I prefer to call it doublethink myself.

{LINK}

I think it's ironic that the term "hypocrisy" is in the title of the book, given that that's pretty much all this is. You can't talk about Republican propoganda machines in the same sentence where you refer to vast right-wing conspiracies intended to destroy Democracy.

Interesting how the greatest crime to a liberal is being hypocritical. It's always used by them, presumably so they don't have to argue a point on the merits, where they will lose. Bill Bennett? Although he never spoke out against gambling, liberals were piling on top of themselves to accuse him of hypocrisy, as if that suddenly made everything else he said invalid.

A sign doesn't have to be in St. Louis to be correct in pointing toward St. Louis.

Goalie

Joe Conason? It must be nice to see the world through such a serenely partisan lens, undisturbed by truth or reality.

JLB, you think I'm going to let you have all the fun?!?


Goalie

Likewise. Is it wrong to point out when someone is being a hypocrit who attacks anothers reputation as an excuse to avoid admitting their own faults?
A sign can point either way . . .

Point it out? If you feel like you have to, but it has all the relevance of an ad hominem attack...mainly because that's what it is.

I mentioned Bennett (as does the link). Does the fact that he gambled and lost money that he could afford in any way invalidate his statements...in and of themselves? Or is the ad hom hypocrisy attack just a convenient way for the left to attack someone while avoiding the merits of the argument...an argument they will lose on the merits?

Interestingly, Conason makes several sweeping accusations against Rush Limbaugh, but he doesn't source them. Well, I actually did a little research, and found the Cigar Aficionado piece on him that Conason cites, and predictably gets wrong. Interestingly, he said he was going to Paris for the first time on his birthday just a few years ago:
But more to the point...is he advocating a boycott of France and then going over there anyway? I've never heard him advocate or endorse such a boycott...only reporting on them. And I've certainly not heard of him going to Paris recently, especially after their U.N. hijinks. So Conason's charge on this score seems awfully vacuous, and actually reeks of class warfare ("And he loves French wine, the more expensive, the better.").

Vis a vis the Cuban cigar business:
Incidentally, according to him most of the Cuban stogies he has smoked are pre-Castro...

Further...he doesn't live in New York. He lives in Florida. His show is broadcast from WABC in New York, and I believe he has a place there, but he is a Florida resident.

So what's the real motivation behind Conason's attack? Could it be that he, like many liberals, realize the danger in having a funny pop culture icon who is conservative? After all, that's the source of much of the liberal's power...being regarded as "hip." And nothing threatens them as much as having a bunch of funny hip conservatives.

Goalie

You answer yourself on tis.
Although he may not have gotten his facts perfectly straight (either through bias or being misinformed), it does not mean that conservative hypocrisy does not exist.

Interesting dodge, but you aren't answering the question.

I'll rephrase. Why, in the liberal mind, does hypocrisy invalidate an opinion or an action? If anything, hypocrisy may require the person to explain a bit more, but it doesn't invalidate an opinion or, for that matter, an objective truth.

Goalie

So you see nothing wrong with hypocrisy?
obviously being hypocritical does not necessarily invalidate a judgment. However it's ethically wrong to allow immoral men to pass judgment upon others and be trusted that they are morally rightous simply because they point out anothers faults.

Why is it wrong?

Let's take a for-instance. Suppose you are a murderer. You get caught and are in prison. You then espouse the idea that it is perhaps wrong to murder people, and you start thinking that murderers are pretty bad people.

Is your opinion supposed to be discounted, even though it is objectively correct, simply because you are a murderer? This is the type of moral relativism the hard-core left is asking us to accept when they trot out the hypocrisy argument, particularly with Bennett.

I never said I don't see anything wrong with hypocrisy...only that it doesn't automatically invalidate an opinion.

Goalie