I find it a bit peculiar that some Daily Kos Members are so dead set against Facebook as a medium to reach people. I understand the fatigue that sets in when you disprove the same lie you did last week confronting yet another thoroughly mixed and firmly set concrete-headed Faux News viewer, but bear with me past the squiggle and I will tell you why I still do it.
Dali, being himself.
I do it for 2 reasons. One is to embolden those around me that share our views and yet are not willing or are reluctant to express them on their own page. They can come over to my page and engage in the discourse without feeling they are going to enrage their own trolls. The other is part of what brought me to the Great Orange Satan in the first place.
The 5%, the truly undecideds, the quiet ones, the ones that don't comment but I know are reading along. I have no illusions that my recalcitrant high school and college buddies or the backassward portion of my family are going to wake up one day and say to me and the world,"Damn! I have been such a prick! I have been full of hate and lies! Today I change!" I expect the odds of that are longshot. I might even be skeptical of a sudden change in their opinion. But, I know that on my list and on other folks lists that do the same as me that there are voters, concerned citizens that see both sides arguing over things. If I do not confront the lies then they go unanswered sometimes. Yes, it is tiresome swatting the same damn fly for the 90th time. Some days I want them to shut the hell up and leave me alone. Then they say something so outrageous, a dog whistle so loud that the political anger rises and I get that taste of bile and the keyboard starts smoking again. Here is an exchange from yesterday...
headline/posting:(I just love, love, love poking at them too. I have to admit I do start the shit sometimes)
From the Guardian again
"The comparisons with Romney's trip to Europe and Obama's visit at almost exactly the same stage in the electoral cycle four years ago are almost too embarrassing to mention. Obama wooed a quarter of a million people in Berlin while Romney was mocked by the British prime minister."
David (name deleted) You mean the same Europe that is being overrun with Muslims and plagued by failing economies due to all their leftist, liberal government programs, and pathetically useless medical systems? Plainly obvious why they love Obama.
Yesterday at 8:40am via mobile · Like
Sallie 'Pathetically useless medical system'? Maybe not perfect but should you come here and be unfortunate enough to be run over by a bus, then you would be scooped up, taken to hospital and NO ONE would ask you if you can pay/have insurance before they treated you!
23 hours ago · Unlike · 1
David emergencies, yes I agree. Normal medical care is what I should have been more clear about.
23 hours ago · Like
Sallie At the risk of seeming to go on about this, our NHS is not perfect no service could be, however, in the main it provides good free care to all those who need it. I would rather have that even with occasional free-loaders than see poor people suffer for want of care. As to Muslims our economy would be poorer without Muslim workers be they Doctors or shop keepers, they are not all terrorists. I am sure you are a nice young man but please temper your opinions with a little humanity. :)
22 hours ago · Unlike · 2
David I never use the word terrorist. My opinion is tempered with plenty of humanity.
22 hours ago via mobile · Like
Chip "overrun by Muslims" sounds a lot like a dog whistle David.
22 hours ago · Like · 2
David Viva la France, Chip.
22 hours ago via mobile · Like
Chip And Belgium, Sweden and Finland. The point is David he went there to try to make a good impression and show the world he was ready to be President. Quite the opposite happened.
22 hours ago · Like
David Don't misunderstand. I'm not a fan of Romney. I agree he muffed his international opportunity. I just don't understand how such a large percentage of the US is so blindly enamored with Obama when it is plainly obvious he is taking this country in the direction that many failed European countries have already gone decades ago. Hence the reason my family chose to move away from all that nonsense in the UK to come here.
22 hours ago via mobile · Like
Chip Failed? I don't think we can call them failed. Not when their life expectancy exceeds ours, their infant mortality rate is less, have a higher standard of living and a higher literacy rate.
22 hours ago · Like
Sallie At the risk of sounding impertinent then David, you are an immigrant? Yes countries in Europe are struggling, the reason being that they have been shafted by the greedy financial institutions just as your adopted country has. A further handicap for some countries struggling is that they do not have the natural riches and resources that you have over there. Obama again is not perfect, but it seems to me and others over here that he has the rare quality for a politician, he cares about people.
21 hours ago · Unlike · 1
David No, it is pertinent. Yes my family immigrated to the US. Three generations and numerous family members in the medical profession, and I have firsthand experience with mountains of medical bills from our premie twins and from a near fatal medical condition I had in 2005. The difference is, I didn't walk away from my bills and try to stick it on the rest of society. I worked hard to pay off my financial obligations. and I hear second hand from family members in the UK what a mess the NHS is (noted exception of the medical emergencies). I also hear directly from them of the significant changes in their communities, the number of 'kids' dropping out of schools and bumming around, living off 'the system' and having ZERO motivation to get a job and earn their own living. It is a trend, and an alarming one. I don't believe, nor did I state, that Muslims are terrorists. I do however, have concerns that our liberal, and tolerant members of western society are opening the door to a culture of intolerance on their behalf.
19 hours ago · Like
Chip The most intolerant people I know David are Christians. As far as living off society, why did Exxon need 2 billion in subsidies last year? Why did they pay no taxes? For all your anecdotal evidence I can supply more that says their system works better than ours. I pay my bills too, that is another straw man argument.
18 hours ago · Like
David Chip there is a mountain of evidence to support either of our opinions on this matter, I'm just expressing what I get directly from family members from their day today experience living this reality. Not what they, nor I, read on the Internet.
18 hours ago via mobile · Like
Chip Does your evidence outweigh that of evidence concerning things like mortality rate, quality of life and life expectancy? Finding it online does not diminish its value.
17 hours ago · Like
Chip Opinions are fine, but facts are another matter.
17 hours ago · Like
David Facts can be presented in such a manner to cater to whatever audience one is wishing to influence.
17 hours ago via mobile · Like
Chip Facts are facts David. Life expectancy is a measurable quantity. Cost of living is a measurable quantity.
17 hours ago · Like
David But it's the factors contributing to that measurable quantity. None of which support a valid argument that putting a medical system similar to NHS is the right call for the US.
17 hours ago via mobile · Like
Chip Disagree, when we are the only country without a health system similar to them or has the number of uninsured individuals there is a direct correlation.
16 hours ago · Like
Chip http://mcr.sagepub.com/...
Sicker and Poorer—The Consequences of Being Uninsured: A Review of the Research on the Relationship.
mcr.sagepub.com
Health services research conducted over the past 25 years makes a compelling case that having health insurance or using more medical care would improve the health of the uninsured. The literature's broad range of conditions, populations, and methods ma...
16 hours ago · Like · 1 ·
Sallie David I am sorry your UK relatives have had bad experiences of the NHS they do of course have the choice to pay for private health care if they wish, many do, and some companies provide it for their employees. Sometimes the health care can vary from area to area I do not know where they live but in this area the care is excellent as I said before no one pretends this service is perfect but I don't think anyone at all over here would say we would be better off without it. I can tell you now that if my husband and I had had to pay for our health care in the way you do, we would have been homeless and penniless by now. Concerning immigrants; in all societies where immigration is allowed there will be native people who resent incomers it is part of the darker side of human nature I think, I suspect that cave dwellers resented outsiders moving in to the cave next door! It will ever be. All I can say is that many many immigrants here have worked hard, paid their taxes and contributed greatly to our society, in particular nursing staff. Trashy tabloids here will always pick on stories of immigrant free-loaders but they are a small minority.
5 hours ago · Unlike · 1
Sallie Furthermore, this country is an ageing population, without immigrants to add to the young work force we would be in trouble. The recent influx from Poland etc has given us a valuable source of hard working cheerful young people :)
4 hours ago · Unlike · 1
Over the course of the afternoon that was the exchange. I was ready to let it go after about the third comment, but he kept coming back for more. Sallie got a bit hot under the collar and that from the other side of the little pond. See, we can even engage them from the other side of the ocean! In hindsight I think it was worth it. I don't know if anybody but the three of us read all of it. I know 2 others that liked the original comment and one lives down in Houston and the other in Georgia, aid and comfort for me I would say. Neither of those two would I have known outside of Facebook, certainly not the lawyer in Ga and it is unlikely I would have known about our HS reunion and met the pediatrician in Houston. I consider them valuable allies now. To those that have left Facebook or who have decided to disengage from this never-ending argument, I fully understand. It never stops and it is tiresome. To those that are still in the trenches and shooting down lies, Keep up the good work! I got yer back!