The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgiving

[Kepler]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Well, if you want to talk about tallying, I think you'd be hard pressed numerically to match the sum total from Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and the like. Numerically things like The Inquisition and the Crusades, while certainly resulting in the killing of many innocent folks, are only a tiny fraction of the previously mentioned tally. That would be true even if you threw in Hitler on the Christian side, which any thinking person would not do (though someone around here tries to argue so every so often). Killers don't just make up reasons afterwards. Stalin didn't just happen to starve the Ukrainians in the 1930s and afterwards come up with a reason. For mass killers like Stalin and Mao, there was certainly reasoning in what they did, even if tragically flawed.

The "reasoning afterwards" was as regards religious justification, but I think you knew that. It's a 2x2 chart: good/bad x religious/non-religious. The good/bad dimension is where you get your killin' done. The religious/non-religious dimension is where you justify it either by magic or utilitarianism.

It may well be the 20th century killed off more people than all the religious wars in all the previous centuries because of the growth in population, but I wouldn't get cocky. Religion waxes and wanes with the hemlines, and we've got plenty more centuries to come. The next Mao may be Marianist.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

He's every bit a part of the clown show as anyone, if not more. He just happens to play "victim clown".

I play "saint clown."

 

[jerphisch]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Well, if you want to talk about tallying, I think you'd be hard pressed numerically to match the sum total from Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and the like. Numerically things like The Inquisition and the Crusades, while certainly resulting in the killing of many innocent folks, are only a tiny fraction of the previously mentioned tally. That would be true even if you threw in Hitler on the Christian side, which any thinking person would not do (though someone around here tries to argue so every so often). Killers don't just make up reasons afterwards. Stalin didn't just happen to starve the Ukrainians in the 1930s and afterwards come up with a reason. For mass killers like Stalin and Mao, there was certainly reasoning in what they did, even if tragically flawed.

Just saying, the numbers are what they are.

Do tragically flawed ideas like invading Iraq get included in the tally or are we just cherry picking which tragically flawed ideas get counted?

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

The "reasoning afterwards" was as regards religious justification, but I think you knew that. It's a 2x2 chart: good/bad x religious/non-religious. The good/bad dimension is where you get your killin' done. The religious/non-religious dimension is where you justify it either by magic or utilitarianism.

It may well be the 20th century killed off more people than all the religious wars in all the previous centuries because of the growth in population, but I wouldn't get cocky. Religion waxes and wanes with the hemlines, and we've got plenty more centuries to come. The next Mao may be Marianist.

You were the one that was commenting about how it's surprising the nutjobs haven't killed anyone lately. When you start saying the same about nutjobs who aren't by inference Christians, you'll be a lot more consistent in your commenting.

On the religious justification afterwards, I'm still not on board with the idea, at least not wholeheartedly like you seem to be. Certainly there are cases where someone kills and then uses religion (or something else) as an excuse afterwards, but there are lots of cases through history where religious (and non-religious, just to be clear) folks have their justifications all laid out before they lift a finger.

Not sure I follow your 2x2 thing.

 

[joecct]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Do tragically flawed ideas like invading Iraq get included in the tally or are we just cherry picking which tragically flawed ideas get counted?

Statistically insignificant when compared to the above list. Sucks, but it is.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Do tragically flawed ideas like invading Iraq get included in the tally or are we just cherry picking which tragically flawed ideas get counted?

Invading Iraq was about, amongst other things, a tragically flawed idea that you can push democracy onto a country with no interest or history of such. The support for the war does not have clear dividing lines between religious and non-religious folks. And I say that as someone who was never in favor of it and have said so when we went in and since then. That's a bad example to try to forward the argument I think you're trying to make.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Statistically insignificant when compared to the above list. Sucks, but it is.

Hey, don't ask them to go by numbers. They hate those things.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Hey, don't ask them to go by numbers. They hate those things.

We're not the guys who prefer prayer to peer review.

 

[burd]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Invading Iraq was about, amongst other things, a tragically flawed idea that you can push democracy onto a country with no interest or history of such. The support for the war does not have clear dividing lines between religious and non-religious folks. And I say that as someone who was never in favor of it and have said so when we went in and since then. That's a bad example to try to forward the argument I think you're trying to make.

You are correct, Bob. But many, including the last Republican candidate for VPOTUS, thought Iraq was "A task from God." Unfair to use her as a measure of opinion, I admit, but she was on the ticket to secure the support of that social conservative block that has been so influential with the GOP in recent years.

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Invading Iraq was about, amongst other things, a tragically flawed idea that you can push democracy onto a country with no interest or history of such. The support for the war does not have clear dividing lines between religious and non-religious folks. And I say that as someone who was never in favor of it and have said so when we went in and since then. That's a bad example to try to forward the argument I think you're trying to make.

No, it was about cashing in. Something Cheney did quite nicely. He's a very very rich man.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

You are correct, Bob. But many, including the last Republican candidate for VPOTUS, thought Iraq was "A task from God." Unfair to use her as a measure of opinion, I admit, but she was on the ticket to secure the support of that social conservative block that has been so influential with the GOP in recent years.

That's two election cycles ago, not the last one. Unless Romney had a second VP candidate of which noboy but you and he had knowledge.

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

That's two election cycles ago, not the last one. Unless Romney had a second VP candidate of which noboy but you and he had knowledge.

It may as well be one since Romney had absolutely no shot. Especially the way he ran his campaign. I think some of his guys are working with Walker right now.

 

[burd]

That's two election cycles ago, not the last one. Unless Romney had a second VP candidate of which noboy but you and he had knowledge.

Oops. Mitt will be pizzed.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

You are correct, Bob. But many, including the last Republican candidate for VPOTUS, thought Iraq was "A task from God." Unfair to use her as a measure of opinion, I admit, but she was on the ticket to secure the support of that social conservative block that has been so influential with the GOP in recent years.

I followed the Iraq stuff fairly closely and I don't recall the Task From God angle you seem to recall. I'm not saying that someone might not have said that at some point, but it certainly wasn't one of the main discussion points regarding going into Iraq or not and for people after the fact to try to blame it on Christians is massive revisionism. In all the years liberals have complained about Iraq, and with a good bit of justification in my book (though of course many liberals supported/voted in favor of going in), I don't ever recall hearing this angle on it.

 

[jerphisch]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Invading Iraq was about, amongst other things, a tragically flawed idea that you can push democracy onto a country with no interest or history of such. The support for the war does not have clear dividing lines between religious and non-religious folks. And I say that as someone who was never in favor of it and have said so when we went in and since then. That's a bad example to try to forward the argument I think you're trying to make.

Nope, wrong argument. The Iraq war has about the same link to Christianity as anything does that your assigning to atheism. Like Kepler keeps pointing out, it's a good/bad thing, not religious/atheist thing.

 

[burd]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

I followed the Iraq stuff fairly closely and I don't recall the Task From God angle you seem to recall. I'm not saying that someone might not have said that at some point, but it certainly wasn't one of the main discussion points regarding going into Iraq or not and for people after the fact to try to blame it on Christians is massive revisionism. In all the years liberals have complained about Iraq, and with a good bit of justification in my book (though of course many liberals supported/voted in favor of going in), I don't ever recall hearing this angle on it.

Palin definitely said it, though not until around '08, I believe. But like I said earlier, it is unfair to use her as a measure of opinion, either of conservatives or Christians. Idiots, maybe.

 

[ScoobyDoo]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Oops. Mitt will be pizzed.

Why? He knows he's irrelevant. And he's got ****loads of piles of moola in the Cayman's. He don't care about this little stuff.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Nope, wrong argument. The Iraq war has about the same link to Christianity as anything does that your assigning to atheism. Like Kepler keeps pointing out, it's a good/bad thing, not religious/atheist thing.

That's just silly. One of Mao or Stalin or Pol Pot's main things was to stamp out God, a very clear connection. To say that connection is as strong as any connection of Christians to going into Iraq is laughable.

Kepler had made the comment about nutjobs and that it's surprising they haven't killed anyone yet, making the assertion (one he's made many times) that such folks are dangerous and certainly more dangerous than his harmless fellow liberals.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Palin definitely said it, though not until around '08, I believe. But like I said earlier, it is unfair to use her as a measure of opinion, either of conservatives or Christians. Idiots, maybe.

Fair enough. I'm impressed at your encyclopedic-like knowledge of what Palin said so long ago. Can't say I'm similarly able.

 

[burd]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS VIII - I am certiorari we'll be arguing until Thanksgivin

Fair enough. I'm impressed at your encyclopedic-like knowledge of what Palin said so long ago. Can't say I'm similarly able.

I hear you--remembering is not so easy anymore. But to hear that from a major party's VP candidate was so appalling, it was hard to forget.