EPT2008 US Presidential Election - Page 28
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CTStalker
Canada9720 Posts
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fusionsdf
Canada15390 Posts
On February 26 2008 06:45 Servolisk wrote: The article points out that the Clinton campaign has done similar before. The clinton campaign has been known to use the drudge report for this sort of thing before, and drudge confirmed their source was the hillary campaign. Source: NYTimes Theres another one that I can't find. Combine that with the refusal of clinton staffers to say that it wasnt a clinton maneuver - maggie williams had the opportunity and kept spinning it away. The only good thing about this is the desperation it shows. | ||
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fusionsdf
Canada15390 Posts
And we all know how successful pro-life conservatives generally are right? Look at all the flack mccain is getting, and he and guiliani were pretty much the only ones who supported abortion. Pretty much every republican politician has gotten away with "I am pro-life" to solidify the support from their base, and done nothing about it in office in order to actually get elected. While theoretically Conservative is an economic policy only, it can not be denied that american conservativism is tied extremely close to christianity. | ||
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geometryb
United States1249 Posts
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Slaughter
United States20255 Posts
On February 26 2008 08:14 fusionsdf wrote: And we all know how successful pro-life conservatives generally are right? Look at all the flack mccain is getting, and he and guiliani were pretty much the only ones who supported abortion. Pretty much every republican politician has gotten away with "I am pro-life" to solidify the support from their base, and done nothing about it in office in order to actually get elected. While theoretically Conservative is an economic policy only, it can not be denied that american conservativism is tied extremely close to christianity. Everyone knows that the older and more strict portion of christianity are conservative for the most part, however the younger generations are becomming ever increasingly liberal and that conservative group is shrinking. Also there are plenty of conservatives that are not super religious out there, its just that the conservatives that are christian shout the loudest. | ||
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a-game
Canada5214 Posts
american conservatism rather is an increasingly small piece of the GOP pie, fighting for space with the louder and more noticed neo-con and religious right blocs. edit: there are some conservatives on this board, like shmay etc. the passion with which they trumpet their cause often has a 'religious' tinge to it, it's like the 'conservative book of economic ideas' is their bible. but i obviously respect them much more than their evangelical cousins, even if that respect is accompanied by deep disagreement. | ||
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a-game
Canada5214 Posts
this isn't just one poll, it takes days and large poll leads in multiple polls to affect the national average that heavily. edit: although, national polls don't really have much consequence on how he'll do in the march 4 primaries. | ||
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Clutch3
United States1344 Posts
On February 26 2008 02:58 gwho wrote: percentage of gdp. nice to know. anyways im totally with you shmay that small gov is the way to go. i may sound like a total partisan pig for what im about to say, but here it is anyway. ill admit i am conservative, in the true sense, not a neocon who draws their philosophy from machiaveli and the likes. to be American means to have small government. the founding fathers all knew of how government tends to grow and go sour so they devised the constitution to keep the evils of usurping of power, and also i quote "the evil forces of democracy" at bay. Ronald Reagan said "no government willingly reduces it's size. In fact, government bureacracy is probably the closest thing to eternal life on this earth." Being conservative IS being american. that's what america is all about. preservation of individual freedoms. The welfare state, and strong leaders (meaning leaders with lots of power, instead of leaders "strong enough to resist the temptation of taking too much power" -RP) in the eyes of history, an old, over proven idea. if you really want to be progressive, progress to liberate humanity and protect individual freedoms. Don't regress to the powerful state idea or welfare state concept. Anyone who doesn't want small government, protection of liberties, i will say is still welcome in this republic. freedom of religion means freedom of views, acadamia and philosophy. however, if you wish to change the government to reflect that, you go against the very core and heart of American philosphy. And you have not been educated enough about the constitution by your public school. i will even go further to say that as a system, with the exception of convicted individual teachers in that horrible system, the public schools are responsible for keeping kids ignorant about it, and feed them dilutions of machiavelli, world government, and socialism. I absolutely agree, being American IS about preserving individual freedoms. The most powerful threat to individual freedoms today comes not from the government (though Lord knows, George W. Bush has tried his best), but from multinational corporations. Think about it. Governmental policy on almost all social issues: gay rights, abortion, stem cells, etc., is all moving (sometimes maddeningly slowly) towards more freedom. Though many people may scream about it, it's clear that these social issues are used merely as a tool by the GOP to energize their base; they have neither the ability nor the will to really try to make real changes on these fronts. The only big issue where government needs to be watched in terms of civil liberties is privacy, where I think that most liberals and most libertarians (as you seem to be) are in good agreement. As far as economic issues go, it's a slightly more complicated argument, but on most measures, economic freedoms continue to grow. Certainly corporate regulation is not keeping up with the ability of businesses to cleverly game the system. Personal tax rates are relatively low. The amount of money spent by the government on non-military, non-entitlement purposes is very small as a percentage of GDP. The only big issue is entitlements, which is an issue where people can agree to disagree. There are serious demographic challenges to Medicare and Social Security, and no politician seems to want to touch how to deal with this. On the other hand, corporations have vastly increased their ability to harm the average person. There's not a day that goes by where there's no some reprehensible news about some company that ignored the death and/or suffering of many people to increase the bottom line. There's one problem after another that can be traced back to insufficient regulation or the fact that business has grown too slick and too rich for government to handle: Enron, Worldcom, Tyco, Halliburton, rolling blackouts in Calfornia, Vioxx, the sub-prime crisis, etc etc. Just a day or two ago there was a lovely piece about Bayer apparently knowingly selling HIV-tainted drugs. The corporate world, even moreso than the government, grows more powerful and more indifferent to the suffering of people as time goes on. And in the struggle between the government and the corporations, big business has been losing big time recently. As of right now, no labor union is even close to as important as any of a few dozen corporate lobbies. There's no balance between the workers and the corporate leaders. There are two reasons why it's better to have a strong government which can stand up to the corporate special interests. First of all, corporations are, and should be, devoted to increasing the profits and keeping their shareholders happy. The government is theoretically meant to serve the people. Secondly, the control of corporations is held by the small percentage of people who control most of the wealth in the country. The government is a much more representative body (if far from ideal). Ironically, most of the bad things about government (pork, gridlock, money in politics, etc.) -- and I think many people would agree here -- can be traced back to some corporate interest that had too much power and gamed the system. So, I would argue the idea that it's the government per se that's the problem here. As an aside, Robert Reich's new book, "Supercapitalism", is a fascinating investigation of how Americans over the past thirty years have had their ability to effect change as citizens eroded, even as our influence as consumers and investors has grown. Think about it, if you want to change the way Walmart does business, there's no way to do it effectively through the governmental process. The way to change corporate behavior is by not buying their stuff or by not investing in them. The Constitution is a living document. To think that any person living in the 18th century could have foreseen the issues of today is laughable. To make an argument that people who disagree with you are simply "undereducated", forgive my smugness, smacks of someone who hasn't formulated a more effective argument. And I would argue, that to be American is to be liberal. Liberals were the first people to oppose slavery, to support civil rights, to support labor unions which fought for workplace safety and worker rights, to create social security and bring millions out of poverty, to oppose bans on interracial marriage, to support a woman's right to vote, and now to support equal rights for gays (an idea which will be widely accepted in 25 years). And, I might add, that the key ideas America was founded on were, at the time, most definitely not conservative ideas. | ||
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a-game
Canada5214 Posts
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080226/ap_on_el_pr/obama_dodd not exactly a john edwards calibre endorsement, but when it's this close every little thing helps | ||
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Servolisk
United States5241 Posts
![[image loading]](http://mattbors.com/strips/350.gif) | ||
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Rev0lution
United States1805 Posts
![[image loading]](http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3115/2286994669_426a7d669e_b.jpg) He's a muslim terrorist! duh!!! | ||
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HeadBangaa
United States6512 Posts
On February 26 2008 11:58 Clutch3 wrote: Relative to what, socialist states?Personal tax rates are relatively low. | ||
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Orome
Switzerland11984 Posts
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QuanticHawk
United States32157 Posts
On February 27 2008 00:45 Rev0lution wrote: He's a muslim terrorist! duh!!! that's grade a, top notch journalism there | ||
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Clutch3
United States1344 Posts
Relative to the large majority of countries with the highest standards of living on the planet. Relative to historical levels in the United States. | ||
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gwho
United States632 Posts
On February 27 2008 03:41 Clutch3 wrote: Relative to the large majority of countries with the highest standards of living on the planet. Relative to historical levels in the United States. yeah man, we pay almost a third in taxes. no state in history has ever kept up that burden and survived. we have all the signs of a downfall. some pay even more than a third. and i don't care for a rat's ass if they relatively low. i want absolutely low. low. in terms of social security tax, i thought ponzi schemes were illeagal. in terms of income tax, i want zero percent, like we had for over 100 years, and half the country's lifetime. we don't need that money to run the government, provided that the government isn't doing what it shouldn't be doing anyway. the founding fathers were totally against direct tax. do you think we would need all these bullshit welfare programs, and scholarship programs and the ponzi scheme social security if people simply just kept the fruits of their labor, not allow government to get big enough to cause all of these problems in the first place? 1913 is where america's financial slavery starts. 16th ammendment, the power to coin money given up by the congress, bills of credit allowed instead of paper that is backed by real stuff: gold. having the money be a representation of something backing is it the cure for inflation. if it has to be backed, inflation couldn't happen. they couldn't create credit and diilute everyone else's purchasing power if it required limits. if the fed and the banks can create money out of thin air and collect interest on it, why can't i? why do i have to work my butt off for money that constantly becomes less over time, pay a third of it to a gov that abuses the money? thats definitely not what the founding fathers' idea of freedom was. nor is it anyone's, except propagandized folks. you'd really have to be ignorant. The fed has secured this power to print money, which congress should have. actually congress only has the power to create silver/gold certificates. but what the fed does, it prints, and then loans it to the government - they collect interest! now why should an illegetitimate, unconstitutional power get to do that? If anything, congress should coin money themselves and not have to pay interest. The interest that the FED collects today, is over all of our income taxes combined. 100% of our income tax goes toward interest. Thats why the 16th ammendment was passed. if we didn't have such huge debts to pay to someone else, or spend like drunken sailors, there would be no need to steal from all of the supposedly free people. solution: get out of the dollar. other currencies are better, even though they too are fiat and unbacked. commodities are great. gold is even better. | ||
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Flaccid
8921 Posts
On February 26 2008 23:57 Servolisk wrote: Hahahahahahahahahahaha. Only good political cartoon I've ever seen. | ||
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gwho
United States632 Posts
too many people are ignorant about 911. it's not about terrorism. it's about retribution, violence, and people being plain pissed off. If they could get back at a nation at exponential effectiveness through fear, that's even better. you have to see it through their perspective. what if russia or china was in our streets, causing collateral damage in the form of your mom, brother, or grandfather? hm?? i doubt it is in anyone's genuine nature to turn the other cheek and offer up your sister and say please kill her too. NO you'd be fucking pissed. ID be fucking pissed. probably enough to fight back. But this didn't just happen overnight. china was in our country for decades, bombing bombing bombing. that's how they see us. if they were really able to cripple america so easily with boxcutters and such, then is anywhere safe at all? the whole word should be in perpetual police state. now lets think about this. America with their military power could beat the crap out of probably any country right now, especially a third world country like iraq, afghanistan with no army, airforce or navy. YET some plain dudes who weren't even secret agents, who had to get flight training in AMERICA... very smart for someone who's going to attack that nation, not even try to hide their ethnicity/religion, or bother to learn the language to blend in, or understand the security checks and systems they would need to bypass. and then hijakced multiple planes!, which are alerted to NORAD if they deviate even slightly from course. There would be F14's next to them, and if they didn't land, they would be shot down. ignoring the fact that the wtc fell at freefall speed, and looked quite suspiciously like a controlled demolition, falling on it's imprint and all. Ignoring the fact that building 7 of the WTC complex also fell in freefall, demolition style, EVEN THOUGH IT WASN't HIT BY A PLANE!!! please, just keep ignoring the evidence and go on beliving the government's story, since it makes you so happy and joyful inside. if the government was lying, why, i would be so filled with fear! i wouldn't want that. ignore that a sample of the wtc rubble (which most of was shipped off to china like a dog trying to scrap the evidence) was analyzed and determined to be pulverized by thermate. ignore the fact that jetfuel could not possibly reach the melting point of steel. if it did, there was some thermate in the buliding... then who planted it there? but our reactionary countermeasures, therefore are what? everything that violates privacy and freedom. -baggage checks -unwarrented, universal spying by the gov. who can also use the info for blackmailing, an organized effort to find people (helps a lot if you want to get concentration camps going). not that any government has done this before. it's purely out of their goodness. they just need to make sure there are no checks and balances restraining that power. -the government now CAN take you off the streets and torture you, if they say you're a terrorist. and because you get no real trial, you can't prove you're not a terrorist if they don't want you to be. -crazy war spending. on world conquest proportions. think back to all of the wars and areas of the world we've been in. suddenly in a great schism of history has the dream of world conquest died? are just so benevolent? you know what else has existed since the first empire besides world conquest: domestic propaganda. ours just happens to be spreading democracy at gunpoint. That a whole world of a religion is all totally nuts, irrational, hateful, and want to destroy us. they're not people. If Obama WAS a muslim, i in fact would vote for him, just to get rid of this stupid association of a religion and terrorism. America is so fucking stupid! why can't they separate Islam from Terrorism? pissed off people and yes, radical beliefs, terrorize, not just Muslims. Are we so certain they're nuts? are we so certain that they aren't pissed cause we won't stop occupying and meddling with their country? If Obama did do anything funny, with the state of propaganda that America is in (against muslims), they would be all over him in no time. Better than having some pretentious elite whiteman we had for so long but in every cycle masterfully and secretly fucks up our nation so well. If i was at the top, and wanted to conquer the middle east through America, isn't it a beautiful plan? cause a flase flag operation like 911 to get the people's blood boiled up. when you're angry, fearful, overly "patriotic" you start to lose your reasoning. There will be lots of support for war. because most people won't look into the details, you can conceal shipping off 911 to china, the fact that you're raking in the dough like crazy off the war, the fact that we've been messing with them for decades. And since i have the media in my pocket, controlling the information will be rather easy. We then proceed to stomp all over the freedoms of the nation i am using to hit the middle east, which will be readily handed over out of their fear/anger/patriotism "for their protection". We create inflation and recession in the host nation, bringing the unstoppable military power through finance, just like good old Jefferson said. "I sincerely believe that banking institutions are more dangerous than standing armies" Two birds with one stone. middle east, and America that we used so well to prepare so many other nations beforehand. Once the sole superpower falls, and creates chaos, we can strengthen the world alliances, the UN, and implement world government. skin implantable chips to control people. everyone depends on money. have complete control over the power to print money. hoard the gold. destroy competing currencies. we now have satellites so we can track people and "purge" anyone who will not accept our rule. the finale and achievement of the age old dream of world conquest: complete. | ||
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QuanticHawk
United States32157 Posts
On February 27 2008 04:22 gwho wrote: too many people are ignorant about 911. it's not about terrorism. it's about retribution, violence, and people being plain pissed off. If they could get back at a nation at exponential effectiveness through fear, that's even better. you have to see it through their perspective. what if russia or china was in our streets, causing collateral damage in the form of your mom, brother, or grandfather? hm?? i doubt it is in anyone's genuine nature to turn the other cheek and offer up your sister and say please kill her too. NO you'd be fucking pissed. ID be fucking pissed. probably enough to fight back. But this didn't just happen overnight. china was in our country for decades, bombing bombing bombing. that's how they see us. if they were really able to cripple america so easily with boxcutters and such, then is anywhere safe at all? the whole word should be in perpetual police state. now lets think about this. America with their military power could beat the crap out of probably any country right now, especially a third world country like iraq, afghanistan with no army, airforce or navy. YET some plain dudes who weren't even secret agents, who had to get flight training in AMERICA... very smart for someone who's going to attack that nation, not even try to hide their ethnicity/religion, or bother to learn the language to blend in, or understand the security checks and systems they would need to bypass. and then hijakced multiple planes!, which are alerted to NORAD if they deviate even slightly from course. There would be F14's next to them, and if they didn't land, they would be shot down. ignoring the fact that the wtc fell at freefall speed, and looked quite suspiciously like a controlled demolition, falling on it's imprint and all. Ignoring the fact that building 7 of the WTC complex also fell in freefall, demolition style, EVEN THOUGH IT WASN't HIT BY A PLANE!!! please, just keep ignoring the evidence and go on beliving the government's story, since it makes you so happy and joyful inside. if the government was lying, why, i would be so filled with fear! i wouldn't want that. ignore that a sample of the wtc rubble (which most of was shipped off to china like a dog trying to scrap the evidence) was analyzed and determined to be pulverized by thermate. ignore the fact that jetfuel could not possibly reach the melting point of steel. if it did, there was some thermate in the buliding... then who planted it there? but our reactionary countermeasures, therefore are what? everything that violates privacy and freedom. -baggage checks -unwarrented, universal spying by the gov. who can also use the info for blackmailing, an organized effort to find people (helps a lot if you want to get concentration camps going). not that any government has done this before. it's purely out of their goodness. they just need to make sure there are no checks and balances restraining that power. -the government now CAN take you off the streets and torture you, if they say you're a terrorist. and because you get no real trial, you can't prove you're not a terrorist if they don't want you to be. -crazy war spending. on world conquest proportions. think back to all of the wars and areas of the world we've been in. suddenly in a great schism of history has the dream of world conquest died? are just so benevolent? you know what else has existed since the first empire besides world conquest: domestic propaganda. ours just happens to be spreading democracy at gunpoint. That a whole world of a religion is all totally nuts, irrational, hateful, and want to destroy us. they're not people. If Obama WAS a muslim, i in fact would vote for him, just to get rid of this stupid association of a religion and terrorism. America is so fucking stupid! why can't they separate Islam from Terrorism? pissed off people and yes, radical beliefs, terrorize, not just Muslims. Are we so certain they're nuts? are we so certain that they aren't pissed cause we won't stop occupying and meddling with their country? If Obama did do anything funny, with the state of propaganda that America is in (against muslims), they would be all over him in no time. Better than having some pretentious elite whiteman we had for so long but in every cycle masterfully and secretly fucks up our nation so well. If i was at the top, and wanted to conquer the middle east through America, isn't it a beautiful plan? cause a flase flag operation like 911 to get the people's blood boiled up. when you're angry, fearful, overly "patriotic" you start to lose your reasoning. There will be lots of support for war. because most people won't look into the details, you can conceal shipping off 911 to china, the fact that you're raking in the dough like crazy off the war, the fact that we've been messing with them for decades. And since i have the media in my pocket, controlling the information will be rather easy. We then proceed to stomp all over the freedoms of the nation i am using to hit the middle east, which will be readily handed over out of their fear/anger/patriotism "for their protection". We create inflation and recession in the host nation, bringing the unstoppable military power through finance, just like good old Jefferson said. "I sincerely believe that banking institutions are more dangerous than standing armies" Two birds with one stone. middle east, and America that we used so well to prepare so many other nations beforehand. Once the sole superpower falls, and creates chaos, we can strengthen the world alliances, the UN, and implement world government. skin implantable chips to control people. everyone depends on money. have complete control over the power to print money. hoard the gold. destroy competing currencies. we now have satellites so we can track people and "purge" anyone who will not accept our rule. the finale and achievement of the age old dream of world conquest: complete. lolwut Tell me next time you go on a crazy rant, this way I can put on my tinfoil hat too so that BIG BROTHER DOESN'T GET ME!!!!! | ||
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BlackJack
United States10574 Posts
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