Wow. Something about open mouth and insert foot should apply here.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_bin_laden_torture_republicans
Do these people just need us to torture to make themselves feel more virile or something?
Quote from: nathanm on May 18, 2011, 08:19:48 AM
Do these people just need us to torture to make themselves feel more virile or something?
Wasn't so much that for me, as it was the irony of the statement, considering Sen. McCain was a POW for 5 friggin' years. Santorum's a tool.
Quote from: Hoss on May 18, 2011, 08:25:32 AM
Wasn't so much that for me, as it was the irony of the statement, considering Sen. McCain was a POW for 5 friggin' years. Santorum's a tool.
Santorum is santorum. I would not suggest looking that up on urban dictionary at work.
Now that's a great lesson, Nate.
http://www.spreadingsantorum.com/index2.html
Thanks! :o
What's interesting is Paneta is attributed as saying waterboarding did not result in the information leading to OBL's whereabouts, yet former AG Mukasey says it most certainly did.
Someone's lying out their arse.
Quote from: Conan71 on May 18, 2011, 11:50:04 AM
What's interesting is Paneta is attributed as saying waterboarding did not result in the information leading to OBL's whereabouts, yet former AG Mukasey says it most certainly did.
Someone's lying out their arse.
I'm betting the truth lies somewhere in between. Can we assume we got actionable intel from waterboarding in the last 7 years? Yes, almost definitely. Did we get a lot of trash intel, too? Almost definitely. Is anything we got during a waterboarding session admissible in court? Absolutely not.
Allowing for the possibility that we got good info from waterboarding doesn't concede the point that it is still torture, still morally wrong, and still produces information with a very high signal to noise ratio.
Also: Santorum's a moron.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 12:09:35 PM
I'm betting the truth lies somewhere in between. Can we assume we got actionable intel from waterboarding in the last 7 years? Yes, almost definitely. Did we get a lot of trash intel, too? Almost definitely. Is anything we got during a waterboarding session admissible in court? Absolutely not.
Allowing for the possibility that we got good info from waterboarding doesn't concede the point that it is still torture, still morally wrong, and still produces information with a very high signal to noise ratio.
But it was quite admissible in the court of double tap.
Santorum is yet one more in a long line of egotistical partisans I wish we would hear no more from. CBS morning news was going on about troubles in the Gingrich campaign due to his problem with oral diarrhea.
Trump is out, Romney or Huckabee will likely be the only two standing closer to the primaries. I believe I heard something about Bachman possibly announcing soon. She will get blown out quickly as well by the mainstreamers.
Quote from: Conan71 on May 18, 2011, 12:41:41 PM
But it was quite admissible in the court of double tap.
It was, and so you get the doubleedged swordness of it: we can torture our way to being able to deploy an assassination squad, but we can't torture our way into a legitimate conviction in court. I don't disagree with how we took out Bin laden, but this whole thing can't be about simply killing the adversary. There's a huge chunk that has to be a moral victory, and in that, the waterboarding was a total loss.
Re: the Republican field . . . it's getting bad, quick. Soooo many lightweights and/or compromised also-rans. The problem is that the GOP is so ideological split. The Old Guard will put its (still considerable) heft behind a centrist like Romney or Pawlenty, while the Tea Party is casting about for someone who's angry enough to represent them. I really don't think there is one candidate out there who can straddle that fence -- especially when the Tea Party is starting to really become so explicitly anti-establishment.
Quote from: Conan71 on May 18, 2011, 12:41:41 PM
Trump is out, Romney or Huckabee will likely be the only two standing closer to the primaries.
Huckabee announced last night (I believe) that he is out too.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 01:21:51 PM
Re: the Republican field . . . it's getting bad, quick. Soooo many lightweights and/or compromised also-rans. The problem is that the GOP is so ideological split. The Old Guard will put its (still considerable) heft behind a centrist like Romney or Pawlenty, while the Tea Party is casting about for someone who's angry enough to represent them. I really don't think there is one candidate out there who can straddle that fence -- especially when the Tea Party is starting to really become so explicitly anti-establishment.
Obama should be a shoe-in. So why aren't you celebrating, or are you?
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 01:54:19 PM
Obama should be a shoe-in. So why aren't you celebrating, or are you?
Likely because there were many that said Hillary would be a shoe-in as well. It's still well early to tell.
Quote from: Hoss on May 18, 2011, 02:06:51 PM
Likely because there were many that said Hillary would be a shoe-in as well. It's still well early to tell.
The near certainty of
any Democrat (or at least not a Republican) should have you guys jumping in the aisles for joy.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 01:21:51 PM
It was, and so you get the doubleedged swordness of it: we can torture our way to being able to deploy an assassination squad, but we can't torture our way into a legitimate conviction in court. I don't disagree with how we took out Bin laden, but this whole thing can't be about simply killing the adversary. There's a huge chunk that has to be a moral victory, and in that, the waterboarding was a total loss.
Re: the Republican field . . . it's getting bad, quick. Soooo many lightweights and/or compromised also-rans. The problem is that the GOP is so ideological split. The Old Guard will put its (still considerable) heft behind a centrist like Romney or Pawlenty, while the Tea Party is casting about for someone who's angry enough to represent them. I really don't think there is one candidate out there who can straddle that fence -- especially when the Tea Party is starting to really become so explicitly anti-establishment.
You don't convict the man responsible for the deaths of thousands in court. If the information was, in fact, gained via waterboarding or pushing bamboo shoots under someone's fingernails, it resulted in a moral victory and a huge morale booster.
I'm starting to warm to Pawlenty a little as I hear sound bites from him. Romney's biggest problem is going to be having to sell himself around Romneycare and I don't think he can do it. There's too many on the Tea Party spectrum of the GOP who won't let him get away with that.
Huckabee out? Were there bones rattling in his closet? Affair, toe-tapping in the airport, diddling underage boys?
Quote from: Conan71 on May 18, 2011, 02:20:49 PM
Huckabee out? Were there bones rattling in his closet? Affair, toe-tapping in the airport, diddling underage boys?
I just caught it on TV. I don't remember the exact words but it was not apparently related to skeletons, etc.
Edit:
Found this
http://www.mikehuckabee.com/mike-huckabee-news?ContentRecord_id=9a989cf6-fe6d-42fb-9825-d8095c2d15c2
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 02:10:25 PM
The near certainty of any Democrat (or at least not a Republican) should have you guys jumping in the aisles for joy.
I want my guy to win, sure, but I really do believe in the marketplace of ideas. If the GOP has a strong field, my guy is forced to play smarter, be sharper, is perhaps even held to a higher standard. If Obama's a shoe-in, he doesn't need to be quite as loyal to his base and even though I don't see him as quite the traitor to the cause that some other libs do, I still think he's veered right a couple of times too many. If he still needs my vote, then (at least according to theory) he'll try to court it by not veering as much.
This cycle, though, I'm glad the GOP is self-destructing because more than usual I think the ideas clanging around in some of those heads aren't just bad for the country, but they're crazybad. Like, drive-us-off-a-cliff bad (cf. debt ceiling debate). It hasn't always been that bad with the GOP, but it sure is now.
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 02:26:21 PM
I just caught it on TV. I don't remember the exact words but it was not apparently related to skeletons, etc.
Edit:
Found this
http://www.mikehuckabee.com/mike-huckabee-news?ContentRecord_id=9a989cf6-fe6d-42fb-9825-d8095c2d15c2
No skeletons in evidence. I'm betting he either couldn't make the poll numbers or the dollar signs line up to his satisfaction. Possibly both.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 02:34:49 PM
I want my guy to win, sure, but I really do believe in the marketplace of ideas. If the GOP has a strong field, my guy is forced to play smarter, be sharper, is perhaps even held to a higher standard. If Obama's a shoe-in, he doesn't need to be quite as loyal to his base and even though I don't see him as quite the traitor to the cause that some other libs do, I still think he's veered right a couple of times too many. If he still needs my vote, then (at least according to theory) he'll try to court it by not veering as much.
This cycle, though, I'm glad the GOP is self-destructing because more than usual I think the ideas clanging around in some of those heads aren't just bad for the country, but they're crazybad. Like, drive-us-off-a-cliff bad (cf. debt ceiling debate). It hasn't always been that bad with the GOP, but it sure is now.
Typical left vs. right stuff. Competition makes my guy better. Goes both ways, of course. See another thread regarding the debt ceiling. I forget which one at the moment. Nice video of Harry Reid in 2006 saying not to raise the debt.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 02:35:53 PM
No skeletons in evidence. I'm betting he either couldn't make the poll numbers or the dollar signs line up to his satisfaction. Possibly both.
Reading his account, sounds like fund-raising and approval wouldn't have been much an issue. However, a fundamentalist like him would have gotten slaughtered in open primary states.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 02:35:53 PM
No skeletons in evidence. I'm betting he either couldn't make the poll numbers or the dollar signs line up to his satisfaction. Possibly both.
From what he has on his website, I'd say he just decided he didn't really want the job.
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 02:44:18 PM
From what he has on his website, I'd say he just decided he didn't really want the job.
Can't blame him. I wonder how many times President Obama has thought of calling McCain in the middle of the night and said: "Uh, how bad did you
really want this job, John? It's yours!"
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 02:40:10 PM
Typical left vs. right stuff. Competition makes my guy better. Goes both ways, of course. See another thread regarding the debt ceiling. I forget which one at the moment. Nice video of Harry Reid in 2006 saying not to raise the debt.
Well, look, you asked so I told you. I think the GOP isn't thinking clearly, and that the Tea Party is dangerous, especially if they get their way. They really want to destroy a lot of the modern parts of our state that I personally value -- and in some cases, am relying on in the future. I genuinely would like a considered opposition in the GOP, but I don't think we have that right now.
I can't speak to the debt argument in 2006. I don't know the context, and wasn't paying attention to it back then. If the circumstances were much like they are now, then Reid and Obama were both wrong, as is the GOP now. Flirting with a debt panic in order to advance an ideological agenda is really bad policy.
Quote from: we vs us on May 18, 2011, 03:58:57 PM
Well, look, you asked so I told you.
Correct. Also about what I expected. I am not condemning your answer.
2006? Ah yes, before the sh!t hit the financial fan. I think the world economy is far more precarious today.
In 2006 we were only 4 years into the Bush doctrine.
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 02:10:25 PM
The near certainty of any Democrat (or at least not a Republican) should have you guys jumping in the aisles for joy.
I just don't believe ANYTHING is a certainty, although with the political climate on the right these days the mass destruction of the moderate wing of the Republican base will make those on the extreme right not very palatable to the moderates and/or indies. Which usually results in those people not even voting, as opposed to voting for the other party.
I'm never averse to voting for a Republican if he/she aligns more closely to my belief system/fiscal views than the opponent on the other side of the aisle. Problem is alot of these loonies in the TP have these beliefs based in hard-line religion. Religion should NOT play into politics, although I know it does..I'm not naive.
I'm not for one party. I'm for the person/people that most align with what I believe our path should be for this city/state/country.
Quote from: Teatownclown on May 18, 2011, 06:38:21 PM
2006? Ah yes, before the sh!t hit the financial fan. I think the world economy is far more precarious today.
In 2006 we were only 4 years into the Bush doctrine.
Weren't there problems with the economy immediately after Bush took office in Jan 2001?
Red,
Remember how the stock market took a big juicy dump about 3 weeks after Bush was nominated. They knew then what a mess was coming.
McCain and Santorum absolutely personify and highlight exactly the point that I have been trying to make concerning the hijacking of the Republican party. McCain IS a Republican. Santorum is.... well, santorum!
Quote from: heironymouspasparagus on May 18, 2011, 09:05:45 PM
Red,
Remember how the stock market took a big juicy dump about 3 weeks after Bush was nominated. They knew then what a mess was coming.
Actually what I remember is the machine tool manufacturing sector was on its way down many months before Bush was nominated. Guess which sector of manufacturing I was working in at the time.
Quote from: Red Arrow on May 18, 2011, 09:23:15 PM
Actually what I remember is the machine tool manufacturing sector was on its way down many months before Bush was nominated. Guess which sector of manufacturing I was working in at the time.
That was likely largely due to the FRB's increasing the target rate up over 6% in early 2000, which pushed commercial paper and corporate bonds up over 7%, a level not seen since except during the recent liquidity crisis.
Quote from: nathanm on May 18, 2011, 11:19:06 PM
That was likely largely due to the FRB's increasing the target rate up over 6% in early 2000, which pushed commercial paper and corporate bonds up over 7%, a level not seen since except during the recent liquidity crisis.
No, it simply means manufacturer's sales were down, which meant they didn't have near the demand for machine tools as they had prior to then. We've seen a prosperous economy with higher primes than that.
If you ascribe to the idea that 3% is a nominal amount in terms of taxes and how they will or won't affect the eocnomy, then a percentage or two in borrowing rates should also have a limited effect on the economy, right?
Quote from: Conan71 on May 18, 2011, 11:48:59 PM
If you ascribe to the idea that 3% is a nominal amount in terms of taxes and how they will or won't affect the eocnomy, then a percentage or two in borrowing rates should also have a limited effect on the economy, right?
In things like machine tools which mainly have a demand when the manufacturing sector is expanding (as I understand it; I may be wrong..as guido likes to point out I don't know everything about everything), borrowing costs are relatively important.
Economically speaking, higher taxes are less contractionary than higher interest rates, as taxes only apply to the profit.
Quote from: nathanm on May 19, 2011, 01:30:10 AM
In things like machine tools which mainly have a demand when the manufacturing sector is expanding ...
As I remember it, our customers' sales were down, or at best stable, and they didn't need our product at the time. They didn't need new equipment and replacement for old equipment was also down.
Kind of independent of either Billy Bob or Bush.
I was in oil service related business at the time. Oil was recovering from a 98 - 99 low of under $10 a barrel. The hotness was still in telecom, but the real economy was not quite as exciting; still doing well, just not as well. The oil related companies used that as an excuse to make cuts (no, not me) and load the remaining people up with heavier work load and reap the windfall. Same old same ol'. Plus they used that as first big push to move all the machining to China. Small pieces before that, but that time for real.
So, since all the real manufacturing was moving to China, what need is there for machine tools?? Much less...