Week 3

Week 3

Welcome to this week's Smart Retorts.

This week, Gil concedes that conservatism is "succeeding in part" because "it has consistently cast itself in the role of victim".

Gil goes on to describe this "demonization". According to Gil, we "get the consistent demonization of 'evil' judges, 'un-American' homosexuals and vile liberals."

Not sure whom Gil is quoting here.

But wasn't it Teresa Heinz Kerry who was quoted as saying, "We need to turn back some of the creeping, un-Pennsylvanian and sometimes un-American traits that are coming into some of our politics."?

When later asked by Colin McNickle, editorial page editor for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, what she meant by the term "un-American", Heinz Kerry made the now infamous quote "Shove it".

Then Gil rants against Dr. Dobson, quoting an April newsletter from Focus on the Family out of context.

The first quote is this:

In it, Dobson calls U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy the most dangerous man in America. However, you can see the context here.

While we can debate the wisdom of executing minors, (who, by the way, would have been at least 30 or 40 years old by the time their sentences were carried out,) the more important issue is how the law came to be struck down. It was not debated or decided by the American people or their representatives, where such issues should be deliberated and determined. It was nullified by judicial decree. The Oligarchy did it for us.

Even those who are opposed to the idea of capital punishment for minors should be gravely concerned about the criteria by which the Supreme Court arrived at its decision. In writing for the majority opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy, whom I consider to be the most dangerous man in America, explained his rationale for the ruling, boldly claiming, "It is proper that we acknowledge the overwhelming weight of international public opinion against the juvenile death penalty." 29 This justification was written by a man who regularly ignores the weight of American public opinion in forcing his post-modern nonsense on our culture. Kennedy further promised that the Supreme Court of the United States would continue to look to "the laws of [selected] other countries and to international authorities" in re-interpreting the Constitution.30

In his second quote of Dobson, Gil says:

Terri Schiavo was condemned to death by an immoral Florida court judge [Judge George Greer].

What else do you call this?

As for evil judges, haven't Democrats been obstructing some "evil judges" of their own in recent news? Forgot that whole filibustering thing in the Democratic Senate already?

Gil then references an incident in a North Carolina Baptist church where 9 members were allegedly expelled if they would not support Bush. It appears Gil's source for his information is this. You can tell because its nearly a direct quote from the site (which source is identified as the democraticunderground.com). He even uses a term from that article in his, "Exhibit A". For those of you who know, the Democratic Underground BLOG is not a very good source for facts and the story appears weak.

There were only nine Democrats in the whole church? Think about this. Nine! This is a sign that Democrats are persecuted across the country?

Try reading Persecution by David Limbaugh, once.

In fact, there is a lot of dispute (from what I've read) over the reasoning for kicking out the nine. Varying stories say that the pastor asked everyone to leave that did not agree with his position on homosexuality and abortion. At most, the church could lose its tax exempt status according to some of the information I've read, although I don't believe that that has happened at this point.

What does Dr. Dobson's quote about a Republican judge (George Greer) or the news story about Chan Chandler, a pastor of East Waynesville in North Carolina, have to do with demonizing liberals in Pennsylvania or in America as a whole?

And if this quote from Democrat Harry Reid isn't demonizing, I don't know what is.

"The man's father is a wonderful human being," Reid said in response to a question about President Bush's policies. "I think this guy is a loser.

After the statement was released, Reid phoned the Review-Journal to acknowledge he thought he crossed the line.

Republican National Communications Director Brian Jones issued a statement calling the senator's comments "a sad development but not surprising from the leader of a party devoid of optimism, ideas or solutions to the issues people care about most."

Source

Gil, I think we have some more pressing issues to deal with, like Social Security?

Thanks for reading this week's Smart Retorts.