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Bob Dole had the decency to retire to obscurity when he lost, why not McCain? He is not more the voice of the Republican Party than his air-headed daughter.
Mr. McCain is still in public service in the Senate, and would make a much better de facto head of the Republican Party than the fourth grade schoolyard bully Rush Limbaugh. Be grateful that the GOP actually has someone with some brain cells actively involved in government to finally stand up and demonstrate some sanity. We have enough press on the antics of the Palins off in Alaska to keep us howling with laughter with out Rushbo and that other frightening buffoon Bobby Jindal. Who has taken to inserting the Catholic Church into the affairs of the State of Louisiana and a lot of other scary Bush style American Pinochet behavior. Be thankfull for Senator McCain.
And I seem to remember that Mr Dole had given up his place in the Senate. Viagra ads and lobbying aren't exactly a fade away. Just a tackier way to stay in the public eye...
Can't disagree about Dole, but McCain was the GOP candidate and will be the party leader until he leaves the Senate. Flush Limbaugh is indeed an empty headed schoolyard bully, and does not reflect the position of real Republicans anywhere. They could start their own Limbaugh party where they could gather and venerate Timothy McVeigh and other Limbaugh lemmings.
Thank you, Thank you vis. Even as an independent(for lack of a better fitting party) I agree. I think that the moderate and right-of-center republican party has several very good ideas that need to be heard, and that "Flush" (that's so cool!) and the others that are trying to "Purify" the party need to be relegated to the same ranks as the John Birch society. In short, the embarrassing barely-remembered part of our history.
It was nice that Tina Brown took her lips off of Obama's butt long enough to appear on TV. My God, you could have said at least one thing critical about the Administration. You must not even read the articles from your own website!
And John McCain is an idiot!!! He sat there and defended against prosecuting the Bush Administration. Then right after that, he said that other countries will not torture because of threats of retribution. My God, he should be voted out. That kind of logic is criminal!! Hey McCain, if someone murders your family are you just going to say "Let's move forward" or the court of "public opinion" is good enough?!?!?
Hurray! Thank you for saying what I have been thinking since this whole thing started. If we don't hold the people responsible for desecrating our Constitution, what's to stop the next elected official from doing likewise? We, the people, need to demonstrate that this is our government, not the republicans nor the democrats. If torture was the only way to go, why wasn't it done in the light of day?
If blowjobs were the issue instead of torture, would the Republicans be so eager to move on?
nuff said. so true.
Can't argue with history.
What is it with you Democrats and Clintons BJ's - jealous?
We're not the fetishists that trotted out the whole sordid affair.
Summers was a horrible hire. Obama basically showed his hand with that one....
I'm with bluehawaii on this one.
More jealousy?
How old are you, Grundy? 12?
The caption for Gladwell's clip is just a little confused, taking his quote out of context. Obviously "hard work" is a mantra of the American dream, but he's not incorrect: our school systems judge students according to aptitude, which doesn't improve a population but instead subdivides it--and usually along socio-economic lines. Just what he said.
Malcolm forgets that hard work is a learned ethic and dependent on environment. You can group by ability, but the kids who are slow should not affect the ones who get the stuff. Some kids cannot even sit still for 10 seconds let alone an hour.
I know very rich people who's kids wind up bankrupt and poor waiting for mommy and daddy to die so they can inherit their lifestyle. I also know very very poor who work their lives away to make others rich without being able to take care of themselves much at all. I myself have an IQ of 127 and was entirely left behind in public education because I have several learning disorders and had to struggle to learn how to survive on my own because of it. If that's not a brilliant shining example of desperately needing to reform our education system I don't know what is. Also my mother worked for public education when No Child Left Behind came out and watched as teachers were pressured by school districts to pass kids that wouldn't be able to otherwise just so that the schools could continue to get money. You wonder why our illiteracy rates among High School grads are so high?
How do you figure hard work being a learned ethic? I've yet to actually see that idea fit the real world.
Let's be honest. Those who want to prosecute the past administration on the "torture" issue are really diverting their anger because of the Bush administration's decision to go into Iraq. You can't prosecute a bad decision that cost over 3,000 American lives and thousands of wounded veterans (though we'd like to), but you can go after the legal decisions leading to the use of "advanced interrogation." The real question is if you thought water-boarding made us less safe, don't you think exposing ALL our interrogation methods and having public trials will only cement hatred of the U.S. for generations to come? What, really, would we gain as a nation.
do you like yerbe matte?
ask some folks who have been or had there family tortured.
recipe for making a martyr or heroe: persecute unjustly.
mccain's own claim to fame is that he is a torture survivor.
recipe for tyranny.. make actors unaccountable.
and at the risk of weakening our national security ,
the secret torture recipe that wasn't effective anyway:
if you don't pay your bookie, they may bludgeon,break or burn parts of your body. big secret.
Justice for all?
Anything you wouldn't want the police to do you should allow your intelligence community to do. As a matter of history, the more these kinds of things are done for "National Security" the more likely they are to be done to the people as well for the same given reason.
Also we lose face when we say that it's not ok for Americans to be treated this way but cover up the fact that we were doing it after the world knows, that we did it. That's when the worse violence breaks out, when we admit that we were breaking our own ethics, then refuse to do anything about it.
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Lets also not forget that following WW2 much of the resistance to creating a Jewish state in the middle east was because small Jewish groups were doing the same thing that other militants are doing now, and that even the Israeli government is doing now to Palestinians.
While we are on this witch hunt maybe we should also:
Prosecute Paul Bremer for giving the wrong advice on the occupation of Iraq that led to tens of thousands of needless deaths.
We should prosecute Dick Cheney for forcefully encouraging invasion of Iraq and the deaths of 4500 troops.
We should look into prosecuting Donald Rumsfeld for not having enough troops to occupy Iraq.
We should prosecute Alan Greenspan of keeping interest rate too low and encouraging asset bubbles in housing, equities and commodities that have cost investors $20 trillion in 2008.
We should prosecute Chris Cox for his faulty regulation of thieves like Bernie Madoff, Paul Greenwood and Paul Stanford.
We should prosecute Hank Paulson for arbitrarily letting Bear Stearns survive and letting Lehman fail.
Do Barney Frank and Chris Dodd deserve to be prosecuted for their hand in supporting Fannie and Freddie in every endeavor?
When is giving advice even when it is faulty a crime? Its is time to move on. These advisors will never work in this town again and their names will always have an asterisks against them.
Dodd is done. He really deserves to be voted out of office. Simply for DOING NOTHING of substance besides presiding over a screw up. Frank is equally ineffectual as is most of congress.
Giving advice is not a crime, but heeding that advice may be, especially when the advice is "to commit a crime."
The issue here is that the advice "to commit a crime" was requested, (by the Bush Admin.), and heeded.
If I told you to run into oncoming traffic that is not a crime. If I forced you to, that probably is. And just because I might not be able to get a job in a certain town doesn't mean that I don't deserve to be punished for breaking the law.
It is kind of funny that Republicans are endorsing "move on" though.
You're right and giving advise makes you part of a conspiracy.
I love how pursuing justice is a 'witch hunt' when you talk to a conservative.
You fools want to try to claim that the other party is dirty and needs reform when your party broke the law and defied the Constitution.
You all disgust those of us who love this country more than we love our political party.
It's called "Conspiracy to Commit" and it is a crime to give out advice that leads to the commiting of... a crime.
And lets look at the list you've generated hammer. Conspiracy, War Crimes, Fraud, Price-Fixing, Insider Trading.... yup all punishable crimes. Let me ask you hammer, is prosecuting someone for a committed crime still a witch-hunt?
April/26/2009
From:
octavio
To:
Everybody,
Leaders should always be prosecuted.E,g; when
George W. Bush lied to the public ( about Sadam's weapons
of mass destruction.Or when it became obvious that George
W.Bush gave orders to TORTURE individuals.Or allowing
personal vedettas ( because the problems Sadam Husein
had with George H.Bush ) and spend trillions of the tax
payer's money just to capture Sadam Husein.After so much
waste of taxpayer's money.The new president ( Barac Obama )
is going to spend the next 8 years correcting Geroge W.
Bush's mistakes,etc,etc.
END!
You give bad advice, you take your lumps. You act on that advice, you're held accountable. I may advise you that shooting your neighbor is the best course of action. You do so and you go to the gallows.
Bush actually looks pretty good based on what Obama has been doing -- simply because Obama obviously lied in order to become elected. Bush was too dumb to know any better.
???
Please site references before putting on the tinfoil hat there Portmanteau. If you want to really site lies to get elected, neither Bush nor Cheney gave up control of their companies in order to become president and vice. It's actually in their published corporate minutes. They made billions off of the wars they started. That's not only a conflict of interest, it's corruption.
McCains logic is faulty, as is typical with republicans. He stresses "Logic" provided by the attornies as "faulty", as tho that exceuse any transgressions on national policy, Geneva Conventions, American moral values, etc. is forgived because some lawyers gave "bad advise". BS. The FBI saw that the "advise" was condoning illegal activity: why didn't the officers of other branches of the Smerican forces refuse? Because they tazke "advise" as legal cover to do anything, even though they suspect it's illegqal and wrong.McCain is BS'ing the Amereican public who doesn't use their brains, as usual..
I wouldn't take the word of Ahmadinejad to be the truth. From his past words and behaviour, he appears wily, deceitful and spiteful. If he is serious, he will stop the games and the rhetoric and get down to business.
Are you so sure that's not Americaninjihad you're not referring to?
Please the only similarities between Nixon and Bush are that they are both Republicans.
Oh my God. It all makes sense now.
Try again. Both broke the law in office. Both lied to the public. Both decided that the truth is not as important and the only thing that matters is power.
John McCain does not have credibility on this current issue of "torture." If the issue were prosecution of Vietnamese war criminals for their treatment of U.S. POW during the Vietnam War than yes, John McCain would have credibility, but as demonstrated by his presidential campaign and his recent behavior it is obvious that he will say and do anything to score political points.
I'm not sure what the ATTORNEY GENERAL should do, but to "move on" before the lessons have been learned would be irresponsible and dangerous.
(Shoot, a lot of Americans still haven't learned that the pursuit of frivolous politics such as the attempted impeachment of the head of our government for lying about recent extra-marital fellatio during testimony into a past real estate scandal was disproportionately harmful to our country and resulted in 9/11.)
At least the Republicans haven't accused Obama of "wagging the dog" yet.
let that be a lesson to you kids, it's okay to torture if you get a lawyer to say so.
it's too much trouble to prosecute people that simply mistakenly ordered torture because, well they were real busy and it was for our own good.
john mccain torture victim and apologist.
Macarthur didn't move on when he conquered the Philippines. He summarily hung the Japanese generals against advice of lawyers. I guess it depends on which foot the shoe's on.
I'd like the ask the lefties who troll here what they would do if they knew in general a suitcase bomb was going to go off in Kansas City but needed the details. A man from Pakistan who slipped across the Mexican border has the details but says "F--- you!" when asked about t hem. What do you do, check with the local ACLU chapter to ask if giving him a noogie to make him talk would be all right?
We are a nation of laws. If that is a problem for you, leave. There are plenty of places where you can live as you seem to want. I would prefer to have this person interrogated by the FBI with techniques that work.
Well of course we'd call Jack Bauer and let him electrify their testicals. You've been watching too much 24 moron.
Banjo1
We're not talking about TV (24). This is real life- no one is going to tell you there's a bomb that will go off in an hour- how dumb are you?
Kansas City, KS or MO?
Such a lame scenario, the same one Cheney's daughter's been hauling around like a crap ventriloquist act. Why don't we torture ANY captured enemies in a time of war, who might very well have actionable knowledge to save lives? Suddenly when we're talking about protecting Das Homeland, the law changes? Go play your banjo, fool - Rome has been burning for eight years.
And who was the last domestic terrorist caught coming across the Rio Grande? The American Jihad is hanging out with the missing WMDs, playing cards with Elvis and JFK...
I would turn the channel away from 24 and watch Mythbusters, it's more interesting.
If our intelligence community is so bad, that that is how we have to conduct ourselves, we need to reform our intelligence community not torture people.
Well, some other industrialized country half you idiots think is the Third World will go after Bush/ Cheney for war crimes- and it should be done! I think we're all so exhausted from fear of jack booted Cheney minions black planing citizens off the streets and wondering who would be next ( middle class white people? For exercising Constitutional rights?) We just want some Obama intelligence and efficiency and prosecution of
those Wall Street people first.
But Mr Bush and Mr Cheney probably should face the war crimes court in Amsterdam. Lets see those papers and then pack them off for an international Court to deal with. The Congress has stuff to do- like reinstating banking regulations?
As for education- I think hard work is right! But it would be nice if parents sent disciplined decently behaved children to school ready to work, and our schools taught HOW to study instead of this stupid test based curriculum. And it would help if the very limited were in places appropriate for them and not chewing up every dollar that could provide appropriate curricula for normal to bright kids. They don't consume the schools budget on a few "special" kids in Asia. But parents pay for school there too, so they keep their children in line.
McCain says no administration will ever do this (torture) again.
We never thought our own government would do it again after the 1970s. But we had to stand by in disbelief as the same guys from administrations 30 years before redefined torture and went ahead with their morally bankrupt plan for America. With no penalty to suffer the American people can expect more of the same in the future when another morally bankrupt administration gets voted in.
McCain - what happened to you and your stand on torture?? Where are you, man?
I wouldn't say all republicans are idiots, but after reading some of these posts I would posit that all idiots are republicans.
As he speaks, Malcolm Gladwell seems to be asking himself "am I sounding like an idiot?"
The answer is yes. "The dull child can work harder than the smart child." Good lord.
And how does one measure "hard work." Gladwell seems to think it means "doing your homework." Any teacher can tell you that just doing the homework is not necessarily a sign of hard work, commitment or anything else. There are different ways of doing homework. We are not all equally good at subjects, no matter how hard we work.
I've always enjoyed Gladwell's books and articles, but I think I'm moving over to the side that says he oversimplifies. He is out of his league here, and yet willing to babble on like an expert. He should read Frankfurt's book On Bullshit before he does another interview on education!
FYI I am a teacher: recipient of a Distinguished Teaching Award from UC Berkeley. I may not be as smart as Gladwell, but on this subject I know what I'm talking about.
Can you please please please get to be Secretary of Education WestWoman. That's not sarcasm, that's me begging right now. We need more teachers like you.
Thank you.
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