Obama Speech: 'A More Perfect Union'
debigbadwolf @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 10:46 am
If you believe anyone is genuine in politics you are sadly disillusioned.
I find it amazing that any 'news' is ever broadcast and that the news outlets tend to report on what in fact is not really news. ie. they tend to report on anomolous occurances which effect none of us, and fail to report on events which effect all of us. eg. odds are you won't die in a plane crash. however, when a plane does crash and kill 350 people it makes worldwide headines. Forget the 35,000 planes that landed safely that day, or the millions between crashes it the anomoly that is reported (with indifference to the thousand people who probably died on the road in car accidents that day... even this is too boring).
The media will report on Obama, Clinton, and McCain every time they gaff and ignore when they do something right. Did you notice that when the economy of the USA was going great three years ago Bush got raked on how badly the war in Iraq was going with no credit for the economy? Now that the war is going 'better' he is getting raked for the economy, with no credit for the war?
If it bleeds it leads.
BartSimpson @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 10:50 am
Scape Scape:
$1:
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should’ve been authorized and never should’ve been waged, and we want to talk about how we’ll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
—-
Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
—-
Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
IMHO the best speech of 08.
Thoughts?
It does NOTHING to counter that fact that Obama has been listening to his pastor spew racist bile for twenty years while endorsing same pastor with his presence.
BartSimpson @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 10:57 am
Joe_Stalin Joe_Stalin:
Hilly has pulled even with Oh Bama. He dropped in the standings.
Obama lost the nomination with the revelations about his racist pastor. John McCain can reasonably get away with distancing himself from Hagee because he'd never met Hagee before. Obama cannot do this as he has listened to Pastor Wright for twenty years and has tacitly endorsed Wright many times previous to the election.
It'll be Hillary vs. McCain come November and Hillary will win.
Scape @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 11:05 am
debigbadwolf debigbadwolf:
If you believe anyone is genuine in politics you are sadly disillusioned.
I find it amazing that any 'news' is ever broadcast and that the news outlets tend to report on what in fact is not really news. ie. they tend to report on anomolous occurances which effect none of us, and fail to report on events which effect all of us. eg. odds are you won't die in a plane crash. however, when a plane does crash and kill 350 people it makes worldwide headines. Forget the 35,000 planes that landed safely that day, or the millions between crashes it the anomoly that is reported (with indifference to the thousand people who probably died on the road in car accidents that day... even this is too boring).
The media will report on Obama, Clinton, and McCain every time they gaff and ignore when they do something right. Did you notice that when the economy of the USA was going great three years ago Bush got raked on how badly the war in Iraq was going with no credit for the economy? Now that the war is going 'better' he is getting raked for the economy, with no credit for the war?
I find it amazing that any 'news' is ever broadcast and that the news outlets tend to report on what in fact is not really news. ie. they tend to report on anomolous occurances which effect none of us, and fail to report on events which effect all of us. eg. odds are you won't die in a plane crash. however, when a plane does crash and kill 350 people it makes worldwide headines. Forget the 35,000 planes that landed safely that day, or the millions between crashes it the anomoly that is reported (with indifference to the thousand people who probably died on the road in car accidents that day... even this is too boring).
The media will report on Obama, Clinton, and McCain every time they gaff and ignore when they do something right. Did you notice that when the economy of the USA was going great three years ago Bush got raked on how badly the war in Iraq was going with no credit for the economy? Now that the war is going 'better' he is getting raked for the economy, with no credit for the war?
If it bleeds it leads.Thank you for the black helicopter report. If you think the majority or at least the key people that matter in media and run for office are a part of some vast conspiracy then your outlook is so bleak as to be meaningless. Seriously, why get up in the morning? The fact is that there are large corporations that now own the air waves does not mean they own the will of the people. That there are political leaders that have faced and failed moral and ethical challenges does not mean there is a new world order ready to snuff out the human spirit.
Media report what the people want. If they didn't they would be out of work. If you want to dig and get more details you are now in the information age, you can do it yourself and dig for details. You really want to know what's going on with the war in Iraq? Why not contact the people in Iraq on the war blogs? Troops blog, people blog and the enemy blogs but the truth may not line up to your preconceived black and white notions because the world is a complex grey and not simple black and white.
xerxes @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 11:06 am
Hillary won't win. She simply won't have enough delegates to secure the nomination at the DNC in August.
Scape @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 11:15 am
Hillary is toast, and McCain has no grasp as to the situation in Iraq. He is constantly making gaffs that leave serious question as to if he even knows what it is to be Sunni or Shiite. Political candidates should denounce the bigotry of their associates. They are judged by the company they keep, just like the rest of us. But when it comes to faith, it's foolish to suggest that anyone agrees all the time with his or her religious leader. In fact, if you agree with everything your pastor says, then one of you has become unnecessary.
$1:
McCain's brain is plainly on the wane
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Last week we finally got a clue as to why John McCain has been slavishly supporting the Bush administration policy on Iraq for all these years: He doesn't have a clue what it is.
That became obvious during a press conference in Jordan Tues day. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who had just come from Iraq, stated that "Al Qaeda is going back into Iran and is receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran."
This prompted his fellow senator and fellow neoconservative Joe Lieberman of Connecticut to whisper something in his ear. McCain promptly corrected himself. But the damage was done, forcing him to issue this elaboration later in the week.
"I corrected my comment immediately. To think that I would have some lack of knowledge about Sunni and Shiite after my eighth visit and my deep involvement in this issue is a bit ludicrous."
Ludicrous? No, It's true. What McCain's critics failed to note was that this gaffe fit within a pattern of gaffes that show not just a lack of knowledge but astounding ignorance. Consider this comment a few weeks earlier about al Qaeda's prospects in Iraq in the event of an American withdrawal: "My friends, if we left, they wouldn't be establishing a base," McCain said. "They'd be taking a country."
No, they wouldn't. The Sunni radical group al Qaeda is a minority within a minority in Shi'a-dominated Iraq. The real threat is from such radical groups as the Iranian- based Dawa Party and from that other Iranian-born group that until recently called itself the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
But we don't have to worry about Dawa and SCIRI taking over after we leave. They already run Iraq. The real tragedy of the Iraq War is that Iraq is now firmly in the hands of Iranian-allied Shi'a groups and will remain so no matter what we do.
Unless, of course, we "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran," as McCain put it in that joking allu sion to the'60s song "Barbara Ann" not so long ago. Despite hav ing thoroughly screwed up the Iraq War, the neoconservatives still want to push on to Iran and even tually Syria, though none of the above represents any threat to America.
How did such a soft-headed politician win the nomination of a party that prides itself on its hard- headedness? As a conservative, I blame the self-proclaimed "alternative media" of talk radio and the Internet. Old-time conservatives such as Pat Buchanan and the late William F. Buckley recognized the radicalism of the neocon vision from the beginning. But the former sports announcers and washed-up lawyers of the alternative media simply lack the intelligence to assess the situation.
An excellent example came when McCain called talk-radio show host Hugh Hewitt from Jor dan before the infamous press conference. "As you know, there are al Qaeda operatives that are taken back into Iran, given training as leaders, and they're moving back into Iraq," McCain told the reformed ambulance-chaser. He then went on to say, "I think that Iran maintains its ambitions in the region. I think that if we leave Iraq, the Iranians will then extend that influence."
Wait a minute, senator. The other day you said al Qaeda is going to take over Iraq. Now you're saying the Iranians are going to take over. Which is it?
That's what any intelligent conservative would have asked. Hewitt instead turned the conversation to the happy prospect of bombing Iran. But if President McCain were to bomb Iran on Jan. 21 of next year, is there anyone out there who believes he would know what to do on Jan. 22?
This sort of thing makes me nostalgic for the good old days of the Cold War. Back then, the commies were kind enough to pronounce themselves as such. The Marxists who tried to take over Spain in the civil war of the 1930s had the same goals and the same language as the Marxists who tried to take over Central America in the civil wars of the 1980s. The communists rarely switched allegiances, one of the few exceptions being the movement of various ex-Marxists to the philosophy we call neocon servatism.
That left men like George W. Bush and McCain to try to sort out the Mideast by the rules of the Cold War. In the Mideast, however, our ally yesterday is our enemy today, and vice versa. Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein were on the sides we supported in the wars of the 1980s. Meanwhile our current Dawa allies in Iraq were busy truck-bombing our Kuwait embassy in 1983.
It would take someone a lot smarter than McCain to deal with this. Last week he made the mistake of letting us in on that secret.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Last week we finally got a clue as to why John McCain has been slavishly supporting the Bush administration policy on Iraq for all these years: He doesn't have a clue what it is.
That became obvious during a press conference in Jordan Tues day. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who had just come from Iraq, stated that "Al Qaeda is going back into Iran and is receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran."
This prompted his fellow senator and fellow neoconservative Joe Lieberman of Connecticut to whisper something in his ear. McCain promptly corrected himself. But the damage was done, forcing him to issue this elaboration later in the week.
"I corrected my comment immediately. To think that I would have some lack of knowledge about Sunni and Shiite after my eighth visit and my deep involvement in this issue is a bit ludicrous."
Ludicrous? No, It's true. What McCain's critics failed to note was that this gaffe fit within a pattern of gaffes that show not just a lack of knowledge but astounding ignorance. Consider this comment a few weeks earlier about al Qaeda's prospects in Iraq in the event of an American withdrawal: "My friends, if we left, they wouldn't be establishing a base," McCain said. "They'd be taking a country."
No, they wouldn't. The Sunni radical group al Qaeda is a minority within a minority in Shi'a-dominated Iraq. The real threat is from such radical groups as the Iranian- based Dawa Party and from that other Iranian-born group that until recently called itself the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
But we don't have to worry about Dawa and SCIRI taking over after we leave. They already run Iraq. The real tragedy of the Iraq War is that Iraq is now firmly in the hands of Iranian-allied Shi'a groups and will remain so no matter what we do.
Unless, of course, we "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran," as McCain put it in that joking allu sion to the'60s song "Barbara Ann" not so long ago. Despite hav ing thoroughly screwed up the Iraq War, the neoconservatives still want to push on to Iran and even tually Syria, though none of the above represents any threat to America.
How did such a soft-headed politician win the nomination of a party that prides itself on its hard- headedness? As a conservative, I blame the self-proclaimed "alternative media" of talk radio and the Internet. Old-time conservatives such as Pat Buchanan and the late William F. Buckley recognized the radicalism of the neocon vision from the beginning. But the former sports announcers and washed-up lawyers of the alternative media simply lack the intelligence to assess the situation.
An excellent example came when McCain called talk-radio show host Hugh Hewitt from Jor dan before the infamous press conference. "As you know, there are al Qaeda operatives that are taken back into Iran, given training as leaders, and they're moving back into Iraq," McCain told the reformed ambulance-chaser. He then went on to say, "I think that Iran maintains its ambitions in the region. I think that if we leave Iraq, the Iranians will then extend that influence."
Wait a minute, senator. The other day you said al Qaeda is going to take over Iraq. Now you're saying the Iranians are going to take over. Which is it?
That's what any intelligent conservative would have asked. Hewitt instead turned the conversation to the happy prospect of bombing Iran. But if President McCain were to bomb Iran on Jan. 21 of next year, is there anyone out there who believes he would know what to do on Jan. 22?
This sort of thing makes me nostalgic for the good old days of the Cold War. Back then, the commies were kind enough to pronounce themselves as such. The Marxists who tried to take over Spain in the civil war of the 1930s had the same goals and the same language as the Marxists who tried to take over Central America in the civil wars of the 1980s. The communists rarely switched allegiances, one of the few exceptions being the movement of various ex-Marxists to the philosophy we call neocon servatism.
That left men like George W. Bush and McCain to try to sort out the Mideast by the rules of the Cold War. In the Mideast, however, our ally yesterday is our enemy today, and vice versa. Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein were on the sides we supported in the wars of the 1980s. Meanwhile our current Dawa allies in Iraq were busy truck-bombing our Kuwait embassy in 1983.
It would take someone a lot smarter than McCain to deal with this. Last week he made the mistake of letting us in on that secret.
Bacardi4206 @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 12:03 pm
I truely hope Hilary wins, she stated that if she got into presidency. She would leave NAFTA which IMO for Canada is a good deal because I think NAFTA continously fucks over Canada. Our economy could be much better if the U.S. wasn't getting discounts basicly off of our natural resources. Most are fine, but there are some that the U.S. practicly robs us in.
Obama stated he would, but he was just stating that to win. He won't pull out of NAFTA, Hilary probally wouldn't either, just another political stunt to get votes but we already know Obama is 100% bull shitting.
Though most of you probally won't agree with me there lol, what resource what is it that we produce, give the U.S. to do something with it then buy it back from the U.S.?
Scape @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 12:09 pm
She didn't say that and the leak was by Wilson to muddy the water in the US election. What is said on a diplomatic background and what is said in a stump speech are not the same thing and you have to be naive to think otherwise but the damage is done.
Bacardi4206 @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 12:13 pm
Actually she did say that, she was the first to say it and Obama copied her. She said she wanted to negotiate a the NAFTA agreement so it was more beneficial to America, and all those that are losing there jobs. If we don't negotiate, America will back out of NAFTA. That is what she said. Obama then stated that he agreed with her, and said he would do the same.
Scape @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 12:28 pm
The context was where it was said and why. Put simply, NAFTA is not on the table, the presidency is. None of the current candidates have seriously made NAFTA reform a part of their platform until that speech in a state hard hit by the economic realty created by the trade deal. So yes, she did say that but both Hillary and Obama are not meaning what you are implying here. NAFTA is not nor ever will be on the table.
debigbadwolf @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 1:25 pm
NAFTA is an issue for the primaries and will not be making an apperance in the real presidential race. You'd better hope to hell that we don't ditch it.... Have you seen the canadian economic figures since FTA and NAFTA were passed? Did you know that there have been MORE Canadian buy-outs of American firms in the NAFTA era than vice versa? We seem to do just fine by it in the natural resources department too. Ever heard of the Tar Sands?
As for Media, I don't think there's a conspiracy to lead the people astray. In fact, I think it's a sad commentary about the people when they buy into and believe the 'infotainment' that is the news. The problem is people no longer know what news is as they have slowly become more lazy and accepting in the 'information age' not more well informed.
If you think that the masses are going to flock to Blogs filled with first-hand wartime accounts and real information I think you are sorely mistaken. History is not black and white, nor did I ever imply that it was, but interpret as you will your view of in black and white (ahhhh we have a winner of the false majority principal contest). While a great hope, it's probably not practical to assume people will be able to find and interpret the 'truth' or what is 'real' themselves.... the masses will stick to the big media outlets.
"The truth is out there"
-since you like my sound bites so much I thought I would give you more fuel for the fire.
Bacardi4206 @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 2:01 pm
Scape Scape:
The context was where it was said and why. Put simply, NAFTA is not on the table, the presidency is. None of the current candidates have seriously made NAFTA reform a part of their platform until that speech in a state hard hit by the economic realty created by the trade deal. So yes, she did say that but both Hillary and Obama are not meaning what you are implying here. NAFTA is not nor ever will be on the table.
You know this how? I understand that a lot of politicians spill bullshit just to get votes, but there is no way somebody can know that 100% for sure unless something happens like what happened to Obama. If that doesn't happen, which hasn't happened to Hilary yet. Then saying she won't do it is only a assumtion and not reality.
Bacardi4206 @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 2:08 pm
debigbadwolf debigbadwolf:
NAFTA is an issue for the primaries and will not be making an apperance in the real presidential race. You'd better hope to hell that we don't ditch it.... Have you seen the canadian economic figures since FTA and NAFTA were passed? Did you know that there have been MORE Canadian buy-outs of American firms in the NAFTA era than vice versa? We seem to do just fine by it in the natural resources department too. Ever heard of the Tar Sands?
As for Media, I don't think there's a conspiracy to lead the people astray. In fact, I think it's a sad commentary about the people when they buy into and believe the 'infotainment' that is the news. The problem is people no longer know what news is as they have slowly become more lazy and accepting in the 'information age' not more well informed.
If you think that the masses are going to flock to Blogs filled with first-hand wartime accounts and real information I think you are sorely mistaken. History is not black and white, nor did I ever imply that it was, but interpret as you will your view of in black and white (ahhhh we have a winner of the false majority principal contest). While a great hope, it's probably not practical to assume people will be able to find and interpret the 'truth' or what is 'real' themselves.... the masses will stick to the big media outlets.
"The truth is out there"
-since you like my sound bites so much I thought I would give you more fuel for the fire.
As for Media, I don't think there's a conspiracy to lead the people astray. In fact, I think it's a sad commentary about the people when they buy into and believe the 'infotainment' that is the news. The problem is people no longer know what news is as they have slowly become more lazy and accepting in the 'information age' not more well informed.
If you think that the masses are going to flock to Blogs filled with first-hand wartime accounts and real information I think you are sorely mistaken. History is not black and white, nor did I ever imply that it was, but interpret as you will your view of in black and white (ahhhh we have a winner of the false majority principal contest). While a great hope, it's probably not practical to assume people will be able to find and interpret the 'truth' or what is 'real' themselves.... the masses will stick to the big media outlets.
"The truth is out there"
-since you like my sound bites so much I thought I would give you more fuel for the fire.
Really, yeah that is all good news huh? All those buyouts, and the good we get out of NAFTA. Except you left out all the bad. I already stated that we do good in a lot of departments, mostly average and I only stated that in some we do get fucked over... Big time. Now for the buyouts, what about that American Company that is buying out our company that makes Dexter, Canadarm, and Canadarm2 and the other things. Expecially that top of the line satalite that we could use to protect our artic borders?
That is all beneficial to Canada right?
That is only beneficial to America, and the Company that is selling out.
Also for the parts where we do get fucked over, who ever heard of giving our resources to another country so they can do something with it and then sell it back to us? That is completly stupid, what we should be doing is making our own plants, creating more jobs for Canadians by doing so and it doing it ourselves THEN selling it to America.
Scape @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 4:35 pm
Bacardi4206 Bacardi4206:
Scape Scape:
The context was where it was said and why. Put simply, NAFTA is not on the table, the presidency is. None of the current candidates have seriously made NAFTA reform a part of their platform until that speech in a state hard hit by the economic realty created by the trade deal. So yes, she did say that but both Hillary and Obama are not meaning what you are implying here. NAFTA is not nor ever will be on the table.
You know this how? I understand that a lot of politicians spill bullshit just to get votes, but there is no way somebody can know that 100% for sure unless something happens like what happened to Obama. If that doesn't happen, which hasn't happened to Hilary yet. Then saying she won't do it is only a assumtion and not reality.
If they were really serious about it don't you think this would have come up by now?
debigbadwolf @ Mon Mar 24, 2008 5:23 pm
It's called TRADE... sometimes you get a better deal, sometimes you don't. I find it amazing that in the 21st century there are still people with an isolationst economic worldview. The Canadian economy (and the US for that matter) both rely on tertiary and quatrinary industry. While touting our natural resources is important, you must realize we dont 'lose' everything we sell and buy back. To paraphrase Scape, things aren't black and white, they are grey....
All kinds of people make money when we sell our resources AND buy them back:
1- Jobs in the resource industry - if we didn't sell to the US there would be fewer jobs. Really this is a no brainer
2- Companies (Canadian and US) who make profits from the sales.
3- Traders, brokers... hey even the stock owners
4- The consumer - the law of comparitive advantage
5- Fostering future trade
While the US and Canada are sometimes fond of referring to the importance of the manufacturing industry, politicians do this to garner support from unionists and the disenfranchised who (perhaps) have lost their jobs to the global market (notably maybe the US auto industry is crashing because their cars suck and 25% of the cost every veichle they manufacuture goes to early retirement and health plan claims for people who no longer work for them- I'm no economist but this seems to have nothing to do with NAFTA, the WTO or the fact that Toyota's don't break down all the time).
In the end, we in fact have (to some extent) surpassed the traditional economic models of manufacturing (we still need it in the west, but 15% of the economy is more than enough to sustain our lifestyle). The model requiring 70% of our economy to come from primary and secondary activities is a product of the Victorian industrial age. We have left this age and handed it to China, Mexico, and India.
I can't wait to see what you think of this one...