“Does this make sense in the real world? No. But this is the world of politics.”
—CNN’s Carol Costello, editorializing—as usual—while ridiculing a Republican—as usual. Her target was Rep. Michele Bachmann’s recently announced endorsement of former rival Mitt Romney, now the presumptive GOP presidential nominee.
The ethical values that “make no sense” to Carol Costello might fill the Pacific Ocean.
Does it make sense for competitors, once the competition is decided, to shake hands, reconcile, and behave professionally? Not in Costello’s world. Is it absurd, when two members of an organization have made their individual passionate pitches to supervisors regarding the reasons why they, and not their rival, should receive a major promotion, for the losing employee to promise, and deliver, full support and cooperation to the winner of the job? To Costello, it is. Should loyalty to an organization and the goals of that organization trump the bitterness and animus of prior arguments and disputes, allowing former adversaries to work together? Costello’s answer is no. It makes no sense to her.
It makes no sense to Carol Costello because she has no comprehension of what professionalism is, why graciousness, mutual respect and compromise are critical to any organization’s ultimate success, or that mature, serious professionals do not regard competitive advocacy as personal affronts. It makes no sense to her because she is not professional, and cannot comprehend what ethical professional conduct is. Her statement that Bachmann’s willingness to support the rival she opposed while advocating her own candidacy “makes no sense in the real world” demonstrates her Costello’s inexcusable ignorance of the real world, the status of which she presumes to analyze daily for the viewing public. What makes no sense is that CNN tolerates such smug foolishness from its anchors.
I am no fan of Michele Bachmann, her values or her abilities, as any regular visitor here knows. In this matter, however, Bachmann shows that she understands professionalism, loyalty, humility, respect, cooperation and compromise infinitely better than the foolish CNN anchor who dares to mock her for it.
_________________________________________
Spark: Carol Costello. I heard her say this, gagged, and ran upstairs to my computer to write the post.
Graphics: Wikipedia
Ethics Alarms attempts to give proper attribution and credit to all sources of facts, analysis and other assistance that go into its blog posts. If you are aware of one I missed, or believe your own work was used in any way without proper attribution, please contact me, Jack Marshall, at jamproethics@verizon.net.
Ethics Alarms 
I can’t disagree more.
You’re comparing running for the nomination to seeking a promotion at a job. You say the ethics in the end result should be the same. Okay, but that only works if the ethics in the runup have to be the same, too. If you were a supervisor, what would you do with an employee who viciously attacked their supposed coworkers? What if they then made nice afterwards? You’d fire them for being a horribly unethical. This wasn’t “Here’s why I’m the better choice” it was “Here’s why I’m God and my opponent is the devil.” You can’t come back from that kind of rhetoric without admitting that you were lying the entire time.
In this matter, however, Bachmann shows that she understands professionalism, loyalty, humility, respect, cooperation and compromise infinitely better than the foolish CNN anchor who dares to mock her for it.
What Bachmann actually showed was viciousness, hubris, condescension, and patronization. No matter what she said or did, she thinks she can make it all better by saying she now supports the winner. Poof, everything she has said and did in the last 10 months is gone.
That unethical behavior should be called out, not celebrated.
I have to agree with tgt on this. Bachmann’s actions now don’t show her understanding of those concepts, only that she can toe the company line. What she possibly has shown is that she would prefer a man to be president whom she has drug through the mud than the current sitting president. It’s not an understanding of the items you mention, it’s an understanding of PR strategy.
Unfortunately, these candidates were playing by the rules of the 1990s rather than the rules of 2012, which should account for archived internet videos.
“Towing the company line” is nothing but a pejorative phrase for “doing what’s in the best interest of the organization.” What’s the alternative that You and Costello suggest? Sabotage? Continued abuse? Lifetime resentment? A spiteful third party run? I don’t get it.
I attempt to mend fences and be collaborative with most people I have professional disputes with, once they are over. The ones I respect cooperate, and sometimes quite wonderful things result.
So even though you think your coworkers policies are socialist and anti-morality, you’d back them? You don’t need to endorse someone to work with them.
Well, would I expect a losing GOP candidate for president to pledge loyalty to the elected President, or to move to Canada? There are obviously points at which even professionalism must yield to strongly held personal principle, but that should occur only in extreme cases. I worked hard and loyally for an exec at an association whom I disliked, didn’t respect, disagreed with in virtually every respect philosophically and politically, and he was abusive to me to boot. But I made him look good, and did a terrific job for my constituency, the members. (He fired me eventually anyway.) It was still the right thing for me to do.
Loyalty != endorsement. If you need to equivocate like that to make your point, you’ve already lost.
Again, You lose me. Endorsement in a political party is a requirement of loyalty.
Why in the world do I have to endorse a political party to be loyal to the president?
Now YOU’RE confused.
Reread what you wrote. I am only confused that you think you have a coherent argument and valid examples.
So much for sportsmanship, eh? I don’t know what resentful planet you and Costello are on, but on this one, when the battle is over, professionals don’t hold grudges, and work together for the common goal.
I’d also point out that while Bachmann lied repeatedly during teh campaign, she was not especially abusive to Romney or anyone else, and he ignored her almost completely.
I believe in sportsmanship. What upsets me is that you think the behaviors I called out are consistent with sportsmanship.
I didn’t say that, as you know. But agreeing to support an adversary is humility, not hubris. She knows her support, given her status with the extreme GOP right, is a gift to Romney, and comes at some political risk (Cognitive dissonance always works two ways). If you you’re saying her support is “viciousness, hubris, condescension, and patronization,” that makes no sense—it is part of the process of amends and reconciliation. If you’re saying her previous conduct was “viciousness, hubris, condescension, and patronization”, I don’t think that it was, and if it was, so what?
I was saying her previous statements showed viciousness (which I now have to retract). The hubris, condescension, and patronization came in part from her prior statements and in part from the belief that she can make it all go away. Again, I was wrong on the merits of her statements, so my conclusion doesn’t apply to her.
If you did not think that calling your opponent evil and being vicious wasn’t sportsmanship, than your comment about sportsmanship is just a non sequitur. It doesn’t reply to what my argument was. My argument had invalid premises, so it didn’t hold up, but that doesn’t excuse your inappropriate attack.
Agreeing to support an adversary on it’s own is not humility or hubris. The hubris was in thinking she was above basic logic and prior statements. Without finding the comments I could have sworn Bachmann made, I’m now in agreement with Tim against you. Bachmann is cheerleading for her “team”, even though she doesn’t actually back their beliefs.
I’m completely confused.
Sportsmanship is the conduct of being gracious and supportive to the winner. Was the contest itself sportsmanlike? Maybe not–I don’t know what the standard of “fair” combat in campaigns is anymore. Apparently it’s whatever the public will tolerate. There was a time when a President who used a pure military operation as a campaign weapon (after saying he wouldn’t “spike the ball”, no less) would be universally viewed with horror.
Who called whom evil? If you mean that in general that is the patina Fundamentalists like Bachmann put on other religions, I’m not sure it’s germane…she may think Romney is evil, but she never has said that in public.
What evidence is there that Bachmann doesn’t back her own “team”? She’s an outlier on the team, no doubt, but given that there are only two viable teams to choose from, again, I don’t see your point.
Sportsmanship is not just about winner or loser. You know this, as you immediately discuss it, but you discuss it in the wrong terms. What we consider the standard of “fair” in campaigns isn’t the basis of what is and is not good sportsmanship. It seems to be fair to lie about your opposition, but nobody should consider that good ethics or sportsmanship.
Into the next section, you seem to be beating a dead horse. I’ve already said my premise was flawed, but that’s irrelevant to your bringing up sportsmanship. Either you attacked me with a non sequitur or you have an incredibly screwed up definition of sportsmanship. Since further discussion shows your definition of sportsmanship is only somewhat screwed up, it looks like you used a non sequitur.
Bachmann was on record 2 months ago as saying she will back whoever the nominee is. If the nominee was Ron Paul, she’d back him. Her backing has nothing to do with policy and everything to do with “team”. It’s crap, and should be called out for being crap. Backing candidates because of their team is horrible. They should be backed on the basis of their ideas.
1) I’m not attacking anybody, nor do I regard disagreements here as “attacks,” and I wish you’d stop using that terminology. I don’t feel attacked. Should I?
2) It is, rather, the contention that one’s support of an organization’s goals cannot and should not ethically take precedence over individual disagreements with other members of the organization that is “crap.” I expect an actor to take my direction for the good of the show whether he agrees with it or not. Your formula would make functioning, ideologically diverse organizations, including national governments, impossible.
3) Since Costello’s comment had nothing whatsoever to do with the campaign tactics past, I have been dealing with the only application of sportsmanship that is relevant to Bachmann’s endorsement. If you are saying that past bad sportsmanship precludes future good sportsmanship toward the same adversary, that is self-evident nonsense.
1) Since when is calling me resentful not an attack on me? Are you getting squeamish on military terminology now. Should I use euphamisms instead?
On occasion I have attacked you, not much and not intentionally, but it does occur, and I’d support your calling it out. Normally, just like you, I attack arguments and ideas.
2) I don’t know about that. I feel there’s a line here. Bachmann can still support her goals and the organizations that generally agree with her (though, she does seem to attack the GOP as much as support it) without cheerleading for group identification over ideas. What Bachmann is saying is “I support Romney because he’s the Republican” not “I support Romney because I think he would a better President than Obama.” She made that clear early on.
3) Your comment clearly lumped me in with your reply. Maybe that was your mistake.
1) Since I didn’t call you “resentful”. I evokeda metaphorical planet in which being resentful was encouraged, since that’s what I thought you were arguing for—that Bachmann was obligated to continue her resentment of Romney after the battles was over. I’ll retract that, though, since now I have no idea what you think you’re arguing for.
2. Bachmann, like Gingrich et al. is saying BOTH “I support Romney because he’s the Republican” AND “I support Romney because I think he would a better President than Obama.” Santorum, in one of his rantings, appeared to contradict the latter late in the game, and then recanted.
3. I don’t acknowledge any mistake.
1) Bah. You didn’t say “You are resentful”, but you called me resentful plain as day. I don’t know what idiotic planet you are on, but on this one, we understand that phrases can have implied meaning. You’re not an idiot, but you can’t complain that I misrepresented what you said.
I’m arguing that pushing for the team over ideas is bad, even if it’s commonplace. Just like how in Basketball, grabbing at a player’s jersey where the refs can’t see is wrong, even if it’s commonplace
1. I did not call you resentful. I assumed your reading comprehension was superior to that. You argument, I felt, was in favor of lingering resentment as a legitimate motive not to be sportsmanlike for Bachmann and presumably others.I said you were pro-resentment, “clear as day.” Why would you have to be resentful to be pro-resentment. I am not a gun owner, but I am pro-gun ownership. I am not an investor, but I’m pro-investment; I’m not running for office, but I encourage it. There is no way you can twist my words to mean that I was accusing you of being “resentful.” Resentful of what?
2. The post was about one thing, and an obvious one. Costello, an idiot, stated flat out that in the “real world” it makes “no sense” for hard adversaries to bury enmity and support each other after the contest is finished. She–is–wrong. In the professional world, part of the real one, this is standard. It is also right, ethical, practical, wise, and necessary for groups and individuals to be productive. Costello doesn’t understand that—I guess you don’t either. You both appear to prefer that feuds, disagreements and harsh rhetoric should be the cause for vengeance, snubs and enmity forever. Why you think this is proper or vaguely sensible I cannot begin to comprehend. I understand why she may think that, she’s a dope. You aren’t, so it’s puzzling.
1) You’re denying the common meaning of an English phrase. When you talk about someone being from an “{adjective} planet”, the plain English meaning is that you are acalling them {adjective}. Maybe you missed those 12 years of grade school where this was a common taunt, but it’s also pretty common in current political discourse: planet wingnuttia, for example.
You may not have thought you were calling me resentful, but that’s what your words directly implied. I’m not twisting them at all.
2) First, the contest ISN’T over. You keep comparing winning the primary to earning a job or completing a contest. This is not valid, as their are more steps before you get to that result. Second, but related, you’re equivocating on the word “support”. Working for your boss without enmity and supporting that they are the leader is very different from supporting someone in a political contest. The first, as you have said, is both necessary and ethical. The latter, on the other hand, is neither necessary for a working political system nor ethical.
I don’t believe that “feuds, disagreements and harsh rhetoric should be the cause for vengeance, snubs and enmity forever.” That generic statement is just wrong. I do believe that if you don’t agree with someone’s positions, you shouldn’t pretend you do just because you want your “team” to win. That’s disingenuous and unethical. If the Yankees beat the Red Sox in the post season, you wouldn’t expect the Red Sox to support the Yankees to win the World Series, but you’re claiming that doing so not only makes sense, but is actually necessary.
That’s not the best example either, but it’s better than your completed contest comparison.
I can’t and won’t discuss this as long as you keep defaulting to the false accusation that I referred to your post as partisan because you disagreed with me. Since my post was and is not partisan, that makes no sense. I called it partisan because you were declaring the ethical transgressions of one party as clearly worse than the other. That is by definition partisan and biased, because only bias can lead lead anyone to honestly believe such evident nonsense. I said the comment was partisan, because it is partisan. One advantage of the middle is that you can see equally well in either direction, and I recommend it heartily.
I can’t and won’t discuss this as long as you keep defaulting to the false accusation that I referred to your post as partisan because you disagreed with me.
Your words: “The intransigence is on both sides, and only a committed partisan would refuse to see and/or admit it. That’s no fallacy. There is no substantive difference between the dishonesty and lack of integrity in the two parties. Thinking otherwise is a dead certain marker of bias.
I stand by my statement.
I called it partisan because you were declaring the ethical transgressions of one party as clearly worse than the other. That is by definition partisan and biased, because only bias can lead lead anyone to honestly believe such evident nonsense. I said the comment was partisan, because it is partisan. One advantage of the middle is that you can see equally well in either direction, and I recommend it heartily.
First, I didn’t say the ethical transgressions of one party are clearly worse than the other; I said that one party is more often guilty of one specific transgression.
Second, calling out that one party does some things worse than the other is abolutely not by definition partisan or biased. That only works if you recalibrate reality to what the party’s say and do. I believe in an independent standard of ethics, not one that is relative.
You’re in the middle of the two parties and you can equally see in each direction? I’ll concede that, but because you’re looking at them from inside the situation, your result is skewed by your frame of reference. The middle is not necessarily fair or even. You keep claiming it necessarily is, and this is patently untrue.
Of course it seems patently untrue to you, just as Christians will say that atheism is patently ridiculous. I would think, however, it is obvious that when you think of one side as “us” and the other side as “them,” objective analysis is, if not impossible, damn near to it.
You’re analogy is again wrong. The midway point between two poles is not necessarily a fair or even point. That’s what my argument is.
Here’s a clearer example for you. Take 2 sets of people: those that believe blacks are subhuman and deserve no more rights than animals and those who believe blacks and whites deserve the exact same rights. It’s patently absurd that the middle position between these two poles (that blacks get half the rights of whites) or any position between the two poles (that blacks get some but not all the rights of whites) is fair and even.
That’s what my comment said. I was not saying that the behavior of the republicans was patently absurd.
Also, I don’t think of the democrats as “us”. That tribalism is something I make pains to avoid, and I think there’s evidence for my ability to separate that out in my comments at ethics alarms. I attack bad arguments and bad ideas no matter who says them.
THAT’s an even worse analogy. Being in the middle between two flawed ideologies is nothing like that. I’m not in the middle in dozens of individual issues that lie in one camp or the other…that’s not the same as the ideologies themselves, both traditional, core positions dating from the nation’s founding and continuing the argument with no chance of resolution. The objective is balance, and demonizing one side or the other jeopardizes that. One needs foxes AND hedgehogs, and, ironically, they need each other.
The point I was making was that the middle ground is not necessarily the fair ground. I took it to the extreme to illustrate the point, I am not saying the republicans are pure evil and the democrats are good and true. The two parties vary in their platforms and actions. At some times, the middle is true and fair. At other times, the true and fair point can be considerable closer to either side, or even past one of the sides (*cough* executive power *cough*). This also is a multidimensional space, so the fair point can be in different spots between the poles in different cases.
You claimed that claiming one side is better than the other is necessary biased and partisan. As I’ve described above. That’s not true. It is often a something said by partisans, but it is not inherently partisan.
Now, I absolutely agree that demonizing one side or the other jeopardizes the ability for fairness and balance. That’s been my position. The right has been demonizing non-demonic positions, and increased intractibility is a logical consequence of this.
To keep things fair and balanced, we have to call out behaviors that are unethical and dangerous. I called out one unfair behavior that I believe one side does more than the other, and that that behavior directly contributes to a specific issue. Instead of determining if I’m right to call the behavior unfair, or if it contributes to a specific issue, or that it occurs more on one side of the aisle than the other, you attacked my position as partisan, as you believe both parties are roughly equivalent in negative qualities generally, a comment that, whether true or not, has nothing to do with the issue that I brought up.
Only one elected official has specifically used the term “demon” to describe Republicans, and did so without a peep from leadership: Maxine Waters. Other Democrats, notably Joe Biden, have come very close. Previously, another House Democrat, again without sanction or criticism from leadership, said on the House floor, “Republicans want you to die.” Citing Republicans as the leaders in demonization proves my point completely. I hear Democrats say that Republicans are better at being “ruthless,” and conservative pundits say the reverse–and mean it, as I’m sure you do. When one is sufficiently biased, objectivity is literally impossible, which is why I sometime write posts from what I think is a biased position from the opposite perspective that I see. And, with luck, you’ll never know which ones.
Nothing you said contradicts any of my points. You use “both sides say such things about the other” to claim that since I say something like what the partisan’s say, I must be biased. That’s not valid logic. Instead, you have to look at what I said and whether it reflects reality. The strong language on the democrats side is mostly accurately representative of the republican positions. The war on women language is an accurate representation of the attacks on planned parenthood, women’s reproductive rights, and the fair pay reauthorization. Calling Obama a Muslim terrorist, saying he wants to bring down this country, saying that all people opposed to a war are unpatriotic, calling any criticism of the president during wartime treason, that’s actual demonization.
So long as you keep doing the he said / she said ruckus and not independently analyzing statements and decisions, you’re going to continue to come up with results that are not reflective of reality.
My, what a narrow, twisted and vengeful universe you live in! BTW: Mrs. Bachmann never called herself God or Mitt Romney the Devil. Those allusions exist only in the Tiggy Continuum.
I was corrected and retracted said comments over a month ago.
My apologies, TGT. I was going through a batch of old, missed mail like crazy yesterday and obviously failed to take in the full context.
Your comment may apply to Newt and Santorum, but not Bachmann. She ran a stupid campaign and a dishonest campaign, but not a vicious one, and again, Romney never laid a glove on her.
The ethics of political campaigns are different than the ethics of job campaigns, and also different from the ethics of other adversary settings, like trial. Yet in all three, after the resolution, peace and harmony must reign.
You seem to be endorsing the attitude that has made the Hill unworkable, with members of the opposing parties unable to cooperate or be civil with one another. I’m surprised
I’ll take the criticism that Bachmann was actually somewhat tempered in her attacks, and that seriously undermines my point.
I do though strongly denying that I’m endorsing the Republican intransigence. I’m actually calling it all out. The problem isn’t that they aren’t turning the switch from competitor to coworker, it’s that their competitor switch is tuned to unethical evil.
What? Isn’t that just rapid partisan rhetoric I detected? What exactly are you referring to?
Absolutely not. You’re taking the fallacy of the middle. The intransigence is on the republican side. The rhetoric from that side is also significantly more out of touch with reality than such from the left. A spade is a spade.
What I’m saying is that when you demonize your opponent for trivial or things or things where there is legitimate evidentiary disagreement, you can’t then compromise on those things.
The intransigence is on both sides, and only a committed partisan would refuse to see and/or admit it. That’s no fallacy. There is no substantive difference between the dishonesty and lack of integrity in the two parties. Thinking otherwise is a dead certain marker of bias.
BS, BS, BS. The democrats have shown their willing to compromise when the republicans aren’t backing dangerously insane position. The republicans have shown that they won’t compromise on anything. Stop with the both sides do it. Also, stop with the no true scotsman fallacy. If I don’t agree with you, I must be partisan.
Stop moving the goalposts. We haven’t been talking about dishonesty and lack of integrity.
There is plenty of evidence that republicans have been calling sensible positions evil to a greater degree than democrats have. Do you deny what I actually said, or would you like to jump somewhere else to create a new false equivalence?
Just take this and read it back to yourself. It’s utter, utter nonsense. Simple example: there is no way to fix the debt without increasing taxes, and no way to fix the deficit without cutting entitlements. To argue one party is more “intransigent” than the other takes industrial strength blinders.
More false equivalence. The democrats agree that we can fix the deficit by cutting social programs, but cutting those programs is neither good for the economy nor for those who need those programs to more than technically survive. Most of the republicans agree that we could fix the deficit by increasing taxes, and were perfectly willing to do so in the past. There argument is not based on principal or the weighing of what is good policy for the nation.
I’d like to know what I wrote that is utter nonsense. Can you point it out to me? The part where I called out your various fallacies?
You are partisan because the absurd position that the Republicans are any more obstructive or “evil” is by definition a position that only a hyper-partisan can hold. Moving the goal-posts! The post wasn’t about a partisan issue at all; an adversary in the same party endorsing the winner after a campaign is typical, unremarkable, and appropriate. You identified no fallacies. Your “true scotsman” cant is old and ill-used. I keep extensive files on outrageous conduct by both the parties, and avoid writing on many of the worst ones because I don’t want to end up with a zombie readership of ideological hacks, and because this is not a political blog. The Democratic file is a bit bigger right now, just as the GOP file was bigger when that party held both houses and the Presidency, or two out of the three, as the Democrats do now. I haven’t written about Obama’s website attacking private citizens by name for giving money to Romney, but that’s mighty close to “evil.” I haven’t written about the President’s excessive use of taxpayer funds for blatant campaign appearances. In the past few days, the Occupy movement has smashed windows, messed up cities, and killed a few people, all with the explicit support of the Progressive Congressional Caucus, all Democrats, and Nancy Pelosi. I think that’s worse than anything the GOP has done lately. So is siccing gangs on George Zimmerman while trying to rig his trial, as the 100% Democratic CBC has done.
Your claim regarding the Democrats and compromise is risible. All accounts of the “super-committee” report that the impasse was bipartisan. It was Obama, not the Republicans, that rejected Simpson-Bowles—though I’m sure the Republicans would have done so too. Even reliable liberals like Ruth Marcus and Dana Milbank pronounced Obama’s budget proposal a cynical fraud, intentionally pre-empting compromise or serious dialogue with the Republicans in order to have a campaign talking point. The Democratic majority Senate has refused to pass a budget for three years, which is an abuse of power and irresponsible—no GOP Senate has ever done that. I think refusing to push harder to rescue the Syrians is really close to “evil,” and is Democratic through and through.
I’m sure I can make an equally damning list for the GOP, but that’s not my point. The point is, again, that if you really believe one party is significantly worse than the other, is more irresponsible, dishonest, corrupt, misguided, stupid or untrustworthy, then you are paying selective attention.
The post in question was not a political post, and I’m not going to be egged into off-topic partisan debates that force me to defend a position I don’t stand for. I’m just answering your question: “nonsense’ is the contention that either party has been more obstructive or “evil” than the other.
You are partisan because the absurd position that the Republicans are any more obstructive or “evil” is by definition a position that only a hyper-partisan can hold.
No. No it’s not. You’re buying into the both sides are equal fallacy. We had a discussion recently about republican opposition to Obama compared to other party opposition to past Presidents, and that discussion showed your error. You don’t have a standard of reasonability separate from the party’s positions. You take whatever the party’s positions are as the default poles, and work off of that, instead of determining if those positions are actually sane.
Also, I haven’t been calling republican positions “evil” in this post. I noted that they are inappropriately making their opponents out to be evil over legitimate policy decisions.
Moving the goal-posts! The post wasn’t about a partisan issue at all; an adversary in the same party endorsing the winner after a campaign is typical, unremarkable, and appropriate.
Yes, you did move the goal-posts in this sub discussion. What the original post was about does not bear on this point. We’re still working on the original post in other sub threads, and I have not moved the goalposts of what I demand in that discussion.
Since you brought it up here, endorsing the winner of the primary is typical, and considered unremarkable, but it IS remarkable because it actually IS inappropriate in some cases.
Your “true scotsman” cant is old and ill-used. I keep extensive files on outrageous conduct by both the parties, and avoid writing on many of the worst ones because I don’t want to end up with a zombie readership of ideological hacks, and because this is not a political blog. The Democratic file is a bit bigger right now, just as the GOP file was bigger when that party held both houses and the Presidency, or two out of the three, as the Democrats do now. I haven’t written about Obama’s website attacking private citizens by name for giving money to Romney, but that’s mighty close to “evil.” I haven’t written about the President’s excessive use of taxpayer funds for blatant campaign appearances. In the past few days, the Occupy movement has smashed windows, messed up cities, and killed a few people, all with the explicit support of the Progressive Congressional Caucus, all Democrats, and Nancy Pelosi. I think that’s worse than anything the GOP has done lately. So is siccing gangs on George Zimmerman while trying to rig his trial, as the 100% Democratic CBC has done.
I call a spade a spade, and you did commit the true scotsman fallacy. You claimed that anyone that disagrees with you must be partisan. It didn’t matter what the evidence to the contrary was.
From there, none of your examples actually apply to the situation at hand. The discussion was about demonization of the opponent for legitimate policy decisions. Whichever side has done more “evil” things is irrelevant, so I’m not going to bother playing tit for tat.
Your claim regarding the Democrats and compromise is risible. All accounts of the “super-committee” report that the impasse was bipartisan.
This is the same error from before. If one side has an unreasonable position and the other side has a reasonable position, no compromise can be made, and that does not condemn both sides equally.
It was Obama, not the Republicans, that rejected Simpson-Bowles—though I’m sure the Republicans would have done so too. Even reliable liberals like Ruth Marcus and Dana Milbank pronounced Obama’s budget proposal a cynical fraud, intentionally pre-empting compromise or serious dialogue with the Republicans in order to have a campaign talking point.
I’ll aggree on the rejection fo Simpson-Bowles, though I believe that was solid strategy at the time, as any position obama supports has been immediately opposed.
I call BS on your comments about the budget. Again, judging it on it’s own, not in comparison to the republican position, shows the budget to be partisan, but not highly so.
The Democratic majority Senate has refused to pass a budget for three years, which is an abuse of power and irresponsible—no GOP Senate has ever done that.
Because no GOP Senate has ever had to get 9 votes from an opposition party who is being unreasonable. Until 2009, simple majorities have passed budgets. Thanks for making my point for me.
I think refusing to push harder to rescue the Syrians is really close to “evil,” and is Democratic through and through.
And, again, is irrelevant to our discussion.
I’m sure I can make an equally damning list for the GOP, but that’s not my point. The point is, again, that if you really believe one party is significantly worse than the other, is more irresponsible, dishonest, corrupt, misguided, stupid or untrustworthy, then you are paying selective attention.
I claimed that one party is more intransigent than the other, and my evidence for that is solid. Your denial is based on changing the definition of reasonable. I also claimed that one party demonizes their opponents inappropriately more than the other. You have still not responded to that claim, choosing to respond to a strawman of my position. I agree that both parties are dishonest, corrupt, untrustworthy, and often both irresponsible and stupid, which is, again, irrelevant to what I claimed.
The post in question was not a political post, and I’m not going to be egged into off-topic partisan debates that force me to defend a position I don’t stand for. I’m just answering your question: “nonsense’ is the contention that either party has been more obstructive or “evil” than the other.
Do you remember how we got here?
You: “You seem to be endorsing the attitude that has made the Hill unworkable, with members of the opposing parties unable to cooperate or be civil with one another. I’m surprised”
Me: “I do though strongly denying that I’m endorsing the Republican intransigence. I’m actually calling it all out. The problem isn’t that they aren’t turning the switch from competitor to coworker, it’s that their competitor switch is tuned to unethical evil.”
Let me try to rephrase what my original point was. Vicious and unethical campaigning paints the winner into a corner. If they claim their opponent’s position is evil in the primary, they can’t then compromise on the position later. Bachmann was a step down from that level of campaigning, but her comments with respect to Romney’s positions makes her support of him now look silly. The fix to this situation is not to pretend like campaign comments don’t matter, but to not make hyperbolic political comments. That’s the unethical behavior.
The US properly allied itself with the Soviet Union against the Axis. There was nothing unethical about that, in such a context. “The team” was the human race.
Allying is not endorsing. Argh.
In politics, endorsing is allying.
Why? Why is it true for politics but not for governments?
I wish I could hear the quotation in context, because reading it above, I found it objectionable on altogether different grounds. I assumed a resigned tone in the speaker, and thought the comment unethical because it was tacitly accepting that the world of politics is not, and need not be, subject to the same rules of rational behavior that apply in the real world.
That too.
So I guess Hillary Clinton was unethical for accepting the job as Secretary of State, then. Did Costello ever call that out…?
–Dwayne
Accepting a job in an administration is not the same as endorsing someone just because they are in the same tribe as you.
Maybe Bachmann is angling for a job in a Romney administration.
Sure, and just because something is thought to be effective doens’t make it right. It also doesn’t make Dwayne’s comparison any more valid.
I agree, but in ethics as in politics, pragmatism can be puzzlingly odd.
Since Bachmann called Romney a “frugal socialist, ” a “crony capitalist,” pointed out that his Massachusetts health care plan was the blueprint for the Affordable Care Act, and said he couldn’t win, it would have been more ethical for her to not endorse Romney, since in her opinion he and Obama are nearly identical. I agree her criticisms were not viscious, but endorsing him is a step too far and shows blind obedience to Party and obliviousness to the possibility that Romney being Romney will change his positions on everything in order to win. I’m sure it killed her to do it and there was probably a lot of pressure put on. Newt’s endorsement is going to be the interesting one.
“Newt’s endorsement is going to be the interesting one.”
Newt’s endorsement won’t be worth the gas passing over his vocal chords.
I meant interesting in the astronomical unethicalness of it.
I’m sorry, Jan, in professional advocacy, such invective just doesn’t reach the level of moral obligation. I have been in court where lawyers I knew were pals in private life sneered at each other and characterized the arguments of the adversary as “outrageous,’ “trickery,” “deception”, “sleight of hand”. Hillary Clinton said that Obama wasn’t qualified to be President, yet joined his team, as she should have. You should read some of the flamboyant speeches the Old Guard like Dirkson, Mansfield, and other used to give about the other side’s positions, yet they could work together on compromises and projects and laws for the good of the country.
All this untenable argument by tgt and others proves is that the partisan polarization have created a lot of people, like Costello, who don’t even understand what professionalism means.
Does one lawyer then support the opposition lawyer’s position in legal proceedings after the trial? Absolutely not.
Whether Obama is qualified to be president or not is irrelevant to deciding to take a job in his administration. At that point, he is the leader, not still just a candidate for the job.
I don’t believe my argument is untenable. If your comments paint you in a position, it’s not ethical to pretend those comments don’t matter anymore.
Graciously accepting that someone else has won the job you want and offering your support in no way requires one to abandon principled positions. IF, as Joe Lieberman did when running with Kerry, the politician also personally advocate s position that he or she had previously opposed on principle, that is something different, and on the unethical nature of that, you’d be correct.
Graciously accepting that someone else has won the job you want and offering your support in no way requires one to abandon principled positions.
I absolutely agree. The problem in your logic is that Romney hasn’t won the job.
No, but that lawyer would vouch for the lawyer’s good character and write her a letter of support were she nominated for a judgeship. That’s the better analogy.
That analogy fails because you’re going from one situation where they were rivals to a second situation where they were not. In politics, we’re in a continuation of the original situation, not a completely separate situation.
Politics is no different, as far as I can see. The rules of professionalism apply. The fact that they are seldom practiced is another issue, but complaining when they ARE practiced is bizarre.
Yuu don’t see a difference in a continuation of a situation and a completely separate Situation. Parallel to your judgeship nomination would be Romney being a finalist for the Nobel Peace Prize or some such other honor. In that case, Bachmann’s support could be ethical.
I absolutely think the rules of professionalism should apply to politics, but I think that you aren’t accurately applying the rules.
A judgeship isn’t just an honor. It’s a job requiring judgment, analysis, hard work and character. Just like being President, only easier, and for life.
If multiple people were going for the nomination of a judgeship, one of those people attacked another as unqualifed and with dangerous character deficiencies or reasoning skills, that attacker was then eliminated while the process was ongoing, and then the attacker backed his attackee because they were both prosecutors or both defense attorneys or both went to Georgetown Law, I’d call that behavior unethical as well.
When you make a parallel situation, the ethical analysis works out the same way. When you create a non-parallel situation, the ethical analysis of the situations do not necessarily match.
I think I see your perspective, but haven’t you talked about the conflict between loyalty and ethics before? Michelle Bachmann has endorsed a candidate that, in the past, has done things that are antithetical to her and the (present day) Republican Party’s beliefs. I think she has a political obligation to endorse him, but not an ethical one.
Yes, loyalty is ethically tricky, and like courage, a virtue that can and often is employed in the service or wrong and even evil. If Bachmann thought that Romney was bad for the country in comparison to the alternative, then she would be ethically obligated not to support him. If she thought he was evil, or would engage in evil—same thing. I am giving her the benefit of the doubt that she doesn’t feel this way.