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http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/14/opinio...ice/index.html
A short (single page) blip from James Carville, Democratic strategist and talking head. Not a lot here that hasn't been heard from other sources, but interesting to hear it from Mr. Carville. Ignore the Republican bashing that this left-handed Limbaugh is paid to do and there are some pretty valid points in what he has to say.
I've always admired James Carville, both for his candor and the fact that Mary Matlin married him.
In the article, he mentioned (and I paraphrase) that the President must change course, fire his top advisors and start over. I agree with this to a point, although he's already lost most of his economic team, replacing everyone won't make any difference if they are hindered by a top-down ideology. That's the surest way to guarantee more of the same.
That is great! I love James Carville, as "idiosyncratic" as he is. I also love the fact that he married a Republican, because that's what I did (although I'm not Democrat--I'm a Democrat-leaning Independent).
It's good when a "family" member points out the elephant in the room. I, too, shudder at the thought of another Texas cowboy president (nothing against Texas, but Perry seems even more opposed to my values than Bush). Time is running out, though, so maybe Obama should heed Carville's advice.
Independents like me need to get louder in our support for Obama. Independents generally don't speak up much because they don't have a polarized ideology, their views are more nuanced and harder to put into a sound bite, kind of like Obama!
I believe President Obama has gone WAY too far in attempting to compromise and find ways to work with people who have no other aim in life other than to destroy him and his Presidency, to gain power themselves. While he is looking for fairness, long term good governance, and trying to chart a course with that in mind, he is dealing with people who will and do obstruct his every effort, and by his compromising with them is disheartening people in his own party.
I kind of agree with James Carville, and especially with this part:
"As I watch the Republican debates, I realize that we are on the brink of a crazy person running our nation. I sit in front of the television and shudder at the thought of one of these creationism-loving, global-warming-denying, immigration-bashing, Social-Security-cutting, clean-air-hating, mortality-fascinated, Wall-Street-protecting Republicans running my country."
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just as an aside, we have friends who have a home very near the Virginia vacation home of James Carville and Mary Matalin and know them well. According to our friends, they are very different from their public "partisan gunslinger" personas, and often agree much more than they disagree, which is comforting. Our friends say that both of them just know how to make the most money out of their partnership, but are really great people in real life......I can't imagine being married to someone whose political views were so opposite to mine, but I guess if we both made a huge amount of money because of it, it would be easier to deal with, hahahaha.
That's why he makes the big bucks. Framing things using imagery which appeals to a fringe audience. Of course he's not the only one, and he does it in an entertaining way, but let's not forget that it's all theatrics and hyperbole.Quote:
Originally Posted by loosechickens
So his advice to the President is:
1. Conduct purges of scapegoats within the Administration.
2. Conduct show trials of scapegoats outside the Administration.
3. Limit communication to authorized party hacks (Not that "over-educated, over-explanatory" CBO Director).
4. Never, ever deviate from the party line.
People pay this guy for advice? Seems like it would be cheaper to check out a copy of “Darkness at Noon”, or “The Gulag Archipelago” from the library.
With over a year to go till the election, I still think that at best the election will be very close. That being the case I give the advantage to Obama simply because it could come down to the lesser of two evils.
I do think that if President Obama makes a few dramatic moves he will win handily. I will concede the Bible Belt to the opposition but this is a large country and for the most part the collective wisdom will not go for the GOP radicalism.
Peace
I'm confused LC. Its comforting to think of opposing celebrity analysts who happen to be married finding middle ground, but not the President of our country? Carville and Matalin are just a less glam, lower profile version of Brad & Angie so the level of cooperation within their relationship is inconsequential to most of us. I would go so far as to say some of us wish them well, but don't really care.Quote:
Originally Posted by loosechickens
The President on the other hand has a relationship with each of us that matters a great deal because it will effect us, our kids, grandkids, etc. He damn sure better compromise and better start doing a lot more of it. I hate to use phrases like "in typical liberal fashion...", but you're driving me to it by picking the rhetoric out of Carville's article and ignoring the substance. There are apparently a LOT of people in this country that feel the President needs to get off his butt, climb down off that very high horse he's been riding and get something done. Mr. Carville offered some interesting thoughts in his article, even if they were completely framed in hyperbole. It might do the President (and therefore the rest of us) some good to think it over.
I'm sorry, Gregg.....I really have to disagree. I think that if there is one thing this President HAS done, it's been to try to bring all voices to the table, with the expectation that everybody would have to give some to arrive at some solutions. But the Republicans have pretty much been totally unwilling to compromise, and have shown themselves willing to crash the whole economy to protect even the richest from paying any more taxes, while expecting the poor to suffer more, and the economy to sink even further while they protected those corporations' every tax break. People such as Mitch McConnell have said publicly that their primary mission is to make sure that President Obama is a one term President, so they have ruthlessly opposed even things that not too many months ago, they supported, and in some cases even originated, just to make sure of that goal.
Nope.....only in the past week or so has the President more or less been on ANY kind of a "high horse", as he's tried to show the ?American people just what is going on. There can't be much compromise happening when only the President and the Democrats are doing any compromising. Even the debt ceiling bill, the Dems caved on, giving the Republicans pretty close to 100% of what they wanted, because in the end, somebody had to blink to keep the economy from going over the cliff.
Today's Republicans are not the Republicans of even a few decades ago. This group really would prefer to destroy the Federal government, although I think many of them would be really surprised at the chaos were they to achieve their aims.
I wasn't making any comparison between the Carville-Matalins and the President, only making a comment that friends who know them well say that much of their differences are part of a "persona" that each of them adopts, as hired "gunslingers", and that they are kind of laughing all the way to the bank. Is Carville a Democrate and Matalin a Republican? Of course, but those personas are mostly for public consumption, and both of them in real life are much more moderate and closer together than the parts they play in the public sector. I just thought that was interesting. But nothing was meant in any sort of comparison to the main subject under discussion, which was that this President has some real problems, and needs to address them if he expects to win re-election.
If you think that this President has been "on his high horse" and somehow hasn't BEEN trying hard to "get something done", then we'll just have to agree to disagree, I guess.
It's going to be an interesting year ahead....sometimes I have to fight my urge to just insulate and isolate and come up out of my hole on voting day, cast my vote, and then see what happens. Because the process of getting to that point is going to be traumatic, I'm afraid. Every time I think this country cannot be more divided without actually ending up in civil war, the polarity ratchets up a notch. Scary.
Well LC, we've made it this far by agreeing to disagree. :) There actually is one very important point that I will readily concede. The Republicans in Washington, the so called conservatives, have for the most part become assholes. I have never had a party affiliation, but am completely disenfranchised by the Republicans now because of their obstructionist ways. That is simply my view, there are others in the conservative ranks that applaud the hard line stand that has been taken, but it ain't workin' for me.
I actually do give Mr. Obama credit where credit's due for attempts to compromise. I do not think he and his administration have us on a good path. Economically speaking I am diametrically opposed to most of his policy and I don't think he has the what it takes to propose what its really going to take to fix this country. I am fully aware that the Republicans will likely work to shoot down any proposals he makes, but we at least need to start getting some REAL ideas on the table. What we really need is someone with the guts to tell our country that we are in serious trouble and that its going to hurt for a while to get out of it. There are very few on either side of the aisle with that kind of fortitude.
BTW, Mr. Obama did propose a jobs bill. I haven't read the whole thing, but even I'm opposed to what I have seen so far. More of the same trying to spend our way out of trouble in ways that are destined to produce little, if any, long term benefit. IMO, that's not the kind of action we need any more.
No problem, Gregg......disagreeing with the President's policies is both reasonable and to be expected from those who do not share his particular vision as to which direction we should be traveling. I only reacted to the idea that somehow, he was on a "high horse" and making no efforts toward compromise, where most Democrats would say that he's done nothing BUT compromise, often far, far more than even reasonable people in his party think reasonable.
I agree that this country is in a huge mess....heck, the entire world economy is in a mess, with a hugely unsustainable model that depends on constant growth in a world with dimishing resources and ever increasing pollution. And with the incredible drumbeat of devisiveness that has been fanned by those with money and power to be gained by fanning those flames of difference rather than looking for ways to find common ground, I really do not have a lot of faith in how we're going to do, no matter what.
What do you think would be the best path for the President? Given what actual power he has, and that does not involve Congress, which is locked in gridlock at the moment, with the Republicans absolutely determined not to give an inch, so that they can bring down his Presidency, so useless to him as a cooperator in actually solving problems.....the old, "burn the village down to save it" mentality, to me. If you were advising him, what would be your advice?
The Democrats say he is selling out to big business and the polluters.....the Republicans try to paint him as a socialist who is trying to take over the country and turn it into a Marxist state......my feeling is that if both sides are against his policies, he's probably right in the "sweet zone".... ;-)
This is kind of what I mean, Gregg, about feeling as though the President has bent over backwards trying to find common ground, and trying to accomodate Republican viewpoints as well as Democratic ones. Yet, to hear conservatives tell it, Obama is all about raising taxes, and anti-business.....go figure. From www.americablog.com
"All told, the Recovery Act included $243 billion worth of tax cuts through 2012.
Nearly two years after signing his first big tax cut bill into law, President Obama completely outdid himself by signing the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010, commonly known as the December 2010 tax deal. The biggest element of the December deal was the extension, for two additional years, of all the Bush tax cuts and alternative minimum tax relief, at a two-year combined cost of more than $400 billion.
In addition, the deal extended a variety of business tax cuts and incentives, which reduced revenues by some $150 billion, and it cut the estate tax—a tax paid by only a very few super-wealthy, massive estates—by $65 billion. The December tax bill also cut the payroll tax paid by employees by 2 percentage points, delivering more than $110 billion in tax cuts to working Americans.
Put it all together, and in one fell swoop, President Obama cut taxes by $654 billion in 2011 and 2012 alone. In other words, with this bill President Obama cut taxes by more, in raw dollar amounts, in just half of his term than George W. Bush did over his full first term.
With the huge Recovery Act tax cuts and the enormous December 2010 tax cuts combined, President Obama has already signed into law tax cuts amounting to more than $900 billion from 2009 through 2012. Even after accounting for legislation that the president signed that increased revenue during that period, President Obama has cut taxes by more than $850 billion in his first term, or approximately 1.5 percent of GDP.
Just recently, President Obama proposed another $250 billion in tax cuts designed to spur job creation, mostly in the form of additional cuts to the payroll tax. In fact, as the Citizens for Tax Justice noted, President Obama’s proposed payroll tax cuts are essentially equal in size to the total cost of the extended Bush tax cuts for 2012. If Congress passes this next set of Obama tax cuts, his total will rise to well more than $1.1 trillion, or nearly 2 percent of GDP—close to double the size of the tax cuts in President Bush’s first term."
James Carville is a political has-been and now just another talking head. I can't believe anyone takes him seriously.
PS: The only two presidents to lose reelection in my l lifetime were uncharismatic, weak, and poor campaigners who ran against more charismatic opponents. Obama is none of the above.
He will win in a cake walk.
Yes most of the job bill was tax cuts. I made a post to "personal finance" about this.Quote:
Just recently, President Obama proposed another $250 billion in tax cuts designed to spur job creation
"High horse?" Is this the new Republican-approved word for "uppity," as some suggest their "arrogant" characterization is? Good God, if he were any more humble, he'd be groveling on his belly. For those of us who wish he'd channel FDR, his "bully pulpit" seems more like a game of "Mother, may I."
Remember "I'm the decider?" Real humble, that one.
I haven't heard "uppity" since watching Gone With the Wind, but whatever floats your boat. IMO our President appeared extremely arrogant during his first year in office, like the newest (honorary) member of the jet set spreading his wings. That has since been tempered quite a bit. Approval ratings hovering around 40% will do that. Even so, if you listen to his speeches you hear about 20 "I"s for every "we". That used to sound arrogant, now it might just be that no one is standing with the President anymore.Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
That's the real question now, isn't it? I still have the opinion that it is less about how much we are spending and more about what we are spending it on. If you want to talk about cuts there are a few that make sense to me. I'm not an isolationist by any means, but there's a hundred billion or so in the foreign aid budget that seems to carry little benefit. Cut the military back to defending OUR shores rather than everyone else's and we could probably lop off another quarter trillion. Quit subsidizing industries. Period. If we're going to be capitalists there is no such thing as too big to fail.Quote:
Originally Posted by loosechickens
I've said it a hundred times, but regarding what we spend money on its still guns and butter. Our transportation infrastructure is crumbling. We are overly dependent on foreign oil. The electrical grid is extremely vulnerable. Our public education system is second rate at best. Money spent to develop any or all of those will pay dividends for generations to come. We need to make investments in the future, not bailouts for today. Investing in roads, bridges and rail systems will help keep us competitive. Investing in nuclear, solar, wind, clean coal and natural gas along with developing better delivery systems for the power will help keep us secure. Educating our youth will keep us viable. I do not know how many millions of job would be created with such a program, but would guess several. And none of them would be minimum wage jobs.
Saying that is easier than the President actually selling the idea. The benefits would have to be obvious enough and immediate enough to make any opposition appear insane to oppose it. Work with leading Republicans. Have a closed door and say "this is what I want to do and I will share the credit all the way". To be effective the President will have to do an end around on the Tea Party. Beat them to the punch. Start everyone talking about how much money will be coming in to the coffers if we create 10 million great jobs instead of 2 million crappy ones. It's a politicians wet dream so how hard can it be to get the ball rolling?
I don't think we're very far apart on the issues, Gregg....I agree with most of what you are saying. The difference lies, I think, in the fact that I think that is pretty much EXACTLY the direction that President Obama has been trying to move us, yet you seem way less than pleased with him and are not a supporter.
He has been slower than I would like to get us unentangled in Iraq and Afghanistan, but I also understand that wars are much easier entered then they are to extricate oneself.
From what you said above, I'm surprised that you are not an Obama supporter, because that is surely not the prevailing Republican outlook, and is far closer to the vision of the future espoused by this President. You may be closer to being a moderate Democrat/moderate Republican, which is the centrist position where I see this President, than you realize.
thanks for the thoughtful post.....lots of good meat there.
I think there are more than just a few of us in the US that are disenfranchised from the parties. I lean conservative for fiscal reasons, but tend to be quite liberal on social issues. I've seen too many programs initiated by the Democrats that don't have an ending. It's not so much that the idea they propose isn't valid, or even needed, its that Democratic programs have tended to stretch to perpetuity by design. They also tend to be band-aids rather than cures. The focus tends to be on helping the individual who was injured/oppressed/whatever rather than stopping the forces that caused the injury. I'm all for helping anyone who needs a hand, but we need to zoom out for a while and look at our bigger pictures to find real solutions. Like I said above, IMO we are just spending money on the wrong things.
Now please don't make the leap from that and assume I'm saying the Republicans are doing any better. They're not, but their proposals have tended to be finite in duration a little more often and smaller in scope overall. It is truly a case of the lesser of the evils for me.
No Child Left Behind doesn't seem to have an end to it. Proposed by GW (for which I could boot him in the behind), supposedly hated by liberals, why is this thing still around? Why hasn't the President dumped it?Quote:
Originally Posted by Gregg
I wanted to comment on a small portion of your comments. I recently went on two road trips and I saw construction everywhere of roads and bridges. I was actually quite surprised at how much construction was going on in especially in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland and NY.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gregg
also, there is a lot of power development going on in NY. The whole marcellus shale/hydrofracking controversy along with the development of windmill farms is moving along. Also, there is a new streamlined process for Nuclear power plants and several actually have the possibility of being started in the next few years after a very long moratorium on new plant building.
"President Obama today said that safe, new nuclear power plants are a “necessity” as he announced more than $8 billion in federal loan guarantees to build the first nuclear power plant in three decades. "
that is from a speech in Feb 2010
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics...ry-investment/
and this one from March 2011 "Nuclear energy has been handed a big role in meeting a pledge from President Barack Obama that the country will generate 80pc of its electricity from clean energy sources by 2035."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...-stations.html
I honestly think one of the problems we are having is the political spin being put on everything by the media and the information that circulates via e-mail and even verbally about perceptions of what is going on, not what is really going on. The headlines today were more about whether or not Obama's tax plan constituted class warfare or not rather than exactly what the new taxes meant to individuals and corporations. But factual news is becoming a thing of the past in this age of sensational headlines.
I wanted to add that a big project I saw in DC was the new Dulles metro rail project. They are extending the metro out to Dulles airport, a huge project with new stations being built along the way. The total when complete will be about 23 miles of new rail. It will enable many people to leave their cars home, a great goal.
9/19/2010Quote:
Originally Posted by Iris lily
"President Barack Obama is expected on Friday to announce the details of what the White House calla "relief from key provisions of No Child Left Behind."
Some lawmakers have said it would be a mistake for the administration to bypass Congress. This is a particularly sore spot for Republicans, who already bristle at what they see as the executive branch's broader attempts to sidestep their authority on a number of issues by issuing federal regulations.
"It's not just the specifics that worry the Republicans, it's the idea that he doesn't have the authority to change the law," said Michael Petrilli of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a Washington-based education organization."
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/09/1...r-changes.html
That may be good new about No Child Left Behind if the "relief" is reasonable. I won't say any more, I'd just like Congress to repeal that.Quote:
Originally Posted by flowerseverywhere
Me too. I understand it was intended to be a sinecure for one of the Bush boys--the one who sells standardized tests for a living. Kind of a "no Bush left behind" thing. :~)
I'm very happy to know that there is activity, at least in some areas. What I had in mind is something exponentially larger in scope. Somewhat along the lines of the CCC back in the 30's. Literally putting millions of people to work with new projects. It would have to be federally administered, or at least under the federal umbrella, simply because of the scope. Individual states don't have the resources to take it on.Quote:
Originally Posted by flowerseverywhere
A few million in highway repairs or a few billion in new nuke plants won't get us there. I've seen estimates on the various parts of the program floating around for years. To build a smart grid credible estimates range from $1 or $2 trillion up to $8 trillion. Building a network of new nuke plants along with retrofitting existing plants with control systems to match the new could easily be $1 trillion. I really haven't seen overall estimates to bring our rail system up to speed, but you've got to guess that between laying new track, building new terminals and bridges and fixing up all the old stuff it wouldn't be that hard to spend a trillion bucks. There are estimates that say half of the highway bridges in the county need work and a quarter of them are not even safe any more. As you observed back east, there is some work going on around me, but no where near that estimated level so the total of that work nationally would probably rival the smart grid for cost.
And all that doesn't even touch on developing domestic natural gas, clean coal, significant solar and wind, etc. What about urban renewal? Increased band width, fiber optic lines and all the other information grid components? There is no shortage of areas that need attention and probably no limit to what it would cost to fix or build everything. I'm not slamming Mr. Obama for doing nothing, I'm more fed up with the lack of vision in Washington overall. Even worse, anyone with vision and the guts to talk about all of this would be squashed by the system there. To complete the full circle, maybe Congress is the very first thing we need to fix so we can get started on the rest.
All these things are what President Obama and the democrats have been talking about. All of them. But honestly, if he/democrats were to put this up in congress for debate/vote, how would the republicans react? How do you think they would react, Gregg? How do you think the mainstream republicans, a shrinking minority, would react? How would the tea party republicans react?Quote:
Originally Posted by Gregg
I'm pretty sure they would condemn it and vote it down, knocking each other over to get in front of a camera to spin just why they voted against job creation. Of course, we know they would rather sell their grandmother down the river than do anything at all that would help the economy and the people, cause, remember, job one is to get President Obama out of office. Right now, they would vote against apple pie and motherhood if they thought it would get rid of him.
The Tea Part wants to take us back to 18th or 17th century. No cars or trucks back than. No electricity so no need for power plants we also did not have 340 million citizens than.
I thought I saw something like that on the Green Party platform.Quote:
Originally Posted by freein05
wouldn't it be wonderful? I love the old CCC bridges and walls in the national parks and could see many projects that could enhance our countries beauty, safety and infrastructure.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gregg
I can't imagine that there is a chance one dollar would be appropriated to this project by our present congress.
and IrisLilly, did you see the No child left behind news?
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics...,7709150.story
it involves states being allowed to apply for waivers to the program.
"Obama said he has no other choice after his team has been working with Congress for several months to try to remedy the problems without success.
“Congress has not been able to fix these flaws so far,” Obama said, “so I will.” "
I am annoyed that the Republicans don't get back to basics of Republican ideals and kill the hell out of the Education Department and any such initiatives.Quote:
Originally Posted by flowerseverywhere
Quote:
Originally Posted by LDAHL
Thank goodness that a conservative finally admits that the tea party has as much relevance as the green party. Please let the lamestream media know so they'll stop all coverage of the tp! Particularly NPR and CNN which both feature stories on the tp every single freakin day. BTW, when WAS the last time you saw even a passing mention of the greens anywhere? I think your post was the first mention of the greens I have seen in a decade. Ah, good times, good times when the greens actually had about a month of breathless coverage from the msm.
I think the tea party, which seems to be not so much a party in the conventional sense but a loose collection of groups reacting in dismay to this latest spurt in the power of government, is at this point at least as important to the Left as the Right.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosebud
the Left requires villains for its narrative, and the tea party fits that bill. With no central platform you can pick and choose which person speaking in their name provides the most outrage. Look at how the image their enemies have test-marketed have changed over the years, from "astroturf" corporate shills, to the violently racist-fascist fantasies following the Giffords shooting to today's know-nothing obstructionists image the President is selling with his new Harry Truman schtick. If the tea part didn't exist, it would have been necessary to invent it. That's why NPR/CNN will keep up their villain with a thousand faces coverage.
The tea party is a loose coalition of regional groups dedicated to a few very specific principles and represent a very large percentage of American citizens. I hope we never get to the point where certain liberals or liberal groups get to decide who has a voice and who doesn't.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosebud
Already, the coverage most of the "lamestream media" provides the movement is negative. I'd certainly rather that all coverage be negative with the opportunity for rebuttal than to forbid discussion at all.
On a side note, I'm reminded of my irritation that liberals have taken and usurped the term "liberal" to such a degree that classical liberals such as myself and the vast majority of the tea party can no longer use the term. A classical liberal would never, ever suggest that the media be silenced on any subject. From now on, I'll simply refer to you guys as progressives. I hope you'll understand.
I am not sure why people have to assign such labels to everyone and especially with such negativity.
Quote:
Originally Posted by alan
Nice attempt to spin my comment into the implication that I, a typical non-classical liberal, wish to take away somebody's freedom. Very clever the way you just slipped that in there.
Here's the deal. Non-Classical Liberals, Progressives, whatever you want to call us: We're in favor of the First Amendment, okay, got that? We like it very much. ME criticizing a news organization for covering the tea party ad nauseum or in my view, without historical and political context or without the balance of other points of view has nothing to do with eliminating anyone's "voice" or shutting down any media outlet. I have the right to criticize the TP, journalists and news organizations: That is MY first amendment right.
Here in a nutshell is my criticism of media coverage of the TP:
1. The media portrayed the TP as solely a grassroots, populist movement and ignored the sponsorship of wealthy and powerful movement conservative players. There is a huge element of astroturfing in the TP movement.
2. The media portrayed the TP as a separate and distinct political movement from the GOP and movement conservatism, failing to analyze the TP in historical and political context. In fact a recent study indicates that 80% of TP members are registered Republican and were so registered at the birth of the TP. Studies have also shown that they do hold, compared to other groups, views that would be deemed extreme by the majority of folks in the US. They also show, as a group, more racial animus towards non-white people than other groups in general.
So, if what you are saying is correct, and the media showed them in a bad light, it's only because there are some extreme folks in the mix. The racism and hatred and just plain craziness in some quarters on the right were not invented by the media. They exist.
IMHO, the TP is simply a re-branding effort by the GOP, and to a great extent, it worked. So, good for the GOP, they did something smart.
3. The media did not always balance TP claims with factual analysis by experts. Instead, we were subjected to, for example, the ridiculous "death panel" issue, where an outright false claim was reported by the media and then they would put on, sometimes, some partisan on the other side sputtering about the demogoguery of the TP. You did not have clear, dispassionate, substantive analysis and reportage about the health care bill. So, this helped the TP and gave them more power to shape the debate because people were confused.
Anyway, of course I will concede the point that it is important to cover the tea party to the extent that it represents the Republican base, and obviously the Republican base is a sizable minority, just as the Democratic base is.
You can call me progressive, non-classical liberal, liberal, a die-hard Democrat, and Obamabot, a librul, a socialist. I don't care. Here's where you don't go:
Marxist, Leninist, communist, fascist, Nazi, #)#@), DemocRAT, thug, baby-killer, Feminazi, #(#(@ liberal, un-American, unPatriotic, not a "real" American, terrorist lover, terrorist sympathizer, histrionic woman, parasite (per Ayn Rand, sheesh, let's not get started on her)...
BTW, historical context of the term "conservatism" suggests that modern movement conservatives are really no longer conservatives, but radicals because they want to get rid of a lot of stuff that's been around for a long time, e.g. social security. But, I'll give you a pass on that one.
A friend sent this link to me today.....it's long, it's complicated, but if we're wandering into the weeds of "who the liberals are" and "who the Republicans of today are", etc., it is useful. Have at it.
http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-all...ult/1314907779
the author of this piece is described by James Fallows in Atlantic as:
"....... is by a recently retired Congressional staffer named Mike Lofgren. Lofgren's name is barely known to the general public, but among people who have covered or worked in the national-security field, he is a familiar and highly esteemed figure. He spent 28 years as a Congressional staffer, mainly on budget matters, mainly in the defense-and-security realm, and mainly for Republican legislators."
An interesting look from inside looking out, by someone right in the middle of the huge changes that have come in the past thirty years in the Republican Party. Certainly the things he discusses are why I am no longer a Republican, and he illustrates very well how the very far right fringes have become somehow the "mainstream" of the Republican Party.
Wow.....good heavens! Could it be that even Fox News is beginning to be a bit aghast at where the hard right is taking the country? I wouldn't have believed this.....
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_980850.html
"Fox News CEO Roger Ailes has given one of his typically candid interviews to Newsweek. The interview was published Monday.
For a man who first made his name as a media guru for Richard Nixon, Ailes is often surprisingly forthcoming about Fox News and his opinions. In previous interviews, he has called NPR executives "Nazis" (he later apologized), said he didn't mind if people thought Glenn Beck was fired from the channel, and admitted that he wants both Bill and Hillary Clinton to join Fox News.
Behind the scenes, Ailes is reported to have clashed with Sarah Palin and told Beck to cool his more controversial rhetoric.
Monday's interview offered up more of Ailes' unvarnished opinions about his network and his employees. He made a big admission to Newsweek, saying that he has made a "course correction" at Fox News, veering it away from the hard-right line it took in the earlier days of the Obama administration. (Ailes offered a preview of this strategy in January, when he told Russell Simmons that he had ordered his anchors and pundits to "tone it down" in the wake of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting.) Beck's departure, as well as a more nuanced approach to his most famous pundit, Sarah Palin, have been part of that strategy, Ailes said.
He also spoke openly about many of his anchors, saying that Bill O'Reilly "hates" Sean Hannity because he's jealous of his radio success (and thus confirming years of rumors about the animosity between the two).
Ailes also called Hannity "predictable" and said that he sometimes has to have a word with Shepard Smith when Smith says things that may not go over well with the Fox News crowd. (He didn't say whether he was referring to Smith's seemingly pro-union comments about the Wisconsin protests, or his saying that the killing of Osama bin Laden was illegal and that American foreign policy is on a dangerous path.)
Read the full interview, including news about Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney and Rick Perry's relationship with Ailes, here. "
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I see, after posting this, that the link on the last word "here" doesn't work, so to see the whole article, you'll have to go to the link posted and click on the "here" from there....sorry.......
Well, you did say you wished the media would stop all coverage of the Tea Party.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosebud
And that's an entirely different thought than the one I commented on.Quote:
Here's the deal. Non-Classical Liberals, Progressives, whatever you want to call us: We're in favor of the First Amendment, okay, got that? We like it very much. ME criticizing a news organization for covering the tea party ad nauseum or in my view, without historical and political context or without the balance of other points of view has nothing to do with eliminating anyone's "voice" or shutting down any media outlet. I have the right to criticize the TP, journalists and news organizations: That is MY first amendment right.
Yes, the populist movement did gain the sponsorship of wealthy and powerful people. That doesn't take away from it's populist message.Quote:
1. The media portrayed the TP as solely a grassroots, populist movement and ignored the sponsorship of wealthy and powerful movement conservative players. There is a huge element of astroturfing in the TP movement.
The Tea Party is a separate and distince political movement. It just happens to have a broader appeal to dis-enchanted Republicans than to Democrats. I can't speak for what the majority of folks in the US consider extreme, since there are no examples given. I will challange the "racial animus" part as it's been my experience that race and identity politics have nothing to do with the movement, regardless of how the media and the political left try to frame things.Quote:
2. The media portrayed the TP as a separate and distinct political movement from the GOP and movement conservatism, failing to analyze the TP in historical and political context. In fact a recent study indicates that 80% of TP members are registered Republican and were so registered at the birth of the TP. Studies have also shown that they do hold, compared to other groups, views that would be deemed extreme by the majority of folks in the US. They also show, as a group, more racial animus towards non-white people than other groups in general.
So, if what you are saying is correct, and the media showed them in a bad light, it's only because there are some extreme folks in the mix. The racism and hatred and just plain craziness in some quarters on the right were not invented by the media. They exist.
Where the left and the media have succeeded is in their focus on the fringe elements of the group and linking those attributes to the whole. Then, the non-political only see what the media wants them to see and comes away with a bad impression.
That's because there was truth behind the claims. Any factual analysis by experts would expose the underlying truth that in many cases, care, or lack of care will be decided by government bureaucrats, which could be construed as "death panels", or perhaps "life panels", or even "care panels".Quote:
3. The media did not always balance TP claims with factual analysis by experts. Instead, we were subjected to, for example, the ridiculous "death panel" issue, where an outright false claim was reported by the media and then they would put on, sometimes, some partisan on the other side sputtering about the demogoguery of the TP. You did not have clear, dispassionate, substantive analysis and reportage about the health care bill. So, this helped the TP and gave them more power to shape the debate because people were confused.
As for the health care bill analysis, I don't think you can blame the Tea Party for people's confusion. Our Speaker of the House told us that we had to pass it before we could find out what was in it, and now, all this time later, we still don't know what effect various parts of the bill will have.
Luckily for you, the conservatives on this site do not engage in that sort of name calling. Watch out for some of the progressives though, there are a few who like to speak in terms of "small minded right wingers", "low information voters", etc.Quote:
You can call me progressive, non-classical liberal, liberal, a die-hard Democrat, and Obamabot, a librul, a socialist. I don't care. Here's where you don't go:
Marxist, Leninist, communist, fascist, Nazi, #)#@), DemocRAT, thug, baby-killer, Feminazi, #(#(@ liberal, un-American, unPatriotic, not a "real" American, terrorist lover, terrorist sympathizer, histrionic woman, parasite (per Ayn Rand, sheesh, let's not get started on her)...
I suppose you could look at it that way, but you could just as easily believe that modern movement conservatives recognize the non-conservative aspects of things that have been around for a long time, as well as the realization that those non-conservative "stuff" have the real possibility of placing this country's economy into the same situation Greece is in now. Of course, Greece has the rest of the EU to bail them out. If conservatives don't persevere, when it happens to us, I wonder who'll step forward to save us from ourselves?Quote:
BTW, historical context of the term "conservatism" suggests that modern movement conservatives are really no longer conservatives, but radicals because they want to get rid of a lot of stuff that's been around for a long time, e.g. social security. But, I'll give you a pass on that one.