David Re.. He does the same crap he does with me -- provides no support for his statements, you come back and give him detailed replies, and he again responds with unsupportable positions.
He does that, and I debated whether to include both of you in that post. However, some of your posts at the end were getting sad, and to say nothing about them would have meant I thought just Ted was going overboard in the exchange.
I'm not sure a "Holier than Thou" attitude is called for
You asked the other day how one would know, Ted knew he was wrong in a debate. Well, how do we know when anyone loses a point in these online or any other debates? The guy losing, loses all rationale. When Ted posted he wasn't into mind games, does that make any sense? That is exactly what a debate is, a mind game. If you aren't into mind games, then go on a site where you can play tiddly winks all day. And in some areas Ted is very good at mind games. Playing the stock market is nothing but a mind game, and Ted seems very good at that. I just wish that he would use some of the talents he shows there in his political side. At any rate, by saying he wasn't into mind games, and quiting the debate, Ted was just saying uncle. Was I too smug over getting Ted to say uncle; perhaps. In fact Ted has mentioned it before, but I am an old man who doesn't change habits easy, so please accept my mea culpas, and I will try to tone that down.
What is funny here, you offered a $100 dollars if anyone could point to a post where Ted conceded. There it is. He just conceded that point of the debate to the guy he called not so bright and pretty ignorant less than a wk ago. I will take a cashiers check only <g>
From my perspective, I think you could do quite well here if you would change a few things.
1. Don't hold on to extreme positions too often. Extreme positions can be attacked from the fringes. Better to start from a more moderate positions, and concede the fringes. Example, not every person killed by the Israeli army can be defended as necessary collateral damage. Stress the other side that all terrorist bombings are unnecessary and as history shows, detremental to the cause. That is your main point, stick to the main point and concede the fringes.
2) You degenerate too many discussions into bipartisan arguments, instead of arguing on its merits only. Case in point. The Jimmy carter 1994 agreement. According to this article http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/DL25Dg01.html Jimmy Carter, under his presidency, and as Bill's negotiator, perpetuated what he and every president since 53 has done, which is contain NK until it collapses of its own dead weight. GW is simply continuing that policy, by waiting NK out. Let NK do all of the posturing it wants; all of the extremist nuclear holocaust threats will just make Russia and China abandon NK that much faster; and at the end of the day, Kim looks like another Saddam, and Gw looks all the saner by comparison. The point is, you cant't win them all. Concede the smaller points, and win the big one, I.E. GW is proceeding now just as all of the other presidents have rationaly and sanely.
3 You don't quite have the patience to know when the other guy is getting belligerent, and calmly and rationaly put on the finishing touches. You tend to also go ballistic, when in fact, that is the precise time to calm it down. I do it occasionly, and it can be a hard habit to break, but it is quite often the diff. between the winners and losers.
4) Not only you, but everyone one this thread seems to be debating on a small scale basis, when the problems we are discussing are much larger than that. Mayabe it is just me, but I think we could eliminate a lot of the bipartisan wrangling, if we would elevate the discussions above that if possible. Case in point. The discussions about Iraq and Yugoslavia, have broken down into bipartisan shouting matches, instead of being in favor of intervention, or not. Frankly, it should make no difference who is president, intervention or not is the question. All presidents have to look at both the micro and the big picture. We should look at it that way, also.
Now I am sure you and others will have points to help with my debating skills or my bedside manners; (Too windy, too mouthy, too smart ass, too republican,???)fire away. |
