DonRoberto's Comments (804)

“No kidding. The President should be all over this. Uh, I mean figuratively, of course.”

“Where exactly does one apply for the butt makeup applier job? I really, really want to know.”

“Looks like Joe Biden still has some say in policy....­.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/04/world/asia/04drones.html?_r=1&ref=global-home”

“Our last President had common sense in spades.

I myself would prefer our Presidents be a little smarter than common citizens, unlicensed plumbers, illiterate pageant winners, and bloggers named Blimpius.”

“Thinkers rarely march in step; demogogues always do.

I and most other Democrats will continue to do things our own way, and you are free to deliberately mischaracterize the results. After all, it's in your nature.”

“The headline on this article is ridiculous. Joe Biden was the VP before the decision, and Joe Biden was the VP after the decision.

Our President believes in process; his approach to decision making illustrates this. He solicits advice (and advisors) from a wide variety of competing, often mutually exclusive viewpoints, and makes their ideas stand and compete on their own merits --- even those ideas to which he might personally be partial. The final decision is the result of this process, and is no more a repudiation of a specific advisor than it would be if it were in one hundred percent agreement with that advisor's views.

Vice-President Biden is still the Vice-President and will continue to figure largely in the President's decisions on a wide range of issues, including Afghanistan policy; to believe otherwise is to ignore our President's fundamental approach.”

“That goes along with what I was saying. The jobs of the future aren't usually advertised in the newspapers, and those areas that benefitted most from a recent boom will suffer the most when the boom ends.

The area where I work has been isolated from much of the recession by the dependence of a large segment of the local economy on the healthcare industry. We have other industries but healthcare has (until now, anyway) been one of the fastest growing.”

“A voice of reason amidst the hip young cynics and the angry old folks! Thanks for counterbalancing the reactionary rhetoric with a dose of reality --- you are fanned.”

“From where I'm sitting, there are lots of jobs available --- but we can't find any Americans to fill the slots, so we hire foreign workers or contractors for as much or more than what Americans would get paid.

There's no reason that Americans can't do these jobs, but they would have to be educated, have a basic familiarity with the English language, have basic math skills and know how to use them, and be willing to continue learning throughout their careers. Does that sound so difficult?

We have an open slot right now, and have had for weeks. I predict it will eventually be filled by a hardworking, energetic young person from India or China, who received an inexpensive or free education in his home country. Meanwhile, here at home, many state-supported colleges will once again be raising their tuitions to help pay their football coaches' salaries.”

“I am once again in awe of Mr. Friedman's uncanny ability to articulate, with the full benefit of hindsight, those aspects of the Iraq War which are so obvious now to us all. Perhaps in two years, he can once again amaze us with his hindsight in his analysis of the Afghan campaign.

Unfortunately, Mr. Friedman is oh-for-two in the foresight department. He is as shortsighted and wrong about Afghanistan now as he was previously in his role as media cheerleader for the Iraq War.

Listing his concerns for America cannot substitute for a logical argument, and his either willful or inadvertant misunderstanding of the stakes does not diminish them in any way. I'm sure Mr. Friedman's confident grasp of the Big Picture will feature highly in a future book, but his opinion here is of little use.”

“I think Tiger should take a page from Meredith Baxter --- he should just come out with it, and admit he's a *heterosexual* male.

Sooner or later, everyone will know, anyway.”

“I think your view of the civilian contractors is a bit harsh, as the private paramilitary Blackwater/Xie types only make up one-eighth of the budget for private contractors in Iraq. The other seven-eighths goes to teachers, truck drives, carpenters, electricians, engineers, translators, and the like.

In short, perhaps you *should* care a little about what happens to them.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0818/p02s01-usmi.html”

“Lizr, I am not trying to support any unsupportable positions. I also think the morass the last President buried us in, with the help of many in the current Congress, was unsupportable.

The primary issues now are whether a) President Obama is getting us out of the morass, and b) whether he has reneged on any of what he has promised to do.

You may make a legitimate argument on issue a) that the President is getting us more deeply involved in the fools' errand Bush started us on. I disagree somewhat on that point, but share your concern over the Afghan "surge".

On issue b), though, I would argue that the President has held to the timeframe for Iraqi withdrawal he announced on February 27, 2009, which was also in line with his campaign promises, and in general alignment with the SOFA agreement the Iraqis signed late in 2008. Accusing the President of betraying anyone's trust on the Iraqi withdrawal does not accord with the facts, no matter what the rightwing trolls who pose as "leftists" here might tell you.”

“That's a fact.

The President gave his timetable for withdrawal, in line with the SOFA signed late last year, in February 2009. The withdrawal is still ontrack. Yet we still get these New Age yahoos, who've read maybe a dozen articles on the subject, proclaiming to all the world that they know better than those who are intimately involved with the actual details.

They're like the Rush Limbaughs of the Left; facts don't matter --- only their own misinformed opinions.”

“You're projecting your own inability to see integrity where it exists.

If you think the President could have safely removed US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan by now, without also sacrificing our basic national interests (as well as the safety of the 160,000 civilian defense contractors also in Iraq) then you are misinformed.”

“This is cause for concern, but no more so than every other midterm election. The Democratic Party has always been the "big tent" --- i.e., they consist of a large number of disparate interests who make common cause on the issues they care about.

There is a significant effort at dividing Democratic voters thru trolling operations and the like, and we should make sure real Democrats are aware of this and wise to it. We should also continue our traditional get-out-the-vote operations. But if real Democrats are so easily swayed as to stay home instead of voting their interests, then we will deserve more years of the Republican hell our country has become.”

“Sure, I'll say it. The absolute size of the deficit does not matter; only the size of the total debt service in relation to our ability to pay matters.

Bottom line, the deficits need to be watched, but until the structural problems with the American economy are addressed, this is no time to cut overall government spending domestically.”

“*** NEWS FLASH ***

Some old white people don't like black people, and the GOP exploits this.

*** END NEWS FLASH ***”

“Not sure what the "PDS" you refer to means, but I would challenge you to present a piece of evidence supporting your contention that the GOP has changed its strategy, if it has one.”

“The reason their demographics are poor are because their product is poor. If the GOP wants to improve their demographics, they need to abandon their tactics of vilification, demonization, and character assassination, and present the public with a positive product --- *not* more of the same, tired remarketing of old ideas.”

“The numbers are telling.

GOP dependence on character assassination and 24/7 vilification of all non-Republicans (and any Republicans who aren't ideologically "pure") has resulted in a party united *against* specific people, things, and ideas, but who have no idea (beyond vague labels like "family values" or "conservativism") what it is they actually stand *for*.
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A two-party system served America well for many years, and I am one Democrat who would like to see the return of a Republican Party based on conservative principles, instead of the current GOP coalition of radical rightwing ideologues and corporatist propagandists led by bloviating radio hosts and mentally-ill television personalities.”

“LOL”

“Exactly --- and it's not just the rightwing roasting him. Healthcare reform has been on the agenda since Teddy Roosevelt; fifteen Presidents either failed to achieve it, or failed to try. President Obama gets us closer than ever before, but members of his own party lambast him over its lack of perfection.

It's no surprise that the Israel-Palestine conflict is the next grounds for criticism. Presidents since Truman have wrestled with the issues involved, and since Carter have personally intervened, but only with very limited success. But if Barack Obama doesn't achieve world peace during his first term, then he has somehow failed us all.

Has the last President left us in such dire straits that only a messiah can save us? Are we really so jaded that we can no longer respect a mere human being as our President?”

“The Grant question is actually a trick question. The President *and* Mrs. Grant are both buried there.

Of course, one could make the argument that the answer to "Who was President during the Bush Administration?" is actually Dick Cheney.... but that's another topic.”

“Whose responsibility were the Bush Administration's decisions? Does it truly take a "liberal" to comprehend who the President was during the *Bush* Administration?

As Bugs Bunny would say, what a maroon....­..”