And while I have little clue who most of them are, I feel duty bound as a blogger to express my shock that his choices are not progressive/moderate/conservative enough, and I will do my best to write a hysterical 2,000 word post saying that if he would only listen to me, things would be better. Also, I will, without irony, note that he is appointing too many Clinton re-treads, failing to acknowledge that if Obama had not won, Clinton would have, and probably would have appointed more… Clinton people. Finally, I will whinge incessantly that I was misled during the election. I thought he would be much more progressive/moderate/conservative than he is acting now, and I wish I had voted for the alternative (the crazy old man McCain).
Why oh why will he just not listen to me?
Oh yes. I forgot. He also has not fixed the economy, brought our troops home, or closed Gitmo yet. I read in the WSJ thast one of his many advisors has a different opinion than me on one of those issues, so I reserve this space to freak out about that, too.
SLAP IN THE FACE. IT IS ALL A HORRIBLE SLAP IN THE FACE.
/emo leftwing blogger
4tehlulz
ZOMG LARRY SUMMERS OBAMA HAETS TEH WIMMINZ
/Talk Left
myiq2xu
I told ya so!
mgordon
You forgot about the limo.
Ming
Why, you could almost write the response without seeing the announcement! Heh.
One thing I’m interested in is what you and our esteemed BJ commentariat thinks of the "two-for-one" of having Hillary as Secy o’ State. Financial entanglements of Bill’s foundation aside, I can imagine some really great pros as well as some really worrisome cons.
snarkfest and serious comments eagerly anticipated.
ThymeZone
Relax. You know you voted for him because he’s a guy you can go and have a corned beef sandwich and a beer with.
Conservatively Liberal
GoatBoy, you old racist!
A little old lady said it best this AM on Washington Journal:
Obama ain’t getting paid yet.
Maybe he needs to look into overtime first? ;)
Zifnab
Racist.
The Other Steve
This is a terrible slap in the face to John McCain. This economic team is not nearly socialist enough.
NonyNony
Frankly, I’ll just wait to see what she does in that role. It’s in her best interest for Obama’s administration to succeed (since she’ll be part of that administration), so she has every incentive to not only do her best, but to find some key big issues on foreign relations to bring a "win" for the administration.
I’m of the opinion that the best way to deal with rivals with whom you agree with philosophically is to co-opt them so as to make their successes your successes. It doesn’t make any sense to do that with rivals that you are at odds with on a fundamental level, but when you’re only rivals because of "the game", subverting them into allies is the best way to go. And that’s where Obama and Clinton stand – from a philosophical standpoint you couldn’t get a sheet of paper between them on the issues. So why not?
(As a side-note – I’m getting rather annoyed with left blogistan going on and on about how Obama’s "surrounding himself with hawks". Did anyone besides me not notice during the campaign that the man was himself a "hawk"? His objection to the Iraq War was not an anti-war stance, but rather that it was a stupid war to be getting into and that Bush’s pre-emptive, unilateral war philosophy was stupid AND dangerous AND unproductive AND makes the world less safe overall. But he’s not anti-war, he never claimed to be, and in fact was running on the idea that Iraq was distracting us from Afghanistan. I thought it was really weird that the anti-war factions on the Tubes were so vocal in their support for a guy who seemed to be essentially saying "Remember Bush I and Clinton’s foreign policy? Let’s go back to that." And now they’re shocked – SHOCKED – to discover that the man might just not be anti-war. Weird.)
boonagain
That’s what we get for electing an inadequate Black man!!!
slaney black
No Goolsbee? That dude is half the reason I voted for O-Man in the primaries.
WEAK.
TheFountainHead
ZOMG, MAGIKAL UNIDEE PONEE R REELY ANOFER MAMINAL IN DESSGISES!!
ACK!
UR PROGWESSIVNESS. HE FIXED.
ThymeZone
Don’t make fun of my diet, man.
Punchy
I fer one welcome da Hill as SoS. Chicks are notoriously hard to push over. They study yo faults, pretend fo a while not to care, then when they can inflict the mostest pain, unload like there’s no 2morry. Crush your pride, ego, sense of worth. I see Hill doing alotta this.
Llelldorin
I’m with NonyNony. Frankly, this is how you’re supposed to delegate work—if you can’t possibly do everything that you need to do, you find someone else who could do your job in a pinch and assign them part of it.
I was for Obama in the primaries, but Clinton would have made an outstanding President. Bush has managed to move the nation’s basic status to "totally fucked" on nearly every front. It’ll take someone of Clinton’s stature to dig our foreign policy out while Obama digs the economy out (and while Daschle digs out healthcare… it’s not like we’re short of crises).
The Moar You Know
There is a remarkably minimal amount of sobbing and pants-peeing going on over at the Great Unwashed Hippiefest, given what good news this is for
McCainHillary.TenguPhule
Irony of the Year.
ThymeZone
Oh god, I’m outta here. The sexism police will be here any minute to cut all our balls off.
Clor
You forgot setting your Obama yard sign on fire and posting it on YouTube. Hop to it!
srv
Speaking as one of the few progressives here, y’all here got exactly what you voted for. But there will be a lot of unhappy MUP’ers who bought the drivel and weren’t so keenly aware of what had been packaged for them. You no doubt get a hearty laugh at those folks, for being so naive. The kind of laugh bankers have for you folks.
As appointments go, they’re not so bad. I’m sure we’ll see the boards stuffed with the specialists who got us into this mess. But sadly, these people don’t matter. Romer, being an expert on everything Hoover and FDR did wrong, isn’t going to make a lick-spittles worth of difference in the next year or two.
TZ is still going to get all those bailouts (and more) he dreams of AND double digit unemployment. The only question is what happens after, and neither scenario is going to be happy trails for y’all or your 401k. Or National health care.
Joshua Norton
That’s funny. Every single op ed and opinion piece I see on every blog and in every newspaper starts with "What Obama needs to do about…." I tend to skip right over them – which cuts my reading by about 3/4. It’s getting as tiresome as the 2 years of non-stop election crap we just got over.
Zifnab
@The Moar You Know: Does this make us misogynists?
sparky
@TheFountainHead: winz!
o kanis
I am delighted that Obama has appointed the wise heads steeped in Rubinomics to pilot his economic team. Geithner, Summers, and of course, the steady hand of Robert Rubin himself as a valued adviser in the background. These names inspire confidence and a warm and fuzzy glow on Wall Street and the media. That certainly is good enough for me.
We can sleep easy now that the policies and decisions over the past ten years, decisions that have resulted in worst financial breakdown since the Depression will be firmly dealt with. Well done, President Elect Obama! Well done!
Rubinomics? Here’s a primer.
Robert Rubin: What Meltdown; CNN Money; Jan. 31, 2008
http://tinyurl.com/…
Where Was The Wise Man?; NYT; April 27, 2008
http://tinyurl.com/…
Citigroup Saw No Red Flags Even as It Made Bolder Bets; NYT; Nov. 23, 2008
http://tinyurl.com/…
On the destruction of derivatives oversight by Rubin, Summers and Greenspan, see the NYT, The Reckoning–Taking a New Look at a Greenspan Legacy; Oct. 8, 2008
http://tinyurl.com/…
The Moar You Know
@Zifnab: I’m busy beating my wife for not cooking breakfast properly, so I’ll have to get back to you on that.
TheFountainHead
@o kanis: I C wut you did thar.
Tsulagi
Your both wrong. Since he’s a devout Muslim who hates the Jews, you voted for him so you could have falafel and tea with him on a prayer rug pointed toward Mecca.
o kanis
Let me also add that the role of Treasury Secretary Designate Timothy Geithner in the bailouts of Bear Stearns, AIG, and probably Citi also inspires confidence in the incoming Obama Administration. The valuable experience in handing over taxpayer money to Wall Street failures cannot be overstated, especially since it looks like TS Geithner will not hesitate to put said valuable experience to good use in the future.
Again, well done, President Elect Barack Obama.
Brick Oven Bill
Slaney Black;
You raise a very good point. But Goolsbee is a tall, fit, well-spoken, white man, without fake hair. This is not good for the image. And he is not a protégé of Robert Rubin, who (surprise) is expecting more money from the Administration in his position at CITI. Therefore Geithner and Sumner. Then things will change again and Robert Rubin will ride in to our rescue.
Loyalty. Duh.
That One - Cain
@Punchy:
Only a man whose slept with Hillary would know that. You sick bastard, what was in it for you?
cain
That One - Cain
I always thought Rubin was included because it’s good to have the guy who fucked it up when you’re trying to fix the mess since well he knows where things started going bad, what assumptions were made and what not. It’s hard to do a post-mortem without this guy I would guess. *shrug*
cain
Brick Oven Bill
Rubin is in the money making part of the cycle, for now.
John Cole
Yeah. Whatever. I will listen to K-Thug, thank you:
SUCK. ON. THAT.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I can’t stop laughing over that.
TZ, the future of your balls has already been negotiated and I’m in charge.
::whispers:: "Shhhh! Don’t tell, I’m a double agent, you’re balls are safe with me".
Common Sense
Ya know, two names that I sincerely hope to hear as a part of foreign policy.
Jim Webb and Sam Nunn.
I get that neither could be Veep for political purposes (although I didn’t like it). Still, I agree with nearly all of their policies wrt foreign affairs. One big hiccup I could see would be Nunn’s desire to ban gays from national service. That might require Obama to defend DADT too early, and we all know what happens when Democrats waste their time on this type of issue. Still, I’m not convinced that most Americans wouldn’t support DADT. Even the talk radio hosts are fine with civil unions, right? The whole hysteria comes over the word marriage.
I don’t worry about losing the VA Senate seat with Webb. I think this election showed that Virginia is perilously close to foregoing battleground status anyway. The no women in the service thing was a bit ugly, but again if Obama himself strongly supports a woman’s right to serve, I don’t see America siding with the social dinosaurs.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
John, I can’t figure it out, I’ve known all along he was not going to be a far-left liberal/progressive , why is it others didn’t know this? I’m lost as to why so many people thought this way.
Brachiator
OMG! And they are all white men!
Except for Council of Economic Advisers Chair-designate Christina Romer. Romer, by the way, has a PhD from M.I.T. Take that, Larry Summers….
I’ve noted in other posts that I can see what being appointed Secretary of State does to feed Senator Clinton’s ambition, but I fail to see what it does for Obama or the country. Clinton has a glamorous name, perhaps, but has demonstrated none of the political instincts or administrative abilities needed for the job. And I don’t see how this "two-for-one" stuff is an advantage. Unless Bill Clinton is specifically tasked some responsibility by a President Obama, any advice he might offer Hillary would either be irrelevant or potentially divisive.
I’m offput by the assertions of the "Permanent PUMAs for Hillary" that being “Secretary of state is far superior to vice president," and am bothered by the more serious accusations that Senator Clinton may stack the State Department with loyalists, and freeze out not only excellent career foreign office people from promotion, but also lock out more creative and talented people who were Obama advisers who might also be good in State Department positions.
The best that can be said for Senator Clinton is that she is intelligent and hard working. But there is absolutely nothing to suggest that she is either a skilled diplomat or a talented administrator. And compared to Bill Richardson, Madeleine Albright, or someone like Israeli politician Tzipora Livni, Senator Clinton’s foreign policy credentials are very weak.
So, Obama has a strong, capable economics team. On the foreign affairs side, however, neither Biden nor Clinton are particularly impressive; they are both stodgy competent types who are not very creative or particularly inspiring.
o kanis
Only those not really paying attention seem to be disappointed that Obama is not a "leftist".
Obama is a Chicago pol. Speak as if you’re a "progressive", then fuck the lefties once in power. Tried and true.
So that’s known and to be expected. However, it’s one thing to expect it, and another to be asked to eat a shit sandwich (Summers, for example) and pretend it’s fois gras.
Obama "knows what he’s doing" will be the mantra of the other side of lefty (thwarted) hope. For a while, at least.
Jess
C’mon–she save Ireland while dodging sniper fire. What have you done that’s so cool lately?
John Cole
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII: If you will notice, many of the people wailing about his picks are the same people who supported Hillary to the bitter end.
Personally, I am just goignto hold my fire until he takes office and actually starts doing something, and criticize him based on his performance. Kind of a novel concept, I know.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
That’s my take too. Let him actually take the title first and actually do some "presidentin" before I start to get pissy.
With regards to who is doing the whining, I guess that means the war is still on.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
That’s bullshit. While he did come from Chicago politics, he never spoke as a lefty at all. If others thought of him as a true lefty it was only in their own minds. He talked over and over about unity, about bipartisanship, about coming together to make things right again. He never hid from that message. He courted the right more than he did the left during the entire campaign. I saw it, and I supported him for it. I knew what he was doing. Anyone who thinks that he was speaking Lefty during his campaign would have to be tone deaf.
ThymeZone
Mum’s the word.
o kanis
Well, of course you’re going to judge by results, and wait till Obama is president. Except that his personnel choices are part of his presidency. People, in a democracy at least, are expected to evaluate presidential choices and comment on the likely outcome. What are the policy implications of having Rubinites in the economic team, for example. Will they follow the policies that got us to where we are now? Or will they, like Nixon in China, know what to do, and be more credible doing it.
Otherwise, let’s put up a temple and worship a portrait.
MNPundit
I am going to kick Larry Summer right in the balls when I see him next.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
If you want to evaluate the (de)merits of those he’s chosen, go for it, but if you have a better idea of who should be in that position then perhaps you should have run and won the office yourself. It’s his presidency, it’s his cabinet. Let him actually do some real work with those people in those positions before you choose to come out swinging.
ThymeZone
Hmm … so then we might also wait a year or so, watch the effects of the bailouts and restructurings and other maneuvers, and see how we are doing, before deciding whether worrying about whether a fat cat got away is really all that important?
Just saying.
If unemployment a year from now is under 10%, Ford and GM are still providing jobs, and sensible banking reforms are about to be signed into law .. ones that protect ordinary people and not just bank stockholders …. then it’s Epic Win?
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Absolutely. Right now we’re not even sure if the country would last another year with the current administration. Thank GOD this isn’t a monarchy.
o kanis
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I based my phrase, Chicago politics, on an article I read that described the hardknuckle politics of the Daley machine, and how Obama was part of that. I can’t find it right off hand, but I’m looking. It’s not really that important, but a shorthand way to say Obama is a politician. I know, grasping the obvious by the throat. Meanwhile, here’s something….
As a community organizer, he had helped register thousands of voters. But when it came time to run for office, he employed Chicago rules to invalidate the voting petition signatures of three of his challengers.
The move denied each of them, including incumbent Alice Palmer, a longtime Chicago activist, a place on the ballot. It cleared the way for Obama to run unopposed on the Democratic ticket in a heavily Democrat district.
"That was Chicago politics," said John Kass, a veteran Chicago Tribune columnist. "Knock out your opposition, challenge their petitions, destroy your enemy, right? It is how Barack Obama destroyed his enemies back in 1996 that conflicts with his message today. He may have gotten his start registering thousands of voters. But in that first race, he made sure voters had just one choice."
http://tinyurl.com/3g4fl9
As for left rhetoric, we had the famous Wall Street vs Main Street runaway populism speech at the height of the economic meltdown last Semptember, a speech that was characterized by having the quintesential Wall Street insiders, Rubin and Summers, directly behind him, grinning like chesire cats. There’s other examples, but this was the most brazen by far.
ThymeZone
Pretty good Salon piece on the Citi situation no matter where you stand on the issue.
This graph stands out:
Question: If interest rates are hovering near zero, and capital is washing over your bank like water, and you are supposed to make money … don’t you go on a retail lending spree? And wasn’t that the entire point of the Greenspan era? And if yes-yes, then why get pissed at the fat cats for doing exactly what the institutions that steered them basically told them to do?
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
o kanis, I never said he didn’t play Chicago hardball. I said he didn’t court the left as much as you think he did. He always talked about unifying the country. Where do you think the term "magical unity pony (MUP)" came from?
What won Obama the presidency wasn’t the regular Democratic electorate, it was crossover votes from Republicans and first time African American and young voters.
o kanis
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I don’t see the need for anger and insults. I’m pointing out some decisions that seem strange, given the background of the people he has chosen. I am not running for office, nor do I pretend that I know more than Obama, heaven forbid. Nor do I think I’m "coming out swinging" by pointing out the record of some of his choices.
gex
Hey, at least the DFH’s are right about important issues sometimes. Unlike the wingnuts who will no doubt write a similar argument, but in seriousness, about how unAmerican and radical leftist the new Administration will be.
But I will grant you that people should shut up until Obama is actually the President and actually does something.
ThymeZone
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
You are quite right. Unlike GW Bush who pulled "compassionate conservatism" out of his ass while running for president, with no intention of ever turning it into anyything real, Barack never ran on a platform of "liberalism you can believe in." He simply spelled out what he intended to do, pointed out differences between his agenda and his opponents’, and let the voters decide.
He said he intended to protect and create jobs, get us access to healthcare, and respond aggressively to an economic crisis. Nothing I am seeing tells me that he is not on that track.
So far, so good. Economy is job one, the rest will come.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I’m not angry and I’m not insulting you, I’m challenging what you said, that’s all. If you can’t handle the heat here, perhaps you had better find thicker skin.
ThymeZone
The records of those people that count will be the ones they create in the next four years.
srv
It could not, possibly, be related to new appointees like Melody Barnes had thrown ‘progressive’ around so liberally:
What a Progressive President Might Say
Those Koskids – That Word. It doesn’t mean what they thought it meant.
Kinda like torture, but in a kinder, more gen[i]tle progressive way.
o kanis
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
You disagree with what I said about Obama advisers Rubin, Summers, and their protege, Timothy Geithner?
And you agree that everything is ok with Obama’s economic team?
Temple and portrait time.
ThymeZone
I’m sorry, is there a decoder ring? No matter how I rearrange those words I cannot make a sentence out of them.
I suppose you might have meant "who would throw."
Policy is set by the president in these contexts. This one appears to pick people for talent, not for ideology.
We’ve seen an administration that chose people for their ideology. Heckuva job, Brownie.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I agree it’s his team and he should be held accountable for what they do AFTER THEY’VE DONE SOMETHING IN HIS CABINET!
Ad hominem much?
Look, I can play that game, I didn’t choose to. I’m being the kindest right now that I usually am (ask any troll, they’ll tell you I can get mean) and I am not being mean in the slightest here.
But, since you want to take that stance, fuck off and watch the next few years, you’ll see I’m right.
Brachiator
@John Cole:
This is too sensible. On the other hand, it was weird to see former Secretary of State James Baker appear on one of the Sunday talk shows and suggest that Obama and Bush make some joint statement on the economy before Obama actually takes office. And elsewhere another pundit suggested that Geithner should immediately take office as Treasury Secretary. I am not aware of too many other times in history where people were looking for ways to oust a lame duck president before the formal end of his term.
As CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII noted, Obama never hid his message from anyone. And I have yet to see any coherent or sensible lefty agenda that anyone need pay attention to. If it’s a matter of "lefties" wanting to bask in the glow of their ideological purity as they pointlessly heap scorn on Obama’s choices, then they pretty much deserve to get fucked.
o kanis
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Shudder.
Lol!
ThymeZone
Exactly.
D-Chance.
Obamamerica goes for a little hawtie. I hope Big Mitch can handle the competition…
ThymeZone
Exactly.
Reposted due to blog software being crap.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
::puts o cannibis (who is obviously HIGH) on ignore::
o kanis
John Cole,
Since when is it lefty to point out the questionable record of some of Obama’s choices?
When mentioned, the response is "do you have anything better". No, I do not. Because it’s not my business. And anyway, what would be the lefty alternative to Summers/Rubin? Not Reich and not Krugman, but someone not up to his neck in derivative deregulation.
The proper response, imo, is to acknowledge their history, and then try to fit them into a coherent reason why Obama feels he has to appoint these guys.
Anyway, I’m done lest Circus Maximus unleash his mighty death ray upon me. Sayonara.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Reposting what I said:
gwangung
gwangung
Define questionable.
Vincent
Well, let’s see: ending torture and closing Gitmo, getting serious about global warming, taking steps to enact national health care, doing more for the middle class, planning to appoint more liberal federal judges, withdrawing from Iraq, taking the idea of governing seriously…
I could go on and on…
Seriously, what more do you people want? It’ll be hard enough getting back to the status quo of the 90s before we all try to shoot for the moon.
And I have to point out that all this focus on the Cabinet overlooks all the progressive people like Melody Barnes that he’s appointing to his policy staff. Classic sleight of hand.
ThymeZone
There is no way Thomas Edison was ever going to invent the light bulb. He had a record of hundreds of failures.
Oh wait ….
Cassidy
@ o-kanis
For real dude…drop the whiny teenage snark. It isn’t making tou sound witty and smart. Stop boo-hooing in your milk and stop being a whiny …(looks around for PC police)…bitch. Between you, goatboy, "The only real progressive of the world" srv, I’m starting to feel a little queasy.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Listen to Cassidy, he received my derision in spades before he got smart. (What you received o kanis was NOTHING compared to what Cassidy got from me, and I gave him hell for WEEKS! Trust me, I was very nice to you, Cassidy could tell you what my wrath is like).
Thank you Cassidy. ;)
Llelldorin
Is there somewhere a pool of talented, experienced left-leaning economists who weren’t up to their necks in derivatives deregulation? That was a major Clinton-era initiative–it’d be surprising if there were a senior-level Democratic economist who wasn’t involved.
As far as I understand it, the current situation was basically caused by a terrible decision to deregulate financial markets made during the Clinton administration, followed by the Bush administration following its usual approach of ignoring problems until a few months after they’ve become catastrophes. Is that about right? If we can’t have people with clean hands, I’ll take chastened people with dirty hands.
Frankly, I never expected a left-leaning Obama administration. I do expect that they’ll start using the parts of the government that exist (or formerly existed) to gather information (the CEA, the OTA, NOAA, and so forth) for something beyond catapulting propaganda.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Exactly, Rome wasn’t built in a day. Obama is a stepping stone, hopefully to sanity first, and progress thereafter.
o kanis
I see the temple and portrait brigade is up in arms about a little criticism re Obama’s appointments.
The "left" vs "pragmatist" dichotomy is a mug’s game. And both sides are in it up to their ying yang. The media, of course, love it, as do the wingnuts.
To point out that Obama’s economic team, specifically Summers, adviser Rubins, and the bementored Geithner are responsible, via the decade long orgy of derivative deregulation is somehow a sign of "leftism".
You guys are the ones that were totally oblivious to the hilarity of Obama stroking the folks with his Wall Street vs Main Street speech last September, while Rubins and Summers, two of the four people responsible for this fucking disaster grinned like smug pricks behind him.
You like that shit sandwich? Bon appetit.
Furthermore, your rhetorical muscle flexing is rather droll. You do feel the need, eh?
lover of jazz
um, if clinton had gotten elected that’d be a good point, but she kinda didn’t.
and geithner studied credit derivatives for about two years and didn’t have enough sense to figure out they were a really bad friggin’ idea? cool, let’s put him in charge!
he helped craft the TARP bill and has had a hand in much of the inconsistent flailing around for the last month that has everybody freaked out.
and let’s add in some time with the goddamned IMF to make him look even less appealing.
i know obama is much more of a centrist than some of the crazies on both sides think, so i’m not putting too much faith in the idea that he’s going to surprise me in any substantial way, but some of his choices so far seem a bit questionable on a purely common-sense level. fine, hire capitalist-corporatist-centrist types but there must be some people fitting that description who saw this mess coming.
most of these clintonites were either on board with, or benefitted hugely from, the financial services modernization act in 1999.
they didn’t see where it’d lead then and somehow they’re our saviors now?
i don’t think so.
o kanis
As for "what would you do" bs, I’m not the president elect, and neither do I pretend otherwise.
BUT, picking people not up to their asshole in derivatives deregulation may be a start…at the very least, someone who has expressed some skepticism and foresight, and not at some speech in Hong Kong, either.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
o kanis, read this, for the third time, it means exactly what it says:
If anyone is getting up in arms about your questioning the people who he has chosen, it isn’t me. I’m merely saying that if you have a better choice of appointee, you had better get elected first. That’s all.
Obama is president elect, he goes into office with the cabinet HE chooses. Don’t like it? Tough shit. You can say all you want about the choices he makes, but he has reasons for choosing them, and until they do something in their position, I will not question it personally.
Carry on with your questioning. You will, we already know this.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
But you’re not president elect, you said so yourself.
Did you ever think that the best people to dismantle a thing
aremight be the ones who built it and KNOW where the screws and nails are?sparky
though i am in the "let’s wait and see what Obama does" camp, i think the people who are unhappy, especially WRT the economics picks are doing everyone a valuable service. they are, if nothing else, pointing out how complicit our governing class (not just Bush et al) has been in this debacle. these critiques illustrate that what we are seeing is the fruition of a structural problem with this economy.
put differently, i don’t care about Rubin’s reputation. but i do care whether he and his cronies have learned from their mistakes. pointing out their mistakes isn’t a bad way to ask that question.
Brachiator
@o kanis:
Please provide a link to a publication or blog with the title "Here are the Progressives that Obama should be selecting for his Administration," with intelligent commentary on the alternative choices.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Absolutely, and if they screw up and the economy comes crashing down, Obama will be the one at fault. He knows this.
srv
I’m going to put that one in the tool belt when it comes time to pardon Cheney and Addington.
ThymeZone
Twenty bucks says ok-anus is DougJ.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Why? Just about every person involved in any presidential secrets and/or corruption has been pardoned for the last few decades at least, why would now be any different? of COURSE they’re going to be pardoned. Anyone who thinks differently is an idiot.
Additionally: it would behoove Obama to get them out of his hair, so he can work on the real business of the country, which is fixing it and putting it back together the way it was a decade ago. Moreover, with Pelosi, Reid and several others in congress, pardons will be par for the course.
sparky
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII: agreed. it occurs to me that part of what’s going on here is a pretty normal reaction to the last, oh, eight years. the governing elite has been proven wrong over and over again and yet almost none of its members have admitted error. given how long that is in intertubes time i can’t really blame people for thinking that some of Obama’s picks suffer from the same affliction, and it might possibly be true. but if Obama puts them to good use despite that failing it doesn’t matter. so here i have to rely on Obama’s competence. i haven’t seen any reason not to.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
What’s the tell?
ThymeZone
If you just replace his ok-anus handle with DougJ, it sounds exactly like DougJ.
It’s a new handle here, and Doug is probably a little bored right now and thought he’d fuck with us.
And ok-anus is just the kind of handle he’d invent.
Also, he is just a little too polite. Whenever I see a disconnect between the level of argument and the language, I start smelling spoof.
LBNL, it’s only twenty bucks. Who wants the bet.
By the way ok-anus, when are you going to ask for the money I owe you?
That One - Cain
Maybe it was me?
cain
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I almost asked you about that in my last post. LMAO
You would know what sounds like DougJ, I’ve never had enough exposure to the real DougJ to know the difference (nor have I enough knowledge to track his spoofing and understand his characters, I haven’t a clue who DougJ’s characters are). ;)
srv
Ah, but where are the bodies buried, and who is in which hole? And who does Blackwater have offshore? I’m sure Nancy nodded grimly (she so admires Maggie), but you think she got blood on her hands? If Jack can get his pardon this season, keeping us all safe, certainly we need the experts in black arts onboard also.
Or were you just hoping they’d stop torturing taxpayers and leave everyone else hanging by their thumbs?
demimondian
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII: If that analogy were the least bit apposite, the answer would be "hell, no".
When you hire someone to fix something, you want to hire someone who looks at the thing as a tool, not beautiful creations. People who build things love them, or they’d have never complete them. For the purposes of this discussion, regulatory frameworks are "things," just as computer programs are "things" or works of art are "things".
So, no. I don’t want someone who’s invested in preserving the beauty of a solution they wrought, I want someone who is interested in repairing the function of the broken tool.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
I don’t expect Cheney and Addington to give up that info, but, if they choose to do so, I’m sure Obama would much appreciate it.
I think the people who Obama wants to rely on are those who still have a soul.
demimondian
@ThymeZone: You know, TZ, I don’t gamble, but, if I did, I’d take you up on it. That’s not DougJ; the sentences are too long.
Indylib
@Common Sense:
Maybe Webb will go to DOD when Gates leaves.
srv
Well, he could have at least put the right links in, but he figured rightly that nobody reads them. But Dougie should be smart enough to know you can’t have more than 3 without getting anal-moderated. Which is curious, because he didn’t spend 20 minutes in limbo like the rest of us…
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
The kind of people they are dealing with are DEALMAKERS, they want a good second start. Having and giving up the info could be the chance to walk away from all guilt. It’s like taking a snitch deal from a prosecutor to get to the bigger fish. It happens all the time.
You work on something that you consider a work of art, these people are not artists, they’re dealers always looking for a better deal. (and might I add, if the economy goes under, there are no more deals to be made, for a while, at least).
ThymeZone
Maybe. Maybe they are all you.
cain. Er, TZ.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
and demi, I tried to add this, but post editing hosed it:
Think about this, with our economy the way it is, if the economy goes down the tubes, dealmaking is going to be a scarce model for a while. These people will probably want to put it back together again so they can start making more deals (hopefully they’ll learn what NOT to do next time).
ThymeZone
Oh great, you’re a gourmand too.
Comrade Stuck
After reading this thread, I am now convinced that we need to immediately pre-impeach Obama, all of the dem leadership in Congress, and the rest of the less than 99% pure progressive membership. We should then immediately install by fiat, the collective braintrust of the liberal boobosphere and let them fix the country. It’s the only way to be sure.
demimondian
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII: You’re more trusting than I am.
That One - Cain
@o kanis:
It’s the nature of the blog. Pay it no mind or participate vigorously. : ) You should know, even though I don’t type it, I’m silently saying "fuck off, asshole" every time I type a post.
cain
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
demi, ideological purity is NOT going to be the order of the day, I’m sorry. We’ve got big problems and we’re going to have a Chicago hardass helping us to find the solution. He’s smart. His reputation is on the line, he won the chance to put the people HE wants in place to solve the problem. If the situation doesn’t get solved, HIS ASS is on the line.
If you don’t want to trust him to fix it, fine, but, ideological purity happens in GOOD times, not bad. Look at the Republicans ("go more to the right, no more RINOS") it’s going to screw them in the end too.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Cain, perhaps you should go back and read my portions of that conversation, I wasn’t vigorous at all, as a matter of fact, I was very weak (I was having a conversation with someone I felt had redeeming qualities until he started using ad hominem attacks against me). I didn’t even bring a sword to the fight.
Steve S.
Here’s a couple I ran across in recent days, here and here.
That One - Cain
I wasn’t really commenting on your side of the convo, you’re always gentle. :) I was more addressing his whine that he was feeling attacked and insulted.
cain
demimondian
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII: I understand what you’re saying. More than that, I’m not a "progressive", never have been, never will be. I’m an old-school pragmatist, and I care about results.
I do not trust people who built a structure to replace large parts of that structure. I fear that these guys *are* craftsmen, and, as such, can’t be expected to have the necessary distance from their own constructs to be able to evaluate them disinterestedly. You trust them to do that, which is a reasonable attitude to take. I don’t — which is also, a reasonable attitude to take.
I would have been much more comfortable with these choices if there were anybody at the same level who was a wild-eyed radical. That person would serve to hold the deal-makers to account, internally. The fact that there is no such person…yeah, that makes me very nervous.
demimondian
@Steve S.: With all due respect, any publication which nominates Dennis Kucinich for anything important is largely discredited by the choice.
Brachiator
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
I particularly liked the backgrounds of these two members of Obama’s national security transition team ("Serious People"):
That the Obama people would find and support people like this …
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Cain, I’m not always gentle, when I’m awakened from my comfort zone, I get quite pissy and I fully admit it. He felt he was being attacked and insulted BY ME, and I didn’t attack OR insult him. The most I said before he started attacking me was that he would need thicker skin to get along in this crowd (which btw is the same thing you said in different words).
—–
demi, I don’t think Obama is wild-eyed (he’s very calm, and I like that, he seems very confident and assuring) but I do think he’s radical, and as I said, he’s the ultimate "buck stops here" man. He has it in his self interest to make sure they don’t screw him, and I think he’s fully aware of what these guys are capable of.
jake 4 that 1
If you ever put together a Top 10 BJ posts, make sure this one isn’t any lower than #5.
Comrade Stuck
@Brachiator:
Yes, but, they worked in Government while Bush was president. They must be banished therefore, because they are are are Impure :)
Comrade Stuck
We have a large supply of "thicker skin" in the Funhouse. It’s used, but very thicker.
srv
In any normal universe, supporters of 40-1 net capital ratios would be called extremists or radicals. Here, not so.
The right has truly succeeded wildly beyond any expectations in redefining the norm. It’s one thing to rationalize not protesting against a war, or torture, or any of the other 100 things in the last 8 years. But rationalizing more of the same when they look at their 401k… I guess it’s the Chump Generation.
TheHatOnMyCat
Only to themselves and the chattering classes.
The voters don’t pay much attention to such things.
This is a country where most people want the government to be competent and to look out for their interests.
The "right" has shown that it can’t do either of those, and the voters aren’t really responding to their appeals now.
That might change, but it won’t be likely to change soon.
srv
Well, with all that shaking, Miscik didn’t resign. And her signature was on the dotted line as head of intelligence analysis. Slate cleaning the slate.
She went another 3 years before landing a job at Lehman Bros.
Atanarjuat
demimondian said:
Yeah, like knowing with near 100% certainty how all teen-aged mothers will turn out.
That kind of rank misogyny is definitely "old school," without question.
-Country First.
TheHatOnMyCat
OMG, not Rank Misogyny?
Say it ain’t so, Joe.
RankMisogyny
Hey? Who called my name?
TheHatOnMyCat
Just a note to whoever designed your moderation filter:
Have you considered a career in gardening?
Atanarjuat
As to the topic:
Surprise! The Great Redistributionist is a slippery chameleon, and all you hopey-changey suckers who bought into his dog-and-pony show are going to feel betrayed one way or another.
Then again, perhaps Obama knows the ultimate truth about liberals: it would be easier to herd cats than to please fickle leftists, who demand everything, expect everything, and want it to happen NOW.
I think I’ll drive over to Costco now and buy a palletful of Orville Redenbacher’s popcorn; it looks like I’ll be happily munching quite a bit while the Leftist Outrage Carnival Show continues to unfold with such delightful predictability.
-Country First.
demimondian
@Atanarjuat: Hey, atanutjob. You’re still not funny.
Atanarjuat
demimondian said:
I’m not trying to be, you POS misogynist. There’s probably a dog somewhere in the world that deserves the oxygen you’re stealing.
-Country First.
demimondian
@Atanarjuat: You *still* aren’t funny.
Loser.
TheHatOnMyCat
Well, in a campy sort of way, he’s unintentionally funny.
Sort of the way George Bush is funny.
I picture him sitting in front of a booklet called "How to do concern troll spoofing" and copying the examples out of the book into the blog.
"Country First?" It’s starting to sound like a brand of sausage, or a urinal block.
demimondian
@TheHatOnMyCat: I dunno. Thinking he’s funny is kind of laughing at the kids on the "short bus". It’s sick and disgusting.
Now, laughing a a governor who prates about moral values, yet is such an abject failure as a parent that her two eldest children ruin their lives before they graduate high school, on the other hand, is a perfectly good thing to do.
That One - Cain
@ThymeZone:
That would lead to explain somehow the flirtatious behavior between myselves as TZ, TZ the plumber, TheHatOnMyCat and CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII. :-)
cain
TheHatOnMyCat
demi, come on, the urinal block thing was comedy gold.
At least the sausage joke.
From now on I’m calling Atan "Country Crock."
I think Circus suggested it. Perfect fit.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
LMAO at this conversation.
TZ, I like your new hat, btw. ;)
Brachiator
@Steve S.:
Thanks. I note that some of the people mentioned at the counterpunch link have in fact been named to cabinet positions by Obama. Joseph Stiglitz, mentioned in both the links you provided, is an interesting figure. He may have too much stature now to accept a government post, but it is very interesting that he and Lawrence Summers have locked horns before:
It’s also interesting to note that some of these Progessive-approved people, such as Stiglitz or Susan Rice, have links to the Clinton Administration, which is supposed to be a bad thing for some (and I hope that Obama finds a place for Rice in his administration). A few others are strong Hillary Clinton loyalists, but not particularly impressive apart from their ideological leanings.
I’d like to see a few more Washington outsiders. I get nervous when panelists on "Washington Week In Review" smile and nod over some of the appointments and how "necessary" it is for Obama to have people who know how Washington works and who are conveniently noted in the contacts file of reporters and pundits.
You know, I quit a job once because of principle. I could handle the fallout, but still it was not an easy thing to do. But it immunized me against ever glibly expecting people resign in order to maintain their political or ideological purity.
demimondian
@TheHatOnMyCat: Oh, no. I think that the urinal block line was gold — and I’m all over the "Country Crock" tag line.
I just think that Atavistuat is just too pathetic in himself to be funny. Kind of like C+ Augustus these days.
TheHatOnMyCat
purr
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Atan, few of us expect Obama to do all we want to see done and many of us here on this very blog realize he is NOT going to run a liberal/progressive agenda (me included).
One question: Did George Bush lick your ass? Ummm, abortion is still legal, isn’t it? There are still several Democratically appointed justices on SCOTUS, there is still no prayer in school, Bill O’Reilly still will be ranting about the War on Christmas again, and fiscally the entire country is headed for financial Armageddon on it’s currently projected course… what did Bush do for you?
TheHatOnMyCat
So, concern trolls to Gitmo, and Republicans rounded up and confined to reservations …… off the table?
Shit.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Yes, I believe I came up with that at breakfast recently. Thanks for remembering. ;)
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
::insert hilarious WR laugh::
(welcome to my inside joke) ;)
That One - Cain
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
Goddam, that’s a bad visual.
cain
Doug H. (Fausto no more)
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
He pissed off the liberals.
– Me First (and screw the Gimme Gimmes)
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
LMAO Cain… do you need something to wipe that vision away now? Sorry!
btw…
You ARE differentiating between TZ’s characters and me? TZ is not me, I can assure you. You will notice the following things that differentiate us:
1. I use the word "perhaps" a LOT
2. I use run on sentences, lots of paragraphs, place periods inside of quotes half the time and outside the other half and I don’t use a link on my names (this one and Rome Again – I did use a link on Rome Again a couple of times, haven’t done that in months). I know how to post multi-lined quotes without bold text (he doesn’t – I tried to teach him, he’s difficult to train). Oh, and I also use RAISED WORDS for affect quite often.
3. I speak openly about events in my life, TZ doesn’t very often, even to me in person.
4. TZ articulates arguments based on written argument, while I am a social science ramifications thinker. I write as I cognate a problem (I’m also a woman and have some strange female intuition that is scarily accurate for reasons I don’t even understand – a bit of trivia: TZ was thinking of voting for Hillary before I told him why I didn’t think she was a good choice (this was back in like April) and he asked me who I liked and I told him Obama if he would keep his religion to himself – TZ started seriously looking at Obama after that).
5. I post a LOT about my understanding of religion (a totally different viewpoint than most people would ever realize), whereas TZ doesn’t have any religious preference except that the righties would stop using religion as a weapon and an excuse to change everything around them. He doesn’t quote scripture, I do.
TZ is much more sophisticated in his speech than I am. He ALWAYS (if he does not, it’s very rarely) has a link with a site or picture. When he creates names they never have spaces in them, mine always do) and my names always have to do with Rome (don’t ask why, it’s a long story). Whoops, I did create a troll name once, about two years ago, right after I moved to Phoenix, it was called Moll Slanders (this is a confession – ::smiles:: – oh, and I use ::action symbols:: that he doesn’t use at all).
You DO realize I’m a separate person? Just checking.
:) (oh, and I post a lot of smilies and winks)
Ha!
Steve S.
I wouldn’t nominate Kucinich for anything either, but that’s only because his image has been trashed by the MSM, in much the same way that Jerry Brown’s was. Note that Brown has in fact been a very effective and relatively progressive politician over a long period of time, though his options are somewhat limited by the media’s narrative about him.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
He only pissed off liberals because he was clueless, heartless and a liar. If Republicans were truly concerned about their country, they would have been pissed off too. Country first IS a crock, it’s only about party and nothing more.
The embarrassment this country has suffered to accommodate that idiot for the last almost eight years amazes me still to this very day. Only hateful and vengeful morons would allow the executive office of our country to be treated as it was just to harass the party on the other side of the aisle.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
Oh, and Cain, I often make a slight mistake that goes unnoticed until later and have to correct myself a lot too (here comes another one)…
I said I use lots of paragraphs (I do that too, I’m very long winded and I realize it) but, I meant to say "parenthesis".
I use a lot of parenthesis. Check that last post I wrote you, I think there were about 10-15 in there.
Whoops!
Cassidy
@ Circus
Oh, I’m still smart. I’m not a liberal. Seriously, nothings changed about me, I just know what team I’m on when the big day comes. MUP, Hillary, Krazy Kucinich…doesn’t matter. I know the Dems are going in the right direction.
FYI, to the purity queens, ideologocal purity losses my kinds vote. Do you really think you can win an election w/out my demographic?
Cassidy
Oh and Circus…not holding agrudge mind you…but suggesting I go get blown up is a little more than "giving me a hard time". Just saying is all.
And periods inside parenthesis is grammatically correct, but looks retarded. That’s my reason anyway.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
@Brachiator:
Well, I’m not trying to state that all of the people he is relying on are what we would call really good people, just that they may have some reason to not have completely sold out. I expect he will deal a bit differently with some people than he would with others. I expect he even anticipated that there may be some arm-twisting involved. He is sharp, he is bold and I think he expects that he will have to condition some people to work with him (and perhaps he even likes that prospect – as we have seen with him on the campaign, he likes playing cat and mouse and he’s very good at it). I think he has been thinking about how to sway some players that may not have been swayed by other men.
Do I think he’s a messiah? Nope. Do I think he can make mistakes? He’s human; but I also think he has had a lot of time to think about how to fix things and how to impress upon some who would normally not be coaxed the reasons why they need to help him repair this nation. I personally recognize that he holds that kind of talent and likes to exercise it. it’s why he went looking for votes on the right as well as the left. He is bold and innovative.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
See Cassidy? You just proved my point. You and I had some very harsh arguments and I got verbally intense and said some things in the heat of anger that were pretty disturbing. I don’t normally go that far, your arguments drove me up a wall and after weeks of that, I got serious and went farther arguing against you than I ever did with anyone. What o kanis saw today wasn’t even a spat. I was happy, I was not disturbed in the least, I was having a friendly debate and then was told that I was attacking him. I did no such thing, YOU know what I’m like on the attack. (and now that you realize you need Dems to get stuff accomplished, and I’ve seen your postings recently, I’m apologizing for the nasty shit I said, I am truly sorry for that behavior now).
::shake on it?::
(and periods inside of parenthesis look retarded to me too).
Brian J
To whatever extent people like Robert Rubin (who, it seems, won’t be involved in the administration once Obama is sworn in), Larry Summers, and Tim Geithner are "responsible" for what has happened, some of them at least have seem open to more financial regulation. I’m not versed in these matters enough to have a strong opinion one way or another, but I will say that (a) the answer to alleged problems with deregulation isn’t necessarily more regulation and (b) I’m not ready to say that there’s very little difference between someone like Larry Summers and Phil Gramm.
I also don’t even a tenth about someone like Christina Romer compared to, say, Brad DeLong. But when I read that she was being named, it seemed like a very smart decision, based on what I do know. Any mainstream economics blogger would say that she’s one of the nation’s top experts on the Great Depression and fiscal and monetary policy. DeLong said she’s a center-left moderate, which makes sense*, but at the very least, she signed the first petition against the Bush tax cuts. That’s a good sign to me.
*Part of the reason so many people are bound to be disappointed is that there’s a relatively limited number of people who can fill spots like the CEA chair. If what I’ve read is any indication, it’s not the field where you’d find a lot of extremists, at least as far as people with the appropriate stature to fill a spot like this.
TheHatOnMyCat
You left off one thing: You are much nicer than I am.
Of course, everybody is nicer than I am.
Cain
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
Of course I do! However, TZ was claiming that perhaps I was all his personas (or maybe I was impersonating everyone) So I was poking gentle fun at the relationship between the two of you.
cain
Cain
@CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII:
Actually, I do too. I blame this keyboard. I never blame myself.
cain
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Only when you haven’t eaten. ;)
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Okay, I just have gotten very upset when people have accused me of being TZ’s sock puppet. He’s much smarter than I am, trust me, and I possess female qualities that if you knew him, you would realize he wouldn’t be caught dead trying to imitate. He’s all male and I’m completely female and we play out those gender personality roles very well, both online and off (talking about conversational method only, not anything more than that).
Carry on! ;)
Atanarjuat
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII, President George W. Bush didn’t "lick" my "ass," as you so rudely put it (though I wonder if there’s some projection there on your part), but he did prosecute the War on Terror unflinchingly and without delay after 9/11.
There’s a strong reason why America has not suffered another terrorist attack of this nature since 9/11, and it’s not because liberals have insisted on giving Islamists their legal rights, but because Bush’s first concern is the safety of our nation. So keep tossing rude rejoinders and dismissing the accomplishments of our President; it doesn’t mean that everyone else is as blindly and reflexively anti-Bush or that many others haven’t appreciated his service and diligence to the nation.
-Country First.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Oh really? Would you like to name the Iraqis who were on the planes on 9/11?
Bush attacked the wrong people, the people on the planes were SAUDI. Bush attacked a country whose leader was fundamentally at odds with Osama bin Laden and Iraq wasn’t a hotbed for Al Qaeda activity until AFTER we invaded it.
Dipshit!
demimondian
@Atanutjob: Dude, you aren’t funny. Not even a little bit.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
So Bush "unflinchingly" invaded a country of innocent people and shed the blood of hundreds of thousands (some estimates are in the millions) because he had the go ahead from his supporters who did it because of RELIGIOUS and ETHNIC HATRED.
Congratulations, shit for brains.
And where is Osama bin Laden?
George Bush (quoted in a White House Press Conference, March, 2002):
"And, again, I don’t know where he [Osama Bin Laden] is. I — I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."
George Bush (quoted November of 2005):
"There was no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the attack of 9/11, I’ve never said that and never made that case prior to going into Iraq."
Quotes of George W. Bush
Bush went to Iraq to make himself a big man in Washington to avenge his father’s half baked Iraq war. You have been duped and you don’t even consider the innocent lives that were taken.
Your hero Bush "unflinchingly" made a huge mistake that costs lives . I hope you are proud of him.
DougJ
BUT SUMMERS NAD GEITHNER *CAUSED* TEH CRISIS
Cain
@Atanarjuat:
But the idea kind of excites you, right? I mean, you’ve been licking his ass for quite some time here, it’s only fair he return the favor I think.
cain
srv
Equally weak. Unless you mean we needed more female bankers and economists and they got in the way.
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Actually, the words lick and ass are both words that can be found in all sorts of places, even the Bible (I’m not sure lick is there, but I know ass is).
Now, if I had said "tongue-lash your anus" that would have been different.
You "lick ass" all the time when you verbally beat up on Democrats.
Thanks for playing.
TenguPhule
Anthrax Attacks.
Even as spoof, I can’t abide asshats who neglect it.
Atanarjuat
TenguPhule blithely quoted, then just as blithely said:
That’s funny, I can’t abide asshats who fail to read for comprehension. Notice the part of my statement you quoted that has the qualifier "of this nature?"
Do you understand what that means? Do you understand there’s a world of difference between the 9/11 terrorist attacks that took thousands of lives and was executed by foreign nationals, and the anthrax attacks that killed a handful and was likely planned by a domestic nutjob?
Even more importantly, do YOU understand that the anthrax attacks took place only ONE week after the 9/11 terrorist attack?
Okay, let me help you here: even if the President of the United States of America was Obama back then (or even Al Gore), there’s no way he could have responded effectively to either attack in a week or less. In your chronic George W. Bush hatred, you’ve totally lost the ability to think clearly or reason logically.
Now, fast-forward: ever since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and, yes, even the anthrax attacks that occurred only a week later, there hasn’t been such an attack on American soil, ESPECIALLY of the 9/11 nature.
It’s amusing that you anti-conservative knee-jerk liberals obsess on finding "spoofs," but can’t be bothered to understand basic facts in the context provided. But then again, as I’ve seen repeatedly here on BJ, most of you suffer not just from anti-Republican rage, but from not having taken RIF as children.
That’s real sad, even for Bush haters like CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII who seem to be just as obsessed with picturing one’s opponents licking anyone’s ass for any reason. Yeah, those are some nice liberal values you people have.
-Country First.
Tattoosydney
Annoying spoof troll is annoyed (and all alone in big empty room where no one is listening).
Conservatively Liberal
Atanarjuat is just a goatfucker, so wasting your time on the idiot is just that. A waste of time. He is out to get goats, and he is as sloppy as fuck. The goatfucker is definitely out for attention, same as myiq3.14159. They are one and the same as far as I am concerned. Same MO, and SOS.
Both double as McCain ball washers.
myiq2xu
I thought I heard assCLown calling my name
Conservatively Liberal
Time for your morning drive-by Goatboy? Go back and hang with the rest of the racist fuckwits at Cornfluence. Speaking of assclowns, I hear that that you are the best when it comes to being a clown who is an ass. You even decorate your blog with clowns.
Throw a few goat pictures up and you will have the perfect atmosphere for you and your ilk.
myiq2xu
assCLown:
How’s daddy’s favorite little bitch today?
Conservatively Liberal
Come on GoatBoy, is that all you got? What a wuss. What a bitter racist little goatfucking ratfucker you are.
Former Hillary supporter turned McCain ball washer? Poor little GoatBoy, you have nothing to show for your ratfucking so all you can do is haunt the places you shit all over.
Pathetic.
myiq2xu
C’mon little steveeboy, assume the position and give daddy some sugar!
Conservatively Liberal
Steeveboy? Is that the pet name you whisper in your
goat’svictim’s ear during hot goat sex?Kinky little racist goatfucker, aren’t ya?
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
Wow, I was just talking about how you got rewarded by Bush for your support, trust me, I didn’t get any sexual pleasure from the question at all.