This is a response to your earlier sociopathic rant.

Your arguments are amusing in spite of being blatantly incorrect, not only in their logic but in point of fact. 2,219 words, impressive - given that you used so many words, yet said nothing.

Your tactics are transparent. Republican politicians and media talking heads use them all the time. The Republican party teaches Young Republicans in high school and college how to “debate” without saying anything, all the time. People see these tactics everywhere, but it is more evident during election season when people like you attempt to dominate the blogosphere with your nonsense to prevent people from having any meaningful dialogue where they can see the facts and come to their own conclusions.

The fact that you used little factual information to support your positions; and when you did use facts, you used them to make statements disguised as arguments to support a position that was irrelevant to the debate; used ridicule instead of logic; and repeatedly attempted to switch the debate away from what was actually stated, to argue points that were never brought up, just demonstrates your contempt for open discussion, and your oversized ego. It demonstrates the typical strategies used by Republican operatives trained to create confusion, so people viewing the “debate” don’t know which side to take.

You don’t prove anything. You don’t provide any logic or evidence to prove that you are right and the opposition wrong. You just say “you’re wrong”, and expect that to be the end of the debate. You just act cocky and arrogant. Just like Bush. (Even Bush’s friend, former Mexican President Vicente Fox said that Bush was “the cockiest guy I’ve ever met.”)

To your continued complaints about my using the term Democratic and how it is being used, I present the following evidence by definition:

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This
dem•o•crat•ic Audio Help ?d?m ??kræt ?k - Show Spelled Pronunciation[dem-uh-krat-ik] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–adjective
1. pertaining to or of the nature of democracy or a democracy.
2. pertaining to or characterized by the principle of political or social equality for all: democratic treatment.
3. advocating or upholding democracy.
4. (initial capital letter ) Politics.
a. of, pertaining to, or characteristic of the Democratic party.
b. of, pertaining to, or belonging to the Democratic-Republican party.

American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
dem•o•crat•ic Audio Help (d?m’?-kr?t’?k) Pronunciation Key
adj.
1. Of, characterized by, or advocating democracy: democratic government; a democratic union.
2. Of or for the people in general; popular: a democratic movement; democratic art forms.
3. Believing in or practicing social equality: “a proper democratic scorn for bloated dukes and lords” (George du Maurier).
4. Democratic Of, relating to, or characteristic of the Democratic Party.

democratic2 [dem??kr?tik] adjective
believing in equal rights and privileges for all

You claim that I should be asking whether or not this legislation is constitutional or ethical. In fact, I had asked those questions and pointed out several times that it was unconstitutional, unethical and illegal. You may recall that you ridiculed the reference to the Constitution.

You also claimed that the spying was not on Americans but on foreign nationals. That is also not correct. It has been publicly acknowledged by the telecoms and by the people who work the equipment, that the equipment does not only spy on specific foreign nationals but on all traffic, including Americans’.

You unwillingness to concede the facts have nothing to do with my not proving my positions or making my points, it just demonstrates your repeated arrogance and unwillingness to deal with facts.

You claim that Bush was elected according to the rule of law, and that it was well documented in the courts. However, the Supreme Court, which was largely composed of Republican appointed justices, went beyond the law when they appointed Bush as President, first by stopping the count of the vote in Florida when it was clear that the count was moving in Gore’s favor; and second when they created new law (which they are not allowed to do – that is what the legislature and the executive branches are there to do – they are only there to interpret the law that already exists). When they ruled in favor of Bush “winning the Presidency”, they specifically stated that the “logic” behind their ruling could only be used in this particular instance and that it could not be used as a precedent for deciding any future elections. That should cause anyone to question whether or not this had anything to do with upholding the law.

You claim that it would be fair to say that if the government ordered you to do something that you should be immune to prosecution. You claim that that “isn’t democratic, but it seems fair”.

I don’t concede the point, because it is not only a ludicrous claim, but it is not supported by law that is currently on the books.

If a soldier obeys an unlawful order by a superior, or by his government, he can still be prosecuted for following that order. Ask the soldiers who were ordered to torture prisoners at Abu Gharib and sentenced for having followed those orders. Ask any soldiers who have been ordered to murder, illegally, by their superiors, if they are immune to prosecution. They aren’t. Even if they were following orders, they are guilty of war crimes. Remember Nuremburg?

Following an unlawful order is not only illegal, but government officials engaged in ordering unlawful orders is also considered to be a crime. More than two individuals engaged in perpetrating that act or covering it up is considered to be a conspiracy, by definition. That is not only breaking the law, but is against the Constitution, which all soldiers and elected officials swear an oath to uphold - “against all enemies, foreign or domestic.”

Based on your reference to Paragraph 4, you claim that I get it. You obviously don’t.

If we are fighting them over there so that we don’t have to fight them here, then why are we using illegal tactics to fight them here? By that logic, they are obviously already here (based on the Administration’s actions and your defense of them), and we aren’t doing enough to combat them here, because we are over there - spending all of our time, money and energy over there. Get it?

Obviously the terrorists aren’t stupid. However, this administration and the people who support it apparently continue to be. Obviously, terrorist threats continue to change, Bush’s policies haven’t, in spite of that. Bin Laden loves that, because he recognized long ago that he could never hope to defeat the United States militarily. He’s doing it by destroying our economy, and Bush and his policies, along with the people who continue to back him, continue to support Bin Laden by following Bush’s failed policies.

While the Telecom immunity bill may not specifically allow for taping of every American’s phone, you claim that I am overstating the issue and distorting it. You obviously don’t understand the technology being used. But the testimony of the Telecom whistleblowers who do understand it demonstrated repeatedly that individual communications aren’t being pulled out selectively, they are pulling out everything and copying it to super computers. That is allowing them to gather whatever “evidence” or doctored evidence, to make a case, however weak, to go after political opponents. That has been repeatedly proven in the case of the fired U.S. Attorney Generals who did not aggressively go after anyone whom Rove and the Bush Administration wanted embarrassed on the flimsiest of evidence, gathered by illegal wiretaps, which were “made legal” by their stamp of approval on them.

You claim that I misused the term democratic. Again, here is the definition for this application:

pertaining to or characterized by the principle of political or social equality for all: democratic treatment.

You did get a dictionary didn’t you?

You don’t get how the generals shilling for the war has anything to do with illegal wiretapping?
Creating fear by causing people to believe that we are under constant threat of being attacked by our neighbors, so that we have to spy on them doesn’t have anything to do with pushing for illegal wiretapping? I think there is a clear cause and effect relationship here, even if you can’t see it. You again claim that I misuse the term democratic. Again, you need to get a dictionary.

Here’s another definition. “believing in equal rights and privileges for all”

Generals who shill for the war and create an environment of fear to get people to support illegal wiretapping eliminates equal rights and privileges for all. Hardly the behavior that one would expect from someone who believed in it.

You claim more distortion when I said gathering mountains of communication could not be sifted through in time to protect targets which did not have equipment, policies or procedures in place to protect them to begin with. You further claim that the question is not “if we could make timely use of information gained by the surveillance proposed by the new rules”, but rather “are the rules ethical?” Then you make the switch back to say “if we don’t get the information, it will not matter, will it?”

Again, your arguments are totally illogical. What is the point of the legislation if it doesn’t protect us? Doesn’t that require that the information be timely? Doesn’t it require that the collection of that information be focused enough that we don’t have to sift through tons of chaff in order to find it in the first place?

You forget that our intelligence agencies had all the information that they needed in order to stop the 911 attacks in the first place. They just refused to act on the evidence that they had IN THEIR POSSESSION. The Justice Department under Ashcroft refused to allow the FBI to look at Zacarias Moussaoui’s computer hard drive. He was the “20th hijacker”. The one who never got on a plane on 911, because he was caught trying to get training to fly a plane without wanting to learn how to land. He is the only person charged in the 911 attacks. They had him in their custody BEFORE September 11, 2001. The evidence of the planned 911 attacks was ON HIS COMPUTER HARD DRIVE. The Justice Department dropped the ball with the technology and the evidence that they already had. They just failed to act on it.

If you can’t find the evidence because you can’t see the needle in the haystack, which you’ve created with a policy that doesn’t focus in on the evidence, you can’t act on it in time. This just makes the job more difficult. All this policy does is to create more superfluous chaff so that they can claim that they couldn’t prevent the next attack.

Obviously you deny the “pandemic of fear” from the spying. You take a “conservative” position. That’s why you guys claim you need to arm yourselves with concealed weapons and shoot anyone who you feel threatens you in your state of paranoia.

You claim that we should just “trust the intelligence community”. I actually agree with that, just not the policy that right wingers actually enact. The fact is that the vast majority of the intelligence analysts were actually doing their job correctly. They did come up with the correct answers. The problem was that the Bush Administration and their hand picked flunkies that were running the intelligence gathering, were cherry picking, and ignored the strongest facts while accepting the weakest “evidence” and the evidence which the intelligence community specifically stated was most questionable, as their primary rationale to go to war and to impose spying on Americans.

So yes, we should trust the real analysts. The ones who actually know their craft. The ones who put the nation’s security over political ideology, and fraudulent claims. They were the ones who came forward and spoke out against how the Bush Administration intentionally misstated the facts and ignored the truth, remember?

You claim that we should not stop trusting the criminal justice system because an innocent man was convicted. Again, if a mistake is made, how can you trust something out of hand without question? Even conservatives loved Reagan when he came up the comment “Trust but verify” when referring to nuclear disarmament. I think that that same position should be taken when accepting or not accepting an intelligence assessment, (or rather the spun version of the real intelligence assessment).

You claim that a law passed by Congress to authorize the telecoms to illegally surveil its citizens on the nation’s behalf is a different matter than war crimes. Yeah, that’s what Germany thought when they gave that power to Hitler.

Pathetic attempt to make a point on the backs of soldiers who have committed suicide? These soldiers committed suicide because they were lied to by their government. They were discarded by the military when they sought help for problems that they acquired as a result of taking actions that they were ordered to take. Illegal actions. They acted in the belief that they were doing something honorable in defense of their country, and their country failed them, YOU failed them. The fact that you would ignore that and discard their sacrifice without investigation or question, by making such a quaint comment as “May they rest in peace” just demonstrates that your attitudes and beliefs only continue to allow it to happen. You don’t care about why it happened or how to prevent it. You only want to bury it so you don’t have to think about it.

Have you ever spoken with suicidal soldiers? Have you listened to them? Have you ever worked to help them? I have. You obviously don’t have a clue.

My family has dozens of members who have served in our armed forces, or are currently serving. What has your family done?

You claim that my “imagined reasons for going to war”, like my “opinions regarding the profits of oil companies, have nothing to do with granting immunity to telecoms”. You claim that my venting is illogical. You have to possess the ability to be logical in order to make the distinction. You obviously don’t.

The oil companies that were forced out of Iraq when Saddam Hussein took over and nationalized the oil industry assets have all been granted ownership and control of Iraq’s oil fields by the Bush administration. That planning to slice up their oil fields was discussed in Cheney’s secret Energy Task Force. That was why it was kept secret. Some of the information, including the maps slicing up the oil fields was recently made public.

Nothing to do with granting immunity to telecoms? You have to create an environment of fear that you are about to be attacked by terrorists from a foreign country in order to get the support of our country to go in and invade them to control their oil fields. Creating the fear and the propaganda to control the minds of the country and get their support to go to war is well documented. It comes out of Hitler’s playbook.

You claim that windfall profit taxes on oil companies unfairly target American oil companies. You forget that most oil companies are multinationals and they don’t care much about the countries that they headquarter in. They only headquarter in a country to avoid taxes. They don’t much care about how much they charge for fuel or the effect that excessive pricing has on the nation or the people that they depend on to fight their wars for them either. You claim that windfall profit taxes are un-American. Windfall profits are profits that are far above the norm, far above what is a fair price that would be charged because the industry has a monopoly and they can hold the nation hostage because of their control over the energy we need to use in our normal lives. Given that many multi-billion dollar companies fail to pay corporate income taxes in the state or the country that they make so much of their profit in, it is only fair that they should pay taxes in some other manner. Their lack of paying taxes is what is causing so many individuals to see their individual taxes and their property taxes go so high. 66.7% of all corporations in the State of Wisconsin (according to Wisconsin Department of Revenue figures), don’t pay income taxes. That’s right, zip, zero, zilch, nada.

Other products that have higher profit margins don’t have to be “targeted” to get more taxes out of them as you claim, because most of them don’t have a monopoly. Oil companies do (Even if they are separate businesses, most of them work together in coordinated strategies – also illegal. Price fixing is just one example of that. Look around as you drive down the street and see how many different gas stations owned by different oil companies all have the same prices posted on the exact same day.)

And many of the largest and most profitable companies in the world don’t pay much in taxes in comparison to other companies, if you are attempting to be fair and equal (democratic).

For example: Exxon Mobil just recently had two straight quarters of profits that are greater than any other corporation in the history of the world.

In 2003 they paid $913,726.00 in corporate income taxes in Wisconsin. In 2004 they paid $1,529,372.00 in corporate income taxes in Wisconsin.

By comparison, the combined Harley Davidson companies paid $12,781,851.00 in corporate income taxes in 2003 in Wisconsin and $26,594,526.00 in corporate income taxes in 2004.

The U.S. Federal Tax Code contains more than $17 Billion in breaks to benefit the oil and gas companies for the years 2007-2011 (offered or extended in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, passed by the then Republican controlled Congress).

In addition, oil and gas companies pay reduced royalty fees on product they recover from federally owned waters, which Erich Pica, a spokesman from the environmental group Friends of the Earth, says could cost taxpayers $65 billion over five years.

Executive Compensation Research firm Equilar analyzed compensation of the chief executives of the 25 largest publicly traded oil and gas companies and found that for 12 CEOs at the largest U.S. based publicly traded oil companies, their median total compensation increased by more than four times the rate of that of executives in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index as a whole. (BusinessWeek News Analysis June 17, 2008)

So what do taxes on oil companies have to do with immunity for Telecoms? Again, let’s go back to the manipulation of the population with fear tactics in order to get them to go to war in order to take over the oil fields for the profit of the oil companies. If you still don’t get the connection, then you are simply beyond help.

And you also intentionally misuse the wrong definition of “democratic” in order to “win” your argument when you refer to “relating to or associated with the Democratic Party of the United States” given that that is only one definition which is completely unrelated to this issue.

The first definition which you correctly use, “characterized by free and equal participation in government or in the decision-making processes of an organization or group”, actually supports my argument. Oil companies who make the decisions to go to war by manipulation of the government, with the consent of the elected officials who lead us into war, eliminates free and equal participation in government by those who don’t have any choice or input into the decision making process, thereby making it “undemocratic”.

Also, choice is not “what it means to be an American.” If that were true than any choice, regardless of how wrong or illegal, would be American. America is ruled by laws and a Constitution - something which you repeatedly fail to recognize. Just another example of your lack of logic.

Again you make a ludicrous argument relating to the use of the word “sold” in defining how the Telecom Immunity Bill or any other policies were foisted on the American public. The point isn’t that policies shouldn’t be “sold”, but that the reasons given to sell these particular policies were outright lies. You are attempting to do what most conservatives and NeoCons attempt to do, which is to ridicule an argument that you can’t win, by arguing a point which was never in contention to begin with, but which you claim is your opponents’ position.

Then you argue that I use cyclical reasoning by answering a question by restating the question, by connecting issues because one imagines or supposes they are connected.

Unfortunately for you, the facts behind the strategy in selling the war, and in selling the policies of the Bush Administration, which were supported by the Republican Congress and people like you then, (and which still are), demonstrates that the Republican Party and its representatives are still using double talk and lies to promote the failed agendas and policies of the Bush administration. The connections aren’t imagined, they are well established. And most people understand the connections even though you continue to imagine that they don’t. Your “reasoning” is not only illogical, it is delusional.

What you consider to be “stereotypes and thinly veiled personal attacks” aren’t, particularly if they are true statements of fact. And in the case of the people who have perpetrated the lies on the American public, and particularly in your case, as you find the “image of beefish men rubbing their hands together like Mr. Burns and trying to figure out how they can deceive jonny lunchpale (your spelling errors), amusing” - it certainly speaks volumes about your character or lack thereof. Obviously you approve of deceiving “jonny lunchpale”, so nothing you say can be trusted.

You mentioned that we withdrew from Somalia after the first major combat engagement. You are referring, of course, to the infamous “Blackhawk Down” incident.

The operation, which led to the deaths and casualties of our soldiers in Somalia, was an ill conceived mission. The convoy went out without armored vehicles and without armored support even standing by as a backup. They went out without adequate and accurate intelligence to indicate the number of militia and the extent of the resistance they encountered. The armored support group, which was finally called in after the convoy ran into trouble and had to be evacuated, was an armored group sent in by and under the control of the Indian government.

And while the incident happened during the Clinton Administration, the military units were sent out during the first Bush Administration. The first Bush Administration sent them into Somalia without armored vehicles and tanks, to be part of a UN peace keeping mission.

We don’t intervene in Darfur because there isn’t any oil in Darfur, and that is the only thing that will get Bush and Cheney to act. They aren’t interested in humanitarian missions. They never have been.

In response to your question as to “does this explain how we lost WWII?” Again, referring back to world history - the United States won WWII.

The United States was able to win WWII because of a number of factors, including the following facts:

We had (at that time), the industrial capacity to out produce ships, tanks, trucks, weapons, ammo and equipment beyond the capacity of our enemies. We don’t have that any more. We gave that away to the Communist Chinese.

We had the support of many different ethnic groups within our society, which allowed us to use their unique skills to defeat our enemies, in spite of the fact that many of them were treated as second class citizens by the majority of the people of this country.

Navajo “Windtalkers” were able to develop a code based on their spoken but unwritten language so that they could gain advantage over our enemies. That code was never broken.

Japanese Americans volunteered for military service even after having their property seized and entire families being thrown into detainment camps throughout the Southwest (like Indian reservations, but behind barbed wire and guarded by machine guns). Their understanding of the Japanese language helped the U.S. military break Japanese codes to give the U.S. military advantage. My family was part of that history. A dozen family relatives served either in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, the most highly decorated military unit in all of WWII, or in Military Intelligence. The 442nd RCT was a segregated unit – all Japanese Americans except for the highest level officers who were Caucasian.

African Americans were forced to do menial labor during most of the war, building roads, driving trucks and working in the mess halls. But, their fighter unit, The Tuskegee Airmen, was finally able to win the respect of bomber groups because, during their entire time protecting bomber planes, they never lost a single bomber.

The diversity in our culture, which Republicans constantly work to eliminate, is what gave us strategic advantage. Your extensive education in military history must have missed that point.

Your repeated ridicule of things you can’t debate just demonstrates that you don’t have any ideas, or documented evidence to support your positions.

You made a funny! You claim that the word “republican” means “somebody who believes that the best government is one in which supreme power is vested in an electorate.” You forgot to tell Bush. Hardly what one would expect from someone who backs “the Proclaimer” - you know - the guy who shouts “I’m the decider” when he is questioned, or when asked if the actions he is taking are against the Constitution yells “The Constitution is just a goddamn piece of paper.” Yeah, Republicans believe the best government is one in which supreme power is vest in an electorate. You are just hilarious!

I’ve actually had discussions with people who are in the intelligence community or who are retired from there. One of my uncles had a long career there. Where do you get your extensive knowledge from?

I never said that we should eliminate any possible source of information gathering. I‘m saying that if it was going to be done, it needed to be focused, and legal, to be effective.

Again, you fail to see the connection between the Telecoms and looking at developing alternative energy.

We went to war in Iraq for their oil. The Bushies had to sell the war and create fear among the citizens by getting everyone to get paranoid, and agree to spy on their neighbors so that the distraction would allow the Bushies to go to war for oil. If we develop alternative energy sources, we can be energy independent and we don’t need to go to war for the oil.

We really aren’t that far off – most of the technology already exists – the problem is that Republicans in Congress and Republican Administrations have repeatedly refused to fund their development and expansion because the only thing they understand is drilling for more oil (which is becoming even more difficult to find in the quantities needed), and building nuclear power plants which create more waste that can’t be safely disposed of.

Republicans have refused to support higher mileage mandates which were originally put in place in the late ‘70s during the Carter Administration, and promptly buried when Reagan/Bush got into office. They’ve been opposing them ever since. They effectively destroyed what was a 38 year head start.

North of Milwaukee on I43 there is a wind powered turbine farm which only recently expanded from only two turbines which stood there for many years before they expanded to several dozen units stretching across the region. Don’t tell me it can’t be done. It is already being done.

We have the ability and current technology to build 150 mpg vehicles. A Bellevue, Oregon company has retrofitted a Saturn Vue hybrid gas/electric vehicle with additional capacitors and a plug in module using technology from Honeywell, NASA and Martin-Marietta and the technology was put on display at the Detroit Auto Show in January of this year. The Big Auto Companies have failed to take them up on mass manufacturing the car, so they have to sell retro-fit kits until they can get enough of a demand and profit from it to gear up for mass production.

Given that the average mpg for most vehicles in the United States is only about 20 mpg, increasing the mileage output by more than seven times, would do more for conserving fuel and stretching it for many more years than drilling for a finite and dwindling resource.

Do you really think that drilling in ANWAR, that by best estimates would take ten years to develop, only has the total oil reserves to meet the needs of the United States for one year, and would have most of its oil shipped overseas to Asia because that is where the oil companies would make the most profit, is our best immediate answer?

You claim that “Since people like you would interfere with the relationship between risk and profit, what motivation is left for research?”

I’ve got news for you. I was educated as a research chemist. I understand research. I’ve done research for many years. U.S. corporations invest very little in research in the United States because they don’t want the expense. They would prefer to use antiquated technology that is already paid for, even though that technology wastes our natural resources, rather than use new technology that conserves our natural resources and makes corporations more profitable in the long run. U.S. corporations do most of their research overseas to avoid the overhead, which is why very few people are interested in getting into the profession here in the U.S.

You claim that you are interested in the relationship between risk and profit, but when an oil monopoly raises prices beyond the point that people and businesses can pay for that energy so that they can make a profit themselves, or so that they can afford to live in a home, or drive a car, they are killing off their own customers. And the concept of risk and profit isn’t for the sole benefit of the wealthiest investors and owners. That benefit should be extended to anyone, including small business owners, and individuals.

If oil companies had supported higher efficiency vehicles, instead of fighting against them for the last thirty years, and continually increasing their profits by forcing the consumers to buy more and more gas at higher and higher prices, they could have made higher per unit profits, with less overhead for production, while keeping the overall cost to the consumer to a reasonable level.

The average driver drives 12,000 to 15,000 miles per year. At 20 mpg and $4 a gallon, that works out to a consumption of 600 to 750 gallons and costs the consumer $2400 - $3000 per year. Most consumers can’t afford that so they cut back. That cuts into oil company profits because they don’t sell as much. But that also means that consumers have to cut back on purchases on other items, which means that other manufacturers have to cut back and they don’t use as much energy, so oil companies don’t sell as much in that sector either.

Initially, the oil companies won’t care because the profits are so high in the short term that they don’t notice that they are destroying the financial stability of their consumer base, and reducing the total units sold.

But if the oil companies would work with vehicle manufacturers to build more efficient vehicles and other appliances that get better efficiency and did that first, before they raise the fuel prices, then, because the amount of fuel needed to do the same job would be far less, the increases in prices wouldn’t be as noticeable, because you are getting the same work done for the same or less cost.

At 50 mpg, someone driving 12,000 to 15,000 miles per year only uses 240-300 gallons. At $4 a gallon that works out to only $960-$1200 a year. Compared to 20 mpg, that’s a savings of $1440-$1800 a year with the same amount of driving. And if you think that that cannot be accomplished right now, guess again. I drive a Prius and I regularly get between 50 and 60 mpg.

But now that GM’s stock price is below $10 for the first time since 1954, they are still trying to sell their gas guzzler trucks, not here in America, but to China. China has a population that is more than four times what ours is. Do you really think that getting four times as many drivers as the U.S. has, to drive gas guzzlers in China, is going to help our gas shortage problems? They’re just creating four times the number of drivers using low efficiency vehicles so they could drive up the competition for fuel and thus, the price of fuel, even higher.

The same comparison can be done with better insulated homes and businesses to cut back on heating and cooling costs, or with the use of gas or electric appliances. The cost of the individual unit of fuel is a problem only when it outstrips the consumer’s ability to pay for it and still function normally. That is why the business model that the oil companies are using is flawed.

The oil companies have got it backwards. Instead of raising prices first and then drilling more to consume more, they should be conserving more by increasing efficiencies and using less before they raise the prices. That way the consumers are able to keep up with the price increases and can afford to pay for it while still being able to do what they need to do, and the limited oil resources we have will last much longer.

No one is arguing that the risk and profit model should be tampered with. I’m just saying that in order for the country’s and the world’s economy to be kept healthy, there has to be an intelligent policy where there is a balance between what people and companies earn and what they are forced to pay for the goods and services they have to buy in order to survive. Raking the consumers over the coals to get the last drop of blood out of them doesn’t do any one any good over the long haul. The risk and profit model works when you have customers who aren’t being forced to pay beyond what they can afford – when they aren’t being forced to choose between filling their gas tank and paying the mortgage or feeding their kids. Your interpretation goes well beyond the concept of “free market” into arm twisting of grandparents.

Oil companies buy leases owned by individuals and by the U.S. Government. The U.S. Government has a responsibility to the taxpayers to make sure that they lease the nation’s resources to companies who act responsibly to keep the nation healthy and secure.

And the right to risk and profit should be extended beyond just corporations in order to be democratic. It should be the right of all people. The resources of the nation aren’t solely owned by or for the benefit of the oil companies, particularly when they do so little to use them wisely.

Exxon Mobil only pays an effective 34% income tax rate (effective, meaning 34% rate on the taxes that they don’t avoid due to loopholes), to the Federal Government here in the United States. They pay up to 90% in countries like Libya and Russia. The deal they have here in the U.S. is much better than what they have in other countries so no one should be crying for the company that just earned profits this last year that were greater than any other company in world history.

Long term, investing in efficiency and alternative sources of fuel just makes more sense.

By the way, in 1981 Reagan and Bush 1 banned the offshore oil drilling that the oil companies are trying to overturn today. And the oil companies? They are actively drilling in only about 25% of the oil leases that they have already had issued to them.

The same argument can be made to compare to your model of education.

You claim that our model of education is better because your statistics show that we have higher literacy here than China or India. You say that the Chinese government is expelling people before the Olympics and falsifying its accomplishments. Yet, what happens here in the United States? People who had spoken up against the Bush administration early on, found themselves without jobs, and blacklisted. People in Bush’s Administration got positions based on fraudulent credentials, most particularly, since we are talking about education here, Bush’s Secretary of Education, who, when he was running Texas’s educational system, fraudulently drove up his graduation and literacy rates by eliminating all of the dropouts from his calculations. So much for that miracle worker.

You claim that because we have a higher literacy rate that we are doing better than India or China. We’ve been at public education for much longer - we should have a higher rate.

However, they have much larger populations with much less money available per capita, yet they still manage to educate larger total numbers of engineers – almost ten times what we do, every year. In order to be able to accomplish that, they have to have a larger number of TEACHERS to begin with.

And if, as you claim, Communist China is fabricating the numbers of the engineers that they are graduating, then why is it that Republicans are continuing to move manufacturing plants and jobs there rather than keep them here in the United States?

Are you saying that Republicans are intentionally sending these jobs and manufacturing plants over to a country that doesn’t have qualified people doing these jobs, and are willing to make us dependent on their products because we have no manufacturing facilities and jobs here in America to do the work?

Are you saying that they know that these products aren’t being built with the same quality and safety standards that we are used to having built here at home, and are being exposed to unsafe products with the knowledge of Republican CEOs and Republican politicians who give them tax breaks to import unsafe products?

You claim that we do enough because we spend so much money on education, yet the amount spent for each student is very high, much higher than in other countries, thus helping fewer students.

You also claim that K-12 education is free. Not true. Everyone that lives in a school district pays taxes to support those schools and that education. That isn’t free, but it is an investment to insure that our population is well enough educated to be able to get a job and be able to support themselves and pay taxes to support our infrastructures in the future.

And while some of the taxes we pay to the State and the Federal Government go to help subsidize education at institutions of higher learning, the amounts that have been collected in taxes and distributed to the schools have fallen off drastically in the Bush years, because of the administration’s redistribution of the budget, and the huge tax cuts that were given to the wealthiest and the largest corporations. So, while the percentage might look like a large chunk, in reality, the total amounts have been slashed drastically from what was provided in earlier years. As a result, students have had to pay a higher percentage of the costs, which have caused more and more students to either drop out because of the expense, or not be able to afford it in the first place. That removes access to higher education to all but the privileged few.

Access to that education is the carrot that our Government dangles in front of the financially underprivileged so that they will risk their lives in military conflicts to have a shot at getting that education. But when these soldiers are crippled in combat and are unable to complete their entire tour of duty, our government strips them of the benefits that they have earned. They take away their medical benefits and their educational benefits and leave them to fend for themselves, because according to our Government, they haven’t completed their term of enlistment.

This year, in the state of Wisconsin, we have a $527 million deficit in the current two year state budget, so state agencies have to give back $270 million to the state general fund. The University of Wisconsin must chop $25 million, the DNR must chop $13.2 million and the Department of Commerce must chop $10.5 million. The State Department of Health and Family Services must also cut $53.3 million from Medicaid.

By comparison, because of corporate tax avoidance, through loopholes, tax breaks, and profit shelters, this cost Wisconsin $643 million in 2006. Overall, Wisconsin’s corporate sector fell $1.3 billion short on its payments of all state and local taxes, compared to what it would have paid if it had supported programs at the average level among corporations nationwide.

In other words, government agencies that were supposed to be there to assist taxpayers are being cut. Funding for education and the environment; support for increasing jobs, and healthcare assistance for seniors and the disabled are being cut. Why? To support corporations who don’t pay their fair share of income taxes!

So, what happens when corporations don’t pay their fair share? Individual income tax payers and property tax payers have to pick up the difference in higher assessments and higher rates, and the services that they get from their government are cut. They get less for more cost.

Education isn’t the only area that has suffered. Look at the disasters that have been created by the Bush Administration because of incompetence in: USDA meat testing; Consumer Product Testing; food imports; raw material imports that are used in pet food, or pharmaceuticals manufactured here in the U.S.; lack of proper emergency disaster response for hurricanes or tornadoes; the shameful way that the Veteran’s Administration has treated veterans and soldiers who are casualties of the Iraq War; we have a mortgage crisis; and the Stock Market has just had its worst June since 1930. Oh, and yes, we are still mired in a War in Iraq and Afghanistan that has gone on for longer than all of World War II and has cost more than WWII.

And again, you misrepresent my position when I’m trying to get us out of Iraq and stop spending money there. This isn’t money being spent for foreign aid. It is for war profiteering. I have no problem with foreign aid when it is for humanitarian assistance. I don’t support war profiteering.

Look at the war profiteering that has taken place over the last five years in the Iraq War by Bush Campaign donors, because of no-bid contracts that were only given to Bush loyalists like Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater, Titan, CACI and many others, and the hundreds of billions of dollars that have disappeared because of little or no accounting for their “cost plus billing”. It started at about $4 billion a month when the war started and has increased to $10 to $16 billion a month today, with no end in sight. Refer to the documentary “Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers” by Robert Greenwald. Many returning vets are also speaking out against the war profiteering once they get out of the military, but they are prohibited from saying anything when they are in the service because they could be court-martialed for speaking out against the crimes of their Commander-in-Chief.

And you also misrepresent history in claiming that the Roman Empire didn’t fail because of fiscal irresponsibility. During the decline of the Roman Empire, not only did the Emperors’ live lavish lifestyles and spend money on extravagances to buy off the citizens with spectacular shows at the Coliseums, but they overextended the reach of their armies because of the size of the area they needed to protect, and the cost to pay and supply them. And this, in an empire that ran primarily on slave labor. (Anywhere from 20 to 40% of the population of Rome were estimated to be slaves. But this doesn’t take into consideration the fact that the practice of manumission, or making citizens of slaves, also took place. And given the differences in social status between the aristocrats and the plebians (commoners), even the freed slaves didn’t have full privileges of the lowest class of citizens.)

The Roman Senate had to work deals with some of their richest citizens and give them control of their army to quell revolts, in return for their funding, because they couldn’t raise enough money through the tribute/taxes they collected from conquered lands, or the valuables that they stole from them. They couldn’t provide logistical support for all of their armies, and they couldn’t pay their troops, while maintaining the Empire’s huge infrastructure, so the Empire eventually collapsed. Major military campaigns cost a lot of money. Every military empire has eventually learned that lesson. All of the “great” military empires of the world have eventually collapsed – Rome, Greece, Persia, Egypt, Portugal, Spain, France - even Great Britain is a shadow of its former self. These are all matters of historical fact. Obviously, you never studied that part of history either.

The United States has many similar examples of this same scenario. This country has had to depend on funding from some of its richest citizens to pay for expenses because of fiscal irresponsibility, and we pay huge interest payments on the debt because of it. And the most egregious form of fiscal irresponsibility comes from the Federal Reserve System.

The Federal Reserve Bank is not part of the government. There is nothing “Federal” about it. It is owned privately by a few families that remain in the shadows. That is why Republicans love to keep the country in deficit spending, because taxpayers end up paying only for the interest on the debt, rather than paying down the principle for the debt itself. For all of the money currently collected in federal income taxes, none of it goes towards paying down the principle. It all goes to pay for the interest, and those interest payments go to the families that control the Federal Reserve. Federal Income taxes that are collected are held in the Federal Reserve Banks. And the Federal Government pays the Federal Reserve Banks a fee to hold that money, which the banks invest and earn interest on! What a Scam! Even Ron Paul ( R ) recognizes that and has spoken about it, but the Republican leadership continues to shut down any public discussion about it.

President Andrew Jackson ( D ) attempted to prevent this scam from ever happening, but after many years the bankers ended up taking over and controlling this country’s wealth.

It is clear that you are incapable of working to solve problems. You’re only interest is in ridiculing everything you disagree with, even if you don’t have any solutions to the problems yourself, and in spite of evidence that demonstrates that the only policies you advocate have repeatedly failed. But based on the past eight years, we should expect that of “conservatives”.
The discussions and excuses we’ve seen from current Republican candidates and their representatives haven’t changed. They are just more of the same.

Hey, it’s been fun, but it would be more fun if I had a challenge. Come back when you get that education that you claim to care so much about. Perhaps you should spend more, and hit the books more next time. To bad your sarcasm and arrogance doesn’t count towards intelligence. Perhaps you would have scored more points.

You keep dreaming of that Lefty police state; I’ll keep working against it. More than half your commentary was actually related to the topic–so keep studying hard.

I’m not in favor of what Speaker Pelosi, or the other Democrats who support immunity for the telecoms, did. Senator Russ Feingold, Democrat from Wisconsin, spoke against the FISA amendment saying the legislation “is not a compromise, it is a capitulation.”

But it does appear that this was somewhat of a compromise bill, which is supposed to provide more accountability. It also forces the Republicans to approve $95 Billion worth of domestic spending on programs such as unemployment insurance and higher-education benefits for veterans. Bush, who had threatened for months to veto that legislation, said he would sign it. (Now he and McCain, who had both spoken against the new GI Bill are both trying to take credit for it.)

The legislation also would require court approval of procedures for intercepting telephone calls and e-mails that pass through U.S. based servers – another step that the White House and GOP lawmakers had previously resisted.

On June 19, 2008, House and Senate leaders agreed on the legislation that they would move forward for a vote by the full Senate the following week.

Senator Obama has indicated that he would vote in favor of an amendment that would eliminate the immunity clause from the FISA legislation, but if that failed, he would vote for the FISA legislation to avoid not having a law in place. The Bush administration has claimed that some wiretap orders that allowed surveillance of foreign terrorism suspects (who are currently in the United States) would have begun to expire two months from now unless new legislation was approved. It is questionable that that is actually the case, since the current law would have allowed them to continue wiretaps with the approval of the courts, and of the hundreds of wiretap requests, it was publicly released that only three were not approved.

I would prefer that Sen. Obama vote against this legislation and after winning the Congress and the White House in December, the Democrats could put forward a cleaner and better piece of legislation.

Speaker Pelosi said that the most important part of the deal is the “exclusivity” language making it clear that the surveillance law is the only legal authority when it comes to government spying. That would eliminate Bush administration lawyers’ claims that the commander in chief’s war making powers trumped such consideration.

In addition, Keith Olbermann reported on June 30, 2008 that John Dean, former White House Counsel to President Nixon, reviewed the legislation and found that the legislation only provided immunity against civil lawsuits, not criminal prosecution. Nor would it provide any immunity to Government Officials who had broken the law. But in order for the courts to provide the immunity against the civil lawsuits, the telecoms have to admit that they broke the law. If that happens, that opens up the door for criminal prosecution. And if that happens, there is also a possibility that the new administration and the courts can move forward with criminal prosecution against the Bush Administration, because they had to have given the telecoms the go ahead to break the law, themselves having given an unlawful order.

Given that it is likely that Democrats will take even more of a majority in the House and Senate because of the criminal behavior of Republicans in Congress, and it is also likely that Senator Obama will win the Presidency, I don’t think that they would do what Bush and the Republicans in Congress have done.

However, the Republicans have been using their political advantage to appoint hand picked (and unqualified) loyalists to bureaucratic positions, to break the law for political advantage and undermine the processes in every governmental agency under their control, while refusing to testify when compelled to do so in Grand Jury investigations.

It might just be possible that the Democrats could potentially use this new immunity for the telecoms, to do something else…

Wiretap Republicans. Wouldn’t that be a hoot?

Republicans would, in their zeal to avoid civil lawsuits against telecoms, (which would cost them money due to their investments in them), may have very well provided the tool (not so much the legislation, but the equipment that is already in place), to allow our government to finally put them in jail. And Democrats would actually have legal justification to place the wiretaps on them in the first place.

Let’s catch the guys who refuse to testify in front of the Grand Jury. You can start with President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

Anything any other Republicans out there want to hide?

Have a good day Christopher.

Have a nice day, Les.

Glad to hear from you. I’ve always enjoyed our exchanges in the past. I’m confused, though. You ridicule me (perhaps with some basis) for saying: “I love the way liberals always …” but I didn’t notice that I had done it more than once. One example of something does not equal a pattern, but I’m glad you expect me to maintain such a high standard (and that you didn’t harp on my typos). Thanks.

Les:

I enjoyed all 3,000 words of your latest response. Most informative was the fact that I do not control Watchdog. Wow. I kept entering my password in the login, but it wouldn’t work. Hey, Jim, can I get that password?

As far as I can recall, you have not asked to this point “what is so Democratic as to allow spying on Americans?” but I understand you will go on to do so. I’m unsure what “democratic” has to do with things, the question is rather “is it constitutional?” or “is it ethical?” or “should the Bush administration—through Congress—grant immunity to telecoms for actions they take on behalf of the government?” Let’s remember, if we could, that the legislation didn’t allow spying on Americans, but rather spying on foreign nationals whom we might suspect to have terrorist connections and individuals (both citizens and noncitizens) within the United States. One person was abroad, the other, within the U.S. And that strict guidelines were spelled out for the supervision of this program. As for the rest of your first paragraph, claims and opinions are not facts, and if you had proven your point, I’d concede. You’ll notice I do so when you actually make a point.

Paragraph 2: Bush was elected according to the rule of law. The affair was well documented in the courts. Sometimes things don’t go your way. Sorry.

Paragraph 3: I think it would be fair to say that if the government ordered you to do something, that you should be immune from prosecution. This isn’t “democratic” but it does seem fair. Would you at least concede this point?
Paragraph 4: incoherent, but you get it eventually. So?

Paragraph 5: Les, the terrorists are not stupid. Just because we are destroying them in Iraq doesn’t mean they are not going to strike elsewhere. You’ll note that the Japanese first attacked Pearl Harbor, then other places. I hope whoever is president is wise enough to understand that security threats can rapidly change. Also, the Telecom immunity bill did not allow for the taping of every American’s phone; quit overstating the issue. Distortion does not bring us to the truth. Again you misuse the word “democratic”, but I like the use of parallelism and rhetorical questions. You did get a book, didn’t you?

Paragraph 6: I’m not sure how this relates to the telecoms issue. What I mean is, I don’t see the relationship—cause and effect, problem and solution, chronological or other which connects this to the topic. Again you isuse the word “democratic”

Paragraph 7: More distortion. The telecom bill does not “push” for extensive spying on everyone. Distortions of this sort generally (but not always) suggest the speaker is floundering. Also, the question is not if we could make timely use of information gained from the type of surveillance gained from the proposed new rules, but rather are the rules ethical. But, if we don’t get the information, it will not matter, will it?

Paragraph 8: More distortion. Your comments imply that spying would be almost total rather than specific and limited as the bill proposed. Since the government is allowed to “spy” in many instances already (like criminal cases, for example), where can I see the pandemic of fear you promise?

Paragraph 9: I think we should trust the intelligence gathering community. We’ll have to agree to disagree.

Paragraph 10 through 16 (911 commission). Again, if the intelligence communities might misuse or misinterpret data collected from communications originating in foreign nations has little or nothing to do with the question regarding the proposed rules. As I have stated several times, I would support prosecution of individuals who misused that information. The 911 commission does note that the intelligence agencies did not willfully distort information, that the analysts did not feel pressured to reach a conclusion, and that the briefings sent to the president were (in retrospect, I’d add) one sided. I agree we should not screw up like this again. But do we stop trusting the criminal justice system because an innocent man was convicted?

Paragraph 17: I believe you are trying to make an analogy here between soldiers committing war crimes and the telecoms. Kind of a stretch. After all, war crimes are clearly defined by the Geneva Conventions and usually involve directly killing innocent civilians or surrendering soldiers, not surveillance of them. Furthermore, a law passed by congress to authorize the telecoms to act on the nation’s behalf is really a different matter. We’re not talking the Final Solution here. I’ll ignore your pathetic attempt to make a point on the backs of soldiers who have committed suicide. May they rest in peace.

Paragraph 18: The government regularly offers immunity to defendants when it serves the people’s interest to do so. But I would support the prosecution of anyone who misuses information gathered under the umbrella of the proposed rules.

Paragraph 19: Your imagined reasons for going to war, like your opinions regarding the profits of oil companies, have nothing to do with granting immunity to telecoms. Your venting is illogical.

Paragraph 20: Again, windfall profits taxes (un-American as they are) have nothing to do with immunity for teleco