Yeah, that's a real stretch, must be a slow news day.
US Presidential Election: Tuesday November 6th, 2012
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I thought British politics was embarrassing until I moved to America. Takes the cake over here.
Never have I seen such a huge swarth of people (the republican base) vote against their own self interests.
Never have I seen such a huge swarth of people (the republican base) vote against their own self interests.
Is this a joke, or are people seriously claiming he was on the verge of saying 'the government nigger/nigga'?
I despise Santorum as much as anyone else, but that's clearly bollocks.
I was about to say that I'd wait for the Messi of phoneticians (and staunch liberal), Mark Liberman at Language Log, to give his verdict before absolutely ruling it out, but he already has...er, sort of.
I wouldn't leap to that explanation, but it COULD be a brain-fart... and what on earth would bring about that start of a word that he broke off, what could he possibly have thought and then corrected... in terms of trying to figure it out from context, I'm at a loss... I'd say that's fair enough... even if saying that that's definitely what he was going to say isn't.
And considering some of the stupid offensive shit that's come out of his mouth, could you really blame anybody for thinking it might be the case? ;P
I hear that said a lot, and I've said it myself. And yes in many cases they surely buy some version of trickle-down.
But it carries a big assumption, which is that people's only interest is their economic status. But lots of poor Republican voters are also ultra-nationalists, Christian fundamentalists, libertarians, bigots, or a mixture of the above. There's realistically only one mainstream party for them, and if that means the rich don't pay their fair share, well they may be alright with that.
I definitely agree with your reply. It is the only logical explanation for their voting patterns.
So, amid calls from the Obama campaign for Romney to release his tax returns from the 80s (and rumors that he used a tax shelter), the Romney campaign gives a rather odd deflection:
...I'm sorry, WHAT? Are you simple?
...I'm sorry, WHAT? Are you simple?
I think you're still selling many of them short. Sure there are plenty of those sorts in the ranks, but it is actually possible to be a republican for principled and thought out reasons. I don't happen to agree with them, but that's not to say I'm right. I've got a buddy that's gone all republican on me. He's smart, poor, not bigoted, not ultra-nationalist, vaguely religious etc. He presents reasoned arguments that unemployment is best handled by helping business interests etc. You know the talk. I don't agree with it, but I don't assume he's an idiot for thinking it. He obviously understands that according to the common notion that as a poor fellow he is indeed voting against his economic interests, but he doesn't believe the government should be engineering this sort of thing. Encouraging employment is about as far as he sees a proper government reach.
Not having a go at you. It's just that those labels you were slinging around are bit loaded.
Is this a joke, or are people seriously claiming he was on the verge of saying 'the government nigger/nigga'?
I despise Santorum as much as anyone else, but that's clearly bollocks.
I was about to say that I'd wait for the Messi of phoneticians (and staunch liberal), Mark Liberman at Language Log, to give his verdict before absolutely ruling it out, but he already has...er, sort of.
I don't see what's so implausible about it. Government nigga is a phrase that exists and is quite plausibly (lets not kid ourself, is) used in GOP circles (though you'd hope not at such a high level)..As Liberman says, I'm at a loss as to what else he could possibly have been about to say that required a correcting.
Admittedly there's a case of liberals looking for controversy, and that should be factored. But it's certainly plausible.
brad..what you mean is there are many GOP voters who are misinformed or just dont understand the issues.
How many of their voters are even educated?
How many of their voters are even educated?
If anyone uses it, it's Santorum.
Is this a joke, or are people seriously claiming he was on the verge of saying 'the government nigger/nigga'?
I despise Santorum as much as anyone else, but that's clearly bollocks.
I was about to say that I'd wait for the Messi of phoneticians (and staunch liberal), Mark Liberman at Language Log, to give his verdict before absolutely ruling it out, but he already has...er, sort of.
I don't think anyone is seriously claiming he was about to call him a nigger/nigga. I think it's just amusing that it sounds like he almost did. Perhaps some are hoping that he'll issue a denial for more amusement.
No, I honestly believe it's possible to be a well reasoned and principled republican. Honestly there's a large part of me that feels embarrassed having to say that as for me it's part of the self-evident truth of opinion. That so often gets lost these days though as one side sees the other as stupid, idiotic, and all those other words that get tossed around.
For me it's a more generalized level of reasoning.
1. For so many political issues, I don't think anyone is either wise enough, or has the necessary exposure to the facts to be able to unequivocally know the truth. Given that, I reckon I need to be double damned sure whose opinions I may choose to denigrate. So it's particularly worrisome for me that so many should feel free to so casually pronounce their certainty of the truth, and at the same time breezily declaring opposing views to be ignorant.
2. Again, for so many political issues I think we, the media, and the political system mistakenly pretend that an issue has but one of just 2 answers. Left/right, conservative/liberal, right/wrong dichotomies. I don't know if it's a mental convenience, a political ploy, or just better for ratings. Whatever it is though, I consider it a folly that trivializes the answers and cheapens the discussions. These issues are treated like buttons or switches, when I usually see them more as sliders. Given that, it's easier to imagine a whole continuum of reasoned opinions, not just the learned-wise vs the ignorant-idiots.
Sorry for this all being so pedantic. Again, as I write this it really comes off as obvious to all of us. It just seems that in the artificially fanned (media, parties, internet) flames of political discussions, this all gets a bit lost.
So anyway, republicans... like the liberals that I tend to line up with, I've known some smart ones and some absolute bellends. I don't agree with where they tend to stand on most issues, but I don't think it's because they're necessarily stupid. Also I'm well aware that given my likely imperfect exposure to the facts I could well be wrong.
Coming at it from another end, there are friends I agree with on politics, but I can see that they just don't have the slightest idea what they're talking about.
I swear to Giggs I'm not meaning to have a swipe at you either. Honestly. I read your posts and I line up eagerly with you almost all the time. I think I tend to have a go at the generally like minded as they sort of represent me in a way, if that makes any sense. If the repubs want to go clowning around spewing nonsense, devaluing their brand, then have at it. Like everyone else here, I'm sat back with the popcorn positively gloating at the show of this pack of mongrels challenging Obama. 4 more years!
Thanks for your thoughts brad.
I work with a bunch of very well educated republicans. The owners of the company and many of the heads of departments are all republicans. They all know I am a democrat but I love those guys. We get on like a house on fire. But I fundamentally disagree with them on economics. Almost all of them dislike the demonisation of the President. They also are embarrassed by the Tea party crazies.
I put down the main reason them being republicans to them being brought up as republicans. For me it was obvious I would lean to labour. I grew up loving the great music of the 60s..and that music was closely tied to the great events happening in America that went on to influence the whole world. Of course the main political names of that period were JFK, Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. I grew up admiring these great men.
For me there was never a doubt I would be a democrat the moment I came to the US.
Simply put, the main difference I see between the parties is, the Democratic party is more about ordinary people and being 'inclusive'. The GOP is not about either.
That is why my hope is the changing demographics will help pull the GOP to the middle...and reasonableness.
I work with a bunch of very well educated republicans. The owners of the company and many of the heads of departments are all republicans. They all know I am a democrat but I love those guys. We get on like a house on fire. But I fundamentally disagree with them on economics. Almost all of them dislike the demonisation of the President. They also are embarrassed by the Tea party crazies.
I put down the main reason them being republicans to them being brought up as republicans. For me it was obvious I would lean to labour. I grew up loving the great music of the 60s..and that music was closely tied to the great events happening in America that went on to influence the whole world. Of course the main political names of that period were JFK, Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. I grew up admiring these great men.
For me there was never a doubt I would be a democrat the moment I came to the US.
Simply put, the main difference I see between the parties is, the Democratic party is more about ordinary people and being 'inclusive'. The GOP is not about either.
That is why my hope is the changing demographics will help pull the GOP to the middle...and reasonableness.
People definitely are.
He was either going to say nigger and stopped mid word, say another word starting with nig and decided against it or he randomly and involuntarily made the nig sound.
Unless I'm missing something, the first option seems the most likely to me and many others.
You're missing something. Why would Santorum say something that would cause him to lose any chance of winning the nomination. Does he have history of making racial epithets ? These types of insinuations reflect far more poorly on those suggesting he was going to say something like this, than anything Santorum himself as done.
Assuming he was about to say nigger it would've been an accident (as in, he didn't consciously plan on saying it), hence stopping himself mid word.
"If you disagree with me you're racist"
You're assuming he was going to do something based on what ? Why would he say such a thing ?
He was describing Obama. Obama is black. My best guess for why is that he calls black people niggers sometimes in his mind and it slipped out into his speech.
So far the only evidence we've established against him saying the n word is that it would be bad P.R, but him stumbling on the word shows that if he was about to say it it wasn't planned. So what evidence is left? "He was saying something else" is a good argument if we had alternative ideas to what he was going to say but we don't.
Why would you guess such a thing ?
The most compelling argument against of course is that the speech will have been written and unless he was riffing, it's unlikely to have included that. They're not that stupid.
They have pre-written talking points and depending on the candidate, they either read off notes or teleprompter or paraphrase the substance of what was rehearsed.
It's only fair he gets caught up in a completely ridiculous scandal that he shouldn't be (it's unfathomable of course he was about to say nigger), after the way he skated through 'I said blah not black'-gate without even fully admitting the stupid campaign rhetoric he got caught out on.
I don't know why people think it's unfathomable. I think it's perfectly fathomable.
Based on what ? Does he have a history of making racial epithets ?
Did Ron Atkinson?
I'm not saying he did, and to be honest it's far more rational to think he didn't, but he's the supposedly respectable end of a party who're still claiming Obama is a birth certificate doctoring muslim house nigga. I don't see why it's unfathomable.
I'm not saying he did, and to be honest it's far more rational to think he didn't, but he's the supposedly respectable end of a party who're still claiming Obama is a birth certificate doctoring muslim house nigga. I don't see why it's unfathomable.
He has a history of being a complete fecking idiot, is what he has a history of.
I think it is by this time entirely apparent that whether or not Santorum regularly uses racial epithets in private or not, he is almost entirely incapable of realizing when he is saying something COMPLETELY STUPID:
I have absolutely no problem believing that the filter in the human brain that tells a candidate for office not to call the President a nigger is not fully functional in Rick Santorum's brain. Hell, this isn't even the first time he's said something stupidly racist ("I don't want to make black people's lives better by giving them your money.") and then rather pathetically tried to walk it back after (he claims he said "blah people.")
You have to start with an assumption that Santorum is racist, which isn't even remotely proven. Its more like unimaginative wishful thinking by people who don't want to engage on substantive issues.
I start on the assumption that his party is racist, and that him being prone to flippant lapses of language regarding it isn't unfathomable. I'm not convinced he did though.
That's a bad assumption then.
I wouldn't rule out it being written as something like 'government bureaucrat' and him having a brain fart with the word 'nigger'. Who knows. Either way Mockney, he didn't actually say it, like Muamba didn't actually die. So, yeah, whatever.
Because he said nig and I'm trying to figure out why.
Just because a politician hasnt proven himself to be racist doesn't mean he isn't, particularly if he's right wing, and holds many ridiculous views on other subjects.
He probably tripped over his words. These politicians are tired from months of grueling campaigning and are beginning to lose focus.
Well that's what I meant by "And yes in some cases they surely buy some version of trickle-down" before going onto the others. I wasn't suggesting they were all fundies and bigots by any means, my point was that you can be poor, not much like low taxes for the rich, but still vote Republican for mainly cultural reasons.
Yeah having read the comments on that thread, I wasn't aware that 'government nigger' was an actual phrase.
Still, it's pretty out of context here as he's talking about being anti-war, it would be totally bizarre and incoherent (but then this is a Republican primary) to pivot from anti-war to food stamps/race-hate and then straight back to America's image abroad.
Again the context seems weird. He's talking about Obama as an anti-war candidate, talking America down abroad. I'm just not sure how, even for a racist, 'nigger' is going to start intruding on his thoughts there. 'Liberal', maybe.
I'm quite persuaded by the 'peacenik' explanation - he has that in mind but skips straight to 'government' and then gets interference. Then again Prof Liberman seems convinced that it's a /g/...
Santorum was listing Obama's characteristics, it sounded like this to me "anti-war, government neh...geh...America was a source of division around the world..."
My first thought is that he was going to say 'American needs to get out of Iraq' but his handlers told him not to phrase it that way or some such, so he was trying to change it to something more vague like 'source of division' which only hints at the wars. So he stumbles over 'need' and 'get' and you get 'neh geh'.
But i could be wrong. He's certainly thick enough to be a racist.
My first thought is that he was going to say 'American needs to get out of Iraq' but his handlers told him not to phrase it that way or some such, so he was trying to change it to something more vague like 'source of division' which only hints at the wars. So he stumbles over 'need' and 'get' and you get 'neh geh'.
But i could be wrong. He's certainly thick enough to be a racist.
Isn't it just wonderful that we're sitting here talking about a very serious candidate to the Presidency of the United States, and while we're pretty sure he probably didn't almost say nigger, we can't rule it out?
well putMost likely he was starting to say "negotiator(with terrorists)" but stumbled over his words. Or, he just stumbled and his mumbling was neh-gah-um before continuing.
But it would be way funnier if he were saying "nigger."
But it would be way funnier if he were saying "nigger."
Government negotiator?
It's Santorum. He's berating Obama for being anti-war. What a douche Obama is for not having a hard-on for war. It doesn't have to make sense because Santorum doesn't.
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