[quote=“agentsmith”]US presidential candidates claim that, if elected, they will serve the American people but they all serve the interests of big banks and Wall Street.
[/quote]
Bankers are people too.
Whenever anyone says he will serve the people, ask him to be more specific about which people.
[quote=“rowland”][quote=“agentsmith”]US presidential candidates claim that, if elected, they will serve the American people but they all serve the interests of big banks and Wall Street.
[/quote]
Bankers are people too.
Whenever anyone says he will serve the people, ask him to be more specific about which people.[/quote]
The people who bought and paid for him. You didn’t think people give hundreds of millions of dollars to presidential campaigns without expecting to get something in return, did you?
The fact is with instant mass communications these days it would cost about a hundred dollars to hold a national election but then everyone would end up on an equal footing and that’s not the way it works.
Bob Gates:
[quote] Gates said Monday during a Politico Playbook event in Washington that “people are out there making threats and promises that are totally unrealistic, totally unattainable,” according to The Guardian.
“The level of dialogue on national security issues would embarrass a middle schooler,” he was quoted as saying about the GOP candidates.
Gates expanded on those comments during a Tuesday interview with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell. He said he was referring to candidates’ plans for dealing with the Islamic State terror group, including "carpet bombing them and making the sand glow and other such things.[/quote]
Who is this guy? Some typical liberal hippie peacenik, I guess.
[quote=“Winston Smith”]
The fact is with instant mass communications these days it would cost about a hundred dollars to hold a national election but then everyone would end up on an equal footing and that’s not the way it works.[/quote]
Power laws apply to power, among other things. If everybody in the country were running for office, the one who wins will be the one who spends the money to get his message out.
And if you manage somehow to eliminate money from campaigns, then it will be a 300-million way tie.
There is no equal footing. Never has been, never will be.
[quote=“rowland”][quote=“Winston Smith”]
The fact is with instant mass communications these days it would cost about a hundred dollars to hold a national election but then everyone would end up on an equal footing and that’s not the way it works.[/quote]
Power laws apply to power, among other things. If everybody in the country were running for office, the one who wins will be the one who spends the money to get his message out.
And if you manage somehow to eliminate money from campaigns, then it will be a 300-million way tie.
There is no equal footing. Never has been, never will be.[/quote]
Nobody is suggesting eliminating money from campaigns, that’s all but impossible. But any rational person must be able to admit by now that the Citizens United bullshit has made things exponentially worse. A good start would be rolling back the clock, and any candidate who doesn’t explicitly state they are for a repeal is suspect.
So much for my predictions- I figured it was Cruz who was tanking, not Trump. Rubio definitely a big winner. on to New Hampshire!
Indeed, Rubio showing some life. Trump won’t build off that.
I’m still not sure which of the three I’d prefer.
I prefer Trump or Cruz as I think Hillary would make short work of either, but Rubio could actually pose a threat. I can’t imagine woman and minorities coming out in mass numbers for either Trump or Cruz, but for Rubio it could happen.
Cue ad: Respectable middle-class white (of course!) woman walking to her car in multi-storey parking lot; suddenly attacked and thrown to the ground by man in black ski-mask ( ski-mask to avoid racial issues; black to trigger racial issues); shot of brutally beaten and obviously raped women in hospital with doctor holding sonogram while Paul Anka/& Odia Coates’ “You’re Having My Baby” plays in rising volume ; morph to Rubio’s face while voice-over says " If this happens to you Marco Rubio insists you should be forced to bear your rapist’s child."
She’s hot stuff with a hat pin, and good fun with a hand gun.
I saw Rubio trying to look tough, saying when it came to American hostages, he’d treat Iran like Reagan did, not that wimp Obama.
[quote]Following the Israeli–U.S. meeting, Israel requested permission from the United States to sell a small number of BGM-71 TOW antitank missiles]] to Iran, claiming that this would aid the “moderate” Iranian faction,[23] by demonstrating that the group actually had high-level connections to the U.S. government.[23] Reagan initially rejected the plan, until Israel sent information to the United States showing that the “moderate” Iranians were opposed to terrorism and had fought against it.[26] Now having a reason to trust the “moderates”, Reagan approved the transaction, which was meant to be between Israel and the “moderates” in Iran, with the United States reimbursing Israel.[23] In his 1990 autobiography An American Life, Reagan claimed that he was deeply committed to securing the release of the hostages; it was this compassion that supposedly motivated his support for the arms initiatives.[4] The president requested that the “moderate” Iranians do everything in their capability to free the hostages held by Hezbollah.[27]
A BGM-71 TOW anti-tank guided missile
The following arms were supplied to Iran:[28][29]
August 20, 1985 – 96 TOW anti-tank missiles
September 14, 1985 – 408 more TOWs
November 24, 1985 – 18 Hawk anti-aircraft missiles
February 17, 1986 – 500 TOWs
February 27, 1986 – 500 TOWs
May 24, 1986 – 508 TOWs, 240 Hawk spare parts
August 4, 1986 – More Hawk spares
October 28, 1986 – 500 TOWs
…
A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that’s true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. As the Tower board reported, what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages
[/quote]
Wiki
Obama didn’t even give them any cake
[quote]A retired Central Intelligence Agency official has confirmed to the Senate Intelligence Committee that on the secret mission to Teheran last May, Robert C. McFarlane and his party carried a Bible with a handwritten verse from President Reagan for Iranian leaders.
According to a person who has read the committee’s draft report, the retired C.I.A. official, George W. Cave, an Iran expert who was part of the mission, said the group had 10 falsified passports, believed to be Irish, and a key-shaped cake to symbolize the anticipated ‘‘opening’’ to Iran. [/quote]
nytimes.com/1987/01/11/us/mc … wanted=all
Take a look at the Clinton/Sanders debate vs the Krazy Klown show the Republicans put on, and tell me how anybody with an IQ in the double digits or up votes for any of these guys (possible exception- Kasich ).
Favorite point of the debate
even above Trump being shocked, shocked, that Bush was so vulgar as to mention mooning
-Jeb? whining that nobody should be allowed to criticise Presidents #41 or #43 because you don’t attack someone’s kinfolk ( does that apply to President #42 ?)
that Obama shoudn’t be allowed to do the exact same thing as Ronald Reagan because Obama is [ fill in the black I mean blank]
was Rubio saying Cruz couldn’t comment on Rubio’s pandering to Hispanic voters on Univision because Cruz doesn’t understand Spanish, with Cruz interrupting in Spanish to challenge Rubio to reply to him in Spanish- all the while both were claiming the title of who was going to be toughest on (non-Cuban ) (of course) illegal mmigrants.
Rubio seems to be the punch line for the past two GOP debates.
CNN’s closed captioner captures the esssence of the latest Republican debate:
Latest quotes from the campaign contestants
Bernie Sanders
Hillary Clinton
Donald Trump
Marco Rubio
[quote]“He called me Mr. Meltdown. Let me tell you something, last night during two of the debates, he went backstage, he was having a meltdown,” Rubio said in Dallas.
“First, he had this little makeup thing applying makeup around his mustache because he had one of those sweat mustaches. Then, he he asked for a full length mirror … maybe to make sure his pants weren’t wet.”[/quote]
What do people expect from Trump though? Remember this is a guy who sued Bill Maher for 5 million dollars after proving with his birth certificate that his mother in fact was not an orangutan.
Clinton and Sanders are talking real issues and it’s actually pretty interesting. Trump wants to turn America into celebrity apprentice and will conduct national business with his Twitter fingers.
[quote=“BrentGolf”]
Clinton and Sanders are talking real issues and it’s actually pretty interesting.[/quote]
They’re finally talking about all those State Department scandals?
BrentGolf:
But was it the long-form birth certificate?
Not even all the spinning of the Very Serious People can turn this into a victory for Marco.
I did like the way the Donald made Tough Guy Chris Christie into his personal flunky; wonder if he inherits the nickname Fredo?