I have no idea where this came from, but I think it’s pretty cool. From a a list of “10 Right-Winger Being Prepped To Take Over the Conservative Movement”:
6. Erik ‘E.D.’ Kain, The Washington Examiner
“The Apostate”
Approximate Age: 29
Accomplishments: The only reason Kain is not widely loathed by his conservative brethren is that he is not, for the moment, widely known. He’s got a touch of the wingnut (“pro-life across the board”) but is anti-war, anti-torture and anti-death penalty. And if that isn’t enough, Kain wants to cut defense spending, which aligns him with, of all people, Alan Grayson. He has so far collected one antagonist of note: Robert Stacy McCain of “Emmett Till had it coming” fame.
Fun Fact: He’s so goddamn reasonable as to be unquotable.
Antecedent: Kain’s pulled a neat trick. He’s essentially David Frum: The Next Generation. But unlike Frum, Kain has nothing to apologize for.
gwangung
I’m getting popcorn.
Matt
Across the board? Does that mean what I think it means?
me
Ouch.
Omnes Omnibus
Lucky in his enemies, I see.
Cat Lady
Gary “sunspots” Johnson is his favorite 2012 candidate. He better hope the memory hole is turbo charged.
zhak
I don’t trust any man whose stance is “pro-life across the board.”
It just smacks of misogyny mixed with “we men know what’s best for the little woman.”
I think if men had to carry babies to term, abortion would be a simple lifestyle choice & the views of women, pro or con, would not be counted.
arguingwithsignposts
And a whole lot of the commentariat here, apparently.
AhabTRuler, V
Doesn’t this deserve the Blogospheric Navel-Gazing tag?
Betsy
@arguingwithsignposts:
They did say “of note.”
Violet
Said it before, but it’s worth repeating. Is Mr. Kain against all abortion, even in cases of r ape or inc est? If yes, then he’s pro-life across the board. If no, then he is not pro-life across the board, but instead has a line. And then the issue becomes where the line is, which is an entirely different subject.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
Kain ain’t so bad. Even if I don’t agree with his argument he generally seems to be arguing in good faith and his arguments aren’t based in the Bizarro realm of political thought (ie Liberal Fascism). And it isn’t like you have to read his posts.
Isn’t Gary Johnson the former Republican governor from the southwest who is in favor of legalizing pot?
Omnes Omnibus
@Betsy: Robert Stacy McCain is not a person of note.
Anoniminous
A Conservative blogger being reasonable? The first indication we have achieved Peak Wingnut?
Or not …
zhak @ 6 observed:
“I don’t trust any man whose stance is “pro-life across the board.”
So close we is and yet so far.
AhabTRuler, V
@Violet: Yes, but he also pointed out that he doesn’t support legislating against abortion. Now, it does remain to be seen how far that argument can be taken or trusted, but in the meantime I will put him down as pro-choice and hold him to it.
Anton Sirius
@AhabTRuler, V:
Of course not, don’t be ridiculous.
Hey, look over there! Someone at the Atlantic is saying something nice about someone else at the Atlantic!
Frank
@arguingwithsignposts:
Not me. If all Republicans (I know he doesn’t consider himself a Republican, but I don’t believe it) were like Kain, we would have our country back. I still don’t get why he supports the conservative causes as he seems to badmouth most of them.
Cermet
Like all religious lifer’s, Mr. ED the talking horse doesn’t know which end he is talking out of on this subject – the Bible does not prohibit abortion despite the fact that this practice was very well known and part of tradition at the time – hell, the Bible implies that there is no soul in a fetus until after the first trimester (so it aligns very well with our current law/practices.)
I too don’t like it nor want woman to find ways to avoid it but it is their right and I have zero right to control their bodies – period, end of issue, no further point.
On this, like so many other so-called conservatist that believe in personal freedom, Mr. Ed is just more rear ended hot air.
gwangung
Munch, munch.
Litlebritdifrnt
@zhak:
I have always said if men had the periods and the babies there would be a mandatory 1 week per month paid sick leave, contraceptives would not only be foolproof they would be free and they would be available at 24/7 vending machines available on every street corner, there would be about a dozen different “morning after” pills, maternity leave would start at about six weeks and last for two years. There is a reason they don’t want the Wimminz making the laws.
Cermet
@Frank: Uh? If he is pro-life across the board, how does he support the right for a woman to choose? If he does that, then I am the complete ass and blowing that hot air and I take back all I said as bull shit and wrong about Mr. Ed … damn, I guess I’m batting 1.000 again.
jacy
@zhak:
I thought that we had discussed this to death already, and come to the conclusion that Kain is actually pro-choice, but doesn’t want to lose his “pro-life” merit badge by actually speaking those words aloud.
Baby steps, people.
Violet
@AhabTRuler, V:
I’m not really interested in what someone’s personal views are on abortion. Everyone can have their own personal views. It’s when those views start to invade my personal liberty that I get a little upset.
I take your point that he doesn’t support legislating against abortion. And if he means that, then he’s pro-choice. But I’m suspicious of anyone who chooses to use the term “pro-life” because it carries such baggage and is associated with the rabid anti-abortion crowd. And very often “pro-life” also means “pro-death penalty,” a fact which really seems at odds with the entire meaning of the phrase.
So I would like Mr. Kain to be a little clearer on what he means by the vague “pro-life across the board” statement before I give him full benefit of the doubt.
RareSanity
Uh…hmmm…well, I…umm
I can not think of a list single list, that includes Michael Goldfarb, I would want to be on.
General Stuck
The Kain Mutiny
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Wow. I think that calls for pistols and seconds at dawn.
I haven’t seen anything in EDK’s posts here that struck me as particularly objectionable, though today’s post on the mosque struck me as having a Broderist undertone–there are people to be blamed in this matter, both sides are not equally to blame. I suspect if we got further into the details, it could get ugly.
Toast
What I don’t get is this: How do you get from “So goddamn reasonable as to be unquotable” and “David Frum: The Next Generation” to “Being prepped to take over the conservative movement”? Those descriptions (accurate, imo) pretty much preclude that fate, no?
morzer
@RareSanity:
There is the “People Who Scream When They See Michael Goldfarb In the Mirror ” list.
Betsy
@Omnes Omnibus:
Good point.
lamh32
So OT, but:
Good Lord!
What does it say about Newt Gingrich’s completely bigoted statement that the “mosque” developers are like the Nazi’s, when even Pat BucKKKanan says you’ve gone too far.
To be clear, BucKKKanan is still as bigoted as ever. I patiently await his next “black people sticking it to whitey” blog post, still, a broken clock is right at least twice a day!
Gingrich went too far, says Buchanan
AkaDad
I’m not sure I’ve read everything he’s written since he’s been here, but what I have read, E.D. sure sounds like a Liberal.
JGabriel
Jesus. Erik, if you’re around, my sympathies. Do you find that piece more a) embarrassing, or b) insulting?
Feel free to explore other descriptions should those prove insufficient.
.
demo woman
I have a friend who has a child because she had the choice.
She gave birth to a child more than 25 years ago that she was not allowed to see.. After a few days hooked up with wires the baby girl died. A simple sonogram which was not common at the time would have discovered several deformities. Her husband wanted another child and after genetic counseling they tried because she new she would not be forced to carry a child to term that would end up dying a horrible death. They did try again and she did have a sonogram every month and she did have a healthy son with ten fingers and ten toes. Choice is essential.
I can respect anyone who wants to take away choice from an individual and that includes Kain.
MNPundit
Hah no idea about abortion.
Welcome ED Kain, misogynistic asshole.
jeffreyw
Not enough dinner in this thread.
Sloegin
Kain’s got the whole ‘reasonable-guy’ disease of assuming too many things that sound true are true, when they actually aren’t… (or are a lot more complicated than that).
But, some people are amenable to better data and can actually change their mind now and again… so who knows.
soonergrunt
everybody is going on about th “pro life across the board” thing but just chill out! Once we get Ed to one of our famous Combination Abortion/Wine Tasting Parties, he’ll convert in no time! Especially after we gift him the combination Serrated Currette and Corkscrew with the handle made of real teak wood!
sent from my shitty non-android phone.
Violet
@demo woman:
Say what you will about Andrew Sullivan, but his series where readers wrote in with their experiences with abortion was incredibly moving. In more than one case, having the choice allowed women (and their husbands/partners) to choose to continue a pregnancy while they waited for further results. And the end result was they had a healthy child.
I’m in the “safe, legal and rare” camp. Provide tons of sex education and contraceptives. Do that and there won’t be a call for as many abortions. And when there is a need for one, doctors will be trained and it will be safe for the woman. That’s my wish and hope.
burnspbesq
@AhabTRuler, V:
I see we’re back to beating the commemorative plaque that says a horse once died here. Yawn.
burnspbesq
@Cermet:
Pay attention, it’s easy.
I am opposed to abortion on religious grounds. The First Amendment says I don’t get to make that decision for anyone else, and I accept that. Presto! Anti-abortion and pro-choice.
AhabTRuler, V
@Violet: I don’t disagree.
Toast
I love how this thread has reduced Kain to his stance on abortion. Look, the dude’s a self-described conservative. If he was a progressive and said he was “pro-life” I’d be right there excoriating him along with everyone else, but he’s not, and Cole knew that when he signed him up. 99% of what he’s written here has seemed pretty goddamned reasonable. So could we stop with the Pass/Fail grading and give some credit where it’s due?
El Tiburon
The problem is conservatives spent a generation destroying the term ‘liberal’ while at the same time absolutely demolishing the term ‘conservative’.
‘Conservative’ has no meaning, except that which antagonizes ‘liberals’, which really means the majority of Americans who ain’t bat-shit crazy.
Frank
@Cermet:
You bring up one issue, an issue I don’t even care about. Give me one pundit/politician that you agree with 100%…They are hard to find.
AhabTRuler, V
@burnspbesq: Come to get a few licks in yourself?
MikeJ
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
That will never happen. He can’t read comments at work and won’t waste his beautiful mind on comments at home. I see no reason to attempt to engage him since he’s already stated he’s unengagable.
RareSanity
@morzer:
Touche…
fasteddie9318
If ED is personally pro-life but opposes legislating against abortion, how is it that a bright fellow like him can’t figure out that he’s pro-choice?
Violet
@burnspbesq:
Wish that more people believed as you do. But they don’t. They believe that abortion=murder and it must be stopped. And that means they feel they should get to make decisions that affect other people’s lives.
I have a friend in this camp. A couple friends, actually. They truly believe that abortion=murder and want to do anything they can to stop it. It’s pretty impossible to discuss the topic with them.
Mark S.
The piece links to the 20 hottest conservative women by Rightwingnews (what’s with them and stupid lists?). I’ve only heard of five of them, and those are the same washed-up whores who have been around forever (Coulter, Malkin, Ingraham). Jesus, if you’re still jerking it to Coulter after all these years you’ve really got to invest in a Sears catalog.
demo woman
@Violet: Kain has the choice to act like an ass on abortion. Since I’m 60, I can remember the olden days when females carried a fetus that had no hope of living outside the womb. Fortunately, I never was faced with having to make a decision on choice (that would have been difficult for me), but I just can’t judge someone else who has. Whether Kain is truly for choice in his own way, he does prescribe to a group that has decided to judge what best for others. That’s a place I can’t go.
maus
Grats! I disagree with some of the tone, logic, and facts at his disposal, but I’m all for an educated, capable “opposition”, and I’d probably vote for some of them over the blue dogs we’ve got.
@Mark S.: Ann Coulter at least inspired a vamp coulter counterpart on True Blood :3
RareSanity
@Mark S.:
Laura Ingram? Really?
Although no one on that list could be classified as unattractive, only one could legitimately be called “hot”.
ETA: Of course, she would open her mouth and ruin it. Just sayin’.
Laura Ingram…I really can’t get over that one…Laura freaking Ingram…
demo woman
@maus: OMG You might consider voting for either Pelosi or Boehner then.
Linda Featheringill
@zhak:
Under the category of don’t feed the trolls, add another rule:
Don’t respond to males who try to tell you what to do with your body. Ignore them.
[I kept my baby and raised her by myself. Fricking hard work, that. But I still don’t want men to tell me what to do with my body.]
garage mahal
lolofucklawlz @ 8:03 pm
and these lists of theirs, why do they feel the need to publish the results? I think it’s some sort of low self esteem bonding club deal.
TooManyJens
Oh, for…
That’s what “pro-life across the board” means.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consistent_life_ethic
matoko_chan
im totally sending those guyz the fetus=slave linkage.
i may not be of note, but i am dayum sure antagonistic.
what are your feelings on Tucker Carlson style email publishings, Kain?
Mark S.
Geez, people, Erik said that he was “pro-life across the board” in his very first post here. He said that he was against legislation against abortion either in an update or in the comments. This wasn’t any secret.
DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective
First of all, there is no coherent or identifiable “conservative” worldview, or movement. There never really has been, although it was easier 20 or 30 years ago to pretend that there was.
Second, if Kain the standard, then equivocation is the new assertion.
I don’t pay much attention to people whose main argument seems to be that there are two sides to everything. Actually, there are about six, on average. But that said, at some point, one has to take a position. “Fence” is not a position.
TooManyJens
@Toast:
Do you think it’s impossible to oppose abortion on progressive grounds? I’m not talking about supporting Republican policies here — because most of them are stupid and unhelpful and come from a place of deeply not giving a shit about women — but do you think that it’s impossible to be a progressive and believe that abortion is usually unjust violence against a human being?
Seanly
I don’t care how reasonable a conservative is – they are still wrong on many, many things. I’ll stop there before I get into profanities & liberal use of the label “douchebag”.
JamesC
Uh… I’ve not been reading Balloon Juice religiously, but I can’t recall Kain outlining his stance on abortion in any detail.
Any links, or is the sudden misogyny charges based more on reaction than substance?
soonergrunt
I don’t know about anyone else, but if Mr. Mr. Kain is saying that he opposes making abortion illegal, who gives flying fuck what he calls himself, and why are people getting the vapors over it?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@TooManyJens: Win!
Mark S.
@JamesC:
I’m such a sweetie. Here and here.
Seanly
Ummm, I just read a good portion of the article. It is not very flattering to our future Villager overlords. However, they can’t fuck things up as much as the Nixon – Reagan – Bush – Bush axis.
General Stuck
@soonergrunt
Cause “the vapors” are blogospheric rocket fuel.
JamesC
@Mark S.:
First link you listed only provided the “pro-life across the board.” A vague and generic statement of conservative credentials that, as I suspected from the hullabaloo here, didn’t mean nearly as much as people thought it did.
So, basically, from those two samples, we can determine, roughly, that Kain has personal ethical issues with abortion, but feels that it ought to be up to the individual to choose. He’s also listed himself as against outlawing abortion.
Oddly, that seems reasonable to me. I’m not sure what the fuss here is.
matoko_chan
@soonergrunt: fetus=slave
im going go look for something in my old mails.
i object to this because i am a young woman.
if women dont have control over our own bodies we are the slaves.
a diploid oocyte is not a slave.
this is ED’s stock in trade. enable the racist fucktards in his base to think they make sense.
Sentient Puddle
@Cat Lady:
Incorrect. Gary Johnson was the governor of New Mexico. Ron Johnson (of Wisconsin, and near as I can tell unrelated to Gary) is the one you’re thinking of.
TooManyJens
@JamesC: Part of the fuss is that the term “pro-life” has come, in our fucked-up political culture, to be synonymous with the far-right political and religious figures who most often wrap themselves in the name. When one chooses to use the term, one should be aware that a lot of people will not inquire further and will assume that you’re one of Them.
Another part is that having ethical problems with abortion is in itself offensive to some people, regardless of one’s views on the law.
TooManyJens
@Sentient Puddle:
But where does Don Johnson fit into all of this?
General Stuck
From a Senator Al Franken speech to NARAL about abortion.
Pretty much speaks for me on the topic.
Makewi
All the best conservatives hold far left positions. It’s a joke, but apparently the only people who don’t know it are folks like Dougj and the man of the hour.
Montysano
To riff off of Groucho Marx: I wouldn’t want to be a member of a club that has Goldfarb and K-Lo as members.
JamesC
@TooManyJens:
And here I thought at least the liberal faction of this nation’d uphold the “personally held but not publicly insisted convictions won’t get you discriminated” bit of a tolerant, progressive culture.
Hey, folks. The Other Side’s got enough people willing to make reactionary ad hominem attacks based on specious generalizations of ideology. We bash them for it, and rightfully so. Can we not fall prey to the same sins of anti-intellectualism?
matoko_chan
@TooManyJens: Kain also said he would not discuss it.
that is fucking cowardly.
if he believes in what he says, he should be able to stand and deliver.
he just comes here to look fake-reasonable and talk smack about his base behind their backs.
suzanne
@soonergrunt:
The reason it bothers me is because it’s a cowardly way of trying to maintain the social capital that comes from aligning with the conservative/anti-choice crowd, rather than being intellectually honest and saying that the feminists/liberals are right. The stereotype of the feminist is the humorless ugly chick who can’t get a date, and that stereotype harms the movement by making it unpalatable to many. For me, it’s not just how you vote when you’re in that booth alone, but also what you stand for publicly, and whether or not you do what’s right, even when it’s unpopular. Calling yourself pro-life when you, well, aren’t, is cowardly capitulation.
matoko_chan
@soonergrunt: he panders to his wingnut fucktard christofascist base and enables them to push their nasty prurient fuckery on the rest of us.
/spit
morzer
@matoko_chan:
Nearly as cowardly as someone talking smack about science that she doesn’t understand, and then howling insults before dropping trou and fleeing back to trollistan.
burnspbesq
@AhabTRuler:
“Come to get a few licks in yourself?”
Gotta stay in shape.
burnspbesq
@Violet:
There is no shortage of priests who would deny me Communion if they knew of my position. Sometimes the inherent conflicts between being an American and being a Catholic get to be tiresome.
Makewi
@General Stuck:
Good lord man, don’t you know you’ll hurt the movement with that talk.
JamesC
@suzanne:
It’s already been noted by other commenters that a pro-life stance goes beyond the abortion debate. And that a pro-life stance isn’t necessarily un-nuanced when it comes to the issues of one’s own life and one’s own choice.
I think he’s right in avoiding the issue. As was indicated in his explanation of his stance, he doesn’t feel that his opinion on it should be a universal take, and it seems as if his range of interest lies outside of it anyhow.
…I get the feeling I’m stepping into a minefield on his behalf, though, so some clarification: my own opinion is that concern for an existing sapient outweighs that of a potential one, putting me solidly in favor of leaving the issue entirely in the hands of the woman affected.
But I wank enough elsewhere about why the entire Conservative political engine ought to be scrapped and rendered into spare parts. It’d be intellectually dishonest of me to not try and understand the position of a nominally diametric opinion.
matoko_chan
@morzer: you might think that but you’d be wrong. i know plenty about current science and math…its just you old bioluddites that are stuck back in the 90s.
who schooled aimai on teh Super Rational?
lawl.
but you are right about one thing…it is a total waste of my time to try to explain the biological basis of intelligence to bioluddites.
:)
Cat Lady
@Sentient Puddle:
It’s Gary Johnson. Mitch Daniels, also too, but not Newt. I never heard of Ron Johnson, but Don Johnson would be ok with me if he wore his Miami Vice clothes.
mclaren
I, for one, welcome our new conservative overlord.
ratufa
From what I’ve read from him, Kain seems like a relatively reasonable person.
But, if I was in his shoes and found myself sandwiched between James Kirchick and K-Lo in a top-10 list, I’d be doing some heavy drinking right now and wondering what went wrong with my life.
So, don’t be too hard on the guy. He’s had a tough day.
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
It is pointless, because you’re no neuroscientist. Hell, half the folks on the IEEE mailing list aren’t as scornfully self-righteous about their pet theories as you are, and definitely none of the scientists involved in the work of unpeeling the secrets of intelligence.
I don’t know how old you are, but it’s definitely “too young to have learned humility.” …which makes me feel old, as I’m not even halfway through my third decade yet, and I’m saying shit like that.
Right! That’s my cue to drink heavily.
Makewi
@JamesC:
Just wait, it gets better with this one. Eventually she’ll start confusing current scientific thinking with science fiction. But only to throw the bio luddites off her trail.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
Have you worked out the meaning of “evolutionarily” yet?
Or the math behind rubber-banding?
Perhaps the difference between game design and game theory?
Somehow, I doubt it. I observe, with amusement, that you are doing the same old song and dance routine, where you throw a few insults, pretend that you have done more than take one, misunderstood class in Science for Dummies, and then scuttle off into self-pitying obscurity. When you can actually produce and explain some hard science, rather than plagiarizing from popularizers, I shall take you seriously. Until then, have fun knapping cognitive flints while telling yourself that you really are incredibly advanced, and who needs bronze anyway.
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
I am SO stealing this.
TooManyJens
@ratufa:
Finally, something we can all agree upon!
Sentient Puddle
@Cat Lady: OK, then read the sunspots story. That’s Ron Johnson.
Gary Johnson is someone entirely different. That’s what I’m trying to say.
DougJ
@TooManyJens:
How about Dennis Johnson? Just inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame. May he rest in piece.
morzer
@DougJ:
Not to be pedantic, but I think he’d rather rest in peace.
Anne Laurie
@soonergrunt: Because “Run with the hare, and hunt with the hounds” is very, very seldom intended as a compliment. I could not care less what Kain thinks about abortion, as long as he’s not attempting to criminalize it. But he’s chosen, for professional purposes, to hang with the people who do want to criminalize it, while oozing out great doughy wads of justificationalism around his ‘more liberal’ acquaintances. ‘The next David Frum’ seems like a perfectly adequate description, and the original Frum draws a certain amount of ire, too.
matoko_chan
@JamesC: where did i claim to be a neuroscientist? im a student.
and you don’t know anything about my theory of consciousness belief set.
i have a lot of experimental hypoth about SBH and evo theory of culture and cognitive anthropology and EGT. some are fanciful, some are are practical…..SBH is so new we can’t even call it theory yet.
IMHO my hypoth of conservative ‘selection for stupid’ explains a lot…for example, why Palin and Bush are the exemplars of conservative ethos.
:)
all i see in you is another person yelling at me to get off the balloon-juice lawn.
soonergrunt
@suzanne: @matoko_chan:
These are two of the most self-centered posts I’ve read in a long time.
If it’s none of your business how or why somebody came to a position they hold in their life, then it’s none of your business.
If religious freedom or intellectual freedom or ethical freedom are to mean anything, they mean that, at a minimum.
Sure, you can complain about it, but you’re wasting your energy, to say nothing of engaging in some pretty staggering intellectual cowardice yourselves to expect that someone hold a certain position for a certain reason.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
All that squirming, and you still haven’t got as much as a pinky out of your strait-jacket. Doesn’t this tell you anything?
arguingwithsignposts
@matoko_chan:
And yet here you are, which sort of shows which side of that intelligence divide you’re on, doesn’t it?
morzer
@arguingwithsignposts:
She’s a sort of Bristol Palin of popular science.
soonergrunt
@Anne Laurie:
If you want to hit the guy for the company he keeps or the things he says about this company to the polite company, that’s one thing, but as for the rest of it, I stand by what I said in #99:
matoko_chan
@morzer: if rubberbanding models conservative selection for stupid, what does it matter if its designated formal game theory or game design?
I can use SBH or EGT just as easily. conservatism grants social capital for commonsense and religiosity….and withdraws social capital from intellectuals and teh highly educated. it is social levelling for IQ and education. same as rubberband theory, which is skill levelling. IQ + education == higher SES, which is analogous to game skill. Conservatives get skillups for ‘commonsense’ and religiosity (religiosity correlates negatively with IQ and g).
SBH and EGT overlap a lot.
@Anne Laurie: bravo, bravura.
totally agree. instead of calling out his base on wrong and bad ideas, he comes here and publically snarks at them while totally giving them undercover support.
matoko_chan
@arguingwithsignposts: im not here for long.
:)
matoko_chan
@soonergrunt: i just think Kain is as dishonest as douthat and mcmegan.
if he really believes a fetus is the same as a slave, shouldn’t he have to stand and deliver, instead of saying he won’t discuss it?
what Anne Laurie said.
TooManyJens
Am I the only one who finds the big “REDACTED” more satisfying than the pie option on the pie filter? I tried the option where you make the text teeny-tiny, but I found that I was still tempted to try to read it (“just this once!”) and it hurt my eyes like hell.
(Edit: three “REDACTED” in a row. It’s like winning the Balloon Juice slot machine, only instead of coins pouring out you just get the satisfaction of not reading crackpot theories.)
MNPundit
If Kain is personally opposed to abortion but unwilling to legislate that position good.
But it means he’s pro-choice. There’s no way around that, ED Kain is pro-choice.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
So, in sum, you don’t know the math, which means you don’t understand rubber-banding, and, in consequence, you have no idea how it applies to your theory, or whether it applies.
Also, too, as your intellectual mistress might say, when you rely on analogy, you leave your.. er.. theory.. wide open to easy refutation. All one has to do is change the analogy, or simply dismiss it as irrelevant.
Incidentally, if you are trying to make an argument, steer clear of “X and Y overlap a lot”. It really doesn’t suggest much precision in your understanding or application of concepts.
Finally, you mean “brava” not bravo or bravura. Bravo is an adjective, applied to masculine persons/things, bravura is a noun. You need “brava” feminine, singular adjective.
Now, are you going to produce the math, or are you simply going to offer vague waffle about concepts you don’t understand?
matoko_chan
@morzer:
except im not fat….or pregnant.
:)
bootsy
I guess that my observation doesn’t reflect on E.D. Kain, but for my money the “Washington Examiner” is one of the most disgusting publications out there. Full of super-racist Byron York “editorials” and yet freely distributed in a black-majority city (DC). Why don’t they include a KKK flyer as an insert?
DougJ
@morzer:
I have a real problem with homonyms when typing. It’s very strange. It’s worse in email where I don’t look things over before hitting send.
aimai
@matoko_chan:
Was I “schooled on the super rational” in some dream sequence? Does this make me part of Matoko Chan’s bff list or enemies list? I can’t figure it out.
–aimai
soonergrunt
@matoko_chan: In this country, what he believes and doesn’t believe is none of your business, though. What he tries to make you do, or believes that you should have to do are most certainly your business, but beyond that, no.
For him and his, abortion is morally wrong. Somebody asked so he told them, and you can waste your energy criticizing him for it, because he did put it out there and if he can’t take that heat he should get out of the kitchen but that’s really where it ends. He’s not trying to change the law or to deny you your rights in any way, shape, or form.
That’s where your right to demand or expect anything of him ends.
As long as he’s not hurting anyone and he and presumably his family are living according to their religious and ethical precepts and not trying to force anyone else to do that, then he deserves to be left alone as far as he will leave anyone else alone.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
Just ignorant and lacking a personality? Quite a proud CV you’ve got there.
General Stuck
This is a hard bunch here in Juiceland.
matoko_chan
@morzer: sry, i dunno how to print equations in comboxes.
ill give you refs.
Maynard Smith, Evolution and the Theory of Games, chap. 5, appendices B, C, G, and H.
im unaware of formal maths for rubberbanding skillarchies.
i think rubberbanding falls under the farmer method.
and ty for the correction, i don’t have any italian.
yours was much better.
:)
morzer
@DougJ:
I suspect the computer tries to anticipate your wishes. It certainly produces some odd syntax if left to itself.
matoko_chan
@soonergrunt: i don’t give a goodgawd-damn about what his personal beliefs are……i just want him to explain why a fetus is the same as a slave.
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
…roight… because breeding habits amongst conservatives are solely defined by metrics of “commonsensicality” or “religiosity.”
See, here’s the fundamental and fatal flaw with your entire thesis as to the supposed biomemetic nature of intelligence and its interplay with politics. You assume that their propagative behavior is built upon binary behavior specifically in relation to transient political stances and incomplete definitions of intelligence. You’ve also asserted that talks as to the biological nature of “intelligence” has no direct correlation with evolutionary inheritance – an utterly fallacious position and possibly evidence A that your biological background is weak as hell, but one that’s understandable as the data on that shifts every damn time anybody studies it under a new angle, and one liable to put you under a racism critique that’s actually justified. You can’t even derive a theory as to the nature of “intelligence” in order to define the operational boundaries of your theory, instead asserting it in a manner that can only be interpreted as being a generalized theory for all forms of intelligence – and why you insist on doing so I certainly don’t understand, as you might have some grounds in arguing that perhaps their grasp on specific forms of scientific intelligence might be a bit weak, but you’re certainly losing strongly on the position as to their sociological and communal “intelligence,” especially given their stronger grasp on the art of pathos politics than their rivals.
You’ve utterly failed for the two threads we’ve talked about this issue to account for these blind spots, instead resorting to ad hominem attacks on our supposed “bioluddite” failings to appreciate the questionable genius of your world model.
People don’t function under binary behavioral programs, especially when it comes to intimacies. You don’t have a sufficiently strong theory of mind to back your arguments up. You can’t even demonstrate the supposed math that maybe correlates to your assertations – and you certainly can’t prove that it’s not only correlation but causation. Ergo:
Yer fulla shite, Makoto.
And now I return to my vodka~
matoko_chan
@aimai: you said i made it up, so i gave you the ref.
did you forget?
morzer
@matoko_chan:
He doesn’t think this, as far as I know, and didn’t. He made a comparison between the situation of a slave and the situation of a fetus.
trueslant.com/erikkain/2010/07/29/abortion-and-slavery/
matoko_chan
@JamesC:
but im not talking about organic dna transmission (genetic, epigenetic)…..im talking about memetic transmission.
what are you talking about?
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
You’re talking about the spread and propagation of ideas? You’re necessarily talking about its transmission along generational lines. You’ll note that apostasy is rare, and that fundamental worldviews are usually held for life, barring traumatic imprinting. You want to talk about the biological nature of thought? Then you’re talking about inheritance of neurological traits.
matoko_chan
@morzer: TNC says it better.
a diploid oocyte is not like a slave. the holocaust is not like a steak dinner. The whole abortion=slavery is a conservative eumeme to try to defend conservative idealized chattel slavery of women and children….ED and his base are just flipping the truth, like they do with racism. See! the liberals are the REAL RACISTS.
if women don’t have control over our own autonomous bodies we are the slaves.
matoko_chan
@JamesC: yeah, symbolic and behavioral inheritance. wasn’t that clear?
memetic selection can easily occur in a 50 year timespace, genetic selection cannot.
are you a biological determinist?
Omnes Omnibus
Wow, I go away for a little while and I come back to this? This is why we can’t have nice things.
soonergrunt
@matoko_chan: My point, which you seem to not get, is that he doesn’t owe you or anyone else, anything.
He has his beliefs, among those beliefs being that it is improper to impose his views on you.
Neither you, nor Suzanne, nor Anne Laurie nor anyone else are entitled to an explanation of what those beliefs are or how he got them as long as he’s not trying to impose them on you.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
The problem here is that Dawkins (who is the modern father of the meme and memetic theory) has never shown that memes have an independent existence, nor that he’s done anything but propose a sociocultural analogy to genes. It’s extremely strange to try and cobble together a theory based on what cannot be tested scientifically, and then propose it as an empirical reality. If anything, Dawkins is trying to turn processes and their outcomes into universalizable entities, pretty much as Plato tried to do with language. It didn’t work for Plato, and it doesn’t work for Dawkins.
suzanne
@soonergrunt:
You’re right. His personal beliefs and how he comes to them aren’t my business. However, he has made his public life my business, to some degree, by proposing his ideas in the public sphere. And he has done so by using expressly political language. “Pro-life” is a political position. Many people who are pro-choice have widely ranging moral viewpoints on abortion, but “pro-choice” is the accurate description of how they feel the abortion issue should be dealt with in terms of public policy. So when E.D. says he’s “pro-life, but doesn’t want the law to interfere,” I see it as siding with the oppressor class by using their terminology, rather than the oppressed class, which I find a pretty crappy thing to do. His personal beliefs are his own, sure, but the minute he posted about them, they became his public beliefs.
Or, what Anne Laurie said.
Holy shit. I just agreed with matoko_chan about something. Someone take my temperature.
Yutsano
@Ivan Ivanovich Renko: Every now and again a lawyer will say something smart. It should always be encouraged. Usually with milk and a warm cookie.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
You’ve shifted your ground. First you claimed that Kain told us that fetuses were slaves. Now you say he made a comparison. You should understand the difference between a comparison and a statement of identity between two things. Added to which, you drag in a passage of TNC’s less honest writing, where he substitutes crude sarcasm for argument. This isn’t a refutation of Kain’s point by a long shot.
What Kain argues is that slaves and fetuses share a fundamental helplessness, a vulnerability to and dependence on others. I happen to think this argument conceals a rather large assumption about when a fetus becomes a person, but after a certain point Kain is clearly right, in that the fetus does become a human being. The key question is when this transformation takes place.
You can certainly push him to lay out a more detailed and precise position, but you have no warrant for calling him a coward or imputing bad faith because his beliefs differ from yours. He has, at least, attempted to defend them publicly and signed his name to them.
aimai
@soonergrunt:
Soonergrunt,
I think the thing here that (some) women are trying to say is that Kain’s whole “I don’t mean to impose on you” shtick is really, probably, just a shtick. To be a conservative in this country means, almost definitionally, being willing to use the government, law, or mob rule to enforce conservative mores on liberals, women, minorities and other people who haven’t, conventionally or historically been willing to accept conservative domination. When the law is on their side, they bang the law. When the law isn’t on their side, they bang the table, or bang “morality” or “common decency” or “judeo christian values” or some other guff. I haven’t bothered to read enough of Kain’s shtick to care whether he is in some sense sincerely hands off with his pro-life stuff. I’m not interested. But after fifty years of being alive, and female, and watching the conservative movement forget all “hands off” and autonomy and equality and the first amendment and the fourteenth amendment and any other right that, applied to women, or minorities, would make the old masters unhappy…well…lets just say that I no longer take Kain or any other self described “conservative’s” honest intentions at face value.
Its just a dodge to say that he opposes abortion but wouldn’t legislate to prevent women from accessing it. His party and his fellow conservatives would–is he standing up to them, or just letting them do his dirty work?
aimai
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
Hardly determinist. Behavior is a probabilistic, not deterministic outcome of neurological traits. My own stance is that cultural dichotomies need not necessarily happen, and bad memes need not stick around.
But the way you change behavior isn’t to rudely demand change and be shocked when people spit back at you for invading their fundamental worldviews. In fact, to me, that seems exceedingly deterministic, expecting people to act like programs and change outcomes based on direct input.
No, a probabilistic outlook means recognizing that certain people are far more likely to embrace certain outlooks. And barking insults at them won’t budge those numbers at all. Best you can do is budge the numbers on the externalities that affect their likelihood of exposure to others, and work off those reactions.
Besides, you’re niggling at a point of conflict that isn’t even crucial to my critique of your position. Without that formal theory of intelligence, you’re still flailing wildly.
soonergrunt
@Omnes Omnibus: I know. If we’d just had the party I suggested earlier, we’d all be sitting around all mellow and relaxed and this whole mess could’ve been avoided, but Nooooo! We can’t have nice relaxed abortion and wine tasting fest even though the zinfandels are exceptional this year. NOOOOO! We have to get all up in everybody’s grill and freak the fuck out, and now I’m sure that the John Cole warning color is trending orange, and the money for the combination uterine currette and bottle opener is totally fucking wasted! /poutrage
matoko_chan
@soonergrunt: but he is trying to impose them on us. he is trying to harm us.
this is a meme war.
and the fetus=slave meme is a eumeme, a harmful and untruthful meme, and if propagated would lead to universal abortion bans.
JamesC
@aimai:
Hmm… my long-term memory for blogs is frankly shite, but everything he’s put up here so far’s been mostly “government should exert influence as a regulation against excess, and as little and cautiously as possible otherwise.” Which is, you know, actually conservative of him, rather than wingnut.
Or, to put it succinctly (and possibly inaccurately to some degree), his conservative credentials are built around economic theory, not social.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
A meme war? Please, let’s not pile ludicrously inconsistent metaphors onto an already inadequately demonstrated analogy for genes and evolution.
Omnes Omnibus
@morzer: Is a meme war anything like a thumb war?
JamesC
@soonergrunt:
Wait.
Wine party?
I call truce! More wine here, please~
morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yes, but without the thumbs.
matoko_chan
@morzer: no he did not. he said right here he would not discuss it when women including me asked him to explain and defend his position.
@aimai: that was beautifully said. brava! :)
@JamesC: i am no where near brave enough to reveal my personal formal theory of intelligence perversions here.
as for the other, i hypothesize there is a between group difference. i theorize about the mechanisms driving that. but anytime i mention inheritance or IQ here people start raving about that old Murray book on the bellcurve of IQ and the whole discussion goes to shit.
i call them bioluddites because they reject the heritability of intelligence. what would you call them?
morzer
@JamesC:
After vodka? You have a strong head there, my friend!
E.D. Kain
@JGabriel: Let’s put it this way: I wouldn’t have written this list. Reihan Salam is a really good wonky writer, though.
In any case, I’ve already said many times that I’m somewhere between Classical Liberal and contemporary liberal with some conservative streaks and sentiments. I’m no right-winger. But nor am I insulted by appearing on the list. I like being an apostate. Sounds kind of cool.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
English speakers who expect logic and evidence rather than insults and assertions without proof?
My recollection is that ED Kain said he couldn’t respond to comments at night. More to the point, he did lay out his logic in the post I cited, and which you persist in distorting.
I will say that from watching your posts, I can always tell when you know you can’t defend your claims because you start throwing around ten dollar words and two bit insults.
A Ghost To Most
why don’t you folks get a room?
back on topic – I (so far) don’t mind ED too much – but I see he is no better at responding to posts about him than posts by him
ETA: so while I’m composing this, he actually responds 8-}
morzer
@E.D. Kain:
Admit it, you are Julian the Apostate reborn! Now, when do you plan to demand that only Classical authors be taught in the schools? Also, please don’t invade Persia this time around!
soonergrunt
@aimai: I think you’re making one hell of a long jump there.
You don’t read his stuff and at the same time, you know what he’s going to say?
So this man, with whom you can’t even honestly be certain you have an actual conflict,
isn’t entitled to be treated as an individual moral agent? You can’t even extend the decency to actually find out what he believes and why he considers himself to be conservative?
Wow. Talk about bullshit.
This isn’t what passes for feminism these days is it? Cause if it is, then it sure has fallen a long way from the days when it was about equality.
The others are wrong for demanding that he justify deeply held beliefs, most especially beliefs that dictate to him not to interfere with their lives.
Your position, however, is morally grotesque. He doesn’t appear to agree with you on the face of the subject, so he isn’t entitled to be treated as an actual person.
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
I’d call them “sensibly cautious of theories that are as yet empirically unproven” myself, but I’m a progressive transhumanist eager for the big theory of mind and AI breakthrough. What do I know? I actually have a vested interest in the idea of the mechanics of sentience having readily identifiable – and replicable – components, but I’m aware enough of the ongoing research not to sneer down on anybody that disagrees. It’d only say more about my own ideological blind spots than it says about their’s.
General Stuck
@suzanne:
Well, of course you are right that Kain is posting in the public sphere and you are perfectly within your rights to respond. But I guess I don’t see anything untoward, and certainly not diabolical in someone who uses the term “pro life” when clearly assigning it to his “personal” preference, and not using pro choice.
Kain doesn’t claim to be a liberal, but something of an odd kind of conservative, or with conservative beliefs, but willing to take the liberal position after counseling himself on the merits of the issue. How can anyone find fault with this attitude?
I don’t see the terms conservative and liberal as political, but more personal, That generally tends to push people into one or the other political groups, or pol parties.
And I don’t see Kain as being any kind of pro active agent of any party, or any movement. Jeebus, his postings and beliefs have been all over the pol and ideological spectrum. An odd way to be purveyor of propaganda for any group or movement.
I am flummoxed all around on the tone tenor and substance of what BJ is these days. Misreading, Divining commentors motives and the apparent need for purity of one sort or another is becoming tedious and at times, ugly.
E.D. Kain
@ratufa: Heh. Heavy drinking sounds wonderful. Count me in.
morzer
@A Ghost To Most:
We charge for watching. Just so you know.
JamesC
@morzer:
I am immune to hangovers. Except when tequila was involved that time. Well, that and I forgot to drink plenty of water before and after. Never, ever forgot again.
morzer
@JamesC:
*chuckles* My worst mistake was smoking a long, very good cigar on an empty stomach. The ceiling began to revolve – and then started going up and down as well.
E.D. Kain
@Anne Laurie: I hang out with lots of people who don’t want to criminalize it. Your generalizations are pretty lame, honestly. I am personally pro life, like I’ve said, but politically pro choice. This is a fairly common position.
matoko_chan
im detecting a pattern here…..teh XX seem to dislike EDs argumentation while teh XY are [somewhat] stickin’ up for him.
is there only one woman on that list? the loathesome-not-lissome K-Lo who is not actually a woman at all but a variant of an immortal demon-castrato posing as a nun…
telling that.
Omnes Omnibus
@JamesC: Your take on Kain’s writings here squares with mine. He allows a few facile right-wing phrases and tropes to creep in from time to time, but he is more of the right than most people here. I have not read much of his work from other venues, so I cannot comment as to what shows up there. He seems to have pushed a few people’s buttons and it probably would not be a bad idea if he would clarify a few things. Finally, as a guy, my reaction to Kain’s statement of a personally pro-life, but not in favor of state action to prevent abortion view is that it is not an unreasonable one, but I can understand that it may not seem so to others. I disagree with Kain’s view, but it does not seem like fighting words to me.
soonergrunt
@matoko_chan:
This is what we call reaching for the outrage.
@suzanne:
And ONE MORE TIME–you can attack his ideas as he has articulated them, but it is immoral to question how he came to those ideas. Whether they are from personal experience, religion, or he rolled dice, is none of your business. Leaving aside the moral dimension of attacking his faith and belief system (you’re not the religious police are you?) is the ethical problem of attacking the man and not the argument.
matoko_chan
@JamesC: oh wow. i am a sufi quellist transhumanist and im mad about Friendly AI.
ill buy the tequila.
:)
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
Are you sure you want to use a gender-based argument on this? With this small a sampling pool?
I dunno, that slope looks a bit greasy.
Edit: You keep that evil tequila away from me! I learned my lesson, and I don’t need a remedial course!
soonergrunt
@JamesC: I tried to start a wine party, but as I said, they decided to serve poutrage instead.
I’ll get you some wine. Would you like an abortion with that?
morzer
@soonergrunt:
Does it come with garlic? I find fetus au naturel a little bland.
JamesC
@soonergrunt:
… … …last time somebody offered me an abortion, it was balut.
So, why not?
Omnes Omnibus
@soonergrunt: There was a moment when I first read your suggestion when it seemed that you were suggesting abortion tasting. If so, I will have to respectfully decline. Is it an infantry or an Oklahoma thing?
matoko_chan
@soonergrunt: no sooner. hes a hypocrite. he says he’s “pro-life” and that means abortion is wrong, and he supports the fetus=slave idiocy. Kain and his base don’t really believe abortion is murder or they would seek to punish women who have abortions, or to persuade women not to have abortions. They do neither of those things. They infantalize women by trying to ban abortions. Douthat and McMegan argued that liberals CAUSED Dr. Tillers death because we wont help them overturn Roe.
it is the old conservative trope of virtualized chattel slavery of women.
conservatives don’t actually give a shit about fetuses or they would seek to limit the holocaust of fertility therapy embryos doomed to terminal cryostasis.
Conservatives just want to control those uppity uteruses.
And Kain is just giving them cover.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
Hush, child. Time for wine and the flesh of the unborn. Are you a garlic girl?
Omnes Omnibus
@matoko_chan: Did you see that Kain has been in this thread and made a statement that should help clarify his stand?
Yutsano
@soonergrunt: How fortuitous. I happened to buy an olive-parmesan focaccia at the store tonight and I have some fontina cheese laying around. All we need are some good ripe bosc pears and we got a wine party.
And I prefer my abortion medium rare with a Kansas City style rub and a side of oven fries.
TooManyJens
@JamesC: I have had a hangover exactly once in my life. From this experience, I learned the following important lesson: when you’re drinking the stuff that tastes like fluoride rinse, stop fucking drinking.
suzanne
@soonergrunt:
I wasn’t aware I questioned how he came to those ideas. To your point, it really doesn’t matter. I don’t even know what his specific religious beliefs are, and I don’t give a damn.
I said that his *public* stance, articulated in his choice of words in a public forum, shows that he is *publicly* aligning with the anti-choice crowd. Those people seek to oppress women. The fact that he seeks to align with those people speaks ill of his public character, in my opinion.
Harry Reid made a similar capitulation, and the vast majority of commenters here thought it revealed weakness of character.
soonergrunt
@morzer: You can grill it a bit if needs be. Kind of like Steak Tartare.
@Omnes Omnibus: I used to have a window sticker when I was a paratrooper that said “airborne eat their young”. Shortly after I got married, it disappeared out of the back window of my truck. I decided not to inquire on the advice of my platoon sergeant.
Omnes Omnibus
@TooManyJens: I don’t know; some might say that if you are at that point the hangover is already inevitable so you may as well continue on.
matoko_chan
@JamesC: well…..lets do it the math way then. a counter-example would disprove my anti-ED thesis.
and….sex-linked or sex-limited do you think?
is there an XX juicer that will defend ED?
stand and be counted.
soonergrunt
@Yutsano:
Consider it done. Slow cooked over low heat, or a fast broil with a surface sear?
Omnes Omnibus
@soonergrunt: This is why we always said that artillery lends dignity to what would otherwise be a vulgar brawl.
Yutsano
@soonergrunt: Oh dude seared til it squeals.
We can therefore assume your platoon sergeant was either A) rather long married himself or B) protecting a valuable asset in his unit by his advice.
matoko_chan
@morzer: no! he SAID he would not discuss abortion.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
Not a garlic girl then? Ginger? Marinade? Raw? Au poivre? Au gratin?
morzer
@soonergrunt:
Garlic stuffed for me, well done. I am sentimental and the sight of blood always affects me badly.
Now, about the wine… perhaps a good Medoc?
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
The “math” way would suggest that your sampling pool is way too small to make any definitive statements in the first place.
Nate Silver would groan. Don’t make him do that.
Anyhow – rare, and seasoned with but sea salt and coarse peppers. A good slice of abortion ought to stand on its own, you know?
matoko_chan
and i adore garlic…..and Strong AI….and tequila.
but not in that order.
soonergrunt
@suzanne:
then if I have imparted something to you, and you’re not attacking the veracity of his stated beliefs, then I’m sorry. Go on and go get him on his publicly stated beliefs. And in the same token, feel free to slap Harry Reid around for his moral cowardice.
Yutsano
@morzer:
SociaIist. :)
Omnes Omnibus
@morzer: If one is grilling, one might consider a nice nebbiolo. They work well with grilled veal.
morzer
@Yutsano:
You’ll pry my arugula from my cold dead hands!
soonergrunt
@Omnes Omnibus: WHAT?! DID YOU SAY SOMETHING ABOUT ARTILLERY?!
matoko_chan
@JamesC: no, mathmatical logic i mean..not stats. if my hypothesis is that teh XX dislike Kain, then proof/disproof by counter-example requires only a single XX that favors Kain.
morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
A sage suggestion.. one might even say.. thymely?
dww44
@zhak:
Thanks so much for this. I am saving this one for perpetuity. Oddly enough, an older friend of mine, mother of 4 boys and an ardent staunch conservative, said this same thing, but not as succintly and clearly as you, last week during the heated runoff between our two Republican candidates for governor. The man candidate ran ads accusing the woman candidate of not being anti-abortion enough. She lost in a squeaker and was told by other party luminaries to “Deal” with it.
Well, he shall probably win in November, seeing as how we are trending even redder than we have in the last decade or so, and I just may have to retire to more friendly environs, cause the wedge issues just keep carrying the day in these parts.
Omnes Omnibus
@soonergrunt: I wore the ear plugs; my hearing is fine. Thank you for your concern.
Anne Laurie
@soonergrunt: Fair enough. I was the eldest of six kids — sometimes I still have to remind myself that it’s not always my job to wade into the scrum and restore order by smacking everybody, instigator or instigatee.
KDP
XX here. I read personally pro-life across the board as a trait that correlates to the anti-war, anti-death penalty, and anti-torture. Additionally, since he does not support state interference in the right to choose, his personal preferences are his to have. As stated, he is consistent. Those who promote any form of state-sanctioned death (war, death penalty) or torment cannot also claim to be pro-life. These are contradictory positions.
What I would like to see him articulate is how to be pro-life in supporting women and children who do not have comfortable financial and familial support systems? What about public/private sector child care to ensure that children receive consistent, supportive care if and when their parents work? What about support systems for the woman who becomes pregnant, but has no resources to care for herself or her child? Someone pro-life across the board might also support the provision of services and support that promote the health and well-being of mother and child without mandating their family structure.
soonergrunt
@Yutsano:
This guy, SFC McCarthy, deeply loved his wife and children, but whenever the new fiscal year started up and we would start going to the field regularly again after a couple months break, he would be like “back to the manly-man world!”
soonergrunt
@morzer: I was thinking a rack of lamb kind of thing, but it would be so small, and you’d have to use fishing line for the rack…
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
Ah… that’s a situation where you want statistics on your side, not arithmetics. What does a single XX-bearer, assuming we’re not dealing with Klinefelter’s, in agreement with Kain prove? That that specific individual agrees with him, nothing more. It says nothing about gender being a cause for agreement with certain viewpoints.
And asserting this without evidence edges rather easily into discrimination. Again, that’s a greasy damn slope you’re walking down. At least bring cleats.
matoko_chan
@KDP: too much equivocation for a confirmed yes….you over-qualled your response…..sry. :)
Some one else?
Yutsano
@soonergrunt: There’s an underlying joke in there somewhere, but I’m having some trouble getting it to grok right now. I’ll just go along with a big snicker and that smile I used to give the Dawg when he’d go off on some Marine tangent.
soonergrunt
@Anne Laurie: Hey, as the youngest of four, only boy, and most often the instigator*, I have tried very hard to learn to bite my tongue or hit the delete key as an adult.
*”Diane, did you hear what Leigh said about you?”
“Maggie, did you know Diane wore your blouse and stained it last night?”
matoko_chan
@JamesC: sure it works….if my hypoth is ALL XX dislike Kain, then one XX who like him can disprove it.
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
Uh.
Did you read her answer at all? Her equivocation was whether he supported social net infrastructure for women.
How does this undermine her assertion that she otherwise finds his stance okay?
arguingwithsignposts
@JamesC:
That anecdote is not the singular of data?
arguingwithsignposts
@matoko_chan:
If that’s an example of the high quality of your “hypoths,” you need to study moar.
Yutsano
@arguingwithsignposts:
soonergrunt
@Yutsano: The joke, having dealt with it myself, because my wife learned from SFC McCarthy’s wife, is that here’s these muscular, stereotypical masculine men who do a very dangerous and very stereotypically masculine job would come home from the field after a day of jumping out of airplanes and shooting machine guns and so forth and be bossed around by our wives, going to commissary, and planting the flower where she wants and hanging the pictures and turning in between the Laura Ashley sheets and so on, and all you could really say was “yes, dear.”
matoko_chan
@JamesC: she qualled her support. im not convinced she relly likes him.
aws, im not sampling…im doing proof by counterexample.
morzer
@matoko_chan:
*blinks* Are you sure you don’t mean refutation?
Yutsano
@soonergrunt: You know what smile I’m talking about though, amirite?
arguingwithsignposts
@matoko_chan:
Shit, you disproved your “hypoth” in your original fucking statement!
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
So the reverse of a Devil’s Proof, eh?
Fine. Angle, Palin, Malkin, Bachmann, Roe (edit: hah, I always get the two swapped for some reason) etc etc etc ad nauseum. Or are they somehow not women because of their political stances?
On the liberal and feminist side, Serrin Foster, Frederica Matthewes-Green, even Susan B. Anthony. Or are they somehow not women because they disagree on this specific position, or because they’re dead?
Do you want me to abuse Google more? I do rather enjoy having access to the human metacortex. It makes disproving absolutes so very easy.
There’s an inherent ignorance in assuming that because you hold a position, all people with a similar stance will agree with you on all aspects of it. There’s an even greater arrogance in assuming that, because they disagree with you, they’re morally and ethically bankrupt. Why, exactly, are you asserting that there must be ideological purity? That’s Their gig.
matoko_chan
@JamesC:
no…….they aren’t juicers.
soonergrunt
That would be the same smile and eye-roll thing my wife does when I go off on a tear.
TooManyJens
@JamesC: I’m not sure Frederica identifies as a feminist anymore, but hell, I could get you plenty of names to go on your “liberal, feminist” list if it really proved anything.
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
Oh, so now we’re limiting it to Juicers with XX chromosomes? Since when was that part of the exercise?
Do you want to define it further? How long should they be Juicers? Do we consider viability of opinion by postcount? Duration of presence? If they lurk for long periods of time between posts, is that still valid?
Or is it, as I suspect, the only opinion you hold valid is one that reflects your own?
@TooMany Jens
Meh, my point’s been made. Anybody else wants the shitstirring stick?
Yutsano
@soonergrunt: Being a military SO had its own pleasures. It’s also addictive. I’d hook up with another Marine in a heartbeat.
morzer
@JamesC:
Sounds like a good old-fashioned refudiation to me.
TooManyJens
@JamesC:
Is it deer shit? ‘Cause I think I just heard Lily and Rosie’s ears perking up.
JamesC
@Yutsano:
I’d caution against letting your SO hear that, unless that’s the sort of thing you folks get up to~
Yutsano
@JamesC: Check the tense of the verb I used again, then you’ll see I’m not too concerned about it. :)
matoko_chan
@JamesC: well….since people are arguing about ED commenting here i kinda sorta thought XX juicers was implied.
who else would care?
soonergrunt
@Yutsano: My wife is a Navy brat. The Admiral’s only daughter ran away at 19, joined the Army and married an enlisted Soldier at 23. Her mother, the Admiral’s wife, was also a Navy brat. If she hadn’t given them their first grandchildren, they probably would’ve disowned her.
But she seems to like me. We’ve managed to stay married for 17 years, as of the 20th of August.
JamesC
@Yutsano:
Ah-hah. My mistake there. Never mind~
@matoko_chan:
You want to make insinuations about the acceptability of his stance by gender, you get to eat the whole package. And you still didn’t read KDP’s statement. That wasn’t an equivocation – that was a request for clarification specifically on the issue of women’s support services, not about the moral ethics of holding a personal opinion about abortion.
morzer
@JamesC:
Now there’s an image to er.. savour.
Yutsano
@soonergrunt: I’m trying to remember the exact quote, but I saw written somewhere once that being in the Army is a choice, but being in the Navy is a family tradition. It could have been worse, she could have married a Marine. No number of grandchildren will make up for THAT sin in their eyes. I say this as a Navy brat who has gotten serious with two Marines.
Steeplejack
@Ivan Ivanovich Renko:
Well, give a h/t to Ross Hershberger, from whom Burnspbesq got it.
matoko_chan
@JamesC: wallah, she didnt convince me….lacking sincerity and conviction….if she doubts him, how can i not?
surely someone else will stand up for ED?
Mark S.
@TooManyJens:
A-roo-roo?
matoko_chan
@JamesC:
. that is not what this is about….ED is upholding his fellow travelers goal of harming me by restricting my civil rights.
this is sillie n/e ways. in less than 10 the j-womb will be finished and we will have full term human ectogenesis.
abortion will be obsolete.
like conservatism.
:)
sleep dwell in thine eyes and peace in thy breast, while visions of friendly AIs dance in your head.
nite
Steeplejack
@Yutsano:
Fix’d.
JamesC
@matoko_chan:
Right… because “sincerity and conviction” is so easily expressed by text. And because she has to convince you in order to qualify as a woman, and one that thinks his stance is okay.
Yeah, this has degenerated. This is twice now that you’ve asserted that any proof positive must meet your “standards” of acceptability, and neither time have you offered an outline as to what that might be, outside of gut feelings of “sincerity” and “conviction.” If you can’t find the rhetorical problem with this, then I’m officially bored of you.
And what the heck does “wallah” mean anyhow?
Eh, no matter. Off to work on fictions. This thread’ll be off the front page by the time I’m back, so g’night folks~
Yutsano
@Steeplejack: With gratitude. I was not aware of the history of the remark.
roshan
I hope these rankings or praise or whatever it is, doesn’t go to his head. Once you start craving your peers affection and adulation, you forget what the real purpose was that you stood for. That said, enjoy it while you can and forget it fast, Kain.
asiangrrlMN
May I say that Kain has grown on me? I may? Thank you. If the conservatives were more like him, I think I would have less personal agitas. As for his stance on abortion, I would prefer if he said more often that he was politically pro-choice and personally anti-abortion (rather than pro-life) for reasons stated above by suzanne. However, I am not quibbling about that. What I want to know is, where’s the bourbon, bitchez?
@JamesC: Wow. I really like the way you work. Even though I have pied matoko_chan, I can get the gists from your ripostes. You are devastating, Sir! And, I gather she is saying if a single woman agrees with Kain, said single woman is not real or something? If so, fuck her with a rusty pitchfork, thank you very much. I think E.D. and I would have a perfectly lovely conversation in which we would find we have much in common. Anyway, I just wanted to say, keep up with the good work.
Yutsano
@asiangrrlMN: It’s the disagreements that I’d break out the popcorn for. Those would be epic for the generations. Plus gwangung and I could nosh on popcorn endlessly when that happens.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: You mean if E.D. and I had an actual face-to-face conversation? Oh, hell, yeah. That’s what would make it fun. From reading his posts, I think we would find many areas of both agreement and disagreement. By the way, I’ve changed my mind. You and FH#1 can keep him.
matoko_chan
@JamesC: well….what i read was KDP supported Kain as long as he was REALLY pro-life across the board, and then she qualled her answer by axin’ questions about if he supported social services for women. that is another socon meme, that trashy women get pregnant and deserve what happens to them.
But asiangrrlMN is a fine counterexample. she and ED are congruent a lot i think. so i retract my hypoth that all XX juicers dislike ED.
wallah is arabic slang for AMG!
timb
I don’t care what anyone has said about ED. If he took on McCain, then at least he’s an honest conservative. Good for him. Most of them just look the other way and then wonder why people call cons racists
matoko_chan
@timb: he took on Beck too.
but its just bait and switch.
i want to know…..what good conservative ideas?
i dont think there are any.
why does Kain attempt to make his base look reasonable on abortion and racism?
why is a fetus just like a slave?
for a start….
celticdragonchick
@morzer:
You win the internets today with that sentence.
BTW, knapping a flint for a Brown Bess musket in the middle of a re-enactment battle with an improvised hammer is…interesting to say the least.
Frank L
This thread, like so many others, has been “matoko_chan”ed
Mike Schilling
@celticdragonchick:
knapping a flint for a Brown Bess musket in the middle of a re-enactment battle with an improvised hammer is…interesting to say the least.
Even more so if you misread “hammer” as “hamster”.
matoko_chan
@Frank L: