When a conservative lies about someone conservatives are angry with, does that make the lie acceptable?
The Pink Flamingo is being hammered at another site for leaving a comment calling down a SC writer, Nancy Morgan for lying about Lindsey Graham. Some may look at what Morgan did as a sin of omission, but the object of her inaccurate reporting was to slander a man’s good name and destroy his reputation.
If Morgan had said that conservatives who do not identify themselves with the GOP and were members of the Libertarian and Constitution Party were determined to hold an elected Republican official to task, it would ruin the whole purpose of her article.
“…Graham has come to exemplify the growing disconnect between conservatives and the Republican Party. He believes he knows best, and if the people that elected him disagree, he tells them to just “chill out,” as he did at a recent townhall meeting in Greenville. The same townhall meeting where one of his constituents called him a traitor.
That townhall received little media attention. What did receive national media coverage was Graham’s recent interview where he attacked Glenn Beck, the left’s favorite target. “Glenn Beck does not represent the thinking of the Republican Party,” Graham stated. How he knows this is a mystery, as he went on to say he never watches the Glenn Beck Show. Go figure.
Graham may be right about one thing: Glenn Beck clearly represents the thinking of conservatives, not the GOP. And Sen. Lindsey Graham is now willingly spouting the talking points of the left and abandoning the conservative principles that got him elected. He has been seduced by the left and his reward is ever more national face time and political influence….”
From the Greenville News:
“…Whether they represent a vocal minority or the seeds of a serious election challenge for Graham remains to be seen, though at least one Republican consultant believes the state’s senior senator has “real problems” outside of just a raucous town hall meeting.
“If he were running right now, he’d be in serious trouble,” said Dave Woodard, a Clemson University political science professor and former campaign manager for Graham who said he has Upstate polling to support his view.
Graham, re-elected last year to another six-year term, flatly rejected that idea, describing the crowd at his town hall meeting this week as 40 percent Constitution Party members who themselves are about to spark a “backlash” because of the recent visibility of their “radical” views.
“They’re a political fringe group,” Graham told The Greenville News. “They believe that Medicare is unconstitutional and student loans are unconstitutional. I’m the conservative in the room.”…”
What it respresents is a serious problem for the GOP and reasonable Republicans in general. If these extremists cannot be revealed for who and what they are, they are going to end up costing us the House in 2010. If this happens, don’t blame the GOP for the destruction of this nation as we know it, blame conservatives.
Want to know how a non-conservative sees things?
“…Graham, who scored a full 100 percent rating from Americans for Tax Reform in 2007, is also under attack because he voted for Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court and recently insisted that “birthers” are crazy. Graham then went on “Fox News Sunday” and made the mistake of saying that he didn’t believe that Glenn Beck represented the Republican Party. Graham implied that Beck believed that the “country’s best days are behind us.” On his radio show, Beck played the clip of Graham on Fox and then railed against the South Carolina senator, lumping him in with other enemies:
“Yeah, the best days. The best days are behind for Lindsey Graham, you bet. David Brooks, Lindsey Graham , all of these people. Nancy Pelosi, all on both sides. On both sides. Katie Couric, Brian Williams, all of them. All of them. Anybody who’s playing this game, your best days are behind you.”
In only a week Graham has become a central target for the group called RINO Hunters that protested his appearance in Greenville. For those new to intraconservative sectarian warfare, RINO stands for Republicans In Name Only. A member of the RINO Hunter organization is featured in the video of the Lindsey Graham event. A man sets up a RINO Hunter sign on his pickup truck along with a mannequin head first in an actual toilet to simulate a swirly. The man says that it represents the way he would like to punish those he considers RINOs….”
LIES AND LIARS
I don’t like lies. I do not like people who lie and have no compassion or tolerance for them. I don’t care if the person doing the lying is Barack Obama, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, or Ronald Reagan himself. If I catch a lie and I can do something about it, I do.
Funny thing about lies and conservatives. They apparently only hold Democrats accountable. If a conservative lies, mis-represents, stretches the truth, or fails to tell the important parts of a story – it’s all for the “cause”.
A few months ago Pink Flamingo friend and confidant, Sally Vee introduced me to the lectures and teachings of Rabbi Daniel Lapin. Even though both of us are dedicated Christians, we’ve come to understand Lapin’s comment that everyone needs a rabbi! It has been quite awhile since the teachings of any religious figure have had such a profound effect on the very way I live my life and the way I look at life.
Several weeks ago I listened to his short CD on the Ten Commandments. I thought I knew what they were all about, but by the time the CD had ended, I received new insight into why things are the way that they are. According to the Rabbi, the reason the Ten Commandments are presented side by side, five on one side of a tablet and five on the other is that there is a correlation between the Laws that are side by side.
The one I’m interested in is good old #9 – You are not to lie about someone, especially in a court of law. What I found interesting about Rabbi Lapin’s interpretation is the fact that when you lie about a person, you are literally stealing their good name. You are stealing their reputation, damaging it, possibly destroying it beyond redemption.
There have been two instances where lies have caused irreperable harm and heart-breaking damage to my life. The first monsterous lie destroyed my reputation in the eyes of my grandparents and caused both my sister and I to be disheerated from our grandparents’ estate. The reason? Someone told my grandmother that my sister and I were involved in some very nasty immoral activities. We were never given the opportunity to face our accuser and fight for our reputations.
The second great lie happened in the spring of 2001. Someone I thought was a friend began spreading lies about me to the man I was to marry. Her lies destroyed that. The lies enabled him to undertake a debauched life-style that has ruined him. There is nothing left but a pathetic shell of a man who believed every nasty thing said about me. Yes, I was fortunate to discover his lack of faith in me before we were married, but my sense of self, well being, and my self-confidence have never truly recovered.
Those same lies ruined my best friend. She and her son moved to the other part of the state, returning only for her father’s funeral. I was driven away from mutual friends as the Princess of Lies continued to spin her wretched web of hate. The only solace is one person who heard the lies and believed them had a change of heart. Our relationship has never been the same, but he heard the worst about me and realized it was not true.
I was hurt so badly by those lies my entire life has changed. Rationally, I know what was done was not true and I know most of why it was done. But – the psychological scars are still there, and are still raw. When I encounter someone spreading tales or half-truths, or manipulating the truth about someone I know and consider a friend, having been on the recieving end of such things, I fight back.
You can’t go around spreading tales and abusing someone who does not deserve the treatment and remain unscathed. What goes around comes around. Look at what is happening to Rush Limbaugh. He has been vicious when it comes to attacking good decent Republicans like Lindsey and John McCain. Limbaugh set the standard for how conservatives treat Republicans. I do not approve of the lies that have been told about him. They are wrong. They are lies and the people who are doing it should be held accountable. Same thing holds true for conservatives who do nothing but denigrate our good elected Republicans. They need to be held accountable for the problems they are creating.
They need to learn how to tell the truth. They also need to open their eyes, wake up, smell the coffee, and see what is going on out in the world. The very same sources who lied about and denigrated Reagan are up to it again. Only now they are dealing with conservatives who are so – stupid – culturally ilterate, and so pathetic, these people don’t know the difference.
When the far right lied about Reagan, Republicans basically turned their back on these people. It’s time they do the same thing – again. If Rasmussen’s latest poll is correct, Huckabee & Romney have the upper hand for 2012. Neither man is far right. Romney is rather moderate, and Huck is not considered a very strong conservative. They are pulling nearly 60% of the polling.
The GOP is a center right party. It is not extreme. It is not the party for extremes. If we want to retake the house in 2010 we need to offer strong, center right candidates. Far right candidates rarely win. We also need to take the rational approach that someone who will win in Midland, Texas cannot possibly be elected in West Palm Beach. To demand 100% conservative purity is just plain stupid, short sighted, and is a death wish for our nation.
To compound the problem by lying about our good Republicans, and manipulating what they stand for and who they are because they do not meet a narrow minded version of “purity” is just plain criminal.
Do people who make these demands actually want to defeat the Dems or do they want to remain in a minority status forever, damning our country to socialist ruin?
Who’s the fool now?
![[Valid RSS]](valid-rss-rogers.png "Validate my RSS feed")
October 25th, 2009 on 10:06 pm
We really need to get to a 3 party system. A left party, a right/libertarian party, and a center party.
Opposing amnesty for illegals and the nomination of a woman who says latinas are by nature better judges than white males isn’t “extreme.” What does it say to you that the sort of people you find “extreme” are the only ones who want to talk about fealty to the Constitution? Are they far right….or has the nation gone far, far left?
Thirty years ago the idea of “gay” marriage was considered laughable by nearly 100% of the populace? Now opposing it makes one an “extremist?”
None of this will mean much to you….but the fact is that there are many of us who have decided that we aren’t going to be defined by the left. Global warming is a scam. Alinksyist mockery of those with the courage to say so doesn’t intimate me…and it doesn’t intimidate an increasing number.
Capitulation isn’t a strategy. And if you don’t regard the surrender of liberty as capitulation? Well, that pretty much says it all.
Ed
October 25th, 2009 on 10:12 pm
Morality is the same. I don’t care if a person is liberal, conservative, or moderate. When someone lies it is a lie. You appear to be a moral individual. According to the 10 Commandments, when one lies, they are literally stealing your good name. How do conservatives get a pass from lying about someone but liberals don’t?
SJR
October 25th, 2009 on 10:52 pm
Right. I’m still waiting to hear the lie, though.
Ed
October 25th, 2009 on 11:04 pm
Nancy Morton wrote a hit-piece on Lindsey where she basically told some outright untruths, manipulated facts, and mis-represented certain things. I call that a lie. I’ve detailed what she said.
Not everyone who calls him/herself conservative is good and not everyone who says they are liberal is bad. It’s not all black and white.
SJR
October 25th, 2009 on 11:19 pm
What the heck? I went back and read your article. Then I read the piece on the American Thinker. And I STILL don’t know what the “lie” was.
Would you please specify exactly what “lie” was told in the piece?
Oh, and I have a comment about this, from your comment:
“The real problem is the type of conservative who dislikes Lindsey and wants men like him defeated only want individuals who are so extreme they cannot possibly be elected…”
Are you referring to people like Senator Jim DeMint? Do you regard him as “extreme?” Because he was elected from the same state as Graham I believe, and is proving himself to be an incredibly principled, courageous senator. I sure hope he makes a run in 2012!
Ed
October 25th, 2009 on 11:33 pm
Morgan stressed the fact that Lindsey was attacked by his “constituents” at a townhall meeting a couple of weeks ago. She left out a couple important facts. There is a group of Ron Paul Bots in Greenville who have problems with Lindsey – and vice versa. The same man who made a big deal about posting a video that Morgan was referring too in her article has basically made a habit out of almost stalking Lindsey to make trouble. His profession is collecting unemployment checks. He went after Lindsey at the SC state GOP convention – making it look like the crowd was turning on Lindsey, but it was not true. At that specific meeting in Greenville, the same guy and a group of others went after Lindsey. Lindsey made another snarky remark about Ron Paul and Ron Paul Bots. A woman went after him, accusing him of being everything from Hitler to the AntiChrist. Lindsey finally got her to admit she was a Chuck Baldwin supporter. But – neither Morgan, or Glenn Beck would admit what was going on at the meeting.
The meeting was held at Furman University. From the articles and comments in the school paper, the kids from Furman who were there were quite impressed with Lindsey and how he handled the people, exposing them as fringe. BUT – you will not find the far right admitting this is what happened.
Morgan then said Lindsey was liberal. He has a 90% ACU rating.
I don’t mind DeMint. I would vote for him.
SC has a very vocal fringe group of conservatives who are NOT Republicans. They are so fringe they even make Ron Paul Bots look sane. I’m from SC. I know them. I’m not even talking about “independents”. There is a far right extreme that is so extreme – they even want to create their own conservative nation out of SC – that extreme. Lindsey goes at it with them. He has for years.
They ran a guy in the primaries against Lindsey last time. Buddy Witherspoon. The man had ties to the CofCC, American Renaissance, a whole bunch of little nasties. That’s what I’m talking about. There are certain conservatives who are so extreme, even Rush Limbaugh couldn’t vote for them.
Nancy Morgan, the woman who wrote the article, is a Ross Perot conservative. Sorry, but I blame them for 8 years of Clinton.
SJR
October 25th, 2009 on 11:37 pm
OK, you obviously have some local knowledge I don’t have. Given everything you said, I would suggest that the author didn’t lie, so much as she presented the facts that made her case.
I still think DeMint is a much, much better advocate of limited government than Graham. That he would even co-author a piece witht he likes of John Kerry sends up plenty of warning flags to me.
Ed
October 25th, 2009 on 11:41 pm
Enjoyed the back-and-forth. I’ll check the site again….we probably agree on more than we disagree on substance. We probably vote even more similarly.
I only suggest you consider that the GOP can absolutely not afford to give the back of its hand to the voices of talk radio. Not when the left owns Hollywood, almost every major newspaper, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, NPR, and even the late-night comedians.
The right has Fox and some radio talkers. The GOP turns them and their followers against it at its extreme peril.
Good night!
Ed
October 25th, 2009 on 11:45 pm
Lindsey gets a bad rap, trust me.
DeMint is a PR specialist, owns his own PR firm. He would know how to present himself!
When I hear complaints about Lindsey, no one ever mentions the fact that he is probably the most staunch advocate our military has in DC. When he can, he goes over and puts himself on active duty. He even tries to go into some of the danger zones. No one else is doing this. Conservatives are alleged to be big into the military and supporting our troops. No one in the Senate or House is a greater advocate for them than Lindsey – but that is never mentioned.
SJR
October 25th, 2009 on 11:47 pm
We cannot give up those voices of talk radio. That’s all we have. I agree. I podcast Rush, listen to Hannity, and was in the process of catching up on Medved this evening. As a writer, I spend much of the day listening to talk radio.
The culture war is frightening.
SJR