2008 State of the Union

Bush hasn't even opened his mouth, but I'm already sick to my stomach from all the schmoozing and glad-handing by Congress.

GOLD

lolz @ the 2 different cut aways to Hillary and Obama during the healthcare section. Particularly the Obama one: cuts right when Bush says "...and not more government control.". SUBTLE. Hilarious.

THOSE FUCKING SOCIALISTS!

Holy shit. I forgot that this was a marathon in saying nothing.

Could it have been more obvious that he closes with Iran and 9/11 imagery?

oh, and spying...nice. What are the odds torture is next?

I'd have to say that was a great State of the Union Address. Considering the President has low approval rating and this is his last year which by most accounts is a moot year where nothing gets accomplished. I think he outlined a very bold initiative and laid the gloves firmly in the hands of the House and Senate to pass these measures. He scolded them for their dragging on with several key items (Judges, Wire Tapping, etc..) and encouraged them to create bi-partisan bills.

The part I love best about this is the segregated clapping. You can clearly see which issues each party supports and when there is a break in the party lines.

edit -- casual observerations from the crowd. I noticed that Kennedy and Obama were sitting together signifying their new found unity. I was surprised to see Clinton sitting next to Biden, perhaps she'll chose him as her running mate? He is about her only last friend in the Senate...

I'm simply agog: how goes the battle against human/animal hybrids?

Which is different from his whole presidency how exactly?

Bush requested the congress pass laws outlawing it, they all stood up and clapped alot.

Surely saving us from the Minotaur will be Bush's true legacy.

Damn it! I just submitted my patent on a "Cat Woman"! I would have been rich! Fuck!

Usually it's not parsed with applause.

Anyone catch the NORTH AMERICAN SUMMIT meeting...he should have just said North American Union.

Jesus. Why don't you just go buy some gold and stop making this shit up? You Paulites used to be kind of funny. Now you're just fucking annoying.

Speaking of Paul, have they found him yet?

Why is that when Ron Paul says something he gets laughed at?

Paul said get rid of the IRS and income tax and everyone laughed. Now Huckabee says it and they take him serious.

Paul talks about the north american union and they call it a conspiracy. Why can McCain say "if I am president there will be no NAU"

Why the double standard?


By the way I did by gold and made some damn good money while your money just loses value.


Oh yea, it's funny how in Europe people said the same thing about the European Union (its a conspiracy)

.

Did Bush have anything, even a small nugget of truth in his speech or was it just "everything's fine y'all".

Because he's a fruit loop. And he gives true Libertarians a bad name.

Anyone who takes Huckabee serious is just as wacked out as Paul fans.

McCain has not previously, nor does he now, believe there is an active North American Union. Or a secret cabal designed to create one.


Good for you. See me in 10 years when the stock market rate of return destroys gold's (see the last oh, 40 years for proof).

Loved the post-game wrap up on CNN, Fox, and CNBC-
"Obama Obama Obama Obama Obama Obama Obama Ted Kennedy Obama."

He scolded them? Someone needs to tell this fuck that Congress is a CO-EQUAL branch of government. What a small, petty man.

I am pleased to say I have avoided all of Bush's SOTU addresses. My colon is better for it.

Edit: And another damn thing: bipartisan, in that crowd, is just a clever word for: "Acquiescing to every demand the GOP has." Fuck that noise. Those assholes can't govern and most of them can't even think. McConnell, I'm looking at you.

Yes, a co-equal branch. Let me ask you, what has your congress done for you in the last two years? Since their approval rating is lower then that of President Bush, I'd have to say you are in the minority to approve of their inability to effectively govern.

Seriously? What have your precious Democrats in Congress done in the last two years they were in charge? Yes. I say they were in charge because that is the claim they bolstered when they won a slight majority back in 2006 and instead of creating a friendly, bi-partisan atmosphere they came out acting like asses and got stonewalled. Now they're dragging their heels playing the "Oooh, the Republican's are mean!!!" card when the REPUBLICAN controlled congress (see 1994 > 2006) created bills that passed that both Republicans AND Democrats could vote on. I'll also note that from 1994-2000 there was a DEMOCRAT in the white house and yet bills still managed to get passed, shocking!

Largely arrested the Republicans' anti-American agenda, for one. That deserves applause.

Rolling it back will take a bit more time.

Oddly enough, I totally forgot this was on and was watching Season 4 of The West Wing. My president gave a better performance.

Approval ratings don't change checks and balances, so what's the point of your non sequitur?

The reason why the approval rating is low is because the rank and file democrats don't like it when the Congressional Democrats do not stand up to Bush.
But as a smarter man than I pointed out, that has nothing to do with the President acting like a pissy little child.

Stonewalled, eh? Well, you're right on that but you've identified the wrong party. The GOP is stonewalling in the Senate (and Reid is putting up with it, another reason the approval rating is low) so that little can get accomplished. That way, the RNC can send you little mouth-breathers around the country spouting bullshit about how the democratic party can't get anything done. Good job following orders, robot.

First of all, the Senate didn't change hands until 2002. So, for the first eight years of the Republican Reich, they had to moderate their bills to get them passed in the Senate, and they had to make sure Bill Clinton would sign them while he was President. As for the years between 2002-2006, the Republicans played every dirty parliamentary trick in the House and the Senate to get their bills passed without bi-partisan support. They had the majority and the minority caved in the Senate (remember that idiot compromise regarding the filibuster a few years back -- funny, now that the GOP is in the minority, it's become a favorite tool of theirs...besides Strom Thurmonds rancid dick, that is) which yielded plenty of odious bills that Lord High Pissy Pants signed into laws.

If it makes you feel better, I don't take Huckabee seriously.

Why can't he? And has anyone actually said anything along the lines of if McCain says it it must be true?

There is no double standard. If McCain believes as you say, he's crazy in addition to being a psychopath.

Which people? When? And even if they did say as much, does this somehow make Ron Paul's claims true? How does that work?

I'm of the opinion that Congress' approval would be much, much higher with fewer Bush Republican cocksucks and panderers in it. As it stands now, Republicans are in the way.

Exposed the White House's bid to turn government departments like the DoJ into Republican campaign offices, for one. The Republicans, since it benefitted their party, allowed this corruption to proceed apace. Some committed crimes in order to prevent sunlight from falling on Dick Cheney's pale flesh. That alone makes the Democratic Congress superior to Republicans.

Oh, and they raised the minimum wage, putting a damper on the slide into poverty Bush policies have entirely failed to prevent.


Since torture hasn't been made illegal and the immunity torturers enjoy under Bush hasn't been revoked, since the Democrats are actually allowing Bush to remain in office instead of marching him bodily into prison, I'd say there's plenty of compromise going on. Too much, in fact.

Because democrats are willing to compromise (although there should be no compromise with Bush republicans because they are, to a man, scum) whereas Republicans whine and cry and carry on about cowards and marines and other bullshit, pretending this is governance.

Hell, Bush is part of the executive branch. For him to tell the legislative branch what they should be doing is pretty awful. (Yes, I realize he's not the first to do so, but he certainly does it often.)

No, that may have been the case early (2006) but now it is because they're ineffectual. Whenever a bill is put to a vote everyone knows who is going to vote which way before hand. This isn't just throw something out there and hope it sticks, there are back channel deals made and there are tallies of how the vote will go and the president's position is very clear before the bill is voted on as to if he will veto it. That is why some bills are shelved and not even voted on to be retooled to go back out for the vote. The purpose behind putting through a vote that will not pass is to make the other side look bad. (SEE! They hate children! They won't give health insurance to CHILDREN! -- as an example) sometimes it backfires. You may dislike the President, you may hate the GOP but surely you cannot say the Democrats are pure and innocent?

If it were up to me, I'd oust 75% of congress (Senators and the House) not just the Dem's but the Republican's also. When I say 11% approval rating that's for all of congress not just one party. (there are separate polls for that but it is irrelevant for this discussion).



Do you speak English as a first language?
Since you obviously didn't read it properly, I'll clarify my point, slowly as if you were a child.(you might be, I don't know you) -- The Democrats came out of the 2006 election with a slim majority and acted like asses, this created hostility in the senate (congress) and they got stonewalled ... BY the GOP was implied.

You fail at history. How OLD are you anyways? When could you vote? Here's a link to Trent Lott's wiki, it's a decent enough page to exemplify my point. Trent Lott Wiki

Goto the bottom and you'll see Senate Majority leader \ Senate Minority Leader section. Follow the links to the other Senators (succeded by, Preceeded by) to get a clearer picture. Here's another link Republican Revolution (1994). To give you a brief historical rundown...
Bill Clinton won by what would be considered at the time a slim margin in 1992 primarily due to Ross Perot's involvement in the election (he took votes from Bush Sr.) A fresh faced Clinton made bold initiatives and got his arse handed to him, the country in backlash voted in Republicans, while they had a majority they knew the president had veto power so the created bi-partisan bills to pass .. they held a majority until a dirty underhanded Senator switched parties in 2001, which was ratified then back in 2001. September 11th happened... when the senate broke ranks from the public outcries of unity (Minority Leader Tom Daschel) the country voted in one party to stop the petty bickering

Now, this is a very abridged version of history, not highlighting the many up's and downs and precisely how many seats were held by which side etc... you can pull that stuff up on your own.

As to filibustering, I'd wish it never changed. You used to have to stay there 24/7 now it's just a couple of hours a day, weekends off...

Condescending, smarmy, and completely, utterly wrong? You've got it all!

Eat shit. So I was wrong on when the Senate changed hands. The GOP is still stonewalling the senate because the democratic party is not doing their bidding (what you dumbasses call "bipartisanship"). That hasn't changed. And Bush still acts like a petulant child.

And tell me, oh lord of American Politics, how did the GOP work with the minority party when they controlled the Senate?

Finally: fuck you.

I've tried a couple of times but can't bring myself to listen to this. Something on the radio pricked up my ears though, and I did some googling about it, and found it very interesting.

Bush closes his speech with this...
Here's what Gouverneur Morris, an elite land-owner and aristocrat, thought about "We, the people," written in a letter to Thomas Penn in 1774.

Tell you what, go buy a book or two, read up on how our government works (extra credit for the judicial branch!) and we can sit down and have a nice conversation about the in's and out's of our government and what bipartisan really means (psst, doesn't mean what you think it means).

Oh, and here's a little free education, the GOP worked with the DNC to create bills when they had a slim majority and then when they had a more domineering control, they pushed things through because they had the votes. That's how politics work, hence, why you should just go get yourself an education before entering a discussion, instead of just regurgitating what other people say or post (It's OK, hating Bush is popular, you'll be one of the "Cool" kids!)

Sure, that is one* opinion. Alternatively, it could be because the Democrats failed to do \ accomplish the majority of their agenda and the country is, for the most part, no different than it was in January 2006. We're still in Iraq (more troops actually), we've still got a huge illegal immigration problem, we're still at deficit spending and no charges have been brought against the president or vice president**. I will not get into where I stand on these issues here, as that immaterial to the discussion but these are the issues that they ran on when elected and they've failed to achieve them. All it takes is reaching across the isle and making a few compromises in bills (less spending, more spending, changing percentages, etc...) I'll use the Children's insurance bill as a prime example. That got shot down because the numbers were set too high for family income, if the Democrats tweaked it down about 5-10% (from 70K a year to 60K if I recall the numbers correctly) it would have passed with enough votes to get through Bush's Veto (I was for the bill, FYI) but the Democrats wouldn't budge because they wanted to tout that the Republicans hate children come election time. They've been planning the 2008 election for almost a year and a half before it happened at the expense of the American welfare. So, you can tout off about what the 'atrocities' the Republicans did while in office but at least they tried in their way to better America (regardless of their success) can the same be said for the Democrats? No, they've left millions of Americans suffering and enabled our economy to drift into a possible recession and eventually a depression (the effects of bills\congress takes years to come to fruition, what they do today won't affect us tomorrow but more so 1-3 years from now and so and and so forth)



Yes and unemployment numbers have started to rise. Here's a question for you, is that Causation or Correlation? (I'm pretty sure when it comes into full effect as this was a tiered increase there will be even MORE unemployment, just you wait!! (Causation))

Truth be told, my opinion is minimum wage should be a dollar. It will make a much more competitive work force and skills\knowledge would be more valuable and it would help stave off inflation but I won't get into this debate here either.


* fucked up

** Because members of the Senate \ House would be implicated in those crimes and would have be hauled off to prison as well

EDIT: Disregard, cocks, etc. I'll post something better later.

Best to just catch the cliff notes.

You're so full of shit it's mildly amusing. Riddle me this, dumb fuck, what's one of Congress's duties? That's right moron, it's oversight. If that pisses off the GOP, maybe they shouldn't be running the country like drunken frat boys. As far as I can tell, that's what pissed off the GOP more than anything. That someone would dare question Bush's authority. You boot-licking authority loving Conservatives get all put out when people question you. Eat a dick. Nothing you've said has countered the original point. Bush still acts like a child and has no right to "scold" Congress for not doing his bidding. Bush can go fuck himself. And so can you.

The fact of that matter is you're just repeating the same shit I hear from GOP drones. Good job, professor.

Oh, and anytime you want to have a tete-a-tete (that's a meeting of the minds, you fucking hick) on how the government works, particularly the judicial branch, I'm game.

Until next time: eat shit.

[QUOTE=Glenn Guglia;2128108]Yes and unemployment numbers have started to rise. Here's a question for you, is that Causation or Correlation?

Neither, but that's unimportant. Your libertarianism is unimportant. What's important is that your claim they've done nothing is false.

I don't care. You said they'd done nothing, and you were wrong. They are conducting far more oversight operations than the scum Bush's rubberstamp of a congress.

Hahahahaha

I don't post in Politics, but Snaikeikiake is seriously one of the worst people ever. Awesome.

Fantastic idea. Let's do just what companies want and force dirt-cheap labor at the minimum wage level, while making people who work for minimum wage spend every single hour of their lives trying to bust their asses to buy enough food to survive for a week, and then when they do get that 12-hour break at the end of the week they can just go sleep in a fucking tent.

No kidding. For being as hilariously wrong as he has been in his primary predictions, he certainly has no problem playing the know-it-all here and elsewhere. You'd think he might have learned some humility by now, but maybe he's just gotten used to having his ass handed to him on a daily basis.

Actually, I never claimed they did nothing. I asked a question without answering it and then rebuted your answer as to the minimum wage increase. I'm sure it's an oversight on your part but feel free to reread my post and you'll find I not as you put it 'wrong'. Also worth noting..

The word "majority" is used in my reply to you.

Sorry if you don't have anything else to throw out at me to prove the Democrats are doing a bang up job out there in congress. Sure, they have oversight but they're not doing anything about it as they're as culpable as the Republicans since they were in office and voted on the bills they're giving oversight to now. I know when Iraq was a cluster fuck and failing miserable you could throw that around but now that the surge (McCain's baby) has proved to be working it tends to take out the majority of their arsenal. I wonder what the Democrats will be running on if the better part of 80K troops are withdrawn come election time. According to the State of the Union, about 20-30K are scheduled to return over the coming months and more will follow if decreased violence continues. I could easily see 80K troops returning from Iraq by October which will heavily influence the voting.

Original statement.

What do you expect from right wing scum. They care for no one but themselves. He wants a $1 minimum wage. That's all you really need to know. See, what people like him don't get is that America shouldn't have to compete by lowering it's wages or it's standards. The United States is supposed to hold itself up as an example to the rest of the world in every aspect.

But people like Snaieke only see the world in dolars and cents. They know nothing of national pride, hell, people like him don't have pride in their work or the products they sell. It's all about money because they have an emptiness where their soul is and they fill it with money and possesions. I'm certainly not anti-captialist but for people like him enough is never enough.

It's mindless greed at the expense of everything and everone in their path. People like him are the harbingers of death and will lay waste to our way of life.

Enjoy!

Your pardon. You asked what they'd done, not said they'd done nothing. Then I answered your question with two, and not the only two, things they'd done. Then, for reasons unknown, you tried to make this about your opinion of the minimum wage.

About which I still don't care.

I don't know about that, but he certainly seems to think Libertarian economic theory applies in the real world. Yes yes, we've all heard about the horrors caused by a minimum wage, as if that particular income amount keeping pace with inflation is somehow different than yours or mine doing so. We heard all about it last time the minimum wage was raised too. And the time before that. And the time before that.

That's a really good opinion piece. Thanks for the link!

See, I give kudos to Harry here, he's managed to put forth actual evidence to contradict my stance.

From the Article
I haven't fully digested the contents of this piece yet, but in looking at the graph in comparison to the opinion portion I did notice that the majority of the motions passed were symbolic motions (like the MoveOn.org ad, Rebuke of Iran etc..) Infact, 447 and 382 symbolic measures were passed by the House and the Senate respectively! Those numbers are staggering and dwarf the previous sessions. Also, the number of routine measures passed where much higher than previous sessions (routine, like your rent, telephone bill etc..) adding those two columns to the comparison tends to skew statistics, if you measure the other categories you'll see they've accomplished less, especially if you look at the individual measures themselves. Remember we have a lot more going for us in 2007 than we did back in 1994, we have the internet, homeland security, wireless phones etc.. etc.. So, in comparison this congress was still fairly ineffectual and while they claim to have achieved most of their agenda that doesn't count the big ticket items like I mentioned above. It mostly covers oversight and a few issues like minimum wage.

Still! I thank you for giving me something to look at, I still feel that this congress has been extremely ineffectual (along with 88% of my fellow Americans according to the graph in the article) and look forward to ousting them later this year.

Link to Graph

It was mostly a heat of the moment type thing after your comment (unless I read it wrong...?)

Since raising minimum wage is actually closer to putting more families into poverty, it will put more people out of work and will spiral inflation further out of control, but Pandora's box has already been opened. At this point we need someone who can take the reigns of the economy (Ben Bernanke's a fucktard) so this coming election is really vital to the survival of the American economy. Back to point..

See, in raising minimum wage you have those millions of people who had worked for years to get those 3-5% pay increases to bring them up from 5.25 to $7-10 dollars an hour once minimum wage has been increased to 7.25 in 2009 those people will not be getting the bump they've earned they'll be closer to on par with the new employee's and since most companies will combat this increase in two fold 1) Increase cost to consumer 2) Layoffs .. Here are the resulting economic impact: it will increase the number of expenditures to each American citizen(more for a bag of Tyson chicken, milk, eggs, gasoline etc..), thus making them closer if not directly into poverty. It will cause more American's to be unemployed. It will cause more operations to be shifted overseas. It will cause more under the table employee's (Illegal Immigrants, migrant workers etc..). It will also cause more Americans to have health insurance coverage dropped, as companies will cut hours to combat their wage increase making them part-time employee's and ineligible for benefits... and a few other very bad things.

I'm also not going to get into the definition of poverty as the current definition of poverty is a joke, I don't know a single person that can survive by themselves for anything less than $22,000 let alone the number it is currently set at (google, wiki poverty line, click on first link).


(not directed at you SIB)
As to why a dollar would be the perfect minimum wage, that's in a virtual world. That would never be applied to the real world the complexities in changing that would bring the country to a complete catastrophic halt. See, if you have the wage set a a dollar you would have ZERO unemployment and the entire reason companies can pay you minimum wage or whatever you consider a crappy wage is because they can easily replace you with anyone else with a simple "help wanted" sign or Monster.com posting. If there is zero unemployment employers would have to pay you competitive wages in your industry to ensure that you stay with that company and don't move on to another company that can pay better. Also, the cost of living would be decreased exponentially, there would be less dependency from foreign imports such as China and there would be no need for illegal immigrants and the number of Americans who would actually be paid a dollar and hour would be less than a fraction of our current homeless who are currently unemployed and it would easier to track them for social benefits like Medicare, Welfare etc..

Now, in saying that I will reiterate.. that is a virtual model, there is no way to prove it, there is no way to implement it in America unless a huge economic catastrophe were to affect us (think great depression magnified by 10) because it would take a complete realignment of ALL businesses, trade policies, housing etc... This is why I said it would be better not to post that here because it was lengthy and I hardly covered the entire model or all of the points \ advantages towards it.

Now you can see why I opted to say, I'd rather not get into this here.. as this is lengthy and had little to nothing to do with the State of the Union address but I felt the need to address it since some ignorant individuals opted to chime in about my character without sufficient evidence to make such faulty accusations.