Comments on: The comedy stylings of Bill Kristol

By: Mary

Mary — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 14:07:47 +0000

FOX & Friends” gang the Most biased clueless political team on TV- Next to the old cronie Chris Matthews on MSNBC. Biggest IDIOT in the news goes to Bill Kristol! Who said this guy knows anything about voters; he gives gay people a bad name? Fred Barnes, Mort Kondracke, Bill Kristol and Nina Easton ALL looked like deer in the head lights all night! Could not think of anything to say on camera. Since they were proven they did not have a clue!!! We laughed at FOX trying to keep talking about republican race that ended 15 min after the polls closed.

Clueless-EASTON: She’s not going to pull it out here. WRONG

Clueless-KRISTOL: She has lost the first two states, it looks like, and I think she’ll lose the next couple. WRONG

Clueless-Barnes: She’s the problem, that’s what people don’t like. They don’t like her. They don’t trust her. WRONG

By: JackD

JackD — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 22:44:25 +0000

In general, I don’t disagree but also think Obama is advancing a progressive agenda. I don’t think that a think tank presentation on each item is an effective way to campaign, however. If he can continue to generate enthusiasm with “the vision thing”, more power to him. Considering the difficulty he is going to have with the Congress if he gets elected, he is going to need as much emotional power from the electorate as he can muster in order to get anything done.

On the defense issue, I can only reiterate what I said, that any perceived weakness on defense will hurt any Democrat’s prospects severely. Hillary isn’t wrong about that. She’s just wrong as to what it takes to look strong. I really don’t think any successful candidate can advocate cutting the missile defense type stuff and not buttressing the conventional force at the same time. I don’t want them pounding other people’s ground either but I think Americans at large believe we need the capacity to do so should the need arise. There’s lots of room to debate what constitutes need but the criticism of the Bushies for biting off more than they can chew will hang over a candidate wanting to reduce the conventional force.

For example, should the country feel the need to attempt to stop genocide, to buttress international peace keeping forces, or to intensify engagement with the Taliban, the capacity needs to be there and I think that’s the way most voters will look at it. Getting out of Iraq is something everyone seems to want but not because they have been converted to pacifism.

By: Weldon Berger

Weldon Berger — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 04:26:02 +0000

Yeah, but that goes to my point, too: what better time to push the envelope than when the opposition is fubar. We’re in a vastly stupid war, the economy is tanking, incomes are flat, health care costs are up, energy and food are up, income inequality is waaaaaaay up and all but one of the GOPers are on the wrong side of every single issue. Short of an actual depression, what more fertile ground could a progressive politician ask for? If you can’t come up with a progressive agenda under these conditions, against these opponents, well, what the hell good are you?

Re the defense thing from the other thread: it’s one thing to promise to rebuild the ground forces, but this is rebuilding them and then enlarging them by nearly 20%. And where you have more people, you need more air support and more artillery, more guns, more vehicles, etc … it’s an expensive proposition. Not as expensive as occupying Iraq, but you’re still looking at several hundred billion dollars for the expansion, and then some smaller but still considerable additional annual expense to maintain it. And there’s that nagging question of what he plans to do with all those extra people, since presumably he won’t have 200,000 troops tied down in Iraq and Kuwait.

By: JackD

JackD — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 23:55:13 +0000

It also reinforces my belief that whoever the Democrats nominate, we can’t do worse than those folks. I realize that’s a pretty low bar.