Thursday, January 29, 2009

No Spine

Another demonstration of what it means to be a conservative. Kind of reminds one of local bloggers who delete posts when it's found they made a mistake.

Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA), yesterday (from Politico):

"I mean, it's easy if you're Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh or even sometimes Newt Gingrich to stand back and throw bricks. You don't have to try to do what's best for your people and your party. You know you're just on these talk shows and you're living well and plus you stir up a bit of controversy and gin the base and that sort of that thing. But when it comes to true leadership, not that these people couldn't be or wouldn't be good leaders, they're not in that position of John Boehner or Mitch McConnell."

Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA), today (h/t Think Progress):

“I want to express to you [Limbaugh] and all your listeners my very sincere regret for those comments I made yesterday” and “the best possible message for this country would be for every single Republican to vote against [the economy recovery package].”

3 comments:

  1. Kind of reminds one of local bloggers who delete posts when it's found they made a mistake.

    And if they nor busy deleting posts, they're busy blocking commneters and deleting their comments if they have the nerve to disagree. Especially if they prove him wrong.

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  2. Too often in today's political landscape discourse is kept among those who agree. RDW is not a blog to promote that. They discuss ideas there, and they ask that you keep your tone in check and respect those who are willing to share.

    Unless of course you're one of those guys who likes to insult LIE-berals in every post, no matter what the topic, or regularly toss in a few personal insults like idiot, retard, lib-tard, pretty much anything like that. That's perfectly fine at Fred's place.

    Of course, if he thinks you were wrong about something once, he'll repeatedly declare you a liar on all subjects. Either way. Ask Folkbum. And he reserves the right to throw posts down the memory hole, and to zap comments that hit the target too precisely.

    See, if Fred had made a declaration that was easily and demonstrably wrong, then people might trust his judgment less, and by zapping it he helps to not mislead people. This helps preserve his preferred status quo and makes it easier to suppress that nagging cognitive dissonance.

    Sadly, even Wigderson has fallen into the same trap. I was banned for my horrid behavior there. Can you find it? Apparently I was personally insulting his character. If only I could find where I did that, I might apologize or clarify. If only I could behave like Gus/Mickey, I'd be welcome everywhere.

    I think some bloggers can't take the strain. They like the adulation, but they're sensitive about the criticism. They grow compelled to post often, to post first, to drive traffic. With every post, they risk being wrong. They think if they were shown to be wrong, they'd be less loved by their groupies. Some of them aren't good at fact- or sanity-checking. A little Googling would help them, but that would require a critical eye as opposed to partisan blinders. No one is infallible. I give a lot of credit to any blogger who doesn't zap their mistakes. My beloved Owen doesn't, for example. Does doesn't always admit his error or bias, which makes Boots and Kittens that much easier, but when he's irrefutably wrong, he'll just tag an update on a post.

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  3. I'm not sure why James banned you. I did follow the thread involved and was surprised at his action. You were unrelenting, John, but you were also right.

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