Morning Must Reads: Alarm

I’m waiting for the insane rational that this is Obamas fault somehow, while the same person will defend Libya as a long standing ally against the emerging caliphate and MB AND associate Libyas dictator as part of the Socialist Obama axel.

Partly because that would be the only amusing pretzel logic that would come out of the painful birth of people fight for freedom that we’re seeing in Middle East and the countries it is spreading too.

Eventually all the lies and oppression will catch up with these dictators and I bet every single one of them across the Middle East is quaking in their boots.

Lest we forget: The Middle East is not a continent. Egypt and Libya are African nations.

Anybody hear Dick…Morris urging BO to shoot up the Libyan dissidents?

As long as the sectors of the economy that actually produce things as opposed to those parts that simply manipulate commodity values continue to be centered outside the USA, the erosion of the middle class is going to continue unabated. The Dems and Republicans are expending vast quantities of energy argueing about the wrong problem. (Basically who gets the bigger share of a rapidly diminishing pie)

Yeah, “reacting with alarm” is pretty much the extent of our influence over there right now.

“My Fellow Wisconsans,
“I hate unions. They’re corrupt entities.
“I’m going to eradicate them once and for all.”
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(The preceding message brought to you by the Koch brothers by proxy.)

RE Gadhaffi: I faintly hear “Let Your Smile Be Your Umbrella.”

Hippo – I think all this unrest may be due BECAUSE of BO’s speech in ’09. New generations and the older ones are tired of living like slaves when they know there’s something better. Not necessarily democracy as we see it, but something better nonetheless.

Refresh my memory… beyond giving me a reason to throw something at the teevee, WHY is he allowed on those shows?
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And exactly what did the Clintons have on their mind when they brought him into their circle?

“and the countries it is spreading too.”
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true, Libya is not Middle East and is part of the African continent.

We live in a shrinking world where people from anywhere with enough technology can actually see how other people live outside their own small isolated bubble. It’s no wonder that China is trying so hard to stop their own citizens to ‘learn’ about the outside world.
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I don’t know just what part his speech is fueling this, but eventually the bricks will fall.
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The question of course will be if we’ll see democracy or some other form of Military or otherwise rule. It’s not like we haven’t seen a shift in power from one auhtoritarian rule to another in that and other parts of the world.

I s’pose they were doing what BO is doing now: playing to the middle. Which is OK if you were playing from a position of strength and not trying to suck up to the right all the time.

“as opposed to those parts that simply manipulate commodity values continue to be centered outside the USA, the erosion of the middle class is going to continue unabated”
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So is this a sheepish admission that the US policy to essentially eliminate energy exploration here has been a mistake and once again the policies of the left hurt those they claim to support.
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. We can add energy to education

Walker might want to reconsider his fireside chat…..new polling from Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research shows approval for public employees at 67%; disapproval at 24%; approval for Walker 43%; disapproval 53%; 74% say if employees agree to salary and pension demands, they should be able to keep their collective bargaining rights.

A poll conducted a week ago by We Ask America showed 43% approval for Walker; 51.9 disapproval.

Bruce Bartlett gives the Obama budget a close read.

It’s a fair take, worth reading. One takeaway for me is that you can tell what values a society has by where it chooses to spend its money.

…..both the polls cited above were conducted in Wisconsin.

Did you mean energy exploration or “fossil fuel” exploration? It should be noted that removing oil from the ground doesn’t actually ‘produce’ any thing either. It depletes it.

Take away collective bargaining, and what’s next? This is nothing but a political power grab by Republicans to marginalize and persecute traditionally Democratic voters. The United States and the rest of the world would be getting involved if this were going on in some foreign country or under some despotic ruler. But it’s happening right here. In Wisconsin.
http://www.sunstateactivist.org

Hey Paul -
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Stopped by your lovely island last Thursday, sorry I didn’t have the time to call and say Hi. Hope to be out your way in the not too distant future – much nicer than the foot of snow that greeted my return to Michigan on Sunday.

Mass demonstrations against oppressive regimes and a lack of basic services continue in the Middle East– including Iraq.
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Iraqis have been demonstrating against the al-Maliki government and lack of services for two weeks now… a wave of rallies (has) swept the country from north to south…
(…)
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In Kut.. dozens of demonstrators gathered in front of the mansion of the governor of Wasit Province, demanding the removal of the local governor. They demanded better government services, an end to administrative corruption (constant demands for bribes by provincial officials to do their jobs), accountability for the corrupt, and jobs. On Wednesday, police had shot dead three protesters and wounded more in Kut after they had set fire to a government building.
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..(I)n the town of Nasar in Dhi Qar province, 490 km south of Baghdad, police chief Sabah al-Fatlawi said that a curfew had been implemented after government buildings were burned.
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Also.. some 600 demonstrators in the southern port city of Basra in Iraq rallied in front of the provincial governor’s mansion, demanding his resignation over failure to provide basic services. They were pushed back by police.
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Al-Hayat says that medical officials announced that two persons had been killed and more than 30 wounded in Sulaimaniya when a crowd of some 3000 came out to demand that the Kurdistan Regional Government address problems of unemployment and undertake to improve the situation in the region. The demonstration was sponsored by “The Network for Safeguarding Rights and Liberties,” which was protesting the authoritarian rule of the two Establishment Kurdish parties that make up the Kurdistan Alliance. Iraqi political parties are patronage machines that leave non-members on the outside and sometimes destitute. They demanded a change in government and an end to corruption. -link

nfl-
I don’t see how anyone can visualize a linkage between the events unfolding in N. Africa and the Middle East and Obama’s Cairo speech. Ignoring for a moment that much of the rhetoric coming from these movements has been critical of western involvement in the region, even if Obama’s speech initially was a source of inspiration, he has since squandered all credibility with the Muslim world. He’s backtracked on all his commitments to the Palestinians and has fell in line with the grand American tradition of deferring to Israel on all matters. Obama has no influence in the region. He does not hold the people’s ears.

“The robopoll asked:
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As you may know, Gov. Scott Walker has proposed a plan to limit the pay of government workers and teachers, increase their share of the cost of benefits, and strip some public-employ[ee] unions of much of their power. We’d like to know if APPROVE or DISAPPROVE of Gov. Walker’s plan”

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http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0211/Polling_Wisconsin.html
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Asked that way, even I would have to disapprove. But, when you get legitimate polling questions, and predictive models to go along with it, then come back and talk to us. Ok?

What is Obambi Doing With The Iranian Warships Ready To Enter The Suez Canal?
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Absolutely NOTHING

What Is The Liberal US of A “Dear” Leader Saying About Gaddafi? Is He Supporting Those Who Are Overthrowing The Dictator?
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Absolutely NOTHING
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As with all of the protests, Obambi just sits idly by and watches, polls which action sounds best, and perhaps in a week or two we will hear him say something.

White House Defends Michelle’s Rib Feast!! It Was Only A 600 Calorie Rib
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One short rib, 600 calories. Gee Michelle, can you eat just one?

“It should be noted that removing oil from the ground doesn’t actually ‘produce’ any thing either. It depletes it.”
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Seems you switched your argument from commodities being manipulated to not producing anything. Well unless you think every “produced” product is made out of fairy dust, these products are used to produce other products. You know like gasoline to transport WI Democratic Senators to hide in another state or Asphault for all those shovel ready jobs that never materialized.

More Dead Americans: What Has Obama Done?
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Nothing. I think this is starting to turn into a pattern with our “dear” Leader.

“One takeaway for me is that you can tell what values a society has by where it chooses to spend its money.”
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Or more precisely which special interest group is being bought for the next election.

Michigan orders DPS to make huge cuts Bobb told to consolidate services, close half of schools to end deficit
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One way to get rid of dead-beat Teachers. Just close the schools down.
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You are right Rusty. We should go and bomb those warships. We are the only country that should have warships.
Please spare us your right wing spam of the day. Go take your meds and put down the bottle!

SHOCKING LEVEL OF INFLUENCE EXPOSED: UNION BOSS TRUMKA TALKS TO WHITE HOUSE EVERY DAY AND VISITS A COUPLE TIMES A WEEK
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Oops, probably won’t see this on any signs for the teacher’s union in WI. More of the same higher spending lousy results.

The test also showed that the reading abilities of Wisconsin public-school eighth graders had not improved at all between 1998 and 2009 despite a significant inflation-adjusted increase in the amount of money Wisconsin public schools spent per pupil each year.

In 1998, according to the U.S. Department of Education, Wisconsin public school eighth graders scored an average of 266 out of 500 on the NAEP reading test. In 2009, Wisconsin public school eighth graders once again scored an average of 266 out of 500 on the NAEP reading test. Meanwhile, Wisconsin public schools increased their per pupil expenditures from $4,956 per pupil in 1998 to 10,791 per pupil in 2008. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator the $4,956 Wisconsin spent per pupil in 1998 dollars equaled $6,546 in 2008 dollars. That means that from 1998 to 2008, Wisconsin public schools increased their per pupil spending by $4,245 in real terms yet did not add a single point to the reading scores of their eighth graders and still could lift only one-third of their eighth graders to at least a “proficient” level in reading.

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/two-thirds-wisconsin-public-school-8th-g

Rusty, Iran has every right to deploy military vessels at sea. We do it every day. So does Israel. So does the whole of Europe. Why not Iran? They claim that they are protecting Iranian merchant/cargo ships from Somali pirates. Unless you have anything other than paranoid conjecture to assume otherwise, give it a rest.

How Much Is The Teacher / Union Strike Costing Wisconsin’s?
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If all the teachers in Milwaukee and Madison are paid for the days missed, the protest related salaries for just the state’s two largest districts would exceed $6.6 million dollars.
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Using a figure of $100,005 for average teacher compensation in MPS and an average yearly workload of 195 days, these teachers cost approximately $513 per day in salary and benefits to employ. Spread over 5,960.3 full-time licensed teachers in the district, this adds up to $3,057,634 in daily expenses.
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The average teacher’s total compensation in Madison is $74,912, according to the Department of Public Instruction. Each day costs $384.16 per teacher. The district has 2,370 teachers.
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These figures don’t include administrators and support staff, many of which got an unexpected paid days off thanks to the week’s protests.
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But…but…but, “it’s for the children”

Why do you hate yourself?
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Rhetorical question. No need to answer.

This is, unfortunately, a valid point. Obama’s been testing the waters and checking the winds rather than coming out in support of what it is he supports. This is no time for tepid diplomatic posturing. Who are we with? The people or their narcissistic, corrupt dictatorships? I’m surprised, though, Rusty, that you support these uprisings. You know that the new governments will not be as deferential and cowardly with regard to Israel, don’t you?

When the poll favors your views you’re all over us but when it doesn’t you question its validity. Why?

At a townhall meeting hosted by Congressman Allen West on Monday evening in Pompano Beach, the Q&A segment of the meeting featured a Koran wielding Nezar Hamze, Executive Director of the Council for American Islamic Relations (CAIR).
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Hamze confronted Congressman West and asked him to point out where in the Koran does it give marching orders to Muslims “to carry out attacks against Americans and innocent people”.
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West quickly pointed out that the Koran was written long before America even existed and that it does indeed tell believers to kill infidels, and then proceeded to chronicle a lengthy list of historical Muslim acts of aggression.
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GWOP: Global War on Piracy, the New Frontier of 21st Century Fear-Mongering. Thanks, Rusty.

I wasn’t focusing on his current credibility (or lack of) with the Arab world…merely pointed out that his rhetoric at the time may have triggered a latent desire to get out of the collective thumbs of dictators and “kings.”
However, I don’t think he would simply favor Palestinians over Israel either. It would be nice to just say everyone has equal rights to co-exist and that no one has any more authority over another.

Oh, dear, a Quran-wielding Muslim! Oh, the horror!
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I can think of more than a few acts of Christian/Jewish aggression…

Missing in the breakdown of the poll results are how many Democrats vs Republicans and Union vs non-union folks responded. Given 65% of the union members opposed Walker’s proposal, it makes a decided difference into how the pool was constructed since only 10% nationally and 16% in the state of Wisconsin are union members

I’m guessing he thinks eating ribs all the time is unhealthy. He’s right, of course – but not everyone eats ribs all the time!

Aside from Allen West being a TP nutcase, does this prove your point that all Muslims are evil?
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The Bible lists several incidents in the Old Testament where punishment for marrying outside of the Jewish nation was death.
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So your point is…?

Freeper has a good point about asking the right people.
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About 80 percent of American teachers, for example, are female; at the elementary school level, nearly 90 percent are women. Nursing is 95 percent female. Nationwide, the majority of public sector union members, represented by AFSCME and other groups, are women.
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Meanwhile, over 70 percent of law enforcement workers in the United States are men. Our firefighting ranks are 96 percent male and over half of all professional firefighting departments have never hired a woman.

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Though, that probably wasn’t the point Freeper was trying to make.

“Or more precisely which special interest group is being bought for the next election.”
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You might want to ask that question to Gov, Walker, too, Freeper.

Ahhh, morning in the Swampland. When Rusty has had enough to drink to start copy and pasting links, but not enough to squash the voices in his head that are telling him who’s out to get him.
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We can all look forward to later in the day, and several drinks later, when Rusty shifts from paranoid delusions, to his usual afternoon programming of insults and laughter.
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Just another day in the Swamp.

Allen West, in his own words.
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We already have a 5th column that is already infiltrating into our colleges, into our universities, into our high schools, into our religious aspect, our cultural aspect, our financial, our political systems in this country. And that enemy represents something called Islam and Islam is a totalitarian theocratic political ideology, it is not a religion. It has not been a religion since 622 AD, and we need to have individuals that stand up and say that.

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No wonder Rusty likes this guy. He hates everyone Rusty hates.

Allen West, some history.
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The commanding general of the 4th Infantry Division on Friday accepted a U.S. military investigator’s recommendation and ordered administrative action against Lt. Col. Allen West, who was accused of using improper methods to force information out of an Iraqi detainee.

Following a military hearing, West was fined $5,000 over two months, according to West’s civillian attorney, Neal Puckett.

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from U.S. officer fined for harsh interrogation tactics
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/12/12/sprj.nirq.west.ruling/
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Rusty’s hero should be in jail.

“Though, that probably wasn’t the point Freeper was trying to make.”
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No and only you and God knows what point you were making

“You might want to ask that question to Gov, Walker, too, Freeper”
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And the answer are the taxpaying people of Wisconsin

Allen West, nutcase.
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West said that, although he has not spoken with all of the new members, he hoped that Congress would focus on the “infiltration of the Sharia practice into all of our operating systems in our country as well as across Western civilization.” He explained that targeting Sharia should be part of America’s “national security strategy” and that a response to Sharia would somehow include “tailor[ing]” American “security systems, our political systems, economic systems, our cultural and educational systems, so that we can thwart this”

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I’m starting to think that Rusty is Allen West. Has West said anything about Obama being the anti-Christ yet?

Must be something in the water down here. First BaldCrook, now West. Do they just love going on Flox to gain exposure for the Tea Party? There’s this little inconvenience called representing your constituents, even the ones that didn’t vote for you.

It is certainly true that Islam is going thorugh a crisis right now, although one in which its fundamentalist minions are torturing fellow Muslims more than those of other beliefs. But in terms of misery perpetrated by a religion, no faith comes close to – Christians. It was Christians who came to the New World and either eradicated or enslaved the indiginous popuations. Counting Autstralia, they have done this on three continents (and brought slaves over from a fourth), killing mllions of people in the process. Christians also were the driving force behind the two major wars of the 20th century, although a lot of credit can be given to twisted secular and paganist theories for those conflicts also.
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This doesn’t mean that Christianity is inherently evil – I am a devout Christian myself – but that to generalize about a faith is problematic. Christianity has done wwonderful things throughout human history, and amny deplorable ones as well (Thirty Years’ War, anyone?). So for Christians like Mr. West to get on their high horse about how dengerous Islam may or may not be would be hilarious were it not for the dengerous ill feeling he is generating.

The Koch brother pay taxes in Wisconsin?

But in terms of misery perpetrated by a religion, no faith comes close to – Christians.
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This really isn’t an argument that you want to start down because you can’t possibly substantiate it. You’re trying refute Rusty and Allen West by making the same types of polemicist arguments they do.
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It was Christians who came to the New World and either eradicated or enslaved the indiginous popuations. Counting Autstralia, they have done this on three continents (and brought slaves over from a fourth), killing mllions of people in the process.
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You think Islam’s spread was any less bloody or that their conquests of Arabia, Palestine, Syria, Persia, the Balkans, Northern Africa and Spain didn’t cost that many lives? You don’t think the trans-Saharan slave trade that Muslim Arabs pioneered, bringing Nubians and Abyssians (Ethiopians) into the Muslim caliphates was any less brutal?
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Christians also were the driving force behind the two major wars of the 20th century, although a lot of credit can be given to twisted secular and paganist theories for those conflicts also.
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Once again, you do realize the Ottoman Empire was a part of the alliance system that gave us World War I, right? You do realize that the Mufti of Jerusalem endorsed Hitler’s program, right?
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Christianity has done wwonderful things throughout human history, and amny deplorable ones as well (Thirty Years’ War, anyone?).
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The bottom line, my friend, is that this could be said of most any religion. Funny things happen to people when they think they know God’s intentions and are doing His will. Trying to say one Abrahamic religion is more blood thirsty than another doesn’t fly — especially when the holy books of all three seem to have ample examples of sword plane and righteous wars of annihalation.

“Seems you switched your argument from commodities being manipulated to not producing anything.”
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Not really, Freak.
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If you, actually knew something about science you would know that the biggest reason by far that oil drilling is less common in the US is because we ran out of easy to get oil.
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The discussion was about manufacturing jobs rather than the service sector and/or the financial sector – most notably, the derivative markets.

“No and only you and God knows what point you were making”
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His point, obviously, is that women are going to favor the unions who are being threatened with losing their rights more than men will since the unions dominated by men are not being threatened and the ones dominated by women are being threatened.
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But thanks for calling me God.
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If I weren’t an atheist, I would be really flattered. I know I exist.

All of which underscores the idiocy, and the cost, of the fight that Walker started here. If you want to cut costs, cut costs. There are any number of concessions that were entirely in his right to demand including union contributions to health care, higher ages for retirement, overtime controls, etc. But that is not what he sought: he sought to end collective bargaining for the unions altogether. That is not something that any self-respecting union can concede under any circumstances – and they haven’t. Many oter states – including New york – are in negotiations with unions without the polarization and the chaos that walker has brought to Wisconsin. There are responsible ways of getting things done – but our increasingly confrontational, polarized and, above all, theatrical political culture (fueled by, yes folks, cable news) is increasingly incable of doing anything but shouting.

Two pirates died during the confrontation and 13 were captured and detained, the U.S. Central Command said. The remains of two other pirates who were already dead for some time were also found. The U.S. military didn’t state how those two might have died.

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From Rusty’s article.
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Keep in mind, it was US Navy who boarded the Yacht.
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Hey, I’ve got an idea! Why doesn’t Obama lie and say that Somalia has weapons of mass destruction then we can invade.
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Yeah, that will solve our problems. After all, nobody ever had a problem in Somalia before.
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(Note Sarcasm – yes I have seen Black Hawk Down and know the real story behind it, too-)

Has their been any sightings of the wandering tribe of Democrat Senators? Since they are not at work perhaps their staffs should be let go. That would cut costs.

If you live in my part of Queens where my best guess is that one quarter to one third of the population is Muslim and is about 20% Jewish, all of this paranoia about Muslims is hysterical.
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All in all, I would say about 4,000 to 6,000 Muslims live and/or work within a mile of me. So far, in five and half years I haven’t ended up raising my voice to anybody here much less had to defend my life against jihadists.
I had a much harder time in Boston where my neighbors were mostly white and, basically, no Muslims and not too many Hispanics (at least by comparison, not many Hispanics)
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My congressman, Anthony Wiener is a Jewish man who, at age 46 just married a woman born in Saudi Arabia.
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Married at 46… there’s an example I could follow (I’ll be 40 very soon and haven’t tied the knot yet).

Some very good points, koabd, although I would argue they do not weaken my central thesis. As a creed, Christiantiy is not particualrly bloodthirsty, and probably only somewhat “expansionist”; there are not many exhortations in the good book to “convert or kill” everyone out there. To the extent that Christianity has inflicted as much pain as it has, it is primarily because it was the religion of nations powerful enough to do so (Britain, Spain, Germany). despite the essentially positive nature of the Christian creed, in the hands of the fairly agressive peoples of Europe, it could be used as an excuse to perpetrate all kinds of crimes against the “other”. This is, unfortunately, what men do with the message God has given us, especially when untempered by humility.

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Had, say, the Arabs won the battle of Tours, and Europe come under the hegemony of Islam, I have little doubt the preponderance of these evils would have been on the Islamic, rather than the Christian ledger. Christianity simply impacted more people because its adherents had the “guns, germs and steel” to impose their will and their presence throughout the world. But I agree with you that if Islam has probably harmed fewer people, it is not for lack of trying.

I will say that, in my view, the Ottoman Empire in world War I and the Grand Mufti in World War II, could best be described as having been dragged or mainpulated into an essentailly European conflict rather than generating it themselves. Not that either one covered themselves in glory; when given the chance, Muslim leaders have shown themsevles to be equally myopic and cruel as their Christian counterparts.

But those thought provoking comments, thanks.

momentomori@20.5,

Col West took action to defend his troops in a war zone. It is particularly galling to see him criticized by people whose idea of going in harms way is a visit to the mall.

A little off topic:

I know one guy I see in my neighborhood who tells me that he loves the Tea Party.

He, also, is a retired city employee.

When I saw him today I said to him, “Didn’t I see you in Wisconsin? You had a Pro-Union sign in one hand and a Tea Party sign in the other…”
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He didn’t like that.

I told him before, that when Sarah Palin said “lock and load” they were aiming at his pension.

One thing we agree on is that steamfitters do deserve their pensions.

I’m looking forward to many of the Tea Party supporters who belonged to unions, had worked for the city, state or federal government realizing that Sarah is aiming at them. The sound of the 2010 election “Doh! I thought they meant somebody else’s money.”

patricksartor@22,

Yes, but are they entitled to a pension to which they made zero contributions or at best a minimal contribution? What makes them so special?

“It is particularly galling to see him criticized by people whose idea of going in harms way is a visit to the mall.”
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You mean, like, when T Boon Pickens created Swift Boat Captians for Justice when Pickens, like Cheney, never wore the uniform and W spent his Vietnam daze AWOL from the Alabama State National Guard losing debates at Harvard?
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Oh, no, that would be fair and non-partisan.
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Paulie just means that Democrats shouldn’t be critical of Republicans.
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FWIW, I was medically disqualified in 2003 from joining the Army. (And, no, I was not overweight in 2003 – I fit the weight standard with almost ten pounds to spare.)
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Fight in any wars lately, Paulie?

nflfoghorn @20.2,

According to you people, only all Tea Partiers are evil. Radical Muslims are just misunderstood.

“Yes, but are they entitled to a pension to which they made zero contributions or at best a minimal contribution?”
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You’re talking about the difference between the city’s left pocket and their right pocket. If they got paid $X more and contributed that $X more towards their pension, would the Tea Party still hate them?
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Of course.
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Compensation is compensation and the Tea Party wants to eat a full dinner and walk out on the tab.
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“What makes them so special?”
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Teachers have to have four year degree and, often, one year of graduate school before they can get demonized by the Republicans. Steamfitters only need a year or so of on-the-job training with pay.

Democrats fleeing responsibility has now spread to Indiana as Democrat State House members flee the state. This Democrat strategy has progressed from drama to farce.

“The bottom line, my friend, is that this could be said of most any religion. Funny things happen to people when they think they know God’s intentions and are doing His will. Trying to say one Abrahamic religion is more blood thirsty than another doesn’t fly — especially when the holy books of all three seem to have ample examples of sword plane and righteous wars of annihalation.”
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An even lower bottom line is this: human nature is one of tribalism and self-advancement, which consequently leads to war. For as many examples of religiously justified or propagated war, we can find instances of secular-driven wars, wars over resources, nationalism, ethnicity, pride, reputation, or greed. Arguments suggesting that religion is the prime motivator of war, or that specific religions have an abnormal propensity for war, are simply unsubstantiated rhetorical stratagems used to delegitimize religion or particular religions. They are not factually or intellectually sound. They are dialogue suppressors used by people who wish to advance their small-minded cause. To examine the cause of war, look no further than mankind’s own nature.

“According to you people, only all Tea Partiers are evil.”
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WTF?
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Who are ‘you people’.
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If you mean Swampcritters, you have to add to that statement
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“According to you people,[of people who post on Swampland all Tea Partiers are evil [.self deluded]”
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That would be accurate.
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I don’t presume that you eat live puppies for breakfast. But, if Sarah Palin did, you would find a reason to say that it is just dandy.

Abraham Lincoln, when he was a Wig, also, ran away from the Illinois State Legislature in an attempt to make sure that they wouldn’t have a quorum.
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53_3 had a link to a great article about how many times both parties have done that historically.

patricksartor@22.2,
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No one hates them, Patrick. You are just being hysterical. It’s just that reality has caught up to the public employee gravy train and the unions can’t face it.
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Many people have a 4 year degree. But in the real world of the private sector it’s performance that counts not the degree. A steamfitter whose performance is poor doesn’t last long on the job.

“Arguments suggesting that religion is the prime motivator of war, or that specific religions have an abnormal propensity for war, are simply unsubstantiated rhetorical stratagems used to delegitimize religion or particular religions. They are not factually or intellectually sound. They are dialogue suppressors used by people who wish to advance their small-minded cause.”
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I’ll totally agree that proving a religion or religion in general is the primary or exclusive reason for a war is impossible, but, when people fight believing that they have their god on their side are, often, the very most viscous enemies you’ve ever imagined.
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If their god is the only reason for their morality, then, in defense of their god, they have no need to treat the perceived enemies of their god with any mercy.

patricksartor@23.1,

And I’ll wager that Abraham Lincoln found it to be just as humorous as I do. Democrats flee the state to give their union masters time to gin up opposition. It is a political stunt which has now become farce. Just who is paying for this little jaunt?

“It’s just that reality has caught up to the public employee gravy train and the unions can’t face it.”
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Collective bargaining is a “Gravy train”?
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You are making an unfair and unquantified assumption that public sector workers are not exerting the same amount of effort or are less productive than their private sector counterparts.
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By definition, in a non-socialist economy, if a good or service has a quantifiable market value it is done by the private sector.
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Education, law enforcement, firefighting, regulation of industry, park maintenance , highways, local roads and the armed forces do not have an accurate private sector value reflecting their total benefits. So, comparing public employees to private sector employees is comparing apples to oranges.
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Labor economists have attempted to use proxies to calculate the total benefits of various government services and have come up with some very high numbers, but, you are not using such numbers. You just randomly and arbitrarily state that all work not done for a private, for profit entity is a “gravy train”.

patricksartor@20.13,
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John Kerry’s opponents were all veterans who were disgusted at his betrayal after he came home. They were the ones best able to judge the depths of his depravity.
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Democrats hardly have the standing to criticize anyone. Better they should flee the state.
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Have not fought any wars lately, Patrick, but neither have I given aid and comfort to my country’s enemies.

Democrats flee the state to prevent the Koch brother masters from destroying opposition. It is a political stunt by the Koch brothers which has now become farce.
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Fixed it for you.

This is how the left treats war veterans. This Sergent was wounded protecting the little elitist leftists at Columbia…
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.
“Racist!” some students yelled at Anthony Maschek, a Columbia freshman and former Army staff sergeant awarded the Purple Heart after being shot 11 times in a firefight in northern Iraq in February 2008. Others hissed and booed the veteran.

Maschek, 28, had bravely stepped up to the mike Tuesday at the meeting to issue an impassioned challenge to fellow students on their perceptions of the military.

“It doesn’t matter how you feel about the war. It doesn’t matter how you feel about fighting,” said Maschek. “There are bad men out there plotting to kill you.”
Several students laughed and jeered the Idaho native, a 10th Mountain Division infantryman who spent two years at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington recovering from grievous wounds.

Maschek, who is studying economics, miraculously survived the insurgent attack in Kirkuk. In the hail of gunfire, he broke both legs and suffered wounds to his abdomen, arm and chest.
.
Our fearless leader, who suddenly has lost his tongue when it comes to Libya again, attended Columbia.
.
Let’s see, Obama likes Armedinajihad and Khadafi, but not Mubarak. Maybe it’s because Armedinajihad is such a funny likable guy. Columbia welcomes Mahmoud, but not our war heroes. Here is Mahmoud, the comedy act, at Columbia; he’s a riot. Here he is explaining about the non-existence of Gays in Iran and stoning women. He’s not out to hurt anybody, of course.
.

Yeah PS, the Koch brothers are everywhere. Don’t turn around, they are behind you. Check under your bed, and your closet.

patricksartor@22.4,
.
Health Care coverage with little or no contributions. Pensions with little or no contributions. Early retirement with the opportunity for double dipping.
.
A school system which can hardly be called a success. City workers who can’t handle snow fall. Case after case of government workers engaged in misfeasance or malfeasance.
.
Teachers who fraudulently call in sick so that they can protest. Doctors issuing phony sick passes. And that’s just what is right in front of your face.

Pretty soon all of the Democrats will be “fleeing” to hopefully a concentration of states. California or New York, take your pick.
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Birds of a feather, flock together

Truth of allegations

A major part of the SBVT controversy centered on the group’s testimony. The SBVT statements were accompanied by sworn affidavits. One affiant, Al French, acknowledged he had no firsthand knowledge of what he had sworn to.[55]

The first SBVT ad was contradicted by the statements of several other veterans who observed the incidents, by the Navy’s official records, and, in some instances, by the contemporaneous statements of SBVT members themselves.

Several major newspapers were also skeptical of the SBVT allegations. For example, a New York Times news article stated, “on close examination, the accounts of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth prove to be riddled with inconsistencies.”[56] Regarding the medal dispute, a Los Angeles Times editorial[57] stated, “Not limited by the conventions of our colleagues in the newsroom, we can say it outright: These charges against John Kerry are false.” The editorial argued this position on the basis that “Kerry is backed by almost all those who witnessed the events in question, as well as by documentation.” On August 22, 2004 The Washington Post reported: “An investigation by The Washington Post into what happened that day suggests that both sides have withheld information from the public record and provided an incomplete, and sometimes inaccurate, picture of what took place. But although Kerry’s accusers have succeeded in raising doubts about his war record, they have failed to come up with sufficient evidence to prove him a liar.“[58]

The ABC television show Nightline traveled to Vietnam and interviewed Vietnamese who were involved in the battle for which Kerry was awarded the Silver Star. These witnesses disputed O’Neill’s charge that there “was little or no fire” that day; they said that the fighting was fierce.[59] SBVT supporters question whether these witnesses are reliable because they spoke “in the presence of a Communist official”,[60] but their account of enemy fire is substantially the same as that previously given by another former VC to an AP reporter[61] and by the American witnesses, including the only SBVT member who was actually present that day, Larry Clayton Lee.[62][63][64][65] ABC News’s The Note opined, “the Swift Boat ad and their primary charges about Kerry’s medals are personal, negative, extremely suspect, or false.”[66]

.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swift_Vets_and_POWs_for_Truth#Truth_of_allegations
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If you look even further, you’ll find out that it was funded by T. Boon Pickens.
.
It’s funny how Tea Partiers remember the controversies like “climategate” and forget how the people involved got vindicated.

The leftist libtards have always been confused. This is just more proof of their confusion, rather DELUSIONS.

patricksartor@20.16,

“You people” know who you are.

All that is needed to send you people ballistic is just the mention of the Tea Party. And if you want to see a nuclear explosion just utter the name Sarah Palin in your presence.

“Yeah PS, the Koch brothers are everywhere.”
.

A number of the big business interests standing with Walker are beneficiaries of his administration’s tax giveaways. But the greatest ally to Walker is the dirty energy company Koch Industries. In response to the growing protests in Madison, Koch fronts are busing in Tea Party protesters to support Walker and his union-busting campaign. Last night, MSNBC’s Ed Schultz reported on the involvement of Club for Growth and the Koch-financed Americans for Prosperity in the pro-Walker protest scheduled tomorrow.

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Not everywhere.
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Just a few key places.
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How about the big bad George Soros? I thought he was everywhere doing evil things like giving away his own money?

patricksartor@23.3,

Your paranoia getting the best of you again, Pat? Next you will be telling us that Obama is a plant created by the Koch brothers.

When all is said and done it doesn’t take many brains to figure out if you are a freedom loving, liberty advocate you would side with anyone who would like to pursue a democracy, better yet a Republic to live under.
.
Yes I am fully aware that Israel being located in the center of Muslim World is in particular danger, but if this President would come out and support firmly and with resolve a democracy for any of these potentially new governments, our influence could save Israel from the destructive forces of the likes of Amadinejad and company.
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But, the more he sits on the sidelines the more he will be simply ignored as the know nothing, bowing President of the United States.

liberalmeltdown @24,

Does make you wonder why taxpayer dollars are used to subsidize such know nothings. These people are giving stupid a bad name.

“Armedinajihad and Khadafi”
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That’s too stupid to respond to.
.

Cameron Baker, an undergraduate at Columbia University, made a point of wearing a “Coalition Forces” T-shirt at the start of the fall semester. He was not bragging or making a collegiate attempt at ironic humor.Mr. Baker, 26, really was among the coalition forces, having done back-to-back deployments to Iraq with the Air Force and three more years there with a private contractor. He wore the shirt to quietly broadcast his involvement in Iraq, alerting professors and classmates to tread lightly should the conversation turn to war.
[...]
Perhaps nowhere is this new wave more striking than at Columbia, which more than any other Ivy League institution has thrown out a welcome mat for returning servicemen and women. There are 210 veterans across the university, integrating a campus whose image-defining moment in the past half-century was of violent protests against the Vietnam War.

The campus still tilts heavily to the left, with many students displaying the arty, jaded aura befitting their Manhattan surroundings. But now, students largely welcome the vets, who are both admired and considered something of a curiosity.

The veterans in the undergraduate program attend classes side by side with fresh-faced 18-year-olds, but do not often socialize with them, preferring to gather instead at their own watering hole. In contrast to their classmates, many — though certainly not all — lack stellar high school records, which is what propelled some of them to the military in the first place.

Some also come with post-traumatic stress disorder. The college offers counseling for the disorder, but it is impossible to defend against every trigger.

Each time Mr. Baker goes near a refrigerated soda case, for example, the squealing door reminds him of the whistle of a Katyusha rocket.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/09/nyregion/09gis.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Veterans+at+Columbia+University&st=nyt
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Who knows who said what to one of the 210 war veterans in Columbia’s undergraduate program, but, it is far from the norm.

patricksartor@23.6,
.
Using a certifiable loon as your source hardly buttresses your argument, Pat. It’s like saying that you heard it from Charlie Manson.

Those costs you speak of are part of what is wrong in this country and a result of collective bargaining. We have Unions in this country with many thousands of members when put together force our government representatives to bow down to their every wish. Today’s collective bargaining is nothing short of voter intimidation. The problem of a true democracy and why we have a Republic in this country. It is the “mob rule” mentality. Elections have consequences, and the consequence from this past November was the people voted for what they are now seeing. It’s time to allow the Wisconsin House, Senate and Governor to do their job they were elected to do.
.
The people of Wisconsin and all over this country spoke out with their votes on November 2nd, 2010. The result of those elections were very clear, as majority after majority went to conservatives. The issues were also very well represented, and those on the left fought hard to have someone like Gov Walker defeated. They knew going in that he would try to disenfranchise the Unions, in particular the government Unions.
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Now, Democrats who are in the minority have decided to shirk their duty, and run away. A political maneuver by not allowing a quorum, an assault on democracy. They should be hunted down, and if they still refuse to go to work then they should be jailed.

“Your paranoia getting the best of you again, Pat?”
.
Worldwide, every country has the same types of problems.
.
In economic downturns all democratic countries tend to vote further to the left except for, during the 2010 election the United States.
.
Why?
.
One of the most prolific forces is the Tea Party.
.
Follow the money.
.
It is created by Americans for Prosperity, created and owned by the Koch Brothers.
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Obviously among the uber wealthy the Koch brothers have no trouble finding allies, but, along with Australian billionaire Rupert Murdoch, the Tea Party has persuaded many uninformed people who are, often apolitical to join them.
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Money + misinformation = a temporary political movement.
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It doesn’t take much to follow the dots beginning with why people are voting and protesting against their best interests.

patricksartor@24.3,
.
“The campus still leans heavily to the left…”
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Understatement of the year. That’s like saying that North Korea leans heavily to the left. It doesn’t quite get the flavor of the situation.

Delusional. It’s PS’s favorite. If the shoe fits…
.
So PS, why does Obama favor the overthrow of Mubarak, but not Khadafi, or Mahmoud. Do you know why there are no gays in Iran, PS? It’s because they are executed. Do you know that women are stoned for being accused of adultery? Do you know anything?
.
The question is: Why is Obama suddenly silent again when it comes to Libya?

“Does make you wonder why taxpayer dollars are used to subsidize such know nothings. These people are giving stupid a bad name.”
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Fom one side of your mouth you say that idiots like Ahmadinejad should not be allowed to speak because he says such moronic things.
.
From the other side of your mouth, you say that when you say moronic things that you should not be asked to stop posting on a privately owned blog.
.
Everybody knows Ahmadinejad is an idiot. Academics just want to know what kind of an idiot Ahmadinejad is.
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It’s the same reason the Tea Party is allowed to speak.
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I just wish that you spoke less here.
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Maybe the four of us can cut to the chase and please tell us what kind of idiots you are?
.
Personally, I suspect ones bought and sold by Rupert Murdoch and the Koch brothers nourished on false information and stuffed full of false self confidence by right wing media sources and the Tea Party – AKA, Americans for Prosperity, AKA Koch industries.

patricksartor@23.9,
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When you analyse your “grassy knoll” reasoning, it becomes clear that you have been spending too much time at the Conspiracy of the Month Club. The millions who joined the Tea Party movement did it to oppose Obama’s expansion of government. The Koch brothers had little to do with it.

“Understatement of the year. That’s like saying that North Korea leans heavily to the left. It doesn’t quite get the flavor of the situation.”
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“Harvard tops the first-ever Forbes billionaire college survey…Columbia tied with Yale for fourth place on the list, each graduating 16 billionaires”
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http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/02/billionaire-study-harvard-stanford-business-billionaires-colleges-09-wealth.html
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How many billionaires are there in North Korea?
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Hint: none.
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None of these schools are anything like Marxist. That is just what people who couldn’t get into top schools say out of jealousy.

“So PS, why does Obama favor the overthrow of Mubarak, but not Khadafi, or Mahmoud.”
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Because he can’t unless he wants to sacrifice over a million people in war to do so.
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” Do you know why there are no gays in Iran,”
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They are in the closet, of course. That’s why there were no gays in the the 1950s America, either.
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You’d have to be unimaginably stupid to come out of the closet in Iran.
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“Do you know that women are stoned for being accused of adultery?”
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Exact numbers?
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No.
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What’s that got to do with a puppet for the clerics who run Iran from making dumb statements in front of liberals who laugh in his face?

patricksartor@24.6,
.
1. I never mentioned Ahmadinejad, but since you brought him up, let’s talk about Columbia’s red carpet welcome of the Butcher of Tehran. Is it that the academics at Columbia are all morally obtuse or are they just anti-American?
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2. As for your crusade to get speech that you consider objectionable banned, I just considered that silly. It just made you look like a buffoon.
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3. If you think that a Tea Party spokesman would get as pleasant a welcome as Ahmadinejad did at Columbia than you must live in a bubble.
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4. Your conspiracy theories grow more outlandish every day. If you want to know who was really instrumental in creating the Tea Party movement you just have to look to the White House.

patricksartor@25,

16 billionaires and how many Marxists, Communists and Socialists?

Meltdown, these are students having a debate. They gave Sgt Maschek the respect of having him on-stage to voice his particular opinion. Perhaps you’re not used to seeing open debate– pre-packaged opinions are far more popular and comfortable to accept– but well-debated differences of opinion often inspire emotion and loud responses. Not surprisingly, some clapped, some jeered. It is healthy for a university to offer many points of view and allow the observer to decide for themselves.
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Oh who am I kidding– the only value to you posting this is to say gotcha! ..accuracy doesn’t matter.

“When you analyse your “grassy knoll” reasoning, it becomes clear that you have been spending too much time at the Conspiracy of the Month Club.”
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Grassy knoll?
.
I don’t know anybody who believes in that.
.
How about how Bill Clinton murdered Vince Foster?
.
How about “Death Panels”
.
How about “16,500 armed IRS agents”
.
How about “a government takeover of health care”.
.
How about birthers?
.
How about the theory that the president is a secret Muslim?
.
How about the theory that the president is closet communist?
.
How about the theory that, despite WWII, Nazis and Communists were allies?
.
How about the conspiracy theories involving the Black Panthers?
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Sorry, “the Conspiracy of the Month Club.” is the Tea Party.
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The millions who joined the Tea Party movement did it on the unfounded belief that Obama’s expansion of government was anything other than what he won the election for. He promised to make health care a part of the government and he did it.
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He promised to follow Keynesian Economics for a stimulus package just like FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter, but, this time, somebody was telling them lies that this was new.
.
The Koch brothers did all of the funding after Murdoch used Fox for propaganda.
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Conspiracies are hidden.
.
Fox is in-your-face.
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The Tea Party publicity, obviously funded by somebody is in-your-face.
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Saying that the Koch brother support the Tea Party is like saying that AFL-CIO are supporting the union activists in Wisconsin.

patricksartor@24.7,
.
“…liberals who laugh in his face?”
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Don’t you mean “liberals who buss his posterior?”

Better break out the Purple Heart Band-Aids.
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Oh, wait. That was the GOP disrespecting our veterans….
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http://articles.cnn.com/2004-08-30/politics/gop.purple.hearts_1_purple-hearts-kerry-backers-swift-boat-veterans?_s=PM:ALLPOLITICS

“16 billionaires and how many Marxists, Communists and Socialists?”
.
The doctrines of Marxism as applied by Lenin, a founder of the Soviet Union, to the building of Marxist nations. With Karl Marx, Lenin called for a classless society in which all means of production would be commonly owned ( communism). Unlike some Marxists, however, Lenin stressed bold, revolutionary action and insisted that a strong Communist party would be needed in a Marxist nation to direct the efforts of the workers.
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http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/marxism-leninism?qsrc=2446
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By definition, exactly none.
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Wait until a billionaire gives over all of his companies to the government, and, if that happens, we will have the world’s first billionaire communist.
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In the meantime, a communist billionaire is an oxymoron, like intelligent Tea Party debate.

pintortwo@24.9,
.
Those idiots couldn’t debate their way out of a paper bag. They were rude, crude and woefully ignorant. Not uncommon on most college campuses to day.
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Fools like these should just say thank you and sit down when a veteran enters the room.

“3. If you think that a Tea Party spokesman would get as pleasant a welcome as Ahmadinejad did at Columbia than you must live in a bubble.”
.
I have four family members who attended Columbia.
.
One has voted exclusively for Republicans since he was old enough to vote.
.
If you think you know about Columbia or any other place by watching things about it on Fox News or listening to AM radio, you, sir, are in a bubble.

patricksartor@25.2,
.
All those words to communicate exactly nothing. Do you deny that Columbia produces more leftists of all stripes than it does billionaires?

patrickartor@24.13,
.
But did your Republican relative come out of the closet while he was an undergraduate? If he did than he has my admiration for his courage.

“Do you deny that Columbia produces more leftists of all stripes than it does billionaires?”
.
Should I ask my relative who has voted for all Republicans the past 46 years, never missing one election including when he was a student at Columbia if he is a leftist?
.
Be honest, Paulie.
.
You got rejected by an Ivy League school or didn’t have enough money to go away for college, studied at the local state college and have been jealous of Columbia students, Harvard students and rest for all of your life.
.
There are conservatives and liberals on every single campus in the United States. Saying otherwise is just ignorant.

“But did your Republican relative come out of the closet while he was an undergraduate? “
.
He went there right out of the Army during the Vietnam War.
.
(By luck, he was sent to Europe after the ROTC)
.
If you mean his orientation, he’s been married 37 years and is father of two grown (liberal) children with his, also Republican wife.
.
It was a non-issue.
.
What do 99% of all college students want?
.
Beer.
.
Outside of that:
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A hot girlfriend (or, for girls, boyfriend).
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After that: grades that will knock the socks off either a graduate school or a future employer.
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A small percent care about politics.

There’s no reason to invite someone that hates America to come and spread his propaganda, and therefore increase his stature with Islamic extremists around the world. That’s the only thing that Columbia accomplished.
.
The left has a long history of shutting down free speech from speakers on the right, yet inviting and welcoming tyrants and Marxists.

“There’s no reason to invite someone that hates America to come and spread his propaganda…”
.
Which is why the Swampland should ban wingnuts.
.
You believe that Germans can have unions on the board of directors of Mercedes and still make kick ass cars, but, if Americans unionize, we are so evil and corrupt that we will ruin businesses.
.
You believe that Sweden can have 85% union membership and do well, yet, Americans will botch everything up if you give them the chance to unionize.
.
You believe that France can give amazing health care – about the same as American millionaires get – and have few cases of abuse, but, believe that if you let an evil American near free medical care, he will bankrupt the country.
.
You believe that other countries having unemployment benefits far, far more generous than ours works fine, but, that Americans are so evil and lazy that if we get such treatment, will all hide from jobs or play sick to get welfare.
.
You’re right. You should not be invited to speak here.
.
Your anti-American bile is really disturbing to read.

As someone who has spent time on Ivy League campuses, and who knows a few people who are still there, I can tell you, libmelt, that your story is absolute rot (among oter tings, had it really, happened, it would have found its way to the POst or the Daily News). To be sure, Ivy (and other academic) campuses are full of people who don’t don’t believe the BS put forth by Fox News, as one would expect from a center of rational thinking, and it certainly has its ideologues of the left (and right). But certainly from as long ago as the ’70s, there has been a basic respect for the military, even if there has also been skepticism about the purposes to which that miitary is put.

.

You right wingers seem to be growing increasingly desperate for straw men to help justify your anti-intellectual world view. It seems that if reality doesn’t provide you with fodder for your resentment, you’ll just make stuff up. I continue to be astounded at how hard you all work to be wrong headed.

As people in the middle east fight for democracy, the US is sliding into chaos and a far right ideology of money at the top while the little people struggle and are pitted against one another for whatever scraps the rulers offer. If you are not a member of this “ruling class” of uber rich financiers and silver-spoon fed elites like the Koch brothers, no matter, if you agree with their ideology of striping all rights from the citizenry you just might fair slightly better than those who disagree with this vision for the future of America.

The number of communists on Ivy League campuses after about 1940 are close to 0% since Communism is a proven failure.
.
If you say that liberals are more dominant than conservatives on Ivy League campuses – of the few who care about politics – that is true.
.
To imagine that conservatives do not exist is much dumber than saying that there is not one liberal in the state of Texas.
.
It’s just an absurd exaggeration.
.
Yale had four generations of the Bush family.
.
Your understanding of places you have never been is cartoonish.

..even if Obama’s speech initially was a source of inspiration, he has since squandered all credibility with the Muslim world.
.
Sad. I hate that I agree.
I often wonder what how current events would be different if freshly-inaugurated Obama followed his own words in Cairo and on the campaign trail.
.
What if, for instance, Obama sent word immediately to Iran that we want to talk and are willing to discuss lifting all sanctions and normalizing relations for complete transparency of Iran’s nuclear program, aid stabilizing Iraq, to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist and flourish, and to pressure Hezbollah and Hamas to dedicate themselves to be a political entity only and renounce violence.
.
And we acted as “honest-broker” between Israel and the Palestinians, condemning when appropriate and pressuring each party to stop counter-productive, violent, or repressive behavior.
.
And if Obama gave the Pentagon orders to stop construction of mil bases immediately and to devise a plan for expedient withdrawal from Afghanistan while simultaneously calling Karzai and Mullah Omar to the table to discuss a peaceful future for their nation.

patricksartor@23.11,
.
1. I have always thought that Vince Foster couldn’t take even one more Clinton speech.
.
2. HHS proposed “death panels” again but then quickly withdrew the idea just as the Senate did when the subject came up the first time.
.
3. The IRS agents are a moot point as ObamaCare will never be enacted in full.
.
4. Make that a “stealthy government takeover” of health care. The whole program was designed to drive private insurance companies out of the business leaving it in the hands of Big Brother.
.
5. Birthers are deluded. If there was any “there” there than the Clinton opposition research teams would have dug it up.
.
6. I doubt that Obama is a secret religionist of any sort. He is too convinced of his own divinity.
.
7. He may not go quite as far left as a communist but it’s in the same general area.
.
8. Look up the Molotov – Ribbentrop Pact of 1939
.
9. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neGbKHyGuHU
.
10. Only if you believe that the Constitution of the United States was a conspiracy.
.
11. Obama’s lurch to the left is not what the voters bargained for and they have begun correcting course.

paulejb,

with all due respect, how many places do you know that have produced more billionaires than it has “leftists.” It would be a remarkable achievement under any circumstances. If you think about it, which you won’t, in a world in which huge amounts of wealth are accruing to a relative few, there will tend to be more people behind the re-distribution of at least some of said wealth.

The Koch brothers had little to do with (the Tea Party movement).
.
You can watch David Koch say the following..
.
“Five years ago, my brother Charles and I provided the funds to start Americans for Prosperity”
.
He is the Chairman of that TP group– one of the largest in the country.
.
You can also see the following:
.
(A)t AFP’s annual Defending the American Dream Summit. Independent filmmaker Taki Oldham filmed Koch beaming as organizers who run AFP’s 25 state-level outposts touted their success in mobilizing dozens of tea party events across the nation:
.
AFP CALIFORNIA: We helped organize huge tea parties all throughout the state. And on April 15, Tax Day, over 10,000 Californians joined us on the steps of the state capital and we held one of the largest tea parties in the country. . . .
.
AFP MICHIGAN: … We have held the largest tea party in the state …
.
AFP GEORGIA: … the largest Tax Day tea party in the nation on April 15 …
.
AFP OKLAHOMA: … we’ve held 29 tea parties …
.
AFP MARYLAND: … we organized dozens of tea parties …
.
DAVID KOCH: This is a phenomenal success in my judgment. Eight hundred thousand activists from nothing five years ago. This is a remarkable achievement. And we’re being effective in so many ways.
-link
.
In addition, the Kochs gave $12 million to Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks and founded and funded Patients United Now, Citizens for a Sound Economy and Citizens for the Environment. They also provided principal funding for the Cato Institution and Mercatus Center think-tanks and support many other advocacy groups including the Heritage Foundation, the Manhattan Institute, the George C Marshall Institute, the Reason Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute.

Jealousy is not becoming of you erieangel.
.
How about a good old fashioned individual responsibility lesson or two. That is good to fix most anything in this country.
.
Try it on for size sunshine, I think you might like it if you can take your liberal tin-foil hat off.

pintortwo@23.13,
.
Isn’t freedom of speech and association a wonderful thing. You have George Soros and the Hollywood billionaires and the right has the Koch brothers.
.
You have the militant labor unions, Code Pink, and ACORN and the right has the Tea Party.
.
What could be more fair?

patricksartor@25.4,

The fact is that since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the adoption of capitalism in Communist China the last refuge for communists is academia in America.

pelhamite1,
.
I would much prefer a billionaire accumulating wealth to a leftist dedicated to controlling every aspect of my life for my own good. I will decide what is for my own good.

PS @24.17, you are babbling. Private company unions and Public employee unions are apples and oranges. I don’t think unions make America a great country. You consider Sweden a great country? Alcoholism and drug use are the way that the population quells it’s natural desires to be free from their nanny government.

Paulejb, do you think Soros and the Kochs balance each other out? Lets’ try dueling wikis for political advocacy:
.
The Kochs (link):
Americans for Prosperity is an advocacy group that was founded in 2004 by the Koch brothers,[1] and is funded by them;[15] [1] it is the political arm of the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, of which David Koch is chairman of the Board of Trustees[15][16]. Americans for Prosperity created Patients United Now, which advocated against a single-payer system during the 2009-2010 healthcare reform debate.
.
Citizens for a Sound Economy was co-founded by David Koch in the 1980s,[15] and, according to the Center for Public Integrity, the Koch Brothers funded it with $7.9 million between 1986 and 1993.[1]. In 1990, they created the spinoff group, Citizens for the Environment.[1]
.
..They provided initial funding for the Cato Institute,[15] they are key donors to the Federalist Society,[15] and also support the Mercatus Center, the Institute for Humane Studies, the Institute for Justice, the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution, the Institute for Energy Research, the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment, Heritage Foundation, the Manhattan Institute, the George C. Marshall Institute, the Reason Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute.[17][18]
.
As of 2011, David Koch sits on the board of directors of the Cato institute,[19] the Reason Foundation and Aspen Institute.[16]
…
During the 2010 election cycle, Americans for Prosperity claims to have spent $40 million dollars.[15] Koch groups were the largest oil and gas industry donors to Congressmen and women on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is responsible for legislation affecting the industry. Koch-backed groups donated $279,500 to 22 Republicans and $32,000 to five Democrats, including $20,000 to committee chairman Fred Upton.[15] Of the six Republican members who were elected to Congress for the first time, Americans for Prosperity supported five of their campaigns.[15] Of twelve Republicans newly appointed to the Committee, nine signed a pledge distributed by Americans for Prosperity to oppose greenhouse gas regulation.[15]
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.. from 2005 to 2008, Koch Industries and the foundations under its control donated $5.7 million on political campaigns and $38 million on direct lobbying to support fossil fuel industries. The report also asserts that between 1997 and 2008, Koch Industries donated nearly $48 million to climate change skeptic groups,[24] exceeding even the donations of ExxonMobil, and nearly $10 million to the Mercatus Center, $3.3 million to the Heritage Foundation, over $5 million to the Cato Institute (all 1997-2008), and $5 million to Americans for Prosperity (2005-2008).[25] Koch Industries and its subsidiaries spent more than $20 million on lobbying in 2008 and $12.3 million in 2009, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan research group.[26][27]
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The Claude R. Lambe Foundation has donated to the American Energy Alliance, an offshoot of the Institute for Energy Research.[28]
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Charles and David Koch have organized seminars. In June 2010, an event was held in Aspen, Colorado, titled “Understanding and Addressing Threats to American Free Enterprise and Prosperity”. The seminar program says “past meetings have featured such notable leaders as Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas; Governors Bobby Jindal and Haley Barbour; commentators John Stossel, Charles Krauthammer, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh; Senators Jim DeMint and Tom Coburn; and Representatives Paul Ryan, Mike Pence, and Tom Price.”[29]
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Soros (link)
.. Soros gave $3 million to the Center for American Progress, $2.5 million to MoveOn.org, and $20 million[46] to America Coming Together. These groups worked to support Democrats in the 2004 election. On September 28, 2004 he dedicated more money to the campaign and kicked off his own multi-state tour with a speech: Why We Must Not Re-elect President Bush[47] delivered at the National Press Club in Washington, DC… Soros was not a large donor to US political causes until the 2004 presidential election, but according to the Center for Responsive Politics, during the 2003-2004 election cycle, Soros donated $23,581,000 to various 527 groups.

In the meantime, a communist billionaire is an oxymoron, like a PS debate. Fixed it for you PS.
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China tea party: Billionaires protest property-tax plan
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http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2010/03/chinese-tea-party-billionaires-protest-proposed-property-tax/1.
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You may not be an Oxy, PS, but you are…
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In what Bloomberg calls “a nascent Chinese Tea-Party movement,” China’s richest man and other influential communist billionaires are protesting a proposed tax on property.

I agree that we are sliding into chaos, but I would identify the causes a little differently. Roughly 40 years ago, our nation and also the world passed into a phase where there came to be too many people and too few resources. As the number of educated (and eager) people in China, Brazil, India and all the rest rose, it became all to easy (indeed, in many cases it became compelling) to move jobs from the US to these places. As one might expect, the “industries” that replaced these were 1) less job intensive and 2) tilted toward the model of a fwe well paid leaders and many less well paid millions. to make matters worse, millions of previously under utilized people (women) entered the work force and created a genuine glut of labor that has never really abated.

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More seriously, the resources of this amazing Earth of ours, awesome though they are, began running up against the task of supporting ever more billions of people. The US, the greatest energy glutton of them all, was given not one but two wake-up calls in the ’70s of the necessity to get busy and work on energy independence utilizing not just the reneweable sources of water, wind and sun but the necessary form of nuclear power.

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But, at a time when the US began to be presented with these long term challenges, the first really comprehensive challenges of its post war hegemony, a new ideology also reared its head. The ideology of denial. An ideology based on the dismissal of these challenges, based on the belief that they could be overcome through sheer positivism, nothing more than declaring it was “Morning in America” and believing deeply that simply unleashing the creative force of capitalism and exploitation that chase our demons back into the closet. It was magical thinking at its most astounding. And, to a remarkable extent, people bought it, even as the evidence of America’s economic degradation and the increasingly alarming state of world resources continued to mount.
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Now, forty years in, the chickens have really come home to roost, with the only major difference being that a problem that we environmentalists foresaw in the ’70s but did not think would come on quite so fast – global warming – exacerbating the situation. And the politics of denial – what Paul Krugman calls the War on Arithmatic or the War on Logic – continues. As a nation we have one political party totally dedicated to destructive policies and, truth be told, the other party largely intimidated by them, and facing problems of its own. We were given signs to act, but we ignored them, and our nation has fallen significantly behind other nations of the developed world as a result. The pressure is creating fissures – it is a little shocking that Wisconsin of all places was one of the first places to explode but it will not be the last. After two score years of running this nation into the ground, the Republican Party may have finally brought us to a point where this land of ours can no longer be repaired.

If I were you pehamite, I would start building my survival shelter at once. You seem to be nearing the edge of no return. Take along some bubble wrap too, you might need it when it get really tough.
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LOL

A map of alcoholic beverages per capita by country. According to this, the US has a higher rate than Sweden.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a9/Alcohol_consumption_per_capita_world_map.PNG

Newfie,will you be sharing your “survival seeds” with him?

You clearly know as little about Sweden as you do about the US of A. Sweden significantly out performs the United States on every Quality of Life metric there is, depsite its having far less in natural resources. And while it is certainly true that many Swedes think their brand of fairly paternalist socialism needs some correction, they are by and large aghast at the level of social darwinsim that is accepted over here. Like Canadians, Britons and, well, almost everyone else from the “developed world” thay watch the know nothingism of the Republican Party and scratch their heads as to how a people so favored by God with regard to resources and geography can be so bitter, reactionary and myopic.

As to the alcoholism, it has long been the curse of all the Nordic peoples, a function of the intensity of the light loss (and light gain) that is inherent with living at those latitudes. some people can handle it; many cannot.

No witty reply Paulie?
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I think you can see that Soros is only important as a target for the corporatists. He has not impacted the political landscape much– his most significant contribution is to the right, as their liberal boogeyman used to denigrate straw-man-progressiveness.
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On the other hand, the Kochs are the prime example of corporate elite wielding money and influence– they advocate in order to consolidate power for themselves and a small cabal of other elites. They use “regular Americans” as their dupes, to do their bidding. FOX is their mega-phone because Murdoch is one of them.
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Why can I say that with confidence? -because they clearly deceive their faithful. They pretend that their TP groups are popular movements, but they are obvious astro-turf. They invest in think-tankery and political pay-outs because they expect a profit. It has nothing to do with ideology, it is selfishness. They define current issues with no regard for truth.They deny climate-change, want lower corporate and top-earner taxes, seek to break unions, want less environmental restrictions, less regs overall because they will benefit from it as highly influential corporate oligarchs. That’s_it.

“. And if you want to see a nuclear explosion just utter the name Sarah Palin in your presence.”
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I smirk and roll my eyes if somebody brings her up. That is, unless she is a punchline to a joke, which is how the vast majority of Americans see her.

“A school system which can hardly be called a success.”
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You gave one score of one test and then assumed that all of Wisconsin Schools are unchanged in academic performance. Most systems have multiple subjects and four or more exams per K through 12. This is called cherry picking and proves nothing. Send the English and HIstory exam results along with the exams prior to the eighth grade and after the eighth grade for those topics and math to see if there is improvement or not.
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“City workers who can’t handle snow fall.”
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Outside of that blizzard on December 26th – and we have had six snow falls since then making it the snowiest Winter since 1925 – the Department of Sanitation has had no problems.
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“Case after case of government workers engaged in misfeasance or malfeasance.” there are 50,000 municipalities in the United States. I hope you know that the NYC Department of Sanitation investigations have turned up no wrongdoing after two months.
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Your engaging in gross generalizations.
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How many thousands of private sector fraud cases happen every year?
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Private for profit, non-profit secular, non-profit religious and government sectors all have had their share of corruption scandals.
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Would it be fair to say that Enron is a typical example of the private, for profit sector?
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If so, that would justify communism and liberals are very anti-communist.
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Please show, outside of the strike, these many examples of abuses of the school system done in the state of Wisconsin are or just stop wasting everybody’s time with this nonsense.

“China tea party: Billionaires protest property-tax plan”
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Obviously China allows private property and has abandon all of the tenants of Marxist-Maoist philosophy but has a one party rule which maintains the name “communist Party” and has as many human rights violations as it always has.
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China disproves the the right wing argument that free markets create free people.
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It is not only legal, but, in some instances easy to create a private business in China today, but, the lack of freedoms we have in our first amendment are holding down the Chinese people.
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They are oppressive capitalists, not Marxists.
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Their economic policy is most of way towards free markets and they have no sign of having free people.

The Swedish government tries to regulate the consumption of alcohol. Swedes go to Denmark to buy alcohol so the reported per capita consumption is a false number.
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http://www.cafebabel.co.uk/article/30957/sweden-alcohol-systemet-abstention-vodka-society.html
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Swedes binge drink.
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You can have all the nanny state socialism.

“‘I am confident that young Swedes can begin to see alcohol as less of a taboo and build up a more relaxed attitude towards it. “
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From Psychiatric Meltdown’s article, at the conclusion.
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It looks like meltdown likes drunken blonds and is saddened by the fact that he can’t find any in Sweden.
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Look who else has government owned liquor stores:
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State liquor stores remain in operation at the start of the twenty-first century. In 1985 alone, the Ohio government earned more than 100 million dollars from sales in these stores.

During the 1990s, Ohio Governor George Voinovich and the state legislature sought to increase the profits from state liquor sales. To accomplish this, state officials eliminated state-owned liquor stores. Now, liquor sales in Ohio were to be handled by state �agents.� Agents were not employees of the Ohio government. Rather, they were private contractors who received a commission from the alcohol that they sold. The Ohio government continued to own the liquor, but it did not have to employ workers to sell the alcohol, saving Ohio millions of dollars. The switch to state liquor agencies, according to some estimates, saved Ohio 21.4 million dollars per year.

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http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=1430
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Please tell John Boehner that he is from a socialist nanny state and that his father’s bar business benefited from Swedish style socialism .
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Sweden’s mostly successful efforts to decrease alcohol consumption is not unusual and not inherently liberal. In countries and states with low alcoholism rates, there is no demand from the people to control alcohol consumption.
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But the idea of the government responding to the demands of the people bothers psychiatric meltdown. He, apparently, loves it when the government listens to only the wealthy and powerful.