Wells Hall Off Topic Board

wait for it

Oh crap, I posted in the wrong forum. Sorry guys.

Someone move it to Wells, please.

you will be waiting a long ass time for someone in power to do the right thing.

Problem with Obama and the democrats is they blame the Bush Admin everytime they fail at something. So there is no real point having them in power if we are all doomed because of the Bush Admin. This isnt the Third Reich. Stop whining.

Problem with the republicans is they refuse to work with the democrats. What the fuck is that about. Both parties have good ideas. But because your ego's are so bloated and are so butt hurt they are in power you cannot come to an agreement on anything. Shame on you.

Let's just come to the realization that everyone has a hidden agenda, an interest group and corporate backers to please.

When the majority of the House and Senate start giving a damn about this country and not their own benefit then I might start believing change will happen and they will start doing the right thing.

Also, Denis Leary has the best policy by far from Lock N Load

My foreign policy? Fuck you! My domestic policy, FUCK YOU!

I think we would agree on pretty much anything, but "this guy" is a national security writer for a liberal magazine. You might be right that Democrats (and I would say there is a difference between voters and people who work for the party in some capacity) attempt to rationalize Obama's policies, but the idea that liberals do as a whole (which you didn't state) is absolutely crap. I don't know whether the people who write for lefty magazines and websites (like Jeremy Scahill, Adam Serwer, Marcy Wheeler, and Glenn Greenwald) are Democrats. I doubt that they are, but they are certainly liberal and they certainly don't try to rationalize everything Obama does. If you read lefty sites, they may draw distinctions between Obama and Bush, but the idea that it's some sort of 24/7 Obama suck-fest is absurd. I don't know your political views and I don't know if you actually read material put out by liberals, but there is not as much love for the guy as you might think.

Note that I only used the word "Democrats" and not "liberals".

I'm more liberally inclined on most issues, but I'm not a Democrat. I don't prescribe to any political party. Most people in this country do so based on their feelings about a few social issues, and they tend to subscribe to the hivemind of that political party. Again, "most people". Not all. Just read this forum. Nearly every thread is a chicken fight, piss fest about some random outrage of the week. The liberal minded folks argue one thing, the conservative minded folks argue another. The topic of debate is irrelevant and interchangeable because every discussion regresses into a low-brow barrage of back and forth insults.

I never said Scahill isn't liberal. He certainly seems to be from the articles of his that I've read, but he's openly critical of both political parties especially on foreign policy. That's why I like him. He's one the few people out there on a national level writing about the dangers of our current foreign policy which is an extension of the one that preceded it.

Why the hell would I post a video from Scahill, using his contention that Obama is closer to a moderate Republican from the 90s than to a modern day liberal, and somehow claim that Scahill tries to rationalize everything Obama does? I don't quite understand the point you're trying to make there. I clearly used Scahill as an example of someone who steps outside party affiliation to comment on and criticize what's going on with our government.

Also note that I said I don't think Obama is Bush 2.0, but rather much of Obama's foreign policy especially in the Middle East is quite similar to that of the Bush administration. That is undeniable. Also make a distinction between "similar" and "more successful". I would argue that Obama has been more successful in the Middle East with going after Bin Laden, pulling out of Iraq, and setting a timetable for pulling out of Afghanistan. However, at the same time he's supporting uprisings in Syria and targeting Yemen. And nobody knows what Obama is planning to do with Iran.

I also didn't exaggerate how much love there is for Obama, and I didn't imply there is a 24/7 suckfest. THAT notion is absurd. I made it obvious that our country is polarized due to the irrational loyalty people have to political parties. Yes, there are people in the Democratic base or liberal base who have issues with Obama's policies on various issues, but at the end of the day it seems to be party over country.

Scahill mentions in the video that everyone gets themselves worked up about things like whether Obama ate dog as a kid (who fucking cares...) while ignoring the larger, more global issues. That is the crux of the matter. When it comes to war, there is no significant difference between Republicans and Democrats. They've mostly voted for the same wars. I remember watching the State of the Union address in January, and for most of the night the attendees were obviously split on their support of what Obama was saying (with the Republicans sitting adamantly and not clapping). But when Obama said no option is off the table with Iran, the entire place erupted. That was the one issue on which all the politicians agreed - potential military action with Iran.

One of the calling cards for Democrats right now is that we'll see the real Obama in his second term. If Obama wins I certainly hope he will commit to some of his initial campaign goals. But look at a couple of the facts - Guantanamo is still open and the NDAA authorizes indefinite detention of any citizen (Obama says he won't use that power, but what about the next guy?). Yes, the Republicans tacked on the provision with military vet benefits to the NDAA to pressure Obama into signing it. Let's get one thing straight - I'm criticizing Obama, but I'm not a fucking Republican. And I imagine most people reading this are assuming that of me simply because I criticize Obama. The neocon base in the GOP right now is the single worst hindrance to political progress. Who knows if the Democrats will gain back majorities, but right now things are so gridlocked and so polarized that it's just one big fucking mess.

Bottom line - the collective notion people have that, "Well, I don't agree with ____, but he's a better choice than ____," is the problem. There are other choices, but for various reasons perhaps beyond the subject of this thread (lobbyists, Super PACs, media reporting, etc.), people are quite convinced they MUST make a choice between one Democrat or one Republican.

Good summary. I've been shockingly surprised at some of Obama's foreign policy warmongering...and that's a good thing. And the double bonus is listening to hypocritical liberal chickenhawks suddenly defend Obama for the very same things they ripped Bush for.

Interesting. I guess it's less pronounced than some other liberal commentators, but I still find Maher to be quite the Obama apologist, especially when it comes to the War on Terror. I guess it would be unfair to call Maher a pacifist even when Bush was in office, but he certainly was quicker to find fault with military operations when the president had an R in front of his name.

He's not a complete shill, but he doesn't approach the level of true non-partisanship of guys like Glen Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, Noam Chomsky, and others who have been consistently opposed to the growth of the military industrial complex for years.

No worries, HillSpartan. I just wanted to clarify some things in general.

The lack of posts in this thread just proves my point. Few people are willing to talk about the real truth of how shitty our government's policies are. Few people are willing to step outside of their bipartisan comfort zones and have a real discussion on how the similarities between the Democrats and Republicans, especially when it comes to foreign policy, are glaring. As a liberal person, the hypocrisy within the Democratic/liberal/whatever-you-want-to-call-it base is, well, scary. Of course I think the Republicans/Tea Party/neoconservatives/whatever-you-want-to-call-them are just as big hypocrites and scum, but most people already know that.

I'm attaching an article from Glenn Greenwald. Very interesting read with numerous factual backups in the form of other news articles, though I doubt more than a handful of people on here will read it or give it any consideration. The mere mention of Ron Paul in the title will scare most people off because they'd rather stick to the misinformation about Paul's positions on foreign policy. This article points out the scary truth about our foreign policy as well as domestic policy, war on drugs, and stripping of individual privacy, freedoms, and liberties.

Instead, most people will stick to the namecalling and circular arguments in most of the other threads. That takes less effort than having a real, civil conversation, I suppose.

Every single poll conducted since Obama took office shows that not only is America more respected and trusted, but that Obama is specifically the most trusted leader in the World although many are disappointed in him too. Bush was at times rated as the least trusted World leader in a World that included Ghaddafi and Kim Jong Il.

Listen, if people think that Bush or McCain would have let other countries play such a large role in Libya, and that Iraq would have been ended on schedule, you just aren't paying attention. To this day McCain and Romney want to send troops back into Iraq. I also know that Oboma quadrupled our troop presence in Afghanistan as well as our intelligence effort there. QUADRUPLED!!! There's little doubt that's why Bin Laden is dead and Al Qaeda has been decimated.

Best article I've read in a long while, thanks for sharing it. I'm now working my way through many of the links shared in the article, many/most of which are also excellent.

I share Greenwald's desire for a Gary Johnson candidacy, but I wish he could have gotten more (or any, really) play in the GOP primary. I think he would have had a greater impact there than he will if he runs as the Libertarian candidate. Here's hoping he gets in the mix in 2016.