For those who want it all except to pay for it

how tragic, comical and infuriating at the same time

alanhart, i'm not sure exactly what your disagreement with me is other that i responded rudely do dog who cannot hold a civil conversation. so i can sit back and let you have a teachable moment with it while it calls you names i suppose

back to your argument, faults of western governments are many, but the blame is misplaced. russia and iran are dealing in bad faith while us/europe are simply self-serving
are you implying that if alternative energy was viable tomorrow and us withdrew from mideast anything would be solved (and i don't mean the final solution)?

Read up on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_religion

Actually, this link takes you right to the part of the article that lists official state religions in present-day countries, and how they're implemented/integrated. It doesn't get into the extraordinary number of European countries that have flags based (no mistake) on the cross.

are you implying that if alternative energy was viable tomorrow and us withdrew from mideast anything would be solved (and i don't mean the final solution)?

No, I'm not. The key problem is that untangling from long-standing empires is a very difficult process. That area (some parts more than others; Iran not at all) has been under various distant empires for so long, they're complicated messes of rival clans, entrenched and toxic institutions, explosive population growth, etc. that it would be a mess for a very long time.

The Balkans is another region with the same problem. Russia also. The tactic is always to jumble up the population so that people are at each others' throats, and the local ethnicity can't get it together to rebel. In the case of the mideast, I'm talking about the various peoples that we lump together as "Arabs". They hate each other. China is busy pursuing the same strategy ... Han relocation to the western provinces.

At least Netanyahu likes his country. We have a leader who despises his birth land. dogismy Why don't you leave the jews alone? What is your obsession? Maybe you can show anger about your country's 13 trillion dollar debt.

julialg, if you hate America so much why don't you just leave?

alanhart.. I am trying to restore America to it's former glory. Do ya think i can go to saudi arabia and have 4 wives alanhart?

good for you, alanhart

but while speaking softly about facts is important, history teaches us that this is no substitute for carrying a big stick.

the primary responsibility of any legitimate government is to keep its citizens safe. sadly, the only way for israel to keep israelis physically unharmed is to maintain a militarized society with continued heavy emphasis on technology.

Well, this thread should be retired. There's no point in letting the hardened pro-current Israeli government to continue their gleeful skipping toward deeper fascism ----- they love their country. Oh, they love, love, love their country. Nationalism over everything ....... That always turns out so, so well .......

G'night, all.

Actually Alan, your theory has played out to a tee right here in the good old USA where the power structure has always made sure that working class white people thought African Americans would take their jobs and their women.. Supporting and maintaining racism among blue collar whites is the best insurance against class conflict in this country.

I reject all extremism (except perhaps when it comes to the Yankees), but especially the religious variety regardless of whether its Muslim, Jewish, Christian or worship of the cat godess. Religion and politics are a dangerous combination whether it means bombing abortion clinics in the US or schools for girls in Afghanistan. (Have you ever noticed that regardless of their "faith", all religious extremists seem to want to remand women to second class status and kill gays).

I can't believe that any New Yorker over the age of 15 can underestimate the potential for evil among Islamic extremists in particular, or did you like the smell of burning jet fuel and bodies? Liberal as I am I would gladly put a bullet in the brain or, better yet push out of a 110 story window, Osama Bin Laden, Khalid Sheik Muhammad and anyone else involved with the planning and execution of 9/11. Fuck you you attacked my country, my city, my mother's backyard...you die. And Israel has endured attacks Islamic terrorists since before the state was established--historically they've done some awesome things in retaliation for things like Munich, Entebbe etc ("cool commando shit" Bill Maher called it). But that does not excuse them from actions that are needlessly aggressive, confrontational and frankly stupid--any more than 9/11 excused the war in Iraq.

We don't have to hold Israel to a higher moral standard. But we do have to hold it to the same moral standard we should hold our own country and the rest of our allies. (Okay granted we have allied with some real doozies like Pinochet, Somoza, and Chiang Kai Shek. But now that the cold war is over we don't follow the ABC--ANYbody But Communist--foreign policy can hopefully be more discerning in our friendships.)

The argument that native Arab and Palestinian citizens in Israel are not treated equally and given second class status has validity. This is wrong, unfortunate and hopefully will be rectified in the near future (unfortunately with the right dominating Israeli politics I'm not hopeful but good things can happen). The way that the argument is used by anti-Israel propagandists is eerily reminiscent of when the Soviet Union would dwell on Jim Crow and discrimination against African Americans as "proof" of the superiority of their system. (The Comintern never could figure out why they never gained traction in the African American community despite the obvious legitimate grievances Blacks had against American society. Perhaps if they hadn't been so quick to dismiss the importance of the church....I for one am glad they messed that one up.)

I guess what I am trying to say is that I am equally alienated by the arguments of the Somewheres, the Pauls, the Riversiders and tea baggers on one hand and the Dogs on the other. Neither extreme makes sense and neither extreme can win....so moderation and compromise may just have to be considered.

Liz, your comments seem genuine and sincere, but a little naive. One reason for negative world views expressed of Israel are the result of over-reporting. The country has more reporters in the country than just about anywhere else, so any incident no matter how small or large gets reported quite differently than a similar incident in another country. Add to this that Israel is a Democracy and media access adds to that. Lastly one should be aware that Western media such as Reuters will use third party journalists often from the local population who have been known to doctor photos and misreport events. This occurred during the Lebanon War and Gaza campaign. Fortunately we live in a world of Bloggers and Photo shop experts who have been able to spot such forgeries and if one reads enough news you do can get the more balanced view missing from the mainstream media and But I do agree that Arab Israelis do suffer some discrimination in Israel, it's wrong, but it's no where near the level of discrimination suffered by Jews who still live in countries such as Iran, Ethiopia or the Middle East.

http://indyposted.com/26612/reuters-ripped-for-editing-photos-of-gaza-flotilla-raid/
Reuters is under fire for photos it published that gave a false impression of a heavily disputed incident during the first Gaza flotilla, which turned into a bloody ambush rather than a humanitarian exercise in civil disobedience. The Israelis defended the use of force in which 9 people were killed by documenting a bloody attack from which Israeli forces needed to extricate themselves. “Free Gaza” activists countered that they had tried to help injured Israeli soldiers.

It is in this context that photos from Reuters became critical to those who wished to judge the incident. The photos first published by Reuters shows flotilla passengers surrounding an Israeli soldier. An unedited photo shows one person in the crowd clearly holding a combat knife. What was edited from the photos changed their tone and import entirely from a portrayal that cast Israelis in a guilty light to one that vindicated their accounts. Reuters explained themselves to Haaretz, a left wing Israeli newspaper as follows.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5254838.stm

The news agency Reuters has withdrawn from sale 920 pictures taken by a photographer after finding he had doctored two images taken in Lebanon.

Bloggers first spotted that smoke on Adnan Hajj's image of the aftermath of an Israeli air strike in Beirut appeared to have been made darker.

A Reuters investigation confirmed this and also found two flares had been added to an image of an Israeli jet.

alan: empires are messy - yes. but now what?
liz: "But that does not excuse them from actions that are needlessly aggressive, confrontational and frankly stupid" - oftentimes Israel's overt actions (or any other countries' of consequence) are difficult to disentangle from much deeper geopolitical undercurrents. So if the actions are truly stupid - one can criticize away, but i doubt that most of the critics (including the media) are even sufficiently informed, let alone understand what is going on. I'll give you an example of a fundamental misunderstanding that probably got this thread going in the first place: people on board that one boat were 'peace activists'. No, they were not. That said, it appears from the information available so far that military's actions were not rational.
Another example: helen said what she did because she is senile. No, she is not.

Agree, Israel has a number of blunders , they are not perfect. The best example is helping support the creation of Hamas. Not very widely known, but Israel years ago turned a blind eye to Hamas while doing the opposite with Fatah in the hopes of seeing the two sides fight each other. Same can be said of Iran, which Israel supported during the Iran Iraq war.

"Neither extreme makes sense and neither extreme can win....so moderation and compromise may just have to be considered. "
Again, who do you think the parties to a compromise should be? And please don't say 'palestinians', can you be more specific?

RS: as far as I can tell pitting hamas against fatah is still the crux of their policy. It works for now, which is why they need gaza isolated.
Still waiting for all the self-made policy makers on this board to provide specific steps Israel should take, I really am curious.

Very complicated. I think we need many parties to come together. Abbas of the Palestinian Authority seems sincere, but may not have sufficient power to broker a solution. Hamas is more problematic because they need to accept Israel's right to exist. My feeling is for a solution to work, you need Egypt and maybe Jordan's cooperation. That said Israel will need to consider land swaps and disengage from major parts of the West Bank(some areas of the West Bank have thousands of Jewish residents while other areas of Israel under pre 67 borders have large Arab populations.

But as I said earlier, the real parties that need to be won over are West Bank and Gaza Imams and Rabbis on the west bank. The religious leaders can either promote or block real peace.

Disagree. The real player here is Iran and you are not even mentioning them, hamas is just a proxy. Current administration needs Iraq/Afghanistan resolution badly. The only way they can accomplish it is by dealing with Iran. The only thing they have to offer in those negotiations is to sacrifice Israel and/or allow the bomb (which really is one and the same). Watch for them to sponsor government change in Israel in the near future to replace Netanyahu with a lap dog.

Iran has a large population of college educated professionals. Large parts of the country have no interest in Israel and disagree with the leadership. It's only a matter of time before the population decides on a leadership change. Iran money and arms flowing into the area is a problem, but if Israel or the United States attempts to forcefully change the leadership of Iran the results will be worse the current problem.

se , its been arrogant and stupid when countries like the U.S. , Israel , Brittan, Russia or anyone else externally imposes a puppet regime. These never last, create hatred in the affected countries and make the situation worse in the long run.

I am not endorsing US sponsoring regime change in Iran (anymore than regime change in Israel, which is incidentally exactly what is happening right now). Simply pointing out that when you have an actor with a nine figure terrorism line item in their budget settlements are difficult to accomplish. USSR had a large population of college educated professionals also and it took them seventy years to change the regime.

alan- answer the questions and then I'll elaborate. And answer them directly, not with your usual fact-challenged, rambling responses.

dog- way to ignore all facts and the truth about the history of modern Israel. Way to turn a blind eye to the human rights abuses of today's muslim-based nations.

back to the original topic(Sweden embraces Reagan and Thatcher)

If the eurozone is to escape its sovereign debt crisis, s outh European countries must learn from Sweden's example of spending cuts and structural reform in the 1990s, according to the Swedish finance minister.

Anders Borg said that while emergency measures by the European Central Bank to shore up Greece and other eurozone members would stabilise the situation in the short term, only the countries themselves could provide a permanent solution.

"They cannot have our expenditure levels and US tax levels. That is not a viable combination," he told the Financial Times. "There is a high degree of responsibility that should be put on governments with high deficits. For the sake of Europe, it is very important they realise this."

Sweden has been hailed as a model for the rest of Europe after eliminating a heavy budget deficit during the 1990s and overhauling its pensions system, while Mr Borg is one of the few European finance ministers to have enhanced his reputation during the financial crisis , steering Sweden towards what appears to be a swift recovery from last year's recession.

Some commentators have questioned whether south European countries have the political will to push through such measures, but Mr Borg said similar doubts had been raised about Sweden.

"People said we were so into welfarism that we were completely unable to take control of our public finances. The guys on Wall Street were saying, 'you will never get your house in order'."

Sweden confounded the sceptics by transforming a deficit of 12 per cent of gross domestic product into a balanced budget within five years, and today has one of the healthiest public finances in Europe.

Mr Borg said eurozone turmoil had "substantially" set back the prospect of Sweden's joining the single currency, seven years after voters rejected membership in a referendum. The government was unlikely to make a fresh push for entry in the next four years if it wins a second term in September's election, he added. "The Greek situation has had a very detrimental effect on public support for the euro."

However, Mr Borg said he remained supportive of Sweden joining in the long term and was confident the euro would survive.

"I would put a higher probability that we will have 25 members of the eurozone in 10 years than we would see a break-up."

Mr Borg has taken a high-profile role in the debate on regulatory reform, advocating a hardline stance against bankers' bonuses and leading the push for a European Union bank levy to absorb the cost of future crises.

But he warned that reforms must be "pragmatic and flexible" to avoid undermining recovery, and insisted it was in Europe's interest to "safeguard London as a competitive financial centre".

While the eurozone crisis has sparked fresh concerns over European banks, Mr Borg said Swedish lenders had stabilised after sustaining heavy losses in the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

"Our banks pushed the accelerator and moved towards the abyss. We didn't go over the edge, but we were very close in 2008 and 2009."

Mr Borg is seen as the economic brains behind the centre-right government that took power in 2006 on a platform of cutting Sweden's high taxes and pruning its generous welfare system. After trailing for months, the government has been shown pulling ahead of the centre-left opposition in recent polls as Fredrik Reinfeldt, the prime minister, seizes on the eurozone crisis to highlight Sweden's relative economic strength.

It was a Social Democratic government that cut the deficit in the 1990s but Mr Borg, a former professional economist and central bank official, has helped steal the mantle of economic competence for his Moderate party and its coalition allies.

He said September's election represented a choice between "welfare and work" as the government aims to entrench pro-market reforms in a country traditionally dominated by the Social Democrats.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/20b2400c-7427-11df-87f5-00144feabdc0.html

Sweden:

Sweden is cited by Mr Osborne as another template for how to respond to a fiscal crisis without harming public services.

In 1993, Sweden’s budget deficit was reaching 10 per cent of GDP. But only four years later the country had a balanced budget once again.

Goran Persson, the former Swedish prime minister, has said he balanced his budget by sharply cutting Government spending, cutting red tape on Swedish companies, increasing the use of information technology, and increasing the skills and education of the Swedish workforce.

The last part of the plan has attracted the Tories, who say it makes the case for reforming public services during a downturn.

The Swedes improved education by bringing independent providers into the state sector – a policy that is a central plank of Michael Gove, the shadow schools secretary.

Tough measures were also introduced where companies were able to negotiate better contracts for text books and buildings, and this forced the state bureaucracy to reduce its costs.

And it was not all about education. On jobs and benefits there is also much that the Tories take from Sweden. Unemployment benefits were cut by a fifth for the first 200 days of joblessness and by a quarter for claimants out of work for 300 days or longer.

In addition the Swedes cut subsidies to the unemployment insurance schemes run by the trade unions.

In a significant warning to the Tories, Mr Persson has also said that any Government following his example must have a clear mandate from its voters to administer the necessary economic medicine.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/budget/6199271/Canada-and-Sweden-inspire-Tory-cutters.html

Please help me Mr. Government I need so much help. I need the state, liberty is so hard and difficult. I hate the responsibility and I will give up all autonomy and promise to always vote for you Mr. Government. Just give me these few needs and I will be a servant to you all powerful Mr. Government.

1. Universal health care- a human right
2. Housing- a human right
3. food- a human right
4. Job with good benefits and pension. (seiu)
5. College-free for all a human right
6. Social Security
7. Medicare

If someone taxes Paxil, should the government pay for it? If not, then who?

If the gov't doesn't run a balanced budget, why collect taxes at all? Seems very unfair to me.

"If the gov't doesn't run a balanced budget, why collect taxes at all? Seems very unfair to me." Riversider... Great idea. The government should also give people money. Anyone who feels they don't have their fair share, the government should just give them cash. 19.6 trillion in debt by 2014, what's a few more trillion. After all ,the rich never sacrificed enough and those damn evil bankers collapsed the system.

If the chinese are willing to buy our debt given our trade deficit and budget deficit I think we push pedal to the metal. Besides, If we didn't have to pay taxes, we could consume more and put more Americans back to work. I'm surprised nobody ever thought of this. Subsidies should be an American right, It's unfair to discriminate based on Economic Class. If you prick me do I not bleed?

U.S.. May federal budget deficit at $135.93billion.. One month.

Are you a bleedin' prick?

Not since the circumcision.. which was a long time ago.

i like!

I get the distinct impression that you went back for another!

To the Keynsians, Someone should comment on Sweden's success in invorgarting their economy by adopting Reagan economic ideas.

Riversider I don't think the progressives understand anything but kruman style economics.

Freddy Krueger?

"The Israeli government in its sovereignty feels it can treat Israeli Arabs and Palestinisans like garbage"

Ironic how much better Arabs living in Tel Aviv are treated INCREDIBLY better than if they lived in Arab countries.... particularly the women.

"We don't have to hold Israel to a higher moral standard. But we do have to hold it to the same moral standard we should hold our own country and the rest of our allies"

Agreed..... but I doubt this hypocrisy of holding Israel to higher standards than any other country anywhere ever... I don't think thats ending in our lifetimes.

" The country has more reporters in the country than just about anywhere else, so any incident no matter how small or large gets reported quite differently than a similar incident in another country."

Except the ones where Jews are killed, of course.

"The photos first published by Reuters shows flotilla passengers surrounding an Israeli soldier. An unedited photo shows one person in the crowd clearly holding a combat knife. What was edited from the photos changed their tone and import entirely from a portrayal that cast Israelis in a guilty light to one that vindicated their accounts. "

"The news agency Reuters has withdrawn from sale 920 pictures taken by a photographer after finding he had doctored two images taken in Lebanon."

Again, the Arab propaganda efforts have worked pretty well.... mainly because the rest of the world wants to believe it.

Ironic how much better Arabs living in Tel Aviv are treated INCREDIBLY better than if they lived in Arab countries.... particularly the women.

It doesn't matter, Just re-read "The Prince". Regardless of conditions, if the subjecting population is radically different it's perceived worse. The Lebanese are controlled by the Syrians and object far less, why because they are all Arabs and for the majority of Lebanon both Moslem.

Israeli elite would be good read up on Machiavelli. Another reason they need to embrace a two state solution once they have assurances of their own safety and security.

The interesting thing about Arab-Israeli relations is that the majority of Israelis are ready and willing to make peace. Arafat was offered the whole enchilada including East Jerusalem and he crapped out. Go to Hamas official website and examine their central tenets. They call for the destruction of the state of Israel. Let me spell that out for anyone who does not understand...Their reason to exist is to destroy Israel. Hezballah operates under similar conditions. Why does Israel conduct a blockade? To search for weapons. Especially long range missiles from Iran. Follow the news? Hamas has no trouble shooting missiles at Israel. What the heck is wrong with the world? Is the world blind to the secular/religious battle in economically distressed Turkey? The subterfuge isn't even subtle. Cropping out daggers? Photo shopping out the Israeli's pool of blood? Could the world be filled with people that stupid?

sadly.......yes.
I want all my entitlements and I don't want to pay. (I want other's to pay because I'm a lazy self-entitled bastard...F-k the future ,I'll be dead...after bankrupting the Medicare/Social Security system) The only reason I'm up angry about the Gulf is I like cheap seafood and oil.

"The only reason I'm up angry about the Gulf is I like cheap seafood and oil."

the interesting thing is that if US is successful at bankrupting BP, US taxpayer will have to pay for that shrimp

Obama is showing poor judgment on putting bp out of business(if tthat's his goal). If he does there is nobody around to clean up the mess or pay the damages. Add to tht the huge number of people you put out of work . This is not just those that work for bp directly but those who work for companies that service BP. Pretending to be angry for the tv camera is bad politics.

I think everyone agrees safety standards were too low, so fix it, and we may learn that bp was negigent, so fine them but intentionally pushing them to bankruptyc is absurd.

I think its very sas what happened in the gulf. The regulators were captured just as in Banking.

I think 99.99.99% of our shrimp comes from Ecuador and China.

Well Chinese waters aren't so clean either..

Everything is a crisis with the socialists. What is the solution? ( Bigger massive oppressive government. ) The gov't creates the problems then blames the private sector. They demonize the easiest target and the lemmings lap it up. The leader of the regime is in so over his head it's pathetic. I think a junior high school vice president position in Chicago would be more appropriate.

Julia: put a cork in yourself.

I think 99.99.99% of my shrimp deliverymen come from Ecuador and China.

{Just realized deliveries in AZ might get substancially worse in the next year}

cc Hayek.s book The road to serfdom is #1 on the Amazon best sellers list. America's waking up cc your checks maybe in jeopardy soon.

Stop yapping.

Everybody's gone Serfing, Serfing USA

The United States issued more debt last year cc than all the debt issued in the World. 19.6 trillion in debt by 2015 cc. And you keep yous head up your ......

You're revolting.

Your very own leader of the regime is" out kicking some ass" but I'm revolting

"Everybody's gone Serfing, Serfing USA"

Hayek, Hayek, Hayek, very funny

Your endless slogans are stupid. You and your dumb ass buddy riversider love to point out the obvious. You don't have any solutions, so shut up and spare us your repetitious bullshit.

I have solutions cc but the lemmings are running the show.

You have toxic solutions, julia.

Shut up Julia.

Toxic to the parasites, liberating to the opressed.

Shove it Julia.

as you will never succeed absent a situation involving a bloody revolution you are "safe" espousing conditions that have never existed in modern, advanced societies. that's the ironic beauty/dishonesty in your position. it's easy to say that some idealized state or non-state should exist. but impossible to prove it's efficacy. just look at the marxists.

Julia, you're a stoopid robot

and in a bloody revolution you could get FAR worse

Look, I think for the most part everyone wants this country to prosper. Reagan created a lot of believers but after 2000 and most recently after 2008 there were doubters who wanted to back to Keynes, honestly believing that debt and spending was the way back to prosperity. The European debt crisis really brings that point home. Which is why we need to re-examine the flaws in Keynes. C+I+G, totally ignores the human element, and was never meant to mean constant debt, but rather gov't spending smoothing the bumps. Clearly we cannot cycle between tons of debt and even more than tons of debt. Something isn't working and the world is waking up to it. I point to Sweden because they were forced to deal with this reality in the 1990s.

Keynes didn't call for endless debt spending. Bush wanted a second term.

Here's the real shame...
We need oil. We need it so bad this is how deep we have to go for it. This is the danger associated with our need. So now that there has been an accident we want to shoot BP because it happened on their watch. We need BP more than ever. We need them to be healthy and we need them to clean. Instead of the President making muscles at BP to satisfy the press, the President should be making muscles at the American public.
Oil got us into the problems in the middle east.
Oil contributed to climate change
Oil is the problem in the Gulf right now.

Now is our time to conserve!
Now is our time to invest in renewable energy!
Now is our time to band together and do what it takes to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels by 30%!
That's what our President should be yelling about...not destroying BP.
In Germany if you sit with your car idling someone will knock on the window and tell you to shut it off.
That's the spirit our President needs to foster. Car pools, turn off the AC, shut off those lights. Every little bit helps...it's a mind set and theirs an opportunity being squandered!
Here is some hard advice for the folks in the Gulf...
If your a fisherman get in your boat and move far away or sell your boat and retrain for another profession. Pains me to be so blunt but, shit happens.
If you make you living serving these folks...make new plans. The old plan is over.
There was once thousands of people in the rust belt that made their living in the steel industry.
There was once thousands of people in the garment center that made their living in the clothing industry
There was once thousands of people in New England that made their living in the Whaling industry.
Shit just happens.

Something isn't working?

And of course, it has nothing to do with two endless wars, enormous tax cuts and unfunded Medicare drug benefits?

So much bullshit is getting spewed here.

how much more shit before the sewers overflow?

Depends on whether or not your toilet is clogged, I suppose.
But seriously sewage services are not what's bankrupting the country, it's entitlements.

you are so tiresome. you are not funny, interesting or provocative.

you are endlessly boring.

Obama's unintended solution to BP, is to increase dependence on foreign oil, further wreck the balance of trade, put Americans out of work and put out of business the company best able to help resolve the problem. BP screwed up. Let's not right one wrong with ten wrongs.

add back the tax cuts, the wars and the drug benefit and where are you?

It really is bothering aboutready that her redistribution beliefs are being shown to be total failures.

whatever obama does, there are a hundred screeching assholes just like riverside and julia. if obama says up, the screechers scream down. he is not trying to bankrupt bp. if he didn't protest the dividend payment, the screechers would scream that he didn't care. and on and on.

A.R. should want "fat cats", really FAT CATS....as everyone knows one cannot get blood from a stone.

finallyjoy, a civilization is judged by how it treats the ones who, for various reasons, cannot help themselves.
Of course, for a number of humans it's still a seductive (and to them logical) idea to cross out all non-producers.
And the trains will run on time.

And who is doing this judging? And can I inquire who is the arbiter of whether this is being done successfully..

as noted above: neither witty, clever or interesting.

but certainly endless.

salut I have said many times the truly dysfunctional should be helped. Maybe 2 to 3% of our fellow Americans are in that category. The rest of the welfare state parasites should support themsevles.

but luckily, you haven't or ever will be elected as dogcatcher much less a real position.

stop yapping.

Blah blah blah. Nonstop losers. They even criticize each other for the others' nonstop blah blah blah.

ah...the town jerk/\.

Hello Robert Kiyosaki. You just blab on and on and never reach a conclusion while you try to make yourself look smart. Blah blah blah. Robert Kiyosaki Columbia County.

fuck you.

Blah blah blah. Have you found that magic politician yet who is going to solve all of our problems?

fuck you.

No politician you've found to date can meet your standards of blah blah blah, right?

fuck you.

cc, that's the funny thing. much of the "stimulus" program and this " jobs creation" proposal has been tax cuts (although not for the rich) and payments to the states for basic services and some construction and infrastructure. btw NYC did VERY well in the first program, I don't know the details of the second. compared to the cost of the wars? and we have been fighting a real economic war here. so he's blamed for that spending. now much less spending, the austerity that they have wanted. let's see what happens next. and they'll still blame the state of the economy on Obama.

I have no love for his economics team generally but once the decision was made not to nationalize temporarily the banks there wasn't a lot of room for ingenuity.

cc is in a really bad aggressive mood today. The government check is late?

finallyjoy, you should be in charge of defining the truly dysfunctional.
All good ideas and systems (1. Universal health care- a human right
2. Housing- a human right
3. food- a human right
4. Job with good benefits and pension. (seiu)
5. College-free for all a human right
6. Social Security
7. Medicare)
are always, always abused, that's just the human nature.
As is the taking upon him/herself to "improve" the society.
You should be put in charge of defining the "truly dysfunctional". Shudder.

I still laugh at this, the ultimate blah blah blah

columbiacounty
about 7 weeks ago

so...here's how we get started.

a politician stands up and says: there are no easy answers anymore. for a viable future, we need to have shared sacrifice. rather than try to figure out how and which programs to cut, lets start with a lengthy dialogue aimed at creating a process that is fair.

i naively thought that obama was that guy; i think he may have thought he was as well.