uncool2pillow

Your 2nd point may be valid. The 1st and last have little to to do with demonstrating a belief that the poor only have themselves to blame. He thinks (quite probably in error, I'll grant) that tax cuts to the rich will create jobs and grow the economy.

Speaking of Dickens, I'm reading A Tale of Two Cities. I'm taking it too slow. I love his descriptive writing.

How? His campaign seems to be built on the principle that Obama's stimulus (govt programs) have failed to help the unemployed. Elect him and he will empower the job creators to help those who are. Now, I'm not saying he's right, but how does he demonstrate that he believes poverty is one's own fault?

There's a difference between believing that poverty is one's own fault and simply believing that government programs cannot alleviate poverty.

That New Yorker piece was phenomenal. A couple of great quotes from Van Zant about Springsteen's relationship with his dad as an archetype of the 60s generation gap and another when Van Zant confronted Bruce about writing songs for his fans, not for himself.

Under any circumstances? I'll assume this is either a misstatement or ignorant ideasm.

Liriano v. The Twins should be fun tonight.

I know this is a joke, and I appreciate it, but (and it's easy to say this now as a 41 year old) wars should include drafts and bonds. If it's important enough to go to war, it's important enough for all of us. And when we go to war we should expect sacrifice through service or financial burden to pay for it.

That's a serious concern. I think it's much more likely, though, that he stand aside to let Israel bomb their reactors. Obama could very well let Israel do the same thing. I don't see Iran's quest for a nuclear weapon ending well at all.

I saw the Smithereens in college. I'd forgotten about them until I saw your post. Added 'em to Spotify. Thanks.

Well hello there.

Yes, and it goes both ways. Romney misspoke, Obama misspoke. Just like LouieB pointed out about Romney's Olympic foot in the mouth, this will happen 100s of times before the election.

IRDB doesn't hypothesize what other people think, he tells us based upon little evidence at best. In the past few pages of this thread he's done it to me, Jules, and now the presumptive Republican candidate. Mitt Romney's policies are clearly based upon the idea that if the rich pay less taxes and have more money they will help stimulate the economy. You certainly can argue that that's wrong and that it hurts the poor and creates bigger deficits. I would agree with much of that. But to say that Romney sees poverty or struggling as a sign of personal weakness is crazier than Obama seeing

Does he have more than one of those jackets? What does it smell like at this point? All those hot, sweaty outdoor gigs.

Once again you demonstrate expertise at knowing what other people think.

But you don't go to our most reliable ally in the world the day before the Olympics opening ceremony and say they're not ready. Diplomacy means knowing how and when to state the truth.

Romney's statement on the UK and the Olympics... Wow. What on earth would compel him to say things like that.

1) Texas doen't stike me as a battleground state. 2) An ounce of prevention and all that. I don't even know why I keep coming back to this issue when it's not really important to me either way. I suppose it's not to persuade people that it's a good law, but that there are some decent people who support it and decent reasons to,support it so long as we make sure it's not such a burden to access a photo id.

I was just hoping to get an acknowledgement that there is some bipartisan support for this idea and it's not all about racist attempts to disenfranchise. I guess I'll have to rethink my opinion of Carter.

Six minutes of that kind of noise on NBC isn't bad.

The report of a commission headed by Jimmy Carter and James Baker to Build Confidence in U.S. elections: http://www1.american.edu/ia/cfer/report/full_report.pdf p. 18 (sect. 2.5) deals with their recommendation on photo IDs.

You excel at telling us what people you disagree with think. Yesterday, you told me why I am a conservative, today, you sum up Jules' beliefs.

Yep, like Geo. Lucas, Lou Reed has enough of my $$.

That was a pretty entertaining 2 minutes. Here's a link to my favorite. http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2012/07/wilco_lee_field.html#comment-937498 Admittedly, a large percentage of the commenters there probably aren't Vegan, but I always did picture Vegans as a little less high strung than many of the comments indicate.

I have a friend who saw him a few months ago and thought he was really reaching the end. I'm glad to see he's off the next tour. I hope he's not being pushed too hard for others' financial interests.