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light-hearted politics topic: In your state, whose TV

Posted By: ads are predominant? on 2008-10-21
In Reply to:

This board has become quite ugly to come and visit.  Most folks know who they want to win and the arguments are becoming redundant.  So, on the lighter side, I'm wondering what's happening in other states.  Here in Michigan, McCain has pretty much stopped trying to advertise, and nearly all ads are Obama.  I think Michigan has been such a forgotten state, our own one-state recession has been going on for decades, and the majority of us are democrats.  Just wondering if other states are being overwhelmed with predominantly one candidate over the other...




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She was in state politics at the time, not national politics......
how much foreign policy experience did Bill have when he went to the presidency having only been a governor? The same as Sarah Palin. Because he was concentrating on his job...the state of Arkansas (and Paula Jones and what was that stripper's name?). Sarah Palin was concentrating on the state of Alaska.

Good grief. lol. Why don't you poll all the governors in all the states in the union and ask them how much they think about foreign policy?
Let's keep topic politics and keep religion out of it.
nm
hard hearted
Wow, I am offended, I am actually very soft hearted and concerned for many people and causes, but I guess, since I don't agree with you that makes me EVIL. You guy are too much, lol!
cold-hearted, aggressive, and
wouldn't give a hoot for your well-being any more than the wolves she's shooting just for the fun of it. She surely can't give the old cop out of hunting for food. she just wants to kill for the sake of killing.
Two Border State Governors Declare Illegal Immigration State of Emergency

Two Border State Governors Declare Illegal Immigration State of Emergency



SIGN THE PETITION!
CLICK
HERE!

THANK YOU!


You can have our federal money along with a new state motto: "Michigan - The Slave State". n
NM
Laws vary state-to-state

Many people were confined against their will just because someone wanted them "out of the way." These were normal people with no mental illness - that is why it is so difficult - don't blame the liberals. Blame your state.


CONFINING THE MENTALLY ILL


In the legal space between what a society should and should not do, taking action to restrict the liberty of people who are mentally ill sits in the grayest of gray areas.

Our notions about civil and constitutional rights flow from an assumption of "normalcy." Step beyond the boundaries and arrest and prison may legally follow. Short of that, government's ability to hold people against their will is severely and properly limited. Unusual behavior on the part of someone who is mentally ill is not illegal behavior. Freedom can't be snatched away on a whim, or on the thought that a person is hard to look at, hard to hear, hard to smell.

It was only a few decades ago that the promise of new medications and a change in attitude opened the doors of the mental hospitals and sent many patients into society. There, they would somehow "normalize" and join everyone else, supported by networks of out-patient facilities, job training, special living arrangements and regular, appropriate medication. But the transition has been imperfect, long and difficult.

In some parts of urban America there is little professional support for those with mental health problems. A new generation of drug and alcohol-fueled mental illness has come on the scene. People frequently end up on the street, un-medicated and exhibiting a full range of behaviors that are discomforting at the very least and threatening at their worst.


You tried. Some of us do see the light.

A lot of us (family, neighbors, friends) could not believe how Obama spoke about the (SECRET MEETING).  Obama should not have discussed to anyone about the talk in the meeting.  As for Obama's so called aides he picked, should have fired them on the spot for a leak like that.  What if Obama was to talk with the President of Iran?  Look out.  Do not want to mention what I think of all this because I WILL GET BLASTED.  I guess some have to learn the hard way in life.  I see a lot of government me, me, me and LOOK AT ME approach.  Totally into one-self. 


You explained it completely clear and totally made sense.  Writing totally on the wall and so many others could not believe today's secret meeting.


Thanks, this does shed a different light.sm
I do admit, I have not been following this.
Here's another one that sheds even more light.

This also is pretty long and contains much of the same as the other link I provided, but this one also addresses how he should start a *small war* in order to be sucessful.  It also addresses how the George W. Bush camp tried to denigrate Mr. Herskowitz's character after he was pulled from the book (one of the classic trademarks of this administration), and that even after all that, former President George Herbert Walker Bush requested that Mr. Herskowitz write a book about his father, and he agreed.


 


http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1028-01.htm


 















Published on Thursday, October 28, 2004 by GNN.tv

Two Years Before 9/11, Candidate Bush was Already Talking Privately About Attacking Iraq, According to His Former Ghost Writer

by Russ Baker
 

HOUSTON -- Two years before the September 11 attacks, presidential candidate George W. Bush was already talking privately about the political benefits of attacking Iraq, according to his former ghost writer, who held many conversations with then-Texas Governor Bush in preparation for a planned autobiography.

He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999, said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. It was on his mind. He said to me: 'One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.' And he said, 'My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.' He said, 'If I have a chance to invade·.if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency. Herskowitz said that Bush expressed frustration at a lifetime as an underachiever in the shadow of an accomplished father. In aggressive military action, he saw the opportunity to emerge from his father's shadow. The moment, Herskowitz said, came in the wake of the September 11 attacks. Suddenly, he's at 91 percent in the polls, and he'd barely crawled out of the bunker.

That President Bush and his advisers had Iraq on their minds long before weapons inspectors had finished their work - and long before alleged Iraqi ties with terrorists became a central rationale for war - has been raised elsewhere, including in a book based on recollections of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill. However, Herskowitz was in a unique position to hear Bush's unguarded and unfiltered views on Iraq, war and other matters - well before he became president.

In 1999, Herskowitz struck a deal with the campaign of George W. Bush about a ghost-written autobiography, which was ultimately titled A Charge to Keep : My Journey to the White House, and he and Bush signed a contract in which the two would split the proceeds. The publisher was William Morrow. Herskowitz was given unimpeded access to Bush, and the two met approximately 20 times so Bush could share his thoughts. Herskowitz began working on the book in May, 1999, and says that within two months he had completed and submitted some 10 chapters, with a remaining 4-6 chapters still on his computer. Herskowitz was replaced as Bush's ghostwriter after Bush's handlers concluded that the candidate's views and life experiences were not being cast in a sufficiently positive light.

According to Herskowitz, who has authored more than 30 books, many of them jointly written autobiographies of famous Americans in politics, sports and media (including that of Reagan adviser Michael Deaver), Bush and his advisers were sold on the idea that it was difficult for a president to accomplish an electoral agenda without the record-high approval numbers that accompany successful if modest wars.

The revelations on Bush's attitude toward Iraq emerged recently during two taped interviews of Herskowitz, which included a discussion of a variety of matters, including his continued closeness with the Bush family, indicated by his subsequent selection to pen an authorized biography of Bush's grandfather, written and published last year with the assistance and blessing of the Bush family.

Herskowitz also revealed the following:



  • In 2003, Bush's father indicated to him that he disagreed with his son's invasion of Iraq.

  • Bush admitted that he failed to fulfill his Vietnam-era domestic National Guard service obligation, but claimed that he had been excused.

  • Bush revealed that after he left his Texas National Guard unit in 1972 under murky circumstances, he never piloted a plane again. That casts doubt on the carefully-choreographed moment of Bush emerging in pilot's garb from a jet on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in 2003 to celebrate Mission Accomplished in Iraq. The image, instantly telegraphed around the globe, and subsequent hazy White House statements about his capacity in the cockpit, created the impression that a heroic Bush had played a role in landing the craft.

  • Bush described his own business ventures as floundering before campaign officials insisted on recasting them in a positive light.

Throughout the interviews for this article and in subsequent conversations, Herskowitz indicated he was conflicted over revealing information provided by a family with which he has longtime connections, and by how his candor could comport with the undefined operating principles of the as-told-to genre. Well after the interviews-in which he expressed consternation that Bush's true views, experience and basic essence had eluded the American people -Herskowitz communicated growing concern about the consequences for himself of the publication of his remarks, and said that he had been under the impression he would not be quoted by name. However, when conversations began, it was made clear to him that the material was intended for publication and attribution. A tape recorder was present and visible at all times.

Several people who know Herskowitz well addressed his character and the veracity of his recollections. I don't know anybody that's ever said a bad word about Mickey, said Barry Silverman, a well-known Houston executive and civic figure who worked with him on another book project. An informal survey of Texas journalists turned up uniform confidence that Herskowitz's account as contained in this article could be considered accurate.

One noted Texas journalist who spoke with Herskowitz about the book in 1999 recalls how the author mentioned to him at the time that Bush had revealed things the campaign found embarrassing and did not want in print. He requested anonymity because of the political climate in the state. I can't go near this, he said.

According to Herskowitz, George W. Bush's beliefs on Iraq were based in part on a notion dating back to the Reagan White House - ascribed in part to now-vice president Dick Cheney, Chairman of the House Republican Policy Committee under Reagan. Start a small war. Pick a country where there is justification you can jump on, go ahead and invade.

Bush's circle of pre-election advisers had a fixation on the political capital that British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher collected from the Falklands War. Said Herskowitz: They were just absolutely blown away, just enthralled by the scenes of the troops coming back, of the boats, people throwing flowers at [Thatcher] and her getting these standing ovations in Parliament and making these magnificent speeches.

Republicans, Herskowitz said, felt that Jimmy Carter's political downfall could be attributed largely to his failure to wage a war. He noted that President Reagan and President Bush's father himself had (besides the narrowly-focused Gulf War I) successfully waged limited wars against tiny opponents - Grenada and Panama - and gained politically. But there were successful small wars, and then there were quagmires, and apparently George H.W. Bush and his son did not see eye to eye.

I know [Bush senior] would not admit this now, but he was opposed to it. I asked him if he had talked to W about invading Iraq. He said, 'No I haven't, and I won't, but Brent [Scowcroft] has.' Brent would not have talked to him without the old man's okaying it. Scowcroft, national security adviser in the elder Bush's administration, penned a highly publicized warning to George W. Bush about the perils of an invasion.

Herskowitz's revelations are not the sole indicator of Bush's pre-election thinking on Iraq. In December 1999, some six months after his talks with Herskowitz, Bush surprised veteran political chroniclers, including the Boston Globe 's David Nyhan, with his blunt pronouncements about Saddam at a six-way New Hampshire primary event that got little notice: It was a gaffe-free evening for the rookie front-runner, till he was asked about Saddam's weapons stash, wrote Nyhan. 'I'd take 'em out,' [Bush] grinned cavalierly, 'take out the weapons of mass destruction·I'm surprised he's still there, said Bush of the despot who remains in power after losing the Gulf War to Bush Jr.'s father·It remains to be seen if that offhand declaration of war was just Texas talk, a sort of locker room braggadocio, or whether it was Bush's first big clinker.

The notion that President Bush held unrealistic or naïve views about the consequences of war was further advanced recently by a Bush supporter, the evangelist Pat Robertson, who revealed that Bush had told him the Iraq invasion would yield no casualties. In addition, in recent days, high-ranking US military officials have complained that the White House did not provide them with adequate resources for the task at hand.

Herskowitz considers himself a friend of the Bush family, and has been a guest at the family vacation home in Kennebunkport. In the late 1960s, Herskowitz, a longtime Houston Chronicle sports columnist designated President Bush's father, then-Congressman George HW Bush, to replace him as a guest columnist, and the two have remained close since then. (Herskowitz was suspended briefly in April without pay for reusing material from one of his own columns, about legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden.)

In 1999, when Herskowitz turned in his chapters for Charge to Keep, Bush's staff expressed displeasure -often over Herskowitz's use of language provided by Bush himself. In a chapter on the oil business, Herskowitz included Bush's own words to describe the Texan's unprofitable business ventures, writing: the companies were floundering. I got a call from one of the campaign lawyers, he was kind of angry, and he said, 'You've got some wrong information.' I didn't bother to say, 'Well you know where it came from.' [The lawyer] said, 'We do not consider that the governor struggled or floundered in the oil business. We consider him a successful oilman who started up at least two new businesses.'

In the end, campaign officials decided not to go with Herskowitz's account, and, moreover, demanded everything back. The lawyer called me and said, 'Delete it. Shred it. Just do it.'

They took it and [communications director] Karen [Hughes] rewrote it, he said. A campaign official arrived at his home at seven a.m. on a Monday morning and took his notes and computer files. However, Herskowitz, who is known for his memory of anecdotes from his long history in journalism and book publishing, says he is confident about his recollections.

According to Herskowitz, Bush was reluctant to discuss his time in the Texas Air National Guard - and inconsistent when he did so. Bush, he said, provided conflicting explanations of how he came to bypass a waiting list and obtain a coveted Guard slot as a domestic alternative to being sent to Vietnam. Herskowitz also said that Bush told him that after transferring from his Texas Guard unit two-thirds through his six-year military obligation to work on an Alabama political campaign, he did not attend any Alabama National Guard drills at all, because he was excused. This directly contradicts his public statements that he participated in obligatory training with the Alabama National Guard. Bush's claim to have fulfilled his military duty has been subject to intense scrutiny; he has insisted in the past that he did show up for monthly drills in Alabama - though commanding officers say they never saw him, and no Guardsmen have come forward to accept substantial rewards for anyone who can claim to have seen Bush on base.

Herskowitz said he asked Bush if he ever flew a plane again after leaving the Texas Air National Guard in 1972 - which was two years prior to his contractual obligation to fly jets was due to expire. He said Bush told him he never flew any plane - military or civilian - again. That would contradict published accounts in which Bush talks about his days in 1973 working with inner-city children, when he claimed to have taken some of the children up in a plane.

In 2002, three years after he had been pulled off the George W. Bush biography, Herskowitz was asked by Bush's father to write a book about the current president's grandfather, Prescott Bush, after getting a message that the senior Bush wanted to see him. Former President Bush just handed it to me. We were sitting there one day, and I was visiting him there in his office·He said, 'I wish somebody would do a book about my dad.'

He said to me, 'I know this has been a disappointing time for you, but it's amazing how many times something good will come out of it.' I passed it on to my agent, he jumped all over it. I asked [Bush senior], 'Would you support it and would you give me access to the rest of family?' He said yes.

That book, Duty, Honor, Country: The Life and Legacy of Prescott Bush , was published in 2003 by Routledge. If anything, the book has been criticized for its over-reliance on the Bush family's perspective and rosy interpretation of events. Herskowitz himself is considered the ultimate as-told-to author, lending credibility to his account of what George W. Bush told him. Herskowitz's other books run the gamut of public figures, and include the memoirs of Reagan aide Deaver, former Texas Governor and Nixon Treasury Secretary John Connally, newsman Dan Rather, astronaut Walter Cunningham, and baseball greats Mickey Mantle and Nolan Ryan.

After Herskowitz was pulled from the Bush book project, the biographer learned that a scenario was being prepared to explain his departure. I got a phone call from someone in the Bush campaign, confidentially, saying 'Watch your back.'

Reporters covering Bush say that when they inquired as to why Herskowitz was no longer on the project, Hughes intimated that Herskowitz had personal habits that interfered with his writing - a claim Herskowitz said is unfounded. Later, the campaign put out the word that Herskowitz had been removed for missing a deadline. Hughes subsequently finished the book herself - it received largely critical reviews for its self-serving qualities and lack of spontaneity or introspection.

So, said Herskowitz, the best material was left on the cutting room floor, including Bush's true feelings.

He told me that as a leader, you can never admit to a mistake, Herskowitz said. That was one of the keys to being a leader.

Research support for this article was provided by the Investigative Fund of The Nation Institute .

Russ Baker is an award-winning independent journalist who has been published in The New York Times ,The Nation ,Washington Post ,The Telegraph (UK), Sydney Morning-Herald , and Der Spiegel , among many others.

© Copyright 2004 gnn.tv


Why thank you....Ms sweetness and light....
Well, obviously your faith makes cursing a personal choice too. Try reading the post next time and do not, please, put words into my mouth. I was not comparing Hitler to a Jew. What a ridiculous statement. I was not comparing Hitler to abortion, even a more ridiculous statement. I was talking about moral relativity, and that the people in Germany during the rise of Hitler were probably defending his stand on Jews, just like you are defending abortion, because when people are led to believe that any life, at any stage, means nothing, or in your case state it does not even exist, it is a breeding ground for people like Hitler. I meant that people in Germany were probably rationalizing the killing of Jews like you are rationalizing the killing of babies, therefore making it easier to accept what Hitler was doing. You twist words and when you don't get your way you result to base name calling. Calm down, get a grip and a cup of coffee. I am not your enemy.
i am making light of the

attempts to discredit Barack by calling him a celebrity.  You will see the same issue repeated over and over on this board, only by those who seriously consider that a valid issues.


 


Perhaps because the book has only now come to light....
I didn't know about the book until now. The point being...it is known about now, she knew it then, she should not have taken the job. What if they had chosen Michelle Malkin or Ann Coulter? Would that be okay with you? Geez.
Glad you see the light.......
xx
Thanks for shedding that light sm
I had not considered what it would do to the lower income people. I had only considered that a straight-across-the board system would work better than our tiered/progressive/whatever you want to call it works now. I do like the flat-rate system, much more equitable.
The light at the end of the tunnel

"We hate you guys. Once you start issuing $1 trillion, 2 trillion …we know the dollar is going to depreciate, so we hate you guys but there is nothing much we can do."

So says Lueo Ping, China Regulatory Commission (02/11/09)


I will gladly eat crow if I'm wrong because our country needs help, but I still don't think it will work.  We have too many in Washington who are crooks and until we get our government to actually work FOR us instead of working for themselves......maybe we will get there.  Who knows.  Right now I don't like the road we are on.  I don't like spending so much money and borrowing from China or just printing money.  I don't like the idea of all these government programs providing welfare, etc.  This package isn't even going to help for a year or two, if it does at all, so regardless more people are going to lose jobs, homes, etc. 


I think the light will come back on again.

Obama is a very wise man. He has come up with an excellent plan to get distressed homeowners back on their feet. He is going to take away their vehicles. 


 


Anybody got a light? 


So shines a light in a dim world. sm
Loved the scene from Armageddon.  Great time to tie it in. Thanks!
Valles and these parents see the light....nm
x
Glad you can make light.
Put your political silliness aside and think of someone other than yourself, and yes, they can use body armor.  If you want to send them some, please do.  Let me tell you one thing, you don't intimidate me at all.  You can laugh and act like a fool all you want, but the truth is, you care about your political perversions and not a bit about the troops or you would be doing something to make their lives easier.  Like I said, I never ever met a soldier who didn't want a package from home.  Never.
I think you already have someone to light candles and pray to...
ahem.
Let us hope that the light at the end of the tunnel

isn't a freight train getting ready to run us over.  That is just how I feel about our economy and government right now.  I'm tired of the finger pointing.  I'm tired of republican versus democrat.  I'm tired of politicians and CEOs lining their pockets with money while the rest of us struggle to survive because of what they have done to our economy. 


After the debate my husband and I flipped back and forth between CNN and Fox.  All CNN talked about was how Barry won the debate and most people on Fox said McCain did.  LOL.  Personally, I think they both could have done better.  I think that time has come that we want more answers and we want specifics.  We are tired of being pacified just so these politicians can get elected and not do anything they promised us during their campaign. 


Mrs. Bridger, you need to chill and light
yourself up another fattie.
I kinda like the puff, light, etc.

Saves some money and if I put them down, they go out instead of burning away. I had my first carton of 'em last week. Took 7 days for that carton. Sunday I started my second carton. I'm almost through that one today because it's not a "puff and light."


Some day....


Ggive me a break...now that the story has seen the light of day maybe.
What was wrong with the GOVERNOR wardrobe. Why did it need the RNC boost into the ELITE label league of NM and Saks? What part of HYPOCRISY do you not get? It's not so much about the money (though that aspect of it is an eye-opener), but rather the conflicting image/message of NM, Saks and Joe the Plumber.
Saved by the test. Undecided has seen the light.
with sense of clarity and purpose. What a relief. Lord, what a glorious day.
Thanks for the article, puts O in a good light really.
Told me how he is trying to rein in the lobbyists and get spending under better control and not things as usual in DC. I am Obama girl, thanks for posting!
If you mean John Edwards....the affair and a child that has just come to light. nm
nm
Does shed some light on how things work in Alaska. sm
It is interesting that she is against more taxes on the oil companies overall but has a 75% tax on oil profits in Alaska.
A little off topic...sm
 
TO ALL THE KIDS

WHO SURVIVED the 
40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!


First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant.

 

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

 

 

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

 

 

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we
rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

 

As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats, seat belts or air bags.


Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat.


We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.


We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and

 

NO ONE actually died from this.

 

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank koolade made with sugar, but we weren't overweight because .

 

WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!

 

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back  when the streetlights came on.

 

 

No one was able to reach us all day.

 

 

And we were O.K.



We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down
the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

 

 

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or chat rooms..........

 

 

WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found  them!

 

 

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no
lawsuits from these accidents.

 

 

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

 

 

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays,

made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang
the bell, or just walked in and talke! d to them!

 

 

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!

 

 

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.

 

 

They actually sided with the law!

 

 

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!

 

 

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

 

 

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned

 

HOW TO

DEAL WITH IT ALL!

 

If YOU are one of them . . . CONGRATULATIONS!

 

 

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as
kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives

 

for our own good.

 

And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave (and lucky) their parents were.

 

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!


what topic would you like us

to discuss? I'm open to discussion.


 


off topic but.
regarding that burial arrangement.. In much of Europe burial plots are "rented." You can only stay buried there as long as someone continues to pay the rent. It is a "duty" that gets handed down generation to generation. If there is no one paying your yearly rent, they dig you up and you go to the common area, which is oftentimes not even actually burial. Many cemetaries have a kind of holding area that is just full of the bones that remain from the people who were removed from the burial sites for non-payment.
Nothing to say on the topic?
Yawn.
I was the OP of that particular topic.

I do believe that I stated below that I am not one of the irresponsible people who got us in this mess.  My husband and I pay our bills and our mortgage.  I know the government won't pay off my mortgage.  It was wishful thinking and playfulness.  That is why I encouraged others to think about what they could buy if they didn't have their mortgage to pay each month.  I'm sorry but you have taken it WAY out of context and blown it WAY out of proportion.  I don't expect any one to pay my bills but me and I certainly don't want my money going to irresponsible people either. 


Don't get me wrong, it would be nice if the government would reward responsible people for once instead of continually giving more money to crooked politicians and crooked rich people and constantly giving to irresponsible people.  What do honest, hard-working Americans get in return for their hard work......we are asked to give more of our money to the government so they can spend it well on Pelosi's mice and other porky things in a stimulous package that will not work.


BTW, you assumed that I'm a pub.  When it comes down to it....I'm a middle of the road kind of person.  I agree some with one side and some with another.  So don't stereotype me as a pub and call me a hypocrit.  It was wishful thinking and playfulness and you turned it into this huge issue when it should not have been. 


Try less caffeine and maybe some yoga for stress relief.


I am the OP of that topic.

I pay my bills.  I pay my mortgage.  I expect no one to pay my bills for me.  I was suggesting the government paying off my mortgage for me in a playful manner.  That is why I encouraged others to think of things they could buy if they didn't have to pay their mortgage every month.   You assume that I am a pub obviously or you would not have attacked my playful topic and called me a hypocrit.  Well, I am not a pub.  I am a middle of the road kind of person who can see some points on both sides of the fence.  So stop stereotyping me and please reduce your caffeine intake and learn to take a playful topic as that....just for fun. 


Red state, blue state?

Written last Thanksgiving:  "Some would argue that two different nations actually celebrated: upright, moral, traditional red America and the dissolute, liberal blue states clustered on the periphery of the heartland. The truth, however, is much more complicated and interesting than that.

Take two iconic states: Texas and Massachusetts. In some ways, they were the two states competing in the last election. In the world's imagination, you couldn't have two starker opposites. One is the homeplace of Harvard, gay marriage, high taxes, and social permissiveness. The other is Bush country, solidly Republican, traditional, and gun-toting. Massachusetts voted for Kerry over Bush 62 to 37 percent; Texas voted for Bush over Kerry 61 to 38 percent.

So ask yourself a simple question: which state has the highest divorce rate? Marriage was a key issue in the last election, with Massachusetts' gay marriages becoming a symbol of alleged blue state decadence and moral decay. But in actual fact, Massachusetts has the lowest divorce rate in the country at 2.4 divorces per 1,000 inhabitants. Texas - which until recently made private gay sex a criminal offence - has a divorce rate of 4.1. A fluke? Not at all. The states with the highest divorce rates in the U.S. are Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Texas. And the states with the lowest divorce rates are: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont. Every single one of the high divorce rate states went for Bush. Every single one of the low divorce rate states went for Kerry. The Bible Belt divorce rate, in fact, is roughly 50 percent higher than the national average.

Some of this discrepancy can be accounted for by the fact that couples tend to marry younger in the Bible Belt - and many clearly don't have the maturity to know what they're getting into. There's some correlation too between rates of college education and stable marriages, with the Bible Belt lagging a highly educated state like Massachusetts. But the irony still holds. Those parts of America that most fiercely uphold what they believe are traditional values are not those parts where traditional values are healthiest. Hypocrisy? Perhaps. A more insightful explanation is that these socially troubled communities cling onto absolutes in the abstract because they cannot live up to them in practice.

But doesn't being born again help bring down divorce rates? Jesus, after all, was mum on the subject of homosexuality, but was very clear about divorce, declaring it a sin unless adultery was involved. A recent study, however, found no measurable difference in divorce rates between those who are "born again" and those who are not. 29 percent of Baptists have been divorced, compared to 21 percent of Catholics. Moreover, a staggering 23 percent of married born-agains have been divorced twice or more. Teen births? Again, the contrast is striking. In a state like Texas, where the religious right is extremely strong and the rhetoric against teenage sex is gale-force strong, the teen births as a percentage of all births is 16.1 percent. In liberal, secular, gay-friendly Massachusetts, it's 7.4, almost half. Marriage itself is less popular in Texas than in Massachusetts. In Texas, the percent of people unmarried is 32.4 percent; in Massachusetts, it's 26.8 percent. So even with a higher marriage rate, Massachusetts manages a divorce rate almost half of its "conservative" rival.

Or take abortion. America is one of the few Western countries where the legality of abortion is still ferociously disputed. It's a country where the religious right is arguably the strongest single voting bloc, and in which abortion is a constant feature of cultural politics. Compare it to a country like Holland, perhaps the epitome of socially liberal, relativist liberalism. So which country has the highest rate of abortion? It's not even close. America has an abortion rate of 21 abortions per 1,000 women aged between 15 and 44. Holland has a rate of 6.8. Americans, in other words, have three times as many abortions as the Dutch. Remind me again: which country is the most socially conservative?

Even a cursory look at the leading members of the forces of social conservatism in America reveals the same pattern. The top conservative talk-radio host, Rush Limbaugh, has had three divorces and an addiction to pain-killers. The most popular conservative television personality, Bill O'Reilly, just settled a sex harassment suit that indicated a highly active adulterous sex life. Bill Bennett, the guru of the social right, was for many years a gambling addict. Karl Rove's chief outreach manager to conservative Catholics for the last four years, Deal Hudson, also turned out to be a man with a history of sexual harassment. Bob Barr, the conservative Georgian congressman who wrote the "Defense of Marriage Act," has had three wives so far. The states which register the highest ratings for the hot new television show, "Desperate Housewives," are all Bush-states.

The complicated truth is that America truly is a divided and conflicted country. But it's a grotesque exaggeration to say that the split is geographical, or correlated with blue and red states. Many of America's biggest "sinners" are those most intent on upholding virtue. In fact, it may be partly because they know sin so close-up that they want to prevent its occurrence among others. And some of those states which have the most liberal legal climate - the Northeast and parts of the upper MidWest - are also, in practice, among the most socially conservative. To ascribe all this to "hypocrisy" seems to me too crude an explanation. America is simply a far more complicated and diverse place than crude red and blue divisions can explain.


I don't know what state you live in but in my state

they are adding police and only in the big cities do they have paid firemen. The rest are volunteers.


I look at it this way: If a state can't stay in the black, then they have to cut spending some place that wouldn't jeopardize the safety of the citizens. Threats of cutting essential services like Barney Fife stated today are unjustified. Cut the non-essential services first.


Our governor talks about cutting back on services, laying off government workers, which I think is a good idea because government is too big anyway, but then he turns around and spends more money on non-essential items. Doesn't make sense.  


 


 


I listened to Bush speak last night. No light at the end of this tunnel. nm
nm
Note to gt......off topic

It's me - the one who's been posting under all the gt alias joke monikers.  I just had to blow off steam after the conservative board debacle last night.  Don't know why I get involved in it.  My fall equinox resolution will be to inform, not condemn.


Thanks for tolerating my not-that-funny-ha-ha little joke.


Kind of off topic
Do any of you ever watch subtitle South Korean shows?  Out here in CA, we have a channel that is for mainly Indian/Asian shows and I gotta tell ya, I have gotten to like the South Korean mini series..they last about 18 shows, twice a week..They are so good and have made me understand the Asian culture so much..I have a Japanese friend and I was astonished when I went to her home, you take your shoes off and sit on the floor for eating, sleep on the floor..all the things I thought were in the past..Plus, a big bonus, at least I think so, Asian guys are so cute. Hey, conservatives, if you are gonna attack me for this post, save it..okay?  IMO, learning about others will keep us alive and not bombing each other.
new topic for discussion

McCain's cross in the dirt story he tells now -- history of:


 


how similar the McCain story is to that offered by Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsen and then later popularized by Christian leaders Chuck Colson and Billy Graham. Sullivan also points out other suspicious changes:


The story changed from the guard using a sandal to the guard using a stick.


At Saddleback, McCain talked about a single guard being the protagonist. The same guard loosened his ropes and then later sketchd the cross in the dirt. In McCain's 1999 book, these were two different guards at two different prison camps.


McCain's first writings about his time in captivity didn't mention the story at all, so he's asked his readers for evidence of McCain offering that story prior to his 1999 book (when he was gearing up for a presidential run).


Several contributors to the comment thread on my first post have pointed to this rather stunning New York Times piece from 2000 in which McCain tells the story but about someone else!


Many years ago a scared American prisoner of war in Vietnam was tied in torture ropes by his tormentors and left alone in an empty room to suffer through the night. Later in the evening a guard he had never spoken to entered the room and silently loosened the ropes to relieve his suffering. Just before morning, that same guard came back and re-tightened the ropes before his less humanitarian comrades returned. He never said a word to the grateful prisoner, but some months later, on a Christmas morning, as the prisoner stood alone in the prison courtyard, the same good Samaritan walked up to him and stood next to him for a few moments. Then with his sandal, the guard drew a cross in the dirt. Both prisoner and guard both stood wordlessly there for a minute or two, venerating the cross, until the guard rubbed it out and walked away.

 


I like Obama, but everything is a topic

There has always been scandal and there always will be because we're all human.  I think Obama wants us to think he's "not involved" and does not promote it, which I'm sure he doesn't, but you can't think that he's not liking the negative attention casted towards that party rather than his.  This has become something big (baby mama drama) in this country.  It's everywhere. I think Maury Povich does a show every day on it doesn't he?  Paternity testing and such...  It's in our world and there's no turning our backs on it. 


This should be the #1 topic on this board. sm
The Fed is responsible for this whole mess. They will also profit from it like they have been since 1913. The currency controllers have control over everything including the 2 puppets starring in the current horse and pony show.

Another good video to watch for those that do not understand our very corrupt system is Money as Debt. Here is the link:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9050474362583451279
I'm with you and hope to keep a topic like this going. sm
America is sick, someone please call a doctor.
One way to make the topic go away
is to stop responding to it. Does it occur to you you're giving it a lot more power than it probably deserves to have?
O is not the article topic.
Or just trying to avoid it all together? Once you read it, you might be able to at least grasp the main idea.

I am used to the lame smears and all the pathos that surrounds those who hurl them. They don't work. Even the more intelligent among the pubs are beginning to see that, but I guess it takes longer for others to catch on.
You really can't stay on topic, can you?
It might help you focus a bit better.
Forget the topic I did...LOL. nm

I was just going to post on this very topic -
Not only are these companies getting our tax money to cover their irresponsible and greedy butts, but they are not even paying in their taxes!

It really burns me up - if I owed that money they would be all over me - potentially a crime - my butt would be sitting in prison!!!


Here's a topic for discussion

Leaving criminal penalties out of the equation:  Is it immoral to break the law? 


What if you consider the law immoral (such as, for example, segregation)?  What if you consider integration immoral?  How much does individual conscience have to do with this?  Easy to say someone else's conscience is in error, but they are saying the same about yours.


Some people try to short their taxes because the money goes to fund a war they do not believe in (there's usually one going on) or to fund abortions, or medical research they abhor, and now to bail out failed businesses and individual mortgages.  I think everyone could find something that's funded by our tax money objectionable.  How much are we morally required to render unto Caesar?


It's illegal to overstay a parking meter.  Is it also immoral if you did it intentionally, simply because you've violated a law?  How about sliding through a red light at 3 a.m. on a deserted country road when you could not possibly injure anyone? 


If it's legal to raise rent past a tenant's ability to pay, is it also moral?  What if this makes them homeless?


you are also competely off topic,
I never 'flashed' my IQ, I just 'mentioned' it once.

I only reacted to 'infantile and small-brained' comments.

Spare yourself your moral lectures, if you want to preach, do it in church.