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JLB · Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 26454 Location: Casa del JLB

Democratic agenda already under fire
By Donald Lambro
Friday, November 17, 2006

WASHINGTON -- When the Democrats were campaigning to take over Congress, they benefited from a tidal wave of political anger aimed at the Republicans who had been in charge for the past 12 years.

But as the Democrats prepare to take control of the House and Senate, it is their legislative proposals that are in the spotlight, drawing much closer critical scrutiny than they received in this year's election. As one top GOP political strategist told me, "They are the ones who are in trouble now." The Democrats won't assume power until January, but their proposals to pull out of Iraq, slap a higher minimum wage on small businesses and raise taxes, including the tax on dividends and capital gains, are already taking hits.

In some cases, the criticism is coming from people who were among the Republicans' severest critics. People like retired Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, the former head of the U.S. Central Command, who called for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's resignation and has been a critic of the conduct of the war. Zinni thinks the Democrats' proposal to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq within four to six months would be a disaster.

The Democrats' reasoning behind their plan, if you can call it a plan, is that the prospect of troop withdrawal would put pressure on Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to take more aggressive steps to combat the terrorists and end the sectarian violence there.

"Well, you can't put pressure on a wounded guy," Zinni told The New York Times last week. "There is a premise that the Iraqis are not doing enough now, that there is a capability that they have not employed or used. I am not so sure they are capable of stopping sectarian violence."

Indeed, he thinks it makes more sense to increase U.S. troop strength, as Republican Sen. John McCain has proposed, to "regain momentum" as part of a comprehensive effort to stabilize Iraq, build its economy and its security forces.

Zinni is not the only one criticizing the troop-withdrawal plan devised by Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which would send the proposal to the Senate floor early next year. Retired two-star Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who commanded a division in Iraq and who had also called for Rumsfeld's resignation, said the idea was "terribly naive."

"There are lots of things that have to happen to set them up for success," Batiste said. "Until they happen, it does not matter what we tell Maliki." Kenneth Pollack, a defense analyst at the Brookings Institution and a former national-security adviser in the Clinton administration, told the Times that if Levin's plan were put into effect, it would result in "the eventuality of civil war tomorrow."

That view was further underscored in Senate testimony last week by Gen. John P. Abizaid, the American military commander for the Middle East, who said withdrawal would result in an increase in sectarian killings and undermine Iraq's ability to provide for its own security.

One of the Democrats' major campaign promises is to raise the federal minimum wage to more than $7 an hour, but small-business lobbies are already gearing up to battle the proposal they say would hurt smaller enterprises that have been the engine of job growth in the United States.

This would be a job killer, plain and simple. If it became law, millions of small businesses would find ways to trim their employment force, reducing the number of entry-level jobs that are critical to helping people get on the first rung of the economic ladder.

The businesses most severely hurt would be the younger start-ups that are still struggling to get established and that have not built up their payroll capacity to the much higher levels the Democrats would mandate by legislative fiat. Economist John Cogan at the Hoover Institution said, "This would hurt small businesses, especially in the South" where wages tend to be lower than in other regions of the country. But Cogan thinks the Democrats' plan would face numerous hurdles in Congress and very possibly from Democrats themselves, particularly in the Senate.

"There will be Democrats who don't want to stick it to small business," Cogan told me.

Democrats also hope to repeal the capital-gains and stock-dividend tax cuts that Republicans passed and President Bush signed into law, reforms that unlocked needed venture-capital investment that created jobs, lifted the stock market to record levels and boosted worker pension wealth.

Hundreds of companies have begun offering dividends as a result of the GOP's pro-growth initiative, and the lower tax rate on capital gains has made it more profitable to sell stock, spawning increased tax revenue that has helped to shrink federal- and state-budget deficits.

If Democrats vote to raise taxes on capital gains and dividends, they are going to encounter fierce opposition from two powerful constituencies, many of whom voted for them on Nov. 7: Millions of retirees and those soon to retire who depend on a lifetime of stock investments for their income; and the financial industry and investors who have plowed larger capital gains into new investment opportunities, boosting the nation's economy in the process.

The Democrats' campaign mantra that it's time for a change apparently appealed to a lot of dissatisfied Americans. But once these voters learn the fine print in the Democrats' plans, many may begin to think this wasn't the change they had in mind.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/DonaldLambro/2006/11/17/democratic_agenda_already_under_fire

They are started off with a whimper, aren't they? :lol:

Murtha down, Pelosi with the rug yanked out from under her, and nothing but unpopular ideas that they mislead the American people about.

2008 is going to be the end of the Democrat Party. 8:)

Swampfox.f · Joined: 08 Nov 2006 Posts: 248

JLB wrote: Democratic agenda already under fire
By Donald Lambro
Friday, November 17, 2006

WASHINGTON -- When the Democrats were campaigning to take over Congress, they benefited from a tidal wave of political anger aimed at the Republicans who had been in charge for the past 12 years.

But as the Democrats prepare to take control of the House and Senate, it is their legislative proposals that are in the spotlight, drawing much closer critical scrutiny than they received in this year's election. As one top GOP political strategist told me, "They are the ones who are in trouble now." The Democrats won't assume power until January, but their proposals to pull out of Iraq, slap a higher minimum wage on small businesses and raise taxes, including the tax on dividends and capital gains, are already taking hits.

In some cases, the criticism is coming from people who were among the Republicans' severest critics. People like retired Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, the former head of the U.S. Central Command, who called for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's resignation and has been a critic of the conduct of the war. Zinni thinks the Democrats' proposal to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq within four to six months would be a disaster.

The Democrats' reasoning behind their plan, if you can call it a plan, is that the prospect of troop withdrawal would put pressure on Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to take more aggressive steps to combat the terrorists and end the sectarian violence there.

"Well, you can't put pressure on a wounded guy," Zinni told The New York Times last week. "There is a premise that the Iraqis are not doing enough now, that there is a capability that they have not employed or used. I am not so sure they are capable of stopping sectarian violence."

Indeed, he thinks it makes more sense to increase U.S. troop strength, as Republican Sen. John McCain has proposed, to "regain momentum" as part of a comprehensive effort to stabilize Iraq, build its economy and its security forces.

Zinni is not the only one criticizing the troop-withdrawal plan devised by Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which would send the proposal to the Senate floor early next year. Retired two-star Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who commanded a division in Iraq and who had also called for Rumsfeld's resignation, said the idea was "terribly naive."

"There are lots of things that have to happen to set them up for success," Batiste said. "Until they happen, it does not matter what we tell Maliki." Kenneth Pollack, a defense analyst at the Brookings Institution and a former national-security adviser in the Clinton administration, told the Times that if Levin's plan were put into effect, it would result in "the eventuality of civil war tomorrow."

That view was further underscored in Senate testimony last week by Gen. John P. Abizaid, the American military commander for the Middle East, who said withdrawal would result in an increase in sectarian killings and undermine Iraq's ability to provide for its own security.

One of the Democrats' major campaign promises is to raise the federal minimum wage to more than $7 an hour, but small-business lobbies are already gearing up to battle the proposal they say would hurt smaller enterprises that have been the engine of job growth in the United States.

This would be a job killer, plain and simple. If it became law, millions of small businesses would find ways to trim their employment force, reducing the number of entry-level jobs that are critical to helping people get on the first rung of the economic ladder.

The businesses most severely hurt would be the younger start-ups that are still struggling to get established and that have not built up their payroll capacity to the much higher levels the Democrats would mandate by legislative fiat. Economist John Cogan at the Hoover Institution said, "This would hurt small businesses, especially in the South" where wages tend to be lower than in other regions of the country. But Cogan thinks the Democrats' plan would face numerous hurdles in Congress and very possibly from Democrats themselves, particularly in the Senate.

"There will be Democrats who don't want to stick it to small business," Cogan told me.

Democrats also hope to repeal the capital-gains and stock-dividend tax cuts that Republicans passed and President Bush signed into law, reforms that unlocked needed venture-capital investment that created jobs, lifted the stock market to record levels and boosted worker pension wealth.

Hundreds of companies have begun offering dividends as a result of the GOP's pro-growth initiative, and the lower tax rate on capital gains has made it more profitable to sell stock, spawning increased tax revenue that has helped to shrink federal- and state-budget deficits.

If Democrats vote to raise taxes on capital gains and dividends, they are going to encounter fierce opposition from two powerful constituencies, many of whom voted for them on Nov. 7: Millions of retirees and those soon to retire who depend on a lifetime of stock investments for their income; and the financial industry and investors who have plowed larger capital gains into new investment opportunities, boosting the nation's economy in the process.

The Democrats' campaign mantra that it's time for a change apparently appealed to a lot of dissatisfied Americans. But once these voters learn the fine print in the Democrats' plans, many may begin to think this wasn't the change they had in mind.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/DonaldLambro/2006/11/17/democratic_agenda_already_under_fire

They are started off with a whimper, aren't they? :lol:

Murtha down, Pelosi with the rug yanked out from under her, and nothing but unpopular ideas that they mislead the American people about.

2008 is going to be the end of the Democrat Party. 8:)

It is a shame that your partisan view points invalidate anything that you say.

When it comes down to it this is the summation of your entire thought process:

Rebublicans=good and Democrats=bad

It is exactly that type of thinking that is destroying our country.

Charlie Man · Joined: 02 Aug 2005 Posts: 4643

Well, there goes that call for bi-partisanship, right?

Silly op-ed writers and JLBs, not promoting consensus.

Basically, this article is full of ungrounded attacks on the democrat agenda without any attempt to see the good or alk about a better way. Pure partisan hackery.

GTTofAK · Joined: 09 Jan 2005 Posts: 5968 Location: Alaska

This article is just an example of one of he universal truths of polling. Just because x% respond the same way on a poll as you do does not mean they agree with you.

Divinity11 · Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 4484 Location: The Dirty

Hmmm, an Op ed from Townhall? Isn't this that same place that hosts the rantings of Ann Coulter? :lol:

Amongst the red-highlighted nonsense, I particularly like the way Donald ended his partisan drivel:

Quote: The Democrats' campaign mantra that it's time for a change apparently appealed to a lot of dissatisfied Americans. But once these voters learn the fine print in the Democrats' plans, many may begin to think this wasn't the change they had in mind.

Ooohhh, "many may". Well, that settles it.

Come on folks, of course there are going to be differences amongst ideas in a party. That's a given. Where is the REAL news?

Exactly.

Nothing to see here, folks.

Otacon · Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2006 12:05 pm Post subject:

It's a shame that some people will never be able to get past their allegiance to their party and actually attempt to work together. This article is nothing more than a baseless attack on the Democrats. We don't know how the Democrats will perform in Congress because they haven't gotten their yet. Wait until atleast the end of next year before passing any judgement.

Sands · Joined: 01 Nov 2006 Posts: 882

Now Swampfox.f...

You see, what you do is...

Post a copy and paste of a columnist's blog from a rightwing Opinion site, with HUGE TEXT and obnoxious colors...add no original opinion of your own, no debate questions, then follow it up with a hundred back to back troll comments until someone with some intelligence shuts your case down.

That's how you get a 20,000+ post count.

00timh · Joined: 08 Nov 2004 Posts: 13037 Location: upstate NY

How is it that when liberals attack anything and everything that conservatives do it is for the good of the country and when conservatives attack anything liberals do it is damaging partisanship?

in case you all have missed it conservatives and liberals fundamentally disagree on how to govern this country. Liberals never ceased attacking Republicans just after an election. they vowed to fight for their cause against the majority. but that's okay.... :roll:

The link JLB provided is an op ed of what is likely to happen should the democrats persue an agenda that they have said they would. It is an assertation that I myself happen to be in agreement with.

Heinz · Joined: 30 May 2006 Posts: 1636 Location: Philadelphia

This may be hard for Dems to face, but they weren't elected to be democrats, they were elected to be moderates and to bring us back to a more CONSERVATIVE style of government that Bush had abondoned.

They were elected to be REAL Republicans, not Democrats.

Swampfox.f · Joined: 08 Nov 2006 Posts: 248

Heinz wrote: This may be hard for Dems to face, but they weren't elected to be democrats, they were elected to be moderates and to bring us back to a more CONSERVATIVE style of government that Bush had abondoned.

They were elected to be REAL Republicans, not Democrats.

Well the REAL Republicans have disappeared. What we are left with is a group of opportunistic criminals. The dems didn't win, the repubs lost, but the real losers are all of us in America who have been subjected to neo-conservatism.

Dookiestix · Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2006 2:15 pm Post subject:

Heinz wrote: This may be hard for Dems to face, but they weren't elected to be democrats, they were elected to be moderates and to bring us back to a more CONSERVATIVE style of government that Bush had abondoned.

They were elected to be REAL Republicans, not Democrats.
Then why do you still feel the need to demonize them and attack others who support Dems? :wink:

Dookiestix · Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2006 2:25 pm Post subject:

Quote: Olbermann: Funny, how when Trent Lott defeated Lamar Alexander by one vote for the Senate minority leadership yesterday, it was characterized in the media as a remarkable comeback story, with the random kidding reference to that ironical word “minority.” But when Steny Hoyer and Jack Murtha both stood for the House majority leadership today, that was characterized in the media as Democratic infighting, with frequent implications that the Dems were already coming apart at the seams.
This is how Republicans work. Write the fictitious obituaries and spread the propoganda in order to minimize the effectiveness of the Dems.

The partisan hackery is blatantly obvious.

Heinz wrote: They were elected to be REAL Republicans, not Democrats.
And if Dems were elected to be REAL Republicans, not Democrats, then why all the propoganda anyway when they haven't even been sworn into power yet?

00timh wrote: The link JLB provided is an op ed of what is likely to happen should the democrats persue an agenda that they have said they would. It is an assertation that I myself happen to be in agreement with.
JLB also predicted a GOP win as well with some of his copy and paste screeds. I'd be careful about those kinds of sources in the future.

Brooklyn · Joined: 03 Mar 2006 Posts: 1054 Location: New York City

Quote: "Well, you can't put pressure on a wounded guy,"

Total BS! Giving the Iraqis any incentive to take control of their country is a good thing.

Quote: am not so sure they are capable of stopping sectarian violence."

They are just as capable as we are.

Quote: One of the Democrats' major campaign promises is to raise the federal minimum wage to more than $7 an hour, but small-business lobbies are already gearing up to battle the proposal they say would hurt smaller enterprises that have been the engine of job growth in the United States.

This I agree with. Nothing further.

Quote: "There will be Democrats who don't want to stick it to small business," Cogan told me.

I believe the Dems want to propose a minimum wage increase, but don't want it to pass. If they can propose it, and get the Repubs and a few Dems to shoot it down, it would be a win for the Dems.

Quote: Hundreds of companies have begun offering dividends as a result of the GOP's pro-growth initiative, and the lower tax rate on capital gains has made it more profitable to sell stock, spawning increased tax revenue that has helped to shrink federal- and state-budget deficits.

Well, I don't want to see any increases in my taxes, but to me, it is worth it to have a much needed check on the president's power.

Ozzone · Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2006 2:49 pm Post subject:

So now that the Democrats are going to be in power in Congress, Republicans are supposed to just accept preposterous ideas like "cut and run" and raising the minimum wage?

Democrats did not win control because Americans wanted us to abandon Iraq in 4-6 months without consequence nor did they want small businesses to suffer or fail.

What will Americans think if we do "cut and run" and Iraq falls completely apart? Will the Democrats just say "oops"?

What will Americans think if small businesses fail or massive job cuts ensue? Will the Democrats just say "oops" again?

No, the Democrats will find a way to blame the Republicans. That's what they always do.

Alizard · Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2006 2:56 pm Post subject:

00timh wrote:
in case you all have missed it conservatives and liberals fundamentally disagree on how to govern this country. Liberals never ceased attacking Republicans just after an election. they vowed to fight for their cause against the majority. but that's okay.... :roll:

It was not only "okay", it was essential to the survival of our country. In case you hadn't noticed, a government where only one party runs everything is not a democracy... it had become a dictatorship. Fighting against the corrupt "majority" was necessary to revers the course to disaster.

The good news was that the stuff that the dems were criticizing were (at the same time) exploding and/or burning down, leaving the repubs no way to defend their disaterous blunders which resulted in them being thrown out of office in unprecedented numbers.

You missed that part when you whined about how this party attacked that party. In the end, it's actions and results that determine who gets to keep their job. That's why ther repub congressmen had such a recent spike in unemployment....

It's called democracy. get used to it, because it ain't going away.

Alizard · Posted: Fri Nov 17, 2006 2:59 pm Post subject:

Ozzone wrote: So now that the Democrats are going to be in power in Congress, Republicans are supposed to just accept preposterous ideas like "cut and run" and raising the minimum wage?

The funny thing is: the repubs all now realize that "cut and run" lying soundbyte won't fly.... as they used it in their campaigns and it backfired on them big time.

The real question is: why haven't you caught on that nobody is buying that lie anymore?

JLB · Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 26454 Location: Casa del JLB

[quote="Swampfox.f"] JLB wrote: Democratic agenda already under fire
By Donald Lambro
Friday, November 17, 2006

WASHINGTON -- When the Democrats were campaigning to take over Congress, they benefited from a tidal wave of political anger aimed at the Republicans who had been in charge for the past 12 years.

But as the Democrats prepare to take control of the House and Senate, it is their legislative proposals that are in the spotlight, drawing much closer critical scrutiny than they received in this year's election. As one top GOP political strategist told me, "They are the ones who are in trouble now." The Democrats won't assume power until January, but their proposals to pull out of Iraq, slap a higher minimum wage on small businesses and raise taxes, including the tax on dividends and capital gains, are already taking hits.

In some cases, the criticism is coming from people who were among the Republicans' severest critics. People like retired Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, the former head of the U.S. Central Command, who called for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's resignation and has been a critic of the conduct of the war. Zinni thinks the Democrats' proposal to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq within four to six months would be a disaster.

The Democrats' reasoning behind their plan, if you can call it a plan, is that the prospect of troop withdrawal would put pressure on Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to take more aggressive steps to combat the terrorists and end the sectarian violence there.

"Well, you can't put pressure on a wounded guy," Zinni told The New York Times last week. "There is a premise that the Iraqis are not doing enough now, that there is a capability that they have not employed or used. I am not so sure they are capable of stopping sectarian violence."

Indeed, he thinks it makes more sense to increase U.S. troop strength, as Republican Sen. John McCain has proposed, to "regain momentum" as part of a comprehensive effort to stabilize Iraq, build its economy and its security forces.

Zinni is not the only one criticizing the troop-withdrawal plan devised by Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which would send the proposal to the Senate floor early next year. Retired two-star Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who commanded a division in Iraq and who had also called for Rumsfeld's resignation, said the idea was "terribly naive."

"There are lots of things that have to happen to set them up for success," Batiste said. "Until they happen, it does not matter what we tell Maliki." Kenneth Pollack, a defense analyst at the Brookings Institution and a former national-security adviser in the Clinton administration, told the Times that if Levin's plan were put into effect, it would result in "the eventuality of civil war tomorrow."

That view was further underscored in Senate testimony last week by Gen. John P. Abizaid, the American military commander for the Middle East, who said withdrawal would result in an increase in sectarian killings and undermine Iraq's ability to provide for its own security.

One of the Democrats' major campaign promises is to raise the federal minimum wage to more than $7 an hour, but small-business lobbies are already gearing up to battle the proposal they say would hurt smaller enterprises that have been the engine of job growth in the United States.

This would be a job killer, plain and simple. If it became law, millions of small businesses would find ways to trim their employment force, reducing the number of entry-level jobs that are critical to helping people get on the first rung of the economic ladder.

The businesses most severely hurt would be the younger start-ups that are still struggling to get established and that have not built up their payroll capacity to the much higher levels the Democrats would mandate by legislative fiat. Economist John Cogan at the Hoover Institution said, "This would hurt small businesses, especially in the South" where wages tend to be lower than in other regions of the country. But Cogan thinks the Democrats' plan would face numerous hurdles in Congress and very possibly from Democrats themselves, particularly in the Senate.

"There will be Democrats who don't want to stick it to small business," Cogan told me.

Democrats also hope to repeal the capital-gains and stock-dividend tax cuts that Republicans passed and President Bush signed into law, reforms that unlocked needed venture-capital investment that created jobs, lifted the stock market to record levels and boosted worker pension wealth.

Hundreds of companies have begun offering dividends as a result of the GOP's pro-growth initiative, and the lower tax rate on capital gains has made it more profitable to sell stock, spawning increased tax revenue that has helped to shrink federal- and state-budget deficits.

If Democrats vote to raise taxes on capital gains and dividends, they are going to encounter fierce opposition from two powerful constituencies, many of whom voted for them on Nov. 7: Millions of retirees and those soon to retire who depend on a lifetime of stock investments for their income; and the financial industry and investors who have plowed larger capital gains into new investment opportunities, boosting the nation's economy in the process.

The Democrats' campaign mantra that it's time for a change apparently appealed to a lot of dissatisfied Americans. But once these voters learn the fine print in the Democrats' plans, many may begin to think this wasn't the change they had in mind.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/DonaldLambro/2006/11/17/democratic_agenda_already_under_fire

They are started off with a whimper, aren't they? :lol:

Murtha down, Pelosi with the rug yanked out from under her, and nothing but unpopular ideas that they mislead the American people about.

2008 is going to be the end of the Democrat Party. 8:)

Quote: It is a shame that your partisan view points invalidate anything that you say.

Wrong.

You can be correct and still be partisan.

It's a shame you combine blind partisanship with the inability to use logic. 8:)

Quote: When it comes down to it this is the summation of your entire thought process:

Rebublicans=good and Democrats=bad

It is exactly that type of thinking that is destroying our country.

Again you are wrong.

Conservatives=good and Liberals=bad.

The fact that you can't tell the difference is what is destroying our country. 8:)

I agree

JLB · Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 26454 Location: Casa del JLB

Charlie Man wrote: Well, there goes that call for bi-partisanship, right?

Silly op-ed writers and JLBs, not promoting consensus.

Basically, this article is full of ungrounded attacks on the democrat agenda without any attempt to see the good or alk about a better way. Pure partisan hackery.

I guess the New York Times is partisan too, eh? :lol:

Quote:
Editorial
Speaker Pelosi Tempts Disaster
Sign In to E-Mail This Print Save

Published: November 17, 2006

Nancy Pelosi has managed to severely scar her leadership even before taking up the gavel as the new speaker of the House. First, she played politics with the leadership of the House Intelligence Committee to settle an old score and a new debt. And then she put herself in a lose-lose position by trying to force a badly tarnished ally, Representative John Murtha, on the incoming Democratic Congress as majority leader. The party caucus put a decisive end to that gambit yesterday, giving the No. 2 job to Steny Hoyer, a longtime Pelosi rival.

But Ms. Pelosi’s damage to herself was already done. The well-known shortcomings of Mr. Murtha were broadcast for all to see — from his quid-pro-quo addiction to moneyed lobbyists to the grainy government tape of his involvement in the Abscam scandal a generation ago. The resurrected tape — feasted upon by Pelosi enemies — shows how Mr. Murtha narrowly survived as an unindicted co-conspirator, admittedly tempted but finally rebuffing a bribe offer: “I’m not interested — at this point.”

Mr. Murtha would have been a farcical presence in a leadership promising the cleanest Congress in history. Ms. Pelosi should have been first to realize this, having made such a fiery campaign sword of her vows to end Capitol corruption. Instead, she acted like some old-time precinct boss and lost the first test before her peers.

As incoming speaker, Ms. Pelosi will be dogged by skepticism — from within the party and without — about her political smarts and her ability to deliver a galvanized agenda.

It was a no-brainer for the caucus to end the misguided fight for Mr. Murtha, who belittled the need for reform. Now the pressure is even greater for Speaker-elect Pelosi to recover by leading the House to something actually worth fighting for — starting with credible anticorruption strictures. For this she needs gaffe-wary advisers, among them Mr. Hoyer, who has his own questionable record of flourishing in big-money politics. The new majority — led by a presumably wiser speaker — must realize by now that intramural vendetta is hardly a substitute for productive government.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/17/opinion/17fri2.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Even the leftist media knows a train wreck when they see one. 8:)

JLB · Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 26454 Location: Casa del JLB

Otacon wrote: It's a shame that some people will never be able to get past their allegiance to their party and actually attempt to work together. This article is nothing more than a baseless attack on the Democrats. We don't know how the Democrats will perform in Congress because they haven't gotten their yet. Wait until atleast the end of next year before passing any judgement.

If they can screw up so bad in the first week, I'm sure we can expect more of the same. 8:)

JLB · Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 26454 Location: Casa del JLB

Sands wrote: Now Swampfox.f...

You see, what you do is...

Post a copy and paste of a columnist's blog from a rightwing Opinion site, with HUGE TEXT and obnoxious colors...add no original opinion of your own, no debate questions, then follow it up with a hundred back to back troll comments until someone with some intelligence shuts your case down.

That's how you get a 20,000+ post count.

Your troll post is certainly an example of how you plan to get there.

I did it the hard way. 8:)