brain...exploding...from...irony...

Just curious.Do you know what a "Dittohead" is? And what the term means?Edited by subbie, : No reason given.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

A commonly-held misconception.A "dittohead" is not someone who agrees with everything Rush says. A "dittohead" is someone who is "dittoing" previous praise that other callers to the show have given. They are not saying they agree with Rush, they are saying they agree with what others have said about the show.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

Rush's show.I heard him explain it himself one day. Sorry, can't provide you with date and time. However, if you listen to the show, it's quite obvious in context that that is the meaning. A caller opens a call by saying, "Dittos," "Megadittos," or something of that ilk, and Rush responds by thanking the caller, exactly as if the caller had complimented him on the caliber of the show.Now, I'm certainly not saying that most "dittoheads" don't agree with most of what Rush says, but that isn't what it means to be a dittohead. It simply means they enjoy the show. The misconception, however, is one that is sometimes held by those who call themselves "dittoheads." Occasionally, someone might call and say "50% dittos" and then go on to explain where and why they disagree.Despite what you may have heard, or would like to believe, not everyone who listens to Rush agrees with everything he says, nor do most of them let him do their thinking for them.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

I always sort of think of Barry Goldwater as the last true Republican, or at least the last one who had any major national prominance.I recall something he said about gays in the military: "The only thing the military should be concerned with is whether someone can shoot straight," or words to that effect.Edited by subbie, : Added a subtitle to make Admin happy

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

I'm hardly a AUH2O scholar or anything, but based on what I know about him, I strongly doubt that Goldwater would have sacrificed any of the principles that he believed in for political expediency. Would that have made him a political eunuch? Possibly. Alas, we will never know.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

The biggest problem with Rush and his ilk is not that so much of what he says is horseshit. The biggest problem is that he starts out with a germ of truth and is able to make much more out of it than it warrants.For example, two of his frequent targets are "feminazis" and "environmentalist-whackos." As he uses those terms, there can be no doubt that such people exist. There are extremist feminists who hate men and hold most men responsible for nearly every evil in society. And, there are nuts who, under the guise of environmentalism, are more interested in taking down big, evil corporations. Rush takes what these rather small groups of people say and believe and spins it to make it sound like they represent all feminists and environmentalists.IMO, Rush is no worse than any other demogogue who is more interested in pushing a party line than pushing the interests of all americans. And there are plenty of those kinds of liars, thieves and villians on both sides of the aisle.Rush largely preaches to the choir. Are his listeners "lazy-thinking team player[s], incredibly naive, or merely stupid?" Well, no more so than any other choir that laps up what their favorite demogogue says. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a dittohead, and certainly don't mean to defend Rush or his choir. But to complain only about him without leveling he same complaint at the other side when they do the same thing only addresses half the problem.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

Arianna Huffington, Michael Kinsley and James Carville come immediately to mind.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

I agree. That's why I said that's the biggest problem with Rush. I don't think they are beholden to them as much as they are pandering to them.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

Hmm. Okay, what is it about then?

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

I think somewhere we got crossed up. When I talked about those on the other side, I wasn't addressing your complaint about Rush's factual inaccuracies. I was referring to this part of my post: The three that I mentioned are the sort of demogogue I was discussing. Does Rush lie more than anyone else on the national scene? Dunno, never looked into it. Thus, if your measure of comparison is who lies more, I can't really respond. But I don't really think who lies more or less is the only, or even necessarily the best, measure of who is the worse demogogue. You might argue that Rush is worse because his impact is larger. Possibly. But my point was never that those on the other side are worse than or as bad as Rush. It was simply that all deomgogues need to be fought against, not just those whom you happen to disagree with.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

Or maybe you can't see it that way because your political blinders won't let you see it.In any event, if it's going to take me agreeing with you to bring this relatively off topic strain in this thread to a close, then I shall. After all, I'm not particularly trying to defend my soil here since I don't really have a dog in this fight anyway.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin

Not backing away, clarifying. I was never talking about just liars, and don't particularly care to, as I don't happen to think that mere liars are the worst of 'em.I don't believe I ever said there were as many one the left as there are on the right, not even sure I ever said they were "equivalent." IIRC, I said there were plenty on both sides. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. If it makes you feel better to characterize my disinclination to continue to discuss this matter further as a retreat, by all means do so. I was simply trying to make the point that demogoguery is not the exclusive domain of any political party.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin Franklin