The ..2012.... Political thread
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Why didn't Bush take Saddam out like Obama took out both Libya leader and Bin Ladin..Bush and his cronies just wanted profits off the war and to drive up oil prices. 1972 when Saddam kicked out the foreign oil company is when america started stirring up trouble in Iraq. Don't forget Bush Sr caused the death of 10,000 Kurds.
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appletart2:
Why didn't Bush take Saddam out like Obama took out both Libya leader and Bin Ladin..Bush and his cronies just wanted profits off the war and to drive up oil prices. 1972 when Saddam kicked out the foreign oil company is when america started stirring up trouble in Iraq. Don't forget Bush Sr caused the death of 10,000 Kurds.
Not sure what you mean - Obama (if you think he was really involved) 'handled' Gadaffi the way he (disingenuously) accused Bush of doing with Saddam...To me, they both deserved brutal endings to their lives - but if anything (and to a fault), Bush actually acted half humane about it and gave the man his day in court while Obama's team acted like a lynch mob....regarding Osama, that's Bush's kill even though he was gone from office already...it was his team and his stragedy, which was implemented prior to Bush's departure and was - ironically - heavily criticized by Obama (Obama should send Bush a card and flowers if he's so lucky to be reelected as president)
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Iowa Hawk:
service_gamer:
Okay, so we have U.N. weapons inspector disagreeing with the reasons for war and the Bush administration admitting that the intelligence that led to the war was flawed. If you want to argue that 'Gee, we probably shouldn't have gone in, but maybe it wasn't so bad that we got Saddam out' I can at least respect your argument. But when by any objective measure the facts state that the Bush administration acted defiantly in invading Iraq and based its actions on, at best, flawed intelligence and, at worst, fabricated intelligence, defending the war on the merits of some compliance issues is absurd. Arguing that the Bush administration meant the most broad-reaching definition of WMDs is ridiculous; they painted Iraq as a regime on the cusp of possessing nuclear warheads. You can confirm this by a simple Google News search covering the buildup to the war and the early days of fighting, and you can confirm that the administration not only used nuclear scare tactics, but also took advantage of the 9/11 attacks to lead us into Iraq. Why else would President Bush hold a press conference to admit that Iraq didn't possess WMDs and also had nothing to do with 9/11? If the motives for going to war were as pure as you say they were, why would he bring up and concede such points?
It?s interesting that your wrath is so?one directional. All George Bush did was pick up where his predecessors left off, yet you seem to think he is the one who contrived some make-believe threat from Hussein. Why no indignation directed at the other saber rattlers? ?If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq?s weapons of mass destruction program.? President Clinton, 2/17/98 ?He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983.? Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Advisor, 2/18/98 ?Hussein has chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies.? Madeline Albright, Secretary of State for President Clinton, 11/10/99 ?We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country. Iraq?s search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power.? Al Gore, 9/23/02 ?We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.? Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), 9/27/02 ?He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do.? Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), 10/10/02 ?In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons.? Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), 10/10/02 ?I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security.? Sen. John Kerry (D, MA), 10/9/02 And on and on and on. There is so much more where that came from, but I?ll spare you the cut-and-paste. You think all these people were credible but not George Bush? He had the support of not only the UN, but of the United States Congress, including prominent Democrats. Do you think Bush had his own private source of intelligence that contradicted what everyone else knew? Leaders world-wide said the same thing about Hussein and his weapons, but only George Bush, alone, knew that there were no such weapons, right? Is that your point? Your comment about Bush saying at a press conference that Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11 sounds more like an answer to a question posed to him from a reporter, since he had never claimed that invading Iraq was motivated by 9/11 in the first place. Why "walk back" something you had never said?
...nuclear weapons, or as many conservatives pronounce it, 'nucular'...
Come on now, you're calling Jimmy Carter conservative??
It's interesting that your response is so...afraid to tackle the issues that I brought up head-on. First, I'm (correctly) placing the blame at the feet of the Bush administration, not simply George W. Bush. And picking up where his predecessors left off? No, predecessor; his father. Your quotes from Clinton and officials from his administration are a nice distraction, but since the Clinton administration never invaded the country under false pretenses, they are irrelevant. The quotes you provided from various democrats circa-2002 are also irrelevant, because of the whole, y'know, being (at best) given the wrong info or (at worst) fed misinformation. This also undermines your point that he had support of prominent democrats, because again they supported the war on the basis of information that turned out not to be true (of course, in your defense, this fact is lost on an embarrassing number of Americans; see: John Kerry "the flip-flopper" from 2004). Also, your assertion that the U.N. supported the war is totally false. And making a vague note of worldwide leaders touting similar WMD intelligence conveniently neglects the horde of countries that vehemently protested the war. Finally, you claim that George Bush never linked Iraq to 9/11. While technically this is true, it's pretty naive to actually believe that the administration wasn't trying to create this link. To believe this, one has to be completely ignorant of such concepts as framing a message via the media. One also has to believe it to be a mere coincidence that President Bush's public addresses on the matter in the lead-up to and the immediate aftermath of the invasion would repeatedly include references to Hussein and 9/11, often in the same sentence. One also has to believe it to be a coincidence that the rise of polling data showing nearly half of Americans erroneously believing that Hussein was personally involved in 9/11 coincided with U.S. involvement in Iraq. True, President Bush didn't have to "walk back" something he never said, but read between the lines; the question was asked and answered chiefly because of the administrations implications of Hussein's involvement in 9/11. Oh, and touche on Jimmy Carter
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mustangsally10:
The Iraq war has left us with a much bigger problem. Saddam Hussein, was Iran's greatest enemy, because of that Tehran's influence in Iraq is much stronger today than is America's. Iran does not control Iraq but Tehran no longer has anything to fear from its western neighbor now that a Shia-dominated government sits in Baghdad, made up of parties whose leaders spent long years of exile in Iran under Saddam . The Iraq war was a debacle we will be paying for for decades.
I agree with a lot of what Sally says (did hell freeze over this week??). There certainly was a neutralizing effect when Saddam Hussein was in power, helping to keep Iran subdued. Debacle? I think that remains to be seen, and it may be very hard to quantify the effect of the war down the road, considering the way things seem to be coming undone far and wide in the Middle East since the beginning of this year.
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Is this an archive site from 2003? Are Americans arguing about WMDs of a dead dictator? If I were in your place I would be most concerned about jobs today.
rich n:
Face it, President Obama is a failure - epic style...anyone (even another Dem, if push came to shove) would be better than this failure. But I don't see that happening since going back to the beginning of the electoral vote, there has never been a new president from the same party voted in to replace a one term president (only in the cases of impeachments or assasinations has that occurred)
What about Pierce? His party denied him the nomination after only one term. Grant served two terms, but he wanted a third and his party said no. Even though Obama never single-handedly saved the world as some of his supporters seem to have expected, can it really be true that anyone would be a better replacement? Republicans: Would you vote for Michael Moore over Obama? Democrats: Would you vote for Sarah Palin over Bush?
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Did anybody besides me see those clowns Scarborough, Barnicle and Ford slandering the Oakland police the other day? I guess that's what we should expect from msnbc And then mayor Quan, instead of sticking up for the police for doing their job, goes on tv and folds like a marzipan dildo. Disgraceful.
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EADG:
Did anybody besides me see those clowns Scarborough, Barnicle and Ford slandering the Oakland police the other day? I guess that's what we should expect from msnbc And then mayor Quan, instead of sticking up for the police for doing their job, goes on tv and folds like a marzipan dildo. Disgraceful.
If the shitty shoe fits...
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al Sabah:
Even though Obama never single-handedly saved the world as some of his supporters seem to have expected, can it really be true that anyone would be a better replacement?
Obama is doing perfectly fine. ...and dealing with 20 years of Republicans...and 12 years of Democrats...out of the most recent 5 Presidents.
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A Rocky Mountain "NO!!!" to Tax Hikes 11/1/2011 If 2008 was an election for change, tonight was an election for no change ? with Colorado voters rejecting tax hikes, ballot initiatives and refusing to overhaul school boards. Voters resoundingly shot down the only statewide ballot measure, which would have raised taxes for nearly $3 billion in school funding. http://www.denverpost.com/politics/ci_19245045
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Occupy Seattle surrounded the Sheridan hotel where Jamie Dimon was staying. Police put up chain link fence and pepper spray crowd. And I though we only had police security for dignitaries. Who knew Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase has such connectioning :
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appletart2:
Occupy Seattle surrounded the Sheridan hotel where Jamie Dimon was staying. Police put up chain link fence and pepper spray crowd. And I though we only had police security for dignitaries. Who knew Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase has such connectioning :
Do these clowns even have a point? I mean 'we're against corporate greed' is a pretty broad and unfocused mission statement, doncha think? For some reason, the Janis Joplin lyric 'Having lots of freedom means nothing left to lose' somehow pops up in my mind when thinking of these 'protesters'...LOL
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I find it offensive to call them "clowns." They deserve respect, for one thing, they're not out looting, destroying and fighting, and terrorizing people in the streets as happened in England not long ago. For the most part they are demonstrating peacefully as is their right. Did you think the Tea Party rallies were all "clowns." And Tea Partiers are not heeding the wishes of the Founding Fathers on taxation, without taxing the early U.S.A. would not have amassed monies to exist, and have credit, and borrow, and to be a real nation that produces and provides goods and services. Throwing a fit over small tax increases is greatly harming the country. I saw a list of what the occupiers desire and will try to find it again and reproduce it here.
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SusyLuvsPaul:
I find it offensive to call them "clowns." They deserve respect, for one thing, they're not out looting, destroying and fighting, and terrorizing people in the streets as happened in England not long ago. For the most part they are demonstrating peacefully as is their right. Did you think the Tea Party rallies were all "clowns." And Tea Partiers are not heeding the wishes of the Founding Fathers on taxation, without taxing the early U.S.A. would not have amassed monies to exist, and have credit, and borrow, and to be a real nation that produces and provides goods and services. Throwing a fit over small tax increases is greatly harming the country. I saw a list of what the occupiers desire and will try to find it again and reproduce it here.
Clowns = a handful of well intended organizers and then a swell of followers without a clue. Although the nuance was much different, it's like how the first hour of rioting after the Rodney King verdict probably had some degree of well-meaningness, it was just a free for all after that
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PS - I've seen a list as well and in reality, it is just various opinions taken from a number of those who are 'protesting'...not an organized list from a definitive leader
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Rich, to call these people clowns is pretty mild. Most clowns are good-natured and funny. Considering the mess and ongoing public nuisance these misfits are perpetrating, not to mention the nefarious groups supporting them, I don't think "vermin" would be inappropriate.
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people who are used to being fed what to think are very threatened by those who have the clarity to see and understand what and why the world is near collapse financially, environmentally, and morally. They can't function without being outer directed. The Occupy movement is self directed. It's brilliant, organic, spontaneous and has already changed the direction. The more people find out about it the more they support it. But, there will be those who will not understand and of course they are the ones who are responsible for creating the environment which has made this movement necessary whether by their greed and sense of entitlement or by their vulnerability to be controlled and used by those who would use their productivity and actions for their own gain. Don't expect it to be run like a corporation(that's the point)...it's a peoples movement and it's not going away.
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I?m sure by now you?ve heard somewhere on the mainstream media that the Occupy Wall St. protestors are a bunch aimless college kids running around not really sure of what it is they are protesting or what it is they want. Well they have released a mission statement and it appears to me that they know exactly what they want and exactly what they are protesting. Check it out below: As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies. As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known. They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage. They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses. They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one?s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation. They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization. They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless nonhuman animals, and actively hide these practices. They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions. They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right. They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers? healthcare and pay. They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility. They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance. They have sold our privacy as a commodity. They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit. They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce. They have donated large sums of money to politicians supposed to be regulating them. They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil. They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people?s lives in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantive profit. They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit. They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media. They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt. They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas. They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. * To the people of the world, We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power. Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone. To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal. Join us and make your voices heard!
Demand one: Restoration of the living wage. This demand can only be met by ending ?Freetrade? by re-imposing trade tariffs on all imported goods entering the American market to level the playing field for domestic family farming and domestic manufacturing as most nations that are dumping cheap products onto the American market have radical wage and environmental regulation advantages. Another policy that must be instituted is raise the minimum wage to twenty dollars an hr. Demand two: Institute a universal single payer healthcare system. To do this all private insurers must be banned from the healthcare market as their only effect on the health of patients is to take money away from doctors, nurses and hospitals preventing them from doing their jobs and hand that money to wall st. investors. Demand three: Guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment. More tyranny at gunpoint, the sort of persuasion preferred by socialists. It is obvious the OWS socialists didn?t think this one through. They are obviously misinformed on how fractional reserve banking and the fiat money system work and how it perniciously destroys wealth. Wages are now largely and increasingly insufficient because of inflation that is epidemic (regardless of what the government and corporate media tell you) due to the fact the monetary base is ?elastic,? in other words manipulated and inflated by the Federal Reserve and the money masters. If you?d like to get an idea of how much the banksters have debased the dollar and jacked up inflation since 1913 (when the Federal Reserve was established), Demand three: Guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment. Demand four: Free college education. Demand five: Begin a fast track process to bring the fossil fuel economy to an end while at the same bringing the alternative energy economy up to energy demand. Demand six: One trillion dollars in infrastructure (Water, Sewer, Rail, Roads and Bridges and Electrical Grid) spending now. Demand seven: One trillion dollars in ecological restoration planting forests, reestablishing wetlands and the natural flow of river systems and decommissioning of all of America?s nuclear power plants. Demand eight: Racial and gender equal rights amendment. Demand nine: Open borders migration. anyone can travel anywhere to work and live. Demand ten: Bring American elections up to international standards of a paper ballot precinct counted and recounted in front of an independent and party observers system. Demand eleven: Immediate across the board debt forgiveness for all. Debt forgiveness of sovereign debt, commercial loans, home mortgages, home equity loans, credit card debt, student loans and personal loans now! All debt must be stricken from the ?Books.? World Bank Loans to all Nations, Bank to Bank Debt and all Bonds and Margin Call Debt in the stock market including all Derivatives or Credit Default Swaps, all 65 trillion dollars of them must also be stricken from the ?Books.? And I don?t mean debt that is in default, I mean all debt on the entire planet period. Demand twelve: Outlaw all credit reporting agencies. Demand thirteen: Allow all workers to sign a ballot at any time during a union organizing campaign or at any time that represents their yeah or nay to having a union represent them in collective bargaining or to form a union.
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rich n:
appletart2:
Occupy Seattle surrounded the Sheridan hotel where Jamie Dimon was staying. Police put up chain link fence and pepper spray crowd. And I though we only had police security for dignitaries. Who knew Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase has such connectioning :
Do these clowns even have a point? I mean 'we're against corporate greed'L
JP Morgan is hiking rates when there showing record profits up 48% but not lending money. Greed. They were behind all these bad loans that brought down the world economy What does Jamie Dimond earn... it too hard for a simpleton like me to figure out but I'll try!! Net worth 200 million with stock option last year and payouts in the 20 million all while this banks is hosing the public for huge over draft fees and while he holding a political job and gets face time with our president and than passing bail outs for his crooked friends. over the last few years he been pulling down what looks like about 36 million on top of his salary. I know because he deserves it.. He important! Bank of America just moved 55 trillion of bad debt (congress is fighting over 1 trillion cuts) to a Merrill Lynch account which than will make this bad debt, FDIC insured. Tax payer debt. Tony Blair Inc now works for JP Morgan and was negotiating for JPM with Quadafi . Former leader of England working for the very banks they approved bailouts for. Since you had to ask what is there point. Here these kids point..... Guillotine time Mutha Fucaz!!! http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2011/02/18/jamie-dimon-bonus-king/
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Occupy Wall St (& elsewhere) "... Rampant drug use, rapes, theft, smashed windows, public urination, defecation and sex, and physical clashes with police have made these demonstrations into hotbeds of chaos---which is what the organizers would like to export to the rest of country." Monica Crowley, Nov. 3, 2011 ---------------------- "Somehow I expected them all to own their own little shops. I expected them to all be nice and clean and friendly and happy ... (instead I found them to be) hideous, spotty little teenagers" who "were all terribly dirty and scruffy." George Harrison
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Andy_Shofar:
Occupy Wall St (& elsewhere) "... Rampant drug use, rapes, theft, smashed windows, public urination, defecation and sex, and physical clashes with police have made these demonstrations into hotbeds of chaos---which is what the organizers would like to export to the rest of country." Monica Crowley, Nov. 3, 2011 ---------------------- "Somehow I expected them all to own their own little shops. I expected them to all be nice and clean and friendly and happy ... (instead I found them to be) hideous, spotty little teenagers" who "were all terribly dirty and scruffy." George Harrison
sounds like a Rolling Stones concert to me. Monica crowley the voice of conservative talk and married to Alan Colmbs the "liberal media voice for Fox news" now we know the rest of the story.