"If you've got a business, you didn't build that."

[tonyz]

I just read Mark46th's comments and agree. Moreover, my .02 below.

Originally Posted by Sigaba

Rather than pursuing the more difficult task of proving that the president is a "Marxist" (which, in my opinion, requires actual research rather than "duck tests"), why not pick the low hanging fruit by reverse engineering the president's policy preferences and rhetoric within the framework of American political philosophy?

IMO, now, that is potentially fruitful (pun intended) and something that even I might understand.

Originally Posted by Sigaba

MOO, the president is leading Romney into a trap when he says that this election is a debate over narratives.

At present, Americans are more interested in here and now solutions than in the big picture questions.

I also found your earlier comments to be interesting.

Is this not another election that offers the very real opportunity for the candidates to illustrate bold policy differences ? To date, has Obama supported policies that exacerbate or actually address our undeniable economic problems?

To another of your points, if Romney can exit from the convention with not only a running mate, but with, for example 10 solutions to obvious matters of national concern (my gosh it, can't be that difficult - tax policy, energy, healthcare, and immigration policy alone, should yield 10) he would do himself some good.

MOO, Romney had better define himself - fast - before the Obama crowd does.

For example, the Obama camp has already labeled Romney a felon - when Romney probably hasn't even met a felon. While in reality, Obama has had actual felons as supporters, friends and acquaintances - at least in the not so distant past.

Obama is "cool" - Romney is competent. Unfortunately, in this day and age cool trumps competent in the "minds" of too many. Culturally, that is a real challenge for Romney.

[Dusty]

Originally Posted by mark46th

I agree , the right shouldn't be pointing out POTUS as a socialist/marxist. He does that for himself with regularity. Also, it won't change anyone's mind on the left. The left knows who he is and embraces it. We should pin Obama's ears back on the economy and his lack of awareness there of, every time he goes off topic...

I don't do it to change anybody on the left's mind, Brother; I do it to fire people up to vote this time.

[tonyz]

Like many, I was not excited about Romney - don't get me wrong - I was ABBO but I had not read about Romney's undergraduate and graduate education - when so much is made of Obama's.

This guy was no slouch. I also suspect that given his background, he understands what a it takes to build, lead and manage a business organization.

Excerpt:

"Romney graduated high school in 1965 and promptly enrolled in Stanford University. However, his stay there was cut short, and he traveled to France to begin missionary work on behalf of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a popular activity among the Mormon youths at the time. He spent the next two and a half years there cycling around the countryside dressed in formal black attire, attempting to convert the mainly Catholic residents to his faith. Disaster struck six months before he left for home when he was involved in an automobile accident. A Catholic priest, believed to be under the influence, smashed into the car Romney was driving. He was thrown right out of the vehicle, but did not suffer serious injuries. However, one of the passengers died in the accident. The experience proved to be a sobering one for Romney, as he would later recount.

Upon his return, he married his high school sweetheart, Ann, and soon after, enrolled in Brigham Young University. He graduated in 1971 with a Degree in English, with a 3.97GPA. His young family then moved to Boston, and Mitt enrolled in both Harvard Law (HLS) and Harvard Business School (HBS). He obtained his MBA from HBS in 1975 and graduated cum laude from HLS with his Juris Doctor the same year, finishing in the top 5% of his class."

http://2012.republican-candidates.or.../Education.php

Originally Posted by Badger52

His academic time is one thing. The list of what he said he'd do & what he stood for, versus what he's actually done counter to that, is of more import in my view. Many who did not look at the substance of his "watch the kind of people I surround myself with" remark are, admitted or not, suffering some buyer's remorse.

Couldn't the same be said for most Presidents? Two that come to mind are : George H W Bush's "Read my lips... No new taxes", and George W Bush's "No more nation-building!

[Dusty]

Originally Posted by WCH

Couldn't the same be said for most Presidents? Two that come to mind are : George H W Bush's "Read my lips... No new taxes", and George W Bush's "No more nation-building!

Yeah, you could say that. This thread's about being a communist, though. The Bush's weren't communists.

Obama apologists are so predictable with the "Bush blah-blah"; no matter what the f.ck Obama has done, Bush is worse.

[ddoering]

If they can't blame it on Bush then it must be racism......

[Hand]

How did Bush Jr's policies affect today's rate of unemployment, unprecedented federal debt, cities all across the country filing for bankruptcy and our current level of people sponging off of the borrowed money that uncle sugar is doling out?

Previous presidents have taken office with similar obstacles and managed to make improvements. Every day under the current administration is only worse than the last. When was the last time we heard some good news from the WH?

[Paslode]

Originally Posted by Hand

How did Bush Jr's policies affect today's rate of unemployment, unprecedented federal debt, cities all across the country filing for bankruptcy and our current level of people sponging off of the borrowed money that uncle sugar is doling out?

Previous presidents have taken office with similar obstacles and managed to make improvements. Every day under the current administration is only worse than the last. When was the last time we heard some good news from the WH?

We have kicked the can down the road through many administrations in a fashion that is synonymous with moving credit card balances, to a new credit card so you can keep spending on the old ones. Overtime that debt accumulates to a point where you cannot make your minimum payments or maintain your plastic lifestyle.

Bush Jr's also has TARP which bailed out the bankers for the sub-prime mortgage scheme.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trouble...Relief_Program

It's not that any one President caused the mess, it is that they allowed it to continue to some degree. I say to some degree because we have two Houses that create laws, control taxes and government spending.

[Hand]

Originally Posted by Paslode

We have kicked the can down the road through many administrations in a fashion that is synonymous with moving credit card balances, to a new credit card so you can keep spending on the old ones. Overtime that debt accumulates to a point where you cannot make your minimum payments or maintain your plastic lifestyle.

Yes sir, I understand, but I don't see this this as an unavoidable eventuality. We put a man on the moon and a satellite outside the solar system. We pioneered the automobile, the personal computer. Are we really not smart enough to reign in our excessive spending before we completely ruin our economy for good?

Originally Posted by Paslode

Bush Jr's also has TARP which bailed out the bankers for the sub-prime mortgage scheme.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trouble...Relief_Program

It's not that any one President caused the mess, it is that they allowed it to continue to some degree. I say to some degree because we have two Houses that create laws, control taxes and government spending.

I remember the debate leading up to TARP, I absolutely disagree with that decision. But then, since you brought that up, are you suggesting that it tipped some balance and sent the national debt into a free fall? By pointing at a Bush Jr bad policy, does that somehow remove Obama from any responsibility for his own mistakes or bad policies? Obama has his very own TARP and his is bigger, he also has this abortion of a health care bill. Can we say these are Obama's fault? Or are they also the result of previous administrations decisions?

Debt has actually fallen during Reagan and surprisingly Clinton's administrations. It can be done. I referenced not only debt, but unemployment, cities failing financially and the number of those on entitlement programs because there is no argument that previous administrations can be blamed for the current state of the country given those factors in consideration.

Our success as a nation rests squarely on the shoulders of free enterprise and personal liberty. These two things have been grossly restricted by this administration. There are countless examples scattered through out this forum of this happening. These cannot be blamed on Bush Jr.

While I disagree with what I'm about to say, for the sake of debate - Ill give you that responsibility for the debt isn't Obama's fault. Is there anything that he CAN be blamed for?

[Dusty]

http://www.foxnews.com/

Mitt Romney is starting to give anxious Republicans just what they want, moving from a defensive crouch over attacks on his Bain Capital record and launching a broadside against President Obama over the issue at the heart of the 2012 race -- jobs.

The Republican presidential candidate took to the stump Tuesday with a crowd-rallying vigor, and is unlikely to let up when he holds a town hall meeting Wednesday afternoon in Bowling Green, Ohio.

The spark, for Romney, was Obama's now-famous comment Friday in which he suggested businesses owe their success to government investment. While Romney has bounced among various themes in recent weeks, his speech to a Pennsylvania crowd Tuesday zeroed in on that quote as illustrating a singular difference between his attitude toward the economy and Obama's.

Romney described the comments as "stunning" and revealing" and argued they played into a larger narrative of Obama "changing the nature of America," calling his policies "extraordinarily foreign."

"In the past, people of both parties understood that encouraging achievement, encouraging success, encouraging people to lift themselves as high as they can, encouraging entrepreneur celebrating success instead of attacking it and denigrating makes America strong," he said.

Romney said Obama wants Americans to be "ashamed of success." He suggested the comment was tantamount to saying Steve Jobs didn't build Apple or Ray Kroc didn't build McDonald's, calling the notion "insulting" and wrong.

Snip

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by Hand

When was the last time we heard some good news from the WH?

I can't believe everyone hasn't read all the wonderful ways the current Administration has positively impacted decades of US history; after all, it's in the WH Presidential biographies.

[Dusty]

Originally Posted by Broadsword2004

I disagree with Sigaba that Obama is just a self-serving politician. That is more Romney IMO. Obama is a genuine leftist. That said, I disagree with Dusty on Obama being a Marxist. A Marxist doesn't believe in liberal democracy or any kind of private property ownership whatsoever. Remember, there are all kinds of leftist: pacifists and warmongers, nationalist socialists versus internationalist socialists, believers in liberal democracy versus believers in a "dictatorship of the proletariat," etc...George Orwell was a socialist. But he was no Marxist.

IMO, I see Obama as a classic European-style social democrat. Not an outright socialist, but believes in a much larger role for government in society then what has been the norm in America. He'd fit in perfectly with Britain's Labour party as it was during much of the 20th century, or in one of the leftwing parties of the Scandinavian countries (Finland, Sweden, Norway, etc...), or with France's Socialist party.

Regarding Romney, I think Romney's problem is that he is not a genuine conservative, so he sounds like cardboard in trying to talk like a conservative. He does not sound like a man who is well-versed in conservatism or conservative policies, but rather just as a politician who made the decision to run as a Republican and now must try to sound like a conservative.

Good points.

[tonyz]

Just to follow up on Broadsword2004's interesting observations - there is no magic in societal groups doing things together.

IMO, the magic of the free market system, among other things, is that a bunch of individuals (volunteers) have the initiative, self discipline, self-motivation to do things together because the system rewards it - or doesn't reward it, as the case may be.

But, not because the system makes you do it.

IMO, Obama is a statist who wants to - likes to - make you do things.

ETA: I am less clear on Romney's motivations as of yet. It is certainly not fame or money.

It might be interesting to have psych evaluations of both candidates.

[Dusty]

Originally Posted by tonyz

Just to follow up on Broadsword2004's interesting observations - there is no magic in societal groups doing things together.

IMO, the magic of the free market system, among other things, is that a bunch of individuals (volunteers) have the initiative, self discipline, self-motivation to do things together because the system rewards it - or doesn't reward it, as the case may be.

But, not because the system makes you do it.

IMO, Obama is a statist who wants to - likes to - make you do things.

It might be interesting to have psych evaluations of both candidates.

Well, Obama has marxist dreams, e.g.

"Marxism. noun...the system of economic and political thought developed by Karl Marx, along with Friedrich Engels, especially the doctrine that the state throughout history has been a device for the exploitation of the masses by a dominant class, that class struggle has been the main agency of historical change, and that the capitalist system, containing from the first the seeds of its own decay, will inevitably, after the period of the dictatorship of the proletariat, be superseded by a socialist order and a classless society. "

but constraints are forcing him into a more European-like socialist approach.

In a perfect world for Obama, the current have-nots (people on the dole) would be the only class, and the wealth collected by capitalists would be divvied up equally and given to the strugglers upon whose backs the capitalists trod for hundreds of years.

Have you read the novel, "Dreams From my Father'? (rhetorical)

[tonyz]

Originally Posted by Dusty

Well, Obama has marxist dreams...

He may well have - I've always preferred the term statist because IMO it is nebulous enough - but accurate enough - to described observable conduct (both actions and omissions) by the man.

Without a beer summit - and I ain't getting one of those - it is very difficult to gauge the man's true belief system.

That is a big part of the problem this election cycle - the press has given this guy such a free pass that we are left with only his statements and his actions and little understanding of his core beliefs and influences.

Only now, are some of those things coming to light.

ETA: While some have reported on his questionable associations and secrecy - unfortunately, those folks are quickly labeled kooks - oddly enough, occasionally, by those who claim to hate labels. Thus, IMO, there has never been a proper vetting process of this man. Maybe folks will realize what is at stake this go round and push the matter come hell or high water. Unfortunately, I think we still need some in the MSM to take up the charge.