It finally happened. I was called a member of the "intellectual elite"...

[OrlandoGator]

...and it was intended as an insult.

I feel kind of honored, although it is indeed sad that the words "intellectual," "elite," "liberal," "pragmatic" and "activist" are now somehow things you say to people you don't like.

It's not bad enough that they insult and exploit our troops. Now they are desecrating our very language!

[villager]

1. as they are told to do

you dang-blasted member of the reality-based community! (or is that "commie-unity?")

[OrlandoGator]

2. What should we expect? Rush has been using "liberal" as profanity...

...for 20 years now.

[villager]

43. and we need to do the same to "Republican," quite frankly...

Make the word synonymous with treason -- which it actually is.

[tjdee]

3. I love that insult, it makes me feel kind of smart.

[Maple]

4. Congratulations!

Brains are a good thing to have in the 21st century.

Vital even.

[Daphne08]

5. I'm old enough to remember when the term "intellectual elite"

was a term of great respectability.

Congrats!

[ultraist]

6. I'd still consider that a high compliment!

[Somawas]

18. I enjoyed being an "effete intellectual snob" back when we had Spignew

Agnort to kick around.

[Coastie for Truth]

7. An honor and a compliment

[Career Prole]

8. Beats the heck out of being a brainstem conservative

Doesn't it? :D

[Maple]

12. Heh...now that phrase I like

'brainstem conservative'....I must remember that one!

[Career Prole]

26. None of the higher functions, Maple...

Pulse, respiration, reflexes, and the right to vote.
That's what we're pitted against.
It's an ordeal trying to reason with a brainstem. :eyes:

[Jackpine Radical]

Now you know why they got so excited about Terri Schiavo.

They couldn't tell there was anything wrong with her.

Brainstem Bushbots.

[Career Prole]

44. Duuuuude! That's sick!!

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Diagnosed by a jury of her peers...

[OneGrassRoot]

23. Man, I needed that...........

"Brainstem Conservative"

That's one of the funniest things I've heard in a long time....and it gets funnier and funnier the more I think of it!

Thank you, thank you, thank you........:yourock:

[tnlefty]

35. Welcome to DU, timeforarevolution!

Hope that you like it here. :hi:

[OneGrassRoot]

38. Thanks much....

For the welcome, tnlefty....:hi:

I've been lurking for a long time....getting more and more steamed. And more and more inspired. It took a good belly laugh for me to actually post a reply.

Brainstem Conservative......gotta love it.....

:applause:

[Career Prole]

45. Oh, heck...you're quite welcome!

And welcome to the DU! :hi: :toast:

[Maru Kitteh]

47. Oh, now that's GOOD......... n/t.

[yorkiemommie1]

9. you isn't a Moran !

and that is a good thing !

[ChairmanAgnostic]

30. you AINT be an moran. please!

and that is a good thing

[shaniqua6392]

10. You should be proud.

I hope someday someone calls me those names!!

[Jacobin]

11. Somebody has been Rush Limbotomized

He loves to coddle his mentally challenged listeners by telling them that 'smart people' are evil

[FreedomAngel82]

31. Smart people are evil?

Where does that come from? :crazy: For Biblical references see King Solomon. It's all in how you use your brains.

[Vickers]

13. "intellectual elite" vs. "misguided assclown"

Hmmmmm....I'll stick with "intellectual elite." :spank:

[Child_Of_Isis]

14. I hate to say this...

but I actually believe that Liberals are intellectually superior. They have critical thinking skills.

[FreedomAngel82]

32. I think what it is

is we're encouraged to be smart. My dad always (he's an old school republican) talks with me about stuff (history or not). I don't mind it myself cause sometimes I learn something new. :) Liberals encourage you to use your mind and not just blindly follow them unlike the now-day republicans.

[Itchinjim]

15. I was called an "liberal elitist" during a rather heated arguement...

with a RW acquaintance once. It made me spit the beer I was drinking directly from the pitcher at the time all over the table.

[Warren DeMontague]

16. Surely, anyone who THINKS is not to be trusted.

Typical.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

17. Makes me want to ask those who

toss around that phrase to tell me what it means. Not exactly sure what they mean by that. Are they saying you are SMARTER than they? Seems to me the whole dang reThuglican party is composed of elites and elite wannabes........

[yankeedem]

19. Congratulations!

Your welcome kit with latte mix and Birkenstocks will be delivered shortly. The kits now include DU bumperstickers to put on your 1988 Volvo 240 which you use to drive around Vermont with.

[Canuckistanian]

20. And how are the property taxes on your ivory tower?

And isn't ivory kind of hard to keep clean?

[Xipe Totec]

21. Shame on you!

Engaging in a battle of wits with unarmed opponents...

To be fair, you should never argue with freepers unless you are six beers ahead of them, sniffed glue, or suffered a concussion.

[PuraVidaDreamin]

22. Why can't we start using unimaginative,

lazy, underachievers

[stopbush]

24. The public has an insatiable curiosity to know everything,

except what is worth knowing. Journalism, conscious of this, and having tradesman-like habits, supplies their demands. (Oscar Wilde)

[FreedomAngel82]

33. Oh of course

What are they afraid of? The truth will hurt? The truth may hurt you emotionally but I'd rather know the truth then be ignorant.

[izzie]

25. I got this when I lived in Alaska and in the South and it was funny

People said I sounded like I was from Boston so I must know what was going on. Now I may sound like I came from Boston and I did go to college there for a year but I have lived a good deal of my life in Maine and it is a really funny statement to say I am from Boston and must know what is going on.:silly:

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

27. You should have thanked them profusely

I can think of no greater goal to which someone could aspire as to become an intellectual. Like the word "liberal", I would take it as a great compliment.

[Journeyman]

28. Nothing new in this kind of slur . . .

Richard Hofstadter chronicled the attack on the educated in his 1964 Pulitzer Prize-winning study, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life.

You can take heart, however, in Hoftstadter's assertion that anti-intellectualism is subject to cyclical fluctuations, and when society's disdain reaches its nadir something usually happens to bring intellectuals back into favor (e.g., the post-war euphoria for the intelligentsia's aid in winning the war with the atomic bomb gave way to the rabid abuses of McCarthyism, which in turn receded with the need -- indeed the demand -- for intellectuals in the wake of Sputnik).

[eridani]

46. Those were the days!

Thank you Nikita Kruschev and the hoards of nameless techies who put Sputnik in the sky, thus making all of those National Science Foundation scholarships possible.

[FreedomAngel82]

29. What's so bad about being smart?

Shouldn't you want to be smart and educated and learn something new every day? I want the president of my country to be way smarter then me. That's why I love Clinton, Gore, Kerry, Edwards, Dean, Kucinich. All of our democratic people (for the most part) are very smart and encourage that. What's so bad? :shrug:

[tanyev]

34. Did you say "Thank you"?

[kiki]

36. Not to rain on your parade...

...but compared to the people we're talking about here, paint is a member of the "intellectual elite". :)

[DemGirl7]

37. you should feel proud

like the way I felt proud, when someone called me a "moonbat". I like to spin these terms the right wing like use to insult liberals into something positive, I suggest you should get a button or bumper sticker poking fun at the insult, and calling yourself a member of the "intellectual elite" and saying that you are proud to be one. Because it will probably drive them crazy.

[sakabatou]

39. Congrats!

[JitterbugPerfume]

40. wow

I wanna be one a them intellectual elite folks

[sakabatou]

41. So do I... but there just aren't enough repubs in my area

[AlwaysQuestion]

42. Progressive "accused" of intellect --HORRORS!

--just joining in with the others to offer you hearty congratulations! How sweet it is to be among the intellectual elite, but before you let any of this get to your head, remember the source of your being pigeon-holed. Nah, c'mon, I'm only razzin ya. Still, ya just gotta admit, that such an epithet hurled at you is their way of letting you know they have no such intellect. As someone noted before me, such delicious irony. Ya just gotta love their egregious stupidity. NOT! It's all too much really!

Hope ya'll keep flyin' at her to see how many other "insults" you can get them to zing your way. I mean, let's find out just how faaar down the gene pool they really are. Pre-chimpanze prhps.

[OrlandoGator]

48. I almost forgot..."peace" is a bad word now, too.

Damn people are stupid.