And yet people still look at me funny when I tell them that Dubya will go down in history as one of the worst Presidents ever. This administration makes the Nixon Administration look forthright and open.
You're right. It's shameless the way they re-worded Murtha's original statement. Straight out of the Swift Boat playbook.
Clinton unleashed an ugly monster, and now Dems think his wife is their best hope. The Democratic Party should just die already.
No the Republican Party is so corrupt now that Nixon looks like Mother Theresa. What is a shame is that the Democrats haven't been more able to capitalize more. What I mean by rudderless is that they haven't shown more backbone. Right now Russ Feingold is my number one Democrat. I just wish the Democratic Party would get behind him more.
Yeah, the Dem's problem goes way back. Nader's popular votes in 2000 should've been a huge warning shot off their bow. Instead, he became a scapegoat for their inept leadership and worse off, they took Nader's voters for granted in 04! Their main offensive is to capitalize off the short term memory of the electorate and playing off as the lesser of two evils, the Not-Bushes. They've conceded nothing to the people while porking up their traditional allies. This has become one reason for the quid pro quo relationship with a Republican dominated Capitol Hill. The whimper against Scalito's confirmation hearing is the icing on the cake. They could force a mandate. They could sound off to the American people with a fight (as members suggested before, similar to Gingrich's Contract with America). Instead, they've created proxy networks to bleed their enemies while the Republican machine is much more established and focused. This party sickens me as much as the Republicans disgust me with their corruption. Hillary will just make it worse. The Democrats have lost their focus and platform. A new party would serve blue states much better.
Nadir is a millionaire fool, parading around in a cheap suit. He lost the respect I had for him for his work to make Americans safer, when he helped elect George W, Bush. He could have had a cabinet post in a Gore Administration, but his ego was far more important to him. I'll add this... if you seriously think a third party has a snowball's chance in hell of capturing the Presidency, or a branch of Congress, and that we would be better off electing Gorge W. Bush's, because there is "no real choice," I have a bridge to sell you. My ten year old made it out of mud in my backyard. You can have it for this month's trade deficit. I don't give a damn about Hillary Clinton. I give a damn about our country, and the Democratic Party is a far better choice than any third party on the horizon, much less the corruption and disregard for law of Bush, his small cabal of advisors, and the current leadership of the GOP. Keep D&D Civil.
If choice A (Republicans) is bad and choice B (Democrats) is only slightly better, and there is no other choice (choice C); are we really living in a free and democratic society? If the current political system will only allow for the existence of two parties, and if both of those parties no longer represent a large percentage of the populous; then how is America any better then a society that holds sham elections like the Soviet Union used to?
We aren't the Soviet Union. It's not about whether a third party is a good idea or not, it's about getting the better of the two choices that are viable, the one who is most likely to agree with you politically, into office, and prevent the disaster from getting elected. Some would argue that we had a sham election in 2000. If Democrats had run a better campaign, it wouldn't have mattered what Nadir did, or what he didn't do. The fact is that it mattered. Look... I thought Kerry sucked as a candidate. I didn't vote for him in the primaries. I knew that Bush was far worse for the country than Kerry, regardless. I knew the same thing in 2000. I knew McGovern was far better than Nixon in '72. I understand ideals. I have some. I also understand the need to be realistic. If moderate, centrist candidates were the two choices in any of those 3 elections, an attempt at a third party could have made sense. As far as I'm concerned, when the choices are so stark, a third party makes no sense at all. Keep D&D Civil.
As it is now, the third party serves to drive ignored and specialized issues to the forefront, such as Perot's deficit reduction platform. But your response is similar to what Dem leadership was preaching during the Nader outcome. They did nothing to address issues that the Greens put out and the many "fools" who voted for him in protest. Then in 04, the leadership assumed that history wouldn't repeat twice and took those votes for granted. Just who are these Democrats serving or even saving? It seems these guys are more motivated to cover their asses than for the love of their country. I see the party on the verge of collapse or headed towards a strong Centrist overhaul. To me, that's the same wolf in sheep's clothing. Maybe people would be satisfied if Democrat corruption wasn't as blatant as Republican...
I called Nadir a fool, and I think he's that, as well as a hypocrite. Be that as it may, here's a quote from Time: One symptom of lobbying run amuck is the proliferation of earmarks--spending placed in legislation, often without public review, for specific projects. "Beating up on lobbyists is easy to do, but we have to put our own house in order, and at the top of that list is earmark reform," says Republican Congressman Jeff Flake of Arizona. The most famous recent earmark was last fall's so-called Bridge to Nowhere--a provision that Representatives from Alaska inserted into a bill to spend close to $223 million to make it easier to reach a virtually uninhabited area of the state. In the end, the money was cut from the budget in light of public outrage. Lobbyists are paid to land earmarks; Abramoff used them to get money for his tribal clients. The number of those earmarks mushroomed from close to 2,000 in a highway bill in 1998 to more than 6,000 in that bill last year. Practitioners say the boom is a major factor in the doubling of the number of lobbyists in Washington over the past five years, to almost 35,000, and Bush points to the popular practice as one of the reasons curtailing federal spending is so difficult. http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/01/16/gop.ethics.tm/index.html It does make a difference. The quote from Bush is hilarious. He has yet to veto one spending bill, his party is in power, and we have watched influence peddling go through the roof with Bush and the GOP in charge. Keep D&D Civil.
Same link.... Republicans point out that Democrats also accepted money from Abramoff clients and did favors for him, but even those Republicans acknowledge that when the public thinks both sides are dirty, the party in power is likely to pay the higher price. I think Nadir is an egomaniac who's either authoritarian or facsist leaning. Then again, Perot was eccentric as well.... The popular votes that went to third parties is a tangible indicator of dissatisfaction to the party with the closest platform. It's ironic that Democrats are smearing Bush over tactics Clinton originally employed. Politicians might have unwritten codes of conduct that Bush is totally disregarding, but voters should hold both parties equally accountable. I don't think many Americans believe the Democrat portrayal of their recapture of Capital Hill as some Crusade to bring down tyranny. Maybe it's the lack of a strong leader or a consistent platform, but it's because of that that any recognizable face can immediately seize candidacy. Is it just me to think that there something horribly wrong with that? The party is a headless chicken wandering in circles during its last minutes.
