I have not posted anything for over two months, save for a brief recap of my health issues. I was finally discharged to go home last Saturday after having been in a regular hospital, a rehab hospital, and a skilled nursing facility for a total of 44 days.
A quick review. I underwent surgery to amputate the little toe on my right foot due to a severe infection, and was fortunate that I did not lose the whole foot or worse. I am happy to report that I am very much on the mend though I will have a wound vac to remove gunk from my foot for perhaps another month or so. I will have a visiting nurse a couple times a week with one day spent at a wound healing clinic.
It is a rather extensive , but necessary, process that included daily doses of antibiotics via IV which could only be done in the hospital. But the healing is progressing well and I am able to carry on all activities, albeit slowly.
I am pleased that my readers have seen fit to carry on commenting in my absence and I will try to catch up on all of your remarks in the next week or so, time permitting.
I am in the process of introducing some new topics as well as writing some pieces revisiting some of our favorite things but from a different perspective.
Thanks for sticking with me.
Incidentally, while I had some moments of feeling sorry for myself, I encountered many other patients with far more serious illnesses/injuries requiring much more care and more intense therapy than I needed. The experience was quite humbling in that respect.
Umoc193's Blog 
Comments
Glad you’re on mend!
You betcha! I’m relieved to hear this. It’s good to see you back.
Goodonya, mate, as they say in the old country. Glad to see you back in business.
Reg
Dave, I am happy to hear that you are doing better and that your foot is healing. I have missed communicating with you and reading your blog posts. With your recent experience in the hospital and the nursing facilities, it would be interesting to hear your comments on the ongoing GOP attempts to nullify the Affordable Care Act. I can not understand what motivates the stupid bastards other than they seem to only be happy when they are opposing something or hating someone. Charlie
Charlie, the GOP seems to think that health care isn’t a human right.
Missed ya, big guy! Looking forward to reading more of your work.
U had referred to this post on FB. I thought I had just missed it. Lo and behold, it arrived today????? Take care and carry on….. Don’t drive your visiting nurse crazy! Carla
Right on Charlie. Wouldn’t expect anything different from evil people who sustain themselves by hating everything and everyone, especially people of color. But, then again, they may not be hateful; maybe they are just stupid (bastards).
2% water by weight
Not looking too good for life!
Devildog, thank you.
“If you think about a cubic foot of this dirt and you just heat it a little bit – a few hundred degrees – you’ll actually get off about two pints of water – like two water bottles you’d take to the gym.”
Once more, please.
No more! I’m out of my “element”.
Then I must press on alone.
“And this dirt on Mars is interesting because it seems to be about the same everywhere you go. If you are a human explorer, this is really good news because you can quite easily extract water from almost anywhere.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24287207
If you must you must but must you!
“The main requirement for making the fantasy a fact, perseverance — the wherewithal to solve the problems one by one over the long course of the endeavor.”
If I don’t, someone will.
Tourist, did you ever see the 40′ tall yellow rubby ducky when it visited Japan?
“Giant duck’s arrival paints Pittsburgh quack and yellow”:
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/neighborhoods-city/giant-ducks-arrival-paints-pittsburgh-quack-and-yellow-705216
P.S. I doubt the pun “quack and yellow” is translatable into ANY other language!
It’s even iffy in English.
True dat.
Apparently no “Doc Martin” tonight 😦
Yeah, but “Great Performances” is decent tonight: “Broadway Musicals: A Jewish Legacy. ” Just finished watching it.
Saw it before, agree it’s excellent.
At least we should get “Last Tango in Halifax” and “Foyle’s War” tonight — let’s hope!
Keeping my fingers crossed!
Nope. It was apparently done here twice, in 2010 and 2012, in Osaka and Onomichi, both elsewhere. I don’t know if I was vaguely aware.
Tony Norman’s column on it – “a gigantic yellow duck of indeterminate meaning” – is excellent, in which he calls it “a Warhol-like celebration of kitsch.” There you go! The key is “celebration.”
The team wins. The fans are happy. The parade is a third thing.
Pittsburgh turned out to celebrate Pittsburgh!
===
The first rule of photography (mine) is: If it’s yellow (or red), there’s a picture in it.
Ducky seems to come in 3 sizes, has been in a number of other places, including Kaohsiung, Hong Kong, Sydney, Auckland, St. Nazaire, Hasselt, Osaka, Sao Paulo, Onomichi. Pgh. is getting the largest duck:
http://www.florentijnhofman.nl/dev/project.php?id=79
“The Rubber Duck knows no frontiers, it doesn’t discriminate people and doesn’t have a political connotation. The friendly, floating Rubber Duck has healing properties: it can relieve mondial tensions as well as define them. The rubber duck is soft, friendly and suitable for all ages!”
Clearly an un-American-exceptionalist Ducky — oh, the humanity!
Glad you have returned to the land of the semi-autonomous living! I hope your full recovery is quick and uneventful.
In response to (some) college football players wanting to get paid, Big Ten commissioner Jim Delaney said, ” If you don’t like it, turn pro”. Hmmm! Where have I heard before, if you don’t like it, …
Today’s PG editorial on Cutting professors and the article on Bob Nutting and the Nutting family way of doing business (for the long term for their best interest and the community at large) may be of value to some who “don’t quite get it” and have so expressed that failure here, both recently and in the past.
But DD, how could the Nuttings cut staff? All of those people without a job? Wait a second, what would happen if they didn’t cut staff? Oh, that’s right, the paper would file for bankruptcy and everybody would lose their job.
Well pd, since you were (perhaps) the only one to have gotten it (maybe Also Tourist but to only some extent), my comment wasn’t addressed to you-but your response is welcome.
Dick Cheney: “I never said [what’s on the tape].”
Ted Cruz: “I never said [what’s on the tape].”
Newt Gingrich: “If you quote me [from the tape] you’re lying.”
Near the end of the previous thread, on September 27, 2013 at 5:26 AM, I agreed with Devildog that Mr. Calazza’s piece on Ms. Vojtko was “made necessary by Kovalik’s column and the brouhaha that followed” (Devildog’s words). I took no side at that point other than to favor awareness, information, knowing. I referred to “whatever happens or doesn’t from now” and I acknowledged “spinning, both in the initial telling and in the rebuttals.”
Devildog answered: “There was no spinning in the rebuttals . . . .”
No, of course not. When spokespeople speak – advocates, officials – the easiest way to decide between the positions is to note which side is the spinner and which side is the rigorous adherer to truth. There can only be one of each. That’s how we do it in America.
Cold fusion could be achieved, cancer could be cured, and peace could breakout across the Middle East all on the same day and Pittsburgh Dad would denounce each one as another example of “O’s failed policies.”
A lot of lies, a lot of wishful thinking, some very ugly derangement, denial, denial everywhere, and a firm grasp of one reality: They’ve lost. Empty words are all that’s left.
They are like the North Korean people – I’ve done this one before – whose lives are governed by an untenable ideology. They believed in their system. They’ve seen for themselves how badly it works – how wrong they were. What they can’t do is admit to the outside that their lives have been a mistake.
Others’ patience is running out.
“I didn’t draw a red line”. I have neither the time, inclination nor knowhow to come up with other examples from “your” side, which I am fairly certain exists in comparable numbers. Your point could have been made without going partisan.
And your spinning example is? My spinning example-Ms. Vojtik’s sad situation was the result of Duquesne’s inhumane treatment of her.
Once again, it’s funny you mention N. Korea because government control of the economy is the ultimate goal of progressivism. How is that working out for the N. Korean people?
Govt shutdown here we come!!!!!!!!
Tourist, do you think O has ever lied?
Do you really believe the N. Korean people ever wanted the govt they have or believed in the ‘ideology’ that their govt shoved down their throats? It’s like one humungous example of Stockholm Syndrome. It’s the way it was in the USSR, East Germany and all of the Eastern bloc countries. You have no choice but to accept it so you may as well make the best of it. Remind you of anything currently happening in the US?
Pittsburgh Dad,
“. . . government control of the economy is the ultimate goal of progressivism.”
The ultimate goal of economic conservatism is to eliminate legal rights and responsibilities, as well as all concepts of human rights and dignity, and replace them with pure power exercised in a hierarchy according to wealth.
I just made my statement up. Where did you get yours?
“Control” of the economy? Is that like the “government takeover of one-sixth of the economy”? That was you, too. The mandate to buy private insurance (yes, a requirement to do something) is a “takeover”? In English?
Empty words. Inflammatory words. Frightening words. Lies.
As I said, they’re all you’ve got.
“Has Obama ever lied?” He wouldn’t be human if he hasn’t. What kind of “lies” are you talking about? When a player guarantees a win and the team doesn’t – that kind of lie? Forecasts, predictions, goals not met because government control of everything in life is not complete yet? Oh! And is it your position that the opposition has been effective or not? When an effort is thwarted, does it make the proponent a liar?
He’s held his negotiating cards close, obviously. And he kept the Bin Laden raid from us till it was over, but I can live with those and the rest. By any reasonable application of an adult definition, I’m not aware that he has, no. Even if I’ve overlooked something, I’m betting it’s minor. Ya gotta cut the Messiah some slack, ya know.
Don’t look now but the beginning of universal healthcare is the law of the land. Of the two full wars the U.S. was waging when Obama took office on a vow to end them, one has been ended and the other is on track to be, before he’s done.
Hey! Weren’t we supposed to be at war with Iran by now? Wasn’t that a certainty before reelection, or, if not before, after? The Iranians want to talk now? The Syrians want to talk now? The Russians want to talk now? Well, let’s wait and see how those go. It’s way too soon to be thinking about a second Peace Prize.
I can go into it all (the Benghazi, lies, Obamacare lies, IRS lies, etc…) but it would be pointless. I mean how can the Chosen One ever lie? On the other hand, I can’t resist.
He spent a trillion dollars to get us out of the recession (predicted 5.4% unempt but I will let that go). What has resulted? A urate of 11% if labor force participation remained constant and trillion dollar deficits that will slow growth for generations. Median income of the top 1% has increased over 30% under O while it has decreased for the 99%. He got a trillion to decrease the gap. So he didn’t get another trillion – shouldn’t the 1st trillion decreased the gap at all, let alone allow it to explode (Unintended Consequences of a failed philosophy and all)
Universal healthcare? Do you mean Obamacare which will leave 30M uninsured while doubling the cost of insurance? How about you can keep your doctor? How is that working out? How are all of the part-time jobs that have resulted from Ocare working out for the ‘middle class’? The exchanges are supposed to start Tues? How many Americans do you think are aware of this? How many do you think will enroll in them? And didn’t Howard Dean say something about ‘Death Panels’ recently?
And if you think we are further away from bombing Iran (or Bibi is), you are dreaming. The idea that we can ‘negotiate’ with a nutjob holocaust denier is delusional. Peace prize? For increasing the use of drones beyond one of Cheney’s wet dreams? Really??? O didn’t get bin Laden. You like movies, right? Ever watch Zero Dark Thirty? Now it took licenses but getting bin Laden occurred as a result of 10 years of domestic and international agencies working together to hunt him down. And it appears that O didn’t even give the command to Seal Team 6. O was playing rummy while Hillary gave the go-ahead. It appears that Hillary was wearing the pants both literally and figuratively in during O’s 1st term
Finally,
——– ‘The ultimate goal of economic conservatism is to eliminate legal rights and responsibilities, as well as all concepts of human rights and dignity, and replace them with pure power exercised in a hierarchy according to wealth.’
LOL – You mean the conservatism (capitalism) that has lead the US to have the highest standard of living in the history of the Milky Way?
I breezed over your’ I’m just making that up’ comment. I would argue that it is what you believe.
Let me ask you this? How does progressivism attempt to achieve its goals (and ‘attempt’ is the key word)? What is the mechanism, in general? Not every time, but in general?
Pittsburgh Dad,
Separately to yours at 12:10 AM: You were in Rome. You took in the cultural and historical sights. You observed Italians enjoying their heritage as you were. You concluded from that – this you told us – that Europeans have too much time on their hands because of the failed philosophy of socialism.
Your understanding of North Korea is equally impressive.
Thx!!!! I thought you would come around. Given this, your last post does confuse me.
Pittsburgh Dad,
Yours of 1:32 AM, first paragraph: In other words, whether the subject is the goal of liberalism (11:06 PM), or what liberals think the goal of conservatism is (1:32 AM), you know what we think. You are always telling us what we think. And what Obama thinks. Because if we don’t think those things, nothing you say about them matters. You see where I’m going, right? You like to say you live in reality. At least half your reality is made up. (A good part of the other half is, too, briefly noted below.)
Second paragraph: In the U.S. under our constitution, putting aside crime and corruption, liberals and conservatives are limited to and use exactly the same mechanisms: free enterprise, entrepreneurial drive, community and patriotic spirit, appeals to self-interest, education, bully pulpits, the ballot, legislation, executive authority, administration, regulation – I’m sure there are better versions of a list.
Liberals and conservatives differ (your said “in general, not every time”) in two areas. They differ on their preferences among available means/mechanisms, and the question is why? And they differ on what they mean by “best,” which is what both say is their goal.
The preferred conservative mechanisms are obviously the ones associated with more market, less government. To me, the “why” is that conservatives are addicted to abstract principle and theory. Everything is about “liberty” and “getting government off our backs” because “people know what’s best for them.” For our purposes right now, may we leave it at that? You know what I mean. For the record, I like/agree with all those things. Oh, and “personal responsibility.”
The problem with the theory is that the free market, blah, blah, blah, is said to produce the greatest total good (value), which would also be the greatest good (value) on average. Total and average are not all boats.
Raising all boats is what conservatives claim to do. Not only do real-world results contradict them (the second half of your reality); the premise of their theory itself is winners and losers!
A company that cannot compete “deserves to die.” Companies are one thing.
We did not walk out of the jungle and naturally become liberals. We walked out of the jungle and naturally became conservatives. Liberalism/progressivism is a response to conservatism left to its own devices.
Opportunity in America should mean more than the right to survive if you can.
===
Liberals believe he ain’t heavy; in success without victims; in art *and* in science; that a rising tide *should* lift all boats; that it’s complicated.
——Raising all boats is what conservatives claim to do. Not only do real-world results contradict them (the second half of your reality); the premise of their theory itself is winners and losers!
So how did the US become the wealthiest country in the history of the world? What real-world results don’t support this? The USSR? Western European Social Democracies? This is clear evidence that ‘REAL WORLD’ results support my position. What real world results support progressivism?
I have asked this before – why don’t people want to move to these bastions of progressivism? Why do they all want to come here?
Complicated? Google Occam’s Razor. Scientific theory is, in many ways, based on this principle.
Pittsburgh Dad,
You: “So how did the US become the wealthiest country in the history of the world?”
+++ Do you mean “the greatest total good (value), which would also be the greatest good (value) on average”? I said that. The issue was “raising all boats.”
You: ”What real-world results don’t support this? The USSR? Western European Social Democracies?”
+++ The U.S. of A. The issue was the claim that conservatism raises all boats.
Me: “Total and average are not all boats.”
You “breezed” again.
===
You: “The USSR? Western European Social Democracies? . . . . why don’t people want to move to these bastions of progressivism?”
+++ “In 2010, 47.3 million people lived in the EU, who were born outside their resident country. This corresponds to 9.4% of the total EU population. Of these, 31.4 million (6.3%) were born outside the EU and 16.0 million (3.2%) were born in another EU member state.” (Wiki)
+++ “Russia hosts the world’s largest population of immigrants after the United States, according to a new UN study showing that the number of people living abroad across the globe has reached a record high . . . . The US remains the most popular destination with a total 45.8 million migrants, while Germany (9.8 million) is ranked third after Russia, the UN study said.” (RIA Novosti)
+++ 48,000 U.S.-born Americans and 195,000 foreign-born emigrate from the U.S. annually. (Census Bureau)
You: “Why do they all want to come here?”
+++ Why do all Republicans want to shoot them from helicopters?
The only point of those statistics, whatever else they might mean or not mean, is that claiming “everybody wants to come here, nobody wants to go there,” is as ridiculous as saying North Koreans have Stockholm syndrome or Europeans sightseeing in Europe prove progressivism is a fail.
You should stick to topics you understand, though I would miss you.
“Weren’t we supposed to be at war by now”. Did anyone with any sense believe we would do that-and the Iranians have sense. U.S. do it, no. Israel probably.
Talk? Great! Iran-we don’t want nuclear weapons! Really, why not? Everyone else does. Syria, here’s our “complete” list. Oh, really. Russia- that’s all they ever want to do is talk. Why does everyone want to talk to Obama-figure that one out.
Obama vowed to end the two full wars-but Bush signed the agreement with Iraq when we would get out and Obama is just not rescinding the agreement. Afghanistan-Obama said this was the good war, the one we should be fighting.
Rising tide-most benefit, either by seeking and getting employment or the pie has been increased so there’s more available to those that can’t (or even won’t). Pretty simple concept-why not try and refute it if you don’t accept it. You’re good at researching and presenting data. Don’t throw it back here, the challenge won’t be accepted. I suppose you never heard of win-win. Is it bad if one’s winnings are greater than the other’s or is is better if both lose relatively equally? Is a rising tide, other than Obama’s rising tide limited to Wall Street, at the expense of the less fortunate or does a rising tide (to me at least) that the pie has been increased?
Oh, yeah. Obama’s lies are “white lies”. Nothing racist, just something my late, great mother said when she was caught.
Sorry to intrude into this food fight between you and PD. he exaggerates, presumably to make a point, and you use that to take conservatism to task.
+++ The U.S. of A. The issue was the claim that conservatism raises all boats.
Me: “Total and average are not all boats.”
You “breezed” again.
———–> No, I didn’t ‘breeze’. I stick by my statement. The poorest people in the US have a higher standard of living than in any other country in the world (at least any country that provides the economic opportunities that were possible here until you know who took office) – cell phones, large screen TVs, cars, computers, etc……
+++ “In 2010, 47.3 million people lived in the EU, who were born outside their resident country. This corresponds to 9.4% of the total EU population. Of these, 31.4 million (6.3%) were born outside the EU and 16.0 million (3.2%) were born in another EU member state.” (Wiki)
——-> In the US, immigrants from outside the US make up almost 15% of the population, almost 2 and a half times the EU
+++ “Russia hosts the world’s largest population of immigrants after the United States, according to a new UN study showing that the number of people living abroad across the globe has reached a record high . . . . The US remains the most popular destination with a total 45.8 million migrants, while Germany (9.8 million) is ranked third after Russia, the UN study said.” (RIA Novosti)
————-> Russia has 10M immigrants, about 6.7% of popn – again less than half the US.
+++ 48,000 U.S.-born Americans and 195,000 foreign-born emigrate from the U.S. annually. (Census Bureau)
—–> This proves….. What? Not a lot of US citizens leave the US? Thx for proving my point
Not a minor fact to consider is that the US does have an immigration policy that limits the no. of immigrants we allow in every year. I have a hunch the numbers would be dramatically different if every country suddenly had an open border.
BTW, I stick by my analysis of why able bodied young Italians were hanging out on the Spanish Steps every day. It has nothing to do with ‘experiencing their heritage’ and everything to do with not needing to have any responsibilities. There is some statistic about the unbelievably large percentage of Italian men in their 40s that still live with their parents. The percentage of people in their 20s still living with their parents in the US has skyrocketed under O for 2 reasons – there are no jobs thanks to the failed stimulus and there is no need to get a job with all of the govt handouts. As I said before, we are becoming more like Europe every day – and that ain’t a good thing.
And also my comments about N. Korea being one humungous example of Stockholm Syndrome could not be more accurate..
I want to be in this discussion but something just came up and it’s good. If this is still going on tomorrow — and if I am able to tell what day tomorrow is — I’ll be back then unless what I want to say has been preempted.
I’m convinced that we have many Netanyahus in this country. Why can’t we find one-we need to have one!
Oy vay!
Why do Russia, Syria, Iran and North Korea all want to talk with Obama? Personality? Credible threat of military action? Or what?
I hear it’s because he has a to-die-for chocolate chip cookie recipe. Like Little_Minx said, “Oy vay!”
Well Toadsly, the explanation you have provided is more credible than a credible military threat from Obama. Back to the game.
Our men and women in uniform are not a credible threat, Dog?
Obama? Maybe a whole lotta drone strikes have some people’s attention. Maybe the idea of U.S. forces refreshed after withdrawing from Iraq and Afghanistan gives some people pause.
“Why do Russia, Syria, Iran and North Korea all want to talk with Obama?” That was your question. It’s a good one.
I’m getting the game live on cable! Go Bucs!
No cable, but keeping up with scores by refreshing:
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/mlb/game/boxscore/l.mlb.com-2013-e.39104
Oh wait, it’s self-updating — hooray!
In between innings Tourist so my quick response is do you really, really believe we, more tan Israel is the credible threat to Iran, especially after the going to Congress fiasco and now “talking” with them? As for drone attacks, do you really, really believe that might give a clue as to whether or not we attack Iran? Back to the game!
“a clue as to whether or not we attack”
That’s what you want them worrying about. They seem to be.
I’m not sure how heckling of the home team is interpreted.
Tourist, somehow I don’t think your heckling of the home team meant the Bucs were the home team. So now, not thinking our exalted leader is the saviour is tantamount to treason.
The Iranians worried about an attack from us. They may be insane but they’re not idiots.
Savior? Treason? No one, not even you, thinks that’s what I said.
I want *them* to believe America is a credible threat. I wondered how Americans insisting that the commander in chief is not credible might affect their perception.
I’m just curious.
Insane Tourist, not idiots. Comprende?
Aren’t tea-party types trying to shut down the US government committing treason?
Yes, Minx, absolutely right! Enjoy the game!
It’s not either/or, it’s both/and.
Toadsly! Chocolate chip cookies remind me of Phoebe Buffay’s old family recipe for Nesslay Toulouse (that Monica Geller attempted to re-create with dozens of experimental batches) 😉
Another European friend was to arrive next week via Melbourne, Bangkok and Manila. He called yesterday – in Tokyo – proposing drinks immediately. How could the answer be anything other than: “I’ll be right there . . . . Where?” It was almost lunchtime.
Hey, Tourist, who is this firebrand you had lunch with that caused you to flip your lid and exactly how did you quench your thirst. Back to the game!
The guest wanted a couple of cold ones, after which back to our place because my wife, too, has known him and his for more than thirty years. (Alas, his wife didn’t come.) No prep meant pizza. I count four more cans, an empty bottle of white and two empty reds this morning. I walked him to the train at 9 p.m. I haven’t heard from him today. I hope I put him on the right one.
Devildog said sarcastically, “Oh, yeah. Obama’s lies are ‘white lies’.” That’s close enough to what I said, yes. I said: “Even if . . . I’m betting it’s minor.” I’m still waiting for an actual lie to excuse. When Devildog said, “’I didn’t draw a red line’,” in quotes, at 9:14 PM, I did not initially understand what he was getting at. Now I think he meant it as an example of an Obama lie. Here’s the president’s original statement without benefit of teleprompter:
(QUOTE) I have, at this point, not ordered military engagement in the situation. But the point that you made about chemical and biological weapons is critical. That’s an issue that doesn’t just concern Syria. It concerns our close allies in the region, including Israel. It concerns us. We cannot have a situation where chemical or biological weapons are falling into the hands of the wrong people. We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized. That would change my calculus. That would change my equation. (UNQUOTE)
No one – meaning at least me – disputes that it was a mistake to say “red line.”
Slate’s John Dickerson: (QUOTE) If you read his entire answer, Obama tries to dilute his comment almost immediately. He says his “calculus” and his “equation” would change, words that are meant to give him room to move. He didn’t want to box himself into a military-only response. But when you use terms like “red line,” it tends to make people not listen to the rest of the sentence. (UNQUOTE)
Just as, for example, when George W. Bush challenged Iraqi insurgents to see for themselves what America’s sons and daughters were made of: “There are some who feel like that the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is: Bring ’em on.”
What? He didn’t mean it like that?
(QUOTE) Obama said the “red line” he talked about a year ago against Syria’s use of chemical weapons wasn’t his but an international standard. “I didn’t set a red line, the world set a red line,” Obama said. “My credibility is not on the line. The international community’s credibility is on the line. And America and Congress’ credibility is on the line because we give lip service to the notion that these international norms are important.” (UNQUOTE)
That’s not even a white lie. It’s an explanation of what he meant when he said what he never should have said but did not deny saying – except in the minds of those who don’t want to hear it.
===
I didn’t cite specific lies of Cheney, Cruz or Gringrich. I cited lying as their S.O.P.
Lie openly for as long as it works. When it no longer does, deny saying it. What difference does any of it make?
Talking to Republicans, Republicans say they want to eliminate Social Security. Talking to seniors, Republicans say Democrats do.
Obama hates white people. Obama hates America. Obama’s plan is to destroy America. Liberals hate freedom. They’ll be breaking down your door. They’re coming to take your guns.
Or maybe all the hate, hate, hate is just exaggeration to make a point to people with a lot of guns.
Devildog presumes Pittsburgh Dad exaggerates to make his points and that I overreact (my word), unfairly taking all of conservatism to task (his words). Maybe. The caution is valid and I will keep it in mind. But when they – any of them, from the Cheneys, Cruzes and Gingrichs all the way down to the Pittsburgh Dads – continue to rip our unique nation apart, there can be no reconciliation. They have to be exterminated – every last one of them.
===
It’s fine to assert something out of thin air. If the assertion is questioned, it’s normal for the asserter to elaborate at that point.
“And also my comments about N. Korea being one humungous example of Stockholm Syndrome could not be more accurate.”
===
If you believe that the United States, before you-know-who took office, provided the greatest economic opportunities in the world, then this sentence negates itself: “The poorest people in the US have a higher standard of living than in any other country in the world (at least any country that provides the economic opportunities that were possible here until you know who took office) . . . .” It says our poorest are better off than the poorest in any other country like us, of which there are none.
Yeah, that’s cheap. I’m ashamed of myself. If the actual, obvious, intended, recognized meaning of it is even true, and that is not semantic, it is not evidence of lifting all boats. It is evidence of a higher water level. It is a statement of totals and averages.
When they tout value overall and say that people are better off on average, they mean them. They are entitled to mean them. That’s all they mean.
America is the most exceptional country in the history of the Milky Way. I would like to keep it that way.
“Exceptional” isn’t always a compliment.
Tourist, unlike you, I don’t proofread my comments 100 times (remember, I have a job now; I’m sort of busy).
‘You know who’ said that he wanted to ‘fundamentally transform’ this country. This is a truly scary statement. If he accomplishes it, this country will no longer be the most exceptional country in the history of the Milky Way. It will just be another Social Democracy – Europe has about a dozen of them and I have no desire to live in any of them (well, I do want to live my retirement years in a castle outside of Florence). He must be stopped.
The GOP is showing a backbone. The liberal bubble is so large now that they don’t even realize that middle America ain’t gonna blame the GOP for this shutdown. It doesn’t mean that the GOP shouldn’t acquiesce, for the most part, on a budget deal – they can’t win it. But when it comes to raising the debt ceiling, expect no concessions. The GOP is just priming the pump over this budget deal – waking up America to the failure that is Obama and his policies.
Health care’s not a human right?
Human right? Try life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness(I’m very happy now). Health care? Where it is written so shall it be- and I don’t mean written by Obama or even Congress. But, does life include the unborn?
Is clean water a human right? Public education?
A ‘right’? Uh no.
It’s a right when it’s Medicare, Medicaid, etc., but not for others. Lack of universal health care constitutes unequal protection under law.
This is interesting
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2387000/posts
Thought experiment:
Ten years from now, the United States has fully embraced universal healthcare and the government is responsible for administering every aspect of medicine.
Two patients’ files fall on the desk of a government employee: Both have brain tumours in exactly the same places, and only with heroic attempts will either survive.
One is a 25 year old man. One is an 91 year old woman. With heroic methods each have about a 20% (cure rate).
Since the Equal Protection clause of the Constitution does not discriminate based on age, can the 91 year old woman expect the same life-saving treatments as the man? And if not, does she have a case to sue under the Equal Protection clause?
Why is it either/or? Why not both/and? Oh wait, this is a straw-man case.
Could be both, but probably won’t be. Could be a straw man, but probably won’t be. And maybe that’s the way it will have to be-and should be (unless some rich guy, despite “equal protection”, wants to pay for it out of his own pocket).
Both/And? LOL
Who doesn’t have access to health care in the US. I think even illegals, oh sorry, I mean undocumented immigrants are provided health care. Ain’t America great????
And no, health ‘insurance’ is not a right. The Declaration of Indep. says the ‘right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness’. Not ‘guarantee’ of happiness.
Tourist, I once wrote how you guys mistake opinion for fact and now j’accuse you of mistaking opinion for lies. Obama hates Whites, wants to destroy American is an opinion not a lie. That opinion may be true or it may not be true, or may not be based on a preponderance of evidence or evidence beyond a reasonable doubt but it is an opinion not a lie-I don’t know hat’s in his mind but I guess you do. Meanwhile, he’s keeping me guessing as he is keeping the Iranians guessing (in fear).
Devildog On October 1, 2013 at 10:30 PM
Insane Tourist, not idiots. Comprende?
+++ No.
Gomenasai!
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
Pittsburgh Dad,
“fundamentally transform” (11:08 PM)
This is important. Shades of Pelosi’s “Pass it to see what’s in it.” Watch the tape and she’s telling a public audience that has heard conflicting claims from Democrats and Republicans that they will see how good it is – “what’s in it” – when it passes.
Since the first term it’s been a Fox-and-blog favorite that the president said he wanted to “fundamentally transform/change/undo America.”
He didn’t – not that way.
The president DID say, during the 2008 campaign, that he wanted to fundamentally change how things were done in Washington. So did Senator McCain and Mr. Romney, as I recall. The president also DID say to his supporters that they were “five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” Five days after that, the United States of America became a nation where children other than white males could join in the dream of growing up to be president.
“Fundamentally change” and “undo” both came back hard during the 2012 campaign – not only “wanted to,” but, on the Rogers blog, all the things “this president has already UNDONE about Amerika.”
I said then: “Name one.”
That took a couple more rounds.
Eventually the definitive consensus from the right was: “He’s divisive.”
Since you were part of that and know this, for you to now try it again . . . . You’re a liar.
I agree, he didn’t want to ‘undo’ America. Apparently, we have different interpretations of the phrase ‘fundamentally transform’.
The difference is between what he meant and how you use it.
Hillary will break the other barrier.
Gender, sexual orientation or both. Just a question, the answer to which I don’t know
As I said, ‘different’
Yes, true versus false where false is preferred.
Tourist, you’re proving what I said a long time ago. Nuance doesn’t count. Take your red line defense of Obama. The whole world, but you, believes Obama said, implied, whatever that here’s a red line and if you cross it, there will be hell to pay (meaning to most, war). The whole world believes that line was crossed and Obama did nothing, damaging his and our credibility. Is it important what he actually said? No! He shouldn’t have said whatever he said and it was damaging. Btw, Syria did move chemical weapons, according to ” reliable sources”.
But, please, don’t stop telling us who said what when. It’s very enlightening.
Talk to you tomorrow. Thursday- Pens open up and Bucs v. Cards. But what’s on Public Broadcasting?
Devildog,
YOU ARE RIGHT!!! It was understood by everyone as you say! He shouldn’t have said it! It was a mistake to say it! He painted himself into a corner, put himself in a box, out on a limb! His words themselves (Dickerson) suggest that he knew it, too.
How, then, to avoid not just a few missile strikes but what would follow? Or should he have doubled down?
In contrast to the image he clearly created the first time, he latched onto what he had actually, you know, said – not a shining moment but a sufficiently acceptable explanation unless you are already invested in his and our failure, or in war.
Actually, since the U.S. has chemical weapons and is understood to have supplied or facilitated the acquisition of them by Iraq in the Iran-Iraq War – “How do we know Saddam has chemical weapons? We have the receipts” – a red line that is a unilaterally American creation is likely to seem more hypocritical than principled. It really has to be based – even if we must be the prime enforcer – on international norms, in the name of civilized nations, and so on.
Obama was telling the truth.
You don’t see it as lying because you believe what he says in general. Half the country does not. I am at a point where I do not believe a word that comes out of his mouth. He is lying and he knows it. Whether we are talking Obamacare, IRS, Benghazi, the red line, etc….. In addition, I truly believe that he knows that he is lying. This is why liberalism is so cynical. I don’t have to read between the lines to interpret what a conservative says. Conservatism, Tourist, is uncomplicated. It is logically consistent. Liberalism isn’t. This is why O needs a teleprompter for his speeches. While it is overstated to a large degree, O does come off as a reasonably intelligent person. The reason he flubs up when making a speech is because it is hard to remember something that is logically inconsistent. It requires mental gymnastics that would make Nadia Comaneci proud
Pittsburgh Dad,
“I am at a point where I do not believe a word that comes out of his mouth.”
+++ Do yourself a favor. Consider what that says about you, your judgment and your credibility.
“Conservatism . . . is uncomplicated.”
+++ For better or worse, reality is not. This is what I mean when I say conservatism is theory.
“It is logically consistent.”
+++ For the sake of argument, I accept that.
“Liberalism isn’t.”
+++ I want to solve the *actual* problems we face. I prefer what works in the world. Consistency is for hobgobblins.
I have considered it.
If I’m not mistaken, when a batted ball hits an umpire, even if it bounces up and is caught, it hit the ground. The rule is that “the umpire is the field.”
If, if, if they made the rule that when a fair ball hits a fan in the stands, the ball hit in the stands, they wouldn’t have to try to figure out where the trajectory would have taken it. I realize that would create homeruns that might not have been, but it would be clear.
Reasonable?
No, the fan is not a part of the game and should never touch a fair ball
Get better camera angles like they have in football.
Pittsburgh Dad, I like your response better. You’re right. My rule would work, but it’s a distortion (like the designated hitter and infield fly rule). Fans shouldn’t, but will, so it’s still going be the umpire’s call. Nothing actually changes. But, yes, that is the game.
Lack of filet mignon means lack of equal protection.
I think I have calmed down enough to go to sleep. Good night everyone.
The consensus buzz is that “Gravity” is the “best space movie ever.” I don’t know who might be interested or if it’s just me. Anyway, I advise not reading too much. I haven’t seen it but I already know something I wish I didn’t. Can’t wait!
Have you ever seen the movie ‘Airplane’? Rent the DVD and thank me later
I saw it a long time ago. I remember it as funny. I don’t remember too much else. Okay, the seed has been planted.
“My heart sank further when I learned that liberal groups, lacking any better ideas, have decided to take this endeavor seriously . . . . [I]t’s far worse that the ‘moderates’ in attendance will have been bused in by Arianna Huffington and organized by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.”
The “endeavor” has nothing to do with any of this. I’m illustrating the perspective of the writer, Anne Applebaum, a bona fide conservative sometimes mistaken for a liberal. Enter her name and Google’s autocomplete offers “anne applebaum liberal or conservative.” As she sees it:
(Quote)
Whatever connotations it once had, the word “moderate” has now come to mean “liberal” or even “left-wing” in American politics. It has been a long time since “moderate” Republicans were regarded as important, centrist assets by their party: Nowadays, they are far more likely to be regarded as closet lefties and potential traitors. “Moderate” Democrats, meanwhile, no longer exist: In their place, we have “conservative Democrats.” Nobody pays attention to them either . . . .”
(Unquote)
She writes from Europe. This is her take on the shutdown:
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/foreigners/2013/10/_government_shutdown_the_view_from_overseas_does_not_favor_the_gop.html
The word “silly” in the subtitle, probably from an editor, is unfortunate. What Applebaum is saying is far more important than that.
Applebaum’s complaint is that the law is the law and it is wrong to use some extraneous political matter to change, or if you will subvert that law. I don’t care if she is a liberal, moderate or conservative; what I care about is that she is wrong, legally, historically or otherwise.
Laws are not written in stone-they are amended, gutted, rescinded, etc. as for dealing with the law itself rather than using extraneous bills to do what you want to do with that law, this is done all the time, perhaps mostly to add pork to a bill to “buy” votes. So what is the problem here. Not atypical bargaining to get what you want. Scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. Give me just a little, e.g., delay the individual mandate, eliminate the device surcharge and I’ll go along with what you want.
Horse trading has gone on forever but all of a sudden it’s evil incarnate. Obama rammed through Obamacare without a single Republican vote, changed the law, questionably, by executive fiat, and now expects the other side to just lie down and shut up. Life doesn’t always work that way. I don’t know how this will work out but I haven’t seen anything illegal or immoral.
The power of the purse has always been used to influence executive policy!
Yeah, you missed it. Her point is not that Obamacare is the law. Her point is that Obamacare is the legitimate result of a system now being delegitimized: “the credibility of democracy itself.”
Own it.
“. . . this principle, so fundamental to our entire political system, and so vitally necessary to the functioning of democracies around the world . . . . I repeat, democracy is not designed to reflect majority opinion. It is designed to filter majority opinion through legitimate institutions and to translate it, through agreed procedures, into policy.”
That’s just b.s. Agreed procedure into policy. What is it that’s going on that violates “agreed procedures”. Did I miss that point? I didn’t miss any point-I just disagree with it. Majority opinion is being filtered through legitimate institutions. What is it-precisely- that you believe is illegitimate? Blood sport! Politics! The country will survive despite the doomsayers, as I said previously about Obamacare as it may be amended, revised, gutted and/or rescinded, or left alone. What face-saving way will both sides come up with (eventually) that will leave many on both sides unhappy?
“The country will survive despite the doomsayers,”
Because we are exceptional? Because God is on our side? It’s automatic?
The best car must be kept in good repair. And still a driver can crash it.
How about because it is what a rational person expects about the future? This country has survived a Civil War, 2 World Wars, 30% unempt, FDR, LBJ and Jimmy Carter. While Ocare is a trainwreck and unconstitutional, this country will ‘survive’ it. Whether we will be better off as a result of it, well, I think you know my answer to that.
Pd’s comments are incorporated herein. Also, what’s going on now is through agreed procedures and legitimate institutions. Don’t worry holders of U.S. 30 year treasury bonds, you will get paid. if they become sold at a discount, higher rates, I’m a buyer.
So Minx, did you not see my response to your Equal Protection comment above or did you read it and ignore it? If you read it and ignored it, may I ask why? If you didn’t read it, please do so and respond.
Thx
Silence is an answer.
Not a good one
Sometimes silence speaks volumes more than words ever can.
I agree, completely.
“That’s not true and you know it.” “Are you calling me a liar?” “Oh, no! Not at all!”
Ah, the good old days.
Here’s what happened: Republicans began to lie blatantly about Obama and the Democrats. For a time there was no effective response because people in public life simply didn’t call each other liars. It wasn’t the way they behaved. Slowly, moved by the grassroots, Democrats began to say it – to call lies lies, and even to call liars liars.
The Republicans responded brilliantly. They began calling everything Obama said a lie. Everything.
When George W. Bush gave a speech, a partisan of the opposite persuasion might say, “What a bunch of crap!” With Obama, they don’t say “crap.” On the P-G blogs every time: “More lies from Obama.” To his YouTube videos: “Every fucking word is a god dam lie.” Here: “I do not believe a word that comes out of his mouth.”
They successfully neutered the word. There was no effect in calling a lie a lie if everything is called a lie all day long. They lie now and people yawn. Paul Ryan’s acceptance speech at the convention was ranked the most dishonest in history. That made no difference whatsoever to anybody.
What does “lie” mean anymore?
Devildog has said before that a statement is not a lie if the speaker believes it. That is correct. Lying requires intent. A false statement is not a lie because it is false. If the president says that he wants to increase funding for X, and a Republican who listened to the speech goes on TV and declares that the president wants to cut funding for X, the Republican is not lying if, all history and evidence to the contrary, he believes – call it a hunch – that the president secretly wants to cut funding for X. Devildog is right about this.
You’d think that would be bad enough.
On October 2, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Devildog nailed the lid down.
“Obama . . . wants to destroy American is an opinion not a lie. That opinion may be true or it may not be true, or may not be based on a preponderance of evidence or evidence beyond a reasonable doubt but it is an opinion not a lie – I don’t know what’s in his mind but I guess you do.”
No, I don’t either – whether “his mind” is Obama’s or the opinion-giver’s.
We can never know what’s in anyone’s mind, even if they tell us, because they may not mean what they say. The truth could be anything. A president of the United States might truly want to destroy America. Have we had any of those? I’m not sure? At the very least, we should be alert to the possibility.
Another example: If a person believes Obamacare is destroying America, it’s at least possible that destroying America is the president’s intention and that making healthcare available to the tens of millions without it is a smokescreen. I can see how a person could believe that, and then of course proclaim it.
It is irrefutably possible that the president always intends the worst and always lies about everything. It is irrefutably possible that a person claiming such, or anything else, about the president, or about anyone or anything else, believes it.
Since we can never know if any person is lying the old-fashioned way, we apply Occam’s Razor (thank you, Pittsburgh Dad) to the useless concept.
There is no lying, only opinion. Say anything you want!
This is where we are in American politics.
It’s a true paradigm shift and I am embarrassed that I failed to recognize it sooner. I’m not entirely clear on mechanisms hereafter – for policy and like – but a vastly broader horizon lies before us, now that we are free from the shackles of truth.
As we are reminded, we are Americans: “This country has survived a Civil War, 2 World Wars, 30% unempt, FDR, LBJ and Jimmy Carter.” If that doesn’t give you a thrill and convince you we’ll be okay no matter what, remember the Alamo, ancient Ionia, Rome and the British Empire.
Why am I so depressed?
So Tourist, you think this is a “true paradigm shift”. I would say that you are not lying with that comment; rather, I would say that not only do you have no knowledge of history (how presidents have been treated, both recently and from the beginning of our history) but that you are a thin-skinned, crybaby crying to the equivalent of your mother. Get tough kid, you are watching a blood sport where you believe your ox is being gored. Crap is ok but shit isn’t. Well my distinguished colleague, crap happens. I note you didn’t mention race. A welcome, but uncommon, omission.
Depressed! That’s just one of your problems. For a time…, People in public life don’t call people liars. Even if that was true, big fuckin deal. It’s like crap v. Shit. What’s wrong with you anyway? You have trouble with the truth v. you are a liar. Call a spade a spade (in your mind) and tell it like you think it is-though I do like the English parliament with sticking knives in the back and twisting it while using nice words in a beautiful accent.
I’m not going to go into everything said about Bush. Why don’t you just grow up a little-and I fervently hope you get over your depression. Sorry for my tone and words-next time, I’ll say the same think but try to “sound” nicer.
Tourist, for most of your post – yada, yada, yada….
With that said, the one valid point is that nothing is forever. Rationally, I expect America will be the lone superpower for the next 50-100 years. After that, all bets are off. This doesn’t mean the US won’t be the only superpower for the next 500 years. More leaders like O and my grandchildren will be speaking Chinese.
It has been said that Obamacare is one of the first if not the first major piece of legislation passed without any bipartisan support, not even one vote. You sow the seed, you reap the whirlwind! No negotiation by Obama then, no negotiation now. Yeah, I know, it’s the Republicans (there was no tea party then) who have always refused to negotiate with “this” president when there have always been bona fide negotiations with others. Is it this guy, racism or what?
Devildog,
Democrats expected single-payer. The president wanted to include the Republicans. He took single-payer off the table – took it away from *us*. Romneycare *was* the compromise. The result was as you said: not one vote.
Reap the whirlwind?
Shove it up your ass.
Tourist, my distinguished colleague, the last thing I want to do is bring you down to my level. It is so not you, I think-but I could be wrong.
It is not an unknown bargaining tactic to ask for the moon and then move to a fall-back position claiming you’re making a great concession. You say Democrats “expected” single payer. Really! Maybe some (Obama) wanted it but it would not/could not get enough Democratic votes to pass even in a heavily controlled Congress. It was a non-starter so giving it up was giving up the impossible.
Pass what could pass with Republican support, which would have been significant, win the 2010 election (and 2012) and go from there. Maybe, just maybe, things would have been different. But, who knows, maybe no tea party but there would still be the racists to contend with.
Idiocy run amok 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦
“For Rep. Ted Yoho, government shutdown is ‘the tremor before the tsunami’”:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/for-ted-yoho-government-shutdown-is-the-tremor-before-the-tsunami/2013/10/04/98b5aa8c-2c3c-11e3-8ade-a1f23cda135e_story.html
By David A. Fahrenthold, Published: October 4
Why in the world would Ted Yoho ever back down?
“This one is from a 72-year-old lady: ‘Way to go, tiger,’ ” said Yoho (R-Fla.), a freshman congressman. In the middle of the government shutdown that he had helped bring on, Yoho is reading texts off his personal cellphone.
Here’s another. “It just says, ‘Shutdown,’ ” Yoho said. “With a smiley face.”
A year ago, Yoho was a large-animal veterinarian in north Florida who had never held elected office. Today, he is part of one of the most influential voting blocs in the House of Representatives, the hard-line conservatives who pushed their own leadership into a risky showdown over President Obama’s health-care law.
Right now — with national parks closed and workers furloughed and cancer studies shut down — Yoho is supposed to be learning a hard lesson, about being careful what you wish for.
He is not.
Instead, Yoho has felt little pressure to change his mind, either from inside the Capitol or outside it. His leaders are still weak and uneasy. His constituents — or at least the small slice that bothers to write or call him — are mostly supportive. And his defiance has made him far more powerful than a freshman congressman has any right to expect.
So he’s already planning for a bigger act of defiance.
“You’re seeing the tremor before the tsunami here,” Yoho said. “I’m not going to raise the debt ceiling.”
Yoho, 58, is a genial man who has decorated his office with photos of his old patients: cattle. He won his office last year by defeating 23-year veteran Rep. Cliff Stearns (Fla.) in a GOP primary, and then cruising to victory in a deep-red district. His slogan was “. . . had enough?”
Today, Yoho compares his role in the American political system to the role that Fred Flintstone’s feet played, in Fred Flintstone’s car.
He is the squealing brake.
“I see one side of our government, or two-thirds of it, running 100 miles an hour toward socialism,” Yoho said, meaning Obama and the Democratic-led Senate. He knows people agree with him on that, he said, because he asks people about it at town-hall meetings: “ ‘How many people feel we’re heading into socialism?’ Hands go up.”
So, Yoho said, conservatives “are like Fred and Barney in the Flintstone-mobile, trying to stop that.” This year, that meant trying to defund Obama’s health-care law, even at the risk of shutting down the government.
Then the government shut down.
Yoho’s own son Tyler was furloughed from his job in the office of Rep. Robert Pittenger (R-N.C.). And, in Yoho’s small office suite, some of the messages from constituents began to take a dark turn.
“As it’s gone on, the cursing has gotten a little bit worse,” said Omar Raschid, Yoho’s deputy chief of staff, conceded Wednesday.
“I [expletive] hate you,” a constituent from Gainesville, Fla., wrote Wednesday, under the subject line “You sucking at life.” “You have ruined everything this party used to stand for and I [expletive] hate you for that.”
The calls were sometimes just as bad.
“He hates poor people and old people. How could you work for such a man?” somebody told staffer Brittany Posobiec. The caller said the Affordable Care Act would help those groups and that the shutdown would make their lives worse. The caller said Posobiec needed to reexamine her “life’s path” since it had led her to Yoho’s office.
Posobiec responded coolly, “Thank you for giving us a call today.” But the week’s calls were negative enough that she put up a sign on her cubicle — “Brittany’s Win Column” — so she could focus on the positive things in her job (like convincing another caller that the flaws in Obamacare were worse than the caller thought).
All of this had been predicted by Democrats, and some Republicans, too: If a shutdown came, the hard-core conservatives would finally look upon their works and repent for not funding the government.
But Yoho has not changed his mind.
It was still worth it.
For one thing, Yoho still has not been punished for defying House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) on the shutdown. That was not surprising, since Yoho had defied Boehner in the debate over a strike on Syria, and nothing happened then. In fact, Yoho liked Boehner even better than ever: “We moved leadership. And leadership was willing to be moved.”
For another thing, the rest of the messages from Yoho’s constituents — 800 out of the 1,200 e-mails and faxes and calls — were from people who supported him. “Please hold firm,” someone from Newberry, Fla., wrote in an e-mail. “You will find that 40% of the government can shut down for the time being, without any impact outside Washington.”
Now, Yoho is ready for a bigger fight. He doesn’t want to raise the debt ceiling — ever again. The experts, and Republican leaders, say that would trigger a financial catastrophe.
But Yoho didn’t listen to them about the shutdown. And look how that turned out.
“I think we need to have that moment where we realize [we’re] going broke,” Yoho said. If the debt ceiling isn’t raised, that will sure as heck be a moment. “I think, personally, it would bring stability to the world markets,” since they would be assured that the United States had moved decisively to curb its debt.
In the middle of this defiance, the phone rings. Yoho takes it himself. “Hello, Congressman Yoho’s office.”
There’s a pause. “Do ya?” he says. Pause. “Mmm-hmm.”
It’s a constituent, Greg from Gainesville, who is telling Yoho he’s wrong on the shutdown. There are people in Yoho’s district losing aid and pay because of the government shutdown, Greg says. It’s time to pass a “clean” funding bill and reopen the government.
“I mean, we do have a lot of need all over the area,” Yoho told him, sounding sympathetic. “And we’re working on getting something resolved here, as fast as we can.”
He hung up. So what was that about? Is Yoho really working to get this shutdown resolved as fast as he can?
Yoho said nothing had changed. He would not give another inch.
“Is there any more the Republicans can do?” he said. “I guess, encourage [Democrats] to come to the table” and compromise, he said.
What’s idiocy is thinking that someone’s opinion, one not necessarily beyond the pale like not raising the debt ceiling, is idiocy. Not necessarily my position-just a comment on idiocy. The government has more than enough revenue to pay its debts; it’s just a question of allocating that revenue.
😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉
Finally stopped laughing (whew!). Yoho’s position IS beyond the pale, so your comment reflects poorly on yourself.
My reply is silence!
Reply? There was no question!
I don’t know what lefties are complaining about. An O admin advisor (Jarrett?) wants the shutdown to continue because it will supposedly hurt the GOP. People are blaming the Tea Party for this shutdown and, as a result, the hardcore right wing wackos are turning the Repub Party into a regional party that will never win the WH again. So eventually liberals will control the government and be able to implement every nutty program they want.
Or will this happen?
Since everything this WH says must be 100% calculated in an attempt to keep the low info. voters happy, I think one should look for the reason the WH said this and not so much at what he said.
*she?
Toadsly! Any word on whether “Doc Martin” will air tonight?
Doc Martin is scheduled from 9:00-10:00PM. on my !3.1 EPG guide.
Thanks, Toasdsly! Hope it’s right.
Great “Doc Martin” episode tonight! Laughed so hard, several times, I feared I’d torn an ab.
Enjoyed “Last Tango in Halifax” on Sunday too — other than being annoyed at Celia’s prejudice, although admittedly she got rather blind-sided by the mews — but after having worked hard all day Sunday, I fell asleep during most of “The Paradise.” Did I miss much?
Ack! “…blind-sided by the NEWS…”
No lesbians, so far, in “The Paradise.” First episode: Innocent country girl moves to big city and lands job at innovative Victorian-era department store. Inscrutable, very, very handsome, widowed owner is sweet on her, and she seems to be receptive. Problem is he is wooing the daughter of wealthy blue blood who is lending him money for his business. Also, it has been hinted his wife’s accidental death was suspicious. Many subplots are brewing, mostly with her fellow store workers. Two hours flew by.
The last 90 minutes of “The Paradise” flew by for me too — zzzzzzzzzzzz 😉
Even just one hour of “The Paradise” last night was nearly sleep-inducing. Am just not warming up to it. (BTW, did you spot that Sarah Lancashire, who was Caroline in “Last Tango in Halifax,” also plays Miss Audrey in “The Paradise,” albeit with radically different costume and hairdo)?
UMOC, hope your recovery is continuing apace. We’d be glad to hear from you some more.
The government has been shut down for a week and the world hasn’t come to an end. I think now may be a good time to see if we can get 3/4 of the states to ratify an Amendment to the Constitution to make the shutdown permanent.
You say you’d never compromise
With the mystery tramp, but now you realize
He’s not selling any alibis
As you stare into the vacuum of his eyes
And say do you want to make a deal?
Anger – denial – bargaining – depression – acceptance.
Some are at bargaining. Others remain in denial. Opposition is skewed. Blame is skewed. The public is behind them. It will be Romney in a landslide.
Float the amendment.
“Trainwreck”? The sixth stage is death.
How does it feel?
The U.S. Senate’s leading Democrat found himself in embarrassingly hot water Wednesday, after dismissing the idea of funding children’s cancer research through the government shutdown.
‘If you can help one child, why won’t you do it?’ asked CNN reporter Dana Bash.
‘Why, why, why would we want to do that?’ countered Reid.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2442195/Why-want–Harry-Reid-dismisses-funding-childrens-cancer-research-separately-rest-government.html#ixzz2gzsHDcYV
Tourist, the GOP lost a prez election. When Bush was prez did you believe he should get everything he wanted just because he was prez?
And the obligatory answer (even though I admittedly had to Google your lyrics)
Like a rolling stone?
“The Radical Christian Right and the War on Government,” by Chris Hedges:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_radical_christian_right_and_the_war_on_government_20131006
There is a desire felt by tens of millions of Americans, lumped into a diffuse and fractious movement known as the Christian right, to destroy the intellectual and scientific rigor of the Enlightenment, radically diminish the role of government to create a theocratic state based on “biblical law,” and force a recalcitrant world to bend to the will of an imperial and “Christian” America. Its public face is on display in the House of Representatives. This ideology, which is the driving force behind the shutdown of the government, calls for the eradication of social “deviants,” beginning with gay men and lesbians, whose sexual orientation, those in the movement say, is a curse and an illness, contaminating the American family and the country. Once these “deviants” are removed, other “deviants,” including Muslims, liberals, feminists, intellectuals, left-wing activists, undocumented workers, poor African-Americans and those dismissed as “nominal Christians”—meaning Christians who do not embrace this peculiar interpretation of the Bible—will also be ruthlessly repressed. The “deviant” government bureaucrats, the “deviant” media, the “deviant” schools and the “deviant” churches, all agents of Satan, will be crushed or radically reformed. The rights of these “deviants” will be annulled. “Christian values” and “family values” will, in the new state, be propagated by all institutions. Education and social welfare will be handed over to the church. Facts and self-criticism will be replaced with relentless indoctrination.
U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz—whose father is Rafael Cruz, a rabid right-wing Christian preacher and the director of the Purifying Fire International ministry—and legions of the senator’s wealthy supporters, some of whom orchestrated the shutdown, are rooted in a radical Christian ideology known as Dominionism or Christian Reconstructionism. This ideology calls on anointed “Christian” leaders to take over the state and make the goals and laws of the nation “biblical.” It seeks to reduce government to organizing little more than defense, internal security and the protection of property rights. It fuses with the Christian religion the iconography and language of American imperialism and nationalism, along with the cruelest aspects of corporate capitalism. The intellectual and moral hollowness of the ideology, its flagrant distortion and misuse of the Bible, the contradictions that abound within it—its leaders champion small government and a large military, as if the military is not part of government—and its laughable pseudoscience are impervious to reason and fact. And that is why the movement is dangerous.
The cult of masculinity, as in all fascist movements, pervades the ideology of the Christian right. The movement uses religion to sanctify military and heroic “virtues,” glorify blind obedience and order over reason and conscience, and pander to the euphoria of collective emotions. Feminism and homosexuality, believers are told, have rendered the American male physically and spiritually impotent. Jesus, for the Christian right, is a man of action, casting out demons, battling the Antichrist, attacking hypocrites and ultimately slaying nonbelievers. This cult of masculinity, with its glorification of violence, is appealing to the powerless. It stokes the anger of many Americans, mostly white and economically disadvantaged, and encourages them to lash back at those who, they are told, seek to destroy them. The paranoia about the outside world is fostered by bizarre conspiracy theories, many of which are prominent in the rhetoric of those leading the government shutdown. Believers, especially now, are called to a perpetual state of war with the “secular humanist” state. The march, they believe, is irreversible. Global war, even nuclear war, is the joyful harbinger of the Second Coming. And leading the avenging armies is an angry, violent Messiah who dooms billions of apostates to death.
Dominionists believe they are engaged in an epic battle against the forces of Satan. They live in a binary world of black and white. They feel they are victims, surrounded by sinister groups bent on their destruction. They have anointed themselves as agents of God who alone know God’s will. They sanctify their rage. This rage lies at the center of the ideology. It leaves them sputtering inanities about Barack Obama, his corporate-sponsored health care reform bill, his alleged mandated suicide counseling or “death panels” for seniors under the bill, his supposed secret alliance with radical Muslims, and “creeping socialism.” They see the government bureaucracy as being controlled by “secular humanists” who want to destroy the family and make war against the purity of their belief system. They seek total cultural and political domination.
All ideological, theological and political debates with the radical Christian right are useless. It cares nothing for rational thought and discussion. Its adherents are using the space within the open society to destroy the open society itself. Our naive attempts to placate a movement bent on our destruction, to prove to it that we too have “values,” only strengthen its supposed legitimacy and increase our own weakness.
Dominionists have to operate, for now, in what they see as the contaminated environment of the secular, liberal state. They work with the rest of us only because they must. Given enough power—and they are working hard to get it—any such cooperation will vanish. They are no different from the vanguard described by Lenin or the Islamic terrorists who shaved off their beards, adopted Western dress and watched pay-for-view pornography in their hotel rooms the night before hijacking a plane for a suicide attack. The elect alone, like the Grand Inquisitor, are sanctioned to know the truth. And in the pursuit of their truth they have no moral constraints.
I spent two years inside the Christian right in writing my book “American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America.” I attended services at megachurches across the country, went to numerous lectures and talks, sat in on creationist seminars, attended classes on religious proselytizing and conversion, spent weekends at “right-to-life” retreats and interviewed dozens of followers and leaders of the movement. Though I was sympathetic to the financial dislocation, the struggles with addictions, the pain of domestic and sexual violence, and the deep despair that drew people to the movement, I was also acutely aware of the dangerous ideology these people embraced. Fascist movements begin as champions of civic improvement, communal ideals, moral purity, strength, national greatness and family values. These movements attract, as has the radical Christian right, those who are disillusioned by the collapse of liberal democracy. And our liberal democracy has collapsed.
We have abandoned our poor and working class. We have created a government monster that sucks the marrow out of our bones to enrich and empower the oligarchic and corporate elite. The protection of criminals, whether in war or on Wall Street, is part of our mirage of law and order. We have betrayed the vast and growing underclass. Most believers within the Christian right are struggling to survive in a hostile world. We have failed them. Their very real despair is being manipulated and used by Christian fascists such as the Texas senator. Give to the working poor a living wage, benefits and job security and the reach of this movement will diminish. Refuse to ameliorate the suffering of the poor and working class and you ensure the ascendancy of a Christian fascism.
The Christian right needs only a spark to set it ablaze. Another catastrophic act of domestic terrorism, hyperinflation, a series of devastating droughts, floods, hurricanes or massive wildfires or another financial meltdown will be the trigger. Then what is left of our anemic open society will disintegrate. The rise of Christian fascism is aided by our complacency. The longer we fail to openly denounce and defy bankrupt liberalism, the longer we permit corporate power to plunder the nation and destroy the ecosystem, the longer we stand slack-jawed before the open gates of the city waiting meekly for the barbarians, the more we ensure their arrival.
How I know I don’t have to read a word of your post
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Hedges#cite_note-socialist-3
In his December 29, 2008, column for Truthdig, Hedges stated that “the inability to articulate a viable socialism has been our gravest mistake. It will ensure, if this does not soon change, a ruthless totalitarian capitalism.”[
Damn it Pd, I was just about to post the same thing. Hedges is a self-described Socialist, and an Obama critic who supported the Green Party candidate for president and spoke at their convention, as well as a former NYT reporter who”was asked to leave.
But, despite all this Minx, I found your post and his article to be sooo enlightening. But, as I said before and you commented about it, I have trouble multi-tasking so please advise. Should I be more concerned about global warming or the Christian Right-which is the most immediate threat and which is the gravest.
Words scare you. Try ideas sometime. From the Truthdig article:
(Quote)
We eat corporate food. We buy corporate clothes. We drive corporate cars. We buy our vehicular fuel and our heating oil from corporations. We borrow from corporate banks. We invest our retirement savings with corporations. We are entertained, informed and branded by corporations. We work for corporations . . . .
“By now the [commercial] revolution has deprived the mass of consumers of any independent access to the staples of life: clothing, shelter, food, even water,” Wendell Berry wrote in “The Unsettling of America.” “Air remains the only necessity that the average user can still get for himself . . . . Commercial conquest is far more thorough and final than military defeat.”
(Unquote)
He’s talking about a culture of dependency.
Okay, Tourist, I’m not just going to call you, I’m going all in. Corporate conquest, commercial conquest, culture of dependency. You’ve got to be kidding! At least we have a choice, almost all the time, between and among corporations. Culture of dependency-try substituting government for corporation.
Government or corporations? Why is it one or the other? Continuing:
(Quote)
The corporation is designed to make money without regard to human life, the social good or impact on the environment . . . . A corporation that attempts to engage in social responsibility . . . can be sued by shareholders.
Robert Monks, the investment manager, says in [the 2003 documentary film “The Corporation”]: “The corporation is an externalizing machine . . . .There isn’t any question of malevolence or of will. The enterprise has within it . . . those characteristics that enable it to do that for which it was designed.”
Ray Anderson, the CEO of Interface Corp., . . . calls the corporation a “present day instrument of destruction” because of its compulsion to “externalize any cost that an unwary or uncaring public will allow it to externalize.”
(Unquote)
He’s talking about trust.
Trust? And you trust the government more why? How do corporations make a profit? Do they do it by forcing people to buy an overpriced, crappy product? No. Who is forcing us to buy and overpriced, crappy product? Well, that would be your Lord and Savior
You mean the black guy?
QED
So you’re done?
I am confused about why you inserted O’s color into the conversation. After losing every argument we have ever had, you assert that people only oppose him for one reason. I thought that is what you were doing here. Therefore, argument over
I’m talking about dependency, Tourist, that is, the culture of. Governments not corporations do that, the taking away of initiative, accountability, personal responsibility, etc.
As SCOTUS said, corporations are people. I don’t know whether you have experience in experience (I assume you’ve been screwed over many times) but don’t swallow all the b.s. “some” corporations do make decisions with their long-term (as well as short-term) interests in mind. Concerning the quote about corporations engaging in social responsibility can be sued by shareholders, be advised that corporations contribute many hundreds of millions to charity, for their long-term interests or whatever without being sued (and every court would say its within management discretion. Why would you, a learned and I think reasonable man, quote this without regard to human life, social good or concern for the environment bullshit (please spare me the examples).
You worry about the corporations and global warming and when I worry about something, which I don’t usually do, it will be about the government-not because they are evil people but because they are too often wrong for the power they possess. Actually, I’m not even worried about the government, especially having recently had dinner with my Indian friend and having discussed and agreed about karma (to some extent anyway).
oops! “in corporations” not “in experience”.
Oh, the horror! And a Pittsburgher, too! “Once on Food Stamps, Now He’s a ‘Genius’ — Dancer and MacArthur fellow Kyle Abraham talks to The Root about how his life story informs his work”:
http://www.theroot.com/views/once-food-stamps-now-hes-genius
“…It is overwhelming because his story is simply awe-inspiring. He once scraped by on food stamps and was wondering how to pay off student loans before the call came. Indeed, his fortune was catapulted by a deep dedication to dance and tightly choreographed moves. He is founder and artistic director of Kyle Abraham/Abaham.In.Motion
‘When I first started dancing, I knew I was interested in choreography,’ said the 36-year-old Brooklyn, N.Y., resident. He grew up on the hardscrabble streets of Pittsburgh, Pa., and hails from a close-knit, working-class family. His father passed away in 2001; he maintains close ties with his mother and sister”…
Devildog, I present the Hedges and Berry argument (6:42 PM) that there is a culture of dependency on corporations. You say (7:32 PM) I should substitute “government” for “corporations.” I ask (7:37 PM) why it has to be one or the other. You answer (8:16 PM): “Governments not corporations.”
Obviously, you are right. It’s not possible that there is a web of dependencies or even two, or that in the 21st century this might be useful. Government bad. Corporations good. I wish I’d seen it sooner. And if Obama would simply adopt the tea-party agenda as his own, Republicans would be willing to “negotiate.”
Pittsburgh Dad, same thing. You trust corporations. You don’t trust government. You must not vote. I do, and I’m a taxpayer. It’s as much my government as they are my corporations. I trust and don’t trust both. Yes, that makes it complicated.
People including me oppose various things Obama does for various reasons related to the things. It’s people who oppose everything he does, who brand everything a “failure,” that I question.
“Lord and Savior”?
As a commenter at TPM put it:
(Quote) They will default, they will continue and they will not stop. They’re drunk on this power they perceive they have. It’s not going to end in the Congress or with some vote. Remember the tea party is on a quest to save America. They truly think that an uprising is all they have left at this point. Some say don’t give them that much credit. Look at history – when you mix fear, guns, religion and political power the end result was never good. I think we’re on track to violence not seen in some time in U.S. history. I think it’s going to take a major shock to the system to make average America wake up to what’s really going on with the tea party. (Unquote)
“Remember the tea party is on a quest to save America.”
Or, as Michele Bachmann just said: “We are in God’s End Times . . . . We need to rejoice.”
Side A thinks Side B wants a socialist dictatorship. Side B thinks Side A is insane.
Side B is in a position to *know* that it does not want a socialist dictatorship.
Side A is in a position to *think* it is not insane.
It’s not really funny, but the panic is. As I occasionally say, make lemonade.
Tourist, don’t put words or thoughts in my mouth or “brain”. I said nothing about socialist dictatorship nor trust corporations nor corporations good or government bad or the tea party or negotiate or anything about this mess we are in (which like other matters is exaggerated by both parties to raise money and rev up the base). As is my want, I merely pointed out the ridiculousness of these brilliant authors that both you and Minx always quote and link. It’s the corporations we need to fear. Government can’t control them so it needs to go to war and dismantle them. Cruz and Bachmann are the greatest threats to America since… Well, maybe of all times.
For example, culture of dependence! Corporations create that-absurd. Government-one certainly could rationally argue that, right or wrong.
TPM and you can find the bomb shelters or try to alert “the people” as to the true Armegeddon threat. Relax baby, relax-after you tell me how the Germans relaxed to Hitler.
FWIW, I think (know) Side B is insane. Remember who it is that is Living In Reality.
FWIW 2, if you are asserting that I ‘fully’ trust corporations, that is a false assertion. What is true is that I trust corporations more than I trust the government – much more. Corporations are beholden to their stockholders but the goal is to maximize profit. If the corporation doesn’t provide a good or service that the public demands, what will happen to its profit?
The government is not accountable. It can’t be. There is no cost function. Once a program is implemented, no matter how wasteful, it is never eliminated. The TN Valley Authority and the Johnstown Flood Tax should have been, at best, temporary but they exist to this day. And why is that? It’s because once the govt has control, it is almost impossible to take it back no matter how inefficient the regulation is. This is why O won’t delay the individual mandate. He wants to get people hooked on the subsidies. When Ocare fails, the govt won’t be able to take away the subsidies, so they will have no choice but to go to single-payer.
BTW, I do vote. I vote for people that will promote policies that will lead to real economic growth and implement a foreign policy that demonstrates why the US was an exceptional country until ‘you know who; began to fundamentally transform it.
The idea that those who oppose O do so because of his color is a mystery to me. I hated Clinton as a person – rapist and likely involved in some really bad things before he was governor.
But he deregulated the telecommunications and finance industries (dereg that ultimately led to 2008). He signed off on NAFTA and welfare reform. These are all conservative policies. He said this
If O supports similar policies to the ones Clinton AGREED to, I would support him more. But O doesn’t want negotiation. It’s his way or the highway. O wants more regulation, more spending, bigger government. He wants a blank check. If the GOP wants to continue as a national party, they best not give in. If they do, many will lose their seats in Congress. If some of those seats go to Dems and they get control both the WH and Congress, maybe the low info. voters will wake up when it all falls apart. I have to admit I don’t have much faith. Low info. voters are low info. for a reason
Well, Pd, what is a mystery to me is why it is a mystery to you that opposition to Obama is claimed to be race-based since conservatives have been accused of racism for so many of the things they support or oppose, even before Obama “exploded on the scene”. Welfare reform (support) and affirmative action(oppose) for example.
Another good point DD. Because I could care less about O’s race, I just never bother thinking about whether it affects how I think. I mean I would support Condi Rice, Ben Carson, any other minority that supports individual freedom and has the credentials to be prez. But to lefties, Rice and Carson are House N’s.
Liberals partake of the worst kind of racism – the racism associated with low expectations. They do it for a very cynical reason – votes
In the beginning was eating, whatever was at hand. Gathering was recognized. The day was scheduled. Storage arose. Hunting was perfected. Hunts were organized. Agriculture was discovered. Specialization emerged. Trade followed. Money was invented. The measure of “growth” – making money – was conceived. “Eureka!” said economists. “What more could there be? It’s the end of history! There are no worlds left to conquer!”
Government imposes costs on corporations through, for example, product-safety and environmental-protection requirements, safety-net systems, and so on, and the argument is that those are also costs to society.
Corporations unburdened by such requirements, the argument goes, hold their costs down, generate more growth, and externalize to society the poverty, health and cleanup costs.
Either way, society pays. One way, it avoids the poverty, sickness, injury and pollution.
Management 101: Prevention is cheaper than correction.
“Richest nation in the history of the Milky Way”? Don’t worry. It gets better.
When an irresistible force meets conservatives yelling “stop,” progressivism wins every time. There is no such thing as an immovable object.
Flail away!
As I said above – low info. forever
Poverty rate is higher today than it was in 1965
Better that future MacArthur “genius” award winner Kyle Abraham should’ve starved than received food stamps?
In all honesty, yes. How many lives are lost as a result of the slow growth that results from failed progressive policies?
And how do you know he would have starved to death without food stamps?
Don’t put words in my mouth. I didn’t say starved “to death,” just starved, as in malnourished.
You’re right but that that actually makes my position stronger
“How many lives are lost as a result of the slow growth . . . ?”
None. Think it through.
I have but apparently you haven’t. Remember we talked about how you still don’t understand the concept of opportunity costs
I am sorry, you are right. I keep forgetting in liberalworld, everything is free.
None of which suggests you understand your own sentence.
I taught the concept for 5 years. I studied economics for 10 years. You have no clue how the economy works and yet you claim it is me who doesn’t understand the concept. This is why I love liberals.
You must be in a tizzy of the nomination of Janet Yellen to head the Fed, since she’s an economic “dove” who’s genuinely concerned about unemployment.
No one O appoints is ‘genuinely concerned about unemployment
“No one O appoints is ‘genuinely concerned about unemployment’”
That from the person who wrote: “If a recession is avoided, O can take the credit. The only hope is that . . . the urate increases anyway.”
The issue is that you believe progressivism has the lowest opportunity costs (I believe you actually think there are no opportunity costs to progressive policies but I will let that go for now). However, real world experience clearly shows that progressivism leads to much higher poverty rates than capitalism does. I mean nobody was tearing down the Berlin Wall on the West German side.
Sorry. That’s not it either. Try again.
No need
Good point, tourist-Mgt 101, prevention is cheaper than correction. And that’s why corporations practice “prevention”, both for short-term and long-term interests. Even so, no one argues against “reasonable” regulation, the bugaboo being what is reasonable and what is excessive, that which brings no value to society. Not only does “excessive” regulation bring no value but it is counter-productive. Of course, to you and yours, excessive is not part of your vocabulary. The answer, to everything, is always spend more, regulate more.
Stop, you say. Conservative/progressive. What a joke! Spend, regulate, Obamacare is the limit of your progressiveness and everything conservatives propose to amend or change a broken system is DOA.
Pittsburgh Dad,
You at 12:54 AM: “I taught the concept for 5 years. I studied economics for 10 years. You have no clue how the economy works and yet you claim it is me who doesn’t understand the concept. This is why I love liberals.”
Thank you. I’m trying to help you here.
Yes, indeed, you seem not to understand a certain concept. It is not the concept you are focused on.
Trust me when I say I don’t need your help. I would never need your help.
Two worlds, one where slow growth creates more poverty and a higher likelihood of deaths, esp. among children. Another with higher growth and less poverty where the likelihood of death is much greater. The first is your world
You guys say you want to eliminate poverty but progressive policies lead to more poverty (you know, the whole negative unintended consequences of a failed philosophy thing).
Another with higher growth and less poverty where the likelihood of death is much *lower (whoops)
It’s hiding in plain sight. Why don’t you sleep on it?
Devildog,
You (11:30 PM) are missing or ignoring the “externalization” aspect. One way or another, society bears all of its costs. What varies are (1) the apportionment, and (2) the total.
TEPCO’s objective is to avoid liquidation or nationalization, while getting the government (society) to take over at Fukushima (externalization), so that management can turn its attention back to self-preservation and making money for the shareholders.
If a company’s actions have victims (human, environmental) – “liberals believe in success without victims” – even if the market puts that company out of business, the damage must be repaired, paid for by the rest of society. Moreover, there will be another company (and in parallel are) doing everything it can to similarly externalize the costs of the risks it creates, so that they, too, are ultimately borne by the rest of society.
What does that mean? Money-money can be paid. Health and safety are trickier. How does society “pay” for dirty air? If corporations are people, shouldn’t they bear personal responsibility? Why should they be allowed to distort the apportionment by passing the buck to the rest of us? All the more because, as we both said, preventing the damage in the first place is cheaper.
How did I give you the idea I think corporations are the enemy?
The business of America is business. The meaning of America is more.
Tourist, the enemy is the the one who creates (or attempts to create) a culture of dependency. It seems that you adopted the point of view that it’s corporations. Government-some do, some don’t.
In the past, it was cheaper to pollute, now it isn’t. Some regulations were/are needed. Some are excessive. We need the right balance. Keystone pipeline?
The meaning of America? Keep searching for that and the meaning of life. I’ll just live it.
Pittsburgh Dad,
Good morning! Sleep well? Maybe not. Anyway, please don’t give up. I want us to understand each other. Once more, okay?
You at 11:39 PM: “How many lives are lost as a result of the slow growth . . . ?”
You at 1:17 AM: “. . . one [world] where slow growth creates more poverty . . . .”
This is your field, not mine, but isn’t this basic? Growth does not create poverty. Slow growth (slower than?) does not create poverty. The pie gets bigger with growth. All boats should rise. Lives are not lost as a result of growth, relatively slow or otherwise, or a bigger pie. The answer to your question is “none.”
Lives are lost as a result . . . (final hint) . . . of . . . decisions . . . by people with free will . . . to accept . . . .
Try it from there. It’s not your “jungle” philosophy, of course, but we can agree to disagree about that.
===
Minx at 11:29 PM: “Better that [he] should’ve starved than received food stamps?”
You at 11:39 PM: “In all honesty, yes.”
Well, Tourist, one asks a stupid question, one gets a stupid answer.
Minx at 11:29 PM: “Better that [he] should’ve starved than received food stamps?”
PD at 11:39 PM: “In all honesty, yes.”
That’s like the tea-party mob who cheered the idea of someone who is stricken on the street and has no health insurance being left untreated (and allowed to die).
To yours of 10:15, my response is silence and a referral to my post of 9:27.
My question still stands – how many have lost their lives from the slow growth as a result of failed progressive policies?
Suppose 2 worlds. Everything else equal, what world are you in more danger of dying? A world with a growth rate of 2% or 4%? You want to live in the world where there is 2% growth
Given this, we only have a stupid question.
Most small businesses — that holy grail of conservatism — fail, and of the rest, most remain small. Very very few grow significantly. So much for the myth of small business as the salvation of our economy.
So both small businesses and corporations should be outlawed. Do you really want to live in the USSR? You should really check into Chile’s immigration laws.
If anyone’s in touch with Slavic Diva, please wish her a Happy Giuseppe Verdi Bicentennial from me 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 I remember how much she loved his Requiem (ironic that he was an atheist).
Relayed your message to Diva, via FB. She was pleased and inquired as to your well-being. I informed her you comment on this blog site.
Thanks, Toadsly! Please tell Diva that I’m plodding along through life, and things are about the same Chez Minx.
You guys are making the ridiculous assumption that someone would die without food stamps. No evidence that this would occur
Could be just the opposite pd since so many food stamps are used to purchase booze and butts. Doesn’t mean we should get rid of food stamps-but make sure they go only to the “right” people and only for the purpose intended.
Food stamps don’t cover alcohol or tobacco.
Thanks Minx. I didn’t know that food stamps couldn’t be used for alcohol or cigarettes. Let’s work together to eliminate those dastardly (obviously erroneous) rumors that many people have figured out how to scam the system and use the stamps for those purposes. The tea partners must be stopped from impugning the integrity of people receiving food stamps. Will you join me in that effort?
I don’t know, Dog. Who’s scamming, the shopper or the store? It would seem obvious enough to use your food stamps for food and your cash for booze and cigarettes. If you’re using the stamps for booze and cigarettes, too, maybe you don’t have any cash and are addicted. Anyway, when it comes to ripping off the food-stamp program as well as unemployment, there’s someone better you could ask.
Both are scamming of course. Ask him yourself. Maybe, maybe. Probably as simple as the store owner keying in some food code in his register. Doesn’t sound very complicated.
As I have said before, it doesn’t matter how much of a failure a govt program is, once implemented, it will never be eliminated. As Minx demonstrated, you can always find one person who ‘benefits’ from the program. To liberals. that’s enough
Another thing that doesn’t matter is how much of a success a program is. You will call it a failure. Honestly, that makes you sound a tad partisan.
And, Tourist, I await your recital of liberal programs that were failures, including whether those programs are still in existence.
Sorry Tourist, I forgot. Good morning!
Hey there, Devildog!
The point is, what’s failure?
Implement a program with a purpose and what might be the result? It could work as advertised. There could be clear benefits suggesting doing even more. Improvements could be less than expected. There could me mixed results. It might do nothing significant at all. It might make the situation worse.
The last two are failures. Kill them. Learn from them. Learn from the others, too.
The mantra of “failed liberal policies” is great for liberals because it’s so self-evidently asinine. Nothing argues for single-payer better than a conservative repeating that 30 million remain uninsured under Obamacare, with no need even to remind people, although I think we should, that it was conservative “input” to Obamacare that resulted in 30 million being left out.
Liberals want to solve problems. Conservatives see no need. Liberals want to make things better. Conservatives like things the way they are.
I’m for ending a failed program as a practical matter. “You guys” are for ending any program as a philosophical matter.
OMG!!!!! LOL! We have a winner – this is the best post ever!!!!!!!!!!!! If I wasn’t convinced before that liberalism is a complete failure (and I admit I am real close), this post leaves no doubt
All of those unemployed and uninsured are completely conservative’s. If we just spent $1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 more, everybody would have a job and everybody would have health insurance.
—-Conservatives like things the way they are.
Asinine doesn’t begin to describe this comment
conservative’s *fault
Ok Tourist, I will accept your explanation-that there hasn’t been even a single failure since you either cannot or will not identify one. No matter how much of a success a program is, Pd calls it a failure which makes him a “tad” partisan and no mater how much of a failure a program is, (for a myriad of reasons), you call it a success which makes you…
Liberals want to solve problems, conservatives see no need, says you. Get off this kick! Medicare, Social Security and Obamacare for three where you guys pay lip service to the problem. There are many more where only we offer solutions but you claim no real problem.
Progressives-get real.
“no mater how much of a failure a program is, (for a myriad of reasons), you call it a success”
Anybody, please — it doesn’t have to be Devildog — could you point quickly to where I said that? I’m heading out again. Thanks!
You don’t need to say it.
Well, Tourist, my point is you consider every liberal program to have been a success and here’s my reasoning.
I asked you to identify any liberal programs you deemed to be failures and you didn’t identify even one. You said a failed program is one either that made it worse or accomplished nothing significant. To repeat, you didn’t identify any such program. Instead you gave reasons why a program is not a failure, I.e., is successful, even though it may not have fully achieved its stated purpose in that it could have taught us something or some other noble achievement. Since you didn’t or couldn’t name a failure, and since we can/should learn from every experience, every program, in your opinion and reasoning, can be described as a success.
I believe we have had this disagreement before but you believe that if we have a problem, doing something is better than doing nothing-e.g., Obamacare. I respectfully disagree!
“You don’t need to say it.”
You mean to be accused of saying it? Yes, we know.
Tourist, don’t you remember how we agreed that about 90% of govt programs are a complete waste
I take that to be honest confusion on your part.
Pittsburgh Dad,
Summarized out of mercy: You asked (October 9, 2013 at 11:39 PM) how many have died as a result of slow growth. I answered “none” and explained in a number of steps that growth means a bigger pie and that no one dies from that.
Your response now (October 10, 2013 at 6:15 PM) is: “My question still stands – how many have lost their lives from the slow growth as a result of failed progressive policies?”
I am sorely disappointed.
The answer is still “none” and your 6:17 PM follow-up is similarly wrong. 4% growth may be better than 2% growth in a hypothetical choice of worlds – which was not your original question – but anyone in danger of dying is not further endangered by growth on any scale.
This really is basic. I am not an economist as you are, and even I understand it.
Tourist-growth meaning a bigger pie is synonymous with a rising tide lifts all ships. You would argue not necessarily so and I would respond historically yes though the bigger pie might not be distributed in the manner which you would prefer (while there might be individual exceptions).
Devildog,
Yes. We both understand this. It’s only Pittsburgh Dad who is so determined to throw “failed progressive policies” into every conversation that he has convinced himself that growth is bad, that growth kills.
(The context is poverty, obviously.)
Wrong, what you don’t understand is that more growth kills fewer people
And DD, I put the JFK line in my response below without reading your post.
And as I said above, the poverty rate is higher today than in 1965 – you know before the failed Great Society Programs were implemented
And poverty today doesn’t mean you are living under a bridge. Most poor own cars, TVs, cell phones – things that ‘middle class’ people in many other countries can only dream of having.
Uh, no you don’t. You guys believe the same amount of output is produced no matter what tax rates are and no matter how generous the welfare state is. This ignores the simple concept of incentives. This is why the USSR failed and why western European Social Democracies have consistently higher urates and slower growth than the US has experienced. You do remember the food lines in the old USSR, right? Since everybody was ‘guaranteed’ the income necessary to be ‘middle class’, nobody had to worry about how much they produced. Do you think more people starved in the US or in the USSR?
Now I know the response – O isn’t Stalin. It doesn’t matter. Russians respond to incentives the same way Americans do
You guys assume everything is the same (same output is produced) and lets just give people ‘money’ to pay for it. But the same amount of output isn’t produced. The USSR proved this to be true.
The idea that the Tea Party doesn’t want a safety net is beyond ridiculous. But it goes back to what JFK said – a rising tide raises all boats.
Would you mind elaborating? This is interesting.
Opportunity costs
A lot of things cost, not just opportunity.
How do you respond to the fact that the poverty rate was higher in 1965 than it is today and that it decreased during the Reagan recovery (significantly) and has increased during O’s (ahem) recovery?
The point that I have tried to make for over a year to Tourist is that there is no evidence that progressivism decreases poverty. In fact, the evidence shows the direct opposite – USSR, Europe and what has happened when the welfare state has been expanded (LBJ, O and Carter) versus when it has been contracted (Reagan and Bubba) in the US
Although contraction has just meant slower growth, not actually a decrease.
Just as slower growth does not actually kill.
This tete a tete just “kills” me. Interesting op-Ed page in today’s PG. Unusual for this paper, side by side articles (I do mean side by side) that explains a lot, with a third not unusual of a moronic, class-warfare article by a bleeding heart, social “scientist” (who could learn something by reading Will’s column).
In the spirit of the falling tree in the forest: If no one mentions socioeconomic class inequalities, or “class warfare,” does that mean they don’t exist?
OMG Minx, are there really socioecomic class inequalities? We must make everyone equal in every aspect of life. I asked Jesus and “that’s what Jesus wants”.
Yep, progressives want everybody to be equal – equally poor
Then you must really LURRRVVVVE countries with the greatest wealth inequality — e.g., Russia (with its oligarchs; see below), banana republics… Heck, they’re more American than America 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉
“Russia Sees Staggering Income Inequality”:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=233472082
“The Occupy Wall Street movement called attention to the huge gap between the rich and poor in America. But when it comes to wealth inequality, the U.S. has nothing on Russia where 35 percent of the entire country’s wealth is owned by just 110 people. How on earth did a country go from communism to oligarchy so fast?…”
“…What happened right after the fall of the Soviet Union was the government needed to privatize quite dramatically and quite quickly because they needed revenue, and they were looking to just unload everything that they owned, which was everything. So many of the most prime factories and mines and very valuable sort of entities ended up in the hands of a few people who either had access to a lot of capital or had political clout. And these people ended up with these companies for very little money, and these companies generate billions of dollars a year in revenue. So they became very rich very quickly. And it’s held that way since the end of the Soviet Union…
“[A]ccording to the report, which was put out by Credit Suisse, basically 93.7 percent of the Russian population has wealth that’s measured at less than $10,000. So that’s almost the entire population. And then you have the, you know, the group that is worth more than a million dollars is literally .1 percent of the population. So you have 110 people who, according to Forbes, billionaires, and some of them go up to 18 billion, 17 billion. And you add them up, and that actually adds up to a substantial chunk of the overall wealth of the country, which is $1.2 trillion…”
Devildog,
I wish I could have been faster. There must be things we could discuss from George Will’s column over virtual beers. I just couldn’t figure out where to start. I don’t understand his point – literally. He seems to have resolved the assassination questions: Oswald acted alone for “small, squalid causes” and “altered the nation’s trajectory less by killing a president . . . .” After that, the idea seems to be, liberals blew it out of proportion.
Anecdotally, I recall my father, a Republican who voted for Nixon, crying in front of our TV for three or four days.
Another part that rang subjectively off was: “. . . the college-bound population bulge — baby boomers with their sense of entitlement and moral superiority, . . . .” That would be me and I know I felt no sense of entitlement or moral superiority yet.
Seriously, I don’t know if most of what Will is saying about liberalism is accurate or not – I’m not a scholar and Will is not unbiased – or what significance any of it might have, or even if what he is saying is bad, though Will clearly thinks it is, or, most of all, what any of it has to do with today.
So . . . honestly . . . I started clicking around to try to get a handle on it, and – bear with me, please – I encountered these:
“On April 19, 1969, during a parents’ weekend, over 80 members of Cornell’s Afro-American Society took over the student union building, Willard Straight Hall. The takeover was precipitated by increasing racial tension at the university and the students’ frustration with the administration’s lack of support for a black studies program. The specific catalysts for the takeover were a reprimand of three black students for an incident the previous December and a cross burning in front of the black women’s cooperative and other cases of alleged racism.” (Wiki, Cornell University Willard Straight Hall Takeover.)
(Quote) John M. Olin Foundation was an American grant-making foundation established in 1953 by John M. Olin, president of the Olin Industries chemical and munitions manufacturing businesses . . . . It made its last grant in the summer of 2005 and officially disbanded on November 29, 2005 . . . . “All in all, the Federalist Society has been one of the best investments the foundation ever made”, wrote the Foundation to its trustees in 2003.
The fund was largely inactive until 1969, when John M. Olin was disturbed by a building takeover at his alma mater, Cornell University. At the age of 80, he decided that he must pour his time and resources into preserving the free market system . . . . According to the official website, “the general purpose of the John M. Olin Foundation is to provide support for projects that reflect or are intended to strengthen the economic, political and cultural institutions upon which the American heritage of constitutional government and private enterprise is based . . . . William E. Simon [Nixon’s treasury secretary] served as president of the Foundation from 1977 until his death in 2000. He frequently discussed the foundation’s commitment to supporting the “counter-intelligentsia” . . . . James Piereson was the last executive director and secretary. (Unquote) (Wiki, John M. Olin Foundation.)
To be clear: I see nothing whatsoever wrong with the Olin Foundation, its mission, its actions or its personnel. It has a point of view, an agenda, as most do.
The aforementioned James Piereson wrote the 2007 book Will describes as a “profound meditation,” and I’m guessing the book grew out of this 2004 article, “Punitive Liberalism: What Reagan Vanquished”:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/245kubju.asp?page=1
“. . . the Punitive Liberals held that Americans had no right at all to feel pride in their country’s history or optimism about its future . . . .The Punitive Liberals felt that the purpose of national policy was to punish the nation for its crimes rather than to build a stronger America and a brighter future for all . . . . Fortunately for all of us, Ronald Reagan stepped into the void . . . .”
To which I’m thinking: Whaaaaaaat?
You might recall that earlier in this thread I said that the ultimate goal of economic conservatism is to eliminate legal rights and responsibilities, as well as all concepts of human rights and dignity, and replace them with pure power exercised in a hierarchy according to wealth.
I also said I made that up.
So I’m back to: What’s Will’s thing all about?
You mentioned people “who could learn something by reading Will’s column.” Maybe you could get the ball rolling.
Tourist, I’ll try to have something for you by the time you get up. If you’re still up now, any comment on Breuningsen and Carnes (who is kind of the reverse for requiring land-owning to vote-and one of the thingsWill was talking about-diversity uber alles).
P.S., Tourist. I said Carnes could learn something from reading Will’s column, but “people” can also.
George Will roots for the Cubs, proof positive that his judgment is not to be trusted.
Good morning, Tourist. Hope your weekend is off to a good start. As promised!
Kennedy, the man and the myth. Similarities to Obamama abound but that’s neither here nor there. But, to quote the Allman Bros., “that’s where it all begins”.
I’m not going to write a treatise but rather select a few lines from the Will column.
Punitive liberalism. The absurd “what might have beens”. Liberalism became less concerned with material well-being than with lifestyle and cultural issues such as feminism, abortion and sexual freedom (right up your alley, I think).
Liberals are now punitive progressives, with little in common with old-line liberals. First in foreign policy which led to so-called neocons and then to the concerns of “liberalism” mentioned above. What has ensued is a struggle for the hearts and minds of people that will continue for quite a while. As you have often asked, what kind of country are we and what kind do we want to be.
To yor whaaaat, I say yesssss!
Sorry but I missed your point about Cornell and the Olin Foundation.
Good evening, Devildog. I hope you enjoyed your dinner. TGIF?
I had no serious point about Cornell and Olin. I was sharing. I said I went clicking around. I thought it was interesting – interesting, amusing, funny, not significant – what fired Mr. Olin up at the age of 80: a student take-over of a building at his old school. But for that?
You quote Will’s “liberalism became” line. I had reacted to that one, too. The paragraph is: “Under Kennedy, liberalism began to become more stylistic than programmatic. After him — especially after his successor, Lyndon Johnson, a child of the New Deal, drove to enactment the Civil Rights Acts, Medicare and Medicaid — liberalism became less concerned with material well-being than with lifestyle and cultural issues such as feminism, abortion and sexual freedom.”
As I said – questioned – yesterday, is that, if true, even bad? It sounded to me as if liberalism was being accused of evolving, meeting needs and moving to the next. As for “such as feminism, abortion and sexual freedom,” what are “lifestyle”? That’s a standard label meaning “I don’t like it.”
Your “yessss!” to my “whaaaaat?”: You’re yessing this charge: “held that Americans had no right at all to feel pride in their country’s history or optimism about its future . . . . that the purpose of national policy was to punish the nation for its crimes rather than to build a stronger America and a brighter future for all”?
What can I say? I never did, nor was I exposed to anything like. I *was* exposed to the idea that there might be “more to” and “another side to” various stories.
‘Tis the weekend. I have a few plans. Today could hit 90 degrees.
Yessss! 90 degrees! Tokyo must be a “shining city” this morning.
More evidence of the expanding disrespect for our country and president being shown by countries around the world, including even our so-called friends.
Add Sweden to the list which, rather than awarding the Nobel Peace prize to Obama (for the second time) awarded it to the (un)distinguished Organization for the Protection of Chemical Weapons. How could they! The Nobel committee is just one of many Foundations taken over by the left that were funded by conservatives who are rolling over in their graves many times over.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2329556/How-JFK-secretly-ADMIRED-Hitler-Explosive-book-reveals-Presidents-praise-Nazis-travelled-Germany-Second-World-War.html
Tourist: Caught “Gravity” tonight. Good script; great casting and acting; extraordinary special effects. This is a film you must see on a large screen with a digital projector, preferably in 3D. For me, who really wasn’t that interested in seeing it, “Gravity” lived up to its hype – unlike “Forrest Gump” and “Shakespeare in Love.”
Toadsly, thank you for the confirmation. It opens here on, I think, December 13. Most American movies are shown with Japanese subtitles and that takes them time. Many TV shows are dubbed fully into Japanese (viewable as a choice) and that takes longer. I think people know generally by now what “Gravity” is about, but I will repeat my caution not to read too much. I know something I wish I did not. Everything suggests this is one of a kind. Just go!
I went to the Ocare website to get some pricing for insurance. To my surprise, even if I make $0, I have to pay a minimum of $200/mo (silver plan; 165 for bronze plan). If I make about 15/hr,, I have to pay 200 also. I am 46. For a 27 year old, the prices are 140/mo if you make 0 or 15/hr (120 for bronze plan). PA hasn’t accepted Medicaid.
I went to eHealth and there are plans for as low as 107/mo – prob not as good as the Ocare bronze plan. But there are also many plans for much less than 200/mo that I am almost certain cover what the silver plan does. Given that many 27 year olds currently have the option to buy a basic plan for 107/mo and have not done so because they feel they don’t need it, what is the likelihood they will pay 140/mo for even more coverage they won’t need or want
It isn’t whether O care will fail – it almost certainly will. Notice how the admin isn’t announcing enrollment numbers. They know what enrollment is – they ain’t using Commodore 64s. If it was good, they would be shouting it from the rooftops. The problem is if they get people hooked on the subsidies, they won’t be able to pull them back. This will mean single payer
Ocare will not be defunded – no chance. But the GOP must get the indiv mandate delayed for a year. I think the indiv mandate will have to be delayed. How can you force people to buy something if they can’t actually buy it?
“But the GOP must get the indiv mandate delayed for a year.”
===
“It is not surprising that some would have us stay where we are a little longer to rest, to wait. This country was conquered by those who moved forward. William Bradford, speaking in 1630 of the founding of the Plymouth Bay Colony, said that all great and honorable actions are accompanied with great difficulties, and both must be enterprised and overcome with answerable courage. If this capsule history of our progress teaches us anything, it is that man, in his quest for knowledge and progress, is determined and cannot be deterred. Those who came before us made certain that this country rode the first waves of the industrial revolutions, the first waves of modern invention, and the first wave of nuclear power, and this generation does not intend to founder in the backwash of the coming age. We mean to be a part of it. We mean to lead it. We choose to go to the Moon.”
All in the Valley of Death rode the six hundred
Forward the Light Brigade
Charge for the guns
Into the Valley of Death rode the six hundred
All honorable actions …
Not surprising Obama would have us stay where we are a little longer for a rest-for some but not others.
I believe I have come up with a solution to the Washington dispute. How does this sound.
Hail to the ‘skins
Hail victory
Brave ones off to war
Fight for old D.C.
That’s close enough to the current lyrics and the following stanzas could be changed accordingly. I noticed that the original lyrics were changed in the 80’s to make them less offensive. If this works, I should be sought after by the politicos.
‘I’m for ending a failed program as a practical matter. “You guys” are for ending any program as a philosophical matter.
Wouldn’t a philosophy based on real world experience reflect what is the best practical outcome?
Just asking.
Liberalism is based on an ideal. In an ideal world, what solutions to a problem should we implement? Conservatism is based on reality. Given reality, what is the best ‘practical’ solution to a problem. Conservatives understand that we will never reach the ideal. It’s not practical. Since liberals have no concept as to what is practical, the philosophy of progressivism, by definition, must be a failure. Progressivism is flailing about from one ‘solution’ to another (welfare, gun control, spending) trying to solve problems individually. In the real world, issues are related and attempting to implement one failed program (for example, welfare) to solve one problem (poverty) actually enhances that problem by perpetuating cycles of dependency which creates a permanent underclass which leads to the gun violence; which gun control legislation makes worse since the only people who will have guns would be criminals.
Devildog,
“Well, Tourist, my point is you consider every liberal program to have been a success and here’s my reasoning.”
After I noted gently that you attributed to me something I did not say, you come back and attribute it to me again, based, this time, on “reasoning.”
It’s plausible reasoning but it does not make you correct and I still didn’t say it.
“I asked you to identify any liberal programs you deemed to be failures and you didn’t identify even one.”
You did and I didn’t. You never told me why I might want to. Or maybe I’m not good at details or my memory is slipping and I couldn’t think of one at that moment. I tend to move on. If a program somewhere made some situation worse and is gone as a result, I probably *don’t* remember it, though I like to think I would acknowledge it if it were pointed out. Or maybe it’s still that question of what we mean by “failure” — or “program” for that matter.
But that was then (yesterday). I have evolved.
I was inspired by your “since we can/should learn from every experience, every program, in your opinion and reasoning, can be described as a success.”
Never mind again that that was you telling me what I think. I didn’t — I had not taken it that far — but I do now. There are no failures. There are only learning experiences. Learn and do better! Learn and do more! Yes! This is my position!
Enough with the negative waves!
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Failed government programs are learning experiences? Sort of like getting AIDS through unprotected sex is a learning experience.
“Failed government programs are learning experiences?”
Any rational citizen of any political persuasion who hopes for good government of any reasonable description would say “yes” to that. They might see the lessons differently – what to change, do differently, versus what should not have been done or ever attempted. The only people who could think there’d be nothing at all to learn from what worked and what didn’t are those opposed *to* government – preconceived, predetermined – people for whom no bathtub will ever be small enough.
‘Tis their right.
Meanwhile, in the 21st century, in civic discussions *about* government, seeking solutions to the problems *of* government, when they offer their views on what is best in and *for* government, consider their possible intentions and ask them to say “shibboleth.”
Liberals believe this because they believe that, in general, programs are beneficial so if 1 happens to fail, it’s a learning experience. Conservatives, rightly, see most govt programs, regulations, etc… as failures.
I am confused – ‘problems of government’? Aren’t the issues we are discussing problems of society? Again, just asking.
Shibboleth? Only in your deluded world Tourist. Only in your deluded world
Tourist, my putting words into your mouth and my “attack” of you was not meant as such-you should know better. Rather, it was a defense (not that he needs one from me) of your accusation that he is a “tad partisan”. Though he may literally talk about all liberal programs are failures, you are not much different in that you cannot/will not identify any one as a failure(I know, learning experience). Pd can correct me if he wants but maybe he is merely exaggerating to make a point-or pulling your chain. Anyway, everything “we” do is good and everything “you” do is bad. Take that!
The idea is for all people regardless of age to exhaust themselves (the time and effort that takes varies with the individual) and then down a few. It tastes better that way.
Good morning, all! Monday is a holiday here, too: Sports Day. The idea is to put a lot of beer in a bag and go out and watch younger people exhaust themselves. I think.
I was with an American woman yesterday. I usually see her once a year. We and others are involved in the same project. This time her husband also made the trip (he was not with us yesterday). Between them, she’s the traveler. He got a passport a few years ago but never used it till now. In Doonesbury, the deposed president-for-life of Berserkistan, plotting his return to power with the help of Duke and Earl’s K-Street lobbying firm, is Trff Bmzklfrpz (pronounced “Ptklm”). Add random vowels in long bunches and you’d have something like this American couple’s family name.
Last week he noticed that their name was spelled wrong in his passport. Not having noticed sooner is probably something to feel stupid about; otherwise, it’s correctable, no doubt for a separate fee – or would have been if the American government had been open for business last week.
When leaving the United States, emigration processing is handled by airline personnel. They check those things. It’s highly likely they would have caught the discrepancy between the passport name and the ticket name, and certain – the shared view of those hearing this story yesterday – that he would not have been allowed to board their flight. (Think of the toddlers, politicians and a certain airline pilot detained more than eighty times, who cannot get off the no-fly list once the system flags them as questionable.) She realized this.
Solution in a federal shutdown: (1) Call the airline and convince them over the phone that they made a mistake on his ticket, which he only just noticed. Get the ticket changed in the computer to match the mistake in the passport. (2) Keep fingers crossed that no one asks him for a second ID or compares spellings of the husband and wife.
They’re here. I hope they get home all right.
Wow, what is the proof that the federal shutdown would prevent her from resolving this issue?
Truly unreal
He’s not just any Republican, he was a candidate for Congress!
“Joe The Plumber: ‘Wanting A White Republican President Doesn’t Make You Racist,’ It ‘Makes You American'”:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/12/joe-the-plumber-racism_n_4090529.html
To make his case, Wurzelbacher re-posted an excerpt of a blog by conservative blogger Kevin Jackson on his own website, Joe For America, on Oct. 10. In the post, Jackson writes, “Wanting a white Republican president doesn’t make you racist, it just makes you American.” The post was not attributed to Jackson, and Wurzelbacher only included a link to Jackson’s original post at the bottom of the page.
Jackson, who is black, referred to the time prior to President Barack Obama’s election to the presidency as the “pre-black president era,” saying at that time, criticizing the president “meant that you didn’t like his policies.”
“The election of a recognized black president was not supposed to change anything. In fact, it was supposed to (1) ease any perceived racial tensions, and (2) allow the government to focus on legislating without race. So America would be more free than ever to discuss the issues,” Jackson wrote. “Not the case. And that is why having a white Republican president is best for the country.”
The essay goes on to question why no one has accused black people of racism “when blacks had sanity and disagreed with the policies of racist white Democrat presidents.” Jackson also brings Mexicans into his argument, saying “many deranged Mexicans” who fight for immigration rights “are not called racist.”
“Mexicans disagreed with most white Republican presidents over America’s immigration policy. Many deranged Mexicans believe we should open the country up to them, some saying that much of America belongs to Mexico anyway. They are not called racists,” Jackson wrote.
Wurzelbacher has made inflammatory comments about immigration before. In August 2012, when he was running for office, he suggested America “put a damn fence on the border going to Mexico and start shooting.”
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article attributed authorship of the essay to Joe Wurzelbacher. A portion of the essay was posted to Wurzelbacher’s website from The Black Sphere, where it originated.
Minx, if I may be so presumptuous as to try to explain the essay to you. The point of the essay, its only point, is that one is not a racist, and shouldn’t be called one, because of a disagreement with an Obama policy, or policies.
No, Wurzelbacher’s point is that he imagines a non-white shouldn’t be president, and he’s ticked off that one did. One shudders to think what he’ll say when a Democratic woman gets elected.
How’d you feel about Ted Cruz, Sarah Palin and some jerk with a Confederate flag showing up at a demonstration in DC this weekend to protest the Federal government shutdown?
I don’t know about the ‘jerk with the Confederate flag’ but, assuming Cruz and Palin had nothing to do with the flag, my answer would be ‘good’.
And from what I understand, the demonstration concerned O’s blockade of the Vet’s War Memorial
I shall never fight in the armed forces with a negro by my side … Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds.
—Robert C. Byrd, in a letter to Sen. Theodore Bilbo (D-MS), 1946
Pd, don’t give any credence whatsoever to Minx’s post by engaging in a food fight.
This is what liberals do – accuse everyone who opposes Obumbles of being a racist.
It’s simple, it’s makes it easy to cover for an obviously failed presidency and it convinces me more every day how insidious progressivism is. It is a cancer on this country. And it is growing.
Robert Byrd acquired some wisdom and changed his mind. You should too.
As I was saying….
Byrd, Wallace and other segregationists wisely changed their views over the decades.
If dredging up a 67-year-old quote of a view that the writer later rejected is the best you can do, you are demonstrating that your argument is specious.
Byrd was in the Senate in 2010. It appears you believe a leopard can change his spots. I assume if there was a conservative in office who was once in the Klan but since denounced it, you would forgive him also. Or would you not believe him because he is a conservative? Keeping in mind that as a conservative he would oppose expansion of the welfare state, affirmative action, etc…
Or, as more likely is the case, you assume all conservatives are racist by definition
You ignore Wallace in my 4:24 PM comment. Both his and Byrd’s views changed.
What about that Klansman some years ago with cancer whom a rabbi took into his home, and who converted to Judaism?
Uh, Wallace was a Democrat
Wallace converted.
What? He was a born again Christian and supposedly saw the light but he always ran as a Democrat
Wallace ran for President in 1968 on the American Independent Party ticket.
And ran as a Dem for governor for the next 20 years.
Irrelevant. Do you deny that Wallace ran for the highest office in the land in 1968 NOT as a Democrat when he was still supporting segregation? After he renounced segregation, he returned to the Democratic party.
So you are saying you would have forgiven Wallace if he turned into a conservative permanently?
This occurred this past weekend (not 67 years ago):
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2013/10/14/ugly-rebel-yell-in-front-of-the-white-house
…Michael Ashmore of Hooks, Tex., was among the many who converged on Washington for the “Million Vet March on the Memorials” to protest the government shutdown. This was the event where former half-term governor reality television star and best-selling author turned conservative gadfly Sarah Palin said, “Our vets have proven that they have not been timid, so we will not be timid in calling out any who would use our military, our vets, as pawns in a political game.” Applauding her self-awareness would be the height of irony — and sarcasm.
The protest and some of the barricades placed at the World War II Memorial then moved to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. And it was there that Ashmore waved his Confederate flag. A symbol of Southern resistance and white supremacy unfurled in front of the home of the first black president of the United States. As Jeffrey Goldberg of Bloomberg View and the Atlantic correctly said on Twitter yesterday, “In many parts of America, waving a Confederate flag outside the home of a black family would be considered a very hostile act.”
Ashmore’s reprehensible rebel yell wasn’t the only offensive thing to happen yesterday. In front of the World War II Memorial, Freedom Watch founder Larry Klayman said, “I call upon all of you to wage a second American nonviolent revolution, to use civil disobedience, and to demand that this president leave town, to get up, to put the Quran down, to get up off his knees, and to figuratively come out with his hands up.”
Ashmore’s actions and Klayman’s words are just the latest in a series of displays of disrespect directed at President Obama. For more than four years, the president’s detractors have said they “want our country back.” But they never say from whom. They continue to say he should be impeached. But they never say what his “crimes” or, if they do, said “crimes” are not grounded in any kind of reality.
For those of you who would push back by saying we’re overreacting, that the Confederate flag is nothing more than a symbol of regional pride, save it. That flag you revere so much is no better than a Swastika, a threatening symbol of hate that has no place in American political discourse.
DD, I shouldn’t but…
http://abcnews.go.com/US/sexual-assaults-occupy-wall-street-camps/story?id=14873014
Irrelevant.
LOL!!! As usual, you were right DD.
How is it irrelevant? Doesn’t that prove that every member of the Occupy movement is a rapist?
This is too easy: It’s irrelevant because the difference is that the flying of the Confederate flag was done IN SUPPORT of the demonstration’s goals, whereas the rape at Occupy was not in support of theirs.
So you agree that every member of the Occupy movement is a rapist and you are OK with it?
Good morning, Pittsburgh Dad! A few loose ends, if I may:
pittsburgh_dad On October 14, 2013 at 11:52 AM
Liberals believe this because they believe that, in general, programs are beneficial so if 1 happens to fail, it’s a learning experience. Conservatives, rightly, see most govt programs, regulations, etc… as failures.
+++ Well said this time, on what liberals believe.
+++ If something fails, one gives up or tries again.
+++ The opposite of beneficial is detrimental. If one group finds something beneficial and another finds it detrimental, there is a difference in goals.
+++ Categorizing “most govt programs, regulations, etc.” as “failures” ignores their goals – treats as politically illegitimate the goals of people you disagree with. See your own last comment below, at the bottom of this box.
pittsburgh_dad On October 14, 2013 at 11:55 AM
Wow, what is the proof that the federal shutdown would prevent her from resolving this issue? Truly unreal.
+++ The question is not clear but it doesn’t matter. What made you take it as anything more than an I’d-hoped-humorous anecdote about a person failing to recognize the misspelling of his own name – in his passport (!), of all things?
pittsburgh_dad On October 14, 2013 at 1:43 PM
This is what liberals do – accuse everyone who opposes Obumbles of being a racist.
+++ And such respectful opposition, too.
pittsburgh_dad On October 14, 2013 at 1:43 PM
[Progressivism] is growing.
+++ Okay. No disagreement there.
+++ Categorizing “most govt programs, regulations, etc.” as “failures” ignores their goals – treats as politically illegitimate the goals of people you disagree with.
Illegitimate? Progressives state their goals are to improve quality of life of as many citizens as possible. I couldn’t agree with that goal more. The problem is Progressive programs, for the most part (80%, 90% of the time) create worse outcomes than what existed before – you know, negative Unintended Consequences of a failed philosophy and all
-Spent 15B on poverty since 1965 and the poverty rate is higher today than it was in 1965
-the USSR failed
-Every country that has implemented Progressive forms of govt have consistently had higher urates and lower growth rates
Having fun Pd?
Like a kid on Christmas morning!!!!!!!!!
I thought so-sounds like it!
Pittsburgh Dad,
You at 8:03 PM: “Progressives state their goals are to improve quality of life of as many citizens as possible. I couldn’t agree with that goal more.”
“Improve” is an active verb. Acceptance of what comes is not “improving.”
pittsburgh_dad On July 13, 2013 at 11:52 PM
I never advocated for survival of the fittest. Not true. All I said is it would work. It would be brutal, but it would work.
Tourist On July 14, 2013 at 12:11 AM
(Quote) The closer the better (Unquote)
pittsburgh_dad On July 14, 2013 at 12:23 AM
Although I don’t recall saying that, yeah, more or less, I agree with that.
We have had this discussion 100 (1000, 1M9 times. Evidence shows that the market results in improving the quality of life for the greatest amount of people possible (as compared to the outcomes in which Progressivism has been attempted – the USSR, Europe, etc…).
Nobody says there shouldn’t be a safety net (the 10-20% of govt programs worth a damn)
You just disagree – incorrectly
First paragraph: Absolutely nothing shows a market outcome improves the quality of life for the “greatest amount of people possible.” Improvement for the remainder would be more.
And evidence shows Progressivism doesn’t create improvement for the remainder and actually hurts ,any of those capitalism would help – you know, less people dying if the growth rate is 4% instead of 2%
*many
Then get out of the way and let’s grow at 4%. Why is that so hard to understand?
Progressivism, in its pure form, is a failure. You can spend a trillion and maybe for 6 mos-1 year, you ‘might’ have higher growth (you know, the O recovery) In the long-run, a progressive country can never grow as fast as a capitalistic country. I am trying to get in the way of those that want slower growth
Progressive policies are literally costing this country billions (trillions?) of dollars of output every year. The quality of life of millions of people (the poorest in society) is less than what it could be because of the false belief that the government can make people’s life better.
Pittsburgh Dad,
“Progressivism, in its pure form, is a failure.”
There is no pure form of progressivism. Progressivism is a response to unchecked conservatism – to business’s externalization of risks and costs to the rest of society and to the need of business for a certain level of unemployment, a pool of available workers to choose from, more workers than will be hired, so that those who are hired are suitably appreciative of whatever they get. Business likes a buyer’s market for labor. Who wouldn’t?
Pure capitalism would be the jungle, survival of the fittest – WE HAVE AGREED ON THIS; YOU HAVE SAID IT YOURSELF.
Although not true of all including many leading conservatives – “There’s no safety net in the constitution. Keep cutting, baby!” – YOU ARE IN FAVOR OF A SAFETY NET AND I HAVE ACKNOWLEDGED THAT.
You accept a safety net because your argument relies on one. The holy trinity of your system is maximum growth, maximum profit, maximum self. (To each his own.) For these purposes, no one is arguing against growth. But you are wrong when you say X-billion more would necessarily benefit the bottom. There is no INCENTIVE in pure capitalism to benefit the bottom. The INCENTIVE is to NOT do so. The only thing that sustains (literally) the bottom is compulsion first and a safety net second.
In a time such as now, I’ll take 2% growth with some direction over 4% growth falling where it may. Always and forever? No.
Repeating myself from the top, but as I put it earlier in this thread: “We did not walk out of the jungle and naturally become liberals. We walked out of the jungle and naturally became conservatives. Liberalism/progressivism is a response to conservatism left to its own devices.”
There should be a level of balance we can all live with. Hell, all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable. Had conservatives not dialed their self-absorption to eleven, there might never have been a need for liberals. If some of what you see happening scares you, you brought it on yourself.
Too bad you couldn’t get it right when you had the chance.
Oh, Tourist, what is it you are smoking and/or drinking. Everyone believes in having a safety net. Unfortunately, your safety net is to make it available to anyone and everyone who can scam the system and large enough to encourage a culture of dependency, either because you’re too dumb to understand that, or your heart bleeds too much, or you need the votes. Our safety net is to take care of people who are not in a position to help themselves to the extent possible in order to enable them to help themselves (where possible) as soon as possible, for their own self-being.
Who came out of the jungle first and and pure this vs. pure that is pure bullshit, as is what business wants and needs. It all comes down to the best way to help”people in need” because,remember, a rising tide lifts all ships.
Good night!
“because, remember, a rising tide lifts all ships.”
And yachts, and cruisers and sailboats and even Zodiacs. We bleeding-hearts worry also about the people in rowboats and on rafts and inner tubes and clinging to driftwood.
Good night!
Wonderful Tourist. Keep worrying about everyone, if you have that capacity. My capacity is limited to those who cannot help themselves.
I have talked before of the logical conclusion to the argument that if some govt is good, more must be better. But real world experience has shown that more govt control perpetuates cultures of dependency. This results because the incentive structure changes to the environment in which an actor operates. With minimal safety net, there is strong incentive to increase the value of your own resources. With a larger safety net, the incentive becomes ‘to get mine’. People who become dependent on the govt hurt the economy by not just taking from the producers but by also not producing anything themselves. And progressives call conservatives selfish.
In addition, the govt inherently overvalues the resources it uses – wasting them. Therefore, the growth in the capacity to produce more output is diminished (that is, what potentially can be produced does not increase as much as it could have) – the production possibilities curve does not shift as far out as it would in an economy based on capitalism
In the limit, as population growth outpaces economic growth, shortages occur and progressivism collapses under its own weight.
Pittsburgh Dad,
“I have talked before of the logical conclusion to the argument that if some govt is good, more must be better.” (12:34 AM)
Talked of the logical conclusion of the argument?
Not exactly. You have made the “more must be better” statement on a few different subjects in order to rebut it yourself and use that to argue something else.
Here’s one from almost a year ago. I begin by quoting you, I respond, and then you answer.
(Start of copying/pasting)
written by Tourist, November 23, 2012 – 07:46 PM
“Remember, for an economic philosophy to work, it must work in its purist form. So if some is good, more must be better. Well, since the USSR failed and western European social democracies are falling apart, it is clear that a lot of liberalism is no better than a little liberalism.”
Some version of that has been posted here several times.
1. Where does it even come from?
2. For “more must be better,” I give you chocolate cake.
3. What in the world was the Soviet Union a pure form of?
4. The poster has acknowledged the need for some market regulation. If some regulation is needed, the market does not work in its pure form, which, per the above, means the market concept itself does not work.
5. The market works. Liberalism works. It’s complicated.
written by living in reality, November 23, 2012 – 07:59 PM
1. It makes sense that this is true
2. Chocolate cake – I always like more (more later)
3. USSR was as close to pure communism as we have experimented with
4. The market would work in its pure form – u may not like the outcome. It would be survival of the fittest. But it would work.
5. In the extreme when dealing with humans, u will not have the desired outcome no matter what economic system was employed. Pure capitalism would be Darwinian. No person would think we should go to that extreme (just like eating to much chocolate cake, it would eventually create issues).
(End of copying/pasting)
See. You made the “more must be better” claim and when asked where it came from answered that “it makes sense that this is true” – meaning it came from you. You then applied it as a test to liberalism in that exchange and to government in this one in order to prove . . . something.
I want the smallest government that will do what I want government to do, and you insist that, since I want any government, I must want maximum government, which shows that government is bad.
How many of the positions you oppose exist only in your mind, attributed by you to others?
Coincidentally, I was objecting very recently, more generally, to people saying I said things and meant things I did not say. I have made the same objection on behalf of the president.
===
From E. J. Dionne in the P-G today:
(Quote)
The NBC/[Wall Street] Journal pollsters asked respondents to choose between two statements: “Government should do more to solve problems and help meet the needs of people,” or “Government is doing too many things better left to business and individuals.” In October 2010, only 45 percent chose the first, pro-government statement. In the latest poll [last Thursday], 52 percent did.
(Unquote)
Let me guess. “Low-info voters”?
The Nile.
Correction: “in order to rebut it yourself” in the third paragraph of my comment is incorrect. Take it as true and “apply it as a test,” which I say further down, is more what I meant.
Not necessarily low info voters, Tourist. Could be the culture of dependency kicking in-about which you have been warned. I suppose you would be happy if that number kept rising-to the top where the law of diminishing returns will be here. You will have to rely on a U.S. oligarchy.
Re: chocolate cake
You have heard everything in moderation?
There must be some minimal amount of govt, no matter how inefficient it is with regards to potential output. We live in a civilized society. Similarly, we must eat some chocolate cake – eating celery every meal is no way to live.
But eating chocolate cake for every meal is the dietary equivalence of progressivism
I will ask the questions one more time. Why is the poverty rate higher today than in 1965? Why did it decrease significantly under Uncle Ronny and increase under O?
Obviously, all things in moderation – as you now say. Yet it is you, no one else, who has repeatedly declared as some sort of rule that “if it’s good, more must be better.” You then extrapolate real-world liberalism or real-world government to some absurd extreme, apply your test of “if it’s good, more must be better,” and announce to the world that you have proved the thing a failure.
No wonder you insist everything is simple. You can’t grasp even a two-step fallacy.
You can’t grasp that repeating things a million times takes a lot of typing and it became tiresome a long time ago.
The more limited govt is the better. However, there are goods the private market would not produce. These are called public goods and they are necessary to provide the framework necessary so as to allow the market to operate as efficiently as possible. Two examples would be military and public safety. The ONLY reason we should have any govt involvement in the market beyond military and public safety is because we live in a civilized society. Do I know the exact amount of govt necessary? No. It would be hard to convince me that, beyond a very minimal safety net, anything beyond military and public safety is necessary nor beneficial. You surely haven’t convinced me
Still haven’t answered the questions. I think I know why
Pd, you hit the nail on the head but it is beyond The comprehension of Tourist and other progressives. “Limited” government and “limited, effective” safety net. Add to that personal responsibility and accountability. I guess that makes us less than human, evil beings. Can you imagine trumpeting the glory of polls showing that an increasing number of people want more government. What a disgrace!
Tourist, is the Wakayama Electric Railway anywhere near you? See photo of Station Master!
http://www.wakayama-kanko.or.jp/world/english/things/experience/list01/detail017.html
Not even close, Minx.
Pittsburgh Dad,
“Still haven’t answered the questions.”
About the poverty rate? You said you were only going to ask one more time. This is about the fifth.
Actually, I started to answer when you asked it the second time, on October 10, 2013 at 8:22 PM. I was going to point to the footnotes, mention apples and oranges, say you were not alive in ’65 and that Neil Armstrong is dead, and blame Bush.
Then two things happened: (1) Five minutes later you threw in the Soviet Union again, and “O” and “Bubba.” (2) I realized you had already said the same thing I was.
(Quote)
pittsburgh_dad On October 10, 2013 at 7:53 PM
And as I said above, the poverty rate is higher today than in 1965 – you know before the failed Great Society Programs were implemented
And poverty today doesn’t mean you are living under a bridge. Most poor own cars, TVs, cell phones – things that ‘middle class’ people in many other countries can only dream of having.
(Unquote)
Exactly. Apples and oranges. More of the poor today have shelter, basic technology needed to survive in the 21st century, and so on. They are not, as you point out, living under bridges. Far fewer people live under bridges, in parks, on the street today. The various programs, as far as they’ve gone, have obviously helped a lot. I’m glad.
This is a reflection of the advanced technology that was created in the private market that made TVs, computer, cars, etc. relatively cheap. The poverty rate is the poverty rate. Welfare has done nothing to decrease the poverty rate. I would argue, as the experience under O demonstrates, that more welfare increases poverty
It does this by providing disincentives to work. I am pretty confident that even you would agree that the best way to drop into poverty is to not have a job.
Now we’re getting somewhere. Pittsburgh Dad repeats the mantra of limited government, adding that he does not know how much government that should actually be. Devildog says Pittsburgh Dad hit the nail on the head. Devildog’s arguments are heavy with “what have you been smoking?” “that’s b.s.,” “beyond the comprehension of [liberals]” and “I don’t have an answer for that.”
Concepts and theories.
Real world problems and solutions are left to liberals. We’re the doers.
How many times have I said there should be a minimal public safety net. Nobody needs liberals to tell people how beneficial govt is. This is the type of reasoning that leads to the trainwreck that is Ocare
So, Tourist, real world problems and solutions are left to liberals, the doers? And how many of the world problems have been resolved by the solutions provided by the doers? Leaving problems to resolve themselves by nature and market forces would have been better.
DD, that’s only because us Neanderthals keep getting in the way
We dug in deep
And shot on sight
And prayed to Jesus Christ with all of our might.
And we would all go down together!
We said we’d all go down together!
Yes, we would all go down together!
Tourist, Billy Joel had as much knowledge of what went on there as you do. Ask any Marine who was there and he would tell you it was hell but “we” were winning (and ruled the night) but it was lost back home with the media and politicians. I don’t really want to go there though.
Oh please! We ain’t in a foxhole in some Godforsaken rain forest in SE Asia. You want to work together, start telling the truth
What do you mean “we”?
Ask Billy Joel
Left purposely vague Tourist. But who won Hue in the Tet offensive, it’s main battleground and, in the broader since, who won the Tet battle tactically and strategically but lost the war at home. I’ll leave it to your imagination who ruled the night.
Vietnam? Work together. Start telling the truth?
Nothing always including to never explain, but how do you two read things so wrong? That I don’t write subject-verb-object is part of it. This is why education should be about more than learning a trade.
I see the kids of a new generation.
They won’t stand for this mind-control.
They’re gonna change the world we life in.
They’re gonna bring back liberal arts.
Meanwhile, hold onto each other, like brother to brother.
Marion: “Wait! Wait! I can be reasonable.”
Tort: “That time has passed.”
* live in
I am sorry, did I miss some veiled reference to NASA? Whenever you lose an argument, that is usually where you go to justify a failed philosophy
No, but for camaraderie as they all go down together, “Apollo 13” works pretty well: “Gentlemen, it’s been a privilege flying with you.”
Keeping you going is the least I can do.
Too clever by a half!
Liberals are on top of the evolutionary tree. And. eventually, natural selection will eliminate the knuckle-draggers.
Liberals are on top of the evolutionary tree.
Liberals are on top of the evolutionary tree.
The individual mandate is going to get delayed a year. Wolf Blitzer on CNN, Alan Colmes just said it on Fox. Gibbs, ex O spokesman, ripped O a food one this weekend.
It’s just a matter of time
*good
The GOP can have negative polling numbers and they still shouldn’t give in to the clown in the WH
“A tea party purge among the GOP”:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/harold-meyerson-a-tea-party-purge-among-the-gop/2013/10/15/727ef4e8-35a8-11e3-8a0e-4e2cf80831fc_story.html
By Harold Meyerson, Published: October 15
The Republican Party has reached its Ninotchka period. Ninotchka, you may recall, was the eponymous Soviet commissar played by Greta Garbo in Ernst Lubitsch’s 1939 MGM comedy, released one year after Stalin’s show trials resulted in the execution of all of the tyrant’s more moderate predecessors in the Soviet leadership. “The last mass trials were a great success,” Ninotchka notes. “There are going to be fewer but better Russians.”
Like the Stalinists and the Jacobins, today’s tea party zealots have purified their movement — not by executing but by driving away those Republicans who don’t share their enthusiasm for wrecking their country if they can’t compel the majority to embrace their notions. Today, there are fewer but “better” Republicans — if “better” means adhering to the tea party view that a United States not adhering to tea party values deserves to be brought to a clangorous halt. NBC News-Wall Street Journal polling last week turned up a bare 24 percent of Americans who have a favorable impression of the Republican Party — a share almost as low as the 21 percent who have a favorable impression of the tea party.
Also like the Stalinists and Jacobins, today’s Republicans devour their past leaders. To the hard-core right wing, the Bushes, Mitt Romney, Bob Dole and John McCain are irritating vestiges of the party’s pussyfooting past; none was sufficiently devoted to rolling back the federal government when he had the chance. Thankfully, the Bushes et al. haven’t met the fate of Bukharin and Danton — but they are as conspicuously absent from today’s Republican rallies and state conventions as Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin are conspicuously present.
If anything illustrates just how far today’s Republicans have drifted from their traditional moorings, it’s the dismay with which their longtime business allies have greeted their decisions to close the government and threaten default. Such pillars of the Republican coalition as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the National Retail Federation have called for an end to the shutdown and an increase in the debt limit. Bruce Josten, the chamber’s executive vice president for government affairs, told The Post last week that his organization is considering backing primary challenges to tea party incumbents.
Today’s tea party-ized Republicans speak less for Wall Street or Main Street than they do for the seething resentments of white Southern backwaters and their geographically widespread but ideologically uniform ilk. Their theory of government, to the extent that they have one, derives from John C. Calhoun’s doctrine of nullification — that states in general and white minorities in particular should have the right to overturn federal law and impede majority rule. Like their predecessors in the Jim Crow South, today’s Republicans favor restricting minority voting rights if that is necessary to ensure victory at the polls.
The remarkable resurgence of these ancient and despicable doctrines is rooted in the politics of demographic and cultural despair. A series of focus groups that Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg conducted of evangelical and tea party Republicans (who, combined, constitute a majority of party members) found that they entertain a widespread and fatalistic belief that the United States is well on its way to becoming a socialist state by virtue of the growing number of non-white Americans’ dependence on government. Encapsulating the groups’ perspectives, Greenberg writes: “Their party is losing to a Democratic Party of big government whose goal is to expand programs that mainly benefit minorities.”
It does not register with these Republicans that Obamacare, which facilitates more widespread access to privatized insurance, is nowhere as socialistic as Medicare and Social Security. It seems that some believe that Obamacare is socialistic because they fear it will chiefly benefit the welfare queens of Republican lore, while Social Security and Medicare beneficiaries include millions of deserving people just like them — the disproportionately elderly and white Republican Party’s members.
It should not have been surprising, then, that demonstrators waved Confederate flags at the tea party demonstration Sunday on the Mall while demanding that congressional Republicans not succumb to the pressure to compromise and that the Obama administration open the Mall’s monuments, the World War II memorial in particular. The tea party’s theory of government and the fear and loathing that many adherents harbor toward minorities find a truer expression in the Confederate flag than in the Stars and Stripes.
It’s not clear whether those waving the Confederate flag on Sunday favored opening the Lincoln Memorial. I suspect, however, that the Republican enshrined there wouldn’t have favored them.
Tea party zealot = elitist idiot
Meyerson is an avowed democratic socialist.
Why even post this?
For its content? Part of the free exchange of ideas? Some may speak, others may not? How many times have you said: “There’s no need to read this”?
Well, you know, the whole progressivism is a failed philosophy thing. I know exactly what Meyerson said – didn’t have to read it.
This is why I never post support. Remember how UMOC used to want evidence and when I provided it, he (and you) would just ignore it
There is no need to post support for either of us. I won’t believe what you post for obvious reasons and you won’t believe what I post because you lack any understanding whatsoever of how the world works.
Ditto Pd about posting support (I wouldn’t do it even if I knew how to) but what else can someone unnamed do.
Are you part of the New Political Center?
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/center-interactive-quiz
Tea party zealot = elitist idiot
From someone who believes the elites should tell everyone what is best for them. I guess liberals believe they are too stupid to make their own decisions
Are you that someone?
Nicely read, Toadsly.
Tourist, if by ‘nice;, you mean needing a reading comprehension course, you couldn’t be more right
No. Toadsly’s reading was accurate. Oh, everyone knows what you meant. But it’s only understandable with local context.
Here’s another from the news: “The compromise we reached . . . . It’s never easy for two sides to reach consensus . . . .” That’s Harry Reid today. Without context, a reader might not appreciate the totality of the Republican surrender.
The GOP did lose. I have said that if people want to turn this once great country into another socialist nightmare, the sooner the better. That way, it will fall apart sooner and we could get back to everything this country was and is supposed to be
I am all for that if the GOP is going to bend over for O, that a 3rd party (not necessarily the tea party but it is a candidate) should emerge and if it is a minor party until the socialists run this country into the ground OK. When that happens, the 3rd party will be set up to return this country to what it could and should be.
If that doesn’t happen until the US turns into a glorified Chile, well, Via con Dios!!!!!!
I don’t believe the shutdown will affect the elections – the GOP have too many safe seats. Looking back, given that the GOP wasn’t going to win and that Ocare was almost certainly going to fall apart, the shutdown was a bad idea (for the most part – I still like how it made the lines clear, both within and between the 2 major parties).
I am still waiting to hear about the millions of people that are enrolling in the exchange. I still have a good feeling about the individual mandate.
Pittsburgh Dad,
Some of your assumptions, premises and hyperbole notwithstanding, that’s among your more considered presentations. It’s misguided in the sense that history is not replete with second comings – recoveries, yes, but not second empires.
I’m not sure clear lines – as in battle lines – are something to celebrate, either.
It certainly is something to celebrate. I am a registered Republican and Mitch McConnell does not represent me. I would rather have a socialist in that seat. This way, I don’t feel like I am being f’ed by someone I thought was in DC to represent me. He represents you more than he represents me
And before you wax poetic about how McConnell, O, Nancy, Boehner, etc.. are supposed to represent everybody, that is a load of BS. O and Nancy don’t represent me any more than Bush represented you
I am totally sincere that if a GOP rep is just going to be Dem lite, it’s best just to have a socialist in those seats. I don’t want McConnell any more than I want O
Wait, what color is McConnell?
Surrender as in Corregidor or surrender as in aboard the Missouri. Take your victory lap-and enjoy it for a few months anyway. There’s only one way to go from here-as political history has shown many times over. So glad we avoided the equivalence of WMD’s!
7:22 PM: A window closes.
This, though, from above (6:36 PM): “This is why I never post support. Remember how UMOC used to want evidence and when I provided it, he (and you) would just ignore it.”
I think I know the main example you are talking about. It was an economic paper/article on how the New Deal prolonged the recession or something like that. We certainly did not ignore it. We just didn’t accept it. I don’t know about UMOC, but I did not know the writer, so I read the argument, which disputed the established view, and then I searched for responses to the article and those all disputed *it*. I don’t think I found any support. This is what we discussed: an economist claiming the New Deal made things worse and no other economist agreeing with that.
I’m saying “all” and “no other,” and that’s probably not 100% right. A few scientists dispute global warming. Somewhere there is probably one who thinks smoking is good for you.
When we have to make judgments beyond our personal ability to be sure, we try to see who has the better argument and where the weight of opinion seems to fall.
That’s why I post support. I like sharing things said better than I could. And because I’m lazy.
You didn’t look hard enough. The study is the most widely accepted study on the New Deal.
http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2006/sunspot.shtml
In 2006, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research predicted “the next sunspot cycle will be 30-50 percent stronger … according to a breakthrough forecast using a computer model of solar dynamics … scientists have confidence in the forecast because, in a series of test runs, the newly developed model simulated the strength of the past eight solar cycles with more than 98 percent accuracy.”
Did this happen?
98% accuracy? How confident are the climate hoaxers?
Since I have 2 links and don’t want to wait for moderation, this is a 2 post response.
————————–
You didn’t look hard enough. The study is the most widely accepted study on the New Deal.
http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2006/sunspot.shtml
In 2006, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research predicted “the next sunspot cycle will be 30-50 percent stronger … according to a breakthrough forecast using a computer model of solar dynamics … scientists have confidence in the forecast because, in a series of test runs, the newly developed model simulated the strength of the past eight solar cycles with more than 98 percent accuracy.
Did this happen? See my next post.
98% accuracy? How confident are the climate hoaxers?
Ok Tourist, there are some posts in support that are worth reading (and there are some people on MSNBC that I watch). But one can be numbed on this post by the links from the poster in chief and nauseated by many on the aforementioned channel). Besides which, one can learn little from the extremists from each side so one can safely dismiss (usually) what comes from their mouths without wasting time on them.
I never knew, and, as I think about it, maybe still don’t know, Samantha Bennett’s politics, although frequent kindnesses to small animals are probably a clue. I never gave that any thought, really, because politics is not what she writes about. Now even she has weighed in.
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/opinion/samantha-bennett/our-congress-is-making-us-a-global-laughingstock-707866/
Despite enjoying that . . . .
I first heard the catchy chant “This fall fire them all! Reelect nobody!” at least forty years ago. It and “both sides are to blame” are a set. That’s when I formed my opinion against term limits. Voters should make *each* decision.
Blaming both sides is a victory for the side that is to blame. Kicking them all out is, too.
Govt has shut down 17 times since when – the 80s. Gingrich shut it down for a month. I think we’ll survive this. What we won’t survive are more ‘leaders’ like O
I don’t know what “17” refers to. There have not been 17 of *these* – of that I’m sure.
Of course *we* will survive “this.” *This* much is over; we’re here; we already have. I have not been basking in the thrill of the gory details, but I’m not sure everyone whose medical treatments were disrupted or who weren’t paid as expected would agree, but there are big issues here, and collateral damage is, well, collateral. Best not to dwell.
Japan will survive Fukushima. I’m not talking about the radiation. It will survive the bungling, the prior deliberate indifference of those with, shall we say, different agendas, and the shattered image, but it’s standing is not the same. It has been damaged.
Us, too. By you.
Because? For what?
Kicks?
As I said.
Your article: (Quote) The 1870 law said that “[I]t shall not lawful for any department of the government to expend in any one fiscal year any sum in excess of appropriations made by Congress for that fiscal year, or to involve the government in any contract for the future payment of money in a excess of appropriations.” The Carter administrations ruling of the 1870 Anti-deficiency Act required Agencies without appropriations to shut down immediately.”
Congress used the law to shut down operations at the FTC in 1980. Tien explains; “The first agency to ever shut down for a lapse in appropriations was the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC shutdown for one day in 1980 because Congress refused to pass a full-year appropriation for the agency until it had authorizing legislation.” (Unquote)
That, and sixteen, or fifteen, more are your argument?
Uh, yeah
N.B. The Confederate flag was featured PROMINENTLY at the demonstrations.
“The G.O.P.’s Dixiecrat Problem”:
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2013/10/the-gops-dixiecrat-problem.html
Listed as a series, the congressional impasses, conflicts, and imbroglios of the past five years resemble plot points for a dark television satire titled “Apocalypse As Usual.” The latest installment featured a pseudo-filibuster, a government shutdown, a Values Voter Summit, at which it was argued that Obamacare violates the Thirteenth Amendment, and, last Sunday, a rally at the Second World War memorial best described as “pitchfork optional.” The past few weeks, with scenes like the one where Ted Cruz, an apostle of the creed that government should do almost nothing, shouting into a bullhorn to demand that it get back to running parks and memorials, seem like the buildup to some spectacular season finale.
The Confederate flag was featured prominently in the raucous demonstrations in front of the memorial and the White House—a bit of iconography that at least did the public the favor of connecting the historical dots. The flag, defended by its stalwarts as an apolitical symbol of Southern pride, actually came to prominence not in the aftermath of the Civil War but eighty years later, in defiance of civil rights. The massive resistance campaigns that inspired the Southern Manifesto and shut down school districts rather than comply with Brown v. Board of Education were orchestrated under the banner of the Stars and Bars. The election that galvanized the brand of racialized acrimony and indignation we’re now seeing in the country was not the one that brought Barack Obama to office in 2008; it was the one in 1948, which brought us the Dixiecrats.
The rise of the Dixiecrat Party, like that of the Tea Party sixty years later, was ostensibly the result of one faction within a political party coming to believe its policy interests had been neglected. But on a more fundamental level, it was the product of demographic changes in national politics. The rebel Democrats wrote a defiant advocacy of racial segregation into their platform precisely because the national Democratic Party understood that its future lay with Northern black voters. Southern whites had formed the party’s base since the Civil War, but by the middle of the twentieth century, the great migration of blacks to Northern cities had thrown that alignment into flux. Franklin Delano Roosevelt is remembered today for guiding the nation through the Great Depression and the Second World War, but his greatest political achievement may have been holding together the irreconcilable Northern and Southern elements of the Democratic Party for as long as he did.
If we care to recall it, there is a direct and historical relationship between the ideological commitment to small government and the belief that the government’s priorities are skewed toward racial minorities. Federal intervention in the Little Rock desegregation crisis and Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society initiatives hardened the conviction among some whites that government worked predominantly on behalf of minority communities. L.B.J. had envisioned the Great Society as an updated New Deal, but F.D.R. knew well that his reforms didn’t stand a chance unless Southern legislators believed their benefits went largely to white workers.
It’s also worth remembering that the Dixiecrats had few illusions that Strom Thurmond, their Presidential nominee, could win the election. But they did believe that by denying either party a majority in the South they could magnify their influence in national affairs and, in a best-case scenario, throw the Presidential election to the House of Representatives. In short, they hoped to leverage their influence as spoilers and obstructionists in national affairs.
Today’s Republican Party, like the Democrats six decades ago, has had to come to terms with a demographic shift—one in which Hispanic voters are a crucial new element. We would be naïve to believe that the opposition to comprehensive immigration reform that features so prominently in current Tea Party politics is incidental to its appeal. (A 2010 survey of Tea Party supporters conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute found that fifty-eight per cent believed the government “paid too much attention to the problems of blacks and minorities”; sixty-four percent said immigrants were “a burden” on the country.) The Tea Party–inspired eruptions that have recurred throughout Obama’s Presidency represent something more complicated than a reactionary backlash to the sight of a black President; they are a product of the way he so tidily represents the disparate strands of social history that brought us to this impasse. The problem isn’t that there’s a black President; it’s that the country has changed in ways that made Obama’s election possible.
A half century ago, the Republican Party looked with envy at the youthful energy of the mass movements aligning themselves with the Democratic Party—until the 1968 Democratic Convention conveyed the pitfalls of grassroots politics. Today, it finds itself in a similar bind, caught in the narrow straits between movement and mob. John Boehner is not a Franklin Roosevelt; he’s not even a Sam Rayburn, and it’s his unenviable charge to corral elements that are, in effect, raging against math. The country regards the shutdown as a sign of government dysfunction, but for the implacable members of Boehner’s caucus, shutdown may simply be the ultimate form of limited government. Sixty-five years ago, the Dixiecrats spearheaded a movement toward the G.O.P. The Tea Party is an echo of that same movement, save for one distinction: in 2013, the rebels have nowhere left to go.
http://www.examiner.com/article/socialist-obama-wants-to-change-america
Furthermore, pd, anyone who disagrees with Walter Williams is a racist.
Why does this page now say “Recent Comments / There are no public comments available to display”?
They appear to have returned now.
People,
As Minx noted, the site is not working properly. There is no indication of the most recent comments and no easy way to find them unless they are at the bottom of the thread. For the time being, please do that. Please post as new comments, not as replies.
Pittsburgh Dad,
Summarizing starting with yours on October 17, 2013 at 1:23 AM:
You claim the government has shut down 17 times. I say not like this, it hasn’t. You post a link with a list of examples like the Federal Trade Commission being out of money for a day. I ask if those are your argument. You answer (6:21 PM): “Uh, yeah.”
Okay.
You provided one example. I have an example. Google 1995 shutdown
I was about to say this is truly becoming tiresome. Well, it is, but it’s illustratively typical.
No, I did not “provide one example.” You claimed 17 examples. I remember 1995.
I agree, let me know when you realize you are wrong. I hate having to point it out to you every time.
This ain’t even a hard one. Although winning arguments against lefties never is that difficult – you just need to point out the hypocrisy. Easy to do when their whole philosophy is based on one
The extract below is roughly edited according to my own biases and purposes. The fuller version begins with traditional conservatives being squeezed between the tea-party base and the money at the top. It highlights for me two things: (1) It really is “standing athwart history yelling ‘stop!’” The old, who won’t be there, want to impose their past on the young. The young will have to repair the damage. What a waste. (2) It used to be possible to have reasonable faith that in the end, on election day, when push came to shove, we would do the right thing – profiles in courage, e pluribus unum, and all that. We live in interesting times.
(Quote)
There’s a strain in the Tea Party, especially at the grass roots, that’s xenophobic and racist, and certainly the Confederate flag also symbolizes regional resistance to federal power . . . . But I don’t really think it’s helpful to announce that the entire Tea Party base is racist. I don’t think it’s that simple. For one thing, they’re just as riled up about immigration as they are about blacks. There’s certainly a worry about a change in the social composition of America. But we found in our research that they also resent young people — including in their own families.
They think young people are not measuring up. That the grandsons and daughters and nieces and nephews . . . hold ideas that are not very American in their view — like Obama. Obama symbolizes all of this.
One of the big mysteries that we’ve tried to deal with in our research is why the Affordable Care Act, which after all is fairly moderate — it’s an extremely important piece of legislation, but it’s moderate in its means — why would that become a flashpoint?
. . . The people left out of the insurance system have been lower income and more moderate income workers. They’re a younger population, browner and blacker. And then you come along with a president who symbolizes everything that conservatives and Tea Partyers hate . . . . So Obamacare really symbolizes the idea that this new America is going to take something from “our America.”
And for the ideological forces, Freedomworks, Americans for Prosperity, Heritage Action — you just have to go back to Bill Kristol’s memo in 1993 on Clinton healthcare. They’re worried about . . . creating a positive relationship between the government and working-age people that will make it hard for Republicans to win elections or proceed . . . to roll back Social Security and Medicare . . . .
. . . There is a question in my mind as to whether a regional group around Texas will stay out permanently. But over the last month, while we’ve been having an Armageddon-like battle supposedly over Obamacare in Washington, several more Republican-led states have accepted the Medicaid expansion, or are on the verge of doing it. In the final analysis, this is about money for healthcare, and states and localities as well can’t be denying care to people who get sick in this country.
. . . If you ask them about the particular provisions in the law, almost all of them are very popular, including with majorities of Republicans. So once this thing is actually carried through . . . this law is here to stay. It’s not going anywhere. By 2016, it will not be reversible. And by about five years after that, people will be wondering what all the fuss was about.
(Unquote)
http://www.salon.com/2013/10/17/tea_partiers_grave_fear_why_they_disdain_young_people_even_their_own/
What a load of crap. Just complete garbage. That liberals really believe this garbage is beyond insane. This isn’t hyperbole. This post is a joke. right?
Ocare is done. The individual mandate is going to be delayed.
All the Dems won is that Ocare isn’t going to be defunded as long as the Lord and Savior is in office. We knew that a month ago.
Silver has said the shutdown won’t effect the elections. The GOP is 100 times more likely to win the Senate than the GOP losing the House
Immigration Reform will not happen. Gun legislation – nope. Climate change – regulations forever delayed
O is a lame duck. He won’t get anything done. Not that he has an agenda anyway
Thanks Tourist. Very….!
I had you in mind, Dog. It seems to be a really good study.
Yes, Tourist, it was very helpful in understanding why I resent my daughters and grandkids. I take back what I said before about social science studies, especially from Harvard professors. I look forward to similar links coming from you.
One question though. Do you really believe that bullshit?
Devildog,
I just realized how people can think the Moon landings were faked. They weren’t there! If it’s not in their experience, it can’t be right.
Have you discussed the invalidity of generalized findings with your buddy?
“Findings” you say. “Findings” you say. “Findings”you say. And a “generalized finding” to boot. ilooked at my navel, and found out … Was that a “finding”? I talked to a few people I came across at Giant Eagle and arrived at a generalized finding that….
Resenting young people in your family as this guy claims, for the reason this guy claims, is enough to disqualify this social science study.
“Resenting young people in your family as this guy claims, for the reason this guy claims, is enough to disqualify this social science study.”
Can you back that up?
Certainly I can back it up. I conducted a study and the generalized finding backs it up. My study is being considered for publication but it might take a while.
Using “reply” is about freedom?
Yes it is Tourist, yes it is.
http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2013/October/17/California-Healthline-Obamacare-delay-questioned.aspx
Kaiser is suggesting a delay is possible. I repeat, KAISER, you know, the organization touting the greatness of Ocare, is suggesting it may NEED to be delayed
Only a matter of time
I feel sorry that this seen means more to you than just an entertaining (meh) clip from a science fiction movie
*scene
Why Tourist would you show us a clip from a sci Fi movie that draws an analogy between the bad guy and Obama, the bad guy who would not negotiate-the my way or the highway guy?
No comments in awhile so let me be the first to go against those disgraceful teabaggers. I say Sebelius today, Sebelius tomorrow, Sebelius forever!!!!!!!!!
Sometimes, no comments are good comments!
Yep, can’t disagree with ya there toadsly
Do like his Symphony No. 2!
A fave:
I actually prefer a lesser known work that Lee Ann Womack did a remake of
http://www.bestcountrysingers.com/lee-ann-womack/song/prl-When%20The%20Wheels%20Are%20Coming%20Off.html
Pd, you are in need of an attitude change! Sibelius just told Sanjay Gupta that she has asked, or told or directed “those” contractors to bring in their “A” teams. “What, me worry”!
Ditto, and vice versa.
Nice! But, for me, the name Sibelius will always be synonymous with the tone poem, Finlandia.
“I actually prefer a lesser known work that Lee Ann Womack did a remake of.” (Pittsburgh Dad)
I love the solution in those lyrics: “I’ll admit I’m lost.” Meanwhile, just say no.
One breaks windows. One spray-paints.
Build it and they will come.
Somebody is breaking windows alright
Hundreds of thousands of people are losing insurance. Job growth is non-existent (not only due to Ocare; regulations and higher taxes also hurt); the jobs being created are low paying part-time jobs; the urate is only decreasing because people are leaving the labor force because there are no jobs
O lied about the video, knew about the IRS (likely directed his sycophants to tell Lerner to do it); O knew the Ocare website was going to be a trainwreck before the election and didn’t reveal this info. for political reasons – the result being taxpayers are going to have to pay billions more in taxes
Bush told lies, Reagan told lies. But when everything you implement depends on the government solving the problem, everything you say is a lie. Uncle Ronnie said it best – government isn’t the solution to our problem, government is the problem.
The Sibelius Obamacare breakdown explanation tonight-the main culprit being volume-brings Benghazi to mind and this equation:
Video;Benghazi=volume;website
Sibelius also brought to mind the question as to when can you tell a lawyer is lying when she fumbled the question as to when Obama first learned about “the problem” and seemed to say shortly after the rollout. Really? Anyone believe he didn’t know before. Anyway, which is worse, not knowing before or learning shortly after. Kind of like the IRS/Tea Party “scandal”. Where is Howard Baker when we need him to ask the question. Oh, I forgot, the question(s) has been asked many times but has gone unanswered.
My last post was written without seeing Pd’s last post. Great minds…
What could be clearer proof that healthcare is a threat to the republic than problems with a new website?
Real Americans? Yes We Can! It’s complicated.
For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.
(Quote)
Applying his engineering skill to local problems, Kondratyuk designed a huge 13,000 ton grain elevator (quickly nicknamed “Mastodon”) in Kamen-na-Obi, built of wood without a single nail since metal was in short supply in Siberia. This ingenuity would work against him when in 1930 he was investigated as a “saboteur” by the NKVD. The lack of nails in the structure was used as evidence that he had planned it to collapse. Convicted of anti-Soviet activity, Kondratyuk was sentenced to three years in GULAG, . . . .
Ordinarily, he would probably have been shot, but the guards recognised the early symptoms of typhus in him and perhaps decided to spare themselves a bullet . . . .
His friends obtained forged identification papers for him . . . . He settled in Novosibirsk in Siberia in 1927. . . . Working as a mechanic, Kondratyuk completed the manuscript of a book titled “Conquest of Interplanetary Space” . . . . In 1925, Kondratyuk made contact with Moscow-based scientist Vladimir Vetchinkin and sent him the manuscript . . . .
While in Moscow, Kondratyuk had the opportunity to meet Sergei Korolev, then head of the GIRD (Soviet rocket research group). Korolev offered Kondratyuk a position on his staff, but Kondratyuk declined, fearing that the scrutiny he would come under the NKVD would reveal his true identity.
***
Since Kondratyuk’s body was never recovered, conspiracy theoriests speculate that he escaped from the Soviet Union and eventually made his way to the United States where he worked on the space programme under yet another identity.
***
When American astronaut Neil Armstrong visited the Soviet Union after his historic flight to the Moon, he collected a handful of soil from outside Kondratyuk’s house in Novosibirsk to acknowledge his contribution to spaceflight, reportedly urging Soviet authorities to start commemorating Kondratyuk. Later, a science centre and college in Novosibirsk, the streets in Poltava, Kiev and Moscow were named after Kondratyuk, as well as the Kondratyuk crater on the Moon and the 3084 Kondratyuk minor planet discovered in 1977. Independent Ukraine has issued postage stamps and coins featuring Kondratyuk. The Poltava Technical University bears Kondratyuk’s name since 1997.
(Unquote)
From Wiki, Yuri Kondratyuk, with minor repositioning by me.
Just a symptom, Tourist, just a symptom. All I want for Christmas is my current healthcare plan, my current healthcare plan, my current healthcare plan, all i want for Cristmas is my current healthcare plan so I can wish you Merry Christmas. One’s current healthcare plan was promised could be kept but it won’t for probably more than a million.
Just a symptom Tourist, wait and see the problems that will come.
Under ACA you get to keep your current health insurance plan. But if your employer decides to do away with it, you and your co-workers could consider organizing into a union to bargain for you. Oh wait, you believe you should go up against your employers’ executive machinery one-to-one and win what’s rightfully yours, because it’s only inherently right for administrators to be organized in one voice, not workers. Yeah, sure, let us know how that works out fer ya…
Minx, with all (due) respect, I ask you what planet do you live on (and what country in). Recently, you claimed that people don’t/can’t use food stamps for butts and booze because that would be against the law. Now, it’s that under ACA you are entitled to keep your insurance but if your employer eliminates your coverage (encouraged by ACA provisions), just join a union and bargain from power. And when your insurance carrier eliminates your plan (encouraged by ACA), do you also join a union to negotiate from power.
The claim by Obama that you could keep your plan under ACA (which the overwhelming number of people who had a plan wanted) was either just plain wrong or a blatant (knowing) lie.
As to your question as to how it worked for me without a union bargaining for me, the answer is just fine, thank you., just fine!
——What could be clearer proof that healthcare is a threat to the republic than problems with a new website?
Only if govt is the only or best solution. Not really worried about this
Only. The private sector sees no problem.
If so, we are doomed
Yes, doomed to thrive in the 21st century. You know, the Founders in the 18th did not abolish government. They created one.
Build, baby, build!
Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. George Washington
A “member” on RedState disputes that Washington said that. I don’t care. It’s obviously true, or mostly. (I disagree with “not reason.”) How can it not be “force”? “Monopoly on the use of force” is part of the definition of a state – not just definition of, but prerequisite for being.
In a community of three hundred million or three, a holdout will inevitably be forced, nationally, by the commonwealth, the town, the village or your father.
Not long ago the right seemed to be arguing against federal authority. Now you are arguing against all authority.
http://www.redstate.com/barrypopik/2009/11/12/dubious-origins-of-a-george-washington-quote-on-government/
Pick one
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. – Benjamin Franklin
A wise and frugal government which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government. – Thomas Jefferson (1801)
If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains set lightly upon you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. – Samuel Adams
I believe that every individual is naturally entitled to do as he pleases with himself and the fruits of his labor, so far as it in no way interferes with any other men’s rights. – Abraham Lincoln
To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical. – Thomas Jefferson
Government at its best is a necessary evil, and at its worst, an intolerant one. – Thomas Paine
What’s not to like, other than bits here and there? A couple go in the direction of a right to not contribute while enjoying all the benefits: “I believe that every individual is naturally entitled to do as he pleases with himself and the fruits of his labor” and “To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.”
The fruits of your labor are the fruits of your trees. The $X0,000 you are paid is the product of a balance and system far more complex, which, as you may have heard, you did not build.
“Opinions which he disbelieves” would be your objection to being “forced,” ever, into the responsibilities of citizenship, the common good, or to pay for a war you did not support. This is about whether we are in any meaningful way a nation, or if it’s just “you.”
To yours below at 1:26 AM: Shall we agree, then, to leave the Founders out of it?
BTW, I love the fact that you use the Founders to support your failed philosophy and then when I quote one of them that seemingly refutes your position on the role of govt, you throw this out
‘Now you are arguing against all authority.’
And BTW, I love the fact that you use the Founders to support your failed philosophy and then when I quote one of them that seemingly refutes your position on the role of govt, you throw this out 😉
There are two possibilities why one would employ a vacuous cipher as an advisor in chief. One is that you are so much of an egotist that you believe you can afford to employ an old friend in that position. The other possibility is that you are too stupid to recognize her as such.
Kirsten Powers, about as straightforward that a leftist could be (which is really damning her with faint praise) just said that Obamacare has set back activist government decades
Tourist, you apparently saved a lot of the posts from Rogers’ old blog. Do you have one of the many in which I indicated that Progressivism is a failure and O’s re-election would only quicken its death?
I don’t have any interest in or use for social media. I question and affirmatively dislike certain aspects of it. I deem it a failure.
I heard someone say that, ironically, social media does little to enhance real social skills. How much more proof do you need?
I am just referring to Powers because what she said reminded me of my many insightful posts about the end of progressivism.
I noted that she was a liberal because it surprised me that any liberal would acknowledge the possibility that this will occur. With that said, I couldn’t care less whether any liberal acknowledges what is apparent to anyone with any common sense. After all, not having common sense is what being a liberal is all about
You declared liberalism/progressivism a failure on the Rogers blog 91 times. Four times you elaborated. Once you said it was obvious. Three times you said it was common sense.
You understand that I have no wish for you to recognize this, right?
Trust me Tourist, what you wish for as it concerns me has never concerned me
4? Everyone of my posts makes it quite clear why progressivism is a failure. This is where having common sense comes in handy. It would assist you in realizing this
Thank you. I was afraid I’d given it away.
I love it when you think you get over on me. It’s kind of cute. Of course, the operative word there is ‘think’.
Then I should quit while you’re ahead.
Tourist, I can never be ahead. Your brilliant posts have shamed me for over a year now. Once again, I am humbled
I see now. As usual with your comments, I try not to read too much into them since it would really make my brain hurt to try to interpret your convoluted logic
I would suggest you read the other 87 posts again.
“it would really make my brain hurt to try”
No pain, no gain. That’s your problem: You’re never willing to try.
I am pretty confident I would gain more from interpreting this
Please do. I’ll wait.
恐縮で
とんでもない。
? Misinterpretation?
私は謙虚にしています
誰のmisinterpretation? 分かりました。大丈夫よ。喜んで待っています。
(You got it right.)
O spent a half a billion, that’s billion with a ‘b’, for a website that would have cost any competent private company a half a million. And the private company would have done it right. Now liberals are arguing that it is the GOP’s fault for not allowing O to spend more.
At this point, it is literally a test of how stupid the American public is. I am not confident
Yet you continue to insist that the only job-creation has been in fast food.
BTW, “half a million”?
What job creation? Everyone of these jobs cost 100s of thousands of dollars and aren’t worth a dime. It is literally as if they burned the money. There was no added value. You can compare it to paying people to dig holes
This is what liberals don’t understand. Crackpots like Krugman suggest we should build a defense for an alien invasion because it would put people to work.
In economics, this is known as The Broken Window Fallacy. Liberals think that when a window is broken, this is actually a good thing for a glazier since he gets paid to fix it. This would suggest all windows should be broken because money will be spent replacing them.
I hate to say it but this is an illustration of why you still don’t understand the concept of opportunity costs. The money spent on fixing the window could have been spent on something that actually increased the value of the physical stock that exists. That is, spent on something that added value to society.
Similarly, the money wasted on the Ocare website could have been spent on something that would have actually added value to society.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window
And yes, a half a million
BTW, I don’t actually hate to say that you still don’t understand the concept of opportunity costs. After all, no liberal does
“It is literally as if they burned the money.”
+++ Nope. People shopped.
“In economics, this is known as The Broken Window Fallacy. Liberals think that when a window is broken, this is actually a good thing for a glazier since he gets paid to fix it. This would suggest all windows should be broken because money will be spent replacing them.”
It *is* a good thing for the glazier as he does get paid to fix it.
Breaking all windows is ad absurdum. There’s your fallacy.
As I was saying……
Lather, rinse, repeat?
Good morning, all!
Pittsburgh Dad,
You were spewing heavy nonsense. I was spewing light nonsense. I’m serious now on two points.
One: You confuse the three consequences of fixing the window – it gets fixed and keeps the rain out; someone gets paid for fixing it and can buy food and Christmas presents; the owner forgoes new shoes, a couple of six-packs or a capital investment – with breakage of the window in the first place.
Two: You go from there to accuse liberals of wanting not merely to break the window, but of wanting to break all windows. This is what you do. You talk about everything in non-existent extremes, pure forms. Because liberals are of the left, you insist our model is the Soviet Union, and it’s easy to attack the Soviet Union. Because we do not object to as many of Obama’s actions as you do, he must be our lord and savior. Your one measure of civilization is growth and the one purpose must be maximum growth.
I think you do this because it’s simple. You need scales and rules. You don’t like conflicting values and having to make judgments. Welcome to reality.
The only money *burned* is by those rich guys lighting their cigars, and they live in cartoons.
Just for you:
“He’ll want to know what we can do to catch the Russians or, better yet, leap-frog them.”
“We can put a man on the Moon before the Russians. How about that?”
“How much would it cost?”
“Somewhere between ten and twenty billion dollars.”
“Pumping that much cash into the private sector could be very popular.”
===
Putting a man on the Moon and eleven more cost $25 billion. The pictures were worth it.
Tourist writes, “Because we do not object to as many of Obama’s actions as you do, he must be our lord and savior”. And because “we” don’t agree with as many programs as “you” do, or believe in approaching problems in a different way, or don’t want to throw quite as much money at it, or agree with only a part of a program, “we” must be evil incarnate.
You will respond by saying you guys don’t agree with anything “he” wants but that’s not true. Healthcare, immigration, whatever!
Uh, I think you need to discuss the issues you have with the Broken Window Fallacy with this guy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric_Bastiat
I know you live in Japan but do you have a relative that lives in western PA? I want to increase economic activity by breaking one of her windows.
—–The pictures were worth it.
If that is all we ever got out of it, it would be 1000 times worse than Ocare
—
Simple? No, just common sense. Conservatism is based on a concept we have discussed recently – Occam’s Razor. I guess you need a reminder
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor
Uh, I think you need to discuss the issues you have with the Broken Window Fallacy with this guy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric_Bastiat
I know you live in Japan but do you have a relative that lives in western PA? I want to increase economic activity by breaking one of her windows.
—–The pictures were worth it.
If that is all we ever got out of it, it would be 1000 times worse than Ocare
—
Simple? No, just common sense. Conservatism is based on a concept we have discussed recently – Occam’s Razor.
I said precisely what Bastiat said about the economic effects of the broken window. You either *do* lack basic reading comprehension or you are even *more* dishonest in your arguments than you have shown yourself to be thus far.
Conservatism is based on Occam’s razor? As in “Keep cutting, baby”?
“In science, Occam’s razor is used as a heuristic (general guiding rule or an observation) to guide scientists in the development of theoretical models rather than as an arbiter between published models. In the scientific method, Occam’s razor is not considered an irrefutable principle of logic or a scientific result.” (Wiki)
But it’s simple.
You misinterpret both.
Show me.
Please see above
Which is as far as it ever goes. You can never justify what you say because what you say never holds up.
Never holds up to what? Everything I say is accurate and is exactly the way the world works. You have never proven me wrong and you will never prove me wrong
It’s not you, it’s just the failed philosophy you believe in/