jryan

That's just patently false:

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE69E54M20101016

 

and in fact:

 

 

 

Not only did the deficit decrease, it decreased substantially.

Where is it mentioned in that article how the stimulus is counted in the 2009 and 2010 deficits? YOU argued that the stimulus spending that Obama and the Democrats voted in and spent in 2009 was not part of the $1.4 trillion deficit calculation in 2009, so my subtracting the $159 billion from that total was incorrect.... so I simply took your word as gospel and ADDED the stimulus spending from 2009 and 2010 to the deficits of 2009 and 2010. Either way the narrative that Obama spent less is false.

It was a campaign promise of Obama's to not keep any debts off-books... but you are now arguing that the stimulus is not in the 2009 or 2010 figure and shouldn't be counted. Why is that?

The way I see it is that either the deficit numbers include the stimulus, in which case you can't count $0.159 trillion of 2009 as "Bush Debt" (leaving a Bush total of $1.257 trillion), or the stimulus is not counted in those deficits, and tacking then onto the deficit totals results in: 2009-$1.41 Trillion Bush, $0.159 Trillion Obama, 2010 - $1.649 trillion total Obama deficit.

At best I see that the Reuters article has the Democrats arguing that the stimulus was necessary, but I don't see where it argues that it shouldn't be counted on the books... whether you assume it is counted or not it still makes Bush's portion of the 2009 budget less than the Obama budget of 2010.

Wrong. FY2009 was Bush's last budget, and it was $1.4 trillion regardless of any stimulus spending. If you really believe what you're saying, please dig up for me this mysterious $1.24 trillion budget that you claim Bush passed for FY2009, but even the hippie dippie patchouli-wearing peacenik communists at the CATO institute will tell you that you're wrong.

I'm not sure how it is that you see that as evidence since the CATO institute doesn't actually break out the stimulus money spent in 2009 or 2010 in it's article.

But we can argue it that way too and show that the claim is disingenuous for the same reason, but in a different direction.

According to the White House's own stimulus tracker, $558 billion has been spent of the $787 billion stimulus. I have already shown that the stimulus payouts in 2009 accounted for $159 billion of that, which leaves $399 billion spent in 2010. I will also grant that the $558 billion is 15 days into FY2011, so lets discount $40 billion for 2011... which is more than was likely spent. If you want to argue that that spending was off the books when comparing deficits (something Obama promised he wouldn't do) then the ACTUAL deficits for 2009 and 2010 SHOULD look like this:

2009: $1.4 trillion + $0.159 trillion = $1.559 trillion total deficit outlays

2010: $1.3 trillion + $0.399 trilion - $0.04 trillion = $1.659 trillion in total deficit outlays.

So whether you count the stimulus on the books or off it still shows that the claim that Obama cut the deficit between 2009 and 2010 is not actually true. He increased spending in 2010 by roughly $100 billion dollars.

Conservatives (particularly of the Tea Party variety) want more fiscal responsibility in Washington, lower taxes, and a lower deficit. Obama and the Democrats have delivered in all of these areas: taxes are the lowest they've been in decades (indeed a compromise with Republicans, where Republicans flat out refuse to compromise with Democrats), they've managed to substantially reduce the deficit from where it was left by the Bush administration, and the stimulus is creating jobs. By all quantitative measures Obama and the Democrats are addressing the problems conservatives are concerned about.

The Federal budget has gone from $3.1 trillion in 2009 (the "Bush Budget") to $3.55 trillion in 2010.

The "Bush Deficit" in 2009 is not really a fair assessment when you are discussing 2009 -vs- 2010 since $159 billion of the 2009 deficit was stimulus spending voted into law during the Obama administration. So, the "Bush" portion of the 2009 deficit ($1.4 trillion) is about $1.24 trillion, which is not good by a long shot, but still less than Obama and the Democrats managed on their own in 2010.

Therefor it is disingenuous to claim a "Bush Deficit" in 2009 when there was so much emergency spending signed into law and spent AFTER Bush left office. I'm not happy with the $1.24 trillion either, but I have to shake my head at the categorization that Obama lowered the deficit. If he did it would only be insofar as he reduced his own spending from 2009.

Top 20 PACS and who they support

527 spending by election cylce

I think the point is that when the talk comes 'round to soft money campaign financing the Democrats shouldn't be throwing stones.

It wouldn't matter if the majority of violence was committed in the name of Islam or if the majority of Muslims committed violence. It would still be wrong to attribute that violence to Islam as a religion OR to Muslims in general. You can't hold individuals accountable for actions that they didn't commit individually. And it doesn't make sense to hold a book or an ideology responsible for actions because the actions are the result of interpretations, not the text itself. A cookbook doesn't prepare meals or ruin them, cooks do.

But is one recipe tends to lead more often to ruined meals maybe it's time to reconsider the recipe.

I personally know a number of Christians who believe they are fighting a holy war by being a member of the U.S. armed forces. My understanding is that that point of view is not very uncommon, though I don't have any statistics.

Well, then that is fairly useless. For each person you supposedly know who think they are in a wholly war I can point to entire Islamic governments who believe the same thing.

Sorry, I thought my rhetorical point would be clear. I was implying that equating all of religion with radical Qutbism is the same as equating all of Islam with radical Qutbism, and that both positions are unreasonable.

And I am not stating that all Muslims are Qutibists. All Muslim terrorists aren't even Qutibists.

That is absolutely not true. But if it was, what would be your point? 100% of them are religious. Why should I care what a religious person thinks? Why the hell should I allow a place of worship on American soil, when religious people attacked America nine years ago today?

There were 223 reported acts of violence in the name of Islam between July 14th and September 9th that cost 1024 people their lives. Find me similar numbers for any other religion.

You are actually taking it one step further than me and choosing to paint all religion with what is predominantly a problem with Islam. This doesn't actually put you on the high road.

Yup, the media is highly biased against common things. You hardly ever hear about the number of people who die in car accidents or from normal disease, but if someone gets hit by lightning or eaten by a shark the media is all over it.

Well, except that in this case they are seizing on the innocuous and reporting on the the radical response as if THAT were normal.

I wonder what the response would be if the dope in a church in Florida announced that he planned to burn a Quran if Iran stones Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani? Would the media be wringing it's hands in concern for his feelings? Likely not.

Ok, how about we change that from "any Muslim" to "any religious person." When religious people stop blowing stuff up, maybe then I'll give a damn what you have to say. Do you see how unreasonable that sounds?

Well sure! And let's not forget that 99.999% of those religious people with a hankering to blowing stuff up in the name of their religion just happen to be Muslims.

Islam is treated as an entity when we are meant to care about the feelings of the Muslim community. If I am to accept that the actions of a 50 parishioner Church in Florida will be used by Muslims the world over to incite violence against random westerners and Christians that happen to be in arms reach then forgive me when I hold all of Islam responsible for the actions of it's millions of radical, violent adherents.

In other words, when they stop burning down churches, setting Christians to the torch for blasphemy, and generally react as strongly to the violent radicals in their own midsts as they do to the peaceful protesting radicals in the West then I will start to give a damn about what any Muslim feels about what some dope in Florida might do to a book he purchased.

Well, the funny thing is that the media in the West is decidedly slanted against the West. They don't dare call foul on the incredibly hypocritical approach to "peace" that Islam takes.

For instance, we will cover with intricate detail the world wide Muslim outrage of a Church with 50 parishioners planning to burn a Quran and nobody bothers to comment on the fact that maybe these same outraged Muslims of the world should

I bet there were more than a few Bibles in there and more than 50 Muslims in that mob.

But we can't draw those comparisons in Western media, apparently. And showing that the Muslims need to remove the plank from their eye before rioting and murdering because of the spec in ours is right out.

I think that's a lot to read into a couple of sentences. If you know Malaysian culture well enough to know precisely how that paragraph will be read in that environment, and if the rest of his speech didn't qualify his remarks, fine. But otherwise I think that's a good example of what's been part of the problem here -- taking Imam Rauf's words out of context and extrapolating them into a critical conclusion. (Though I applaud you for not reaching as far-gone a conclusion as many on the right have been reaching.)

Maybe so, but the news on the bridge building Imam doesn't get any better -- which is likely contributing to how I read his words. He is apparently also a slum lord, for instance. Which makes me really wonder how much he actually cares about his religion of peace and charity. He doesn't seem to practice it uniformly, at any rate.

Then there is the curious story of the waiter with a history of legal troubles who somehow managed to plunk down $5 million to buy the damaged building that will be replaced by the Muslim community center (so far from ground zero apparently that pieces of the building severely damaged the roof) and then promptly failed to make any tax payments on the land ($227,000 in arrears as of today).... but may still get $70 million in public funding for the mosque.

So for me it doesn't really matter what religion will be practiced inside the building for the deal to still stink... while also strongly questioning the Imam's methods of bridge building even IF he is on the up and up.

It was this passage in particular:

My message to the Christian community in Malaysia is that using the word Allah to mean the Christian God may be theologically and legally correct, but in the context of Malaysia, it is socially provocative. If you want to have influence with people in Malaysia, you must find a way to convey your message without provoking this kind of response.

The message here is to not provoke the Islamists, even though in theory Muslims and Christians pray to the same God. Imagine a priest instructing American Jews to stop using the word "God" because some backwards Christians get upset... he wouldn't seem much like a bridge builder would he?

Rather than taking the opportunity to admonish the very real discrimination in Malaysia against the Christians he takes the side of the Muslims in principle but argues that burning down churches isn't the best response. This will accomplish nothing. He is taking the middle road on something that has no real middle road. "Ladies, you should stop dressing so provocatively, and to the gentlemen I say that raping isn't the way you should be relieving your frustration."

Imam Rauf is more complicated a figure than the two prevailing views of him. For myself, I read the Pearl speech and find it heartening, but then I read articles like this one and feel that the man just doesn't get it. He is a poor bridge builder and seems incapable of accepting his own council. He also has a bad habit of blaming the victim far too often. In fact, the Pearl speech is a bit of an outlier when it comes to positions he has taken that I can agree with.

That isn't to say that I don't agree with the notion that he is perfectly within his rights to build the mosque and community center. But it's not like I can't strong disagree with him doing so and find his expressed purpose for the center to be 180 degrees different than the actual outcome.

Fair enough.

I had been reading some old discussions about relativity and why it is that the universe can be 153 billion light years across and only 14 billion years old. While the argument that it is a matter of expanding space makes perfect sense I had wondered whether time dilation played a part in making initial expansion appear to happen at a rate far faster than the speed of light.

Well that doesn't exactly answer my question, but I think it moves in the right direction.

Given that answer, can we assume that average gravitational potential at any given point in the young universe was greater than today given the greater density of the young universe as compared to the much larger universe today?

Quick question that I can't find the answer to: Was the gravitational field of the younger, denser universe sufficient to slow time?

For which an in junction was placed against him. i.e. the result of the legal action has taken place. You're trying to additionally punish him for a crime he has not (yet) been charged with or even committed.

Which is the crux of the complaint by the DoJ lawyer. The injunction was not what the DoJ would normally seek in his experience as a voting right lawyer, and he was specifically instructed to not pursue the case any further because of the offender's race.

Not charged with the crime. IANAL, but I doubt that would matter.

 

Arrest him on a new charge and try him for that crime. That's how the system works.

Again, that is the crux of the complaint. Any other case like this would have had the perpetrator charged with voter intimidation and prosecuted to the fullest. That was the opinion of the whistle blower who IS a lawyer who DID make a career out of prosecuting such cases.

If he repeats, you file another injunction. Just like any other crime — the punishment is supposed to be proportionate to the infraction. Just like we don't generally lock people up just because they might commit another crime, you can't anticipate the action here. That's not how the system works.

But they DID commit a crime because threatening people at a polling station is voter intimidation.

Take careful note while you read that and consider what the reaction would have been had a Republican president ordered any of the cases sighted in the Slate article to be dropped.

This still doesn't connect it to the lawsuit that was filed. The unprotected speech/expression at the polling place was dealt with.

You mean to say that the street corner threat to kill a white woman and white children is in no way connected to physical threats against white people at a polling station? I beg to differ. I think that would be called a "pattern" in court when determining the defendants actual sentence.

Merged post follows:

Also, here is a video that shows the intimidation as well as a short documentary about Shabazz which includes his threats to kill white people.

reset button?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101532912

Pangloss's link says through 2012, i.e. after the next presidential election.

Ok, so he can threaten people with weapons at poling places every OTHER presidential election. Next cycle it's the KKK's turn, I guess.

Why should what he said in an interview , i.e. not part of the intimidation complaint, come into play? All sorts of reprehensible speech is protected by the first amendment; there is no caveat that it be "nice" or "agree with any particular ideology." Punishing someone for it is a violation of their civil rights.

 

And, what more could you do as the result of a civil lawsuit?

There is a bit of a gray area in free speech when that speech is urging people to commit murder.

Also, it will have to wait until I get home as I can't search Youtube here, but the video is of Shabazz saying those things on a street corner to a black man walking with a white woman. After seeing the black man with a white woman he begins screaming about killing whitey and killing their white babies. Free speech doesn't cover threats to your life, and seems to be a cut and dry "hate speech" case.

That reset button was turned up to "60s Bond Film" apparently.

The so-sad-it's-funny punchline to all of this is that the sites like DailyKOS and Media Matters are claiming that the case was NOT closed because the DoJ issued a "penalty" to Shabazz stating that he can not conduct any political activity or carry a weapon to a polling place. This will be enforced until 2012.

So yeah, the penalty for Shabazz threatening voters at a polling place during a presidential election will be enforced... until the next presidential election.

Also, there is a video surfacing of Shabazz on a street corner declaring that blacks will not be free until the kill white and kill whitey's babies. (link)

Maybe if they investigated a little more they would have realized he was a dangerous man that deserved more than a slap on the wrist?

you have to remember that the government works (or at least should) for the people. if they make decisions unpopular with the people then they will not get re-elected.

Well, except for abolishing all elections... the people tend to hate that but have no recourse.

Not that I'm saying that could or would happen.

I don't really fully agree with the premise here in that I don't think Clinton was a centrist when this ran in 1992, and never really became centrist until after his health care defeat and the Republican win in 1994.

In that way we could possibly see a far more centrist Obama next year if the Republicans win control of the House and Senate this year.

It probably isn't prosecutable as long as all involved remain friends. The crime needs a participant willing to become a witness to the crime. Their is enough evidence here of either lies or stupidity that it may be possible to apply enough heat to get someone to turn witness, but not likely.

One thing is for sure, Sestak has earned himself all the help that he needs from Obama! Nobody in the administration would want him feeling unappreciated! In that way this "slip" was brilliant on Sestak's part.

Of course, at this point they have to worry about Specter because he may well run as an independent like Lieberman did. This could very well kill their chances in November in that Senate race.

I find this whole debacle to be a bit of schadenfreude as we conservatives had to endure months of "Boy, those Democrats have such a big tent, don't they? How great is it that they have so much ideological room that they can accept Specter with open arms!? *swoon*" .... only to have this happen in the very next primary. *giggle-and-point-at Democrats*

If outing Valerie Plame was a crime then Joe Wilson should be in jail.