We're Rich, Soft, Fat, and Spoiled

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 5:14 pm

We're Rich, Soft, Fat, and Spoiled - and completely disconnected with reality.

I was listening to a talk radio show today in which people actually argued that Carl Rove should be executed for treason, yet Osama BL deserves his day in court. Same person said both!

Another person said an American-born Muslim cleric should be deported for encouraging his followers to train and fight against the infidels, but was not guilty of treason!

The last straw came when several callers actually equated our depriving prisoners of heat or food as part of the interrogation process with the World Trade Tower attack and beheadings in the name of Allah. These were called "morally equivalent!"

:-5 I'm only glad there wasn't a jaywalker crossing the street at that moment :driving:

Post by **spot** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 6:19 pm

I blame Thomas Midgley, Jr for all of it.

If you look at the people coming out with this jargonized rubbish, they're all the ones who grew up when lead in the atmosphere was at its highest. Thomas Midgley, Jr was the man who developed tetra-ethyl lead as an additive to gasoline in car engines. He's often spoken of as having had "more impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in earth history."

Anyway. Rotted brains, all of them.

You think the "more impact on the atmosphere" is extreme? Sadly not - he also invented and introduced CFCs as refrigerants.

What a guy, huh?

koan · Post by **koan** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 6:34 pm

I would be way more concerned if the idiotic comments were made in best selling books. There are enough stupid people who get published to worry about a caller who makes bizarre statements on a radio show.

turbonium · Post by **turbonium** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 6:42 pm

Well, stop listening to Radio Taliban!! :wah:

Post by **spot** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 7:19 pm

flopstock wrote: I get so sick of hearing how evil we are, I just want to stand up and say, fine you've judged me I might as well be what you insist on seeing. :mad:That, now that you say it, is why I'll be so unhappy to see Karl Rove leave the White House team. I'm very keen that he stays in post. I hope he does.

Post by **spot** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 7:31 pm

Scrat wrote: The cleric should be taken to the Muslim community he came from and hung in public. Then all of his friends and all families and anyone in his life should be tracked down and deported. NO EXCEPTIONS!! Scrat, it isn't called "deported" when you do it to an American-born citizen from America. It's called "exile". It's what happened, for example, to Alexander Solzhenytsyn when he was thrown out of the Soviet Union, for the exact same "crime", dissent. The Soviets had a similar stance on friends and family, now I think of it.

Adam Zapple · Post by **Adam Zapple** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 7:46 pm

It's still not clear exactly what Karl Rove did. If the prosecutor finds he committed a crime, I won't defend him. But what we know so far is (remember, this happened in 2003 not 2005):

1) a reporter called him to talk about welfare reform or some such

2)During the course of the two-minute conversation, the reporter asked Rove about Wilson's report. Rove, knowing that CIA director George Tenet was going to release a report discrediting Wilson's report, warned the reporter not to put too much stock in Wilson's account. Wilson had been claiming that Dick Cheney had sent him to Iraq so Rove told the reporter it wasn't true...that Wilson's wife "who apparently works at the agency" on wmd issues sent him.

3)Rove signed a waiver for the prosecutor allowing any reporter or any person to testify about their conversations with Rove (not exactly the actions of a man with something to hide).

4) Cooper put on this big act about protecting his source (Rove) when Rove had signed a waiver years ago. The day before Cooper was to go to jail, his lawyer contacted Rove's lawyer and was reminded that Rove had already signed a waiver. Then Cooper comes out with a dramatic announcement that he received a last minute reprieve from his source.

5)Rove is not a target of the investigation. Someone must be, but according to the prosecutor it is not Rove. Of course, this could change with more information. But for now, apparently Rove has done nothing wrong.

6) Valerie Plame had not worked covertly for seven years. She is currently an analyst. That is not to say that she may not have gone back to covert work. It is doubtful that Rove or anyone else without the need to know would have the names of covert agents, therefore unlikely, though not impossible, that Rove knew she had worked covertly.

7) We know that Wilson did a hackjob to damage the Bush administration, apparently with the complicity of his wife. Wilson's report has been discredited by no less than the NY Times, a rabid anti-Bush paper. We know he has lied about his mission and his report. We don't know, though his opponents alleged, whether anyone in the administration, including Rove, deliberately "outed" Plame though that is why it is being investigated. Let the prosecutor do his job. If anyone needs to be prosecuted he will do it.

8) Also, if Rove gave a waiver to all concerned to talk to prosecutors and Judith Miller can't talk, then who is her source. Maybe that is the question everyone should be asking.

If Rove did something wrong, I'm confident the prosecutor will deal with it and him. If he didn't, then all the rhetoric against him amounts to little more than a political smear campaign. It does seem strange, you must admit, for the Democrats to demonize Rove and convict him in the press for, so far, nothing more than answering a reporter's questions when they excused and defended such actions a perjury, witness tampering, and cramming classified documents into pants, walking out of the National Archives with them and shredding them. :rolleyes:

Adam Zapple · Post by **Adam Zapple** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 9:23 pm

Why didn't he step forward when it came into question. I think he signed the waiver for just what is occurring now. How long have they been fighting to have the information disclosed? He never expected the reporter to give him up.

He did. He signed a waiver releasing anyone that had ever talked to him from any confidentiality agreement that might have stopped them from revealing what Rove had said to them to the prosecutors. He signed that back in late 2003 or early 2004. That's long before this became the scandal de jour or long before anyone knew Rove was involved. It's smear because the Democrats are waiting to see what the prosecutor has, they just smell blood in the water involving a guy they want to ruin.

If someone in his position is not aware of an agents positon, covert or otherwise, he has no business disclosing anything he knows or think he knows about that person.

He's an assistant Chief of Staff at the White House. I can't imagine that he would know the identity of covert agents. Thousands of people work as analysts at Langley. Their identities aren't big secrets. They can be seen driving into the parking lot on a daily basis. Valerie Plame Wilson was one of them. I can imagine this scenerio: Wilson claims publicly that Dick Cheney authorized his trip and reviewed his report. Cheney knows he didn't. The White House starts asking "Who did, then?" Probably the CIA, though we don't know, verifies to the White House that it was Wilson's wife who authorized the trip, surely there is a papertrail to that effect. Rove, answering the questions of a reporter that called him not the other way around, warns this reporter that he may be about to report a false story (Wilson's report) based on a false premise. The reporter wonders, "I thought Cheney authorized this." Rove: "No, it was his wife who apparently works at the agency" that sent him, it wasn't Cheney as Wilson claims.

Now we have Democrats calling for Roves imprisionment and liberal callers to talk shows, if the above posts in this thread are accurrate, calling for Rove's execution. I'm asking, based on what?? What we know now, what the public record shows, and what the prosecutor says is that Rove isn't even under investigation for wrong-doing. Someone, other than Rove, is! Who is he/she? I'm sure the prosecutor will let us know if and when the grand jury returns with an indictment.

koan · Post by **koan** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 11:30 pm

As to the American born Muslim terrorist...perhaps the Canadian border isn't your biggest problem, huh? :yh_whistl

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 3:51 am

spot wrote: I blame Thomas Midgley, Jr for all of it.

If you look at the people coming out with this jargonized rubbish, they're all the ones who grew up when lead in the atmosphere was at its highest. Thomas Midgley, Jr was the man who developed tetra-ethyl lead as an additive to gasoline in car engines. He's often spoken of as having had "more impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in earth history."

Anyway. Rotted brains, all of them.

You think the "more impact on the atmosphere" is extreme? Sadly not - he also invented and introduced CFCs as refrigerants.

What a guy, huh?
:yh_rotfl ......................... :yh_questn ......................... :yh_rotfl

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 3:57 am

turbonium wrote: Well, stop listening to Radio Taliban!! :wah:

LOL. That's what I'd say, too. Unfortunately it was conservative Michael Medved's show. He's nationally syndicated but I'd never heard him until I moved here (San Antonio) last week.

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:03 am

flopstock wrote:

I get so sick of hearing how evil we are, I just want to stand up and say, fine you've judged me I might as well be what you insist on seeing.

spot wrote: That, now that you say it, is why I'll be so unhappy to see Karl Rove leave the White House team. I'm very keen that he stays in post. I hope he does.
:yh_think Umm . .. .. .. .. huh?

.

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:09 am

Scrat,

Agree with everything in your post (especially the diaper comment) except tracking down the guy's family. I mean, what then? Send Guido to break kneecaps?

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:13 am

Adam & Floppy,

Fine. investigate the guy. Watch him split hairs a la Clinton's redefining "is." Fry him or roast him. But to say he's worse than Bin Laden ?!?

Post by **spot** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:17 am

Accountable wrote: :yh_think Umm . .. .. .. .. huh?.Let me try to untangle this since it's puzzled two people now. We had "I just want to stand up and say, fine you've judged me I might as well be what you insist on seeing", from flopstock. It reminded me why I'm keen that Karl Rove stays in post in the White House team. He's a guy with one of the big red flags marked "unexploded bomb", that people ought to be able to see and remember. He's passed the point, long since, of pretending he's acting in the interest of his country as a whole. If we get an unknown rising star in his place, people might mistake the new one for an acceptable political adviser instead of a corrupt destroyer of democracy.

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:21 am

So he's "the evil we know." Is that it?

Post by **spot** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:26 am

They don't come much eviler. The last thing I want is a cleaned-up disinfected sanitized White House, so people can forget where the problems originated. Who the hell remembers as far back as last week? The White House is the criminal dock, right now. If you want to see the guilty men, that's where you focus.

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:30 am

Then I post the same question to you as to Adam & Flop. Guilty as Hell he may be, but is he on the same moral plane as Bin Laden?

Post by **spot** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:36 am

Absolutely, totally, one hundred percent. Bin Laden has killed his thousands, and Rove his tens of thousands. There are earlier posts in which the "unavoidable" nature of civilian deaths has been used to discount their worth in the moral scale. Whether the CIA was the employer of Bin Laden, or Rove is still the employer of Bin Laden since they have the same first-half game-plan, or Rove is the enemy of Bin Laden who merely jumped at the chance offered to him, they spring from the same bed, they have slept together, they are equally diseased.

Adam Zapple · Post by **Adam Zapple** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:48 am

Accountable, I don't know if Rove is guilty or not. What we know, the info in the public record, indicates that he is not. I don't think he is evil, but perhaps if I was a Democrat, and got spanked by Rove in two elections, I might think so. :rolleyes:

Scrat posted:

Rove stated so&so was working for the CIA and was the wife of so&so. This was done for one reason, to get back at the husband for going to Niger to check out the yellow cake story which turned out to be crap anyway in the end.

I'll call it low and unethical and was meant as a way to get back at said individual.

Speculation but you are entitled to it. :yh_peace

flopstock posted:

If he didn't think he did anything wrong, why didn't he step forward and say that? I still say he signed that waiver because he thought he would not be given up.

One of the rules of politics is not to bring further attention to oneself in situations like this. It wasn't a big story outside the beltway until the last couple of weeks. I big public denial would've just stirred up the negative publicity. Secondly, if you have cooperated fully with the investigation and you know you have nothing to hide, there is no reason to make a big public denial. Would you have believed him anyway?

flopstock posted:

BTW Adam ...appreciate it -if you quote me, that you not edit it unless you indicate where you have edited midquote...thanks

My sincere apologies. I normally do indicate so with (.....) but forgot in this case. It was my error of omission. Hope you won't think me as evil as Karl Rove. It really was unintentional. :yh_doh

Jives · Post by **Jives** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 7:05 am

Accountable wrote: We're Rich

Hold the phone there with your generalizations and stereotypes, Accountable! I'm as far from rich as you can get and still buy food. I'm a teacher.

Soft,

(Jives flexes his biceps and stretches) Come here, son. Let me show you some Air Force hand to hand combat.

Fat,

Ha! I lost thirty pounds this summer and replaced it with a ripped abdomen. I swim for two hours every day. My doctor says I'm the only person he ever saw lose weight on steroids.

and Spoiled

Them's fightin' words here in the West, dude! I'm from straight-laced, severe, Montana / Kansas stock, second cousin to Abraham Lincoln.

- and completely disconnected with reality.

Well...you got me there! Now excuse me, I have to go play my Playstation2.

:-3

Clint · Post by **Clint** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 7:31 am

Thanks Jives, someone needed to say that.

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 7:33 am

:yh_rotfl

I luv you, man!

:yh_rotfl

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 8:05 am

spot wrote: Absolutely, totally, one hundred percent. Bin Laden has killed his thousands, and Rove his tens of thousands. There are earlier posts in which the "unavoidable" nature of civilian deaths has been used to discount their worth in the moral scale. Whether the CIA was the employer of Bin Laden, or Rove is still the employer of Bin Laden since they have the same first-half game-plan, or Rove is the enemy of Bin Laden who merely jumped at the chance offered to him, they spring from the same bed, they have slept together, they are equally diseased.
If I read your multi-post right, then, Rove is even worse than BL. BL killed civilians on purpose, with full knowledge and intent of the signal it would send. Rove (using your apparent opinion that he's the one really in charge) shoots at mosquitoes with a shotgun, with no regard who else gets hurt/killed in the process.

Accurate?

Post by **spot** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 2:26 pm

Accountable wrote: If I read your multi-post right, then, Rove is even worse than BL. BL killed civilians on purpose, with full knowledge and intent of the signal it would send. Rove (using your apparent opinion that he's the one really in charge) shoots at mosquitoes with a shotgun, with no regard who else gets hurt/killed in the process.

Accurate?Quite simply, I don't understand your analogy. Who do you equate to mosquitos? I can't believe you don't equally value the life of an Afghan and the life of an American. What kind of moral value are you trying to express, exactly?

As for "he's the one really in charge", no - I thought there was a concept of shared responsibility in the corridors of power. We have that here, don't you? If there were an informational "know your enemy" Deck of Cards I expect he'd be the queen of spades, in the Long Range Planning section.

Accountable · Post by **Accountable** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 2:48 pm

With the shotgun analogy, I was referring to air strikes' propensity for collateral damage, which you equated to murder [my words, not yours]. The Taliban or Al'Quaida being the mosquitoe, bombs being the shotgun.

As for shared power, Rove is supposed to be a political advisor, with no official responsibility, yet some call him the puppet master.

Sorry, didn't mean to muddy the waters.