An apology to our allies.

I Do not think I took you 'out of context' here, other than on the fact of Truman signing an 'official' end to the state-of-war in 1951

Be fair, the sovereignty was granted 4 years after that and the final peace treaty was only signed 23 years ago.
Though I think he missed that last treaty altogether

It's electrifying still to see him on that favorite Fenian currency and international medium of exchange...the $ C-note no euros fer me BBY!

Ah, but I was referring to his employment as a British government spy against the British terrorists and their French allies, before he joined those other British terrorists and the French against the British government.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Everyone spies on everyone else. Jonathan Pollard, anyone?

True.

[TorpX]

I find all of this very amusing.

Obama was given the Nobel Peace Prize and endorsed, in effect, by europeans because he was good and pure and true (or so we were told, ad nauseum). Now, reality is slowly seeping in to the picture.

Obama (and the US Federal ruling class) trample the U.S. Constitution, spend recklessly, and generally use American institutions like drunken frat boys use an abandoned cabin. If Obama has no respect for the American people, why would anyone expect him to have any respect for foreign peoples.

[eddie]

Evidently Obama learned from that Jackass Cheney!

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

Benjamin Franklin?
Paid by all sides to spy on their own population and on the foriegners.
Not much has changed in the couple of centuries apart from the technology.

Originally Posted by Tribesman

Ah, but I was referring to his employment as a British government spy against the British terrorists and their French allies, before he joined those other British terrorists and the French against the British government.

Citation needed.

[AVGWarhawk]

"I see nothing...."

Sgt. Schultz

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Citation needed.

Why?

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

Why?

Because while it sounds like something that might have happened, I've read two good biographies on Franklin and I don't recall that. That could be my memory, or it could be because both authors left it out. I'd just like to know.

And when you claim something, you should have facts in hand.

[CaptainMattJ.]

Originally Posted by TorpX

I find all of this very amusing.

Obama was given the Nobel Peace Prize and endorsed, in effect, by europeans because he was good and pure and true (or so we were told, ad nauseum). Now, reality is slowly seeping in to the picture.

Obama (and the US Federal ruling class) trample the U.S. Constitution, spend recklessly, and generally use American institutions like drunken frat boys use an abandoned cabin. If Obama has no respect for the American people, why would anyone expect him to have any respect for foreign peoples.

"Spend recklessly". Oh, i don't know, could've had something to do with the fact that, through Clinton and Bush's deregulation, we allowed not only wall street and multiple other companies become too big to fail, but we allowed them to gamble BILLIONS upon BILLIONS of dollars that they neither had nor owned. And because so much of the loans and wealth was concentrated in wall street, if wall street collapsed so would the economy. We had to spend astronomical amounts of money to bailout the banks BECAUSE WE ALLOWED THEM TO ENJOY FREE MARKET. This is why history is just as important a subject as math science and primary language. Because if you take a comparatively SHORT LOOK BACK IN TIME to the end of the 19th century, you'd see why Republicans are dead wrong about allowing corporations freedom of market. You'd see why allowing corporations to spend however much they wanted, become however big they wanted, and pay/charge as much they wanted, is the entire reason capitalism and deregulation are awful concepts for everyone that isn't a mulch-billionaire CEO.

Not only did we have to spend astronomical amounts of money bailing out free enterprise run amuck, but the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are mind-numbingly expensive. It was republicans and the General Staff who not only started the war but fought Obama until he agreed for a crawling retreat from Afghanistan, in which we have wasted hundreds of billions of dollars trying to fix a region that was never able to be fixed in the first place. It is republicans who have proposed INCREASES for the DOD's budget, yet anyone with even minimal information about the DOD's spending knows how grotesquely inefficient its spending is. The F-35 JSF program is hundreds of billions of dollars and counting (and that's excluding the maintenance costs of the program for its lifespan), is ridiculously behind schedule, and is completely unnecessary for our military. It is only one out of thousands of examples of the grossly inefficient spending from the DOD. Billions upon billions were simply lost in the reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, in some cases because only one person was hired to audit billions of dollars worth of spending and as a result, things such as military contractors charging 80 dollars for a component that is sold for 2 dollars, happened in vast scale. And they want to RAISE ITS BUDGET?!?!

Meanwhile Obama tries to increase spending in domestic programs that actually benefit the people and he gets endlessly harassed for it. The reason? Party politics. Both sides are so eager to slander the other that they completely lose sight of whats not only good but RIGHT for the people who pay them large salaries to serve them. Or they get bought out by the corporations, who now can spend as much as they want influencing the election, and their seemingly ridiculous and incompetent views are actually just the politicians trying to protect the companies that give them millions to protect them from necessary reform.

[AVGWarhawk]

CaptainMattJ:

Meanwhile Obama tries to increase spending in domestic programs that actually benefit the people and he gets endlessly harassed for it.

With one fundamental issue, there is no budget. What is being cut? Where is the funding coming from? More taxes......

[Ducimus]

Someone complains about party politics, and then spouts a partisan line.

[Skybird]

Just a reminder. The US debts exceed the yearly GDP. AVGwarhawk is right. There is no budget. There is just more desire to live on tic. Money lent is no wealth. Investments basing on credit only do not create wealth. To generate wealth you need to invest saved real value, not lent money and credit. Must I really give long quotes by von Mises on this miracle believing that from nothing comes everything?? Even alchemists never claimed they could do that stunt, even them needed at least some lead to turn it into gold. :-)

[CaptainMattJ.]

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

CaptainMattJ:


With one fundamental issue, there is no budget. What is being cut? Where is the funding coming from? More taxes......

Well for one simply fixing the many inefficiencies of the DOD and further cutting its spending to reduce our military to what it was supposed to be all along - a DEFENSIVE military - would free up a great deal of money. In addition we should effectively cut our military aid to these cesspools in the ME and go back into conditional military isolation similar to but not exactly what we had before WW2.

Once our full withdrawal of troops from afghanistan is comlete, and subsequently lowering the planned garrison were going to leave behind, also frees up billions that was being wasted on foreign rather than domestic issues.

Other than that, there are many ways to fix spending, a big one being healthcare reform. We must modify and supplement the ACA to tackle the massive issue of healthcare costs itself. The reason healthcare costs so much is because of insurance companies monopolizing the healthcare industry through the collaboration and buyout of medical suppliers, pharmaceutical companies, and essential healthcare services so they can jack up profit margins to astronomical percentages and charge outrageous premiums for plans that are deplorable. Not only that, but a healthy 22 year old pays much higher premiums because the insurance companies spread out the costs of the unhealthy over the healthy

We spend so much on healthcare for three big, main reasons. 1, because of the enterprises and corporations of healthcare. 2, Because fellow americans who are poor need assistance for healthcare, especially our elderly parents and grandparents. 3, because our country is plagued with health problems, more than most any other country in the world. This is caused by poor dietary habits and also the fact that we allow our food manufacturers to wash our meats with ammonia and spray our plants with a laundry list of pesticides and chemicals because we want free enterprise more than we want regulation to keep these greedy, selfish, detrimental corporations from screwing over the american people as they have done so very, very much over the entire history of the United States and mankind in general.

There are plenty of ways to redirect, accumulate, and better distribute the GDP of our country. But unlike what many head republicans seem to think, the answer certainly isn't deregulation and tax breaks for the top-income embezzlers and manipulators.

[Ducimus]

I find the espousing of more regulation of any sort, coming from anyone living in a state that has done just that and is bleeding money as a result; to be lacking in credibility.

[CaptainMattJ.]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

Someone complains about party politics, and then spouts a partisan line.

No, i stated my opinion. The difference, which obviously goes far over your head, is that my conclusion on the issue was not regurgitated word for word by talking head democrats. I looked at the issue, studied the issue, studied both sides, and came to my own conclusion. And because i come to my own conclusions (unlike those who blindly follow talking heads like rush limbaugh, sean hannity, al sharpton, and chris matthews), there are issues in which i agree with democrats, issues in which i agree with republicans, and issues where i think both sides are either partially right or entirely wrong.

Just because you're so partisan it hurts, doesn't mean everyone that disagrees with you is too.