(02-03-2022, 03:07 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(02-03-2022, 06:21 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(02-02-2022, 02:00 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It is a battle FOR America, not a battle WITH America.

Dude, a battle FOR America that doesn't involve a battle WITH America is meaningless.

Dude, as you do not have the excuse of being a non-native speaker of English, you have no excuse for such bungling of pronouns. (Pronouns are the trickiest words in foreign languages).

When someone does a horrible deed against one set of Americans (let us say people mowing down members of synagogues or historically-black churches, or for that matter the terrorists who turned commercial jetliners into weapons of mass destruction) one does it against us all. Dylann Roof (who lethally mowed down ten black people in a Bible study in Charleston, South Carolina and killed nine) is a tragedy, but he is also a traitor. He may end up paying with his life.  

I recognize Trump supporters all over America as no less American than I. Of course their interpretation of what constitutes America far narrower than mine. I also think that they are wrong in their assessment of Donald Trump. Usually the partisan divide is not so stark at that, but Trump's supporters have made such so. 

Americans have united against those who have done grave wrong to Americans, whether on 12/7/1941, 9/11/2001. or 1/6/2001. With the latter it is slower because the Bad Guys are Americans who have an ideological constituency. Some people want America to go from being an Empire of Liberty to just another evil empire that the world will little mourn upon its passing.

(02-03-2022, 09:53 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(02-03-2022, 04:19 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: OK -- Washington defined the Presidency. Lincoln saved the Union. FDR saved American capitalism and in turn (with Churchill) Western Christian Civilization. For good reason the best five Presidents are typically "Mount Rushmore and FDR". 6th to 12th range from Eisenhower to Obama, and you know how often I compare Obama and Ike.  

I note that the first three best presidents on that list were crisis presidents - Washington, Lincoln and FDR.  They might have been controversial in their times, but history gave them credit for solving the great problems of their time and gave them a superb place in the history books.  Biden and Harris are still in the controversial phase.  With the great problems of the crisis still up in the air, no way will they get the blessing of a history that hasn't resolved yet.  I do half expect it will eventually happen.  The problems will eventually be solved.  Simplifying writing the history books requires giving absurd credit to somebody.

But clearly not yet.

(02-04-2022, 03:08 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(02-03-2022, 03:07 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(02-03-2022, 06:21 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(02-02-2022, 02:00 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It is a battle FOR America, not a battle WITH America.

Dude, a battle FOR America that doesn't involve a battle WITH America is meaningless.

Dude, as you do not have the excuse of being a non-native speaker of English, you have no excuse for such bungling of pronouns. (Pronouns are the trickiest words in foreign languages).

When someone does a horrible deed against one set of Americans (let us say people mowing down members of synagogues or historically-black churches, or for that matter the terrorists who turned commercial jetliners into weapons of mass destruction) one does it against us all. Dylann Roof (who lethally mowed down ten black people in a Bible study in Charleston, South Carolina and killed nine) is a tragedy, but he is also a traitor. He may end up paying with his life.  

I recognize Trump supporters all over America as no less American than I. Of course their interpretation of what constitutes America far narrower than mine. I also think that they are wrong in their assessment of Donald Trump. Usually the partisan divide is not so stark at that, but Trump's supporters have made such so. 

Americans have united against those who have done grave wrong to Americans, whether on 12/7/1941, 9/11/2001. or 1/6/2021. With the latter it is slower because the Bad Guys are Americans who have an ideological constituency. Some people want America to go from being an Empire of Liberty to just another evil empire that the world will little mourn upon its passing.

I pretty much repeated what an author said to me and called it meaningless. What's the problem with that? So, what happened on 1/6/2001? I assume that you meant 1/6/2021 right. Damn mistakes, they make you look stupid or foolish in your case. It's kind of like someone writing Covid 19 is as deadly as a rattle snake bite as if it's true. Shall we continue playing the game that I know how to play very well or would you prefer to take a time out?

(02-02-2022, 09:55 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(02-02-2022, 01:11 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2022, 10:30 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-28-2022, 01:13 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Bluer as in more darker in terms of peoples skin tone or bluer as in more Progressive minded and big government oriented/related like Washington DC? In Minnesota, the rural Democrats are dying off and the rural communities that were controlled by them for several decades are turning into ghost towns. As a result, the more economic minded and more American minded Republicans and their voters are taking over and the economy is becoming more economically diverse. So, are you familiar with what's going on between Buckhead and Atlanta these days? Buckhead has formally declared its independence and is in the process of breaking free from from Atlanta. I think it's a good gauge what's to come and what to expect as time goes on.

Rural areas have always been more conservative in every meaning of the word -- even during the labor movement period of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  Dogma tends to set-in in more insular communities.  They may get infuriated, but they aren't empowered, unless they decide to bring out the guns.  Then it's open rebellion.  Nothing good comes from that.

The young don't believe it can happen, not even the rural young.  If it does, then the armies are aligned and battlelines drawn.  Youth WILL show up out of pure self-interest.

Dude, the armies are already aligned and the battle lines have already been drawn and the Blue youth that show up out of pure self interest are going to find Themselves being turned against each other and slaughtered. The Blue community seems pretty insular and dogmatic these days don't you think. I suppose that you don't think or view it that way since it's very obvious to everyone else that you're one of Them. Sorry dude, I wish I was a better writer than a businessman. It's the only thing that's  keeping you in the game at this point.

In your scenario, the US Armed Services would divide between your concept of a Real America and the more diverse America. The Armed Services recruit heavily from poor people with the offering of steady work, clear direction, and career training. It is too well-disciplined to splinter. In short the Army is not on any side yet, and it will not end up on any one side unless to suppress sedition -- especially if that manifests itself in 'ethnic cleansing' or religious persecutions.  

You may expect private militias responsible to none but their leaders to establish marauding bands; the Army knows how to deal with such bands. Those bands will be put down swiftly and surely. If those marauding bands leave behind large numbers of dead, then images of such will be powerful tools for discrediting them.

(02-04-2022, 05:03 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(02-02-2022, 09:55 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(02-02-2022, 01:11 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2022, 10:30 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-28-2022, 01:13 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Bluer as in more darker in terms of peoples skin tone or bluer as in more Progressive minded and big government oriented/related like Washington DC? In Minnesota, the rural Democrats are dying off and the rural communities that were controlled by them for several decades are turning into ghost towns. As a result, the more economic minded and more American minded Republicans and their voters are taking over and the economy is becoming more economically diverse. So, are you familiar with what's going on between Buckhead and Atlanta these days? Buckhead has formally declared its independence and is in the process of breaking free from from Atlanta. I think it's a good gauge what's to come and what to expect as time goes on.

Rural areas have always been more conservative in every meaning of the word -- even during the labor movement period of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  Dogma tends to set-in in more insular communities.  They may get infuriated, but they aren't empowered, unless they decide to bring out the guns.  Then it's open rebellion.  Nothing good comes from that.

The young don't believe it can happen, not even the rural young.  If it does, then the armies are aligned and battlelines drawn.  Youth WILL show up out of pure self-interest.

Dude, the armies are already aligned and the battle lines have already been drawn and the Blue youth that show up out of pure self interest are going to find Themselves being turned against each other and slaughtered. The Blue community seems pretty insular and dogmatic these days don't you think. I suppose that you don't think or view it that way since it's very obvious to everyone else that you're one of Them. Sorry dude, I wish I was a better writer than a businessman. It's the only thing that's  keeping you in the game at this point.

In your scenario, the US Armed Services would divide between your concept of a Real America and the more diverse America. The Armed Services recruit heavily from poor people with the offering of steady work, clear direction, and career training. It is too well-disciplined to splinter. In short the Army is not on any side yet, and it will not end up on any one side unless to suppress sedition -- especially if that manifests itself in 'ethnic cleansing' or religious persecutions.  

You may expect private militias responsible to none but their leaders to establish marauding bands; the Army knows how to deal with such bands. Those bands will be put down swiftly and surely. If those marauding bands leave behind large numbers of dead, then images of such will be powerful tools for discrediting them.

Are you more diverse than me? You may have read a lot more books but I have interacted/communicated/socialized with a helluva lot more people than you and the other three combined.

Quote:Eric preaches the blue gospel to the blue flock (the blue indoctrinated) David does it too but he's not as committed as Eric. You are a blue demagogue who is in using and spreading propaganda. Bob is too. I don't see much diversity of thought anywhere I look (blue news network) these days. So, did you know that Whoopi was (racist and classist rant deleted, and soon to be reported. No, I am not going to let you get away with  a vile term for Southern white people, either, as it is just as nasty as the other two). It's all business nothing personal.

Quote:The US Army divided the last time. What makes you think/ feel it won't happen again this time?

Quote:I know that this is hard for you to swallow but you and the others don't represent America, the American Constitution or core American values and principles . Like I said, you should start thinking about moving to one of the so-called Democratic States before the American States and the American regions declare they're independence and formally recognize the America (US) Constitution as the Law of the Land and swear an oath to keep it and defend it. It's coming dude and you and the others are on the wrong side once again.

(02-05-2022, 03:54 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I thought earlier lists were more accurate. This one seems to lean toward excusing some very bad activities among these some of these presidents, and seems to submit to conservative opinions. Certainly Ike and Reagan are very much over-rated on this list.

To me, the worst is a toss up between GW Bush and Donald Trump. Bush cost 400,000 people their lives for no reason. LBJ is over-rated, having cost millions of lives including about 57,000 American lives for no reason. Although Buchanan was a very poor leader who favored the South in some shady ways, I don't see how he can be blamed for the division in the country that seemed bent on civil war no matter what he did. The best was FDR, despite some bad decisions. Washington didn't do that much, and Lincoln did, although in some tyrannical ways, but he had trouble finding the right general in the right place.

(02-06-2022, 09:31 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(02-05-2022, 03:54 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I thought earlier lists were more accurate. This one seems to lean toward excusing some very bad activities among these some of these presidents, and seems to submit to conservative opinions. Certainly Ike and Reagan are very much over-rated on this list.

To me, the worst is a toss up between GW Bush and Donald Trump. Bush cost 400,000 people their lives for no reason. LBJ is over-rated, having cost millions of lives including about 57,000 American lives for no reason. Although Buchanan was a very poor leader who favored the South in some shady ways, I don't see how he can be blamed for the division in the country that seemed bent on civil war no matter what he did. The best was FDR, despite some bad decisions. Washington didn't do that much, and Lincoln did, although in some tyrannical ways, but he had trouble finding the right general in the right place.

I have to fault your view of Washington.  His singular and greatest act was stepping aside after 8 years and retiring from the public square.  That was, to say the least, an unheard-of event in that or any prior time.  The humility and bravery it took to walk away set the standard for the nation.

Quote:The Republican National Committee has voted to formally censure Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for “actions in their positions as members of the January 6th Select Committee not befitting Republican members of Congress.” This is both morally repellent and politically self-destructive.

The action of the mob on January 6 was an indefensible disgrace. It is deserving of both political accountability and criminal prosecution. Aspects of it are also fit subjects for a properly conducted congressional inquiry. It is wrong to minimize or excuse what happened that day.

Republicans who did nothing to encourage the mob — and there are many such Republicans — need not wear a hair shirt over January 6, but when they choose to talk about it, they should tell the unsparing truth. We commend the example of Mike Pence, who told a Federalist Society gathering, “I heard this week that President Trump said I had the right to overturn the election. President Trump is wrong. I had no right to overturn the election. The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people alone.”

There is also no conceivable political benefit to the Republican Party or its members — other than Donald Trump — in looking to defend or minimize January 6 rather than simply move on. The American people are never itching to hear a defense of rioters. But the voters have also shown little interest in the Democrats’ obsession over the event.

MORE IN CAPITOL RIOT
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Trump’s Continuing Disgrace
Fair-minded people can, of course, criticize some of the responses to January 6. To say that investigation and prosecution are justified is not to defend every aspect of the hundreds of criminal prosecutions, or to bless the Democrats’ norm-breaking partisanship on the January 6 committee. But the RNC has issued a statement, purportedly in the name of the entire party, denouncing “a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse” and “Democrat abuse of prosecutorial power for partisan purposes.” This will, quite predictably and not wholly unreasonably, be read as an argument that the action of the mob was nothing but “legitimate political discourse” and that nobody should be prosecuted. It will be used against hundreds of elected Republicans who were not consulted in its drafting and do not endorse its sentiment. To the extent that the party did not intend this as the meaning — and RNC chair Ronna McDaniel, already doing damage control, says it was not meant that way — its wording is political malpractice of the highest order coming from people whose entire job is politics.

A censure of this sort is also the wrong remedy, but one that has become all too common from political-party operatives attempting to vent their spleens at popularly elected public officials. In Arizona, for example, the Republican Party issued a bizarre censure last year of sitting governor Doug Ducey, former senator Jeff Flake, and the widow of former senator John McCain. Not to be outdone in self-destructiveness, Arizona Democrats censured sitting senator Kyrsten Sinema. The first rule of party operatives should be “do no harm.” Attacking a party’s own elected officials, through channels that reflect neither the voters nor the people they elect, violates every rule of political sense.

We understand how Republicans think it is wrong for Cheney and Kinzinger to give the committee a patina of bipartisanship it would lack after Nancy Pelosi rejected Kevin McCarthy’s selections to serve and to have enthusiastically embraced the committee’s mission that has gone well beyond any legislative purpose. But there is also, obviously, a need for full accounting of January 6. Again, fair-minded people can disagree here. But Cheney has already been removed from leadership (unwisely, in our view) and faces a primary challenge; Kinzinger is retiring from the House. At least those responses have the virtue of coming from elected officials and the voters.

The RNC bought the entire party a bounty of bad headlines and easy attack ads. It did so for no good purpose, and its action will only encourage those who see riots as legitimate political discourse. A mistake, and worse, a shame.

(02-06-2022, 09:31 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(02-05-2022, 03:54 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I thought earlier lists were more accurate. This one seems to lean toward excusing some very bad activities among these some of these presidents, and seems to submit to conservative opinions. Certainly Ike and Reagan are very much over-rated on this list.

To me, the worst is a toss up between GW Bush and Donald Trump. Bush cost 400,000 people their lives for no reason. LBJ is over-rated, having cost millions of lives including about 57,000 American lives for no reason. Although Buchanan was a very poor leader who favored the South in some shady ways, I don't see how he can be blamed for the division in the country that seemed bent on civil war no matter what he did. The best was FDR, despite some bad decisions. Washington didn't do that much, and Lincoln did, although in some tyrannical ways, but he had trouble finding the right general in the right place.

I have to fault your view of Washington.  His singular and greatest act was stepping aside after 8 years and retiring from the public square.  That was, to say the least, an unheard-of event in that or any prior time.  The humility and bravery it took to walk away set the standard for the nation.

(02-07-2022, 01:51 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(02-06-2022, 09:31 AM)David Horn Wrote: I have to fault your view of Washington.  His singular and greatest act was stepping aside after 8 years and retiring from the public square.  That was, to say the least, an unheard-of event in that or any prior time.  The humility and bravery it took to walk away set the standard for the nation.

Sure. I just don't think that makes him number 1 greatest on the list of presidents.

(02-08-2022, 02:13 PM)Skabungus Wrote: It's so hard to come back after several years and jump back in on threads that have progressed on into the desert leaving a myriad of dead end trails, gulches and asides.  

Instead, I'll tell you a little story.  

My dad died in January.  He was 85.  He had a good life and lived large for most of it.  His last 26 years were spent golfing and traveling the world with my mom, and then later, a girlfriend.  The past decade he spent in a golf course community in Florida.  Eighteen holes a day, and steak and lobster or other rich dishes along with an ample supply of well aged scotch.  He was the poster child for Silent generation dreams come true.

Quote:A hard right conservative his entire life, he was convinced all this hubub about covid was just that.  Liberals trying to use the "new flu" as an excuse for overreach, more regulations and the like.  He'd parroted about every right wing dismissal you can imagine, comparing the new plague to ... a flu, a cold, and yes, even a snake or spider bite.  He was part of that "there's a pill for everything" generation that simply didn't believe someone should have to modify behavior to stay safe.  Medical science had kept him alive since is open heart surgery at 60 and every time he'd developed another disorder, well, the good doctors had a pill for him.  Certainly this covid thing would run the same course.

Quote:I spoke to my dad in April of 2020 when he came up to see us here in Michigan.  He was good enough to grace his children and grand children with a one day visit every year.  He'd called on the phone to say he'd be by in the morning to see us, and I had to tell him that we'd been exposed to covid and that were he to come by, he'd have to wear a mask and sit outside with us.  Unacceptable.  Totally unacceptable in his eyes, so he skipped the visit opting instead to drop some presents for the grand kids on our porch and leave.  For the next two years every time I'd speak with him, I'd be brow beaten for having bought into all the liberal fear mongering around covid.  

Quote:Covid killed his disbelieving ass on January 20, 2022.  Actually it just put him in the hospital on life support.  I had to fly down and end the ordeal by reading his living will to two doctors and the head nurse, twice.

Getting his affairs in Florida squared away meant I spent about 4 days in the palatial surrounds of his golf course community.  I couldn't find a mask on a face.  There was much talk about everyone that was dying.  There was lively discussion about the amazing benefits of the monoclonal antibody treatments (because, there is a treatment for everything you know) and how everyone seemed to know someone who'd survived it.  Yet they were dropping like flies.  On my drive back to Ohio, with my dad's girlfriend, we got a call from her Saturday golf gang.  Three of the seven had tested positive and the other four didn't feel well, but weren't going to get tested, because, you know, the lines.

Quote:WTAF.  I still don't know what to make of it.  I'm told the same is the case in many of Florida's retirement communities, and we all know it's the same in many rural communities where fear trumps science.  The only words that come to mind are mass psychosis, or mass denial.  It's something I've really never encountered before, at least on such a scale.

Quote:I work with a lot of wildlife biologists.  Covid never comes up, because there is nothing to say.  It's obvious.  Just like EHD, or Chronic Wasting Disease in deer, or whorling disease in trout.  It runs it's course.  The weak, the aged and the ill equipped are culled from the herd.  Nature takes its course.  When covid comes up someone will say, "well, we all know what it will take for it to end", which is kind of a joke, because it never ends, it only lessens.  Natural selection is an ongoing process.

Quote:My son just got over covid.  My daughter had it last May and September.  No long term effects for either.  My ex wife and I have both avoided it by social distancing, masking up and getting all our shots.

I don't really have too many illusions about where this is all going with regard to covid.  The disease will do it's thing and then fall back into the background along side antibiotic resistant TB, the flu and a few others.  It wont be gone, but it wont be a global killer forever either.

Quote:I do have questions about what the reaction to covid says about our future.  It is not simply America.  My friends in Europe share similar stories.  

So I've told you a story, and I've not proofed a word of it.

Quote:Ring around the rosies,
A pocket full of posies, 
Ah-choo, ah-choo
All fall down!  

(02-08-2022, 03:46 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: COVID-19 has yet to show its full cultural effect... but it will have one. I wonder what equivalent we will have to 

Quote:Ring around the rosies,
A pocket full of posies, 
Ah-choo, ah-choo
All fall down!  

(08-16-2022, 10:58 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Liz Cheney lost her re-election bid.

Kissing up to Donald Trump is nearly a necessity for getting along in Republican politics. We shall see if such is good in the general election.

(08-16-2022, 11:56 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Shame on the people of Wyoming. I would never want to visit that state.

(08-16-2022, 11:56 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Shame on the people of Wyoming. I would never want to visit that state.

(08-17-2022, 09:41 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(08-16-2022, 10:58 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Liz Cheney lost her re-election bid.

Kissing up to Donald Trump is nearly a necessity for getting along in Republican politics. We shall see if such is good in the general election.

(08-16-2022, 11:56 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Shame on the people of Wyoming. I would never want to visit that state.

According to an NY Times commentary I just read today, the Wyoming GOP is split between the elites (Cheney, et al) and the Blue Collars who hate them.  This neo-GOP of almost all blue collar voters iis slowly but surely pushing the elites aside and taking over most state and local political positions.  What do they want?  Validation!  In the end, they have stopped doing any of the things that government needs to do, and spend their time on identity politics of all kinds ... and punishing the elites for being, you know, elite.

This may be the first entity with a large enough concentration of hyper-partisans to actually deep six an entire state.  We'll have to see.