Jobber of the Week

I was going to submit my drama and humor for approval, but seeing how I have heat with so many of the guys who are involved, I may have to be the big slow lug with the cool guy persona who leaves and creates his own "lone wolf" stable, only to fill it up with a bunch of losers. But at least I'd have the power of The Book.

A thought entered my head while looking at this thread. What?

Gosh, a bit many threads asking to be fed political opinions, you think? Especially since the first one received a generally poor reaction. Lieberman's foreign policy is very similar to Bush, so if that's what matters to you then there you are, I guess. His support in various social issues has soured me on him. He was a big backer of the Parent Teacher's Association in their campaign against pro wrestling and was heavily involved when games like Doom and Resident Evil were being blamed for school murders. So, socially, Lieberman is on that strange plane where the far left and far right meet, restricting personal liberties in an interest of preserving the family (conservatives usually because they feel it threatens their kids' good ol Christian upbringing, and progressive liberals usually because it's the politically correct thing to do.) Kerry was seeming like he was going to be a huge part of this race but has been falling on his own sword by trying to fling poo at Dean and missing all the time. Wes Clark is the case of a press & communications team surrounding around a man who has nothing to say. If Dean wins, expect Clark to become his VP. Edwards isn't going to risk his political future on a guy who basically called Southerners a bunch of Confederate hicks. Gephardt, to me, seems to represent the "politics as usual" that guys like Dean and Arnold rail on against on the campaign. I started off this race liking Edwards because he hadn't had the oppertunity to say anything stupid. He still hasn't said anything that caused me to hang my head in shame, but also just doesn't seem to get any kind of message out, period. I could be wrong on this though, CNN's Inside Politics a month ago showed that Edwards is spending the second largest amount of money, next to Dean, in two of the three early states. His social policies are kind of odd. A guy who votes that religious symbols at school aren't a violation of church & state while still banning no on a partial-birth abortion ban (which actually puts him farther on the left than some other guys in the race) is a tough pill for me to swallow. Here in California we're having a pretty late primary. I imagine I'll vote for Edwards in the primary because Kerry's campaign has been so negative I think it's actually hurt his election chances in a general election. If Dean gets the nomination, I'll vote for him, but it'll be an interesting four years at the rate he's pissing off senators in his own party.

Hurrah for futility. I doubt it'll do any good, what with Strom Jr invoking the security clause if necessary and little legal precedent to go on (Clinton's attempts to bar anti-abortionists that was mentioned earlier being the only one.)

I like how all this money was spent on attorneys for years just for the kid to break down and admit to it so he won't even spend a month paying his dues for it.

And then they'd get arrested.

I'm not sure if we have anyone here who's a cemented Dean supporter other than Tyler, and he's been MIA for a while. My stance is pretty simple: Anyone But Bush. Yeah, I know, you probably figured that out, but hey, you asked the question. Believe it or not it's not because of war, gay rights, or church and state issues even though I harp on those things a lot. I'm just not nuts on family legacies (which is why I wouldn't vote Hillary unless she was running against another legacy such as Bush but I have said I'd rather vote for Guiliani who I assume the GOP would run against her), I'm underwhelmed by the return of Reaganomics, and his attempts to change nuclear proliferation scare me. I'm not against building new bombs and replacing our old bombs (hey, at least it'll make jobs), but this whole idea of small-scale nuclears for bunker busters and other situations where conventional would work will, in my opinion, desensitize the world to nuclear arms, and cause an idiot somewhere (Pakistan?) to launch, creating the situation of falling dominoes. Top it off with a "with us or against us" stance that was pure politics to make the Democrats cave in early, and is still inspiring Republican supporters to ask Democratic supporters why they hate America. Saudi Arabia is not with us, there's a good amount of evidence they are against us. I don't expect Dean or anyone else to eliminate the Saudi government, but I don't expect him to talk brashly of cleaning house in the Middle East and then conveniently forget about that country.

But it can't be security if people who aren't protesting the President's agenda can get up right there. That's operating under the assumption that anyone who wants to do the President harm won't be smart enough to go under the guise of a supporter.

So, you don't have a problem with your rights being tampered (if not infringed) for political gain. Okay then.* * I'm sorry if that sounds like a straw man of the greatest degree, but I really can't figure out your position besides one of apathy.

Not a war statement. Are all these people "No blood for oil types" too? I'm a rational person here. The Port of Oakland scene mentioned in that article, for instance, WAS a scene of people who got what they deserved (in that case, they were blocking transport of military supplies.) But there's a difference between disruptors and someone holding a less than favorable sign.

Right, but the TV people weren't allowed to talk to them even if they chose to. kkk: I don't think this is really business as usual. Clinton had a ton of detractors, and they got tons of attention. Beyond that, there's the issue of free speech. You could claim Presidential security except that there seems to be political interest involved. If you want to say "Yeah, oh well, I don't mind because I don't agree with their political opinion anyway" then we might as well not have the Bill of Rights.

Well, thanks for the misinterpretation. What I was saying was that terror strikes on the US is something that's only started becoming an issue over the past few decades. Instead of immediately telling other countries how to be run, we should consider what's causing this change.

Anyone who's even paid attention to the history of the region knows that doesn't work.

Well, congratulations, you found the one page on AngelFire that's actually funny. Needle in the haystack, right there.

Well, this is going to be one of those interesting threads where I wind up in a position I didn't expect to find myself in. I have agreed with the Democratic candidates when it comes to rebuilding Iraq. Getting more countries involved, sharing the bill, and eventually getting out of there. But the one thing that's always confused me was Dean's commentary that the rebuilding process would go so much quicker if we let the U.N. take the lead. That ordinary Iraqis would see the UN as a peacekeeping organization dedicated to their goodwell while an emphasis on the United States would be seen as an invasion force. It makes sense from an outsider perspective, anyway. But those who think that the ordinary Iraqis are going to love the UN ought to think again. I was searching through Google Images the other night, looking for pictures of the various ways Saddam's administration has snubbed the Bush family (for instance, one hotel had the design of Bush Daddy's face in the floor, so everyone could walk on him, surrounded with large "GEORGE BUSH IS A CRIMINAL" lettering. Another picture revealed a Saddam statue surrounded with statue version of Bush Daddy and Margaret Thatcher's decapitated heads.) During all this searching I found the web site of a freelance journalist who was invited to Saddam's birthday party in 2000. Along with the usual interesting "inside Saddam's government" look, there's some interesting commentary on the UN. I'll include that in my bolding, but I reccomend reading the whole thing, it's quite interesting. http://www.rosegeorge.com/frameworks/gener...sp?ArticleID=21 Anyway, I think this proves wrong Dean's opinion that removing the "American face" for the war in place of a UN one is going to somehow improve relations with Iraqis, as the UN sanctions have been partially responsible for everyone's squalor (Saddam refusing to share his wealth, of course, is the other part.) I wouldn't be suprised if just as many Iraqis blame the UN as Saddam for their situation, though I have no numbers. However, I think it also answers a question the righties have been asking, which is why we should even bother the UN with rebuilding. We should get the UN involved in rebuilding because if you're going to sanction a people into poverty, you should help them out when the situation is resolved. It's only the proper thing to do. Thoughts?

*steals the towel*

Well, that's your perogative.

No, I'm sorry, but if there was someone out there equally violent on the pro-life side making the news, it would be turning people off from that ideology too. It's like the fundie Christians draggin' the Republicans down. All's well and good until the scum at the bottom rises up and makes a mess for everyone.

The thing is that the pro-choice crowd really doesn't have anybody like the pro-life bombers. These terrorists (no distinction is necessary) make the pro-lifers look bad, and affirm thoughts in pro-choice peoples' heads that yes, any sane person would agree with them instead of the bombers. And heck, I'm pro-choice and even I recognize that.

MOV files? Apple pretty much has the Quicktime encoding market locked up. Are you a Mac user trying to watch a Divx movie or something?

Ah. Well, now that you've mentioned that, I can type the sidebar from the previous Franken chapter that I ignored: That is astonishing. Hard to think of a more serious charge. You want to be damned sure you have that one locked down pretty tight before you put it in print. But knowng what we already know about Sean Hannity and the standards to which he holds himself, what are the chances that this whole charge is just baloney? His entire case comes from a guy named Mansoor Ijaz, a Pakistani-American who claims to have transmitted the offer as a middleman between the U.S. and Sudan. I got the story on Ijaz from former National Security Advisor Sandy Berger and from Daniel Benjamin, past director for counterterrorism on the National Security Council and now senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Berger only had to meet once with Ijaz to determine that he was an unreliable freelancer, persuing his own financial interests. Ijaz was an investment banker with a huge stake in Sudanese oil. Ijaz had urged Berger to lift sanctions against Sudan. Why the sanctions? Because Sudan was and remains a notorious sponsor of terrorism, harboring Hamas, Hezbollah, and al Qaeda. Also, the Sudanese regime is the leading state sponsor of slavery and is considered by many to be genocidal. And totally untrustworthy. Ijaz, however, was arguing their case. As Benjamin said of Ijaz, "Either he allowed himself to be manipulated, or he's in bed with a bunch of genocidal terrorists." Ijaz said that Sudan was ready to hand over bin Laden. The U.S. does not conduct diplomacy through self-appointed private individuals. When the U.S. talked to Sudan, there was no such offer. The U.S. pushed every lead and tried to negotiate. Nothing. The story does have a happy ending. Ijaz now has a job as foreign affairs analyst for the Fox News Channel. Edit: To be fair, I should mention that Clinton has actually called this issue "the greatest failure in [his] Presidency." This was in the shadow of 9/11 though (early 02) so whether he was trying to salvage his popular opinion or really meant it, I don't know. However, the only source for this conversation is a very sketchy source of NewsMax. Go figure.

The backstage answer was that Triple H wanted a belt. The TV storyline answer was that Stephanie page a huge sum to Lesnar in the middle of his first title reign to be SmackDown exclusive and not exercise his ability to go over to Raw. So, Eric dug into the closet and pulled out the WCW title again (in gold and leather only, the actual lineage is still with the SD belt). However, every person who has held the belt so far has been well-known for their backstage power and arguing (HHH, Shawn, Goldberg.) So it's been handed off from politician to politician to politician to crybaby to politician again.

Yeah, but while we can't eliminate oil, we can use oil more efficiently and not waste it. You know how Saddam was threatening to stop sending us oil a while back, and some government beancounter was quoted as saying we get 13% of our oil from Saddam? If we used 13% less oil, we could have cut Saddam out of the picture. And this isn't political commentary about whether or not we should have gone into Iraq. I'm talking pure economics here. Just 13% less oil not only in cars but any other way we find we waste oil = one less Middle East country to depend on.

PWTorch: Because yesterday's news was fake and the reality is 180 in the other direction. Until tomorrow.