Political Hippo Circle Jerk - America, farg YEAH!

[General_Failure]

Hey I know what would be great, let's talk about abortion!

Yeah, good things will surely come from it!



And this is the end of the abortion discussion.

[PhillyGirl]

I was just curious.

[Tomahawk]

Hey I know what would be great, let's talk about abortion!

Yeah, good things will surely come from it!



And this is the end of the abortion discussion.

Censor

I'm calling the First Amendment to narc on you

[General_Failure]

NB was the last poster to do that. You wanna end up like him? Crying for help as we shovel dirt on top of you?

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

Abortion might be immoral but it should NOT be illegal.  Sorry, but there's too many instances where the procedure is a necessity.

If you're talking about cases where it's the woman's life or the baby's, that's pretty rare and naturally should be an exception.

You can even throw in rape, incest, and all the other delightful scenarios that don't amount to "convenience."

Abortion as a form of after-the-fact birth control should be illegal.  Abortion as a fail-safe for people who don't like to use protection is abhorrent.  Partial-birth abortion is probably one of the ugliest things largely accepted by American society.

But, you're right.  Abortion should not be illegal in all cases.  I agree, and I apologize for being unclear with my wording.

EDIT FOR BIG BROTHER:  I was responding to Rome's post only and did not see the mess of other posts after it.  Feel free to turn my post into an animated GIF of Stewie Griffin's iPod commercial.

Fiscal conservatism is an oxymoron.  Government, by its very nature, is expansive and all-consuming.  For a country with 300-plus million citizens, expecting a small centralized federal government is ridiculous.

We have a big government because we're a big country.  Expecting the private sector to provide for all of us is preposterous.

As a Libertarian I'd prefer it, but as a realist, I know it's just not remotely possible at this point.

So, in non-existent happyland, you'd love to be a Libertarian.  But, you're finally admitting that you're really NOT a Libertarian at all.

[PhillyGirl]

Nice email:

Sent: Sunday, October 26, 2008 11:30 AM
Subject: I like this letter


by Patrick J. Buchanan

Barack says we need to have a conversation about race in America.? Fair enough. But this time, it has to be a two-way conversation. White America needs to be heard from, not just lectured to. This time, the Silent Majority needs to have its convictions, grievances and demands heard. And among them are these:


First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.

Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.

Second, no people anywhere has done more to lift up blacks than white Americans. Untold trillions have been spent since the '60s on welfare, food stamps, rent supplements, Section 8 housing, Pell grants, student loans, legal services, Medicaid, Earned Income Tax Credits and poverty programs designed to bring the African-American community into the mainstream.

Governments, businesses and colleges have engaged in discrimination against white folks -- with affirmative action, contract set-asides and quotas -- to advance black applicants over white applicants.

Churches, foundations, civic groups, schools and individuals all over America have donated their time and money to support soup kitchens, adult education, day care, retirement and nursing homes for blacks.

We hear the grievances Where is the gratitude??

Barack talks about new 'ladders of opportunity' for blacks.

Let him go to Altoona? And Johnstown, and ask the white kids in Catholic schools how many were visited lately by Ivy League recruiters handing out scholarships for 'deserving' white kids.? Is white America really responsible for the fact that the crime and incarceration rates for African-Americans are seven times those of white America? Is it really white America's fault that illegitimacy in the African-American community has hit over 73% percent and the black dropout rate from high schools in some cities has reached approximately 56% percent?

Is that the fault of white America or, first and foremost, a failure of the black community itself ?

As for racism, its ugliest manifestation is in interracial crime, and especially interracial crimes of violence. Is Barack Obama aware that while white criminals choose black victims 3 percent of the time, black criminalschoose white victims 48% percent of the time ?

Is Barack aware that black-on-white rapes are over 100 times more common than the reverse, that black-on-white robberies were 143 times as common in the first three years of this decade as the reverse?

We have all heard ad nauseam from the Rev. Al about Tawana Brawley, the Duke rape case about Jena...all of which turned out to be hoaxes, and false allegations. But about the epidemic of black assaults on whites that are real, we hear nothing...so, what's going on in the media ?

Sorry, Barack, some of us have heard it all before, about 40 years and over 40 trillion tax dollars ago.

This needs to be passed around because, this is a message everyone needs to hear !!! Moreover - if things don't change within the next 20 years The America that was established by our forbearers will be gone.

Moreover, they espouse being 'African-Americans' - get real - basically none of them came from Africa! Their ancestors came from Africa. Or should we all start calling ourselves by where our ancestors derive: German Americans, Italian Americans, Irish Americans, French Americans, Spanish Americans, Polish Americans, English Americans, etc. etc. etc. We live in the UNITED STATES, not the separate states. They are the ones keeping themselves on the outside via non-conformity choices.

Stats can be verified by the link below.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/buchanan-wright.asp

Lovely Pat. I can't believe he wrote that. Although the Snopes link proves he DID in fact, write it.

[PhillyGirl]

FF, thank you for clarifying that.

One thing that a lot of people don't understand is that pro-choice isn't about being pro-abortion. I hate, hate, HATE that abortion is used as a method of birth control in this country. It makes me sick. But making it illegal won't change that. It will continue to happen at the same alarming rate, just in unsafe methods that will most likely end up killing BOTH mom and child.

One thing that I love about Obama is his thought process about it...better education about abstinence and pregnancy and birth control options (for both the young mother AND her parents), better counseling, better methods of taking care of young mothers....THAT is what is needed so desperately. POUR money into that.

Preaching "abstinence only" and banning abortions and/or birth control options is not going to fix the problem.

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

FF, thank you for clarifying that.

One thing that a lot of people don't understand is that pro-choice isn't about being pro-abortion. I hate, hate, HATE that abortion is used as a method of birth control in this country. It makes me sick. But making it illegal won't change that. It will continue to happen at the same alarming rate, just in unsafe methods that will most likely end up killing BOTH mom and child.

One thing that I love about Obama is his thought process about it...better education about abstinence and pregnancy and birth control options (for both the young mother AND her parents), better counseling, better methods of taking care of young mothers....THAT is what is needed so desperately. POUR money into that.

Preaching "abstinence only" and banning abortions and/or birth control options is not going to fix the problem.

I agree with this post, except that I only "really like" Obama and do not love him.

[PhillyGirl]

I actually meant to write "What I love about Obama's ideas on this" but I accidentally deleted half that sentence...sorry.

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

We both suck at writing exactly what we want to say, which is good because no one wants to hear that anyway.

Let's go eat some paste.

[Phanatic]

Fiscal conservatism is an oxymoron.  Government, by its very nature, is expansive and all-consuming.  For a country with 300-plus million citizens, expecting a small centralized federal government is ridiculous.

We have a big government because we're a big country.  Expecting the private sector to provide for all of us is preposterous.

As a Libertarian I'd prefer it, but as a realist, I know it's just not remotely possible at this point.

Certainly the government has to be large but it does not have to grow for every problem we face. Sometimes the size and inefficiency of the government are the cause of the problem. Making the government bigger just adds to the problem. I really think this is the case for the Home Land Security department. Faced with a lack of communication between the CIA and the FBI the GOP rather then make things smoother and more efficient added a whole department of government to add to the mess. Sure it will work for a while but the bureaucracy will build up and become useless eventually.

[Diomedes]

Pat Buchanan obviously didn't listen to Obama's race speech.  Obamn understands well that white america has some resentment that isn't simply a matter of racsim...

In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.

Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

Yeah, but in all fairness, many Obama supporters didn't really listen to that speech either.  And if they did, they don't agree that some white resentment is not a function of racism.

[Rome]

Small government would totally work in a country with a population of 300,000,000.  Actually, the smaller the better.

Who needs the roads paved, the country protected or the citizenry educated?

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

Small government would totally work in a country with a population of 300,000,000.  Actually, the smaller the better.

Who needs the roads paved, the country protected or the citizenry educated?

Phanatic already said it, so I won't bother typing it in my own words:

Certainly the government has to be large but it does not have to grow for every problem we face. Sometimes the size and inefficiency of the government are the cause of the problem. Making the government bigger just adds to the problem. I really think this is the case for the Home Land Security department. Faced with a lack of communication between the CIA and the FBI the GOP rather then make things smoother and more efficient added a whole department of government to add to the mess. Sure it will work for a while but the bureaucracy will build up and become useless eventually.