Scott Walker is officially the GOP frontrunner, and the media is out for blood

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Noah Rothman:

How do you know that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has taken at least temporary custody of frontrunner status in the race for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016? Beyond, of course, the polls that show him rocketing to the front of the pack in critical early primary states likeIowa? The political press is coming down hard on him and his nascent campaign.

After three unambiguous statewide victories in a Democratic state in just four years, Scott Walker is thoroughly vetted. If there were skeletons in his closet, the media and the myriad opposition researchers scrutinizing his past would have found them by now. “Scott Walker could very well be indicted in the coming days,” the forlorn MSNBC host Ed Schultz predictedon the night of Walker’s second statewide victory. He never was.

So, the press has taken a keen interest in catching Walker in unflattering moments or making hash out of otherwise minor controversies. Rudy Giuliani was speaking at an event for Walker when he sent the political media into a manic frenzy in which reporter and pundit alike tripped over one another to denounce what they dubbed the New York City’ mayor’s callous and quite possibly racist assertion that President Barack Obama doesn’t love his country. Only now, on day five of that story, is it finally beginning to fade from the media’s focus.

When Walker refused to denounce the former Big Apple mayor to the media’s satisfaction, they pounced. “What Scott Walker did ought to disqualify him as a serious presidential contender,”Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank hyperventilated. “Clownish,” insisted Rachel Maddow Show producer Steve Benen. “Spineless,” The Washington Post editorial board averred.

And all this merely because the Badger State governor said “the mayor can speak for himself” despite conceding that his comments were “aggressive.” The press would not have been satisfied unless Walker had thrown himself upon a pyre in penitence for the sin of having attended an event at which the president’s values were questioned and his honor attacked. It was bizarre to see the political press respond to Giuliani’s remarks as though they had been personally insulted.

This episode did provide the media with the opportunity to quiz every Republican candidateabout how they feel about a politician out of office for over a decade. Despite the fact that the head of the Democratic National Committee is involved in a significant quid pro quo scandaland remains suspect of interfaith marriage and the Vice President of the United States is aserial groper, Democrats are spared association with these figures by an energetic political media.

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@George Wells: I never made a personal opinion in that comment.
Read the context of that scripture.
It exactly mirrors your issue:
What should NON-Jewish converts to Christianity have to follow from the pre-Christian parts of the scriptures?
That was a hot topic in those early days after Jesus had been killed and the church was spreading its message beyond the original Jewish audience.
Were NON-Jewish converts to Christianity supposed to go under the Mosaic Law?
No.
BUT….
ALL Christians were supposed to follow all the pre-Mosaic Law admonishments against blood, things strangled (killed without bleeding) idolatry and fornication (all things pornographic.)
There are tons of grey areas where Christians disagree with one another.
These four things, however, are not among those grey areas.

#100:

“Capital punishment is not classified as murder.”

Thank you, Redteam for actually having the courage to make an argument. And for once not diluting it with silly insults seeming designed to satisfy Renasty05.

I suspect that you are splitting hairs unnecessarily as you attempt to distinguish murdering people who you FEEL deserve being murdered under the protective rhetorical umbrella of “justice” while reserving the term “murder” for the killing of criminals the friends of whom you are afraid to offend.

Tell me again how you distinguish these two “classifications” of killing people. (It’s really boiling down to killing people, one way or another, isn’t it?)

So if a traitor sells Pentagon secrets to the Russians, he threatens the national security and it is OK to kill him because his treason JUSTIFIES murdering him, and so you get a pass to call it “justice” INSTEAD of “murder”, right?

And how is this materially different from putting a price on the heads of Illegal immigrants whose presence in the United States – by Retire05’s heroic submission of evidence to a politician proves – does similarly pose a severe and imminent threat to the national security of the United States?

As I have said before and you agreed: A society has the right to protect itself against whatever it fears, and to do so by whatever means it deems appropriate. “Justice” is defined as what is legally correct. The society defines that standard by its laws. The laws specify what is a “just” punishment. Is that too hard to follow?

Dead is dead.

@Redteam:

The issue of capital punishment is not something I have ever brought up, or addressed, here on the page of FA. It is simply a diversionary tactic on George’s part, in order to hide his own failures.

George uses the same tactics as the Marxist, Greggie. When all else fails, change the subject.

@Nanny G #101:
“There are tons of grey areas where Christians disagree with one another.
These four things, however, are not among those grey areas.”

I will gladly stipulate that yours is the better knowledge of two-thousand-year-old scripture.
I do not profess to subscribe to the letter of those scriptures.
I believe that the knowledge that has been gained since those scriptures were penned has in many cases revealed errors in the inspired word that were interjected by the men who wrote, compiled and revised them.
I disagree with your contention that all aspects of pre-Mosaic Law are inviolable. I disagree that all Christians follow the admonitions of pre-Mosaic Law unconditionally.
Redteam is parsing words when he disingenuously differentiates “justice” from “murder” in his attempt to avoid the Lord’s proscription against “murder.”
A criminal isn’t killed in a kill-or-be-killed situation. He is already incarcerated and does not significantly threaten the lives of his captors. Once in captivity, the criminal becomes a ward of the state, and his life should be preserved until HE in WHOSE NAME life is SACRED decides to take it. IF you acknowledge that life is “SACRED”, then you have to leave its taking to HIM. HE may have hinted that self-defense is justifiable, but that argument falls apart once a perpetrator is behind bars. Here is the quintessential example of where Christians disagree on the justification of “murder.” Some Christians support the death penalty and some, for the reason I have explained, do not.

#103:
“The issue of capital punishment is not something I have ever brought up, or addressed, here on the page of FA.”

Sure you did:

“What you propose is murder, plain and simple. One other item forbade by the Bible.” (from YOUR #91)

You can’t hide under the same umbrella that Redteam is taking cover under, playing a shell-game with synonyms for “murder.”
When the state says that “murder” is justified, it becomes “capital punishment”. The proposal I made included state-sanctioned, lawfully prescribed capital punishment of illegal aliens.
You can’t worm your way out of the justice in that by claiming that it’s “murder,” and then arguing that you didn’t bring it up.

@George Wells:


“The issue of capital punishment is not something I have ever brought up, or addressed, here on the page of FA.”

Sure you did:

“What you propose is murder, plain and simple. One other item forbade by the Bible.” (from YOUR #91)

Murder is an act. Capital punishment is a reaction to (punishment of) that act. Not one and the same.

You can’t worm your way out of the justice in that by claiming that it’s “murder,” and then arguing that you didn’t bring it up.

I brought up murder, an act. I did NOT bring up capital punishment, a response, or punishment, for an act.

Get back on your meds. Your thinking has become convoluted.

@George Wells:

And for once not diluting it with silly insults

Is that too hard to follow?

I notice you didn’t bother returning the courtesy. I don’t make the argument that capital punishment or shooting illegal aliens is not “killing people”.
both of those clearly ‘kill people’ but I do see a difference in the two. One is justifiable according to the laws as set by the society that it occurs in, the other is mostly getting rid of an obnoxious presence. After all, if sex is ‘just sex’ whether it’s with a man or a woman, then why not just have sex with whoever is present, regardless of sex. By that same standard, sex is sex. homosexual sex is one kind of sex, heterosexual sex is a different kind of sex. Substitute ‘killing people’ for ‘sex’ and sub murder for homo sex and capital punishment for hetero sex.

@George Wells:

Redteam is parsing words when he disingenuously differentiates “justice” from “murder” in his attempt to avoid the Lord’s proscription against “murder.”

You are incorrect. I have not used the ‘scriptures’ in my argument. I do believe that your message of just shoot illegals aliens will get rid of them or just shoot queers will get rid of them is how to deal with undesirables but then you say ‘it’s not something you yourself would do’ is your attemt to avoid the Lords’s prescription of thou shalt not commit murder. You have mentioned ‘the scriptures’ several times in your comments. I have not.

@Redteam:

Scriptures, in English, tell us that “thou shalt not kill.” That is an incorrect translation from the original Hebrew and Greek. Kill should be retranslated to “murder.” Murder is the killing of an individual with intent. One can kill and not be guilty of murder. If you kill a home invader who you find raping your daughter, that is not murder. What George proposes is murder.

There are two reasons to take a person’s life (capital punishment) according to Scriptures; murder and rape.

A bit hypocritical of George, who violates Scriptures, to try to use Scriptures in his argument, don’t you think? I suggest what George knows of Biblical laws could be put in the eye of a gnat.

@George Wells: They take you seriously–hilarious. How uptight can they be?
You think they evah have any fun?

#107:
“After all, if sex is ‘just sex’ whether it’s with a man or a woman, then why not just have sex with whoever is present, regardless of sex. By that same standard, sex is sex. homosexual sex is one kind of sex, heterosexual sex is a different kind of sex. Substitute ‘killing people’ for ‘sex’ and sub murder for homo sex and capital punishment for hetero sex.”

Whoa, Boy!
Don’t you get dizzy playing a shell game with words like that?
I got dizzy just reading it.
I haven’t got a clue what you were aiming at, but I think that you were trying to drive this “capital-punishment-is-not-murder” bus off a cliff and crash it back into a gay-sex debate – something that Retire05 is always accusing ME of doing.
Are you sure that you want to p*ss HER off?

#106:
“Murder is an act. Capital punishment is a reaction to (punishment of) that act. Not one and the same.”

You are attempting to split the same hairs that Redteam is attempting to split.
You said:
““The issue of capital punishment is not something I have ever brought up, or addressed, here on the page of FA.” but went on to say that I was proposing “murder.”

You went on to reiterate:
“I brought up murder, an act. I did NOT bring up capital punishment, a response, or punishment, for an act.”

But what I proposed was KILLING a few illegal aliens, and I went on to explain that:
“The proposal I made included state-sanctioned, lawfully prescribed capital punishment of illegal aliens.”
The CAPITAL PUNISHMENT (not “murder”) of those illegal aliens was for their “ACT” of illegal entering our country and thus endangering OUR national security in precisely the way that YOU argued that they were doing.

FURTHERMORE, your explanation that:
“Murder is an act. Capital punishment is a reaction to (punishment of) that act.”
is incorrect. Yes, capital punishment IS sometimes used to punish the crime of “murder,” but “murder” isn’t the only crime that is punishable by death.

The US Code provides for the death penalty in cases of bank robbery-related kidnapping, espionage and treason, none of which require the commission of murder. You will undoubtedly notice that the latter two of these “non-murder” capital offenses relate to threats to our national security. Now, if you are arguing that illegal immigration DOESN’T threaten the national security nearly so much as you had previously OVERSTATED, then perhaps it DOESN’T deserve the death penalty.

I was deferring to the expert testimony that YOU so generously and professionally provided to your esteemed buddy (“I did a report for a sitting U.S. Congressman, which he presented to the committee he sits on which deals with homeland security”)(thank GOD he was sitting and not standing at the time…) and I was as duly alarmed as any other civic-minded citizen would be by the dire prognostications that you offered. I wonder if you made the same “trillions of dollars” mistake in your report to him that you made in your post here on FA…

FYI: There are an additional half-dozen non-murder-related crimes (like sex crimes against very young children, hijacking a plane or causing a train wreck) that are punishable by death in some states. Capital punishment isn’t the mono-dimensional fix-for-murder that you seem to think it is.

@Rich Wheeler #110:
“You think they evah have any fun?”
LOL.
I think that this is about it for Retire05.
Redteam is another matter. Sometimes he falls off his own plate so hard I worry he might hurt himself. There is something going on then – I don’t know what – that takes him places I’ve never been. Might be fun… you never know.

@George Wells:

The US Code provides for the death penalty in cases of bank robbery-related kidnapping,

blah, blah, blah

I wonder if you made the same “trillions of dollars” mistake in your report to him that you made in your post here on FA…

Since you have NOT seen the report, how do you know there were any mistakes in it? Are you psychic, or just psychotic? Hell, I doubt you even know where to go to find the numbers. You’re just not that smart.

There are an additional half-dozen non-murder-related crimes (like sex crimes against very young children, hijacking a plane or causing a train wreck) that are punishable by death in some states.

Where did I say otherwise?

Now, I suspect you will come back with another one of your mundane retorts,.

#114:
You have so little to complain about that you need to invent issues?
You asked:
“how do you know there were any mistakes in it?”
…right after quoting me as having said:
“I wonder if you made the same “trillions of dollars” mistake.”
I don’t have to be a psychic to wonder, do I?

“Where did I say otherwise?”
In your #106, you said:
“Capital punishment is a reaction to (punishment of) that act (the act of murder.)”
I simply pointed out that while capital punishment is SOMETIMES just that, at other times it is NOT that, but instead a punishment for SOMETHING ELSE.

The point has relevance because I have made the argument – which you are desperately trying to ignore – that the illegal immigration which you claim to be such a terrible threat to our national security would qualify as a capital offense FOR THE REASONS YOU GAVE!

@Rich Wheeler #110:
“They take you seriously–hilarious.”

Yes it is.
The only POSSIBLE value of my admittedly preposterous “solution” is found in its unmasking of the abject hypocrisy of both political parties in their collective failure to effectively deal with the illegal immigration issue.

It doesn’t matter a hill of beans whether you call my “solution” capital punishment or murder because there is absolutely zero chance that EITHER political party will ever take the first significant step toward ending illegal immigration. All actions to date and all proposals so far from either side of the isle have been nothing more than pork-barrel “projects” and lip service intended to mollify constituents. The problem is not limited by our political will, it is limited by the population of Mexico.

Retire05 has done nothing but obfuscate, sending up smoke screen after smoke screen in an attempt to divert attention from the truth that, without drastic action such as I have proposed, illegal immigration will be with us forever. Since NOTHING will be done, she needs to get over that, and she needs to stop whining to ME about GOD and the Bible. Illegal immigration has nothing to do with either. It has EVERYTHING to do with the mutual failures of both the Democratic and the Republican Parties to deal effectively with the issue.

@rich wheeler:

They take you seriously–hilarious.

George makes a reasonable argument at times, unlike you whom I never take seriously. I know you’re an ex Marine that loves Obama(an obvious Muslim traitor to his country) and therefore can’t really be serious.

@George CooCoo Wells:

Don’t you get dizzy playing a shell game with words like that?

I thought you were well read enough to follow that. I’ll try to put it on a lower level at some point if you think you need it simplified.

@George Wells:

“I wonder if you made the same “trillions of dollars” mistake.”
I don’t have to be a psychic to wonder, do I?

So provide me with my “trillions of dollars” mistake. If I made a mistake in calculation, or made a mistake in typing out the numbers, I will gleefully correct my error. Now, you could also provide me with the correct information, but as I said, I doubt you are smart enough to find the information.

I simply pointed out that while capital punishment is SOMETIMES just that, at other times it is NOT that, but instead a punishment for SOMETHING ELSE.

Perhaps you should change your moniker to Captain Obvious.

As to the rest of your ranting and bloviating, you have become boring. Claim, all you want, that I “obfuscate, et al” but I really don’t care. You are a human tragedy, a dark soul that deserves no respect or given no credence. IOW, you are simply another queer obsessed with being queer. And to be blunt, a waste of time. Rant on, George, rant on, as I know you will with another vapid response.

@George Wells:

It has EVERYTHING to do with the mutual failures of both the Democratic and the Republican Parties to deal effectively with the issue.

that was one of the initial points I made about the illegal alien issue, that none of the politicians have any solution to it. None of them even care about securing the border.

#117 & #120:

Hey, ain’t this fun?
Redteam and GW agreeing on something!
“None of the politicians have any solution to it. None of them even care about securing the border.”
Right you are, Sweet-Pea!
I’m blowing you a kiss!

#119:
You made a three-decimal-point typographical error (or brain fart) that I caught and you apologized for – one of your few such acknowledgements in my experience.
As I told you before, I’m not playing your “give me the link” game anymore, as there is no way I know of to locate specific past posts, and some of them get removed from the archives anyway, so you can save your breath asking. FYI: “Categories and Archives” aren’t even loading right now.

“Bloviating”? You like that word because it starts phonetically with “blow”?

“Rant on”?

Hardly. Even Redteam recognizes that I’m speaking the truth. It is only YOU who become bored when you are proven wrong, shown to misrepresent and to lie. When you give up debating, there is precious little for me to respond to (“another vapid response”) but you have only yourself to blame. When you resort to insults, I know I’ve successfully made my point, and with that understanding in hand, I thank you for the acknowledgment.