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Finally, An Honest Liberal


Jimmy Leeds

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LA Times

JOEL STEIN

Warriors and wusses

Joel Stein

January 24, 2006

I DON'T SUPPORT our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car. Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on.

I'm sure I'd like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything. If you're wandering into a recruiter's office and signing up for eight years of unknown danger, I want to hang with you in Vegas.

And I've got no problem with other people

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He's only "an honest liberal" if you subscribe to the partisan premise that all liberals -- every last one, no exceptions -- hate America and hate the people who, as Stein says, "joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq."

It also calls into question the meaning of the phrase "support the troops". Stein writes:

All I'm asking is that we give our returning soldiers what they need: hospitals, pensions, mental health and a safe, immediate return.

What else should one say or do in order to be thought of as "supporting the troops"? Discuss.

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great article by a liberal who's had enough. He's got some Ann Coulter in him as well, a great humorist. I'm glad he wrote this and I'm glad he doesn't give a sh!t what others say. I wish more Democrats were like this.

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I found this line about the Stein piece on some conservative web site: "Finally, a mainstream media journalist fesses up and admits what democrats and the rest of the media have been reluctant to confess."

To the righties on this board: do you actually believe this to be the case? Do you believe the MAJORITY of Democrats -- not the ones Drudge highlights, not the ones Hannity calls out for speaking ill of the President in a college lecture -- the MAJORITY of Democrats are rooting against the troops? I know we have our philisophical differences on being there and foreign policy in general, but do you actually believe that someone like me is sitting at home cheering on the criminals planting car bombs outside of Baghdad police stations or at American military checkpoints?

<JESTER>

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http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/ne...t_id=1001918137

Joel Stein. A critical juncture as far as the Alito nomination is concerned and he drops this bomb? Stein is the Dean of the West Coast and every Republican should thank him.

Stein has done more for the President than one could ever ask for. Alito in, the press trying to defend him while Bush ratings will climb. Rove could not have done a better job!

:clap::clap::clap::clap:

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I found this line about the Stein piece on some conservative web site: "Finally, a mainstream media journalist fesses up and admits what democrats and the rest of the media have been reluctant to confess."

To the righties on this board: do you actually believe this to be the case? Do you believe the MAJORITY of Democrats -- not the ones Drudge highlights, not the ones Hannity calls out for speaking ill of the President in a college lecture -- the MAJORITY of Democrats are rooting against the troops? I know we have our philisophical differences on being there and foreign policy in general, but do you actually believe that someone like me is sitting at home cheering on the criminals planting car bombs outside of Baghdad police stations or at American military checkpoints?

<JESTER>

To be honest with you Greg, no I don't, I think a lot of this is hyped up in the media, what with Jane Fonda wishing for American planes to be shot down in Vietnam and saying our soldiers WERN'T tortured does not help the fact.

A lot of Libs/Dems/Inds seem to jump on the bandwaggon of what's popular to protest at the convenient time for them.

It's ironic that the biggest protests against Vietnam all of a sudden came when LBJ was president increasing the draft from 17,000 to 34,000 at that time.

We all want the best for our country, I want better education for children, I want better health care, but before we get that, we have to secure the safety of our country, and if that means wiretaps, then so be it, I've got nothing to hide.

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We all want the best for our country, I want better education for children, I want better health care, but before we get that, we have to secure the safety of our country, and if that means wiretaps, then so be it, I've got nothing to hide.

I agree with you on that. But this is where the debat has been warped. It's not about the wire taps; it's about the fact that the Bush Administration felt going through the proper checks and balances to secure them was too much of a process, so they just spied on whomever they felt needed spying on. They didn't even use the mechanism that would have allowed for review AFTER the tapping had occurred. That's just balls-out abuse of power right there, and it continues a pattern of behavior where the administration will circumvent the law in the name of security -- and then get away with it, because one party controls two branches, soon three.

<JESTER>

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Far be it from me to speak for whoever created that cartoon but it is not supposed to funny. It is merely meant to show how much this administration has to hide and how ironic that it tries to hide things from the public for no other reason than it makes them look bad.

The Democrats have been doing a good job at the illegal spying hearings today. Pointing how illogical the whole thing is. Gonzales scares me. Some of the things he says about presidential authority make it sound like he thinks Bush is more King than President. As one of the Democrats so rightly pointed out, (paraphrase) Republicans like to say that Democrats have a pre-9/11 mentality when it comes to national security, well it seems to me that you have a pre-1776 mentality.

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I believe that the sky is really brown. That does not make it true.

He refuses to say what limits, if any, the president's power under the authorization of force have. When ever anyone brings up examples to try to pin him down (intra-country calls, mail, searches of homes, etc) he does not give a proper answer.

While not comparing Bush to Hitler I do believe that he and his administration subscribes to this part of Nazism. In today's parlance we call it the "unitary executive" and it is just as scary now as it was then.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuhrerprinzip

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Commander-In-Chief

Just because he is the Commander in Chief does not give him unlimited power to do anything he wants. I know they keep harkening back to Lincoln and the suspension of Habeus Corpus, but (1) Lincoln didn't try to hide it and (2) eventually the Supreme Court told him NO.

The people elected Bush. Actually, 51% of the people who voted elected him. He isn't King and I thought we didn't believe in that here.

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Not my commander in chief. Last time I checked I was not in the military.

The FISA law is clear 731. The power grab is appalling. It would not matter who was doing it.

Sue, the way this hearing has gone I gather that Gonzales believes Bush has unchecked power, that makes him a King.

Edited by PeteyNice
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Not my commander in chief. Last time I checked I was not in the military.

According to some of the people on here, he should be able to do whatever he wants to you and you should say "Thank you, Mr. Commander In Chief, may I have another, because of course, I have nothing to hide".

Whatever happened to the right to question what your government does???? Or has that gone away???

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http://justice.gov/ag/speeches/2006/ag_speech_060206.html

A typical FISA application involves a substantial process in its own right: The work of several lawyers; the preparation of an application and related legal papers; the approval of a designated Cabinet-level officer; a certification from a designated Senate-confirmed officer; and, finally, of course, the approval of an Article III judge who sits on the FISA Court. See 50 U.S.C.

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Not my commander in chief. Last time I checked I was not in the military.

The FISA law is clear 731. The power grab is appalling. It would not matter who was doing it.

Sue, the way this hearing has gone I gather that Gonzales believes Bush has unchecked power, that makes him a King.

I didn't like this frigging argument when Gorelick tried to make it for Clinton. And that argument was why they tightened up some of the LOOPHOLES in FISA to stop Presidents from MAKING this argument in 1995.

Didn't work for me with Clinton, and it doesn't work now. And it especially doesn't work when Bush LIED when he said that no American citizen was under surveilance without a warrent. He's only on TAPE saying it. But apparently nobody CARES when they are outright lied to about what their own government is doing to them. Because they always think it is being done to someone ELSE. Forget that. When another's rights are violated, EVERYONE's rights are violated. Becaue you make it obvious that you don't care about your own rights, which makes it possible for them to violate them.

Edited by SueNJ97
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