Opinion of Christine O'Donnell

[angus]

definitely a freedom fighter.

[angus]

definitely a freedom fighter.

Please explain why you think this.

I don't usually vote in these FF/HP polls, because few people are fall into either of those categories, although I often post in them my opinion.  But she is really a modern-day freedom fighter if ever there was one.  For example, she took on the GOP establishment, and won.  And even after every opinion writer mocks her, she comes out and gives speeches and says she's a serious campaigner, even in the face of intra-party chastisement.  But I think she was a freedom fighter long before this.  She has spoken out about teaching evolution in public schools, calling it unsubstantiated, and she has even spoken out against masturbation, saying it's selfish to your partner and sinful.  I think that takes huge balls.  I think she's not afraid of opposition, and not afraid to express her views, and she has an agenda that she thinks will help the people and she's not afraid to push it in the face of adversity.  So she's a fighter for her brand of freedom, and she probably has more courage than many politicians do. 

[angus]

(which I disagree),

Seriously?  Don't you remember when you were in college?  I do.  Can you imagine some chick doing an on-line interview in which she said how masturbation is sinful and selfish?  Or saying publicly that evolution is a myth?  She'd be made fun of.  In the hallways.  In the dorm.  At parties.  In class, in those few minutes before the professor arrives and everybody's loud and obnoxious.  But she stands up to the adversity.  I know times have changed--Virginity pledges, attacking evolutionary theory, getting your lip pierced, and getting tattooed were things you just didn't see back when I was in college, but they all seem common and socially acceptable now--but times haven't changed that much.  Folks are still basically clickish and have a herd mentality.  I think it takes huge balls to come out and say things like that publicly.  So, if she really believes what she says--and I think she does--then she's courageous.  Additionally, sticking to her guns when the GOP establishment was telling her to crawl under a rock requires tenacity and courage.

[angus]

it certainly wouldn't have been a lonely crusade-- if not a winning one.

nonsense.  I guess I'm just not buying that.  Consider the evidence all around you.  Folks in this forum (a relatively mild-mannered lot) are excoriating her.  And folks in the popular media (a not-so-mild-mannered lot) are also having fun with the crusade.  I have no doubt that when she was making the statements she was being picked on, and would also have been picked on by your classmates in your school.  Clearly she's up against the machine, being ridiculed, no less so now for taking on the GOP establishment, than 20 years ago for making the anti-masturbation campaign. Huge balls, she has.

[angus]

Angus, I'm disappointed in you.  You've clearly fallen for her narrative when nothing could be further from the truth.

Moderate Republicans, or "RINOs" as we're called by folks like O'Donnell, are a minority in the Republican Party and have been under siege for decades and losing our last beachheads.  TEH GOP OMG!ESTABLISHMENTTTT!OMG is only involved to the extent that their job is to get behind candidates that they believe have a better shot at moving the ball forward and increasing Republican gains.

I realize that O'Donnell may have been made fun of for her extreme views.  But did that give her supporters the right to act like schoolyard bullies and claim that Mike Castle was gay?

Mike Castle has a long-term relationship with the people of Delaware and with the Republican Party of Delaware, who officially supported his campaign.  Well-funded and well-organized groups from outside the state, such as the Tea Party Express, targeted Castle as yet one more opportunity to knock off one of the few remaining moderate Republicans in elected office.  These groups arrogantly came in, preyed on the prejudices and jealousies of the Republican primary electorate, and replaced a moderate candidate who was likely to win the general election with an ultra-conservative candidate who has lost twice before -- and who by all indications will lose again to a 'bearded marxist.'

She's not 'up against the machine', she's fully supported by wealthy ultra-conservatives who want to protect their rights to destroy our environment and their crusade to turn back decades of progress on rights for gay and lesbian Americans.  The national ultra-conservative machine beat out the Wilmington, Delaware machine.... and you applaud it like it was some sort of glorious accomplishment.

You make some good points, but the fact remains that she does stand up to the abuse pretty well.  Which, to me, is admirable.  

I can't vouch for her supporters, and I'm not trying to.  I'm only making statements about her.  The bit about Castle being gay is irrelevant to my point of view in this thread, although I agree that it was in poor taste, and unnecessary, and, for all we know, untrue.  

Were I a Delaware voter, I'm not sure whether I'd vote for O'Donnell.  I'm ambivalent on this somewhat.

On the one hand, I would like to see the Republicans take control of both houses of congress this year.  Of course that is unlikely, but to the extent that it might happen, Delaware is key, so I would want to vote for her for that reason.

On the other hand, she's a freedom fighter, and therefore an idealist.  I don't want to see any more idealists in congress.  The Bolsheviks were idealists.  The Nazis were idealists.  Idealism is such a drag, and putting idealists in power usually makes a big mess of everything, so it is best avoided.  Rather than freedom fighters, we need to elect pragmatists to congress.  We need people of good judgment.  True freedom fighters rarely have good judgment, and are motivated largely by ideological concerns.  

Also, her priorities aren't quite the same as mine.  (The anti-masturbation campaign was a long time ago, but that tells me she's pretty far removed from my own philosophies.)  Also, she's something of a Social/Cultural Conservative, which can be off-putting.  If she were strictly a Tea Party Conservative, that’d be one thing, but she has about one too many ideological purities for my tastes.  For these reasons, I'd be tempted not to vote for her.  

To be honest, I suppose that my desire to see a Republican-controlled congress might win out, but since I don't live in Delaware I don't follow any of it that closely.  I'm not aware of a third or fourth candidate I really like, and I don't know how much I like or dislike Coon.  I might also be tempted to write Castle’s name in since he’s running a legit write-in campaign.  Then again I might vote for O’Donnell.  At this point I can't say how I’d vote if I were living in Delaware, but in any case don't construe any of my earlier statements as endorsements of her supporters, or as an endorsement of her candidacy.  I'm just answering a specific question:  yes, in my opinion she's a Freedom Fighter.

[angus]

You make some good points, but the fact remains that she does stand up to the abuse pretty well.  Which, to me, is admirable.

Hitler was also a rather stalwart fellow.

tenacious, maybe.  And he was also rather idealistic.  He seems on balance to be more abusive than she does.  She's mostly taking slop, not dishing it out to others.

To be honest, I suppose that my desire to see a Republican-controlled congress might win out,

I still don't see why you favor the oppressive party.  You work for a university - thus your bread is buttered to the left.  You claim to have some kind of hedonistic tendencies, and though I suppose those are all in the past, I find it hard to believe you look forward to the theocracy.  You make a huge salary, certainly, but not enough to be harmed by centrist economic policies.  Quite frankly, you are too old to still be stuck on adolescent Randian fantasies of individualism.  I really can't see why you take your irresponsbile line in politics.

Hardly huge, but we do well enough.  My family and I live a reasonably comfortable lifestyle precisely because we do not live beyond our means.  I would like to see that our society, as a whole, does not live beyond its means.  Indeed, I do favor centrist economic policies.

Also, like most Republicans, I remain a proponent of government funding of education and of R&D.  The people, through their legislatures, fund schools, colleges, and universities.  The federal and state governments fund medical, military, and environmental research, as well as basic research operations. I'm sure the Democrats and Republicans would argue over specific priorities, but neither of these parties denies education/R&D funding altogether.  You are probably thinking of Libertarians or Constitutionalists. I am NOT a Libertarian; I am a Republican.

And "theocracy" is so overdone, don't you think?  I do not think a Republican takeover of congress will yield a theocracy.  For starters, the US Constitution would prohibit that.  Stop being so dramatic.

[angus]

If God created everything then what created God?

The people who wrote the Bible.

What? You don't believe in God?

non-sequitur.  He's not saying he believes or doesn't believe in God.  (Whether he believes in God is probably irrelevant.)  He's just stating that men created God.  Man created photodiodes, right?  If I say, "Man created photodiodes," would you automatically ask, "Don't you believe in photodiodes?"