Who won?

[angus]

Ah, I've slept since then, and would have trouble debating you, point-for-point, each of their performances.  We could look up the transcripts, of course, and I suspect in the thread someone will, but not I.  I drifted off during the replay, after having watched most of it two times, with the idea that this was a more interesting debate than any other I've watched.  And Michelle Bachmann, at least to me, came off as fairly well informed, and didn't make any false statements that I could remember at the time I drifted off to sleep.  And that was especially reassuring because the great disappointment, for whom I voted for in the last general election and the one you have unabashedly depicted in your signature, seems to be especially effective in the area of foreign policy, despite his ineffectuality in domestic policy.

But as I said before, my heart still belongs to the Doctor.  So none of it really matters to this "likely Iowa caucus voter."  

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Bachmann - Not as brain-dead as normal - but seemed upset the rapture might be delayed if Israel isn't backed-up

But she didn't really play that record last night, did she?  It's as though someone on her team replayed for her the quote from the previous debate where she referred to Israel's "indefensible" 1967 borders.  Borders which, I might add, Israel defended pretty damn well.  In fact, all of them, Perry included, seemed to have been sat down in front of cameras and made to listen to the asinine and inaccurate statements they'd made in past debates.

Not that there were no inaccuracies.  (I counted at least 14!)  But imho they all, except Cain, had commanding performances.  Bachmann included.

Allen West is my Congressman down here, and I like him alot, but he is the most pro Israel member of the House; he refers to Israel as his "spiritual homeland", and we should not be at all involved in their affairs, but if I were Israeli, I wouldn't want the 1967 borders. At one point, the width of the country is 9 miles...It makes a tight squeeze. But I agree with you for the most part.

[angus]

I were Israeli, I wouldn't want the 1967 borders...

And if I were Mexican, I wouldn't want the 2011 borders.  I'd prefer the 1824 borders.

But I'm not Mexican.  And I'm not Israeli.

I'm a yankee.  And, as such, I prefer that my tax dollars got to my son's school and the local parks.  Not to Netanyahu's bombs and bullets which he points toward Palestinians in retribution for the pebbles and stones and sticks that they throw at his troops.  

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

I were Israeli, I wouldn't want the 1967 borders...

And if I were Mexican, I wouldn't want the 2011 borders.  I'd prefer the 1824 borders.

But I'm not Mexican.  And I'm not Israeli.

I'm a yankee.  And, as such, I prefer that my tax dollars got to my son's school and the local parks.  Not to Netanyahu's bombs and bullets which he points toward Palestinians in retribution for the pebbles and stones and sticks that they throw at his troops.  

I don't disagree with the Paul position on Israel, up to a point. But then he just reverts to type and inserts either "it's none of xxx's business" or "xxxx should get out of the way"... and his foreign aid response told me the guy is nothing but an Ideological brick.

[angus]

There was a moment, I admit, when he squandered the opportunity to answer Gingerich's criticism of his isolationist policy.  In that moment he appeared brickish.  I'd have done it better, no doubt.  Then again, I'd be the best president ever.  Washington included. 

You probably have touched on a nerve.  Not that I'd ever want to be president.  Or that you would.  Or that either of us would do any better than these eight clowns, or Obama, or Bush, or Clinton, etc., etc., but the fact that we're really attracting such mediocre characters to the debate that even in the heat they can come up with no better answers than any of us can is telling.  In that light I judge them.  Kinda like I judge Socrates (who liked to show up at parties with 12-year-old boys on his arm) in the light of his own times, and Jefferson (who had a yen for semi-dark milk chocolate flavored Sally in his own times), as being, respectively, a decent philosopher and a decent statesman.  I think it's okay to judge people by the standards of their milieu.  I'm not defending the milieu in which we find ourselves, politically.  Certainly I'd agree that it stinks.  But, given it, these guys were pretty damn good.  In a world where 12% of Americans can point to Iraq on a globe even as 53% of them supported its invasion by our troups, these guys are commanding. 

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

This is my problem with Paul and most of the GOPers... there's a little nugget of reason in there... but they take it to an extreme.

Sure, the US would be better off being "less-interventionist"... but that doesn't mean being isolationist.

[angus]

This is my problem with Paul and most of the GOPers... there's a little nugget of reason in there... but they take it to an extreme.

Sure, the US would be better off being "less-interventionist"... but that doesn't mean being isolationist.

But most GOP candidates aren't less interventionist!  Are they?!  They seem to be more so than the general public.  Am I confused?  One of us seems to be.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

This is my problem with Paul and most of the GOPers... there's a little nugget of reason in there... but they take it to an extreme.

Sure, the US would be better off being "less-interventionist"... but that doesn't mean being isolationist.

But most GOP candidates aren't less interventionist!  Are they?!  They seem to be more so than the general public.  Am I confused?  One of us seems to be.

Sorry, I made a general statement in the first paragraph, but didn't clarify I was only referring to Paul in the second paragraph.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

I were Israeli, I wouldn't want the 1967 borders...

And if I were Mexican, I wouldn't want the 2011 borders.  I'd prefer the 1824 borders.

But I'm not Mexican.  And I'm not Israeli.

I'm a yankee.  And, as such, I prefer that my tax dollars got to my son's school and the local parks.  Not to Netanyahu's bombs and bullets which he points toward Palestinians in retribution for the pebbles and stones and sticks that they throw at his troops.  

I agree 100%, I dont want to fund Israel at all, I meant that it was not right for President Obama to be dictating what borders they have. I think Israel should do what they want, but when they are attacked in retribution, they should remember that they picked that war with Iran. I should of clarified.

[angus]

Polnut, we have found the kernel.  

I suspect that most Paul supporters are willing to go out on that limb.  After all, all we have ever known--I'm 44 and all I have ever known, and most Paul supporters on this forum are even more warped than I by virtue of their having even less wisdom--is a world in which the USA must police the world.

We haven't any more the resources, nor the moral authority, to do so.  The world has changed since 1945.  And not always for the worse!  India is certainly better off without the yoke of British oppression.  On the other hand, SudAfrika has certainly fallen by almost every objective measure since its abandomment of Apartheid.  So there, you have one example in which political correctness led to greater economic mobililty, and one example in which political correctness led to less.  

But that's a little afield, I admit.  We were discussing foreign policy vis-a-vis last night's debate.  I say that we give Peace a chance.  In my lifetime, and I assume yours, we've never really done that, have we?  In fact, we haven't really done so in our history.  I'm willing to give it a go.  It's a radically liberal position, I realize, and one that doesn't currently find a home in either of the two major parties.  But, since it also divorces government from the mundane duties of providing housing, clothing, shelter, etc., for each citizen, finds slightly greater acceptance in the GOP than in the DNC, which is a clearinghouse for the nanny-state proclivities of the dispossessed and the holier-than-thou moralists.  

I have no illusions of grandeur.  I've talked to Paul at length, as I have mentioned on this forum before.  He and I agree on maybe 65% of the issues.  (I'm far to his left, as a practical matter, but on foreign policy we're in about as much agreement as two humans can be.)  And all he's suggesting is that we return to our principles in this regard.  All we have beget, with our current policy, is a nation in which we no longer trust our neighbors, a nation in which we must take off our shoes before we even board a plane, a nation in which we actually accept torture as a legitimate means of procuring information, and a nation in which, to quote Gingrich from last night, "our children will be in greater danger..."

I might be paraphrasing, but it caught me offguard.  If you really believe that, Mister Speaker, then don't you think it might be time to ask ourselves "What for?"  I don't see my child's future being brightened by killing five thousand Americans and fifty thousand Iraqis.  So if all you have to offer is "greater danger" for him, then oughtn't we rethink our priorities?

I don't know what I'll do it comes down to Gingerich versus Obama, a Republican that I never liked and I don't like now, versus a Democrat that I supported last time based on his apparently false promises of a post-partisan spirit of co-operation but who has been so intransigent and ineffectual domestically, but I'll tell you this, don't count me as automatic just because I wear a blue shield.

I do know that I don't buy into the notion that just because we have the highest aggregate GDP, and the highest per-capita GDP of all the really large nations, that we have the moral obligation to spend our hard-earned produce and the blood of our sons and daughters remaking the world in our image.  It's a false god.  And I, for one, am glad that at least one candidate in one of the two major parties has the courage and strength of conviction to finally say it.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

I've talked to Paul at length, as I have mentioned on this forum before.  

Out of curiosity, where did you meet him? At rallies? When I go to political events I usually get about 15 seconds of conversation with the candidate.

[Politico]

Polnut, we have found the kernel.  

I suspect that most Paul supporters are willing to go out on that limb.  After all, all we have ever known--I'm 44 and all I have ever known, and most Paul supporters on this forum are even more warped than I by virtue of their having even less wisdom--is a world in which the USA must police the world.

We haven't any more the resources, nor the moral authority, to do so.  The world has changed since 1945.  And not always for the worse!  India is certainly better off without the yoke of British oppression.  On the other hand, SudAfrika has certainly fallen by almost every objective measure since its abandomment of Apartheid.  So there, you have one example in which political correctness led to greater economic mobililty, and one example in which political correctness led to less.  

But that's a little afield, I admit.  We were discussing foreign policy vis-a-vis last night's debate.  I say that we give Peace a chance.  In my lifetime, and I assume yours, we've never really done that, have we?  In fact, we haven't really done so in our history.  I'm willing to give it a go.  It's a radically liberal position, I realize, and one that doesn't currently find a home in either of the two major parties.  But, since it also divorces government from the mundane duties of providing housing, clothing, shelter, etc., for each citizen, finds slightly greater acceptance in the GOP than in the DNC, which is a clearinghouse for the nanny-state proclivities of the dispossessed and the holier-than-thou moralists.  

I have no illusions of grandeur.  I've talked to Paul at length, as I have mentioned on this forum before.  He and I agree on maybe 65% of the issues.  (I'm far to his left, as a practical matter, but on foreign policy we're in about as much agreement as two humans can be.)  And all he's suggesting is that we return to our principles in this regard.  All we have beget, with our current policy, is a nation in which we no longer trust our neighbors, a nation in which we must take off our shoes before we even board a plane, a nation in which we actually accept torture as a legitimate means of procuring information, and a nation in which, to quote Gingrich from last night, "our children will be in greater danger..."

I might be paraphrasing, but it caught me offguard.  If you really believe that, Mister Speaker, then don't you think it might be time to ask ourselves "What for?"  I don't see my child's future being brightened by killing five thousand Americans and fifty thousand Iraqis.  So if all you have to offer is "greater danger" for him, then oughtn't we rethink our priorities?

I don't know what I'll do it comes down to Gingerich versus Obama, a Republican that I never liked and I don't like now, versus a Democrat that I supported last time based on his apparently false promises of a post-partisan spirit of co-operation but who has been so intransigent and ineffectual domestically, but I'll tell you this, don't count me as automatic just because I wear a blue shield.

I do know that I don't buy into the notion that just because we have the highest aggregate GDP, and the highest per-capita GDP of all the really large nations, that we have the moral obligation to spend our hard-earned produce and the blood of our sons and daughters remaking the world in our image.  It's a false god.  And I, for one, am glad that at least one candidate in one of the two major parties has the courage and strength of conviction to finally say it.

Steps were/are made so that 9/11 never has a sequel. It does not take an economist to figure out what would happen to the global economy if a major terrorist attack on par with 9/11 were to take place right now. Perhaps there is a smarter, simpler way to prevent the unthinkable, but the Obama and Bush Administrations have done a decent job on this front.

The last time America strongly pursued isolationism, the world ended up with Hitler and Stalin, and Hawaii ended up being bombarded despite our neutrality (so much for being left alone if we just mind our own business). It is something to think about the next time Ron Paul gives one of his diatribes...

[angus]

I've talked to Paul at length, as I have mentioned on this forum before.  

Out of curiosity, where did you meet him? At rallies? When I go to political events I usually get about 15 seconds of conversation with the candidate.

I met him twice.  Once at a rally, and there I only got about 15 seconds.  The second time at the January 2008 Black Hawk County caucus.  I spent a good twenty minutes in a one-on-one conversation with him.  I asked him about fiscal policy, monetary policy, and, of course, who he really supports among those who had a shot of winning the nomination.  On the latter question, he impressed me by steadfastly arguing that his own views ought to be preferable to a cross-section of republicans and that he in no way considered himself a second-tier candidate.

I posted pictures at the time.  I'd even bought a new outfit just for that caucus.  Double-breasted olive-green irridescent taffeta jacket.  Burnt-orange silk shirt.  Purple tie.  Very David Letterman.  Or maybe equal parts Letterman and Kramer from Seinfeld.  Anyway, it was fun because I was asking him all these serious questions, and the cult following that surrounded him parted for me, as the Red Sea parted for Moses, when I walked through.  I suppose that I must have sounded like I knew what I was talking about.  (And neckties never hurt.  They add gravity and make one seem important.)