What was that all about? W and Palin would be simpletons even if they were Democrats, and Cheney and Rumsfeld are intelligent men by any standard. Maybe I'm just a pollyanna liberal, but I think neither intelligence nor virtue has anything to do with our political preferences. (How's that for a dangerously radical statement?)

As for vaunted Libertarian logic, how about a sample?

Stalin and Mao brutalized their people.
Stalin and Mao were Socialists.
Therefore socialists all brutalize their people.

Ah, but the Western European Liberal Democracies are all Socialist.
(At least the fundowacko right is always pointing to them as prime examples, in fact, they consider any country to the left of the late 19th century USA, including Canada, Socialist.)
So why aren't they brutalizing their people?

If one is indeed a function of the other, then slightly socialist nations would be at least slightly brutal, right?. And it would be impossible for a laissez faire political economy to be brutal at all. South America in the 50s would be a libertarian paradise and a civil rights Eden.

And what about all those right wing dictatorships that routinely brutalize their people? Can you think of even one right wing dictatorship that doesn't brutalize its people?

Maybe, just maybe, economic organization has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not a country brutalizes its people. And maybe those who would like us to accept that phony correlation are just cherry picking the data to justify their own political superstitions and make it sound like geometric logic? TB, the mess boys ate the strawberries. Get over it. We're all bright people here, that crap may have worked for you in high school, but it don't cut it here.

Next thing you'll be telling us is that the Nazis were Socialists because they had the word in their name. I know that one really steams you because it just won't go away, will it, no matter how often you claim it ain't so.

Sheeeeeit. 80% of your posting time here is spent trying to convince yourself. Just add up all the people you've actually gotten to change their minds.