McCain/Palin v. Obama/Biden

[Soriak]

Originally Posted by Etoille

Didnt peg you for an opportunist Soriak. I'm impressed!

Hah, you have to pick your fights

Plus, he'd have a hell of a time finding evidence favoring McCain on economics. Goolsbee (Obama's economic adviser) and Holtz-Eakin (McCain's adviser) met for a small debate round about tax policy. Goolsbee went first and pretty much ripped McCain's plan to pieces. When H.E. got his chance to counter, all he could come up with was saying that tax policy isn't everything. He's a bright guy, you'd think he could offer something... (last I checked, McCain's economic policy still consists of vetoing pork-barrel projects - and they still haven't come up with a single project they would cancel. I guess they don't have to, the media isn't pushing that question. Plus, everyone loves to cancel government projects, just as long as it's not one they're profiting from. Saying you'll cancel something specific is only going to lose you votes.)

McCain also seems to believe that lowering taxes leads to more government revenue. At least that's what he himself said (prefaced with the condescending "as everyone knows...") and one of his advisers confirmed... except Holtz-Eakin says McCain doesn't actually believe that. The false impression is simply because McCain has to simplify things for the audience... huh? This is rather fundamental. Either you think lowering taxes raises revenue more than the cost of the tax cut, or you don't. The latter is backed by studies, the former is wishful thinking. (Wouldn't it be nice to have lower taxes and more revenue?)

[Khorum]

Originally Posted by Sunder

Have you watched the past 8 years of politics? Truth has no place in the GOP political campaigns. They say what they want and what their blind, idiot followers want to hear with little to no facts to back them up.

Unfuckingbelievable. What __FACTS__ have you obamaniacs ever volunteered to support Obama's claims to competence, to decency, to honesty or to anything approximating the personal COURAGE to even believe half the shit he's ever said.

With Dubya __NOONE__ doubts that he would stand by his beliefs. NOONE. There happens to be half of the country who may disagree with those beliefs, but let's face it, the truth is that Bush spent the last eight years staunchly defending his convictions in the face of EXCRUCIATING public criticism.

Obama, on the other hand, REFUSED to take a position on a vote for something as clear-cut as whether or not to allow abortionists to murder fetuses that somehow survive an abortion. I mean, how fucking HARD was it to make a stand on something like that?

And you're gonna fucking lecture us on FACTS when in truth the only FACTS about Obama's career-long adherence to maximum political convenience has given my state and city 130 million dollars worth of defaulted contracts under Rezko, a gang-blighted cancer of a neighborhood with no hope of recourse because Obama FUCKING PRESSED THE WRONG BUTTON during state votes and a man who cavorted with terrorists who bombed this country's institutions?

What fucking FACTS have you ever volunteered to counter any of that?

[Lonin]

Interesting essay by Douglas Rushkoff about RNC last night:

I felt a bit nauseous watching the Republican convention last night. I’m very much a give-the-benefit-of-the-doubt kind of guy, so I try to listen to the arguments people make even when they’re made in over-the-top or patronizing ways. Sometimes it’s good to distinguish between the rhetorical devices and the underlying substance. Even people who use manipulative language sometimes have an important point beneath their persuasion techniques (ads against smoking, for example).

I usually don’t feel uneasy when I put those filters on, but last night - during the Guiliani speech - I realized I was no longer filtering a speechwriter’s intentional manipulation; I was trying to look beyond real hate. These folks were gritting their teeth, shaking their fists, and smiling the way gladiators do when going into combat against barbarians. And this is the incumbent party. The ones currently in power.

What is it they hate? Guiliani and Palin both made it pretty clear: community organizing. Community organizing is energized from below. From the periphery. It is the direction and facilitation of mass energy towards productive and cooperative ends. It is about replacing conflict with collaboration. It is the opposite of war; it is peace.

Last night, the Republican Convention made it clear they prefer war. They see the world as a dangerous and terrible place. Like the fascist leaders satirized in Starship Troopers, they say they believe it is better to be on the offensive, taking the war to the people who might wish us harm than playing defense. It is better to be an international aggressor - a bulldog with lipstick - than led by the misguided notion that attacking people itself makes the world a more dangerous place.

In their attack on community organizing - a word combination they pretended they didn't know what it meant - Giuliani and Palin revealed their refusal to acknowledge the kinds of bottom-up processes through which our society was built, and through which local communities can begin to assert some authority over their schools, environments, and economies. Without organized communities, you don't get the reduction in centralized government the Republicans pretend to be arguing for. In their view, community organizing as, at best, equivalent to disruptive and unpredictable Al Qaeda activity. But it actually goes deeper than this. Consider how Republicans have so far justified their choice of candidate: he is a "great man." That America needs a "hero" in the White House to lead us in continued preemptive strikes against Bin Laden in Iraq (I know Bin Laden is not in Iraq, but Giuliani clearly implied he was). Only a leader with McCain's war record and paternal qualifications can help Americans muster and maintain the tenacity necessary to "drill baby drill," (even though this will have no influence on oil price or supply) and generate the requisite hate to "kill baby, kill." As I explained in Coercion, having a parent figure on whom to transfer authority allows people to regress to a more childlike state. This not only allows them to feel safe; if gives them the freedom to express their rage. Make no mistake - that's what we're witnessing. And this rage - not America - is the greatest threat to humanity's long-term chances for survival. Republican party representatives are proud today that their convention has finally produced the "same level of energy and enthusiasm" as the DNC's last week. And while it may have produced the same level of excitement, the excitement was of a very different character. It's much easier to get people riled up but inviting them to hate a man - particularly one who they haven't been allowed to hate for traditional reasons. Giuliani's job - much like his job as mayor of NYC - was to give the Republicans in attendance permission to hate Obama and the potentially intelligent society he represents. It's not about city vs. country or educated vs. military. It's about thought vs. violence. In the black and white world of those committed to war as an international relations strategy, voting "present" makes no sense - especially when the Illinois legislative process is willfully misrepresented. (Voting present is a way to preserve the bill without passing it in its current state. Far from an easy out, it is the hard path - requiring further negotiation to remove earmarks and other problems.) They would prefer the simple relief of a "yes or no" world, where the evil are punished and the good rewarded. For in such a world, we get to know who the enemy is and just hate them. I don't believe hate is the best way to motivate people to develop long-term solutions to problems. It is a tried and tested way to motivate them to short-term support of dangerous leaders. That much is certain. But if McCain and Palin are able to rouse the national hatred they will need to actually win this election, I fear they will have unleashed a force that they will be unable to control.

[Khorum]

Originally Posted by Soriak

Hah, you have to pick your fights

Plus, he'd have a hell of a time finding evidence favoring McCain on economics. Goolsbee (Obama's economic adviser) and Holtz-Eakin (McCain's adviser) met for a small debate round about tax policy. Goolsbee went first and pretty much ripped McCain's plan to pieces. When H.E. got his chance to counter, all he could come up with was saying that tax policy isn't everything. He's a bright guy, you'd think he could offer something...

McCain also seems to believe that lowering taxes leads to more government revenue. At least that's what he himself said (prefaced with the condescending "as everyone knows...") and one of his advisers confirmed... except Holtz-Eakin says McCain doesn't actually believe that. The false impression is simply because McCain has to simplify things for the audience... huh? This is rather fundamental. Either you think lowering taxes raises revenue more than the cost of the tax cut, or you don't. The latter is backed by studies, the former is wishful thinking. (Wouldn't it be nice to have lower taxes and more revenue?)

Wishful Thinking? You sucked that fucking CBPP revisionism so much that you imagine you can argue enough rhetorical acrobatics that even OBAMA himself has failed to explain how in EVERY instance capital gains were lowered, the Laffer curve was confirmed. What did Obama say to disprove the Laffer effect during Reagan's, Clinton's and Bush's administrations and their respective cuts on Capital Gains?

Oh right, he DIDN'T address it, he went and blubbered about class warfare and exposed his astonishingly flimsy grasp of finance markets:

And with what evidence have you given us that Obama's keynesian policies will work, has worked or has EVER worked when even around YOUR neck of the woods command economies are rapidly receding in favor of privatization? Obama can no more answer a straight question about why cutting taxes on investment capital IMPROVED the economy anymore than he can explain how the Bush tax cuts yielded not one but TWO years of the highest government revenues in American history. Instead, he clings to CLASS-WARFARE to promote the delusion that poisoning the economy is some kind of JUSTICE.

Did Goolsbee, whose ONLY accomplishments is to win a couple high-school debates and publish a coffee-table layman's guide to macro-socialism fail to coach Obama sufficiently on the market conditions that showed how in EVERY INSTANCE TAXES WERE LOWERED ON WEALTH-CREATION, the government generated more tax revenue from those same sectors? Maybe Goolsbee is actually smarter than he sounds and decided not to harp on the CBPP's preposterous revision of reality wherein corporate restructuring costs elevated tax revenues enough to explain it?

I've met Goolsbee, he gave some lectures in the Gleacher center and the only thing even remotely admirable about the guy is his taste for interns, his flashy suits and... well... no not even his suits really. The dude is a fucking keynesian HACK and you think he somehow compares to McCain's use of Arthur Laffer, whose economic policies in the Reagan Era WON THE COLD WAR?!?

No? Nothing? What you're not even gonna stroke Joe Stiglitz now, whose dire pronouncements about the Bush Tax Cuts have swerved from disaster today, to disaster in 2009 and now all the way to disaster in 2012 because in each instance disaster didn't come until the French deliberately sabotaged our mortgage sector?

[Khorum]

Originally Posted by I'm Rich Bitch

No matter how many links you provide about Palin or how much you bloviate about her

Jesus, you really DO watch O'Reilly don't you?

[I'm Rich Bitch]

Originally Posted by Khorum

Obama's capital gains tax = 20%. Ace.

[Leto Eu`Acumen]

Obama fielding questions from the press a couple hours ago with several questions about Palin:

[I'm Rich Bitch]

Originally Posted by Khorum

Jesus, you really DO watch O'Reilly don't you?

I am a Premium Member to his site. I am sleeping with the enemy baby! On there I am a staunch conservative.

[Agraza]

Originally Posted by Lonin

Interesting essay by Douglas Rushkoff about RNC last night:

He makes a damn good case that the GOP is leading us toward 1984. It's a shame that those in control in D.C. make the republican party look so fucking retarded.

I don't know why they even let Giuliani talk. He was likely the most damning aspect of the convention. Either the man needs counseling or a gag.

[I'm Rich Bitch]

Originally Posted by Khorum

Unfuckingbelievable. What __FACTS__ have you obamaniacs ever volunteered to support Obama's claims to competence, to decency, to honesty or to anything approximating the personal COURAGE to even believe half the shit he's ever said.

I wrote a page long post on this at the request of Tuco. You bloviated a response to it.

[Khorum]

Originally Posted by I'm Rich Bitch

Obama's capital gains tax = 20%. Ace.

Which is a 5% tax increase, retard. And how does he explain the fact that in EVERY INSTANCE that the capital gains tax was lowered the government collected higher tax revenues? How does he explain the fact that in EVERY INSTANCE the tax on investment and wealth-creation was raised it has dramatically LOWERED the federal tax revenues?

He doesn't.

Does Obama go on and explain the reasons that he thinks LOSING the tax revenues from Capital Gains will somehow improve the lives of Americans and stimulate the economy?

He doesn't

What does Obama do when brought to task about the abject STUPIDITY in believing in socialist policies that don't survive contact with reality like his preposterous wealth-redistribution plan? HE FUCKING GOES ON AND TELLS A STORY ABOUT HEDGE FUND MANAGERS AND THEIR POOR POOR SECRETARIES.

When asked AGAIN to explain how he could think his position makes any fucking sense in the context of clear empirical evidence that IT DOES NOT, Obama just goes on and blubbers about THIS VICTIM and THAT OPPRESSOR.

Obama even fails to explain why he's not just taxing those "50 or so hedge fund managers"----who, I SWEAR TO YOU, isn't paying a fucking cent in taxes---he's actually taxing what Gibson correctly described as 100 million hard-working Americans who leverage their retirement in the finance markets.

Obama just goes rightly along playing the class warfare card and HOPING TO FUCK that Americans are too stupid to realize that when he taxes investment, business and other wealth-creation sectors, HE IS FUCKING OVER ANYONE WHO HAS A RETIREMENT FUND, A COLLEGE FUND, A SMALL BUSINESS, A MORTGAGE OR EVEN A SAVINGS BANK ACCOUNT.

And apparently, in YOUR fucking case, he's absolutely right. But unfortunately, the rest of those 100 million Americans knows EXACTLY where those AMERICAN investments are gonna go when a 5% tax increase is slapped onto them: somewhere else.

[Szlia]

Originally Posted by Khorum

[...]Goolsbee, whose ONLY accomplishments is to win a couple high-school debates and publish a coffee-table layman's guide to macro-socialism [...]

What constitutes academic accomplishement? I would say that being considered an expert in your field by your peers is certainly an accomplishement. I doubt the American Bar Foundation, the National Bureau of Economic Research, the Panel of Economic Advisors to the Congressional Budget Office, the Democratic Leadership Council and the Progressive Policy Institute were all that impressed by Goolsbee being the best debator in the US when he was in high school.

[TheMarauder]

Originally Posted by I'm Rich Bitch

I am a Premium Member to his site. I am sleeping with the enemy baby! On there I am a staunch conservative.

How do we know you aren't a...double agent?

[Khorum]

Originally Posted by TheMarauder

How do we know you aren't a...double agent?

Because that would imply cleverness and guile. And he's IRB.

[TheMarauder]

Originally Posted by Khorum

Because that would imply cleverness and guile. And he's IRB.

Good point.