My letter to Jon Stewart

[GamezRule]

Actually, he is one of the only Republican's I actually like, although, I still wonder why the Tea Party liked him so much, probably just because he was a republican with a shot at Ted Kennedy's seat.

 

[Tacitusitis]

Yeah, fudgingg lefties going out and getting shot, just to discredit our Sarah! Disgusting, it's just not cricket!

Why is no one paying attention to the REAL VICTIMS

in Wasilla

 

[Camikaze]

I find the letter in the OP rather self-defeating. In the process of criticising the right for making wild claims, the point of the entire letter is to make one itself. It reads pretty much as 'tsk tsk look at all those naughty people and their rhetoric on the right, they're fascists!'. That's ridiculous. And I think that's precisely what Stewart is getting at with what may sometimes appear to be a conflation of the two sides. Even if we think that it's the right that is causing all the problems, in what way is it productive to point fingers and call names?

Now, I disagree with Stewart in that I think it's important in this situation to acknowledge the political climate and its influence or even the plausibility of its influence and look for some accountability for those that are responsible for it, but that doesn't mean you have to condemn 'the right' as a whole. It's about individual accountability. That is where I think the OP fails.

 

[Ayatollah So]

And this is why it can be frustrating to read moderates apply this "false equivalency" try to rise above it all, when all you do is throw yourself inbetween reasonable and non-reasonable. The average between a neutral and a negative is a negative.

This. So much this. I was going to add one point, but Mark1031 beat me to it (see below, I promise it's worth reading).

I kind of look at what Jon [Stewart]'s doing as the role of a mediator. To try and maintain some sort of middle ground or agreement between two sides you need to display a level of neutrality and give and take.[...]

I'd rather he take a role closer to a referee. And you don't make yourself a good referee by trying to call an equal number of penalties against both sides.

You cannot paint the other side as all evil and expect them to join you in a handshake. Some folks seem to be missing this nuanced point.

Both sides' leaders need to tell their supporters to put weapons down, before a handshake is in order. Some folks seem to be missing this nuanced point. If you reach out a hand while the other leader's right-hand man is brandishing a sword, you might lose an arm.

You see, the problem is that demagoguery is effective. People by and large don't understand the details of policy and it is much easier to drive decisions based on emotion rather than reason-this is a biological fact. What is "hope" and "change" after all except vague appeals to emotion? As one side employs more and more heated and demagogic rhetoric without paying any political penalty then that will be a self reinforcing behavior and eventually the other side will become equally heated and demagogic. Thus, perpetuating the notion of equivalence and calling on calm from both sides rewards the most egregious violator and leads to perpetuation of the behavior.

I have nothing to add to the above thread-winning comment. I just wanted to see it in print one more time.