Biden vs. McCain

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Wed, 08/27/2008 - 21:45.

It occurs to me, watching Vice Presidential candidate Joe Biden speak at the Democratic National Convention, he is a far superior speaker, intellect and candidate for President than is John McCain.  While McCain is years older than Biden, Biden makes McCain seem like a kid. I really want to see Biden step up in the campaign and put McCain in his place, in his face, personally. I'd like to see Biden vs. McCain in a gloves-off debate... let Biden put McCain away for good.

Then, I'd like to see Biden redefine the status and role of Vice President of America as it should be... be a world leader, peer and partner with the President, carrying similarly complex and important duties and responsibilities, and executing with public visibility and excellence. I believe Biden is capable of being such a VP - reinventing the Vice President and the Executive Branch, which is a great opportunity for change for America.

I feel much better about Obama's chances seeing Biden at the table.

BIDEN vs. MCcAIN??

Norm, Norm, Norm... I realize that your position there puts me at risk of being declared "persona non grata" on this site, BUT you really didn't think this one through.

Your proposal is a tacit -- and spot on -- admission that the BO is not up to the job for which he is applying.  Even a fully functional teleprompter couldn't help him in a free-for-all debate format. Based on his performance at Saddleback, McCain would probably mop the floor with him.

BIDEN is not running at the top of the ticket.  Obama is.  If he can't duke it out with the guy at the top of the other ticket (about whom I'm personally not all that excited), how do you think BO would handle that 3 am call from the State Department, CIA or Pentagon that all hell has broken loose and is heading this way?

I'd much prefer someone on OUR end of that call with more age, experience and who not only grasps the concept of hell but spent 5 years as a "guest" there.

PS: And I'd remind you that another talented public speaker was that Hitler fellow, providing catastrophic historical evidence that skill as a speaker is a rather shallow -- and dangerous -- measure of a man.  

 

"I grabbed a pile of dust, and holding it up, foolishly asked for as many birthdays as the grains of dust...I forgot to ask that they be years of youth."

Publius Ovidius Naso

BO?

C'mon, Dick. How do you pronounce that, the BO thing? How could anybody ever vote for somebody with the BO tag?

I kind of like the Obama-bin-Biden takeoff I first saw from Donald Luskin, too.

The names this time around are incredible--as is the dis-information, especially that swirling about financial policy. Larry Kudlow handled this BO's economic advisor rather roughly and rudely earlier today--it didn't seem fair or balanced.

I Have A Friend Who Keeps A Pit Bull

I have a friend who keeps a pit bull to protect himself and his family.

I guess you could say that he is not qualified to be the head of his household either, because his dog is better in a fight than he is.

Given that MOST of the trash

Given that MOST of the trash who conduct home invasions and burglaries do so in possession of a weapon, if your friend's pit bull (and I own a 100# American Bulldog for the same reason) doesn't carry a pistol with which to defend himself, the criminals will simply dispatch the dog before going about their nefarious business.

But that is, of course, a bit beside your interesting -- if somewhat bizarre -- metaphor.

The reason some would prefer Biden to debate McCain is that Biden's "master" (Obama) is totally unarmed and would probably be quickly "dispatched" by McCain.

Now that McCain has chosen his running mate, I'd MUCH prefer to see Biden debate Sarah Palin. I'm certain the classic Biden dismissive demeanor would cost their ticket the REST of the female vote now that Hillary's people have ANOTHER reason to vote for the Pubbies.

BTW, MY dog IS armed and I also keep a weapon handy for such just such an eventuality.

"I grabbed a pile of dust, and holding it up, foolishly asked for as many birthdays as the grains of dust...I forgot to ask that they be years of youth."

Publius Ovidius Naso

Not peers

McCain really isn't worthy to discuss matters much less debate with Obama - like 110 IQ vs. 160... McCain showed his intellectual capacity in Naval Academy... debate unnecessary. Biden is far superior in every way to McCain but since they are each old farts I'd like the better old fart to take McCain to the woodshed, because only an old fart can fuck up another old fart... AARP watches over that shit. As for that shrill you want as your President, after McCain kicks the bucket... she can debate my three year old.

Disrupt IT

Palin holds a degree in journalism from the University of Idaho

Please - this is a joke. IQ, maybe 100. And Repubics want this women to be our President!

Let's start diggng... here are some highlights from the very rapidly morphing and in-conflict wikipedia (seems many people from both campaigns are writing her bio right now):

"After she was announced as McCain's presumptive running mate, she stated that she does not believe that climate change is man-made"

In May 2008, Palin objected to the decision of Dirk Kempthorne, the Republican United States Secretary of the Interior, to list polar bears as an endangered species. She threatened a lawsuit
to stop the listing amid fears that it would hurt oil and gas
development in the bears' habitat off Alaska's northern and
northwestern coasts. She also called the global warming theory
supported by Kempthrone and most scientists "unreliable", and asserted
that human activity has not caused Arctic ice to melt. She said the
move to list the bears was premature and was not the appropriate
management tool for their welfare at the time.

Palin's government accepted the federal money would have been spent on the Gravina Island Bridge,
had Palin not canceled the bridge because the federal government wanted
Alaska to pay for part of it. This gained the state of Alaska over $200
million, which it could spend however it wants. In 2008, the state gave
each resident $1200.

 

 

Disrupt IT

What "trash" would bother you and me, besides McCain and Palin?

Around 5 today I was sitting on the front porch, swinging my 4 month old, and something happened - a car drove by - then some teenager said "They're working it" and ran around the corner... another said "They're working it on Brightwood"... and all the boys ran off to see... if I wasn;t babysitting, I would have checked it out. A minute later, the shots started... three or four shots... close range and large caliber. I listened for more... shouting, a get-away or sirens. Nothing. One of the kids came back and I asked what happened. "Shoot out". "Think anyone was hurt?" "Nah"... just the product of too many guns on Earth.

Shootings happens all the time... people die... we may get a stray bullet here... we may get murdered. But I really don't worry about that. I worry about climate change, which McCain's VP pick doesn't worry about.

I worry about the remote possibility Palin could become our President. That would be trash conducting a home invasion.

Disrupt IT

Norman, I was warned by a

Norman, I was warned by a another former Clevelander friend that realneo was a gaggle of socialist/collectivist ideologues surrounded by a larger population of moderate/conservative citizens. She was right.

Mr. Jefferson (not George; the OTHER, earlier one) had this figured out over 200 years ago, I share his thoughts in hopes that at least a FEW of those conservatives would weigh in here and give the debate more balance.

If I'm all alone in here, this will probably be my swan song. Having said that, I commend you for not banning me as the your bretheren over at Democrat Underground did after my second post. So much for "diversity." But then, Marxists never have tolerated much of that, have they? (For more on that topic, see "USSR," "Cuba" and a few others.

And as for the November election, come November 5th, those Obama/Biden yard signs and bumper stickers will some day be curiosities for those who will ask who they were.

***********************

An astute student of history and human nature, Thomas Jefferson, predicted what we see happening here in America. As ambassador in France, he witnessed the run up to the FIRST socialist/communist revolution there. He penned the following observations concerning what would happen HERE should that socialism come to the United States. He CORRECTLY predicted that we would become an increasingly contentious and litigious people as we shouldered one another out of the way to get OURS from the public trough and the trough would soon be empty.

He also knew where the bulk of the problem would originate.

That whirring noise you may hear coming from that mountain in Charlottesville, Virginia is Mr. Jefferson getting up to around 3600 RPM.

(For those with attention deficit disorder, a 6 minute video with this information may be seen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypLu49pq3bI)

"The mobs of the great cities add just so much to the support of pure government as sores do to the strength of the human body. It is the manners and spirit of a people which preserve a republic in vigor. A degeneracy in these is a canker which soon eats to the heart of its laws and constitution." --Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia Q.XIX, 1782. ME 2:230

“I think our governments will remain virtuous for many centuries as long as they are chiefly agricultural; and this will be as long as there shall be vacant lands in any part of America. When they get piled upon one another in large cities as in Europe, they will become corrupt as in Europe." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1787. Papers 12:442

"I view great cities as pestilential to the morals, the health and the liberties of man. True, they nourish some of the elegant arts; but the useful ones can thrive elsewhere; and less perfection in the others, with more health, virtue and freedom, would be my choice." --Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Rush, 1800. ME 10:173

"Our cities... exhibit specimens of London only; our country is a different nation." --Thomas Jefferson to Andre de Daschkoff, 1809. ME 12:304

"Everyone, by his property or by his satisfactory situation, is interested in the support of law and order. And such men may safely and advantageously reserve to themselves a wholesome control over their public affairs and a degree of freedom which, in the hands of the canaille of the cities of Europe, would be instantly perverted to the demolition and destruction of everything public and private." --Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1813. ME 13:401

"An insurrection... of science, talents, and courage, against rank and birth... has failed in its first effort, because the mobs of the cities, the instrument used for its accomplishment, debased by ignorance, poverty, and vice, could not be restrained to rational action. But the world will recover from the panic of this first catastrophe." --Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1813. ME 13:402

"I fear nothing for our liberty from the assaults of force; but I have seen and felt much, and fear more from English books, English prejudices, English manners, and the apes, the dupes, and designs among our professional crafts. When I look around me for security against these seductions, I find it in the wide spread of our agricultural citizens, in their unsophisticated minds, their independence and their power, if called on, to crush the Humists of our cities, and to maintain the principles which severed us from England." --Thomas Jefferson to Horatio G. Spafford, 1814. ME 14:120

"I grabbed a pile of dust, and holding it up, foolishly asked for as many birthdays as the grains of dust...I forgot to ask that they be years of youth."

Publius Ovidius Naso

Norm is not the norm

Norm is not the norm, as you're finding out. When it comes to politics, you want to ask him questions about his meds, but refrain out of fear of finding out that he has passed through life totally unmedicated, and just has these wild swings we all must endure.

Part of having a healthy community dialogue is having divergent points of view. The "warning" you got is one of those ostensibly friendly gestures that has the net effect of slowing progress for everybody.

 

I can understand, though, why you find things a bit extreme around here. The technology and the art and architecture content are great. The talk is a little shrill because it is online; when people get face-to-face, as we do from time to time, everybody then begins to move toward that big tent in the middle, which is where lots of things are going to get done over the next 5 years.

Well said

Elder statesman :)  This is my last "older" dig.  I promise!

livin' with a law student

Since August 15 I have had a CWRU law student living in my home. Each day he brings divergent points of view on the current presidential race. Originally from Nigeria, he has a slightly different view of American politics. He's had 4 years of schooling here, living in Georgia and Michigan before coming to Cleveland and had 5 years of working for the UN in London in between school periods. He has criticisms of both parties, both candidates and strategizes for both campaigns while making dinner in the center of activity in the house - the kitchen. I don't mind a good debate. It sharpens my resolve and improves my debate capabilities and expands my knowledge.

As you can tell I am a left leaning, life-long liberal. It was my upbringing and is also my choice. I don't want to or mean to (have no reason to) deny you your point of view, but I do find the gun talk disagreeable. Just as Laura finds Norm's foul language unnecessary, I am dismayed to read that your dog is armed. Mine is not, but she is a good arbiter of people's intentions. She welcomed Tim, Norm and Jeff B. for example. Norm's dog and Jeff B.'s dog and cat and after a few minutes, even Tim's dogs welcomed me. None of them are armed as far as I can tell (didn't see any holsters).

Peter N. DeWolfe, is also an elder statesman, by the way.

Sometimes the tone does become uncivil here, but we do try to avoid "trashing the hotel" (that's a Betsey Merkel quote). You can dig through the archives and find online arguments that have led to "break-ups", but no one is asked to leave this community by the folks who post and comment here. If you choose to go, that's on you. We do thwart porn and drug vendors - robotic signers on.

Opinionated? Yes. Concerned about the region, the nation and the world? Yes. Unwilling to engage in dialogue? No.

my dogs are legged

Susan, my dogs are not armed, but legged, four apiece, per dog. If my dogs had arms, though, I'd stick a little dog pistol in each one; no sense ruining those lovely teeth biting people.

If I had kangaroos, I'd get them all concealed-carry permits.

As for myself, I got rid of my nickel-plated, snub-nosed police special .38 when I found myself sorely tempted to use it during my first marriage. I gave it and my box of wadcutters to my dad and told him to dispose of them however he saw fit. I did not want to do anything to make me sorrier than I already was.

Guns are a lousy shortcut. For dogs, though, they're probably OK.

Dear Tim, Here's a little

Dear Tim,
Here's a little lapel tag I hand out to any folks like yourself. It makes it far easier for the more larcenous among us and keeps those of us who do not share your unqualified love of your fellow man much safer than otherwise:

ATTENTION CRIMINALS: I am GUN FREE!!
MY MONEY IS IN MY LEFT FRONT POCKET SO PLEASE DON’T HURT ME.
Attention other citizens: If I am found injured, please call 911.
If I am deceased, please call my next of kin at ______________________________
Thank you and have a nice day!

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson

too many candyass badasses

Dick, there are a lot of candyasses out there running around with guns who think they're badasses, but who, in a confrontation, would probably piss their pants and get pistol-whipped with their own new gun after shooting themselves in the leg. I remember getting into a car with one of our coked-up insurance brokers a few years ago, when carry permits were first made easy, and having him wave around a .44 magnum as though it were a toy, or a status symbol. He is also a draft-dodger of the RVN era, much like our current VP Cheney, who is also among the weapon-inept.

 

My one point is that there's too much braggadoccio (spelling?) going on about guns, and a lot of people just aren't fit or equipped to handle them, and will only hurt themselves or have the weapon taken from them and turned on them. Your card would encourage the candyass to take up and bear arms.

 

The other point is that people who have anger-management problems, like myself, should not carry weapons, for their own good first of all, and thereby stay out of compromising situations.

 

Finally: It's sometimes best to let people think you are a candyass, and not carry a gun, than to carry a gun effetely, and remove all doubt.

Anger one letter away..

From DANGER!  The sign hangs over the front desk in the principal's office of Denison School.

before you know it. . .

Laura, I'm not that old or that far gone at 61; I just got done with zits a short while ago. Before you know it, you'll be here, caught up to me, thinking you're not that old, either.

I also learned that God gets us for slamming people or calling them names, and He eventually makes us just that way ourselves, or worse. The Deity has an odd sense of ironic humor when it comes to humankind. Once I found this out, I immediately stopped calling people faggots. I just hope I stopped in time...

Lest you judge a book by it's cover

Dick,

You said that a friend said that "realneo was a gaggle of socialist/collectivist ideologues surrounded by a larger population of moderate/conservative citizens." and that you agree with her.

Lest you judge a book by it's cover, I will offer to you a little bit about me... I was a registered Republican, until this last spring when I asked for a Democratic ballot and voted for Barack Obama.

I have an Obama sign in my front yard, even though I voted for George W. Bush four years ago, and will defend my decision to do so in public. (both on Bush & the Obama sign)

I am somewhat unique here (as we all are) in that I have strong conservative beliefs, which include some strong environmental opinions. As I understand it, "only in America" is there the belief that conservative opinions and environmentalism do not mix.

I know for a fact that gun toting Americans have saved vast tracts of endangered wetlands for the porpoise of waterfowl hunting. (They have also ended up saving much much more than the waterfowl.)

I also know that discharging a firearm into one's metatarsals is unhealthy, and that (in my opinion) is what our Global Warming problem is about.

So... welcome to our little group, and please use this forum to it's fullest. I would suggest, however that it will probably be easier for you if you leave your preconceived notions of who and what WE are elsewhere.

We, in turn, will try our best not to use our preconceived notions, and our early opinions of YOU, and who you "appear" to be elsewhere.

Bill

should we telegraph our punches?

Bill, I'm beginning to think twice about yard signs, or overt support of a candidate, or letting people know how I intend to vote or how I voted in the past. How can I talk to everybody on an equal footing if I identify myself with one team, or another? How can I help convene a healthy dialogue if I am helping to drive a wedge? These elections seem to pit neighbor against neighbor, and it takes a while for us to recover and figure out we all have parallel interests after the election is over.

I think it's better if we, the electorate, think of ourselves as "us" and think of the political people as "them" and try not to align ourselves too closely with the interests of any one party or candidate. I think they're using us, and to serve their own interests, to boot. These elections are distractions, as they're currently conducted. They keep us off balance while they steal the basic freedoms and confiscate the assets.

should we cooperate with polls?

Along the lines of what I was saying above, please also consider whether we should cooperate with polls. I think that to give them--the political strategists/tacticians--information to make it easier for them to manipulate us is foolish. If anything, I am tempted to give them dis-information.

Is that, then, another form of dissing, as the children are wont to say today?

I don't think we should give away our positions at all; we can have intelligent discourse without being a raving cheerleader for one side, or the other.

Speaking of punches, how's

Speaking of punches, how's THIS one for a classic below the belt hit?

McCain presidential campaign strategist Steve Schmidt went on the record with the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz today, revealing the depths to which the mainstream media has sunk in their efforts to destroy the family of Republican vice presidential pick Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

Schmidt said that the campaign has been deluged with demands from reporters that the Palin family submit to DNA testing to assuage baseless rumors promulgated by the Democratic party's favorite website, the Daily Kos.

Schmidt accused the media of being "on a mission to destroy" Sarah Palin.

Kurtz writes that Markos Moulitsas, the founder of the Daily Kos, believes the made up allegations against Palin and her daughter are legitimate. Kurtz fails to note that Moulitsas writes for the Post's sister publication, Newsweek.

Schmidt also said reporters are demanding to see the birth certificate for Palin's newborn.

The news media is treading on dangerous ground with their despicable behavior regarding the Palin family. They are arousing an anger in Americans all across the country who see themselves in the Palin family and are beyond outrage over how they have been trashed.

I guess the sewer dwelling leftist mainstreet media (aka willing handmaidens for Obama) reserve their calls for tolerance and fairness ONLY for America's foreign enemies.

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson

WOW "socialist/collectivist ideologues"

Is that the 80's version of "Commie Pinko Faggot"?

I wonder what the 00's version would be?

Insulting can be so difficult these days; political correctness does so tend to get in the way.

(In my best Ed McMahon

(In my best Ed McMahon voice) YOU ARE CORRECT, SIR!!"

And that IS the 21st ceentury version.

And a socialist/collectivist is simply a communist who hasn't yet acquired a gun -- but eventially ALWAYS will.

And as for PC? Political Correctness:
”A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical liberal minority,
and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media,
which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible
to pick up a turd by the clean end.”

Be sure to wash your hands for at least 20 seconds...

"I grabbed a pile of dust, and holding it up, foolishly asked for as many birthdays as the grains of dust...I forgot to ask that they be years of youth."

Publius Ovidius Naso

MEMO TO SELF: WORK ON THE

MEMO TO SELF: WORK ON THE TYPING!!
It's EVENTUALLY not eventially and
it's CENTURY not ceentury.
Duuhhh

"I grabbed a pile of dust, and holding it up, foolishly asked for as many birthdays as the grains of dust...I forgot to ask that they be years of youth."

Publius Ovidius Naso

It Must Be Nice...

It must be nice to have such a simplistic (and well armed) view of the world.

I hope that you don't ever find it necessary to have to rub your dog's nose in it's business, as you might get shot...

Best,

Peter
...........................

"Therefore, one who is good at being a warrior doesn't make a show of his might;
One who is good in battle doesn't get angry;
One who is good at defeating the enemy doesn't engage him.
And one who is good at using men places himself below them.
This is called the virtue of not competing;
This is called correctly using men;
This is called matching Heaven.
It's the high point of the past.
Lao-tzu ~300 B.C.

Clubs

You won't be banned Richard--but you may be subjected to friendly harassment, all in good fun, right?!  (Personally, I just can't take it when any dialogue digresses into a FU session). BTW, the  Plain Dealer censors and refuses to post my comments now.  So, join the RealNEO club!

Independent and in the middle

  Thanks Bill--I probably fall somewhere in line after you--somewhere in the middle. I definitely believe Americans should try their best to be adults; to take responsibility for their own actions and their own livelihood; and to work together to raise children to be adults who promote fair and civil communities that respect everyone's right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

You might be interested to

You might be interested to know that that phrase "the pursuit of happiness" used by the Founders meant the right to honestly acquire, hold and legally use PRIVATE PROPERTY.

How's that one holding up under today's American brand of egalitarian socialism with community governments now confiscating formerly private property from one citizen and giving it to other citizens (developers)?

It is, after all, a natural progression from that brand of fascism (ostensible private ownership but public or government control) we've had here since FDR to full socialism (goverment ownership AND control).

All for the "greater good," of course.

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson (who understood that the system he and the others were ATTEMPTING to leave us would produce more material wealth and abundance than any other in history).

Obama is the next step down into that murky, libertyless pit.

"I grabbed a pile of dust, and holding it up, foolishly asked for as many birthdays as the grains of dust...I forgot to ask that they be years of youth."

Publius Ovidius Naso

Property law

Thanks--I may be younger, but I know a thing or two about property law.

(Also, a friendly reminder--you can edit your posts as long as no one replies to them--and don't worry on the spelling or grammar, we are all famously bad at both.  Also, if you highlight a line of text or word or image--you can then click on the "link chain" icon in the rich text mode and insert the url for a link).

Let's also find one thing that you and I can agree on DBachert--

Do you think that our local governments and by extension our representatives feed too much from the public trough of federal and state tax dollars?

Mr. McShane, And thank you,

Mr. McShane,
And thank you, sir.

Your comment re. "trough," brings to mind this observation by the same Mr. Jefferson:

Upon his return from France during the run-up to the first documented modern socialist "revolution" there, he remarked that if that alien philosophy ever reached America's shores, at least two things would happen:
1. We would become an increasingly contentious and litigious people as we shouldered one another out of the way to get OURS from the public trough and
2. The trough would soon become empty.

Were Mr. Jefferson alive today, I suspect he'd be mortified that not only is the trough empty but we have bored through the bottom and now wallow in the mire of a virtually insurmountable debt burden that has placed our children and grandchildren in a form of servitude from which they may never escape.

"To preserve [the] independence [of the people,] we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses, and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes, have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:39

And, yes, we CAN agree that ALL OF US have played a role in emptying that trough.

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson

AMEN

And WOmen :)

women and men

George Sand  George Sand was not a man.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Evelyn Waugh

 

Evelyn Waugh was not a woman.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What does gender matter anyway? Oh... 18 million cracks. The women that "got the vote" - now that was responsibility, discipline, commitment. But they did not have to resemble men to pass the nineteenth amendment. The suffragists I recall learning about in school wore dresses.

Can we not all be humans respected for our sense of responsibility, our discipline and commitment to furthering a healtheir civic space?

It's Ms. McShane so long as it matters. The internet blurs these lines.

OMG -- now I AM confused.

OMG -- now I AM confused. I've visited McShane's personal page and the photo there CLEARLY shows a man. Unless that is a rather old photo and McShane is one of the children pictured, now grown.

To steal a line from Jim Carey, SOMEBODY HEP ME!!

:-))

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson

who in turn took it from...

...that line may have been stolen from Jim Carey, but he in turn probably lifted it from Wilson Pickett? Comics seem to have little original material and seem to own little of their own personalities; it's like they fill up an empty sack, and that's what they're paid for, and that's what we get.

check the first name

First name, Laura - often a woman's name. Yes indeed. I would suspect that the gentleman you saw is her Dad, but maybe not. Can't make her out in the group shot by the tree, but I think she is the little girl on the gentleman's righ side in the photo.

She's been at this speaking up and speaking out business for some time as far as my research tells me. I found letters regarding some shady business being foisted upon us back in the day by Jacobs (the Figgie corp finagling at Harvard and 271) in old public records. Never underestimate lmcshane.

OF COURSE! Had I just read

OF COURSE!

Had I just read more carefully, I'd have picked up on the "Laura" a bit further down the page.

So, Laura, if you're monitoring this thread, my apologies for the error.

PS: You're still a bed-wetting, kool-aide swilling, commie-pinko liberal fellow traveler. (ONLY KIDDING!!!)

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson

The Man

  The man in the photo is my grandfather(deceased).  I am the tallest and gangliest of the bunch.  And I confess to all of the above enumerated "flaws" :) 

Thirteen

  Here's a book for all of us to read--by Richard K. Morgan--originally published in Britain under the title Black Man.  Science fiction has not been my favorite fiction genre, but I occasionally read it to keep my shape-shifter skills intact.  A good friend in college said that I was locked in at age 13.  Norm will like the book--I lost count on the use of  f**king this and that.  All in all, it's a boy book.  I only hope that it is not an accurate depiction of our future.

And, to balance out the extreme male future of 13, I am switching off with The Tuff Chix Guide to Easy Home Improvement, which I highly recommend.

Elephants in the room

To play off of Roldo's summation of Sarah Palin--the distraction. She is not a distraction. She is a she. A flesh and blood human being. Not a distraction, not a token, and not separate from the rest of us. She is the governor of a state, which requires her to balance a budget, something senators aren't required to do each year.

Remember the Equal Rights Amendment, Richard? Republicans have put women into position of real power, and so have Democrats. But, can we possibly suspend our skepticism to believe that the party of Lincoln will actually uphold the equal rights of all? Gay, Lesbian and Transgender rights, too? Gender is the issue in the United States, and so is the Federal Reserve and the value of the dollar and the fourth estate.

Richard, the media that you want to portray as determined to undermine Sarah Palin includes us now. I am not undermining Sarah Palin. So far, she has taken everything like a man. I am not voting for her ticket this time around, because she picked the wrong man to equally represent the entirety of this country.

Laura: I wrote that McCain's

Laura: I wrote that McCain's SELECTION of Sarah Palin was a distraction. And that's what it was meant to be.

And I think that the last few days has proven that correct - we have been distracted from the issues that should comprise this election campaign.

New militaristic, nationalistic, evangelical leader for Republic

I don't thnk she was hired as a distraction - she is the new figurehead and talkinghead and downright head of the Republican Party... and I dare them to jilt her. If you watched the TV coverage of Palin's speech you saw all the mediaheads befuddled - they were all blushing and gushing and downright smitten - in love or lust, she has hypnotized even the hardest line of liberal commentators. And just one rigged election and one 73-year-old dying and she controls all the nukes. Think about that!

 

Disrupt IT

"Controls all the

"Controls all the nukes?"
You forget about Russia, China, India, Israel, Iran (soon, very soon -- unless the Israelis stop them which they doubtless will) and others.
We'd BETTER have someone in charge who -- unlike the Democrat candidate -- would at least answer an attack on, for example, Cleveland.

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic but will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path to destruction." Thomas Jefferson

The Nation on Palin record

Sarah's Way--or the Highway

Yeah, but "people like her". In Youngtown today women reported that they'd vote for McCain "jus cuz" she has "energy". Oh my God!

Jesusland

  Alright Roldo--I will come out and publicly say that this country has allowed itself to become as militant in their blind faith in a false GOD as evidenced by the followers of McCain/Palin/Bush, just as the jihad followers of Osama bin laden. 

Today, I went out to register voters as I plan to do as much as I can before October 6th--a young Latina voter told me that she will not vote.  She will let her GOD decide this election. 

I talk to God (some of us know her as Mother EARTH) and she wants you to vote people---it's not an option.  It's your religious duty to God and country.

now I get it

From an email today -- I have been waiting for this explanation.

I'm a little confused. Let me see if I have this straight…

* If you grow up in Hawaii, and are raised by your grandparents, you're "exotic, different."

* If you grow up in Alaska eating mooseburgers, you're a quintessential American story.

* If your name is Barack, you're a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.

* If you name your kids Willow, Trig and Track, you're a maverick.

* If you graduate from Harvard law School, you are unstable.

* If you attend 5 different small colleges before graduating, you're well grounded.

* If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer, become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate's Health and Human Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran's Affairs committees, you don't have any real leadership experience.

* If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000 people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then you're qualified to become the country's second highest ranking executive.

* If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you're not a real Christian.

* If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you're a Christian.

* If you teach responsible, age appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.

* If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with no other option in sex education in your state's school system, while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant and if you try to make victimized women pay for their own rape kits, you're very responsible.

* If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family's values don't represent America's.

* If you're husband is nicknamed "First Dude", with at least one DWI conviction and no college education, who didn't register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely admirable.

OK, much clearer now.

At last an honest GOP slogan: Greed is good

By Tony Collings 9/18/08 11:42 AM

I almost drove off the road this morning (at my stately gas-saving 25mph) when I heard Laura Ingraham use the G-word.

The conservative radio talk show host said, in defense of investment bankers who are now in the doghouse: “Greed is good for America.” I thought I misheard her, but then she said it again: “Greed is good for America.”

At last the conservatives have come up with a slogan that tells the truth about what they really believe in. Not jobs for the working class. Not regulation to prevent predatory lending. Not oversight to curb excessive speculation. Not the public good.

Just good old-fashioned greed.

As my Michigan Messenger colleague LoRayne Apo-Joynt put it: “Gordon Gekko in a wig.” Yes, Laura Ingraham could well be the female version of the villain in the film, “Wall Street.” And she could well be the truth-teller about what’s really in the heart of hearts of her fellow conservatives.

Laura is always saying that Sen. John McCain should take her advice, and for once I agree with her. She’s hit on the perfect slogan that says it all.

http://www.michiganmessenger.com/4616/at-last-an-honest-gop-slogan-greed-is-good