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The reason that Fox News and Republicans (and nobody else, you'll notice) says things like "the Democrat party" is that they did research and found that people

by jbooth 16y ago

The reason that Fox News and Republicans (and nobody else, you'll notice) says things like "the Democrat party" is that they did research and found that people have a more negative reaction to that than the democratic party. It started a few years ago, after almost 200 years of everyone saying "Democratic party". I have a huge problem with this line of thinking, not because I'm offended by the phrasing (I'm not), but because it shows a 1984-ish approach to politics and governing. As far as your claimed independence and moderation -- what does John Kerry's yacht have to do with anything? That sounded awfully partisan to me. I'm a partisan. I own it. You should do the same.

CWuestefeld 16y ago
We're largely debating about angels on the head of a pin, but what the heck... If you scan my comments, you'll see that I never uttered the phrase "the Democrat party". My phrase was "a Democrat talking point", and I think this is quite consonant liguistically with a statement like "I am a Democrat". Nobody says "I'm a Democratic". Specifically, had I said that "gun control is a Democratic talking point", that would indicate that the talking point of gun control is somehow characterized by democracy (but for the capital "D", which may help resolve it, I admit). That is nothing like what I meant. "John Kerry's yacht" refers to a person who claims that we should all be paying our fair share to provide such democratic (note the lower-case D: I do mean that it's characteristic of democracy) funding for our government. Specifically, it refers to the recent discovery that he had moored his boat out-of-state in order to avoid sales tax, painting him as hypocritical. Kerry was the first to come to mind because of its recency. One might also reference anti-immigration Republicans and their cleaning ladies, for example. I'm a partisan. I own it. You should do the same. I'm not partisan, at least not in the way that's typically used, in the polarization of American politics between left and right. I am a member of the Libertarian Party, so in a proper sense I am a partisan, but I'm not of the sort that mindlessly bashes the {GOP,DEM} while ignoring the faults of the {DEM,GOP}. For example, you'll see that just up-thread, I called the NRA "GOP stooges". And there are precious few Libertarians in office for me to criticize.

by jbooth 16y ago

CWuestefeld 16y ago

We're largely debating about angels on the head of a pin, but what the heck... If you scan my comments, you'll see that I never uttered the phrase "the Democrat party". My phrase was "a Democrat talking point", and I think this is quite consonant liguistically with a statement like "I am a Democrat". Nobody says "I'm a Democratic". Specifically, had I said that "gun control is a Democratic talking point", that would indicate that the talking point of gun control is somehow characterized by democracy (but for the capital "D", which may help resolve it, I admit). That is nothing like what I meant. "John Kerry's yacht" refers to a person who claims that we should all be paying our fair share to provide such democratic (note the lower-case D: I do mean that it's characteristic of democracy) funding for our government. Specifically, it refers to the recent discovery that he had moored his boat out-of-state in order to avoid sales tax, painting him as hypocritical. Kerry was the first to come to mind because of its recency. One might also reference anti-immigration Republicans and their cleaning ladies, for example. I'm a partisan. I own it. You should do the same. I'm not partisan, at least not in the way that's typically used, in the polarization of American politics between left and right. I am a member of the Libertarian Party, so in a proper sense I am a partisan, but I'm not of the sort that mindlessly bashes the {GOP,DEM} while ignoring the faults of the {DEM,GOP}. For example, you'll see that just up-thread, I called the NRA "GOP stooges". And there are precious few Libertarians in office for me to criticize.