On May 14, 1:47 pm, Larry Blanchard <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Wed, 14 May 2008 11:04:20 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> > His
> > many other sins will be forgotten, and his foamy little sniveling
> > opponents on the Left will be relegated to being laughed at as the
> > caricatures of intellect that they are.
>
> Wow! We can always depend on Tim's tirades to be erudite and
> entertaining, regardless of their truth or falsity :-).
>
> Bush didn't win by outsmarting his opponent - he won by the power of
> better cheating.
And Rove was the architect, not Bush.
Leon wrote:
> "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> "Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>>
>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>>
>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>>
>> I like Obama too, but Clinton is better at getting the 'stupid' voters.
>> This is how Bush was elected twice...
>
> Strangly, the stupid voters were able to out smart the voters that opposed
> Bush. What would you call a group that is not as smart as the "stupid" one?
>
First, let me comment that I'm no fan of W's, but ...
What you say above is *exactly* at the heart of what keeps far lefties
up at night. They have tony education as fine liberal (in the bad
sense of the word) schools. They have been told that they are very
smart, insightful, and wise. Then they take a look at the unwashed
masses. A good plumber makes as much or even more than a Professor Of
Feminist Deconstructionist Literature And Whining. Their garbage man
seems happier than they are without the benefit of having gone to
Harvard to learn to hate Whitey. Whole blocks of the country vote
against their anointed candidates. They've spent a lifetime building
up a worldview that cannot withstand even the casual scrutiny of
Reality.
So ... they are bitter. Bitter because Joe Sixpack (for whom they have
complete contempt) doesn't listen to them. Bitter because those
redneck hunters, fishermen, loggers, and farmers, make fun of their
Ivy League pretentions. And then, when some faux Texan with an even
more phony "aw shucks" core pone style kicks their butts not once, but
twice in Federal elections, they are just *outraged*. Bush is one of
the most savvy, skilled politicians I've ever seen. His enemies
routinely dismiss him as stupid or worse and he regularly demolishes
them. I note with interest, for example, that W had better grades
in college than Gore-bie, The Peace Prize Boy - connoisseur of lefty
whine.
And there's more on the way. In looking over the past few years, I've
come to believe that the real motivation for the Iraq war was real
simple: To set up the timing and logistics to neutralize the
Syrian/Iranian threat. This threat has been and is quite real. These
guys are *the* bad guys in the ME, and have more to do with the
failure of calming things down than any Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Witness the recent Iranian-sponsored pillaging of the Lebanese
government for just one example. Anyway, when the time comes -
probably before he leaves office, Bush is going to declaw the Iranians
in a public and humiliating way. In 40 years, he'll be remembered as
having the brains and patience to undermine a very real threat. His
many other sins will be forgotten, and his foamy little sniveling
opponents on the Left will be relegated to being laughed at as the
caricatures of intellect that they are.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 14, 10:25 pm, Charlie Self <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> Oh, jeez, Tim. Sounds exactly like what was being said about Bobby
> Kennedy when he ran for Senator from NY, and then started his
> Presidential run...except for the racial. He was just a plain, ol'
> Massotwoshits carpetbagger.
Gee, a New York Senator/carpetbagger running for
President. That couldn't possible happen again,
could it?
--
FF
On May 14, 11:42 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Doug Winterburn wrote:
> > Leon wrote:
> >> "Doug Winterburn" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> >>news:[email protected]...
> >>> Renata wrote:
> >>>> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
> >>>> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
> >>>> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
> >>> NASA has adjusted their warming analysis:
>
> >>>http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0817-nasa_snafu.html
>
> >>>> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>
> >>>> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
> >>>> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
> >>> I hope we don't all freeze to death:
>
> >>>http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global...
>
> >> Have you noticed that cleaning up the air is causing global warming?
> >> Before emission controls no one complained about "global worming".
>
> > The warming crowd is now saying that the current cooling is caused by
> > warming? Now, "climate change" seems to be the rage - it covers all the
> > alarmist bases.
>
> The beauty of Global Warming Alarmism is that it is a "theory" that can be
> argued for all observed phenomena. Too hot? GW. Too cold? GW. Lots
> of storms? GS. Few storms? GW. The only real test of this theory would
> be to remove all government funding for it. Then we'd see how committed the
> apologists for this theory really are - they could donate their own funds
> for this Very Important Research.
>
> You gotta hand it to Peace Price Boy - The Gore-bie Of Our Time - He managed
> to popularize an obscure rat hole in research to further his political
> ambition. His keening about GW is analogous to Carter making nice with
> the murderous Hamas leadership: They are both vile purveyors of mayhem.
>
> http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22069080-5001031,...
>
> --
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
in the air.
As to the upcoming Presidential race, I'll just be happy if any of the
3 are better than the current one. I don't think the US can handle
another 4-8 years of that.
-Nathan
On May 14, 11:43 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
>
>
> > On May 13, 6:25 pm, Lou <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> Anybody, and I mean anybody who votes for Obama hasn't
> >> got a brain in there head. He has proven to be the most useless
> >> senator ever. He is nothing more than a used car salesman who
> >> seems to be able to sell the op on Nothing.
> >> Even I could get as far as he has if Oprah would buy
> >> me the presidency.
> >> ...
>
> > I don;t agree that he has been a senator long enough to
> > prove anything.
>
> > --
>
> > FF
>
> He's been senator long enough to prove *one* thing:
> He is a political scallywag, scoundrel, and racial
> carpetbagger.
>
Oh, jeez, Tim. Sounds exactly like what was being said about Bobby
Kennedy when he ran for Senator from NY, and then started his
Presidential run...except for the racial. He was just a plain, ol'
Massotwoshits carpetbagger.
On May 14, 4:53 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> N Hurst wrote:
>
> ...
>
>
> And THAT is Bush's failing. His stubborn insistence that
> we have to stay and fix what's been broke for 1500 years.
> Or ... was it really Bush? Could it have been the whiny
> State Department full of career bureaucrats hollering
> "You broke it, now you have to buy it." I can't tell
> who was stupider here, the administration or the State
> Department, but they were dead wrong.
Here's a hint, Colin Powell resigned after four years as
Secretary of State because he had been ignored for
the last three of Bush's first term. The last major foreign
policy decision for which Bush decided to follow Powell's
advice instead of Rumsfield and Cheney was the decision
to mount an offensive against al Queda and the Taliban
in Afghanistan.
>
>
> > Did Bush need to toss the Geneva Convention out the window?
>
> Where did he do that? AFAIK, he stuck to - barely - the ones
> which we've actually signed.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson,
disagrees with you, as does the USSC. So do I.
You've also made it clear that you don't want torture to
be illegal or to violate treaties. Its pretty clear that you
want people to be tortured. You read laws and treaties
(if you bother to read them at all) the way Clinton listens
to questions during a deposition, seeking someway to
misconstrue it to mean what you want.
>
>
> ...
> > Should the US be allowing her intelligence officers to use
> > interrogation techniques that are provably ineffective? US soldiers
>
> They managed to work to crack some of the top level Al Queda thugs
> pretty quickly
Your evidence for this is what, exactly, Kalid sheik
Mohammed's admission that he, not Osama bin Laden
was the mastermind behind the attacks of September 11,
2001?
> ... or is the military in on the vast conspiracy
> as well and lying about this too?
>
> > used some of the exact same techniques years ago and were court
> > martialled and convicted for waterboarding as recently as Vietnam. Yet
> > now we're cool with it?
>
> In Viet Nam, those techniques were used on people who wore the
> uniforms of an identifiable military. That means they were entitled to
> certain protections under international law. In this case, the
> subjects were people making war while hiding in civilian clothing -
I seem to remember the argument being made that the
Geneva Conventions did not apply to a civil war and that
persons who attacked civilians forfeited their protections.
I don't accept that, but is sounds a lot like a position you
would favor.
>
> Your captors are free to do almost anything they want including
> waterboarding you or making you listen to Sean Penn speeches.
>
What competent court or tribunal determined
that any person held at Guantanamo bay, in fact,
made war in civilian clothing?
Or are you arguing that
the rules and regulations governing captures on land and sea
and regulating the Armed Forces, passed by the Congress and
signed into law by the President of the United States aren't
REAL laws, just some sort of general suggestions?
> and they have almost NO protection under international laws. Fred will
> jump in here and claim otherwise, but he's wrong and exhibits wishful
> thinking on the matter. If you make war in plain clothing, you
> have the same legal status of a spy ... i.e., Almost none.
If a person who is hors de combat due to captivity,
and who is denied status as a protected person none-
the-less claims that status, that is a matter to be
decided by a competent court or tribunal. The US
military had a tried and true procedure for doing just
that and it probably would have been a pretty simple,
and entirely uncontroversial matter. There was no
excuse for abandoning that tried and true procedure.
US law has required that spies be tried before execution
since the Continental Congress passed the First US
Articles of War.
"Spies may not be punished without
trial." is one of the articles of the 1907 Hague conventions.
It would be difficult, at best, to mistreat a prisoner without
violating the common criminal provisions of the UCMJ
which, as you know, (e.g. the trial of the civilian spouse of
a US soldier for a crime allegedly committed in Germany)
apply to American civilians on US military bases abroad.
UNCATS prohibits torture, inhumane or degrading treatment
without exception.
I had been misled by many sources who claimed that the
US took exception to the minimal due process requirements
for spies and sabotouers in the GCs. Not so. The US
takes exception to certain restrictions on the applicability
of the death penalty, and (IIRC) to certain obligations to
allies and cobelligerents.
For UNCATS and most recent
treaties the US takes exception to any restrictions on the
applicability of the death penalty and to any provision that
is determined by the Federal Courts to be in conflict with
a provision of the Constitution.
Breathe control torture plainly violates UNCATS, and if
committed on an US military base, federal
criminal law.
Claims that it is legal to commit crimes against someone
because he is a bad person, are no longer persuasive
in any US court, nor should they be.
> You will also note that Al Queda is not a signatory to the
> Geneva Conventions and cannot thus make claims upon them.
While al Queda is not, most of the people accused
of being part of al Queda are nationals of states that
are. Further, inasmuchas a state of war does not
exist between those nations and the United States
if they commit a belligerent act they commit a crime
whether they are in uniform or not.
That of course, was never at issue. At issue was
the suspension of the normal process used by the US
military to determine if a person is a combatant, and
if so, lawful or unlawful.
As well as the claim
claim by the President and Commander-in-Chief that
he had authority to create courts, make the laws those
courts would enforce, their rules of evidence and procedure,
appoint the judges, the prosecutors and the defense
attorneys, and to direct their actions, and that the Congress,
to whom the plain language of the Constitution grants
the sole authority to do those things, has no say in
the matter.
>
> You will further note that while we made people uncomfortable
> and shoved them around and humiliated them, their fellow
> combatants beheaded people in the most horrible possible way.
Why should we note that? And if we should, why do you not
note the prisoners tortured to death in Bahgram prison? Does
their mistreatment mitigate the murder of Daniel Perle?
>
> There is no moral equivalence here, it is anti-war left wing
> fiction and propaganda.
>
If you are not arguing moral equivalence, what is your
point?
>
>
> > Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
> > terrorism?
>
> Sometimes, where there is immediate need to do so and then only
> under some kind of US military or civilian judge's supervision.
>
I disagree.
>
>
> > Bush's Presidential legacy is going to be much more than the Iraq
> > thing. He and his administration have fought for the erosion of
> > personal liberty far worse than any other President I can think of.
>
> You must be kidding. Bush has merely applied that oh so sophisticated
> notion of "A Living Constitution" to suit these times.
Surely you gest. His supporters claim that he is
applying the plain language of the constitution, though
somehow I doubt that they have ever read it, or at most
read nothing but Article II.
> That *is*
> what the left engineered starting with FDR, their patron saint.
Whom even the now infamous Reverand Wright denounces...
> ...
> > Warrantless wire taps on US Citizens,
>
> Permited legally under FISA (which precedes him) but unworkable
> because of the sheer volume of paperwork involved. Did the Dems
> offer to step in and help to make it work better for the good of
> the country? No.
ISTR that only one, or at most two democrats were notified,
at a classified meeting so that they were not permitted to
discuss the matter after leaving the room.
> They were too busy blaming Bush for the world's
> sins and teeing up their next election.
It would be easy to forgive the Bush administration for missing
the deadline to notify the FISA of warrantless wiretaps were
it not for two considerations.
One, the Bush administration wrote the law extending that
deadline from 24 hours to 72. If they needed more time
or needed to expand the court to handle the workload
they could have written that in too. It's not like anybody
in the Congress actually read the Patriot Act before
they voted on it.
They never even submitted late notifications.
>
> > removal of habeas corpus for US residents,
>
> A huge failing on W's part. Thanks to the Hamdi suit, SCOTUS
> fixed this. The system worked ultimately.
>
> > Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
>
> Nonsense. The government can't ask for cooperation on the one hand
> and then prosecute with the other. This was proper. If there was
> any sin here (and there probably wasn't much of one), it should
> be addressed by the DOJ, not the individual carriers.
That would make sense were the government not asking
for cooperation in the commission of a crime.
>
> > and mandatory gag orders on subpoenas issued through National Security
> > Letters so that US Citizens who aren't even suspected of wrongdoing
> > won't know they're being investigated.
>
> No different than Obama's pals here in Chicago being investigated
> for quite some time before *they* knew anything about it. This
> is called "crime investigation". An investigation does not make
> you guilty and the policeman or government agency doing it has no
> legal obligation to inform you of it ahead of time.
>
>
>
> > As much as I love my country, the more I hear about how Bush has
> > allowed either by inaction or active support of things such as these
> > the more sickened I become.
>
> You should go read the history of the FDR administration. He made
> Bush look like a piker. No president since Andrew Jackson had more
> overt contempt for rule-of-law and the Constitution than FDR.
> Yet the left worships the man but hates guys like Bush who are
> merely using the same techniques in somewhat different ways.
>
>
>
> > For a man who claims to be a Christian I really have to wonder which
> > Christ he's following.
>
> An utterly bogus observation. I don't care if he worship purple
> frogs on yogurt. That is not germane to his governance or lack thereof.
>
> You watch, in a few years the real depth of the threat coming from
> Iran especially is going to become evident, and it will have been
> Bush that took the steps to quiet it before it completely flared out
> of control.
Like what, exactly?
> Either we do it or the Israelis will. Which would you
> prefer?
Whoever gets the job done best.
I freely admit that people have walked the Earth who are
worse than GWB.
I would like to set the standard for President a bit
higher than "better than the worse person who ever
lived.".
--
FF
Charlie Self wrote:
> On May 13, 11:12 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>>> Doug Miller wrote:
>>>> In article <[email protected]>, Tim Daneliuk
>>>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>>>>> than the three current contenders.
>>>> :-)
>>>>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>>>> .. and has absolutely *no* chance of winning, thus making a vote for him
>>>> nearly indistinguishable from a vote for Obama.
>>> True, but so what? If you examine Obama, Clinton, and McCain
>>> their positions are oh-so slightly distinct without any real
>>> difference. Face it, any of the three will be lying through
>>> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
>>> of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
>>> thing.
>> Unfortunately, this year, the only thing we can look at is who will do the
>> least damage. There are no choices -- the Republicans let the Dems and
>> Independents choose the candidate, so now we have a candidate who doesn't
>> just reach across the aisle, he has done full gainers to the far left of
>> that aisle.
>>
>> As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
>> being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
>> OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
>> embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
>> difference between these clowns.
>>
>> --
>
> Sorry. McCain is all for continuing far too many of Bush's expensive
> shenanigans, including the mess in Iraq. The country is teetering on
> the edge of bankruptcy now with Republican spend and borrow tactics.
You guys are hilarious. The entitlements and the interest on
the consequent debt just *dwarf* the military spend yet you
blame the military costs for our "bankruptcy". It's mind boggling.
100s of billions spend on social do going not even permitted
to the Federal government, but you object to something it
is *supposed* to do - run the military. Astonishing.
> What we need is someone who will QUIT spending, QUIT borrowing and
> work to get our problems straightened out. Let the worldwide supply of
I agree. Let's put the Feds back on a Constitutional diet: Run the
courts, defend the nation, enable interstate commerce, and take
care of the "postal roads". You'll save upwards of 60+% of the annual
Federal spend this way.
> assholes diminish their own numbers without our help. I don't like
Nice theory. Let's let Iran and Syran get nukes because - given their
rational view of the universe - there's no reason to believe they'll
actually use them right? I am with you in one way though: No more
land invasions. We should bomb the roads, sewers, water plants,
telecommunications facilities, sewer treatment plants, cell phone
towers, military facilities, military equipment and government
buildings of Iran and Syria every day until they place nice.
In the mean time, they can drink their oil.
No occupation, no rebuilding, no money, no humanitarian aid.
Make their day-to-day lives so miserable that they'll be too busy
boiling water and too poor to have time for nukes. This is
relatively cheap and very effective. No reason to waste our
soldiers lives and our money occupying tribal sewers.
> Clinton or Obama either, but I am not among the 14% or so who think
> Bush has this country heading the right way. It's time to get him and
> his imitators out for a few years.
You'll change your mind if either of those two has the reins. You'll
be begging for Bush back, I suspect. McCain is a push.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 14, 11:26=A0pm, "Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Fred the Red Shirt" wrote:
>
> > (The Italians have hot women too.)
>
> And most of them are pretty good cooks.
>
> (Still trying to find an Italian cusine item I don't like).
>
> Lew
Hear! Hear!
...
On May 15, 3:09 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> <SNIP>
>
>
>
> >>> Did Bush need to toss the Geneva Convention out the window?
> >> Where did he do that? AFAIK, he stuck to - barely - the ones
> >> which we've actually signed.
>
> > The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson,
> > disagrees with you, as does the USSC. So do I.
>
> If this is so cut and dried, why has he not been brought
> up on appropriate charges?
> He was dead wrong on Hamdi
> and the appropriate legal steps were taken.
He was also dead wrong regarding his ad hoc
tribunals. As you know, they were struck down
by the USSC which held that they violated
common article 3 of the 1949 GCs and the
UCMJ. That does prove my point, right?
> If you're
> clearly right, then similar steps should obviously
> work here as well, shouldn't they?
>
This administration has relied on the most
transparent of stalling tactics to keep those
steps from being taken. For instance, Padilla
was transferred from one Federal District to
another, mooting his habeas petition and forcing
his attorneys to refile in the new district. Other
appelants were released after being granted
certitori by the USSC depriving the court of the
opportunity to rule on the vital matters of law
that were in contention.
That the administration
was afraid to plead its case before the USSC
is a pretty good indicator that it knew it was
wrong, eh?
In 2006, the administration finally allowed a case
challenging the jurisdiction of the Bush ad hoc
tribunals to reach the USSC. Of course they were
stuck down and the administration demanded, on
the eve of the 2006 election, that the Congress
immediately authorize new tribunals, claiming
that any delay, say for example, to after the election,
would jeopardize national security.
The Congress complied. The tribunals established
by the Military Comissions Act of 2006, have jurisdiction
to try unlawful combatants.
>
>
> > You've also made it clear that you don't want torture to
> > be illegal or to violate treaties. Its pretty clear that you
> > want people to be tortured. You read laws and treaties
> > (if you bother to read them at all) the way Clinton listens
> > to questions during a deposition, seeking someway to
> > misconstrue it to mean what you want.
>
> No. I disagree that all forms of coercion constitute
> a prima facia case of "torture", and reasonable people
> can disagree here.
>
>
>
> >> ...
> >>> Should the US be allowing her intelligence officers to use
> >>> interrogation techniques that are provably ineffective? US soldiers
> >> They managed to work to crack some of the top level Al Queda thugs
> >> pretty quickly
>
> > Your evidence for this is what, exactly, Kalid sheik
> > Mohammed's admission that he, not Osama bin Laden
> > was the mastermind behind the attacks of September 11,
> > 2001?
>
> Thereby demonstrating the efficacy of the technique, no?
AFAIK the efficacy of torture to obtain confessions
has never been in dispute. Indeed, it as effective on
the innocent as it is on the guilty.
>
>
>
> >> ... or is the military in on the vast conspiracy
> >> as well and lying about this too?
>
> >>> used some of the exact same techniques years ago and were court
> >>> martialled and convicted for waterboarding as recently as Vietnam. Yet
> >>> now we're cool with it?
> >> In Viet Nam, those techniques were used on people who wore the
> >> uniforms of an identifiable military. That means they were entitled to
> >> certain protections under international law. In this case, the
> >> subjects were people making war while hiding in civilian clothing -
>
> > I seem to remember the argument being made that the
> > Geneva Conventions did not apply to a civil war and that
> > persons who attacked civilians forfeited their protections.
> > I don't accept that, but is sounds a lot like a position you
> > would favor.
>
> You cannot, on the one hand, cling to a strict interpretation
> of the GCs (that is not universally held within the international
> legal community) and on the other pick and choose when they
> apply.
Yet you insist on doing so.
> There are, as you well know, different categories
> of protections offered to different classes of persons in the
> GC. Plain clothes combatants have almost no such protections
> therein. Wishing it were so doesn't make it that way.
And yet, unless I am very much mistaken, you were perfectly
happy when the President forbade the military from determining
if their prisoners were plain clothes combatants.
>
> ...
>
> >> Your captors are free to do almost anything they want including
> >> waterboarding you or making you listen to Sean Penn speeches.
>
> > What competent court or tribunal determined
> > that any person held at Guantanamo bay, in fact,
> > made war in civilian clothing?
>
> Presumably, the military tribunals held there wherein
> the accused had legal representation.
President Bush forbade the military from conducting
those tribunals and forbade the courts-martial from
trying them the persons in question. That is precisely
my objection.
> Or is it your
> position that the entire JAG core is utterly corrupt
> and the tribunal process completely compromised such
> that these were all show trials?
The JAG had nothing to do with Bush's ad hoc
courts.
Further, to WHAT trials do you refer? Bush's ad hoc
courts were struck down in 2006 without ever having
conducted a trial.
You just make this up as you go along, don't you?
But since you mentioned the JAG, consider that five
of the six judge advocates general singed a public
letter urging the Congress to NOT pass the Military
Commissions Act of 2006 (which was substantively
identical, in most respects to the President;'s executive
order) and all six spoke against it before the Congress.
> The lack of public
> transparency in trials of (alleged) foreign combatants
> does not instantly mean that the process is bogus.
Again, to what trials do you refer? Please name a
defendant, provide a date, something.
> Having known a great many military folks over the years,
> my view is that the odds are that these trials were
> likely conducted to very high ethical standards.
WTF? The courts in question were struck down in
2006 without ever conducting a single trial.
Meanwhile, the US Federal Courts have tried about a
hundred persons for 'terrorism' related crimes with
a sustained conviction rate approaching 80%.
>
>
>
> > Or are you arguing that
> > the rules and regulations governing captures on land and sea
> > and regulating the Armed Forces, passed by the Congress and
> > signed into law by the President of the United States aren't
> > REAL laws, just some sort of general suggestions?
>
> They are real. But just to *which* rules do you refer.
The UCMJ.
The provisions of the UCMJ to the effect that the proper status
of a prisoner who disputes his status be determined by
a competent court or tribunal.
UNCATS.
> The GCs do not materially protect non-uniformed combatants.
> There is likely policy and procedure in place for the
> military lawyers involved, but that is not some international
> and immutable standard that supercedes the GCs here to the
> best of my knowledge.
You argue that because a person engaged in an act
that disentitled them to the protections of the GCs, they
are not entitled to a proper hearing to determine if they
engaged in an act that disentitles them to the protections
of the GCs.
>
>
>
> >> and they have almost NO protection under international laws. Fred will
> >> jump in here and claim otherwise, but he's wrong and exhibits wishful
> >> thinking on the matter. If you make war in plain clothing, you
> >> have the same legal status of a spy ... i.e., Almost none.
>
> > If a person who is hors de combat due to captivity,
> > and who is denied status as a protected person none-
> > the-less claims that status, that is a matter to be
> > decided by a competent court or tribunal. The US
> > military had a tried and true procedure for doing just
> > that and it probably would have been a pretty simple,
> > and entirely uncontroversial matter. There was no
> > excuse for abandoning that tried and true procedure.
>
> Just where do you get the idea that a fair discovery
> as to the status of the captured was NOT conducted?
Do you understand the relevant definition of 'competent'?
> Just because they didn't do it on Judge Judy doesn't
> mean it did not happen. Again, you are at least
> implying that the military tribunal process was entirely
> compromised.
No, I never implied anything of the sort. I have made it
quite clear time and time again that the tribunals were
not competent and the USSC agreed when if struck
them down in 2006.
> I'd like see evidence of that please.
I don't give a rat's ass what you would like to see.
I will only provide evidence to support my argument.
I repeat it again now. The president and commander
in chief did not have the authority to establish military
tribunals not authorized by the Congress. My evidence
is that the USC struck down those tribunals in 2006.
>
>
> ...
> > US law has required that spies be tried before execution
> > since the Continental Congress passed the First US
> > Articles of War.
>
> And I am fine with that. It is my belief - a belief
> rooted not in observable fact, since the process was
> not public, but rooted in a confidence in the professionalism
> and ethics of our military - that exactly this took place.
Please name of a person whom you believe was executed
after trial during the present administration.
>
>
>
> > "Spies may not be punished without
> > trial." is one of the articles of the 1907 Hague conventions.
>
> > It would be difficult, at best, to mistreat a prisoner without
> > violating the common criminal provisions of the UCMJ
> > which, as you know, (e.g. the trial of the civilian spouse of
> > a US soldier for a crime allegedly committed in Germany)
> > apply to American civilians on US military bases abroad.
>
> > UNCATS prohibits torture, inhumane or degrading treatment
> > without exception.
>
> All we have to do is come up with a universal definition
> for "torture". You may know that those who defend it
> as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that it is
> NOT inherently torture, though everyone agrees it has
> the capacity to be abused.
If I understand the English language correctly, the
antecedent of 'it' is 'torture'.
So the statement above is logically:
"You may know that those who defend torture
as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that
torture is NOT inherently torture, though everyone
agrees torture has the capacity to be abused."
Which I agree is exactly the sort of thing we have
come to expect from the Bush administration.
>
>
> ...
>
> > Breathe control torture plainly violates UNCATS, and if
> > committed on an US military base, federal
> > criminal law.
>
> I rather think this is not so cut and dried. If it is,
> the participants should be tried, found guilty, and
> sentenced.
By whom, the people who ordered the crime in the
first place?
> Wanna take any bets as to whether, say,
> Obama will take any such action? I rather doubt it.
Relevance?
>
>
>
> > Claims that it is legal to commit crimes against someone
> > because he is a bad person, are no longer persuasive
> > in any US court, nor should they be.
>
> No they shouldn't but that's not the discussion here.
Nonsense. That is precisely your argument. If the
government were to subject you to exactly the same
treatment as Khalid Sheik Mohammed there is no
question that you would believe you had been assaulted.
The ONLY reason you argue that KSM was not assaulted
is because you believe he deserved it. Whether or not
the victim of an assault deserved it, is not a defense.
> The discussion is to what degree particular classes
> of combatants can make legal claims upon international
> treaty and US policy.
Wrong. That was discussed near the top of this
article. The issue down here is whether or not
the legal standing of the victim is a defense in
an assault prosecution. The UCMJ enumerates
the allowed defenses. That the victim was not
entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions
is not among the enumerated offenses.
>
>
>
> >> You will also note that Al Queda is not a signatory to the
> >> Geneva Conventions and cannot thus make claims upon them.
>
> > While al Queda is not, most of the people accused
> > of being part of al Queda are nationals of states that
> > are. Further, inasmuchas a state of war does not
> > exist between those nations and the United States
> > if they commit a belligerent act they commit a crime
> > whether they are in uniform or not.
>
> Their belligerent acts were carried out on behalf of
> Al Queda. Moreover, their wearing a uniform or not
> is fundamental to their class before the law.
> Say I went to Africa to fight as a mercenary,
> wearing a suit and tie, posing as a health worker.
> If I started killing innocents to create an act
> of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
> international laws protect me from being treated
> as a spy? I think not.
Were you to wear a uniform and carry arms
openly while killing innocents to create an act
of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
international laws protect you from being treated
as a war criminal? I think not.
To disguise yourself might be an act of perfidy,
and an offense in and of itself, but one that
pales in comparison to the other crimes
committed, and completely irrelevent to the
issue of whether or not you could be prosecuted
and punished for those other crimes, don't you
agree?
But that has never been the point of contention
between us. The issue in dispute has always
been the process (again a term of art) to be
employed to determine IF you committed any
such crime.
>
>
>
> > That of course, was never at issue. At issue was
> > the suspension of the normal process used by the US
> > military to determine if a person is a combatant, and
> > if so, lawful or unlawful.
>
> You keep saying this, but I see no evidence of it.
You have never seen evidence that Bush did not
allow prisoners at Guantanamo bay to be prosecuted
in the Federal Courts or the military courts-martial,
(e.g. the normal process) and instead created his own
ad-hoc courts for that purpose?
Not surprising, since you claim to have
seen trials and even executions that no
one else has.
> I see people swept up in the course of combat,
> status to be determined later, granted legal
> counsel (it is claimed, I cannot confirm) to
> stand before a military tribunal.
>
Padilla's case made it all the way to the USSC,
without his counsel ever being permitted to
communicate with him. Hamdan was permitted
to meet with his council only once, and then
only because his defense attorney had been
ordered to negotiate a guilty plea. That kind
of stretches the definition of 'granting legal
council'.
>
>
> > As well as the
> > claim by the President and Commander-in-Chief that
> > he had authority to create courts, make the laws those
> > courts would enforce, their rules of evidence and procedure,
> > appoint the judges, the prosecutors and the defense
> > attorneys, and to direct their actions, and that the Congress,
> > to whom the plain language of the Constitution grants
> > the sole authority to do those things, has no say in
> > the matter.
>
> All true but missing a critical detail. With the advent
> of FDR's "making it up as you go along" approach to
> Constitutional law, there is ample precedent for Bush's
> claim.
Sure, so long as you ignore the repeal of the Articles of
War in 1949.
> I'm not claiming Bush made all the right calls
> here. I am claiming he is within his executive privilege
> *as granted by precedent*.
Your claim is meritless because it contradicts the plain
language of the Constitution. Or is it your argument that
the President retains the authority delegated to him by
Federal Law, even after that law is repealed?
> You don't like it? Fine.
> I'm not actually crazy about it myself. But the only
> way to unwind it would be to get the government and
> the nation at large to go back to a strict interpretation
> of the Constitution. As I have said over and over,
> you cannot reasonably expect Bush to avoid using the
> "flexibility" of a "Living Constitution" when all his
> political foes favor this when power is in their hands.
None of this has anything to do with any living constitution
argument.. The argument advanced by the administration is
the "unitary president" theory, which holds that the President
is not bound in his official acts, by federal law. To my
knowledge no proponent of this theory makes any claim
of the sort you suggest. They argue that they are
returning to the true meaning of the constitution. IOW, they
claim to be doing exactly what you say you want them
to do.
Further, what I may or may not expect the President to
does not absolve me of my responsibility to demand that
he respect the rule of law.
>
>
>
> >> You will further note that while we made people uncomfortable
> >> and shoved them around and humiliated them, their fellow
> >> combatants beheaded people in the most horrible possible way.
>
> > Why should we note that? And if we should, why do you not
> > note the prisoners tortured to death in Bahgram prison? Does
>
> Clearly wrong, and last I checked, the perpetrators were
> being tried and convicted in (gasp!) military courts.
What is clearly wrong?
Willy Brandt received the harshest sentence at trial,
a few months confinement and a reduction in pay. It
is my understanding that since then, his sentence
has been reduced to honorable discharge.
> If you think that any system that is not perfect is not
> workable at all, you are sadly mistaken. The system,
> however imperfect, has safeguards and remedies and these
> seem to be working.
>
> > their mistreatment mitigate the murder of Daniel Perle?
>
> Of course not.
>
Then why introduce his murder into the discussion?
>
>
> >> There is no moral equivalence here, it is anti-war left wing
> >> fiction and propaganda.
>
> > If you are not arguing moral equivalence, what is your
> > point?
>
> My point is that sensible analysis considers not just the
> act, but the degree of malfeasance. Yes, a very few
> US military behaved wrongly in a number of cases.
The light sentences handed out to (some) the murderers
at Bahgram, when contrasted with the much harsher
sentences handed out to those convicted of less serious
offenses at Abu Ghraib leads me to suspect the former
acts were condoned, if not ordered, by higher authority
while the latter were not. Contrast also the disciplinary
action taken against the commanding officer at Abu Ghraib
with the inaction at Bahgram.
> But
> the enemy acts badly pretty much at every opportunity.
> I thing we've shown considerable restraint and maturity
> in our response on the whole. I can say this without
> excusing the horrific acts you describe.
Again, inasmuchas the horrific acts committed by the
enemy were not in dispute, nor even under discussion,
why introduce them?
>
>
>
> >>> Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
> >>> terrorism?
> >> Sometimes, where there is immediate need to do so and then only
> >> under some kind of US military or civilian judge's supervision.
>
> > I disagree.
>
> The more I think about this, the more I may come to see it your
> way. It certainly makes me morally queasy. Not so much because
> we are extracting information by force (though that is part of
> the problem) but moreso because of the kind of human sewage
> with whom we have to make common cause to pull this off.
> For the moment, my view on this is that there are two
> choices here - Bad: Do nothing thereby failing to use
> every tool to thwart people who wish to murder non combatants,
> or Really Bad: Make common cause with thugs and tyrants.
False dichotomy. To refrain from torture does not require
that one do nothing.
One merely needs to consider the history of lynching
(the real history, not the Hollywood version) in this
country to understand the dangers.
>
>
> ...
> >> You must be kidding. Bush has merely applied that oh so sophisticated
> >> notion of "A Living Constitution" to suit these times.
>
> > Surely you gest. His supporters claim that he is
> > applying the plain language of the constitution, though
> > somehow I doubt that they have ever read it, or at most
> > read nothing but Article II.
>
> *Everyone* who bends the Constitution to suit "these times"
> claims they are applying a plain reading. Bush is merely
> the last in a long lineage of such people.
No, many, if not most who bend the Constitution to suit
"these times" DO advance some sort of living Constitution
claim.
>
> >> ...
> >>> Warrantless wire taps on US Citizens,
> >> Permited legally under FISA (which precedes him) but unworkable
> >> because of the sheer volume of paperwork involved. Did the Dems
> >> offer to step in and help to make it work better for the good of
> >> the country? No.
>
> > ISTR that only one, or at most two democrats were notified,
> > at a classified meeting so that they were not permitted to
> > discuss the matter after leaving the room.
>
> There is a Senate Intelligence Committee last I looked.
> If even just one of them were involved, you're suggesting
> they could not have quietly suggested that - for
> reasons they could not discuss - FISA process needed
> to be revisited?
Unauthorized circumspective discussion of national
security matters is impermissible for obvious reasons.
Further, I don't think you can come up with any credible
scenario where in the needed changes could be introduced
or discussed without making it obvious as to what was
discussed behind those closed doors.
But as you know, the Congress did pass exactly the
legislation requested by the administration on this
point. To hold the Congress to blame for its inadequacy
is asinine.
>
> ...
>
> > They never even submitted late notifications.
>
> And even I have real heartburn about this. It's
> unconscionable and one of the reasons that the
> Republicans do not deserve the White House next time.
>
>
>
> >>> removal of habeas corpus for US residents,
> >> A huge failing on W's part. Thanks to the Hamdi suit, SCOTUS
> >> fixed this. The system worked ultimately.
Well then you agree that what GWB did was wrong. That was
the point being made.
>
> >>> Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
> >> Nonsense. The government can't ask for cooperation on the one hand
> >> and then prosecute with the other. This was proper. If there was
> >> any sin here (and there probably wasn't much of one), it should
> >> be addressed by the DOJ, not the individual carriers.
>
> > That would make sense were the government not asking
> > for cooperation in the commission of a crime.
>
> What crime exactly was being committed?
Illegal wiretaps.
>
> ...
>
> >> You watch, in a few years the real depth of the threat coming from
> >> Iran especially is going to become evident, and it will have been
> >> Bush that took the steps to quiet it before it completely flared out
> >> of control.
>
> > Like what, exactly?
>
> My guess - and that's all it is, though it seems consistent
> with what is released to the public - is that Iran is well on
> the way to nuclear delivery capability and that the only
> thing that will give them real pause on this is to feel
> serious threat from someone ... us, for example.
Allow me to rephrase. Like what steps, exactly, has
Bush taken to quiet the Iranian threat?
>
> ...
> > I freely admit that people have walked the Earth who are
> > worse than GWB.
>
> > I would like to set the standard for President a bit
> > higher than "better than the worse person who ever
> > lived.".
>
> He is nowhere near as bad as you paint him. He is - at worse -
> the Republican incarnation of FDR - make up the rules
> as you go, push the limits of executive power, ignore
> the noise, and win the war.
> ...
As I pointed out above, FDR had some authority under the
Articles of War that was substantially diminished when they
were replaced with the UCMJ. It is particularly important to
note that a, if not the, primary justification for the change was
concern for potential abuse under the precedent law.
To suggest an equivalency between the current situation
and the Great Depression and World War two betrays a
complete lack of perspective.
Even though I recognize that enormous difference in exigency,
I still condemn FDR for some of his actions. Consequently
I cannot reasonably decline to condemn Bush for like sins.
--
FF
N Hurst wrote:
<SNIP>
> It's too bad you think massive intelligence fabrications and
This is the claim of the left without any proof. Intelligence
work, by its nature, is imprecise. Evidently, not only did Bush
cover up, so did Blair, Burlosconi, and Putin. It was a a giant
conspiracy I tell you, run from within the CIA. Tin Foil Hats ...ON!
> obfuscations tailored to hype up going to war in Iraq is a good thing
> for the Middle East.
> I mean, I guess Iraq is better now than it was in 2001 if you're a
> fundamentalist Muslim or a security contractor.
>
> The ME has had a massive anti-American campaign going on for a long
> time, I won't argue with that, but did we really need to just hand
> them more cannon fodder on a silver platter?
Who gives a rats ass what they think? Bush's biggest mistake
was caring about the fate of the nations involved at all.
The purpose of war to crush threat. Iran/Iraq/Syria with
nukes is an unacceptable level of threat. Savage their
economies and infrastructures and leave with a promise
to do it again and again until they act nice. They
don't like us. Who cares? Muslims hate Christians and
Jews (and other Muslims). Who cares? Our purpose should
be do defend our country and our interests, not try and
build democracies where none are possible. We should accept
that the bulk of the Islamic world is inhabited by tribal
savages and quit trying to rehabilitate them. We should
merely make it too painful for them to mess with the West.
And THAT is Bush's failing. His stubborn insistence that
we have to stay and fix what's been broke for 1500 years.
Or ... was it really Bush? Could it have been the whiny
State Department full of career bureaucrats hollering
"You broke it, now you have to buy it." I can't tell
who was stupider here, the administration or the State
Department, but they were dead wrong. We did NOT break
anything, and thus owe the people of these lands a single
thing. Let Iraq break out into civil war right after
we're done polishing off Iran. Leave their military,
their infrastructure, their water supplies, and their
telecommunications systems as smoldering slagpiles
and walk away. Game, set, match.
>
> Did Bush need to toss the Geneva Convention out the window?
Where did he do that? AFAIK, he stuck to - barely - the ones
which we've actually signed.
>
> Should the US be allowing her intelligence officers to use
> interrogation techniques that are provably ineffective? US soldiers
They managed to work to crack some of the top level Al Queda thugs
pretty quickly ... or is the military in on the vast conspiracy
as well and lying about this too?
> used some of the exact same techniques years ago and were court
> martialled and convicted for waterboarding as recently as Vietnam. Yet
> now we're cool with it?
In Viet Nam, those techniques were used on people who wore the
uniforms of an identifiable military. That means they were entitled to
certain protections under international law. In this case, the
subjects were people making war while hiding in civilian clothing -
and they have almost NO protection under international laws. Fred will
jump in here and claim otherwise, but he's wrong and exhibits wishful
thinking on the matter. If you make war in plain clothing, you
have the same legal status of a spy ... i.e., Almost none.
Your captors are free to do almost anything they want including
waterboarding you or making you listen to Sean Penn speeches.
You will also note that Al Queda is not a signatory to the
Geneva Conventions and cannot thus make claims upon them.
You will further note that while we made people uncomfortable
and shoved them around and humiliated them, their fellow
combatants beheaded people in the most horrible possible way.
There is no moral equivalence here, it is anti-war left wing
fiction and propaganda.
>
> Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
> terrorism?
Sometimes, where there is immediate need to do so and then only
under some kind of US military or civilian judge's supervision.
>
> Bush's Presidential legacy is going to be much more than the Iraq
> thing. He and his administration have fought for the erosion of
> personal liberty far worse than any other President I can think of.
You must be kidding. Bush has merely applied that oh so sophisticated
notion of "A Living Constitution" to suit these times. That *is*
what the left engineered starting with FDR, their patron saint.
Now a nominal rightwinger gets in (he is no such thing actually),
and merely applies the same principle of a malleable Constitution
to suit *these* times. The left should be thrilled. He's doing
what they've done for decades before he was ever on the scene.
> Warrantless wire taps on US Citizens,
Permited legally under FISA (which precedes him) but unworkable
because of the sheer volume of paperwork involved. Did the Dems
offer to step in and help to make it work better for the good of
the country? No. They were too busy blaming Bush for the world's
sins and teeing up their next election.
> removal of habeas corpus for US residents,
A huge failing on W's part. Thanks to the Hamdi suit, SCOTUS
fixed this. The system worked ultimately.
> Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
Nonsense. The government can't ask for cooperation on the one hand
and then prosecute with the other. This was proper. If there was
any sin here (and there probably wasn't much of one), it should
be addressed by the DOJ, not the individual carriers.
> and mandatory gag orders on subpoenas issued through National Security
> Letters so that US Citizens who aren't even suspected of wrongdoing
> won't know they're being investigated.
No different than Obama's pals here in Chicago being investigated
for quite some time before *they* knew anything about it. This
is called "crime investigation". An investigation does not make
you guilty and the policeman or government agency doing it has no
legal obligation to inform you of it ahead of time.
>
> As much as I love my country, the more I hear about how Bush has
> allowed either by inaction or active support of things such as these
> the more sickened I become.
You should go read the history of the FDR administration. He made
Bush look like a piker. No president since Andrew Jackson had more
overt contempt for rule-of-law and the Constitution than FDR.
Yet the left worships the man but hates guys like Bush who are
merely using the same techniques in somewhat different ways.
>
> For a man who claims to be a Christian I really have to wonder which
> Christ he's following.
An utterly bogus observation. I don't care if he worship purple
frogs on yogurt. That is not germane to his governance or lack thereof.
You watch, in a few years the real depth of the threat coming from
Iran especially is going to become evident, and it will have been
Bush that took the steps to quiet it before it completely flared out
of control. Either we do it or the Israelis will. Which would you
prefer?
>
> -Nathan
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
<SNIP>
>>
>>> Did Bush need to toss the Geneva Convention out the window?
>> Where did he do that? AFAIK, he stuck to - barely - the ones
>> which we've actually signed.
>
> The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson,
> disagrees with you, as does the USSC. So do I.
If this is so cut and dried, why has he not been brought
up on appropriate charges? He was dead wrong on Hamdi
and the appropriate legal steps were taken. If you're
clearly right, then similar steps should obviously
work here as well, shouldn't they?
>
> You've also made it clear that you don't want torture to
> be illegal or to violate treaties. Its pretty clear that you
> want people to be tortured. You read laws and treaties
> (if you bother to read them at all) the way Clinton listens
> to questions during a deposition, seeking someway to
> misconstrue it to mean what you want.
No. I disagree that all forms of coercion constitute
a prima facia case of "torture", and reasonable people
can disagree here.
>
>>
>> ...
>>> Should the US be allowing her intelligence officers to use
>>> interrogation techniques that are provably ineffective? US soldiers
>> They managed to work to crack some of the top level Al Queda thugs
>> pretty quickly
>
> Your evidence for this is what, exactly, Kalid sheik
> Mohammed's admission that he, not Osama bin Laden
> was the mastermind behind the attacks of September 11,
> 2001?
Thereby demonstrating the efficacy of the technique, no?
>
>> ... or is the military in on the vast conspiracy
>> as well and lying about this too?
>>
>>> used some of the exact same techniques years ago and were court
>>> martialled and convicted for waterboarding as recently as Vietnam. Yet
>>> now we're cool with it?
>> In Viet Nam, those techniques were used on people who wore the
>> uniforms of an identifiable military. That means they were entitled to
>> certain protections under international law. In this case, the
>> subjects were people making war while hiding in civilian clothing -
>
> I seem to remember the argument being made that the
> Geneva Conventions did not apply to a civil war and that
> persons who attacked civilians forfeited their protections.
> I don't accept that, but is sounds a lot like a position you
> would favor.
You cannot, on the one hand, cling to a strict interpretation
of the GCs (that is not universally held within the international
legal community) and on the other pick and choose when they
apply. There are, as you well know, different categories
of protections offered to different classes of persons in the
GC. Plain clothes combatants have almost no such protections
therein. Wishing it were so doesn't make it that way.
>
>> Your captors are free to do almost anything they want including
>> waterboarding you or making you listen to Sean Penn speeches.
>>
>
> What competent court or tribunal determined
> that any person held at Guantanamo bay, in fact,
> made war in civilian clothing?
Presumably, the military tribunals held there wherein
the accused had legal representation. Or is it your
position that the entire JAG core is utterly corrupt
and the tribunal process completely compromised such
that these were all show trials? The lack of public
transparency in trials of (alleged) foreign combatants
does not instantly mean that the process is bogus.
Having known a great many military folks over the years,
my view is that the odds are that these trials were
likely conducted to very high ethical standards.
>
> Or are you arguing that
> the rules and regulations governing captures on land and sea
> and regulating the Armed Forces, passed by the Congress and
> signed into law by the President of the United States aren't
> REAL laws, just some sort of general suggestions?
They are real. But just to *which* rules do you refer.
The GCs do not materially protect non-uniformed combatants.
There is likely policy and procedure in place for the
military lawyers involved, but that is not some international
and immutable standard that supercedes the GCs here to the
best of my knowledge.
>
>
>> and they have almost NO protection under international laws. Fred will
>> jump in here and claim otherwise, but he's wrong and exhibits wishful
>> thinking on the matter. If you make war in plain clothing, you
>> have the same legal status of a spy ... i.e., Almost none.
>
> If a person who is hors de combat due to captivity,
> and who is denied status as a protected person none-
> the-less claims that status, that is a matter to be
> decided by a competent court or tribunal. The US
> military had a tried and true procedure for doing just
> that and it probably would have been a pretty simple,
> and entirely uncontroversial matter. There was no
> excuse for abandoning that tried and true procedure.
Just where do you get the idea that a fair discovery
as to the status of the captured was NOT conducted?
Just because they didn't do it on Judge Judy doesn't
mean it did not happen. Again, you are at least
implying that the military tribunal process was entirely
compromised. I'd like see evidence of that please.
>
> US law has required that spies be tried before execution
> since the Continental Congress passed the First US
> Articles of War.
And I am fine with that. It is my belief - a belief
rooted not in observable fact, since the process was
not public, but rooted in a confidence in the professionalism
and ethics of our military - that exactly this took place.
>
> "Spies may not be punished without
> trial." is one of the articles of the 1907 Hague conventions.
>
> It would be difficult, at best, to mistreat a prisoner without
> violating the common criminal provisions of the UCMJ
> which, as you know, (e.g. the trial of the civilian spouse of
> a US soldier for a crime allegedly committed in Germany)
> apply to American civilians on US military bases abroad.
>
> UNCATS prohibits torture, inhumane or degrading treatment
> without exception.
All we have to do is come up with a universal definition
for "torture". You may know that those who defend it
as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that it is
NOT inherently torture, though everyone agrees it has
the capacity to be abused.
>
> I had been misled by many sources who claimed that the
> US took exception to the minimal due process requirements
> for spies and sabotouers in the GCs. Not so. The US
> takes exception to certain restrictions on the applicability
> of the death penalty, and (IIRC) to certain obligations to
> allies and cobelligerents.
>
> For UNCATS and most recent
> treaties the US takes exception to any restrictions on the
> applicability of the death penalty and to any provision that
> is determined by the Federal Courts to be in conflict with
> a provision of the Constitution.
>
> Breathe control torture plainly violates UNCATS, and if
> committed on an US military base, federal
> criminal law.
I rather think this is not so cut and dried. If it is,
the participants should be tried, found guilty, and
sentenced. Wanna take any bets as to whether, say,
Obama will take any such action? I rather doubt it.
>
> Claims that it is legal to commit crimes against someone
> because he is a bad person, are no longer persuasive
> in any US court, nor should they be.
No they shouldn't but that's not the discussion here.
The discussion is to what degree particular classes
of combatants can make legal claims upon international
treaty and US policy.
>
>> You will also note that Al Queda is not a signatory to the
>> Geneva Conventions and cannot thus make claims upon them.
>
> While al Queda is not, most of the people accused
> of being part of al Queda are nationals of states that
> are. Further, inasmuchas a state of war does not
> exist between those nations and the United States
> if they commit a belligerent act they commit a crime
> whether they are in uniform or not.
Their belligerent acts were carried out on behalf of
Al Queda. Moreover, their wearing a uniform or not
is fundamental to their class before the law.
Say I went to Africa to fight as a mercenary,
wearing a suit and tie, posing as a health worker.
If I started killing innocents to create an act
of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
international laws protect me from being treated
as a spy? I think not.
>
> That of course, was never at issue. At issue was
> the suspension of the normal process used by the US
> military to determine if a person is a combatant, and
> if so, lawful or unlawful.
You keep saying this, but I see no evidence of it.
I see people swept up in the course of combat,
status to be determined later, granted legal
counsel (it is claimed, I cannot confirm) to
stand before a military tribunal.
>
>
> As well as the claim
> claim by the President and Commander-in-Chief that
> he had authority to create courts, make the laws those
> courts would enforce, their rules of evidence and procedure,
> appoint the judges, the prosecutors and the defense
> attorneys, and to direct their actions, and that the Congress,
> to whom the plain language of the Constitution grants
> the sole authority to do those things, has no say in
> the matter.
All true but missing a critical detail. With the advent
of FDR's "making it up as you go along" approach to
Constitutional law, there is ample precedent for Bush's
claim. I'm not claiming Bush made all the right calls
here. I am claiming he is within his executive privilege
*as granted by precedent*. You don't like it? Fine.
I'm not actually crazy about it myself. But the only
way to unwind it would be to get the government and
the nation at large to go back to a strict interpretation
of the Constitution. As I have said over and over,
you cannot reasonably expect Bush to avoid using the
"flexibility" of a "Living Constitution" when all his
political foes favor this when power is in their hands.
>
>
>> You will further note that while we made people uncomfortable
>> and shoved them around and humiliated them, their fellow
>> combatants beheaded people in the most horrible possible way.
>
> Why should we note that? And if we should, why do you not
> note the prisoners tortured to death in Bahgram prison? Does
Clearly wrong, and last I checked, the perpetrators were
being tried and convicted in (gasp!) military courts.
If you think that any system that is not perfect is not
workable at all, you are sadly mistaken. The system,
however imperfect, has safeguards and remedies and these
seem to be working.
> their mistreatment mitigate the murder of Daniel Perle?
Of course not.
>
>> There is no moral equivalence here, it is anti-war left wing
>> fiction and propaganda.
>>
>
> If you are not arguing moral equivalence, what is your
> point?
My point is that sensible analysis considers not just the
act, but the degree of malfeasance. Yes, a very few
US military behaved wrongly in a number of cases. But
the enemy acts badly pretty much at every opportunity.
I thing we've shown considerable restraint and maturity
in our response on the whole. I can say this without
excusing the horrific acts you describe.
>
>>
>>> Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
>>> terrorism?
>> Sometimes, where there is immediate need to do so and then only
>> under some kind of US military or civilian judge's supervision.
>>
>
> I disagree.
The more I think about this, the more I may come to see it your
way. It certainly makes me morally queasy. Not so much because
we are extracting information by force (though that is part of
the problem) but moreso because of the kind of human sewage
with whom we have to make common cause to pull this off.
For the moment, my view on this is that there are two
choices here - Bad: Do nothing thereby failing to use
every tool to thwart people who wish to murder non combatants,
or Really Bad: Make common cause with thugs and tyrants.
>
>>
>>> Bush's Presidential legacy is going to be much more than the Iraq
>>> thing. He and his administration have fought for the erosion of
>>> personal liberty far worse than any other President I can think of.
>> You must be kidding. Bush has merely applied that oh so sophisticated
>> notion of "A Living Constitution" to suit these times.
>
> Surely you gest. His supporters claim that he is
> applying the plain language of the constitution, though
> somehow I doubt that they have ever read it, or at most
> read nothing but Article II.
*Everyone* who bends the Constitution to suit "these times"
claims they are applying a plain reading. Bush is merely
the last in a long lineage of such people.
>
>> That *is*
>> what the left engineered starting with FDR, their patron saint.
>
> Whom even the now infamous Reverand Wright denounces...
But not for the aforementioned reason.
>
>> ...
>>> Warrantless wire taps on US Citizens,
>> Permited legally under FISA (which precedes him) but unworkable
>> because of the sheer volume of paperwork involved. Did the Dems
>> offer to step in and help to make it work better for the good of
>> the country? No.
>
> ISTR that only one, or at most two democrats were notified,
> at a classified meeting so that they were not permitted to
> discuss the matter after leaving the room.
There is a Senate Intelligence Committee last I looked.
If even just one of them were involved, you're suggesting
they could not have quietly suggested that - for
reasons they could not discuss - FISA process needed
to be revisited?
>
>> They were too busy blaming Bush for the world's
>> sins and teeing up their next election.
>
> It would be easy to forgive the Bush administration for missing
> the deadline to notify the FISA of warrantless wiretaps were
> it not for two considerations.
>
> One, the Bush administration wrote the law extending that
> deadline from 24 hours to 72. If they needed more time
> or needed to expand the court to handle the workload
> they could have written that in too. It's not like anybody
> in the Congress actually read the Patriot Act before
> they voted on it.
>
> They never even submitted late notifications.
And even I have real heartburn about this. It's
unconscionable and one of the reasons that the
Republicans do not deserve the White House next time.
>
>>> removal of habeas corpus for US residents,
>> A huge failing on W's part. Thanks to the Hamdi suit, SCOTUS
>> fixed this. The system worked ultimately.
>>
>>> Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
>> Nonsense. The government can't ask for cooperation on the one hand
>> and then prosecute with the other. This was proper. If there was
>> any sin here (and there probably wasn't much of one), it should
>> be addressed by the DOJ, not the individual carriers.
>
> That would make sense were the government not asking
> for cooperation in the commission of a crime.
What crime exactly was being committed?
>
>>> and mandatory gag orders on subpoenas issued through National Security
>>> Letters so that US Citizens who aren't even suspected of wrongdoing
>>> won't know they're being investigated.
>> No different than Obama's pals here in Chicago being investigated
>> for quite some time before *they* knew anything about it. This
>> is called "crime investigation". An investigation does not make
>> you guilty and the policeman or government agency doing it has no
>> legal obligation to inform you of it ahead of time.
>>
>>
>>
>>> As much as I love my country, the more I hear about how Bush has
>>> allowed either by inaction or active support of things such as these
>>> the more sickened I become.
>> You should go read the history of the FDR administration. He made
>> Bush look like a piker. No president since Andrew Jackson had more
>> overt contempt for rule-of-law and the Constitution than FDR.
>> Yet the left worships the man but hates guys like Bush who are
>> merely using the same techniques in somewhat different ways.
>>
>>
>>
>>> For a man who claims to be a Christian I really have to wonder which
>>> Christ he's following.
>> An utterly bogus observation. I don't care if he worship purple
>> frogs on yogurt. That is not germane to his governance or lack thereof.
>>
>> You watch, in a few years the real depth of the threat coming from
>> Iran especially is going to become evident, and it will have been
>> Bush that took the steps to quiet it before it completely flared out
>> of control.
>
>
> Like what, exactly?
My guess - and that's all it is, though it seems consistent
with what is released to the public - is that Iran is well on
the way to nuclear delivery capability and that the only
thing that will give them real pause on this is to feel
serious threat from someone ... us, for example.
>> Either we do it or the Israelis will. Which would you
>> prefer?
>
> Whoever gets the job done best.
I would prefer it not be the Israelis. This will have
all manner of sideshow issues and make a nasty problem
even worse.
>
> I freely admit that people have walked the Earth who are
> worse than GWB.
>
> I would like to set the standard for President a bit
> higher than "better than the worse person who ever
> lived.".
He is nowhere near as bad as you paint him. He is - at worse -
the Republican incarnation of FDR - make up the rules
as you go, push the limits of executive power, ignore
the noise, and win the war.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
N Hurst wrote:
<SNIP>
> Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
> pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
> reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
> cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
> sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
> in the air.
Of course I am, as are all true Conservationists. That's because
doing so is good for *me* (mankind). But wild eyed theories
about the end of the world "explained" by Gore-bie (The Inventor
Of The Internet) are not about making the planet better for the
critters that live on it. The Enviros are about using fear
to get people to embrace globalist, leftist politics, nothing
else. "The earth is in trouble and the only way we can fix it
is if we band together into a global government that does things
for you. All you need to do is give up reason, freedom, and thought."
>
> As to the upcoming Presidential race, I'll just be happy if any of the
> 3 are better than the current one. I don't think the US can handle
> another 4-8 years of that.
This one is not as bad as everyone thinks. The proof of which is
that any of the three viable candidates are far, far worse. Bush
will be skewered by history for his lack of fiscal restraint, and
he will be applauded by history for understanding the dynamics
of the Middle East far better than *any* of his critics (well his
administration will, anyway). Critics wail about the cost of the war
and loss of life. But they are profoundly dishonest. They do not
weigh the real cost of NOT going would have been. Imagine Iran/Iraq/
Syria - left to their own nasty devices - having nuclear weapons
capability in, say, 30 years. Unlike the Israelis, who see such
a weapon as a defensive choice of last resort - the Islamic Nutjobs
running Iran, especially, would be happy to torch off a few tactical
nukes to flatten Israel in the name of their fine religion. And
this has consequences for everyone on the planet, the least of
which being the radiation that would rise into the jet stream
and land upon all the rest of us. Those of you under the age of
50, contemplate just *what* a nuclear-enabled Islamic world would
look like and see if you still think W is nuts. I don't, and
I mostly disagree with him on almost every other matter.
Bush is no brilliant President, but it is ironic that the single
thing he got right is the one thing he is most criticized for -
this by a bunch of sheep following guys around who think there
are 60 states and that AmeriKKKa is an oppressive place.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Doug Miller wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>, "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Yeah, and Whew I had totally forgotten about McCain's running mate that
>> needs to be considered. I imagine that whether Obama or Hillary wins they
>> will team up and McCain will have half of an Oreo Cookie to run against.
>
> I doubt it. There's no way that Obama would offer second spot to Hillary; she
> and Bill would sabotage him every chance they got, and he's smart enough to
> know that. I also doubt very much he'd accept second spot behind her even if
> she wins the nomination (which is looking less and less likely every day).
>
> I've been saying for > 2 years now that the Democrat ticket in 2008 will be
> Obama and Evan Bayh. I still think that, even though Bayh endorsed and
> campaigned for Hillary -- what better way for Obama to "reach out" to
> Hillary's *supporters*, without reaching out to *her*, than to pick one of her
> most prominent backers as his running mate?
...except that Bayh doesn't represent "change" and the "new" type of
politics that BO keeps talking about. In fact, anyone currently in
politics won't qualify if he means what he says. Well, maybe Bayh after
all.
Renata wrote:
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 20:12:28 -0700, Mark & Juanita
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> -snip-
>> As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
>>being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
>>OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
>>embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
>>difference between these clowns.
>
> Starting WWIII is certain to be a recoverable "incident". For some,
> anyway (civilization, not so much) But, it'll sure please ole Rev
> Hagee.
Hmm, Don't believe Rev Hagee is running for office, but then I could be
wrong.
>
> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>
I've read enough to be able to be able to know BS when I see it. OTOH, if
you are willing to believe that people can measure the global average
temperature to 1/10's of a degree precision from centuries before the
invention of the thermometer by using tree ring data or ice core samples,
by all means jump on board. Algore will be happy to have you freezing
during the winter, sweating during the summer, and straining to see by the
light of CFL's while he continues to jet around in his G5.
As an engineer who has spent a significant amount of my career in modeling
and simulation of real-world test events, I am intimately familiar with the
difficulty of building models that predict accurately the results of those
test events. ... and that is when *I* have control of a large number of
the test parameters. Yet somehow I am to believe that people using models
with inputs from centuries-old tree ring data and other inputs from a
system many orders of magnitude more complex than any system ever built by
humans are going to be able to predict a degree or less temperature rise
over the next 50 years accurately when they can't even get the weather for
next week right? (Yeah, Fred, I know the difference between weather and
climate, they can't even predict the trends for a season very accurately).
> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
>
Well, given that the planet hasn't warmed since 1998, and they are now
predicting a cooling trend over the next 12 years as a result of "natural
variations in climate", yeah, I'd say warming is a bit of a misnomer. Nice
thing about their theory though, no matter what happens, it's all a result
of global climate change. Temps go up: man-made global warming. Temps go
down: wild swings due to man-made climate change. I love the concept, no
matter what happens, you are right, you get paid for it, and you get to
work to dismantle the free-market society from which we all benefit.
> Renata
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
"Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:3272ae0f-4bb5-40e9-85ae-4700a6cba68b@j22g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
On May 14, 9:29 am, "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>
> >I have seen this in my history books.
>
> > The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> > brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> > To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
> Oh we are giving him a chance, we hope he beats Billarys butt. Then I hope
> he looses to McCain.
That would largely depend on McCain's choice for running mate, eh?
Yeah, and Whew I had totally forgotten about McCain's running mate that
needs to be considered. I imagine that whether Obama or Hillary wins they
will team up and McCain will have half of an Oreo Cookie to run against.
;~)
Robatoy wrote:
> I have seen this in my history books.
>
> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
Required listening for Canadians involved in US politics:
<http://members.tripod.com/~JB5555/southpark/hapicamp.wav>
On May 15, 6:39 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:> ...
> > On May 15, 3:09 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> <SNIP>
>
> >> He was dead wrong on Hamdi
> >> and the appropriate legal steps were taken.
>
> > He was also dead wrong regarding his ad hoc
> > tribunals. As you know, they were struck down
> > by the USSC which held that they violated
> > common article 3 of the 1949 GCs and the
> > UCMJ. That does prove my point, right?
>
> Not fully. It proves that the Bush administration
> interpreted precedent and current conditions to
> grant them power they actually did not have.
> They were slapped down by SCOTUS. The system
> *worked*. This is a far cry from the larger
> complaint voiced here repeatedly that Bush
> is some kind of civil liberties monster.
>
>
>
> >> If you're
> >> clearly right, then similar steps should obviously
> >> work here as well, shouldn't they?
>
> > This administration has relied on the most
> > transparent of stalling tactics to keep those
> > steps from being taken. For instance, Padilla
> > was transferred from one Federal District to
> > another, mooting his habeas petition and forcing
> > his attorneys to refile in the new district. Other
> > appelants were released after being granted
> > certitori by the USSC depriving the court of the
> > opportunity to rule on the vital matters of law
> > that were in contention.
>
> > That the administration
> > was afraid to plead its case before the USSC
> > is a pretty good indicator that it knew it was
> > wrong, eh?
>
> I freely admit that I find these shenanigans
> repugnant. Note that I have never held the Bush
> administration up as some paragon of good works,
> merely that you critics are vastly overstating
> things in the level of malice attributed to it.
>
> <SNIP>
>
> >> There are, as you well know, different categories
> >> of protections offered to different classes of persons in the
> >> GC. Plain clothes combatants have almost no such protections
> >> therein. Wishing it were so doesn't make it that way.
>
> > And yet, unless I am very much mistaken, you were perfectly
> > happy when the President forbade the military from determining
> > if their prisoners were plain clothes combatants.
>
> Hmm, I don't recall him doing so. Do tell. I do recall
> the claim that tribunals were being held in secret and
> such determinations were being made.
>
> >> ...
>
> >>>> Your captors are free to do almost anything they want including
> >>>> waterboarding you or making you listen to Sean Penn speeches.
> >>> What competent court or tribunal determined
> >>> that any person held at Guantanamo bay, in fact,
> >>> made war in civilian clothing?
> >> Presumably, the military tribunals held there wherein
> >> the accused had legal representation.
>
> > President Bush forbade the military from conducting
> > those tribunals and forbade the courts-martial from
> > trying them the persons in question. That is precisely
> > my objection.
>
> I do not recall this and may well be wrong. But I was
> under the impression that the claim was that there
> WERE such trials to determine the standings of those
> in GTMO, for example, but that they were held in secret
> for "security reasons". "Security reasons", BTW, was
> the first wail of complaint I heard from the loudest
> Bush critics because they maintained he could not be
> trusted to actually do this.
>
> <SNIP>
>
>
>
> >> The lack of public
> >> transparency in trials of (alleged) foreign combatants
> >> does not instantly mean that the process is bogus.
>
> > Again, to what trials do you refer? Please name a
> > defendant, provide a date, something.
>
> I can't because they were (it is claimed) done in secret. Ordinarily,
> this would outrage me. But given that the people in GTMO weren't
> snatched off the street in Detroit, but in the middle of a battlezone
> in a foreign country, I was (and for the moment am) content to believe
> in the essential fairness and professionalism of the military to deal
> with what is a military, not civil matter.
>
> If/when this is inarguably demonstrated to be false and all your
> claims confirmed, the administration officials who participated in this
> should be tried and sentenced as is appropriate. You make a great
> case, but I question just how valid it is. Not because I think you are
> lying, but because things are rarely this clear cut. When they are,
> (say like Hamdi) the courts swiftly address this. Moreover, given the
> vitriolic hatred so many on the left have for Bush, how is it that -
> in the presence of such abundant evidence of malfeasance - no charges
> have been mounted against him by his many enemies? Clinton was
> humiliated in a sham impeachment for far, far less. Surely the
> left wants payback. With the kind of inarguable "facts" you
> claim, they should be foaming at the mouth to get it.
>
> >>> Or are you arguing that
> >>> the rules and regulations governing captures on land and sea
> >>> and regulating the Armed Forces, passed by the Congress and
> >>> signed into law by the President of the United States aren't
> >>> REAL laws, just some sort of general suggestions?
> >> They are real. But just to *which* rules do you refer.
>
> > The UCMJ.
>
> > The provisions of the UCMJ to the effect that the proper status
> > of a prisoner who disputes his status be determined by
> > a competent court or tribunal.
>
> > UNCATS.
>
> >> The GCs do not materially protect non-uniformed combatants.
> >> There is likely policy and procedure in place for the
> >> military lawyers involved, but that is not some international
> >> and immutable standard that supercedes the GCs here to the
> >> best of my knowledge.
>
> > You argue that because a person engaged in an act
> > that disentitled them to the protections of the GCs, they
> > are not entitled to a proper hearing to determine if they
> > engaged in an act that disentitles them to the protections
> > of the GCs.
>
> Not at all. I think I have made it pretty clear: Status should
> be determined, and once found to be non-uniformed combatants,
> we should do whatever we wish within the bounds of the GCs
> to which we are signatory.
>
> >> ...
> >>> US law has required that spies be tried before execution
> >>> since the Continental Congress passed the First US
> >>> Articles of War.
> >> And I am fine with that. It is my belief - a belief
> >> rooted not in observable fact, since the process was
> >> not public, but rooted in a confidence in the professionalism
> >> and ethics of our military - that exactly this took place.
>
> > Please name of a person whom you believe was executed
> > after trial during the present administration.
>
> Same point: I am not privy to secret proceedings. I either
> trust that they were conducted properly, not at all, or
> that my government is utterly corrupt. But as I keep
> saying, your claim for abundant evidence for the latter
> should be yielding large and loud suits against the President
> and this administration. Where are they?
>
>
>
> >>> "Spies may not be punished without
> >>> trial." is one of the articles of the 1907 Hague conventions.
> >>> It would be difficult, at best, to mistreat a prisoner without
> >>> violating the common criminal provisions of the UCMJ
> >>> which, as you know, (e.g. the trial of the civilian spouse of
> >>> a US soldier for a crime allegedly committed in Germany)
> >>> apply to American civilians on US military bases abroad.
> >>> UNCATS prohibits torture, inhumane or degrading treatment
> >>> without exception.
> >> All we have to do is come up with a universal definition
> >> for "torture". You may know that those who defend it
> >> as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that it is
> >> NOT inherently torture, though everyone agrees it has
> >> the capacity to be abused.
>
> > If I understand the English language correctly, the
> > antecedent of 'it' is 'torture'.
>
> > So the statement above is logically:
>
> > "You may know that those who defend torture
> > as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that
> > torture is NOT inherently torture, though everyone
> > agrees torture has the capacity to be abused."
>
> > Which I agree is exactly the sort of thing we have
> > come to expect from the Bush administration.
>
> OK, my grammar was compromised. I'll say it correctly.
> Many who defend *interrogation techniques* like waterboarding
> argue it is not inherently torture, though everyone agrees
> these techniques can be abused. Better?
>
> I shall endevour to not torture the language in the future.
>
>
>
> >> ...
>
> >>> Breathe control torture plainly violates UNCATS, and if
> >>> committed on an US military base, federal
> >>> criminal law.
>
> OK, here's the UNCATS language to which we are signatory:
>
> Any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental,
> is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining
> from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him
> for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of
> having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person,
> or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain
> or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the
> consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in
> an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising
> only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions.
>
> Guess what? It's not "plain" at all. Just when do we move from
> discomfort to pain to "severe" pain? What constitutes "suffering"? For
> me, that would involve having to watch TV for more than 5 minutes.
> Does playing loud, obnoxious noise - say Rap - constitute
> torture? How about a forced Rosie O'Donnell film festival?
> Everyone's threshold for pain is different. Yes, I'm splitting
> hairs, but I'm doing so to make a point. The defenders of
> waterboarding argue that it is both effective, and does not
> cause "severe". Moreover, if we take the sort of simplistic
> "plain" reading you favor, then injecting someone with drugs
> that cause no pain but make them spill all they know would be
> OK, right? My point is that these kinds of things are matter
> both of conscience AND of judgment. You judge waterboarding
> to be torture. A good many other people do not. That doesn't
> make them immoral monsters (the implicit claim laid at the feet
> of the Bushies), it illustrates a difference of opinion.
> In short, your claim of "plain" meaning is bogus.
>
> >> I rather think this is not so cut and dried. If it is,
> >> the participants should be tried, found guilty, and
> >> sentenced.
>
> > By whom, the people who ordered the crime in the
> > first place?
>
> No, by the checks and balances built into our adversarial
> political and judicial system.
>
>
>
> >> Wanna take any bets as to whether, say,
> >> Obama will take any such action? I rather doubt it.
>
> > Relevance?
>
> Any president, faced with the enormous task at hand,
> would have to make calls about just how far we could
> and should go. I have little doubt that Bush's
> polar opposites politically might be different in
> small ways tactically, but they'd have done much
> the same thing. More to the point, will the next
> president, if they are a Democrat, bring charges
> against Bush, pardon him of all wrongdoing (thereby
> damning his legacy w/o an actual legal battle), or
> remain silent on his decisions once they see the
> full scope of what is going on in the world of
> bad guys? I'd bet on the latter.
>
>
>
> >>> Claims that it is legal to commit crimes against someone
> >>> because he is a bad person, are no longer persuasive
> >>> in any US court, nor should they be.
> >> No they shouldn't but that's not the discussion here.
>
> > Nonsense. That is precisely your argument. If the
> > government were to subject you to exactly the same
> > treatment as Khalid Sheik Mohammed there is no
> > question that you would believe you had been assaulted.
>
> I am a citizen and participant in our legal/social
> contract. I am entitled to far higher levels of
> representation and redress because of that status.
>
> > The ONLY reason you argue that KSM was not assaulted
> > is because you believe he deserved it. Whether or not
> > the victim of an assault deserved it, is not a defense.
>
> No, I argue that waterboarding, conducted properly
> is not inherently torture. I trust that the people
> doing it have both a moral conscience and oversight.
> If I'm wrong about any of that, I want the people
> responsible for doing it brought to justice.
>
>
>
> >>>> You will also note that Al Queda is not a signatory to the
> >>>> Geneva Conventions and cannot thus make claims upon them.
> >>> While al Queda is not, most of the people accused
> >>> of being part of al Queda are nationals of states that
> >>> are. Further, inasmuchas a state of war does not
> >>> exist between those nations and the United States
> >>> if they commit a belligerent act they commit a crime
> >>> whether they are in uniform or not.
> >> Their belligerent acts were carried out on behalf of
> >> Al Queda. Moreover, their wearing a uniform or not
> >> is fundamental to their class before the law.
> >> Say I went to Africa to fight as a mercenary,
> >> wearing a suit and tie, posing as a health worker.
> >> If I started killing innocents to create an act
> >> of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
> >> international laws protect me from being treated
> >> as a spy? I think not.
>
> > Were you to wear a uniform and carry arms
> > openly while killing innocents to create an act
> > of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
> > international laws protect you from being treated
> > as a war criminal? I think not.
>
> You're avoiding the question. Does purposely not
> wearing a uniform and making war on civilians
> change my standing before international or domestic
> US law? I say it does, you want to pretend that's
> not the issue.
>
>
>
> > To disguise yourself might be an act of perfidy,
> > and an offense in and of itself, but one that
> > pales in comparison to the other crimes
> > committed, and completely irrelevent to the
> > issue of whether or not you could be prosecuted
> > and punished for those other crimes, don't you
> > agree?
>
> No, or not as you've stated. It fundamentally
> effects just *how* I may be treated during my
> prosecutions and to what legal protections
> I am entitled. That's why you can summarily
> execute spies found guilty, but not uniformed
> military POWs.
>
>
>
> > But that has never been the point of contention
> > between us. The issue in dispute has always
> > been the process (again a term of art) to be
> > employed to determine IF you committed any
> > such crime.
>
> Which I agree should take place. My government
> tells me is has taken place. (Except in obvious
> examples like Hamdi.) You claim otherwise.
> Make your case in a court, get the president
> impeached or jailed. You'll be an instant
> celebrity.
>
>
>
> >>> As well as the
> >>> claim by the President and Commander-in-Chief that
> >>> he had authority to create courts, make the laws those
> >>> courts would enforce, their rules of evidence and procedure,
> >>> appoint the judges, the prosecutors and the defense
> >>> attorneys, and to direct their actions, and that the Congress,
> >>> to whom the plain language of the Constitution grants
> >>> the sole authority to do those things, has no say in
> >>> the matter.
> >> All true but missing a critical detail. With the advent
> >> of FDR's "making it up as you go along" approach to
> >> Constitutional law, there is ample precedent for Bush's
> >> claim.
>
> > Sure, so long as you ignore the repeal of the Articles of
> > War in 1949.
>
> >> I'm not claiming Bush made all the right calls
> >> here. I am claiming he is within his executive privilege
> >> *as granted by precedent*.
>
> > Your claim is meritless because it contradicts the plain
> > language of the Constitution. Or is it your argument that
> > the President retains the authority delegated to him by
> > Federal Law, even after that law is repealed?
>
> I claim that from FDR forward there has been a large amount of "gray"
> injected into the role of the Presidency viz the Legislature as each
> as chosen to interpret the Constitution as a moving target. My proof
> of this is that - even after all the "sins" you enumerate above - no
> one has managed to show Bush to have materially broken any laws, at least
> not the level of impeachability or other serious sanction. Why?
> Because the moving target Constitution theory makes *all* law open to
> interpretation. He is doing nothing more than walking in FDR's,
> Kennedy's, Johnson's, Nixon's ... footsteps. Bad? Surely. But
> unremarkable given that the nation and its government long ago
> abandoned their own laws.
>
> You keep trying to read my comments as a defense of Bush. You should
> be reading them as a commentary about the inevitable outcome of
> ignoring the rules set forth in the Constitution long ago. I'm not
> happy with this administration. I just see great irony in the foaming
> directed at it my a good many people who are otherwise just fine with
> the "lets make up the Constitution as we go" line of thinking. I am
> responding more to them than I ever was or am defending Bush who has
> been a crushing disappointment on almost every front. The only place I
> did and do agree with him, was the necessity of interdicting in the
> ME. Then he screwed up and *stayed*.
>
>
>
> >> You don't like it? Fine.
> >> I'm not actually crazy about it myself. But the only
> >> way to unwind it would be to get the government and
> >> the nation at large to go back to a strict interpretation
> >> of the Constitution. As I have said over and over,
> >> you cannot reasonably expect Bush to avoid using the
> >> "flexibility" of a "Living Constitution" when all his
> >> political foes favor this when power is in their hands.
>
> > None of this has anything to do with any living constitution
> > argument.. The argument advanced by the administration is
> > the "unitary president" theory, which holds that the President
> > is not bound in his official acts, by federal law. To my
> > knowledge no proponent of this theory makes any claim
> > of the sort you suggest. They argue that they are
> > returning to the true meaning of the constitution. IOW, they
> > claim to be doing exactly what you say you want them
> > to do.
>
> You're dead wrong. A nation welded to the clear meaning
> and limits imposed by a strict reading of the Constitution
> would never have allowed an environment to flourish where
> arguments like "unitary presidency" could have even seen
> the light of day. You are in pain because of the outcomes.
> I am in pain because of the root cause.
>
>
>
> > Further, what I may or may not expect the President to
> > does not absolve me of my responsibility to demand that
> > he respect the rule of law.
>
> But as I keep pointing out over and over, there is NO rule
> of law. It's become a moving target. That's, for example,
> how both the right and left ignore border protection.
> It's how you get people trying to make gay marriage
> illegal. It's how you get people trying to make handguns
> illegal. And, yes, it's how you get unfettered arrogance
> of power in both the Executive AND Legislative branches.
>
>
>
> >>>> You will further note that while we made people uncomfortable
> >>>> and shoved them around and humiliated them, their fellow
> >>>> combatants beheaded people in the most horrible possible way.
> >>> Why should we note that? And if we should, why do you not
> >>> note the prisoners tortured to death in Bahgram prison? Does
> >> Clearly wrong, and last I checked, the perpetrators were
> >> being tried and convicted in (gasp!) military courts.
>
> > What is clearly wrong?
>
> It was clearly wrong to torture prisoners to death.
>
>
>
> > Willy Brandt received the harshest sentence at trial,
> > a few months confinement and a reduction in pay. It
> > is my understanding that since then, his sentence
> > has been reduced to honorable discharge.
>
> As I am unfamiliar with the details, I shall defer to
> you on this one.
>
>
>
> >> If you think that any system that is not perfect is not
> >> workable at all, you are sadly mistaken. The system,
> >> however imperfect, has safeguards and remedies and these
> >> seem to be working.
>
> I have rethought this statement of mine, and wish to
> retract it. The system is working, but poorly.
> And it works poorly exactly because of the aforementioned
> making up the law as we go along theory.
>
>
>
> >>> their mistreatment mitigate the murder of Daniel Perle?
> >> Of course not.
>
> > Then why introduce his murder into the discussion?
>
> To demonstrate that there are degrees of sin here, and
> ours are minor by comparison.
>
> >>>>> Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
> >>>>> terrorism?
> >>>> Sometimes, where there is immediate need to do so and then only
> >>>> under some kind of US military or civilian judge's supervision.
> >>> I disagree.
> >> The more I think about this, the more I may come to see it your
> >> way. It certainly makes me morally queasy. Not so much because
> >> we are extracting information by force (though that is part of
> >> the problem) but moreso because of the kind of human sewage
> >> with whom we have to make common cause to pull this off.
> >> For the moment, my view on this is that there are two
> >> choices here - Bad: Do nothing thereby failing to use
> >> every tool to thwart people who wish to murder non combatants,
> >> or Really Bad: Make common cause with thugs and tyrants.
>
> > False dichotomy. To refrain from torture does not require
> > that one do nothing.
>
> One is effectively "doing nothing", at least locally, when
> one has a captive with relevant information and does not
> act to get that information. What, short of physical
> intimidation and force, would you suggest instead to
> get the needed info?
>
> >> There is a Senate Intelligence Committee last I looked.
> >> If even just one of them were involved, you're suggesting
> >> they could not have quietly suggested that - for
> >> reasons they could not discuss - FISA process needed
> >> to be revisited?
>
> > Unauthorized circumspective discussion of national
> > security matters is impermissible for obvious reasons.
> > Further, I don't think you can come up with any credible
> > scenario where in the needed changes could be introduced
> > or discussed without making it obvious as to what was
> > discussed behind those closed doors.
>
> One need not discuss the details to make the case,
> "Hey, I think FISA is broken and we need to help
> the President with better tools."
>
>
>
> > But as you know, the Congress did pass exactly the
> > legislation requested by the administration on this
> > point. To hold the Congress to blame for its inadequacy
> > is asinine.
>
> Probably true.
>
>
>
> >> ...
>
> >>> They never even submitted late notifications.
> >> And even I have real heartburn about this. It's
> >> unconscionable and one of the reasons that the
> >> Republicans do not deserve the White House next time.
>
> >>>>> removal of habeas corpus for US residents,
> >>>> A huge failing on W's part. Thanks to the Hamdi suit, SCOTUS
> >>>> fixed this. The system worked ultimately.
>
> > Well then you agree that what GWB did was wrong. That was
> > the point being made.
>
> >>>>> Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
> >>>> Nonsense. The government can't ask for cooperation on the one hand
> >>>> and then prosecute with the other. This was proper. If there was
> >>>> any sin here (and there probably wasn't much of one), it should
> >>>> be addressed by the DOJ, not the individual carriers.
> >>> That would make sense were the government not asking
> >>> for cooperation in the commission of a crime.
> >> What crime exactly was being committed?
>
> > Illegal wiretaps.
>
> You say they are "illegal". The administration says they are
> permissible given the parties involved. Why doesn't someone
> bring suit - not against the Telcos - but the administration for
> this?
>
>
>
> >> ...
>
> >>>> You watch, in a few years the real depth of the threat coming from
> >>>> Iran especially is going to become evident, and it will have been
> >>>> Bush that took the steps to quiet it before it completely flared out
> >>>> of control.
> >>> Like what, exactly?
> >> My guess - and that's all it is, though it seems consistent
> >> with what is released to the public - is that Iran is well on
> >> the way to nuclear delivery capability and that the only
> >> thing that will give them real pause on this is to feel
> >> serious threat from someone ... us, for example.
>
> > Allow me to rephrase. Like what steps, exactly, has
> > Bush taken to quiet the Iranian threat?
>
> I suspect they are currently diplomatic primarily. It has also been
> quietly reported that we've had SOGCOM people in Iran already, though
> obviously no one will confirm this. And Bush may yet pull an
> air attack on Iran before the year ends.
>
>
>
> >> ...
> >>> I freely admit that people have walked the Earth who are
> >>> worse than GWB.
> >>> I would like to set the standard for President a bit
> >>> higher than "better than the worse person who ever
> >>> lived.".
> >> He is nowhere near as bad as you paint him. He is - at worse -
> >> the Republican incarnation of FDR - make up the rules
> >> as you go, push the limits of executive power, ignore
> >> the noise, and win the war.
> >> ...
>
> > As I pointed out above, FDR had some authority under the
> > Articles of War that was substantially diminished when they
> > were replaced with the UCMJ. It is particularly important to
> > note that a, if not the, primary justification for the change was
> > concern for potential abuse under the precedent law.
>
> That was not what I was talking about. FDR openly thrwarted
> the enumerated powers doctrine and led the US into the
> sewer of a moving target Constitution moreso than any
> president since Jackson (who just ignored SCOTUS completely
> in the Trail Of Tears tragedy). And *that* teed up an
> awful lot of what you find so repulsive in *this* president.
>
>
>
> > To suggest an equivalency between the current situation
> > and the Great Depression and World War two betrays a
> > complete lack of perspective.
>
> The threat here is potentially greater because of the
> proliferation and miniaturization of nuclear weapons.
> If there were no nukes or other serious WMDs potentially
> on the table, I would care even slightly about what
> happens in Iran, Iraq, et al. But these weapons are
> potentially available to some very unstable people
> and governments. We cannot wait until they actually
> acquire them. We do so at our own peril.
>
>
>
> > Even though I recognize that enormous difference in exigency,
> > I still condemn FDR for some of his actions. Consequently
> > I cannot reasonably decline to condemn Bush for like sins.
>
> Fine, this is both your privilege and your responsibility.
> But Bush, like FDR, will pretty much get away with whatever
> he wants. So will Obama/Hillary/McCain. We are no longer
> a Constitutional Republic with a fixed rule of law.
>
> --
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 15, 2:44 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
> evodawg wrote:
> > J. Clarke wrote:
>
> >> So you're saying that it's cheaper to bomb half the middle east
> >> every
> >> day for all eternity than it is to occupy and Americanize the
> >> place?
>
> > Sounds like a good idea to me.
>
> So you'd prefer being at war forever to building alliances?
>
Alliances with whom? For the most part, the Middle East consists of
people and governments who can be wheedled and bribed into alliances
that they keep until they're finished being read the hard parts. After
that, it's over.
A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
On Tue, 13 May 2008 16:49:44 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
<[email protected]> wrote:
>Robatoy wrote:
>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>
>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
>He has no new ideas. In fact, he has no ideas at all, other than
>"let's whip up some change, any kind of change."
>
>>
>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
>You mean this guy:
>
> http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/05/the_obama_change_we_really_can.html
>
>Or this guy:
>
> http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html
>
>When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
>him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
>He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
>incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
>"divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
>alternatives are lousy. That combined with his amazing amnesia of
>never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
>this guy is nothing to be proud of. He just looks better in a suit
>than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
>
>No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
>to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
>
>
>I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>than the three current contenders.
>
>Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
>PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Tom Watson
tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet
www.home.comcast.net/~tjwatson1
Buck Turgidson wrote:
> Anyone can sound sharp when they're an expert on his own opinion. I am very
> wary of people who are so sure of everything as is this guy Daneliuk. I
> wonder what he's like in person.
Lovable, handsome, charming, humble ...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 13, 10:20=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
> with your evening Thorazine.
>
I'm glad you enjoyed that life's experience. It worked for you, did
it?
On May 14, 4:53 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>... Iran/Iraq/Syria with
> nukes is an unacceptable level of threat.
That is an interesting comment considering that of the
three, Iraq was the one that was clearly NOT actively
involved in either military or civilian nuclear development.
--
FF
On May 14, 9:29=A0am, "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>
> >I have seen this in my history books.
>
> > The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> > brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> > To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
> Oh we are giving him a chance, =A0we hope he beats Billarys butt. =A0Then =
I hope
> he looses to McCain.
That would largely depend on McCain's choice for running mate, eh?
"Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> I'll bet he knows the proper usage of the words "there" and "their."
And possibly not. In any event, his speech writers should be making sure he
doesn't look as illiterate as the current president of the US.
On May 14, 4:15 pm, "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "N Hurst" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
> > On May 14, 11:42 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
> > pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
> > reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
> > cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
> > sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
> > in the air.
>
> Agreed, pollution is a problem. Not all that is labeled as "pollution" is a
> problem. The latest craze is the carbon pollution by very far lengths taken
> out of context amd made to sound bad. IIRC we contribute between 1-2% of
> all of this carbon pollution. The earth naturally emits the other 98%. The
> large volcano that recently erupted emitted more pollution in a single day
> than all of the automobiles combined.
> Before the carbon pollution there was the ozone pollution. Some scientists
> now speculate that because of the restriction of some pollution the sun's
> rays now penetrate more of the atmosphere and causing the oceans to heat up
> more in turn that is responsible for the more frequent and stronger
> hurricanes. I personally think that the weather bureau has spent a fortune
> on the latest radar and needs to catch every passing cloud to consider it
> for tropical storm naming nomination. The biggest problems with the storms
> are that our politicians are squandering money that should go toward
> hurricane preparedness.
> I think we should control the obvious pollution but lets not make up
> pollution problems for political gain. The first step to controlling carbon
> pollution would be to tape every politicians mouth shut, that would do as
> much if not more good as buying carbon credits or capturing the carbon and
> burying it at the bottom of the ocean.
My #1 wish for environmental improvement is the relaxation of the EPA
rules that require a facility upgrade everything if they upgrade
anything.
Installing $2million smokestack scrubbers that can eliminate 97% of
the output particulate pollution shouldn't require a $100million
overhaul of the entire power plant. I understand the intent, but
really, "All or nothing" is kind of stupid in this application.
> > As to the upcoming Presidential race, I'll just be happy if any of the
> > 3 are better than the current one. I don't think the US can handle
> > another 4-8 years of that.
>
> While it is easy to play Monday morning quarter back and I'll admit that I
> am not real happy with the current politicians that are in charge, I pray
> that our next president does not have to face the obstacles that Bush had to
> address during the first year of his presidency. I imagine that any
> president would probably have to make a change in his agenda had he had the
> same circumstances.
No president is powerful enough to do everything that has gone on in
the past 8 years. It was a team effort! :-)
> I do agree with the wish of the next president being better than the present
> one and for that matter I wish that every succeeding president is better
> than the one before.
Amen to that.
Doug Winterburn wrote:
> Leon wrote:
>> "Doug Winterburn" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> Renata wrote:
>>>> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
>>>> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
>>>> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
>>> NASA has adjusted their warming analysis:
>>>
>>> http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0817-nasa_snafu.html
>>>
>>>> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>>>>
>>>> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
>>>> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
>>> I hope we don't all freeze to death:
>>>
>>> http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm
>>>
>>
>>
>> Have you noticed that cleaning up the air is causing global warming?
>> Before emission controls no one complained about "global worming".
>>
> The warming crowd is now saying that the current cooling is caused by
> warming? Now, "climate change" seems to be the rage - it covers all the
> alarmist bases.
The beauty of Global Warming Alarmism is that it is a "theory" that can be
argued for all observed phenomena. Too hot? GW. Too cold? GW. Lots
of storms? GS. Few storms? GW. The only real test of this theory would
be to remove all government funding for it. Then we'd see how committed the
apologists for this theory really are - they could donate their own funds
for this Very Important Research.
You gotta hand it to Peace Price Boy - The Gore-bie Of Our Time - He managed
to popularize an obscure rat hole in research to further his political
ambition. His keening about GW is analogous to Carter making nice with
the murderous Hamas leadership: They are both vile purveyors of mayhem.
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22069080-5001031,00.html
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
DGDevin wrote:
> Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
>> When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
>> him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
>> He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
>> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
>> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
>> alternatives are lousy.
>
> Okay, let's say that's true. So then you must be planning on voting for him
> given that you've just said the alternatives are so lousy, right?
No. I plan to vote for Ronald Reagan who - even dead - is better than
any of the above. I want to register my disdain for the choices the
mainstream parties have given me. We desperately need a "None Of The
Above" voting choice on our ballots. If more than 33% of the people
who voted, select that option, the election should be invalid and
require a "do over". I favor a Constitutional Amendment to make this
so.
>
>> That combined with his amazing amnesia of
>> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
>> this guy is nothing to be proud of.
>
> Do you hold all candidates to the same standard? Did you recoil from the
> Republicans when that carpet-chewing nutball Pat Robertson's organization
> worked so closely with Republicans that the Federal Election Commission sued
> him over it? Do you lose sleep over the fact that McCain's wife's father
Yes.
> did business with the mob? Should we be troubled that Mike Huckabee was
Cite please.
> pastor of a church that didn't admit black members until the 1980s? Or are
We should be more than troubled, we should be outraged.
> embarrassing associations a problem only with candidates you already
> dislike?
I am consistent in this. The stink is everywhere in politics.
>
>> He just looks better in a suit
>> than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
>
> Sure, that's how he's come from behind to whomp Hillary, because he looks
> better in a suit, that's some real insightful analysis on your part.
He has NO CONTENT to his speeches. "Change you can believe in?"
C'mon? What change? From what TO what and WHY? How will we pay
for it? He is capitalizing on the boneheaded anti-war sentiment
currently in vogue and the fact that Hillary both did support
the war and won't completely back away from it. So I guess there is one
policy point he can exploit. But he is an empty vessel, with
nothing meaningful to say other than "change, change, change."
>
>> No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
>> to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
>
> Wait, you've already described the other candidates as being so lousy they
> make Obama look good, but now you'd rather he didn't win. I'm having
That doesn't actually *make* him better, it's a public perception thing.
> trouble following your logic here, unless what it really comes down to is
> there isn't much logic involved.
What is comes down to is that *all* the candidates are lousy and
he is *perceived* as being better than the alternatives. I don't
share that view, but I understand that is *is* the dominant view.
In my opinion he is the most dangerous of the bunch because
he has no specific ideas but a strong affiliation to the general ideation of
the extreme Left.
>
>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>> than the three current contenders.
>
> For the most part I liked Reagan, alas, even if he were alive the
> Constitution would prohibit him from becoming President again. Of course
> given that the current administration doesn't find the Constitution a
> barrier to doing what they want maybe we shouldn't care too much what that
> document says.
Don't just blame Bush for that. The rules by which W plays were
put in place LONG before he was even in politics. It was, you'll
recall, the activist political left, that decided the Constitution
was a "living" document to be interpreted as necessary to fit
current conditions. That's all Bush is doing ... he's just
not doing it the way the left elite snobs would like.
>
>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>
> Explain what's real about a supposed libertarian who fought like a hungry
> dog for the govt. to go on spending billions on a failed war on drugs and
> used every trick in the books to enable the feds to ignore the voters of
> states who approved medical marijuana laws? Oh yeah, he's changed his tune
> *now* since he'd like to get elected again one day and his medical marijuana
> stance already helped cost him his seat in Congress. I'm also curious about
> how such a staunch anti-abortionist as Barr agreed to his own wife having an
> abortion. And how about his refusal to testify about his extra-marital
> affair during his divorce proceedings, kind of odd for a guy who was a
> front-runner in the Clinton impeachment effort. He's now on wife number
> three but he backed the Defense of Marriage Act 'cause he figures gay
> marriage would harm the nation, now that's funny.
Note that I said "appears". I've not had time to dig into his record
deeply yet. If it turns out that you're record is correct I will never
vote for him.
>
> Hey, as a rule I think liberal politicians are every bit as crooked,
> manipulative and hypocritical as conservative politicians; historically I'm
> a conservative voter. But if Barr is your idea of the Real Deal then I have
> to wonder what color the sky is on your planet.
Again, I just saw him announce, and I've not examined the details for
myself. I'm with you. I don't mind people changing their minds
on principle. I mind people using the force of government to
tell me what to do.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
J. Clarke wrote:
> Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>> "Tim Daneliuk" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>
>>> Nice theory. Let's let Iran and Syran get nukes because - given
>>> their rational view of the universe - there's no reason to believe
>>> they'll actually use them right?
>>
>> You mean like the USA?
>
> You really think that a bunch of people who think nothing of blowing
> themselves to Hell for the glory of Allah will hesitate to nuke major
> cities for the same purpose?
>
> The trouble with nukes is that it's a lot easier to keep someone from
> getting them than to take them away afterwards if it turns out that
> the people having them are using them irresponsibly.
>
> Or are you cool with some loon killing tens of millions of people for
> the glory of Allah?
>
>>> I am with you in one way though: No more
>>> land invasions. We should bomb the roads, sewers, water plants,
>>> telecommunications facilities, sewer treatment plants, cell phone
>>> towers, military facilities, military equipment and government
>>> buildings of Iran and Syria every day until they place nice.
>>> In the mean time, they can drink their oil.
>>>
>>> No occupation, no rebuilding, no money, no humanitarian aid.
>>> Make their day-to-day lives so miserable that they'll be too busy
>>> boiling water and too poor to have time for nukes. This is
>>> relatively cheap and very effective.
>
> So you're saying that it's cheaper to bomb half the middle east every
> day for all eternity than it is to occupy and Americanize the place?
>
>
It wouldn't be "every day" - at most, even if they are utterly unwilling
to play nice, it would be a few weeks a year to keep their infrastructure
broken.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Doug Miller wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>> than the three current contenders.
>
> :-)
>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>
> .. and has absolutely *no* chance of winning, thus making a vote for him
> nearly indistinguishable from a vote for Obama.
True, but so what? If you examine Obama, Clinton, and McCain
their positions are oh-so slightly distinct without any real
difference. Face it, any of the three will be lying through
their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
thing.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Renata wrote:
<SNIP>
> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>
> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
>
> Renata
And the lunacy dance begins. In the absence of facts to support your
earth worship, you'll redefine terms. Now it won't be "warming", it
will be something else you use to terrify the illiterate masses.
You pantheists have a problem, several actually. First of all, the
data does not all point in one direction. Secondly, it is barely
correlative, let alone causal. Thirdly, the actual recent local temp
averages have been among the lowest in recent decades. Fourthly, and
most damning of all, you (and no one else) can establish that we live
in the best of all possible climates, and thus ought to seek to keep
it from changing. It is the height of presumptive arrogance to declare
that we're about to go into a climate abyss when NO ONE can actually
predict what the consequences would be, how bad, how fast, and so
forth. (Never mind that you can't even establish that humans could
actually do anything useful to thwart climate that has undergone
continuous change for 4B+ years.)
That doesn't stop people in your religion (because GW orthodoxy is a
religion requiring more faith than a literal 6-day Creationist
exhibits) from worshiping your idols as officiated by your high
priests like Peace Prize Boy.
'Think I'll fire up the SUV and go 12mpg for a while just to clear my
mind. This trip's for you...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Larry Blanchard wrote:
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:25:18 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
>> Oh, and I actually live in Illinois. The depth of his personal lack of
>> character is just starting to get exposed as Federal law enforcement
>> goes after the Governor and a number of other likely criminals, all of
>> whom appear to have had untoward relations with Obama.
>
> And I used to live in Chicago. The fact that Illinois, and especially
> Chicago, politicians are crooked surprises you? And by extrapolation and
> experience, everywhere else as well :-).
>
> The trick is to vote for the crook who will do the least harm for the
> country and the most good for you.
>
> Me, I prefer someone who knows a Shiite from a Sunni. McCain is beginning
> to remind me of a Bush/Stockdale hybrid.
>
Uh, mind your manners. Stockdale was beaten as or even more severely than
McCain in Viet Nam. His apparent slowness and poor speech patterns
were a direct result.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Lew Hodgett wrote:
> RE: Subject
>
> You idiots for real?
>
> Do you ever clip any of your drivel?
>
> If you need to be reminded:
>
> Idiot 1: "Fred the Red Shirt"
> Idiot 2: Tim Daneliuk
>
>
> Lew
>
>
You, of course, being the sane one here? You certainly get no points
for manners.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
"Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>I have seen this in my history books.
>
> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
I like Obama too, but Clinton is better at getting the 'stupid' voters.
This is how Bush was elected twice...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-j-elisberg/in-defense-of-being-educa_b_101517.html
--
Brian
www.garagewoodworks.com
"In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king."
Desiderius Erasmus
On Tue, 13 May 2008 16:49:44 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>...I've got news for you.
>He [Obama] is just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
>incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
>"divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
>alternatives are lousy. That combined with his amazing amnesia of
>never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
>this guy is nothing to be proud of...
Before you dismiss Jeremiah Wright's remarks as "evil racist screeds", consider
that his comments about "God damn America" are not much different from the
prophet Isaiah when he decried the sins of ancient Israel. Isaiah was not
received well by the people of his time either. Jeremiah Wright's remarks are
to be seen in contrast to the common political invocation, "God bless America".
What seems like a prayer ("Please, God, send your blessings upon our nation.")
is actually used as an arrogant statement ("God does bless our nation. God
approves of our nation and its actions. God is on my side."). Which is worse -
a prophetic warning about how God is displeased with us and our sins, or a
presumptuous statement that God is on my side?
As for the remarks being racist, they are no more racist than those who produced
the TV mini-series "Roots". Both point out grievous injustices commited by one
group of people against another. Yet the produces of Roots received awards for
their efforts.
What Obama does have to be proud of is his years of community organizing in
Chicago where he fought for the disempowered. The rich and powerful don't
really need anyone to fight for them.
Mithrandir
On Wed, 14 May 2008 10:50:39 -0500, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>You either don't live here in the area or are utterly disconnected from
>reality. Wright *is* rich, thanks to his flock giving large sums of
>money to him. So is Obama. These guys have less in common with urban
>poor blacks than I do - and I'm as white as a ghost. They do what the
>far left liberals always do to the poor: condescend to them. I know
>this because - unlike Hussein Obama - I've *been* poor. Obama is a
>political carpetbagger and Wright is a fraud.
So you're saying that the only ones who can legitimately work for the rights of
the poor are people who are poor themselves? That *is* disconnected from
reality.
I would like to see you back up all your name-calling with a list of verifiable
actions that Obama has taken, either during his years as a community organizer,
or in the IL legislature, or in the US Senate, that justify the names you sling.
Mithrandir
"Tim Daneliuk" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Nice theory. Let's let Iran and Syran get nukes because - given their
> rational view of the universe - there's no reason to believe they'll
> actually use them right?
You mean like the USA?
> I am with you in one way though: No more
> land invasions. We should bomb the roads, sewers, water plants,
> telecommunications facilities, sewer treatment plants, cell phone
> towers, military facilities, military equipment and government
> buildings of Iran and Syria every day until they place nice.
> In the mean time, they can drink their oil.
>
> No occupation, no rebuilding, no money, no humanitarian aid.
> Make their day-to-day lives so miserable that they'll be too busy
> boiling water and too poor to have time for nukes. This is
> relatively cheap and very effective. No reason to waste our
> soldiers lives and our money occupying tribal sewers.
>
>> Clinton or Obama either, but I am not among the 14% or so who think
>> Bush has this country heading the right way. It's time to get him and
>> his imitators out for a few years.
>
> You'll change your mind if either of those two has the reins. You'll
> be begging for Bush back, I suspect. McCain is a push.
>
>
> --
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Mithrandir wrote:
>> On Wed, 14 May 2008 10:50:39 -0500, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> You either don't live here in the area or are utterly disconnected from
>>> reality. Wright *is* rich, thanks to his flock giving large sums of
>>> money to him. So is Obama. These guys have less in common with urban
>>> poor blacks than I do - and I'm as white as a ghost. They do what the
>>> far left liberals always do to the poor: condescend to them. I know
>>> this because - unlike Hussein Obama - I've *been* poor. Obama is a
>>> political carpetbagger and Wright is a fraud.
>>
>> So you're saying that the only ones who can legitimately work for the
>> rights of
>> the poor are people who are poor themselves? That *is* disconnected from
>> reality.
>
> No, I'm saying that rich liberals like Obama keep the their pet poor
> around
> to appear to be benificient but they are no such thing. Obama's activism
> isn't rooted in attracting business into poor neighboorhoods, he's already
> demonstrated an antipathy towards business in his comments about oil
> companies. His activism is built on the premise that the poor are victims,
> that their condition is not their fault, and that everyone else owes them
> something. The truth is that without a permanent working poor underclass
> and below, the liberal Democrats would have no compelling voting base,
> or at least not enough of one to get elected to anything above
> dog catcher. They *need* to keep the poor in their place, or replace
> them with new imported poverty to keep a permanent begging class in
> place to vote for them. It sounds harsh, but work with almost
> anyone who has *worked* their way up from poverty and you will
> generally find a fairly low level of respect for the Obamas of this
> world.
>
> Furthermore, "the rights of the poor" he "works" for are nothing more
> than a socialist wealth redistribution system. The "rights" he claims
> for them exist in no founding document of the US, nor are they even
> natural rights. He is however, strangely silent about the *sins* of
> the poor.
>
>
> For example, you NEVER hear him (or Jackson or Sharpton) calling their own
> communities to "repentance" - to stop behaving in the violent, disgusting,
> and abusive manner that causes most of the poverty they experience.
> Instead Obama questions the incarceration rates of blacks vs. everyone
> else with the not too veiled message that it's really racist at the core.
> (He should read this:
> http://www.city-journal.org/html/eon2007-04-02hm.html) But this is no
> surprise ... he went to a racist church, which at the time
> was run by a Race Victimhood Pimp masquerading as a minister of God. Not
> much different than the Iranian Ayatollahs now that I think about it.
>
>
>>
>> I would like to see you back up all your name-calling with a list of
>> verifiable actions that Obama has taken, either during his years as a
>> community organizer, or in the IL legislature, or in the US Senate, that
>> justify the names you sling.
>>
>>
>> Mithrandir
>>
>
> We don't have to go that far back. Let's just stick to his most
> recent history:
>
> Let's begin with lies, exaggerations, and taking all sides of issues:
>
>
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/05/obamas_profile_in_exaggeration.html
>
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/05/the_obama_change_we_really_can.html
>
> Then there's his basic lack factual knowledge:
>
>
http://www.stoptheaclu.com/archives/2008/05/09/obama-wants-to-be-president-of-57-states/
>
> McCain gets abused for not remembering the differences between Sunni and
> Shia
> halfway around the word. Obama doesn't know what his own country looks
> like ... and he's about 30 years *younger* than McCain. That has to be
> more than just "I was tired." (I bet Obama can recite the 7 Pillars Of
> Islam from memory though, but thats a guess on my part.)
>
>
> Then there is the considerable body of evidence connecting him, at least
> indirectly,
> with political crooks and outright thugs. Google the following three
> names
> together: rezko obama blagojevich The latter is the malodorous governor
> of our state and is #1 on the FBI investigation hit parade at the moment.
> The corruption in this state runs deep AND wide. It sure looks like -
> though
> not yet proven - that Obama was part of it. There is enough incidental
> evidence that he has an ethics problem that I do not think he merits
> being elected or even considered for the highest office of the land.
> But ... he's a far left Democrat and - as we've seen repeatedly - they
> are above the law far more so than anything Bush and his bunch could
> invent.
>
> Then there's the matter of attending a church - for 20 or so years - where
> the pastor is virulent racist but Obama never hear a word.
>
> I have no idea what kind of a person Obama is personally. He may well
> be a fine husband and father. But he is an atrocious political
> candidate who actually makes Hillary look good (which I thought to
> be impossible). He has major league warts, no record of positive
> accomplishment (other than feeding at the public trough to get the
> rest of us to pick of the tab for the highly dysfunctional inner
> city community he claims to be "helping"), and only distanced himself
> from the bigoted snakeoil of Wright when he had absolutely no other
> choice.
>
>
> The Dems could do better. They could do WAY better - Lieberman leaps
> to mind. Even our friend Gore-bie would be better - and he'd probably
> beat anyone in this field in a walk. But because the nutcase Left has
> hijacked the Dems far more effectively than the Right has been
> hijacked by its religious base, the Dems keep going to the bottom of
> the barrel for their candidates. I cannot abide McCain's political
> positions for the most part, but I hope he just clobbers Obama in the
> Nov. general election - it is exactly the reality check the Dems
> need...
>
>
and lets not forget the Judge's Obama would install in the Supreme Court!
God Help US!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
--
"You can lead them to LINUX
but you can't make them THINK"
Running Mandriva release 2008.0 free-i586 using KDE on i586
On May 14, 6:21=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 14, 3:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> N Hurst wrote:
>
> >> <SNIP>
>
> >>> Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on=
> >>> pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
> >>> reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces=
> >>> cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of=
> >>> sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating=
> >>> in the air.
> >> Of course I am, as are all true Conservationists. =A0That's because
> >> doing so is good for *me* (mankind). =A0But wild eyed theories
> >> about the end of the world "explained" by Gore-bie (The Inventor
> >> Of The Internet)
>
> > You just can't help yourself injecting Swiftboat-grade bullshit in
> > your arguments. The ol' 'Have you stopped beating your wife' theories.
> > I can't believe I ever thought your posts were worth reading. Now It
> > is nothing but useless rhetoric.
>
> Oh relax Robie baby, you're making it too much fun to set the hook
> and reel you in. =A0Take a break, make some sawdust, and breathe
> deeply. =A0You will experience great clarity and calm ...
>
TimBit... nice fall-back position to take. You then admit your
position was for effect rather than based on your true beliefs?
On Wed, 14 May 2008 11:04:20 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
<[email protected]> wrote:
>Leon wrote:
>> "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> "Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>> news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>>>
>>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>>>
>>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>>>
>>> I like Obama too, but Clinton is better at getting the 'stupid' voters.
>>> This is how Bush was elected twice...
>>
>> Strangly, the stupid voters were able to out smart the voters that opposed
>> Bush. What would you call a group that is not as smart as the "stupid" one?
>>
>
>First, let me comment that I'm no fan of W's, but ...
>
Tim, don't hold back, tell us what you think :)
>What you say above is *exactly* at the heart of what keeps far lefties
>up at night. They have tony education as fine liberal (in the bad
>sense of the word) schools. They have been told that they are very
>smart, insightful, and wise. Then they take a look at the unwashed
>masses. A good plumber makes as much or even more than a Professor Of
>Feminist Deconstructionist Literature And Whining. Their garbage man
>seems happier than they are without the benefit of having gone to
>Harvard to learn to hate Whitey. Whole blocks of the country vote
>against their anointed candidates. They've spent a lifetime building
>up a worldview that cannot withstand even the casual scrutiny of
>Reality.
>
>So ... they are bitter. Bitter because Joe Sixpack (for whom they have
>complete contempt) doesn't listen to them. Bitter because those
>redneck hunters, fishermen, loggers, and farmers, make fun of their
>Ivy League pretentions.
It's worse than that, they simply ignore them for the most part.
Infuriating.
> And then, when some faux Texan with an even
>more phony "aw shucks" core pone style kicks their butts not once, but
>twice in Federal elections, they are just *outraged*. Bush is one of
>the most savvy, skilled politicians I've ever seen. His enemies
>routinely dismiss him as stupid or worse and he regularly demolishes
>them. I note with interest, for example, that W had better grades
>in college than Gore-bie, The Peace Prize Boy - connoisseur of lefty
>whine.
>
>And there's more on the way. In looking over the past few years, I've
>come to believe that the real motivation for the Iraq war was real
>simple: To set up the timing and logistics to neutralize the
>Syrian/Iranian threat. This threat has been and is quite real. These
>guys are *the* bad guys in the ME, and have more to do with the
>failure of calming things down than any Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
>Witness the recent Iranian-sponsored pillaging of the Lebanese
>government for just one example. Anyway, when the time comes -
>probably before he leaves office, Bush is going to declaw the Iranians
>in a public and humiliating way. In 40 years, he'll be remembered as
>having the brains and patience to undermine a very real threat. His
>many other sins will be forgotten, and his foamy little sniveling
>opponents on the Left will be relegated to being laughed at as the
>caricatures of intellect that they are.
On May 13, 11:12 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> > Doug Miller wrote:
> >> In article <[email protected]>, Tim Daneliuk
> >> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
> >>> than the three current contenders.
>
> >> :-)
> >>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>
> >> .. and has absolutely *no* chance of winning, thus making a vote for him
> >> nearly indistinguishable from a vote for Obama.
>
> > True, but so what? If you examine Obama, Clinton, and McCain
> > their positions are oh-so slightly distinct without any real
> > difference. Face it, any of the three will be lying through
> > their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
> > of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
> > thing.
>
> Unfortunately, this year, the only thing we can look at is who will do the
> least damage. There are no choices -- the Republicans let the Dems and
> Independents choose the candidate, so now we have a candidate who doesn't
> just reach across the aisle, he has done full gainers to the far left of
> that aisle.
>
> As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
> being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
> OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
> embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
> difference between these clowns.
>
> --
Sorry. McCain is all for continuing far too many of Bush's expensive
shenanigans, including the mess in Iraq. The country is teetering on
the edge of bankruptcy now with Republican spend and borrow tactics.
What we need is someone who will QUIT spending, QUIT borrowing and
work to get our problems straightened out. Let the worldwide supply of
assholes diminish their own numbers without our help. I don't like
Clinton or Obama either, but I am not among the 14% or so who think
Bush has this country heading the right way. It's time to get him and
his imitators out for a few years.
Dave in Houston wrote:
> "Jack Stein" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> Dave in Houston wrote:
>>
<SNIP>
> Face reality, Bush will go down in history with Calvin Coolidge and
> Richard Nixon.
>
> Dave in Houston
>
I am not generally fond of Bush's policies, but I have to agree with
you here. He will go down in history like Nixon. And Nixon has
been (properly) rehabilitated from Watergate (a serious, but relatively
small blip) as one of the more successful international policy
presidents of modern history. You watch, Bush will be too. You
have step away from the moment and have the benefit of 30 or
40 years to see the merit or lack thereof of policy decisions on
this scale.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 14, 6:21 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> On May 14, 3:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>> N Hurst wrote:
>>>> <SNIP>
>>>>> Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
>>>>> pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
>>>>> reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
>>>>> cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
>>>>> sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
>>>>> in the air.
>>>> Of course I am, as are all true Conservationists. That's because
>>>> doing so is good for *me* (mankind). But wild eyed theories
>>>> about the end of the world "explained" by Gore-bie (The Inventor
>>>> Of The Internet)
>>> You just can't help yourself injecting Swiftboat-grade bullshit in
>>> your arguments. The ol' 'Have you stopped beating your wife' theories.
>>> I can't believe I ever thought your posts were worth reading. Now It
>>> is nothing but useless rhetoric.
>> Oh relax Robie baby, you're making it too much fun to set the hook
>> and reel you in. Take a break, make some sawdust, and breathe
>> deeply. You will experience great clarity and calm ...
>>
>
> TimBit... nice fall-back position to take. You then admit your
> position was for effect rather than based on your true beliefs?
>
Oh, I think the GW stuff is vastly oversold. I think science is
far from clear or unambiguous, and I think Gore is a political
whore of the first order. But I do enjoy watching you blow
a gasket since you start so many of these threads just for
your own effect.
I'm going to the shop now...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 14, 8:48 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Tom Watson wrote:
>>> A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
>> You are a very hurtful man. I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
>> (of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). My people
>> are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
>> We have hot women. They have great vodka.
>>
>> Robatoy is Dutch? That's kind of shocking actually...
>>
> Okay, I'll bite. Why is that shocking?
>
Because they're usually not as, um ... emotive as you are
in my experience at least. The Dutch folks I know tend
to be very thoughtful...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 14, 2:59 pm, Frank Boettcher <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Wed, 14 May 2008 11:04:20 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
>
>
>
> <[email protected]> wrote:
> >Leon wrote:
> >> "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
> >>news:[email protected]...
> >>> "Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> >>>news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
> >>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>
> >>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> >>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> >>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
> >>> I like Obama too, but Clinton is better at getting the 'stupid' voters.
> >>> This is how Bush was elected twice...
>
> >> Strangly, the stupid voters were able to out smart the voters that opposed
> >> Bush. What would you call a group that is not as smart as the "stupid" one?
>
> >First, let me comment that I'm no fan of W's, but ...
>
> Tim, don't hold back, tell us what you think :)
>
>
>
> >What you say above is *exactly* at the heart of what keeps far lefties
> >up at night. They have tony education as fine liberal (in the bad
> >sense of the word) schools. They have been told that they are very
> >smart, insightful, and wise. Then they take a look at the unwashed
> >masses. A good plumber makes as much or even more than a Professor Of
> >Feminist Deconstructionist Literature And Whining. Their garbage man
> >seems happier than they are without the benefit of having gone to
> >Harvard to learn to hate Whitey. Whole blocks of the country vote
> >against their anointed candidates. They've spent a lifetime building
> >up a worldview that cannot withstand even the casual scrutiny of
> >Reality.
>
> >So ... they are bitter. Bitter because Joe Sixpack (for whom they have
> >complete contempt) doesn't listen to them. Bitter because those
> >redneck hunters, fishermen, loggers, and farmers, make fun of their
> >Ivy League pretentions.
>
> It's worse than that, they simply ignore them for the most part.
> Infuriating.
>
> > And then, when some faux Texan with an even
> >more phony "aw shucks" core pone style kicks their butts not once, but
> >twice in Federal elections, they are just *outraged*. Bush is one of
> >the most savvy, skilled politicians I've ever seen. His enemies
> >routinely dismiss him as stupid or worse and he regularly demolishes
> >them. I note with interest, for example, that W had better grades
> >in college than Gore-bie, The Peace Prize Boy - connoisseur of lefty
> >whine.
>
> >And there's more on the way. In looking over the past few years, I've
> >come to believe that the real motivation for the Iraq war was real
> >simple: To set up the timing and logistics to neutralize the
> >Syrian/Iranian threat. This threat has been and is quite real. These
> >guys are *the* bad guys in the ME, and have more to do with the
> >failure of calming things down than any Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
> >Witness the recent Iranian-sponsored pillaging of the Lebanese
> >government for just one example. Anyway, when the time comes -
> >probably before he leaves office, Bush is going to declaw the Iranians
> >in a public and humiliating way. In 40 years, he'll be remembered as
> >having the brains and patience to undermine a very real threat. His
> >many other sins will be forgotten, and his foamy little sniveling
> >opponents on the Left will be relegated to being laughed at as the
> >caricatures of intellect that they are.
As a practicing liberal (mostly), I have to look back on my "tony"
education, at Albany State at something under $400 a year tuition,
after serving four years as an enlisted man in the USMC, with a father
who was an auto mechanic, and wonder where in hell I missed the boat.
If Bush declaws the Iranians, it will surprise even him, and cost
about 11 trillion bucks, passed down unto the 75th generation.
On May 13, 5:49 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html
>
>
No wonder he's ahead of Clinton. He's been campaigning
in seven more states than she.
--
FF
On May 13, 6:25=A0pm, Lou <[email protected]> wrote:
> Anybody, and I mean anybody who votes for Obama hasn't
> got a brain in there head. He has proven to be the most useless
> senator ever. He is nothing more than a used car salesman who
> seems to be able to sell the op on =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0Nothing.
> Even I could get as far as he has if Oprah would buy
> me the presidency.
> =A0 =A0 =A0 Lou
Yea.... errrmmm... oh-boy...
Did you ever graduate from ANYTHING, lou?
Buck Turgidson wrote:
>>
>> That's nonsense. We could take out their infrastructure from the
>> air in a matter of weeks. Even at 11 Trillion, it would still be
>> better than letting them have nukes. Do YOU want to breathe
>> radioactive isotopes delivered via the jetstream as the Islamic
>> whackos seek to meet Allah and destroy Israel? I'd prefer not
>> to thanks.
>
>
> Reading your posts, the words "circumspect" and "thoughful" don't come to
> mind.
You know Tom, there's a time for subtlety and a time for bold frontal
assaults. I believe Mr Daneliek has determined that this is the time for
the latter.
I really don't understand you people who believe government is the
solution to all ills, longing for a stronger federal intrusion into
peoples' lives. You ought to be turning handsprings and dancing for joy
right now. You've got both houses of congress, regardless of who wins the
election, it's only a matter of degree, you get to choose from a full-bore
hard-core Stalinist socialist, a Chicago Daley machine socialist, or a
liberal barely Republican who will espouse socialism and stronger
government intervention and regulation. I mean you're going to get
everything you want over the next several years: a) punishing taxes on oil
companies, pharmaceutical companies, and people who make more money than
you do; b) punishing regulations to stifle any innovation or productive
progress in any portion of society except government; c) if you play your
cards right, you're going to get the government to take over running 1/7 of
the US economy, letting us experience the same efficient and abundant
health care system as the Brits are dealing with and delivered with the
same personal care as the DMV or SS administration; d) the end of the "tax
cuts for the rich" and the implementation of even higher levels of taxes on
those people; e) a complete surrender in Iraq and capitulation to the
radical jihadists.
Like others have said, there are no happy liberals, here they are on the
verge of getting everything they want but they are still griping an
moaning.
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
On May 13, 6:25 pm, Lou <[email protected]> wrote:
> Anybody, and I mean anybody who votes for Obama hasn't
> got a brain in there head. He has proven to be the most useless
> senator ever. He is nothing more than a used car salesman who
> seems to be able to sell the op on Nothing.
> Even I could get as far as he has if Oprah would buy
> me the presidency.
> ...
I don;t agree that he has been a senator long enough to
prove anything.
--
FF
On May 14, 3:13=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> N Hurst wrote:
>
> <SNIP>
>
> > Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
> > pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
> > reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
> > cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
> > sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
> > in the air.
>
> Of course I am, as are all true Conservationists. =A0That's because
> doing so is good for *me* (mankind). =A0But wild eyed theories
> about the end of the world "explained" by Gore-bie (The Inventor
> Of The Internet)
You just can't help yourself injecting Swiftboat-grade bullshit in
your arguments. The ol' 'Have you stopped beating your wife' theories.
I can't believe I ever thought your posts were worth reading. Now It
is nothing but useless rhetoric.
On May 13, 9:11=A0pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > I have seen this in my history books.
>
> > The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> > brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> > To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
> Required listening for Canadians involved in US politics:
> <http://members.tripod.com/~JB5555/southpark/hapicamp.wav>
What do YOU think the odds are of my clicking on that link?
Zeeerooo... like you... a big fucking ZEROOOOOO
On May 14, 9:36 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> As an engineer who has spent a significant amount of my career in modeling
> and simulation of real-world test events, I am intimately familiar with the
> difficulty of building models that predict accurately the results of those
> test events. ... and that is when *I* have control of a large number of
> the test parameters. Yet somehow I am to believe that people using models
> with inputs from centuries-old tree ring data and other inputs from a
> system many orders of magnitude more complex than any system ever built by
> humans are going to be able to predict a degree or less temperature rise
> over the next 50 years accurately
As you may recall, I don't think that studies
of the geological record are useful for predicting
the future because present circumstances
are dissimilar to those in the geological past.
Maybe they could if they were doing a massive
least squares to estimate the parameters of their
models, but I am doubtful that the data permit
separate resolution of all, or even most, of the
forcing functions. I've never read an explanation
of how any climatologist constructs any models.
My impression is that they all know how they
do it and it never occurs to them to tell anybody
else.
There are several reasons why I don't have a lot of
confidence in the temperature data.
> when they can't even get the weather for
> next week right? (Yeah, Fred, I know the difference between weather and
> climate, they can't even predict the trends for a season very accurately).
Hmm, so you make a point of telling me that you know the difference
between weather and climate, and then go ahead and write as
if poor weather forecasting were an indicator of the accuracy of
long term climate predictions...
> ...
> Well, given that the planet hasn't warmed since 1998, ...
According to whom? Somebody else was making that claim
in another ng, but when I asked him to point me to the data
he pointed me to a website with at least scores of pages,
without specifying what he was looking at. I didn't see anything
that looked to me to support what he was saying, but then
again he hasn't been able to explain how changes in solar
irradiance cause a change in the Earth's temperature either.
> from and they are now
> predicting a cooling trend over the next 12 years as a result of "natural
> variations in climate",
Who are they?
We are near a sunspot minimum now, so whoever they
are, they must think that something else will more than
offset the expected rise in solar irradiance over the
next five years or so.
--
FF
"jo4hn" wrote:
> I was thinking of Warren G. Harding who had Marc Hanna as his Rove.
Might want to check that.
Marc Hanna (Hanna Mining), had McKinley has his hand picked
presidential lackey puppet, at the turn of the century (1900).
Harding was 25-30 years later.
BTW, Hanna Mining is still based in Cleveland. The Hanna family
represents some of the oldest, moldiest money in Cleveland.
On a par with J D Rockfeller, who is also buried in Cleveland.
Lew
On Wed, 14 May 2008 19:48:48 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
<[email protected]> wrote:
>Tom Watson wrote:
>> A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
>
>You are a very hurtful man. I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
>(of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). My people
>are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
>We have hot women. They have great vodka.
>
>Robatoy is Dutch? That's kind of shocking actually...
>
>>
My vaguest apologies.
It was my understanding that you came to this country as a refugee
from the former USSR - which we in the States habitually refer to as -
Russkies.
Robatoy is a refugee from Amsterdam - which seems counterintuitive.
(BTW - a suggestion for his corporate name)
The actual point is that the angst generated by both of you is
interesting in that neither of you are native born.
There is an inverse proportionality that I find both endearing and
frustrating.
Tom Watson
tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet
www.home.comcast.net/~tjwatson1
On May 13, 10:20=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 13, 8:25 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> I am *a* voice here already. For a guy who lives where he lives, you
> >> certainly have strong opinions about something that is ultimately none
> >> of your business.
>
> > There was a time I had some respect for your rhetoric.
>
> And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
> with your evening Thorazine.
>
> Turns out you
>
> > are nothing but yet another arrogant cowboy.
>
> Naw. =A0I don't like horses. =A0Their tail ends remind me too
> much of certain people.
>
>
>
> > You don't think that loose cowboys with nukes, threatening the
> > planet's destruction is none of MY business???
>
> Who would that be exactly? =A0The last I looked, the most dangerous
> nukes were the ones the Ukrainians were trying to sell. =A0I didn't
> hear you yammering on about that. =A0
>
> > Think again.
> > Given the opportunity, I'd have to take you out.
>
> Wow, a threat upon myself. =A0I am now officially very scared.
> Will that be with a peashooter, a spitwad, or will you just
> continue to foam until the attendant sedates you for the night?
>
> > You and your ilk are a danger to human life. Period...seminary boy!
>
> >>> You have been teetering on a tight-rope, and you just fell off.
> >> But the trip was worth it...
>
> > And down you will go. Snug at the end of your own rope.
>
> I am properly mollified.
>
> --
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------=
- -
> Tim Daneliuk =A0 =A0 [email protected]
> PGP Key: =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
You remind me of this clown:
http://rattube.com/blog1/2008/05/12/bill-oreilly-meltdowns/
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Lew Hodgett wrote:
>> RE: Subject
>>
>> You idiots for real?
>>
>> Do you ever clip any of your drivel?
>>
>> If you need to be reminded:
>>
>> Idiot 1: "Fred the Red Shirt"
>> Idiot 2: Tim Daneliuk
>>
>>
>> Lew
>>
>>
>
> You, of course, being the sane one here? You certainly get no points
> for manners.
>
Why do you bother with close minded liberals? Specially this guy?
--
"You can lead them to LINUX
but you can't make them THINK"
Running Mandriva release 2008.0 free-i586 using KDE on i586
On May 14, 9:05=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 14, 8:48 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> Tom Watson wrote:
> >>> A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
> >> You are a very hurtful man. =A0I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
> >> (of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). =A0My people
> >> are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
> >> We have hot women. =A0They have great vodka. =A0
>
> >> Robatoy is Dutch? =A0That's kind of shocking actually...
>
> > Okay, I'll bite. Why is that shocking?
>
> Because they're usually not as, um ... emotive as you are
> in my experience at least. =A0The Dutch folks I know tend
> to be very thoughtful...
>
It is not often one encounters an individual who can bob and weave
like you do, Tim. It is very frustrating to discuss anything when you
won't stay on point. In fact, I suggest you start a career designing
camouflage.
On May 13, 10:54=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 13, 10:20 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
> >> with your evening Thorazine.
>
> > I'm glad you enjoyed that life's experience. It worked for you, did
> > it?
>
> Oh yes. =A0After heavy sedation, even liberal Democrats make sense ...
> and some Canadians.
>
Great!
In that case I will know where to go for an explanation of what it is
those two groups are trying to say.
Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> ...
> On May 15, 3:09 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
<SNIP>
>> He was dead wrong on Hamdi
>> and the appropriate legal steps were taken.
>
> He was also dead wrong regarding his ad hoc
> tribunals. As you know, they were struck down
> by the USSC which held that they violated
> common article 3 of the 1949 GCs and the
> UCMJ. That does prove my point, right?
Not fully. It proves that the Bush administration
interpreted precedent and current conditions to
grant them power they actually did not have.
They were slapped down by SCOTUS. The system
*worked*. This is a far cry from the larger
complaint voiced here repeatedly that Bush
is some kind of civil liberties monster.
>
>> If you're
>> clearly right, then similar steps should obviously
>> work here as well, shouldn't they?
>>
>
> This administration has relied on the most
> transparent of stalling tactics to keep those
> steps from being taken. For instance, Padilla
> was transferred from one Federal District to
> another, mooting his habeas petition and forcing
> his attorneys to refile in the new district. Other
> appelants were released after being granted
> certitori by the USSC depriving the court of the
> opportunity to rule on the vital matters of law
> that were in contention.
>
> That the administration
> was afraid to plead its case before the USSC
> is a pretty good indicator that it knew it was
> wrong, eh?
I freely admit that I find these shenanigans
repugnant. Note that I have never held the Bush
administration up as some paragon of good works,
merely that you critics are vastly overstating
things in the level of malice attributed to it.
<SNIP>
>> There are, as you well know, different categories
>> of protections offered to different classes of persons in the
>> GC. Plain clothes combatants have almost no such protections
>> therein. Wishing it were so doesn't make it that way.
>
> And yet, unless I am very much mistaken, you were perfectly
> happy when the President forbade the military from determining
> if their prisoners were plain clothes combatants.
Hmm, I don't recall him doing so. Do tell. I do recall
the claim that tribunals were being held in secret and
such determinations were being made.
>> ...
>>
>>>> Your captors are free to do almost anything they want including
>>>> waterboarding you or making you listen to Sean Penn speeches.
>>> What competent court or tribunal determined
>>> that any person held at Guantanamo bay, in fact,
>>> made war in civilian clothing?
>> Presumably, the military tribunals held there wherein
>> the accused had legal representation.
>
> President Bush forbade the military from conducting
> those tribunals and forbade the courts-martial from
> trying them the persons in question. That is precisely
> my objection.
I do not recall this and may well be wrong. But I was
under the impression that the claim was that there
WERE such trials to determine the standings of those
in GTMO, for example, but that they were held in secret
for "security reasons". "Security reasons", BTW, was
the first wail of complaint I heard from the loudest
Bush critics because they maintained he could not be
trusted to actually do this.
<SNIP>
>
>> The lack of public
>> transparency in trials of (alleged) foreign combatants
>> does not instantly mean that the process is bogus.
>
> Again, to what trials do you refer? Please name a
> defendant, provide a date, something.
I can't because they were (it is claimed) done in secret. Ordinarily,
this would outrage me. But given that the people in GTMO weren't
snatched off the street in Detroit, but in the middle of a battlezone
in a foreign country, I was (and for the moment am) content to believe
in the essential fairness and professionalism of the military to deal
with what is a military, not civil matter.
If/when this is inarguably demonstrated to be false and all your
claims confirmed, the administration officials who participated in this
should be tried and sentenced as is appropriate. You make a great
case, but I question just how valid it is. Not because I think you are
lying, but because things are rarely this clear cut. When they are,
(say like Hamdi) the courts swiftly address this. Moreover, given the
vitriolic hatred so many on the left have for Bush, how is it that -
in the presence of such abundant evidence of malfeasance - no charges
have been mounted against him by his many enemies? Clinton was
humiliated in a sham impeachment for far, far less. Surely the
left wants payback. With the kind of inarguable "facts" you
claim, they should be foaming at the mouth to get it.
>>> Or are you arguing that
>>> the rules and regulations governing captures on land and sea
>>> and regulating the Armed Forces, passed by the Congress and
>>> signed into law by the President of the United States aren't
>>> REAL laws, just some sort of general suggestions?
>> They are real. But just to *which* rules do you refer.
>
> The UCMJ.
>
> The provisions of the UCMJ to the effect that the proper status
> of a prisoner who disputes his status be determined by
> a competent court or tribunal.
>
> UNCATS.
>
>> The GCs do not materially protect non-uniformed combatants.
>> There is likely policy and procedure in place for the
>> military lawyers involved, but that is not some international
>> and immutable standard that supercedes the GCs here to the
>> best of my knowledge.
>
> You argue that because a person engaged in an act
> that disentitled them to the protections of the GCs, they
> are not entitled to a proper hearing to determine if they
> engaged in an act that disentitles them to the protections
> of the GCs.
Not at all. I think I have made it pretty clear: Status should
be determined, and once found to be non-uniformed combatants,
we should do whatever we wish within the bounds of the GCs
to which we are signatory.
>> ...
>>> US law has required that spies be tried before execution
>>> since the Continental Congress passed the First US
>>> Articles of War.
>> And I am fine with that. It is my belief - a belief
>> rooted not in observable fact, since the process was
>> not public, but rooted in a confidence in the professionalism
>> and ethics of our military - that exactly this took place.
>
> Please name of a person whom you believe was executed
> after trial during the present administration.
Same point: I am not privy to secret proceedings. I either
trust that they were conducted properly, not at all, or
that my government is utterly corrupt. But as I keep
saying, your claim for abundant evidence for the latter
should be yielding large and loud suits against the President
and this administration. Where are they?
>
>>
>>
>>> "Spies may not be punished without
>>> trial." is one of the articles of the 1907 Hague conventions.
>>> It would be difficult, at best, to mistreat a prisoner without
>>> violating the common criminal provisions of the UCMJ
>>> which, as you know, (e.g. the trial of the civilian spouse of
>>> a US soldier for a crime allegedly committed in Germany)
>>> apply to American civilians on US military bases abroad.
>>> UNCATS prohibits torture, inhumane or degrading treatment
>>> without exception.
>> All we have to do is come up with a universal definition
>> for "torture". You may know that those who defend it
>> as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that it is
>> NOT inherently torture, though everyone agrees it has
>> the capacity to be abused.
>
> If I understand the English language correctly, the
> antecedent of 'it' is 'torture'.
>
> So the statement above is logically:
>
> "You may know that those who defend torture
> as an intelligence gathering mechanism argue that
> torture is NOT inherently torture, though everyone
> agrees torture has the capacity to be abused."
>
> Which I agree is exactly the sort of thing we have
> come to expect from the Bush administration.
OK, my grammar was compromised. I'll say it correctly.
Many who defend *interrogation techniques* like waterboarding
argue it is not inherently torture, though everyone agrees
these techniques can be abused. Better?
I shall endevour to not torture the language in the future.
>
>
>
>>
>> ...
>>
>>> Breathe control torture plainly violates UNCATS, and if
>>> committed on an US military base, federal
>>> criminal law.
OK, here's the UNCATS language to which we are signatory:
Any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental,
is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining
from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him
for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of
having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person,
or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain
or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the
consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in
an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising
only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions.
Guess what? It's not "plain" at all. Just when do we move from
discomfort to pain to "severe" pain? What constitutes "suffering"? For
me, that would involve having to watch TV for more than 5 minutes.
Does playing loud, obnoxious noise - say Rap - constitute
torture? How about a forced Rosie O'Donnell film festival?
Everyone's threshold for pain is different. Yes, I'm splitting
hairs, but I'm doing so to make a point. The defenders of
waterboarding argue that it is both effective, and does not
cause "severe". Moreover, if we take the sort of simplistic
"plain" reading you favor, then injecting someone with drugs
that cause no pain but make them spill all they know would be
OK, right? My point is that these kinds of things are matter
both of conscience AND of judgment. You judge waterboarding
to be torture. A good many other people do not. That doesn't
make them immoral monsters (the implicit claim laid at the feet
of the Bushies), it illustrates a difference of opinion.
In short, your claim of "plain" meaning is bogus.
>> I rather think this is not so cut and dried. If it is,
>> the participants should be tried, found guilty, and
>> sentenced.
>
> By whom, the people who ordered the crime in the
> first place?
No, by the checks and balances built into our adversarial
political and judicial system.
>
>> Wanna take any bets as to whether, say,
>> Obama will take any such action? I rather doubt it.
>
> Relevance?
Any president, faced with the enormous task at hand,
would have to make calls about just how far we could
and should go. I have little doubt that Bush's
polar opposites politically might be different in
small ways tactically, but they'd have done much
the same thing. More to the point, will the next
president, if they are a Democrat, bring charges
against Bush, pardon him of all wrongdoing (thereby
damning his legacy w/o an actual legal battle), or
remain silent on his decisions once they see the
full scope of what is going on in the world of
bad guys? I'd bet on the latter.
>
>>
>>
>>> Claims that it is legal to commit crimes against someone
>>> because he is a bad person, are no longer persuasive
>>> in any US court, nor should they be.
>> No they shouldn't but that's not the discussion here.
>
> Nonsense. That is precisely your argument. If the
> government were to subject you to exactly the same
> treatment as Khalid Sheik Mohammed there is no
> question that you would believe you had been assaulted.
I am a citizen and participant in our legal/social
contract. I am entitled to far higher levels of
representation and redress because of that status.
> The ONLY reason you argue that KSM was not assaulted
> is because you believe he deserved it. Whether or not
> the victim of an assault deserved it, is not a defense.
No, I argue that waterboarding, conducted properly
is not inherently torture. I trust that the people
doing it have both a moral conscience and oversight.
If I'm wrong about any of that, I want the people
responsible for doing it brought to justice.
>
>>>> You will also note that Al Queda is not a signatory to the
>>>> Geneva Conventions and cannot thus make claims upon them.
>>> While al Queda is not, most of the people accused
>>> of being part of al Queda are nationals of states that
>>> are. Further, inasmuchas a state of war does not
>>> exist between those nations and the United States
>>> if they commit a belligerent act they commit a crime
>>> whether they are in uniform or not.
>> Their belligerent acts were carried out on behalf of
>> Al Queda. Moreover, their wearing a uniform or not
>> is fundamental to their class before the law.
>> Say I went to Africa to fight as a mercenary,
>> wearing a suit and tie, posing as a health worker.
>> If I started killing innocents to create an act
>> of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
>> international laws protect me from being treated
>> as a spy? I think not.
>
> Were you to wear a uniform and carry arms
> openly while killing innocents to create an act
> of terror, would the GCs, US civil law, or other
> international laws protect you from being treated
> as a war criminal? I think not.
You're avoiding the question. Does purposely not
wearing a uniform and making war on civilians
change my standing before international or domestic
US law? I say it does, you want to pretend that's
not the issue.
>
> To disguise yourself might be an act of perfidy,
> and an offense in and of itself, but one that
> pales in comparison to the other crimes
> committed, and completely irrelevent to the
> issue of whether or not you could be prosecuted
> and punished for those other crimes, don't you
> agree?
No, or not as you've stated. It fundamentally
effects just *how* I may be treated during my
prosecutions and to what legal protections
I am entitled. That's why you can summarily
execute spies found guilty, but not uniformed
military POWs.
>
> But that has never been the point of contention
> between us. The issue in dispute has always
> been the process (again a term of art) to be
> employed to determine IF you committed any
> such crime.
Which I agree should take place. My government
tells me is has taken place. (Except in obvious
examples like Hamdi.) You claim otherwise.
Make your case in a court, get the president
impeached or jailed. You'll be an instant
celebrity.
>>
>>> As well as the
>>> claim by the President and Commander-in-Chief that
>>> he had authority to create courts, make the laws those
>>> courts would enforce, their rules of evidence and procedure,
>>> appoint the judges, the prosecutors and the defense
>>> attorneys, and to direct their actions, and that the Congress,
>>> to whom the plain language of the Constitution grants
>>> the sole authority to do those things, has no say in
>>> the matter.
>> All true but missing a critical detail. With the advent
>> of FDR's "making it up as you go along" approach to
>> Constitutional law, there is ample precedent for Bush's
>> claim.
>
> Sure, so long as you ignore the repeal of the Articles of
> War in 1949.
>
>> I'm not claiming Bush made all the right calls
>> here. I am claiming he is within his executive privilege
>> *as granted by precedent*.
>
> Your claim is meritless because it contradicts the plain
> language of the Constitution. Or is it your argument that
> the President retains the authority delegated to him by
> Federal Law, even after that law is repealed?
I claim that from FDR forward there has been a large amount of "gray"
injected into the role of the Presidency viz the Legislature as each
as chosen to interpret the Constitution as a moving target. My proof
of this is that - even after all the "sins" you enumerate above - no
one has managed to show Bush to have materially broken any laws, at least
not the level of impeachability or other serious sanction. Why?
Because the moving target Constitution theory makes *all* law open to
interpretation. He is doing nothing more than walking in FDR's,
Kennedy's, Johnson's, Nixon's ... footsteps. Bad? Surely. But
unremarkable given that the nation and its government long ago
abandoned their own laws.
You keep trying to read my comments as a defense of Bush. You should
be reading them as a commentary about the inevitable outcome of
ignoring the rules set forth in the Constitution long ago. I'm not
happy with this administration. I just see great irony in the foaming
directed at it my a good many people who are otherwise just fine with
the "lets make up the Constitution as we go" line of thinking. I am
responding more to them than I ever was or am defending Bush who has
been a crushing disappointment on almost every front. The only place I
did and do agree with him, was the necessity of interdicting in the
ME. Then he screwed up and *stayed*.
>
>> You don't like it? Fine.
>> I'm not actually crazy about it myself. But the only
>> way to unwind it would be to get the government and
>> the nation at large to go back to a strict interpretation
>> of the Constitution. As I have said over and over,
>> you cannot reasonably expect Bush to avoid using the
>> "flexibility" of a "Living Constitution" when all his
>> political foes favor this when power is in their hands.
>
> None of this has anything to do with any living constitution
> argument.. The argument advanced by the administration is
> the "unitary president" theory, which holds that the President
> is not bound in his official acts, by federal law. To my
> knowledge no proponent of this theory makes any claim
> of the sort you suggest. They argue that they are
> returning to the true meaning of the constitution. IOW, they
> claim to be doing exactly what you say you want them
> to do.
You're dead wrong. A nation welded to the clear meaning
and limits imposed by a strict reading of the Constitution
would never have allowed an environment to flourish where
arguments like "unitary presidency" could have even seen
the light of day. You are in pain because of the outcomes.
I am in pain because of the root cause.
>
> Further, what I may or may not expect the President to
> does not absolve me of my responsibility to demand that
> he respect the rule of law.
But as I keep pointing out over and over, there is NO rule
of law. It's become a moving target. That's, for example,
how both the right and left ignore border protection.
It's how you get people trying to make gay marriage
illegal. It's how you get people trying to make handguns
illegal. And, yes, it's how you get unfettered arrogance
of power in both the Executive AND Legislative branches.
>
>>
>>
>>>> You will further note that while we made people uncomfortable
>>>> and shoved them around and humiliated them, their fellow
>>>> combatants beheaded people in the most horrible possible way.
>>> Why should we note that? And if we should, why do you not
>>> note the prisoners tortured to death in Bahgram prison? Does
>> Clearly wrong, and last I checked, the perpetrators were
>> being tried and convicted in (gasp!) military courts.
>
> What is clearly wrong?
It was clearly wrong to torture prisoners to death.
>
> Willy Brandt received the harshest sentence at trial,
> a few months confinement and a reduction in pay. It
> is my understanding that since then, his sentence
> has been reduced to honorable discharge.
As I am unfamiliar with the details, I shall defer to
you on this one.
>
>> If you think that any system that is not perfect is not
>> workable at all, you are sadly mistaken. The system,
>> however imperfect, has safeguards and remedies and these
>> seem to be working.
I have rethought this statement of mine, and wish to
retract it. The system is working, but poorly.
And it works poorly exactly because of the aforementioned
making up the law as we go along theory.
>>
>>> their mistreatment mitigate the murder of Daniel Perle?
>> Of course not.
>>
>
> Then why introduce his murder into the discussion?
To demonstrate that there are degrees of sin here, and
ours are minor by comparison.
>>>>> Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
>>>>> terrorism?
>>>> Sometimes, where there is immediate need to do so and then only
>>>> under some kind of US military or civilian judge's supervision.
>>> I disagree.
>> The more I think about this, the more I may come to see it your
>> way. It certainly makes me morally queasy. Not so much because
>> we are extracting information by force (though that is part of
>> the problem) but moreso because of the kind of human sewage
>> with whom we have to make common cause to pull this off.
>> For the moment, my view on this is that there are two
>> choices here - Bad: Do nothing thereby failing to use
>> every tool to thwart people who wish to murder non combatants,
>> or Really Bad: Make common cause with thugs and tyrants.
>
> False dichotomy. To refrain from torture does not require
> that one do nothing.
One is effectively "doing nothing", at least locally, when
one has a captive with relevant information and does not
act to get that information. What, short of physical
intimidation and force, would you suggest instead to
get the needed info?
>> There is a Senate Intelligence Committee last I looked.
>> If even just one of them were involved, you're suggesting
>> they could not have quietly suggested that - for
>> reasons they could not discuss - FISA process needed
>> to be revisited?
>
> Unauthorized circumspective discussion of national
> security matters is impermissible for obvious reasons.
> Further, I don't think you can come up with any credible
> scenario where in the needed changes could be introduced
> or discussed without making it obvious as to what was
> discussed behind those closed doors.
One need not discuss the details to make the case,
"Hey, I think FISA is broken and we need to help
the President with better tools."
>
> But as you know, the Congress did pass exactly the
> legislation requested by the administration on this
> point. To hold the Congress to blame for its inadequacy
> is asinine.
Probably true.
>
>
>> ...
>>
>>> They never even submitted late notifications.
>> And even I have real heartburn about this. It's
>> unconscionable and one of the reasons that the
>> Republicans do not deserve the White House next time.
>>
>>
>>
>>>>> removal of habeas corpus for US residents,
>>>> A huge failing on W's part. Thanks to the Hamdi suit, SCOTUS
>>>> fixed this. The system worked ultimately.
>
> Well then you agree that what GWB did was wrong. That was
> the point being made.
>
>>>>> Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
>>>> Nonsense. The government can't ask for cooperation on the one hand
>>>> and then prosecute with the other. This was proper. If there was
>>>> any sin here (and there probably wasn't much of one), it should
>>>> be addressed by the DOJ, not the individual carriers.
>>> That would make sense were the government not asking
>>> for cooperation in the commission of a crime.
>> What crime exactly was being committed?
>
> Illegal wiretaps.
You say they are "illegal". The administration says they are
permissible given the parties involved. Why doesn't someone
bring suit - not against the Telcos - but the administration for
this?
>
>> ...
>>
>>>> You watch, in a few years the real depth of the threat coming from
>>>> Iran especially is going to become evident, and it will have been
>>>> Bush that took the steps to quiet it before it completely flared out
>>>> of control.
>>> Like what, exactly?
>> My guess - and that's all it is, though it seems consistent
>> with what is released to the public - is that Iran is well on
>> the way to nuclear delivery capability and that the only
>> thing that will give them real pause on this is to feel
>> serious threat from someone ... us, for example.
>
> Allow me to rephrase. Like what steps, exactly, has
> Bush taken to quiet the Iranian threat?
I suspect they are currently diplomatic primarily. It has also been
quietly reported that we've had SOGCOM people in Iran already, though
obviously no one will confirm this. And Bush may yet pull an
air attack on Iran before the year ends.
>
>
>> ...
>>> I freely admit that people have walked the Earth who are
>>> worse than GWB.
>>> I would like to set the standard for President a bit
>>> higher than "better than the worse person who ever
>>> lived.".
>> He is nowhere near as bad as you paint him. He is - at worse -
>> the Republican incarnation of FDR - make up the rules
>> as you go, push the limits of executive power, ignore
>> the noise, and win the war.
>> ...
>
> As I pointed out above, FDR had some authority under the
> Articles of War that was substantially diminished when they
> were replaced with the UCMJ. It is particularly important to
> note that a, if not the, primary justification for the change was
> concern for potential abuse under the precedent law.
That was not what I was talking about. FDR openly thrwarted
the enumerated powers doctrine and led the US into the
sewer of a moving target Constitution moreso than any
president since Jackson (who just ignored SCOTUS completely
in the Trail Of Tears tragedy). And *that* teed up an
awful lot of what you find so repulsive in *this* president.
>
> To suggest an equivalency between the current situation
> and the Great Depression and World War two betrays a
> complete lack of perspective.
The threat here is potentially greater because of the
proliferation and miniaturization of nuclear weapons.
If there were no nukes or other serious WMDs potentially
on the table, I would care even slightly about what
happens in Iran, Iraq, et al. But these weapons are
potentially available to some very unstable people
and governments. We cannot wait until they actually
acquire them. We do so at our own peril.
>
> Even though I recognize that enormous difference in exigency,
> I still condemn FDR for some of his actions. Consequently
> I cannot reasonably decline to condemn Bush for like sins.
Fine, this is both your privilege and your responsibility.
But Bush, like FDR, will pretty much get away with whatever
he wants. So will Obama/Hillary/McCain. We are no longer
a Constitutional Republic with a fixed rule of law.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
>
> That's nonsense. We could take out their infrastructure from the
> air in a matter of weeks. Even at 11 Trillion, it would still be
> better than letting them have nukes. Do YOU want to breathe
> radioactive isotopes delivered via the jetstream as the Islamic
> whackos seek to meet Allah and destroy Israel? I'd prefer not
> to thanks.
Reading your posts, the words "circumspect" and "thoughful" don't come to
mind.
In article <[email protected]>, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
>Doug Miller wrote:
>> In article <[email protected]>, "Leon"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> Yeah, and Whew I had totally forgotten about McCain's running mate that
>>> needs to be considered. I imagine that whether Obama or Hillary wins they
>>> will team up and McCain will have half of an Oreo Cookie to run against.
>>
>> I doubt it. There's no way that Obama would offer second spot to Hillary; she
>
>> and Bill would sabotage him every chance they got, and he's smart enough to
>> know that. I also doubt very much he'd accept second spot behind her even if
>> she wins the nomination (which is looking less and less likely every day).
>>
>> I've been saying for > 2 years now that the Democrat ticket in 2008 will be
>> Obama and Evan Bayh. I still think that, even though Bayh endorsed and
>> campaigned for Hillary -- what better way for Obama to "reach out" to
>> Hillary's *supporters*, without reaching out to *her*, than to pick one of
> her
>> most prominent backers as his running mate?
>
>....except that Bayh doesn't represent "change" and the "new" type of
>politics that BO keeps talking about.
Bayh is a chameleon. He'll say or do whatever is needed to get elected.
>In fact, anyone currently in
>politics won't qualify if he means what he says.
Including Obama himself !
> Well, maybe Bayh after all.
We'll soon see.
Lew Hodgett wrote:
> "jo4hn" wrote:
>
>> I was thinking of Warren G. Harding who had Marc Hanna as his Rove.
>
> Might want to check that.
>
> Marc Hanna (Hanna Mining), had McKinley has his hand picked
> presidential lackey puppet, at the turn of the century (1900).
>
> Harding was 25-30 years later.
>
> BTW, Hanna Mining is still based in Cleveland. The Hanna family
> represents some of the oldest, moldiest money in Cleveland.
>
> On a par with J D Rockfeller, who is also buried in Cleveland.
>
> Lew
>
>
Oopsie, you are right. My bad.
sigh,
jo4hn
"Renata" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 20:12:28 -0700, Mark & Juanita
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> -snip-
>> As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
>>being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
>>OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
>>embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
>>difference between these clowns.
>
> Starting WWIII is certain to be a recoverable "incident". For some,
> anyway (civilization, not so much) But, it'll sure please ole Rev
> Hagee.
Let's see here, Clinton was the one in the last couple of weeks that
mentioned Nuking Iran. And WWIII was really about 60 years ago. The war
between the US and England back in the 1700's was really the first world
war, it involved several leading nations.
>
> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
There are climate changes but while the Arctic is loosing ice, the Antartic
has been gaining Ice at the rate of 10% per year for the last several years
and that area dewarfs the Arctic in ice. Houston set a 120 year record low
a couple of weeks ago and we are expecting yet another cold front in the
next copule of days. China has had a record cold winter.
The only thing you can really be sure of is that the "Global Warming" buss
word is always associated with Politics, the price of oil, sink holes, the
writers strike, the Al Gore spoof movie, and what evergoes wrong this week.
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> No. I plan to vote for Ronald Reagan who - even dead - is better than
> any of the above.
Seems like a pointless gesture.
> I want to register my disdain for the choices the
> mainstream parties have given me. We desperately need a "None Of The
> Above" voting choice on our ballots. If more than 33% of the people
> who voted, select that option, the election should be invalid and
> require a "do over". I favor a Constitutional Amendment to make this
> so.
That could lead to no administration for years on end, as bad as the govt.
often is that could certainly be worse.
>> Do you lose sleep
>> over the fact that McCain's wife's father
>
> Yes.
>
>> did business with the mob? Should we be troubled that Mike Huckabee
>> was
>
> Cite please.
He was a beer distributor in Arizona who took some legal hits in court over
filing falsified paperwork and concealing who he was doing business with
which at that time in that place meant guys with mob ties. It's nothing you
need to bother looking up unless you like spending time on right-wingnut
*and* left-wingnut websites, for some reason both fringes think it's
something they can smear McCain with. I fail to see what it has to do with
McCain, if belonging to a family (in his case just by marriage) that did
business with mobsters was disqualifying then the Kennedys should never have
got anywhere in politics.
> I am consistent in this. The stink is everywhere in politics.
On that we are agreed.
> He has NO CONTENT to his speeches. "Change you can believe in?"
> C'mon? What change?
Ron Paul says good government is more important than just having a
Republican in the White House and he thinks Obama would be better on foreign
policy than the others. Do you think you have this figured out better than
Paul? Hey, I don't think he's the answer to a maiden's prayer, but I'd sure
rather have him than Hillary. However I don't think he can beat McCain, I
suspect we're looking at McCain in the White House next year with a Democrat
Congress, that should be big fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNOpdE2Z0Ss
> From what TO what and WHY? How will we pay
> for it? He is capitalizing on the boneheaded anti-war sentiment
> currently in vogue and the fact that Hillary both did support
> the war and won't completely back away from it.
"Boneheaded?" Thousands of dead American soldiers (and many more Iraqis),
hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars wasted, the contempt of most of
the world including allies, an economy in the toilet, massive national debt
(much of it held by China), no WMDs found, the Army and the Marines
stretched to the breaking point--exactly what part of the invasion of Iraq
do you think shouldn't be inspiring anti-war sentiment? "Currently in
vogue," since when is an unjustified and incompetently executed war
something that shouldn't be unpopular? I come from a family with a long
history of military service, I recognize that some wars are necessary, the
invasion of Afghanistan for example was justified as an organization that
actually did attack America was based there. But the justification for
invading Iraq was all smoke and mirrors, the invasion has turned out to be
the worst foreign policy blunder in decades. Do you have kids? They'll be
paying for this until they're old and grey, how happy do you think they'll
be about that?
> So I guess there is
> one policy point he can exploit. But he is an empty vessel, with
> nothing meaningful to say other than "change, change, change."
You and some friends are marching into a swamp infested with alligators and
poison snakes, the slimy water is up to your chin, your feet keep getting
stuck in the mud and it kind of looks like soon you won't be able to move at
all. Somebody suggests changing course and not marching straight into the
swamp any more. Is your response going to be that since they didn't specify
an exact direction you're not going to listen to them?
I don't know if Obama as President will be better, but it's unlikely he
could be any worse. I almost don't care at this point, the Bush admin has
been such a flaming shambles that I'm prepared to let almost anyone have a
crack at doing better, it's too bad Pat Paulsen isn't running.
> What is comes down to is that *all* the candidates are lousy and
> he is *perceived* as being better than the alternatives. I don't
> share that view, but I understand that is *is* the dominant view.
> In my opinion he is the most dangerous of the bunch because
> he has no specific ideas but a strong affiliation to the general
> ideation of the extreme Left.
The extreme left huh? Specifics? What is there in his legislative history
that leads you to believe he's really a lot more radical than most folks
think? His kid does go to school with the child of a guy who used to be in
the Weather Underground, and there's that photo of him not putting his hand
over his heart for the National Anthem, that's pretty damning stuff for
sure.
> Don't just blame Bush for that. The rules by which W plays were
> put in place LONG before he was even in politics. It was, you'll
> recall, the activist political left, that decided the Constitution
> was a "living" document to be interpreted as necessary to fit
> current conditions. That's all Bush is doing ... he's just
> not doing it the way the left elite snobs would like.
Ah, so your excuse is that because some other kids stole candy too you
shouldn't be blamed for doing it as well, lovely.
Warrantless wiretaps? Secret trials? Citizens declared to be enemy
combatants without due process? We're supposed to just let that stuff go
because of what some previous administrations did?
> Note that I said "appears". I've not had time to dig into his record
> deeply yet. If it turns out that you're record is correct I will
> never vote for him.
You won't have to dig far, his history is right there for anyone to find
with a quick web search.
> I don't mind people changing their minds
> on principle. I mind people using the force of government to
> tell me what to do.
It is sometimes necessary for the common good, we need traffic laws because
without them the streets would be a madhouse. For that matter we need the
streets too, if they were built only in neighborhoods where the residents
could afford them half the country would still be in the 18th century. For
that matter some of it still is.
Doug Winterburn wrote:
> Leon wrote:
>> "Doug Winterburn" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> Renata wrote:
>>>> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
>>>> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
>>>> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
>>> NASA has adjusted their warming analysis:
>>>
>>> http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0817-nasa_snafu.html
>>>
>>>> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>>>>
>>>> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
>>>> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
>>> I hope we don't all freeze to death:
>>>
>>>
http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm
>>
>>
>> Have you noticed that cleaning up the air is causing global warming?
>> Before
>> emission controls no one complained about "global worming".
>>
>>
> The warming crowd is now saying that the current cooling is caused by
> warming? Now, "climate change" seems to be the rage - it covers all the
> alarmist bases.
Like I always say, "It's always something". If the left didn't have
something to bitch about, then they would have to be happy. Ever met a
happy LIBERAL?
--
"You can lead them to LINUX
but you can't make them THINK"
Running Mandriva release 2008.0 free-i586 using KDE on i586
Yeah, vote for Reagan, the best President Japan ever had.
"Tim Daneliuk" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Woodie wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>>
>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>>
>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>>
>> Can you tell me why Obama is the best idea ever? Or even a really good
>> one?
>> He talks of change - that's really his whole platform - and when serving
>> in Illinois, he changed... well... he must've... uhm... changed what?
>>
>> This Obama-dude is just more of the same. Only worse.
>
> You misunderstood him. He is talking about *exchange*. Exchanging
> power for money. Exchanging the ethics of his office for the favors
> of crooks. Exchanging the hopes of his constituents for his own
> personal benefit. DAGS rezko blagojevich obama and see what shows
> up. We in Illinois are apparently blessed with not just one, but
> two completely lousy Senators. One thinks our military isn't much
> different than Nazi storm troopers, the other likes to make common
> cause with corrupt politicians and crooks. Swell.
>
> (Not that the other two running are any better particularly. Hillary's
> trail oozes behind her and McCain led the fight for the "Keeping The
> Incumbent In Power Act" aka McCain-Feingold.)
>
> Vote Reagan In 2008.
> --
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>> On May 13, 5:49 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>>> ...
>>>
>>> http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html
>>>
>>>
>> No wonder he's ahead of Clinton. He's been campaigning
>> in seven more states than she.
>>
>> --
>>
>> FF
> And because he lives here in metro Chicago, he will also get votes
> that were never cast.
>
You go Tim! There is a reason that it's called "Crook" County!
I've said it all along BO is a Chicago politician. So by DEFINITION,
there is stink on him somewhere. It may take a while to find, but let
there be no doubt, it is there!
"Jack Stein" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Dave in Houston wrote:
>
>> ROFLMAO ! I find it oxymoronic that you would use Bush and smart in
>> the same sentence (make that paragraph) (no, no; make that thesis).
>> NOT need someone to write his speeches for him? This is, without
>> doubt, the most scripted president in history. Turning this guy loose
>> without a teleprompter is a gamble I doubt a Las Vegas bookie would
>> cover. DAGS the word "Bushism" and take your pick of audio/video gaffs
>> and written lists.
>
> Let me guess... You've been watching David Letterman trash Bush every day
> for the last 7 years, and you think yourself a genius?
Lemme guess, it took you three days to come up with that response? What
are you, a Bush speech writer?
I watch a lot of comics because I like their particular slant on
different subjects though I rarely watch Letterman and more so because there
is a particular guest he has on that particular night.
I'd rather listen to Lewis Black.
I am aware that you Bush supporters (all 18% of voters according to
polls that you don't pay any attention to because they don't concur with
your view of things) have little to laugh about these days.
Face reality, Bush will go down in history with Calvin Coolidge and
Richard Nixon.
Dave in Houston
Renata wrote:
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 20:12:28 -0700, Mark & Juanita
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> -snip-
>> As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
>> being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
>> OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
>> embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
>> difference between these clowns.
>
> Starting WWIII is certain to be a recoverable "incident". For some,
> anyway (civilization, not so much) But, it'll sure please ole Rev
> Hagee.
WWIII has been in progress for the las 30 years or so. Hopefully
whoever is elected along with help from other civilized nations can win
it. The loss of this war could result in you wearing a birka.
>
> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
NASA has adjusted their warming analysis:
http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0817-nasa_snafu.html
> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>
> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
I hope we don't all freeze to death:
http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm
>
> Renata
On Wed, 14 May 2008 20:36:24 -0700, jo4hn <[email protected]>
wrote:
>jbd in Denver wrote:
>> Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote in news:140sf5-tde1.ln1
>> @ozzie.tundraware.com:
>>
>> Agree or disagree...
>>
>> Tim's a sharp fella.
>>
>sharp as the proverbial meatball.
My favorite has always been Foghorn Leghorn's:
"The boy's about as sharp as a bowling ball."
I do not direct this directly at tim - for brutus is an honorable man.
(this is not ad hominem - i swear)
Tom Watson
tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet
www.home.comcast.net/~tjwatson1
In article <[email protected]>, "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Yeah, and Whew I had totally forgotten about McCain's running mate that
>needs to be considered. I imagine that whether Obama or Hillary wins they
>will team up and McCain will have half of an Oreo Cookie to run against.
I doubt it. There's no way that Obama would offer second spot to Hillary; she
and Bill would sabotage him every chance they got, and he's smart enough to
know that. I also doubt very much he'd accept second spot behind her even if
she wins the nomination (which is looking less and less likely every day).
I've been saying for > 2 years now that the Democrat ticket in 2008 will be
Obama and Evan Bayh. I still think that, even though Bayh endorsed and
campaigned for Hillary -- what better way for Obama to "reach out" to
Hillary's *supporters*, without reaching out to *her*, than to pick one of her
most prominent backers as his running mate?
"Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
>> Concerning your statement, while Bush does not always sound great, I
>> wonder if he is the only one that is smart enough to not need some one to
>> write his speeches for him. ;~)
>
> ROFLMAO ! I find it oxymoronic that you would use Bush and smart in
> the same sentence (make that paragraph) (no, no; make that thesis).
> NOT need someone to write his speeches for him? This is, without
> doubt, the most scripted president in history. Turning this guy loose
> without a teleprompter is a gamble I doubt a Las Vegas bookie would cover.
> DAGS the word "Bushism" and take your pick of audio/video gaffs and
> written lists.
>
> Dave in Houston
>
I thought you might get a kick out of that. ;~)
"Doug Winterburn" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Renata wrote:
>>
>> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
>> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
>> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
>
> NASA has adjusted their warming analysis:
>
> http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0817-nasa_snafu.html
>
>> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>>
>> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
>> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
>
> I hope we don't all freeze to death:
>
> http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm
Have you noticed that cleaning up the air is causing global warming? Before
emission controls no one complained about "global worming".
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 8:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Face it, any of the three will be lying through
>> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
>> of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
>> thing.
>
> Lying through their tooth.
Says Robatoy, proliferating a ridiculous stereotype, then later
complains about bigotry.
> The West Virginians did just that.
> They'd rather vote for a woman than a black man.
>
> And THAT is is what keeps Hitlary going. Her inner belief that "HOW
> can she be beat by a negro??
>
> She is WAY more fucked up than anybody dares to believe. She's a
> bigot. (BTW, Mark.. THAT is what bigotry really means. 'I' have been
> amongst entire congregations praising Jesus, she doesn't fit the
> bill.)
>
> My southern neighbours, mostly, never left the 1800's.
"Leon" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Have you noticed that cleaning up the air is causing global warming?
> Before emission controls no one complained about "global worming".
Come on, Leon! That's reminiscent of the AGGIE joke whose punch line says
that when you remove all the legs from a flea and then command it, "JUMP!"
that the flea can no longer hear.
Dave in Houston
Dave in Houston wrote:
> ROFLMAO ! I find it oxymoronic that you would use Bush and smart in the
> same sentence (make that paragraph) (no, no; make that thesis).
> NOT need someone to write his speeches for him? This is, without doubt,
> the most scripted president in history. Turning this guy loose without a
> teleprompter is a gamble I doubt a Las Vegas bookie would cover. DAGS the
> word "Bushism" and take your pick of audio/video gaffs and written lists.
Let me guess... You've been watching David Letterman trash Bush every
day for the last 7 years, and you think yourself a genius?
--
Jack
http://jbstein.com
"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>>I have seen this in my history books.
>>
>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>
>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
>
> I like Obama too, but Clinton is better at getting the 'stupid' voters.
> This is how Bush was elected twice...
Strangly, the stupid voters were able to out smart the voters that opposed
Bush. What would you call a group that is not as smart as the "stupid" one?
Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote in news:140sf5-tde1.ln1
@ozzie.tundraware.com:
Agree or disagree...
Tim's a sharp fella.
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **
Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote in news:de8vf5-95t2.ln1
@ozzie.tundraware.com:
> Because honest debate requires that you treat your verbal sparring
> partners with personal respect. Lots of very nice people have
> horrible ideas (and vice versa).
Very well said.
As I said Tim was sharp, so also do I say the same of Fred (which leaves me
no friends at all!).
It takes little intellegence to believe.
It takes considerable intellegence to defend.
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 11:26 pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> On May 13, 9:11 pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>> Robatoy wrote:
>>>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>>>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>>>> Required listening for Canadians involved in US politics:
>>>> <http://members.tripod.com/~JB5555/southpark/hapicamp.wav>
>>> What do YOU think the odds are of my clicking on that link?
>>> Zeeerooo... like you... a big fucking ZEROOOOOO
>> Hey.. try a new concept. It's called humour (sp).
>
> You don't have a license to use words like humour and colour. To you
> it is color and humor.
Humour and colour aren't even words... Get with the program - learn to
speak the W's english.
In article <[email protected]>, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>than the three current contenders.
:-)
>
>Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
.. and has absolutely *no* chance of winning, thus making a vote for him
nearly indistinguishable from a vote for Obama.
On May 13, 11:26=A0pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 13, 9:11 pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> Robatoy wrote:
> >>> I have seen this in my history books.
> >>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> >>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
> >>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
> >> Required listening for Canadians involved in US politics:
> >> <http://members.tripod.com/~JB5555/southpark/hapicamp.wav>
>
> > What do YOU think the odds are of my clicking on that link?
>
> > Zeeerooo... like you... a big fucking ZEROOOOOO
>
> Hey.. try a new concept. It's called humour (sp).
You don't have a license to use words like humour and colour. To you
it is color and humor.
On May 14, 3:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> N Hurst wrote:
> As to the upcoming Presidential race, I'll just be happy if any of
the
> > 3 are better than the current one. I don't think the US can handle
> > another 4-8 years of that.
>
> This one is not as bad as everyone thinks. The proof of which is
> that any of the three viable candidates are far, far worse. Bush
> will be skewered by history for his lack of fiscal restraint, and
> he will be applauded by history for understanding the dynamics
> of the Middle East far better than *any* of his critics (well his
> administration will, anyway). Critics wail about the cost of the war
> and loss of life. But they are profoundly dishonest. They do not
> weigh the real cost of NOT going would have been. Imagine Iran/Iraq/
> Syria - left to their own nasty devices - having nuclear weapons
> capability in, say, 30 years. Unlike the Israelis, who see such
> a weapon as a defensive choice of last resort - the Islamic Nutjobs
> running Iran, especially, would be happy to torch off a few tactical
> nukes to flatten Israel in the name of their fine religion. And
> this has consequences for everyone on the planet, the least of
> which being the radiation that would rise into the jet stream
> and land upon all the rest of us. Those of you under the age of
> 50, contemplate just *what* a nuclear-enabled Islamic world would
> look like and see if you still think W is nuts. I don't, and
> I mostly disagree with him on almost every other matter.
>
> Bush is no brilliant President, but it is ironic that the single
> thing he got right is the one thing he is most criticized for -
> this by a bunch of sheep following guys around who think there
> are 60 states and that AmeriKKKa is an oppressive place.
>
> --
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
It's too bad you think massive intelligence fabrications and
obfuscations tailored to hype up going to war in Iraq is a good thing
for the Middle East.
I mean, I guess Iraq is better now than it was in 2001 if you're a
fundamentalist Muslim or a security contractor.
The ME has had a massive anti-American campaign going on for a long
time, I won't argue with that, but did we really need to just hand
them more cannon fodder on a silver platter?
Did Bush need to toss the Geneva Convention out the window?
Should the US be allowing her intelligence officers to use
interrogation techniques that are provably ineffective? US soldiers
used some of the exact same techniques years ago and were court
martialled and convicted for waterboarding as recently as Vietnam. Yet
now we're cool with it?
Should the US be supporting 3rd party torture of people suspected of
terrorism?
Bush's Presidential legacy is going to be much more than the Iraq
thing. He and his administration have fought for the erosion of
personal liberty far worse than any other President I can think of.
Warrantless wire taps on US Citizens, removal of habeas corpus for US
residents, Federal immunity for illegal telecommunication cooperation,
and mandatory gag orders on subpoenas issued through National Security
Letters so that US Citizens who aren't even suspected of wrongdoing
won't know they're being investigated.
As much as I love my country, the more I hear about how Bush has
allowed either by inaction or active support of things such as these
the more sickened I become.
For a man who claims to be a Christian I really have to wonder which
Christ he's following.
-Nathan
On May 16, 5:09=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Dave in Houston wrote:
> > "Jack Stein" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> >news:[email protected]...
> >> Dave in Houston wrote:
>
> <SNIP>
>
> > =A0 =A0 Face reality, Bush will go down in history with Calvin Coolidge =
and
> > Richard Nixon.
>
> > Dave in Houston
>
> I am not generally fond of Bush's policies, but I have to agree with
> you here. =A0He will go down in history like Nixon. =A0And Nixon has
> been (properly) rehabilitated from Watergate (a serious, but relatively
> small blip) as one of the more successful international policy
> presidents of modern history. =A0
Oh, you mean China. Did we end up doing business with China?
Nice one, Lou.
You watch, Bush will be too. =A0You
> have step away from the moment and have the benefit of 30 or
> 40 years to see the merit or lack thereof of policy decisions on
> this scale. =A0
>
Right.
So, let me ask all Illinois residents.
Do you think Obama should pay back
every dime he has collected through a paycheck
for NOT doing his job? After all 60 days after
he was elected, he started running for another office.
He doesn't vote for or against anything. He votes present
so later on he can always say "I didn't vote for that".
He doesn't spend anytime in his office.
He hasn't stood up for Illinois like he promised when he ran for
office.
Do you think he should pay back the money he hasn't earned?
Lou
Robatoy wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>,
> Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>> When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
>> him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
>> He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
>> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
>> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
>> alternatives are lousy.
>
> No shit, Sherlock. But giving that, what choices do you ultimately have?
I have the choice of showing my contempt for them all by voting
for the greatest president of my lifetime, who also happens
to be dead.
>
>> That combined with his amazing amnesia of
>> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
>> this guy is nothing to be proud of. He just looks better in a suit
>> than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
>
> That is so fucked up that I can't waste my time dealing with that
> ignorance. You just decided to hang your hat on a expedient nugget of
> bullshit served up by the media. No spine, eh?
The media served nothing up. Good ol Pastor Wright did that
all on his own. Worse still, The Man Who Would Be President
managed to hear not a single word of it for, what, 20 years?
My what selective listening. Then, Wright did again, on purpose,
out loud, for *everyone* to see. Even Obama couldn't be
seen buying into it. In fact, my bet is that he *engineered*
it, though of course I cannot prove this:
http://heracletus.wordpress.com/2008/04/30/political-genius/
>> No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
>> to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
>>
> And you expect to be a voice in your beloved America?
I am *a* voice here already. For a guy who lives where he lives, you
certainly have strong opinions about something that is ultimately none
of your business.
> Learn to speak first!... (without pandering)
First of all, grownups learn to *listen* first. Then they learn to
fight fair, to argue about ideas, not each others' waist size or nose
hair. Only then do they speak. My views on this matter are drawn
entirely from *listening* to Obama. I never agreed with his *ideas*
but I used to think he was personally a principled fellow. I was
wrong. He's a bald face political opportunist. Anyone denying this is
talking, but not *listening* to the man.
Oh, and I actually live in Illinois. The depth of his personal lack of
character is just starting to get exposed as Federal law enforcement
goes after the Governor and a number of other likely criminals, all of
whom appear to have had untoward relations with Obama. He is going to
just get hammered in the political arena when/if he gets the
nomination. Mr. Change is going to rapidly morph into Mr. Trying
To Explain His Doings With Thugs.
And, just to *whom* do you think I pander exactly? I despise
all the viable candidates. They're easily all far worse in
most important ways than the current President. So ... to
whom am I pandering, pray tell?
>
> You have been teetering on a tight-rope, and you just fell off.
But the trip was worth it...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 14, 8:48 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Tom Watson wrote:
> > A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
>
> You are a very hurtful man. I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
> (of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). My people
> are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
> We have hot women. They have great vodka.
>
I thought you had lived in Germany, Canada, and the
United States, but never in the Ukraine.
Which would make you as Ukrainian as I am Italian.
(The Italians have hot women too.)
--
FF
Mithrandir wrote:
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 16:49:44 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
>> ...I've got news for you.
>> He [Obama] is just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
>> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
>> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
>> alternatives are lousy. That combined with his amazing amnesia of
>> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
>> this guy is nothing to be proud of...
>
> Before you dismiss Jeremiah Wright's remarks as "evil racist screeds", consider
> that his comments about "God damn America" are not much different from the
> prophet Isaiah when he decried the sins of ancient Israel. Isaiah was not
> received well by the people of his time either. Jeremiah Wright's remarks are
> to be seen in contrast to the common political invocation, "God bless America".
> What seems like a prayer ("Please, God, send your blessings upon our nation.")
> is actually used as an arrogant statement ("God does bless our nation. God
> approves of our nation and its actions. God is on my side."). Which is worse -
> a prophetic warning about how God is displeased with us and our sins, or a
> presumptuous statement that God is on my side?
His name may be "Jeremiah", but he's no Old Testament prophet. He is a plain
old race baiting bigot with a big cash flow from his Faithful, and a
highly visible parishioner in his pew the last 20 years who appears to have
been deaf.
>
> As for the remarks being racist, they are no more racist than those who produced
> the TV mini-series "Roots". Both point out grievous injustices commited by one
> group of people against another. Yet the produces of Roots received awards for
> their efforts.
Oh yawn. The Poor Downtrodden Victim Society rears it tired head. Wright
was not reciting 2 century old history. He was accusing the nation - at this
time - of being just as bad. He is a malignancy on the culture, a bigot to
his bones, and a caricature of a pastor. He has many fellow travelers,
notably the "Reverends" Jackson and Sharpton. All three of these
guys are Victim pimps, no more.
>
> What Obama does have to be proud of is his years of community organizing in
> Chicago where he fought for the disempowered. The rich and powerful don't
> really need anyone to fight for them.
You either don't live here in the area or are utterly disconnected from
reality. Wright *is* rich, thanks to his flock giving large sums of
money to him. So is Obama. These guys have less in common with urban
poor blacks than I do - and I'm as white as a ghost. They do what the
far left liberals always do to the poor: condescend to them. I know
this because - unlike Hussein Obama - I've *been* poor. Obama is a
political carpetbagger and Wright is a fraud.
>
> Mithrandir
>
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 14, 7:15 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Larry Blanchard wrote:
> > On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:25:18 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
> >> Oh, and I actually live in Illinois. The depth of his personal lack of
> >> character is just starting to get exposed as Federal law enforcement
> >> goes after the Governor and a number of other likely criminals, all of
> >> whom appear to have had untoward relations with Obama.
>
> > And I used to live in Chicago. The fact that Illinois, and especially
> > Chicago, politicians are crooked surprises you? And by extrapolation and
> > experience, everywhere else as well :-).
>
> > The trick is to vote for the crook who will do the least harm for the
> > country and the most good for you.
>
> > Me, I prefer someone who knows a Shiite from a Sunni. McCain is beginning
> > to remind me of a Bush/Stockdalehybrid.
>
> Uh, mind your manners.Stockdalewas beaten as or even more severely than
> McCain in Viet Nam. His apparent slowness and poor speech patterns
> were a direct result.
>
Perhaps. but if so, delayed.
Sometime ago CNN played a recording of Stockdale, taped
several years before he hooked up with Perot, in which he
described being shot down and his first several months as
a POW. He sounded pretty normal at that time.
In addition to his injuries from ejection, the civilians who
captured him beat him badly until the militia called
them off. One knee was injured so badly he was
afraid he would lose the leg. He said that it had
been the experience of the French that the Communists
did not repatriate amputees (since then I've often
wondered why) so that if he lost the leg he was
as good as dead. Being one of the very first
Americans captured by the North Vietnamese hr
was treated as a sort of novelty and his leg was
saved by a series of operations, he thought surgeons
who worked on him were top notch.
As the war progressed, that changed dramatically
for the worse, for himself as well as those captured
later.
--
FF
On May 14, 4:15 pm, "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "N Hurst" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
> > On May 14, 11:42 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
> > pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
> > reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
> > cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
> > sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
> > in the air.
>
> Agreed, pollution is a problem. Not all that is labeled as "pollution" is a
> problem. The latest craze is the carbon pollution by very far lengths taken
> out of context amd made to sound bad. IIRC we contribute between 1-2% of
> all of this carbon pollution. The earth naturally emits the other 98%.
I think the anthropogenic contribution is closer to 3 to 5%.
Some sources include biomass burning while others do not.
Regardless, the observed rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide
makes it clear that nature is not quite sequestering all of the
carbon dioxide that is emitted from all sources combined,
and the rate of rise indicates that the excess over and above
what is being sequestered is about half of what humanity
produces from fossil fuels and cement production. E.g. if
anthropogenic production of carbon dioxide magically ceased,
the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would
begin to decline about as steeply as it has risen in the past
several years.
> The
> large volcano that recently erupted emitted more pollution in a single day
> than all of the automobiles combined.
Two big difference between the particulates emitted
by volcanos and those emitted by cars are:
!) The particulates emitted by cars are emitted close
to the ground where they have very little effect on global
temperature, and they rapidly settle out of the atmosphere
whereas volcanos blast theirs up high into the atmosphere
where they can have a significant effect on albedo and
it can take years for them to settle out.
and
2) The particulates emitted by cars are generally concentrated
in the same places where lots of people breathe (e.g. cities)
whereas (hopefully) volcanos emit theirs in more remote
areas.
Volcanic emissions can significantly contribute to global
dimming, and therefor global cooling. Particulate emissions
from cars are a local health issue.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Tambora#Global_effects
Anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide average to
more than one hundred times more than volcanic:
http://volcano.und.edu/vwdocs/Gases/man.html
> Before the carbon pollution there was the ozone pollution.
I'm not sure which came first.
--
FF
On May 13, 8:13=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> =A0Face it, any of the three will be lying through
> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
> of the United States." =A0Not one of them actually will do any such
> thing.
Lying through their tooth. The West Virginians did just that.
They'd rather vote for a woman than a black man.
And THAT is is what keeps Hitlary going. Her inner belief that "HOW
can she be beat by a negro??
She is WAY more fucked up than anybody dares to believe. She's a
bigot. (BTW, Mark.. THAT is what bigotry really means. 'I' have been
amongst entire congregations praising Jesus, she doesn't fit the
bill.)
My southern neighbours, mostly, never left the 1800's.
On May 13, 9:02=A0pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 13, 8:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> =A0 Face it, any of the three will be lying through
> >> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
> >> of the United States." =A0Not one of them actually will do any such
> >> thing.
>
> > Lying through their tooth.
>
> Says Robatoy, proliferating a ridiculous stereotype, then later
> complains about bigotry.
>
Hey.. try a new concept. It's called humour.
Tom Watson wrote:
> A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
You are a very hurtful man. I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
(of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). My people
are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
We have hot women. They have great vodka.
Robatoy is Dutch? That's kind of shocking actually...
>
>
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 16:49:44 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>>
>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>> He has no new ideas. In fact, he has no ideas at all, other than
>> "let's whip up some change, any kind of change."
>>
>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>> You mean this guy:
>>
>> http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/05/the_obama_change_we_really_can.html
>>
>> Or this guy:
>>
>> http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html
>>
>> When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
>> him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
>> He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
>> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
>> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
>> alternatives are lousy. That combined with his amazing amnesia of
>> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
>> this guy is nothing to be proud of. He just looks better in a suit
>> than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
>>
>> No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
>> to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
>>
>>
>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>> than the three current contenders.
>>
>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>>
>>
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
>> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
>
> Tom Watson
> tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet
> www.home.comcast.net/~tjwatson1
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 14, 12:41=A0am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 13, 10:54 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> Robatoy wrote:
> >>> On May 13, 10:20 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >>>> And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
> >>>> with your evening Thorazine.
> >>> I'm glad you enjoyed that life's experience. It worked for you, did
> >>> it?
> >> Oh yes. =A0After heavy sedation, even liberal Democrats make sense ...
> >> and some Canadians.
>
> > Great!
> > In that case I will know where to go for an explanation of what it is
> > those two groups are trying to say.
>
> Only if you send me Thorazine first.
>
I just googled thorazine. That's some nasty shit you're playing with,
bro'.
"Upscale" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
>> I'll bet he knows the proper usage of the words "there" and "their."
>
> And possibly not. In any event, his speech writers should be making sure
> he
> doesn't look as illiterate as the current president of the US.
>
>
Concerning your statement, while Bush does not always sound great, I wonder
if he is the only one that is smart enough to not need some one to write his
speeches for him. ;~)
evodawg wrote:
> Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
>> Lew Hodgett wrote:
>>> RE: Subject
>>>
>>> You idiots for real?
>>>
>>> Do you ever clip any of your drivel?
>>>
>>> If you need to be reminded:
>>>
>>> Idiot 1: "Fred the Red Shirt"
>>> Idiot 2: Tim Daneliuk
>>>
>>>
>>> Lew
>>>
>>>
>> You, of course, being the sane one here? You certainly get no points
>> for manners.
>>
> Why do you bother with close minded liberals? Specially this guy?
Because honest debate requires that you treat your verbal sparring
partners with personal respect. Lots of very nice people have
horrible ideas (and vice versa).
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On May 13, 11:23=A0pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On May 13, 9:02 pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> Robatoy wrote:
> >>> On May 13, 8:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >>>> =A0 Face it, any of the three will be lying through
> >>>> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
> >>>> of the United States." =A0Not one of them actually will do any such
> >>>> thing.
> >>> Lying through their tooth.
> >> Says Robatoy, proliferating a ridiculous stereotype, then later
> >> complains about bigotry.
>
> > Hey.. try a new concept. It's called humour.
>
> Gotcha. When you do it, it's humor. When someone else does it, it's bigotr=
y.
You're learning, son.
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Doug Miller wrote:
>> In article <[email protected]>, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>>> than the three current contenders.
>> :-)
>>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>> .. and has absolutely *no* chance of winning, thus making a vote for him
>> nearly indistinguishable from a vote for Obama.
>
> True, but so what? If you examine Obama, Clinton, and McCain
> their positions are oh-so slightly distinct without any real
> difference. Face it, any of the three will be lying through
> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
> of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
> thing.
>
I don't think it's so much a matter of lying as not having a clue as to
what the constitution says. Also, some of them think it's a "living,
breathing document", to be interpreted to fit their current agenda, such
as when SS was deemed constitutional under the commerce clause by the
SCOTUS when faced with the threat of stacking the court by adding more
justices to force it through anyway.
That and the other unfunded entitlements add up to in excess of $50
trillion for future taxpayers.
I won't be surprised when the voters gleefully vote for a candidate
promising universal health care that will more than likely add several
more tens of trillions more - all for "the children". Those children
will be real pleased when they are paying %85 of their earnings to
support this largess.
Of course, the folks promising all this stuff will be recipients or dead
before those children have to pay the piper and figure out who did it to
them.
"Lou" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:57bdba25-7f04-4f6e-9180-343f33a5a0c4@k37g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
> Anybody, and I mean anybody who votes for Obama hasn't
> got a brain in there head. He has proven to be the most useless
> senator ever. He is nothing more than a used car salesman who
> seems to be able to sell the op on Nothing.
> Even I could get as far as he has if Oprah would buy
> me the presidency.
I'll bet he knows the proper usage of the words "there" and "their."
Dave in Houston
On May 14, 8:48=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Tom Watson wrote:
> > A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
>
> You are a very hurtful man. =A0I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
> (of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). =A0My people
> are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
> We have hot women. =A0They have great vodka. =A0
>
> Robatoy is Dutch? =A0That's kind of shocking actually...
>
Okay, I'll bite. Why is that shocking?
On Wed, 14 May 2008 21:10:03 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>My family (not I) came from that corner of the world before I
>was born. I came to the US by another route.
Please tell me that you were not a refugee from Amsterdam and that you
and Robatoy are not separated twins.
>
>
>That's the essence of democracy: endearing, maddening, uplifting,
>irritating, and so forth ...
Obama's message entirely.
Tom Watson
tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet
www.home.comcast.net/~tjwatson1
On Wed, 14 May 2008 12:33:50 -0700 (PDT), Lou <[email protected]>
wrote:
>So, let me ask all Illinois residents.
>Do you think Obama should pay back
>every dime he has collected through a paycheck
>for NOT doing his job? After all 60 days after
>he was elected, he started running for another office.
>He doesn't vote for or against anything. He votes present
>so later on he can always say "I didn't vote for that".
>He doesn't spend anytime in his office.
>He hasn't stood up for Illinois like he promised when he ran for
>office.
>Do you think he should pay back the money he hasn't earned?
That should be a requirement, who knows what Illinois cronies will
weasel they're way onto the federal dole. Four governors convicted and
jailed in my life time, Chicago and Cook county politicians. No thank
you.
Mark
(sixoneeight) = 618
Robatoy wrote:
> I have seen this in my history books.
>
> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
Can you tell me why Obama is the best idea ever? Or even a really good one?
He talks of change - that's really his whole platform - and when serving
in Illinois, he changed... well... he must've... uhm... changed what?
This Obama-dude is just more of the same. Only worse.
On May 13, 5:49=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > I have seen this in my history books.
>
> > The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> > brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> He has no new ideas. =A0In fact, he has no ideas at all, other than
> "let's whip up some change, any kind of change."
>
>
>
> > To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
> You mean this guy:
>
> =A0http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/05/the_obama_change_we_really_can..=
.
>
> Or this guy:
>
> =A0http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html=
>
> When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
> him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
> He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
> alternatives are lousy. That combined with his amazing amnesia of
> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
> this guy is nothing to be proud of. He just looks better in a suit
> than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
>
> No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
> to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
>
> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. =A0Even dead, he's a better choice
> than the three current contenders.
>
> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>
YOU think that (whoeverthehellheis) is the real deal...
enjoy that illusion.
On May 13, 8:25=A0pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> I am *a* voice here already. For a guy who lives where he lives, you
> certainly have strong opinions about something that is ultimately none
> of your business.
>
There was a time I had some respect for your rhetoric. Turns out you
are nothing but yet another arrogant cowboy.
You don't think that loose cowboys with nukes, threatening the
planet's destruction is none of MY business???
Think again.
Given the opportunity, I'd have to take you out.
You and your ilk are a danger to human life. Period...seminary boy!
>
>
>
> > You have been teetering on a tight-rope, and you just fell off.
>
> But the trip was worth it...
>
And down you will go. Snug at the end of your own rope.
On May 13, 8:25 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
>
> ...
>
> > That is so fucked up that I can't waste my time dealing with that
> > ignorance. You just decided to hang your hat on a expedient nugget of
> > bullshit served up by the media. No spine, eh?
>
> The media served nothing up. Good ol Pastor Wright did that
> all on his own. Worse still, The Man Who Would Be President
> managed to hear not a single word of it for, what, 20 years?
Who, besides yourself, claims he never heard a word
of it for 20 years?
--
FF
On May 14, 10:35 am, "Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Leon" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
> > Concerning your statement, while Bush does not always sound great, I
> > wonder if he is the only one that is smart enough to not need some one to
> > write his speeches for him. ;~)
>
> ROFLMAO ! I find it oxymoronic that you would use Bush and smart in the
> same sentence (make that paragraph) (no, no; make that thesis).
> NOT need someone to write his speeches for him? This is, without doubt,
> the most scripted president in history. Turning this guy loose without a
> teleprompter is a gamble I doubt a Las Vegas bookie would cover. DAGS the
> word "Bushism" and take your pick of audio/video gaffs and written lists.
>
> Dave in Houston
I used to track Bushisms, but when I got past 30 single spaced pages,
I quit.
His daddy took lessons from Mrs. Malaprop and passed the lessons down
to Sonny Boy. In any normal society, Bush would be just another half
drunk yuppie getting pushy at the bar before someone bent his nose.
J. Clarke wrote:
> So you're saying that it's cheaper to bomb half the middle east every
> day for all eternity than it is to occupy and Americanize the place?
Sounds like a good idea to me.
--
"You can lead them to LINUX
but you can't make them THINK"
Running Mandriva release 2008.0 free-i586 using KDE on i586
Anyone can sound sharp when they're an expert on his own opinion. I am very
wary of people who are so sure of everything as is this guy Daneliuk. I
wonder what he's like in person.
"Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:wVIWj.23686$5b3.14997@trnddc05...
>
> "jbd in Denver" wrote:
>
>> Agree or disagree...
>>
>> Tim's a sharp fella.
>
> Yep, about the same as a concrete block.
>
> Lew
>
>
Garage_Woodworks wrote:
> "Tim Daneliuk" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
>> Nice theory. Let's let Iran and Syran get nukes because - given
>> their rational view of the universe - there's no reason to believe
>> they'll actually use them right?
>
>
> You mean like the USA?
You really think that a bunch of people who think nothing of blowing
themselves to Hell for the glory of Allah will hesitate to nuke major
cities for the same purpose?
The trouble with nukes is that it's a lot easier to keep someone from
getting them than to take them away afterwards if it turns out that
the people having them are using them irresponsibly.
Or are you cool with some loon killing tens of millions of people for
the glory of Allah?
>> I am with you in one way though: No more
>> land invasions. We should bomb the roads, sewers, water plants,
>> telecommunications facilities, sewer treatment plants, cell phone
>> towers, military facilities, military equipment and government
>> buildings of Iran and Syria every day until they place nice.
>> In the mean time, they can drink their oil.
>>
>> No occupation, no rebuilding, no money, no humanitarian aid.
>> Make their day-to-day lives so miserable that they'll be too busy
>> boiling water and too poor to have time for nukes. This is
>> relatively cheap and very effective.
So you're saying that it's cheaper to bomb half the middle east every
day for all eternity than it is to occupy and Americanize the place?
--
--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)
evodawg wrote:
> J. Clarke wrote:
>
>> So you're saying that it's cheaper to bomb half the middle east
>> every
>> day for all eternity than it is to occupy and Americanize the
>> place?
>
> Sounds like a good idea to me.
So you'd prefer being at war forever to building alliances?
--
--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)
Lou wrote:
> So, let me ask all Illinois residents.
> Do you think Obama should pay back
> every dime he has collected through a paycheck
> for NOT doing his job? After all 60 days after
> he was elected, he started running for another office.
> He doesn't vote for or against anything. He votes present
> so later on he can always say "I didn't vote for that".
> He doesn't spend anytime in his office.
> He hasn't stood up for Illinois like he promised when he ran for
> office.
> Do you think he should pay back the money he hasn't earned?
> Lou
I'd rather he (and Senator Durbin) just resigned. They can
keep the money if they just go away.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Woodie wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>
>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>
>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>
> Can you tell me why Obama is the best idea ever? Or even a really good one?
> He talks of change - that's really his whole platform - and when serving
> in Illinois, he changed... well... he must've... uhm... changed what?
>
> This Obama-dude is just more of the same. Only worse.
You misunderstood him. He is talking about *exchange*. Exchanging
power for money. Exchanging the ethics of his office for the favors
of crooks. Exchanging the hopes of his constituents for his own
personal benefit. DAGS rezko blagojevich obama and see what shows
up. We in Illinois are apparently blessed with not just one, but
two completely lousy Senators. One thinks our military isn't much
different than Nazi storm troopers, the other likes to make common
cause with corrupt politicians and crooks. Swell.
(Not that the other two running are any better particularly. Hillary's
trail oozes behind her and McCain led the fight for the "Keeping The
Incumbent In Power Act" aka McCain-Feingold.)
Vote Reagan In 2008.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On May 13, 8:25 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>
>> ...
>>
>>> That is so fucked up that I can't waste my time dealing with that
>>> ignorance. You just decided to hang your hat on a expedient nugget of
>>> bullshit served up by the media. No spine, eh?
>> The media served nothing up. Good ol Pastor Wright did that
>> all on his own. Worse still, The Man Who Would Be President
>> managed to hear not a single word of it for, what, 20 years?
>
> Who, besides yourself, claims he never heard a word
> of it for 20 years?
>
> --
>
> FF
He claims to have never heard any of the bile while attending that
church.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
"Larry Blanchard" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:25:18 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
>
> Me, I prefer someone who knows a Shiite from a Sunni. McCain is beginning
> to remind me of a Bush/Stockdale hybrid.
>
Toss into that had of wishes a president that recalls correctly if he or SHE
was shot at during a ME visit and or a president that knows that the people
in Afghanistan don't speed Arabic. Thank you Hillary and Obama
respectively.
"Upscale" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> "Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
>> I'll bet he knows the proper usage of the words "there" and
>> "their."
>
> And possibly not. In any event, his speech writers should be making
> sure he doesn't look as illiterate as the current president of the US.
>
>
And still managed to beat the Best and Brightest the Democrats could run
against him. Go figure.
"Leon" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Concerning your statement, while Bush does not always sound great, I
> wonder if he is the only one that is smart enough to not need some one to
> write his speeches for him. ;~)
ROFLMAO ! I find it oxymoronic that you would use Bush and smart in the
same sentence (make that paragraph) (no, no; make that thesis).
NOT need someone to write his speeches for him? This is, without doubt,
the most scripted president in history. Turning this guy loose without a
teleprompter is a gamble I doubt a Las Vegas bookie would cover. DAGS the
word "Bushism" and take your pick of audio/video gaffs and written lists.
Dave in Houston
Larry Blanchard wrote:
> On Wed, 14 May 2008 11:04:20 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
>> His
>> many other sins will be forgotten, and his foamy little sniveling
>> opponents on the Left will be relegated to being laughed at as the
>> caricatures of intellect that they are.
>
> Wow! We can always depend on Tim's tirades to be erudite and
> entertaining, regardless of their truth or falsity :-).
Thank you, I aim to please.
>
> Bush didn't win by outsmarting his opponent - he won by the power of
> better cheating.
That's nonsense. Both the NYT and USA Today post election analysis
of the first election showed that Bush was the winner (barely).
The second time around was nowhere even close to as disputed.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On May 13, 5:49 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> ...
>>
>> http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html
>>
>>
>
> No wonder he's ahead of Clinton. He's been campaigning
> in seven more states than she.
>
> --
>
> FF
And because he lives here in metro Chicago, he will also get votes
that were never cast.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Robatoy wrote:
> I have seen this in my history books.
>
> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
He has no new ideas. In fact, he has no ideas at all, other than
"let's whip up some change, any kind of change."
>
> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
You mean this guy:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/05/the_obama_change_we_really_can.html
Or this guy:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/new-patriotic-o.html
When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
"divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
alternatives are lousy. That combined with his amazing amnesia of
never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
this guy is nothing to be proud of. He just looks better in a suit
than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
than the three current contenders.
Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 10:54 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> On May 13, 10:20 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>> And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
>>>> with your evening Thorazine.
>>> I'm glad you enjoyed that life's experience. It worked for you, did
>>> it?
>> Oh yes. After heavy sedation, even liberal Democrats make sense ...
>> and some Canadians.
>>
>
> Great!
> In that case I will know where to go for an explanation of what it is
> those two groups are trying to say.
>
Only if you send me Thorazine first.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Tom Watson wrote:
> On Wed, 14 May 2008 19:48:48 -0500, Tim Daneliuk
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Tom Watson wrote:
>>> A Dutchman and a Russkie were arguing one day and came up with this:
>> You are a very hurtful man. I am Ukrainian (a Slav) not Russian
>> (of more-or-less Finnish blood lines, I am told). My people
>> are professional victims, theirs are professional predators.
>> We have hot women. They have great vodka.
>>
>> Robatoy is Dutch? That's kind of shocking actually...
>>
>
>
> My vaguest apologies.
>
> It was my understanding that you came to this country as a refugee
> from the former USSR - which we in the States habitually refer to as -
> Russkies.
My family (not I) came from that corner of the world before I
was born. I came to the US by another route.
>
> Robatoy is a refugee from Amsterdam - which seems counterintuitive.
>
> (BTW - a suggestion for his corporate name)
>
> The actual point is that the angst generated by both of you is
> interesting in that neither of you are native born.
>
> There is an inverse proportionality that I find both endearing and
> frustrating.
>
That's the essence of democracy: endearing, maddening, uplifting,
irritating, and so forth ...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:25:18 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Oh, and I actually live in Illinois. The depth of his personal lack of
> character is just starting to get exposed as Federal law enforcement
> goes after the Governor and a number of other likely criminals, all of
> whom appear to have had untoward relations with Obama.
And I used to live in Chicago. The fact that Illinois, and especially
Chicago, politicians are crooked surprises you? And by extrapolation and
experience, everywhere else as well :-).
The trick is to vote for the crook who will do the least harm for the
country and the most good for you.
Me, I prefer someone who knows a Shiite from a Sunni. McCain is beginning
to remind me of a Bush/Stockdale hybrid.
On Wed, 14 May 2008 11:04:20 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> His
> many other sins will be forgotten, and his foamy little sniveling
> opponents on the Left will be relegated to being laughed at as the
> caricatures of intellect that they are.
Wow! We can always depend on Tim's tirades to be erudite and
entertaining, regardless of their truth or falsity :-).
Bush didn't win by outsmarting his opponent - he won by the power of
better cheating.
On Wed, 14 May 2008 17:51:44 -0500, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Almost 10x that number of Americans die *annually* on our highways.
> Why are you not similarly exorcised about this and demanding the dismantlement
> of this very dangerous environment.
And twice as many people are killed each year by the wrong medication as
were killed in 9/11. Those two events certainly don't get the same
response :-).
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> Doug Miller wrote:
>> In article <[email protected]>, Tim Daneliuk
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
>>> than the three current contenders.
>>
>> :-)
>>> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
>>
>> .. and has absolutely *no* chance of winning, thus making a vote for him
>> nearly indistinguishable from a vote for Obama.
>
> True, but so what? If you examine Obama, Clinton, and McCain
> their positions are oh-so slightly distinct without any real
> difference. Face it, any of the three will be lying through
> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
> of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
> thing.
>
Unfortunately, this year, the only thing we can look at is who will do the
least damage. There are no choices -- the Republicans let the Dems and
Independents choose the candidate, so now we have a candidate who doesn't
just reach across the aisle, he has done full gainers to the far left of
that aisle.
As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
difference between these clowns.
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
jbd in Denver wrote:
> Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote in news:140sf5-tde1.ln1
> @ozzie.tundraware.com:
>
> Agree or disagree...
>
> Tim's a sharp fella.
>
> ** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **
I aspire to become Scary Sharp...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On May 13, 6:25 pm, Lou <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Anybody, and I mean anybody who votes for Obama hasn't
>> got a brain in there head. He has proven to be the most useless
>> senator ever. He is nothing more than a used car salesman who
>> seems to be able to sell the op on Nothing.
>> Even I could get as far as he has if Oprah would buy
>> me the presidency.
>> ...
>
> I don;t agree that he has been a senator long enough to
> prove anything.
>
> --
>
> FF
>
>
He's been senator long enough to prove *one* thing:
He is a political scallywag, scoundrel, and racial
carpetbagger.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Dave in Houston wrote:
> "Jack Stein" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> Dave in Houston wrote:
>>
>>> ROFLMAO ! I find it oxymoronic that you would use Bush and smart in
>>> the same sentence (make that paragraph) (no, no; make that thesis).
>>> NOT need someone to write his speeches for him? This is, without
>>> doubt, the most scripted president in history. Turning this guy loose
>>> without a teleprompter is a gamble I doubt a Las Vegas bookie would
>>> cover. DAGS the word "Bushism" and take your pick of audio/video gaffs
>>> and written lists.
>> Let me guess... You've been watching David Letterman trash Bush every day
>> for the last 7 years, and you think yourself a genius?
>
> Lemme guess, it took you three days to come up with that response? What
> are you, a Bush speech writer?
>
> I watch a lot of comics because I like their particular slant on
> different subjects though I rarely watch Letterman and more so because there
> is a particular guest he has on that particular night.
> I'd rather listen to Lewis Black.
> I am aware that you Bush supporters (all 18% of voters according to
> polls that you don't pay any attention to because they don't concur with
> your view of things) have little to laugh about these days.
> Face reality, Bush will go down in history with Calvin Coolidge and
> Richard Nixon.
>
> Dave in Houston
>
>
I was thinking of Warren G. Harding who had Marc Hanna as his Rove. One
major difference is that Harding did not have the ability to affect the
rest of the world as efficiently as does Bush.
grumpy gus,
jo4hn
On Tue, 13 May 2008 14:11:09 -0700 (PDT), Robatoy
<[email protected]> wrote:
>I have seen this in my history books.
>
>The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
>To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
I am from the state he represents, ain't no way in hell I will.
DAGS Rezko
Business as usual.
Mark
(sixoneeight) = 618
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 8:25 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> I am *a* voice here already. For a guy who lives where he lives, you
>> certainly have strong opinions about something that is ultimately none
>> of your business.
>>
>
> There was a time I had some respect for your rhetoric.
And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
with your evening Thorazine.
Turns out you
> are nothing but yet another arrogant cowboy.
Naw. I don't like horses. Their tail ends remind me too
much of certain people.
>
> You don't think that loose cowboys with nukes, threatening the
> planet's destruction is none of MY business???
Who would that be exactly? The last I looked, the most dangerous
nukes were the ones the Ukrainians were trying to sell. I didn't
hear you yammering on about that.
> Think again.
> Given the opportunity, I'd have to take you out.
Wow, a threat upon myself. I am now officially very scared.
Will that be with a peashooter, a spitwad, or will you just
continue to foam until the attendant sedates you for the night?
> You and your ilk are a danger to human life. Period...seminary boy!
>>
>>
>>> You have been teetering on a tight-rope, and you just fell off.
>> But the trip was worth it...
>>
>
> And down you will go. Snug at the end of your own rope.
I am properly mollified.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
DGDevin wrote:
> Tim Daneliuk wrote:
>
<SNIP>
>
>> From what TO what and WHY? How will we pay
>> for it? He is capitalizing on the boneheaded anti-war sentiment
>> currently in vogue and the fact that Hillary both did support
>> the war and won't completely back away from it.
>
> "Boneheaded?" Thousands of dead American soldiers (and many more Iraqis),
Almost 10x that number of Americans die *annually* on our highways.
Why are you not similarly exorcised about this and demanding the dismantlement
of this very dangerous environment. It is terrible that people die in
war, combatants and civilians. But the Iraq war demonstrates again the
trend that each major war the US fights, the death toll goes down
(but the injury survival toll goes up). Moreover, every single
solider *volunteered* to serve. We no longer practice the slavery
of the draft.
> hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars wasted, the contempt of most of
Nowhere near what we waste on anti-Constitutional entitlements to keep
loafers loafing.
> the world including allies, an economy in the toilet, massive national debt
> (much of it held by China), no WMDs found, the Army and the Marines
The debt is much more an artifact of the entitlement spend than it is
military spend, even with the increased cost of the Iraq war. Go look
at any recent budget. Figure out what was spent on military and what
was spent on entitlements. Then pro rate the interest paid on the
debt accordingly.
> stretched to the breaking point--exactly what part of the invasion of Iraq
> do you think shouldn't be inspiring anti-war sentiment? "Currently in
The part about thwarting threat in the region before it gets out of
control. I'm with you - we should not be *there* - we should have
rained pain on the Iraqi, Iranian, and Syrian governments by wiping
out their military capacity, public works, and government facilities
by air. Cripple their economies, throw them into complete turmoil
so they have no energy for nukes, funding Hezbollah, attacking Israel,
etc. We don't need boots on the ground there, just cut them off at
their knees. Cheap, effective, and sustainable.
> vogue," since when is an unjustified and incompetently executed war
> something that shouldn't be unpopular? I come from a family with a long
The war was not incompetently executed. The peace was, thanks in part
to the drooling idiots in the State department that insisted we stay
and fix things. Bush is dead wrong on this too. If we were going in,
it should have been to "visit" and he should have stuck by "Mission
Accomplished."
> history of military service, I recognize that some wars are necessary, the
> invasion of Afghanistan for example was justified as an organization that
> actually did attack America was based there. But the justification for
> invading Iraq was all smoke and mirrors, the invasion has turned out to be
> the worst foreign policy blunder in decades. Do you have kids? They'll be
> paying for this until they're old and grey, how happy do you think they'll
> be about that?
My kids are going to be paying far, far, far, far more for the foolish
and greedy demands of healthcare, drug benefits, Social Security,
and Medicare that are not funded at anywhere near the levels needed
to sustain my lazy, money grubbing, unethical generation that is
headed for retirement in a little while.
>
>> So I guess there is
>> one policy point he can exploit. But he is an empty vessel, with
>> nothing meaningful to say other than "change, change, change."
>
> You and some friends are marching into a swamp infested with alligators and
> poison snakes, the slimy water is up to your chin, your feet keep getting
> stuck in the mud and it kind of looks like soon you won't be able to move at
> all. Somebody suggests changing course and not marching straight into the
> swamp any more. Is your response going to be that since they didn't specify
> an exact direction you're not going to listen to them?
Of course I will .. but I want to know just WHAT I'm signing up for.
>
> I don't know if Obama as President will be better, but it's unlikely he
> could be any worse. I almost don't care at this point, the Bush admin has
> been such a flaming shambles that I'm prepared to let almost anyone have a
> crack at doing better, it's too bad Pat Paulsen isn't running.
He was entertaining. I'd personally like to see Kinky Friedman run.
>
>> What is comes down to is that *all* the candidates are lousy and
>> he is *perceived* as being better than the alternatives. I don't
>> share that view, but I understand that is *is* the dominant view.
>> In my opinion he is the most dangerous of the bunch because
>> he has no specific ideas but a strong affiliation to the general
>> ideation of the extreme Left.
>
> The extreme left huh? Specifics? What is there in his legislative history
> that leads you to believe he's really a lot more radical than most folks
> think? His kid does go to school with the child of a guy who used to be in
> the Weather Underground, and there's that photo of him not putting his hand
> over his heart for the National Anthem, that's pretty damning stuff for
> sure.
How about his attacks on big eeeeeevil corporations making "too much" money?
How about his acknowledgment that reducing taxes stimulates the economy,
but he wants tax rates raised anyway to be more "fair" (as he defines it)?
How about his support for *increasing* foreign aid to suit the UN?
He is far left issue after issue.
>
>> Don't just blame Bush for that. The rules by which W plays were
>> put in place LONG before he was even in politics. It was, you'll
>> recall, the activist political left, that decided the Constitution
>> was a "living" document to be interpreted as necessary to fit
>> current conditions. That's all Bush is doing ... he's just
>> not doing it the way the left elite snobs would like.
>
> Ah, so your excuse is that because some other kids stole candy too you
> shouldn't be blamed for doing it as well, lovely.
No. I think *some* of what W did was wrong and he got remediated
by SCOTUS. I think some of what he did was controversial, but
not obviously wrong. But it is hilarious to watch the lefties
pee themselves because Bush is doing *exactly* what they want to
do all the time: "interpreting" the Constitution for "our time".
I was merely commenting on this irony.
>
> Warrantless wiretaps?
Permitted under FISA. But FISA could not work due to
the paperwork burden. Where were the Dems to help find
a workable alternative? Standing across the street
throwing rocks and complaining (as usual).
Secret trials?
There is a long and standing precedent for this during wartime.
Citizens declared to be enemy
> combatants without due process?
Utterly wrong. He's a bozo on this one.
We're supposed to just let that stuff go
> because of what some previous administrations did?
No, we're supposed to fight back on principle. Unfortunately,
neither the right nor the left have any principles any more,
so what do you expect?
>
>> Note that I said "appears". I've not had time to dig into his record
>> deeply yet. If it turns out that you're record is correct I will
>> never vote for him.
>
> You won't have to dig far, his history is right there for anyone to find
> with a quick web search.
>
>> I don't mind people changing their minds
>> on principle. I mind people using the force of government to
>> tell me what to do.
>
> It is sometimes necessary for the common good, we need traffic laws because
> without them the streets would be a madhouse. For that matter we need the
> streets too, if they were built only in neighborhoods where the residents
> could afford them half the country would still be in the 18th century. For
> that matter some of it still is.
"Common Good" is the biggest code phrase for collectivism ever devised ...
well, that and "What About The Children?". Government force should be
limited to: Defending the nation, and interdicting when citizens heap force,
fraud, or threat upon each other.
P.S. "The streets" are one of the enumerated powers given the Federal
government in the Constitution because they are "post roads." No foul there.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 14, 3:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>> N Hurst wrote:
>>
>> <SNIP>
>>
>>> Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
>>> pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
>>> reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
>>> cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
>>> sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
>>> in the air.
>> Of course I am, as are all true Conservationists. That's because
>> doing so is good for *me* (mankind). But wild eyed theories
>> about the end of the world "explained" by Gore-bie (The Inventor
>> Of The Internet)
>
> You just can't help yourself injecting Swiftboat-grade bullshit in
> your arguments. The ol' 'Have you stopped beating your wife' theories.
> I can't believe I ever thought your posts were worth reading. Now It
> is nothing but useless rhetoric.
>
Oh relax Robie baby, you're making it too much fun to set the hook
and reel you in. Take a break, make some sawdust, and breathe
deeply. You will experience great clarity and calm ...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
"N Hurst" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On May 14, 11:42 am, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> Global warming arguments aside, do you not think that clamping down on
> pollution is a good thing? Under pretty much any guise, pollution
> reduction is a good thing for us humans. I'm for anything that reduces
> cancer and various lung-related illnesses, even if it's at the cost of
> sunsets that aren't as pretty because of all the particulates floating
> in the air.
Agreed, pollution is a problem. Not all that is labeled as "pollution" is a
problem. The latest craze is the carbon pollution by very far lengths taken
out of context amd made to sound bad. IIRC we contribute between 1-2% of
all of this carbon pollution. The earth naturally emits the other 98%. The
large volcano that recently erupted emitted more pollution in a single day
than all of the automobiles combined.
Before the carbon pollution there was the ozone pollution. Some scientists
now speculate that because of the restriction of some pollution the sun's
rays now penetrate more of the atmosphere and causing the oceans to heat up
more in turn that is responsible for the more frequent and stronger
hurricanes. I personally think that the weather bureau has spent a fortune
on the latest radar and needs to catch every passing cloud to consider it
for tropical storm naming nomination. The biggest problems with the storms
are that our politicians are squandering money that should go toward
hurricane preparedness.
I think we should control the obvious pollution but lets not make up
pollution problems for political gain. The first step to controlling carbon
pollution would be to tape every politicians mouth shut, that would do as
much if not more good as buying carbon credits or capturing the carbon and
burying it at the bottom of the ocean.
> As to the upcoming Presidential race, I'll just be happy if any of the
> 3 are better than the current one. I don't think the US can handle
> another 4-8 years of that.
While it is easy to play Monday morning quarter back and I'll admit that I
am not real happy with the current politicians that are in charge, I pray
that our next president does not have to face the obstacles that Bush had to
address during the first year of his presidency. I imagine that any
president would probably have to make a change in his agenda had he had the
same circumstances.
I do agree with the wish of the next president being better than the present
one and for that matter I wish that every succeeding president is better
than the one before.
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 9:11 pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> I have seen this in my history books.
>>> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
>>> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>>> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
>> Required listening for Canadians involved in US politics:
>> <http://members.tripod.com/~JB5555/southpark/hapicamp.wav>
>
> What do YOU think the odds are of my clicking on that link?
>
> Zeeerooo... like you... a big fucking ZEROOOOOO
Hey.. try a new concept. It's called humour (sp).
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 10:20 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> And you will again ... when the nice man comes into the room
>> with your evening Thorazine.
>>
>
> I'm glad you enjoyed that life's experience. It worked for you, did
> it?
Oh yes. After heavy sedation, even liberal Democrats make sense ...
and some Canadians.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Lobby Dosser wrote:
> "Upscale" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> "Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>
>>> I'll bet he knows the proper usage of the words "there" and
>>> "their."
>> And possibly not. In any event, his speech writers should be making
>> sure he doesn't look as illiterate as the current president of the US.
>>
>>
>
> And still managed to beat the Best and Brightest the Democrats could run
> against him. Go figure.
He looks better in a pant suit than Hillary ... also a dress, I suspect.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
Robatoy wrote:
> On May 13, 9:02 pm, Woodie <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Robatoy wrote:
>>> On May 13, 8:13 pm, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>> Face it, any of the three will be lying through
>>>> their teeth when swearing to "defend and uphold the Constitution
>>>> of the United States." Not one of them actually will do any such
>>>> thing.
>>> Lying through their tooth.
>> Says Robatoy, proliferating a ridiculous stereotype, then later
>> complains about bigotry.
>>
> Hey.. try a new concept. It's called humour.
Gotcha. When you do it, it's humor. When someone else does it, it's bigotry.
Mithrandir wrote:
> On Wed, 14 May 2008 10:50:39 -0500, Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> You either don't live here in the area or are utterly disconnected from
>> reality. Wright *is* rich, thanks to his flock giving large sums of
>> money to him. So is Obama. These guys have less in common with urban
>> poor blacks than I do - and I'm as white as a ghost. They do what the
>> far left liberals always do to the poor: condescend to them. I know
>> this because - unlike Hussein Obama - I've *been* poor. Obama is a
>> political carpetbagger and Wright is a fraud.
>
> So you're saying that the only ones who can legitimately work for the rights of
> the poor are people who are poor themselves? That *is* disconnected from
> reality.
No, I'm saying that rich liberals like Obama keep the their pet poor around
to appear to be benificient but they are no such thing. Obama's activism
isn't rooted in attracting business into poor neighboorhoods, he's already
demonstrated an antipathy towards business in his comments about oil companies.
His activism is built on the premise that the poor are victims, that
their condition is not their fault, and that everyone else owes them
something. The truth is that without a permanent working poor underclass
and below, the liberal Democrats would have no compelling voting base,
or at least not enough of one to get elected to anything above
dog catcher. They *need* to keep the poor in their place, or replace
them with new imported poverty to keep a permanent begging class in
place to vote for them. It sounds harsh, but work with almost
anyone who has *worked* their way up from poverty and you will
generally find a fairly low level of respect for the Obamas of this
world.
Furthermore, "the rights of the poor" he "works" for are nothing more
than a socialist wealth redistribution system. The "rights" he claims
for them exist in no founding document of the US, nor are they even
natural rights. He is however, strangely silent about the *sins* of
the poor.
For example, you NEVER hear him (or Jackson or Sharpton) calling their own
communities to "repentance" - to stop behaving in the violent, disgusting,
and abusive manner that causes most of the poverty they experience. Instead
Obama questions the incarceration rates of blacks vs. everyone else with
the not too veiled message that it's really racist at the core.
(He should read this: http://www.city-journal.org/html/eon2007-04-02hm.html)
But this is no surprise ... he went to a racist church, which at the time
was run by a Race Victimhood Pimp masquerading as a minister of God. Not
much different than the Iranian Ayatollahs now that I think about it.
>
> I would like to see you back up all your name-calling with a list of verifiable
> actions that Obama has taken, either during his years as a community organizer,
> or in the IL legislature, or in the US Senate, that justify the names you sling.
>
>
> Mithrandir
>
We don't have to go that far back. Let's just stick to his most
recent history:
Let's begin with lies, exaggerations, and taking all sides of issues:
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/05/obamas_profile_in_exaggeration.html
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/05/the_obama_change_we_really_can.html
Then there's his basic lack factual knowledge:
http://www.stoptheaclu.com/archives/2008/05/09/obama-wants-to-be-president-of-57-states/
McCain gets abused for not remembering the differences between Sunni and Shia
halfway around the word. Obama doesn't know what his own country looks
like ... and he's about 30 years *younger* than McCain. That has to be
more than just "I was tired." (I bet Obama can recite the 7 Pillars Of
Islam from memory though, but thats a guess on my part.)
Then there is the considerable body of evidence connecting him, at least indirectly,
with political crooks and outright thugs. Google the following three names
together: rezko obama blagojevich The latter is the malodorous governor of
our state and is #1 on the FBI investigation hit parade at the moment.
The corruption in this state runs deep AND wide. It sure looks like - though
not yet proven - that Obama was part of it. There is enough incidental
evidence that he has an ethics problem that I do not think he merits
being elected or even considered for the highest office of the land.
But ... he's a far left Democrat and - as we've seen repeatedly - they
are above the law far more so than anything Bush and his bunch could invent.
Then there's the matter of attending a church - for 20 or so years - where
the pastor is virulent racist but Obama never hear a word.
I have no idea what kind of a person Obama is personally. He may well
be a fine husband and father. But he is an atrocious political
candidate who actually makes Hillary look good (which I thought to
be impossible). He has major league warts, no record of positive
accomplishment (other than feeding at the public trough to get the
rest of us to pick of the tab for the highly dysfunctional inner
city community he claims to be "helping"), and only distanced himself
from the bigoted snakeoil of Wright when he had absolutely no other choice.
The Dems could do better. They could do WAY better - Lieberman leaps
to mind. Even our friend Gore-bie would be better - and he'd probably
beat anyone in this field in a walk. But because the nutcase Left has
hijacked the Dems far more effectively than the Right has been
hijacked by its religious base, the Dems keep going to the bottom of
the barrel for their candidates. I cannot abide McCain's political
positions for the most part, but I hope he just clobbers Obama in the
Nov. general election - it is exactly the reality check the Dems
need...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
On Tue, 13 May 2008 20:12:28 -0700, Mark & Juanita
<[email protected]> wrote:
-snip-
> As bad as McCain is, the damage he does will be recoverable; the ideas
>being espoused by the other two will do permanent damage to the country.
>OTOH, given how McCain keeps poking conservatives in the eye and his
>embracing of the global warming hoax, I'm not sure where there is much
>difference between these clowns.
Starting WWIII is certain to be a recoverable "incident". For some,
anyway (civilization, not so much) But, it'll sure please ole Rev
Hagee.
Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
Renata
Charlie Self wrote:
<SNIP>
> If Bush declaws the Iranians, it will surprise even him, and cost
> about 11 trillion bucks, passed down unto the 75th generation.
That's nonsense. We could take out their infrastructure from the
air in a matter of weeks. Even at 11 Trillion, it would still be
better than letting them have nukes. Do YOU want to breathe
radioactive isotopes delivered via the jetstream as the Islamic
whackos seek to meet Allah and destroy Israel? I'd prefer not
to thanks.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk [email protected]
PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
jbd in Denver wrote:
> Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote in news:140sf5-tde1.ln1
> @ozzie.tundraware.com:
>
> Agree or disagree...
>
> Tim's a sharp fella.
>
sharp as the proverbial meatball.
In article <[email protected]>,
Tim Daneliuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
> him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
> He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
> alternatives are lousy.
No shit, Sherlock. But giving that, what choices do you ultimately have?
>That combined with his amazing amnesia of
> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
> this guy is nothing to be proud of. He just looks better in a suit
> than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
That is so fucked up that I can't waste my time dealing with that
ignorance. You just decided to hang your hat on a expedient nugget of
bullshit served up by the media. No spine, eh?
>
> No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
> to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
>
And you expect to be a voice in your beloved America?
Learn to speak first!... (without pandering)
>
You have been teetering on a tight-rope, and you just fell off.
Robatoy wrote:
> I have seen this in my history books.
>
> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
T'aint nothin' new about Socialism!
Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Castro.... All socialists. The only "new" thing
about it is the US seems to be headed for it at break neck speed.
--
Jack
http://jbstein.com
"Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:a1877e16-e720-485a-b29d-61fa8fa08e7c@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>I have seen this in my history books.
>
> The best idea, ever, is scuttled by the those who cannot expand their
> brains enough to comprehend the new ideas.
>
> To my southern neighbours: "Please give this Obama dude a chance?"
Oh we are giving him a chance, we hope he beats Billarys butt. Then I hope
he looses to McCain.
Leon wrote:
> "Doug Winterburn" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> Renata wrote:
>>> Really, what I want to ask you though, is about this hoax. Tell me,
>>> have you read any scientific papers (e.g. any by that quack from
>>> NASA, Dr. Hansen)?
>> NASA has adjusted their warming analysis:
>>
>> http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0817-nasa_snafu.html
>>
>>> Or are you just listening to that danged 'liberal media'?
>>>
>>> BTW 'global warming' is a bit of a misnomer. And, there is no doubt
>>> the planet will survive whatever climate change is the works.
>> I hope we don't all freeze to death:
>>
>> http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm
>
>
> Have you noticed that cleaning up the air is causing global warming? Before
> emission controls no one complained about "global worming".
>
>
The warming crowd is now saying that the current cooling is caused by
warming? Now, "climate change" seems to be the rage - it covers all the
alarmist bases.
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
> When he first announced his run, I wanted so much to at least respect
> him as a person, if not his particular ideas. I've got news for you.
> He's just another politico who happens to be benefiting from an
> incredibly lame set of candidates on both sides of the political
> "divide" (it is no such thing). i.e., He only looks good because the
> alternatives are lousy.
Okay, let's say that's true. So then you must be planning on voting for him
given that you've just said the alternatives are so lousy, right?
> That combined with his amazing amnesia of
> never having heard Jeremiah Wright's evil racist screeds tells me that
> this guy is nothing to be proud of.
Do you hold all candidates to the same standard? Did you recoil from the
Republicans when that carpet-chewing nutball Pat Robertson's organization
worked so closely with Republicans that the Federal Election Commission sued
him over it? Do you lose sleep over the fact that McCain's wife's father
did business with the mob? Should we be troubled that Mike Huckabee was
pastor of a church that didn't admit black members until the 1980s? Or are
embarrassing associations a problem only with candidates you already
dislike?
> He just looks better in a suit
> than the others do when they get dolled up. That's it.
Sure, that's how he's come from behind to whomp Hillary, because he looks
better in a suit, that's some real insightful analysis on your part.
> No, everyone should the country a favor and send this guy back
> to Illinois where he can at least pester fewer people.
Wait, you've already described the other candidates as being so lousy they
make Obama look good, but now you'd rather he didn't win. I'm having
trouble following your logic here, unless what it really comes down to is
there isn't much logic involved.
> I'll vote for Ronald Reagan first. Even dead, he's a better choice
> than the three current contenders.
For the most part I liked Reagan, alas, even if he were alive the
Constitution would prohibit him from becoming President again. Of course
given that the current administration doesn't find the Constitution a
barrier to doing what they want maybe we shouldn't care too much what that
document says.
> Then again, there is Bob Barr who appears to be the Real Deal...
Explain what's real about a supposed libertarian who fought like a hungry
dog for the govt. to go on spending billions on a failed war on drugs and
used every trick in the books to enable the feds to ignore the voters of
states who approved medical marijuana laws? Oh yeah, he's changed his tune
*now* since he'd like to get elected again one day and his medical marijuana
stance already helped cost him his seat in Congress. I'm also curious about
how such a staunch anti-abortionist as Barr agreed to his own wife having an
abortion. And how about his refusal to testify about his extra-marital
affair during his divorce proceedings, kind of odd for a guy who was a
front-runner in the Clinton impeachment effort. He's now on wife number
three but he backed the Defense of Marriage Act 'cause he figures gay
marriage would harm the nation, now that's funny.
Hey, as a rule I think liberal politicians are every bit as crooked,
manipulative and hypocritical as conservative politicians; historically I'm
a conservative voter. But if Barr is your idea of the Real Deal then I have
to wonder what color the sky is on your planet.