The biggest scandal in 50 years, right before your eyes
If you start naming the biggest political scandals of the past 50 years, Watergate and Bill Clinton’s “I did not have sex with that woman” mistake would have to be included. So would Ronald Reagan’s decision to secretly trade arms for hostages, along with the mass deception and self-deception perpetrated by the Bush administration to get us into Iraq.
However, while presidents Nixon and Clinton were led astray by their weakness for power and sex, neither consciously put the security of the country at risk. Reagan made a serious mistake, but he was at least motivated by sincere concern for the lives of U.S. hostages. The invasion of Iraq is a closer call, but even there, President Bush and his administration weren’t consciously choosing to do damage to our country.
By that standard, the most disturbing political scandal of the past half century is playing out today before our very eyes, to too little notice or comprehension. Marc Thiessen, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld and now a columnist for the Washington Post, lays the plot out there for everyone to see:
“Today, Obama is perfectly willing to go over the fiscal cliff and blame the GOP for the resulting tax increases on the middle class. But when it comes to the debt limit, he does not have that luxury. He can’t default on our debt — the consequences are too catastrophic. So in the end he will cave.
Indeed, he would have caved during the last debt-limit stand-off, in the summer of 2011. According to Bob Woodward, when Obama told his advisers he intended to veto the debt-limit bill the Republican-controlled House had passed, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner told him he couldn’t — that if Republicans didn’t give in, he had no choice but to sign their bill. “You can’t veto,” Geithner reportedly told Obama, because the consequences “would be indelible, incurable. It would last for generations.”
Republicans had Obama cornered and didn’t know it — so they let him off the hook. When the next debt-limit increase comes in February, they will know better. The president’s current negotiating leverage dissipates as soon as we go over the fiscal cliff. Come February, the tables will be turned — and Republicans will hold all the cards in the debt-limit negotiations.”
If I may, I would like to offer a pithier but still entirely accurate version of Thiessen’s advice to Republicans*:
That fool Obama cares too much about what happens to this country and its people. That is his fatal weakness. You, on the other hand, don’t care about “catastrophic” consequences that would be “indelible, incurable” and “last for generations.” Your amorality is your strength. Use it to demand what you want, or else.
Maybe it’s just me, but I find the whole idea extraordinary. Since when is the willingness to inflict “indelible, incurable” damage on our country something to be bragged about and used as leverage? Since when is it OK for a major political party to hold a gun to the country’s head, figuratively speaking of course? Has patriotism become so diluted by cynicism that such strategies can now be publicly embraced and advocated?
And of course, it’s not just some former speechwriter advocating this strategy. This is the course that the Washington Republican establishment seems ready to adopt. As Sen. Lindsey Graham told Fox Monday, “In February or March you have to raise the debt ceiling. And I can tell you this, there is a hardening on the Republican side. We’re not going to raise the debt ceiling.”
You’re not? What’s next? “We won’t pay the troops, even if it leaves the nation defenseless, unless you surrender to us on the budget?” How would that be substantively different?
Of course, Republicans have talked themselves into believing that this is all justified. They are so absolutely certain that they are correct about the budget that they are willing to knock the United States to its knees to get their way. It requires an enormous amount of self-righteousness and grandiosity to think that way, but they seem up to the task.
Somehow, it doesn’t seem to have crossed their minds that the U.S. Constitution offers an alternative means of resolving such disputes. It’s called free and open debate. It’s called elections. We just had one, focused largely on the issues at stake here; they spent well over $1 billion trying to sell their viewpoint, and they lost.
Now, having failed to convince the rest of their country of their wisdom, they believe that their desperation gives them the right to impose it under threat of grievous harm?
That isn’t leadership. That isn’t patriotism. It is the act of a petulant, frustrated three-year-old threatening to hold his breath until the country turns blue.
Which, now that I think about it, it may very well do.
– Jay Bookman
* A more risque, profane and metaphorical version of the strategy is available here.
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762 comments Add your comment
GW
December 11th, 2012
7:54 am
Dispicable.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
7:56 am
I dunno. I think what Obama’s skeered of is having the balls not to “shut the country down” or whatever kind of happy apocalyptic horsesh-t framing the beltway Villagers prefer, but, rather, to do what is necessary to tell Congress to — can I say it in this context, please, Jay? I think it certainly applies here — eff off and die, by exercising that option to mint a trillion dollar platinum coin.
Yes, it would be hokey and weird and yes, it would establish Executive powers that the next right wing moron to occupy the White House could conceivably use for evil. It would certainly prompt the GOPers to do their usual “let’s impeach a President in his second term!” dance (he’d never be convicted in the Senate of course.)
C’est le merde, I say.
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
7:56 am
I’m not sure I even understand one tenth of what this “Fiscal Cliff” is about, but it doesn’t have the feel of the dire expectations the GOP say it has. If taxes going up is the worst of it, then I say good. I’ve always believed that it is a duty to your country to pay your taxes. If taxes go up, think of it as being drafted and do your duty.
I also seem to remember that this same GOP fear and drama was being said when President Clinton raised taxes. “The economy will fail, there will be no jobs, the sky is falling, we are doomed”. Yet this country enjoyed the greatest economic boom in our recent history…go figure. Maybe I’m wrong, but it does seem “much ado about nothing…”
GA Dawg
December 11th, 2012
7:58 am
We can’t pay it if we ain’t got no money. And with Obarma spending like a drunken you-no-what, we ain’t got no more money for wellfair and handouts to the moochers.
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
7:58 am
GW,
Do you mean this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3Z2MP8vMWU
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
7:59 am
I wanna see Lindsey Graham hold his breath ’til he turns blue. Oh pleez!
As for the rampant Republican impotence hiding behind threats to take US down if they do not have their way with US, such a threat by the cons should be met with sufficient force to subdue them. Something along the lines of “You losers do not get to call the shots,” from President Obama as he imposes an executive order that cuts the Congressional staff, lights, pensions, salary, etc., and uses that money toward the national debt, etc. Our president needs to play hardball and I think he will this time around.
Granny Godzilla
December 11th, 2012
8:01 am
“It is the act of a petulant, frustrated three-year-old threatening to hold his breath until the country turns blue.
Which, now that I think about it, it may very well do.”
.
.
.
.
Very clever!
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:02 am
“Maybe it’s just me, but I find the whole idea extraordinary. Since when is the willingness to inflict “indelible, incurable” damage on our country something to be bragged about and used as leverage? ”
as Donovan said yesterday … “waaaaaahhhhhhhh” … followed by “Compromise be damned.” … followed by more “waaaahhhhhhh” … and “our principles will not be compromised” …. followed by yet more “waaaaaahhhhhhh” … “You want compromise? Ok. Let’s all hold hands and jump off the cliff together.”
they don’t care – party above country … purity above all …
followed by more whining and something
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:02 am
…and in case anyone thinks I’m making light of the seriousness Jay’s outlined here, I am not. I do believe the stakes are incredibly high, and that the potential to destroy lives/livelihoods is hanging in the balance.
I just don’t think that Obama has that weak a hand on the debt limit, as Marc Thiessen (by way of professional concern troll Bob Woodward) would have people believe.
Phil Lunney
December 11th, 2012
8:02 am
I have a simple solution. Let’s begin with Lindsey Graham and South Carolina, when he invokes the Debt Limit, the U S Government begins to shut down military bases in South Carolina, immediate savings. Next, when Mr. Cantor insists this is a proper strategy, the U S Government shuts down projects and contractors in Richmond, Virginia. Since they are so adamant that we must ‘cut’ expenses and not increase taxes, let’s take them up on their strategy. Charity begins at home, let Mr. Graham and Mr. Cantor demonstrate their generosity with their own districts.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:04 am
We can’t pay it if we ain’t got no money.
another sorry individual who apparently believes that the richest, most powerful nation ever on this planet is “broke.”
unless your real name is “Pete Peterson,” read. learn.
http://www.alternet.org/economy/8-facts-prove-our-govt-not-going-broke?page=0%2C1&paging=off
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
8:05 am
Now, having failed to convince the rest of their country of their wisdom, they believe that their desperation gives them the right to impose it under threat of grievous harm?
That isn’t leadership. That isn’t patriotism. It is the act of a petulant, frustrated three-year-old threatening to hold his breath until the country turns blue
Secessionists and terrorists….. but certainly not patriots.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:07 am
“I wanna see Lindsey Graham hold his breath ’til he turns blue. Oh pleez!”
and stamp his itty bitty feet
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:10 am
Jay, we’ve heard Obama’s plans on raising taxes in detail, but nothing on his plan to cut spending. Have I missed something?
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:10 am
and stamp his itty bitty feet
and slam his closet door.
not that there’s anything wrong with that.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
8:11 am
There’s one itsy bitsy flaw in that Republican master plan though–they still have to get legislation through both houses before it would go to the president for signature and until they accomplish that little feat, their little fingers will remain curled back pointing toward themselves as the ones that let US default. Go ahead cons, make my day.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:11 am
Please, Lord, save me from the “We need to cut SPENDING so that we can PROSPER!” morons in my midst. That’s all I ask.
Amen.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:12 am
“and slam his closet door.
not that there’s anything wrong with that”
I’m assuming you saw this from TBogg: http://tbogg.firedoglake.com/2012/12/07/roberts-court-agrees-to-go-balls-deep-in-the-gay/
(best. blog. title. ever.)
Plato
December 11th, 2012
8:12 am
However the Republicans believe Obama is intent on destroying the country, so they won’t want to hand him the keys to the wrecking ball. Because they are Patriots, they will back down first.
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:13 am
My gut feeling is that Obama wants the cliff scenario because it will give him larger tax increases. I’ve yet to hear an explanation from anyone on the left on how the revenue increase will solve the deficit problem. Even Bowles says spending is the major issue, not revenue.
steve
December 11th, 2012
8:14 am
I miss the old days. You know, back when the losing party understood that the people have spoken and abided by it, at least to a fair extent. Today’s GOP is unrecognizable. It started with Reagan’s deal with the devil (religious right), continued during the demonizing of the Clintons, who for all their flaws weren’t evil America -hating socialists as they claimed. So why do these Fox News watching people continue to fall for their utter dishonesty? Letting the country crash and burn isn’t patriotic but it will get you called “a great American” by that phony Sean Hannity!
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:15 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:11 am
When one cannot put forth a rational argument, one resorts to name-calling.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:15 am
I have a simple solution
I have a simpler one. Obama and his seconds and thirds cancel their winter holidays and instead go out campaigning against this Reign of Terror in purple districts.
They signal to their superPAC buddies that they wouldn’t mind a bit if a crapload of attack ads were to appear on TV in those districts, calling the Congressmen child molesters–hey, it’s protected speech now, thanks John Roberts!
They muscle their way into making Congress capitulate and unconditionally surrender on their idiotic “destroy the country to save it” austerity bomb.
(and if that doesn’t work, mint a coin.)
Jay
December 11th, 2012
8:16 am
“Jay, we’ve heard Obama’s plans on raising taxes in detail, but nothing on his plan to cut spending. Have I missed something?”
Straitroad, as the party demanding such cuts, the Republicans are obligated to propose them, correct?
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
8:16 am
I’ve yet to hear an explanation from anyone on the left on how the revenue increase will solve the deficit problem
The problem with the conned is that they are deaf and failures at explaining their own “solutions”. [And I am being charitable this morning]
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
8:16 am
Jay is only encouraging the more risque and profane trolls with that joke. A joke, I might add, which would have been moderated and the author banned for ever. Now, Jay thinks he can troll up his own blog? I’m offended. I’ve already made two phone calls, (to Anita Bryant and toppers Gore). You’re not getting away with this, Jay. Not this time, buster. You’re finished at the ajc. (Jay has been on double secret probation for months).
Iraq War Debt
December 11th, 2012
8:19 am
Where is George W. Bush?
HadIt
December 11th, 2012
8:20 am
Blackmailers never stop. First they will eliminate the taxation of the rich. In time the bible thumper wing of the party will want their way and the Republicans will threaten the nation with destruction unless a constitutional amendment is passed banning abortion and gay marriage. In time the rich will not only be exempted from taxation and military service, they will also be exempted from criminal laws as well. And in time we will not longer be the United States of American; we will be the United Christian States of America.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:20 am
When one cannot put forth a rational argument, one resorts to name-calling.
You took offense? really? at that teensy, generalized bit o’ snark @ 8.11? Well, my bad.
However, you should read the arguments (I think they’re “rational”, YMMV) that I did put forth @ 7.56, 8.02, 8.06, and 8.15 before you get too carried away about my “name-calling.”
Mick
December 11th, 2012
8:21 am
This too shall pass but it’s starting to get very old…
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:21 am
Jay
December 11th, 2012
8:16 am
I think both sides are obligated to propose the cuts. I have heard Obama state mulitple times that he believes this problem should be solved using a balanced approach but he only mentions tax increases with any specificity. Obama is the current leader of the country, thus he is obligated to lead.
Redneck Convert (R--and proud of it)
December 11th, 2012
8:21 am
Well, if we welch on our debts the budget will be Balanced, right? We’ll have a clean slate. And nobody will ever loan us another penny again, so we’ll never be able to go back into debt.
And that means no more welfare checks and food stamps to Those People. And that’s what this whole fight’s about. Oh, you can use all the high-falutin’ words you want, but the bottom line is one side’s been saying for years, “Get those N—-s and Mexicans out of my wallet!” We’ll, we finally found a way.
Have a good Tuesday everybody.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:22 am
” I’ve yet to hear an explanation from anyone on the left on how the revenue increase will solve the deficit problem”
REALLY???
you don’t understand how increasing revenues will help with the deficit problem??
I’m assuming you also go to the boss every year and demand a pay cut to help increase your standard of living, as well …
Oops
December 11th, 2012
8:22 am
Jay
This column is legitimately unhinged, an by that I mean yours
Republicans care and don’t want to default either
I don’t believe what you write, or what Thiessen writes
Hyperbole sells, but it doesn’t move us closer to an answer
blahblahblah
December 11th, 2012
8:22 am
“Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that “the buck stops here”. Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better. I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America’s debt limit.”
- Barack Obama, 2006
What a petulant, frustrated three-year-old. Liberal spin machine in 3, 2, 1…
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:22 am
A joke, I might add, which would have been moderated and the author banned for ever.
awjeez. Jay would never moderate out a link to a profane post (unless the auto-bluenose didn’t like a word in the URL).
And you know it. So, please stop lying.
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:22 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:20 am
Stands, I’m just tweaking you. I know it’s a little early for that. No harm intended.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:24 am
Well done! we get the irrelevant Senatorial 2006 quote in 40 minutes!
Just wipe ten minutes off that time and you can… I dunno, deliver crappy pizza or something.
Oops
December 11th, 2012
8:24 am
“It’s called elections. We just had one, focused largely on the issues at stake here; they spent well over $1 billion trying to sell their viewpoint, and they lost.”
Republicans won. The house anyway. Deal with it.
Obama doesn’t get to run this country like a dictatorship.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:25 am
Stands, I’m just tweaking you. I know it’s a little early for that
yeah, ok. If memory serves, you’re usually not out there in la-la land, and can be reasoned with, so I hope we’re good.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
8:25 am
USinUK, well I know whenever I have some big bills coming due, I says: “I could bring in more money, nawwww… how would that possible help solve the problem.”
tm
December 11th, 2012
8:26 am
Jay sound like a 3 year old who didn’t get the toy he wanted for Christmas. What are they suppose to do? Bow down to the King and give him everything he wants? The King started this feud when he shoved his Obama Care with his tax increases without any compromise on his end. He them proceeded to lose the majority in the House. Actions have consequences.
Oops
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
Republicans are trying to force the other side, the one that loves to spend and rack up debt, to face facts
Spending will have to be reduced
If the spendthrifts have to be brought to the bargaining table kicking and screaming, so be it
Christian Conservative
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
The same can be said for Obamacare Jay. Its a huge gubmint scam that will hang over the head of every hard working American from now on unless something is done. And you forgetting to mention the burden of debt Obama and the dems are putting on the backs of our children and grandchildren without a care in the world. Thats the real travesty going on. wink wink.. you forgot to mention the Obama scandals in your tripe.. Bengazi, failed solar companies, arming rebels with our weapons, Fast & Furious.. I could go on but we must continue to blame Republicans for this administrations continued failures….
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
“Republicans won. The house anyway. Deal with it.”
Republicans lost seats, dear. LOST seats.
Haliburton (Dick Cheney's) Contracts
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
How much were the contracts worth?
Examining Halliburton’s ‘Sweetheart’ Deal in Iraq
December 22, 2003
Oil services company Halliburton has come under intense scrutiny over its multi-billion-dollar contracts with the U.S. military in Iraq. Congressional critics want to know if the company is engaging in gold-plating contracts — inflating costs and pocketing the difference. Other critics charge that Halliburton has seemingly become another branch of the U.S. military, while the company’s former chief executive officer, Dick Cheney, is now the vice president.
In the first of a three-part series looking at the complex relationship between the defense contractor and the federal government, NPR’s John Burnett examines the scope of contracts in Iraq held by Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root, better known as KBR.
America’s war on terrorism has created a windfall for KBR. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the company has constructed base camps at more than 60 locations throughout the Middle East and South Asia. Under its deal with the Pentagon — known as a “Logcap” contract — KBR is the go-to company to provide troops in Iraq with everything from portable toilets to Internet cafes.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1559574
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
Republicans won. The house anyway.
they held a sufficient number of gerrymandered seats. I don’t really have to tell you though that fewer Americans voted for Republican congrefscritters than voted for Democratic ones, do I? And that there are enough vulnerable Representatives out there who can have their arms twisted, if the administration should so choose, to make this reallll interesting?
Oops
December 11th, 2012
8:28 am
Tm
Apparently the repubs are just supposed to roll over and play nice
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:28 am
Keep up – exactly. improve my standard of living? naaaahhhhhh …
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:29 am
“Apparently the repubs are just supposed to roll over and play nice”
well, that would be nice. but we would settle for putting the country – rather than party purity – first.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:29 am
And I can tell you this, there is a hardening on the Republican side
…and a hard man is good to find.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Uncle Billy
December 11th, 2012
8:29 am
If no agreement is reached by Dec. 31, 2012 tax rates revert to those in effect before the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003. Discretionary spending would be significantly curtailed by the agreement reached in 2011. Then we would have the austerity which Romney/Ryan proposed. So why do Republicans see this as intolerable? It is what they have been calling for.
Oops
December 11th, 2012
8:29 am
The deluded think that the House isn’t run by the Republicans
Figures
Americans Want to See Compromise in Washington to Avoid ‘Fiscal Cliff’ |
December 11th, 2012
8:29 am
[...] to Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist Jay Bookman, however, the way the Republicans are handling the issue could be the biggest scandal in American [...]
tm
December 11th, 2012
8:30 am
“Apparently the repubs are just supposed to roll over and play nice”
My Lab does that not my representative who I want to e a pit bull.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:30 am
Spending will have to be reduced
…because Pete Peterson and his hired leather slaves Simpson and Bowles tell me so?
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:31 am
“And I can tell you this, there is a hardening on the Republican side”
there’s a Bob Dole / Viagra joke in there, somewhere …
Tap Out
December 11th, 2012
8:32 am
Make all these broke red states pay their fair share. The rest of the country is tired of supporting them.
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:32 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
There are democrats in gerrymandered districts as well.
JohnnyReb
December 11th, 2012
8:32 am
The Dems under Obama have now gone 4 years without a budget, increased the debt more than our entire past history, added the mother of entitlements, and obviously enlisted legacy media to convince citizens the real bad guys are the Republicans. To top that off, Obama wants authority over the debt limit without Congressional approval.
Rant on Jay. Conservatives, stick your ground.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:33 am
“The deluded think that the House isn’t run by the Republicans”
no the deluded think that the Republicans have a mandate to hold the line.
Who knew?
December 11th, 2012
8:35 am
When we do fall off the cliff, we’ll all do a swan dive. Followed by a score of perfect 10!!!
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
8:36 am
Is there a Republican in the house that can explain the process by which bills are paid by cutting revenues while increasing spending through borrowing. You know. The Bush years.
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
8:37 am
“Since when is the willingness to inflict “indelible, incurable” damage on our country something to be bragged about and used as leverage?”
.
I’m sorry but………Lincoln,FDR, and LBJ DOES come to mind.
GW
December 11th, 2012
8:37 am
Americans Want to See Compromise in Washington to Avoid ‘Fiscal Cliff’: http://blog.locustfork.net/2012/12/americans-want-to-see-compromise-in-washington-to-avoid-fiscal-cliff/
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:38 am
The same can be said for Obamacare Jay.
yawn.
What’s your latest complaint about how that was passed, anyway–they didn’t televise the conference committee bathroom breaks? They didn’t say “mother may I?” before caving on the Public Option?
And you forgetting to mention the burden of debt Obama and the dems are putting on the backs of our children and grandchildren without a care in the world.
Ok, again, read. learn.
http://www.alternet.org/economy/8-facts-prove-our-govt-not-going-broke?page=0%2C1&paging=off
8. Won’t our kids be forced to shoulder the debt we leave behind?
Yes, this is a real tearjerker. Who among us wants to pawn off our debts onto our kids? A sad thought, if were true. But it’s not. Government debt, unlike our mortgages, is rarely repaid in full. Instead they roll over. The cost to taxpayers is the interest we pay on the outstanding debt and the refinancing of it. With the global economy at stall speed there is no danger in the foreseeable future of rising interest rates.
What about in 30 years when our darlings are at the helm? The answer depends on the economy, not on debt. If we borrow cheaply now to put our people back to work, if we invest fully in funding higher education, and if we build up our crumbling infrastructure and tend to the environment, then we’ll leave behind a prosperous economy. Debt will shrink over time as the economy grows. And more revenues will come in as our people go back to work.
However, if we become obsessed with debt and deficits, and slash to the bone the programs that develop future prosperity, we’ll leave behind a faltering economy and an even bigger environmental mess.
Debt hysteria is like a pandemic that quickly cripples logical thinking. Once infected, Very Important People with Very Impressive Degrees sound like fools.
Let’s hope there’s a cure…and soon.
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
8:38 am
“Since when is it OK for a major political party to hold a gun to the country’s head, figuratively speaking of course?”
.
Since when has it NOT happened.
.
Figuratively speaking of course……………….not.
.
lol
straitroad
December 11th, 2012
8:39 am
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
8:36 am
I certainly can’t. Bush was far too liberal with his spending and the Republicans governed as if they were democrats.
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
8:40 am
“Has patriotism become so diluted by cynicism that such strategies can now be publicly embraced and advocated?”
.
Only to the Romney/Obama bots who confuse patriotism with nationalism.
tm
December 11th, 2012
8:41 am
Stand- a whole lot of “Ifs” in you theory
Alex
December 11th, 2012
8:42 am
Straitload, the plan he endorsed 2 summers ago, the last time we did this little dance, had TONS of cuts.
The point is, the republicans are proposing NOTHING substantive. They don’t want any tax increases, and they just want “cuts.” But they won’t say which cuts.
So Obama is calling their bluff. He knows they have become a fringe party — representing the best interests of white conservatives with lots of money and evangelicals brainwashed to vote against their own economic interests (as well as against the economic interests of the bible, but that’s another topic) — so he is forcing them to either become more moderate in their stances, or reveal to the American public how, deep down, they don’t want to support the poor or any seniors who aren’t independently wealthy.
Grasshopper
December 11th, 2012
8:42 am
Oh. please. Stop the histrionics.
If Obama were any type of leader at all, he would have moved us past this on the day after the election. I know you weren’t talking about Obama when you wrote the following, but you should have been:
“That isn’t leadership. That isn’t patriotism. It is the act of a petulant, frustrated three-year-old threatening to hold his breath until the country turns blue.”
JohnnyReb
December 11th, 2012
8:42 am
“Lincoln,FDR, and LBJ DOES come to mind.”
I can’t agree with putting Lincoln in the group, but add Wilson and Obama and you have the biggest mistakes in our political history.
alittlecommonsense
December 11th, 2012
8:43 am
Of course it’s not that Republicans have deeply held concerns about the looming debt crisis. No, it’s that they are immoral and “don’t care about “catastrophic” consequences”.
This is the problem with you hardcore Democrats. Instead of looking at the other perspective, you demonize.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
8:43 am
Republicans governed as if they were democrats.
Really. So you’re claiming that Democrats were in charge in 2001 and 2003. Please share some more of your revisionist history with us, straitroad.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:45 am
Stand- a whole lot of “Ifs” in you theory
um, a little help here–which half-baked theory was that?
I think I’d put at least twelve of them out there this morning…
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
8:46 am
This is the problem with you hardcore Democrats. Instead of looking at the other perspective, you demonize.
No, dear child. This is demonizing. And that nutjob doing it is purebred Republican.
JohnnyReb
December 11th, 2012
8:46 am
Here’s another proud moment courtesy of Obamacare – WalMart is dropping insurance coverage on a very large number of employees and moving them to part time status.
Of course, this gives Jay an opportunity to again bash the Walton family.
indigo
December 11th, 2012
8:47 am
“Since when is the willingness to inflict indelible and incurable damage on our country something to brag about and used as leverage?”
Why, sir, since:
1. Since they sold themselves to Big Business and daily receive their marching orders from CEO chieftains whose personal estates will prosper no matter what else happens.
2. Since they allowed Christian fundamentalists to become their base, people who, in the end, don’t really care about what happens here since “we’re only strangers here, heaven is our home”.
Lynnie Gal
December 11th, 2012
8:48 am
This scandal about the GOP hard right has been playing out since Clinton was hunted down like a dog by them. Bill gave them the ammo and they went to extremes–impeachment of our president for a sexual dalliance. Then, W., Cheney and Rummy conspired to lie us into two wars which we are still paying for in human lives and money. Then, the TeaP’s crash our city halls and town hall meetings demanding that people in this country, even those with pre-existing conditions, do not deserve health insurance–even though the majority of them were on SS and Medicare. They assailed our president with claims of Socialist, Muslim, Kenyon, terrorist–all version of lie, until this election with the vast majority of Americans told them to go to hell. Now, the dead-enders of the hard right are threatening to take down our economy, including themselves, just to let everyone know they still have power. They’re still crushing unions and women’s rights, starting days after the electorate told them to go away. These are sick little men, abusers, really, who want to further crush the poor and middle class with their policies and claim they are “helping” them. Next election, everybody with an “R” by their name needs to be removed from any office he holds–statewide or nationwide.
guy
December 11th, 2012
8:48 am
There is something wrong when the speaker and obama haven’t met one on one in 18 months until the last day or two. ???? Look how much the deficit has increased in 5 years and obama wants to raise the debt ceiling. Neither party knows a damn thing about running a business and that’s why we are all where we are today. There’s nothing to boast about on either side. We ought to be mad as hell instead of making excuses for these fools,whether you are repub. or demo.
BRW
December 11th, 2012
8:49 am
“there is a hardening on the Republican side”
Old white guys and their arteries. Do tell….
DownInAlbany
December 11th, 2012
8:51 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:27 am
Republicans won. The house anyway.
they held a sufficient number of gerrymandered seats.
Speaking of gerrymandering. Have you looked at the Second Congressional district? Does the name Sanford Bishop mean anything to you? G-mandering happens with both parties.
Alan Grayson says more Walmart employees on Medicaid, food stamps than other companies
December 11th, 2012
8:51 am
Leave it to Alan “Congressman with Guts” Grayson to get a security escort from Walmart on Thanksgiving.
Grayson, who returns to Congress next year after losing his old seat in 2010, ditched his family on Thanksgiving to hand out turkey sandwiches to employees of an Orlando-area Walmart.
Amid employee walkouts across the country, Grayson approached workers with his turkey tidings and told them about their right to join a union.
Walmart employees are paid so little, he argued, they often seek government programs for help.
“In state after state, the largest group of Medicaid recipients is Walmart employees. I’m sure that the same thing is true of food stamp recipients. Each Walmart ‘associate’ costs the taxpayers an average of more than $1,000 in public assistance,” Grayson wrote in a Huffington Post column on Nov. 24, 2012.
He doubled down in a subsequent interview with The Young Turks show on Current TV, saying Walmart employees represent “the largest group of food stamp recipients.”
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/dec/06/alan-grayson/alan-grayson-says-more-walmart-employees-medicaid-/
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:51 am
(best. blog. title. ever.)
I don’t think I got past the photo (which I had seen before, but it never gets old.)
as for riffing on Lindsay’s closet, I have to credit Sam Seder for that; he’s had a sound effect of a creaky door closing shut whenever the guy’s name comes up for ages, now.
no, it is not fair (and probably not even accurate), but if it gets laugh…
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
8:53 am
“WalMart is dropping insurance coverage on a very large number of employees and moving them to part time status.”
right.
and that’s Obama’s fault.
I love the party of personal responsibility!
ad
December 11th, 2012
8:53 am
Government debt is a problem when 1) the amount of interest the gov pays prevents spending on necessities, 2) the gov’s borrowing crowds out private borrowing and raises interest rates for everybody and 3) the debt is so high that nobody is buying your bonds. We don’t have any of those problems. Interest rates are low and US bonds are still the most attractive in the world. That’s not to say that there isn’t an amount of debt that’s too high, but, given current circumstances, we’re not there.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:53 am
G-mandering happens with both parties.
Agreed; never claimed it doesn’t (although I know nothing of the district you reference).
I’m just saying that the moral/political high ground claimed by those who point out that the House was held by the GOP in 2012 is not exactly unshakeable.
DownInAlbany
December 11th, 2012
8:53 am
guy
December 11th, 2012
8:48 am
There is something wrong when the speaker and obama haven’t met one on one in 18 months until the last day or two. ???? Look how much the deficit has increased in 5 years and obama wants to raise the debt ceiling. Neither party knows a damn thing about running a business and that’s why we are all where we are today. There’s nothing to boast about on either side. We ought to be mad as hell instead of making excuses for these fools,whether you are repub. or demo.
Nominated for post of the day!
Aquagirl
December 11th, 2012
8:55 am
Neither party knows a damn thing about running a business and that’s why we are all where we are today.
What Constitution are you reading? The one taught in inferior public schools doesn’t mention stuff like profit margins anywhere. Obviously government brainwashing is at fault for this.
Patty
December 11th, 2012
8:56 am
Oh, please. Neither side of this are thinking about the American public. It’s like two little boys standing out on the playground, having a pissing contest. Too bad we’re the ones getting pissed on.
Alex
December 11th, 2012
8:57 am
Also, if we should cut the military, duh.
If we really are a Christian nation (whether you believe Christianity is a religion, or if you’re bill o’reilly and believe it’s a philosophy), then we should NOT have the largest army in the world and a military budget that dwarfs all else. Instead we should be following the way of the Slaughtered Lamb, the One whose strength is weakness, who did not regard equality with God as power to be exploited, but humbled himself, taking the form of a slave; who implored his followers to turn the other cheek, who is called Lord of Lords and yet Prince of Peace, who, contrary to the worldly expectations of his followers, did not institute a kingdom or empire with the force of armies, but instead willingly died on a cross to end the cycle of violence, which can never be redemptive, and to give a glimpse of the coming kingdom where nation shall not raise up sword against nation, where they shall practice war no more, where the wolf shall lie down with the lamb. The message of Jesus is that there are things in this world worth dying for but NOTHING worth killing for.
So there’s your cut. The military. Final answer.
Jhunt163
December 11th, 2012
8:59 am
Boy those revenue increases are really working elsewhere…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9707029/Two-thirds-of-millionaires-left-Britain-to-avoid-50p-tax-rate.html
http://homes.yahoo.com/news/is-this-your-chance-to-pick-up-a-chateau-on-the-cheap–190653964.html
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
8:59 am
We don’t have any of those problems. Interest rates are low and US bonds are still the most attractive in the world. That’s not to say that there isn’t an amount of debt that’s too high, but, given current circumstances, we’re not there.
so, shaddup-a you face about this BS “debt crisis.”
(I’d pay a coupla months’ earnings to hear Obama say that on TeeVee.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:00 am
JAY
Loved the gutter version!
Anyhow, I think it is healthy to go over fiscal cliff. Clearly, the GOP don’t have to elaborate on cuts….if the president is committed to same he needs to pony up..the idea that all should cave since your guy won is silly.
Your guy needs to put his arrogance aside..he should put the $109 bln of cuts back on the table and push for the $50+ billion in defense cuts..that’s more difficult than other stuff. Increased taxes on “rich” which is the holy grail of liberals is done..He has successfully laid blame on all our woes on the evil 1%.
Best for the country if GOP gives BO everything he wants…or nothing at all. The drama of doom of going over cliff is just that..
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
9:01 am
Any night now………………….Chris Mathews will proclaim that the term “debt-ceiling” is ………………………racerist.
.
Problem solved.
.
lol.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:03 am
Jhunt163
December 11th, 2012
8:59 am
C’mon now…this is completely different than millionaires here…no way they would move to greener pastures…neither will businesses…the liberals are telling us so…President Trillions et al know what’s best for all of us…you just can’t accept that can you?
JP
December 11th, 2012
9:03 am
Jay,
I thought you were going to say the biggest scandal was “Benghazi” or “Fast & Furious” and recommending that O be impeached…just kidding…of course, it has to be those Evil Republicans because O “cares too much about what happens to this country and its people.” Thanks for the laugh this morning…I haven’t laughed in Omerica since the elections!
JKL2
December 11th, 2012
9:03 am
-That fool Obama cares too much about what happens to this country and its people.
ROFLMFAO!!!!!
Is that like the man who kills his wife because he “loves her too much”? Most people don’t want to “radically transform” things they love.
Thanks for the laugh Jay.
curious
December 11th, 2012
9:04 am
This is great!
Let the country go broke and the party of individual responsibility will have the chance to “build it themselves”.
Let’s default on our obligations and let China foreclose on on us. I predict all these companies that are hamstrung by the government will be the first to scream “uncle” and plead for help.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:05 am
Stevie Ray – drama of doom, you say???
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqALm_rmM1g
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
9:05 am
tm: My Lab does that not my representative who I want to e a pit bull
Well a pit bull can be more friendly than a lab unless treated cruely. A cougar, lion or any number of animals are much more vicious but I would not recommend any of them them as the deciders of my life. Current thinking is that the smartest dogs have the mentality of a 5 yr old, so its not surprising at all that the GOP conned expect childish behavior from their representatives without using real intelligence. How very sad
MikeB
December 11th, 2012
9:07 am
Leave all the “talk” about other scandels out…… Thats just a smokescreen for a President who has not a clue about how to actually work……
Twitter this and soundbite that so you media types are satiated and can write a story…. Thats how he operates. Don’t see alot of rolling up the sleeves and transparently working diligently through the process to avert this catasprophic line in the sand…..
That said, it comes down to this (as illustrated in Bob Woodwards book) both sides don’t trust ea. other… Obama is to naive to know the signs of a “good deal” and Boehner is unwilling to go the extra mile like he was previously, because his own party thinks he went too far to begin with in 2011…. Time for the President to show some leadership in the Congress, rather than offer the appearence of leadership via pandering out on the road…. That is how real work will get done.
To be fair, he is attempting to get more citizens interested and involved in what goes on in D.C. That is not a bad thing as long as those involved truly understand what they are contacting their representatives about….
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:07 am
“I thought you were going to say the biggest scandal was “Benghazi” or “Fast & Furious” and recommending that O be impeached…just kidding…of course”
of course you are … those are faux scandals created by FOX …
curious
December 11th, 2012
9:08 am
Stevie Ray
“Increased taxes on “rich” which is the holy grail of liberals is done.”
Tax cuts for the “rich”: The holy grail of conservatives.
Get Real
December 11th, 2012
9:09 am
Ah yes, the latest from Jaybon Republicans bad and Democrats good…
sdf…..quoting Krugman, peleeeez….his philosophy essentially states you simply cannot spend enough. Our bonds are so “attractive” because Europe is in such dire straits; the lesser of 2 evils….
JKL2
December 11th, 2012
9:09 am
-Somehow, it doesn’t seem to have crossed their minds that the U.S. Constitution offers an alternative means of resolving such disputes. It’s called free and open debate.
Harry Reid says,”What?”
I believe that motion has been tabled by the Democrats.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
9:11 am
It requires an enormous amount of self-righteousness and grandiosity to think that way, but they seem up to the task
Yeah, or it just takes a certain amount of genuine unflinching ideological commitment – a concept that liberals generally have difficulty understanding.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:12 am
“Our bonds are so “attractive” because Europe is in such dire straits; the lesser of 2 evils….”
right. that’s the only reason our bonds are attractive … not because the US is a leading trade partner and they want to hold currency or anything
oy to the stupid.
Get Real
December 11th, 2012
9:13 am
Get a grip Butch
williebkind
December 11th, 2012
9:13 am
Hi Ho, Hi ho off the cliff we go the people are chastised because Obama will not compromise, hi ho.
JP
December 11th, 2012
9:13 am
Sure, USinUK, FoxNews created the “Benghazi” or “Fast & Furious”…our Ambassador really wasn’t dragged through the streets of Libya and murdered…also American astronauts never walked on the moon…all done in a studio. Stop drinking the Kool-Aid and watching BSNBC!
Road Scholar
December 11th, 2012
9:15 am
Let’s stop talking about tax increases and focus on deductions and exemptions. Cut all deductions except charitable contributions and mortgage interest under that for a $1 million dollar home. Then remove the exemption for churches and other religious institutions!
Gerrymandering in GA? Sanford Bishop’s district? Do you know how hard it was to get all south Georgia dems into one area the size of a CD? They also gave up on the 4th and 5th districts keeping the rest for the conserves….oh, they forgot to win the Savannah/John Barrow one!!!
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
9:17 am
USinUK, sometimes I just have to recall that Fox viewers are the most misinformed and delusional viewers in the country. They also thought they were going to beat Obama.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:19 am
“Sure, USinUK, FoxNews created the “Benghazi” or “Fast & Furious””
they sure are trying to turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse for themselves.
you must be VERY proud to be so easily led.
willydoit?
December 11th, 2012
9:19 am
“”At a campaign-style event in Michigan, Obama warned his listeners their taxes will rise on Jan. 1 without action by the Congress. “That’s a hit you can’t afford to take,” he declared”"
http://www.ajc.com/news/ap/top-news/obama-boehner-discuss-fiscal-cliff-stalemate/nTRPP/
Why is he still campaigning?
I don’t really have an extra $2200 to pay in taxes this year, but I am willing to sacrifice and pay it…its the American thing to do.
Its time for the rich and the middle class to roll up our sleeves and pay our “fair share”!
Who’s with me??
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
9:20 am
Poor Republicans. Worrying about what will become of themselves when they go splat after jumping off the cliff of their own demise. The cliff of higher taxes on the wealthiest. Will their billionaire backers quit funding their elections once they see that the Republicans cannot deliver anything at all in exchange for their money. The drama unfolds.
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
9:20 am
The biggest scandal in fifty years. Gotta be when the queen of mean first described the despised 47% as “little people” who are the only suckers who pay taxes.
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
9:21 am
When O’bozo campaigned on a “balanced” approach to the budget he meant increased taxes balanced by unlimited automatic increases to the debt ceiling, apparently.
Got it.
RIP USA 1776-2012
emz
December 11th, 2012
9:21 am
Like the country turning blue.
Real Scootter
December 11th, 2012
9:23 am
They also thought they were going to beat Obama.
I disagree Keep.I think it was just “wishful” thinking.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:24 am
Let’s default on our obligations and let China foreclose on on us.
Ok, I’ll ask the class again–anyone know what China’s share of our ZOMG it is TEH SCARY! 16 trillion debt is, percentage-wise?
.
.
.
(raw-number answer here; you’ll still need to do a bit of elementary-school math for the actual percentage.)
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
9:25 am
straitroad — “There are democrats in gerrymandered districts as well.”
And, as I told you yesterday, given the sheer VOLUME of votes by which the Democrats outscored the Republicans in November, gerrymandering is the only reason y’all still have a majority in the House.
So you go riiiiight ahead and keep playing things the same way. See if that doesn’t cause you to lose more seats in two years.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:25 am
Why is he still campaigning?
Because he hasn’t personally fixed everything that sucks about America yet.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:26 am
Keep Up – “USinUK, sometimes I just have to recall that Fox viewers are the most misinformed and delusional viewers in the country”
the “clap if you believe” brigade.
Donovan
December 11th, 2012
9:27 am
You liberals are something else. Twisted minds with vengeful motives. Similar to Muslims who kill in the name of Allah, but call their faith a religion of peace. Let’s look at the Bookman diatribe here.
“Since when is the willingness to inflict indelible, incurable damage on our country something to be bragged about and used as leverage?”
Has the Democrat Senate passed a balanced budget in years? No it has not and refuses to do so. Has the Democrat leadership stopped spending and made rectifying cuts to save this country? No they haven’t. Have Democrats in the Senate tried to work with the House Republicans? No they haven’t. All they get are replies from that old liberal coot, Reid, that each initiative is “Dead On Arrival”.
The propaganda from Bookman is as close-minded and vengeful as the party he supports. You reckless goofballs do not have the best interests of this country in mind.
“Since when is it ok for a major political party to hold a gun to the country’s head”? I guess it’s ok when the Democrat Party did the same with ObamaCare. I believe the country was 85% in opposition to that rammed legislation. Once again, your Chicago style politics to party agenda overrides what’s best for this country.
You people won the election because you were smarter in choosing your battles. You Democrats are the slick purveyors of propaganda which effectively remind the have-nots of entitlement programs and class envy. The Santa Claus Party always trumps the pragmatic party. However, you have not won the war.
We don’t use slick terms like “blackmailers” or “hostage takers” like Pelosi and her ilk. We don’t spin up the propaganda machine each morning with delight like Jay Bookman. We simply put forth a message of dire consequences when threatened by a pompous president who just won an election.
You all don’t want to make any serious cuts and don’t want to tax the “middle class”? Ok, fine. Then let’s all hold hands and collectively suffer the consequences together. This Democrat/Bookman propaganda rubbish of placing the blame on Republicans for the Democrat folly of the last 4years is ludicrous.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:28 am
“RIP USA 1776-2012″
http://imagemacros.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/ohdramazrb2.jpg?w=720
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:28 am
“We don’t spin up the propaganda machine each morning with delight like Jay Bookman. We simply put forth a message of dire consequences when threatened by a pompous president who just won an election.”
Donovan made a funny.
willydoit?
December 11th, 2012
9:29 am
“Because he hasn’t personally fixed everything that sucks about America yet.”
Money fixes everything in America…are you willing to pay more? It can be deducted right from your paycheck every week, you’ll never miss it.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:29 am
oh, and williedoit @ 9.19, for what it’s worth I’ve been fine with paying the Clinton-era federal income taxes, myself, ever since Obama got elected in 2008; I don’t take issue with that part of your post.
However, I do tend to think that lower-incomed Americans shouldn’t get hit with higher taxes until we’ve got unemployment well under its current levels. I might be convinced otherwise if someone were to argue that those additional revenues would be plowed into new infrastructure spending.
Mr Right
December 11th, 2012
9:30 am
I thought you were going to say the biggest scandal was “Benghazi” or “Fast & Furious” and recommending that O be impeached…just kidding…of course”
of course you are … those are faux scandals created by FOX …
Ok,ok, move on, move on, nothing to see here! Fox had these people killed so just move on, sorry old Fox!
JKL2
December 11th, 2012
9:30 am
stands- Well done! we get the irrelevant Senatorial 2006 quote in 40 minutes!
Thanks for pointing out our president is a lying POS.
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
9:30 am
Jay
December 11th, 2012
8:16 am
“Jay, we’ve heard Obama’s plans on raising taxes in detail, but nothing on his plan to cut spending. Have I missed something?”
“Straitroad, as the party demanding such cuts, the Republicans are obligated to propose them, correct?”
Jay, as the candidate who promised to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term, Obama is obligated to submit a proposal to do so, correct?
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:30 am
You liberals are something else.
We “liberals” are the majority of your citizens. Might start learning how to cope with that.
(and no, I didn’t read the rest of your crap; I doubt most people do.)
Granny Godzilla
December 11th, 2012
9:31 am
F Sinkwich
RIP USA 1776-2012
.
.
.
Well, you really are a piece of work.
Damning America like that.
Sad, sick and just plain un-American.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:32 am
our president is a lying POS.
Stay classy, JKL2.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:34 am
USinUK – not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:05 am
I loved that show!
CURIOUS
Agreed but the DEMS and BO have been selling this thing ad nausea as a means to once again, lay blame…I don’t recall but when he agreed to extend these cuts (that he should have removed in the first place)years before, did the LIBS get up in arms about this?
The DEMS and GOP are victims of themselves and DC cash culture…we are simply along for the ride. Going over the cliff will be best thing to happen as this could be the impetus we need to push for reform..get private money out of DC
alittlecommonsense
December 11th, 2012
9:35 am
Um, taxpayer… I’m a 46 year old man. If you feel the need to call me a child, I could find lots of other names to call you. Let’s start with Jerk. If you have a point to make, make it without calling someone a child because you disagree with their politics. Jerk.
willydoit?
December 11th, 2012
9:35 am
“oh, and williedoit @ 9.19, for what it’s worth I’ve been fine with paying the Clinton-era federal income taxes, myself, ever since Obama got elected in 2008; I don’t take issue with that part of your post.”
Point made. I don’t have a problem raising taxes on the wealthy, I just believe we should all be willing to pay a little more ourselves if we are demanding another group pay more.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:35 am
“Ok,ok, move on, move on, nothing to see here! Fox had these people killed so just move on, sorry old Fox!”
“you provide the pictures, I’ll provide the war”
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
9:35 am
Speaking of gerrymandering. Have you looked at the Second Congressional district? Does the name Sanford Bishop mean anything to you? G-mandering happens with both parties.
Whining about a Democratic district that was created by Republicans??????? Oh My Freakin’ God!!!!! Such a bunch of whiney badonkadonk toboggans…
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:36 am
…are you willing to pay more?
yeah, I’ve said so.
I’ve even said I’d pay two months earnings just to hear Obama call out the “debt crisis” bullsh-t artists.
But no, if where you’re going is “will you unilaterally disarm in the hopes in order to add ~0.0000001% to the revenue stream”, I will not do that. Sorry, there are limits.
Seriously Folks
December 11th, 2012
9:36 am
Okay..I find it laughable that folks come on here and spout things like, “The President hasnt offered any specifics in cuts..only wants new taxes. Okay. This is REAL simple. Go to your search engine of choice….search “whitehouse.gov”…in the “what are you looking for” secting, type, “proposed cuts in spending”…and VOILA…a 213 page pdf outlining CUTS IN SPENDING… So PLEASE spare us all the “talking point” you heard this morning on am radio or cable television….this internet thingy kind of works! (but for those who think that is too many steps..I have taken the liberty to post here) http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2013/assets/ccs.pdf
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
9:37 am
Donovan: “Has the Democrat Senate passed a balanced budget in years? ”
A balanced budget is a stupid economic idea that is only ever under discussion at all because it makes financiers and various other corporate interests, and their money-drenched lobbies in Washington, drool at the ability to wreak financial havoc to their own benefit.
Truly asinine idea that makes ze-ro sense.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:38 am
Whining about a Democratic district that was created by Republicans??
y’know, I did google this Congrefsman’s name when it came up (I don’t know the guy), and I have to admit when I saw that he is African American and I started assuming how it was that his district was drawn, I was *this* tempted to react, but chose not to.
Figured there’d be better informed Georgians who could do so in my stead, and they have. Thanks!
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:38 am
willydoit?
December 11th, 2012
9:19 am
Agreed…no way we get out of this mess without “middle class” stepping up..I’m have zero pity for those making over 75K with no dependents or filing separately…Since cuts will not likely take place, there will be push to go back to the rich well…particularly as we get buried by ACA new expense beyond 3.8% tax..
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:38 am
you’re right, JKL … because the economy today is EXACTLY like it was in 2006.
EXACTLY.
no difference whatsoever.
Mr Right
December 11th, 2012
9:39 am
Jay, as the candidate who promised to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term, Obama is obligated to submit a proposal to do so, correct?
Obama promised to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term ? Now that’s a scandal Jay needs to look at!
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
9:39 am
Donovan: “Once again, your Chicago style politics to party agenda overrides what’s best for this country.
You people won the election because you were smarter in choosing your battles. You Democrats are the slick purveyors of propaganda which effectively remind the have-nots of entitlement programs and class envy. The Santa Claus Party always trumps the pragmatic party. However, you have not won the war.”
You got it bad there don’t ya kiddo?
DownInAlbany
December 11th, 2012
9:40 am
Road Scholar
December 11th, 2012
9:15 am
Gerrymandering in GA? Sanford Bishop’s district? Do you know how hard it was to get all south Georgia dems into one area the size of a CD? They also gave up on the 4th and 5th districts keeping the rest for the conserves….oh, they forgot to win the Savannah/John Barrow one!!!
Yep, redistricting took the only person who has really challenged Bishop (Mike Keown) right out of the 2nd!
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
9:40 am
I propose that any poster who slips and refers to the Democrat party as the “Democratic party” be banned from the site forthwith for 30 days. That ought to cure that.
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
9:40 am
“Damning America like that.”
Take another swig of Geritol, Granny. You have me confused with O’bozo’s spiritual advisor and mentor. O’bozo wants America damned just like Wright.
Remember that “fundamentally transform” thing?
weetamoe
December 11th, 2012
9:41 am
Most divisive president in history. Instead of calling a meeting with opponents and conducting negotiations in public so that those of us affected by the outcome can determine for ourselves the honesty and knowledge of the participants and what is a stake, Obama flits about the country trying to pit groups of citizens against each other. That’s the tantrum-prone three-year-old.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
9:41 am
Has the Democrat Senate passed a balanced budget in years?
When did the “Party of Fiscal Responsibility” ever do that???
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
9:41 am
Donovan — “You liberals are something else. Twisted minds with vengeful motives. Similar to Muslims who kill in the name of Allah, but call their faith a religion of peace.”
ST*U, Donny.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118715/quotes
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
9:43 am
dB
And he’s still at it!!!!!
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:43 am
“Most divisive president in history. Instead of calling a meeting with opponents and conducting negotiations in public”
oh, bollocks.
the first thing he did upon reelection was to call the GOP leadership! know what they did? SAID THEY WERE EFFING ASLEEP RATHER THAN TAKE HIS CALL.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/08/us/politics/president-obama-begins-work-on-second-term.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:45 am
You have me confused with O’bozo’s spiritual advisor and mentor.
It’s called “irony,” Sink. Americans have been using it against oppressors since they started singing “Yankee Doodle Dandy.”
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
9:45 am
DownInAlbany @ 9:40
You do realize that Bishop’s district was drawn by the GOP Party here in Georgia, right?
http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Redistricting_in_Georgia
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
9:46 am
Thanks for pointing out our president is a lying POS.
Granny Godzilla
December 11th, 2012
9:46 am
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
9:40 am
“Damning America like that.”
Take another swig of Geritol, Granny. You have me confused with O’bozo’s spiritual advisor and mentor. O’bozo wants America damned just like Wright.
Remember that “fundamentally transform” thing?
.
.
.
.
Oh can it, Sinkwich.
You can’t muster any love for your country because of your simple minded radical right ideology.
You are a squishy patriot daming your country to the grave.
ITS ALL BUSH'S FAULT
December 11th, 2012
9:47 am
The GOP has been exposed for the crooks they have always been.They would prefer to destroy the economy before raising taxes on the rich that have finaced their campaigns..
the cat
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
In trying to get a traffic report yesterday I was forced to listen to Sean Hannity. He is not trying to rewrite his own personal life history by talking about when he was in college, Reagan, etc.
Uh Sean-you are a college DROP OUT!
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
Boy, it just burns their behinds that Barack Obama, a man that none of them have any respect for, took their candidate *and* their party to the woodshed in November, doesn’t it?
America heard you just fine, cons. America heard what you were offering and what you had to say, and America said “no thanks.”
Now grow up and deal with it. You might draw inspiration from how you handled it the first time your parents refused to let you borrow the car on a Saturday night when you were in high school. I doubt your temper tantrums worked any better then than they will now.
the cat
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
sorry-NOW trying
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
Mr Right
December 11th, 2012
9:39 am
You won’t get a response to any of the failed 2009 guarantees he not only failed to deliver..he didn’t even try on most..you will however get the obligatory “it was Bushs’ fault..” No new talking points there.
Mr Right
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
the first thing he did upon reelection was to call the GOP leadership! know what they did? SAID THEY WERE EFFING ASLEEP RATHER THAN TAKE HIS CALL
And why would they take his call ? He is so partisan he will not compromise (se Obamacare) period..
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
Michigan’s right to work law will make a scab out of some new hires. Imagine the bitter rancor in the day to day employee interaction.
MikeB
December 11th, 2012
9:49 am
@ Donovan.. Well stated. One of the best posts of the year!Hope others are intelligent enough to consider your perspective
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:49 am
“He is not trying to rewrite his own personal life history by talking about when he was in college”
it was the longest 6 months of his liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiife
RB from Gwinnett
December 11th, 2012
9:49 am
Just one more in a long line if jays “republicans are evil if they don’t agree to everything Obama wants” mantra….
Tired, irresponsible, and stupid…
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
9:50 am
A little common sense shows my 8:46 post is spot on.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:51 am
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
9:37 am
Hmm….i guess we should simply toss fiscal focus out the door? I do think we are forever beyond balanced budget any how…this president is not going to cut spending…no matter what he agrees to…he wants us all to know it’s ok….taxpayers are getting a bargain as we only have to pay 60 cents for 100 cents of government..
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
9:52 am
MikeB: “@ Donovan.. Well stated. One of the best posts of the year!Hope others are intelligent enough to consider your perspective”
You kiddin me? Donovan has his head about ten feet down a sand hole.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:52 am
In trying to get a traffic report yesterday I was forced to listen to Sean Hannity.
psst. stop torturing yourself. There is All News 106.7 for those purposes available to you now. No need to tune in to right wing extremism for traffic updates via terrestrial radio in Atlanta metro.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:52 am
“And why would they take his call ? ”
oh, I dunno.
maybe because he’s PRESIDENT and they owe him a modicum of respect.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
9:53 am
Poor Republicans being confronted with their payment past due statements.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:53 am
and Jay, sorry about the plug @ 9.52 for a direct competitor to your employer’s cash cow, but a guy’s gotta do what a guy’s gotta do.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
9:54 am
Welcome
Donovan’s perspective rings crystal clear for those on the far right. That groupthink issue kinda messes them up because they expect everybody else to think like them.
Aquagirl
December 11th, 2012
9:54 am
Donovan has his head about ten feet down a sand hole.
Sand hole? Is that what the kids are calling it these days?
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
9:54 am
“You are a squishy patriot daming your country to the grave.”
Refusing to cave into O’bozo’s brand of euro-socialist Marxism makes me a solid patriot, Granny.
People who do are not, squishy or otherwise.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
9:54 am
MikeB — “@ Donovan.. Well stated. One of the best posts of the year!Hope others are intelligent enough to consider your perspective”
Perhaps I would, if I lived in Opposite Land. (laughing)
As it stands, Donny’s one of the most bizarrely under- and mis-informed posters on here. It’s only the fact that his posts are usually grammatically correct that he escapes the kind of scorn that some of the conservative Mothership Escapees here receive.
the cat
December 11th, 2012
9:54 am
stands-thanks! Haven’t heard of that station.
WSB is a parody of itself now.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:55 am
Tired, irresponsible
There’s nothing responsible in going along with spending cuts that’d send our economy into a tailspin.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
9:55 am
USinner
I left you a double dose @ 9:35 this morning.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:55 am
shorter Donovan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HluUIly_r08
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:56 am
oops. I forgot, @ 9.55–the Goopers don’t have any actual spending cuts to propose, do they? They just rail against how we have to rape Teh Poorz, without actually saying how it’s to be done, last I checked.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
9:57 am
F. Sinkiewicz — “Refusing to cave into O’bozo’s brand of euro-socialist Marxism makes me a solid patriot, Granny.”
Fishy, you wouldn’t know socialism if you moved in next door to Bernie Sanders. And I’m pretty sure you’d burst into flames if you ever read Marx, so I doubt you know much about that, either.
Labeling people and things is easy. Actually *defending* your personal truckload of intellectual manure is quite another.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
9:58 am
Brocephus – ” Oh My Freakin’ God!!!!! Such a bunch of whiney badonkadonk toboggans…”
you are a god.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:59 am
Haven’t heard of that station.
Yeah, I hope they stay afloat. I’ve been tuning in the past few months, pleasantly surprised. They really don’t seem to have any political ax to grind; they remind me of the all-news stations I’d heard in the NYC metro area some years back.
You hear national news stories from the usual national outlets (including ABC news and Fox), but they do have a staff of local reporters out there, too.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
9:59 am
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
9:48 am
Hmmmmm so it’s only the ransom they pay that keeps the relationship thriving? Unions have far outlived usefulness…are dying out…let them go..
Granny Godzilla
December 11th, 2012
10:00 am
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
9:54 am
“You are a squishy patriot daming your country to the grave.”
Refusing to cave into O’bozo’s brand of euro-socialist Marxism makes me a solid patriot, Granny.
People who do are not, squishy or otherwise
.
.
.
Balderdash…Sinkwich, you wouldn’t know “euro-socialist Marxism” if it bit your backside.
You are little more than a vichy collaberator.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:00 am
USinner @ 9:55
You know that vid came to mind soon as I started reading Donovan’s post…
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:00 am
where is Jay’s fainting couch?
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:00 am
“You are little more than a vichy collaberator.”
eeeeeeeyouch.
that’s gonna leave a mark.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:01 am
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
9:57 am
What is intellectual about manure?
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:02 am
USinner
Also threw Tommy Lee Jones in that one for you.
Mr Right
December 11th, 2012
10:02 am
maybe because he’s PRESIDENT and they owe him a modicum of respect.
Respect is a two way street,yea, he is our president but they were also elected by the people as he was. By the way, ya’ll got your britches jacked up over Romneys 47% remark then turn around and say because Obama won the 47% that voted against him don’t matter! Oh well, I guess it’s called revenge!
josef
December 11th, 2012
10:02 am
Granny
I was thinking more a Quisling, myself…
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:04 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:52 am
Get Sirius for 19 bucks a month…you can select from glee to anger..America Left, America Right, MSNBC, Fox, Potus (actually a great listen)…I’ve heard everything Fox has to say but America Left has a couple shows that are fun and fun to call in…Alex Bennett
Owl
December 11th, 2012
10:05 am
What’s missing here is leadership.
And that is to be expected from our President first.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:05 am
Michigan’s right to work law will make a scab out of some new hires.
Michigan’s Right-To-Work law being peddled by the GOP is nothing more than government sanctioned freeloading. Funny that Republicans whine about freeloaders, yet they pass laws to encourage and propogate freeloading. The life of a Republican brain cell must be bliss. Doesn’t seem as though they get used at all sometimes.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
10:05 am
Stevie Ray: “I do think we are forever beyond balanced budget any how…”
Again, a balanced budget is a horrendous idea that would deeply destabilize the economic system. No serious economic theorist supports that idea. Not one. It’s a complete joke.
“this president is not going to cut spending…no matter what he agrees to…”
What in the world are you talking about, Stevie? Do you seriously not think this president is going to cut any spending? Have you been paying attention?
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
10:05 am
Unions have far outlived usefulness…are dying out…let them go.
but we need the skimmer class fo’evah because socialism.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:06 am
“Also threw Tommy Lee Jones in that one for you”
I saw! that was a great meme !!
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
10:06 am
There’s a time for negotiation, a time for compromise, and, a time for a speech
I’ve only seen one of the three so far…and it ain’t helping.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:07 am
” Unions have far outlived usefulness…are dying out…let them go.”
yay!! let’s bring back a race to the bottom for workers’ rights!!!
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:07 am
Unions have far outlived usefulness…are dying out…let them go.
Tell that to Germany…
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
10:07 am
Again, a balanced budget is a horrendous idea that would deeply destabilize the economic system.
and I think Stevie Ray is intelligent enough to know this, and the fact that he (and his soulmate “oops”, aka “jm”) continues to parrot this Beltway nonsense indicates there’s just no getting through to what’s on the other end.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:08 am
“There’s a time for negotiation, a time for compromise, and, a time for a speech”
turn … turn … turn.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:09 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
9:55 am
No spending cuts put forth by President Trillions will ruin economic life as we know it…will definitely impact DC cash collections but to say “tailspin” is dramatic. He originally promised cuts on a philosophical basis…and proposed at one point workable 109 biln/year cuts…
Without cuts and assuming current anemic growth to continue, the deficit will continue at current levels and your guy will leave office and us with 20 trillion or so in debt..the debtor champion of all time..
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:09 am
“The biggest scandal in 50 years, right before your eyes”
Red meat for the socialists. Though I thought most of them were also vegetarians. Maybe there’s less venn diagram overlap there than I thought.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:10 am
S. Ray — “What is intellectual about manure?”
You have stumbled over the point, good sir.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
10:11 am
oops
Maybe the fainting couch is in Singapore…
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:12 am
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
10:07 am
I’m confused…balanced budget objective of some sort keeps focus on DC idiots being a zero’d in on expenses…by your other comments, it seems you think 80 bln a year from rich folks is plenty to make headway? Despite all the new stuff already committed to?
What is your position? Continue deficit spending and expect different results?
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:13 am
They BOTH suck
I would never go to Singapore. Not even for vacation. I prefer not to be caned.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:13 am
oops — “Red meat for the socialists. Though I thought most of them were also vegetarians. Maybe there’s less venn diagram overlap there than I thought.”
Perhaps you might learn more if you asked liberals more questions and leapt for fewer wild-eyed conclusions about them.
Seriously Folks
December 11th, 2012
10:13 am
Stevie Ray….please see my 9:36 post…nice little link in there for you…spare us the “without cuts” talking point..it is tiresome and EASILY refuted with one click of your mouse!
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:14 am
” I prefer not to be caned.”
then don’t litter.
there.
see how easy that was?
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:14 am
“Maybe the fainting couch is in Singapore…”
Jay’s in Singapore? Weird. Obviously he’s a night owl.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:15 am
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:10 am
Indeed…I have determined that intelligensia (self proclaimed of course) certainly, on both sides, come up with the answer before doing the work…I will continue my quest to connect the two beyond the use of bathroom gutter talk.
St Simons - aboriginal BOOTAKOOK 2014
December 11th, 2012
10:16 am
why is this bad?
this is the inevitable endgame of lie, distort, & fling poo.
Let them do their worst.
The People are Awake, and will wipe them out in 2014.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
10:17 am
Stevie Ray: “Unions have far outlived usefulness…are dying out…let them go..”
You realize that’s the exact same thing as saying “Living wages have far outlived their usefulness … are dying out .. let them go…” don’t you?
Not one iota of difference.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
10:17 am
He originally promised cuts on a philosophical basis…
This was before the GOP lost in 2012.
(there’s also the little matter of those proposed cuts — especially the “entitlement [spit, gag] ‘reforms’” floated — being absolutely WRONG. Yes, this Obama-bot acknowledges that his Supreme Leader does stupid things sometimes. Kinky, huh?)
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
Will … could it be … THE MASONS???
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
argh. Time suck take too much time. Must go. later!
lovelyliz
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
“Your amorality is your strength”
That’s the modern day GOP for you
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
balanced budget objective of some sort keeps focus on DC idiots being a zero’d in on expenses
A balanced budget objective also leaves no room for emergency expenditures. Imagine passing a balanced budget in October and then another terrorist attack happening in December. You gotta wait until next October to budget your response to that attack. Or, imagine a 8.0 earthquake along the New Madrid fault line happening within a budget year. How do you respond to that when you’re limiting yourself to a balanced budget that did not set aside emergency funding for such an event.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Madrid_Seismic_Zone
In a report filed in November 2008, The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency warned that a serious earthquake in the New Madrid Seismic Zone could result in “the highest economic losses due to a natural disaster in the United States,” further predicting “widespread and catastrophic” damage across Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, and particularly Tennessee, where a 7.7 magnitude quake or greater would cause damage to tens of thousands of structures affecting water distribution, transportation systems, and other vital infrastructure.[22] The earthquake is expected to also result in many thousands of fatalities, with more than 4,000 of the fatalities expected in Memphis alone.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
S. Ray — “…I will continue my quest to connect the two beyond the use of bathroom gutter talk.”
If there’s manure in your house, then that’s bathroom’s more of a gutter than you think.
Road Scholar
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
Sinkwich: When are you leaving for Somalia?
SPC
December 11th, 2012
10:20 am
And how would you suggest we address the spending disease? It’s a problem with both parties, but it’s being made much worse now. This president, and most politicians, will only respond to leverage when it comes to fiscal responsibility.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:20 am
Seriously Folks
December 11th, 2012
10:13 am
I have often referred to his proposal to cut spending…at least the workable one of 109bln/year. Love it..57% of this defense and balance finding more waste in entitlements. I know he has put this stuff forward…my point is that agreeing to them and making them happen in a useful time frame are two completely different things..teh DC incentives easily trump our interests in taking anything away from special interests..
nobodyyouknow
December 11th, 2012
10:20 am
It amazes me how the O’bama supporters including YOU Jay and your buddies in the media come up with all this B.S.. In case you didn’t get the message HE’S THE DAMN PRESIDENT! You make it look like the “poor man” has no say in this. To be perfectly honest I don’t trust any politician. Most all presidents in the past have worked with the other side. Yes, its dificult but they find a way. And I know the taxes on the wealthy must be increased. We all need to pay more. BUT JAY THEY MUST FIGURE OUT A WAY TO CUT BACK ON SPENDING. I’m in my 70’s and I will be willing to sacrifice some of my income to get us out of this awful debt. I’ve asked this before and got NO REPLY. JAY can you name one government program, entitlement or whatever that is not BROKE? ITs your job in the media to inform the readers of the responsibility and failures of our leaders in Washington. Not just the side you support but all sides. This country is in financial trouble BAD. And you and your peers need to get to reality. Stop your bias and write the FACTS on Democrats and Republicans!
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
10:24 am
Obama – the most victimized President in history…
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:24 am
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
10:17 am
Oh please….did you know that many who are not in unions make good money..often more than unions? They actually don’t intimidate employers extorting things like onerous pensions and post-retirement HC, job banks and the like…Unions biggest enemy is technology and themselves…there is no more guaranteed lifetime employment..
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:25 am
nobodyyouknow — “ITs your job in the media to inform the readers of the responsibility and failures of our leaders in Washington. Not just the side you support but all sides.”
You pretty clearly don’t understand that Jay’s an opinion columnist for the AJC. His ‘job in the media’ is to write opinion pieces, not to adhere to any particular reader’s notion of impartiality.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
10:25 am
“That fool Obama cares too much about what happens to this country and its people.”
Well if the fool cares so much about America so much then why has he allowed us to run up a staggering 6-7 trillion in new debt in just 4 years???
“You, on the other hand, don’t care about “catastrophic” consequences that would be “indelible, incurable” and “last for generations.”
Aaaah. So the people that don’t care like the tea party folk are the ones who’ve been protesting and screaming about the debt spendig for years now. But yet they don’t care? The people the most concerned about the debt are the ones that Jay claims don’t care? You gotta be kidding?
“Your amorality is your strength. Use it to demand what you want, or else.”
Speaking of morality didn’t Obama say on the campaign trail in 08 that it was immoral or unconsionable for us to run up some huge debt to the bank of China that our kids will have to pay back? Didn’t he say that that was unpatriotic, unAmerican? Didn’t this man say these things???
A Chicago style thug and morality? Seriously?
Oscar
December 11th, 2012
10:28 am
Lot of people are going to miss those social security checks and the army likes to get paid also. Disabled veterans.
No dredging of the Savannah River either.
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:30 am
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
OK since we must now go there, I have no manure inside my house….I can easily compete and likely more often than not defeat manure with my 50 year old reserve emissions…in fact, i control the ball so to speak. On any given day, I can dial up a continuum of characteristics….its like my effects guitar peddles….tone, crunch, echo, and the list goes on…
I don’t presume myself an intellectual…just have unhealthy relationship with numbers but no remotely part of intelligensia….that’s a self assigned moniker.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
10:30 am
I thought the stupidity low was already reached on this blog but seems we are doomed for even more lows. If only the conned scarecrows could get a brain, even if collectively they have to share it.
Hmmm, conned lecturing on patriotism while trying to secede at the same time…..
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:30 am
Stevie Ray @ 10:24
http://www.freep.com/article/20121206/COL33/312060264/
Of the 10 states with the highest per-capita incomes, for example, only one is a right-to-work state, and just three of the top 20 are. On average, right-to-work states have per-capita incomes that trail union states by more than $5,000.
Right-to-work advocates always claim their states are creating more jobs than union states — which holds some truth, if you just look at the sheer number of jobs created.
But of the 11 states with the fastest-growing economies as measured by gross domestic product, only three were right-to-work states in 2011. (Michigan was on that list in 2011, too, which Snyder spent all year this year bragging about. Now, suddenly, he claims our economy is being hobbled by an oppressive union environment.)
As a result, right-to-work states also suffer much worse poverty than union states, by several important measures.
Eight of the 10 states with the lowest overall per-capita incomes are right-to-work. And among the states with the highest rates of people without medical insurance (a sign of the quality of jobs available), seven of 10 are right-to-work. Eight of the 10 states with the highest poverty rates are right-to-work.
That’s coming from the same Detroit Free Press that endorsed Snyder for Governor…
Stevie Ray
December 11th, 2012
10:30 am
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:18 am
Of course, sustain is the real key peddle on my array of options..
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:31 am
“Speaking of morality didn’t Obama say on the campaign trail in 08 that it was immoral or unconsionable for us to run up some huge debt to the bank of China that our kids will have to pay back? ”
don’t know. did he? look it up. Teh Goog is your friend.
Madmax
December 11th, 2012
10:31 am
Jay,
Since you like tables, check this out http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=200. Revenues have returned to pre-recessionary levels but unprecedented spending (both in ratios, absolute and current $) continues and this president refuses to put spending on the table. That is the ” act of a petulant, frustrated three-year-old threatening to hold his breath until the country turns blue.”
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:35 am
MadMax – um. yeah. I just looked at your link – revenues are nowhere near pre-recessionary levels.
in current dollars:
2011 = 2,303
2007 = 2,568
excluding inflation:
2011: 1,949
2007: 2,414
as a % of GDP:
2011: 15.4%
2007: 18.5%
which just makes me wonder … what are you smoking?
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
10:36 am
Obama- the victim president.
Dirty Dawg
December 11th, 2012
10:37 am
I think we should resort to the strategy I heard recently, namely that the Secretary of the Treasury has the legal authority to have coins minted out of platinum – he’s limited when it’s gold and/or silver – and to declare the value of said coins to be anything he wants. So, as the plan relates, he’ll have one coined made, declare its value to be a trillion dollars and give it to himself – the US, as it were. Either that or just ignore the damned a-hole Repugs in the House, and go on about the business of the country and see just what those pr!@ks will do about it.
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
10:39 am
If the Unions are so great………….they wouldn’t need the State to FORCE people to join.
.
Coercion only attracts parasites.
.
See Fed.gov…………and those who are employed by said entity.
.
lol
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:40 am
leadership in action
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/the-exchange/u-punts-climate-change-action-again-170846578.html
St Simons - aboriginal BOOTAKOOK 2014
December 11th, 2012
10:40 am
i usually charge for spotting revenue streams, but the ajc should charge
Premier Radio Network by the word for publishing their transcripts heah.
Oscar
December 11th, 2012
10:41 am
The governemnt will find a way to keep operating, even without the debt ceiling being raised. It won’t be pretty. And may have to be resolved by the Supreme Court.
But the president can’t ignore our obligations.
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:42 am
the most powerful person in the country is a victim
very funny
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
10:42 am
Heywood, as usual drone wedding party kid, you don’t know what you are talking about. NO ONE in any state in this country is FORCED to join a union. That is current law.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:42 am
D. Dawg — “I think we should resort to the strategy I heard recently, namely that the Secretary of the Treasury has the legal authority to have coins minted out of platinum – he’s limited when it’s gold and/or silver – and to declare the value of said coins to be anything he wants. So, as the plan relates, he’ll have one coined made, declare its value to be a trillion dollars and give it to himself – the US, as it were.”
I think the bond and securities markets would listen to the announcement, laugh at it, and then move on.
josef
December 11th, 2012
10:44 am
Will Jones
“Th. Jefferson, a prophet, nailed it in his Jan. 19, 1810 letter to S. Kercheval: The same entity, manifest in their banker-frontmen Rothschild and Rockefeller-Bush, is attempting to again enslave mankind from which we revolted to receive in covenant this Promised Land.”
JAY
Is this who it sounds like?
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
10:46 am
Poor Republicans are gonna be so much poorer now that they have to actually pay back all their tax cuts and spending of borrowed money, with interest of course.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:48 am
Keep
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
10:48 am
@usinuk
Yes, these are directly related to Obama’s policies… Are you really that out of touch! Kinda sad.. But hey, you did say you were a child of public schooling…
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:49 am
“the most powerful person in the country is a victim”
someone evidently never took civics and learned that the President is not a King … checks and balances and all that, doncha know …
Adam
December 11th, 2012
10:49 am
You know what? Let them default. Let’s default and just not pay any troops and shut down the military, pay social security benefits for a couple of weeks, shut down Medicare except for people on life support or something, and pay mostly only the interest for a couple of weeks too.
Yes, this will suck and we will most certainly be downgraded and people will stop getting mail and chaos will ensue. But people will remember and the Republicans will be blamed and the Republicans will quickly undo their mistake. In the mean time, we will have reduced the deficit substantially and we can stop this “OBAMA BIG SPENDER” nonsense when the numbers come out. It will surely send the economy into a short recession too. The effect will be all the pressure will be on the Republicans to undo their mistake, and they will be voted out in 2014 for their trouble.
You don’t negotiate with hostage takers.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:50 am
“Yes, these are directly related to Obama’s policies”
you know, a quote so that I know what the hell you’re talking about would be helpful here.
oops
December 11th, 2012
10:50 am
“someone evidently never took civics and learned that the President is not a King … checks and balances and all that, doncha know …”
waaaaaaaaaa waaaaaaa
keep cryin
sob the sob story
our poor wittle pwesident is just getting spanked
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
10:51 am
No Scandel here————–
.
“NYT reports that the median net worth of a member of Congress climbed 15 percent from 2004 to 2010, to $913,000; meanwhile, the median net worth for all Americans dropped 8 percent over that same period, to roughly $100,000.”
.
Clearly…………..Barry…….and Washington needs more discretionary money to spend.
.
lol
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:51 am
“But hey, you did say you were a child of public schooling…”
oh, and, you obviously don’t know me … I’ve never said that … just the opposite, in fact.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
10:51 am
“Of the 10 states with the highest per-capita incomes, for example, only one is a right-to-work state, and just three of the top 20 are. On average, right-to-work states have per-capita incomes that trail union states by more than $5,000.”
Demographics and history has more to do with this than anything. State per capita incomes, wealth, etc. is something that has been built up over time. For example when Illinois, Ohio, and the northern states were all Republican led states they were in their ages of prosperity and the gap between these states and the Democrat controlled southern states was staggering. Its only in the past 50 years or so that many of these states have become decidedly blue for the most part and hence began a steady decline. Since then though the gap between the northern and southern states has become to narrow. Why? Because the Republican dominated northern states became D controlled and that is when they began to slide and the gap began to narrow.
The southern states were mired in poverty and backwardness under D control for a long, long time. But in the last few decades as they became R controlled they are now gaining jobs and gaining populations as the now D controlled northern states are losing jobs and populations. Still a long way to go to narrow a gap that’s been built up over a long, long time but its easy to open your eyes and see southern states grabbing up car mfging plants left and right while northern states like Illinois continue to bleed and decay.
The key is not looking at what states have in terms of wealth or income which was built up over a long time. The key is looking at the current trends of jobs growth, population growth, unemployment, etc. The trend is your friend. And the trend clearly shows that right to work states are gaining jobs and population relative to their unionized blue state counterparts.
guy
December 11th, 2012
10:53 am
Aquagirl, Let’s just go communist and everyone will be equal. No profit margins needed except for government leaders. So simple!
Jay
December 11th, 2012
10:53 am
It was, Josef. Emphasis on WAS.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:54 am
““someone evidently never took civics and learned that the President is not a King … checks and balances and all that, doncha know …”
waaaaaaaaaa waaaaaaa
keep cryin
sob the sob story”
um. yeah. you might want to pace yourself on this late-morning boozing of yours. no one here is crying, just correcting your erroneous assertions.
Thomas Heyward Jr
December 11th, 2012
10:54 am
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
10:42 am
Heywood, as usual drone wedding party kid, you don’t know what you are talking about. NO ONE in any state in this country is FORCED to join a union. That is current law.
.
—————————————————————————————————————————-
.
I stand corrected.
You are only “forced” to join the Union if you wish to work in your chosen field and that particular field has the STATE-backed Union representing it.
.
Sorry……………..my bust.
.
lol.
.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
10:54 am
oops — “our poor wittle pwesident is just getting spanked”
Sure doesn’t look that way. Looks more to me like a bunch of bitter cons are upset that the American people rejected their candidate and their ideas about a month ago.
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
10:55 am
BRO @ 1030,
I also like what the Free press said here…
Two years ago, a newly elected Rick Snyder told the Free Press editorial board he was determined to be a new kind of governor — a pragmatist focused like a laser on initiatives that promised to raise standards of living for all Michiganders.
And until last week, we believed him.
For two years, we supported Snyder as he took painful steps to restore Michigan’s fiscal stability and confront a crisis in which plunging tax revenues and mounting obligations to retired workers threatened to cripple the state’s cities and school districts.
We criticized the governor for signing legislation that burdened a woman’s right to choose, condoned discrimination against gays, and beggared colleges and universities to pay for business tax cuts.
But we also indulged many compromises Snyder maintained were necessary to advance his pro-growth agenda. And when ideologues on the right and left mounted campaigns designed to hamstring state government by limiting its authority to raise revenues, regulate labor relations, and fund critically needed infrastructure, we joined the governor in opposing them.
In short, we trusted Snyder’s judgment.
That trust has now been betrayed — for us, and for the hundreds of thousand of independents who voted for Snyder with the conviction that they were electing someone more independent, and more visionary, than partisan apparatchiks like Wisconsin’s Scott Walker or Florida’s Rick Scott.
Last week, in an abrupt about-face Snyder’s defenders said was born of his frustration with organized labor, the governor unleashed a legislative blitzkrieg that seems certain to bring a bill barring closed-shop contracts to his desk next week.
He has already promised to sign it.
Watching Snyder explain his right-to-work reversal was disturbing on several levels.
His insistence that the legislation was designed to promote the interests of unionized workers and “bring Michiganders together” was grotesquely disingenuous; even as he spoke, security personnel were locking down the capital in anticipation of protests by angry unionists.
Snyder’s ostensible rationale for embracing right-to-work legislation — it was, he insisted, a matter of preserving workers’ freedom of association — was equally dishonest.
The real motive of Michigan’s right-to-work champions, as former GOP legislator Bill Ballenger ruefully observed, is “pure greed” — the determination to emasculate, once and for all, the Democratic Party’s most reliable source of financial and organizational support.
Off track for a better state
Michigan voters have never trusted business interests or organized labor to govern Michigan unilaterally, and they have been appropriately wary of schemes to secure a permanent advantage for either side. Thus the ignominious demise of Proposal 2, which a majority of voters correctly perceived as an attempt not just to tip the scales of labor negotiations in unions’ favor, but to lock them there for decades to come.
Snyder and other critics of Proposal 2 called it an overreach — and we agreed, even when proponents warned that Snyder and his Republican legislative allies would move to crush the labor movement if the voters rejected Proposal 2.
Nonsense, we assured them — Gov. Snyder is smarter than that. Too many of Snyder’s higher priorities would be jeopardized, we reasoned, if he picked a needless fight over right-to-work.
Our reasoning was sound, and it remains so. What we miscalculated was Snyder’s resolve to buck his own party’s most irrational ideologues and keep his eye on the main prize: a better Michigan.
It’s all about politics
Like the failed labor initiative it seeks to avenge, Snyder’s right-to-work legislation is an attempt to institutionalize Republicans’ current political advantage. Everything else is window dressing, and most of these diversionary talking points are demonstrably false.
The argument that right-to-work status makes states more competitive or prosperous is refuted by a mountain of evidence that shows right-to-work states trailing their union-friendly counterparts in key metrics like per capita wealth, poverty rates and health insurance coverage.
Snyder’s contention that workers’ First Amendment rights are compromised when a union they have freely elected to bargain on their behalf proposes a contract making union dues compulsory is equally specious. Employees are always free to reject such a contract or decertify the union that negotiated it, just as stockholders can force the ouster of corporate managers they deem unresponsive to their needs.
Snyder has long acknowledged that steamrolling right-to-work legislation through the Legislature would have enduring negative consequences for productive collaboration between workers and employees. His decision to embrace such legislation now destroys, in an eye blink, the trusting relationship he and his business allies have struggled to establish.
It also yokes a governor who once aspired to be seen as a new kind of Republican with the most ideological, backward-looking elements of that party — the very people whose exclusionary vision of the country’s future was rejected by voters in last month’s election.
Trust betrayed
Snyder’s closest brush with candor came when he suggested that his endorsement of right-to-work was less than voluntary — a decision “that was on the table whether I wanted it to be on the table or not.”
But that is less an excuse than a confession that Michigan’s governor has abdicated his leadership responsibilities to Republican legislators bent on vengeance.
What reasonable person now believes that Snyder has the will or the wherewithal to deliver Michigan, or even his own party, from the failed politics of division?
Michigan voters who provided Snyder’s margin of victory in 2010 feel betrayed, and they have every justification. If he was ever serious about being the governor who brought Michiganders together, Snyder has just sent himself back to Square One.
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
10:56 am
@usinuk
Walmart is only the beginning. Companies are cutting people and will continue to cut… The medical industry will never be the same… and all this is only the tip of the iceberg.. All this is due to Obama’s policies… The biggest scandal is re electing this president… Period.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
10:57 am
“Yes, this will suck and we will most certainly be downgraded and people will stop getting mail and chaos will ensue.”
I pay my bills online and most of the mail I get is junk mail. And for birthdays and Christmas most of my friends and family send me them cute little evite cards and such. The postal service is not missed in the Doomy household. If I want to mail a package I’ll use UPS or my Fedex account. I learned my mistake last January when I mailed a package priority mail from here to Montgomery which is a 3 hour drive. I dropped it off on a Friday morning and figured it would get there Monday in time for her birthday if I sent it priority mail. It got there Tuesday. Priority mail and it took 3 days to go 3 hours. No thanks. I’ll use my Fedex ground account next time.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
10:58 am
The key is not looking at what states have in terms of wealth or income which was built up over a long time. The key is looking at the current trends of jobs growth, population growth, unemployment, etc. The trend is your friend. And the trend clearly shows that right to work states are gaining jobs and population relative to their unionized blue state counterparts.
You could have saved a lot of bandwidth by simply saying “It’s the Dems fault”. However, that huge dissertation that you wrote is not something I wouldn’t have expected from you.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
10:58 am
Stevie Ray: “Oh please….did you know that many who are not in unions make good money..often more than unions?”
Sure, a few layers of upper management and the highly skilled. But what about the average worker? Their ability to survive, let alone live a prosperous life, is quickly vanishing.
“Unions biggest enemy is technology and themselves…there is no more guaranteed lifetime employment”
Sure there is, for members of the plutocracy, who are busy every second amassing astronomical wealth as they ruthlessly attack the living standards of average workers.
And YOU and people like you are swallowing it hook, line, and sinker.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
10:59 am
Hmmm … first of all, you’re confusing the insurance industry with the medical industry – they are two VERY different businesses. secondly, the insurance industry is reaping a BONANZA with people being forced to buy coverage –
lastly, as for WalMart – they have traditionally kept people at 38 hours/week and called it “part time” to avoid paying bennies … this isn’t news, it’s SOP for the SOBs.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:00 am
Stevie Ray
I have lots of family in Michigan, and the people who voted Snyder thinking he was more of a centrist are starting to get upset with him. I read that editorial from the Free Press, and I couldn’t believe they went after him like that. I understand though, when you trust someone like that and they do a complete 180 on you.
josef
December 11th, 2012
11:02 am
JAY
Thought so.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
11:02 am
There is a reason why Michigan’s car industry has imploded and Detroit is the site of filming for Hollywood apocalypse movies. And there is a reason why Alabama, Tenn, Georgia, and South Carolia have been adding car mfging plants. Too bad the libs can’t seem to figure it out.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
11:03 am
Thulsa Doom:
“And the trend clearly shows that right to work states are gaining jobs and population relative to their unionized blue state counterparts IN A RACE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE ECONOMIC HEAP“.
That’s the important little detail you left off there.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:03 am
WalMart and how they treat employees
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/story/2012-06-05/walmart-workers-air-complaints/55450634/1
Madmax
December 11th, 2012
11:03 am
Usink – aside from the fact that you cherry picked the highest rate of spending in the 8 years- please – the issue is spending is at extreme levels, we keep spending at unprecedented rates – spending is at the highest measure of any administration at anytime in our recent history while revenues have returned to Clinton Bush era levels.
using current $ up 32%
using inflation adjusted up 30%
using percent of GDP up 23%
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
11:05 am
@usinuk
I am not confused about anything, other than the fact that this country just re elected a total IDIOT… We may not recover from this President… But hey, we get what we vote for…. Have a great day…
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:06 am
Madmax – I picked the highest rate of spending … in what?
Ronald Reagan
December 11th, 2012
11:07 am
While you are crossing bridges let’s not forget about Senator Kennedy’s great bridge crossing murder, Obama’s “Fast & Furious” bloody coverup & his latest Benghazi (I hope it won’t affect my election) coverup!
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:07 am
Hmmm … you seem confused about a lot of things … you must be suffering from a terminal ODS condition where you see socialists under every bed …
Adam
December 11th, 2012
11:13 am
Doomy: The postal service is not missed in the Doomy household.
Well GOOD FOR YOU *golf clap*
I don’t suppose you bothered to check what would happen if you left a package at UPS or FedEx as they were closing on Friday, did you?
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
11:14 am
LOL…. very funny… Time will tell usinuk…. not confused about anything, I am very capable of making educated assessments… But you keep drinking the grape juice, as things will correct, no matter how many illiterates voted this guy into office …
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
11:15 am
“secondly, the insurance industry is reaping a BONANZA with people being forced to buy coverage –”
Not really. Not in terms of profit margin anyway. Margins are pretty thin on health insurance companies profits. But you are right in one aspect though. Because rates are expected to rise substantially as a result of Obamacare hospitalization deductibles will correspondingly rise. Which means that a lot of higher margin filler policies such as indemnity and critical illness policies will be sold to help fill in the gap. That’s some serious margin for Doomy and company.
“lastly, as for WalMart – they have traditionally kept people at 38 hours/week and called it “part time” to avoid paying bennies … this isn’t news, it’s SOP for the SOBs.”
Got proof of that? Cause it sure doesn’t jive with what I see with my very own eyes when I look at Walmart employees benefits. I deal with a number of Walmart employees since we’ve had Medicare kiosks set up in plenty of Walmarts over the last several years. Their group health plan is actually pretty good relative to a lot of other employer group plans I’ve seen. $1750 deductible which is reasonable and relatively reasonable copays. I have a Walmart employee right now that is transitioning to Medicare. His copay to see a psychiatrist is $14 on his walmart plan. I think he gets a break from his psych on the copay but I’m not sure if its because of him being a Walmart employee or because obviously he is not high income working as a cashier at Walmart. Regardless, on his Medicare plan his copay will be $35 so his copay under his Walmart plan was better. So the idea that Walmart does not provide benefits is just not true.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
11:16 am
no matter how many illiterates voted this guy into office …
How would they know.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:16 am
” not confused about anything, I am very capable of making educated assessments”
all evidence to the contrary.
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
11:16 am
Poor Republicans are gonna be so much poorer now that they have to actually pay back all their tax cuts and spending of borrowed money, with interest of course.
ummm…everyone will pay not just the poor republicans
TP how much will your taxes increase if we go off the cliff?
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
11:16 am
Heywood: You are only “forced” to join the Union if you wish to work in your chosen field and that particular field has the STATE-backed Union representing it. .
Heywood, again you are wrong (see Taft-Hartley) but what can we expect from someone who claims the President is using drones to attack WI wedding parties….. come back when you know what you are talking about. We’re laughing at you again.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:18 am
There is a reason why Michigan’s car industry has imploded and Detroit is the site of filming for Hollywood apocalypse movies. And there is a reason why Alabama, Tenn, Georgia, and South Carolia have been adding car mfging plants. Too bad the libs can’t seem to figure it out.
Libs can’t figure out your imaginary world because libs can’t imagine stuff like that…
http://online.wsj.com/mdc/public/page/2_3022-autosales.html
Sales and Share of Total Market by Manufacturer
General Motors Corp.
YTD Sales: 2,349,984
Marketshare: 17.9%
Ford Motor Company
YTD Sales: 2,030,107
Marketshare: 15.5%
Chrysler LLC
YTD Sales: 1,499,420
Marketshare: 11.4%
Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc.
YTD Sales: 1,888,361
Marketshare: 14.4%
American Honda Motor Co Inc.
YTD Sales: 1,290,011
Marketshare: 9.8%
Nissan North America Inc.
YTD Sales: 1,042,366
Marketshare: 7.9%
I could keep on listing, but no other manufacturer has more than 5% of the marketshare. Seems as though somebody would do a bit of research before claiming others can’t figure something out. Google is quite easy to figure out, and it can get you the information you need to not embarass yourself. There was also a recent news article that talked about how car sales were the highest in about 5 years I think. Nobody’s imploding other than those who rely on rhetoric as opposed to facts.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
11:19 am
One provision of the ACA limits the amount that insurance companies can skim off the premiums to 15 or 20%, I believe. I think it should be more like 5 to 10% max.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
11:19 am
Hmmmmm:”But you keep drinking the grape juice, as things will correct, no matter how many illiterates voted this guy into office …”
A little racist jab there under cover of anonymity?
How about the biggest “illiterates” of all, the economic illiterates who cast their votes dutifully for Romney despite his program’s attack on their very conditions of life?
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
11:19 am
@Thulsa
When has FACT ever mattered to usinuk… Just like all the rest of these puppets….
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
11:20 am
You would think that someone who is a self-proclaimed economic genius would comprehend that: (1) profits are not the same as profit margins and (2) citing medical benefit coverage for full time employees does not support an argument that part time employees are getting benefits.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:20 am
“Not really. Not in terms of profit margin anyway. Margins are pretty thin on health insurance companies profits. ”
baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahaha
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/14/business/14health.html
and more recently
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705396894/Health-insurance-companies-profits-increase-after-affordable-care-act.html?pg=all
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:21 am
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/november-new-car-sales-highest-in-nearly-five-years-2012-12-10
U.S. new car sales in November rose 15% year-over-year to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 15.54 million. Compared with October, sales rose 4.7% to 1.14 million units sold according to data released today by Truecar.com.
General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) led the parade with sales of more than 186,500 units, down 4.7% sequentially but up 3.4% for compared with November 2011. Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) finished second, with over 177,000 units sold, up 5.4% sequentially and 6.4% compared with last year. Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) sold nearly 162,000 units, up 4.2% from October and 17.2% year-over-year and Chrysler sales topped 122,000 units, down 2.9% from October but up 14.4% year-over-year.
GM, Ford, Toyota, and Chrysler remain the top four carmakers measured by market share as well, with 16.3%, 15.5%, 14.1%, and 10.7%, respectively.
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
11:21 am
and then there was welcome to the Occupation…
A racist …… LOL.
josef
December 11th, 2012
11:22 am
Hmmmm
“…how many illiterates…”
Judging from that post, and awaiting an assessment from OREP, I would posit that you are e pluribus unus…
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
11:22 am
“I don’t suppose you bothered to check what would happen if you left a package at UPS or FedEx as they were closing on Friday, did you?”
Actually I do know what would have happened because I’ve shipped to Montgomery before using Fedex. It would have made it in 1 day just like it used to and been there Monday instead of Tuesday. Again. Lesson learned.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:23 am
“When has FACT ever mattered to usinuk… Just like all the rest of these puppets…”
please. In like you lightweights, I actually LINK to FACTS that support my argument.
you guys??? not so much.
josef
December 11th, 2012
11:23 am
He ne ha…
In case you check in, a little Noble Savage humor for you…
The Indians asked their new chief if the coming winter was going to be cold or mild. Since he was a modern man in a modern society, he didn’t know from predicting what the winter was going to be like.
But just to be on the safe side, he told them that the winter was indeed going to be cold and that they collect a lot of firewood to be prepared.
But, being a practical leader and a believer in science, he called the National Weather Service.
‘It looks like this winter is going to be quite cold, ‘ the meteorologist at the weather service responded.
So he went back and told the people to collect even more firewood in order to be prepared.
A week later, he called the National Weather Service again. ‘Does it still look like it is going to be a very cold winter? ‘
‘Yes, it ’s going to be a very cold winter. ‘
So he goes back again and ordered them to collect every scrap of firewood they could find.
Two weeks late, just to make sure he wasn’t overreacting, the chief called the National Weather Service again. ‘Are you absolutely certain that the winter is going to be very cold? ‘
‘Absolutely. It ’s looking more and more like it is going to be one of the coldest winters on record. ‘
‘How can you be so sure? ‘ The chief asked.
The weatherman replied, ‘The Indians are collecting a sh*tload of firewood. ‘
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
11:24 am
ummm…everyone will pay not just the poor republicans
All I hear are poor Republicans whining about paying their bills. If you don’t want the debt, don’t make it. As for how much I’ll pay, it depends on how much I make from each source. Pension, dividends, capital gains, personal business less expenses. The usual.
catlady
December 11th, 2012
11:24 am
I think it is a great idea. Start cutting in the states whose representatives are not willing to help with the crisis. Of course, Georgia will be in the hole pretty quickly, but so be it.Obama should draw up a list of “cuts” to be made on a state by state basis. It IS time for hardball.
Jefferson
December 11th, 2012
11:27 am
Reasonable people can come to reasonable conclusions under reasonable conditions unless you are a republican.
Let it be known.
saywhat?
December 11th, 2012
11:29 am
thulsa doom- Obama’s victim.
Hmmmmmmm
December 11th, 2012
11:30 am
@josef…
lol
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
11:31 am
Josef,
Sagegirl
December 11th, 2012
11:31 am
“Got proof of that?”
I do. My mother worked at Walmart 15 yrs ago. She was never allowed to complete a 40 hr scheduled work-week and when she hit hr 38 was sent home. Every time. They have not changed their business practices.
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
11:31 am
TP…thanks for the non answer
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
11:34 am
Josef,
BTW, It’s Stand Watie’s tomorrow…
the cat
December 11th, 2012
11:34 am
Doomy-you pay a fortune to ship via Fed Ex or UPS or the postal service. Why don’t you get your act together and send items in a timely manner or maybe you have stock in Blue or Brown?
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:34 am
josef –
Paul
December 11th, 2012
11:34 am
‘Of course, Republicans have talked themselves into believing that this is all justified. They are so absolutely certain that they are correct about the budget that they are willing to knock the United States to its knees to get their way.”
If Republicans had the courage of their convictions, they would not have appropriated funds in excess of the current debt limit.
But they did obligate the country to spend more than the debt limit. Therefore, Republicans don’t just lack the courage of their convictions, they don’t have any.
Courage OR convictions.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:35 am
josef
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
11:35 am
Brocephus,
Its the Dem’s fault. Nice and short and pithy. Tanks.
And speaking of lengthy posts your post on the amount of car business in Detroit is quite a waste. Detroit obviously has more car mfg. than the states I mentioned. This goes back about 100 years and that’s quite a head start. I don’t think anyone doesn’t know that for Pete’s sake. The point is that in new plants being built the Southern states seem to be grabbing quite a bit of new business as far as new plants goes.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
11:36 am
I actually LINK to FACTS that support my argument.
you guys??? not so much.
See also MadMax @ 10.31, who seems to be arguing that charts containing useful data are tools of the Devil (well, if you read between the lines… I do hear an awful lot of righties who seem to think Jay has a “fixation” on data, which would indicate to me that the people that they prefer, DON’T.)
And by the way–did “Morality ?” ever find a cite for that “1/3 more moochers on disability under Obama” bit he was peddling yesterday?
Keep Up the Good Fight!
December 11th, 2012
11:36 am
Hmmm… you would think everyone would comprehend that UPS and FedEx do NOT deliver to all parts of this country. For those areas they don’t serve directly, they use the USPS. In fact they use a lot of USPS services. It’s garbage to think that either can replace the USPS or even wants to.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:37 am
Paul
Don’t come here talking common sense. You know that infuriates some people.
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
11:37 am
Anybody who thinks Barack Obama is a friend of the left, just read this.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/12/11/president-obama-s-foolish-willingness-to-screw-liberals-over-medicare.html?source=socialflow&account=thedailybeast&medium=twitter
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:38 am
“See also MadMax @ 10.31, who seems to be arguing that charts containing useful data are tools of the Devil ”
although, considering that the table actually refuted his thesis, maybe it is a tool of the devil …
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
11:38 am
And there is a reason why Alabama, Tenn, Georgia, and South Carolia have been adding car mfging plants.
that reason being, mainly, a history of tolerance for slave labor. (these days it’s couched in fat tax breaks that are borne by the population that is supposed to benefit from all those shiny new facilities in their midst.)
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:39 am
dB – 11:36 – no … but evidently it was ALL OVER the news, donchaknow …
josef
December 11th, 2012
11:39 am
I thought y’all might like that one, too! And Unmentionable says from the wind out there today, he might not be collecting firewood, but he’s certainly making sure the gas bill is paid!
CORBIN
It is that. One bad-a33 Redskin, he…! And, Dec. 17 is coming up, 150 year anniversary of…? Wonder if the we can get a post on that one from the Imam?
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
11:39 am
Anybody who thinks Barack Obama is a friend of the left
…will run screaming from anything that is actually left-wing, rhetorically, so I’m not sure why you bother.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
11:40 am
the cat,
Sorry but maybe my expectations of priority mail being able to deliver something in 2 days that’s only a 3 hour drive was just a wee bit too much. But if I ever use the postal svc again I’ll be sure to heed your advice and use plenty of extra time given the tortoise speed of the postal svc.
Donovan
December 11th, 2012
11:41 am
Just got back from a walk and decided to check in to see what the enemy was carping about. Well, well. It sure looks like I stirred up a hornet’s nest. This tells me that what makes you liberals mad is the truth of my postings. It hurts doesn’t it? Now quit behaving like someone bloodied your nose and you don’t know how to fight back.
Stands for Deceipt…you liberals Are the majority of sheep depending on government to tell you what to do, accepting hand-outs, and hating the productive citizens.
Welcome to the Occupation…since you haven’t figured out that your worthless degree won’t earn you a living I would suggest you take a shower, cut your hair, leave your parent’s basement, and go look for a job. Socialism is a losing proposition.
Aqua girl…I get tired of swimming in your cesspool dealing with daydreamers.
How do you talk to a liberal? You can’t, but sometimes they listen and get really, really mad.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:41 am
Doom
And speaking of lengthy posts your post on the amount of car business in Detroit is quite a waste. Detroit obviously has more car mfg. than the states I mentioned.
So, how are they imploding when sales are increasing and two of the Big Three still have the largest market share in the US? You made the statement that they were imploding. I simply pointed out their sales figures and market share. You can trust the Wall Street Journal with that kind of information, right?
As to Southern States getting new plants, what company would turn down freebies? When the state basically gives you land, reduces your taxes to nil, and make it easy to pay employees less, why would a company NOT jump at that option? As it stands, even with the increase in jobs, those same Right-To-Work States, which includes the entire South, will still be at the lower end of per-capita states. The only way to move up the chain is to offer higher wages, and that ain’t happening in GOP controlled states.
Paul
December 11th, 2012
11:43 am
Brosephus
I was kinda going for an alternative to citing a source.
Nothing seems to satisfy those guys, does it?
Hey, I know what it is… their brains aren’t elastic… add more stuff, it creates pressure… give’em sources and logic, it triggers the ‘think’ mechanism, that creates pressure and…
BAM!
Their heads explode.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
11:44 am
SfD — “And by the way–did “Morality ?” ever find a cite for that “1/3 more moochers on disability under Obama” bit he was peddling yesterday?”
He’ll never find it because he’s looking in the wrong place.
*State* disability and workers comp claims are up, NOT Federal. And his description of how one gets on disability yesterday didn’t bear any resemblance whatsoever to how it’s ACTUALLY done — unless you’re talking about state disability and workers comp programs.
Oh, but then he’d have to blame the governors and legislatures of the STATES who let so many people onto the disability rolls — and lots of them are Republicans . . . oh, no . . .
It’s just another example of “Morality” flapping his gums about something he doesn’t know jack spit about.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
11:45 am
“that reason being, mainly, a history of tolerance for slave labor.”
I was told the Hyundai plant outside of Montgomery starts folks off at around $14 an hour. If true then that’s probably a lot more than local starting wages for factory work around Montgomery. But don’t let that get in the way of your emotionalism parade with the nonsensical slave labor rhetoric.
“(these days it’s couched in fat tax breaks that are borne by the population that is supposed to benefit from all those shiny new facilities in their midst.)”
And what the local populations give up in tax breaks to lure these plants they more than make up for in increased sales taxes and substantially increased local economic activity. Or so we are told by the govt officials who made the deals with these companies to begin with. Liberals do trust in the good stewardship and judgment of govt bureaucrats don’t they? Right?
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
11:47 am
Doom — “Sorry but maybe my expectations of priority mail being able to deliver something in 2 days that’s only a 3 hour drive was just a wee bit too much. But if I ever use the postal svc again I’ll be sure to heed your advice and use plenty of extra time given the tortoise speed of the postal svc.”
FWIW, you’ll have a MUCH easier time getting the USPS to pay off on an insured package that’s damaged or lost than you will with either UPS or FedEX. I’ll take the slower speed in exchange for the shipper not wanting to take three weeks to “investigate” the issue. Look, you insured it, here’s the smashed package, now pay up.
USPS comes right across. UPS and FedEX, not so much.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:47 am
“Nothing seems to satisfy those guys, does it?”
which is the root of a LOT of their problems, if ya know what I mean (and I think that you do)
Madmax
December 11th, 2012
11:47 am
Usink – again only if you cherry pick your years and even then, they continue to show the issue is spending – if you do trend analysis, you will see it took us 200 years to reach 1 trillion in spending, 15 years to reach 2 trillion, 7 years to reach 3 trillion and current projections are for us to reach 4 trillion in 6 or less. What part of that trend do you fail to understand. While revenues are recovering, there has been no spending reduction using any measure by this administration.
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
11:47 am
Josef,
Dec 17…Grant expels the Jews from his department…correct Professor ?
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
11:48 am
Donovan — “Now quit behaving like someone bloodied your nose and you don’t know how to fight back.”
ST*U, Donny.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118715/quotes
josef
December 11th, 2012
11:49 am
“that reason being, mainly, a history of tolerance for slave labor.”
Well, that, and 150 years of imperial colonialist occupation…
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:50 am
Paul
getalife
December 11th, 2012
11:51 am
Dang, I thought we finally had a scandal with this President but it is just the gop acting like spoiled children. We see that everyday from the cons.
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
11:51 am
Donovan,
Sometimes, just when I think you might actually have a point, you say something snarky and unnecessary, making everything else trite. It must really suck being as angry as you seem to be all the time. You might want to consider a hobby…just saying…
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:52 am
“Usink – again only if you cherry pick your years and even then, they continue to show the issue is spending”
dearheart, I’m dancing to the beat that YOU laid down in your 10:30 chart, which was about revenues being more than what they were pre-recession.
they weren’t. it’s not cherry picking data – it’s refuting YOUR thesis.
you posted the link and you were wrong. now, man up and admit it.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
11:54 am
And what the local populations give up in tax breaks to lure these plants they more than make up for in increased sales taxes and substantially increased local economic activity.
So, that explains why Montgomery had to increase their sales tax to 10%….
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
11:54 am
Corbin – “Sometimes, just when I think you might actually have a point, you say something snarky and unnecessary, making everything else trite.”
sometimes????
josef
December 11th, 2012
11:55 am
CORBIN
Correct,,,move to the front of the class..
Pretty to the point, that order was…he must’ve been sober that day…
“The Jews, as a class violating every regulation of trade established by the Treasury Department and also department orders, are hereby expelled from the Department [of the Tennessee] within twenty-four hours from the receipt of this order.
Post commanders will see to it that all of this class of people be furnished passes and required to leave, and any one returning after such notification will be arrested and held in confinement until an opportunity occurs of sending them out as prisoners, unless furnished with permit from headquarters.
No passes will be given these people to visit headquarters for the purpose of making personal application of trade permits”
Doggone/GA
December 11th, 2012
11:55 am
“You might want to consider a hobby…just saying…”
What?! And give up his hobby of coming here?
Common Sense isn't very Common
December 11th, 2012
11:55 am
Jay’s fainting couch had to be sent out to be reupholstered after all the cons here cried all over and peed on it when the results of the election became known
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
11:57 am
Well, that, and 150 years of imperial colonialist occupation…
de po’ foreign industrialist white man can’t get a break.
around $14 an hour.
Why, that’s actually enough to live on, kinda (with help from various assistance programs, which we should gratefully provide to our citizens, mind you).
Obviously we should welcome these Korean insect overlords.
Or so we are told by the govt officials who made the deals with these companies to begin with. Liberals do trust in the good stewardship and judgment of govt bureaucrats don’t they?
When they’re conservative governors who’ve been elected on “freedumb good gubmint baaad” rhetoric? no, not generally.
JamVet
December 11th, 2012
11:58 am
What this country needs is a minimum wage for upper level management.
And in the spirit of economic justice and fairness, I say make it about 75% of what it was in 1968 (Which is the case for the actual minimum wage right now), so that puts it at about $65,000 per year…
Then the now record corporate profits can be used to revitalize the middle class and we can restore actual capitalism in this country once again…
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
12:01 pm
So, that explains why Montgomery had to increase their sales tax to 10%….
good lord.
I’m assuming this includes food and clothing (another hideous culture-shock I experienced when I moved Down Here.)
josef
December 11th, 2012
12:01 pm
SFD
Well, that, too!
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
12:02 pm
Any deal will necessarily disappoint everyone, like some self-fulfilling founding vision of a house divided against itself on every stinking issue. We are just going to print money. if cash is the new king, then we’ll just bring down the king. Just like the inflationary rabble we truly are.
Paul
December 11th, 2012
12:03 pm
JamVet
Read a good proposal the other day.
Tie workers’ pay raises and bonuses to CEO pay and bonuses.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:03 pm
“So, how are they imploding when sales are increasing and two of the Big Three still have the largest market share in the US? You made the statement that they were imploding.”
You’re right. My mistake. I should have said had imploded as in past tense. You know. Seeing as how that was in fact exactly what happened before the U.S. taxpayer had to bail their asses out to the tune of mega billios of dollars. Did you somehow forget about all that? And just out of curiosity have we been paid back all of our taxpayer money yet?
“As to Southern States getting new plants, what company would turn down freebies? When the state basically gives you land, reduces your taxes to nil, and make it easy to pay employees less, why would a company NOT jump at that option? As it stands, even with the increase in jobs, those same Right-To-Work States, which includes the entire South, will still be at the lower end of per-capita states. The only way to move up the chain is to offer higher wages, and that ain’t happening in GOP controlled states.”
Sorry but your entire statement rings hollow considering the mega billions of dollars of taxpayers money that was spent propping up the big 3 in the unionized states. Surely you realize in your statement about tax giveaways by the states that these tax icentives are in the millions and not the billions. And surely you do recognize that if we are going to talk about giveaways by the taxpayers and subsidies by govt to car companies that we are talking about millions in the cases of these states and not the mega billions to the big 3 in the unionized states. Surely you understand the difference in millions in taxbreaker breaks compared to mega billions right???
And same question to you that I posed to stands? Surely you trust the allknowing judgment and competency of govt bureaucrats who agreed to give these tax breaks to these companies to locate in the South. Being a liberal we all know that gubment knows best. Right?
alex
December 11th, 2012
12:04 pm
Just be happy you don’t work in Detroit where the teachers have opted for a sick day so that can protest the right to work initiative , thus the children stay at home and the WORKING parents have to find help or take a day off from work. Now disagreement and protesting is the American way but closing schools because of ta lack of teachers is inexcusable. After all this is detroit where the ENTIRE city is undergoing an architectural reorganization and downsizing due to the declining population and economy of the area, The Unions have obstructed multiple attempts by the city council, etc to get finances under control……Lovely….And it’s COLD; wait, we’ll call it a SNOW day….Sheeesh…
Paul
December 11th, 2012
12:04 pm
Georgia
Well, as was noted earlier, if Republicans don’t want to raise the debt limit, they can stop appropriating funds in excess of the current limit.
But they won’t.
josef
December 11th, 2012
12:05 pm
Jokes aside, why those states and the auto industry, etc? Lillian Hellman’s Hubbards are still in bidness and moving with the times…
getalife
December 11th, 2012
12:05 pm
“what company would turn down freebies? ”
Moochers, leechers, lend me your ears.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
12:06 pm
dB
I can’t remember if food is covered, but clothing… yep!!! It’s been 10% for a few years too. I can’t remember when the wife and I first came across that, but we were shopping locally on one of our visits to friends there. We decided against buying anything there and just waited until we got back here. That made our 7% here seem quaint.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
12:07 pm
Tie workers’ pay raises and bonuses to CEO pay and bonuses.
Yarite. Let’s fight that battle.
I guarantee you, every single solitary GOPer (and a shameful number of sk@anky corporate Democrats) would be willing to die on that hill.
But we’d have the righteous power of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie and maybe Al Franken, and President… hey, where’d our reinforcements from 1600 Pennsylvania run off to?
(ditto this for that stock transaction tax thingie Stevie Ray was talking about the last few days.)
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
12:07 pm
“Medical plans are facing an unexpected new fee. It´s to help cover people with pre-existing conditions under President Obama´s health care overhaul. The $63-per-head fee — buried in a recent regulation — will hit health plans serving an estimated 190 million Americans, mostly workers and their families. It´s payable starting in 2014. Employers are not happy.”
Now that it’s passed we’re finding out what’s in it!
And it ain’t pretty.
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
12:08 pm
Alex,
You’re a hoot…
Rawmilkdrinker
December 11th, 2012
12:09 pm
Straitroad; Try looking at it this way. You give up 20-30% of your income off the top and see how much easier it will be for you pay your rent, mortage, electric and grocery expenses that you’ve already incurred.
Jackie
December 11th, 2012
12:09 pm
It appears those who support the so-called conservatives position on the debt limit and spending do not understand how our government works.
ALL spending must come from the House of Representatives. The Republican controlled House voted on and spent money last year and we are obligated to pay that debt, they want to moan and complain about President Obama not showing leadership in that he will not sign the bill that does not meet our obligations. In other words, the so-called conservatives want to run up their bill and want to complain because THEY spent more than they wanted their supporters to know.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
12:10 pm
Early afternoon meltdown in progress
The hits just keep coming…
These attitudes are the exact thing that will have the Repubs back in the WH in no time..
Keep up the good work
getalife
December 11th, 2012
12:10 pm
filky,
Ok, single payer then.
Deal?
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
12:11 pm
Sinkwich,
It’s to help cover people with pre-existing conditions. Are you heartless?
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
12:11 pm
Speaking of scandals–was I the only one in here who was pissed off at the White House floating a “raise the Medicare eligibility age” trial balloon, late last week?
I’ve brought it up repeatedly and nobody else has said boo. Just wondering.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
12:12 pm
You’re right. My mistake.
Glad to see that you acknowledged as such for once in your life. It must be quite humbling for someone with your ego to actually have to admit you were wrong about something. And, no I didn’t forget about the bailout of the auto manufacturers at all. Had you made reference to that in your original post, I would have acknowledged it.
Surely you trust the allknowing judgment and competency of govt bureaucrats who agreed to give these tax breaks to these companies to locate in the South. Being a liberal we all know that gubment knows best. Right?
Obviously, with these goverments making those decisions being “Conservative” run governments, it seems that the judgments and competency trust is a conservative trait and not a liberal one. Seems as though Conservatives trust in the judgement of government just as much, if not more, than they seem to think liberals do. The big difference is that liberals are honest when it comes to their judgement of government. If conservatives were more honest about anything related to their incessant dependence on government, it would be a first.
As for my trust in government, I don’t trust any elected official farther than I can throw them. I can’t count the number of times I’ve stated that here. Maybe you’ll pay attention this time as to avoid asking that same question later on in the future. Given your track record, though, I’m sure I’ll answer that same question for you time and time again in the future.
JamVet
December 11th, 2012
12:12 pm
Paul,
One of my service providers sent me a survey yesterday. After I dutifully answered all of their questions, they asked me if I had any other suggestions.
I wrote – Outsource ALL of their upper management jobs to India and bring ALL of the technical and customer service jobs back to this country.
I am not expecting a reply…
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
12:13 pm
“Democratic lawmakers have joined with Republicans in raising alarm about a looming ObamaCare-tied tax on medical devices, saying the additional tax is causing “uncertainty and confusion for businesses” and should be delayed.”
The hits just keep on coming…
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
12:14 pm
dB
I’m with you on that. They need to leave those programs alone right now. The whole “crisis” crap is manufactured and increased permanent employment will alleviate most all of the issues without changing a thing.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
12:14 pm
Why no mention of the billions to bail out the financial industry and their stupidity?
Jackie
December 11th, 2012
12:14 pm
The so-called conservatives should take a look at what this is all about and how this affects everyone.
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2011/01/fret_ceiling.html
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
12:15 pm
Tie workers’ pay raises and bonuses to CEO pay and bonuses.
Yarite. Let’s fight that battle.
I guarantee you, every single solitary GOPer (and a shameful number of sk@anky corporate Democrats) would be willing to die on that hill.
it’s a fight worth fighting
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:15 pm
“around $14 an hour.
Why, that’s actually enough to live on, kinda (with help from various assistance programs, which we should gratefully provide to our citizens, mind you).”- SFD
Well perhaps they should just start them off at $86 an hour. If a husband and wife make $14 an hour its basically 58k a year in Montgomery. And believe it or not people can live off 58k a year in Montgomery. And lastly I believe that the median income of a household in the U.S. is in the mid 50s so the “starting” wage would actually be above the median U.S. wage if that is true. I’m sorry- what was that nonsense you were spewing about slave labor?
“Obviously we should welcome these Korean insect overlords.”-sfd
Liberals do love they racism and xenophobia don’t they?
“Or so we are told by the govt officials who made the deals with these companies to begin with. Liberals do trust in the good stewardship and judgment of govt bureaucrats don’t they?) Doom
“When they’re conservative governors who’ve been elected on “freedumb good gubmint baaad” rhetoric? no, not generally.”- SFD
Stands, you’re right. Maybe we should let the Dems decide what private companies get money or tax subsidies. After all they did so well with Solyndra…
getalife
December 11th, 2012
12:15 pm
filky,
Single payer?
Deal?
obamaSINLADEN
December 11th, 2012
12:17 pm
…they believe that their desperation gives them the right to impose it under threat of grievous harm?
u mean like when the dems RAMMED socialized(tax payer funded by feds stealing a persons hard earned money before that person can get it) health “care”? down this countrys throat?? wheres ur tolerance?
getalife
December 11th, 2012
12:17 pm
doomy,
Tell us more about those companies leeching and mooching.
I am all ears.
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
12:18 pm
They need to leave those programs alone right now.
Words really cannot express my fury at the White House for putting that one out there.[1]
JC on a pike, just three years ago we were having very serious discussions about the possibility of extending Medicare to those between 55-64 (it would be a buy-in program; supposedly, Joe Liebermann stood in the way, although there are dark conspiracy-theories out there that had Joe taking the fall)
And the White House decides to blithely test whether we’d go for heading literally in an opposition direction and privatizing the program, essentially, for millions of Americans.
un be leevable.
—-
1. not that this stopped me from writing to the White House and letting them know how PO’d I was, mind you.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
12:18 pm
They BOTH suck: These attitudes are the exact thing that will have the Repubs back in the WH in no time..
Keep up the good work
stands for decibels
December 11th, 2012
12:19 pm
dems RAMMED socialized
oh, do go back to kindy-garten. They rang the bell, didn’t you hear?
Adam
December 11th, 2012
12:20 pm
Thulsa Doom: After all they did so well with Solyndra…
And who else Doomy? Can you name one single solitary OTHER company besides that one that went bankrupt while on the loan program?
Can you explain why the majority of other loan holders in green energy are paying back their loans 46% faster than expected?
http://green.autoblog.com/2012/03/14/clean-energy-federal-loan-guarantees-cost-46-less-than-expected/
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
12:20 pm
“uncertainty and confusion for businesses”
I’ve spent a great deal of time mocking Ayn Rand and the heroic bigger than life characters she created, but there is one admirable quality those titans of industry have — they never wavered over some threat of “uncertainty” — they had a vision and acted on it.
“Uncertainty” has become some catch-all excuse for inaction and wealth hoarding.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
12:21 pm
Excuse me, paying back their loans faster than expected, therefore costing taxpayers 46% less?
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
12:22 pm
u mean like when the dems RAMMED socialized(tax payer funded by feds stealing a persons hard earned money before that person can get it) health “care”?
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They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
12:22 pm
Isn’t it a stretch to say that on average both the husband on wife will both have what is considered higher end hourly wages in Montgomery?
Sure it happens, but at what percent of the population of the metro area?
If those jobs were already so plentiful at that rate in that area, why would there have been such a higher number of applicants when the plant opened?
If it was same ole, same ole, the jobs would have been filled but the supply would not have out paced the demand as it did and probably still does
Adam
December 11th, 2012
12:25 pm
I have discovered that, for the most part, it is to my benefit and the Democrats’ benefit to let the right think they are correct on things, while also pointing out they are wrong, calmly, with facts. It is also to our benefit to let the media continue to highlight the crazy things coming out of the Republicans’ mouths. It keeps people engaged in voting. And highlighting how the Tea party took over when everyone stayed home also helps mobilize people.
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
12:25 pm
I have found that those who complain the most about having something rammed down their throats, are the same ones who will swallow anything.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:25 pm
“It must be quite humbling for someone with your ego to actually have to admit you were wrong about something.”
It is rather difficult it is. But its not that big a deal to say I should have used past tense. Regardless though the point still stands that without the taxpayer saving their asses that these unionized auto companies would have “imploded”.
Ya’ll do lemme know when we have to bail out these nonunionized plants down here to the tune of mega billions.
B
O
O
M
!
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
12:28 pm
Donovan: “Welcome to the Occupation…since you haven’t figured out that your worthless degree won’t earn you a living I would suggest you take a shower, cut your hair, leave your parent’s basement, and go look for a job. Socialism is a losing proposition”
Nice caricature! Where’d you pick up that one, from Rush?
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
12:28 pm
Jay
Thusla hasn’t declared himself a winner or said another has lost, but he did post his BOOM…
Go ahead and send him that tube top with the AJC logo..
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
12:28 pm
And Mo Dowd nails it:
The Mayans were right, as it turns out, when they predicted the world would end in 2012. It was just a select world: the G.O.P. universe of arrogant, uptight, entitled, bossy, retrogressive white guys.
. . .
The G.O.P. put up a candidate that no one liked or understood and ran a campaign that no one liked or understood — a campaign animated by the idea that indolent, grasping serfs must be kept down, even if it meant creating barriers to letting them vote.
. . .
Who would ever have thought blacks would get out and support the first black president? Who would ever have thought women would shy away from the party of transvaginal probes? Who would ever have thought gays would work against a party that treated them as immoral and subhuman? Who would have ever thought young people would desert a party that ignored science and hectored on social issues? Who would ever have thought Latinos would scorn a party that expected them to finish up their chores and self-deport?
A-HENH.
Read it all here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/09/opinion/sunday/dowd-a-lost-civilization.html?src=recg
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:29 pm
“therefore costing taxpayers 46% less”
But still costing us right?
Lemme know when it ALL gets paid back. Ifn we’re all still alive at that point in time of course.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
12:31 pm
Doom — “Ya’ll do lemme know when we have to bail out these nonunionized plants down here to the tune of mega billions.”
What, you mean like the Kia plant in West Point (South Korea) or the Mercedes plant outside of Tuscaloosa (Germany)?
Why would we bail out another country’s company?
F
L
O
P
curious
December 11th, 2012
12:31 pm
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech…and earned it!
“Sinkwich,
It’s to help cover people with pre-existing conditions. Are you heartless?”
Based on his views expressed here, I’d say so.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:31 pm
I’ve found that those that are self annointed experts on swallowing also have an affinity for gerbils.
larry
December 11th, 2012
12:32 pm
Ya’ll do lemme know when we have to bail out these nonunionized plants down here to the tune of mega billions.
Boom ? Boom?
I know we are talking autos, but let us not forget about the huge bailout of Lockheed Martin in 1971. And by the way, why are all of these auto plants owned by foreign car companies, whose profits go back to their home coutries where they are headquartered ?
Could it be right-to-work laws ran off GM and Ford ?
alex
December 11th, 2012
12:32 pm
@ Corbin: “i’m dreamin’ of a White Christmas….”
Detroit: unemployment 10.7% 6% sales tax, 6.85% income tax, household income 29,000
West point, ga. (Home of Kia) unemployment 10.1%, 7% sales tax,6% income tax,household income 35,000
Cost of living virtually the same
You decide, but ..I forgot, Detroit has SNOW days for the kids…
curious
December 11th, 2012
12:34 pm
Hannity, Limbaugh, and Boortz dropped out of college in order to serve their country in the military.
Right?
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:34 pm
they both suck,
Here ya go. Doomy laying down the BOOM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufb6T-av-rU
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
12:36 pm
Hannity, Limbaugh, and Boortz would better serve their country by leaving it…
Paul
December 11th, 2012
12:37 pm
Sinkwich
“Democratic lawmakers have joined with Republicans in raising alarm about a looming ObamaCare-tied tax on medical devices, saying the additional tax is causing “uncertainty and confusion for businesses” and should be delayed.””
Looming?
Looming?
I discussed this with my brother, a senior exec in the health industry.
He wasn’t concerned about it. Just said ‘they’ve got to get the revenue from somewhere.’
BTW, Sink, just how do you think people without health insurance or with preexisting conditions had their expenses covered in the past?
I’d really like to hear what you think on that one.
But as with JamVet and the insurance company, I’m not expecting a reply.
Leastwise, one that answers the question.
MAC
December 11th, 2012
12:37 pm
The systematic looting of the federal, state and local governments by public employees unions aided and abetted by politicians (mostly but not all Dems) for short-term political gains is a much bigger scandal and has much greater financial impact in the next 20 years than the over-hyped fiscal cliff and, for that matter, the social security and medicare solvency.
The election of Obama wasn’t a blank check and the House is doing its duty of checks and balances to allow a balanced discussion. Yes some taxes need to be raised, but both sides need to quit posturing and do what’s right and I find it very partisan and disingenuous, Jay, that you would encourage us all to be sycophants to the Obama one-sided agenda that has consistently put politics and donor rewards first(he cares too much about the country, really??).
Adam
December 11th, 2012
12:38 pm
Thulsa Doom: But still costing us right?
As much as loan guarantees cost, maybe. Which, in the end, is a pretty low or negative cost. It should also be noted that the government’s record on these loan guarantees, whether you look just at green energy or at ALL of the loan guarantees, have a better track record of companies not defaulting than the private equity firms. That is true whether you look at one company or all of them aggregated. Have a look see if you don’t believe me. I have a link or two in my now defunct laptop, so I cannot get that for you right now, but I trust you know how to use The Google.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:39 pm
They both suck,
How ya like some of the lyrics?
I know you know, I see you bowing to me,
Well its allright. Its allright
Boom, here comes the boom,
Ready or not here comes the voice of the south
Boom. Here comes the Boom,
Ready or not how you like me now
I said Boom, here comes the boom,
Ready or not here comes the voice of the south
Boom. Here comes the Boom. How you like me now?
Is that all you got?
Ha Ha. I’ll take your best shot.
I’ll take your best shot.
Is that all you got? I’ll take your best shot.
alex
December 11th, 2012
12:39 pm
@ Joe,” …General Bill’……the ladies in waiting won’t be waiting for long……..
DwayneL
December 11th, 2012
12:39 pm
The election and re-election of the fool in the White House is the biggest scandal in my lifetime! He’s destroying this country and some are too dumb to see it.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
12:39 pm
Thulsa: By the way, while you are NOT looking up information in order to stay better informed, look up the term “epistemic closure” and then look in the mirror.
"Poor" Cons Defending "Wealthy" Cons.....Ain't That Rich
December 11th, 2012
12:42 pm
@obamaSINLADEN
December 11th, 2012
12:17 pm
…they believe that their desperation gives them the right to impose it under threat of grievous harm?
u mean like when the dems RAMMED socialized(tax payer funded by feds stealing a persons hard earned money before that person can get it) health “care”? down this countrys throat?? wheres ur tolerance?
=============================================
WHY are “POOR” cons who don’ t have a pot to p!$$ in
DEFENDING “WEALTHY” cons who HAVE IT ALL?
Is it WEALTH ENVY?
Ain’t That Rich?
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
12:42 pm
DwayneL — “He’s destroying this country and some are too dumb to see it.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paranoia#Use_in_modern_psychiatry
Corbin Sharpe. Baby Boomer leech...and earned it!
December 11th, 2012
12:43 pm
This Doomy and his “BOOM”…
http://static.fjcdn.com/pictures/Wile_5ad325_497874.gif
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:44 pm
“Which, in the end, is a pretty low or negative cost.”
How do you figure that Adam? And if its a low or negative cost then hell lets just give loan guarantees to everyone.
“It should also be noted that the government’s record on these loan guarantees, whether you look just at green energy or at ALL of the loan guarantees, have a better track record of companies not defaulting than the private equity firms. That is true whether you look at one company or all of them aggregated.”
Irrelevant. It should also be noted that when a private equity firm loses money they are losing folks like Mitt Romney’s money which I’m cool with. When the govt loses money they are losing Joe taxpayer’s money. You do understand the difference right?
alex
December 11th, 2012
12:45 pm
@ MAC…you’re quite the KNIFE, agree,but Jay is an Obama syncophant, tried and true;glass half empty kind of guy, agree that both sides need to bend and adapt…
@ Corbin I’ve actually heards that Boortz really just considers himself to be an entertainer anyway
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
12:45 pm
Gridlock. Better to do nothing than to aggravate a symptom. Let Uncle Sam go full Thelma and Louise. (Who both spit, by the way, not swallow.)
Tea Party Meber
December 11th, 2012
12:46 pm
2 heck with Obama Bin Laden his goal is 2 tax us all to death so he can keep people on welfare cuz he no they will vote 4 him again. I dont no why so many suport him when hs is a terrist I saw a video somewhere on U tube that proofs he is a terrist and has ties to Sadam and Bin Landen
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
12:47 pm
Adam – Excuse me, paying back their loans faster than expected, therefore costing taxpayers 46% less?
just a matter of point, the taxpayers are getting LESS money in return than expected…because less interest is paid…just sayin
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:47 pm
“By the way, while you are NOT looking up information in order to stay better informed,”
Not intended to be a factual or proveable statement. More like mindless, baseless rhetoric.
Adam, look up the term “useful idiot” and then look in the mirror.
Chris Matthews
December 11th, 2012
12:49 pm
Obama is he worst President in American History!
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
12:49 pm
Ya’ll do lemme know when we have to bail out these nonunionized plants down here to the tune of mega billions.
We’re more likely to bail out the states for the revenue losses before we bail out a foreign owned company. Seems like somebody’s brain went…
B
O
O
M
!
guy
December 11th, 2012
12:50 pm
Raise taxes and raise the debt ceiling. That’s what “the anointed one” wants so be it. With 49% of people receiving some form of government assistance each month that’s a must. It will only get worse as more get on the bandwagon so even higher taxes will be needed. Also, obamacare will take even more. That’s what “his” people voted for so let the hair go with the hide. Of course,those who never pay in have no clue or don’t care where it comes from. You can’t fix _ _ _ _ _ _!
Tea Party Meber
December 11th, 2012
12:52 pm
UR wrong the bigest scandel is Obama Bin Laden refussing 2 show his birt certeficate 2 Americas. Ever 1 no he is a terrist there is a video on the internet that proof it.
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
12:53 pm
OH NOES! THE DJIA HAS MOVED ANOTHER 115 POINTS AND WE ARE FCREWN!
Wait.
What’s that?
The DJIA has moved UP 115 points?
Never mind.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
12:53 pm
“With 49% of people receiving some form of government assistance each month that’s a must.”
why do you hate the military?
why do you hate seniors that have contributed to SS all their lives?
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
12:55 pm
USinner
I don’t think it’s hate as much as it’s government assistance envy.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
12:56 pm
guy — “With 49% of people receiving some form of government assistance each month that’s a must.”
You should register your displeasure IMMEDIATELY by never driving on 75, 85 or 285 again.
Stick it to the Man, guy!
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
12:57 pm
“We’re more likely to bail out the states for the revenue losses before we bail out a foreign owned company. Seems like somebody’s brain went…”
Exactly! Thanks for making my point for me- that we won’t have to bail these people out! I love it when folks can make my points for me and do it with an emphatic B O O M. Well done Bro. And tanks!
getalife
December 11th, 2012
12:57 pm
“Thelma and Louise. (Who both spit, by the way, not swallow.)”
How do you know?
Redneck Convert (R--and proud of it)
December 11th, 2012
12:57 pm
Well, I don’t mean to be the fly in the ointment here but if Limberger, Boorz and Hannity ever got took into the army and got handed a rifle you’d need a super-dooper elephant scooper and the NY City Sanitation Department to clean up the stuff that would run down their pants leg.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
12:59 pm
Kam
I’m sure you noticed that the two of our regulars who were touting the DJ going down after the election as a wall street sign about Obama do not seem to be mentioning it anymore.
What they both failed to mention (I think they both work or worked in the financial industry at one time) is that those decreases were done via low trading days with high volumes. Meaning certain segments were attempting to prove a point, not “investors” across the board. If it had been high trade, high volume days of both individual and institutional investors that would have been a different story, but it wasn’t.
USinUK - not very ladylike (and former Girl Scout)
December 11th, 2012
12:59 pm
“I don’t think it’s hate as much as it’s government assistance envy”
so envious they misrepresent what’s “assistance” and what’s something they’ve actually paid into their entire working lives …
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:00 pm
The gop and their cons are having a nervous breakdown.
These words from kid rock keep repeating in their heads.
“I am American bad azz”
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:00 pm
Doom — “I love it when folks can make my points for me and do it with an emphatic B O O M. Well done Bro. And tanks!”
So your point is that foreign companies giving Americans jobs is better than American companies giving Americans jobs because we wouldn’t bail out a foreign company if it went belly-up?
I don’t think that’s what you mean, but that appears to be what you’re saying.
JamVet
December 11th, 2012
1:01 pm
guy, how much government assistance do you get every month?
(Think before answering.)
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:02 pm
Thanks for making my point for me- that we won’t have to bail these people out! I love it when folks can make my points for me and do it with an emphatic B O O M. Well done Bro. And tanks!
And thanks for acknowledging the fact that these non-union plants are a revenue loss for the states that are giving away the kitchen sink for the chance of getting those few jobs. I didn’t make your point nearly to the point that you made mine.
Check and Mate!!!!
williebkind
December 11th, 2012
1:03 pm
JamVet
December 11th, 2012
1:01 pm
Are you referring to my tax returns in various ways?
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
1:03 pm
BOTH
Of course, and the markets are by definition reactionary moving on any number of factors.
Mr Right
December 11th, 2012
1:04 pm
The gop and their cons are having a nervous breakdown.
The guy in the WH is enough to give any decent American a nervous breakdown!
JamVet
December 11th, 2012
1:04 pm
willie, think it over. All of it.
How much do you get?
This is not a trick question…
guy
December 11th, 2012
1:05 pm
Joe Hussein Mama I have a scooter that the government got for me and I receive $1,500.00 each month plus free healthcare. I don’t need 75,85, or 285. I am doing quite well,thank you!
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:06 pm
Mr. wrong.
w is gone.
We made it.
It was a close call.
Lets not repeat that mistake kay?
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:06 pm
guy,
Hoveround?
Mick
December 11th, 2012
1:08 pm
The next fifty years of america, what will it look like? Well, there are way too many who want the demise of unions and along with that goes a decent wage, healthcare and god forbid, a pension! Fools rush in and I’m sorry but all you bloggers out there in your 20’s, 30’s, god willing, you will get old but you just might rue the day you proclaimed unions were “not needed anymore”. If anything, they keep right to work state wages somewhat competitive without the benefits.
Good luck – I’m set, how about you???
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:08 pm
guy — “Joe Hussein Mama I have a scooter that the government got for me and I receive $1,500.00 each month plus free healthcare. I don’t need 75,85, or 285. I am doing quite well,thank you!”
So you b!tch about others getting government assistance while receiving it yourself?
Take a hike, ya freakin’ hypocrite.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:09 pm
Wait a minute, guy just admitted he is a leech.
Where is nero or waldo?
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:12 pm
getalife — “Wait a minute, guy just admitted he is a leech. Where is nero or waldo?”
Or Bruno, for that matter. He left Jay’s permanently shortly after he admitted that he doesn’t have health insurance himself and that he hasn’t for most of his adult life.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:13 pm
At least guy admitted he is a leech.
Now, all you other cons need to be honest like guy and admit you are leeches too.
Confess, repent and all is well on the blog.
Georgia
December 11th, 2012
1:13 pm
The right is sending out another wave of justification to the talk shows and actually getting laughed off the sets. They have to form New language. Meltdown city. Postcards from the cliff. Pundit interrupted. Much.
alex
December 11th, 2012
1:14 pm
@ they both suck: what they should mean that anyone who gets ANYTHING out of daily or weekly fluctuations in the market should NOT be in it and should HAVE to read and take notes on “A Random Walk Down Wallstreet”… all you day traders–good luck …..
Fly-On-The-Wall
December 11th, 2012
1:15 pm
If guys comments are really true then he may have been one of those Tea Party types holding up the sign that said keep the government out of my medicare.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:16 pm
Well, I don’t mean to be the fly in the ointment here but it looks like pencil neck convert needs some new and funnier material.
L
A
M
E
!
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
1:17 pm
Joe Hussein Mama
Bruno did the blog suicide thingie here forcing Jay to ban him. He was over at Kyle’s trying to be the alpha dog, but he hasn’t been there much post election.
Jefferson
December 11th, 2012
1:17 pm
I like to hear crying at Christmas, could you pout too ?
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:19 pm
I have not seen Bruno at Kyle’s too.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:20 pm
K’Chak — “Bruno did the blog suicide thingie here forcing Jay to ban him.”
Oh, I did not know that. I recall Bruno’s revelation that he didn’t have health insurance, followed by a WALL of scorn and obloquy aimed at him, and then I just didn’t see him any more after another week or so. I figured that his bit of truth had pretty much destroyed whatever credibility he had built up here.
“He was over at Kyle’s trying to be the alpha dog, but he hasn’t been there much post election.”
I’m sure he and Cryberius were tussling mightily over who would be the pack leader, much as a pair of fluffy bunnies scuffle over who gets the freshest and greenest leaf of lettuce.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:22 pm
Government bought guy’s scooter so he could hold up those signs at the tea party.
I remember a con kook yelling and screaming at a disabled American in a wheelchair and thought they could not get any scummier than that.
I was wrong.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:22 pm
alex
My point was that some very large stakeholders in the market made a point after the election, but even those “institutions” are back on board in terms of the “market”. Some on this blog took the decreases and asserted it was some HUGE NEGATIVE SIGN from wall street and said as much.
Now that it is going back up, it may as well be “Silent Night” from those who were making those assertions.
Pretty damn funny if you ask me.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:24 pm
Bruno envy…
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:24 pm
get, kam & JHM
More of an echo chamber over there on most days than here. Not as much opportunity to mix it up, so I figured Bruno got bored.
Mick
December 11th, 2012
1:25 pm
Kyle’s place; populated by exiled bookman screeders or otherwise known as the island of misfit bloggers…
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
1:26 pm
Joe Hussein Mama
It was in the early morning hours of the SCOTUS decision over the health care law and Bruno came in and spiked the ball about 1:30 in the morning. When the actual ruling came down, he lost it. An epic melt-down.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:26 pm
Doom — “Bruno envy…”
Only if you’ll admit to Librul Envy, son.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:27 pm
“so I figured Bruno got bored”
Probably but he did try to bring the music over there.
I wish him and Platinum Blonde well.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:28 pm
Bro & Thulsa
What’s up with the Saban to Cleveland rumors?
Probably like the Miles to Arkansas rumor. Easy ploy for another fat raise, but who knows.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:28 pm
K’Chak — “It was in the early morning hours of the SCOTUS decision over the health care law and Bruno came in and spiked the ball about 1:30 in the morning. When the actual ruling came down, he lost it. An epic melt-down.”
Oh, man, I remember that day. I had like three different medical appointments that day, and the news broke over the radio while I was driving between the first and second appointment.
I was *so* wishing that I could have been participating in the disussion that day.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:31 pm
get
But I must admit Little Brain and Criberius are good for laughs when reading their consistent meltdowns.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:32 pm
“Only if you’ll admit to Librul Envy, son.”
I don’t think its not possible to envy a toy punkin.
JKL2
December 11th, 2012
1:32 pm
usinuk- why do you hate the military?
That’s called a paycheck, not assistance. Big difference.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
1:35 pm
Both,
Dave has not changed his argument style.
It always is an insult followed by you don’t know what “_______” means.
Old and tired.
lil bar is just your basic con kook.
Nothing is the gop’s fault and uses the old tired deflection of blame.
That blog can bore you to death.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:38 pm
they both suck,
I can’t see it unless he’s just gotten bored with winning. He did make the comment the other day that winning doesn’t bring as much joy anymore because of the automatic expectation of a win. It doesn’t mean as much. But its hard to see him jumping ship this late in life and to a miserable climate like Cleveland. So many great college and pro jobs have come and gone in his 6 years with no interest from Saban that its hard to see him taking this job. And both he and his wife have both stated so many times that they’re done moving and that this is the last stop that it seems implausible. Nevertheless if he decided to go I would be cool with it. He would leave us with 3 national titles, scores of top tier recruting talent still on board, and a future head coach in Kirby Smart that we hope and think would keep us at or near the top. He’s not going to be around forever. My feeling is that he will retire before he moves again. I’m just happy that the program has been resurrected to the heights it has been known for.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
1:40 pm
Doom — “I don’t think its not possible to envy a toy punkin.”
What a fortuitous use of the double negative on your part, son.
DebbieDoRight - A Do Right Woman
December 11th, 2012
1:40 pm
Jay: It’s called elections. We just had one, focused largely on the issues at stake here; they spent well over $1 billion trying to sell their viewpoint, and they lost. Now, having failed to convince the rest of their country of their wisdom, they believe that their desperation gives them the right to impose it under threat of grievous harm?
Jay — I’d LOVE to live in your world. I mean, look around the country…….where have you been for the past 20+ years?
Republicans have been shoving sh###t down our throats for years:
* In Michigan — Right to Work
* In Wisconsin – teacher’s Union
* In Florida / Wisconsin / South Carolina / Mississippi and Louisiana — Voter Suppression
* In Georgia — (this list is so long but I’ll pick the one I like best) – Forcing taxpayers to pay for a stadium they don’t want or need.
I can go on but you get the theme. This has been happening for a long time; it’s a concentrated, systemic assault on our fundamental freedoms and rights.
The republicans have taken everything away that they can from us, and given us Honey Boo-Boo to keep us occupied.
//DDR Driveby///
imjustsayin
December 11th, 2012
1:41 pm
It’s also called extortion ( see defination #2 below). If Republican’s carry out their threat then Obama should then send in the federal marshal’s to arrest those voting to damage the full faith and credit of the United States. Remember, by raising the debt ceiling, you increase the funds to pay your bills outstanding, NOT an authorization to spend more money.
ex·tor·tion /ɪkˈstɔr ʃən/ Show Spelled [ik-stawr-shuh n] Show IPA
noun
1. an act or instance of extorting.
2. Law. the crime of obtaining money or some other thing of value by the abuse of one’s office or authority.
3. oppressive or illegal exaction, as of excessive price or interest: the extortions of usurers.
4. anything extorted.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:42 pm
What’s up with the Saban to Cleveland rumors?
Sounds like wishful thinking amongst those who don’t want to be dominated by the Tide. Seems as though, if that were to happen, Kirby Smart would keep things going the way they currently are going.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:43 pm
they both suck,
The other thing about these newspaper rumors is that I think sometimes its just a writer trying to make a splash or stir things up to sell papers. The Les Miles to Arky thing is ridiculous. Why in the hell would you leave LSU to go to Arky? Louisiana has a vastly more fertile recruiting area, a bigger stadium with better facilities, a top notch committment to coaching pay, etc. Going to Ark would be a significant downgrade for Miles.
guy
December 11th, 2012
1:43 pm
Thanks for all your comments about the scooter,etc. I love it! Keep working for ME! obama’s gonna give ME MORE!!!!! Bless America and keep those taxes coming in!
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
1:43 pm
MAC: “The systematic looting of the federal, state and local governments by public employees unions aided and abetted by politicians”
Wow, sounds just terrible! We better get something done about that. And soon!
Hey by the way, do you have figures on the looting? How much dough did they pocket?
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:44 pm
They BOTH
http://www.al.com/alabamafootball/index.ssf/2012/12/scarbinsky_4.html
Interview w/Mrs. Saban
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
1:46 pm
Have the SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS! ever had any scandals?
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:47 pm
Thulsa: How do you figure that Adam? And if its a low or negative cost then hell lets just give loan guarantees to everyone.
Your argument here is as useless as “Hey if we can allow gay people to marry why don’t we just let people marry dogs too?”
No one is talking about indiscriminately giving out loan guarantees. On the contrary, the government’s record shows they scrutinize who they give loans to a lot more carefully than private firms. Which, by the way, is NOT irrelevant, because it shows the government doesn’t choose to go the risky route nearly as often as a private investor would.
That’s an important comparison for the sake of highlighting the government’s prudence. Solyndra is a SMALL issue compared to the other companies that got loans under the same program and are paying the money back. There is very little risk to the tax payer and because of that, you can very clearly make the case that the government is actually a GOOD steward of the money the tax payers are paying.
And as to your other rant, I’ll concede that you didn’t request that I look up the information for you and therefore seemingly accepted my explanation as to why my ready links are not available. From our past conversations, it would seem you have evolved at least that far.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:47 pm
” In Michigan — Right to Work”
Nothing wrong with freedom from union bullying.
“* In Wisconsin – teacher’s Union”
Everybody’s got to share some pain to balance the state budget. Even state employees. Nothing wrong with that.
“* In Florida / Wisconsin / South Carolina / Mississippi and Louisiana — Voter Suppression”
Pure gobbledeegook
“* In Georgia — (this list is so long but I’ll pick the one I like best) – Forcing taxpayers to pay for a stadium they don’t want or need.”
Sure. Uh-huh. And they’ve never forced taxpayers to front money for a stadium in a blue city or state. Jeez. What a laughably silly point.
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
1:48 pm
DDR –
In Michigan — Right to Work
…..This has been happening for a long time; it’s a concentrated, systemic assault on our fundamental freedoms and rights.
How is a right-to-work state an assault on your rights exactly?
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:48 pm
Is TBG here? I t-ed him up quite nicely to rant at me for a backhanded compliment in my last paragraph
Fly-On-The-Wall
December 11th, 2012
1:48 pm
What’s really sad with all of this Republican government led union busting is that this battle was fought 100 years ago and now we’re going to have to fight it again. Sad, truly sad.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:48 pm
Paying union dues as part of a membership in a union is not union bullying, Thulsa.
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
1:49 pm
WASHINGTON —
The government is investigating whether software companies that make cellphone apps violated the privacy rights of children by quietly collecting personal information from mobile devices and sharing it with advertisers and data brokers, the Federal Trade Commission said Monday.
Yes, we will try to protect our children
alex
December 11th, 2012
1:49 pm
@ they both suck ..you are right they BOTH suck..
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:50 pm
Have the SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS! ever had any scandals?
Yes.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/07/20/alabama-still-collecting-tax-for-confederate-veterans/
The last of the more than 60,000 Confederate veterans who came home to Alabama after the Civil War died generations ago, yet residents are still paying a tax that supported the neediest among them.
Despite fire-and-brimstone opposition to taxes among many in a state that still has “Heart of Dixie” on its license plates, officials never stopped collecting a property tax that once funded the Alabama Confederate Soldiers’ Home, which closed 72 years ago. The tax now pays for Confederate Memorial Park, which sits on the same 102-acre tract where elderly veterans used to stroll.
The tax once brought in millions for Confederate pensions, but lawmakers sliced up the levy and sent money elsewhere as the men and their wives died. No one has seriously challenged the continued use of the money for a memorial to the “Lost Cause,” in part because few realize it exists; one long-serving black legislator who thought the tax had been done away with said he wants to eliminate state funding for the park.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:50 pm
“On the contrary, the government’s record shows they scrutinize who they give loans to a lot more carefully than private firms.”
And your mind still seems incapable of understanding that if a private equity firm loses Mitt Romney’s money then they’ve lost Mitt’s cash- a private investor. If the Federal govt loses money on Solyndra or any of the various other failed green companies they lost taxpayer money. How many times does this have to be explained to you before you understand?
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:50 pm
Bro
I don’t think he will leave, especially with the great situation he is in, but we are taking Saban. Isn’t like he has been known to keep his word in the past, which of course many coaches also fit that category.
Heard it this morning and my thoughts were that a big raise was coming his way. My numbers could be wrong, but I heard that revenue for football and football related activities has doubled since Saban showed up at Bama. That is impressive for anyone or any school.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:51 pm
Unions are already going to die. Too few workers see the value in them anymore. I just hope they realize that the step AFTER dismantling unions is to roll back all the worker rights that were achieved because of their existence, and the only way to maintain those rights is for unions to exist again. It would sure be funny to see what the Republicans try next once workers actually DO volunteer their money to the unions.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:51 pm
Nothing wrong with freedom from union bullying.
Obviously nothing wrong with sanctioning freeloading either.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:52 pm
alex
I lean left, but have no misconceptions that Democrats handle power and overall governing any better than the Republicans.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:52 pm
Thulsa: And your mind still seems incapable of understanding that if a private equity firm loses Mitt Romney’s money then they’ve lost Mitt’s cash- a private investor. If the Federal govt loses money on Solyndra or any of the various other failed green companies they lost taxpayer money. How many times does this have to be explained to you before you understand?
I understand that fully and do not deny that. The point I am making is a different one. And it seems you are deliberately avoiding it in favor of hyperbole.
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
1:52 pm
Paying union dues as part of a membership in a union is not union bullying
Being required to join a union and pay dues is bullying…or extortion
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:53 pm
They BOTH
He recently signed an extension that will have him coaching in Tuscaloosa to somewhere near 70 years old. In the link I posted, Mrs. Saban stated that they love Alabama to the point of retiring there. Her interview doesn’t sound like she’s planning on moving again.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:54 pm
Adam, Being forced to join a union that you don’t want to join in order to work is bullying Adam. Is there something you don’t understand about that?
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:54 pm
Being required to join a union and pay dues is bullying…or extortion
That has been against the law for a good while now. Nobody can be forced to join a union or pay dues.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:54 pm
They BOTH suck: How do you figure that Democrats don’t handle governing any better? I do believe there are numbers and figures out there that show Democrats in power means that government run programs, overall, work more efficiently and “better” in most senses of the word, except for the general conservative argument that “better” means elimination of said programs. Republicans, on the other hand, seem intent on reducing or eliminating as much of government as they possibly can and routinely create problems and red tape to help accomplish this, even if only to point at it and say “see? government can’t do ANYTHING right” after they have screwed up the program.
Mick
December 11th, 2012
1:57 pm
doom
Sorry, but the voter suppression tactic was an epic fail in florida with a 12 page ballot, decreased early voting days, the scheme was blatant. In the end it was kind of like shooting yourself in the foot, all it accomplished was pissing off every african american voter in the state who promptly showed up to vote no matter how long the wait, and in many cases because of the long lines, romney voters gave up. Careful what you wish for…
Adam
December 11th, 2012
1:58 pm
Thulsa: What you say only SEEMS bad. If someone doesn’t want to join a union in order to work, they are not required to, and at least 90% of all other jobs out there do not even have unions associated with them. Sometimes a union is necessary for the work we are talking about thanks to the employer we are talking about. I see no problem signing a contract that includes me in a union as a condition to do a specific job, nor do I see a problem with many other contractual requirements to specific jobs. Is there something YOU don’t understand about THAT?
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
1:58 pm
Bro
You may have seen it, but if I can find it I will post a link showing pics of Saban’s vacation home on Lake Burton in Na GA. He may have sold it. That place his HUGE.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
1:58 pm
http://www.nrtw.org/a/a_1_p.htm
Question: Can I be required to be a union member or pay dues to a union?
Answer: You may not be required to be a union member. But, if you do not work in a Right to Work state, you may be required to pay union fees.
Employment relations for almost all private sector employees (other than those in the airline and railroad industries) are covered by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).
Under the NLRA, you cannot be required to be a member of a union or pay it any monies as a condition of employment unless the collective bargaining agreement between your employer and your union contains a provision requiring all employees to either join the union or pay union fees.
Even if there is such a provision in the agreement, the most that can be required of you is to pay the union fees (generally called an “agency fee.”) Most employees are not told by their employer and union that full union membership cannot lawfully be required. In Pattern Makers v. NLRB, 473 U.S. 95 (1985), the United States Supreme Court held that union members have the right to resign their union membership at any time.
If you are not a member, you are still fully covered by the collective bargaining agreement that was negotiated between your employer and the union, and the union is obligated to represent you. Any benefits that are provided to you by your employer pursuant to the collective bargaining agreement (e.g., wages, seniority, vacations, pensions, health insurance)are not affected by your nonmembership. (If the union offers some “members-only” benefits, you might be excluded from receiving those.) If you are not a member, you may not be able to participate in union elections or meetings, vote in collective bargaining ratification elections, or participate in other “internal” union activities. However, you cannot be disciplined by the union for anything you do while not a member.
The Supreme Court, in Communication Workers v. Beck, 487 U.S. 735 (1988), a lawsuit that was supported by the Foundation, ruled that objecting nonmembers cannot be required to pay union dues. The most that nonmembers can be required to pay is an agency fee that equals their share of what the union can prove is its costs of collective bargaining, contract administration, and grievance adjustment with their employer.
Republicans who are passing Right-to-work laws or cheering them on are doing nothing more than advocating and legally sanctioning freeloading. Anybody who does that and then b*tches about 47% or any other “leech” rhetoric is a hypocrite of the highest order.
Morality?
December 11th, 2012
1:59 pm
Jay – Obama ain’t the hero you make him out to be – he helped create this mess – while in Congress Obama voted for this mess – it took BOTH sides years to bring us to this disaster. Going over the FISCAL cliff will destroy your beloved SOCIALIST social programs. Ironically the SOCIALIST social programs are the #1 reason we are at this point now. Most people, like clueless lemmings, honestly believe the gub’ment can take care of any problem – not this time. Pray for a miracle.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
1:59 pm
“And it seems you are deliberately avoiding it in favor of hyperbole.”
Adam,
That’s just ridiculous. Its a simple point. Private equity I don’t care about as a taxpayer. If they lose money they lost their private investor’s money. Why the hell would I care if Mitt Romney lost money in a private investment? But if its my taxpayer money and the govt is putting it at risk in investments and they lose then guess what? That’s public money they are gambling with and losing. That’s a big deal. And its a helluva lot different than investing in basic research. Can you not see the inherent conflict in govt and business getting together and private businesses taking our money and just blowing it? As much as you guys rail about private business why do you not see a problem with our govt Dem or Rep handing out loans to businesses and putting our tax money at risk? It seems to me that you’re just mad cause this happened under Obama. Doesn’t matter. If it happened under W it would be every bit as wrong.
alex
December 11th, 2012
1:59 pm
@ Fly, completely different battle, the pendulum swung, it swings again…
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:00 pm
E. Cat — “How is a right-to-work state an assault on your rights exactly?”
Two ways.
First, it’s a state infringement on the Constitutionally-guaranteed right of freedom of association. State laws can’t override or infringe Constitutionally-guaranteed rights without a specific, compelling and *narrowly-drawn* state interest. The fact that the state is simply *invalidating* labor unions wholesale rather than crafting a narrow restriction to serve whatever the *state* interest is constitutes a prima facie case for the appellants.
Secondly, it posits that business *management* can promulgate an artificial person (a corporation) for the purpose of conducting business, yet denies that same right to business *labor* to promulgate an artificial person (a labor union) to represent and speak for its collective membership. Such an explicit denial creates an unconstitutional separate-but-equal class distinction in the workplace and a second prima facie case for the appellants.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:00 pm
Mick: Romney voters didn’t give up. Romney got more votes than McCain, and Obama got less votes than in 2008. This shows that Republicans will vote reliably for Republicans come hell or high water, and that any vote for a third party candidate does not diminish any Republican votes, but Democratic votes instead. I am convinced it’s why a lot of third party people push this. It would not surprise me to find out that many of them did not practice what they preached.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
2:00 pm
Adam
IMO Democrats play some of the same games that Republicans play with their egos and bullying when they have the chance. Does this fit every Democrat or Republican? By all means no, however that is how I see it.
They both can be big babies with their power trips.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
2:02 pm
We need a grover norquist for the dems caving on SS and Medicare.
Like him or not, his tactics did work on the gop and taxes.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:03 pm
Thulsa: That’s just ridiculous. Its a simple point. Private equity I don’t care about as a taxpayer.
You’re still shifting this onto your point, a point that I was not making and am not denying. You have not at all even addressed the point I was actually making. I can only conclude it is either deliberate, or that you truly do not understand my point.
And no, I am not mad at all. And I am not equating Obama with another President, I am equating public with private. Again, you don’t seem to understand, so I’ll drop it. I have no need to convince you, as your continued insistence on being incorrect loudly and often serves my interests more than if you and other conservatives started to actually make sense.
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
2:03 pm
MostSome people, like clueless lemmings, honestly believethe gub’menttax cuts can take care of any problem…Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
2:04 pm
MostSome people, like clueless lemmings, honestly believethe gub’mentTERM LIMITS can take care of any problem…alex
December 11th, 2012
2:05 pm
@ Bro the supreme court ruling and partial explanation does not appear to support your “free-loading” assertion. Appears to be “ala Carte”, , Hmmm, pass the cherries Jubilee,we’re gonna celebrate!
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:05 pm
They BOTH suck: Perhaps they can be bullies and play power games on both sides of the aisle, but I am talking about historically, which administrations and Congresses have run the government programs better? As in, made sure they did what the government programs were supposed to do in more efficient ways than the other “team”? If you were not making the point regarding who actually has a better record of governance then I apologize, but I thought that was what you were trying to say, that they both suck at it more or less equally. I disagree and have stated why I think so.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:08 pm
“What you say only SEEMS bad.”- In your “opinion”.
“If someone doesn’t want to join a union in order to work, they are not required to, and at least 90% of all other jobs out there do not even have unions associated with them.”
What kind of kool-aide are you drinking and how much time have you spent up north? Ever heard of union shops?
“Sometimes a union is necessary for the work we are talking about thanks to the employer we are talking about.”
Really? Give me an example of where, why, and how a particular job can only be done by a union member as opposed to a non union worker.
“I see no problem signing a contract that includes me in a union as a condition to do a specific job, nor do I see a problem with many other contractual requirements to specific jobs. Is there something YOU don’t understand about THAT?”
Yeah. There is something I don’t understand about that. As you pointed out “you” see no problem with the union requirement. That’s “you”. Not everyone is “you” and not everyone sees union membership in the same vein that “you” do. In other words “you” do not speak for everyone and not everyone thinks or believes the same things “you” do or feels the same way “you” do about being forced to join a union.
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
2:10 pm
The thugs are out and about. Never saw that coming.
“What began as a peaceful protest this morning became testy this afternoon, prompting Michigan State Police officers to don their riot gear to control an increasingly angry crowd. Tear gas was sprayed at least once. “
barking frog
December 11th, 2012
2:10 pm
If the Republicans refuse to fund unemployment benefits and then
government paychecks they will reap the consequences in 2014.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:11 pm
Thulsa: “Sometimes a union is necessary for the work we are talking about thanks to the employer we are talking about.”
Really? Give me an example of where, why, and how a particular job can only be done by a union member as opposed to a non union worker.
There you go again….
Deliberately missing my point. I’ll give you another chance. Here’s what I said, with the part you ignored bolded: Sometimes a union is necessary for the work we are talking about thanks to the employer we are talking about.
Yeah. There is something I don’t understand about that. As you pointed out “you” see no problem with the union requirement. That’s “you”. Not everyone is “you” and not everyone sees union membership in the same vein that “you” do.
And no one has to. They are free to seek other employment if they do not like the terms of the employment they are applying for. Isn’t that what you conservatives are always saying on other employment issues?
Welcome to the Occupation
December 11th, 2012
2:11 pm
Thulsa: “Adam, Being forced to join a union that you don’t want to join in order to work is bullying Adam”
But being forced to sell your labor for bread to eat, that’s the biggest form of bullying of all.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:12 pm
“As in, made sure they did what the government programs were supposed to do in more efficient ways than the other “team”?”
Oh my God. Adam do you actually believe one party has a better track record of “administering” govt bureaucracies? Seriously? Once a bureaucracy is created it grows a life of its own. If you think the presidents of one party historically have a better job of micro managing all the various agencies and govt departments than the presidents of another party then you are truly delusional.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:12 pm
F. Sinkwich thinks there is something funny about Michigan legislators bringing us ever closer to a Marxist revolution.
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
2:13 pm
“This shows that Republicans will vote reliably for Republicans come hell or high water, and that any vote for a third party candidate does not diminish any Republican votes, but Democratic votes instead”
It does no such thing. It’s silly to believe that if something happens once, it will always happen. They must LOVE you in Vegas!
getalife
December 11th, 2012
2:13 pm
filky,
Back in the day, heads would be busted open.
“They both can be big babies with their power trips.”
It is called tit for tat politics .
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:13 pm
Thulsa: Oh my God. Adam do you actually believe one party has a better track record of “administering” govt bureaucracies?
Yes, and there is data to support this. I have seen no data suggesting the opposite. And I did not say the President himself micromanages all this. But his administration is full of people that are mostly picked by him or at least retained because they are trusted and are general exceptions to the bell curve.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:15 pm
“But being forced to sell your labor for bread to eat, that’s the biggest form of bullying of all.”
Isn’t that what mankind has done since the dawn of history. Sell his labor for bread to eat? Or if he hasn’t sold his labor he used his own labor to produce something that he could sell in order to buy bread to eat. Or he used his own labor to grow his own grain for bread.
Just more of occupation’s oppressed workers of the world unite crap.
F. Sinkwich
December 11th, 2012
2:15 pm
Thugs are getting political support from the usual suspects and are promising violence:
“As protests against Michigan’s right-to-work laws swelled, pro-union Democrat legislator Douglas Geiss took to the state House floor – and Twitter – to promise violence. “We are going to undo 100 years of labor relations,” said Geiss. “And there will be blood. We will relive the Battle of the Overpass.””
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:15 pm
Regnad: It does no such thing. It’s silly to believe that if something happens once, it will always happen. They must LOVE you in Vegas!
Actually data suggests this more often than just this once. As for your gambling reference, i am reasonably sure inTrade did not like me for accurately picking the winner months out, based on solid proven data.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
2:16 pm
the supreme court ruling and partial explanation does not appear to support your “free-loading” assertion.
I didn’t claim that the SCOTUS rulings had any bearing on the “free-loading”. Right-to-work laws do not make unions illegal. They merely enshrine the ability for one to work and directly benefit from union negotiated benefits without having to pay anything in response to those negotiated benefits. In non-RTW states, people who benefit from negotiated benefits do not have to join unions or pay union dues. They may, however, have to pay for the cost of the negotiations. RTW laws remove the requirement for the payment for the negotiations, hence legislating free-loading. In other words, alex, you and your fellow conservatives are actively cheering on free-loading all the while being hypocritical about people freeloading off the government.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:17 pm
“Yes, and there is data to support this. I have seen no data suggesting the opposite”
Sorry but that is utter nonsense. There is no data that empirically proves that one party over time effectively manages govt bureaucracies better than the other. The suggestion in and of itself is patently absurd.
getalife
December 11th, 2012
2:18 pm
HSBC got busted for money laundering 8 billion from the drug cartels and not one criminal charge filed.
Our justice system is if you have money, pay the fine and do no time.
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
2:18 pm
“If you think the presidents of one party historically have a better job of micro managing all the various agencies and govt departments than the presidents of another party then you are truly delusional.”
====================
Don’t understand why you assert that it is impossible for “the presidents of one party” to do a better job managing “all the various agencies and govt departments than the presidents of another party .” Please explain.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:20 pm
Thulsa: There is no data that empirically proves that one party over time effectively manages govt bureaucracies better than the other.
Actually there is. You must be thinking that there is no data to prove they run them the same, or that Republicans run them better. Because that’s where the truth is.
Again, you’re free to look this up. I’d provide you my ready links if my laptop had not just died this morning. Again, I trust you know how to use The Google. And if your previous responses are any indication, you will actually look for and find this data, and come back with a snarky comment not addressing the issue because you don’t want to admit you found me correct again.
oops
December 11th, 2012
2:21 pm
bye bye Michigan unions.
sorry dems. you lose on that one.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:21 pm
“pro-union Democrat legislator Douglas Geiss took to the state House floor – and Twitter – to promise violence”
Isn’t that what they always do?- resort to violence or threats of violence? Talk about knuckle draggers. “No justice. No peace”. OWS riots, rapes, assaults of policeman, and property damage.
oops
December 11th, 2012
2:22 pm
non union members aren’t freeloading
they’re making an intelligent decision on what to do with THEIR money.
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
2:23 pm
“Actually data suggests this more often than just this once. As for your gambling reference, i am reasonably sure inTrade did not like me for accurately picking the winner months out, based on solid proven data”
I am not saying you are wrong, but bald assertions sometimes set me off. Congratulations on your InTrade success. Amazing what you can accomplish with real data, over wishful thinking, isn’t it?
St Simons - aboriginal BOOTAKOOK 2014
December 11th, 2012
2:23 pm
We need a grover norquist for the dems…’
-the new acorn panthers.
josef
December 11th, 2012
2:23 pm
Speaking of those auto plants relocating down in Uncle Sam’s Oldest Colony. Unmentionable just got back from his home town which is the site of a Nissan plant in the process of expanding. I was looking through the pictures. The town is now nothing like I remember. The town square which used to look like something from a Yankee photographer’s wet dream on conditions in the South has now been refurbished, properly and correctly time period, the Courthouse in the center of the square has undergone a great restoration process befitting its landmark status. The town is now known as “the film capital of Mississippi” due to the number of movies being made there taking advantage of the breaks, reception by the locals, the services available and, of course, the great stage. The “quarters” have not been overlooked. In addition to plenty of new, modern housing, the community has made endeavors to make sure that there, too, the old style architecture of the district has also been preserved while at the same time bringing the buildings up to modern standards. None of this could have been done without the cooperative effort between the locals and Nissan. The American companies which left the town to wallow in its decline and misery are not missed. Oh, yes, and local property taxes are, well, next to nothing.
Just saying…
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:23 pm
Thulsa: “Isn’t that what they always do?- resort to violence or threats of violence?”
Actually no. In most cases that doesn’t happen. It may make you feel comfortable to assert that this happens in response to everything, but you shouldn’t, because that is not the truth. If they do resort to violence in a concerted effort, you should be concerned that people are willing to fight and die for their rights. Just as you would expect me to be concerned if the Tea Party actually decided to make good on all their threats of violence over election outcomes they don’t like.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:24 pm
Regnad,
The assertion was made that one party effectively manages govt bureaucracies better than the other. The onus is on you guys to prove it true. But if you want some proof from my end then I’ll give you some.
If Dems are so efficient managing govt and govt bureaucracy then why have we added an unprecedented 6-7 trillion in new spending under this potus in only 4 years? Is that your idea of effectively managing governement?
B
O
O
M
!
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:25 pm
Regnad: Yes, yes it is. I am not sure how much I can really call it gambling if the risk is so minimal, however
I would be providing links if I could, by the way. Anyone else is free to go and find this info. I’m not making it up, honest.
oops
December 11th, 2012
2:25 pm
Santa is a Republican
he doesn’t give gifts to those who’ve been naughty
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:25 pm
Correction. Make that 6-7 trillion in new debt- not new spending.
alex
December 11th, 2012
2:26 pm
@ joe, I am NO constitutional lawyer and I did not sleep at a holiday-in express, but your arguement of loss of right to association is not plausible, even for me. Anyway unless you’ve argued this case in front of the Supreme court neither of our opinions carry much ….
getalife
December 11th, 2012
2:27 pm
St. Simons,
Ted Kennedy was the grover for SS and Medicare.
We need to replace him with somebody like grover that goes on all the talk shows and threaten dems not to cave on SS and Medicare.
oops
December 11th, 2012
2:27 pm
“The American companies which left the town to wallow in its decline and misery ”
call the unions to cry, they killed the auto companies
just saying
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:27 pm
Thulsa: If Dems are so efficient managing govt and govt bureaucracy then why have we added an unprecedented 6-7 trillion in new spending under this potus in only 4 years?
Well, first of all, most of those trillions are not “new spending.” Secondly, the remaining amount of increase does not indicate one way or the other how efficient a program is at its intended purpose. You will need to look at other data besides dollar amounts if you want to get at the truth of efficiency and whether or not the programs are better run. You also have to take into account deliberate sabotage attempts on programs, rather than skipping over those changes during Republican administrations in order to make a half century comparison, as I have seen others try to do with certain things.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:28 pm
Doom — “Isn’t that what mankind has done since the dawn of history. Sell his labor for bread to eat?”
Seems like someone slept through several semesters of History.
“Or if he hasn’t sold his labor he used his own labor to produce something that he could sell in order to buy bread to eat.”
You’d have to have a medium of exchange for that, and that came along much later than agriculture in human history. FWIW, barter was actually a fairly rare economic system.
“Or he used his own labor to grow his own grain for bread.”
Working for oneself is all well and good, but considering you’re throwing the term ‘bully’ around as heedlessly as you are, perhaps you should consider whether or not people take jobs they don’t really want (as far as the conditions and compensation are concerned) just so they can feed themselves and their family. If there’s only one employer paying a living wage in the area but he works his employees to exhaustion, how’s that *not* bullying?
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
2:28 pm
“No justice. No peace”.
Mr. Doom thinks justice is over-rated…I guess it’s not really necessary (except to those unspeakable folks… the have-not types…you know, “those” people).
josef
December 11th, 2012
2:29 pm
Oh, yes, and as for Kyle’s…whenever Jay’s blog runs into a shut down for whatever reason, we pretty much go over there to hang out, and I, just speaking for myself, have always been made to feel welcome and at home. Of course, I do try to remember that I am a guest, and to act like one.
Bruno is fine, btw, still full of p*ss and vinagre. As for those who emigrated from here to there, we lost the finest blogger we ever had in my several years of coming to Jay’s Place when Hillbilly Deluxe moved. A courtly Southern gentleman, a wit without a mean streak in him, and more knowledgeable of history than most of the MAJOR historians combined, and a fellow who has forgotten more about music than the rest of us at FNM ever learned…
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:29 pm
JHM: FWIW, barter was actually a fairly rare economic system.
As it should be again. “You owe me” is something that needs to be eliminated from our minds.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:30 pm
Doom — “If Dems are so efficient managing govt and govt bureaucracy then why have we added an unprecedented 6-7 trillion in new spending under this potus in only 4 years? Is that your idea of effectively managing governement?”
Obama’s doing the same thing Reagan did; massive deficit spending to kick-start the economy. Why do you hate Ronald Reagan?
F
L
O
P
alex
December 11th, 2012
2:30 pm
@ Josef , did you see elvis?
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:30 pm
“Just as you would expect me to be concerned if the Tea Party actually decided to make good on all their threats of violence over election outcomes they don’t like”
Sure buddy. Those middle aged to old folks in their lawn chairs making all sorts of threats of violence election. Uh-huh. Oh I’m sure you could find some examples on youtube but nothing compared to the ACTUAL violence of the ows protestors, their riots(over 2,000 of them arrested), the rapes, property damage, etc. And we can find lots and lots of examples of ows folks making threats. A lot more than tea party folks. I know cause me and taxpayer started trading video of such things one day. He ran out of ammo fairly quickly. But I had plenty videos of ows violence and threats of violence to go all day long.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
2:31 pm
non union members aren’t freeloading
they’re making an intelligent decision on what to do with THEIR money.
If they earn their money/benefits via wages/benefits negotiated for by a union, and they don’t pay a single penny for those negotiations, they are freeloading. Plain and Simple.
Face it Conservatives. If you cheer for RTW legislation, YOU ADVOCATE FREELOADING!!
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
2:32 pm
“If Dems are so efficient managing govt and govt bureaucracy then why have we added an unprecedented 6-7 trillion in new spending under this potus in only 4 years? Is that your idea of effectively managing governement?”
Mr Doom – that was completely non-responsive to the question. You asserted that it was impossible for one party to manage the programs better than another. I asked why.
I’ll assume you have no answer – it’ll save us both time.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:33 pm
Thulsa: Those middle aged to old folks in their lawn chairs making all sorts of threats of violence election.
Look up “Woman Killed After Car, Motorized Wheelchair Bump” and then tell me the middle aged people just have no way of executing violence.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:33 pm
alex — “@ joe, I am NO constitutional lawyer and I did not sleep at a holiday-in express, but your arguement of loss of right to association is not plausible, even for me.”
Not to be argumentative, but it doesn’t *have* to be plausible to *you.*
“Anyway unless you’ve argued this case in front of the Supreme court neither of our opinions carry much ….”
Tell you what. Make a note of what I said. Then, when the SCOTUS releases its decision, let’s go through it (the long version) and see if what I said makes an appearance in there.
I feel pretty confident that you’ll see both of my points making an appearance in the decision.
Mick
December 11th, 2012
2:34 pm
josef
Yes, HD was really cool and did possess that backwoods wisdom, but why did he leave?
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:34 pm
Has kayaker returned yet?
Wait a minute
December 11th, 2012
2:34 pm
Thank God Timothy Geitner was able to explain to the 4th grader in charge that the debt limit had to be raised. I worried when President Reagan gave missles to Iran that he 1) either didn’t know about it, scary enough; or 2) knew about it and approved it (just plain bad policy).
Now I’m reading that President Obama was ready to stop the government borrowing a year and a half ago because he doesn’t know how our government operates? Always knew (as a result of him never having held any sort of substantive job) that he had no business or operational experience whatsoever, but reading that scares the daylight out of me, that someone so fundamentally clueless is in charge. We get what we vote for at the polls, I’m afraid. It’s really scary when someone with a massive ego and such little brainpower is in charge. Very scary.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:35 pm
Doom — “Uh-huh. Oh I’m sure you could find some examples on youtube but nothing compared to the ACTUAL violence of the ows protestors, their riots(over 2,000 of them arrested), the rapes, property damage, etc.”
You’ve been debunked on this point by Jay many times. Doom. Move along.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:36 pm
Adam — “Has kayaker returned yet?”
He popped in again one morning last week, but he only had time for a couple of ragey screeds before he split again.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:38 pm
JHM: You’ve been debunked on this point by Jay many times. Doom. Move along.
Case in point of one of the rules of the conservative playbook: Pretend you were never proven wrong, and re-assert that you were right. Newt Gingrich did this on Sunday when Lawrence O’Donnell said to his face that he should apologize for predicting a recession as a resulting of raising taxes. Newt ignored the point completely, just like Thulsa has been doing with most of the points I am making, and Newt made his own point as though he was responding, just like Thulsa has been doing with most of his responses.
By the way Thulsa, if you’re starting to feel proud that you’re being compared to Newt, you shouldn’t be. First of all, you’re not making any money being wrong so often (or are you?
), and secondly, Newt Gingrich is a stupid person’s idea of what a smart person sounds like.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:38 pm
“Obama’s doing the same thing Reagan did; massive deficit spending to kick-start the economy. Why do you hate Ronald Reagan?”
So did Reagan run up 6-7 trillion in debt? And since they’re the same I can safely assume that Obama has created the same number of jobs as Reagan? Right? You really want to go there missy? Cause I don’t think you do.
We can use total net new jobs which includes the recessions of both or we can use when jobs started picking up after the recessions ended. Reagan created 21 million new jobs if we go from the bottoming out of the 81-82 recession and 16.1 million if we are talking about overall including the recession. So where is Obama? I think he’s around 3 or 4 million according to the libs if we go from when the recession bottomed out and maybe positive by a few hundred thousand jobs if we include the recession.
Oh. I almost forgot. Where’s the 7% economic growth under O that we had under Reagan shortly after the 81-82 recession ended? Where is it Joe???
I remember in one month under Reagan we had something like a million jobs created in one month. So tell me Joe. Have we had a million jobs created in one month under O??? A simple yes or no will suffice. I thank you in advance.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:40 pm
JHM: Mainly I just want to remind kayaker of our bet, not get on his case at all about the text we exchanged prior to the bet, and see what his response will be. If he wants to make good on the bet, I would be also happy to give him time to do so.
Jack ®
December 11th, 2012
2:40 pm
Regardless of the outcome of the current negotiations, upper-incomers will pay more Medicare surtax for 2013: a 3.8% tax on unearned income and a 0.9% levy imposed on their earned income. These taxes are supposed to help pay health insurance coverage for lower-income families. I’m not exactly sure how that’s gonna work since the new taxes will go into the general fund–not the Medicare fund.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
2:41 pm
So did Reagan run up 6-7 trillion in debt?
Reagan did triple the debt from what it was when he entered office.
Just sayin’
josef
December 11th, 2012
2:41 pm
oops
Those companies that left weren’t auto companies. They were minimum wage consumer goods manufacturers. They relocated from Up North in the 1950s and 1960s taking advantage of the socio-economic conditions in the colonies at a time when the choice for hundreds of thousands of Mississippi’s population was to refugee north, starve or, if lucky, take one of those non-union jobs with American manufacturers, taking their profits and putting them in banks Up North. Then when they found they could get it even cheaper some place else, off they went.
Who knows what will happen with Nissan there, but mention certain of the Carpetbag companies to the locals and get a round of cussin.’ Mention Nissan and get a round of praise. See, Nissan respected the local culture, its pride, its value of the community, its work ethic and its stability. Their goal has been explicitly to encourage that sense as producing a loyal and willing to work labor force.
When a business does what it should, there is no need for unions. The unions didn’t give a sh*t about the locals back in the bad old days. Now that good times have come to Hard Times, the unions ain’t particularly popular.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:41 pm
“You’ve been debunked on this point by Jay many times. Doom. Move along.”
Nope. The only place its been debunked is in liberal fantasyland. Truth hurts. Bring me back one a them chocolately unicorns when you return from kook fantasyland.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:41 pm
So did Reagan run up 6-7 trillion in debt?
Well, let’s see. Prior to Obama taking office, the debt stood at roughly $10.7T It is now roughly $16T, or an increase of $5.3T, or a 49.5% increase over 4 years.
Would anyone from the class like to tell us what the percentage increase was under Reagan’s first 4 years?
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:43 pm
Thulsa: Nope. The only place its been debunked is in liberal fantasyland. Truth hurts. Bring me back one a them chocolately unicorns when you return from kook fantasyland.
Again, it suits me just fine that you do not realize that you’re the one in fantasy land and that a majority of the American public is not in there with you. I like being part of the majority that voted for the winners.
AmericaShrugged
December 11th, 2012
2:43 pm
Well empirical evidence shows one party is certainly better at CREATING government bureaucracies! Let’s see WPA, CCC, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare, food stamps for the Dems and Medicare Part (D) for the Repubs.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
2:43 pm
When a business does what it should, there is no need for unions.
THIS!!!!^^^^^^^^^^
Unions are nothing more than a free market answer to a problem. If employers treated their employees worth anything, there would be no need to collectively bargain for anything.
Ken
December 11th, 2012
2:44 pm
Higher taxes will fix nothing. They just get the President a trophy. Tough choices elude congress.
Mick
December 11th, 2012
2:44 pm
doom
Give it up on the reagan comparison, because there is none, kinda like cherries and grapefruits. The housing debacle is still reeking havoc, we are about half way out of it.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
2:44 pm
Erwin’s cat
December 11th, 2012
11:31 am
TP…thanks for the non answer
A reply that meets with your disapproval is hardly the accepted definition of “non answer” but you’re welcome anyway.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:44 pm
So did Reagan run up 6-7 trillion in debt?
Reagan did triple the debt from what it was when he entered office.
Just sayin’
I’ll ask it again. Did Reagan run up 6-7 trillion in new debt. A simple yes or no answer will suffice for any lib who cares to take up the question.
Adam
December 11th, 2012
2:44 pm
Unions are nothing more than a free market answer to a problem
Quoted for truth
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:45 pm
Doom — ““Obama’s doing the same thing Reagan did; massive deficit spending to kick-start the economy. Why do you hate Ronald Reagan?”
“So did Reagan run up 6-7 trillion in debt?”
I know you’re too young to remember it, Doom, but Reagan took us over the $1T debt line for the first time in our national history.
“And since they’re the same I can safely assume that Obama has created the same number of jobs as Reagan? Right? You really want to go there missy? Cause I don’t think you do.”
You know what you can do with your goalpost movement, Doom. YOU brought up large amounts of deficit spending as an example of poor government management and didn’t say JACK about jobs. Now that you’ve had Reagan’s profligate spending presented to you, you want to jump off spending and run straight to job creation.
Well, Sonny, you and your cherry-picked Heritage data AND your goalpost moving can go take a freakin’ hike.
“We can use total net new jobs which includes the recessions of both SNIP”
Or you can just shut your yap and recognize that you just got your argument and your head handed to you.
josef
December 11th, 2012
2:46 pm
Alex
“@ Josef , did you see elvis?”
When he was still alive, or after he was SUPPOSED to have died?
Actually, I lived in Memphis growing up. Had a friend who lived on Timothy Street in Whitehaven next to Graceland. Elvis would come down to the fence and talk to the neighbors. He would go to the late show at the Malco. My brother and brother-in-law’s firm did a lot of work with his enterprises. He was a major benefactor of the Baron Hirsch synagogue and the Memphis Jewish community. So, yeah, I saw Elvis!
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
2:47 pm
Doomy and Reagan sittin’ in a tree….
saywhat?
December 11th, 2012
2:47 pm
doom apparently thinks “heckuva job brownie” did as good a job or better managing FEMA than any Democrat appointed head of that department.
Can I get a
B
O
O
M
?
RF
December 11th, 2012
2:47 pm
“When a business does what it should, there is no need for unions”
Exactly. Simple as that, and no amount of union bashing and right to work BS will take away that simple, pure fact…
Of course, when your political ideology is take over by the extreme end (and this would be true for either party), then you lose your ability to reasonably discuss solutions. Right now, too many on the right would still “strain a gnat and swallow a camel” to get Obama and prove that a non-white man can’t effectively run the country. The debt deal, even if it costs us further loss of credit rating, and even if deep cuts to “entitlements” are given, will end up either keeping the country afloat or running its credit into the ground. Amazing they would risk that for a few political points against the black man.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
2:47 pm
Doom — “Nope. The only place its been debunked is in liberal fantasyland.”
Nope. Jay’s pointed out several times that you’ve got no evidence whatsoever that the individuals arrested and charged were actually members or organizers of OWS. Even *prosecutors* in most of those cases have conceded that point in municipal court.
“Truth hurts.”
It usually hurts you, because when he debunks you, you change the subject.
“Bring me back one a them chocolately unicorns when you return from kook fantasyland.”
Ah! The mating cry of the Beaten Conservative! (laughing, pointing)
JKL2
December 11th, 2012
2:48 pm
getalife- Our justice system is if you have money, pay the fine and do no time.
Just following the fine example of Eric Holder. Social justice, not equal justice.
Morality?
December 11th, 2012
2:49 pm
Jay completely missed what the real scandal of the last 50 years is. What got us here – to this point where we are on the edge of bankruptcy? That is the real scandal. 50 year build up of SOCIALIST social programs (introduced primarily by the left leaning democrat party) that were and are unfunded or under funded…… and the raid, over many years by politicians in both parties , of the Social Security System. It’s fantasy 101. There is NO Social Security surplus NONE. The current checks sent out are being funded by tax dollars coming in and we have a short fall that is be covered up the Fed gub’ment and the politicians. Social Security is the largest PONSI scheme in the history of the world. That is the largest scandal of the last 50 years. Jay get honest for once.
RAMZAD
December 11th, 2012
2:49 pm
Republicans are only patriotic when it is convenient for Right Wing ideology. They really proved it to me when they outed CIA agent Valerie Plame as payback for her husband’s report that Iraqi attempt to acquire Yellow Cake uranium from Niger was a Republican hoax.
It is very clear that Republicans do not care about America where the country is not an economic gravy train for their economic and power hungry megalomania. Just look at their disdain for the 47% who built America in their heyday.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:49 pm
Mick,
You’re right. There is no comparison between Reagan’s economic performance relative to Obama’s. NONE! And as far as debt goes if I remember correctly Reagan had to work with a full Democratic Congress. And Reagan’s biggest complaint later on after leaving office was that he agreed with the Dems to raise taxes to reduce the deficit and the Dems would reduce spending. Reagan did this twice. Did the Dems actually reduce spending? Nope.They just lied. Just like they are lying today about the cliff. If the Rs agree to tax increases the Ds will say that they will agree to spending cuts. But they are LIARS. They will take the tax increases but the spending cuts will never materialize. And yet some of the brainwashed on here blame Reagan. Hilarious.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
2:50 pm
Just don’t bring up the last President or say that more jobs were created under Clinton than Reagan and you will be ok……
Mick
December 11th, 2012
2:51 pm
**Social Security is the largest PONSI scheme in the history of the world**
Not intended to be a factual statement rather a showcase of ignorant ideology…
josef
December 11th, 2012
2:51 pm
RF
So, how went the interview?
Mick
December 11th, 2012
2:52 pm
doom
One could say that it was because of the democratic congress that it made reagan look successful. Turnabout is fair play…
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
2:53 pm
Thulsa
Unless 6 years of a Republican Senate in your mind means a “full Democratic Congress”, then NO, you do not “remember correctly”.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
2:54 pm
Is Michigan a right to work state yet?
RF
December 11th, 2012
2:54 pm
“Social Security is the largest PONSI scheme in the history of the world”
Ponzi schemes are normally run by someone for a reason- to make money. Who’s getting the “profit” here???
“50 year build up of SOCIALIST social programs (introduced primarily by the left leaning democrat party)”
Actually, members of BOTH parties voted to create the social programs, and have voted to continue them. They are the product of a bipartisan agreement. I’m sure you’ll be right in line with the rest to receive when your time comes. Would you seriously turn down Medicare and Social Security?
saywhat?
December 11th, 2012
2:55 pm
does doom remember reagan’s wonderful choice for secretary of the interior, Watt, who managed his department so well that he spent millions and millions of taxpayer dollars changing the department seal- he changed the buffalo from left facing to right facing.
Yep, those Republicans sure do manage goverment efficiently.
Can I get another
B
O
O
M
?
Tom Middleton
December 11th, 2012
2:55 pm
But when the Republicans are being so outplayed at every level that they can’t win any other way, Jay, what’s their alternative, I mean besides utter oblivion?
Of course, they could come to the center and start working for all of us like they’re supposed to do, but a psychotic political party isn’t going to do that without a great deal of help through retribution from the victims – the American people themselves.
I mean, when their drug of choice is political power, and they’re getting dramatically less of it every single election, yeah, they’ll get the idea; and We The People will be much the better off for it in virtually no time at all!
Peter Irons
December 11th, 2012
2:55 pm
@ Joe, you’re right about me and not being argumentative and I had already said as much…,well the supreme court may address what you have brought up. It will be interesting. Using right to free association to argue that the free individual should be made to “freely ‘ associate. Any way, I should stick to my previous statement: I got no idea about constitutional law and admit when I do not….
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:56 pm
“Jay’s pointed out several times that you’ve got no evidence whatsoever that the individuals arrested and charged were actually members or organizers of OWS”
Aaaah. Joe and the hair splitting. So if a riot instigated by OWS folks ends up in a number of hooligans being arrested then it has nothing to do with OWS because these arrested micreants aren’t official OWS members. And of course this is because OWS is supposed to just be a loosely unorganized group of upset ordinary citizens to begin with. The good ole plausible deniability. Joe doing what Joe does best- the tap dance routine.
Musta been a bunch of middle aged tea party folks who crashed the party and acted as if they were ows hooligan thugs to give ows a bad name. KD.
RF
December 11th, 2012
2:56 pm
josef 2:51. Went well, I guess. One of the interview committee members was a bit hard to read, but we’ll see. I’m just waiting to hear if I make round two. Either way, the interview experience is important, especially in today’s job market! I’m expecting to hear something by the first of the week.
oops
December 11th, 2012
2:56 pm
pathetic
““What they’re really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money,” Obama told workers at the Detroit Diesel plant.”
saywhat?
December 11th, 2012
2:58 pm
well doom, if you were a hooligan thug, which party would you crash? The one with angry old guys in lawn chairs, or the one with young hipsters listening to good music?
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
2:59 pm
“I mean, when their drug of choice is political power, and they’re getting dramatically less of it every single election”
Gawd that is asinine. The party whose drug of choice is political power would be the one that wants to enhance its power through creating more govt dependency, more programs, more govt bureaucracy, etc. That would be the Dem party.
Mick
December 11th, 2012
2:59 pm
**““What they’re really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money,” **
Sums it up quite nicely…
Alex
December 11th, 2012
3:00 pm
utter oblivion
psychotic party
drug of choice
retribution from the victims
Tom Middleton…..
Tom,Tom,TOM, can we talk you down from the ledge…how about some rational discussion…
The other half of your brain.
December 11th, 2012
3:00 pm
True story at local car dealer
From Tom Selkis’ (Latham Ford) Facebook……….
True story yesterday at the dealership…..
“I’ll try to make this as short and to the point as I can.
One of my salesmen here had a women in his office yesterday wanting to lease a brand new Focus. As he was reviewing her credit app with her he noticed she was on social security disability. He said to her you don’t look like your disabled and unable to work. She said well I’m really not, I could work if I wanted to but I make more now then I did when I was working and got hurt.(non-disabling injury)
She said the gov’t sends her 1500.00$ a month in 1 check, she gets 700.00$ a month on an EBT card (food stamps), and 800.00 a month for rent. Oh yeah and 250 mins free on her phone. That is just south of 3500.00 a month.
When she was working she was taking home about 330.00$ per week. Do the math and then ask yourself why the hell should she go back to work. If you multiply that by millions of people you start to realize the scope of the problem we face as a country. Once the socialist have 51% of the population in that same scenerio we are finished.
The question is when do we cross that threshold if we haven’t already.
She didn’t lease the Focus here because the dealer down the road beat our deal by 10.00$/month. Glad to know she is so frugal with her hard earned money.”
Jay, The MasterBaiter, No Jay, this is the biggest story.
saywhat?
December 11th, 2012
3:00 pm
oops
December 11th, 2012
2:56 pm
pathetic
““What they’re really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money,” Obama told workers at the Detroit Diesel plant.”
————————————————————–
Far less pathetic that he said it than how pathetic it is that he’s right. Even more pathetic that you can’t see it.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:01 pm
saywhat?
Well you do have a good point there you do. I have to admit if I want a good hellraising party with young hotties, pot, alchohol, and sheer craziness and rebelliousness just for the hell of it then I’m going OWS!!!!
Mick
December 11th, 2012
3:02 pm
half a brain
Come on down to sunny florida, land real cheap west of krome, I’ll give you a deal!!!
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
3:02 pm
Thulsa
Government grew under both Reagan and the Bush’s. Since when are they considered Democrat?
Your theories hold true when looking at Republican Presidents about as well as paper bags holding water……….
Now do your usual deflect to blame it on the Democrats…….
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
3:03 pm
P. Irons — “Using right to free association to argue that the free individual should be made to “freely ‘ associate.”
You mistake my point, sir.
I’m not arguing for mandatory union membership at all — besides it’s already settled law that you can’t be forced to join a union as a condition of employment. My point is that the state’s not even considering the obligatory *narrow* restriction in order to satisfy whatever their “compelling state interest” is. Quite the contrary, the state is imposing an unconstitutionally overbroad restriction by doing away with those unions entirely, and that *is* unconstitutional — and has been found so many times by the SCOTUS.
For the state to prevail in court, they’d need to lay out the legal problem or issue and then demonstrate how their solution was crafted to be as narrow as possible, so as not to infringe on other rights or the rights of individuals. If they can’t do that, it’s likely that the law would be thrown out.
Of course, all this presumes that appellants would be granted certiorari by the SCOTUS, and that’s far from certain. The Court is hit with *thousands* of petitions and appeals each year and can only consider a small fraction of them.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:04 pm
I read the liberal unions are threatening to kill people. I guess it is their right. Call it individual or group expression.
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:04 pm
“What they’re really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money,”
On average, union workers make about $1500 per year more than non-union workers. Which is about how much they pay a year in union dues, so it’s a wash.
And, in a free society, I would think that people who don’t wish to join a union and pay dues in order to be employed ought not have to do so.
And a large percentage of the money flowing to unions via dues isn’t used to represent union members. It’s spent on politics.
Funny how liberals think they can protest having their tax dollars spent on things they don’t agre with (like supporting religious charities) but forcing workers against their will to fund liberal political machines (unions) is just fine by them.
Silly little brainwashed liberals.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
3:05 pm
Thulsa
But I admit, they do talk a great game without a doubt.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:05 pm
“Quite the contrary, the state is imposing an unconstitutionally overbroad restriction by doing away with those unions entirely”
that is a LIE!
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
3:05 pm
My girlfriend’s hairdresser’s husband has an uncle that used to work with a guy who knew someone that wanted to lease a Ford Focus.
The other half of your brain.
December 11th, 2012
3:06 pm
Mick
December 11th, 2012
3:02 pm
half a brain
Come on down to sunny florida, land real cheap west of krome, I’ll give you a deal!!!
Mickey, I’m doing just fine in Georgia, thank you.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
3:06 pm
The mating cry of the Beaten Conservative!?
B
O
O
M
!
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
3:06 pm
Doom — “Aaaah. Joe and the hair splitting.”
Aaaah. Doom and the guilt-by-association. (laughing)
“So if a riot instigated by OWS folks”
Your evidence of such a thing, please?
“ends up in a number of hooligans being arrested then it has nothing to do with OWS because these arrested micreants aren’t official OWS members.”
Your evidence that the alleged riot was instigated by OWS members, please?
“And of course this is because OWS is supposed to just be a loosely unorganized group of upset ordinary citizens to begin with. The good ole plausible deniability. Joe doing what Joe does best- the tap dance routine.”
Good thing we have courts. I wouldn’t want to trust your powers of ESP to arrive at a just conclusion, Doom. (laughing)
BTW, do those magic peepers of yours enable you to tell what kind of car someone drives, how many cellphones they have and how they pay for their groceries? (laughing)
“Musta been a bunch of middle aged tea party folks who crashed the party and acted as if they were ows hooligan thugs to give ows a bad name.”
Musta been. Your evidence, please? (laughing)
Mick
December 11th, 2012
3:07 pm
**On average, union workers make about $1500 per year more than non-union workers. Which is about how much they pay a year in union dues, so it’s a wash*
No, it’s not; you fail to mention healthcare and a pension. Those are some very important items not usually given to non union employees…
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:08 pm
And Reagan’s biggest complaint later on after leaving office was that he agreed with the Dems to raise taxes to reduce the deficit and the Dems would reduce spending. Reagan did this twice.
TWICE???
http://capitalgainsandgames.com/blog/bruce-bartlett/1632/reagans-tax-increases
The other half of your brain.
December 11th, 2012
3:08 pm
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
3:05 pm
My girlfriend’s hairdresser’s husband has an uncle that used to work with a guy who knew someone that wanted to lease a Ford Focus.
Thank’s for that, silly!
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
3:09 pm
Williebkind — “that is a LIE!”
I’m listening, Willie. Go ahead.
Mick
December 11th, 2012
3:09 pm
brain
That story has been making the rounds, let the buyer beware…
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
3:10 pm
I read the liberal unions are threatening to kill people.
I read that I will be the starting quarterback in the Super Bowl.
RB from Gwinnett
December 11th, 2012
3:10 pm
““What they’re really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money,” Obama told workers at the Detroit Diesel plant.”
Yes, because when faced with the choice of having diesel engines made in China/India/Korea/Wherever, the pay rate in Detroit would never be a factor, right?
And before you even bother to reply, ask yourself this; “Is the US diesel market the only place DD might like to sell engines?” If the answer is “no”, then why would they care if they produce them in Detroit or in Shanghi if the’re selling them in both and it’s cheaper to build them and ship from one to the other?
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
3:11 pm
“So if a riot instigated by OWS folks ends up in a number of hooligans being arrested then it has nothing to do with OWS because these arrested micreants aren’t official OWS members”
BENGHAZI!!!
Real Scootter
December 11th, 2012
3:11 pm
Of course, all this presumes that appellants would be granted certiorari by the SCOTUS, and that’s far from certain. The Court is hit with *thousands* of petitions and appeals each year and can only consider a small fraction of them.
Dang JHM,could you please dumb that down a bit? Them big words are tough on us rednecks!
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:12 pm
Am I the only one who wonders why Joe Hussein Mama spends all day every day on Bookman’s blog? I would think that a guy as smart as JHM pretends/wishes to be would have somethiong better to do. Like maybe, oh I don’t know, a JOB……………
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
3:13 pm
Bro
Did you see how much capital gains taxes were in either 86 & 87 or 87 & 88? I’m not advocating we go back to that rate, but this notion that it is all about the tax rates is bs from the get go.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:13 pm
“Government grew under both Reagan and the Bush’s. Since when are they considered Democrat?”
they both suck,
I’m not letting the Rs off the hook. They deserve a significant amount of blame under W for spending in the 6 years under W.
At least under Reagan though he thought he was going to get spending cuts which never materialized. And also Reagan is guilty as charged for a massive military spending spree. But was that spending spree worth it? Yep! It brought about the end of the USSR and we later enjoyed an enormous peace dividend under Clinton as a result. If I remember correctly I think defense expenditures under Clinton were almost a third less.
Alex
December 11th, 2012
3:13 pm
@ Joe, would you please explain this in less legaleeze, I think constitutional law is fascinating, but do not posses the legal vocabulary to follow many of the discussions, thanks…Mr. Irons does know more (MUCH MORE) than me !!!!
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:14 pm
Mick
December 11th, 2012
3:07 pm
“No, it’s not; you fail to mention healthcare and a pension. Those are some very important items not usually given to non union employees…”
I’ve been working since 1977, I’ve never belonged to a union, and every job I’ve ever had provided healthcare. As far as pension, I prefer to save on my own, which my employers have almost universally subsidized via 401(k) matching funds.
But thanks for playing, any way….
josef
December 11th, 2012
3:14 pm
OTHER HALF
“She didn’t lease the Focus here because the dealer down the road beat our deal by 10.00$/month.”
Hey, that’s free market competition for you! So, is he kvetching because of her sources of income or is he kvetching because he couldn’t skim off his share of the socialist government’s largesse?
We are left to assume that had he been able to compete with his competitor’s price he WOULD have taken the shekels.
Sort of blows the rest of the argument to hell…
mm
December 11th, 2012
3:15 pm
“The party whose drug of choice is political power would be the one that wants to enhance its power through creating more govt dependency, more programs, more govt bureaucracy, etc”
Cons, it’s time to grow up.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:15 pm
So the people in the state of Michigan want a law that says states cannot take money out of their paychecks and give it to unions for dues. Now the progressive liberal liars read that as “a broadstroke to do away with unions”. Now all that education the progressive liberals confess to have and this is how they comprehend the Michigan bill. To top it off they have already rioted and destroyed others peoples’ property. Have you ever seen the liberals protest peaceably–I have not. Like I said the people in the north and east and west coast are morons.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:16 pm
“Am I the only one who wonders why Joe Hussein Mama spends all day every day on Bookman’s blog?”
Perfesser Joe does have a job- and a mission statement too. It is to enlighten the ignorant and downtrodden masses of the Bookman blog. Can’t you just feel the enlightenment??? I’m feeling like a farter smucker already just for being on the same blog as Joe.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:16 pm
Mick @ 3:07
He also fails to mention that when looking at per capita income, right-to-work states make up only 1 in the top 10 and 4 in the top 20. On the bottom end of per capita income, there are 7 of 10 RTW states and 16 of 20.
Tom Middleton
December 11th, 2012
3:17 pm
Thulsa Doom @2:59pm: “Gawd that is asinine. The party whose drug of choice is political power would be the one that wants to enhance its power through creating more govt dependency, more programs, more govt bureaucracy, etc. That would be the Dem party”
Doom, if you can find some way to put that on a bumper sticker, you can run on it from now on and LOSE. I mean, did your parents create a dependent child when they helped you get through school, etc.? Doom, you just don’t like minorities, that’s your problem, and those otherwise not born rich!
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
3:19 pm
Real Scootter — Dang JHM,could you please dumb that down a bit? Them big words are tough on us rednecks!”
No problem, buddy.
Let’s say that the former union members got up a group and a legal team and got their case pushed through the court system. If they lost at the state level, they could appeal to the Federal district level, and if they lost there, then they could appeal to the Federal Circuit level.
If they *still* lost there, they could go to the Supreme Court BUT the SCOTUS doesn’t hear every case that comes their way. They get THOUSANDS more cases each year than they could possibly consider, so their staff narrows things down for them and gives them a list with the highlights of each case. Then the justices vote on which ones they’ll hear. I don’t know offhand how many they pick each year.
If the justices pick your case, it’s called ‘granting certiorari,’ and it means that they think your case deserves to be considered by the Supreme Court. It’s really a long road to get there, and from what I understand, it is quite a feather in a lawyer’s cap for his and his clients’ case to make it that far.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:19 pm
They BOTH
Yeah, I’ve looked at those rates. Reagan did good in cutting rates to a point. The current GOP, however, is like a crack fiend, with their crack being tax cuts. They remind me of heroin addicts in Russia who shoot up Krokadil, even after knowing the effects of it and how bad it is for them.
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
3:20 pm
“He also fails to mention that when looking at per capita income, right-to-work states make up only 1 in the top 10 and 4 in the top 20. On the bottom end of per capita income, there are 7 of 10 RTW states and 16 of 20″
Perhaps Michigan felt that its citizens were too affluent…
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:20 pm
Taxpayer,
Thanks for the homage. Another adoring fan.
Kamchak - "Socialism" is just a code word for "fear," the monster under you bed ~ Kamchak
December 11th, 2012
3:22 pm
I’ve been working since 1877 and I have to walk 35 miles round trip, bare foot in the snow, uphill both ways and I work 24 hours a day non stop.
And Socialism — BOO!
josef
December 11th, 2012
3:22 pm
TOM
oom, you just don’t like minorities, that’s your problem..”
Not out to defend Doom, but he IS a member of a minority…perhaps the most mistreated one in all of Western Civilization…just saying.
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:22 pm
“He also fails to mention that when looking at per capita income, right-to-work states make up only 1 in the top 10 and 4 in the top 20. On the bottom end of per capita income, there are 7 of 10 RTW states and 16 of 20.”
He also fails to compare per capita income to cost of living in those staes.
The other half of your brain.
December 11th, 2012
3:23 pm
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:19 pm
They BOTH
Yeah, I’ve looked at those rates. Reagan did good in cutting rates to a point. The current GOP, however, is like a crack fiend, with their crack being tax cuts. They remind me of heroin addicts in Russia who shoot up Krokadil, even after knowing the effects of it and how bad it is for them
Bro, Are you saying that we should keep supplying ” the crack “
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:23 pm
“Funny how liberals think they can protest having their tax dollars spent on things they don’t agre with (like supporting religious charities) but forcing workers against their will to fund liberal political machines (unions) is just fine by them.”
That is a good statement. It fits the liberals perfectly.
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:23 pm
“Perhaps Michigan felt that its citizens were too affluent…”
Or maybe Michigan felt too many of its citizens were without jobs….
josef
December 11th, 2012
3:24 pm
@ 3:22
Now THAT’s an interesting typo…
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:24 pm
“Dang JHM,could you please dumb that down a bit? Them big words are tough on us rednecks!”
The only way he can dumb it down is if he gets his cut-and-pastes from a different source.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:25 pm
Ok this is just like the radio broadcast War of the Worlds–so dont panic.
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:26 pm
Kamchak, your unicoen just pooped a pile of skittles over on aisle 10. How ’bout cleaning that up for us.
Thanks in advance bro….
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:26 pm
“I mean, did your parents create a dependent child when they helped you get through school, etc.?”
Sorry but I worked my way through college. Took 5 1/2 years but it was worth it to say I did it on my own. Your powers of mind reading failed you again.
“Doom, you just don’t like minorities, that’s your problem, and those otherwise not born rich!”
Well of course I hate minorities. That’s why I learned Spanish and went to live in Central America as a foreign exchange student- cause I hate minorities and especially spics. (Kook disclaimer for facetious, sarcastic statements)
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:27 pm
Nine peaceful demonstators shot to death by the union thugs protesting the signing of the Michigan right to work state as report by Jay Bookman at the scene.
Real Scootter
December 11th, 2012
3:28 pm
Thanks Joe!!
I will look up those words and hopefuly learn them.
I’m gona guess here and say certiorari,is Latin.
The other half of your brain.
December 11th, 2012
3:29 pm
Willie, 3:27 that was funny, He will show it on a chart later today.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:29 pm
Bookman stared into the camera with drugged glazed eyes and screaming the peaceful demonstrators were bulling the union thugs with equal right statements when the guns discharged dozens of times claiming nine victims.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
3:30 pm
Bro
In those years I am refering to, Reagan actually increased capital gains. He worked with Congress to lower them back towards the end of his second term. Bush Sr had bought into “vodoo economics” by that time and needed to sell the folks just that.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:31 pm
The gay CNN correspondent asked was it a dirty scene.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:31 pm
Better got my popcorn so I can watch ole Ben kick ass and take names. Has kamchak cleaned up that unicorn poop over on aisle 10 yet? My popcorn is on that aisle and I don’t want to look at unicorn poop while selecting which Orville Reddenbacker I want. Do hurry kam.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
3:32 pm
Real Scootter — “I’m gona guess here and say certiorari,is Latin.”
You are correct, sir!
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:33 pm
steve
December 11th, 2012
8:14 am
“I miss the old days. You know, back when the losing party understood that the people have spoken and abided by it, at least to a fair extent. Today’s GOP is unrecognizable.”
Looks like poor little steve doesn’t understand the three branches of government and the Constitutional system of checks and balances.
josef
December 11th, 2012
3:34 pm
Scootter
Now, repeat after me… Coito, ergo sum.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:34 pm
The current DEM party, however, is like a crack fiend, with their crack being spending. They remind me of heroin addicts in Russia who shoot up Krokadil, even after knowing the effects of it and how bad it is for them.
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:34 pm
Bookman responded to the gay CNN correspondent that scene was blasted with shouts of debauchery and OWS members raced across the scene nude dancing around the bodies of the gundowned demonstrators.
Tom Middleton
December 11th, 2012
3:39 pm
Doom@3:26pm
My bad, Doom, then it’s just that you don’t like helping others, kind of ironic for someone who knows how tough it can be. Is that resentment?
I’m a Dem, dude, ‘cause I went through school on the GI Bill. Thank you, government, and may you continue helping others as well! I mean, what else are you here for anyway, just protecting the rich?
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:39 pm
Seen on bumper sticker…
“Try Occupying a Job”
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:40 pm
Bro, Are you saying that we should keep supplying ” the crack “
No, I’m saying this country needs an intervention of epic proportions before our crackheads ruin us all.
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:41 pm
“I’m a Dem, dude, ‘cause I went through school on the GI Bill.”
And it’s the Dems who want to de-fund the military.
Libs are always good for a laugh at least….
Peter
December 11th, 2012
3:42 pm
Well the America 8th grader is still doing poorly compared to the rest of the World….. Imagine how poorly the Georgia 8th grader is doing with that republican led school system in place ?
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:44 pm
Anybody remember back in 2004-2008 when Bookman used to write a weekly column bashing George W. Bush for running deficits, for “bankrupting our future” and “creating this huge liability our children and grandchildren will have to repay”?
Now Obama runs deficits double or triple the size, and Bookman says it’s on the Republicans to offer up spending cuts.
I think maybe the words “hypocrite” and “irony” just don’t exist in liberal la-la land……………
RB from Gwinnett
December 11th, 2012
3:47 pm
““He also fails to mention that when looking at per capita income, right-to-work states make up only 1 in the top 10 and 4 in the top 20″
Guess nobody want’s to look at the taxes being paid in those pro-union states and the people leaving in droves to the RTW states either. Oh well, I guess we’ll just go with half the story as usual…
josef
December 11th, 2012
3:47 pm
SCOOTER
Psst…
Magister Latinae galeam pygae est!
Ben Shockley
December 11th, 2012
3:47 pm
“Imagine how poorly the Georgia 8th grader is doing with that republican led school system in place ?”
Ummm…….dude……..I think you’ll find that the “education establishment” in Ga is about 95% Dem.
Thanks for playing though.
Real Scootter
December 11th, 2012
3:47 pm
Coito, ergo sum
OK,wiseguy,I’ll look that up too!
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:49 pm
They BOTH
I was thinking only of the end results. You have a point there.
————————–
Doom @ 3:34
Seems as you only speak the half truth again, but that’s par for the course for you. Here’s a chart that shows outlays each year since 1940. Care to point out where Republicans cut spending from the previous year if the Dems are the party of spending?
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=200
Seems as you took one too many a toke from the rhetoric joint. Both parties spend with abandon. Seems as one party wants to lay blame to the other one in order to avoid owning up to their complicit guilt. Both parties spend, but only one purposefully cuts revenue too.
Real Scootter
December 11th, 2012
3:49 pm
josef
December 11th, 2012
3:47 pm
LALALALALA with fingers in ears!!!!
Soothsayer
December 11th, 2012
3:50 pm
Ben Shuckley: how can anyone live inside a brain so full of hate?
You remind me of a long series of posters on this blog without anything of substance to say. Just little snippy quips about something that someone else posted.
That you have an inflated opinion of yourself is unmistakable and is on display for everyone to see.
How about posting one thing of substance today? Something you thunk up all by yoreself without no one’s help. Try it! I know you’ve got it in you.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:51 pm
“My bad, Doom, then it’s just that you don’t like helping others, kind of ironic for someone who knows how tough it can be. Is that resentment?”
Tom, in all seriousness I do a lot to help others- particularly clients of mine that are on medicaid or who need some help with say a ride to an appointment. I don’t mind helping people and I’m fully and absolutely in favor of a social safety net to help those who are down on their luck. What I don’t like is making a lifestyle out of it and promoting a system that incentivizes laziness on the part of able bodied people.
“I’m a Dem, dude, ‘cause I went through school on the GI Bill.”
Yeah. I did too. The GI bill helped and to me the GI bill is one of the few govt successes that I can think of. The thing is though that you had to work for it via military service. It wasn’t just given to you.It was earned. And I think that’s lost on a lot of people today who feel like they are just owed a lot of free shyte. And its bankrupting us. Can’t you see that?
getalife
December 11th, 2012
3:52 pm
Where is the tea party on your speaker’s proposal?
Our President proposed to cut twice as much as the gop.
Fiscal cons are liars.
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
3:52 pm
JHM
Such an explicit denial creates an unconstitutional separate-but-equal class distinction in the workplace and a second prima facie case for the appellants.
interesting
Alex
December 11th, 2012
3:53 pm
More latin: Julius Caesar im gallia est…..Puella, puellae, peularrum…
Williebkind
December 11th, 2012
3:56 pm
Ben and Doom:
You cannot argue with a stop sign and the liberals cannot debate the facts but you are doing quite well.
Real Scootter
December 11th, 2012
3:58 pm
Ok y’all,I don’t mind looking up a few Latin words but I ain’t gona buy a Rosettastone!
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:01 pm
K’Chak
Filii Veteranorum Confoederationis????
Regnad Kcin
December 11th, 2012
4:01 pm
RScooter:
“Ipse dixit and quid pro quo. So little time, so much to know!” – The Nowhere Man (Jeremy Hillary Boob Ph.D)
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
4:01 pm
Soothsayer @ 3:50
You realize that you’re asking for the equivalent of David Copperfield levitating the Eastern Seaboard, right?
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:02 pm
Doom
While we certainly need to get spending down, you do know that over the last 30 yrs, Republican Presidents have presided over more debt than Democrat Presidents, right?
I blame both parties for stupidity, however when you say the Dems have a spending problem (true), you either purposely or ignorantly forget the facts in terms of the numbers and how the Republicans love the checkbook as well. Of course they have been in the WH more years, but the numbers speak to as much or more rhetoric about small government as it does any reality.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:03 pm
Brocephus,
Your chart doesn’t show which party was in control of Congress during those years. Also when we had a balanced budget as Clinton left office it was because the Republicans under Gingrich brought Clinton to the table screaming and kicking to balance the budget. You remember the 94 R revolution concerning govt spending and getting govt under control don’t you.
Now you can rightly blame the Rs for profligate spending in the early 2000s. They earned that blame. But when the Ds took over Congress it set a new standard for profligate spending. The Rs have been fighting to reduce spending lately in case you haven’t noticed. When we had this same debate early in the year when we were going to hit 16 trillion I think it was Obama who had no serious intentions of curbing spending and had no problem raising the debt ceiling.
Perhaps we do need some revenue increases and small tax increases. But the math is quite clear. The problem isn’t taxes. The problem is a federal govt that now consumes 25% of our GDP and a society in which half of us are net takers and not contributors to the tax base. It was never intended to be this way by the founding fathers. The primary problem is spending and a federal govt that is involved in way too many facets of everyday life.
pogo
December 11th, 2012
4:07 pm
OWS? Ewwwww that smell! Can’t you smell that smell???
GT
December 11th, 2012
4:07 pm
Good call curious, there were a lot of private corporate planes flying into Washington back in 2007 and early ‘08 very willingly to jump as high as told to get this bailout.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:08 pm
“you do know that over the last 30 yrs, Republican Presidents have presided over more debt than Democrat Presidents, right?”
they both suck,
And do you know who controlled Congress and the purse strings during much of that time?
Both parties deserve a lot of blame. W was bad enough with the spending but what I’m saying is in terms of spending Obama has now reached unprecedented proportions compared to W. Its not really debateable either and I just see absolutely no serious effort from the man to even try to get the deficit under control. None.
Soothsayer
December 11th, 2012
4:08 pm
Here, I’ll even help you. Please publish a brief discourse on how the country benefited from George W. Bush’s presidency and how foolish the country was to elect a relative unknown like Barack Obama. Don’t forget to include how much better the country would be today if John McCain had carried on Bush’s “3rd term.” How much better the country would be if the auto makers had been allowed to go bankrupt. How much better off we would be if we didn’t have the “stimulus” at the worst depths of the near depression caused by George W. Bush. That should be a good start for you.
Alex
December 11th, 2012
4:08 pm
@Tom and Thulsa: G.I Bill;
Harry Colmey,author of first draft (R)
McFarland(D) and Atherton (R) :”Fathers ” of the Bill
Rogers (R) “Mother” of the bill
Roosevelt(D) sign the bill as prez
Truly a BIPARTISAN bill……..
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:11 pm
Williebkind,
Some of them don’t know the difference between opinion and a fact. And some of them still wouldn’t know a fact if it were a great white shark that swam up and bit em in the ass.
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:13 pm
SCOOTTER
When Greenwood LeFlore was speak of the Mississippi House, two of the legislators got into it, one smart ass orating in Greek, the other in Latin. LeFlore took the podium and addressed their diatribes in Choctaw, point by point. When Sam Houston would get frustrated by the verbal gobble-de-gook and pompous orations in the Texas Republic’s legislature, he would address them in Cherokee.
cloudodust
December 11th, 2012
4:14 pm
The United States is getting, ‘Knocked to it’s knees.’ by social spending programs. We need the successful, er, rich folks to pony up, be patriotic and pay their fair share. Anyone not on goverment handouts will probably be considered successful by the year 2017 so I reckon those of us still working will be paying the new Patriotic Tax by then…
oops
December 11th, 2012
4:15 pm
is Jay still passed out on his fainting couch?
skipper
December 11th, 2012
4:16 pm
There certainly should not be a REQUIREMENT that somebody should have to join a union to go to work…..if they want to, fine, if not, ditto. If we are a “free” country (and yes, organized labor started off as a decent thing) workers should be able to decide. I have listned to tons of views on thie blog. Me and Bro disagree alot but I know Bro is a good person who believes his views and likes to back them up. So here is mine: unions have to a very large extenet morphed into a bigger monster than they were supposed to be. Now, to cut to the quick, folks want tons of $ to turn 1 wrench, more days off than there are in a year, more sick days, etc. It is tough to fire a no-good worker. Sometimes, folks just want a job. Being forced into a union to work at a place just ain’t right…….
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:16 pm
Doom
Waiting for the exact response, because you use it all the time.
It has been a mixed bag, so the right wing talking points (that you like to use) about Democratic Congresses are not exactly factual. You were just wrong….. TODAY, about Reagan’s terms.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidents_and_control_of_congress
Mama Says
December 11th, 2012
4:17 pm
Jay,
This is a battle between two wrongs and you should be able to see that.
The fact that any president would basically threaten to default on our debt and thereby ruin our country, especially financially, in order to get something he wants is a pretty bad thing. I do agree that the fact republicans would use this problem for anything but a well balanced approach to debt reduction is also be a problem, But the problems are the same. One party thinks they have all the answers to an issue that both parties have created over 50 years.
However the bigger problem is that you as a “news guy” or media guy would take sides. You should be giving us ALL the facts not just the ones that are in the democrats favor.
Why not explain to us why Obama extended these “George Bush” tax cuts if they were so bad that now he would ruin the country to reinstate them.
Tell us why I and millions of middle class tax payers got a lower tax rate under Bush and then again under Obama yet the “fair” thing to do is increase taxes on someone else.
Tell us why the simple logic of spending what you have rather than taxing more is a bad thing.
Tell us why went taxes are lower government revenue increases as it did under many presidents during hard economic times. (Including Obamas in his first term).
Give us the contributions made to democrats and republicans on e dry issue rather then the contributions of rich folks who support republicans.
Tell us why Obama was so interested to have us covered under his medical bill yet he exempted many unions and special interest who supported him with political contributions.
And yes continue to slam republicans, but do so with facts that are not slanted.
Until the media starts reporting from the middle instead of from the left or right the entire country will be ripe for lies and manipulation.
We in the citizenry do not have the power collectively that one media outlet does. All this crap would change if our media weren’t simply partisan mouth pieces spouting the party lines.
Until the media cleans its own act up you and all the others will simply continue to look like a child complaining to his mother that the other hit him.
The transportation bill failed in Atlanta for one very important reason, we don’t trust the government to do what it says. As a conservative I can easily tell you that the distrust falls against both sides, as a citizen I can tell you that if the media were controlling the transportation issue it would have failed for the same reason, a lack of trust in the media.
skipper
December 11th, 2012
4:17 pm
(sorry about all the typos….got eyes checked today…still dilated.lol!)
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
4:19 pm
Your chart doesn’t show which party was in control of Congress during those years.
That’s easy to google.
http://www.dflorig.com/partycontrol.htm
That shows through 2009. Both parties are at fault. You try to divert to claim a “balanced budget”, yet you still don’t acknowledge that spending increased each year. It’s hard to debate with someone who refuses to acknowlege when they’re wrong. You should really check your pride as admitting when you’re wrong doesn’t make you less of a man. It actually makes your more of a man as a real man will admit when they’re wrong.
Both parties have spent us into this mess, and it will take the opposite of what got us into this mess to get us out. It will take spending cuts, tax increases, AND increases in the number of long-term employement opportunities here in America. More people working means more tax receipts and less borrowing. More people working with decent income means less who have to depend on welfare and such. We don’t have a spending or revenue problem nearly as much as we have an employment problem.
skipper
December 11th, 2012
4:21 pm
@Mamma Says.
You just made my case…..I have been begging for a new “Common-Sense” party…..dems are too left and repubs are too right. Nobody has walking around sense. the only third parties out there are the loonies……….what about a legitimate party withe frickin’ common horse sense???????
Tom Middleton
December 11th, 2012
4:21 pm
Doom@3:51pm
Well if you help others as part of your paying job, Doom, and you also had the GI Bill and didn’t just work your way through like you said, then why are you so politically resentful of government helping those with no where else to turn?
There’s an enormous dichotomy in the Republican Party these days, just as there is in you, Doom. For instance, Republicans, want everyone, except rich kids, to get jobs and pay for everything, but they are the absolute pits are creating them for people to go out get.
Maybe you just need to do a little work on yourself, catch up, and become part of the big picture with the Dems, unless, of course, I was right and you really don’t like minorities, in spite of everything you say.
I mean, whatever happened to your telling everyone you were going to change? Quite frankly, my friend, I just don’t see it and haven’t ever since you said it!
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:22 pm
MAMA
“However the bigger problem is that you as a “news guy” or media guy would take sides. You should be giving us ALL the facts not just the ones that are in the democrats favor.”
One mo’ time, Maybelle, Jay is an opinion writer and a statedly partisan one…he’s just doing his job for which he is (handsomely) paid…
oops
December 11th, 2012
4:24 pm
Jay laughs haughtily at the fiscal cliff
but hits the fainting couch for the debt ceiling
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
4:26 pm
skipper: Me and Bro disagree alot but I know Bro is a good person who believes his views and likes to back them up. So here is mine: unions have to a very large extenet morphed into a bigger monster than they were supposed to be.
I’ll agree to an extent with you on the union morphing thing. Some have gone way overboard with their demands. You’ll never hear me deny that. However, more has been done to demonize ALL unions because of the actions of some. It’s the same way with demonizing all CEOs for the actions of some.
One thing I’d suggest is that people actually educate themselves on the truth while forming their opinions. People are under the guise that workers are forced into joining unions, and that just ain’t true, regardless to what the talking heads, pundits, and politicians tell you. The most that can be done to someone working in a union job that doesn’t join the union is that they pay fees to cover the bargaining that the union does.
Think of it this way, you negotiate a deal with the Falcons to sell t-shirts outside the stadium all by yourself. Once the negotiations are done, there are 5 more vendors who want to come in and reap the benefits of your deal. Is it right that they benefit without putting in the work to negotiate that deal?
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:26 pm
They both suck,
Exactly what am I wrong about- particularly in regards to Reagan? He never controlled the house and controlled did not control the senate all of the time either.
RB from Gwinnett
December 11th, 2012
4:28 pm
Doom, Willie, and Ben, one thing the R’s need to figure out is how to park 3/4th of our brain and run a campaign based on emotions instead of issues and facts. It should be pretty clear facts don’t matter so we’ve got to figure out how to appeal to voters feminine side or we’re going to contiue to struggle.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
4:28 pm
B. Shockley — “I’m a Dem, dude, ‘cause I went through school on the GI Bill.”
“And it’s the Dems who want to de-fund the military. Libs are always good for a laugh at least….”
The Department of Defense doesn’t fund the GI Bill or College Fund. That comes from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs. Which, by the way, the *Republicans* want to defund.
Cons are always good for a laugh.
nobodyyouknow
December 11th, 2012
4:30 pm
J. Hussane Moma? I know Jay is an opinion Columnist. I’m an opinion writer, just not in the newspaper. AND THATS MY DAMN OPINION!
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
4:30 pm
RB — “one thing the R’s need to figure out is how to park 3/4th of our brain and run a campaign based on emotions instead of issues and facts. It should be pretty clear facts don’t matter so we’ve got to figure out how to appeal to voters feminine side or we’re going to contiue to struggle.”
You already did. Remember 2004?
John sKerry?
Mama Says
December 11th, 2012
4:31 pm
josef,
Yes you are correct. Doing what is paid to do, disinformation.
Yet he carries the banner of the AJC, a major media outlet.
Isn’t that like paying a prostitute to tell you the bad side of the sex industry ?
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:31 pm
Thulsa
Did you or did you not say that you beleived Reagan operated under a Democratic controlled Congress? Yes you did and except for two years you were wrong. His 1st 6 yrs, he had a Republican Senate. That is history and not new.
If you are giving Reagan a pass for Repubs not having control of the House then you surely are doing the same for Obama at this time, right?
Again, both parties are at fault, however you come across as making excuses for Republicans. At least that is how I read it, but I could be wrong.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
4:32 pm
nobodyyouknow — “J. Hussane Moma? I know Jay is an opinion Columnist.”
Good. Then you already know you don’t need to rant any longer about how Jay’s not being ‘balanced’ or ‘even-handed’ in his opinion columns.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:34 pm
“.. then why are you so politically resentful of government helping those with no where else to turn?”
ially
Tom,
As I said I’m not opposed to the govt helping people out, especially those that are temporarily in need and down on their luck. I am opposed to govt created dependency and govt involvement in things govt should have no business being involved in. And if it makes you feel better that includes corporate subsidies such as farm subsidies, tax breaks for the rich that they don’t need, etc.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:34 pm
Mama Says
Doesn’t Wingfield carry that same “banner”?
Isn’t Wingfield a right leaning Op Ed writer while Bookman is a left leaning Op Ed writer?
Doesn’t the AJC run both of these writers on a regular if not daily basis as well as nationally syndicated right and left leaning Op Ed writers?
Please correct me if anything I have stated is incorrect. Thanks
Erwin's cat
December 11th, 2012
4:34 pm
http://www.nrtw.org/a/a_1_p.htm
Bro – I was one of the less informed on this RTW stuff. I had always believed there were instances in union shops, that if you wanted to work there you had to join the union.
I still would rather be in a RTW state, but in all transparency…I’m middle management so i’m not directly affected or at least somewhat shielded
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:35 pm
MAMA
Oh, I wouldn’t go so far as to call it disinformation, but on this one, you’ve got a point…
“Isn’t that like paying a prostitute to tell you the bad side of the sex industry ?”
pogo
December 11th, 2012
4:35 pm
By stating “our president” josef are you confirming (just as getasniff implies daily) that Obama is in fact not the president of the rest of us (about 49%) who totally disagree with him? Kind of looks that way man. But that is OK. He is not our president as his beliefs are fundamentally different from our own. He is what he is and the impact to our country of his belief system will be very apparent soon.
Another interesting dynamic of this blog. The many liberals here are constantly telling the “cons” to get over it and get out of the way because the country spoke in the last election. Judging from this, it seems they are advocating a one party system with total control of the government.. Sound familiar? China, North Korea, Venezuela and umpteen numbers of African countries come to mind. Yea, yea, “socialist smocialist” but the reality is this country is now changing into a population of people who depend solely upon the governement for everything and that simply is not possible and have the country survive.
Mama Says
December 11th, 2012
4:37 pm
Just a little myth busting for you that wish to say the unions are not forcing you to do anything.
My son is trying to get on with one of the major railroad companies, part of the hiring steps is signing a paper that acknowledges that you will contribute 90 bucks a month to union dues.
Sounds like a condition of employment to me
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
4:38 pm
Another major conservative donor, Sheldon Adelson, seemed less fazed by the GOP’s struggles. After spending nearly $150 million on Republicans in the 2012 election, he vowed to “double” his donations in the next round of election showdowns.
Ole Sheldon is willing to pay twice as much for his ho ho’s next election.
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:38 pm
BOTH
Yeah, and them other columnists’ blogs ain’t near as much fun as Big Daddy’s verandah…
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:42 pm
“You try to divert to claim a “balanced budget”, yet you still don’t acknowledge that spending increased each year”
Bro,
Are you trying to argue a claim that I never made about spending?
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
4:43 pm
EC
I have no problem with either way. My problem is the deliberate subterfuge used to disguise the intent. Nobody’s forced to join unions anymore, even in states without RTW laws.
Personally, I pay union dues for two reasons:
#1 I don’t believe in gaining benefit from someone else without me paying at least a token in return for the benefits I get.
#2 I’ve seen enough personnel issues on my job that it doesn’t hurt to have the ablilty to call upon well versed representation if I ever need it.
Granted, the union that represents us is equivalent to using a Shih Tzu as a guard dog. They can’t bargain for benefits or pay, and we can’t strike or slow down. However, their bargaining ensures that I have a shot at getting vacation time to spend with my family when we want to take a vacation as opposed to being stuck with having to take time when my wife can’t get off work and my child is in school.
Mama Says
December 11th, 2012
4:44 pm
They both Suck,
If you trying to point out that a major media outlet is paying people to express their bias opinions yes you are right.
If you wish to read my post again I said that the media needs to REPORT from a middle position.
In effect you just argued the problem and by the way what anyone from FOX would say. The fact that you have two sides opining does nothing to solve the issue.
If the media wishes to be known as a source of hard factual news it should not be in the opinion business, either way
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
4:44 pm
“Conservatism is a racket for a lot of people to get very, very rich,” declares Joe Scarborough on MSNBC. “With no thought of winning elections.”
“It may be that major parts of American conservatism have become such a racket that a kind of refounding of the movement as a cause is necessary,” says William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard.
We already know what Republicans do for a “living” and now we know that Sheldon is willing to pay twice as much for them to put out. The Koch boys are gonna have to up the ante as well if they want a piece of that action.
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:44 pm
pogo
Not sure what exactly you are referring to when you say me saying “our President.” But. he is that, whether we like it or not. Am I some huge fan of his? Not at all. But he is still the President of the United States of America, the geo-political unit of which I am a almost full and equal citizen, so, yes…he is MY president…
Mama Says
December 11th, 2012
4:47 pm
josef,
As a conservative I could not bring myself to type that.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:48 pm
“Did you or did you not say that you beleived Reagan operated under a Democratic controlled Congress?”
Yes but that I wasn’t sure. I knew he never had control of the House and I knew for at least part of his 2 terms he did not have either house of Congress. He did not have control of Congress at any point in time TBS since he never had the house. He only had the senate for 3/4 of his time there.
“If you are giving Reagan a pass for Repubs not having control of the House then you surely are doing the same for Obama at this time, right?”
Am I hallucinating sir or did Obama not have control of both houses of Congress for his first 2 years and control of the Senate all 4 years? Having total control of both chambers including a near filibuster proof senate for 2 years is a lot more than Reagan ever had.
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
4:52 pm
Mama Says
Read the link that Erwin’s Cat posted. Within that link, you’ll find the Supreme Court cases that affirms that your son does not have to join the union. If he’s not in a right-to-work state, he may have to pay fees to cover the cost of the bargaining, but his “dues” does not make him a union member if he does not expressly sign up to join the union. Tell him to look at the total cost of union dues vs what they’re saying he will contribute. The two are probably not the same amount.
————————-
Are you trying to argue a claim that I never made about spending?
No, I was responding to your deflection after you made the snarky comment about the current Dems being the party of spending. Here’s the exchange if it will refresh your memory…
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
3:34 pm
The current DEM party, however, is like a crack fiend, with their crack being spending.
————————
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
3:49 pm
Here’s a chart that shows outlays each year since 1940. Care to point out where Republicans cut spending from the previous year if the Dems are the party of spending?
————————-
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:03 pm
Brocephus,
Your chart doesn’t show which party was in control of Congress during those years. Also when we had a balanced budget as Clinton left office it was because the Republicans under Gingrich brought Clinton to the table screaming and kicking to balance the budget.
To your credit, which I’ll give you partial credit for, you do mention Republican spending in the 2000s. To your discredit, and hence my deflection post, you never own up to the spending from the 80s or 90s. I gave you a link that showed spending, and regardless to whether the budget was balanced or not, spending has increased every year. That means that both parties have increased spending year over year.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:52 pm
Mama Says
Op Eds are not new. I have read where both Kyle and Jay have mentioned to bloggers that they are opinion writers. Neither one is hiding that. Why should they? That is why they were hired.
The AJC also has news articles that are not Op Eds. Pretty much every paper has a similar format.
If you like, why don’t you pick an AJC non editorial article and slice and dice it for its “liberal bias” or whatever bias you think it has. Present the article, tell us the bias and what it should say to be more “fair and balanced”.
Not sure why you have an issue with Bookman but didn’t say a word about the right leaning writers employed directly or indirectly by Cox Enterprises.
Dollameisha
December 11th, 2012
4:52 pm
Beg to differ on your biggest scandal in 50 years, Jay. Nothing comes close to Ford pardoning Nixon for his involvement in Watergate.
That one foolish act forever instilled the concept that if you’re powerful and well connected enough you can get away with anything.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
4:52 pm
“Granted, the union that represents us is equivalent to using a Shih Tzu as a guard dog”
I resent that. My new pup is a Shih Tzu mix and he’s as feisty as they get. And as a guard dog he can bark real, real loud when he hears something late at night.
josef
December 11th, 2012
4:54 pm
MAMA
Which, if I may be so bold as to say so, is perhaps the biggest single problem facing the country today. It is reminscent of the 1850s, and we know what that led to. I don’t like the current governor of Georgia very much myself, but his is “our/my” state Chief Executive…
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:57 pm
Thulsa
Thanks again for the excuses. I showed the chart of a mixed bag of control in terms of Congress and said that your theory of Repub President and smalll government holds as much water as a paper bag.
The facts are what they are. Republicans have not been any better on spending, although they talk a great game. You can spin until your heart is content. Say “BOOM” a million times, but it will not change that it is a two way street with your “small government” Republicans being just as culpable as the Democrats in terms of government growth, spending……….. you name it.
They BOTH suck
December 11th, 2012
4:58 pm
Check back later
peace
Thusla: I hope that tube top with the AJC logo that Jay is sending you is a good fit
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
5:02 pm
“To your discredit, and hence my deflection post, you never own up to the spending from the 80s or 90s.”
Then perhaps I had you and TBS confused since I was posting to tbs on the same spending issues. In the 80s Reagan spent a significant amount on the military buildup which brought the USSR to dissolution so I did indeed acknowledge his spending. And as I mentioned either to you or to tbs Reagan had stated after leaving office that his big regret in agreeing with the Dems to go with tax increases was that he believed the Dems when they said they would go along with reduced spending. He said he fell for it twice. The tax increases took place. The reduced spending by the Dem controlled house did not. So while both parties are still responsible that one goes mostly on the Dems.
I didn’t bring up the 90s because Newt and the Rs brought Clinton to the table to force a balanced budget but the Rs didn’t take over the house till 94. What more is there to talk about? You guys love to tout the Clinton budgets but forget that the R Congress had a big hand in balancing the budget at the end of Clinton’s term.
nobodyyouknow
December 11th, 2012
5:02 pm
Joe Huss. Moma. I’ll rant as much as I can rant when I get p—st off about this great country and the mess the politicians have gotten it in. I’m wondering if you are really Jay in disguise anyway. You have feces for brains. You might blow your nose a little harder and get it out.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
5:03 pm
When Boehner refused to take a July 2011 phone call from Obama to discuss the debt-ceiling crisis, pundits everywhere were stunned. When the House speaker then waited an audacious 24 hours to return the call, the nation as a whole was dumbfounded. What could possibly be more important than returning a phone call from the leader of the free world? Guess we’ll never know.
Boehner who.
Tom Middleton
December 11th, 2012
5:05 pm
Doom@4:34pm: I am opposed to govt created dependency and govt involvement in things govt should have no business being involved in.
Do you have some specifics, Doom? Who are you willing to put (or leave) out in society with no one to willing to help them at all? And please, please tell us how you think we should address the problem, since it is (or should be) a national concern. For instance, do you think religion could play an important part, if, in fact, it’s a functional one? Just asking…
Brosephus™
December 11th, 2012
5:05 pm
You guys love to tout the Clinton budgets but forget that the R Congress had a big hand in balancing the budget at the end of Clinton’s term.
I don’t know who “you guys” are, but anytime I mention Clinton, I also give credit to Congress for whatever happened then. In case you haven’t recognized, I don’t cheerlead for either side as I think they’re both morally corrupt.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
5:06 pm
they both suck,
We’ll agree to disagree but from what I see its the Rs who are constantly talking about eliminating whole departments in the federal govt and its the dems who are trying to constantly grow govt. I don’t think there’s any disputing that.
TaxPayer
December 11th, 2012
5:06 pm
Poor Republicans are going to be even poorer once those tax hikes kick in. Then again, if the Republicans had really wanted permanent tax cuts, they should have made them permanent back in 2001 and 2003 while they had the votes to do so. Now they just have to accept the fact that they failed and have to pay the price for their failure–back taxes with interest.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
5:09 pm
nobodyyouknow — “Joe Huss. Moma. I’ll rant as much as I can rant when I get p—st off about this great country and the mess the politicians have gotten it in.”
Yawn.
You complained that Jay wasn’t being impartial and claimed that it was his *job* to be impartial. Unfortunately for you, you’re just plain WRONG. It’s *not* his job to be impartial, no matter how much you might like for it to be. Anything other than that you want to say to me is irrelevant and beside the point.
If you don’t like it, then shove off for Kyle’s blog. Perhaps the conservative soporifics over there will prove more pleasing to you.
“I’m wondering if you are really Jay in disguise anyway.”
Jay will be glad to tell you I’m not.
“You have feces for brains.”
I hope you enjoyed your time on this blog, because comments like that generally get folks thrown off.
“You might blow your nose a little harder and get it out.”
And you could stand to smarten up a bit. I’ll be glad to help you out, but you’re going to have to man up and put some effort into it yourself, pal.
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
December 11th, 2012
5:15 pm
SHEETZ — with charts.
Thulsa Doom
December 11th, 2012
5:15 pm
Bro,
“you guys” is liberals in general.
Tom,
Okay. Some quick examples. No 99 weeks of unemployment benefits. That’s ridiculous. 6-12 months max and that’s it. If you can’t find a job or start your own small business or you were too stupid to set aside some savings for a rainy day fund then that’s just tough shyte. Women getting help to care for their kids because the dad doesn’t give a shyte? Have the govt garnish up to 15% of the father’s paychecks to help pay for the food stamps and other benefits to raise their kids. Starting making fathers of kids pay for their shyte. Medicaid and other benefits? Fine. Allow them for a certain period of time and no more. Gotta start weening people off of govt dependency. Plain and simple.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 11th, 2012
5:19 pm
Doom — “Medicaid and other benefits? Fine. Allow them for a certain period of time and no more. Gotta start weening people off of govt dependency. Plain and simple.”
You must not realize that Medicaid and a lot of welfare benefits are administered by the *states* and that most states impose time limits on how long recipients can benefit from those programs.
‘Cause if you did, that might mess up your rant.
I’m out. Have a pleasant evening.
Tom Middleton
December 11th, 2012
6:14 pm
Doom@5:15pm
I pray you never get into trouble yourself, Doom, and have to be on the receiving end of your attitudes about government. For unless you’re as perfect as you think all of those you mentioned should be, you could easily be spiraling downward out of control, with no one to stop you or help you climb back up!
This is why I’m a Democrat, Doom: We acknowledge a world of imperfect people, and we know how easy it is for someone to slip and fall, often to never get back up and continue contributing to our world.
Republicans, on the other hand, think only others should be perfect when it comes to your bank accounts and taxes, and that smacks of selfishism on a level that only a real religion could help cure.
In other words, Doom, without the Dems, your people would lose this country in no time at all, and then where would you be without a whole majority of people to blame your evil on.
Start with personal responsibility, my friend, and then learn how to look through the eyes of those you so easily condemn. I’ll bet your commission on the next person you help that you’ll not only change your mind about them once and for all, but that you will realize, more than most, how imperfect you are as well!
Doom, when I see you change, then I will know you believe that others can change as well, and that all your condemning of those you don’t like is more than just hatred of those not just like you!
nobodyyouknow
December 11th, 2012
7:20 pm
J. Hussan MOMMY, I know, I know, I’m just a big mouth conservative, WRONG, I’m independant as you should be and support the candidate best qualified to lead this country. And PAL if I get thrown off this site, nothings lost, its expected when one gets frustrated and loses it trying to talk common SENSE into a BIASED brain.(example) Its common sense that when one spends more than they take in somethings got to give, But you O’bama adorers will never get it. Go to sleep and dream of your “CHOSEN ONE”.
Adam
December 12th, 2012
8:07 am
They BOTH suck: Thank you for all that. It is nice to know there’s someone Thulsa actually listens to. I have told Thulsa I don’t even know how many times the exact same information. But, because it’s me, he seems to think he has to fight to the bitter end and be against everything I say, calling me wrong when he is wrong.
I particularly thank you for this: the right wing talking points (that you like to use) about Democratic Congresses are not exactly factual. You were just wrong….. TODAY, about Reagan’s terms.
I have also pointed out on numerous occasions how tax cuts do not increase revenue. T he measure of a tax cut increasing revenue is whether or not there would have been more or less revenue without the change. In no case were taxes cut across the board and revenue increased more as a result. NO case. Ever. Reagan’s Tax Reform of 1986 is a perfect example of raising rates on the poor (11% to 15%) while lowering them on the rich, and works well in combination with payroll tax increases (only applicable to those making less than $110k) in generating revenue.
But if Thulsa has ever tried to make the case that taxing the poor more is the way out of our fiscal issues on the revenue side, I have not seen it.
JKL2
December 12th, 2012
8:36 am
Thulsa- It wasn’t just given to you.It was earned. And I think that’s lost on a lot of people today who feel like they are just owed a lot of free shyte. And its bankrupting us. Can’t you see that?
I’ll guess at least 47% can’t…
JKL2
December 12th, 2012
8:42 am
tom middleton- why are you so politically resentful of government helping those with no where else to turn?
They have plenty of oportunities, they are just too lazy to do the work. It isn’t the governments responsibility to make you successful. Life doesn’t owe everyone a juice box and a trophy.
Joe Hussein Mama
December 12th, 2012
9:11 am
nobodyyouknow — “J. Hussan MOMMY, I know, I know, I’m just a big mouth conservative,”
I neither said nor thought any such thing.
“WRONG,”
You’re correcting yourself. I didn’t make any claim about you *or* conservatives.
“I’m independant as you should be”
You know nothing about me, so your advice is irrelevant.
“and support the candidate best qualified to lead this country.”
What’s that got to do with you not understanding that Jay’s an opinion columnist and not under any obligation to perform his job according to your expectations?
“And PAL if I get thrown off this site, nothings lost”
Good. Then why don’t you save us all some trouble and take a hike.
“its expected when one gets frustrated and loses it trying to talk common SENSE into a BIASED brain.(example)”
You are just TOO cute.
You spouted some ignorant blather about Jay being biased and not doing his job properly. I pointed out that it IS his job to be biased, as he’s an opinion columnist. You then started changing the subject; complaining about bias, putting words in my mount and making personal insults towards me — insults that I have NOT directed back towards you.
Now, if you’re too dishonest to stay on topic, fine. If you’re not man enough to admit that you were wrong about Jay’s job, fine. But you need to put on your traveling manners and act like you’re in someone else’s house — and that includes not insulting the other guests.
“Its common sense that when one spends more than they take in somethings got to give”
This has nothing whatsoever to do with what you and I were discussing, and you know it.
“But you O’bama adorers will never get it.”
I adore no one and nothing. And once again, this has nothing whatsoever to do with what you and I were talking about.
“Go to sleep and dream of your “CHOSEN ONE”.
Ah, and here we have it. A bitter old man whose candidate was sorely beaten in the last election, looking for someone to argue with.
Look, old-timer, you’re going to need to show a lot more character and honesty and politeness before I show any interest in your advice or directions. From what I can see, you’re a forgetful old prat with a nasty temper and a nastier mouth.
I don’t care how old you are, pal, but you need to grow up and act right.
Bill Orvis White
December 12th, 2012
9:26 am
If Speaker Boehner cannot stick this His core principles by fighting for a balanced budget, severe cuts to needless entitlement programs, capital gains tax cuts, extending the rightful Bush-era tax cuts, eradicating ObamaCare and eliminating burdensome regulations, then WE THE PEOPLE NEED TO REPLACE SPEAKER BOEHNER WHO WOULD HAVE CAVED ON THESE IMPORTANT MUCH-NEEDED BOLD MOVES! I GO FURTHER TO ADDRESS THOSE WITH COMMON SENSE AND TEA PARTY REPUBLICAN MEMBERS THAT ANYONE WHO DOES NOT SUPPORT MAKING THOSE BOLD MOVES NEEDS TO BE REMOVED FROM OFFICE THROUGH IMPEACHMENT AND QUICKLY REPLACED WITH REAL LEADERS WHO WILL SAVE THIS ONCE-FREE NATION!
With those warnings safely in place, I am disgusted that this so-called president is taking us over this cliff thus killing our economy. I’m also disgusted that union thugs are calling for strikes to further weaken our economy! WHAT IS GOING ON HERE PEOPLE? IS ANYONE OUT THERE?
GOOD NIGHT!
Amen,
Bill
captguitarman
December 13th, 2012
3:40 am
” Of course, the Democrats have talked themselves into believing that this is justified.” Boehner. propose specific cuts on specific programs and deep six the extra stimulus. Try to generate at least $2 to $4 in cuts vs. every new $1 from the “rich.” Don’t cave on the statutory control of the debt ceiling whatever you do, or we’ll ahve 20+ trillion in debt by next year, not by 2016. And then stand pat. Or in the alternative, cave on everything and let Obama and the Dems own it all. That might be a quicker way back into power when the economy collapses.