While the public polls show a public disgusted with the two party duopoly on power and demanding change, the same figures are emerging as the choices for the next president. The most obvious is Hillary Clinton who is reportedly positioning herself now as a candidate of change — a curious role for one of the most establishment figures on the political scene. The other leading candidate is Joe Biden who has been a source of continued gaffs as Vice President and viewed as the other leading candidate of establishment interests. However, there is an effort to reinvent Clinton who supported various wars under Bush and Obama and did little to stop torture and surveillance programs. Indeed, the new MSNBC host Ronan Farrow has proclaimed that the “Clintons represent a style of honesty that the public craves.” Farrow does not appear to remember Bill Clinton’s public and sworn denials in the Lewinsky affair or other scandals. Indeed, the new Hillary Clinton is already attracting the type of influence seekers associated with the two parties. Just this last month, Goldman Sachs gave Clinton almost a half of million dollars for just two speeches in one week. The event is made more curious by fact that speech was described as “prepared remarks” followed by limited questions. It is doubtful that Clinton informed Goldman Sachs of anything other than the most predictable remarks from a politician — not some critical re-orientation of their investment strategy. UPDATE: Chuck Schumer has already endorsed Clinton to be the next president.
In speeches on October 24 and October 29, Goldman Sachs gave Clinton $200,000 a speech. Thursday’s speech was a closed door meeting with Goldman and its clients. The prior Tuesday she spoke at a session hosted by Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein.
From Goldman Sachs to the Carlyle group, business interests are lining up to give huge amounts of cash to the Clintons personally for such speeches.
In the meantime, the two parties are moving to ensure that the same faces and choices will be given to voters despite overwhelming discontent over the two-party monopoly on power. With a system protecting incumbents and control of the two main parties, such public opposition remains largely immaterial and business interests are already putting money down on candidates like Clinton — and the “style of honesty” that they crave.
“We came. We saw. He died.” Thus You-Know-Her cackled and smirked as American sponsored Al Qaeda “rebels” repeatedly abused the captured and dying Libyan leader Moammar Gaddhafi. (Youtube has the graphic video which the interested viewer can easily locate). So much for the “dignity” of national office.
And this soulless war slut wants my vote? Never. Enough with the mindless, corporate militarism. So from my experienced anti-war perspective, I see only:
A Useless Ewe
(From The Triumph of Strife: an homage to Dante Alighieri and Percy Shelley)
How did the Nazi Germans get like that?
Why did the Japanese do such fell deeds?
How did America grow dumb and fat?
Why does our media spout fascist screeds?
Like ruptured ducks they waddle, limp and quack
Our chicken hawk a timid twitter bleeds
A pigeon on her stool she sings for slack
So she can coo and squawk and glare and cluck
Her stupid vote for war she won’t take back
Instead, she stalls and hides and hopes for luck
Invested in the bars of her own cage
Her signature refrain: buk! buk! buk! buk!
She pecks and scratches, fitful, on the stage
Her part already fading from the page
She piles up heaps of corporation cash
To foster the impression of a lead
Reactionaries throw for her a bash
To help her buy a job without the need
To find out whom the people would prefer
She’d like to have the title and the deed
But not what she would just as soon defer:
A stance on issues ravaging the land
From which ambivalence we can infer
That we need someone not so blind and bland
No leadership from her will manifest
Until we’ve put aside the other hand
Which makes decision easy to ingest
And moot the question of her quisling quest
For who requires an also-ran to run?
Who follows those advancing to the rear?
Who offer no new thing beneath the sun
No lure to them who’ve cast aside her fear
And have no wish to truck with it again
Why wait for years if only then to hear
The call to act like mice and not like men
Advice to trim the sails and not make waves
To baldly go where everyone has been
A road to hell this good intention paves
Before and after; both sides of the street
A path that neither life or treasure saves
Much better left to warm her Senate seat
This useless ewe continuing to bleat
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright 2006-2010
“The first step is to realize that the concept of equal suffrage will destroy democratic governments. Then we can do the hard work of determining the details of how to construct a good democratic process.”
*
David, If there’s a bottom line regarding the nature of citizenship in the US that’s lower than this one just get to it, stop teasing me. Every time I think you can’t get more fringe you surprise me. Just what else is lurking in the corners? I’m interested, really.
You’ve probably given the suffrage issue some thought or you wouldn’t have mentioned it so who’s vote is least valuable? Who gets the least share of the democratic process, the next to least, the most and so on? Srsly, I’m interested.
lottakatz wrote: “…who’s [sic] vote is least valuable?”
The person who knows the least about what they are voting on and who owns no property would be the one whose vote has the least value.
This is not the proper forum for a full discussion on this topic. In brief, let me say that because government oversees everyone in society, I think everyone living here should get a vote. I do not believe voting is an inalienable right like many democrats do. Voting is a privilege that should be extended to those who are affected by the laws created.
In a weighted system of voting, a person could increase the value of their vote through testing and certain status. For example, because the primary role of government concerns property rights, a person who owns land free and clear would get a bump in the power of their vote. A person who could recognize the pictures of current government leaders (picture of president, vice president, speaker of the house, etc.) would get a higher vote. If the vote concerns a bill or proposed law, the person who has read the proposed law should get a higher vote than someone who has not read it. When voting for candidates in federal government, someone who can demonstrate an understanding of government structure (knows three branches of government and structure of Congress and understands electoral college, etc.) would get a higher vote. Someone in society who is self employed would get a higher vote because that person will have more government laws affecting him. Someone in society who employs others should have their vote increased, but the person who employs one person would have the same increase as the person who employs many. Perhaps this is enough for you to understand the gist of not having equal voting system. In modern times, we have the technology available that can make this kind of voting system possible, if only we can be open minded enough to move that direction.
I also think we do poorly by having campaigns to get everyone to vote, as if the act of voting in itself was noble. We should extend the privilege of voting but not promote it. People who are not interested in voting should not be left alone not to vote. Let only those who are interested in voting cast a vote.
Many people today do not understand the fragile nature of a democracy, and how a truly pure democracy (otherwise known as mob rule) does not work. Our country originally had some safeguards built into it, but Constitutional Amendments concerning voting have eroded these safeguards. I will leave you with a quote to ponder, written in 1770 by Alexander Tyler in the book, “Cycle of Democracy.”
“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising them the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over a loose fiscal responsibility, always followed by a dictatorship.” Alexander Tyler, 1770.
DavidM,
“You are confusing universal suffrage with equal suffrage.”
What the hell does this mean? What is equal suffrage? Is this a linguistic sleight-of-hand that you erect in the hope it reads well?
Define your terms, DavidM.
It would be advantageous for you if you could do this without denigrating people that don’t hold your views, or otherwise convince others without resorting to your obvious love of redemption whether it be from earthly powers or spiritual.
DavidM wrote to Gene H: “You are confusing universal suffrage with equal suffrage.”
gbk wrote: “What the hell does this mean? What is equal suffrage? Is this a linguistic sleight-of-hand that you erect in the hope it reads well? Define your terms, DavidM.”
No sleight-of-hand. The terms have been in use since before this country was founded. Universal suffrage refers to the privilege for everyone to vote. Equal suffrage refers to everyone getting an equal vote. Originally, America did not have either universal or equal suffrage. Voting was restricted to freeholders (those who owned land free and clear). Thomas Jefferson was one founding father who argued in favor of restricting voting only to men who owned land.
Gene,
David can’t even quote Attila the Hun correctly. He meant to say:
“It is not enough that I succeed. Everyone else must fail.”
Of course, what David considers “success” — principally the possession of great family wealth that impoverishes others — would apply to George “Deputy Dubya” Bush, as well. So we can consider that theory easily debunked. And anyone who thinks that “Benghazi” ranks as a national issue has no business calling other voters “dumb.”
It seems clear to me that David really longs for a “Lord” to “come back” and lay down the law from his “throne.” A mythological monarchist, for sure.
Michael Murray wrote: “David can’t even quote Attila the Hun correctly.”
You are associating me with the wrong person. My voting concepts are more aligned with Thomas Jefferson, the author of our Declaration of Independence. Unlike Jefferson, I do support the idea of universal suffrage, but I think Jefferson might have supported my system of universal suffrage if I could have explained to him my concept of a weighted voting system.
I say that if the Republicans want another Republican president, then they should elect their own Republican candidate president and not expect the Democrats to do it again (Clinton) and again (Obama) for them. How many hapless foreigners — most likely Muslims — will have to needlessly die so that You-Know-Her can prove her “toughness” while ceaselessly mouthing empty animist ritual incantations to the effect that the Great Big Daddy Spook just loves the slaughter. Hence:
An Ersatz Commander in Knickers
Before a mirror now she stands
Saluting with her two left hands
“Commanding” like some jaded Joan of Arc
A warfare welfare mother slick
Another monkey on a stick
She gladly held the match that lit the spark
She clearly failed to look and see
The dwarf dyslexic chimpanzee
Who made baboons of her and Bubba Bill
Attacking those upon the left
Who saw through Dubya’s lack of heft
She now sounds less a leader than a shill
In thrall to medals on the chest
Not nearly brightest nor the best
She signed off on a jingoistic jaunt
No judgment did she bring to bear
Emitting only heated air
Her bad decisions have returned to haunt
And now with knickers in a bunch
She lives to rue the fateful hunch
She followed on her first blind date with war
It seemed like such a little thing:
A rapt submission to a fling
That’s left her used again like Dubya’s whore
Yet unrepentant at the ease
With which war caused her brain to freeze
Our You-Know-Her wants us to make her queen
She’s got this urge to have a go,
She’d like us all to truly know,
In spite of all that we have heard and seen
She now says she would like to fight
And not just pander to the right
She says the middle finger them she’ll give
But calculating cons and pros
She tallies up the “yea”s and “no”s
And then displays a pinky as her shiv
It simply doesn’t seem to work
This “centrist” mush served by a jerk
Who likes the times that buy men’s souls just fine
For having sold her own soul cheap
She now can utter not a peep
When voters choose someone more genuine
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2007
David,
Quite simply: bullshit.
I’m not confusing anything. Equal sufferage is a crap idea often put forth by corporatists/fascists to justify what is actually an inequitable voting process. Equal sufferage means a system without graded voting where a voter could possess a number (as in multiple) of votes in accordance with income, wealth or social status. Contrast this to universal sufferage where the right to vote is not restricted by sex, race, social status, or wealth and every individual citizen of age (barring the reasonable exceptions of mental incapacity or certain kinds of criminal convictions) has one vote.
One (wo)man, one vote.
You are confusing “unfair” and “unbalanced” for “fair” and “balanced”.
Which isn’t surprising considering you’re a confessed FAUXNews aficionado.
Gene H wrote: “I’m not confusing anything. Equal sufferage [sic] is a crap idea often put forth by corporatists/fascists to justify what is actually an inequitable voting process. Equal sufferage [sic] means a system without graded voting where a voter could possess a number (as in multiple) of votes in accordance with income, wealth or social status.”
You obviously don’t know what you are talking about. At least learn how to spell suffrage. I support the concept of universal suffrage, but not equal suffrage because equal suffrage destroys democracy and leads to poor government. Wise, honest and faithful people make for better leaders in government. Your system will just increase the animosity and polarization we have in govt and society right now.
Ah, yes. Another cowardly fool “Democrat” who stupidly bought into Deputy Dubya’s stud hamster vendetta against the toothless Iraqi tinpot, Saddam “he tried to kill my daddy” Hussein.
Buffaloed Girl
(Somewhat after the traditional song of a similar name)
Buffaloed girl, won’t you come out tonight?
Bask in your fright; hide in plain sight.
Buffaloed girl don’t you put up a fight;
Just dance to the right with the goons!
Buffaloed girl, don’t you burn any flags;
Marry some fags; count body bags.
Buffaloed girl, wrapped in riches not rags,
Just keep raking in those doubloons!
Buffaloed girl, send our troops to Iraq!
Then leave them there! Don’t bring them back!
Buffaloed girl, cover George Bush’s back,
And scrape up a few more platoons!
Buffaloed girl, just stay out of the fray.
Keep your mouth shut! Keep making hay!
Buffaloed girl, while the cat is away
Just keep playing mice with buffoons.
Buffaloed girl, don’t you hear the troops cry?
Wounded for wrongs; dead for a lie
Buffaloed girl, look in everyone’s eye
And then soil your own pantaloons
Buffaloed girl, under Lieberman’s wing
Saving his job, that’s the main thing
Buffaloed girl, you and Holy Joe sing
The duet of right-wing spittoons
Buffaloed girl, rail at video games
Focus group that; spout the right frames
Buffaloed girl, don’t you name any names
Just save children from their cartoons
Buffaloed girl, take a “listening” tour
If you don’t know; if you’re not sure
Buffaloed girl, voters like their fake “pure”
Like war debt that simply balloons
Buffaloed girl, when it counted you hid
Don’t try to lie. That’s what you did
Buffaloed girl, Dubya made you his kid
When you bought the crap that he croons
Buffaloed girl, your irrelevance mounts
Even in small, measured amounts
If “it” takes a village, by all your accounts
Then take “it” to Mars and its moons
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2006
People who hate Ted Cruz are RACIST!,
Aggravating isn’t it … a whole lot of educated men out there who actually believe Hillary Clinton would make a better President than anyone else putting themselves forward for the job.
Even worse, these men want a President with enough experience in government, foreign and domestic, to hit the ground running and support her based on those credentials.
What in the hell is happening to this country?!
Don’t worry, the Republicans won’t be left out. Goldman will hedge its bets by throwing some money at a Republican nominee. Most donors hedge their bets by contributing to both candidates. If the Republicans weren’t in a completely chaotic death spiral and had an actual presumptive nominee he’d be getting big paying speaking gigs by now too.
The problem is money in politics, it’s dueling millionaires/billionaires out there and SCOTUS has blessed it.
Looks like the Ted Cruz homeboy likes to walk on the edge of the precipice.
Tex is an imbecile.
SwM,
This thread is hilarious and it’s only just beginning.
Tex and all his buds are throwing a “Thank God she’s giving it serious consideration” party tonight. There’s about 30 of them all over the age of 60 and each one is supposed to bring another male between the ages of 21 (legal age to drink) and 50. So far Tex is taking 9 guys. Our neighbor is bringing 12. These men have never wavered in their support for Hillary since she made her first run for Senator.
sorry ter i owe you an apology. Yeah Cruz wife being at Sachs is a problem for me also.
Both parties are corrupt.
my name is to merely make a point
Former Goldman Sachs lobbyist Mark Patterson serves under Geithner as his top deputy and overseer of TARP bailout — $10 billion of which went to Goldman Sachs. Left-leaning government watchdog Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington responded: “It makes it appear that they are saying one thing and doing another.” Paul Blumenthal of the Sunlight Foundation noted that, while at Goldman Sachs, Patterson lobbied against the executive-pay limits that Obama had crusaded for as senator (this was, of course, before his administration carved out exemptions for AIG). While Patterson agreed to recuse himself on any Goldman Sachs–related issues or policy concerns, Blumenthal wrote, it “still creates a serious conflict for Geithner, as Treasury is being partly managed by a former Goldman lobbyist. Geithner is also placed in a tough position considering that his chief of staff is limited in the areas in which he can work (supposedly).”
Obama’s close hometown crony, campaign-finance chief and senior adviser Penny Pritzker, was head of Superior Bank of Chicago, a subprime specialist that went bust in 2001, leaving more than 1,400 people stripped of their savings after bank officials falsified profit reports. Pritzker’s lawyer at O’Melveny and Myers, Tom Donilon, is now Obama’s deputy national-security adviser. He earned just shy of $4 million representing her and other high-profile meltdown clients including Goldman Sachs.
White House National Economic Council head Larry Summers reaped nearly $2.8 million in speaking fees from many of the major financial institutions and government-bailout recipients he now polices, including JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Lehman Brothers, and Goldman Sachs. A single speech to Goldman Sachs in April 2008 brought in $135,000. Summers had prior experience negotiating government-sponsored bailouts that benefit private concerns. In 1995, he spearheaded a $40 billion bailout of the Mexican peso that bypassed Congress. Summers personally leaned on the International Monetary Fund to provide nearly $18 billion for the package. Summers’s boss, then–secretary of the Treasury Robert Rubin, was former co-chairman of Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs — the Mexican government’s investment banking firm of choice.
Rubin continues to mentor another former employee of his with regular visits and chats — Treasury Secretary Geithner, who as head of the New York Federal Reserve pushed bailed-out insurance conglomerate AIG to cover up sweetheart deals for investment banks that benefited, you guessed it, Goldman Sachs.
As Obama harangues Wall Street to clean up its house, all the president’s Goldman Sachs men have their feet on the coffee table at his.
how about that cruz terd gerber
Goldman Sachs partner Gary Gensler is Obama’s Commodity Futures Trading Commission head. He was confirmed despite heated congressional grilling over his role, as Reuters described it, “as a high-level Treasury official in a 2000 law that exempted the $58 trillion credit default swap market from oversight. The financial instruments have been blamed for amplifying global financial turmoil.” Gensler said he was sorry — hey, it worked for tax cheat Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner — and was quickly installed to guard the henhouse.
Goldman Sachs kept White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel on a $3,000 monthly retainer while he worked as Clinton’s chief fundraiser, as first reported by Washington Examiner columnist Tim Carney. The financial titans threw in another $50,000 to become the Clinton primary campaign’s top funder. Emanuel received nearly $80,000 in cash from Goldman Sachs during his four terms in Congress — investments that have reaped untold rewards, as Emanuel assumed a leading role championing the trillion-dollar TARP banking-bailout law.
it’s unlikely Hillary Clinton spoke for free at the two events. A story from NYTimes from earlier this year notes her speaking fee of $200K. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/12/us/politics/hillary-clinton-hits-the-lucrative-speechmaking-trail.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all
Has anyone contacted her spokesperson re: Goldman Sachs?
whats that abotu crus terd gerber
Goldman Sachs was top Obama donor
From Robert Yoon, CNN Political Research Director
April 20, 2010 5:50 p.m. EDT
Obama taps Goldman Sachs exec as Canada envoy
lol Ter ber. You talk about Cruz and goldman sachs but ignore all the money they give Obama and Hillary.
Hillary Clinton Raked In Around $400,000 Speaking At Goldman Sachs
Hillary Clinton spoke at two Goldman Sachs events over the past few days, the National Review’s Alec Torres reports.
Clinton takes home about $200,000 per speech, which apparently is around the going rate for the “formers” of President Obama’s cabinet. From NRO:
Last Thursday, Clinton spoke for the AIMS Alternative Investment Conference hosted by Goldman Sachs, a closed event exclusively for Goldman clients. AIMS is an annual conference that explores the latest strategies and products available to financial advisers. At the event, Clinton offered what one attendee described to me as “prepared remarks followed by questions.”
hell, if they want to give me a half mil i’d be grinnin like a jackass eatin briars too.