while i appreciate greenwald's pursuit of this issue, his articles are very misleading. i don't what democrats said over the years since the act was passed, but 98 senators voted for the original patriot act and only 1 voted against. link
Yes, Rand Paul may be crazy, but the Patriot Act shouldn't have been approved with a rubber stamp. That's not what I voted for when I voted for the President.
Stuff like this makes me want to take my talents to South Beach. Or, rather, some place South of America. Preferably with a beach.
That's the problem with you. You are so blinded by your stereotypes and labels. Some of his ideas may be crazy to you but that doesn't mean you should completely dismiss everything he says. I am glad he shed some light on what goes on in congress from a newer/outside perspective. I had a similar perspective of politics before except from the right. Everything Obama did was considered stupid because I had labeled him a liberal communist nut and the party he represented started with a D. I was wrong and got caught up in a lot of the talk radio programs I listened to. Anyways politics isnt really my priority in life anyways because like Donny said stuff like this just makes you want to join Lebron in South Beach (okay not really.. I really hope the Heat don't win)
my response really has to do with the fact that rand paul isn't the guy i'm going to listen to on what's broken about the senate. he has the purist ideas on everything like his dad, some of them are appropriate at places some of them aren't. it seems like he wants to move the senate to the other extreme, which will get nothing done because they would spend every minute of every day debating irrelevant topics.
Hmm I thought their job was to debate topics and eventually work towards a solution. If they are just tabeling everything that does sound like the Senate is broken. No? Also topics like Libya, Patriot Act, etc, etc do not seem like irrelevant topics.
the patriot act passed by an overwhelming vote, there is no need to debate it. however, the budget and healthcare got an incredible amount of debate. lybia, no, its not an act of war. its well within the president's rights, paul is just trying to get face time
i'm not being dismissive about public debate when this article was written, there were 290 bills stalled in the senate.
Ohhhhh Kay… Now I’m a little annoyed. I appreciate folks who like to think and engage in actual conversation, and I’m also fairly interested in the opinions of those with a definite “partisan” slant, e.g. mcmark, ATW, etc. But ever since the election pgabs has complete lost any ability to discuss anything rationally that might tread upon the image of Obama. I put pgabs on my ignore list and have not engaged in any dialogue with him since his Obama-Derangement-Syndrome went too far and he compared me to basso simply because I deigned to criticize his not-so-subtly-disguised man-crush, President Obama. Every now and then I click on some of his posts though… *sigh* I don’t know what the hell happened, but I don’t have any desire to engage pgabriel anymore – his posts are always overly defensive of the administration, often ignorant accordingly, and grossly hypocritical given his past history in regards to Bush. The worst part is that he cannot even read past a few keywords before thinking in Obama-centric clichés, as demonstrated above. Rand Paul is certainly whacky in some ways, but the article is far more than a Rand Paul piece, and what Rand Paul is arguing for is absolutely commendable. But pgabs won’t let himself be bothered with that, he can simply write it all off quickly under the “Rand Paul is crazy” donkey talking point and feel secure and comfortable in his vacuous rhetoric. I honestly don’t recall pgabs’ stance on the PATRIOT act or wiretapping during Bush, but if anyone here might possibly fulfill thadeus’ rhetorical question in the “What is Freedom” thread, it’s pgabriel. It’s annoying: A reasonably approachable and engaging poster is reduced to a pathetic variant of the white house press secretary because of some weird allegiance to a man who, like any other man, is riddled with faults, conflicts, and failings. It’s gotten so bad that now you want to accuse me of linking my ego to a thread on a basketball website? Grow the **** up, pgabriel. Stop self-neutering your ability to think independently and intelligently for some stupid political version of flag football. Quit ****ing whining at me like some pissed off 3yr old simply because I have the gumption to take a stand, be consistent, and demand what I think people deserve from our government and its leaders.
actually i have responded reasonably to your continual ego err thread bumping. i have never defended wire tapping of citizens and i have continually asked if that is still going on. i have responded with two reasonable posts about the rand paul accusations. funny that reasonable poster like you would all of sudden align yourself with a quack to continually bump your ego err thread. but i however responded on with a reasonable response on why everything isn't debated in the senate. this is one issue with oboma asshat, i started a thread just last week on obama pandering to the oil industry. so don't make ass upmtions on what i think about the obama admin. i stated in your ego err thread several times when it was started TWO FREAKIN YEARS AGO that i do not believe anyone should be prosecuted from the bush admin for this before obama was elected. so keep me on ignore, lord knows you're better than the rest of the human race, see your sig
"my gumption to take a stand" dude you're on a freakin basketball web site yeah, you don't have an ego proble
what i find crazy is democrats defending the patriot act. talk about hypocrisy. and you can call paul all the names you want, but he has been pretty consistent in his desire to uphold the constitution. ill take him over most of our other politicians including your precious obama any day. our involvement in libya is "irrelevant"? the patriot act is "irrelevant"? what i also find crazy is how much OOF's (obama only fans) are acting like bush supporters did. pgabs can simply dismiss everything paul says by calling him "crazy". the toolism on display is really disappointing - i expected it from conservatives/republicans, who have traditionally been more willing to march lock-step w/ what their leaders say, but to now see democrats acting pretty much exactly as republicans did for 8 years is surprising...i honestly expected different. the hypocrisy really does cut both ways. after 8 years of bush i vowed to never vote for another republican again as long as i live, but the democrats and their sycophants are driving me right into the arms of the elephant.
