The Party Always Finds You
By Mitch Berg
A few days ago, many of us in the local center-right blogosphere got a good laugh at a local leftypundit’s declaration “if you say you’re not a racist, you are”.
Apparently the corollary is “if you negotiate carefully and in good faith to make sure that a potentially-political event is non-political, you are political”.
Or so Nick Coleman would have you “think”:
Tuesday’s cancellation of a visit to Forest Lake High School by Iraq War veterans in a giant bus labeled “Vets For Freedom National Heroes Tour” produced a bonanza of outraged media reports:“Heroes banned by School! Minnesota hates the Heroes!”
Or maybe a Minnesota school was just trying to keep its students from becoming pawns in a political game.
It’d be a lot more convincing if Saint Paul didn’t have a “Paul and Sheila Wellstone School”.
There would not have been much outrage if that big bus, instead of saying “Heroes Tour,” had been painted to say “Republican Tour to Shore Up the Pro-War Vote.” But that would have been an honest paint job.
And it would have made clear why Forest Lake Principal Steve Massey — now vilified by right wing radio and TV — did what he did.
Cut the crap.
Massey had reached an agreement with Pete Hegseth; politics was out.
And let’s cut the crap just a bit further; what if it were politicial? So what? Forgetting for a moment that the public schools don’t even make a laughable effort to insulate students from (acceptably PC left-of-center) politics; what’s wrong with students getting many sides of a given debate?
Rather, of course, than the one side that the Minnesota Left deems appropriate.
Massey and Forest Lake — a patriotic small town with a Fourth of July parade where spectators stand and doff their hats and put their right hands over their hearts every single time an American flag goes by — are getting a bum rap.The visit to Forest Lake was worked out by Massey and Forest Lake alum Pete Hegseth, an Iraq veteran who heads Vets for Freedom. VFF says it is nonpartisan, but the liberal watchdog group the Center for Media and Democracy said it began as a Republican front group managed by White House insiders.
Their plan? According to the Center for Media and Democracy, the plan is to drum up support for the war. The group’s political bent was clear last year when it bought TV ads to thank Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., for supporting the war.Hey, folks: It’s an election year. Things may get ugly. They sure were in Forest Lake.
Speaking of politicizing things.
Permit me to say something: Vets for Freedom are real vets, their heroics are authentic (but not all heroes support the war) and their right to their opinion is unquestioned.But uniforms and valor should not hide a political agenda. On that, they must be questioned. Even in a school. Especially in a school.
Nick Coleman, who became the doormat of the Twin Cities center-right alt-media for politicizing schools, is only “concerned” because students might see a message that disagrees with him and the party whose monkey he is.
Massey had little choice.
Forest Lake shows how badly we need to talk about this war. And how very hard it is to do.
For real conversation about the Flake High fiasco, tune into the NARN this weekend. Various shows will be interviewing the various figures in this story; more as details are available.
March 27th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Forest Lake shows how badly we need to talk about this war. And how very hard it is to do.
It’s especially hard when one side is silenced. Then the “dialog” becomes a lecture. Much like a Nick Coleman column.
March 27th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
mitch, you left out one important fact from the article that seems to go un-noted by the righty blogs:
“Then Massey says Hegseth’s group decided to call a press conference at the school and alerted media.”
Uh, an invited guess decides to throw their own press conference at a public school? No wonder the invite was canceled…
March 27th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
[…] Mitch points out this gem, There would not have been much outrage if that big bus, instead of saying “Heroes Tour,” had been painted to say “Republican Tour to Shore Up the Pro-War Vote.” But that would have been an honest paint job. […]
March 27th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Why didn’t Massey tell them they couldn’t hold a press conference on school grounds? Sounds kind of harsh if you ask me.
March 27th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Mitch, what do you mean by “[teaching] the revisionist view of the Civil War as gospel”?
March 27th, 2008 at 6:14 pm
“If Minnesota schools didn’t pretty routinely teach man-made global warming as fact”
Don’t forget physics, genetics, and the germ theory of disease.
March 27th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
RickDFL: Amateur scientist.
Global climate is not nearly as well understood as physics, and libs notoriously dispute the scientifically proven genetic links between race and intelligence. What germ causes the disease of alcoholism? Schizophrenia?
March 27th, 2008 at 7:04 pm
The only ‘media’ that was laid on for the school was the Forest Lake local paper.
The thing that makes me mad is that the folks who complained about our talking to kids simply assumed they knew what we would say.
The whole thing was set to be videotaped, so they could have seen and heard what was said.
Had we talked with the kids as planned the whole thing would have been a non-story.
March 27th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
Mitch,
You’re about as ‘center’ as you are media. You’re neither, never have been anytime recently, at least not since the days ‘of being a cub reporter’ (read free-lance groupie hoping to get paid $5 for copy), and given your inability to actually ground your comments in the relevant facts, you never, ever will be again.
As for the center part, you’re the center between Ronald Reagan and Strom Thurmond. You couldn’t be more out of touch with the ‘center’ if you were circling the earth with Bonzo.
Terry – you’re grasp of Global Climate Change is clearly FAR more amateurish than Mitch’s. To contrast it with ‘physics’ is to say that Global Climate change isn’t as well understood as ‘space’ or ‘biology’. The subject you contrast it to is so vast as to defy your statement on its face. Are you referring to quantum, nuclear, sub-nuclear (or shall I say nukyaler), linnear/kinetic? Which? Because, depending upon your choice, you are either far wrong or perhaps right.
That said,t the amount research behind global climate change dwarfs the Manhattan project, the space race, and nuclear weapons development, probably combined. Your claim that it’s not well understood is beyond foolish, its willfully accepting the commentary of the lunatic fringe in spite of mountains of evidence. Lastly, are you, for a moment, attempting to refute the concept of germs causing disease? Or are you simply trying to say that because certain predispositions in genetics, like alchoholism, aren’t triggered by germs, therefore believe nothing about germ theory? See, I guess I’m not quite clear here – because either statement (and the latter is akin to what you Climate Change Deny-ers basically say) is such a profoundly stupid comment that I can’t for a moment think of something any more adequate to mark you as moronic than your own words.
So there it is folks, Terry made the point on Global Climate Change far better than any of us can, specifically, he showed clearly that the disbelief of Climate Change is akin to denying the effects of bacterium and viruses as disease agents, simply because not ALL disease causation has been fully defined yet. Therefore, germs causing disease is ‘just a theory’ and ‘is controversial’.
Terry (et. al.) perhaps if you believe that then you won’t have an issue with your daughters and sons engaging in unprotected sex, I mean, HIV is just a theory.
March 27th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Uh, peev. I’m a telescope operator at an astronomical research observatory by profession. I know what science is. I know how its funded, I know how a scientific consensus arises. Don’t lecture me on what ‘science’ is.
I am not a scientist. I do not publish. RickDFL is less of a scientist than I am. He chooses what science to believe in based on whether or not it agrees with his socialist ideology. If this was the 1920’s he’d be almost certainly be pushing the scientific fad called ‘eugenics’, AKA “racial hygeine”.
March 28th, 2008 at 12:08 am
given your inability to actually ground your comments in the relevant facts, you never, ever will be again.
When you point your finger and say that, there are twenty fingers, toes, etc pointing right back at you.
To wit:
the amount research behind global climate change dwarfs the Manhattan project,
I’m going to make absolutely sure that statement comes back to haunt you on ths blog forever.
March 28th, 2008 at 8:12 am
Don’t forget physics, genetics, and the germ theory of disease.
Yeah, Rick, if you Tics didn’t have that one Kansas school board, you’d have to make it up.
Leaving aside that it’s a complete strawman and misdirection for purposes of this thread (what’s new?) – the DFL/Education Minnesota (pardon the redundancy) is to education on politics and current events what that particular school board was to science.
Oh, yeah – and most univesity Applied Sciences departments, like engineering and physics, are the Republcan strongholds on campus.
Just curious, Rick; do you speak purely in talking points in person?
(I’ll await Peev’s inevitable “when you point a finger about talking points four are pointing back at you” with bated breath).
March 28th, 2008 at 9:49 am
Terry: Professional Idiot
“What germ causes the disease of alcoholism? Schizophrenia?”. Then feel free to stop taking antibiotics, please.
March 28th, 2008 at 10:08 am
Mitch:
“if you Tics didn’t have that one Kansas school board, you’d have to make it up.” They are not even top of the ‘enemies of science’ list anymore. Hell they are not even the nuttiest School Board, that goes to Dover, PA.
“Leaving aside that it’s a complete strawman and misdirection”
You cited the teaching of a well-tested scientific theory as an example of political bias in the schools. Teaching science is the very definition of not displaying political bias. You example raises the perfectly obvious question of what other scientific theories count as ‘liberal’? Can you provide a list?
March 28th, 2008 at 10:11 am
You cited the teaching of a well-tested scientific theory as an example of political bias in the schools.
Huh? Which one? Global warming?
Not well-tested.
And the fact that it is being taught as a proven fact, rather than as a hypothesis with plenty of evidence on both sides, is proof of bias. Absolutely. If you have any regard for what science is, it should nauseate you, no matter what your politics.
You example raises the perfectly obvious question of what other scientific theories count as ‘liberal’? Can you provide a list?
Er, no, since I have no idea what you’re getting at. I don’t consider science “liberal” or, for that matter, conservative. And I say that as someone who works in a fairly empirical field, and was a bio major for a whole semester, so while I’d never posit myself as an expert, I’m pretty familiar with what science is and how it works.
Now, Man-Made Global Warming? That’s vastly more politics than science.
For you to try to generalize that to try to say “Mitch says science is liberal” is intellectually very, very dishonest.
March 28th, 2008 at 10:22 am
The bulk of Peev’s comments were pure bile. Anyone keeping score on that?
March 28th, 2008 at 10:24 am
Actually, due to the length of Peev’s posts, the recent post (like most others) consist of more spaces and articles… alas, not enough punctuation. So his billous comments rank a distant second or third to those items.
March 28th, 2008 at 10:31 am
they are not even the nuttiest School Board
And, again, who cares?
I seceded from that argument long ago; as I’ve written a number of times, I find nothing incongruent about Evolution and the biblical Creation story (when viewed as an allegory – and, really, why on earth not?), and for that matter I see no necessary conflict between faith and science – it’s an invention of narrow-minded dogmatists on both sides of the “debate”.
So take your “school boards” talk back to Kos where it belongs; I really don’t care, and it’s a non-issue to me – to say nothing of being off-topic.
As usual.
March 28th, 2008 at 10:50 am
Mitch writes:
“And the fact that it is being taught as a proven fact, rather than as a hypothesis with plenty of evidence on both sides, is proof of bias”
Here is the most lefty model high school curriculum on global warming I could find.
http://www.worldwildlife.org/climate/seclimatewitness/curriculum.cfm
Please point to a factual statement “being taught as a proven fact, rather than as a hypothesis with plenty of evidence on both sides”.
March 28th, 2008 at 11:07 am
RickDFL-
I don’t get it. Are you saying that the diseases of alcoholism and schizophrenia are caused by germs?
March 28th, 2008 at 11:20 am
The very first sentence of the “Opening Letter and Table of Contents”
http://www.worldwildlife.org/climate/seclimatewitness/Climate-Curriculum/WWF_Lesson00_Introduction.pdf
“The future of our planet lies in the hands of your students. We appreciate your interest in taking action and leading discussions about climate change in your classroom”
If you’re going play the ‘find me a quote’ game, RickDFL, you should 1) read the material yourself, and 2) avoid linking to a PDF that can’t be cut & pasted.
March 28th, 2008 at 11:53 am
Gee, RickDFL, even the lesson plan “The Great Climate Change Debate” doesn’t mention that there is any doubt that anthropogenic climate change is occurring. The issue of the “Great Debate” is about how to best address it.
March 28th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Terry: In reverse order
There is no doubt it is occurring.
It does and find your own links you lazy sod.
If you have doubts about the germ theory of disease, I have no interest in debating you. I encourage you to act on those doubts.
March 28th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
There is no doubt it is occurring
That’s just dumb, Rick. There is all kinds of doubt; your side just refuses to allow that it exists.
You can’t claim to support empricism for some things, and toss it on purely political grounds when it suits you.
March 28th, 2008 at 2:03 pm
Mitch:
“your side just refuses to allow that it exists”
Debates like this are best conducted under the rules of ‘put up or shut up’. Please point me to your best evidence.
March 28th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
DFLRick:
“Put up or shut up”
This from a guy who quite recently said, “…find your own links you lazy sod.”
Isn’t that akin to wanting your cake and eating it, too?
March 28th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Please point me to your best evidence.
“…find your own links you lazy sod”
Hahahaha.
http://www.cdfe.org/global_warming_religion.htm
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L21418509.htm
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L21418509.htm
http://www.sepp.org/key%20issues/glwarm/ccwtltr.html
http://www.sepp.org/policy%20declarations/statment.html
http://www.sepp.org/policy%20declarations/heidelberg_appeal.html
http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?fded5949-97a0-41e8-ad66-bba0fa15e61f
http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?fded5949-97a0-41e8-ad66-bba0fa15e61f
And in keeping with your usual style in these sorts of things, allow me to state that all of your alleged “scientists” are ignorant idiots, while mine all farging rock.
March 28th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
There is no doubt it is occurring.
Science requires skepticism. Religion requires faith in absolutes. I can see what side of the line you fall on, RickDFL.
It does and find your own links you lazy sod.
Waaa! Mom, my mouth wrote checks my ass can’t cash again!
If you have doubts about the germ theory of disease, I have no interest in debating you.
Errr . . . I expressed doubt that the diseases of alcoholism and schizophrenia were caused by germs. Surely even the stodgy mind of a commissar would agree that this is the case. I realize that, having chosen the moniker ‘RickDFL’, the concepts of ‘reason’ ‘logic’ and ‘rhetoric’ frighten and confuse you, but you really should study them if you’re going to try to press an argument.
I encourage you to act on those doubts.
I forgive you for being uncharitable. I understand that having your ass handed to you is a less than pleasant experience.
March 28th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
RickDFL does this ALL the time.
It seems he can’t really construct an argument, but he can recite talking points, call names, and cut and paste links.
I might be able to write a RickDFL-bot myself, but I want to use my powers for good. *shrug*
March 28th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
DFLRick? DFLRiiiiiiick
How did that feel? Please tell us what seven-ways-to-Sunday looks like.
😆
March 28th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Badda:
I am more than happy to find and provide links to evidence for my own position. I expect others to do the same for their positions.
March 28th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
I think you missed the point, DFLRick. Hmmm, getting slapped seven-ways-to-Sunday must sting!
March 28th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
How long before you wish that I contract a disease, DFLRick?
March 28th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Rick,
Wanting evidence (and I can certainly dig up more, but I had work to finish) is one thing.
But frankly, Rick, you start from a really bogus assumption – really, several:
1) That only liberals have regard for empiricism. (balderdash).
2) That your science is right, and everyone else’s is wrong, if indeed it’s science at all (which is itself not science, but pseudo-religion).
3) That you can substitute hype and PC for fact.
March 28th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Mitch:
None of the links links you posted is a peer-reviewed scientific article. Nor do any of they, generally, make scientific arguments. The issue is not whether you can find some trained scientists who will deny global warming – I am sure you can find some who believe in ghosts. The issue is whether anyone is making a scientific argument against global warming.
So taking you links
1. Your first example, Richard Lindzen is a co-author of the following statement: “Greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth’s atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise. Temperatures are, in fact, rising. The changes observed over the last several decades are likely mostly due to human activities, but we cannot rule out that some significant part of these changes is also a reflection of natural variability. Human-induced warming and associated sea level rises are expected to continue through the 21st century.” I agree. I doubt any high school curriculum says anything different.
2. Vaclav Klaus is an economist, not a scientist. As far as I can tell his objections are entirely political not scientific.
3. See above
4. Petitions are not science.
5. Petitions from 16 years ago are unpersuasive, especially when signed by the co-author of the statement in point 1. Nor does the petition actually deny the fact of man-made global warming.
6. The Heidelberg appeal does not contain any statement denying man made global warming. Hell I could probably sign it.
7. Is an argument in favor of man-made global warming.
8. Ditto
March 28th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Mitch:
1. I don’t assume or believe it.
2. See the ‘put up or shut up’ principle.
3. Ditto
March 28th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
I am more than happy to find and provide links to evidence for my own position.
Bullshit.
You wrote the comment:
The curricula were in PDF form. Nevertheless I was able to show in no uncertain terms that they did, in fact, suggest teaching ‘climate change’ as a proven fact with no alternative arguments presented. Even the section on the ‘climate change debate’ suggested that the only debate was what to do about human-generated ‘climate change’.
In short, your arguments are contradictory, you don’t know how to assemble supporting arguments and you purposely mischaracterize the statements of your opponents.
You are a fool.
March 28th, 2008 at 5:56 pm
None of the links links you posted is a peer-reviewed scientific article.
You didn’t ask for them.
1. I don’t assume or believe it.
2. See the ‘put up or shut up’ principle.
3. Ditto
1. Your behavior contradicts this.
2 & 3. Given that your approach to “science” is – judging purely by your appearances in this space – more polemical than empirical, one wonders what the threshold to get you to “shut up” indeed is.
March 28th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
I’d love to know what RickDFL thinks of all the peer reviewed papers that show a link between race and intelligence or demonstrate that gene mod foods are safe for consumption.
March 29th, 2008 at 6:29 am
RickDFL said:
“None of the links links you posted is a peer-reviewed scientific article.”
Mitch said:
“You didn’t ask for them.”
Nor does he provide links exclusively to “peer-reviewed scientific article”s until he decides he needs to move the goal posts.
March 29th, 2008 at 9:49 am
Mitch:
‘Moving the goalposts’ would probably include citing 8 links none of which say the authors deny man made global warming to prove there is a controversy about mad made global warming.
March 29th, 2008 at 10:01 am
RickDFL slipped:
“mad made global warming”
Appropriate.
March 29th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
Buncombe, Rick.
You stated without apparent fear of contradiction that there is no scientific opposition to the theory of man-made global warming.
Several of the links provided showed exactly that; that scientists, including many that are vastly more qualified to their opinions than the ones Algore trots out, are far from unified, and indeed have many cogent questions for the theorists – questions that are answered with pseudo-religious condemnation.
Just declare victory and run away. It’s your only real hope.
March 29th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Mitch said:
“scientists . . . are far from unified, and indeed have many cogent questions for the theorists”. Not exactly Luther’s 95 Theses.
None of it is “scientific opposition to the theory of man-made global warming”. If you can find a quote in any of the articles you cited where someone denies man made global warming, please quote it.
March 29th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Hate to break this to you, RickDFL, but your task (and the task of other enviro weenies) is to make a three-fold argument before you reorganize the world economy to suit your socialist dreams: 1) You have to prove that global warming is occurring 2) you have to prove that it is overall a bad thing for people 3) you have to prove that existing political institutions – like ‘nations’ – can address the problem without making even more people poor.
Poverty isn’t just a lack of a big screen TV. For most of the people in the world it means disease, starvation, and an early death.
How’s that research on the refereed papers showing a link between race and intelligence going? Found any deniers yet? Only papers and research by ‘real scientists’ counts, of course. No sociologists or literary types allowed!
March 29th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
RickDFL said:
“Not exactly Luther’s 95 Theses.”
How appropriate for you to use a religious analog here, RickDFL, and further proof that your “dedication to science” is somewhat superficial.
March 30th, 2008 at 9:54 am
Not exactly Luther’s 95 Theses.
You’re not exactly the pope.
None of it is “scientific opposition to the theory of man-made global warming”.
…from the point of view of a guy who thinks every qualified scientist agrees with him, and when shown otherwise starts chanting “I know you are, but what am I?”, which may be many things, but isn’t exactly science.
If you can find a quote in any of the articles you cited where someone denies man made global warming, please quote it.
The point, Rick, was that your statement about the unanimity of “scientific” agreement, which you delivered as an absolute, is from from absolute.
Surely you’ve read the list Senator Inhofe submitted to the Senate, the 400 scientists who manufactured consensus that you’re claiming – right? (And I already know the links you’re going to post in response; a raft of ad-hominem attacks on the scientists involved, bla bla bla). The point is, the unanimity you’re claiming does not exist; your response to that is the usual Rick response; ad-homina and a spiral of pointillism.
March 30th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Mitch:
“delivered as an absolute, is from from absolute”
Then it really should not be this hard too come up with even one scientist who denies man made global warming. Since you can not produce a quote to this effect, I take it you now concede none of the links you provided show this. As for Inhofe’s list, it starts with this disclaimer “The following scientists named in this report have expressed a range of views from skepticism to outright rejection of predictions of catastrophic man-made global warming”. That is a far cry from denying man made global warming. So if you want to wade through the report and find one who denies that man-made global warming feel free.
March 30th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
Rick,
You are too obtuse to take seriously. You yourself note: “r “The following scientists named in this report have expressed a range of views from skepticism to outright rejection”, and follow it with “That is a far cry from denying”. No, that states that a number of those 400 scientists reject it.
I concede nothing to you, since all you are doing is sophomorically parsing words.
You want one name? John W. Brosnahan. Or the Royal Meteorological Society’s International Journal of Climatology, which showed that the IPCC’s computer models couldn’t even correctly predict the past.
Your argumentation technique is obtuse and tiresome, and based entirely on your opponents’ level of interest in answer your absurd demands. But since you have yet shown me a list of every scientist in the world stating they agree with MMGW, I presume that means you’ve given up and will not only concede, but remit a check for $200 to me.