Are you Liberal or Conservative or somewhere in between?

[Rapscallion]

There's no room in politics for an honest, sane person of either side of the spectrum. Only lunatics on both side.

In the US, correct - or at least it seems that way. Either your country does something about it, or it sinks under the weight of lunacy.

Rapscallion

[Andara Bledin]

You either didn't read the article by von Campe, or it went entirely over your head.

That isn't a citation for Obama conspiring with former Hitler youth; that's an example of grasping at straws for something to be angry over without any reflection or even investigation.

Not only is he questioning Obama, but he honestly raises the question of the birth certificate which has been so thoroughly and utterly debunked that anyone who brings it up is outing themselves and incapable of accepting reality as it stands.

^-.-^

[blas87]

I read it.

I picked that one because it was the first one I figured any of you would read. It didn't help that my search mostly only encouraged anti-communist and anti-socialist webpages, which doesn't help.

[Andara Bledin]

Color me confused, then. What was the point?

^-.-^

[blas87]

You all thought I was talking out of my ass about czars. And since nothing is good enough without research, preferably from a source that the majority of you would be more apt to read, there you go.

Though I wouldn't buy into that crazy anti-Communist stuff myself, but I figured it best to stick away from the more conservative point of view pages. After all, those are all bunk anyway with incorrect facts.

[Mytical]

Raps, those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. Most people seem not to even know yesterday, let alone history. Every major power that has come, pretty much has collapsed for the same basic reasons. Stretched too thin (America is in a catch 22..if we try to be the 'world police' we are dictators yada yada yada, if we don't we are heartless beastards ), corruption (Rome), and/or economic.

Honestly, it's time we throw down our spears, and start worrying about our homeless/starving/etc. I know, go ahead, throw eggs at me. America needs to focus on rebuilding ourselves, rooting out corruption, and remember that charity begins at home. Once we have our own backyard in order, then we can worry about what everybody elses looks like.

[Rapscallion]

Honestly, it's time we throw down our spears, and start worrying about our homeless/starving/etc. I know, go ahead, throw eggs at me. America needs to focus on rebuilding ourselves, rooting out corruption, and remember that charity begins at home. Once we have our own backyard in order, then we can worry about what everybody elses looks like.

Oh, I wholeheartedly agree, but reality does intrude, regrettably. There are problems of poverty in every country. No matter what you do, there are going to be poor people. There's always going to be crime, or people with criminal intent. It's where you draw the line. Do you not go out of your country's boundaries until you've not had a pickpocket incident for six months? Do you wait until everyone owns three cars and a large house before sorting out famine victims in Africa?

I don't think for one minute that this is acceptable, nor would most people. It's where you consider the 80/20 rule - 80 of the work can be done with 20% of the effort, and the remaining 20% of work would take the remaining 80% of your effort. That's what you're up against in the domestic department. Talking completely off the top of my head, I would imagine that the US isn't far from those percentages. I'd imagine most of the western world isn't far from it.

However, much of what happens for US forces abroad comes under one of two headings.

1: philosopical dick waving.

2: you have oil and we want it.

The second explains quite a bit of recent wars and the like. The former explains the last fifty years - the US got involved in many theatres around the world to combat the communist menace. Korea, for example - no real benefit other than to stop the blasted commies. No oil, no real practical benefit I know of. I may be corrected, but many of your young service people killed young service people (and vice versa) on their side to stop commies. Many of the bases abroad are a result of past military actions.

Without tallying up, I reckon that the majority of actions by the US outside of its own shores in the last fifty years have been a result of the two conditions above and not philanthropy.

Rapscallion

[ExRetailDrone]

The second explains quite a bit of recent wars and the like. The former explains the last fifty years - the US got involved in many theatres around the world to combat the communist menace. Korea, for example - no real benefit other than to stop the blasted commies. No oil, no real practical benefit I know of. I may be corrected, but many of your young service people killed young service people (and vice versa) on their side to stop commies. Many of the bases abroad are a result of past military actions.

Without tallying up, I reckon that the majority of actions by the US outside of its own shores in the last fifty years have been a result of the two conditions above and not philanthropy.

Rapscallion

I think I would agree with you, with the little I admittedly know about politics (which is why I rarely get involved with these discussions, although I do enjoy reading them). The US involvement in Korea and Vietnam seemed like nothing more than jamming our noses in others' business because "we gerta get dem dayem commies". It also seemed like a catalyst point where the rest of the world started to kind of expect the US involvement in every little scuffle that happened around the world, whether the countries involved actually wanted us there or not. And even if they didn't want us there, it still seemed expected, and if we weren't there, we were the bad guys somehow. Now, I may very well be way off base, and I readily admit that, but from the few things I've read and heard, and perhaps my own crazy inner-brain-workings, it seems that's how things have gone. Damned if we do, damned if we don't. And if those wars were part of the starting of that, the country placed itself in that Catch-22.

Bleh, I should not be blathering about this kind of thing with a tired brain.

[Panacea]

While we're on this subject, I have noticed a bit of a trend where people will voice one liberal opinion after another, but still try to find ways to say that they're conversative. <snip>-and I've seen it on this very board----people will say things like, "I support universal health care, gay rights, abortion rights, and I oppose the death penalty, but I'm still conservative because of *insert obscure reason*." Um, no. You're a bleeding heart liberal.

Well, yes and no. Conservatives in the United States themselves split into two camps with two completely different agendas: fiscal conservatives, who are usually disinterested in social issues, and social conservatives, who are usually disinterested in fiscal issues. Fiscal issues tend to bore listeners to tears, so fiscal conservatives like Reagan latched onto the idea of using social conservatives to sell a relevant social message along with the fiscal message to attract voters. It worked beautifully and the two camps have never managed a divorce even though their goals are at odds.

Then throw in the libertarians desire for limited government.

None of these factions can stand alone, so they band together to have any hope of opposing the Democrats, who are even more disorganized and chaotic as a party.

Hence multinational political dicussions on these forums get a bit tricky at times. As the concept of liberal or conservative is quite a bit different once you leave the US.

And I find it funny as hell that folks elsewhere in the world see our politics for what it is so clearly, whereas most of us Americans do not. Try to point out what we look like to the rest of the world though, and you get a "damn furriners don't know nothin' and yer unAmerricun to say such a thing."

Corruption is bankrupting us. Those with the money and power to circumvent the legal system and have undue and incestuous influence with the government on all levels are what are bankrupting our country.

Ignorance is what is fucking bankrupting this country, and the ones in power are doing their best to continue to support ignorance. Poverty makes acquiring knowledge difficult. Keeping the women pregnant and having kids they can't support and then gutting the very systems that would give them and their progeny a way out is what is bankrupting this country. Keeping the downtrodden "in their place" is what is bankrupting this country.

The fact that anyone who is not among the "us" part of the "us vs them" mentality fostered, supported, and in some ways created by the "us" side would support that side truly leaves me baffled.

^-.-^

Applause.

In order to get the GOP nomination, you have to hold views that will never get you elected in the general election. But if you hold views that would actually get you moderates/swing votes, you'd never get the nomination with the GOP in the state its in these days.

But Liberal has become the dirty word for anyone that doesn't agree with the right side of the spectrum in the US.

Well, Liberal as a dirty word has been true since the first Clinton administration, if not earlier.

But you're spot on when it comes to the GOP nomination. This is why I left the Republican party during the 2008 election (I started out as a Reagan Republican). When McCain picked Sarah Palin as his VP candidate, I was done, then and there.

I'm a fiscal conservative, not a social conservative. The GOP has abandoned all pretense of fiscal conservative since electing Bush Jr as President, and so deeply embraced social nuttery that I can't stomach it anymore. And as you've pointed out, Obama is a centrist. I am much more comfortable with him than anyone in the GOP field.

If the GOP picks anyone other than Romney, then they can kiss the White House goodbye for another 4 years. The country doesn't want a social conservative. I think the GOP senses this, which is why they're pushing social issues in Congress right now: trying to get it done while they can.

Obama is really not that liberal even by American standards. I mean, take a look at that jobs bill he's pushing. Except for additional taxes for the top earners, any Republican could have authored it.

Republicans did author a lot of these ideas. Obama took many pages out of their playbook in an effort to be bipartisan. Repubs are having none of it. If it comes from Obama, they oppose it no matter what just as they did with health care reform (which was built on Republican ideas that were created during the last attempt at health care reform during the Clinton administration).

It isn't about doing what's best for the country, or even following ideology for the GOP right now. It's about opposing and beating Obama. That's been the whole goal since he was elected. So they'll slit their own throats and fight even their own ideas all in the name of "defeating" Obama.

Meanwhile the country goes to hell in a handbasket.

There are things about the US that shock me - coming from this perspective.

Holidays/vacation - I was astounded to find that people getting more than ten paid days off work a year was uncommon. I'm guaranteed 28 by law (bank holidays to come out of that) - I actually get 33. Yes, all paid. Goes to 34 next year.

Tax everyone for a national health care type system - not this affordable bollocks that puts money into the pockets of big business, but something run for the benefit of everyone so that everyone can attend a dentist, a primary care physician, or a hospital as and when they actually need it.

A minimum wage that goes up with inflation. I may be wrong, but I understand that the US minimum wage hasn't altered in some time, though that can vary from state to state.


Rapscallion

We believe in the myth of the self made man here. Pull your self up by your own bootstraps. And forget the community driven efforts that actually built this country into what it is.

The first settlers were not individualists or wild frontiersmen. They were communities who worked together in order to survive. Individualists died. Collectivists lived. Just look at what happened to the Lost Colony of Roanoake or the Plymouth colony in its earliest days. The former died because individualists started a fight with the natives they couldn't finish even while the country itself was becoming their enemy while the latter very nearly went the same route (and survived only because they managed to make peace and keep the individualists in check).

Even the individualists who did survive and make a name for themselves did so after the Revolution, and were the exceptions not the rule. But we want to treat our entire society as if that were the rule, that to be respectable you have to "make it on your own" , with no help and no community. And it's NEVER been that way in this country.

We've also elevated free markets from a sensible economic theory into a religion. Corporations are the bishops and CEO's are the popes. They're regarded as infallible when it comes to the best interests of this country; you see it when you hear GOP candidates like Herman Cain brag about their "business" street cred.

Running a business is NOTHING like running a government. Government's purpose is NOT to make a profit for its owners (shareholders), but to serve the needs of its entire population and preserve social order. It requires an entirely different skills set, one we have made completely unrespectable by our mockery of career government employees. Providing police, fire, rescue, teachers, garbage removal, and other essential services of government should not be subject to issues of profit-loss.

And if you read Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations," (which is the basis for all our treasured ideals on free market capitalism) he clearly excepts two groups from his theories on free markets: lawyers and doctors. He believed that access to the courts and health care were too socially important to leave to free markets. And he was right.


Blas, I think your point would have gone over better, and been better debated on its merits, had you simply referred to Ayers directly and left the whole czars thing out of it. You mixed your subjects and undermined your own point.

I don't care much for Bill Ayers, and don't like that he never was held accountable for what he did. I certainly wish Obama didn't associate with him.

But we don't have "Attainder of Blood" in this country. Obama himself never bombed any police stations, does not advocate violence, and his views are centrist not ultra liberal. I prefer to judge him by his political views and his own political actions rather than judge him on the activities of a friend of his, someone Obama has never tried to bring into his administration or even hinted that he wanted to.

It's just not that big a deal.

[Rapscallion]

And if you read Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations," (which is the basis for all our treasured ideals on free market capitalism) he clearly excepts two groups from his theories on free markets: lawyers and doctors. He believed that access to the courts and health care were too socially important to leave to free markets. And he was right.

Interesting. On the doctors thing, I have to say that I've yet to hear of a country that was worse off for having a healthier citizenry.

On the court thing, it's not something I had given any thought to, but on initial impressions it does make sense.

Rapscallion

[Gravekeeper]

I will stop by later and see who de-bunks it because it came from a conservative webpage.

I don't debunk things because of their source, I debunk things because they're wrong.

However, I'm not entirely sure what I'm suppose to be looking for with this Obama czar's thing. Czar's have been around forever. This is absolutely nothing new, and your link proves....what? That he has czars that lean left? I don't understand what point you're trying to make?

Apparently, the police bomber and his fellow terrorist wife are only good buddy croonies of Obama and not czars. The wife worked for Michelle Obama previously.

Argh, see, this is the damn problem. The whole Bill Ayers police bomber thing was a big right wing talking point scare during the election. It was a classic guilt by association political attack. If you had looked into it, even for 30 seconds, you'd know it was entirely bullshit. Do you know who Bill Ayers is? I mean for crying out loud it has its own Wiki page. Read. Instead of just blindly swallowing what some twat on the radio said.

As for Cass, Cass who? Cass Sunstein?

Anyone who associates themselves with those kinds of people isn't anyone I want running the country.

But you obviously don't even know what "kinds of people" they even are, and as a result you don't even know what kind of person Obama is either. This is the problem and why these discussions are so frustrating.

And I find it funny as hell that folks elsewhere in the world see our politics for what it is so clearly, whereas most of us Americans do not. Try to point out what we look like to the rest of the world though, and you get a "damn furriners don't know nothin' and yer unAmerricun to say such a thing."

That's damn frustrating too. -.-

[FArchivist]

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=81027

Oh, you chose World Net Daily. Ow.

Word of advice in the future: Never, EVER, take anything coming from World Net Daily, Huffington Post, the Daily Mail, or anything from Andrew Breitbart or Jonah Goldberg as fact. Ever. Especially the Huffington Post when it comes to science. Even if any of them are saying that water is wet or the sun is shining.

Anyway, that's for the future. Moving on to the article in question...

That would be the former Hitler youth. Apparently, the police bomber and his fellow terrorist wife are only good buddy croonies of Obama and not czars. The wife worked for Michelle Obama previously.

First, that article is by one Hilmar Von Campe, a former Hitler Youth member. He claims, in the article, that Obama is setting the stages for a violent coup by 'radicals' in order to set up a fascist state. Apparently, he provides all the proof for this in the book he's hawking.

Nowhere does he say that people affiliated with Obama were or are members of the Hitler Youth.

As for Bill Ayers, contrary to popular propaganda he's not best buds with Barack Obama. Or even cronies of any type. Their interaction was limited to:
- they lived in the same neighborhood and were at the same neighborhood functions, including neighborhood parties hosted by people living there
- Obama was president of the board of directors for the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, while Ayers worked in the operational division of the same
- they both served three years on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago, an anti-poverty association

Aaaand that was it. Definitely not a bromance. Which is why it's been dropped out of the news.

As for his Ayer's wife, Bernardine Dohrn, she DIDN'T work for Michelle Obama. Both Michelle Obama, Barack Obama, and Bernardine Dohrn worked for the law firm Sidley Austin at the same time in the 1980s. Sidley Austin has quite a few hundred employees; there's no documentation that they knew each other when working there.

Cass was one I was struggling to name as well. He's a scary one as well.

Cass Sunstein? OK...what's wrong with him?

[Panacea]

Interesting. On the doctors thing, I have to say that I've yet to hear of a country that was worse off for having a healthier citizenry

In spite of what the GOP likes to claim about the US having the world's "best health care system," it's just ain't so. We just have the most expensive. Outcomes should be far, far better for what we pay.

I don't debunk things because of their source, I debunk things because they're wrong.

Applause.

That's damn frustrating too. -.-

You ain't whistlin' Dixie. It makes me embarrassed to be an American sometimes. Just makes me want to scream, "Our country's not full of paranoid nut jobs! Really, it's not!"

*sigh*

[Andara Bledin]

It makes me embarrassed to be an American sometimes. Just makes me want to scream, "Our country's not full of paranoid nut jobs! Really, it's not!"

What's worse is how much evidence we have that they're willfully ignorant paranoid nutjobs.

I just don't get why people who display signs of being otherwise intelligent and who have access to the internet still can't manage to do any sort of research into the people they endorse and argue for.

^-.-^

[Gravekeeper]

What's worse is how much evidence we have that they're willfully ignorant paranoid nutjobs.

What's worse is being out here with the rest of the world as we watch in horror while you treat some of them as viable political candidates. >.>

But again, damn foreigners, etc.

The debt ceiling fiasco was a prime example. That could have been catastrophic to the global economy. But American politicans dicked around like children, while the rest of the world watched in horror. You know there were more than a few angry phone calls to the White House from overseas during it. But nobody cares because it seems like the opinion of non-Americans can't penetrate the forcefield of American Exceptionalism(tm).