Nothing I said in the post you cited was directed at YOU. Or Jeff. I was thinking of the GOP establishment types, and their supporters in the private sector, MSM, and academe. I have very little doubt that they loathe and disparage the Great American Unwashed. They are a bunch of ideological snobs and control freaks. 'Nuff said.
I AM NOT DISPARAGING YOU.
We disagree in our assessments of the characters of Ted Cruz and Donald Trump respectively. I strongly suspect Cruz is a man of unsteady character and little wisdom, but with great personal ambition -- towards what end is completely unclear to me. I used to love the guy, until I noticed the dirty tricks, and started analyzing his manner of speech.
As to the latter, I note the difference between persuasion, which is entirely legitimate; and manipulation, which is not. I see a good deal of the latter in Cruz's manner of speaking.
But I recognize that you are entirely free and warranted to disagree with my assessment; and that does not make you any less in my eyes. We go back a long ways, and almost always agree in our assessments of matters that come to the attention of the forum.
I have long regarded you as a person of fine character and excellent understanding and intelligence. Nothing has changed for me in that regard. We just happen to disagree this time, maybe for the first time.
Our disagreement is based on what we know, on what we have seen; on evidence, logic and experience. We are looking at the same things; but our takeaways are different.
But the state of our knowledge is different, probably because our education, training and experience are different. For one thing, I am a keen analyst of language and the usages to which it can be put, which run the gamut from the accurate description of reality to the transformation of reality into shapes more pleasing to our subjective desires. I'll just leave it at that for now. (I could write a lengthy paper on the systematic abuse of language that has become rife in American culture in recent times. Maybe I will actually do that some time, if only for my own self-amusement.)
In closing, I still love you dearly. And may the best man win.
No matter what, come hell or high-water, I'll be voting for the Republican presidential nominee (even if I have to hold my nose) in November.
May God ever bless you, Joanie.
Hi, Sisters Betty and Joanie. I have watched your debate, and I don’t think either of you are attacking the other. When our candidate is downplayed, it only feels like we are the ones being targeted. My wife, an upper level math teacher, often says that she teaches an intimidating subject. The students will sometimes transfer that to her and say she is an intimidating person. The truth is that she’s a real softie who cries at birthdays and weddings.
But, it’s the subject that’s intimidating, and she’s very good at it, and she refuses to play games with grades. She wants the students to learn it, because in math you will see it again. It builds.
On to Cruz and Trump. Let’s insert some reality into this. We’re not hearing it in the media but it is simple fact. Here is reality: Kasich and Rubio are out of it. They have no mathematical pathway to victory
Check the numbers. There are about 1400 delegates left. If Cruz loss oh and fl, there are 1240. Cruz needs about 900 of those. He’s already behind in Illinois and n. Carolina and missouri, so that means 900 out of 1100.
He might get that if trump dies or he finds Harry potter’s magic wand, but that’s his only hope.
Cruz is not anywhere near the lead in either Ohio or Florida. That means this is over for Cruz MATHEMATICALLY.
So, we need to unite behind Trump and push him over the top so the establishment is fired.
The people who loathe and disparage Donald Trump aren't so much loathing and disparaging HIM as they are loathing and disparaging the Trump VOTER. And who is the Trump voter? Largely working class folks, folks in the trades, middle-class people. Those of us smug about our fine college educations often think such people are hapless, stupid, clueless about how to manage their lives without expert help. Certainly they can't be trusted to run our government.
... and then, when a person who fits into the category you are describing as 'loathing and disparaging the Trump voter' takes offense at that characterization, you suggest that that person is too thin-skinned and shouldn't be taking your comments 'personally'.
Your description of those who do not support Trump was wide-ranging and unfair, and I, and almost all of my close family and friends, happen to fall, unfairly, into your stereotypical group. Rather than adjusting your description so as to possibly include a much smaller subset of Trump non-supporters, you choose instead to suggest that I must have a tendency to 'take things too personally'. That is not the case at all, and I believe that it is you who might want to consider reining in your blanket criticisms, and your apparent penchant to lump together all of those citizens who choose not to support Donald Trump by describing them as somehow intolerant of working-class Americans. That is a deeply offensive blanket characterization, and one's skin would have to be armor-thick in order to not be personally offended by it.
I'll not pursue this anymore, and I suspect that you also would prefer to end this discussion.
I, too, wish you well, and I, too, will vote for whomever the republican nominee is, no matter how distasteful to me his candidacy might be.