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Barack Obama Wins Democratic Nomination
An anonymous reader was one of many who noted that Barack Obama has claimed the Democratic nomination having secured enough delegates and super-delegates to claim victory. Of course, technically this assumes that the supers all vote as they say they will and they are free to change their minds. So no doubt we'll continue to hear debate on this subject until either the convention or Hillary steps down.
First of all, I'm not sure why this is "news for nerds", but I'll readily concede that it is "stuff that matters".
Obama may have the nomination, but someone really ought to tell Hillary. Last night, during her non-concession speech, she stated that she's "making no decisions tonight". Today I heard on NPR that she is "open to the Vice-Presidential spot", even though she may not take it...she "just wants to be considered".
Sweet Zombie Jesus...what will it take to make this woman go away???
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
I'm a republican and I will vote for Obama.
You may be right that Obama can't win, but in times like this I think sometimes you have to just roll the dice and go for it otherwise nothing changes.
you must live in an alternate reality where the republican party stands for saner government and a balanced budget.
what's the price of gas over there?
I've upped my standards, so up yours.
Clinton has no practical reason to "go away" - Obama's victory was surprisingly narrow. Over the last few months the Obama campaign lost momentum - Clinton's victories were quite substantial in several key states that would be essential to a Democratic victory (Ohio and Pennsylvania especially).
Given Obama's weakness in three key Democratic demographics - women, white blue collar workers, and Hispanics - Clinton still has a substantial role to play in the election.
Her supporters are bitter about how they perceive Clinton's treatment versus how Obama has been treated by the press. I realize it's anecdotal, but talking to a number of my friends who were ardent Clinton supporters I've become worried that they simply won't vote Democrat due to what they perceive was the unfairness and sexism of the campaign.
Clinton's in a strong position to request the VP slot. If she concedes to Obama then she simply becomes an also-ran, and has no negotiating power.
/* Dang, I can't type that well. */
I threw everything out the damn window that made me a Republican 8 years ago and until I see a positive change in that party I'm not going back. The Republicans dug the hole they are in. They have to dig themselves out now, and McCain is not the answer. He's already digging that hole deeper.
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/06/mccain-id-spy-o.html
Anyway, Obama would be demonized with any name, and regardless of his hue. No matter who he is, if he's a D and he's running, then he'll be the "single most liberal member of Congress" since Che Guavera or whoever, an "elite" know-it-all who is out of touch with the heartland of America, will have gotten a "free pass" from our "overwhelmingly liberal media," would put us in danger of "appeasing" the terrorists, "emboldening our enemies," etc. It's the same script, every time, all the time. The Republicans always use the same words to galvanize their base, because, well, it works. Who or what Obama is or isn't has little to do with how the Republicans will vote.
You say that like it's a bad thing.
My blog
Right. It's O'Bama. He's Irish. :-P
My blog
Leaving gender out of the issue, how many republicans do you think would vote for someone named Hillary Rodham Clinton? A name that rings with the sounds of two recent so called enemies (Dennis Rodman is one, you figure out the other). See how stupid that sounds, troll?
Reviewing just the first hour of video games.
In the US there are two major political parties, and each one puts one candidate up for the election in the general election for President. But before the general election, each party has the primary campaign, where individuals within each party run against each other for the right to be the candidate in the election. These primary campaigns basically involve citizens (when it's their state's turn) going and voting for the candidate that they want to represent whichever party. Depending on the rules of the particular state, sometimes you have to be a registered member of that party in order to vote, and sometimes they're open to anyone registered to vote at all. Basically the way it works is that depending on how many votes you get in a primary, then you get a certain number of delegates. Delegates are basically voting representatives for that state, proportioned by the relative populations of each state,and are expected to vote in accordance with the results of the primary popular vote in that state.
You don't need to win one of the primaries to run for president, but you need to win one if you want the support of one of the major political parties. For various reasons, it's currently not particularly practical for a candidate to win the general election unless they are a candidate from one of the two main parties.
The two major parties in the US are the Democrats and the Republicans. Each party creates the specific rules that are used in their own primaries to select their candidates. The democrats, for various reasons, have come up with a complicated system that not only has regular delegates, but also has "super-delegates." Supers are usually (but not always) individuals considered particularly important to the democratic party (elected officials, party leaders, etc), and they are free to put their delegate vote towards whichever candidate they wish. Basically, they're individuals who's vote counts for way more than the average person's. Their role is restricted purely to the democratic primary however, in a general election, their vote counts for no more than anyone else's.
That's just a brief overview, without the history of why super-delegates exist, but there's plenty of information out there to be found on that.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
Whats in a name.. Democrat.. Republican.. those are just names, the issues they stood for fell by the wayside long ago.
The current crop of politicians have their own agendas, and in many cases, those agendas cross the borders between the party lines, and in some cases, quite far across those borders.
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
"if you don't vote then you don't have any 'moral' right to complain about the result."
That's a quaint assumption backed up by no rationale whatsoever. I am a taxpayer and a US citizen, so I have every right to persuade other members of society to effect changes I desire. Voting is a right, not a gateway to other rights. On its own, it also happens to be the least effective method of bringing about change. I would rather use my freedom of speech to persuade the public to bring about a candidate that will uphold everyone's rights rather than trample them. Until such a candidate exists, there will be no acceptable choice for president.
Funny how you touch on shit that doesn't matter in the least, yet leave out the one thing that really does paint Obama as an elitist, insensitive bastard: him going on about how people only like guns/religion because they're poor, a month or two ago.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Is Obama a black man with a white mother or a white man with a black father? As a racist white male, this question has been causing me night terrors!
Leftism is bad because it takes from those who earned and gives to those who don't deserve.
Uh, that's what the American government is all about. Right or Left, everybody's stealing from one group and giving it to some others, many of whom haven't earned it in any way. On the left you have the welfare system, which gives free money to poor people, and on the right you have super-rich tax breaks and "back room corporate deals", which gives free money to the fabulously wealthy.
You have two choices - either accept this premise, and decide which system of redistribution you think is "least unfair", or reject it entirely, and work to radically change our government and socio-economic system so that all kinds of involuntary redistribution are unnecessary and impossible to execute.
Because, for some unknown reason, a large portion of the people in the U.S. equate a person's religion with who they are. It's as if one of the reasons we broke from you folks has been completely forgotten.
Apparently, people believe that if you believe in some man-made myth of a supreme being who sits high in the sky watching everything you do, who tells you you must follow a set of rules they have set down or else you will be condemned to an eternity of pain and torture yet, who still cares and loves you*, you are somehow more worthy of an elected office than the atheistic heathens who do not believe in a supreme being.
And we can all see what a great job those religious-minded folks who have been elected to office have done.
*My apologies to George Carlin fans for not quoting his diatribe accurately. I just wanted to get the gist of his comments.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
I don't support him personally, but in your case, why not vote for Ron Paul? Vote for who you want to win, not some asshole who's convinced you he has the best chance to win. Better to stand for your principles and lose than abandon them to win. It's the latter choice (on the part of politicians and the public) that's given us the pathetic political situation we're in today.
The supermarket down the street doesn't give a damn how hungry I am, they just want to make money. But the way they've chosen to make money(by selling food), happens to align nicely with one of my priorities in life, which is obtaining food. I honestly could not care less if the manager of that supermarket gets paid well or is happy or whatever. We don't care about each other, but our interests align enough that I choose to go to that supermarket and spend my money.
The point is that it sucks that the government that we've got isn't as concerned with the citizens as it should be, but unless you've got some brilliant way to change it, we just need to work with what we've got, and make the best of it. Whatever the motivations of the democrats or the republicans are, they do tend to do some things differently, and there's certain areas where the goals of each party might align with my personal goals. What a senator in DC gets out of that whole deal might be completely different from what I get out of it, but that doesn't mean that the end result doesn't affect me and that I can't have an opinion on it.
It might be as simple as drawing up a list of the pros and cons of some of the basic direction that each party can be expected to go in when you see how it might affect you. Because it will affect you. Even if you believe that everyone at the top is motivated purely by greed, their selfishness leads them in different directions from each other, and one of those directions is bound to be more useful to you than the others.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
If she is seen as reducing Obama's chances in the general election the harm to her reputation and the resulting backlash will keep her from ever having the support needed to try again.
I'm generally a conservative. I hesitate to call myself a republican, though that is the party I'm registered with, but of the two majors, they are closer to what I believe in. A libertarian might be the right term, though they tend to be rather... Extremist. The point is, I'm not a Democrat and didn't get to vote in that primary.
Regardless I am what you might call a moderate conservative. I have and will certainly cross party lines. I vote based on who I think will do the best job, not a D or an R. So I'm the kind of voter that the democrats need to be after. In my case, I'll almost certainly vote for Obama if he's nominated. If not, I'll probably vote for McCain. I don't like Clinton at all. She seems very totalitarian, in that she thinks she knows what's best for the economy, for you personally (her video game stance for example) and so on. That is opposite to what I think. I think in general government should try and stay out of things, when practical. They should be a force that guides the economy, not controls it, and that ensures people have freedoms but that they don't infringe on others, not that hands out a list of what is right and wrong.
So for me, Obama is good. I don't agree with him 100%, but then I don't agree with anyone but myself 100%. However over all I like his policies, and I think he'll be good for the nation. Clinton, no, sorry, I won't go that route. While I don't think McCain is as good a candidate as Obama, I think he's better than Clinton.
I'm not the only person I know who's the same way either. I have a number of friends with similar political views and the thing I hear is "I hope Obama wins because I'll vote for him, but if not I'll vote for McCain."
Hardcore republicans are a lost cause. They'll vote R no matter what. So while they might hate Obama more, it doesn't matter since they won't vote for Hillary either. They are all R all the time. The people who matter are those who come down on the conservative side, but aren't caught up in party dogma.
Now I have no empirical evidence as to who will vote what way, but this assumption that Clinton has the ability win win republicans where as Obama doesn't is just silly. Neither will win the party voters, and I and my friends are proof that there are at least some out there who feel Obama yes, Clinton no. We probably aren't the only ones either.
No candidate is going to have a walk in the park this time around, all of them have something that a non-trivial portion of America has a problem with. However that doesn't mean Obama has no chance, in fact I'd say it is quite the opposite.
> Generally you Democrats and Republicans I don't see enough difference between Republican and Democratic candidates. Party voters still make me sick
This is exactly why Hillary lost the game and Obama got it. People in US(and around the world , though irrelevant) were fed up of the status-co politics. They wanted something different and someone who can make a change. As citizens and consumers, people want products which are different. Especially when they realize that the product they have currently(Bush) sucks so bad. Hillary miserably failed to understand this pulse and stuck with same old crap. There is no perceivable difference between Hillary and Bush. The differences are really cosmetic. Iraq is just one example where there is a striking parallel between the policies of Bush/Mcain and Hillary.
http://www.nasirudheen.blogspot/
Well, here's the quote:
I guess you and I just read things differently, because I got a bit more nuance out of his statements, and "people only like guns/religion because they're poor" doesn't quite capture it. Seeing the economic viability of your community crumble, seeing the way of life of your parents crumble, can be a polarizing experience, and yes, people cling to things, things they consider symbolic of their way of life. I don't see anything especially patronizing about saying that people are pissed off and that when they're pissed off the symbolic things matter more than they might in times of prosperity.
I didn't turn my back on the Republicans. They turned their backs on me. I wanted fiscal conservatives. I got spending that made the liberals turn green with envy. I wanted strong foriegn policy. I got a war over non-existant WMDs, which has weakened both our military and our political capital with other nations. I wanted to escape the Democrats fear-mongering. I got Republican fear-mongering.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
Did any of you see the speech yesterday by McCain? Who does a speech in New Orleans and not have a single black person show up? The differences between McCain and Obama are so stark that people have very little choice in the matter. 3/4s of this country want the war to end. A vote for McCain is a vote to continue the war. He has made that painfully obvious. A vote for McCain is a vote for continuation of the same policies that have made Bush the most unpopular president in the history of the country. On top of all of that the turnout for this election is going to be massive. Election boards nationwide have reported that turnout for just the primaries this year have exceeded turnout for general elections past. What is energizing people to come out like that? Probably the same feelings that makes Bush unpopular. Independent voters are breaking hard to the left for Obama. And in reality, if you want the best indicator that people are going to vote a Democrat president in, look at the Republican house and senate seats that have been lost already to Democrats this year. Across the country seats held for decades by Republicans are being won by Democrats or are being polled as likely Democrat pickups already. There is one house race I know of in the south that voted 70% for Bush in 2004, it is that Republican of a district. Yet today, it is polling 65% in favor of the Democrat candidate. The turnarounds nationwide are, in some cases, that big. There is no way this country is about to continue the policies of George W Bush with a vote for McCain.
Perhaps I am just too liberal, but I don't really think that race will keep Obama from winning.
I wish that I could agree with you here, but I can't. Of the people I come into contact with who usually vote Democrat and are white (generally labor union types, government union employees and folks on the dole), most are willing to totally ignore the fact that they have the most to gain from Obama winning and yet will vote against him because they're convinced that he will do things like legalize black men raping white women
I realize that the above was something of an overstatement but I guess that I am reacting to the frustration of dealing with how to respond to the sheer hostility towards minorities that I deal with constantly. Example within the past month include:
-A neighbor who refers to the Starlings that live in his eaves as "nigger birds."
-Another neighbor who regaled me with stories of a weekend camping trip with his cop friends that including a fellow camper shouting "white power" as my neighbor arrived.
-A co-worker who said that she voted in the primary for the first time (age 50) so "that we could keep America from being overrun by niggers."
I sincerely wish that I were exaggerating, but, sadly, I'm not. And considering that my conscience and lack of good sense causes me to almost always rebuke people for this sort of thing, I can only wonder what these people say to each other in private.
But maybe it's because I live in the Midwest and people are supposedly more racist here, but my many conversations with people in other parts of the country have done nothing to disabuse me of the notion that this is very widespread.
Great, now I've gone and depressed myself...
The republican party does the exact same thing, it's just less honest about it. The democrats will tax you and then do whatever with the money, but at least you see the money coming out of your wallet. The republicans don't tax you, but still do whatever with the money, pretending like it magically grows on trees. Eventually it catches up with you as prices rise and your income doesn't, not to mention the mountains of new debt we're piling up daily. Either party is going to spend your money, but at least the democrats respect your intelligence enough not to lie to you about it.
The only type of conservatism that currently exists in the republican party is social conservatism, and I'd think that you as a libertarian would have some serious issues with that.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
Yes. I wanna help my neighbors
Do you want to help your neighbors, or do you want to force me help your neighbors?
That's the difference between private charity, funded by people who want to donate to it, and government welfare, funded by taxes.
-- Support a free market in the field of government
> I wish Slashdot editors could be real editors, and check their work.
We will see a black female president who supports communism and is a Debian core developer, before that happens.
Thank you for demonstrating once more that libertarianism is about childish selfishness at its base. What magical fairy land do you live in where everyone is born with the exact same opportunities?
Protip: we are a society, and without that society those who "earned" would have nothing. A society doesn't survive by kicking the less fortunate in the nuts. For every greedy welfare moocher (which I'm guessing you imagine make up the majority of the people on welfare) out there there are a hundred families who have fallen on hard times because the parents' employers care more about profit than about people.
Government exists to serve and protect the people. All of them. I suggest you get over yourself and get used to it.
Take your trolling somewhere else. Obama in no way voted for the Patriot Act. Ever. Like the Iraq war authorization, that vote predated him in the senate. I can't believe someone marked you insightful. Here's proof. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=107&session=1&vote=00313 He later supported revising it with civil liberties measures.
What signature defines me as a person?
Maybe leftists simply recognize that you pay one way or the other. You can have less inequality or you have to pay for more policing. You can have a public health service or you can have people who are sick and less productive.
You're assuming that governments are the only agencies capable of providing welfare, which is simply not true. Many charities and church organizations provide aid for people that need it, and the better part about those organizations is that since they rely on donations, they actually try to help the person get out of the economic situation that he is in, rather than doing nothing and letting the individual slum on the free cheese.
That's the issue many people have with government welfare programs, they don't provide much incentive for people to get off it.
Which do you think is better? Donating $50 to a charity that helps the poor, that is more likely to succeed at getting them out of their situations, and being able to write off the $50 for taxes, or not getting that write-off and have the government spend your $50 on people that probably won't ever leave the welfare system?
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
And Sen. Obama is offering exactly what as an alternative to more war? Certainly not immediate withdrawal from Iraq, despite how many Americans want that (it'll be a bloodbath if we leave now, we're told, as if Iraqi are so busy laying roses at our soldiers and mercenaries' feet). His Iran threat to the Chicago Tribune ("[T]he big question is going to be, if Iran is resistant to these pressures [to stop its nuclear program], including economic sanctions, which I hope will be imposed if they do not cooperate, at what point ... if any, are we going to take military action? ... [L]aunching some missile strikes into Iran is not the optimal position for us to be in" given the ongoing war in Iraq. "On the other hand, having a radical Muslim theocracy in possession of nuclear weapons is worse.") and his recent vote for allocating $165 billion for the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan (including $51 billion dollars for veterans' education) tell me that he, like any other corporate-funded Democrat, have no principled objection to war or to these wars in particular.
As Cindy Sheehan recently reminded us, the Democrats have a strong history of war making and a lot to apologize for:
Digital Citizen
And high oil prices will in turn decrease consumption, which will save the planet! The neocons are actually trying to save us from ourselves, you see. It all becomes so clear now!
I agree with you. I think it's a f-ing shame that McCain is being fed to the wolves as the nominee for this election. He's the only non-born-again GOP nominee who (currently) has the potential to get elected. However, the GOP needs a solid cleaning up and a resounding defeat this fall is the only way that's going to happen. They need to purge all the religious zealots, war mongers, and lobbyist puppets and get back to a base of solid fiscal conservancy and international trade. Right now, it's ironic that the Dems offer the best options for the above. I'm voting for Obama, because I expect him to run a tight ship and weaken the grip of lobbyists over DC. Time will tell how right I am, but right now, there's simply no better candidate in my mind's eye.
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws-Plato
Meanwhile, all that lost revenue in taxes affected many other people outside your immediate perception. I'm glad the tax cuts helped you personally, but plenty of people have been hurting under the tax breaks.
You must live in a reality where everything is black and white. Higher gas prices means fewer gas consumers whilst lower prices brings more consumption. We're witnessing that right now. For envirodems, lower consumption is a GOOD thing not a bad thing.
Moreover, higher gas prices means that other source of energy that are arguably "better" from a sustainability/environmental perspective but previously unworkable given the price of gasoline become much more appealing.
Besides, an increase in domestic production would have such a SMALL impact on the overall cost of gasoline and any impact would be fleetingly short lived. The US simply does not have enough oil reserves to make much of a lasting impact.
Finally, there's a really good argument that we should drain the cheap oil from other places first and keep our oil reserves until a time it actually matters. Using our reserves now would probably not give us a real good return on its value.
Do you want to be forced to pay pennies of your income to help my neighboors, or do you want them to turn to a life of crime to support themselves and wind up in a prison where you will be forced to pay dollars of your income to support them?
Public education, social responsibility, and the empowerment of all will help you more significantly than isolating yourself from society.
I'm not saying we should go all commie or socialist over here, but a balanced struggle between socialist and capitalist (and many other!) points of view in our government is what keeps it healthy. Falling in the trap of a single party (even a dual party like we have now) reduces our government's health.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
A choice quote from your link: "Watching the never-ending spectacle of glassy-eyed white girls gone wild for this mulatto, and knowing the Negro libido and psyche, one finds it almost impossible to believe that he has never taken advantage of his opportunities."
Would you care to renounce that author?
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
I couldn't agree more... though I always though it would be interesting if say 50% of my tax dollars I was able to distribute to charities as I see fit. let the government continue to control the other half to fill in the gaps. Make the charity selection process part of the tax filing process.
I think we'd see a lot of special interest programs drop of the map because they'd would have to convince the citizens that it's a worthy program as opposed to lobbying government officials. Not to mention I think it would make a lot of people feel like their taxes where actually doing something/going to a good cause as opposed to simply being "taken" by the government for whatever.
Collector's Edition
You've got to be kidding me. This is the #1 reason that I can't really be a libertarian. Altruism and having people "take care of the poor" on their own time is a fantastic idea, except that it DOESN'T WORK. Human Beings are assholes, and most would as soon kick a guy in the gutter before giving him a dollar, much less pick him up and help him find a job. Just admit that you don't give jack sh*t about people who through luck or mental illness are in a bad situation.
If you quit the welfare program tomorrow I guarantee you crime would rise through the roof and local charities wouldn't be able to do anything more than they already do. How do I know? Because I volunteer all the time, and most charities (especially for the homeless and battered women shelters) are full to the TILT every day, and have to turn away people. It really is sad.
"sometimes he felt that his whole life was a dream, and he wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it."
I can se Mccains slogan. Obama shall not pass.
Correction: McCain WAS the most anti-torture candidate. Until he had the oppertunity to vote against allowing the CIA to use "harsh interrogation techniques" that meet the UN's definition of torture. At which point he toed the party line, and voted to allow the CIA to waterboard and use other combinations of intense questioning methods.
And that is McCain's weak spot. He spent the late 90's and early 2000's building up a GREAT maveric image, heck, John Kerry talked to him about a VP seat in the 2004 election! But since then, McCain has flip flopped on almost every stance he took out of line with the Republican party. Campaign finance reform, Gay marrage, Torture, even the war he has been pretty fishie on.
John McCain from 1999 would have been a great option instead of Bush. John McCain from 2003 would have been a great option instead of Bush. But at this point, he is so manipulated and has gone back on so many of his 'maveric' stances, that he's losing the independant voters and me along with them.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
That doesn't make sense. That's Gandalf's line, not Saruman's. :)
The Republicans
are the
Grand Oil Party
We are Dead Stars looking back Up at the Sky
I know. If the price of gas gets any more expensive, rappers are going to start drinking it!
"But this one goes to 11!"
Do some research on welfare (AFDC). ~55% of people on welfare in the US are off of it in less than 2 years: 20% are on welfare for less than 7 months. 15% are out in 7 to 12 months. 19% are off in 1 to 2 years.
That leaves 27% who are on it for 2 to 5 years, and only 20% who are on it over 5 years. The debates about this shit are so far divorced from reality anymore it is driving me crazy. THE US DOES NOT HAVE A WELFARE PROBLEM. For the most part it is working exactly as it should - helping people to become self-reliant.
what's the price of gas over there? And you must live in an alternate reality where Democrats understand that the laws of supply and demand regulate gas prices and allow for increased production in addition to increased efficiency to bring the cost of oil down.
In the real world that I live in, I've heard Republicans screaming for increased domestic production and Democrats screaming, "NO!" Well , i'll tell you this . It doesn't matter whether it's democrat or republican . The result for the American people matters . So make a choice based on what changes you want , rather than on something as relative as a political position.
At least you have the ability to vote for it. I don't live in the US , so i can't vote for it.
Yet the consequences are for the entire world.
Slipping shoelaces ?
It doesn't matter if everyone is born with the same opportunities. I was born poor to a couple of crackhead parents. I went off on my own at 16 years old and did what I had to do. I'm sick of people saying 'ooh I was born into this ghetto and I can't get out there are no opportunities.' Cry me a river. Get yourself a pair and get out of that environment. I've worked at pizza places, temp jobs, telemarketing, and other jobs that most poor people won't even take because 'it doesn't pay me enough'. How can you justify handouts that are taken by force from the rich when most of the poor people I know won't even take a crap job? I've slept in cars, under bridges, on the el train, buses, you name it. I finally managed to land a full time job and buy a car after years of hard work. Childish selfishness? No, I call it the inability to comprehend why people can't pull themselves up by their bootstraps and thake care of themselves. Everybody wants something for nothing. In Libertarianism, there is no such thing as a free lunch. What, exactly, is wrong with that?
Without tax revenue, the bills from the excessive spending of the Bush administration cannot be paid . This is deferred debt. This is why tax cuts were irresponsible and not appropriate.
Everybody agrees that we should cut spending (on things that don't benefit them directly usually), but it's my view that we should spend only money that we have. That's how I manage myself and it keeps me happy and those who deal fairly with me happy.
Ever since the rabid warmongering of the paranoid years of Truman we've been digging this deficit hole and it's got to a point where we'll never get out, we'll just collapse one day because everybody's just too short sighted.
My poetry site welcomes the unusual.
Hard to believe, but never the less, true.
A second piece of wisdom. You do yourself a disservice praising and quoting a piece liberally sprinkled with the following kinds of phrases: "Magic Negro", "Negro clown", "young gentleman of color is claiming to have had a sexual encounter with Saint Barack", "because Obama is a socialist, a Democrat, and - especially - a Negro". It strongly suggests that you yourself are quite comfortable with overt racism and pathological hate. And it leads me to the conclusion, Mr. Cornelius, that you are engaged in a crude form of psychological rationalization for your own unstated racist sentiments.
A little self-introspection may be in order.
And I quote:
"Despite claims in 2003 that Halliburton is the 'only company' that can handle the Pentagon's logistics work in Iraq, today's Post quotes a consultant for the company as saying, 'You're really asking too much of one firm to be able to manage all of this.' Other companies expected to bid for the contract later this year include Lockheed-Martin Corp. and Northrop-Grumman Corp."
Perhaps you haven't heard of Bunnatine Greenhouse?
"She testified before Congress that the contracts awarded to one of these subsidiaries, KBR, represented the "most blatant and improper contract abuse" that she had witnessed during her 20 year tenure working for the government."
The new LOGCAP 4 government contract is expected to have "robust competition" and be awarded to no less than three separate companies.
Seems pretty obvious after some simple research that KBR isn't the only company that can handle the job in Iraq.
I was looking for a candidate that stood for higher taxes, more government, less free trade, more social programs and was anti-defence. Thnx for letting me know!
Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
The idea that any finite amount of money could "Eliminate extreme poverty around the world" is a fraud and nothing else. Bad governments in the poorest countries will steal all the money and use it to strengthen the government and enrich the leaders. In relatively rich countries, most extreme poverty is due to personal waste and sloth, and no amount of money can fix that either.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Can someone PLEASE mod the above as "lazy"?
Mod ALL posts or comments in the media like this as "lazy", please?
Do I have to be the person to come and post "RTFM" ?
For everything that's holy you're on the fracking INTERNET! USE IT!
http://www.barackobama.com/issues/
There you go. There are, in detail, his stances on the issues. Do you honestly think he has time to go over policy during a 5 minute campaign speech?
If this was too harsh, please mod me down, but I am really sick of people making that comment and I think that was the straw that broke the camel's back. Thank you and goodnight.
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Democrats should get rid of the Socialists, Enviro-Radicals, and Hollywood liberals if they want to clean up their party.
Sure, why not. The Radicals and the Sharon Stones are few and noisy. But which Socialists? Where are they? Last time I checked, Labor Unions were cut off at the knees. If anything, corporate capitalism is unhinged.
Take a look at many of Richard Nixon's domestic accomplishments during his presidency, he seems positively pinko even by today's Democrat standards. The shift to the right has been so massive in the United States that even right-leaning moderates (such as HRC) are regarded by the "general populace" (the proverbial "boiling frogs") as pseudo-socialists, and with each right-wing "victory", the "pinko bar" shifts along ever further in their eyes, until they're decrying reds in their beds for the most absurdly microscopic details, even as they ignore the fact that their children are blissfully sucking on Chinese toys with lead paint, which BTW entered the United States unimpeded and unchecked, all for the sake of (all together now:) Capitalism.
Lil' Thindime, lilting a lacrimose lament, krashes the kwaint konfines of Kokonino Kounty