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I know this not the place to talk politics.... http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/04/election.runningmates/index.html But look at #8. If it was an Obama/Hagel ticket, my head would explode. These Straussian assholes have got-to-go. |
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I'm hoping for Biden. He seemed like a leveled-headed and rational guy.
I don't think many "wavering
I don't think many "wavering Republican voters" will be supporting this ticket.
Not sure if even Bill Richardson's hispanic cred will help the candidate.
Obama needs Ohio.
What do you mean by Straussian?
Leo Strauss and his hair
Leo Strauss and his hair brained ideas and followers. I just cannot get over how much that man's ideas have influenced all of the people who have really screwed things up in modern politics.
To me, the man was saying: "Freedom is awesome, as long as you subscribe to this rigid ideal of freedom that I have designed."
Considering how many conservatives (Goldwater conservatives) have been turned off by the previous eight years... Hagel may be a good choice, given his libertarian leanings.
Nobody will care much who
Nobody will care much who the Veep is after they are chosen and since Obama is going to get crushed in the electoral college (ie. how the president is elected) it doesn't matter much except for CNN/FNC/PMSNBC needing to sell ads 24/7.
Of that list at least Jim Webb has written an terrific history book.
Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish shaped America
It sucks that we have such
It sucks that we have such an antiquated system for determining the President, every four years it comes down to either Florida or Ohio (or both).
The last thing I want to see is four years of Mundane McCain (with his likely VP Mittens Romney). The man was on the ball in 2000, but now it just seems like he's been castrated.
>an antiquated system ? We
>an antiquated system
?
We are of course a Republic of independent states, the electoral college insures an election in all states and conforms to the themes of checks and balances and representative government vs. whims of an angry mob, ie. direct democracy.
There are no current public figures that I'd ever elevate into the league of the founding fathers and thus have a snowball's chance in hell of leading a change, thus the system will continue. bfd.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLIT
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/04/10/schneider.electoral/index.html
re: crushed in the electoral college
It seems pretty obvious to me (call me naive if you must) that the Blue-State/Red-State lines will be redrawn this year.
I have to agree with Kurt,
I have to agree with Kurt, Bush & Co. has screwed the pooch for all the dudes with (R) after their name.
The GOP should hire a marketing team and rebrand themselves as something else... but not too much (like New Coke).
No Breaks!
Obama's already working on red Virginia
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/05/obama.thursday/index.html
>call me naive if you
>call me naive if you must
huh? I thought it was intuitively obvious to the casual observer. tic.
In a mere 5 months the matter will be settled. I'm fully aware that ~99.999% of the people on this board share your opinion, along with the media and nearly all pundits, but nevertheless I like my odds, and when the future proves me right you can always say that you had a idea this might happen. lol.
ps. that article is not germane.
which article is not germane
they both reinforce the point that red states could go blue in november...
arg!!!
arg!!!
political naivety and cognitive dissonance?
3 quick obvious points.
1) we're talking about the presidential election
2) Obama is a left-winger, very liberal, your article specifically refers to staunch conservative democrats and voters.
3) In the modern era, ie since 1968, Republicans have won 7 of 10 elections, Demos won 3. One of which was exigent, ie. watergate, and the other two by a centralist Bill Clinton who nevertheless failed to ever gain more than 50% of the vote.
For what its worth, Obama branding McCain as McBush is dishonest but politically smart, the more appropriate comparison is that Obama is Carter 2.0. Long live McGovern?
Finally, I think McCain will pick Lieberman as his Veep and this will shirley push the moveon.org/dailykos crowd into anaphylactic shock, which they'll ironically get a nice buzz from 'cuz I know some of them are kinky like that. So stock up on car batteries!!!
Sounds like you need to get in on the bet
Roger and I have wagered $100 on this topic - if a dem wins the white house, I get paid. You want a piece of the action?
If you'd seen Roger on the
If you'd seen Roger on the Bocce court you'd know not to bet against him. I don't want to get in between you guys, but I will call Roger when the results are in to go drinking, er celebrating.
re: "Obama branding McCain as McBush is dishonest"
They are the same on Iraq (lets keep fighting!), he supported Bush's very unpopular veto of the SCHIP expansion, and he wants to make permanent Bush's unpopular tax cuts for the rich. He consistently supports Bush's bad policy, then conveniently frames himself as a maverick when Bush policy fails.
One thing I routinely hear
One thing I routinely hear when I talk about Obama is how Democrats love to raise taxes, and how people hate how taxes spend their money, and how raising taxes are bad for a failing economy.
I conveniently remind them the 65-70% of their taxes go straight to the DoD and how we are currently engaged in a two theater war that is costing the US roughly 2.5 billion dollars a day, and how McCain has routinely expresses interest in making it a three theater war. Our nation runs on crude, why the hell are we blowing shit up on a daily basis and destabilizing the regions that feed the pipe that delivers our drug? Wouldn't it make sense to have policies that reduce our dependence... nah, let's just elect Mundane McCain and see how much our anuses can really stretch.
/rant
taxes and patriotism
I've been thinking about this popular notion: supporting your country by fighting or having an American flag is patriotic, but paying taxes for that war is NOT!
I too have been thinking of
I too have been thinking of something you said on Friday about tests... I thought about it all weekend, and then I remembered something my father told me:
"The military and police run autonomously."
ie. no matter who the President is, they (military and law enforcement) will be doing their damndest to make sure we don't get tested.
tested?
I'm not taking any SAT's, what you talking about tests?
You were saying at lunch how
You were saying at lunch how Obama, if elected, will get 'tested'.
Re: McCain's policy on Iran:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-zoPgv_nYg
Oh McCain! You card. When America's sons and daughters come home in body bags it's hil-lar-i-ous. I'll tell you what, what we need is more preemptive wars. I'm gonna start preemptively punchin' dudes in the taint... after all it's American and patriotic.
Do you have a current
citation for that cost of war? $2.5B/day sounds a little high... last I heard was 12B/month. but I dunno...
Sorry, it's $2 billion a week
Sorry, it's $2 billion a week... so by that measure it's a steal. Fuck it, let's go for broke.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15377059/
McCain wants us to remain in Iraq in a combat fashion until 2013*... Seriously can we afford this, either with our dollars, lives, or sanity?
Anybody with half a brain knows that we will be maintaining 20+ military bases in Iraq for at least the next 100 years. It will be like Korea, but with more sand and less kimchi.
We won the cold war by out spending the Soviets... but we can't keep it up, eventually it (the loans) will run out and someone else is going to be holding the deed to our home. Fiscal conservatives my ass.
*Re: this speech.... it wreaked of BS.
Thanks!
yeah, it's a McFairyTale
Imagine
If the result is as successful as Korea has been then our efforts will prove to have been worthwhile.
Unfair comparison?
Was S. Korea ever like Iraq is now?
Are you even serious? Try an
Are you even serious?
Try an order of magnitude and then some, which is to say it was far worst.
It was so bad that the public flushed Truman down the drain and hired a republican to fix it, ie Eisenhower, which he did.
Those who don't know history are easily mislead and strangely overconfident in their ignorance. Sad, but true.
You're right
My uncles and other men in the 50s didn't fight in a war, it was just a conflict.
I'd like to see that, but
I'd like to see that, but the culture of Iraq is nothing like that of Korea's... and never will be. So the likelihood of a stabilized democratic Iraq is only a dream. It's really depressing to think about, but in my heart I know it's true.
Time will tell.
Time will tell.
Also, I was referring to the
Also, I was referring to the economic implications of maintaining permanent military bases in foreign regions. There are other factors like the social implications (imagine if China or Russia had military bases here in the US with 4000-10000 troops per base...)
I read a stable democratic
I read a stable democratic Iraq.
One can dream.... cold
One can dream.... cold reality normally wakes you up though.
Middle Eastern culture is a tricky thing. The closest analogous thing we have in the US are gangs (ie. street/drug gangs).
You admit that you confuse
You admit that you confuse heart and mind.
I know, I know. I want it so
I know, I know.
I want it so badly, I really do. My heart is there, but the cold facts make me think twice.
They're already starting to
They're already starting to strong-arm Iraq into accepting a permanent occupation despite the Iraqi Parliament.
the whole post is
the whole post is incoherent.
>I conveniently remind them the 65-70% of their taxes go straight to the DoD
O'RLY?
DoD budget is on the order of ~400-450B, total federal budget is on the order of $3T(rillion), so that puts DoD @ ~15%, whupdido.
Democrats bribing old people, ie. social security and medicare/aid is alot bigger problem, ie. >$1T.
>Wouldn't it make sense to have policies that reduce our dependence
About 10 years ago Clinton/Democrats signed a law to ban ANWAR drilling. Setting up operations takes about 10 years, so that supply would be on market right about now. Hmmmm (but say it like the church lady from SNL!!!)
The only thing America has to fear are the Democrats.
Re: Taxes... the kind you
Re: Taxes... the kind you and I pay (Federal Income taxes)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:U.S._Federal_Receipts_-_FY_2006.png
and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:U.S._Federal_Spending_-_FY_2006.png
Overlay my friend. All this is assuming the federal budget is balanced... which it never has been under a Republican since I've been alive. Fiscal conservatives my ass.
Re: Social Security and Medicare/Aid... It has been broken and will always be broken. Most of us (my generation) knows this... it won't go away.
In regards to the stuff you said about Clinton and ANWR... so Obama is anti-ANWR as well because he's Democrat? Is that the argument you're presenting? You know as well as I do that is a logical fallacy. In any case, you throwing that down like it's a trump card only distracts from the real issue at hand. It's like you're advocating that the best way to deal with an addict is to give him more of what they're addicted to...
DoD budget is 480B for 2008
DoD budget is 480B for 2008 (515B for 2009).
but that does not include:
145B - Global War on Terror (yup, it's in the budget as such)
40B - Veterans affairs
35B - Homeland Security
260B - Debt payment, a large portion of which can be attributed to defense spending
Then there's little things like Iraq and Afghanistan which come from appropriations.
If you want to play semantics, fine, the Department of Defense only gets about 15% of budget. Realistically, military spending takes a larger chunk of the pie.
ANWR - Here's a report for you.
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/ftproot/service/sroiaf(2004)04.pdf
Summary
* opening ANWR to oil production would relieve the price of of oil by up to $0.50/barrel. So instead of being $131.47/barrel today, it would cost $130.97/barrel instead (which OPEC would counteract, in any case).
* opening ANWR to oil production would reduce US oil imports by 3 to 4%
Yes, the ANWR supply of oil could be on the market right now, and you and I would see no difference on the price at the pump.
So you mark the beginning of
So you mark the beginning of your era above with Lady Bird and not Roosevelt? I would have figured you would have said that since the beginning of the modern era* there have been twelve presidents, six conservative, six liberal, each with varying stances on both economic and social issues.
I can understand your myopic scope given your age and your breadth of understanding though.
I do like how you start to equate social liberalism with communism (ie. the name drop of moveon.org). One must seek to find what is best for both individual and state. And quite frankly when the state is in as bad shape as it is now... you have to set aside some of the those frivolous needs of the individual... because without the state, there is no shelter to be had, for petty ideologies or society at large.
/soap box
*ie. post the Great War
back on topic
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/06/08/obama_family_joins...
sketchy car
I can't help but think about security......from Hillary!
Hillary
“We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California...”
I love it!
I love it!
Bad fit!
His seat is too low!
Ha, thats exactly what I
Ha, thats exactly what I thought. (sorry San)
What's funny is that CNN had this photo up on TV last night right next to the (in)famous Dukakis(sp?) photo in the tank. None of the experts thought the photo was a good idea, the package was on political staging.
But how about that wack fender?
.
that's a trail-a-bike, he was pulling his youngest kid.
Rear tire
needs air...
Dear Lord
so many errors, so much incoherence, so little time, maybe later.
Hagel
As former CEO of Election Systems and Software, he could perhaps provide the inside edge in rigged-election-swing-states like Florida.