--- Davd Brin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > None of which changes the central fact an iota. FDR > got rid of Wallace and replaced him with Truman for > those very reasons. NATO, the MArshall plan and all > of that were PUSHED BY DEMOCRATS (for the most part, > including the leadership) AND WERE OPPOSED BY THE > PRINCIPAL REPUBLICAN LEADERS OF THE DAY. > > Go ahead and toss out all the exceptions you like. > This is a general fact.
Prove it. I have cited specific people and made specific arguments based on those specific people and their positions. You've made general assertions without a single refernce or grounding. Prove your above statement, or stop calling _me_ ignorant. > I have no idea what this means, but if you are > saying > what I think, then you are talking about Ike > dragging > the GOP into reluctant adherence to the Truman and > Marshall doctrines. Again, prove it. The most important Republican in the country is usually the President when he is a Republican. You seem to be saying - when a Republican does something good, it was against the wishes of his party. But when a Democrat does something good, that's immediate proof about the virtues of Democrats. You have offered no evidence cther than your unsupported opinion - and you're not an historian, Dr. Brin, so that's not good enough, and for a claim like the one you are making, even if you _were_ an historian it wouldn't be good enough. Prove it. > certainly not you, my friend. Again, the whole > grand > strategy of containing communism was invented out of > whole cloth by Truman and Marshall over vociferous > GOP > opposition. When Truman trounced Dewey, they > decided > to try a TR style internationalist and Ike save the > party. Truman _trounced_ Dewey???????????? You do know how close the 1948 election was, right? Would you like to provide some evidence that Dewey was an isolationist? A biography of him (he was an exceptionally distinguished public servant - do you know what he was famous for, Dr. Brin, since you're so casual about throwing accusations of ignorance around?) > > Do you think Wendell Wilkie would have won the > > nomination if large parts of the party didn't > agree > > with him on an issue that important? There > weren't > > primaries in those days, you know. > > They were desperate. And it is a plain fact that > most > of the party's leadership hated the idea. Again, this is an assertion. Give me a name. I've given you one. Wilkie. He was the nominee. You've given nothing other than your statement. Give me some evidence to support something clearly somewhat implausible - that the Party leader's beliefs had no relationship to those of the Party as a whole. In the above you've made at least one obvious unquestionable error of fact, Dr. Brin, about a fairly famous incident in American history (the 1948 election). You've also made a large number of sweeping assertions backed up by no evidence other than your opinion. When confronted on these facts, you've argued that I'm ignorant. Well, I'm supplying facts and evidence, and you're carefully avoiding any and all challenges to do so. I asked you for a cite to back up your opinion - a book, for example, by a serious historian. I didn't get one. Quite obviously you are unable to provide one. I will admit that it was a little unfair of me to ask for one, since I'm pretty sure I know the literature well enough to be certain that no such book existed. But if only the ignorant could disagree with you on this topic, you'd think there would be at least one. Finally, you carefully ignored my larger point on the differing roles of liberals and conservatives in political society. It does weaken your argument a bit, doesn't it? If you were really interested in _discussing_, or _arguing_ about this, not just insulting those who disagree with you, I'd suggest taking a look at _Conservatism as an Ideology_, published in the 1950s and written by Sam Huntington, but just as relevant today as it was then. You might, of course, want to look at the ur-text of modern conservatism as well, _Reflections on the Revolution in France_. Of course, in order to dismiss me as ignorant your knowledge of the field must be pretty complete, so you've read both of those classics and can tell me how I'm misinterpreting them, right? I respect your writing a great deal, Dr. Brin, or I wouldn't have continued with this for this long. But that doesn't give you the right or the credibility to make the claims that you have made, both political and personal. I certainly hope to continue to count you as a friend, so I'm reluctant to push this further, but I feel that I must and ask that you withdraw your comments about my ignorance and suggest that (unless I choose to opine about physics or the proper way to write a science fiction novel) you be a little more cautious about making them in the future. ===== Gautam Mukunda [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Freedom is not free" http://www.mukunda.blogspot.com __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free web site building tool. Try it! http://webhosting.yahoo.com/ps/sb/ _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
