SOTU Address = Pathetic Joke WTF?

[whork25]

No. Because your encouraging stupidity. Disagreeing with me is fine. Patting the biggest loser/ moron on the back for emphasizing his lack of intelligence is not cool. We should be looking to help the less fortunate, not contribute to their celebration of ignorance.

Thank god we have you George to tell us simple minded people how the world is put together

[Option D]

No. Because your encouraging stupidity. Disagreeing with me is fine. Patting the biggest loser/ moron on the back for emphasizing his lack of intelligence is not cool. We should be looking to help the less fortunate, not contribute to their celebration of ignorance.

But his point is looking at 1 problem from 2 different vantage points.

Healthcare. I think it should be universal, because I hate to see people go sick for lack of funds.
Healthcare. Some think mainly in the contex of costs and go with the "every man for himself" route.  

Why is that dumb.. maybe its different from what you think, but fuck, its just another way to look at it. Nothin to do with lack of ignorance

[George Whorewell]

A lack of ignorance is commensurate with intelligence. There is nothing intelligent about "Whork 25".

[Option D]

A lack of ignorance is commensurate with intelligence. There is nothing intelligent about "Whork 25".

Would you agree with his assessment of the Healthcare issue as it pertains to the economy

[Soul Crusher]

But his point is looking at 1 problem from 2 different vantage points.

Healthcare. I think it should be universal, because I hate to see people go sick for lack of funds.
Healthcare. Some think mainly in the contex of costs and go with the "every man for himself" route.  

Why is that dumb.. maybe its different from what you think, but fuck, its just another way to look at it. Nothin to do with lack of ignorance

Because under that crap theory and way of thinking, not only does the society become bankrupt and collapses financially, but it becomes unable to deliver or afford youraunted universal healthcare either.  So you kill off both the economy and the ability to deliver heath care all in one scoop due to emotionally based economics which always has the same miserable outcome.  

 

[George Whorewell]

Would you agree with his assessment of the Healthcare issue as it pertains to the economy

No I don't. Everyone in this country has access to health care- including illegals. As far as actual health insurance goes we have medicare, for those with pre-existing conditions we have high risk pools and other safety nets. For everyone else, you can choose to buy insurance or not choose to buy insurance, its a personal decision that should involve as little government intervention as possible. Insurance is a business. Fire insurance, homeowner insurance, car insurance, etc.-- all carry some inherent risk. If you don't buy insurance and your business burns down, your screwed. If you buy insurance and your business never burns down, then you feel as if you wasted money. By that same token, either you will buy health insurance and not need it, or you won't buy the insurance and get sick. Nobody buys insurance when they need it-- that completely defeats the purpose. Its common sense. Now if the government was so concerned with covering those with pre-exisiting conditions, why not enact a program that ONLY covers pre-exisiting conditions and have it funded with some of the trillions wasted by this administration during the past two years?

Bankrupting the country and allowing the government to takeover 1/6th of the private sector because of 20 million uninsured people is a complete joke. The other 200+ million of us that like our health insurance coverage shouldn't be forced to suffer and future generations shouldn't be forced to carry the burden.

[Soul Crusher]

Alvin Felzenberg
Obama's State of the Union Was Tantamount to Plagiarism
By Alvin Felzenberg

Posted: January 26, 2011



________________________ ________________-


If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, what can be said of plagiarism? President Obama’s second State of the Union address contained enough recycled ideas and lines lifted from speeches of others to make historians wince. I suppose this is what one does when one not only has nothing new to say, but is required by custom and Constitution to come forth with a report of some kind by a certain time and day.

Had Obama or his writers been considerate enough to have informed listeners of where some of the president’s best lines and offered-up ideas originated, the speech might be remembered for its cutting and pasting of great and not-so-great moments of the past performance of others. After quoting Robert Kennedy early on, Obama tried to have his listeners believe that everything else he said that we might remember were his or his writers’ creations. Had the president submitted the text of his second State of the Union Address in the form of a college term paper, he would have been sent forthwith to the nearest academic dean. Once again, our public affairs are such that we have one standard for presidents and another for undergraduates. Now is as good a time as any to let Obama’s listeners in on what the late Paul Harvey would have termed “the rest of the story.” [Take the poll: Was Obama’s State of the Union speech a success?]

Early in his address, Obama said that he wanted the nation he leads to be a "light to the world." The last president who set such a mission for the nation he led, and in those exact words, was Woodrow Wilson.

Obama’s concept of the “American family” may well have had its origins in the first State of the State address New York Governor Mario Cuomo delivered in 1983. Cuomo proclaimed the state of New York as a “family.” He also talked about multiple partnerships, both public and private.

In an address to the Heritage Foundation in the early 1990s, Margaret Thatcher delivered what might go down as the most memorable line in Obama’s second State of the Union address. The British Prime Minister told her American audience that the United States was the “first nation to have been founded on an idea.” It took the president a few additional words to get this idea across.

Obama’s pointed mutterings about a second “Sputnik Moment” being upon us and his recollection of how American policymakers responded to the last one with increased expenditures on infrastructure, science, technology, and education were clearly intended to evoke the spirit of Dwight D. Eisenhower. His setting of specific deadlines and goals was vintage JFK, but for the absence of any sense of challenge to his audience, list of benefits the United States would derive from them, or any semblance of a shared adventure the American people were about to embark upon. [Read Robert Schlesinger: Obama Not the First to Use 'Sputnik Moment.']

There was a certain Back to the Future feel to the masterful tributes Obama paid those Ronald Reagan might have described as “ordinary heroes.” After all, it was Reagan who began the practice of inviting citizens who had done extraordinary things to sit beside the first lady in the House gallery as the president recited their achievements. It was also Reagan who reminded his listeners that the greatness of America emerged not from the hand of government, but through the entrepreneurial spirit of the American people. [Check out a roundup of political cartoons on Obama.]

Obama received his most sustained applause when he said, "I know there isn’t a person here who would trade places with any other nation on Earth." Leaving aside the faulty grammar (people change places with people, not with nations), the poaching from John F. Kennedy's immortal inaugural address was obvious enough for the most historical of Obama's listeners to notice. ("I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation.") That Obama could utter almost identical words days after paying tribute to Kennedy on the 50th anniversary of the delivery of that famous speech and not making reference to it suggests a self-absorption rare even among presidents. [See photos of the Obamas behind the scenes.]

Most pointedly, the low point of Obama’s speech came when he brought back government re-organization from the ash heap of failed efforts of previous presidents who sought to save money without inflicting pain on a public that had grown accustomed to government largesse. This one, like all that talk about all those green energy jobs that lay before us, had fallen out of the presidential repertoire with retirement of Jimmy Carter. Obama might have had the decency to have Carter on hand to witness the moment. He will have another chance should he, when he delivers his budget, bring back that other Carter flop from yesteryear, “zero based budgeting.” [See a slide show of 10 worst presidents.]

Even Obama’s feigned attempt at humor had an antecedent in the remarks of a predecessor who spun better yarns than this president. Obama informed his listeners that salmon comes under the jurisdiction of one department when swimming in fresh water and under another when swimming in salt water. He rhetorically inquired what happened to the fish when “smoked.”

Somewhere in the White House library resides a published letter Franklin Roosevelt wrote to an adviser in which he complained that some bears were the property of the Interior Department, while others belonged the National Parks System. FDR, tongue in cheek, warned of a pending custody battle over cubs that emerged from illicit unions of bears crossing departmental jurisdictions. [Read A Brief History of the State of the Union Address.]

It would appear that the only president of note whose imprint was absent in Obama’s long awaited and much-anticipated speech was Obama. This was supposed to have been the moment when the nation found out whether he was at the core a Rooseveltian liberal of a Clintonian centrist. What it got was a cut and pasted version of great and not-so-great State of the Union and other addresses of the past.

Sometime last year, many suggested that Obama would have an easier time getting his message across if he was less dependent on his teleprompter. This may be the year his writers are advised to throw away their books of political quotations. Then we may finally find out what the president truly believes and what he hopes to achieve in the office he so ardently sought.

http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/alvin-felzenberg/2011/01/26/obamas-state-of-the-union-was-tantamount-to-plagiarism



________________________ ________________________ _


GAME

SET


MATCH   

[240 is Back]

GAME

SET


MATCH   

a 15-point drop on gallup would be game, set, match.

IMO, a columnist owning Obama doesn't really do much if he wins in 2012.

[Soul Crusher]

a 15-point drop on gallup would be game, set, match.

IMO, a columnist owning Obama doesn't really do much if he wins in 2012.

2012 will come down to a few things

Gas prices,  UE, and another financial crisis or foreign policy WTF.

Granted to me every policy of Obama is a WTF, but the average moron voter will look at UE, Gas prices, or some other stupid shit before decidng who to vote for.


Look for me, I would vote for Babar the baby elephant before Obama, bt I know the average soccer mom or dope does notfollow things like I do.


So we will see, a lot can happen.                   

[240 is Back]

Look for me, I would vote for Babar the baby elephant before Obama

Actually, Babar the Elephant was born in a forest in France.

He's not eligible to be President of the USA.

[Option D]

Because under that crap theory and way of thinking, not only does the society become bankrupt and collapses financially, but it becomes unable to deliver or afford youraunted universal healthcare either.  So you kill off both the economy and the ability to deliver heath care all in one scoop due to emotionally based economics which always has the same miserable outcome.  

 

I see this too complicated for you to grasp.

[Soul Crusher]

Actually, Babar the Elephant was born in a forest in France.

He's not eligible to be President of the USA.

Why not?   We have a foreign born POTUS now who can't prove he is a NBC.  

[Soul Crusher]

I see this too complicated for you to grasp.

Oh really?   Please enlighten me.    We are already broke beyond repair and facing a currency and debt cllapse and youthink somehow the answer our problems is spending trillions more?   Ha ha ha - show me any nation who was n such debt that came back to prosperity by burning more treasure and fortune on the non-producers of society?   

I'll wait for he example since in te literally hundreds on histry books I have read, covering periods of ancient greece until now, it has never been done.   

www.usdebtclock.com


       

[Option D]

Oh really?   Please enlighten me.    We are already broke beyond repair and facing a currency and debt cllapse and youthink somehow the answer our problems is spending trillions more?   Ha ha ha - show me any nation who was n such debt that came back to prosperity by burning more treasure and fortune on the non-producers of society?   
I'll wait for he example since in te literally hundreds on histry books I have read, covering periods of ancient greece until now, it has never been done.   
www.usdebtclock.com

Im not about to go around and around with you because we are going around 2 different circles. This is a loaded issue that should have been prioritized differently. I think the budget for many things should be looked at. But I cant have this convo with you.

[Soul Crusher]

Im not about to go around and around with you because we are going around 2 different circles. This is a loaded issue that should have been prioritized differently. I think the budget for many things should be looked at. But I cant have this convo with you.

We already spend 1/6 of our econmy on health care, if that is not enough - how much should it be?   

BTW - I'll wait for you to provide me an example of a nation already in massive hock who got out of it by spending a shit load more on people who dn't produce anything and are already an albatross on the system.   

[Option D]

We already spend 1/6 of our econmy on health care, if that is not enough - how much should it be?   

BTW - I'll wait for you to provide me an example of a nation already in massive hock who got out of it by spending a shit load more on people who dn't produce anything and are already an albatross on the system.   

I think defense and war on drugs/defense/welfare shoud be hacked by a lot..

[Soul Crusher]

I think defense and war on drugs/defense/welfare shoud be hacked by a lot..

Fine, I agree with you, but I am not in favor of substituting one form of welfare for another.   

[George Whorewell]

Not to point out the obvious, but we spend more on entitlements such as social security and medicare than on national defense. Not sure if anyone was aware of that.

[Skip8282]

Not to point out the obvious, but we spend more on entitlements such as social security and medicare than on national defense. Not sure if anyone was aware of that.

Exactly - the entitlements are a far bigger problem than defense.  The military can cut, no doubt, but as long medical inflation keeps soaring upward, I don't know how the entitlements won't keep soaring up too.

[Soul Crusher]

A Presidency to Nowhere
The Wall Street Journal ^ | Jan 27, 2011 | Daneil Henninger



* WONDER LAND * JANUARY 27, 2011

A Presidency to Nowhere

High-speed rail and solar shingles are not the answer to America's "Sputnik moment."

No president before Barack Obama has been so right and so wrong.

When in his State of the Union speech Mr. Obama said, "This is our generation's Sputnik moment," citing the emergence of global competition from the likes of China and India, he was right.

Minutes later he proposed to cover the country with high-speed rail and companies making solar shingles.

High-speed rail and solar shingles? If that's the president's idea of meeting our Sputnik moment, then Houston, we have a problem.

About halfway into the speech, I began to wonder: What is John Boehner thinking? Let's first welcome back the tradition of House Speakers who bring nothing but a poker face to the State of the Union. (The vice president re-tightening his tie in the middle of the speech was a minor Biden classic.)


(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Soul Crusher]

From President Obama, lots of talk, little leadership

By Ruth Marcus
Thursday, January 27, 2011;



DAVOS, SWITZERLAND

The state of the union is . . . leaderless.

Sounds harsh, but when it comes to digging America out from what President Obama calls its "mountain of debt," I'm becoming increasingly worried that this assessment is accurate.

The president talks the talk about fiscal responsibility. But the evidence suggests he's not willing to spend the political capital to translate that talk into action.

Judge Obama by his own standards. "We have to signal seriousness in this," he told The Post just before the inauguration, "by making sure that some of the hard decisions are made under my watch and not under somebody else's."

So what hard decisions has the president made? On the plus side of the ledger, he worked to ensure that the costly expansion of health coverage was coupled with potentially cost-saving measures to control Medicare spending. Emphasis on potentially.

In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, he proposed a five-year freeze on discretionary spending, two years longer than his previous offer.

But as the president himself recognized, this kind of nibbling around the edges of the budget is entirely inadequate.

"To make further progress, we have to stop pretending that cutting this kind of spending alone will be enough," he said. "It won't." Except Obama then offered nothing else of substance about what else he envisioned - and would be willing to push for.

Some serious people with unquestioned bona fides on fiscal responsibility grasped at wispy tendrils of seriousness in the president's remarks. He mentioned Social Security! He talked about tax reform! I hope they are right but fear they are deluding themselves.

Examine the president's words, and you see nothing new or specific. It hardly constitutes bravery to call for a bipartisan Social Security fix that doesn't slash benefits. At that level of generality, who would disagree?

The health-care law - if implemented as planned - is merely a down payment on cost containment. But the president's only specific was to repeat his offer to join with Republicans on medical malpractice reform. This is attacking a mountain with a teaspoon.

Corporate tax reform is a great idea but not a solution to the fiscal problem. The president's opening bid was to fix the corporate tax code without adding to the deficit.

As to the individual income tax system, the president repeated his stale complaint that "we simply can't afford a permanent extension of the tax cuts for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans." No mention of the affordability of the tax cuts for everyone else.

In fact, when Obama discussed income taxes, he cited the need to "simplify the individual tax code" without daring to whisper that the real goal needs to be more revenue. "Members of both parties have expressed an interest in doing this, and I am prepared to join them," Obama said. Joining up is not my definition of leadership.

Administration officials insist that proffering more in the State of the Union would have been self-defeating. Negotiating in public does not work, this argument goes. Do corporate tax reform first and the larger overhaul will come more easily.

This would be more convincing if the president's behind-the-scenes track record were more reassuring. Obama put little muscle behind the legislative effort to create a fiscal commission. Then, having established one by executive order, he did nothing to ensure its success, according to sources close to the process. The commission was tantalizingly close to getting the supermajority needed for congressional action - former Service Employees International Union president Andy Stern had promised to be the 14th vote, the sources said - but the administration did not lift a finger to help by lobbying other Democrats.

On Tuesday, the most Obama could manage to choke out about his own commission was that "I don't agree with all their proposals, but they made important progress."

Into this disturbing vacuum of leadership come Virginia Democratic Sen. Mark Warner and Georgia Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss, who have assembled a bipartisan group pushing for tax reform and other deficit reduction this year.

When I spoke with them after the speech, they emphasized two points: that nothing would be accomplished without presidential involvement, and that it would be a mistake to let things slide into the election year or, inevitably, beyond.

"Every one of these painful choices gets harder every day we don't do anything," Warner said.

Wise words. If only we had heard more of that from the president himself.

ruthmarcus@washpost.com

[Option D]

LMAO.. Ruth Marcus.. Shes Objective too huh.. and you like to qualify this as proof..lmao..

[Soul Crusher]

LMAO.. Ruth Marcus.. Shes Objective too huh.. and you like to qualify this as proof..lmao..

She voted for him and used to love him.   

Again - you have to be a brain dead dolt to not see what is going on.   Its like having Gilligan at the helm of the Titanic a mile out from impact.     

[Option D]

She voted for him and used to love him.   

Again - you have to be a brain dead dolt to not see what is going on.   Its like having Gilligan at the helm of the Titanic a mile out from impact.     

LMAO.. you just prooved my point Smart guy.

you are amazing.....fuckin awesome i tell you...

And tell me whats goin on that im brain dead to see oh senior flip flopper

[Soul Crusher]

Deaf on debt:
Returning to old liberal
ideas, President Obama
ignores the American
people

 Charles Krauthammer

Friday, January 28th 2011, 4:00 AM



 The November election sent a clear message to 
Washington: less government, less debt, less
spending. President Obama certainly heard it, but
judging from his State of the Union address, he
doesn't believe a word of it.

 The people say they want cuts? Sure they do - in the
abstract. But any party that actually dares carry them
out will be punished severely. On that, Obama
stakes his re-election.

No other conclusion can be drawn from a speech
that didn't even address the debt issue until 35
minutes in. And then what did he offer? A freeze on
domestic discretionary spending that he himself
admitted would affect a mere one-eighth of the
budget.

Obama seemed impressed, however, that it would
produce $400 billion in savings over 10 years.
That's an average of $40 billion a year. The deficit
for last year alone was more than 30 times as much.
And total federal spending was more than 85 times
that amount. A $40 billion annual savings for a
government that just racked up $3 trillion in new
debt over the last two years is deeply unserious. It's
spillage, a rounding error.

As for entitlements, which are where the real money
is, Obama said practically nothing. He is happy to
discuss, but if Republicans dare take anything from
granny, he shall be Horatius at the bridge.

This entire pantomime about debt reduction came
after the first half of a speech devoted to, yes, new
spending. One almost has to admire Obama's
defiance. His 2009 stimulus and budget-busting
health care reform are precisely what stirred the
popular revolt that delivered his November
shellacking. And yet he's back for more.

It's as if Obama is daring the voters - and the
Republicans - to prove they really want smaller
government. He's manning the barricades for 
Obamacare and he's here with yet another spending
- excuse me, investment - spree. To face down
those overachieving Asians, Obama wants to sink
yet more money into yet more road and bridge
repair, more federally subsidized teachers - with a
bit of high-speed rail tossed in for style. That will
show the Chinese.

And of course, once again, there is the magic lure of
a green economy created by the brilliance of
Washington experts and politicians. This is to be
our "Sputnik moment," when the fear of the foreigner
spurs us to innovation and greatness of the kind
that yielded NASA and the moon landing.

Apart from the irony of this appeal being made by
the very President who has just killed NASA's
manned space program, there is the fact that for
three decades, since Jimmy Carter's synfuel fantasy,
Washington has poured billions of taxpayer dollars
down a rat hole in vain pursuit of economically
competitive renewable energy.

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2011/01/28/2011-01-28_deaf_on_debt_returning_to_old_liberal_ideas_president_obama_ignores_the_american.html