kamui
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Posts posted by kamui
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HH I had expected a little bit, uhmm, more substantial...
Generally, I find US elections really disgusting. Charakter assassination, aka Swiftboating, previoulsy a GOP speciality, seems to be standard by now for both parties.
And since a few years both parties have these opposition trackers, guys with video cams by the Dems and GOP who film every move a opposition politician makes. Every slip of the tongue, every silly face is being blown completely out of proportion by the left or right blogsphere and associated media.
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If Romney loses and that seems likely and if he loses fairly big and its not a close election (but definitely won't be as close as '08), the Republicans will shift closer to the center.
I don't think so and if so only slowly and under great pain. The right wing/Tea Party was able to kick out a lot of well respected Reps in the past two years or so. The center GOP has been erased almost completely. Also Big Money which is running the GOP won't give up easily their vision of raw capitalism and anti-social plans.
PS: The GOP looks more and more like a version of political parties in Asia (Thailand, Japan, e.g.), where politicians more or less execute the will of people standing in the shadow.
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My prediction is that there will be an internal revolution in the Republican party just as there were with the Dems. After the landslide losses in the '80s they Dems gave up fielding Presidential candidates who were seen as true Liberals. As I said, they've selected moderates and centrists since the '90s...Clinton, Gore, Kerry and Obama are centrists.
Interestingly the GOP is currently moving even more to the right. The selection of Ryan is clear signal. And in almost all internal GOP races the candidate most close to far right won. Moderate GOP had and have to go into hiding or have been kicked out.
If Romney wins there won't be an internal revolution for the next 4 years, but it this is only a postponement. If he loses the GOP might fall into a crisis a little bit earlier. With the whites becoming a minority the current non-inclusive GOP won't have a chance in future elections.
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Romney picks Paul Ryan!
WTF was he thinking? Ryan strikes me as one of the weakest choices.
He plays to the very conservative base: anti-abortion, anti medicare, privatize social security, radical tax cuts for the rich and corps, cut main government functions, e.g.
And he is young, energetic, with a strong own profile.
It might be energized to conservatives, but won't do anything for the women, Latinos, elderly, which are important in some swing states like Florida. And of course it opens lines of attack for the Dems.
We'll see...
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I didn't quite follow the logic. Wouldn't Obama have had to give up his U.S. citizenship to have to "get it back?" Is this guy saying that Obama moved to Indonesia with his mother and step dad, took Indonesia citizenship and renounced his U.S. citizenship, came back to the U.S as a foreign student and wasn't a U.S. citizen, at least while attending Columbia and Harvard?
It is the usual BS, one the variations of the Birther stuff.
Actually I think that the Dems are happy about this Birther stuff. It turns the center and the independents away from the GOP.
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I saw her standing there and I told her she had three beautiful children. She didn't have to get all pissed off and threaten me. It was an honest mistake!
I think we had this already.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOVq_UL48o0
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As predicted some evangelical sect has already made a highly insulting comment:
Just minutes after it was reported that people had been shot at a Sikh Temple in Wisconsin, the hate mongers at Westboro Baptist Church were tweeting out: 'God Sent Another Shooter.'
But why Huffington Post is publishing this is beyond me. I think in Germany such comments would be completely ignored by the media. (We have some right wing crazies as well, but they don't receive attention by the media.)
And the New York Times has already moved on:
Online version of the NYT at 4am, Eastern Time,
Of course the NYT did not intend to show people partying next to the headline of the Sikh killing. But it's telling.
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PS: the first phase has already begun:
State Rep. Josh Zepnick, who represents much of the Milwaukee area's Sikh community, said he was "torn to shreds" by the attack.
"It's a very peace-loving community that has successfully integrated and assimilated into the metropolitan Milwaukee area," Zepnick told CNN afilliate WTMJ.
And state Rep. Mark Honadel, who represents the area, called the attack "craziness."
"Unfortunately, when this type of stuff hits your area, you say to yourself, 'Why?' But in today's society, I don't think there's any place that's free from idiots." [since those massacres seem to happen quite often in the USA I wonder, if this explanation isn't way too simplistic]
Top state and national political leaders offered statements of condolence after the killings, which came two weeks after a massacre at a Colorado movie theater that left 12 dead and dozens more wounded.
"Our hearts go out to the victims and their families, as we all struggle to comprehend the evil that begets this terrible violence," Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said in a statement issued by his office. "At the same time, we are filled with gratitude for our first responders, who show bravery and selflessness as they put aside their own safety to protect our neighbors and friends."
In a statement from the White House, President Barack Obama said the United States had been "enriched" by Sikhs, "who are a part of our broader American family."
"My administration will provide whatever support is necessary to the officials who are responding to this tragic shooting and moving forward with an investigation," Obama said.
And from Boston, Obama's presumptive Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, called the slayings "a senseless act of violence and a tragedy that should never befall any house of worship." He said the hearts of he and his wife, Ann, "are with the victims, their families, and the entire Oak Creek Sikh community."
http://edition.cnn.c....html?hpt=us_c1
PS: I forgot in my "ritual" list: soon we will hear some nasty comments on the killings by right wing evangelicals. Of course they are isolated and absolute disgusting, but the media and blog sphere will jump on it anyway.
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6 people dead and a Police officer critical after a gunfight and this doesnt deserve its own news item ??? WTF, Kamui ??
I guess I have become too cynical. We just had 13 Egyptian soldiers killed. Dozens of people are being killed in Syria every day, 13 people were killed by a Typhoon in the Philippines, 48 Iranians were kidnapped (just try to imagine the media reaction if this would have been westerners), every second day people are being killed by terrorists/insurgents, whatever, in South Thailand, and so on.
In the USA it is the second massacre in a very short time. It's terrible, but the reaction in the USA will follow an established ritual. The people in the USA (media, pols like Obama, Romney, e.g.) will say how terrible it is. Anti-gun activists will ask for more tight gun laws, while gun sales will go up for a few days, the NRA says "no comment" and the pro-gun people will demand to losen the gun laws even more. That's it. Except for the local people and the friends/family/e.g. involved, no one will really care anymore after a few days.
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Another shooting in the USA:
6 Killed in Shooting at Sikh Temple in Wisconsin
Police in Wisconsin said Sunday that at least one gunman opened fire in a Sikh temple near Milwaukee, killing at least six and injuring several others before being shot himself. The gunman is also believed to have died.
The shootings occurred at about 10:30 a.m. at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in the town of Oak Creek, just south of Milwaukee, officials said.
The authorities described the scene at the temple as chaotic as they attended to the victims and tried to sort out what had happened. Police said they were still uncertain where other shooters were at the temple.
Bradley Wentlandt, the chief of police in nearby Greenfield told journalists on the scene, that four bodies had been found inside the temple and three were found outside, including that of the shooter. He said a veteran police officer who arrived on the scene exchanged fire with the shooter.
“That officer was shot multiple times,†Mr. Wentlandt said. “The shooter was put down.†He said the injured officer was taken to the hospital and it was unclear if he would survive. The shooter, who was not immediately identified, was “assumed diseased,†he said.
At least three men all with gunshot wounds have been admitted to Froedert Hospital, the Milwaukee region’s main trauma center, said Nalissa Wienke, a spokeswoman for the hospital. One victim was shot in the head and extremities and another in the abdomen. The third was undergoing evaluation.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinal reported that victims were being removed from the temple’s prayer room and that SWAT team members were sweeping the building. The newspaper reported that the temple’s president, Satwant Kaleka, was among those shot.
There were conflicting reports about whether another gunman had taken hostages inside the temple. Local news agencies, citing text messages from people inside have reported that two or more shooters could have been involved.
The shooting comes just over two weeks after a gunman killed 12 people and wounded nearly 60 in a mass shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo.
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You mean triple post.
US presidential elections drag on forever. Actually, a president virtually begins his reelection campaign after his second year in office. The Confederate constitution drew a lesson from the US constitution and specified that the president would serve one six-year term, with reelection not allowed.
I think a one term presidency would change the dynamic of the government completely, since the president would have to answer to the electorate only once and couldn't care less after the election.
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double post
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I think this opinion piece from a conservative standpoinst sums it up well.
Mr. Negative vs. Mr. Complacent
By ROSS DOUTHAT
DURING the dog days of last summer’s debt ceiling negotiations, with Washington gridlocked and the president’s approval ratings slumping, a narrative coalesced among disappointed liberals. President Obama was failing, they decided, because he was too moderate, too reasonable and too conciliatory. He didn’t have the ideological confidence required to actually fight for liberalism, or the brazenness required to really tear the Republicans apart.
Apparently somebody at the White House bought into this narrative, because so far Obama’s re-election campaign has delivered just about everything that liberal partisans were begging for a year ago.
Since the campaign kicked off, the president’s domestic policy rhetoric has become much more stridently left-wing than it was during the debt-ceiling debate. He’s dropped all but a pro forma acknowledgment of the tough choices looming in our future, and doubled down on the comforting progressive fantasy that we can close the deficit and keep the existing safety net by soaking America’s millionaires and billionaires.
On hot-button cultural issues, meanwhile — immigration and gay marriage, reproductive issues and religious liberty, even welfare reform — he’s moved away from Clintonian triangulation, offering a succession of explicit panders to Democratic voting blocs and interest groups instead.
To this bordering-on-McGovernite substance, he’s added Richard Nixon’s style, with a pitch to swing voters that started out negative and has escalated to frank character assassination. In Obama’s campaign ads, and in the rhetoric of his aides and allies, Mitt Romney isn’t just wrong on specific policies or too right-wing in general. He’s part Scrooge, part Gordon Gekko; an un-American, Asia-loving outsourcer; a tax avoider andpossibly a white-collar felon.
If you’re an undecided, stuck-in-the-middle kind of voter, the president isn’t meeting you halfway on the issues, or pledging to revive the dream of postpartisanship that he campaigned on last time. He’s just saying that you’ve got no choice but to stick with him, because Romney is too malignant to be trusted.
By taking this line, Obama is testing the conceit — beloved of MSNBC hosts and left-wing bloggers — that a harder-edged, more ideological liberalism would be a more politically successful liberalism as well. And at the moment, the president’s continued lead in swing-state pollsprovides modest but real evidence that his strategy is working. If the election were held today, I’d bet gingerly on the president eking out the necessary 51 percent.
But Obama’s current edge may have more to do with the Romney campaign’s complacency than with the genius of his McGovern-meets-Nixon approach.
In Romneyland, it seems to be an article of faith that 2012 will be a pure up-or-down vote on the president’s performance, and that the most generic sort of Republican campaign — hooray for free enterprise and low taxes, with the details To Be Determined Later — is therefore the only kind of campaign they need to run.
But as The New Republic’s William Galston has pointed out, even a referendum election tends to involve a two-step process, in which voters first decide whether they’re willing to eject the incumbent, and then decide whether they’re willing to roll the dice with his opponent.
In this case, that roll of the dice involves handing the White House back to the Republican Party just four years after the Bush administration failed (and then some) to deliver on its promises. And by running a generic campaign in the aftermath of those failures, Romney isn’t giving voters any reason to think that he won’t just deliver the same disappointing results.
The Romney campaign is clearly afraid of talking too much about its candidate’s biography (all that money, all that Mormonism ...) or offering anything save bullet points and platitudes on policy (because details can be used against you ...). But a Republican candidate who won’t define himself is a candidate who’s easily defined as just another George W. Bush.
A Romney campaign that loosened up and actually took some chances, on the other hand, might find that the Obama White House’s slash-and-burn liberalism had opened up some unexpected opportunities.
Because Obama has moved left on fiscal and social issues, there’s more space in the center — assuming, that is, that Romney can get over his fear of offending his own party’s interest groups.
Because Obama has gone so negative, there’s room to accentuate the positive, and run as the candidate of (right-of-center) hope and change.
Because Obama’s message depends so heavily on voters’ unhappy memories of the Bush era, Romney can do himself an enormous amount of good just by exploding the premise that he’ll govern as “Dubya, Part II.â€
Or he can keep doing what he’s been doing, in which case he stands a very good chance of losing oh-so-narrowly, and joining Thomas Dewey in the ranks of Republican presidential nominees who mistakenly believed that they could win the White House by default.
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If the GOP had chosen a better candidate, I guess Obama would be a clear loser already. But the GOP wasn't ready since it is undergoing a radical change, with the right wingers taking over and all moderates being kicked out.
How can a candidate win (Romney) who isn't loved (or is even loathed) by his own base?
But it's not over until the votes are cast. There is so much noise in US media, it's unbelievable for an outsider.
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Great photo.
But seriously, who would you rather have on your side in a gunfight, Josey Wales or a porn star?
How often do you have a gun fights compared to sex?
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Long time republican and conservative eastwood likes roymney...shocking!lol
Jenna Jameson supporting Mitt Romney
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) - Porn star Jenna Jameson chose a familiar stage to make her endorsement for the 2012 presidential election Thursday night. At a San Francisco strip club, the former adult actress and stage performer said she was ready for a Romney presidency.
"I'm very looking forward to a Republican being back in office," Jameson said while sipping champagne in a VIP room at Gold Club in the city's South of Market neighborhood. "When you're rich, you want a Republican in office."
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Mark the field "long link" after you have pressed the "Sharing" button on youtube, and copy the long link.
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how come my youtube gets posted as a link, and you as a movie....?
what do I do wrong ?
TIA
BB
in the menue click on the icon with three photos ("Insert media" by mouse over, it's overnext to the quote function) and insert the youtube link you get when you click on sharing below the Youtube video - or you show Flash your shooting score and he will do it for you.
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This article is from 2007. Since Obama became president gun sales have exploded:
U.S. most armed country with 90 guns per 100 people
Tue, Aug 28 2007By Laura MacInnis
GENEVA (Reuters) - The United States has 90 guns for every 100 citizens, making it the most heavily armed society in the world, a report released on Tuesday said.
U.S. citizens own 270 million of the world's 875 million known firearms, according to the Small Arms Survey 2007 by the Geneva-based Graduate Institute of International Studies.
About 4.5 million of the 8 million new guns manufactured worldwide each year are purchased in the United States, it said.
"There is roughly one firearm for every seven people worldwide. Without the United States, though, this drops to about one firearm per 10 people," it said.
India had the world's second-largest civilian gun arsenal, with an estimated 46 million firearms outside law enforcement and the military, though this represented just four guns per 100 people there. China, ranked third with 40 million privately held guns, had 3 firearms per 100 people.
Germany, France, Pakistan, Mexico, Brazil and Russia were next in the ranking of country's overall civilian gun arsenals.
On a per-capita basis, Yemen had the second most heavily armed citizenry behind the United States, with 61 guns per 100 people, followed by Finland with 56, Switzerland with 46, Iraq with 39 and Serbia with 38.
France, Canada, Sweden, Austria and Germany were next, each with about 30 guns per 100 people, while many poorer countries often associated with violence ranked much lower. Nigeria, for instance, had just one gun per 100 people.
"Firearms are very unevenly distributed around the world. The image we have of certain regions such as Africa or Latin America being awash with weapons -- these images are certainly misleading," Small Arms Survey director Keith Krause said.
"Weapons ownership may be correlated with rising levels of wealth, and that means we need to think about future demand in parts of the world where economic growth is giving people larger disposable income," he told a Geneva news conference.
The report, which relied on government data, surveys and media reports to estimate the size of world arsenals, estimated there were 650 million civilian firearms worldwide, and 225 million held by law enforcement and military forces.
Five years ago, the Small Arms Survey had estimated there were a total of just 640 million firearms globally.
"Civilian holdings of weapons worldwide are much larger than we previously believed," Krause said, attributing the increase largely to better research and more data on weapon distribution networks.
Only about 12 percent of civilian weapons are thought to be registered with authorities.
http://www.reuters.c...834893820070828
PS: I wonder about Germany, since we have extremely strict gun ownership rules. Unless you are a hunter or sports shooter it's almost impossible to own a gun. (And hunters and shooter have to follow very strict rules too with mandatory courses and exams, mandatory membership of licensed hunter or shooting associations, secured storage for guns needed, e.g.).
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The forgot the most important rule: Draw your weapon and shoot the fucker.
Yeah, right, especially since all gun owners are well trained and use adequate equipment for such an occasion:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uqD8Ja6IZ0
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Rubio will help but I don't think he's enough to turn the election around. Palin actually gave McCain a nice bump initially but it didn't take long to see she wasn't close to being vice presidential.
External events (bad economy, an Obama scandal, etc.) are the only things that can turn it around for Romney.
You might be right Steve:
Aug. 1: Obama Extends Electoral College Advantage
By NATE SILVER
Barack Obama’s standing in the FiveThirtyEight forecast reached its strongest position to date on Tuesday as a result of favorable polls in a set of swing states. The forecast model now gives Mr. Obama a 70.8 percent chance of winning the Electoral College, up from 69.0 percent on Monday and from 65.0 percent last Tuesday.
Three of the polls were conducted by Quinnipiac University in conjunction with The New York Times and CBS News. The polls gave Mr. Obama leads of 6 points in each of Ohio and Florida, and an 11-point lead in Pennsylvania.
In each state, the polls are at the high end of the range of numbers produced by other polling firms. As we frequently advise, no one set of polls — no matter how reputable the pollster — should be read as gospel. Differences in the numbers from survey firm to survey firm often reflect sampling error or methodological differences rather than any fundamental change in the condition of the race.
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<< The Registrar General's report also said nearly a quarter of marriages registered in Scotland in 2011 were for couples where neither the bride nor groom lived in the country. >>
Marriage by internet?
TG's in Issaan.
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Forgot to put the link but USA Today and other outlets have an article saying Obama is leading in Ohio, Florida and Penna., and its outside the margin for error. Something like 7 or 8 points or more. This race is over unless something changes. National polls mean jack squat. The ONLY thing that matters are the swing states and the 5 biggest which includes these 3. I was suprised to see him leading in Florida. He was behind slightly a few months ago.
Abortion: Will become easier. Demographics will determine this. Gen Y and Gen X women, even the ones that wouldn't get an abortion, won't stand in someone's way to get one. Men and women will see it as a war on women as its being promoted now.
Romney might have a joker with Rubio as VP, him being a Latino and from Florida, don't you think?
Usa Thread
in Non-Thailand News
Posted
Obama is outspent 8-1 by GOP super pacs
Koch-backed group, Romney super PAC lead charge against Obama
By: Dave Levinthal
August 17, 2012 04:11 PM EDT
Top conservative super PACs and outside groups have outspent President Barack Obama’s super PAC by more than 8-to-1 this month.
Together, the Koch brothers-linked Americans for Prosperity and pro-Mitt Romney super PAC Restore Our Future combined to spend about $31 million on ads against Obama, an analysis of federal independent expenditure records shows.
The pro-Obama super PAC Priorities USA Action, meanwhile, spent a comparatively anemic $3.69 million to slam Romney.
The divide further illustrates what’s been true for much of the election cycle: Conservative outside groups have a massive cash advantage over their liberal counterparts.
Americans for Prosperity’s most
“The president has not earned reelection in 2012,†one woman declares.
“I don’t feel that I helped my grandchildren by voting for President Obama, and I regret that,†another man says.
A Restore Our Future ad, meanwhile,
Here’s the rundown on the top 10 outside political groups, between Aug. 1 and Wednesday, airing ads that overtly advocate for or against federal political candidates:
1) Americans for Prosperity, $20.7 million, all in opposition to Obama.
2) Restore Our Future, $10.1 million, all in opposition to Obama.
3) Priorities USA Action, $3.69 million, all in opposition to Romney.
4) Crossroads GPS, $1.82 million, all in opposition to Rep. Shelley Berkley (D-Nev.) and Virginia Senate candidate Tim Kaine (D).
5) Club for Growth Action/PAC, $1.36 million, mostly in opposition to Republican House candidate Paul Gosar in Arizona and Republican Senate candidates Tommy Thompson and Eric Hovde in Wisconsin, and in support of Senate candidate Mark Neumann in Wisconsin.
6) Conservative Majority Fund, $1.02 million, all in opposition to Obama.
7) Friends of Democracy, $776,072, in opposition to a variety of Republican congressional candidates, most notably Reps. Charlie Bass of New Hampshire, Dan Lungren of California, Sean Duffy of Wisconsin and Chip Cravaack of Minnesota.
8) Patriot Majority USA, $707,298, all in opposition to Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) and Republican congressional candidate Andrew Roraback in Connecticut.
9) Americans for Job Security, $649,800, all against Hovde.
10) U.S. Chamber of Commerce, $595,754, primarily against several Democrats, including Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) and Kaine.
© 2012 POLITICO LLC
http://www.politico....9841.html?hp=f3