No. Santorum is not the "face of the Republican Party." Don't go having hysterics like that; it is unbecoming. It also shows ignorance on your part. Now is that the rightful face of Ibram?

I'm of the Libertarian Party persuasion myself. Being of the right-lib stripe, I find many Republicans sympathetic -- and no Democrats, however amiable in person. The Donkeys are way too much the Party of Stupid, rejecting fiscal sense and economic literacy in favor of sympathizing too much with Occupy. We need say little of the party affiliations of the KKK -- you know those guys didn't vote R.

A friend of mine is a FTM tranny. Has to live on meds or he's a mess inside. Wanna take him shooting at the range one day.

Yeah, sure, he's not the face of the party. Just the close close second in the race to be their presidential candidate. That's not a huge representative position or anything.

If he isn't the face of the current Republican party, UG, who is? You can't ignore him just because he's not what you WANT Republicans to be.

I believe in civil liberties, personal freedom, and a strong social safety net. You believe in the first two, I think, and not the third. The Republican party has made itself into SUCH a social-issues, moralizing, evangelical-christian party that it no longer can be construed to be for civil liberty and personal freedom. You may disagree, but that is why I will never, ever support the current incarnation of the social-issues-focussed, hyper-conservative, sexist, racist, homophobic, and at the end of the day thoroughly disgusting Republican party.

See? You prove your determined ignorance of all things Republican, and that is downright disgusting. You've shown me in detail what you want the Elephants to be, and what you want them to be does you great discredit. Reading about three issues of National Review would explode the whole myth.

Again, such hysterics are unbecoming, and partake overmuch of the white sheet. I'm too virtuous for that one, I can tell you that.

I hope one day you will be too. What you are doing now you should not be doing, even if a bunch of slobs around you in college are doing it and telling you it is virtue. They risk never growing up, really.

Well thought, and fairly accurate. A "strong social safety net" has the disadvantage of being highly bureaucratic, and hence snaring personal freedom and even civil liberties in its meshes. Another freedom reducing factor is that given its head it sucks up an increasing fraction of the resources, the wealth and the money, of any economy it is attached to. Money so consumed can't be put to use creating the general prosperity, a thing the Democratic Party will deny in extremis. In practice, this becomes an ever more extreme extremity of statism until in the end, unchecked, you get a Camazotz, an "Everything Not Forbidden Is Compulsory." Such utopias are much too rigid to function with the human mind -- the problem of utopias everywhere. Taking this road is extremely dangerous to life as the good should live it.

(Digression: Utopia is only utopia if you're the only inhabitant. For everyone else, your utopia doesn't fit. The Randians are among those who never did get that.)

Politics may -- and very often does -- annoy the hell out of a fella, but Utopia is the end of politics, and in a very bad way.

So the conclusion of all that is in the main, we should and must do without a "strong" social safety net, in exchange for a minimalist one -- hence less argument for statism and more for living the lives of human beings, free, adult, and most usually sane.

Republicans have had about 2 years in control of legislatures across america, and the house of representatives. The result has been unprecedented attacks on voting rights, abortion rights, privacy rights, doctors' rights, workers' rights, union rights, gay rights... the Republican party was the party of RADICAL social conservatism, at the DEEP expense of civil liberties and rights, under Bush... and now they're doubling down on it.

In what way is the republican party NOT a radical social issues party, UG? in what way does the republican party work to ensure civil rights, rather than impose a conservative, christian moral vision on America? I reject the notion that freer markets help ensure the freedom of the minorities against the tyranny of the majority, or that the republican social agenda is in any way pro-civil-rights unless you have some REALLY good evidence.

I'll read three issues of the national review if you watch a week of Rachel Maddow.

Can't. No cable, and without cable here you get no television reception at all -- the Oxnard plain just isn't favorably located relative to the VHF transmitters, plus the changeover. Could read some Nation, though American Scholar might be less emetic or more sensible.

Not true. Won't, maybe. Probably. But not can't. If you can read this post, you can get the show.

As an aside, I am amused to see UG getting his butt kicked by a girl. (and I mean that in the nicest possible way). UG says :

That is **TYPICAL** of UG, channeling Rush Limbaugh perhaps; I heard precisely the same sentiment from that other bloviator the other day. That statement is pure fantasy. UG knows more about life than Ibram does? How can you support such a claim UG? How can such stuff be measured anyhow? And even if you could measure it, how do you know what Ibram knows? You frequently substitute your opinion for fact, this is just the most recent offense.

And one more thing, just a personal note. The style you use by opening with "Don't argue--I'm right" is one you use over and over and over. It doesn't work. It isn't valid. It isn't effective. But I find it very annoying, so, points there.

www(dot)rentadrone(dot)tv/msnbc-live-rockinroosters/

Anyway. Tell me how the Republicans' economic policies support freedom more than their social policies shit all over freedom. I'm all ears.

So you decided to take the drugs?

hm? which? what?

nm.

;)

Anyone but Obamy in 2012. That really is the most important issue. And if he wins at least the other side should control the Congress.

Okay, merc, how would Rick Santorum's economic policies be better for America than his radical social policies are terrible for freedom and liberty and social civil rights?

Ah come on Merc. ALL the candidates I've seen have seriously way-out views.
You might not like Obama's slant, but he's closer to the middle than the Republican whack-jobs. They all seem to want a theocracy for a start!

Your middle is our right wing, and so I don't see Obama as an ideal President.
But he's had his hand on the tiller through a rough ride - global recession (caused in part by American bankers), withdrawing from a costly war in terms of $, lives and global opinion, losing the 2022 World Cup to Qatar...

I know I'm biased because of my politics. And I know we won't agree on those. But I worry - not every night, but sometimes - about any of those fruitloops in power. I do not want to see A Handmaid's Tale become a reality before I die.