Your comments did more than anyone else's in this thread (that I read) to destroy productive conversation. I understand how these things feel and that it's always, with high confidence, the other person who blew it—but civil conversation requires that we each catch ourselves in that bias.

It looks like you've been using HN primarily for political arguments for a while now. That's not what this site is for, so please don't. (Edit: actually, that last bit was probably unfair on my part—it was probably just a case of election-seasonitis, which afflicted most commenters, rather than an abuse of the site. Sorry about that.)

The act of one making a point, and one understanding the point one has made, are two very different events.

IMO it seemed a bit like name-calling that inadvertently asked a deeper question.