October Surprise

[Zircon]

With the USS John C. Stennis, CVN-74, on its way to the Persian Gulf four months ahead of schedule, we will have five complete battle groups in the area. As the Syria/Iran arrangement escalates in what remains a cool confrontation with the Russians and Chinese, what is in on the agenda?

October is just prior to the election "scheduled" for November 7, 2012. This administration has been involved in Libya, Egypt, Yemen. Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and now hovers over interactions in Syria. In all cases, we've eliminated or been an ally with those who have eliminated their former dictators (and our former "friends" in many cases).

Does anyone see the potential for the suspension of the electoral process in November due to a "national crisis"?

[BobGrau]

With the USS John C. Stennis, CVN-74, on its way to the Persian Gulf four months ahead of schedule, we will have five complete battle groups in the area. As the Syria/Iran arrangement escalates in what remains a cool confrontation with the Russians and Chinese, what is in on the agenda?

October is just prior to the election "scheduled" for November 7, 2012. This administration has been involved in Libya, Egypt, Yemen. Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and now hovers over interactions in Syria. In all cases, we've eliminated or been an ally with those who have eliminated their former dictators (and our former "friends" in many cases).

Does anyone see the potential for the suspension of the electoral process in November due to a "national crisis"?

I share your suspicioun about the military build-up, but I don't see elections being suspended - someone always trots that one out come election time.

[MV/Liberace!]

Does anyone see the potential for the suspension of the electoral process in November due to a "national crisis"?

no.

[Juan]

With all the talk of Romney being a felon, I look for a DC grand jury to return an indictment about a week before the election and for Romney to be hauled off in handcuffs.

[b_dubb]

With all the talk of Romney being a felon, I look for a DC grand jury to return an indictment about a week before the election and for Romney to be hauled off in handcuffs.

Ummm ... what?

[Zircon]

I share your suspicioun about the military build-up, but I don't see elections being suspended - someone always trots that one out come election time.

First time we've had a person who many view as a communist as president.

[stevesh]

Does anyone see the potential for the suspension of the electoral process in November due to a "national crisis"?

No. That's been a popular meme for the Right for at least the last three elections. It would take a Red Dawn scenario for elections to be suspended in the US. Alex Jones might disagree, though.

[b_dubb]

what pisses me off is how if you turn on fox news it would seem that Iran has declared open war on the US. I hate fox news

[Sardondi]

No. That's been a popular meme for the Right for at least the last three elections. It would take a Red Dawn scenario for elections to be suspended in the US. Alex Jones might disagree, though.

Seems I remember in 2004 when Daily Kos, DU and HuffPo et al were full of how Bush was going to suspend the elections, impose martial law, yadda. And I took them about as seriously as I take any talk of election suspension now.

what pisses me off is how if you turn on fox news it would seem that Iran has declared open war on the US. I hate fox news

Uh, because of Iran's attitude to the US?

[Sleepwalker]

First time we've had a person who many view as a communist as president.

Some people said Franklin Roosevelt was a Communist.  Same with Lyndon Johnson.  Some people will apply all kinds of names to Presidents they don't like. 

[Zircon]

Some people said Franklin Roosevelt was a Communist.  Same with Lyndon Johnson.  Some people will apply all kinds of names to Presidents they don't like. 

Sleepwalker, please check out who the president surrounds himself with, his early life and radical friends, family radicals. If Bush had a list like Obama has he'd have been called the anti-Christ. I believe a person provided a list of individuals he has or has had an association with. If you'd like I can post it here?

[Zircon]

what pisses me off is how if you turn on fox news it would seem that Iran has declared open war on the US. I hate fox news

In some ways it could be argued that Fox is "itching" for a confrontation between Israel and Iran. Of course, they do not make policy.

If Israel unleashed, Iran would be pulverized. That bearded runt in Tehran is mostly talk. With Obama running things, we'll probably abandon Israel if it happens. Both the Russians and the US Navy are there but they're both more into a Mexican standoff than anything else. The Navy is there to intimidate. Unless attacked I don't see them involved in military strikes.

[Ben Shockley]

Uh, because of Iran's attitude to the US?

Gosh, why do you suppose any Iranian could ever resent the U.S., Winnie?
I'll give you credit for already knowing the answer.
Now tell us why you feel it's somehow unwarranted or extreme.

What do you think would be the attitude of the average avowed-Christian American 50 years from now if some coalition of enlightened Moslem countries had managed to depose the saintly Bush II back around 2004 and installed a dictator of their choice..?


--of course, that's an imperfect analogy.  Bush II was more like what the Iranians got from the coup, not what they lost.
I guess a better analogy is:  Iranians are like American progressives and reasonable people, after we lost a democratically-elected Al Gore in 2000 to a right-wing partly-religiously-driven coup.

Dig?

[Juan]

after we lost a democratically-elected Al Gore in 2000 to a right-wing partly-religiously-driven coup.

Of course the United States is not a democracy, Gore didn't win the electoral college, and, thus, didn't win the election.  I didn't care for Bush, either, but facts are facts and this constant harping about a stolen election does us no good.

[PB the Deplorable]

... I guess a better analogy is:  Iranians are like American progressives and reasonable people, after we lost a democratically-elected Al Gore in 2000 to a right-wing partly-religiously-driven coup.

Dig?

Well, maybe not the Iranian people so much, but the Ayatollahs and Revolutionary Guard-types that have seized power?  You are right - some definite similarities with the 'Progressives'.

As for the constant bleating about Bush II having somehow 'stolen' the election, it's a story the D's like to keep going in order to better down play their election theft of Senate seats (Minnesota), governorships (Washington State), and various House elections (starting with B-1 Bobs old seat)

[Sardondi]

Gosh, why do you suppose any Iranian could ever resent the U.S., Winnie?
I'll give you credit for already knowing the answer.
Now tell us why you feel it's somehow unwarranted or extreme.

What do you think would be the attitude of the average avowed-Christian American 50 years from now if some coalition of enlightened Moslem countries had managed to depose the saintly Bush II back around 2004 and installed a dictator of their choice..?


--of course, that's an imperfect analogy.  Bush II was more like what the Iranians got from the coup, not what they lost.
I guess a better analogy is:  Iranians are like American progressives and reasonable people, after we lost a democratically-elected Al Gore in 2000 to a right-wing partly-religiously-driven coup.

Dig?

"Attitude"? Attitude? Fuck that "attitude". I give a fuck about their so-called "resentment". What they resent is their own incompetence, cowardice and fecklessness. They're humiliated by the fact they live in a culture socially indistinguishable from the 16th century. You damn betcha they "resent".

The government of Iran has had as a national policy a fucking declared-but-unofficial war on the US for decades. They are the world's chief supplier of the combined quotient of arms, explosives and killers, including suicide bombers, to countless terrorist organizations and virtually every civil conflict in the Mideast and now into sub-Saharan Africa. They are killing our people now, and they will kill them in the future, for no other reason that that they are Westerners. Their leaders, whom they chose, daily rail about how they're going to fucking nuke not just Israel but the US. I'd say that's a tad stronger than some fucking "attitude". Any society that valued itself, its people and its culture would have wiped them off the face of the earth long before now.

I'm convinced there are some Iranians who don't want a kleptocracy of lunatic Muslim fundamentalist haters to rule their country. God bless 'em. But what are they gonna do about it? Oh, and who do they beg for help? Who do they plead to come save them from the big, bad strong men? Who do they want to die so they don't have to spill any of their blood? It's not Syria and its not the PLO that they want, bubba.

I am sick to fucking death of intellectually bankrupt attempts to draw some sort of equivalence between US policy and the murderous actions of megalomaniacal Islamic regimes which rule through ignorance, fear, coercion and oppression. The suggestion that one is the equal and the cause of the other is a stench in the nostrils of decency.

That's what I dig.

[Zircon]

Shockley: Iranians are like American progressives and reasonable people, after we lost a democratically-elected Al Gore in 2000 to a right-wing partly-religiously-driven coup.

Progressives as "reasonable" people. Only a fucking idiot moron believes that. "Religious coup". Another fucking moron comment. Have you spent anytime listening to that piece of shit you apparently supported. The god damn progressives are the intolerants, the racists and those seeking to build plantations. The left is a religion unto itself. The godhead is THE STATE.

Regular people who advocate the progressive ideology and want to be pigeon-holed into a STATE defined role - like in the Soviet Union - are useless. They are lazy cowards as they refuse to think for themselves. They yell out "gimme, gimme  Bwaaaahhh !!!" like a bunch of babies with shit filled diapers looking for the nanny state and perpetual mother to clean them up and let them fuck themselves up again. Always someone else to bail them out. "I want toys !!!, I want to be entertained !!!". Worthless human debris.

[analog kid]

That escalated quickly

[McPhallus]

Gosh, why do you suppose any Iranian could ever resent the U.S., Winnie?

--of course, that's an imperfect analogy.  Bush II was more like what the Iranians got from the coup, not what they lost.
I guess a better analogy is:  Iranians are like American progressives and reasonable people, after we lost a democratically-elected Al Gore in 2000 to a right-wing partly-religiously-driven coup.

Dig?

I won't comment on your views, but your posts often contain more than a whiff of arrogance, which is why you get such strong reactions.

[Mind Flayer Monk]

Theory 1: A considerable amount of technology that we adopted from a crashed alien spaceship will be shipped through the middle east over the next few months. The extra carrier group is added security.

Theory 2: The Navy showed how they could protect the region and our interests for cheaper than the Army/Air Force. If we remove more fixed land bases from the region and instead run operations from a ship (drone launches and surveillance, an occasional cruise missile) we could exert similar control and have a more defensible position.
A third carrier group could be there to train in some new theory the Navy has for cheaper defense and less negotiations for fixed land bases (instead of foreign aid to dictators just keep the money).
We could also better cover the area for naval mines.

[Mind Flayer Monk]

Huh looks like they are not adding carrier groups, just relieving existing groups.
I guess some of this depends on how much you trust the DOD as a news source.

Eisenhower relieving the Lincoln
Stennis relieving the Enterprise

http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=117139


"Currently the USS Enterprise and USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike groups are deployed to U.S. Central Command. The USS Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group is due to relieve the Lincoln group shortly. The Stennis group will relieve Enterprise."

[Ben Shockley]

I won't comment on your views, but your posts often contain more than a whiff of arrogance, which is why you get such strong reactions.

As opposed to the apparent "received orthodoxy" of right-wing jingoism rampant in this forum?
How would you have me react, brother McPhallus?

Join the club, too, along with Winnie Sardondi, who only perceives any "disturbance in the force" (a jab in the eye, he memorably called it) if it's from the left.
All kinds of mouth-breathing brick bats thrown in here by right-wingers, but that's fine.   Right?   Maybe it ain't cool that I can spell, huh?
Or is the "arrogance" my having the temerity to even post anything other than warmongering ...?

Touting "reactions" like you did, McPhallus:  Look for example at "Zircon," whom I have no idea how to categorize.   In other threads, he'll wax New-Agey, yet he comes on here like the best friend the designers of cyanide showers could have.   Go figure ~~
You once chided / joked at me for "lecturing" in here about "spurious correlation" following an MV post about something ~~
Here's another 100-level (thus way beyond most posters in here) statistical term:  OUTLIER.
[was that arrogant?  No.   Honest]
I may be an outlier myself on one side of a regression line of "opinion" in this forum.  But the people you tout as being the reasons I should shut up and go away are quite likely themselves outliers on the "angry right-wing" side.

Look guys: I'll play the game.      Tell me how to be a cool kid in the political threads in this forum.   Tell me who the privileged people are who can say what they want, and who I shouldn't reproach, and all that...  Just tell me the rules.
Then read them carefully after you write them, with an eye to irony....

No, I guess that's impossible.....

XOXO 



and real thanks to you McPhallus, if you were trying to be constructive

[ziznak]

Such hostile territory in CG land right now... I'm going back to sleep.

[BobGrau]

left, right... Euclid sucks.

[stevesh]

As opposed to the apparent "received orthodoxy" of right-wing jingoism rampant in this forum?
How would you have me react, brother McPhallus?

Join the club, too, along with Winnie Sardondi, who only perceives any "disturbance in the force" (a jab in the eye, he memorably called it) if it's from the left.
All kinds of mouth-breathing brick bats thrown in here by right-wingers, but that's fine.   Right?   Maybe it ain't cool that I can spell, huh?
Or is the "arrogance" my having the temerity to even post anything other than warmongering ...?

Touting "reactions" like you did, McPhallus:  Look for example at "Zircon," whom I have no idea how to categorize.   In other threads, he'll wax New-Agey, yet he comes on here like the best friend the designers of cyanide showers could have.   Go figure ~~
You once chided / joked at me for "lecturing" in here about "spurious correlation" following an MV post about something ~~
Here's another 100-level (thus way beyond most posters in here) statistical term:  OUTLIER.
[was that arrogant?  No.   Honest]
I may be an outlier myself on one side of a regression line of "opinion" in this forum.  But the people you tout as being the reasons I should shut up and go away are quite likely themselves outliers on the "angry right-wing" side.

Look guys: I'll play the game.      Tell me how to be a cool kid in the political threads in this forum.   Tell me who the privileged people are who can say what they want, and who I shouldn't reproach, and all that...  Just tell me the rules.
Then read them carefully after you write them, with an eye to irony....

No, I guess that's impossible.....

XOXO 



and real thanks to you McPhallus, if you were trying to be constructive

Way too defensive, man. It's just a stupid forum.

George Noory sucks.

[onan]

I dunno, I don't think Ben is over reacting. Having a similar mind set I will share my thoughts. It is sometimes overwhelming to read the right leaning miasma of this forum. For a time I attempted to show that there is usually two sides to political issues. Often tried to reach some middle ground with other positions. Sometimes learned some valid points from different perspectives. But other than The General, Fry's Girl, Eddie Coyle, MV, and Mknight, I have not felt like there is much tolerance for another point of view.

So when Ben makes a post that is said to be defensive... well maybe, but it isn't an unreasonable response.

[Ben Shockley]

Thanks Onan, and -- stevesh -- dude, I still hold out hope for you   
Funny that I should be called "defensive" for just responding relatively calmly I thought, without animus, without any "ugly words," to a post that clearly criticized me...    Isn't "response" allowed in this forum, stevesh ?? 

[ChancersAnswer]

Politics aside, Ben: I love your choice of username and avatar! Nice to see someone respects the great man, Clint. 

[Ben Shockley]

Politics aside, Ben: I love your choice of username and avatar! Nice to see someone respects the great man, Clint. 

Thank you for noticing.  Here's the story.   I do love Clint's movies from the '70s, and I use his character names for a lot of my online IDs.  So when I came to register in here, I wanted to use a different Clint character that I hadn't used before, and -- Ben Shockley got picked.   There is no special significance... I have no connection to prostitutes who have a line on dirty politicians...
I AM known to drink too late on days I should show up for official meetings...

[ChancersAnswer]

Thank you for noticing.  Here's the story.   I do love Clint's movies from the '70s, and I use his character names for a lot of my online IDs.  So when I came to register in here, I wanted to use a different Clint character that I hadn't used before, and -- Ben Shockley got picked.

You have excellent taste, sir! He's known more commonly for his Spaghetti Westerns and the Dirty Harry films, but I thought The Gauntlet was just as good a film. I think it was one of the many ones that he also directed, as well.   

There is no special significance... I have no connection to prostitutes who have a line on dirty politicians...
I AM known to drink too late on days I should show up for official meetings...

Ah, but do you have lots of odds bet against you when crossing stateline?