quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: President Obama still has some serious problems. No president has been reelected with unemployment *or* the economy being at the levels they are. It's surprising the Republicans are not dominating with that narrative.
I just read something this morning that discussed this in The New Yorker
The gist is that in any other country or time, the GOP would be running away with this election hands down. But the GOP isn't really a party any more.
Or, it's ripe for a platform shift and it's in the midst of that turmoil. Hopefully some charismatic conservatives can redefine it's platform and stamp out the radical elements.
Or else the entire party flames out and a new party rises from the ashes.
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: President Obama still has some serious problems. No president has been reelected with unemployment *or* the economy being at the levels they are. It's surprising the Republicans are not dominating with that narrative.
FDR
As bad as the economy is, it was in fact worse when Obama took office.
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quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: kmboots, William Ayers and Bernadette Dorn were indeed devils who were active members of the terrorist "Weather Undergound." They planted bombs that killed people. They got off only because the FBI screwed up its case. Neither has ever denied or apologized for what they did. In fact, Ayers has said he only wished he had done more. So he is now a college professor. So he has a house in the suburbs and mows his lawn. What do you think he still stands for? Would you want your children to have him for a teacher?
There is also evidence that Ayers ghost wrote Obama's books.
Not sure why I bother...
The Weather Underground did plant bombs that were meant to do property damage not to kill people. The people killed by the Greenwich bomb were members of WUO who were killed in the process of making the bomb. (This was also a very common occurrence in the IRA.)
He has on a number of occasions made clear that when he said that he wished they had done more he was referring to stopping the Vietnam War - where lots of innocent people were being bombed by us.
This is not to justify what he or the WUO did; it was wrong. It is merely to prevent Ron spreading even more misinformation.
As for having any of my hypothetical children taught by him - no problem. Judging by how well their children and the child they raised are turning out not to mention how passionately Bernadette Dohrn fights for families at the Children and Family Justice Center.
The "evidence" that Mr. Ayers wrote either of the President's books is as specious as just about everything else you post.
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We're ... really never getting his tax returns. Ever. Unless some sort of Oh Sh*t Moment happens that has them realize that a leak of the central circumspect elements is imminent anyway.
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posted
Rabbit (I like the way you quote yourself), I think you may be confused by the difference between legally sealed and private:
quote:First, different countries may have different policies and laws governing records.
Second. there is a difference between "sealed" and "private". "Sealed" is typically a term used in legal settings to mean a record cannot be "opened" (viewed, seen, copied) without a Judge reviewing the record and a court order. As examples of "sealed records" in the USA:
adoption records before 1980s a minor's arrest and court records
Third, privacy is a term used broadly to cover a variety of records, and typically, it means NO one other than the person whose name is on the record, or the parent or legal guardian, can request to see or copy the record. Some examples of records protected under "privacy" in the USA include:
school records college records employment records medical records hospital records psychiatric records dental records
If Romney and Ryan had not released their college records, then why wouldn't Obama have mentioned this?
What about all the articles Obama wrote for college publications--which were published? Why are they inaccessible? Is Obama afraid for American to read what he was ranting and raving about at that time? Is he afraid that Americans might learn he was listed as a foreign student from Kenya, or Indonesia?
Here is some information about Romney that includes some of his academic achievements:
quote:4. Mitt and Ann married on March 21, 1969--four months after he returned from his mission. Future President Gerald Ford was a guest at their wedding. Ann was attending college at Brigham Young University and Mitt transferred there, eventually graduating first in his class in 1971 with a degree in English and a 3.97 GPA. Their first son, Taggart, was born on their first anniversary.
5. The young couple moved to Boston so Mitt could attend Harvard Law School. He was also accepted into a joint M.B.A. program at Harvard Business School. Their second son, Matthew, was born and in 1975 he graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School and in the top 5 percent of his class at HBS.
6. He first worked at Boston Consulting Group, then as a management consultant at Bain & Co., where he became a vice president in 1978. By then he and Ann had three more sons--Joshua, Benjamin, and Craig. Mitt was asked to head Bain Capital, a venture capital company, in 1984. It was there that he became a millionaire.
7. Romney was a leader in the Mormon church while living in Belmont, Mass. He was bishop of the Cambridge congregation, then bishop of Belmont, and in 1986 became president of the Boston-area "stake," similar to a diocese.
8. He spent $3 million of his own money in an unsuccessful race to unseat Edward Kennedy from the U.S. Senate in 1994.
9. He became president and CEO of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee in February 1999 and turned around a scandal-plagued Winter Olympics. Romney donated $1 million to the games and refused to take a salary unless the committee finished in the black. When the Olympics ended successfully in February 2002, people viewed him in a new light as a rising politician.
10. Romney was elected the 70th governor of Massachusetts in 2002 and served until 2007.
It seems to me that Romney has been pretty well vetted in an already long career of outstanding public accomplishment in business and government. What do we know of Obama? What has he ever done that compares?
Why are any of you still trying to defend Obama? Even Newsweek thinks his time is past.
P.S. In response to what Samprimary said, I take back what I said to Rakeesh. Rakeesh, please do not go to Heaven.
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: You are correct and as soon as we have a deceased Presidential candidate that exception will be highly relevant.
Didn't we almost have a dead man elected to the Senate a couple years back?
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posted
Wait, I forgot-is Romney running on his governmental experience now? Because he hasn't been able to so far, or not to a very great extent because, hey, Romneycare. Anyway, Ron, I won't go to Narnia either. Though it is amusing that if it was possible, your consistent dishonesty and cowardice (which in light of statements you've made in the past about the importance of truth, is actually blasphemous) would certainly bar you as well. So I suppose in that light, we're both heretics by the standards of your particular fantasy:)
Still would like some sort of acknowledgement that Democrats are, in fact, willing to embrace spending cuts, as has been proven in this conversation. It's not going away, Ron. You may as well fast forward to the part where you disappear again, because I'll be pointing out your dishonesty and hypocrisy (with some satisfaction) until you do.
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: President Obama still has some serious problems. No president has been reelected with unemployment *or* the economy being at the levels they are. It's surprising the Republicans are not dominating with that narrative.
FDR
As bad as the economy is, it was in fact worse when Obama took office.
Sure. And FDR took office during the nadir and it was essentially better for the next 4 years, he got reelected and drew down federal spending which dropped things, WW2 happened, and it was rapid improvement from there. Pres Obama can certainly argue he stopped a worse drop from happening, but that's not as convincing as recovery, and right now while the recssion is officially over we are not experieng growth but stagnation. This isn't to say Obama controls the economy but historically presidents in bad times don't get reelected, presidents during wars and recoveries do.
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: You are correct and as soon as we have a deceased Presidential candidate that exception will be highly relevant.
Didn't we almost have a dead man elected to the Senate a couple years back?
In fact it has happened on several occasions that a dead person has won an election in Congress. in 2000, Mel Carnahan became the first senator posthumously elected- famously beating out John Ashcroft (later appointed AG). Carnahan had been sitting governor, and his lieutenant governor appointed his widow to his senate seat.
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quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Talk is cheap for a pauper like you, Rakeesh.
Evidence and honesty are cheap for a pauper in both like you, Ron.
At any rate, not only have you failed to make your case and provide evidence for your claim about Democrats and spending, you haven't even *started*. In the words of Christopher Hitchens which just seems so present in my mind whenever you begin blathering and lying and generally being spineless, "You have all you work still ahead of you."
Though admittedly it's a tall order: you claimed Democrats wouldn't embrace spending cuts, and were presented with proof established in history even though it's recent that they have been willing to do so. Then again, for someone who routinely denies and lies about history, perhaps this is familiar territory
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: President Obama still has some serious problems. No president has been reelected with unemployment *or* the economy being at the levels they are. It's surprising the Republicans are not dominating with that narrative.
I just read something this morning that discussed this in The New Yorker
The gist is that in any other country or time, the GOP would be running away with this election hands down. But the GOP isn't really a party any more.
I think there are a couple of major things sitting in their way.
First, there's a pretty big disconnect between the Republican base's perspective of what is important with the economy (deficit, debt, and getting those freeloaders off welfare) and Democrats and a large majority of independents (more and better jobs). So they're stuck in the same trap of either playing to their base or trying to appeal to everyone else.
Also, their solution to our economic problems is to pump up the stock market, increase the money rich people have, and increase company profits, all of which have happened under President Obama.
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Talk is cheap for a pauper like you, Rakeesh.
Ron have you ever responded to my post regarding the inherent evil of Christianity and the pinnacle of evil that is Christ?
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quote:Rabbit (I like the way you quote yourself), I think you may be confused by the difference between legally sealed and private:
Obama's college records are not "legally sealed", they are merely "private" as are all college records. The act that legally sealed Obama's records, applies only to those records of official acts and communications since he took office. It does not apply to anything done before he took office in 2009.
quote:If Romney and Ryan had not released their college records, then why wouldn't Obama have mentioned this?
Why would he mention it? Neither Romney nor Ryan has asked to see Obama's college records. Any rational person knows that college records don't mean anything once you have a track record in the real world.
This is a non-issue except among the radical fringe that Obama is correctly choosing to ignore.
Why should Obama pay any attention to people like you? Were you satisfied when he produced his long form birth certificate? Were you satisfied when federal courts repeatedly ruled that law suits disputing his citizenship status were "without any merit"?
If Obama did release his college records and they did not show anything you claim, would you admit you were wrong or would you argue (just like you've done with his birth certificate) that the records are falsified? Is there anything you can imagine in Obama's college records that might cause you to vote for him or cause you to stop claiming that he's an imposter?
Can you point to even one instance where evidence provided by your opponents has changed your mind about anything? If you can't, then explain exactly why your opponents should provide you with any more evidence when it makes no difference.
[ August 24, 2012, 12:52 PM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
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I found those in under 30 seconds with google. If you'd spent that amount of time trying to verify this "myth" you continue to promulgate, you'd have also found it was a blatant, bald face lie.
So now, let's see some reciprocity. Link me to some things Romney and Ryan published while they were in school. Show me the place where I can read their college transcripts or at least a news article that discuss what's on those transcripts. You claimed that Romney's college records are available to the public -- show me some evidence of that.
[ August 24, 2012, 08:23 AM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: You are correct and as soon as we have a deceased Presidential candidate that exception will be highly relevant.
Didn't we almost have a dead man elected to the Senate a couple years back?
No, He wasn't almost elected. He won the election and his widow was appointed to serve in his place.
posted
I think he said you should consider your answer carefully because one of the options is specifically against the forum rules, and is furthermore one that I think management above BB has taken consistently very seriously.
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posted
Ron, since you are well aware you won't actually reply directly and in a relevant way to Rabbit's evidence which again proves you a liar, for about the third time in this thread...
How's about skipping ahead in this process to the part where you tuck tail and run again? Note: anything that doesn't take some form of 'huh, I was wrong about that stuff about Obama' will be merely another example of your typical dishonest cowardice. Which given that this is the damned Internet, man.
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I found those in under 30 seconds with google. If you'd spent that amount of time trying to verify this "myth" you continue to promulgate, you'd have also found it was a blatant, bald face lie.
So now, let's see some reciprocity. Link me to some things Romney and Ryan published while they were in school. Show me the place where I can read their college transcripts or at least a news article that discuss what's on those transcripts. You claimed that Romney's college records are available to the public -- show me some evidence of that.
I'm looking forward to reading Ryan's book report for Atlas Shrugged.
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: I found those in under 30 seconds with google.
I'm sure that in Ron's mind, it just proves that Google has a liberal bias.
Obviously, it does. I mean, there are no results for "obama liar communist hippie fascist radical liberal nutjob taking jobs away from hard working conservatives who don't need to pay taxes and deserve all the good things cause he's hitler".
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quote: Snopes receives more complaints of liberal than conservative bias, but insists that it applies the same debunking standards to all political urban legends. FactCheck reviewed a sample of Snopes' responses to political rumors regarding George W. Bush, Sarah Palin and Barack Obama, and found them to be free from bias in all cases. FactCheck noted that Barbara Mikkelson was a Canadian citizen (and thus unable to vote in US elections) and David Mikkelson was an independent who was once registered as a Republican. "You’d be hard-pressed to find two more apolitical people," David Mikkelson told them.
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Talk is cheap for a pauper like you, Rakeesh.
And even cheaper for you, Ron. As you prove every single time you post this crap. I just wish we could get you a mic and a national stage. It would be the best thing to happen to the Dems in 100 years.
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quote:Today, we are publishing more than 950 pages of internal audits, financial statements, and private investor letters for 21 cryptically named entities in which Romney had invested—at minimum—more than $10 million as of 2011 (that number is based on the low end of ranges he has disclosed—the true number is almost certainly significantly higher). Almost all of them are affiliated with Bain Capital, the secretive private equity firm Romney co-founded in 1984 and ran until his departure in 1999 (or 2002, depending on whom you ask). Many of them are offshore funds based in the Cayman Islands. Together, they reveal the mind-numbing, maze-like, and deeply opaque complexity with which Romney has handled his wealth, the exotic tax-avoidance schemes available only to the preposterously wealthy that benefit him, the unlikely (for a right-wing religious Mormon) places that his money has ended up, and the deeply hypocritical distance between his own criticisms of Obama's fiscal approach and his money managers' embrace of those same policies. They also show that some of the investments that Romney has always described as part of his retirement package at Bain weren't made until years after he left the company.
Bain isn't a company so much as an intricate suite of steadily proliferating inter-related holding companies and limited partnerships, some based in Delaware and others in the Cayman Islands, Luxembourg, and elsewhere, designed to collectively house roughly $66 billion in wealth in its many crevices and chambers. When Romney left in 1999, he and his wife retained significant investments in many of those Bain vehicles—he claims they are "passive investments" and that they are managed in a blind trust (though the trustee isn't blind enough to meet federal standards of independence). But aside from disparate snippets of information contained in his federal and Massachusetts financial disclosure forms, his 2010 tax returns, and SEC filings, the nature of those investments has been obfuscated by design.
posted
And the people foisting this candidate upon us complain about the length of obamacare's bill.
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An infographic to present in advance for if it is indicated in any way that obama is being 'floated' or artificially sustained by 'liberal media bias.'
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: I found those in under 30 seconds with google.
I'm sure that in Ron's mind, it just proves that Google has a liberal bias.
Obviously, it does. I mean, there are no results for "obama liar communist hippie fascist radical liberal nutjob taking jobs away from hard working conservatives who don't need to pay taxes and deserve all the good things cause he's hitler".
Of course there are! Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
That reads like a behind-the-scenes look at Clavell's Noble House, Samprimary.
Gaming the hell out of the system to keep as much earned in America as free from American taxes as possible: apparently totally kosher for private citizens, but when that sort of dodgy dare I say voodoo investment scheming is not even suggested but able to be claimed by opponents in government, it's reprehensible.
So therefore, for a man supposedly with his eyes on public service for a long time, it is therefore obviously beyond reproach. I also like how Romney can sell 'We need to reform the tax system because people game it and it's inefficient. And I should know!"
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quote:Originally posted by Tinros: Obviously, it does. I mean, there are no results for "obama liar communist hippie fascist radical liberal nutjob taking jobs away from hard working conservatives who don't need to pay taxes and deserve all the good things cause he's hitler".
at least until Google finds this thread...
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posted
Actually, without the quotes around that, there are 18,700 results. I... kinda want to go bury my head in the sand now. Or join Curiosity on Mars.
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quote:Even now, backers like Ms. Ryan see the Paul campaign ending in a fizzle rather than a bang at the convention. In addition to disappointments over delegates, Mr. Paul, who finished second to Mr. Romney in New Hampshire’s signature primary, will not get to address the party convention.
That reflects both sides of the movement’s new circumstances. To enhance its long-term viability among Republicans, Paul campaign leaders decided to cooperate with Romney forces for a smooth convention, while eschewing compromises that would have alienated core supporters even more.
Mr. Paul, in an interview, said convention planners had offered him an opportunity to speak under two conditions: that he deliver remarks vetted by the Romney campaign, and that he give a full-fledged endorsement of Mr. Romney. He declined.
“It wouldn’t be my speech,” Mr. Paul said. “That would undo everything I’ve done in the last 30 years. I don’t fully endorse him for president.”
¶ Mr. Paul’s campaign chairman, Jesse Benton, acknowledged the frustrations that the Paul high command had been forced to manage.
Some true believers want to “dress in black, stand on a hill and say, ‘Smash the state,’ ” said Mr. Benton, who is married to one of Mr. Paul’s granddaughters. But “it’s not our desire to have floor demonstrations. That would cost us a lot more than it would get us.”
quote:Many clubs have taken out ads inviting GOP delegates "to party like a liberal" in a city where the "poles are open all night." City officials say the convention, expected to draw more than 50,000 visitors, could be Tampa's biggest party ever. Imagine all those rainmakers.
A strip club with a spaceship on the roof seems an odd place to expect Republicans. At first blush, one might not equate lap dances with the political party that wraps itself in buttoned-down family values.
But at convention time, even upstanding men seem to seek out undressed women. When the Christian group Promise Keepers held a convention in Tampa a couple of years ago, attendees flooded the 2001 Odyssey, co-owner Jim Kleinhans recalls. They had such a good time that "they kept their promise to come back the next night."
Many male convention-goers, regardless of political stripe, are drawn to the sexual underground, according to a study conducted by Baylor University business professor Scott Cunningham. He examined sex ads placed online around the time of the 2008 conventions in St. Paul, Minnesota, and Denver. Ads for prostitutes and escorts jumped 25% to 40%. Cunningham offers a range of possible explanations -- chief among them anonymity, or what he calls "the reduced likelihood of future shaming."
Many clubs have taken out ads inviting GOP delegates "to party like a liberal" in a city where the "poles are open all night." City officials say the convention, expected to draw more than 50,000 visitors, could be Tampa's biggest party ever. Imagine all those rainmakers.
A strip club with a spaceship on the roof seems an odd place to expect Republicans. At first blush, one might not equate lap dances with the political party that wraps itself in buttoned-down family values.
But at convention time, even upstanding men seem to seek out undressed women. When the Christian group Promise Keepers held a convention in Tampa a couple of years ago, attendees flooded the 2001 Odyssey, co-owner Jim Kleinhans recalls. They had such a good time that "they kept their promise to come back the next night."
Many male convention-goers, regardless of political stripe, are drawn to the sexual underground, according to a study conducted by Baylor University business professor Scott Cunningham. He examined sex ads placed online around the time of the 2008 conventions in St. Paul, Minnesota, and Denver. Ads for prostitutes and escorts jumped 25% to 40%. Cunningham offers a range of possible explanations -- chief among them anonymity, or what he calls "the reduced likelihood of future shaming."
Not throwing this out to ~score political points~ or whatever, I think adults should be able to go to strip clubs if they so choose without shame. I am just surprised that the gap is so large between democrat stripclubbin' and republican stripclubbin' even if the mechanisms behind it could be analyzed and put forth in frank terms.
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quote:The Washington Post's "Fact Checker" awarded Romney's ad "four Pinocchios," a measure Romney pollster Neil Newhouse dismissed.
"Fact checkers come to this with their own sets of thoughts and beliefs, and we’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact checkers," he said. The fact-checkers — whose institutional rise has been a feature of the cycle — have "jumped the shark," he added after the panel.
This cannot be embellished to make it better.
Conservatives: take a good long look at yourselves as a group, and how you ended up with the candidate you deserve.
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posted
I've been noticing this attitude a lot recently—this weird sort of factual relativism that seems to at least tacitly acknowledge that it's biased, while claiming that the other side is biased too, so it all somehow balances out.
For example, a while back my mom posted a link to a story on Fox News about how Obama was ceding a huge portion of the southwest to Mexico. (I think there was a Hatrack discussion on it.) I said that it was utterly bogus and linked to the actual website of the national wildlife refuge in question, which said that the report was false and that all that happened was that they'd closed off a small strip along the border to the public.
Then my cousin's husband posted a comment on how that site seemed to be biased too. I was flabbergasted. Fox News was saying some things that were just flat-out factually incorrect and a lot of other things that were at the very least highly misleading. The official website in question laid out the facts in a simple and straightforward way. How do you discuss things with someone who dismisses facts as a mere difference of opinion?
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posted
Pretty much. Once someone is a grown adult and can't be graded on that sort of thing, there's really nothing stopping them from claims such as 'non-partisan fact-checkers are biased', especially when the rest of the choir cheers that claim. It has to be held onto. A guy at work tried it over and over again just today, actually, when he was chanting 'Romney Romney!' (This from the same numbskull who claims the Book of Mormon was inspired by Satan). He mentioned the welfare thing, and when I explained that it was actually a handoff of control to governors and that every serious non-partisan fact checking organization in the country graded it a flat out lie, he abruptly tried to shift to 'proof' that Democrats caused the recession as evidenced by when they took office.
Even tried to make use of the word 'fact' after I brought in fact checkers. I pointed out to him that mentioning one fact and then claiming a link to an opinion doesn't actually make the opinion a fact at all, and then insisted he move back to the welfare thing. Grudgingly, about ten minutes later, the closest he got was 'everyone fudges words in politics'. It was like pulling teeth to get the jackass (a seriously Bible thumping Christian with multiple assault convinctions and charges) to admit there was deception, only to promptly pivot back to equivalence.
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quote:Originally posted by Bokonon: Jon, honestly? You make such positions socially unacceptable.
And then you get lambasted for being intolerant. The more you attack those positions, the more their persecution complex sets in.
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posted
I'm torn here, because I don't think non-partisan fact checkers should be given a free pass. Politifact labeled the claim that the Ryan Medicare reform plan "ends Medicare as we know it" the "lie of the year," because the plan takes a decade or so to end Medicare as we know it rather than doing it instantaneously.
They may not be biased, but they can certainly be stupid.
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posted
Certainly not a free pass, and if the only support for the claim that those ads are lying was fact check groups backup then it would be a problem.
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