Don't care what floats on the airwaves mate, I'd rather see the FCC disafuckingpear, along with ANY regulatory agencies dedicated to the monopolizing or of any form of communications.

Pirate Radio is still legal...hardly-The rule is a signal strength of 250 µV/m at 3 meters from the antenna within the band 88 to 108 MHz....get a about 300 or so feet away in Stereo...Nazis run the planet y'know...

But, as long as you don't piss anyone off, you should be able to broadcast with a 5-10 watt transmitter anywhere from 10-20 blocks, depending upon obstructions...

Pirate Radio Baby....DO IT TODAY!

Get conservative radio off the air? Good luck. You might as well tell people not to slow down to look at car accidents.

It's their own fault.

Liberal talk radio just isn't the same thing as conservative talk radio, but that's exactly the model that most of the AAR programs were based on.

I don't think most liberals like just listening to talk all of the time. They really should have jazzed up their programs with more music, apolitical interviews, and who knows, maybe even some radio theater.

Liberals don't crave the lecture scene quite the way the cons do.

@rougy, by liberals you mean progressives, right?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressivism

Big difference.

No, there isn't a big difference, Blankie, despite what the Wiki-monster has to say.

Unless someone wants to play word games, and I'm not in the mood for that.

If I remember correctly, the word "progressive" first emerged out of the lexicon of Mao Zedong, likely meant in the derogatory sense, much like "reformer." A common left-wing perspective is that progressive is an empty term used by establishment representatives to win the support and votes of left-leaning individuals, who are then promptly betrayed.

>> ^rougy:
No, there isn't a big difference, Blankie, despite what the Wiki-monster has to say.
Unless someone wants to play word games, and I'm not in the mood for that.

Translation: "No amounts of truth will convince me I'm wrong!"

Face it, in the current American political discourse, the words "liberal" and "progressive" are almost interchangeable.

Unless somebody is in the mood to toy with semantics and claim that GW Bush was too "liberal."

Or that forming an aliance to declare independence from a mother country is "conservative."

There's no denying the term "liberal" has been hijacked and is now used to classify anyone from the political left OR progressives. And what's wrong with arguing semantics? It's arguing for the meaning of words, which is important. If tomorrow everyone called turkeys chickens that wouldn't make them chickens.

But, yes, in modern American discourse liberal and progressives are nearly interchangeable, which is unfortunate because it's revisionist.

And qualm likes little boys.

There's a difference between arguing semantics in order to find out the truth of the matter, and arguing semantics in order to "reframe" something to make it appear as something that it is not.

Frankly, I think that the reason the word "progressive" gained so much use in the 2000's was due to the diabolically successful efforts of the right-wing noise machine to turn the word "liberal" into an almost universal pejorative.

I'm a word guy, too, but like it or not, there's often a difference between what a word means originally and what it means in the vernacular.

On a side note I do remember, in the run-up to the election of 2000, the Greens and the Libertarians were in agreement on...probably 75% of the issues...and that's another reason I'd like to see the end of our two-party system. I think we'd make more progress if Greens and Libertarians were represented.

And lastly, the reason that the Dems and the liberal left aren't making more progress is because we're more reactive than active. It's like playing a chess game where you can never seem to get into a position to launch your attack.



(Cut! Where's my fluffer!)

@rougy, when I use Liberalism, I am using the original meaning. It's a focus on individual freedom vs. the right of the collective or divine rights of kings.

The colloquial use of liberal, unfortunately, has nothing to do with individual freedom.

And, yeah, I have no clue where Progressive came from, but the Dems seem to like it. I think it fits. Either way, Leftists and Dems are most certainly not liberals.

(Cut! Let's have qualm to the set to fluff rougy.)

More semantics. You like original meanings?

How about this: libertarians are awful. They should start using that to describe themselves.

And the libertarian idea of "freedom" is really a charade to cloak their arrogance and selfishness.

A real libertarian should live in the woods and eat berries, otherwise he's just another social parasite.

Individual freedom does not preclude social duty. Selfishness does.

His Rights of Man defended the revolution against the attacks of Edmund Burke and proffered a new vision of the republican state as a promoter of the social welfare, advocating such policies as progressive taxation, retirement benefits, and public employment. An even greater success than Common Sense, Rights of Man transformed English radicalism, linking demands for political reform with a social program for the lower classes.

Thomas Paine - A Short History

>> ^blankfist:
@rougy, by liberals you mean progressives, right?
[links to misleading wikipedia pages]
Big difference.


Wikipedia usage fail. Try the right pages for the context of the conversation:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_liberalism_in_the_United_States
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressivism_in_the_United_States

[edit]: Tried to work around weird parsing bug.

Modern liberalism. Right, I gotcha. I acknowledge that's different from classic liberalism. Not everything is a "na nana boo boo" moment, NetRunner.

I was making a distinction that the term liberalism was hijacked. I am a classic liberal. You are a modern liberal.

>> ^blankfist:
Modern liberalism. Right, I gotcha. I acknowledge that's different from classic liberalism. Not everything is a "na nana boo boo" moment, NetRunner.
I was making a distinction that the term liberalism was hijacked. I am a classic liberal. You are a modern liberal.


I agree, not evrything is a "na nana boo boo" moment. That's why I don't understand what relevance your resistance to the evolution of political terminology has to any other point you were trying to make.

In this case, it seemed to be "na nana boo boo, Air America is dead", though I suppose you were going to disagree with rougy's assertion that liberals¹ don't like to be told what to think, but went on a tangent instead.

There are meaningful debates to be had without trying to turn it into a literal semantic battle.

1. I mean the normal meaning of the term in the context of 21st century American politics, which also happens to be the context of the original article

@NetRunner: I suppose I was having a conversation not writing a thesis. Next time I post on VS, should I do it in outline form with a definitive beginning, middle and end so you don't become confused by sidebars common with conversation?

I recognize there's a deviation in terms between modern liberal and classic liberal. I don't care for terms deviating so drastically from their original root meanings, which seems almost too typical in political discourse. Calling "modern liberals" liberals is an oxymoron. The root word for liberal is liber which means free. The term liberalism means a belief in individual freedom, which is antithetical to the collective viewpoints of, ahem, modern liberals.

And, yes, Air America is dead. Forgive me if I revel in this small victory for politics.

@blankfist, I think most people who use "liberal" and "conservative" in a political context in conversational speech expect people to generally understand what they mean. However, you can't seem to restrain yourself from always wanting to get into some sort of strange etymological battle about what you think "liberal" should imply.

It's funny that you're acting like I want the sidebars. You essentially demand them of anyone who says "liberal" and doesn't use your preferred, archaic definition (which, incidentally, no one does). I don't want you to annotate your comments, I'm just saying you shouldn't try to force other people to do so, and that your efforts to impose that on people doesn't score you or your ideology any kind of political points.

As to your schadenfreude about Air America dying, it's hard to imagine this is some principled stand against political radio -- I doubt you'd have made a peep if some 2nd string conservative radio talker got the plug pulled, or even if Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck or Bill O'Reilly got canned.

IMO, Air America was doomed to failure because it didn't even try to be a left wing version of right wing radio; it was mostly populated with reasonable people making reasonable (and often obvious) commentary on the politics of the moment. It was, to me, utterly boring, and I'm almost certainly the target audience for them.

@NetRunner said: "It's funny that you're acting like I want the sidebars."

Was I? I don't think that's what I wrote. Go back and reread, please.

NetRunner said: "I doubt you'd have made a peep if some 2nd string conservative radio talker got the plug pulled, or even if Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck or Bill O'Reilly got canned."

That's where you're wrong. Egregiously so. Once again go back and reread, because I'm tired of giving you the Cliff Notes version of my posts. I wrote, "Now, if we can get the Conservative radio shows off the air, all will be better in the world." Nothing would please me more than to see those evil men sink. You seem to think of the world only within your duality paradigm of "well, if he's not a Democrat, then he must be a Republican."

The word "liberal" in its modern use doesn't even make sense. No one could deduce its meaning using the root any longer. What if in twenty years the Republicans starting claiming they were Progressives and wanted the country to go back to 1950s America? And the majority called them Progressives, and it was widely accepted. Majority doesn't make right.

@blankfist, you said: I suppose I was having a conversation not writing a thesis. Next time I post on VS, should I do it in outline form with a definitive beginning, middle and end so you don't become confused by sidebars common with conversation?

To which I said: It's funny that you're acting like I want the sidebars.

To which you said: Was I? I don't think that's what I wrote. Go back and reread, please.

I belabor the point because I'm trying to get you to break out of your debate habits. On display are two of your staples:

1. Go onto a tangent about how people like rougy and NetRunner are evil for pretending they're liberals (and then slowly work your way into saying liberal means pro-freedom, and all left-leaning people are anti-freedom socialists)
   
   
2. Pretend that people are putting words in your mouth when your subtexts are made explicit.
   

I'm being obnoxious about this because I like debating with you, but the above are just intellectual laziness, and I expect more from you.

Let me slap down another off the shelf attack you like to level at me lately: You seem to think of the world only within your duality paradigm of "well, if he's not a Democrat, then he must be a Republican."

You're far from the only one making this or similar assertions, but you're one of the people who I think should know me better than that. I go after people who I think are either morally wrong, or factually wrong. I go after people left, right, and center, Republican, Democrat, or Libertarian (the Ron Paul kind or otherwise).

That said, this also seems to be more semantic quibbling. Everyone who thinks the solution to all of our world's problems is less taxes, and less regulation are all morons who should be kept away from the levers of government, no matter what party they do or don't claim to be a part of.

People who attack the idea that there are many unrecognized rights that government should defend (e.g. right to food, health care, decent working conditions, a living wage, etc.), deserve whatever rhetorical riposte I can muster. Again, that's no matter what party they do or don't claim to be a part of.

Look, bottom line is, knowing you as I do, I think morally your heart's in the right place, I just think you're objectively wrong on what effect your policy prescriptions would have. That separates you from the Republicans I generally go after with a vicious glee -- they seem to know exactly what their policy prescriptions will do, it's just that their twisted morals want inequality to punish the people they view as undeserving.

@NetRunner: Those aren't my staples, but thanks for the straw men coupled with ad hominem. That's a new low for you. I beg you reread the comments again.

But to continue this trite belaboring, you pointed out that I went on a tangent, to which I replied (and I paraphrase for your reading comprehension level) maybe I should write my comments as something more linear with no deviations instead of as conversations with sidebars. Your reply to that was nonsensical, because I wasn't insinuating you wanted a sidebar, you big silly lummox.

Horse. Dead.

That said, everyone who thinks the solution to all our world's problems is more taxes and more regulations are morons who should be kept away from the levers of government, no matter what party they do or don't claim to be a part of. Why? Because they shouldn't be so immoral to believe a majority should have the right to steal and tell the minority what rights they do or do not have.

Look, bottom line is, know you as I do, I think morally (and ethically) your heart's in the right place, I just think you're myopic and objectively wrong on what effect your policy prescriptions are having and will continue to have. That aligns you with the Republicans I generally go after with a vicious glee -- they also do not understand what their policy prescriptions will do, because they, too, are blinded by power lust to be a majority putting the boot on the necks of the minority.

@blankfist, I don't mean to cause offense. I'm not saying these things to try to smear you or make you feel bad, I'm saying them because I've seen you do these things countless times (including your last response), and just figured I'd give you some (hopefully) constructive criticism so you can sharpen your arguments. What you do with my advice is up to you.

I am glad we made some progress on another front though -- you confess to being highly partisan on the opposite side of an ideological divide from me. This is better than the non-partisan airs you like to put on.

Anyways, I take solace in the fact that the only way you can lump me in with Republicans is to accuse us of both believing in democracy, just like Thomas Jefferson.

You, I suppose, have a better idea? A system in which most of the limits put on our actions are imposed by a wealthy elite freely exercising property rights?

I know, I know, you don't think it would work out that way...

@NetRunner, I'm not sure I understand what you mean seeing me "do these things countless times". If you're remarking about my consistent desire to use words based on a word's original lingual connotation as the prime factor in determining someone's meaning, then I'm guilty as charged. You may continue to enjoy language as a memorization technique no doubt taught to you lazily by a teacher whose idea of educational integrity was to grade based on ability to commit to memory rather than deconstruct the sum of its parts.

On that topic, anyone who believes being against big government and for more individual freedom is demonstrating partisanship, then I think we've discovered another grand achievement from our lackluster public school system.

It's true Jefferson was a man who spoke of "the people", and he practically coined it. He was a self avowed Republican, however. Not to be confused with the modern Republican, but of the root meaning of republicanism. He also believed in a strong democratic core whereby the choice of the men and women entering and exiting office would be chosen by a majority as opposed to an aristocratic minority, which is how elections were conducted at the start of the US. I agree elected officials should be selected by a majority. I don't believe, as didn't Jefferson, majority decision gives right for the popular group to take away rights and liberty and instill dependence and tyranny in its place, which is the democracy rule that Democrats and Republicans enjoy today.

I believe in persuasion over coercion; voluntarism over compulsion; individualism and self-governance over collectivism and dependence. Look how your precious system of big government has failed us routinely and driven us into entangled alliances and wars abroad. Your continued answer to this will surely be "but we can make it better." No. We cannot, otherwise it would've been better by now. It's only gotten worse.

I gave AA a shot a few years back, until I came to the conclusion that it's not conservative talk radio that I hate, but rather the talk radio format itself.

Talk radio is as dumb a media format as media formats come. Listening to some blowhard bullshit off the cuff about politics for 3 hours a day, 5 days a week, 12 months a year is not something I'm interested in doing, regardless of the political views of the host. I think even your intellectual Chomsky types would be hard pressed to come up with three hours of commentary a day for weeks on end, let alone the rejects they dig up to host these AM shows.

I have to take this failure as a sign of intelligence of my ideological brethren.

If you want news, commentary, culture and politics on the radio, public radio is by far your best bet.

I actually like talk radio. The program I listen to, Free Talk Live, is on for almost 3 hours a day, 6 days a week, 12 months a year. They've actually taken some of the spots AA was on.

I subscribe to their podcast.

I think I like talk radio because for the type of work I do I can play it in the background and it fills the dead space. It's also rarely boring because the topics are so damn good and relevant. There. I just plugged the shit out of Free Talk Live.

@dystopianfuturetoday, I agree with that 100%. But does that mean you're dancing with glee because the single left-wing radio outlet folded, while all the right-wing talk radio thrives?

I'd love it if they all went away at once, but I think a situation where all political opinion radio is essentially one giant right-wing zoo is unhealthy for society, and not something to really cheer about.

I'd probably listen to a left-wing political shock-jock, but Air America really didn't have any. I could strike the pose that "that kind of thing doesn't appeal to liberals", but that's not true -- I love inflammatory left-wing rhetoric, and so do most of the liberals I know.

Our rhetoric is definitely different in content, but we loves a good no holds barred smackdown and a good righteous rant.

@blankfist, I'm just saying that steering conversations into literally semantic battles isn't helping your advocacy for libertarian (or whatever made-up word you'd prefer everyone use) ideas.

Me personally, I really love arguing semantics; I've got something of a fetish for it (it's part of why I'm a programmer in my day job). However, I think it's important to speak the same language as your audience if you're looking to be understood.

People who use words with their colloquial, rather than archaic meanings aren't brainwashed by some sort of government indoctrination they received in public school (fun fact: I didn't go to a public school), they're using the words they think will convey their meaning most accurately and concisely to the listener.

What you're doing is like trying to hijack a conversation about due process for police officers with a story about how the word "cop" originally referred to the criminals being chased by officers of the law, and not the police themselves, and then act as though this implies something nefarious about the very idea of having public defenders.

At best, this fixation on trying to dust off the old meaning of liberal is a strange sort of non-sequitor. At worst, it's some Orwellian plan to shape thought by trying to erase the modern definition of the name your ideological opposition uses. In either case, it's usually deployed as an attempt to change the subject.

As I said originally, I'm just trying to convey to you that I think it's an intellectually lazy tactic, and that I think you can and should do better.

@NetRunner: Actually, I'm not clear on the etymology of cops, but I believe they were named that for their copper badges. I don't know. Anyhow, your example is hugely flawed, because the term cop is still used as its base meaning. Most words are used appropriately based on their root meaning, that's why you can read almost any Romantic language and glean most of the words because they share a common base thread.

Intellectual laziness isn't having a desire to apply correct usage of language based on the original lingual meaning. No, I believe intellectual laziness is learning memorization techniques handed down by your party to gain agenda.

If you like arguing semantics, then argue them. Don't give in to those awful memorization techniques that have made us all stupider and more susceptible to revisionism under the Prussian education system.

^ To be honest, I'm going off of what I saw on hotforwords for the cop thing. I don't know if she's authoritative, but she did address the notion that cop was short for copper badges, but said that's not really the origin.

If you want a semantic battle, I'll waste a few brain cells on it. Let's start with the etymology of the word semantic itself:

1894, from Fr. sémantique, applied by Michel Bréal (1883) to the psychology of language, from Gk. semantikos "significant," from semainein "to show, signify, indicate by a sign," from sema "sign" (Doric sama).

In short, semantics refer to the method or process of how people communicate ideas. Normally discussions of semantics are about accurately conveying an idea or concept with words. For example, how do people know the difference between their, they're and there in spoken language? Why doesn't that kind of overloading create a lot communication issues?

A big part of the answer is context. With they're, their, and there, all you need to really know is the grammatical part of speech. Other concepts need a semantic context.

For example, let's talk about a red light. A red traffic light means stop, but a red light in other context might mean that your stereo is in standby mode, your phone is charging, or you're getting close to the whorehouse.

It can also be used metaphorically, as in "She told him she didn't want to see him anymore, but he just loves to run red lights."

I find that you can be selectively obtuse about these different ways of discerning meaning from words.

When I say "I am a liberal", I usually mean this, and not necessarily this.

However, I don't really think being a liberal necessarily is in conflict with being a liberal. I too have a strong devotion to individual liberty, I just think there are more fundamental human rights than you do. But I also think there are limits to rights, and that there's no root violation of "individual liberty" if you have taxpayer subsidized, compulsory social insurance, any more than if you have a taxpayer subsizied, compulsory fire department.

But I don't need to express all of that if what I'm really saying is "I don't think liberals like to be told to think." There's no real doubt about who I'm talking about when I say "liberals". My semantics are clear.

If one wanted to respond to such an assertion, they would take on its semantic content. In other words, they'd say "broad generalizations like that are bad", or "bullshit, liberals are all zombies that do what George Soros tells them to", or even address the implication, such as "conservatives don't like to be told what to think, either!", or "I believe what I believe, and if Rush Limbaugh agrees with me, then I suppose he's on my side."

Incidentally, here's a good etymology of the word liberal. Personally, I'm using the original root definition, "befitting free men, noble, generous," when I describe the people who believe in this. When I'm referring to anti-tax zealots, I'm usually dancing around this, but I can also come up with more scathing barbs as the situation merits.

And I agree language should be used as communication first and foremost. It's a personal pet peeve when some mock others for bad grammar, poor spelling or generally a bad use of language. It's not a huge pet peeve by any stretch, because I can find the humor in just about anything, but I've often thought the purpose of language is to communicate.

If I go to a non-English speaking person and point at my mouth, he or she will most likely deduce that I'm either hungry or thirsty. That's great.

A larger pet peeve for me, however, is revisionism. I don't like it when people change historical occurrences and language to front a disingenuous agenda. Through the process of memorization, people can easily be taught new meanings to virtually any word, and therefore the term freedom could easily be resigned to mean hegemony or nation-building, as in, "we're spreading freedom."

At that point, language serves to be an evolving tool that is inconsistent rather than a basis for communication through a lingual commonality. Therefore, it's irresponsible to persist with using words incorrectly when you understand them to mean something else. The modern US liberal is no more a liberal than Thomas Jefferson was the first Democrat.

redistribution increases the individual liberty of the poor more than it decreases the liberty of the rich.

@jwray: More money doesn't mean more liberty. Liberty isn't something that can be purchased. More money allows you to afford to do more, but that has nothing to do with liberty.

I can't afford a Bentley, but that doesn't mean I have less liberty. Contrary, if I worked really hard to buy that Bentley by saving religiously, but could never afford it my entire life because the more money I made the more direct tax I had to pay, and property tax, and income tax, etc. then in the end one could make the argument that "redistribution" is theft and takes away individual liberty.

>> ^blankfist:
I can't afford a Bentley, but that doesn't mean I have less liberty. Contrary, if I worked really hard to buy that Bentley by saving religiously, but could never afford it my entire life because the more money I made the more direct tax I had to pay, and property tax, and income tax, etc. then in the end one could make the argument that "redistribution" is theft and takes away individual liberty.


I think the counter argument I and most liberals would give is that if a homeless guy gets a preventable illness, and can't afford the preventative treatment, he gets sick and maybe dies, which is a pretty severe imposition on his liberty.

Consider we look at the moral calculus of doing the opposite of the health care plan. Let's say there's a bill that will scrap Medicaid entirely, and use the saved revenue to provide a tax cut for people making $1 million/yr or more.

Certainly, we're providing more "liberty" to the rich in the form of cash, but we're depriving the poor of even the most basic assistance with medical costs, which would certainly result in an increase in the number of people dying from preventable illness, and vastly reduce the liberty of the poor.

To put it in Republicanized^* rhetoric, I'm not so concerned with who gets how much liberty, as I am in making sure the total sum is as big as possible by efficiently redistributing liberty from those for whom there are diminishing returns (e.g. Bently vs. Mercedes) and giving it to those who get the most bang for the buck (e.g. going from dying of preventable illness, to living a complete life).

* Republicanized in that this is how Republicans talk about income, they don't care about who's rich and who's not, they just want the GDP to grow as much as possible.

>> ^NetRunner:
I think the counter argument I and most liberals would give is that if a homeless guy gets a preventable illness, and can't afford the preventative treatment, he gets sick and maybe dies, which is a pretty severe imposition on his liberty.


You could not be more wrong. Sickness and death brought about by natural occurrences do not have a tangible culprit that can be held accountable. No one person or organization made that homeless person sick in your scenario. Nor did anyone kill him. Nature is the culprit, and nature cannot be held accountable.

Regardless, that's a severe imposition on his health and life, which is not the same as liberty. Liberty is his personal freedom from control and coercion. Don't confuse it.

We do provide more "liberty" to the rich, but that has absolutely nothing to do with your scenario. Those in South Central LA know oppression more than those of us in Brentwood, but not because of health care. It's because of government coercion and control. I see police patrolling my neighborhood maybe once a day if that. In South Central they're all over the place. I actually drove through South Central and got pulled over by a rank-and-file who asked if I was selling drugs in his neighborhood. He had no reason to pull me over other than suspicion. They'd never do that here in Brentwood. At least not right now.

^ I think one thing you and I could see eye to eye on is to make sure that the law is applied equally to all people, regardless of economic/racial/ideological/religious/sexual preferences.

Personally I think the difference in experience has more to do with the differences in economic status than anything else.

Blanky hates Air America... therefore he hates America!