All Hank, all the time.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Read it again:



What is instructive is that he was unable to state the simple fact "No I happen to be against Hezbollah." - the words appear to fail him.

Within the next sentence, he tosses off the "I condemn them" but then immediately wraps them into a conversation about both sides, and talks about "both sides coming together"

Which sides - a terrorist organization occupying another country and the Nation which it unilaterally attacked.

You're right about one thing - Dingell's comments are bewildering.

As to who is the hack, well....

There is no way that you can read the full text of what Dingell said and think that Hanson represented it fairly. I'm not defending Dingell, who has an ability only seen in Congress to say very little at great length. But he clearly is saying that (a) he opposes violence, and (b) some negotiated settlement is necessary for peace. If you read (a) and nonetheless think he does not distinguish between Hezbollah and Israel, then you need Spanky to tutor you in reading comprehension.

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Read it again:



What is instructive is that he was unable to state the simple fact "No I happen to be against Hezbollah." - the words appear to fail him.

It is similar to when Ty was unable to unqualifiedly condemn Arafat as a murderous thuggish ruggish terrorist. The left has Moral Compass with no bearings. It is just spinning wildly out of control.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Penske_Account
It is similar to when Ty was unable to unqualifiedly condemn Arafat as a murderous thuggish ruggish terrorist. The left has Moral Compass with no bearings. It is just spinning wildly out of control.

If you read what the Left says as carefully as Victor Davis Hanson did, that is certainly true. I say this to you because you plainly do not bother to read almost anything linked here, or the longer posts for that matter.

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
If you read what the Left says as carefully as Victor Davis Hanson did, that is certainly true. I say this to you because you plainly do not bother to read almost anything linked here, or the longer posts for that matter.

Seriously, why can't Dingell just admit that Hezbollah is evil?

Why does he need to qualify it?

If the modern day left was in power during WWII we'd all be goosestepping and speaking german now. I like gewurtraminer and a little reisling from time to time, but overall that is not a palatable reality to me. Why can't the left find morality? Why do they hate G-d?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Penske_Account
Seriously, why can't Dingell just admit that Hezbollah is evil?

Why does he need to qualify it?

If the modern day left was in power during WWII we'd all be goosestepping and speaking german now. I like gewurtraminer and a little reisling from time to time, but overall that is not a palatable reality to me. Why can't the left find morality? Why do they hate G-d?

Why can't Rush Limbaugh and Hanson and Diane and Slave and you just admit that Dingell didn't say what you all are attacking him for? Why do you need to keep attacking him? In the middle of a war, with Islamo-fascist terrorists trying to kill us, why do you all spend so much time villifying honorable Americans for no good reason? Why do you care more about trashing political enemies than about fighting the war on terror?

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Why can't Rush Limbaugh and Hanson and Diane and Slave and you just admit that Dingell didn't say what you all are attacking him for?

I admit that he didn't say that Hezbollah was unqualifiedly an evil terrorist outfit. Is that what you were looking for?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Penske_Account
I admit that he didn't say that Hezbollah was unqualifiedly an evil terrorist outfit. Is that what you were looking for?

You, too, can sign up for Spanky's reading comprehension course. If you get him to play poker while he's doing his teaching, you just might come out ahead.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Adder
And you dont' think this is all just a pretext for (1) trying to make it less convenient to smoke in the hope that fewer people will do it (you do agree that actually smoking increases cancer risk, right?), and/or (2) getting rid of an otherwise annoying and impolite behavior (i.e. smoking indoors and around others)?

A pretext is a lie.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
A pretext is a lie.

What do WMD have to do with smoking restrictions?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
Why do you think I sent you to Medline and the actual Surgeon General's report instead of some reporter's synopsis of the same studies? At the very least, read the conclusions at the end of each chapter of the Surgeon General report (hint: especially adult respiratory) to bolster your own position instead of shouting back that science is wrong. Scientific study is all about the fucking details, trying to parse which of a gazillion different factors is likely to lead to a specific result.

And you're so hyped up on lung cancer that you're forgetting all of the other health problems that have an association with tobacco smoke, including environmental tobacco smoke, like asthma, COPD, CHD, a variety of other cancers and reproductive problems. I'll talk to your oncologists if you talk to my pulmonologists. If a person doesn't have a genetic predisposition to lung cancer, he or she may very well have a predisposition to one of the other nasty, expensive to treat diseases that tobacco smoke exacerbates. And then I have to pay for his or her healthcare costs through increased insurance premiums or Medicare / Medicaid, and that's when it becomes a problem that I care about.

I understand your point. My problem with the way medicine offers conclusions is that its very reluctant to admit the socially unpalatable finding implicit in its research (you're probably not going to get a disease from 99.9% of the things you do until you're quite old). The findings are always subtly geared toward making the readers as hyper-vigilant as possible, which, I think, actually causes our taxes to go up. Frivolous visits to docs and E/Rs are a fairly sizable chunk of medical costs each year.

I also have a problem with dumbing down data for the public. Why not tell Joe Shmoe he probably won't see any problems from weekend binge drinking or an occasional suntan or cigarette? It's true. Why do we always inflate the dangerous aspects of things?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
What do WMD have to do with smoking restrictions?

That linkage creeps me out. Do we have to dumb everything down for the average American?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
That linkage creeps me out. Do we have to dumb everything down for the average American?

What do you mean "we," kemo sabe?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
What do you mean "we," kemo sabe?

That's rather open ended, isn't it?

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
But he clearly is saying that (a) he opposes violence, and (b) some negotiated settlement is necessary for peace. If you read (a) and nonetheless think he does not distinguish between Hezbollah and Israel, then you need Spanky to tutor you in reading comprehension.

He clearly (i) refused to condemn Hezbollah when given the opportunity and (ii) proceeded to treat Hezbollah and the State of Israel as if they have some moral equivilency.

You're getting caught up in trying to knock Hanson - an always excellent read in my opinion - and ignoring the implications of Dingell's viewpoint. That somehow, the terrorists and Israel are on equal footing.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
I understand your point. My problem with the way medicine offers conclusions is that its very reluctant to admit the socially unpalatable finding implicit in its research (you're probably not going to get a disease from 99.9% of the things you do until you're quite old). The findings are always subtly geared toward making the readers as hyper-vigilant as possible, which, I think, actually causes our taxes to go up. Frivolous visits to docs and E/Rs are a fairly sizable chunk of medical costs each year.

I also have a problem with dumbing down data for the public. Why not tell Joe Shmoe he probably won't see any problems from weekend binge drinking or an occasional suntan or cigarette? It's true. Why do we always inflate the dangerous aspects of things?

I'm noting that you said this the next time the fat debate comes up. We've got a major obesity problem in this country because people don't think that extra donut is going to have an impact one way or another. And yeah, they're probably right about the single donut.

But then, the causal link between obesity and morbidity is about as tenuous as second hand smoke and cancer, so no worries.