Civil Discourse after the Read More. Meanwhile, has the President blinked on taxes? Is Obama in retreat and if so, what accounted for that retreat?
Maybe the acrimony across the political divide has always been intense. It is simply that with the proliferation of cameras and cell phones, the tension is more visible today. The other possibility is that the conflicts are heightening and that fact is reflecting itself in a much higher level of hostility.
But enough of this bootless speculation. Everyone knows the real reason that Rupert Murdoch was attacked was because he was a racist, and his network was getting too many viewers despite the fact that nobody watches it because it is so marginal. But really, certain people can be justifiably attacked because they stir up violence; violence simply to head off the cerebral electorate as interpreted by Keith Olbermann and Janeane Garofalo which would otherwise be marching with one mind toward progress. So the end justifies the means and when you’re talking about bringing good into the world, you’ve got to break some eggs to make an omelet. Peace out man.
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To the extent that the president blinked or is retreating, I’d suspect he’s looking at internal polls that show personal “armageddon” for his reelection prospects.
The other possibility is that he and senate Dems are looking at the language being used in the “compromise” and have come up with ways to defeat it in order to spend more.
That’s it. I’m out. No idea what else it could be.
Tom Coburn abandons his plan, rejoins the Gang of Six to give obama some cover. The plan calls for some spending cuts (doubtful it will ever come to be) and more importantly ‘increase in revenues’, and showcase Obama as the moderate middle-roader.
Can nobody in DC understand especially right now is not the right time to tax even more? It seems to me our side blinked first. What happened to ‘calling Obama’s bluff’?
Life in the liberal carnival, civil discourse practiced by a “comedian” who’s probably about as funny as cancer, a greasy headed arrogant lesbian and a long haired, maggot infested brownshirt. But they are our betters, the anointed who will usher in centuries of progressive bliss…or maybe legal weed and laws prohibiting discrimination against waiters with open facial syphilis chancres.
I think the “additional revenues” consists of closing certain tax loopholes, rather than increasing or adding new taxes. That would be a face-saver for the GOP.
It’s all a game to these people, and I just want us to get past the artificial debt ceiling debacle.
Every fusillade carries with it an implied threat.
How’d that glitterbug in the 2nd video get to stage a press conference while not in cuffs? Those that the Statists like they subsidize; that which they don’t they treat like border agents or LTC Lakin.
Meanwhile the St. Louis D.A. matched a rookie prosecutor to a high-priced Union funded defense in the trial of the SEIU thugs of Kevin Gladney. Quelle surprise at the verdict. But Parliament lets in a guy with a foam that could have been acid. Did that happen when the IRA was active?
What is this leading up too? In the long run, people expect governments to protect them from assault. But need I remind anyone here that less people have died at the hands of indiscriminate criminals that as subjects of their own governments.
How humanitarian can our leaders be if they never utter a harsh word against Redistributionist, Utilitarian, and Sustainability nutcases?
Hee hee, “we need to all celebrate love”. Yes I agree, at gun point if necessary. Who do I got to blow in this town to get ‘special’ rights too?
‘closing certain tax loopholes’
Yes like the mortgage deduction, capital investment and medical expenses.
Comedians about as funny as their careers.
Over 10 years? Yea, sure. There is an old (I believe Central Asian) joke: Some character promised local Emir to teach Emir’s donkey to speak English in 10 years for a large sum of money now. When his friends were terrified that the task is impossible and Emir will cut guy’s head for an inevitable failure, he replied that 10 years is a long time and something will happen in the interim: either donkey will die, Emir will die, or he himself will die.
But, realistically, what are the chances that those “10 years in the future cuts” will happen? Similar promises made before never materialized, so…
I have to admit that the cream pie in the face (or equivalent) is an inspired bit of political thuggery – technically nonviolent with the clear subtext of, “Next time it’s a knife or a gun or a bomb, so you’d better shut up”.
I think their prayers to god have been: Dear god, just get us though the next election.
The Christian Science Monitor remarks on the existence of the two tracks. ‘Cut, cap, and balance’ vs. ‘gang of six’ plan: Which for House GOP? The suggestion is that the House initiative is set to provide cover for a Senate-originated deal, a chamber which Reid has declared will stay open so that it can ink the compromise which he is probably confident will come through.
Is everything choreographed or there actually a principled fight going on somewhere?
The Left; be it international, American, or a combination, consider themselves not to be bound or restricted by the Constitution, law, custom, civility, morals, or human decency. Both the Marxist, and the National Socialist, varieties are awash with contempt for the “bourgeois sentimentality” that limits the response of the rest of us, and which if they indulged in it would limit their seeking of absolute power. They are not “of” us, but rather assured that they are morally superior to us and justified in anything that they do. TWANLOC.
Both varieties hold to the enforced process to control the allowed narrative by any means. The National Socialists used the phrase Gleichschaltung for coordinating and harmonizing all aspects of life with the approved [by the Party] national viewpoint. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Gleichschaltung
The Marxists call it Agitprop:abbreviated from Russian agitatsiya propaganda (agitation propaganda), political strategy in which the techniques of agitation and propaganda are used to influence and mobilize public opinion. The twin strategies of agitation and propaganda were originally elaborated by the Marxist theorist Georgy Plekhanov, who defined propaganda as the promulgation of a number of ideas to an individual or small group and agitation as the promulgation of a single idea to a large mass of people.
The use of targeted violence is inherent in both forms; to remove threats and to intimidate others into submission. And escalating the levels of violence to accustomize the public to its legitimacy is part of it too.
The entire concept of “Political Correctness” is part of the process. Entire swathes of the Enemy’s program are rendered immune from criticism. Those who oppose the program are placed beyond the Pale for the crime of speaking out, and the initial justification for violence is set in place.
The fact that the Left can constantly resort to violence and threats with impunity while blaming everybody else for non-existence violence is a sign that we are losing.
When is the last time one of these …. TWANLOC in the videos above were prosecuted for their attacks? What would be the result if a member of the TEA Party threw something at a Leftist?
The attacks in the videos contain, in addition to the statutory definitions of assault, highly symbolic elements that legitimize further violence. There are already physical attacks and threats taking place. We don’t have time and space here to go into a long list, but let me mention two. The New Black Panther Party intimidating white voters with clubs at polling places. And the beating of Kenneth Gladney at a Town Hall hosted by Democrat Russ Carnahan guarded by SEIU Purple Shirts. Mr. Gladney was beaten to the point of requiring hospitalization. His crime? Being black and handing out Gadsden Flags [symbol of the TEA Party] outside the Town Hall.
The NBBP thugs were videotaped, charged, brought to trial, convicted; and while awaiting sentencing the Justice Department dropped the charges after conviction and is ignoring Congressional subpoenas and investigations into why. Threatening white voters with weapons now can be done with legal impunity as far as the Justice Department is concerned, in accordance with their stated doctrine that they will not deal with complaints about the violation of white’s civil rights.
Gladney’s attack was also videotaped, and the assailants who were wearing SEIU uniform shirts were positively identified. One was a Democrat candidate for Mayor of St. Louis. The District Attorney [Democrat] refused to accept an assault complaint under the interesting doctrine that the location of the beating, while inside the boundaries of his Judicial District, was somehow not in his jurisdiction. The local city government [Democrat] claimed that their police force did not have authority to investigate and charge for assaults.
When finally a charge was filed against the assailants, the court stalled for over a year; claiming that they had never had to empanel a jury before and had no idea how to do it. Despite eyewitness and video evidence, the SEIU members were found NOT guilty.
There is no doubt that physical attacks by the Left will be conducted under a doctrine of possunt quia posse videntur. They do it, because they think they can. And they will be right. Death threats have become the common political currency of the Left. In Wisconsin, Governor Walker, the Republicans in the Legislature, and their families were threatened. And there was no punishment for the threats, even in the cases where the source was identified.
This will continue until, and beyond, the point where casualties are inflicted. The attacks will continue with no legal recourse, until somehow the Left is convinced that a line has been drawn beyond which they dare not ever tread again. The means of such convincing is as yet unclear.
Subotai Bahadur
Why would the Republicans say anything but No? Put it another way. What is the upside for the GOP in sending money to the Departments of Education and HUD? Are they afraid the Democrats will call them even meaner names and tell people not to vote for them twice?
SB @ 13. I’d misidentified Kenneth Gladney as Kevin up @ 5.
I wish to reiterate that when the DA finally mounted a prosecution, he sent in a rooky prosecutor up against the best the SEIU could buy. Oh, and I forgot: half the jury had union ties and not challenged at voir dire.
A pincer movement or vise-closing is going on here.
1. From the top the sell-out of our enslavement under insurmountable debt and private sector destruction by funded regulators.
2. From the bottom by thug assaults gone uncharged or under-prosecuted.
#12 wretchard
Is everything choreographed or there actually a principled fight going on somewhere?
From the moment that Mitch McConnell came out of nowhere and offered a plan to Obama that was a) a Tyrant’s wet dream, b)would be thrown out of court as being unconstitutional as soon as they saw it based on clear precedent [remember the Line Item Veto bill?], and c) had the the Democrats making orgasmic noises worthy of a porn flick [it being unconstitutional is a feature to them and not a bug]; it was highly likely that we were being subjected to the patented Institutional Republican “Quisling Bait and Switch” ™. Especially given “the dog that did not bark”. Not one Republican Senator screamed like a ruptured Bann Sidh at the prospect of giving Buraq Hussein Obama an unconstitutional means of raising funds forever to run the government outside the Congress, doing as he will. Dead-Freaking-Silence.
If there is a principled fight going on, it is coming from the Patriot movement alone.
IF this goes through as choreographed, and it well might, there will be tax increases. There will be a raised debt ceiling that will mean a QE 3 and a destruction of what little worth the US dollar has left. There will be absolutely no cuts in spending outside defense.
The last refuge for us is going to be the FOUR precious metals.
And the Great Blue Sky Tengri Nor knows the truth of the matter and will reveal it in the fullness of time.
Subotai Bahadur
Prince Poncie and the Beast.
http://politics.standard.co.uk/2011/07/boris-fines-obama-for-not-paying-congestion-charge.html
“I think the “additional revenues” consists of closing certain tax loopholes”
If that woks, closing them all would work better, right?
We close them all by eliminating taxes and going to tariffs. That would shift the tax base from the GDP to what used to be called M3. That would put an end to social engineering by tax code and Tax cheating.
I thought “cut and cap” could have worked if the House had passed it quickly and presented it to the Senate and Obama with a note saying that this is “all you’re getting and we’re going home.” But the “balance” part — the balanced budget amendment that has been a populist conservative staple for years, was rightly or wrongly seen as too much a stunt, or at least a Bridge Too Far with only one house, and I think it caused the House plans to be taken less seriously.
Now we’re stuck with whatever the Senate comes up with, or stuck with the blame,and the Lefties think they’re setting us up for another term of the Obama Politburo. I don’t know, but it strikes me the Conservative movement, and the country at the moment, need somebody who can argue, articulately, that there are some futures that don’t look bleak. I’m not seeing it though.
Fear. The obomination hasn’t been able to destroy America yet. He thinks another term will do it. Since he isn’t an American, he doesn’t understand how tough we are.
He knows all the indicators say he is a 1 term POTUS. With 16 months left he understands the time to move those indicators is running out.
The Second amendment prevents the normal Socialist type coup. So his only hope is to pull the golden rabbit out of the silk hat. Since Congress is holding that hat, he MUST co-operate to some extent. He wants to replace Lucy with a kicking tee. Only he needs Lucy to lend him the money for the tee.
We will see how that works. I think he is out of time. An economy the size of America’s doesn’t turn on a dime. One must plan months if not years ahead.
I’m trying to figure out now what stocks will be the best buy after the crash.
But what do I know. I’m just some asshole behind a keyboard.
W: Is everything choreographed or there actually a principled fight going on somewhere?
If this fight is choreographed as it appears, there will be a Republican civil war. The GOP establishment will have joined the TWANLOC in their contempt for America , and should be considered outright traitors. I thought better of Coburn.
It appears that the bulk of the GOP no longer represents my interests or what I think are America’s interests. Why should I vote for them? Many of the problems we now face arose under Dubya and he failed to address them. Essentially Dubya laid the groundwork for Buraq. Another RINO in the White House will not cut back on the excesses and criminal projects of Obama; he will make them permanent. We need a President who will fight the Left’s plundering of our land, our rights and our economy, not one who will acquiesce to it.
13. Subotai Bahadur wrote:
“This will continue until, and beyond, the point where casualties are inflicted. The attacks will continue with no legal recourse, until somehow the Left is convinced that a line has been drawn beyond which they dare not ever tread again. The means of such convincing is as yet unclear.”
We’re seeing the mobs of Rome and Constantinople. They were dispersed/dwelt with in two ways: the army for short-term control, and the cessation of grain shipments from Egypt. Without food, the mob army doesn’t march (Napoleon made the famous comment about an army perambulating on its stomach—but he also knew first-hand how easy it was to disperse mobs, well-fed or not).
When will the American mobs have their Egyptian grain cut off? Without their welfare money, what will they do for food? Looking back, it seems as if LBJ intentionally laid the foundation of urban mobs with his “Great Society”, which, like his Vietnam war, was an attrition campaign. All that, “Let’s help the poor and downtrodden” was really “Let’s community organize them into mobs to use for our purposes when the day dawns.”
The Third American Civil War will be the Left and their mob army against the rest of us. It will be like our original civil war, in which communities and families broke apart over duty to king and country (were the people sovereign, or German Georgie? Was the country we owed duty to Momma England, or colonial soil?) and yet like our second one, too, in that it will have its sectional divides (New England, the coasts, and the mega-cities going one way, the rest going the other). Third time round is the charm, apparently.
14. Blast From the Past wrote:
Why would the Republicans say anything but No? Put it another way. What is the upside for the GOP in sending money to the Departments of Education and HUD? Are they afraid the Democrats will call them even meaner names and tell people not to vote for them twice?
As I suggested in the Belmont column “Take the High Ground”, our RINO leadership of McConnell, Boehner, and other assorted Hyracodontidae, the running rhinos who seemingly evolved for running away, (thanks for your comment, Subotai—I think
indicate they’ll take McConnell’s ignominious way out. For some reason, they don’t realize it makes them look like der Fuehrer in his bunker on his last day. Do wild rhinos ever gorge themselves to death?
The insightful Sebastien Haffner once wrote that Hitler never changed. He never altered his goals or his means of achieving them. It was his enemies who changed. When his enemies were strong, Adolf got nowhere. When they were weak, cowardly, divided, Adolf triumphed. I suppose the same could be said of Lenin, too (Mussolini was quite different). We’re in somewhat of a similar situation, only it is not merely our enemies who never change their goals or methods, but neither do our own leaders ever change! What a miserable curse it is to have such Hyracodontidae thundering along away from the fight, their tails always held high.
Where is the Darwin award when you need it?
Subotai 16. “IF this goes through as choreographed, and it well might, there will be tax increases. There will be a raised debt ceiling that will mean a QE 3 and a destruction of what little worth the US dollar has left. There will be absolutely no cuts in spending outside defense. ”
Leading, ultimately to a collapse of the economy. Riots when the cities can no longer be fed. Martial law. Disarmament in exchange for food. Boot in a human face for as long as they can make it stick.
Just when you thought all was lost you get this bobbing and weaving from Boehner:
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/oops-boehner-says-gang-six-proposal-appears-fall-short
Is he serious or is this just a head fake to keep the Mc Connell capitulation alive?
Civil Discourse. Hmmm. Is that like civil war?
I think I accidentally made a permanent enemy last week. Unfortunately it was my boss. He was going on about the best, most honest, most informed, most credible, source of Truely Truthy Truth, this journalist named Glen Greenwald.
I laughed and said,”that’s the most famous sock puppet on the web, dude!”. I also laughed and said, “that guy has zero credibility with me”.
OOPS.
I’ve been trying hard for a long time to keep my mouth shut and not respond to the various provocations when suddenly I just let loose and laugh and a moment of candid honesty slipped out.
I’ve been tight lipped throughout all the various death threats and prayers for my elimination from my lefty community for years. Even though I take them seriously, I’m starting to laugh at inappropriate times. I think my contempt is starting to soak through.
Unsk – “the bulk of the GOP no longer represents my interests”
I registered independent in the middle of GW’s last term. All it meant is that I could not vote in the Republican primary. I despised McCain, voted for him. Sigh.
Sorry for the long quote but this is gold.
“And I’m saying it bluntly, that this administration is the greatest wet blanket to business, and progress and job creation in my lifetime. And I can prove it and I could spend the next 3 hours giving you examples of all of us in this market place that are frightened to death about all the new regulations, our healthcare costs escalate, regulations coming from left and right. A President that seems, that keeps using that word redistribution. Well, my customers and the companies that provide the vitality for the hospitality and restaurant industry, in the United States of America, they are frightened of this administration.And it makes you slow down and not invest your money. Everybody complains about how much money is on the side in America.
You bet and until we change the tempo and the conversation from Washington, it’s not going to change. And those of us who have business opportunities and the capital to do it are going to sit in fear of the President. And a lot of people don’t want to say that. They’ll say, God, don’t be attacking Obama. Well, this is Obama’s deal and it’s Obama that’s responsible for this fear in America.
The guy keeps making speeches about redistribution and maybe we ought to do something to businesses that don’t invest, their holding too much money. We haven’t heard that kind of talk except from pure socialists. Everybody’s afraid of the government and there’s no need soft peddling it, it’s the truth. It is the truth. And that’s true of Democratic businessman and Republican businessman, and I am a Democratic businessman and I support Harry Reid. I support Democrats and Republicans. And I’m telling you that the business community in this company is frightened to death of the weird political philosophy of the President of the United States. And until he’s gone, everybody’s going to be sitting on their thumbs.”
Steve Wynn 7-18-2011
“Law enforcement sources say the FBI has arrested an agent of Pakistan’s official state intelligence service, accusing him of making thousands of dollars in political contributions in the United States without disclosing his connections to the Pakistani government.
Syed Ghulam Fai will appear in federal court this afternoon in Alexandria, Va. He’s not charged with being a spy. But he is charged with being an unregistered agent or lobbyist of the Pakistani government.
He’s the exective director of a group called the Kashmiri American Council” NBC
Our government has been bought and paid for by our enemies.
#26 Annoy Mouse
I registered independent in the middle of GW’s last term. All it meant is that I could not vote in the Republican primary.
I consider myself a TEA Party Conservative who eagerly expects to be joining whatever Party [above or underground] that the Patriot movement coalesces around. I remain a registered Republican only so I can fight back against that side of the Enemy from within [I work at being a delegate to all conventions up to State, and usually make it]. Fortunately, my county party organization is TEA Party. If Sarah runs as a Republican, I will stay as long as she does; because she will have as many enemies in the Institutional Republican Party as in the Democrats and I may be able to help defend her from within. If she does not run, or runs 3rd Party; I am with her. But I am more and more dubious about the utility of normal electoral politics in the time frame before it all collapses.
“If there is to be trouble, let it be in my day, so that my child may have peace.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zf2K4-BQYAI&feature=related
Subotai Bahadur
“23. Tamquam”:
“Riots when the cities can no longer be fed. Martial law. Disarmament in exchange for food. Boot in a human face for as long as they can make it stick.”
Socialism’s boot: Grecian Formula.
Socialism: a religion of the stomach has failed.
“She and her 7-year-old daughter have to take a bus in from a suburb and travel all the way across the sprawling city just to get a warm meal.”
“Greece is finished.”
What is next for Greece?
The left view:
“Greece is tightening its belt — and the number of people living in poverty is surging as a result. Thousands line up in front of food banks and resort to rifling through rubbish bins. The country’s financial crisis is rapidly turning into a social one — while wealthy tax evaders manage to get off scot-free.”
“Greece Threatened with Widespread, Long-Term Poverty”
“This time, the fight for survival last exactly 29 minutes. At precisely 3 p.m., Father Andreas, a 37-year-old Greek Orthodox priest, opens the doors of the food bank in downtown Athens. At this hour, the line of hungry people stretches all the way across the large square outside and into the street. Needy people of all ages are waiting patiently — pensioners, unemployed people, mothers with children, immigrants, asylum seekers. “We can’t let these people starve,” the priest says. “They are already suffering so much. They should at least not go without food.”
It is a charitable deed. But in just under half an hour, all of the kitchen’s 1,200 servings have been taken, causing several dozen people to leave with empty hands and growling stomachs. They can only hope to be among the lucky ones next time.
Katarina was one of the lucky ones. The 44-year-old got her hands on eight servings of a salad made of carrots, potatoes and peas, several yoghurts and a bag of bread — the only food her family will have today. Katarina is ashamed and prefers not to give her full name. She and her 7-year-old daughter have to take a bus in from a suburb and travel all the way across the sprawling city just to get a warm meal.
Katarina was laid off from her job at a biscuit factory roughly a year ago. Since then, she’s been forced to rely on the handouts paid for by what Father Andreas calls “holy money.” Katarina says there are no more jobs to be had. “No one will even pay you to stuff mailboxes with advertisements anymore,” she says. “Greece is finished.”
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,775301,00.html
Is everything choreographed or there actually a principled fight going on somewhere?
I think the Republicans are stumbling around and getting nothing effective done, and that’s maybe just exactly the right thing.
I think it’s clear we are going to cruise into August without a deal, and September, and probably 2012. What will be, will be.
What will happen first – legislation, or financial meltdowns? I’d say right now it’s too close to call. But we are certainly going up to the edge and taking a look down. Politics is rotten to the core.
But it’s the only game in town.
Re. #21. Unsk
“Many of the problems we now face arose under Dubya and he failed to address them. Essentially Dubya laid the groundwork for Buraq.”
Sorry to disagree but the probs started much earlier. With papa Bush. He essentially turn the country from the direction set up by his former boss back to traditional “redistributive” scheme started by FDR long time ago thus rendering Reagan years as a fluke. And it was amplified by ‘president responsive to young women needs Clinton, and than younger Bush who was supposed to be just a placeholder and than present demagogue.
Grrr, I couldn’t agree more. Papa Bush started an explosion in regulations, beginning with the American Disabilities Act. He was even worse than Dubya by a fare bunch. Papa was one of the first to be embarrassed by conservatives, and he and his cronies meddling in Dubya’s administration led to some of Dubya ‘s biggest mistakes
20. stoicheion
Study up on Weimar Germany and Fascist Argentina….
The winners are those who produce with prompt criticality the daily essentials: power companies and telecom do very well — they are coddled monopolies/ oligopolies who see their debts wiped out — while their assets keep spinning cash.
Others that win: silver and gold miners. If you calculated the S&P 500 in gold/ silver you’d come to realize that we’re in a major bear market, one of the worst on record.
Anyone extending credit — regardless of form — usually gets crushed.
The problem with bonds at this time is that their coupons are too low relative to risk — hyperinflation or default.
Both are lethal — and for many, many entities they are the only end game possible.
CDS rates on Germany are taking off. The wider community is coming to understand the Faustian pact Berlin made to launch the Euro.
The rigged exchange regime is going to burn like the Hindenburg.
BTW, AAPL would be severely punished: too much exposure to financial reverses on its war chest AND probable trade war with China AND a complete hammering of their market when the money tap turns off.
I think everyone has underestimated the Republicans and that Obama has blinked. he took the bully pulpit but his poll numbers have gone down. they view from the inside the beltway pundits, liberal and conservative alike ias that the Republicans are losing the argument but the pol numbers just do not show that.
here is what is actualy going to happen over the next 10 days. The house will pass their plan and the Senate will turn it down. Plan B, the McConnel plan is also a dead horse in the House because those freshmen Republicans ain’t budging. That only leaves the gang of six plan and Obomber is going to sign on to that without knowing the details because having promised to veto everything else he still knows he has to get the ceiling raised because ultimately he sits behind the big desk. The political reality is hatred of congress is diffused because if you sit in a safe dem district there is no republican to vote against but there is a president on the ballot so even if you blame the republicans more you will punish the prez because he to is part of the problem.
Now the gang of six plan has some virtues, it promises to lower rates as well as to cut loopholes and the devil will be in the details, details that will not be hashed out in the next ten days. So the compromise, and this is where Obomber blinks is going to be a short term extension of the debt ceiling with about $500 billion in immediate cuts while the tax reform details are hashed out and remember that whatever those details wind up being the smoke and mirrors will be the revenue enhancement. The reality will be lower rates and no ethanol subsidies and other loopholes most of which none of us should really be opposed to if it results in lower rates and a simplified tax code that actually will result in higher revenues.
Meanwhile Obomber will be wrung through a wringer. have a litle faith in those House freshmen.
I’m going with the New Chicago Rules from here on out: “They bring a pie, you bring a flamethrower.”
Blert: “CDS rates on Germany are taking off. ”
Zerohedge has a post that shows why: http://www.zerohedge.com/article/how-greece-could-create-another-round-systemic-risk-pt-1-0
The Netherlands, the UK, Germany and France each have a bank loan exposure to the PIIGS equal to 10% of their individual GDP’s or greater. The US exposure is 3% of our GDP. If things fall apart in Europe, which seems pretty likely, all hell could break loose.
Unsk/21: The GOP establishment will have joined the TWANLOC in their contempt for America , and should be considered outright traitors. I thought better of Coburn.
Coburn IS a good guy and he would be a great senator if these were normal times. These are not normal times, and as we hang on the edge of the cliff by our fingernails, Coburn is the man who would brook no criticism of Obama at a townhall meeting, telling the audience Obama is an honorable man. That is the kind of sentiment one can afford in normal times. I do think that he is aware these are not exactly normal times and knows what is at stake but he still can’t bring himself to any other conclusion but that his side is politically weak and therefore has no choice but to cooperate with the opposition. I think Coburn fully realizes the gravity of where we are, BUT he does not acknowledge or credit the concept of TWANLOC. This is where the Republican leadership is failing us, imo.
I’m in the middle of reading Whittaker Chambers’s Witness. He said that one of the things that made the Alger Hiss case such an ordeal for him was that he had to testify before a nation that could hardly bring itself to believe that a communist infiltration of the government could possibly exist. In the beginning, his charges were presented as wildly incredible, almost laughable, and a detestable witch-hunt. Similar forces today try to marginalize the Tea Party.
But there’s something else about Chambers’s story that worries me more.
When he came to realize that communism was an evil destructive illusion, he began to pray, daily, even though at first he wasn’t even sure he believed there was a God to hear his prayers. Then one day, he was walking down the stairs in his home and thinking about what he called “the impossible return” (meaning his return from communism and how could he do it?) and the thought struck him, “I cannot do it. You can’t go back.” But as he stepped into the hallway, he suddenly felt a great enveloping hush surrounding him and he heard, very distinctly, these words: If you will fight for freedom, all will be well with you.
This experience, from that moment on, changed everything for him. He was a changed man, and he described the change in this way: “I do not mean that I was exalted or conspicuously changed. I was still an erring, inadequate man, capable of folly, sin and fear. Like other men, I still must walk through damp pockets of desperation. But those were surface vicissitudes, as the surface of water is torn up while the depth below remains unchanged. Henceforth, in the depth of my being there was peace and a strength that nothing could shake.”
When I read that, it reminded me of the passage in Angelo Codevilla’s The Character of Nations (which I’ve quoted here before) that identifies the moral relativists’ – or any of the various collectivisms for that matter – ultimate enemy: the soul that is stiffly independent because its anchor is beyond the regime’s reach.
That immovable anchor, and the peace and strength that flows from it is exactly what Jesus meant when he said, Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth… But take heart, I have overcome the world.
To prevail we need that kind of spiritual moral fiber – and it comes from one source and one source only, namely, Judeo-Christian in origin – and if that can still be found in the American people at large as well as in our political leadership, then our freedom is assured. Without it, all the surface storms will surely blow us away.
Does all this describe anyone you know?
Just now watched Subotai’s Youtube link @29 of the Oathkeepers.
Yeah, that’s it. They’ve got it.
Don’t know how large their membership is, but I hope there’s a BUNCH of ‘em.
Wonderful, Karen. Thank you. I, for one, think we have what it takes.
@ 35. Joe Hill
You are more optimistic than I. Like I said, this compromise (Grand Bargain or Gang of Six plan) will give Obama the much needed fig leaf, for him to appear yet again a more reasonable Clinton-lite. Especially he can move in that direction from now on till election day.
This gives his followers and those who money can buy all they need to vote for the second phase of Obama’s grand destruction of our Republic.
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/07/20/obama-summons-democrats-to-wh-for-debt-ceiling-meeting/
Now there’s some blinking for you.
maineman @40, thank you. I hope you’re right that we do have what it takes. Certainly most here at BC have an abundance of what it takes, but BC seems to me to be somewhat, well, unusual. BC is compelling, engaging, discerning, civil and considered in tone – the quality of this blog comes from Wretchard and it attracts… those that it can.
Another of Chambers’s observations was that, in the past, you always had individual traitors here and there but the 20th century was the first time in history where millions of people banded together in a “treason of ideas” to destroy their own institutions.
It seems that in the 21st century, there’s no longer any need for that kind of formal organization, i.e., no one needs to be recruited into the cause. You couldn’t have an Alger Hiss case today. The treason of ideas is already out there, circulating as prolifically as our rotten unsound currency, debasing everything from the Presidency and the Supreme Court on down to the average man in the street.
Here is a thorough overview of the Gang of Six proposal:http:
//www.redstate.com/mikehammond/2011/07/20/thirty-problems-with-the-gang-of-six-proposal/
To cut to the chase – this proposal envisions $260 billion in Defense cuts, $240 billion in imaginary discretionary cuts, a whole host of ways to raise taxes – revises the Cost of Living index to increase taxes and hold down costs, closing “loopholes” like the mortgage deduction and charitable giving deduciton, and a bunch of complex rules that will prevent anything positive to come from this ridiculous piece of crap. As the post says, the Republicans on the Gang of Six, including Coburn, got taken to the cleaners – bigtime. Another sellout – what a shock!
Did anyone ever think the Dems would come up with anything better? Why are the Pubs negotiating with these corrupt liars, thieves and traitors? After all the duplicitous cons the Dems have pulled over the years, one would think the Pubs would finally learn. One can only surmise that the Pubs don’t really want to learn and that they really want to find a way to give the Dems what they want, and let America go down the tubes in the process.
The remaining good Pubs just gotta say No! If they can’t find a way to raise the debt ceiling in a way that has positive outcomes, then the government, Buraq and the Dems are just gonna have to live with the current revenue and no more.
Karen Yvonne, some beautiful expressive writing –it ain’t easy putting poetry into a comment on the Alger Hiss case. Hiss was a Golden Boy –clerk to Oliver Wendell Holmes at the Supreme Court, in FDR’s State Dept, at his elbow at Yalta, secretary-general of the UN organizing conference, and America’s first ambassador to the brand new UN. Then busted as a Stalin spy. Later, Joe McCarthy got into the same topic, but was laid low by his manners –the same problem Chambers had vs the svelte, chiseled Hiss. Memo: if you want to roust commies, don’t let the media catch you being short and fat.
Buddy, when I first started reading this book, I was surprised to discover what a fine writer Chambers was. Don’t know why that should be so, since having been an editor at Time magazine, one should expect some abilities along those lines. But still I was surprised the book is such a pleasure to read. In fact, the only dull part is the reproduction of the transcripts of the hearings in which Hiss’s slick lies and evasions really do try the reader’s patience. True to type.
Unsk/44: As the post says, the Republicans on the Gang of Six, including Coburn, got taken to the cleaners – bigtime.
What?!? Coburn is back with the Gang of Six? What happened to his “Back in Black” plan? It sounded pretty good to me. It cuts the budget $9 trillion over 10 years, puts SS in the black for the next 75 years, repeals large parts of Obamacare, gives the Educ. Dept. NO ROLE in public schools, among various and sundry other things. Coburn’s plan was front page news in The Oklahoman just a couple of days ago (July 19th). Well, you find out in the last few paragraphs that there was never any hope for it, because Coburn is quoted as saying he “harbored no illusions that the plan would be embraced by Obama and lawmakers in either party…”
Coburn said, “$9 trillion is very reasonable. That sounds idiotic to Washington. But with this $9 trillion, government will have still grown since 2001 by 63 percent.”
$9 trillion over 10 years is idiotic to Washington. Now that’s what’s idiotic.
Fourth and final post on this thread.
#46 Karen Yvonne
Coburn is back with the Gang of Six? What happened to his “Back in Black” plan?
The battle over the debt ceiling, the Budget, and the Continuing Resolution has broken the cover of a lot of Institutional Republicans who had been trying to act as if they supported the TEA Party and Conservatives. Just like the mythical Blue Dog Democrats pretended to not be like blatantly Socialist mainstream Democrats, while voting with them down the line on all but inconsequential matters [they took turns as established by, and with the permission of, the Democrat leadership for the occasional vote against the party when their vote did not matter to establish their cover]; there are a lot of Republicans who are trying to pretend to be on our side. Coburn’s “Back in Black” plan was apparently disinformation and agit-prop to confuse the issue, and he [and whoever he reports to] never intended it as anything else.
Coburn has shown, by switching back and supporting a plan that in reality gives Obama his clean debt ceiling raise in return for tax increases on the middle class now and more [insert expletives of choice here] promised spending cuts in the out years that will never happen; that his true loyalties are with the Political Class, regardless of party.
From now on, it would be wise to ignore anything he says. All that counts, as it should with all politicians, is what they do. What specific legislation do they actually and formally offer and actually support in Congress? How do they actually vote on legislation and amendments? Where are they sending money? Words and promises are the inflated currency of the Political Class.
Subotai Bahadur