90.9 WBUR - Boston's NPR news station
Top Stories:
Listen News Programs Schedule
PLEDGE NOW
April 27, 2012 at 10:00 AM
Week In The News: Romney, Murdoch, Arizona In Court

Romney sweeps. Arizona on trial. Murdoch in trouble. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney takes the stage at an election night rally in Manchester, N.H., Tuesday, April 24, 2012. (AP)

Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney takes the stage at an election night rally in Manchester, N.H., Tuesday, April 24, 2012. (AP)

So, it’s Romney’s after all for the GOP this week. Santorum gone. Newt gone. And Mitt channeling Ronald Reagan’s “are you better off than you were four years ago.” President Obama, on the hustings this week, “slow-jammin” and calling out for the youth vote. And the ghosts of elections past, John Edwards, goes on trial.

At the Supreme Court, a sympathetic hearing for Arizona’s get-tough immigration law. In Mexico, Walmart, big bribery, and cover-up. In the U.K., press lord Rupert Murdoch in the hot seat.

This hour, On Point: our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests

John McCormack, staff writer at the Weekly Standard.

Rana Foroohar, assistant managing editor of Time magazine in charge of business and econmics coverage.

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst.

From Tom’s Reading List

The Guardian “Murdoch, the News Corp chairman and chief executive, giving his second day of evidence to the inquiry in London, said he was “misinformed and shielded” from what was going on at the News of the World, adding that there was a “cover-up”.”

Politico “With the primary campaign essentially over, Mitt Romney has landed on a new  strategy to keep him in the headlines: getting in President Barack Obama’s face  at every opportunity.”

The Wasington Post “Charles Taylor, the U.S.-educated guerrilla leader who fought his way to the presidency of Liberia, was convicted Thursday of crimes against humanity — including murder, rape and slavery — for his role in assisting a bloody rebel movement in neighboring Sierra Leone.”

 
  • Roy Mac

    Jan Brewer for Veep!  Tea Party wants smaller govt and lower taxes, but every citizen of Arizona is entirled to a weapon and a personal INS escort.  Can the US expel both Texas and Arizona in one act of congress?

    • Azra

      P L E E E E E E E E E E ZE?

    • Drew You Too

      Arizona has some beautiful scenery so just kick the people out. All Texas really has is Big Bend and driving from the east tip to the west tip is literally mind numbing. We won’t even discuss the caliber of politician only Texas seems to be capable of producing, I will gladly support expulsion of the entire state. Maybe we should just give it back…

    • Chris B

       We should have just let the whole south secede in the first place.  We wouldn’t have a congress full of crackers, all the teabags would have to go through immigration to get here and illegal immigration would be their problem.  On the other hand, by now the place would be one enormous Haiti that we’d have to share a border with.  Sigh.  No simple answers.

      • Lin

         Could not agree more.

      • TomK in Boston

        Amen! They could have their medieval aristocracy/theocracy agricultural and mineral extraction nation, and we could continue with the 21′st century, maybe importing them when we need cheap unskilled labor.

    • Gregg
  • kaltighanna

    Speaking of Arizona, any comments on the new abortion law that allows doctors to lie to women about health problems if they think they might choose an abortion and also establishes a cut-off at 18 weeks (providing that pregnancy begins at the last day of menstrual period, by the way)? Isn’t this all unconstitutional?!? Where are they going with this?

    • Azra

      Wow! This is news to me. Isn’t it high time that we start demanding mental competance/illness evaluations of all those who hold office, or practice medicine in America?This is long overdue. Mental illness is rampant among politicians/judges/extremists/the clergy, and more; a shocking and dangerous state of affairs. Mental problems are becoming so common that some Americans don’t bat an eye anymore, when these intrusions come up for consideration.

      Without a doubt, this would be unconstitutional, and immoral. It would also be a prime example of how extremists feel about women; that we are weak, lowly creatures, not worthy of the same respect that men are entitled to. They’re determined to dominate, and will stop at nothing. They know that it’s a man’s world, and plan to play it for all it’s worth. Our bodies and lives are not our own. These very twisted individuals are cropping up all over the place. Who do they think they are. We know WHAT they are, but why have they been allowed to get this far out of bounds?

      Weren’t the mandatory , unecessary, expensive sonograms unconstitutional enough? How can loonies be getting away with such atrocities in this day and age, IN AMERICA? Why is no one stepping in?

      So much for letting freedom ring, huh? What’s next, female ” circumcision”??? Why wasn’t the line drawn long before this? Does anyone have answers? Solutions?

      • aj

        Your upset. Do understand I can empathize with your propensity for equal rights.

        But the American female is not a minority. She is a majority of the population. Historically, her rights as a citizen were circumscribed. The right to vote, to own land (unless she was a widow), no fault divorce, hold office, sit on a jury, contraception (first barrier contraceptives then hormonal), equal opportunity in education/employment/athletics, to be lesbian, etc. I supported the ERA, do you?

        Nonetheless, females are the majority of America. Great progress has been made. You would have a hard case to convince me that an affluent white woman in the year 2012 is living in a more oppressed enviornment than a black man let alone a black woman. Is Gloria Steinem really being denied her equal rights as a citizen in the present society? Not even remotely. But do feel free to convince me otherwise. I could use a good laugh.

        Instead, women of color, and less well off caucasian females are the ones who are still infringed upon. That’s who these foolhearty laws regarding planned parenthood effect. Most of you are so affluent, you could not begin to appreciate this hard truth. Its about economic inequality.

        Abortion is not your constitutional right as an American citizen. I’m sorry, it just isn’t. In fact, Constitutionally speaking, the Federal government has absolutely no jurisdiction on the matter. If you seek a Constitutional right to offspring homicide, seek it in your home state’s Constitution. Though that may conflict with your state laws regarding pre-meditated murder. It’s up to your state legislature and state’s highest court.

        I have a daughter, and feel strongly that in addition to her equal and inalienable rights, that as a female citizen, she should have sufficient access to contraception (morning after pill is contraceptive), paid leave, and child care. In our society, only if you are an affluent white woman are these “luxuries” a given. If we had a single payer insurance model instead of Romney/Obama-care which is fundamentally a ” separate but (un)equal ” model of care in this country. And to read all the affluent white women on this forum support the Affordable Health Care Act and yet gripe for months about the .00001% of fertile females who work at a Catholic hospital have to go to Planned Parenthood instead of through otherwise luxurious PRIVATE health insurance for free contraceptives. I realize that the white affluent American femal is just as out of touch with poor (female) as the white affluent male.

        Somewhat contradictory, I would advocate access to abortion in case of rape, incest, mommy’s health, even stem cell research (at least temporarily), in addition to compassionate end of life care (all aspects).  

        P.S. Not all men are circumsised. Apparently just the one’s you have been intimate with. I am not.    
         

        • J__o__h__n

          There has been a constitutional right to abortion since 1972.  “I’m sorry, there just isn’t” isn’t a sufficient legal argument against it. 

          • aj

            Roe v. Wade is case law. Not a Constitutional right. That’s all I was saying. Disagree?

          • J__o__h__n

            It was an interpretation of the Constitution.  It wasn’t explicit in the document but was the result of rights granted by the Constitution.  Thomas and Scalia’s narrow interpretation of the Constitution is simplistic.

        • Azra

          What on the world brought on that tirade, nor do I understand what you’re on about. I don’t know how you found out which contributors to this site are women, whether they’re affluent or not, and if they’re white. I’m new here, just comment once in a while, and don’t read most of the postings when I do visit, so I don’t know anything about any of the people who comment here, unless they divulge, in the commentary, their race, creed, or how much money they have.

          I wasn’t asked to fill out any questionnaires, (that policy must have been discontinued), so no one here knows anything about me either. You obviously do have that iformation about everyone else, but I certainly don’t, so why did you address your cryptic reply to me? You have no idea who I am. Pls send it, instead, to the women you were railing about, and who might be able to understand it.

          None of it pertained to me; I was commenting about unethical doctors lying to patients. Don’t know how the wires got crossed.

          • Azra

            Correction:

            First line of my comments should have read, “I don’t know what in the world . . . ”

          • aj

            I meant no disrespect.

          • aj

            And I apologize.

          • Azra

            Apology accepted.

        • Azra

          P.S. TOO MUCH INFORMATION.

      • Don_B1

        The Tea Party Republicans (the Tea Party people were ALWAYS Republicans, just radical conservatives!) have lifted the rocks from over their heads and are trying to drag the rest of us into their lairs.

        They want THEIR FREEDOM and no freedom for anyone else; watch what is happening in Hungary as a prototype of what they want to achieve here: total control (See Frank Bruni in The New York Times).

        It is even worse than the despicable “War on Women” they are waging; they are waging a “War on Science” (prohibiting the teaching of Climate Change and Evolution, etc.) so the U.S. will lose its technical edge, our only chance to maintain leadership and economic power in a world about to be made really unfriendly because of the life-threatening disasters of Climate Change.

        • Azra

          Don’t forget their war against healthcare. It doesn’t bother them that their country’s health care is on par with third-world countries. They have no shame, no ethics. They do have certain perks, like their own version of Obamacare. THEY’RE set for life, with their government aid, and the public be damned.

      • kaltighanna

        You’re not going to believe this, but this insane law was sponsored by a WOMAN in Arizona. I guess it’s not really about men versus women anymore. The GOP has been highjacked by fundamentalist christians and that’s the result. In order to pander to the fundamentalists, the politicians in the GOP must keep shifting further and further to the right and into madness. I’m sure the female Republican lawmaker who sponsored the bill knows full well it’ll be challenged in court and struck down, but she figures it’ll win her the votes she needs for re-election either way. Maybe if more rational, moderate people turned out to vote in bigger numbers this problem would go away…

        • Azra

          Now even radical WOMEN are turning against us? We’re doomed!

          • aj

            Why do you have to marginalize a female lawmaker just because she opposes abortion? Were you unaware that not all women support abortion? Of course not. So then why call her “RADICAL”, afterall that is what the establishment used to call feminists in 1970 when they protesting for equal rights? Shouldn’t you support a strong independent woman, who was voted to represent her constituents in the legislature, and is voicing and advocating her position in such a manner?

          • Azra

            No. I would never support unethical behavior. As I told you earlier, it’s the fact that someone would think it’s permissible for doctors to lie to patients about the state of their health. It’s criminal.

            Once again, it’s not abortion that I’m talking about. I have never mentioned abortion. It’s the dishonesty of people we should be able to trust, and the fact that some equally unscrupulous strong woman actually condones it. Wonder what accounts for so much bizarre, dishonest behavior? Baked brain, perhaps? Something in the water? Smoking evening cigarettes during the day?

          • aj

            Your right, your right. You never mentioned abortion. Next time I’ll try and keep my stupid mouth shut.

          • Azra

            I do that myself every now and then, usually when I’m really tired, thinking I”ve seen words that were never there, maybe because I was expecting to see them.

          • Terry Tree Tree

            NOT doomed, Lady!  You ladies, and some of us guys, will have to keep fighting their DIS-information, and subsequent law attempts, with truth, and NUMBERS of voters!

        • aj

          Why does a woman who is against abortion, have to be legislating “just to get re-elected.”  Are there not strong independent women who oppose abortion on principle. Are you not using conjecture to slander the female lawmaker because of your inherent bias, that all women support abortion?

          • aj

            Disregard this question. I’m an idiot. Azra has helped me to recognize this inconvenient truth.

          • Azra

            Now you’re making me feel bad. We all make mistakes.

          • aj

            There I go again, crossing up my wires. I was trying to make you lol, not feel bad. Have a good weekend.

          • Azra

            Thanks. It’s so easy to be misunderstood when all we have are letters on a page, not even a human voice, to give some indication as to what another person is trying to express. We need more clues.

          • aj

            Some are better than others at expressing with letters.

            You for example give off a great vibe.

            Thank you Azra.

          • aj

            How bout this for a clue to my sincerity in apologizing to you…
            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZmisn7M6NM

    • AC

      i wish someone would look into the numbers and see that these states with tough abortion laws are making a FORTUNE in private adoption sales! (totally speculative, i don’t have any real facts – hoping some one else, say a journalist, will do the hard work here…..)

      • Azra

        You could be right. Bet they do have higher than average rates of child abuse, neglect, and filicide.

    • margbi

       I’d like to add comment on the news story of the teacher in a Catholic school in Ft. Wayne, IN, who was  fired from her job. She alleges this was because she and her husband were trying to conceive by IVF. The Diocese of Ft. Wayne-South Bend said this was contrary to Catholic teachings. I just wonder how they got the information initially. Isn’t medical information privacy protected?

      • Azra

        Outrageous, isn’t it? From what I understand, she needed time off, and her employer was anything but sympathetic. The teacher probably didn’t even know that there was a conflict. I certainly would never have imagined it. We were taught that we should have as many children as possible, so the world will have more Catholics. So what’s the problem, I wonder? There’s no mention of IVF in the Bible, so where are they getting their ridiculous rules? Guess the infallable Popes are responsible, like the current Pope, whose brother, (also a member of the clergy), was allegedly involved in a scandal. Think he was shielding a child molester, or maybe he is a child molester? Don’t remember, but the Pope allegedly knew what was going on, and turned a blind eye. Why would anyone follow rules devised by someone like that?

  • Hidan

    The below should be big news

    U.S. military chief: Israeli strike on Iran would not be ‘prudent’
    U.S. General Martin Dempsey says that Iran is a ‘rational actor’ and that sanctions are starting to influence it.

    http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/u-s-military-chief-israeli-strike-on-iran-would-not-be-prudent-1.413361

    Than this

    Lieutenant General Benny Gantz told Haaretz that Iran has not yet made critical decisions:

        [Iran] is going step by step to the place where it will be able to decide whether to manufacture a nuclear bomb. It hasn’t yet decided whether to go the extra mile.

    http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/idf-chief-to-haaretz-i-do-not-believe-iran-will-decide-to-develop-nuclear-weapons-1.426389?localLinksEnabled=false

  • Hidan

    Now the kicker 

    Now They Tell Us: Iran Didn’t Actually Threaten to Wipe Israel Off the Map
    Posted on 04/19/2012 by Steve Rendall

    Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor acknowledged on Al Jazeera English (4/14/12) that Iranian leaders have never called for Israel to be “wiped” off the map.

    Meridor agreed with interviewer Teymoor Nabili’s suggestion that the supposed remarks  were never actually made; Iranian leaders, Meridor said,

        come basically ideologically, religiously, with the statement that Israel is an unnatural creature, it will not survive. They didn’t say “we’ll wipe it out,” you are right, but [that] it will not survive, it is a cancerous tumor, it should be removed.

    Hostile words, to be sure, but not the menacing threat endlessly reported in corporate U.S. media in recent years. (Iran, Israel and “wiped off the map” occur together more than 8,500 times in the Nexis news database in the last seven years.)

    http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/04/19/now-they-tell-us-iran-didnt-actually-threaten-to-wipe-israel-off-the-map/

    Watch for yourself,

    Dan Meridor: We misquoted Ahmadinejad
    We analyse the words and issues central to the dispute between Iran and Israel with Israel’s deputy prime minister.

    http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/talktojazeera/2012/04/2012413151613293582.html

    Turns out Bibi is yet again proven to be a liar.

    • SteveV

      Are you telling us that we may be preparing to invade (bomb) another country based on false data? I’d be shocked to find something like this could happen, but then they do hate our freedoms.

      • Hidan

        Shocker,

        Don’t worry if the above doesn’t work there this,

        Iran Terror to the South!

        The Obama administration formally adopts one of the more inane bits of right-wing fear-mongering dogma

        http://www.salon.com/2012/04/24/iran_terror_to_the_south/singleton/

        Amazing I know for someone the right calls a radical liberal to be taking proven false talking points from the extreme right.

        For quite some time, right-wing dogma has warned that Iranian Terror is taking hold and expanding in Central and South America thanks to improving relations between Iran and several Latin American governments, as well as due to growing Hezbollah cells. In fact, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry and Rick Santorum all warned of these menaces at various points during the GOP primary debate, prompting a rating of “Mostly False” from PolitiFact after a detailed analysis of those claims. Like so much inane right-wing dogma, this has now been formally embraced by top-level Obama officials. This menace, of course, was what was invoked by the laughably absurd claim that Iran’s Quds Forces had formed an alliance with Mexican drug cartels to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador on U.S. soil, and today, this fear-mongering tale got another big boost from a leading Obama official:

      • Don_B1

        The path that took us to war in Iraq, only this time we are following (Israel) instead of leading (U.K.).

    • aj

      KEY

    • Don_B1

      Bibi “promised” to remove an illegal settler outpost within a year and now that the year is almost up, he is pushing a law through the Knesset to legalize the settlement.

      Bibi is a radical for Israel’s “one-state” solution, which will be the end of Israel, proving that he is the equivalent to James W. Jones, who led the Peoples Temple into the mass suicide/forced suicide/murder at Jonestown, Guyana in 1978.

      That an Israeli should take steps that could make the Holocaust irrelevant should horrify everyone. But American evangelicals/fundamentalists are happy because they think it will lead to the Second Coming.

  • Hidan

    How does this relate?

    Congress is trying to pass an Cyber Intelligence Sharing Protection Act (CIPSA) bill

    http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr3523
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCI2j7aEDVM
    http://cyberspying.eff.org/

    the particulars of the bill, especially provisions that would permit private companies to hand over personal user information to the federal government.

    So how is congress trying to get this passed? With the help of NPR Tom Gjelten fear and propaganda piece labelled

    “Could Iran Wage A Cyberwar On The U.S.?”

    http://www.npr.org/2012/04/26/151400805/could-iran-wage-a-cyberwar-on-the-u-s?plckFindCommentKey=CommentKey:1d857a4c-33d6-4ad7-b9df-bb932008c0d9

    If one thought the title was misleading try reading the piece pure spin. The piece pretty much goes like this,

      Quoting Kit Sturgeon

    Kit Sturgeon (csturgeo) wrote:

    Well, I’m glad to see that almost all of the comments so far are along the same lines, but I’m going to post anyway to add a few things.

    This story is bunk. Let’s look at the “experts”.

    First, Dmitri Alperovitch, identified in this story as a “cybersecurity researcher.” Who is he? It turns out, he’s a VP at McAfee, an Antivirus software manufacturer, a company that stands to benefit greatly by increased fears of a cyberattack.

    Second and third, Jeffrey Carr and James Clapper, two people intimately tied in with military contractors.

    Now, let’s look at just one piece of the supposed evidence that these experts present.

    The article says, “Those groups have managed to shut down Twitter, block websites and carry out sophisticated cyberattacks inside Iran.”

    I am a computer professional. I am not a security expert, just a senior network engineer, and I can tell you that blocking Twitter and websites requires a very low level of expertise. Then to group these EASY things along with unnamed “sophisticated cyberattacks”? Really?

    So here we have biased “experts” presenting inaccurate facts. And you publish it as news.

    I’d go on, but I’m out of characters. Take it from here, crowd.

    Don’t forget that the U.S. drones can now target suspected militants in Yemen without even knowing if there militants or the people around them are civilians or not

    • aj

      When I hear Tom Gjelten (Martha Raddatz spouse), I feel like vomiting. Similar to when Mrs. Greenspan interviews Israeli Ambassador once a month, and Jane Harman (AIPAC’s gopher) twice a month, while giving no time to the Palestinean representative and/or an Arab-American to counterbalance. Malpractice in my opinion, especially considering Mrs.Greenspan is a self-ascribed Zionist.  

    • aj

      Obama threatened a veto. Translation: I’ll sign it into law minus the ceremony.

      • Hidan

         Probably sign it on Mother’s Day or the 4th of July. He seems to loving signing bills that infringe on civil rights on holiday.

  • Michiganjf

    Is there any way we can give Arizona back to Mexico??

    They’re just as backward, and have become just as much an embarassing pain.

    … okay, even MORE of an embarassment.

    • Azra

      Yes, they’re much worse in Arizona, because they’re backward by choice. America has made giant strides since its inception, but some people have snapped somehow, recently, have gone primitive, and are trying to drag the rest of us back with them! That would never happen in Mexico. They’re much too smart. They would never intentionally move backwards.

      We do agree about the huge embarassment though. HUGE.

  • Michiganjf

    From Tom’s Reading List above:

    “‘The Washington Post “Charles Taylor, the U.S.-educated guerrilla leader who fought his way to the presidency of Liberia, was convicted Thursday of crimes against humanity — including murder, rape and slavery — for his role in assisting a bloody rebel movement in neighboring Sierra Leone.’”

    … just send Charles Taylor to a RED STATE like Arizona, Kansas (Topeka), or Florida, where all those “crimes” have been legalized!!!

    … of course, they’ll still hold his race against him, so maybe it’s not such a good idea after all.

    • aj

      Keep in mind, the CIA broke Taylor out of prison and sent him to Liberia so he could be able to commit such unspeakable acts of horror.

      The CIA also murdered Che Guevara, one of the most righteous Sons of Libery in the 20th century,

      Shall I go on?…

      • Hidan

        according to the ICC than U.S. officials should be brought to the hague  for it’s arming and support of el salvador and the military dictatorship  chile.

        Also milton Friedman would be on such list

        • aj

          Indeed, more recently Italian courts indicted in absentsia 23 CIA agents for kidnapping (rendition) and sending him to Mubarak to be tortured for them (outsource torture).

  • Azra

    How can we help but love Joe? He didn’t seem to realize that what he said could have another meaning. Surely he didn’t intend for it to be humerous. One can only imagine President Obama’s reaction upon hearing what Joe had said, but we do know that he had a good laugh. Thank you, Joe, for the comic relief.

    • aj

      What did he say? I missed it.

      • Azra

        You can’t fully appreciate it, unless you hear it coming from Joe, and the fact that he was completely oblivious, made it even funnier. Since he made his comments a few days ago, you might not have another chance to hear them, unless they’ve made it to the”Sunday Funnies” on “This Week” (ABC).

        So, I’ll give you the synopsis, but you won’t get the full impact. Okay. Joe Biden, (just thinking about him makes me chuckle), made a speech the other day, don’t remember where he was, or who he was with. Think he was talking about other countries making nuclear weapons. Anyway, I think he was wrapping it up, when he said, very sternly, and dramatically, (this is not verbatum), something like, “Teddy Roosevelt said, ‘speak softly, and carry a big stick.’ Well, let me tell you, President Obama has a very big stick.” There were a few laughs from the audience, and I waited for him to bust into laughter, because he got a few laughs. That’s when I realized that he had missed the whole thing. The joke had gone completely over his head, and he continued his speech in the same somber tone, with no hint of a smile.

        Good old Joe.

        • aj

          LOL. I think they stopped showing the Sunday Funnies on ABC’s “This Week.” But that’s Okay, you captured the moment perfectly Azra. Old Joe just can’t help himself!

          Very very funny. It’s still a good saying (despite Biden’s faux pas). As you probably know, I need to work on the ‘speak softly’ part, but I got the stick from me old man. Good genes, lol. (I know, I know, too much info. Sorry!)

          • Terry Tree Tree

            MORE than I want to know!

        • Azra

          Should have been BURST into laughter.

        • Terry Tree Tree

          LOL!  LOL!   Wonder HOW he knows?  WHY he would tell?

  • U.S. Vet.

    Michelle Obama’s holiday in Spain cost U.S. taxpayers $467,585 dollars

    http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/26/group-michelle-obamas-spain-trip-cost-taxpayers-467k/

    I sure am glad that the U.S. federal goverment is running massive surpluses, otherwise I’d really be mad.

    • Brett

      AND, the Republican candidates all have had required Secret Service protection throughout their campaigns, to the tune of $40,000 per day per candidate, all as taxpayers footed the bill…Remember when Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Huntsman, Paul, Gingrich, Santorum and Romney were out there on the trail? Let’s see, that came to around $320,000 a day. When one thinks about such punch lines to jokes as Cain, Perry, or Bachmann, that seems ludicrous!. Just those three alone would have set the taxpayers back about $120,000 a day. What about Newt and Santorum continuing on knowing they really didn’t stand an ice-cube’s chance in hell of winning the nomination? That alone would have cost $80,000 a day… kinda makes Protecting the First Lady seem relatively cheap. 

      • aj

        Great counter. However, I don’t think Dr. Paul has Secret Service protection. He’s a true statesman, not a fat mess like Newt.

        • Brett

          It’s required for all. That’s why candidates should be very careful about how much they cost the taxpayers. 

          • aj

            Ron Paul qouted as saying Secret Service as “welfare.” You really should edit his name out or issue a correction sir.

            It is disingenuous if in fact he does have it.

          • Brett

            I didn’t know he had opted out. If I had, that would have been disingenuous. Some other folks we know on here do use those tactics, however (we won’t mention any names, we wouldn’t want to poison anyone), but I did here the term “required,”  hence, my mistake. At any rate, Newt alone, when  one considers how long he has stayed in the race, has cost the taxpayers…ugh, about a crapload.

          • Don_B1

            You are just throwing a red herring into the argument. It does not materially affect Brett’s argument whether Ron Paul, alone, is being provided protection or not.

          • aj

            I am distinguishing Dr.Paul who is a man of principle, from the rest of the loonies in the GOP primary, includung Etcha the presumptive.

          • aj

            “If you could have a Secret Service nickname what would it be?

            Republican presidential candidate and Texas Rep. Ron Paul, who opted out of Secret Service protection because he thought it was a “form of welfare,” jokingly said on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno”  Tuesday he would like to be called “Bulldog.”

            -Foxnews.com March 21 2012

            With all due sincere respect, I implore you to issue an correction.

          • Gregg

            If it came from Fox it’s got to be a lie and unfortunately it means you’re brainwashed.

            Ron Paul for Secretary of Treasury!

          • aj

            YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

            Now it’s time to smoke!

          • Brett

            Thanks, aj. I stand corrected…let’s see, $320,000 a day subtract $40,000 a day comes to $280,000 a day when the field was full. How much did Palin’s daliance with the Veep job cost?…I’ll have to get out the calculator.   

        • Chris B

           Newt probably requires a double helping of security since there’s so much of him to protect.

        • J__o__h__n

          He isn’t a statesman.  He is just against everything which occasionally makes him right. 

          • aj

            Give Federalism a chance J_o_h_n. Thought experiment: Your President is Ron Paul, your Governor is Ralph Nader. Would you not be better off in 4 years of this combination, then with either Etcha or Barry.

          • J__o__h__n

            We would be worse off.  I’d rather have horrible but competent Romney over crazy Ron Paul. 

          • Brett

            Nader would best serve his country as a consumer advocate 

    • Gregg

      It’s really out of touch. The first family has a right to vacations and it’s expensive to protect them but this is crazy. It’s a thumb in out eye.

      • Hidan

         fake outrage only applying to democrats and ignored when such happens with republicans

        Brett noted below which this is such.

      • Terry Tree Tree

        HOW MUCH was spent on ‘W’, and family, that holds RECORD for MOST VACATION time, taking RECORD from his father?   HOW MUCH was spent on EACH Bush?

    • Brett

      How much does a US Vet cost taxpayers? 

    • John in Amherst

       So the president’s family should just hole up in some bunker in an
      undisclosed location until 2016?  I’d wager Michelle would much rather
      be able to vacation with her 2 daughters without having a security
      detail that has to fend off attacks not just from screwballs like Al
      Qaida, but by rightwing nut jobs like Ted Nugent.  (BTW, Did you ever
      run the numbers on what it cost the US to secure the ranch in Crawford
      or Cheney’s “secret” hide away in Jackson Hole?) 

      • Brett

        NO that would detract from his argument! ;-)

  • Ed

    We’re seeing other countries develop, test, and threaten with nuclear weapons. This shouldn’t surprise us. What if the U.S. had legal slavery, and were supporting legal slavery throughout the world? We would expect there to be disaster and conflict, that this injustice couldn’t stand over time.

    But the U.S. is supporting legal abortion around the world (see Kenya, where we paid for it’s passage). And abortion is a greater crime than slavery.

    • Brett

      I hear ya…maybe next time someone wants to abort a pre-born child, just give birth to the child and make him a slave instead! Problem solved. NO, wait, that wasn’t your point; maybe you’re saying that the US should support illegal abortion at home and abroad? 

    • Hidan

       I would think men of the cloth sexually abusing children would be quite up there.

    • Ray in VT

      It would be hard for me to disagree with your last statement more.

      I don’t think that other countries developing nuclear weapons or the hostility of a given nation towards us has much of anything to do with abortion.  Much ill will was created by us throughout the Third World during the Cold War through our support of dictatorships in places such as Central America.

    • J__o__h__n

      Anything new with Ratzinger or the evil marrying gays this week? 

    • Azra

      There’s no comparison. There aren’t many crimes that are worse than slavery. Slaves have actually been born, and opressed.

    • Terry Tree Tree

      Clergy RAPING children NEVER seems to be a problem for YOU!

  • Gregg

    I never understood why President Obama was so quick to call for Mubarek to step down. Now with the Muslim Brotherhood is calling the shots. A new law likely to go into affect lowers the marriage age to 14 (not that the little girl have a choice) and allows husbands to have sex with their wives up to 6 hours after their death.

    http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/04/25/210198.html

    Nice work.

  • Gregg

    GDP dropped to 2.2% for quarter 1. There is no recovery. Ousting the “unmitigated disaster” is paramount.

    • aj

      Key. Britain’s conservative coalition gov’t faces a double-dip recession (first since the seventies), Spain had a negative 1st quarter, Italy worst consumer sentiment in decades, China slowing.

      • GretchenMo

        Obama casts a long shadow apparently.

        • Ray in VT

          Yes.  Obama caused all of this.  Everything was just peachy before he got elected.  It is truly amazing the amount of power that he has when just one man can do all of this.

          • GretchenMo

            As leader of the free world, he controls the world’s biggest economy by far.  He is responsible!

          • Ray in VT

            The President does not control the economy.  Probably the only time that that was true was during World War II.  Your assertion that the President is responsible for the current economic situation is just plain laughable.

          • GretchenMo

            Millions of unemployed aren’t laughing; too bad Obama can’t hear their cries for help.

          • Ray in VT

             Perhaps not, but at least the informed ones would laugh at your assertions.

            Job creation numbers are better now than they were when he took over.  That’s probably because the of the Tea Party or something, though, right?

            Besides, aren’t the unemployed just supposed to pull themselves up by their bootstraps or something?

          • Don_B1

            Controls? With the Republicans in Congress opposing his every attempt to get the economy going, it is because the (mostly red) states have cut so many teachers and first responders that employment has stayed low with a consequent drag on the whole economy.

        • ana

          Immature reasoning that needs to be backed up by real facts.

        • J__o__h__n

          Proof austerity budgets don’t work.

          • GretchenMo

            Socialism can teach us nothing about austerity.  That’s why we should reject Obama!

          • Don_B1

            Spending money at next to no cost to bring the current economic water-treading into robust growth is CAPITALISM, not socialism; the Republicans just would not allow enough of it, because it would hurt their election chances.

          • Adks12020

            look up socialism…it might help you’re worldview to know what you’re talking about.

          • Azra

            Fascism is abhorrant. There’s no place in America for fascists. That’s why we should reject all Republicans.

          • aj

            lol

    • GretchenMo

      Recession not far behind.  Good thing we don’t have those Keystone XL jobs to worry about.

      • Don_B1

        5,000 jobs for a couple years when a smaller investment in non-fossil fuel energy would provide tens of thousands of jobs for hundreds of years?

        Republican “austerity” will lead us back into recession just as the U.K. has gone back into recession under the David Cameron/George Osborne leadership. The same is true with the Eurozone where Germany’s demands that Spain cut spending has only resulted in a drop in GDP with consequent drop in tax revenues and an overall INCREASE in its deficit. Spain was in SURPLUS before the financial crisis of 2008, with a debt/GDP ration SMALLER than Germany’s. Its PRIVATE sector borrowed from banks in Germany and France to overgrow, creating inflation that pushed up wages. But wages are “sticky” everywhere, and Spain needs to devalue its currency to compensate and grow its exports. But its use of the Euro prevents that, just like being on the “gold standard would.

        Try to spend a little time learning the real facts of the situation instead of learning and regurgitating Republican “Talking Points.”

        • Brett

          “5,000 jobs for a couple years…” Hardly seems worth even doing a risk assessment.

      • John in Amherst

         Keystone is not dead.  The administration resisted railroading the project through on a short time line at least in part because some of the legislators in states of the Midwest (which get their water from the Ogalala aquifer) were worried about the impact of the proposed route.  

      • Azra

        Guess the governor of Nebraska doesn’t think jobs are worth the risk.

    • John in Amherst

      The unmitigated disaster is the GOP, which has seen fit to put their party’s future above that of the country.  The GOP has sought to obstruct virtually every Obama proposal and program since day one.  The party and their minions (FOX, Rush and the likes of Beck and Ted Nugent) have stated at every turn they want to see Obama fail, and ousting him has been their fundamental goal since November 2008.  And then they have the audacity to bemoan Obama’s lack of ability to unite the country and solve the problems in the economy and the foreign relations disasters that Bush/Cheney instigated?  Their actions border on sedition. 

    • Terry Tree Tree

      You FORGOT the Steady, Rapid Decline, BEFORE President Obama took office?
         CONVIENENT!!

  • GretchenMo

    GSA scandal and Michelle’s extravagant vacation; I think we know where Obama’s priorities are.  Why does he hate America?  Disgusting!

    • aj

      Even I don’t smoke reefer this early in the morning.

    • ana

      Such immature reasoning.   How do your examples contribute to the assumption that this POTUS hates America?  I am scratching my head.
       

      • GretchenMo

        Maybe it’s lice.

        • aj

          Are you in morning or noon kindergarten?

          I’ll bet you “10,000 dollars” miss ana’s hygiene is beyond repute. Furthrtmore, I suspect yours leaves something to be desired…hmmmm?

          my opinion

          • GretchenMo

            You started smoking some time ago, it shows.

          • aj

            lol

        • ana

          No lice here.  Actually it is a common response to unfathomable  declarations of  pure avarice.

          • ana

            meant to say  pure vacuousness.

          • aj

            I bet you are an exquisite scrabble player.

          • Terry Tree Tree

            BOTH?

    • J__o__h__n

      More people were fired by Obama for the GSA scandal than Bush fired over 9/11.

    • MadMarkTheCodeWarrior

      In what reality are you living? Stop listening to Rush Bimbo and the 24 by 7 Fox Reality-based TV show that is the mouthpiece of a Brit who’s news Empire is guilty of systematically hacking individuals and politicians throughout Europe…. Yeah they guy who’s agent’s deleted the voicemails on the kidnapped and murdered teen Milly Dower answering machine such that their parent’s thought she was still alive. These people don’t hate America…

      America is a tool for their systematic power grab. They have absolutely no respect for the lower and middle classes. We are just pawns in their games for power.

      Obama doesn’t hate America, he’s trying to mange a government constipated by a party hell bent on standing in his way with their priority to make him look bad, weather or not it’s good for America.
      Case in point is the long list of proposals floated under Obama that have been obstructed by the very party that originally floated them before Obama took office.

      Now if you want to talk about who hates America or
      Americans….

      Consider the Republican House and Senate that was willing to allow the US to default and risk a double dip recession just to score political points with a game of chicken over the debt limit in August 2011. Consider the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009: WHICH PARTY INSISTED ON SUBSTITUTING tax breaks for the wealthy (THE HISTORICALLY LEAST EFFICIENT WAY TO STIMULATE ECONOMIC GROWTH) FOR state aid for retaining Firemen, Police and Teachers and funding construction and repair projects to restore our infrastructure (THE HISTORICALLY MOST EFFECTIVE WAY to stimulate economic growth)?

      Which party effectively took away personal bankruptcy from individuals? Which party wants to take away Social Security, Medicare and Medicade? Which party has fought for corporations to have free reign to influence political campaigns? Which party has worked overtly work to make it harder for US to vote? Which party has done nothing to protect American jobs from outsourcing to China? Which party is waging war on American workers? We used to be the good guys. Which party stood behind us becoming a nation that tortures?

      Now who hates America?

      • Don_B1

        And the Party that introduced a bill in the House to indemnify the oil companies for ALL AND ANY environmental damage from domestic drilling for oil or natural gas.

        When the poisonous substances used in fracking (oil or natural gas) appear in your well water (or reservoir water) they would not have to pay ONE DIME for your medical bills or your burned down house.

        Now that is American CAPITALISM!

    • Azra

      Please translate.

    • John in Amherst

      So the president’s family should just hole up in some bunker in an undisclosed location until 2016?  I’d wager Michelle would much rather be able to vacation with her 2 daughters without having a security detail that has to fend off attacks not just from screwballs like Al Qaida, but by rightwing nut jobs like Ted Nugent.  (BTW, Did you ever run the numbers on what it cost the US to secure the ranch in Crawford or Cheney’s “secret” hide away in Jackson Hole?)  The GSA scandal is on the way to correction.  If Obama dropped everything to tend to the GSA scandal as priority #1, you’d want to flog him for that as well, right? 

      • William

        It is rather hard to defend her taking a plane 4 hours ahead of the President at a heafty cost to the taxpayers. Two planes to the same vacation spot?

        • John in Amherst

          unless Airforce One is packed w/ reporters who would otherwise mob the first family, or other politicians who want the president’s ear, or both.

          • Azra

            Don’t forget about his many bodyguards.

  • GretchenMo

    Was SS on direction from the WH in their recruitment of service workers in Columbia and El Salvador?  If so, why?

    • Ray in VT

      So now the White House is encouraging the Secret Service to engage with sex workers?  I was waiting for someone to suggest this.  They were probably just scouts clients for the President, because he’s such a terrible person.

      • GretchenMo

        Interesting thoughts, a pattern is starting to develop.

        • Ray in VT

          I can see one from your end:  everything is Obama’s fault.

          • nj_v2

            It really does come from his end!

          • Don_B1

            GretchenMo is so simple-minded she cannot recognize sarcasm; her memory only picks up Republican talking points.

          • Azra

            Comes from all that brainwashing.

          • Azra

            Just another parrot, unencumbered by the thought process.

        • ana

          A pattern in your head, dear.

          • Don_B1

            Hallucinations in her head.

        • Gregg

          It’s creepy.

      • J__o__h__n

        Why are they encouraging it with foreign prostitutes?  Keep service jobs in America.

        • Brett

          Kinda gives a double entendre to the term “service jobs.”

          • Brett

            Or “secret” service…

          • Terry Tree Tree

            Shhhhhh!   It’s a SECRET of the Service!

        • Azra

          That’s right. Where’s their patriotism? What’s wrong with Las Vegas prostitutes, made right here in America? We should all buy American.

    • AC

      i don’t think you know very much about the secret service, do you?
      but I’ve noticed the majority of your commentary is purposely aggressive & inflammatory – not really important. you’re bored, aren’t you?

      • Brett

        Perhaps a combination of unhappy and bored?

    • ana

      How in the world did you come up with that!!   You need to think before you post.

      • GretchenMo

        It’s a question.  You need to think outside the box provided by msm.

        • Ray in VT

          Is the world flat and is the moon made out of cheese are also questions that the MSM does not ask.  Your question is not quite as ridiculous, but it’s toward that end of the spectrum as far as I’m concerned.  I could give you some “questions” from the left that you’d probably hate, but why bother.

          • Azra

            Please pardon my ignorance, but what is the MSM?

          • aj

            mainstream media.

             

          • Azra

            Thank you.

        • aj

          “outside the box” translate: I smoke two joints before I smoke two joints and the I smoke two more.

          • Brett

            Dude, I hate to tell you this, but I think you mixed up your night time pot with your day time pot.

      • Brett

        That would require a capacity for thinking…

    • Terry Tree Tree

      Comparing President Obama to Larry Craig, John Ensign, Tom Foley, and other pervert REPUBLICANS?   Without any EVIDENCE?
         No Bias?

  • Gregg

    Why does Richard Armendariz still have a job? The same reason Holder does. Obama wants these radical viewpoints in his administration. It’s breathtaking how the government is crucifying private business. Obama said he would put the coal companies out of business and he meant it. The sad part is the noise from the sidelines from those cheering for America’s demise.

    • ana

      Actually, it seems that Holder will do only one term per reference by upcoming interview on npr today.

      • GretchenMo

        How many other rats are going to leave this sinking ship?

        • Don_B1

          It would be nice if you did, since you obviously “like” it so much.

  • aj

    Both Obama and Romney come from polygamous backgrounds. And you all huff and puff over “the Brotherhood.”

    Hypocrites. Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt people.

    • Guest

      Poor aj, he must be on drugs or under the influence. Go back to bed and learn to read, well.

    • Azra

      Mrs. Obama was a Mormon? I didn’t know that. Guess you’re the only one she confided in.

      • aj

        Obama’s father comes from a part of Kenya where polygamy is common place. Romney’s Great-grandfather fled to Mexico in order to continue to indulge in polygamy.

        I’m just trying to add nuance, to the sort of outright condemnation of the Muslim Brotherhood, just because their muslim and that’s all we know about them. Things aren’t always black and white.

        I am convinced I am no match for your intellect. But do I make no good points? Be gentle… 

        • Azra

          You flatter me. I’m the one who didn’t know what MSM was, remember? I also don’t know much about the various relious practices or customs. They don’t really interest me much, and I believe that our religion shouldn’t define us. What does it matter who worships what?

          About a week ago, I heard about Mitt’s great grandfather, now I also know about polygamy in Kenya. Thanks. I guess Mitt gets really angry if someone brings up polygamy.

          Can you make the connection between polygamy in Kenya, and president Obama? He grew up without a father, and didn’t visit Kenya until he was an adult. His father wasn’t a polygamist, (was he?), so what makes her think that it’s in his background? Polygamy is not genetic.

          • Azra

            CORRECTION:

            Last sentence shoud read “Even if he was, polygamy is not genetic.”

          • aj

            My admiration is sincere. Your correct, the point I raise is in essence, irrelevant. You have schooled yet again. Appreciate the feedback, you force me to think, about what I write. I like that.

            P.S. Is polygamy genetic? No, but carrying a “very big stick” is. lol

          • Azra

            LOVE IT! Thanks.

          • Terry Tree Tree

            BRAGGING about it?

  • Brett

     Brian Leary, a spokesperson for the Secret Service said that the budgeted cost for protecting the GOP candidates has been…wait for it. Drum roll: $113,000,000. That’s 113 MIL-YEN! Yowsa! That’s a lotta moola!  

    • aj

      Republican Hack: ” You sunk my battleship! “

      • Brett

        Hehe

    • Brett

      That’s for 2012, I should say. 

  • Brett

    The potential Republican veep choices are all falling over themselves to say the other guy would make a better choice. Romney is whipping up so much enthusiasm so his Party; it’s staggering.

    • Brett

      “for” not “so”

  • Greyman

    Wow: 113 comments thus far, and the show hasn’t even aired! Is this a record, by any chance?

    • GretchenMo

      No, just another day in the echochamber.

      • jefe68

        If you don’t like it why not move on?

    • Mr_Trees

      Fridays are CRAZY!!

  • GretchenMo

    It’s good to be a government worker according to the BLS:
    Government employees saw an increase of 0.7% in total compensation, with an increase of 0.4% in wages and a 1.1% increase in
    benefits.  Compensation for private sector workers rose 0.4%, consistent
    with a 0.5% increase in wages and a 0.3% increase in benefits.

    Thanks Obama!

    • Ray in VT

      So are you a government worker thanking your boss?

      • GretchenMo

        Looks like I should be!  Plus they’re always hiring.

        • Ray in VT

          Well, bridges always need to be inspected, highways always need to be maintained and the nation always needs to be protected.  Feel free to try to get rid of those if you like.

          • GretchenMo

            Ha, too bad 80% of them are paper pushers, pushing the same paper over and over.  Pretty cush!

          • Ray in VT

            Tell me who you would like to get rid of, then.  Teachers, the police, NASA, NOAA, those involved in monitoring public health in order to make sure that companies are not illegally pollution polluting our air and water?  Perhaps we could move some of them out to private contractors, except that they cost the public more.

          • Don_B1

            Maybe we could drill an oil well in her front yard and be indemnified for the oil spill all over her house when the House bill [H.R. 4345, The Domestic Fuels Protection Act] passes.

          • Terry Tree Tree

            Gretch and GREEDY rich Republicans will do that for FREE!!  AND pay their own costs?

        • Don_B1

          Don’t you wish! The small growth at the federal level is mainly in homeland defense and the states are hemorrhaging jobs, particularly in the red states, where recovery is slowest, except for states helped by the automotive recovery.

    • jefe68

      Do you use divisive tactics as a means to compare different sectors of the economy. The subtext here is government workers are bad folk because they are getting a pittance more in compensation. The real issue is in the private sector wages have been mostly stagnant for the past 30 years when adjusted for inflation.
      The real outrage should be aimed at corporations that post record profits and yet ahead of the government in these stats. That’s the real story, not this mantra of everything government is and does is bad, except the military. Which if you did your homework before going on your anti-government rant would have known is about half of the governments employees.

      • Don_B1

        The typical Republican rant uses wage statistics that do not account for the fact that public employees, in the main, have more education as befitting the knowledge required to perform their jobs.

        Many states have difficulty hiring and retaining science teachers because they can earn more in the private sector without being constantly attacked as leeches. Therefore those science classes are being taught by untrained and therefore inarticulate teachers who will not inspire their students to become the scientists and engineers desperately needed for this country to maintain its economy.

  • Brett

    Is Romney attempting to invoke Hitler in the above photo? 

    • Mr_Trees

      I’m no Romney fan, but I think he’s waiving.  Funny how waiving in fotos can look like a Nazi salute. But you knew that.

      • Brett

        “I pity the fool…” No, wait, that’s Mr. T. …Sorry

        • Brett

          Didn’t Hitler put greasy goop in his hair like Romney does? …Just asking a question. I wonder if Mitt had ruled Nazi Germany, would it have gone down in flames in much the same way as it did? Surely Romney would have been more effective in achieving his goals than Hitler was?  

          • Don_B1

            Let’s just describe him as snarling and not set the groundwork for Godwin’s Law.

          • Brett

            Hi, Don. I was just making fun of the way neocons frame their arguments about Democrats and pretend they’re just asking questions with no intent, kind of like when Fox asks people to text yes or no to questions like, “is Obama trying to systematically destroy the country and rebuild it as a socialist nation?” I also give people the Godwin’s Law award on here from time to time, like the guy last week who compared illegal immigration to Hitler invading Russia. I was sort of making fun of both kinds of comments. 

            P.S.-I enjoy reading your comments; you are up, as it were, on a lot of what’s happening. 

          • Don_B1

            I agree, bringing up that subject is not always a violation, but it does need to be used really carefully. I was probably a bit quick to judge here.

          • Azra

            Wonder if Hitler tied his dog to the roof of his Volkswagen?

          • Azra

            It’s hard to say. Hitler got those ovens filled pretty effectively.

            Apparently, Hitler also had that je ne sais quoi, sadly lacking in Romney. I doubt that Mitt would have been able to charm all of Germany into following him, even if it was just across the street.

          • Brett

            Hehe…So, one could logically say that Hitler was better than Romney! ;-)

          • Azra

            Logically, I guess one COULD make that assumption.

      • Azra

        Think his expression is what does it; I thought the same thing, as I made up captions when I first saw the photo.

        • Azra

          I also detected a bit of Herman Munster.

          • Brett

            Now, let’s not cast aspersions on Herman Munster! ;-)  

    • nj_v2

      He’s adopting a strong persona because we need him to protect us from the emerging, Soviet threat.

      http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/04/26/romneys-campaign-brings-up-soviet-threat/

      (CNN) - On the same day Vice President Joe Biden knocked Mitt Romney for having a “Cold War mindset,” two of Romney’s national security advisers made references to threats dating back to the Soviet Union era.…

      “We are seeing the Soviets pushing into the Arctic with no response from us. In fact the only response from us is to announce the early retirement of the last remaining ice breaker,” Lehman said.

      Also, in a discussion on the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) with Russia, former U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Pierre Prosper mistakenly referred to a country that no longer exists.
      “You know, Russia is another example where we give and Russia gets, and we get nothing in return,” he said. “The United States abandoned its missile defense sites in Poland and Czechoslovakia, yet Russia does nothing but obstruct us, or efforts in Iran and Syria.” 

      • Don_B1

        That was Condoleezza Rice’s expertise! And she did so well with Iraq!

  • Mr_Trees

    Mr. Luck, Welcome to Indy (via Iowa)

  • Erin in Iowa

    Funny that the first line in Romney’s speech was “This is the beginning of a new campaign”.

    • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

      I think that’s what is now known as the etch-a-sketch maneuver.

      • Azra

        Start with a clean slate every week or so.

    • Azra

      There was really no need for him to tell us that. It’s what we’ve come to expect.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

    I’m not happy with Obama, but please, we were facing the worst crisis since the Great Depression when he came into office. Things may not be great, but they are so much better than they were 4 years ago.

    And on gas prices, they are dropping before Memorial Day, which is nothing short of a miracle.

    • Azra

      That’s right. May has always seen the highest gas prices, yet by Monday, I think it was, they had already dropped by $ .19, and are still going in the right direction. Truly incredible!

  • John in Amherst

    The GOP has been obstructing the Obama administration at every turn.  The GOP was quite up-front in their stated goal to see Obama fail, which was reiterated by McConnel and Bheoner (sp?) from day one.  And now they criticize Obama because he hasn’t been able to unite the country and move forward?  PLEASE spare me…

    • StopSpendingNow

      None of us know who will win the election in November, but let’s suppose for a moment that it’s Romney.  Do you hope that he would be successful in implementing the policies he has formulated or will formulate?  Do you think Reid and Pelosi would express their support for Romney and use their influence to pass his policies, and urge the Congress and the country to unite behind President Romney?
      Of course not.  It’s partisanship and politics, and both sides do it all the time.

      • TFRX

        Record number of anonymous holds and filibusters is “both sides do it all the time”?

        I don’t know how much you believe your own PR, but many folks here know better.

        • StopSpendingNow

          If partisanship doesn’t exist on both sides, why don’t you supply a link to Democrat leadership post-election support for President George Bush to defend your opinion?  Also, please provide a link to the budget votes in the Senate for the past three years.

          • John in Amherst

             The Dems, unlike the GOP, never openly stated, repeatedly, that their primary goal was to see Bush fail.  The Dems also do not have the same lock-step approach (aka “party discipline”).  They also lack a media outlet that is staffed by party hacks and led by a former party strategist, that is blindly unapologetic in its 24/7 vitriolic denunciation of the president.  GOP “politics as usual” is nearly indistinguishable from sedition. 

          • John in Amherst

             se·di·tion   [si-dish-uhn]
            noun 1. incitement of discontent or rebellion against a government.
            2. any action, especially in speech or writing, promoting such discontent or rebellion.

      • Don_B1

        When a Party refuses to vote for policies IT HAS DEVELOPED (Cap & Trade, PPACA [Heritage Institute/Romneycare] and Keynesian steps to recover from recession [Bush was a strong proponent, though more for the worst, most ineffective form, which was why the recovery from the 2001 recession was the weakest in decades]), it is not because they oppose the policy; it is because they fear the credit the opponent party will receive when it works as they KNOW it will.

      • denis

        There is quite a bit of difference between publicly stating the obsession with making sure there is failure so the President looks bad and claiming credit for the countries successes [which is the time tested attitude that allowed compromise and working for the common good].

  • Tina

    All the circumstances that Romney blames Obama for are really caused by Republican CEOs and Republicans on Wall Street and in office!  His argument is so disingenuous!

  • Aranphor

    Who’s this Republican bozo you have talking? He’s lying his ass off. What a putz.

  • BHA in Vermont

    No Mr. Romney, we are STUPID if we elect a guy who’s only plan is to claim anything he would have done would be better than anything done in the last 3 years.   

    Where is the beef (or in this case, filet mignon) Mr. Romney. All words, no plan.

  • J__o__h__n

    Can On Point get thoughtful conservatives instead of a hack from the Weekly Standard? 

    • Azrastarr

      Is there such a thing these days?

    • John in Amherst

       picking these guys is one thing.  The tepid challenges to what they say is another.  Not quite to FOX’s “fair and balanced” standard yet, but getting there…

  • nj_v2

    The Weekly Standard hack is weak, even by conservative standards. He claims that the Keystone pipeline would lower gas prices. Tom questions him on that, and in one breathe he starts babbling about jobs.

    If this is Romney’s best defender, Mittens is in trouble.

    • Jasoturner

       Weak?  Utterly disingenuous.

  • Tina

    How can you not like the new health care law?!!!  Do you have a pre-existing condition?  Are you so arrogant as to believe that you never will have a pre-existing condition?!!

    • GretchenMo

      NP “I vote for it.  I’m sure we’ll love it once we know what’s in it.”

      • JGC

        There is an excellent 20 page section in Bloomberg Businessweek (March 26 issue) called “Take Two Years and Call Me in the Morning” about this topic (what is here and what is coming in the Health-Care law). Changes are happening now, and there is no going back to pre-Affordable-Care-Act days, even if the Supreme Court overrules it.

          

    • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

      “Romneycare” is working in MA. He did one thing right as governor.

      • Azra

        You’re absolutely right. People living in Massachusetts are very happy with it. They now have peace of mind, they’re going to the doctor when they need to, and even children with cancer can’t be turned away, or have insurance companies drop them, and refuse to pay, even when the parents have paid them for yrars. There are more people in MA. with dependable health insurance, than ANY other state, and their emergency rooms are now empty, and able to properly treat emergencies.

        In sharp contrast, but no surprise, Texas is doing the worst job, and most CHILDREN HAVE NO HEALTH INSURANCE. Under Obamacare, children are safe until they are 26 years old!

    • Azra

      Or an accident.

  • Guest

    It’s sad how many poorly educated people have posted here. For anyone to think that a Mormon is electable within these United States, I think they are on the same drugs as the Republicans. These are the same people who didn’t bother to go to college, so now we have less than 24% attending college as the future of this country goes out the door. Many well educated people are leaving the country to Canada, as one example. I’ll just watch the idiots.

    • StopSpendingNow

      Harry Reid has managed to get elected and re-elected, he’s majority leader in the Senate, and he’s a Mormon.  He serves in the Congress with 14 other Mormons.

    • Don_B1

      I do not think Romney’s religion should have anything to do with voting for or against him. If he has done something repellent because of his conception of religion then he should be rejected for that.

      But the policies that he says he will implement in the federal government will destroy what is left of the middle class, and for that he should be rejected by the voters. Maybe I just don’t know that much about the Church of the Latter-Day Saints, but I believe it believes in doing unto others as you would like them to do unto you. I do not see that aspect in Romney’s world view.

  • jefe68

    Moda’s back….

    • aj

      How are you privy to this…

      • jefe68

        I was meaning in spirit, he lives on in GretchenMo. 

  • Adks12020

    This “socialism” talk is ridiculous.  People need to learn something about what socialism is and stop listening to the talking heads.  I’m glad Pres. Obama mocked the comment.

    • John in Amherst

       Coming up with their own set of facts (like a novel new notion of defining socialism) is a GOP strong suit.

  • T.A.

    Washington legislators need to explain how it makes sense to punish longterm jobseekers by decreasing extended unemployment benefits, perhaps to those who need it most.  Even if the jobless rate goes down in a particular state, like Massachusetts, there are folks who still can’t land a job…logic anyone?!  

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

    Dump SS, Medicare, and all the public services we take for granted – and you will get rid of socialism. Republicans like to use the word like a baseball bat, but they are socialists as well.

    • Don_B1

      They just privatize the gains (to the 1%) and socialize the losses (to the 99%).

  • kaltighanna

    Watch John McCormack squirm! :)

  • Tina

    Republican CEO’s want to get rid of perks like health insurance. Republican politicians want to get rid of Obamacare AND hope to get rid of Medicare and Social Security.  Tell me:  what will regular people — especially people with pre-existing conditions — supposed to look forward to with this picture?  

    The corporations have already made their way into the administration of Medicare’s drug coverage.  It could have been administered more leanly than involving corporations looking for profit!  

    I’m waiting for the day when you cannot die without becoming a “market” and having corporations administer your death!

    • aj

      Come on Tina. Obama care calcifies this evil market you deplore. I beg you to wake up and stand steadfast in opposition to Romney/Obama-care.

      Instead demand single-payer insurance!

      You of all people should join me in recognizing that Romney/Obama-care is nothing more than a “Separate but (un) Equal system of healthcare!” Similar to Jim Crow.

      If I cannot convince you of this sick truth, I have lost.

      • Guest

         You are more than lost; you ARE ignorant.

      • Tina

        I DO prefer single-payer; and I hope we will get to it someday.  But to oppose Obama care is to sit in the same seat as the Republicans who want to get rid of it for entirely different reasons!  Right now, Obamacare has eliminated discrimination against pre-existing conditions and has stopped the life-time limit on coverage (which often comes years or even decades before life is over).   Tell me that ANY Republican plan would cover those two areas — none of their plans would!  

        • aj

          Of course your correct, but lest we forget Obama care IS Romney care, and Romney care was created at the Heritage Foundation (A Republican think tank). Not to mention its UN-Constitutional.

          How is this the outcome with a Democratic President, a Democratic House, AND a Fillibuster proof Senate??

          It is unacceptable. Plain and simple. It doesn’t cut it, just because Obama says so. I’m sorry.

          • Don_B1

            The Senate was “filibuster-proof” for a total of 14 weeks from the death of Sen. Kennedy to the election of Sen. Brown, EXCEPT on healthcare as Sen. Lieberman promised to filibuster if even a public option was included.

        • aj

          You say ” I Hope ” we get to single payer someday. I remember Obama saying he was our hope manifested. So we elected him. And we got the same health insurance plan that we would have had Mitt Romney been President.

          What’s wrong with this picture?

          • Don_B1

            President Obama delivered the best improvement that could pass Congress; see my comment above. No other president has come close, which should be a consideration in your judgment of his great if not perfect accomplishment.

            Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good!

          • aj

            I cannot help it. I am to bitter from Obama’s record of consistently selling out his own. If I was convinced he fought hard for his left side, then I would relent.

            I watched the legislative proceeding through congress very closely. And its my opinion, that he fought for himself, and not for those that elected him to represent change in the Democratic primary.

            I respect your opinion, but answer me this, how is this legislation different from that of the Heritage plan. Or how is this act different then if Romney had been President. It’s not.

          • Don_B1

            It is basically the Heritage plan, but it is NOT the President Romney plan. He would never have been able to pass his Massachusetts plan through Congress, and if he had tried he would not have succeeded. It would take a Congress much more liberal than the current one to pass that kind of legislation.

            But what did YOU do to help Obama get even a public option included in the PPACA? Here is where the general public got enthralled with the ELECTION and went home to watch all the miracles take place. Well, Obama is human and he cannot just command (particularly) Democrats (who include a lot of Blue Dogs) to do something. Just because George W. Bush could command fiscal conservatives (Rick Santorum?) to vote for Medicare Part D (drug benefits) does not mean that any president from the Democratic Party can do the same.

            If you really do want the government to work to reorder the healthcare system so as to provide better care at a lower price, then you need to work for some form of Medicare for all. Anything less is just less or no government support for lower prices, so those who don’t have the money just don’t get the care (the Republican approach).

        • Don_B1

          Actually the most important part of the PPACA may be the data gathering on the effectiveness of treatments and the encouragement for different methods of delivery from PFS (pay for service”/procedure”). This offers the ability to deliver life saving/prolonging care while holding down costs.

  • Guest

    I see 3 or 4 unemployed people posting their ignorance..repeatedly. Please go mow your lawn.

    • aj

      What lawn? My lawn is Yankee Stadium. More NPR yuppies out of touch. I have J-O-B by the way.

      • Ray in VT

        AJ, as a Red Sox fan I am sad to hear that.

        • aj

          lol. How do you blow a 9-0 lead in the 6th? Final score 15-9 N.Y. Ouch!

          Hows that bull pen working out for ya?

  • NewtonWhale

    Any discussion of the economy has to begin by saying that Obama got it right and the republicans got it wrong.

    Reaganomics and Bush’s tax cuts have destroyed the middle class. Trickle down doesn’t work, and Romney wants more of the same.

    Meanwhile, those countries that tried austerity are in a double dip recession (Spain, Britain) while America has added private sector jobs for 25 consecutive months. If republicans had not obstructed him, it would be even better.

    Republicans are like the vicious child who murders his parents and then asks for pity because he’s an orphan.

    • William

      FDR, Carter and now Obama have proved trickle up economics does not work.

      • NewtonWhale

        The fact that you think FDR was a failure discredits everything you say.

        The man saved Democracy and created the most prosperous and powerful country the world has ever seen. That’s why he was elected 4 times.

        • William

          You have got to be kidding. FDR made the depression the Great Depression. His economic policies were a disaster and even Truman could not get them renewed after WW II. The private sector produced the economic success we enjoyed not big government and certainly not anything FDR dreamed up.

          • NewtonWhale

            Welcome to Earth.
            Watch out for the gravity.

          • William

            Stay away from the kool-aid you head is starting to swell.

          • Tina

            Some of that “economic success” you mention occurred because Jim Crow was deeply entrenched, either neglecting or taking advantage of African-American citizens!

          • Ray in VT

            Upon what sources do you base you positions.  After 3 years of economic downturn following the 1929 crash banking were on the verge of folding by early 1933.  The country was already in the toilet by the time he got elected, following on the heals of an administration that could not cope with the challenges of such a collapse.

            Certainly some of FDR’s policies ended with the war or the end of the war, but some of the major initiatives, such as Social Security are still very much in effect.  CCC projects are still very much in use around me, drawing in tourists and providing a sustained public benefit.

            Some have certainly argued that the war ended the Depression, and I think that they are probably right.  But what was the war if not the greatest government spending program in history?

          • William

            Hoover’s and FDR blew it. FDR took his war against the wealthy and millions suffered. Social Security was sold as insurance but was a tax and the money is gone. CCC projects might have a cosmetic appearance, but many were poorly built. The idea of going to war to pull us out of a depression does not seem much of a recovery.

          • denis

            where in therld do you get your info?  watching / listening to right wing talk 24 / 7?

          • William

            FDR’s own treasure secretary said the new deal was a failure in a speech, May 6, 1939.

  • GretchenMo

    Obama owns this failure and despite his pledge not to make excuses, it’s all he’s got. 

    • Mr_Trees

      “Obama owns this office and is therefore the object of my hate speech”

      FTFY

      • GretchenMo

        I don’t hate Obama, I hate what he’s done to this country and fear what more he might try to do.

        • Ray in VT

          So what has he done, and please don’t give me any of this garbage about him causing the current economic mess.  Everything was going to pot when he got elected, so is he to blame because he didn’t wave some magic wand and make everything better?  There are things that he has done that I don’t like, as did his predecessor, but to blame him for just about everything, as many of his critics seem to do, is just disingenuous.

        • John in Amherst

           The tactics of the GOP – to obstruct every action, oppose nearly every appointee – is unprecedented.  Their actions, undertaken solely to weaken Obama and strengthen the GOP’s position in this election cycle, border on sedition.  And the sniping and thinly veiled threats against Obama made by the GOP minions at FOX and on talk radio border on treason.

        • MrNutso

          You mean 2 wars, 1 illegal, massive treasury bankrupting tax cuts, massive unpaid for medicare expansion, attempted privatizing of social security, politicization of the office of the presidency.

          • Ray in VT

            None of those things were problems for many conservatives so long as a Republican was in the White House.

        • Azra

          Don’t you hate what Bush did to the Country?

        • Azra

          Your fear is misplaced. The President is on OUR side. We learned from the previous administration, how much damage Republicans are capable of doing, but you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. What about all the radicals who have taken over the Party? Given half a chance, they would make America unrecognizable, and inhospitable. Fortunately, they’ll never have that chance.

        • jimino

           Hate may be too strong but I sure did not like his futile efforts to try to reach any sort of reasonable compromise with an opposing party totally devoid of any intention to do so or any actual ideas that would improve things for our country. 

  • BHA in Vermont

    Romney and his 1% buddies are certainly better off than they were 3 years ago. They are the only ones who can make millions doing nothing and pay the lowest possible tax rate to boot.

  • Dosch

    The student loan situation turns our citizens into indentured servants to the banks.  This is the new serfdom.  Now matter what happens, you can’t get out of paying the thing back.  Once again, the banks sticking it to the people!

  • aj

    This is Kenneth Kenith from Connecticut.

  • J__o__h__n

    Shouldn’t Paul Ryan know that there is a monopoly on interpretation of Catholicism and that is the Pope.  Am I correct Ed? 

    • NewtonWhale

      He’s not a real Catholic.
      He just plays one on TV.

      • Azra

        . . . and he dressed as a priest for Halloween . . . or was he a nun? Don’t remember.

  • manganbr

    Can anyone really make the objective case that we’re worse off now than we were four years ago? Is it not better to have an economy that’s growing slowly, than one that is shrinking rapidly?  

    • NewtonWhale

      You cannot convince some people with facts.
      Like the caller who is worried about social security and is voting for Romney.

      • TFRX

        I think the phrase you’re looking for to describe the caller is “Dunning Kruger Poster Child”.

        • NewtonWhale

          Yeats said it best:

          “The best lack all conviction, while the worstAre full of passionate intensity.” 

      • Azra

        Sounds like right-wing callers are providing the ingredients for a great sitcom.

    • Pete

      Unemployment when Obama took office : 7.8%

      Unemployment now: 8.2%

      • John in Amherst

         employment is widely understood to be a lagging indicator of the economy.  The economy was falling off a cliff right at the end of the Bush administration (Tarp was a Bush plan to rescue the financial industry that had just headed into a nose dive).  Piloting the economy is even more difficult than steering an oil tanker.  Add to the problem the economic crises in Europe and Japan.  We elected a politician, not a magician, and the economic headwinds have hardly been favorable.

        • Pete

          Unemployment when Reagan took office:
          7.5%

          Unemployment the year Reagan ran for reelection: 7.2%

          Unemployment when Reagan left office: 5.4%

          • John in Amherst

             are you implying the world now is just like the world then?  Hey, Rip Van Winkle!  wake up. 

          • Pete

            Just giving you some comparisons based on the usual
            measurements that people use to evaluate how well a President has been doing
            his job by.

             

             

            Here in another:

             

            The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush
            presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took
            office.

          • Ray in VT

            Another false equivalency.

            You are comparing debt numbers from a time of growth to that of a severe economic decline.  We are paying for unpaid for ventures that were passed early in the last decade as well as attempting to cope with an economic downturn.

            It’s like calling Obama the foodstamp president because more people are on them now than they were 4-6 years ago.  Unemployment is higher, so more people are drawing benefits.  Revenues are down, and last I checked the House gets to pass spending legislation, so they could always shut off the spigot.  Maybe they should shut the government down again and see how that works out for them.  Also, what were the debt figures of Ford and Carter versus those of Reagan.  Pretty unfavorable I would bet without looking at the exact numbers.

          • John in Amherst

             Bush chose to fight the Afghanistan and Iraq wars off-budget.  Obama has chosen to bring them onto budget.  While Bush was busy slashing taxes and regulations and oversaw a boom economy, he pissed away the surplus of the Clinton years and then racked up his multitrillion dollar deficit.  Where’s the comparison?

          • Ray in VT

            So according to the historic tables that I tracked down, the U.S. economy was still adding non farm jobs when Reagan was elected and sworn in.  You compare two things that are substantially different.  The recession of the early 1980s was far lighter than the one that we have just experienced.

          • Pete

            How would the “adding of non farm jobs when Reagan was sworn in” have any bearing on Reagan’s economic record?

          • Ray in VT

            By the fact that the economy was in better shape when he took over and the economic downturn that happened during his tenure in office was not as severe.  He also ran up then record economic deficits.  Economic inequality rose under Reagan, and there were some severe downturns in dairy prices.  His record is not nearly so rosey as his advocates would have on believe.

          • Pete

            How was it not as severe? Unemployment went up to 10%
            during his first two years in office before it dropped down below 7.5%.

            Economic inequality has gone UP under Obama not down. But I’m sure, like unemployment, and the debt that’s not his fault. Right?
            Those are funny measuring sticks that you guys are holding.

          • denis

            and how much did dems work with repubs to correct the problem of 10% unemployment?  or did they say, “if we obstruct and keep the rate at 10% we can have big wins”?

      • manganbr

        Of course that’s true, but isn’t that a “freeze-frame” of the moment, which distorts the reality, as people actually experienced it. Wasn’t it also part of the reality in that moment that the unemployment was going up pretty quickly no matter what? What direction was GDP, unemployment, the stock market, moving at that time, and what direction are those figures moving now?

      • Ray in VT

        And how many jobs were lost in the first few months of Obama’s administration versus those created in the last few?  Where were many of the major economic indicators headed in January 2009 versus now?

      • Terry Tree Tree

        Unemployeed numbers were INCREASING, when President Obama took office!
           Unemployment numbers are DECREASING, now!
           ALMOST all conditions were getting WORSE, at the end of ‘W’ admin.!  The exception was that the GREEDY rich were getting GREEDY richer!
           ALMOST all conditions are getting BETTER!
           GREEDY rich are STILL getting GREEDY richer!

    • Azra

      . . . and with so many safeguards that the President has put in place; all the regulations that now protect us.

    • Tina

      Did anyone watch the most recent Frontline about the Economic Crisis and the Bailouts (I think two more hours are still upcoming in the PBS program.)?  That prosperity that people may remember was a fake:  we were hovering over a gaping chasm of economic crisis that was just waiting to take us down.  I’m SURE Romney is betting on people’s memories of times they thought were good being stronger than their understanding of how credit default swaps brought down the worldwide economic system!  Then, because the bad guys got bailed out, he can make it look like it’s Obama who was on the wrong side of the people, rather than that the bad guys were Republicans who supported the system they created as well as the de-regulation that, unfortunately, they engineered Clinton into signing when he got rid of  ______ (fill in the blank: my chemo brain can’t remember the name of the bill he eliminated, but I’m sure readers do.  thanks!).  It was at first Bernake or Paulson who decided not to further destabilize Wall Street with stricter penalties on the offending companies and CEOs.  That may/may not have been a mistake, but it certainly does rub the wrong way on regular people these many years later.  However, it is disingenuous for Romney to make it look like the Democrats were at fault, when the gaping chasm was Republican-driven!  

      • jefe68

         Yes and it was excellent. The online interviews are a must by the way.

      • aj

        Glass-Steagall. Stay strong sister!

      • StopSpendingNow

        The Frontline show was excellent and informative, and I am looking forward to the last episodes next Tuesday .  One of the lessons we should learn from this show is that when the government injects itself into the market to achieve social goals, in this case the lowering of lending standards and encouragement of subprime mortgages so that unqualified borrowers could have home ownership, the result is frequently catastrophe.

        • Zero

          So government can interfere by deregulating…huh?  There should have been consumer protections in place.  Read the housing bill, not one consumer protection.  It was an open invitation for banks to do business with whomever they wanted and however they wanted.

          Wake up from the republicanism.  You guys are like Indian Jones in the Temple of Doom after he drank the blood from the skull.

          • StopSpendingNow

            The government interfered by regulating, not deregulating.  It required quotas on mortgages to low and moderate income borrowers who would not otherwise qualify for a loan, and these government quotas dramatically increased the number of subprime mortgages. At the height of the government regulations, HUD required that at least 56% of the loans acquired by Fannie and Freddie be from borrowers at or below the median income level, and these borrowers seldom had significant down payments, and had low credit scores, high debt, and uncertain employment. Before these affordable housing & community reinvestment regulations, Fannie & Freddie acquired only prime loans; with the regulations, Fannie & Freddie eventually held 74% of the subprime mortgages outstanding.  Without goverment regulation, the subprime mortgage market would never have ballooned to the level it did.

      • Terry Tree Tree

        People have beat the disease you have before!!
          Live STRONG, Lady!

    • William

      We are not better off and 4 lost years matter. 1 trillion dollars in a failed stimulus plan matters. Shovel ready jobs that “were not so shovel ready ha..ha..per Obama” matters.

  • NewtonWhale

    So add “liar” to Paul Ryan’s other sins:

    “I think Ayn Rand did the best job of anybody to build the moral case for capitalism” -8/18/09

    http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1188874849092 

    • Tncanoeguy

      Indeed, nothing terribly moral about capitalism, particularly the unregulated capitalism that some people favor. 

      • Ray in VT

        It’s an economic system that designed to make money, not a moral system designed to provide or assist the poor or the hungry.  Markets aren’t moral.

        • Tina

          Thank you!  Such an important point!  (Altho and even tho the Republicans keep throwing words from the moral domain AT capitalism!)

          • Azra

            They manage to fool a lot of people, by doing things like that. It’s their rule of opposites. For instance, when they destroy forests, they do it under their “Healthy Forest” Act. They go for EXACT opposites; for what they’re proposing, and when lying about president Obama’s accomplishments. That system makes it very easy to figure out what they’re up to, so if they pass “Equality and Fairness for the Middle and Lower Classes”, you’ll know we’re in deep trouble.

        • William

          Which economic system has lifted more people out of poverty?

    • Brett

      Ayn Rand did the best job of anybody in fooling high schoolers into thinking she was a good writer.

      • Brett

        Doesn’t Ryan look like he should be in an East Side Kids movie? Maybe hanging out at Louie’s Sweet Shop?

  • J__o__h__n

    Does the Romney supporting caller know Romney’s support of Ryan’s budget? 

    • aj

      Google the painting “Whistler’s mother” then look at a photo of a  contemporary female Cairene. Then ask me about burkas.

      • J__o__h__n

        How is the west in 1871 an excuse for abuses in 2012?  I don’t think Whistler’s mother had her genitals mutilated. 

        • aj

          It’s not an excuse, it’s context. Needless to say genital mutilation is disgusting. How many American men are circumsised (genital mutilation)? 140,000,000 maybe? Again, just context? I’m not trying to disagree wiyh you outright, just trying to add context?

          • Azrastarr

            So-called circumcision in women is nothing like what it is for men. After males heal, there is no more pain. For females, there is pain for the rest of their lives, with every movement. which is the reason for doing it in the first place. It keeps women in their place; keeps them in excruciating pain whenever men force themselves on the girls and women.

            Then there are the countless deaths from infection, and more.

            To the best of my knowledge, men don’t have a lifetime of pain from being circumcized.

          • aj

            I yield. Please forgive.

          • J__o__h__n

            It should be ended for both.  Obviously the female version is far worse.

          • Terry Tree Tree

            Males should be allowed their own choice, AFTER 18!  HYGIENE should be TAUGHT, and EMPHASISED!
               Female Genital MUTILLATION should be outlawed in the world!

          • Terry Tree Tree

            NO, no lifetime pain for me.  NOR for my sons, that they have told me of, or indicated.
              Female Genital MUTILLATION, should NEVER be called ‘circumcision’!

    • Brett

      Yeah, but…but…but…he said he supports keeping interest rates on college loans as low as they are now, that he doesn’t want to double them up…but…but…but…that isn’t in the spirit of Ryan’s budget. But…but…maybe he’ll toss a coin on that one, best two outta three. Was he crossing his fingers behind his back when he said that?? 

  • Aranphor

    Come on Tom, put that pundit’s comments to the screws. He is such a hack it stinks.

  • Tim

    Is John McCormack working for the Romney campaign? I don’t hear analysis, just one-sided right wing rhetoric. He categorizes Obama as a liberal when Obama is the most moderate, right-of-center Democratic president since Truman. 

    • crt

      and every one else are left wing liberals…..

    • Ray in VT

       I think that that’s pretty common with political commentators.  A lot of them have a particular position, and it distorts their vision.

  • NewtonWhale

    You just saw the reason for republicans’ success.

    You just heard a caller fiercely defend his right to get the retirement benefits he was promised and rail against those who call them entitlements.

    Then he says he’s voting for Romney.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eg1MnscddCs

    • J__o__h__n

      The same fools who voted in the House freshmen in 2010.

    • Azra

      Don’t expect it to make sense. They typically vote against their own best interest.

    • Tina

      Not only was he promised the benefits:  he paid into them!  

      But, yes, how did he come to the conclusion that Romney would best protect his interests?!  This is happening thru out America!

    • Terry Tree Tree

      Shooting himself in the CROTCH?

  • jefe68

    That caller Jerry was a good example of how one can be so confused. He says he does not like how Social Security is being called entitlements and yet he supports Romney, who has been railing against the very program he feels strongly about.
    Romney supports the Ryan plan, it’s all about doing away with all of the New Deal and Great Society programs. To see this any other way is misguided. As the caller Jerry clearly is.

  • Patrik

    You can’t run the country like a company. 

  • Kevin

    Holy cow! On Point has somebody on their roundtable who is actually to the right of Karl Marx. And the On Point commentators go WIIIIILLLLDDDD! How dare the show expose them to opinions with which they disagree! 

    • J__o__h__n

      Have Pat Buchanan.  I don’t agree with him but at least he adds to the conversation. 

    • GretchenMo

      I’d say RABIDDDD!  The echochamber is not amused.

      • jefe68

        Funny how you keep complaining about an echo-chamber and yet… you seem to want the same thing you are decrying. Funny how your comments are also right out of the same kind of echo chamber you keep bringing up. Alas it’s the right wing one. Or should I say the regressive party talking points.

    • Ray in VT

      This show pretty regularly has people from both the left and the right, and I think that they do a far better job of having contradictory views than many outlets.  Who was the liberal on Fox News?  Alan Colmes?  I like contradictory viewpoints, but I dislike partisan rhetoric that is detached from reality.

      • Tina

        So well said, Ray!

        • Ray in VT

          Thank you, Tina.

      • Gregg

        Fox has tons of vitriolic liberals, tons. Bob Beckel, Pat Cadell, Joe Trippi, Juan Williams, David Schoen, Greta, Tamara Holder, Kirstin Powers, Susan Estrich, Geraldo Rivera not to mention Alan Combs and the late great Geraldine Ferraro. Their main news guy (Shepherd Smith) is a Democrat. That’s off the top of my head, I’d be dangerous with google. I disagree with you.

        However, I agree with you about On Point. I find the show to be far more balanced (and consistently so) than this blog. I don’t get the show until 7 PM so by then I have seen and participated in comments here. Like now.
        then I hear the show and realize Tom does a pretty good job… for a lib.

    • jefe68

      The right of Karl Marx… talk about complete nonsense.
      Your comment is nothing but partisan rhetoric, period.

  • Jim

    Aquinas is where we can find what Paul Ryan thinks?  I guess he agrees with this then:

    Hence whatever certain people have in superabundance is due, by natural law, to the purpose of succoring the poor. For this reason Ambrose [Loc. cit., 2, Objection 3] says, and his words are embodied in the Decretals (Dist. xlvii, can. Sicut ii): “It is the hungry man’s bread that you withhold, the naked man’s cloak that you store away, the money that you bury in the earth is the price of the poor man’s ransom and freedom.”Since, however, there are many who are in need, while it is impossible for all to be succored by means of the same thing, each one is entrusted with the stewardship of his own things, so that out of them he may come to the aid of those who are in need. Nevertheless, if the need be so manifest and urgent, that it is evident that the present need must be remedied by whatever means be at hand (for instance when a person is in some imminent danger, and there is no other possible remedy), then it is lawful for a man to succor his own need by means of another’s property, by taking it either openly or secretly: nor is this properly speaking theft or robbery.

    • Terry Tree Tree

      Don’t use their own religion to disprove what they say! When you prove they’re HYPOCRITES, they get UPSET!!

  • William

    Oh yeah, we have not spent enough on education the last 30 years…and Obama has been the absolute worse President when it came to supporting big spending for education.

    • GretchenMo

      Very little of it got to the kids, most is spent on Viagra and other benefits for teachers sitting in disciplinary rubber rooms; but that’s how union dues get paid!

      • Ray in VT

        Yeah, we can probably get more out of education by paying teachers less to do it.  While we’re at it we should probably get rid of teacher certification, because we don’t need the government telling teachers whether or not they’re qualified to teach.

        • GretchenMo

          We don’t hold them accountable for their performance and their pay only goes up, I’m not sure what benefit certification provides. 

          • Ray in VT

            Certifications can quantify whether or not they know their topics.  I know that there are bad teachers out there, but holding teachers strictly responsible for student outcomes, without regarding student abilities/disabilities or available resources certainly isn’t the answer.  Having seen both the public and the private school systems, I’ll trust the public one.  There’s plently of unaccountability in the private sector.  Can you hook me up with a deal where I run a company into the ground and then get paid millions to leave?

          • Zero

            “Pay only goes up” … in the state of Florida, I can tell you that teacher pay hasn’t kept up with inflation in 7 years. 

            Your “accountability” philosophy is doing nothing but creating a rotation of unqualified teachers.  But we can’t really determine if they are indeed unqualified because there are so many restrictions on them and course material that there is little to no room for individual talent.

            Then republicans turnaround and say let kids go to private schools (where the restrictions do not apply, where the teachers are the same but they have more freedoms and less accountability). Perhaps, republicans can use a little of their own philosophy and deregulate the teachers.  That would be nice to deregulate people who want to help other Americans instead of deregulating banks who want to create shadow markets and funnel money out of Americans’ pockets without regard.

            Are you starting to see how you vote against your own economic interests and the interests of the middle class?  

            Again, wages that are at least somewhat near what a college degree earns in the private market will attract new and robust talent.   

      • jefe68

        This is a lie designed to change the subject and demonize teachers. You are not interested in the issues other than using them to forward your own intolerance towards others.

      • Zero

        Actually, money is directed to everything but the teachers–athletics, standardize testing, superintendents, stupid field trips, rock gyms, bean bag couches, televisions, etc.

        You get good teacher the same way any industry gets good employees–competitive wages.  Every republican seems to forget that teaching requires a college degree, and if you give them crappy wages, all the people that made “A”s in college go into business, while secondary education is left with “C” students. 

        I know quite a few people with master degrees who would love to teach but can’t afford the pay cut. 

        Look up the public employee statistics: public employees with college degrees are statistically making less than they would in the private market…while public employees with high school education would be making less in the private market.

        • Terry Tree Tree

          You trying to confuse Gretch with FACTS?

      • Alan in NH

        I sure would like to know where you acquire your information. Viagra for teachers sitting in disciplinary rubber rooms? What does that even mean? What is the belief you have that supports this statement? I, for one, don’t get the point you’re making, beyond that you apparently don’t like teachers or unions. Is there something I’m missing?

        • Gregg

          I think I read they ended them but I’m not sure. The “rubber rooms” are where the zombies live. I’ll betcha’ their insurance is provided and covers viagra. The salaries cost NYC $30 million/year. So GretchenMo  had a point. She is a pleasure to decipher. 

          • Terry Tree Tree

            ‘Rubber-Rooms’ were, and probably are still, where teachers are sent, when accusations are made against them, but NOT charged with wrong-doing.
               ADMINISTRATIVE decision, to evade a REAL administrative decision!
              Little, or nothing to do with teacher pay, OR unions!

  • MrNutso

    Simple answer, raise more revenue.

  • Dosch

    Every study shows that the roll back of tax cuts for the wealthy will effect almost NONE of the current small business owners!

  • MrNutso

    Etch-a-sketch moment.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

    Republican budgets are all about tax cuts and never about addressing the deficit, much less the existing debt. The overall plan is to allow the 1% to milk as much out of our system before it finally collapses.
     

  • Lin

    TOM, PLEASE LET RANA TALK!!!! SHE HAS WANTED TO COMMENT ABOUT JOHN’S POINTS ON THE ECONOMY ABOUT 6 TIMES NOW AND HE JUST GETS TO RAMBLE ON WITH HIS REPUBLICAN MANTRAS. 

  • losing interest

    tom, where did you find this guy?  unsupported statement after statement.  can someone make him account for his false statements, otherwise not worth my time listening to this drivel

    • Lin

       Seriously. This guy is almost the WORST shill EVER! Yet he has basically dominated the economic discussion.

    • GretchenMo

      I’m guessing you’re talking about Jack.  He’s on every week, yapping the same tired garbage.  He must have some photos of Tom or something.

  • Tina

    Sadly, John McCormack does that new fast-talk talking:  I for one cannot hear that fast, let alone think about what I’m hearing when faced with fast-talk.  It’s a new speech pattern, and I question its usefulness in true communication, which is, after all, at least a two-way (or beyond “two”) street.  

  • AJNorth

    What is about the “Right” being incapable of veracity? These cretins would still lie if the truth sounded better — and do.

    The price of gasoline has nothing — NOTHING — to do with Obama’s policies.  In fact, under Obama crude oil production has increased over output at any time during the tenure of the appointment of the Supreme “Court” — G.W. Bush.  There is a GLUT of crude in this country, and has been for many months; that is why we have been EXPORTING oil.  The Keystone XL pipeline will have ZERO effect on gasoline prices; it will only increase the record-setting profits of the oil cartel.

    As far as the pipeline “creating jobs,” that is ANOTHER lie; read the Cornell University analysis for yourselves: “Cornell GLI Study Finds Keystone XL Pipeline Will Create Few Jobs “ – http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/globallaborinstitute/research/Keystonexl.html .

    While we’re at it, let’s look at the oil cartel’s staggering profits; Economics 101: profit is the difference between the cost of bringing something to market and the price paid.  In a global economy, of which energy is a part, competition for limited product will drive prices up; that is NOT the case for domestic petroleum (at least not yet).

    And by the way, a major contributor to rising gasloline prices has been the recent shut-down of refinery capacity in the U.S. — http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-03-07/peak-oil-crisis-east-coast-refineries-redux .

    The shills for the oil cartel, and the politicians they have bought and paid for — along with their media moutpieces, such as the Weekly Standard – can all pound salt.

  • manganbr

    We should apply Winston Churchill’s comment about democracy to capitalism: it is the worst economic system, except for all the others. Rather than idealizing the morality and purity of capitalism (as republicans do lately), we should recognize its imperfections, and balance those against the moral checks of government safety nets, support for those in poverty, healthcare, etc. Ayn Rand is absolutely correct to identify that the moral core of unregulated capitalism is not just atheist; it is vehemently anti-christian. 

    • William

      Have we ever had unregulated capitalism? At least since FDR’s reign of terror on the private sector we have been under a pretty regulated economic system. Just look at the number of government agencies and regulations

      • Ray in VT

        Reign of terror, please.  We had a relatively unregulated system throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, and what did we get?  Corporations buying congressmen, massive pollution, child labor, unsafe working conditions and worker abuse, and an economic depression about once per decade.  Yeah, everything since the New Deal has been pretty terrible.

        • William

          The depression, made Great by FDR, was not the first economic downturn in this country. The massive government invention and regulation made it worse not better. You think regulations prevent companies from buying influence? What about all those green companies gone bust with our money?

          • Zero

            Open up a history book.  The economy was improving during the FDR years, and every time they tried to cut from the consumer class, the economy contracted. 

            P.S., England is again in a recession, and they went the austere avenue.

          • William

            Nope. Unemployment dipped, then went back up. FDR was anti-business and failed. Some people look to WW II as pulling us out of depression, but if you have to have a war to pull yourself out of depression, that is not much of a recovery.

          • jefe68

            You really need to read up on the Depression which was in full swing by the time FDR came into office in 1933. The crash happened in the fall of 29, October 29th to be precise. It had been building up for years due to a lot of bad ideas about credit. Not unlike what just happened in 2007 and 08.

            The reasons were there was to much debt and over speculation. People were buying stocks on credit. Insider trading was legal in those days, or one should say it was tolerated as there were no regulations whatsoever. When stocks started to fall people panicked and in turn there were runs on the banks. Everything collapsed like a house of cards. This was the already past history by the time FDR came to office.
            You really are making yourself look like a complete fool are you aware of that?

          • William

            Hoover then FDR made the mistake with big government spending and both failed. Except FDR went after the business community. He hated them and sought to “make things right”. He failed. You are the fool. You try to defend failure. If FDR’s “ideas” were so great why did we not keep them inplace forever?

          • jefe68

            What? Hoover is the very picture of small government and staying out of the economy. You have to be kidding. You really are a fool.
            It’s a waste of time even trying with people like you. You just believe in this revisionist crap of history based on fantasy.

          • William

            Hoover increased spending from 3 billion in 1928 to 4.7 billion in 1932. 4 % deficit in 1932. His fed cut the discount rate in 1928 from 6 percent to 1.5 percent in 1932. The comparison between the depression of 1920-21 to the 1930′s depression is interesting. The fed did the opposite in 1920. Fed. budget cut from 18.5 billion to 6.5 billion 1919-20. (1 year). 3.2 billion by 1922. The 1920′s went on to be a pretty good recovery.  

      • jefe68

        “FDR’s reign of terror”… how does one deal with this kind of rhetoric? This is nothing but pure hogwash. 

      • Zero

        When was Glass-Steagall signed into law? …The 1930s.  Deregulated in the late 1990s.  We had pretty good economies in the meantime.  And Glass-Steagall is stronger than Dodd-Frank.  

        Amazing, just a 10 years after we take away the regulations from the Great Depression era, GDP contracts 8% and we almost had the next depression. 

        Moral hazard didn’t work; every banker thought their bank was too big to fail, and they were right.

        • William

          Did reduced regulations cause the GDP to shrink or was it increased government spending?

          • Ray in VT

             Is it your view, then, that government spending caused the housing bubble and the over-leveraging of big banks that finally caught up with us in 2008 and 2009?

            I think that spending is a problem, especially if it is not paid for, and I think that the argument can and has been make that the relaxation of government regulation of the financial industry certainly contributed to the crash.

          • William

            Government interference with the housing market caused the housing bubble. They were giving out loans with little regard to getting paid back.
            There were government regulations and regulators responsible for keeping the financial sector honest. They just ignored it, bought off or were told my Congress not to get involved. *Barney Frank*. So, what good are they?

          • jefe68

            What? Wrong, wrong, wrong.

          • William

            So, all those billions of dollars with the federal home loans were not the problem?

          • jefe68

            Actually no they were not.
            They did not help but the damage was already done by Wall street and the banks.

          • William

            Morgenthau’s speech on the failure of the New Deal is public record. So, when FDR went after the rich like Obama, create a villian, that solved the problem with the economy during the Great Depression or made it worse?

          • J__o__h__n

            Your recall of the recent past is as accurate as your New Deal history.

          • William

            FDR’s Treasure Sec. said the New Deal was a failure. U want to argue with that fact too?

          • Zero

            The banks started to fail because they gobbled up risky mortgages and loans.  Paulson, Bush’s budget director, was a firm believer in moral hazard.  He saw the markets were faltering, and knew the damage of letting a bank fail would cause to the economy.  The economy was already imploding and Lehman Brothers needed a bailout. Paulson let Lehman Brothers file for bankruptcy and the economy tanked.  So, at that time GDP was contracting.  AIG was the next bank that needed a bailout, and AIG had significantly more mortgages and loans than Lehman Brothers.  If AIG alone would have declared bankruptcy after Lehman, we would probably had a depression.  Eight more banks after that needed a bailout. AIG and the rest ended up being TARP  The most GDP contracted was 8% before TARP was 8%, which is a lot. 

            Now, you can criticize the way TARP was done.  Bush and Obama handed over money to the banks without forcing them to refinance mortgages and credit card debts, etc.  Bush’s TARP had zero stipulations.  And if banks would have been forced to refinance and reduce CEO and Executive salary and bonuses, the economy would be much better today.

            Now, the economy would also be better if Bush never spent a trillion dollars in Iraq.  Was that the kind of spending you were referring to?  Gee, imagine how much we would have saved if we actually went after terrorists during the Bush administration.  The Bush Tax Cuts also whipped away a surplus, and cost America over $3 trillion thus far.  Is that the kind of spending you were referring to? Tax cuts for people who don’t need tax cuts….

            I hope this has educated you on how republicans are constantly probing your ‘you know what’  

          • William

            Who was giving out risky loans? Which was the biggest player? U.S. Government

          • jefe68

            Wrong, it was the banks and mortgage brokers and then Wall Street created these crazy default swaps that bundled all this stuff together and the shit hit the fan.
            You really do seem very confused on the facts.

          • William

            They bundled up bad mortages, sliced them up by degree of risk and sold them off. Of those bad mortages were any owned by the taxpayers? Issued via freedy/fani mae?

          • Zero

            The banks had the freedom to take on risking loans…this was previously regulated under Glass-Steagall. 

            Quit being an idiot.  The government stopped a depression!

          • Zero

            And I’m not saying Government is universally good (like you are saying Government is universally bad).  Republicans are right about government being the problem…they just have to be in office to prove it. 

          • Alan in NH

            Two off the budget wars under Bush didn’t do a whole lot for the black bottom line.

          • William

            Yup. But Afghanistan is the “good war” per Obama and Iraq was the legacy of the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998. Goes to show what can go wrong with government decides to save the world.

          • Terry Tree Tree

            Closest I’ve seen you come to admitting that ‘W’ admin. caused a LOT of the problems we have!
               Bet you still support Catholic clergy RAPING children?

          • jefe68

            Yes it did. Because the unregulated speculation on Wall Street did not help build one thing in the nation.
            It’s all a house of cards and the evidence is there is one wants to see it. This casino that we call Wall Street has been in control of way to much of our economy since the mid 90′s and it still is. It offers very little value to our economy other than those who make their living on Wall Street.

          • William

            As opposed to the current fed program buying government debt by printing money. Isn’t that pretty much of a wall street run mad policy? But if the government does it, that is ok? It appears that the fed is doing their own credit default swaps with itself.

          • jefe68

            You seem very confused on how the fed works in relation to the economy. Also Wall Street was placing bets and speculating. The Fed does not engage in this crap.

          • William

            The fed is buying it’s own debt and has been doing so for a while. What is the point of doing such a foolish thing? They called it the “hail mary pass”. Would it not be better economically to downsize government spending, size and regulation and let the economy fix itself?

      • Alan in NH

        William: I don’t know how old you are or how much history you study. Take a look at the U.S. from 1815 to 1855 or post Civil War through say 1905. About forty years each of unregulated capitalism. FDR’s reign of terror? Seriously? We’re here now as a nation in relative economic strength due to the vestiges of that great government program of FDR’s called World War II. Practically full employment, industry going gangbusters…what was not to like? You can’t run a consumer-based economy if most consumers don’t have enough money to buy the products produced. Both Henry Ford and FDR knew that.

        • William

          Did you ever read about some of the things FDR did? Trying to stack the Supreme Court with more justices so he could get what he wanted? Locking up a butcher in NYC for selling chickens at a discount? Killing millions of pigs while people went hungry? So along comes WW-II and FDR called together the industrial leaders and decides to let them do what they do best..wham…we become the industrial giant that won the war. You know looking at Henry Ford and his big pay increase. Was it to create consumers or keep employees? He had massive turnover problems and his bosses came to him with the idea of paying higher wages. FDR hated companies and had not clue how wealth is created.

          • jefe68

            Boy are you ever wrong. Interesting how you are trying to use revisionist history. It is amazing, the inanity of your world view is astonishing.

          • William

            He did not try to stack the court?

          • manganbr

            How did this become an argument about FDR? I was never suggesting that the US ever has had a period of totally unregulated capitalism. The point was that, Ayn Rand, as a writer, deserves credit for recognizing that the moral basis of capitalism, in its purest form, is not compatible with Christian morals. And secondly, that there’s a difference between accepting capitalism as an imperfect system that requires some checks and balances, and totally idealizing it and working to make it as pure and unregulated as possible. Though we may have never had a pure free market, that is certainly the direction the tea party would like to take. 

          • William

            Some checks and balances on capitalism…you know that children in this country have been cited by the police for opening a kool-aid stand without a permit. A unemployed person can’t start a carpet cleaning business without serveral permits from various local, state and federal agencies. Why is it that along lifes way people in government have determined they must regulate capitalism to the “kool-aid stand” level? Can you imagine what the major companies like Boeing, GM etc..must go through. All these checks and balances on captialism make us better off?

          • jefe68

            Do mean that by stacking the Supreme court that he had the good fortune of being able to appoint people he wanted to the court.
            Because that’s the process we have. It goes both ways, you can’t say it’s stacking the court when the judges are not to your liking and then say it’s not when they are.

          • William

            He tried to change the rules to force justices to retire. If they did not, he could appoint another justice to serve along side the justices already there. It would have increased the size to 15 justices. The Senate voted 70-20 and shot this idea down. FDR wanted “his boys” on the court “right now” and was not willing to wait for normal retirements. It was a attempt to control all 3 segments of our government and a good indication of the true FDR.

        • jefe68

          Actually the idea of credit comes from the period leading to the Great Depression and that is one of the roots of the entire mess.
          People ran out of credit and the banks ran out of money. FDR saw the crisis and realized that something had to be done or the possibility that the USA and it’s democracy was really at stake. To ignore the history or use revisionist ideology is a fools errand.

          • William

            If anything, FDR’s failures have been glossed over by history. He took the depression as a chance to “make things right” and went after the wealthy. The wealthy said “fine” and went golfing. What good did he accomplish this such childish ideas?

          • jefe68

            Once more revisionist history based on an over simplification of what was going on. Did FDR and his administration make mistake, yes, did they keep trying to get the US out of the Depression, yes. Hoover did nothing for 4 years.

  • http://twitter.com/Dave_Eger Dave Eger

    What a novel concept, actually enforcing the existing laws before creating new ones.

    • AC

      o snap!

  • John in Danvers

    I guess now OnPoint is also fair and balanced and feels compelled to have a real kook on the Friday show. Fair is fair, but to allocate so much time to partisan journalists is a real waste of the public value OnPoint otherwise creates.

    • Azra

      “Fair” should mean accurate. That’s what’s fair to the listeners. What we need are fact checkers, not partisan self-proclaimed experts who say whatever pops into their head at the time, and change their opinions, facts and figures like the the weather. Broadcasters and journalists should feel obligated to give listeners all the facts. Heresay and bickering are the last things we need. How are we supposed to know what’s true, and vote responsibly, if we’re continually being fed erroneous nonsense. That doesn’t help anyone decide how to vote. It only adds to our confusion, bewilderment, and voting mistakes. Then the Country suffers for our mistakes, because the media, who know better, interview so many self-serving individuals, and don’ t give us the facts afterward. We don’t need that junk. It’s not at all helpful. From now until November, all we want are the facts, please. We need only the facts. From now until November, it should be illegal to book a guest who isn’t a bipartisan fact-checker. To do so is unAmerican. We must know the truth.

  • Tina

    Tom, you don’t think that Faux News is at least as influential here in the U.S. as Murdoch is in Great Britain??

    • GretchenMo

      Faux News, you are a riot!  Where can I catch your act? 

      • Azra

        Faux describes it so much better, don’t you agree?

    • TFRX

      Steve Doocy still has a job. “Unlike some people.”

    • William

      Did FoxNews edit the Zimmerman 911 tape or was that the very Liberal NBC?

  • Thinkin15

    The problems in this country aren’t that the wealthiest aren’t wealthy enough and that we don’t have enough guns. So basically, that’s all the Republicans care about and have “ideas” and policies for. So we don’t need another round of Republican abuse.

    • William

      But they are the only ones with a budget. Obama has failed to just get a simple budget passed in 3 years. I know that is a “idea” but it seems he is just not ready for prime time.

      • Ray in VT

        I will fault the President and the Democrats for not having an alternative.  I would not extend any sort of congratulations to the Republicans, however, for what they’ve come up with.

        • William

          The Ryan plan does not go far enough with spending cuts and that is it’s biggest problem.

          • Ray in VT

            I disagree.  I think that the tax code, which is riddled with holes that allow highly profitable companies and high income individuals to pay little to no taxes, and the lowest tax rates in 60 years are bigger problems, although spending definitely needs to be addressed as well.

          • William

            It won’t matter if you don’t know how much you plan on spending. Just tossing more money into the government piggy bank won’t slow down the debt.

          • Zero

            Actually, if you look at a CBO report and understand baseline spending and discretionary spending, raising taxes would reduce the deficit more than anything else.  The war is the next leading driver of the deficit after the Bush Tax Cuts. 

            Indeed, if you actually look at what is driving our deficits, Obama is trying to end them and republicans are trying to keep them intact.

            Food stamps, welfare and unemployment help is not a budget concern. 

          • William

            If you cut spending 20 percent across the board and then froze spending levels at 2006 budget levels for ten years that would make a difference.

          • Zero

            You are also cutting from the consumer economy in a demand-crippled economy.

            I know republicans don’t like to believe in this thing called “demand,” but the market is sensitive to it. 

          • denis

            and what in spending do you want to eliminate?

          • Gregg

            Think big, agencies (plural) as opposed to programs. Obamacare notwithstanding.

          • GretchenMo

            Full of slush funds, to pay off unions no doubt.

        • Gregg

          “Cut, Cap and Balance” passed the House. It would have prevented the downgrade of our credit rating. John Chambers of S&P said as much.

          http://www.sodahead.com/united-states/would-the-bill-cut-cap-and-balance-have-prevented-the-downgrading-of-the-usas-credit-rating-with/question-2066371/

          According to a CNN poll taken at the time, 2/3 of americans supported it.

          http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/peter-roff/2011/07/21/poll-americans-support-cut-cap-and-balance

          As an aside, CNN did not report the results of their own poll. Shameless.

          Republicans have passed a plan (actually several) through the Democratic process with the support of the American public that demonstrated a the fiscal sanity S&P (and the world for that matter) wanted to see. I applaud that. The Senate didn’t even bother to do their most basic Constitutional requirement and vote. I not only “fault” that, I find it unacceptable.

          • J__o__h__n

            S&P downgraded our rating and had no impact on the rate we can borrow and US is still a valued currency.  S&P gave AAA ratings to mortgage backed securites which were a fraud and crashed the economy. 

          • GretchenMo

            So ratings don’t matter … but they did five years ago.  How many sides of this issue are you going to argue?  I’ve lost track.

        • denis

          once again, the budget comes from the house not the senate or the admin.

      • MrNutso

        I could come up with a budget as well, but I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t like it.

      • Zero

        FYI, taxing the top 44% per se would reduce the deficit faster, more significantly, and more responsibly than cutting from the consumer class in a demand-crippled economy.

        • William

          It would be difficult to say a new tax would reduce the deficit without a budget.

          • Zero

            First off, in traditional law making (if you have every watched School of Rock) congress drafts the bills with the president’s political temperament in mind.  Obama has called for time and time again, what he wants to see in a budget.  Republicans than create budgets that are completely outside political (and economical) reality, then turn around to idiots like you and say they are the responsible ones. 

            You can watch the budget hearings on CSPAN–there is political gridlock caused by a fraction of extreme right wingers.  Bills are being voted on that are too right wing for democrats but are not far enough to the right for the TEA party–that is political gridlock caused by the right.

          • William

            His own party did not vote for his budget. You just can’t make this stuff up.

          • Zero

            What did 5 democrats not vote for it?  Is this one of those John Boehner moments where one think bipartisan support equals a few dems?

          • GretchenMo

            Are you kidding?  Fewer than 5 voted for it.  Try to keep up.

          • Zero

            Your incomprehension of how budgets are created (via budgetary comity) is leading you to believe republicans are the responsible ones, when they are responsible for whipping away a surplus, reducing middle class income, creating a trillion dollar deficit, and then they create political gridlock and point their finger at Obama for not getting serious. 

            Give me a break.

             

      • denis

        Aren’t you one of those “constitution” guys? So according to the constitution who is responsible for the budget?

        • Gregg

          The House has passed several.

        • William

          So the President can’t get a budget passed and that is no big deal?

          • Azra

            NOT AFTER JANUARY 20TH.

      • Azra

        Do you mean to say that you think Mitt IS? Or is it Newt? One of the Ricks?

    • Zero

      Think about it dude, if everybody had a gun, we wouldn’t need to pay for police.  Every citizen can have a cold war between each other, and nobody will shoot. 

      • Alan in NH

        I’ll assume your comment is satire. Might your suggestion be just as likely to start individual arms races? Does Joe have an AK-47? Better get one. Maybe he’s getting a grenade launcher now that I’ve got my AK. Uh-oh. Hey, did the privatization/individualization of law enforcement ever work anywhere except for the makers of guns?

        • Zero

          I once had a smart republican tell me that automatic weapons need to be legal in case a group of people rob a home, but how can a single mother protect her home by herself, we should let kids keep guns so they can team up with the mom and blow the robbers away. Grenades would help in home defense as well.  And a rocket launcher should eliminate drive-by-shootings…so there is really no need to increase police patrol in troubled neighborhoods. 

      • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

        Why not give everyone an RPG?  Think how safe you gun lovers will be then!

  • Katelalley

    I would like to know your guests thoughts on a tax reform solution that has EVERYONE paying some federal tax, regardless of income. Unless everyone has skin in the game, as it were, we will be unable to have a national discussion and achieve consensus on issues of funding entitlements, addressing debt, infrastructure rebuilding programs, the environment… In short any of the many challenges we face.

    • TFRX

      Screw that. The same people who have found their income stagnant or down, going nowhere since the beginning–THE BEGINNING–of 5-year ballyhooed Bush expansion don’t need to be told about having to have “skin in the game”.

      They didn’t, all of a sudden in the last decade plus, lose their way and need a “moral guiding hand”. Not going after these people for income tax isn’t a moral hazard.

      All the other taxes weigh on them more heavily than people in the middle and upper classes anyway.

    • Ray in VT

      I don’t think that tax increases on the working poor or the elderly, many of whom are just barely getting by doing what they can to provide for themselves, is the solution.  I can’t see the societal benefit on raising taxes on the hypothetical family making 25k/year with 2 or 3 kids while also having the lowest upper income tax rates in generations.

      • Gregg

        True, but many are calling for a return to Clinton’s rates which would do just that.

        • Ray in VT

          I think that we could do some modest reductions in tax credits and such, without perhaps causing great hardship, but the proposition that we should cut tax rates on millionaires but raise them the working poor or the elderly is utter lunacy as far as I’m concerned.

          • Gregg

            I have not seen that proposition (I’ve heard the calls to raise them) advocated regarding the wealthy and the only ones I have seen advocating raising the taxes on the poor are a few Democrats. Fareed Zarkaria was on “On Point” not long ago saying it over and over. The word is he’s in line for an advisor job if Obama is reelected. 

            Still, I don’t think it will happen and as long as the economy continues to tank, a tax hike on the rich is highly counter productive.

          • Ray in VT

            I’d be willing to pay a bit more in taxes and see the social safety programs continue.  I think that Democratic plans would largely raise rates but keep programs, while GOP plans would largely cut rates but also dramatically cut benefits and depend upon potential gains from growth.  If drastic cuts are to be made, and so much goes towards entitlements, then who is going to bear the brunt of that?  Anyways, I out.  Have a good weekend.

          • nj_v2

            Greggg spouts more cluelessness.

          • Gregg

            Thank you for the thoughtful comment.

        • Azra

          I vote for rates as they were during the Eisenhower administration.

          • Gregg

            And the loopholes? And the spending levels? And the hawk from hell in the White House? Okay.

          • Azra

            Income tax rates.

    • MrNutso

      People actually pay taxes, but the are offset by the earned income tax credit.  They also pay federal payroll taxes and probably state and local taxes.

      • Ray in VT

        Plus gas taxes, sales taxes, etc.  A lot of poorer people do pay into the system, just not via the income tax.

    • GretchenMo

      Exactly, they pay no federal income and this entitles them to the “give me-give me” attitude.  No wonder they vote for the people who promise to give them even more with no strings attached.

      • Azra

        You’ve said a mouthful. “Vote Republican, and we’ll guarantee you will keep your Bush tax cuts, and we’ll take even more money from poor, from elderly people, sick people, women, children’s education . . . whatever we can get away with, so you can have more.”

        Sadly, they usually get those votes.

        • Azra

          The more they get, the more they want.

        • Azra

          The more they get, the more they want.

    • jimino

       Do you realize that of the 47% who don’t pay federal income tax, about 85% are under 20 or over 65 years of age.  You want 10-year olds to be taxed on their allowance?

      • Azra

        We only want justice. We just resent paying for the houses, vehicles, horses, yachts, garage elevators, vacations, and Tiffanys’ purchases of somebody who pays little or no income tax, especially when we work so much harder to earn it. Don’t you. You should, unless you’re part of the reason that the rest of us pay higher taxes.

  • Tina

    Bring back Rana Foorohar!  She was great and very clear!  Jack was really on point today, too!

  • U.S. Vet.

    U.S. drone attack in SW Somalia kills at least 22

    http://www.presstv.ir/detail/238376.html

    Since Obama won a Nobel ‘Peace’ Prize, I guess he has the right to slaughter innocent civilians.

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      And how many “innocent civilians” have died during the TWO wars George Bush started??

      • GretchenMo

        How many peace prizes did he win?

        • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

          Another Republican AMNESIAC I see. You folks will know your place on January 21, 2013 when the question of the day will be: Romney WHO?

          • GretchenMo

            Gotcha, you’re an ignorant apologist.

          • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

            Adolescent insults do not serve your cause.Looks like I touched a nerve too…

            I will be thinking of this conversation on Jan 21…and laughing out loud.

          • Azra

            Halleluia! That day can’t get here soon enough.

        • Alan in NH

          if we’re going to play numbers, let’s play numbers. What does the Nobel Prize have to do with anything? Who knows why that committee gave it to Obama? I’m hearing the number of civilians lost during the two Iraq wars numbers in the hundreds of thousands.

    • GretchenMo

      He’s killed more since he won than before! 

      • Still Here

        He found something he’s good at.

    • Azra

      Did you ever kill anyone.

  • JGC

    Hi Tom, a suggestion for a program next week:  an in-depth discussion on the New York Times article “Debt Collectors Pursue Patients Inside Hospitals” (April 25).  Incredible! 

       

    • margbi

       I read that, too. Absolutely awful. How do collectors even know those they are pursuing are in the hospital? I thought there was medical privacy!

      • JGC

        I looked up the Accretive Health investor site (that is the main company mentioned as a purveyor of in-house debt collection for non-profits); within the careers section here is one of their motivators for their new hires in debt collection:  “At Accretive Health, we have fun as we pursue our ambitions.”  Woo hoo! Keep pursuing all those luckless, lacking-proper-health-insurance-folks,especially in the emergency room. Have fun! Pursue those ambitions! You will get a shopping gift card for your efforts, and the board  of directors will enjoy even more enormous profit as well. (BTW, Hello, to Edgar Bronfman, Jr.!) 

        On the other hand I was disappointed to see that both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney have held up Intermountain Healthcare (before 2010) as a formula to be emulated. Intermountain Healthcare is a hospital system that (as an initially Mormon enterprise) got its non-profit mandate in the wake of Roe v.Wade.  Yes, it has brought down its costs, but is that partially because it has been aggressively shaking down its clientele through debt collection? Everyone will need healthcare; everyone should have access to the same healthcare.    

           

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

    McCormack is simply a spind doctor for the Republicans. A bigger idiot I have not heard in some time. His comments about the Keystone pipeline were simple lies and propaganda taken from the Trans-Canada play book. I live in a State it will cross and personally know the issues and facts. The jobs will be very few, once the pipeline is constructed, not the thousands they claim…in fact it will be less than 100 permanent jobs. Also, the oil shipped is meant for the world market (meaning China) …not the US, and it will not lower the price of gas in the US by one dime.

    • Vince Dunsworth

      EXACTLY! If that oil was meant for the US market, it would make more sense to pipe it to the northern border and build a refinery up there. (Away from Texas!) It would cost a hell of a lot less to build a new refinery than that pipeline, and the customers for that oil would be closer. That oil was never for us. China, Mexico and points South.

  • Inasrullah

    Other than the robomantra of lower taxes, how exactly will Romney “save” America? Rana is spot on! Romney needs to shine a light on his own plan that he will accelerate the economy over and above the Obama Administration.  All I hear are false promises based on failed Republican economics. Romney’s solipsism entrenched in his own megalomania is downright scary.

    • GretchenMo

      Please, at best you’re not listening but more likely you only hear what you want.

      • jefe68

        As you do yourself.

    • Azra

      He needs to shine a light on a quite a lot of things, like his tax returns, for instance.

    • TomK in Boston

      That’s right, but be careful. Voodoo econ “failed” for us, but it worked as designed for the Romneys of the world, didn’t it?

      I don’t think the peak of inequality in 1929 and the onset of the Great Depression were coincidence. They were cause and effect. Maybe the “Great Recession” is the result of the Bush inequality spike, end of story, but I’m not sure. If an Etcha regime pushes our inequality to 3′rd world dictatorship levels, past the 1929 mark, we’ll get a Great Depression II that will make the Bush crash look like happy times.

  • Chepodog

    McCormack somehow steered everything including Murdoch’s admission of a cover-up back to criticism of Pesident Obama.  I thought Fox News Channel was bad!
    No one mentioned: last summer when Obama brought up a budget plan that would cut $4 trillion from the deficit over 10 years, Speaker Boehner said it was too ambitious and $2 trillion over the time period was more realistic. 

    • GretchenMo

      and then they got to a deal and Obama backed out like the coward he is.

      • aj

        coward no, wus yes.

        • Gregg

          I would accept that compromise in the name of bipartisanship.

          • GretchenMo

            Wus it is!

          • aj

            lol

          • Azra

            Compromise? And you call yourself a Republican???

          • Gregg

            No.

          • Azra

            I thought you were. Sorry. My mistake.

          • Gregg

             “Unaffiliated”

          • Brett

            A rose by any other name…if it walks like a duck and acts like a duck…

      • TomK in Boston

        President Obama was a coward to even consider that deal, which was a total sellout to the far right class warfare agenda. I’m glad he finally woke up, but it’s disturbing that he even considered it.

        The sad truth is that, on the left-right scale I grew up with, our President is one of the last of the moderate republicans. He only looks liberal compared to the insane asylum that the current GoP has become.

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      As the Veep said:  Bin Laden is dead, and GM is alive. Under Romney’s “leadership” the reverse would be true.

      • Azra

        Too true.

  • GretchenMo

    McCormack was great.  I hope he’ll be on again and again.  He’s a good foil for Tom and Jack whining hour.  He certainly touched some nerves of the sensitives leftwing nutjobs out there.  Love it!

    • Ray in VT

      I can also see that he touched a nerve with the right wing nuts jobs out there.  Hated it.  I’d rather have someone who can back up his statements, even when I don’t agree with them, rather than just churning out partisan talking points.

      • GretchenMo

        Yes, but a positive nerve.  Not your hate stuff, how ugly. 

        • Azra

          Your hate stuff is no prettier.

  • U.S. Vet.

    U.S. deaths in Afghanistan:  Obama Vs. Bush

    Bush 575

    Obama 1,274

    http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/obamavsbush

    At least Obama was able to beat Bush in one area. 

    It’s even more impressive when you consider that it took Bush nearly 8 years to have 575 U.S. troops K.I.A. in Afghanistan.  Obama more than doubled that number in just 3 years.

    • Ray in VT

      And how many did Bush’s policies kill in Iraq in 8 years versus Obama’s 3?

      • Azra

        Guess there are no statistics for that. Try Fox. They always have the facts.

    • Alan in NH

      A little false advertising here, friend. You may remember that the U.S. military, under Bush, shifted most of its attention, hardware, manpower to Iraq during 2003-2006. And actually, I’d like to know what point you are making with the numbers. Merely stating them doesn’t prove much of anything. Are you saying that the military has been less competent and effective under Obama? And if so, why would that be? I understood that some of the extra casualties have been attributable to our troops moving into more hotly contested areas of Afghanistan under Obama, rather than in hanging around Kabul under Bush’s guidance. But I could easily be wrong.

    • TomK in Boston

      Huh? I thought you guys wanted us to be in Afghanistan. President Obama has followed Bush-like policies. With Iraq ending he shifted focus to Af, kept the drones humming, kept up the torture, nailed bin Laden. Be honest, if Bush was still in the WH you would think it was fine.

      Did you complain about the Iraq casualties and massive spiking of the deficit  with Bush? Did you care that there were no WMD?

    • TomK in Boston

      “At least Obama was able to beat Bush in one area.”

      Yeah, Bush usually wins:

      Major terrorist attacks on us soil: Bush 1, Obama 0

      Wars started over non existent scary things: Bush 1, Obama 0

      Economic crashes: Bush 1, Obama 0

      Budget surpluses turned into deficits: Bush 1, Obama 0

  • Zero

    From last weeks New Yorker, “Evening the Odds: Is there a politics of inequality” by Nicholas Lemann:

    The most striking change in American society in the past generation–roughly since Ronald Reagan was elected President–has been the increase in inequality of income and wealth.  [I]n 1979, members of the much discussed “one per cent” got nine per cent of all personal income.  Now they get a quarter of it.  The gains have increased the farther up you go.  The top tenth of one per cent get about ten per cent of income, and the top hundredth per cent get about five per cent.  While the Great Recession was felt most severely by those at the bottom, the recovery has hardly benefitted them.  In 2010, ninety-three per cent of the year’s gains went to the top one per cent.

    Since rich people are poorer in votes than they are in dollars, you’d think that, in an election year, the ninety-nine per cent would look to politics to get back some of what they’ve lost, and that inequality would be a big issue.  So far, it hasn’t been.  Occupy Wall Street and its companion movements briefly spurred President Obama to become more populist in his rhetoric, but there’s no sign that Occupy is going to turn into the kind of political force that the Tea Party movement has been.  There was a period during the Republican primary campaign when Romney rivals like Newt Gingrich tried to take votes from the front-runner by bashing Wall Street and private equity, but that didn’t last long, either.  Politics does not feel sour from the country’s economic distress.  Yet much of the ambient discontent is directed toward government–the government that kept the recession from turning into a depression.  Why isn’t politics about what you’d expect it to be about?

    Traditionally, class figured less in politics in America than in most other Western countries, supposedly because the United States, though more economically unequal, and rougher in tone, was more socially equal, more diverse, more democratic, and better at giving ordinary people the opportunity to rise.  That’s what Alexis de Tocqueville found in the eighteen-thirties, and the argument has had staying power.  It has also been wearing thin.  During the five decades from 1930 to 1980, economic inequality decreased significantly, without imperiling “American exceptionalism.”  So it’s especially hard to put a good face on the way inequality has soared in the decades since.  Even if you think that all a good society requires is–according to the debatable conservative mantra–equal opportunity for ever citizen, you ought to be a little shaken right now.  Opportunity is increasingly tied to education, and educational performance is tied to income and wealth.  When it comes to social mobility between generations, the United States ranks near the bottom of the developed nations….

  • Gregg

    Now Buenos Aires, Moscow and San Salvador in addition to Columbia. And as if it couldn’t get any sleazier, Bill Clinton is involved. Sleazy, sleazy, sleazy.

    Cheesily worded headline warning:

    http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505263_162-57422766/secret-service-probing-foreign-hard-partying-allegations-going-back-to-2000/

  • manganbr

    So if you could push a magical button and put the economy back into the exact conditions it was under in November of 2008 you would? I’m not sure many other would. It’s one thing to argue that Obama didn’t handle the situation as well as one might, but it’s an entirely different point to suggest that we would be better off if the economy was where it was at before he took office. But proving that the stimulus plan did not work is just as hard as proving that it did work. Any one who comes to a definitive conclusion about it one or another, is oversimplifying the complexity of the system, and standard of evidence that would be required to come to a confident judgment. Either way, it’s a “what if” logic, where one has to guess what the economy would have done without the stimulus, and base a judgment on that, either for or against the stimulus. We do, I suppose, have the UK austerity budget as some evidence of what effects an alternative plan might have had, though even in that case, I wouldn’t press the point too far, since the US and UK economies are different.

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      Are you serious? Mr. Plastic is a complete fraud, how could you possibly think otherwise?

    • Azra

      I can hardly wait for the debates to begin. Romney is already afraid to go out in public, so having to actually provide real answers to important questions, will be too much for him to cope with, especially with his opponent right next to him, contridicting him with facts. Mitt will be standing there, (God, I hope there’s a dress code, so he won’t show up in old jeans again), quaking, (wait . . . can he be a quaker and Muslim at the same time?),praying for it all to end, with those hot, unfogiving lights surrounding him. He’ll be hesitating, getting flustered, and groping for words more than ever.

      It promises to be must see TV.

  • http://bookmaggot.com Alan

    I could not stand the guests in this one. I turned it off after like 15 minutes. Cable news is a perfectly good source of partisan talking points; I really don’t want or need to get them from public radio as well.

  • TomK in Boston

    Put your helmets and body armor on, Etcha is mobilizing to grab every penny left to the middle class and redistribute it to his fellow aristocrats. Did you catch his remarks on fairness? They basically amount to a declaration of unconditional class warfare. Anyone need a translation? Here ya go, in parens. I posted something like this earlier, but I think it bears repeating:

    “This America is fundamentally fair.” (Highest inequality and lowest top tax rates since 1929 are A-OK by me.)

     “We will stop the unfairness of urban children being denied access to the good schools of their choice.” (I’ll escalate teacher-bashing and privatization, destroying our once-great public education system and redistributing the $ to my buds in the for-profit education sector.)

    “We will stop the unfairness of requiring union workers to contribute to politicians not of their choosing.” (Unions once provided good wages and benefits to working stiffs. We have them on the ropes, but I’ll crush them, and allow us oligarchs to pay workers less than Chinese.)

    “We will stop the unfairness of one generation passing larger and larger debts on to the next.” (I’ll turn medicare into Ryan Groupons and cut and privatize SS, redistributing massive $ to my Wall st buddies. Funny thing is, some of the sheep will even believe that this is “saving” the programs, ha ha ha.)

    Nice way to open the campaign, huh? He comes right out and says he’s gonna screw us – for anyone who can read voodoo econ newspeak. 

    • Azra

      Masochists eat that stuff up, and will vote for him.

  • Dbcooper292

    I think this person Ms. Foroohar lends credibility to the theory the media is biased.  To think she’s an editor at Time puts a question mark on that entire publication.  Essentially an advertiser for Democrats, and a person with no place on what is supposed to be a news program.

    • TomK in Boston

      You bet the corporate media are biased – surprise, toward corporate interests. Have you noticed all the guests Tom has from righty think tanks like “Heritage” and “Cato”? And someone finally quantified the bias in the sunday morning talk shows that has been making me wanna puke for a long time now. I do NOT want to see class warrior Ryan or evil witch Bachman every dam sunday morning. Sheesh!

      http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Sunday-talk-shows-02.png

      • aj

        Bachman is not the wicked witch. She’s one of the flying monkeys.

        • aj

          Obama is the wussy Lion. No courage.

          • TomK in Boston

            10-4

          • Azra

            Romney is the rusty, inflexible tin woodsman, needing a heart.

    • Hidan

       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIU_0DG_xAU

      D.B Cooper was 43 when we first heard his name

      47 miles away from where he fell down to his fame

      But he told me that the hardest part wasn’t really jumping out of the plane

      It was spending the night watching those lights

      Shine through the pouring rain

  • Hidan

    Folks remember Gregg eariler comment about the MB purposing two laws one allowing for people to marry 14yrs? Turns out it’s Fake. That right Fake. But the Saudi own newspaper does allow such in Saudi Arabia.

    FAKE Egyptian Law Would Allow “Farewell Intercourse” with Wives’ Corpses
    Posted by Cienna Madrid on Thu, Apr 26, 2012 at 12:04 PM

    UPDATE: Fortunately, it looks like I got my panties in a twist over nothing—the story is reportedly fake. That’s what I get for trusting the internet.

    http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2012/04/26/egyptian-law-would-allow-farewell-intercourse-with-wives-corpses

    Proof,

    Egypt ‘necrophilia law’? Hooey, utter hooey.

    ‘Necrophilia law’? Don’t believe everything you read on the Internet, kids. At least until there’s like, you know, some proof.

    http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Backchannels/2012/0426/Egypt-necrophilia-law-Hooey-utter-hooey?cmpid=addthis_email#.T5nEqMQOQoo.email

    • Gregg

      Here’s a fair look at it from a right-wing blog I like:

      http://hotair.com/archives/2012/04/26/egyptian-parliament-considering-bill-legalizing-er-sex-with-spouse-after-death/

      I hope it is fake, we’ll see. I doubt it. Either way my point stands. Deny it.

      • Hidan

        Dude admit you were wrong, your rightwing crap blog is not going to change the fact you were wrong.

        What’s funny is that Hotair site links back to the Saudi Link that I was debunked as a lie.

        Come on are you that dishonest?

        • Hidan

           “that was debunked as a lie”

        • Gregg

           Hot Air has not to this point updated (corrected) the story. They are very cautious and fair.

          • Hidan

             So Hot Air after finding out the story to be false did not update or correct it because according to Greg there very cautious and fair.

            Good one, just goes to show how dishonest the rightwinger are.

  • Hidan

    Today, Egypt’s state-owned Al Ahram newspaper published an opinion piece by Amr Abdul Samea, a past stalwart supporter of the deposed Hosni Mubarak,
    that contained a bombshell: Egypt’s parliament is considering passing a
    law that would allow husbands to have sex with their wives after death.

    It was soon mentioned in an English language version of Al-Arabiya and immediately started zipping around social-networking sites. By this afternoon it had set news sites and the rest of the Internet on fire. It has every thing: The yuck factor, “those creepy Muslims” factor, the lulz factor for those with a sick sense of humor. The non-fact-checked Daily Mail picked it up and reported it as fact. Then Andrew Sullivan, who has a highly influential blog but is frequently lax about fact-checking, gave it a boost with an uncritical take. The Huffington Post went there, too.

    There’s of course one problem: The chances of any such piece of legislation being considered by the Egyptian parliament for a vote is zero. And the chance of it ever passing is less than that.

    Greg original comment

    I never understood why President Obama was so quick to call for Mubarek to step down. Now with the Muslim Brotherhood is calling the shots. A new law likely to go into affect lowers the marriage age to 14 (not that the little girl have a choice) and allows husbands to have sex with their wives up to 6 hours after their death.

    http://english.alarabiya.net/a…

    Nice work.

    Greg response after showing such was absurd

    Dude, it’s happening. The radical Islamist are barbaric.

    Clearly it’s not add,

     

    • Hidan

       “Clearly it’s not”

    • Zero

      Gregg is of the opinion that spreading democracy is okay until a dictator supports our economic interests.

      • Gregg

        Now they’re telling me what my opinion is. This is rich.

      • Hidan

         He’s mainly an dishonest partisan hack. I doubt he even believes half the stuff he post(at least hope not)

    • Gregg

      It’s on the radar, don’t tell me it’s not. Here is a story from a year ago about a Fatwa:

      http://my.telegraph.co.uk/markulyseas/markulyseas/1311/fatwa-necrophilia-is-an-acceptable-practice-in-islam/

      You say it has Zero chance and I hope and pray to Allah you are correct. I really do, forgive me if I don’t share your optimism. I stand by my claim “The radical Islamist are barbaric” and will add: They are now running the show in Egypt.

      Forget about predictions, doesn’t the mere fact that it will come to a vote give you pause?

      • Hidan

        Dishonest again,

        Just admit your wrong, The piece you link to is an Moroccan Imam that has no bearing in Egyptian politics.

        The links I provided debunk such.

  • Roy Mac

    Who in hell is this dickhead McCormack??  A Romney campaign staffer????

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      One would think so. He is nothing more than an empty suit.

      • Azra

        So he’s qualified to run for President. (Republican, of course.)

    • TomK in Boston

      The “Weekly Standard” is a far right rag. So we have here a fine example of “balance” in the corporate media. On the one hand, an extreme righty. On the other hand,  plain vanilla. Gawd forbid we might ever hear an unapologetic liberal, yet alone someone as far left as McCormack is far right.

      I guess Tom can’t get Ryan or Bachmann, or we’d be hearing their toxic spew too.

      • Gregg

        C’mon man! “The Weekly Standard” is a respected publishment. It’s Barnes’ and Kristol’s gig. Neocon central. Don’t hate on them.

      • JonS

        If you regard McCormack as an “extreme righty” it probably says more about you than him. It must kill you and your ilk that routinely blog here to actually listen to someone who frankly sounds like a moderate/conservative rather than a left wing ideologue. This is a center/right nation and has been for the past 25 years. So who then is extreme?

        • Hidan

          moderate /conservative?

          Someones dislusional 

        • TomK in Boston

          Thanks for agreeing with me. Yes, the USA has been careening to the right since 1980, with disastrous results for the middle class, and you’re along for the ride, so former centrists look like liberals to you and former righty wingnuts look like moderates to you. Not too hard to understand, huh?

          • JonS

            Having lived through the Carter years when inflation was about 12%, home mortgage rates were 16.25% (my first mortgage rate), and unemployment about 9-10% , only an idiot would yearn for a return to those days.

          • TomK in Boston

            I bet even non-idiots would like to return to one-worker families being able to have a comfortable living and being confident that their kids would live even better. Being able to pay for college with a summer job was pretty good.
            I doubt that anyone is dumb enough to be fooled by using the period of vietnam hangover and oil shocks as a reference point. From the end of WW2 to the mid-70s we had an amazing middle class society where everyone got a share of the GDP. When GDP rose, income at the top rose, but unlike now, median income rose too. Now we’ve been following the policies you like for 32 years, and the only thing that rises is income at the top. In a rational world, we’d write voodoo off as a failed experiment and try something else.

          • JonS

            Keep dreaming. Utopia is just around the corner. After WWII, the US benefited from the fact that much of the world’s industrial base was destroyed with the lone exception being the US. Now we face a global competitive environment with the unfortunate consequence to middle class jobs.

      • Hidan

         Anything left of crazy is considered liberal.

    • Still Here

      Given you’re a ballsack, normally I’d trust your judgment but not here.  I found it pathetic that the rest of the panel couldn’t even make a cogent argument counter to him.

  • jw1011

    John McCormack’s smug neocon point of view and tendency to preach that point of view has absolutely no place on a program that focuses on analysis of the week’s events. I don’t want want his (or anyone else’s) interpretations shoved down my throat. I found him so objectionable I had to turn off the radio. Please do not invite him back.

  • Hidan
  • Vince Dunsworth

    To Tom Ashbrook:

    How about a little objectivity. AZ’s law is not a “Show your papers law”, it is a common sense response to what can correctly be called an invasion. Your ivory tower in Boston prevents you from seeing what is happening elsewhere, pwerhaps you should visit Arizona. Or Colorado. Or California!

    Your attempts to try to make this a race issue are nonsense. Yes, the fact is that the majority of illegals ARE Latino. That’s geography, not racism. Perhaps if we didn’t have so many Latinos who are are here illegally, LEGAL Latinos would not have to be concerned with “profiling”. The illegal Latinos are creating the “profile”, blame them.

    My wife and I have reduced our contribution to NPR this year because of highly biased reporting like this. NPR usually does a great job, but when you digress into advocacy journalism, you degrade NPR’s value.

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      One hundred years ago Mexican bandits “invaded” the US, and killed several American citizens. At that time the US was not hindered with the nonsense of PC, and sent troops into Mexico. Too bad there is no moral courage to defend the borders of the Nation.

      • Vince Dunsworth

        There’s a long bad history on both sides, none of which justifies the current invasion.

        Defending the borders is not good enough, we need to defend the workplace. Mandatory E-Verify as in HR2885 would free up 7-8 million jobs and send 7-8 million illegals, and their families, packing.

        • Azra

          Better load up your guns, boys.

    • Gregg

      By all accounts (which means little), “United States v. Arizona” is not going well for “United States” in the U.S. Supreme Court. If the Feds would do their job then Arizona wouldn’t need to legislate a solution. We’ll see what happens.

  • Guest

    Good God, who is this McCormack, some kind of rightwing robot?  Pull the cord, get a sound byte. Why bother?  Had to turn it off.  Sorry On Point, he is beneath you.

  • Gary

    It “drives” me crazy that Obama is not presenting electric vehicles as a solution to our economic problems.  I hear estimates on the order of $500B leaving this country every year for foreign oil, and about $1.5T per year when adding in our military costs to secure those oil sources (like another aircaft carrier being sent to the Persian Gulf at $7T for the past 30 years).  What would that do to our economy if we could keep $1.5T per year in our countries pocket?  This is not even considering environmental benefits, national security, reducing the flow of money to terrorists, reducing the chance of more oil wars, and reducing the fossil fuel influence in our government.  Win, win, win, win, win, etc.

    • Drew You Too

      Mandate that all public transportation and freight be electric. Not Hypebrid (sic), not diesel, not flex-fuel, not natural gas, but ELECTRIC.

      Wonder what would have happened if Tesla Motors founder had been given a five hundred million dollar handout.

  • roxie

    Come on they keep saying Obhma has not made a big differencein office . My answer to this is it came from 8 years of bush what make you repukes think he can fix it in four years????

    • Vince Dunsworth

      There’s no way Obama could have fixed Bush’s mess in 4 years, but I fear he’s just made it even worse. I voted for the guy in the hopes that we’d have some change. Didn’t happen.

      I just hope that Romney tacks to the “center” and doesn’t cave to the far right wing of the party.

      • Zero

        GDP was contracting at 8% and unemployment was north of 9% when his policy took effect, two wars are now down to one, he has pushed out 3 dictators with zero casualties and under $50 billion, he actually went after Bin Laden, and taxing the top would have reduced the deficits almost in half.  Oh, and he actually thinks consumer protections is the sane thing to do. 

        As far as I’m concerned, he hasn’t regulated enough, he needs to get out of Afghanistan, he should have done what he can to make the banks refinance people’s mortgages and loans (although Bush did the majority of the bank bailouts and he sure as hell wouldn’t try to help the middle class at the expense of the banking industry). 

        Whatever.  Unions and the New Deal created the middle class and the Reagan era of economics has been chipping away at it–I don’t see how a Wall Street man who believe in corporate personhood, who has never lived a day outside the upper class is going to save the middle class.   

      • Gregg

        Mr. Dunsworth, do you believe there ever comes a time when the “center” solutions are just exercises in futile procrastinations? In other words, isn’t time we decide one way or the other?

        I appreciate your honesty but it’s time to cut bait.

        • Vince D

          Gregg, I want someone, ANYONE, who is not hidebound by ideology. Someone who will use their brain rather than their talking points. Right, and left wing ideologic numbskulls aren’t helping anything.

      • Drew You Too

        The first mistake was voting for a Politician and expecting them to enact effective changes if they became elected. I am not faulting you (or the hundred or so million voters) that are duped every election cycle, just stating my opinion.

        Three decades of narcissistic sociopaths only concerned with self perpetuation at the wheel and some of us still think they will “do the right thing”.

        And why would you hope Romney tacks to the center? Why would you want anyone to tack anywhere? In my mind that simply means they lack conviction and will always pursue the most self-serving path.

        I want a leader who tells me what he believes, and means it. I want a leader who actually will try to do “the right thing” as opposed to stumping about it. I want a leader who will take action for the betterment of humankind and not base every decision on it’s potential negative impact to their next campaign. No need to tell me I want to much, I’m perfectly well aware of that fact.

        What was it you wanted again?

      • JonS

        I live in massachusetts. When Romney was our governor, he was able to work with a heavily Democratic legislature. He is a socially moderate  fiscal conservative much like many Eastern/ New England republicans.

        • TomK in Boston

          LOL. you have no idea what will be written on the Etchasketch at any moment. A good whore can fulfill any fantasy. We wanted a moderate, that’s how the chameleon morphed. If the polls say Ryan/Bachmann extremism is the way to win, that’s what we’ll get.

          What drives me crazy is considering a financial con man (translation to english of newspeak “private equity”) to be qualified to fix an economic crash caused by financial con men.

          • JonS

            BTW, I really liked Bill Weld.   He cleaned up the mess left by Dukakis…I’m sorry he never went beyond being a governor. He would have made a great US Senator. Another politician from that era that I really liked was Sen. Bill Bradley from NJ…

          • Gregg

            I don’t know much about Weld but I remember the hearing Jesse Helms chaired about his nomination for Ambassador to Mexico. I supported Weld but Helms was great with the gavel.

          • Gregg

            I just looked it up and watched it. Helms totally rips the media and Richard Lugar. He shows respect to Biden. His position was unassailable and he refused to put up with any of the lies. We need someone like that now.

            http://www.c-spanarchives.org/program/90869-1

            I’m such a geek.

          • TomK in Boston

            I wish John Glenn made it to the WH. Also I was a huge Jim Webb fan. He was the only out-of-state pol I ever contributed to, but he seemed to fade out over time.

          • JonS

            Dittos for Jim Webb and John Glenn. Free thinkers, good and principled men and willing to speak their minds. If I recall Webb was Bush 41′s Sec of the Navy.  I see the same qualities in Tom Coburn . Unfortunately both are not standing for re-election and the country will be worse for it.

            If you think about it , term limits and an end to gerrymandering would do alot, in my opinion, to bring better people into Washington.

          • nj_v2

             Weld was the only Republican i ever voted for.

        • TomK in Boston

          BTW, Etcha was basically a no-show gov, more interested in gearing up for a presidential run than in MA, EXCEPT for one thing. You know, the thing that he dare not mention, the socialist health care with the unconstitutional individual mandate, which BTW is working just fine.

          Actually, Etcha thought that Romneycare would be his claim to fame on the national stage. However, we’re veering to the right so fast that a system invented by righty intellectuals in their elite think tanks in the 90s became socialism in 2011.

          Enjoy the video

          http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxZK0spa1yI

          • JonS

            This may not fit your stereotype, but  I support universal healthcare in Massachusetts as well as certain parts of Obamacare ( excluding prior conditions). It’s successful in Massachusetts because we’re a relatively prosperous state and most people have employer provided healthcare. That said ,Obamacare is a disaster for two reasons. First the mandate is unconstitutional–the federal government can’t mandate anyone to buy insurance . Second although universal healthcare is something everyone in this great nation should have, this is the wrong time to burden employers with these additional unknown costs.. With stubbornly high unemployment and the lack of significant economic growth , government should not be imposing on employers additional significant hiring costs. Once this country returns to sustained economic growth, then universal healthcare should be considered, but not now. And when it is reconsidered in the future, this country needs to have an honest adult discussion on how to control medical costs. For me unaffordability of health insurance is the primary reason so many are uninsured.

          • TomK in Boston

            OK, maybe my stereotype is wrong. BTW, I voted for Weld. I think Etcha did a great thing with the MA law, so it disgusts me that he runs away from it.
            You can find experts who take either side on the mandate. In my opinion it’s fine. The right likes to present the constitution as primarily limiting federal power. I have the opposite view. The FF tried governing with the states holding the power with the Articles of Confederation, saw that it was a disaster, and quickly put the Constitution together to create a strong federal gvt with the Commerce Clause and the bit about “promote the general welfare”.  There’s been lots of mention of how G. Washington mandated that everyone buy a rifle. More recently I saw that Madison mandated that seamen buy health insurance, and when that didn’t work he mandated that the ship owners provide it. The FF were first and foremost PRACTICAL, and I think they’d be wondering what’s the big deal about national Romneycare.

            If you just look at costs and outcomes around the world, any non-ideologue must see that the problem is our lack of universal care. Unfortunately ideology doesn’t allow us to have that discussion. I agree that President Obama erred by going after health care when the economy needed emergency care. I don’t agree that hiring costs are a big issue right now. The situation is that corporations are richer than ever and are not hiring because of lack of demand. They can afford to hire, if they ever see the need. The same argument goes for tax rates. Increasing taxes on the “job creators” would be bad if they were struggling, getting the revenue is more important if they are richer than ever and can afford to pay.

            The high cost of insurance is why Ryan’s Groupon plan is so evil. He cuts costs to the gvt by shifting costs to individuals who have to go one-on-one with the giant, predatory insurance corporations.  The result, absent the voodoo about how the free market will then magically lower premiums, is a net increase in the national expenditure.

          • JonS

             The problem with Donald Verilli’s argument before the SCOTUS was that he failed to articulate any limiting principle were the SCOTUS to find the mandate constitutional. If the mandate is upheld under the interstate commerce clause what couldn’t the federal government then  mandate? As C.J. Roberts asked, can someone be compelled to engage in commerce over their objections? I think not and believe Obamacare will be held unconstitutional by a 6-3 vote.

            BTW, I agree that uncertainty about demand is hindering investment as far as major companies are concerned. However when it comes to small business, ie., the “real job creators”, they  will not hire the additional “more costly” employee unless absolutely compelled to by circumstances. Employers do not like firing employees , despite the caricature by the left . Rather they will pay overtime to an existing employee or just pay a temp. If you may it more expensive to hire someone, the demand must be that much greater to justify the risk and cost of hiring that new employee.

          • TomK in Boston

            I agree there is a difference between small businesses and large corporations when it comes to response to added costs. Similarly, our nominally high corporate tax rate that the right loves to go on about is a very low actual rate for big corps with lobbyists, but is higher on small business. I’d be happy to fix all that with some kind of sliding scale.

            The argument that if gvt can mandate health ins, they can mandate anything, like eating broccoli, looks very high school debate team to me. I agree with Newt and the Heritage foundation on this one. Statistically speaking, “everyone” is in the health care market, and the vast majority of those rugged Galt types who don’t need no steenking insurance run to the ER or some gvt plan as soon as they get sick or old, and you and me pay top $ for them. That’s a rather unique situation.

            I wonder if anyone told G. Washington that if he could mandate every man to have a rifle, he could force them to drink tea, too?

          • Gregg

            Only if they chose to be in a militia.

      • Azra

        It DID happen. It’s still happening. Where have you been?

    • Azra

      I.Q.

  • david

    Obama stated that under his energy plan fuel rates would probably skyrocket.
    Many state that Obama or any Admin. has no affect on the cost of gas!
    New EPA regulations are hitting the oil, gas and coal industries rather hard. Obama is no friend of these companies, he has made that clear in many comments. Obama wants green!
    I would love the George Jetson reality, but it is not yet feasible.

    What Obama’s EPA regulations are doing as we speak.
    * “Mass Exodus of US Oil Refinerys  The Closure Of The U.S. Oil Refinery Industry In The Past 2 Years.”
    http://www.altadenagroup.com/CSIA/post_details.asp?p_Id=10132

    If this is true, then think of the mess we are in for when the pray of the environmentalist comes true, NO MORE OIL!

    Wake UP!!!!! America!!!!

     

    • Azra

      Looks like our president has his priorities in order.

      It’s not heresay, or a rumor. The truth is, and always has been, that American presidents have no influence on the price of gas. Such a pure and simple message, in this day and age, why has it taken some people so long to wake up to that fact?

      • 2yous

        You can’t possibly expect American’s to pass on the chance to blame someone for something, can you? When did partisan hacks from either party decide to give a damn about facts? I must have missed that change in the Zeitgeist.

        • Azra

          Facts are out of fashion, apparently.

    • Zero

       Quick question: If per se BP had stronger regulations enforced, would they have been better off or worse?

      • Gregg

        The regulations did not need to be stronger, they were plenty strong enough to have prevented the disaster. BP should not have been exempted from the National Environmental Policy Act. Leaving it up to the oil companies to police themselves is crazy. Sarah Palin would not have done that.

        • Drew You Too

          Internal investigations. lol
          That’s about all they are good for, a laugh I mean.

          “BP should not have been exempted from the National Environmental Policy Act. Leaving it up to the oil companies to police themselves is crazy.”

          Great comment! The opening and closing sentences I didn’t include in the quote? Not so great.

          • Gregg

            No regulation can work if there is a categorical exemption granted.

            There’s a record, Palin made the oil companies walk the walk in Alaska. And she did it in dramatic fashion.

          • Azra

            Shame she can’t make them clean up after themselves.

          • Gregg

            She did that too.

          • Azra

            Except for the Exxon Valdez. Not caused by drilling, but still a sad, terrible mess.

    • Gregg

      He said he wanted high gas prices (just not as sudden). He said he would put coal companies out of business. Now we have a big shot EPA dude advocating government crucifying oil companies. This federal assault on private business is unprecedented and horrifying. Add a heapin’ helpin’ of bankrupt taxpayer subsidized solar companies, a car that nobody wants on our dime, a moratorium on drilling, no pipeline and we’ve got real trouble… and $5/gal. gas. I was hoping he would fail. I’m worried.

      • 2yous

        $5.00/gal. gas. ?????

      • nj_v2

        Greggg thinks that if he repeats it often enough, that more drilling will lower prices, it will magically become true.

        • Gregg

          We sure did drill our way to cheaper natural gas now didn’t we.

          • Azra

            Cheaper for who(m)?

          • Gregg

            Everybody.

            PS – I’d go with “whom” but I’m not sure if it’s even a sentence (I don’t grammar much). You could recast, start with “Who” but then you end with a preposition which as it turns out is not really all that bad. To be safe, you should ask nj_v2.

          • Azra

            I’ve also heard that ending a sentence with a preposition is okay now, and that anything goes. Frankly, I prefer having guidelines.

          • Gregg

            A new student at Harvard asked, “Where is the library at”? The upper classman informs him, “Here at Harvard we don’t end sentences with prepositions”. So the new guy asks, “Where’s the library at a$$hole”.

          • Azra

            That was great! Thanks for the laugh.

          • nj_v2

            “Whom” 

            Objective case

          • Azra

            Thanks. “Who” seems to be accepted by most these days, but still doesn’t sound right.

  • U.S. Vet.

    U.S. fabricated raid on Bin Laden compound in Pakistan

    http://www.presstv.ir/detail/238468.html

    So that’s why Obama had the ‘body’ dumped in the ocean, so that no one could ever identify that the body was not Bin Laden’s.

    • Azra

      What about that U.S.-fabricated landing on the moon? Now THAT was impressive, even by today’s standards.

  • Hidan

    So Greg after having his Egyptian parliament passing a bill allowing for men/women to sleep with there dead spouses. BTW the saudi Own newspaper disgracefully deleted that article after being proven to be shown as false. Hotair(right wing website) is still quoting information from such debunk article. While the Imam is Moroccan and the country he tried to smear is Egypt it makes little sense to take anything this guy says seriously nor the info from Greg(already debunked sources)

    wrote this

    ” Here’s a fair look at it from a right-wing blog I like:

    http://hotair.com/archives/201…

    I hope it is fake, we’ll see. I doubt it. Either way my point stands. Deny it.
     ”

    The Hot air quotes the same debunked article from the Saudi Own newspaper which is debunked here (http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Backchannels/2012/0426/Egypt-necrophilia-law-Hooey-utter-hooey?cmpid=addthis_email#.T5nEqMQOQoo.email)

    Trying to be smooth or relying on others not to read his link he than said this,

    It’s on the radar, don’t tell me it’s not. Here is a story from a year ago about a Fatwa:

    http://my.telegraph.co.uk/mark…

    You say it has Zero chance and I hope and pray to Allah you are correct. I really do, forgive me if I don’t share your optimism. I stand by my claim “The radical Islamist are barbaric” and will add: They are now running the show in Egypt.

    Forget about predictions, doesn’t the mere fact that it will come to a vote give you pause?

    Quoting an “An Imam in Morocco ” mind you not egytian and in no way has the Moroccan government promoted such law.

    Which again this Imam was quote was used to claim the MB was promoting such law. Not even close to being true yet even after being debunked he is still claiming as it if is.

    Folks this is how dishonest Greg is,

    • Gregg

      “Which again this Imam was quote was used to claim the MB was promoting such law. “

      Liar. It was used to show “it’s on the radar” of radical Muslims. There is precedent.

      The radical Islamist are barbaric. They have no boarders. Sorry that makes your head explode. I have no idea why you are prattling on. Do you support this law?

      • Hidan

         There’s no law, why do you keep claiming there is?

        A liar would be the one stating otherwise, you claimed that the MB were promoting this law in Egypt be linking debunked source information. After you were “PROVEN” to be wrong you linked Hotair linking to the SAME debunked source.

        Morocco or not Egypt and there is no such laws being purposed by either Country.

        Why do you lie so? Are you that dishonest?

        Seems the Radical Conservatives have no morals or ethics, once caught lying there still keep going as if it never happen.

        Feel free anything to admit you were wrong.

        • Hidan

           “anytime”

        • Azra

          Lies are all they have.

      • nj_v2

        An Islamist are barbaric?

        Grammar much?

        • Gregg

           “Islamists“, my sincerest apologies.

        • Still Here

          Your mom would be so proud!

          • nj_v2

            The mistake is made over and over. And over. In many forums. Even in news articles. “The terrorist are…” “The Islamist are…”

            It’s not a typo. Greggg wrote it that way in two separate posts.

            People honestly don’t know the plural form of a word ending in “ist” still has an “s” at the end.

            Creeping illiteracy. It’s bewildering.

          • Gregg

            It’s just an easy mistake to make, that’s all. Have fun with it if you must … but you can’t even spell my name. It’s adorable the way you do that. 

  • Hidan

    The many faces of Romney

    Romney: I’m More Conservative than Santorum on Economy
    http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/romney-santorum-conservative-economy/2012/03/13/id/432333

    Mitt Romney: I’m Progressive
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2XkKK1mio4

    Romney in 2002: “I’m Someone Who is Moderate… My Views Are Progressive”

    http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2011/12/13/romney_in_2002_i_m_someone_who_is_moderate_my_views_are_progressive_.html

     

    • Azra

      That’s exactly right. He never had a plan, or any solutions, so he has become even more of a joke. Barack pointed out of toouch Mitt is, and gave many valid examples. Soon after hearing that, Mitt said, “Nya nya nya nya nya! So are you.” (He wasn’t able to offer a single example . . . not ONE!)

      Barack showed what Mitt has promised to do to women. Mitt brought out the big guns then. The gloves were off, and his wife was on. (Sorry ’bout the mixed metaphors, folks.) He said, “I do too care about women, you big fat liar.” Then, he offered no proof. Instead, he had his wife stick up for him, and talk about her Multiple Sclerosis.

      He wont’ go on talk shows, or allow ANYONE to interview him, just like the Tea Party twenty ten-ers, in 2010. Remember how Bachmann, and the rest, hunkered down for MONTHS, in undisclosed locations, so no one would find out how inept they were, until after they were elected. Well, that’s Mitt’s strategy too. After all, it worked out really well for those ladies.

      Barack has been asking Republicans to help kids with student loans. Like Oompa Loompas they are, EVERY Republican voted against the students, and they got extremely angry. (Boehner might even have said, “HELL NO”; I don’t recall. Anyway, it was just the same ole same ole.) Then Barack had the audacity to tell us what Republicans were up to. Imagine that! So Mitt said , “Me too. He’s not the only one. I kinda think it might be a good idea, so vote for me. Whatever HE says, I can memorize, and repeat, saying, ‘me, too.’ I can say whatever they tell me you want to hear. I’ve been rehearsing. Just give me a chance. I’ve already shown you that I can rehash Barack’s 2008 leftovers. You’ve had quite a number of samples. What about, “…not here, not now. Remember hearing him say that on the 2008 campaign trail? Well, he threw it out, so it’s mine now. I just recently began recycling it, (word for word. Aren’t I good?), and I’m proud of myself for using his castoffs. So keep listening, because I will be using more of them very soon. Just have go through all his old speeches . . .it could take a while. You see, there’s not an original thought in my head, so all I can do is copy HIM. That’s why one of my monikers is

      “ME TOO” MITT?

  • JonS

    Tom Ashbrook –you reveal your inner Jack Beatty/Axelrod /Plouffe when you voiced skepticsm over the one caller who offered support for Romney because of concerns over social security. If you were “fair and balanced” you would ask yourself what has Obama proposed to deal with the not -too-distant crisis facing social security .  I believe the correct answer is “nothing”. Just this week it was noted by the SS trustees that money will run out sooner than previously predicted.

    A metaphor for Obama’s entire presidency is how he addressed the slaughtering in Syria. Rather than deal with the issue head-on, he announced at the Holocaust Museum his  appointment of  an Atrocities Prevention Board . I kid you not. As Charles Krauthammer wrote in yesterday’s Washington Post, ” He goes to the Holocaust Museum to commit himself and his country to defend the innocent, to affirm the moral imperative of rescue. And then does nothing of any consequence”. 

    This is how Obama has addressed all major issues, domestic and foreign, that face this country. Never has any presidency been more inconsequential despite the dire needs of this nation. That anyone could seriously vote for another 4 years of his presidency is a mystery to me. But then , I’m not a member of his coalition of the hopelessly stupid, ill-educated, uneducated, green energy parasites, AFSCME, teachers unions, and government handout dependents.

    • Hidan

      ad nauseum,Causal Reductionism, Ad Hominem,Bad Analogy,Selective Observation,Non Sequitur ,Needling, and of course Pious Fraud all wrapped into on post.

      Congrats.

      • JonS

        You sound like a member in good standing in Obama’s coalition.

        • Still Here

          A sheep, in other words.

        • Hidan

          And some people think consertives aren’t simpleminded fools.

          Mind listing off the qualities for an Romney or McCain Coalition? Than once done being the person who your are Ill take it the traits you listed (being the right wing hack you are) in reverse.

          Amazing enough Onpoint has been growing yet intellectual conservatives are still hard to find on this thread.

          But hey when the Republican party goes so far to the right it’ seem impossiabel for any intelligent conservativesto wish to defend such.

          • Azra

            Alas, they’re a dying breed.

          • Azra

            On second thought, intellectual conseratives aren’t so much a dying breed, as they are an oxymoron.

      • Azra

        You left out fabrication.

    • StopSpendingNow

      What’s really scary is that President Obama may have plans to address unemployment, the deficit, social security and medicare, gas prices, income inequality, taxes, foreign relations, health care, and on and on, but doesn’t dare reveal those plans until he’s secured a second term.  Then, just as he told the Russian president, he can be more flexible in what he does.

    • nj_v2

      There is no Social Security “crisis.” Fully funded for 20-something years. Some tinkering with the cap (make rich people pay a higher percentage) solves the problem.

      There’s plenty of legitimate stuff to criticize Obama about, but, for some reason, the right-wing clown posse feels the need to make sh*t up.

      • JonS

        What part of Obama’s coalition are you? I said “not too distant crisis”, meaning that if nothing is done, SS will be bankrupt in roughly 20 years.  The SS trustees report projects insolvency in 2033, 4 years earlier than last year’s report. 

        But the key measure is the system’s “actuarial deficit” which measures funding shortfalls over a full 75 year period. This year, the Trustees project a 75 year shortfall equal to 2.67% of the total wage base. That’s around $9.1 trillion in present value dollar terms, meaning that if we set aside $9.1 trillion today, earning interest, we’d have enough to cover full benefits for the next 75 years. Going back to 2010, the Trustees projected a much smaller actuarial deficit of only 1.92% of payroll, equal to $5.9trillion. So things have gotten a lot worse in a short space of time. 

        The short story is first, taxes will need to be raised or benefits cut and by more than originally thought; and second the longer we wait to fix the system the bigger those cuts will have to be. But that requires leadership at the presidential level –something sorely absent in the oval office which is the crux of what I was commenting about. We have in Obama a president who prefers voting present on all of the serious problems facing America. 

        • Gregg

          I was going to bring up that latest report but you’re all over it as Nero fiddles. 

        • TomK in Boston

          The trustees project that in 20 yrs or so SS will ONLY be able to pay out 75% of promised benefits, if nothing is done. I don’t consider paying 75% “insolvent”.

          The spin on this is the kind of media bias I’ve come to expect. The negativity is designed to convince us to go along with cuts (translation = “reform”) – class warfare.  But what else is as strong as SS? What else is good for that long? We’re not exactly a nation of long term planners. Why not headlines like “Despite worst econ crash since 1929, worst case for amazingly strong SS is 25% cut in 20 years!” 

          We constantly hear about the strain of the boomer retirements on the system. Guess what, we planned for that in the 80s. Its old news. The short term problem is that we’ve had an economic crash, and the long term problem is that skyrocketing inequality, the result of voodoo econ, has moved too much income above the cap. All we need to do is raise the cap. No need for any cuts, no need to redistribute any $ to wall st with fees and losses on privatized accounts. What’s the problem?

          Seems to me that some of the proposed fixes to a 25% cut in 20 years are bigger cuts than what they are supposed to fix!

      • Hidan

         Fully Funded to an rightwinger mean in crisis and must be gutted so they can promote privatizing it.  Not working means to an right winger that keep doing it until they can gut it so they can promote privatizing it.

        Republicans Run of failure,so oddly enough the more they fail the easier it is to get elected. If there failure can’t be fixed by democrats in an short period of time then they run against not fixing there failure than once back in office do the same thing.

        -failure,failure, failure,kick out of office, failure not fixed, government can’t do anything right, elected,failure,failure, repeat.

  • gslouch

      Does anyone really think that one man can magically turn things around once they are elected?  I voted for president Obama to oust a reckless, clandestine administration.  Now, at least i can be proud of my president.
        I think some of the callers to this particular show are confused or misinformed.  It’s not the current administration that threatens social security.  If the caller has listened carefully he would have heard that it’s the republicans and teabaggers who want to shrink the governments’ hand in this safety net.  Privatizing social security?  C’mon, who would be able to do this?  Certainly not the poverty stricken.
         The republicans and the Ryan plan want to decrease entitlements.  What a clean, sterile-sounding name.   Who benefits from “entitlements?”  The poor, the elderly, in total those in dire need.   This is no time to take away that help!!
          I will cross my fingers that Mr. Obama can win reelction.  He is not going to solve our country’s problems instantly but nobody else can either, no matter what they promise.

    • nj_v2

      Slouchy posits: [[ I voted for president Obama to oust a reckless, clandestine administration. ]]
      How’s that working out for ya?

      http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20120328194549799

      Obama takes Bush’s secrecy games one step further

      The ACLU is suing the Obama administration under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), seeking to force disclosure of the guidelines used by Obama officials to select which human beings (both U.S. citizens and foreign nationals) will have their lives ended by the CIA’s drone attacks (“In particular,” the group explains, the FOIA request “seeks to find out when, where and against whom drone strikes can be authorized, and how the United States ensures compliance with international laws relating to extrajudicial killing”). The Obama administration has not only refused to provide any of that information, but worse, the CIA is insisting to federal courts that it cannot even confirm or deny the existence of a drone program at all without seriously damaging national security;…

      http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/04/18/112346/obama-ran-against-bush-but-now.html

      Obama ran against Bush, but now governs like him

  • U.S. Vet.

    25 horrible statistics about the U.S economy Barack Obama does not want you to know

    http://www.infowars.com/25-horrible-statistics-about-the-u-s-economy-that-barack-obama-does-not-want-you-to-know/

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      How about the 2 LOSING WARS George Bush got us into. Why is it that ugly fact never bothers you??  Or the thousands of dead???  You crazy Republicans have NEVER met a war you did not like, nor want to send OTHER peoples kids to DIE in…for nothing. An arm chair general for sure.

      • Azra

        Unpaid-for Wars? WHAT wars?

        Unpaid-for tax cuts? Don’t recall them either.

        • Gregg

          It’s because the wars were paid for and regarding tax cuts, it’s physically impossible for them to cost money. No money is exchanged. So, I’m with you. I don’t remember those things either.

          • Azra

            Meant “unnecessary”.

    • Roy Mac

      Hey, bro.  What part of the sandbox you hanging in?  I’d like to come talk to you.

  • NewtonWhale

    Jack Beatty accused Pres. Obama of “misquoting” Rep. Todd Akin and said Obama was “pretending” that Akin had compared federal student loans to “a stage 3 cancer of socialism”. Beatty added: “This is a bad habit the President has got into, where he gets revved up and he misrepresents what these people are saying”.

    ,A transcript of the question and Akin’s response from Saturday’s debate are below: YOKLEY: “Let’s talk about education. We’re at Mizzou. A lot of people have taken student loans here. In July student loan rates, they’re at three percent now; they’re set to double in July. It’s about six billion dollars to correct that for a year. Is that something you would support? Extending the lower rates for student loans?” AKIN: “Let me see if I can hit this thing right straight on the head. America has got the equivalent of the stage three cancer of socialism because the federal government is tampering in all kinds of stuff it has no business tampering in. So, first to answer your question precisely, what the democrats did to get rid of the private student loans and take it all over by the government was wrong. It was a lousy bill. That’s why I voted no. The government needs to get its nose out of the education business. Most of this question is about the state of Missouri. It belongs with the governor and the legislators. I don’t want to see the federal government getting in to the student loan business. I’d be happy if they got out of it and it went back to the private sector.”Akin clearly said that the “stage three cancer of socialism” was caused by the federal government getting involved in things it shouldn’t, and that the federal student loans were an example of that.I think Beatty owes the President an apology.
    You can watch videos of both Obama and Akin here:
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/25/todd-akin-student-loans-cancer-socialism_n_1452122.html 

  • 2yous

    American’s are stupid when the issue is the economy. They like to pretend that good economic news is always the result of smart and effective moves made by politicians they like and bad economic news is always the result of stupid ineffective moves made by politicians they despise. They will bend over backward to explain away any kind of economic turmoil during “their” man’s time in office, and they’d rather drop dead than give credit to “the other side” for any successes they might have.

  • Gregg

    So, President Obama at the White House Correspondence Dinner invoked Sarah Palin and asked, “What’s the difference between a pit bull and a hockey mom”? A pit bull is delicious.

    It was awkward.

    • http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

      It was a joke…………..

      • nj_v2

        With Obummer, the joke’s ultimately on us. 

        • Jason___A

          As opposed to whom? That dottering fool McCain? Or Mr. Plastic Romney, who stands for everything on every issue.

          • Gregg

            Fair enough but yes.

          • Azra

            That’s why they call him “ME TOO MITT”. No matter what president Obama says or does, Mitt says, “Me too! I’m FOR it now, even though I was always against it a few minutes ago.” What a phoney! Wonder if he even knows what he’s for or against anymore. By now, he must be very confused.

            Even his dog had the good sense to run away, as far and as fast as he could. Of course, Seamus KNEW the Romneys, but they don’t want the American public to know them. Mitt is in hiding now, and he claims he’s not in the Tea party. If this is true, why is he refusing interviews? There are a lot of questions he needs to answer. If he can’t take the pressure now, how does he expect to cope during the debates? (And beyond.) Only the strong survive debates. Wimps finish last, if they finish at all. I can hardly wait to watch them. Could prove to be as entertaining as the Correspondents’ Dinners.

          • Azra

            Should be “I’m for it now, even though I was against it until a few minutes ago.”

    • Azra

      IT WAS HILARIOUS!!! HE TOTALLY ROCKED ‘EM!

      I’M STILL BASKING IN THE AFTERGLOW.

    • NewtonWhale

      Funny stuff, well delivered:

      “JimmyKimmel got his start on the Man Show. In D.C., that’s what we call a Congressional hearing on contraception.” 

      “In my first term, I passed healthcare reform. In my second term… we’ll pass it again.” (was that alito they showed?) 

      “In my first term we repealed don’t ask don’t tell. In my second term, I will replace it with a policy called ‘it’s raining men’.”

      “Congrats to Arianna on your Pulitzer. No one else out there is linking to the hard-hitting journalism HuffPo links too.”

      Pres. Obama at the #WHCD, taking a nice shot at Arianna @HuffPo: “It’s a great business model, you don’t pay them!” 

      “What’s the difference between a hockey mom and a pitbull? A pitbull is delicious.”

      “Mitt and I both went to Harvard. I have one degree, he has two — what a snob!” 

      “In my first term, I sang Al Green. In my second term, I will sing Young Jeezy.”

      “In my second term I will win the war on Christmas”

      • Gregg

        I though Obama was funny as heck, Kimmel not so much.

        • Azra

          Jimmy had some good ones, but I expected a lot more. Seth was much, funnier.

          To be fair, if Jimmy had done his routine first, it would have made a big difference. Barack Obama is a tough act to follow, in all respects.

          • Still Here

            Not that tough, we’ll all see that in January.

      • Azra

        The faux Romney commercial was good too.

      • Azra

        That Harvard joke was one of my favorites. PRICELESS! Wish they would have those dinners more often.

    • Azrastarr

      In what way was it awkward? The President certainly thought it was funny, or he wouldn’t have come up with it in the first place. The audience roared with laughter. There was nothing awkward about it, by any stretch of the imagination. His whole routine was A HUGE SUCCESS.

      I like a multitalened President, especially this one. Give me someone who can unselfconsciously poke fun at himself any day.

    • Zero

      It took me a moment to get the second part of that joke.

  • Grandpadewey

    When ANY politician says they care for “Americans” when they talk about certain issues; my question is, which Americans are you talking about? Perception is 100 percent. Think about it.

  • Hidan
  • david

    Can a President have an effect on gas prices?????
    If the agenda of a president is against oil and gas, can he affect the price in a way that steers a country off of it???
    True, he has no affect on the price of oil per gallon controlled by others, unless he starts a conflict with them.
    But!!! He can through the EPA impose such strict regulations that it makes it near impossible to make a profit on gas.
    If for instance, oil refineries work on a profit margin of $.03/gal. and due to new clean air regulations that margin disappears to break even, then why be in the business of refinning oil to gas?
    And! if you do not comply with all the new regulations, the EPA, the arm of the President, will get you!
    About 20gal. of a 42 gal. barrel of oil goes to gas.
    Guess where the other 22gal. goes?????
    http://www.exxonmobilperspectives.com/2011/06/05/theres-more-in-a-barrel-of-oil-than-just-gasoline/
    Before you dump oil for the green craze, you better think of the things you are going to live without.
    If oil refineries leave this country for greener fields, then get ready for not only imported oil, but! imported gas!
    Just a thought, folks!

    • Azra

      Which fields? The more advanced countries won’ t be needing fossil fuels for much longer, and we’re not really so far behind them.

      • Azra

        If we DON’T “dump oil for the green craze, you better think of the things you’re going to live without”, potentially: lungs, kidneys, drinking water, seafood, edible crops, and no chance of a do over, once it’s too late.

        • Gregg

          Don’t you think that’s a bit much? It doesn’t have to be either or. We still need oil… lots of oil.

          • nj_v2

            Greggg thinks fossil fuel supplies are limitless.

          • Gregg

            Please don’t tell me what I think.

          • Azra

            Not really that much of an exagerration, when you think of what’s happening to people along the Gulf. Many have died already, many more are suffering terribly, especially the children. Everyone’s eyes begin stinging as soon as they go outside. There are painful sores in their nostrils, and iungs. They vomit a lot. Even twenty miles from the spill, people are being poisoned by the oil that they had hoped would be their salvation.

          • Azra

            That came out wrong. Think it should be “exaggeration”, at least that’s what I meant to type. If not correct, close enough to be understood, I guess.

        • Warren

          Mr Gore’s environmental Guru was Mr.Lovelock.This week Mr.Lovelock claims that while there is Global Warming, it is not imminent.He appologizes for the hysterical environmental movement.To quote Mr.Vonnegut,”And so it goes”

          • david

            Research Mr. Gore’s real interest in Global warming. The Chicago carbon exchange was set up before Obama came to office in hopes he would enact carbon regulations(cap and trade). The CCX was looking to make a $1 Trillion if it passed. Gore was part of a business that had 10% interest in the CCX. Now! do you see why Gore was “maybe” pushing global warming! Guess who else had involvement????
            http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/9629

          • Azra

            Yes, but what about the rest of the world? Many countries are weaning themselves from oil, as they gradually switch to clean energy. China is the leader, or one of them, and right now they burn so much coal that they could be the world’s worst polluter, so China deserves a lot of credit. Think they’ll soon leave us in the dust in this department, and others. They’re in a race to become number one.

        • david

          If you don’t use oil, it will come to you.
          I can remember history telling how back in Texas before big oil, oil seeped out of the ground.
          Off California, it is seeping from off shore.
          Researchers tell us that oil naturally seeps at the bottom of the ocean due to pressure.
          Now, if you believe that oil came from fossils, no problem, we will run out of it. But, if it is a by-product of the earth’s core, then we will either use it or live with more pollution seeping out from every crack.

          • Azra

            The seepage IS disturbing. Isn’t there a way to collect all that oil, and put it to good use?

          • Azra

            Is it due to the fault lines? Where does it come from?

    • nj_v2

      Petroleum production has or is about to peak in all regions. Demand continues to rise. What do you think is going to power our profligate consumption post-petroleum era?

      • david

         Ponder this idea. Maybe true, maybe not.
        Newton’s third law: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
        The core of the earth, molten metal or such at around 12,000 degrees.
        If Newton’s law is true, then the burning core of the earth must produce a by-product?????
        What IF, that by-product were oil???
        The law of supply and demand. If something is limited in supply/demand will cause it to be expensive. Big bucks for the oil companies.
        If it is unlimited/demand will cause it to be cheap, not good for oil companies.

        • Gregg

          Interesting but here’s the thing, any estimate is an estimate. No one knows with certainty how much oil there is. President Obama’s recent diatribe about 2% of proven reserves is entirely misleading.

          I’m pretty sure we’d agree, however much there is, it’s enough to get us by until we work out the kinks on those solar powered jets.

        • Azra

          Maybe a different type of fuel altogether, better than oil. Still a fossil fuel though, and sounds like it could be a very dangerous operation, but food for thought.

    • TomK in Boston

      Sure a president can influence gas prices. He can start a war in the middle east, or just keep tension high. For example, he can threaten Iran. That will keep prices high.

      OTOH, he can raise MPG standards, decreasing our consumption, decreasing price.

  • Warren

    Last week the Boston Globe did a story about  MIT’s photo study of glaciers and climate.The spokeswoman ,Ms Knott said of the exhibition,”It gets across the idea that science is not settled.There’s lot’s we don’t know”.In today’s Boston Globe Ms.Vennochi writes a editorial entitled”Nonprofit Greed’s real Victims”.I would love Ms V. do do a story about Joe Kennedy.He delivers oil to indigents and pays himself $750,000.00.He pays his wife 200,000.00..
          Each week the Boston Papers run a story about graft and corruption in our Welfare Agencies.This week it’s about the plunder of Medford’s Public Housing Agency(graft,embezzlement and cronyism).While the Left bemoans Corporate Greed(Smith’s “self interest”),they turn a blind eye to government graft.
          May 1st is right around the corner so I wish you all a “Happy High Holiday”.

  • mmaaaxx

    Holy ish Tom, I love your show, but you have had some seriously asinine callers lately…I say take a good look at your screeners; that was painful.

  • Joan

    Romney says “Believe in America”

    No thank you, I don’t believe in America that rewards the top one percent like yourself and hangs the little guy out to dry.

    In addition, seeking to destroy our civil service system (by out-
    sourcing jobs) and regulatory system for the markets and the environment…That’s not the kind of America I want for my
    children or anyones children for that matter…..Joan

    • Azra

      What he meant was “believe in the power of money, and its ability to corrupt.”

  • WoodTimothy

    The
    purchase of a DVD Competitor
    For
    One’s Truck

    The
    technological the
    wonder years dvd     for
    ones automotive industry have greatly changed just
    how most
    people drive and ride as passengers. The
    occasions of long boring drives are
    usually over. Now numerous
    movies to video
    game titles may
    be enjoyed inside
    the
    actual vehicle. System
    . DVD players to vehicles has definitely produced
    sense
    of relief for tired parents with young
    ones in
    the back seat. If
    you’re planning
    on buying a DVD player, could
    very well be choosing
    designed
    to do wonders to
    extend your
    body’s stress level.You may
    want to be picky in
    regards to getting
    a BLOSSOM
    DVD     player for
    ones vehicle. The
    sort of technology is
    simple to
    duplicate so selecting each
    of these at
    random is
    not really recommended. It
    is still an
    impressive investment of
    capital so choose wisely and
    carefully. You
    can get varying specs on DVD players as
    well so pay
    attention.One of
    one’s first decisions you’ll
    need to make is
    you
    need a
    conveyable DVD player a
    treadmill that
    is certainly integral
    to
    all your vehicle. A
    portable you
    will the
    simple to
    take the into other
    motor vehicles however
    the included
    a
    person is stuck. If
    you ever only want
    for
    your car then that
    could be a
    suprisingly simple choice but
    a majority of people enjoy
    the freedom that
    give a
    conveyable unit.If you burn your
    own personal REMEMBER
    WENN DVD     in
    your home along
    with purchase them new you’ll
    need for
    certain the DVD player you
    obtain can
    play both types. Look in
    the packaging in
    the varieties
    of DVDs it
    can play. It
    becomes a
    waste to
    blow money and
    after that discover later that
    it’ll not
    even play your movies.It is
    likely a
    clever idea to
    steer away
    from no big
    brands or folks
    that can
    be cheap.
    The
    type of products rarely be
    as durable as
    you desire them
    how to. It
    often is
    worth it to
    spend additional
    cash in
    a brand
    name you
    are sure of from experience which
    you could trust.Try reading some customer
    feedback online before
    deciding which brand to
    purchase. This
    will offer
    you lots
    of insight from individuals
    that formerly
    purchased DVD players for auto use. This
    is usually a good
    way to learn that
    you can trust being
    manufacturer plus
    that
    you should avoid.Do cease
    afraid to
    have creative. With
    just a tiny work
    you
    can try such
    thinggs as install video screens at
    the back of your sun visor to
    allow them to be
    viewed should
    the car is stopped. DVD players and accessories are
    rather functional generally
    in most formats.Try away
    DVD player at
    the store prior
    to buying to
    guarantee that it
    reallyworks. It
    will be something
    you require to
    discover so
    that you can do
    the installation. A
    good portable DVD player has
    to be inspected and stimulated.
    Guaranteeing
    it
    works will remove
    need
    for difficult
    dependable
    back.No challenege
    show up kind
    of DVD player you
    receive, you
    ought to just
    remember to follow all laws. Never watch it while
    the car is
    set in motion when
    you’re the
    motorist. Safety comes first.

ONPOINT
TODAY
May 24, 2013
650 Comments
President Obama talks about national security, Thursday, May 23, 2013, at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington. (Carolyn Kaster/AP)

Oklahoma’s monster tornado. The president on counterterrorism. A vote on gay Boy Scouts.

May 24, 2013
39 Comments
A metal fan crowd surfs in a mosh pit during the heavy metal festival Wacken Open Air in Germany. (Philipp Guelland, DAPD/AP)

The definitive history of heavy metal and what it’s always been about.

RECENT
SHOWS
May 24, 2013
39 Comments
A metal fan crowd surfs in a mosh pit during the heavy metal festival Wacken Open Air in Germany. (Philipp Guelland, DAPD/AP)

The definitive history of heavy metal and what it’s always been about.

 
May 24, 2013
650 Comments
President Obama talks about national security, Thursday, May 23, 2013, at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington. (Carolyn Kaster/AP)

Oklahoma’s monster tornado. The president on counterterrorism. A vote on gay Boy Scouts.

On Point Blog
On Point Blog
Summer’s On Its Way: Exercise Questions Answered
Friday, May 24, 2013

Three fitness experts joined us during our hour on high-intensity workouts and offered their tips on being safe and responsible during any type of exercise.

More »
Comment
 
Is America Coming Undone?
Thursday, May 23, 2013

New Yorker writer George Packer says yes. He reflected on the nation’s core institutions failing the American people.

More »
5 Comments
 
WIRED’s Bill Wasik On The Henry Fords Of Today
Wednesday, May 22, 2013

He talked about how Google and Tesla are paving the way of innovation and how technological development is related not only to creativity but to environmental responsibility.

More »
Comment