Hugh @ 209

But you always feel threatened, don’t you? So there is no victory for you, just endless wars.

No, we won the Cold War; but Bill Clinton blew it by not keeping up the Armed Forces and allowing the Bin Ladens and jihadis to grow into unspeakable terrorists. The seeds of the current war starts with Clinton.

We spend how many billions on our war machine and how many airplanes were called to stop the airplanes of 9/11? Seems it’s not the size that counts, but how it’s used. Bush is further proving that by wasting our military on Iraq.

Twain @ 197

Please define victory.

Victory: where our side wins and the other side collapses or is no longer able to threaten us.

Any living person could ‘threaten’ us with words. Nobody in the whole world who doesn’t have a large number of deliverable nukes can in any way defeat America — save ourselves.

So, I guess, in those terms, we’ve already won!

Okay, next issue.

I don’t know. A debate where only Republicans asked questions of Republicans might be interesting.

How high would you build a wall between this country and Mexico to keep out the demonic evil illegal alien spawn of S*tan?
…

It could become a bidding war of sorts. Who pledges to build the wall the highest, kill the most Muslims the fastest, etc.?

rwcole @ 167

Has there been a good post here yet on Clusterfuck’s plans to bind the US to permanent bases in Iraq without congressional approval? Would love to read something good on the legality of such a scheme.

Another question is what have the Dems said about it. I haven’t seen a single word.

Yeah, I guess all the Dem candidate speeches calling for immediate withdrawal from Iraq just aren’t specific enough. Ha!

Speaking of religious intolerance, I just heard on the news that there are now mobs in Sudan calling for the execution of the school teacher who named the teddy bear Mohammad.

Has the idea of simply ejecting her from their Muslim country never occurred to them?

Why did Mohammad’s religion inspire so many people to do so many nasty things? Same for Christianity, I suppose?

Were people always cruel and violent and capable of using absolutely anything as a pretext for continuing it? Perhaps Mohammad and Jesus should’ve whispered or something.

LS @ 109

I love Liberty Lee’s snark!!!

707

He may just be better at this than Colbert.

It’ll be like the Trilla in Manila, LibertyLee vs. Colbert…winner take nothing!

LOL

If a poor guy fucks up- he can’t get out of his credit card debt even with bankruptcy. When the banks fuck up—Uncle Clusterfuck opens the checkbook.

Anyone see somethin wrong with this approach?

The fundamental difference is that an individual should receive more protection and help from his or her government than some financial entity (corp., bank, s&l, etc.). Financial entities are by nature investment risks. A person isn’t risking investment capital. A person is the foundation of our country and should be respected that way.

Quick question. Do these Presidential candidates (D and R) want to be President of the country, or just their respective parties?

Because I just don’t see the problem with a Democrat asking a question of a Republican candidate, and vice versa.

But I’m rather naive that way.

Me too. The only thing to avoid is the obviously snark-ridden idiotic questions. But, aside from that everyone should be asking questions.

The Debates the next weeks at a) NPR and b) Des Moines Register are very important to focus on real issues: Health care,immigration, energy independence and new jobs,Constitutional Rule Of Law in our daily lives and getting the USA Taxpayers out of the Contractors-Oil Iraq War which is going to bankrupt the country, let’s hope the neocon controlled NPR does not do another CNN-Klein insulting absurdity,waisting everybody’s time with private bedroom preference issues over and over again,shame !

here are some issues were we need truth and clarity from the next president of the USA :

in the W.Post,November,28,07 : “Kurdish Ministers woo U.S.oil firms” we learn that the Oil lobby in DC ( with Lobby firm Barbour,Griffiths and Rogers) is using Richard Perle and Scooter Libby to make deals with Kurdish politicians against Baghdad Central Gov. plans to keep all deals constitutional and all profits evenly divided among all Iraqis, why do the White House let this bunch of neocon gangsters do their own side deals and wreck the work of the US Military and the Iraq Parliament by distabilazing the Iraq Oil Laws ? who are the real insurgents here ? what kind of racket are they setting up in Iraq? who will pay for the corruption later ? the USA Taxpayers ?

next month in Paris,let’s hope Sec.Rice really pushes the israelis and palestinians to make a permanent deal,already is clear that the usual orthodox israeli community and the extreme palestinians dont want to give up one inch,and the israeli orthodox are demanding another 10 billion dollars from the USA to continue to block any deals,while palestinians are going to burn another 500 million or more without showing work intentions,the Europeans and Russia must insist that Saudi Arabia pays the ticket,they made hundreds of billions in oil over -prizes due to the paranoia and tensions,so they must be on the down side too ! Palestine needs jobs and a harbor/airport as well as peace from its young militia,and Israel must stop building luxury homes on arab land with USA money and using USA weapons to kill palestinians that complain, enough from these two !!!

Africa ,Asia and Latin America need education and internet, if the White House has any links to the real world, the President would suggest to Sec.Rice,Gutierrez,Gates and Spellings to launch a massive distribution plan of

http://laptop.org/ all over the world, to really show Americas face : Love and Trade,Commerce,Education,

Peace and Growth, but knowing that Joshua Bolten and his neocons run the White House with Rahm Emanuel,Schumer,Feinstein ,Lieberman ,Bloomberg, Chertoff,Bodman and now with King Mukasey I as enforcer outside the USA Constitution,what will the President do ? will he do what’s best for America ? or will he do what the neocons want ?

the candidates must clearly tell what steps they will take in the first 6 months about Energy alternatives: will they install solar panels and concentrators everywhere ? turbines? ethanol/biodiesel/methane/plug-in in most gas stations ? hydrogen fuelcells for cars and trucks and in gas stations hydrogen delivery ? water desalination and water re-distribution ? a smart guest worker program that let us grow most or all our fruits and vegetables inside the USA ? above all,training in all these issues from energy to organic foods, will the candidates go forward ? or back to the same old nonsense?

the Debates must give precise answers about these and other vital questions, for me is Edwards-Huckabee-Obama-Paul-Richardson the only way to break free from the Neocon and Oil Lobby’s and set America on a new course, these candidates must consider running as a team , most of the rest of the candidates are loaded with the same old neocons and incompetents that got us where we are today , we need new leaders and no more Oil and Neocons in power, let’s give them a long vacation !

rwcole @ 167

Has there been a good post here yet on Clusterfuck’s plans to bind the US to permanent bases in Iraq without congressional approval? Would love to read something good on the legality of such a scheme.

I wondered the same thing..I don’t have the ref handy but “stationing of forces” doesn’t require Senate approval. The House could shut off the money, however.

It would certainly go beyond the 2001 AUMF, but so does the use of troops in sectarian conflict. Judging from the wording of the AUMF we should have started withdrawing once we had defeated Sadaam and the Army.