DCP's Stock goes Down again

[_Kishkumen]

I think it was more boneheaded for Obama to insult religious people than for Romney to overstate the percentage of americans who don't pay income taxes and have a "victim" mentality.

That does little to reassure me of your sharp listening skills. I have to chalk that up to you listening with your "partisan ears." What Obama said was that people use different coping strategies to deal with their unhappiness about where they are in life. Religion is one tool. He most certainly did not call religion the opiate of the masses or say that religion is bad.

Try listening again. Religion was one of a number of things he discussed. Furthermore, what he said is probably true.

[_Ludd]

Meanwhile, if the Republican Party wants to come back in 2016, they are going to have to get their right wing Palin / Santorum / Bachman religionist / tea bagger crazies under control.

Although I think Romney is a less than ideal candidate (that's why he'll probably lose to what ought to be a very vulnerable incumbent president) I think you're wrong to suggest that the "right wing Palin/Santorum/Bachman religionist/tea bagger crazies" are in control now. If they were, Romney wouldn't even be the Republican nominee. Romney is very much a centrist candidate. That's why he's not very popular among the people you claim are in control.

[_Ludd]

I think it was more boneheaded for Obama to insult religious people than for Romney to overstate the percentage of americans who don't pay income taxes and have a "victim" mentality.

That does little to reassure me of your sharp listening skills. I have to chalk that up to you listening with your "partisan ears." What Obama said was that people use different coping strategies to deal with their unhappiness about where they are in life. Religion is one tool. He most certainly did not call religion the opiate of the masses or say that religion is bad.

Try listening again. Religion was one of a number of things he discussed. Furthermore, what he said is probably true.

Yeah, it probably is true to a great extent.

I also think what Romney said (read in it's entire context) is true too. I also think most conservatives (and even most centrists) agree with him. The only reason people like David Brooks and William Kristol got on Romney's case about it is that he was stupid enough to say something like that when it was possible that people were recording him. That's one of Romney's biggest problems in my opinion. He doesn't know when to keep his big fat mouth shut.

[_Chap]

... What Obama said was that people use different coping strategies to deal with their unhappiness about where they are in life. Religion is one tool. He most certainly did not call religion the opiate of the masses or say that religion is bad.
...

It is as well to look at what Karl Marx actually said on the subject of religion:

The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d’honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

Please remember that when Marx wrote this in 1843-4 most people in Europe, Marx included, thought of opium primarily in medicinal terms. It was the only really effective painkiller, and was taken as a remedy for a quite large range of ailments. Nowadays he would probably have written something like '[Religion] is the paracetamol of the people' rather than '[Religion] is the crack cocaine of the people'. He was talking analgesia, not addiction.

[_cinepro]

Do you believe global warming is a hoax?

It's possible to agree that global warming is real but disagree on the wisest course of action to deal with it.

Do you believe Roe v Wade should be overturned?

I didn't know that was an issue. Has Romney talked about working to overturn it as President?

Do you think we need to spend more or less money on defense spending?

I think less, so if that's what you're saying too, I'm with you there.

Should the rich get a tax cut, or pay more in taxes?

I think everyone should pay less in taxes, and since the rich pay the majority of taxes, that would mean they would also get a tax cut.

Should we cut federal funding to planned parenthood, to PBS?

As long as the government is broke, yes. I don't know why we need to borrow money to fund public television and subsidize abortions.

Should you think we need more religion in our public schools?

I wasn't aware of Romney trying to get more religion into the public schools. Has this come up in the campaign?

Do you believe that Americans have a second amendment right to assault rifles, extended carbines, and armor piercing bullets?

I wasn't aware that Romney was trying to increase access for people to those weapons. Has this been something he talks about?

Do you believe gays should have the right to marry?

No.

Do you think we should open up national parks and lands to drilling?

If it can be done in an environmentally responsible manner, sure.

Do you believe that tax cuts pay for themselves?

No. Tax cuts have to be accompanied by reduced spending.

DO you believe in Keynesian economic theory?

No. I would if it worked, but it doesn't.

Do you believe that we should offer a undocumented citizens a path to citizenship, or encourage them to self deport?

As far as I know, they have a "path to citizenship". People become citizens all the time. I don't think our current situation with illegal aliens is good and something needs to change. But since Obama and Romney appear to be equally incompetent on the subject (and unable to propose a lucid plan of any sort), it's a moot point for me.

DO you think we need more or less corporate money in our elections?

If restrictions on "corporate money" are also applied to "union money", I'm all for it. It would certainly change things dramatically for politicians, but whether or not it would actually "improve" things, only time would tell.

Not sure how anyone can be on the fence.

After the last four years, I agree.

[_Cicero]

Although I think Romney is a less than ideal candidate (that's why he'll probably lose to what ought to be a very vulnerable incumbent president) I think you're wrong to suggest that the "right wing Palin/Santorum/Bachman religionist/tea bagger crazies" are in control now. If they were, Romney wouldn't even be the Republican nominee. Romney is very much a centrist candidate. That's why he's not very popular among the people you claim are in control.

Agreed, and there is no doubt in my mind that the narrative coming from the right after Romney loses will be that he lost because he was not a true conservative.

[Guest]

That does little to reassure me of your sharp listening skills. I have to chalk that up to you listening with your "partisan ears." What Obama said was that people use different coping strategies to deal with their unhappiness about where they are in life. Religion is one tool. He most certainly did not call religion the opiate of the masses or say that religion is bad.

Try listening again. Religion was one of a number of things he discussed. Furthermore, what he said is probably true.

Here's what he said. Keep in mind that he was speaking at a fundraiser in San Fransisco:

You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.

And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

Obama lists the following "coping strategies" for their bitterness:

1. Clinging to "guns"
2. Clinging to "religion"
3. "Antipathy toward people that aren't like them"
4. "Anti-immigrant sentiment"
5. "Anti-trade sentiment"

If Obama meant for his comment to depict these small town Pennsylvanians' religious belief as a positive thing, then I agree that my comprehension skills must be pretty bad, because it sure doesn't look like a positive statement to me. Unless he also meant that it was a good thing that they were "clinging" to "guns".

And when speaking to a group of rich San Fransisco democrats, why would he be holding up gun ownership and religion as good things? Is that really a good selling strategy?

[_cinepro]

If you really think that 47% of Americans do have a victim mentality and will never take responsibility for their lives, then if you want to be elected as President it is pretty boneheaded to say so in front of a large audience, is it not?

The fact that you may have been wildly overstating the figure compounds the misjudgement rather than excuses it.

As I've already said several times, I'm not trying to excuse it. He shouldn't have said it, it was a huge mistake, the 47% figure was wrong, and politicians obviously say stupid things when they're trying to raise money.

It may cost Romney the election, and it's his own fault if it does.

[_Kishkumen]

Obama lists the following "coping strategies" for their bitterness:

1. Clinging to "guns"
2. Clinging to "religion"
3. "Antipathy toward people that aren't like them"
4. "Anti-immigrant sentiment"
5. "Anti-trade sentiment"

If Obama meant for his comment to depict these small town Pennsylvanians' religious belief as a positive thing, then I agree that my comprehension skills must be pretty bad, because it sure doesn't look like a positive statement to me. Unless he also meant that it was a good thing that they were "clinging" to "guns".

And when speaking to a group of rich San Fransisco democrats, why would he be holding up gun ownership and religion as good things? Is that really a good selling strategy?

Hey, he might have added prescription drug addiction, alcoholism, infidelity, monster-truck rallies, you name it.

Which of those things would not be true?

I mean, unlike Romney's complete mangling of the facts regarding the 47%.

[_DarkHelmet]

Setting aside your overly-simplistic view of very complicated periods such as the Great Depression and the economic woes of the 1970s, it should be noted that both Reagan and Bush were Governors before becoming President. Reagan wasn't just "an actor for chrissakes".

I was talking about professions before they got into politics. Reagan was an actor. Ike was a General. Clinton was a lawyer. etc.

I'm not sure there is any universal indicator that we can look to to predict the "quality" of a President, especially since it is impossible to know what events and situations the candidate will face during his term.

That being said, I would tend to have more confidence in people that have a combination of "real-world" experience and executive/political experience, such as being a governor. Being a Governor or the President involves working with other branches of government in ways that CEOs and Businesspeople don't.

But I also think it is extremely important that a politician knows what it is like to have to make a payroll, and what happens in the real world if your business runs out of money, and how government regulations can affect business owners. Politicians are spending other peoples' money, and if someone only has experience as a politician (or has been a politician for too long), I think that creates a distorted view of government and the economy. In a capitalistic society that relies on the success of private enterprise for prosperity, this should be a very important factor.

But I also think experience in Washington is important; it seems absurd to send someone to be President who doesn't have some experience working in Congress or the White House.

In the case of an incumbent, those are obviously minor considerations in that we now have four years of job performance on which to base our judgement.

That sounds good, and Romney may be a great president, I was just pointing out the track record of presidents with business background against presidents with no business background. If we use history as a guide, it appears having a business background doesn't mean much, if anything, for a president.