Wufacta
Obama's a triangulator. Yet now there seem to be a lot of people supporting it and arguing that "you have to compromise" all of a sudden. I would just like to open a discussion here. First of all, (a) do people agree that Obama triangulates? Or that he is about general themes such as 'unity' which appeal to people of all parties but aren't specifically progressive? (b) do people think this is a good or bad thing? And what, if any, is the difference between this kind of triangulation and the kind practiced by the DLC?
One of the most false and untrue statements made about Hillary Clinton is that she is 'the establishment' and that she 'does not represent change'.
The truth is that Hillary represents a huge amount of change. Because she agrees on the need for change and disagrees only on the best means of bringing them about. Because she supports for policies and positions that would be very different from status quo Republican policies. Because she'd be the first woman President, and the first liberal woman leader of a G-8 nation.
Many commentators on this site have maintained that Hillary Clinton is a 'corporate Democrat', that she cares for no values or principles, that she is about 'triangulation'. Nothing could be further from the truth, and the record bears this out.
Hillary Clinton has been fighting for progressive economic causes her entire adult life, longer than either Sens. Obama or Edwards.
Below the fold for the record.
I support Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination and President in 2008. Congratulations to Barack Obama, who brought in thousands of young first-time caucus goers. Liberals want to see change.
It is Senator Clinton however who best represents and embodies the kind of change we need. Hillary is running as the would-be first woman President. Obama is running as the would-be first black President. Both are significant, and a lot of people say neither is more significant than the other. As a minority man, having the first woman President is more significant. More below the fold.
Which is more objectionable? A cartoon that implies that a young woman run over by an Israeli bulldozer was 'protecting terrorists' or a headline that reads "F*CK BUSH"?
Recently, in Colorado, a student editor-in-chief of the Rocky Mountain Collegian at Colorado State University was outed for publishing the latter. The entire column read simply "Taser this: F**k Bush."
The former occured 4 years ago at the University of Maryland, and the story was also picked up by the Associated Press. There are stark differences between the way the two cases have been framed by the media, at least in the articles I've looked at, and I believe that a double standard is at work here.
What's your favorite sense of humor? Mine is droll humor, wit, non-sequitor, and self-deprecation. Droll humor and non-sequitor are nice because they're easy to make, though often they're more fun to make than listen to, because the audience doesn't always get it! Self-deprecation is also pretty easy to make for me. Slapstick appealed to me as a kid and still does. Wit is wonderful to listen to!
One type of humor that I hate is low-brow, sexual humor. The first time I encountered it was South Park in 1997. What's so funny about a bunch of kids farting, or singing about private sexual organs? Maybe that kind of thing would be funny in the 1950's when no one thought kids could think like that.
Poll 68 votes Show Results Taken from wikipedia. Vote favorites. Black comedy, also known as black humour is a sub-genre of comedy and satire where topics and events that are usually treated seriously â€" death, mass murder, suicide, sickness, madness, fear, drug abuse, rape, war, terrorism etc. â€" are treated in a hu Caustic humour is a type of humour which relies on a witty put-down. ''Ever noticed that people who believe in Creationism look really unevolved?' Droll humor is an often dry, witty form of humor that elicits laughs through amusingly odd, sometimes zany behavior or speech. 'If God did not intend for us to eat animals, then why did he make them out of meat?' Deadpan is a form of comedic delivery in which humour is presented without exhibiting a change in emotion or facial expression. Deadpan is a type of dry humour. A non sequitor. It is a comment which, due to its lack of meaning relative to the comment it follows, is absurd to the point of being humorous or confusing. Obscenity. It can simply be used to mean profanity, or it can mean anything that is taboo, indecent, abhorrent, or disgusting. Parody, Mockery Saracasm, Satire Self-irony / Self-deprecation Wit, as in many one-liner jokes Repartee is the wit of the quick answer and capping comment: the snappy comeback and neat retort. (Wilde: "I wish I'd said that." Whistler: "You will, Oscar, you will".) Practical joke: luring someone into a humorous position or situation and then laughing at their expense Form-versus-content humour is a type of humour in which the way a statement is made contributes to making the statement humorous. Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated physical violence or activities (e.g., a character being hit in the face with a frying pan or running full speed into a wall). The style is common to those genres of entertainment in which the audience i 'Low-brow' (not a category in wikipedia but I had it in mind obviously!) 68 votes Vote Now! Taken from wikipedia. Vote favorites. Black comedy, also known as black humour is a sub-genre of comedy and satire where topics and events that are usually treated seriously â€" death, mass murder, suicide, sickness, madness, fear, drug abuse, rape, war, terrorism etc. â€" are treated in a hu 6% 4 votes Caustic humour is a type of humour which relies on a witty put-down. ''Ever noticed that people who believe in Creationism look really unevolved?' 1% 1 vote Droll humor is an often dry, witty form of humor that elicits laughs through amusingly odd, sometimes zany behavior or speech. 'If God did not intend for us to eat animals, then why did he make them out of meat?' 14 votes Deadpan is a form of comedic delivery in which humour is presented without exhibiting a change in emotion or facial expression. Deadpan is a type of dry humour. 8 votes A non sequitor. It is a comment which, due to its lack of meaning relative to the comment it follows, is absurd to the point of being humorous or confusing. 9% 6 votes Obscenity. It can simply be used to mean profanity, or it can mean anything that is taboo, indecent, abhorrent, or disgusting. 1% 1 vote Parody, Mockery 7% 5 votes Saracasm, Satire 13 votes Self-irony / Self-deprecation 4% 3 votes Wit, as in many one-liner jokes 9% 6 votes Repartee is the wit of the quick answer and capping comment: the snappy comeback and neat retort. (Wilde: "I wish I'd said that." Whistler: "You will, Oscar, you will".) 9% 6 votes Practical joke: luring someone into a humorous position or situation and then laughing at their expense 0% 0 votes Form-versus-content humour is a type of humour in which the way a statement is made contributes to making the statement humorous. 1% 1 vote Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated physical violence or activities (e.g., a character being hit in the face with a frying pan or running full speed into a wall). The style is common to those genres of entertainment in which the audience i 0% 0 votes 'Low-brow' (not a category in wikipedia but I had it in mind obviously!) 0% 0 votes
Ten years after the Asian financial cataclysm of 1997, the economies of the Western Pacific Rim are growing, though not at the rates they enjoyed before the crisis. The region has been indelibly scarred: there are greater poverty, inequality and social destabilization than before the crisis. Meanwhile, despite all the talk about a "new global financial architecture", there is little in place to regulate the massive amounts of capital shooting through global financial networks at cyberspeed - one of the chief causes of the 1997 crisis.
Ten years after the Asian financial cataclysm of 1997, the economies of the Western Pacific Rim are growing, though not at the rates they enjoyed before the crisis. The region has been indelibly scarred: there are greater poverty, inequality and social destabilization than before the crisis.
Meanwhile, despite all the talk about a "new global financial architecture", there is little in place to regulate the massive amounts of capital shooting through global financial networks at cyberspeed - one of the chief causes of the 1997 crisis.
10 years after the Asian Financial crisis, certain things come into clearer focus- lack of 'transparency', 'corruption' and 'not allowing for failure' were overrated as causes. A sudden vacuum of liquidity, combined with self-destructive policies imposed by global institutions, were underrated, no matter how blindingly obvious it should have been at the time. Neoliberalism remains just as discredited today as it was then.
Three new studies this week with bad news for electronic voting.
First, in Florida, Diebold voting machines were successfully hacked.
In California, Diebold, Sequoia and Hart voting machines were successfully hacked.
Meanwhile, a new report from the NYU and U.C. Berkeley law schools finds that most states which require a paper trail for electronic voting never even count them.
Finally, the American Enterprise Institute has come out against amending HAVA. Why?
If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. - Ronald Reagan, Vanderbilt University
Socialists have, so to speak, presented their case wrong side foremost. They have never made it sufficiently clear that the essential aims of Socialism are justice and liberty. - George Orwell, the Road to Wigan Pier
Throughout history, the notion of liberty, like justice, religion, and science has been appropriated by various individuals and by and for various causes. Everyone is 'for' liberty. Yet no group believes in liberty as a principle to the exclusion of all else. And no group has deluded itself into thinking that it does as much as libertarians.
So Bill Richardson is being excorciated for being against single-payer health care despite the fact that he is for widely expanded access to health care by
all supported by an advance refundable tax credit to help families pay... with the aim of universal health care in mind after all these reforms have taken place. Furthermore, Richardson will try to do this without raising taxes. Strangely enough some people here seem to be mad at him for this.
In last year's elections, voters rejected Bush conservatism, but it is not clear that they embraced New Deal liberalism. Democrats run the risk of flaming out and having 2006 be a re-run of 1946 or 1994, where the party that won Congress overreached and lost the longer term battle.
This is not a very deep diary. The headlines today are "Senate hands Bush major defeat on immigration." Despite the President's 28% popularity ratings, you don't see headlines like "[Congress] hands Bush major defeat" on much of anything very often. This Congress has capitulated on issue after issue, including the crucial issue of Iraq, as documented here. In fact, on Iraq, one gets the sense that they didn't even try very hard. You knew from the beginning that Bush was going to veto the timetable that they put forward.
George Lakoff argues that the coherence of issue positions that can be considered conservative or liberal can be explained through two competing views of the metaphor of the family. Conservatives adopt the 'strict-father' role, emphasizing discipline and authority, while liberals adopt the 'nurturing-parent' role, emphasizing caring and protection. Liberals have been losing ground because we think that we can win people over simply by presenting a rational case for our position, and don't realize that people's emotional, or values responded, based on these unconscious metaphors or frames, are actually more powerful.
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