Well, I don’t agree with Trump on this but your article points out the problem with libel laws. There is a double standard for public figures like politicians compared to everyday folk. Libel is misrepresenting facts about a person that were published and damages the person’s reputation. Libel is easier to claim ordinary individuals but very difficult for public figures. So we have entered a gray area of free speech.
“public officials and public figures (people who are famous) must show that statements were made with actual malice to recover in an action for defamation. Actual malice means that a statement was made with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether or not it was false. In addition, a plaintiff must show actual malice by “clear and convincing” evidence rather than the usual burden of proof in a civil case, preponderance of the evidence.A private person suing about a matter of private concern need only show negligence, meaning that the defendant knew the statement was false, or would have known if she or he had exercised reasonable care.”
“Trump’s smear of Ghazala Khan is despicable. And if you don’t agree, you’re despicable.”
This is an attitude I find really corrosive to political discussions and it comes primarily from the progressive left. The attitude that if you disagree with them on something, it’s because you are somehow a bad person.
Argumentum ad hominem is everywhere in politics. Sometimes people talk about politicians in terms of their personality instead of their policies.
In politics, in addition to this, you might be attacked by someone who is your friend’s enemy.
You tend to think that your enemy’s enemy is your friend and your enemy’s friend is your enemy. This mentality is not related to whether you are right or left, conservative or progressive.
What argument was included in the topic “Trump’s smear of Ghazala Khan”? Wasn’t it an argument about Trump’s temperament? You should be able to argue about it freely. Whether you have the same temperament as Trump’s is, of course, a different matter. In this respect, ColinJohnstone is right.
"A President must be disciplined, control emotions, and act only after reflection and careful deliberation," the letter said. "In our judgement, Mr. Trump has none of these critical qualities. He is unable or unwilling to separate truth from falsehood. He does not encourage conflicting views. He lacks self-control and acts impetuously." Republican foreign policy officials sign anti-Trump letter http://www.cbsnews.com/news/republican-foreign-policy-officials-sign-anti-trump-letter/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab7e&linkId=27422525
I strongly agree. Those people (inevitably on the political left) who are always looking for a chance to call someone else a bigot, are usually themselves utter bigots - as per the correct dictionary definition.
“Political correctness” is a label typically used for left-wing terms and actions, but not for equivalent attempts to mold language and behavior on the right. However, the term “right-wing political correctness” is sometimes applied by commentators drawing parallels: in 1995, one author used the term “conservative correctness” arguing, in relation to higher education, that “critics of political correctness show a curious blindness when it comes to examples of conservative correctness. Most often, the case is entirely ignored or censorship of the Left is justified as a positive virtue. … A balanced perspective was lost, and everyone missed the fact that people on all sides were sometimes censored.”
In 2003, Dixie Chicks, a U.S. country music group, criticized the then U.S. President George W. Bush for launching the war against Iraq. They were criticized and labeled “treasonous” by some U.S. right-wing commentators (including Ann Coulter and Bill O’Reilly). Three years later, claiming that at the time “a virulent strain of right wing political correctness [had] all but shut down debate about the war in Iraq,” journalist Don Williams wrote that “[the ongoing] campaign against the Chicks represents political correctness run amok” and observed, “the ugliest form of political correctness occurs whenever there’s a war on.”–Wikipeda
If “political correctness” is related to some sort of censorship, it would be observed everywhere. “Inclusive, bias-free language” would not be the only type of what you call political correctness. If one party is in power, people who do not support the party are likely to be in danger of censorship and oppression. Similarly, if you are a henpecked husband, your language could be monitored and censored by your mighty wife. If you do not want to quarrel with your wife, you should try to use politically correct expressions.
No one mentions that these parents were putting their son’s memory on display for the Dem’s political gain. They were probably paid a nice speaking fee as well. And all this because he died, I would argue needlessly, in a war hillary voted for. These absurdities are more shocking to me than anything Trump says.
In my opinion the Khans were brave people who wanted to make a point, an important point. That point is that Muslims can be patriotic Americans who are prepared to put their lives at risk for their country. The little I have read about the Khans indicates that they were very grateful for being American in a very old world sort of way. The elder Khan always had a copy of the constitution with him for example.
Since a big part of Trump’s success is based on whipping up anti-Muslim sentiment, (Not only the total ban on Muslims, but also the story about Pershing smearing bullets in pigs blood) I fully understand the Khans for wanting to make their statement on behalf of the many patriotic Muslim Americans, and I understand the Democrats for featuring them.
Let’s not forget a similar speech at the Republican convention. The argument that Hillary is responsible for the death of members of the US embassy in Benghazi is a big part of their attack on her, so they featured a relative of one of the slain diplomats emotionally claiming that Hillary withdrew security from Embassy and lied about it (although the reactions of the family members who died there are not all in agreement with this statement, and the fact-checking site Politifact rates this accusation as mostly false).
In my view, I find the Khans’ speech above reproach because it deals with an important policy issue, in other words terrorism doesn’t equal Islam, and nothing in the speech was not obviously true. I feel that the Benghazi relative speech was more in the line of mud slinging at Hillary around very questionable presentation of the facts.
For Trump to imply, (usual Trump innuendo based on nothing) that Mrs. Khan was prevented from speaking, or that Mr. Khan had no right to “say he hadn’t read the constitution” (typical Trump distortion since Khan didn’t say that), or to suggest that Trump had made sacrifices too, on a par with the Khans’ sacrifices, amount to an attack or an attempt to belittle the Khans. If not despicable, it is certainly the mark of low character and an absence of common sense and decency. But then that is Trump. What you see is what you get.
BTW, hard core Trump supporters, like “truthers” everywhere, will believe anything that they want to believe, regardless of the evidence to the contrary.
45% of North Carolina Republicans believe Obama (who was a state senator at the time) is responsible for the 2004 death of Cap. Khan (from Twitter)
"So an example is that in Taiwan I am taking classes where I cannot call myself a foreigner, although by definition it is correct and is used by government agencies, legal documents, and most people. I need to call myself an international citizen because it has a better feeling to it. My professor imported this from the U.S. and you can see in the news this is becoming more common. This is very authoritarian in telling me what is ok to say and what is not. "
I once saw a sign “alien” in an airport, when a game called “alien game” was popular with young people. I don’t know why you want to stick to the expression “foreigner”, even if it sounds better than “alien”.
Of course not. But I would not be impressed if you said that my comment was a personal attack on you, that people have told you that I am Hillary’s private lover, (ugh!) you just don’t know if it is true or not, and that you have heard from people who ought to know, that I am paid by the Clinton foundation,
@Steve
“…For Trump to imply, (usual Trump innuendo based on nothing) that Mrs. Khan was prevented from speaking…”
It would interest me to know whether this claim about Mrs Khan was actually true?
Let’s not mince about the bush here: there are some interpretations of Islam, whereby women would have (for want of a gentle way of putting it) a different status than men, no?
Trump is coarse motormouth. I don’t feel drawn to him politically. I do struggle to see that he is any more “despicable” than many other figures on the political stage. As things stand he at least doesn’t have the blood of any innocent civilians of his hands - which is possibly more than you can say for his opponent?
I suspect that, at the end of the day, almost all of us believe what we want to believe regardless of evidence.
Let’s suppose a bunch of (Clugston style) Linguists carried out a scientific survey which showed that LingQ isn’t an effective method for learning languages? Would that sway you for even a millisecond, Steve?
