Bubblehead - first off stop quoting tribesman. The more you do the more you encourage him to continue. As soon as you go off of "prove your point or prove me wrong" and into "your just a troll" - you lose focus and credibility just like he does.

To the both of you - stop the personal attacks. Takeda and I disagree, but we don't get personal. Looks like its personal for both of ya. Settle it in PM or ignore the other person.... But Subsim is here for discussion, not personal attacks.

Wow! Jingoism forever! You try to tell people you are a centrist, but you march in lockstep with the hard right and never even see it. You are also so convinced of your rightness and that of your cause you seem to be incapable of actually discussing anything. You pronounce your "wisdom" and dismiss any disagreement as "crap". It's no wonder you get so little respect here.

No, we end up in these situations because people would rather have their favorite candidate in power. You are so one-sided all you can do is preach to your own choir, denounce the other guy's and tell everyone you're the only one who's right.

And when you get what you thought you wanted you then get to listen to the other side tell you it's all your fault until they convince the voters to put them back in office so you can start blaming them again.

Better to be a cynic than a "true believer".

what personal attacks?
You said the same regarding yourself before didn't you.
Not at all, if someone writes rubbish it gets addressed. Skybird never quotes me but I will always point out when he is making up "truth" about legislation that doesn't exist outside his mind(or when he goes all wahhibi with his fundamentalism or when he is into his mein kampf mode).


Bubbles that makes no sense and shows you are having problems with your comprehension.
Take it slow....you by your own comments have destroyed your own arguement:yep:
....you by your own comments have destroyed the specific credibilty that you are trying to claim:yep:
....by attempting stupid sweeping generalisations you show you are way out of your depth on the issues:yep:
....morphing your same old conspiracy theories into new settings shows that you have a closed mind:yep:
....your purely partisan crazed fanboy rants about whichever of the candidates is for you this months chosen savior of the world show for you that you are totally naive when it comes to politics:yep:

I just read Wikipedia on WIllard Mitt Romney.

Fun read. He's an accomplished guy, no denying.

To me what's fun is that one of Republican potential nominees is basically a Lloyd Blankfein/Dick Fuld/Jamie Diamon kind of guy, no mistake. Even better, he's smarter PE VC kinda guy. Republicans can do only better if their pick would've been someone like LTCM's John Meriwether or even John Paulson. I mean you can't be more funny. I can't even figure out what republicans like and what they don't like - do they like the idea of capitalism or not? Because Romney is perfect example of capitalism at its maximum. So why is he now called liberal and bad? How's Gingrich who's record arguably is much less distinguished by virtue of being a politician all his life, is any better?...

I don't know, i think republicans should embracy the HUGELY successful Romney to run USA Inc. I think this country could us a little more business sense and a little less politics. Debt is way too much and I think Mitt will actualy KNOW what to do in ballpark terms to get things reasonable (i.e. he'll probably cut the government a lot and eliminate waste, his whole life he's done that and successfully). He's so rich he doesn't need to make money anymore, he'll be after legacy, greatness etc and that may benefit US, perhaps (one can hope). But he is obvioulsy way out of touch in terms of what money's worth to him and to regular people . i say make fun of that, not shy of it. They can't dig much on the guy after all these weeks - what, he has a photo holding dollar bills? Come on. :)

On balance if he makes US profitable I think it's good. I think Dems will actually work with Romney as opposed to NG who they despise.

that's my take on the matters from abroad. Looks like gonna be a fun election to watch...


only downside - a republican in white house = middle east war. :(

I have to say right here, they just don't do wars like they used to any more

If this guy knows what he is doing, he will understand that wars in the middle east are not profitable

It is too easy to equate the current wars in the middle easy with the classic colonialist and for profit wars of Cortes and the East India Company.

The Aztec empire was conquered on a "shoestring budget", and yet it fueled the Spanish economy for years.

We all know that Net income = Gross profit – Total operating expenses

Afghanistan has a GDP of 11 billion, the US millitary spends 44 billion a year in Afghanistan(not counting other NATO countries, nor does it count the aid the USA gives to Afghanistan.)

sources: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL33110.pdf
http://www.google.ca/publicdata/expl...of+afghanistan

if the US wants to make money, waging war in the middle east is not the way to do it, it is just not profitable

Not if that republican is Ron Paul!

(as if that would ever happen though :shifty: - but it is worth pointing out that not all republicans and certainly far from all US conservatives are pro-war. Likewise those democrats are far from doves themselves...)

Indeed. Obama's foreign policy has not been much different than W's. And that is a bad thing.

A false premise. We didn't go to Afghanistan, or Iraq for that matter, to make a profit.

US needs to have presence in the region to control it and noone wants it without US paying a lot or by military. simple as that. US can survive just FINE at home but its got so much business interests abroad that it basically needs to be global to protect it, otherwise the Chinese and Russians will start to play.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in Geopolitics. I think they nailed very well why US does what it does and I have nothing more to add.



Put it another way - it DOESN'T matter who comes to power in US 2012 elections - country is efficient enough to run by itself. Being a European, US is a country I'd bank on any day compared to the socialism in Europe, Nationalism in Russia and that hybrid of capitalism/theft economy China has going on.

I think US fundamentally has things right, even though its population is poor overall and politicians are just talking heads. Americans deep down seem to have a sort of compass that's pointing correctly. I'm afraid in Europe it's messed up too much lately (well, not in Nordics and Germany but the rest) and Russia is fast sliding to nationalism - Let's hope Putin holds them back (I kid you not, he's way more liberal than views of average russians are).

Newt's speech on losing Fl was the best of the night. When he's good, he's good. The end though... quoting the Declaration is fine, but unlike the founders, he's not really pledging his life, sorry. Had they lost, they'd have been executed for treason. I'd call out that kind of hyperbole in Obama or Romney, too.

I thought he was pathetic in his speech and at times bordering on totally deranged.

I must ask though, if the "liberal elite" can make the party faithful vote against him what will happen to his nonsense in a national vote with all sorts of people?

I hereby swear my vote to Mitt Romney so long as he pledges to never, ever sing again.

"O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!"

Thank you so much The Villages.
(it really is called The Villages and it is full of retied people it is down the road from Ocala)

Gingrich's pledge reminds me of his previously failed "Contract On..." er, ah, excuse me, "Contract With America"... :D

"Best of the night" is a pretty low bar, the others were pretty weak. He said to his supporters what needed to be said, and spoke pretty well. That's what "good" is. Not "great," but as I said, good. I don't think he's right about having a chance, mind you, but he has to say that if he's continuing.

He can speak well about total nonsense some of the time, which is his problem.

Regarding the media, that's for the kind of search we can't do, but will likely be done at some point. I don;t doubt that negative coverage on him is high, but on the other hand, Newt makes it so very easy for them to do.

His real problem is how he polls in states that matter for the real election vs Mitt.