US Politics - From barbarism to decadence

[TerraPrime]

Did we need proof that the Tea Party and the Republicans are not much more than shit stirring hypocrites and their followers are complete dupes?

Ok - here ya go.

To be fair:

Many Democratic leaders who had boasted they prevented lawmakers from inserting special spending requests in the stimulus law when it passed also engaged in the behind-the-scenes letter writing to secure funding afterwards, including Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

[Swordfish]

No, I'm fairly certain it was when you refused to examine data, then went on to accuse the source of partisan bias.

Perhaps you should examine what color you are, kettle.

If an article contains data, it cannot be biased unless the data is also biased?

Um.... OK.... If you say so.

:rolleyes:

Which contains this:

You understand the difference between 'plan to buy/provide funding to buy' and 'actually buy', correct?

There is no question about what the bill is authorized to do.

Has that plan been implemented?

Here's the Wiki link to the program you're talking about if you're curious:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public-Private_Investment_Program

This is just not my memory of what was going on at the time, and I would bet anything that it was not most people's. It could be yours, I cannot disprove that. But the zeitgeist of the time, if you will, was that we were enacting a $700 billion bank bailout to save the banking sector, and people were scared shitless.

Again, you seem to be conflating public perception with official projections.

That was your bad then, because I was making my main point with the Moody's data, not the rest of the Rolling Stone article. So, again, you conveniently dismissed the Moody's data which said ARRA basically saved the world, which was my point, because you saw that the article came from Rolling Stone.

Huh? Again, I have no idea what you are talking about here. It's pretty clear why I disputed the credibility of the article. I don't really know why you are so dead set on trying to pin an argument on me that I never made.

Yes, absolutely I am. That is the whole point of what I said when I started this whole discussion which has turned into an argument. The public perception is my point. I agree with you that the experts said TARP wouldn't cost us that much. I remember Paulsen and then Obama saying so. But most of the public wasn't buying it. and today most of the public still hates "the bailouts." My main beef is that both parties actually worked together on something huge that had to be done, and the public both doesn't understand that it was a good thing and then blames one party for it while rewarding the other.

You have an odd way of communicating your agreement. Not sure why it took a whole page to get to this admission.

Who is being rewarded for it? What is the reward?

[Swordfish]

I think because you didn't understand me from the start, which may have been my fault. I don't know.

The reward is the coming election in which Republicans will be swept into power with "the bailouts" being one of the top explanations on voter's minds. So they're going to reward the Republican party for signing the bill that they profess to hate so much. Although the cynic in me says that it's really more the economy than anything, and when voters are asked for reasons they tend to like to come up with more specific things like "the bailouts" or "healthcare."

I'm not so sure the republicans are going to benefit as much as some people think. But I guess we'll find out.

Is polling data showing the bailout issue to be a high priority among those likely to vote republican? Is that where this is coming from? If so then it's maybe starting to make sense to me now where you're coming from.

[BloodRider]

To be fair:

Right, and it is wrong, to be sure. Still they are not running on the idea that spending is evil, and they are pure as the driven snow.

[Shryke]

Here's NPR showing how a nice little diagram of the GOP's web of influence and the various astro-turf organizations it employs/is employed by:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130845545?

[BloodRider]

Here's NPR showing how a nice little diagram of the GOP's web of influence and the various astro-turf organizations it employs/is employed by:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130845545?

And now it comes out that corporations are writing laws to create new markets for themselves. This is the end result of hands off capitalism, and gov't corruption. I am stunned at the implications of this story.

[awesome possum]

Come on, guys. You're linking to NPR. You know they're just part of a Jihadist inquisition, right?

[alguien]

If an article contains data, it cannot be biased unless the data is also biased?

No, but the refusal to even examine it and yet accuse the other side of bias is hypocritical, to say the least.

Also:

Either way, for the third time, democrats not only provided HUGE support for TARP (and the rest of the bailouts) but also fanned the flames of 'big bizness doesn't deserve your hard earned tax dollars because they are teh evil'.

Why couldn't one be in favor of TARP in order to keep the economy from going down the crapper, yet still be hyper-critical of the gross mismanagement that led it to become a necessity in the first place?

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

DAMN JON STEWART.

I am a big fan, but he had Obama on the daily show last night for 30 minutes worth of interview and he didn't even MENTION the wars? Didn't even bring it up? Healthcare this, midterm that. The ONLY political issue that has mattered in America for the last 120 years (foreign policy) and it's standing in the corner like King fucking Kong and everyone just looks the other way.

FUCK.

[alguien]

DAMN JON STEWART.

I am a big fan, but he had Obama on the daily show last night for 30 minutes worth of interview and he didn't even MENTION the wars? Didn't even bring it up? Healthcare this, midterm that. The ONLY political issue that has mattered in America for the last 120 years (foreign policy) and it's standing in the corner like King fucking Kong and everyone just looks the other way.

FUCK.

To be honest, I wasn't really expecting him to. For one, the Iraq occupation is, in some sense, drawing down (I know, we still have troops there and probably will forever) and Afghanistan could have been an hour-long segment itself. Also, its the Daily Show. While it has elevated itself to serve in some sense as our nation's court jester, its really is still a satirical comedy. It really shouldn't be up to them to ask the hardest hitting questions.

The whole focus for this week's shows have been how Washington is confusing and broken. Stewart's primary and recent criticism of Obama on the O'Reilly factor was that he ran as a visionary and has governed as a functionary. This is exactly what Stewart addressed during the show and its kind of where I expected it was going. Perhaps he could of at least mentioned the wars, but I wasn't expecting them to be a focus.

For me, the interview was actually more serious than I thought it was going to be, actually.

Here's a link to the Washington Post blog that summed up my thoughts.

The sad fact is that the reason people make that mistake is the same reason Stewart is popular -- his interview with Obama was more adversarial and critical than just about any exchange you would have seen between someone at Fox News and a member of the Bush administration, even towards the end, when Bush's popularity had hit rock bottom. Even so, the president's appearance was meant for his base -- those disillusioned liberals who flocked to Stewart during the Bush years for confirmation that they were not alone in believing something was very wrong in America.

That base finds itself, after the euphoria of victory in 2008, wondering what went wrong. Stewart, at the expense of discussing issues like the war in Afghanistan, the ongoing existence of Gitmo or the expanding national security state, was focused on this question, with the president making his case for why their present disillusionment is misplaced.

[Swordfish]

No, but the refusal to even examine it and yet accuse the other side of bias is hypocritical, to say the least.

No. It really isn't.

I'm under no obligation to comb through data posted in an article when I know the article has an agenda and is demonstrating bias (for reasons i already talked about).

There are way too many other good sources of information out there to waste my time on something like that.

Which i believe is how many of you feel (rightly) about articles from Fox news.

You're letting your obsession with catching me in a 'gotcha' cloud your reason.

I'm not sure where the actual polling is on TARP or the auto bailouts. My thinking comes more from what I perceive to be the mood of the country, especially the Tea Party. I have certainly seen lots of "no bailout" signs and such.

This column by Ross Douthat, a conservative-leaning NYT columnist, touches on the attitude pretty well I think:

I'd be interested to see what he's basing all that on.

When Bennett lost his primary in Utah, there were two main explanations given by the Tea Party-types who voted him out. One was that he voted for TARP, and another was that he'd co-sponsored a health care bill with Democrat Ron Wyden (who I'm sure you're familiar with :P).

Heh. the name sounds vaguely familiar. ;)

I'm not exactly sure though how ousting Bennet constitutes rewarding the republicans?

I think that once the election happens we'll see more polling, specifically exit polling on what people say was driving them. I think the economy ought to be #1, and maybe it will be. But I suspect that health care and some version of "TARP/bailouts" will be another. And I think "big government/too much government" equates with both of those in the minds of a lot of voters. I think ARRA gets lumped in there too.

I suspect healthcare and the economy will be the big two, with almost everything else a distant second. But I guess we'll find out.

I'm not really sure what to think about the net impact of the tea party on republican chances. I mean, it's not like most of those people would've voted democrat anyway, but they may siphon off a lot of votes in some races.

or, I suppose they might increase voter turnout for the GOP?

No idea really.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

I'm not British enough to start another UK politics thread, but I found this article enlightening.

No terror arrests in 100,000 searches

More than 100,000 people were stopped and searched by police under counter-terrorism powers last year but none of them were arrested for terrorism-related offences, according to Home Office figures published today.

The statistics show that 504 people out of the 101,248 searches were arrested for any offence – an arrest rate of 0.5%, compared with an average 10% arrest rate for street searches under normal police powers.

The figures prompted the former Conservative home affairs spokesman David Davis to call for the controversial policy to be scrapped.

"This astonishing fact of no terrorism-related arrests, let alone prosecutions or convictions, in over 100,000 stop and searches, demonstrates what a massively counter-productive policy this is," said Davis.

Adding yet more evidence that "terrorism" as we know it is mostly theater and a naked power grab by the state.

[MinDonner]

It's less a "power-grab by the state" than a "knee-jerk way of keeping the tabloids happy" - given the lack of actual arrests, I'm not sure what power has actually been grabbed. The random searches were ridiculous though, the guy who sits next to me at work is Asian* and he was stopped at least once a week.

*in British English this means Indian subcontinental, not Chinese

[alguien]

Fox Claims Union Members Are Being Bused in At Gunpoint for Stewart/Colbert Rally

Wow. :stunned:

I mean, really. Wow. How in the hell do people continue to watch this garbage?

[Swordfish]

Like Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's.

What he is pointing out is that you dismissed a post of mine, the point of which largely rested on the Moody's data that I had referenced, because it came from Rolling Stone. The Moody's data wasn't buried in the article in this sense because I had used it in my post to argue how effective the Stimulus Act had been. So you effectively said "I don't have to listen to this talk that the Stimulus Act has been effective because it's Rolling Stone that is saying it." But it was really Moody's that was saying it, which I had pointed out.

*sigh*. This horse is pretty much dead. i've already explained my point ad nauseum about why I don't find rolling stone to be a credible source, and why this argument that 'it contains valid stats' is irrelevant.

I didn't comment at ALL on the conclusions it drew about the stimulus one way or the other. Why would I?

Again, if I posted a fox news article that contained a bunch of accurate data but also concluded that the stimulus led to a rise in violent crime and islamic terrorism, as well as officially making us a socialist country, I doubt you'd think this 'logic' about moodys made any sense.

I don't know why you find this so hard a concept to grasp.

Either way, that's the last thing I'm gonna say about Rolling Stone.

Yeah, he doesn't really include links or references but he is probably basing it on things like (see below...)

....see above. I'm not saying that this particular election is the reward for Republicans. But a traditionally conservative Republican being thrown out in his own primary by the Tea Party movement largely because he voted for TARP...that's kinda what I'm talking about, and that's a perfect example of where Douthat may have gotten the ideas for his column above.

Sure. i don't think there's any question that the Tea Party is against bailouts. But wasn't your original assertion that the democrats were unfairly going to get the brunt of that displeasure?

That's the part i'm not so sure about.

At the end of the day, you are probably correct that the economy is #1 (I suspect it always is, it's just a matter of how honest poll-responders are). Healthcare will probably be #2. You could certainly blame the Dems for healthcare if you don't like it. I think it's unfair to blame them for the economy, but I'm biased that way.

I agree. The presiding administration always gets too much blame for the economy when it's bad, and too much credit for the economy when it's good.

[alguien]

Again, if I posted a fox news article that contained a bunch of accurate data but also concluded that the stimulus led to a rise in violent crime and islamic terrorism, as well as officially making us a socialist country, I doubt you'd think this 'logic' about moodys made any sense.

That wasn't my point. I debated about whether or not to even follow up on this and it's my last attempt, because the idea is pretty damn simple no matter how you try to misconstrue it.

If you had posted such a Fox news article (bit of a false equivalency, btw) and I refused to even examine the references mentioned, even after you subsequently referred to them specifically in further discourse (so no "combing" would be necessary) because I blithely dismissed the entire thing as partisan hackery, on this board I would be accused of intellectual laziness and letting political bias trump reason.

ETA: and to be honest, the reason I originally commented was because you're a poster who, though I usually disagree with politically, I respect as an educated debater and so it surprised me. I probably was too sarcastic in my initial post, so my apologies.

[awesome possum]

Republicans have been unleashing their violent crazies these last few weeks.

WASHINGTON -- This election season, a man was arrested for hitting a protester at a rally for Washington GOP Senate candidate Dino Rossi, a man stomped on the head of a woman at a campaign event for Kentucky GOP Senate candidate Rand Paul, local police wrestled to the ground a Democratic man at an event for Rep. Eric Cantor ®, Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) received suspicious powder to his office, biker supporters of Florida GOP congressional candidate Allen West harassed a Democratic tracker and Alaska GOP Senate candidate Joe Miller's private security force handcuffed and detained a reporter.

And all that was in just the past two weeks.

And "American's number one cable news network" along with dozens of douchebag politicians are encouraging these nuts. They're riling them up.

I wonder what their excuse will be when one of these people actually kills (again). Besides, you know, blaming Democrats?

[Swordfish]

That wasn't my point. I debated about whether or not to even follow up on this and it's my last attempt, because the idea is pretty damn simple no matter how you try to misconstrue it.

If you had posted such a Fox news article (bit of a false equivalency, btw) and I refused to even examine the references mentioned, even after you subsequently referred to them specifically in further discourse (so no "combing" would be necessary) because I blithely dismissed the entire thing as partisan hackery, on this board I would be accused of intellectual laziness and letting political bias trump reason.

Not by me. I see no reason why anyone should read articles from Fox News. They are not a reliable source.

ETA: and to be honest, the reason I originally commented was because you're a poster who, though I usually disagree with politically, I respect as an educated debater and so it surprised me. I probably was too sarcastic in my initial post, so my apologies.

No worries.

[alguien]

I wonder how Murkowski will act in Congress if she wins as an Independent?

It'd be amusing if she became the GOP's equivalent of the Joe Lieberman, but I get the sense that she's fairly conservative.

[ThinkerX]

In the course of my work, I have been seeing an increasing number of anti-Murkowski cards or fliers...mailed by the Republican Party, apparently attacking her for being 'too moderate'.

Miller...might not be quite as popular as advertised.

I am starting to wonder if the Democratic contender might actually have a shot (though, at this point, it remains a long shot).