Via the Sully borg, this idiocy:
“We should not bring Guantanamo terrorists to the heartland. It would make us a new mecca for terrorists, for Al Jazeera and other network attention and I think would lower the security of the entire United States,” – Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL), asked about the possibility of a detainee transfer to a prison in Illinois.
Um, millions of non-terrorists go to Mecca VOLUNTARILY. The goal of terrorists is not to end up in a supermax in central Illinois, but heaven or Valhalla or whatever the hell they call it. What a jackass. And as Bodenner noticed, love the gratuitous smear of Al Jazeera. Apparently anything that starts with Al is scary.
‘Cepting Al Bundy, of course.
Thanks, Republicans and Green party, for six years of this.
Dave
Boy, the Green Party sure does love putting asshole Republicans into office, don’t they?
cleek
algebra is a secret mooslim plot to enslave our minds!
Odie Hugh Manatee
Oh fudge, here come the Greenies to bitch and moan.
On the bright side, at least there aren’t many of them online, probably because they are trying to conserve energy, use fewer resources and save the earth.
@cleek:
Especially when you know they really want to say Fatherland.
Eh? EH?!
Dave
Aluminum is a scary terrorist element!!
Chyron HR
Isn’t he bisexual?
cleek
also, anyone who says “heartland” or “homeland”, without sneering at the condescending jingoism, should be whipped.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@cleek: My father never understood I was striking a blow for freedom with my Ds.
I think within a couple of years, we’re gonna be talking about “Kirkisms”, this guy seems to have that special combination of stupid and thinks-he’s-smart, like a young Rick Santorum.
WyldPirate
Good FSM, but do I detest fuckwits that use the term “heartland”. It harkens back to the use of “motherland” by the Soviets.
And what is with these dumbasses that think terrorists are so bad assed compared to our own street gangsters and thugs? For fuck’s sakes the damned medical profession easily kills 100K+ per year due to accidental causes due to their refusal to use things like checklists but do we get upset by that? Fuck no. Instead we disrupt the lives of millions–and butcher and maim hundreds of thousands of innocents in other countries– for decades over a single event that killed a tiny number.
Fucking fuck stupid fuckwits who can’t assess risk because they have their heads inserted in their fourth point of contact.
shortstop
I told youse guys that Kirk’s tenure as a non-asshole would be brief. Of course the people who actually live around Thomson Correctional Center and are panting for jobs are all for this move. Instead of getting a goodly number of hurting people employed, Kirk must pander to all the fools wetting their pants in the belief that suspected terrists harbor the superhuman ability to slip through supermax security, and that a bunch of ill-intentioned Muslims are going to descend on this whiter-than-white farm town to stage a prison breakout. Because, you know, they wouldn’t stand out at all.
Comrade Dread
This fails on so many levels.
For one, most of the genuine terrorists we’ve got aren’t high level supervillains with laser beams coming out of their eyes.
No, they’re the worst of the worst, only in the sense that they’re more often than not complete bleeding morons. Literally probably the lowest functioning human beings one can find outside of a coma ward. Completely disposable.
Which is why the folks that send them out have no problem if they actually succeed in blowing themselves up. They can replace them fairly rapidly by grabbing some other idiot, filling his head with ideas that he can escape his crappy existence and trade it up for virgins in heaven, and strap a bomb/AK-47 on him and send him out.
That is to say, even if we didn’t have the largest prison system in the world that has successfully incarcerated far more dangerous people, I just don’t see Al Qaeda sitting around plotting a multiyear prison break strategy for the idiots who couldn’t even blow themselves up right.
KC
Intelligence + Well Articulated Thoughts = Elite
mellowjohn
i’ve been watching mark kirk from fairly close-up since he was first elected in the IL-10 (i live in the IL-5). he’s not the moderate many people outside illinois seem to think. he’s a political wind-sock.
he ran to the center as a congressman because his district was purple. but to get the senatorial nomination, he had to run hard right. he won (barely) against a democrat with issues and should probably have won by more, given the political climate nationwide.
he may vote for things like DADT repeal occasionally (many in illinois think is vote was more “enlightened self-interest” for a naval reservist – if you know what i mean, nudge, nudge, wink, wink), but he’s going to be a highly reliable vote for yertle mcturtle, just as he was for orange john
david mizner
The Green Party, unlike both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party, wants to put suspects on trial, if possible, and if not to let them go, and to shut down Guantanamo.
Kirk may express his position more stupidly but it’s essentially the same position as that of every top-level Democrat.
scottinnj
Gee I didn’t know Paul Simon and Chevy Chase got it all started with ‘you can call me Al”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsEjsIbWq88
Gus diZerega
The Greens – if they did not exist the Republicans would have had to invent them.
When Green leaders works hard for majority vote replacing plurality elections, I’ll respect them.
Till then they are Republican agents for all intent and purposes because they are too filled with their sense of self-righteousness to notice the impact of their actions.
Suffern ACE
I think there already was a Mecca in the heartland and the Milwaukee Bucks used to play there. If we built a new one, the terrorists could use it on off nights for semi-pro hockey or ice shows.
Dave
@david mizner: That may be what the Green Party WANTS to do. What they actually ACCOMPLISH is getting asshats like Bush and Kirk elected.
Dave
@WyldPirate: Here’s something ironic. If you are old enough, you may have seen the ABC miniseries “Amerika”, which conservatives demanded after “The Day After” aired and thought was so liberal in showing what a nuclear war would be like for an average American.
So it’s a conservative’s nightmare/wet dream about the Soviets taking over America. And they carve these bullshit “states” out of the country. And the first one is named…Heartland.
cleek
@KC:
elitist sticker.
Paris
The Green Party endorsed Mark Kirk?
david mizner
@Dave:
Well, wanting is the first step. If Obama had wanted to close down Gitmo, he could’ve have done so.
My point, if it isn’t clear, is it’s silly to blame the Green Party when the Democratic Party leaves a gargantuan opening on the left. If you want to be a corporate-centrist party, well, okay, but you can hardly complain when some DFHs try to scoop up a few progressive votes.
Chyron HR
@david mizner:
It’s amazing what noble positions you can support when there’s no danger of any member of your party being in a position to enact them.
Just Some Fuckhead
It is not the Green Party’s responsibility to get your candidate elected. They have their own candidates. It is your candidate’s responsibility to attract the support of folks that may be inclined to vote Green or take up the political space Green candidates occupy.
Otherwise, it’s a lot like Republicans claiming they can’t win elections because people keep voting Democratic.
WyldPirate
@Dave:
Your point is well taken, but the problem is that the two-party system–along with their systematic suppression of any competing party– is becoming a more obviously a complete failure at governing on every level with each passing year.
david mizner
@Chyron HR:
In fact, there are more than 100 Green party members holding elected office.
More to point maybe, their position on this was the same as Obama’s former position. Our problem and the world’s problem is that Obama is in a position to enact it and refuses to do so.
david mizner
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Yup. Democracy’s a bitch, having to earn votes and such.
WyldPirate
@Dave:
I remember “Amerika” and the Conservetard uproar after “The Day After”.
The lack of self-awareness and the ignorance of most Americans regarding their country’s own history and that of Western Civilization is stunning.
John Cole
@Just Some Fuckhead: Who said it was their responsibility to elect Democrats? I’m merely thanking them!
burnspbesq
@david mizner:
I’m sorry, but even on Christmas Eve you don’t get to make up your own reality. Tell us how, in the face of a Congressional refusal to appropriate funds to do anything about Gitmo, Obama is supposed to do anything. Be specific, and give examples.
Just Some Fuckhead
@John Cole: In that case, the Green Party would like to thank you for your continued efforts to elect Republicans.
shortstop
@mellowjohn:
More likely enlightened self-interest for a closeted Republican who has seen what happens to other closeted Republicans who vote to keep civil rights and liberties and basic respect away from gays and lesbians, I think.
Cat Lady
Thumb sucking bedwetters, all of them, and I apologize in advance to all the babies out there who can’t help themselves. Fucking courage – how does that work?
Al Green – not scary. When I go to a party and the person who says they brought the Al Green, that’s your friend.
Amanda in the South Bay
@david mizner:
Eh, what-Santa Cruz and Eugene? Wake me up when they actually do something nationally other than siphon Dem votes and help elect Republicans.
Bill Murray
@burnspbesq: those millions of hidden use black ops money used by the CIA and DoD
david mizner
@burnspbesq:
Well, that money blocked was to transfer un-tried suspects en masse to American soil.
First, Obama should’ve and could’ve released all the suspects the government can’t or won’t put on trial, then put the rest on trial in the federal courts, as they did with Ghailani, who will sentenced on January 25th and sent to a federal prison.
Would it have been hard? Yes. Would the GOP have put up a fight? Yes.
schrodinger's cat
I guess that explains their animosity towards Al Gore.
Mark
@Amanda in the South Bay: You don’t have to look far. My mom is 60, getting to the end of her 99 weeks, and has access to health insurance because of San Francisco’s health plan. Her premiums at Kaiser are $10 a month.
Where did that program come from? The Green Party and Left-Wing Democrats on the board of supervisors.
Gavin Newsom takes credit for the program, but he opposed it initially because the restaurant industry didn’t support it. That’s the difference between the vast majority of our piece of shit Democrats and Green Party members who govern.
A city implements limited single-payer health insurance and it reduces public health costs. That has national implications, even if Democrats are too feeble to recognize it and capitalize on it.
Phil Perspective
@Odie Hugh Manatee: I am not sure the Greens cost us the Senate seat formerly held by the President. After all, the Glibertarian candidate did get a decent amount of votes.
sukabi
Al Jazeera was more than likely thrown in for making US “news” look bad… they did do a comprehensive piece on the first responders healthcare bill that the regular US media slept through until The Daily Show did their 2-3 night flogging.
Mike in NC
Speaker Boehner will soon be getting well acquainted with Al-Anon, one might suggest.
El Cid
O no! Our prisons have made the US a Mecca for drug users!
shortstop
@Mike in NC: Al-Anon is for the relatives and friends of alcoholics. If Boehner happens to hit bottom and start recovery, he’ll be in Alcoholics Anonymous.
shortstop
@El Cid: You laugh, but can you deny that all the meth heads gathered in a rusted-out Nova in the parking lot of the Joliet Correctional Center, making befuddled plans to to spring their buddy inside, are a significant threat to national security?
El Cid
@shortstop: Oh no! Our rusted out 1970s muscle cars have made us a Mecca for meth!
Dennis SGMM
According to the latest year for which I can find numbers, as of October, 2008, the Green Party had a total of 255,019 registered voters. That’s the total. California had the most Greens with 118,416 registered, followed by New York with just over 29,000, and Maine with a bit more than 27,000.
If this small number of registered Greens poses a threat to the Democrats then it seems to me that the Dems have some serious work to do in raising voter turnout, and winning over more undecideds and swing voters.
alwhite
6 years hell! Where have you been for the last 30? In fact you really can go back to the post WWII anti-communist hysteria to see this same shit going on. The boggie man might change but the tactic is the same.
The only thing that has made it worse is that for the last 30 years the Republicans have no policy or goals once elected so they have had to flog the hate more.
handy
I always knew Al Michaels was a scary treasonous ‘Murka hater. Well, he’s apparently a wingnut anyway, so what’s the difference, amirite?
BTW, if I had to pick one Green for the mess we’re in it would probably be Nader, who isn’t really a Green but an opportunist. And I’m saying this as someone *hangs head in shame* who voted for him.
Uloborus
@david mizner:
Yes, that approach has been considered and can’t be done. We have nowhere to release them. Do you understand? NOWHERE. We can’t release them in America. Every other country we know has refused.
And you do not seem to understand what a 90-8 vote in the Senate means. It means ‘This is not an issue that even Obama can finagle.’ You really can’t get a more blatant demonstration that congress is determined to stop any and all attempts to release those prisoners.
Incidentally, where exactly should he try them, since congress refuses him the funds to move him anywhere that there’s a valid court?
You are, in fact, being the perfect example of a Green party member here. You want your flying ponies so bad that you’re happy to see the regular pony you’re being offered sent to the butcher’s. You have no grasp of the context of the situation or what the limits of the law are, only what sounds to you like the moral thing to do in simple language.
New Yorker
This is obviously Obama’s fault. If he had only used the bully pulpit, Kirk would agree to close GTMO and bring the suspects to Illinois. Obama obviously wants to keep every one of them down there.
WyldPirate
@burnspbesq:
Get about two C-130’s and fly them into Gitmo. Shackle the prisoners remaining. Fly their ass to Bagram Airbase. We have a big prison there were we tortured the fuck out of people–you gotta love this–““pulpified” their legs along with their brains.
Hold them in Bagram until we leave while trying to try as many in court as possible. Hold them there at Bagram while we work on the solution for the remaining prisoners.
If we need to–as bad as this sounds–we can simply abandon the fuckers whose minds we destroyed and bodies we brutalized by becoming as bad or worse than the people we were condemning.
there is no excuse for gitmo still being open. None.
There is no excuse for the bullshit proposal of “indefinite detention without trial”. None. This BS re: Gitmo and “human rights/civil rights the Obama administration has done and is proposing, is IMO, his worst “leadership” failure.
johnsmith1882
@Phil Perspective:
Specifically regarding the election of Kirk, the Green Party taking away votes from Guinnulias had little to do with the outcome. Guinnulias was a weak candidate with a sketchy past (ran both the Illinois head-start (pay for your kid’s college ahead of time, whatever it’s called) and his bank into the ground). His (lack of) business acumen, coupled with a kind of smirky persona, doomed him from the beginning. Even still, he made a huge run towards the end, and went from double digit points down to losing by something along the lines of 48%-52%. Illinois is a pretty safe bet for getting Dems elected, but it was Guinnulias himself that sunk his campaign. Even Gov. Quinn got re-elected, and he’s not been particularly popular since taking the Gov. mansion over from nitwit Blago. I blame the Greens as much as anyone for what happened in 2000 (myself voted for Nader, yay me), but Kirk’s Senate win has nothing to do with them, and everything to do with the crappiness of his opponent. (So crappy, even Illinois couldn’t push him across the line).
Jewish Steel
Oh! The principled pouting, whining and special pleading from my Green brethren election night this year. There. There’s your Green party in action. How’s that taste, idiots?
Fucking winner take all elections! How do they work?
johnsmith1882
@Jewish Steel:
In states like Illinois, the Green party can be an effective “protest vote” without affecting the chances of the Democrat. Illinois so solidly goes blue that the 5% or so that vote Green don’t take enough votes away, so the Dem still wins. I can’t speak for other states, but Kirk’s being our new Senator doesn’t have anything to do with the Green party.
Ailuridae
@Uloborus:
This has been explained at length to Mr Mizner many times here by myself and others. Like most firebaggers he is not arguing in good faith. Your patience is almost assuredly going to be tried here. A warning in advance.
Ailuridae
@johnsmith1882:
3.2% voted Green. The margin was 2.3%. Are you really sure it didn’t affect the outcome?
Montysano
I have friends who are shocked, shocked I tell you, to find that I occasionally visit the Al Jazeera English site. Of course, the reality is that it’s about as bland and Fair and Balanced as they come. Do we really need to pretend that CNN, given the chance, wouldn’t have fallen all over themselves to be the first to run the bin Laden tapes?
johnsmith1882
@Ailuridae:
Yes, I am sure. Guinnulias was a crappy candidate. He cost himself, and the Dem party, the election. That 3.2% figure happens in every election around here. To think that this one time it was an outlier is incorrect. You can’t realistically figure that that 3-5% is going to suddenly be 0%. A stronger Dem candidate would have won the Senate seat with ease. As it was, a candidate nobody much liked still came within 2-4% of defeating Kirk.
I can see what you are saying, 3% is more than 2%, Guinnulias would have won if 0% voted Green. But you have to look at that 3% as a constant, not an outlier. 0% Green is not going to happen, so get more votes, Dem candidate.
Ailuridae
@johnsmith1882:
You’re not thinking clearly. If the green candidate in every election gets 3-5% and say 80% of those vote D without a green candidate it doesn’t in any way imply that the Green Party’s existence isn’t a detriment to electing Ds. Furthest thing from the truth.
What is true is that the Green Party is a persistent feature on the IL ballot that likely costs the D party votes each and every year. This time, it just happened to elect a Republican Senator.
RSA
__
Alarms, Albanians, albatrosses, albinos, … Hey, you’re right!
New Yorker
@RSA:
don’t forget algebra. That scared the hell out of me freshman year of high school..
johnsmith1882
@Ailuridae:
Um, I’m going to say this politely, even though you question my mental acumen. Do you live in Illinois? Are you familiar with Alexi Guinnulias? If 3-5% can vote Green in Illinois in every election and not affect the outcome, what is the outlier here? Is it that 3-5%, or is it a weak Democratic candidate? Politics doesn’t happen in a vacuum. This wasn’t the blues versus the reds, this was Alexi Guinnulias versus Mark Kirk. Guinnulias, a weak candidate with a shaky past, and Kirk, who presented himself as a moderate republican (and who has already voted to repeal DADT). Further, is electing Dems the _only_ reason for voting? What if the Democratic candidate is a poor choice, as Guinnulias was? You seem to be advocating dissolving the Green party, so the blue team has a better shot. That might work on paper, but in real life, the blue team had a weak candidate.
Jewish Steel
@Ailuridae:
@johnsmith1882:
Gah! A virus has eated my Google Chrome. I cannot join the fray meaningfully but to briefly ask, what are Greens protesting w/their protest vote? Are they involved in D or R primaries? What message are they trying to send and who do they think is getting it?
If we had parliamentary style apportionment you could not felild a candidate to red for me pull the lever for. But we don’t.
(pardon any typos. m bb will only show me 75% of this combox.
Gus diZerega
The problem with the Greens is not that they should not have a position different from Democrats and Republicans. We need such a party and my personal sentiments are Green. The problem with the Greens is that their leadership, such as it is, leads for ego reasons and NOT to change anything. And that is being flattering.
If they were in it for more than warm tingly feelings of self-roghteousness they would be pushing really hard and constantly for majority vote elections. This is a practical goal in states with initiatives. Running initiative campaigns for majority vote and instant run off would actually increase the Green vote because people like me would then often vote for them. Wh knows? They might start winning even.
But apparently pushing an initiative like that is too much trouble because then the initiative and not the candidate gets talked about. Not so much ego gratification.
Jewish Steel
*…field a candidate too red…
I am not proposing felating a candidate unto redness here.
Amanda in the South Bay
@Mark:
I stand corrected, while still maintaining that legions of disaffected left wingers voting green in 2012 gives me the creeps. President Pawlenty!!
Citizen Alan
Don’t forget to blame Monica Moorehead. Because if only the 600 or so Floridians who voted for the Workers of the World Party had instead voted for Gore, he’d have carried the state and the election.
The Nader campaign was a factor in Gore losing, but it wasn’t the only one. Gore declined the aid of Bill Clinton, one of the most gifted politicians in living memory, and instead spent the summer of 2000 pretending he didn’t even know the man. Despite knowing that Florida would be a vital swing state, he decided not to choose as his VP Bob Graham, the highly popular Senator from that state whose presence would have easily put him over the top. Despite knowing that there was a groundswell of anger from the Left wing of the party over various perceived betrayals by the Clinton administration, he decided instead to pick a VP candidate even further to his Right.
And so, he went with Joe Fucking Lieberman, the most repulsive Democrat in America, apparently because Lieberman was the most prominent Democrat to come out against Clinton during the Lewinsky scandal. Oh, and maybe so that Lieberman and Tipper could bond over their mutual desire to ban everything under the sun “for the children.”
And despite the obvious fact that Nader was beginning to attract media attention, Gore refused to make even trivial efforts to reach out to disaffected left-wing voters. Instead, he ignored Nader and the left completely except for when he joined ranks with Bush to keep Nader out of the debates, an arrogant and contemptuous gesture that only reinforced Nader’s “Republicrat” meme that both parties were out of touch, inbred with each other, and antithetical to functioning democracy, and also a move that almost certainly increased the size of the Nader protest vote.
Al Gore did nearly everything he could to give the 2000 election to Bush. That includes going out of his way to practically dare people who should have supported him to instead vote for a third party. And in the end, the ineptness of his campaign made the race in Florida close enough for Bush to stead. Gore’s supporters should grow up and take responsibility for that fact. It’s over. Build a bridge and get over it.
gene108
@Mark:
The problem with the Green Party / Liberals is they do not understand what needs to be done, in order to govern or get their agenda passed.
San Francisco has become a fairly liberal town, by most Americans standards.
The Democrats are willing to give liberals an ear, which is why they are the Party that pushes shit like repealing DADT or Clinton’s attempt to end the military’s ban on gays, in 1993, or Clinton and then Obama’s attempts and finally success at achieving near universal coverage.
But for all the hard work Democrats do for liberals, which usually ends up costing them elections – even in the liberal hey-day of the 1960’s, Democrats got their assess handed to them in 1966 because of Civil Rights votes and in 1968 lost the White House, as white voters became Republicans due to Civil Rights – the liberals don’t ever fucking bother to thank them for trying.
You can’t govern, when the politician you send up to do your bidding tries and fails and you want to vote that politician out of office because they tried and failed.
I don’t fucking get that mindset. Liberals spend 100% more energy attacking Democrats for trying to enact liberal legislation and failing to do so, more than they spend going after Republicans or trying to change the public’s sentiment on issues.
The Green Party just gives this behavior an “organized” outlet.
Even if the Green’s became a national Party, and we had a 3-4 Party system in America, say a far left, center-left, center-right, and far right political parties, the Green’s would actually have to compromise with the center-right and center-left parties to get anything done.
The fucking attitude of liberals / Greens is their shit is fucking superior that if we did, everyone would automatically come around to loving it.
The case in point is the single-payer health plan you brought up. There’s no acknowledgment or acceptance that people’s reservations about single-payer or expanding government’s role in health care is legitimate. It’s just, “this shit is the bomb and if the rest of the country did it, they’d understand it”.
I think that’s why anytime something liberal attempts to get done you hear rhetoric like “shoving it down our throats, or people thinking the liberals are condescending, elitists.
You’ve had 16 years to push the health care discussion to the Left, since Clinton’s failed attempt in 1994 and if anything, the country has moved to the Right, in regards to health care delivery and wanting less government involvement and more privatization.
Quit bitching about why Democrats aren’t liberal enough. The reason Democrats aren’t liberal enough is because conservatives have successful scared their electorate into rejecting liberal policies.
Liberals don’t bother to try and discuss this shit with voters and why single payer would be better. They just have hissy fits, when Democrats are rightfully scared they’ll get voted out of office by tacking to the left – see liberal sweetheart and one term Congressman Al Grayson, as an example – and don’t do shit to change what people are talking about.
If you guys really think Dems and Reps are the same, would President McCain have done anything to change the status quo on health care reform? Repeal DADT? Signed the Lilly Ledbetter law? Withdrawn combat troops from Iraq (FYI no Republican Presidential candidate in 2008, except Ron Paul, wanted to end combat operations)? Attempt to close GITMO, when the Republicans in their primary debates, again with the exception of Ron Paul, were talking about doubling or tripling the size of the damn place?
The hard-left in this country are a bunch of ungrateful sadistic fucks. If someone takes a big political gamble, like President Clinton and tries to get gays to openly serve in the military and fails, the end result is you want to punch him, kick him to the curb and stomp on his head for the failure.
By contrast, gutting / privatizing Social Security was a bigger failure, in 2005 with regards to how far it got in the legislative process versus Clinton’s failure to repeal the fact it was 100% illegal to be gay and in the military (whether open or closeted) at the time or health care reform, but the right-wingers aren’t Bush, Jr.-bashing for this failure.
They have a goal and they keep trying to achieve it. They don’t shit on Bush, Jr. for his failure, because he at least tried.
If nothing else this gives a sense of strength / unity/ purpose for conservatives and helps them sell their agenda.
The Party that gives liberals the time of day isn’t the enemy and wish liberals would wake up and realize that. If they want Democrats to be more liberal, they don’t need to elect “more and better Democrats”, they need to fucking have the electorate in Democratic districts and various states demand for more liberal policies. You want Ben Nelson to be more like Bernie Sanders? Change the attitude of voters in Nebraska.
The Republicans changed the attitude of voters in Tennessee, very successfully in the 1990’s. Al Gore, Jr., whose father Al Gore, Sr. was a long serving Senator in the state, didn’t win his home state in the 2000 Presidential election, despite his families high level of name recognition in the state for generations.
The Clinton-Gore ticket carried Tennessee in 1992 and 1996, for some perspective on how quickly the Republicans were able to win Gore’s home state from him in 2000.
Quit bitching at the political process and start working to change the opinions of voters. And FYI, you aren’t going to change the opinion of voters, when things you want, like expanding health care coverage, actually gets passed and you have nothing positive to say about it.
Most folks aren’t junkies. All the hear is from the Right that Obamacare sucks. All the hear from the left is Obamacare sucks, ergo Obamacare sucks and does nothing to improve on the current system, so we should vote the dumbfucks who passed this terrible legislation out of office.
And who is openly opposing and talking about repealing Obamacare? Republicans. So those assholes get voted into office, because otherwise we’d be saddled with this terrible law that does nothing to improve anything about health care for most Americans and makes things worse, per what the Left and Right are saying.
End Rant.
johnsmith1882
@Jewish Steel:
Generally, the “protest” part of that would be lefties voting left, but not for the democrat. (I know, Ailuridae, this is exactly what you are saying). They aren’t involved in either primary in Illinois, only on the ballot come the election. The message, generally speaking again, is that the Democrats are a bunch of pussies that don’t fight for liberal causes, like, say, the environment. I’m not sure what your last sentence says, is it, “can’t field a candidate too red for you to pull the lever for”? I guess that puts us on opposite ends of the spectrum, Mr Steel.
Jewish Steel
I am also a fan of the old Earth First! slogan, No Fucking Compromise. But I have found that it only works for stuff that is directly under my control. You should hear my guitar tone.
If you want to exercise real power in our political system however…
WyldPirate
@Citizen Alan:
“Memes” and reality are sometimes one and the same.
Old Ralphie nailed the part about both parties being ” out of touch, inbred with each other, and antithetical to functioning democracy”. It’s even worse now than it was ten years ago.
burnspbesq
@WyldPirate:
That might work in “Unitary Executive Comix,” or on teevee. In the world that we actually inhabit? Not so much.
4.2 for technical merit, 5.7 for artistic impression.
burnspbesq
@Jewish Steel:
Amen. “No Fucking Compromise” leads directly and inexorably to “No Fucking Accomplishments.”
fucen tarmal
this means the conservatards would be more conflicted about sweet home alabama…i mean that really has it all if you think about it..
allah-bama. allah-o-bama. allah o’bama…my god the irish are in on it too!
gene108
@johnsmith1882: I think a better question about whether to dissolve the Green Party of the sake of the blue team, is to look at what would be the most effective role of a Green Party in the U.S.
They are not a viable 3rd Party. As a political party they only serve to siphon votes away from the give-the-time-of-day-to-liberals Democrats.
As an advocacy group for liberal causes, they are non-existent.
I really think they and America would be better served, if they focused their energy on becoming more of an advocacy group and less of a political party.
The problem with liberal laws not being enacted is the fact voters (1) don’t understand what liberal legislation will do (2) there is a constant assault on the “L” word liberal by better funded conservatives and (3) there is no organized attempt to counter the very organized right-wing message machine.
You want liberal Democrats, then make their electorates demand liberal legislation.
agrippa
There have been comments about the Green Party. A third party is fine. But a thrd party will not accomplish very much without proportional representation. Our system being what it is, that is very unlikely.
The best that a third party can do in a presidential election would be to deny the front runner a majority in the Electoral College. That occured once [ with the exception of 1800, which was caused by a mistake in wording] in 1824.
It would make life interesting for a period of time.
As for ‘both parties’ being the same”: force of circumstance virtually compels the Greens to say that, however true or untrue.
Jewish Steel
@johnsmith1882
That’s the wrong kinda red you’re thinking of, youngster.
Just Some Fuckhead
I guess the only other canard that needs to be dispelled in this thread is the assumption that the green vote somehow belongs to the most dominant party that isn’t Republican. I’m not sure from where this notion arises other than sheer hubris.
WyldPirate
@burnspbesq:
It would work for several reasons:
1. They are military prisons, both of them. We transfered prisoners from Bagram to Gitmo early on. They can be transferred back to Bagram w/o Congressional approval. They have the capacity for over 1000 prisoners there already.
2. We are going to be in Afghanistan at least four more years. It buys time moving them there–where some are quite likely already from–and it closes Gitmo, which is a symbol of the worst brutality of the failed Bush/Obama policies (and yes Obama is in the midst of a MASSIVE FAIL on this issue despite the efforts of his apologists). Thus, symbolic as this move might be, it is a symbolic and functional win as there is one less blight on our very tarnished reputation as a “beacon of justice and democracy” to the rest of the world.
3. We have basically three options with these remaining prisoners: a.) Try their case via military tribunal or have the Congress come to their fucking senses and do the right thing (nagonnahappen); b.) hold them indefinitely, c.) or release them. If you don’t do–or can’t do a or b– option c is the most just of the remaining alternatives for the prisoners that retain a shred of sanity. It isn’t like releasing a few insane prisoners in Afghanistan is adding much to the depravity we have unleashed upon the world in the last 10 years.
You can try to snark your way out like you did in response, but you have nothing better as an alternative.
johnsmith1882
@gene108:
I agree, the Green party is not a viable third party. Which is why I view it as a “protest” vote. And your 3 points sum up the problem nicely. Liberal is a dirty word in this country. The part of this I don’t understand is that liberal legislation is widely supported, but at the same time liberals are _always_ the bad guys. You like your social security, medicare, unemployment insurance, heck, being able to vote without being landed gentry, but those dirty libruls are to blame for all the world’s problems. (you in the general sense, not _you_ you) 2+2=5, I guess.
NR
Illinois 2004 Senate race: Obama got 70% of the vote.
Illinois 2008 Senate race: Durbin got 68% of the vote.
Illinois 2010 Senate race: Giannoulias got 46% of the vote.
But go ahead and blame the Greens and their 3% of the vote for your problems. They’re a convenient scapegoat that will keep you from having to look at the real reasons that the Dems got so much less support this time around.
mclaren
Has anyone looked into Al Bundy’s religious affiliation?
johnsmith1882
@Jewish Steel:
Ok, then I don’t understand what you mean. Ohh, commie red? Then yeah, I guess that is before the time that I was politically aware, although I knew enough that we all were going to be blown to bits in the inevitable nuclear war. St. Ronnie saved us from the bad, bad men in the Kremlin, and then ascended directly into heaven, isn’t that what happened?
gene108
@johnsmith1882:
Don’t forget raising the minimum wage. When raising it was on a state-wide ballot initiative in 2004, Floridians, who went heavily in favor of Bush-Cheney, voted to raise the minimum wage by something like 70% in favor.
Society has generally trended to become more liberal, yet liberals keep feeling like they are losing…that’s also some food for thought…
Besides the repeal of DADT and gays being allowed to serve in the military, you have a non-white President (like him or not), no one, even Republicans and conservatives, are balking at ideas, that were liberal pipe-dreams in the 1960’s and 1970’s, like voting minorities and women into state wide office. They have had a two-fer with Nikki Haley in South Carolina, who also is in an interracial marriage, which a couple of generations ago would’ve been illegal in South Carolina, but didn’t bug the conservatives in the electorate one bit.
Hell, hard core conservatives are falling over themselves to be the first people to elect a woman into the Presidency, Sarah Palin.
And yet liberals keep feeling like they are losing the ideological battle…
Jewish Steel
@johnsmith1882:
Oh, I’d say there were indeed some bad folks in the Kremlin. Twas ever thus. Happily there were a few chaps who did not cleve so tightly to their (splendid and humane, imo) ideology that they weren’t able to make a few pragmatic decisions here and there.
An Xmas lesson for us all, no?
Jewish Steel
And who better to sermonize on the true meaning of xmas than this atheist jew?
(Ha!)
ronin122
Don’t look at me, I actually got off my ass AND voted for Gianoullias.
shortstop
@Jewish Steel: Have at it. Self-proclaimed Christians seem mostly unable to detect the original intent.
johnny walker
@johnsmith1882: Yeah, but the operating assumptions here are that not only do all Green votes belong to the Democratic party, but 0 Green voters would’ve stayed home had there been no Green candidate for them to vote for.
That’s not particularly realistic, but that appears to be what the “Deal With The World As It Is” crowd here has settled on. That quip above about not being able to invent your own reality is a one-way street it seems.
@Ailuridae: Well then clearly the only people to blame are the Greens, what with it being completely impossible for a Dem candidate to ever do anything that would gain them support from Greens. Maybe someday people will stop failing the Democratic party. Until then it’s clear that there’s simply nothing to be done!
Of course that’s leaving aside the rather sizeable assumption one must make to conclude that 80% of Greens would be comfortable voting for the Dem. But again: Greens’ fault. They should just learn to suck it up and vote for candidates they find unsupportable, clearly.
johnny walker
@burnspbesq: Ok, now how about “Maybe a little less compromise coupled with less granting of specific points of compromise before negotiations begin?”
Because you know, arguing against an old bumper sticker is catchy and all but I’m not sure how much it has to do with the opinions of other people who also disagree with it, if perhaps to different degrees than you.
Mark
@gene108:
Do you even have a fucking clue what San Francisco did?
The city’s public hospitals saw the city’s uninsured population (primarily working people who made too much to qualify for Medicaid.) The city’s taxpayers were subsidizing all the businesses in the city that were too fucking cheap to offer health insurance. So the city instituted a payroll tax on said businesses to eliminate the free riders. This is such a fucking Green Party idea that Mitt fucking Romney did it and it ended up in the ACA.
I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about when you refer to “expanding government’s role in health care.” Get your Republican talking points the fuck out of here.
And jesus fucking christ, Alan Grayson is a first-term congressman in Florida in a Republican district full of elderly people who showed up to vote. Walt Minnick got kicked in the face too, and he voted with the Republicans on every issue.
On the other hand, zero Dem congressional districts in California flipped to the Republicans in 2010 vs 2008. Democrats got elected to pretty much every statewide office, and both Boxer and Brown beat well-financed ‘CEO’ candidates.
I went to my congresswoman’s (Jackie Speier, who you might remember got shot at Jonestown) health care town hall. She stood there while the wingnuts hurled insults at her – calling a woman who took fucking bullets for her constituents unpatriotic. She patiently explained how health care reform would work and she brought up constituent after constituent who was being screwed by the current system. No matter how uninformed the dipshit who screamed at her, she was calm and rebutted their bullshit.
You’ve painted a completely false picture of governing liberals. Time to re-evaluate.