"A black sheriff?!": The Official Topic of Obama and New Era American Politics

[Beardo]

What happens when YOU don't pay YOUR taxes?

I would go to jail (or some equivalent). So you advocate the use of force to take something that is not yours. So yeah private property IS a foreign concept to you fegs.

Or as triumph put it. You just have to imagine it not existing and it wont!!

[Mupepe]

Rich people are rich because other people dont steal their money!!! 

what?  this reminds me of talking to one of those chat bots that just randomly busts out with irrelevant statements when it doesn't understand what you're saying.

[Great Rumbler]

What happens when YOU don't pay YOUR taxes?

I would go to jail (or some equivalent). So you advocate the use of force to take something that is not yours. So yeah private property IS a foreign concept to you distinguished effete fellows.

Or as triumph put it. You just have to imagine it not existing and it wont!!

Do you have a functioning brain in your head at all? Because there's no way there could be, maybe just a shriveled plum or something.

"Wait, guys, we can't raise taxes on the rich because they wouldn't pay! Then we'd have to take their money BY FORCE and that would mean that we don't respect private property which is WROOOONNG. Rich people should only pay as much as they want to pay and not a penny more!"

[Van Cruncheon]

well, he ain't wrong. rich people ARE rich because people don't "steal" their money. i mean, that's logically true inasmuch as it is likewise a weird non sequitur.

[Van Cruncheon]

hey beardo, what happens when more and more people like us start sprouting up in a society, believing -- for the purposes of argumentation -- that "private property doesn't exist"?

[Oblivion]

What happens when YOU don't pay YOUR taxes?

I would go to jail (or some equivalent). So you advocate the use of force to take something that is not yours. So yeah private property IS a foreign concept to you distinguished effete fellows.

Or as triumph put it. You just have to imagine it not existing and it wont!!

At first glance, there appears to be much wrongness in this, but just to give you the benefit of the doubt, you're not suggesting that NO taxes should be paid whatsoever, are you?

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

Beardo is just a contrarian poor troll who will disappear once backed into a corner.

Also, yeah, I think the real reason is that most people think they will be millionaires in their lifetime.  There was some survey that asked college students if they believed they were going to make more than $75,000 a year by the time they are 30 and the majority said yes.  Most people think they are ballers or ballers-in-waiting who are just waiting for that break.  Taking taxes is just playa hatin' y0!

[Oblivion]

I was reading one of Paul Krugman's books a while ago, and given that we're living in an era where the poorest dirt farmers are willing to go bat for the rich and protect them from being taxed even a cent more, I really wondered how the fuck we had marginal tax rates of 70- 90% for most of the previous century. Like with most things, we have to thank Reagan. According to Krugman, CEOs generally weren't really trusted by the public after the great depression. We all know that Reagan came in and slashed taxes for the rich, but what he also did was help promote the image of the amazing, hard working, sexy CEO, the type of person that everyone would want to be like. Also teaching how wrong it would be that these hard working people should be taxed after putting in all that amazing American blood, sweat and tears. Thus if you tax the rich, you're punishing them for being successful, and imagine if YOU were that person, wouldn't you be ANGRY if the gubment came in and STOLE your money and gave it to some BLACK GUY OR ILLEGAL?!

[Human Snorenado]

The idea that rich people's money is a "national resource" and a community commodity is pretty shocking. But, I'm guessing nobody here agrees.

I'm sure Lloyd Blankfein earned all that money.  Joe Casssanno as well.  All of the Wall St. hierarchy did.

[Human Snorenado]

Since none of you guys think money is private property, you wont mind if I just take a little bit from your bank accounts do you?

Thanks guys!

you can't be this hard headed.  You really can't.  no one is advocating pillaging their bank accounts.  what's said is that when shit hits the fan, rich people, who can afford the cost much easier than the average person, should be forced to sacrifice some in order to keep the system that allows their lifestyle stable.  Deciding now is not the best time to buy that extra yacht is not the same thing as deciding that now is not the best time to take my child to the doctor.

How are you gonna enforce this sacrifice?

Taxes?

And if they choose not to pay?

Nail one of them to the ticker on the NYSE with their balls in their mouth.  I think that would be an instructive message.  If that doesn't motivate them, perhaps killing every family member while they watch might.  I'm just spitballing ideas here.  Honestly though, these people are true sociopaths so we're likely going to have to kill them and take the money; it's the only thing they'll understand.  Which honestly I'm more than fine with.

[Mandark]

Oh man.  I leave for a few hours, and Beardo winds up advocating for fucking tax protesting?

Dude, please take a moment and think through what you're saying.  Really.

[Dickie Dee]

I'm really glad I wasn't around for this

[Oblivion]

[Dickie Dee]

I thought it funniest that Beardo was sorta arguing for a new paradigm in which a modern society can exist without people collectively being taxed, but was actually only reptilian brained repeating TAXES R BAD.

[Brehvolution]

That model is working great in Somalia. They aren't pirates. Just entrepreneurs working without the saddle of government on their backs.

[Mr. Gundam]

That model is working great in Somalia. They aren't pirates. Just entrepreneurs working without the saddle of government on their backs.

I was listening to NPR this morning while driving into work, and they were actually talking about a Pirate Stock Exchange in Somalia. My mind was blown.

[Mr. Gundam]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2014368284_nascararmy02.html

Minnesota Dem wants NASCAR out of Defense budget

WASHINGTON — The Minnesota Democrat who's out to get rid of the Pentagon's sponsorships for NASCAR teams says she won't back away from her efforts and, despite GOP resistance, will broaden her fight to repeal tax breaks for track owners, too.

Rep. Betty McCollum says her work could save U.S. taxpayers tens of millions of dollars. But Defense Department officials and lawmakers from NASCAR country say that the sponsorships help military recruitment and that the tax breaks could save jobs in the struggling economy.

In an interview, McCollum said it doesn't make sense to keep the benefits for NASCAR teams and track owners when other cuts are being made to community health care, programs for homeless veterans and Head Start.

"I started to look at what is in this large defense budget to see what's not related to security that we could redirect to critical supplies or mission support," she said. "Or in the case of racetrack owners, what are some of the special tax perks that some of the special interests are getting?"

She plans to file legislation to prohibit Pentagon sponsorships of dragsters, Indy cars, stock cars and motorcycle racing, affecting just about every level of motorsports.

"We should take a critical eye and a critical look and say, 'Is this an appropriate role for the government?' " McCollum said.

McCollum filed an amendment this month to prohibit the Defense Department from spending money to sponsor NASCAR teams, saying it's a poor use of money given the other cuts the House was making. The amendment came as the House, led by Republicans, spent days wrestling with $60 billion in cuts to the current fiscal year's budget.

In the days before the vote, her office logged angry calls from across NASCAR country. "There were some people that were very upset," McCollum said.

She also received a threatening and racist fax, which received widespread media attention and is being investigated by the U.S. Capitol Police. But her chief of staff said the office also received a lot of calls from tea-party supporters who backed McCollum's amendment.

Her amendment failed, 281-148.

Racetrack owners received tax breaks worth $45 million in 2010 and 2011, aimed at helping them make improvements to their facilities. A two-year extension of the program was included in the tax cuts compromise that President Obama forged with Congress in December.

McCollum said she'll file legislation to repeal the tax benefit. "It's an earmark," she said.

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North Carolina Republican Rep. Patrick McHenry disagrees. His Charlotte-area district is home to half the NASCAR teams. His Twitter avatar recently was the No. 3 logo in memory of legendary driver Dale Earnhardt, who was killed in a crash at the Daytona 500 in 2001.

McCollum insisted that she has nothing against NASCAR.

"This isn't about NASCAR," McCollum said. "I've watched the Indy 500, the Daytona 500. I have friends who are avid fans. ... This is about making tough choices."

[Brehvolution]

If you are in the tea party and don't agree with her, you aren't a teabagger.

[Dickie Dee]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[Phoenix Dark]

elected republican officials. seriously

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

the group started in Southern California about eight months ago and is trying to raise $350,000 to start social programs such as women's shelters, fighting hunger and homelessness in the area.

but to be fair to all of those horrible, horrible crackers who like to shout at children...

Many in the crowd outside the event said they were concerned about past anti-American statements by the event's two keynote speakers, Imam Siraj Wahhaj and Amir Abdel Malik Ali. Wahhaj is an imam at a mosque in Brooklyn. A U.S. attorney named him and 169 others as co-conspirators in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Wahhaj was never charged and has denied involvement.

Malik Ali is a Bay Area Islamic activist who spoke at "Israeli Apartheid Week" at UC Irvine in 2010. There he said he supports Hezbollah, which the CIA labels a terrorist group.

I would guess that some local demagogue made a big stink about the terrorists coming to town under the guise of peaceful charity and manufactured the outrage that is so readily apparent.  Reportedly the protest crowd may have outnumbered the attendees, I'm glad the anger there didn't become physically dangerous, but it looks like it very well could have.

In a nutshell, I'd say this kind of thing is the obvious consequence of our really crappy media we have today.  People are only too eager to stoke the flames of hate and feed the ignorance of their audience, so it shouldn't surpise people when too many actually take them seriously.

[Groogrux]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

I second that.  That just makes me really sad.  It also terrifies me because that is the leading party in my area.  I would hate (and shudder at the thought) that people all around me think the same way.  God damn Fox News and the GOP and all their stupid bullshit followers and supporters*.

[Edit] *People who fall in line with that kind of thinking.  Honestly, if they don't want their kids going to schools where acceptance of other cultures is taught, then they should send them to a private school.  Practically every area has one.  They could even home-school their children.  Also, when did being a Muslim automatically make somebody a terrorist?  I don't remember reading that anywhere in the Bible.

[Brehvolution]

It's not just muslims. Anyone who is not a white conservative isn't a real American to these morons.

[Mandark]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/04/opinion/04fri4.html?_r=1

Oh good, the House GOP wants to decimate federal funding for Poison Control centers, since that $27 million is totally blowing a hole in the budget.  Thumbs up, guys!

[Dickie Dee]

Personal responsibility, if you swallow some poison why should I have to pay for it

[Mupepe]

hey mandark, if 27 million dollars isn't that much then the agency can go without it

[Oblivion]

I just had the most distinguished mentally-challenged political conversation with my idiot conservative friends yesterday. Things get really heated usually, but this instance was different in the sense that they said that (just to name one example) they all agreed that something like Obama being a citizen or a non-socialist is a 'belief', and no matter how much 'proof' is provided to the contrary, that it's still just an 'opinion'. 

Normally my irritation dissipates the following morning, but I'm still annoyed as fuck. I don't claim to have all the answers on things like abortion or what have you, but at the very fucking least, all semi-sentient people should be able to agree on shit like 2+2 = 4. Seriously, it was far worse than arguing with Beardo. At least with him you can actually respond.

Scuse me while I go find some concrete.

[Positive Touch]

let that be a lesson to you: conservatives are only good to laugh at, never to have as friends

[Mandark]

From a radio interview:

HUCKABEE: I would love to know more. What I know is troubling enough. And one thing that I do know is his having grown up in Kenya, his view of the Brits, for example, very different than the average American. When he gave the bust back to the Brits --

MALZBERG: Of Winston Churchill.

HUCKABEE: The bust of Winston Churchill, a great insult to the British. But then if you think about it, his perspective as growing up in Kenya with a Kenyan father and grandfather, their view of the Mau Mau Revolution in Kenya is very different than ours because he probably grew up hearing that the British were a bunch of imperialists who persecuted his grandfather.

[Great Rumbler]

Indonesia...Kenya...they're both America-hating Muslim nations, right?

[Phoenix Dark]

"Obama is black"
"No he's not, he's half white"

"Obama was raised by his mother and grandparents"
"No he was raised by his Kenyan father and grandfather"

"Obama is Christian"
"No his father was Muslim, meaning he was born a Muslim"

"Obama is not a Muslim"
"No but only because he is atheist like his mother and father"

[Positive Touch]

how dare he see the british as imperialists!!

[Dickie Dee]

how dare he see the British Empire as imperialists!!

.

[Human Snorenado]

Man, how dare AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT hate on the British.



WAIT SHIT WHAT

[recursivelyenumerable]

let that be a lesson to you: conservatives are only good to laugh at, never to have as friends

My coworker is a Tea Partier, he fixes my broken CSS layouts for me and for that I will forgive him any and all sociopolitical infelicities.

[Brehvolution]

From a radio interview:

HUCKABEE: I would love to know more. What I know is troubling enough. And one thing that I do know is his having grown up in Kenya, his view of the Brits, for example, very different than the average American. When he gave the bust back to the Brits --

MALZBERG: Of Winston Churchill.

HUCKABEE: The bust of Winston Churchill, a great insult to the British. But then if you think about it, his perspective as growing up in Kenya with a Kenyan father and grandfather, their view of the Mau Mau Revolution in Kenya is very different than ours because he probably grew up hearing that the British were a bunch of imperialists who persecuted his grandfather.

Still repeating this bullshit?

The bust was on loan to the WH and the amount of time it was on loan for expired. Case closed.

[Oblivion]

From a radio interview:

HUCKABEE: I would love to know more. What I know is troubling enough. And one thing that I do know is his having grown up in Kenya, his view of the Brits, for example, very different than the average American. When he gave the bust back to the Brits --

MALZBERG: Of Winston Churchill.

HUCKABEE: The bust of Winston Churchill, a great insult to the British. But then if you think about it, his perspective as growing up in Kenya with a Kenyan father and grandfather, their view of the Mau Mau Revolution in Kenya is very different than ours because he probably grew up hearing that the British were a bunch of imperialists who persecuted his grandfather.

Still repeating this bullshit?

The bust was on loan to the WH and the amount of time it was on loan for expired. Case closed.

Why oh why does Barack Hussein Ostalin lament that Hitler didn't win WWII?  :'(

[Phoenix Dark]

I thought conservatives would cheer a US president insulting Europeans 

[Mandark]

Man, how dare AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT hate on the British.

http://www.visitingdc.com/images/george-washington-picture.jpg

WAIT SHIT WHAT

Apparently Huckabee's leading the GOP's Federalist wing, which is going to push for a new Alien and Sedition Act, and accuse anti-British Dems like Obama of being Jacobins.

[Boogie]

I need a new Republican Talking Points Scorecard.

This one is full and looks like a demented game of snakes and ladders.

[Mandark]

Military commissions reinstated at Gitmo.

Super disappointing.  Not surprised, though.

[Phoenix Dark]

Disappointing but more of an issue of congress obstructing progress than Obama backtracking. With congress refusing to support alternatives to Gitmo, trials or indefinite detentions were the only options.

edit: maybe not http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2011/03/08/guantanamo/index.html

[Mupepe]

backtracking and placating to right wing tards.  He's on a fucking roll with his base.

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

backtracking and placating to right wing tards.  He's on a fucking roll with his base.

The cult set will come up with a snarky response to any complaints about this.  Then people will forget about it.

[Phoenix Dark]

My dad is friends with a huge Obama supporter/OFA member. I see him every few weeks and he tries to get me to join OFA for 2012, and I try my hardest to come up with a nice "no thanks" each time. I don't see how any true blue OFA member could possibly be as fired up as they were in 08, yet this guy and others are.

I'm going to vote for Obama obviously, and whenever I hear him getting attacked I can't help but jump in and offer some defense - half assed or otherwise. But the fact remains a lot of his presidency has been pretty damn disappointing. I realize he can't do much right now, but given the advantages he had from 09-10 I would have liked more

[Mupepe]

I understand why he couldn't do certain things and the atmosphere he worked/works in.  But man, have some fucking balls.  He gave in on most shit without a fight.  He was willing to compromise, and by compromise I mean give the right everything they want before he even started anything. 

I always end up defending him in conversations as well but that's mostly because of the distinguished mentally-challenged amount of disinformation and half truths I hear people spouting.

[Mandark]

Some alternate system was always going to be set up, because the way most of the prisoners were captured/interrogated/tortured would get all the evidence against them thrown out of a civilian court and no other countries would take them off our hands.  There's no president who would release a terrorist suspect under those circumstances.

I hoped that at least by closing Guantanamo, there would be a somewhat clear precedent set that the warrantless capture, torture, and indefinite imprisonment would stop being official US policy going forward, even if they were stuck with the current detainees.  Then again, the fact that this happened to begin with shows that lack of precedent probably won't stop anything.

[Dickie Dee]

My dad is friends with a huge Obama supporter/OFA member. I see him every few weeks and he tries to get me to join OFA for 2012, and I try my hardest to come up with a nice "no thanks" each time. I don't see how any true blue OFA member could possibly be as fired up as they were in 08, yet this guy and others are.

Probably not, but I imagine once the campaign heats up people will be fired up just to keep out whatever Troglodyte the GOP comes up with.

[Phoenix Dark]

You're right. The GOP will be throwing away a pretty decent shot at winning. Their candidates will be forced to head far right, and the base simply won't tolerate someone with a chance to win. Obama benefits from being the only grown up in the room.

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

There isn't anyone on the right that can motivate their base and put the GOP paymasters at ease.  Most candidates either seem to be one or the other.  I guess that is what you get when you forgo long term thinking and planning with guerrilla political warfare.

Obama is a disappointing president and you need a lot of cognitive dissonance to defend him but in the post Bush era of Presidential politics, not being a total fuck up means you're doing pretty well.

[Mandark]

More thinly veiled self-congratulation, plz.

[Oblivion]

Slightly off topic, but I thought this was amusing:

“This is a fakery,” Simpson said on Fox News. “If they care at all about their children or grandchildren, and sometimes I doubt that – I think, you know, grandchildren now don’t write a thank-you for the Christmas presents, they’re walking on their pants with the cap on backwards listening to the enema man and Snoopy Snoopy Poop Dogg, and they don’t like them!”

I think the “enema man” is Eminem; put that together with the dog, and you have to wonder what Freud would say.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/dogg-days/

[Phoenix Dark]

Republicans (and democrats) urging Obama to either bomb Libya or impose a no-fly zone - and criticizing him for his slow response. I can just imagine Obama thinking "you fucking idiots rushed into two wars without any planning, and now want me to possibly start another one? fuckouttahere"

[Mupepe]

Yeah, a bunch of people here at work (who by the way continually whine about bleeding heart agendas that have nothing to do with America) are saying we should be bombing and sending supplies/troops.  If we weren't in two wars right now, maybe.  I asked them then "when does our involvement stop?" they say when the good guys win!  REALLY?  You can't be that unrealistic about what kind of commitment sending troops means.  Christ.

[Mr. Gundam]

Yeah, a bunch of people here at work (who by the way continually whine about bleeding heart agendas that have nothing to do with America) are saying we should be bombing and sending supplies/troops.  If we weren't in two wars right now, maybe.  I asked them then "when does our involvement stop?" they say when the good guys win!  REALLY?  You can't be that unrealistic about what kind of commitment sending troops means.  Christ.

Don't you also work for a company who benefits from overseas military interventions?

[Mupepe]

Only in countries with trade embargoes.  We spun off our construction and services arm which is who benefit from Iraq and Afghanistan primarily.  We have plenty of business already in Libya.  All of this fucks our shit up.

[Phoenix Dark]

The U.N. security council will determine whether a no-fly zone is instituted. People cheering for the US to unilaterally impose one are plain dumb. What happens if a US plane is shot down, or if one of our ships is attacked? All of a sudden we're in an entirely different situation. Just imagine the saber rattling and calls for blood that would be coming from the right in that case. "The US was attacked and Obama does nothing! We should have been at war 5 minutes ago"

We were just complaining about Obama, but this is one of the many cases where I'm glad as fuck he's president and not McCain.

[Dickie Dee]

The U.N. security council will determine whether a no-fly zone is instituted. People cheering for the US to unilaterally impose one are plain dumb. What happens if a US plane is shot down, or if one of our ships is attacked? All of a sudden we're in an entirely different situation. Just imagine the saber rattling and calls for blood that would be coming from the right in that case. "The US was attacked and Obama does nothing! We should have been at war 5 minutes ago"

We were just complaining about Obama, but this is one of the many cases where I'm glad as fuck he's president and not McCain.

August 2009 on Twitter:

Late evening with Col. Qadhafi at his "ranch" in Libya - interesting meeting with an interesting man.

And one day earlier:

TRIPOLI, Aug 14 (Reuters) - U.S. Republican Senator John McCain praised Libya's leader Muammar Gaddafi for his peacemaking role in Africa and said Congress would support expanding ties, Libya state news agency Jana said on Friday.

And he still would bomb the shit out of Libya right now 

[Positive Touch]

OH SHIT DAVID BRODER IS DEAD


WHO CARES

[Van Cruncheon]

IF THEY'RE FOREIGN AND WEIRD, BOMB 'EM USA~