The 2012 US Presidential Election - Who will run, Who will win???

Yah, Bachman tends to characterize things in ways that suit her political needs, sometimes in the face of reality.To be fair, so does Obama. Its one of the big reasons I won't be voting for her. Romney is guilty of it too, though to a lesser extent IMO. Bachman is very blatant and stubborn about her mischaracterizations. A good politician should be able to lie to you in a way that, even if you don't believe it, you still like the guy when he gets done saying it. Clinton was a master politician, making all these guys look like the B team, with Obama and Bachman looking like B team rookies. On that front, Gingrich is probably the top dog in the pack.

By the way, lets also not forget that we didn't need to raise the debt ceiling and had we not, we would have not received a downgrade. In other words, Bachman was right. To do it, we would have had to make immediate and draconian cuts across the board, like many states and most European countries are currently doing. If you consider that those cuts were never going to happen because of politics, Bachman was wrong. She was wrong in the same way one lemming in the middle of the herd marching off the cliff is wrong when he shouts out, "Wait! Turn around!!". Not only can you not turn the herd, you can't even avoid being pushed by the herd to your doom.

I must have misunderstood. I read this:

and I got the impression that a) Bachman really thinks that, b) it is wrong, and c) she is the only one who doesn't get the joke. Where I come from, that is the same as calling someone stupid. I highly doubt that item (a) is even true, which makes b and c the counterargument to a straw man setup to call someone stupid.

As would I. What I said was liberals are sexist and partisan, but sexist first. Did you like the shake Hillary Clinton got in 2008?

Same here. I personally suspect she would have found a shorter, thicker frank to be more satisfying.

 

We may differ a great deal politically in this regard, as I'm not specifically looking for a politician that is a good liar.

I think we would have defaulted, and created economic havoc not only in the US, but around the world. If so, this probably would have effected our credit rating.

I think calling a person stupid is kind of harsh. I don't always live up to how I think I should be, but I try not to do that. You could say that I think that statement was really stupid. I don't care for the idea of her being President.

I'm not a Hillary fan either. At the time of the last election, I voted Ron Paul in the primary, and Barr in the general election. I don't even know that much about him, but he seemed better than the alternatives at that moment. I wasn't really keeping an eye on Hillary in the election, I remember something about her campaign planting question askers at events, but other than that, don't really remember. If you're still thinking about it, feel free to post a link of how Hillary was wronged.

 

Sorry, did I imply it was something I was looking for in a politician? Gingrich's numbers reflect his struggle with the truth. So do Obama's. Clinton's only comment on Rick Perry, "He's a good lookin rascal". Likability goes a long way towards getting your agenda through. Maybe if Obama took a page out of Clinton or Reagan's playbook, he wouldn't need to punish his enemies. Its called consensus building.

I agree. The entrenched interests in Washington will not stop sending until our currency is worthless and unemployment is at 50%. It doesn't make her wrong about what to do, it just makes her wrong about her timing.

How quickly we forget.

Hey I'm cool with it. We should be able to call Hillary a nag or a witch, right? And use the 'N' word in reference to Obama? Wait a minute, didn't we use 'witch' again recently? Christine O'Donnel comes to mind.

Rank liberal hypocrisy is one of the biggest reasons they can't get better than 35% support on a national scale. The mantra has always been more Saul Alinsky: Win at any cost, even if it means using racist terms like Uncle Tom, or blatant sexism. Yah, Hillary got her share of it when the attack machine turned on her. Republican women get it that much more because they are both woman AND in the wrong political party. New age uncle toms.

Even the supposedly non-partisan National Organization for Women remained oddly silent as sexism was used against professional and successful women like Meg Whitman in California, and they certainly didn't have any problem with abuse of the less educated, grittier, blue collar girls like Palin and O'Donnell. Apparently, they've received enough backlash over all this crap that they finally spoke out on the choice of cover photos used for Bachman on Newsweek.

 

Another rabbit out of the hat.....

 

as a new yorker i was going to say that george pataki had no chance for the presidency in 2012. he is no weaker than the other republican candidates but with a built up campaign there could be something.

 

Sorry if I mistook your position. But, as far as "A good politician should be able to lie to you in a way that, even if you don't believe it, you still like the guy when he gets done saying it." Really, I don't view a politician lying to me as a good politician.

I didn't forget. I never read about it until now. The Presidential campaign was really ugly. That may be why I missed someone writing in the media that Hillary was a "nag" and her laughter sounded like the cackle of "hens" and "witches". I guess there were others writing racially-related slurs about Obama. Happily, I'm sure I missed reading some of those as well.

Who are you talking to? You're aware that's not my position. It can't be the writer of the Salon article, as it's not theirs either. Of course, one would be able to use sexist and racist terms, it's part of our freedom of speech. But, in my opinion, it just takes the credibility away from members of the media that choose to do so.

 

Maureen Dowd, leftist extraordinaire is the first name that comes to mind, only because she was directly named in the Salon article. I would throw the entire National Organization for Women on the list too. Like the ACLU, they start out with a wonderful charter and devolve into partisan attack dogs. I also throw Salon on that list. The amount of rank hypocrisy required to used sexist attacks on women within their own party may have been too much for them, but they have no problems engaging in the activity against any Republican woman.

Regarding freedom of speech, sorry but that is a cop out. Democrats supposedly stand for women's rights, so every time they use sexism, they look a lot like the "Moral" Republican who gets caught cheating on his wife with another man. Freedom of speech would also be inapplicable to any nationally recognized right wing pundit that used the 'N' word on air or in print. There may be racists in the Republican party, as there are in the Democratic party, but as you know it is completely unacceptable in either case.

 

Okay, you made me look up Maureen Dowd's columnist page on The New York Times.

I think the word usage of calling Hillary a "nag" was poor. However, after reading some of her articles, sexist language does not appear to be a pattern. What does seem to be a pattern is her disgust for the Tea Party.

 

This is why I'm not a Democrat. I was once, many many years ago, until I was a consultant for a Democrat politician and realized that the politicians with a (D) after their name are all hypocrites. They don't want to help the poor, they want to keep them poor to harvest their votes. Dems want to own minorities, and any minority that is a Conservative and popular is viciously and relentlessly attacked (ex; Clarence Thomas).

N.O.W. lost all their power during the Bill Clinton scandals. With the accusations of rape while he was governor, collaborated by two Arkansas State Troopers, and his treatment of Lewinsky, N.O.W. was shamefully silent. Their board finally issued a gutless release that said they have not condemned President Clinton because of all the good things he's done for women in the past. Evidently, N.O.W.'s members didn't feel the same way as the board did, and donations dried up. Today, Liberal extremist Bill Maher spews hate-filled violent sexist rants against women, and except for the rare, lukewarm chiding, N.O.W. is eerily silent (and Maher is a man that does, sincerely hate women). N.O.W. is now a worthless organization.

 

I think that is accurate. She hates, and the word "hate" is appropriate, all things conservative. As a purveyor of hate, she doesn't mind using sexism in her hate, even when it is directed at members of the liberal party(Democrats) who are more conservative than others (Hillary). It isn't that she is sexist, sexism is just a tool that she uses when it suits her needs. You need to read Saul Alinskys rules for Radicals to get an understanding of the mindset. If immoral "ends justiifies the means" politics is your cup of tea, than this book is your bible, and people like Dowd are your fellow devotees.

@Corwin: I have no idea how I managed to forget about Maher in the course of this conversation. Here is a "respected" individual in liberal circles who has absolutely no qualms about referring to a woman as a "c*nt" on national television, but refuses to apologize when pressed on the issue.

[video=youtube;I9UNOXZnBLk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9UNOXZnBLk[/video]

Almost every woman I've ever known has found that word to be like nails on a chalkboard, probably very analogous to a black guy who hears a white guy using the word "n*gger". Even more fascinating is the abject refusal of those on the left to disown the guy after this kind of behavior. Google "maher c word" and you won't find a single MSM media outlet on page one, other than Fox, that has given the story enough print press to get indexed. Its pathetic.

 

The back story is, Bill Maher used to be funny and entertaining. But about, I dunno, 8 years ago (I"m guessing) he had been dating a very hot girl and paid for the two of them to fly to Vegas for the weekend. He didn't get laid. He then talked about this on one of this Real Time episodes on HBO, that if he paid for a girl to go on an overnight trip with him, there should be an expectation of getting laid...

I really felt for the guy because he was sincerely clueless - On the one hand, this girl may had taken advantage of him and he didn't have the understanding to know it, OTOH, he may have made her feel like a whore... But right after that episode, everything changed - he got angrier and spewed hate-filled rants against women of all political persuasions.

 

The thing with Maher, and Corwin hit the nail on the head here.. is he just is no longer funny. That's why he got kicked off of prime time. No one watched his show. And those that did were not enough to justify or garner enough advertising dollars to keep him on the air.

Now that he can swear and bring on other lewd guests who can swear and pander to an audience that enjoys shouting vulgarities at and about things they just do not understand or like HBO apparently felt there were enough people out there that would pay to watch him.

Look, ultimately the advertisers did not feel that a former (amateur) stand up (mediocre at best) comedian doing political satire that appeals to one small niche' market was not enough of a reach for their products.

With HBO you have SEVERAL different channels to choose from. So you can see drama, comedy, family, horror, sex, or SHIT like Maher, if you so desire.

He's got a small niche' following and it seems to work for him once every few weeks here and there, so long as he's not hogging the one and only HD channel.

I doubt he earns much more than he did from HBO hosting a stand up comedy hour where he got his start. Maher like Olbermann is simply a washed up no talent that could not hack it amongst his peers in his own field of expertise. Instead they both chose political satire and obstinate thinking over improving on their craft.

 

I used to find Maher funny, but yeah, he just seemed to have turned bitter. Olberman at one point seemed to be a journalist, but somewhere during the 2008 campaign he visibly cast it away and dropped all pretense of being anything more than a cheerleader for Obama. He did so to the point that he afterward became an embarrassment even for a network that itself serves largely the same function but tries to at least occasionally maintain a thin pretense of being in the business of reporting instead of just evangelizing for the left.

The line between reporting and entertainment has become increasingly blurred in the last decade, but it's never been a secret that news venues have been in the biz of promoting an agenda. It has always been so. The Hearst news organization was credited with starting the Spanish-American war before the 20th century started. It's up to individuals to filter what they hear and consider the source.

Frankly it's the reason Fox news has extremely high viewership compared to the other channels. "Fair and balanced"? Hardly. Everyone is aware they're slanted to the right, but with all other networks slanted left, they do provide "balance" by providing the only visual medium that covers news from the other angle.

 

Speaking of washed up no talent hacks that have fallen from previously ground breaking careers, I saw Dan "the Dan" Rather on Rachel Maddow last night, opining on the situation in Libya. For a very long time when the networks were the only real game in town, "The Dan" ruled with an iron fist. After decades delivering slanted news as real journalism, he got busted when he decided to run with a leftist partisan story that appears to have been made up out of whole cloth! It was just a bridge too far. Now he is the head guy at some no-name network, probably fetching Olbermann's coffee at the same location. So sad.

 

Yeah, Rather flew too close to the fire several times prior to that, and people kept thinking "but he wouldnt do *that*... he's a real journalist!" Finally despite all evidence he was buying a fake story, he decided that even though the story was clearly made up, he decided to run with it it cause he was sure something like it happened even if this one was based on fabricated evidence.

He went down in flames when a blogger (Dan's crowd dismissed bloggers as "guys in pajamas") spotted the flaw in the primary document that supplied Dan's "smoking gun". It was printed on a 1960s era inkjet. [For those no older than my boots... there were no inkjets in the '60s... there were typewriters.] The doc was written with a font that didnt exist when it was supposedly written.

Rather and the producer that was equally aware they were peddling snake oil in an attempt to sway an election saw the whole facade of respectable journalism collapse around their very partisan little ears. The attempt came right before a presidential election, and but for a sharp-eyed blogger might have changed history.

Actually it DID change history. The main stream media now fears the hell outta bloggers.

 

I believe the book "Bias" by Bernie Goldberg came out right around the same time. In the book, Bernie, a self proclaimed leftist at the time, relates story after story of his personal experiences working with "The Dan" at CBS. The book spelled out how "The Dan", CBS, and the other networks had driven public opinion by giving little or no air time to issues and opinions they disagreed with. Chapter after chapter detailed how headlines and story structure were used, not to report the news, but to move public opinion. The book was a HUGE top seller and, along with Dan Rather's fall from grace, turned American news viewers into skeptics.

It cracks me up because Piers Morgan interviews CNN anchors when he can't line up someone legitimate to interview, which is often. One evening he had Christiane Amanpour as his guest. She had no issue talking about their duty to drive policy. She views herself as some sort of crusader, out to save the planet. ATVKing will love this one. Piers asked her if she was sorry she didn't do more to bring attention to Rwanda, and she said she was too busy saving Bosnia and she is only one person after all. She said she had to stay focused on Bosnia if she were to sway opinion and get action. For such an educated woman, it amazes me she would openly admit she reports for the purpose of driving an agenda. She doesn't even give lip service to objectivity. From that day on, I tune out practically everything I see her on.

For anyone who hasn't read Bias, I highly recommend it. Bernie is a smart guy, and it will change the way you watch news. All news.

 

I read "Bias" when it first came out. Fascinating book that really opened many people's eyes. Dan Rather really has no respect for the truth.

I recall that there was an editorial doctrine at CBS to get minorities on camera. There was an Asian man on the CBS news crew that was often put in front of the camera at the scene of disaster to pretend (lie) that he lived in that area.

I remember that the whole scandal with the forged document just killed CBS News. While every other network was decrying the document as a complete fraud, CBS kept claiming that they had experts that said it was real. Meanwhile, some of those same experts appeared on other news shows complaining that they told CBS the document was a fake, but CBS had edited, cut and pasted things they said to make it appear that the fraudulent document was real. I think one even sued CBS. You could download a screenshot of the CBS document and then recreate the same text on Microsoft Word using the default font and margins, exactly. You could hold the two up to the light and see them match.

David Letterman on CBS let it leak that he had been told by CBS to not make any jokes, or even mention, the scandal. What a mess for CBS!

 

I think Ron Paul is right in his call to evaluate the Constitutionality of the government agencies created in the past 100 years. Things have been in an uproar and maybe it we stuck to the foundation of our country's formation we'd have less trouble trying to play this balancing act.

 

FOX News plays a backwards game of partisanship in their own collective heads. I don't see how anyone can take the things their personalities say seriously. Glen Beck is a tragedy in and of himself. I can't believe that people out there follow him blindly. Same with Jon Stewart (but Stewart is usually unbiased and reactionary whereas Beck makes sweeping accusations based on his own "research".

Anderson Cooper is the man. I think he and Jon should co-anchor a more newsy Daily Show news program. 1 hour doesn't do it anymore - not with all of the bs correspondents on that show anymore... Let's move onward and upward...

 

Of course they do. Their bias plays as somewhat of a counterweight to the longstanding bias of the MSM, and the extreme partisan bias of outfits like MSNBC. The collective lot of them (ALL) have become news entertainment with some fading shades of journalism mixed in here and there. Fox rules the roost with a gaggle of well endowed, extremely intelligent hot women. It doesn't get much more entertaining than that.

I almost spit my food out when you mentioned Glenn Beck and "Research" in the same sentence. Now that is comedy, though to his credit, his "Research" ended Van Jones' brief stint at the white house (Allah be praised). Jon Stewart is a far cry from unbiased, though he is willing to take shots at the left now and again, which speaks well of him. Besides, hes damn funny, and that goes a long way towards forgiving his liberal leanings.

I like AC too. He does his best to be objective, even when dealing with issues near and dear to his heart like homosexuality, though he is the guy who invited a gay coast guard General to a Republicans primary debate, and let him hammer away on open gay military service(as if that were part of the Republican platform). It was a bit like bringing a libertarian to a Democratic primary and letting him hammer away on the candidates on how they would make the government smaller. A general election debate, that guy would have been fair game, but not in a primary.

BTW, talk about money in the game, did you know AC is the child of Gloria Vanderbilt, and a direct heir to the Vanderbilt fortune? Its enough to foster a few conspiracy theories.....