Political Quotes of the Day

Discussing all things political in NW Arkansas and beyond.
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Dardedar »

On the now fizzled IRS scandal:

"These so-called not-for-profit tea party groups deserved more scrutiny from the IRS, not because they are Republican, but because 100 percent of them are in violation of the law. Tax-exempt groups are supposed to be tax-exempt because they are "charitable" or "social welfare organizations." The organizations are supposed to be feeding the poor or helping the sick. But that's not what they are doing. These tea party groups are laundering money so that rich people can give campaign contributions to help candidates and deduct it from their taxes. So saying that the IRS is targeting the tea party is like accusing law enforcement of targeting bank robbers. That's what they are supposed to do."
--Marc Perkel

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Dardedar »

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"If you explain a fact to a conservative, he loses his argument today.
If you teach a conservative how to research and understand the facts for himself, he becomes a liberal."
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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"I checked, party identification -- the percentage of Americans who call themselves Republicans -- all-time low, lower than Watergate, only 21 percent say that they're Republicans today," Begala noted. "That's a catastrophe."
"Republicans have become more ideologically conservative, they've moved farther from the mainstream, and they're more fractured,..."
"The Neanderthals are fighting with Cro-Magnons, the neoliths hate the paleoliths. It's great. I love it as a Democrat." --Paul Begala Clip

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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"In the short run the point is that Republican leaders are about to reap the whirlwind, because they haven’t had the courage to tell the base that Obamacare is here to stay, that the sequester is in fact intolerable, and that in general they have at least for now lost the war over the shape of American society. As a result, we’re looking at many drama-filled months, with a high probability of government shutdowns and even debt defaults.

Over the longer run the point is that one of America’s two major political parties has basically gone off the deep end; policy content aside, a sane party doesn’t hold dozens of votes declaring its intention to repeal a law that everyone knows will stay on the books regardless. And since that party continues to hold substantial blocking power, we are looking at a country that’s increasingly ungovernable." --Krugman
http://www.salon.com/2013/08/02/paul_kr ... _our_time/
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Dardedar »

"Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our
politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them." --Bertrand Russell
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“You know, I, for the love of me, I cannot understand why people who have billions of dollars are compulsively driven for more and how many people have got to die because they don’t go to a doctor because you want to avoid paying your taxes?” ~ Bernie Sanders

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Dardedar »

Robert Reich: "Why the Anger?"

LINK

"...cable news and yell radio compete for viewers and listeners by being ever more strident. Not long ago I debated a Republican economic advisor on a cable TV program. During the brief station-break, the show's producer told me to "be angrier." I told her I didn't want to be angrier. "You have to," she said. "Viewers are surfing through hundreds of channels and will stop for a gladiator contest."

Within this cacophony, we've lost trusted arbiters of truth -- the Edward Murrows and Walter Cronkites who could explain what was happening in ways most Americans found convincing.

We've also lost most living memory of an era in which we were all in it together -- the Great Depression and World War II -- when we succeeded or failed together. In those years we were palpably dependent on one another, and understood how much we owed each other as members of the same society.

But I think the deeper explanation for what has happened has economic roots. From the end of World War II through the late 1970s, the economy doubled in size -- as did almost everyone's income. Almost all Americans grew together. In fact, those in the bottom fifth of the income ladder saw their incomes more than double. Americans experienced upward mobility on a grand scale.

Yet for the last three and a half decades, the middle class has been losing ground. The median wage of male workers is now lower than it was in 1980, adjusted for inflation.

In addition, all the mechanisms we've used over the last three decades to minimize the effects of this descent -- young mothers streaming into paid work in the late 1970s and 1980s, everyone working longer hours in the 1990s, and then borrowing against the rising values of our homes -- are now exhausted. And wages are still dropping -- the median is now 4 percent below what it was at the start of the so-called recovery.

Meanwhile, income, wealth, and power have become more concentrated at the top than they've been in ninety years.

Political scientists have also discovered a high correlationbetween inequality and political divisiveness.

The last time America was this bitterly divided was in the 1920s, which was the last time income, wealth, and power were this concentrated."

The rest
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Dardedar »

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***

Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele on republican blathering about impeachment:

"Steele said that Republicans are making things harder on themselves, “Particularly from members of the House, who take these
arcane, asinine positions that they know have no basis in fact and no grounding in reality.” LINK
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Dardedar »

Huff po comment on political conservative dogmatism:

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"How does someone proceed with their life after being so adamant and sure about such a huge issue and then being proven wrong?

Seriously. How do people do it? Do they just continue denying they were wrong? Do they pretend they knew the correct answer all along? Do they reflect on their monumental error and decide they need to make big changes in their lives? With the repeal of DADT the sky would fall and so would the military. And nothing happened. With gay marriage they sky would fall and so would straight marriage. And nothing happened. With Obamacare they claim government is taking over everyones lives. And nothing will happen.

Then there's the flip side: "The Iraq war is necessary and just". And then it wasn't. "The Iraq war will pay for itself". And then it didn't. "Democrats are weak on terrorism". And then they weren't. "Death panels". Nope. "Voter fraud". Sorry, no.

I mean it just never ends. Who are these people and how do they live with themselves? I honestly have no clue." LINK
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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And this was 9 years ago:

"The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous.

Rich ironies abound! Lies pop up like toadstools in the forest! Wild swine crowd round the public trough! Outrageous gerrymandering! Pocket lining on a massive scale! Paid lobbyists sit in committee rooms and write legislation to alleviate the suffering of billionaires! Hypocrisies shine like cat turds in the moonlight! O Mark Twain, where art thou at this hour? Arise and behold the Gilded Age reincarnated gaudier than ever, upholding great wealth as the sure sign of Divine Grace." --Garrison Keillor

The rest...
We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican party?
What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican party? I'll tell you what they did. Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act. What did conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, 'Liberal,' as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won't work, Senator. Because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor." --Lawrence O'Donnell
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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Everett W. Burdett wrote:Never has a wiser and saner treatment of those public questions which most nearly touch the individual - namely, those arising in and which concern the municipality in which he lives and labors - been demanded than here and now. We must meet them with firmness, but, at the same time, with an anxious desire to make all reasonable concessions. While holding fast to our own, and insisting on the inviolability of private property and the absolute necessity of individual initiative, we must treat those who are temporarily dazzled and misled by the glittering generalities of socialistic and quasi-socialistic doctrines with patience and respect. We must, in our own interest, as well as that of the body politic, try to enlighten and educate the honest and intelligent portions of our citizens in sound economic doctrines, and show them the error of their ways in adopting illusory and dangerous panaceas.
Municipal Ownership in Great Britain ~ Everett W. Burdett
Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 14, No. 5 (May, 1906), pp. 257-314
The University of Chicago Press
"We may become the makers of our fate when we have ceased to pose as its prophets."
~ The Open Society and Its Enemies by Karl Popper
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by David Franks »

Indium Flappers wrote:
Everett W. Burdett wrote:Never has a wiser and saner treatment of those public questions....
If this is in response to the post that immediately precedes it, I have to wonder what relevance the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts in particular, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and Medicare have to do with "the inviolability of private property and the absolute necessity of individual initiative".

Surely these advances aren't an impediment to "holding fast to our own", given that all rights come with responsibilities-- a fact the writer neglected to acknowledge in this snippet.
"Debating with a conservative is like cleaning up your dog's vomit: It is an inevitable consequence of your association, he isn't much help, and it makes very clear the fact that he will swallow anything."
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

Post by Indium Flappers »

David Franks wrote:
Indium Flappers wrote:
Everett W. Burdett wrote:Never has a wiser and saner treatment of those public questions....
If this is in response to the post that immediately precedes it, I have to wonder what relevance the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts in particular, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and Medicare have to do with "the inviolability of private property and the absolute necessity of individual initiative".

Surely these advances aren't an impediment to "holding fast to our own", given that all rights come with responsibilities-- a fact the writer neglected to acknowledge in this snippet.
Ah, my apologies. No, my post had no connection to the post immediately preceding it whatever. I was simply in the midst of reading the article from which I drew the quote, and I liked the quote. The article I quoted from is actually an investigation into the results of municipal provision of electricity, gas, and electric tramways and telephones in Great Britain from the late 1800's to 1906, and how this compared with provision of similar services by private enterprise in the U.S. during the same period.

I can see how you would mistake my intention though, I should have made it clear what the quote was talking about. My bad.
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~ The Open Society and Its Enemies by Karl Popper
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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"These kind of procedures that are being put in place to slow the process down and make it likely that fewer Hispanics
and African Americans might vote, I think, are going to backfire, because these people are going to come out and do
what they have to do in order to vote, and I encourage that," he said."
--Colin Powell, Link

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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How not to defend voter suppression in North Carolina

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This is Phyllis Schlafly,... "writing a piece for publication effectively saying Democrats are entirely right -- North Carolina had to dramatically cut early voting because it's not good for Republicans.
Remember, Schlafly's piece [isn't] intended as criticism; this is her defense of voter suppression in North Carolina. Proponents of voting rights are arguing, "This is a blatantly partisan scheme intended to rig elections," to which Schlafly is effectively responding, "I know, isn't it great?"
The reduction in the number of days allowed for early voting is particularly important because early voting plays a major role in Obama's ground game. The Democrats carried most states that allow many days of early voting, and Obama's national field director admitted, shortly before last year's election, that "early voting is giving us a solid lead in the battleground states that will decide this election."

The Obama technocrats have developed an efficient system of identifying prospective Obama voters and then nagging them (some might say harassing them) until they actually vote. It may take several days to accomplish this, so early voting is an essential component of the Democrats' get-out-the-vote campaign.
LINK
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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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When they say MLK was a republican, and they do like to say that, quote them this:
The Republican Party geared its appeal and program to racism, reaction, and extremism. All people of goodwill viewed with alarm and concern the frenzied wedding at the Cow Palace of the KKK with the radical right. The “best man” at this ceremony was a senator whose voting record, philosophy, and program were anathema to all the hard-won achievements of the past decade.
Senator Goldwater had neither the concern nor the comprehension necessary to grapple with this problem of poverty in the fashion that the historical moment dictated. On the urgent issue of civil rights, Senator Goldwater represented a philosophy that was morally indefensible and socially suicidal. While not himself a racist, Mr. Goldwater articulated a philosophy which gave aid and comfort to the racist. His candidacy and philosophy would serve as an umbrella under which extremists of all stripes would stand. In the light of these facts and because of my love for America, I had no alternative but to urge every Negro and white person of goodwill to vote against Mr. Goldwater and to withdraw support from any Republican candidate that did not publicly disassociate himself from Senator Goldwater and his philosophy."
Link
"Here is what King had to say about Ronald Reagan, the hero of modern Republicans:"
When a Hollywood performer, lacking distinction even as an actor can become a leading war hawk candidate for the Presidency, only the irrationalities induced by a war psychosis can explain such a melancholy turn of events.
"In 2008, King’s son Martin Luther King III said “It is disingenuous to imply that my father was a Republican. He never endorsed any presidential candidate, and there is certainly no evidence that he ever even voted for a Republican.” --ibid

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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"Pat Robertson told his viewers that that gay men in cities like San Francisco attempt to spread HIV/AIDS to others by cutting them with a special ring when shaking hands.

Co-host Terry Meeuwsen seemed to want to move the conversation along, but Robertson stuck to his crazy guns. "You know what they do in San Francisco, some in the gay community there they want to get people so if they got the stuff they'll have a ring, you shake hands, and the ring's got a little thing where you cut your finger," the TV preacher said. "Really?" Meeuwsen asked, incredulously. "Yes, really," Robertson replied.

...the Christian Broadcasting Network posted the episode online -- but edited out this portion of the program... Robertson's anti-gay hysteria was so ridiculous, even his own network was reluctant to allow people to see it.

When The Atlantic asked for comment, Robertson said he "regret that my remarks had been misunderstood, but this often happens because people do not listen to the context of remarks which are being said." He added, "In no wise [sic] were my remarks meant as an indictment of the homosexual community or, for that fact, to those infected with this dreadful disease."

There is no context in which it makes sense to accuse gay people in San Francisco of deliberately cutting others in the hopes of deliberately spreading the AIDS virus." Link, with clip

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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Re: Political Quotes of the Day

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The left eating their own. This time, O'Donnell. A comment from this thread on Crooks & Liars.

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“The single weakest argument I’ve heard for military intervention in Syria is that death from sarin is a uniquely horrifying form of death, uniquely inhumane,” O’Donnell said in his rewrite segment Tuesday night."

I like Lawrence O'Donnell, but who is making that argument? President Obama isn't making that argument for why the use of chemical/gas weapons of mass destruction crosses a red line for the majority of civilized countries:

President Obama, in his recent speech re military action against Syria: "Because these weapons can kill on a mass scale, with no distinction between soldier and infant, the civilized world has spent a century working to ban them. And in 1997, the United States Senate overwhelmingly approved an international agreement prohibiting the use of chemical weapons, now joined by 189 governments that represent 98 percent of humanity."

Nothing about it being "a uniquely horrifying form of death, uniquely inhumane" vs being killed by other means. It is because, like nuclear weapons, this form of warfare makes no distinction between soldier and infant. It doesn't even disable or destroy the enemy's means of weapon or artillery production. It merely kills human beings wherever the wind blows. And it does so relatively silently, without giving the targeted group a chance to retreat, protect or defend itself. That's what makes it different from so many, but not all, other forms of weaponry and why it has been banned by so many countries."
"I'm not a skeptic because I want to believe, I'm a skeptic because I want to know." --Michael Shermer
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