Posts Made By: Joe Bergeron

August 22, 2008 02:12 PM Forum: Polls

THE QUESTION - some of you shouldn't look - you have been warned

Posted By Joe Bergeron

That's interesting. How does your theory take into account Clinton's years of budget surpluses and debt payoff?

August 22, 2008 02:16 PM Forum: Polls

THE QUESTION - some of you shouldn't look - you have been warned

Posted By Joe Bergeron

It's remarkable how many of the economic panaceas proposed by the rich (politicians and their primary supporters), which are calculated to make them even richer (consumption tax, no capital gains tax, etc.), also just happen to be exactly what us ordinary citizens need to prosper. With a win-win situation like that, it's amazing that any of us has the gall to oppose the wishes of our feudal lords, I mean our leaders, in these areas. Or ANY area!

August 24, 2008 04:57 PM Forum: Polls

Biden

Posted By Joe Bergeron

I have to admire the ability of a "fringe leftist" like Biden to be re-elected over and over again. Of course, I guess to you this merely reflects the fringe leftism of the population of Delaware.

Happily for you, your candidate is free of any tinge of stupidity or arrogance!

August 24, 2008 05:31 PM Forum: Polls

Biden

Posted By Joe Bergeron

True enough.

September 4, 2008 04:44 AM Forum: Polls

Palin

Posted By Joe Bergeron

From the AP:

"Sep 3rd, 2008 | ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and her Republican supporters held back little Wednesday as they issued dismissive attacks on Barack Obama and flattering praise on her credentials to be vice president. In some cases, the reproach and the praise stretched the truth.

Some examples:

PALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."

THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."

PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform — not even in the state senate."

THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation.

PALIN: "The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes, raise payroll taxes, raise investment income taxes, raise the death tax, raise business taxes, and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."

THE FACTS: The Tax Policy Center, a think tank run jointly by the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, concluded that Obama's plan would increase after-tax income for middle-income taxpayers by about 5 percent by 2012, or nearly $2,200 annually. McCain's plan, which cuts taxes across all income levels, would raise after tax-income for middle-income taxpayers by 3 percent, the center concluded.

Obama would provide $80 billion in tax breaks, mainly for poor workers and the elderly, including tripling the Earned Income Tax Credit for minimum-wage workers and higher credits for larger families.

He also would raise income taxes, capital gains and dividend taxes on the wealthiest. He would raise payroll taxes on taxpayers with incomes above $250,000, and he would raise corporate taxes. Small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year would see taxes rise.

MCCAIN: "She's been governor of our largest state, in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply ... She's responsible for 20 percent of the nation's energy supply. I'm entertained by the comparison and I hope we can keep making that comparison that running a political campaign is somehow comparable to being the executive of the largest state in America," he said in an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson.

THE FACTS: McCain's phrasing exaggerates both claims. Palin is governor of a state that ranks second nationally in crude oil production, but she's no more "responsible" for that resource than President Bush was when he was governor of Texas, another oil-producing state. In fact, her primary power is the ability to tax oil, which she did in concert with the Alaska Legislature. And where Alaska is the largest state in America, McCain could as easily have called it the 47th largest state — by population.

MCCAIN: "She's the commander of the Alaska National Guard. ... She has been in charge, and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities," he said on ABC.

THE FACTS: While governors are in charge of their state guard units, that authority ends whenever those units are called to actual military service. When guard units are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, for example, they assume those duties under "federal status," which means they report to the Defense Department, not their governors. Alaska's national guard units have a total of about 4,200 personnel, among the smallest of state guard organizations.

FORMER ARKANSAS GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: Palin "got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."

THE FACTS: A whopper. Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.

August 29, 2008 06:59 PM Forum: Polls

Palin

Posted By Joe Bergeron

...does anyone think McCain is a statesman who evaluated all candidates to pick the person best qualified to assume the presidency in the event something should happen to him?

Let's see...

Former city council member of a small town.
Former mayor of that small town.
Less than 2 years as governor of one of the smallest states.

And that's..it.

Oh yeah, that's presidential material, all right. Compared to her, George Bush looked like he had relevant experience when he was elected. Foreign policy? Well, she lives closer to Russia than any other candidate. So much for the Republican argument about Obama's lack of experience.

Palin's selection was pure stunt casting, a political act designed solely to ease McCain's election, not to provide for the continuity of the government should anything befall the geezer. What does she have going for her?

She's a woman. Woos Clinton's disaffected gynophilac supporters. Climbs onto the "historic candidate" bandwagon.

Has a kid about to go to Iraq. Neutralizes Biden on that issue. I wonder how many politicians McCain had to check to find any whose kids are in any danger of going there?

Without these two factors, there's no way she ever would have been selected. Can anyone honestly say she's the candidate best qualified to assume the presidency? This is a purely political choice, made with no regard for the welfare of the nation. Obviously, Obama made his own political calculations when he chose Biden, but he also knew very well that Biden is suited and qualified to become President.

I wonder who McCain will announce for his cabinet...maybe Cheney's daughter? Get that Lesbian vote wrapped up too?

September 2, 2008 01:09 PM Forum: Polls

Palin

Posted By Joe Bergeron

http://www.andrys.com/palin-kilkenny.html

I'm sure we'll all have varying opinions about whether what's indicated here makes her a good potential President.

August 29, 2008 06:22 PM Forum: Polls

Palin

Posted By Joe Bergeron

Well Don, thanks for talking up something you detest. Have these guys done any other great things which you detest?

August 29, 2008 06:26 PM Forum: Polls

Palin

Posted By Joe Bergeron

No, now I'm thinking of going Celestron.

August 29, 2008 06:53 PM Forum: Polls

Palin

Posted By Joe Bergeron

"Aggressive interrogation techniques"... nice euphemism for torture. "Torture" doesn't take as long to type, you know.