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All you americans: What did you think?

I'll let you know once I get around to watching it. XD I wasn't even aware it was airing tonight- shows how much I know.

I think there is no hope in our political system and ignore anything that has to do with our political system. I have come to the conclusion that the best way to get things done in America is to take action yourself. It is quite clear that all of these politicians that "represent" the people do no such thing. And yes, even the *gasp* president himself.

And one more thing I'd lik---

<looks out window>

<several black helicopters land in the street>

<skaldicpoet9 is apprehended and stuffed haphazardly into the back of a helicopter>

I'm going to wait for more people to reply to this thread with what they think, so I know what to think.

I did watch it though.

Why bother? I have no interest in listening to a puppet show.

People need to understand that the system is corrupt. The government is in bed with Wall Street, the banks, and the federal reserve. The entire system is paid off by the very people who not only got us into this mess, but are continuing to rob this country blind.

It's nothing but theater. Vote democrat or vote republican, it doesn't matter. They both are controlled by the same people. Anyone who still has any hope in such a corrupt, crooked government is either stupid or deserves a reward for "most hopelessly optimistic person ever."

Haha, quote of the week!


How have the black helicopters not apprehended you yet?

Very well said by the way, fellow "everyone thinks we are conspiracists" buddy  :gentleman:

I don't believe in conspiracy theories. It's a fact. Look at all the bailouts, "too big to fall," everything. The only thing the government is good for is looking out for their buddies in ivory towers.

I watched about half of it before having to mute the tv for an interview or something.

From what I watched, it's a typical Obama speech. He is really good at delivering his speeches, talking intelligently, throwing in humor when its appropriate, and making sense. He said some good things, and I pretty much like his stance on most issues.

I like how he's addressing the other side's concerns and facing their criticisms head on (although it'll not be enough for them, since obama could single handedly cure every disease, invent a 10000000GHz computer, and make everyone millionaires, and immortal, and republicans would still find fault in him in everything he does), but I started to facepalm when he began started talking about the beginning of the millennium having a budget surplus, cause I knew it was a lead in to "blaming it on bush", and that is just canon fodder for the other side to attack. I guarantee you, all the conservative reports and blogs will criticize mainly that part of his speech, and ignore the other parts that were good.

Obama's doing a good job. Anyone who thinks that a recession can be turned around in only 1 year is delusional, the economy always goes up and down, it's just the nature of the beast.

On a side note, I kinda find it funny how during Bush, the dems kept talking about the defecit, and the repubs kept spending on the war claiming that the defecit is a fairly meaningless number. Now, the repubs are criticizing obama for running up the defecit, and the dems are claiming that it's just a number that doesnt really matter. I dont understand what it is anymore really, and I don't think anyone really does.

Exactly, besides in my opinion the term conspiracy theory was only concocted to further subvert the truth by merely labeling something a "conspiracy theory". It just seems to me that it is quite obvious who runs this country and why.

Anyways, I just realized that I am derailing this thread slightly with "omgz teh system iz evilz" talk, so I'll let people go along their merry way discussing the address now.


edit: Hey Glaiel, not to be creepy or anything but I just saw your profile and I never knew you were from Seattle, hello from a fellow Seattlite :D

I gave up on our government when I was 17. I'm surprised more people aren't talking about the Supreme Court's recent decision to let corporations effectively buy politicians.

Oh man, don't even get me started  :durr:

I wish more people would pay attention to what the government was doing in general. You wouldn't imagine the type of things they're doing to protect their own interests while screwing over the people they're supposed to represent.

Edit: also watch this, this man knows what he's talking about. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUU7SUpLpZA#t=0m26s

I just read the speech transcript and there's not really anything in there I disagree with on domestic issues. I like the focus on research, manufacturing and exports.

Let's face it -- some wealthy people make a lot of money screwing the majority of Americans over. However that doesn't stop positive steps being taken to improve the welfare of the same majority. It's partly up to that majority to assume responsibility for their future.

Kinda like sports fans. XP

More seriously, people are corruptible and those in power will be corrupted.  Both parties are very corrupt and self serving.

I have yet to watch this year's State of the Union.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not.

There are things that are indeed total bullshit conspiracy theories (oh no they faked the moon landing lolol). Pretty much all of them involve the government doing things in secret or covering up something, blah blah blah.

The government bailing out large financial institutions isn't really a secret or conspiracy at all. It's a fact, it's out in the open and on the news. It's everywhere. You'd have to be living under a rock to deny it.

The question though is why? Whose interests is the government serving? The answer to me seems pretty obvious if you think about it.


(Hint: it's not the people)

Meh, I wouldn't call it a "conspiracy theory". Anymore than I would call the lost city of Atlantis a "conspiracy theory". I just see them as "alternate explanations" contrary to the popularly held opinions on a certain subject.


I'm not. I'm dead serious. Think about how many people are discredited as "conspiracy theorists" just because their "theories" don't fit in with the established line of thought. It is convenient to pass people off as loons so as to discredit any validity their concerns may have had credence. So as to maintain the status-quo.

I think it's the other way around, they listen to the wacky explanations these people have with little evidence and then call them loons.

The term 'conspiracy theory' is a totally neutral descriptor.  It is typically assigned to any theory involving a conspiracy.  Any luggage it acquired is from the kinds of oddball theories that surface and the people who have them.

Obama gave a good speech. I think he said pretty much everything he needed to say, but did so in a very genteel way. I think it would help him push his agenda if he spoke directly to the American people more often.

@Gunmaggot: On the flip side of the coin, let's not forget what happened to the term "special needs". "Special" is now an insult among most children, and certainly not to the fault of people who are disabled. It is not always the fault of those within a descriptor group that a negative connotation arises.

Er, that may not be fully disagreeing with you, actually.

You are completely agreeing with me.

On the same subject:  There isn't anything you can call a special needs person that won't eventually get subverted into an insult.  'Retarded', 'moron', 'idiot' - they didn't start out as insults.  'Retarded' was pretty PC in its day.

I'm just wondering, to the people who say the whole system is hopelessly corrupt and no one will ever fix anything and we should all give up (okay I probably made that last part up but it's how you're making it seem.), is there any government that you think is okay or are they all equally fucked?

Also,

If I did this - not "more people," but if you convinced just one person - me - to do this, all it would accomplish would be me having just as much influence as I do now over what the government does (none), and being more depressed from knowing the types of things they're doing to protect their own interests while screwing over the people they're supposed to represent.

And really, I don't feel like being depressed.

I like to maintain an equilibrium of knowing enough to have a vague understanding of what's generally going on, but not enough to care or be upset that nothing I do will change anything.

Yeah, I dunno why I thought I wasn't. :P


A sad truth, really. I don't know if there's ever a way to be truly PC, as everyone figures out pretty quickly what is really meant by a term, making it no different than the previous.

The key to politically correct terms is to make them so long that they will never fall into use as slang.

Or use words no one understands.

ITT people act outraged about the government so they can justify their abdication of responsibility.

Well, that is a really large area to cover. Generally, I believe that government is inherently a corruptible and inefficient solution to maintaining order. However, there are many differing governments around the world and to assess them all fairly would take some time.

It is my opinion that all government is fucked but that doesn't mean that I think that I am 100% correct in this assertion, just that I believe this assertion to be much more viable than any alternative I have explored.

And lastly I never said anything about giving up, I will continue to fight injustice where I see it, it just may not be within the narrow confines of our political process  :noir: 

It seemed like there wasn't a lot of new information in this, so I guess the important question is whether he persuaded any members of the public on anything.

DADT repeal will apparently be this year, which I'm happy about. (Frank and Pelosi have been saying as much since the beginning of 2009 but this is the first time I've heard the White House sign on to anything like a timetable.)

I took it as a reassurance that he is actually going to manage to do something eventually, though I would have quite liked it if he'd come out, said "Shafted" and left.

So far I've got to say the discussion on this here has been far more sane than on any political site I visit.

DavidN: Right now, Obama is handling the post-Bush administration US- when you look at it that way, he's doing quite an acceptable job. The rest of the world is watching and waiting, the massive economic crisis of the subprime bubble burst seems to be at least contained, war talk is down(unless you're a Fox News viewer) and generally, the mood around the world seems to be 'cautiously optimistic'. If only that, after the incrementally depressing 8 years, he's a welcome 'change'.

Seriously, those who complain about big government and taxation... Sometimes, you pay taxes for something that doesn't directly benefit you. For example, you might be contributing to the repairing of a road somewhere, or (if you have single-payer health care) for someone you don't know about to get treatment for some condition. That's what a social project is about, spreading the burden of taking care of each others around. Once you start having people saying 'I shouldn't be paying for that guy's problems', it unravels and degenerates to what life used to be during the industrial revolution. Sure, there might have been top hats and monocles, but chances are, you're not the one wearing them.

(http://formaementis.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/hughestown2.jpg)

look at how happy these people look, wow, those were the days, the good old days.
 

That is true - I accidentally got into US politics when I kept checking the polling sites during the run-up to the election, then forgot to stop afterwards, and I've seen that the environment he has to work with has been... pretty hostile, at its best. From what I've seen on said political sites, it seems that a lot of people's opinions of him have turned to impatience, because the promised sort of four-year-long episode of Jim'll Fix It in 2008 wasn't really as instant as they had hoped.

I'm just watching from the inside just now - I live in the US but haven't been given a vote yet. From what I've seen, opinions of the US in Britain have definitely been rising above the sort of undisguised contempt of the last few years, but I'm hoping that that won't be reversed during the elections this year.

the speech has nothing to do with real life or what people should be concerned about. for instance, obama recently made it legal to assassinate US citizens if the military suspects them of being terrorists, even bush didn't go that far (he only said it was okay for non-citizens).

Link?

http://open.salon.com/blog/behind_blue_eyes/2010/01/27/obamas_hit_list_us_citizens_marked_for_assassination

i don't know if this is the specific link i read the story in, but it appears to be about the same subject

Hm. That's pretty disturbing.

Here in Europe, most people are pretty puzzled by the extreme opposition to free health care in America, especially those claims that it'll make everyone poor and lead to bankruptcy and what not.

Most European countries, including my country (Austria) and Norway, which has one of the highest standards of living in the world, have had free health care for decades and for some reason, we're still alive and kicking.

CAsinclair: I think it's because of the way US media presents health care reform. You hear about how bureaucrats are going to decide whether the state pays for your treatment or not, your taxes are going to go up etc. In reality, in a single-payer system, you never get to see how the machine operates. You get sick, you go to the hospital, doctors treat you, the bill is sent to the bureaucracy who put it in the spending pile. It never goes the other way- the bureaucrat never gets to tell the doctor that he can't treat you because you might not live more than 6 months even with treatment.

Appealing to peoples' greed and contempt for others is something the media seems to do everywhere, unfortunately.  :(

Nothing puzzling about it really. The insurance companies don't like this idea one bit and with the help of certain politicians have initiated a smear campaign against any positive support of an option such as this. Ultimately confusing a lot of people by throwing around scary buzzwords like "socialism", "death panels", and so on. Further helped along by talking heads like Hannity, Beck and Limbaugh, which some Americans just eat right up.

Sometimes it makes me sad to be American when it seems we can't even give basic health care to our citizens, but we can sure as hell start a few wars and expend a few citizens.  >:(

One thing Obama did that made me really happy was he went after the Supreme Court's ruling of reversing the unlimited spending.

"With all due deference to separation of powers, last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests –- including foreign corporations –- to spend without limit in our elections.    I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities.    They should be decided by the American people.  And I'd urge Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps to correct some of these problems."

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/01/28/2010-01-28_full_transcript_text_of_president_obamas_2010_state_of_the_union_address_with_vi.html?page=10

You can see it on their faces during the speech, they are PISSSSSED. (Edit: Update, looks like they did a news story on this as well: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35117174/ns/politics-white_house/ ) Also Nancy Pelosi looks like she's had too much botox, she's slowly pulling a Joan Rivers smile.

Some of his other stuff was kinda meh, but NPR did some good fact checking on some of his boldest statements. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4476500

Nuclear power is an interesting one. Yes you can call it clean and safe, its better than coal on the environment above us but the nuclear waste is terrible on the ground and lasts a very long time.

It's kinda odd how he's going around plugging holes in the boat.  Doesn't he realize that it's on fire?

In all seriousness though, Obama can't do much about the coming tide.  A financial system based on irresponsible credit over actual product?  A medical system that's broken this badly?  An educational system that has let down an entire generation already?  A political system where the craziest right-wingers still have all the power with 41 seats? 

We have a term for that: "Borrowed Time."

I wish someday we could have a president who uses powerpoint. Put up some bullet points to outline your speech! Also, having the speaker and the VP behind him while he was talking was a poor decision. Basic presentation classes would tell you that you shouldn't have something distracting behind you.

The rest of the speech was blah. Nothing brilliant or actionable was mentioned that I could see.

-SirNiko

Whats distracting about this?

(http://www.lesjones.com/www/images/posts/pelosi-nancy.jpg)

It doesn't matter who is in office, the president is nothing but a figurehead. This speech is nothing but a sideshow. Just as this state of the union is going on, Ben Bernanke is close to being reinstated as federal reserve chairman. Mr. "too big to fall" himself. You wanna talk change? The only change coming out of anywhere is straight out of your pocket and down the shitter.

Indeed falsion. It saddens me that some people think he is doing a good job, when that isn't Obama's priority. I think it's clear by his actions that he isn't interested in any change, and in fact his job is to maintain the status quo. I couldn't watch the speech and think it was anything else but bullshit.

Ross Perot?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERlGndQ_xtM

I would say that Obama's actions are probably much less important than the sweeping economic changes of this era; I don't think this is a traditional industrial recession at work, it's the heralding of a transition into a hyper-globalized world where, over time, the individual is going to become increasingly powerful. Why? Because we're building the tools necessary for the individual to be economically competitive with, and to have similar powers, to huge corporations; everything's going automated and computer-controlled, and each step in that direction means less reason for traditional wage-earner work, traditional administration, and traditional economies of scale to exist. Even if I'm wrong and this recession isn't "the one," it's going to happen soon.

Simultaneously, markets have become highly globalized, such that the playing field is becoming level everywhere and wages across the globe are flattening out. That means a decline for the wealthiest countries and an upswing for the poorest. It's certainly been true of games that globalization has led to a lot of production moving out to places like Eastern Europe, because the talent can be had for a bargain rate there.

Right now, of course, most automation has come from within information systems alone, since they don't have to deal with manipulations of real stuff. But even that has allowed for an increase in outsourcing(thus less redundant employment), and in the future, if we get better robots, if we get cheap, widespread 3D printing technology, etc., traditional factories will essentially cease to exist. It'll be a world of cottage industry, human-touch services, and intellectual work.

This should be great, of course; less work for everyone! But it also destroys the current status quo to have the era of the firm just suddenly end. I expect unemployment to remain high for a very long time to come, but for this to not be "the end of the world," either. We still have all the processes necessary to keep people fed, housed, sheltered, etc., but we also need to account for the fact that 8-hours-a-day 5-days-a-week work may no longer be necessary to do so. The current government spending spree is the first stage of that. What will follow? If I were in charge, I would implement basic income (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income). It allows a minimum of consumption to continue regardless of how small the amount of work to go around gets, and it makes life stable so that people can plan ahead; if you don't even know where your next meal is coming from, you can't embark on lengthy, risky projects. You'll be so stressed that simply getting your life in order will be a challenge. With basic income you wouldn't have that problem, and society as a whole would benefit from it.

But politically, it's not going to happen (yet). The U.S. government can't even go for socialized healthcare, as it is, and that would probably be prerequisite to a basic income bill.

@allen I'm not talking about Obama specifically. As I said, it doesn't matter who is in charge. The president is nothing but a figure head. You can vote democrat, or vote republican, it doesn't matter. The president does not run the financial system.


You'd combat spending with more spending basically. Look at where it says "Funding" under the Wikipedia article you linked. Especially where it says income taxes and fiat money. How is that any different from what is happening now?

Where do you think the government gets the money to pay for these programs besides taxes? They turn to the federal reserve who can basically print money out of thin air backed by nothing with no financial oversight oncesoever. The real reason people work more than "8-hours-a-day 5-days-a-week" is due to rapid inflation. They keep printing more money out of thin air and the value of the dollar keeps plummeting. People end up working more but actually end up earning less.

It's an investment. The flow of wealth is thought to create wealth, in certain situations. The basic idea is that every dollar spent on something like public education/roads/anything-that-makes-production-easier can produce two dollars worth of goods or services down the line. Essentially the idea is spending money (backed by production of goods and services) on things that ease/encourage production of goods and services.

Spending to ease economic conditions and create wealth is not a new idea. A good analogy would be a farmer selling an ox-pulled plow and spending a little extra cash to buy a tractor. He has more potential to produce with better tools.

Although that may be a grossly simplified view, so I'm not entirely disagreeing. Lately it seems increasingly evident that we no longer have the jobs or production to back up much of our currency, and that industry may not be growing fast enough to justify the addition of currency--that money being printed has been backed by essentially nothing. Just seems to be meaningless national placeholder funding. That's just opinion though, I haven't done enough research to say it with confidence.

In a related subject, this is fascinating to me:


I'm curious about the results of the Canadian experimental program that was mentioned earlier in the article.

That's exactly what I'm getting at. In fact, the video I posted earlier in this thread kinda touches upon this fact towards the end (at around 4:19). The same guy (George Celente) has also done other interviews where he explains it in more detail such as this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhaEc_4zuFI). If you look him up, you'll see that he's been predicting economy trends for years, and his predictions have been eerily accurate.

This thread is the most cynical, depressing thing I've ever seen.

Carry on.

especially cause biden looked like he was having a stroke

the USA (and most countries) use fiat money, rather than representative money.  This means the purchasing power of our dollar is linked to our credit worth. As we accumulate more national debt, the USD inflates.

anyway! there's basically one thing the govt can do to fix unemployment/inflation: adjust the fed. interest rate.  higher interest reduces inflation but increases unemployment (because loans are more expensive, money is more scarce and makes it more valuable. less loans means less entrepreneurship = less jobs) Lowering it does pretty much the opposite: easier to get loans, businesses can take out loans for jobs, more money = less purchasing power.

anyone remember that during one of bush's state of the union addresses cheney was behind him and constantly snickering and laughing? it was hilarious

This thread is silly.

Anyway, feel free to head over to Obama's current scorecard (http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/) and make some actual assessments rather than making shit up.

How about a magic card?
(http://www.mightygodking.com/images/magic08/barackobama.jpg)

But yeah this thread is getting very silly. The Health Care situation was "lost" in Clinton's campaign, and he still managed to get re-elected. In 1994, his State of the Union highlight was 'Reforming the health care system'. He focused on many things people liked, including Social Security, Economy, and he strengthened ties between the US and China.

Then came the 2000-2008 shit-brigade with the introduction of "War on Terror", "Axis of Evil", "WMD in Iraq", and of course the lovely Patriot Act Part 1 & 2 (I heard 2 was better cause it had more explosions.)

So now we have a president who still mentions the word "terrorism", but his focus is mainly on big spending, job loss due to the recession, and health care. I don't care if he only gets 10% of what he says done, thats a big fucking deal in my book. Alito messed up big time by exposing himself as more extreme than people originally thought he was (most people knew but some were skeptical), and Obama did say they were pulling troops out of Afghanistan. I remember there was a huge scare when I was in high school that Bush was cooking up a way to re-establish the draft. Nobody thought it would happen, but it was circulating news media which scared the poop out of me.

And he said he was going to put a stop to "Don't Ask Don't Tell". Having friends who are gay and in the military, this is a huge deal. Most people don't understand what it means to be kicked out, that means they deny you veteran's benefits and its not an honorable discharge. You are basically told "Thanks for serving the country, but because of your sexual orientation, we hate you and we love Jesus."

But now american can kill american on sight if they think they are communist terrorist.

The government doesn't control the Fed though. They're an independent organization that operates under complete secrecy with no oversight by anyone. And that doesn't help much considering that they're also extremely shady. Just look up the recent controversy between them trying to cover up for AIG. But the thing is, nobody can touch them. Anyone who can is probably already on their payroll. And Obama? Hell, he wants to expand the powers of the federal reserve, as if they didn't have enough power already.

A bill was enacted a few months back to audit the Fed, but I have very little faith in doing much as the Fed has way too much influence over everything and always does a good job of keeping the shit they've been involved in away from the public. Not to mention, I heard that the bill got watered down and is pretty much useless by now anyway.

I've not watched it all the way through, but I caught a few bits on TV while it was playing.  I don't actually watch TV, so I only caught some bits whenever I came downstairs to get more food or when I was stepping out to have a smoke.  I plan on watching it all on youtube or something this weekend.  The next morning, tho, the local news was going ape-shit over some plan Obama has to drastically cut NASA funding.  I live in Huntsville, AL, and there are a ton of engineering jobs here that are centered around aerospace and NASA projects.  The whole community here is going into abject-panic-mode over this funding cut plan.  Kinda ironic, considering he's trying to 'save jobs'.

As far as the economy goes, I don't think people really realize how utterly screwed the US actually is.  Most people here seem to think that the banks were at fault for bursting the housing bubble and sending us into a nose-dive, but they weren't.  The collapse of the banks wasn't a cause, it was a symptom.  The economy is tanking and instability in the banking foundations is just the first major issue.  Throwing money at the problem to keep the banks liquid is like putting a cork in a bullet hole.  The blood stops squirting everywhere, but you've not really solved the problem.


Keeping the rates low and throwing loans around is what caused the banks to collapse in the first place.  The fact that they were trying to fix one problem by creating a worse problem says a lot about the fiat monetary system and the banks that run it.

I'd like to point out that the largest banks are the ones who got the bailouts (at least, that is my understanding).  There are many smaller non-mega banks that are actually doing quite well in the economy.  The larger 'mega-banks' failed, not all banks have failed.  I think this is kind of interesting as the biggest banks are the ones that appear to be most involved with the government.  It is ridiculous that these larger banks can make a lot of risky business decisions, fail hard, and just lobby away all there problems.  Essentially they lobbied to have the people of the US pay for there poor business practices.  However these poor business practices may have been encouraged by the government.

The banks are not solely responsible for the economic downturn, as you said.  Rather unfortunately I think the government is strangling the economy and the people of the United States have been encouraging this.

That is interesting that he cut NASA funding and how important NASA is around where you live.  President Obama talks like he wants to save jobs, create new jobs and really push technology and research, then he goes and makes huge cuts to NASA.  All this while other countries are investing ever more money into their space programs (countries like China and India).  Brings to mind this saying: "How can you tell when a Politician is lying?  When his lips are moving."

???

how does making cuts to NASA make Obama a liar? NASA may be taking cuts, but this is in light of the end of an era in the US space program. We comfortably have a rover on mars, the end of american contribution to the ISS is in sight, the hubble has recently undergone its final renovations, and the days of the space shuttle are numbered. Plans to go to the moon again are unrealistic(George Bush's idea, there's your lying president). A mars landing is being considered, but that is so astronomically far away that it does not have priority.

Except that Obama has somewhat pointedly been avoiding lies during his presidency. (http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/)

91 promises kept vs. 15 promises broken. That's a pretty good track record right there. Obama has been doing what he said he would do during his campaign.

It's the internet era, and as such it's pretty simple to keep track of accountability.

  I didn't claim "President Obama is a liar for cutting NASA funding" (I think he cut the Constellation Program, the over all funding of NASA may have actually increased) in my previous post.  However I did allude to this, didn't I?  I stated a few observations and mentioned that it brought a particular saying to mind about politicians being liars.  I do think that important issues should be discussed, however I don't like attacking some one's character, speaking poorly about some one or showing little respect to some one.

"That is why jobs must be our number one focus in 2010, and that is why I am calling for a new jobs bill tonight." 2010 State of the Union Address  (http://stateoftheunionaddress.org/2010-barack-obama) yet he plans to cancel the Constellation Program, which will undoubtedly result in result in job losses.  Infer from this what you will.

Interesting,


 On the flip-side (there is almost always another side, isn't there?) I'd like to point out that he has kept 91 promises out of 503 made according to your link.  That is failing, and failing hard in any class I have taken.  275 of them are still 'in the works'.  Eighty-something are 'stalled'.  Those are just his 'campaign promises'.  

Let us look at President Obama's file (http://www.politifact.com/personalities/barack-obama/).  65 True statements out of 236 statements.  So his track record, according to this 'file' on Polticalfact.com, of stating a true statement is about 25%.  That is not a very respectable number by any stretch.  Even if you give him 'Mostly True' statements then he is at about 47% truthfulness rate.  Still quite underwhelming.  But if we compare President Obama's truthfulness to say, Sarah Palin her statements are 'True' about 24% of the time.  Including 'Mostly True' statements Palin's truthfulness comes in around 39 percent.  Looks to me like *no shock here* politicians aren't very truthful.  ::)  So it is no surprise that statements like "How can you tell a politician is lying?  When his lips are moving" are popular in the public.

President Obama hasn't been doing what he said he would do during his campaign. (http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/promise/240/tougher-rules-against-revolving-door-for-lobbyists/)  The very link you posted shows that he has broken a number of campaign promises already and has many yet to fulfill.

The Ares rockets were going to launch the Orion spacecraft (the space shuttle's replacement), but looks like their funding through the Constellation Program may fall through because of President Obama's decision.

PS I have learned that the Constellation Program looks AMAZING (http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/constellation/main/) and some of the space program's useful technologies (http://www.spacecoalition.com/products.cfm). :handthumbsupR:

I am not for, or against, a particular political party (who people tend to appear to treat like sports teams) or person.  
I am for the preservation and expansion of our liberties and much prefer virtuous and trustworthy character in our leaders.  

BigLon, I know the recent elections in Massachusetts are getting everybody excited, but Obama's still got two and a half years left (at the least!). I'm not sure how you expect him to accomplish every single goal within a single year of taking office.

Two and a half years left, wow, time sure goes by quickly.  A change from one liberty encroaching politician to another isn't going to improve things too much.  I hope that the US gets a president of good character and values the peoples' liberty.

The President tends to decide time critical decisions.  He can make some very important choices and influence congress.  However it is usually up to congress to ensure the president's agenda is brought to reality.  I don't expect President Obama to accomplish every single goal within a year of taking office, or even within his entire duration in office.  As we have already seen, he won't be able, or is unlikely, to accomplish all of his five hundred some odd campaign promises. Wow, that is really a lot of promises, and it is impressive that he has already kept ninety some odd of them, and is working on a couple hundred more.  I also understand that he isn't the one solely responsible for being unable to keep his campaign promises.

Obama speaks at House Republican retreat in Baltimore:

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ-RzMNUO7k

Transcript: http://projects.washingtonpost.com/obama-speeches/speech/173/

Basically, Obama answering questions from Republicans.  I'd love to see more of this.  It was a great discussion - very civil and friendly - and I think Obama handled himself very well.  Watch it.

This is slowly turning into another "libertarian vs. socialist" debate, just like the drugs thread.

let's all just take this quiz and post the results then.
http://www.theadvocates.org/quizp/index.html

LIBERAL
Your PERSONAL issues Score is 70%.
Your ECONOMIC issues Score is 20%.

I got the exact same result as you.  :lol:

That's a pretty clever quiz.

Got 100% personal, 40% economical (liberal).

Always liked the political compass quiz (http://www.politicalcompass.org) more, however, mostly for having more issues to ask about.

(http://i49.tinypic.com/143lrhc.png)

Took that one too, here are my results:
(http://www.politicalcompass.org/facebook/pcgraphpng.php?ec=-6.50&soc=-5.95)

It's interesting that I'm considered more of a "libertarian" by this quiz even though I "strongly agreed" with a lot of questions about governmental control of the economy. I'd have expected to be more in-between.

Oh well...  :shrug2:

(http://www.politicalcompass.org/facebook/pcgraphpng.php?ec=-7.25&soc=-4.97)

Yeah, I knew I was pretty liberal.

Both those tests are pretty biased toward libertarianism. I'm surprised the advocates one isn't more biased, considering the site it's on.

(http://www.politicalcompass.org/facebook/pcgraphpng.php?ec=-4.25&soc=-3.59)

Granted, I know where I stand on each of those scales. I'm liberal because I don't think the government should control people's lives, but I do think regulating business is vital because an unregulated large business will do unethical things for profit (hell, they still do even with regulations).

large business wouldn't exist without government favors and lobbyists, though -- in a "natural" free market without special favors to some businesses over others, businesses tend to be small-scale and local. hong kong is an example of this; hong kong has basically the freest market in the world, but isn't dominated by huge corporations, it's instead dominated by small family-run businesses and some larger companies with employees in the hundreds. truly large corporations (the ones with tens of thousands of employees) require laws to keep their competitors out of business, subsidies, special favors, and so on. without that they collapse.

huh, that quote is weird -- my middle name is valentin, not valentine. and i don't favor laissez faire capitalism, for other reasons. i'm more a mutualist. capitalists tend to be far more trusting and forgiving of corporations than i am. and i don't read science fiction; the last sci fi novel i read was prolly 15 years ago, so i'm not sure what that quote is talking about.

The relative small size of Hong Kong may also be a factor?

yes, but consider that the US's population during the industrial revolution was about or only slightly larger than the population of Hong Kong today, and yet the 19th century US had horribly large corporations that were far worse than the ones we have today, and far bigger and more monopolistic

tru dat

Paul, you contribute educated and interesting input to these discussions.  Thanks.

I recently found this quote by President Obama, I thought it was kind of related to the recent comments of this thread.
"My administration is the only thing between you [CEO's] and the pitchforks. " - President Barak Obama

We the people can't change anything without lobbying.  We the people don't have anywhere near the amount of money the corporations have to lobby with.

We are no longer individuals.

Corporations are individuals.

We are cells now.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Corporation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Corporation)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIB9FWKYNJ0 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIB9FWKYNJ0)
America: Freedom to Fascism

Liberal, 100%/40%
(http://www.politicalcompass.org/facebook/pcgraphpng.php?ec=-2.00&soc=-6.05)