Yeah, because liberals are never assholes…EVER. My argument was rational because I provided facts. I backed them up with concrete logic. You, like many of your kind, gave me emotional rhetorical nonsense. There was nothing digified about your responses. Every answer to my logic was “Well, NYAH!” You didn’t want a dignified discussion, you wanted to railroad this site with your leftist ranting. Remember, you came to this site, not the other way around.

“Honestly, resorting to such condescending terms as “sweetie”? Congratulations, Mr. Right Wing Radical. You give conservatives a bad name.”

I used it because I thought it was appropriate. In retrospect, I was proven right. I admit it, I am pretty far to the Right. No regrets. And no, I don’t give conservatives a bad name. You choose to accept that conservatives are bad because that’s your mindset. You made the assumption that conservatives are a bunch of twits and nothing was going to change your mind. All of your posts up to and including this one has been nothing but snideness and goading. You knew exactly what you wanted when you sent in your first post. Don’t blame me if your argument was total garbage.

“I also like how you neglect to call out the racist post made by someone else who agrees with you,”

Ok, so how does this equate to our discussion? You see, this is a standard tactic with liberals. They come into a site both barrels blazing with unfounded rhetoric or outright lying and when they’re called on it, they get emotional and change the topic. What the other person said wasn’t racist. Last time I checked, communist wasn’t a racist word. Ideological, yes, but not racist.

Illegal alien refers to his spotty record on whether he was actually born in this country. It’s a valid argument because the President has to be born in this country. That’s not rhetorical, that’s the law. So it is a valid point. But that’s JDavid’s opinion. I never defended it. I’m not sure I agree with it because I don’t know all of the facts. IN fact, I doubt we’ll never know the entire truth because the only ones that really know is the Obama family and I doubt they’ll tell. Feel better now?

“and yet you will pick apart every one of my posts bit by bit in an attempt to prove me wrong.”

Well looking at the scorecard, I did prove you wrong. Completely and absolutely. The fact that you did nothing to refute any of my points supports that. What JDavid said won’t have any impact on the country. Obama is the president, for better or worse. However, the opinions you and your kind have are dangerous and could destroy the country for reasons that I went into in great detail in the last post. That’s the distinct difference. Remember, your buddies are running the show completely, not us. If the country is gutted, then it’ll be on your watch and you will have to shoulder the responsibility for your actions (though I’ll probably wait for Hell to freeze over before that happens).

“You say your job comes with a lot of free time? I hope you’re not getting paid for that, seeing as you spend quite a bit of time going on blogs and giving detailed responses to every liberal reply to a post.”

Happily for me, yes, I do get paid for my work. I won’t get rich from it, but I won’t have to get welfare support either, so I’m content enough. Wasn’t that kind of a mean-spirited comment though? I thought liberals weren’t nasty?

Anyway, back to my point. The job isn’t super demanding. In fact, in some ways, it runs itself, which gives me ample time to mess around on the computer and refute silly liberal posts. It’s a good way for me not to get totally bored with my job.

Tell you what. I won’t (not that I do anyway) go onto any of your little DailyKos-type sites and make posts. Tell your liberal friends to stay on their side of the fence (though I doubt they’ll heed, since they need the attention). If they come to the conservative sites where I frequent, and I do expect them to, I will reply to any silly argument that comes up.

Uh, No. No less than Roosevelt’s own Treasury Secretary, Henry Morgenthau, made this comment in MAY 1939:
“We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. And I have just one interest, and if I am wrong … somebody else can have my job. I want to see this country prosperous. I want to see people get a job. I want to see people get enough to eat. We have never made good on our promises … I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started … And an enormous debt to boot!”

So you see, I don’t know where you get your land of plenty for 1937, but up to 1939 at the very least, even the friggin Secretary of the Treasury was telling people that the New Deal wasn’t working. The US arms production started shortly thereafter, long before 1941. That was because we were arming Britain while mobilizing. So, once again, you’re making statements that have no basis in fact whatsoever.

“If you think the answer is not “spending money like water” (by the way, water is not free, nor is it necessarily cheap), then what should we do?

Um, it’s a saying. You had to have heard of it, right? Oh well. Maybe not spend as much, for starters? Not really complicated.

“I have yet to hear the conservatives in congress actually come up with a feasible alternative. So I’m genuinely curious, Mat. How do YOU think we should fix the economy?”

Ok, let’s see. Get ourselves off of this ridiculous dependency on oil that we have. Domestic production of oil, coal and natural gas (which we have massive reserves of BTW) will hold us over for a couple of decades while we find and then switch over to an alternative energy source. That alone would enrich this country and keep petrodollars from flowing to our enemies such as the Middle East, Russia and Venezuela.

Secondly, I’d dump the Obama tax bullshit and cut taxes on businesses like crazy, so they hire more workers, so they can make more money, so we don’t have as many people taking handouts. The Democrats are famous for keeping lower class people down in that category for an excellent reason. Once people move into the middle class, their votes aren’t guaranteed. That alone would cut all of these idiotic giveaway programs that the Democrats are so enamoured of, and colossally fail.

Pull out of NATO and the UN. Those costs are silly and those organizations are obsolete. NATO was useful during the Cold War, when it’s sole purpose was to deflect a Warsaw Pact attack to the West. That’s been over for some time and the Europeans don’t spend anything on their defense budgets. Guess who ends up footing the bill? The logistics alone would enable us to cut defense costs while maintaining the type of army we need.

As for the UN, it’s basically anti-American. Move it to Geneva, Switzerland. Again, it was workable during the Cold War, but has outlived its usefulness. The Security Council alone is idiotic. Great Britain and France have lost a lot of influence and should not have permanent status. Russia, less so, but a case can kinda be made for them. It’s extremely corrupt as well.

Cut foreign aid to the bone. You’d be surprised how much money gets pissed away in this category. We spend hundreds of millions each year to people who totally fucking hate us. How stupid is that? A recent example: your buddy Obama just gave the Palestinians $900 million to rebuild Gaza (that’s assuming that its used for what it should be, which is doubtful). You really think that money couldn’t have been spent better here? And that’s just one example!

“You obviously believe that the middle east will be a major source of conflict and we should get involved to prevent a nuclear war, and it’s okay to kill or be violent towards people there because they would do the same to us.”

Well, gee, let’s see. The Middle East has had how many wars in the past 60 years? There was Israel 1948, 56, 67 and 73. There was Jordan- Syria 1970. There was Lebanon 75-90. There was the Yemeni Civil War forever. There was the Iran-Iraq War 80-88. There was the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 90. I’m sure I left a few out. And you have Iran steadily building towards nukes, Syria which wants nukes but will have to settle for chemical and biological weapons and other countries who have threatened to start their own nuclear programs if Iran ends up with nukes. And all the while you have some Iranian nutcase threatening to turn Israel into a sea of fire when he gets nukes. Yes, I would say that the Middle East is not just a “source of conflict” but a fucking powderkeg, sweetie.

“I personally am more of a pacifist and believe it is never right to kill or be violent unless it is in self defense.”

Well good for you. I’m sure that will come in real handy when the nukes start dropping. Just take care to duck when the bullets start flying. So your basic argument is that we should wait for the enemy to hit us with nukes, or any type of weaponry really and then hit back? Ever hear of EMPs? Electro-magnetic pulse? Iran’s looking into that technology. What you do is explode a nuke high in the atmosphere. Now, the explosion kinda sucks, but the real damage (especially when it’s right above the continental US) is this pulse that will knock out all of our power (electricity will go bye-bye). That will probably send us back instantly back to the 19th century (which for liberal eco-nuts would be just grand). The world has nasty weapons today. We can’t afford to just take it on the chin and come back fighting. If and when we get hit, it’ll take us out for the long haul. You should try for the Defense Secretary post under Obama. I’m sure he’d love to have you. Wow, talk about naive…

“I also think that diplomacy should be our first move, instead of just barging in and attacking or taking over.”

There are times to use diplomacy and times to just knock the crap out of someone. Our diplomacy has worked wonders for us so far. Obama’s made a mockery of Britain, France and China while making us look like a bunch of retards with Russia.

“I do believe that if Iran was to launch nukes at Israel or any one of our allies we should assist in retaliation when necessary, but it should be avoided if possible.”

Ok, your concept of allies is pretty odd. You’re saying that if one of our allies gets attacked, we may or MAY NOT help them? Yeah, that’ll teach them…Good luck trying to find allies in the future, but then you don’t seem to have a good grasp of long-term thought processes.

As for Iran, if they launch, it’ll already be too late, do you not realize that? They’ll obliterate Israel (look at a map and tell me how much of the country will survive even a couple of hits), and Israel will launch their nukes, which will take out Iran and probably portions of Iraq. You drive a car to work? Do you heat your house in the winter? Well, have fun paying gas prices because if oil reserves are radioactive, we’re not going to have them in the forseeable future (like hundreds of years). You thought gas prices were high last year? That’s nothing compared to what they’ll be in your “oh well, nukes are nukes” scenario. You really think Israel won’t hit anyone else over there? The have nothing to lose, so they’ll just lob nukes into every Arab city in the Middle East. Perhaps you can see the Muslim reaction to that situation.

As for our retaliation, I can guarantee that it’ll blow a semi-covert war into a totally full-blown conflict. You honestly think the muslims will be thinking rationally (assuming they ever do) if their cities are radioactive dust? Besides, the Iranian leadership doesn’t really care if they get nuked. They’re looking for the Mahdi (savior) and he’ll only come when the world is close to ruin. They got Israel, and that’s what matters to them.

Once again, you have shown a severe lack of understanding about, well, everything. But I do enjoy shooting down arguments, so keep ‘em coming.

“Horseshit, pure and simple. FDR’s New Deal didn’t bring the US out of the Depression, World War II and the fact we industrialized like mad to get war production up did. If anything, FDR’s programs kept the US in the Depression longer than it should have. And any economist worth their salt would agree with me there.”

Actually, you’re the one speaking horseshit. The economy improved, unemployment rates went down, and major assistance was provided to the millions of people in need. The economy only worsened when FDR cut funding for some of the programs because conservatives in congress pressured him to, which lead to the recession in 1937. Of course World War II was what pulled us completely out of the depression, but FDR improved the situation. Any economist who doesn’t believe that shouldn’t be trusted.

If you think the answer is not “spending money like water” (by the way, water is not free, nor is it necessarily cheap), then what should we do? I have yet to hear the conservatives in congress actually come up with a feasible alternative. So I’m genuinely curious, Mat. How do YOU think we should fix the economy?

You obviously believe that the middle east will be a major source of conflict and we should get involved to prevent a nuclear war, and it’s okay to kill or be violent towards people there because they would do the same to us. I personally am more of a pacifist and believe it is never right to kill or be violent unless it is in self defense. I also think that diplomacy should be our first move, instead of just barging in and attacking or taking over. I do believe that if Iran was to launch nukes at Israel or any one of our allies we should assist in retaliation when necessary, but it should be avoided if possible.

So what you’re saying is that anything less than just spending money like water is not optional? That’s an entirely unreasonable statement. Ok, let me put it this way. All of this spending has to come from several areas. One is taxes. Unfortunately, there are not enough rich people to fund the types of programs that Obama proposes. It is mathematically impossible. And you can’t milk them to the point of exhaustion because, as I said before, they’re the ones who are providing jobs. All you’re doing with taxing the crap out of those people is slowing down the economic growth. The second is borrowing. The problem with that option is that we’ve borrowed so much already that we’re extremely deep in debt. Sooner or later the other countries that lent us all this money will want us to pay up. Either that or they just won’t lend us the money anymore. That’s not an inexhaustable resource. The third is to print the money. The problem with that is that it causes inflation, which means the dollar is devalued. In fact that’s what has China so worried right now. They bought up a ton of our debt and they’re afraid that we’ll wait until the dollar is devalued and then we’ll pay off the debt with crap dollars. Not a good way to build trust.

” am no economist, but this is how I see the situation. Tax cuts don’t work, if you haven’t been paying attention for the past 8 years.”

The problem wasn’t with the tax cuts, which stimulated economic growth, it was the fact that the Republicans basically spent like Democrats for eight years. That’s where the debt came from (that and the war we’re fighting).

“Government spending, however, does work to stimulate the economy. FDR did it with the New Deal; he had to spend a lot of money but ended up creating a lot of new jobs.”

Horseshit, pure and simple. FDR’s New Deal didn’t bring the US out of the Depression, World War II and the fact we industrialized like mad to get war production up did. If anything, FDR’s programs kept the US in the Depression longer than it should have. And any economist worth their salt would agree with me there.

“We are going to be paying off the deficit for years to come, and we would be regardless of whether Obama spent anything or not.”

Ok, you’re right that we’ll be paying off, but the question is the amount that we’ll pay off. Do you realize that the spending so far will increase the deficit dramatically? Do you want to pay for 10 years or 50? Not to mention while we’re busy paying this off, the rest of the world will be passing us by. With your way of thinking, you can forget the US being the economic powerhouse. China will be and they will be calling the shots. How do you like them apples?

“I never said that Obama can never be at fault, no matter how “idiotic” his policies are. I have yet to see a single one of his policies fail because he hasn’t been in office that long, so I’m reserving my judgment for now.”

No, what you said is that no matter how long Obama is in office, he might never fix all of the problems and he’ll be blamed for them. You know what I say to that? Tough titty toenails. He’ll be in there for at least four and maybe eight years. Somewhere down the line, he’ll have to take responsibility for his own errors (which I do not see happening, from what I’ve seen so far). The problem that I have is that Bush will be blamed this entire time, even though I agree that some of it was his fault. Obama’s whining about his “inheritance” of the mess he got will undoubtedly be echoed his entire 4-8 years while he’s in office. Watch and see. And the Democrats will believe him lock, stock and barrel. Like I said, did Bush cause problems? Absolutely, but the point I made is that conservatives have already talked about mistakes that Bush made. I doubt I’ll ever see a liberal openly come out and say Obama made a mistake, hence the comment about deification. The cult of personality is always a slippery slope.

“Those statements in quotes were made by the author of this website in her original post. I was just showing that they are applicable to George W. Bush as well. The violations consisted of waterboarding, head-slapping, and other things, which qualify as torture and have been described in memos from the Bush administration that Obama made public…”

Well, I’m glad you look at torture both ways, but I don’t really consider head-slapping to be much torture. But my point still stands, who decides what is torture? Us? The enemy?
Let me put it another way. How would you feel if a terrorist attack occurs and kills hundreds of Americans and it could have been prevented by information from one of those interrogation sessions? Have you actually met any of these people being tortured? Because I can bet you even money that most of the people you’re so hell bent on defending would try to kill you in some gruesome fashion without batting an eye. As William Tecumseh Sherman once said, “War is all hell.”

“I never said Bush went into Iraq because it was in the country’s best interest. He went into Iraq because it was in his own best interest, with no regard for what was actually best for the country.”

It’s entirely possible that there is some truth to that. I don’t get into the mind of Bush, so I can’t tell you exactly. But let me remind you of one thing. The fighting might be in Afghanistan, but the support and materiel is coming from the Middle East. Never forget that. Sooner or later I believe we will be engaged in the heartland. Is that based on any facts? No, in this case, it’s just sound reasoning. We’ll never win this war until we come to grips with the idea that the Islamic world doesn’t particularly like the West. Sooner or later, things will explode. What’s happened so far is a skirmish.

“If we had just focused on pursuing Osama bin Laden right from the get-go and stayed out of Iraq, we wouldn’t be in the situation we’re in now.”

Read my comment above. Bin Laden is just a small cog in the wheel. That’s the problem with not being able to see the forest with the trees. We’re focused on one minute issue, when we ignore the bigger problem, i.e. the muslim world. Am I saying that every muslim is the enemy? No, but there’s enough support in that part of the world that enables these terrorists to just keep regrouping and attacking again. Who do you think has the willpower? Us? Maybe the military does, but the civilian population as a whole doesn’t. Sooner or later someone will blink and my bet’s on us, which will be most unfortunate.

Even if Iraq did have WMDs, it is not the place of the US to invade Iraq trying to get rid of them. That should have been a UN action, and the UN voted against it. The United States is not the world’s police officer.”

Yeah, because the UN always does such a bang up job of dealing with these problems. If it’s up to the UN, North Korea and Iran will have nukes, the latter cheerfully tossing them at Israel. They did a terrific job in Bosnia, where the peacekeepers pretty much just sat around and watched Serbs massacre Bosniaks. They did such an awesome job in Somalia, where they let our Special Forces troops hang out to dry. My point is that the UN is pretty much useless as an enforcing body and should be put out of its misery.

But you commented on how we shouldn’t be the world’s police officer. To some extent I agree. However in the townhall interview back during the campaign (the second debate between him and McCain), Obama felt that we should pretty much get involved in every country that has a problem. With this guy, I think our chances of intervention in useless affairs will increase (kinda like what Clinton did in Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo and Haiti).

You’re right in saying that he’s been in office for only two months. However, it’s been a very busy two months. Did Bush ram through as much in the same amount of time? I doubt it. In 60 days, Obama’s rammed one spending bill after another, taken over control of at least one industry, has pissed off our closest allies while kowtowing to the muslim world and is on the verge of enacting a law that will require children to join a number of national organizations (mandatory volunterism), one of which sounds like a paramilitary organization. With stuff like that, I kinda wonder how the next 3 1/2 years will turn out.

This is just plain idiotic and racist. You assume that because Obama has a foreign-sounding name, he is an illegal communist alien? He was born in Hawaii, and has the birth certificate to prove it. Do you know who wasn’t born in the US? John McCain. He was born in the Panama canal zone, which was controlled by the US, but was not a US state. If Barack Obama isn’t a valid US citizen, surely John McCain isn’t either.

Normally I would not reply to such tripe, but I have to clarify that I am not confused, nor am I stupid or childish. I fully believe that both sides tend to rely on rhetoric, because keeping track of every single relevant fact would be a huge task, and most people have more important things in their lives to do.

Mat-
I agree that it sucks that Obama and congress are spending so much money, but I don’t see any other reasonable options. I am no economist, but this is how I see the situation. Tax cuts don’t work, if you haven’t been paying attention for the past 8 years. Government spending, however, does work to stimulate the economy. FDR did it with the New Deal; he had to spend a lot of money but ended up creating a lot of new jobs. We are going to be paying off the deficit for years to come, and we would be regardless of whether Obama spent anything or not.

I never said that Obama can never be at fault, no matter how “idiotic” his policies are. I have yet to see a single one of his policies fail because he hasn’t been in office that long, so I’m reserving my judgment for now. If he does something stupid, I should hope that he apologizes and makes an effort to fix it, something Bush rarely, if ever, did. I am not “deifying” Obama either; I believe that he is very intelligent, and I hope that he can make things better. But he is no god.

You said: “So, what exactly were these violations? And who made those statements? You mind giving credit for those remarks? Lots of generalizations here. BTW, do the Geneva Convention apply to our troops who are captured by al qaeda? So far, nope, because they’ve all been mutilated and killed. However, by all means pursue this course.”

Those statements in quotes were made by the author of this website in her original post. I was just showing that they are applicable to George W. Bush as well. The violations consisted of waterboarding, head-slapping, and other things, which qualify as torture and have been described in memos from the Bush administration that Obama made public. I think ALL torture is wrong, and you’d be foolish to think that I don’t believe the Geneva conventions apply to American POWs. If I could stop them being tortured, I would, but the people responsible don’t abide by the Geneva conventions because they are terrorists. We are not terrorists, and therefore should not resort to such base techniques.

“It’s called realpolitik. Most countries do things because its in their best interest. That’s the way the world works. You’re telling me that no other country on the planet does not do things in their best interest? That’s naive at best, dumb at worst.”

I never said Bush went into Iraq because it was in the country’s best interest. He went into Iraq because it was in his own best interest, with no regard for what was actually best for the country. If we had just focused on pursuing Osama bin Laden right from the get-go and stayed out of Iraq, we wouldn’t be in the situation we’re in now. Even if Iraq did have WMDs, it is not the place of the US to invade Iraq trying to get rid of them. That should have been a UN action, and the UN voted against it. The United States is not the world’s police officer.

As for why I’m on here in the first place, this is the first time I’ve ever posted anything on a conservative blog. I came to the site because I was reading a post on a different website by Melissa about PETA’s hypocrisy, something which I actually agree with her on. I don’t often get to hear a rational conservative’s point of view, and I thought she might be able to offer that.

I kinda chuckled when you said youthful optimism, because I’m anything but. I personally think we’re totally screwed, but the country hasn’t realized it yet. Far from causing a breakdown, I usually reply to their imbecilities mainly because I’m bored. I do agree that most trolls are not worth a reasonable person’s time. Usually I ignore it, but from time to time, I’ll just fire back with both barrels. Is it logical? Given the outcomes of these arguments, no. Is it a form of catharsis? Yes, for now.

Now, I really do believe that people like Mr. Chuckles and Glynn (and even copithorne) really have nothing else to do in their lives so they have to make posts on a conservative blog. That’s childish. I don’t go onto lefty blogs (I think I’d suffer illogic overload) and make statements. So obviously they’re trying to get a rise.

However, people like Shirley and Jo sound like they’re confused. That’s why I posted back, as sarcastic as my replies were. And I think that’s the situation with most of the population. I honestly don’t think they have any clue of what this guy is planning to do.

Now, did the Republicans kinda deserve the backlash? I would argue yes, since they behaved like Democrat-Lite. It’ll take a lot of effort to win back people, and that’s something I don’t think the Republicans completely understand even now. But most people don’t think five minutes ahead of time, much less 10-20 years down the road, and that’s when they’ll be paying the price for all of these goodies that are being rammed through Congress now. You’re correct when you say that these people will learn the hard way.

I just loath trolls, particularly the plants, but the robotic, self-worshiping devil’s tools as well. After a dozen or so comment threads of seeing obstructionist Obamunist troll-bots purposely breaking up constructive discussion I begin to grow desperately weary of them. When they finally have their *workers’ paradise* of maggot-infested potato soup twice a day (and happy to get that) I am going to take an unholy pleasure in the suffering of those ignorant and malicious tools.

I’m well aware of the responsibility I take when I reply to liberals on this site. To be honest, 90% of the replies I make are when I’m at work. My job has a lot of open time, so responses just fill that in. Yes, it can be somewhat vexing, but I think it’s more my ongoing research as to why liberals think the way they do, as well as why they turn to rhetoric rather than facts. You have to admit that it is intriguing, since it seems to be working to some extent.