So we hit the debt limit...

[Berkut]

It has nothing to do with the neitrality of language - the actual words used are not nearly as important as the belief system that motivates the words.

You are trying to sell the idea that your party is so right that it is actually safe to just assume that you are right and the other guys are not just wrong, why they are actually lying about literally everything (or so close that it is better to just assume they are lying about everything). Sorry, that fails any possible objectivity test. You cannot argue that you evaluate on the merits while demanding that people not evaluate anything at all, because it is better if they just assume you are right, and the other guy is lying.

And this happens over and over and over again on almost every single nominally partisan subject.

Not being a partisan hack is not about any fallacy of the middle, it is about actually thinking about issues instead of just assuming "my party is right, and the other party is full of liars and cheats" in place of thinking. The funny thing is you keep claiming that I am always in the middle, yet my posting record pretty clearly disproves that. In fact, on any particular issue, my position is almost never in the middle. Hell, on THIS issue, I would have been much happer with Obamas 1:3 ratio plan than just about anything else I've heard. We probably actually agree. The entire debate hasn't even been about the issue, but my audacity at suggesting that the Tea Baggers MIGHT have a point worthy of not simply dismissing as a bunch of ignorance and lies. Oh, the heresy!

To the extent that you do any analysis, it is like a YEC spending time "proving" that the Earth is 6000 years old. They start with the a conclusion, and then work from there. That is not real analysis. The goal is not to learn the truth, but rather to prove the already known Truth.

[Berkut]

"You can assume that anything a Conservative says about the economy is a lie"

/=

In fact, you can't go very wrong believing that everything conservatives say about the economy is a falsehood

Close but not quite.
[/quote]

Close enough certainly.

[garbon]

"You can assume that anything a Conservative says about the economy is a lie"

/=

In fact, you can't go very wrong believing that everything conservatives say about the economy is a falsehood

Close but not quite.
[/quote]

That's pretty much the same. After all when you assume something their is always a slight chance that it was wrong to assume just like DGul's statement which suggests that there is only a small chance that you'll be wrong in "believing" what they say is a lie.

[DGuller]

You are trying to sell the idea that your party is so right

I do?  Care to point it out where I say that? 

Here's an extremely frustrating issue that almost always comes up in such debates with you.  You lose track of what I say, and what you think I think, and don't remember which idea I expressed, and which idea you assume I believe in but didn't express.

You cannot argue that you evaluate on the merits while demanding that people not evaluate anything at all, because it is better if they just assume you are right, and the other guy is lying.

Again, you're just completely making stuff up.  Nowhere do I demand that people not evaluate anything.  That's a fabrication out of the left field.  I just provided guidance in cases where you want to go with the talking points, like you went with the talking point about the growing government over the last several decades.

What I did say is that you can't go too wrong assuming that conservatives are lying about economic matters.  That is, if you are to evaluate objectively conservative statements, you will find that more often than not your evaluations will be very different from the point the conservatives are driving.  How that can be interpreted as demand to not evaluate anything at all, I have no idea, I'm not an expert in dyslexia.

Not being a partisan hack is not about any fallacy of the middle, it is about actually thinking about issues instead of just assuming "my party is right, and the other party is full of liars and cheats" in place of thinking.

And yet that didn't save you from inadvertently parrotting a dishonest conservative talking point.  At the same time, an allegedly partisan hack like me had enough critical thinking skills to look at the data, and see through the fluff.  This particular example doesn't speak well of the might of your reasonable moderate thinking, does it?

[Tamas]

[Admiral Yi]

While Seedys ranting is kind of funny, I am always wondering exactly what point it is he is trying to make. I think we all get that he is an anti-capitalism communist or something like that, some sort of red of one kind or another...but WHAT kind?

I mean...what is it he is advocating for?

He is advocating for the punishment of people he considers evil.

[Berkut]

Actually, it does rather nicely, since my basic point was rather borne out by YOUR data, while you got lost in your ranting about what liars conservatives are.

Again, you're just completely making stuff up.  Nowhere do I demand that people not evaluate anything.

Of course you did - you said people should just assume that the conservatives are always lying, because that is a safe assumption. It is simply not true that conservatives "lie" anymore than liberals. We can both trot out plenty of examples of conservatives AND liberals lying about economic matters, and plenty of examples where neither of them do so. There is no objective measure by which any reasonable person can assume that one side lies so much more than the other that said rational person would conclude that one ought to just assume that all conservatives lie. Of course, you being the one making the claim, the onus of responsibility to prove it is on you - go right ahead and prove that not only do conservatives lie on economic matter more than liberals, they do so to such an overwhelming extent that simply assuming that any conservative speaking about any economic issue is a lying is actually a rational position.

Of course, any non-partisan hack can see that both parties have elements that lie their asses off when it suits them, and elements that do not. The conservatives are not defined by Glenn Beck, and the liberals are not defined by Michael Moore. The vast majority of both parties operate on good faith.

[DGuller]

Actually, it does rather nicely, since my basic point was rather borne out by YOUR data, while you got lost in your ranting about what liars conservatives are.

Except that it wasn't, as I explained countless times before, as many times as you ignored it.  You know, at some point I may get tired of correcting you, but that wouldn't make your assertion less incorrect.

Here is an example of a trend that has been increasing over decades:
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs.php?year=1970_2011&view=1&expand=&units=p&log=linear&fy=fy12&chart=10-fed&bar=1&stack=1&size=1001_541&title=&state=US&color=c&local=s&show=

Notice how different that looks from the essentially flat trend with a spike in the end that is the total spending graph?

I don't know whether you honestly think that you have a point, or whether you're just trying to tire me out, but in either case, the assertion that the size of government has been growing over the last several decades is unarguably wrong.  The last few years may be an important event of its own, but what happened in the last few years does not make for a trend over the last few decades. 

The fact that you keep trying to change the subject to just the present level of spending, and how much higher it is now than at some arbitrary point in the past, even though this debate started about trend over the last several decades, is an indication that you do indeed understand the difference, even if your official talking point implies that you do not.

[Berkut]

No, the debate is that the fiscal conservatives do in fact have a legitimate gripe, and your data shows that rather nicely, no matter how much you bleat about how everyone not in your group are all liars and CANNOT have a legitimate point.

That is not a change of subject, that IS the subject - or rather, that is the point that illustrates the subject which is that they have a perfectly reasonable bitch. And your graph nicely proves that no, they are NOT lying when they say the federal government is larger than it has ever been. Whether that is over 1, 2, or 3 decades changes the point not one bit.

It is pretty amusing that you whine and cry about people putting words in your mouth, yet at the same time no matter how many times I tell you what MY point is, you insist that I am wrong, and you actually know what point I was making better than I do. Curious, that. Rather ironic considering your basic point is that all conservatives always lies about economics.

[Berkut]

Question:

If there was no tea party, what would the liberal Dem budget look like?

Would it have spending cuts at all? Would the Blue Dogs have any influence in keeping spending in check for another round?

[DGuller]

That is not a change of subject, that IS the subject - or rather, that is the point that illustrates the subject which is that they have a perfectly reasonable bitch. And your graph nicely proves that no, they are NOT lying when they say the federal government is larger than it has ever been. Whether that is over 1, 2, or 3 decades changes the point not one bit.

It actually changes the point quite substantially.  If the federal government has been growing over the last several decades, then it's a clear indication that something in the system is out of balance.  If the federal government has been considerably larger than in recent history only during the years of the worst recession in 70 years, then their point is significantly diluted.  The difference in implications between the two assertions is enormous.

It is pretty amusing that you whine and cry about people putting words in your mouth, yet at the same time no matter how many times I tell you what MY point is, you insist that I am wrong, and you actually know what point I was making better than I do. Curious, that. Rather ironic considering your basic point is that all conservatives always lies about economics.

The difference is that I'm actually not putting words in your mouth.  Here are your own words:

You know, I said a long while back, right here on Languish, that the Tea Party's position on the debt and spending was ridiculous in the particular, but in fact reflected a very valid and rational position. Namely, that the size of the federal government has grown ridiculously over the last few decades,

I can see why you would want to retrospectively change your point, and repeat that retrospectively changed point numerous times, but that doesn't cancel out the original point that you made.  The original point on which you based your whole argument was wrong, and that was the point debunked by my graph.

You could've just retracted that point, and directly switched the focus to the last several years, instead of indirectly switching the focus and pretending that's what you were talking about all along.  That would've been more honest, and saved us both needless aggravation.

[Martinus]

Show of hands - who is still following the Berkut - DGuller debate?

[The Brain]

Show of hands - who is still following the Berkut - DGuller debate?

It's a debate? Yikes.

[DGuller]

Show of hands - who is still following the Berkut - DGuller debate?

I do.   

[Admiral Yi]

Show of hands - who is still following the Berkut - DGuller debate?

Spot-reading.