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First off, you are using a TON of blaming statements (which are mostly ad hominem) and are using a trolling technique to attempt poll others for feelings. It's

First off, you are using a TON of blaming statements (which are mostly ad hominem) and are using a trolling technique to attempt poll others for feelings. It's a nasty habit and your comments only serve to make someone angry. I believe you are aware of your intent and only use it to illicit fear. We still have enough liberty here that this article can run in the newspaper freely. That is evidence enough America is far from stinky. Do we have unfair levers of power here? Yes. Are we attempting to determine how the levers got into a few people's control? Yes. Will we figure out how to stop them and keep it from happening again? You bet we will. And none of that will come to pass because of your crappy comments. It'll happen because we are Americans and aren't going to allow our liberties to being eroded by a bunch of fear mongering asshats. And THAT, my friends, is a blaming statement.

angersock 12y ago
Eh, their post was their opinion, and they've got some decent points. Your accusation of ad hominem is misapplied--go look it up. The observation was made that the real damage to the US would come from within and not without. This seems trivially easy to "prove" if you keep up with the news and history. The observation was made that broad swathes of government and private practice were in league to perpetuate these issues. Such behavior is expected because of the mechanism of action at work: the rot and the power is in the legislative and judicial systems, so of course those folks will be acting in concert. The observation was made that in other "corrupt" countries officers routinely relieve travelers of excess pecuniary baggage, which appears to also be the case in some parts of the US. These are not ad hominem propositions, nor were they presented as such.
- kordless 12y ago
  > their post was their opinion This is a false statement. "Your country is beginning to stink." is a blaming statement that attempts to lay out pre-support of the opinion "In many respects it is worse than third world countries". However, in the subsequent context in which it is used the statement is presented as a logical conclusion or fact. It is then followed up with another blaming statement meant to seal the 'logic' of the opinion, "It looks like it is not terrorists who are going to destroy America after all. Your corrupt governments, banks, judiciary and law enforcement will do it on their own." There is no proof that America will be destroyed by corruption inside government, banks or the judicial system. There are observations that we are threatened by some individual's actions, but there are also observations we are doing something about it. The claims we will be 'destroyed' because we are 'corrupt as a third world country' are simply false. There is no evidence this will occur and it is pure conjecture. While I agree with you it probably started as an opinion the comment, in general, their comments consititued an irrelevant conclusion. Irrelevant because it was full of blaming opinion from someone outside those being blamed, and conclusion because it was presented as fact. As it turns out, irrelevant conclusions fall into a broad of set of relevance fallacies, which themselves are 'ad hominem' arguments. Look it up.
ObviousScience 12y ago
Wait, an article balances out the police seizing private assets without a crime for 3 decades to the tune of a hundred million dollars a year? There's something wrong when police have been funding themselves with $30 billion in essentially stolen money.
VexXtreme 12y ago
> we are Americans and aren't going to allow our liberties to being eroded by a bunch of fear mongering asshats I can't count how many times I've heard this comment along the lines of "hurr durr this is Murica and no one is taking muh freedom away". No, your freedoms are already gone and it looks like you haven't woken up to it yet.
- argonaut 12y ago
  > "hurr durr this is Murica and no one is taking muh freedom away" You really don't need to use language like this. This isn't Reddit.
vfclists 12y ago
I think you don't really get my point. Many countries don't have any meaningful rights or rule of law of any kind. There are many countries whose citizens will not challenge the authorities in any form or manner, because the systems give them no redress against any abuse of power. Even if they are rich the legal systems don't exist. Witness Khordovsky and his problems with the Russian government. In America these institutions exist, but the legislatures have turned them into revenue collecting bodies for the federal,state, local governments and the law enforcement bodies. It is like law enforcement and the legal system have turned into feeding troughs for the whole band of officials involved in it. If you are not rich enough to give your lawyer a fair share of what they steal from you, you are not getting it back. If you are rich enough they don't bother stealing from you because they know you have the power to get it back. This sucks. Apparently police and prison officers unions and PACS or whatever their called fund political campaigns which result in preserved or even bigger budgets for law enforcement, then turn around and use the increased income to fund the politicians next time around, to keep the cycle going (except Detroit), which results in more borrowing by the government from which the banks also get their share, pauperising future generations even more. It is an interesting country.
- kordless 12y ago
  > I think you don't really get my point. I don't think you get mine about speaking for others and making blaming statements. You can't say what I get or what I don't get, nor can you form blaming opinions and then try to speak them as fact. This behavior itself is where problems start, not where they are ended. This has nothing to do with the topic at hand and everything to do with solid lines of communication between those that agree to disagree. I hear you when you say we have problems. We do. Like other countries, we have certain traits that make up who we are as a culture. Part of our culture, at least historically, is firmly objecting to too much government control. Given the recent reaction to the NSA's overreach, I'd say we are moving forward on the issue. Unfortunately for the impatient, this can be painful. We're also know for dragging our feet and whining about change while it is occurring. We're not perfect, but we're trying.

angersock 12y ago

Eh, their post was their opinion, and they've got some decent points. Your accusation of ad hominem is misapplied--go look it up. The observation was made that the real damage to the US would come from within and not without. This seems trivially easy to "prove" if you keep up with the news and history. The observation was made that broad swathes of government and private practice were in league to perpetuate these issues. Such behavior is expected because of the mechanism of action at work: the rot and the power is in the legislative and judicial systems, so of course those folks will be acting in concert. The observation was made that in other "corrupt" countries officers routinely relieve travelers of excess pecuniary baggage, which appears to also be the case in some parts of the US. These are not ad hominem propositions, nor were they presented as such.

kordless 12y ago
> their post was their opinion This is a false statement. "Your country is beginning to stink." is a blaming statement that attempts to lay out pre-support of the opinion "In many respects it is worse than third world countries". However, in the subsequent context in which it is used the statement is presented as a logical conclusion or fact. It is then followed up with another blaming statement meant to seal the 'logic' of the opinion, "It looks like it is not terrorists who are going to destroy America after all. Your corrupt governments, banks, judiciary and law enforcement will do it on their own." There is no proof that America will be destroyed by corruption inside government, banks or the judicial system. There are observations that we are threatened by some individual's actions, but there are also observations we are doing something about it. The claims we will be 'destroyed' because we are 'corrupt as a third world country' are simply false. There is no evidence this will occur and it is pure conjecture. While I agree with you it probably started as an opinion the comment, in general, their comments consititued an irrelevant conclusion. Irrelevant because it was full of blaming opinion from someone outside those being blamed, and conclusion because it was presented as fact. As it turns out, irrelevant conclusions fall into a broad of set of relevance fallacies, which themselves are 'ad hominem' arguments. Look it up.

ObviousScience 12y ago

Wait, an article balances out the police seizing private assets without a crime for 3 decades to the tune of a hundred million dollars a year? There's something wrong when police have been funding themselves with $30 billion in essentially stolen money.

VexXtreme 12y ago

> we are Americans and aren't going to allow our liberties to being eroded by a bunch of fear mongering asshats I can't count how many times I've heard this comment along the lines of "hurr durr this is Murica and no one is taking muh freedom away". No, your freedoms are already gone and it looks like you haven't woken up to it yet.

argonaut 12y ago
> "hurr durr this is Murica and no one is taking muh freedom away" You really don't need to use language like this. This isn't Reddit.

vfclists 12y ago

I think you don't really get my point. Many countries don't have any meaningful rights or rule of law of any kind. There are many countries whose citizens will not challenge the authorities in any form or manner, because the systems give them no redress against any abuse of power. Even if they are rich the legal systems don't exist. Witness Khordovsky and his problems with the Russian government. In America these institutions exist, but the legislatures have turned them into revenue collecting bodies for the federal,state, local governments and the law enforcement bodies. It is like law enforcement and the legal system have turned into feeding troughs for the whole band of officials involved in it. If you are not rich enough to give your lawyer a fair share of what they steal from you, you are not getting it back. If you are rich enough they don't bother stealing from you because they know you have the power to get it back. This sucks. Apparently police and prison officers unions and PACS or whatever their called fund political campaigns which result in preserved or even bigger budgets for law enforcement, then turn around and use the increased income to fund the politicians next time around, to keep the cycle going (except Detroit), which results in more borrowing by the government from which the banks also get their share, pauperising future generations even more. It is an interesting country.

kordless 12y ago
> I think you don't really get my point. I don't think you get mine about speaking for others and making blaming statements. You can't say what I get or what I don't get, nor can you form blaming opinions and then try to speak them as fact. This behavior itself is where problems start, not where they are ended. This has nothing to do with the topic at hand and everything to do with solid lines of communication between those that agree to disagree. I hear you when you say we have problems. We do. Like other countries, we have certain traits that make up who we are as a culture. Part of our culture, at least historically, is firmly objecting to too much government control. Given the recent reaction to the NSA's overreach, I'd say we are moving forward on the issue. Unfortunately for the impatient, this can be painful. We're also know for dragging our feet and whining about change while it is occurring. We're not perfect, but we're trying.