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Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
10/13/09
10/13/09
10/13/09
09/03/09
Your huddled masses
Yearning to breathe free
And I will hold them to my bosom
And explain to them my plea.
I will end the corporation
And the greedy business too
You will come to rely on government
For everything you do.
I am President of the United States
Monarch, Ruler, King
I will protect you from yourselves
And you won't have to do a thing.
We will make the cars, control your health care and we'll run the banks.
But as to the question of abortion, it's above my pay rank.
We're tough because we care for you and your freedom stands in our way.
How can we embrace you if you're able to turn away?
And in a time of trouble
Do not fear and do not fret.
For I your lord and savior,
Bring you Obamanet.
It doesn't really matter what the Constitution has to say,
Because nobody in government has read it anyway.
09/02/09
""The Internet is a "fearsome awesome problem" and it would have been better if it had never been invented.""
Oh and then there is this little gem from him :
"…it would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subjected to the lights of publicity during those years." -David Rockefeller, Bilderberg Meeting, Germany 1991.
[uncensored.co.nz]
09/02/09
There are legitimate complaints, honest arguments, reasoned critiques, and valid fears. And then there is imaginary paranoid crack-pottery. I'm afraid this was a part of that last group.
09/02/09
"When people fear the government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty." -Thomas Jefferson
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
Then in the middle this forum devolved into a health care debate where anecdotal evidence was thrown around like a fact and then we were suddenly invaded by face huggers and Aliens.
Rather than throwing around my own opinions, I have a couple of questions to ask:
1) Before you decide if this bill, or any bill that grants extensions on governmental powers, is a good thing, ask if you would want a GOP president and GOP congress to have these powers (Or vice versa if you lean more conservative).
2) Is peace and security more important than liberty and Freedom?
3) Would a business without government regulation be better or worse for the population and environment?
4) Neglecting the fact that most countries in the world have price caps on medical procedures, why is the US Health Care system the most expensive?
Just some thoughts.
09/02/09
1) Yes. Because I read it as a matter of the power to coordinate not the power to do. And I believe that the executive could have (and would have) claimed the power to do with or without this bill (regardless of political party.)
2) No. But I get the counter-arguments.
3) Worse. And I don't get the counter-arguments.
4) You got a few days?
09/02/09
I still don't know that the President or any government official needs access to private networks. If its a dire threat you call the company and they pull the plug.
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
More importantly? I would have said "No shit the executive branch should be able to coordinate public and private efforts in the case of an emergency. It's their job."
Hell, I wish post-Katrina the Bush Admin had taken control and coordinated anything other than delivering trailers to the wrong place at the wrong time.
09/03/09
If you choose to live in tornado alley and a tornado hits your house why should someone in a different state be forced to pay for it?
If you choose to live on a fault line and an earthquake destroys your house why should someone in a different state be forced to pay for it?
If you choose to live below sea level and water destroys your house why should someone in another state be forced to pay for it?
People know the risks and yet they still choose to live there. It should be up to the state and local levels along with charities and donations to fix the mess. Why should someone who chooses to live in a state that's above sea level be forced to pay for it?
A lot of people don't even want to move back to New Orleans, so why should I (who lives in a different state) be forced to pay for a place people don't even want to live?
Also, if "Bush is stealing oil in Iraq" is true, and he's no longer in office, but we're still in Iraq, is Obama now stealing oil from Iraq?
09/03/09
And why? Because it is consistent with my ideals of Justice, Ethics, Patriotism, Democracy, Federalism, Christianity, personal morals, humanism, decency, and what it means to be an American. We look out for each other. It's the social contract. We could abandon each other like we are Burma or China or the Sudan. Or we can take seriously that we are One Nation,Under God Indivisible, With Liberty and Justice for All. One Nation. One People. It's what my founding fathers taught me. It was why they abandoned the Articles of Confederation for the Constitution. It is what my ancestors and my family fought and died for.
If you don't believe in the Social Contract, that is fine. We simply disagree about what it means to be a Citizen of a Nation.
And the rest of your little ditty (now at the top of the page) is nonsense, and you know it. The folks in government may disagree on how to interpret the Constitution, but most of them take it very, very seriously. On both sides of the aisle.
I apologize for the unusually blatant sincerity and sentimentality. It's late, and my guard is down.
09/03/09
*passes out on desk*
09/03/09
I guess I believe that it's more Christian, more moral, more humane, more decent, and more American, for an individual to willingly donate his time or money to a cause rather than having the Government force him too. We do look out for each other, and we do so without the need for legislated theft.
We are citizens of one nation, but there is also a reason why we are still broken up into states with separate state and local governments. If one state says you can carry concealed weapons, and another state says you can't and that's important to you, you can move. But whenever the Federal government imposes something you have just lost that freedom to move... everyone is equally screwed.
The federal government should not be running our health care, or the auto industry, or most of the things it runs. That is not the job of the federal government. Shouldn't this stuff be left up to the states and the people within those states?
09/03/09
And I didn't say none of those things are important to me. I just said the federal government should stay out of most of it, and leave it to the states, local governments, and the people. I don't think the federal government should be involved in education. But should the federal government be involved in making interstate highways? Yes.
09/03/09
09/02/09
If George W. Bush had tried any of this bozo crap, people here would be whipped up into a frenzy over it. Well, it's time people grew up and realized that government power grabs are to be fought, regardless of whether or not 'your guy' or 'your party' wants them.
09/02/09
09/02/09
and how is the above saying he cannot seize control?...what it doesn't say is as important as what it does.
09/02/09
However, if you are going to base your opinion on what is not said, and therefore on what does not exist, well, there's not really any way for me to counter that, is there? So, kudos. By citing directly to your own imagination, you do, in fact, win.
09/02/09
So, apparently, you blindly trust the government to have good intentions with regard to enforcing a vague law that gives blanket power. If you had any knowledge of world history or even US history, you'd be quite leery of such things.
As a citizen, you should question the government no matter what 'party' controls it. Otherwise, you're nothing but a slave-in-waiting.
09/02/09
A couple of notes, however. (1) I am making the idiotic assumption that this edited paragraph is not the entire bill. (2) Actually, powers not explicitly granted are not granted by default. Statutory interpretation is not, in fact, governed by the "OMG! Mom didn't say we couldn't principle."
Does that mean that an executive couldn't choose to "interpret" the law to do whatever the hell they want to do? Of course not, but they don't need this bill, which contains limiting language, to do that. They could just yell "National Security! National Security!" and do it anyway.
They do that with Wars all the time, even when they don't have authority to do so.
But thank you for calling me a slave-in-waiting. It was the first time I'd ever been called that, and I live for new experiences.
09/02/09
@92BuickLeSabre: I consider myself a quite conservative (please don't ban me), and I have to say, you nailed that shit right on the head, my friend.
09/02/09
09/02/09
You are being both too cynical and not cynical enough.
@gaiking: See above. And while your concerns about the 2nd Amendment may be valid on their own terms, they are not actually at all analogous to this case from a Constitutional Law perspective. Unless your point is merely that lawyers will always argue that the law means what they are paid to argue that it means, in which case - see above.
09/02/09
09/02/09
"Well, I apologize for my obvious lack of knowledge about anything."
I didn't say that. In fact, I hear that your knowledge of outer Mongolian limericks is unrivaled on any gadget blog.
It is your blind trust of the government that is what I am questioning. That blind trust indicates a severe lack of understanding of both civics and history.
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
(I would've thought that much was obvious.)
(Actually, technically, I was trying to promote the person I was responding to by promoting the thread - like the way this response approved your comment - but the same logic applies.)
09/02/09
and btw, Sean Fallon - really taking credit for that photochop up there? Looks like it took about 2 minutes to slap together. Adding the signature probably took the most time.
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
When there are people like Glenn Beck and Michael Savage saying that AmeriCorps is pretty much Obama's personal SS and that affordable health care is taking away our liberties and people continue to listen to it, literally anything, no matter what it is will be explained to the dumbest by the loudest in the most dishonest terms possible.
09/02/09
"no matter what it is will be explained to the dumbest by the loudest in the most dishonest terms possible."
That's probably how Obama got elected then huh? He was louder and more dishonest than the rest.
09/02/09
You've certainly downed a few glasses of Kool-Aid yourself if you think "affordable health care" is a synonym for "socialized health care".
1) No one is against "affordable health care", and 2) "affordable health care" is possible in both the free market and otherwise.
Either way, they have nothing to do with this article. Giz is the one who reported on it before, and they've screwed up their update to the story by claiming the original story wasn't true (it was, until the bill was revised).
09/02/09
We have had a a century for this to be a true statement.
Guess what, it isn't and has never been. We have old people running the boarder to CANADA because the US healthcare system is so awful. We have the worst and least affordable health care system in the entire industrialized world. Thats not democratic spin, that is actual FACT provided by a UN committee that was created to study that.
So no free market can not provide affordable healthcare. It has had many many years to try, and has failed every single time. You can never expect a market thats whole premise in existing is screwing people out of as much money as possible to provide something that is a basic need.
09/02/09
These programs are both government run, so do you WANT government run health care or no? Obviously they want it or they wouldnt be using medicare/medicaid. Its just amazing to me these people dont connect the effing giant sized dots as the words roll off their tongue.
Also, keep in mind that the entire senate all has high quality government run health care. So.....
09/02/09
09/02/09
Though I probably shouldn't have even responded to "Voyou_Charmant." This thread was supposed to be about Obamanet, not Obamacare. I apologize.
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
09/02/09
That report gave automatic points to countries with a public option because it was not about how GOOD the healthcare was it was about AVAILABILITY.
Give everyone mediocre at best health care and you go to the top of the list. Give all but 10 - 30 Mil people the best and you are near the bottom.
09/02/09
And your right it gave points to having a option, because THEY HAVE the option. We have nothing. Who cares how good it is if you at least have the option of having health care, or dying a slow painful death because civilized life is beyond your means.
And your last paragraph is moronic. We dont give everyone the best, if we did we wouldn't be having this debate. Even PAID PRIVATE healthcare in the US is considered worse than most nations. I pay thousands a year for my company, yet one of our employees now has to shell out thousands because while the surgeon on a necessary surgery was covered, the anesthesiologist wasn't. Our health care is a disaster, only someone blind to the truth of the matter would EVER say it is the best.
09/02/09
Indeed. Also, I find it funny that no one bitches about the FREE health care that veterans receive.
09/02/09
What motivation do politicians have to take away our rights other than conforming to corporate pressure?? This isn't the middle ages. Wealth, status, and authority are not provided by violence and oppression, as was the case in earlier times. Most politicians are initially elected because they are likable, and they are likable because they are evidently sociable (i.e. - people persons).
It is mind-control of the proletariat that confers power in today's world, and it is the corporate machine manipulating the government that is wrestling away our freedoms.
They can't tax us? What about the hundreds of billions of tax dollars that go into the coffers of SOCIALIZED defense industry corporations? These are private organizations that exist in an insulated, taxpayer-funded vacuum free from competition. They create their own no-bid contracts using the revolving door in washington that they created. What do you think Cheney, Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater, Iraq, etc. is all about?
They can't imprison us? What do you think the war on drugs is all about? Similar SOCIALIZED corporations are constantly exerting pressure on government to boost 'security' and 'law enforcement' industries. They do this by encouraging arbitrary quotas, boosting the prison population, manufacturing criminals and exaggerating the need for a police state. An entire generation of violent criminals started out as minor drug-offenders in need of simple therapy. Instead they were trapped in an increasingly apathetic, ruthless legal system from which there is little hope of escape. Whatever happened to our right to fair and proportionate punishment?
They can't force us to do anything we don't want to do? There was little to no support for a war in Iraq in 2002. There were many voices in the U.N. calling out - with EVIDENCE and authority - against the rush to war. It was the cowardly denial and negligence of these facts in the corporate media that made this war possible. That FORCED this hell on us. No - not just us - on the world. If the news had called bullshit on Powell, and focused our attention on what caused our bloodlust in the first place (remember? September-fucking-eleven), there would have been more than just impeachment proceedings.
Meanwhile, the economy "collapses"... and the mega-corporations consolidate their holdings.
09/03/09
If you're comment was serious then you're loonier than most posters here.
09/03/09
How can you argue against socialized health care, yet show no sign of anger towards the socialized military companies that stole billions of dollars in Iraq?
Do you have even the faintest notion of how the federal budget is allocated?
09/02/09
The chances of Obama pulling some switch and turning off the internet are soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo... so so so soooooooooooo low, it astounds me that people in America make such a big deal out of it.
There's much bigger issues that need to be solved, like health care for every American.
I know an issue like this is entitled to it's news time but I think it's gotten too much attention.
But that's just me.. lol
09/02/09
OOOOOhhh what you mean is you want ME to pay for everyone ELSE to have health care.
09/02/09
"Every American DOES have health care."
"Every American DOES have health care."
I've read it three times, and I still can't figure out what even remotely accurate thing you could be saying.
09/02/09
09/02/09
(Eh? Eh? Canard? Quack? Ahhh, I love the word canard.)
09/02/09
09/02/09
Life isn't about me, it's about WE. You don't think that everyone chipping in so we can all afford health care is a good thing???
Hey, kindergarten called, they want you to f*@king stop being a douchebag and share.