Comments Posted By Travis Monitor
Displaying 81 To 90 Of 175 Comments
NO DOUBTING TED KENNEDY'S IMPACT ON HISTORY
A senator like Ted Kennedy has an enormous amount of power and influence. That power extends to all the constituents in his state as well. No voter in his right mind would want to give up that kind of influence, even if it was based on principal.
Spoken like a liberal Democrat.
I find that Republicans get bounced for scandals more easily because Republicans think "that guy is a scumbag, I wont vote for him again" while liberal Democrats think "I dont care what he does off-hours, even if he's an SOB, he's *my* SOB." Different voter mindset.How about the simple principle that power corrupts and that when powerful people act corruptly, the citizen voters need to boot that powerful person out of office to cleanse the office of corruption? .. Or more simply having some standards of ethical and legal behavior for officeholders? Would you hire a felon to be your accountant? your lawyer? your doctor? Then why accept it in your senator?
The fact is that the Kennedy family power was used and abused to get Ted Kennedy off of a vehicle homocide conviction after he got Mary Jo Kopechne killed.
Leo Damore's "Senatorial Privilege" went through the details of exactly what Kennedy did and didnt do that caused the painful Chappaquiddick death of Mary Jo Kopechne, which included not just driving her off the bridge, but also fleeing the scene at a time Mary Jo was still alive. He swam 1/4 mile to the mainland then went to sleep and reported it to nobody until the next day; He didnt ask for help, but was trying to make up an alibi. the neck brace? A fake for media manipulation to make him look more injured than he was. So it wasnt merely careless drunk driving but abandoning a drowning victim at the scene of an accident at a time when *she was still alive*. Some people think it was just a drunk driving situation but it went beyond that. He killed her.
The Kennedy family manipulated the local DAs and judges to get Kennedy off so he did not have to face the serious charges that would have been filed had he been anyone else. What was is said about watergate? the coverup was worse than the crime? well, in this case the underly crime was bad enough but the coverup compounded it. It took Damore to unwind what really happened. There are drunk drivers who get life in prison for less intent/action to kill than what Kennedy did.
See:
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 27.08.2009 @ 12:25
http://www.amazon.com/Senatorial-Privilege-Chappaquiddick-Leo-Damore/dp/0895265648
"Maybe people felt more comfortable with him precisely because of his failings. Is there no redemption from past sins even if you try hard?"
Why do only Democrat politicians get this kind of get-of-jail-free card treatment though? Being able to manipulate the justice system and the media so he could literally get away with murder (or at least manslaughter) made him a more 'comfortable' man for Massachusetts voters? Such a crime and abuse of power is forgivable enough to re-elect him again and again? I dont get that.
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 26.08.2009 @ 22:45
"and if you’re opposed to the bill that should scare the crap out of you. It could easily guilt/motivate the Dems to stop being factional and coalese into a filibuster-proof wave."
Since ObamaCare is a trillion dollar massive expansion in Government spending, control and taxation, it fits quite well in the Kennedyesque mold of liberalism run amok. A crypto-socialistic monstrosity that undermines our fiscal future and puts govt more involved in our lives is a better monument than say naming an airport or aircraft carrier.
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 26.08.2009 @ 22:39
YES, BUT DON'T CALL THEM UNPATRIOTIC
My 911 project ... showing a 911 history video to our kids.
As they said of the Holocaust - NEVER FORGET.
Here's some other good ones:
"I plan on telling people about Islamic terrorism and all the death and pain it causes globally on a daily basis.""I plan to spend 9/11 actively working to get every last Liberal out of public office on election day. That is the greatest memorial I can think of to those who perished on 9/11."
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 24.08.2009 @ 23:20
"September 11, 2009 is the inaugural 9/11 National Day of Service, which will be the culmination of President Obama's Summer of Service. Greater DC Cares will support this effort by engaging more than 2,200 volunteers in the region in service on that day. Participants will clean parks, serve meals to the hungry, restore our national monuments, organize public libraries, and much more! Individuals and organizations who answer the call to action will recognize that together we can transform a day of sorrow into a day of service."
***restore our national monuments*** .... Huh, ARE THEY GOING TO TRY TO REBUILD THE WTC????
BTW, it wasnt a day of sorrow, it was a day when our enemies attacked us. A day of infamy.
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 24.08.2009 @ 23:15
"Finally… does the idea of a National Day of Service offend you? OK, then come up with a better idea."
Call 9/11 "Infamy Day", a day to remember all the victims of terrorism, and all the heroes who've died fighting against terrorists of many types.
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 24.08.2009 @ 23:13
"Well, if Bush had asked Americans to do something other than shop after 9/11,"
Strawman alert!
"Yep. But it’s not a quote from anyone who was on the teleconference, or in the Obama administration. It’s a claim from the single anonymous source" If it was anonymous, how do you know its not someone on the conf call?
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 24.08.2009 @ 23:11
"Reagan was the greatest modern president, he turned the US into a debtor nation"
- false, debt/GDP and deficit/GDP wasnt much higher when he left office then when he entered ,
"cut social programs"
- false, spending was higher in 1988 than 1980, thanks in part to an economy that grew by 1/3rd
" supported Sadam, literally ignoring him using WMD on his own people"
- false, Secty of State George Schultz explicitly condemned it in 1988
"sold Iran thousands of missiles"
- exaggeration
"armed and trained those who became the Taliban and Al Qaeda"
- false, one of those urban legends
", and married religion with conservatism."
- false, Reagan no more married the two than say FDR with his prayer on D-Day or Jimmy Carter touting his Baptist Sunday school teacher background or Clinton campaigning in black churches. if anything, Reagan merely extended America's traditional attachment to religious values as a part of a reaction to the excesses of 60's secularist liberalism. (In other words, the 'culture wars' are wholly a product not of the 'religious right' but the 'irreligious left' who's activism awakened a response from people of faith seeing their values maligned and crushed by political elites.)Meanwhile, you missed that whole "Reagan cut taxes and reinvigorated the American economy" elephant in the room, leading to an expansion that grew the economy by one-third in 7 years.
As Rick M. put it: "Your grasp of Reagan and history is outrageously shallow, incomplete, and skewed by ideology. " ... The left doesnt understand Reagan, and someday because of that they will be condemned to repeat the experience.
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 23.08.2009 @ 16:43
"At heart, America is a profoundly conservative country in that First Principles, a respect for our past, and supporting change only when that change can be folded into tradition, is believed and supported by a large majority. This doesn’t mean that the out of bounds hasn’t been moving left the last 100 years. We are also, at bottom, a practical people, and see real benefit to growing government when the occasion calls for it. This too, makes us an exceptional people in that despite all, the people still have a big say in how big a government they will accept."
Well said. Americans are conservative in the sense of revering our founding traditions of Jefferson/Adams/Washington and our Constitution etc., pragmatic, and distrustful of Big Government ... Obama is crossing all those lines (tradition vs change, pragmatism vs ideology, big govt vs people) with the mad rush to 'not waste a crisis' and impose an ideologically driven solution to a complex solution. He might have gotten away with it had he not already stuffed the plate full with bailouts, stimulus, massive budget deficits, and a CO2 cap&trade bill.
I think the crisis with Obama's leadership has not come to a head yet and wrote today in my own blog:
If President Obama attempts to 'fix' his problems with salesmanship, he will fail. The problem is fundamental: Obama has the wrong focus, the wrong agenda, the wrong priorities, and the wrong ideas. It is an ultimate act of mis-leadership by President Obama, and an act of ideology triumphing over common sense, that he pursues his command-and-control programmatic agenda, including these ten items (top 10 power grabs), while failing to focus on economic recovery and private sector job creation as Job One.
http://travismonitor.blogspot.com/2009/08/big-govt-agenda-goes-clunkety-clunk.html
It will only be worse should our economy get on with its (likely tepid) recovery. The deficits and over-spending will still be egregious but the excuse that govt pump-priming is needed will be unavailable. If Obama/Pelosi Dem leadership doesnt "get it" that HE is the one off course, not the protesters, then expect a Tsunami rejection of Dems in 2010/2012.
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 23.08.2009 @ 14:59
YOU COULDN'T PAY ME TO BE A DOCTOR
"This is another example of a situation where free-market capitalism does not work."
Hardly. This is another example of a situation where an industry hemmed in by heavy regulation ends up being very costly and the regulations end up being counterproductive.
Healthcare and health insurance havent been free-market capitalism for many many decades. Over-regulation got us into this mess and the same approach wont get us out."Is health care a commodity? Yes, "
It's an economic good. There is no free lunch."but it can still be a human right, too."
Comment Posted By Travis Monitor On 22.08.2009 @ 22:59
If healthcare is a right, our right to be able to *choose* our insurance company, and *choose* what it provides or doesnt - rather than have govt dictate it all - is included. Govt dictation on healthcare is a denial of our rights. If healthcare is a *right*, then rights are denied when single-payer bureaucracies deny care based on rigid rules and bean-counting. If you call yourself 'pro-choice' but are 'pro-mandates' or even worse 'pro-single-payer', you are a hypocrite or a dunce.
