Republican National Convention(s)

[Dill]

(08-25-2020, 06:18 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: This is a lot of words to basically say it's ok to do it when you think it's ok to do it.  I suppose comparing someone to the Nazis would be perfectly acceptable if they were for building more highways?  Not a charged comparison at all, right?

Those "words" are actually a concise statement of a scholarly standard of independent research which emerged in German universities during the late 18th century, and was over the next century adopted in research institutions worldwide, including the US. If you can resolve those "words" into statements, you'll find nothing there "basically says it's ok to do it when I think it's ok to do it." 

So it's happening again, as it has on so many other threads (e.g., most recently, the Esper/Milley thread)--I articulate standards of analysis/judgment independent of any specific issue or political conflict so people can have a rational discussion of issues, and you cast the standards as just another form of personal bias. 

The only principle have you articulated and doubled down on, in both the old and the new forum, is that one needn't actually engage with and demonstrate understanding of opposing positions before condemning them. One can judge them before hand. Pre-judge them. Praejudicium. Prejudice elevated to an operational standard. 

As far as building highways, Ike got the idea for a US interstate from Germany--from HITLER if it comes to that. I don't recall reading whether anyone considered it a "charged comparison" if peope noted where he got the idea. Perhaps adopting that particular Hitlerian idea did not cut against the grain of American democracy the way that undermining the free press does.