.
[quote]Headhunter wrote:
Just look at the sheer demagoguery around Social Security: a program GUARANTEED to bankrupt us, yet when solutions are proposed: “You want old people to eat catfood! They want to take away your check!!” Pure evil.[/quote]
Hilarious. Pretty good demagoguery there yourself, Chuckles.
I hope like hell Giuliani is the GOP candidate. He doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell!!!
Giuliani:
PRO gun control
PRO gay rights
PRO choice on abortion
How will that play with the GOP base?
He’s a cross-dresser and an adulterer. He’s been married three times, once to his cousin. He has some questionable business dealings. How will that play with “values” voters?
The so-called “great” job Giuliani did on 9-11… sure, he did his job. He wasn’t a total screwup, like we’ve seen so often on the GOP side, once they are in office. In comparison to someone like Rumsfeld, Michael Brown, Condi Rice or Bush himself, Giuliani looks like the model of efficiency and competence. Amazing! He’s not a total fucking idiot! Woo-hoo!
None of the presidential candidates in the Republican party seems to be able to mend the growing gap between the Christian Fundamentalists, and the old school Conservatives. This was the GOP’s coalition that allowed them to squeek out narrow wins in 2000 and 2004 and has been ruptured by scandals, corruption, and lack of legislative success. I don’t see anybody on the GOP side who can mend the gap in a hurry.
[quote]Headhunter wrote:
Just look at the sheer demagoguery around Social Security: a program GUARANTEED to bankrupt us[.]
[/quote]
According to the CBO, Social Security will be able to provide its current level of benefits for roughly 40 more years without changes. Thereafter, if benefits are reduced to 75% it will continue to be solvent for the foreseeable future. That hardly qualifies as being “GUARANTEED to bankrupt us.”
Medicare/Medicaid on the other hand are potentially catastrophic liabilities.
Something I don’t understand about the Evangelicals/Christian Right…
Weren’t they supposed to be “easily galvanized” to come out in large numbers to defeat Bill Clinton in his second Term?
What happened?
Mufasa
[quote]Mufasa wrote:
Something I don’t understand about the Evangelicals/Christian Right…
Weren’t they supposed to be “easily galvanized” to come out in large numbers to defeat Bill Clinton in his second Term?
What happened?[/quote]
What happened in November 2006? If the Christian Right shows up to vote in massive numbers, Republicans can win by a slim margin.
Think Christian fundamentalists will turn out in massive numbers for a Mormon (Romney) or a New York liberal (Giuliani)?
Think traditional conservatives will turn out in massive numbers for another Republican candidate who talks to God instead of his Secretary of State?
That is the GOP’s plight for 2008. There is nobody who can bridge that rift in the party, as far as I can tell.
Brad:
Interesting. So…
The numbers are not large enough to overcome a disgruntled electorate AND the “typical” Dem base?
(Sounds like the GOP needs “The Gipper”, Reagan…)
Mufasa
By the way, Guys…
You ALL know that 18 months is AN ETERNITY in the Political Process, with tides and fortunes that can change overnight.
Hillary is by NO MEANS an “automatic”; no one is. It’s just interesting to analyze her chances over the next few months.
(By the way; she was on National News last night, doing a “sit down” interview with Katie Couric. She’s not waiting for ANYONE, guys…)
Mufasa
[quote]Brad61 wrote:
…What happened in November 2006? If the Christian Right shows up to vote in massive numbers, Republicans can win by a slim margin.
…[/quote]
Wasn’t 2006 the first congressional Democratic “win” since 1992?
I think you are giving too much credit to the Christian Right. I wish people would stop doing that.
2006 was about the war in Iraq. Nothing else.
[quote]Mufasa wrote:
By the way, Guys…
(By the way; she was on National News last night, doing a “sit down” interview with Katie Couric. She’s not waiting for ANYONE, guys…)
Mufasa[/quote]
Now, if she sat on Katie Courics face; that would be worth watching.
[quote]pat36 wrote:
Mufasa wrote:
By the way, Guys…
(By the way; she was on National News last night, doing a “sit down” interview with Katie Couric. She’s not waiting for ANYONE, guys…)
Mufasa
Now, if she sat on Katie Courics face; that would be worth watching.
[/quote]
Hey, its bad enough to know what she looks like without imagining that…
[quote]Headhunter wrote:
pat36 wrote:
Mufasa wrote:
By the way, Guys…
(By the way; she was on National News last night, doing a “sit down” interview with Katie Couric. She’s not waiting for ANYONE, guys…)
Mufasa
Now, if she sat on Katie Courics face; that would be worth watching.
Hey, its bad enough to know what she looks like without imagining that…
[/quote]
No kidding!!! Come on pat!!!
JeffR
Hillary not only lacks charisma and likeability, she?s more gaffe prone than most people seem to realize. For example, back in March she suggested that the illegal immigration bill in the House, ?would literally criminalize the Good Samaritan and probably even Jesus himself.?
Then there were her wacky comments about school vouchers back in February:
?First family that comes and says ?I want to send my daughter to St. Peter?s Roman Catholic School? and you say ?Great, wonderful school, here?s your voucher,?? Clinton said. ?Next parent that comes and says, ?I want to send my child to the school of the Church of the White Supremacist …? The parent says, ?The way that I read Genesis, Cain was marked, therefore I believe in white supremacy. … You gave it to a Catholic parent, you gave it to a Jewish parent, under the Constitution, you can?t discriminate against me.??
As an adoring, if somewhat puzzled, audience of Bronx activists looked on, Clinton added, ?So what if the next parent comes and says, ?I want to send my child to the School of the Jihad? … I won?t stand for it.?
Criminalizing Jesus? Cain and the Church of the White Supremacist? The School of Jihad? What?!? You put this woman in front of a camera for a year, in a presidential campaign, where every word the candidate utters is scrutinized like the Zapruder tape and she?ll give plenty of ammunition to her opponent.
— anonymous
As a liberal leaning voter, Hillary scares me–but I can’t put my finger on why. Probably because I viewed her, in light, as First Lady in Chief back in the 90s.
Does anyone remember all the jokes made as Pres. Clinton’s expense that Hillary–often referred to as Billary–was the one with all the power in the White House? If this was true does it help or hurt her current campaign? All in all, I can’t see that 8 years of Clinton can hurt the US more than Bush’s 8 years. Actually, I think 8 years with a Clinton should get us back ot the porsperous 90s. Just a thought.
[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
Actually, I think 8 years with a Clinton should get us back ot the porsperous 90s. Just a thought.[/quote]
LIFTICVS,
You seriously are giving the POTUS way too much credit w/r/t his role in the economy. Sure the office of the president plays a part, but I think in the overall picture, it’s a rather small part.
I love the romantic view some folks have of Bubba and the economy in the 90’s. Like he was handed a shitty economy, polished it up into a nice shiny winner, and handed it off to GW, only for GW to mess it all up.
Good grief.
[quote]bigflamer wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
Actually, I think 8 years with a Clinton should get us back ot the porsperous 90s. Just a thought.
LIFTICVS,
You seriously are giving the POTUS way too much credit w/r/t his role in the economy. Sure the office of the president plays a part, but I think in the overall picture, it’s a rather small part.
I love the romantic view some folks have of Bubba and the economy in the 90’s. Like he was handed a shitty economy, polished it up into a nice shiny winner, and handed it off to GW, only for GW to mess it all up.
Good grief.
[/quote]
I sure as hell felt safer when the wars we were engaged in were a little more secret. Come on, if the office of POTUS doesn’t mean anything then why do so many pundits spend so many hours analyzing it and the differences between them?
While the power of the presidency may be over romanticized it still weilds power with respect to the military and thus economic security. During the “Clinton Years” we suffered no uncertainty.
Terrorism is not the reason for the ills we have suffered. Terrorism is merely a blip–a itch–if you will–that has turned into a festering wound from incessant meddling and incorrect treatment.
[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
As a liberal leaning voter, Hillary scares me–but I can’t put my finger on why. Probably because I viewed her, in light, as First Lady in Chief back in the 90s.
Does anyone remember all the jokes made as Pres. Clinton’s expense that Hillary–often referred to as Billary–was the one with all the power in the White House? If this was true does it help or hurt her current campaign? All in all, I can’t see that 8 years of Clinton can hurt the US more than Bush’s 8 years. Actually, I think 8 years with a Clinton should get us back ot the porsperous 90s. Just a thought.[/quote]
She is scary because she is a power freak! Recall that Bill gave her the task to reform healthcare. And the first thing she did was form a committee without any of the major players currently in healthcare and did not allow open discussion about her new healthcare reform plan. And once the plan came out it was crazy; putting doctors in jail for treating patients outside the plan for cash, etc…
Hillary is scary because she has a serious socialistic bent and she will not stop until she can control everyone and everything. Be afraid; be very afraid if she gets in the White House.
[quote]Lorisco wrote:
Recall that Bill gave her the task to reform healthcare. And the first thing she did was form a committee without any of the major players currently in healthcare and did not allow open discussion about her new healthcare reform plan. And once the plan came out it was crazy; putting doctors in jail for treating patients outside the plan for cash, etc… [/quote]
Laura Bush (“Pickles”) was appointed to be in charge of the Street Gang Task Force.
How’s that going for her?
Pickles?
Do some people actually call Cute Little Laura Bush that?
LOL!
Mufasa
[quote]bigflamer wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
Actually, I think 8 years with a Clinton should get us back ot the porsperous 90s. Just a thought.
LIFTICVS,
You seriously are giving the POTUS way too much credit w/r/t his role in the economy. Sure the office of the president plays a part, but I think in the overall picture, it’s a rather small part.
I love the romantic view some folks have of Bubba and the economy in the 90’s. Like he was handed a shitty economy, polished it up into a nice shiny winner, and handed it off to GW, only for GW to mess it all up.
Good grief.
[/quote]
Clinton came in with an economy on the upswing and left with it on the downswing.
Unfortunately too much of the good times during his admin was due to the stock market bubble and overexuberance.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
Clinton came in with an economy on the upswing and left with it on the downswing.
Unfortunately too much of the good times during his admin was due to the stock market bubble and overexuberance.[/quote]
Well Zap, what about this “spectacular” economic boom we are having under the Bush administation?
Where did all the consumer spending come from? Well, it wasn’t from salary increases, because they have actually decreased relative to inflation from 2001 levels:
Hmm… wonder where all this money came from? It’s obviously not from our negative savings rate:
http://money.cnn.com/2005/08/02/news/economy/savings/index.htm
Oh, I know where it came from…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Barrons_shiller_06-20-2005.gif
And what about all those new jobs and that spectacularly low unemployment rate?
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/employment/2004-06-29-jobs_x.htm
A perfect model of economic sustainability if I’ve ever seen one. Throw in another $400 billion military engagement in Iran, and I think we’re set for another economic repeat of Argentina. More tax cuts please…