The USA presidential election 2008

[Farouche]

Mr Nice -------------------
bad news from the economic front - I have just been laid off
so i will not realize my plans to buy a new apple laptop, dj equipment and lots of other stuff - and cut down spending in general, thus adding to the economic malaise

That sucks. Good luck to you in finding something else.

Sweet Pea ---------------
i'm 100% anti-war and can't support either candidate.

Naptaq -----------------
Two months later:

Sweet Pea ------------------
i'm going to vote for obama of course

Naptaq -----------------
I like to joke that people are like politicians because how easily we change our mind and forget previous stances or statments..Or, what the media calls : flip flop ;D

HA! Ha! Ha! She like, totally said she didn't like either of them because they support war, and then months later after watching the debates and spending plenty of time weighing the options, she completely contradicted herself by deciding to vote for the least hawkish and most socially liberal candidate rather than invalidate her vote! How deliciously scandalous! Guffaw!!

[Sweet Pea]

Oct 31, 2008 15:28:39 GMT -5 Farouche said:

Mr Nice -------------------
bad news from the economic front - I have just been laid off
so i will not realize my plans to buy a new apple laptop, dj equipment and lots of other stuff - and cut down spending in general, thus adding to the economic malaise

That sucks. Good luck to you in finding something else.

Sweet Pea ---------------
i'm 100% anti-war and can't support either candidate.

Naptaq -----------------
Two months later:

Sweet Pea ------------------
i'm going to vote for obama of course

Naptaq -----------------
I like to joke that people are like politicians because how easily we change our mind and forget previous stances or statments..Or, what the media calls : flip flop ;D

HA! Ha! Ha! She like, totally said she didn't like either of them because they support war, and then months later after watching the debates and spending plenty of time weighing the options, she completely contradicted herself by deciding to vote for the least hawkish and most socially liberal candidate rather than invalidate her vote! How deliciously scandalous! Guffaw!!

i was joking, you turkeys. ;D

i never tell people how i'm going to vote.

but i should point out that voting for the least objectionable candidate on election day is a good deal different than supporting them. i have not supported obama (as in worked for or contributed to his campaign) because i can't truly get behind a candidate who is not staunchly anti-war.

[MrNice]

Naptaq ------------------
Why are they so paranoid about it, if they're not guilty.. or not planning an attack? I have no idea.

there is a cute saying in russian, it goes something like this:
KGB: the fact that you are free is not your accomplishment, but is due to our imperfect methods

I don't think you understand very well the danger of this kind of oversight
while bush and o'reilly clouded your mind with terrorists and non existent WMD, it inevitably ends up with 'someone doesn't like you so they make you go away' situation

[pnoopiepnats]

Yeah glad you brought up the famous friends syndrome.

A lot of foreigners seem to be impressed with American and Americans.

I know I get treated differently(better) here in Oz because I'm American.

[pnoopiepnats]

As for McCain, I can't get past his dumping his disfigured wife for the beer heiress.

[Naptaq]

Oct 31, 2008 15:22:16 GMT -5 Farouche said:

in this case is shorthand for his very poor leadership, not his friendship quotient.

I know it was, that's why the jerk comment seemed out of place, because people usually label 'jerk' somebody they know.

I have never seen a Michael Moore documentary

Ok.

it became inescapably clear that he's been a poor president on virtually every level

When did it became clear to you?

The failures of Barney Frank who oversaw the bad loans can't be placed on George Bush.

I'm betting the "history will be his judge, not the people who were actually personally affected by his policies, because those people don't count" crap came straight from O'Reilly.

That's right. It's better than Keith Olbermann.

If you proof of any dishonesty, on the part Bill O'Reilly, to point out, please do.

And to respond to the Nixon comment, Bush didn't have a Watergate scandal kinda thing.

No, I really don't think you do know the difference. I don't think you know the difference between a lot of things, Naptaq, because you have no sense of subtlety and you refuse to engage your brain.

Where is the argument?

I bet you're one of those people who goes on celebrity sites and says things like, "you guys are just jealous of Paris Hilton because she's rich and beautiful!!

Yeah, my wall is covered by Paris Hilton and Britney Spears posters.
jk

I don't have anything against Paris Hilton; I do not follow the stories about her.

It seems to me, she isn't doing anything benificial for America.. or the world for that matter. Probably the opposite.

That comment had nothing to do with Bush. Not everything is a veiled insult to your hero.

It sure looked like it. And for the record Bush isn't my hero, but I don't dislike him either.

your opinions exclusively from Bill O'Reilly.

No, that's not true. However, I like Bill O'Reilly very much and it's no accident that The Factor is #1 in primetime on cable TV.

There's a very popular quote from Benjamin Franklin that's often paraphrased thus: "Those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither."

It's a good quote, but I have to ask: What liberties have you given up? Have you really been affected by the Patriot Act?

Most Americans have no been affected.

You really cannot fathom a single reason an innocent person wouldn't want the government listening in on their lives??

A common phone call:

"Honey what do you want, chicken or beef?"

"Chicken. When are you coming home?"

"At about 6:30. How are the kids?"

"Oh they're fine. Jack has a toothache though, he complained earlier"



So yeah, 50 government employes, on giant headphones, are using their time by listening to this phonecall. ;D jk

NSA employee lodging a complaint about people in his department allegedly listening in on intimate conversations (including conversations between lovers, even phone sex)

Those people are responsible, and guilty, for passing these tapes around, not the patriot act.

And honestly that kind of disgusting abuse of the system is practically freaking benign compared to its other uses or potential uses.

For example?

The government doesn't need a court order to decide whose phones to tap

Yeah to protect people like you and everyone you know.

The Patriot Act is al-Qaida's worst nightmare:

"The report says between the Sept. 11 attacks and May 5, Justice Department terrorism investigations led to charges against 310 people, of whom 179 were convicted or pleaded guilty. The Patriot Act, it says, was instrumental in many of these cases."

Now, Did you know that the US has been in a state of war *far* more often than not in the course of its history?

Well I do know that it's very unusual for there to be no war anywhere in the world. It rarely happened throughout history.

So it's not unusual.

If we can only be free in the short periods between military engagements

Compared to other countries in the world, USA is one of the the freest and greatest countries in the world.

This is a jolly game or a thought exercise for you, Naptaq, but it's real life for us Americans, and we tend to know what we're talking about a lot better than you do. Try to keep that in mind.

I know plenty Americans who agree with what I'm saying.

And this is just a discussion.

[Naptaq]

Oct 31, 2008 15:40:28 GMT -5 Sweet Pea said:

i was joking, you turkeys. ;D

i never tell people how i'm going to vote.

oh, I thought only the "[I'm going to vote for Obama] 10 times" was a joke.

my bad.

[MrNice]

The Patriot Act is al-Qaida's worst nightmare:

"The report says between the Sept. 11 attacks and May 5, Justice Department terrorism investigations led to charges against 310 people, of whom 179 were convicted or pleaded guilty. The Patriot Act, it says, was instrumental in many of these cases."

dude, this is not proof of anything
its just like the war on drugs
since the 'war' started more and more people are arrested and more drugs are confiscated now then ever - however the drug problem is also much worse now

by the way what happened to the other 131 people? were any of them by any chance innocent and had to deal with criminal chargers brought against them?

[Naptaq]

Oct 31, 2008 18:26:40 GMT -5 MrNice said:

The Patriot Act is al-Qaida's worst nightmare:

"The report says between the Sept. 11 attacks and May 5, Justice Department terrorism investigations led to charges against 310 people, of whom 179 were convicted or pleaded guilty. The Patriot Act, it says, was instrumental in many of these cases."

dude, this is not proof of anything
its just like the war on drugs

It has prevented people from being killed and disrupted al-Qaida's activities in USA.

by the way what happened to the other 131 people? were any of them by any chance innocent and had to deal with criminal chargers brought against them?

The judicial system also jails innocent people and after they're found not guilty they're let go.

No system is perfect.

[MrNice]

It has prevented people from being killed and disrupted al-Qaida's activities in USA.

you don't know whether it has prevented anything
all you know is that 179 people have been put in jail
if you have other information please present it, otherwise don't make empty claims

No system is perfect.

you can say that about any system and justify any horrible things in this manner
no system is perfect, yet we should strive towards a better system - not go backwards

[Naptaq]

Oct 31, 2008 19:04:33 GMT -5 MrNice said:

It has prevented people from being killed and disrupted al-Qaida's activities in USA.

you don't know whether it has prevented anything

They had to find evidence that they were planning to do something so that they could get them convicted and put in jail. Some even pleaded guilty.

No system is perfect.

you can say that about any system and justify any horrible things in this manner
no system is perfect, yet we should strive towards a better system - not go backwards

Right.

[Farouche]

Naptaq -----------------
I know it was, that's why the jerk comment seemed out of place, because people usually label 'jerk' somebody they know.

If I call him a "bad friend," then you can complain.

Naptaq -------------------
When did it became clear to you?

I can't remember the exact moment. It might have been when I started actually reading about the Iraq war, instead of just hearing about it peripherally. I had hesitated for a long time to accept that he'd lied in order to invade Iraq; I would say to people, maybe he was wrong, but surely he acted on good faith..? But as I read about the circumstances, and saw how he continually defended his actions while refusing to admit a mistake, I concluded that either he's so deluded that he believes what he's saying, or he thinks people are too stupid and gutless to be able to stop him from making war wherever he personally feels like it.

Of course, there was also the appointing of Bush's super-conservative supreme court justice, which the Democrats tried to oppose for a while, but eventually who eventually got the appointment anyway. And there was the Patriot Act, and his view that prisoners of the US that the US detained *outside* of the US did not have any constitutional rights, and his support of torture--which is not only awful and barbaric and violates a whole bunch of laws, treaties, and constitutional prohibitions, but which does not work in a vast number of cases, because people that are in that much pain will literally say anything to end it.

There is also his general insistence that the president is above the law; that he doesn't have to listen to congress or the constitution because he just can't be bothered when he's got big scary shadowy terrorists to think about. That's why many people say he's acting like a dictator: because he has done so much to increase the power of the presidency, with so little regard for what either the American people or the other branches of government think about his actions.

Naptaq ------------------
That's right. It's better than Keith Olbermann.

You are obsessed with Olbermann, and it is bizarre. I can only imagine that O'Reilly despises Olbermann for his liberalness, and therefore so do you. The guy is EXACTLY the mirror image of the far-right-wing O'Reilley, but at least Olbermann is open about his intentional bias, and doesn't call his show a "no spin zone" and pretend to be "fair and balanced!" You can believe that the far right way is the best way, but you CANNOT argue that far right is actually centrist. It's the same way you can argue that red is better than blue, but you can't redefine the terms and argue that blue is green.

Naptaq -----------------
If you proof of any dishonesty, on the part Bill O'Reilly, to point out, please do.

There is no way in hell I'm going to track down clips for you, and I know you will dismiss any commentary on O'Reilly as having obviously come from a liberal, therefore making it invalid. I actually started to assemble a few clips from YouTube, but you are someone who can't even hold a straight conversation about a direct quote from Sarah Palin. I spend enough time trying to explain simple concepts to you. I don't do hard-core, time intensive research for people who refuse to address the evidence rationally.

Naptaq ----------------
No, that's not true. However, I like Bill O'Reilly very much and it's no accident that The Factor is #1 in primetime on cable TV.

Did I mention that nearly two fifths of Americans don't believe in evolution? So am I surprised that a far right wing pundit has a big audience? Nope.

Naptaq -----------------
It's a good quote, but I have to ask: What liberties have you given up?

The government is legally allowed to spy on me whenever they want to, without having to provide ANY justification at all. Just because it chooses not to spy on me right now does not mean I would never be affected, or that I should not be concerned about those whose are affected right now. And that's not even getting into any additional loss of liberty that could follow the precedent set by the Patriot Act.

Naptaq ----------------
Have you really been affected by the Patriot Act? Most Americans have no been affected.

"First they came for the suspicious foreigners, and I did not speak up because I was not a suspicious foreigner.

Then they came for the protesters, and I did not speak up because I was not a protester.

Then they came for those who criticized the government in the press, and I did not speak up, because I was not part of the press.

Then they came for me, but there was no one left to speak up."

That's a paraphrase of a famous poem about the dangers of apathy in allowing the government to take away the rights of citizens. It is unconscionable to simply shrug your shoulder and say, "dunnit affect me."

Naptaq -----------------
A common phone call:
[blah blah blah]
So yeah, 50 government employes, on giant headphones, are using their time by listening to this phonecall. ;D jk

Why would you even bother to type that? What part of "they purposefully listened in on intimate conversations, including phone sex, and passed the tapes around the office" do you not understand??

Conservatives have been scoffing at the notion that the NSA would care enough to violate the insignificant little lives of ordinary Americans from the first moment the Patriot Act came into being. 'Cause like, it's just soooo paranoid and crazy to think that fallible human beings with almost unlimited powers, working without public oversight, would ever be tempted to abuse those powers...

Naptaq ----------------
Those people are responsible, and guilty, for passing these tapes around, not the patriot act.

Let's try a little thought experiment. If the nation passes a law that says murder for any reason is now legal, and millions of people go on a killing spree as a result, would you still say that there was no problem with the law itself? If a law specifically encourages people to commit despicable acts, you better believe that law bears responsibility for the despicable acts committed in its name.

Naptaq -------------------
For example?

Ugh. Suffice it to say, the government can literally wiretap ANYone. They could potentially use what they learn to head off peaceful, legal protests; they can use it to filter out from consideration for government jobs anyone who criticizes the president or the war in the privacy of their phone conversations; they can leak damaging information about high profile critics to the press, and ruin careers. And I'm sure they're a lot more imaginative than I am when it comes to figuring out how to use the information they gather.

Naptaq ----------------
Yeah to protect people like you and everyone you know.

Me and everyone I know, we say NO THANK YOU. I don't want my parents to remove my bedroom door so that they can keep an eye on me and make sure no burglars can get in to attack me, and I don't want my government abridging my right to privacy to prevent terrorism.

Naptaq ----------------
Well I do know that it's very unusual for there to be no war anywhere in the world. It rarely happened throughout history. So it's not unusual.

Way to miss the point big time. Let me break this down into itty bitty words for you:

IF, according to you, we should be prepared to forfeit our rights during wartime,
AND we are at war somewhere in the world nearly all of the time,
THEN, according to you, we should be prepared to forfeit our rights all of the time.

Naptaq -----------------
I know plenty Americans who agree with what I'm saying.

Sad but true, a lot of Americans do think like that. And nearly all of them are steadfastly ignorant, superstitious dittoheads who get their opinions from Limbaugh and O'Reilly, refuse to think for themselves, and couldn't be trusted to form a rational argument if their lives depended on it. In that light, I take it back. Welcome to America.

[MrNice]

Oct 31, 2008 2:45:05 GMT -5 Sweet Pea said:

Oct 30, 2008 23:14:12 GMT -5 MrNice said:

no - that's not what he is going to do. he is going to start massive spending programs financed by debt leading to a currency collapse down the road. I am worried about it.

i really don't think he's that stupid.

its either that or defaulting on obligations
there is no other outcome
I highly doubt the government will default rather then print

[Sweet Pea]

Nov 1, 2008 8:46:52 GMT -5 MrNice said:

Oct 31, 2008 2:45:05 GMT -5 Sweet Pea said:

i really don't think he's that stupid.

its either that or defaulting on obligations
there is no other outcome
I highly doubt the government will default rather then print

well, hopefully if he wins he and his advisors will be creative and brilliant and come up with some solutions for the economy. no one predicted that bill clinton would be able to get the economy in such good shape when he was elected, if i recall correctly. i think stopping the blood flow of trillions of dollars into defense contractors pockets would be a good start. they should beat their swords into plowshares anyway.

[Naptaq]

Oct 31, 2008 21:49:18 GMT -5 Farouche said:

I can't remember the exact moment. [...]But as I read about the circumstances, and saw how he continually defended his actions while refusing to admit a mistake

I wrote this on October 1st in this thread but it's worth repeating again:

You may reject some piece of fallacious news when it first comes out at first, consciously, but days, weeks, months or even years later, when it's repeated so long and so often not just by the media, but by people you encounter, or people in your circle, you find yourself agreeing with the news more and more. This all happens very gradualy and sublty. This fallacious meme then propagades faster and faster because of the shear number of people being programmed by it. Like a rolling snowball this malignant cancer spreads.

Out of curiosity: What mistakes do you have in mind?

and his view that prisoners of the US that the US detained *outside* of the US did not have any constitutional rights

I sense an ACLU endorsment coming from you. "To protect everyones's right we first have to protect the bad guys." Yeah sure.

Those prisoners are not there by accident, you know.

and his support of torture--which is not only awful and barbaric and violates a whole bunch of laws, treaties, and constitutional prohibitions, but which does not work in a vast number of cases, because people that are in that much pain will literally say anything to end it.

It has worked in some cases. For example they succesfully got information by using waterbaording on a high-ranking member of al-Qaida, Abu Zubaydah.

There is also his general insistence that the president is above the law

You're well aware that most Senators voted for the Iraq war.
Hillary voted yes.

A president cannot do anything he wants.

with so little regard for what either the American people or the other branches of government think about his actions.

He's the president, he calls the shots. At the end of the day he carries the responsibility of the decisions he makes.

I can only imagine that O'Reilly despises Olbermann for his liberalness

No, I think O'Reilly gave up on Olbermann a long time ago, since it became apperent that Olbermann is a far left loon. He doesn't even bother with the man - he's a better man than I.

I think Keith, Rosie o'donnell , Arianna Huffington and all of these far left people are all destructive to America.

Again I'll point out that O'Reilly doesn't have anything against liberals. He has them on his show every week.

The guy is EXACTLY the mirror image of the far-right-wing O'Reilley

This is far-right.

but at least Olbermann is open about his intentional bias,

At least Olbermann is honest about that.

call his show a "no spin zone" and pretend to be "fair and balanced!"

He takes no BS, as Barney Frank found out.

And to point out to a credible study on media, Fox News had 40% negative stories on Obama and 40% negative on McCain while the others are more or less in the tank for Obama.

There is no way in hell I'm going to track down clips for you, and I know you will dismiss any commentary on O'Reilly as having obviously come from a liberal, therefore making it invalid.

Suit yoursef. I know I'd be very amused, not by O'Reilly's video clips itself, but by your commentary on them.

Hey the invitation, to point out O'Reilly's dishonesty, is always there.

O'Reilly isn't a partisan commentator and calls out the right wingers and left wingers, when they're being dishonest.

Once I stumbeled upon a comment, on YouTube, and somebody wrote "Everybody knows he has a bullshit detection meter"

Did I mention that nearly two fifths of Americans don't believe in evolution? So am I surprised that a far right wing pundit has a big audience? Nope.

There's more to O'Reilly's popularity than this.

The government is legally allowed to spy on me whenever they want to, without having to provide ANY justification at all.

On the grounds of Suspicion of terrorism.

"First they came for the suspicious foreigners, and I did not speak up because I was not a suspicious foreigner.

Then they came for the protesters, and I did not speak up because I was not a protester.

Then they came for those who criticized the government in the press, and I did not speak up, because I was not part of the press.

Then they came for me, but there was no one left to speak up."

This poem is not the reality of the USA.

Why would you even bother to type that? What part of "they purposefully listened in on intimate conversations, including phone sex, and passed the tapes around the office" do you not understand??

The point of the normal phone convo was that government doen't waste much time on it. If they wanted to tap every phone call, they would need 10% of chinese population.

Let's try a little thought experiment. If the nation passes a law that says murder for any reason is now legal, and millions of people go on a killing spree as a result, would you still say that there was no problem with the law itself?

No. It's like what Staint Augustine once said "An unjust law is no law at all"

If a law specifically encourages people to commit despicable acts

It does not do that.

People got cought, got proven guilty, by evidence that they were planning to blow up, or poison, something, or someone, and put in jail because of the Patriot Act.

I don't see people complaining about CCTV cameras, because there's a lot of those cameras springing up. Would that be a violation of your rights as well? And what's already happening is that anything stupid that a person does, unaware that there is even a camera, and gets put on YouTube.

One could make a case that a restarunat is ripe for "dispicable acts", because, you know, there is a possibility that you get something nasty on your plate, especially if you're nasty to the cook. One could also say "Restaruants, McDonalds.. actually everything that serves food is ripe for abuse because not only can they spit in it, but they can poison the food aswell"

Me and everyone I know, we say NO THANK YOU.

So what? It still doesn't change the fact that it's out to protect you.

IF, according to you, we should be prepared to forfeit our rights during wartime

You have your rights.

THEN, according to you, we should be prepared to forfeit our rights all of the time.

Of course! You have no right to go to California, no right to visit other continents, no right to talk on the phone , no right to buy an Apple compzter, no right to shop at Wal-Mart, no right to rent an apartment, no right to talk trash about the governtment and no right to talk to people you don't know. ;D

jk

Sad but true, a lot of Americans do think like that.

It's fortunately. We don't want everyone thinking the same, do we? That's fascism. After all, I could be mistaken, and you're right - about everything.