July 13, 2008
www.TruthForUs.com
Martin C. Boire
Absence of Malice; On the Art of Discourse
Recently I was able to thank someone for a pleasant, carefully though-out discourse on one of my writings. I say discourse because these days most have lost what discussion and discourse really are. Most interaction on American TV and other venues has reduced to shouting matches, with guests spitting out the opposition position of what the other guest says, and all of them merely scratching the surface and failing to touch upon the root of their subject matter.
Discourse has always been about pausing and taking into honest consideration what the other has said, and seeing if there is something there that when applied should produce a change in one’s thinking. Discourse is not so much about what one thinks, as why one thinks it.
When one watches TV shows today, you can tell from the talkers’ expressions and postures that they have their response ready and are simplistically waiting to pounce as soon as the other person stops talking. It is an insult to the viewer.
On the other hand, I remember a man named William F. Buckley who had a TV show, “Firing Line” I think, back in the 1980s here in the States. It was just he and his guest in two chairs on a open stage or platform. I was so busy at the time as a new husband and father and remodeler of our first home, that I don’t recall that I focused much on what was being said. But there are three things I first recall when I think of him and his show. There was never any shouting, quickness, or arguing. After his guest said something, Mr. Buchanan would lean back in his chair so far I thought it would fall over backwards like my desks in school, and fiddle his pen around in his teeth while looking at the ceiling and considering (for an eternity in TV sound-bite land) what the guest had said. Then he would lean forward and say words to the effect “for you to say that, you must believe this . . . ,” having taken the time to see what philosophic basis the guest must predicate his argument upon in order to have gotten where he was. He had actually thought about what the other fellow had said. Bingo - a reasoned discourse aimed to getting to root causes of things. The true nature of an honest discussion.
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By Martin C Boire
www.TruthForUs.Com
September 17, 2007
John Kerry’s Leadership
So if John Kerry is such a great leader, why didn’t he LEAD at the moment it was needed and stop to cops from tasering the UoF student who was carrying on in his goofy question for Kerry. I’d have sprung from the stage and ordered them to stop.
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By Martin C Boire
www.TruthForUs.Com
September, 2007
The NYT Funding Ads for Moveon.org Pull the Mask Away
The NYT’s masquerade of impartiality was permanently lost with the revelation that they co-funded far left-wings ads for moveon.org. They are merely an active advocate for the left-wing agenda.
It shows the loss of objectivity in reporting in many media institutions.
It shows a network of cooperation.
It shows a network of common interest.
See also, “Manipulating the News - a guidebook to get people thinking your way” posted elsewhere on this site.
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By Martin C Boire
www.TruthForUs.Com
September, 2007
The fact that Hillary Clinton is going to call Monday for a $110 Billion dollars universal health case system shows that her researchers have told here that the American population has grown socialist enough that this is more saleable than frightening to most.
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