First of all, there is only one other poster on this board whom I truly despise - although he has used multiple handles so it may seem like more. I will admit to hating this individual, it would be a silly for me to claim otherwise. But this individual is opposed to all of the values that I hold dear, and in fact, it is entirely accurate to claim that I view this individual as an enemy. I admit that he is, and I'm entirely comfortable in that view. He is also an enemy of the ideals that make this country great, although, fortunately, he's too insignificant to have any importance in that role. But that doesn't preclude my despising him because of the hateful individual that he is.
2nd of all, it is EXTRAORDINARILY important that more people think Bush is worthy of being voted out of office than in being retained. I don't actually give a damn what anyone here whom I might not actually know thinks about me personally. But I care an awful lot about what people think about this issue, and I will admit to being truly distressed that a very significant element of the populace does not seem to understand that they are being manipulated and lied to about matters affecting the safety and security of this nation. For example, why is it that the Bush administration has now devoted an EXTENSIVE amount of effort among the heads of State, Defense, and the National Security Advisor's office into discrediting Richard Clarke, yet nearly NO effort whatsoever is being devoted to flushing out the Administration official who committed TREASON in outing Victoria Plame from a deep cover CIA position, in order to punish her and her husband Joseph Wilson, who also criticized this administration? If The Bush administration was one tenth as zealous in assassinating Al Qaida leaders as they are in assassinating the character of anyone who criticizes them and their record, Bin Laden and Ayman Al Zawahiri would clearly be dead on slabs by now. Of course, Kerry is by no means perfect. But I do not believe that I am overstating it when I contend that Bush is the most disastrous President since Warren Harding.
3rd, you say I am obsessed with these debates. Perhaps, but I would prefer to call it extremely focused. Certainly, the possible issues associated with escort/client interactions that are the normal subject matter of this board DO seem insignificant to me in comparison to the issue of who and how the leadership of the free world is carried out.
And finally, my reason for rejecting the Political Discussion Board is that it seems quite clear to me that the purpose of such a board is to segregate these conversations from the general audience. My entire purpose of these posts is to involve the general audience. I don't care in the slightest, nor do I actually have the slightest expectation of ever changing the minds of the half-dozen or so posters I've been sparring with. It has NEVER been about that. It HAS been about trying to influence others, either by reasoned argument, OR by making it completely obvious how UNREASONED the opposing argument is. To the extent that I've gotten sidetracked in screeds against Bribite, I acknowledge that I've actually been working at cross purposes with this. But certainly, the ONLY reason I have ever been doing these posts is for the GENERAL audience of the General Discussion Board. I don't have anything fundamental against any Political Discussion forum, either here or elsewhere. I simply acknowledge the obvious fact that those forums are not the ones where the audience I am targetting resides. Hence, I won't bother with them. I never denied nor misrepresented my purpose on these political threads. It's about persuading those who could possibly be persuaded. The current political climate is entirely too polarized to try to change the minds of those on the opposite pole. It's all about trying to influence the small slice of the uncommitted in the middle, and that opportunity is effectively negated by being thrust into a separate forum.
And incidentally, you have no idea who I am, or what my larger purpose is. I would tell you point blank that my intent in THIS forum has been to try out approaches to this debate among this audience, as an early stage audition in front of a set of very uninhibited critics of all political stripes, before taking those approaches that better withstand the crucible of opposition here, into some broader and far more significant forays in the national media. Obviously, the mutual hatefest I've had with bribite is not part of that, but the rest of it certainly is. That being said, the population of this forum has clearly rejected being used in this manner, so I'll need to find another, equally non-mainstream venue to de-bug these approaches to the debate before unveiling them in the broader media.
-- Modified on 3/26/2004 2:48:53 PM
