2012 Presidential Election

[Lanky Livingston]

ahem

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39622062/ns/us_news-security/

...but then again, thats not US soil, right?

but then again also he might have been too busy lying to congress and cheating on his wife..who knows.

The fault for that one lies on both Clinton & Bush's shoulders, and your article even says so. And Jesus, learn how to read - I never said the USS Cole or any other Navy ship or embassy was not US soil. My god...

 

[Lanky Livingston]

And I think you're being rather foolish to believe Gore would have been effective in any meaningful way. He would have reacted, like I have said again and again. But his reactions would not have been with the full force of US Military might as you suggest. Go back over his history, he is not pro-military and I used his support of Clinton as Clinton's VP during US bombings in Afghanistan after Americans were killed as an example of ineffective military action. It really isn't that hard to understand, but your bias won't let you see that.

But don't you understand, he would have had no choice. There was no choice. Pro-military or not, his cabinet, advisors, etc. would have told him he had no choice, and he would have brought the hammer. There was no other option after an attack of that magnitude.

 

[fansince62]

The fault for that one lies on both Clinton & Bush's shoulders, and your article even says so. And Jesus, learn how to read - I never said the USS Cole or any other Navy ship or embassy was not US soil. My god...

ok...then the fault for the murders in Afghanistan lies squarely with those masters of strategic thinking: Biden and Obama.

btw...there's a distinct difference between having to react and shaping the strategy/magnitude of the reaction. while I happen to think that a response into Afghanistan was mandatory....there really were few to no options once the initial destruction of terrorist camps was completed. the institutional structure simply isn't in place for any real forward leaning progress in that country. we need to get out of there though that leaves hanging an awfully large problem - nuclear weapons in Pak and reconstitution of terrorist camps.

more fundamentally...these clowns and their Dem allies in Congress spent the better part of two years leading into the 2008 election doing everything they could to undermine the then sitting President, the war efforts and the soldiers in the field. now..they are sitting on the other side of the aisle...having to live with some of the conditions they helped create. even more disturbing, American security ultimately takes a back seat in their worldview to the priorities of subordinating American power to mutlilateral and International decision making bodies. they've already established that they have no clue about economic recovery, that they are willing to lie about the numbers with a straight face....now they are demonstrating weak knees and conflicted objectives when it comes national security.

if these folks are reelected.....forget the future of this country. It will go down the tubes....a path it is already on.

 

[Goaldeje]

Jeebus. Let me say this up front. Obama has not handled Libya well. Having said that, he did promise in his campaign not to make unilateral decisions without consulting other nations. He consulted, he is abiding by the UN wishes, and has gone from there. Why do i have the feeling you guys would be crushing him mercilessly if he went all maverick, a la W, and declared war on Libya? He did what he said he was going to do, a welcome change from other campaign promises he has failed to live up to.

You can debate the policy, but his actions are consistent with what he promised.
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[fansince62]

Jeebus. Let me say this up front. Obama has not handled Libya well. Having said that, he did promise in his campaign not to make unilateral decisions without consulting other nations. He consulted, he is abiding by the UN wishes, and has gone from there. Why do i have the feeling you guys would be crushing him mercilessly if he went all maverick, a la W, and declared war on Libya? He did what he said he was going to do, a welcome change from other campaign promises he has failed to live up to.

You can debate the policy, but his actions are consistent with what he promised.
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ummm...Bush went to Congress...Bush went to the UN......so that avenue is blocked off. in a wider venue...what do you think happens behind the scenes? even when the US acts "unilaterally" do you think that a decision is just made and executed? or that there is all sorts of coordination that takes place in the background (both diplomatically, militarily, logistically, internationally (e.g., airspace), etc., etc.) in order to ensure the highest probability that plan and execution correlate?

I agree to a great extent that his actions are consistent with his wider vision...spoken and unspoken...about the US role in the world. and I also believe what we are seeing in terms of an inability to act decisively draws in part from a conflict between his vision to dismantle the American military presence in the global environment and the demands of US security in a world that may not share his power-sharing vision.

 

[Henry]

I'm not following this thread really, but having read the title I think this is the place to note that I got CRUSHED by taxes this year. The hole I was crawling out of just collapsed on top of me. Pretty darn brutal. Taxes on small business owners (such as myself) have to get straightened out. I don't care who does it.

Oh, and nothing to do with nothing but Paul McDonald's success on American Idol has got to be one of the signs of the Apocalypse.


That is all.

 

[Elephant]

I'm not following this thread really, but having read the title I think this is the place to note that I got CRUSHED by taxes this year. The hole I was crawling out of just collapsed on top of me. Pretty darn brutal. Taxes on small business owners (such as myself) have to get straightened out. I don't care who does it.

Oh, and nothing to do with nothing but Paul McDonald's success on American Idol has got to be one of the signs of the Apocalypse.


That is all.

You sound like a man of reason placing the fact that you got crushed in taxes as well on the shoulders of the President. All except the American Idol stuff.

 

[Lanky Livingston]

yeah, actually you implied it all the way up until I corrected you. then you tried to warp your point in to "pictures on tv" until i corrected you again. now its you didnt even say it..

No, actually I didn't imply anything except that the 9/11 attacks were far more impactful & devastating than the attacks on US embassies in Africa and the USS Cole.

pick a point, stand by it and if youre wrong admit it.

Still not wrong...

the article may say bush was to blame as well but it happened on clintons watch. bush eventually did go after al qaeda and he is the reason they all hide in caves and die so frequently. so at least he finally did something..

then how did clinton have the choice not to fight back? october 2000 was under his watch and he didnt nothing.

Look, the attack happened when Clinton had 4 months left in office. Even if that was enough time to execute a successful attack, the USS Cole claimed the lives of 17 sailors vs. 3000 people killed in the 9/11 attacks. It was a US warship vs. a US civilian center/tourist destination, with nothing to do with the military. The magnitude of the two events are completely different - this is an inarguable fact.

 

[Henry]

All except the American Idol stuff.

Is that for my opinion of the specific guy, or American Idol in general?

Because, for the record, I don't watch that damn show. My wife was watching it and I walked in, asked who the asthmatic on stage was, saw the judges lavish praise upon him, and then I walked out, confident that I had made the correct decision years ago to never watch that stupid show.

you somehow think your numbers make it different. tell the parents of the sailors who died on the Cole that their son/daughter's death isnt as important to you. and then let me know what happens..your inarguable facts are a joke.

Whether it's fair or not, the numbers do make it different Mike. Before 9/11 sending hundreds of thousands of troops to war against another country was politically impossible. 9/11 changed our country in very profound ways, ways that enabled Bush to take actions that Clinton never could have.

 

[Henry]

Never could have? or never would have? lets face it; Clinton was about cutting back the military in both bases and members. I was there when it was as easy as getting your CO to approve any member with less than 1 year left to get out. I was in Guam when he shut down our base and sent half to a base in Japan and the rest to SD.

I dont know how it wasnt possible to send in hundreds of thousands of troops before 9/11 when we did that exact thing during the first Gulf War and they didnt attack us at all. They attacked Kuwait..and I remember the parades, the cheering, the fact that Stormin Norman almost got a fifth star out of it..etc etc.

I am not by any means saying that 9/11 didnt change America forever but trying to place it over the USS Cole or foreign embassy is only done IMO by people who havent served.

Never could have, Mike. Bush sold the first Gulf War as an international effort with a very specific and very limited goal of stopping one country from invading another one. Sending entire armies into other countries to topple their governments and occupy them for the better part of a decade is something else entirely. It's not something this country likes to do, and there was NO way an opposition Congress would have EVER let a President do that before a devastating attack on our civilian population unified this country to the extent that 9/11 did. GWB had a 90% approval rating in October of 2001. At that time he had more political capital than any President had had in over 50 years.

I'm not judging what he did or didn't do. Nor am I doing so for Clinton.

But you have to acknowledge the difference in the political power they had at their disposal to use military force. Bush had practically unprecedented power. Clinton did not.

 

[Henry]

Going after bin Laden and launching the military attacks that Bush did are entirely different things. Clinton did 'send cruise missiles.' That's not what we are talking about here.

The three terrorist attacks to wich you refer, which happened years apart, combined resulted in about one one-hundredth of the American casualties that we suffered in a few hours on 9/11.

Those three attacks, combined, accounted for less than one sixth of the Americans killed in one suicide attack in Lebanon in 1983, which incidentally convinced that great warrior Ronald Reagan to pack up his toys and go home, and offer nothing of consequence in retaliation.

It was a different political climate in the 80s and 90s. And foreign policy was handled very diffferently.
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[Henry]

Nothin but love Mike.

Now if you all will excuse me I have to find a way to come up with about six grand.
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[Elephant]

Is that for my opinion of the specific guy, or American Idol in general?

Because, for the record, I don't watch that damn show. My wife was watching it and I walked in, asked who the asthmatic on stage was, saw the judges lavish praise upon him, and then I walked out, confident that I had made the correct decision years ago to never watch that stupid show.

Ha! I have watched one episode of the show. I was with my fiance, she asked me to watch at least one episode with her so I did. That was enough and I have not watched another since.

 

[Ax]

9/11, the USS Cole, the Embassy, Somalia, and EVERY other terrorist attack against this country, share equal footing with me, in presenting the US with a Kill Everyone We See Fit To card. I realize that most people let the numbers of our dead affect their view of these things. I do not. If ever there was a need to handle things, "The Chicago Way" it would be acts of terrorism.

Henry is correct, that the precedent wasn't set when Clinton was in office. But Mike is also correct, that he could have, and I believe, should have, set that precedent. Even though Bush had more leverage, it still took balls to pull the trigger. He didn't have to do it, either. But he did.

Bill Clinton was, and likely still is, a gutless, Class A vagina. A great politician, but a terrible person, with no spine to approve the dirty work, necessary, to be a world leader.

Obama has shown more spine than Clinton, (Bill anyway) but he still lacks any leadership qualities I can see. He's a follower.

Let's hope in 2012, he follows Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush, as one term Presidents.

 

[fansince62]

and in other news...

- the producer price index (PPI) rose last moth at a rate equivalent to 20% annual inflation. The CPI is soon to follow.

- the Fed will continue its QE money splurge to buy back our own debt in order to prevent humngous interest rate increases. The QE buy-back will worsen the deficit and exacerbate the hugely ineffective Obama stimulous efforts.

- more unemployment

brace yourself...amid amisdst all the cuts....the next recession is around the corner.

but...hey...at least the admin is wisely moving moneys to encourage Brazillian oil production!

 

[Ax]

and in other news...

Oh Goody!!!

With regards to Tom Highway, this operation (Obama Administration)is a cluster****.

Not that many months from now, we'll have half the country fainting from hysterically, and enthusiastically chanting "Four More Years!"

The other half will be naked, bent over, wrists tied to ankles, looking behind themselves asking, "Four More Years?"

Scurry.

 

[Ax]

the fact that you just quoted Gunny Highway is priceless...

"Well, that doesn't mean we're gonna be swappin' spit, or nothing"

 

[Lanky Livingston]

yeah, you did. and you cant admit you were wrong which makes it impossible to take you seriously. I can admit when I make mistakes (as I did with the impeach Obama thread) but if you cant do anything but back track to try and warp your original point to fit this one we may as well stop this.

Please point out where I did any such thing, and I'll admit it. You won't find it, and I have not warped my original point one bit.

4 months? like thats not enough time to do something? hell man, he had a chance to get bin laden BEFORE the cole happened and did nothing. that was AFTER the first WTC bombing.

you somehow think your numbers make it different. tell the parents of the sailors who died on the Cole that their son/daughter's death isnt as important to you. and then let me know what happens..your inarguable facts are a joke.

Jesus...reading comprehension is not your strong suit, my man.

 

[Lanky Livingston]

OK, I agree to disagree here. I respect your opinion Henry, always have.

He has the same opinion I have.

 

[Boone]

Eh, I am proud of my vote for Obama still, and would probably do it again against the same opponents. Palin should be kept as far from the White House as possible. Obama had the potential for leadership - we have the benefit of hindsight now to see he hasn't been the greatest leader; however in 2008 it was just more right-wing rhetoric.

I'm fairly astounded by that proclamation.

So you essentially acknowledge that Obama is a zero, while simultaneously confirming you don't care - you'd vote for him all over again.

That's great

John McCain - psychotic female running mate or not - demonstrates more leadership sleeping than Obama could ever even glimpse.

I'd love to hear you argue the point.