Lessons Obama learned from stimulus bill

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/17/obama.ahead/index.html?iref=nextin

• Lessons Obama learned from stimulus bill - Backwards typist

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    Some postings are like getting a history lesson.

I feel like sitting in a classroom agian.

Sometimes it even feels more like brainwashing.

Is this the goal of a forum?  

During the debate he stated the reason he did not vote for the bill presented in Illinois regarding babies that live through abortion is because there is a bill that already addresses this?  Or did I miss something?

BILL O'REILLY, HOST: In the "Personal Story" segment tonight, political humorist Bill Maher (search), he has a new book out called "New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer." Of course, Mr. Maher is about as polite as I am and as timid as Dracula. He joins us now from Los Angeles.

You know, you've had some celebrities on your HBO show, "Real Time," which begins again on Friday, talking about policy and war on terror and stuff like that. I get the feeling they don't know very much, but you do. So I'd like to make Bill Maher, right now, the terror czar. Bill Maher, the terror czar. Could be a series.

How would you fight this War on Terror? How would you fight it?

BILL MAHER, HOST, HBO'S "REAL TIME": I think the first and most important thing is to get the politics out of the War on Terror. You know, maybe I'm a cockeyed optimist, Bill, maybe I'm naive, but I thought that 9/11 was such a jarring event that nobody would dare return to business as usual on that one subject after that.

But of course, we found out that nothing could be further from the truth. And your president, my president too, but the one you voted for...

O'REILLY: You don't know that. Were you looking over my shoulder there? I could have voted for Nader. I could have voted for Kerry, but Kerry wouldn't come on the program, so I wouldn't vote. But I could have gone for Ralph. Ralph's a friend of mine.

MAHER: Yes. Anyway, I said the guy you voted for, President Bush, you know, how come this guy, who was supposed to be such a kick-and-take- names kind of guy, how come he has not been able to get the politics out of this?

You know, as a guy who's been accused of treason, I'll tell you what real treason is: Treason is when legislators vote against homeland security measures because it goes against the wishes of their political or financial backers. Treason is the fact that, as a terrorist, you could still buy a gun in this country because the NRA (search) lobby is so strong.

O'REILLY: OK. But you're getting into the political, and I agree with you. I think that the country should be united in trying to seek out and kill terrorists, who would kill us.

But I'd like to have some concrete things that you, Bill Maher, the terror czar — and take this seriously, this could be a series — what would you do?

All right, so you've got bin Laden. You've got Al Qaeda (search). You've got a bunch of other lower-level terrorist groups. What do you do to neutralize them?

MAHER: OK. Well, first of all, you discounted my answer, which is get the politics out, but OK.

O'REILLY: Well, assume you can do that. They're gone.

MAHER: We'll let that go. Keep going. I wouldn't worry that much about bin Laden. I mean, capturing bin Laden at this point, it doesn't really matter whether he's dead or alive. He's already Tupac to the people who care about him and work for him. Capturing bin Laden, killing him would be like when Ray Kroc died, how much that affected McDonald's.

O'REILLY: It would be a morale booster. But I understand. You're not going to send...

MAHER: A morale booster, right. Well, we've had plenty of morale boosting. We've had plenty of window dressing. What we need is concrete action.

In the book I wrote before this one about terrorism, I suggested that we have a Secret Service for the people. I said whenever the president goes anywhere, he has very high-level, intelligent detectives who look around at a crowd. They know what they're looking for. They're highly paid. They're highly trained.

We don't have that in this country. We should have that. We should have a cadre of 10,000 highly trained people who would guard all public events, bus stations, train stations, airports — and stop with this nonsense that this robotic sort of window dressing...

O'REILLY: OK, so you would create a homeland security office that was basically a security firm for major targets and things like that. It's not a bad idea. Costs a lot of money. Costs a lot of money. It's not a bad idea.

MAHER: Costs a lot of money compared to what? If you paid 10,000 people a salary of $100,000 a year, that would, I think, cost $10 billion or something. That's nothing. There's that much pork in the transportation bill before you get...

O'REILLY: Yes, 10,000 wouldn't do it, but I get your drift.

MAHER: Whatever it costs.

O’REILLY: You would create a super-security apparatus. OK, that's not bad. That's not bad. How about overseas now?

MAHER: What we need to do is what I call get Israeli about this. Because the Israelis are not afraid of profiling. The Israelis are not afraid to bury politics in the greater cause of protecting their nation. We don't act that way. You know, I'm afraid 9/11 really changed nothing.

O'REILLY: Boy, your ACLU (search) pals aren't going to like that. You're going to lose your membership card there.

MAHER: I'm not a member of the ACLU.

O'REILLY: Oh, sure you are, just like I voted for Bush. You're a member of the ACLU. I can see the card right in your pocket there.

MAHER: Bill, I'm not a joiner. I'm not a joiner. I don't like organizations.

O'REILLY: They won't have you, Maher, let's be honest about that. All right, now, in your book, which is very amusing, by the way — if you want a few laughs buy Maher's book.

MAHER: Thank you.

O'REILLY: You take some shots at FOX News, which is your wont, and I just want to know why you think we're so fabulously successful here.

MAHER: Well, I think that question has been answered many times. It's because the conservative viewer in this country, or on radio the conservative listener, is very predictable. They like to hear what they like to hear. They like to hear it over and over again.

O'REILLY: All the surveys show that the viewers are all over the map. They're not conservative in a big bloc. Some of them are moderate. Some of them are Democrats. Some of them are Moroccans. I mean, they're everywhere. That's your analysis? That just the conservatives watch us?

MAHER: Well, I think mostly the conservatives do watch you. That's not to take anything away from what you guys have achieved over there. It's a very well-produced broadcast, and they have excellent personalities like yourself, Bill. Who could resist watching you when you get home from work at night?

O'REILLY: Whoopi Goldberg, maybe? I don't know.

MAHER: Yes.

O'REILLY: Anyone who doesn't watch here is misguided. We identify them as such.

But look, I think there's more to it than — you're in TV. You know the ratings game. I mean, if you don't provide a product that is satisfying people, no matter what your ideology, they tell you to take a hike.

There's a guy over at MSNBC. He's a very conservative guy. He was hired and nobody's watching him. They hire liberals. Nobody watches them. Air America (search). Nobody's listening to it.

I mean, there's got to be a reason why we're No. 1, a punch line for you, and No. 2, you know, becoming the most powerful news network in the world.

MAHER: Well, I think, as I say, it's a well-produced product. You know, your program moves along, always at a clip that never seems to bore. You know, you move along to the next topic, the next guest. It never sort of drags. I don't think a lot of people know how to produce that stuff that way.

O'REILLY: All right. It's bells and whistles and my charming personality. That's what I thought it was.

Last thing: You know, one thing I like about Maher is he's not a hypocrite. He drives a little hybrid vehicle. Right? You putter around there. Does it have training wheels? What's it like?

MAHER: Actually, I had the Prius hybrid for three years. I was one of the first ones to get it right after 9/11. And I traded it in a few months ago for the Lexus hybrid.

O'REILLY: I think we should all cut back on our energy consumption, and I think we should all get these hybrids as fast as we can.

Hey, Bill, always nice to see you. Thanks very much. Good luck with the season on the TV show.

MAHER: Continued success there, Mr. No. 1.

O'REILLY: All right. Thank you.

Watch "The O'Reilly Factor" weeknights at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET and listen to the "Radio Factor!"

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You guys are very good teachers, and people generally do learn best by example, you know.

By the way I have another question.  That smut rag by Ann Coulter you enjoy so much....she refers to Bill Clinton as a horny hick.  Now does hick apply to ALL people from Arkansas, or all people with a working class background or just people from Arkansas with a working class background? 

(I hope the spacing comes out okay, apologies if not).  From C-span here are a couple comments.  One by a republican and one by a democrat.  It’s good to know that there are people (democrats & republicans alike) who realize this is a bad deal and are looking out for our best interest and not their own.

Rep. Michael Burgess – R. Texas 26^th district

Speaker, I come to the floor today to talk about this 700 billion dollar bill that is in front of us.  I use the term bill advisedly because we have seen no bill.  We are here debating talking points on perhaps one of the largest fundamental change in our nation’s financial system in its history.  And house republicans have been cut out of the process.  Not only have we been cut out of the process, we have also been derided by the leadership of the democratic party and called unpatriotic for not participating.  Mr.  Speaker I have been thrown out of more meetings in this capital in the past 24 hours than I ever thought possible as a duly elected representative of 820,000 citizens of North Texas.  Mr. Speaker, politics is a full contact sport and I understand that, but it is a full contact sport in the light of day in the public arena.  Since we didn’t have hearings, since we didn’t have markups, lets at least put this legislation up on the internet for 24 hours.  That’s what Thomas was made for.  Lets do that and let the American people see what we have done in the dark of night.  After all, I have not gotten any more mail, any more emails on any other subject other than this one that is before us today.  Mr. Speaker I understand we are under martial law as declared by the speaker last night.  I think its ironic house republicans have not been needed for a single thing in this house to assure passage for the last 22 months.  And today we are going to be asked to vote for a bill for political cover because democrats are too weak to stand up to their speaker.  I yield back.

Rep. Marcy Kaptur – D. Ohio 9^th District

Mr. Speaker, my message to the American people, don’t let congress seal this wall street deal.  High financial crimes have been committed.  Now congress is being asked to bail out the culprits and to do so at the expense of those who elected us to guard their interest the people of our country.  The normal legislative process that should accompany review of a monumental proposal to bail out wall street has been shelved, yes shelved.  Only a few insiders are doing the dealing.  Sounds like insider trading to me.  These criminals have so much political power they can shut down the normal legislative process of the highest law making body in this land.  All the committees that should be scanning every word of what is being negotiated are benched, and that means the American people are benched too.  We are constitutionally sworn to protect and defend this republic against ALL enemies foreign and domestic, and my friends there are enemies.  We are told we will have a trillion dollar bill to review soon and have less than 24 hours with no regular hearings to try to vote on this tar baby.  The people pushing this deal are the very same ones who are responsible for the implosion on wall street.  They were fraudulent then and they are fraudelent now.  We should say no to this deal.  I ask my colleagues to join us at 2:00 at HC8 of the capital to meet with some real experts who have done financial resolutions without putting financial burdeon on the taxpayer.  Please join us HC8 at 2 p.m.

94 democrats voted against this bill today.  That is more than half the democrats, yet they get in front of the camera and give their little speeches about how all democrats are for this and its all the republicans fault this didn’t pass.  Hello folks, do the math. 

Pelosi has shown how truly inexperienced, divisive and uncaring she.  She gets up there and her mouth just flaps with nothing of substance being said.  She is incompetent and should be fired.  All that came out of her flapping gums today was more bashing of the republicans and accusing them of what democrats have been doing for over 2 years now.  Why in the world would you give a speech putting all the blame on people and bash the other political side before a vote is even held.  Chalk it up to one more of the numerous reasons she is incompetent and needs to step down.  And if she doesn’t step down she should be physically removed.  Even the Deputy Minority Whip held up a copy of Pelosi’s floor speech at a press conference and said she had “failed to listen and lead” on the issue.

Then I heard Barney Frank talk.  He should be renamed Barney Baloney.  He stands and mocks the people who voted against the bill making fun of them.  As someone said he may be a funny and clever guy, but there is nothing funny about this situation.

Did anyone even notice today that every time Pelosi and Franks spoke the market dived.  When they stopped talking the market started going up.  They’d get in front of the camera again and the market started tanking again big time.  This happened about 3 or 4 times (I was watching it on a split screen).  At that point you would have thought the President would have called over and told them to shut up because they were tanking the market.

Kucinich (democrat) said the ones who caused this are the one who are giving us a line (Pelosi, Franks, Kerry, Dodd).   

Truth is this $700B is not enough.  This is a small part of what is needed.  Many people are saying it's more like close to a trillion.  After this they’ll say well we need this much more, then that much more, and before we know it we’re going to be paying more than just $10,500.

There are economists and educated people who are asking for a decent bill.  But do they consult them.  They are the ones with the knowledge and ideas to get us out of the mess.  No who do they get – Pelosi, Franks, Dodd, etc – the people who did this in the first place).

All I can see is both candidates are more interested in getting themselves elected than what is happening with the economy so don’t even try to say one is worse than the other.  I cannot say what Obama is saying because I’m not hearing anything from him except that he keeps saying it needs to be fixed, but I’m not hearing his specific viewpoints on the bill itself (and I'm not hearing McCain's specifics either).  Specifics would be good if I'm suppose to vote for one or the other in November.

I found a site that has an interesting interview with a historian.  He wrote....

"Especially in politics it is of the utmost importance to try to look behind the facade: who makes up the team of the presidential candidate? The future president of the United States of America is for a large part dependent on and being fed by his team of advisors and future cabinet members."

Below is a link with his interview.  Very interesting.  There are two parts to the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MouUJNG8f2k&feature=related

Hillary's supporters like General Wesley Clark and others are starting to come out now in full force making statements that are not favorable towards Barack.  Even though Clark's statements are true (just cos you are shot down in an aircraft doesn't mean your qualified to be President) but it doesn't help in getting your party elected to the white house.  I knew she was going to do it so that McCain would win and because he's so weak he'll only be in four years then she and Bill will run again in 4 years.  I just didn't know how she was planning it until I watched the news this a.m.  She is such a skum bag in my opinion.  The worry of having to listen to her again in 4 years is enough to put me through the roof again.

I am so much calmer now these days since I learned how to deal with the frustrating day to day news of politics.  My solution - I now watch HBO, The Food Channel, BBC, Travel Channel, and any other channel that is not news related.  If I want news I will look at Drudge.  TV is just too overwhelming for me and all these so called "experts" commenting on the politics. 

So...you shouldn't be seeing any more stupid irate comments from me anymore.  I'll now just be a couch potato learning how to cook different foods and planning my vacation to all these far away places on the travel channel.  Oh yes, I forgot...while I speak in a british accent because I watch so much BBC.  HA HA 

How many of you enjoyed your Stimulus Checks?  I for one loved mine.  Think back to what you did with that check?  Maybe you paid some bills, bought that CD you have been wanting, maybe a night out with your family to a nice restaurant or even Pizza Hut.  A lot of us were able to buy new clothes for our children.

Admit it, it was worth going to the mailbox for.  I looked forward to the mail for once.

Senator Obama has pushed for more Stimulus checks immediately for the American people.  But who do you think veto'd it?  President Bush did.  Senator McCain has sided with President Bush 90% of the time.  Believe me, you won't be going to the mailbox to find anymore Stimulus Checks in there if you elect John McCain on November 4, 2008.