A new resource???
In Saturday's Rocky Mountain News, the publisher, John Temple, announced his creation of redblueamerica.com. He decide that the current availability of internet (and cable!) allows us to set up our political camp as an exclusive place that tends to only involve people that think just like us. Those who tend to agree on policies and ideas utilize the same resources, hear the same arguments, and pat each other on the eback in agreement. He feels that the impact is to create more division, more divisiveness, more anger, less tolerance, and ultimately, no unity. Hmmm. I wonder if you've heard anyone else make that argument...in late November or early December?!
Check out his new creation : www.redblueamerica.com
Play on it for awhile. What do you think?
Check out his new creation : www.redblueamerica.com
Play on it for awhile. What do you think?
posted by Meyer at 9:47 AM
9 Comments:
I agree, politics are too polarized. I can’t criticize Clinton without people assuming I am a Republican, and I can’t criticize Bush without people assuming I’m a Democrat. The odds that I agree with one party’s actions and policies on every issue is about 1 in 600. (Yes, that’s a made up number) Party devotion is dangerous. Sometimes I want to rip my face out when I talk to a Democrat. (Bush bombed the world trade centers, look outside the window and see how much snow there is as proof of global warming) The same is true of many Republicans, including me. Though I try to be completely independent and unbiased, it is a struggle I often lose.
Quote from Red and Blue:
"I'm probably going to trade in my liberal bona fides, here, but I'm serious: The CIA needs to return to the good old days of paying liberal artsy types to take their message abroad, just like it did during the Cold War.
Now, this might be happening right now. But I doubt it. Why?
* The liberal artsy types found out about it and got mad."
I like this idea of warring with other nations by attempting to out-intellectualize the enemy. Who ever can send the most creative ideas to the other country will win the war and the proceeds can go to charity.
"I like this idea of warring with other nations by attempting to out-intellectualize the enemy."
Let's see what Gen. David Petraeus has to say about that, shall we?
He was the force behind the counterinsurgency manual that's being put into place in Iraq. It says that in a counterinsurgency war, "the people are the prize" -- that is, you have to win the support of the masses, to deny your enemy friends and sanctuary. And you win the support of the masses by, yes, guaranteeing them security... but also by persuading them, culturally.
It's also part of how we won the Cold War: Making Russians and East Germans lust after our Levis.
But thanks for the comment!
Joel Mathis
joel@redblueamerica.com
It will be hard for any occupying force to win the hearts and minds of anyone. There is a natural box people put up in that situation. However if Iraq is to be stabilized it must be done. The beauty of it is that our opponents are so extreme and irrational that it just might be possible.
I really like this site. The simple fact that it opens both ends of discussion and thought is brilliant, and I don't know why it hasn't been done sooner. After reading the stories and the two different takes, I feel that I can better make my own decisions and my own opinions. This is an incredibly valuable tool.
Now, I only have one true concern. How are everyday people going to tune in to this site? How will they be able to entice people to break away from only their clearly partisan news sources? I think this site is a great resource to allow citizens to create their own views, but will it truly be effective if they do not get the attention that, say, Fox News gets? I hope that they can.
The unfortunate aspect of this site is that it may be hard to find the best discussions. It only features recent posts and the most viewed, discussed, and emailed, all of which are factors the community controls. If the community is diverse and well-educated, this could potentially be an extremely valuable tool, as ashley m noted, but if the community is composed of disrespectful, rude, or otherwise unintelligent people, it could take a nose-dive for the worst. The best improvement to this site might be a group of moderators who feature quality discussion threads. If it never develops this feature, however, the best way to access it might be by using the search feature. I wouldn't trust the most viewed list.
In my last post I was slightly inaccurate. They do have a featured topic page. Sorry! I missed it.
I agree with alexa. A blog is made only as good as its participants. I am not impressed with the contributions I have seen on the Red Blue America site at all--many people write complete opinions without bringing in any facts. From "This is just the beginning" post I read:
"By next week this will be advocated by at least a dozen crazy radical groups in this country. This is the same guy that shared the Noble [sic] Prize with Mr. Gore. He believes government should tells [sic] us, or better yet, make us stop eating meet [sic]. President Messiah Obama will just love doing that after all liberals think we all need to be taken care of."
Not only did this person use bad grammar and punctuation, which makes me extremely irritated and makes this person look uneducated, he uses a broad generalization and doesn't really make it clear what he's talking about.
I don't think this website is a good way to bring the "division" together. People can say whatever they want without backing up their opinions with fact and it can confuse people who just want to get a balanced view.
Michelle: you complete ignored reality in your last post, and in fact became quite the hyppocrite. You stated negatively that "people can say whatever they want without backing up their opinions with fact and it can confuse people who just want to get a balanced view". Guess what? By contributing to Mr. Meyers blog you have done precisely what you attack in your post. You have contributed to a discussion forum where yes, you can say whatever you want. And yes, you did state your opinion, and yes it was a biased one.
Why in the world would you participate in an openly opinionated duscussion site to attack the fact that "people can say whatever they want"? Of course we can! That is the beauty of blog! These things are not made for unbiased factual delivery, redblueamerica even states "RedBlueAmerica.com is a place where people can find out how people with differing views from their own think.". So yes people can say whatever they want without supporting it. We are participating in a blog michelle, not a factualy balanced interpritation of the world.
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