At 3/27/12 10:27 PM, Camarohusky wrote:At 3/27/12 09:58 PM, adrshepard wrote: As long as Zimmerman didn't try to detain Martin or make threats, he did nothing illegal. There's no law saying you can't ask someone what he is doing in a neighboorhood.Yes, cause the uproar here is 100% about Zimmerman asking Martin what he was doing, and not about Zimmerman shooting Martin...
Great contribution, Camarohusky. With so many people using the common sense of your average Afghan peasant to rush to judgment, your failure to understand even a 100-word post is refreshing.
At 3/28/12 09:23 AM, HiryuGouki wrote:The fact of the matter is that Zimmerman suffered a broken nose and Martin repeatedly slammed his head into the ground. Striking the head like that can be fatal, and anyone would be well within his rights to stop that attack with deadly force.I call so much bull on that. Proof please.
Read please.
At 3/28/12 02:28 PM, RightWingGamer wrote:
Wounds can be self-inflicted. Also, was there blood on the ground where Zimmerman's head was supposedly slammed against? And I thought there were grass stains on the back of his jacket... would your head really bleed if it was slammed into the grass on a rainy day?
Even if you ignore the eyewitness who reportedly saw Martin on top of Zimmerman beating him up, it's doubtful that Zimmerman would have had the presence of mind to have broken his own nose, cut the back of his head, and rubbed grass stains into his shirt seconds after killing someone, or without anyone noticing.
Zimmerman's story is directly contradicted by almost every witness there, as well as the fact that Martin is almost half Zimmerman's weight. There's no way that scrawny little kid could have done that.
He wasn't a "scrawny little kid" any more than Zimmerman was a muscular behemoth. Sometimes big people are weak and go down easy, sometimes lighter people have a lot of fight in them. But that's irrelevant. According to at least one witness, Zimmerman was on the ground crying out while Martin was top of him laying blows.
At 3/27/12 09:40 PM, aviewaskewed wrote:He did nothing illegal, nor did he violate any rights.This is so flat out wrong it's insane. But again, a black kid gets shot, a guy with "Racist" in his username defends the shooter...I shouldn't be shocked.
As long as Zimmerman didn't try to detain Martin or make threats, he did nothing illegal. There's no law saying you can't ask someone what he is doing in a neighboorhood.
Look, it doesn't matter if Zimmerman is the Grand Wizard of the KKK, it doesn't matter if he followed Martin around in his truck and asked him questions, it doesn't matter if the police dispatcher said he didn't have to follow him. All that matters is whether shooting Martin was a legitimate act of self-defense.
You may not like how Zimmerman profiled Martin or tried to play cop, but if you're going to get upset about bigotry and idiocy, what Zimmerman did lies at near the bottom of an infinitely long list.
The fact of the matter is that Zimmerman suffered a broken nose and Martin repeatedly slammed his head into the ground. Striking the head like that can be fatal, and anyone would be well within his rights to stop that attack with deadly force.
Even if Zimmerman shoved Martin first, it's still a legitimate case of self-defense. Pushes are not life-threatening attacks, which means Martin's response was an overreaction.
The only way it wasn't a case of self-defense is if Zimmerman pulled a gun first or if he shot Martin after he had stopped attacking (not just paused to get another strike in). The nature of the wound, the position of the body, and witness testimony can attest to that, and in those respects I defer to the judgment of the police, whose job it is to investigate such things.
Not testing Zimmerman for drugs or letting him go home (which was presumably close by in the same neighboorhood) does not outweigh the fundamentals of the case.
At 3/26/12 01:33 PM, VictorGrey wrote:At 3/25/12 09:02 PM, RacistBassist wrote:
If somebody drives their car around following me at night, and then chases me down when I run from them, I'm stomping that mouth, too.
Where are you getting this from?
What Zimmerman's defenders imply, is that they are in fully moral right to go around being a royal asshole who thinks they're Barney freaking Fife, and provoke people into thinking they're a threat and into fights. And if you don't lap their ass, they're also in full rights to fucking shoot you.
He's in the neighboorhood watch. They watch people.
I haven't heard any account that explains how Zimmerman might have "provoked" Martin into breaking his nose.
Zimmerman PUT himself in that situation, so self defense my ass.
This was not a crime-free neighboorhood; Zimmerman was one of the people who decided to keep a lookout. Asking someone who you don't recognize what he is doing in the neighboorhood is not forcing a situation.
I'll tell you one damned thing, any self-righteous s.o.b, that is so stuck up his own ass, that he thinks he can stalk somebody around, get out of their car, jog directly at someone in the middle of the night, scare the shit out of them...
Again, where are you getting this from?
At 3/25/12 10:17 AM, Camarohusky wrote: The fact that it was white on black makes the outcry even worse. (Yes, I know he's technically partially hispanic, but look at his picture, and his name. He's about as hispanic as Taco Bell is authentic Mexican food.)
No, he's pretty much your average second-generation Hispanic. Look at his hair and facial features. He's not white by any means.
Also, I don't know why you think the police didn't investigate anything before sending him home. You weren't there, you don't know what happened, you only see that he wasn't immediately arrested and so you assume the police just let him go.
Not all the witnesses say Zimmerman was never in danger.
http://www.myfoxtampabay.com/dpp/news/state/witness-martin-a ttacked-zimmerman-03232012
At 2 hours ago, camobch0 wrote: Considering the video of Marines pissing on dead Afghani bodies, this U.S. soldier slaughtering 16 completely innocent Afghani civilians, the Quran burning, the uncounted dead civilians from U.S. drone strikes, and numerous other incidents of anti-Arab/Muslim hatred or civilian slaughter, how many people here think we should still be in Afghanistan?
Me. Do you think the Taliban should rule in Afghanistan? Peeing on dead insurgents and burning a book are parties compared to what the Taliban has done and continues to do. You may not like the US presence, but don't try to frame this as what's best for the Afghanis; our actions have given them a better life, hands down. And they know it. Despite all the things you listed, the vast majority of Afghans do not want the Taliban in power again. Every poll and investigation confirms it.
What do you guys think should happen to this soldier, and what do you think WILL happen to him? Also, what do you think the Afghani response will be?
Probably he'll be executed or get life in prison. The Afghanis will throw a fit, like they always do when they can blame some tragedy on the US.
At 21 hours ago, Camarohusky wrote: Why don't we all combine to call you a faggy queer for the sole fact that you believe what you believe in.
Because "faggy queer" doesn't come close to reflecting my views. I'm not some petulant, whiny homosexual. "Sadistic asshole" makes more sense, even if it's still wrong.
If that is what you wish to do, please, keep calling her bitch instead of just addressing her points
I'm doing both.
No the argument, from anyone who ever has has primal urges is that sense and reason don't always make it to the front. The treat every person in the throws of passion as having the same amount fo concentration as a champion chess player is just ludicrous and naive. I'm telling you to cut them slack, I am merely inviting into the real world.
So I suppose when you whack off you just let it fly everywhere? Or when you get angry at someone you always react violently? After all, how can you be expected to control yourself in such times?
A little planning and self-discipline is not too much to ask of anyone.
In the real world, where pretty much everyone lives, this is called "being a annoying bitch."And that is why it takes 3 years and a license to practice law: regular people are too ignorant to understand the tactics, let alone the law.
Why is it you think that being a lawyer and being a bitch are mutually exclusive?
First of all, she's not representing a client but her own beliefs. Others may share them, but that doesn't make her their advocate in any legal sense. Second, there isn't any law involved; everyone who gets insurance signs paperwork that specifically describes what services will and will not be covered. She may have a point that the Georgetown insurance improperly denied the claims of the friends she mentioned. But that's not what she's advocating. She wants contraceptive coverage for everyone regardless of purpose under the plan, which the insurance company has no legal obligation to provide.
"Without insurance coverage, contraception can cost over $3000 during law school."The expense of contraception wasn't your previous point.
That's a hell of a lot to pay for what can be solved with a 2-dollar condom. She isn't talking about medically necessary birth control pills at this point.
No, it wasn't, but spending a thousand dollars a year on contraception does fit the stereotype that women don't know how to manage money.
I was merely saying that your crass description of her "inability to overcome the challenges of being a woman" is worth on a scale of 1 to 10 a number equal to the amount of seconds you have spent being a woman. Say what you want about the topic, but you have no grounds to say how easy or hard it is to be a woman.
Nonsense! There is nothing in the realm of female experience, short of vaginal orgasm, childbirth, and breast feeding, that a man cannot also experience. The symptoms of menstruation are not unique to women, nor is any residual discrimination that modern women may encounter today. Women are biologically different than men, and there are some cultural values that apply (flexibly) to gender, but other than that, we are identical.
Oh really? They're paying health insurance which places an extremely high premium on preventative care. yet it fails to provide a simple little bit of care that could avoid extremely expensive problems.
Possibly; it all depends on the math. In Georgetown's case, a moral objection outweighed any future savings. But some non-religious insurance companies don't cover birth control pills. If the contraceptives are such a win for everybody, why hasn't every health insurance company already decided to cover them? It's not because of moral objections, and it's not because health insurance is obscenely profitable (it's about average). The only explanation is that it isn't such a miracle drug after all.
At 18 hours ago, Angry-Hatter wrote:At 3 hours ago, adrshepard wrote: Covering additional products and services is going to require an increase in premiums.And having to pay for fewer cancer patients and pregnancies is going to lower them.
In some cases, probably. See what I said above to Camarohusky.
These are the kind of risk/benefit calculations that you should make before you decide to start taking oral contraceptives, and I don't suppose to know what choice is the right one for someone at risk of contracting liver cancer, but do I think that the choice should be available? Absolutely. Do I think that the potential benefits outweigh the potential negatives? You betcha.
Moderately expensive items that reduce risks by a very large amount are better.
Not necessarily. To know for certain, you'd have to weigh the costs of the preventative medicine applied to everyone against the cost of a small percentage of them getting the disease and requiring treatment. Coincidentally, that is exactly what health insurance companies do. So why don't all of them provide free birth control pills already?
I'm not "scoffing" at the usefulness of birth control pills at preventing ovarian cancer, I'm scoffing at the idea that they are so profoundly necessary that the government needs to step in and mandate that every insurance package provide them free of charge.
....... You know that 50% of any demographic is by definition going to be female, right?
The target audience for the film, "Rambo" is a demographic. I'm guessing it's not split by sex 50/50. In the US, its about 97 men for every 100 women. The smaller the scale (such as an insurance pool), the more likely that ratio gets distorted.
Menstrual cramps are one of the most common reasons for women to seek medical care, and even the most conservative estimates indicates that about 40% of women experience great discomfort and pain during their menstruation period.
I'd have to see some links before I believed either fact. Not that I think you're lying, but "most common" and "great" are words that need some detail.
Oral contraceptives greatly reduces this discomfort for ALL women, but you apparently don't think that that is a particularly big deal, and that women should just deal with it.
In the case of your girlfriend who had debilitating pain, no, she needed help. But those with less severe pain? Yes. They should deal with it, or at least pay for their own relief.
In any case, there appears to be no reliable source that I can find that supports your claim that Rush has an audience of 20 million listeners, but I'm sure you wouldn't mind citing your source for that, right?
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/limbaugh-gop-m edia-stars-politics-15852664
http://www.medialifemagazine.com/artman2/publish/Radio_46/Ri sing-stink-over-Limbaugh-s-trash-talk.asp
Yeah, I've seen the criticism of the numbers and I don't see the point of arguing about it. If it makes you feel better, I'll say that the reason advertisers haven't dropped him entirely since his show started is because he has a "very, very large audience."
At 21 hours ago, Angry-Hatter wrote:At 26 minutes ago, adrshepard wrote: No one here is against birth control. We are against paying for it so someone else can get it for free.Then you're in luck, because no one is arguing for women getting contraceptives for free, only that it should be covered by the insurance plans they are already paying for.
Covering additional products and services is going to require an increase in premiums.
Liver cancer:
Yes, oral contraceptives increase the risk of liver cancer, BUT, only in women who has a low risk of contracting liver cancer, such as white women in the US and Europe. Women of African and Asian descent, who have a naturally high risk of getting liver cancer, show no increase in liver cancer from oral contraceptives.
So it "only" affects the majority of women in US and Europe. Great.
You know what else prevents cancer? Orange juice. Should insurance companies pay for that?
Wow, orange juice decreases the risk of developing certain forms of cancer by as much as 50%-80%!? That's amazing! I'd love it if you could direct me to that study!
A cancer elitist are you? It has to reduce the risk of cancer by a hell of a lot to be worthwhile? Cheap items that reduce risks by a small amount are worthless?
Ok, I confess I'm not 100% sure about how the insurance system works in the US, but correct me if I'm wrong here; if a person gets cancer, or if a woman becomes pregnant, the cost to pay for the treatment that comes with those conditions get paid for through the insurance the bought, right? If more people get cancer or have babies (which is relatively costly), then insurance premiums go up, right?
Right, which is why many insurance plans already cover birth control pills. But not every insurance company has groups with identical demographics. What may be viable for one insurance company to provide may not be viable for another. Forcing ALL insurance companies to provide birth control pills ignores that reality and exacerbates it by mandating it be provided without any copay, which very few insurance companies do now.
By number, you must mean "two," because decreasing cancer risk is the only factor worth considering. We get it; acne and cramps suck. You know what else sucks? Hemorrhoids. But you don't see anyone going out and demanding they get Preparation H for free, now do you?
My girlfriend gets bad cramps, and along with them, severe migranes, which significantly impedes her ability to enjoy life. Once it got so bad that she actually fainted and was out cold for several minutes, and had to go to the hospital. A little while ago, she started taking oral contraceptives, and now, her cramps are much less painful, and her migranes are completely gone.
She lies in the small minority of women whose menstrual problems are severe enough to disrupt her life and merits treatment with birth control pills. The vast majority of women have an easier time.
As if your previous displays of mindblowing ignorance wasn't enough evidence to how much of a misogynistic pig you are, I point to the preceeding section as ultimate proof.
It's not my fault that her life fits into common female stereotypes. I'm just pointing it out.
HAH! What a joke. Limbaugh doesn't have anywhere NEAR 20 million people listening. You must not have read about how laughably inaccurate and illogical the method for recording radio listeners is. Add to this that with the new and more accurate method of recording what people actually listen to on the radio, Rush is way down, and dropping fast; a 33% drop in the last 3 months.
Is the method as laughably inaccurate and illogical as linking to an article from May 2011 and saying he's lost listeners in 3 months that haven't passed yet in 2012?
At 21 hours ago, Camarohusky wrote:
Personally attacking solely because of the opinion she expressed.
What other measure of a person is there besides what she believes?
Let me guess, you have never been near the point of having sex, have you? Life isn't always crystal clear when the blood goes south of the Equator.
Great argument. "Sympathize with me, for I am a slave to my primal urges."
Think of it like getting into Harvard just to make a political statement about a general topic. Not how it works.
Yeah, it was a weak link in the series.
Again, an outsider to the Attorney world looking in and making baseless assumptions. In the attorney world this is called "Good Advocacy"
In the real world, where pretty much everyone lives, this is called "being a annoying bitch."
She goes to congress and tells about women who spend all their money on something they don't particularly need and barely have enough left to feed themselves (can't manage money)Now I don't remember any of her speech being about the spending habits of young females.
"Without insurance coverage, contraception can cost over $3000 during law school."
That's a hell of a lot to pay for what can be solved with a 2-dollar condom. She isn't talking about medically necessary birth control pills at this point.
Rather than suck it up and overcome the unique challenges of womanhood, she complains that women can't do it on their own and need someone, in this case the government, to intervene and save the day (damsel in distress)And now we have an outsider top the world of women making a comment on how easy it is to be a woman.
I know that women have thrived despite the real obstacles men put in front of them thoroughout history, during which time they had to live without contraceptive pills. Now, when nearly all official and unofficial restrictions upon women are gone, living without contraception coverage is an unbearable monstrosity? I don't think so.
The funny thing is, the girls are paying for them in the form of health insurance. It's kind of like paying for "full coverage" auto insurance but not getting windshield ding repair. Think about it.
No, they aren't. I discussed this already.
At 1 hour ago, Camarohusky wrote:At 39 minutes ago, adrshepard wrote: Sarah Fluke is not a slut (even though she speaks on behalf of them--look at the first part of her testimony); she's a bitch whose actions have done nothing but reinforce mysogeny.Really? Did you learn nothing?
I learned:
"Misogyny" is spelled with an "i" and another "y."
Do you not dispute what I said? In the first few paragraphs of her remarks she's not talking about people with a medical need for birth control pills; she's talking about people "who had to go without contraception" because they couldn't afford the $85/month pills. Any woman not taking the pill and who can't get a guy to wear a condom but screws him anyway is a slut.
Her argument is that the approval process for Georgetown is screwed up, not "all forms of contraception should be paid for, at least partially, by someone other than the person using them."
At 2 hours ago, Angry-Hatter wrote: Oh, I wouldn't say that, necessarily, but when someone says that they are against something that is important to women's health and well being, then that person is either completely ignorant of that fact, or he is a misogynist.
No one here is against birth control. We are against paying for it so someone else can get it for free.
Let's ignore the proven health benefits of taking birth control for a second and let's look at the latter part of your assertion: women who can't afford contraception.
Let's also look at the associated risk of getting other cancers (liver, breast, cervical) which increases with the use of oral contraceptives.
What we're talking about is health insurance coverage, so the question is simply, why shouldn't health insurance companies cover prescription contracetive pills when they are 1) of demonstrable benefit when it comes to preventing ovarian cancer,
You know what else prevents cancer? Orange juice. Should insurance companies pay for that?
Again, this is about coverage in insurance plans that people are already paying for. It's not like it's being given out for free; people pay for their insurance, and they get the coverage. Adding birth control will decrease costs in the long run.
No, it isn't, because the cost of birth control is added on the liability side of the insurance company's equation, with no copay to mitigate the cost. Everyone's premiums will increase as a result, because the insurance company won't just choose to absorb the cost.
At 9 hours ago, Iron-Hampster wrote: If you can't afford contraceptives, you have plenty of options to keep having sex while not getting pregnant.
But as stated, having access to birth control is not always simply about not getting pregnant. It has a number of health benefits that are completely unrelated to sex.
By number, you must mean "two," because decreasing cancer risk is the only factor worth considering. We get it; acne and cramps suck. You know what else sucks? Hemorrhoids. But you don't see anyone going out and demanding they get Preparation H for free, now do you?
Sarah Fluke is not a slut (even though she speaks on behalf of them--look at the first part of her testimony); she's a bitch whose actions have done nothing but reinforce mysogeny. Think about it:
She finds out a school doesn't provide free birth control, which is incredibly important to her, but attends anyway (spiteful and insistent)
She continually harasses the administration to change their policy for THREE whole years (nagging)
She goes to congress and tells about women who spend all their money on something they don't particularly need and barely have enough left to feed themselves (can't manage money)
Rather than suck it up and overcome the unique challenges of womanhood, she complains that women can't do it on their own and need someone, in this case the government, to intervene and save the day (damsel in distress)
Her testimony is an argument against the claims verification process at Georgetown, not against making women pay for their own contraception.
At 2 hours ago, Th-e wrote:It is nice to see advertisers dropping his ass, but still sad to know that there is a chunk of people who are so dumb as to eat his shit up regardless.
You could say the same thing about any political pundit.
When I think of Limbaugh, I tend to wonder why advertisers and radio stations didn't drop him sooner.
Because he has an audience of 20 million people. In a month, when nobody cares about Sarah Fluke anymore, he'll get a whole other slew of companies begging to advertise on his show.
At 1 day ago, Camarohusky wrote:At 30 minutes ago, adrshepard wrote: Then you enroll in Medicaid and other government programs.Again, Tony's comment insinuates that Medicaid and its relaterd programs should not exist.
Only if you consider Medicaid to be a human right.
Most who claim healthcare is a right put in in the Human right catergory. Many characterize human rights as more basic and mroe fundamental than Civil liberties or civil rights. The government as caretaker of the people is tasked first and foremost with ensuring the basic human rights of its people. Many see healthcare as among this fundamental task.
I know we use "many" loosely around here, but I have to disagree. Everything else that we would consider human rights involve being allowed to do something or not being deprived of something. Calling healthcare a human right doesn't work, because it requires someone else to do something for you, as opposed to leaving you free to live how you please.
When people say "right to healthcare" they usually don't mean a right to healthcare 100% funded by the government. they usually mean the right to access healthcare...
They already have it. Obamacare is not about increasing access but shifting costs around.
With how brokenm our payment system is, it's easy to see how the government paying for it would actually lead to higher efficiency.
Doubtful. Hospitals and other health providers already inflate prices among competing insurance carriers. Prices would only go up if the government was the only carrier, unless they were compelled to agree to some inherently inefficent government-mandated price index.
At 1 hour ago, Camarohusky wrote: There definitely certain things peopel can give up, but that is not enough in many cases. Some treatments cost, by themselves, upward of $60,000 a year. That is much more than most Americans make. Also, usually when on these treatments, the ability to work at all is severely dimished. What then?
Then you enroll in Medicaid and other government programs.
Tony said that he does not believe health care is a right. Under this claim I assume he includes medicaid in the policies that should not exist.
There should be more a distinction between rights and services the government is expected to provide. Medicaid is not a right; Congress could do away with the program if it wanted to without violating the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. While we want our country to have some sort of safety net, providing healthcare is not a indisputable guarantee like freedom of speech or religion.
If healthcare were a right, wouldn't the government be obligated to pay for every health service and item because a right must be freely granted to anyone simply due to him existing?
At 16 hours ago, Camarohusky wrote:At 27 minutes ago, Tony-DarkGrave wrote: it should be bought, I mean by paying for your own insurance and paying off the amount of money the insurance didn't pay off. like the current system just with lower costs...What is your opinion on those who cannot pay for their healthcare for whatever reason?
That they aren't trying hard enough to find ways to pay for it. That they need to seriously rethink their priorities if they value their car or house over their health.
"Dying" from a lack of health insurance is a myth. The people who literally cannot pay for it are covered by Medicaid. Those that suffer from a lack of insurance do so because they made choices about how much of their lifestyle they wanted to sacrifice.
At 1 day ago, VictorGrey wrote: Rick Santorum on Small Government: "This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don't think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and regulations low, that we shouldn't get involved in the bedroom or in cultural issues. That is not how traditional conservatives view the world."
Your link doesn't explain the context of the quote. Radio interviews are tricky, especially when there's no expectation of scrutiny. I'd have to hear the whole interview before concluding this quote accurately summarized his beliefs.
Rick Santorum on Sex: "One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country.... Many of the Christian faith have said, well, that's okay, contraception is okay. It's not okay."
This quote is from a larger discussion on the concepts of promiscuity, the sexual revolution, and hedonism. He believes that sex should ideally be act of love, and that contraception erodes that by promising sex without consequences or love, done merely for the sake of pleasure. He doesn't think that attitude should be encouraged through subsizidizing contraception.
Rick Santorum on Religious Tolerance: "The idea that the Crusades and the fight of Christendom against Islam is somehow an aggression on our part is absolutely anti-historical. And that is what the perception is by the American Left who hates Christendom. ... What I'm talking about is onward American soldiers. What we're talking about are core American values."
There are too many concepts lumped into this one quote to go over all of them. I'm not even sure why this is controversial. The Crusaders did not reflect Christian values by modern standards.
Rick Santorum on More Religious Tolerance: "Would the potential attraction to Mormonism by simply having a Mormon in the White House threaten traditional Christianity by leading more Americans to a church that some Christians believe misleadingly calls itself Christian, is an active missionary church, and a dangerous cult?"
This was a rhetorical question posed by a hypothetical voter concerned with Romney's faith. Sloppy reporting by the Week.
Rick Santorum, on Gay: "If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual [gay] sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy..."
This is part of a larger argument about the merits of a traditional family unit. He personally believes that a man is improved through raising a family, that there is something inherently nourishing to personal development on the part of the parents and the children. The implication is that same-sex parents don't experience the same benefits. Hard to say either way unless you can specifically identify how you've been shaped by having parental figures of two sexes. Also note that he says legislation about gay intercourse, etc. should be left to the states to decide democratically.
Rick Santorum on the Freedom: "The idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire."
Self-explanatory; I want to have sex with that woman, whether she wants to or not."
Rick Santorum on Trade Negotiation: âEUoeI donâEUTMt want to go to a trade war, I want to beat China. I want to go to war with China and make America the most attractive place in the world to do business.âEU
Trade wars are destructive. He wants to beat China at its own game by making the US a better place to do business.
Rick Santorum on America's Future: Suffering, if you're a Christian, suffering is a part of life.
No source given from "addictinginfo"
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/rick-santorum-v-limited-gover nment/
Rick Santorum in Defense: "Some will reject what I have to say as a kind of a Government conservatism.
Already covered above.
http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/99240/santorum-surge-201 2-vetting-quotes
Epic Rick Santorum: "As the hobbits are going up Mount Doom, the eye of Mordor is being drawn somewhere else. It's being drawn to Iraq. You know what? I want to keep it on Iraq. I don't want the eye to come back to the United States."
Original source error 404.
Implications of the original quote compiler's laziness aside, all this shows is that Rick Santorum believes the government shouldn't try to erode traditional values, though neither should it use the law to forcibly uphold them.
At 9 hours ago, lapis wrote: Since everyone here seems to be negative, allow me to defend it: the reason wars today are so much less dirty than in the past is to a large part thanks to the increased journalistic scrutiny that people in the military have to deal with.
You mean "US and Israeli wars," right? Journalistic scrutiny would be great if it applied to every combatant equally, but it really only affects the US and Israel (and to a lesser extent, Europe). It makes us all feel good about ourselves while we're losing wars.
What Manning might have achieved is reminding generals and politicians that they may be held accountable even for actions that remain classified. Since they will be less eager to start wars, there will be more peace, hence the Peace Prize. Peace is not something to be maintained at all costs. Sometimes wars are necessary, and people like Manning get in the way of that.
A bad peace is even worse than war, or so the loading screens on Rome: Total War say.
At 13 minutes ago, MultiCanimefan wrote: Pull out and and stay out.
Even if the Taliban manages a complete resurgence?
It's going to be option 1 for a year or two more, then we'll leave behind an Afghan government that's just strong enough to keep the Taliban from taking over. Afghanis may hate the US, but they hate the Taliban even more. We should continue to provide financial and logistical support to Afghanistan, and if the Taliban ever mounts a concerted attack, the US should help beat them off.
That's the best solution. We can't "win" the hearts and minds of anyone because half of them are such goddamned ignorant peasants, and the other half is afraid to do much because of retaliation from the Taliban.
By the way, that bbc article is a joke. We're dealing with a nation of essentially children and they criticize us for "mistakes."
At 13 minutes ago, SmilezRoyale wrote: It seems to me like Decades of intervening in the politics of other nations by the US Government has engendered a massive sense of entitlement by Americans to meddle in other countries business.
What do drug addicts, abusive spouses and parents, and third-world despotisms have in common?
They all say the same thing when confronted: "none of your business."
We get it. You hate the US. There's no need to keep reminding us about it.
At 1 day ago, lapis wrote:At 5 days ago, Ranger2 wrote: Here are the facts: (...)U.S. Agencies See No Move by Iran to Build a Bomb:
-Iran is building nuclear weapons despite sanctions. It is not even hiding them like Saddam did; it is openly flaunting it.
Don't forget that Ranger2 is an Israeli, not an American; this article doesn't dispute that Israeli intelligence believes there is a imminent threat.
Besides, I don't see how the "strategic doubt" theory is supposed to work. Surely the current sanctions against Iran outweigh any advantage given by its rivals' uncertainty over its nuclear program.
At 3 days ago, Slizor wrote:
Two, the story is predicated on a simplistic understanding of "reward". It assumes, following usage in the status quo, that what you receive for a service/product is "earned" - that you have a moral right to it on the basis of deserving it. However, the world is replete with examples of people who get a high salary but actually do very little - investment bankers being a good example.
You don't have the slightest idea what you are taking about. An investment banker has to make extremely difficult and risky decisions about what companies to accept as clients, whether their securities are marketable and how to make them so, and deal with a whole other slew of complicated financial instruments.
Equally, people who do do useful things - factory workers, for example - often see very poor returns for the provision (and fruits) of their labour.
You're fundamentally confused about the concept of "value." It is not the amount of calories or muscles used, or whether the end product is something real, like a house, as opposed to something abstract like financial advice, it's about how replaceable you are. I'm sure many factory laborers work pretty hard, but the fact is that there are a hell of a lot more people who can operate part of an assembly line than can keep track of the latest financial regulations or trends and use them to build securities. The market for employees functions the same way as the market for goods. Especially skilled or uniquely capable individuals will get paid more than those who blend in with everyone else.
As such, to suggest that in Capitalism people are given their due "reward" is fundamentally not in line with how capitalism has operated. Also, to link reward to hard work in capitalism is just plain fucking stupid
Not true. You're just forgetting that hard work applies to young adults as well. The people who bungle through high school, don't care about learning, or who only do the minimum necessary to advance to the next grade aren't going to be in a good position to get a college education. The poor but dedicated student has far more potential than the rich, uninspired slacker. The US spends hundreds of billions of dollars each year for just this purpose through community and state colleges, scholarship programs, and subsidized financial aid, not to mention what's spent at the federal level to support primary education.
Operating under its implicit definition of socialism, the government, even if it takes all the "reward" can not take away the inate pleasure of crafting something, or of enjoying your work.
Every failed socialist system spent considerable resources trying to convince people that this was the case. It didn't work, so instead the government just punished anyone who publicly said otherwise.
At 16 hours ago, aviewaskewed wrote: Riiight, because there's so many welfare recipients on drugs because we totally got those solid numbers I asked for...oh wait, no we didn't. So all this is assumption backed by nothing to prove this a big enough problem to actually warrant the added expense of drug testing (which will ultimately be passed on to everyone, that public whose funds you're trying to protect).
You're not going to get definite numbers about illegal activity in general. All the data about issues like drug use or sexual behavior in kids in teens, for instance, is based entirely on self-reporting polls.
However, if enough of a drop in welfare enrollment can be attributed to this policy, and the money saved is more than the cost of the tests, then that should be a good enough indicator.
I also love how you have this massive lack of compassion for anyone with a substance abuse problem, that they're all automatic scumbags beyond hope...
Not necessarily true. You can't "opt out" of paying for welfare and the rest of the social safety net. It's not "compassion" or "charity" if it's forced.
The only person I see hating here is you. :)
Dude, you were scolding him like a parent because he was posting drunk and it wasted your time because you took his posts seriously.
No one is arguing NO ONE on welfare does drugs. I'm sure there are some that do. My issues with this is that we cannot determine if the added EXPENSE is worth it, and also I think it shows the very prejudicial mindset that many people have towards ALL people on welfare.
Well, I don't think it's prejudice to believe that most people are on welfare due simply to bad luck. I've never done a survey of welfare recipients, obviously, but I have met a lot of people who would be considered "working poor," and one thing they have in common is a history of bad life decisions. I can't imagine that those who depend on welfare are that much different.
I really do hope you, or somebody you know gets to the point where their in poverty and can't scrape that money together...just so that you can get off this high fucking horse of yours where if people don't conform to your standards of living and what not they are scum and should just die.
I don't think they should die because they are still redeemable (not that I'm all that glorious and pure, but relative self-sufficiency is a start). I just don't see how so many people could get that far down a hole and have anyone to blame but themselves. There's no point in forcibly caring for someone if he's fighting you the entire time. They aren't children.
At 2 days ago, aviewaskewed wrote:
Why do you assume the drug testing will be part of helping people find a job? Because it's more logical to believe this is a way to actually force people OFF welfare and kick them out of the program.
What's the problem with that? Do you want drug addicts to get public funds? People who would rather do drugs than try to live a normal life should be homeless vagrants and have their children seized.
And while you're hating on the drunk guy, check out my original post:
Everyone seems to be overlooking the fact that a 2-5% failure rate does not mean 2-5% of welfare eligible people use drugs. It more likely means that more than 2-5% are not applying for welfare because they know they will fail the test. According to this article, welfare enrollments have dropped significantly since enacting the urine test requirement.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/11/us/states-adding-drug-test -as-hurdle-for-welfare.html
And:
http://www2.wkrg.com/news/2011/oct/11/nearly-1600-welfare-ap plicants-decline-drug-test-ar-2541270/
Lots of people are refusing to take the test, at least in Florida. That's either because they are idiots (who lives so recklessly that he can't scrounge up $25-$35 to take a piss test) or because they are on drugs. The ones who refuse due of the "indignity" of testing obviously don't need the money, since starving to death is anything but dignified.
At 3 hours ago, EKublai wrote: Therefore, if it is the state's policy to drug test those who receive taxpayer dollars, then every official of the state government on the tax payroll must do the same.
Except that the officials perform a service for their pay. Welfare recipients get money simply by being pathetic.
Everyone seems to be overlooking the fact that a 2-5% failure rate does not mean 2-5% of welfare eligible people use drugs. It more likely means that more than 2-5% are not applying for welfare because they know they will fail the test. According to this article, welfare enrollments have dropped significantly since enacting the urine test requirement.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/11/us/states-adding-drug-test -as-hurdle-for-welfare.html?pagewanted=all
However...I live in the state of Pennsylvania...and while I love my forests and many of its people...PA is not known for its rational thinkers.
You're right; Obama won big in Pennsylvania.
Besides, the PA law targets far fewer people than the one in Florida, specifically those with a history of drug-related charges.
At 6 hours ago, Nintharmed wrote:
Capitalism is crippling towards everyone, be they poor, white, black, rich, middle-class, whatever.
Not by any objective standard.
The economic masters of our current time have promised us success, but what have they delivered? Housing bubbles, credit crunches, Global Warming and delivery of our companies into the hands of China, leaving America and others hangers-on to economic ruin.
A recession is not the same as economic ruin. The vast majority of people are doing just fine.
The company cannot care for it's workers. It can only care for the wealth, which inevitably finds itself in the hands of grotesque Communist-dictator states such as China. Lets face it, trickle-down economics is bootless.
Except for China, which embodies extreme capitalism at the expense of the individual.
The money will always speak instead of the investor.
The money is the voice of the investor. He puts his money where he thinks it will do the best.
There is no escape from this: America, Europe, even the Middle East are regularly left broken
We aren't broken; you're just being dramatic to make your argument appear more important than it actually is.
The only way to eliminate the egotistical nature of Capitalism is to socialise the marketplace, and to ensure that moral values take precedence
Whose moral values? Yours? How far will you go to ensure them? Forced re-education? Censorship? Gulags? Purges?
Every time a government has tried to forcibly instill a new culture and values upon people it has lead to oppression and violence. Societies change through grassroots movements, not mandates from politicians.
At 1/31/12 04:17 AM, ClickToPlay wrote: That being said, the United States and the "West" intend evil for any nation who won't comply to their laws.
Our laws are:
Don't support Islamic terrorism.
Don't pursue WMDs.
These are pretty easy "laws" to follow.
Why do you assume that the U.S and it's friends are always the good guys? You've got to be a fool to trust any government's assumption of who the 'terrorist' is in this situation..
We didn't need the government to tell us that 9/11 was a terrorist act.
In any case, no one is saying that Iranians are terrorists or Iran is a terrorist state.
This apparent selectivity isn't surprising when you think about it. The strongest, most influential nations in WWII were in Europe (aside from the US and USSR) and the Holocaust was a European event. Even though there were still lots of deaths in Asia, the people in Europe and the immigrants in the US probably didn't have nearly as strong as a connection to civilians in China, for instance.
From a Western perspective, there hasn't been anything exactly like the Holocaust long before and since. The Soviet Union had purges, but those were politically and not racially motivated. Plus, the people who died in the Holocaust weren't typical victims of the undisciplined barbarism that can come with war, like in Nanking under the Japanese from what I've read. The Holocaust was a calculated and organized effort to exterminate a race. I think it was the mechanical efficiency that made the Holocaust so unimaginably horrible.
At 1/25/12 09:39 PM, aviewaskewed wrote:
The election was very close until the economy went in the shitter, if you think anything else tipped that election, I just don't think you paid attention.
True. Just like how Obama's poll numbers on how he is handling the economy went up since last month in connection with more positive growth reports. Of course, no one really did anything in that time, but since Obama's at the top, he gets credit for it.
I'm okay with legalizing drugs like heroin and cocaine, aren't you? What could go wrong?Amsterdam seems to be doing ok. But you're right, clearly if the War on Drugs is criticized the only possible conclusion to draw is that you either like that, or you want to legalize everything...there is of course no middle ground.
All I meant to convey was that the drug war would still be expensive even if drugs like marijuana were legalized. It's not fair to blame prudish obstinancy over marijuana for the costs of enforcement.
Yeah, the whole "dictator with nuclear weapons" thing isn't that big a deal, when you think about it.It kind of isn't really. N. Korea has them and what have they done?
Other than harass S. Korea and occasionally kill some of its people? Nothing, if that behavior doesn't count.
Firing ICBM's shortens your life expectancy tremendously.
If your enemy has enough ICBMs to wipe you out, too. If he only has a few and his delivery isn't reliable, then MAD doesn't apply. An arms race among Middle Eastern nations would be pretty sloppy compared to that between the US and USSR.
Plus, some of these WMD-holding regimes aren't stable, like you said. Wouldn't you be disconcerted if Ghaddafi had nuclear weapons and they fell under the control of some cruddy militia?
How? Where? When? Also abortion bans are certainly a health issue, and potentially a civil rights issue as well.
Planned Parenthood recieved about 300 million from states and the federal government in 2009, if wikipedia is correct. The organization's services include abortions, the majority of which are probably elective, judging by other data about abortions in general (I think we talked about this in another thread).
Other then the last sentence (which was clearly a low blow) I think there was actually a pretty accurate representation of the mindset of people who vote Republican. Certainly that's been my experience personally with Republican voters.
In that case, let me say that people who vote Democrat tend to live in an environment that tolerates a lack of personal responsibility and moral fortitude in the name of compassion and understanding, even at the expense of one's own values. I know more than a few people like that.
At 1/25/12 04:55 PM, morefngdbs wrote: Really chilling words when you look at what has been done lately in the USA.
If you can't tell the difference between post-WWI Germany and the present day United States, then the only thing that's chilling is your level of ignorance.
At 1/24/12 06:56 PM, bcdemon wrote:At 1/24/12 04:04 PM, Ranger2 wrote: Makes sense, seeing as Iran's President has said that he would like to wipe Israel off the map.Come on now, that's the pro-Zionist translation. The real translation is about removing the "regime occupying Jerusalem" He doesn't mention the words "wipe" or "map" or even "Israel" yet you are able to sit there and regurgitate the lie that Ahmadinejad said "wipe Israel off the map".....
That's bullshit, we've already argued this in another thread. The official Iranian website translated his remarks as "wipe Israel off the map." It used to be at this address, http://www.president.ir/en/?ArtID=10114, but that was a year ago, and its gone. This NYT article confirms that the "pro-Zionist" translation was the same one used by the Iranian government.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/weekin review/11bronner.html?_r=1&ex=1307678400
They aren't idiots, they know what "wipe off the map" means in English, yet they made no effort to correct it.
Herd mentality and momentum are powerful things
Hell, they worked for Obama.
they'll spend money like drunken frat boys at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch for the Drug War
I'm okay with legalizing drugs like heroin and cocaine, aren't you? What could go wrong?
military adventurism
Yeah, the whole "dictator with nuclear weapons" thing isn't that big a deal, when you think about it.
and the enforcement of abortion bans
As if that would outweigh the amount of taxpayer dollars already going to support and provide abortions.
The thing is, Gingrich can't beat Obama. His numbers are even worse than Santorum's (an 11 point spread and a 9.8 spread respectively).
Numbers which could never, ever change in the next 11 months.
They care about their agendas, particularly in rural areas. You might not like this, but it's the party of provincialism. Rural Republicans in particular live in a cultural and informational vacuum. They don't know which way the wind is blowing. They just know what Joe Bob and Betty Lou think.
Epic tolerance from a liberal.
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