Raising The Bar
It is not often that you see a blogger fisking something on their own site (unless you read Anti-Strib regularly that is) however there are times when it is necessary and today is one of them.
I put up a post yesterday on the Bureaucratic Nightmare that Sara Jane Olson (aka Kathleen Soliah) found herself in over the weekend. An anonymous commentor left the following in response to my post (profanity redacted and spelling is left uncorrected - as much as it pained me to do so)
What Anonymous doesn't realize is that he/she made my point and then opened a new one! My larger point was that the government is tasked with certain jobs and if they can not do those jobs properly why in the name of all that is holy would we give them something even more important (our health care) to be in charge of?
But Anonymous opened up another subject...the propensity of people who would rather score political points instead of reasoning an issue out. Here is a person who obviously cares about the issues who is more concerned with saying "yeah well your side screwed it up too" then he/she is about actually FIXING the problem. The larger problem here is that our government IS messed up. You have legislators who have no respect for the people....who actually believe that the people who voted them in to office are too inept or too dumb to take care of their own family. However, these hyper-partisans would rather trash the other side or attack the messenger than they are in fixing the problem.
One of the many reasons why I got into blogging was because I really would like to be able to change the level of discourse. It is part of the reason why I chose my nom de plume. I wanted to make sure that my conversations (via the blog) were held in a manner that would make my grandmother proud. I also firmly believe that if we can get past the hyper-partisanship that we will be able to solve the real problems that are facing Minnesota today.
So my challenge to all of my readers and my fellow citizens is this - raise the bar. If you firmly believe that Universal Health Care is a good thing, tell us why. If you firmly believe that the City of Columbia Heights would fall without a new bicycle bridge (HF 3226) - tell us why. If you firmly believe that money for the Crookston Ice Arena project (HF 2916) is more important than fixing failing bridges - tell us why. Don't engage in ad hominem attacks...give us the reason. It is only then that we can get to the business of fixing what is wrong with our state and our country.
Do we have a deal?
I put up a post yesterday on the Bureaucratic Nightmare that Sara Jane Olson (aka Kathleen Soliah) found herself in over the weekend. An anonymous commentor left the following in response to my post (profanity redacted and spelling is left uncorrected - as much as it pained me to do so)
And can you imagine having those people in charge of you ROADS and BRIDGES?!?!?
They'd like, be crashing down all over the f*****g place!
And your national defense? They'd be going to war against the PEOPLE WHO DIDN'T CRASH JETS INTO OUR BUILDINGS!!!
Can you imagine such ineptitude?
Holy s***, I'm glad we have people in charge who can fix our really big problems. Whew.
What Anonymous doesn't realize is that he/she made my point and then opened a new one! My larger point was that the government is tasked with certain jobs and if they can not do those jobs properly why in the name of all that is holy would we give them something even more important (our health care) to be in charge of?
But Anonymous opened up another subject...the propensity of people who would rather score political points instead of reasoning an issue out. Here is a person who obviously cares about the issues who is more concerned with saying "yeah well your side screwed it up too" then he/she is about actually FIXING the problem. The larger problem here is that our government IS messed up. You have legislators who have no respect for the people....who actually believe that the people who voted them in to office are too inept or too dumb to take care of their own family. However, these hyper-partisans would rather trash the other side or attack the messenger than they are in fixing the problem.
One of the many reasons why I got into blogging was because I really would like to be able to change the level of discourse. It is part of the reason why I chose my nom de plume. I wanted to make sure that my conversations (via the blog) were held in a manner that would make my grandmother proud. I also firmly believe that if we can get past the hyper-partisanship that we will be able to solve the real problems that are facing Minnesota today.
So my challenge to all of my readers and my fellow citizens is this - raise the bar. If you firmly believe that Universal Health Care is a good thing, tell us why. If you firmly believe that the City of Columbia Heights would fall without a new bicycle bridge (HF 3226) - tell us why. If you firmly believe that money for the Crookston Ice Arena project (HF 2916) is more important than fixing failing bridges - tell us why. Don't engage in ad hominem attacks...give us the reason. It is only then that we can get to the business of fixing what is wrong with our state and our country.
Do we have a deal?
Labels: Civil Discourse
posted by The Lady Logician at
11:11 AM
1 Comments:
You've proven THEIR point By merely asking those questions, you prove that you don't understand their brilliant and magnanimous "rule" to which they are entitled. When you in the hoi polloi even question their intellectual and moral superiority, you illustrate why you must be cared for, like it or not.
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Anonymous, at 11:44 AM
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