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In other news, no one involved in the massive fraud and graft that trashed the world economy has seen the inside of a jail cell.

Much of the pressure that lead to the problem was created by powerful politicians pursuing seemingly noble progressive goals. Unfortunately their meddling lead to disaster as they pressured mortgage companies to make more and more loans to people that couldn't afford them. The politicians did their damage and are now retiring, their friends and lovers got their money. America is left holding the bag. Actually it is worse that that - those same politicians created important legislation claimed to address the mess they made, but it doesn't. In some cases it only creates the opportunity to damage more of the economy. President Bush had tried to reform things, but was blocked by the Democrats.

The Real Culprits

In Reckless Endangerment, Morgenson and Rosner offer considerable censure for reckless bankers, lax rating agencies, captured regulators, and unscrupulous businessmen. But the greatest responsibility for the collapse of the housing market and the near “Armageddon” of the American economy belongs to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and to the politicians who created and protected them. With a couple of prominent exceptions, the politicians were Democrats claiming to do good for the poor. Along the way, they enriched themselves and their friends, stuffed their campaign coffers, and resisted all attempts to enforce market discipline. When the inevitable collapse arrived, the entire economy suffered, but no one more than the poor.

Jim Johnson, advisor to Walter Mondale and John Kerry, amassed a personal fortune estimated at $100 million during his nine years as CEO of Fannie Mae. “Under Johnson,” Morgenson and Rosner write, “Fannie Mae led the way in encouraging loose lending practices among the banks whose loans the company bought. A Pied Piper of the financial sector, Johnson led both the private and public sectors down a path that led directly to the credit crisis of 2008.”

Fannie Mae lied about its profits, intimidated adversaries, bought off members of Congress with lavish contributions, hired (and thereby co-opted) academics, purchased political ads (through its foundation), and stacked congressional hearings with friendly bankers, community activists, and advocacy groups (including ACORN). Fannie Mae also hired the friends and relations of key members of Congress (including Rep. Barney Frank’s partner).

Reckless Endangerment includes the Clinton administration’s contribution to the home-ownership catastrophe. Clinton had claimed that dramatically increasing homeownership would boost the economy; instead, “in just a few short years, all of the venerable rules governing the relationship between borrower and lender went out the window, starting with . . . the requirement that a borrower put down a substantial amount of cash in a property, verify his income, and demonstrate an ability to service his debts.”

Reckless Endangerment utterly deflates the perceived history of the 2008 crash. Yes, there was greed — when is there not? But it was government distortions of markets — not “unregulated capitalism” — that led the economy to disaster.

Bailout Politics

Among the Congressional “leaders” invited to the White House to devise a bailout “solution” are the very people who have for years created the risks that have now come home to roost.

Five years ago, Barney Frank vouched for the “soundness” of Fannie Ma

K Street Traffic Runs Both Ways

. . . Democrats, now firmly ensconced in power, have a K Street Project all their own. . . .

These days the Democratic leadership is strong-arming K Street to — take a guess! — hire more Democrats. “I think they haven’t come to terms with what happened two Novembers ago,” Sen. Bob Menendez (D., N.J.), told Roll Call. He added that while Democratic politicians will talk to Republican representatives of various industries, the “lack of a common philosophical and policy background makes it hard to communicate and build consensus” (in Roll Call’s words).

No kidding. Funny how that works. For good and ill, the Republican party is the pro-business party and the Democratic party ain’t. Maybe that explains the lack of common philosophical background. After all, I don’t recall Tom DeLay saying that labor unions and the NAACP should hire more Republicans.

“If Democrats want to hold the majority,” a Democratic lobbyist told Roll Call, “they don’t do it by playing Mr. Nice Guy. You don’t hold power if you don’t know how to use that power.” Why, it’s almost like that guy’s a ventriloquist’s dummy for Tom “The Hammer” DeLay.

On Thursday, the Senate Democratic leadership dragooned the heads of 17 major trade associations, according to the Politico. In an act of political intimidation the KSPers never dreamed of attempting, the senators leaned on the business representatives to get with the Democratic program or lose access.

What about all those Democratic promises of turning away from the corrupt practices of Republicans.

The great conservative statesman Edmund Burke offers one possible answer: “Hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises; for never intending to go beyond promises, it costs nothing.”

The New K Street Project

K Street Traffic Runs Both Ways

. . . Democrats, now firmly ensconced in power, have a K Street Project all their own. . . .

These days the Democratic leadership is strong-arming K Street to — take a guess! — hire more Democrats. “I think they haven’t come to terms with what happened two Novembers ago,” Sen. Bob Menendez (D., N.J.), told Roll Call. He added that while Democratic politicians will talk to Republican representatives of various industries, the “lack of a common philosophical and policy background makes it hard to communicate and build consensus” (in Roll Call’s words).

No kidding. Funny how that works. For good and ill, the Republican party is the pro-business party and the Democratic party ain’t. Maybe that explains the lack of common philosophical background. After all, I don’t recall Tom DeLay saying that labor unions and the NAACP should hire more Republicans.

“If Democrats want to hold the majority,” a Democratic lobbyist told Roll Call, “they don’t do it by playing Mr. Nice Guy. You don’t hold power if you don’t know how to use that power.” Why, it’s almost like that guy’s a ventriloquist’s dummy for Tom “The Hammer” DeLay.

On Thursday, the Senate Democratic leadership dragooned the heads of 17 major trade associations, according to the Politico. In an act of political intimidation the KSPers never dreamed of attempting, the senators leaned on the business representatives to get with the Democratic program or lose access.

What about all those Democratic promises of turning away from the corrupt practices of Republicans.

The great conservative statesman Edmund Burke offers one possible answer: “Hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises; for never intending to go beyond promises, it costs nothing.”

The New K Street Project

Outright denial of the problem without any proof or reason except some unsupportable personal conviction is particularly vile and selfish.

And here we see why the "Climate Change" nee "Global Warming" movement is so subversive and dangerous. If someone where to say, "I don't belive in Einstein's theory of relativity", he would be told he is wrong, or ignored. If someone were to say, "I don't believe in the theory of continental drift", she would be told she is wrong, or ignored. But to DOUBT or DENY climate change is sacrilege - you are vile, selfish, practically an evil doer fit to be punished. Scientists who see the data differently are in danger of losing their jobs, and funding. It has happened before. What other science acts that way? What other theory demands such fealty?

U.S. Senate Report: Over 400 Prominent Scientists Disputed Man-Made Global Warming Claims in 2007

Many of the scientists featured in this report consistently stated that numerous colleagues shared their views, but they will not speak out publicly for fear of retribution. Atmospheric scientist Dr. Nathan Paldor, Professor of Dynamical Meteorology and Physical Oceanography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, author of almost 70 peer-reviewed studies, explains how many of his fellow scientists have been intimidated.

Scientists Behaving Badly - More nails for the coffin of man-made global warming

You both asked:

I'm surprised you didn't include Occupy

and answered your own question:

Freedom of speech rights my ass. Occupy doesn't know what their rights are and what they mean, how to deliver a message, or how to work for change. Instead, they come across as a bunch of posers and whiners squatting in the parks and demanding the right to squat there for the rest of their lives while they wait for the world to change itself just because they discovered the world isn't fair.

Despite that, Occupy was the news story of the year to me. It was a brief spark of hope dashed by the incompetence of self-styled "victims" who insult those who know what actual oppression is.

The Occupy movement in the US is essentially the political equivalent of bitcoint: It takes large amounts of valuable time and energy and produces seeming random outputs that are claimed to be valuable but which in fact are largely useless despite the claims of their respective supporters.

Excellent: “Daily Show” on class divisions at Occupy Wall Street

Occupy’s Misogyny

When are the feminists going to speak out on the abuse of women that’s happening at the hands of the Occupy crowd? Rapes and sexual assaults are rampant among the Occupy movement in cities across the nation. According to ABC News, this past Saturday night a 23-year-old reported being raped by a 50-year-old inside a tent at Occupy Philadelphia. Similarly, a 14-year-old child was allegedly raped at Occupy Dallas. And at Occupy Cleveland, a 19-year-old told police she was raped after sharing a tent with an unknown man. After reporting her rape at Occupy Baltimore, a young woman claimed occupiers refused to help find her attacker. Now reports of rape and attempted rape in Zuccotti Park are surfacing. These are just the ones that were reported.

In addition to rapists, suicidal folks are causing emotional distress within the movement. After a 32-year-old man shot himself inside his tent at Occupy Burlington, Vermont protesters were so traumatized that they readily agreed to pack up and end their demonstration.

Besides rapes and suicides, occupiers have injured women in the midst of their shameless attempts to grab attention. A couple weeks ago, I attended Americans for Prosperity’s “Defending the American Dream” Summit, which was crashed by Occupy D.C. I was able to depart safely, with my frightened guests in tow, as protesters hissed vile remarks in our direction. Others weren’t that lucky. The Daily Caller reports that an elderly woman was pushed down the stairs during the occupiers’ stampede into the convention center. Not one protester stopped to help her, even as she lay in pain from severe injuries to her wrists, ankles, and legs.

Despite claiming to represent the 99%, Occupy Wall Street managed to cost at least 91 people their jobs: Milk Street Cafe, FiDi eatery that lost business due to Occupy Wall Street barricades, to close for good

During a time when most city governments have having a very difficult time financially, the Occupy movment jacked up the costs. It cost Oakland CA about $2.4 million, LA is looking at $2.3 million, with some more big bills coming in shortly. Many other cities are in a similar position.

A number of "Occupy" site around the world was hit by revelations that

Disagree. Small integrated reactors would solve all of America's energy problems but delete the energy monopolies that ex-government officials post themselves to run. That's why America, as a nation, refuses to invest in nuclear options except in the case of warships, where we have no other choice for power efficiency ratios.

Wind alone is a classic example of lies feeding lies.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/2910739/Wind-farms-fail-to-deliver-value-for-money-report-claims.html

http://www.martinfrost.ws/htmlfiles/scotnews11/110407-wind.html

http://tohatchacrow.blogspot.com/2010/07/scottish-wind-farms-fail-to-deliver.html

http://papundits.wordpress.com/2011/05/02/electrical-power-statistics-renewables-fail-to-deliver-january-2011/

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/275673/texas-wind-energy-fails-again-robert-bryce

http://toryaardvark.com/2011/08/17/wind-turbines-how-long-before-the-golden-eagle-is-extinct/

http://toryaardvark.com/2011/08/22/wind-turbines-now-they-are-a-threat-to-national-security/

http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/46519

http://papundits.wordpress.com/2011/03/04/renewable-power-fail-as-usual-november-2010/

http://wind-works.org/SmallTurbines/SkystreamDeliversLessThanAdvertisedatFrenchTestSite.html

http://carbon-sense.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/why-wind-wont-work.pdf

The current political attitude toward funding education makes it likely that things will stay that way unless people demand change.

Whatever problems the US education system has, more money is not the solution.

...there’s no correlation between increased funding and a better education. In testimony delivered earlier this month at a hearing conducted by the House Education and Workforce Committee, the Cato Institute’s Andrew Coulson pointed out it costs the taxpayer $151,000 for each student’s K-12 public education — nearly three times as much as was spent per student in the ’70s, if you adjust inflation. What’s the result? “Overall achievement has stagnated or declined, depending on the subject,” reports Coulson.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/259743/education-reform-cost-free-way-katrina-trinko

Breaking that cycle requires real money to recruit better teachers, and the shitty schools usually have the LEAST money.

I agree with the rest of your post, but you miss the point entirely here. The problem isn't that poor schools aren't being funded. In fact, per-student costs in poorer districts is actually multiple times what it is in more affluent areas (if you want a citation, watch the documentary Cartel and count the luxary cars found in school admin parking lots in the "poor" school districts of NJ). The problem is that a tiny fraction of that function actually makes it into the classroom. Most of it goes to pensions and unions.

A lot of the OWS folks are mad about the college debt. Occupy Wall Street and Student Loans by Josh Barro for The National Review. At Occupy Wall Street protests, student loan frustration by Jenna Johnson for The Washington Post Blog. Here's a demand: forgive student loan debt by Robert Applebaum for The Guardian. You're welcome.

Tax rates may be historically low, but that's just a number. How about tax actually collected? This may shed some light:

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/277652/progressive-income-tax-veronique-de-rugy

Your point would be nice if i limited my statement to just data. But as we know, hansen's data is not the raw data available, he had manipulated it and refused to disclose how or why when it was requested of him until he was ordered to do so by the government after the so called y2k problem with his numbers..

As for the rigging the AC, they rigged the entire day. http://www.nationalreview.com/planet-gore/17534/stagecraft/chris-horner

I've seen no evidence that James Hansen was politically active until the past 5 or 6 years

Then you either have not been paying attention, or are just didn't notice,

"card carrying communist!!"

Given that a suspicious looking brown guy whose political mentor in Chicago was a communist domestic terrorist has been elected President, I think you're safe Haque.

(Let the battle between "+1 Funny" and "-1 Troll" commence!)

right now they're trying to do them most they've ever done with the least soldiers to do it. (from a soldiers per activity point of view)

Don't Forget The Infantry
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/272808/don-t-forget-infantry-jim-lacey

To be fair, at least one notable Republican, Newt Gingrich, appears to support Obama's space policy. There is a lot of evidence that NASA was mostly a method of channeling funds to constituencies rather than a means of getting people into space.

"Conservatives (and the Religious Right) are far more likely than liberals to give of their **own** money to support "love thy neighbor" programs."
False. In fact the most generous group is actually atheists. Who, btw, have no afterlife angle there playing. Doing it because you're afraid you will be accountable to your sky wizard is not charity, it's paying for points.

I'm afraid you didn't get this correct, and the rest of your post is pretty much off as well.

The Right Cares - Charitable numbers

Lopez: And conservatives are more generous than liberals -- is it really that simple?

Brooks: No, it's really not a question of politics per se -- it goes much deeper, to the values that lie beneath political views. My book explores four areas of our culture that lead people to give, or not: religious faith, attitudes about the government's role in our lives, the source of one's income, and family. These are the big drivers of giving in America today, and the biggest is religion. Religious folks give far more than secularists in every way I've been able to measure. For example, people who attend a house of worship every week are 25 percentage points more likely to give to charity each year than people who never go to church, and give away about four times as much money. And this is not just a question of religious people giving to their churches, as meritorious as that might be: They also give and volunteer significantly more to explicitly nonreligious causes and charities.

Obviously, religion also correlates pretty strongly with politics, which is one reason why conservatives appear to give so much....

Lopez: Surely that religious people are generous isn't that surprising, right? The collection basket is just a normal part of their lives, right?

Brooks: It's probably not surprising to NRO readers, but it is surprising to a lot of folks out there, who see religion as superstition leading people to be less accepting of others, and religious contributions as little more than glorified country club dues. Many people I know find it almost unbelievable that religious people are 21 percentage points more likely than secularists to volunteer for totally nonreligious causes; or that they are about twice as likely to donate blood.

Lopez: Why does all of this matter?

Brooks: One of the most exciting areas of social science research involves the benefits of charitable behavior to givers, their communities, and our nation. There is a growing body of evidence that giving stimulates personal prosperity, strong communities, good citizenship, and a healthier nation. In other words, charity is not just about cash for services (which theoretically, the government could provide with tax revenues). Rather, it enhances quality of life for givers and those around them.

Lopez: How will being charitable make me happy, healthy and rich?

Brooks: Charitable giving and volunteering are tremendously pleasurable. They also empower givers, making them feel less like victims, and give people a lot of meaning in their lives. I have talked to clinical psychologists who actually prescribe volunteer work to their patients, with amazing results. Studies also show that givers are admired and elevated to positions of influence and authority. It is hardly surprising, given all the evidence, that givers enjoy (on average) higher happiness and prosperity than non-givers do. In fact, my research leads me to the belief that the single best self-help strategy is to serve others.

Lopez: What does your data mean for the term "bleeding heart"?

Brooks: According to the popular lexicon, "bleeding hearts" are those who most want to raise taxes and redistribute income from the rich to the poor. Yet the data show that these folks are actually less likely to give away their own money than are those whose hearts apparently don't bleed quite so much. For example, people who

Actually, he wanted to offer subsidies to nonprofits that would give rides to people while the transit union was on strike. Blind people already were in a pickle what with the buses not running. The plan apparently didn't go through, however, and the strike lasted a month and a half.

Not the best source, but at least it's a source: http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269165/pawlenty-s-transit-strike-katrina-trinko

If you're thinking of something else, you should probably provide a source.

I think you need recalibration.

Inquiry launched as Dutch euthanasia cases surge by 13% in ONE year

Anti-euthanasia groups say, however, that the sharp increase is probably linked to the collapse of the palliative care system in the Netherlands. Euthanasia is usually carried out by administering a strong sedative to put the patient in a coma, followed by a drug to stop breathing and cause death. . . .
Many Dutch people are growing uneasy about the way in which the law has been applied.
Among them is Dr Els Borst, the former health minister and deputy prime minister who guided the law through the Dutch parliament.
Last December said she regretted that euthanasia was effectively destroying palliative care. Amsterdam, a city with a population of 1.2 million people, is now served by two tiny hospices.
The British campaign group Dignity in Dying - formerly the Voluntary Euthanasia Society - has acknowledged that euthanasia is open to abuse but insists that assisted suicide could still work in practice.

Continent Death - Euthanasia in Europe

Euthanasia has also entered the pediatric wards, where eugenic infanticide has become common even though babies cannot ask to be killed. According to a 1997 study published in the British medical journal The Lancet, approximately 8 percent of all Dutch infant deaths result from lethal injections. The babies deemed killable are often disabled and thus are thought not to have a "livable life." The practice has become so common that 45 percent of neonatologists and 31 percent of pediatricians who responded to Lancet surveys had killed babies.

It gets worse: Repeated studies sponsored by the Dutch government have found that doctors kill approximately 1,000 patients each year who have not asked for euthanasia. This is not only a violation of every guideline, but an act that Dutch law considers murder. Nonvoluntary euthanasia has become so common that it even has a name: "Termination without request or consent."

Despite this carnage, Dutch doctors are very rarely prosecuted for such crimes, and the few that are brought to court are usually exonerated. Moreover, even if a doctor is found guilty, he or she is almost never punished in any meaningful way, nor does the murderer face discipline by the Dutch Medical Society. For example, in 2001, a doctor was convicted of murdering an 84-year-old patient who had not asked to be killed. Prosecutors demanded a nine-month suspended probation (!), yet even this brush — it can’t even be called a slap — on the wrist was rejected by the trial judge who refused to impose any punishment. Not to worry. The appellate court decided to get tough: It imposed a one-week suspended sentence on the doctor for murder.

Even such praising with faint damnation isn’t enough for the Dutch Medical Association. As a result of this and the handful of other non-punished murder convictions of doctors who engaged in termination without request or consent, the organization is lobbying to legalize non-voluntary euthanasia. Along these same lines — and demonstrating that the culture of death recognizes no limits — the day after the Dutch formally legalized euthanasia, the country’s minister of health advocated the provision of suicide pills to the elderly who do not qualify for killing under Dutch law.

Lest we think the Dutch experience is a fluke, let us now turn our attention to Belgium. Only one year ago the Belgians legalized Dutch-style euthanasia under "strict" guidelines. As with the Netherlands, once unfettered, the euthanasia culture quickly began to swallow Belgium whole. Moreover, the slide down the slope has occurred at a greatly accelerated pace. It took decades for the Dutch euthanasia to reach the current mo

OBL's family wasn't anywhere near OBL, otherwise they would either be dead or in position to describe what happened, neither of these two cases being true.

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Amal al-Sada was shot in the leg as she rushed the Navy SEALs, according to U.S. officials. She is now in Pakistani custody, along with her daughter and two other bin Laden wives, according to Pakistani officials, who say they eventually will be repatriated.-- Bin Laden's Wife: I'll Stand With You

Next.

Please show us a video of OBL that is after 2001. I bet you cannot find one. The 2007 video is clearly a fake, since he appears younger.

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Oct. 29, 2004: Osama Bin Laden Video Message

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Wanted: dyed and alive. Bin Laden reappears – and he’s had a makeover
Of course you weren't thinking that hair dye isn't invented till the year 2200, were you?

Next.

The locals know nothing more about OBL than we do. If they did know more, OBL would have been betrayed along time ago.

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BACKGROUND: The Haqqani group, al-Qaeda's own Taliban

Next.

Osama is dead from 2001. US waited a long time to present his death to us, when the time was right.

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See video from 2004, and this: Osama bin Laden Killed: 'Justice Is Done,' President Says

Next.

If Al Qaeda is driven by CIA, MI6 and Mossad, then its no wonder Al Qaeda announced OBL's death. Why would they need to announce it anyway?

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The US had the body, there was nowhere for Al Qaeda to go, was there? Try to say, "He's not dead!", and the US could produce either the body or the photos. Then there would be the awkward question of, "If he's not dead, why isn't he saying anything?" For Al Qaeda to try to cover up Bin Laden's death would have been more pathetic than the idea that, "Al Qaeda is driven by CIA, MI6 and Mossad". Well, there is also the fact that Muslims from around the world have been recruited to fight and die for Al Qaeda, and apparently none of them would have noticed that it was run by Americans, British, and Jews? Really? The fact that Bin Laden's wife saw him killed would also make that awkward, wouldn't it? If you've paid attention, you know that al Qaeda has announced the death of its regional leader in other places, such as Iraq.

You might want to try reading from a broader range of media - you've got things pretty much backwards. Maybe you can start here

Granted it's hard to define a movement with no membership requirements, but there's plenty of nutters in there to make the rest seem a bit dodgy. .

It's pretty easy to identify the majority of the "dodgy" part of the Tea Party movement.

Dems who created fake Tea Party candidates arraigned in Michigan
Who’s Behind the ‘Crash the Tea Party’ Website?
Democrats Embarrassed by Campaign Tricks
Liberal Orgs, Unions Funneling Money to Anti-Tea Party Group

Does anybody actually take the tea party seriously?

It looks like it, yes.

The National Review Institute has obliged Representative Waters, commissioning McLaughlin & Associates to take a detailed look at tea partiers: both the 6 percent of the 1,000 likely voters polled in mid-January who told McLaughlin that they had participated in tea-party rallies and the additional 47 percent who said they “have not participated in a tea party protest but . . . generally agree with the reasons for those protests.” The results dispel a number of myths.

The first is that the tea partiers are driven by racial animus against the president. Actually, a third of the people who participated in tea-party rallies say that they approve of Obama’s performance in office and a fifth say that they voted for him in 2008. Five percent of them are black, 11 percent Hispanic. Of those who agree with the protests, 29 percent approve of Obama’s performance. Waters and Krugman can rest easy.

The second myth is that the tea partiers are unpopular. Krugman wrote last April that the tea parties “have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so,” and Brooks speculated that “the tea-party tendency” might “be the ruin of the Republican party, pulling it in an angry direction that suburban voters will not tolerate.” Some Republican officials worry that media criticism and Democrats’ attacks on the activists have made it politically risky to associate themselves with the tea-party movement.

The polls do not bear out this fear. Most voters don’t consider themselves well-informed about the tea parties, but have a favorable view. As noted already, 53 percent of the electorate look sympathetically on the tea parties. McLaughlin also asked likely voters which characterization of the tea parties they leaned toward: an “anti-government, fringe organization that is driven by anger” or a group of “citizens concerned about the country’s economic future.” A majority of 57 percent chose the benign characterization while only 19 percent disagreed. Even a plurality of self-identified liberals went with “concern” rather than “anger.” -- The Coming Tea-Party Election

Party Smartly

Granted it's hard to define a movement with no membership requirements, but there's plenty of nutters in there to make the rest seem a bit dodgy. .

It's pretty easy to identify the majority of the "dodgy" part of the Tea Party movement.

Dems who created fake Tea Party candidates arraigned in Michigan
Who’s Behind the ‘Crash the Tea Party’ Website?
Democrats Embarrassed by Campaign Tricks
Liberal Orgs, Unions Funneling Money to Anti-Tea Party Group

Does anybody actually take the tea party seriously?

It looks like it, yes.

The National Review Institute has obliged Representative Waters, commissioning McLaughlin & Associates to take a detailed look at tea partiers: both the 6 percent of the 1,000 likely voters polled in mid-January who told McLaughlin that they had participated in tea-party rallies and the additional 47 percent who said they “have not participated in a tea party protest but . . . generally agree with the reasons for those protests.” The results dispel a number of myths.

The first is that the tea partiers are driven by racial animus against the president. Actually, a third of the people who participated in tea-party rallies say that they approve of Obama’s performance in office and a fifth say that they voted for him in 2008. Five percent of them are black, 11 percent Hispanic. Of those who agree with the protests, 29 percent approve of Obama’s performance. Waters and Krugman can rest easy.

The second myth is that the tea partiers are unpopular. Krugman wrote last April that the tea parties “have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so,” and Brooks speculated that “the tea-party tendency” might “be the ruin of the Republican party, pulling it in an angry direction that suburban voters will not tolerate.” Some Republican officials worry that media criticism and Democrats’ attacks on the activists have made it politically risky to associate themselves with the tea-party movement.

The polls do not bear out this fear. Most voters don’t consider themselves well-informed about the tea parties, but have a favorable view. As noted already, 53 percent of the electorate look sympathetically on the tea parties. McLaughlin also asked likely voters which characterization of the tea parties they leaned toward: an “anti-government, fringe organization that is driven by anger” or a group of “citizens concerned about the country’s economic future.” A majority of 57 percent chose the benign characterization while only 19 percent disagreed. Even a plurality of self-identified liberals went with “concern” rather than “anger.” -- The Coming Tea-Party Election

Party Smartly

Granted it's hard to define a movement with no membership requirements, but there's plenty of nutters in there to make the rest seem a bit dodgy. .

It's pretty easy to identify the majority of the "dodgy" part of the Tea Party movement.

Dems who created fake Tea Party candidates arraigned in Michigan
Who’s Behind the ‘Crash the Tea Party’ Website?
Democrats Embarrassed by Campaign Tricks
Liberal Orgs, Unions Funneling Money to Anti-Tea Party Group

Does anybody actually take the tea party seriously?

It looks like it, yes.

The National Review Institute has obliged Representative Waters, commissioning McLaughlin & Associates to take a detailed look at tea partiers: both the 6 percent of the 1,000 likely voters polled in mid-January who told McLaughlin that they had participated in tea-party rallies and the additional 47 percent who said they “have not participated in a tea party protest but . . . generally agree with the reasons for those protests.” The results dispel a number of myths.

The first is that the tea partiers are driven by racial animus against the president. Actually, a third of the people who participated in tea-party rallies say that they approve of Obama’s performance in office and a fifth say that they voted for him in 2008. Five percent of them are black, 11 percent Hispanic. Of those who agree with the protests, 29 percent approve of Obama’s performance. Waters and Krugman can rest easy.

The second myth is that the tea partiers are unpopular. Krugman wrote last April that the tea parties “have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so,” and Brooks speculated that “the tea-party tendency” might “be the ruin of the Republican party, pulling it in an angry direction that suburban voters will not tolerate.” Some Republican officials worry that media criticism and Democrats’ attacks on the activists have made it politically risky to associate themselves with the tea-party movement.

The polls do not bear out this fear. Most voters don’t consider themselves well-informed about the tea parties, but have a favorable view. As noted already, 53 percent of the electorate look sympathetically on the tea parties. McLaughlin also asked likely voters which characterization of the tea parties they leaned toward: an “anti-government, fringe organization that is driven by anger” or a group of “citizens concerned about the country’s economic future.” A majority of 57 percent chose the benign characterization while only 19 percent disagreed. Even a plurality of self-identified liberals went with “concern” rather than “anger.” -- The Coming Tea-Party Election

Party Smartly

Granted it's hard to define a movement with no membership requirements, but there's plenty of nutters in there to make the rest seem a bit dodgy. .

It's pretty easy to identify the majority of the "dodgy" part of the Tea Party movement.

Dems who created fake Tea Party candidates arraigned in Michigan
Who’s Behind the ‘Crash the Tea Party’ Website?
Democrats Embarrassed by Campaign Tricks
Liberal Orgs, Unions Funneling Money to Anti-Tea Party Group

Does anybody actually take the tea party seriously?

It looks like it, yes.

The National Review Institute has obliged Representative Waters, commissioning McLaughlin & Associates to take a detailed look at tea partiers: both the 6 percent of the 1,000 likely voters polled in mid-January who told McLaughlin that they had participated in tea-party rallies and the additional 47 percent who said they “have not participated in a tea party protest but . . . generally agree with the reasons for those protests.” The results dispel a number of myths.

The first is that the tea partiers are driven by racial animus against the president. Actually, a third of the people who participated in tea-party rallies say that they approve of Obama’s performance in office and a fifth say that they voted for him in 2008. Five percent of them are black, 11 percent Hispanic. Of those who agree with the protests, 29 percent approve of Obama’s performance. Waters and Krugman can rest easy.

The second myth is that the tea partiers are unpopular. Krugman wrote last April that the tea parties “have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so,” and Brooks speculated that “the tea-party tendency” might “be the ruin of the Republican party, pulling it in an angry direction that suburban voters will not tolerate.” Some Republican officials worry that media criticism and Democrats’ attacks on the activists have made it politically risky to associate themselves with the tea-party movement.

The polls do not bear out this fear. Most voters don’t consider themselves well-informed about the tea parties, but have a favorable view. As noted already, 53 percent of the electorate look sympathetically on the tea parties. McLaughlin also asked likely voters which characterization of the tea parties they leaned toward: an “anti-government, fringe organization that is driven by anger” or a group of “citizens concerned about the country’s economic future.” A majority of 57 percent chose the benign characterization while only 19 percent disagreed. Even a plurality of self-identified liberals went with “concern” rather than “anger.” -- The Coming Tea-Party Election

Party Smartly

Granted it's hard to define a movement with no membership requirements, but there's plenty of nutters in there to make the rest seem a bit dodgy. .

It's pretty easy to identify the majority of the "dodgy" part of the Tea Party movement.

Dems who created fake Tea Party candidates arraigned in Michigan
Who’s Behind the ‘Crash the Tea Party’ Website?
Democrats Embarrassed by Campaign Tricks
Liberal Orgs, Unions Funneling Money to Anti-Tea Party Group

Does anybody actually take the tea party seriously?

It looks like it, yes.

The National Review Institute has obliged Representative Waters, commissioning McLaughlin & Associates to take a detailed look at tea partiers: both the 6 percent of the 1,000 likely voters polled in mid-January who told McLaughlin that they had participated in tea-party rallies and the additional 47 percent who said they “have not participated in a tea party protest but . . . generally agree with the reasons for those protests.” The results dispel a number of myths.

The first is that the tea partiers are driven by racial animus against the president. Actually, a third of the people who participated in tea-party rallies say that they approve of Obama’s performance in office and a fifth say that they voted for him in 2008. Five percent of them are black, 11 percent Hispanic. Of those who agree with the protests, 29 percent approve of Obama’s performance. Waters and Krugman can rest easy.

The second myth is that the tea partiers are unpopular. Krugman wrote last April that the tea parties “have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so,” and Brooks speculated that “the tea-party tendency” might “be the ruin of the Republican party, pulling it in an angry direction that suburban voters will not tolerate.” Some Republican officials worry that media criticism and Democrats’ attacks on the activists have made it politically risky to associate themselves with the tea-party movement.

The polls do not bear out this fear. Most voters don’t consider themselves well-informed about the tea parties, but have a favorable view. As noted already, 53 percent of the electorate look sympathetically on the tea parties. McLaughlin also asked likely voters which characterization of the tea parties they leaned toward: an “anti-government, fringe organization that is driven by anger” or a group of “citizens concerned about the country’s economic future.” A majority of 57 percent chose the benign characterization while only 19 percent disagreed. Even a plurality of self-identified liberals went with “concern” rather than “anger.” -- The Coming Tea-Party Election

Party Smartly

I guess it would help if I actually posted a link.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/264631/senator-kyls-defense-michael-j-new

If you listen to Walker on the Koch prank call he makes no bones about it, it's about union busting, not Wisconsin's finances (which, on the whole, aren't that bad).

Don't get me wrong, public union busting is a good idea in its own right. But I googled Wisconsin's finances for the past few years. There's been a significant increase in deficits since the 90s. Apparently, in the 2013 budget, they are expecting a shortfall of 25-30% of the overall budget.

Did you miss the collapse of the banks?

Nope. Nor did I miss the subsequent destruction of US enterprise and jobs by the administration and 2009-2010 Congress which wasn't GOP dominated. Wisconsin, needless to say, was not prepared. Such revenue-dropping events will happen again and again. Public union busting is an obvious tool for helping make future downturns less harmful to Wisconsin.

The US is the only one allowed to use this tech to abuse human rights, and it really doesn't want to risk losing its lead in technology used for spying on citizens.

You are completely wrong. First off, it's legal, and not an abuse of human rights. (And no, this isn't the first time a court has made a similar finding.)

Second, it's necessary because some American citizens, immigrants, and visitors don't want to live in peace, but have taken up the cause of extremists. (Just a sample - there are many, many more.)
Daniel Boyd pleads guilty to US terrorism charges -9 February 2011
Domestic Terrorist 'Jihad Jane' Pleads Guilty to Four Charges - Feb 2, 2011
Stockham requests new attorney - February 05, 2011
          Note: This individual is apparently an American Sunni Muslim who tried to attack a Shia Muslim Mosque.
Iranian Book Celebrating Suicide Bombers Found in Arizona Desert - January 27, 2011
Baltimore man accused of plotting to blow up military recruiting station in Md. - Thursday, December 9, 2010
Oregon Bomb Suspect Mohamed Osman Mohamud Wanted "Spectacular Show," - November 29, 2010
Faisal Shahzad: 'War With Muslims Has Just Begun' - Oct. 5, 2010
2 MN women charged with aiding Somali terrorists - Aug 5, 2010
U.S. links 8 to Somali terrorist group - November 24, 2009
And here's one for the Canadians: Converts Who Kill

And how did this get started? September 11 attacks

If you bother to read bin Laden's 'letter to America', you will see that in order for him to call off his minions, Americans will have to convert to his flavor of Islam, give up the constitution, implement Sharia law (which will mean cutting off hands of thieves, stoning adulterers, no more alcohol (prohibition again), drugs, porn, executing homosexuals, etc., etc., etc.), and many other odious demands.

Ultimately this is about various factions of Islam trying to extend their power by force. It won't go away soon. I suggest you get used to it.

Dreaming of Al-Andalus

By the way - the Muslim Brotherhood is not helping.

I don't think anybody really equates the FSF with piracy.

You're not up to date - apparently, if a country standardizes on FOSS in government, it "fails to build respect for intellectual property rights", and is considered by US businesses to be sufficient reason to put that country on the Special 301 report (which means that the country does not provide "adequate and effective" protection of US intellectual property rights).

Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning

Liberal Fascism - The blog

Wikileaks is guilty only of receiving the data and publishing the parts they feel are morally justifiable to make public, not stealing, and not espionage, and certainly not treason (they aren't even eligible to commit that one).

Well, thats kind of the problem.

Taliban Study WikiLeaks to Hunt Informants
WikiLeaks Comes Under Fire from Rights Groups
Wikileaks Fails “Due Diligence” Review

This could turn into a feedback loop. If enough informants against the Taliban and Al Qaeda are killed as a result of Wikileaks, it could have consequences in the United States or Europe.

The diplomatic consequences have already been considerable.

What motivates Assange?

In December, 2006, WikiLeaks posted its first document: a “secret decision,” signed by Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, a Somali rebel leader for the Islamic Courts Union, that had been culled from traffic passing through the Tor network to China. The document called for the execution of government officials by hiring “criminals” as hit men. Assange and the others were uncertain of its authenticity, but they thought that readers, using Wikipedia-like features of the site, would help analyze it. They published the decision with a lengthy commentary, which asked, “Is it a bold manifesto by a flamboyant Islamic militant with links to Bin Laden? Or is it a clever smear by US intelligence, designed to discredit the Union, fracture Somali alliances and manipulate China?”

The document’s authenticity was never determined, and news about WikiLeaks quickly superseded the leak itself. Several weeks later, Assange flew to Kenya for the World Social Forum, an anti-capitalist convention, to make a presentation about the Web site. “ No Secrets

Assange the Anti-American

Manning supposedly had some encrypted chats with Assange prior to releasing any material. It will be very interesting if those come to light.

Regardless of whether they've broken a world-changing story so far, they've produced a chilling effect on corruption.

It isn't so much corruption that is shut down, as American diplomatic operations. Dealing with actual corruption would require a scapel, not the blunt object of the Wikileaks releases.

Battered by a scandal which seems to provide a fresh wave of embarrassment with each passing day, the US government is being forced to undertake a major reshuffle of the embassy staff, military personnel and intelligence operatives whose work has been laid bare by the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks.

The Obama administration was yesterday facing a crisis in its diplomatic service, amid growing evidence that the ongoing publication of a tranche of supposedly-confidential communiqués will make normal work difficult, if not dangerous, for important State Department employees across the world.

"In the short run, we're almost out of business," a senior US diplomat told the Reuters news agency, saying it could take five years to rebuild trust. "It is really, really bad. I cannot exaggerate it. In all honesty, nobody wants to talk to us ... Some people still have to, particularly (in) government but ... they are already asking us things like, 'Are you going to write about this?'"

"We're going to have to pull out some of our best people – the diplomats who best represented the United States and were the most thoughtful in their analysis – because they dared to report back the truth about the nations in which they serve."

Julian Assange’s EgoLeaks
WikiLeaks’ Selective Morality

WikiLeaks Reportedly Outs 100s of Afghan Informants

... in spite of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's claim that sensitive information had been removed from the leaked documents, that reporters scanning the reports for just a couple hours found hundreds of Afghan names mentioned as aiding the U.S.-led war effort.

One specific example cited by the paper is a report on an interview conducted by military officers of a potential Taliban defector. The militant is named, along with his father and the village in which they live.

"The leaks certainly have put in real risk and danger the lives and integrity of many Afghans," a senior official at the Afghan foreign ministry told The Times on condition of anonymity. "The U.S. is both morally and legally responsible for any harm that the leaks might cause to the individuals, particularly those who have been named. It will further limit the U.S./international access to the uncensored views of Afghans."

One former intelligence official told the paper that the Taliban could launch revenge attacks on "traitors" in the coming days.

Blood Already on Assange’s Hands (and the WikiLeaks-Gitmo Connection)

Regardless of whether they've broken a world-changing story so far, they've produced a chilling effect on corruption.

It isn't so much corruption that is shut down, as American diplomatic operations. Dealing with actual corruption would require a scapel, not the blunt object of the Wikileaks releases.

Battered by a scandal which seems to provide a fresh wave of embarrassment with each passing day, the US government is being forced to undertake a major reshuffle of the embassy staff, military personnel and intelligence operatives whose work has been laid bare by the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks.

The Obama administration was yesterday facing a crisis in its diplomatic service, amid growing evidence that the ongoing publication of a tranche of supposedly-confidential communiqués will make normal work difficult, if not dangerous, for important State Department employees across the world.

"In the short run, we're almost out of business," a senior US diplomat told the Reuters news agency, saying it could take five years to rebuild trust. "It is really, really bad. I cannot exaggerate it. In all honesty, nobody wants to talk to us ... Some people still have to, particularly (in) government but ... they are already asking us things like, 'Are you going to write about this?'"

"We're going to have to pull out some of our best people – the diplomats who best represented the United States and were the most thoughtful in their analysis – because they dared to report back the truth about the nations in which they serve."

Julian Assange’s EgoLeaks
WikiLeaks’ Selective Morality

WikiLeaks Reportedly Outs 100s of Afghan Informants

... in spite of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's claim that sensitive information had been removed from the leaked documents, that reporters scanning the reports for just a couple hours found hundreds of Afghan names mentioned as aiding the U.S.-led war effort.

One specific example cited by the paper is a report on an interview conducted by military officers of a potential Taliban defector. The militant is named, along with his father and the village in which they live.

"The leaks certainly have put in real risk and danger the lives and integrity of many Afghans," a senior official at the Afghan foreign ministry told The Times on condition of anonymity. "The U.S. is both morally and legally responsible for any harm that the leaks might cause to the individuals, particularly those who have been named. It will further limit the U.S./international access to the uncensored views of Afghans."

One former intelligence official told the paper that the Taliban could launch revenge attacks on "traitors" in the coming days.

Blood Already on Assange’s Hands (and the WikiLeaks-Gitmo Connection)

You're wrong. High tech companies are fleeing California for low tax states. In fact, high earners inevitably flee high tax states for low tax states:

Examining IRS tax return data by state, E.J. McMahon, a fiscal expert at the Manhattan Institute, measured the impact of large income-tax rate increases on the rich ($200,000 income or more) in Connecticut, which raised its tax rate in 2003 to 5% from 4.5%; in New Jersey, which raised its rate in 2004 to 8.97% from 6.35%; and in New York, which raised its tax rate in 2003 to 7.7% from 6.85%. Over the period 2002-2005, in each of these states the "soak the rich" tax hike was followed by a significant reduction in the number of rich people paying taxes in these states relative to the national average. Amazingly, these three states ranked 46th, 49th and 50th among all states in the percentage increase in wealthy tax filers in the years after they tried to soak the rich.

Here's a comparison between California and Texas that explains, in great detail, how and why Texas is kicking California's ass.. This is also why more than half the new jobs created in the last twelve months were created in Texas. Another reason is strong vs. weak or no public sector unions. One thing that articles notes:

Renting a 26-foot U-Haul truck to go from Austin to San Francisco this July would cost you about $900. Renting the same truck to go from San Francisco to Austin? About $3,000. In the great balance of supply and demand, California has a large supply of people who are demanding to move to Texas.

High tech employees are fleeing California for Texas, because they can keep more of what they make, the government isn't going bankrupt, and the roads and schools are now better in Texas. Despite all the money California spends on a a bloated public sector, the actual core services delivered are worse in California than they are in Texas:

“Today, you go to Texas, the roads are no worse, the public schools are not great but are better than or equal to ours, and their universities are good. The bargain between California’s government and the middle class is constantly being renegotiated to the disadvantage of the middle class.”

Here's a slightly older analysis from 2007. Since then, of course, things have gotten better (relative to the rest of the nation) for Texas and worse for California.

Low taxes and small government create jobs. High taxes and big government destroy jobs.

You're wrong. High tech companies are fleeing California for low tax states. In fact, high earners inevitably flee high tax states for low tax states:

Examining IRS tax return data by state, E.J. McMahon, a fiscal expert at the Manhattan Institute, measured the impact of large income-tax rate increases on the rich ($200,000 income or more) in Connecticut, which raised its tax rate in 2003 to 5% from 4.5%; in New Jersey, which raised its rate in 2004 to 8.97% from 6.35%; and in New York, which raised its tax rate in 2003 to 7.7% from 6.85%. Over the period 2002-2005, in each of these states the "soak the rich" tax hike was followed by a significant reduction in the number of rich people paying taxes in these states relative to the national average. Amazingly, these three states ranked 46th, 49th and 50th among all states in the percentage increase in wealthy tax filers in the years after they tried to soak the rich.

Here's a comparison between California and Texas that explains, in great detail, how and why Texas is kicking California's ass.. This is also why more than half the new jobs created in the last twelve months were created in Texas. Another reason is strong vs. weak or no public sector unions. One thing that articles notes:

Renting a 26-foot U-Haul truck to go from Austin to San Francisco this July would cost you about $900. Renting the same truck to go from San Francisco to Austin? About $3,000. In the great balance of supply and demand, California has a large supply of people who are demanding to move to Texas.

High tech employees are fleeing California for Texas, because they can keep more of what they make, the government isn't going bankrupt, and the roads and schools are now better in Texas. Despite all the money California spends on a a bloated public sector, the actual core services delivered are worse in California than they are in Texas:

“Today, you go to Texas, the roads are no worse, the public schools are not great but are better than or equal to ours, and their universities are good. The bargain between California’s government and the middle class is constantly being renegotiated to the disadvantage of the middle class.”

Here's a slightly older analysis from 2007. Since then, of course, things have gotten better (relative to the rest of the nation) for Texas and worse for California.

Low taxes and small government create jobs. High taxes and big government destroy jobs.

I'd never root for something that's bad for our country, but it certainly would be karmic if they were blamed for not being able to accomplish anything because of the other party obstructing them.

I suppose it could happen. One should remember however that the vast majority of relevant "obstruction" came from within the Democrat party. This is particularly true in the House, where the Republicans didn't have the votes on their own to obstruct bills or much ability to put subversive amendments into House bills. The latter was due to a change in House rules. Allegedly, the current House (which disbands in January) is the first House without any bills debated under "open rules". The significance of this is that debate under rules tends to favor the dominant party. From the PDF file just mentioned, page 6:

In this paper, we focus on the micro-level, two-step bargaining process over restrictive rules. The rst step involves examining which proposed amendments are allowed to be voted on under the restrictive rule. Second, we look at the success of these proposed amendments. Using a new dataset of all proposed amendments considered before the creation of a special rule in the 110th Congress, we nd that majority party Democrats are signicantly more likely than minority party Republicans to have their proposed amendments considered and successfully passed under restrictive rules. However, success is conditional on intraparty ideology. More conservative Democrats { like Stupak { were generally more successful than their liberal counterparts in getting their amendment considered under the rule and passed on the floor. The next section discusses the literature in greater detail.

In other words, the politicians with the most pull were Democrats who were on the ideological outskirts, followed by mainstream Democrats, followed by Republicans. That's not what I call a good case for attempting bipartisanship. Especially when you consider that the policy was apparently in place from day one of this Congress.

In the Senate, the Republicans did manage to have enough members for filibusters. Senate Democrats made several failed attempts to court individual Republicans, but not a serious attempt to engage with the Republican party. I don't see a reason for the Republicans to be anything other than staunch obstructionists in those circumstances.

The next Congress looks to me like it fixes the worst of the partisanship abuses, which were in the House and splits Congress, always a good thing. I doubt either branch of Congress is going to appear obstructionist relative to the other. We are more likely IMHO to see hostility to incumbent politicians than a particular reaction to one side. The wild card in all this is Obama. If he continues to be an ass, we could well see things swing even further to Republicans, perhaps even to a Republican dominated Congress and presidency. That's not a great outcome, but maybe they'll spend most of their scaling back the excesses of 2009-2011.

Listen, I respect your zealotry. And I don't pretend to be an expert in all this. But I have worked in politics, and I understand how number-shuffling works. Even a quick Googling shows that these things you assert are hotly disputed by reputable sources.

For the "Obamacare thingy", the gist is the the CBO must score a bill according to guidelines given it, and in this case, the guidelines require it to make unsupportable and in some cases extremely unlikely assumptions. For example see:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/25/AR2010022504074.html
http://www.nationalreview.com/critical-condition/47494/obamacare-budgetary-disaster/james-c-capretta

Among many others.

For the deficit claim: Oh my goodness. Did you read the linked article? Did you understand the deficit was reduced because, the prior year, the administration ran the biggest deficit in US history? And that it declined a little because the bulk of the stimulus spending had ended?

For the tax cut: That's neither here nor there. The other things you raise are *results*; the tax cut was a *tactic*, and even the administration doesn't seem to think it achieved the desired result.

The job creation thing: many, many people have pointed out this this is a totally unfalsifiable claim. There is simply no way to account for job creation in this manner. The only things we know for sure: (1) We've lost about 3.2M jobs;* and (2) The unemployment rate, post stimulus, is slightly higher than the rate the administration warned we would have if we *didn't* pass the stimulus.**

* Of the 214,000 net new jobs, half are in Texas
** A further critique is that the government, since it does not create wealth, cannot actually "create" a job. Any money it uses to "create" a job is money it must simply tax or borrow from the private sector to do so.

Not only did she NOT advocate any armed revolution, she said so.

She may have said "I hope that's not where we're going", but she sure did sound like advocating for it as a next step if the votes don't go her party's way: http://www.nationalreview.com/battle10/243092/new-harry-reid-ad-says-angle-over-line-second-amendment-rhetoric-elizabeth-crum

"our Founding Fathers, they put that Second Amendment in there for a good reason and that was for the people to protect themselves against a tyrannical government, and in fact Thomas Jefferson said it's good for a country to have a revolution every twenty years."

"They're afraid they'll have to fight for their liberty in more Second Amendment kinds of ways? That's why I look at this as almost an imperative. If we don't win at the ballot box, what will be the next step?"

What if a Democratic candidate said something like this during elections in the Bush years? Would you have given them a free pass?

Just imagine if we shared global climate data with everyone... oh wait.

You realize the raw data has not been shared, only the mysteriously "adjusted" data.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/15/phil-jones-lost-weather-data
http://article.nationalreview.com/407512/the-dog-ate-global-warming/patrick-j-michaels

You obviously don't understand fallacies. Quoting them is insufficient- you need to match them properly too. It's not hard, it just requires being precise and honest about your argument. Let me explain:
1) That was hardly an ad hominem, which would require me to actually ATTACK THE PERSON. Say, by calling teabaggers idiots, which I clearly didn't. You could try to claim that there's an implied ad hominem included, but that's false because some teabaggers actually embrace the word. It's also an accepted way to say concisely and precisely convey my point, so if you can't handle it, get another term into the vernacular.
2) That's not a strawman. It's a real position, though it may not be yours. I was speaking generally, you couldn't help but take things personally like a child.
3) That's not an appeal to emotion. "Think of the starving children" would be. It was a taunt and a put-down. And it worked- you flew off the handle and wrote your little rant.

You're thinking three years in the past when TEA was about government and taxation, rather than strictly about playing politics rather than debating issues.

Teabagging is not Libertarianism. It started there, but that's not what I'm talking about. That's why I use the word "teabagging" but not "libertarianism". Misguided as I think he is in places, I'm not arguing against Ron Paul's philosophy. I didn't mean to offend your fucking messiah. SORRY.

Texas wanting to secede from the union because of democrats is similar to the DOI. Teabagging on the other hand, is a load of anti-democrat horseshit which is a quite novel thing. Prior to it, it was usually only political parties which engaged in this behavior, and they were honest about being part of government. These wackos claim to be no part of government, including the ORIGINAL POINT WHICH YOU'VE STILL NOT ADDRESSED: "the people didn't vote for you, therefore you are not a legitimate government".

Here's a tip for better success: Want to try to convince someone about a specific point, don't just send them to a large website and say "go read". If it was just you here, I wouldn't bother schooling you, random stranger. It's at least a dozen people who've been modding me up. And they should be shielded from ignorance.

I never said the financial and banking industry was unregulated. I said they're as close to unregulated as they've been able to manage, and they're usually lobbying to have existing regulations removed.

Actually, you said:

The entire banking fiasco of the last few years is what happens when the financial industry has as close to a free market as they can get.

As close as they can get is not the same as "as close to unregulated as they've been able to manage." The banks have had to manipulate the market (with government assistance for which you blame the bank when it was the SEC that defined it) to continue doing business because they were practically forced (by the government) to give loans to people who they knew couldn't pay them back. If the government came up to you and said, "Give money to this person even though you'll probably never see a dime back" how would you react? That's exactly what happened with the housing industry and they are trying to do it again. With all these requirements, people were deceived as well to think that they could extend the equity in their homes to "pay off" debt through a HELOC. This was defined by the SEC as acceptable lending. And I don't know if you know this, but the SEC is a federal agency.

washington times = a list of individuals often labeled "right wing" (white supremacist), when chances are, they aren't "right wing" by any other definition than lumping bigots into that group. Except when bigotry is on the left (Black Panther, Nation of Islam etc) it is excused or marginalized where no such thing is afforded to the "right".

Gawker is just a repeat of the big "three" individual offenders listed in the WT article. If that is all the left has... that is pretty sad.

Daily Kos is nothing more than "faux news" for the left.

MN Publius article is interesting in that it simply ignores that violence against (R) offices. Again, for every alleged infraction of the "right" I can easily point to one from the left.

http://www.channel3000.com/politics/3776992/detail.html

not to mention all the "Fake" hate crimes that never happened ..

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/516936/posts

http://www.nationalreview.com/phi-beta-cons/39720/godmother-fake-hate-crimes

http://sweetness-light.com/archive/partial-list-of-fake-hate-crimes-2006-2007

Or the nice young man who was just guarding the polls

http://hotair.com/archives/2010/07/06/video-the-nice-young-man-eric-holder-left-off-the-hook/

Yeah, you can repeat the three "massive hate crimes" by large groups (meaning idividuals) of angry Right Wing Extremists (Lone Fringe kooks), but that is all you got.

Wrong.

The first big day for this movement was Tax Day, April 15. And organizers had a gimmick. They asked people to send a tea bag to the Oval Office. One of the exhortations was “Tea Bag the Fools in D.C.” A protester was spotted with a sign saying, “Tea Bag the Liberal Dems Before They Tea Bag You.” So, conservatives started it: started with this terminology. But others ran with it and ran with it.

--
http://nrd.nationalreview.com/article/?q=Mjk1YmRjNzIxNmUwMTI0ZWYxZWU4OWU2MzFiOWJmNDE=

Wrong. Now that teabaggers know what the term means, they call themselves tea partiers. But back in the day, they carried teabags around and called themselves teabaggers.

Here's an article backing up that fact, but I warn you, it is from that den of liberal iniquity, Billy Buckley's The National Review, so take it with the grain of salt that any reading of The National Review requires.

http://nrd.nationalreview.com/article/?q=Mjk1YmRjNzIxNmUwMTI0ZWYxZWU4OWU2MzFiOWJmNDE=

In an obvious effort to belittle the contributions of fighters in WWI and WWII, some polititians and commentators have decided to call the cold war WWIII and the War on Terror WWIV.

The WWIII designation has gained enough use to be in Wikipedia. WoT as WWIV is still limited to the lunitic fringe.

By the way, yes the AP wrote the article found by the Slashdot geek. But AP usually obtain their material elsewhere. A quick search turned up the likely source: The Case Against College Education which was written by Ramesh Ponnuru of the National Review. The notion was promoted in the blogosphere (echo chamber?) by Stephen Spruiell in this post at the National Review blog

Neither of those guys seem to have even an undergraduate degree in economics, but in their defense, neither appear to have claimed that "a growing number of economists" support this idea -- unless one of them wrote the AP piece. In any case, I wasn't able to turn up any economist who said anything like this, nor any other article on the topic at all. It seems to have been invented from whole cloth at the National Review, and propagated without questioning. Their motivation appears to be to invent a quasi intellectual cudgel to use against certain initiatives of the Obama administration in the area of higher education funding.

Certainly it's possible that somewhere in the vast literature of economics somebody somewhere might have explored this notion, but there doesn't seem to be any apparent evidence for this "growing number" of economists who support this idea.

That aside, some of the arguments offered in the TIME piece are worthy of pondering, but they ignore many of the societal benefits of higher education, or assume those have no value.

In any case, concerning your cowardly anonymous chicken shit rock throwing, like Jon Stewart said famously, fuck off.

By the way, yes the AP wrote the article found by the Slashdot geek. But AP usually obtain their material elsewhere. A quick search turned up the likely source: The Case Against College Education which was written by Ramesh Ponnuru of the National Review. The notion was promoted in the blogosphere (echo chamber?) by Stephen Spruiell in this post at the National Review blog

Neither of those guys seem to have even an undergraduate degree in economics, but in their defense, neither appear to have claimed that "a growing number of economists" support this idea -- unless one of them wrote the AP piece. In any case, I wasn't able to turn up any economist who said anything like this, nor any other article on the topic at all. It seems to have been invented from whole cloth at the National Review, and propagated without questioning. Their motivation appears to be to invent a quasi intellectual cudgel to use against certain initiatives of the Obama administration in the area of higher education funding.

Certainly it's possible that somewhere in the vast literature of economics somebody somewhere might have explored this notion, but there doesn't seem to be any apparent evidence for this "growing number" of economists who support this idea.

That aside, some of the arguments offered in the TIME piece are worthy of pondering, but they ignore many of the societal benefits of higher education, or assume those have no value.

In any case, concerning your cowardly anonymous chicken shit rock throwing, like Jon Stewart said famously, fuck off.

Do you think he's getting rich as head of GISS?

If he has any investment sense, yes. But there's more to being the perpetual head of a government agency than money. It carries a bit of power and prestige.

So far he's been more right than wrong about what he's said.

He made three claims: 1988 was warmest year on record (I gather the 30s are still contenders for warmest year on record through 1988, the estimates for those years is lower than 1988, but the actual temperatures may have been higher), second, that because global warming is large, it is caused by the greenhouse effect (I think it likely that the current global warming is caused in large part by human release of greenhouse gasses, but Hansen's conclusion is simply logically faulty), and third, that GISS models predict bad things will happen. The last point remains correct, I imagine, with current GISS models still predicting bad things will happen. Whether bad things actually will happen (or have happened for that matter) remains conjecture. If you look at his actual projection, his models overstated global warming. Two of the scenarios mentioned there, "A" and "B" overstate effective forcing from greenhouse gasses (GHGs) by something like 80% in the case of scenario A (which was intended to be an extreme scenario) and almost 10% for scenario B. The third scenario was a fixed level of forcing, there might be some AGW effect, but it would be bounded and reached by the year 2000. So we ended up somewhere between the weaker AGW scenario and a scenario of no effective AGW. There is a huge difference in what makes good policy choices in this region.

I can't rule out that scenario B was actually more accurate originally, but got sexed up for the 1988 congressional hearing. After all, even by 1988, Hansen had somehow acquired a reputation as someone who'd deliver reliable AGW testimony. He's also on record as saying some remarkably stupid and biased stuff for a scientist. Given that the CRU (which maintains other important global temperature estimates) has also suffered from biased management, we have to consider the possibility that our best estimates of global temperature are compromised and biased upwards by some unknown amount. While I know there are thousands of climatology papers out there, I have yet to see papers (aside from some critics of dubious provenance) either criticize or independently verify the estimates from these two groups.

In other words, Hansen's predictions are borne out by possibly biased GISS and CRU research. Now maybe there is independent verification of these temperature estimates. I'd be interested in hearing about that. But as it looks to me, Hansen gets to verify his own predictions and yet, he was still off in favor of the political view that he continues to wish to propagate.

How, precisely, do you 'support the troops'? Do you support them in that you hope they will come back alive? Do you support them in re-integrating into civilian life after discharge? Do you support them by hoping they win their battles? Do you support them in hoping they succeed in their mission?

Although different people would stress different items from your list, a straightforward person would list all of the above. An obama or a pelosi would keep trying to weasel out.

Make no mistake, 'support our troops' means everything and nothing.

Weaselese...

Here's Coulter's quote in context http://old.nationalreview.com/coulter/coulter.shtml And here's the video where she explains it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJfGmaDrXJQ

As far as Franken is concerned, if he believes that people should help each other (which I do as well), then why does he need government involvment? I certainly don't need any help from the government to give food to the nearby food bank or donate clothes to those in need. In fact, more government regulation to "help those that need it" usually ends up doing the opposite.

You do not need the government to help the poor, downtrodden, unfortunate, or anyone else down on their luck. You need to get off your ass and get involved in your community. Help your neighbor when they need help. Volunteer with local charities. Help people that need help instead of continually asking the government to do it. That just invites fraud and abuse.

The future of space, at least in the near term, doesn't look so great for astronauts.

If you haven't seen it already, I'd definitely suggest reading through this piece by aerospace engineer Rand Simberg (of transterrestrial.com) over at the NRO, titled, "Obama's Space Program: More Conservative than Bush's -- America has never had a space policy more visionary or more friendly to private enterprise." Of course, the National Review has plenty of issues, but the piece itself is quite well-written and a strong defense of the new plan for NASA:

http://article.nationalreview.com/432073/obamas-space-program-more-conservative-than-bushs/rand-simberg

The new plan gives us redundant capabilities to get people to orbit, and competition among the multiple providers will drive down prices not just for NASA but for everyone, including those who want to use Bob Bigelow's orbital facilities for business or pleasure. It will develop, finally, the technologies needed to reduce the costs of going beyond Earth orbit as well. It will open up space not just for NASA astronauts but for all, Americans and others, to seek their own dreams there. It may be intrinsically unconservative to have a federal human-spaceflight program in the first place, but politics would seem to dictate that it's going to continue. If so, don't we want to see that money spent on a more effective, more conservative, and fundamentally American approach to opening up space? If so, then Obama's space program beats the previous one, which was based on the anachronistic Apollo model.

The new policy isn't perfect. I would have preferred that the president not be so openly dismissive of the moon. "Been there, done that" is not a sound basis for selection of goals. Besides, we barely scratched the surface and haven't yet done a proper assessment of the possibilities of using its resources for further reductions in transportation costs (something that the VSE got right -- unfortunately, the technology was starved by Mike Griffin's Ares overruns). But that doesn't matter right now. If we can finally get on with the business of letting private industry take on the (literally) mundane task of getting people only 200 miles above and let NASA focus on new technologies, there is plenty of time over the next few years to decide exactly where to go from there -- and Barack Obama will not be involved in that decision. The important thing is that we had to euthanize NASA's expensive, unneeded new rockets and move on to the more critical development of opening up space. We're now on a path to do so, assuming that Obama's plan survives Congress.

Many don't trust President Obama to execute this policy along these lines. Neither do I, necessarily. But I'd rather have good policy poorly executed than poor policy well executed. The execution can always be improved later. Do I believe that Obama really cares as much about human spaceflight as he said in his speech at the Cape? No, and I think that's a good thing. I think he sees NASA as a problem he inherited from George W. Bush, and in that, he is right for once. He assigned to the problem people who do care about getting humans into space and, like Bush, he now wants to move on to other matters. Really, we should fear the day he gets interested in spaceflight; that will be the day that private enterprise is no longer trusted to conduct it. Let's hope that day never comes. In the meantime, remember that when government does the right thing, it doesn't matter whether it's done for the wrong reason. Whatever the motivations behind it, this is a much more visionary space policy than we've ever had before.

Now, what is the point of a return trip? Men on the Moon has been done. No one doubts we could do it again if we really wanted to.

I disagree. I don't think we could do it again. Others feel the same way.