Friday Open Thread
w00t for Friday! How are your NCAA picks doing? I’ll bet none of you picked Murray State. You should know that teams connected to me do well. Pick Murray State (my parents’ alma mater), Kentucky (my home state), Wisconsin (my alma mater) and you’ll do well. I’ve won exactly 0 of brackets I’ve picked in my life so I know what I’m talking about. Enough with the important stuff, let’s open thread.
The anti-incumbent national mood also affects Republicans. John McCain is in trouble in Arizona.
The latest Rasmussen poll has John McCain up over primary challenger and former Rep. J.D. Hayworth by a mere 7 points. As a point of comparison, Rasmussen’s last poll of this race, from two months ago, had McCain holding a 22 point margin.
My, how the mighty have fallen.
Gen. John Sheehan is an asshole:
A retired U.S. general said Thursday that the Dutch policy of allowing openly gay soldiers to serve in its military led, in part, to its failure to halt the massacre of Muslims in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, “nations like Belgium, Luxembourg, the Dutch, et cetera, firmly believed there was no longer a need for an active combat capability in the militaries,” John Sheehan, former supreme allied commander – Atlantic, told a Senate hearing on the don’t ask, don’t tell policy under which gays are not allowed to serve in the U.S. military openly.
“As a result, they declared a peace dividend and made a conscious effort to socialize their military,” he said. “That includes the unionization of their militaries. It includes open homosexuality demonstrated in a series of other activities, with a focus on peacekeeping operations, because they did not believe the Germans were going to attack again or the Soviets were coming back.
“That led to a force that was ill-equipped to go to war. The case in point that I’m referring to is when the Dutch were required to defend Srebrenica against the Serbs. The battalion was under-strength, poorly led, and the Serbs came into town, handcuffed the soldiers to the telephone poles, marched the Muslims off and executed them,” Sheehan said.
“That was the largest massacre in Europe since World War II.”
I’m glad Sheehan is a retired general.
Tags: Open Thread
http://tv.gawker.com/5497006/the-jon-stewart-clip-that-will-make-glenn-beck-cry-real-tears
Jon Stewart EVISCERATED Glenn Beck last night.
Even though Gen. Sheehan is retired, he is still subject to the UCMJ and could be brought up on charges for lying to Congress (he lied about speaking to Dutch military officials). His comments just show that any run-of-the-mill asshole can be made a general.
And I found out where Clinton Bunting got his 20 million visitor figure to support his proposed theft of state parkland for a casino – the Rehoboth Beach-Dewey Beach Chamber of Commerce, in its latest issue of “Focus On,” states that there are a “22 million POTENTIAL visitors within 150 miles.” This is quite different than what he has been saying. Another “fact” that he pulled out of his arse.
Hey, maybe we could get some of those DOJ Terrorist lawyers to prosecute him. That is, if they’re not too busy fixing Bin Laden’s traffic tickets or whatever they’re supposed to be doing.
There is not a shred of evidence that he lied. You just want to shut up anyone that disagrees with you. He is right that if don’t care about fighting effectiveness than put leftist social policy in place. The Europeans are a joke. They can afford to be because we aren’t. I am opposed to any repeal of DADT.
Republicans passed around a fake “Democratic” memo and Politico fell for it.
Stop the Rogue government. The people don’t want this insane health deform. The mere threat of this bill has insurance rates skyrocketing and companies like Caterpillar moving jobs overseas. The President could have a bipartisan bill with the support of most people in a month if he wanted it. This the worst example of governing in a generation. It is a rogue government running roughshod over the constitution, the states, and the people.
You’re right David, Sheehan could actually be that stupid.
The mere threat of this bill has insurance rates skyrocketing
Good. The private sector is proving its bad faith, and demand for a public solution will increase.
ROFL
Rogue government = democratically-elected government not run by Republicans
You think 27% support is good? Most people oppose the deform bill. Whether or not Republicans oppose it makes no difference to them. That is a weird and meaningless question and only you would think it is good news for it. The real numbers that matter are from the question are you more or less likely to vote for a supporter of the bill. In most swing districts, less likely is a strong majority even topping 60% in many. That is toxic for any numskull congress person who thinks Nancy will be able to come up with some way to save them.
This is the self destruct button for the Democrats. It couldn’t happen to a nicer party.
Hitler, Chavez, Hussein (early on), and Hamas were all Democratically elected. A government becomes rogue when it uses its legitimate power to take over illegitimately against the will and rights of the people.
No, please don’t waste time asking me if Obama is Hitler. I am reminding you that democracies can fall off the edge as well. That is why our founders made us a Constitutional Republic. We have abandoned that for democracy and we suffer for it.
Stop the Rogue government.
I guess “Rogue” now means “democratically elected”?
The people don’t want this insane health deform.
And “The people” means “me and a steadily decreasing narrow plurality on some polls”.
The mere threat of this bill has insurance rates skyrocketing
And I’m sure as soon as you Kill the Bill those nice insurers will lower their rates and keep decreasing them like they were.
The President could have a bipartisan bill with the support of most people in a month if he wanted it.
Irrelevant. The only possible reason to make the bill any worse would be if some GOP votes could be picked up. And if you think that’s possible, I’ve got some “Industrial land” in Sussex County to sell you.
Now settle down, have a drink, and relax, my friend. Sometimes in big peoples’ government, you don’t get to control the game. It doesn’t mean the game is out of control, just out of your control.
Isn’t being the loyal opposition to insanity as worthy as being part of the ruling regime? The last time I checked, government had two main factions, the leadership and the opposition. I think my role is at least as valuable as yours.
Stop the Rogue government.
As Jon Stewart put it:
“You lost. It’s supposed to taste like a shit taco.”
No worries though, with all those people on your side you will handily elect a new Congress who will repeal it, right?
Obviously David doesn’t know how to read polls. 27% said they are more likely to support the bill because all Republicans oppose it. The support was 46% support, 42% opposed – a plurality in favor.
I’m definitely opposed to Republican insanity.
I suppose by David’s logic Bush is better because he wasn’t actually democratically elected. Republican logic is hard to follow – votes shouldn’t count if they elect someone they oppose, yet they look forward to voting if they think they’re going to win.
PELOSI LIES ABOUT CATHOLIC SUPPORT
Catholic League ^ | March 19, 2010 | Bill Donohue
Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on remarks made by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi today:
Last year, when Nancy Pelosi went to see the pope, she was denied the opportunity to exploit him: photographers were not invited into the room for the typical photo session. Instead, Pope Benedict XVI reminded her of the duties expected of public Catholics. But her determination to play the Catholic card—oh, so selectively—rebounded again when she informed the media that today is the feast of St. Joseph, a special day of prayer for workers, and especially Italians. She apparently stopped short of blessing herself, though she didn’t stop short of invoking St. Joseph’s name in support of the health care bill. Separation of church and state fanatics who suffered apoplexy whenever George W. Bush dropped the Lord’s name are not expected to take to the streets.
Then Pelosi lied. She said she is grateful for the support of 60 orders of nuns, not mentioning that the letter she received had a whopping total of 55 signatories. Worse, she had the gall to say that this represents “every order you can think of.” Wrong. In fact, there are 793 religious communities, which means she heard from seven-and-a-half percent of them. Moreover, since there are approximately 65,000 nuns in the U.S., that means she was contacted by .0008 percent of them.
In other words, not only are the bishops formally opposed to the bill she champions, it’s a lie to maintain that the nuns are on her side. Shameless is too kind a word to use to describe what Pelosi did today.
You are a real idiot, Phoney.
There is nothing those people can’t sucker you into believing.
OK – who spiked David’s Wheaties with crack this morning?
An excellent piece of journalism:
http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20100320/NEWS02/3200342/O-Donnell-faces-debt-tax-issues
… and Christine is now toast.
Ooh, that is a great article. I’m going to put up a post, anon, so we can all discuss it.
Democrats working on executive order on abortion
Associated Press ^ | March 20, 2010
WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic lawmakers say party leaders are considering winning crucial support from abortion foes for health care overhaul legislation with an executive order by President Barack Obama. The order – which does not require congressional approval – would be aimed at reflecting long-standing law barring federal aid for abortions except for cases of rape or incest or when the mother’s life is threatened. Democratic Reps. Henry Waxman of California and James Oberstar of Minnesota both said an executive order was under discussion by party leaders.
Thank Goodness the dems ditched the deem and pass scenario. They will not vote twice up or down on the bill….much cleaner.