Going away party for Paladin

You should quote something a little closer to his age like Justin Beiber.

Probably to Troll Kingdom like the rest of the Wordforge rejects.

He wanted to walk over gturner, and I sorry we didn't cut bait then.

Lots of people have sure shown their assholes like Goatse since 2016, for damn sure

I used to try to invite people all the time, but I haven't invited a single person here since gturner got banned out of sheer embarrassment, if im being honest.

You really want to bark up that tree?

Bitch, if it were true, a few people would have been disinvited from here since the last perma went out

Nah, people who disagree with you is great, when they present thoughtful arguments.

Or good faith arguments. Although obviously it would be ideal to have both thoughtful and good faith arguments I'd definitely prefer good-faith and not-so-thoughtful to thoughtful sophistry that was in bad faith.

Determining where Paladin may have been on a chart mapping thoughtful--> thoughtless and good faith---> bad faith is an exercise best left to the reader.

You people can be so adorable sometimes.

Thanks cutey, you too.

Anybody know how he's handling things since the FBI raided Mar-a-Lago?

Indeed, thoughtful counter-arguments are great.

Unfortunately, too often these days, any ideas that deviate from the Blue Standard™ get met with a wall of inane tribalistic crowing that drowns conversation rather than advancing it. That's why we have barely any conservatives left around here.

That, and the admins have selectively banned many of the right-wing trolls while ignoring the left-wing ones.

Nah, the actual conservatives are barely here because their movement has been co-opted by cunts. We used to have gentleman's disagreements. Then you let the fascists rule your show.

The ones still trying to argue that isn't the case are willingly on the wrong side.

This is how the Red third of America feels.

Imagining that your opposition has no legitimacy whatever -- indeed makes you the problem.

"Forsake Fascism" isn't a big fucking ask.

If that one makes you cry and sweat like we asked for your foreskin, maybe your perspective is warped.

When Republicans offer the likes of Herschel Walker and Tommy Tuberville and are willing to look the other way because the ends justifies the means I'm not sympathetic to claims (expressed or implied) of "cancel culture". When Ben Sasse and Adam Kinzinger can't pass the republican purity tests...

It is when you're willing to portray anything you dislike as "fascism." That's all you accomplish by hanging your hat on that one word.

Ah, I had a parody of you going "you're gonna say eating my cereal is fascism!! " but your real fucking post flew up mid-type.

I dislike people splitting people's skulls open for politely asking not to have their skulls cracked open.
I dislike people eating popcorn watching the skull cracking.
I dislike people inciting the skull cracking, and calling it "jokes".

Yeah, that's some radical touchy-feely stuff.
Right up there with "seize the means of production".
Why, it's the same thing somehow.

Funny you should mention that. I can't find the clip, but respected BBC journalist Katty Kay was on Real Time last week and the topic of fascism came up. She said something to the effect of people throwing around the term fascism constantly (Read: when they don't really understand the meaning. My words, not hers) are not helping the situation. This made me think of Little Miss Can't Be Wrong/ the you're responding to. This is a woman who's not a right winger and a hell of a lot more intelligent than him. Just thought I'd point that out.

The real quote is out in the chicken coop.
But it was devastating, trust me.

Good thing I have HBO Max and can re-watch the episode and I quote, "America's not going to become a fascist state, it's not going to become a socialist state. Is there a far right tendency? You know, are there conservatives on the supreme court? Of course, but fascist? I mean, that's not helpful either. If you want to gem up violence, backlash in the country, you start throwing around words like fascism, you're not helping the cause of avoiding a civil war."

Hopefully not. But denialism isn't going to prevent it.

That ship sailed with Social Security. Its been an arm wrestling match over matter of degree after that.

Violent, racist, nationalist, homophobic, misogynistic, conspiracy-theory driven, but it's not Fascism, don't call it that.
It has to have a quantum precise quark-perfect set of circumstances to be Fascism.
It has to be exactly like Hitler right up to the body count and costumes.
Even though Mussolini didn't meet this standard, and he was plenty Fascist.
Let's just ignore Mussolini.
Ignore him reeeaally hard.

keeping in mind that the american far left is the rest of the developed world's moderates...

Nooo don't you know the American far left is further left than the most left of them all! The American right has said so!

Not for lack of trying. If this is true then I definitely don’t want the American left to be more like Europeans.

Yeah, Europeans weep themselves to sleep every night.
That's why their happiness index is higher than ours.
Oh...wait...

This reads like, "I don't want our standard of living to be higher and more comfortable."

Kinda like you with socialism.

How is it when it’s a topic you agree with, you “respect” someone on the other side of the aisle, but when it’s something you disagree with, the it’s “Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong”?

On economics, yes. And this is where they have my full support.

On cultural issues, no.