The Final Word On The American Taliban (Part Four)

The next American Taliban question was answered perfectly when I posed it on Quora. Up until this point, we have seen the answers point obviously at the Republicans. What we haven't seen is an example of a Republican answering the question and demonstrating its validity in action. With this question...

-Which US political party (the Democrats or the Republicans) views compromise as a weakness and why?

...we did.

There is a political theory out there (citation anyone?) that the party in power tends to fragment and engage in infighting, while the party out of control tends to become more extreme. It should be clear that a fragmented party as well as an extreme party would have difficulty with compromise, though in neither case is this because compromise is seen as "weak." It is because they disagree with the compromise position. 

An extreme example: The Taliban would have gays put to death. In many states in America gays are allowed to marry. What compromise policy should one approve of, in the interest of avoiding deadlock? If the pro-gay marriage party, say, refused to accept mere amputation as a compromise policy, would you say they did so because they wanted to avoid appearing "weak"? I hope you agree that would be absurd. Sometimes you just need to accept that there are strongly and sincerely held views in this world that are irreconcilable and will only be resolved by one view prevailing and another position being utterly defeated. Compromise is not always a noble goal.

Initially, I made the error of thinking he didn't answer the question. But Rob is a well known conservative on Quora and the second time I read it, I realize that he did (see bolded emphasis), thus proving that Republicans are the ones that view compromise as weakness:)

Here's another answer.

Currently, the Republicans because their party has been taken over be extremists. Generally there are extremists on either side who view compromise as failure and a bunch of politicians in the middle who keep the lights on. Democrats are generally more likely to compromise because the Democratic party tends to include people who applaud diversity, which requires some level of compromise to begin with. The Republicans have certainly shown, in the past 6 years, that being uncompromising can reap huge electoral benefits in a country with an ill-informed populace.

The comments that follow this answer are great examples of reality versus bubble.

-Which political party in the United States (Democrats or Republicans) is more undeterred by facts and why?

The top answer (too long to reprint here) in that it indicts both parties ignorance of basic facts. His list is most impressive.

A couple of other answers...

At this time in history, that would surely be the Republicans, or at least the far-right of that Party, which currently seems to rule the roost. They deny climate change or at least deny human involvement, say the earth is 6000 years old, don't accept evolution, etc

The republicans by far. Thirty years of economic failure of supply economics, climate change denial, Birthers, thinking women swallowing thing goes to their uterus, young earth republicans, clueless about human reproduction, abstinence teaching only, clueless about contraception devices, to name a few of their many attempts at avoiding reality

I think our pattern has developed into the full blown truth:)

The Final Word On The American Taliban (Part Three)

Next up in this series are the following questions...

-Which political party in the United States (Democrats or Republicans or neither) suffers from severe xenophobia and why?

There weren't as many views on this one so the answers should be taken with the smaller numbers in mind. My favorite?

I'm not sure either party suffers from severe xenophobia, although I would say the right wing of the Republican Party uses fear based appeals as a tactic more. Fear of Muslims, fear of undocumented immigrants, fear of socialism, fear of gays, fear of home invaders, fear of the government, fear of the collapse of America, fear of the United Nations, fear of economic collapse, and so on. Is it xenophobia? Not so much. Fear of change? Pretty much.

If they want to win elections, they are going to have to change this ideology.

-Which political party in the United States (the Democrats or the Republicans or neither) demonizes education and why?

Top answer?

Both and neither, really. 

The Republicans, when playing to their base, like to deride their opponents' education as being uppity or out of touch all while poo-poo-ing scientific evidence which might point to a need to enact policies which could negatively impact Big Business (their donors) profit margins. I don't consider that demonization, though. 

The Democrats tend to want what they consider to be thoughtful measurement with benchmarks and clearly defined objectives, which, when laid like a template over public education, becomes a strait jacket of regulations and teaching-to-the-test without much learning actually going on in the classroom. Again, problem that this is, I cannot label it demonization. 

If I had to choose one or the other, though, which has less trouble convincing themselves education is "not important", it would be the GOP; the Democrats, from their consistent meddling, have always seemed VERY interested in exactly what goes on in every classroom, right down to the slightest zero for not turning in homework- the child obviously has problems which we all must help solve....

The rest of the answers are equally as thoughtful.

The Final Word On The American Taliban (Part Two)

Next up in my American Taliban, Final Word series are these two questions...

-Which U.S. political party (Democrats or Republicans) has a fundamental belief in scriptural literalism? Why?

Top answer?

Definitely the GOP simply because of the dominance of religious conservatives. Many of the GOP platform stances such as anti gay rights and anti abortion are rooted in scriptural literalism. When someone believes that an arbitrary historical text written by ordinary men is the divine word of God there is no room for compromise or discussion. 

These people want clarity and certainty in their beliefs and mindset. Reality is black and white with no ambiguity. This is what makes all fundamentalist religions such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam identical to each other. All historical religious texts contain an increasily massive number of propagated human errors from translation and transcription that monotonically increases with time. The Bible and all other religious texts are all written by humans yet many attribute these texts as the word of God. 

To me it is logically absurd that so many people can blindly follow religious texts in a literal manner that conflict drastically with each other. Each religion essentially invalidates itself and all others by declaring itself the one true religion.

No room for compromise or discussion...wholeheartedly agree! It's pretty sad when you think about it. Where is the room for progress?

-Which political party in the United States (Democrats or Republicans or neither) writes and passes legislation to control a woman's body?

The top answer (from my favorite responder!!) was filled with data and incredibly detailed. Save the link for future information. It will definitely be useful in the coming election.

Beaten By Corporate Force

Take a look at our president. A pretty sad fucking picture, isn't it? Not surprising, though, when you consider what he has now come to realize in the last few weeks: our country...our world, actually, is being run by corporations and there is nothing we can do about it. The United States government is completely powerless to stop this oil spill and must sit on the sidelines as British Petroleum attempts yet another Shemp like move in order to plug the damn hole. Not that the government would want to help anyway as so many of them have been bought off by the oil industry.

It's been mighty interesting these last few weeks listening to the Cult trying to spin this one away. This is Obama's Katrina, some say. Others like Sarah Palin say that it proves her "Drill Baby Drill" line was right all along. I'm not sure how that works. To be fair, some of them haven't uttered a peep because they know how royally fucked we all are. The United States government is bowing down to the corporate cock and there's not a damn thing we can do about it.

At the end of the day, it's example #343 of how the free market fantasy of the Cult has no practical application in reality. We've seen quite clearly what happens when private concerns have little or no oversight. In the case of the BP spill, take a look at five specific examples of the Mineral Management Services complete failure in doing its job of regulating.

• MMS's 2009 decision that acoustically-controlled shut-off valve (BOP) would not be required as a last resort against underwater spills at the site.

• MMS's failure to suggest other “fail-safe” mechanisms after a 2004 report raised questions about the reliability of the electrical remote-control devices.

• MMS granted a categorical exclusion waiver on April 6, 2009 to BP exempting it from National Environmental Policy Act's requirements including a detailed environmental analysis, concluding the spill risk in that part of the Gulf was “minimal or nonexistent.” Such NEPA waivers have become routine at MMS, and the Interior department approves 250 to 400 per year for Gulf of Mexico projects.

• MMS gave permission to BP and dozens of other oil companies to drill in the Gulf of Mexico without first getting required permits from another agency (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA) that assesses threats to endangered species — and despite strong warnings from NOAA about the impact the drilling was likely to have on the gulf. Those approvals, federal records show, include one for the well drilled by the Deepwater Horizon rig, which exploded on April 20, killing 11 workers and resulting in thousands of barrels of oil spilling into the gulf each day.

• MMS routinely overruled its staff biologists and engineers who raised concerns about the safety and the environmental impact of drilling proposals in the Gulf and in Alaska.

But why would MMS do this? Aren't they supposed to be regulating BP?

In September 2008, reports by the Inspector General of the Interior Department, Earl E. Devaney, were released that implicated over a dozen officials of the MMS of unethical and criminal conduct in the performance of their duties. The investigation found MMS employees had taken drugs and had sex with energy company representatives. MMS staff had also accepted gifts and free holidays amid "a culture of ethical failure", according to the investigation.

The New York Times's summary states the investigation revealed "a dysfunctional organization that has been riddled with conflicts of interest, unprofessional behavior and a free-for-all atmosphere for much of the Bush administration’s watch." Gee, I'm shocked.

And in May of 2010, after the spill, it was revealed that MMS regulators in the Gulf region had allowed industry officials to fill in their own inspection reports in pencil and then turned them over to the regulators, who traced over them in pen before submitting the reports to the agency. MMS staff had routinely accepted meals, tickets to sporting events, and gifts from oil companies.

Of course, none of these facts matter. In Cult Land, the government is still all powerful and tyrannical with President New Hitler at the helm sinking his leather boot heel into face of private industry. I guess it's up to the rest of us in the real world to solve this problem. Honestly, I don't have much faith that we will. Our culture and society have already shifted to be extremely distrustful of anything government related despite all evidence to the contrary.

Interestingly, though, a solution was presented in comments recently by none other than our very own Last in Line.

You all know that this could have been taken care of in 48 hours...the typical procedure oil companies and other governments have done many times in the past is to put a 100 yard tube down the well, send dynamite down the tube to blow up the well at the bottom, and pour concrete on top of it. Problem solved. What is going on is BP doesn't want to lose the well so they are doing all kinds of other half-assed crap that is further damaging the gulf region.

Why hasn't this been done yet?

The answer is quite simple, actually. Our "socialist" president doesn't want to be held responsible for BP losing money. He isn't going to allow the government to interfere in a private concern. In other words, he knows that corporations are running our world. He can't involve the government any more than it already is at present. Plus, Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh would all up in the hizzy about the brown shirts again.

C'mon, last, don't you know that the government is completely evil? That they are forcing us to bend to their will with the butt of a gun? Let's just all get down on our knees and thank BP for all the black liquid love that is washing up on our shores right now in the Gulf. The Corporation is good....the Corporation is beautiful....anyone who thinks that the Corporation is anything other than pure goodness is a Marxist....(chant with me, touching yourself and Atlas Shrugged simultaneously)....The Corporation is good....the Corporation is beautiful....anyone who thinks that the Corporation is anything other than pure goodness is a Marxist....The Corporation is good....the Corporation is beautiful....anyone who thinks that the Corporation is anything other than pure goodness is a Marxist....The Corporation is good....the Corporation is beautiful....anyone who thinks that the Corporation is anything other than pure goodness is a Marxist....