[Rhodes22-list] For Ben C., from South Carolina - political

[Herb Parsons]

How so?

Michael D. Weisner wrote:
> Ed,
>
> You want to sue "unjust enrichment"?  That seems to smack of a Marxist 
> viewpoint.  I am shocked!
>
> Mike
> s/v Shanghaid'd Summer ('81)
>        Nissequogue River, NY
>
>
> From: "Tootle" <ekroposki at charter.net>Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 
> 8:49 AM
>   
>> Ben referencec the following article alledging it was written by a
>> conservative and 'Bill Buckley protege.'
>>
>>
>> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/opinion/16brooks.html?hp
>>
>> What is a conservative?  To Ben C., from his rigid and blindfolded view, 
>> it
>> is one thing.  He keeps referencing a group of people as 'the
>> anti-intellectual wackos and fundamentalist nut cases', as if his 
>> viewpoint
>> was perfect.
>>
>> I am reserving the comment to define conservative, neo-conservative, but I
>> am responding to his reference to David Brooks' and the New York Times.
>> When you move from the northeast corner of the USA you find Americans who
>> believe that "all the news that is fit to print" is not now nor has been 
>> for
>> several decades an accurate description of the New York Times.  The people
>> who write for the New York Times are MSM, ‘Main Stream Media’.  David 
>> Brooks
>> is MSM.
>>
>> This type of person is like Chris Matthews who gets tingles up his leg 
>> over
>> Obama.  Chris Matthews has in the past made demeaning and derogatory
>> comments about people willing to do menial jobs.  These people have
>> developed a holier than thou attitude.  The come across as saying that 
>> their
>> opinion is more right than others.  So, for the rest of us, those that 
>> quote
>> them as authorities of correct opinions must be viewed as fellow 
>> travelers.
>>
>> David Brooks said, “If you wanted someone to destroy a corrupt
>> establishment, she’d be your woman.”  While the rest of the article bashed
>> her and her supporters, this quote is what many of us want.  We want 
>> someone
>> to make a real effort to reduce and find corruption and wrong doing.
>>
>> Furthermore, we want to reduce those who use legal methods to fill their
>> pockets.  This is illustrated in the Fannie May and Freddie Mack issue.
>> There are many who made millions of dollars using legal methods associated
>> with these institutions.  They made these monies by acting as consultants,
>> lobbyists, lawyers, etc. for these institutions.  The monies paid these
>> people exceed reasonable compensation to most Americans.
>>
>> Because something is legal does not make it right.  These people should be
>> sued for ‘unjust enrichment’ if nothing they did was illegal.  Maybe such 
>> a
>> law suit would not win, but their activities and methods would become more
>> public.  They would be exposed to ‘Sunshine’.
>>
>> The argument is offered that both Democrats and Republicans are involved.
>> So what?  Expose the truth about all of them.  I guess lawyers like Ben 
>> C.,
>> would find employment defending their actions.  I would prefer that they 
>> be
>> placed on public exhibition in from of the courthouse is a cage.
>>
>> Again, because something is legal does not make it right.  “Making right
>> choices in gray areas is difficult.  To be aware of the dilemma is not
>> enough.   There needs to be a moral sensitivity which remembers to ask the
>> right questions at the right time.  To know what is good is not enough?
>> There is a difference between waking up and getting up. There must be
>> specific decision for the right.  To be sensitive and aware is good.  To
>> make proper decisions is better.  The way of victory is to maintain a 
>> moral
>> stamina which continues.”   Paraphrase of Bryan Crenshaw
>>
>> Ed K
>> Greenville, SC, USA
>>
>>
>> Ben Cittadino wrote:
>>     
>>> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/opinion/16brooks.html?hp
>>>
>>> What is a conservative?  To Ben C., from his ridgid and blind folded 
>>> view,
>>> it is one thing.  He keeps referencing a group of people as 'the
>>> anti-intellectual wackos and fundamentalist nut cases', as if his
>>> viewpoint was perfect.
>>>
>>> I am reserving the comment to define conservative, neo-conservative, but 
>>> I
>>> am responding to his reference to David Brooks' and the New York Times.
>>> When you move from the northeast corner of the USA you find Americans who
>>> believe that "all the news that is fit to print" is not now nor has been
>>> for several decades a accurate description of the New York Times.  The
>>> people who write for the New York Times are MSM, Main Stream Media.
>>>
>>> This type of person is like Chris Matthews who gets tingles up his leg
>>> over Obama.  Chris Matthews has in the past made demeaning and derogatory
>>> comments about people willing to do menial jobs.
>>>
>>> Robert;
>>>
>>> The above link is to today's NY Times column by David Brooks, who you may
>>> recognize as the William F. Buckley protege' and conservative 
>>> commentator.
>>> It concisely sets out the problem with Palin that those of us who
>>> represent the dying breed of "Rockefeller Republicans" (the political
>>> philosophy of your Susan Collins and Olympia Snow) have.
>>>
>>> As the Party falls away to the anti-intellectual wackos and 
>>> fundamentalist
>>> nut cases (and they know who they are) we can only hope that the
>>> overwhelming support of the new politics of hope among the youth (under
>>> 40) folks will bode better for the future.
>>>
>>> Even though I hail from the Great State of New Jersey, home of John
>>> Basilone (hero of Guadalcanal), I still consider the greatest American
>>> hero to have been Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (teacher, Governor, and 
>>> hero
>>> of the 20th Maine).
>>>
>>> Fair winds and following seas.
>>>
>>> Ben C. , s/v Susan Kay. Highlands, NJ
>>>
>>> Robert Skinner wrote:
>>>       
>>>> Ed,
>>>>
>>>> Since you persist in making snide comments about the great
>>>> state of Maine, this is to let you know that you have real
>>>> opposition in Maine -- perhaps neither as bombastic,
>>>> prevaricative, nor monomaniacal as you might find among
>>>> your neocon fellow traveler comrade dittoheads, but at
>>>> least equally valid [understatement].  As a professional
>>>> musician once reminded me, volume is no substitute for
>>>> quality.  And, by the way, repetition is no substitute for
>>>> logic.
>>>>
>>>> I, for one, am paying attention to the issues, primarily
>>>> the gone-to-hell-in-a-handbasket state of the nation while
>>>> in the care (using the term loosely) of the Grumpy Old
>>>> Patriarchs, and the fact that a good house-cleaning could
>>>> not produce any worse results.  As I see it, any group
>>>> of teen-age mutant turtles could do better and cost a hell
>>>> of a lot less.
>>>>
>>>> It doesn't make a lot of difference who is the master of
>>>> the ship of state when it is on the rocks.  The question
>>>> is who can get it off in one piece.
>>>>
>>>> OK, now that I've had my turn, you can have the soap-box
>>>> back, Ed.  Please clean up after you are done, and put
>>>> the seat down.
>>>>
>>>> /Robert
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/
>>>> Wednesday 10 September 2008
>>>>   by: Andrew Sullivan, The Atlantic
>>>>
>>>> Editor's Note: Historically a John McCain supporter, conservative
>>>> journalist
>>>> and blogger Andrew Sullivan takes on the issue of John McCain's 
>>>> integrity
>>>> as
>>>> he strives to win the presidency. - vh/TO
>>>>
>>>>       For me, this surreal moment - like the entire surrealism of the
>>>> past
>>>> ten days - is not really about Sarah Palin or Barack Obama or pigs or
>>>> fish
>>>> or lipstick. It's about John McCain. The one thing I always thought I
>>>> knew
>>>> about him is that he is a decent and honest person. When he knows, as
>>>> every
>>>> sane person must, that Obama did not in any conceivable sense mean that
>>>> Sarah Palin is a pig, what did he do? Did he come out and say so and end
>>>> this charade? Or did he acquiesce in and thereby enable the mindless
>>>> Rovianism that is now the core feature of his campaign?
>>>>       So far, he has let us all down. My guess is he will continue to do
>>>> so.
>>>> And that decision, for my part, ends whatever respect I once had for 
>>>> him.
>>>> On
>>>> core moral issues, where this man knew what the right thing was, and had
>>>> to
>>>> pick between good and evil, he chose evil. When he knew that George W.
>>>> Bush's war in Iraq was a fiasco and catastrophe, and before Donald
>>>> Rumsfeld
>>>> quit, McCain endorsed George W. Bush against his fellow Vietnam vet, 
>>>> John
>>>> Kerry in 2004. By that decision, McCain lost any credibility that he can
>>>> ever put country first. He put party first and his own career first 
>>>> ahead
>>>> of
>>>> what he knew was best for the country.
>>>>       And when the Senate and House voted overwhelmingly to condemn and
>>>> end
>>>> the torture regime of Bush and Cheney in 2006, McCain again had a clear
>>>> choice between good and evil, and chose evil.
>>>>       He capitulated and enshrined torture as the policy of the United
>>>> States, by allowing the CIA to use techniques as bad as and worse than
>>>> the
>>>> torture inflicted on him in Vietnam. He gave the war criminals in the
>>>> White
>>>> House retroactive immunity against the prosecution they so richly
>>>> deserve.
>>>> The enormity of this moral betrayal, this betrayal of his country's
>>>> honor,
>>>> has yet to sink in. But for my part, it now makes much more sense. He is
>>>> not
>>>> the man I thought he was.
>>>>       And when he had the chance to engage in a real and substantive
>>>> debate
>>>> against the most talented politician of the next generation in a fall
>>>> campaign where vital issues are at stake, what did McCain do? He began
>>>> his
>>>> general campaign with a series of grotesque, trivial and absurd 
>>>> MTV-style
>>>> attacks on Obama's virtues and implied disgusting things about his
>>>> opponent's patriotism.
>>>>       And then, because he could see he was going to lose, ten days ago,
>>>> he
>>>> threw caution to the wind and with no vetting whatsoever, picked a woman
>>>> who, by her decision to endure her own eight-month pregnancy of a Down
>>>> Syndrome child in public, that he was going to reignite the culture war
>>>> as a
>>>> last stand against Obama. That's all that is happening right now: a
>>>> massive
>>>> bump in the enthusiasm of the Christianist base. This is pure Rove.
>>>>       Yes, McCain made a decision that revealed many appalling things
>>>> about
>>>> him. In the end, his final concern is not national security. No one who
>>>> cares about national security would pick as vice-president someone who
>>>> knows
>>>> nothing about it as his replacement. No one who cares about this
>>>> country's
>>>> safety would gamble the security of the world on a total unknown because
>>>> she
>>>> polled well with the Christianist base. No person who truly believed 
>>>> that
>>>> the surge was integral to this country's national security would pick as
>>>> his
>>>> veep candidate a woman who, so far as we can tell anything, opposed it 
>>>> at
>>>> the time.
>>>>       McCain has demonstrated in the last two months that he does not
>>>> have
>>>> the character to be president of the United States. And that is why it 
>>>> is
>>>> more important than ever to ensure that Barack Obama is the next
>>>> president.
>>>> The alternative is now unthinkable. And McCain - no one else - has 
>>>> proved
>>>> it.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://www.suntimes.com/news/otherviews/1156080,091008ebertpalin.article
>>>>
>>>> Roger Ebert on Sarah Palin: The American Idol candidate
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> September 11, 2008
>>>>
>>>> BY ROGER EBERT Sun-Times Movie Critic [How appropriate!]
>>>>
>>>> I think I might be able to explain some of Sarah Palin's appeal. She's
>>>> the
>>>> 'American Idol' candidate. Consider. What defines an 'American Idol'
>>>> finalist? They're good-looking, work well on television, have a sunny
>>>> personality, are fierce competitors, and so talented, why, they're 
>>>> darned
>>>> near the real thing. There's a reason 'American Idol' gets such high
>>>> ratings. People identify with the contestants. They think, Hey, that
>>>> could
>>>> be me up there on that show!
>>>>
>>>> My problem is, I don't want to be up there. I don't want a vice 
>>>> president
>>>> who is darned near good enough. I want a vice president who is better,
>>>> wiser, well-traveled, has met world leaders, who three months ago had an
>>>> opinion on Iraq. Someone who doesn't repeat bald- faced lies about
>>>> earmarks
>>>> and the Bridge to Nowhere. Someone who doesn't appoint Alaskan
>>>> politicians
>>>> to 'study' global warming, because, hello! It has been studied. The
>>>> returns
>>>> are convincing enough that John McCain and Barack Obama are darned near
>>>> in
>>>> agreement.
>>>>
>>>> I would also want someone who didn't make a teeny little sneer when
>>>> referring to 'people who go to the Ivy League.' When I was a teen I
>>>> dreamed
>>>> of going to Harvard, but my dad, an electrician, told me, 'Boy, we don't
>>>> have the money. Thank your lucky stars you were born in Urbana and can 
>>>> go
>>>> to
>>>> the University of Illinois right here in town.' So I did, very happily.
>>>> Although Palin gets laughs when she mentions the 'elite' Ivy League, she
>>>> sure did attend the heck out of college.
>>>>
>>>> Five different schools in six years. What was that about?
>>>>
>>>> And how can a politician her age have never have gone to Europe? My dad
>>>> had
>>>> died, my mom was working as a book-keeper and I had a job at the local
>>>> newspaper when, at 19, I scraped together $240 for a charter flight to
>>>> Europe. I had Arthur Frommer's $5 a Day under my arm, started in London,
>>>> even rented a Vespa and drove in the traffic of Rome. A few years later,
>>>> I
>>>> was able to send my mom, along with the $15 a Day book.
>>>>
>>>> You don't need to be a pointy-headed elitist to travel abroad. You need
>>>> curiosity and a hunger to see the world. What kind of a person (who has
>>>> the
>>>> money) arrives at the age of 44 and has only been out of the country
>>>> once,
>>>> on an official tour to Iraq? Sarah Palin's travel record is that of a
>>>> provincial, not someone who is equipped to deal with global issues.
>>>>
>>>> But some people like that. She's never traveled to Europe, Asia, Africa,
>>>> South America or Down Under? That makes her like them. She didn't go to
>>>> Harvard? Good for her! There a lot of hockey moms who haven't seen
>>>> London,
>>>> but most of them would probably love to, if they had the dough. And
>>>> they'd
>>>> be proud if one of their kids won a scholarship to Harvard.
>>>>
>>>> I trust the American people will see through Palin, and save the 
>>>> Republic
>>>> in
>>>> November. The most damning indictment against her is that she considered
>>>> herself a good choice to be a heartbeat away. That shows bad judgment.
>>>>
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>>>>
>>>>         
>>>       
>> -- 
>> View this message in context: 
>> http://www.nabble.com/For-Ed%2C-from-Maine---political-tp19503919p19531396.html
>> Sent from the Rhodes 22 mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
>>
>>
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