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ribozyme
Guest
I do not think he would consider doing that. I suppose BamaRider is ardently opposed to the estate tax too.
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L
LCMS_No_More
Guest
A logical conclusion considering that there is nothing more evil and despicable than a tax to an adherent to right-wing ideology.
E
Ender
Guest
Well, that’s an unpleasant response; perhaps I was mistaken in expecting better of you. I asked nicely and even said please. Your dismissive reply was unwarranted.
Another uncharitable judgment from you. I see no reason to accept your interpretation of the Yoo document over that of Ridgerunner. If you’ve actually read it then quote something from it that contradicts his understanding of what it says. I believe it is, as Ridgerunner said, a discussion of the law, neither more nor less.
Would it do me any good to request that you cite your source? Pretty please?
You have mangled the meaning of my comments just as I believe you have misunderstood the Yoo document and the other sources you reference. We do not differ on the authority of the Pope. We have different understandings of what we read and, if your misinterpretation of what I have said is any example, it is your interpretation that is deficient.
Ender
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BamaRider
Guest
Thats your problem, when a yes or no will do, all we get is a bunch of quotes, links, and weather reports. “Is it gonna rain today?” “Well it could if this front crosses at this time, or this low pressure systems picks up the pace. But then it again it won’t if the high pressure system remains stationery, but will we be watching to see if the moist air off the ocean will have any affect, if so we coiuld have several days of rain.”
So a guy like me asks again- " I see, but is it gonna rain or not?" It is not that simple, you can’t put the chances of rain in a sound bite." And thats what all your posts remind me off.
I watch the news, I know which candidates answer the questions forthright. If I get a weather report, the guy gets a strike, too many and he’s outta the game. I’d like to see the SoCal answer with a yes or no, to the following. I’d ask the same of all 3 political candidates too.
Do you wanna win the war in Irag or not?
Do you always vote pro life?
Are ya gonna raise taxes on ANYONE?
Are you gonna control the borders?
Do ya wanna socialize medicine and strip me of my private insurance?
Are ya gonna defend this country without polls?
Do we gotta check with France and Holland before putting a cruise missle in the living room of a guy like Zarqawi?
Are ya gonna make welfare checks easier to get?
Can we get a yes or a no to the above? What say ye! Lemme hear y’all !I said can we get a yes or a no to the above!
And that is how the regular folks in fly over country vote. I know many folks on the left coast and in the northeast think we are just hayseeds and don’t know much, but usually good to be consistenly underestimated.
We know gobble gook when we hear it. And nothing is gonna change after this election. I don’t see either one of the dynamic duo turning a red state blue. Not gonna happen. They won’t answer questions.
Given the demise of the Northeast as a political force (they all moved south long ago) and now that the south holds 33% (and growing) of he nations population, and when ya join that with the mostly conservative mid west and mountain states, the status quo will remain. I know that bothers a lot of folks on the coasts, but there it is.
But demographics are a whole nother thread, I digress.
Since when is WWII the measuring stick on how long we fight a war? I don’t care how long it takes, we stay till we win.
Some of the other stuff you wrote about I’ll just say this. I have no confidence whatsoever of either of the TWO candidates on the left defending my niece from a crazy terroists with a nuke. For crying out you wanna follow him around and see where he eats lunch? Now all that is well and good, if you ain’t worried about nuke going off!
I said before I don’t care what they do, to extract info outta bad guys. I trust the guys on the ground. I’m NOT gonna Monday morning QB them. If any go rogue I’ll leave it to the officers there to deal with them. I’m not gonna support a policy handcuffing them in what they need to do.
Again all you did was complain about what wrong with the ports, billions have been spent on Homeland Security, but its like all govt agencies mired in red tape, and mediorcity.
As far as the anthrax thing a few weeks after 9-11, I don’t know what could have been done to prevent a kook from going to the post office. So I say yes, no terroists attack since 9-11. I don’t see any terroists taking either member of the “dyanmic duo” serious. I bet they’re shaking in the caves at the thought of one of them becoming Commander in Chief. Gimme a break.
In light of that, I’m not gonna change how I vote. If a wacko with nuke in his lunch box is captured, I much rather have the current folks in charge then one of the dynamic duo.
I really don’t know how to respond this, so I won’t.
Sorry if I had too many typos, I’m sleepy.
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ribozyme
Guest
Do you have any evidence that controlling the borders are a priority for the Republican Party (note, I said Republican Party not conservatives)? Some in the GOP do not want immigration reform because it interferes with making profits as it denies businesses a source of cheap labor.
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BamaRider
Guest
Ribeye was askin-
The guy I’m voting is weak on borders. He was not my first choice.
To answer a earlier question of yours, yes, I want the estate tax gone.
No I don’t, they have failed to do so, and your premise for the reason has merit.
The guy I’m voting is weak on borders. He was not my first choice.
To answer a earlier question of yours, yes, I want the estate tax gone.
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Ridgerunner
Guest
Having read the Yoo memorandum, and finding that it does not say what you claimed it said, I have no interest in chasing down any more rabbit holes that lead to nothing.
For the other posters who might have gotten as tired of chasing down absolutely unfounded assertions as I have, I would like to say the following. Many law journal articles were written by all kinds of professors and students, a few years ago, about the powers of the president, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and the rights of detainees, and so on and so on. There were as many different opinions in those articles as there were people to write them. Many were extremely speculative. Some were pretty far out. Some were twisted to fit the political purposes of the writer. Some were plain reviews of the law that the writer thought were properly researched. Some were well researched. Some weren’t. Mostly, they don’t mean very much.
But getting back to the Yoo memorandum. It’s long, and it’s legalese wall to wall. But I encourage you to read it. SoCal’s link is at Post #250 of this thread. You will find that it absolutely does not authorize torture; that the word “testicles” is not in it anywhere, and that the writer actually says, on page 47, as I mentioned before, that any kind of harming of genitals is to be regarded as illegal.
Yes, and the Youngstown vs. Sawyer case, cited by SoCal, is an old case from the Korean War era dealing with Truman taking over steel mills. It has nothing to do with the subject of the Yoo memorandum.
Frankly, if Mr. Yoo said something on Youtube or at Berkley about testicles, (and I’m not going to go down that rabbit hole either) it does not change the fact that the memorandum does not authorize torture. The memorandum does not authorize anything at all, and doesn’t purport to. That wasn’t its purpose. It’s a review of the law. Nothing more.
We waited in vain for the study by conservatives that shows conservatives, southerners and evangelicals are incapable of thinking and understanding information. We waited in vain for the actual case histories on the 100 “murdered” detainees. All we see are more assertions without foundation.
This thread no longer contains any real information. It’s just a sounding board for spewing hatred of Republicans. I waited a long time for the real foundational stuff, SoCal, and you didn’t deliver. Now I’m done. Shoot me in the back as I leave, if you want, but I’m finished with this thread, and I would encourage anyone else who is sick of the hate mongering to do the same.
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SoCalRC
Guest
You are correct, and I am in error. It is simply tiresome to establish every conceivable fact, particularly when it is impossible anyway.
Consider, we are entering our sixth year in Iraq, and have slowly but surely collected mountains of evidence. Yet, there are people who are still certain that Sadam had something to do with 9/11 and/or Iraq had weapons of mass distruction.
And, whenever I think that the intelligence of public discourse cannot sink any lower, I am inevitably proven wrong. Consider the VPs remarks recently, which echo something the President said a few weeks ago. Cheney contended that if we leave Iraq, we risk Al Quada getting Iraq’s oil.
Think about the sheer stupidity of that remark. A very small (according to the Pentagon) group of foreign SUNNI fighters is going to take over Iraq’s oil and sell it on the international market? Iraq has a majority SHIA population and most of the oil is the south - where the SHIA majority lives.
Now, consider the implication. We’ve been there 5 years, are pouring in $2.4B a week, and the US commander and ambassador both just testified to Congress that it is inevitable that Iraq will always be strongly allied with Iran and they cannot even conceive of a scenario when a US presence will not be met with violent opposition. But the VP contends that AQ, which he has repeatedly stated is “on the run” and in its “last throws” is going to do what the entire might of the US could not do? Occupy and pacify Iraq?
Some things are so far removed from reality that there is almost no way to respond. Frankly, I consider the US’s involvement in torture one of those issues. We have had 6 years of leaks, revelations, coverups, and humiliations on the world stage. We now have current and ex high ranking government officials who cannot travel to the EU for fear of legal prosecution. Much has now been stated in open testimony before Congress (we’ve even had folks plead the 5th). Now we know that John Ashcroft, when AG, raised the objection of “war crimes” to the administration long before the horrible photos from that prison emerged.
None the less, exasperation and relentless streams of false assertions from others towards me is no excuse for discourtesy towards you. I should have simply stated that I consider the US governments involvement in torture to be well established fact, but given the scope of the subject and the complexity of the evidence, it is best that you research the matter for yourself.
I would have to say that, based on all the available evidence, we most assuredly do disagree on the authority of the Pope, and the Bishops.
vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html
I have quoted this section of the Dogmatic Constitution of the Church several times and asked you to reconcile it to several of your positions, and your answer is always the same - the words do not mean what they say. I have quoted doctrinal notes that reaffirm my interpretation, all to no avail.
I cannot follow your line of reasoning. Consider this thread. I see no contradiction in CHRISTIFIDELES LAICI, particular with regards to the right to life. You believe that the Pope’s position is expressed with some type of inherent contradiction. So it is certainly possible that you, not I, struggle with abstract thought and the written word.
Personally, I think that the most probable explanation is the one I have already been proposing. As the research suggests, self described conservatives think in a very different way. This makes communication with someone like myself, who believes that consistancy and compatibility with measurable reality are important, very difficult.
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SoCalRC
Guest
You don’t have to chase rabbit holes. I provided a link which included YouTube links, among them were fox news and the infamous testicles exchange with Yoo himself.
You also utterly ignored the other links. The Yoo memo was not beginning. It was the high level meetings to establish a policy of torture that was first. The Yoo memo was then solicited from the Justice Department for cover. Notice that Yoo signed off on it himself (mormally the AG would sign off on it, but we know that the AG had concerns that the US was heading squarely into war crimes area).
We also do not even have to look to the memo, or the news. Everything that really matters is right here.
I’ve stated that conservatives may well think differently. Bamarider was happy to proudly state what the research suggests (reading what I have to say is not nec. to form an opinion about it, he is certain of his moral superioritity, regardless of the human condition in his state, etc.). And you joined him, by asserting demonstrably false things, like how I vote.
I also stated that torture is a non negotiable, and provided Church documents to support that position. No one has provided any Church documents to counter that claim.
You are trying to some how ‘catch’ me. Then argue that any error of fallacy, however small, invalidates the whole. Again, this demonstrates a willingness to abandon reason. But it remains moot.
We have a large body of evidence, on many fronts, and the US government has acknowledged that it has engaged in practices which, under long standing US policy, are torture.
But even if we erase that, and follow your thread pulling. My fundemental point remains made. I have stated that I am not willing to compromise on torture, but that many folks here are. Bamarider affirmed that directly, and was joined by others.
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SoCalRC
Guest
Define win. Sadam, gone. WMD, none. That was the original justification. Western Democracy? Unfriendly to Iran? Permanent US military bases without ongoing casualties? Won’t happen, not in 6 years, not in 60 years.
Yes. Only a sociopath leaves a $500B structural deficit and $9T in debt to his children . Cutting taxes in a time of war was cowardize on a historic scale. Don’t you love your country? What about your children? Shouldn’t people be willing to pay for their own defense?
Besides, I figure if raising taxes in the face of fiscal reality was good enough for Ronald Reagan, it is good enough for me.
Yes.
No. But 10-18% inflation on health care has to be addressed. It will bankrupt the nation and is already hurting our national defense.
The first think would be to get rid of the $350B dollar boon-doggles that the GOP congress/president added. Any time pols make competition illegal, you know that someone is fleecing the nation.
Huh?
No. That’s another one that the GOP has dead wrong. It infuriates me to hear Bush and GOP hopefuls ***** foot around about getting Bin Laden because they don’t want to ‘annoy’ Pakistan.
Frankly, I thought it was almost treason when Bush&Co passed on taking out Zarqawi when they had the chance the first time.
No. And I’d go after the giant welfare queens no one touches - corporations. Record profits, $4 gas, why are billions in tax dollars going to oil companies?
I understand part of it, when I put a plant in Mobile, we were woo’ed. The state wanted the jobs and the indirect revenue. But it is out of control. Do you know just how much some cities in your state shell out to large retailers? Some of the deals are larceny. Then they take all that windfall dough and buy more favors from Congress.
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Al_Masetti
Guest
Kudos to “BamaRider”.
SoCalRC has finally revealed his core beliefs. Basically it is anti-Bush. President Bush is no conservative, but the angry rhetoric in this post is uncalled for.
The original justification for the war was not WMDs. This has already been discussed. All anyone needs to do is to read the text of President Bush’s speech.
But, thank you, “BamaRider”.
Good job.
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Al_Masetti
Guest
This is a good thread and I want to get it away from being purely a set of rants and get it back to the differences between left and right without all the vitriol.
There are creative ways to demonstrate the differences between left and right.
If, for example, you are interested in getting rid of the estate tax, check out “The Fair Tax” by Neal Boortz and John Linder.
They have several excellent Web sites.
fairtax.org
I will post more here later.
But I have read the two books on the Fair Tax. And they are excellent.
One author is Neal Boortz:
boortz.com/
The other author is Congressman John Linder who has been submitting the authorizing bill in the House of Representatives, H.R. 25 in this Congress. As you know all taxation bills must originate in the House of Representatives … that’s in the Constitution, which we occasionally follow.
johnlinder.com/
Part of the agenda of the right is to get rid of income, payroll, corporate, and estate taxes, which are complex and hidden. And where the purpose of the taxes deal more with redistribution of wealth (a Marxist purpose) rather than raising revenue to run the government.
The alternate tax proposal of H.R. 25 creates a transparent tax. EVERYONE can see exactly what the government is taking. Right now, what the government is taxing is hidden in many different ways, so we can’t see the full impact on us.
The next step is to put the entire government spending on the internet including the earmarks and all of the backroom deals.
Finally, there are two books. Both are excellent.
Here is the more recent of the two:
amazon.com/FairTax-Answering-Critics-Neal-Boortz/dp/0061540463/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b
And here is the earlier book:
amazon.com/FairTax-Book-Neal-Boortz/dp/0060875410
Also check www.booktv.org where the authors occasionally appear.
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SoCalRC
Guest
Sorry, when the National Security Advisor goes on TV and tells me the ‘smoking gun’ may be in the form of a mushroom cloud, the Vice President says that there is “no doubt” that a nuclear program has resumed, and the President tells the nation that someone has gone to Africa for weapons material - ‘nuclear threat’ seems like a reasonable interpretation!
Similiar, we were told that there was “no doubt” that there were close operational ties between Sadam and Osama Bin Laden. So, it seemed reasonable to conclude that the governement was saying that we had to elliminate support for terrorism against us.
But I would be fascinated to hear why we really went to Iraq. After all, if those were not the reasons, then we were not under direct threat. No direct threat would mean that the war was not ‘pre-emptive’, but ‘preventive’. Preventive war is prohibited under international law, Nato treaty, and, of course, Catholic just war doctrine.
Two additional notes:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yoo
I don’t normally cite Wikipedia, but it is convenient in that it includes links to many of the documents in the footnotes and, of course, a link to audio of Yoo making the remarks.
Last, I appreciate your concern for my childrens’ entitlement status but I, for one, do not really mind the estate tax. I have already given them good educations and good starts in life, and even the old threshold of $2,000,000 (for my wife and myself) gives me plenty of room to pass on huge nest eggs. Right now, of course, it is $4,000,000, next year $7,000,000, and then no tax at all. But, like I said, I’m OK even if it sunsets back to the old “unified credit exclussion”.
The standard argument is that this attacks small businesses and farms, but there is no evidence of that. I’ve asked in these forums before for a single specific instance of the tax having that dire effect, but never got one. There are plenty of mechanisms to keep even more than the unified credit exclussion inside one’s familiy. But, frankly, I wouldn’t want my offspring to be ‘idle rich’ anyway. It does not reflect my values.
Besides, if I do pay estate tax (and short of planning on dying in 2010 I have no way to currently avoid it) most of it will be on unrealized capital gains. That is, it is the first time the money is taxed in any way.
I actually have never understood why trickle down types object to the estate tax. Unrealized capital gains makes sense from that perspective, since it rewards me. Since I accumulated the wealth, trickle down theory makes me vital to society (in their view), so I am specially rewarded. But if my children inherit significant wealth instead of creating it, then they are not participating in the ‘trickle down’. That is, society is geared towards benefiting them because of the wealth, but they are not creating jobs, etc., which is the justification for the special treatment. In other words, I get the benefits for my lifetime, but then the actual ‘trickle’ mechanism is thwarted.
But, of course, there I go again, looking for consistancy! Should I read anything else into your concern about the estate tax, and your desire for a reverse progressive tax system?
That is, should I assume that you are indicating that Christ was wrong? Should we strive to be ‘rich in spirit’ and devote our lives to ‘service of the priviledged’?
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vern_humphrey
Guest
Whoop! There’s the bell. Recess is over.
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Ender
Guest
"Ender:
As far as I’m concerned if there is no source presented to substantiate a claim of fact then it is not fact but at best hearsay and innuendo. I think all the huffing and puffing about the Yoo memorandum demonstrates the reasonableness of the requirement to make all the information available. Yoo’s comments are a statement of the requirements of the law. If there is no treaty and nothing in the Constitution or US law prohibits the torture of non-US citizens then in fact the commander-in-chief has the legal right to do whatever he pleases. That is not a statement of morality; it is an interpretation of the law and is either correct or incorrect.
Ender
OK, so that’s a no.
As far as I’m concerned if there is no source presented to substantiate a claim of fact then it is not fact but at best hearsay and innuendo. I think all the huffing and puffing about the Yoo memorandum demonstrates the reasonableness of the requirement to make all the information available. Yoo’s comments are a statement of the requirements of the law. If there is no treaty and nothing in the Constitution or US law prohibits the torture of non-US citizens then in fact the commander-in-chief has the legal right to do whatever he pleases. That is not a statement of morality; it is an interpretation of the law and is either correct or incorrect.
Ender
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vern_humphrey
Guest
A even more logical conclusion would be there is nothing more evil and despicable than a job to an adherent of left-wing ideology. How dare anyone ask them to carry their share of the load!
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Al_Masetti
Guest
Your posts are a little hard to follow.
When you are responding to two different posters, would you mind separating your responses into two different replies.
I did make the first post that you replied to but not the second one.
Long posts are difficult to follow under the best of conditions.
But when a poster is responding to two different posters … it makes it almost impossible to follow.
Thanks.
- Al
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Al_Masetti
Guest
Just for the benefit of readers, a report was just recently published that explained in great detail from translated captured documents that there in fact was a close relationship between Saddam and al Qaeda.
I will post a link.
There was an excellent article in The Weekly Standard.
weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/954igypd.asp
Check the Weekly Standard frequently. If you have the money, buy a paper subscription; it’s easier to read than the Web site, although the Web site has excellent excellent articles.
Stephen Hayes has written on this Saddam- al Qaeda connection frequently and he has been severely criticized, only to be vindicated subsequently.
www.weeklystandard.com
Excellent.
I will post a link.
There was an excellent article in The Weekly Standard.
weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/954igypd.asp
Check the Weekly Standard frequently. If you have the money, buy a paper subscription; it’s easier to read than the Web site, although the Web site has excellent excellent articles.
Stephen Hayes has written on this Saddam- al Qaeda connection frequently and he has been severely criticized, only to be vindicated subsequently.
www.weeklystandard.com
Excellent.
S
SoCalRC
Guest
In academic debate, the President is considered the ultimate source:
abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/LawPolitics/story?id=4635175&page=1
But, as we’ve mentioned many times, reality does not appear to be a criteria of the conservative mind.
S
SoCalRC
Guest
Alas, as with your explanation about the origins of the mortgage crisis, this is another tale that does not bear close scrutiny.
Hayes book was released in June '04. Since then, the ‘leaked’ Defense Department memo on which he largely relied has been debunked. Further, as the Washington Post noted, some of his other ‘links’ appear to be confusion over names:
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58899-2004Jun21.html
That article, like the Knight Ridder article by Jonathan Landay, relied on the government’s own investigation of the matter at the time. Lest anyone suspect that more information has emerged, the Pentagon has recently done another exaustive study of the evidence and found no link:
mcclatchydc.com/227/v-print/story/29959.html
- Status