Just for the sake of clarity, what in the name of bleeding Og is a “quasi-socialist”?
Dirty fucking hippies? Your words, not mine. From where I sit, to each his own.
Were you right? Who knows? You sure don’t, and neither do I. Did OIF result in Egypt, in Libya, in (some day) Saudi Arabia, Jordan, etc etc? Will those countries look like Turkey in 20 years? Who knows?
I’d like to think you were intellectually honest about this and could hold out some hope that those military actions might some day pave the way for Democracy in the middle East. In fact, I hope that you hope for that. Because what’s the alternative? That we condemn millions to autocrat rule so we can have the issue on some cute little message board that W was a bad guy? Really?
No. OIF was a wasted attempt, and none of the people demonstrating and dying in the Muslim world right now are doing it in the name of Iraq. Bush and the neocon’s great folly is the idea that we can sail in and they’ll welcome us. These people want to change, but they need to do it from within.
It was a powderkeg, and the invasion of Iraq didn’t ignite it. Instead it happened when the region was ready and it combusted on its own.
I would propose that the Iraq invasion delayed change for several years.
While it’s cute of you to pretend that you know what the future will bring, most intelligent people understand that we’ll have to wait and see. Only an idiot would suggest otherwise.
As for where the political spectrum has gone, I like to use government spending as a convenient proxy for liberalism (ie, bigger government, more intrusiveness, less freedom). You can see by the chart that it has gone pretty much in one direction over the last 100 years.
I forgot to add that I still remember many saying that democracy was flourishing in the ME around 2004 thanks to the Iraq invasion.
Unfortunately many extreme anti-US groups got elected in Lebanon, Palestine and other places, and many thanks to scaring or angering the populations by reporting the evil (exaggerated or not) of what the US was doing in Iraq. When those countries exploded around 2006, I could not heard a peep from the ones supporting the invasion regarding how good it was for democracy in the region.
No retard. Stop and try to think. We aren’t saying we know the future. We are saying that OIF didn’t start these turnovers. The coming governments may well be worse, but without rolling the dice they will never turn to the better.
It’s funny how utterly you misunderstand even simple things.
Actually the Republicans are the free spenders. At least if you bother looking at facts. But keep fuckin’ that chicken smashy. Someday you’ll get that golden egg.
It was maybe '68. Somebody, nobody really knows who, bought some billboard space on a highway leading into town, with a huge picture of rather poorly rolled joint and a scarifying legend in big scary letters…you know, all jagged and edgy looking…screaming “Wny Do You Think They Call It DOPE?!”
Addenda, a week later: “Because WE have a sense of humor!”
Considering that the Federal Government really didn’t do much back in the day and is doing a lot more that the vast majority of us really want them to do, the chart is only so much bunk.
I for one want clean, disease free food with requirements that it actually contain food and not sawdust and cadmium. I want us to take care of our people. I want us to inspect companies and make sure they aren’t maiming their workers and then discarding them. I want to ensure that the oil company isn’t just throwing their waste products in the stream out back. I want us to test drugs and ensure that they actually do what is claimed and don’t kill people. I want a public highway system that ensures that we can get anything to anywhere at any time, safely.
If you don’t want those things, then fuck off to Somalia where you can live in the Libertarian Paradise that it has become.
Perhaps, in the fullness of time, General Custer’s Excellent Military Adventure will be seen in a different light, perhaps as a pivotal point bringing peace and harmony to the Sioux and the Cheyenne, leading to the earthly paradise that is the Rosebud Reservation. Who knows, we cannot predict the verdict of the future, perhaps they will record General Custer as a humanitarian and a liberator, paving the way to full equality for Native American, and the full blessing of casinos and alcoholism.
I mean, we don’t really know, do we? It could happen! Perhaps the future will record him as a giant of humanism and progress. Still, for now, my bet is on stupid bloodthirsty washishte.
Someone said it. They didn’t say Sweden, or France, or the UK. They said Canada as if that was the goal.
If a doctor said that they couldn’t treat a problem at a clinic and that you must go to the emergency room, I’ll remember your words and not listen to him. Because you know better than the doctor. I wouldn’t want to cost you anymore money than you have already spent. Asshole.
No, they didn’t.
I think what he’s getting at is that there are conditions that an emergency room is not obliged to treat, because they do not technically fall wtihin the definition of “emergency”.
Sam:
Well, you got me there. I did call you a lying sack of shit. That’s probably unfair to sacks of shit. But of course, I did to you exactly what I claimed nobody does to you (i.e., accuse you of being a liar), so there you are; I’m hoist by my own petard.
But I’m not going to be polite or give you the benefit of the doubt anymore. While I’ll concede I’ve never caught you in an outright lie, you do willfully misrepresent facts and arguments so as to make it seem as if they support your claims. It’s not the same as outright lies, but it’s close enough. You did it throughout the entire Iraq war debacle from start to finish, you did it during the Swiftboating of Kerry, and you’re sure to be doing it now as well.
Perusing your list, I find it a bit hard to believe. Never in all the years I’ve had the displeasure of your acquaintance have I seen you offer the slightest support for any of the following:
welfare programs
government role in health care
voluntary unions (I suppose you strongly support the protests in Wisconsin, then?)
progressive taxation
So while you may perform some sort of lip service to these ideas, you sure don’t spend much time forcefully arguing for them here. Which tells me they aren’t all that important to you, really. Nowhere near as important as supporting the Bush administration and urging a country you don’t even fucking live in to go to war. Oh well. I guess you were just being gullible.
Other items on your list, like gay marriage, gays in the military, opposition to the death penalty and drug legalization fall squarely within the libertarian ideology and are hardly evidence of your “non-conservativeness.”
But the real proof is in your statement “I only look like a ‘rabid conservative’ on this board because so many of you are way, way over on the left and unwilling to credit anyone with any amount of moderation so long as they oppose your big-government, high-taxing, quasi-socialist ideas.” Because in all honesty, this board isn’t all that left wing, and if in your mind the majority of posters fall into the category you delineate above, well, that says everything we need to know about where you *really *stand, politically.
Not to speak for Sam, but it’s possible to favor certain things without ipso-facto agreeing with the way they are implemented. For example, I’m very much opposed to racism but I thought forced busing was a bad idea. Lefties have a very bad habit of calling people names like racist, sexist, anti-unionist, etc., simply because they don’t accept or fall into lockstep with liberal ideas on how to implement solutions to the problems that exist in those areas.
[QUOTE=Euphonious Polemic]
If the “real” left had been in power and had crafted a health reform bill, you would be seeing a health insurance system similar to Canada.
[/QUOTE]
Yes, they did.
And yet two other doctors and the emergency room nurse thought it did. The issue isn’t about whether the doctor was correct in his actions, but that it took 14 hours to see him.
Because it wasn’t an emergency.
He did not say Utopia. And no, you are just guessing that he was expecting that the system was going to be perfect.
That straw must be very tasty.
Ah, yes, you were opposed to racism, but opposed to actually doing anything about it. Instead, you were one of those saying “Of course the Negroes deserve equal rights, but as a society we’re just not ready for it”, while congratulating yourselves on your forward thinking. :rolleyes:
It is possible for someone to be so deeply hypocritical that they are incapable of recognizing it. The fact is that you were supporting racism, making you … well, fill in the blank.