Rescisco's Comments (249)

“There's been a lack of acknowledgment by Sarah Palint in understanding what it is that the English language provides in terms of, obviously, the ability of our country to communicate and like make sense!

I want Sarah Palin to acknowledge nouns and verbs, as well as facts and detailed knowledge that individual men and women -- our sons, our daughters, our moms, our dads, our brothers and sisters are using every day in this country to communicate.

Intellegence? Yes, I want Sarah Palin to make an effort to learn something and possess knowledge as much as anyone, and wish she could have started to formulate a new strategy for educating herself earlier. But, at the end of the day, I'd much rather she take time to get this learning thing right than just roll the dice on a gut feeling and hope for the best in another gotcha interview.”

“Here's the dirty little secret. Phrases like "jobless recovery" and "permanent unemployment" are the new norm. The "real" economy ceased to exist at least a decade ago. It's a thing of the past.”

“All things must pass.”

“An excellent post. Congress never met a problem it couldn't make worse. Real health care reform is so far removed from this "debate" that it died and nobody noticed. Unfortunately its demise will produce tragic results that we will notice and for which it, the first victim in this assault by politics, will be blamed. Talk about injustice.”

“An expanded American commitment in Afghanistan will lead to an extended and costly American failure. Why must we perpetually refuse to learn from past failures and unceasingly pursue misdirected policies in places we do not understand for purposes we cannot articulate intelligently at the expense of our real security interests? Either we are addicted to failure or completely void of thought. In either case, we are ill served and tragically fated.”

“Well, whatever one thinks about Rep. Grayson, he is one of the few who actually breaks a sweat trying to help real people. He is one of the few who speaks not with talking points but with sincerity. He has earned my respect for that if nothing else.”

“Mr. Hoffman has discovered that if you "Rush" to "Palinize" your campaign you will fall down and hurt your "Beck."

(My first effort was funnier but the comedy challenged censor did not agree)”

“With respect to this story, we will never know. More disturbing to me is that there are too many more important aspects of the Kennedy assasination that will never be known. The official Warren report is so full of holes, gaps, and outright fabrications (magic bullets?) that it is more fiction than fact. That we as a nation have comfortably accepted and made our peace with what remains the greatest unsolved crime in our national history says much that is disgusting about the condition of humanity generally and the slothful indifference of Americans specifically. This is not to endorse any specific theory or to offer one, only to say that it is unacceptable to aid and abet in the burying of the truth. Sorry to be a bit over the top perhaps, but I just had to write this out.”

“A thoughtful post. Now, please name the thing something other that the "Patriot Act!" The use of this name alone suggests the clever use of symbolic manipulation to distract us as our freedoms are restricted in the name of another powerful but in this case empty symbol, security.”

“"The conservative media is winning now," Bill O'Reilly said on September 17. "They're damaging the president of the United States."

And that's not what news organizations do dumb arse Foxxies! The news media is not supposed to be conservative or liberal. FOX is a conservative media outlet with a conservative agenda. To suggest anything other is to be a part of the "problem." The problem is the destruction of journalism as as profession and the corporate "ownership" and control of the country through its control of the media. The concentration of ownership restricts the flow of genuine "information" and retards the abililty of people to think. The other cable media outlets, to one degree or another, aid and abet by reducing the quality and quantity of genuine news coverage to chase balloons and immitate FOX with political blowhard programming that participates in false debates about fabricated controversies (immitating the FOX style for ratings). The news is dead, and that's the only news there is.”

“Balloon Boy Journalsim, as I am calling it, is about ratings and entertainment. Americans are too (choose one: distracted? ignorant? self absorbed? etc.) to have a serious relationship with reality. This family will be interviewed on every morning show today and other shows later in the day. This is nothing new. In a Jerry Springer, Dr. Phil. reality show, dancing with the bozos world populated with wannabe celebs and fame chasers, BBJ is all the "journalism" you will get.”

“"Balloon boy" journalism. That's my new description of the MSM. BBJ, balloon boy journalism, a cablenews BJ for a nation too distracted to have a meaningful relationship with reality. Yep, I think that's the perfect summation. I rest my case.”

“A very interesting study. The instinct to rally behind the flag whenever our "leaders" respond to a perceived (or manufactured) national security threat (well documented in existing literature) is more complex and potentially more damaging to democracy when the public is gripped by a fear which, though understandable, is taken to absurd and ill informed lengths. Terrorism is psychological warfare and the goal is to induce a fear that will lead to irrational action. This is exactly what happened post 9-11 as fear (which quickly went from reasonable to stupid irrationality) did the choosing and made the policy without the intervention of knowledge and wisdom. This is exactly the "victory" terrorists want and that we have been willing accomplices in producing. And, as this study seems to suggest, we are still more than willing to cooperate with the designs of our adversaries.”

“I am not totally optimistic, but it is still possible that VP Biden's counsel could be heeded. For now he should keep doing exactly what he is doing. In the event that his advice goes unheeded in the end, your "resignation" option is an unlikely one to be implemented (I hope). Biden at the "table" is an advantage at least for now and probably will continue to be so (again I hope).”

“The "surge" in house prices means too many people are still buying houses they can't afford.”

“The "outrage pandemic" is the product if a mindset that is self indulgent and hostile toward an an increasingly complex world that one must work to comprehend. At a time of great challenge and uncertainty, the temptation to curse everything and everyone in sight provides a sense of significance for the insecure and a strategic weapon for those (politicians and others) who would take advantage of that insecurity for personal or partisan advantage. Hence a very destructive cycle ensues and feeds off of itself.”

“"Obama has evidently already ruled out even considering a 'reduction' option, no less a withdrawal one."

I fear this is correct. What this means is, given his proclivity for finding the middle, we will incrementally place ourselves into an impossible situation that we should have been smart enough to avoid in the first place. The fact is, too many politicians who understand too little about too much are working too hard to limit the president's options by making up "tests" of his "manhood" and false measures of "strength" and American interests. The President will muddle along, much like JFK, until he finds himself unable to undecide the politically induced middle of the road indecision that lead to a four alarm disaster. And the beat goes on!”

“So it is proposed that we have an "opt out" plan for the pubic option but no opt out plan for Afghanistan. That sure as heck makes me the most depressed Democrat of the week! In fact, sort of puts me in the mood to opt out of voting for some of these turkeys.”

“The Nobel Prize for Peace is not awarded without thought and not without great consideration of what good its awarding may do to promote this elusive thing we claim to want but have never achived - peace. The political and ideological reactions to its awarding are not new with this year's decision nor will we ever have agreement on the merits of future winners. That is primarily because we do not have to think, we do not have to consider the the effect of our actions, and we do not want to agree on what "peace" means. The Peace Prize is a wonderful concept. Public reaction to it is often living proof that we prefer the comfort of hate and division to the hard work of peace and human progress.”

“The silliness of this argument is just too much. Looking at it a bit differently, it is amazing that in a short time this President has restored the image of the U.S., kick started diplomacy after eight years of total and harmful neglect, won worldwide support for an aggressive agenda for reducing tensions, has nations once again welcoming our leadership and eager to work with us, and has changed the entire global dialogue. This is not insignificant stuff, and it is a tangible beginning that creates real opportunities. Peace is something the world has never really had, so in one sense all previous winners have failed in spite of their "accomplis­hments." But in another sense, all have suceeded to the degree that they kept the hope alive and the cause has inched forward. Hope is once again alive, and we have lept forward at a sprint in a few short months to a saner and more encouraging place from which to wage the endless and often heartbreaking battle to find an elusive peace.”

“Why must controversy be manufactured before we digest the event and have a chance to ponder its meaning? Is it a requirement that we discredit every damn thing before we understand it? And while I'm at it, how many people read the announcement before criticizing it? I would ask how many of those who read it understood it, but that would clearly be too much to expect.”

“Dignity...­a weapon of the mind and an ideal more powerful than all the armies of the world. The Peace Prize is not only about a specific accomplishment but also and perhaps most importantly about the work to be done. That the President has ignited the imagination and created passion for what needs to be done is both an accomplishment and, as he correctly noted, a call to action. The work is never done, no accomplishment is ever the end, and too often (perhaps most of the time) we refuse to even begin. This award recognizes a new beginning and it says "let us continue" to work against the tide of human imperfection for the most elusive of human accomplish­ments...pe­ace. I fail to see any of this as a bad thing or as excuse for childish partisanship.”

“We seem to have no tangible foreign policy goal except to confront the al-Qaida menace, and we insist on doing that in a place where they ain't. Mr. Sheer has it right when he says "there is a continued need for effective international police work to thwart the efforts of a widely dispersed al-Qaida network." The only unanswered question about Afghanistan is how much longer and how many more must die before our awareness of the absurdity of our involvement sinks in? To paraphrase a question from another mistake, who wants to be the lask American to die for an absurdity? We need to make overt the covert stupidity and cluelessness of the pro-war position here.”

“It may seem unfair to call President Obama "incompetent," and I must admit I recoiled at the thought. But upon reflection, American leadership in all fields strikes me as rather incompetent. It is as if the requirements for "success" on the path toward leadership suck the competence out. Only the safely mediocre are allowed to ascend lest someone truly try to unravel the mess we have become and hold the guilty accountable. There is too much invested in short term greed and selfish self interest to worry about long term success. Leaders are not wanted or needed when you have no desire to go anywhere and the short term incentives reward stagnant thinkers and reluctant actors.”

“The United Nations Copenhagen summit on climate change is not just the "highest-stakes environmental negotiations in history," it is the most important summit in human history. We have faced nothing like the challenges associated with climate change and have no frame of reference to make our way easier. This is a time when we need to use our brain to move our feet, and that is something humanity has never done really well for any extended period of time. This is a last chance to get it right.”