[www.nytimes.com]

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Ms. S represents the "RINOs". She supported the stimulus, abortion rights yadda yadda. Ideologically there was little difference between her and the Democratic candidate. At least now, Hoffman won't muddy up the water. He'll have to stand on his conservative values and the people will have a clear choice. It will be an interesting race.

---

The solution to the problem is to find a solution to the problem.

"She supported the stimulus"

LOL - The "we don't want it'"s have lined up and begged for it
In Texas, Arizona and other Repub strongholds - all talk and no walk there

Google yourself - Rick Perry begging for funds for NASA, Jon Kyl saying that they should cancel it
and then crying (along with McCain) that they were being "threatened" when the White House offered to let them opt out.
And on and on and on - out there taking credit out of one side of their mouth while denouncing with the other.

So are Rick "The Secessionist" Perry and Jon Kyl RINO's too ?

How about Kit Bond ? Rep. John Mica from your state boasting of it's contribution to light rail - he a RINO ?
Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska boasting about it being a "victory for the Alaska Native contracting program
and other Alaska small business owners" RINO ?

I wonder how many of these RINOs will be featuring the money they "brought home" in their reelection promos.

---

There were many true conservatives who opposed TARP bailouts and the stimulus, but once the stimulus was passed they'd be crazy to opt out and lose money for their districts.

Some would say that Scozzafava's dropping out made Sarah Palin look brilliant.

---

The solution to the problem is to find a solution to the problem.

---

"Who exactly is the third-party maverick arousing such ardor? Hoffman doesn’t even live in the district.
When he appeared before the editorial board of The Watertown Daily Times 10 days ago, he “showed no grasp”
of local issues, as the subsequent editorial put it. Hoffman complained that he should have
received the questions in advance — blissfully unaware that they had been asked
by the paper in an editorial on the morning of his visit.

Last week it turned out that Hoffman’s prime attribute to the radical right —
as a take-no-prisoners fiscal conservative — was bogus. In fact he’s on the finance committee
of a hospital that happily helped itself to a $479,000 federal earmark.

Then again, without the federal government largess that the tea party crowd so deplores,
New York’s 23rd would be a Siberia of joblessness. The biggest local employer is
the pork-dependent military base, Fort Drum."

yep - flippin' brilliant

Frank Rich pretty much nails it [www.nytimes.com]

---

That was good, mick e.

Over the heads of most here, though.

Quote
lafinfil
"Who exactly is the third-party maverick arousing such ardor? Hoffman doesn’t even live in the district.
When he appeared before the editorial board of The Watertown Daily Times 10 days ago, he “showed no grasp”
of local issues, as the subsequent editorial put it. Hoffman complained that he should have
received the questions in advance — blissfully unaware that they had been asked
by the paper in an editorial on the morning of his visit.

Last week it turned out that Hoffman’s prime attribute to the radical right —
as a take-no-prisoners fiscal conservative — was bogus. In fact he’s on the finance committee
of a hospital that happily helped itself to a $479,000 federal earmark.

Then again, without the federal government largess that the tea party crowd so deplores,
New York’s 23rd would be a Siberia of joblessness. The biggest local employer is
the pork-dependent military base, Fort Drum."

yep - flippin' brilliant

Frank Rich pretty much nails it [www.nytimes.com]

Login only, sorry.

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Not here.

---

Where, then?

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Somewhere else, perhaps.

---

Quote
Black
Login only, sorry.

I have found that if you go to Google news and enter the title of the article from the NYT login page, it will usually give a link to a full article that works. Sometimes all it needs is session cookies.

The G.O.P. Stalinists Invade Upstate New York

---

"FUNDIT"

I am sorry but if you were looking for a watery Republican you could wean away for those votes that matter you will be disappointed. Republican party should be the home of conservatisms. If you don't like it there are plenty of Democrats out there.

And please don't shed crocodile tears for the fall of Republican party. If what happened in New York really hurt the Republicans Frank Rich wouldn't get so wound up about it.

We'll see on Tuesday who was right.

---

Apple should give all thier shareholders thier money back, too.

So now Ms. S throws her support to the Democrat. Why am I not surprised. The Republican party is now like the movie X-Man. You have to figure out who the real Repubs are and who are the fakes.

[www.foxnews.com]

---

The solution to the problem is to find a solution to the problem.

I didn't think she would go this far. What did I tell you before this endorsement? It is much better to smoke her out now than later when she is in congress and decides to side with Pelosi. No wonder Frank Rich was besides himself. He wasn't worried about the health of the Republican party. Their plant was outed before the battle began. That's why.

---

Quote
swampy
The Republican party is now like the movie X-Man. You have to figure out who the real Repubs are and who are the fakes.

That's kind of clever- who said it?

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Can you explain to me in very simple words why anyone besides the current GOP leadership
would be "beside himself" watching the party being further marginalized by the teabaggers and carpetbaggers.

Perhaps Gignrich and Steele are beside themselves after seeing the candidate they endorsed get tossed aside
by the influence of a 1/2 term quitter that doesn't even poll well in the friendly confines of Fox News (3rd place with 17% in July)

---

Starting to sound like Connecticut Dems and Lamont. For the far right to put a seat that's never been represented by a Dem into play seems like the height of party irresponsibility.

I never had such elaborate dreams before, but it does begin to appear that the GOP may be working towards imploding into a marginal third party. Which is not easy when there's only two major parties to begin with.

---

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/01/2009 10:49PM by $tevie.

Perhaps Pelosi could hold her position and Obama could get re-elected if they actually DID something.


By this time in his administration, George W. Bush had taken an optimistic, fun-loving, freedom-enjoying country into the deepest of xenophobic paranoia and right to the brink of war...

Not exactly laudable, but something happened by November 2, 2001.

Quote
Mac-A-Matic
By this time in his administration, George W. Bush had taken an optimistic, fun-loving, freedom-enjoying country into the deepest of xenophobic paranoia and right to the brink of war...

Not exactly laudable, but something happened by November 2, 2001.

[www.theonion.com]

Quote
$tevie
I never had such elaborate dreams before, but it does begin to appear that the GOP may be working towards imploding into a marginal third party.

This is how the media and the pundit have scared Republicans from simply adhering to their core beliefs. If what you are saying is true Frank Rich wouldn't come unhinged. He would be celebrating. In fact, he would keep quite and let conservatives take over the Republican party. Fact of the matter is just the opposite. Republicans win if they just go back to what they once stood for. The "moderates" will then have to make up their minds. There are no "Moderates" party.

By endorsing Owens, Scaz validated every accusation hurled at her.

---

>>Republicans win if they just go back to what they once stood for.

Yes, and perhaps bring the stove pipe hat back into fashion.

---

Republicans did not used to represent the right wing fringe. I am old enough to remember when the party was dignified. Pandering to religious fundamentalists and fascists has ruined the GOP.

---

Quote
$tevie
Republicans did not used to represent the right wing fringe. I am old enough to remember when the party was dignified. Pandering to religious fundamentalists and fascists has ruined the GOP.

Pandering to leftist radicals and socialists has ruined the Democratic party.

---

The solution to the problem is to find a solution to the problem.

Socialists. The imaginary bugaboo of the right wing.

---

$tevie, just what do you call a guy who is on record as saying he wants to "spread the wealth around?" I was giving him the benefit of the doubt by saying Socialist. I could have said Marxist, Communist or Fascist.

Any way you look at it, he's taking my tax dollars and giving it to other people to buy cars, or houses or health insurance.

---

The solution to the problem is to find a solution to the problem.

Swampy, if you want to freak out about one little quote then I won't stop you.

---

Quote
$tevie
Pandering to religious fundamentalists and fascists has ruined the GOP.

Please save your crocodile tears. The last time we listened to you it gave us McCain and Specter. This time we'll do it our way. What is the worst that could happen? Lose?

---

The worst for you has already happened! The corrupted Repugnant-Con party is down and out, possibly never to recover again.

In my book, this is a good thing!

Also, we're still laughing at you, rabies breath!

Pandering to the religious nutters and fascists was a one trick pony. Geedubya did that and took the dems (and the moderate repubs) by surprise since it added significantly to the republican base before the moderate repubs got wind of the fact that the party had abandoned their values.

As $tevie notes, the republican party of our youth had some dignity and there were plenty of people who would look at both the repub and dem offerings and weigh them equally to assess who to vote for. Since that time, both dems and repubs have moved far to the right, the dems ending up in the middle (about where Nixon would be today) and the repubs flying off the deep end into nutcase land.

The word "socialist" as used by the right wing talk radio nutters is simply code for "might raise taxes", nothing more.

---

"Man is a little germ that lives on an unimportant rock ball that revolves about a small star at the outskirts of an ordinary galaxy... ...I am absolutely amazed to discover myself on this rock ball rotating around a spherical fire. It’s a very odd situation. And the more I look at things I cannot get rid of the feeling that existence is quite weird." - Alan W. Watts

"Any way you look at it, he's taking my tax dollars and giving it to other people to buy cars, or houses or health insurance." swampy

How about giving back my tax dollars that paid for your cancer treatment.

Dakota, get an original thought of your own. You are such a dittohead. What you spew is the same crap Rush spouts everyday about conservatives and the Republican Party. It's thanks to his ilk that moderates and independents have run screaming from the Republican Party. When you quote tv and radio entertainers like Rush and Beck, it shows how inconsequential the Republican Party has become. Where are the leaders in the party? If Palin is your answer, Democrats have nothing to fear.

Quote
swampy
There were many true conservatives who opposed TARP bailouts and the stimulus, but once the stimulus was passed they'd be crazy to opt out and lose money for their districts.

Hypocrisy, def

the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavorior does not conform; pretense.

Quote
kanesa
Dakota, get an original thought of your own. You are such a dittohead. What you spew is the same crap Rush spouts everyday about conservatives and the Republican Party. It's thanks to his ilk that moderates and independents have run screaming from the Republican Party. When you quote tv and radio entertainers like Rush and Beck, it shows how inconsequential the Republican Party has become. Where are the leaders in the party? If Palin is your answer, Democrats have nothing to fear.

Heh, heh, the sweat on you fingers as you type these words says otherwise my friend. Take those fleeing independents, please. They are all yours. However, the polls say just the opposite. It is Obama who is turning them off. As for Palin, which I am not her fan by any means, with a computer and a few facebook post tied up your entire healthcare operation for the whole summer. You could barely dig out from under the death panel questions. And now she was the first out of the gate to expose Scoz for what she really is. Not bad.

---

Quote
Dakota

Quote
kanesa
Dakota, get an original thought of your own. You are such a dittohead. What you spew is the same crap Rush spouts everyday about conservatives and the Republican Party. It's thanks to his ilk that moderates and independents have run screaming from the Republican Party. When you quote tv and radio entertainers like Rush and Beck, it shows how inconsequential the Republican Party has become. Where are the leaders in the party? If Palin is your answer, Democrats have nothing to fear.

Heh, heh, the sweat on you fingers as you type these words says otherwise my friend. Take those fleeing independents, please. They are all yours. However, the polls say just the opposite. It is Obama who is turning them off. As for Palin, which I am not her fan by any means, with a computer and a few facebook post tied up your entire healthcare operation for the whole summer. You could barely dig out from under the death panel questions. And now she was the first out of the gate to expose Scoz for what she really is. Not bad.

Tip:
When you know your posts are being intensely scrutinized and you're surrounded by detractors ready to pounce on the slightest slip with the harshest imagineable judgement, you might think about
1) spelling
2) grammar
3) making some sort of sense.

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Scrutinize this.

---

Oh, one more thing. You want a piece with perfect grammar and spelling? This should make you happy.

In Iowa, Second Thoughts on Obama

By JEFF ZELENY
Published: November 2, 2009
WILLIAMSBURG, Iowa — Pauline McAreavy voted for President Obama. From the moment she first saw him two years ago, she was smitten by his speeches and sold on his promise of change. She switched parties to support him in the Iowa caucuses, donated money and opened her home to a pair of young campaign workers.

But by the time she received a fund-raising letter last month from the Democratic National Committee, a sense of disappointment had set in. She returned the solicitation with a handwritten note, saying, “Until I see some progress and he lives up to his promises in Iowa, we will not give one penny.”

“All my Republican friends — and independents — are sitting back saying, ‘Oh, what did we do?” Ms. McAreavy said. “I’m not to that point yet, but a lot of people are.”

But an erosion of support from independents and disapproval from Republicans suggests that the coalition Mr. Obama built to win the White House is frayed.

---

It's hard to make progress when you are shoveling 8 years of piled up shit and the people responsible for the shit keep poking you with sticks.

Quote
Dakota
Oh, one more thing. You want a piece with perfect grammar and spelling? This should make you happy.

In Iowa, Second Thoughts on Obama

By JEFF ZELENY
Published: November 2, 2009
WILLIAMSBURG, Iowa — Pauline McAreavy voted for President Obama. From the moment she first saw him two years ago, she was smitten by his speeches and sold on his promise of change. She switched parties to support him in the Iowa caucuses, donated money and opened her home to a pair of young campaign workers.

But by the time she received a fund-raising letter last month from the Democratic National Committee, a sense of disappointment had set in. She returned the solicitation with a handwritten note, saying, “Until I see some progress and he lives up to his promises in Iowa, we will not give one penny.”

“All my Republican friends — and independents — are sitting back saying, ‘Oh, what did we do?” Ms. McAreavy said. “I’m not to that point yet, but a lot of people are.”

But an erosion of support from independents and disapproval from Republicans suggests that the coalition Mr. Obama built to win the White House is frayed.

A year ago everyone thought we were plummeting headlong into an all-out crash and a full-blown depression.
Remember?
Yeah, I didn't think so.

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Quote
Black
A year ago everyone thought we were plummeting headlong into an all-out crash and a full-blown depression.
Remember?
Yeah, I didn't think so.

Thank god that Obama saved us from that!

Quote
Dennis S
It's hard to make progress when you are shoveling 8 years of piled up shit and the people responsible for the shit keep poking you with sticks.

Does this presume to state that democrats did not have their hand in shoveling the shit up our asses?

Perhaps if Obama faced a hostile republican dominated Congress there could be some sympathy for the lack of forward progress our government has made, but with a democrat controlled White House and Congress, should there really be any impediment for progress and change? Especially since it was the democrats who hyped and promised "hope" and "change" for the two years prior?

As it stands, the republicans can't even stage a filibuster to delay legislation, what's stopping us from moving forward?

I'm constantly amused (and repulsed) by those of you who continue to believe that this is some sort of dem v. rep kind of thing. The people are/have been getting screwed by the government yet we choose to be blinded by some sort of liberal/conservative ideology that our politicians don't actually believe or follow.

With no means of blocking legislation, the republicans are essentially castrated. Time to make the changes that were promised. But the reality is that the dems are just as guilty as the republicans and have their own agendas at heart, regardless of party affiliation.

Obama's mistakes were letting Congress screw around writing the legislation and then not using the nuclear option to shove a White House crafted bill through. All this effort to make Congress feel like part of the process and not tick some people off has resulted in ticking EVERYbody off.

---

Present.

---

Quote
$tevie
Obama's mistakes were letting Congress screw around writing the legislation and then not using the nuclear option to shove a White House crafted bill through. All this effort to make Congress feel like part of the process and not tick some people off has resulted in ticking EVERYbody off.

What??? No way is Obama gonna do the work. First off, I don't think he would know where to begin.

---

The solution to the problem is to find a solution to the problem.

Quote
$tevie
Obama's mistakes were letting Congress screw around writing the legislation and then not using the nuclear option to shove a White House crafted bill through. All this effort to make Congress feel like part of the process and not tick some people off has resulted in ticking EVERYbody off.

Or, he intentionally took the focus off the economy long enough to take away the daily jitters and allow things to level off/normalize.
Hard to know what effect the current administration's actions have had since there's no "control" universe.

Does anyone whining that we were promised "change" and didn't get it really think we have the same administration as the Bush/Cheney white house?

---

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.

Quote
swampy

Quote
$tevie
Obama's mistakes were letting Congress screw around writing the legislation and then not using the nuclear option to shove a White House crafted bill through. All this effort to make Congress feel like part of the process and not tick some people off has resulted in ticking EVERYbody off.

What??? No way is Obama gonna do the work. First off, I don't think he would know where to begin.

Let's let the digs at Obama go by for now and concentrate on this question: do you actually believe that what comes out of any denizen of the White House is personally worked on by the President of the United States all by his lonesome? Do you really think this is how it works?

---

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/03/2009 12:34PM by $tevie.

Quote
Black
Does anyone whining that we were promised "change" and didn't get it really think we have the same administration as the Bush/Cheney white house?

I'm with you on that, honestly. I also don't believe that one year is long enough to really "change" anything.

But I just think that the health care reform legislation went awry and gave Obama's enemies the idea that he was vulnerable. I would have preferred to see him kick some butt. Especially some Democratic butt.

---

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/03/2009 12:36PM by $tevie.

Quote
$tevie

Quote
swampy

What??? No way is Obama gonna do the work. First off, I don't think he would know where to begin.

Let's let the digs at Obama go by for now and concentrate on this question: do you actually believe that what comes out of any denizen of the White House is personally worked on by the President of the United States all by his lonesome? Do you really think this is how it works?

She probably doesn't. But in Obama's case, it's because he's, you know, lazy.