Whether it's your first Bonnaroo or you’re a music festival veteran, we welcome you to Inforoo.
Here you'll find info about artists, rumors, camping tips, and the infamous Roo Clues. Have a look around then create an account and join in the fun. See you at Bonnaroo!!
Yeah... it's not the president's place to set that kind of policy in the legislative branch. The Senate & House set their own rules for that kind of thing.
Not to mention that Obama so far seems more deferential to Congress than his predecessor. I'm not saying that it's necessarily a good thing, per se, but it is somewhat refreshing after eight years of the "strong executive" tack taken by the Bush administration.
This showed up on my Facebook status. Sharing it with Jess in mind.
(My friend returning from vacation) is home safe and sound. Increased security provisions were definitely in place today. When leaving the Bahamas, every passenger had a full check of carry on luggage and a pat down...then when we arrived in Ft. Lauderdale, our bags were lined up on the tarmac and checked over by a bomb sniffing German Shepherd!
I was listening to NPR this morning and they were discussing security measures. And this guy (can't remember his name) was talking about how when flying out from Israel (I think? Maybe Palestine? I don't fully remember but it was that area of the world), they used to individually interview every single person on the flight.
and it was 20 years ago for anyone flying on the Israeli national airline.
The reporter said that it was annoying the first time, but then you got used to it and ajusted.
The overall thought of the discussion is that we too will get used to whatever new security measures are put in place, just like we did after 9/11 and after the shoe ban and after the liquid ban...
^^^That'll be next if they ever hit a mall. Which, I hate to say it, is surprising that they haven't tried yet.
I've always heard El Al is the safest airline in the world. They know everything about you, including which way you hang , before you even get to the airport.
Scott Brown presidential run in 2012!!!!! Ok, well not really but the Reps are already pushing him.
As someone who lives in MA. I have to say that Coakley ran the worst campaign imaginable. She thought she had it in the bag. It's not that Brown's win was a repudiation of Obama or the Dems, it was the fact that the Dem candidate SUCKED and probably wouldn't have won the election even if she was uncontested.
I notice that's being spun as a repudiation of the current health care bill. I think it's stretching things to read this as a national pulse on the health care issue, because it involves the state least likely to be affected by national legislation. Massachusetts is the closest state to having universal coverage - I believe it's upwards of 95% covered there under the state plan. I'm assuming it's less of a non-issue in the other 49 states, where the coverage rates are less likely to instill complacency in the electorate.
No, I don't think so at all. Coakley ran a terrible, terrible campaign. She never advertised, thinking she had the election locked up because she's a Dem and also currently the AG. Brown had a steady stream of advertising and also got out and shook hands and knocked on doors. When asked by the Boston Globe if she was being too passive, this was her response:
"As opposed to standing outside Fenway Park? In the cold? Shaking hands?’’ she fires back, in an apparent reference to a Brown online video of him doing just that. “This is a special election. And I know that I have the support of Kim Driscoll. And I now know the members of the [Salem] School Committee, who know far more people than I could ever meet.’’
She was just a horrible candidate. I am far more left leaning than right and I almost didn't even vote for her. To top it off, her campaign spelled Massachusetts wrong on an attack ad against Brown and she also called Curt Schilling a "Yankee Fan." That may sound trivial for people from other states, but MA folks really love the Red Sox and to call a Sox legend a Yankees fan is a big faux pas. She would have lost this election even if she was running alone.
^^yeah - I don't give a crap if she doesn't follow sports at all and thinks there are touchdowns in baseball - but you can't attempt to make a connection with voters in Massachusetts (not Massachusettes), and not even know something as basic as that. It's not about sports, its about creating a strong, likeable image for yourself in the eyes of the voters.
As someone who lives in MA. I have to say that Coakley ran the worst campaign imaginable. She thought she had it in the bag. It's not that Brown's win was a repudiation of Obama or the Dems, it was the fact that the Dem candidate SUCKED and probably wouldn't have won the election even if she was uncontested.
What campaign? She didn't even run a campaign, it was a non-campaign. She was a Democrat from Massachusetts with a 19-point lead over her opponent a month before the election. Hard to quack that up. She thought she had it in the bag, so what does she do? She takes a vacation to the Caribbean with just a couple weeks until the election. Meanwhile, her opponent has been out identifying himself with the people, while she was too meek to ever establish a strong public persona. And when she got back, she saw that Brown actually had a viable chance, so she responds to his attack ads with attack ads of her own. The problem was, those ads were really the first way she had identified herself as a candidate, which doesn't exactly make a good impression. Mark my words - her campaign will, in time, become a textbook example of how not to run for political office. If this had been an ordinary Senate race, I might not have minded as much - but this was one of the most nationally watched state elections in history, since it would give the Democrats a supermajority, and thus allow for the healthcare bill to pass through the Senate. To run a campaign as ineptly as she did is just an absolute disgrace to her, her party, her state, and her country.
All three candidates in this race sucked, in my opinion, and I wouldn't have been happy with any of them in office; just slightly less disappointed with some than with others.
Last Edit: Jan 21, 2010 17:42:13 GMT -5 by jack324 - Back to Top
No one has yet mentioned the Supreme Court (or should I say corporate court) decision today allowing for unlimited corporate campaign contributions. Overturning over a century of precedent, the Court re-affirms that corporations are "citizens" and therefore cannot be stopped from spending whatever they like on political "speech." This could be HUGE.
Let me demonstrate the magnitude of this decision with this example. EXXON alone could easily outspend everyone who donated in every federal politician's last election (all of Congress and the President) by donating less than 18 days of net profit. Yours, mine and everyone who donated money to their congressperson has been rendered all but monetarily irrelevant.
The argument that limiting corporate speech is equivalent to limiting personal speech is ridiculous. A person is endowed with certain inalienable rights their Creator, God, so the government has no rights to abridge these. A corporation is also endowed by its creator, the public, and so is due only the rights and privileges we allow.
This is exactly how corporations were designed and existed until the post Civil War era. Corporations were issued charters to perform specific duties for a specific length of time. During the Industrial Revolution, "robber barons" used the 14th amendment (created to protect slaves' rights) to have themselves declared "citizens." (Ironically, of the 300+ cases brought under the 14th in the 19th century, only 12 were to protect blacks. The rest were brought by corporations to expand their power.)
I think this decision could forever change politics as we know it.
Can we somehow use this to make them citizens of whatever country they're headquartered in, most likely the Cayman Islands or something? There's got to be some way to turn this on them...
Post by flyingmonkeys on Jan 23, 2010 1:55:51 GMT -5
We had a verrry easy accessible welfare health insurance program called TennCare. You all probably know about it. It was eventually shut down (under a democrat governor) due to how crazy it was abused.
I grew up worshipping Rock and Roll like a religion. I know its shortcomings and strengths but have loved it unconditionally all the same since I was eight-years old. I ran away and joined the circus and honestly, I'm still as obsessed as I was as a boy. I'm not a kid anymore but I still remember how it felt and it doesn't really feel all that different to me now.
Yeah, Troo, the Supreme Court decision is truly scary. Now we will need to ask politicians which corporation they are working for, or sponsored by. Approx. 150 years ago Lincoln warned us not to let corporations take over the US. He's spinning in his grave now.
Although I know how the feds can save some money now. We could have the Exxon White House, the Home Depot Capital Building, etc., ad naseum.
We had a verrry easy accessible welfare health insurance program called TennCare. You all probably know about it. It was eventually shut down (under a democrat governor) due to how crazy it was abused.
I don't actually know all about this, but I was curious. I'm at the TennCare Wiki page, and see no mention of the program being discontinued. If anything, it looks like a program called TennCare II is in place until June of this year.
I fail to see why you're blaming a Democratic governor for this. Even if there are problems with the program being abused (which I must admit, I'm not finding) that isn't really a governor's fault. Something like this would be created legislatively. It's the legislature that's in charge with establishing eligibility requirements and rules on something like this.
Sorry, just wondering... 1. why you're claiming a program has failed, when a quick search tells me it's still going on for another six months... 2. why you're so quick to pin blame (on a claim which rubs the wrong way against my available information) on a Democratic governor, when legislatures are in charge of crafting language/rules on such programs... and most curiously... 3. exactly what the hell does this have to do with Obama, when TennCare was created in 1994 and renewed/extended during W's first term?
Sorry, but it seems to me you're going to great lengths to pin something on this president when he had nothing to do with it...
Good speech. I particulary enjoyed that he called out the Supremes.
And, does anyone every pay attention to who applaudes when? I love how not a single Rep stood when he lambasted the Supremes for selling out the country to corporations. How interesting.
“Why is marijuana against the law? It grows naturally upon our planet. Doesn't the idea of making nature against the law seem to you a bit . . . unnatural?” -Bill Hicks
Thank friggin'God the 911 trial is NOT going to be held in NYC. Some people finally got some damn sense. As far as this matter goes, disagree all you want, but if you don't live here, until you do, I don't really care what you think.
Random backtracking on something that was discussed earlier in this thread....
The guy who posed as the pimp in the anti-ACORN video is making news again. He and a "crew" of four guys were arrested posing as telephone system repairmen, trying to gain access to the phone lines of Sen. Mary Landrie (D-LA).
Particularly curious of what jigawig thinks, since I know she cited those videos...