Conservatives, Liberals, Republicans, Democrats

[nforcer06164]

Clinton was the one who loved golf, Alain, not Bush. I think that if there was a major political issue and a golf game, Bush wouldn't go "STFU" to his Secret Service officials like Clinton did THREE TIMES. And this was when the military literally had Bin Laden in a scope and was waiting for him to give an order to shoot. But he ignored it. He was too busy watching golf.

I think Bush is smarter than that. Ever watch a State of the Union by Bush? We don't give him enough credit. People would say the same about Gore, even moreso, if he was in power. Ever see the bumper stickers? "Gore... the lights are on, but nobody's home."

And to get back on topic...

There is no clean-cut "Liberal Democrats" and "Conservative Republicans" anymore. I like to better refer to our parties as "Conservative Democrats" and Liberal Republicans", because no candidate is strictly left or right anymore.

[alainbryden]

I'll ignore your ignorance. You just countered an argument no one made.

[talisman]

Huh? How does the SOTU address make Bush smarter? You think he actually writes it or something?

Personally, I think Bush is very smart when it comes to staying on message and appearing in control. I don't see him as the kind of president that comes up with ideas though. He seems like the guy who asks his Cabinet and staff to think of policy which he then approves, disapproves, or modifies. I think he sort of sets long term goals, then asks around to get opinions on the best way to get there, before thinking of a way himself.

Of course I have no evidence for any of this. Just what I imagine.

[devnill]

I dont mean to flame, so excuse me if i seem that way BUT...

i dont think people in this forum or anwhere else really know wheat the definition of conservative or liberal really is. a conservative is a person who beleives in traditional values of our country, and a liberal is the opposite; they beleive that as times change, so should public policy.

With that said, anybody can eaisily see that these terms are thrown around more as inflammatory comments on teh chaacter of people... if you only watched cnn and fox, you would think conservatives are anal retentive snobs, and liberals are strung out hippies.

as the first poster said:

My point is that the term republican is not interchangeable with the term conservative, and the term democrat is not interchangeable with liberal.

this is absolutely correct, and often, most consteratives are alot more liberal than they would admit and vice versa.

[Mindfields]

Clinton was the one who loved golf, Alain, not Bush. I think that if there was a major political issue and a golf game, Bush wouldn't go "STFU" to his Secret Service officials like Clinton did THREE TIMES. And this was when the military literally had Bin Laden in a scope and was waiting for him to give an order to shoot. But he ignored it. He was too busy watching golf.

Hold on, why would Clinton want Bin Laden in our scopes? I thought we didn't even know about him until 9/11? We knew about the Taliban, but...it just doesn't make sense.

[DracIV]

Osama was not just some random guy from some random group who became infamous overnight. He has been the leader of a well-know terrorist organization for decades. He was already a fairly infamous terrorist leader a decade ago, which is why several times countries that found him offered to hand him over to the US to be dealt with. Clinton refused the offers.

[Mindfields]

I know that he was big in the Taliban before that, but I don't see why Clinton would care. I would've heard something about it if he did.
I would also like to address Al Qaeda. My History Teacher was on her daily rant about how stupid Bush is (she's a HUGE hippie). And she told us that the reason Al Qaeda is so pissed at us is because we gave Saddam nukes. They're against dictatorship and monarchy just "like" we are! They don't like the King of Jordan, and they don't like Saddam Hussein very much either! Then the Shiites are pissed at us because we said we would come back and help them after the Gulf War! They both have a right to try to kill us, if you ask me!

[nforcer06164]

I know that he was big in the Taliban before that, but I don't see why Clinton would care. I would've heard something about it if he did.
I would also like to address Al Qaeda. My History Teacher was on her daily rant about how stupid Bush is (she's a HUGE hippie). And she told us that the reason Al Qaeda is so pissed at us is because we gave Saddam nukes. They're against dictatorship and monarchy just "like" we are! They don't like the King of Jordan, and they don't like Saddam Hussein very much either! Then the Shiites are pissed at us because we said we would come back and help them after the Gulf War! They both have a right to try to kill us, if you ask me!

Nobody has a right to kill or try to kill us, or anyone, for that matter. Someone may deserve death for inhumane acts that they may commit (again, a good topic for debate), but nobody gets the right to kill over a supposedly broken promise. It seems your teacher may be making things up....

And your teacher IS wrong on one point. We never gave Saddam nukes. It'd be kind of hypocritical to give them nukes and then demand them destroyed, wouldn't it? And why would Al Qaeda be angry even if we did? We practically dropped weapons into the hands of Bin Laden to help him when he was on our side at some point... and what did he do? He turned right around some time later and fired OUR OWN WEAPONS at us. So, would they be angry if we gave them the ammunition to try to kill us? Nah, I don't think so.

[Mindfields]

I admit to saying that we gave the nukes to Saddam. Thank God I'm not a history teacher cause nobody tells me anything anymore an I don't know whether to trust NBC or CBS...they look so much better compared to FOX and ABC...But how did Osama get the weapons?

[DonCasablanca]

To clear up some of the first post's confusion, and (I hope) address the topic at hand:

The labels "Conservative" and "Liberal" carry little of the meaning suggested by the adjectives "conservative" and "liberal". Not only are they inappropriate when linked to the Republican and Democratic parties, but moreover, they can be used interchangeably to describe views of any political persuasion:

Republicans believe in a conservative economic policy.
Republicans believe in a liberal economic policy.

We've read these statements countless times, and each are absolutely true: Republicans believe in a conservative economic policy -- lower taxes, less government spending (although beginning with Clinton it seems the Democrats are the party of fiscal responsibility). Republicans believe in a liberal economic policy -- when economists define liberal economics, they of course refer to a belief in the free market, unguided by government control; lower taxes, less government spending.

Perhaps most tellingly, "liberals" (colloquially) think of Libertarians as a party of the extreme right. A party that by every definition is the most liberal -- the most progressive, the most committed to preserving personal liberty, even approaching Anarchism for all practical purposes -- most people think of as a version of Republican "Conservative" extremism.

Thus, the labels "Liberal" and "Conservative" have utterly lost political meaning, and are now useless except for talk show name-calling. They don't make sense in their literal senses, nor in the sense Devnill suggests (this idea of the "traditional values of our country" is understood in literally millions of different, mutually exclusive ways; think of how often some vague idea of good ol' Americanism is abused by both parties). We have to stick with unique understandings of each party's platform, independent of this meaningless, one-dimensional, left to right spectrum.

[blahblah18]

wow all the posters from the grave are back...
Don makes a very accurate point, but its even worse then he says it to be.... Liberal and Conservative have nwo become catchphrases for channels like CNN and Fox News to throw back and forth to each other with no actual meaning.

Also, Bush is considered NOT conservative enough for the republican party by most people, although recently he's been trying to change the image. His talks about the privatization of Social Security is basically the definition of the first step of the Libertarian movement.

Libertarian though really can't be defined in terms of democrat or republican, since its ideas are so different that it really can be taken as parts of both...
Its considered a liberal movement due to its complete basis on the preservation of individual rights and the protection of those rights, yet its considered a conservative movement because its trying to basically eliminated any government run business or operation, including the privatization of social security, school systems, hospitals, and basically everything that doesn't protect human rights or our personal and natinoal defense... Basically there would public police, fire, and military, with very few others.

Also, I am the first to say that Bush has been miserable in his presidential tenure, but the argument that he had advance warning of WTC and did nothing, I find quite ludicrous. We get hundreds of intelligence reports everyday, and if any of them ever come to fruition, then its leverage to say that it was predicted.

[slimshdy425]

Wow, mega bump.

Thanks to all those who supported my original point.

[nforcer06164]

I admit to saying that we gave the nukes to Saddam. Thank God I'm not a history teacher cause nobody tells me anything anymore an I don't know whether to trust NBC or CBS...they look so much better compared to FOX and ABC...But how did Osama get the weapons?

NBC, CBS, and ABC are dominated by "liberals", and FOX is dominated by "conservatives". Basically, the former generally blow things up, and the latter mostly tells it like it is.

Please explain how NBC and CBS look better to you.

And we gave the weapons to Osama. Didn't I say that?

[Mindfields]

Please explain how NBC and CBS look better to you.

I admit to this also: NBC has Conan O'Brien and Saturday Night Live. Who wouldn't like NBC? CBS just has the CSIs. To me, it's a nice switch off of comedy and drama/mystery. ABC just has the exact same crap that FOX does, I mean, didn't they both come up with the "Trading Spouses" dealie and the "Nanny 911" dealie at the same time? I like HOUSE though...

[nforcer06164]

Please explain how NBC and CBS look better to you.

I admit to this also: NBC has Conan O'Brien and Saturday Night Live. Who wouldn't like NBC? CBS just has the CSIs. To me, it's a nice switch off of comedy and drama/mystery. ABC just has the exact same crap that FOX does, I mean, didn't they both come up with the "Trading Spouses" dealie and the "Nanny 911" dealie at the same time? I like HOUSE though...

Dude, the shows they display and their quality has nothing to do with their news, which is what I was referring to. You seemed to refer to that also. Please don't tell me that you forgot what you were talking about several posts ago.