Did you somehow manage to miss this entire page? US politics has never been "graceful and respectful", and is in fact much milder that it was in the past.

Agree.

Disagree. Been way too much rhetoric, slander, acqusations, and other misc BS over the last couple years. If not in quantity, certainly in the amount of emotion behind them.

True, but since the thread is about restricting such speech, I think it's a point that no newspaper today would ever print the kinds of things they did then.

To that I simply say I disagree :DL

As stated by Ducimus too

He disagreed with my contention that it is not as bad now. If you truly think it was ever nice and respectful, you need to watch all the videos and read up on the campaign of 1800. And 1828. And 1860. And 1864.

Even the argument over who stole what in 2000 is predated by the election of 1888.
http://www.historycooperative.org/cg...2/summers.html

Ducimus may be right in his contention that it's just as bad now (and I don't deny that it is bad), but this is certainly nothing new. It was never nice, and never pretty.

Aye I've now read some 'ugly' tactics in the articles I must have missed them when skimming it earlier. It sounded ugly then in the 1800s but post 1950 seemed to be respectful enough . . . until lately. When you see a very ugly person a substantially less ugly person could be thought of being quite appealing when in fact that person is not by all standard handsome or pretty.

Therein lies the difference between now and then I think. The present concern is over quality and it's obvious that there is much more restraint now than back in the day, but it could easily be that sheer quantity now has a far greater effect.

After all, mudslinging in previous times was a much more localized affair. No matter how bad the attack it was only seen by it's local subscribers and by just a few people in other cities sometimes months later. Nowadays anyone with access to the internet can instantly reach far more people than the most popular newspaper ever could with the presses running day and night.

A good enough point. I do vaguely remember the election of 1960, but the arguments I heard were all from individuals, and didn't seem to be on the national scale. You could be right - there may have been a lull in there.

@ August: You're point about the internet and its affects is well made.

I know of no violent speech used, except by Dems lately, just the use of a lot of metaphors that had no bearing on these shootings.

No amount of limiting speech will solve these senseless crimes, but make no doubt criminals will learn to use them as an excuse, because so many, mainly the left are playing they had a role. I think it's the lefts progressive view that society is responsible for these acts, not the individuals. If the left had their way it would be an excuse.."I'm not guilty because Sarah made me mad."

We've lived through more violent times where it was politics...the 60's for instance and you didn't hear this speech in public, it was planned behind closed doors.

The problem I see is the left wants to do anything to limit speech they don't like, even though they take part of it. It's nothing but a political play that only took a few hours before the left is using this to push far left progressive politics, gun laws, laws against religion, laws against talk radio, ect.. Even on MSNBC they're now talking about so called hate speech in churches against gays, ect...should be illegal. The left wants to teach that people don't have common sense to know the difference and give nuts that would do these crimes anyway a viable excuse. I'm not a nut, if I don't want to hear it or believe it...I turn away from it.

In the end it's a stupid move on their part and will backfire. Most moderates see the right wing radicals for what they are, the same as the left. Sarah is a media seeker, dumb and will never win any office, the left just uses her because she's all those things. The lefts use of this sad moment for attempted political gain is making them look....political, in a moment of tragedy and that sickens most people.

August,

after I have explained it several times in the past one or two years, you really finally need to understand one thing: of all major German newspapers with internet homepages, there currently is only one that offers an English edition: Der Spiegel. And that is the reason why I quote it more often than I link German texts. It makes little sense to post in this forum German articles all the time, don't you think? Or do you want a perspective form the German media in form of the the FAZ? SZ? TS? Die Welt? Focus? WN? ON? And all of them in German exclusively? Or maybe you prefer to believe American media only, and stick exclusively top them? That would be your loss? I survey at least the headlines and top articles of German, American, British, French, Russian, Israeli and Southkorean newspapers. What foreign newspapers for a view from outside America do you read...? Or are you one of those guys thinking there is no world beyond your national borders worth to be considered anyway?

Your repetitive mocking of Der Spiegel is a bit tiresome, really. When you disagree with what it says, then say so. And it is sufficient to leave it to that.

Your constant repetition of this rethorical trick "But it's Der Spiegel!" reminds of your similiar behavior when having called me a "clerk" time and again in earlier years, trying to ridicule what I said by telling people I were just a shop salesman, and what can such a guy know.... But at that time you already knew damn well that I have been many other things in my life too and did have many different jobs and engagements as well, maintained non-profit obligations voluntarily both in private and professional settings from psychotherapy to the security business, and had come around in a certain part of the world a bit.

Do I walk around and tell people all the time "You must not take August serious, he has just been a soldier, you know how these guys are, they simply don't know it better"? Would you like it if I contribute to a discussion in this way?

When you constantly play this card of "clerks" and "Spiegels", then that says more about you then it say about me, or that news magazine (which just btw is the biggest in whole Europe).

Very good point. And with the internet, you get completely unfiltered and unedited comments from across the political and intellectual (some would say they're related :arrgh!:) spectrum. The democratization of mass communication can be a good thing, but then again it can also product a screwy signal to noise ratio.

First Skybird, I don't really care how big Spiegel is in Europe. Every one of their articles about us that you've posted so far has just totally missed the mark, either through a lack of cultural understanding or just plain self serving bias, yet you continue to treat it as gospel.

That in itself wouldn't be so bad but you can be quite arrogant in insisting that their view from 3000 miles away is clearer than our view right here, so you'll have to forgive me if I don't bother to debate an inaccurate and biased article point by point with someone who acts like they are already convinced of it's accuracy. Would you if our positions were reversed?

Secondly I don't remember ever calling you a "clerk" but if I did please point to the last time I did so, and then please explain how that could be considered "constantly".

Yep. It's one of the things we as a society still need to work out. The internet is a great thing but we have not yet learned how to tune out the noise or insulate ourselves from the propaganda of others.

People are welcome to disagree and believe that politics has become more virulent of late, but to believe this is entirely irrational as it is contradicted by reality.

I'd not try and "rank" political discourse, but it is clear that it is in the same ballpark it has always been in at the very least, and to my ear, has the feel of being LESS virulent (unless you irrationally find suggestions that rape would be legal, or kids would be stuck on pikes as LESS virulent).

It might be fair to make the caveat that you talk only about "modern" history, but again, history gives the lie to this as well. I remember 8 years of wishing Bush dead by groups that are considered mainstream (all the dem candidates went to a Kos meeting, and that site has wished death on many republicans, many times). Before that, there were loons on the right who accused the Clintons of being involved in murders (that aid who offed himself). For Bush Sr. there were claims of black helicopters, and other insanity. Reagan? I was in college during Reagan, and the standard attitude towards him was VERY hateful, to say the least. Many times people bemoaned the lack of success when he was shot.

Anyone who claims politics has become more nasty needs to demonstrate which period was so much better. Remember by the time to get back to the 60s, you start hitting "political machines" (mostly democratic as far as I can tell, but some on both sides to be sure) that were in fact doing things that were clearly illegal as SOP. Truman was the product of such a machine, as was virtually everyone before him. So during those periods the threat of violence or reprisal was totally on the table all the time.

You certainly get all things right about America. Thjat'S why all sources disagreeing with yoiu or being critical of your views, gets claimed by you to be "missing thre mark".

And no, I do not treat Der Spiegel as a gospel. I just have explained why I quote them more often than any other German paper. Will you please finally, finally take note of that explanation which I have given several times over the past two years or so. They also not rarely represent the opinion majority over here, so the content they express is not just typical for them alone.

If they are all so wrong and illogical and unknowing, then it should be child'S play for you to proves and demonstrate them wrong. I usually quote such articles for one of two reasons, sometimes for both: either to show that there is more than just your American rightwinged self-description and that you may be are perceived quite different than you see yourself (and being outside of your community may offer the unique chnce to see it from a perspective that you do not even know to exist - being part of that community is both a risk to lack perspective and objectivity, and to know some internal things better than foreigners could)

Oh, I do, and repeatedly. I did not had you on my ignore list for so long time just for nothing. ;) It was one of the reasons. And during that ban time I even read you I think two times being quotes by others with that reference to me.

You represent a very self-convinced and extremely right-leaning view on America, ignoring certain inn er contradictions or internal problems that maybe we foreigners sometimes can see better from the outside - exactly because we are foreigners and look at you from the outside. ;) That we people in oither countries look so sharply at your nation, is not necessarily anti-Americansim of ours. It is coming from the simple fact that your nation'S behavior usually effect our fates and nations much much more than we effect yours. That'S why parts of your social issues and politics are of legitimate interest. The less effect you produce in the world, the smaller our intzerest in your natrion would be, because the less it would effect us and the less we would need to care for it.