its the same thing with Mccain.... even though most would hate to admit it. we are all fed a lot of Bs... no matter who you are voting for. you arent getting 100% and its not all true. and its not change made by the president. it all starts with the people. we voted him into office. we made the change. the difference in votes on each side shows how the majority feels. Mccain got pwned! it wasnt even close really. i actually thought we'd have to wait a hell of a lot longer to find out who won but apparently most of the country is on the same page.
This is to all you people who think the 2 major candidates are different :laugh: Apparently actuaries aren't the only ones that know how to hedge. Obama: Goldman Sachs $739,521 UBS AG $419,550 Lehman Brothers$391,774 Citigroup Inc $492,548 Morgan Stanley $341,380 Latham & Watkins $328,879 Google Inc $487,355 JPMorgan Chase & Co $475,112 Sidley Austin LLP $370,916 Skadden, Arps et al $360,409 McCain: Merrill Lynch $349,170 Citigroup Inc $287,801 Morgan Stanley $249,377 Wachovia Corp $147,456 Goldman Sachs $220,045 Lehman Brothers $115,707 Bear Stearns $108,000 JPMorgan Chase & Co $206,392 Bank of America $133,975 Credit Suisse Group $175,503 In all fairness Obama did raise a lot of money through private donations but I'm sure he cares about those people that donated 20 dollars as he sits in his multi-million dollar house every nite.
yea my statement could go both ways between both parties. he talkes of these great ideas i just want him to pull through because they sound very good. he just needs to work at it in order to achieve them and yes the US did vote and they did speak, very one-sided-like too, and now we have obama as our president so hopefully he can take that role and turn himself into a rolemodel. im not predicting the out come of his term(s) in office yet because he hasnt even been our next president for 24 hours. im just saying i need to see some bite with that bark. and that would have gone for mccain too provided he would have won, our nation is ****ed as of right now and all show no go is NOT going to make this great nation any better.
Obama will be a great, transformational president. Don't be worried. Democrats get a bad reputation because they tend to be the janitor to conservative policy. They are forced to do things that republicans don't want to do, in order to put the country back on track. Just because they are labeled "Tax and Spend Liberals," doesn't mean that it's a bad thing. Most of them govern from the center anyway in order to get things done. We have a lot of issues here to deal with. And with a democratic majority (no matter how scary you think that is), it will be a little easier to actually push legislation through (and get things done) instead of being in gridlock between the legislative and executive branches.
agreed on the gridlock scenario. and that goes for both R's and D's but when you said most govern from the center do you mean most presidents try to get rid of the R or D infront of their name and govern with an un bias manner? becasue i dont know if i beleive that fully, bush was a die hard Rep. and look what happened to this country, obama- no different there are MANY many people saying that he is tooooooo liberal. and some even shot the socialist word at him. so i dont know if i fully believe that that unbias approach will happen. if he works with mccain and palin like he promised (more promises) then i can see where you are getting the idea of an unbias governing tactic but if he doesnt follow through with that promise its most likely he will be the lefty version of bush.
:roll: Just like Republicans have to unscrew the messes left behind by Democrats. Neither side is perfect, and both have created plenty of screwups in the past. We're in this current situation because of both parties, just because we have a Democratic majority doesn't mean that things are magically going to be wonderful and everything will turn around like it never happened.
What messes did clinton leave behind besides his personal life crap? I'm not that informed, Ide like to know.
because aegis gave her blessings and noone that ive seen yet (and i havent been in here all day) has made any of this personal.
and just incase nobodys mentioned it yet..the franken/coleman votes are being re-counted and they say they wont know for sure till maybe dec.
I agree that it's both sides. And nothing will magically appear to save the day. But, it does help to get things done with more of a majority. Hopefully, Obama will try his best at putting the needs of the country ahead of partisan politics and do what's right, along with congress. If they can't work together, we're still screwed. And governing from the center just means that he'll bend a bit from the left in order to get things passed (much in the way Clinton did) instead of putting up the "Veto" roadblock on everything (*cough* Bush). I still think that Clinton was the best republican the conservatives ever had.
Aaaaand you're wrong. Clinton passed the Assault Weapons Ban which has ZERO to do with machine guns at all. Those are already covered by the ATF dating back to 1934. The AWB limited magazine sizes, and went after "scary" looking guns like the AR-15 and AK-47 variants. It didn't affect full auto weapons at all. Full auto weapons can be purchased with the proper paperwork if you live in a state that allows them, same with suppressors/silencers. You'll have to go through a Federal Background check, and get a $200 dollar tax stamp from the ATF. Then you just have to shell out a few thousand (or more) for the gun of your choice.
I wrote a paper on assault weapons and the legislation that banned them. I agree with Brian on this... It was mostly from an aesthetic point of view. And I found it ridiculous. Just for the record, I support gun-rights. Even "assault" weapons. Even though I don't think they're really necessary for the average citizen. They are pretty damn sweet though
there is but in the spirit of the election aaaaaannndd this wildly out of control forest fire of a thread the m0dz decided to let it go this time around. which is kind of cool because this gets to stay open as long as theres no "you lint licker!" **** goin on
the guy i bought my buisness from and who is now one of my employees is a national firearms instructor so its not like im completely clueless to any of it..i dont care very much..but its certainly not as easy as it looks.
providing a very strong WTO which gave companies like Wallmart control over too much price. and also by giving lage manufacturing companies more opportunity to produce product in counties that have rediculously cheap labor in the hopes that they would be doing more tride with us. BUT that totally backfired because forign countires that we use as manufactuaing locations only "buy" the materials needed to be productive. the average person in these countries cant afford to really buy into our markets anyways and esp if they arent paid enough by owners of our production companies. Thus making money ONLY for the owners of big business here in the states. taking jobs away from americans and starting to shrink the middle class even more..... he wasnt too bad though cuz thats all i can point out. otherwise he was a great president. way better than bush.... Mccain would have been a war hungry fist so im happy he's not the prez. and Palin gives me the creeps. she thinks with too much emotion and doesnt seem to have much critical thinking capability. she is a hardcore christian and believes that evolution shouldnt even me mentioned in schools....wow. i wouldnt be suprised if she didnt believe that global warming was even real.
Clinton and his foreign policy screwups are a big reason we have some of the issues we do now. He pulled out of Somalia without accomplishing what we went over there to do (remove Farrah Aidid) and since then their situation has done nothing but go downhill. That country hasn't had a stable government in 15 years and is now one of the piracy capitols of the world. He also failed to take action when the embassies overseas were bombed, as well as the USS Cole. He also refused to take out Bin Laden when he had the chance, which might have made a big difference in the years to come. No one died when Clinton lied, they just died when he didn't do anything. Bin Laden himself said that Clintons inaction caused them to escalate their attacks. Some point the finger at him for the tech bubble bursting and for laying the groundwork for the future housing market bubble burst as well.
IIRC, his administation was pushing the major lenders, like Fanny and Freddie, to offer more sub-prime loans. They are in quite hte pickle now. Someone who knows more about that can chime in to back or bash me on that.
i can't help but laugh about you bringing up Bin Laden, seeing as HE (Bin Laden) has publicly stated before that the reason he has it out for america is because of our involvement in Saudi Arabia. He believed it was a muslim battle and they were more than apt to handle it themselves without us... the prince didn't agree and took us over Bin Laden, thats why he had it out for us. there have been interviews with him where he specifically stated that the Bush family and their interferences in the region are the cause of his attacks. nice try tho, as far as Somalia is concerned, remember that Nato and our allies also said to pull out and supported our decisions (opposite of this new republican way of doing whatever we please). The housing, market, and production changes were direct effects of the 60's and 70's. Interest rates, market prices, and specifically inflation were held low to compensate for the high oil prices and irregular import/exports. that was the administrations of the past's choice to deal with it. again, a fine temporary solution, but by no means an extended plan for the future. You can sit there and pass the blame all you want, but all of the problems we have had, are having, or will have are a direct result of intolerable citizens that expect to live free with huge payouts and freedoms. you want a future, great, but it comes at a cost at some point. at some point, people need to be held accountable for their desires rather than passing it on.
Sure, Bin Laden was butthurt about the Saudis choosing our military over him and his fighters. Not that I can blame the Saudis, and it certainly doesn't justify his actions. And if you want to start sounding off about Somalia then get the facts straight. NATO was never in Somalia, the UN was. The first time we went in(Operation Restore Hope), we restored things so that the humanitarian efforts could continue. Marine snipers tend to have a very calming effect on people who want to start crap. Then we pulled out and left the UN in place(Operation Restore Hope II). Aidid stepped up his attacks against the peacekeepers, so Clinton decided to send in Task Force Ranger to remove Aidid. I'm sure we've all seen/read Black Hawk Down, so I don't need to go into the battle or what happened. However, Clinton pulled out our troops right afterwards because of the loss of life, something the Somalis knew would happen. Nevermind the fact that while we lost 18, they lost somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,000-10,000. Our guys definitely did not lose that battle. Clinton was afraid of losing face, and pulled out, thereby negating the brave fighting by our troops on the ground and the actions of two Medal of Honor winners. He didn't have the stones to finish what he started, and our guys paid the price for it. Many of them will say the exact same thing. The UN force pulled out in 1995 (two full years after we did), and the Somalis have paid the price since. At least Bush learned from Clintons mistake and is trying to see it through to the end, even if it isn't the popular choice.
Ok, this is just not true. Clinton was forced to pull out of Somalia because of pressure from senate Republicans, as they where mounting efforts to completely cut off funding for the troops there. These are many of the same senators who are now calling Democrats unpatriotic by opposing funding bills for soldiers in Iraq. Clinton got the closest to taking out Bin Laden of all of the presidents. He failed because of poor CIA intelligence and decision making high in the CIA (which we all now know had been a mess since the Soviet Union fell). He had his hand on the trigger to taking him out on, but was unable to get good enough intelligence to make a tactical strike into a sovereign nation. Clinton handed over major foreign policy dossiers to the Bush administration that clearly stated that Bin Laden was a direct and major threat to the United States, and even met with high ranking Bush operatives regarding Bin Laden during the changeover. In the 1980's, both Cheney and Rumsfeld had been burned badly by CIA intelligence, and were want to trust anything given to them, so they collectively shelved the threat assessments from Bin Laden. Honestly, the fault here lies with the CIA. From the CIA history I've read, I don't blame Cheney or Rumsfeld for their actions, as the CIA had been a mess for many years. The fact remains, however, that Bush's Administrations legacy will forever be 9/11 and the runup to Iraq. Their actions in shelving intelligence dealing with Bin Laden prior to 9/11 is something that history will not judge them kindly for.
and with that said, i am 100% positive that the CIA was aware of the imminent attack and warned the Bush Administration who proceeded to shrug it off.
Well, obviously I don't work for the CIA, but I don't think that there was anything that obtuse happening. Cheney and Rusmfeld simply did not believe many of the intelligence reports coming out of the CIA, and they had reason. There were many warnings signs within the CIA that the 9/11 attacks were coming, but the intelligence gathering arm of the CIA had been broken since inception, and only got worse with the fall of the Soviet Union. I'm not a tinfoil hat type of guy, I don't think it was some big conspiracy, it was just a broken system with two old guys at the helm that had been raped by the system in the past. In fact, we saw this in an even more grand scale with the runup to Iraq. Cheney and Rumsfeld where absolutely convinced Iraq had WMD's, even when the CIA intelligence pointed otherwise. The problem was that George Tenet (Director of the CIA), caved to the political pressure (like many many of the previous CIA directors). Obviously, we now know that Iraq didn't have WMD's, and the weapon inspections were working, but many of the CIA intelligence estimates created in the runup to the war said otherwise, or were edited to appear to give a concise message that said "Iraq is an imminent threat and has WMD's." At this time, it's unclear as to how high up the chain this type of "fact gathering" went, but we all know that it was used as one of the major reasons that America went to war.
I was not a supporter of Obama... a lot of what he stands for I dis-agree with.. but he IS our President (or will be) so enough said.. in 4 years we will still have things to bitch about just like the other side still hates Bush and still will in 10 yrs and still be blaming him for the early depression... why dont we just move forward and work together to make a little sense in a society that is going to Hell in a hand bag.. and not a versace one at that yeah yeah I know... I am so over getting into arguments over this stuff.. I do it to stir people along, but reality is I dont know a lot, I know what I agree with and what I dont, and heck... we have enough issues around this site without having to bicker over political points of view when our views are mostly formed by drive by media that is only reporting crap.. enough.. good night
Well the clean water act passed We already had that system in place, but now they sunk in a bunch of crap under that bill that we will have to pay for!
Are you claiming that the CIA knew that there was going to be an attack within a short time or that they knew that on 9/11 they'd hijack some planes and run them into some buildings? They both fall under this. One is possible. One is pretty nutbar. Clinton Inaction? Clinton probably got the closest to killing Bin Laden of anyone with the cruise missiles. And the right was really really pissed off when he did that.
62% of Americans said that the economy was the number one issue facing Americans today. That is why Obama got more votes- citizens agree he has a better plan to get the nation on it's feet again. The trickle down theory that Republicans use doesn't benefit the middle and lower class. It's just a good way to keep rich people rich. These rich people that I am talking about are 5% of Americans, and they own 90% of the nations wealth. So if anyone here's number one concern is the economy- Obama would be the natural choice. Unless you're filthy rich. Only 9% of Americans said that national security was the biggest issue. These people voted for McCain- because he's experienced and intellegent in war. McCain is a great candidate and a great man. Unfortunately for him, his strong suits weren't the nation's top priority.
"Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces, and Resources For a New Century" is a document that was written and published by the Bush administration in 2000. In it are 68 pages of strategies to beef up our military. Much of which include taking control on 'common areas'. These are places like the ocean, lakes, rivers, national parks, and yes- space. Bush's buddies would like to make a space force, SPACECOM, as a part of the military "to protect America and it's citizens". Anyway, there is a paragraph that states, "Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likey to be a long one, absent some catastropic and catalyzing event- like a new Pearl Harbor...." (there is plenty more). What they mean is, there needs to be an event to get Americans rilied up and rearin' to go to war. Citizen don't support going to war without just cause. Pearl Harbor was the reason we got knee deep into WWII, and 9/11 is the reason for the TWO wars we are in currently. Conspiracy theororists believe one of two things: A) We let it happen B) We made it happen
I agree with a lot of this... ^^ You also have to throw in the fact that Obama and his crew also did an excellent job of portraying McCain as "more of the same" by claiming he was just another version of Bush, which really isn't necessarily true. It is my understanding that in reality McCain was generally considered to be a more liberal Republican with a history of working closely with quite a few from the Democratic party on many issues. Smart tactic for Obama's party. Coupled with common "fears" and concerns the majority of the population had as pointed out above, and it was quite evident that it was going to be a tough election for conservatives. I tend to vote conservative and Obama isn't necessarily my choice, but he is going to be our next president and will I will have no problem giving him the benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise. I hope he can follow through with a lot of his promises and can lift this country, as well as improve our view from around the world and in general just provide some leadership to help us continue to grow. Go USA!
ill put in my .02 cents worth, its not one person that changes everything, all laws passed have to go through congress to, i dont see why people get so worked up over 1 person being elected.
:lollol::iamwithstupid::shutup: why are you talking politics on a subaru forum. You all make very good points but plz. Most of us dont care.:biggrin:
