First they taunt you...then they mock you...then they...JOIN you?

[Horse with no Name]

This is too funny not to share.
I have written in the past about an acquaintance that is a Bush supporter. Might I add...rabid Bush supporter.
This was in 2000. Then in 2004, still supporting Bush. Taunting the "get over it" meme.
This has cooled considerably since then, and very rarely politics are the discussion. Each knows how the other one feels so it is basically a moot point.
So anyway, he was talking the other day about the Presidential election. I groaned inwardly because my brain had him backing Guiliani or one of the other clueless fucklenuts that the republicans have hoisted forward.
Anyway...he said he was leaning towards Kucinich????
Said he was the only one who acted like they gave a shit about the common person.
I am guessing his anti-NAFTA rhetoric is hitting home with many folks.
Keep hitting it Dennis. One vote at a time.

[BOSSHOG]

1. Yeah Buddy

I see those "common persons" everyday driving around in their beat up old cars or trucks sporten them W stickers. Looks like they are really cared for.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

2. Go Dennis!

I must admit I hadn't considered the possibility of him converting Bush supporters. Not that I'm complaining.

[gateley]

3. VERY cool! When someone (your friend, e.g.) is in agreement with a position

of a Dem candidate, that opens up the door for them to look at other candidates, too (in my fantasy world, anyway).

If Dennis DOESN'T get the nom, as a result of his calling attention to the fact that the Dems DO have good ideas, Reps may listen more openly to what the nom has to say.

Dennis is a good spokesman for us and represents us well.


Great story!!

[toadzilla]

4. woohooo!!!

[MuseRider]

5. No surprise to me.

It has happened here a couple of times to me. Now I really have no idea how they will actually vote but they sure do appreciate his support of the common man and his honesty (also his drive for impeachment). It is interesting, he is the only Democrat that they would even consider. Straight from the horses mouth. It would be lovely if they really go through with it and tell their friends along the way.

[demnan]

6. Kucinich is gaining momentum

I've noticed it mostly from other Democrats, not so much Republicans - that gives me a lot of hope!

[Emit]

7. fucklenuts?

:rofl:

[CT_Progressive]

22. Its sort of like a "Tard Carnival (tm)".

[NobleCynic]

24. Yeah, I paused when I saw that one too

[L0oniX]

31. they go well with asscarrots

[Basileus Basileon]

8. I find this somewhat unlikely. It's rare a Republican turns into a

socialist simply on the virtue of protectionism. A Ron Paul isolationist/libertarian, yes, but a big-government populist?

I've noticed a large number of "Staunch Republican Loves My Candidate" posts, and while any of them might be true, it would be very difficult for them all to be true.

[Horse with no Name]

12. well I really don't care what you think

since you think it is unlikely ANYONE would vote for anyone other than YOUR candidate.

[Basileus Basileon]

14. I do not recall saying that.

In fact, it's kind of a strange statement. I don't think Biden is going to pull in 100% of the vote. I am aware that he has a rather narrow appeal at the moment, and I expect him to come in fifth (maybe fourth, if things go right) in Iowa.

I simply believe it's unlikely that a staunch Bush Republican would suddenly decide to support a socialist (and to me, that's high praise) candidate, especially since there are indeed protectionist Republicans. It's possible that this particular story is true, if your Republican were particularly stupid, particularly prone to reversing opinions, or particularly uninformed. It would be almost impossible for all these stories to be true, just like all the "My brother/cousin/friend/whatever used to be a Democrat until he realized how spineless and terrorist-loving they were" stories on FR.

[Horse with no Name]

18. So why don't you just come out and call me a liar then?

and I am QUITE sure you are familiar with the FR "stories".:eyes:

[Basileus Basileon]

21. Because I didn't say that.

I said I thought it was unlikely this in particular is true, and that some people who post conversion stories are certainly liars, while others are likely truth-tellers.

I'd give it (just gut feeling here) maybe a 20% chance you're outright lying, a 60% chance you're blowing an actual conversation out of proportion, and a 20% chance this happened as stated.

[Horse with no Name]

23. and I give 100% chance

that you are full of shit.
But carry on...

[Basileus Basileon]

28. Edit: never mind.

I've said my piece, and if it's true, I welcome our new ally.

[scarletwoman]

27. Perhaps you have too low an opinion of the innate intelligence of the masses.

Some people ARE actually capable of eventually recognizing that they're getting it up the ass with no reach-around. Excitement morphs into resentment...

sw

[Basileus Basileon]

29. Some people are, yes. I don't doubt *all* the conversion stories.

But were all the political-conversion stories on the Internet true, it would imply that three quarters of America had gone from one extreme to the other and back again in the last two years.

[scarletwoman]

30. I see that you exaggerate for effect: "...it would imply that three quarters of America had gone

from one extreme to the other and back again in the last two years."

Has anyone actually claimed this? Anecdotes are offered as small snapshots of the poster's physical world reality.

Have you kept scrupulous statistics of the number of "political-conversion" stories compared to voting patterns? Or perhaps you have your own anecdotal evidence that exhibits contrary sentiments?

Do you think the rest of us incapable of judging for ourselves whether one DUer's anecdote holds any meaning?

sw
(edited for open tag)

[Basileus Basileon]

32. Why, yes, I do. I would think that was an obvious rhetorical turn.

Obviously nobody has implied that three quarters of America have twice switched political positions. The point I was attempting to make was that the number of anecdotes of complete political reversals on the Internet are extraordinarily high, and are omnipresent. You'll see creationists crowing how they schooled their science teacher and convinced an entire class, and atheists claiming they stumped their priest and got him to admit that Jesus might not have been divine. You'll see liberals and conservatives claiming that their AWFUL OTHER SIDE neighbor Saw The Light. Hell, you'll even see Yankees fans talking about getting Red Sox fans to stew in anger because it was conclusively demonstrated that Derek Jeter kicks ass and Big Papi sucks.

To a partisan, the world is a matter of Truth and Lies. And little is more gratifying for them than getting someone else to realize the Truth. Conversion stories all have one unrealistic common thread: they involve someone going from one extreme to the other. And that makes sense to people who see the world as Truth vs Lies. It is ironic in its impossibility: only partisans see the world in the sort of way that allows one to leap from one extreme to another, and yet partisans rarely (if ever) actually do so.

As for most people? It is possible that a staunch conservative would find DK appealing, in that one small protectionist regard. However, it would be remarkable for him to support DK. People seem to believe that once they open the gates just a little bit, the dam will burst and the Truth will flood forth, and so tales like this seem realistic. However, that's not the way people's brains work.

This tale could be true. It would require one of three things:

1. The Republican has no firm beliefs, and doesn't really mind switching (say) from believing that the market is most efficient to believing that government can handle social services best. He doesn't particularly care.

2. The Republican is unaware of DK's positions, or of Bush's positions.

3. The Republican is incredibly stupid, and is incapable of processing the concept of single-payer healthcare, or of privatized social security, and has not yet been told by anyone else that DK is a Big Bad Liberal.

[scarletwoman]

35. Since I have never once believed that I have seen such a definitive sample of internet anecdotes as

to feel capable of judging them en masse, your argument fails to persuade.

Since one can never know for sure whether one internet anecdote is more true than another, one must fall back on simple common sense and logic: which anecdotes are more likely to be true? Based on one's understanding of human behavior, of course.

It is not so far-fetched, imho, to imagine that a former Republican voter, upon finding him/herself jobless due to outsourcing, might find some impassioned anti-corporate globalization speechifying more compelling than Ron Paul's "unfettered markets" schtick.

sw

[Selatius]

38. I was a Republican before 2000. I grew up in Mississippi. I believed in the Repub talking points.

Specifically about liberals and big government and how it's preferable to have small government with weak regulatory powers. Then again, that's the information I soaked up from the environment at a time when I was not interested in politics. In 2000 I was still in high school. Most of my classmates voted for Bush, citing the same propaganda.

Today, I am fully aware of economics, American history with respect to the third world, and the power of money over politics. I dabbled in the labor histories of the United States and several European countries such as France and Spain. I am now a form of free market socialist after studying various economic models from pure unregulated capitalism, mixed economies, and socialist/trending-socialist economic models.

My economic stance seeks to take the strengths of the free market (regulated) and combine it with the strengths of socialism. Looking back, I've come a long way in seven years.

[Basileus Basileon]

39. No, I agree it is not impossible

that any one of the Amazing Conversion stories on the internet are true. However, common sense would dictate that most probably are false. People do not undergo complete belief inversions frequently, and such anecdotes are ubiquitous. Moreover, people have several motives to falsify such stories on the Internet.

1. They might be looking for applause. The most slapdash Amazing Conversion story will get a few dozen slaps on the back, easily.

2. They might be looking to convince others that their beliefs are attractive. This is also a reason to believe them; who doesn't want to think Their Guy is popular?

3. They might be fantasizing about what might have been, given a mundane interaction--the political/theological version of the Penthouse letter that has as its origin nothing more than a girl smiling at you in the library.

4.They might be taking a conversation with someone who expressed disgust at an aspect of something they oppose, and simply "filled in the blanks" as they saw fit afterwards. I remember a conversation I had with a friend of mine (a Navy guy) who said he couldn't stand Bush, or a thing he stood for, and that he had all but ruined the country, and that he wanted a new direction. I remember a week later, asking him if he was looking at Hillary or Obama or someone else. He laughed at me, and said he was all for Fred Thompson. As it turns out, he was upset that Bush was incompetent (and that spending had increased); he wanted a "real conservative." Of course, I assumed otherwise from our first, brief conversation.

There may be a few hardcore political partisans who decided to support a candidate they previously laughed off as a nutjob. I would wager that the odds that so many just happen to be friends of people who post on political forums are fairly low. When you contrast even that with the utter lack of posts claiming experience with people leaving the writer's flock, I would lower the bar further still (it is notable that the only exception--the "DEM/PUB I KNOW WILL NOT SUPPORT CLINTON/GIULIANI" posts I have seen--are from people attempting to convince others that nominating a particular primary candidate would be a bad idea).

[treestar]

37. 4. The Republican learned a lot in the last two years

And changed his world view.

Especially if this is a younger person, that can happen.

[kenfrequed]

41. Hmmph

It really is actually about the populism.

Most Americans don't like 'free trade.' Once most Americans see who is for it and who benefits they start voting their wallets.

[Clark2008]

9. What happens if Kucininch wins the nomination?

Seriously... would the corporate media fold like a tent? Would the corporate backers all have heart attacks (providing they have hearts)?

I plan to vote for him because I think everyone else on both sides suck corporate penis, but I wouldn't say I am an ardent supporter.

However, everyone who doesn't have a candidate should vote for Kucinich to send a message to the corporate elite. That would be a hoot.

[Vincardog]

11. Everyone should vote for Kucinich to kick the shit out of the parasitic corporate elite.

[NoSheep]

40. Ditto!

[0rganism]

19. corporate media fold like a tent? hell no, it would go at him like a stirred ant-hill

You saw how they used the "UFO story" to further marginalize him, beyond simply balancing him out of the q&a during debates like other "minor" candidates. You've seen how much coverage he gets in the MSM already, compared to the "top tier".

DK is POISON to the corporate elites. There won't even be a veneer of evenness or decency in their coverage, the bought-and-paid-for media whores would openly attack him in every conceivable way at every possible juncture. The hatchet jobs on Kerry and Gore would look like red-carpet treatment by comparison. And if, by some miracle, he won the general election, it'd be a matter of weeks before the first assassination attempt.

It's a real damn shame, too, because he's the best of the bunch.

[Selatius]

36. The cynic in me says some nutjob right winger will blow out Kucinich's brains all over his wife.

Then again, I'm probably responding in this fashion, since it's so close to the anniversary of JFK's assassination.

[Vincardog]

10. Go Dennis!

[Downtown Hound]

13. Aks him how he now feels about people like Michael Moore,

Tim Robbins, Noam Chomsky, and others that have been on pretty much the same page as Kucinich for years. Mess with his head a little bit, and make him really question his old belief system.

[GeneCosta]

15. I agree

I began this election-cycle behind Obama, but Kucinich has recruited me to the cause of PEACE.

This socialist will not tolerate anything less than the Kooch.

[AngryAmish]

16. then they tickle you...

[Annces]

17. I wish someone would do an animation of Kucinich

doing a victory dance or something. Give him some turbo power.

[caseycoon]

20. I love it! Several friends who voted for *

really liked what Dennis has to say after I told them who he was & sent them to his website. They particulary liked the getting rid of Nafta part! I'm finding a lot of folks who really don't have a clue about who is for or against what issues.
GO DENNIS!
:woohoo:

[hfojvt]

25. except he is not a registered Democrat, is he?

The other day we had a debate watch party at a restaurant. Towards the end, the waitress was saying that she kinda liked Kucinich. She was kinda shy about it, as if there might be something wrong with liking Kucinich, since the media has painted him as somebody ridiculous, somebody that nobody likes or takes seriously. So I wonder how her support will stand up to continued media ridicule. The other question is if she is a registered Democrat, and if she will show up at the caucus.

[lonestarnot]

26. Damn I love to hear these stories. Dennis yes!

[Perry Logan]

33. This suggests Dennis may have powers we don't know about.

[BuyingThyme]

34. Thank you.