Bill Clinton's speech

Postby TUfriend » Wed Sep 05, 2012 8:34 pm

I like how he attacked the reblicans' reasoning, whereas the republicans just flat out attacked Obama. He also accused them of not being able to do arithmetic. :lol: What are your thoughts?
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Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Wed Sep 05, 2012 9:34 pm

I think he's trying his best to help set up Hillary for President in 2016 (vastly easier if Obama wins re-election), but otherwise I agree with him.
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Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Thu Sep 06, 2012 5:34 pm

I don't think Hillary will run in 2016, as she would be 69 years old in 2016. And despite Reagan running at 71 in 1980, Hillary might think 69 is a bit too old to run for president, particularly after seeing Bill with brown hair when he entered office in 1993, and white hair when he left in 2001.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Fri Sep 07, 2012 6:21 am

One problem if she runs and wins would be having a woman president after having had a black one, and then instead of all the racist comments we'd endure four to eight years of sexist ones instead and *still* get nothing done - though the GOP would problem continue their stonewalling ways with any Dem president anyway. "I'd" be fine with her being president - she'd make a better one than any serious woman candidate we've had so far and probably better than the last two we've had - but I don't know of the rest of the country is psychologically ready for a woman president yet.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
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Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Fri Sep 07, 2012 9:27 am

Consider that Republicans are in congress because the voters of their districts elect them to the offices they hold. They did not just ride into Washington, kick some Democrat out into the street, and take over the office. Voters want them there to counter the pipe dreams of the Democrats. That's why the Dems lost seven senate seats in the last election.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Fri Sep 07, 2012 10:47 am

Votes also want their congressmen to DO something to help them, yet this Congress has achieved less than any Congress in history - less than half than even the 'do-nothing' Congress President Truman complained of.... even voting about (and failing) a repeal to "Obamacare' something like 33 times!
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Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Sat Sep 08, 2012 1:27 pm

Three times the Republicans in the House passed a budget. The Democrats in the Senate did nothing.

Well, they did vote twice on budgets Obama sent over. One was defeated 99-0, and the other, 97-0.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Sat Sep 08, 2012 1:48 pm

You failed to point out that some of those dissenting votes in the Senate had to have been Republicans. You also fail to point out that perhaps if the bills sent by the House were defeated THAT handily, the House isn't doing its job properly.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
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Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Sun Sep 09, 2012 1:52 pm

Jason, please adjust your glasses. I never said the house sent over a budget; I said Obama sent over two budgets, which were defeated 99-0 and 97-0.

Of course Republicans voted to reject Obama's budgets. When neither of them get a single affirmative vote, wouldn't that be kind of obvious? Hell Obama couldn't get allies like Barbara Boxer, Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid, and Richard Durbin to vote for his budgets.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Sun Sep 09, 2012 2:34 pm

Perhaps you're right about the glasses; somehow the two halves of your statement got melded together in my head. In any case, your two statements do nothing to disprove my contention about the current do-less-than-nothing congress and only reinforces it instead. If you'll adjust your own glasses, you'll see that I did NOT say it was all the Republicans' fault. :big:
Anyway, as I've said before, politics is NOT one of my areas of expertise. Science, history, and religious studies are my major fields of expertise; along with writing and drawing of course. That's enough to keep me busy. Politics are too boring, too complex to follow simple rules (as are politicians themselves, it seems to me), and - to me at least - utterly depressing. But I DO know history. This pattern has happened before; here in the US, in Europe and elsewhere. If we do not change things soon, this country will continue to face ever greater crises until something finally gives and we have either another revolution, economic collapse, another civil war... or, most likely, all of these, within the next few decades and possibly sooner. At the very least, we will lose our number one world power standing just like Britain did before us.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
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Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Sun Sep 09, 2012 8:15 pm

>>>You also fail to point out that perhaps if the bills sent by the House were defeated THAT handily, the House isn't doing its job properly.<<<

Jason, the House Republicans did their jobs. They passed three budgets. It was in the Senate, led by Democrats, that nothing got done. The majority leader, Harry Reid, never allowed them to come up for a vote, and never referred them to a joint committee of house and senate members, for reconciliation.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Sun Sep 09, 2012 9:31 pm

Yes, we already went over that. So? That's not what I said last time.
Last time, I said neither of your two statements conflict with what I said about the less-than-do-nothing Congress.
And the last I heard, the Senate was part of Congress. So just where are we disagreeing?
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Mon Sep 10, 2012 3:07 pm

"Congress" includes both houses, but the Senate is the roadblock. The House is doing something; the Senate has one thumb in its ass, and the other in its mouth, waiting for Harry Reid to yell "Switch!"

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jack Roper » Mon Sep 10, 2012 6:47 pm

Ah Drawscore--always looking at things in black and white aren't you: the evil Democrats and the saintly Republicans. You seem to conveniently forget the debt ceiling debacle of last year, induced by the Tea party freshmen (that led to a downgrade in America's credit rating) and the budget deal called sequestration that was agreed to by both parties after they failed to come up with a budget compromise. Now, of course, Paul Ryan, who voted for the sequestration, is denying that was what he was really voting for.
http://app.mx3.americanprogressaction.o ... 38e45839c7

Here's a good article from Talking Points Memo on the budget conundrum now facing the US, called the fiscal cliff.

Brian Beutler-July 31, 2012, 6:59 AM15315
Republicans have been been clear that they do not regard deep, looming cuts to defense and domestic programs — the enforcement mechanism at the heart of last year’s debt limit agreement — as a reason to compromise with Democrats and put real tax revenues into the mix of cuts and reforms required to reduce deficits over time.

But in recent weeks they’ve taken things a step further. They’ve disavowed the so-called “sequester” altogether and handed full responsibility for its existence to President Obama — despite the fact that an overwhelming majority of them voted to implement it last August.

“It was the president who came up with the sequester because he didn’t want the debt limit to get in the way of his campaign,” said House Speaker John Boehner at his weekly press availability last week. “Now these cuts are looming and he’s nowhere to be found.”

In a private meeting with his conference, Boehner said the sequester exists, “for one reason: because the President of the United States didn’t want to deal with the debt limit again before the presidential election. Because the president didn’t want to be inconvenienced, he came up with the sequester.”

The history here is much different and much more complicated. Boehner himself touched off the debt limit standoff by demanding that Congress match each dollar provided in new borrowing authority with a dollar of cuts to federal spending. President Obama was content to use the debt limit as a forcing mechanism to bring down 10-year deficits, but he wanted a deal that included tax revenue, and one that raised the debt limit enough to prevent the brinksmanship from returning ahead of the election. In the end, the parties were only able to agree on $1 trillion worth of cuts to discretionary spending. Under the Boehner rule that would’ve teed up a new debt limit crisis in the middle of the 2012 election. So leaders of both parties agreed to set up a process that would allow Congress to fast track legislation to reduce the deficit, ideally by at least $1.2 trillion. To make sure members came to agreement, both parties, including Boehner, agreed to include an enforcement mechanism that Republicans and Democrats found equally unappealing.

This ultimately resulted in what we now know as the sequester. But before Congress and the White House settled on this particular configuration, they batted around a bunch of other ideas. Among others, Republicans tried to include partial repeal of the health care law, and Democrats tried to include the expiration of the Bush tax cuts on the wealthy. The sequester facing the country today was the result of a long bipartisan negotiation to avoid last year’s default crisis and prevent one from re-emerging in the chaos of an election year.

Back in November, Boehner accepted partial ownership.

“I would feel bound by it,” he said. “It was part of the agreement. And so either we succeed or we are in the sequester. The sequester is ugly. Why? Because we don’t want anybody to go there. That’s why we have to succeed.”

Now that a bipartisan agreement to avoid “going there” appears out of reach, Republicans are trying to wash their hands of their role in creating the sequester — even ones who voted for the debt limit deal.

For the moment the looming cuts haven’t broken through as a driving issue in a campaign driven largely by more tangible economic and budget issues. But Obama’s taking it upon himself to rebut the charge before key constituencies.

“[T]here are a number of Republicans in Congress who don’t want you to know that most of them voted for these cuts,” Obama told Veterans of Foreign Wars last week. “Now they’re trying to wriggle out of what they agreed to do. Instead of making tough choices to reduce the deficit, they’d rather protect tax cuts for some of the wealthiest Americans, even if it risks big cuts in our military. And I’ve gotta tell you VFW, I disagree. If the choice is between tax cuts that the wealthiest Americans don’t need, and funding our troops that [we] definitely need to keep our country strong, I will stand with our troops every single time.”

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Tue Sep 11, 2012 12:49 pm

Jack, we can go through the internet, and find a shitload of articles, stories, blogs, and tweets that would support our differing points of view.

Drawswcore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jack Roper » Tue Sep 11, 2012 12:55 pm

True up to a point. Separating facts from opinion is a good start when evaluating source material. Opinion is basically not much better than fishwrap, as you so delicately put it. Everybody these days seems to have opinions. They are easy because they don't require substantiation. A prime example of this would be your last comment on the Internet.

Are you too lazy to even bring forth one of those articles?

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Tue Sep 11, 2012 1:17 pm

No, but it has been my experience that if I provide a link, particularly if that link is to a conservative site, it will be scornfully disdained, so I no longer bother.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jack Roper » Tue Sep 11, 2012 1:20 pm

You mean like the scornful disdain you show so many folks on here? Yes, I see that.

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Tue Sep 11, 2012 8:12 pm

Not to the people themselves, but to the links they provide, and to their opinions. There is nothing wrong with disagreement, as long as as it's done without being disagreeable. Many times I've said you were wrong, or otherwise disagreed with you, but I have NEVER personally attacked you.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Tue Sep 11, 2012 8:36 pm

Since we're on the subject of Congress rather than Bill Clinton, here's an article I read today I found very interesting:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/10/opini ... ef=general
The author, Mr. Paul Krugman received his B.A. from Yale University in 1974 and his Ph.D. from MIT in 1977. He has taught at Yale, MIT and Stanford. At MIT he became the Ford International Professor of Economics.
Mr. Krugman is the author or editor of 20 books and more than 200 papers in professional journals and edited volumes. His professional reputation rests largely on work in international trade and finance; he is one of the founders of the "new trade theory," a major rethinking of the theory of international trade. In recognition of that work, in 1991 the American Economic Association awarded him its John Bates Clark medal, a prize given every two years to "that economist under forty who is adjudged to have made a significant contribution to economic knowledge." Mr. Krugman's current academic research is focused on economic and currency crises.
At the same time, Mr. Krugman has written extensively for a broader public audience. Some of his recent articles on economic issues, originally published in Foreign Affairs, Harvard Business Review, Scientific American and other journals, are reprinted in Pop Internationalism and The Accidental Theorist.
Of course, Drawscore undoubtedly thinks he knows better than this guy.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Tue Sep 11, 2012 8:48 pm

You go to college, and get your BS degree, and everyone knows what BS is.

Three more years, and you get an MS degree, and that's just more shit.

Another three years, and you get your PhD. That's piled higher and deeper.

The bottom line, is that there are people like Paul Krugman who are incredibly "book smart," but have all the common sense of a kumquat.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Tue Sep 11, 2012 10:27 pm

Somehow I knew Drawscore would simply blow Krugman off. :roll:
Like Drawscore's heroes aren't a bunch of self-centered zeroes.
Only proves once again that Drawscore's Objectivity Quotient is pretty close to zero.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Wed Sep 12, 2012 7:11 pm

Objectivity is subjective. It all depends on whether you look through conservative colored glasses, or liberal colored glasses.

As for Paul Krugman, I think it is just amazing that he can have so much formal education, and still be as dumb as a stump.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Wed Sep 12, 2012 9:15 pm

drawscore wrote:Objectivity is subjective. It all depends on whether you look through conservative colored glasses, or liberal colored glasses.
Drawscore

Figures a non-objective fellow like you would say that. :roll:
A truly objective person looks through neither kind of colored glasses. I don't claim I am perfect at this (some biases are almost unavoidable) but I think I manage fairly well to be 'fair and balanced'. But then, I live in what is probably the most moderate (and thus fair and balanced) state in the country.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Thu Sep 13, 2012 1:52 pm

I have found that those who claim to be the most "moderate," are, more often than not, either far left, or far right.

Drawscore

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby Jason Toddman » Thu Sep 13, 2012 2:47 pm

drawscore wrote:I have found that those who claim to be the most "moderate," are, more often than not, either far left, or far right.

Drawscore

This is because you've claimed to be a centrist yourself. :big:
But then, as I've said, you're not the most objective person on this site by a long shot. If anything, you're about the least objective. I've seen others less objective than you are, but these people are usually labelled 'trolls'.
Also, I tend to be suspicious of homilies like that; especially absolutisms. Conservatives LOVE absolutisms!
Yes, that itself was an absolutism. So sue me! :P
"I have found that those who claim to be the most "moderate," are, more often than not, either far left, or far right." That may be (and probably is) true of professional politicians. For ordinary folk though, I think that's just a crock of s**t!!!
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Bill Clinton's speech

Postby drawscore » Thu Sep 13, 2012 11:26 pm

>>>This is because you've claimed to be a centrist yourself.<<<

Actually, no. I've made no secret of the fact I am conservative, and with that admission, it should be apparent that I am not objective. I tend to have a conservative view of politics.

Drawscore