Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic Sarah Palin for VP!

I should expand further on that minor bubble in commodities I mentioned in the previous post. This is one bubble that actually hurts us and where popping the bubble is beneficial.

That bubble is an oil bubble.

I actually agree with Democrats that much of the rise in the price of oil was due to speculation and not at all to supply and demand. Most want to blame the weak US dollar, but that can't possibly explain how gas prices also doubled in Europe. Why is it with a strong Euro that gas prices can rise so high? It isn't supply with the Saudis unable to sell what they pump and being forced to store the excessive oil.

When the California pension system starts to invest in oil and commodities funds, we know something's wrong and that speculation has a hand in it.

The rising price of oil ended up raising our cost of gas to $4/gallon or higher. That also raised inflation as transportation costs for our goods and services went up.

As with all things not related to supply and demand, bubbles must burst. After rising to nearly $148/barrel in light, sweet crude, the bottom dropped out. Even with OPEC announcing a production cut, oil is continuing to drop and has fallen to $103/barrel and is likely to fall further as it crosses under the 200-day moving average.

When this bubble is completely burst, my guess is that oil will settle somewhere in the $50-60/barrel range. That will go a long way to resurrecting our moribund economy and the world economy as well, which is entering a possible world-wide recession.

Uppity is a racial slur?



....

Seriously?

Okay, I admit, I've never lived in the South (unless you count Texas, but Texans generally don't :p ), but...seriously?

I always associated the word with snobby and pretentious. Usually without basis, hence, "upping" oneself to a status that isn't deserved. But I'm an equal opportunity snob-hater - I dislike snobs of all colors. :p

Bethy

I agree with you that politicians, for the most part, don't have the courage to tell us what we have to do to really solve the problem. Those who try usually lose elections. That's a shame but Congress really delivers what the people want. The people want everything and they want it for free. When people are free to vote on candidates who promise to take money from one group of people and give it to them, they are damaging the economy.

So, unfortunately, we get what we vote for.

I also agree with you that Congress is more important than people think. After all, they are in control of the purse strings and tax policy. It is there where corruption is rampant. Just why do we need fifty programs that all do the same thing? Why is it government agencies run commercials trying to get people to sign up for government services so they don't lose that money for next year because Congress will take it away? Why do we need to fund experiments to learn how fast ketchup runs under certain circumstances? We could probably cut the budget in half and not miss a beat and hardly anyone would notice.

Worst of the worst is the current services baseline, which is the method that Congress uses to create budgets. Most of us create our budget by figuring out what we need and budgeting money for what we need. Some years we'll need X and other years we won't but will need Y. That's called zero-based budgeting where you always start from zero and figure out what you need.

Congress doesn't work that way. They use the current services baseline, which is essentially taking what they spent last year in its entirety and adding the cost of inflation and adjusting for population growth as their starting baseline.

Once they figure that number out, then the changes happen and where Congress lies to us. If a program is slated to grow 10% because of current services baseline but Congress allocates only 8% growth to it, in Washington-speak, that's a budget cut.

But wait! The budget went up 8%, I hear you say. That's what it would be for everybody else but not Congress. That's a 2% budget cut. So when all these politicians are bragging about how much spending was cut, we now know what they're actually talking about. The money spent continues to rise at an alarming rate, all the while politicians are telling us how frugal they're being with all the budget cuts they are making. THEY ARE LYING.

The only thing that ever really gets cut is defense. Whenever Democrats come into office they gut the Defense Department with real, actual spending reductions. When Republicans get back into office, they find a pathetic, weak military and beef up defense spending. Defense spending goes in cycles, up and down. Spending for everything else just goes up and up and up.

Until we clear out everybody in Congress, that will continue.

Requisite Iraq War post:

As one might expect, things look slightly different from my camp.

To which, more informed voices than I reply:

I personally believe that war shouldn't have happened. Maybe I'd feel less centered on that opinion if it hadn't been such a messy venture and we hadn\'t been lied to so shamelessly (citing the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity). Maybe there's less blood in Iraq, but hearing about deception and the record number of suicides again has me thinking about the cost of this war.

The problem, I believe is ideological. For most on the left, it's not a black-white issue, but rather an uneasy gray area. Did the Surge work? Yes, but it's much more complicated than the right tries to sell. The right oversimplifies what went into the decreased violence in Iraq. Bill O'Reilly (who, I, as not a fan, was surprised to find, called Obama's choice on the war perspicacious) barely let him finish in his jump to cement Obama in that rigid point of view.

CNN has a an interview (dated Sept 10) with Bagdad correspondent Michael Ware which looks at "winning" and raises questions on it:

For those of us familiar with puppet governments and the consequences of legitimazing people who should not have power, this might give some pause.

Obviously I'm ecstatic about the decrease in violence, but I don't believe that this war has made us safer. I question the judgement that got us into this war in the first place, a war that McCain supported, the same way Roger questions Obama's judgement in opposing the war and surge. Obama has said:

I would agree with this, I have read quite a bit from both sides and have yet to be convinced that this war was necessary and worth its cost. My unease grows when I consider what's happening in Afganistan and our current state of things, that problem seems to need our attention soon (the current administration seems to agree, somewhat). Not to mention that I'm sure there's many that would tell you that they don't care if you want to call it "defeat," they want those loved ones back.

Obviously, I disagree. I believe Obama's shown himself to be a thoughtful person capable of weighing the pros and cons of a situation instead of making rash, impulsive decisions. In a world full of complexities, I want a person like that leading, not someone with a hand on the red button. I also really appreciate Obama's pragmatism--what the right spins as flip-flopping, I see as someone who realizes that circumstances change and is willing to adapt to make the most of a situation.

I'm also not a fan of politics of fear. I refuse to let others dictate how I live and take away my liberties. I also refuse to let others strip away my values and lower me to their level. You don't fight criminality with more criminality and the instances that have come to light of this have disturbed me. Torture is never funny. War is never trivial.

My own views aside, both candidates have similar plans for Iraq as this article points out:
Counter-terrorism in the campaign

The National Journal evaluates the situation in a level way:

All of this is worth considering, as it ultimately comes down on whose judgement this country trusts.

PS

I don't mind at all. Then again, I make way less than 150,000 a year and to

(votes counted among those that made him "liberal") sounds pretty good to me. If anyone is interested in more from the other side progressive Media Matters links to methodology critiques .

PPS I'm leaving the he said/she said discussion on all fronts unless anything hits my trigger button. There's too much gray to say anything more than what has been said, given the facts. How one sees it after knowing the circumstances ends up being up to the individual. Then "truth" by consensus, I guess. Double-edged sword.

alcyone

I did mention the two-pronged approach which Michael Ware deems to have started two years ago. Any earlier than that and there was no Awakening Movement to speak of, so getting the Sunnis to be our allies in the battle against al Qaeda wasn't possible until recently. It wasn't until too many civilians were killed deliberately by al Qaeda before the Sunnis began to turn against them. The strategy put in place by the president and General Petraeus took advantage of that movement and used that to kill al Qaeda.

That was part of the Surge movement, not a separate item. Michael Ware seems to be incorrect in that respect as the new alliances were part of the new strategy. Ware seems to be saying that the 30,000 soldiers weren't necessary. He's wrong there, too. In previous battles, US soldiers would clear a hostile area but wouldn't have sufficient troops to stay in the region as a garrison. So once they left, the enemy would simply return. The Iraqi people knew this and would refuse to help the Americans out of fear of al Qaeda. They knew once the US left, al Qaeda would return and kill anyone who helped the Americans. The Iraqi people weren't confident about helping until they were certain the US troops would remain after clearing the town.

The Ambar province was a hotbed that the US had to clear out repeatedly. How many times did we have to fight in Fallujah or Ramadi before we kept the towns clear once and for all? Once they received the additional soldiers, there were then enough troops to maintain garrisons once the al Qaeda terrorists had been killed or captured. This prevented their return and opened up the possibility of additional help from the populace.

So Ware's comments are ignorant of that aspect of the operation and of the limitations in intelligence due to the fact that people were afraid they would be killed once the Americans left. Once we started getting help from the population, we started killing al Qaeda commanders in bushels.

Besides, it's CNN. When have they ever been right? Just look at all the lies about Palin. CNN is one of the guiltiest in passing out those vicious false rumors about Palin. They might as well have put Markos Molitsas, creator of the Daily Kos, in Soledad O'Brien's chair.

By the way, that report you linked to is typical of the left. Lies have been redefined. There were no lies on the part of the Administration and no one can possibly prove there were. Every intelligence service in the world, including those fickle allies who wouldn't help us, believed there were large stockpiles of WMD in Iraq. If that had proven to be true and Saddam had used them, Democrats would have been calling for Bush's head for not stopping him before he could use them. So this Center for Public Inaccuracies, oops, I mean Integrity calls bad intelligence a lie.

Sorry, that doesn't wash. Bush never lied. You can believe he did, but you'd have to revise what that word means. Besides, the Iraqi Survey Group did locate 500 chemical warheads and the Poles bought another 17 rockets loaded with active, deadly cyclosarin that they had discovered were about to be sold to al Qaeda in central Iraq. So Bush wasn't even wrong in the literal sense. It wasn't enough to satisfy the press, but he wasn't wrong. Notice that no administration official has ever said there were no WMD found. They have always been careful to say no STOCKPILES were ever found.

Name even one foreign intelligence service that thought Saddam didn't have any. The incompetent Hans Blix doesn't count as an intelligence service. The German ambassador even ridiculed our evidence as woefully inadequate compared to what they had, which definitively proved Iraq had WMD. You won't be able to name any, btw. The French, Germans, Russian, and even the Israelis with the best intelligence service in the world believed large stockpiles of WMD existed. Who would know better than the Israelis and the Russians?

You also completely ignore the second half of the report by the ISG. In the second half of the report (which the press completely ignored because it didn't fall into the "Bush Lied, People Died" paradigm) clearly stated that Saddam was actively using the Oil-For-Food program to buy off officials in the UN and in France and Russia in order to get them to lift sanctions. Much of the rest of the money was diverted into priming his WMD programs, including chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. As soon as France and Russia had gotten the UN sanctions lifted, Saddam intended to resume full production. Yes, the press ignored all of that because it wasn't convenient for them.

Saddam wasn't a danger... yet. The Left even cast what President Bush said about Saddam as a lie, saying he was claiming Saddam was an imminent threat. He clearly stated before the invasion, "We cannot wait for Saddam to be an imminent threat because by that time it will be too late." So the left is proven to be liars while Bush's statements must be redefined or twisted into lies. So the mantra of "Bush lied, people died" was wrong. The Left lied, our soldiers died as their constant barrage of criticism and demands for a pullout from day one only encouraged the enemy to fight harder. The enemy even timed their car bombs for the US news cycle, making sure the bombs were in hearing distance from the hotels the news reporters were staying in. Like dupes, the enemy used American reporters to destroy support for the war effort.

Most Americans want to be safe. That's why we didn't particularly appreciate that many of our prominent allies didn't back us up. The chief antagonists were France and Germany. It wasn't until Angela Merkel was elected in Germany that relations began to warm up somewhat. Still, we were willing to go it alone if it was in our national interest to do so. Since all world coalitions are basically made up of the United States and everybody else, we didn't actually need anyone else's help. We just needed support, not active resistance. Just as an example, look at the Balkans. The mighty Europeans couldn't do a thing and Yugoslavia was in their back yard. It took the US military to depose Milosevic and save the ethnic Albanians.

BTW, that's the only time the modern Left ever sanctions the use of the military: when we have no interests at all in the region. When national security is at stake, then no, we can't use the military.

The resentment in this country when we got no support from others was palpable. Remember the Freedom Fries? Europe, especially, has always been cowardly in modern history, refusing to move until it was far too late. Just look at World War II as an example. If Europe had moved decisively and much earlier than they did, it's quite possible far fewer than 51 million people would have died. Americans don't wait until it's too late. We didn't want to wait for a massive attack costing millions of lives before we acted.

It seems that people always talk about how America has damaged its image in the world. Well, those countries severely damaged their image in our eyes, but those in the anti-American press never seemed to understand that part of it.

When you say that most people just wanted their loved ones home. That will always be true, but most, if not all, of the actual military personnel didn't want to go home without victory. They wanted to complete the mission they were given and then come back. I will guarantee that most of the people who wanted our soldiers home before a victory was attained didn't have anyone in the theater to begin with. It's no surprise that the military votes Republican overwhelmingly. They don't trust liberal leaders. That's why Al Gore tried to disallow their votes.

A defeat may not matter to you, but it would have been catastrophic in consequences. If you thought 9/11 was bad, al Qaeda would have been free to do it again, not just against us but against all of our allies. This is why the Left can never be trusted in a war. They don't think it's a big deal if we lose. It's much better to get the world to like us than to stay alive.

There are always consequences for losing. Just look at our abrupt pullout from Vietnam. While many on the Left say that nothing bad happened afterwards, just ask the millions of displaced Vietnamese who tried to find a new home, many of them dying in small boats trying to reach safety. And ask the residents of Cambodia when three million of them were exterminated by Pol Pot as a direct consequence of the US leaving the region.

I think I love you, Roger. Think your wife would mind if I proposed? O:-)

Bethy

"Seems." That doesn't change that Ware is someone who would have knowledge on the ground. I try to keep an open mind even if the pov from the right would need a stronger basis to convince me. So far the point I got was that soldiers on their own by large numbers does not equal winning. Other factors are more important. Also that there's a significant downside.

Speaking as someone not on the ground in Iraq, I'm more likely to trust his take on the situation than yours. But of course I'll keep reading and formulating my take on things. Nothing is dogma and who knows what will happen tomorrow.

I never claimed no bias from my side, in fact I take pains to acknowledge it. Clearly my relevant facts are different from the ones you deem relevant. That's where ideology comes in. Plus, how CNN shapes bias here, is entirely not like the Palin smears--you can disagree all you want, but Ware isn't some bum who strolled in.

That said, I always check my information and his echoes with a lot of other reports I've read some partisan, some not. But I wouldn't expect you to agree with me or my sources.

So? I'm putting forth a left pov, plus the fact that the report is non-partisan which makes it valid. My perception has a basis, maybe not one you like, but one that is defensible.

It is my understanding that the findings are not as clear cut as the right represents them to be.

Again, its clear cut to people of your ideology, but not enough to get me and others on your boat. Otherwise I'd hear a wide diversity of people talking about it, not just the right.

Funny how things even out, even with the left bias of the media is went like lamb to the slaughter on this war.

Bias turns out to be a complicated thing as well,

alcyone (who'll be back with better formulated thoughts later)

By bringing up Michael Ware, you were attempting to trivialize John McCain's correctness on the Surge while trying to make it seem that Obama's incompetence in failing to vote for and hesitation to acknowledge the Surge was irrelevant. Ware is basically saying the Surge did nothing and wasn't responsible for our victory in Iraq and therefore Obama wasn't a total fool, while McCain's courage was for naught.

Rewriting history on the part of CNN doesn't make Obama look any more presidential nor McCain any less courageous when in fact, the Surge had both components. General Casey had failed but would not acknowledge the failure of his strategy, so President Bush replaced him with a soldier who had a proven track record. General David Petraeus implemented the new strategy in both its parts, both of which were essential to the mission. Part of the mission of the additional troops was to protect the fledgling Awakening movement from al Qaeda retribution, so Ware was naive to believe that the Surge was merely sticking in a few more soldiers and nothing more.

Even Obama was finally forced to admit the Surge worked, even if Michael Ware said that it didn't matter. So who do you believe? Barack Obama or Michael Ware? If you believe Obama, then McCain is one of the ones responsible for winning the war. If you believe Ware, then Obama was still wrong in any case since he would have incorrectly identified the Surge as having worked.

It's funny that by believing Ware, you are giving full credit to President Bush for winning rather than sharing the credit between the president and John McCain. Glad to have you in conservative circles now that you're a President Bush supporter.

Regardless of whether you believe that report was impartial or not, do you agree that intelligence failures do not equal lying? The report clearly states that incorrect intelligence meant that there were hundreds of lies told. Since when did telling something you believe to be true but turned out to be incorrect mean that you lied? My dictionary doesn't say that. To me, any organization that redefines the word, lie, is not as impartial as you believe. A true impartial report would have stated that intelligence failures fooled Bush Administration officials into making incorrect statements. Rather this report tries to turn intelligence failures into deliberate falsehoods, i.e. lies.

The bias is clear as the report ends with Democratic Party talking points, the question: "What did they know and when did they know it?" An impartial report would not have put in incendiary rhetoric like that.

This isn't quite true. People on the left suffer from what is known as Bush Derangement Syndrome, which is such a hatred of Bush that they won't even consider anything that might be positive. That's why they don't talk about it because anything that supports Bush's viewpoint can't possibly be correct.

On the flipside, I will acknowledge the right suffered from Clinton Derangement Syndrome.

Back to the whole lipstick thing, I think this article sums it up for me. It's a pretty good article and a pretty fair one as well.


The First and Last Word on Lipstick

OMG! We won?!?

I should know better than this. I really should. I've been avoiding this thread because I knew it would be upsetting. And I'm tired, in more ways than one.

But I've heard several people (on both sides) complaining about all the politics on the boards and the ridiculous assertions made by the opposing side (whichever that is) and how some of them have taken to avoiding the boards entirely because of it. So I just had to look in and see what it was all about. (I also sent a letter to the mods list, but if anyone responded, I never saw it.) I felt guilty enough skipping over a major thread in this section, though I've learned to trust that things won't get out of hand (or that I or one of the admins will hear about it if it starts to).

So here I am. And there's a lot to see.

Lipstick? You're going to go off about lipstick? A phrase which both candidates have used before? Which Obama has consistently used to describe poor policy proposals? But suddenly we have a woman in the race who has used the word (and therefore "owns" it?!), so of course it has to be about her. And when some people in the crowd took it that way and he didn't immediately respond, then of course that means he agrees.

Does that mean I should go on about McCain's cheerful singing of "Bomb, bomb, bomb... bomb, bomb Iran"? Or his forgetting how many houses he owns? Or his wife's assertion that Palin has foreign policy experience because her state is physically closest to Russia? Or... I could go on.

It's ridiculous. Several grueling, tiring months, with cameras in your face 24/7 and a hungry news media ready to put anything under a huge microscope, just to fill airtime... some flubs are guaranteed of anyone human.

But McCain seems to have made a habit of it. His "Straight Talk Express" drove his campaign right off a cliff back in 2000. And while he's learned from that, he still can't seem to take questions without floundering. Not a very presidential quality.

And don't talk to me about left-wing smear campaigns. Not when the right invented swift boating and most of the tools of the trade.

But none of that should matter when it comes time to vote. We need to focus on the issues.

Iraq? We never should have been there in the first place. Bush wanted it. He ignored or buried the evidence he didn't like and went so far as to manufacture evidence he didn't have. The violence the surge (and, more, the change in tactics which many - including The New York Times - had been calling for since long before it was put into effect) has in some way helped to quell wasn't a problem before we invaded, creating chaos and resentment. A unilateral action that has made our enemies (not all of whom belong to or even have ties to Al Qaida) stronger, not weaker. Because it showed the doubters that we will impose our authority and beliefs on them, we will invade and take over and do whatever we want, secure in our own arrogance and might. That's what it looks like to them, and it hasn't helped our cause one bit. Al Qaida's presence in Iraq is stronger now than it was before we invaded. We created the vacuum that they helped fill, and built up the resentment that drove people to accept them.

And how have we "won"? Violence has settled down to only slightly more than it was before we invaded? Only a few more American soldiers are being killed than were before? If that's victory, then great. I'm truly glad we've come that far. Does that mean we can finally stop throwing billions of dollars into fixing what we broke (while the elected government pulls in yet more billions in oil revenue and fails to lift a finger) and actually bring the troops home? If that's what it means, then I'll gladly say we've won.

Taxes? Analysts have shown that 98% of us would have lower taxes under Obama than McCain. And yet Obama is much closer to having an actual balanced budget, purely from allowing Bush's tax cuts for the ultra-rich to expire, forcing them to finally pay their share. McCain? If he's given any thought to balancing the budget or even slowing the increase in our national debt (which Bush has raised by the trillion), I haven't heard a word of it.

And you can't just wave away the debt. It hurts our economy, hurts the dollar, and more... do you know who owns a large portion of that debt? China. A totalitarian communist country known for human rights violations (as well as being one of the biggest financial supporters of the genocide in Darfur). A growing economic and global power to whom we are becoming ever more dependent and indebted.

Isn't it funny how the good times come under Democratic leadership, while the deficit goes up under the leadership of the tax-cut-and-spend Republicans?

And you're going to tell me that Bush's tax cuts for himself and his cronies have helped? They've had nearly 8 years to do so, and the economy is in worse shape than it's been in decades. Despite the stimulus a war usually provides.

And you're going to criticize Obama for changing his policies? Right, because we've done so well with a leader who will stubbornly "stay the course" no matter what happens, no matter how the situation changes, no matter what effects his policies have once put into place, no matter what the experts say... Stay the course. No, that's the last thing we need.

As for Palin... She's the governor of our most sparsely populated and second-most remote state. Her experience with the Federal government can just about be summed up by her request to her constituents to pray for Congress to approve billions of dollars of pork for the one state which makes more money than it ever uses. And then she goes and falsely accuses Obama of asking for some ridiculous amount of pork? And this is the woman (and, let me say clearly, I have absolutely no bias for or against her gender) who, if anything happens to a certain 72-year-old with a history of skin cancer, would become president?

We need a leader who talks to experts. Experts with differing views. And not just talks to them, but listens to them. Considers what they have to say (even if he doesn't like it), and then makes his own (informed!) decision. Gives us a thought-out policy instead of vague hand-waving and pretty slogans.

We need a leader who will help us fix the system. Who will fight the influence of lobbyists, who allow the big guys to literally write the laws themselves. Who will fight to change campaign finance, allowing our elected officials to focus on actually working for the people instead of constantly looking for more funds wherever they can get them.

We need a leader who can rise above petty inconsequentials like stray remarks and mudslinging.

We need a leader with a positive, thought-out message. Not one who smiles and talks about his respect for the other side, while running a campaign almost entirely composed of negative ads.

We need a leader who can see that offshore drilling will do little to help us. That it'll be years before we see any returns, that those returns will likely be a drop in the bucket compared to our ever-increasing demand, that the world's oil supply will still be running out at an alarming rate, and that our dependence on oil is not only tying us to our enemies but hurting our environment and ultimately poisoning us.

We need a leader who understands the nuances of foreign policy, who sees our place in the world as one country among many - something more and more important as the trend of globalization grows on many fronts. Who can see gray areas and complexities instead of focusing on a propaganda-supported black-and-white crusade against a "transcendent evil" with a burning faith that blinds him to all else.

We need a leader who can see the problems we've had over the past 8 years and can put us on a better path, not one who has voted for those disastrous policies at least 90% of the time.

We need a leader who can stick to his principles. Not one who can denounce things like torture and fringe elements in one campaign and then turn around and embrace them to get an edge in the next.

We need a leader who can be our face to the world. Who can speak clearly and well. Who can inspire. Who can listen to and understand what other countries (allies, neutrals, and enemies) are saying, and respond to them appropriately.

We need a leader like Barack Obama. And it scares the heck out of me that the race is this close. I feared the choice Americans would make 4 years ago. Now, the country is worse off than we were, and half the people who voted to keep us on this track have come to disapprove of it. And yet, they're coming right back, ready to vote for it again. Maybe not the same exact thing, but frighteningly close.

Paul, three of us replied to your email - I know that at least mine was bounced back from your eddress.

The concensus of the admins was that there is an official route for members of this forum to mail the admins if they have a concern or complaint. The admins will then deal with it and - if they think it necessary - change policy or issue a ruling on the matter.

We will not, however, change policy or otherwise act on vague, third-party information that anonymous members whose names we do not know, whose motivations or agendas we do not know, who have not officially emailed us their concerns are complaining on forums outwith this one. It doesn't seem to us that that would be a fair basis on which to base policy.

If they do not complain to us, we have no basis to investigate or act.

I haven't read this thread. However, I would strongly reiterate the main policy of this forum. Debate all you want - so long as you do it with respect for the opposing viewpoint. If your method of debate is such that it involves mocking anyone who chooses to differ from your pov as idiots for not agreeing with you, perhaps you should consider walking away now and not posting at all.

If anyone has concerns that the rules on flaming or courtesy of this forum have been broken here - you can email the admins and we will certainly seriously investigate your concerns.

Otherwise, I'm issuing a general warning - keep it friendly, keep it respectful or we'll be forced to close the thread down.

It's entirely up to you. Play nice or not at all.

LabRat

Ditto what Labby said.

Also, Paul, would you mind splitting up your post, please, between the moderator aspect and your personal viewpoints on the issues? This discussion has stayed very civil for the most part, and I would hate people to mis-interpret your post as an official boards stance on both issues and etiquette (which the lead-in makes it feel like) rather than your personal reaction to the thread and the issues.

Thanks,

Bethy {taking off Mod hat}

Mod Post Warning


As one of the moderators of this forum - and Paul is the other, though he was obviously posting in a personal capacity - I just wanted to respond here to this comment of Paul's:

Paul's quite right that he did email the moderators. There were replies to the email - I replied myself - and I'm sorry that Paul didn't see them.

The moderators' position is this: we want these boards to be a friendly, welcoming place. We do have rules concerning polite and respectful behaviour, and (very, very rarely) have had to caution individual members to observe these. Board members, for the most part, are courteous and respectful even when they disagree.

We felt that this thread has been almost entirely conducted with courtesy even where people are disagreeing. I've particularly noticed examples of members with opposing views doing their best to see the other person's perspective and trying to explain why they disagree. It's a thread about politics. You're never going to get complete agreement. In some cases, people are going to be poles apart. But I haven't seen in this thread - unlike one or two others in the past - people being insulted for their opinions or being called stupid because they don't see things another person's way.

The moderators' position on this thread, as with any other controversial one, is this:

- If you feel that you're being insulted, or flamed, or that a post in a thread is disrespectful, then report it: either to an individual moderator (email address at the top of the forum), or to the moderation team by using the Report this! button. Please don't just complain on your blog or LiveJournal or to friends; while we understand venting, if you feel strongly that someone has crossed the line or broken a boards rule, we need to know about it. We can't take action about something we haven't been informed of.

- Following on from this, we cannot and will not take action on the basis of anonymous complaints and word-of-mouth. It's happened before that people have complained elsewhere, and then the mods are informed by someone that 'people' are unhappy, not coming to the boards, wanting something to be done about the person or subject-matter they're unhappy about. We can't take action if no-one directly affected tells us about it. 'People are unhappy' is hardly a reason to censor.

- Finally, if you know a particular topic or thread is likely to send your blood-pressure sky-rocketing, then please just don't read it. Now, we all understand that impossible-to-resist impulse that hits us when our buttons are ready to be pressed. Please believe me when I say I'm speaking from bitter experience that it really is better to stay away. I made the mistake of not staying away from those kind of threads too many times. It's just not worth it.

We want these boards to be a place you visit to relax, have fun, read fic and chat with friends. If they're not, then find something to do that is fun and relaxing, or stick to forums and threads which you do enjoy, 'kay? Some people can debate and disagree without seeing their stress-levels rising, and it looks as if there are a few here who are like that. Others find reading posts which are in stark disagreement with their own opinions, perspectives and beliefs to be incredibly stressful. Do yourself a favour and recognise which one you are

I leave you on a humorous note, with this from the brilliant XKCD :




This mod post has been brought to you by:


Wendy
Boards Administration Team

ETA: It took me quite a while to compose this last night and I never noticed that while I was writing two other mods posted. Now it's looking kind of like overkill. I won't delete this post, but I did just want to mention that I never realised Bethy and LabRat had also posted.

Yes, I was posting personally.

For the record, I don't think anyone is stupid or evil or anything for voting for the other side. Skewed by the propoganda, perhaps. There's so much of it around from all sides, and with so many channels and sites and everything, it's easy to get nothing but propoganda from one side. But I don't think that's all there is to it. I respect the rights of others to disagree, to have other views, and all that.

I do, however, feel very strongly about this election. About where policy in this country has been and where it needs to go. And I've seen a lot more from the right in this thread than the left.

As for the comment about the election scaring me... I was, in part, responding to this from Roger:

If anyone found my comment offensive, then consider how much more offensive that looks.

There have been a lot of things like that tossed around in this thread.

But... as strongly as I feel about this, as upsetting as I find some of what's been said... I should just go back to avoiding it. Even if it does mean letting this blow-up over lipstick and everything else go with one less voice to challenge it. Even if it does mean that much less support for what I believe in, and correspondingly that much more for what I believe would be disastrous.

I'm sorry I added more flames to the fire. It upsets me knowing the thread is here, filled with right-wing voices. It upsets me hearing about people who are avoiding the boards entirely because of things like this. But, clearly, it upsets me much more just seeing what some people are saying and claiming. And it truly upsets me to see this country going for four more years of what we've had for the last eight.

I disagree with the policies. I disagree with the slander. I disagree with the bickering over minutia. That doesn't mean anything about the people who hold those beliefs other than that I strongly disagree with them and their choices.

As for the mod's list emails... I'm sorry I missed them. I got the copy of the email I sent. I don't know why the others went astray.

Anyway... that's it from me.

Paul

Um. No. But I can see why someone from the right would read it that way. I read your defense of Bush in the same way--trivializing.

Let me state yet again, for the record, that my interest is in representing what it might look like from where I stand. What anyone else thinks it's not my concern.

Clearly, I have a different reading of what Ware pointed out. The two facts that matter to me are these:

1. The surge (defined as increased troops and involvement) is one aspect of a complicated situation.

2.There are downfalls.

Now these might not be important facts to you or we might disagree on terminology, but that would be another argument. Maybe the "Surge" officially refetred to that two-pronged approach, but regardless, it's understood from where I stand as an increase in resources-troops specifically. It was a risk. One that worked. Like the war, which IMO did not.

A similar structure becomes visible here: Judgement on the surge vs judgement of Iraq. Up to the individual where they come down on. There's reasonable positions for both.

Like I said, To me the central issue against the Surge was precisely the risks from an increase in troops. The frequent back and forth over what to call it suggests how important this was.


I would say a large majority was naive then. Except, of course, Ware is in Iraq. Might not matter to some. Matters to me in how I judge his information.

You think I'm willfully ignoring Obama's concession, I think you're willfully ignoring that Obama is saying essentially the same thing as Ware, albeit more diplomatically.

O'Reilly is just interrupting the crap out of him, maybe that's what you mean by "forced":

In my view, you're taking O'Reilly's position, trying to distill a complicated situation into the simple concept of violence down= win. There's no better example of trivializing than the above.

You will most assuredly disagree.

I reiterate, I'm not trying to convince anyone, just trying to avoid being misrepresented. You're presenting your point of view as if anything else has no sensible logic.

In the interest of representing my point as fairly as I can, here is one of the examples listed, which I found quite compelling:

Regardless of the discussion about WMD (which I suppose I might come back to later) this is a particularly interesting example to look at because I'd be hard-pressed to call it an "intelligence failure" especially when a CIA operative is citing a lack of information while Cheney is giving out information. I'd call it "making stuff up."

But let's go to the dictionary, lying is:

A long, incorrect statement given when there is a proven lack of information. Don't know about your dictionary, but if we're going to the above, it looks a lot like lying.

You will most assuredly disagree. *shrug*

And the conspiracy theories are out. We can go all day on that, I mean I have yet to see your sources for Iraq-- I could just as easily use your argument to invalidate them regardless of there being ample evidence of their credibility.

Just because something disagrees with your worldview that doesn't make it automatically wrong.

You might wish it were though.

You mean said what you wanted to hear? Is that what "impartiality" means now? You made your mind up from before and you want to sell it as a "fact." Surprise, surprise, I'm not buying. That's your point of view, you got your reasons, but they're not hard science. Otherwise this dicussion wouldn't be happening.

To repeat, I'm just stating how the Iraq issue looks from my side. Just to get it out there, what anyone else believes or doesn't believe is really not my concern.

But that doesn't mean I'll let anyone walk all over my point of view either.

alcyone

PS Also, Roger you cannot and do not speak for all military personnel.

Were the complaints merely about politics being discussed or about forum members being insulted? As far as I can tell, this has been a very civil discussion where no forum members have been insulted or put down.

Like Paul, I have very strong feelings about this election and to me, it's obvious who the better candidate is. These are important and dangerous times and a full vetting is always useful before such an important election.

There have been minor points discussed such as the lipstick issue. On that no one took a stand one way or the other as to whether it was an insult directed at Sarah Palin but was merely discussed as one of the topics of the day, so I'm not sure why Paul was upset about that.

Most of the more heated issues have been over foreign policy. In that respect, the candidates are diametrically apart on the issues as will happen when their philosophies are different.

Paul, what was so offensive about my statement that you quoted? He was campaigning for a pullout without securing the country. Not once did he ever say he was going to win first before pulling out. Is that not campaigning for defeat? Would the country not descend into chaos, at the mercy of al Qaeda? I didn't find any of your statements to be offensive. Why would this one be? If you did find it offensive, I'm sorry you took it that way but it's an absolutely fair statement to make.

There are several other points that do scream out for a correction.

Did you know John O'Neill, the chief spokesman of the Swift Boat Veterans was a registered Independent who supported John Edwards for president and had never before supported a Republican for president? Before 2004, O'Neill was a big supporter of Ross Perot. The members formed on their own, with the members encompassing both political parties. Blaming that on the right is simply wrong.

Look at the vitriol directed at President Bush over the last eight years. That was a true smear campaign that has destroyed the reputation of a good and honest man who did what he thought was right no matter the cost. I would think you'd want more of those types of politicians in government. I could easily say the same that the left invented smear tactics. And with a media to carry their water for them, it can be very effective. And before you dispute media bias, just about every poll you see will show that the people believe the media is overwhelmingly biased towards the left. And the fact that they vote 93-7 Democrat might have something to do with that.

As an example of a smear tactic, Hurricane Katrina was what finally broke Bush's popularity sending it spiraling downward. Did you know that almost no one in New Orleans blamed President Bush? ABC tried to drum up blame by interviewing as many refugees as they could find, asking them, "Do you blame President Bush for this disaster?" They were surprised that almost nobody blamed President Bush, but almost universally blamed Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco and Democratic Mayor Ray Nagin. Blanco was easily defeated and replaced with Bobby Jindal in the next election. Why was Bush not blamed locally? Because he had no power to act. People down there knew that the president had insisted on an evacuation many days before the storm hit. Nagin ignored him until it was too late. Bush asked for control of the situation and the ability to send in the Coast Guard and Marines three times to Governor Blanco. She said no each and every time. With Posse Comitatus as law, the president was powerless to act. The Louisiana National Guard sat outside the city for three days with tons of food and water before Blanco gave them permission to go in.

Now people blamed FEMA. What people don't know is that FEMA is a coordination agency. It has almost no staff, almost no equipment to do anything. It's job is to talk with local agencies to help coordinate action. Also the organization had just been relocated into the new Department of Homeland Security, a department opposed by the president but insisted upon by Democrats.

As for being a smear, Democrats and their allies in the media successfully teamed up to blame Bush 100% for everything that went wrong when in fact he had little to do with it. Once Blanco finally agreed to let the president act five days after the storm, things cleaned up almost immediately as the Coast Guard went into emergency search and rescue and the Marines delivered supplies to people who needed it. Democrats and the media effectively destroyed the remainder of his presidency on a smear and he never recovered, politically, from Hurricane Katrina. They even tried hard to make people believe that the president knew the levees would break. When video appeared showing that not to be the case, they were forced to back off.

The ultimate smear job was that "Bush lied" when multiple bipartisan commissions could find not a shred of evidence that anyone lied or was pressured to manufacture evidence. So Paul, your accusations are totally unjustified.

The Democrats are experts at hatchet jobs. They did the same to Mark Foley, Tom DeLay (three grand juries before the Democratic DA could find someone willing to indict when it's well known prosecutors can indict a ham sandwich?), Trent Lott, Newt Gingrich, Bob Livingston, and a number of other prominent Republicans. Before you say "Bill Clinton" when it comes to Foley, Gingrich and Livingston, all of them resigned and none had the support of the Republican Party nor did anyone even try to defend them. Lott was forced to resign his Majority Leader post when he was accused of being a racist only because he toasted Strom Thurmond at a party for Thurmond.

They are trying to do the same with Sarah Palin as Obama sent in 30 lawyers and investigators to Alaska to dig up any dirt they could find on her.

Mark Foley, in particular, was portrayed as a predator when in fact he only propositioned people who never worked for him. Plus with the age of consent at 16 in Washington D.C., he broke no laws. How many people knew that? Yet, Foley was the notorious October surprise which Democrats spring like clockwork before every election. Republicans have never sprung an October surprise.

Anybody remember Bush's DUI report three days before the 2000 election that probably tipped Florida into a virtual tie when Bush was leading by 3% just the day before? Or Dan Rather's disgusting attempt to destroy Bush with forged documents three weeks before the 2004 election? Rather's problem was that he jumped the gun, giving people time to debunk his smear job, or Kerry would be president. Now tell me that Democrats are innocent victims.

I await the next Democratic October Surprise. It should come within the next five or six weeks.

Two words: Jimmy Carter.

Didn't Democrats say the same thing five years ago? Ten years ago? Fifteen years ago? Twenty? They say exactly the same thing every time it's proposed. If Democrats had listened five, ten, fifteen years ago, those offshore oil platforms would be producing today. The ANWR battle has been fought for decades, a source the size of LAX that could produce billions of barrels of oil.

How many years will alternative fuels take before they're practical? I'll bet it's a lot longer than five years, which is what Democrats say it'll take to produce more oil. The tide is moving against the Democrats on this. The American people don't understand the resistance to drilling and don't support the Democrats on this. Even Nancy Pelosi is feeling the pressure from Democrats who are fearful for their seats if they don't authorize drilling.

McCain is gaining on this because he supports both and the American people agree with him. While investing in long term alternative fuels, he also supports drilling for more oil to tide us over until those alternatives become practical.

As for the current economic situation, you didn't read my synopsis about economic bubbles? How would you blame the president for the real estate bubble? Is he supposed to tell people not to buy houses? And do you blame him for 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina for the hundreds of billions of dollars in economic damage caused by those two events and the resulting job losses from both. And as far as downturns go, this one's still rather mild. Unemployment is still historically low. Even the last jump to 6.1% had more to do with more people entering the workforce than people losing their jobs. If no jobs had been lost at all last month, the unemployment rate would still have gone from 5.7% to 6.0% as 500,000 more people entered the work force for the first time. I'll bet the hike in the minimum wage to $6.55 accounted for most of the rest.

The dollar is rising now like gangbusters having gained 13% against most major currencies in just the last month. I know because I was in Europe during almost all of August as I watched the dollar skyrocket. Gold and oil prices are falling like stones. The Euro is at $1.399 today, only about 10-12% above where it was when the dollar first started sliding.

Bill Clinton sailed through the 90's because of the rise of the Internet and got out right after the bubble burst. Anyone could have been president through that era and had a good economy. He did his very best to torpedo it with his tax hikes but even he couldn't hold down the dot com bubble. If you blame Bush for the real estate bubble, then you'd have to blame Clinton for the dot com bubble. I don't blame either one for something completely out of their control. Clinton was handed a growing economy and had nothing significant happen on his watch. Bush was handed a declining economy and two disasters. Which one had a tougher job? Be impartial about it. I even gave Clinton credit for a capital gains tax cut. Would you give Bush credit for anything on his watch?

I'll surprise you by praising Bill Clinton again. He passed welfare reform and it was wildly successful. Other Democrats predicted doom and gloom yet even they had to admit their predictions didn't come true. I even supported him when he sent troops into Bosnia. While I didn't support sending them in in the first place because we had absolutely no national interest there, I supported him when the soldiers went in. Once our forces were in harm's way, I supported both the president and the mission, rather than taking the easy way out by saying I supported the troops but not the president like so many have done with President Bush.

I'll praise Bill Clinton a fourth time. I supported him and Al Gore when they campaigned for and passed NAFTA even against their own party. There's evidence that Obama was promising people in Ohio that he would overturn NAFTA while at the same time promising the Canadian government he didn't mean it.

PM denies top aide leaked Obama NAFTA memo

Canadian memo suggests Obama\'s NAFTA comments \'political positioning\'

I praised Bill Clinton several times. And Al Gore, too, when they do something that's right. Would you do the same for George Bush?

Democrats have accused Bush for not listening to anyone as you, yourself have just claimed. Interesting that he's also criticized for listening to his commanders who almost universally got their way for several years until the president finally got fed up with his top generals and replaced both Abizaid and Casey with generals who knew how to win. Now the president is responsible for who he chooses as commander and has to take the blame for their failures, but he can't win for losing. When he listens, he's criticized, and when he doesn't, he's criticized.

You're attacking Palin's experience as governor when you've got Obama at the top of your ticket, the man with the empty resume who had only been in the US Senate for 143 days before he started campaigning for president? How about Joe Biden from Delaware, which has an similarly small population. Are you worried that because he represents a small state with almost no population that he shouldn't be VP?

As for whether we're safer today, I'll point you to the latest ABC/Washington Post poll at:


Terrorism Fears at Low Ebb Seven Years After 9/11

To sum it up, 62% say the War on Terror is going well, up from 54% last year. 62% think we're safer now than before 9/11. It seems the American people disagree with you.

I'm right, though.

Today's lesson in my Social Studies class was all about looking at things through multiple perspectives. For example, during the time period leading up to the American Revolution, why could Samuel Adams be viewed as a patriot by some but as a terrorist by others? Two American colonists living in the late 1700s could both have been "right" on the issue while having opposite opinions.

I have found this thread to be interesting because it has allowed me to see multiple perspectives on important political issues. I hardly know any Republicans at all, certainly none as passionate about the issues as I've seen in this thread, so it's given me a facinating insight into that point of view. I respectfully disagree with many of the opinions brought forth, but I've read them with interest. I think we can all agree that it's unlikely any post will change anyone's deeply held political beliefs, but as long as we attempt to withhold value judgments on those political opinions, I think it's possible to continue this important civil discourse of reasoned debate.

BBC News: No victory[/b] in Iraq, [b]says Petraeus[/b] Thursday, 11 September 2008

alcyone