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[Manmademan]

I don't know. If I defined it as something specific, it might be easy to just throw out that specific argument. Where do you think the strongest arguments might be from the conservative side? I think it's too easy to find the weakest members of the opposition and gawk at them.

That's how politics work. there isn't a general "conservative" or "liberal" position, it's about specific issues. this varies from person to person and politician to politician. "generic republican" always does well in polls against specific democrats, but start talking actual politicians with positions they have to defend and approval tends to fall.

Some conservative positions are entirely indefensible. These are usually the social positions (no gay marriage!) but at the moment it appears to be the government shutdown business.

Some liberal positions are also indefensible- but the big difference here is that democrats aren't controlled or beholden at ALL to their radical fringe, and those politicians are marginalized. this is not the case with republicans at the moment.

 

[Sibylus]

Brazil summons Canadian ambassador over spying allegations: Canadian officials refuse to say whether they monitored Brazil's Mines and Energy Ministry

Glenn Greenwald, who reported on spying by the U.S. National Security Agency​, said he has more documents relating to Canadian spying around the world.

"There's a lot of other documents about Canadians spying on ordinary citizens, on allied governments, on the world, and their co-operation with the United States government, and the nature of that co-operation that I think most Canadian citizens will find quite surprising, if not shocking, because it's all done in secret and Canadians are not aware of it," Greenwald said.

Rousseff tweeted in Portuguese on Monday that, because many Canadian companies are active in Brazil's mining industry, the spying could be a clear case of industrial espionage, Reuters reports.

"The United States and its allies must immediately stop their spying activity once and for all," she tweeted.

"This is unacceptable between countries that are supposed to be partners. We repudiate this cyberwarfare," Rousseff said via Twitter, according to the news service.

So apparently it's looking like Canada has been involved with possible industrial espionage in Brazil. Surprising. By which of course I mean, not at all. These are practically identical claims to those levied against the US a little while ago, so forgive me for surmising the obvious and wagering that this is probably an incident of cooperative espionage. We do like to echo (further suggested by our own calls for oversight north of the border).

I'm sad to hear that Dax was banned. IIRC the only poligaffer we have left in the binder is rocketknight (do correct me if I'm wrong).

Not sure if pleased or snubbed at having escaped the binder.

 

[Averon]

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/360590/house-indecision-jonathan-strong-robert-costa

Sources close to Boehner echo Walden. In private, Boehner has told his allies that he won’t bring up a clean CR, and he’s hopeful that as the deadline nears, President Obama will deal. “There’s no way the president holds firm,” a House GOP insider predicts. “Once that crack opens, I don’t know how the debt limit will be addressed, but it won’t be by Republican capitulation.”

Boehner's final plan is the hope that Obama cracks.

 

[B-Dubs]

Brazil summons Canadian ambassador over spying allegations: Canadian officials refuse to say whether they monitored Brazil's Mines and Energy Ministry



So apparently it's looking like Canada has been involved with possible industrial espionage in Brazil. Surprising. By which of course I mean, not at all. These are practically identical claims to those levied against the US a little while ago, so forgive me for surmising the obvious and wagering that this is probably an incident of cooperative espionage. We do like to echo (further suggested by our own calls for oversight north of the border).

Every country spies, no one should be at all surprised by any of this.

Not sure if pleased or snubbed at having escaped the binder.

OK, time to get in the binder.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/360590/house-indecision-jonathan-strong-robert-costa



Boehner's final plan is the hope that Obama cracks.

Well, I don't see how this plan could possibly fail.

 

[rocketknight]

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/360590/house-indecision-jonathan-strong-robert-costa



Boehner's final plan is the hope that Obama cracks.

His plan Bs have a great track record. What could possibly go wrong!

 

[Box]

That's how politics work. there isn't a general "conservative" or "liberal" position, it's about specific issues. this varies from person to person and politician to politician. "generic republican" always does well in polls against specific democrats, but start talking actual politicians with positions they have to defend and approval tends to fall.

Then how can you tell if a given position on an issue is conservative or liberal? What does that actually mean? Is a position liberal because Democrats support it? Or does it not really mean anything?

 

[Sibylus]

In the land of Massachusetts, where the shadows lie.

Every country spies, no one should be at all surprised by any of this.

This is my practical outlook on things, but I have to wonder if it's a side-effect of our specific intelligence setup: the US and the Commonwealth has spied on and formally shared intel with each other going back decades, so I'm not entirely sure if Greenwald's prediction of surprise is accurate with regard to the Canadian citizenry. As the one cited expert put it, it's part of the game and has been for a very long time. Rightly or wrongly, we accept it, and Brazil may fairly be characterized as a newcomer to that space. Philosophically speaking, I'm not sure where I come down.

 

[Manmademan]

Then how can you tell if a given position on an issue is conservative or liberal? What does that actually mean? Is a position liberal because Democrats support it? Or does it not really mean anything?

"liberal" and "democratic" are not the same thing. a liberal position is generally one in favor of change, progress, and tends to be less about traditional values.

conservative positions tend to be the exact opposite. more authoritarian, more about traditional values, and resistant to change.

This can vary quite a bit from country to country, and era to era. liberals and conservatives back in the 1980s and 1970s were absolutely nothing like the ones we have now. It's a common saying that today's democrats are very, very similar to conservatives of the 70s.

look at richard nixon, for example:

Nixon was not only a fervent supporter of the Clean Air Act, the first federal law designed to control air pollution on the national level; he also gave us the Environmental Protection Agency. The creation of the EPA represented an expansion of government that would face fierce opposition were it being debated today. The EPA is also one of the agencies on Capitol Hill that the business community most detests—along with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which polices working conditions. OSHA is another Nixon creation.

At some point during the 1990s, conservative talking heads decided to turn "liberal" into a pejorative, negative term and calling everything democrats did "liberal" because they weren't fans of it. So suddenly "liberal" is a bad thing, for no clear reason. It confuses the issue quite a bit, since conservatives tend to have a habit now of painting something as "liberal" whether it is or not, because it's an effective tool to smear things among their audience.

 

[Sibylus]

Ah, I guess the sentiment I can unreservedly say I agree with is the sentiment that intelligence should ultimately be responsible to their own particular citizenry for their conduct, their representatives by extension. Even if that requires a time delay for the utmost sensitive materials.

 

[Gotchaye]

For what it's worth, I'm not a conservative myself. I'm not very experienced with political thought. I just wanted to know if people thought it was possible to be serious and thoughtful about an important issue and come to the conclusion that the conservative position was correct. And if not, why, because it seems strange that it would be so and unsatisfying to just believe that conservatives are always wrong.

Well, hold on a second. Do you believe that there are positions that people can't seriously and thoughtfully take? If so, is there any particular reason to think that a political party can't adopt a bunch of them? The Republican party is crazy. This sort of thing happens. There have been many political parties throughout history that were crazy or downright evil. Some of them were even able to exercise a great deal of power.

There are a few varieties of conservatism out there. Most people who would identify simply as "conservative" are radical utopians with authoritarian tendencies. I'm not using those words as pejoratives - they want to enact major changes in policy in order to make society as they think it ought to be in most every particular and what they think society ought to be usually involves people knowing their place. Their utopia always sounds like a pretty nasty place and I have yet to meet one who has actually tried to think through exactly how we're going to get from A to B. Many look forward to some sort of cataclysm that will shake the country from its stupor and put it back on a righteous path. This kind of conservatism is crazy.

There are "social conservatives" who are mostly concerned with Christianity, abortion, and homosexuality. This can be serious to the extent that their religious beliefs deserve to be taken seriously, I guess. They still clearly have persecution complexes, but they're often open about just wanting to force Christianity on everybody else. Clearly evil, but maybe not crazy.

There are apathetic "fiscal conservatives" who don't really care much about politics and aren't very informed. They're vaguely concerned that we spend too much money. Not serious. Some people care more but are clearly suffering from textbook false consciousness. Serious but sad.

There are people pushing this sort of "fiscal conservatism" because they seriously and thoughtfully conclude "fuck you; got mine". Evil.

 

[East Lake]

For what it's worth, I'm not a conservative myself. I'm not very experienced with political thought. I just wanted to know if people thought it was possible to be serious and thoughtful about an important issue and come to the conclusion that the conservative position was correct. And if not, why, because it seems strange that it would be so and unsatisfying to just believe that conservatives are always wrong.

Yeah you could be a conservative and have complaints on Obamacare for instance that even a liberal might agree with, but then the argument eventually turns into what conservatives would do to fix the healthcare problem. When people want a solution to healthcare problems being against Obamacare isn't good enough. So you use death panels, moral arguments about how people don't deserve healthcare, tax concerns, doctor concerns, whatever... None of which offer a better alternative. So now if you're conservative you're in a weird position where you have to criticize Obamacare and defend the previous system which people are clearly unhappy with, or if you care enough about the poor with no healthcare any solution you present probably has no realistic chance of being passed. You could be right in your argument that Obamacare's costs are out of control (not saying that's legit, just an example) but if the voters still want the thing despite that you're SOL.

 

[Manmademan]

Well, hold on a second. Do you believe that there are positions that people can't seriously and thoughtfully take? If so, is there any particular reason to think that a political party can't adopt a bunch of them? The Republican party is crazy. This sort of thing happens. There have been many political parties throughout history that were crazy or downright evil. Some of them were even able to exercise a great deal of power.

There are a few varieties of conservatism out there. Most people who would identify simply as "conservative" are radical utopians with authoritarian tendencies. I'm not using those words as pejoratives - they want to enact major changes in policy in order to make society as they think it ought to be in most every particular and what they think society ought to be usually involves people knowing their place. Their utopia always sounds like a pretty nasty place and I have yet to meet one who has actually tried to think through exactly how we're going to get from A to B. Many look forward to some sort of cataclysm that will shake the country from its stupor and put it back on a righteous path. This kind of conservatism is crazy.

There are "social conservatives" who are mostly concerned with Christianity, abortion, and homosexuality. This can be serious to the extent that their religious beliefs deserve to be taken seriously, I guess. They still clearly have persecution complexes, but they're often open about just wanting to force Christianity on everybody else. Clearly evil, but maybe not crazy.

There are apathetic "fiscal conservatives" who don't really care much about politics and aren't very informed. They're vaguely concerned that we spend too much money. Not serious. Some people care more but are clearly suffering from textbook false consciousness. Serious but sad.

There are people pushing this sort of "fiscal conservatism" because they seriously and thoughtfully conclude "fuck you; got mine". Evil.

I would say that's a bit unfair. Is the republican party AS A WHOLE crazy? probably not. They comprise about 30% of the country or so, they can't ALL be lunatics. Remember that there are a significant number of governors, state representatives, etc that aren't completely terrible. REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP at the moment is off the wall though for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is that a vocal fringe is making it very hard to get things done without catering to them. Our primary system is going a long way towards making this possible. The vast majority DO NOT VOTE in primaries, making it very easy for radicals and fringe politicians to hijack the process. Many moderates are taking extreme positions out of fear of getting "primaried." this goes back before the tea party, "club for growth' has been doing this for a decade or more. I actually don't think Boehner is THAT bad of a person- not next to people like Santorum, Bachmann, Gingrich, Cruz, etc. He's just bad at his job and in a terrible position. Sort of like Bush II, in a way.

Some republicans are single issue voters- and a lot of times that issue is abortion. These are highly religious people that just can't get past the view that abortion is simply legalized murder, all life is sacred, and every other issue is secondary to that. Do I agree? hell no, that position is terribly naive. But the republican party leadership gets a lot of mileage out of exploiting these people. "we will make abortion illegal and save babies, isn't that what's REALLY important?"

Many voters simply vote the way their parents and friends do, and don't have the critical thinking skills or resources to dissect arguments that "sound right" or appeal on an emotional level, but don't actually have any weight or substance. "reduce the deficit!!" sounds great. sounds sensible. But ask "why?" and it sort of falls apart. Most assume government debt is a lot like household debt, and it simply isn't- but most people- even those with degrees are nowhere NEAR well equipped enough to start discussing monetary policy in an informed way. Hell, most of this board isn't either.

Misinformation is another tool. Many are simply misinformed, thinking Obamacare does a lot of things that it really doesn't, and the Party leadership uses fear as well as wholly owned media outlets to reinforce their talking points, knowing they'll never be called on them.

 

[Diablos]

http://www.salon.com/2013/10/07/gop..._ceiling_harry_reid_makes_his_move/singleton/

Last week I reported that while President Obama still steadfastly refuses to award the GOP policy concessions for increasing the debt limit, he would accept non-substantive procedural sidecars, like the kind Republicans supported in February when they increased the debt limit alongside a separate requirement to withhold congressional pay unless both the House and Senate passed budget resolutions.

Today, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid made his move. He plans to introduce legislation to increase the debt limit, and dare Republicans to kill it with a filibuster.

But it won’t be a straightforward dollar increase or a time-limited borrowing authority extension. Reid will likely use a mechanism to allow the president to increase the debt limit on his own, subject to a veto-able resolution of disapproval by the Congress. In other words, the only way the debt limit won’t increase is if two-thirds of both the House and Senate feel it must be pulled back into the realm of legislative horsetrading — something that will never happen absent bipartisan agreement.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (of all people!) originally designed the scheme back in 2011, when Congress was desperately trying to escape its disastrous debt limit brinkmanship.

That’s a process reform senior administration officials say they’d be happy to accept. And if the Senate passes legislation to increase the debt limit without tacking on spending cuts or Obamacare concessions or any quantifiable ransom, it will put a tremendous amount of pressure on House Republicans to follow suit.

There are signs, too, that Republicans in the House and Senate would be satisfied with an approach that ultimately nets zero policy concessions, though not necessarily the one Reid’s advocating.

Here, John Boehner’s deputy chief of staff portrays a procedural debt limit concession as compatible with his boss’ insistence that a “clean” debt limit increase won’t pass the House.

@helitzur February 2013 debt hike included requirement that Senate pass a budget for 1st time in four yrs. Wasn’t “clean.” But POTUS signed.

— David Schnittger (@OhSchnitt) October 7, 2013

McCain, Kirk, and Murkowski are open to this. All we need are three more.
I'm thinking Collins, Ayotte and ummm... maybe Heller and/or Portman. :x

 

[adg1034]

Could be worse, Bachmann seems to be going full-on cultist.



http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewi...e-coming-because-obama-is-supporting-al-qaeda

Um. I know we make real life/The Onion comparisons all the time, but... it's like Michelle Bachmann's become her Onion parody self. I guess deciding not to run again has let her truly be herself in ways she couldn't before.

"Rather than seeing this as a negative, we need to rejoice, Maranatha Come Lord Jesus, His day is at hand,” Bachmann added later. “And so when we see up is down and right is called wrong, when this is happening, we were told this; that these days would be as the days of Noah. We are seeing that in our time. Yes it gives us fear in some respects because we want the retirement that our parents enjoyed. Well they will, if they know Jesus Christ.”

 

[Wilsongt]

Serious question: Have we passed any meaningful legislation since Jan 2011?

 

[Neodiablo22]

Serious question: Have we passed any meaningful legislation since Jan 2011?

Does the sequester count?

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

Can't help but feel Obama is at least somewhat to blame because he compromised so many times before now Republicans think if they push hard enough he will do it again.

It's good that he's making his stand now though.

 

[Drakeon]

Serious question: Have we passed any meaningful legislation since Jan 2011?

Immigration was the hope, but... not that I can think of.

Thanks republicans! (of course, that is literally what they want)

How the fuck can you convince people to vote for you when your entire platform is we won't let anything get done. Fucking Reagan convincing an entire generation that government was evil.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

Serious question: Have we passed any meaningful legislation since Jan 2011?

New? no

They got the VAWA renewed, Sandy, Fiscal Cliff

 

[Jooney]

Serious question: Have we passed any meaningful legislation since Jan 2011?

Several post offices have been named!

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

"liberal" and "democratic" are not the same thing. a liberal position is generally one in favor of change, progress, and tends to be less about traditional values.

conservative positions tend to be the exact opposite. more authoritarian, more about traditional values, and resistant to change.

This can vary quite a bit from country to country, and era to era. liberals and conservatives back in the 1980s and 1970s were absolutely nothing like the ones we have now. It's a common saying that today's democrats are very, very similar to conservatives of the 70s.

look at richard nixon, for example:



At some point during the 1990s, conservative talking heads decided to turn "liberal" into a pejorative, negative term and calling everything democrats did "liberal" because they weren't fans of it. So suddenly "liberal" is a bad thing, for no clear reason. It confuses the issue quite a bit, since conservatives tend to have a habit now of painting something as "liberal" whether it is or not, because it's an effective tool to smear things among their audience.

I agree with the start, but after that I think you are a little off-track.

Liberals and conservatives of the 60s and 70s generally lined up along the same positions today, only skewed to the left overall. For instance, Republicans were pro-military, for lower taxes, socially conservative. The specifics of that were a little different, but not that much. Nixon was still right of the Democrats (minus the Dixiecrats).

Liberal became a dirty word with Carter and Mondale. The 90s were notable in that Clinton self-labelled that way after a decade when that was generally taboo.

 

[Wilsongt]

New? no

They got the VAWA renewed, Sandy, Fiscal Cliff

Of which the Republicans tried to do their best to stop it.

 

[pigeon]

For what it's worth, I'm not a conservative myself. I'm not very experienced with political thought. I just wanted to know if people thought it was possible to be serious and thoughtful about an important issue and come to the conclusion that the conservative position was correct. And if not, why, because it seems strange that it would be so and unsatisfying to just believe that conservatives are always wrong.

There are lots of positions where conservatism is, at the very least, a completely reasonable position to take -- assuming that you define conservatism in the traditional sense of "favoring change that proceeds slowly and with the minimum of disruption to the establishment."

The American "conservative" movement is, by and large, reactionary. Their goal is not to slow the pace of change -- it's to reverse changes that have existed in our society and try to return us to an earlier point in time. Unfortunately, reaction is almost never a reasonable position to take. Since the conservative movement was founded primarily to propagate a reactionary thought process, it's very difficult to find reasonable thought processes in it!

 

[Mario]

So, a week into registration for the exchanges opening, is the healthcare.gov website still proving problematic? I saw they limited access/functionality over the weekend to upgrade/improve/fix it, but haven't seen any revised reports on it today.

Seems there is a huge opportunity the Administration has missed in the website stumbling on launch. Crowing about the number of people registering right now would help damn the Republican claims on "what the people want" by demonstrating interest.

But I can only imagine they aren't crowing about the numbers because they haven't seen the numbers they expected or don't have a number of substance that proves anything yet.

 

[Manmademan]

I agree with the start, but after that I think you are a little off-track.

Liberals and conservatives of the 60s and 70s generally lined up along the same positions today, only skewed to the left overall. For instance, Republicans were pro-military, for lower taxes, socially conservative. The specifics of that were a little different, but not that much. Nixon was still right of the Democrats (minus the Dixiecrats).

and here I disagree, since around the mid to late 80s or so we had the rise of the religious right that completely hijacked the republican party. Modern conservative politicians are VERY much entangled with the religious right in all the worst ways- the abortion debate is part of it, but so is trying to cram creationism in school, ban gay marriage, hang the ten commandments everywhere, and denying global warming on religious grounds. These things did not happen in the 60s and 70s. The Religious right (Christian Coalition, Jerry Falwell, etc) simply didn't have that kind of influence. I've already mentioned nixon (created the EPA, and clean water act) but look at Goldwater:

Yet Goldwater, who collected Kachina dolls and was a champion of American Indian rights, was also a supporter of abortion rights. He called himself a libertarian and in 1989 said the Republican Party had been taken over by a "bunch of kooks." In a 1994 interview with the Washington Post, Goldwater said, "When you say 'radical right' today. I think of moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican Party and make a religious organization out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye."

A former officer in the Air Force, Goldwater was a strong defender of the military but criticized its ban on homosexuals. "You don't have to be straight in the military; you just have to be able to shoot straight." He told right-wingers: "Do not associate my name with anything you do. You are extremists and you've hurt the Republican Party much more than Democrats have."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/saul-friedman/dont-call-todays-republic_b_713288.html

Goldwater isn't a conservative by ANYONE'S definition today, yet he was the party nominee for president in 1964.

Liberal became a dirty word with Carter and Mondale. The 90s were notable in that Clinton self-labelled that way after a decade when that was generally taboo.

I might give you this one- the 90s are only when I became aware of liberal being used as a dirty word. it very well may have gone back as far as carter and mondale.

 

[CHEEZMO™]

Wasn't Goldwater really nuts on some stuff though?

 

[DarkFlow]

Meh, guess this will be dragged on for another 10 days when our debt ceiling is met.

Imagine if we didn't raise it, imagine all the poligaf posts.

Who will have time to post if that happens, I'll be looting.

 

[Manmademan]

Wasn't Goldwater really nuts on some stuff though?

well, he WAS a republican.

seriously though, just those positions above would have totally excluded him from running for dogcatcher in a republican district today, let alone get as far as presidential nominee. Chris Christie doesn't have a prayer of getting past the republican primaries, and he's nowhere near as far left as goldwater is.

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

I agree that mid-80s the social conservative and religious influenced increased, but that's a matter of degree, not one of issues. Abortion, famously, used to split along religious lines and *not* political ones, but that's an exception. And Nixon's EPA was a response to a huge problem that could not be ignored-- it's not like the Democrats were lined up opposite of it. Everyone was on board. Nationally, pollution was a huge problem. And right after the EPA started working, the GOP started resisting it.

I'm old enough to have lived through all of this.

Liberal probaly mostly became a bad word thanks to Reagan, but that was pointing to Carter as the example.

Goldwater:

Goldwater rejected the legacy of the New Deal and fought through the conservative coalition against the New Deal coalition. He mobilized a large conservative constituency to win the hard-fought Republican primaries. Goldwater's right-wing campaign platform ultimately failed to gain the support of the electorate[3] and he lost the 1964 presidential election to incumbent Democrat Lyndon B. Johnson by one of the largest landslides in history, bringing down many Republican candidates as well. The Johnson campaign and other critics painted him as a reactionary, while supporters praised his crusades against the Soviet Union, labor unions, and the welfare state.

Worht noting that politicians in general didn't adhere 100% to party platforms as much as today. Some outlying views does not make him a liberal.

 

[Manmademan]

I agree that mid-80s the social conservative and religious influenced increased, but that's a matter of degree, not one of issues. Abortion, famously, used to split along religious lines and *not* political ones, but that's an exception. And Nixon's EPA was a response to a huge problem that could not be ignored-- it's not like the Democrats were lined up opposite of it. Everyone was on board. Nationally, pollution was a huge problem. And right after the EPA started working, the GOP started resisting it.

I'm old enough to have lived through all of this.

would you say global warming is a huge problem that cannot be ignored? Because modern conservatives are ignoring it. How about the environmental effects of fracking? or the need to do anything but "drill baby drill" to gain energy independence? Because they're not only ignoring all of these, they're flat out saying they don't exist, even when confronted with mountains of evidence to the contrary.

I swear to god there are conservative politicians (some in my state) right now saying "we can't use wind and solar. wind is finite and will stop blowing eventually. we need to stick to oil and coal" with straight faces.

modern conservatives have moved so far right that ANY mention of the "environment" is taboo.

Worht noting that politicians in general didn't adhere 100% to party platforms as much as today. Some outlying views does not make him a liberal.

of course. not arguing that. and not saying Goldwater was a liberal either- not really. But i CAN say that 100% adherence to party platform is pretty much mandatory for conservatives NOW. There is no way a politician with ANY of Goldwater's outlying views would qualify as a conservative right now. At Best he would be a RINO, at worst he would be primaried out of existence and torn apart by AM Radio.

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

I am not saying that there hasn't been a change in extremity, just that the planks are roughly the same. It's a lot easier to ignore global warming than it is chemically polluted lakes closed to swimming, smog alerts that hospitalize and kill people, etc. Though the modern GOP might try to.

 

[RustyNails]

Can't help but feel Obama is at least somewhat to blame because he compromised so many times before now Republicans think if they push hard enough he will do it again.

It's good that he's making his stand now though.

But it looks like Republicans are cracking his stand by offering piecemeal funding, which dumbo Americans think is a good deal. They can't see the big picture, the precedent it will set, etc. Obama basically has to dig in his heels. Did John McClane negotiate with Hans Gruber? No. You don't negotiate with terrorists.

 

[DarkFlow]

Wasn't Goldwater really nuts on some stuff though?

He was, and I went to Barry Goldwater High School in Phoenix. I'm so ashamed.

 

[Videoneon]

Liberal probaly mostly became a bad word thanks to Reagan, but that was pointing to Carter as the example.

This is more of a side note to your guys' discussion, but use of liberal as an epithet does go back a bit in the left too. See the "New Left"

Mario Savio in response to President Kerr, the well-meaning liberal / "the operation of the machine" becomes so odious

 

[Frank the Great]

I was finally able to make an ACA Marketplace account, but now it won't let me log in. Keeps giving me errors.

FFS Obama.

 

[theprodigy]

I was finally able to make an ACA Marketplace account, but now it won't let me log in. Keeps giving me errors.

Thanks Obama!

fixed

 

[Manmademan]

I am not saying that there hasn't been a change in extremity, just that the planks are roughly the same. It's a lot easier to ignore global warming than it is chemically polluted lakes closed to swimming, smog alerts that hospitalize and kill people, etc. Though the modern GOP might try to.

we might be on the same page. I'm saying that the degree that the republican party has shifted rightward has made it a completely different animal than it was in the 60s, combined with the unfortunate influence of the religious right that rose in the 80s. Even as late as 96 we still had Bob Dole in a position of leadership. There are no more Bob Doles.

I have things to do, but I will leave you with this- right now as a result of fracking, we have flammable well water as well as River water that has literally become radioactive.

what do you think the conservative response to this has been? are these problems that cannot be ignored? do you think today's GOP would do anything to address this besides call for more drilling?

 

[Mario]

I was finally able to make an ACA Marketplace account, but now it won't let me log in. Keeps giving me errors.

FFS Obama.

Well, I guess that answers my question.

Such a missed opportunity and a bad look given the circumstances.

 

[DarkFlow]

I was finally able to make an ACA Marketplace account, but now it won't let me log in. Keeps giving me errors.

FFS Obama.

I also got into CoveredCA today after trying all last week. Did everything, Said we made under the Amount for a Family of 4 to get Medi-Cal. So Now I'm just waiting on paperwork.

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

we might be on the same page. I'm saying that the degree that the republican party has shifted rightward has made it a completely different animal than it was in the 60s, combined with the unfortunate influence of the religious right that rose in the 80s. Even as late as 96 we still had Bob Dole in a position of leadership. There are no more Bob Doles.

I have things to do, but I will leave you with this- right now as a result of fracking, we have flammable well water as well as River water that has literally become radioactive.

what do you think the conservative response to this has been? are these problems that cannot be ignored? do you think today's GOP would do anything to address this besides call for more drilling?

I think we are. The modern gop is like the fringe right of past eras.

 

[Snake]

Just tried CoveredCA again and it's finally working. Looks like the ACA is going to be a boon to my family.

 

[j_k_redtail]

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/360590/house-indecision-jonathan-strong-robert-costa



Boehner's final plan is the hope that Obama cracks.

How is this any different from Plan A?

 

[Riki]

How is this any different from Plan A?

Plan A involved him keeping his job.
Plan B is him at least getting a kick back.
We're not at Plan C where he hopes he's not killed by assassin's before the 16th.

 

[j_k_redtail]

http://www.theonion.com/articles/the-republican-party-cannot-stand-by-and-let-obama,34074/

I think this piece is more accurate than we realize. See this link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/10/07/john-boehner-wants-to-talk-badly/

Boehner does not want to be in this situation. (Stephanopoulos played Boehner a few clips from the past in which the speaker said as much.) He is, at heart, a conservative, yes, but a pragmatic one. The idea that the House would vote to repeal or replace Obama’s health-care law 40 times is not one that came from the strategic mind of Boehner, for example.

...

The harder part for Boehner is getting something out of that conversation with Obama and/or Senate Democrats aside from it simply happening. For Boehner to survive politically within his conference, he can’t be seen as capitulating to the White House to reopen the government or raise the debt ceiling. At the same time, he lacks much leverage since most polls show Republicans being blamed more than Democrats for the shutdown, and he’s already on the record as being unwilling to let the country default.

Boehner knows that political reality. His calculation is that if he can get a “conversation,” then the door is open for more concessions from Democrats that might just allow him to declare victory. But, it all starts with convincing Obama that a conversation is necessary.

If Boehner is seen to capitulate on this, he would be neutered politically. That's bad for Boehner certainly, and would lead to chaos within the House GOP - but it could be bad for Obama's Democrats as well. Remember, Boehner survived a coup this past January and could potentially be replaced by someone worse. Maybe Boehner is talking out of both sides of his mouth because he wants to convince the White House that it's in everyone's best interest if Obama throws him a bone. He could be saying: I am the devil you know. Do you think my successor would be better? I am the only one who is holding this caucus together, and if the GOP caucus breaks apart, they could make this country ungovernable. Look at what they're threatening now. So make me a deal. Help me survive. Maybe we can have a shot at our Grand Bargain in the future.

 

[Black Mamba]

Connie Mack on hannity just said Ted Cruz's rise to control in the GOP is obama's fault for not showing leadership.

lol

 

[BLACKLAC]

Good luck with getting that to stick lmfao.

 

[Wilsongt]

Connie Mack on hannity just said Ted Cruz's rise to control in the GOP is obama's fault for not showing leadership.

lol

Everything is Obama's fault.

It's the Obama Rule: In any conversation involving a conservative, Tea Party member, right-wing wacko or Evangelical, the likely hood of something completely irrelevant being Obama's fault reaches 1.

 

[KingK]

So, a week into registration for the exchanges opening, is the healthcare.gov website still proving problematic? I saw they limited access/functionality over the weekend to upgrade/improve/fix it, but haven't seen any revised reports on it today.

Seems there is a huge opportunity the Administration has missed in the website stumbling on launch. Crowing about the number of people registering right now would help damn the Republican claims on "what the people want" by demonstrating interest.

But I can only imagine they aren't crowing about the numbers because they haven't seen the numbers they expected or don't have a number of substance that proves anything yet.

My mom called me today and said she was having issues with the site when she tried it.

 

[PhoenixDark]

Democrat Terry McAuliffe has opened up a significant lead over Republican Ken Cuccinelli in the Virginia governor’s race amid broad public disapproval of the federal government shutdown, according to a POLITICO poll of the 2013 gubernatorial election.

McAuliffe, the former national Democratic Party chairman, is now 9 points ahead of Cuccinelli, the current state attorney general, in a race that also includes Libertarian nominee Robert Sarvis. In the survey, McAuliffe drew support from 44 percent of Virginians versus 35 percent for Cuccinelli and 12 percent for Sarvis.

Four weeks from Election Day, McAuliffe also leads Cuccinelli in a one-on-one contest, 52 percent to 42 percent.

National Republicans take the greater share of blame from Virginians for the lights-out moment in Washington: Fifty percent of respondents said they blame Republicans in Congress most for the shutdown while 35 percent said they primarily blame President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats. Fifteen percent of likely voters in the poll said they blame both sides equally.

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/...ia-governor-election-97953.html#ixzz2h5pPsSN8

 

[theprodigy]

Everything is Obama's fault.

It's the Obama Rule: In any conversation involving a conservative, Tea Party member, right-wing wacko or Evangelical, the likely hood of something completely irrelevant being Obama's fault reaches 1.

hey, this did give us the "Thanks Obama!" meme
....it's something.....right
......right?