Anyone familiar with Cal Thomas? Insights??

[babylonsister]

Just received an article from a nasty freeper written by this guy, very anti-Kerry. Any advice to discredit this guy and his opinions?

"Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry has achieved something that may be unique in the history of our country. He has managed to oppose two wars while they are being fought, undermine the objective of the nation and give aid and comfort to those who are killing American soldiers and kidnapping American civilians.
In a speech at New York University on Monday, Kerry questioned President Bush's judgment in ordering American troops to topple Saddam Hussein, saying the president had exchanged a brutal dictator for "chaos."
...Kerry criticized the president for "colossal failures of judgment - and judgment is what we look for in a president." So is decisiveness, and Kerry fails on both counts. There is nothing in his Senate record, in his pronouncements during this campaign, or in much of his life story that gives voters confidence that this is a man with strong principles whose judgment and vision can be trusted. Instead, Kerry's life has been one of self-promotion and self-indulgence. As with the Vietnam War, he doesn't talk about victory, or America's unique place in the world to which free people, and those yearning for freedom, can look.



tp://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/thomas092104.asp

[MarkTwain]

1. Cal Thomas...

.... originally got his knee pads blowing Jerry Falwell when Thomas worked for the "ministry."

Thomas. Right wing hack that nobody takes seriously outside of the wingnut fundies.

Jewish "World Review." Wingnut fundamentalism of the Hebrew variety. Not regarded as anything other than an older version of the "Moonie Times" for right wing Jews.

The "points," for lack of a better characterization, of that article are so obvious and evidently absurd on their face. They are straw men and not worthy of debate.

When you wrestle a pig (kosher or not), you only get all muddy and the pig is the one who has a good time.

[charlie]

5. Curiously

Around 4 years or so ago, he penned a conciliatory column, saying no, Vietnam protesters were not unAmerican scum. They were true blue patriots, misguided, but as concerned about the country as right-thinking people like him. Surprised the shit out of everyone. I'm sure it'll get dug up and shoved in his face pretty quick.

[AspenRose]

7. He also wrote a surprising book

condemning Falwell and James Dobson (and other fundamentalist Christians) for being so involved in republican politics. The book is called "Blinded by Might" and here's the Amazon link:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0310226503/qid=1096838411/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-6064654-7468037?v=glance&s=books

[charlie]

9. Thanks, never saw that before

I note that it was written during the fundie Right's wilderness period, when even stalwarts like Norquist were saying the movement was a failure, societal wickedness was insurmountable, time for true believers to separate from the mainstream and move to a Christian-only enclave somewhere. I wonder if Thomas still stands by his book's premise. Somehow, I doubt it.

[H2O Man]

16. About a month ago

on a late-night Fox news show, Cal did say that President Bush could put an immediate end to the conflict between the Fitzgerald grand jury and reporters, by simply revealing which White House officials had outed Plame to Novak.

[LifeDuringWartime]

15. great

the local newspaper that gets delivered to my house would rather publish cal thomas, bill o'reilly, and a few obscure "local" writers than molly ivins, who they dropped months ago. i have seen dozens of LTE about the issue, but it hasnt been addressed.

one of the two smaller papers runs an ann coulter column.

and the times wont do home delivery here. @^%@@@!

[readmylips]

2. Cal Thomas, another drunk...

sick dog.

[roguevalley]

4. he dies his hair and moustache. he's got a rug. that sort of tells you

where he is.

[H2O Man]

17. Are you sure?

It looks so .... natural!!!! (Does he realize how STUPID he looks?)

[punpirate]

3. I doubt there's anything about Cal Thomas...

... that you could argue with the freeper that wouldn't simply confirm the freeper's views. Thomas started out as a quasi-fundamentalist religious writer, and has wholeheartedly adopted and incorporated the right wing's view into his religious framework.

He's a hack, but an expert one.

[salin]

6. email him this editorial letter written in Dallas, in response to a cal

thomas column. It is very powerful: http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/opinion/9581909.htm

[babylonsister]

8. Hey, thanks for all your input. n/t

[greekspeak]

10. Let me tell you how I feel about Sallow Cal Thomas

If I had to choose between spending an eternity in hell with Dick Cheney or Cal Thomas, I would choose Cheney. Thomas is a nutcase fundivangelical hack that would love to see a theocracy under St. Pat Robertson. He also always looks like he just ate a bag of lemons.

[democrat in Tallahassee]

11. One of the great thinkers of the 15th Century

my appologies to Molly Ivans for stealing that line

[CO Liberal]

12. Cal Thomas Was Fired by NBC News

I think that says all you keed to know about this asshole....

[Lexingtonian]

13. straightforward prevarication, that's what it is

You know, lying by pretending a lot of facts don't exist.

First of all, the whole column takes as premise a racist insinuation about Arabs being unquestionably evil.

Kerry has represented Massachusetts over 20 years in which Ted Kennedy has been the senior senator and Ted's role was to write much/most meaningful Democratic legislation. It was also 20 years in which the country started far more conservative than it is today, so a liberal really couldn't go far with things in the best of times and represented a protest vote in the worst. Between those two things Kerry took the work of Senate investigations, BCCI and Iran-Contra and iirc S&L mostly.

And to call a man who was state prosecutor indecisive... that's a pretty unlikely combination outside of the Good Ol' Boy belt.

The rest of the article is all right winger code talk/assumptions- in which all wars are absolutely justified by the rw's 'fact' that Americans are created a Messianic people, there's the rw supposition that the life lived is hypocrisy (well, their own are) and the thing proclaimed is The Reality of the person, and there's the rw definition of freedom (ability to escape your superior's/betters' abuse- but retention of the privilege to abuse and exploit those with less power than yourself).

Above all, Thomas convicts Kerry of the 'crime' that he doesn't have a desire to kill and oppress Arabs.

Which tells you all you didn't want to know about Cal Thomas and nothing of significance about Kerry except that He's Absolutely Not One Of Us Right Wingers.

[Zomby Woof]

14. was in the Moral Majority

Jerry Falwell's christ-insane nazi club.

My favorite Crossfire memory was when he and Zappa were guests in 1985 when the PMRC censorhip issue was hot. Thomas denigrated Zappa over his knowledge of free speech rights (Zappa was correct, of course), and Zappa told him "You can kiss my ass!" It was used, ironically in a censored form, as part of a promo for the program for years.

[high density]

18. Right wing nutjob

He seems to fit the role of Fox News' version of Robert Novak.

[FizzFuzz]

19. I heard that he once said something about gay marriage, that he didn't

care because come the rapture, he'd be swept away to a land of purity etc etc blah blah...

sorry, I don't have accurate info here, but it sure seemed believable to me.

anyway, I sure appreciate the real info and analysis people post here. His kind of wordy factual sounding garbage is the kind of thing that can really confuse me (gee it sounnnnds good, but I know the guy is on the dark side....) So I am glad to have it de-mystified for me.

Thanks you all!