Us presidential election 2004

[mr_rOk 0]

I think a lot of the people in Europe feel that Iraq is/was an oil issue.

I think a feeling of slight envy can be felt throughout the old continent. Some might even be sorry for not being in the "coalition" and now want the transition of power towards the Iraqi governing council (IGC) to happen as fast as possible. In a spirit "don't let to much oil slip into America"; although the same man remains in charge of the Iraqi oil ministry after the formal take over of power by IGC. That is the same man America put there.

Quote[/b] ]But if the case can be made that Europe has a stake in a stable Iraq, and the pot is sweetened through reconstruction contracts and a stake in future oil revenues, would we perchance get a festive fruitcake to go along with said Christmas card?

Tex you nailed it right on, the only ruler above all is money.

I'd bet that if GWB would come up with a more nondesputable explanation of why to attack Iraq, and together with it offered financial benefits there'd be Desert Storm 2, not Operation Iraqi Freedom.

If he just wouldn't behave so Texan about it, can't say it any other way, the leaders of Europe would quickly find ways of convincing Europeans that war with Iraq is a viable option

[denoir 0]

@ July 06 2004,00:27)]

@ July 06 2004,00:09)]It seems to me that a large portion of the current hostility towards our presence in Iraq stems solely from this administration and its follies; a new president singing a different tune would be a much more sympathetic figure towards garnering more international support.

Oh, we would be a lot more friendly. We just wouldn't send any troops. Do you really think that we would suddenly want to risk our troops for a cause that we were against just because you got a nicer president?

This is a far bigger issue than that personal dislike for the man currently in office.

Replacing Bush will put you back on the Christmas card list, but it will harldy get you any military resources.

But if the case can be made that Europe has a stake in a stable Iraq, and the pot is sweetened through reconstruction contracts and a stake in future oil revenues, would we perchance get a festive fruitcake to go along with said Christmas card?

I very much doubt it. Yes, Europe does have an interest in a stable Iraq, but you have a much larger stake in it. They may not be too fond of us, but they positively hate you. One way or another, you have no choice but to fix it. So the only reason for us to get involved would be to make things easier for you.

As for the oil contracts, I don't think it's a big deal either. If we really wanted the oil, then we would have joined the invasion in the first place. And it would have been a better gamble than doing it now, when we have this post-war mess.

Plus that it would basically be political suicide to send troops. The Iraq war hasn't exactly become more popular here after the post war situation became messy, no WMD were found etc

And then of course there is the thing that bringing in more European forces is no guarantee of a solution.

Bottom line, I would bet money on that within 6-12 months Poland and Italy will have withdrawn their troops from Iraq. I think you can expect less international support, not more - regardless of who wins in November.

[billybob2002 0]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/bush_mccain_ad

Quote[/b] ]

McCain to Appear in Bush Campaign TV Ad

1 hour, 19 minutes ago

By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer

FOX CHAPEL, Pa. - President Bush (news - web sites)'s re-election campaign has a television ad in the works featuring former Republican rival John McCain and advisers are weighing whether to air it when Democrat John Kerry (news - web sites) announces his vice presidential pick.

Quote[/b] ]

The Bush campaign has not run ads for more than two weeks in local media markets in 20 battleground states where it had been on the air. It's been off the air on national cable channels for more than a week. The campaign spent $83 million on advertising over three months. As of Friday, it had not yet bought airtime for July.

Last month, McCain — Bush's rival for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000 — rejected the notion of a bipartisan ticket with Kerry, and shortly thereafter appeared with Bush. Members of McCain's staff did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

For the party...

[walker 0]

For the party...

Hmm

I would describe that as typical communist drivel. Always thought the Republicans had commie tendencies.

Disdainfully Walker

[billybob2002 0]

Quote[/b] ]Hmm

I would describe that as typical communist drivel. Always thought the Republicans had commie tendencies.

Disdainfully Walker

I said for the party because that is probably one of the few reason he is doing that....

1.) I'm not a republican.....may of voted for one for the governor of maryland but not one....

[quicksand 0]

Quote[/b] ]may of voted for one for the governor of maryland but not one....

Huh,is it my english or this doesn`t make any sense

[theavonlady 2]

Quote[/b] ]may of voted for one for the governor of maryland but not one....

Huh,is it my english or this doesn`t make any sense  

It is an indicator that BillyBob is up way past his bedtime again.

Lights out!

[DarkLight 0]

Quote[/b] ]may of voted for one for the governor of maryland but not one....

Huh,is it my english or this doesn`t make any sense  

It is an indicator that BillyBob is up way past his bedtime again.

Lights out!

Dear god, it's 11:41 (for you americans, that's AM) here and i still don't understand it!!!

Maybe i should get in my bed again... HOORAY!!!

It's sleeping tiiiiime!

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

Michael Moore... eh?

I read his 2 last books and I have the right to say: "he sucks"!!

First of all he is struggling for power just like any of the CEOs or Politicians he attacks. By now he is a big millionaire and the "I am one of you ordinary guys" reputation he has is totally wrong. He doesnt give any interviews, he doesnt allow any spontaneous criticism about his works and when he shows up in a show he wants to see the questions beforehand.

Secondly he always repeats the same bullhsit in every country when promoting his films. He starts with "you british", "you germans", "you french" and then the ordinary "have something we dont have, social welfare".

For the people that actually read his books should know that he twists facts the way they fit his picture. Fine with me, but the problem is that some people might actually take every word of his as "pearls of wisdom".

No, with all my disrespect for Bush I still believe that propaganda is propaganda, may it be for the right or the left, for war or against war. I just have the ordianry new-german disgust for humourous and twisted presentation of facts. His films are fun to watch, no doubt and Bowling for Columbine was a good NON-political piece of documentary.

For all the germans that just love Michael Moore for what he writes against the US, well read what he writes about germany

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I especially like that part

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Germany Still Hasn't Paid for Its Sins - and I Intend to Collect

Did I miss the most exciting part of the fiftieth-anniversary festivities celebrating the end of World War II? You know, when every single German got down on his or her knees, begged for forgiveness, climbed into boxcars in a show of empathy, and then promised to devote one day's salary each week to a Holocaust survivor's family. Man, that must have been a sight. Did you miss it, too? I'm being a little too harsh, you say, on a country that has already repented and most of whose citizens weren't even alive for all the killing?

Hmmm. Let's go to the tote board: 6 million Jews murdered 3 million Catholic Poles murdered 500,000 Gypsies murdered 12,500 homosexuals murdered

Those, plus the Communists, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other undesirables, bring us to a grand total of nearly 10 million defenseless humans slaughtered in the Holocaust. This figure does not include the 400,000 Americans who died in the war (fighting Germany and its partners, the Japanese and Italians), the 25 million Soviet citizens killed or starved to death, plus the millions of other Europeans, Africans, and Asians who died at the hands of what was considered to be the most intelligent, most civilized, most advanced society on earth. And to think, it all happened not many years ago.

We continue to live with the results of this tragedy. All of our families, Jewish and non-Jewish, were somehow touched by this event. My dad's brother, Lawrence, was killed near Manila. The map of the world is forever screwed up by World War II, and whether it's Bosnia or the Middle East or skinheads terrorizing the residents of Idaho, you can trace the roots of these conflicts back to what the Germans did.

And what was Germany's punishment for these sins? They got to become one of the richest countries in the world! And it took only three decades! How on earth did we let this happen? Today the average German enjoys a standard of living that has no equal. A factory worker in western Germany last year made an average wage of $29 an hour. In the U.S., that same worker made $19. The American worker annually has to put in nearly 200 hours more on the job than his or her German counterpart. That's five 40-hour weeks the Germans get paid and don't have to work while they're earning 50 percent more per hour than we Americans. And even though Germany is 25 times smaller in size than the U.S., and has one-third fewer workers, its gross domestic product, per capita, is nearly the same as that of the U.S.

Can you imagine, as someone's grandmother was being shoved into the ovens at Auschwitz, an angel appearing to her and saying, "Don't worry, the Germans are going to be rewarded by the rest of the world with so much wealth, they won't know what to do with it"?

Don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting that we should have treated Germany the way we did after World War I, humiliating them into submission and starving the country to death. Those conditions certainly created the climate for Hitler to be elected by a majority of the German people. And since the war, many Germans have lived their lives denouncing what their parents did. Young Germans today - if they aren't shaving their heads and beating immigrant domestic workers - are actually very progressive, pacifist, and well-meaning individuals who just happen, through no fault of their own, to be living the good life.

The war may seem like a long time ago, and the work of only a few evil Nazis, but, according to Daniel Goldhagen, the author of Hitler's Willing Executioners, the German government has cataloged more than 330,000 average, everyday Germans who physically participated in the daily slaughter of the Jews. Thousands of those Germans are still alive today. In fact, there are over 12 million Germans still kicking around who were fifteen years or older during World War II.

And what have these Germans done to make some kind of reparation for their sins?

"We don't call it reparation," said the woman on the phone at the German Information Center. "It's restitution." Okay, so how much "restitution" has Germany decided each life they exterminated is worth? Well, according to them, nothing. They won't make any "restitution" for the dead, it was explained to me. But here's the good news. They will make up for any property loss the Jews suffered.

So if you lost a few candlesticks in the Holocaust, step right up for your deutsche marks. Lost your life? Too bad. No geld for your loved ones. But ... if you can prove that you spent "at least six months in a concentration camp," were "confined in a ghetto," or were "forced into hiding for a minimum of eighteen months," then you can collect about $350 to $600 a month from the generous Germans. You say you were only tortured in Dachau for five months and twenty-nine days? Too bad! Sue the Germans and you might get a one-time settle ment of $3,000.

To date, Germany has doled out $68.3 billion in "restitution" payments. If we break that down for everyone they killed in the Holocaust, how much is it for each of the 10 million they butchered?

The answer: $6,831.

That's it - $6,831 per mother, father, infant, girl, and boy they gassed, burned, shot, or buried alive. Not a bad price to pay, if it means you can end up one day as the wealthiest nation on earth.

As far as I'm concerned, $6,831 per innocent life is not enough. Not that any amount would be "enough," but my life and your life are worth a little more than $6,831.

I know some of you are saying, "Hey, Mike, the survivors got to move to Israel after the war. Didn't giving them that land make it up to them?" Well, I don't think Israel was actually "given" to them. The British were ruling the place (then called Palestine), and suddenly all these Holocaust survivors with nowhere else to go started arriving and the Brits didn't like that one bit. But they didn't have the energy to fight the Jewish guerrillas after having just lost most of their British empire, so they just bagged the place and said, "Fine, you want this, it's yours." Most Arab residents were not consulted in the deal.

I have never understood why giving the Holocaust survivors Palestine/Israel was such a great gift. Have you ever been there? It's a friggin' desert! There's nothing there! Israelis like to tell you, "We've made the desert bloom!" Talk about rationalizing something . . . I'm telling you, it's 100 percent sand, rock, and more sand. Why did we think we were making it up to them by placing them in a horrible environment that has cost them even more lives in more wars? Because the Bible said so? When did the world start going by that book?

If we had really wanted to do what was right - and punish the Germans - we should have given the survivors the state of Bavaria. Now, that's one beautiful piece of real estate! And it would have cost the Germans plenty. Turning Palestine into Israel didn't hurt the Germans one single bit. But losing Bavaria to the Jews would have really kicked those bastards where it counted. Israel has only 10,840 square miles; Bavaria has over 28,000! Israel has few, if any, natural resources; Bavaria is rich in minerals, forests, and water. Since the war, the Israelis have been surrounded by hostile enemies who want them dead; Bavaria is surrounded by the beautiful Alps containing a few goats and those three guys in the Ricola commercial. I guess it's probably too late to correct this mistake by moving Tel Aviv to Munich and forcing the Germans to go and try to make the desert bloom.

I'd say that Germany got off real easy. Only 20 percent of its war criminals were ever put on trial. Many who fought in World War n are still alive. And where do you think they all are today?

Florida!

It's true. Tens of thousands of Germans, many of them of World War II age, have permanently moved to the state of Florida. German investment in Florida has increased by nearly 200 percent in the past five years. According to the Tampa Tribune, together with the British, the Germans provide over 50 percent of the total manufacturing jobs in Florida. They have over $1.8 billion invested in the state. Over on the southwest coast, just in the counties of Collier, Lee, and Charlotte, there are as many as 86,000 Germans.

On a recent trip to southwest Florida, I arrived at the airport in Fort Myers, which has extended its runway so that nonstop jumbo jets to and from Germany can land there. I noticed German flags flying from houses. Everywhere I went there were signs that were printed in German: RAUCHEN VERBOTEN! - NO SMOKING. Menus in restaurants were printed in English and German. They are buying up property and businesses and settling in for the good life. And more and more of their friends from the fatherland are joining them.

I am of two minds regarding this German invasion of Florida. On the one hand, I hate Florida. It's full of bugs, humidity, and stupid people running around with guns. And it's got those nutty Cuban exiles. If there were a pair of scissors big enough, I wish we couldjust snip the state where it hangs off the rest of the country.

There is a part of me that likes the fact that all these ex-Nazis are moving there to terrorize the people of Florida. Serves them right. The Right-Wing Cubans versus the Geriatric SS in a fight to the finish! I'd pay money to watch that one on Pay-Per-View.

On the other hand, it is ironic that right there in south Florida are thousands of Jewish survivors of the Holocaust. Is it right that those Jewish men and women who fortunately survived the Germans' slaughter should have to be reading menus written in German to accommodate their new "neighbors"? I don't think so.

I have a solution. We all know that Florida is infamous for German tourists being murdered there. I do not believe this phenomenon is the result of gang-related violence. I think it's payback time. One by one, the survivors are getting their revenge. Somebody with a sense of justice has armed the elderly residents of Miami Beach, pointed them in the direction of Fort Myers, and let them loose to even the score. Who would have thought that the Germans would make it this easy for them, foolishly moving to the area that contains the highest concentration of Jews outside of New York? What were these Jerries thinking - that the Moskowitzes were going to "live and let live," and "turn the other cheek"? Obviously these Germans forgot about the tote board.

I say arm every bingo player south of Fort Lauderdale and let's celebrate the real end of World War II. So - RUN FOR YOUR LIFE, KLAUS! And Happy 50th Anniversary!!

[denoir 0]

Kerry picks Edwards [CNN]

Quote[/b] ]

Sen. John Kerry chooses Sen. John Edwards as his Democratic running mate for the 2004 presidential election. Details soon.

[ralphwiggum 6]

duh

[quicksand 0]

Erm..

[DarkLight 0]

Ahha a gay president!  Now that would be something new!

Perhaps we can do some betting... I say he'll get lynched within 24 hours after he confesses that he's gay! (if he becomes "da pres" ofcourse)

(heeeej don't change your message )

[Tex -USMC- 0]

Michael Moore is a retard.

What were you expecting, Albert? Moore is the political manifestation of an internet troll. If he doesn't have controversy, he doesn't have a career.

[billybob2002 0]

Quote[/b] ]1.) I'm not a republican.....may of voted for one for the governor of maryland but not one....

I may of voted for a republican for the governor of maryland but I'm not one....

[Schoeler 0]

I think the Republicans are terrified of the Kerry/Edwards ticket.  Edwards makes Cheney look like a stodgy old buffoon and there is absolutely no dirt on Edwards other than he made his money representing the little guy against the big corporations as a trial lawyer.  

I find myself laughing at the virtuous Republican efforts to bring the anti-frivolous lawsuit legislation into the light of the Senate chamber this week.  Impeccable timing wouldn't you say?  How noble of them and what concern for a subject that didn't seem relevant or important enough until this morning.  

[billybob2002 0]

Quote[/b] ]I think the Republicans are terrified of the Kerry/Edwards ticket. Edwards makes Cheney look like a stodgy old buffoon and there is absolutely no dirt on Edwards other than he made his money representing the little guy against the big corporations as a trial lawyer.

I cannot wait for Cheney vs. Edwards debate.... (expect f***)

[Schoeler 0]

I can't wait to see the Pres debate Kerry in a venue where he is not given the questions ahead of time and Uncle Dick isn't there to hold his hand. I expect a lot of garbled doubletalk.

[Tex -USMC- 0]

I can't wait to see the Pres debate Kerry in a venue where he is not given the questions ahead of time and Uncle Dick isn't there to hold his hand.  I expect a lot of garbled doubletalk.

This in conjunction with flying pigs should make for one hell of a week, especially with Hell freezing over and all.

[ralphwiggum 6]

@ July 07 2004,03:16)]

I can't wait to see the Pres debate Kerry in a venue where he is not given the questions ahead of time and Uncle Dick isn't there to hold his hand.  I expect a lot of garbled doubletalk.

This in conjunction with flying pigs should make for one hell of a week, especially with Hell freezing over and all.

the debate would be interesting, but as always, it's choosing lesser of two evils, or in this year's case, between a moron and boring.

[Tex -USMC- 0]

Kerry's not boring. He's alot of things, but he isn't boring. At least when it comes to politics.

[Homefry 0]

Would you go as far as to call him interesting?

[Schoeler 0]

I saw him in person and he is much different than the canned media soundbites you are being spoonfed that fit him into a neat little slot meant to drive up ratings and insure viewership and controversy right up until November 2nd.

He's not boring. He even looks younger and better in person. I can't understand why the media insists on feeding us all crap when they used to take pride in being impartial and giving us facts.

Tex, normally I would agree it's not going to happen, but from what I've heard, Bush has lost so much ground, he's going to be forced to actually debate this time around.

[theavonlady 2]

History repeats itself.

Then:

Now;

The front page of the tabloid New York Post incorrectly

reported that Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry had

picked U.S. Representative Richard Gephardt (D-MO) as his

running mate on July 6, 2004. Kerry later announced that his

choice was Senator John Edwards (D-NC). (Peter

Morgan/Reuters)

[Schoeler 0]

The Republicans are scrambling today to attack Edwards on any angle they can find, and it's not working.  So far the only thing they can come up with is a lack of foreign policy experience, which is being read instead as a plus for Edwards in many circles given that Cheney had a ton of experience in the foreign policy arena and look where we are now.  

Attacking Edwards as a trial lawyer and touting their new committment to tort reform is also falling weakly by the wayside for the Republicans in the light of Enron executive Ken Lay's criminal indictments today and Cheney's ever more suspect relationship with Halliburton.  The American people aren't geared up to buy the argument that Edwards was an ambulance chaser with all the evidence and his record of winning money from big corporations on behalf of the little guy.  Right now corporate America is the evil job-exporting enemy of the middle class.  The Bush Administration is going to have a hard time finding any takers on this attack angle on Edwards this election cycle.