RE: Hypocrisy, Truth, and Celebrity

Personally, I think many folks mistakenly call themselves conservatives instead of what they really are -- conservation-oblivious capitalists.

Careful, your bigotry is showing. I guess we conservatives can be glad we're not beholden to your definition of us in order to pursue our beliefs. The conserve part of conservative, in an American political sense, refers to our desire to conserve the vision of the founders. That vision being a free and libertarian republic. The fact that we don't choose to knee-jerk whenever some celebrity wakes up out of their drug or alcohol induced stupor and decides to take up a cause doesn't preclude us from using the term to describe ourselves.

'Conservative' writers like Schlussel know that, so in order to belittle a cause not in the best interest of the narrow purpose she serves, she instead attacks an easy and hypocritical target.

I'm going to repeat this, and I hope you'll read it this time:

I said, "In fact, Schlussel doesn't directly attempt to attack or even refute a single established environmental position." Your assertions of Schlussel's motives in the article are pure fantasy. Her entire thesis is exposition of Maher's lies and hypocrisy. You have invented some darker motive out of whole cloth simply because she takes on an enviro-celebrity icon.

At the end of the day, they walk off together.

And those two hang out together and laugh about it.

I really doubt it. Every live interview I've heard with Maher's "opponents" and some I've heard with Maher himself indicate most of his guests find him insufferable and can't wait to get away from him. I think Schlussel indicates elsewhere in her blog that she really can't stand Maher on a personal level. But you said all this yourself. You're engaging in circular argument. In one paragraph you have Schlussel as some fascist anti-environmentalist and in the next you have her as a Maher style hypocrite who doesn't really believe what she says. Which is it?

My whole point is this kind of sad, cartoon-esque BS masks and/or is used to attack noble causes such as environmental conservation.

So you say. You haven't demonstrated in any concrete fashion that Schlussel even attempted to pursue such a course. You've simply launched a paranoid ad hominem attack on Schlussel herself. Personally, I can think of half a dozen more noble causes attacked on a daily basis by cartoon-esque, BS slinging celebrities and/or liberals. Once again, your own assessment of the importance of what you define as environmental conservation is, fortunately for all of us, not a deciding factor in how we, as a society, choose to operate.

If you can't see that in the Schlussel column, consider yourself one of the fooled.

Sorry, but unless you can provide some concrete evidence of that from her article, it simply reduces to my inability or unwillingness to participate in your own delusion. Or as many a wise man has said, "Just because you say it doesn't make it true."