oddsox, - “Is this the Andrew Sullivan article to which you refer?”

-

No. If you read my post you’ll see I referred to last weeks cover of Newsweek. “Why are Obama critics so stupid?” 

I would have wagered the cover-story written by Shenon.

IMax & Shenonymous:
Is this the Andrew Sullivan article to which you refer?
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/01/15/andrew-sullivan-how-obama-s-long-game-will-outsmart-his-critics.html

I don’t know IMax.  I don’t take Newsweek.  What is it about?  Guess
that is a qualified No.

Shenon,

Are you responsible for this week’s Newsweek cover story?

You’re right oddsox, inequality and inequity are not the same thing,
at least not exactly and distinctions ought to be made for sure by
columnists.  But I’ve found many journalists do not have good
command of the language.  Posters on blogs, are more forgivable, as
they tend to be uneducated and more provincial when it comes to the
finer moments of semantics and making finer linguistic distinctions.

But inequality and inequity are abstract concepts.  They are ideas and
ideas are abstractions.  Until you actually measure two things, which
are concrete, not abstract, you cannot determine their inequality. 
Since all dictionaries find these words synonymous, out of context to
be sure, to see their diaphanous difference, equality and equity need
to be defined first since it is the lack of these that makes conditions of
inequalities and inequities.  The meaning of the word equality includes
reference to the ideas of impartiality, symmetry, and balance.  Equality
also means having the same status, rights, and opportunities.  Outside
of its financial association, which has a definite meaning of financial
opportunism, equity, otherwise, is an indefinite or blurry a term but is
similarly defined as a quality of being fair and impartial.  And so, as
fuzzy a term, inequity most often means injustice by virtue of not
conforming to rules or standards in unfair circumstances. 

When we talk about inequality it is usually related to the comparison
of large groups and the differences between life opportunities and
systemic discrimination of one segment of a population to another
that has more advantages.  There is associated with inequality harms
that are essentially corrosive, if not completely destructive, to the overall
well-being of a disadvantaged group.  The notion of fairness is attached
inextricably to the exercise of inequality.  The question of fairness must
always be asked when there is a charge of inequality.  And there is a
principle of justice involved in the idea of equality and inequality. 
Furthermore, all identified inequalities are considered inequitable. 
Justice has to do with ethics and it is both justice and ethics that needs
to be emphasized when discussing inequality, but perhaps not so much
with inequity. 

I work and have limited time to put into the forums as much as I’d like
but I am interested in your amiable willingness to dialogue on certain
ideas that are pertinent to our political situation which I think is serious
and urgent, even grave with the auspice that Republicans are putting
phenomenal amounts of money into taking control of this, our, country. 
I think their further influence in the government would be wretched and
destructive of middle America even more than they already have affected
it.  This needs to be overturned.  While the “list goes on and on,”  I think
we cannot solve all of our nation’s problems at one time, and particularly
in blogtalk.  To be effective as individuals, we need to choose our battles
and work on one or just a couple at a time, and find ways to implement
our conclusions to improving things.  No?

Re: IMax

Your comment:“Your support for Obama puts you in this case, far to my right,”

So… according to you, after I linked to the Mother Jones site, the Talking Points Memo site and the John Nichols article and MSNBC, you claimed me a radical because (according to you) these sites weren’t “more moderate”. Now since I support Obama you are claiming that you are to the left of me….?

Nope. You are a hack IMax. But then, that is obvious is it not? Typical right winger nonsense.

“So…. if I support Obama(which I do), doesn’t that put you exactly where I said you were? You seem confused.”

-

I sincerely have no idea what that means. 

I too supported Obama.  That ended his first year in office with a policy to end water-boarding and decrease a need for detention by increasing summary executions ten fold.

Your support for Obama puts you, in this case, far to my right, you Limbaugh loving, Bill O’Reilly hugging, maniac.

Or is it your hypocrisy I am detecting?

Re: IMax

Your comment:“That places me proudly and decidedly to your right on most issues.”

So…. if I support Obama(which I do), doesn’t that put you exactly where I said you were? You seem confused.

btw IMax, you can ignore the rest of the post… I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself attempting to read more than 100 words

-

I appreciate that.  I’ll give your first two paragraphs their proper due.  So be succinct.

You need to expand your knowledge-base, outraged. I am liberal in nearly all circles.  You are what the 99% refer to as radical.  That places me proudly and decidedly to your right on most issues.  To be succinct: You’re stuck on stupid if you see people such as myself as Limbaughesque.  The man is a loathsome sort.

Re: IMax

Seems kind of strange that someone, such as yourself professing to be liberal would find moderates or conservative views so much more to your liking? I ask you IMax, what’s wrong with this picture? (btw IMax, you can ignore the rest of the post… I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself attempting to read more than 100 words)

More from the RADICAL REPUBLICANS:

“Gingrich says: “One of the things the Congress should do immediately is defund the National Labor Relations Board.” Not to be outdone, Romney is airing a new ad in South Carolina that declares: “The National Labor Relations Board (is) now stacked with union stooges selected by the president.”

Santorum, who has tried to present himself as an ally of working Americans with talk of renewing our manufacturing base, is as militant as Walker when it comes to attacking the collective bargaining rights of public employees. “I do not believe that state, federal or local workers … should be involved in unions,” says Santorum. “I would actually support a bill that says that we should not have public-employee unions for the purposes of wages and benefits to be negotiated.”
http://host.madison.com/ct/news/opinion/column/john_nichols/john-nichols-walker-appeals-to-gop-s-labor-bashing-zealots/article_44cde623-bf1d-5b05-92f1-0e2f60b3ab73.html

According to this article it appears that Romney is contributing to Walker’s campaign and Newt said he’d campaign for Walker. Mr. Nichols clearly shows what zealots the current Republicans are. In the past, Republicans supported unions, but not these new RADICALS.

Outraged - “Well… you certainly are the most UNLIBERAL liberal I’ve ever read..”

-

Begin frequenting more moderate blogs and Web sites.  You’ll see just how radically out of touch you are.

Here’s an example of how OWS keeps itself in the public eye.

Smoke Bomb Thrown at White House

TIME? - 3 hours ago
18, 2012 WASHINGTON (AP) — As hundreds of Occupy protesters massed outside the gates of the White House, an apparent smoke bomb was thrown over the fence ...
507 related articles

-

I cant get through every word in your posts.  I find myself largely disinterested after about the second paragraph.  Do keep posting for others if it pleases you.

Re: IMax

Your comment:“Look, I too am liberal.  At the sametime I would think myself foolish to ignore that the largest percentage of Americans listen to Limbaugh on the radio, FOX News on television and identify themselves at moderate to conservative.”

Well… you certainly are the most UNLIBERAL liberal I’ve ever read…...ah, nope… I don’t believe it at all. Your constant complaining, misinformation and bashing of OWS is blatant. Here again, you put in your little plug for Fox News and Limbaugh both of which have fallen drastically in their ratings. They suck (and lie), yet you claim that “the largest percentage of Americans” listen to them. NO, they don’t. You do this claiming to be realistic, but that is not realistic, it is bogus.

Your comment:“You point to a million signatures (as yet formally authenticated) out of a population of three-hundred-and-sixty-million as what?  A trend toward my liberalism?  Your outraged radicalism?”

Again, you’re blustering for the crooks. No IMax it is a tremendous amount, roughly the amount of votes Walker received to become governor.

From TPM:
“In their announcement, the party boasted of numerous measurements of the total collection of petitions: That they number 300,000 pages, weighing a total of 3,000 pounds — or two Holstein milk cows, in this dairy-producing state.

As a percentage of the electorate, it also surpasses the 32% that Ohio Democrats collected last year to trigger a referendum against Gov. John Kasich’s similar anti-public employee union bill — and in the previous two gubernatorial recalls in American history, the 23.4% collected against Gov. Gray Davis in California in 2003, and the 31.8& against Gov. Lynn Joseph Frazier in North Dakota in 1921.”
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/01/wis-dems-make-it-official-one-million-signatures-collected-to-recall-walker.php?ref=fpb

Yep. We made history yesterday and we’re going to continue. One thing you might want to keep in mind…. I’m not the radical, WALKER IS.

But where was this back-stabbing governor of ours when the petitions were delivered… he’s was OUT OF STATE drumming up cash from his criminal alliances.

MoJo:
“Tuesday’s Walker fundraiser, first reported by the New York Daily News, is hosted by no less than Hank Greenberg, the former CEO of American International Group, the global insurance corporation that needed $150 billion in bailout funds in 2008 and 2009 from the Treasury Department and Federal Reserve….

....Out-of-state donors accounted for almost half of that money, according to campaign finance records. The biggest donor to Walker’s recall defense is Bob Perry, the Texas homebuilding magnate and who bankrolled the infamous Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign that caused trouble for Sen. John Kerry’s 2004 presidential bid. Perry gave $250,000 to Walker. Other top Walker backers are Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, who own the Uline shipping company and chipped in $205,000, and Foster Friess, a Wyoming-based investor and frequent GOP donor, who donated $100,000.”
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2012/01/scott-walker-recall-new-york-fundraiser

Btw, my point with this and its relationship to OWS is that it was about THE PEOPLE. THE PEOPLE did this… and it was THE PEOPLE at OWS, it is THE PEOPLE who make the difference and create the change. And it is the people who matter. It doesn’t surprise me that this point was lost on you…. of course, I was celebrating last night, there was a little of that going on in Wisconsin last night.

Yep…we are happy in Wisconsin today, but we are only halfway there….we will not let up, Walker is a crook (like his accomplices) he will be booted out of the governors mansion. Period.

Shenonymous, Hi.
I was trying to be brief with my first post, but here’s more detail, as you request.

The point of the post is that Inequality and Inequity are not the same thing. 

That’s important because they are being widely used interchangably by columnists and posters here on TruthDig and elsewhere. 
And that’s not only leading to honest confusion and misunderstanding, but it also gives rise to deliberate deception by some who are pushing their particular agenda. 

Nor are Inequality and Inequity both abstract ideas, as you claim, She.

Inequality (or disparity) can be measured objectively.  It’s an absolute—either 2 or more things are equal or they are not.

Inequity (or injustice) adds the element of fairness. 
We can agree on what constitutes what is fair. 
Or we may honestly disagree. 
Much discussion and debate occur over inequity.

The topics at hand are income/wealth disparity and free market capitalism.

Wealth/income disparity illustrates my point.  The facts I’ve seen convince me there is Inequality and it’s growing.  I accept the Gini Coefficient data.
But the Gini Coefficient statistic measures Inequality, not Inequity (or injustice, as one TruthDig poster wrongly stated).

On Free Market Capitalism.  I accept—in fact embrace—the notion that free market capitalism produces Inequality. 
But I reject the notion that it’s Inequitable (or unfair) on its face.

So you can see, before any discussion can advance further (to topics of global competition, advanced technology, crony capitalism, unfair lobbying practices, subsidies, monopolistic practices—the list goes on and on) there has to be an acknoweledgement that inequality and inequity are distinct.

Don’t you agree?

Outraged,

I assume you were trying to make a point.  I will freely admit that point alludes me.

Look, I too am liberal.  At the same time I would think myself foolish to ignore that the largest percentage of Americans listen to Limbaugh on the radio, FOX News on television and identify themselves at moderate to conservative.

You point to a million signatures (as yet formally authenticated) out of a population of three-hundred-and-sixty-million as what?  A trend toward my liberalism?  Your outraged radicalism?  I think not.

OWS is struggling to remain relevant.  Without the accompanying violence and vandalism the American people barely register Occupy’s voice today.

But WAIT…..! If you act now, there’s even more…..check it out:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/46032812#46032812

Walker goes to his crooked “friends” for “support”. It won’t work.

Re: IMax

Your comment:“This current cycle will be relegated, by and large, to the ‘coffee houses’ and internet cafes at a time when 95% of the population is working and pursuing each his own goals and aspirations, regardless of the intellectual needs of the idle few.”

How…soooo ....like you.., to consider the latte drinking liberals (btw, I knew you’d bite on that one…doh!) whose aspirations, at least according to you… supposedly ring hollow. HEY, how about a WAKE UP CALL…....!  Specifically, MEANING TO RAISE MY VOICE.....check this out.

From MoJo:
“It’s on in Wisconsin.

On Tuesday afternoon, the grassroots group United Wisconsin collected more than a million signatures in the past two months to trigger a recall election of Republican Gov. Scott Walker—nearly twice the 540,208 minimum. That’s almost as many signatures as votes Walker received in his 2010 gubernatorial election (1.12 million), and hundreds of thousands more than the 720,000 signatures Walker predicted on Rush Limbaugh’s show Tuesday.”

But WAIT! There’s more, check this out:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#46033323

Wisconsin is happy tonight. Oh yeah….

“a discussion of economic fairness and justice that will be hard to squelch,”

-

Or, more realistically speaking, these are the very same discussions which have been debated, bantered, and tried for the past 200 years.  In cyclical fashion discussions delving into ‘Social Harmony’ ebb and flow in popularity.

Today’s resurrection of these subjects has been brought on by the recent economic downturn and correlating high unemployment.  This current cycle will be relegated, by and large, to the ‘coffee houses’ and internet cafes at a time when 95% of the population is working and pursuing each his own goals and aspirations, regardless of the intellectual needs of the idle few.

OWS, the latest incarnation of social re-engineering, is laboring to remain relevant.

The Powers That Be don’t give care a fig about ideological squabbles. They know how to sock away the wealth and all they care about is buying off enough pols to make sure that governmental regulation won’t hamper them at that task. They love to see a divided populace feuding over ideals that, in the final analsyis are meaningless—and ignorning them. Politics is a TV show. It’s entertainment. The real business of business is not being televised. Wake up: they are ALL your enemies.

In regard to opening “a discussion of economic fairness and justice that will be hard to squelch,”
how come the Republican ignoramuses get credit for that, Mr. Robinson?  Way before that, the Occupy Wall Street 99% forced Wall Street to admit they existed, and that really did “open a discussion (nationwide) of economic fairness and justice that wil be hard to squelch.”  At least let’s hope so!
But give credit where credit is due, please.

ok, folks, let me brag—- and big to boot.
must i be THE ONLY ONE [is it on entire planet, i wonder?]
who notes and often posits the following:
talking solely about the symptoms; i.e., forever and a day describing accurately or inaccurately events, does not elucidate.
and that’s why ALL members of the sacerdotal class; nearly ALL politicians, educators, MSM columnists in usa use only that type of
language; i.e., descriptive.
note, please, that just because its descriptive it doesn’t mean that it is accurate/adequate.
in fact, in usa it never is!
i often call that linguistic behavior: positing sensationalism sans causationalism.
and if one would ‘know’ everything, one would in fact know nothing unless s/he knew the causes for events.
true, we cannot know all causes or causative factors for, say, ‘stupidity’, ‘worthiness’, poverty, etc.; however, we can postulate
them and for an invent such as war [really theft of land by violent means] we actually know the cause.
it is thus the postulating or positing causes that is always omitted in all media, schooling, congress, etc.
isn’t cancer or poverty caused? and we do not know causes of many cancers; thus, we only treat the symptoms.
poverty, too, is caused. the cause for it is the THOUGHT; i.e., meritocracy or division of people into, broadly less and more valued,
deserving, etc.
and who can now prove that THE FIRST CAUSE FOR ANYTHING IS WRONG, UNJUST, ETC?
I CANNOT. alas, this is the nature of all self-sealed dogmas: you can live forever and not ever prove them wrong; thus, safety in
keeping them.
and judging by how much money is spent on arms and maiming, killing people, one can safely conclude that at least 98% of
americans believe that cancer is ok.

Ralph Nader was the average person’s only real progressive - look at his track record and past performance and his education - he was the one that the 99% should have chosen instead of the Republocrats which I think this president more than any other has shown that there’s little difference between the two ‘parties’ once in power. Ralph is much like the NDP in Canada who are now the official opposition party. Americans need someone who speaks for them.

Shenonymous,

Who elected you to decide what type of discussion occurs in the truthdig comments section?

What proposals have you offered here? I don’t see you offering anything.

Brooking study that showed that virtually no one who
graduates from high school, works at a job and doesn’t have children until after getting married end up in
poverty

http://www.brookings.edu/papers/2003/09childrenfamiies_haskins.aspx

Also rhetoric bpawk.  You throw everything into a barrel and hope
you’ve said something, but all you’ve done is dumped the dirty
clothes out on the floor.  Take each thing you said and really say
something about it.  No one is denying the Democratic politicians
in Washington have a hand in the problems we face.  But the liberal
view is the one that champions the people not corporations.  Exactly
how would your third party, unnamed so far, handle the problems?
No one really says.  There is just a lot of sophistry expelled with a
lot of hot breath.

Why just attack the Repubs? After all it was Clinton that help deregulate the financial industry. You have to blame both parties for the mess as they both governed and did nothing to equalize the society (Obama today has continued with Bush’s tax breaks for the wealthy, foreign wars, erosion of civil rights, corporate welfare bailouts, hired the same Wall Streeters to run his administration etc.) Both are to blame - that’s exactly why you need a third party. The call now is to create that otherwise you will get 4 more years of the same, no matter who you ‘choose’.

“We have failed to keep pace with other industrialized societies
in public education; and rather than offer relevant retraining to
employees displaced by innovation and globalization, we leave them
to their own devices.” – ER

This political philosophy is the very foundation of the Republican/
Libertarian mentality.  We need better arguments against it.  The
case is not being made well enough for ordinary people to understand
that the Grim Reaper is at the door for a country of ignoramuses. 

” What’s lost in the discussion is the distinction between inequality
and inequity.” – Oddsox

Then start a discussion by giving definitions to both of those abstract
ideas.  Just saying something is lost is affected rhetoric.  What do
you mean by inequality and inequity?

What’s lost in the discussion is the distinction between inequality and inequity.