Political Punch

Mims nj, you wrote: "McBush will drag us unwillingly into WWIII."

Actually we already ARE in WWIII. Just since 1998 the Islamic extremists have attacked or attempted to attack: Algeria; Egypt; England; Indonesia; Iraq; Jakarta; Jordan; Kenya; Morocco; Pakistan; Saudi Arabia; Scotland (foiled); Seattle, WA, USA (12/31/1999 - foiled); Spain; Tanzania; Tunisia; Turkey; USA; and Yemen. Al Qaeda is known to have cells in at least 65 nations around the world. And al Qaeda wannabes and supporters are in every country!

annoyingrabbit - In my opinion Israel will wait until November to see who wins.

If McCain wins they will hold off on any action against Iran, but if Obama wins they probably do something because of the fear of Obama appeasing Iran, and they know Pres. Bush is a strong supporter!!

Isreal can not afford the appeasement mentality of Obama!!

Oh by the way Obama will come up with some excuse not to go to Iraq and Afghanistan!! wait and see!!

Mary, I for one do not hate Sen. Obama. I actually admire his ability to win the hearts, minds and souls of so many people in such a short time. He is an extremely charismatic person. He has a wonderful presence, or aura. I can certainly see how people have become enamored with him. But having said that, his ideology is completely opposite of mine. Sen. Obama believes in wealth redistribution (stealing from the rich in order to give free entitlements to the middle class); he believes government is the solution (as opposed to personal responsibility); and he is just one in a long line of "tax and spend" Democrats.

Sen. Obama says that he will raise the taxes of the wealthy and give the working class a tax cut. Yet just over one year ago, on June 28, 2007, he said said of the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts: "There is no doubt that the tax system has been skewed, and the Bush tax cuts, people didn’t need them and they weren’t even asking for them. And that’s why they need to be lapsed...” Yet the bottom two federal income tax brackets WERE LOWERED: The 15% bracket was lowered to 10%; and the 28% bracket was lowered to 15%. These bottom two brackets represent the low end of the scale and middle class. In 2007 Sen. Obama didn't believe the poor and middle class needed these tax cuts. Now he says they do. Yet he is going to allow the 2001 tax cuts to expire which will raise the bottom two tax brackets back up to 15% and 28%. THAT IS A TAX HIKE for the poor and middle class. So does he really care about the people?

McBush will drag us unwillingly into WWIII. Is this why you want to drill for domestic oil so badly? Is it so we can invade Iran and withstand trade embargo's? McBush is an evil man. They will pull this country apart by the seams...3 wars? I'm sick of this warmongering...it's senseless and makes us so unsafe.

More Obama is a Muslim nonsense. As Hitler's chief propagandist Goebels said, "if you repeat a lie often enough, it sounds believable."

Not this time.

How boring to all the haters that just sit back and complain about everything and everybody. When I read all of your complaints makes me sad. Here is a man that cares about people and wants to make our lives better because our world is in chaos and a big mess. This man is being ridiculed and abused just because he cannot please people that have such low self-esteem. These people need to get a good look in the mirror, to see what they do not like who they see.
Go Obama 08

Annoyingrabbit, too many Americans don't even realize that Iran has been supporting the Shia militias both in training and in supplying weapons that are killing Americans in Iraq.

James and Brian, I am encouraged that others are paying attention. It is a very scarrey situation out there right now and I fear most don't realize it.

Who cares what the "world" wants as our president---especially if it is obama who is has promised to donate over $700 billion $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ U.S tax dollars to the world on top of what we already give them.

I find it difficult to believe that most Americans will like Obama once they really get to know him. I've listen to him speak without the telepromter, read excerpts from his books, and review his history. He is a compulsive lying crook...and on top of it..he's a dumb one. He also does not like America as evidence by his wife, reverend, choice of terrorist friends the Ayers and the Nation of Islam...not to mention his refusal to even wear an American pin for about year but now since the **** hit the fan is wearing one. The media bias and the Obama lies only can fool some of the people for so long.

Annoyingrabbit & Brian, I agree with your assessments regarding Iran, Israel and the United States. We cannot allow Iran to have nuclear weapons.

Everyone should read the expose on Obama in today's Boston Globe - how he got tons of money for his developer buddies for public housing, how they failed to maintain the buildings that were rat-infested, lacked heat in the winter, etc. And of course all these developers contributed mightily to Obama's various campaigns.
When asked about the deplorable conditions in the slums in his district, Obama said he didn't know about it, no one had told him. Deny and lie, that's what he does best. And the sad thing is, the majority of the tenants in these public housing slums are African-American, you know, the folks who vote 90% for Obama. When is America going to wake up? When is the MSM going to take up the cause of vetting this guy before it's too late? Criminals, all of them.

I agree totally with annoyingrabbits comments. Bush recently replaced his entire chain of military command kicking out those that were opposed to an Iran strike and even put Petreas in charge of the middle east command. Replaced the talented fallon and both heads of the Air Force. The Iranian regieme isn't going to go away and conflict seems inevitable. I read today Israel cannot have a nuclear armed Iran in part because they Hizbollah would use that as an excuse to do whatever they want knowing they had the Iranian umbrella. Thats an impossible situation for Israel to live with. The timing is the only unknown. Will it be before the election possibly harming McCain's chances or after? Israel is likely to attack before because they fear an Obama win will hurt their cause unless Bush can convince them to wait till after when he gaurantee's he will strike. Iran can see this coming and is starting to get very nervous and may well lie to us saying they will stop but neither Bush or Israel will trust them. No matter what the scenario I see an attack coming and I am afraid it will be devastating to Iran who will find it really has no real friends.

Brian, if laws are being broken YES there should be prosecutions. If people are being swindled and defrauded but the actions are not technically breaking any existing laws, lawsuits can be filed. For flagrant problems that are not covered by laws, the American people can boycott the goods and/or services provided by these ripoff corporations. The government is NOT the answer to every problem.

Now as for the subprime mortgage crisis, I don't have a problem with the federal government helping out those individuals who were actually living in the homes being foreclosed IF these homeowners were swindled or defrauded. If these homeowners were not swindled or defrauded then it was just a gamble in which they loose. Speculators who bought multiple homes should take the loss and not be reimbursed. Why should other homeowners who DID NOT FALL for these cheaper variable mortgage rates have to now pay for the mortgages of those who speculated or gambled on the cheaper mortgage rates? The mortgage companies and/or their employees who swindled or defrauded individuals should be prosecuted.

I sure hope Bush has covert operations in Iran at this point---he would be a moron not to. I don't think many realize how close to war we are right now with Iran. I suggest that everyone be watching Israel and Iran such as Israel's little bombing test run recently. Israel and Iran are going to go at it. With our agreement with Israel, we will automatically be at war too. The question is given Obama secret Muslim past/present and his lies about it followed up with his obnoxious anti-jewish friends and comments surrounding him, will Israel wait till after the election to prevent the Iranians from getting nuke via bombing/war or will they realize that Bush is a bigger ally for them than dummy Obama who even if he was on Israel's side doesn't have a clue about anything? There multiple little articles popping up about Israel and Iran right now and I strongly suggest all pay attention to what is happening over there.

what part about a rating agency giving a repackaged passel of subprime and alt mortgages a AAA rating just as if it were a US Treasury bond not sound fraudulent to you?
You pay a premium of AAA and you trust the AAA rating to hold up in adverse economic circumstances. Accountants, actuarys, corporate officers and all sorts that make up the command and control structure signed off on these being AAA. So you trusted them and now your out of money. A crime has been committed. Is there a statue for it? Maybe yes if the federal government regulates with the laws on the books, maybe no if its such a new hustle that they have never seen it before. Either way they broke their fiduciary duty to you and now people have lost huge money, are losing homes, or can't get credit. This is a crime.
By the way corporations were only given all the rights of an individual in the past century and they have used that aggressively to manuever all around us often to our detriment. Obviously corporations can do good things if they still manufactured anything, but now they are in the service industries and some of their services are growing increasingly fraudulant whether it be skimming real money from their funny money or not honoring an insurance policy or lacking truth in advertising or any number of musical chair stock, bond, and exotic instrument games. You are talking last century union issues and I am talking this century globalization issues and what its doing to our own domestic people. Big difference. Your reading right out of the (gasp) republican playbook and I am just observing reality here. This isn't a football game, these are our own people hurting and its not a sport the more aggressive conveinently sheilded by hyped-up and well protected business entities need to keep winning over ordinary working people as it hurts the nation.

Brian, sorry but I disagree! If a corporation is unionized, most of the complaints you raise are collective bargaining issues. I reiterate these are PRIVATE companies. As long as no laws are being broken, the CEOs, officers and managers of these corporations have the CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to run their companies the way they want to. They have the right to increase profits as they see fit (again, provided no laws are broken); AND they have the right to spend their profits anyway they want to (again, provided no laws are broken).

Would it be better if CEOs and corporations gave their employees larger salaries and better benefits. Of course! But the bottom line is profits. GREED is not against the law! AGGRESSIVENESS is not against the law! Paying only the minimum wage to employees with minimal benefits is NOT against the law! Being a TOTAL JERK of a CEO is NOT against the law!

How would you feel if the federal government ruled and decided to enforce their decision that it was in the best interest for all children to spent no more than 15 minutes a day on their IPODs; spend no more than 30 minutes a day on their video games; spend no more that 1 hour a day watching TV; and that parents must give each child a $50.00 weekly allowance. THOSE are parenting issues not issues for the federal government!

When the government (local, county, state or federal) begins to micromanage private corporations the way you suggest, that will be the death knell of not only Corporate America but small business America as well. That's because it is the dream of many small business owners for their business to one day become a corporation. A full-blown government takeover would be the next step; and we would be on our way to becoming the United Communist States of America.

The very same shenanigans and dishonesty crept into most of the big banks and brokerages frankly. It even occured in the rating agencies. The Bush administration did nothing to regulate the mess and only now after the damage is well done are they starting to look at a few aspects of it after sending back a little of the lower earners income taxes in a so called "stimulus" package. That's their response. The greed became epidemic and rampant, once again. Eliot spitzer was virtually the only one enforcing the law, though now Blumenthal has stepped a little into that void. They got rid of Spitzer for good. Corporate America, and I am not talking about little entreprenueral companies now, is run by the most aggressive among us frankly, and they take advantage. The middle classes wealth has suddenly all been shifted upstairs and their government stood by and did nothing but further enable the big boys to take more. Where or why does the former chairman of the NYSE get an approx 180 million dollar retirement package, or the former head of Exxon get a similar 400 million? Where do you think all this money comes from? They didn't invent those institutions, hold the patents, or anything of the sort, they were simply "managers" who walked off with amazing amounts of money. That money, in part, is why the middle class has seen no real increase in per capita income since the 1960's. It went to the managers of these beheamoths when you really look where the money went. I am not saying government is automatically better, but that the modern economies of scale and the control of these entities in just a few hands completely chokes off the middle class and also most of the stockholders. Nowhere do companies block stockholders from having a say in excecutive compensation than in the United States. A lot of your precepts are totally misconcieved. Doubt me, but look from whom the money originated from and who ended up getting a disporportiante amount. A lot has been written about the collusion, legal or not, between boards of directors, often appointed by the ceo's, and the cross board sitting of so many of them. If you go into many of the companies run by these people you will see a gutting continuing to go on in wages and level of service and I maintain those savings are only going to those in power.

McCain isn't Bush no matter how many times Obama backers repeat that mantra. Obama however is the worst possible Carter/Dukakis hybrid this country could ever imagine.

My wife and I are both career military.
I have 25 years in and she has 29 years in. She's a Master Chief and I am a Senior Chief. We, like most the military, votes republican. I voted Bush twice.(Sorry) I can say will all confidence that my wife and I will be voting Dem this year and most my peers say the same thing. Sorry McCain. Your a great war hero but that in itself isnt enough to get my vote. Our great Pres. Bush started a war on his own agenda and based on lies. We should have all our resources going after the SOB that attacked NYC and Obama has the same frame of mind. The economy, war, immigration, energy is why I will vote for Obama.