Is McCain implying Obama is an "extremist" and a "socialist"?
By SilentPatriot Thursday Jul 17, 2008 12:40pm
Sure sounds like it. The Kansas City Star's Dave Helling interviewed John McCain after a town hall meeting Thursday in Kansas City and had this little exchange about one of the Republican nominee's stump speech attacks.
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Helling: You talked about a little bit about Senator Obama today. You said he was the most extreme member of the Senate.
McCain: Yea, that's his voting record.
Helling: Extreme? You really think he's an extremist? I mean he's clearly liberal..
McCain: Well, that's his voting record. All I said was his voting record. And it's more to the left that the announced socialist in the United States Senate, Bernie Sanders of Vermont
Helling: You really think he's a socialist, Barack Obama?
McCain: Oh, I don't know. All I know is his voting record.
This is hardly the first time the McCain campaign has tried to distort Obama's record and tag him as some sort of extremist. Joe Lieberman says "it's a good question" to ask whether Obama is a marxist, Glenn Beck rants about Michelle Obama having a "socialist agenda," and Bill Kristol believes the "bitter" remarks revealed Obama's inner Karl Marx.
Steve Benen has already debunked the right-wing claim that Obama is the "most liberal member of the US Senate" so I won't bother repeating it here, but a look at McCain's voting record during the Bush years reveals just what you would expect: Despite the CW that McCain is a party-bucking maverick, he's voted with Bush 91% of the time -- including 100% and 95% in 2008 and 2007, respectively. A debates over voting records is not one the McCain campaign should be eager to engage in.
Also take note of McCain's blatant lying towards the end of the clip as he attempts to defend himself from flip-flopping charges. Unlike the majority of McCain's Media™, Helling actually confronts the candidate, and gets him on tape denying things that are demonstrably true.
Take, for instance, the myth McCain now peddles that he only opposed the Bush tax cuts in 2001 because they weren't accompanied by restraint in spending. Well, if that was the case, why did he say this back then?: "I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us, at the expense of middle class Americans who most need tax relief." It's really a shame that the somewhat-respectable Republican McCain used to be has become possessed by the base-pandering, run-of-the-mill GOP ideologue he is today.
Like Jon Stewart once said, McCain has gone to "crazy base world." And it doesn't look like he's coming back.
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When is someone in MSM going to ask McSame to change his Depends and get the crap out of his aged brain?
corporate socialism is the only type of socialism permitted in these borders..
So when they said liberal, they actually meant conservative? I don't get this fascination with calling anything slightly left of Mussolini "(far)*10^1000 left" (I'm trademarking that by the way).
So yeah, I guess if you live in neocon nutsy land everything looks communist to you.
Are there any doubts left this guy is just another lying sack of bat guano like Bush?
I never realized the movie "Say Anything" was McBush's biography!
Nothing wrong with socialism, except Merkins are brainwashed into believing it a bad thing by those who don't stand to profit by it, eg, Health Insurance companies.
Yes, its true. Obama is a socialist. He's going to raise your taxes, take away your job, your house, your guns, and force all pregnant white women to have an abortion (snark).
All the Republicans are good for are name calling and fear.
Oh, that's okay; go ahead and debunk it again. Hillary is more to the left than Obama. Websites such as "On the Issues" have lots of aspects of candidate's votes broken down and arranged to percentages etc. If it were true that Obama was the most liberal, I would be a lot more enthusiastic. But it just ain't so.
And all McCain is is a lousy pilot who got caught. Anyone can get caught. How does that make him, or anyone for that matter a hero?
For years, the media's favorable treatment of John McCain has been so impossible to deny that many journalists have refused to even try, choosing to explain the favoritism rather than contest its existence. One common explanation has always been that the media treat McCain well because he treats them well, offering them unprecedented access and candor.
This has always been a troubling explanation to those who think that the media should report candidates' flaws regardless of the candidates' efforts to keep them fat and happy with jelly doughnuts and jocular nicknames. Hours of back-of-the-bus conversations fueled by sweetened baked goods may justify reporters liking McCain better than other candidates, but they don't justify treating him better than other candidates.
But that's just what happens. Time's Ana Marie Cox explained recently:
This is something that I've said whenever discussions of McCain -- McCain's sort of courting of the press comes up. I think that with McCain, it's not that he's such a great, charismatic guy; it is actually just the simple fact of access that makes people give him that second chance.
[...]
McCain's traveling press corps, I think, tend to like him very much and are appreciative of that time that he spends with them. And, even though the access is not as good as it used to be, there's a great deal of effort put into making journalists, you know, sort of a part of the process. And his staff, you know, loves to hang out with journalists. And so, there's just sort of an aura of access.
[...]
Anyway, I mean, I think it's, like, sort of like obvious ... that, like, more access is good for democracy.
But access doesn't do much for democracy if reporters don't use that access to help voters understand the candidates' positions. And it is abundantly clear that the reporters who enjoy McCain's company on his campaign bus have not used their access as well as they could.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200807110002?f=h_column
Phylter @ 6:
No, nothing wrong with socialism, at least socialism of the Scandinavian and Western European variety. Now, Soviet-and-Maoist style Communism, OTOH, where people are deliberately starved in the name of utopia or farmlands are destroyed for one man's gain is a slightly different story.
Both camps have conclusive proof that John's ancestry includes the Romanov's, and that Obama's to Lenin. It's all fact if they want it to be. The 90% of the public that are unable to grasp that oxygen is important to life will believe you. And the president of Diebold will do the rest by fixing the election.
if mccain has indeed "reached across the aisle," then one can only deduce that he has embraced some liberal and or "socialist" positions himself.
correct?
Now Dan Rather is in on the smears. http://www.dailykos.com/comments/2008/7/18/8401/80330/119#c119
John McPapen is lying through his teeth. Obama has never once come out in favor of nationalizing the means of production, or of anything even remotely resembling the thing Americans call "socialism" (i.e. Stalinism and Maoism and Titoism).
McSame needs to stop listening to so much talk radio on that bus of his. These comments are right off of Limbaugh and Hannity's talking points lists...
give me a break mcBush you know all about socialism
you been taken care of and employeed in the u.s. government your entire life. how's that social healthcare
system you have been in your entire life? can you open that system up to the public....or is it just for elites?
It does not take much of a six-sense to see this little prick for what he is, a money grubbing,butt kisser, who will say whatever he thinks people want to hear. The only thing he is for is himself, ask the guys who were in the same pow camp with him or the people who pulled him from a lake after his plane went down,saving his worthless life.-CEO
Mickxotic @ 8:
By European standards all presidential primary candidates, much less the two presumptive nominees from this year's elections, are to their right. Hillary may be to the Left of Obama, but she's not even really Leftist by American, much less European standards. Considering she never even spoke up when Hubby passed the DOMA and Obama has had anti-gay singers on his campaign, as a gay man I have no good choices here.
constituent @ 16:
That's not socialism, that's old-school Hellenistic oligarchy, that is.
Now according to Robert Novak. McCain has flip flopped on Phil Gramm, letting him back in his good graces. Which reminds me of that good McCain joke:
Why is my economic plan so ugly? Because it's mother is Phil Gramm.
Oh yay! My senator has now become shorthand to demonize someone! And falsely too, I might add. More left than Bernie, my ass. By what metric, jerkwad?
mccain playing cute cuddly grandpa with his passive-
aggressive snide comments....somebody feeds these comments to him.
all hail they hypno toad @ 3:
Of course it does, what do you expect when core Neocons were ex-Trotskyists who couldn't handle Maoism and Stalinism?
Jumpin' Jeebus on a pogo stick. As an actual socialist, I can only say that Obama is so far to the right of socialism that 40 years ago he could have been a Republican (if you ignore the fact that he is black).
Mission accomplished ........... why is it every time I watch anything to do with the US news I loose some intelligence, I can now see why the sheelp are in the state they are, growing up in an enviroment like that would reduce most people to 2 year old emotional blobs reacting on a immediate needs basis and blaming everyone/thing else for their own issues opposed to taking any responsibility ........... hmmm
Now from that I can't see a way out.
rend @ 2:
I dare say 95% of people in the US couldn't actually define socialism, or capitalism for that matter.
Karla @ 21:
That's because you have to be exactly like Mussolini to be considered a "centrist". You would then have to be even more insane than that to be considered a "conservative".
McCain is the worse choice for the Republican Party even Barr has picked up votes from McCain. As for Obama even McCain knows he's right now the best and only choice. It's like being at store with one apple that's good and all the others are rotten. You can live with that one healthy apple or die with the rest. I'm no fan of Obama but I would like my country back and the corruption gone. For 7 years Bush/Cheney have said Iran was the enemy yet for 7 years the Bush Administration and Halliburton have been doing alot of business for the pass 7 years. McCain can't remember what he eat for breakfast and he's ready to stay the Bush course of crime. He wants to stay in Iraq for 100 years and doesn't care how many soldiers die. McCain has no problem calling woman mad names or even allowing Foreign Leaders to know he supports the rape of woman and the disrespect of children. Look what he calls his own wife and she so stupid she laughs. What do you think will happen if McCain calls a World Leaders wife the names he using on American woman? Trash is trash no matter what you spray on it, it will continue to stink.
why does McCain know so much about Obama's voting record, but can't remember his own? in the last week or so, when pressed on votes he's made, he claims not to remember. but he knows Obama's record like the back of his liver spotted hand?
Jerry @ 26:
Indeed. They may know of Das Kapital but few know of the Capitalist equivalent, Wealth of Nations and even fewer know it was published...guess when...1776.
"If we keep on doing what we're doing, we'll win this war".
This is not a war, JohnBoy, this is an illegal occupation of a sovereign country!
DrDick @ 25:
Heh, when you say socialist, is what you're referring to soft revolution by the ballot as opposed to the old hard revolution by the bullet? That sort of socialism won't get into effect as easy in the US as it has in Europe. Too much animus left over from the Red Scares.
General@18, You are right on the money, The media just loves to pretend that american citizens are middle to right, when in fact we are more left by far. Gee if most of america is right perhaps I'am wrong or not up to date or not mainstream?... bullshit, ask people if they think we should help the poor or fund education or job training, and then ask them if the rich should not have to pay taxes, or out source american jobs, I think you that most people are liberal, they just don't realize it or think that by saying they are conservative people will think that thay have money or power or both.-CEO
constituent @ 22:
I've said before that someone winds him up - gives him his talking points and sends the doddering old man out there to deliver their message of the day. The question is - we're not putting McCain in if he's elected - (he's just a useful tool) - who exactly is going to be McCain's Dick Cheney?
It is difficult to attack McLame's voting record, he hasn't had one for about a year now!
McCain is so nervous that he might say the wrong thing that he comes out with some crazy sh*t. Then his campaign has to come along behind him and translate what he really meant to mean.
mostly correct, although I'd have said 'Stalinist' to eliminate any possible good connotations...
CEO,citizens,eyes,open @ 33:
I think that few Americans are well-read enough to understand the difference between the socialism of Stockholm and London and the atrocities of Moscow and Phnom Penh. All they know of Marxism is the latter, when the former has done much good for Europe, and even for the Great National Park (;)) to our border. It seems even fewer Americans in my area understand that the Dems are not the second coming of Saloth Sar or Vladimir Ulyanov.
I'd love to see an actual economic Leftist pop up in American politics, or failing that, an economically leftist Populist movement, if only to see the Right shit their pants.
McCain doesn't even know his own voting record. How the hell can he know Barack Obama's?
Wow. I hope this is the Repig game plan. I don't understand why Democratic leaders don't use the term extremist with reference to real extremeists, i.e., most Repigs... `cept I do understand. That wouldn't be nice.
So again, what's wrong with Socialism? Eeeeek... public roads and infrastructure, libraries, and a reinvestment in the FREE public school system, medical coverage. You're speaking of a government that provides for the common defense and welfare of its people.
Dammit, this is America, we can't have those things...
Last week, McCain said Obama closer to Bush on Iraq policy than McCain was. This week Obama is far left wing radical.
Flip flop?
Orangutan. @ 14:
Rather proves age isn't and shouldn't be a factor in presidential politics. I mean, JJ will lead us to Osama, right?
William @ 41:
When most Americans hear "socialism" what pops to mind is Tuol Sleng and the Gulag and the Soviet May Day Parades. Unfortunate, and considering what the type of socialism is that would emerge here in the US, totally wrong, but that onus is still there.
Why couldn't Helling just ask McCain to give an example. If McCain knows Obama's voting record (as he claims) then he should be able to point out a handful of extremist votes he's made. These journalists need to make him prove something, not just insinuate.
silent patriot i am in agreement with you. mccain being opposed to the bush tax cuts before he was for them.
he didn't speak up in 2001 about government spending...
this is an added qualifier....i don't buy and never did
but for some it's clever. those tax breaks are part of economic problems currently....we are borrowing for this war from china, japan and others. people more likely to be in the market are doing very well in certain sectors
more"diasater capitalism"
Let’s be fair & balanced here. If Obama is a Socialist-Liberal Extremist, then McSenile is a Neo-Nazi -Con. So there. (raspberries)
Not quite related ... but a Susan Roberts (CBS News) story on Obama's upcoming trip abroad includes a line about how any mistake Obama makes on the trip will support McCain's argument that OBAMA is inexperienced. (You folks may not see this until your local noon or evening newscast, or perhaps it's on the web.)
But there's NOTHING about how many gaffes ol' Straitjacket Johnny has made. Thinks Czechoslovakia still exists. Can't distinguish Sunni from Shiite, al-Qaeda from Quds Force.
ARGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!
Sorry, I had to vent.
Thanks McCain for supporting Viagra and making sure the government doesn't improve health care system!
"My friends, we've seen this movie before," McCain said. "It was called 'HillaryCare' back in 1993, and we're not going to do it again. We're not going to have the government take over the health care system in America."
The news that McCain has flip flopped on letting Phil Gramm back inb his campaign was broken in a Robert Novak column. Angry right wing flame throwers on ABC's threads have flip flopped on Novak, saying "didn't you libs always say Novak never got anything right" and attacking his unnamerd sources.
For those of you who like the Jonathan Swift defense for the New Yorker cover, here is my modest proposal.
Our nation of whiners is threatened by Islamofacism. Robert Novak has put the McCain campaign at risk by using false anonymous sources. Life, even that beginning at conception, is endangered. Therefore, due to circumstances unforeseen by the Framers, the President is authorized, by a theory of law I may never have discussed but it was classified, to have Novak seized. His rendition will be ordered so he may be taken in a private jet piloted by Cindy McCain to Nicaragua where he can be waterboarded by Rush Limbaugh. We cannot leave this to amateurs like the Army. They might accept false sources from torture…er enhanced interrogation. Like the Steeler defensive…er Packer offensive line.
Some one should point out to McCain that the cold war has been over for a while now, he seems to have missed that turn of events.
General@38 The last time the dems were anywhere close to populist was in 32 and that sure as hell didn't last long, everyone seemed to take a nap after that and most have not gotten up yet, they may wake up to a real bad dream that they can not wake up from." Want of money is the root of all evil ", true, time after time down through history. To be rich is now the goal of our young people above all else, it can't be good, I wonder if our country can recover or will we go the way of other great countrys before us who also thought they were " hot- snot"-CEO
Lovely how this keeps coming up more & more frequently...
First they ignore you
Then they ridicule you
Then they demonize you
And then you win.
The proper response to being called a "pinko commie Marx-loving socialist" is the same as to being called a "muslim": So what if i am?
A pity Senator Obama and the rest of his party is so closed minded as to accept this traditional propaganda.
The economic system we have now has done a great job of bring the human race to the precipice of extinction & is on it's way to making the planet unfit for any lifeforms higher than bacteria. Sustainability can not be achieved if left to the anarchy of market forces & that ruling class god "The Invisible Hand".
Let us have a party that is Marxist and candidates who hold and advance the socialist perspective. We are confident of our chances if ever given a fair hearing.
And of course General_Rennenkampf, we can all agree that the horrors that have been perpetrated in the name of communism by bureaucratic-oligarchs can be roundly denounced as they have been by all true Marxists since 1937.
William @ 41:
You hate america, you're not a good americon ........ get back in your fear box and blame everything on the world ...... two legs good, four legs bad ..........
Everything about McShame screams 'HYPOCRITE' to me. To know the truth about your opponent, constantly lie about him for your own political gain, especially when you proclaimed to the world that you would not wage that kind of campaign, is the very height of HYPOCRACY. And that to me is the essence of McShame.
euthyfro @ 53:
CEO,citizens,eyes,open @ 52:
@ CEO: True, and the last time the Republicans even resembled Populism was 1860. As for America lasting forever, of course we won't. Nothing lasts forever, and all things pass away eventually. The US may become the Roman Empire in terms of North American historiography, a time when much of the continent was united and at its height, though like the Roman empire in the West, not necessarily for the better in the long run.
@ Euthyfro: Yes, I'd like to see true Marxism revive as well, what is mislabeled Marxism in this nation is not going to end well no matter where it is put into place. The US needs a good dose of economic leftism after economic rightist wank-fests like Reagan and Bush's terms. I agree with that post.
Obama needs to(and I believe he will) stop allowing this lying, pandering old fool, to define him. Obama should be ready at every turn to aggressively slap McLiar down and expose him as a typical conservative....full of anger, bigotry, lies and hypocrisy. Go on the offensive Obama, time to kick ass.
General_Rennenkampf @ 11:
Except that because of right-wing propaganda, many Americans can't separate the two.
They don't understand that by definition, countries like Canada, France, Italy, the UK and for that matter virtually all Western democracies, are by our definition: Socialist.
And if we're going to survive as a nation, we to must move further to the left. It's inevitible.
The alternative is the greedy and unsustainable politics of the right, which only results in the economic, social, and political problems we see today, many of them unique to our country.
Phylter @ 6:
Exactly true. Americans must fight the brainwashing.
yakfitguy @ 58:
1/5 of all Americans can't even figure out that this is a heliocentric Solar System, not a geocentric Terrestrial System, so the fact that they can't distinguish Scandinavian socialism from Sovietism comes as no surprise.
I do agree with you that we need to move to the left, economically, we've been economically Right for too long, and it's hurting us, bad. Looking at Bush's terms and Reagan's terms, we need a new FDR or someone even further left than he was (he actually wasn't as far left for the time as is commonly supposed) to revive the economy, or we're fucked.
Is this extreme enough for you?
Why is Obama calling for a 'civilian national security force'? This is alarming. He's showing his true colors now. First he wants to give the U.N. 7% of entire GDP. Now he wants a Stasi style youth force.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69601
"We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded." - Barack Obama
If Americans are too stupid to know the difference between Socialism and Totalitarianism, and fearfully settle for Authoritarianism and Oligarchy, then this excremental mess is well deserved.
General_Rennenkampf @ 44:
Let's hear an "Amen" for Bernie Sanders!
Concerned Democrat @ 61:
WorldNetDaily should be trusted about as much as an Inuit on survival techniques in the Sahara Desert.
I don't know who the reporter was but this is the first time I heard a reporter push back when McCain answered a question. He told McCain that he flipped flopped also. Of course McCain said no he didn't. I want to say thanks to that reporter. To bad we don't have more that are not blinded by the war hero stuff. That only goes so far.
William @ 62:
Unfortunately, 60-odd years of Cold War paranoia and longer periods of anti-anarchist and anti-communist hate will do that to a nation. Ever since 1900 for anarchists and 1919 for communists, the United States hasn't exactly been a comfortable nation for them to live. Which sucks, unfortunately, because we need economic leftism like Glenn Beck needs alcohol.
"core Neocons were ex-Trotskyists who couldn’t handle Maoism and Stalinism?"
That's something i've heard and read as the common knowledge, that neo-conservatism is populated w/ex-Trotskyists but where does it come from?
Was there some jump made when the left-right spectrum in these peoples' minds began eating its tail like a serpent or was it a matter individuals rejecting all their youthful ideals and simply embracing their opposite?
Trotsky and the left opposition never attempted to "handle" Stalinism in the same way that many Americans today can't handle what Bush is doing to the constitution. That was the reason for the creation of the show trials and the gulags: to stop those Russians that lead the October Revolution from continuing it.
I'll put it in the same category as "punk": If you aren't one now, you never were.
euthyfro @ 67:
I'll state that the father of Neoconservatism was a definite Trotskyist, I'm not sure about the rest of them, some may have been disillusioned Maoists after the Great Leap Forward. Either way, the reason Bush Republicanism is Marxism for the Wealthy (an oxymoron if there ever was one) is due to that Trotskyism influencing their thought, like a lot of Stalin's mindset was influenced by his time in the Seminary, and like St. Augustine's theology was too Manichean to make a good Christianity, which of course, it didn't.
Implying???
How about shrieking?
Concerned Democrat @ 61:
If that quote is solid i'll give the Senator a point.
"No standing army but an armed citizenry."
-V.I. Lenin The State and Revolution
this is why i'm not a big supporter of gun control.
You know at the same time, this reporter is clearly trying to get a very specific answer from him and frames every question based upon that. It's hard to know for sure what the final word is here.
Ugh....again. Okay, he said that Obama's voting record is on par with Sanders. This is true. I don't care if you call them Democrats or Republicans or Doo-doo Heads, they mach. You can't dispute a RECORD. It's kind of written down. Obama's votes mach up with Sanders. Sanders is a Socialist. That's what he's registered as. That's what he calls himself. I'm not comparing him to Socialists - He IS one. I'm not saying this is a bad thing. But, facts are facts whether we want to face them or not. Barrack, since he's been a Senator has, indeed, voted with the democrats on more issues than others have. Again, not a bad thing. But, if you start calling someone a liar by lying, you're not helping yourself any. When you're backed into a corner, you shut the hell up and hope nobody noticed. There are enough REAL issues out there that don't need to be embellished or twisted or just damn made up. Why can't we use those issues to make points? There are plenty. Why are we using Bush '04 tactics??? I’m a friggin’ Socialist myself, but at least I can use cold, hard, no-opinion-necessary facts to make points about issues more complicated that a five year old would use. Again, there are plenty out there. This s**t is a waste of good energy.
I don't see any of the MSM reporters being responsible, much like they dropped the ball on the WMD/Iraq bullshit. Grandpa gets a pity pass because he exhibits muddled memory indicative of approaching senility. Maybe KO or Maddow on MSNBC, and an intermittant story on CNN (which I never watch). I do think many Repubs and Indies are noticing though.
From the Q&A on the National Review article:
Whatever.
Maybe McCain didn't get a score because he would be in the no-win position of being neither a maverick nor very conservative.
McCain didn't believe the shit he was spewing in 2000 either. He just knows the way the wind blows. His one goal is just like Cheney's: to seize the reigns of power so as to enrich himself and his friends. Ask EADS or Charles Keating.
Ben @ 72:
Read the methodology of the sampling of the votes and Benen's article. Specifically, Obama voted on 65 out of the 99 votes tested, but there is no consideration for missed votes. Kerry was most liberal in 2003 because he missed votes that weren't necessary for the party. The sampling is rigged.
This is much more accurate: Obama vs. McCain
General_Rennenkampf @ 68:
Alright, i can see the overall vision of a worldwide transforming permanent revolution as the grand strategy of Trotskyism being corrupted into their "creating our own new realities" while most of the world remains in the "reality-based community".
Concerned Democrat @ 61:
You freaking idiot. First, why in the world would you read World Nut Daily? Second, the line right before the quoted one from Obama was that he wanted to increase the size of the Peace Corps and Americorps.
He doesn't want the Stasi, he wants a bigger Peace Corps. He means REAL security not Blackwater security.
Take your "concern" back to LGF.
euthyfro @ 76:
Yes, because Trotskyism wanted a global revolution, neglecting that at the time, the only industrialized states were Europe and Japan, with industrialization and capitalism as precursors for Marx's ideas, that would mean the vast majority of the world would not have sufficed.
It's not an entire corruption of Trotskyism, some of it has to do with "Once a fanatic, always a fanatic."
Socialists want a give a few dollars to those that need it
conservatives want to give millions of dollars to corporations who don't.
McGrampa has admitted that he doesn't even know his own voting record. What a fing liar.
General_Rennenkampf @ 66:
Unfortunately, 60-odd years of Cold War paranoia and longer periods of anti-anarchist and anti-communist hate will do that to a nation. Ever since 1900 for anarchists and 1919 for communists, the United States hasn't exactly been a comfortable nation for them to live. Which sucks, unfortunately, because we need economic leftism like Glenn Beck needs alcohol.
I'd like to give Glenn Beck a nice frosty mug of anti-freeze.
In the 2004 campaign, it was John Kerry that was tagged as pushing socialist policies by -- among others -- Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon.
Old Billy Hussein @ 81:
I'd like to give Glenn Beck a nice frosty mug of anti-freeze.
Heh, the ol' "Death solves all problems, no man, no problem," solution eh? Didn't work that well for the USSR. Sure, it let them beat the Nazis, but they paid much too high a price to do it.
McCain also thinks Czechoslovakia is still around... so... only in America can someone mess up as bad as he did and be called a hero....
WTH @ 84:
The only thing Winston Churchill accomplished in WWI was a Gallipolli clusterfuck and they chose him to be PM of the UK. Of course, John McPapen has neither the wit, eloquence, nor courage of Churchill but shares Churchill's stubbornness, unlike Churchill to our detriment, whereas Churchill was for the UK's benefit.
If Obama is trying to keep his planned visit to Baghdad under wraps for safety and security reasons why did McCain say this today (Friday)?
"I believe that either today or tomorrow - and I'm not privy to his schedule - Senator Obama will be landing in Iraq with some other senators" who make up a congressional delegation. - REUTERS
Is he trying to get the country's best hope knocked off so he'll skate on to an easy victory?
WTH @ 84:
Don't forget, herr dubyah was considered a "hero" for being a passenger landing on an aircraft carrier.
General_Rennenkampf @ 83:
Oh, I don't think it will solve any problems; except that he makes me nauseous. I've never seen anyone who so embodies a walking pustule as Glenn Beck.
McCain doesn't even know his own voting record, how the fuck can he comment on Obama's?
Obama votes "Liberal" 66 times, Clinton votes "Liberal" 72 times = Obama is more Liberal. There's some National Journal straight talk.
ysbaddaden @ 79:
Socialists want government to steal money from you and give it to those it labels as poor
Fascists want government to steal money from you and give it to corporations
Obama is a socialist, McCain is a fascist.
noitaluspacne @ 90:
Now why doesn't your ignorance surprise me ........ I wonder where you are from ..........
God help these propagandists masquerading as broadcast journalists if the FCC is ever restored to integrity.
McSame, in such risible comments, displays a breath-taking lack of judgement.
I wouldn't vote for him to lead a Homecoming Parade, much less our country.
Jerry @ 91:
I'm shocked there was no "Nader/Barr '08!" tag there. The woe-is-me-all-politicians-are-out-to-get-us types are usually all about promoting their "Real Choice!"(TM) third party.
I don't make over $200,000 per year, so I guess the "Socialist" Obama thinks I'm poor and wants to steal noitaluspacne's money and give it to me.
Tell me why I should have a problem with this again?
If he wanted to paint Obama as an extremist he should have exposed his connections to known terrorists like Bernardine Dohrn. Much more effective.
Obama's no extremist.
When he's not doing his preacher-man schtick
He's droning on and on until everybody is dropping off.
His voice could be a WMD.
Even Gore and Kerry are telling him to liven things up a bit.
FOSSIL
You can stump and con-servative or right wingnut idiot with a simple question:
Explain the difference between Communism & Socialism...
Because 99.9% of them don't know.
"Socialism" and "Communism" were rightwing dog whistle words in the '70s and '80s. Not anymore. McCain is living in the past.
Commentator @ 94:
Yeah, ol' encapsulation is stuck inside the box. No critical capacities to see here, folks. Move along...
obama... a socialist?
bwahahahahahahaha *deeeeeep breath* bwahahahahahahaaaa
i think the GOP's cult of the individual has gotten so extreme that other than masturbation, solitary confinement and being stranded on a desserted island they see socialism everywhere.
they are one step away from declaring that the family unit is communism.
this harkens back to their main economic outlook, and the need to destroy collective bargaining, democracy and the will of the people.
McCain doesn't know his own (very short) voting record. How could he know Obama's?
I got off the bus from work about a week ago in San Diego, I know a guy who organizes locally and he was there with a socialist group handing out literature from a booth on the street. We were across the street and I noticed a guy getting in the face of one of the girls handing out info. So I mentioned to the guy I know to go over to help the girl and after listening to the, obviously drunk, right wing goon yelling at her, I engaged the guy in a conversation. He started yelling at me, like all drunk yobs do he got far too close to my face when talking, about the evils of "socialism". I said ok (patting him on the back to try to get him to calm down), give me some examples of the evils of socialism (I thought he'd go to the easy ones like Stalin, who was an authoritarian statist who used socialist rhetoric to justify a dictatorship that had nothing to do with socialism and was technically state capitalist. He did everything he could to not only attack socialism in the USSR but changed the policy to "socialism in one country" and tended to support entrenched interests in nationalist struggles vs. more radical groups, like in China and the Spanish Civil War for example), he just staired blankly, said, "well, the history of socialism..." (?). Ok, what about socialism don't you like? "These leftists always blame the US for everything. They want to force their opinions on everyone!!!". Ok, I said, how is having a booth on a street corner forcing their views on people? You could just walk by if you wanted to or create a booth across the street yourself, is this not just about freedom of speech? Blank look, walked away.
That's honestly what happened and almost every time it's the same. When I was organizing against the war before the war started the same conversation happened numerous times, almost word for word. People have been trained to respond to words themselves without even knowing what they mean. Never once do these freaking people THINK. They hear what to say and repeat. THIS is the willful ignorance that is going to be very hard to overcome in this country.
“Socialists want government to steal money from you and give it to those it labels as poor”
This is such a simplistic, black/white view of the world. Capitalism involves the most theft of all, socialism if anything tries to remedy what is stolen and should never have been the capitalists in the first place. For one, we live in the commons of the environment, whatever you own everyone else doesn’t. Whatever you consume is a cost, since it lowers the per capita resource availability. If you pollute you create costs for everyone, including harming ecosystem itself. So saying that someone should own as much as they can, regardless as to whether or not they actually use the land and resources as efficiently as others would, and denying that there such thing as the commons is beyond ignorant. Denying the commons and saying that everything is subjective is a result of the formulation of “free market” economic theory which has never had much connection to reality.
If you have money and invest in the stock market and make a profit, YOU didn’t work a single bit. Someone else worked and you, investors as a whole, monopolized what they produced. You added nothing tangible to the world. If you invest in the financial markets and make a profit you make a profit off of debt created out of nothing and the debt is not matched by an increase in wages (which is obvious, the financial markets have exploded in size, with trillions now traded a day, losing more and more touch with underlying economic activity). Again, you increased your wealth, taking a larger share of the “virtual wealth” created by private actors without doing a damn bit of work. How is that not theft? Adam Smith said that wages above the “natural rate” were a tax upon all those that didn’t receive the profits (because if you have a disproportionate share of the wealth everyone else has disproportionately less), he also said that profits would be highest in the countries going quickest to ruin. What would the founder of modern capitalism be called today if he said such a thing?
Or take ecological costs. If you own a factory and pollute, you are creating costs. Why is it “theft” to make you pay for the costs? The costs aren’t included in prices or national induces. What logical explanation is there for this? The reason is again economic theory, which has little connection to the reality we live in. If the costs of industrial activity were included in prices, the costs of everything would go up and, like now, there would be increased calls to re-distribute wealth. If they were included in national indices like GDP we might conclude that consumption beyond a point creates more costs than benefits. So it’s best to allow those who create the most costs to socialize the costs. Years off of your life, sickness, ecological destruction are the result, is there not theft involved there as well? It’s best to allow capitalists to monopolize the benefits of national economic activity and to ignore the long term costs, because again it wouldn’t jive with “free market” economic theory.
"Adam Smith said that wages above the “natural rate” were a tax upon all those that didn’t receive the profits "
I meant to say that profits above the "natural rate"
Well... @ 104:
Yes it is simplistic. But that is what socialism is, theft and then redistribution based upon some criteria of what is fair. You can justify the theft any way you please, but it doesn't change the fact that you are taking what doesn't belong to you. It may be going to a good cause, but it really isn't for you to decide how other people spend their money.
Capitalism involves the exchange of goods and services via prices determined by the market. Capitalism itself is not theft, but like all things, can be perverted to favor one group over another. We don't have free markets today and haven't had them for quite some time. In a free market, the government doesn't go bailing out failing companies, the government doesn't set interest rates and the government doesn't give subsidies for anything. Any complaint of capitalism based upon your understanding of "free markets" is bound to be flawed.
Your complaint about pollution is valid though. If anything the market never seems to include the costs of pollution or not to the degree that it should and I think that came be blamed on our "justice" system. If it was possible for a person to hold the polluters accountable, then the market would have to start accurately pricing in the cost of pollution. Failure to do so would be too costly to the investors.
And investors don't just steal. It is their capital that makes it possible for a company to exist. And the company in turn employs people to accomplish some goal. Investors aren't limited to wall street. If you and some friends wanted to start a coffee shop, you could pool your money together for the money necessary to start the business. You would in that case, be an investor in the business. If the business does well, you profit. If it doesn't you lose. Where is the theft?
Thinkprogress.org had a similar post, but their lawyers advised them to take iit down. Anyone have a clue why a post like this would raise the ire of lawyerrs at a progressive blog?
Thanks,
Alec
General_Rennenkampf @ 30:
So true! GOP = Corporate socialism for the uber rich! On steroids! Fuck everyone else!
What are they going to do when their entire house of bullshit comes tumbling down? Talking points, demagoguery and smearing.
Hey folks, read the quotes, its the reporter who is parsing words and making the claims not McCain. Mc Cain did not say extremist or socialist. The reporter did. Journalism at its finest.
"But that is what socialism is, theft and then redistribution based upon some criteria of what is fair. You can justify the theft any way you please, but it doesn’t change the fact that you are taking what doesn’t belong to you. "
So let me get this straight. You have money, you invest it, you add nothing to the world but increase your wealth thanks to either debt being created (which never really gets paid back, it just grows or rolls over, so you make money as a result of someone else paying off debt) or by someone else creating something. THAT isn' theft, you not working and increasing your wealth by denying that to the person who actually DID create something. However, taxing you after you monopolize the work of someone else is theft...I'm sorry that's logically ridiculous. If you want a middle position, neither is theft, it should be up society to determine who should benefit from what is created and how much money, purshasing power and debt should be created, in other words economic democracy.
Financial inflation has exploded, and no one says anything. What is the financial markets but debt which can never be paid off? If the financial markets can't find a way to grow the system crashes.
Well... @ 110:
If my money added nothing then there would be no point in investing. Why would a company or person want my money if I added nothing?
Where does me investing money DENY somebody something? YOU chose where and whom you work for (if you decide to work for someone else). If you think your compensation is not in line with your efforts, you should chose to work somewhere else. By continuing to work for less than you deserve you are denying yourself something, not me. You are allowing the cheap bastard(s) to continue to make a profit at your expense too, if you are really being under compensated.
If you are arguing that my investment must be paid back with interest and that extra interest payment will be paid at the expense of the employees of the company that did the work, I disagree your argument. I don't force my money on anybody. People/Companies go out seeking investment capital to either startup a business or to expand/improve their business. Is the person that provides these services not entitled to some form of compensation for the risk they take of losing all their investment?
Your failure to see tax as theft is because you've rationalized that my money isn't mine. Let's ignore investment income for a moment and go to the more basic case of people that work in a factory for a paycheck. Is it not theft for them to be taxed. Is not all their money, earned with their labor, truely their own to spend as they chose? Or do you have some argument to justify stealing from them too?
Yes, inflation has exploded! And your "solution" for dealing with problem (through theft and redistribution) isn't going to solve the problem because you aren't addressing the real problem (which you just identified). Inflation (loss of purchasing power) without an equal increase in compensation is going to result in people having a decrease in wealth. Any attempt to fix this decrease in wealth without addressing the inflation problem is going to be a complete failure.
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