but that's not even the best part, Cheney is at 18%...woo hoo! If they ever get impeached and tried for war crimes I'll throw a kegger.

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/themix/32962/

You're celebrating the fact that the president has a low approval rating? Congratulations, he's still the fucking president, approval ratings don't change that douche bag. Don't get me wrong I hate the guy as much as anyone, not because of supposed "illegal wars" i just think he's a fucking jackass. You on the other hand just don't like America, plain and simple. Get over yourself, the guy's not going anywhere, fucking hippy.

she should get a job and shower too.
damn hippies.

BMR said:


Remember what happened to Nixon dumb ass?

that's exactly what I was thinking.
bush is nixon, ford, and carter all in one.

I was trying to find a quote from me said "man, this is going to be hilarious cause he's not going to be elected again. I can't wait for all the crazy shit" but I can't find it. Bush has delivered 110%! it's like very week I'm titilated to see what new thing's getting fucked up where. the vp shooting that dood is the best so far.


http://chrisevans3d.com/files/iq.htm

CNV said:

Yeah, sadly this country as a whole is far more apathetic now. The fact that our president was put into office after being the candidate with the lesser amount of votes and his head didn't end up on the end of a stake says a lot.

I think that's an all time high for this administration

haha jesusland

very sad but unfortunately true

BMR said:


What the hell are you going on about?

pam nli said:

He didn't have his V8 today.

BMR said:

I dunno about you but I think that a good portion of America finally waking up to the fact that George is incompetant is definately something to celebrate. I'd like to see a poll on how many people who voted for the prick regret it.

BMR said:

Of course I'm celebrating, it means more people are slowly waking the fuck up. And how could anyone actually like America right now? At least I'm trying to change it instead of sitting with my thumb up my ass going "oh well, I'm sure someone else will fix it, there's nothing we can do, we're just the citizens who control the government on paper but not in reality, so let's just sit back and let these guys fuck up our lives and those of every generation to come after us". But once again, I've forgotten that it's unpatriotic to think...

YOU IDIOTS! LIBERALS CAN'T POSSIBLY LOVE AMERICA!!!!

GAWD!

HailTheLeaf said:


THERE IS NO THINKING IN DEMOCRACY!!!

IF YOU WANT TO THINK GO TO CHINA.
THIS IS AMERICA, YOU MUST BE ASSIMULATED!!!11!1

Dude, that pic is exactly what I picture the world that people like Hail the Queef would create for us all. One big, gigantic Socialist collective. Josh Martin and Hail the Beef would be the parents of such a collective.

Hail the Leaf is a Borg....that's all there is to it.

IOW: too far right is left and too far left is right.

Yep...they are all Borg's.

hoser said:

But we'd get cool cube spaceships!

Cubist interstellar transportation>>>>FREE WILL

The Borg are as right wing as you can get, they are the epitomy of fascism. A collective that assimilates other cultures with overwhelming military force, with no respect as to the individiuality or sovergnty of those cultures, only an absolute and unquestioned belief that their culture is superior... sounds like the way the entire world perceives Borg/Cheney at this point.

Then again, maybe The Collective really is secretly left-wing and I just missed all those Borg at Woodstock...

Damn bleeding-heart automatons.

What is this thing you call...feelings?

ShadowSD said:


dude borg are communists (totalitarian? i don't think you can be considered totalitarian without a leader, unless they do have a leader and i just forgot). other side of the spectrum. being forced to join the collective and being forced to vote on a new government is two different things.

The Borg Queen, she played a major role in one of the movies and the last three seasons of Voyager.

BobNOMAAMRooney nli said:

ahh yes how could i forget.

it has taken a long-ass time for many to see how pig-headed this administration really is. I really don't expect impeachment, however. That, unfortunately, just comes off as some whiny democratic wet dream.

"we're never wrong. like, ever. you say we're wrong?? hah, we'll be with the patriots over here. flags and blinders, please. how about blinders made of flags..'n some guns 'n rosary beads?"

*do note - I like guns, I just thought it fit is all.

WASHINGTON - Lawmakers from both parties said Thursday a newly disclosed videotape of a pre-Katrina briefing for President Bush and top administration officials raises new questions about government response to the storm that flooded New Orleans and killed more than 1,300 people.

Sen. David Vitter, R-La., said the video "makes it perfectly clear once again that this disaster was not out of the blue or unforeseeable. It was not only predictable, it was actually predicted. That's what made the failures in response — at the local, state and federal level — all the more outrageous."

The videotape captured a briefing, one day before Katrina stuck on Aug. 29, involving then Federal Emergency Management Agency head Michael Brown, President Bush, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and other officials. Brown and others warned that the storm could breach levees, endanger lives in the New Orleans Superdome and overwhelm rescuers.

Five days after the briefing, with most of New Orleans underwater, Bush said, "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."

classic...

eddie said:

Sorry, I fucked up the quotes on the last post, here it is the right way:

eddie said:

Even if we put aside the Borg Queen and said they had no leader, I would still disagree that the Borg are far left.

Communism was a far left theory, but a far right reality; just fascism under a different cloak. The USSR was led by dictators, not hippies, and the same is true for every communist regime that ever existed. This is because the theory of communism simply doesn't work on a country-wide level (as the last century has proven to everyone). And when a government fails to work, fascism inevitably takes over, whether you call it a monarchy or a dictatorship or a communist state or unlimited executive power. Fascism is fascism, a goverment led by hardline, militant, unchallenged, and untouchable figures in power who make life wonderful for a small elite and make life miserable for the majority.

Such fascist values are reactionary (which is as far RIGHT on the political spectrum as you can get), because they represent the nature of all human societies up until just a few centuries ago. For 99.9% of human existence, such governments retained their power by rounding up and killing intellectuals and progressives. Only in this last .1% of human history do we see a few countries daring to stray from this model.

Sorry to get carried away on this point, but I hate how reactionary conservatives keep the "communism is far left" rhetoric alive in this country to implicitly keep people at bay from progressive thought. If you believe communism is an inherant failure, a theory that didn't work in practice that falsely represented itself as progress, then you can't turn around and put it on the progressive end of the political spectrum. Either communism lived up to communal ideals and was genuninely far left, or it it didn't live up to communal ideals and wasn't far left; you can't have it both ways.

And clearly, virtually all Americans (particularly conservatives) believe communism was an inherant failure. And yet they continue with all this gay rhetoric that essentially says if you're not neo-conservative, you're a commie. (If those are the only two choices, I should just shoot myself now... it's like me saying hey I'm in a metal band and them saying repeatedly well if you don't play techno then you're a rapper and you hate America.)


eddie said:

True, the collective doesn't give you a free button.

that's speech wasn't punctuated right.

Five days after the briefing, with most of New Orleans underwater, Bush said, "I don't think. anybody anticipate the breach of the levees?"

Fuck, it still didn't work. Oh well, you can still tell by reading it what part I said and what part he said.

quotes start with a [ quote ]
and ane with a [/ quote ]
minus the spaces of course.

Ok last try... (sorry everyone about the duplicate posts, Rev if you have the ability as an admin. to erase the first two posts please do so)


eddie said:

Even if we put aside the Borg Queen and said they had no leader, I would still disagree that the Borg are far left.

Communism was a far left theory, but a far right reality; just fascism under a different cloak. The USSR was led by dictators, not hippies, and the same is true for every communist regime that ever existed. This is because the theory of communism simply doesn't work on a country-wide level (as the last century has proven to everyone). And when a government fails to work, fascism inevitably takes over, whether you call it a monarchy or a dictatorship or a communist state or unlimited executive power. Fascism is fascism, a goverment led by hardline, militant, unchallenged, and untouchable figures in power who make life wonderful for a small elite and make life miserable for the majority.

Such fascist values are reactionary (which is as far RIGHT on the political spectrum as you can get), because they represent the nature of all human societies up until just a few centuries ago. For 99.9% of human existence, such governments retained their power by rounding up and killing intellectuals and progressives. Only in this last .1% of human history do we see a few countries daring to stray from this model.

Sorry to get carried away on this point, but I hate how reactionary conservatives keep the "communism is far left" rhetoric alive in this country to implicitly keep people at bay from progressive thought. If you believe communism is an inherant failure, a theory that didn't work in practice that falsely represented itself as progress, then you can't turn around and put it on the progressive end of the political spectrum. Either communism lived up to communal ideals and was genuninely far left, or it it didn't live up to communal ideals and wasn't far left; you can't have it both ways.

And clearly, virtually all Americans (particularly conservatives) believe communism was an inherant failure. And yet they continue with all this gay rhetoric that essentially says if you're not neo-conservative, you're a commie. (If those are the only two choices, I should just shoot myself now... it's like me saying hey I'm in a metal band and them saying repeatedly well if you don't play techno then you're a rapper and you hate America.)




True, the collective doesn't give you a free button.

Son of a bitch.

you could just log in and then you could edit your posts.

Who gives a fuck about New Orleans and all the poor minority leaches who lost their "let's never get a job and collect well-fare so we can watch Jerry Springer everyday" lifestyles. Most people are greatful when they are lent a helping hand in times of need, but all I've heard from these social parasites is "GIVE US MORE!". I find it funny that there was an uproar and people were pissed that the racist mayor Nagin said for people to "not bother coming back unless you're willing to work" As much of a fuckbag as he is, he is right, and I have to applaude him. What a way to filter out all the bastard factories and those who just want to be able to go back to sit on the couch and wait for the first of the month. I'd bet most of them are lazy drug addicts who CHOOSE not to partake in society by CHOOSING not to have a job.
HA!
My motivation for such an opinion, SEE
Katrina $$ abuse. Using aid for handbags, drugs, booze, etc....

or SEE HERE FOR THE REAL ARTICLE, the link I gave is a message board that outlines the article, my bad-sorry.

VICTIMS, MY FUCKIN ASS!


"He (Leonard - Pictured Center) said he supported his $20-a-day drug habit with money from FEMA and the Red Cross but that he needed the money to "start over." Leonard stated that he and others like him deserved the money because they are from New Orleans."

READ THAT LAST SENTENCE AGAIN.....
Leonard stated that he and others like him deserved the money because they are from New Orleans.
Deserved? kind of like how they now call wellfare 'entitlements', like it is OWED to them or something.....

the_reverend said:

I would but I don't have an account. (Even if I signed up for one, there's no way I could go back and edit posts I put up "anonymously"... right?)

I can't fucking wait until your house gets hit by a natural disaster and the government ignores it...what does aid for hurricane victims have to do with gross government incompetence in handling the entire situation?

relax, I'm just ball bustin. I don't really give a shit about people blowin the $$ on drugs, I probalby woulda too. And quite frankly I'm not surprized that the govn't flopped on handeling it, not because who's in offfice, but because govn't doesn't normally do many things as efficiently as they should.

I do wonder, however, how much of this 'slow responce' has to do with the fact that pretty much the only bridge leading into the largest affected area was completely desroyed.

Highway 90 Pass Christian: Bay St. Louis bridge destroyed

I wonder how much of it had to do with National Guard units being deployed in Iraq when they should've been here, at home, to help with the hurricane

Q: What’s President Bush’s position on Roe vs. Wade?
A: He doesn’t care how people get out of New Orleans.

Rev, I miss how Bush can be compared to Carter.
Jimmy Carter had to be one of the most spineless and weakest Presidents of the past century. If we had insane inflation, 22% interest rates, high unemployment, gas shortages, record crime, and our balls in a sling while a middle eastern country was giving us the finger and we didn't do shit against them, then sure I could see that.

Also, see the new audio of the Gov of LA blowing it on when the levae broke, flooding the city.
This was a massive fuck up, starting from the Mayor of New Orleans, moving to the Gov, then to FEMA. Each had to blow it first in order to bone the next due to misinformation and shitty planning and execution.
The State had plenty of National Guard, they just didn't deploy them. It didn't help either when more then half the New Orleans police force just ran away.

Shadow,
So what you're saying is that we are all naturally right wing animals?
I've seen plenty of people who are hard left wingers act in a reactionary form. Being reactionary isn't a political acton in of itself. It's HOW you react that can be nitpicked as left or right. If you looked at propaganda from the Nazis and the Soviets in 1941, how much of a difference could you see in them, while their methodology are varied. People tend to forget the irony of two facist goverments, one hard right, the other hard left, slaughtering each other by the milions in a war where the poeople lose no matter who the master is.
The other thing is, no goverement is perfect. In order for this to happen, everyone would need to agree with it and go along with it. Because this is impossible, you need to enforce it in order to preserve it. In order to totally preserve it, you must dominate it.
You don't think hippies can be facist? When they are afraid of your ideas and opinions because they are "dangerous" to their way of life, you'll see how fast you can be silenced by being labeled a bigot, a facist and pretty much locked out of the discourse. People like to use "1984", "Brave New World" and "F 451" as examples of right wing facistim, forgetting they were written against communist models of propaganda and goverment enforcement. People forget: Goverment itself can control people regardless of whatever idealistic "perfect" architype you think of.
A good example, read "Harrison Bergeron".
Tell me that isn't left wing PC bullshit turned facist.

Q: how is it possible to make a political argument thread gayer?

A: add an argument about star trek politics

this thread is about as gay as it gets without having pictures of cock and balls. i don't know what's worse, the people who defend bush or the people who make posts every time bush farts.

KILL WHITEY!!!

Dankill said:

No, rather the opposite, that I'm tired of the implication that we are all right wing. I hate the implicit suggestions in the media that either you must be a neo-conservative who supports Bush, or an unpatriotic commie. Sure it *sounds* like they're trying to label you far right or far left by forcing such a choice, but as I pointed out above, modern communist states AS THEY EXISTED were never far left. Anyone who would support communism after the track record of the last century knows that communist goverments are just fascist, oppressive states under a different name. So therefore, if someone is truly supporting such goverments, then they are actually further right than the neo-cons.




Exactly, they're both fascist, and the point I've been making is that all fascism (in the terms that you just defined it in the second half of your sentence) is inherently far right wing. The idea of a master who sends the people to war, where the minority thrives and the majority suffers - THAT itself is far right. If you disagree, can you name a left wing idea/political theory that is consistent with such methods? There are none. Sure you can name goverments like the USSR that were SUPPOSED to follow left wing ideas, but what counts is whether they did or not. Communism in theory was supposed to be equal wealth and power distributed equally, which is the exact opposite of "the people lose no matter who the master is".

Thus communism failed its own ideals, and we all agree on that, so why still the constant insistance that communist states were "far left"? What evidence is there to suggest that communism in practice is far left aside from the unfulfilled lies of long-dead Soviet dictators?






I totally agree that there is plenty of dangerous PC bullshit out there, and silencing views in such a manner is very detrimental to democracy. However, that being said, hippies and tight ass soccer moms have yet to cease government control anywhere in the world (unlike Soviets, Nazis, or neo-cons). Nor do I see them taking control of any goverments. EVER. Do they have the ability to influence our society? Yes, and that should be taken seriously. However, not every school of thought has realistic potential to become a full fledged political system.

Therefore, I think the term "liberal fascism" can be misleading if used in the wrong context, because we're not talking about different forms of goverment as the term suggests, but rather one of the potential forces within a form of goverment, which - although very important - is like comparing apples and oranges. Ultimately, "liberal fascism" is just one more term neo-conservatives have continued to push in order to tilt the dialogue in their direction; they start with the fact that terms such as "PC Notsies" are actually FUNNY (because the hyperbole involved actually makes a good point about hypocrisy), they then ignore the exaggerations that make the joke funny as if they had never existed, and talk about "liberal fascism" as if there are actually PC governments out there literally enslaving people in the name of tolerance. That might make for a hilarious South Park episode, but it's not rooted in reality.

As Colbert has pointed out, neo-cons make the facts on the surface look a certain way so you make assumptions based on how it "feels", and bet that you won't actually look at the facts beneath the surface. They wager everything on the fact that they can make their point in a few sentences, whereas it takes a few paragraphs to rebut them.

Shadow, my point is that I just disagree with labeling facist behavior as right wing as a nature. I just see as sort of pointless and devisive because in my mind, people of any sociopolitical background or upbringing or lack thereof can capable of these actions. It's just finding a term to put on something that never really had a namesake but was pretty much the ugly default switch of humanity.
Besides, based on the fact that neo-cons in the general political scene today can make shitty arguments does nothing to sway me to believe that "this way is always wrong, this way is always right". I could find plenty of liberals that are either shitty debaters or shitty polictions.
You see, I don't follow men.
I follow ideas.
When a party line becomes stagnent or outdated, you change it up. You don't have to agree with every single point on a party. To do so makes you a mindless sheep, be you a conservative, liberal, ect.
I make no bones that I lean to the right, but I don't go blindly with every idea or every arguement or every political figure that comes along without making my own choice. People who assume that if you lean one way that you are a radical are just as stupid kneejerk idiots as the sheep they try to assume everyone around them that they disagree with of being in the first place.
Believe me, I see the fear and propaganda from both sides that make me giggle at the idea of either a ring wing christian theocracy that would make Iran look at us crosseyed or a PC Commie pinko land that makes San Fran look like the deep south as both equally retarded and unlikely.
Not to say we don't have wackos that would like either of these models out there, but I'd say the majority of resonable sane people tend to keep them away from the big red buttons, so to speak.
Yes, there are no liberal fascist goverments in existence, but it doesn't make it implusable. No more then other models that have been advanced in political theory over the past century.
I see it as a evil, like other types, that should be guarded against no more and no less then any others. I don't like people to be so blinded by fear of only one form of danger that they leave themselves open to others that can sneak in via the backdoor, or that they just give so much blind trust to never once thinking it could bite them.

I agree with most of the things you said, people have to be vigilant against all forms of evil, those expected and unexpected. There are still degrees of threat involved though, and something that has been a problem for all of human history seems a bigger threat to me than something that has never ever happened.

Most liberals don't take PC stuff so far that they would challenge the first amendment with it, and those who would are betraying their own ideals, because you obviously can't claim any progress antecedent of the first amendment. And that goes to my point: The challenge of progressivism/liberalism is how to progress forward without falling backwards into the same traps you've been fighting against in the first place, while the challenge of conservatism is choosing what values we have to keep with us as we evolve and progress throughout history. Both challenges face all of us.

The only reason I'm more inclined to go after the neo-cons is because:

1) They've controlled EVERYTHING for years in a way unseen in our country's history, including the executive branch, the legislative branch, the federal judiciary, and most of the news media - directly, in the case of Fox News and talk radio, and indirectly, in the case of neutral organizations like CNN, the networks, and PBS, who are constantly on the defensive to add conservative coverage and balance themselves out against the unending neo-con drumbeat of "liberal media" (that's why everyone ran the War in Iraq commercial with virtually no dissenting viewpoints for one year before we went; didn't that seem weird to anyone else to have NO dissent at all aired for an entire year, it's never happened in the history of this country)

2) Neo-cons advocate "unlimited executive power in a time of war", while at the same time everyone agrees the war against terrorism will last generations, meaning this is our country's closest point to a monarchy since it's inception (any other time in our history both conservatives and liberals would have FLIPPED if something like this was even talked about; the fact that no one notices what's going on now is just creepy)

and 3) NO ONE VOTED FOR NEO-CONS, half the voters who turned out in the last two elections voted for what they perceived as a regular conservative that they could have a beer with, most American voters don't even know what "neo-con" means, and the news media has done little to make it common knowledge, despite the fact that these people RUN THE WHOLE COUNTRY and are fucking up our economy and foreign policy for generations based on theories that no one voted for.

i didn't anything after shadow responded to me but i'm gonna say this anyways.

radical liberal moderate conservative reactionary

now look at it this way in a circle
_______monderate
liberal___________conservative
____radical___reactionary

which two are the nearest? radical and reactionary. they're almost the same. each of them can put into 2 other groups, those who use violence and those who dont.

with that said the borg are radical communists. and if they look like reactionaries, well there's a reason for that. and its in that circle

hmm my spaces didn't work hold on

KeithMutiny said:

Wait, the end goal of communism is a stateless utopia that liberates the individual. How would that jibe with a collective that puts the state above individual rights which is a hallmark of facism? The Borg might resemble Stalinist states but that doesn't make them radical communists because their end goal is the assimilation and superiority over all cultures in a glorified state.

what the fuck is a borg?

are we debating weither they're(the borg) communists, or are we bebating weither they're radical or not.

because i think it's pretty obvious that they're communists, and i think that radicals and reactionaries are pretty much the same with a different name.

HailTheLeaf said:

i bet you know who they are without realizing it. they're from star trek

Kill Borgy!!!!!!

HailTheLeaf said:

TALK TALK TALK TALK. TALK TALK TALK TALK. TALK TALK TALK?

BobNOMAAMRooney nli said:


My point exactly.

eddie said:


The problem with the circle is that whenever we do decide to talk about it as a line, we can't decide what extreme belongs at which end. Hence this whole argument.

I understand that what you posted above is the accepted model of the political spectrum, and I agree that it is seamless in theory. However, I think reality has taught us that a practical form of this model would look a bit different. The following might not be as neat and tidy as the accepted political spectrum, but I believe it is more consistent with the lessons of history.

The line below represents not only right to left, but the incremental passage of time (so the line is gradually getter longer as time goes on - and most importantly, being part of time, each of the terms themselves are also moving along with it as well as independently)


.------------.------------.-------------------.---->
Radical Conservative Moderate Progressive


Notice that the dot representing progressive is near the edge of the line, so if it moves faster than the line is going, it can eventually fall right off the edge. And just like in Pitfall, if you accidentally fall off the top level, you have to go all the way back to the beginning before you can climb up and start to progress again.

This may sound a bit more labored than the accepted model, but it is more representative of what happens in the real world. As agreed upon earlier in this thread, there have been no liberal fascist goverments, and the only people with left wing ideas who have led to fascism began by betraying the very progressivism they were purporting. So again this proves the point that the challenge of progressivism is how to move forward without falling backwards. After all, the more freedom we get, the more easily each expansion of freedom can indirectly curtail other freedoms. Such is the challenge of progress.

Another reason why I prefer the new modelis because the original spectrum is shortsighted and doesn't take into account the passage of time. It implicitly suggests that we are always better off staying right in the middle so as to not go to either extreme - which in the short term, I absolutely agree with - but over centuries, that would mean stagnancy. I believe in moderation, but not stagnancy; there is a huge difference.

Dankill said:

then you missed his last state of the union address which was almost exactly like one that carter gave about oil consumption.

Also, it's well known that the carter administration got those hostages free and someone in the incoming regan administration made sure it was posponed long enough so carter wouldn't get the glory for it.