Funding used to sway votes for end of war bill »
Posted by: TheVisionary 1 year, 5 months agoDemocrats in the House are offering billions in pet projects for projects wide and large all over the country including the reconstruction of the New Orleans levees, in order to gain votes for a bill designed to end the war no later than Aug. 31, 2008.
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Amazing11 year, 5 months ago
I would far rather see the domestic spending than one more dime for a war that should never have been. The troops should be brought home sooner, rather than later. We're spending more than $2 billion a week in Iraq. We have been nearly bankrupted and the Chimp in Charge is asking for patience as we begin our fifth year on this misguided occupation. Bring the troops home now and spend the money on our nation, our problems and our people.
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time4change1 year, 5 months ago
Support our troops by bringing them home NOW....there will NEVER be a 'good' time to get out of what was a failed effort from the start. Bush is demonstrating his "stubborn" personality, something that we haven't seen due to the Repub majority thus far. Now that the Dems have a slim lead...you will see more and more how this moron will not change course...EVER....will not admit a mistake....EVER....I agree wholeheartedly with Amazing1....stop the bleeding (human and fiscal) and end this nightmare now !!
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Lurch1 year, 5 months ago
It`s just the way our govt works.
You cannot get the majority of pols to take a stand for whats right based on merit or morals. You have to bribe them.
Same thing the Bushies did to sell the war. They spent hundreds of millions on a PR campaign filled with lies, censored reports, and sexed up intel. They also spent tens (hundreds?) of billions of our dollars rewarding themselves, their cronies, and the `partner countries` in the alliance of the unwilling. Remember Turkey? It took nine billion to get them to allow us to use their air space. Some willingness.
Like the others said, better to spend that money here to close this chapter and save lives than to waste the money and lives over there.
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aniokly1 year, 5 months ago
We paid taxes for three generations to support the illigimate offspring of deadbeat men, and promiscious women. Ending Welfare was the best thing the Hillbilly *hore Hopper did in eight otherwise non-descrip years. If the government decided to pay for the Healthcare of those without care I could care less, but I will not give up quality healthcare so all of us can have second rate care.
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mesodude1 year, 5 months ago
"non-descrip years"? aniokly you're a COMPLETE joke. Let's see...Clinton brought us the longest economic expansion in US history, moved us from record deficit to record surplus, paid off the national debt, created more than 22 million jobs, gave us the fastest and longest Real Wage Growth in Over 30 years, gave us the lowest unemployment rate in over 30 years, gave us the highest homeownership rate in US history, gave us the lowest poverty rate since 1979, increased the minimum wage, gave us the lowest crime rate in 22 years, put 100,000 more police on our streets, gave us the smallest federal civilian workforce in 40 years, stabilized Southeast Europe by ending a decade of repression and ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, Led diplomatic efforts to end the civil war and foster multi-ethnic democracy in Bosnia, left office with gas hovering around $1 per gallon, and much, MUCH more...Yep, sounds pretty "non-descrip" to me. LOL
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Lurch1 year, 5 months ago
Aniokly, I can tell that was hard to admit, but thank you.
Clinton nearly put an end to welfare as a way of life, with the help of the Republicans in Congress. It was a bipartisan effort and a good one. Even Gingrich, whom I have seen in person and whom I despise on several levels, deserves some credit for that bipartisan effort. [eats bag of mints...]
Healthcare quality is a complicated process, including:
* provider salary (which Bush wants to hike taxes on) guarantees quality docs
* peer provider oversight, versus good ol` boy networks (local communities have different rules that often define the nature of review boards
* reimbursement rates (if you only make $1.50 to see each patient, would you spend fifteen minutes with four patients every hour or would you try to see a dozen or more?)
The above issues could improve with universal healthcare, it depends entirely on how it is implemented.
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invest071 year, 5 months ago
Let's come home from Iraq and don't forget about these:
1. Germany - Our military bases have been there since 1945. Isn't that long enough?
2. Japan - Ditto. The Japanese can't support their own defense?
3. Kosovo - we still have troops in harm's way. I never did figure out when Kosovo attacked us but Clinton went there anyway.
4. Haiti - did you know Clinton sent US Marines there and they are still there?
5. Taiwan and South Korea - if the cold war is over, why don't we redploy these troops home?
6. We still have bases all over the So Pacific leftover from WW2.
Let's close those bases and use the money saved to raise military pay and buy med insurance for our uninsured.
The problem with this plan is that Bush would get the credit and the Dems can't permit that.
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mesodude1 year, 5 months ago
"Kosovo - we still have troops in harm's way. I never did figure out when Kosovo attacked us but Clinton went there anyway."
Actually NATO "went there anyway."
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alakazam1 year, 5 months ago
As far as Japan goes it was a Provision of Treaty that the U.S.A. would promote their General Defense. The Japanese Defense Budget is limited by Treaty to that effect.
Hmm, you tell me about the rest of it, why aren't those troops home? Have not the Republicans had six years to bring them home?
I am not about to waste a couple of hours explaining the last 50 years of Treaty obligation to you.
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invest071 year, 5 months ago
Welfare is a redistribution of wealth and is a far cry from turning swords into plow shares.
Welfare is a bottomless pit that never ends. Look at the addiction of federal dollars in LA and NO. We have thrown billions at them and they only want billions more.
If you really want to turn swords into plow shares, encourage the creative spirit of the American people.
Government has never and will never be capable of turning swords into plow shares. Only free people can do that.
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Lurch1 year, 5 months ago
>Welfare is a bottomless pit that never ends.
That`s exactly why the Bushies want this war to continue, so that the tidal wave of handouts to Bush cronies won`t end. Do you really think those people give a crappe about GIs and iraqis getting killed? These are the same people that rewards themselves $220M for subpar performance and tens of millions for laying off ten thousand workers.
The problem with `the creative spirit` approach is that the lawyers have turned the patent issue into a sham. It is no longer whether your idea is good and original, it is a matter of do you have enough money to force the USPO to give you a patent, even if it is bogus.
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aniokly1 year, 5 months ago
No event in history proved the uselessness of social welfare as much as the victims of Katrina. They were so acclimated to Government care they could not even muster the energy to save themselves. They were all waiting for a government handout. Nagin could have done something, Bllanko did nothing, did not even ask for Federal help until after the levees broke. They were so afraid the Federal Government would look into Louisiana Corruption they could not allow oversight from the Feds. In the end they had no choice. But the people, they were pathetic. One Grandmother realized what was coming, and walked hergrandaughter to the freeway,got a ride with someone leaving the area, and saved both of them. The rest all stood with their hands out waiting for some money to buy some cheap wine to take away the pain.
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NelsonR1 year, 5 months ago
aniokly - Yes your hypothesis and opinion on your post is correct and regretfully so. But do not take your analogy or others you may have in your mind to destroy functioning and beneficial social programs now in place. Your comparrison can be destroyed with this one idea,
Bush has a program for our nations trampling on other nations rights through wars, misery, death and Haliburton thrown in. Now that is more disqusting than outlandish examples of problems within a social program.
By the the way, Haliburton went from 10 dollars to over 40 dollars per share since the inception of this war. Do you think this part of your idol, Mr. Bush causes is a correct one?
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edromar21 year, 5 months ago
I accidently called the war a wart in a typo. There is a simil;arily, in that warts tend to be where you don't want them and they grow despite your scratching. Well, we have not been able to scratch this one off. In the other hand, this wart is more like a cancer that grows and grows and destroys all life in its wake, until we have to have a wake. Well at least we have the example of New Orleans to dance and sing and drink at our wake for this war--as they had to after Katrina--both courtesy of our incourrigible maladministration!
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invest071 year, 5 months ago
The problem is that this practise will not stop with one bill. This has been standard practise in DC for years.
Don't forget the dollars they want to spend belong to you and me. You may not agree with the war in Iraq but vote buying schemes will continue long after we are home from Iraq.
I thought the Dems were going to clean up DC. They passed Campaign Finance Reform and the last election saw more dollars than ever spent.
Robert Byrd is the undisputed king of this. There is a joke that he will only retire when he has paved over every square inch of WV with federal dollars.
The problem is not the war in Iraq. It is the attitude in DC that our money is theirs. It is the addiction to spending someone else's money that is the true problem.
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NelsonR1 year, 5 months ago
invest07 - Well lets start with your premise of discontinuing and abating wasteful programs. My first choice is aggressor wars promoted by Presidents. The squandered billion already spent in Iraq are gone. If we leave now, billions more will be saved and less needless deaths for Amricans. How can you possibly avoid the war issue when you are referring to fiscal responsibility????
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ChefEOD1 year, 5 months ago
Our new democrat leadership at their finest, piling on the pork and spending our money like drunken sailors. After all, the Bush administration is still in office, add to the deficit all you want and blame it on him.
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DoseASpinoza1 year, 5 months ago
This is business as usual. We live with all kinds of laws that are passed as riders on unrelated or semi-related matters. It's how the Legislature works, and the paper trail of the trades is in the laws they pass.
Not saying that is good or bad. A congressional rep's job is to bring home the goods for his/her own district. The Republicans used the same tactics to drag us into this war, I'd rather see someone using them to drag us out of it.
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rabid-badger1 year, 5 months ago
I fail to see how this is any different from what the Republicans did from when Bush became President till the Democrats managed to gain control of the House and Senate. At least the Democrats are attempting to redress some of the imbalances, given that most of the Republican riders contained tax breaks for the extremely wealthy and perks for companies that are essentially war profiteers.
As for 'welfare' paying for the 'illigitimate children of shiftless men and promiscuous women' (and why are the women always prommiscuous-it's not like they got pregnant by themselves; the'shiftless men' fathered those children), would you prefer that the women and their children end up living on the streets? What you're describing is a societal problem, not something caused by welfare. Welfare simply made it possible for the women to provide for their children, without having to rely on the 'shiftless men,' who can't be bothered to support their own flesh and blood.
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Lurch1 year, 5 months ago
You`re right. August 31st, 2008 is stupid. Now August 29th, that`s a Friday and a good day to bring troops home on.
Seriously, what kind of moron brings troops home on a Sunday??
(tic)
Or did you mean forcing the Iraqis to defend themselves after five years and ending the never-ending welfare buffet for war profiteers is a stupid idea?
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amazed1 year, 5 months ago
There needs to be a change in the way congress does business. Of course, it can't happen because only congress can decide how congress does its thing, but, no bill should have more than one topic.
This practice of writing omnibus bills and throwing all kinds of related crap into them so that things that do not have enough merit to pass on their own will get passed anyway really needs to stop.
If this democratic initiative to set an arbitrary and unequivocable bail date on Iraq, was such a great idea, they would not have to buy the votes.
And that goes for every other piece of legislation that is brought before them.
One bill -- one topic. They should also be limited in length to not more than, say, 10 pages, so that the Congresspeople know what the hell their voting for and everyone else affected can know what the bill actually says and means.
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amazed1 year, 5 months ago
absolutely.
There should be NO omnibus legislation. Either something is worth passing or it's not.
If the Republicans were trying to buy votes to continue the war that would be just as abhorent.
I'll even go further and say that the republican minority should NOT filibuster legislation that would otherwise pass -- just as I think it was not right for the votes on judges to be held up by the minority.
If there is a majority of congresspeople signed on, then the bill should pass, but this putting everything but the kitchen sink into really popular legislation, or in this case bribing people to vote for it so that their necessary projects can pass is just not the way the gov't should work. It's corrupt regardless of who's in charge.
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brothers1 year, 5 months ago
The Dem's and no different or better than the Rep. Money talks. They all have their dirty hands in the pot. They will do anything or say anything for money. They should all have their hands chopped off.
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kctrixter1 year, 5 months ago
When I herd "pork barrel spending" I thought they meant things like funding bridges that would never be build, but as I read the list, I realized that this particular gob of pork was gonna help a lot of people.
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fotoman11334061 year, 5 months ago
Guys,
Was wondering when buying politics was going to come into play.? Shove 'nough money out there and you(politicians) can buy what/all they want.
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KYRed1 year, 5 months ago
Should I vote against funding the Iraq war? Well, tell me, what's in it for me? Yah. Lots of spine in Congress.
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