Bode Miller stripped of gold medal!

[Bloodninja666]

US Olympic Committee strips Bode of down hill medal and awards it to Obama. The consensus was Obama is going down hill faster...

[Raskolnikov]

?

[Bergie]

+1

[gzt]

US Olympic Committee strips Bode of down hill medal and awards it to Obama. The consensus was Obama is going down hill faster...
Zing! But... but... he got a Nobel Peace Prize for making peace or something.

[Smiler Grogan]

Well, Bush did build a steep, fast hill.

[matclone]

I always wonder about those who exhibit zeal or glee at the prospect of someone's fall. You see a lot of that these days.

[pu239]

I always wonder about those who exhibit zeal or glee at the prospect of someone's fall.
Schadenfreude.

I got a chuckle out of the original post though.

Seriously though, when it comes to fiscal restraint OBAMA=BUSH=FAIL.

[matclone]

Thanks. I just learned a new word.

[Sal Webber]

Well, Bush did build a steep, fast hill.

Obama was a senator who voted for every single Bush spending bill and wanted to spend more...and now he has the Audacity to turn around and blame Bush for the spending...his fundamental problem is that he thinks government is the answer for everything.

Obama thinks we are all dumb and need protection from evil doers like doctors and corporations. He also believes that wealth is something that is *distributed* instead of *earned*. I will be dissapointed to find out that any on this board are falling for it.

[kittenSmash]

US Olympic Committee strips Bode of down hill medal and awards it to Obama. The consensus was Obama is going down hill faster...

Nice burn, didn't see that one coming. Well played sir.

[coreJack]

Seriously though, when it comes to fiscal restraint OBAMA=BUSH=FAIL.
Or more generally, Republicans = Democrats = FAIL

[Chewie_jrc]

Or more generally, Republicans = Democrats = FAIL

Bingo! I love watching the GOP and Dems "debate" lol. It's like watching gollum argue with himself.

[pu239]

Or more generally, Republicans = Democrats = FAIL

That too.

[coreJack]

Bingo! I love watching the GOP and Dems "debate" lol. It's like watching gollum argue with himself.
Now *that* is fucking hilarious!

[Guido]

Bingo! I love watching the GOP and Dems "debate" lol. It's like watching gollum argue with himself.But, but me MUST haves the PRECIOUS!

[ColoWayno]

I'm in the SS rehab program for political junkies. I'm pretty sure I'll have to tell my handler about posting on this thread.

I'll probably have to drink more milk and do more squats.

[Smiler Grogan]

Obama was a senator who voted for every single Bush spending bill and wanted to spend more...and now he has the Audacity to turn around and blame Bush for the spending...his fundamental problem is that he thinks government is the answer for everything.

Obama thinks we are all dumb and need protection from evil doers like doctors and corporations. He also believes that wealth is something that is *distributed* instead of *earned*. I will be dissapointed to find out that any on this board are falling for it.
Well, Bush thought we needed protection from the evildoers in Iraq. That's been an expensive little fuckup, so maybe it's a push..

[Jamie J. Skibicki]

Oh, Bush doesn't get a pass either. He's simply a tax and spend democrat who found religion. THat and he raped the constitution.

[Sal Webber]

Well, Bush thought we needed protection from the evildoers in Iraq. That's been an expensive little fuckup, so maybe it's a push..
No doubt Smiler. I think you are missing my point though. I'm not a Bush or Republican advocate. I think the federal govt needs to be cut by 50%. Obama ran on a change agenda and so far the only change he has proposed is accelerating spending while unemployment continues to rise...and to fund spending he wants to tax the "rich" over $250k...aka small business owners. Higher taxes will never create jobs. It won't work. Thus the downhill at 90mph metaphor.

[Sal Webber]

oh and by the way Healthcare insurance is not a right...
and neither is a 400lb squat...I believe you have to earn both

[Rorschach]

I dunno, not having poor people dying on the streets is kinda sweet.

[coreJack]

Oh, Bush doesn't get a pass either. He's simply a tax and spend democrat who found religion. THat and he raped the constitution.
Right. They're both spenders - the real difference between Republicans and Democrats is who the money goes to.

Neither party has any interest in shrinking government - though the Republican party does an amazing job of talking that talk, but managing to spend more than even the Democrats.

[Chewie_jrc]

It's really funny/sad listening to people discuss these things. People's brain start hemmoraging when I tell them I don't agree with Obama and they go "WOW YOU MUST BE A BUSH LOVERRR!". And I go, "No, he was pretty awful as well". Then they spaz out more and go "WTF, THERE IS NO OTHER OPTION YOU ARE THE RETARD!!". It literally is almost that bad.

[Chewie_jrc]

Right. They're both spenders - the real difference between Republicans and Democrats is who the money goes to.

Neither party has any interest in shrinking government - though the Republican party does an amazing job of talking that talk, but managing to spend more than even the Democrats.

LoL I would argue that there is very little difference as to where the money goes. It's funny how under the Bush administration EVERY SINGLE sector of government increased in size (as measured through spending). In fact, he outspent every president in history adjusting for inflation (until Obama came along).

It's funny how the Republicans are supposed to be "fiscally conservative" but can outspend the shit outta the dems when they get congressional control. And it's funny how Dems are "non-interventionist" but declared several of the last major wars.

Another fun fact: WWII+reconstruction, Vietnam, the space program (every year) since it's inception, and the Global War on Terror (yes Iraq and Afghanistan) still DO NOT ADD UP TO THE TOTAL BAILOUT SPENDING!!! HUWHAHAH SPENDING IS FUn!!!!

[Jamie J. Skibicki]

I'm still waiting for the T.Roosevelt and B. Goldwater ticket.

WHo it goes to and who the take it from. Either way, the differences are slight.

What got me is when people called me a racist for not liking Obama. THat pissed me off to no end.

Another fun fact: WWII+reconstruction, Vietnam, the space program (every year) since it's inception, and the Global War on Terror (yes Iraq and Afghanistan) still DO NOT ADD UP TO THE TOTAL BAILOUT SPENDING!!! HUWHAHAH SPENDING IS FUn!!!!

Is that adjusted for inflation?

[bowdirk]

The biggest difference between the Repubs and Dems that I see is not what is spent but where it comes from.

The Democrats want to tax the rich.

The Republicans want to borrow from them, and have our children pay it back with interest.

Which is worse?

-Bowdirk

[Chewie_jrc]

I want to say yes, let me check my book when when I get home from work.


....

Is that adjusted for inflation?

[Chewie_jrc]

The biggest difference between the Repubs and Dems that I see is not what is spent but where it comes from.

The Democrats want to tax the rich.

The Republicans want to borrow from them, and have our children pay it back with interest.

Which is worse?

-Bowdirk

It's really no difference. Pay me now or pay me later. So lame.

[Raskolnikov]

I'm still waiting for the T.Roosevelt and B. Goldwater ticket.


While they'd make an interesting ticket, something tells me T.R. and Goldwater wouldn't get along very well on a lot of issues.

The thing about Obama, and the Dems in general, is that at least with them you know right up front that you are about to get fucked. With Bush and his ilk, you get the whole "small government conservative" line right before they bend you over. If I'm forced to choose between what goes as a "conservative" these days and an outright tax and spend "liberal" (talk about a misnomer, btw), I think I might go with the liberal, to be honest.

[Sal Webber]

The Republicans lost their way under Bush. One could make a good argument that it actually took a turn towards Naziism.

I think that there is a conservative movement afoot with the Republicans now though. I'm watching to see how far they go with it. The problem is that conservative independants almost never win.

[TheDeliverator]

If given the choice, I'd rather suck it up and pay out more of what I make if that means my children and my children's children don't have to pay to support the decisions that MY generation made.

Sadly, it won't ever be fixed, and our country (which has been declining long before Bush or Obama became President) is going down the tubes no matter what we do.

It's our American legacy.

Too worried about "getting mine" than making the right decisions.

Too worried about two guys getting married than the ability for sick Americans to afford a visit to the doctor.

Too worried about Prayer in school instead of encouraging math, science and engineering achievements to our children, and in turn providing them with able teachers and schools to give the best educations possible.

[Sal Webber]

Sadly, it won't ever be fixed, and our country (which has been declining long before Bush or Obama became President) is going down the tubes no matter what we do.

Deliverator- You're on the bench for having a piss poor attitude about the best mother fucking country in the universe. Go drink some American whiskey and get your head straight. We are not going down the tubes.

[TheDeliverator]

I'll start chanting "USA USA USA" when we start making the right kinds of decisions.

I don't hate my country, boy, I just miss it.

[Sal Webber]

This debate is nothing new. Do you think everyone in the country was really behind the Declaration of Independence? It was a minority with a complete commitment to a vision. Communism and Naziism tried to rear their ugly heads back in the 30's too. When the country runs into a rough patch financially, the progressives try to make more government the answer. It's not. Every country that has Socialism, Communism, Fascism, etc...did not get there overnight. First it took financial trouble, and then progressives answered the financial troubles with more government. The general public is starting to pick up on the Obama administration's cues. This November things will change for the better(more conservative).

[Rorschach]

Socialism worked well in Britain under Clement Atlee. Sure, any system is only as good as it's implementation, but I wouldn't dismiss anything just because it's demonised by Fox News etc who have extremely obvious self-serving motives for steering public opinion against it.

[PMDL]

Deliverator- You're on the bench for having a piss poor attitude about the best mother fucking country in the universe. Go drink some American whiskey and get your head straight. We are not going down the tubes.

This is a delusional motherfucker, right here.

[PVC]

Deliverator- You're on the bench for having a piss poor attitude about the best mother fucking country in the universe. Go drink some American whiskey and get your head straight. We are not going down the tubes.

Just so you know, this is one of the main ways Americans are stereotyped by the rest of the world.

[August West]

Socialism worked well in Britain under Clement Atlee.

Attlee was an interesting guy. But context is important - the U.S. loaned over $3 billion to the U.K. in 1946 and another $3 billion later through the Marshall Plan. Kenneth Morgan, who wrote the book on the history of Labour policies, said "It is inconceivable that the economic and social policies of the Attlee government could have survived without this massive platform." (Morgan, Labour in Power 272 (1984)).

That's not to say it didn't work out well - I'm not well enough educated in British history to say one way or the other. But the fact remains that there's no such thing as a free lunch. In order to give something to one person, you have to take it from another. And if the mega-spenders in Congress get their way, one day there will be nobody left to take from.

[Rorschach]

Oh, no argument that while the Anglo-American loan wasn't made to fund the welfare reforms, it certainly helped as a knock-on effect. Britain was bombed to fuck, and had just fought an incredibly expensive war. However, while a staunch anti-socialist might see that as just squandering someone else's cash, I see it as an example of sensible government spending. Healthcare, education, milk for school children, slums knocked down and replaced with affordable housing, and industry rebuilt. These are things that I'm fine with the government spending my taxes on.
Plus, the loan was paid off as agreed upon. Eventually. ;)

[August West]

Britain was bombed to fuck, and had just fought an incredibly expensive war.

Agreed; they took a hell of a beating through the early years of WWII while the U.S. sat it out. Good thing Churchill had absolute bulldog determination and the people rallied to stick it through. But now I'm getting off topic.

[drlvegas]

US Olympic Committee strips Bode of down hill medal and awards it to Obama. The consensus was Obama is going down hill faster...

Actually this is just a blatant example of wealth redistribution(gold). Notice he wasn't given(not the same as "awarded") the much less valuable silver medal--he's got the USOC in his pocket.

Rumor has it Al Sharpton has petitioned to be given the gold that was awarded to the South Korean woman figure skater. Wealth re-distribution should be global, not just national.

[PMDL]

All these Fox News buzz-words are giving me the vapors

[Sal Webber]

This is a delusional motherfucker, right here.

PMDL- You're on the bench too. You have to finish the whole bottle of whiskey before you can go back in. Negative talk is for shit magnets. do you want to be a shit magnet?

[PMDL]

No my goal is more along the lines of not being a conformist idiot and thinking about things instead of repeating them

Hence my aversion to political groupthink

[Sal Webber]

No my goal is more along the lines of not being a conformist idiot and thinking about things instead of repeating them

Hence my aversion to political groupthink Good deal. Onward.

[BryanM]

I also feel compelled to mention this bogus war on terror. Yes, we were attacked on 9/11, yes, the Cole was bombed. But it is dangerous not to listen to your enemy. Your enemy often has real grievances and real goals. Governments at war don't like their people to hear what the enemy wants lest the public agitate for negotiations. This has occurred from times immemorial. But it was most interesting during the late 19th and the entire 20th century. There is a great book called "Faces of the Enemy" written long before the War on Terror that explores dozens of governments' efforts to demonize the enemy and to use PR tactics to keep their own public from thinking carefully about the situation. There are political posters, newspaper articles, pamphlets, cartoons, etc. from the US, USSR, South Korea, North Korea, Vietnam, France, Britain, Germany, Japan, so many countries in so many wars all explaining why the enemy was hell bent on invading and taking over the host country and raping the women, castrating the men, repainting the houses some garish colors and so on.

The fact is that US troops have been in the Middle East for almost 20 years in large numbers. Bin Laden and others said as early as 1991 that the US was not welcomed in the dispute with Iraq. Many of Iraq's neighbors actually had a dispute with Kuwait at that time because it was pumping a lot of oil outside of the OPEC guidelines. Iraq had an additional problem with Kuwait that it was lateral drilling into the Umala oil field in Iraq. Iraq and OPEC issued Kuwait warnings on many occasions. Futher, Saudi Arabia wasn't so scared that Iraq was going to invade it because it agreed to take on hundred of thousands of US troops only if the US agreed to a new military supply contract that included the first ever sale of sophisticated fighter jets to any Middle Eastern country aside from Israel. Curiously Israel did not raise even a peep about the sale.

A transcript of US Ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie's last meeting with Saddam Hussein reveals that Hussein asked her specifically what the US would do if Iraq came down hard on Kuwait and she replied tht "Arab on Arab conflicts are not the concern of the United States." Then, 24 hours after Iraq invades Kuwait, Presidnt George H.W. Bush makes an unprecedented ultimatum to Saddam Hussein personally that if he doesn't remove troops now that the US is going to hurt him. This was not the sort of thing a nation's leader could go along with because he'd probably be overthrown if he was seen as so weak as to given in to an ultimatum.

Even the 1991 Iraq War was sold to us using PR firms. The George H.W. Bush administration hired the Rendon Group to devise reasons to talk the US public into the war, and the Kuwaiti Royal Family hired the PR firm Hill & Knowlton to make up incredible stories about Iraqi soldiers removing Kuwaiti infants from incubators to leave them to die. It was later found that one of the young girls who testified before Congress and whose testimony was featured on major news TV shows lied and was actually a relative of the Kuwaiti Royal Family. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_relations_preparations_for_2003_invasion_of _Iraq. Speaking of PR, a PAKISTANI firm recently hired a lobbyist in the US and established a nonprofit here both to help persuade Congress and the American people that an "extended commitment" in Afghanistan is good for the American people and the Afghans. Why? This firm happens to get $2 billion a year in a logistics and supply contract. So some of the "patriotic" support our troops arguments middle Americans are getting about the war is actually supplied by a Pakistani paid PR firm seeking to persuade us it's an important war for the "homeland" because it's getting $2 billion a year of our tax money.

Bin Laden and several Arab countries suggested a pan Arab force and local management of the problem. The US moved so many troops there so fast that it was truly unbelievable. And now, almost 20 years later, they still haven't left.

Bin Laden gave several interviews in the 1990s saying that he did not believe that US troops would ever leave and that much like the Arab war against the Soviets, they'd have to have a war against the US to make us take our troops out of the Middle East and leave.

Now you can like that, or not like that. You can think it is worth it, or not worth it. But it is much different to consider that the goal of the terrorists is to get us to take our troops out of their countries, as opposed to for the purpose of invading our country and turning all of our shopping malls into mosques and banning pork hot dogs at baseball games, etc. We must remember that the FBI and CIA estimate "Al-Qaeda" to have a budget of about $30 million a year and to consist of somewhere between 200 and 5,000 people. The idea that we've laid waste to two countries, killed more than one million people, and spent more than $1 trillion to stop a $30 million organization consisting of somewhere between 200 and 5,000 people is a very, very difficult to understand thing. At this point, any person in Afghanistan or Iraq who resists the US troops there (inside of their country mind you) is a terrorist and probably affiliated with "Al-Qaeda" because they share the same obscene goal of getting US troops to leave the Middle East.

If Americans believed tht the goal of these terorists, insurgents and others fighting US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan was to get us to leave, I think fewer people would support these wars. And already fewer than half of Americans support the wars. Many will say, "Of course the terrorists aren't fighting us just to make us take our troops out of their countries. Then people give difficult to understand reasons why our enemies are fighting us. They say, "It's because they want to stop us from our way of life." Now first, I'm not sure what exactly our way of life is and how the "terrorists" would go about stopping us from living our way of life. It seems that Americans have a lot of different ways of life here. Some of us have lunch with our Senators at private dining rooms in San Francisco over $500 bottles of wine. Others of us beg for food at train stations, or work 65 hours a week in the hopes of eventually paying part of our debts back so that we can afford to buy lottery tickets again. I can't imagine that the "terrorists" are concerned with such diverse "ways of life."

Some Americans have the freedom to travel into outer space at $20 million a ride, or to safari in Africa, to ride about in private jets with an on board masseuse, or to have the cell phone number of their Congressman or Senator and the serious consideration of their representative on important issues. Other Americans would get stopped by security at Neiman Marcus because they didn't look like they had enough money to buy anything (and yes, I'm talking about white folks too).

Another reason I've heard is that the terrorists will settle for nothing less than our total destruction because they hate us because they are jealous of our great happiness and success. Well, first, the United States has been ranked very low on the happiness scale among developed countries. Americans are, on average, less happy, less healthy, work longer hours, get less exercise, less vacation time, and are fatter than the citizens of other wealthy first world countries. So if the terrorists hate us because they are jealous of all we have, then why not go after the 20 countries that ranked higher than we did on the various measures of happiness? Again, not sure.

There is the bit about the terrorists wanting to have "Jihad" and kill all of us and themselves because they get to go to heaven where they get 72 virgins, presumably to do very unsavory things to. This is an interesting jab against wacked out Muslims because American Christians have similar odd fantasies of the afterlife where it looks like the expensive hotel they could never afford to stay in during their life on earth. It has streets paved with gold, and I imagine that most Americans probably have a vague sense that their illegal alien nannies and gardeners won't be allowed into the same clubs and housing in heaven that they will. I'm sure well to do Americans would cringe at the idea that the ultra poor will be on an equal footing with them and eat at the same gold plated restaurants, drive the same platinum SUVs on gold paved streets (which are very slippery after it rains, so be careful!). Imagine if farmers from Central America get the exact same housing and heaven-issued SUV as you do after your long life of "creating value" and "producing" here? Impossible!

It is a testament to postmodern possibilites that most Americans haven't really thought seriously about how we could have such a large military and spend so much money fighting such a small group of illusive evildoers for such a long period of time. In the mean time, some people have gotten very rich off of these wars. And many people who have endured injustices and hardships have probably, at least to some extent, suppressed their discontent because "we're at war!"

It is possible that the terrorists' goal is really for the 1,000 or however many of them to completely depopulate and destroy the United States and all 300,000,000+ of us. And then? Um? Those 1,000 terrorists are going to live here themselves and each of them will get an area about 400 miles square and they will need good video conferencing equipment lest they get lonely because to put 1,000 people in a country this size would render them a bit isolated. But maybe the terrorists haven't thought through their evil plans as much as much as we haven't thought through ours.

So

[BryanM]

But after so much bloodshed and so many bombings and such incredible wasted sums of money -- enough to feed and house every poor person in the United States -- after all of this and the phone tapping and the expanded federal police power, isn't it worth at least exploring the possibility that Bin Laden and these other folks over there actually meant what they said, which is that they are fighting to get US troops out of the Middle East. It is true that there were no attacks on US troops until we had troops there. Actually, the Khobar Towers bombing was before the Iraq war, but it was indeed in response to US troops in the Middle East -- the Khobar Towers was in the Middle East -- it was in Lebanon, another country over there that used to be pretty comfortable and nice and over the years became a horrible, destitute, war torn, ruined country.

Even the Taliban. OK, yes, the Taliban are some wacky characters using artillery on ancient statues because they are inconsistent with the Koran. But they are not our wackos, they are the wackos of the Afghan people. Perhaps the Afghan people are wacky. Or, perhaps the Afghan people dealt with warlords and the opium trade and rape and pillage and murder for decades and the Taliban emerged as a young radical group and put a stop to all of that bringing a real quiet to the country and 100% eradicating the opium trade. But, they also had this penchant for public executions, many for religious offenses. Now I'm not saying I'd want to live in Afghanistan. I'm not saying I'd like to live under an oppressive religious government, but that's also why I don't move to some states in the midwest where the state is really in to fighting for Christian prayer in school, crosses on buildings, nativity sets in parks, etc.

The Taliban were oppressive, but that's all the Afghan people had standing between them and the warlords now running the country. Since the US invasion, the opium production and trade skyrocketed and is right back to pre-Taliban days. The warlords fight among themselves and the US pays off warlords using aluminum briefcases filled with millions of dollars in cash (our tax money). Those warlords are free to treat their people quite badly so long as they cooperate with the US. It's a nightmare for most Afghan people.

The problem with the war on terror is that by the government's standards, so long as there is one person alive on earth who resists US troops anywhere on earth, or plans to resist them, or funds some group that resists them, the war on terror is not over. So that means that the war on terror will never ever be over. And as we kill more innocent people and even armed insurgents fighting us to get us to leave, there will be more "terrorists" because obviously if we kill a person's whole family and leave only that person, whether it was an accident or not, we can assume that they won't feel very good about us. People seeing friends, relatives, coworkers, and just random people blown to bits with, as was reported in the New York Times, the arms, legs and other body parts of your wedding guests strewn about the ground and some parts hanging up in trees and your betrothed destroyed beyond recognition, this can make a quite ordinary person into a bloodthirsty killer. It's not a person looking for 72 virgins so much as a person looking for revenge. We're creating thousands of people who have nothing to live for except revenge.

In any event, read that PR information about the Iraq War on Wikipedia. It's well documented. Then also consider that a military logistics firm in Pakistan that makes various equipment, food, construction, etc. for US troops in Afghanistan -- that Pakistani company has lobbyists and a "grass roots" nonprofit in the United States to "teach" Americans why an "extended commitment" (read violent occupation) is good for the US and for the people of Afghanistan.

The cause of the US wars in the Middle East is poorly explained and poorly understood. It's also impossible to explain why we are still there. No one has said that we're leaving if we "catch" all of the "Taliban" and all of Al-Qaeda. And I imagine we wouldn't.

I have no idea what the real reason for the war is, but it isn't about freedom or protecting freedom unless you are talking about the freedom to get no bid contracts, secret payoffs, pay outs, bailouts, etc. After so much killing and so much wasted money, you'd think Americans *might* move past the cliches and try to think about why this is happening.Ranty.