Meet your new thread, same as the old thread.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Not Bob
You may well want to slap Frank Rich, but the book "What's The Matter With Kansas?" was written by a journalist/historian named Thomas Franks. http://www.amazon.com/Whats-Matter-K.../dp/0805073396

I think that his argument is a stupid one, frankly (hah!) -- people vote "against" their economic interests all the time, and the it was lampooned quite nicely as a bit of hand-wringing condescending drivel in Walter Shapiro's piece in the Atlantic Monthly called What's the Matter With Central Park West?

• Why, then, does Central Park West cling so stubbornly to irrational Democratic Party loyalties? The most plausible explanation is that the prickly voters of CPW feel that their traditional moral values (getting into Yale on merit, reading books other than the Bible, cherishing things from France) are not fully embraced by President Bush . . . CPW is an insular and hidebound neighborhood, brimming with cultural resentments unfathomable to outlanders.

I hate them both. Like I hate athlete's foot.

And nobody got into Yale on merit.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
First of all, I was debunking your "tribal" stereotype about all Republicans being either A or B. I pointed out a class of voters who went Repub that didn't fit your mold and said I wasn't commenting whether their perception was right or wrong. But... now that you are calling those voters idiots for perceiving Rs to be stronger on national security issues....you can blame the Dems for that perception. You guys hailed John "Let Me Ask France First" Kerry as the top man for the job. I'd say that was idiotic, not the perceptions of those who passed on your candidate.

I don't hold the Dems accountable for having a lousy slate of candidates in 2004 or 2008. The candidates are a reflection of what society as a composite will vote for. We've shown ourselves to be singularly minded, ignorant and most likely to vote based on non-isues like abortion. We're regressive on common sense matters like stem cells and childishly tied to the voodoo of religion. We get what we deserve. That a person as absurd as Sam Brownback can be run for our top political office professing a doubt on evolution based on fantastic gibberish - and not be alone - is amazing. It's 2007 and we're running a bunch of people pandering to the lowest common denominator. Yes, that's the definition of politics. But the definition of a healthy society is one where the lowest common denominator moves upward from year to year.

We deserve everything we get.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski

• You're not punk,
  and I'm tellin everyone.
  Save your breath,
  I never was one.

Come all you young rebels,
and list while I sing.
For the love of one's country
is a terrible thing.

It banishes fear with
the speed of a flame.
And it makes us all part of
the Patriot Game.

-- Patriot Game, The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem.

S_A_M

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
Come all you young rebels,
and list while I sing.
For the love of one's country
is a terrible thing.

It banishes fear with
the speed of a flame.
And it makes us all part of
the Patriot Game.

-- Patriot Game, The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem.

S_A_M

It seems that John Reid is going to join the Celtic Football Club board of directors. An (allegedly) avid singer of the ol' rebel songs, the first Catholic to be named Secretary for Northern Ireland, but also a staunch supporter of the war in Iraq and a personal friend (at one time) of the much misunderstood Radovan Karodicz (sp?) . . .

Imagine Rumsfeld buying the Mets (Red State version would, I suppose, be John Edwards buying the Yankees) and you'll get a sense of the debates raging among the Celtic bien pensants today. What is to be done?

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Dissent.

Cheney is about the only clear thinker in this administration of ne'er-do-wells, and I wish for godssakes you guys would come through on this Bush impeachment promise.

Can someone please explain how it fits with conservative ideology for someone to single-handedly create a 4th branch of government?

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by ironweed
It seems that John Reid is going to join the Celtic Football Club board of directors. An (allegedly) avid singer of the ol' rebel songs, the first Catholic to be named Secretary for Northern Ireland, but also a staunch supporter of the war in Iraq and a personal friend (at one time) of the much misunderstood Radovan Karodicz (sp?) . . .

Imagine Rumsfeld buying the Mets (Red State version would, I suppose, be John Edwards buying the Yankees) and you'll get a sense of the debates raging among the Celtic bien pensants today. What is to be done?

Interesting.

I've always thought that this song works on multiple levels, whether the writer intended it or not, and functions about as well as a song about the folly of (some) war(s) as it does as a patriotic anthem.

Maybe Mr. Reid can stick to "Finnegan's Wake" from now on.

S_A_M

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Can someone please explain how it fits with conservative ideology for someone to single-handedly create a 4th branch of government?

First you have to explain how pre-emptive war fits into conservativism.

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
First you have to explain how pre-emptive war fits into conservativism.

They really like flowers and sweets.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Can someone please explain how it fits with conservative ideology for someone to single-handedly create a 4th branch of government?

Your count is wrong. He eliminated the judiciary, and replaced it with himself and military tribunals.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Your count is wrong. He eliminated the judiciary, and replaced it with himself and military tribunals.

I'm no con law guy, but if cheney was actually a 4th branch of governemnt, wouldn't there have to be some checks and balances on him? I think he evolved the office into something else.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
I'm no con law guy, but if cheney was actually a 4th branch of governemnt, wouldn't there have to be some checks and balances on him?

You want the terrorists to win, don't you?

[Diane_Keaton]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
I have never been able to understand how Dems would be worse on protecting us than Republicans... Al Gore would have bombed Afghanistan just as ruthlessly.

The question was whether it was stoopid for people to vote Repub in the last election b/c of the perception that doing so was better in terms of protecting our national interests and security. Who cares whether Al Gore would have bombed Afghanistan. Or, for that matter, whether Kerry would have. Protecting our country has a lot more to do with who liked our bombing of Afghanistan. It's about which candidate has the guts to do what it takes both on a foreign and national policy level (however unpopular) to protect our nation. Which candidate believes the United Nations can protect any person or thing other than its own inertia (at best) or corruption (at worst). Etc. Etc. How funny to call voters idiots if they voted R over the issue.

John Kerry, "I'm an internationalist. I'd like to see our troops dispersed through the world only at the directive of the United Nations."

I just can't BELIEVE voters didn't see how strong Kerry was on national security. WHAT idiots!

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
I'm no con law guy, but if cheney was actually a 4th branch of governemnt, wouldn't there have to be some checks and balances on him? I think he evolved the office into something else.

Intelligent Design clearly wasn't involved.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Intelligent Design clearly wasn't involved.

Poll: how many types of whiff did SS make here?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
It's about which candidate has the guts to do what it takes both on a foreign and national policy level (however unpopular) to protect our nation.

With all respect, because you know that I love you like the sister who starred in Woody Allen movies that I never had, the notion that Democratic candidates don't have the "guts" to do what it takes is the biggest stinking pile of horseshit it's been my displeasure to smell lately. It's a political pose that has nothing to do with policy choices and everything to do with getting elected. Republicans sell this bullshit because it works, not because it's "unpopular." Until recently, Republicans liked to remind people that it was Democrats who'd gotten the United States into every war this century. George McGovern had the guts to climb into a B-24 and fly combat missions that lots of people didn't come home from. John Kerry had the guts to volunteer for duty in Vietnam when Dick Cheney was getting student deferments and George W. Bush was skipping out on flying jets over the Gulf of Mexico so he could work on Republican presidential campaigns. Say what you will about either one's failings, but lack of guts are not among them.

Ronald Reagan had the guts to act in movies during World War II, and then to "do what it takes" to protect the country by invading Grenada and withdrawing troops from Lebanon after a barracks full of Marines got killed. George H.W. Bush had the guts to fly combat missions in the Pacific during WWII, but he got painted as the wimp and Reagan got painted as the warrior, probably because Reagan pounded on a table at the right time and said, "I'm paying for this microphone, Mr. Bush." It's all about the pose.

So now you have wannabes like Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani outdoing themselves to prove that they'd have the guts to torture prisoners, while the GOP has decided that the war hero who actually withstood torture isn't their man. And Republicans are swooning over Fred Thomson because he can play a general in a movie.

How many Americans will die in Iraq because George W. Bush doesn't have the guts to face the fact that he screwed up?