World Politics

[Alpe d'Huez]

Bill Kristol... When even your own "constituency" think you sound like crazy people, imagine what everyone else thinks you sound like.

Interesting read. At the end of the article he subtly implies he'd like Chris Christie to jump into the race. Well, he does talk big. But the problem with that is that his policies are really very similar to all the others. He also has been hammered for taking special trips on the taxpayer dime, and has that secret Colorado meeting with the Koch brothers hanging over his head. So with people like Palin and even Paul Ryan railing against "crony capitalism", IF Christie jumps into the race, are the other GOP members going to have the guts to challenge him on these things? Because they have to know everyone from the so-called left will the more attention Christie gets.

 

[redtreviso]

Interesting read. At the end of the article he subtly implies he'd like Chris Christie to jump into the race. Well, he does talk big. But the problem with that is that his policies are really very similar to all the others. He also has been hammered for taking special trips on the taxpayer dime, and has that secret Colorado meeting with the Koch brothers hanging over his head. So with people like Palin and even Paul Ryan railing against "crony capitalism", IF Christie jumps into the race, are the other GOP members going to have the guts to challenge him on these things? Because they have to know everyone from the so-called left will the more attention Christie gets.

Don't forget.. William "always wrong about everything" Kristol chose Palin..

http://www.google.com/#q=william+kristol+wrong+always&hl=en&prmd=imvnso&ei=_TKCTtTlEYWqsQKAy6nyDg&start=10&sa=N&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=15d8226b480c5dc5&biw=1024&bih=618

 

[redtreviso]

Rick Perry...save a pretzel

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

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

The extra funny thing about that clip, is that you could insert a few sound bites of things he actually does say, and not many people would notice!

 

[Merckx index]

I generally try to avoid making a big deal of a stupid view proposed by some single Republican, because there are plenty of counter-examples on the other side. But this is too much:

WASHINGTON (AP) — A senator who opposes federal regulation on philosophical grounds is single-handedly blocking legislation that would strengthen safety rules for oil and gas pipelines, a bill that even the pipeline industry and companies in his own state support.

Republican Sen. Rand Paul's opposition to the bill hasn't wavered even after a gas pipeline rupture last week shook people awake in three counties in his home state of Kentucky.
…

A deadly gas pipeline explosion near San Francisco last year — along with other recent gas explosions and oil pipeline spills — has created consensus in Congress, as well as in the industry, that there are gaps in federal safety regulations.

http://news.yahoo.com/senator-blocks-pipeline-safety-bill-principle-070809432.html

I don’t know how much more evidence is needed that federal regulations save lives than the pipeline explosion in the Bay Area last year. Yes, we may be over-regulated in some areas, but the notion that all regulation is bad is nuts. One thinks of that old saying “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.”

Industry is eager for Congress to pass a bill this year partly because the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration is already working on new safety rules. They'd rather Congress provide direction to regulators as to what those rules should look like than leave the matter entirely up to the Obama administration.

Yes, it’s called reducing uncertainty, and rumor has it that Republicans always point out the need for this when discussing economic matters.

Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., pointed out that Democrats could still bring the bill to the floor for a vote if they have the 60 votes necessary to clear the procedural hurdles a single lawmaker can erect under Senate rules. McConnell hasn't objected to the use of expedited procedures to pass the bill.

But as a practical matter, important but lesser measures like pipeline safety regulations that can't be approved quickly wind up languishing indefinitely.

This is the same absolutist mind set that has many Republicans opposing any tax increases, even at the risk of default, or more recently at the risk of letting people who need aid following the hurricanes watch their houses rot. Avoiding new federal regulations is apparently more important to Paul than avoiding deaths by faulty pipelines. But to be fair, I’m not sure Rand Paul should be labeled a Republican. When it comes to political views, he and his old man are sort of in a class by themselves. I find some of their positions bold and interesting, but like so many people with radical views, they take their logic to an extreme that suggests they're out of touch with the real world.

An anti-tax activist and ophthalmologist, Paul was elected to the Senate, his first public office, last year.

Is he against regulations that require people with impaired vision to wear glasses when driving?

 

[usedtobefast]

I generally try to avoid making a big deal of a stupid view proposed by some single Republican, because there are plenty of counter-examples on the other side. But this is too much:



http://news.yahoo.com/senator-blocks-pipeline-safety-bill-principle-070809432.html

I don’t know how much more evidence is needed that federal regulations save lives than the pipeline explosion in the Bay Area last year. Yes, we may be over-regulated in some areas, but the notion that all regulation is bad is nuts. One thinks of that old saying “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.”



Yes, it’s called reducing uncertainty, and rumor has it that Republicans always point out the need for this when discussing economic matters.



This is the same absolutist mind set that has many Republicans opposing any tax increases, even at the risk of default, or more recently at the risk of letting people who need aid following the hurricanes watch their houses rot. Avoiding new federal regulations is apparently more important to Paul than avoiding deaths by faulty pipelines. But to be fair, I’m not sure Rand Paul should be labeled a Republican. When it comes to political views, he and his old man are sort of in a class by themselves. I find some of their positions bold and interesting, but like so many people with radical views, they take their logic to an extreme that suggests they're out of touch with the real world.



Is he against regulations that require people with impaired vision to wear glasses when driving?

freaking idiot. and his dad is just loony. Ron has Some good ideas, but all in all not so much. the Tbags would like us to return to the days of Charles Dickens. i don't think they understand what they are doing.
"those that forget history,are doomed to repeat it"

 

[redtreviso]

"""I chuckle at the assertion by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., that President Barack Obama is waging “class warfare” by asking the richest Americans to share the tax burden with the rest of us.

In A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century, Barbara Tuchman wrote about a peasant revolt in 1358 that began in the French village of St. Leu and spread throughout the Oise Valley.

At one estate, the serfs sacked the manor house, killed the knight and roasted him on a spit in front of his wife and kids. Then, after a dozen or so peasants violated the knight’s lady, with their children watching, they forced her to eat the roasted flesh of her husband and then killed her.

Now, that’s my idea of class warfare."""

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/opinion/52624506-82/warfare-asking-burden-class.html.csp

 

[redtreviso]

What is the definition of "sociopath"?

People with Antisocial Personality Disorder (sociopath, psychopath) try to get their way without being considerate of others. They show spontaneous behavior, which humiliates or harms other people. They lack any feeling for or understanding of norms, nor have they any feeling of guilt. They do not seem to be able to plan actions or to act with foresight.

wipes hand on Clinton after touching a haitian

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

Is he against regulations that require people with impaired vision to wear glasses when driving?

...One thinks of that old saying “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson quote, and a good one.

I have to wonder how Senator Paul would feel about taking all the nuclear waste or biological or chemical weapons from the US, putting it an old, defunct Kentucky coal mine, then having no regulations on how it's stored?

..."those that forget history, are doomed to repeat it"

George Santayana. Another great quote.

I'll add one, since the Tea Party so loves the founding fathers. Here's one from the father of the Constitution:

"If men were angels, no government would be necessary."

- James Madison

 

[usedtobefast]

if only the USA public could hear/read this thread. i really think a world wide effort is required. stupid interweb and all. thanks to all here.and sorry for interrupting.

 

[rhubroma]

freaking idiot. and his dad is just loony. Ron has Some good ideas, but all in all not so much. the Tbags would like us to return to the days of Charles Dickens. i don't think they understand what they are doing.
"those that forget history,are doomed to repeat it"

The ironic thing is that what they view as "progressive" thought and the "modern state" is truly and utterly the old way of thinking. And what they view as civil liberty is merely government giving free reign to the predators of finance, the military, industry and business who have already caused incalculable damages to the public in terms of its fiscal responsibility and all the consequent absent services they don't get, or poor ones like the public schools.

Whereas without labor unions we go back to the days of Jay Gould and George Pullman. Therefore history does indeed repeat itself, again. Yet these guys will never learn because blinded by an insipid ideology. They are old and decrepit.

There's isn't thus a progressive world view at all, but a decidedly regressive one. In the words of the late prof. Howard Zinn:

"...They haven't learned anything, absolutely anything, from the history of the 20th century, from a hundred years of vendettas and wars, from a hundred years of terrorism and antiterrorism, of violence that calls upon violence, in a cycle of stupidity without end."

I would only add that they haven't learned anything about the exploitative and predatory natures of those ideologues whom they fanatically support and who financially support them, which basically means they don't know a damn thing about the history of America either at home, or abroad. While they totally fail to realize that there is no freedom or democracy in a state that consents to a tyranny of individuals.

 

[Hugh Januss]

This explains a lot.

 

[Señor_Contador]

What's really amazing, in a sad way mind you, is that this pseudo-libertarian crowd, the ones who appeal to liberty at all costs, always seem to define the State in very undemocratic terms (territory X is populated by people Y who speak language R and follow religion M). And funniest of all is their absurdly anal tendency to quote the Founding Fathers and denounce the goverment all in the same breath (many of the FFs were actually part of the government).

 

[rhubroma]

What's really amazing, in a sad way mind you, is that this pseudo-libertarian crowd, the ones who appeal to liberty at all costs, always seem to define the State in very undemocratic terms (territory X is populated by people Y who speak language R and follow religion M). And funniest of all is their absurdly anal tendency to quote the Founding Fathers and denounce the goverment all in the same breath (many of the FFs were actually part of the government).

Ergo we must assume that, in the absence of their irreproachable authority being placed in question, there must be other special interests at work that has convinced so many Americans that the neocon way is the living incarnation of democracy.

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

What's really amazing...is their absurdly anal tendency to quote the Founding Fathers and denounce the government all in the same breath (many of the FFs were actually part of the government).

Hence my James Madison quote earlier.

I'm reminded of some people's same approach to religion. The way that some, of any faith it seems, will selectively choose quotes, aspects, views from sacred writings, while ignoring logical acceptance of the same writings, and interpret them to suit their own irrational behavior.

Ergo we must assume that, in the absence of their irreproachable authority being placed in question, there must be other special interests at work that has convinced so many Americans that the neocon way is the living incarnation of democracy.

This is perhaps what is most fascinating. Such as with the Koch brothers, who have managed to convince many that they support libertarian thinking and that the government is evil, while their history shows they have had direct interaction with, and given large donations to, many politicians - including many who do not represent them - influencing political legislation that benefits their power. In many ways they are basically socialists. With many neocons supporting this, just as they support war funding and nation building. And yet, these same people have managed to convince millions of TP people that these same actions are "anti government".

 

[ChrisE]

Yes, and the "millions of people" who are convinced by this BS are to blame IMO.

 

[redtreviso]

 

[patricknd]

New girlfriend, red?

 

[Señor_Contador]

Ergo we must assume that, in the absence of their irreproachable authority being placed in question, there must be other special interests at work that has convinced so many Americans that the neocon way is the living incarnation of democracy.

We all know that. And so do millions of Americans who vote Republican. Americans are short-sighted and not stupid. They know they live in the biggest system of privilege in the world. The last thing they want is lose that privilege, so they will vote for the guy who promises to continue the privilege. And that guy is usually a Republican (although I hate to say it).

Republicans are "funny" in that they've devised a way to turn an entire population with obvious left-wing beliefs (Americans support Social Security, free health care, unemployment benefits, free public schools, et cetera) in a bunch of angry tree huggers who turn even more to right come voting time, even though Republican leaders clearly and usually accompany their message with a "and this is what's going to cost you" (cuts in public spending), so they are not lying to you.

On the other hand democrats come accross as a bunch of scared little girls incapable of articulating things like "if the deficit is what you hate, then why is it that the biggest contributors to the deficit are Republican presidents".

I tell you why: Because there is no difference between the democratic and republican parties. We all know this, or at least suspect it. Yet, we always vote for one, instead for any other candidates. Why? Because we love our privilege.

In Spain they have a saying that goes something like:"The People have the politicians they deserve". And we have what we deserve.

 

[Señor_Contador]

Guys, what do you think of these candidates who have "Government is evil" tatooed in their foreheads and yet... spend hundreds of millions running for office, A. K. A. becoming a(n) (evil) government employee?

That irritates the heck out of me!

 

[Señor_Contador]

[...]I'm reminded of some people's same approach to religion. The way that some, of any faith it seems, will selectively choose quotes, aspects, views from sacred writings, while ignoring logical acceptance of the same writings, and interpret them to suit their own irrational behavior.[...]

Yes, but that does not take away from the fact that their concerns are as genuine as the ones from the people sitting around Wall Street right now. The only difference is that both movements are exclusive, not inclusive.

If only the left wing stopped pointing their finger in disgust at the Tea Baggers...

 

[Anonymous]

Hilarious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhDhDRvHaGs

Perry 2012 "Save a pretzel for the gas jets."

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

Hilarious: Perry 2012 "Save a pretzel for the gas jets."

You're a little late.

Rick Perry...save a pretzel

Still, pretty amusing.

Anyone watch Letterman last night? He was poking pretty good fun at the latest Republican flavor, Chris Christie about his, ahem, size, and "sauntering" for office.

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

Meanwhile, the giant Canadian Arctic ice shelf just broke off. Wonder if Scott and some of the other conservatives are going to still insist that global warming is a hoax? Speaking of Scott, I hope he's on vacation and hasn't left for other reasons again...

 

[Anonymous]

I am watching the Piers Morgan interview with Christie, and I like Chris Christie. I don't care that I completely disagree with his economic philosophy, but I like the guy. He needs to run for president.