Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Miscellaneous 86

1) On tonight's broadcast, Rachel Maddow immediately started making fun of Jon Huntsman's campaign announcement. She ultimately did gathered herself and stated quite frankly, "I really don't mean to be making fun of Mr. Huntsman's presentation here." Twenty additional minutes of mock/ridicule followed....Thank the Lord that these MSNBC people aren't agenda-driven, huh?............2) I finally found something that I agree with Ann Coulter on. On the "O'Reilly Factor" tonight, she told the intrepid one that we had basically accomplished our mission in Afghanistan in six months (Me - I was willing to give it to 2003) and that the Obama surge was a mistake. Wow, huh? Of course, this analysis of hers could all be abominable bullshit. I mean, come on, did you ever (in those final 5-6 years of the Bush administration) hear her talk about these evils of nation-building in a Muslim country before. I sure as hell never heard it.............3) In the mean-time, Sean Hannity continues with HIS highly inflammatory/delusional rhetoric. Yes, folks, once again he referred to the President's socialistic and "redistributive" (probably the first five syllable word that he's ever used) policies. And it's always, "Dude, what has he redistributed so far. He hasn't raised anybody's frigging taxes, for Christ. I mean, yeah, he ultimately wants to raise the top rates back to the Clinton era level but, come on, socialistic? And, besides, it wasn't it your frigging President, Bush, who started this whole deficit spending bullshit; his open-ended bad-assed wars and social spending?"............4) What are up to now, folks; 20-30,000 Syrian refugees - all of them running/fearing for the lives? What I want to know is WHY is it that we never hear anything from leftist clowns like Noam Chomsky and Cornell West about stuff like this? I mean, is it simply because the Americans (or, in Chomsky's case, the Israelis) aren't perpetrating it? Me, I can't think of another reason. Can you?............5) I just thought of another part of my "agenda" that the rich folks aren't going to like. I'm also for lowering the amount of mortgage interest that an individual can deduct from the current cap of $1,000,000 to $500,000. Let's just call it yet another part of my corporatist mindset.

13 comments:

The CDM said...

I'm convinced that the reason why Faux News has such great ratings is the same reason why people rubberneck at bad accidents.

With the ratings they have, if everyone WAS lock-step with them, we'd have a much different assortment on Capital Hill.

MSNBC should face facts, the biggest drama queens are on Faux News and they'll never catch up.

Dervish Sanders said...

[1] The ad was weird. You must have missed the part where Rachel said she thought the weirdness was cool. Anyway, I thought Rachel's coverage was top notch.

[2] I do not agree with Ann Coulter's revisionist position (a position I do not believe she held until recently). We shouldn't have gone into Afghanistan at all. We should have taken the Taliban up on their offer to turn over bin Laden.

[3] I'm in agreement with you on this. I WISH Obama were pushing some real wealth redistribution.

[4] I don't know what you're talking about. You need to be more specific. Everything I know about Noam Chomsky and Cornell West causes me to have respect for them. Clowns? I have no knowledge of anything they've done or said (or not done or not said) that justifies this smear.

[5] I wouldn't call this idea a symptom of your corporatist mindset. I'd apply that descriptor to your desire to lower corporate taxes and your anti-union stance.

[6] What's with all the "Miscellaneous" posts? Why not just title EVERY post "miscellaneous" from now on? Then you wouldn't have to worry about having to come up with additional supporting facts to flesh out a post... instead all your posts could be a bunch of unrelated ideas jammed together. Sounds a lot easier to me.

Mordechai said...

BTW willy, the CBO, who knows much more then you and I combined about the economy says your WRONG about health care, among other things;

To Wit;

The Congressional Budget Office just released the latest edition of its long-term budget outlook (pdf), and it shows the same thing as always: If Congress lets the Bush tax cuts expire or offsets their extension, implements the Affordable Care Act as scheduled and makes or offset the Medicare cuts prescribed by the 1997 Balanced Budget Act — which CBO calls the “extended baseline scenario” — the national debt will be totally manageable. If Congress passes laws extending the Bush tax cuts without offsetting the cost, repealing the Affordable Care Act and its cost controls and protecting doctors from Medicare cuts without making up the savings elsewhere — the “alternative fiscal scenario” — the national debt will be totally out of control:

... add the comments of Bill Gross is the manager director of PIMCO from his appearance on CNBC;

Gross hammered the “anti-Keynesians” in both parties who believe “that fiscal conservatism equates to job growth.” The truth, he says, is just the opposite. “Fiscal balance alone will not likely produce 20 million jobs over the next decade. The move towards it, in fact, if implemented too quickly, could stultify economic growth.”

Gross goes on to spend some time mocking the “ivory tower theorem” that deficit reduction will convince consumers to spend more now because they’ll worry less about taxes and service cuts later. “I know of no family,” he writes, “who, after watching the Republican candidates’ debate in New Hampshire, went out the next day and bought themselves a flat screen under the assumption that their Medicare entitlements would be cut in future years and the U.S. budget balanced.” That theory belongs “in the trash bin of theses and research aimed more towards academics than a practical remedy to America’s job crisis.”

So what should we do? “Government must temporarily assume a bigger, not a smaller, role in this economy, if only because other countries are dominating job creation with kick-start policies that eventually dominate global markets.” But what about the deficit? “Deficits are important, but their immediate reduction can wait for a stronger economy and lower unemployment. Jobs are today’s and tomorrow’s immediate problem.”

Gross goes on to offer some ideas for how the government can goose job growth, both in the short term and the long term. Some of them I find convincing, some of them I don’t. But his overall point is well-taken, and more subtle than some commentators are giving it credit for: Politicians have increasingly been pretending that deficit reduction slices, dices and blends. Don’t believe them. Cutting deficits tends to destroy jobs. And though the deficit matters in the long run, we need to survive the short run first.

Gross’s credentials as a deficit hawk are unimpeachable, but he’s arguing here that, to be a deficit hawk over the long term, you need to be jobs-focused now, as no economy with 9 percent unemployment is going to achieve the growth necessary to get its deficit under control. And he’s right. The question is whether his call for the government to refocus on jobs and brush aside fantasies that deficit reduction is also job creation will get as much attention as his concerns about debt and deficits.


You get the idea the right wing economic focus is totally wrong for anyone but Wall Street the Banks, and the rich, however the right wing doesn't care how much damage they do to the middle class other wise they wouldn't have worked so hard since 1980 destroying it in the first place.

Too bad the right wing is more about gaining back power then actually solving problems which doesn't include further shrinking of the middle class, that which the country has since WW2 relied on for economic growth.

dmarks said...

CDM said: "With the ratings they have, if everyone WAS lock-step with them, we'd have a much different assortment on Capital Hill."

Nope. Even the entire viewership of the top-rated cable news shows is pretty small compared to the entire electorate.

Will "take no prisoners" Hart said...

And don't forget, CDM, the chickage over at Fox is unsurpassed.............wd, Noam Chomsky is virulently anti-American, virulently anti-Israel, and virulently hypocritical (he blasts corporate America and the Military Industrial Complex, all the while while making boatloads of money off of both). I wouldn't believe a single thing that the fellow says.............I'm an American first, anonymous. Whatever Obama does, I want it to work. I do have some concerns about the healthcare bill, though; the massive # of exemptions, the fact that a lot of doctors apparently don't like it (surveys from Investors Business Daily and The Medicus Group), and the fact that the penalty for noncompliance is so small that many people will probably just end up paying it (and then buy insurance once they get sick). Hopefully, these things won't be a major factor.............That's good point, dmarks. Even Limbaugh's audience is relatively small in the larger scheme of things.

dmarks said...

Will: Chomsky is a recognized authority in the area of linguistics. Not much else. He's an ultra-fascist (arguing for the rulers to take control of just about every aspect of the economy, including tight control of the media. And yes, he is antisemitic.

Dervish Sanders said...

Noam Chomsky isn't a fascist or an "ultra-fascist". Fascism is a phenomenon of the Right (which is something Conservatives often get confused about). Chomsky's politics are leftist. He is also not anti-Semitic. You're confusing constructive criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.

I've read a couple of his books, heard him speak a few times, and concluded that he's a brillant mind that those on the Left should listen to. Nothing Will or dmarks have said yet convince me otherwise.

dmarks said...

WD said: "Fascism is a phenomenon of the Right"

Fascism is a phenomenon of the Left. Leftist leaders like Ghadaffi, Pol Pot, Castro, Stalin, and Mao meet the definition of "fascism" very strongly and perfectly"

fascism (noun) a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.

Yes, Chomsky is leftist. So? Many fascists are left-wing, and many left-wingers are fascist. He is fascist due to his advocacy of "regimenting all industry, commerce, etc"

Commander Zaius said...

Damn straight! Lets all head to Mexico and hook up with some senoritas.

No fooling, I like Hispanic ladies.

Dervish Sanders said...

dmarks: Fascism is a phenomenon of the Left.

dmarks, I see you are confused. Let me set you straight...

According to the Oxford Dictionary (who says it is the world's most trusted dictionary), the definition of fascism is...

An authoritarian and nationalistic RIGHT-WING system of government and social organization. (in general use) extreme RIGHT-WING, authoritarian, or intolerant views or practices.

Fascists believe the wealthy and corporations should run the show.

This is why I labeled the SCOTUS Citizens United decision "straight up fascism" on my blog. The fascist SCOTUS judges said corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money influencing (buying) our elections.

It is also why I believe the Republican Party is largely fascist. Alternately the word "corporatist" can be used (as they mean basically the same thing).

You can find other definitions elsewhere -- like the one you provided -- but they are wrong. These definitions arose out of a Right-wing campaign to neuter the word and remove the negative Right-wing connotations that were originally attached to it.

None of the dictators you list are or were fascist. Also, ZERO left-wingers have the ability to be fascist -- because only right-wingers can be fascist. "Leftwing fascism" is an oxymoron... not to mention completely impossible.

dmarks said...

WD said, "I see you are confused. Let me set you straight..."

No, I am not confused. You completely failed to make a case.


"Fascists believe the wealthy and corporations should run the show."

Left wing fascists believe the wealthy and government should run the show.

"This is why I labeled the SCOTUS Citizens United decision "straight up fascism" on my blog."
That you did so showed you were uninformed about the decision.

"The fascist SCOTUS judges said corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money influencing (buying) our elections."

They did not say this.

"It is also why I believe the Republican Party is largely fascist." Alternately the word "corporatist" can be used (as they mean basically the same thing)."

That's a popular myth among the hard left. The "corporatists" exist. It is quite laughable.

"You can find other definitions elsewhere -- like the one you provided -- but they are wrong."

You are wrong, actually. You are being entirely self-serving here, definition-shopping in order to get rid of large proportion of fascist leaders, such as Gadaffi and Pol Pot, who happen to be socialist and left-wing.

"These definitions arose out of a Right-wing campaign..."

Haha. A nutty conspiracy theory.

Actaully, the most-commoin, real definition of fascism fits socialist tyranny because there is little substantive difference between the Hitlers and Stalins of the world.

"...the definition fits to neuter the word and remove the negative Right-wing connotations that were originally attached to it."

Of oourse leftists who are apologists for left-wing fascists want to let the Left off the hook.

"None of the dictators you list are or were fascist. "

ALL of them were. And they also happened to be socialist.

"Also, ZERO left-wingers have the ability to be fascist"

They can easily be fascist. Do you want me to quote the law put in place by the left-wing fascist dictator of Venezuela demanding prison time for those who criticize him in the media?

"because only right-wingers can be fascist. "Leftwing fascism" is an oxymoron... not to mention completely impossible."

Only in your imagination.

Will "take no prisoners" Hart said...

I'm with double b and the supernumerary one on this - south of the border all the way!

Dervish Sanders said...

I still believe Rachel Maddow did a good job in covering the weirdness of the Huntsman ad and campaign announcement. I do not believe this had anything to do with their "agenda". IMO a similarly weird launch from a Democrat would have received the same coverage.

dmarks: They did not say [corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money influencing/buying our elections].

I'm absolutely positive that this is exactly what they said. Because Karl Rove and the Chamber of Commerce are doing it right now (and have been since the SCOTUS ruling). If their actions were still illegal I'm pretty sure some Liberal group would have filed a lawsuit to stop them.

dmarks: No, I am not confused [re: the definition of fascism].

You're confused, misinformed, and/or ignorant of history. Or perhaps you're just lying.

Here is another definition from Wikipedia for "Far-right politics"... The entry (in part) says, "The ideologies usually associated with the far right include fascism, Nazism and other ultra-nationalist, religiously extreme or reactionary ideologies".

Concerning the Right-wing nature of Fascism, Thom Hartmann (in a 8/28/2006 article) said...

In a 1923 pamphlet titled "The Doctrine of Fascism" [Mussolini] wrote, "If classical liberalism spells individualism, Fascism spells government". But not a government of, by, and for We The People - instead, it would be a government of, by, and for the most powerful corporate interests in the nation.

In 1938 Mussolini... dissolved Parliament and replaced it with the "Camera dei Fasci e delle Corporazioni" - the Chamber of the Fascist Corporations. Corporations were still privately owned, but now instead of having to sneak their money to folks like John Boehner and covertly write legislation, they were openly in charge of the government.