2012 Presidential Race

[BDunnell]

You need to watch FOX News.

Er... forgive me if I don't. I'm not a rabidly paranoid moron.

[janvanvurpa]

I know the facts, I got the facts. I dont watch CNN, MSNBC and all that other liberal media out there that only gives you what they want you to hear..half-truths, etc.

You need to watch FOX News. They have it all layed out there, the whole truth and not afraid to say it. Not some biased media outlet that caters to the liberals.

You trollin'

Shirley you cannot be serious.

[Gregor-y]

Does he want it in the can? Or would here be just fine?

[janvanvurpa]

Er... forgive me if I don't. I'm not a rabidly paranoid moron.

(best RP accent I can manage--I'm poking fun at you now!) I say, did you mean to have an extra m in there ol' bean?

[BleAivano]

found an editorial at NY Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/opinion/dowd-let-them-eat-crab-cake.html?_r=2ref=maureendowd&

[gloomyDAY]

I'm glad that video of Romney denigrating 47% of Americans has been revealed. Romney does not care about 165,143,716 Americans.


I know the facts, I got the facts...You need to watch FOX News.You can't discuss a single thing with a troll. I'm done with this chap.

[janvanvurpa]

I'm glad that video of Romney denigrating 47% of Americans has been revealed. Romney does not care about 165,143,716 of Americans.

You can't discuss a single thing with a troll. I'm done with this chap.


I wonder how many million American paid a higher % of the tax they did pay on all their earnings---you know? Like how many could manipulate their wages and shift assets to shell companies in Cayman Islands and Switzerland?

It really is amazing to unconcealed, UN-embarrassed contempt he has for ordinary people and which he shows so flagrantly when he's with his social class---those that have enough excess money laying around they can pay thousands just to schmooze with him. EDIT: From NY Times
In a reply to a fat cat at the $50,000-a-plate dinner

That's his real base, those were his real feelings....

I thought Bush was a spoiled rich idiot useful mainly as a puppet...
This guys is a vulture. And totally unaware of what normal people do and think and must live on..

Disgusting is the onl;y word i can think of for Willard Robme.

[BDunnell]

You can't discuss a single thing with a troll. I'm done with this chap.

I genuinely don't think he's a troll — just very, very ill-informed.

[gloomyDAY]

I served in the military and defended this country and the right to say this.... Obama is a moron. lol
Where and when did you serve? How about unit and rank? Just because you were in the military doesn't give you the right to be a complete jackass as a civilian.


I genuinely don't think he's a troll — just very, very ill-informed.Sad if true.

[heliocastroneves#3]

...And I thought the politics here in The Netherlands are worse....:P

[Tazio]

Jimmy Carter once told me a story .
Well , it wasn't Jimmy , but rather , Abby Hoffman , relating Jimmy's words .

Long story short , from behind , out of Jimmy's sight , John Tower was sent to talk to the Ayatollah to ask if the hostages could be kept long enough to make Jimmy look bad , and make Ray-gun an instant hero.
When things went sideways , Ollie and the Contras were added to confuse , and John was sent in again to cover the tracks in the Tower commission .

Somewhere about eight months after I heard Abby tell us this story , he was dead , having allegedly commintted suicide .

Given the treasonous tale he told , I don't believe it was suicide .




The reason I told you all this tale , is to illustrate that it matters not who the puppet in power happens to be .Now this is the kind of fun I'm talking about.
So Bag's you are one of those outside agitators :)
Just some meandering thoughts after returning from a 6 mile hike through the hills and riparian woodlands in solitary communion with nature at what Eddie Poe referred to as "The alters of Byron";

We should be able to have as much fun as the Britt’s have with their politics, unfortunately we Americans are not self effacing enough to be able to laugh at ourselves like they can. Jag Warrior you were right about rating Presidents. I had the unique opportunity to turn 18 the year the voting age was lowered to 18 from 21. The real reason for it being lowered was that there was a strong belief, and movement that if someone 18 years old can be randomly picked to die a horrible death in the jungles of Southeast Asia they are also old enough to vote. I was 19 when I got around to lower division political science as an elective for my B A and the first day of class the professor handed out a list rating the past Presidents. Andrew Johnson was only exceeded by Warren G Harding in that scholarly composed list. When asked, practically everyone in that class said that they thought Nixon who was in his final throws as President with Watergate well and truly revealed, would be at the bottom. Personally I didn't have strong feelings about it, I wasn't really a liberal or very politically opinioned at all at those times because I was a jock much more concerned with maintaining a good GPA while simultaneously playing on the baseball team. But he suggested that time would be a little forgiving to Nixon and he would not approach Harding in ineptitude. He also wasn't very PC as he pointed out that Harding was the first president elected after women received the right to vote and that it was not a coincidence that Harding’s greatest attribute was his good looks. The President of The United States of America Jimmy Carter currently comes in right around number 30, and yes Camp David was a significant accomplishment. It is also generally agreed upon by political scholars that arguably our greatest president Honest Abe Lincoln would never have been elected if photo-imaging was a little further advanced as he was a very gawky looking man even for those times and most of the electorate didn't know what he really looked like, which brings me to California. In an earlier post I explained rather indelicately the demography of California after a very diligent member provided data suggesting Ca. "blinked red and blue, and I think I should do a little clarification. Depending on what other issues or offices were being voted on, on that same ballot the west coast has had a couple of factors that make statistical analysis somewhat difficult. As in other states local politicians tend to do well regardless of their party affiliation if they did a decent job locally. Even though their wasn’t as much information when voting, it was much more straight forward and you had to have a very good reason for an absentee ballot. Projected results always reached the west coast well before the polls closed, along with early west coast counts that encouraged many voters to abstain when things were getting late and the elections outcome was already decided, also exit polls have always been huge, which only encouraged the voters on the losing side to still vote. To say nothing of the fact that it was common for voters to vote across party lines. Being red or blue is much more demonstrative now. Also the conventions were not a bunch of mudslinging and chest puffing except when delegates would do what they came there for to submit Electoral College votes. It was way more colorful back when the delegates for say Iowa for instance would say something like “The great state of Iowa where corn grows as high as your eye cast __ votes for the next President of The United States of America_____ ________." . ;)
Plus incumbent Presidents almost always ran opposed in their party’s primary. Something else that has changed is that during the submission of electoral votes, when they reached the point that the candidates had enough electoral votes for his home state to get him over the top the state that was next to cast its votes always deferred to the candidates home state, this year Mississippi deferred to Ohio a battleground state to try to up President Obama in that state this time in the DNC.
Just sayin'

[ArrowsFA1]

I know the facts, I got the facts. I dont watch CNN, MSNBC and all that other liberal media out there that only gives you what they want you to hear..half-truths, etc.

You need to watch FOX News. They have it all layed out there, the whole truth and not afraid to say it. Not some biased media outlet that caters to the liberals.
Fox gives you what you want to hear and believe, which is exactly why you should watch the likes of CNN & MSNBC. If you have no doubt that Fox tells "the whole truth" where's the harm in hearing a different view? It might make you think a little which is always a good thing.

[janvanvurpa]

I genuinely don't think he's a troll — just very, very ill-informed.

There you go again with that clipped, British understatement... har harumph...

Or is that 'exaggeration for effect'?

You quiet types are hard for us hot-blooded Latinos to read. :arrows:

[Don Capps]

I served in the military and defended this country and the right to say this.... Obama is a moron. lol[/LEFT]

But, did not your time in the military make you a taker, a moocher using the logic of Romney and the GOP?

[Don Capps]

I genuinely don't think he's a troll — just very, very ill-informed.

Actually, any reading of what he has written would strongly suggest that he is both.

[janvanvurpa]

But, did not your time in the military make you a taker, a moocher using the logic of Romney and the GOP?
You mean the taxpayer funded education, the taxpayer funded training, taxpayer funded clothing, taxpayer funded transportation, taxpayer funded food, taxpayer funded 100% medical care, taxpayer funded insurance, taxpayer funded salary and taxpayer funded taxes and social security?

Or the taxpayer subsidised grocery stores, liquor stores, retirement, college education---if he bothered---special taxpayer subsidised mortgages?

Just because the US military expenditures all taken together exceed 45% of every tax dollar taken in doesn't mean its all bad.
Just think--look for the positive!
At least this guy wasn't taking up space in a class room where somebody else might have been learning to do something for the betterment of the Nation.

Odd though how things change... A couple of generations ago a nation ashamed of how it had mistreated, ignored and even shot down it's veterans from the First world war, decided to do it right and passed a highly progressive, indeed basically Socialist piece of legislation "The GI Bill of Rights" as it was know around my house. The men and women of that generation---my father's generation, knew it was something valuable GIVEN from a grateful country---and utilised their rights to free education and bettered themselves, studying, then building a broader, inclusive society...and paid their taxes and funded via Governments the modern, affluent society we all, but especially those under maybe 45, take for granted, and some use their time in uniform to taunt and throw in people's faces who the so openly hate...


It's ood. Maybe since the end of '45 becuase all the military adventures USA have waged have been so frustrating, and seem so futile, and seem pointless that the poor bastids who are stuck being bored or being blown up, or being blown up while they're being bored have to find some way to try to make themselves feel they've done something valuable...

[Rudy Tamasz]

I genuinely don't think he's a troll — just very, very ill-informed.

I think some SanFran liberal writes DanicaFan's character and laughs his butt off reading this discussion.

[janvanvurpa]

...And I thought the politics here in The Netherlands are worse....:P

Tell me this; in Washington DC there are at least 7 paid "lobbyists" for every Senator and Representative in our Congress, the overwhelming majority being paid corporate shills..do you have 7 paid special interest whores for every member of the Staten-Generaal?

Is your version of the Supreme Court filled with radical right wing extremists none of which have previously practiced any Civil Rights law?

[Rudy Tamasz]

Supreme Court filled with radical right wing extremists

Sound about as unbiased, reasonable and supported with evidence as DanicaFan's rant about "socialists".

[Mark]

Oh don't feel bad about getting into an argument, misunderstandings can pop up anywhere and where you least expect. If this were a Monty Python skit we'd cue the clashing organs now and the guys would jump out in Cardinal's outfits...wait----? um never mind.

I wasn't expecting that!

[Bagwan]

Now this is the kind of fun I'm talking about.
So Bag's you are one of those outside agitators :)


Not agitated , but a bit puzzled at how they can pull off these moves and not have the people insensed .

As a president , one must never say no to those in power .

[Tazio]

I'll take that as a big yes. :s tareup: ;)

[Bagwan]

I'll take that as a big yes. :s tareup: ;)

Well , Taz-man , I guess I should ask what you think of a former prez talking about the treason that took him out .
You think that's worth killing Abby over ?
He looked really happy , to have the weight of a president behind him .

[Tazio]

I think some SanFran liberal writes DanicaFan's character and laughs his butt off reading this discussion. More likely an L.A. liberal commie movie editor/ screen writer type reposing at Tra di Noi, sipping some Vermentino di Gallura in the shade at the beach. ;)

[Tazio]

Well , Taz-man , I guess I should ask what you think of a former prez talking about the treason that took him out .
You think that's worth killing Abby over ?
He looked really happy , to have the weight of a president behind him .I'm not sure what to make of it, other than that was a loooooong time ago. Please don't get me started on everything we lost during that period of time. More current generations view my generation as being responsibled for everything wrong in our soceity now. Some radicals like a guy I knew (now deceased) who worked in the radical underground press in the Bay Area was deposited in Patton State Mental Institution for 5 years until The Government felt he was nuts enough to be discharged to live the rest of his life as a semi-free man! I refuse to take it any further than that because I believe there is no distinction between our leaders their agents or vise versa :dozey:

[janvanvurpa]

Sound about as unbiased, reasonable and supported with evidence as DanicaFan's rant about "socialists".
Yes it is.
I'm sure you are a serious student of our Legal History, our court and the cases it has decided.

I suggest you look at who the all are, what their backgrounds were and who they were prior to their appointemnts----but you must be familiar.

Look at the details of Bush v. Gore - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_v._Gore)

"Stop the Count" that is not a conservative decision it is a radical departure--from the law and precedence.


And Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission)

"Corporations are people too"---that is not a conservative position it is a radical position.

As I'm sure you are well versed on the extremely radical nature of these decisions, perhaps you momentarily forgot them, otherwise I am puzzled how you can suggest bias.

[Bagwan]

I'm not sure what to make of it, some radicals like a guy I knew (now deceased) who worked in the radical underground press in the Bay Area was deposited in Patton State Mental Institution for 5 years until The Government felt he was nuts enough to be discharged to live the rest of his life as a semi-free man! I refuse to take it any further than that because I believe there is no distinction between our leaders their agents or vise versa :dozey:

No , Abby was as sane as you or I (I know that's maybe not saying much in my case) .
He told a story much longer and more detailed than what I wrote here . But that was the gist .

The hostages were kept longer than was necessary , specifically to make Jimmy look lame .
No negotiation Jimmy could have tried was going to work once this deal had been made .

A POTUS was stabbed in the back by his own men .



I guess I understand your refusing to take it any further , with the ensuing threat of potential suicide .

[Tazio]

No , Abby was as sane as you or I (I know that's maybe not saying much in my case) .
He told a story much longer and more detailed than what I wrote here . But that was the gist .

The hostages were kept longer than was necessary , specifically to make Jimmy look lame .
No negotiation Jimmy could have tried was going to work once this deal had been made .

A POTUS was stabbed in the back by his own men .



I guess I understand your refusing to take it any further , with the ensuing threat of potential suicide .As you can see I edited my post, Jim was a reasonably sane man after he was released from Patton (at least as sane as me); He just had some of the fight taken out of him, but was what most people would call a productive member of society (general contractor). I think our real disagreement (if you even want to call it one) is that at that time things were quite different than they are now. My actual baseball career stopped suddenly due to a very serious injury, and I became very aware of social justice as I worked the rest of my way through college. The progressive movement in the 60's was exactly that, too real, but more importantly too free (not absolutely free). As you probably know it was the onset of what could have been a socialist revolution in the USA.
But the conservative elements of our government took whatever measures necessary to discredit it, and then destroy it.

http://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/s480x480/548186_406477112740293_767976283_n.jpg

[Dave B]

You need to watch FOX News. They have it all layed out there, the whole truth and not afraid to say it. Not some biased media outlet that caters to the liberals.
There literally aren't enough "LOL"s in the world. Fox news have facts. I've heard it all now.

[DanicaFan]

For everyone's information...Im a real person, not a troll. I usually post in only the racing sections but this election is one of the most if not the most important election we have ever had.
For those curious, I served in the US Air Force, E-4 but I dont know what matters so much to some of you. Im proud of my country, proud of my service, and those who have served & still serving. So therefore, I really hate to see this country plummeting fast.
I am strongly opposed to Obama. You guys deny it but cant hide from the facts. His policies have FAILED ! Again, stop watching or reading that liberal, brainwashing media for awhile and search around. Do some fact-checking, please.

Now Obama wants to ban protests now with Secret Service around... Bill HR347 gives federal agents the right to arrest and bring felony charges to citizens protesting where Secret Service is around.

Now this is a clear violation of the first amendment. Once he has his foot in the door, he will try and limit more of your rights. Im telling you this guy is a threat to this country. He actually scares me with his policies. He is in it for power. He wants government to control every aspect of your life. He studied this philosophy, believes in it,and now is practicing it.

Not to mention his latest fiasco...His disrespect for the American Flag. On a new campaign logo, He gets rid of the starts, puts his "O" in thier place and has 5 red stripes. That is a slap in the face to America and sickens me as an American and military veteran and it should you too. Wake up people before its too late.

[loowisham]

Wow, 13 pages and I have not seen one rebuttal from DanicaFan to any of the questions posed.

[DanicaFan]

Again, Im not a huge Romney fan but at this point in time, he is the ONLY choice we have.

For the record, the best candidate we had dropped out awhile back and that was Herman Cain.

[Jag_Warrior]

Herman Cain???!!! The soulful, male version of Sarah Palin?! Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I rest my case...

[DanicaFan]

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/insurance_zps864b43fc.jpg

[race aficionado]

Reading where we are on this thread I just can't wait for the one on ones.
Those debates will clear the air where they will put up or shut up.

[BDunnell]

Do some fact-checking, please.

Says the person who thinks socialism and Communism are basically the same thing.



Not to mention his latest fiasco...His disrespect for the American Flag. On a new campaign logo, He gets rid of the starts, puts his "O" in thier place and has 5 red stripes. That is a slap in the face to America and sickens me as an American and military veteran and it should you too.

Why? It's just a flag. I'd be sickened if someone left an eviscerated cow in my bed during the night, not if a political candidate's campaign decided to do a bit of Photoshop on the British flag. A sense of perspective wouldn't go amiss.

[BDunnell]

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/insurance_zps864b43fc.jpg

A good point was made earlier about the extent to which you 'subcontract' out your opinions to things you've found on the internet. They do nothing to help advance your arguments, nor to present you as someone whose opinions deserve consideration.

[BDunnell]

For the record, the best candidate we had dropped out awhile back and that was Herman Cain.

The best candidate? Good God.

[Jag_Warrior]

The best candidate? Good God.

Oh, come on, dude! Herman had a cool slogan and he was totally ignorant of foreign policy and the domestic economy. He was the perfect candidate for the rabid right. 999! 999! 999! That's the only answer you need for any question that you ask. He really did make Palin look qualified - see, everything in life is relative. :)

Say it loud and say it proud: 999! :bounce:

[Rollo]

And Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission)

"Corporations are people too"---that is not a conservative position it is a radical position.


It's neither a conservative position or a radical position, it's a matter of legal fact. Some corporations are people.

Companies in particular have legal personhood which means that they have the legal right to hold property, to sue and be sued, they may conduct business and appoint agents; in fact every single legal power that a natural person has except to be able to get married, a company also has. In some cases such as setting up a pension fund or a trust where property is to be held in the hands of a separate person, the veil of personhood is prudent legal planning because it means that a natural person may be sued but the assets of the pension fund or trust remain intact.

[Rollo]

Oh, come on, dude! Herman had a cool slogan and he was totally ignorant of foreign policy and the domestic economy. He was the perfect candidate for the rabid right.

It's great when candidates can quote pop culture references from children's television...

o95KxKKrgkQ

Though the water's great guardian shall arise to quell the fighting, alone its song will fail, and thus the earth shall turn to ash.
- Also from Pokémon the Movie 2000.

Actually Britain does have its own politician who can quote pop culture references from children's television... Nick Clegg. Nick Clegg has been doing impressions of Sooty every since Cameron became PM.

[loowisham]

He still has not answered any questions posed to him. He is adept at getting false information and posting Republican talking points that are so full of holes that that anyone could fall through. Imagine that, a person getting medical care because Danica fan had to prove his citizenship. I suppose he would prefer to live in Darfour(sic).

[janvanvurpa]

For everyone's information...Im a real person, not a troll. I usually post in only the racing sections but this election is one of the most if not the most important election we have ever had.
For those curious, I served in the US Air Force, E-4 but I dont know what matters so much to some of you. Im proud of my country, proud of my service, and those who have served & still serving. So therefore, I really hate to see this country plummeting fast.
I am strongly opposed to Obama. You guys deny it but cant hide from the facts. His policies have FAILED ! Again, stop watching or reading that liberal, brainwashing media for awhile and search around. Do some fact-checking, please.

Now Obama wants to ban protests now with Secret Service around... Bill HR347 gives federal agents the right to arrest and bring felony charges to citizens protesting where Secret Service is around.

Now this is a clear violation of the first amendment. Once he has his foot in the door, he will try and limit more of your rights. Im telling you this guy is a threat to this country. He actually scares me with his policies. He is in it for power. He wants government to control every aspect of your life. He studied this philosophy, believes in it,and now is practicing it.

Not to mention his latest fiasco...His disrespect for the American Flag. On a new campaign logo, He gets rid of the starts, puts his "O" in thier place and has 5 red stripes. That is a slap in the face to America and sickens me as an American and military veteran and it should you too. Wake up people before its too late.


You still did not explain what YOU did to "defend the country".

And how that grants you the right to sneer at people in the country doing actual productive work to make the country move.

Just because you were in a uniform does not mean you did a thing to "defend" the country..
Who did you defend us against?

[Gregor-y]

Don't bother with the what did you do while serving argument; it's just a draw to change the subject. Service is no justification for or against anything. Consider the arguments on their merits, then have a laugh.

[janvanvurpa]

Rollie-baby, love your stuff, you write marveluous.


I hope you have time to glance at this:

In Citizens United (2010), the Court held that private corporations, which are nowhere mentioned in the Constitution and are not political membership organizations, enjoy the same political free speech rights as people under the First Amendment and may draw on the wealth of their treasuries to spend unlimited sums promoting or disparaging candidates for public office. The billions of dollars thus turned loose for campaign purposes at the direction of corporate managers not only can be, but — under the terms of corporate law — must be spent to increase profits. If businesses choose to exercise their newly minted political “money speech” rights, they must work to install officials who will act as 
corporate tools. The Court, transformed by the addition of Chief Justice Roberts and Samuel Alito, who were nominated by that lucky winner in Bush v. Gore, took this giant step to the right of all prior Courts without even being asked to do so.

The petitioner, Citizens United, sought only a ruling that the electioneering provisions of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (better known as McCain-Feingold) didn’t apply to its on-demand movie about Hillary Clinton.

But the conservative (Judges) sent the parties back to brief and argue the paradigm-shifting constitutional question they were so keen to decide. As dissenting Justice John Paul Stevens observed, the justices in the majority “changed the case to give themselves an opportunity to change the law.”

Before Citizens United came down, corporations were already spending billions of dollars lobbying, running “issue ads,” launching political action committees and soliciting PAC contributions. Moreover, CEOs, top executives and board directors — the people whose income and wealth have soared over the past several decades in relation to the rest of America — have always contributed robustly to candidates. But there was one crucial thing that CEOs could not do before Citizens United: reach into their corporate treasuries to bankroll campaigns promoting or opposing the election of candidates for Congress or president. This prohibition essentially established a wall of separation — not especially thick or tall, but a wall nonetheless — between corporate treasury wealth and campaigns for federal office.


The Roberts Court’s 5-4 decision to demolish most of this wall also bulldozed the foundational understanding of the corporation that had governed American law for two centuries. The Court had always regarded the corporation not as a citizen with constitutional rights, but as an “artificial entity” chartered by the states and endowed with extraordinary privileges in order to serve society’s economic purposes. The great conservative Chief Justice John Marshall wrote in the Dartmouth College case (1819), “A corporation is an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law. Being the mere creature of law, it possesses only those properties which the charter of creation confers upon it, either expressly, or as incidental to its very existence.”

The Bellotti decision cracked open the door of campaign finance law, and the Citizens United majority blew that door off its hinges. More good reading here:
'Citizens United' on the Corporate Court | BillMoyers.com (http://billmoyers.com/content/citizens-united-on-the-corporate-court/)

More, an hour of some of the bst discussion in the country here;
Full Show: The One Percent Court | Moyers & Company | BillMoyers.com (http://billmoyers.com/episode/the-one-percent-court/)

Wiki has a nice detailed analysis of the decision..
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission)

Criticisms American politicians President Barack Obama (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama) stated that the decision "gives the special interests and their lobbyists even more power in Washington — while undermining the influence of average Americans who make small contributions to support their preferred candidates".[43] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Ref_2010b-42) Obama later elaborated in his weekly radio address saying, "this ruling strikes at our democracy itself" and "I can't think of anything more devastating to the public interest".[44] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Superville2010-43) On January 27, 2010, Obama further condemned the decision during the 2010 State of the Union Address (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_State_of_the_Union_Address), stating that, "Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law[45] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Ref_f-44) to open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections. Well I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities."
Democratic senator Russ Feingold (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russ_Feingold), a lead sponsor of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipartisan_Campaign_Reform_Act), stated "This decision was a terrible mistake. Presented with a relatively narrow legal issue, the Supreme Court chose to roll back laws that have limited the role of corporate money in federal elections since Teddy Roosevelt was president."[46] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Hunt-45) Representative (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_representative) Alan Grayson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Grayson), a Democrat, stated that it was "the worst Supreme Court decision since the Dred Scott case (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sanford), and that the court had opened the door to political bribery and corruption in elections to come.[47] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Baumann2010-46) Democratic congresswoman Donna Edwards (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Edwards), along with constitutional law professor and Maryland Democratic State Senator Jamie Raskin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Raskin), have advocated petitions to reverse the decision by means of constitutional amendment.[48] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-PubRec-47) Rep. Leonard Boswell (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Boswell) introduced legislation to amend the constitution.[49] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-II-48) Senator John Kerry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Kerry) also called for an Amendment to overrule the decision.[50] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Crabtree2010-49) On December 8, 2011, Senator Bernie Sanders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernie_Sanders) proposed the Saving American Democracy Amendment, which would reverse the court's ruling.[51] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-50)[52] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-51)
Republican Senator John McCain (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McCain), co-crafter of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipartisan_Campaign_Reform_Act) and the party's 2008 presidential nominee, said "there's going to be, over time, a backlash ... when you see the amounts of union and corporate money that's going to go into political campaigns".[53] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Amick-52) McCain was "disappointed by the decision of the Supreme Court and the lifting of the limits on corporate and union contributions" but not surprised by the decision, saying that "It was clear that Justice Roberts, Alito and Scalia, by their very skeptical and even sarcastic comments, were very much opposed to BCRA."[46] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-Hunt-45) Republican Senator Olympia Snowe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympia_Snowe) opined that "Today's decision was a serious disservice to our country."[54] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission#cit e_note-United2010-53)


But that was not the radical thing, it was the
It's neither a conservative position or a radical position, it's a matter of legal fact. Some corporations are people.

Companies in particular have legal personhood ......



I would like to point out that the legal fiction of corporation as person falls apart once the comparison step over from the Civil to the Criminal... Cops arrests baddies, courts put them on trial, and if it was a criminal act---including such things as criminal conspiracy---the courts send people to jail.
"Corporations" don't seem to get locked up very often---unlike ordinary citizens as we sop amply demonstrate with our 'Prison-Industrial Complex---we lock 'em up far better than all those limp-wristed Euro Sossi countries.

[janvanvurpa]

Don't bother with the what did you do while serving argument; it's just a draw to change the subject. Service is no justification for or against anything. Consider the arguments on their merits, then have a laugh.

Yeah yeah, we know... But they don't. an inescapable conclusion when reading this type of guys crqzy stuff is they seem to have no idea that asserting something--or just blurting it out---is not dialog, or proof...

We need to help the poor miserable misguided bastids out by carefully disassembling their basic propositions, otherwise they will never learn..
So when they---absolutely having nothing to do with whatever discussion---bark "I defended the__________" we need to show them they probably did no such thing, and that that has nothing to do with anything...

[Tazio]

I don't know why you are knocking the U.S. Navy. Everyone that I knew that joined at an impressionable age learned at least 3 things:
How to drink :beer:
How to smoke :s mokin:
How to swear :fasttalk:

[janvanvurpa]

I don't know why you are knocking the U.S. Navy. Everyone that I knew that joined at an impressionable age learned at least 3 things:
How to drink :beer:
How to smoke :s mokin:
How to swear :fasttalk:

I think you have those reversed, and I only lived submerged in the Navy, never joined---only family member in generations and as far out--like every cousin--as i could see.
Swear--by 7
Smoke by 7 1/2
Drink by 25--late developer---and it was the french who taught me that..

Now the US Air Farce----that's another story. :uhoh:

[DanicaFan]

Are there only a bunch of liberals here ???? Where are the conservatives and Republicans at ?
I was in Intel in the Service so what I did was all Top Secret and again, what I did in the service is not the issue here or anyone's business to be honest.

[Alexamateo]

Danicafan, I consider myself a conservative, but like Ronald Reagan said he never left the democratic party,the democratic party left him, I feel the same way about the republican party lately. Reagan is actually a good example. He would be considered a RINO today, what with granting amnesty to illegal aliens, cutting marginal tax rates,yes, but raising many others, no, and compromising and working with democrats to get deals done.

For me it started with the hard-line stance on immigration. I would listen to talk show hosts go on about immigration, and say to myself, "That's not right, that's not how it is." My wife is Mexican, and I know many immigrants, legal and illegal, and the characterization that conservative pundits make about illegal immigration is just flat out wrong. I also don't believe them anymore when they talk against deficits and fiscal conservancy. At one point, republicans controlled both houses and the presidency and deficits continued to get worse, so I take that rhetoric for what it is, "We want you to stop spending on your pet programs, so we can spend on ours." As an aside, I have actually come to the conclusion that deficits really don't matter (on the macro level), but I don't expect anyone to take my word for it. It's taken me two years of independent reading and thinking on economics to come to this point.

Like I stated earlier, the republican party seems tone-deaf right now, insulting people about not paying income taxes, when fully 1/2 or more are the very people most likely to vote republican (i.e. the elderly and white working class w/kids(remember included in the 47% were people who paid payroll taxes but got back 100% of their withholding.)) The problem with ideological purity is that your tent keeps getting smaller and smaller, and right now I am on the outside.

Oh, I'm not voting for Obama, but I am not voting for Romney either, of course where I live it doesn't matter. Obama will win my district(Memphis), and Romney will win Tennessee regardless of what I do. I hate to sound so cavalier about it, but I don't think it matters who wins. Forces outside of politics will eventually let us emerge from this lost decade, and things will be rosy for most once again. For me they already are. I'm a salesman and I had my best year ever last year, and this year is on pace to match or even exceed it. Hopefully everyone else can join in the boom times once again very soon.

[D-Type]

Interesting post. It does raise the question "What drives the economy? Is it government policy and decisions or is it market forces, ie bankers' decisions and opinions?". Clearly government decisions can influence the direction the economy is going, or if you like give it a steer, but do they actually control it? I think not.
I'm not sure quite where the division of powers lies in the USA. To what extent can the President take action without the sanction of Congress (both houses) and by corollary without the consent of his party? In the context of this thread, are you really voting for the man or are you voting for his party's policies?
I appreciate that these are not easy questions to answer in the USA with its federalised structure.

[Mark]

It's a very important point. As I understanding with my limited knowledge of American politics is that if the situation were the same in the UK, we'd have a Labour Prime Minister, yet a Tory majority in the Commons?

[Rollo]

Rollie-baby, love your stuff, you write marveluous.

I hope you have time to glance at this:

I did. I also happened to take note of the rather ignorant first line too:

In Citizens United (2010), the Court held that private corporations, which are nowhere mentioned in the Constitution and are not political membership organizations, enjoy the same political free speech rights as people under the First Amendment

Nowhere, huh? Tell me, where in the First Amendment does it define a "person" or "people".
Notwithstanding Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad 118 U.S. 394 (1886) which upheld corporations' rights of protection of personhood under the Fourteenth Amendment?

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.
- Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

Corporations are very much citizens of the United States, subject to the laws of the land and subject to taxation and the relevant laws which they reside in.

And then there's this:
Regulation S. Section 902(k)(1)
Definition of person:
1. Any natural person resident in the United States;
2. Any partnership or corporation organized or incorporated under the laws of the United States;
- Securities Act of 1933

Corporate personhood exists in all 50 states and in Federal Law.


I would like to point out that the legal fiction of corporation as person falls apart once the comparison step over from the Civil to the Criminal... Cops arrests baddies, courts put them on trial, and if it was a criminal act---including such things as criminal conspiracy---the courts send people to jail.
"Corporations" don't seem to get locked up very often---unlike ordinary citizens as we sop amply demonstrate with our 'Prison-Industrial Complex---we lock 'em up far better than all those limp-wristed Euro Sossi countries.

It is rather difficult for White Picket Fences Plc to actually commit assault and battery. It is also somewhat difficult for a corporation to commit most criminal offences against physical person. That would make an interesting challenge for you I suspect.

[Bagwan]

As you can see I edited my post, Jim was a reasonably sane man after he was released from Patton (at least as sane as me); He just had some of the fight taken out of him, but was what most people would call a productive member of society (general contractor). I think our real disagreement (if you even want to call it one) is that at that time things were quite different than they are now. My actual baseball career stopped suddenly due to a very serious injury, and I became very aware of social justice as I worked the rest of my way through college. The progressive movement in the 60's was exactly that, too real, but more importantly too free (not absolutely free). As you probably know it was the onset of what could have been a socialist revolution in the USA.
But the conservative elements of our government took whatever measures necessary to discredit it, and then destroy it.

http://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/s480x480/548186_406477112740293_767976283_n.jpg

Dudely , are we talking about Abby , or Jimmy ?

The point is that this stuff happened long after those tie-dyed years , when Abby came out of hiding .
I'm sure many of those who attended were expecting the bright flowing colours , but he told a rather more serious tale , and , frankly , it chilled us all .

[Tazio]

Dudely , are we talking about Abby , or Jimmy ?

The point is that this stuff happened long after those tie-dyed years , when Abby came out of hiding .
I'm sure many of those who attended were expecting the bright flowing colours , but he told a rather more serious tale , and , frankly , it chilled us all .Come on dude, your harshing my mellow. :cool: That is why I said I don't have all the answers regarding those two. Their is a credible arguement that he simply commited suicide. I wasn't there or maybe I could give you something more like what you want to hear. While you are at it let me know where Jimmy is vacationing now ;) . Reality is what he brought to the radical left. The Radical left movement was not about tie-dye and herb, that is revisionist history. However Hoffman was a very serious player, and not a garden variety radical, although he was a publicty hound, and judging by what he did at Woodstock a bit of a screwball. Whatever happened to him in the 80's does not surprise me at all. I know a woman that lives in L.A. right now that was a high up (for a woman) in A.I.M. and she is involved in an ongoing Federal kidnap, rape and murder trail perpetrated by the leadership of that Native American organization in the 70's of a close friend of hers, another woman in that circle. Nothing surprises me.


Chicago Seven - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Seven)


The Chicago Seven (originally Chicago Eight, also Conspiracy Eight/Conspiracy Seven) were seven defendants—Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, David Dellinger, Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, John Froines, and Lee Weiner—charged with conspiracy, inciting to riot, and other charges related to protests that took place in Chicago, Illinois on the occasion of the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Bobby Seale, the eighth man charged, had his trial severed during the proceedings, lowering the number from eight to seven.

The 1968 Democratic National Convention was held in Chicago in late August—convened to select the party's candidates for the November 1968 Presidential election. Prior to and during the convention—which took place at the International Amphitheatre—rallies, demonstrations, marches, and attempted marches took place on the streets and in the lakefront parks, about five miles away from the convention site. These activities were primarily in protest of President Lyndon B. Johnson's policies for the Vietnam War, policies which were vigorously contested during the presidential primary campaign and inside the convention.
Can we move on to Jack and Bobby Kennedy dorking Marylyn family style, and then offing her with a poison suppository up that fine can Mr. Dunne? :dozey:

[Bagwan]

Come on dude, your harshing my mellow. :cool: That is why I said I don't have all the answers regarding those two. Their is a credible arguement that he simply commited suicide. I wasn't there or maybe I could give you something more like what you want to hear. While you are at it let me know where Jimmy is vacationing now ;) . Reality is what he brought to the radical left. The Radical left movement was not about tie-dye and herb, that is revisionist history. However Hoffman was a very serious player, and not a garden variety radical, although he was a publicty hound, and judging by what he did at Woodstock a bit of a screwball. Whatever happened to him in the 80's does not surprise me at all. I know a woman that lives in L.A. right now that was a high up (for a woman) in A.I.M. and she is involved in an ongoing Federal kidnap, rape and murder trail perpetrated by the leadership of that Native American organization in the 70's of a close friend of hers, another woman in that circle. Nothing surprises me.


Chicago Seven - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Seven)


Can we move on to Jack and Bobby Kennedy dorking Marylyn family style, and then offing her with a poison suppository up that fine can Mr. Dunne? :dozey:

Sorry for the bummer , man , but this aint about Abby , except that it was he who related the tale .

'Tis the tale , itself , not Abby's demise that chilled us all that day .
Chills came to me and many like me , I'm sure , later when we heard he had "killed himself" .

No names of who was actually running the "over-oval office" were offered , but Jimmy did offer John Tower specifically as both covert and treasonous in his initial involvement , and , most cynically set as the man to "cover his own tracks" in "The Tower Commission" .
Conveniently , Tower , in both roles could thus easily be played as a "rogue" , and was thus unlikely to ever reveal this plot against your president . Of course , he would also be corfortable .

I believe Abby told me the truth , and that Jimmy answered his own phone .

[Tazio]

Let's agree to disagree; Abbie could always spin a good yarn!

[donKey jote]

I was in Intel

cool :laugh:

[janvanvurpa]

cool :laugh:

Ironic isn't it.

[Tazio]

Where are the conservatives and Republicans at ?
Disregarding your dangling preposition, the Republicans are busy distancing themselves from Romney like so many rats jumping off a sinking ship!

[Jag_Warrior]

Danicafan, I consider myself a conservative, but like Ronald Reagan said he never left the democratic party,the democratic party left him, I feel the same way about the republican party lately. Reagan is actually a good example. He would be considered a RINO today, what with granting amnesty to illegal aliens, cutting marginal tax rates,yes, but raising many others, no, and compromising and working with democrats to get deals done.

For me it started with the hard-line stance on immigration. I would listen to talk show hosts go on about immigration, and say to myself, "That's not right, that's not how it is." My wife is Mexican, and I know many immigrants, legal and illegal, and the characterization that conservative pundits make about illegal immigration is just flat out wrong. I also don't believe them anymore when they talk against deficits and fiscal conservancy. At one point, republicans controlled both houses and the presidency and deficits continued to get worse, so I take that rhetoric for what it is, "We want you to stop spending on your pet programs, so we can spend on ours." As an aside, I have actually come to the conclusion that deficits really don't matter (on the macro level), but I don't expect anyone to take my word for it. It's taken me two years of independent reading and thinking on economics to come to this point.

Like I stated earlier, the republican party seems tone-deaf right now, insulting people about not paying income taxes, when fully 1/2 or more are the very people most likely to vote republican (i.e. the elderly and white working class w/kids(remember included in the 47% were people who paid payroll taxes but got back 100% of their withholding.)) The problem with ideological purity is that your tent keeps getting smaller and smaller, and right now I am on the outside.

Oh, I'm not voting for Obama, but I am not voting for Romney either, of course where I live it doesn't matter. Obama will win my district(Memphis), and Romney will win Tennessee regardless of what I do. I hate to sound so cavalier about it, but I don't think it matters who wins. Forces outside of politics will eventually let us emerge from this lost decade, and things will be rosy for most once again. For me they already are. I'm a salesman and I had my best year ever last year, and this year is on pace to match or even exceed it. Hopefully everyone else can join in the boom times once again very soon.


Excellent and very reasonable post! :up:

I've never been a Republican. And I've never been a Democrat either. The only party I've ever become involved with was Perot's United We Stand party in the early-mid 90's. The first Presidential candidate that I ever cast a vote for was Ronald Reagan. But that didn't convince me to become a Republican, although I used to be much farther to the right many years ago. I wasn't anything like one of these kooky, slobbering, paranoid wingnuts of 2012, but still a pretty hardcore fiscal conservative. I also doubt that Reagan could be called anything other than a RINO these days - the real Reagan, not the mythical, god-like creation, spun into a legend by the neocons and Evangelicals. Sadly, like you, I feel that even if I wanted to become a Republican now, I could not... I would not. My parents taught me to be careful of the company I kept. For me, there is simply too much hate, ignorance, arrogance, xenophobia and (pure!) paranoid schizophrenia in what has become the modern day GOP. It is no longer Reagan's "Big Tent Party". Now it's all about excluding people. Too much... "Is you with us or is you agin us? Cause if you ain't with us, then you is agin us! What is you, some kinda pinko commie Nazi socialist God hater???!!!" :ninja:


This fellow (Allen West), and many others like him, is someone who I not only disagree with (which is no crime), but he is the sort of wingnut type person who I just wouldn't care to associate with. Now, there are hateful people on the left who I wouldn't associate with either. But the right certainly seems to be so much prouder of showing off their rogues' gallery these days.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=li1r5wrlBMY

[Alexamateo]

It's funny how your perspective changes as you go through different stages of life. A bunch of little socialists have moved in with me in the past 8 years, I call them kids. :p

I find myself adopting positions that at one time I might have considered heretical. Take universal healthcare for example. I made the plunge to self-employment 3 years ago,and I have really prospered. I might have done it two or three years before that, but my concern was having to buy my own health insurance. I had to be sure I was going to make it. Now I wonder how many more people could prosper if they could leave jobs they are stuck in for something either on their own or elsewhere, but don't leave for fear of losing their benefits. I now think it would be better for the economy and society in general to grant it, to pull it completely out of the equation.

That said, I don't think Obamacare is the answer. Steve Cohen is representative of my district and I wrote to him asking how he could be in favor of a bill which it seems to me the insurance lobby wrote. It's like something a republican would come up with, which of course, it is, being modeled after Romney's Massachusetts plan. Isn't it ironic that something Romney could really point to and hang his hat on, he can't? He's painted himself into a ideological corner trying to appease the republican party Puritans. I could actually support Romney if he would only stand up and say what he really believes or at least what I think he believes, but he can't stray from whatever Republican party line the powers that be have decreed so who knows who he actually is.

[ioan]

Obama HAS TO GO. This guy is a Socialist/Communist, however you want to call it, pretty much the same thing... Government controls everything.

First off, the Government is for the people, here to protect its people, not run the people's everyday life.

Im not a big Romney fan either but he is definitely the better choice and my opinion, the only choice we have. We CANNOT afford 4 more years of Obama. My favorite candidate we had was Herman Cain, for those of you wondering.

But these recent attacks on US Embassies, lack of Israel support and Iran situation has really got me upset.

Mr. President....Attacking US Embassies is an act of war and you are doing nothing to defend them or America. He wont meet with the Israel Prime Minister but invites the Egypt Muslim Brotherhood leader over here ? Why, I have no understanding of that. He apologizes to Islamic countries about our beliefs in Islam but doesnt defend us when they attack our country's beliefs and way of life. Disgusting.


And in America, we all know his failures here..

Record National Debt over 16 trillion dollars. He has increased the National Debt more than all other presidents combined!
Unemployment higher than ever
Oil Prices high
Ruining the healthcare system
Lack of Military Support
Not defending our borders
Not enforcing illegal immigration but insteads caters to them, lets them stay here, work, get driver's licenses, etc...
Our Nation's credit rating has dropped to AA-

I could go on and on but I wont. America will fall if he stays in office another 4 years. I am a veteran and to see this country being destroyed by him is very upsetting and depressing.

:rolleyes: :rotflmao:

[ioan]

Excellent post. :up:

[anthonyvop]

Are there only a bunch of liberals here ???? Where are the conservatives and Republicans at ?



We are all hanging back and alternating between laughing at the shear ignorance and stupidity of the left and being scared that there are people who actually believe their crap.

[donKey jote]

We are all hanging back and alternating between laughing [...] and being scared [...].

you're not going soft on us now, are you tony? :laugh:

[Don Capps]

We are all hanging back and alternating between laughing at the shear (actually, it would seem that you meant to use "sheer" -- assuming you know the difference between "shear" and "sheer" to begin with, but then again if you had had a liberal education you would be given credit for making a "cutting" remark; but, I digress...) ignorance and stupidity of the left and being scared that there are people who actually believe their crap.

Actually I find it hard not to laugh out loud at such statements. That is the best you can do?

[DanicaFan]

Allen West is a great Congressman. He has very valid points. He is right when he said Obama surpassed Carter as the weakest President.

[Don Capps]

Allen West is a great Congressman. He has very valid points. He is right when he said Obama surpassed Carter as the weakest President.

Allen West is, to be blunt, an idiot. The only valid point about Allen West is the point on top of the tin hat he wears when he makes up lies such as the one in the clip.

West was very lucky to be allowed to retire after the boneheaded stunt he pulled in Iraq. He was very fortunate that he only got an Article 15, which are not handed out lightly to field grade officers.

As far as weak presidents go, it will be a challenge to beat George W. Bush, who certainly is in a hard competition with Buchanan for the worst president. Gawd, even Nixon and Reagan -- the paranoid maniac and the delusional airhead -- were better than G.W. Bush, which is a difficult sentence to write given how corrupt and inept their administrations were.

[Jag_Warrior]

Allen West is a great Congressman. He has very valid points. He is right when he said Obama surpassed Carter as the weakest President.

I'm sure that you believe this quite sincerely, my friend.

And (IMO) it is because people with your rather warped views have seized control of the GOP that people like Mitt Romney (who I actually don't think is a bad guy overall) had to play the part of a neocon and rabid social conservative in order to secure this nomination. He is failing right now because he has probably lost his identity - I've heard that sometimes happens to even the greatest actors, once they play a certain role or part for too long. People like Allen West and Michele Bachmann (and Jim Traficant ;) ) have been able to find a way into the U.S. Congress only when they've found districts with enough moonbats living there who would elect them. Without fail, whenever they aspire to higher national office, they are promptly dumped on their rear ends... because the United States is not a radical republic. We have our faults, as all nations do. But we are not a people who pretend that hate is love, war is peace or that ignorance is intelligence. And though we have our faults, unlike the GOP/radical right, we don't celebrate our character flaws and pretend that they are attributes.

Allen West may retain his Congressional seat (all depends on how the voter suppression efforts and wingnut turn-out go in Florida). But he will never be a U.S. Senator. He will never be Speaker of the House. He will never be Vice President. And he will most certainly never be President of the United States. Believe as you will. But that is reality.

And lastly, unless intelligent, reasonable, rational people can regain a voice in the GOP, that party will continue to get smaller. There are only so many old, angry, bigoted people left in this country. Either the intelligent, reasonable, rational people, who remain in the GOP, will begin identifying as Democrats (not likely), they will continue to swell the ranks of Independents (more likely) or they will eventually form a third party, which is center-right and has the original ideals of the Republican party (I think either option 2 or 3 would be great for our nation). And maybe their party symbol will be the rhino ( :D )... just to p!ss off the wingnuts and moonbats who stole the GOP from them.

[Captain VXR]

We are all hanging back and alternating between laughing at the shear ignorance and stupidity of the left and being scared that there are people who actually believe their crap.

The left are stupid?
Rick Santorum Doesn't Have 'Smart People' on his Side - National - The Atlantic Wire (http://www.theatlanticwire.com/national/2012/09/rick-santorum-doesnt-have-smart-people-his-side/56895/)

[Robinho]

You simply don't see the irony in what you have written do you?

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

[Captain VXR]

You simply don't see the irony in what you have written do you?

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

That addressed to me?

Romney's banking on a bunch of dumbass social conservatives voting against their own economic interests. Like these:
Kb62fpsyhC4

[DanicaFan]

And for the record I also love Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter.

[race aficionado]

And for the record I also love Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter.

Good for you - to each his own.

I like Rachel Maddow.

[Robinho]

No, sorry, it was supposed to quote Tony's post about being scared by liberals

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

[BDunnell]

shear ignorance

If you are to accuse others of 'sheer ignorance', at least make sure you spell 'sheer' accurately. Otherwise you might be considered ignorant.

[BDunnell]

Allen West is, to be blunt, an idiot. The only valid point about Allen West is the point on top of the tin hat he wears when he makes up lies such as the one in the clip.

West was very lucky to be allowed to retire after the boneheaded stunt he pulled in Iraq. He was very fortunate that he only got an Article 15, which are not handed out lightly to field grade officers.

As far as weak presidents go, it will be a challenge to beat George W. Bush, who certainly is in a hard competition with Buchanan for the worst president. Gawd, even Nixon and Reagan -- the paranoid maniac and the delusional airhead -- were better than G.W. Bush, which is a difficult sentence to write given how corrupt and inept their administrations were.

It is worth stating to those who will inevitably dismiss the above that Don Capps has forgotten more history than certain individuals here will ever know.

[BDunnell]

This fellow (Allen West), and many others like him, is someone who I not only disagree with (which is no crime), but he is the sort of wingnut type person who I just wouldn't care to associate with. Now, there are hateful people on the left who I wouldn't associate with either. But the right certainly seems to be so much prouder of showing off their rogues' gallery these days.

And the skewed political compasses of many, coupled with their educational failings, now see to it that a significant section of public opinion considers his ilk to be in the mainstream, rather than, as is more accurate, representing a lunatic, extremist fringe.

[Captain VXR]

Ah dun gin fand a pikchuur on da interwebz.
https://i.chzbgr.com/completestore/12/9/21/gKZH_SPw1EKyBOtr95x98A2.jpg
:s pin:

[DanicaFan]

Good for you - to each his own.

I like Rachel Maddow.


Rachel Maddow...That is hilarious. This liberal woman spews out a bunch of junk. I cant stand to listen to her for more than 1 minute....lol

[DanicaFan]

Dems hate this fact....Read the article...

Romney's taxes can't calm the Democrats | New York Daily News (http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/the_rumble/2012/09/romneys-taxes-cant-calm-the-democrats)

[BDunnell]

Rachel Maddow...That is hilarious. This liberal woman spews out a bunch of junk. I cant stand to listen to her for more than 1 minute....lol

Again, I say, these are not the comments of someone who deserves to have their political views taken seriously. Do you consider yourself an intelligent person?

[DanicaFan]

Again, I say, these are not the comments of someone who deserves to have their political views taken seriously. Do you consider yourself an intelligent person?


Why ? Because I differ than you ? That is crazy. When I point out facts and give my opinions, you think they are all wrong or bias. That is typical liberal views, if we dont agree, then a conservative is either wrong, racist, or uninformed. They will never admit we speak the truth. The reason for this is because they have nothing else. They know what thier track record is and its pathetic.

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/obamaout_zps2bff9e88.jpg

[BDunnell]

Why ? Because I differ than you ? That is crazy. When I point out facts and give my opinions, you think they are all wrong or bias. That is typical liberal views, if we dont agree, then a conservative is either wrong, racist, or uninformed. They will never admit we speak the truth. The reason for this is because they have nothing else. They know what thier track record is and its pathetic.

But you are uninformed, because you believe socialism to be the same as Communism, for a start. There is no other way to describe you, yet this seems not to trouble you. I'd say this of you whether your views were of the left or the right.

[DanicaFan]

As for communism and socialism being the same... I was referring to the fact that both of these systems have everything distributed equally among the public. Socialism is a jumpstart to communism. You can try and deny it but they both are bad. These systems will fail....

Although not perfect, Capitalism is still the best system.

[Dave B]

Socialism is a jumpstart to communism.
Do you have the faintest idea what your words mean? I've seldom seen such nonsense.

[BDunnell]

Socialism is a jumpstart to communism. [/B]

Er, pardon?

Again, I ask you — do you consider yourself an intelligent person?

[janvanvurpa]

If you are to accuse others of 'sheer ignorance', at least make sure you spell 'sheer' accurately. Otherwise you might be considered ignorant.

might? :uhoh:

[janvanvurpa]

Although not perfect, Capitalism is still the best system.




Clearly you have never given more than maximum 10 seconds thought to Socialism, Communism---probably anything else juding from your shocking comments, but if you are not a troll---or a deep cover satirist---please explain to me --us---what if capitalism is the "best system' does it constantly fail..
STICK TO THAT, not comparative things, which you obviously know less than nothing about,

Why does capitalism fail every few years and every so often have giant "panics" , and get all depressed?


Should Capitalists get a prescription for Halcyon?

[Starter]

Do you extend the same 'respect' to, say, the views of al Qaida? Where does this 'respect' for views with which you disagree end? I have no respect at all for homophobes, anti-abortionists, or so forth. Why should I, when I consider their views not only to be wrong but also damaging?
Sorry to be so tardy in my reply. Just returned from vacation.

I respect their right to have their opinions. It's when they take actions to harm others or restrict other people's rights that my tolerance ends.

[D-Type]

Steady on folks!

Some posters are stepping very close to the line.

For example, it is OK to say "That statement you have just made is crazy", but it is not acceptable to say: "You are crazy to make that statement." The latter is considered 'personal abuse' and is not acceptable..

[Starter]

It's neither a conservative position or a radical position, it's a matter of legal fact. Some corporations are people.

Companies in particular have legal personhood which means that they have the legal right to hold property, to sue and be sued, they may conduct business and appoint agents; in fact every single legal power that a natural person has except to be able to get married, a company also has. In some cases such as setting up a pension fund or a trust where property is to be held in the hands of a separate person, the veil of personhood is prudent legal planning because it means that a natural person may be sued but the assets of the pension fund or trust remain intact.
Um, no. Companies don't have a right to vote.

[gloomyDAY]

Um, no. Companies don't have a right to vote.No, companies can't vote, but thanks to the Supreme Court a company is now able to raise funds without any oversight in order to sway votes. Think about it for 1 minute. A foreign company can give money to a Super PAC without any dollar limit! That's bad.

[Starter]

No, companies can't vote, but thanks to the Supreme Court a company is now able to raise funds without any oversight in order to sway votes. Think about it for 1 minute. A foreign company can give money to a Super PAC without any dollar limit! That's bad.
That is true. I think the Court made a serious mistake on that one.

[DanicaFan]

Some great quotes on how capitalism is the best economic system.....

America's abundance was created not by public sacrifices to the common good, but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal interests and the making of their own private fortunes. They did not starve the people to pay for America's industrialization. They gave the people better jobs, higher wages, and cheaper goods with every new machine they invented, with every scientific discovery or technological advance -- and thus the whole country was moving forward and profiting, not suffering, every step of the way.



The core dynamic of the capitalist system is the accumulation process, a process in which a portion of the profits reaped through the sale of goods and services is reinvested, swelling the capital stock, incorporating new technologies in the process, and permitting larger sales and profits in the future.

And by Winston Churchill..

Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy.


The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.

Ronald Reagan..
It is old-fashioned, even reactionary to remind people that free enterprise has done more to reduce poverty than all the government programs dreamed up by Democrats.

In this era of big government, we sometimes forget that many of our proudest achievements as a nation came not through government, but through private citizens, individuals whose genius and generosity flourished in this climate of freedom.

[Starter]

It's a very important point. As I understanding with my limited knowledge of American politics is that if the situation were the same in the UK, we'd have a Labour Prime Minister, yet a Tory majority in the Commons?
With my limited understanding of British politics, I believe you are correct.

[janvanvurpa]

Steady on folks!

Some posters are stepping very close to the line.

For example, it is OK to say "That statement you have just made is crazy", but it is not acceptable to say: "You are crazy to make that statement." The latter is considered 'personal abuse' and is not acceptable..


That statement you have just made is crazy. :crazy:

[janvanvurpa]

Some great quotes on how capitalism is the best economic system.....

America's abundance was created not by public sacrifices to the common good, but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal interests and the making of their own private fortunes. They did not starve the people to pay for America's industrialization. They gave the people better jobs, higher wages, and cheaper goods with every new machine they invented, with every scientific discovery or technological advance -- and thus the whole country was moving forward and profiting, not suffering, every step of the way.



The core dynamic of the capitalist system is the accumulation process, a process in which a portion of the profits reaped through the sale of goods and services is reinvested, swelling the capital stock, incorporating new technologies in the process, and permitting larger sales and profits in the future.

And by Winston Churchill..

Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy.


The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.

Ronald Reagan..
It is old-fashioned, even reactionary to remind people that free enterprise has done more to reduce poverty than all the government programs dreamed up by Democrats.

In this era of big government, we sometimes forget that many of our proudest achievements as a nation came not through government, but through private citizens, individuals whose genius and generosity flourished in this climate of freedom.

Nobody asked you for great quotes about why somebody else thinks capitalism is so peachy.

In light of the direct clear question asking YOU why if it is so "great" does capitalism constantly, every few years FAIL and get depressed and have "Panics" then "That statement you have just made is crazy",

In addition it is flat demonstrably FALSE.

The only was broader prosperity was gained was by forcing via LAW or direct action, for better wages, better conditions, better education....


Now, this is a presidential election thread, all this re-hashing the crazy statements somebody made are distractions---which is more evidence that somebody is a troll--or a deep cover satirist....

The only possible connection is how accumulated capital passed down generation to generation, from a generation that actually made things-- cars, parts, steel, to a generation that makes their millions making deals, can distort the political process.

[DanicaFan]

If people like socialism so much, move to Europe....lol

[janvanvurpa]

With my limited understanding of British politics, I believe you are correct.

Mark may find it it odd that the president can---and often has been--- from "the other party" that either or both the House and Senate, but even odder is ---particularly in light of how the statements by madmen who keep yelling "we need to stick to the Constitution the way the Founding Farthers done did it!!!" that originally, as instituted, in US Presidential Elections he with the most votes was Pres, he with second most was Vice-Pres...

[BDunnell]

If people like socialism so much, move to Europe....lol

Is this the conclusion to your PhD thesis?

[DanicaFan]

Janvan,
What you refuse to admit is that capitalism is the only economic system to ever show consistent and an increasing of better standings of living. As tough as the economy gets, capitalism still shows hope and growth. Why ? Because it works !
No other system has shown such great progress and improvements in production, technology, growth, etc.

It focuses on free enterprise and individual rights. It has worked better than government "socialized" programs. The less government is involved in our lives, the better off we are. The Constitution was written to protect man from the government and the Bill of Rights was actually written as an anti-government document to give individuals rights superiority. The government's first job is to protect our lives, not run them. I dont know how you cant see that...

Thomas Jefferson said it good... "Government that governs least, governs best.

[janvanvurpa]

If people like socialism so much, move to Europe....lol


No, you still need to answer why Capitalism fails every few years, maybe from where ever you move to.
I believe somebody has already in this thread suggested Mogadishu, I second the suggestion.

MODERATORS---who really aren't. In US Political threads what this guy just did IS HIGHLY OFFENSIVE.

FEW things are more offensive, particularly when a persons whose every post, virtulaly every word seems so ill informed that it seems like (seems---qualifier, like---'as if" those are mitigating words) its a crazy person writing.

Moderators, you people sling around "denmerits" will-nilly---do you job.

[janvanvurpa]

Thomas Jefferson said it good... "Government that governs least, governs best.

Why then does it fail---you forgot 2008?

And Jefferson was a rich man, he did not see the busrting forth onto the world of a middle class of hundreds of millions--which was created by limiting the excesses of naked Capitalism here as well as everywhere civilised.
It was limiting done by the representatives of the People-for the people .

It's why you can read, even if it is at an appalling poor level..

Stop with the quotes, you whatever you name is tell us why Capitalism FAILS every few years.

[DanicaFan]

What some of you guys, including Janvan, said to me is HIGHLY OFFENSIVE. Attacking me personally, calling me and idiot, moron, troll, etc. That is clearly a violation of TOS.

But I am done arguing in here. It's clearly going nowhere. I never could reason with a liberal...lol Oh well, just wait until November gets here and this will be settled once and for all. I just hope you all can seriously look at how bad this country has become and will even get worse if we re-elect this President. There is no hope with him.

Obama himself said that if he cant turn this economy around in 1 term than he is done. Well, the economy didnt turn around, it got worse and he is running again so this again shows he cant keep any of his promises.

So take care everyone, Im out of this topic.

[BDunnell]

What some of you guys, including Janvan, said to me is HIGHLY OFFENSIVE. Attacking me personally, calling me and idiot, moron, troll, etc. That is clearly a violation of TOS.

But I am done arguing in here. It's clearly going nowhere. I never could reason with a liberal...lol Oh well, just wait until November gets here and this will be settled once and for all. I just hope you all can seriously look at how bad this country has become and will even get worse if we re-elect this President. There is no hope with him.

Obama himself said that if he cant turn this economy around in 1 term than he is done. Well, the economy didnt turn around, it got worse and he is running again so this again shows he cant keep any of his promises.

So take care everyone, Im out of this topic.

To be fair to you, you haven't ever really been in the topic. All you've done is start it, post a few pictures you've taken off the internet to illustrate what you think, not answered most of the questions put to you and come across as someone with little to offer in the way of political opinion.

Quick tip — if you want people to take your views a bit more seriously, writing sentences like 'I never could reason with a liberal...lol' doesn't help.

[BDunnell]

FEW things are more offensive, particularly when a persons whose every post, virtulaly every word seems so ill informed that it seems like (seems---qualifier, like---'as if" those are mitigating words) its a crazy person writing.

I think that's rather harsh. Ill-informed, certainly, and not especially well-educated, probably — but not 'crazy' in this instance.

[ioan]

Rachel Maddow...That is hilarious. This liberal woman spews out a bunch of junk. I cant stand to listen to her for more than 1 minute....lol

I wonder how long she could stand listening to you?!

[ioan]

Some great quotes on how capitalism is the best economic system.....

America's abundance was created not by public sacrifices to the common good, but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal interests and the making of their own private fortunes. They did not starve the people to pay for America's industrialization. They gave the people better jobs, higher wages, and cheaper goods with every new machine they invented, with every scientific discovery or technological advance -- and thus the whole country was moving forward and profiting, not suffering, every step of the way.



The core dynamic of the capitalist system is the accumulation process, a process in which a portion of the profits reaped through the sale of goods and services is reinvested, swelling the capital stock, incorporating new technologies in the process, and permitting larger sales and profits in the future.

And by Winston Churchill..

Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy.


The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.

Ronald Reagan..
It is old-fashioned, even reactionary to remind people that free enterprise has done more to reduce poverty than all the government programs dreamed up by Democrats.

In this era of big government, we sometimes forget that many of our proudest achievements as a nation came not through government, but through private citizens, individuals whose genius and generosity flourished in this climate of freedom.

OK let's play the game. The above definitions were all right, back in the day, FFW to today and I ask you: are those bolded parts in those definitions still true?!

[ioan]

No, you still need to answer why Capitalism fails every few years, maybe from where ever you move to.

And that's not all, the best part of it is that when that happens we get a



And by Winston Churchill..

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.

meaning that the poor get to share the loses due to the failure of the rich, but never the profits!

Capitalism is failing for one reason, because what we have today it is not what capitalism was at it's inception, what we have today is a system that is not based anymore on production of goods and services, instead we have a system based on production of money without the required production of added value to support it. We are living in a sick system and we are all going down the drain, some faster, some slower, but without changes we will all finish in the same sh!t.

[Mark]

I haven't seen anything offensive until the claims of it being offensive!

[Captain VXR]

Janvan,
What you refuse to admit is that capitalism is the only economic system to ever show consistent and an increasing of better standings of living. As tough as the economy gets, capitalism still shows hope and growth. Why ? Because it works !
No other system has shown such great progress and improvements in production, technology, growth, etc.

It focuses on free enterprise and individual rights. It has worked better than government "socialized" programs. The less government is involved in our lives, the better off we are. The Constitution was written to protect man from the government and the Bill of Rights was actually written as an anti-government document to give individuals rights superiority. The government's first job is to protect our lives, not run them. I dont know how you cant see that...

Thomas Jefferson said it good... "Government that governs least, governs best.

Inflation-adjusted wages for most people in the USA have changed slightly over a few decades. In the same time, pay at the top has quadrupled. So much for trickle down economics.
It's the Inequality, Stupid | Mother Jones (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-in-america-chart-graph#13484286755741&action=collapse_widget&id=3424397)

I personally support a mix of responsible capitalism and moderate socialism, which has enabled countries like Norway to have very high standards of living for everyone, and contributes to their low crime rates.

[janvanvurpa]

I think that's rather harsh. Ill-informed, certainly, and not especially well-educated, probably — but not 'crazy' in this instance.

Ah, but I said "seems"--and "like" as in "as in, ".. Truth is this guy speaks in 'code -words" and I know what he means with his phrases..and all i can say is Tsk tsk tsk..... Maybe a haruph thrown in for good measure.

[Rollo]

No other system has shown such great progress and improvements in production, technology, growth, etc.

Except for the mixed economic system, which to date delivered the industrial revolution, the discovery of four continents (from a European perspective) and the establishment of the basis of most western law and mode of thinking.



It focuses on free enterprise and individual rights. It has worked better than government "socialized" programs. The less government is involved in our lives, the better off we are.

Presumably you drive a motor car. Also presumably you are aware of the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways which is the single biggest "socialized" program in history and cost roughly $568bn in 2012 terms. Without it, the United States would cease to function and yet so many private firms use it as a delivery system for all manner of goods and services.
If you think that any private system of roads at more than 47,000 miles would have even been built at all, then I would like to hear your reasoning.


The government's first job is to protect our lives, not run them. I dont know how you cant see that...


Maybe because the word "government" is the noun derived from the word "govern". To govern means to enact and oversee policy and planning, which usually also happens in conjunction with a rules making authority.

[Jag_Warrior]

And for the record I also love Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter.

I would have been surprised, disappointed and confused if you'd said otherwise. Oh, and don't forget about Michele Bachmann. Surely if you love those other two, you gotta have a hunka, hunka burnin' love for Micky.

Amirite or amirite... or amirite?! :)

P.S. How do you feel about Laura Ingraham? Way back in the day (when dinosaurs still roamed), Laura was in law school at UVA while I was working on my MBA there. She wasn't really famous back then and I only knew who she was because she was very striking (about 5'10"+/- and pretty darn hot back then)... and she'd made something of a name for herself at Dartmouth (going after gays, when her brother was gay). Even then she was known to be kind of wingnutty, kooky and angry (even though UVA is/was a pretty conservative school). But you'd have probably liked her a lot too.

[ShiftingGears]

Reason(verb):

1. Think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic

2. Find an answer to a problem by considering various possible solutions

3. Persuade (someone) with rational argument


I never could reason with a liberal...lol

Judging by the above definition, I don't think what you've posted in this thread and the 9/11 thread qualifies as reasoning.

[anthonyvop]

No, you still need to answer why Capitalism fails every few years,

Capitalism has never failed. Only people who think they have a better idea on how people should live their lives fail.

[janvanvurpa]

Capitalism has never failed.


Ah another Tony the _________ flat assertion that flies in the whatever of the historic record.

Maybe you can go and rewrite all these articles, you being the expert on all history of everything:
he following 36 pages are in this category, out of 36 total. This list may not reflect recent changes (learn more (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:FAQ/Categories#Why_might_a_category_list_not_be_up_to_ date.3F)).

2

2007–2009 recession in the United States (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007%E2%80%932009_recession_in_the_United_States)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
2010 Flash Crash (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Flash_Crash)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
B

Baring crisis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baring_crisis)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Black Friday (1869) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_%281869%29)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Black Monday (1987) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Monday_%281987%29)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
D

Dot-com bubble (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
E

Economic effects arising from the September 11 attacks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_effects_arising_from_the_September_11_att acks)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
F

Friday the 13th mini-crash (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friday_the_13th_mini-crash)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
G

Global financial crisis in November 2008 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_financial_crisis_in_November_2008)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Global financial crisis in October 2008 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_financial_crisis_in_October_2008)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
L

List of recessions in the United States (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_States)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
O

October 27, 1997 mini-crash (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_27,_1997_mini-crash)[/*:m:shpy7v50]

P

Panic of 1792 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1792)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1796–1797 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1796%E2%80%931797)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1819 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1819)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1825 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1825)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1826 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1826)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1837 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1837)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1857 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1857)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1866 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1866)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1873 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1873)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1884 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1884)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1893 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1893)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1896 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1896)[/*:m:shpy7v50]

P cont.

Panic of 1901 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1901)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1907 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1907)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Panic of 1910–1911 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1910%E2%80%931911)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
R

Recession of 1937–1938 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recession_of_1937%E2%80%931938)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Recession of 1958 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recession_of_1958)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
S

Savings and loan crisis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savings_and_loan_crisis)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Silver Thursday (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_Thursday)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
Stock market downturn of 2002 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_market_downturn_of_2002)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
T

Toxic security (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxic_security)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
U

United States bear market of 2007–2009 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_bear_market_of_2007%E2%80%932009)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
United States policy responses to the late-2000s recession (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_policy_responses_to_the_late-2000s_recession)[/*:m:shpy7v50]
V



Of course that would require clicking and reading the links, far more trouble than one lines plucked from the Florida air..

What kind of air do they have in Florida?? :idea:

[BDunnell]

Capitalism has never failed. Only people who think they have a better idea on how people should live their lives fail.

What does that statement mean?

[Starter]

What does that statement mean?
First, capitalism is an economic system and not a political system or form of government. This thread, supposedly, is about the pending American presidential election. So let's not confuse them.

Tony is correct that capitalism has never failed. From time to time the system renews itself by shedding dead wood (investors stupid enough to think good times last forever, among others) and then moves on. True, it can be a little rough on some. What it has done is provide long term economic growth - with emphasis on the "long term" part. It gives people and companies the freedom to fail and the freedom to win big. It is the only system which allows countries like China, once they adopted a version of it in their manufacturing, to become economic power houses. It has allowed the US to lead the world economically for a century.

[Rollo]

Tony is correct that capitalism has never failed.

Of course he is.

There has never been even a single completely laissez-faire system, in the history of the world. I concede that "capitalism has never failed" largely because a purely capitalist system has never existed.

"A fully free economy, true laissez-faire, never has existed,"
Capitalism: The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics | Library of Economics and Liberty (http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Capitalism.html)

"This tension helps explain why capitalism in its putative ideal form - of laissez-faire state and completely free market - has never existed and doubtless can never exist."
- Stanley Buder, Capitalizing on Change: A Social History of American Business (2009) Pg13.

Nice work in affirming the consequent, which is a formal fallacy by the way. You may as well say that Gordon Shedden's Honda has not crashed at all in this year's Formula One season.

[janvanvurpa]

I wonder what all this abstract theorizing has to do with 2012 US Presidential elections and what happened to the nasty threats from Pino to ban ANYBODY making off topic posts?

(somebody could point out that that is precicely the tactics the right wing extremeists have done to steer the whole dialog in USA away from POLICY involving real stuff, like building highways, or taxes for curing the yawning gaping educational failures we see in evidence here, over to a theoretical discussion of what they imagine the sysytem once was, should have been, and maybe one day can be returned to, theoretically... so somebody could point out that we have had a microcasm unfolding right here mirroring the external world: Good thinking from all over the world, resisted by monumental refusnik, pseudo-religious-nationalistic blather, and pointless empty assertions of a particular skewed view, really just an expression of contempt for others.
As I said, somebody could point that out..

Because Shirely I could not comment

[Jag_Warrior]

No previous candidate in recent history has been in net negative territory on favorability at this point of a campaign. (http://www.people-press.org/2012/09/19/section-3-views-of-the-candidates/)


A review of Pew Research Center and Gallup favorability ratings from September finds that Romney is the only presidential candidate over the past seven election cycles to be viewed more unfavorably than favorably. (http://www.people-press.org/files/2012/09/9-19-12-22.png)

Swing Voters’ Views of the Candidates: Romney is hard to like (http://www.people-press.org/files/2012/09/9-19-12-29.png)

[BDunnell]

Tony is correct that capitalism has never failed.

I refer you to what Rollo wrote above. It is very hard to find any example of pure, unadulterated capitalism in action in terms of government policies.

[Starter]

I refer you to what Rollo wrote above. It is very hard to find any example of pure, unadulterated capitalism in action in terms of government policies.
OK, let's rephrase it as "capitalism as practiced in the US". Kinda nit picky though, we all know what was meant.

[janvanvurpa]

OK, let's rephrase it as "capitalism as practiced in the US". Kinda nit picky though, we all know what was meant.

No we only have dim idea of what was asserted

[Mark]

Well Capitalism as practiced in the US has had failures. The dust bowl; the great depression?

[Tazio]

Mark, please don't confuse this barbeque with facts!

http://a4.ec-images.myspacecdn.com/images02/140/d4d827c14b0b4aafb9e912e06dc67814/l.jpg

[BDunnell]

OK, let's rephrase it as "capitalism as practiced in the US". Kinda nit picky though, we all know what was meant.

Not nit-picky at all, since this element of the discussion has clearly moved on to one not solely about the US. And, in any case, the assertion that all capitalism as practiced in the US is entirely 'laissez-faire' is still nonsensical.

[Starter]

Well Capitalism as practiced in the US has had failures. The dust bowl; the great depression?
The dust bowl???
I think you pulleth our legs.

:D

[Starter]

Not nit-picky at all, since this element of the discussion has clearly moved on to one not solely about the US. And, in any case, the assertion that all capitalism as practiced in the US is entirely 'laissez-faire' is still nonsensical.
As I noted in post #365. I wasn't the one who took it off track (this time ;) ), that was done while I was enjoying our great southwest.

[Rollo]

"When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go, exactly, there’s no — and you can’t find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem. So it’s very dangerous."
- Mitt Romney as quoted in the LA Times, 23 Sep 2012
Mitt Romney pulls in $6 million at Beverly Hills fundraiser - latimes.com (http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-romney-beverly-hills-fundraiser-20120922,0,2317962.story)

What is this I don’t even...

Maybe it's because airplanes travel at heights more than 29,000ft where the air is less dense and needs to be pressurized to keep the occupants breathing. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that allowing the windows to be opened would create lots and lots and lots of holes that need to be sealed, and having them leak pressure is not desirable.

This is cloud-cuckoo-land territory.

[janvanvurpa]

Not nit-picky at all, since this element of the discussion has clearly moved on to one not solely about the US. And, in any case, the assertion that all capitalism as practiced in the US is entirely 'laissez-faire' is still nonsensical.


That's the case now and it has been since there was a United States.
Modern "conservatives", many as astute as we see here to our continuimg amazment and dismay---being bereft of any history, forget just how much all US Governments have given away things---for the betterment of the commonwealth.


Canal land grants:
Total 4,424,073.06 acres (17,904 km2)

Railroad Grants:
The first grants were given to the Mobile and Ohio (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_and_Ohio_Railroad) and Illinois Central (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois_Central_Railroad) Railroads in 1850.[2] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Checkerboarding_%28land%29#cite_note-walton-1) Additional grants were made under the Pacific Railway Acts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Railway_Acts) between 1862 and 1871, when they were stopped due to public opposition. In total, 79 grants were made, totaling 200,000,000 acres (810,000 km2), later reduced to 131,000,000 acres (530,000 km2).[2] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Checkerboarding_%28land%29#cite_note-walton-1)

Homestead Act, free land just given away:
Eventually the federal government granted 1.6 million homesteads and distributed 270,000,000 acres (420,000 sq mi) of federal land for private ownership between 1862 and 1934, a total of 10% of all lands in the United States.[4] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homestead_Act#cite_note-3) Homesteading was discontinued in 1976, except in Alaska, where it continued until 1986.

People and Governments them were not this neo-corn-servative "every man for himself and all against one" repulsive sickening greed mentality which some, beneficiaries of generations of shared giving by the Government, rant and rave against, now that they're fat dumb and happy.

[Tazio]

"When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go, exactly, there’s no — and you can’t find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem. So it’s very dangerous."
- Mitt Romney as quoted in the LA Times, 23 Sep 2012
Mitt Romney pulls in $6 million at Beverly Hills fundraiser - latimes.com (http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-romney-beverly-hills-fundraiser-20120922,0,2317962.story)

What is this I don’t even...

Maybe it's because airplanes travel at heights more than 29,000ft where the air is less dense and needs to be pressurized to keep the occupants breathing. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that allowing the windows to be opened would create lots and lots and lots of holes that need to be sealed, and having them leak pressure is not desirable.

This is cloud-cuckoo-land territory.
This reminds me of when George H.W. Bush visited a grocery store and asked the cashier what the bar code scanner was, :confused:
only stupider and more disconnected. :laugh:

[Rudy Tamasz]

"When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go, exactly, there’s no — and you can’t find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem. So it’s very dangerous."
- Mitt Romney as quoted in the LA Times, 23 Sep 2012
Mitt Romney pulls in $6 million at Beverly Hills fundraiser - latimes.com (http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-romney-beverly-hills-fundraiser-20120922,0,2317962.story)

What is this I don’t even...

Maybe it's because airplanes travel at heights more than 29,000ft where the air is less dense and needs to be pressurized to keep the occupants breathing. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that allowing the windows to be opened would create lots and lots and lots of holes that need to be sealed, and having them leak pressure is not desirable.

This is cloud-cuckoo-land territory.

Rollo, you are a very intelligent person. You often opt to pick too soft targets for your critique, though and that, in my eyes, somewhat diminishes the value of your contribution to the discussion.

[Rudy Tamasz]

That's the case now and it has been since there was a United States.
Modern "conservatives", many as astute as we see here to our continuimg amazment and dismay---being bereft of any history, forget just how much all US Governments have given away things---for the betterment of the commonwealth.


People and Governments them were not this neo-corn-servative "every man for himself and all against one" repulsive sickening greed mentality which some, beneficiaries of generations of shared giving by the Government, rant and rave against, now that they're fat dumb and happy.

Conservatives, neo-conservatives, right, left, center... I believe we are confusing ourselves by sticking to the political vocabulary of the last two centuries to describe and analyse the modern day reality. These days various segments of the society group themselves along different lines and that traditional left/right paradigm no longer works. Even in the world of economics the lines of division between the free market and government regulation are very mich blurred. It's about time to refresh our thinking.

[janvanvurpa]

Conservatives, neo-conservatives, right, left, center... I believe we are confusing ourselves by sticking to the political vocabulary of the last two centuries to describe and analyse the modern day reality. These days various segments of the society group themselves along different lines and that traditional left/right paradigm no longer works. Even in the world of economics the lines of division between the free market and government regulation are very mich blurred. It's about time to refresh our thinking.

I agree. The labels are useless and are 'code words" anyway.. The use of the words is intended to be like a 'recognition sign" and supposed to infer some kind of complex shared set of beliefs, but its rediculous..

What would you suggest calling these "theoretical social Darwinists"?

I know what I would call them but the moderators in their selective enforcement already dish out absurd warnings and threats of lifetime bannation so I gotta keep "clam".

[pino]

I know what I would call them but the moderators in their selective enforcement already dish out absurd warnings and threats of lifetime bannation so I gotta keep "clam".

I am glad to read that and while here, I want to inform you that those threats about off-topic posts were referring to that particular thread. So please stop mention that all the time thank you.

[janvanvurpa]

I am glad to read that and while here I want to inform you that those threats about off-topic posts were referring to that particular thread. So please stop mention that all the time thank you.

Well we only can go by what we read that you wrote... you seem pretty selective and "generous' with your demerits as many others have commented on that over the years, and I've been given "demerits" or whatever you call them merely for saying things "seem" like something or for agreeing with Bdunnel...
Quite an inhibiting presence you and several others bring to honest discussion.

Perhaps you could be a little clearer and trouble yourself to answer when people take their time to honestly inquire what specifically you mean or was "offensive' when you're barking out your warnings, because we can't just guess what you mean..

[Mark]

Can we keep to the topic please, the discussion has been fine - apart from complaints about moderators!

[Rudy Tamasz]

What would you suggest calling these "theoretical social Darwinists"?

I don't know. I'd probably use some plain language, like "people who stand for unlimited competition" or something. In the process of debating some newer and more adequate definitions and recognition signs would emerge and make it to the common language.

We recently had parliamentary elections in Belarus. One of the candidates in my district was a member of a communist party (we have at least two of these). He fully supports the current government and the President who combines Soviet-style welfare state and populist rhetoric with tough Latin American-style government capitalism. On top of that the candidate is a radio host with a bohemian lifestyle and most likely gay, which is anathema to traditional communist demographics. You see, using the "communist" label to describe him is a bit misleading.

[DanicaFan]

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/obamunism.jpg

Ingraining A Culture Where If You Earn Money You Are Not Entitled To It, But If You Want It, And Do Not Have It, You Are !

[DanicaFan]

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/2shirt10.jpg

[ShiftingGears]

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/2shirt10.jpg

t3GnWTy8Ebg

[BDunnell]

http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/obamunism.jpg

Ingraining A Culture Where If You Earn Money You Are Not Entitled To It, But If You Want It, And Do Not Have It, You Are !

That was a long absence.

If you are to return to the thread, maybe you could do so with some thoughts of your own, rather than yet more pictures off the internet?

[Mark]

It does seem to be the case in politics discussions that e.g. posting articles which "prove" your point is seen as the way to go, rather than using your own arguments.

PS. Don't post full articles they'll get deleted ;)

[D-Type]

Just a thought:

Was it Obama, the Republican Party, the Democrats, the Communists, the Socialists, the Liberals, the Green Party, al Qaeda, the Taliban, or someone else who made the decision enabling the US lending agencies to grant mortgages to "sub-prime" customers? And who made the decision to fund these from the world's banking system. Who tried to sort out the resultant mess?

In other words, are people shooting at the right target?

[Alexamateo]

With regards to the lending crisis it is all of us. Oversimplified, Republicans push for relaxed banking regulations and to allow the creation of new investment instruments and Democrats push for relaxed lending standards and to eliminate "red-lining" of certain areas and classes of borrowers. Meanwhile, after the dot-com bubble, investors are looking for the next big thing. Real Estate is always good and it always goes up!! Plus there's all these new type financial instruments, mortgage backed securities, tranches, credit default swaps, real estate investment trusts. After all, even us little guys want our mutual funds and 401k's to keep going up, up, up.

So money starts getting poured into real estate, the rational people that we are, prices are rising, Flip This House (not to be confused with Flip That House :D ) becomes a popular TV show. Since prices are rising, we might as well take out a home equity loan even if we don't want to move, after all real estate only goes up, right? So we created an asset bubble of the very homes we lived in. So asset bubbles do what all asset bubbles do ever since Tulip Mania back in the 1600's, It crashed. It's also interesting to me that a change in accounting rules to fair market rules exacerbated the problem. By making value such a moving target in a declining market, banks would have to sell off assets to maintain adequate capitalization, but since the market was deflating the assets would then be lower,then requiring them to sell off more assets. It was a death spiral. Not sure when it changed but before they could hold assets and record them as the value paid.

So who caused it? We all did.

We have seen the enemy and he is us!

[DanicaFan]

That was a long absence.

If you are to return to the thread, maybe you could do so with some thoughts of your own, rather than yet more pictures off the internet?


These pictures say it best. They are so true.... Sorry, I know the truth is hard sometimes. :)

[heliocastroneves#3]

What some of you guys, including Janvan, said to me is HIGHLY OFFENSIVE. Attacking me personally, calling me and idiot, moron, troll, etc. That is clearly a violation of TOS.

But I am done arguing in here. It's clearly going nowhere. I never could reason with a liberal...lol Oh well, just wait until November gets here and this will be settled once and for all. I just hope you all can seriously look at how bad this country has become and will even get worse if we re-elect this President. There is no hope with him.

Obama himself said that if he cant turn this economy around in 1 term than he is done. Well, the economy didnt turn around, it got worse and he is running again so this again shows he cant keep any of his promises.

So take care everyone, Im out of this topic.

You are out of this topic but still posting replies, that's awesome, I wish I had those powers!


http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/2shirt10.jpg

He left this topic but even managed it to post TWICE after he told us that he left this topic, this guy is great... I'm curious whether I'm able to post on a forum which I actually left.


These pictures say it best. They are so true.... Sorry, I know the truth is hard sometimes. :)

Yes, you definitely have a hard time with accepting the truth because you probably still don't understand that your Danica was by FAR not one of the talented drivers on the IndyCar grid and is by FAR not one of NASCAR's talents either. :s mokin:

[Alexamateo]

Danicafan, I would challenge you to approach statements made by Sean Hannity et al, with the same degree of skeptism you would give to Rachel Maddow.


Consider the statement: "The Obama stimulus has been a complete failure."

The only problem is that it is not true.

My business is brokering trees and shrubs. My customers are primarily landscape contractors. I would hear people say that, but know that I was shipping a bunch of Interstate rest areas and highway projects directly tied to the act back in 2010. (heck,some projects are still ongoing, now.) So I can directly tie a good chunk of my commissions (I am 100% commission) to the stimulus. I am no insider and neither are my customers. I can say this, if not for stimulus spending on infrastructure projects (Which I personally believe is a responsibility of government, just like the military) things would have been worse. To this I can personally attest.

This, among other things has led to my gradual disillusionment with conservative pundits and the republican party. Hyperbole exists on both sides of the equation.

[Rudy Tamasz]

With my basic understanding of how economy works, stimulus is/was used to keep the U.S. economy running in hard times. Since the U.S. has a huge budget deficit, the stimulus money was borrowed from somebody somewhere. If it produces macroeconomic stability and sustainable growth, it will qualify as a success. If not, it's another chunk of money wasted. I believe the jury is still out.

[Starter]

Just a thought:

Was it Obama, the Republican Party, the Democrats, the Communists, the Socialists, the Liberals, the Green Party, al Qaeda, the Taliban, or someone else who made the decision enabling the US lending agencies to grant mortgages to "sub-prime" customers?
It was two parties. First, the US Congress who required lenders to loan to pretty much anyone regardless of creditworthyness in order to eliminate "redlining" and second, some, but not all, of the lenders who were busy lapping up commissions and kick backs for all the loans made.


And who made the decision to fund these from the world's banking system.
Not sure what you mean by that.


Who tried to sort out the resultant mess?
Well, that really depends on what you mean by "sort out". A number of parties tried to do something, mostly too little too late. But once again our Congress stepped up to spend way too much money which they didn't have and also required lenders, some of whom weren't guilty of the excesses, to write down loans. A lose, lose proposition for everyone.

It is never a good idea to save someone from their own stupidity (absent a threat to life and limb) because they'll never learn not to be so stupid. Now all the Americans who used good judgement in their financial dealings are saddled with the cost of bailing out the stupid people through the debt we have accrued.

[Starter]

My business is brokering trees and shrubs. My customers are primarily landscape contractors. I would hear people say that, but know that I was shipping a bunch of Interstate rest areas and highway projects directly tied to the act back in 2010. (heck,some projects are still ongoing, now.) So I can directly tie a good chunk of my commissions (I am 100% commission) to the stimulus. I am no insider and neither are my customers. I can say this, if not for stimulus spending on infrastructure projects (Which I personally believe is a responsibility of government, just like the military) things would have been worse. To this I can personally attest.
Your example is one of the very few I have seen where the stimulus money actually "hit the street". There is a large chunk of your and my money gone missing.

[janvanvurpa]

It was two parties. First, the US Congress who required lenders to loan to pretty much anyone regardless of creditworthyness in order to eliminate "redlining" and second, some, but not all, of the lenders who were busy lapping up commissions and kick backs for all the loans made.


Not sure what you mean by that.


Well, that really depends on what you mean by "sort out". A number of parties tried to do something, mostly too little too late. But once again our Congress stepped up to spend way too much money which they didn't have and also required lenders, some of whom weren't guilty of the excesses, to write down loans. A lose, lose proposition for everyone.

It is never a good idea to save someone from their own stupidity (absent a threat to life and limb) because they'll never learn not to be so stupid. Now all the Americans who used good judgement in their financial dealings are saddled with the cost of bailing out the stupid people through the debt we have accrued.

Required them? i bought this place in 01 and it was a bullsh8t process---but I kept it and haven't missed a payment.

But I read every line carefully and I didn't see anything with a Congressional rubber stamp.

It may be that Congress, always ready to spread their cheeks for anybody with money, wrote legislation that ALLOWED lenders more looseness , and the LENDERS , eager for virtually free money, fell all over themselves to finance sales regardless of circumstances---and regardless of if the person had been victim of up-selling, partial or faulty advice on total costs, went ahead and lent money...They got of $5000 here for essentially typing my name and adress into a form and pressing "PRINT" and if i had defaulted, they'd make the same closing costs again and again and again.

[race aficionado]

These pictures say it best. They are so true.... Sorry, I know the truth is hard sometimes. :)

DanicaFan.
Better start getting accustomed to the fact that President Obama will be re elected to a second term - and that eventually many of the republicans in congress will stop the battle to avoid Obama's re-election - because that battle was lost - and will now put the interests of the country first.

** my second thought is wishful thinking of course but I can't give up in humanity.

My first comment . . . . put that one in the bank.

:s mokin:

[Malbec]

It was two parties. First, the US Congress who required lenders to loan to pretty much anyone regardless of creditworthyness in order to eliminate "redlining".

Can you link to the exact bit of legislation you're referring to?

The last time someone claimed this (might have been you but not sure) it turned out that Congress banned lenders from using demographic information such as race and religion as lending criteria but did nothing to ban credit ratings assessments.


It is never a good idea to save someone from their own stupidity (absent a threat to life and limb) because they'll never learn not to be so stupid. Now all the Americans who used good judgement in their financial dealings are saddled with the cost of bailing out the stupid people through the debt we have accrued.

Actually its a bit more complicated than that. I believe the USA has made a net profit from bailing out AIG. The British government is making a killing helping bail out the Irish and the Arabs/Chinese are also making a handsome profit bailing out institutions and countries. The British government ripped the banks off massively in return for bailing them out at the time of the credit crunch charging rates and fees bordering on usury. Not that I mind of course. On the other hand of course governments have also lost money on many institutions such as RBS and Northern Rock in the UK, however the idea that we are saddled with the cost isn't completely true.

[Malbec]

I don't know. I'd probably use some plain language, like "people who stand for unlimited competition" or something.

The problem with simplifying is that it doesn't describe accurately what people stand for.

Your description of "people who stand for unlimited competition" presumably is aimed at the right. However this political group is often against immigration because ultimately it increases the level of competition within society, therefore they are only for unlimited competition where it suits them and not as a universal principle.

[donKey jote]

DanicaFan.
Better start getting accustomed to the fact that President Obama will be re elected to a second term - and that eventually many of the republicans in congress will stop the battle to avoid Obama's re-election - because that battle was lost - and will now put the interests of the country first.

** my second thought is wishful thinking of course but I can't give up in humanity.

My first comment . . . . put that one in the bank.

:s mokin:

race has a dream :up:

[BDunnell]

These pictures say it best. They are so true.... Sorry, I know the truth is hard sometimes. :)

Again, forgive me if I don't consider you someone whose opinions are worth taking seriously.

[BDunnell]

Your description of "people who stand for unlimited competition" presumably is aimed at the right. However this political group is often against immigration because ultimately it increases the level of competition within society, therefore they are only for unlimited competition where it suits them and not as a universal principle.

Indeed — also, the sort of person who has no problem with both complaining about immigration and moving to the Costa del Sol.

[BDunnell]

Just a thought:

Was it Obama, the Republican Party, the Democrats, the Communists, the Socialists, the Liberals, the Green Party, al Qaeda, the Taliban, or someone else who made the decision enabling the US lending agencies to grant mortgages to "sub-prime" customers? And who made the decision to fund these from the world's banking system. Who tried to sort out the resultant mess?

In other words, are people shooting at the right target?

A certain section of the US electorate will believe they are so long as the President is black. Sad but, I feel, true.

[Starter]

The problem with simplifying is that it doesn't describe accurately what people stand for.

Your description of "people who stand for unlimited competition" presumably is aimed at the right. However this political group is often against immigration because ultimately it increases the level of competition within society, therefore they are only for unlimited competition where it suits them and not as a universal principle.
Not true. It's the illegal immigration most are against. America has a fine tradition of welcoming new people - it has been one of the factors which built the country.

[BDunnell]

[/B]
Not true. It's the illegal immigration most are against.

Simply saying 'Not true' doesn't make it so. Certainly in the UK it is the case that many don't make the distinction, and thus is the 'debate' shaped.

[Malbec]

[/B]
Not true. It's the illegal immigration most are against. America has a fine tradition of welcoming new people - it has been one of the factors which built the country.

The right wing isn't limited to the US.

[DanicaFan]

DanicaFan.
Better start getting accustomed to the fact that President Obama will be re elected to a second term - and that eventually many of the republicans in congress will stop the battle to avoid Obama's re-election - because that battle was lost - and will now put the interests of the country first.

** my second thought is wishful thinking of course but I can't give up in humanity.

My first comment . . . . put that one in the bank.

:s mokin:

He wont get re-elected. And sorry but Obama doesnt have the country's best interests in mind, he has his OWN.

[BDunnell]

He wont get re-elected.

I look forward to looking back at this statement in a few months' time.

Tell me — were you impressed by Romney"s behaviour when he came to Europe? Even conservatives on this side of the Atlantic were acutely embarrassed by him.


And sorry but Obama doesnt have the country's best interests in mind, he has his OWN.

Nice slogan — no doubt one you've heard elsewhere and decided to copy — but essentially empty and meaningless. I wouldn't even say that of David Cameron*, a man for whom and for whose party I would never vote, and whose policies I consider terribly misguided. Trying to second-guess someone else's personal motivation for doing something is, I tend to think, problematic.

(* — David Cameron is the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, in case you were unaware.)

[Jag_Warrior]

It was two parties. First, the US Congress who required lenders to loan to pretty much anyone regardless of creditworthyness in order to eliminate "redlining" and second, some, but not all, of the lenders who were busy lapping up commissions and kick backs for all the loans made.

As the former owner of a mortgage company and a former mortgage banker (who worked for a bank accused of red-lining), I'd be curious to know more about this requirement by Congress, that forced banks to lend to anyone regardless of creditworthiness. Even my bank was not "required" to make loans, even though we had indeed used red-lining principles in making decisions.

Unfortunately, what you're talking about is an urban legend created on right-wing talk radio a couple of years ago. Usually Barney Frank is touted as the author of this non-existent legislation. One version even has the U.S. government paying banks a "stipend" (complete misuse of the word) for the loans they made to minorities. There were efforts to bust up red-lining. But no bank was forced to make the first loan to a borrower that did not meet a bank's minimum lending standards - they just couldn't use different standards based on race, gender or location. Also, FNMA and FHLMC set minimum lending standards for their conforming mortgages. But just as right now, banks can elect to tighten those standards. But they (on their own) cannot lower the underwriting standards, they cannot discriminate and they cannot red-line.

For those who aren't well versed in the mortgage market, here is a factoid for you: banks and mortgage companies made subprimes because of the profits. That's why. They even placed many borrowers, who qualified for primes, into subprimes because the rate and fee profits were 300%+ greater. The bank that I'm doing my refi with right now never entered the subprime market. The free will to make or not make loans was never put in the hands of Congress.

[Jag_Warrior]

Can you link to the exact bit of legislation you're referring to?

The last time someone claimed this (might have been you but not sure) it turned out that Congress banned lenders from using demographic information such as race and religion as lending criteria but did nothing to ban credit ratings assessments.



Sorry, I didn't see your post before I addressed this as well. But you are correct. Again, this claim has become an urban legend that was spread mostly (as far as I know) on right wing talk radio. And yes, it is a false claim.

[Mark]

While I think the Tories are a bunch of toffs in it for their own gain. I'd agree that Tory policies are merely seriously misguided rather than corrupt.

[BDunnell]

While I think the Tories are a bunch of toffs in it for their own gain. I'd agree that Tory policies are merely seriously misguided rather than corrupt.

British politics may have its serious faults, but at least it isn't as pointlessly polarised as is US politics.

[Starter]

Sorry, I didn't see your post before I addressed this as well. But you are correct. Again, this claim has become an urban legend that was spread mostly (as far as I know) on right wing talk radio. And yes, it is a false claim.
I'll defer to your industry experience. The part about greedy lenders stands though, as you've just reenforced.

By the way, I don't listen to talk radio. Though I'll confess that a few years ago I'd tune into Rush ever once in a while at lunch - but that was just for laughs. It was more entertaining than the day time TV in the lunch room.

[Rollo]

The problem with simplifying is that it doesn't describe accurately what people stand for.

Your description of "people who stand for unlimited competition" presumably is aimed at the right. However this political group is often against immigration because ultimately it increases the level of competition within society, therefore they are only for unlimited competition where it suits them and not as a universal principle.

Actually "people who stand for unlimited competition" do exist and some of them would even go so far as to suggest that the only role of government is to prevent civil disorder, which basically suggests that government's duties are defence, the police and the judiciary and that's all. Such thinking falls squarely in the realm of the Austrian School of economics, as championed by Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek.

Ironically this is what's known in economics as "liberal" and even falls into the philosophical position of Libertarianism. On the classic left-right scale (before the American press buggered it up royally), no government whatsoever, is defined as the ultimate rightist position on a left-right scale.


These days various segments of the society group themselves along different lines and that traditional left/right paradigm no longer works. Even in the world of economics the lines of division between the free market and government regulation are very mich blurred. It's about time to refresh our thinking.

The terminology works utterly perfectly. It is the media and politics who like to spin things to coerce people's thinking to either sell them ideas or products.

[BDunnell]

Actually "people who stand for unlimited competition" do exist and some of them would even go so far as to suggest that the only role of government is to prevent civil disorder, which basically suggests that government's duties are defence, the police and the judiciary and that's all.

While I have no doubt that such people exist, I am yet to meet one, and I include in this the time I spent working in politics. One hears even the most rabid right-wing Tory MPs urging the government to intervene in, for example, assisting British industry in exporting its wares.

[Don Capps]

He won't (sic) get re-elected. And sorry but Obama doesn't (sic) have the country's best interests in mind, he has his OWN.

And, pray tell, just what are those personal interests? And, how do they compare with those of Romney, a former venture capitalist whose own interests at Bain Capital would often seem to be at odds with the nation's interest? Please, try to be coherent and specific, in actual sentences of your own, if possible, not parroting some of the code words or terms that you have used in the past. Demonstrate that you are capable of articulating the reasons behind such a statement.

As an aside, exactly what happens when President Obama is re-elected? Will the skies darken and the sun vanish? Will the tides neither ebb nor flow? Will the poles tilt? Will birds no longer sing? Will Kansas experience the Rapture? Just curious so as to be prepared for the consequences.

[BDunnell]

And, pray tell, just what are those personal interests? And, how do they compare with those of Romney, a former venture capitalist whose own interests at Bain Capital would often seem to be at odds with the nation's interest? Please, try to be coherent and specific, in actual sentences of your own, if possible, not parroting some of the code words or terms that you have used in the past. Demonstrate that you are capable of articulating the reasons behind such a statement.

As an aside, exactly what happens when President Obama is re-elected? Will the skies darken and the sun vanish? Will the tides neither ebb nor flow? Will the poles tilt? Will birds no longer sing? Will Kansas experience the Rapture? Just curious so as to be prepared for the consequences.

Splendid.

[Rollo]

I think that if we can engage DanicaFan in reasonable dialogue, that we might be able to draw him out. Obviously he is a dyed-in-the-wool card carrying Republican and that's fine, there's room in a discussion, provided that's what it is.


He wont get re-elected. And sorry but Obama doesnt have the country's best interests in mind, he has his OWN.

If you look at all the major indicators (DJIA, TED Spread and the LIBOR-OIS), they spiked in the period from mid-October through to early January 2009. An election occurs in November '08 and we have a lame duck until January 20, 2009.
This means to suggest that any incoming president, would have inherited an economy like a recently exploded hand grenade.

My question, is if McCain had been elected in '08, he still would have been faced with precisely the same sets of problems; since we know this to be true, how do you think he would have handled it differently?

Secondly, given that the electorate deliberately voted in a hostile congress in 2010, if McCain had been President, what's not to suggest that there'd wouldn't be another hostile congress voted in but with the colours flipped?

It's all very well to suggest that the President has done a bad job but at some point the American people have to fess up to the fact that they deliberately made the job more difficult than it needed to be. My conjecture is that if McCain had been President then this whole discussion would be pretty well much identical but with the colours flipped.

[BDunnell]

I think that if we can engage DanicaFan in reasonable dialogue, that we might be able to draw him out. Obviously he is a dyed-in-the-wool card carrying Republican and that's fine, there's room in a discussion, provided that's what it is.

I think the very first post demonstrated that reasonable dialogue would not, shall we say, be a strong point.



It's all very well to suggest that the President has done a bad job but at some point the American people have to fess up to the fact that they deliberately made the job more difficult than it needed to be.

Some — not all of them.

[Starter]

Secondly, given that the electorate deliberately voted in a hostile congress in 2010, if McCain had been President, what's not to suggest that there'd wouldn't be another hostile congress voted in but with the colours flipped?
And that, friends and neighbors, explains how US politics works. We don't want one party control. There is way too much room for excess that way. A divided House & Senate vs a different party President requires compromise. The Republicans have assumed that if they oppose everything they will win everything. They are wrong. The Democrats have assumed the few times they have controlled both, that they can steamroller whatever they like. They are also wrong. The greatest advances have been made when a Congress of one party and a President of another have worked (reluctantly) with each other.

[Rudy Tamasz]

The terminology works utterly perfectly. It is the media and politics who like to spin things to coerce people's thinking to either sell them ideas or products.

What term do you call people like me who never buy the fixed ideological package from either side but prefer to exercise their own judgment in determining what's best for them?

[BDunnell]

What term do you call people like me who never buy the fixed ideological package from either side but prefer to exercise their own judgment in determining what's best for them?

Nor do I, but I would still describe myself as left-leaning, at least. I don't think the terminology really matters.

[Mark]

British politics may have its serious faults, but at least it isn't as pointlessly polarised as is US politics.

But is it? In the UK you have die hard Labour and die hard Conservative (die hard LibDem's don't exist :laugh: ). Same as you have staunch Democrats and Republicans in the USA. However there must be a significant number who are prepared to switch from one the other, otherwise the government would never change.

[BDunnell]

And that, friends and neighbors, explains how US politics works. We don't want one party control. There is way too much room for excess that way. A divided House & Senate vs a different party President requires compromise. The Republicans have assumed that if they oppose everything they will win everything. They are wrong. The Democrats have assumed the few times they have controlled both, that they can steamroller whatever they like. They are also wrong. The greatest advances have been made when a Congress of one party and a President of another have worked (reluctantly) with each other.

It also explains why US politics doesn't work. Such a thing might have functioned when views were less polarised, but today — and I consider this largely to be the fault of the right — I don't hold out much hope.

[BDunnell]

But is it? In the UK you have die hard Labour and die hard Conservative (die hard LibDem's don't exist :laugh: ). Same as you have staunch Democrats and Republicans in the USA. However there must be a significant number who are prepared to switch from one the other, otherwise the government would never change.

Of course there are the diehards, but look at the nature of debate in the two countries, and you'll see why I feel we can look at our political system with a small degree of satisfaction at least. I don't think we would ever have a discussion about 'death panels', for a start.

[Rudy Tamasz]

Nor do I, but I would still describe myself as left-leaning, at least. I don't think the terminology really matters.

I would describe myself as right-leaning in conventional terms but it means I am pigeonholing myself within a simplistic and narrow stereotype. For instance, I'm all for economic competition but I don't think losers should be stomped into the ground and left to die in the cold. They should get some help in whatever shape, but that help should not let them live a care free life and discourage them from trying again and again. The help should not be excessive, but for the reasons of humanity I'd better err on the generous side when I determine the extent of help. I can go on indefinitely. There are plenty of fine lines to be observed and overtones to be heard. With this in mind calling myself a right winger might be adequate in certain circumstance, in some cases it might not.

[Jag_Warrior]

I'll defer to your industry experience. The part about greedy lenders stands though, as you've just reenforced.

By the way, I don't listen to talk radio. Though I'll confess that a few years ago I'd tune into Rush ever once in a while at lunch - but that was just for laughs. It was more entertaining than the day time TV in the lunch room.

In the early 90's, I was a daily G. Gordon Liddy listener... and it wasn't just for laughs. :eek: :D

Imagine a typical $200K, 30 year fixed rate mortgage at say, 4%. A prime might have 0 points and 1% origination. What many bankers did was tell that qualified borrower that they were actually marginal, give them a subprime rate and the rate might have been 4.5% with 2 points and 1% origination. On the prime loan, the banker would make $2K gross off the origination. But off the subprime, he'd make the same $2K for the origination + $4K for the 2 points + $8K for jacking the rate (rule of thumb: 1% on the rate equals approximately 8 discount points - so an added half percent on the rate equals approximately 4 discount points). For doing roughly the same amount of work, would you rather make $2K or $14K? How could people afford to pay those outrageous fees? Easy. The banker works with a "friendly" appraiser, jacks up the value of the house and fully finances the closing costs. Everybody happy! Everybody feelin' good!

It was a huge, complex problem... much more complex than I may have suggested above. I just wanted to give one, fairly simple example. Congress did play a part though. While no one actually forced banks to lend money at above market rates and fees (that would be like forcing me to remove Salma Hayek's clothes :o ), by not keeping a watchful eye on and properly regulating FNMA, FHMLC and HUD, Congress allowed a largely unregulated/poorly regulated market for mortgage backed securities to develop - prime, subprime and mixed. These mortgages (the good, the bad and the ugliest) were packaged and resold by investment banks as MBS's to whomever would gobble them up (pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, etc.). The ratings agencies (S&P, Fitch, Moody's, etc.) would then place whatever fake rating that the banks (clients paying the bills) wanted, so as to inflate the value of the securities.

Crooked mortgage bankers, crooked appraisers, crooked real estate agents, crooked/stupid/ignorant borrowers, crooked investment bankers, crooks at FNMA and FHLMC, idiots at the Fed, idiots in Congress and the White House... lots of idiots and crooks.

[BDunnell]

I would describe myself as right-leaning in conventional terms but it means I am pigeonholing myself within a simplistic and narrow stereotype. For instance, I'm all for economic competition but I don't think losers should be stomped into the ground and left to die in the cold. They should get some help in whatever shape, but that help should not let them live a care free life and discourage them from trying again and again. The help should not be excessive, but for the reasons of humanity I'd better err on the generous side when I determine the extent of help. I can go on indefinitely. There are plenty of fine lines to be observed and overtones to be heard. With this in mind calling myself a right winger might be adequate in certain circumstance, in some cases it might not.

And I would agree with pretty much all of that, but still would never call myself 'right-leaning' under any circumstances. I don't believe there is any terminology able to explain accurately what you describe, so sticking with the existing terms is fine.

[Captain VXR]

I have to question the sanity of dyed in the wool party supporters who'd vote for a party no matter what. At the next general election I'm most likely to be voting Labour or Green, however that doesn't mean that I won't acknowledge their faults and consider what other points of view has to say. At the same time, however, my mind would be broadly made up long before the election, once the manifestos and candidates had been confirmed. I would agree with Bill Maher that voters still undecided close to the election are idiots:
Lv0ryYJY-UM
(skip to 2:10)

[Captain VXR]

Sorry about spamming this topic with Bill Maher videos, however this just had to be shown :D
9kKiCvWdbxE
Remind you of any forum members?

[Dave B]

In the UK the choice usually comes down to the "least worst" party, rather than one you'd actually want running the country. :s

[Starter]

I would agree with Bill Maher that voters still undecided close to the election are idiots
To be undecided close to an election with two less than perfect candidates is not idiocy.

[Starter]

Sorry about spamming this topic with Bill Maher videos, however this just had to be shown :D
9kKiCvWdbxE
Remind you of any forum members?
That is just as insulting and non factual as anything coming out of the right. You should be ashamed. That kind of crap is only funny when it's your side dumping on the other side and does nothing to either enlighten or cool the rhetoric.

[Starter]

And I would agree with pretty much all of that, but still would never call myself 'right-leaning' under any circumstances. I don't believe there is any terminology able to explain accurately what you describe, so sticking with the existing terms is fine.
Once again something we can agree on. It does happen once in a while. ;)

[DanicaFan]

Bill Maher, another crazy liberal who I dont listen to a word he says because its so biased and not very factual.

[DanicaFan]

Here you go DonCapps...


http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/jobs.jpg

[janvanvurpa]

That is just as insulting and non factual as anything coming out of the right. You should be ashamed. That kind of crap is only funny when it's your side dumping on the other side and does nothing to either enlighten or cool the rhetoric.

It is neither non-factual or insulting, it is a humor piece, and it IS funny because it is an only very slightly "dramatised" version of what we have seen here from "the usual suspects". Indeed it is what I have seen again and again and again from the "typical" so called conser-a-tari-bagger.

Further, It is insulting to be expected to believe that you were insulted. Therefore you should be ashamed for cynically trying to make us believe you were insulted and that we should be ashamed.
Your words of fuax-offense do nothing to either enlighten or cool the rhetoric.

[BDunnell]

That is just as insulting and non factual as anything coming out of the right. You should be ashamed. That kind of crap is only funny when it's your side dumping on the other side and does nothing to either enlighten or cool the rhetoric.

What utterly synthetic outrage. I, for one, found it amusing. Not all humour has to be safe and inoffensive. Some of the best, in my view, is highly offensive. And, let's face it, there are no good right-wing comedians.

[BDunnell]

It is neither non-factual or insulting, it is a humor piece, and it IS funny because it is an only very slightly "dramatised" version of what we have seen here from "the usual suspects".

Exactly.

[BDunnell]

Here you go DonCapps...


http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/jobs.jpg

I say this with — genuinely — no wish to seem insulting, but your lack of awareness of the nature of others is quite startling. Do you not realise from reading his contributions that Don Capps is quite a learned fellow, and not one likely to be impressed, let alone swayed, by some graphic you've downloaded?

[Jag_Warrior]

Here you go DonCapps...


http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/jobs.jpg

I assume your list omitted KB Toys, Jumbo Stores, Stage Stores, FAO Schwartz, eToys, GS Industries and Contec Holdings for a reason? Maybe because those are some of the companies that Bain Capital led into bankruptcy... Contec roughly a month ago? ;) Also, do you know who Jack Bush, Barry Gold, Paul Traub and Michael Glazer are? No? Perhaps you should find out and learn the ins & outs of how private equity really works... the good and the bad side of it, before trying to create a (false) impression that it's all peaches & cream. This simplistic on/off, black/white, good/bad, bifurcated approach annoys me.

I have no issue with private equity in principle. It's what our economic system is based on. And I'm not in favor of the government attempting to pick winners & losers. But when big PE is allowed to run rampant or has advantages unavailable to smaller investors, an economic and social gap is created. And when big PE bankrupts a firm which has a defined benefits plan, do you know who picks up the tab for those pensions? The U.S. taxpayer.

Unfortunately, I don't believe, at this point, that you have any interest in learning how the system actually works. You can prove me wrong by demonstrating some knowledge of business or economics (not gleaned from some obscure website, right wing chain email or Wiki entry), but I'm not holding my breath at this point. Your only interest is to present rather irrational, partisan arguments and talking points, many of which are not fully accurate. But if cherry-picking, only that data and information which supports your preconceived notions, makes you feel better, then post on, brother... post on.

There is a good and bad side to private equity. It's unfortunate that while you want to participate in the discussion (evidenced by your little attachment above), I just don't see it as a good use of time to argue with a graphic, if the poster who placed it cannot at least partially comprehend what he has posted. Oh well... it is the internet after all. :rolleyes:

[janvanvurpa]

Exactly.

A very wise---if sometimes a little satirical----guy once said right on this forum back in 2007:

"Religion is the opiate of the masses" Freddy Engels
"Revolution is the opiate of the intellectuals" Dorthy Parker
"Outrage is the opiate of the middle class white males" Me

Oh wait. That was me. :idea:

[janvanvurpa]

I assume your list omitted KB Toys, Jumbo Stores, Stage Stores, FAO Schwartz, eToys, GS Industries and Contec Holdings for a reason? Maybe because those are some of the companies that Bain Capital led into bankruptcy... Contec roughly a month ago? ;) Also, do you know who Jack Bush, Barry Gold, Paul Traub and Michael Glazer are? No? Perhaps you should find out and learn the ins & outs of how private equity really works... the good and the bad side of it, before trying to create a (false) impression that it's all peaches & cream. This simplistic on/off, black/white, good/bad, bifurcated approach annoys me.

I have no issue with private equity in principle. It's what our economic system is based on. And I'm not in favor of the government attempting to pick winners & losers. But when big PE is allowed to run rampant or has advantages unavailable to smaller investors, an economic and social gap is created. And when big PE bankrupts a firm which has a defined benefits plan, do you know who picks up the tab for those pensions? The U.S. taxpayer.






Looking the obviously mindless dribble graphics for a moment and focusing on what I presume is the "BIG POINT" ie Bain Capital invested private money----and I believe the intent is to imply that they invested their OWN money---I think it is pertinent to look at how Bain operated. From what I read Bain would find companies "in trouble", that is with low stock values, put in a tiny % of their capital--2-3 million and put in the major amout with "leveraged'---that is somebody else's borrowed money, enough to have a controlling interest. Then regardless of if the company "turned around" it was---already in trouble, remember---that's why they were targeted----saddled with millions, often hundreds of millions of new debt AND multi millions of dollars of fees paid to Bain to "managae" the company. And again, regardless of how the companys balance sheets look, big fat 5-10-20million out in "divedends" to the "new controlling stockholders" which was, quelle surprise! Bain.

Thus it's not surprising that so many failed but with only 4-5 million invested of their own funds in it and many many more times that paid back to Bain, there was no risk..

Further thinking, suggesting that this kind of shifting money and dodging risk is some kind of admirable trait, and that that shows what a Great shrewd "businessman" Bain leader Willard is, and thus is materiel to lead a whole country seems well, flat stupid.

The vision, the drive, the risk to establish a company to do, or make a tangible thing, like for example what his dear Daddy did, starting as he did as an undocumented alien from Mexico and ending up head of American Motors and even a Governor of a heavily idustrialised state, is one thing, and is pretty damn impressive.....

But swooping in on and wresting control (via buying up stocks with, in short, by amassing other people's capital, a company other people conceived of, built, ran, risked their futures on, not making anything except a "deal' is another thing entirely.


There is good reason these kind of people are called "Vulture Capitalists"

Is a man whose only real claim for fitness is "I crushed companies in trouble" who the country needs for a president?

[Rollo]

To be undecided close to an election with two less than perfect candidates is not idiocy.

Oh it is idiocy.
The fact that you only have two is really dumb.

In Australia, because of preferential and compulsory voting, in the House of Representatives, we didn't even have a government until 24 days after the election because there was a hung parliament. There are now two coalitions in the Australian federal lower house, one as the government; the other in opposition.
In the upper house there actually is no majority on the floor at the moment because apart from the two majors, there are seven other parties with seats.

The point is that there isn't really a plurality of voices in American politics even though if enough people got off their butts and voted for a third or fourth party, there'd be real campaigning about actual policy on the hustings instead of this ridiculous PR charade.

I'd be undecided in the lead up to practically election in America for the simple reason that to allow someone to wield power for four years is a highly responsible action and if you're only limited to a choice of "two less than perfect candidates" you'd better make sure that the decision is right.

"Constantly choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil."
- Jerry Garcia

[D-Type]

Just out of interest, does Australia use proportional representation of first past the post?

[Rollo]

Just out of interest, does Australia use proportional representation of first past the post?

In the House of Representatives (the equivalent of the Commons) it uses preferential voting, specifically the Alternative Vote. That is, the system which was voted against in the referendum in May.

In the Senate (the equivalent of the Commons) it uses proportional voting. The number of seats in the Senate is allocated 12 each for the states with two each for the territories of the ACT and NT.

Duverger's Law suggests that in any one-seat constituency system, voting will tend towards a duality of parties and this is generally the case, but unlike the UK where first past the post is used, it actually does force a change in policy because suddently the majors find themselves fighting over third and fourth preferences in some cases such as in 2010, a few seats ran down to sixth and seventh preferences.

[Starter]

Oh it is idiocy.
not to pick nits, but if there are only two, then not having made up one's mind till late is not necessarily dumb.

The fact that you only have two is really dumb.
Personally I'd prefer at least a third major party. And there are in fact several more parties, though none commands the membership and influence of the dems & reps. Teddy Roosevelt & Ross Perot were the only third party candidates of consequence in the last hundred years or so. But I still don't see why two HAS to be dumb. Everything is relative and two parties have pretty much been the deal through most of the last century and longer.

[BDunnell]

Personally I'd prefer at least a third major party. And there are in fact several more parties, though none commands the membership and influence of the dems & reps. Teddy Roosevelt & Ross Perot were the only third party candidates of consequence in the last hundred years or so. But I still don't see why two HAS to be dumb. Everything is relative and two parties have pretty much been the deal through most of the last century and longer.

A senior BBC journalist has written about a colleague in one of the US TV networks being told during the Balkan wars not to report on the fact of there being more than two factions fighting each other, on the grounds that viewers would find it too hard to understand. Might this be another reason?

[Starter]

A senior BBC journalist has written about a colleague in one of the US TV networks being told during the Balkan wars not to report on the fact of there being more than two factions fighting each other, on the grounds that viewers would find it too hard to understand. Might this be another reason?
No.

But that shows you what the (American) media thinks of the average citizen. All of them are wrong on that - including Fox (because I knew someone would bring that up). Another reason NOT to get accurate information from the TV people over here.

[BDunnell]

No.

But that shows you what the (American) media thinks of the average citizen. All of them are wrong on that - including Fox (because I knew someone would bring that up). Another reason NOT to get accurate information from the TV people over here.

Well, I'm sure it's wrong to tar all American media with the same brush. I wouldn't say that NPR treats its audience with such contempt, for instance. And there is an extent to which a certain section of any population gets the media it deserves. This is certainly true in the UK, and, judging by some of what we see on here, for instance, it must be in the US too. How else can one explain avid consumers of Fox?

[Don Capps]

Here you go DonCapps...


http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee236/DanicaRules/jobs.jpg

It would be quite an understatement to say that I am very unimpressed and rather underwhelmed.

How lame and infantile.

This is political campaign fodder and not thought.

By the way, you can think, can't you?

It would be an insult to the box of rocks that one could use as a comparison to the perceived abilities you continue to demonstrate when it comes to the process of actually thinking and expressing thoughts that are either simplistic blather or the sort of mindless garbage that one parrots from Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter or O'Reilly.

Once upon there were conservatives whose ideas were well-thought out as well as being well-articulated. Whether one agreed with those ideas or not, one certainly did respect the fact that much thought and consideration -- and intelligence -- had gone into them. They made one think and ponder the ideas and the consequences of those ideas. They were not the sort of mindless drivel that you and others spew forth into the increasing toxic sewer that the American political process has become. While I may have rarely agreed with Bill Buckley, I certainly respected his opinions and carefully considered his ideas. The Republican Party and conservatives of all stripes were not mindless, unthinking idiots whose

Plus, you seem to have avoided providing an answer to what happens when Obama is re-elected. The Republicans secede from reality? Oh, sorry! that has already happened in many cases. As you were. The Republicans in Congress suddenly begin to embrace the concept of governing for all rather the plutocrats? The Supreme Court recognizes its error in the Citizens United case and reverses itself? Wall Street is reined in and sanity -- or something as close as can found -- returns to the financial markets? Grover Norquist is struck by lightning when Congress finally raises taxes to actually address the issue of debt rather than pander to the monied interests? The sky falls? The oceans roil? The color red disappears?

Step up your game. Man up. Show everyone you have something besides air holding your ears apart. Support Romney and the Republican campaign by providing convincing arguments -- concepts, ideas, reasons -- as to why people should be for him. Being against Obama is not the same as being for Romney, although that is the simplistic notion that seems to be operating at the moment. Use words that convince and not vitriol for a change. Defend your side for a change rather than continue to recklessly attack Obama and the Democrats -- my goodness, plankton can do that. Show that you are a cognitive being rather than someone whose brain got fried by watching too much television, especially Faux News.

[Starter]

Well, I'm sure it's wrong to tar all American media with the same brush. I wouldn't say that NPR treats its audience with such contempt, for instance. And there is an extent to which a certain section of any population gets the media it deserves. This is certainly true in the UK, and, judging by some of what we see on here, for instance, it must be in the US too. How else can one explain avid consumers of Fox?
Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media, just on the other side. NPR is hardly the epitome of inbiased reporting either. They are more "liberal" than the other outlets. All of that is not new of course. Media outlets, of all stripes, have been biased for a long time.

[BDunnell]

Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media, just on the other side. NPR is hardly the epitome of inbiased reporting either. They are more "liberal" than the other outlets. All of that is not new of course. Media outlets, of all stripes, have been biased for a long time.

I respectfully disagree. I have never seen any news outlet as biased to the left as is Fox, and none of which I can think is quite as — what's the word? — bonkers.

[Rollo]

Where one stands depends mainly on where one sits. To wit:


Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media, just on the other side. NPR is hardly the epitome of inbiased reporting either. They are more "liberal" than the other outlets. All of that is not new of course. Media outlets, of all stripes, have been biased for a long time.

I bet if we took a straw poll of everyone on these fora who lives outside of the United States, the general suggestion would be that the entire of American politics and media generally is shifted to the right. The fact that you say that "Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media" indicates that what Americans perceive to be the centre of politics is different to the rest of the world.

The output of NPR which we get in Australia, appears on the ABC which is a government owned and run media network and even then most of what NPR still appears slightly to the right of centre. PBS Newshour, which shows on SBS in Australia which is a part-public/private venture, for the most part appears centrist when compared to the Australian media landscape.

I'd go so far as to say that the funding models of the ABC in Australia and especially the BBC in Britain would scare and be heavily resisted if they were attempted in the US.

And if it helps as far as I can make out the term "liberal" as applied in US politics and media, acts as a code word in place of "people and things I don't like". It certainly doesn't appear to have the same definition as economists have; hence the reason why the Liberal Party in Australia is named for the older definition of the word.
Incidentally the Liberal Party of Australia, the Conservative and Unionist Party of the UK (proper name) and the Republican Party of the US are all members of the International Democrat Union which is a centre-right international alliance of conservative parties; probably blurs the term even further.

[BDunnell]

The fact that you say that "Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media" indicates that what Americans perceive to be the centre of politics is different to the rest of the world.

A lot of right-leaning people in Europe would baulk at Fox, just as they baulk at the Republicans generally.

[Don Capps]

Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media, just on the other side. NPR is hardly the epitome of inbiased (sic) reporting either. They are more "liberal" than the other outlets. All of that is not new of course. Media outlets, of all stripes, have been biased for a long time.

I would suggest that this is an opinion that some might disagree with, or at least question how bias is defined.

One of the interesting aspects regarding NPR, which tends to have its reporting automatically labeled as "liberal," is that it is nearly always several (more like many) notches intellectually above that of the other media. This may also be applied to the PBS News Hour. Anti-intellectualism is alive and thriving in the US.

Fox News is a media hybrid attempting to provide both news and serve as a platform for opinions reflecting that of its owner and management. Those opinons are much more pronounced and readily identified than any bias that can be found in the major networks. Although Fox News does attempt to report most news in a straight-forward manner, its selection and coverage can drift towards the ideological biases of the opinion part of the organization. The content of Fox News reflects the political views of the conservative wing of the Republican Party, none of the other news media outlets (the networks, CNN) serve as party organs; so there is bias and Bias, if you will.

To shift the discussion to another track: It could be suggested that people are suffering from Campaign Fatigue. The overly long, seemingly endless crawl to the Republican nomination with its endless and intellectually vacant debates, ersatz issues, inept candidates, and mind-numbing rhetoric has probably worked against Romney. It is more that Romney stumbled to the nomination, surviving the winnowing of a field that, frankly, was not only weak, but devoid of anything remotely resembling the sort of folks one could imagine being in the White House other than being on a tour. That Romney flipped and flopped and did what was convenient to capture a nomination that was, given the opposition, his for the asking, resulted in a Romney that is far removed from the Romney that once existed. By drifting so far to the right and away from many of his former positions during the process of gaining the nomintion, it may be that Romney forfeited any real chance of victory in November.

Under normal circumstances, this election should not even be close, yet it is becoming clear that Romney and the Republicans may have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Indeed, one question that occurs to me is just what happens to the Republican Party after the election when -- not if as one might have suggested several weeks ago -- Romney loses? The question becomes even more interesting if the margins of the Republicans in the House and Senate are reduced significantly. Will they give in to the urge to be even more disruptive or begin to grasp the concept of governing by finding mutual solutions through compromise? One tends to think it will be the former, but stranger things have happened. There is still the question of whether the Republicans will continue their slide to the right or being to move back towards the middle. As a party composed largely of whites and opposed almost by reflex to the concept of the commonwealth, the notion of there being interests greater than own own, how the Republicans face the future is going to determine its role in shaping the way forward. If the GOP continues to drift to the right and reject/ignore the reality of a changed American culture, one senses that it will be shaken up by forces that will either fracture the party or pull it together.

The leanings of the GOP towards a theocratic philosophy of governance is certainly at odds with what the Founding Fathers envisioned, should one care to take the time to examine the record. Few do, of course. Similarly, that the GOP has embraced plutocracy as a pillar of its beliefs, despite many in its numbers being the victims of the greed that results, suggests that there may be disconnects within the party that might be a latent factor leading to discord in the future. Even lemmings have mavericks.

Someone once observed that Sacred Cows make the best burgers. Both the Democrats and the Republicans are going to have to both accept that each will have to toss some of their sacred cows on the barbeque grill in the coming years. Raising taxes and cutting/reducing programs seem to be blinding flashes of the obvious to even The Untrained Eye. Doing so at all, much less wisely, seems beyond the ability of the American political system at the moment. That should be a sobering thought to one and all, yet we stumble along bickering and arguing over what are really petty issues. Then again, this has been going on for some time, with sufficient blame to spread around so that no one is spared, which does mean that some do not deserve more than others, of course. That said, the Blame Game is easy, governing is hard.

So it goes.

[BDunnell]

One of the interesting aspects regarding NPR, which tends to have its reporting automatically labeled as "liberal," is that it is nearly always several (more like many) notches intellectually above that of the other media. This may also be applied to the PBS News Hour. Anti-intellectualism is alive and thriving in the US.

I couldn't agree more, and I wouldn't apply this trend solely to the US. There is definitely a certain section of opinion on the right that would dismiss the likes of NPR as being 'liberal', or 'left-wing', merely because of that more intellectual approach. Leaving aside how the BBC is funded, which is, of course, often a target for the right, the more rigorous, questioning nature of the best of its current affairs programming leads on occasion to the same criticisms. It's nonsense, of course.

[BDunnell]

In fact, regarding the BBC, it could be argued that in recent times it has become ever more of a mouthpiece for whatever the government of the day might be, so afraid is it now to offend, but this is another issue entirely.

[Starter]

I would suggest that this is an opinion that some might disagree with, or at least question how bias is defined.
The term "yellow journalism" goes back to the 19th century and is an example of media bias then. Not the first instance here either. Various media like newspapers (then) and electronic forms always reflect to some degree the opinions and agendas of their owners.


One of the interesting aspects regarding NPR, which tends to have its reporting automatically labeled as "liberal," is that it is nearly always several (more like many) notches intellectually above that of the other media. This may also be applied to the PBS News Hour. Anti-intellectualism is alive and thriving in the US.
Some would say "intellectualism" others "eliteism".


Fox News is a media hybrid attempting to provide both news and serve as a platform for opinions reflecting that of its owner and management. Those opinons are much more pronounced and readily identified than any bias that can be found in the major networks. Although Fox News does attempt to report most news in a straight-forward manner, its selection and coverage can drift towards the ideological biases of the opinion part of the organization. The content of Fox News reflects the political views of the conservative wing of the Republican Party, none of the other news media outlets (the networks, CNN) serve as party organs; so there is bias and Bias, if you will.
One of Fox's primary objectives is entertainment. Including the so called news departments. They succeed very well, given their ratings. I'd also note that you just contradicted yourself in your last sentence where you say Fox serves as a party organ after saying they "reflect the political views". One implys being part of that party as opposed to just agreeing with the party.


To shift the discussion to another track: It could be suggested that people are suffering from Campaign Fatigue.
Couldn't agree more.



Someone once observed that Sacred Cows make the best burgers. Both the Democrats and the Republicans are going to have to both accept that each will have to toss some of their sacred cows on the barbeque grill in the coming years. Raising taxes and cutting/reducing programs seem to be blinding flashes of the obvious to even The Untrained Eye.
Again, agree.

[BDunnell]

Some would say "intellectualism" others "eliteism".

Why the problem with 'intellectualism'? This is a positive trait, surely? It only translates into 'elitism' if people can't be bothered to try and understand.

[Gregor-y]

And, let's face it, there are no good right-wing comedians.
I've been saying that for years. They can be mean and some people are amused by that, but it's not funny.

[Starter]

Where one stands depends mainly on where one sits. To wit:

I bet if we took a straw poll of everyone on these fora who lives outside of the United States, the general suggestion would be that the entire of American politics and media generally is shifted to the right. The fact that you say that "Fox is not much more biased than the other major TV media" indicates that what Americans perceive to be the centre of politics is different to the rest of the world.
We're talking about American politics, so the definition of "left" and "right" elsewhere is irrelevant.

To be blunt, who cares what anyone outside the US thinks about American politics. You don't live here and you don't have to share in the successes and failures of our political system. We're the ones who shoulder the largest consequences of our governments debts and adventures into other people's business - others only periferally so.

[Malbec]

Why the problem with 'intellectualism'? This is a positive trait, surely? It only translates into 'elitism' if people can't be bothered to try and understand.

Its sad when looking deeply into issues, taking as many information sources as possible, weighing them up, thinking carefully and making a rationale decision is seen as a negative thing. Sadder still when engaging in such a process is viewed as elitist.

[Starter]

Why the problem with 'intellectualism'? This is a positive trait, surely? It only translates into 'elitism' if people can't be bothered to try and understand.
That is an elitist response.

I don't have any issue with intellectual pursuits. But that is not the end all, be all, of life. Many people work hard every day to provide a better life for their families and themselves. In many cases, that doesn't leave much time for "intellectual" pursuits. That does NOT mean they are stupid or unaware of what is going on around them.

[janvanvurpa]

Why the problem with 'intellectualism'? This is a positive trait, surely? It only translates into 'elitism' if people can't be bothered to try and understand.

They are, and have been since oh maybe 1950-52, code words... you know kind of like the words "lib'ral" and "comma'nist" so go "inna'lech-you'all"
It was used as accusation against Democrat candidate Adlai Stevenson back in the '52 election that I don't recall really---being born a few weeks after it I suppose, but also against him again in the 56 election and 60, and there I do recall the use---and the Geo W Bush like sneers of those using it..

Now Americans are notorious for sloppy vocabulary and an appalling lack of comprehension of subtleties and nuance in language so follow me a bit so you understand.
It is used as an accusation. It has overtones or undertones of physical weakness, or un-manliness. It is usually thrown out as an accusation by people possessing none of those qualities, especially an the main accusation : an intellect.

There is a difference between an "intellectual" approach/view point/argument and say an analytical approach/view point/argument.. indeed there is some very subtle irony in the way that some--particularly poorly educated, limited experienced ---accuse others of being/using "inna-lech-you-all" --implying that "it's all a buncha theoretical hot-air", when they themselves, like tooo many, always TEND STRONGLY argue theoretical, abstract concepts.

Now I cannot help the reflexive responses I have to stimulus---though of course I can control my actual behaviour, so having been raised here in childhood---in the deeply conservative, segregated, horrible US SOUTH, I have an amusing reflex when idiots have blurted out,or otherwise accused me of being an "Intellectual".....(.merely because I tend very markedly toward sharp analysis and broad scope--and evidently can explain the things I do both broad and close focus..and situate things within social and historical context)..... I have actually clearly "taken offense" and said to the accuser "Me! A fawkin intellectual?!
You come and stand right here and say that to me face." :angryfire Them "Oh but you are" me: "I'm warning you!"

Pretty silly and I catch myself before I beat der scheisse out of them---and when it was just thoughtless use, and I explain the difference between analytical and the ordinary and common connotations of the word, then they understand the reaction..

Ironic indeed because the main problem with USA and US Politics seems to be an impossibility to speak in concrete terms about even the simplest problems (we see this love of mental ****in in the popularity of bench-racing "discussion forums" about racing with fools blithely discussing things they have no way of knowing and no inkling of things significance, but that never deters them), always the drift is toward "idealized" crap.

Just a note on usage. Hope it helps

[BDunnell]

They are, and have been since oh maybe 1950-52, code words... you know kind of like the words "lib'ral" and "comma'nist" so go "inna'lech-you'all"
It was used as accusation against Democrat candidate Adlai Stevenson back in the '52 election that I don't recall really---being born a few weeks after it I suppose, but also against him again in the 56 election and 60, and there I do recall the use---and the Geo W Bush like sneers of those using it..

Now Americans are notorious for sloppy vocabulary and an appalling lack of comprehension of subtleties and nuance in language so follow me a bit so you understand.
It is used as an accusation. It has overtones or undertones of physical weakness, or un-manliness. It is usually thrown out as an accusation by people possessing none of those qualities, especially an the main accusation : an intellect.

There is a difference between an "intellectual" approach/view point/argument and say an analytical approach/view point/argument.. indeed there is some very subtle irony in the way that some--particularly poorly educated, limited experienced ---accuse others of being/using "inna-lech-you-all" --implying that "it's all a buncha theoretical hot-air", when they themselves, like tooo many, always TEND STRONGLY argue theoretical, abstract concepts.

These are very good points indeed.

[BDunnell]

That is an elitist response.

I don't have any issue with intellectual pursuits. But that is not the end all, be all, of life. Many people work hard every day to provide a better life for their families and themselves. In many cases, that doesn't leave much time for "intellectual" pursuits. That does NOT mean they are stupid or unaware of what is going on around them.

It would be an empty person indeed who didn't want to better themselves intellectually, wouldn't it? I agree intellectual pursuits aren't for everyone, but this doesn't make it right for those on the 'non-intellectual' side to in any way be critical of intellectualism. How could anyone seriously argue that intelligence is a bad thing? In reverse, there is a legitimate argument to be made.

[BDunnell]

We're talking about American politics, so the definition of "left" and "right" elsewhere is irrelevant.

What do you mean by that — other than 'I don't know about politics elsewhere, unlike those non-Americans who do know about American politics, so would rather we didn't discuss them'?



To be blunt, who cares what anyone outside the US thinks about American politics. You don't live here and you don't have to share in the successes and failures of our political system. We're the ones who shoulder the largest consequences of our governments debts and adventures into other people's business - others only periferally so.

An utterly insular view, typical of those Americans with no interest in the world beyond their own borders.

Oh, and it's 'peripherally'.

[Starter]

What do you mean by that — other than 'I don't know about politics elsewhere, unlike those non-Americans who do know about American politics, so would rather we didn't discuss them'?
It means exactly what it says. When you are discussing the various shades of red, bringing up green is meaningless.




An utterly insular view, typical of those Americans with no interest in the world beyond their own borders.
An inane response. By definition, a discussion of American politics doesn't include any politics not American.


Oh, and it's 'peripherally'.
I assume you will now note and correct everyone else's typos on this board?

[BDunnell]

An inane response. By definition, a discussion of American politics doesn't include any politics not American.

But you're not comfortable discussing the politics of countries other than your own, though, are you? This is something common to many Americans, sometimes embarrassingly so, whereas there are many non-Americans very well-informed about American politics.



I assume you will now note and correct everyone else's typos on this board?

I often do.

[janvanvurpa]

We're talking about American politics, so the definition of "left" and "right" elsewhere is irrelevant.

To be blunt, who cares what anyone outside the US thinks about American politics. You don't live here and you don't have to share in the successes and failures of our political system. We're the ones who shoulder the largest consequences of our governments debts and adventures into other people's business - others only periferally so.


And speaking of the total lack of ability to see concrete consequences of things...

Somebody with more patience and the ability to speak UN-intellectually want to explain to this guy how the interlinked intertwined world most sentient people live in means a stupid decision in one place may and often does have ripples all over the world...

Want to explain to him the share that hundreds of thousands of dead women and children and old people in those countries invaded by USA just for fun in recent years have had to shoulder as a result of the failures of our political system?


And how about the 2-3 or more million dead in SE Asia that shouldered the results of the failures of American political system?

Good gawd.

To be blunt, while he appears to write marginally better that WannabeDanica'sboy, there's little difference really.

[Don Capps]

I don't have any issue with intellectual pursuits. But that is not the end all, be all, of life. Many people work hard every day to provide a better life for their families and themselves. In many cases, that doesn't leave much time for "intellectual" pursuits. That does NOT mean they are stupid or unaware of what is going on around them.

Which is the irony of where the current version of the Republican Party has moved on the political spectrum. At one end of the GOP are the plutocrats and their fellow travelers/enablers and at the other end many whose financial status is iffy at best and struggling at worst -- members of that "47%" that the other end of the party condemns. Because they work hard and wish to achieve a better life for themselves and their children, their focus is on the everyday grind of making ends meet. They are wage slaves, often supplementing their incomes with second jobs as well as often doing without. Relatively little of what the plutocrats have taken has trickled down to them. For the most part, real wages for workers have scarcely moved for over three decades. Yet, the percentage of income that has been vaccuumed up by those at the top has increased significantly, harking a a return to the robber barons of the past. In a non-zero sum game, the percentages are finite and they have shifted to the top and away from those at the bottom.

They are certainly not stupid or unaware of what is going on around them. They are, however, aware that there is more to life than being a wage slave. The idea of upward mobility in America has long been the bedrock for the general optimism that Americans hold about life, regardless of their political leanings. That it has been tinged with as much myth as reality is usually not openly alluded to, of course, failure often being attributed to personal failure to succeed rather than any acknowledgement that the deck might be stacked against someone. That some do succeed fuels the myth and takes us, collectively, off the hook.

Yes, it is a truth to suggest that intellectual pursuits are secondary to working hard to provide for both making ends meet and a better life for one's family. Yet, many do recognize that there is an intellectual component to life, one of the reasons that education is such an important element in the concept of upward mobility. Not so long ago it was not uncommon for there to be someone who was the first person in a family to graduate from high school or to attend college, or to be the first to to earn a college degree. To a large degree this is taken for granted today, although it should not be. This is another entire kettle of fish, but relevant to the larger discussion given that we still believe in an informed citizenry going to the polls as the best defense of democracy (which begs the question, of course, as to why the GOP is hard over on restricting the franchise, echoing its Southern roots in restricting access to the voting booth, which seems contradictory to a party constantly hammering the concept of personal freedom and rights, crying out against the "heavy hand" of government while cheerfully using that same heavy hand against others).

Elites exist. Not all are based upon things intellectual, but that is the usual connotation. That we have contradictory notions about elites -- they are just fine as long we belong to one, otherwise they are bad -- is to be expected given that there is an almost innate American suspicion regarding elites. Once, to simply have attended college automatically made one part of an elite. Similarly, having a graduate degree placed on in an elite. Being the member of the Marine Corps rifle team makes one the member of an elite -- an elite within an elite Marines would suggest. Being a jenny mechanic was once to belong to an elite. To make the cut for a sports team is to become a member of an elite. And, so on and on.

As "janvanvurpa" points out, there is an anti-intellectual trait in American life, political and otherwise. In the South, being an intellectual was not easy. The word itself was/is more often than not used prejoratively. Being smart was/is one thing, being an intellectual was/is something else entirely. That "janvanvurpa" suggests another irony, that of how abstract notions or beliefs are viewed, perhaps demonstrates the complexity of American life, political or otherwise.

[BDunnell]

The above must be one of the best posts I have ever seen on these forums.

[Gregor-y]

To be blunt, who cares what anyone outside the US thinks about American politics. You don't live here and you don't have to share in the successes and failures of our political system. We're the ones who shoulder the largest consequences of our governments debts and adventures into other people's business - others only periferally so.
Now that's elitism. And pretty much untrue to boot.

Elitism isn't so much a matter of intelligence as arrogance, and that is often is a result of ignorance.

Just look at what concerns in Greece are doing to the world these days. Nothing so big since Pythagoras figured out how to measure a triangle.

[janvanvurpa]

It would be an empty person indeed who didn't want to better themselves intellectually, wouldn't it? I agree intellectual pursuits aren't for everyone, but this doesn't make it right for those on the 'non-intellectual' side to in any way be critical of intellectualism. How could anyone seriously argue that intelligence is a bad thing? In reverse, there is a legitimate argument to be made.


In modern America, everything must be distilled down to a "bumpersticker" length so it can well, fit on a bumpersticker---and there's one that sums that up quite well:

You think the cost of education is expensive?
Try ignorance.

But alas mate, you simply do not understand the culture which really is in so many ways nearly purely a materialist culture..
Virtually no value is accorded to the use or even the attempt to use one's brains---unless there is a direct connection to that use generating more money/stuff.

Therein is a internal conflict in the society acculturated for several generations to be only value possession when it comes to politics---or policy..
They cannot think...they do not have the habit of analysis....
That's why we get these Internet Posters and "American politics doesn't affect you" type answers..

It's really appalling the change in 40 years too as Don Capps reminded us (that once one could discuss policy and actions and even ideas with Conservatives in a give and take manner and our Governments worked in a messy compromise agreement way).

[Firstgear]

But you're not comfortable discussing the politics of countries other than your own, though, are you? This is something common to many Americans, sometimes embarrassingly so, whereas there are many non-Americans very well-informed about American politics.
This has very little to do with Americans in general, and alot to do with the USA's importance in the world stage.

It would have been the same in the Roman empire. Every territory that the Romans conquered would have come to know alot about the Romans, but the Romans wouldn't have cared too much about the inner workings of all these territories.

Another example. Maybe you live in the fictional town of Kleindorf, 50kms south of Berlin. I would say it's quite likely almost everybody in Kleindorf knows who the mayor of Berlin is, but it's also quite likely that alot of Berliners haven't even heard of Kleindorf.

"I say this with — genuinely — no wish to seem insulting, but" your posts often come across as quite arrogant.

[BDunnell]

This has very little to do with Americans in general, and alot to do with the USA's importance in the world stage.

I would tend to argue that an individual's worldview, while undoubtedly influenced (as are all our psyches) by environmental factors, is their responsibility and theirs alone.



Another example. Maybe you live in the fictional town of Kleindorf, 50kms south of Berlin. I would say it's quite likely almost everybody in Kleindorf knows who the mayor of Berlin is, but it's also quite likely that alot of Berliners haven't even heard of Kleindorf.

I don't think that not knowing about a small village is comparable with a lack of knowledge of world affairs. The former is not exactly general knowledge; the latter ought to be. From what you say, it's almost as if you feel the insularity of a certain section of the American population is in fact a positive thing.



"I say this with — genuinely — no wish to seem insulting, but" your posts often come across as quite arrogant.

If that's how you see them, then fine. It's not my intention, but in a discussion such as this it is not exactly hard to adopt a tone some might feel is 'superior'.

[Don Capps]

2012 will be the 17th Presidential election that I have been around for, the 12th in which I will be voting. I can remember bits of pieces of the 1952 conventions and campaign, but the 1956 one was the first one I paid any real attention to, mainly because we were briefly back in the States and had access -- however fleetingly -- to television, which was still a novelty in Europe. My lasting memory of the 1964 election is the long line of voters waiting to cast their votes at a precinct in Columbia -- men and women almost all voting for the first time because they had previously been denied the right to vote in South Carolina solely on the basis of the color of their skin. Fat lot of good voting in my first election (1968) did me, given that regardless of who won -- Nixon or Humphrey, I was going to end up in Viet-Nam in literally a matter of days after the election. As much as I may have agreed with much of what McGovern said, it was obvious to even The Untrained Eye that Nixon was going to win and win big. Through luck and timing, I had two hour or so talks with Jimmy Carter, one in 1975 and another in 1976, the first one-on-one while waiting for his flight and the second with a member of his staff sitting in while awaiting another flight. Personally, I liked him and voted for him in both 1976 and 1980. I had no use for Reagan, his time in office being something of a shambles; of course, it is unlikely that today Saint Ronald would be viewed as anything but a RINO, Barry Goldwater being another member of the RINO club by today's standards. Bush I was simply Reagan Redux. Clinton heeded the advice of those who helped unleash Wall Street, leading to the disasters that followed, which only goes to show that party labels only go so far. With Bush II winning by one vote on what can only a bad 5-4 call, things somehow managed to go downhill from there; the invasion of Iraq was handled so poorly and bungled so badly that I am still amazed that it was possible to do so -- it took effort. That Bush II was re-elected was not much of a surprise, but that it was closer than it should have been was; don't even get me started on the Swift Boat wackos... Until McCain decided to become a Conservative republican as well as a Republican, I actually liked him -- he said things that no one else seemed to have the guts to say out loud, but picking Palin was an inexplicable self-inflcted wound; not that I could actually vote for McCain, but neither did I bear him any dark thoughts.

Jim Webb brought up something that is rather typical of the always unpredictable Webb:


Governor Romney and I are about the same age. Like millions of others in our generation, we came to adulthood facing the harsh realities of the Vietnam War. 2.7 million in our age group went to Vietnam, a war which eventually took the lives of 58,000 young Americans and cost another 300,000 wounded. The Marine Corps lost 100,000 killed or wounded in that war. During the year I was in Vietnam, 1969, our country lost twice as many dead as we have lost in Iraq and Afghanistan combined over the past 10 years of war. 1968 was worse. 1967 was about the same. Not a day goes by when I do not think about the young Marines I was privileged to lead.

This was a time of conscription, where every American male was eligible to be drafted. People made choices about how to deal with the draft, and about military service. I have never envied or resented any of the choices that were made as long as they were done within the law. But those among us who stepped forward to face the harsh unknowns and the lifelong changes that can come from combat did so with the belief that their service would be honored, and that our leaders would, in the words of President Abraham Lincoln, care for those who had borne the battle, and for their widows and their children.

Those young Marines that I led have grown older now. They’ve lived lives of courage, both in combat and after their return, where many of them were derided by their own peers for having served. That was a long time ago. They are not bitter. They know what they did. But in receiving veterans’ benefits, they are not takers. They were givers, in the ultimate sense of that word. There is a saying among war veterans: “All gave some, some gave all.” This is not a culture of dependency. It is a part of a long tradition that gave this country its freedom and independence. They paid, some with their lives, some through wounds and disabilities, some through their emotional scars, some through the lost opportunities and delayed entry into civilian careers which had already begun for many of their peers who did not serve.

And not only did they pay. They will not say this, so I will say it for them. They are owed, if nothing else, at least a mention, some word of thanks and respect, when a presidential candidate who is their generational peer makes a speech accepting his party’s nomination to be commander-in-chief. And they are owed much more than that — a guarantee that we will never betray the commitment that we made to them and to their loved ones.

I am Romney's age (literally days older) and while he got to enjoy France for 30 months, I got to serve in Viet-Nam -- and both happy and amazed that I survived 12 months when I left in mostly one piece. From my understanding he got deferments for both his mission time and then when he returned to school. When he was eligible for the draft, he had the luck to draw a high number, 300 -- mine was exactly one lower, 299, but since I was already in Viet-Nam it was also irrelevant. As Webb states, not really a problem with those like Romney who managed to draw a high number, given that it was within the rules, but at the same time I do wonder about it. Of course, even of those who were drafted or enlisted and then served in Viet-Nam, very few actually experienced combat, and most them on an irregular, occasional basis. Just my luck to wind up in my line of work. Of course, there nothing compared to being shot at/ up/ down/ and sunk to make one realize the true attraction of the academic, intellectual life....

Sorry, just rambling.

[Jag_Warrior]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ts920KBDP1A&feature=relmfu

[Dave B]

To be blunt, who cares what anyone outside the US thinks about American politics. You don't live here and you don't have to share in the successes and failures of our political system. We're the ones who shoulder the largest consequences of our governments debts and adventures into other people's business - others only periferally so.

Whatever you might think, the actions of the USA have ramifications for the rest of the world - especially when it comes to your economy and your (insane) foreign policy.

When you succeed it is broadly good for the world, as you have great spending power and huge political and military influence. When you fail it causes havoc: markets are affected worldwide, innocent civilians get caught up in your wars.

Rightly or wrongly, you matter, and that's why so many people outside of your country care about American politics.

[donKey jote]

in vaguely related news:
BBC News - The Onion spoofs Iran news agency on Obama-Ahmadinejad story (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-19764166)

:laugh:

[Rollo]

When you succeed it is broadly good for the world, as you have great spending power and huge political and military influence. When you fail it causes havoc: markets are affected worldwide, innocent civilians get caught up in your wars.

Rightly or wrongly, you matter, and that's why so many people outside of your country care about American politics.

Dave B speaks with much wisdom here:
Australia in particular has gone to Korea, Malaya, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Iraq again and all because big brother America says "jump" and Australia asks "how high?".

According to the The Australian National Audit Office just over A$3.678 billion has been spent by the Australian Government on the development of the F-35 which I should point out at this point we've got NONE, and just over another A$3 billion was spent by the Australian Government on bailing out General Motors.



To be blunt, who cares what anyone outside the US thinks about American politics. You don't live here and you don't have to share in the successes and failures of our political system. We're the ones who shoulder the largest consequences of our governments debts and adventures into other people's business - others only periferally so.

Bollocks we don't.

Roughly 15% of Australia's National debt is currently carrying the failures of your political system and if yet another pointless war with Iran is declared that'll be even more.

Decisions which the American Government has made has been affecting AUstralian foreign policy directly for the best part of 70 years. To deny this is either wilful ignorance or more likely sheer bloody-mindedness.

[D-Type]

And that's only the effects of American policy on one small country (in population if not in area).

Because of the size of the US economy and its buying power, what happens in the USA affects the rest of the world. That's why we non-Amrericans care about what happens in the USA. We are probably able to be more objective about the happenings there and hence we are concerned if the nation's choice of its president is driven by the likes of some of the polemics we have seen on here.

[Starter]

I don't know if any of you have seen this, but if true, should clear up all of our election problems over here, enjoy:

Subject: THE QUEEN HAS SENT AN EMAIL -


To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II:
In light of your immediate failure to financially manage yourselves and therefore not able to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately. (You should look up 'revocation' in the Oxford English Dictionary.)
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).
Your new Prime Minister, David Cameron, will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections.
Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated sometime next year to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'colour,' 'favour,' 'labour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix '-ize' will be replaced by the suffix '-ise.' Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary').
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2. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as ''like' and 'you know' is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. There is no such thing as U.S. English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take into account the reinstated letter 'u'' and the elimination of '-ize.'
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3. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.
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4. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not quite ready to be independent. Guns should only be used for shooting grouse. If you can't sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist, then you're not ready to shoot grouse.
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5. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. Although a permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.
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6. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left side with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.
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7. The former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline) of roughly $10/US gallon. Get used to it.
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8. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.
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9. The cold, tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. New Zealand beer is also acceptable, as New Zealand is pound for pound the greatest sporting nation on earth and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of the British Commonwealth - see what it did for them. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.
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10. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.
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11. You will cease playing American football. There are only two kinds of proper football; one you call soccer, and rugby (dominated by the New Zealanders). Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies).
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12. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn cricket, and we will let you face the Australians (World dominators) first to take the sting out of their deliveries.
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13. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.
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14. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).
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15. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 p.m. with proper cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season.



God Save the Queen!

[Roamy]

great Starter but what about the Ryder cup - do we play with ourselves now - well I guess we did on Sunday

[Mark]

First seen in 2000 after the election delays of GW Bush.

[Starter]

First seen in 2000 after the election delays of GW Bush.
I figured it might have been around for a while. First time I had seen it. Still pretty funny though.

[Don Capps]

Here is an article that caught my attention that shows that there are real consequences to actions taken by those whose seek to downsize government:

Back to $chool | History News Network (http://hnn.us/articles/back-chool)

This is a consequence of the passage of Proposition 13 back in 1978 and several other proposals that followed which greatly handicapped the state and local governments to fund and operate many services for the citizens of California ("... it handcuffed state lawmakers by requiring a two-thirds supermajority any time they wanted to increase taxes, and made a two-thirds vote among citizens necessary to raise local taxes.). I thought Proposition 13 was a huge mistake at the time and nothing since then has changed that opinion.

[DanicaFan]

Words of Joe Biden.... "The middle class has been buried for the last 4 years." Who is he campaigning for ? Does he realize who has been in the office the last 4 years ? ...lol What an idiot. He is as clueless as Obama. Everyday I find it harder to believe anyone would vote for these two.....lol :D

[Starter]

Here is an article that caught my attention that shows that there are real consequences to actions taken by those whose seek to downsize government:

Back to $chool | History News Network (http://hnn.us/articles/back-chool)

This is a consequence of the passage of Proposition 13 back in 1978 and several other proposals that followed which greatly handicapped the state and local governments to fund and operate many services for the citizens of California ("... it handcuffed state lawmakers by requiring a two-thirds supermajority any time they wanted to increase taxes, and made a two-thirds vote among citizens necessary to raise local taxes.). I thought Proposition 13 was a huge mistake at the time and nothing since then has changed that opinion.
Proposition 13 was not a mistake. I live in Maryland and we had our own version of it in some counties. It was sorely needed.

Spending big dollars on education does not now, and never has, assured a quality education. Those dollars were more likely to go to administative expansion and salaries and union wages than to direct results in classrooms. That's clearly proven when you compare the dollars spent per student against the results and then compare that to models in other location both in the US and elsewhere. It has NEVER been how much you spend, but HOW you spend it. The current US education system is nothing more than a huge government jobs program with little accountability for results.

I recently worked for an on line school which produced better education for a much lower cost - proven by test scores of our students. And our costs included providing computers and printers to our students. We also used the standard curriculum, the same as the public schools in each state we served.