Two comments. First, I expect better of the MPR audience than a bunch of personal attacks on the politicians involved ("crazy", "nut job", etc.). Where is the dialog in that? [They were discussing Rep Bachman]
Second, this Republican agrees that the [Cuban] embargo was a success, but not in the sense that it kept Cuba from profiting from its low wage workers (a form of serfdom?), but rather in the sense that Cuba was able to attempt to build a socialist paradise absent the machinations of the free world and its powerful interests. Did they succeed? If you think that universal health care at the 1950's level is success, with life expectancies comparable to US, and with a thriving black market in access to medical care for those with money (similar to ours, except that our high-payer patients subsidize the entire health industry rather than just the people they bribe), perhaps they did. If you think that a two-level economy is success (the have-nots and the tourists), perhaps they did. If you think a population with low expectations of their government and a high level of self sufficiency, perhaps they did succeed. Certainly their model of socialism is much more benign than, for example, North Korea's alleged communist system (I say alleged because NK is communist only in its choice of friends, not in its actual economic system, which is more a large slave plantation, as near as I can tell). So while I can understand a certain amount of hostility towards Cuba for their oppression of their people's freedoms, I must also acknowledge that, for a Luddite nation, they are doing much better than their Russian handlers did.
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed
Nice platitude. Prove it.
"do no torture on my behalf",
we should perhaps scream
I am willing to let X=8,143 people a year die from terrorist attacks rather than use torture
The number 8,143 is what we are arguing about.
The CIA thinks X is something small, like 1 child or 3 innocent adults.
The rest of us must think X is closer to 1M.
Interestingly, it is the scientific humanists among us who claim X=Inf, even though they do not have a moral compass like the church telling them that. More proof that it does not take a religion to make one moral.
My outrage over failures of the Obama administration pales in comparison to my outrage over the war crimes of the GWB administration.
Then the second generation of guards at Nazi camps is exonerated because they did not start it?
The most fundamental difference between the data that conservatives prefer—that the 10 poorest cities are longtime Democratic strongholds—and the data that liberals will be more inclined to cite—that the 10 poorest states are predominantly Republican, is that conservatives can point to actual policies that Democrats implemented that contributed to the impoverishment of the cities, while the liberals cannot point to specific GOP policies that have caused the poorer states to lag behind.
The Democratic case is illusory and circumstantial; the Republican case is solid and substantial. However, in a country where so many people are economically and historically illiterate, combined with the human proclivity whereby “a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest” (Paul Simon, “The Boxer”), the Democrats may be able to score some points with a hollow argument. The Republicans, though, have the facts on their side.
Ref: Are the 10 Poorest States Really Republican
How can we argue with an author who quotes Paul Simon?
When couples marry, people will give them dates and peanuts – a reference to the wish Zaosheng guizi or “May you soon give birth to a son”. The word for dates is also zao and peanuts are huasheng
The powerful date and peanut lobbies are up in arms, claiming that such a ban will cost them more than peanuts. Their claim? "If you outlaw puns. Only criminals will have puns."
(Footnote: I believe in the 2nd amendment not because I can expect to win but rather because I can expect to make it a little more expensive for the eventual winners.)
A list is only as strong as its weakest link. -- Don Knuth