Bear in mind, gridlock doesn’t necessarily mean government doesn’t do anything. It just means it’s almost impossible to change anything about what government does or how. Sure you want that?
Well, there have been very few bills passed in the past few years that have reduced the size of government. So if we keep it about the size it is now, then that will be a victory.
The hard-core Libertarian position would be: Open the borderrs, but no minimum wage, no welfare, no OSHA, no public schools, etc. IOW, come here if you want, but you’ll be just as poor as you were Mexico, if not more so, unless you work your ass off.
There was no rant. There was a response appropriate to the value of the question.
There was no wrath. There was a simple indication that you were in deliberate violation of the rules and that you were being informed of that without penalty on this occasion.
The rule is hardly new and there are clearly examples of similar enforcement:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7599510#post7599510
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7247244#post7247244
Your subsequent attempt to rationalize your breaking of the rules with continued (if lame) insults is really not helping your case. I suggest you drop it.
It seems to me various “conservatives” in this thread (and in America generally) not only have different ideas about how the Republican Party will or should change, they also have different ideas about what a real “conservative” is, and on what is the real “conservative agenda,” and on what a “moderate” and what an “extremist” conservative is. E.g., some use “conservative” and “libertarian” as synonyms, others as near-antonyms. And the whole thread is premised on the idea that W’s neoconservative foreign-policy agenda is not really “conservative” at all; also, on the idea that the religious right is not really “conservative” at all.
Nothing new there, though.
Do you really imagine we can balance the budget without high taxes? In fact, considering the hole this war has put us in, it probably would take higher taxes than we’ve got now; we can only save so much by cutting spending.
So how badly do you want a balanced budget?
But isn’t that true conservatism?!
Could be. I’m not certain that there’s any ‘true’ faction beyond the religious right that has enough adherents to actually rescue the GOP.
Pelosi in power will have to be different from Pelosi in the minority if she wants to succeed. Note that I said “If she is smart” before continuing with my point. As minority leader all she had to do was throw the party faithful red meat every once in a while and criticize. Now she’ll be required to come up with results. It’s easy to sit back and snipe…it’s another to be out front with solutions.
Anyone who doesn’t see this election as the acendancy of the moderates is either not paying attention or is letting idoelogical fervor overtake reality. I have maintained for years that anyone on the right or left fringe will not be taken seriously by a majority of the country.
Evil One is flip-flopping.
Whether he exists or not…a lot of people think he does. And the more the democrats let him out to play, the more people he scares away…many of the same people who voted Democratic yesterday, some of them for the first time in a long time.
If we’re trying to puzzle out which Congressional Dems are furthest to the left, I should think membership in the Congressional Progressive Caucus would be a pretty clear indicator. Not that any of its members are necessarily “extremists”; that’s another discussion.
You wound me, rjung.
I think this result will be a good thing if the proper lessons are learned by both political parties. Personally, I am pro-choice. I don’t want the government in my bedroom on inside my TV telling me what I can or can’t watch. I think that more money needs to go to education. I think the top ten percent of the country can afford to pay a little bit more in taxes. The democrats can help me here.
But…
I also want a strong national defense and terrorism policy. I disagree with affirmative action and I think that part of our national health insurance problem could be solved with tort reform.
Moderates from both parties can get together and compromise on many of the issues facing the country today…but the further left the democrats go, the quicker they will be out of power again.
Oh…one more. I am in favor of embryonic stem cell research.
Except for the “open borders” part, and public schooling, sounds pretty much like how illegals have got it now . . .
But, somehow, I don’t think the above is what ralph12c4 had in mind.
You seem to be saying “Yes, California liberal Nancy Pelosi, who just became the leader of the House of Representatives due to yesterday’s election, is considerably left of moderate. But since she’ll have to become more moderate in order to achieve practical results on policy, it doesn’t contradict my claim that yesterday’s election was a mandate for moderation.”
I really am not following your reasoning on that one, but then it’s been a long day.
That’s a distinction without a difference. You cannot constitutionally impech someone for “political differences.” The only reason they attempted to impose such a major penalty on a minor infraction was politics. If Bush ever lied to Congress under oath (he refused to testify under oath for some odd reason) bet you a nickel there would be no Republican call for impeachment.
Depends on what he lied about…and how badly whatever lie he told would hurt the various Pubs chances for re-election. If the lie were bad enough, and the damage deep enough…yeah, the Pubs would turn on him like rabid dogs to save their own skins/careers. Never doubt it.
No dog in this fight myself, but the idea that Republicans OR Democrats wouldn’t turn on one of their own in the white house depending on the right set of circumstances is silly.
-XT
I’ll take your word that there was no wrath, as I cannot get inside your head. The rant was there though. It is still there.
What you wrote did not answer the direct question I asked, so I regarded it as unresponsive, almost as germaine as a random series of letters strung together. It was uncommunicative, so I substitued similarly uncommunicative words to quickly make the point and then move on. I put them in brackets, thinking that the convention was universal. My infraction was not a deliberate one. When I explaiin myself you take further offense, and lay down a subtle threat (I assume of a Warning. Banning? :eek: ). I’ll try harder to not offend you in the future. I’ll do my best to knuckle under, Oh Great Arbiter.
In the meanntime, I’ll thank you for introducing Clinton’s impeachment into this thread. It cannot be clarified enough for some that he was impeached not for having sex, but for breaking the law.
Onward.
Only to today’s modern conservative can a man like John Conyers be considered an extremist. BTW, he won re-election last night with 85% of the vote. That is one large bunch of extremist voters in Michigan!