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Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2013 3:29 pm
by GORDON
Posted: Sun Nov 17, 2013 3:13 pm
by GORDON
When the Obama Magic Died.
Forgive the personal reference, but from the very beginning of Mr. Obama's astonishing rise, I felt that I was witnessing something old and familiar. My advantage owed nothing to any mastery of American political history. I was guided by my immersion in the political history of the Arab world and of a life studying Third World societies.
In 2008, seeing the Obama crowds in Portland, Denver and St. Louis spurred memories of the spectacles that had attended the rise and fall of Arab political pretenders. I had lived through the era of the Egyptian leader Gamal Abdul Nasser. He had emerged from a military cabal to become a demigod, immune to judgment. His followers clung to him even as he led the Arabs to a catastrophic military defeat in the Six Day War of 1967. He issued a kind of apology for his performance. But his reign was never about policies and performance. It was about political magic.
In trying to grapple with, and write about, the Obama phenomenon, I found guidance in a book of breathtaking erudition, "Crowds and Power" (1962) by the Nobel laureate Elias Canetti. Born in Bulgaria in 1905 and educated in Vienna and Britain, Canetti was unmatched in his understanding of the passions, and the delusions, of crowds. The crowd is a "mysterious and universal phenomenon," he writes. It forms where there was nothing before. There comes a moment when "all who belong to the crowd get rid of their difference and feel equal." Density gives the illusion of equality, a blessed moment when "no one is greater or better than another."
Posted: Tue Nov 19, 2013 1:13 pm
by Malcolm
Posted: Tue Nov 19, 2013 1:34 pm
by Leisher
[url=http://www.ijreview.com/2013/11/95583-epic-takedown-obamacares-false-promises-makes-nancy-pelosi-look-extremely-uncomforta
ble/]Pelosi on Obamacare.[/url]
It's not "epic", but it is on Obama/Dem friendly NBC yet they're still taking her to task.
Pelosi just mumbles the party lines over and over, while never answering a single thing being thrown at her. She does so despite the fact that it's all been proven to be horseshit.
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:58 am
by GORDON
Ohio company dumping 1000 employees off of insurance.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs....twitter
On the home front, my wife's bank got bought out, and she has been retained, and she is happy because the health insurance is so much cheaper at the new company. But, their policy is set to renew July, 2014. I don't expect us to have cheaper insurance for long.
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 10:01 am
by GORDON
This is a pretty good video to whip out when someone tells you it is racist to refer to it as "Obamacare."
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Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 10:13 am
by Leisher
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 11:52 am
by Malcolm
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 3:40 pm
by Malcolm
Cocksuckers did it.
Fifty-two Senate Democrats and independents voted to weaken the power of the filibuster. The change reduces the threshold from 60 votes to 51 votes for Senate approval of executive and judicial nominees against unanimous GOP opposition.
...
"The American people believe Congress is broken. The American people believe the Senate is broken. And I believe they are right," Reid said Thursday on the Senate floor. "The need for change is so very, very obvious."
How in the mother of fuck do you think this is the fucking change the American people want?
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 4:37 pm
by GORDON
If there is one thing I have learned in the last few years, it is that democrats need more unchecked power.
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 4:41 pm
by Malcolm
GORDON wrote:If there is one thing I have learned in the last few years, it is that democrats need more unchecked power.
This is the most partisan move that could have been made. But since neither side's power base is going to jump to another party any time soon, guess that's the status quo.
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 5:17 pm
by Leisher
I've got whackos on my FB feed talking openly everyday about how a revolution is needed.
At what point do they stop being the whackos?
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 5:19 pm
by GORDON
Yeah but are they the wackos that are willing to fight to the death to prove that nothing is Obama's fault and he's really still pretty awesome?
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 8:57 pm
by Malcolm
Leisher wrote:I've got whackos on my FB feed talking openly everyday about how a revolution is needed.
At what point do they stop being the whackos?
They're whacking off too much, what?
But seriously...
At what point do they stop being the whackos?
... at the point when they can garner enough armed support to march on DC or resist what DC would do to them if they stopped paying taxes. Until then, it's crazy talk.
The real revolution would need to take place at the polls. Just start voting nothing but third parties until the two major ones excise all the psychos. You'd think that'd be easier than open warfare.
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:07 pm
by GORDON
Malcolm wrote:The real revolution would need to take place at the polls. Just start voting nothing but third parties until the two major ones excise all the psychos. You'd think that'd be easier than open warfare.
If an actual reform candidate every had a chance in hell of winning, he'd get Huey Long'd.
Why would hundreds of billions of dollars in corporate government ever allow itself to lose power just because of a few votes? This country, as it was founded, is dead and long gone.
Edited By GORDON on 1385086053
Posted: Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:11 pm
by Malcolm
If an actual reform candidate every had a chance in hell of winning, he'd get Huey Long'd.
By the 20th or 30th time, they'd slip up. The problem that I see is any third party platform ideal that enough people like to sway their votes away from pachyderms and jackasses is the sort of thing one or both major parties would then steal to stay in power.
Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 11:15 am
by GORDON
The King has again, with a wave of his hand, created a new law at a press conference, and the Obamacare enrollment requirement has been delayed until after the 2014 elections.
http://www.foxnews.com/politic....idterms
edit - To an extent. Article (and law, obviously) is hard to understand as worded. Peeps can still sign up during this "enrollment period..." but the next enrollment period is delayed... I don't know what the difference is. At any rate, a change has been made to the law and I am pretty sure the legislature has had nothing to do with it.
Edited By GORDON on 1385137056
Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 3:56 pm
by Malcolm
Registration numbers up. Allegedly.
Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 3:58 pm
by Malcolm
Crackhead has higher approval rating than Obama. Yes, pun intended.
Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 4:42 pm
by GORDON
Malcolm wrote:Registration numbers
up. Allegedly.
They haven't even built the "pay for it" portion of the website yet. "Numbers up" is a vague term.
