The overuse of the term Hypocrite

Watching the Glen Beck thread, it really just has to be said that in politics, and, in social life in general, the American use of the term hypocrite has become complete bull shite and, it is a close relative of the term "flip flop". Both terms have real meaning, but not in today's debate. Now, they're just overused nonsense.

The simple fact is, if you used to believe X 5 years ago and the influx of new information, the digestion of the other side's arguments or just epiphany hits you so now you believe Y, that is NOT hypocrisy. And really, it isn't even flip flopping.

Hypocrisy is when you say one thing and do another AT ROUGHLY THE SAME TIME. And, as far as I'm concerned, flip flopping is when you simply take whatever position is convenient in a moment.

But frick people. What is the point of debate if it isn't to convince the other side of your argument and see them convert in whole or in part? We've degraded so much into team politics that most of you dumb asses spend weeks, months, years trying to convince people only to then gripe when you look up and they're convinced!!

I used to be pro-choice. Vehemently. Now, I'm not. I used to be pro-death penalty. Vehemently, now I'm not. I used to hold a relatively positive view of world wide interventionism. Now, not even fricking close. Those aren't flip flops or hypocrisy. I was convinced by a combination of other people's argument, my own aging and acquisition of information and, just observing events.

Running around and crowing how you "knew it all along" is just stupid. It's a recipe for people being 100% entrenched in whatever they think and completely immune to new information or re-understanding old information.

That's great if you think the whole fricking point of politics and debate is to be able to go "rah team, we were right on this one". If you think the point is to make the damned place better, then grow the frick up.