With longtime friends, I’m totally gleefully out there, actually enjoying watching their eyes popping and jaws dropping. But in the public forum, I’ll have to stay hidden, or I may never have a chance to perform in my town again.

I am not trying to be insulting, I am just wondering how you can be so sure that what you left behind is what motivates your enemies on the “left”

Here is one point on which I agree with you: on the issue of pacifism and conscientious objection. My assumption is that those who make the decision for pacifism are doing so on a carefully considered philosophical and/or religious examination of the issues. I was a Conscientious Objector during the Vietnam War. At the time I thought I had made my decision completely on carefully considered philosophical and religious examination of the issues. The draft board must have thought I made a good argument, as they granted me 1-O status.

One reason for my pacifism was a desire to have clean hands. I changed my mind about pacifism after Pol Pot’s genocidal regime in Cambodia . People who stand on the sidelines and do nothing to stop such slaughter also have bloodstained hands. There are no clean hands in life, only varying degrees of bloodstained hands. Either by acts or by abstention, we all commit evil.

I didn’t realize until decades later that the primary reason for my becoming a pacifist was the death of a friend in a gun accident with his older brother when I was in elementary school. I was not afraid to go to jail by refusing induction into the army. I was not afraid of dying. Ask the two rednecks who beat me up for having long hair: they will inform you I was no coward. I feared killing, as I knew some of the consequences of killing: how the poor brother suffered over what he accidentally did to my friend, his younger brother. Two lives were ruined, not just one.

Most who decide to become pacifists do not have the underlying trauma behind their decision that I did. In that sense, you are correct.

I was raised in a liberal community by liberal parents, so I can be sure that for the most part what I left behind is what currently motivates those on the left. I used to think like a liberal, for the most part, so I know how they think, for the most part. I interact with Democrats on a daily basis. I go out for drinks every Friday with a Democrat. Both my precinct and my city went for Obama. I count Yellow Dog Democrats among my relatives. It’s not as if I don’t have a clue.

Is it really fair to assume that every liberal is as ignorant as you once were?

IMHO, that is a really dumb question. I would not be so foolish as to say “every liberal.” I have no idea why you framed the question that way. If there is something that one learns in life, it is that there is always someone that knows more, someone who is brighter. I encounter my betters on this blog every day. However, given that my SATs and GREs are in the 99th percentile, it would be fair to assume that MOST liberals are MORE ignorant than I once was and more ignorant than I am now. I would make the same comparison to most conservatives, not just liberals, however.

what is sad is that those that make comparisons of bush to hitler and saddam, have no idea of reality, they are completely out of touch.

we are talking about people who went to school, studied hard, went straight to college, studied harder, went to graduate school, studied till they dropped.

now they are phds, and such and learned, but they never realized that compared to regular people they only got to sample the world.

even if they traveled to a far away place, its just a sample, because the largest portion of their experiential lives have been within the confined structure of wanting to be paid to sit around and work on ideas in a box.

they are like house cats, that from kindergarten to years of professorship they have been within a society that only samples that world cause they are generally too busy.

this is the ‘fishbowl’ i refer to and why researchers in the recent past were much better caliber (morals and public trust, etc).

the problem with the fishbowl effect is that it does to a small collective of humans what generally happens to a single human when isolated. people who are apart from people for a long time, lose their centers of behavior. since their behavior is so adaptable, it doesn’t stop adapting when there is nothing to oppose. it pushes, and nothing pushes back to center behavior to a local group. so their behavior can get odder and odder (when seen from the perspective of that center).

consider it a kind of behavioral version of the isolation tank, where the lack of input causes the brain to have nothing to adapt to and measure from and so when it pushes, it keeps going.

well same thing in this kind of academic system (which is why it was designed this way but for other outcome). the people in the system set themselves apart with all kinds of mental things, and then are surrounded by others who generally have much less world experience than the average person, and so they are internally timid and externally act it out (though they dont know it).

the things normal people do over the course of their lives tends to be things that these people dont get a chance to do, and dont understand.

of course not all, but a surprising number that was higher than i would have ever thought.

and so in this world there is nothing to push back against these thoughts. bush and hitler are alike, and with their affectations they accept this fact like any they accept as they go through their other work and sphere and read a paper (today they are much less critical of other work in a technical way).

dont get me wrong they are wonderful people who really want to help. problem is that they grew up in a box which told them this is the way that helps, and they never thought the horrror of it all was that the boxes lied along the way.

some of them i want to slap upside the head and say wake up, the concepts your running around with only work in this fishbowl where whatever wackaloon premise they give you to think resonates down the halls and and hums against any other thought.

and in this way, very respected people can end up making ideas as nutty as the hermit on the hill, and as one sided.

I’m a grad student in anthropology. My anthro department is located at the “left pole,” i.e. the place from which all other positions are to be found to the right. Not only does it color their personal opinions and behavior (my department head, for example, routinely and vocally referred to the Bush administration as the “Fourth Reich,” comparisons of Bush to Hitler and Saddam were de rigeur, and at least one of my fellow students was well known for loudly expressing his wish that Bush would “just die”), but it absolutely does find its way into their teaching, as well. Like neoneo said, I don’t need to think back to how I used to be to understand leftists; I have plenty of opportunities to observe and study leftists in the wild.

As luck would have it, I have relevant first-hand experience, having lived in Europe for many years, and heard Europeans squawking about the difficulty of obtaining a green card sans anchor spouse, having to enter the green card lottery, and worrying about a brain drain. Perhaps that was just idle commentary.

No time to look up figures, and so will have to resort to anecdotal-type evidence, but consider how common it is to meet Europeans working in the US, and how rare it is to meet Americans working in(i.e., not just visiting) Europe. The same thing is true of Canadians.

While in Europe I taught in an ancient university that had a grand total of four (4) Americans on the faculty. Most American universities have that many Europeans in any given department. Got to be a reason for that.

If you knew my finances you’d have to laugh at your benjamins comment. Most of my friends in the UK earn more than I do here and if they were to move here they would not be earning more than they do there.

I am not sure what kind of a country you think you are living in that people from other rich western countries would be clambering to get in for a taste of the good life. Even people from India and China are starting to think twice. None of my family or friends have any desire to move here. Some of them think I am mad for staying.

So?

I am from a small town, and I found the lure of NYC irresistible.

You have heard of London, right?

Pardon the sarcasm above, but it seems that you’re offering fairly lame excuses for leaving Britain. Marrying an American doesn’t necessitate your living here, nor does the desire to live in a large cosmopolitan city. Would you live here, American wife or no, if your familial income were halved? I doubt it. I doubt it very much.

Bottom line: it’s about the benjamins.

I left Britain because my wife is American. I am from a small town, and I found the lure of NYC irresistible. Speaking of economic opportunity though, if I wanted to start my own business for example, I would rather do it in the UK. If I did it there I wouldn’t have to worry about private health insurance for my family. Risking it all to pursue your dream is a romantic idea, but being a bit of a scaredy cat, I’d rather have a safety net. There are many things about the US I prefer, but economic opportunity and health care are not amongst them.

Neo, I do know what you mean. I know liberals who do not seem to know why they think what they think. Which can be annoying. But this is also true Republicans I know. My friends fall into neither category as far as I can tell. Not that I have too many friends.

IgotBupkis, as I understand it, even with insurance in this country, a prolonged illness can bankrupt you. I remember when my son was born, even though both my wife and I have coverage, we had to pay $2000. 10% the cost of the C-section and hospital stay. The fast ones the insurance company tried to pull on us to get out of paying were unbelievable and caused a lot of stress. Just what you need when you have a newborn in the house. In the UK you are properly covered and you and your new child are made to feel welcome in the world. Sentimental and nannyish, perhaps, but it sure beats the reception our son got over here. We were turfed out the hospital before we had a chance to unpack. When the whole system is run for profit, a lot of what I consider to be care is lost.

ObamaCare is a mixed bag, it is not what I would have wanted, no, but I certainly don’t KNOW that it will result in disaster. No more than I KNOW doing nothing wouldn’t have. It has elements I like.

Richard Aubrey, because I don’t distrust Obama’s motives I have no reason to take what he said about a civilian national security force out of context. I believe what I read here: http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/is_obama_planning_a_gestapo-like_civilian_national.html

These are the words he spoke, so I don’t get what I am missing? Am I am naive, or are you are paranoid? I remember when people on the left thought Bush was planning to take over the military to ensure McCain won the election. I thought they were paranoid too.