A significant number of the angry people on the Left are criminals: President Carter informs us that right-wingers who are angry at Obama are overwhelmingly racist. How does he know this? Because they're mad, and Obama's black. Two plus two equals four, right dummies? Just like a year ago when all the right-wingers were ringing talk radio's phones off the hook with angry calls concerning plans for bailout. All that rage was proof positive that conservatives hate white people. Bush is white, isn't he?
I'll believe Carter's "overwhelmingly" claim when he brings me a carefully conducted study where, say, 80% of right-wingers report hating black people.
Oh, but I just happened to have data showing that a sizeable share of left-wingers are criminals. According to the General Social Survey, 29.8% of very liberal guys ages 18-59 say they have been arrested before. Therefore, it is illegitimate to oppose Republican policies because that's what gangsters do.
When I follow the example of liberals and smear the other side, at least I bring some evidence.
Are gun owners mentally ill?
Some anti-gun people think owning a gun is a sign of some kind of mental abnormality. According to General Social Survey data, gun owners ...
According to the General Social Survey, 29.8% of very liberal guys ages 18-59 say they have been arrested before.
ReplyDeleteCould some of that be due to participation in protest marches and other demonstrations?
Peter
Big difference between being arrested and being a criminal, but as always you manage to get the data to say what you want.
ReplyDeleteLet's compare the arrest rate among angry liberals to other groups. That will give a pretty good indication of differing patterns of acting out, if not of outright crime.
ReplyDeleteFew more comments.
ReplyDeleteFirst, everyone likes to smear the other side. Attempting to take the moral high ground by claiming you are following the example of liberals is ridiculous.
Second, criticizing Carter for lack of evidence while at the same time not presenting the arrest rate for "conservatives" is deliberately misleading, and "worse" than Carters lack of data to support his claims.
Third, no data has been presented to correlate arrest rates with actual crimes being committed, or convictions.
I usually enjoy this blog because it's an differing perspective than my own on politics/world/whatever, backed up by data.
This post has been devoid of any logical or reasonable use of the data....
What Carter said may be more mild than summaries may imply:
ReplyDelete"I think people who are guilty of that kind of personal attack against Obama have been influenced to a major degree by a belief that he should not be president because he happens to be African American."
"I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African-American," Carter told "NBC Nightly News."
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/15/carter.obama/index.html
Calling the pres an animal, invoking Godwin, or saying he should be buried is certainly excessive. The White House has plenty of bad policies worth attacking. Hatred of Obama may not be racist but it is still hatred, and Carter is just speculating.
Talk is cheap. If I saw any more animosity toward Obama than toward Clinton (or Carter, for that matter), I'd admit that Carter may have a point. These men do not have race in common. What they do have in common is an obsession with intervening in the Middle East, a total lack of interest in fulfilling the "Tenth Amendment" part of their oaths of office, open support for affirmative action, etc.
Given this, perhaps they are the post-war figures most worthy of our hatred. Hatred is still a poison and it needs to be purged. Better to treat the policies with icy reason than to treat the men with smoldering emotion.
I'll put away the soapbox now.
"...people on the Left are criminals..."
ReplyDeleteHow about checking the political affiliations of prisoners? There's some mysterious reason that Dems often want to reinstate voting rights for convicted felons.