Amateur night

[callmeslick]

Wow. Romney came as close as I could have ever imagined to looking like a complete boob on foreign affairs last night. Rambling, contradicting long stated positions, arguing for a pre-cold war armed forces(More Boats and Airplanes? Really? In 2012?), and then circling back and agreeing with Obama's policy on more than half of the key issues(I think, old Mitt was sort of unsure). Then, the plot gets even scarier when you realize that his key foreign policy advisory team is headed by the likes of John Bolton. This crew is right out of Bush II, and are the same nitwits that blundered us into two really dumb wars. All I can say is that one has to REALLY hate Obama to support Romney, and will be fascinated to see how last night plays out with anyone on the fence.

[flip]

I'm convinced now Obama's plan is to diminish America as a world power, but aside from that, “Politicians are like diapers; they need to be changed often and for the same reason.” I say no 2 term presidents unless they are exceptional.

[TechPro]

I say no 2 term presidents unless they are exceptional.

That's kind of the idea.

[vision]

I'm convinced now Obama's plan is to diminish America as a world power...

I can see why a person would say that, but I don't think that is intentional and probably impossible anyway. One thing that would be good is to re-frame America's image to include less hubris. Also, I can think of a number of reasons why being less of an economic and military powerhouse would be beneficial to the US and the world in general. So even if there is a deliberate plan to make America less powerful on the world stage (which there is no way to prove, nor would I think it even possible), I wouldn't see that a necessarily a bad thing.

Also, yeah, Romney seemed out of his league last night. In debate two, I felt like he held his own against Obama on all the key talking points of the night. Foreign policy? No, he was way out-classed. He also seemed exceptionally stiff, physically, and his voice sounded tired and hoarse to me, as if the stress of the campaign was taking a major toll on him. I be he's glad the hard part is over.

[Isaac]

Last nights debate was frustrating to watch. Both of those fools kept repeating stuff they had already said a million times already. Obama's little jabs at Romney actually were a relief, because he was actually speaking plainly. Sometimes Romney ended up just repeating Obama... that pissed me off too. Parrots, the both of them.

[Tunnelcat]

Romney even agreed with Obama on his foreign policy a lot more than he disagreed with him. Which means he had to walkback a lot of that extreme right wing chest thumping he was doing during his run in the primaries. Obama coined Romney's flip flopping best in one stump speech word, Romnesia!

[Spidey]

The problem here is the nature of the primary/general election system in this country. You have to appeal to the diehards that show up for the primaries, and then move back to the middle to run for the general.

This is not a problem when both parties are facing a primary vote, because as we all seen…Obama had to do the same thing as McCain four years ago, so everything came out in the wash, as they say.

The problem really shows itself when a challenger has to face an incumbent, where the challenger has to go thru the primary, and the incumbent can sit looking pretty, because of the short memories of the electorate.

A solution to this problem would be to make it mandatory that if you want to vote in the general, you must vote in the primary, and vice versa. I believe this would not be an infringement of civil rights, just making the system a 2fer…so to speak.

[callmeslick]

interesting idea, although, I suspect it couldn't pass muster constitutionally, Spidey. Still, what you say about the current primary system is correct, and I would add that the overall effect is to weed moderates out on the level of Congressmen and to some extent Senators. Thus, you end up with a radicalized legislative branch that cannot or will not compromise, form coalitions or even function for the public good. In the long run disasterous for the nation, and the only solution will come when the public wakes up and forces moderation into the process. The only way to do that would be through much greater public participation in the primaries, compared to the current 20% or so turnout.

[Tunnelcat]

Know what would be more fun? Put both candidates in a boxing ring and let them duke it out bare knuckled. At least it would be more entertaining. If Americans what a more manly president, that's just what they'd get from that contest.

[CUDA]

Wow. Romney came as close as I could have ever imagined to looking like a complete boob

You mean like Obama did during the first Debate?

[Sergeant Thorne]

Or at least perhaps watching these liars suffer would be therapeutic. Going bare-knuckle would certain show more of their true character than they care to display through the popular media.

I think it's popular in certain circles to give politics far too much legitimacy when it comes to coloring facts and dodging the truth. Watch Ron Paul speak sometime if you want to know what it looks like for someone to be open about their intentions. Unfortunately I didn't register to vote in time, so I'm not going to be writing his name in as I intended (perhaps if I disguise myself as Hispanic and wait for the NAACP to stop by... ). Lesson learned. I'm such an idiot.

[Krom]

Unfortunately I didn't register to vote in time, so I'm not going to be writing his name in as I intended (perhaps if I disguise myself as Hispanic and wait for the NAACP to stop by... ). Lesson learned. I'm such an idiot.

??? I'm pretty sure you can register to vote even during election day... (At least that is how things work in Wisconsin.)

[CUDA]

depends on the State. in Oregon we already have our ballots. (vote by mail) so it's too late to register

[Sergeant Thorne]

October 8th was the deadline I came across in my search online, for Indiana. I just checked again, and it looks like I was mistaken. This was the mail-in-registration-form mail-by deadline (http://www.usa.gov/Citizen/Topics/Voting/Register.shtml). Apparently Indiana has online registration, so I might be able to go that route. If you can register on the day, it must be so obvious to all but the uninitiated that they don't feel the need to write it... anywhere?

[Krom]

Talk to whoever is in charge of voter registration at your local township/village/city hall (probably the clerk), the deadline for registering in person could be much closer to the election than any mail-in or electronic registration, and it should only take one phone call to figure out.

[Sergeant Thorne]

Thanks, I'll do that.

[Spidey]

The thing about the “horses” comment…

We all know why there are fewer horses in the military, but I haven’t figured out what has replaced surface ships.

I would have asked the president if he knew how many ships are needed to support one carrier and how many of its aircraft are needed in self defense.

I also would have asked if the president thought a carrier group could withstand a full out assault using modern anti-ship weaponry, in any type of full scale war, and how long it would take China…errrr America to replace them.

His comment was fine until the part about…well you know we have these things called….then it became embarrassing and was beneath someone of his stature.

Say what you will about Obama haters (and I don’t think that’s a great endorsement, to begin with) but, there are sure enough Romney haters to go around as well. (not an especially ringing endorsement of him either)

[Top Gun]

While each carrier does require its own support fleet, the force-projection ability of that whole fleet is probably equal to several dozen traditional battleships, if not more. (Actually, from the naval nerds I've heard talk, battleships were fairly ineffective even when they were being produced in large numbers during WWII; events like the Battle of the Coral Sea have a lot do do with it.) There are whole classes of ships that are generally considered obsolete now because of what the development of aircraft carriers brought to the table, so Obama was correct in making the point that the raw size of the Navy doesn't really say anything about its relative effectiveness. Actually, and I was somewhat surprised when I looked this up, a modern US carrier strike group really doesn't have all that many ships in it. But when you think about the ordnance that a carrier's complement can deliver, coupled with the guided-missile capabilities of the assorted cruisers and destroyers...hoo boy.

As for what defends carrier groups against long-range anti-ship weaponry, meet Aegis. Besides that, I'd imagine that the general concept of naval deployment would be to eliminate those sorts of on-shore threats before they could be used.

[CUDA]

this has nothing to do with the size or the type of the Navy. that is up for debate and depends on who you talk to. the issue is.

His comment was fine until the part about…well you know we have these things called….then it became embarrassing and was beneath someone of his stature.

that's the problem.
when the President went down the path of ridicule he made himself look bad. question the man's policy, question the man's information. do not Mock the man. it just makes you look bad. the President made himself look immature by doing so

Ridicule is the first and last argument of a fool.
Charles Simmons

Ridicule is a weak weapon when pointed at a strong mind.
Martin Farquhar Tupper.

[flip]

The only way to do that would be through much greater public participation

This has been our problem the last 20-30 years and I fear that everyone is gonna wakeup just a little to late. I'm doing what I can to stir people up, who knows right?

[woodchip]

Wow. Romney came as close as I could have ever imagined to looking like a complete boob on foreign affairs last night. Rambling, contradicting long stated positions, arguing for a pre-cold war armed forces(More Boats and Airplanes? Really? In 2012?), and then circling back and agreeing with Obama's policy on more than half of the key issues(I think, old Mitt was sort of unsure). Then, the plot gets even scarier when you realize that his key foreign policy advisory team is headed by the likes of John Bolton. This crew is right out of Bush II, and are the same nitwits that blundered us into two really dumb wars. All I can say is that one has to REALLY hate Obama to support Romney, and will be fascinated to see how last night plays out with anyone on the fence.

Yes and you'd have the same nitwits who lied to us about Benghazi, the same nitwits whose foreign policy see's the middle east in flames and the same nitwits who encouraged the Russians to start exercising tests on their strategic nuclear forces. Yes, vote Obama back in so we can re-engage the Russians in a whole new cold war scenario.

The real boob was Obama doing his level best imitation of Uncle Fester as he tried to stare Romney into submission. Yeah, Obama looked real presidential. So dream on Comrade Slick, the momentum is still on Romneys side and growing. The biggest laffer was Obama saying how inexperienced in foreign policy Romney is. I guess Obama forgot how utterly clueless he was back in 2008. The really sad part is after 4 years, Obama is still clueless.

[vision]

There is no Benghazigate. Arab turmoil is due to domestic problems in each country, not US policy. Russia has long sought to be the mighty superpower of yesteryear. None of this has anything to do with Obama.

While some might think Obama's jabs were un-presidential, I saw them as a sign of quick wits, someone who is observant. He was cool under pressure, not nervous, stiff, and sweaty.

[Top Gun]

that's the problem.
when the President went down the path of ridicule he made himself look bad. question the man's policy, question the man's information. do not Mock the man. it just makes you look bad. the President made himself look immature by doing so

If someone makes as stupid of a statement as Romney did, they deserve mockery.

[CUDA]

that's the problem.
when the President went down the path of ridicule he made himself look bad. question the man's policy, question the man's information. do not Mock the man. it just makes you look bad. the President made himself look immature by doing so

If someone makes as stupid of a statement as Romney did, they deserve mockery.

bull★■◆●. childish mockery is just that childish

[Top Gun]

I didn't see anything childish about it. Not all mockery has to be so.

[CUDA]

There is no Benghazigate.

Riddle me this Batman. "IF" there is no Benghazigate then why did the consulate send emails to state department the day of the attack linking it to terrorism. and then for the next 2 weeks why did the White house AND State Department blame it on a Video. if they were not sure what the cause was they should not have said it was because of a video. they should have said we don't know but we'll find out. but instead they went out multiple times and said it was because of a Video. and then later come out and say YES it was terrorism. they know that the consulate was under attack at 4PM local, because the Email from the consulate said so. the attack went on for 7 hours. and yet they had troops in Italy only 1 hour away. why didn't they do anything?? either they are inept, incompetent, or they are covering something up. which is it????

[snoopy]

In the thread on the topic, vision provided a big long list of transcripts pertaining to the occurrences. His conclusion was that they never said anything about having concluded that it happened because of the video. I concluded there sure were a lot of mentions of the video, specifically linking it to "unrest in the area" and a distinct lack of mentions of organized terrorism.

As for the president's immediate mention "acts of terrorism" - I read it as a blanket statement without a direct intent to link Benghazi to terrorism. (Especially not organized terrorism, since you could see rioting as a form of disorganized terrorism.)

I didn't see anything childish about it. Not all mockery has to be so.

I don't think it has a place in serious debate... which is what the forum was. In the context of debate, mockery doesn't do anything to either strengthen your own position or weaken the opposition's.

[Spidey]

If you think we need x amount of ships, and I think we need y amount of ships, isn’t that simply a difference in opinion?

How can that be construed as stupidity?

[Top Gun]

It's construed as stupidity if the insinuation is that the US Navy is desperately under-equipped in terms of ships, as Romney seemed to suggest by citing the WWI timeframe. Every nation on Earth with a long-standing navy has significantly fewer ships now than they did a century ago, because the nature of naval warfare has changed so drastically since then. Romney's comment suggested that he's pretty darn ignorant of the components of military strength as defined in the 21st century.

[Spidey]

I don’t remember Romney saying or insinuating “desperately under-equipped”.

[CUDA]

construed

insinuation

suggest

suggested

[callmeslick]

how about Romney blathering about how we have less planes in the Air Force. Ask anyone, I mean ANYONE connected with the US airforce and they will tell you that the future isn't planes, but remove aircraft and ordinance. Once again, Romney showed utter ignorance of modern military matters. And, once again, I say the alarming thing isn't simply the ignorance, it's that he clearly doesn't give a ★■◆● about learning anything beyond the level of a high school student on the matter. Heaven help us all.

[Top Gun]

I don’t remember Romney saying or insinuating “desperately under-equipped”.

Well exactly what do you propose he means when making a comparison between today and WWI, a time when we had an ass-load of ship classes that would make absolutely no sense today?

And man I wish I could get away with quoting a few individual words while saying absolutely nothing. Boy would that be great.

[Spidey]

And man I wish I could get away with quoting a few individual words while saying absolutely nothing. Boy would that be great.

I don't do that all of the time, and you know it.

I’m pretty sure you understand what’s going on here has a lot to do with perception. While I see things like this as typical political demagoguery, you perceive stupidity.

I’m going to go out on a limb here…

My perception of Romney is more or less objective, due to the fact that I don’t have any particular feelings about the man.

Your perception of the man is colored by your intense hatred of him.

[Top Gun]

Um...I wasn't talking about you. Or did you miss Cuda's lovely post a few back?

And I don't "hate" Romney...at worst, I'm extremely apathetic towards him. I just hate the idea of him being elected president, because I don't feel that he's in any way the correct person for the job at this time. I'm not exactly crazy about Obama, but he's at least done a decent job, and I expect him to continue to do so.

[snoopy]

And I don't "hate" Romney...at worst, I'm extremely apathetic towards him. I just hate the idea of him being elected president, because I don't feel that he's in any way the correct person for the job at this time. I'm not exactly crazy about Obama, but he's at least done a decent job, and I expect him to continue to do so.

You know, if you switch all of the instances of "Romney" and "Obama" that pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter.

I think that Spidey and Cuda's point is that you're too smart to really think Romney is that ignorant concerning military might. He made a statement that may be true at face value, but misrepresents the heart of the matter... I fully expect that he knew what he was doing (It's been par for the course for the debates), and Obama chose to point out the fallacy in his argument through ridicule, which had its own fallacy attached to it (ships remain much more relevant to modern warfare than horses and bayonets do).

[callmeslick]

I don't know, Spidey.....what gives you that idea to assume that he IS that aware of either military or international issues? Romney has not once, but quite consistently failed to do his homework on those subjects. Further, virtually EVERY foray into those issues has been a painful one, starting with his primary campaign statements, on to that blunderfest of a foreign trip in the summer, to the convention speech and on to that last debate. I cannot see where any rational adult can be comfortable with Romney as a commander-in-chief, which is a part of the job that Obama(while hardly flawless) has shown some real capabilities at.

[woodchip]

Right, that's why terrorist flags are being planted on our embassies walls

[callmeslick]

Right, that's why terrorist flags are being planted on our embassies walls

what a pantload of bull★■◆●.

[woodchip]

I guess you haven't been following the news very close. Would you like to see some you tube vids?