Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 08:45 am
@Foxfyre,
I like how anything which doesn't match the very strict conversation that you wish to have is 'sniping' and 'trolling.'

Cycloptichorn
0 Replies
 
parados
 
  2  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 08:54 am
@Foxfyre,
That's an interesting read there Fox.

10 ambassadorships and 4 went to people that contributed to Obama. Your response is "pay to play." I would call it an interesting change in that the majority did NOT go to people that contributed.
0 Replies
 
rosborne979
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:00 am
@Yankee,
Yankee wrote:
All politics is local. Excellent response.

I've heard that said before. But it might be more accurate to say, "all politics should be local.

Yankee
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:04 am
@rosborne979,
Given todays environment, I would agree. Voters must be involved at their local level as well.
0 Replies
 
rosborne979
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:08 am
@Foxfyre,
Foxfyre wrote:
In my opinion, attracting competent and responsible people to high office will require reining the Federal government back to something much closer to its Constitutional roots

Even if that were true, I wouldn't think it could possibly happen unless the politicians in power decided to do it, and changing the political structure at the top can really only happen if the pipeline of candidates rising into those slots changes.

If you put water in one end of the pipe, you're going to get water out the other end.
H2O MAN
 
  0  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:08 am
@rosborne979,


Yes, but DC has a strange effect on the elected... Senators become corrupt with power and never leave.
Strict shorter term limits need to be put in place as soon as the useless trash on both sides is removed.
rosborne979
 
  2  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:16 am
@H2O MAN,
H2O MAN wrote:
Yes, but DC has a strange effect on the elected... Senators become corrupt with power and never leave.
Strict shorter term limits need to be put in place as soon as the useless trash on both sides is removed.

Senators are elected. Their constituents can limit their terms any time they choose.

(even though I think term limits would be a good idea, I don't think we'll ever see it because of the above argument)

I would prefer to see some type of equalization in the way political candidates can advertise themselves for office. Although I'm at a loss for how to do it.
0 Replies
 
Foxfyre
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:22 am
@rosborne979,
rosborne979 wrote:

Foxfyre wrote:
In my opinion, attracting competent and responsible people to high office will require reining the Federal government back to something much closer to its Constitutional roots

Even if that were true, I wouldn't think it could possibly happen unless the politicians in power decided to do it, and changing the political structure at the top can really only happen if the pipeline of candidates rising into those slots changes.

If you put water in one end of the pipe, you're going to get water out the other end.


Of course you are correct, so it may require something of a mini revolution to accomplish it. The power of the people, when sufficiently motivated to be of one mind for even a little while, is awesome however. There surely must be some way to reinstate a system in which it is more profitable to do the right thing instead of the one that keeps somebody in one of the most lucrative occupations on the planet.
H2O MAN
 
  -1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:31 am
@rosborne979,
rosborne979 wrote:



If you put water in one end of the pipe, you're going to get water out the other end.


I think we need Roto-Rooter because the DC sewage pipe is clogged.
0 Replies
 
au1929
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:42 am
On European trip, evidence of President Obama's shifting fault line
Friday, June 12th 2009, 4:00 AM

When President Obama returned from his first European trip, I observed that while over there he had been "acting the philosopher-king who hovers above the fray mediating" between America and the world. Now that Obama has returned from his "Muslim world" pilgrimage, even the left agrees. "Obama's standing above the country, above - above the world. He's sort of God," Newsweek's Evan Thomas said to a concurring Chris Matthews, reflecting on Obama's lofty perception of himself as the great transcender.

Not that Obama considers himself divine. (He sees himself as merely messianic, or, at worst, apostolic.) But he does position himself as hovering above mere mortals, mere country, to gaze benignly upon the darkling plain beneath him where ignorant armies clash by night, blind to the common humanity that only he can see. Traveling the world, he brings the gospel of understanding and godly forbearance. We have all sinned against each other. We must now look beyond that and walk together to the sunny uplands of comity and understanding. He shall guide you. Thus:

(A) He told Iran that, on the one hand, America once helped overthrow an Iranian government, while on the other hand "Iran has played a role in acts of hostage-taking and violence against U.S. troops and civilians." (Played a role?!) We have both sinned; let us bury the past and begin anew.

(B) On religious tolerance, he gently referenced the Christians of Lebanon and Egypt, then lamented that the "divisions between Sunni and Shia have led to tragic violence" (note the use of the passive voice). He then criticized (in the active voice) Western religious intolerance for regulating the wearing of the hijab - after citing America for making it difficult for Muslims to give to charity.

(C) Obama offered Muslims a careful admonition about women's rights, noting how denying women education impoverishes a country - balanced, of course, with "meanwhile, the struggle for women's equality continues in many aspects of American life."

Well, yes. On the one hand, there certainly is some American university where the women's softball team has received insufficient Title IX funds - while, on the other hand, Saudi women showing ankle are beaten in the street, Afghan school girls have acid thrown in their faces and Iranian women are publicly stoned to death for adultery. (Gays, as well - but then again we have Prop 8.) We all have our shortcomings, our national foibles. Who's to judge?

That's the problem with Obama's transcultural evenhandedness. It gives the veneer of professorial sophistication to the most simple-minded observation: Of course there are rights and wrongs in all human affairs. Our species is a fallen one. But that doesn't mean that these rights and wrongs are of equal weightA CIA rent-a-mob in a coup 56 years ago does not balance the hostage-takings, throat-slittings, terror bombings and wanton slaughters perpetrated for 30 years by a thug regime in Tehran (and its surrogates) that our own State Department calls the world's "most active state sponsor of terrorism."

True, France prohibits the wearing of the hijab in certain public places, in part to allow the force of law to protect Muslim women who might be coerced into wearing it by neighborhood fundamentalist gangs. But it borders on the obscene to compare this mild preference for secularization (seen in Muslim Turkey as well) to the violence that has been visited upon Copts, Maronites, Baha'i, Druze and other minorities in Muslim lands, and to the unspeakable cruelties perpetrated by Shiites and Sunnis upon each other.

Even on freedom of religion, Obama could not resist the compulsion to find fault with his own country: "For instance, in the United States, rules on charitable giving have made it harder for Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation" - disgracefully giving the impression to a foreign audience not versed in our laws that there is active discrimination against Muslims, when the only restriction, applied to all donors regardless of religion, is on funding charities that serve as fronts for terror.

Obama undoubtedly thinks he is demonstrating historical magnanimity with all these moral equivalencies and self-flagellating apologetics. On the contrary. He's showing cheap condescension, an unseemly hunger for applause and a willingness to distort history for political effect.

Distorting history is not truth-telling, but the telling of soft lies. Creating false equivalencies is not moral leadership, but moral abdication. And hovering above it all, above country and history, is a sign not of transcendence but of a disturbing ambivalence toward one's own country.

[email protected]
Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:48 am
@au1929,
Quote:

Not that Obama considers himself divine. (He sees himself as merely messianic, or, at worst, apostolic.)


Stopped reading after this part.

What happened to you, Au? Is it really that challenging to have this Black man with a muslim name running the country? You're turning into a wingnut over here.

Cycloptichorn
H2O MAN
 
  -1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 09:54 am
@Cycloptichorn,
Quote:
Stopped reading after this part.


Who gives a ****!

au1929 is dead on!

0 Replies
 
rosborne979
 
  2  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:02 am
@Foxfyre,
Foxfyre wrote:
There surely must be some way to reinstate a system in which it is more profitable to do the right thing instead of the one that keeps somebody in one of the most lucrative occupations on the planet.

"Profit" in a political sense equates to votes. So I think that system actually exists and we have access to it. But the core problem is that people aren't doing their own part (which is research, thoughtfulness and voting) in contributing to the process.

If you could somehow get 100% of the eligible voters to participate, and only 80% of the voters to do some basic research on their candidates (including local candidates) I think the system would flush itself out fairly quickly.

I have a little bit of an issue with people who only point at the upper eshelons of government and say it isn't working, when in large part, it's a reflection of "us".

0 Replies
 
maporsche
 
  2  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:11 am
@Foxfyre,
There needs to be a label for fiscally conservative, socially liberal people like myself.

I feel like I'm usually bitching about the democrats and spending, and at the republicans for pretty much every one of their social policies.
Yankee
 
  2  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:34 am
@Cycloptichorn,
Quote:
Is it really that challenging to have this Black man with a muslim name running the country?


Why did you bring up his skin color? Is it possible to disagree with his policies and NOT be called names?
Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:38 am
@Yankee,
Yankee wrote:

Quote:
Is it really that challenging to have this Black man with a muslim name running the country?


Why did you bring up his skin color? Is it possible to disagree with his policies and NOT be called names?


Once again, you have stumbled into a conversation based on historical posts on A2K which you either were not privy to or don't remember. I do not accuse all of these things, only those whose comments and history lead me to believe that they are true for the individual in question.

Cycloptichorn
Yankee
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:40 am
@Cycloptichorn,
My question remains.

Is it possible to disagree with his policies and NOT be called names?
Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:42 am
@Yankee,
Yankee wrote:

My question remains.

Is it possible to disagree with his policies and NOT be called names?


Of course it is. However, there is no immunity from being accurately described when one provides evidence that this is one's true belief, as is the case here.

Cycloptichorn
Yankee
 
  1  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 10:46 am
@Cycloptichorn,
I have not seen much evidence in my short time in this chat room. But I will take your word for it.
0 Replies
 
Foxfyre
 
  2  
Fri 12 Jun, 2009 11:55 am
@maporsche,
maporsche wrote:

There needs to be a label for fiscally conservative, socially liberal people like myself.

I feel like I'm usually bitching about the democrats and spending, and at the republicans for pretty much every one of their social policies.


LOL....there is. It's called libertarian (little "L" to distinguish that from advocates of the Libertarian Party).

On the American Conservatism in 2008 and Beyond thread, the definition we have been using--to differentiate between the old fashioned conservatives re the dictionary definition or the neo-cons that emulate much of what you are objecting to--we have been using this definition to identify ourselves as Modern American Conservative.

Quote:
Modern American Conservatism/Classical Liberalism
(adapted from Wiki)
Classical liberalism (also known as traditional liberalism[1], laissez-faire liberalism[2], and market liberalism[3] or, outside the United States and Britain, sometimes simply liberalism is a doctrine stressing individual freedom, free markets, and limited government. This includes the importance of human rationality, individual property rights, natural rights, the protection of civil liberties, individual freedom from restraint, equality under the law, constitutional limitation of government, free markets, and a gold standard to place fiscal constraints on government as exemplified in the writings of John Locke, Adam Smith, David Hume, David Ricardo, Voltaire, Montesquieu and others.

As such, it is the fusion of economic liberalism with political liberalism of the late 18th and 19th centuries. The "normative core" of classical liberalism is the idea that laissez-faire economics will bring about a spontaneous order or invisible hand that benefits the society, though it does not necessarily oppose the state's provision of some basic public goods with what constitutes public goods being seen as very limited. The qualification classical was applied retroactively to distinguish it from more recent, 20th-century conceptions of liberalism and its related movements, such as social liberalism Classical liberals are suspicious of all but the most minimal government and object to the welfare state.


 

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