RogerHWerner's Comments (2066)

“If I may play Devil's advocate for a comment: For three decades, Americans were told by our political leadership hat we could have it all without playing for it and the electorate bought this load of crap lock, stock, and barrel. How long has the economy been in the tank" For a year at least. Beginning in January if people knew they were going to want to spend the holidays with family, they should have set aside some money monthly to do it. The women who couldn't afford $160 for gas...hog wash. That's a month of cable for most families. Put another way, $16.00 for 10 months. People are not used to having to make choices. They want everything and they expect to get it. What's happening to do is something of a chock for many.”

“I agree with you! I don't believe Hillary Clinton would be the lightening rod for the GOP with independent voters that should most certainly would have been in 2008. And she would certainly engender excitement among many Democrats. But she still carries a lot of negative baggage.”

“Unfortunately, honesty and competence aren't the most critical skills for POTUS. I mean I believe they are important. Most important are political skills and electability. Sadly, Feingold, Sanders, and Kucinich are honest and competent but they simply aren't electable at a national level because they just don't appear to a broad enough spectrum of voters. I wish it wasn't the case.”

“Please explain why this is logical?”

“This is what the true political junkie and the in side the Beltway political does: They generate rumors and then discuss them. No one knows what Obama will do in the next election regarding VP. Thus far, Biden is doing his job such as it is. The so called rumor says Biden would be too old to run for president but how old would Hillary Clinton be? She's 62 this year. In three years, she'll be 65. That hardly makes her a spring chicken. There are lots of things to focus on and one of them should be groomed to replace Obama in 8 years as top Democrat. Forget the rumor as it isn't going to be Hillary Clinton.”

“For once we need to think about the country not just Democrats. If the nation elects 55 Republicans to the Senate, should popular will be thwarted by a minority even if that minority is progressive or liberal? I'd like to see this law changed with majority support from both sides of the aisle but naturally, that won't ever happen since when it comes to politics we're actually dealing with the functional equivalent of children (on the right and left): If they don't get t heir way, the hold their breath until they turn red, then pick up their marbles and refuse to play. The collective lot of legislators have forgotten that they are really temporary employees purported hired to work on the people's business not be party hacks.”

“Changing cloture doesn't require legislation. It merely requires a vote. Cloture is simply an agreed upon procedure among Senators and if they wished to do away with it they could do so. I support ending the process entirely. Our system is sufficiently cumbersome that it is hard to pass any meaningful laws. Having to deal with cloture makes an already unwieldy system unworkable especially when there is an obstructionist minority.”

“And spending $800 billion on Iraq and Afghanistan isn't investing in America's future. That is simply pissing money down the drain and it actually drains the US treasury since we'll be feeling the deleterious fiscal effects of war for decades to come.”

“Extending unemployment benefits, COBRA funding, providing low interest loads, and targeted public service jobs does in fact create jobs. I refuse to believe that anyone could possible be so purposefully block headed so as to not understand how. These programs put money in the hands of people, who then turn around and spend it. The process of money transfer: government­-people-bu­siness creates jobs since business must hire people to help those with money. Now, we might argue that these efforts may not create high paying middle class career jobs but that's not what Pelosi claims will happen.”

“The sheer inanity of many of the comments to this article boggles the mind. One can only hope these pea wits are conservative trolls lurking on a liberal web site because they have nothing better to do with their sorry lives.”

“Right...Ho­w about this: Let's just fine everyone in the US with a net worth over a million dollars! I mean we all know these people are a bunch of thieves and scoundrels who deserve to pay for their crime of wealth. Give me a break....I­f someone is guilty of an offence then cite and try. Otherwise, give it a break will you. Either Kerry was drunk or there was a mistake made. Sounds like there was a mistake since the local police would have absolutely no reason to be concerned about citing someone with the Kerry name.”

“Either the girl was drunk or she wasn't. If she blew a 0.6 then she wasn't drunk and the police never should have filed charges against her. I'm not a Kerry fan at all but this was a stupid mistake and nothing more unless of course, she blew over the legal limit and they fudged the results to let her off. But why? Kerry isn't from California and he has zero influence out here as far as I know. And a conviction of his daughter for a DUI would have zero consequences for Kerry's Senate seat. So, again, why would this matter to Kerry? He'd be in far worse of a situation if it came out that he used his influence to get his daughter's DUI tossed out.”

“Ann, Palin doesn't respect anyone least of all the people who voted for her in Alaska. That's the mistaken belief expressed by Palin's supporters. The people conducting this interview did an excellent job being completely impartial in the face of profound ignorance. These people are grossly misinformed and posses such a minimal level of knowledge about critical issues that all they can really do is cite talking points and slogans that have been shouted at them for months on end. The really sad part is that these people had no clue how utterly foolish then look and sound. And what is scary is how absolutely certain these people are that they are right. We don;t need voters like this.”

“Actually, the Roman Catholic church via the Papacy has declared healthcare a human right and they support universal heath care. I find it somewhat incongruous that the church supports healthcare for all but objects to permitting women and the doctors making personal and medical judgments about female reproductive health. Women get pregnant and have babies...t­hat is the biological reality. All women must be given the freedom to deal with their reproductive health without government (or church) interference. This is a basic human right.”

“In fairness to the church, most priests are not pedophiles and it's wrong to taint an entire church for the horrible behavior of a few. For every priests that engages in abhorrent behavior, there must be many more who engage with the communities and enrich the lives and people with whom they are associated. Thomas Tobin's behavior is precisely why it wasn't until 1960 that the nation elected a Roman Catholic president. Politicians must be free to represent their constituents without the threat of interference by their church, whichever one that may be. Kennedy I truth will ignore the Bishop.”

“I agree. Time to tax all churches as business.”

“I'd support an individual mandate but only if that mandate was to purchase a Medicare for all type policy from a public option type entity (either government run or a government controlled not for profit company). The notion of requiring anyone to buy health insurance from a blood sucking insurance company is appalling and as I have said, I hope any bill that promotes insurance company based healthcare is roundly defeated. We need real reform not bogus reform that continues to milk people while enriching insurers. The present bills are completely bogus.”

“What is the matter with these people? It's a friggin autograph fro crissakes? Anyone who would stand out in the cold to get an autograph deserves whatever they get because they;re stupid. Buy a book at get a wrist band? Give me a break. Palin could have autographed a thousand books and sold them already autographed. These people were pissed because they were sold a false bill of goods but they should have expected it. Palin is doing the book thing for money and for he own ego. That makes her quite human. I suggest that these people return the books for refund and move on with life.”

“Have you examined the radical Christian agenda lately? The objective is about the same. Christian fundamentalist may for the time being use other methods but these groups have stated they want to replace Constitutional law with Biblical law. If we examine Israel and consider the mind set of radical Jews, they to wish to establish a theocracy. So please don't single out radical Islamists for being substantially different then the other religious lunatics on Earth.

The attitudes you impart to radical Islam derives partly from the most radical of the Muslim Brotherhood's beliefs. If people wish to understand radical Islam, start with the Muslim Brotherhood. Fortunately, most Muslims reject radical ideas but I do think these rejections could be made with more force and perhaps Muslim communities could do a better job of policing themselves.

I'd enjoy hearing from an Islamic scholar who might explain how Muslim world view can be reconciled with the basic western belief of separation of church and state. As far as I know, Islam espouses that all aspects of humanity derive from God and that it's impossible to separate out governance. Islam is more than a religion and the Qur'an more than a holy book. Islam is a way of life under god. How this can be reconciled with democratic ideals has never been addressed in the US or UK as far as I know.”

“I have spent months overseas working on more than several occasions. It was always nice coming home to familiar ground. Spending so much time abroad has given me an interesting perspective on our foreign policy and I can say from personal experience that people in foreign countries don;t dislike Americans. On the contrary..­.people in countries that have problems with our government generally like Americans. What people don't like is American exceptionalism, are penchant for unilateralism, and the substitute of an obviously pro-business agenda for an honest national agenda. I have to say that even most peasants in far less developed nations have a more broad minded perspective than most Americans. Our foreign policy is the principal cause for most of our foreign headaches for the past 65 years. I haven;t enough room here to expound on this but I could write a small book on the subject.”

“I agree with your sentiment and I'd suggest forgetting trying to defend what Islam may or may not be. I don't care. DallasDon appear to have succumb to Bush administration propaganda. There is no war accept in the metaphorical sense. Why is this so hard for people to understand. Even von Clausewitz's expansive definition: War is a "continuation of political intercourse, carried on with other means" doesn't quite apply because we have no defined enemy. al Qaeda? bin Laden? Does anyone even know who the enemy is? We attack anything that smells of radical Islam whether they are a threat to us or not. That's crazy. War in its applied sense requires two or more non-congruous entities aimed at reorganizing a subjectively designed geo-politically desired result. As far as I can tell, there are dozens maybe even hundreds of terrorist organizations. These gangs are criminals and they should be treated as such.”

“What Reid wrote about Broder several years ago has nothing to do with what Broder writes now. Broder may have been a great columnist once but this is a guy who help beat the drum to the Iraq invasion. Broder should simply retire and let his past go. He's got nothing to say that I want to hear.”

“Even if it were true so what? When is the political leadership going to accept that insurance companies can never be part of any real solution because they are the fundamental problem. Health insurance companies should be eliminated from the healthcare debate because they provide no real services for the 30 cents of every dollar they skim off for themselves. Another truth: There can never be a perfect plan. What we can do is work to establish a system that is fair to everyone to the extent that is humanly possible.”

“For 30yrs I've watched Dobbs, who was an interesting business newsman. His positions were always probusiness and centrist but he never manifested false popularism. If you listened to Dobbs/Stewart, then verify them, we find that he was not welcome at the White House under Bush and Obama. Perhaps this illustrates Dobbs' true nature: He's an opportunist willing to annoy those on the right and left...pro­viding his show sells. It follows that whatever Dobbs says may not reflect his personal beliefs. The things Dobbs has said since he acquiring 'anchorman' status have surprised me because they don't sound like the 'old Dobbs'. His recent show was loathsome and I don't support his ideas. Regarding the present interview, it might be better if we ignore the messenger and listen to the message because some of what is said makes sense. Somewhere between Stewart's and Dobbs' views lie our political reality. The US works best when governed from the center. Dobbs fails to recognize that for 38yrs, our politics has moved far to the right and what he perceives as left is not the left at all but the old center, which is where we need to be politically. Watch Obama and in my opinion, he is trying to move the country to the center.”

“Palin isn't the only one to confuse Iran with Iraq. i mean after all they are both in the Middle East, begin with the letter "I", and are Muslim! LOL Seriously, someone with a little foreign policy acumen needs to sit this poor woman down and tell he to shut up. I think there's been enough said to establish that without the support of Russia our options for interdicting Iran's import of refined gasoline are pretty limited and thus far Russia has not agreed to support any such interdiction. They have clearly said they want more diplomacy first. We have virtually no leverage over Russia. Thems is the facts.”