So how did the media and Palin force Obama to train foreign workers, at taxpayer expense, to oursource American jobs, George? I really don't get that one so I need an apologist for his every failing to explain it to me. Thanks. Does he pet you?
What the "do nothing" Obama is up against
Sat, 2010-08-07 09:43
#52
Frustrated Mess
Sat, 2010-08-07 10:30
#53
"So how did the media and Palin...?" "Does he pet you?" You "really don't get that one?" What happened to your world view, FM? It would now look at home in a redneck's rectum. Taking your conversational style from Limbaugh? :)
Sun, 2010-08-08 00:13
#54
You know George, these excuses about Obama and the Democrats are getting tiresome. If these exact same policies were happening under a Bush Presidency, everybody would be up in arms about it, but under Obama we're supposed to give him a pass because...? As for what the people wanted, Bush was so hated that when Obama got in, he could have said almost anything he wanted and people would have gone for it. He could have easily passed it with solid majorities in both Houses of Congress. Yes the right-wing would have shrieked and hollered, but don't they do that anyways? Might as well give them something to shriek and holler about. With a list of strong, progressive, accomplishments that would have given progressive voters strong motivation to re-elect this administration in the coming mid-terms. But no.
At this point, I actually think Obama is worse than Bush. Bush was so hated and distrusted that people would have run in fear if he said the sky was blue. Nobody was taking him seriously. But now Obama (supposedly) represents change, so because everybody loves him what he says is good, even if he's only repackaging the worst policies of the Bush administration.
All you had to do to see that Obama was not progressive was to pay attention. There is a reason Cindy Sheehan gave up on the Democrats and why she chose the symbolism of challenging Democratic Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi.
Sun, 2010-08-08 07:47
#55
You have strange ideas about the power of the presidency and the role of the media...and the prevailing opinions out there among the electorate. I'm close to finishing up Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna, a look at 1930s and 40s Mexico and America. Your take on the place of Obama: "so because everybody loves him what he says is good," is a quaint take on a president who is being blamed by the opposition for exactly what he does not represent. The GOP is readying Jeb Bush for 2012. What do you do with an electorate so goddam gullible, whether it's the 1940s or the next millenium? Do you not read about the situation in Congress? The man is trying to enact the most progressive legislation that he can in the face of racial hatred and economic despair at the situation created by a series of Conservative administrations with a completely privatized future in mind.
It's "tiresome" for you? Then take up a book of U.S.history that actually explains how we got to this bizarre and frightening situation. Try to imagine undoing generations of propaganda in the advancement of capitalism by an individual up against that structure. And hope like hell that he can accomplish just a little bit. The masses of America didn't elect a socialist, they will not elect a socialist. That idea went out with Eugene Debs. But the madness there now has to be countered with something.
All I'm doing in this thread is presenting accounts of what is actually happening. If you can't see that the enemy of your enemy Obama is far, far worse, a far scarier prospect, then you are a puzzle indeed. (By the way, Joe Bageant's new one, Rainbow Pie: A Redneck Memoir is coming out in October. An early review says Bageant describes in memoir what Harper Lee had to present in a fictional account of life. Or maybe you haven't read Deer Hunting either).
Sun, 2010-08-08 10:40
#56
Frustrated Mess
Blah, blah, blah ... excuses, excuses. Yes, Obama is a weak man and a weak president. We got it George.
Sun, 2010-08-08 10:44
#57
Frustrated Mess
Paul Street looks first at the bankster bailouts, the auto bailout, the corporatist schools policies (which, through a veto threat, may have played a role in the Senate's decision on Thursday night to reject a war spending bill that recklessly included funding for teachers of non-murderous skills). Street looks at the approach of the Obama administration to the environment, including mountaintop removal, offshore drilling, nuclear power, crap and trade, and a performance in Copenhagen that might be characterized as sabotaging a planetary rescue attempt. Street acknowledges improvements over Bush-Cheney, but moves on to areas where Obama is worsening their misdeeds.
Chapter Two focuses on war and recounts how Obama's support in the Democratic presidential primaries grew predominantly out of his imaginary opposition to war, especially the Iraq War, to which he's now sending more mercenaries. The Iraqi people had been promised a public vote on the Bush-Maliki deal permitting occupation until the end of 2011. Obama successfully pressured the Iraqi government to deny its people that vote, knowing they would vote the treaty down. Street also discusses Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Israel, and South America (where US ships recently headed). The one thing all these places have in common: Obama's been bad for them.
Chapter Three examines in a way that has been badly needed the tragicomic saga of corporate health insurance reform. Chapter Four looks at race. And Chapter Five delves into more areas in which Obama has adopted and expanded upon Bush's policies (or, in many cases, what we used to call "crimes"). Street reviews the PATRIOT Act, habeas corpus, spying, torture, and the incredible lengths to which Obama has gone in his crusade to fully protect Bush, Cheney, and their co-conspirators, an effort that has included making threats to England should it be so uncouth as to reveal any evidence of wrongdoing.
http://www.truth-out.org/an-honest-look-obamas-first-year61629
Sun, 2010-08-08 21:40
#58
Frustrated Mess
A controversial decision by Barack Obama to privatize the exploration of space
Sun, 2010-08-08 22:30
#59
Konrad Yakabuski writes in the Aug. 7 Globe and Mail, Obama "is aking Congress to return income-tax rates to their pre-2001 levels for households earning at least $250,000 while extending the Bush tax cuts for those making less than that. He will need the support of every Democrat in the Senate, almost all of them in the House of Representatives, and at least a few Republicans to do so.
"Right now, however, official Washington is engaged in a game of chicken. Republicans insist they will never vote to raise taxes, conservative Democrats are distancing themselves from the Obama plan and the White House warns everyone of the political fallout if Congress fails to act." an automatic tax hike for all on Jan. 1.
And of course, if the Republicans are more successful in the Nov. 2 midterm elections, it's back to Bushenomics and greater debt. Which puts the Conservatives another step closer to their goal of privatizing the planet.
We can be sure Steve is taking notes.
Sun, 2010-08-08 22:55
#60
The notion of Obama as a good guy who is hampered by the situation around him is ridiculous. He's a conservative Democrat, through and through, who somehow has managed to build up such an appeal that many "progressives" support him regardless of his actual positions. When he was elected, Democrats had large majorities in both houses of Congress, yet he can't manage to get something as mundane as getting rid of Don't Ask, Don't Tell done? Give me a break - this is just more of "progressives" being forced to eat shit by party leaderships so long that they gleefully reach for the spoon at the slightest opportunity.
Mon, 2010-08-09 09:25
#61
A Globe editorial today, "GOP forgets its history" : "One of the great and defining characteristics of the American Dream - the birthright of citizenship - has come under threat amid the furor over illegal immigration. Republican politicians leding this charge should rush up ontheir own party's history. That United States citizenship should be granted to anyone born within its boundaries wasestablished in the aftermath of the Civil War. The 14th Amendment, along with other Reconstruction amendments ending slavery and enshrinement of the right to vote, were meant to ensure states could not deny freed slaves the privileges of citizenship."
Many GOP sentators, including Arizona's John McCain, are now set to challenge the 14th Amendment, with amendment in mind.
Obama is a black guy, "hampered" by U.S.history, among other things, like vast ignorance mixed with racism and great disparities in living standards and opportunities, and the detritus of finance capital's greed and near collapse, none of which was of his making. And of course there are even some naive people who elected him who don't understand why he doesn't call out the troops against the GOP. But they don't understand much about political democracy period.
Anyone reading something like Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna(this author wanted to know why America was retreating up its ass in terror today) - or anyone who has read the unexpurgated history of immediate postwar America and McCarthyism - knows many Americans (and Canadians) were sent back to their countries of origin in the communist witch hunts of the periiod. You won't see the Globe using those examples for background to editorials, however. Best to forget all that.
Mon, 2010-08-09 09:59
#62
For generations, the respective political class interests have all had a hand in creating and stirring the rancid gruel they refer to as a nation. The question here is not whether Obama is being held back from good deeds, or is part of the latest crooked shell game as is more likely than not. The sooner they all sit down to dine and choke on their own swill the better, and in the process, the only remaining hope is that ordinary people will come to realize once and for all that the centerpiece of this macabre feast is the worm infested corpse of an American dream that once projected its destiny above all others.
Mon, 2010-08-09 10:16
#63
Yes, obviously it's all a "crooked shell game" played out with one of the recently emancipated in charge. Y'all never know what may bubble up in the heat of a Mississippi summer... in deed or thought.
Mon, 2010-08-09 14:29
#64
The Globe's Michael Valpy reported on Margaret MacMillan's keynote address to the Couchiching Conference on the issues facing us, and the particular situation of the U.S The Oxford scholar and author of Paris 1919, presented the sobering dilemma for U.S. leadership (and for us):
"The focus on the financial crisis has left three other crises untended - the growing gap between rich and poor that is eroding social cohesion and leaving too many people without hope, as U.S. polls increasingly indicate; the huge environmental threat that is not going away and leading people to throw up their hands and say, "What can I do?" and the international political stage that shows the United States clearly in decline with no one certain about how power is shifting but concerns growing about how the narrative will unfold.
She referred to a recent article in the Beijing People's Daily that asked with a new and unfamiliar belligerence, "Is the U.S. ready for China's rise?" and predicted a collision if the United States "doesn't give way." She spoke of fears among international scholars that Washington either will try to use power in circumstances where it shouldn't or turn its back on the world and become isolationist."
Mon, 2010-08-09 17:57
#65
Mon, 2010-08-09 18:16
#66
Damn it FM you got me. I checked the G&M link to make sure of the headline.
Mon, 2010-08-09 18:46
#67
In the spirit of recent babble threads, I would say "show trial" would be preferable to "kangaroo court," but either works fine.
Mon, 2010-08-09 18:52
#68
We're good. Kangaroo is not in the thread title.
Mon, 2010-08-09 21:54
#69
Paul Krugman, NYTimes, July 29:Once again I leave it to [url=http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2010/07/concerning-those-who-manufa... Silber[/url] to demolish that crap:
All of which demonstrates what has been entirely obvious for a long while now. There is absolutely nothing the Democrats could do which would cause dedicated partisan hacks like Krugman, or the major liberal and progressive voices in the media and on blogs, to abandon them. ...Standing O
What's with all the pounding on Krugman? The same arguments about expectations that apply to Obama also apply to him. He got the Swedish Bank Prize (the correct title). That's the imprimatur of the establishment. He is very much a FTA/NAFTA supporter. If anything, it's a surprise for him to line up with Digby, who is doing her damndest to get the Democrats to pay attention to their leftish supporters. He occaisionally points out things like lying about WMD, but mostly he writes about economics, well, he IS an economist. Why would you expect him to move outside of that field? If you want a rational attack on the security state, go read Glenn Greenwald.
Mon, 2010-08-09 22:19
#70
For several years, Krugman has been the only consistent - week after week - critic of George W. Bush in the mainstream media of America. Krugman was given the prize by the Swedish committee BECAUSE of that (oh,and some earlier work on economic factors influencing trade. He applauded Canada in an earlier work for being the first to float the dollar.)
But you're right. This thread is about what Obama is up against, and in this world, your concern for "rational" is a heady notion.:)
Mon, 2010-08-09 23:33
#71
Is this the right thread to commemorate the opening day of Omar Khadr's kangaroo trial - the very first trial ever in front of the military commission which the liar and coward Obama promised to abolish?
Tue, 2010-08-10 10:19
#72
Some other early 21st Century concerns that Obama has not been able to overcome in his second year in office:
Gwyn Morgan, the retired founding CEO of EnCana Corp. (and now columnist with the Globe) explains in his Aug. 9 column just how limited U.S. (and Canadian) economic manipulatiion has become in the "new economic order." The weekly purchases of U.S.Treasury bills prevents "apocalyptic collapse of confidence" in the greenback.
"After centuries of European and Americandominance, a new world order is upon us. Stephen Green, chairman of Londeon-based global banking giant HSBC describes this as a global trade triangle with Asian 'workshop' countries forming one side, Western consuming nations a second, and international resource producers the third." (Lucky Canada, we can still have a positive trade balance by selling off resources.)
The U.S., already facing huge fiscal imbalances had to go further in debt to overcome the financiers' greed-driven collapse (Morgan does not say that, just calling it a "financial crisis" ...the right never points to itself). "The U.S. cannot spend its way to financial solvency and, having only one side of the global economic triangle (buyer of goods and energy) must continue to import a large portion of its resource needs. Debt-loaded, demographically shrinking European countries face immediate slashing of social programs and a loneo-term secular decline in living standards.
"The West has passed its zenith."
Of course Obama should have been able to empty "Gitmo" and send Khadr home to Canada for trial. Far as I can make out, he tried. But anyone bothering to read the daily news sees that he faces a nation of nutbars in trying to affect change. He faces a few more challenges that nobody here seems to have an answer for...that they in fact avoid like the plague, never try to answer. Morgan's single-minded call for more of the same demands a challenge.
But the preacher at the pulpit always has the moral upper hand, calling on mysterious forces to rectify the real, on-the-ground problems facing ALL the people, or simply ignoring them in favour of the singular case of injustice...but not offering a real political solution, even there. Nice work if one could get it.
Tue, 2010-08-10 13:10
#73
N.Beltov
Good grief, George. The good ship Obama has burned to the waterline. It's indistinguishable from many of the other rotting hulks on the water. You can still make it to the independent shores ... but you've got to let go of that rubber ducky and take a few strokes to freedom.
Tue, 2010-08-10 13:20
#74
Of course Obama should have been able to empty "Gitmo" and send Khadr home to Canada for trial.
I never said that. I said he promised to scrap the military commissions, got elected, then broke his promise. That's what we call a "lie" in common parlance. Some unkind souls might call it fraud. [url=http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/05/15/military_co...'s an explanation of what happened.[/url]
Tue, 2010-08-10 15:04
#75
I certainly can't provide facts to counter Greenwald (whereverhe's coming from on the political spectrum), And I have not followed the debate back in spring of 2009. Maybe he is a "liar", although I will not concede "coward." Just getting on a platform exposed to the lunatic fringe down there refutes that one. And particularly given his skin colour.
This is not so much a defence of Obama, but of democratic figures who have been desperately trying to prevent that country from slipping over into open fascism. Dependent as it is on military production and deployment, that could easily happen without some of the liberal figures who have withstood the temptation to cave to a misbegotten public opinion, which itself is afraid to be branded "un-American". We all know that for a long time, Republican and Democrat have been hard to choose between in the parlour game of Capitalism. But with entry of the neo-con project to do away with public institutions, and the appearance of Bush junior and a populist grouping of marginalized anti-givmint white Americans, a winner-take-all Libertarian leadership, all played out with the new rules of Reich's Supercapitalism - where everyone watches the fortunes of the market - we're in a new game.
I had hoped that by putting forward the fantastic impediments to political resolution of so many issues that some folks might want to engage in a balanced review of events south of the 49th, but it seems the simplistic just hjas too much easly appeal : an attack on a leader who may, after Nov. 2, have even less power to affect change - or carry through on the hopeful platform that he unveiled two years ago. We knew he could not propose a command economy, but we (I) didn't realize the extent to which finance capital and the Republican media could force modification of so many programmes. Everyone's future depends on economic health, and if you can't bring that about, bugger off, is the prevailing thought.
But I invite you to actually suggest how he could have brought Congress - including so many on the right wing of his own party - to heel. I'll bet folks are just busting a gut to explain how he could break that dependency of the U.S. on China's cheap goods and its purchases of Treasury bills, explained by Morgan.
In the meantime, I'll keep posting "what Obama is up against."
Tue, 2010-08-10 17:10
#76
Frustrated Mess
Go ahead, George, defend this:
According to a report by the ACLU, the current White House has not just failed to meaningfully follow through on its promises, but has also taken abusive policies, and, as shown in the case of targeted and interminable detentions, eroded civil rights to unprecedented levels.Although the ACLU applauds the administration's condemnation of the torture and rendition programs instituted under Bush, it says these positive steps are overwhelmed by what remains uncorrected and unaddressed. Using the CIA's destruction of 92 interrogation tapes as an example, the ACLU says that an investigation into the incident - which was approved by a CIA official and is purported to have erased torturous interrogations carried about by Americans - has dragged on for three years with no resolution in sight The length of time is a minor issue compared with what the ACLU says such foot dragging signifies: "Sanctioning impunity for government officials who authorized torture."
Fear of an unchecked, unaccountable government permeates the ACLU's report, particularly in the section about targeted killings. In this instance, it is not just that the Obama administration has continued a policy of targeting alleged terrorists, but that it has a new wrinkle: American citizens, such as Anwar al-Awlaki, are also being rounded up in the "O.K.-to-kill" list. The shortfalls of this approach are many, and the ACLU says that the inaccuracy of less life-and-death approaches should make such an approach intolerable. "Over the last eight years, we have seen the government over and over again detain men as 'terrorists,' only to discover later that the evidence was weak, wrong, or non-existent," the report says
Tue, 2010-08-10 17:41
#77
I certainly can't provide facts to counter Greenwald (whereverhe's coming from on the political spectrum), And I have not followed the debate back in spring of 2009. Maybe he is a "liar", although I will not concede "coward." Just getting on a platform exposed to the lunatic fringe down there refutes that one. And particularly given his skin colour.
And yet he is following some rather pale footprints.
Tue, 2010-08-10 18:58
#78
I'm sorry, but convincing anyone that Obama is anything other than a centrist pro-war democrat takes even larger amounts of self-delusion than what we typically see on the Canadian left. Obama never pretended to be anything other than a centrist democrat, and I don't see why we should, despite all the evidence pointing to the logical conclusion that he is nothing other than a typical pro-war democrat in the mould of Clinton (although I've seen articles alleging that he is further to the right than Reagan was), convince ourselves otherwise just because he's black, an eloquent speaker, a popular figurehead, or because the a certain proportion of right-wing idiots who watch too much Glenn Beck think he's an evil Islamic socialist Marxist.
But, let us accept for a moment that Obama is really a wonderful "progressive" guy who actually wants to bring the troops home, end imperialism, deliver free healthcare for all, and turn the USA into some sort of idealized version of a Swedish social democratic paradise. Then, doesn't this point to problems in the system? Of course, if we point out fundamental problems in the capitalist system, then you would be chiding any of the radicals and activists who regularly do so in your typical smug social democratic attitude with references to pensions and the "great unread" and writing us off like you do in this post:
But the preacher at the pulpit always has the moral upper hand, calling on mysterious forces to rectify the real, on-the-ground problems facing ALL the people, or simply ignoring them in favour of the singular case of injustice...but not offering a real political solution, even there. Nice work if one could get it.
So, what's your alternative? Your "real political solution" to this problem of Obama not being able to deliver and not wanting to anyways? Just get all those cranky radicals to fold up the tent, drink the kool-aid, and start eating the shit forked out by the likes of Obama?
Or are you just one of those "preachers at the pulpit" that you constantly accuse anyone to the left of Tony Blair of being?
Tue, 2010-08-10 19:14
#79
I'll bet folks are just busting a gut to explain how he could break that dependency of the U.S. on China's cheap goods and its purchases of Treasury bills, explained by Morgan.
American capitalists love cheap labour in China. But it's wrecking the US economy while Washington wages cerrtain protectionist measures against Chinese imports. And they disallow Chinese investments in the most promising sectors of US economy. It's nothing like our crooked NAFTA deal where US corporations and rich people have majority ownership and control of a number of key sectors of Canada's economy. China has real leaders bargaining shrewdly in their own interests. I think they've chosen to stop financing US Military buildup around China and former Soviet countries. Deal's off, and Chimerica will be getting a divorce.
Tue, 2010-08-10 20:33
#80
George:
"But I invite you to actually suggest how he could have brought Congress - including so many on the right wing of his own party - to heel. I'll bet folks are just busting a gut to explain how he could break that dependency of the U.S. on China's cheap goods and its purchases of Treasury bills, explained by Morgan."
In the meantime, I'll keep posting "what Obama is up against."
Tue, 2010-08-10 21:17
#81
Frustrated Mess
Fair enough. And I'll keep posting how Obama is a fraud who, yet again, convinced good, well meaning people to throw their lot in with a war party that will roll over their lives en route to delivering what remains of their humanity to corporate mills to be pressed into one dimensional orifices that eat what their fed and shit money.
Tue, 2010-08-10 21:30
#82
Okay FM, but one bit of friendly advice...look for expletives that aren't dependent on/ involve, orifices. Lyndon Johnson would have been your kind of pres. 
Tue, 2010-08-10 21:43
#83
A good test is to ask yourself whether any presidential candidate in the last 50 years has sounded as left-wing (for the U.S., I know...) during the election campaign as Obama. I'm assuming he was sincere.
BUT...
The President has to work with the House and the Senate. He can't, all by himself, change every aspect of government policy - the system was designed by people who didn't trust any one individual that much. That should be borne in mind.
Tue, 2010-08-10 21:49
#84
A good test is to ask yourself whether any presidential candidate in the last 50 years has sounded as left-wing (for the U.S., I know...) during the election campaign as Obama. I'm assuming he was sincere.
BUT...
The President has to work with the House and the Senate. He can't, all by himself, change every aspect of government policy - the system was designed by people who didn't trust any one individual that much. That should be borne in mind.
GREAT GAIA.
Please don't go away. Yours was the first flicker of rational response since Towser was a pup. Bless you.
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:02
#85
A good test is to ask yourself whether any presidential candidate in the last 50 years has sounded as left-wing (for the U.S., I know...) during the election campaign as Obama. I'm assuming he was sincere.
BUT...
The President has to work with the House and the Senate. He can't, all by himself, change every aspect of government policy - the system was designed by people who didn't trust any one individual that much. That should be borne in mind.
Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon both did a lot more for progressive causes.
Since Reagan however there has been one mode of governance, more or less.
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:05
#86
A good test is to ask yourself whether any presidential candidate in the last 50 years has sounded as left-wing (for the U.S., I know...) during the election campaign as Obama.
A good test of what?
Without looking up actual speeches, I'd guess that JFK, Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, Richard Nixon and George McGovern all made noises more leftish than that empty "hopey changey" thing.
I'm assuming he was sincere.
You dream big.
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:16
#87
"Without looking up actual speeches, I'd guess that JFK, Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, Richard Nixon and George McGovern all made noises more leftish than that empty "hopey changey" thing."
Looking up speeches by any GOP figure today would be enlightening.
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:20
#88
"The President has to work with the House and the Senate. He can't, all by himself, change every aspect of government policy - the system was designed by people who didn't trust any one individual that much. That should be borne in mind."
You'll find them avoiding this aspect like the plague, ygbtk
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:21
#89
I think George W. Bush was secretly a Trotskyist. Of course, he was simply "up against" too much, what with a congress ready and raring to go to war, and the same rich bankers as Obama is up against. And he's done more to convince me that he's a Trotskyist than Obama has done to convinve me he is a progressive - he did surround himself with old Shachtmanites.
Someone please explain to me how George W. Bush could have brought Congress - including so many on the right wing of his own party - to heel. I'll bet folks are just busting a gut to explain how he could break that dependency of the U.S. on China's cheap goods and its purchases of Treasury bills.
Until then, I'll keep posting about what George W. Bush was up against.
Also, I have a similar theory that Stephen Harper is a supporter of the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist)
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:30
#90
You'll find them avoiding this aspect like the plague, ygbtk
Who's avoiding this, Geo.? Most of us have been saying all along that we don't expect much from Obama or the Democrats. What, indeed, should one expect, since they have a majority in the Senate and the House? Those teabagging yahoos really have tied their hands.
I have been saying for the last thousand years that the United States has only one party-the property party. It's the party of big corporations, the party of money. It has two right wings; one is Democrat and the other is Republican.
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:39
#91
There are examples of when the Yanks have actually been not as far to the right on some aspects of social sector spending, public sector economy and money policies compared to our colonial administrators in Ottawa. Marauding multinational energy companies and big money interests in general have found our federal stooges to be very pliable and easily manipulated over the years.
Tue, 2010-08-10 22:44
#92
"The President has to work with the House and the Senate. He can't, all by himself, change every aspect of government policy - the system was designed by people who didn't trust any one individual that much. That should be borne in mind."
You'll find them avoiding this aspect like the plague, ygbtk
[/quote]
So very predictably, to a poster.
Tue, 2010-08-10 23:00
#93
Yes there are three branches of US Government. Their's is a constitutional democracy that is admired by all political stripes around the world for a long time. Karl Polanyi even proposed that there also be three layers of governance for economic decision making. Polanyi thought that the economy is so important to society that the administration of it should be better organized and with oversight committees and important decisions made with a lot more transparency and accountability. Polanyi was a market socialist who admired the structure of US government for its democratic features. The original colonists set out to create the first constiutional democracy not influenced by a European financier oligarchy. And it worked for a while.
Tue, 2010-08-10 23:10
#94
I have been saying for the last thousand years that the United States has only one party-the property party. It's the party of big corporations, the party of money. It has two right wings; one is Democrat and the other is Republican.
Not much different than in Canada.
Tue, 2010-08-10 23:13
#95
I think Obama is morally flexible, while George Bush was morally bankrupted
Tue, 2010-08-10 23:24
#96
Yes there are three branches of US Government. Their's is a constitutional democracy that is admired by all political stripes around the world for a long time. Karl Polanyi even proposed that there also be three layers of governance for economic decision making. Polanyi thought that the economy is so important to society that the administration of it should be better organized and with oversight committees and important decisions made with a lot more transparency and accountability. Polanyi was a market socialist who admired the structure of US government for its democratic features. The original colonists set out to create the first constiutional democracy not influenced by a European financier oligarchy. And it worked for a while.
Yeah, what we need is another Teddy San Juan Hill Roosevelt to clean out all those corporations and create some more parks.
But then, that was before we all came to depend on those corporations to bring home our retirement bacon and give us jobs, eh. All the worker COULD bring home then was "the bacon."
Tue, 2010-08-10 23:31
#97
The rough rider? Yikes! How about another FDR even? Banksters! This is the feds. Come out with your hands up.
Wed, 2010-08-11 00:52
#98
Why do people think that corperations create jobs? That's a capitalist fantasy world your talkng about there. Nobody creates jobs,
If anything, capitalist look for opertunities to exploit .. Exploit the working class by exploiting the earth.
Stop speaking capitalist talk. You're confusing yourself.
Wed, 2010-08-11 00:56
#99
RevolutionPlease
What a mindfuck this thread is.
Hint, we're all fucked or at least our kids are.
Wed, 2010-08-11 00:57
#100
I have been saying for the last thousand years that the United States has only one party-the property party. It's the party of big corporations, the party of money. It has two right wings; one is Democrat and the other is Republican.
Not much different than in Canada.
I like how John Mortimer had his Rumpole call them (well, the British equivalents) the "Liberal-Conservative Party."
Wed, 2010-08-11 09:03
#101
John Mortimer was a cut above us all with his love of justice, women and Tuscany... and champagne was the drink of choice for that socialist, not the Chateau Thames Embankment that he forced Rumpole to drink.