Sore Loserman
 

I believe tonight, more than ever, in America's greatness in its values, in its promises of opportunity equality. Together. I am confident that we can find common ground and secure a better future… that and nonpartisanship is what politics should be about. That is exactly the mission I ask you to join me in tonight. Will you join me?

Go away.

Maybe the voters have finally had enough. I give Joe a month or so before he decides to drop out for the good of CT and the Democratic Party...blah blah blah.

The fucking guy wants to keep all his options open and commit to nothing.

Dude backed a losing horse.

Wants to eat his cake and have it too.

Cry me a fucking river.

I am a Joe supporter and expect him to win in November. He is nicely ahead in the polls in a unique state in which 40% of the electorate is registered Unaffiliated with any party.

Joe apparently wants to stay in the spotlight as much as possible, right up to 2008, of course. I don't think he intends to win this fall, just come out with a decent showing.

I don't think he has a chance of becoming president though. I don't think Americans are willing to elect a Jew as president, no matter how much they claim to love Israel and Jews.

He'll get a block of vote just because he has tenure and seniority, he'll get another block for the things he's done for the state. It'll be interesting which candidate he hurts more. :confused:

Many have said that this was a one-issue race. And it was...to a point. From Lamont's website:

I am running for the US Senate because we deserve a Senator who will stand up for Connecticut and stand up for our progressive democratic values. Rather than spending hundreds of millions of dollars a day in Iraq, it is time for America to refocus on issues back home: fixing our health care system, upgrading our schools, and rebuilding our aging infrastructure. We will start winning in Iraq as the Iraqis take control of their own destiny, just as America has to start investing again in our own future.

Sounds to me like the guy has plans beyond Iraq.

Outside Iraq his foreign policy is smarmy touchy-feely crapola. He hasn't paid attention and it will probably get him in trouble in the next few months, make my words.

But nobody cares about that stuff. The reason this happened was because a series of blogs became really political, incredibly motivated, and simply could not wait to exercise its power. It's a remarkable phenomenon. But it was blood in the water to sharks. And so far, all it has done is tear down a powerful standing senator who was 90% on their side.

And to very seriously hurt the chances that the Ds will take back the Senate. Mickey Kaus:
The drama is exquisite if this comes to pass. I'm half hoping for it just for the beautiful fireworks display.

I believe you can never get a candidate that you are 100% happy with. The furious "netroots" circle that gave Lamont his base have not matured enough, not seen enough elections to really understand that. They are like babes playing with their new metal toy and they may have to stick it into an electrical outlet to learn if that's a good idea.

I'm not a huge fan of Lieberman, but he is more of a moderate. I think this country desperately needs moderates on both sides. This is a step in the wrong direction.

Of course he's using talking points, UT...I wouldn't expect anything less. I merely used that to underscore that this is about more than Iraq to him.

While the blogs may have provided a spark, they can only provide so much momentum. Darrell Issa bankrolled the recall in CA, but couldn't win the GOP nomination. You have have fuel for a fire...blogs are tinder or kindling at this point, IMO. And when I look at this election along with Cynthia McKinney being knocked out in Georgia, I get the idea that at least some Democrats are tired of the same ol' bullshit...they want to start fresh. And why not? The current Democrat powers-that-be are only doing well at this point because of GOP gaffes.

Not even in Ct?
I can picture you waving a Cuban Cigar in the caucus room, saying that. :D

I agree, but it's not time to shift to the left. We've had six years of right-wing extremist bullshit. You don't fight that with left-wing extremism - you fight it with moderation. Liberals are going to vote Democrat, conseratives, repubican. The key will be getting moderates to vote Democrat. I think moderates are typically more conservative on spending, more liberal on social issues. Have you ever heard of someone who supports spending but is against spending it on social issues? Democrats also need to show potential voters that they are tough on defense, and that's what Leiberman did. I was against the invasion of Iraq, and would like to see us out of there, but there has to be a good plan in place, first. If I were the Democrats, I would make a platform that is more moderate, like Leiberman.

There's no left-wing extremist in that race.

I was speaking in general terms, but Leiberman appears to be more moderate than LaMont.

Not really. That's how he has to frame it, but they're both pretty moderate. And on points they disagree on, to consider Lieberman moderate would, for the most part, require that you consider Bush moderate.

Here's the reason to consider Bush moderate: he's not extremist anything. Sure, he's right of center, but that isn't extremist.

Stem cell research. Gay marriage. Tax cuts. Expanding power of the Executive. Do you want more examples?

Not extreme, laddie: just because fringe leftists call it extreme doesn't make it so. Considering the source, it's usually a strong indication it isn't so. Those guys are simply wrong an awful lot of the time.

You see, the dumbshits who pronounce Republican as "enemy" aren't worthy of consideration as serious thinkers, but only as dingdongs likely to commit crimes with explosives -- if they don't blow themselves up making them.

Jesous Christos UG! You just keep showing yourself as more closed minded and condescending with every political post you make.

Many of those fringe leftists you speak of are considered centrist or even slightly right leaning in many countries. It depends on your point of view of course (maybe I don't think gulags are extreme and maybe you don't think bombing San Francisco is extreme) but a large portion of the world considers Bush very far right.

I'm very curious where you get your news from, but I think I know.

Radical conservative repubicans
moderate
George W. Bush only looks moderate from Barry Goldwater's point of view. You're way out of the mainstream, UG.
Bush is really just your typical right wing religious fundamentalist conservative hypocrit. Like Jimmy Swaggert with Porn, Rush Limbaugh with drugs, and Bill O'Reilly with family values, the Cheney administration talks about less government and less government spending, then DOES the opposite. They talk about spreading freedom, then secretly monitor phone traffic.

Timothy McVeigh was liberal? Radical fundamentalist Islamic Jihadists are Liberal? Is that because they allow same-gender marriage and are pro-big-government, or what?

You take that back! UG has been consistently closed minded and condescending form his very first post. :rolleyes:

lol Bruce. I honestly don't have anything against UG... he may be a swell guy in person and he seems sane when he's not posting about commie plots. I'd like to see him make points without resorting to name calling or castigating those who disagree with him. Sadly I've not seen this; you could replace commie with alien and liberal with monster and still find the same amount of support backing what he says. Really, if there is a commie / liberal plot to destroy the world I want to know about it in explicit detail.

Not insane: indignant. The one communist I'm acquainted with to any degree is tw, who I at first thought was merely perverse and irrational, until I noticed just how often and how completely his style of anti-Americanism resembles what the Soviets put out. There was a time when I'd see what the Soviets said pretty much as something related to the work I did in the Navy. Tw doesn't vary much from the stuff I saw.

Tw as a communist propagandist must be rejected of men, and completely, until such time as he becomes a pro-American libertarian. Fat chance, eh? Until that fortunate day, he tastes the lash. Communism's record is terrible, and their abuse of democracy, the one legitimate form of government, unconscionable. Add to this that there is no other form of totalitarianism that is an improvement over communism's collectivist totalitarianism, and you see where my motivation comes from.

As for close-minded -- my mind's only closed to antidemocracy, oppression, and other evils. Those to whom I condescend have been whoring after that which brings these. I say this is about equal parts stupid and perverse.

From the day I joined to today, tw has said nothing anti-libertarian and nothing pro-communism. I think that alone totally negates everything youre saying. He DOESN'T support america wholeheartedly in every case, but only a fool would. Democracies are not always right and non-democracies are not always wrong. I'll say it again, what you are saying is on par with 'it has fur, a tail, and hooves, so it must be a horse!'
It's that kind of logic that gets you sitting atop a cow. Show me one single quote where tw says a single thing in support of communism and I'll give an ounce of credit to your claims that he is a communist. Until then, I still think he's a better, more democratic, more openminded, more kind person than you, UG.

UG, I think you nuts, but far from stupid. Why is it you can't see statements like that, have zero effect on the person you're disagreeing with, but damage your own credibility with readers? :confused:

The one card-carrying Communist that I've met voted for GWB. Twice. The theory being: you can't rush a real revolution. Marx's theories say that a socialist revolution happens when the proletariat are so oppressed by the elite that they can't stand it anymore, take up arms, kill the oppressors, and establish the socialist utopia. So, he pushed things further in the direction towards revolution. Smart guy.
As far as UG: nuts? yes. Smart? No clue, but he certainly does seem to put on the stupid hat in here.

That must be a quote from Robin Williams - right? Maybe from the World According to Garp?

Bruce, he not only continues to propagandize from a Soviet Communist viewpoint, he does not deny doing so, and never has. (I haven't noticed anything particularly Maoist in tw's output, but I could be wrong there.) That Ibram, in his middle teens, can't recognize a communist when he hears one doesn't make my understanding any less valid, but tells me Ibram's not up to speed on communist propaganda. My remarks are accurate: check tw against what the Soviets used to try telling us -- cf. his comments on Vietnam and theirs -- and see for yourself. My experience with these things tells me that tw's unfortunate views are more coherently explained by a communist worldview than by some amorphous perversity of mind. It's a systematic perversity instead.

Do or do not the Communists blame America first, and perennially?

Do or do not the Communists undermine American military efforts to the best of their ability?

Do or do not the Communists prefer that America never take any action abroad, ever? They wanted us withdrawn from the world, the better to implement their oppressions and poverties. (A very bad religion, communism.)

Does or does not tw do all three of these, frequently and loudly? I keep seeing just that from him. You know what they say: once is happenstance, twice is coincidence; three times is enemy action.

So, do not reject it out of hand when I call somebody a communist. The left was handed an enormous gift with the scandal around Joe McCarthy, and since that debacle the intellectual lightweights think it "sophisticated" to dismiss it when somebody notes somebody else's communist attitudes -- all because Tail Gunner Joe had a brain tumor and fell to bits. That the loudest anticommunist in the Senate was a sick man doesn't invalidate anticommunist activism or sentiment -- as the lightweights would have it, and thereby roll over for oppression, poverty, and the generally suck quality of life that is what Communism delivers. That it's something tw is blind to is evidenced by his deafening silence on that point.

The lightweights would like to pretend this struggle was between the Communists and the Birchers. Not so; it was between the Communists and mankind.

Ibram's age is irrelevant. Nobody except you thinks that tw is communist. Of any age.None of those have anything to do with communism. Are you just using the word "communist" to mean "person who doesn't like some aspects of US foreign policy"? Your rehabilitation of McCarthy seems to suggest so.

I guess that mystery is solved.

Oh, real mature, bringing my age into it. You're only jealous cause I keep ripping your argument apart.

Once again, for good measure: Name ONE time tw has ever said that communism is a good thing.


EDIT: and keep in mind that I did live in a communist country for three years.

So is UG, Joe McCarthy's reincarnate or long lost son? :lol:

No. Dude works as a line-repairman for Qwest in Portland, OR.

UG is either pulling chains just because he can or he's finally gotten that Master's in Douchebaggery (his primary field of study is Moral Rectitude with a focus on Rectal Moritude)

Speaking of remarkable degrees of maturity...

Happy Monkey, you are wrong about that having nothing to do with Communism, though you could get right were you to start reading some history of the Soviets' actions -- for those were exactly the things they tried. Try looking in your public library. Please keep in mind that unlike you, I have some experience of this stuff. I know you don't because you'd sound more like me if you did.

Ibram's age has this relevance: he's post-Cold War, and hasn't done a lot of international-relations and history study for that period -- not having had time, nor apparently interest. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but it means he doesn't yet have an informed opinion. This is why he might believe he can rip my argument apart, but has not done so.

No. They are completely orthogonal to Communism.

You keep saying this, and we keep asking, but you never answer: WHAT TOTALITARIAN REGIME do you claim to have lived under?

I'm guessing he's referring to the army.

Where do those of us who weren't around in Communism's terrible reign of unimaginable cruelty go to find information which will identify tw as the "hammer & sickle painted on his barn" commie you imply he is? Somehow all my schooling thus far has glossed over this crucial information.

Once again, you prove yourself to be a prejudicial, presumptuous idiot. I actually know more about WWII-Cold War than about any other period in history, except what I've been alive in. I know all about communists and what they did and how they did it. I also know that doing things and saying things and believing things that resemble what the communists did and said and believed does not make you a communist any more than breathing (which the communists did) or eating (which the lucky commmunists did) or sleeping (which the communists did). You are a communist if you believe in communism and believe that a communist government is the right way to go.

I guess you missed it when I did answer (and I must say I can't recall you asking): this was my military service in the United States Navy. Militaries are totalitarian societies, or subcultures if you will. That you have the option to quit at the end of your enlistment doesn't reduce the totalitarian nature of the organization; it's a safety valve or perhaps an emergency exit.

I have not claimed, nor shall I ever, to have been a Romanian exile or something. Being in an armed service is a sufficient lessoning in totalitarianism for any reasonable person.

Then you should have recognized tw as a communist before I did, if you know so much about it. Kid, you're not proving your expertise by me, not so far. Show me knowledge, not rose fertilizer or bluster, okay?

As for the rest of your para, I'd call that drawing a distinction without a difference. If it quacks like a communist duck... Orwell had a word for that: duckspeak.

That's all you've got. The only thing you've raised about tw is that he doesn't like some aspects of US foreign policy. That has nothing to do with communism.

Jeb, you could do what I did and read the guy's posts. Note the anti-Americanism (and not much of a hop to anti-democracy as well), the whole "America's cause deserved to lose in Vietnam" spin, and the perennial undermining of American motivation to win out against anti-democracy enemies. Note that his political ire is reserved for the most firmly anticommunist of the major political parties: the Soviets and Chicoms learned decades ago that they can deal more profitably with the Democrats than the Republicans (and my, how often they profited). All this humbug is exactly what the Sovs pushed on the world for decades. This is where tw's thinking is stuck, and he won't or can't evolve to enlightenment. Thinking as he does, tw cannot be a real democrat. He can run a fraud, and he can try and pull the wool over your eyes. Unlike me, he has no will to win out against the antihuman forces of anti-democracy. Considering how much genocide the antidemocracies have stacked up, one wonders at his rationales, and one imagines the very worst of his motivations.

Monkey, I understand communism better than you do. If you understood it as I do, you'd sound a lot more like me.

Does anyone here besides UG agree with this statement?


I wont deny that the military is totalitarian, my dad's in it, I should know, but being in the US military is still much less totalitarian and much more free than being a citizen in most if not all totalitarian states. For example, in the military you need to get leave to go someplace. In China (if not currently then only a few years ago) , whether in the military or not, you need to get permission from the government, have a clear purpose in going, have forms filled out in triplicate... etc.

Being in the military, while a similar experience, is not experience enough. Its only marginally more than any other semi-learned person (if you even qualify as such), and not more at all than someone who has studied them. Or lived in one. Grown up in one, in fact.

Like HM said, all youve got is 'rose fertilizer and bluster'. I'm logically and reasonably backing up what I say.

Youre getting completely out-argued by a teenager. And at risk of sounding cocky, I'm fairly certain most if not all readers here would agree.

And that is probably one of the slipperyest slippery slopes ive ever seen.


He disagrees with america sometimes! America is a democracy, so he's against democracy!

He doesnt like Republicans! Hey, nor do most commies! He's a commie!

He thinks the us shouldnt have gone into Nam! Communists agree! He's a commie!

He disagrees with me! He must hate democracy, because I love democracy (as long as it's a democratically elected government thats far right-wing and archaic)!

If I understood it as you do, I would be completely incoherent. I'm glad I understand it as I do.

LOL. I've been on the planet half a century. There's no shame in being guided by those more experienced.

Ibbie, perhaps if you showed me ONE instance where tw was caught endorsing American policy, rather than trying to make me the issue -- you can't bait me in that direction -- you might have a better argument here. I'll for now avoid simply saying an argument, full stop.

Meanwhile, if it duckspeaks like an Orwellian commie duck, it's still an utka.

Show me one instance where I'VE endorsed (recent) American policy? I loathe what America has become. Am I a commie too, now?

Oow, oow....can I be a commie too. :haha:

If you want to be a guide, you'll need more on your resume than calling people commies and being middle aged.
If the world is divided into supporters of US foreign policy and commies, then the commies have won already, and Bush is their biggest recruiter.

UG's rants on Commies sort of reminds me of the dilemma of the average German in 1930's after being approached by a brownshirt.

Brownshirt: We're going to beat up some Commies, join us.
Citizen: Uh, no.
Brownshirt: You don't want to join us?
Citizen: No
Brownshirt: Ok, then, if you're not with us you must be with the Commies. Let's get him brothers!

Not being a Fascist doesn't make one a Communist and vice versa.

Do you still support him after he voted for torture and the suspention of habeas corpus?