I'm taking a break until after the primary--a little too contentious here

[jpgray]

I've learned not to give an opinion without a lot of qualifiers on any candidate, but doing that is boring and should be unnecessary. Give an unvarnished criticism of someone's favorite and you WILL be accused of being uninformed, of trying to tell people what to do (where that comes from, I don't know), or of being some PR/freeper plant. People are too defensive. They read all sorts of nonexistent implications into a simple comment--you have to qualify those out of existence, so a small and basic comment has to be a paragraph long. But of course (to qualify ;-)) no one is really exempt from this--I get emotional about my favorites even if no one candidate really excites me yet.

This is no dramatic "I'm leaving DU!! Look at me!!" post, but I will take a break from posting until the primary is over. In fact, won't do much good to post on this thread, just read--I won't answer you until a while later. :) The facts are extremely subjective here. There are folks here who have "definitive" proof that Kerry intentionally misled journalists about whose medals he threw. There are others who have "unassailable" evidence that Dennis Kucinich's motivation for changing his abortion stance is purely political--he will turn into a fire-breathing woman-hating demon once in office, I guess. There are others who have "incontrovertible" facts that Dean somehow cheated the system by getting a medical out during Vietnam. These fantasies should play out once, maybe twice, but you get the same people parroting these things over and over and over, even after having eighty holes poked in their statements. It's pretty tiring to be the fact-police and responding to "Senator Waffle" or "AWOL Dean" or "Dennis choice-hater." It's irritating because the people that spread the nonsense around know in the back of their minds exactly what they're doing, but it must be very hard to stop. Political fundamentalism freaks me out.

So it's not that people shouldn't do these things, do whatever you want. I just don't want to deal with it--it sucks me in and it's a waste o' time. So I'm taking a little breaky-break. I'll be lurking around, though. Besides, I have to get ready to move, and I won't have much time anyway. See you after the primaries! And don't change, don't do anything different at all, have a good laugh at my rambly thread's expense, but think about what I said for a little while. Have fun, I'll be reading!

[MercutioATC]

1. Agreed. It sucks, but it'll be over relatively soon...

and I think it's good that everybody post (even certain individuals who shall remain nameless).

Stick with us. Don't post to threads that bother you (I'm slowly trying to start doing that).

The point is, your voice is important. Let it be heard.

[never cry wolf]

2. I agree also

I don't know you, or anyone on this site very well yet but a voice of reason can't hurt. When the hell did negative campaigning start in this country in earnest anyway. Seems as if it has pervaded here to an extent and I too HATE that. Well, at least amongst allies, we can all dump on the boy king.

[Andy_Stephenson]

3. With truckloads of

horse puckey

[salin]

4. ya, but

recently this vitriol pointed at ourselves and each other in GD is sapping my energy for taking political aim at uncuriousgeorge and his crowned corporate cronies. :(

I am growing fatigued.

[maxanne]

5. swan song

swan song \SWAHN-SONG\, noun:
1. A beautiful legendary song said to be sung by a dying swan.
2. A final or farewell appearance, action, or pronouncement.