Yeah, I agree with that. I'm fine with disagreeing - I'm always looking to talk to people who have a good understanding of what they're talking about and perhaps I'll learn something from them. It's just when people don't even take the time to inform themselves but still pretend they know better than you that gets me kind of offended. My dad is also kind of a dodge case. In one hand, he's terribly racist. Everytime I talk to him, he's always bitching about how the mexicans are taking over some bs factory ... as if he fucking works there or something (at the same time he hates rednecks and 90% of the people that live in his town anyways, so I don't see why the fuck he worries about it anyways). Then he'll go off on how if McCain is elected, surely my brother and I will be drafted and it'll be just like Vietnam. Both of these obviously distinct viewpoints completely annoy me because there's really no evidence to support either one, just fear justified by (as you said Lead) some irrelevant bs they've thought up that probably aren't even true. I'm voting for Obama as well - but at the same time, I'd argue with him about McCain just because he doesn't take the time to get at least a few facts to support his positions.

MOP - it still continues to amaze me how people on the extreme left and extreme right simply resort to angry name-calling when they're getting owned in an intellectual debate. I guess in their mind "they showed you" - whatever I guess. It just erodes any credibility they had in the eyes of everyone involved.