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  • in reply to: Elizabeth Warren on Hillary Clinton #49284
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Thanks, BT.

    I didn’t mean to accuse her of lying. I have no idea about her family history. I guess the point I wanted to make was that it just wasn’t an important thing to me. The rightwing throws this accusation against her as if it carries the weight of, oh–I don’t know her having duped people with a phony university or something. Her claim, if it isn’t true is harmless and meaningless to me. It affects no one’s life. And yes–she really may have native American blood. I just don’t find myself concerned about it. And I suspect the right isn’t really concerned. It’s just something to throw at her when she’s blasting Trump for ripping people off.

    “But…but she says she’s an indian so it’s even.”

    I agree with your take. It doesn’t matter, one way or another. It’s not going to have the slightest impact on anyone in this country. As in, nada, zilch, zero. And that seems to be the only kind of thing that drives the right into outrage mode. Nothingburgers. OTOH, serious, life-threatening issues like Climate Change and inequality? They pretty much deny those things exist.

    in reply to: Elizabeth Warren on Hillary Clinton #49279
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    She didn’t lie about her family heritage. She went by family stories about it. Passed down to her. Passed down to her parents. And their parents.

    Stop it. She lied. She lied for personal gain at the expense of someone else.

    Nope. She didn’t lie. There is zero evidence that she did, and even less than zero evidence that she gained anything from asserting her Native American heritage.

    in reply to: Elizabeth Warren on Hillary Clinton #49277
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Yeah–I know about 20 people who claim to have some sort of Native American ancestry. In the grand scheme of things who cares? Politicians lie about far worse things. It’s meaningless to me.

    Having said that.

    I have to admit that I don’t know Warren as well as I did Bernie. I followed Bernie for years. I was a fan for a long time. Compared to that, Warren is new to me. I don’t know where she stands on all issues. But on the issue of banking regulation I have no doubt where she stands. And that’s no small thing.

    I also know where Tim Kaine stands. And that’s no small thing.

    She didn’t lie about her family heritage. She went by family stories about it. Passed down to her. Passed down to her parents. And their parents. This is very common for a lot of American families now, and it’s a positive leap from the previous way of doing things — hiding Native American, or black, or brown ancestry when it exists.

    To me, the anger about her claims is pure racism. It’s the same old same old right-wing racism on display. And the greater the mockery, the greater the underlying racism involved. The more glee the right displays in attacking her family claims, the more its underlying and deep-seated racism rises to the surface.

    As for Warren’s politics. She started out as a Republican, if I’m not mistaken. A moderate Republican. Our politics have become so strange, the Overton Window moved so far to the right, she is somehow considered “far left”by most folks on the right. She’s not, obviously. Sadly, she probably is among the furthest left Democrats in Congress, but that says a lot more about the party as a whole than it does about her actual politics/affinities, etc.

    I like her. She’s feisty and honest and seems to have a good heart. But nothing she suggests, as far as policy, is “radical” in the slightest, or would have been thought so even thirty years ago. It would have been the norm before Thatcherism/Reaganism took hold for good.

    Hope all is well, PA. Lots of good points from you in these threads.

    in reply to: Leaked DNC emails shows collusion against Sanders #49257
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Zooey,

    Yes. Trump is a classic narcissist. But he doesn’t just contradict things he said a month ago. Within the same speech he does this. His word salad often doubles back on itself, as if he’s talking himself into and out of things, though one thing remains the same:

    He keeps insisting that he’s the greatest, does everything better than anyone else, and is the only person who can save us. It’s actually quite amazing how he gets away with it, because I can’t remember anyone else who so consistently bragged about how awesome he was without being laughed off the stage.

    Cult of personality. An ego the size of Manhattan painfully exposed. He’s a celebrity pied piper, leading his lemmings over the cliff, and they just don’t seem to care how over the top he is about his own supposed greatness, and one-of-a-kind ability in everything. And they just don’t get what his endless bragging really tells us about him.

    Again, I’ve never seen anything like the reaction to his messiah complex, narcissism and obviously, painfully deep insecurities. Because no one brags incessantly who isn’t so deeply insecure. They don’t have to keep telling us how great they are. Their record speaks for itself, and they don’t have to keep convincing themselves by saying it aloud, in public, every chance they get.

    No one that neurotically, perhaps psychotically insecure should be anywhere near the nuclear codes.

    in reply to: Turks, Alex Jones at the RNC #49222
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    I know you are trying BT. I see that. That post of mine was as much a reminder to myself as anything else.

    I just hate rancorous, endless, get-nowhere, no-point-in-it, Bickering.

    Lets say bnw goes “yawn” — well, why react at all? Why…react…at…all?
    We react because of emotions. Thats all. Emotions. Yes? No?

    w
    v

    Well, I thought I responded with humor after the “yawn,” suggesting that he get more sleep and maybe try Melatonin. And then after the third or fourth “yawn,” I upped the ante to Ambien.

    I thought you liked humor.

    Okay, okay. No reaction is better.

    in reply to: Turks, Alex Jones at the RNC #49217
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    WV,

    I understand your take on this. The video, then, was a way of getting us to take stock of ourselves? At least indirectly?

    Okay. That’s fine.

    It may not seem this way to you, but I’ve always tried really hard not to start fights. I usually finish them and generally won’t back down when others start them. But I try my best not to take the first shot. As a flawed human being, like everyone else, I fail at this from time to time. But, overall, I think my record on that is pretty good in the real world and online as well. It’s a combination of the way I was brought up, my relatively small stature as a kid, and the evolution of my own personal philosophy over time. I eventually grew a lot, thank goddess, both physically and philosophically, but battling bullies has always stayed with me, to this day. I kinda follow Woodrow Call in this, though with a word substitution or two:

    I hate the behavior of bullies. I won’t tolerate it.

    So, anyway. Back to this particular board. It’s also been my thing that criticism of public figures should be okay. Criticism of political parties, economic systems, organized religions, etc. etc. What crosses the line, in my view, is when it turns personal. As long as we debate the relative merits of this or that public policy, government program, public figure or ideology, what have you, I think adults should be able to handle this without getting upset. If adults do get upset, it may be time to question the intensity of investment in things largely beyond our control.

    It’s kinda like the old Warner/Bulger wars. I don’t get how someone could take criticism of either of them personally — as a direct slap in the face, or worse. It’s not them. It’s not their career’s being discussed, etc. etc.

    Bottom line: I’ll do my best to avoid “bickering and ranting” here. That’s all I can do.

    Hope all is well.

    in reply to: Leaked DNC emails shows collusion against Sanders #49204
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    He will beat Bush for vacation days.

    But will he beat Obama who has set the record for vacation days?

    This was updated (factcheck.org) as of December of 2015.

    Presidential Vacations

    Deciding how to count these “vacation” days can create some confusion. CNN recently listed a count of 879 days for Bush and 150 for Obama, numbers that came from a Washington Post “Outlook” piece on “Five myths on presidential vacations.” (Myth No. 1: “Presidents get vacations.”) The 879 figure, it turns out, is from March 3, 2008, at which point Bush had spent that many days at the ranch and Camp David (but it doesn’t include days in Kennebunkport). The numbers are in a 2008 Washington Post piece and attributed to Knoller.

    If readers want to make an apples-to-apples comparison, the best solution is to use Knoller’s figures as of August 8, cited above: Bush, 407; Obama, 125. But the numbers say more about how many days the presidents spent away from the White House than they do about how much time the presidents spent not working.

    Updated, Dec. 23, 2015: As he has in past years, the president is vacationing in Hawaii for the holidays. So we thought we would check in with Knoller, the CBS reporter who keeps track of presidential vacations, for an update. Knoller tells us in an email that Obama has taken “24 vacation trips of varying lengths totaling all or part of 182 days as of today.” This means that Obama as president now has taken more vacation days than Bill Clinton, but less than George W. Bush.

    — Lori Robertson

    in reply to: Leaked DNC emails shows collusion against Sanders #49188
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    I saw the link to thehill story. The DNC is obviously rotten and they did their best to shut Sanders down. It worked. Amazingly enough, it almost didn’t. Despite all of the forces arrayed against him, he almost won.

    Goddess, I hate the duopoly.

    in reply to: Turks, Alex Jones at the RNC #49186
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    WV,

    I don’t know who the narrator is, but it’s baffling how any sane person can “respect” Alex Jones, IMO. He’s easily one of the most despicable public figures on America’s right-wing fringe, a true know-nothing, knuckle-dragging, paranoid moron and bully.

    He’s always on and on about “false flags” whenever there is a mass shooting. He called the one in Sandy Hook a “false flag” operation, and thinks the Oklahoma City bombings were orchestrated by the government. And these are always supposedly designed to take away everyone’s “gun rights,” which for Alex Jones, means the right to gun down fellow Americans if Alex Jones thinks they’re a part of a tyrannical government. The circular logic there being, it’s “tyrannical” for the government to want to put limits on weaponry, etc.

    Needless to say, he’s a Truther, and executive produced the absurdist “loose change” video.

    I have no idea if he truly believes the bat-shit crazy things he says, or he just does all of that to make money. Either way, he doesn’t deserve anyone’s “respect.”

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49175
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    bnw,

    That’s the wisest most awesome post yet from you!!

    ;>)

    Why thank you. It was my best effort at minimalism.

    You said you live in the South. What state? I guessed Asheville, NC because I’m pretty sure you could find a niche there. Or are you misrepresenting DE or MD as the South?

    I’ve lived in NC before, in the Western mountains, but north of Asheville. Currently live in Virginia.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49174
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    vind

    Thanks for the laugh. That’s a gut buster of a picture.

    ;>)

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49167
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    I used to wonder the same thing but maybe the 20000 leagues doesn’t refer to the depth but the distance travelled under the sea? When I was a preteen Jules Verne was my favorite author, btw.

    That makes more sense. Didn’t think of distance traveled horizontally, so to speak. So, using Wiki again, that’s bit more than three trips around the circumference of the earth.

    I liked Verne a lot, too. Thought the Disney movie was cool as well. And then the ride at Disneyworld. Man, that was a long, long time ago.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49164
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    bnw,

    That’s the wisest most awesome post yet from you!!

    ;>)

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49163
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    If it happens in mammals it can only result in a female clone. Even if it could result in a male it wouldn’t prove the virgin birth story from the bible just as the existence of modern submarines doesn’t prove that Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Beneath the Sea actually happened. It would only mean that mammalian offspring can be conceived asexually, today…not necessarily 2000 years ago.

    Speaking of Verne’s book. Again, as resident scienzy guy, can you correct me here if I’m wrong? Isn’t a league roughly 3.4 miles? And isn’t the deepest part of the ocean the Mariana Trench? That’s at least what Wikipedia says. And it’s supposedly in the neighborhood of less than 7 miles to the bottom.

    Um, so, well . . . 20,000 leagues?

    Haven’t read the book since I was a kid, so I am probably missing all the context for the title. But, as well as Verne did on other predictions, I think he blew the depths of the oceans thing.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49154
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    It also shows how important Greek myths were to the theology of early Christianity. The Greek gods, especially Zeus, were always impregnating mortal girls, thus producing demi-gods — like Heracles, Perseus and Achilles.

    The dead and resurrected messiah also draws on Greek and earlier myths going back to at least the Egyptians. Deities being torn apart and brought back to life again, like Osiris and Dionysus. This appears to be a reflection of actual human sacrificial practices of ritual slaughtering of kings — to protect a tribe, a kingdom or produce a better harvest, etc. etc. Eventually, they got wise, and no longer allowed themselves to actually be killed, but were instead, symbolically sacrificed and then reborn from under the skirts of priestesses, usually.

    We find echoes of this in myths and thousands of years later, like the Arthurian myth of the Fisher King, the Holy Grail, the Waste land and so forth. The king being tied directly to the earth. His failing health or loss of limb meaning meaning the tribe or kingdom was in grave danger of collapse. In that story, the king’s being pierced by a spear is a euphemism for castration . . . which was perhaps the ultimate in connections between king and country.

    From Ritual to Romance, by Jessie L Weston, was one of the great early books studying this. T.S. Eliot drew heavily from it for his great poem, the Wasteland.

    • This reply was modified 8 years, 4 months ago by Avatar photoBilly_T.
    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49152
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    It’s interesting that the number of scientists that identify as atheists varies depending on their discipline. The highest number of believers are in the social sciences whereas the fewest are in biology and physics. This makes sense to me because they are the two sciences that’s findings are constantly contradicting religious dogma.

    Sure seems like the biological sciences are knocking at the door of parthenogenesis which will affirm the Immaculate Conception.

    Parthenogenesis happens all the time. It occurs in all sorts of invertebrates and even some vertebrates like varanid lizards. But unless Jesus was a rotifer or Komodo dragon then parthenogenesis wouldn’t explain the virgin birth. Besides, organisms that employ the XX, XY chromosome system (as humans do) and undergo parthenogenesis can only produce a clone of the mother because no Y chromosome is present. That means Jesus had to be a woman.

    “The Virgin Birth” is a translation error. We know it’s impossible from a biological point of view — at least for humans. It was a mistranslation of Hebrew scripture (Isaiah), which used “almah” (young woman) not “bethulah” (virgin). The Septuagint mistranslates “young woman” into the Greek “parthenos” (virgin).

    In order to claim divine parentage for Jesus, the gospel of Matthew posits the fulfillment of a prophecy which was never about a “virgin birth” in the first place. As in, the entire thing is built on an error of translation.

    • This reply was modified 8 years, 4 months ago by Avatar photoBilly_T.
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    But Americans dont want to “waste their votes” so
    they will vote for a monster.

    No-one is twisting their voting-arms.

    I will vote for Hillary because Trump is significantly worse and by a wide margin.

    I will then join the “third party alternative” and/or “reform the dems” thing the day after the election.

    That’s just me listing my vote. Not arguing. If I can’t talk anyone else into it, so be it.

    If I catch flak for it here, so be that too.

    Hildabeast is a crook so Trump is much better. I will vote for Trump.

    If being a “crook” is a deal-breaker for you, bnw, then you shouldn’t be voting for Trump. He made tens of millions ripping off students at Trump University, tens of millions ripping off business partners in his many bankruptcies, tens of millions from taxpayers playing the debt game. He’s currently fighting thousands of lawsuits for his crooked business practices. And if elected, he’ll pocket additional tens of millions, personally, from slashing the top tax rate and ending the estate tax. The latter, btw, impacts just 0.2% of the country. The richest 0.2%. More than 99.8% of the country won’t see any “tax relief” from the end of the estate tax, but government programs will take a hit so the rich can get richer.

    Oh, and Mr “fair trade” outsources labor for his manufacturing companies. And, he’s a serial liar.

    I understand not wanting to vote for Clinton. I won’t either. But voting for Trump makes zero sense, given your criteria.

    • This reply was modified 8 years, 4 months ago by Avatar photoBilly_T.
    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49144
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    I live in the South, and I’m surrounded by people on the rightward side of the political spectrum, along with a great many religious fundamentalists.

    Really? Then you live there with your pie hole shut. This is your outlet.

    I speak my mind with my neighbors on occasion, but I don’t make a habit of it. It’s too depressing to hear the nonsense they believe about our politics and the world. A lot of otherwise very nice people, with views that just don’t have any connection to reality.

    That is very closed minded. They have their reality. You simply reject it. Perhaps all they need is proper exposure and direction? I suggest you find your soap box at a busy intersection or food court and read some of the screeds you post here. Could be many budding Billyists in the making.

    Yes, they are closed minded about these things. I’m glad we agree about something.

    ;>)

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49131
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    I live in the South, and I’m surrounded by people on the rightward side of the political spectrum, along with a great many religious fundamentalists.

    Really? Then you live there with your pie hole shut. This is your outlet.

    I speak my mind with my neighbors on occasion, but I don’t make a habit of it. It’s too depressing to hear the nonsense they believe about our politics and the world. A lot of otherwise very nice people, with views that just don’t have any connection to reality.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49123
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    If anything in Maine I encounter the opposite prejudice. That is, it is widely assumed that the entire country outside of New England and New York is all just an overly religious version of the movie Deliverance.

    That, of course, is not good either. But you picked a beautiful place to live, ZN.

    I love the Blue Ridge Mountains, and we have a lot of beautiful vistas to enjoy here too. But it would be nice if my fellow leftist heathens had at least a bit more representation nearby.

    ;>)

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49119
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Nittany,

    I didn’t know you moved to Vermont.

    Do you like it there?

    Culturally and politically, I think I’m probably closest to New England, if the choice is just within the US. But I really don’t like endless winters — or the much higher costs of living. I live in the South, and I’m surrounded by people on the rightward side of the political spectrum, along with a great many religious fundamentalists. Though, I’m also close to several universities, so there is diversity of sorts here. But not nearly enough for me.

    Cost of living and the weather keeps me from moving, basically. Though I’d actually prefer Europe overall.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49114
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    zn, your argument is reminiscent of the argument used by gun rights advocates.

    I have seen people of faith who do not buy into the fundamentalist program who can handle, with grace and sincere conviction, debates about the irrationality of religion. We all have. So “attacking religion” in general serves very little purpose.

    I have seen gun owners who do not buy into the NRA program who can handle with grace and sincere conviction, debates about gun control. We all have. So attacking gun rights serves very little purpose.

    Like most gun owners, most people of faith are reasonable people.

    But that doesn’t counter the great amount of harm done by a very few hyper-religious people. Pence, Cruz, Santorum etc.

    What harm?

    The extreme persecution of LGBT folks, including forced “conversion therapy” which has led to suicides.

    The Orwellian “religious freedom” laws, which are really just cover for hate-filled bigotry, and establish a foothold for American Sharia.

    The persecution of women, primarily via an attack on, if not a destruction of, their personal autonomy and their right to control their own bodies.

    The attack on science, especially against the science of climate change, which is a deadly threat to humans, nature and the planet, and one (conveniently) never mentioned at the GOP convention. This attack also takes the form of “creationism,” which religious zealots seek to force onto students, despite the fact that its fairy tales have no place in any science classroom.

    For starters.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49113
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    But that doesn’t counter the great amount of harm done by a very few hyper-religious people. Pence, Cruz, Santorum etc.

    —————–

    Well, i dont agree that its a ‘very few’ hyper-religious humans.
    There’s Billions of em. With a B.

    w
    v

    WV,

    I can’t speak for Nittany, of course, but I think he was pointing out that great harm can come from just a few hyper-religious humans — which is a rather nice way of phrasing things. I don’t think he meant there were only a few in existence.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49105
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Carson’s mention of of the Trilateral Satanic Commingling was my favorite part of the convention so far. Probably the only thing I will remember about it in 10 years.

    Follow the logic here: Hillary wrote a paper on Saul Alinsky who once off-handedly mentioned Lucifer. Therefore………………. Hillary is in league with Satan.

    Awesome.

    You know, I keep seeing these articles about how the GOP is imploding.

    It’s not imploding.

    These people have been saying out loud the most batshit crazy ass shit for YEARS, and it makes no difference. They still love Sarah Palin. I mean…you know…she should have finished off the last shred of respectability of the party of Lincoln long ago. And yet…here they are. These people occupy enough of this country to elect Donald Trump – DONALD TRUMP – as president.

    At least the death of the planet will draw big ratings.

    Agreed, Zooey. It doesn’t seem to make any difference. The GOP was supposed to be finished after Hoover. It was supposed to be finished after Goldwater. It was supposed to be finished after Reagan’s first term and the terrible recession he had. His own party turned on him and there was talk of running someone else in 1984. It was supposed to be finished after Gingrich left Congress in disgrace. After Dubya’s catastrophic failures. And on and on.

    It’s the zombie party with its zombie lies of trickle down awesomeness, its anti-science, creationist fanaticism, its Birthers and Birchers and False Flaggers and tea partiers and white supremacists and on and on. Nothing stops it. Not the serial lies, not the moronic economic and social ideas, not the love of inequality, the love of the suffering of others, not the racism, bigotry or xenophobia. Nothing kills it.

    But it’s not only because there are tens of millions of ignorant, reactionary Americans who continuously fall for right-wing lies — Dem or Republican. It’s because the media and the people who own it don’t want it to die. They want to channel the batshit crazies somehow, herd them at least into one known party — the better to control them, I suppose. They have to have somewhere to go and some release valve of sorts.

    Also: Alinsky. I don’t think there ever was a nicer, kinder, gentler boogeyman in our history. He worked his entire adult life to help the poor, the downtrodden, the oppressed and was beloved. Demonizing him is kinda like the Brits demonizing Gandhi, though, of course, Alinsky worked on a much, much smaller scale. His comment about Lucifer was tongue in cheek. But the American Taliban doesn’t know tongue in cheek from sharia.

    • This reply was modified 8 years, 4 months ago by Avatar photoBilly_T.
    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49097
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Western Marxism and the Soviet Union

    Marcel van der Linden talks about State Capitalism in Russia in the pdf linked to above.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49096
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    He’s strictly speaking accurate, b. What they had in the Soviet Union and have in China doesn’t meet the definition of communism. However, communism was never only what Marx said it was. The Soviets and Chinese converted the meaning into a militarized one-party bureaucratic state, and that’s part of the mix in talking about the history of communism.

    But from a strict point of view looking at the original definition in Marx, no they weren’t what he called communism.

    Personally I don’t think it matters. Depends on the point someone wants to make. The strict definition is real, and it’s fair to measure the Soviets by it, as bt did. But then also history morphs things. Our constitution didn’t set up a corporate dominated oligarchy, either, but here we are.

    As you know, “communism” predates Marx. He didn’t invent it. It existed in its modern incarnation before he was born, and in its ur-form, tens of thousands of years before Marx. Humans are actually quite naturally small “c” communists, as David Graeber points out in his book, Debt.

    Of course, I wasn’t referring to the ur-form when I noted the above. I was thinking in terms of socialist theory by people like Proudhon, Elisee Reclus, Kropotkin, William Morris, along with dozens of others including Marx. They sometimes used terms like “socialism” and “communism” interchangeably, though usually with modifiers, like “anarchist-communist,” or anarchist-socialist.” Socialism was usually the umbrella term.

    Again, as you know, Marx’s theory, drawn from decades of thinkers before him, was that communism followed true socialism, was basically its culmination, after actual socialism became second nature, natural, every day. And it meant no state apparatus was needed to keep true democracy and human emancipation going. No more classes, including no more ruling class.

    Other leftists, especially those in the left-anarchist camp, didn’t see the need to go in stages like Marx suggested. They didn’t think it made any sense to have an interum state in order to steer us toward the absence of the state. They basically wanted to go stateless off the bat.

    Regardless, Lenin said he had to institute State Capitalism in order to yank Russia into the 20th century. No subsequent dictator ever moved away from that. And some, like Stalin, took it even further away from actual socialism.

    in reply to: Hillary is not making it easy #49086
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Again:

    Bush inherited the largest single budgetary surplus in American history, and no wars. He slashed taxes twice (2001 and 2003) and doubled the debt. The US Treasury lost revenue his first three years and his last. The CBO told him before he did this that if he just left taxes alone, we could pay off the entire debt by 2009. The whole thing. Not just balance the budget, but pay off the roughly 5 trillion in debt he inherited from Clinton. Bush slashed taxes twice, started two unnecessary wars and the rest is history.

    In Bush’s last quarter, the economy contracted by 8.9% and Obama inherited that, plus a world-wide economic meltdown, 750,000 jobs disappearing a month (in Bush’s last quarter), two wars and roughly 12 trillion in debt.

    See the difference?

    in reply to: Hillary is not making it easy #49085
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Obama was the first American president to oversee reduced government spending in the midst of a recession. Spending rose at its lowest levels since Ike on his watch.

    Yet the federal debt DOUBLED under Obama.

    BTW not prosecuting the Wall street crowd isn’t throwing a bone to republicans. It is Obama returning the favor of all that Wall Street money that was part of his over $1 billion campaign war chest.

    Yes, it is. Traditional, rock-ribbed Republican conservatism has always been deeply pro-Wall Street, going back more than a century. Yes, Obama returned the favor of a ton of cash to Wall Street, which makes my point for me. He’s governed as a true conservative.

    Btw, the current national debt is roughly 19.3 trillion. Obama inherited over 11 trillion from Bush. So he hasn’t quite doubled it. Obama also inherited the largest single budgetary deficit in history from Bush — the 2009 fiscal year deficit of 1.4 trillion. This should be counted against Bush, not Obama, which would bring Bush’s debt total to roughly 12 trillion. Bush left office after doubling the debt, even though he inherited the largest single surplus in American history and no wars.

    in reply to: Trump and our faith-based fantasy world. #49084
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Faith is scary? You guys are funny.

    Belief in non-existent mythic creatures can often be, given what it causes humans to do in their names. Like, slaughter unbelievers, torture them, steal their lands in the name of one’s god. Go to war in the name of one’s god. Rationalize bigotry and discrimination in the name of one’s god, etc. Civil wars between members of the same “faith” that last centuries, etc. etc.

    Organized religion has been the catalyst for more death, destruction and human suffering than any other organized anything, aside from capitalism, and the two go hand in hand all too often.

    All of the above can be said of atheist communist dictators too of which I’m sure communist purges have done worse.

    There never has been a “communist” nation, anywhere in the modern world. It’s the absence of the state, so it can’t exist as a state. Thus no “communist” dictators. The Soviet Union and China, for example, were State Capitalist countries — as Lenin noted about Russia when he implemented it by that name. They didn’t even get to “socialism,” much less “communism.” Socialism requires true democracy, including the economy, and the people, not political parties or dictators, own the means of production.

    That said, no state has ever gone on a holy war in the name of no-god/atheism. They have, however, done so in the name of a god, with no religion being a greater source for this than Christianity . . . with Islam being number two.

    in reply to: Hillary is not making it easy #49074
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    The Dems seem to believe they must also try to appeal to the center and the GOP.

    On what planet?

    That’s all they ever do, bnw. Again, the Dems are the true “conservative” party, not the GOP. The GOP is the far-right party, and there’s nothing “conservative” about them in the slightest.

    Since I became politically aware in the 1970s, I’ve seen the Dems bend over backward to compromise with the GOP, with this escalating dramatically from Reagan on. With Bill Clinton in the White House, the move was basically completed. The Dems took the center-right over entirely from the GOP, which vacated that portion of the political spectrum to move further right. Obama sustained this and expanded it, offering up a host of conservative policies to placate the GOP, while being rejected as no longer far-right enough.

    I listed them before:

    Obama kept Bush’s defense secretary and rehired his Fed chairman

    Obama kept Bush’s TARP and TALF programs going, supported and expanded his wars, ratcheted up the GWOT, added new fronts

    Obama offered Boehner deep cuts to Social Security and Medicare — Bill Clinton came close to privatizing it with Gingrich, btw, but the Lewinsky scandal intruded.

    Obama and the Dems crafted the ACA from the Heritage Foundation and Romneycare plans, with the strong support of Corporate America. It was a “market-based solution” plan to a problem created by for-profit markets. And it included 150 GOP amendments.

    Obama held a summit on the deficit in the middle of a recession, which no previous Republican president would have even considered. Obama froze pay and hiring in the public sector, and we saw the loss of hundreds of thousands of government jobs. Reagan, Bush Sr and Dubya all hired more than a million new public sector employees to fight recessions on their watches.

    Obama was the first American president to oversee reduced government spending in the midst of a recession. Spending rose at its lowest levels since Ike on his watch.

    No prosecution of Wall Street crooks after the crash.

    Obama’s stimulus was 1/3rd tax cuts, a major GOP concession. He reupped Bush’s “temporary” tax cuts twice and made them permanent.

    For starters.

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