Today's pie fight is an example of how we are talking past each other and wasting our time being unproductive.
I speak of the diaries "Ezra Klein Calls President Obama A Moderate Republican" and "Fox News takes over Daily Kos". Each diary has a point to make, and yet we have flames flames flames. A call for civility or a request for all sides of this debate to consider their words more carefully is unlikely to get much traction, probably because I'm not appealing to any emotions here. I'm not making DEMANDS and its not I'M RIGHT AND YOU'RE WRONG. So boring, huh?
Please follow for more boring analysis and pleas...
"Ezra Klein Calls President Obama A Moderate Republican" - A diary and linked article with a shocking title. Neither title really represents Mr. Klein's article and leaves out the key bit of the opinion: is Obama being a 1990s moderate Republican? As many have pointed out there are very few if any 2011 moderate Republicans. It is legitimate to point out that these titles are omitting key information. Does that mean there is nothing of value to discuss here? I don't think so and I see many comments debating and discussing different sides of this issue.
Then we have a diary comparing the first diary title to Fox News. The comparison made specifically involves Sean Hannity attributing words to Katie Couric when she was actually quoting someone. That is definitely journalistic malpractice, but in this instance what we have is more akin to selectively pulling out words for shock value. These two things are not the same; we should be very careful in pulling out the "You are using Republican tactics" argument because really it just causes people to dig in.
Another problem: We have established camps set up here and flags are planted. We've seen unfounded attacks on Obama and we've seen some try to defend the indefensible. This becomes a problem when, for example, I see slink criticize the President and because I've disagreed with her prior criticisms, I kneejerk dismiss anything she has to say. It may be a natural tendency but it is one we have to resist.
The vast majority of both camps are similarly progressive yet disagree on different points. We don't disagree on our desire to see this country march down a more progressive road. Personally, I gag whenever I read something like "I'd rather see America die... then to vote for Obama again." so I rec'ed a diary that pointed out that comment. I contribute to the problem by doing that because of those people who are mostly critical of President Obama, very few of them want to see America die.
We fall into some of the same traps the MSM does by focusing on the extreme opinions. Within the community, I think we would do ourselves a service if we fought against that tendency.
So, in summary, I AM 100% RIGHT*. RADICAL MODERATION ALL THE WAY!!!!
*I don't really think this. Thanks for following down meta lane.