. I certainly am. I think Dennis Kucinich is naive, nuts and completely full of shit. Hank Johnson is really off his rocker and Barney Frank is a dick. Most of the left think so as well. These are all opinions, of course, but they honestly are true. Yet I would these same words to describe Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin. Other than a stray comment here or there (juris would be one, although he is not a conservative), conservatives won't rip those two or anyone else (see: Donald Trump of late) who say crazy shit because they know that's how they appeal to their base.

Essentially, liberals have better judgement than conservatives, generally speaking, because of the very meanings of each word.

LIBERAL: Open-minded or tolerant, especially free of or not bound by traditional or conventional ideas, values, etc.Favorable to progress or reform, as in political or religious affairs.

CONSERVATIVE:a person who is reluctant to change or consider new ideas; conformist. Disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., or to restore traditional ones, and to limit change.

People that are that reluctant to change, admit when they are wrong, refuse to consider new ideas, and protect their own regardless of how batty they are demonstrate a clear lack of good judgment.

In other words, it's that my judgment is perfect. It's that their judgment, by their very nature, is so incredibly bad.

19 comments:

juris imprudent said...

It's a spin filled way to make a point and takes a page from the fear mongering play book.

But it is okay because it is TEAM BLUE! Right? GO Team Blue, GO!

FWIW I agree about how stupid and pointless it is for the GOP to make this the grand sticking point. Proving that you just can't get the stupid social-cons to shut up and go along. That too is as much a manifestation of the nanny-state as anything on display from the other side of the aisle.

juris imprudent said...

Oh by the way, the Dems caused this by not putting a budget in place before last fall's election. So as stupid as the Republicans are being at the moment, you can thank the Dems for not doing what should've been done. Way to go Team Blue.

As far as I know this is the first time in U.S. history that the govt could not put a budget in place before the fiscal year was more than half over. Hell - they should be working on next years budget at this time.

Anonymous said...

George Washington: "No pecuniary consideration is more urgent, than the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt: on none can delay be more injurious, or an economy of time more valuable."

James Madison: "Having never been a proselyte to the doctrine, that public debts are public benefits ... I consider them, on the contrary, as evils which ought to be removed as fast as honor and justice will permit."

Thomas Jefferson: "To preserve independence ... we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and Liberty, or profusion and servitude. ... The fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follow that, and in its turn wretchedness and oppression."

What do these guys all have in common? Plutocrats that managed to subvert an entire ignorant colony against the people who knew what was best for them.

It wouldn't surprise me to find out they started a corporation together just to screw the middle class.

Mark Ward said...

Anon, do you think that these three men were in any way affected by their historical circumstance of taxation without representation? You have quite a perverted version of Common Sense (and I know where it comes from) that doesn't take into account historical facts. In short, the Democrats are not British royalty and President Obama is not King George.

Anonymous said...

That's why I was on your side, Mark. I thought I was agreeing with you.

Plutocrats... corporations screwing the ignorant middle class... tiger blooded warlocks...

Me and you buddy!

Haplo9 said...

>In other words, it's that my judgment is perfect.

Freudian slip? :)

>This would be one of the primary reasons I have this blog: to call them on their bullshit.

And the main reason I comment - to call you on yours. And let me assure you - it is knee deep most of the time. Most of this post would be a good example.

A good translation of Mark's post:

"Well yeah, both parties do some crappy things. And yeah, people are individuals but its much easier to say that anyone leaning to the right supports every single thing the Republican party does. Also, check this out: when I choose my preferred definitions for these two words, it means that I'm on the better side. Go team!"

As usual, you need a healthy dosage of get-over-yourself.

Anonymous said...

let me assure you - it is knee deep most of the time.

You're too kind. It's far, far deeper than that. M should provide snorkels so visitors here won't drown.

Haplo9 said...

>LIBERAL: Open-minded or tolerant

Just for the sake of argument Mark: let's assume for the moment that your generalization is true, and liberals are generally more open minded and tolerant in comparison to conservatives. What makes you certain that you (as in you, Mark the person) fall into the "liberal" side of things as you've defined it?

6Kings said...

Liberal: so open minded that their brains fell out!

Yes, folks, I will be here all week!

william olsen said...

I'm relatively new to this site and have spent some time reading some of the back posts and comments. I find it very telling that the majority of the comments seem to be centered around Markadelphia personally and not any of the information that he presents in each post. Juris Imprudent and Last in Line at least make attempts here and there to counter the actual information or present different information. But then they slip back into attack mode when their beliefs are called into question. This is noticeably true when Mark is more accurate.

This post was a little different in that it was about Mark's judgment. But he used it to make a larger point. The nutty Democrats aren't in charge of their party and the nutty Republicans, for the moment, seem to be running their party. More specifically, he was talking about how rational each party is in tackling the budget for 2011. It was a very good point which shows the difference between the two parties. But most of you avoided that topic and went to the ATTACK MARK lever and pulled. I say that's pretty weak.

Mark Ward said...

Welcome, William. First off, I apologize your post was left in spam until just now when I retrieved it. I hope you stick around. Many left wingers don't stick around because of the personal insults by my regular right wing posters. See my post today for more on that.

Anonymous said...

The 2011 budget was Speaker Pelosi's responsibility. She had both houses of Congress and the Presidency on her side. She had a year to produce a budget.

She punted.

Harry Reid, if he doesn't like the budget coming out of the House, can get the Senate to produce one and send it there. He has a party majority in the Senate and a sympathetic President and, not even counting the year he spent waiting for Pelosi to punt, he has had 6 months during which he could have produced a budget, 6 months in which the budget has already been overdue.

He punted.

Last fall, you claimed the reason there was no budget was because everyone was waiting for the recommendations of Obama's deficit commission. Well, the results have been out all year, the "Bowles-Simpson Plan".

Obama, Reid and Pelosi have resolutely ignored the Bowles-Simpson plan, the very recommendations of the commission the President himself created for the purpose of solving this problem. Of course, the media doesn't want anyone to notice that Bowles and Simpson both approve of Paul Ryan's plan.

But all this is the Republicans' fault. Riiiight.

"True believer" indeed.

Last in line said...

Hey William, when our beliefs are called into question? The problem with your observation is that Mark doesn't call my beliefs into question because...

I don't worship CEO's.

I don't fear monger on abortion...I'm pro-choice.

I don't think that Bank of America can do whatever the hell they want to simply because they have a lot of money.

I don't think that rich people paying a .50 expense ratio on a mutual fund is a big deal because the expense ratio that I pay is .26, and I'm not even rich.

Is having that nonsense attached to me part of Marks "Judgment"? He's debating his version of "what conservatives think" and not debating us here.

I've been reading books on the debate between active and passive management of mutual funds, asset allocation for ones retirement portfolio, the benefits and drawbacks of ETF's (exchange traded funds), tax loss harvesting, etc for a while now and when I see someone claim that a .50 expense ratio on a mutual fund is an example of " rich people fucking other people over", I'm going to know immediately that said person making that claim doesn't know much of anything about mutual fund expenses.

Related to that, the other pattern you'll notice on here is that when I presented my alternate points about mutual fund expenses, the thread died, nobody engaged me in discussion on it, and we don't know if Mark questioned his belief that a .50 expense ratio on a mutual fund was an example of rich people screwing over little people. His merry band of followers have moved on to the next enemy now that they can't throw a .50 mutual fund expense around as an example of rich people fucking people over anymore.

No doubt in my mind that he "believed" that a .50 mutual fund expense was an example of rich people fucking people over.

As far as the rest of Marks judgment, how can anyone ever disprove it...a lot of is is very general ideas like "the other side needs some new thinking", "They have to confront the revenue question seriously" (even though the folks he voted for control the white house and senate), "I'll take them more seriously but until then, they are not thinking rationally", "they need to start being part of the solution", etc.

juris imprudent said...

But then they slip back into attack mode when their beliefs are called into question.

William, I tend to "attack" when people refuse to have an honest discussion about what I actually wrote or questions I asked and instead insist on putting words I didn't say into my mouth and insulting me for not defending those words. You bet I fucking attack that bullshit.

You will note that no one on this thread commented on what I wrote - again. Yes, since it is a pattern, so is my annoyance.

Mark Ward said...

Anon, I think it's fair to point out and criticize the Democrats in Congress for not passing a budget last year. But there were two specific reasons why they did this. What were they? More importantly, has this ever happened before with Congress? Let's see how much of a true believer you are:)

Tim H said...

Regarding your first three "I don'ts" is why you are one of the few people right of center on here that is reasonable. Juris Imprudent would be the other one. I never post but have been a reader for a long time. I just wanted to let you know that if there were more people like you in the GOP, I might actually pull the lever for the folks with the R next to their name.

juris imprudent said...

Tim, not speaking for last but thanks - just please don't ever call me a Republican again, okay?

william olsen said...

I agree with Tim H. Last in Line, you are an exception to this. Juris sometimes behaves well but lets his emotions run away with him. I'm glad to here your list of I don'ts as well and interesting advice on managing mutual funds. The question is do people have the time that you do to get into all of this? I'm also wondering how an active approach would prevent guys like Goldman Sachs from doing what they did. But I would definitely say that active is better regardless.

last in line said...

The active vs. passive debate in mutual fund management has nothing to do with Goldman Sachs.

There are generally 2 ways the stocks in mutual funds are managed. The passive approach is for index funds - where a mutual fund is run by a computer and the fund tracks an index...most common index is the S&P 500.

The active approach is where a professional money manager manages the mutual fund and he/she buys and sells stocks in the mutual fund in hopes that this activity achieves better returns.

I prefer index funds, but that's just me.