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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please.In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. |
Did anyone read McCain's tweet afterwards?
Scandal! Caught playing iPhone game at 3+ hour Senate hearing - worst of all I lost!
I thought it was pretty funny. But seriously I don't know how big of a deal it is. Its not like every minute, or even every ten minutes of a meeting are going to be crucial. People could easily be discussing things he already knows and agrees with, rehashing old arguments etc. So long as he is making well-informed statements and contributing to the debate, its not strictly necessary that he be listening to every word of a senate hearing.
Humans generally don't process all the information they hear anyway, what was the percentage, something like 70% is actually registered in our brains? It could also be like those kids who play around in class but are still smart enough to answer all the teacher's questions without trying too hard, as they're still paying attention on some level. I'm not sure if McCain was one of those kids, but if he knows enough about this subject it might be a similar situation anyway.
If he was playing that game throughout the *whole* hearing then I agree it'd be scandalous. But he was just taking a break 
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
le spectacle of politics.
a senator is supposed to fill this role and image of serious politician-ness. but it's just a silly reaction all around. save the outrage for truly consequential matters.
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WASHINGTON -- Former aides to John Boehner and other high-level GOP operatives are increasingly convinced that the House speaker will step aside after the 2014 midterm elections, according to interviews with a dozen Republican sources.
All summer, rumors have been swirling around the Hill and K Street that the speaker has had enough and that 2014 would be his last year with the gavel. Then the message went out in July: Boehner (R-Ohio) is not leaving.
Boehner told his inner circle at dinner that there was no truth to the talk, and authorized his people to spread the word around town. A story appeared in Politico the next day, reaffirming Boehner's stated commitment to stay past 2014.
Source
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Secretary of State John Kerry said at Wednesday’s hearing that Arab counties have offered to pay for the entirety of unseating President Bashar al-Assad if the United States took the lead militarily.
“With respect to Arab countries offering to bear costs and to assess, the answer is profoundly yes,” Kerry said. “They have. That offer is on the table.”
source
Saudi Arabia finances the war to oust Assad, should we agree to their offer. I did not see this coming.
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The Saud family hate the Assad family. So it's no surprise actually.
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I'm still confused what Obama's plan, strategy, or goal for Syria actually is... Do we just want to kill Assad? Destroy the chemical weapons? End the civil war?
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The plan is to weaken Assad while not toppling him. Punishing him for something that apparently both Assad and the opposition may have done. Helping the rebels while not actually bringing any particular one to power.
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Imo the biggest thing stopping an attack on Syria atm is the fact that there is to much evidence/rumor on the nature of the rebels.
The west doesnt want to topple Assad only to create another "terrorist state". That combined with the general public having enough of fighting wars half the world away only to not end up with a functioning country overnight (which is ofc impossible) makes the entire situation look so disjointed.
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On September 05 2013 05:45 ddrddrddrddr wrote:
The plan is to weaken Assad while not toppling him. Punishing him for something that apparently both Assad and the opposition may have done. Helping the rebels while not actually bringing any particular one to power.
So just dick around?
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On September 05 2013 06:26 DoubleReed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2013 05:45 ddrddrddrddr wrote:
The plan is to weaken Assad while not toppling him. Punishing him for something that apparently both Assad and the opposition may have done. Helping the rebels while not actually bringing any particular one to power. So just dick around?
Can't... resist...
+ Show Spoiler +
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Issues of electricity regulation typically play out in drab government hearing rooms. That has not been the case this summer in Arizona, where a noisy argument – featuring TV attack ads and dueling websites – has broken out between regulated utilities and the rooftop solar industry.
An Internet web video attacks the California startup companies that sell rooftop solar systems as the “new Solyndras,” which are spending “hard-earned tax dollars to subsidize their wealthy customers.” Meantime, solar companies accuse Arizona Public Service, the state’s biggest utility, of wanting to “extinguish the independent rooftop solar market in Arizona to protect its monopoly.”
Similar battles about how rooftop solar should be regulated have flared in California, Colorado, Idaho, and Louisana. And the outcome of these power struggles could have a major impact on the future of solar in the U.S.
Today’s solar industry is puny – it supplies less than 1 percent of the electricity in the U.S. – but its advocates say that solar is, at long last, ready to move from the fringe of the energy economy to the mainstream. Photovoltaic panel prices are falling. Low-cost financing for installing rooftop solar is available. Federal and state government incentives remain generous.
Yet opposition from regulated utilities, which burn fossil fuels to produce most of their electricity, could stop a solar boom before it gets started.
Several utilities, including Arizona Public Service and Denver-based Xcel Energy, have asked their state regulators to reduce incentives or impose charges on customers who install rooftop solar; so far, at least, they aren’t making much headway. A bill in the California legislature, backed by the utility interests would add $120 a year in fees to rooftop solar customers.
Source
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The Israel Lobby has gotten involved. And politicians are of course scared of the Israel Lobby:
http://mondoweiss.net/2013/09/in-sunlight-at-last-israel-lobby-throws-its-full-weight-behind-obamas-syria-strike.html
The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) issued an Action Alert today to our 45,000 members, calling on them to reach out to their elected officials in the House and Senate, to ask them to support the upcoming resolution authorizing the use of military force against the Bashar Al-Assad regime in Syria.
The Action Alert stressed the moral threshold that has been crossed by Syria’s use of chemical weapons against its own people.
We also emphasized that it is in America’s vital national interests that we continue to be able to project – in Syria and elsewhere – a credible military deterrent.
J Street is still on the fence. Its last statement, a week ago, condemned what it called Assad’s use of chemical weapons against civilians and called on the US “and the international community… [to] hold President Assad and all responsible for this heinous crime fully accountable.” I bet J Street comes off the fence.
Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post reports that Chuck Hagel has reached out to the pro-Israel groups for their support and states the bottom line for supporters of Israel: Iran: “there is consensus in the mostly-Democratic pro-Israel community that the Syria vote and Iran are inextricably linked. If so, a ‘no’ vote would be catastrophic.”
And btw, please refer to it as the Israel Lobby, not the Jewish Lobby. That can be pretty offensive to Jewish Americans.
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On September 05 2013 07:02 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Show nested quote +Issues of electricity regulation typically play out in drab government hearing rooms. That has not been the case this summer in Arizona, where a noisy argument – featuring TV attack ads and dueling websites – has broken out between regulated utilities and the rooftop solar industry.
An Internet web video attacks the California startup companies that sell rooftop solar systems as the “new Solyndras,” which are spending “hard-earned tax dollars to subsidize their wealthy customers.” Meantime, solar companies accuse Arizona Public Service, the state’s biggest utility, of wanting to “extinguish the independent rooftop solar market in Arizona to protect its monopoly.”
Similar battles about how rooftop solar should be regulated have flared in California, Colorado, Idaho, and Louisana. And the outcome of these power struggles could have a major impact on the future of solar in the U.S.
Today’s solar industry is puny – it supplies less than 1 percent of the electricity in the U.S. – but its advocates say that solar is, at long last, ready to move from the fringe of the energy economy to the mainstream. Photovoltaic panel prices are falling. Low-cost financing for installing rooftop solar is available. Federal and state government incentives remain generous.
Yet opposition from regulated utilities, which burn fossil fuels to produce most of their electricity, could stop a solar boom before it gets started.
Several utilities, including Arizona Public Service and Denver-based Xcel Energy, have asked their state regulators to reduce incentives or impose charges on customers who install rooftop solar; so far, at least, they aren’t making much headway. A bill in the California legislature, backed by the utility interests would add $120 a year in fees to rooftop solar customers. Source
Are there any good reasons why the panel owners shouldn't have to start paying fees for the services they receive?
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Obama warned Syria not to cross the red line. He said in his speech that he would risk provoking a military response from the US.
Now Obama says the red line was more of a international common-thinking and not really him saying something or putting anything new out there. He further said that his credibility was "not on the line
We don't know his plan. It most definitely is not regime change. Is he hoping for for a couple cruise missiles on big military targets and call it a day?
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WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration has cleared the way for the spouses of gay veterans to receive military benefits, with the Justice Department declaring it will no longer enforce a provision of the law that states only heterosexual married couples are eligible.
Attorney General Eric Holder said in a Wednesday letter to congressional leaders that the Justice Department had determined the Supreme Court’s rationale in a decision overturning part of the Defense of Marriage Act should also apply to Title 38, the part of the U.S. code that governs veterans' benefits. Title 38 currently defines marriage as between a man and a woman, meaning that only heterosexual spouses receive the benefits, which include health care, disability and survival benefits and burials in national cemeteries.
Holder said last year that the Justice Department would no longer defend Title 38 in court. But Wednesday’s announcement went even further, with DOJ finding that the legal basis laid out by the Supreme Court in United States v. Windsor should nullify the marriage definition in the provision. Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki said just last week that the spouses of gay veterans weren’t eligible for benefits because no court had found Title 38’s definitions to be unconstitutional.
“Decisions by the Executive Branch not to enforce federal laws are appropriately rare,” Holder wrote in the letter, adding that in this case it was appropriate given that the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group of the U.S. House of Representatives had withdrawn from pending litigation challenging the constitutionality of Title 38's constitutionality.
“The decision of the Supreme Court in Windsor reinforces the Executive’s conclusion that the Title 28 provisions are unconstitutional,” Holder wrote. Continued enforcement of Title 38 “would likely have a tangible adverse effect on the families of veterans and, in some circumstances, active-duty service members and reservists, with respect to survival, health care, home loan, and other benefits.”
Source
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On September 05 2013 06:26 DoubleReed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2013 05:45 ddrddrddrddr wrote:
The plan is to weaken Assad while not toppling him. Punishing him for something that apparently both Assad and the opposition may have done. Helping the rebels while not actually bringing any particular one to power. So just dick around?
i don't think there's any calculated achievable objective. it's just to satisfy the need to respond to chemical weapons usage.
after all, the whole iraq war was predicated upon such a reaction, a modern day casus belli, red line event.
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On September 05 2013 07:06 JonnyBNoHo wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2013 07:02 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Issues of electricity regulation typically play out in drab government hearing rooms. That has not been the case this summer in Arizona, where a noisy argument – featuring TV attack ads and dueling websites – has broken out between regulated utilities and the rooftop solar industry.
An Internet web video attacks the California startup companies that sell rooftop solar systems as the “new Solyndras,” which are spending “hard-earned tax dollars to subsidize their wealthy customers.” Meantime, solar companies accuse Arizona Public Service, the state’s biggest utility, of wanting to “extinguish the independent rooftop solar market in Arizona to protect its monopoly.”
Similar battles about how rooftop solar should be regulated have flared in California, Colorado, Idaho, and Louisana. And the outcome of these power struggles could have a major impact on the future of solar in the U.S.
Today’s solar industry is puny – it supplies less than 1 percent of the electricity in the U.S. – but its advocates say that solar is, at long last, ready to move from the fringe of the energy economy to the mainstream. Photovoltaic panel prices are falling. Low-cost financing for installing rooftop solar is available. Federal and state government incentives remain generous.
Yet opposition from regulated utilities, which burn fossil fuels to produce most of their electricity, could stop a solar boom before it gets started.
Several utilities, including Arizona Public Service and Denver-based Xcel Energy, have asked their state regulators to reduce incentives or impose charges on customers who install rooftop solar; so far, at least, they aren’t making much headway. A bill in the California legislature, backed by the utility interests would add $120 a year in fees to rooftop solar customers. Source Are there any good reasons why the panel owners shouldn't have to start paying fees for the services they receive?
What services?
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On September 05 2013 09:12 aksfjh wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2013 07:06 JonnyBNoHo wrote:On September 05 2013 07:02 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Issues of electricity regulation typically play out in drab government hearing rooms. That has not been the case this summer in Arizona, where a noisy argument – featuring TV attack ads and dueling websites – has broken out between regulated utilities and the rooftop solar industry.
An Internet web video attacks the California startup companies that sell rooftop solar systems as the “new Solyndras,” which are spending “hard-earned tax dollars to subsidize their wealthy customers.” Meantime, solar companies accuse Arizona Public Service, the state’s biggest utility, of wanting to “extinguish the independent rooftop solar market in Arizona to protect its monopoly.”
Similar battles about how rooftop solar should be regulated have flared in California, Colorado, Idaho, and Louisana. And the outcome of these power struggles could have a major impact on the future of solar in the U.S.
Today’s solar industry is puny – it supplies less than 1 percent of the electricity in the U.S. – but its advocates say that solar is, at long last, ready to move from the fringe of the energy economy to the mainstream. Photovoltaic panel prices are falling. Low-cost financing for installing rooftop solar is available. Federal and state government incentives remain generous.
Yet opposition from regulated utilities, which burn fossil fuels to produce most of their electricity, could stop a solar boom before it gets started.
Several utilities, including Arizona Public Service and Denver-based Xcel Energy, have asked their state regulators to reduce incentives or impose charges on customers who install rooftop solar; so far, at least, they aren’t making much headway. A bill in the California legislature, backed by the utility interests would add $120 a year in fees to rooftop solar customers. Source Are there any good reasons why the panel owners shouldn't have to start paying fees for the services they receive? What services?
Net metering. The utility has to do work to facilitate that.
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EPT
