Tyranny For Ye, But Not For We
By Mitch Berg
The word “hypocrite” gets tossed around with excessive abandon in grassroots political arguments; leftybloggers throw it about like monkeys flinging poo over every perceived inconsistency or imperfection they can dredge up.
“Hypocricy” is when someone completely contradicts a moral, ethical, philosophical or other stance.
Like, say, when a Legislative body tries to inflict a socialized healthcare system on the rest of society – but carefully writes itself out of it so it can keep its own current health plan, which actually works.
Or, say, when an entire politcal class bans the human right of self-defense for most of the society it governs, but writes itself a special loophole to allow itself to carry guns. Because, y’know, someone’s gotta govern the peasants.
Lady Logician – a Chicago native now living in Utah – writes:
Chicago not only has one of the strictist gun control laws in the country, it’s Mayor is talking all out war (in light of the Supreme Courts Heller decision) to make sure that they law is not repealed. Yet it seems that in Mayor Daley’s Chicago, gun control adnerence is only for the proletariat and not for the ruling classes.
Amazingly enough, he was not the first local public official to take the view that firearms restrictions are something for other, ordinary people to observe. Chicago politicians are zealously committed to gun control in law, but fairly relaxed about it in practice.
In 1994, state Sen. Rickey Hendon, D-Chicago, had an unregistered handgun stolen from his home in a burglary, and he didn’t feign contrition about his disregard of the ordinance.
“I have a right to protect myself,” he declared, noting that he had been burglarized before — and forgetting that the state legislature of which he is a member allows Illinois cities to deprive their citizens of that right. Asked if he would replace the lost piece, Hendon said, “No comment.” The police were kind enough not to charge him.
Nice of those Chicago cops. D’ya suppose a regular citizen would get the same forebearance?
U.S. Sen. Roland Burris, another Chicagoan, has endorsed a nationwide ban on handguns and, in 1993, organized Chicago’s first Gun Turn-in Day. But the following year, while running unsuccessfully for governor, he admitted he owned a handgun — “for protection,” he explained — and hadn’t seen fit to turn it in along with those other firearms. Lesser mortals apparently can protect themselves with forks and spoons.
And it’s here LL is wrong. As we’ve seen in the UK, defending oneself with kitchen utensils, or even your fists and fingernails, can be banned as easily as guns can.
But how is this – words fail – hypocrisy possible?
In the early nineties, at the near-nadir of Second Amendment human rights, Dianne Feinstein – today a Senator, back then the mayor of San Francisco – famously obtained a handgun. And then tried to revoke all civilian carry permits in the city – but only after having herself issued a police carry permit. It didn’t end well for Feinstein – indeed, her hypocrisy was a huge moral lift to the Second Amendment human rights movement fifteen years ago.
But San Francisco is a piker a pouring on perks for pols (emphasis added by me):
But wait, you say, State law classifies aldermen as designated “peace” officers and as such share the same rights and responsibilities as Chicago police officers. That also assumes that these aldermen are “law-abiding” as police officers are supposed to be and yet….
…and yet Chicago alderman, who actively repress the civil rights of law-abiding Chicagoans as they preside over an epic meltdown of law-and-order in the streets, give themselves the right to carry a firearm for self-defense.
Because peasants need lords, dammit.
C’mon, February!
November 24th, 2009 at 10:06 am
Mitch, like you, I am a Springsteen fan. Like you, I seperate his music from his politics. But this morning on the Springsteen station on Sirus……domestic terrorist William Ayres was the host. I wanna believe that Bruce is a decent guy with misguided politics. But sometimes it’s a struggle. If Toby Keith had one of the Birmingham church bombers hosting one of his programs…….
November 24th, 2009 at 10:41 am
Or a current of former KKK memeber Chuck. Wait there’s one still in the Senate, which party does he belong to? I forgot…
November 24th, 2009 at 11:20 am
The thought of aldermen being law-abiding….hee hee….how many of them need to be put into prison before we dispense of that notion? :^)
November 24th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
all of them.
November 24th, 2009 at 12:33 pm
The thought of aldermen being law-abiding….hee hee….how many of them need to be put into prison before we dispense of that notion?
All of them. And all their relatives, since many wards in Chicago are run as fiefdoms.
November 24th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
Mitch, first you complain that…
“The word “hypocrite” gets tossed around with excessive abandon in grassroots political arguments; leftybloggers throw it about like monkeys flinging poo over every perceived inconsistency or imperfection they can dredge up.”
And then you complain lefties are hypocrites.
You’ve complained when I pointed out your (and other rightwinger) hypocrisies – but then you go and call the left hypocrites.
So is it that you object to being called a hypocrite (when you may or may not be one), object to hypocrisy (which would be ironic), or that you simply object to left-wing hypocrisy (which would be nothing other than partisan)?
In this case, you talk about masters for the masses as a complaint, but you always seem ready willing and able to entrust our future to the corporate captains whose primary interest is in enriching themselves. You have raised few, if any, objections to allowing corporations to enter into funding political races, and the evidence is repleat that we are in effect massively maneuvered politically by business interests, including on health care, far in excess of what is best for the country’s financial health long term. We moved 8 Million Tech jobs and invested 10 Trillion dollars overseas, supposedly to increase jobs onshore, but that was, as predicted by those outside the ones with financial gain, an unmitigated disaster, with millions of lost jobs, and trillions of lost dollars in income and tax revenues.
For you to complain about ‘masters’ is.. seemingly, hypocritical – changing health care is needed, for this country economically to survive if not for ethical fairness. If you don’t like the left calling you a hypocrite, it seems perhaps you shouldn’t call them one, but even more, perhaps you should instead seek a solution which actually SOLVES something, rather than maintaining the status quo which makes the rich richer – instead of making them richer while compaining about ‘overlords.’
November 24th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
I had a friend get caught up in Chicago’s war on guns, drugs, and civil behavior. It is not noted in the story, but in the end my friend was fined and had his shot gun confiscated – check the link to see how it all came about…
http://dogparkwalker.blogspot.com/2005/07/gun.html
November 24th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
penigma, you do realize that nobody forces anyone to do business with a corporate leader, but every resident is forced to “do bidness” with their governments, right?
Nice try, but next time, do a bit of actual thinking, OK? I am no fan of corporatism, but in such a case, blame belongs to the government, not the corporate leaders, primarily.
November 24th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
318 words from Peev. Not one of them about gun control or Chicago.
November 24th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Penigma, I don’t how you do it, but your political ideas tend to be both weird and unimaginative.
November 24th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
“corporations to enter into funding political races”
What race? Sounds more fair than how the unions operate.
“the evidence is repleat”
Yet, Peevee was unable to provide any.
“We moved 8 Million Tech jobs…”
You did? Really? Why?
Peni, they are not laughing with you… so run along back to PenisBlog…
November 24th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
And then you complain lefties are hypocrites.
I didn’t complain. I proved it.
You’ve complained when I pointed out your (and other rightwinger) hypocrisies
No. I largely showed that your examples were either minor inconsistencies that you inaccurately blew up into nonexistent “hypocrisies”, or showed that you were just reciting an erroneous or just-plain-nonsensical conventional wisdom that it seemed from your writing that you didn’t really understand yourself.
A whole different thing, really.
but then you go and call the left hypocrites.
Nope. I called Chicago’s politicians hypocrites. Disarming the population because you believe the citizens to be untrustworthy rabble, but then making sure they have police-level permits because they “need to protext themselves” is a textbook definition of hypocrisy.
So is it that you object to being called a hypocrite (when you may or may not be one), object to hypocrisy (which would be ironic)
Only if correctly calling out both hypocrisy and others’ invalid examples of “hypocrisy” is “ironic” in any meaningful sense.
I’m not aware of that sense. Feel free to elaborate.
or that you simply object to left-wing hypocrisy (which would be nothing other than partisan)?
Answer me this, Pen: how is noting the black-and-white fact that Chicago’s aldermen got themselves exempted, as cops, from the gun ban, “partisan?” Did parties even get mentioned in my own writing?
No, they did not.
I’d ask you to show me the partisanship – but you really can’t.
In this case, you talk about masters for the masses as a complaint, but you always seem ready willing and able to entrust our future to the corporate captains
Really?
Where do I do that? Give me specifics, please.
Because you’re not only way off topic, but I think you’re on auto-pilot.
You have raised few, if any, objections to allowing corporations to enter into funding political races,
Which is a particularly misleading strawman, as well as being grossly off-topic. I have repeatedly called for a complete repeat of all campaign finance laws, except for an absolute requirement to
publish all contributions, down to the last penny, on the web upon receipt. My stance on campaign finance, thus, is vastly clearer, less ambiguous, and less abuse-prone than yours – whatever yours is.
and the evidence is repleat
The evidence has been folded into a fan-like pattern? Or is it perhaps ‘replete’?
that we are in effect massively maneuvered politically by business interests, including on health care, far in excess of what is best for the country’s financial health long term.
That may be the most over the top generalization I’ve ever read.
We moved 8 Million Tech jobs and invested 10 Trillion dollars overseas, supposedly to increase jobs onshore,
And the Chicago gun ban, or failing to incorporate the Second Amendment, fixes this exactly how?
For you to complain about ‘masters’ is.. seemingly, hypocritical
Why? Because I am in fact a master who is complaining about my fellow despots?
Criminy, Pen – you need to learn new adjectives. Not everything you disagree with is “hypocrisy”. I might be (hypothetically) “wrong”; I might be “mistaken” (unlikely, but possible); you might have a different take on things, and one of these days you might even provide evidence to support it (faith springs eternal).
See? Several different shades of meaning! All through the miracle of “other words”, that you can use without having to always resort to the inflammatory and inaccurate “hypocrite” all the time!
You’re welcome.
changing health care is needed, for this country economically to survive if not for ethical fairness.
Right, but the changes you propose aren’t the ones we need. (Hey, you get to generalize rampantly, so do I).
If you don’t like the left calling you a hypocrite, it seems perhaps you shouldn’t call them one,
Let me be crystal clear on this: I don’t give a rat’s infected ass what “the left” calls me. If you wanna show where I, Mitch Berg, am a “hypocrite” – meaning that I advocate a moral, legal or ethical stance from which I flagrantly and cynically excuse myself – bring the evidence. Or expect to be mocked without mercy at the very least.
I have shown where a number of Chicago polticians are, by any rational definition, hypocrites. If you want to play “I know you are, but what are they?”, feel free, but don’t expect that particular argument to get a more respectful response than it deserves.
but even more, perhaps you should instead seek a solution which actually SOLVES something,
But I did that! I have asked the SCOTUS to incorporate the Second Amendment’s post-Heller interpretation, and ram it down Chicago’s throat like a sledgehammer pounding a drill spike into granite.
Which will not solve all the world’s problems, but it’ll solve the problem that this post was once actually about; the destruction of human rights in Chicago.
November 24th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
“All through the miracle of “other words”,”
Please, please, please don’t teach the Peaver any new words. He might just use them.
November 24th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
So Congress will get to keep its employer-paid health plan. So will everyone else who has one. How is that hypocritical?
The gun bans are ridiculous, and anyone who tries to ban guns but wants one for him/herself needs to be shown the door.
November 24th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
“an absolute requirement to publish all contributions, down to the last penny,”
We can dream.
November 24th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Mitch – thanks for the well-reasoned reply – I have some follow-up below.
MoN – I think you’d struggle to teach third-graders words, be careful where you tred little fella.
Mitch –
First, you appear to have suggeted that I’ve only pointed out ‘minor’ inconsistencies or were blown out of proportion – as to the latter, I might very well make the same claim for you, hope you’ll undestand.
As to the former – let’s remember those ‘minor’ inconsistencies..
1. Habeaus Corpus being suspended, indefinite detention, secret prisons, etc.. while championing the defense of the Constitution.
2. Advocating Military Tribunals where they are not appropriate in law while advocating for fair and equal treatment under the law of law abiding citizen’s rights to carry fire-arms
3. The political corruption of the Department of Justice while championing/complaining about free and fair elections being corrupted by ACORN
4. The unlawful violation of FISA while claiming it was both not lawful and complaining in other posts about the illegality of Democratic politicians.
I hope you trust I could go on for a while – and not really even be talking about you specifically.
Whether you proved hypocrisy wasn’t the challenge – I didn’t say they weren’t hypocrites – I said you were complaining about the use of the word by liberals, and then used it. Strikes me as ironic, that’s all.
But let’s go to this – you are concerned about an expansion of federal powers (by increasing the welfare state to provide for nationalized/federalized healthcare). I get that – yet I also think the nation needs to find a solution to run-away health care expenses which isn’t rooted in simply telling an already hard-pressed middle-class to share more of the burden as the only solution OR doesn’t result in a catastrophic impact on Health Care wages – which is what would result from doing away with employer contribution as David Strom advocates.
Yet, in the next breath you advocate that Heller should be the law of the land, that Chicago can’t decide its own rules locally, no matter how much we may not agree with the way they decide them – and want to enforce Heller even before its been incorporated. I thought you were an advocate of less federal intrustion, not more? I thought you were (generally) and advocate of state’s rights and self-determination. Chicago can pass whatever it likes regarding hand-gun control until the 2nd is incorporated and NOTHING says otherwise – it is within its rights to do so at this point. Chicago and Illinois CAN respond to dicta, but they aren’t obligated to. This is why I said when it came out that Heller was rather a gutless stance – I understand they can’t answer questions not put before them, but in dicta, presumably they could have commented much more strongly. Morever, they could have seen the case as addressing more than just the case in point (i.e. Heller), they could have addressed what the 2nd fundamentally means.
Regardless, while you may see ‘minor inconsistencies’ many, many, not just me, see glaring ones, such as Mark Sanford or Mark Foley or Tom Haggerty etc.. having unseemly relationships while the party claims to be a party of ‘family values’ or the fact that the party of ‘Moral Values/Christianity” freely dumps homosexuals to the curb, yet does NOTHING to curb the excesses of wealth, something the New Testament talks about 1000 times for the one time it talks about homosexuality. Many of us see these – and I suggest to you that each of us can CLAIM that our partisan side only has ‘minor inconsistencies’ while phumpering about the other – making mountains out of molehills – or we can recognize we BOTH have manifest inconsistencies and work for a real solution.
I know which course I prefer.
November 24th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Criminy, Pen – you need to learn new adjectives.
Please, no. Oh God, no!
November 24th, 2009 at 5:57 pm
Terry, you should try to be more civil.
November 24th, 2009 at 6:05 pm
Pen,
I’m not really in the mood to re-examine the Bush years. Not yet anyway.
But let’s go to this – you are concerned about an expansion of federal powers (by increasing the welfare state to provide for nationalized/federalized healthcare). I get that – yet I also think the nation needs to find a solution to run-away health care expenses which isn’t rooted in simply telling an already hard-pressed middle-class to share more of the burden as the only solution OR doesn’t result in a catastrophic impact on Health Care wages – which is what would result from doing away with employer contribution as David Strom advocates.
While simply doing away with employer contributions isn’t a panacaea, it is a fact that third party money inflates prices. It’s economics 101. Cutting third party payments would eventually, inevitably reduce prices, but it’d be a long, painful slog. One that, in the long term, would be preferable to making healthcare permanently unaffordable without the government being involved, which is the inevitable result of the “Public Option”.
Yet, in the next breath you advocate that Heller should be the law of the land, that Chicago can’t decide its own rules locally,
This society decided 45 years ago that Human Rights were not up for local interpretation. The right to protect ones’ life, family and property is not one iota less important than free speech, press, assembly, worship, or any of the other rights “of the people“, to say nothing of rights like voting, equal protection and the like. These rights are not subject to the whims of petty local tyrants, no matter what their rationalization; each of them is a human right, a right we get by being born as human beings, not human beings in the right states.
no matter how much we may not agree with the way they decide them – and want to enforce Heller even before its been incorporated.
Re-read my post. I said in as many words I want Heller incorporated, and then I want the National Guard deployed to Chicago to escort the first law-abiding black family into the courthouse to get carry permits, a la James Meredith.
I thought you were an advocate of less federal intrustion, not more?
On most matters, yes.
But does the Constitution govern this nation, or does it not? Rights “of the people” are not optional.
I thought you were (generally) and advocate of state’s rights and self-determination.
On education, tax policy, wetlands use, drivers licenses and everything else reserved to the States and The People in the Tenth Amendment? Absolutely.
I’d have liked Alabama and Mississippi and the rest of the Deep South to have abolished Jim Crow on their own; does anyone argue the propriety of judicial intervention, and eventually military intervention, to enforce the law of the land in those cases?
As well, I’d have liked Chicago to see the writing on the wall, and do the right thing and abandon the policies of Hitler and Stalin and embrace real liberty. But if we need the SCOTUS to settle it, thank God we have it.
Chicago can pass whatever it likes regarding hand-gun control until the 2nd is incorporated and NOTHING says otherwise – it is within its rights to do so at this point.
Right. Just as Mississippi was within its rights to enforce Jim Crow laws until incorporation. But they were still morally wrong.
This is why I said when it came out that Heller was rather a gutless stance – I understand they can’t answer questions not put before them, but in dicta, presumably they could have commented much more strongly.
But, as has been noted, Scalia quite rightly opted to take a more conservative stance, knowing that McDonald was going to be filed within an hour of the Heller decision, allowing the court to do it the right way.
Morever, they could have seen the case as addressing more than just the case in point (i.e. Heller), they could have addressed what the 2nd fundamentally means.
They did. IT’s a right “of the people”. Case closed.
As far as the “family values” stuff – too easy, doncha think?
November 24th, 2009 at 6:53 pm
MoN – I think you’d struggle to teach third-graders words, be careful where you tred little fella.
Penigma, you misspelled ‘tread’. While lecturing someone else about their inability to use words properly. Bad show, old boy.
The rest of your screed is typical. Rambling incoherent thought piled on rambling, incoherent thought.
Tom Foley didn’t have any unseemly relationships. Mark Sanford is being impeached. Haggard is a private citizen — I’d never even heard of him until his scandal broke.
But you Dems — A treasury secretary who is a tax cheat. A congressman who heads the committee that writes taxes who is a tax cheat. The head of the senate banking committee taking bribes from a mortgage lender. The wolves are in the sheep pen, Penigma, and you helped to put them there.
November 24th, 2009 at 6:55 pm
“…many, many, not just me, see…”
That Dubya was behind 9/11? Really?
….
“I hope you trust I could go on for a while…”
😆
Peevee, we’re sure you could go on and on and on making more crap up.
November 24th, 2009 at 8:28 pm
The Peaver babbles: “be careful where you tred little fella.”
The correct word is TREAD.
Any third grader would know that one, you flaming idiot.
November 24th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
“be careful where you tred little fella.”
Mitch, what’s your comment policy about threats? Including misspelled threats.
November 24th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
MoN,
I think the threat was mostly as re English usage. My policy there is to consider the source.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:14 am
call the police Mon ;)/ Lord knows thats what that wuss Spot did to me.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:16 am
Whatever happened to “Don’t Feed The Trolls”?
If a guy can’t focus his comments on the crux of the matter at hand but instead must rail about irrelevencies, he’s a troll. Don’t respond.
As for gun control, I’ve had carry permits for decades but only because I was in the right profession and knew the right people. I was never so glad as the day I got my permit by right rather than connection. Chicago could use a dose of that medicine.
What the hey – they could hardly have more guns on the streets than they have now. At least some might be in honest citizens’ hands.
.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:03 am
” Lesser mortals apparently can protect themselves with forks and spoons.
And it’s here LL is wrong. As we’ve seen in the UK, defending oneself with kitchen utensils, or even your fists and fingernails, can be banned as easily as guns can.”
Actually Mitch that was the Chicago Tribune editorial writer who said that about protecting themselves with forks and spoons. Still – I thought you would like that piece.
Cindy
November 25th, 2009 at 8:05 am
“I was never so glad as the day I got my permit by right rather than connection. Chicago could use a dose of that medicine.”
Nate, You’re joking right? As a former Chicago native I can pretty much assure you that any kind of meritocracy will only happen in Chicago when Hades gets really, really cold…..
Cindy
November 25th, 2009 at 8:29 am
Mitch said: “I’m not really in the mood to re-examine the Bush years. Not yet anyway.”
He’ll stick to reminiscing about the Reagan administration thank you very much. Kinda like how Angryclown likes to pretend it’s 1986 and the Mets have just won the World Series. The ugly reality, of course, is that from 2001 to 2008, the Mets and the president sucked.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:48 am
So the Mets are doing better in 2009? Because the president …
November 25th, 2009 at 9:04 am
The ugly reality, of course, is that from 2001 to 2008, the Mets and the president sucked.
The difference, of course, is that the American people chose George W. Bush twice. Nobody chooses the Mets. Like toe jam and George Clooney, they have merely always existed.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:50 am
Alas, Troy, the Mets continue to suck. But the president is much better now.
The American people chose Al W. Gore in 2000, now that you mention it, Mitch. The Electoral College and the U.S. Supreme Court decided that election.
And what’s so bad about Clooney? That Murrow movie was pretty good. And “O Brother Where Art Thou?” is sublime.
Think you’re also unfairly bad-rapping toe jam. Swiftea’s gotta eat something.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Nate said: “I’ve had carry permits for decades but only because I was in the right profession and knew the right people.”
Nate’s a hitman.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
“much better”
As if a flaming liberal like AssClown could ever substantiate something for once.
November 25th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
angryclown said:
“But the president is much better now.”
Hehe, that must be why he HAS to put through a health care bill, any health care bill, so as not to appear a failure.
Oh wait, you’re angryclown! You might just be buying whatever he’s selling.