This quote comes from a recent interview with former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, where he claims that then vice-president Bush confided in him that he thought Reagan was an extremist, and his followers only listened to him because they were dumb and they trusted him. But if a Democrat proposed Reagan’s exact same ideas? No way, they follow the man, not the policies.
Now, of course this can’t be verified as true, and later in the interview, Gorbachev does praise Reagan for helping him to end the cold war, but it is a possibly interesting look into the dynamics of the already rocky Bush/Reagan relationship. And I think the quote about his followers rings true. The man is great for having us all not get nuked to hell, but his economic policies would actually sow the seeds for our giant meltdown years later, and somehow he’s still the Republican’s poster boy for it.
[via Huffpo]
Because I’m such a fan of Rockefeller’s “Quote of the Day,” I decided that I too want something with a mildly catchy name to write about on a regular basis. My experiment begins with a weekly series I’ll be writing entitled “What If.”
I will pose a hypothetical scenario and explore what I believe the positive and negative effects would be of said scenario. To start off the series, I’m taking a look at campaign contributions, what I believe to be the negative effects of allowing exorbitant donations and exploring how the system could potentially be improved by putting a ceiling on how much political campaigns can receive in donations. Read on for some mildly insightful wisdom. Continue Reading »
How do you solve the degredation of New Zealand society? Why, pay the “appalling underclass” not to breed of course! That’s what regional mayor, Michael Laws, is suggesting. But he’s not crazy! Hear him out…
“That there is a group within our society who give their children no hope nor opportunity from the moment that they are born,” the regional mayor wrote on the New Zealand radio website where he broadcasts as a talkback DJ.
“That these ‘parents’ are known to authorities … and yet the authorities can only intervene after children have been harmed.”
Mr Laws goes on to write: “it would be far better for this appalling underclass to be offered financial inducements not to have children, given the toxic environment that they would provide for any child in their care.”
The mayor believes “the consequent financial and social savings to our community would be considerable.
“There are too many people who should not have children.”
Yeah, nevermind, he’s crazy.
Look, this sound good in theory, but it’s not the type of idea you say out loud. It’s the kind of thing you just joke about with your buddies while getting drunk and watching Jon and Kate Plus Eight. “What the hell is wrong with these parents? The government should just like give them money to have them sterilized.” This later progresses to watching Cops where you say, “Why doesn’t the government just execute all the criminals? They don’t deserve to live and we’d save so much money on jail.” Then later when watching Friday Night Lights, “Minka Kelly is so hot. The government should round up all ugly girls and send them to Poland. Then there’d only be hot girls and we’d be like Sweden.”
It’s a slippery slope, as you can see.
[via news.au]
In its ongoing effort to practically become a parody of Orwell’s 1984, Fox News has released a new “public opinion poll” on health care and the public option, and if you read closely, you’ll find something to be missing. Let me spell it out for you:
A) Yes, I want health care reform to pass, but only if the public option isn’t in it because it’s a threat to insurance companies
B) I’m not sure if I would support a public option-less bill or not, despite the fact I’m going broke from medical bills
C) No health care reform is needed at all because the current system is perfect more me since I’m not sick and everyone else can go to hell.
D) I’m an idiot who never watches the news yet somehow still feels the need to vote in this poll.
Whats missing? How about an option to say you WANT a public option? Though I suppose then you couldn’t report that 100% of recent survey applicants on FoxNews.com said they didn’t want a public option. That choice would have read something like:
E) No, because the bill absolutely needs a public option to drive competition among insurance companies or else it won’t work.
Hey, at least they say, “this is not a scientific poll” at the end right?
Yes you read that headline correctly.
Thanks to the increasing popularity of absentee voting, a rising number of the recently deceased are casting ballots — legally. The trick is to pull the lever before you kick the bucket.
States such as California, Texas and Florida intentionally count ballots sent in by voters who then died before Election Day, while states such as Colorado, Washington and South Dakota have no reliable method for discarding the votes of the deceased.
In the old days, voting by the dead was reserved for big-city political machines looking to stuff the ballot box illegally.
But the new kind of dead voting is a side effect of the popularity of absentee ballots.
In 32 states, any registered voter can mail in a ballot instead of going to a voting booth on Election Day, according to the Early Voting Information Center. And in 14 other states, they can do so as long as they have a good reason.
I get the legality here. Hell I even understand absentee ballots…I think. But let’s take a look at this for a second. “The Trick is to pull the lever before you kick the bucket?” A trick? I mean is this what old people do for kicks? Like, do people on their death beds smirck because they’ll be getting one last vote in?
Call me crazy but I’d rather have a couple of young Playboy bunnies at my death bed before taking my dirt nap. Pretty sure I won’t be thinking “Laura Bush 2012! Hahaha, I fooled the world!”
“I see dead voters”
I wanted to post the entirety of what Kucinich said, but it was slightly too long for the picture. Thankfully, I have all this space below:
“We compromised on single payer by backing a public option, and now we are being asked to compromise the public option with negotiated rates. In conference, we will likely be asked to compromise negotiated rates with a trigger. In each and every step of the health care debate, the insurance companies have won. If they get hundreds of billions of dollars in new taxpayer subsidies, they get to raise their premiums, and increase their co pays and deductibles, while the public is forced to pay for private insurance, then the insurance companies win big.
If this is the best we can do, then it is time to ask ourselves whether the two-party system is truly capable of representing the American people or whether the system has been so compromised by special interests that we can’t even protect the health of our own people. This is a moment of truth for the Democratic Party. Will we stand for the people or the insurance companies?”
This is a short journal Kucinich wrote for DailyKos, which sums up the majority of the current issues with the health care bill. It may sound like he’s suggesting we overthrow the government if this bill collapses due to how corrupt everything is, but I assume he’s speaking metaphorically. Or maybe he’s not. Use your crazy elf magic to fix everything Dennis!
But seriously, elfen features aside, Kucinich is one of the only congressmen with his head on straight these days, and he may be tiny, but he’s got pretty big balls when it comes to standing up to Republicans. Unfortunately him, Al Franken and Alan Grayson can’t do it alone.
[via DailyKos]
The White House as reportedly enlisted a “key adviser” to become the central strategist for Democratic incumbent, Governor Corzine’s reelection campaign.
One of President Barack Obama’s key political advisers has become the central strategist in New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine’s bruising campaign for re-election, a race the White House desperately wants to win to avert the consequences for its own agenda of a Republican winning in a traditionally Democratic state.
The race is seen as important to the White House’s agenda, because if Republicans take New Jersey, it’ll only make Democrats in Congress even more nervous when it comes to doing anything progressive. Congress is a place where hope and ambition go to die, especially when election cycles near. And by “near” I mean are about a year or two away. It’s all about job security, baby! Continue Reading »
