You must be a selective reader...lots of facts posted by the right...nm

• What's up with that? (sm) - Just the big bad
  • More crickets, I see - ExMQMT
  • You want facts? So do I. - middle class
    • So, when.... - Just the big bad
      • Seems to me he isn't thinking straight - gourdpainter
    • As I posted yesterday - - Amanda
      • Not only Richardson. If he wins, that is when we will see it I guess. - middle class
        • cannot find anything on Ritter - can you give me a link? - Amanda
          • Biden stated 150K. - middle class
            • You are correct on that one. - gourdpainter
    • This is creepy. - new messiah?
    • And your response is a link to a petition? - Just the big bad
  • You must be a selective reader...lots of facts posted by the right...nm - nm
    • I'm just making an observation (sm) - Just the big bad
      • I am trying to understand why you would vote for O. nm - middle class
        • Why I voted for Obama (sm) - Just the big bad
          • Well, I totally DISAGREE with O's tax plan - So, you agree with stealing? -plain wrong.nm
          • And to that, I would say..... sm - m
            • Excellent. - middle class
          • Well there you have it folks - gourdpainter

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something to back it up; i.e., some sort of source to check everything out. I could post forever what I hear and think, but that doesn't mean it's fact.

That is why I don't post factual posts often unless I can back it up with real proof.

So, still asking. What is your source?

Obviously more than 1 of you need a calculator.  I'll go R-E-A-L S-L-O-W so you can maybe understand:

Bush's defense budget  = $512 billion

Obama's defense budget =  $534 billion

534B - 521B = 13B

13 billion -- that's how much MORE Obama allocates to defense spending.  Exactly how is he supposed to be cutting defense spending again?  Oh, but I forgot....Hannity SAID Obama was cutting defense spending, so it MUST be true.  You guys are just ridiculous.

1.  Very tacky to insult a person's family name.

2.  I hear Medium is returning in february.  be on it.

Especially Reagan, but nothing new. 

The Chickenhawk argument goes something like this: anyone who favors military action should not be taken seriously unless they themselves are willing to go and do the actual fighting. This particular piece of work is an anti-war crowd attempt to silence the debate by ruling that the other side is out of bounds for the duration. Like all ad hominem attacks, (argumentum ad hominem means “argument against the person”) it is an act of intellectual surrender. The person who employs an ad hominem attack is admitting they cannot win the debate on merit, and hope to chuck the entire thing out the window by attacking the messenger. This is a logical fallacy of the first order, because the messenger is not the message.

The messenger is not the message. That’s all you need to throw away the entire Chickenhawk response. But why stop there when this one is so much fun?

If you are ever see this charge again, you may want to reflect that person’s own logical reasoning in the following fashion: You may not talk about education unless you are willing to become a teacher. You may not discuss poverty unless you yourself are willing to go and form a homeless shelter. How dare you criticize Congress unless you are willing to go out and get elected yourself? Your opinion on a National Health Care System is negated out of hand since you are unwilling to get a medical degree and open a clinic. And as far as your opinions regarding the Democratic Underground or The Huffington Post are concerned, well, you can just keep them to yourself, mister, unless you can produce an advanced degree in Abnormal Psychology and Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

Using the internal reasoning behind the Chickenhawk argument means you cannot comment on, speak about or even hold an opinion on any subject that is not part of your paying day job. It is simple-minded and profoundly anti-democratic, which is why it so deeply appeals to those who sling it around the most.

But wait! There’s more!

If you accept the Chickenhawk argument – that only those actually willing to go and fight have a legitimate opinion on the subject of war – then that means that any decision to go to war must rest exclusively in the hands of the military. Is that what this person really wants? To abandon civilian control of the military? That’s the box they have trapped themselves in with this argument. Now to be perfectly honest, I think Robert Heinlein made a very compelling case for just this line of reasoning in Starship Troopers (the book, not the clueless projected travesty). Heinlein said that the only people who should be allowed to vote are those that have served in the military, since only they are willing to make the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of the state. I don’t agree with that. I think civilian control of the military has been one of the pillars of our nation’s success, and it has withstood the test of both World Wars and Civil ones. But that is the world you are stuck in when you toss that little Chickenhawk grenade.

Finally, if the only legitimate opinion on Iraq, say, is that held by the troops themselves, then they are overwhelmingly in favor of being there and finishing what they started. I recently received an e-mail from an Army major who is heading back for his fourth tour. The Chickenhawk argument, coming from an anti-war commentator, legitimizes only those voices that overwhelmingly contradict the anti-war argument.

Bill Whittle wrote that. He's a real live veteran and I happen to agree with him.

offshore drilling rigs.  huh huh huh.

My son-in-law emailed me this, and this is what I sent him in response:

Thanks, Mr. Bush.