Town Quixote's

[Town Heretic]

It really doesn't, though I'd admit I fashion a good bit of humor for an audience that excludes more than a few. When I was a kid I loved Bullwinkle. You could watch it on one level and it was fine. You got older and read widely enough, you began to understand there was another layer in the humor and it was even funnier.

Outside of humor, I mostly tone down the writing, but given I do most of it on the fly, if I'm in a hurry it can move up the FOG index a bit. Even so, anyone with an understanding of grammar and a good dictionary can keep up, regardless of their education level.

Look, if this was that densely packed Quixote's wouldn't draw the numbers it does. You're reading too much into things outside of your personal wheelhouse. You have a hard time with inferential humor, especially the sort resting on an assumption of cultural exposure. There's nothing inherently wrong with being outside of the target group, but there's something wrong about insisting that your limitation is someone else's problem. If you aren't interested in making up the difference then it's simply not for you and it's time to move along.


The author made a number of points. I disagreed with most of them. It might be a time consideration. When was it published?


Writing is a bit like telling a joke. It begins with the idea, which you want to communicate. Then you need to know two things. Who am I trying to communicate the idea to and what language will do that in a way that interests.

Some people love the guy who hammers fruit with a mallet. If he tried running the spiel Dennis Miller ran on his old HBO show the bleachers would empty in a heartbeat. Does that mean Dennis should invest in a giant hammer or is there a point you're missing?


You fail to understand the point and the audience. Not everything is a recipe. Sometimes, it's a crossword puzzle and there's satisfaction to be had in working the NY Times in pen. But it isn't for everyone and it isn't trying to be.


Such as? You should stop making general charges and point to specifics. What I imagine you'll find is that you understand most of the words. It's the lyric in their use that you struggle with. Else, it's called vocabulary. Mine is expansive and appropriate for my education. Again, not all conversations are for everyone.


You're just tipping your hand here. You aren't fit to judge what you mostly don't understand. That's just a thin bit of hostility on your part. Feel free to disengage at any point and pursue something you feel is worthy of you.

:e4e:

Do you wish to be understood and make a convincing point? Your writing fails. If you were to write a length book. Most people would fall asleep.

The numbers here suggest otherwise, so don't be concerned about it. I'll be fine. And when I write I have an audience in mind and the writing changes accordingly. In fact, if you poured through this thread you'd find a number of different approaches, depending.

 

[ClimateSanity]

The numbers here suggest otherwise, so don't be concerned about it. I'll be fine. And when I write I have an audience in mind and the writing changes accordingly. In fact, if you poured through this thread you'd find a number of different approaches, depending.

The numbers suggest you have liberal / progressive sycophantic fans who imagine you are winning their case in the court of public opinion . Do you truly think you write in a manner that is easily comprehensible? I can skim good writing and still pick up the meaning. With your writing, I wrestle with each sentence mainly because of the unnecessary run on clauses .

 

[Town Heretic]

The numbers suggest you have liberal / progressive sycophantic fans who imagine you are winning their case in the court of public opinion

I think you're being way too hard on yourself...see the problem? What the numbers actually suggest is that a large number of people read this, agree or disagree with my particular opinions on topic. Would most people would do that to scratch head over the incomprehensible? :nono:

I suspect the interest is twofold. First, there's humor and I tend to emphasize that in the snippets, though I mix in issues. Second, it's a good way to discover threads that might be worth a look. People are busy. I provide links. I could list a number of people who've declared an affection for the thread over the years, including the owner of the site. But if you really feel that way about it, all the more reason to find another thread and be done with torturing yourself.

Do you truly think you write in a manner that is easily comprehensible?

Quote me saying that. I'll wait....now then, I'd say it's self-apparently difficult and frustrating for you, but you aren't the audience I'm aiming to speak to with it, so that's no real problem.

I can skim good writing and still pick up the meaning.

The problem is that you get to decide what constitutes "good" so all you're really saying is that you understand what you understand.

With your writing, I wrestle with each sentence mainly because of the unnecessary run on clauses .

You mean run on sentences containing two or more independent clauses. Set out a few of those and we'll talk about them. The only people I've ever gotten complaints from on any particular of that sort were found on the lampooned end of a barb in The Wrap or a Gazette.

Funny how that works out.

 

[patrick jane]

Don't worry Town, plenty of us understand your writing. They probably said that Mark Twain was incomprehensible

 

[Town Heretic]

The Wrap
on Tuesday​

Cruc played poster boy for the angry white guy set...

The fact that a Latino kills a black kid and people like BLM go after whites tells you all you need to know about the matter- they can pretty much say or do anything and white liberals are going to defend them.

The fact that you're still making statements that underscore an inability or unwillingness to distinguish the actions of some from a greater cause, to distinguish the rule, tells me you have issues when it comes to race that you need to deal with, but will likely won't. That you think only liberals are concerned with the root of the BLM cause, an inequity/disparity in treatment by the criminal justice system, is as sad as it is supportive of my conjecture.

While CC discussed alternate history theory...

...all nations of all colors and races have had slaves since the beginning (although it came in different forms), but it was America that came set the mechanism into place to end it. People should remember that.

Actually, the British Empire abolished slavery throughout its realm in 1833. We had to have a Civil War to manage it a few decades later.

Beyond that, Americans never owned whites, never built an economic empire and engine on the backs of those whites, who were never mutilated, raped and even murdered with impunity. Thanks for illustrating a new axiom: those who fail to understand history are doomed to misrepeat it.

Clete helped me put clarify my disappointment over a certain response to scandal...

Two words...

NEVER HILLARY!

I think its laughable that people who support Hillary can open their mouths at all about anything moral, especially when it comes to the way women are treated.

I think it's sad to see so many ordinarily decent people use logical fallacies to avoid having to do what Trump's own VP choice felt compelled to do: refuse to defend or condone the remarks.

So much of what I'm reading from scrambling Trump supporters might as well go, "Yeah, my guy raped a few people, but X killed a few people. We can't have a murderer represent us!" lain:

Then Cruc said...

Contempt is something that BLM produces

No. The idea produces contempt in you. It's not inherent.

It is not a movement to actually solve anything,

You're wrong. The argument is already making impacts and changes to how police conduct and train in any number of areas, around the country. It's sparking a lot of serious consideration and dialogue in the public square and the corridors of power.

, only the far Right is the lesser of the evils.

A lesser evil is evil...so even were that arguably true, it's no virtue.

And sometimes...

..The fantasy those as yourself live in is thinking that the crime rate in black neighborhoods has anything to do with others and not themselves.

Yeah, feel free to mosey around the ghetto the same as you do your own neighborhood, since the facts are against me .

Oh, it's changed something- it's made white people look stupid in preferring not to stand up for itself.

That's the downfall of white people, which all other races aren't exhibiting- you all plead with your captors and do their laundry lain:

I'm not saying you're a racist, but when you find yourself writing something that could comfortably fit on an op-ed page for Stormfront, you might as well be.

CC was back with more Fun Historic Facts something, holding that the British end to the slave trade was...

No doubt as a reaction to America

So you're suggesting they did what, used a time machine? Because America was decades behind that British action. lain:

, just as the French copied American style governance.

...Look up the Enlightenment and prepare yourself for an interesting discovery. There was a lot of back and forth involved. It's a very interesting period in the world to study.

And...

I used to bite on your snotty comments but not any more.

It wasn't snotty. It was incredulous. There you were, giving America credit for accomplishing what the Brits managed without a Civil War and much earlier and the next thing I read is you crediting us with giving the French their ideas.

...American developed an ideology of rights that had major consequences across the globe. That's a fact. The French stormed the Bastille only after George Washington was inaugurated as the first president of the United States.

None of that touches upon my suggestion that you bone up on the Enlightenment, the ideas flowing from all sorts of people. Locke is credited with establishing the notion of Natural Rights, which figured importantly in Jefferson's thinking and writing and our government, as was the social contract developed by both Locke and Rousseau. Locke influenced us most of all, right down to his notion that revolution is justified when natural rights are denied by the government.

Seriously, if you want to appreciate our revolution and be taken seriously when you speak to things integral to its process you really should invest time in studying the impact of the Enlightenment. No snot involved.

Before, well, whatever this was...

I see a lot of words, but all they say is blah, blah, blah......

Those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it badly....which is entertaining, but probably not what you had in mind.

You got just about every point wrong. What you do about that is up to you.

AB had a neat idea...

Go Trump!

lain:

Good idea. :think: Where?

And on government, of late...

...who exactly is it that believes Trump is a man of excellent moral character?

At this point I'd hope no rational human being, which means he can still win in November.

The same people that are all freaked out over this decade-old tape of Trump talking to another guy are the same people give Bill Clinton a pass for actually doing far worse

See, I think that's by and large true, though adding the time line feels like part of the lame maelstrom of misdirection going on to gloss over and defend the indefensible by marginalizing it. I think it's easy, when times are good, to look at the guy leading us through it and excuse the inexcusable. It's personal, we say. Sure, he's a scoundrel, but the trains are running on time and we're prosperous. Who's perfect? They're all like that, it goes. No normal human being wants or seeks that sort of ego gratifying power...and on and on. Any number of ways to justify what we should repudiate.

I understand the justifications. I've done it myself. It took this horror show of an election cycle to shake me awake on the point.

As for this election, we are stuck with two and only two viable options. A vote for some third party is the equivalent of staying home and removing yourself from having any effect whatsoever

And there, right there, you abandon any semblance of the moral high ground. The minute you insist on choosing between evils, you choose evil.

Don't.

Tomorrow? More everything old is Newt again, a passive aggressive masterpiece and some guy isn't sure the world rotates on its axis...no, really. lain:

 

[Crucible]

I'm not saying you're a racist, but when you find yourself writing something that could comfortably fit on an op-ed page for Stormfront, you might as well be.

Made the front page of yours :idunno:

 

[Town Heretic]

Made the front page of yours :idunno:

As a cautionary tale, or do you think people will become confused by my ambiguous response to it. [/rhetorical sarcasm]

But thanks for reading today's Wrap. oly:

 

[Crucible]

As a cautionary tale, or do you think people will become confused by my ambiguous response to it. [/rhetorical sarcasm]

I think that there's too many people who think facts ought to be considered racist/sexist/xenophobic/bigoted- and anything else I missed in there which are so spammed they've lost their value as words

 

[Town Heretic]

I think that there's too many people who think facts ought to be considered racist/sexist/xenophobic/bigoted- and anything else I missed in there which are so spammed they've lost their value as words

I think generalizations have a way of breaking down when they meet particulars. But if you feel that way, make a thread about it and set out the particular argument. Could be interesting.

Good to see today's Wrap has you considering your position.

 

[Town Heretic]

The Wrap
on Thursday​

CC argued the ends justify the mean spirited...

Trump is RIGHT on issues and policy, and Clinton is WRONG, and that's ALL that matters to people who actually want to fix the nation's problems. All the rest is just opportunism, propaganda, political correctness, snivelling, whining, and other nonsense.

There's a tragedy in that declaration. It's the thing that makes the unacceptable ordinary, clothes it in the robes of pragmatic necessity.

But the clear, unassailable fact of the matter is that character doesn't only matter, it determines.

We should expect and do better.

Responded to MS on polling statistics and a curious notion...

If this thread is any indication, those are bogus numbers.

They aren't. Here's the link. They update all the time, so there will be variation, but it's a good site with a solid reputation for getting it right.

When Trump wins he needs to go back and strike every law that has been passed since women's right to vote.

Well, that literally can't happen, but otherwise, no.

Only male landowners need have the vote.

Or chariots. lain:

Finally got where that stray sock got off to...

Mate, I'm all for jamming a pike in Town's eye (he's an egotistic demagogue, let the record show), but he's also not dumb. So, you know, pick your battles.

So at least you know history. lain: But you could use a new dictionary. I'm not a political leader. I don't take up popular causes unless they're popular with me. I never make arguments based on emotion. I make arguments rooted in reason, mostly in the face of emotional nonsense. So your record won't play. Egotist? I know my abilities and my weaknesses. I can live with the mix...but I don't have to think that much of myself to think less of declarations in lieu of reasoned, objective and, God forbid, fair examination of a particular or person.

Like I have to tell you...by which I mean it's sad that I have to tell you that.

And he was off (either)...

Clearly, I disagree.

You think there was confusion on the point? lain:

You do you. Medium fish in a shallow pond...

Well, at least we can agree something is fishy about your protest.

Still running your humiliation. *cough*. Sorry. Observational thread?

So you don't know much about that thread either.

Crack on, sunshine.

That's the spirit. :thumb:

Then our time bandit was back...

In other words they guessed right sometimes.

Well, no. You should google their accuracy, especially in relation to presidential elections.

Everybody has opinions.

Correct. It is my opinion that the earth rotates on its axis and revolves around the sun. It's also demonstrably true. Likewise, no president could do what you called for. No party would allow it and neither would the Constitution.

No, it would put a stop to all the propaganda tactics

It would put a stop to all sorts of things, beginning with equality before the law.

Before topping his only the guys in powdered wigs should vote comment with this response to my by way of illustration ...

Funny thing is, it hasn't been demonstrated.

The rotation of the earth and it's orbit around the sun hasn't been demonstrated? lain: .

And because some of you think I'm pulling your leg...

Seen the earth spinning have you?

Well, yes. Yes I have. There's been an advance in technology that allows anyone interested to do that. If you haven't you really should. But you don't have to trust that technology. Science and mathematics will tell you if you know where to look. Here's a link to a really good explanation of the science from the good folks at scienceblogs.com.

And CC was back to really put in her penny...

Oh brother, more blah blah blah from the King of Blah

I'll give you this much: you don't have a lot to say, but you sure say it a lot. :thumb:

Before DM took her rhetorical splendor to a new height...by which I mean slightly off the ground...or just off...

Originally Posted by Town Heretic Blah-betty-boom-blah-whiney-whine-hum-whaaaa

ps. I'm more cleverer than yoos is
Somebody wept...

Thanks. So there's the "clever" coupled with the earlier "superior" and "smug" remarks, and I think you threw in an "egoist", the "middle sized fish in a shallow pond" bit...well, I've never known anyone who spent that much time speaking about another fellow's intelligence and ego who wasn't a bit fragile when it came to their own. Which makes all of this easier to understand.

I'm not a populist, he says, but there's like a quarter million views for a few thousand posts on my thread

No, I didn't write that. What I did write was that demagogue didn't fit me. I noted that I don't take a position because it's popular, unless its popular with me. I've defended the larger part of Islam and the legal necessity of gay marriage in a secular republic, which weren't popular positions.

Do you even read your own text?

Worse for you, I read yours.

Now say something that if I managed to pen you'd immediately underline as smug and superior:

It's mildly amusing that you're even defending it. Maybe you don't actually see it.

There you are. Do it again:

I know a good therapist in New York if you're nearby and need a number...

And cosmopolitan as well. From a much bigger pond. Not as shallow as these surroundings. Right. Got it.

How about something telling from an emotional angle:

I'd be interested in reading just how far you could disappear up your own rear end.

That's the stuff.

Now remind everyone how you're really the smarter and better of the two of us:

I'm always learning, but I'm not in any way intimidated by the rather laughable idea that your vocabulary extends beyond mine.

Which I also never wrote.

There's nothing you've said that I didn't understand,

How could I possibly say something that you don't understand?

and there's nothing I've said that gives even a glimmer of an indication that I can't command this language of ours exactly as I see fit.

There's some reason to suspect your insight though.

I don't fold so easy.

Said the fellow who began the conversation and now apparently is playing both the superior and victim card simultaneously.

Not everyone folds, sunshine.
Muppet.

Okay. Any other random words you want to throw in there?

But, no. Black on White attacks are not justified.

I think your closing with a rebuttal to a position I've never taken is a pretty neat bow on the package.

Tomorrow? With enemies like these, cautionary tails (yes), the tangent of a rocket, and the arch of a diver (also yes)... oly:

 

[Catholic Crusader]

The Wrap
on Thursday​

CC argued the ends justify the mean spirited.........

And you just demonstrated that you are a bald-faced liar, which most people here know already. Well, what else should we expect from a 2-time Bammy supporter.

Here is your "mean spirited", the women's champion who destroys rape and molestation victims:

 

[Town Heretic]

And you just demonstrated that you are a bald-faced liar, which most people here know already. Well, what else should we expect from a 2-time Bammy supporter.

I actually voted against the president in his bid for reelection.

So what you demonstrated was an ongoing propensity for getting it wrong in a hostile, assumptive manner. Doubling down with the "Liar" neg rep was just icing.

On the plus side, you read The Wrap, so all's not lost. Pos rep on the way for you.

 

[Town Heretic]

The Wrap
on Saturday​

Took another stab at getting rm to reconsider the felony usage...

Only to a liberal lawyer like you who makes excuses for political reasons for one of their own.

Citing the opinion of the FBI isn't making excuses. It's just noting the fact of it.

...As with conservatives, there's a lot I admire in liberal thinking, but no, thank you. I mostly vote conservatively and register Republican here because that's where our best candidates are, by and large (with glaring, Jeff Sessions-esque, exceptions) especially in the judiciary. But I'm a moderate who isn't wedded to a party lever pull.

If MarK Levin former chief of staff to Attorney General Edwin Meese under Ronald Reagan calls the woman a felon (and he has publicly on his radio & TV show), than it is good enough for me.

One fellow can call property theft and another use theft to describe taxes. But they still aren't, it's just how they feel about it.

the woman is a felon

A felon is someone convicted of a felony. You're conflating your conviction with the legal variety.

and I am quite sure that there are plenty of people that you do respect that have the same opinion as I or Levin for that matter.

I respect any number of people who get things wrong, because at one point or another all of us do. But I can't respect an opinion at odds with the plain truth. .

MS was back on the heels of his "repeal women's suffrage" salvo...

You're just spinning your wheels here.

Well, it's hard to get traction with some people.

The people are gun toting, male landowners.

You left out white. The empowered people were. They aren't alone any longer and haven't been for a very long time, because as flawed as the founders were, they put into play essential principles of law that could self-correct mistakes and omissions and founded something remarkable, a state of peaceful, ongoing revolution and political evolution.

Heck of a thing.

Argued law and morality with Guru...

Individuals and even large groups of people, have the right to self expression and protesting within the parameters of the law.

But both of my examples were of unlawful, yet moral conduct [the Civil Rights Movement protests, by way of]. The law may or may not be a moral instrument.

Under a democratic system only then can any moral position be enforced on the entire populace.

My point being that the law isn't necessarily a moral instrument in a secular republic. It can be, often is by parallel, but sometimes isn't. Sometimes it's just pragmatics. There's nothing inherently immoral in the distinction one mile per hour makes, by way of, though that distinction can technically get you a speeding ticket.

In a true and working democracy these representatives are not there to serve their own ideas . . . however, this is not so in 'make believe democratic', Banana republics

There's long been a debate on the point. The problem with making someone elected to office the slave of the opinion of those who elect him, without regard for his judgment and unique position within the power structure is that often people are elected by a majority that itself has disparate views on any number of subjects. So which views does he then represent? It seems the better course to let those who make promises along a line of issues do their best to keep them, without regard for taking a windsock poll on any particular. If they fail to do enough to suit you then you're free to throw the rascals out of office when they come up for reelection.

Talked about the latest Trump allegations with Angel...

I would never vote for Trump unless God Himself told me to, but i also wouldnt believe these women coming out of the woodwork with their complaints, NOW.

I'm with you on the first part. I'm not on the second. I can completely understand why someone wouldn't want a "my word against Trump" confrontation [sans evidence]...I can understand why the video would embolden someone harboring a resentment for that treatment, who lacked confidence to confront then.

I don't know it's true, but there's smoke rising and a tape of him striking a match.

Continued with Guru...

That is not possible. Unlawful conduct cannot be moral.

I disagree. More, the law can be immoral and unlawful activity the only recourse. Just so, "Tell me, sir, are you hiding any Jews on these premises?" said the SS Colonel at your door.

Law is the measure of morality for a nation

I don't agree. It certainly can be, but it frequently isn't.

And, after I spent a little time explaining legal process MS decided...

You remind me of the guys sitting in line to talk to the prosecutor.

You remind me of a guy with a strong opinion, but no discernible understanding of why he holds it or particular grasp of the judicial system.

As a layman I would walk right past them and cut my own deal.

Your opinion of your opinion isn't in question. Cut what deal? In what court? Civil? Criminal? Municipal?

They would start to whine about me cutting in front of them. You know why I did it?

Because you're rude and feel entitled?

I had to go back to work as I had men counting on me to feed their families.

So none of the lawyers had firms, with staff and families? Peculiar jurisdiction. Can everyone else see this courtroom or just you?

And...

The point was they were making money sitting there providing a service that some of us with a little guts and brains don't need.

It's not about being smart. Lots of very smart people don't try to operate on other people or themselves, even with a medical degree, let alone without one.

So...

I already knew you were a doofus with no hands on experience.

Nothing in my writing led to that conclusion, so you're consistent in approach at least...I've tried, literally, thousands of cases outside of my appellate work.

Far as my manners, I've never been held in contempt.

You mean legally. lain:

Before thudding into the earth and below it with...

Give with one hand hand take away with the other.

Rather, I credit what I can reasonably, but when you puff about how you're too smart to need a lawyer and you crow about how the Holy Spirit is impressed with you I'm going to call you on the hubris of it.

Blow it, buddy.

Do you think the Holy Spirit is applauding that?

Tomorrow? I put soap on the Secret Santa Christmas list. . .

 

[annabenedetti]

I see DilatedMind is here for a read.

Hi DilatedMind. :e4e:

 

[1Mind1Spirit]

The Wrap
on Saturday​

Took another stab at getting rm to reconsider the felony usage...




MS was back on the heels of his "repeal women's suffrage" salvo...




Argued law and morality with Guru...




Talked about the latest Trump allegations with Angel...



Continued with Guru...



And, after I spent a little time explaining legal process MS decided...



And...



So...



Before thudding into the earth and below it with...



Tomorrow? I put soap on the Secret Santa Christmas list. . .

Guess I shoulda finished my sentence so TH can get off his soap box.

Blow it was short for blow it out yer backside where it originated.

Maybe not nice, but fitting.

Hardly worthy of soap.

Town is having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that a layman, lol, can dance in his ballroom.

 

[Town Heretic]

Guess I shoulda finished my sentence so TH can get off his soap box.

Blow it was short for blow it out yer backside where it originated.

Even that one has a more popular, crude ending. But you know that. And silence where a reasonable man would clarify tells me everything I need to know about it. The only reason you're caring now is to keep your hindquarters out of trouble, or because at some point it dawned on you how poorly you came off with that.

Town is having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that a layman, lol can dance in his ballroom

No, I've seen laughable laymen do that all the time. Outside of traffic court or small claims it rarely goes well for them.

Glad you enjoyed today's Wrap though. :thumb:

 

[1Mind1Spirit]

Even that one has a more popular, crude ending. But you know that. And silence where a reasonable man would clarify tells me everything I need to know about it. The only reason you're caring now is to keep your hindquarters out of trouble, or because at some point it dawned on you how poorly you came off with that.

Actually the only reason you keep bringing it up is in hopes I'll step out of bounds.

No, I've seen laughable laymen do that all the time. Outside of traffic court or small claims it rarely goes well for them.

I'll bet you wudn't laughin' when those rare laymen handed yer butt to yuh in them not so serious courts you were the prosecutor in.:jawdrop:

Glad you enjoyed today's Wrap though. :thumb:

Comical enough.

 

[1Mind1Spirit]

I actually voted against the president in his bid for reelection.

So what you demonstrated was an ongoing propensity for getting it wrong in a hostile, assumptive manner. Doubling down with the "Liar" neg rep was just icing.

On the plus side, you read The Wrap, so all's not lost. Pos rep on the way for you.

He may have been wrong as we only have your word for it.

So then you're either a leftist liar or an unstable wishy washy conservative.:idunno:

 

[Arthur Brain]

He may have been wrong as we only have your word for it.

So then you're either a leftist liar or an unstable wishy washy conservative.:idunno:

Or of course, neither of the above...

lain:

 

[Town Heretic]

He may have been wrong as we only have your word for it.

Which is also the only way anyone knows I voted for the president the first time.

So then you're either a leftist liar or an unstable wishy washy conservative.

Well, no. Like I said earlier, I'm a moderate. I find ideas from both sides of the aisle valuable and a good bit both mistaken and unfortunate. I'd be a horrible liberal or conservative, if you're strong in either camp. Liberals would hate my position on abortion and the Second Amendment and conservatives would hate that I don't hate liberals and find some of their ideas solid.