Here's Rush:
"What is so strange about being honest and saying I want Barack Obama to fail?"
WHAT'S SO STRANGE ABOUT THIS?!
At his closing speech at the CPAC conference, conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh doubled down on his widely-controversial claim that he wanted President Barack Obama to fail, insisting that he meant what he said, and chastising those who were critical of him.
Here's Rush:
"What is so strange about being honest and saying I want Barack Obama to fail?"
Here's Rush:
"What is so strange about being honest and saying I want Barack Obama to fail?"
TODAY'S LYRICS
INSTANT KARMA
Instant karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together
Pretty soon you're gonna be dead
What in the world you thinking of
Laughing in the face of love
What on earth you tryin' to do
Its up to you, yeah you
Instant karmas gonna get you
Gonna look you right in the face
Better get yourself together darlin'
Join the human race
How in the world you gonna see
Laughin' at fools like me
Who in the hell do you think you are
A super star
Well, right you are
Well we all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Well we all shine on
Everyone come on
Instant karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you off your feet
Better recognize your brothers
Everyone you meet
Why in the world are we here
Surely not to live in pain and fear
Why on earth are you there
When you're everywhere
Come and get your share
Well we all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Yeah we all shine on
Come on and on and on on on
Yeah yeah, alright, uh huh, ah
Well we all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Yeah we all shine on
On and on and on on and on
John Lennon
Instant karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together
Pretty soon you're gonna be dead
What in the world you thinking of
Laughing in the face of love
What on earth you tryin' to do
Its up to you, yeah you
Instant karmas gonna get you
Gonna look you right in the face
Better get yourself together darlin'
Join the human race
How in the world you gonna see
Laughin' at fools like me
Who in the hell do you think you are
A super star
Well, right you are
Well we all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Well we all shine on
Everyone come on
Instant karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you off your feet
Better recognize your brothers
Everyone you meet
Why in the world are we here
Surely not to live in pain and fear
Why on earth are you there
When you're everywhere
Come and get your share
Well we all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Yeah we all shine on
Come on and on and on on on
Yeah yeah, alright, uh huh, ah
Well we all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Yeah we all shine on
On and on and on on and on
John Lennon
Today's "THIS IS ALL THEY'VE GOT LEFT?" Quotes
"We know the past, we know we did wrong. My bad."
Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele
"Michael Steele! You be da man! You be da man."
Minnesota Republican Congresswoman, Michele Bachmann
And of course, this beauty:
"Back in the day, really, when people would talk about our military in a poor way, somebody would shoot ‘em. And there’d be nothing said about that."
Joe the Plumber
Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele
"Michael Steele! You be da man! You be da man."
Minnesota Republican Congresswoman, Michele Bachmann
And of course, this beauty:
"Back in the day, really, when people would talk about our military in a poor way, somebody would shoot ‘em. And there’d be nothing said about that."
Joe the Plumber
REPOST: "CREATING HEALTH" (EXCERPTS FROM PL's CLASS)
Webster’s Dictionary – health: the general condition of the body or mind with reference to soundness and vigor, vitality.
Psychiatric Dictionary – mental health: psychological well-being or adequate adjustment, particularly as such adjustment conforms to the community-accepted standards of human relations. Some characteristics of mental health are reasonable independence, self-reliance, self-direction, ability to do a job, to take responsibility and make needed efforts, reliability, cooperation, ability to work under authority, rules and difficulties, ability to show friendliness and love, to give and take, to have tolerance of others and of frustrations, a sense of humor, a devotion beyond oneself, and an ability to find recreation.
Freud - "In the final analysis, the stabilized personality is one that has achieved, through learning and maturation, a balance or equilibrium between “cathexes” and “anti-cathexes.” The nature of this balance, that is, whether it falls more on the side of fulfillment or more on the side of restraint or somewhere in the middle, is determined by the influences which are brought to bear on the developing personality. By and large, the presence of strong anti-cathexes will increase the tension level of the personality since the anti-cathexes prevent psychic energy from being dissipated. However, in spite of the existence of considerable tension the personality can be quite stable as long as an equilibrium of forces is maintained. Stability is also produced by the resolution of conflicts between opposing instinctual forces or their derivatives."
Broch (Pathwork “Guide”) – "Physical health and well-being is totally regulated by and dependent on the state of pleasure a human body is capable of allowing. Health and longevity are the results of the capacity for pleasure. Conversely, to the degree you deny yourself pleasure – due to shames, fears, misconceptions, negativity – to that degree you cut off your body from the wellspring of the universal flow. Any kind of physical illness or deterioration, therefore, also physical death, as it were, is a manifestation of division, conflict and denial of pleasure."
Candice Pert ("Molecules of Emotion") – "Health is not just a matter of thinking happy thoughts. Sometimes the biggest impetus to healing can come from jump-starting the immune system with a burst of long-suppressed anger. How and where it’s expressed is up to you – in a room by yourself, in a group therapy situation which can facilitate the expression of long-buried feelings, or in a spontaneous exchange with a family member or friend. The key is to express it and then let it go, so that it doesn’t fester, or build or escalate out of control.
Emotions are what unite the mind and the body. Anger, fear and sadness, the so-called negative emotions, are as healthy as peace, courage and joy. All honest emotions are healthy emotions. To repress these emotions and not let them flow freely is to set up a dis-integrity in the system, causing it to act at cross-purposes rather than as a unified whole. The stress this creates, which takes the form of blockages and insufficient flow of peptide signals to maintain function at the cellular level, is what sets up the weakened conditions that can lead to a disease."
John Pierrakos – "In the totally healthy organism, energy flowing into and out of the person could move freely as circumstances permit, in something of the way that a rose gives off perfume and takes in sunlight through its petals. Integration and creativity require freedom of movement from the innermost reaches of the unconscious to the outermost perimeters of consciousness. The uniqueness of each person comes from the form of his or her individuation from the universal life principle. The person’s fundamental identity, therefore, is shaped by the purposeful movement of the energy of the core.
Illness is a process, or rather an interruption of the life process, that penetrates the entire person because the flow of living energy in the organism is integral to the organism. Armoring anywhere affects the entire organism. Vital force cannot stop moving; thus, when it meets a barrier, it must circumvent this or back up in the opposite direction."
Jane Roberts (“Seth”) – “Your health is an extension of your creativity. Your body is an artistic creation, formed and constantly maintained at unconscious levels, but quite in line with your beliefs about what and who you are. The miraculous constant translation of spirit into flesh is carried on with inexhaustible energy by the inner portions of being, but in all cases the inner self looks to the conscious mind for its assessment of the body’s condition and reality, and forms the image in line with the conscious mind’s beliefs. So - once more - you form reality through your beliefs, and your most intimate production is your physical body. You organize on an unconscious level the atoms and molecules that compose your cells to form your body. But the blueprint is made by your conscious beliefs. You constantly give yourself suggestions about your body, your health or ill health. (For example, many individuals are given glasses to correct an eye difficulty at an early age. When you believe that only glasses will correct poor vision, then only glasses will. Left alone, in many cases, the eyes would correct themselves. The glasses can impede any such self-correction by providing a crutch that further weakens eye muscles. Instead, you must discover the reason for the belief behind the physical non-function, and if this is done the condition will automatically clear up. Now, for most people it is easier to get glasses!)
You think about your body often. You send a barrage of beliefs and instructions to the inner self that affect your physical image. To change your body, you change your beliefs, even in the face of physical data or evidence that conflicts. Now thoughts in general possess an electromagnetic reality, but whether you know it or not, they also have an inner sound value, the sound of your thoughts within your own head. Inner sounds have an even greater effect than exterior ones upon your body. They affect the atoms and molecules that compose your cells. In many respects it is true to say that you speak to your body, but the speaking is interior. The sound is formed by your intent. Suggestions, repeated often enough and believed in fervently, take on a deeply habitual nature. They are no longer examined, but taken for literal truth. They are then handed over to the more automatic levels of personality, where they may trigger specific actions. These suggestions may be remarkably long-standing, and consist of beliefs received in childhood.
You were not given a certain amount of “life force” at birth that you use up as you go along, contrary to many schools of thought. The atoms and molecules within you are quite literally dying and being completely replaced all the time. You are being created physically in each instant. A sick body is performing that function then, in its way, as well as healthy one. [The body] is a mirror of [your] beliefs, and will accurately materialize in flesh those ideas held by the conscious mind. That is one of the body’s primary functions. It is your most intimate feedback system, giving you in flesh the physical counterpart of your thought. So it is futile to become angry at a symptom, or to deride the body for its condition when it is presenting you with the corporeal replica of your own thought, as it was meant to do. It is just as useless to berate your environment or your experience in it as it is to deride your body, for the same reasons.
Your ideas of good and evil as applied to health and illness are highly important, for instance. If you are bound and determined that “GOD” creates only “good”, then any physical deficiency, illness or deformity becomes an affront to your belief, threatens it, and makes you angry and resentful. If you become ill you can hate yourself for not being what you think you should be - a perfect physical image made in the likeness of a perfect God. If on the other hand you carry the idea too far that illness can also be a learning process, then you can fall into the other extreme, glorifying sickness or disease as a necessary ennobling experience in which the body is purged so that the soul can be saved. Following such a belief, you will confuse suffering with saintliness, desolation with purity. Under such conditions you can even seek out illness to prove to yourself the strength of your own spirituality - and to impress it upon others.
There are people who firmly believe that the pursuit of pleasure will lead to pain, and others whose beliefs cause them to feel very uncomfortable when they are in states of health. For these individuals, poor health brings a sense of security and safety. Some individuals become anxious and worried if they think they are too happy, for to them it means that they are not paying sufficiently for their sins. Quite ordinary people often believe that suffering itself is a way toward personal development and spiritual knowledge. In matters of health, such beliefs can have most unfortunate results.
Another attitude detrimental to good health is that of self-condemnation, or dislike of the self. A feeling of self-approval is absolutely necessary for any true sense of well-being. It is not virtuous in any way to put yourself down, or to punish yourself, because you do not feel you have lived up to your best behavior at any given time. All creatures are basically of good intent; even when they commit the most dubious of acts, these are usually caused by misdirected good intent.
Worrying about future events, or dwelling upon past unfavorable situations, only confuses the body’s mechanisms because the physical body can only react in the present moment. [Also], while it may seem natural enough to consider disease as a threat, an adversary or an enemy, this is not the case. Many body events that you think of as negative – certain viruses, for example – are instead meant as self-corrective devices, even as fever actually promotes health rather than impedes it. You are not attacked by viruses, nor do you catch a virus, for all kinds of viruses exist normally in the body. There are no killer viruses, but certain feelings and beliefs can promote an exaggeration of viral activity beyond their usual bounds.
There is no such thing, basically, as a disease. There are instead only processes. So-called states of health and disease are changing constantly, and in vaster terms, disease in itself is a kind of health. Diseases can be eliminated, even those that seem fatal – but only if the beliefs behind them are erased or altered enough so that their specific focusing effect upon the body is sufficiently released. If you shed the distorted concepts of unnatural guilt and accepted the wise ancient wisdom of natural guilt instead. You would understand the living integrity of each organ in your body and have no need to attack any of them.
This obviously does not mean that the time of the body’s death would not come. It does mean that the seasons of the body would be understood as following those of the mind, ever-changing and flowing, with conditions coming and going but always maintaining the splendid unity within the body’s form. You would not have chronic illnesses. Generally speaking, and ideally, the body would wear out gradually while still showing far greater endurance than it does now.
For adults, ideas of health and illness are intimately connected with philosophical, religious and social beliefs, and even more entangled with science’s views of life in general. Children, however, are far more innocent, and though they respond to the ideas of their parents, still their minds are open and filled with curiosity, and they still possess a feeling of oneness with the universe, and with all of life, even as they begin to separate themselves at certain levels from life’s wholeness. Seeing themselves as separate and apart from other individuals, they still retain an inner comprehension and a memory of having once experienced a oneness with life as a whole. At that level, even illness is regarded as simply a part of life’s experience, however unpleasant it may be. Children pick up their first ideas about health and disease from parents and doctors, and by the reactions of those people to their own discomfort.
Children may be quite conscious of the fact that they will themselves to become ill (i.e. - in order to avoid school or a family event). They soon learn that such self-knowledge is not acceptable, however, so they begin to pretend ignorance, quickly learning to tell themselves instead that they have a bug or a virus, or have caught a cold, seemingly for no reason at all. Parents who are aware of this fact can start helping their children at an early age by asking them simply the reasons for their illness. Again, the reasons for such behavior are often quite clear in the child’s mind."
Psychiatric Dictionary – mental health: psychological well-being or adequate adjustment, particularly as such adjustment conforms to the community-accepted standards of human relations. Some characteristics of mental health are reasonable independence, self-reliance, self-direction, ability to do a job, to take responsibility and make needed efforts, reliability, cooperation, ability to work under authority, rules and difficulties, ability to show friendliness and love, to give and take, to have tolerance of others and of frustrations, a sense of humor, a devotion beyond oneself, and an ability to find recreation.
Freud - "In the final analysis, the stabilized personality is one that has achieved, through learning and maturation, a balance or equilibrium between “cathexes” and “anti-cathexes.” The nature of this balance, that is, whether it falls more on the side of fulfillment or more on the side of restraint or somewhere in the middle, is determined by the influences which are brought to bear on the developing personality. By and large, the presence of strong anti-cathexes will increase the tension level of the personality since the anti-cathexes prevent psychic energy from being dissipated. However, in spite of the existence of considerable tension the personality can be quite stable as long as an equilibrium of forces is maintained. Stability is also produced by the resolution of conflicts between opposing instinctual forces or their derivatives."
Broch (Pathwork “Guide”) – "Physical health and well-being is totally regulated by and dependent on the state of pleasure a human body is capable of allowing. Health and longevity are the results of the capacity for pleasure. Conversely, to the degree you deny yourself pleasure – due to shames, fears, misconceptions, negativity – to that degree you cut off your body from the wellspring of the universal flow. Any kind of physical illness or deterioration, therefore, also physical death, as it were, is a manifestation of division, conflict and denial of pleasure."
Candice Pert ("Molecules of Emotion") – "Health is not just a matter of thinking happy thoughts. Sometimes the biggest impetus to healing can come from jump-starting the immune system with a burst of long-suppressed anger. How and where it’s expressed is up to you – in a room by yourself, in a group therapy situation which can facilitate the expression of long-buried feelings, or in a spontaneous exchange with a family member or friend. The key is to express it and then let it go, so that it doesn’t fester, or build or escalate out of control.
Emotions are what unite the mind and the body. Anger, fear and sadness, the so-called negative emotions, are as healthy as peace, courage and joy. All honest emotions are healthy emotions. To repress these emotions and not let them flow freely is to set up a dis-integrity in the system, causing it to act at cross-purposes rather than as a unified whole. The stress this creates, which takes the form of blockages and insufficient flow of peptide signals to maintain function at the cellular level, is what sets up the weakened conditions that can lead to a disease."
John Pierrakos – "In the totally healthy organism, energy flowing into and out of the person could move freely as circumstances permit, in something of the way that a rose gives off perfume and takes in sunlight through its petals. Integration and creativity require freedom of movement from the innermost reaches of the unconscious to the outermost perimeters of consciousness. The uniqueness of each person comes from the form of his or her individuation from the universal life principle. The person’s fundamental identity, therefore, is shaped by the purposeful movement of the energy of the core.
Illness is a process, or rather an interruption of the life process, that penetrates the entire person because the flow of living energy in the organism is integral to the organism. Armoring anywhere affects the entire organism. Vital force cannot stop moving; thus, when it meets a barrier, it must circumvent this or back up in the opposite direction."
Jane Roberts (“Seth”) – “Your health is an extension of your creativity. Your body is an artistic creation, formed and constantly maintained at unconscious levels, but quite in line with your beliefs about what and who you are. The miraculous constant translation of spirit into flesh is carried on with inexhaustible energy by the inner portions of being, but in all cases the inner self looks to the conscious mind for its assessment of the body’s condition and reality, and forms the image in line with the conscious mind’s beliefs. So - once more - you form reality through your beliefs, and your most intimate production is your physical body. You organize on an unconscious level the atoms and molecules that compose your cells to form your body. But the blueprint is made by your conscious beliefs. You constantly give yourself suggestions about your body, your health or ill health. (For example, many individuals are given glasses to correct an eye difficulty at an early age. When you believe that only glasses will correct poor vision, then only glasses will. Left alone, in many cases, the eyes would correct themselves. The glasses can impede any such self-correction by providing a crutch that further weakens eye muscles. Instead, you must discover the reason for the belief behind the physical non-function, and if this is done the condition will automatically clear up. Now, for most people it is easier to get glasses!)
You think about your body often. You send a barrage of beliefs and instructions to the inner self that affect your physical image. To change your body, you change your beliefs, even in the face of physical data or evidence that conflicts. Now thoughts in general possess an electromagnetic reality, but whether you know it or not, they also have an inner sound value, the sound of your thoughts within your own head. Inner sounds have an even greater effect than exterior ones upon your body. They affect the atoms and molecules that compose your cells. In many respects it is true to say that you speak to your body, but the speaking is interior. The sound is formed by your intent. Suggestions, repeated often enough and believed in fervently, take on a deeply habitual nature. They are no longer examined, but taken for literal truth. They are then handed over to the more automatic levels of personality, where they may trigger specific actions. These suggestions may be remarkably long-standing, and consist of beliefs received in childhood.
You were not given a certain amount of “life force” at birth that you use up as you go along, contrary to many schools of thought. The atoms and molecules within you are quite literally dying and being completely replaced all the time. You are being created physically in each instant. A sick body is performing that function then, in its way, as well as healthy one. [The body] is a mirror of [your] beliefs, and will accurately materialize in flesh those ideas held by the conscious mind. That is one of the body’s primary functions. It is your most intimate feedback system, giving you in flesh the physical counterpart of your thought. So it is futile to become angry at a symptom, or to deride the body for its condition when it is presenting you with the corporeal replica of your own thought, as it was meant to do. It is just as useless to berate your environment or your experience in it as it is to deride your body, for the same reasons.
Your ideas of good and evil as applied to health and illness are highly important, for instance. If you are bound and determined that “GOD” creates only “good”, then any physical deficiency, illness or deformity becomes an affront to your belief, threatens it, and makes you angry and resentful. If you become ill you can hate yourself for not being what you think you should be - a perfect physical image made in the likeness of a perfect God. If on the other hand you carry the idea too far that illness can also be a learning process, then you can fall into the other extreme, glorifying sickness or disease as a necessary ennobling experience in which the body is purged so that the soul can be saved. Following such a belief, you will confuse suffering with saintliness, desolation with purity. Under such conditions you can even seek out illness to prove to yourself the strength of your own spirituality - and to impress it upon others.
There are people who firmly believe that the pursuit of pleasure will lead to pain, and others whose beliefs cause them to feel very uncomfortable when they are in states of health. For these individuals, poor health brings a sense of security and safety. Some individuals become anxious and worried if they think they are too happy, for to them it means that they are not paying sufficiently for their sins. Quite ordinary people often believe that suffering itself is a way toward personal development and spiritual knowledge. In matters of health, such beliefs can have most unfortunate results.
Another attitude detrimental to good health is that of self-condemnation, or dislike of the self. A feeling of self-approval is absolutely necessary for any true sense of well-being. It is not virtuous in any way to put yourself down, or to punish yourself, because you do not feel you have lived up to your best behavior at any given time. All creatures are basically of good intent; even when they commit the most dubious of acts, these are usually caused by misdirected good intent.
Worrying about future events, or dwelling upon past unfavorable situations, only confuses the body’s mechanisms because the physical body can only react in the present moment. [Also], while it may seem natural enough to consider disease as a threat, an adversary or an enemy, this is not the case. Many body events that you think of as negative – certain viruses, for example – are instead meant as self-corrective devices, even as fever actually promotes health rather than impedes it. You are not attacked by viruses, nor do you catch a virus, for all kinds of viruses exist normally in the body. There are no killer viruses, but certain feelings and beliefs can promote an exaggeration of viral activity beyond their usual bounds.
There is no such thing, basically, as a disease. There are instead only processes. So-called states of health and disease are changing constantly, and in vaster terms, disease in itself is a kind of health. Diseases can be eliminated, even those that seem fatal – but only if the beliefs behind them are erased or altered enough so that their specific focusing effect upon the body is sufficiently released. If you shed the distorted concepts of unnatural guilt and accepted the wise ancient wisdom of natural guilt instead. You would understand the living integrity of each organ in your body and have no need to attack any of them.
This obviously does not mean that the time of the body’s death would not come. It does mean that the seasons of the body would be understood as following those of the mind, ever-changing and flowing, with conditions coming and going but always maintaining the splendid unity within the body’s form. You would not have chronic illnesses. Generally speaking, and ideally, the body would wear out gradually while still showing far greater endurance than it does now.
For adults, ideas of health and illness are intimately connected with philosophical, religious and social beliefs, and even more entangled with science’s views of life in general. Children, however, are far more innocent, and though they respond to the ideas of their parents, still their minds are open and filled with curiosity, and they still possess a feeling of oneness with the universe, and with all of life, even as they begin to separate themselves at certain levels from life’s wholeness. Seeing themselves as separate and apart from other individuals, they still retain an inner comprehension and a memory of having once experienced a oneness with life as a whole. At that level, even illness is regarded as simply a part of life’s experience, however unpleasant it may be. Children pick up their first ideas about health and disease from parents and doctors, and by the reactions of those people to their own discomfort.
Children may be quite conscious of the fact that they will themselves to become ill (i.e. - in order to avoid school or a family event). They soon learn that such self-knowledge is not acceptable, however, so they begin to pretend ignorance, quickly learning to tell themselves instead that they have a bug or a virus, or have caught a cold, seemingly for no reason at all. Parents who are aware of this fact can start helping their children at an early age by asking them simply the reasons for their illness. Again, the reasons for such behavior are often quite clear in the child’s mind."
AN ACTING COACH ON JINDAL VERSUS OBAMA - GOOD ONE!
VERY INTERESTING ASSESSMENT of sincerity versus falseness in a speaker by Howard Fine, acting coach.
Here's Howard:
"I would like to examine from my perspective as an acting coach, the reason Bobby Jindal's speech did not work. I have heard a great many theories espoused and none of them actually addresses the root of what made him seem so inauthentic in his prepared remarks and why he comes off better in live interviews. It comes down to the difference between "How and Why."
In life we have thoughts and feelings and then we find the words to express those thoughts and feelings. It is a straight line. In acting as in public speaking, we start with the words. What should the great actor and the great orator do? They should find the thoughts feelings that make them need to say these words. In short they should find The Why.
What is a common mistake? It is focusing on The How. The actor or orator in this case is thinking about How to make the speech effective. If you supply the Why, The How takes care of itself. What Jindal did is focus on How he wanted to come across. In acting I call this a General Attitudinal Choice. He thought of the effect he wanted to have on the audience. He wanted to come across as likable and friendly. He wanted the audience to think that he is a good guy, so he adopted a general demeanor of kind and empathetic. This is why he came off as condescending. No matter what he talked about the the pose was the same. He was trying to project his idea of a warm and friendly guy. Therefore he came off as patronizing.
Chances are that he didn't write the speech. He needed to find a way of making the words come from him. In order to do this he would have had to contact sources within his own life experiences and opinions that are in agreement with what he was saying. His feelings and expressions needed to travel freely. Instead he locked himself into a false demeanor.
Obama is effective because he is in the moment. He is helped by the fact that he is a writer. Chances are that he wrote some of his address to the joint session of Congress. In any case, Obama connects his real feelings to what he is saying. He therefore comes across as the real deal."
Here's Howard:
"I would like to examine from my perspective as an acting coach, the reason Bobby Jindal's speech did not work. I have heard a great many theories espoused and none of them actually addresses the root of what made him seem so inauthentic in his prepared remarks and why he comes off better in live interviews. It comes down to the difference between "How and Why."
In life we have thoughts and feelings and then we find the words to express those thoughts and feelings. It is a straight line. In acting as in public speaking, we start with the words. What should the great actor and the great orator do? They should find the thoughts feelings that make them need to say these words. In short they should find The Why.
What is a common mistake? It is focusing on The How. The actor or orator in this case is thinking about How to make the speech effective. If you supply the Why, The How takes care of itself. What Jindal did is focus on How he wanted to come across. In acting I call this a General Attitudinal Choice. He thought of the effect he wanted to have on the audience. He wanted to come across as likable and friendly. He wanted the audience to think that he is a good guy, so he adopted a general demeanor of kind and empathetic. This is why he came off as condescending. No matter what he talked about the the pose was the same. He was trying to project his idea of a warm and friendly guy. Therefore he came off as patronizing.
Chances are that he didn't write the speech. He needed to find a way of making the words come from him. In order to do this he would have had to contact sources within his own life experiences and opinions that are in agreement with what he was saying. His feelings and expressions needed to travel freely. Instead he locked himself into a false demeanor.
Obama is effective because he is in the moment. He is helped by the fact that he is a writer. Chances are that he wrote some of his address to the joint session of Congress. In any case, Obama connects his real feelings to what he is saying. He therefore comes across as the real deal."
PENTAGON TO ALLOW PHOTOS OF RETURNING WAR DEAD
THANK YOU. THANK YOU. THANK YOU! For treating us like adults once again.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/26/pentagon-to-allow-photos-_n_170250.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/26/pentagon-to-allow-photos-_n_170250.html
LOFF56 on "DADLOFF ON OBAMA'S SPEECH LAST NIGHT"
I'd like to use this opportunity to explain to Dadloff and many other long time GOP supporters exactly how this works. I've heard this question over and over again, "How are we going to pay for all this spending?" It's as if they believe that the $787 Billion is being shoveled directly into a furnace to vanish in smoke and ash forever.
Here's how it works: Money gets spent on projects, (really anything at all), but let's say for arguments sake we're talking about building a bridge. The government hires a contractor to build that bridge. That contractor in turn hires sub-contractors who in turn hires workers in all sorts of industries to build that bridge. We're talking, architects, engineers, steel workers, electricians, pavement crews, sign makers, you name it, the list goes on and on. Thousands of people. All of those thousands of people are paid a salary. In turn that salary is subject to income taxes, so right off the bat, the government directly gets back anywhere from 15 to 30 percent of what they just spent! Now, the workers walk away with the other 85-70 percent. So what do they do with that money? Put it under a mattress? No, they spend it. They spend it on housing, food, clothing, electronics, health care, entertainment, a college education etc... Most of which is subject to some sort of tax. Sales tax, property tax etc... More money back to the Government. In addition there's a growth in demand for those very products that those bridge employees can now afford to buy. So the companies making those products see growth and growth = more hiring. And again, more employees = more tax revenue, and the cycle continues. Before you know it, the money the government spent on that bridge comes back to the government and then some. (Despite the likely prospect that somewhere along the line, some contractor might skim a little off the top, or some of that money may get mismanaged. It's an unfortunate bi-product of spending like this, but even if 80% of the money is put into this system the government will still get it's money back and then some.)
On the other hand trickle down economics advocates tax cuts (the more the better), little or no spending and very little oversight so that the rich people who now have all that money can go ahead and spend their money at will on our economy. Here's the problem, we've been doing that for the past 8 years and all we have to show for it is a stock market that got bloated selling paper possibilities, a crumbling infrastructure, health care system, etc. etc. etc. and unemployment that's higher than it's been in decades. Why? BECAUSE RICH PEOPLE DON'T SPEND MONEY ON BRIDGES!!! It's a simple fact of human nature, power and greed breeds more power and greed. All those people that were the beneficiary of Bush's tax cuts spent that money inflating the stock market so that they could turn their 1 million dollars into 2 million dollars. There's very little tax revenue the government can make on that transaction. Those tax cuts actually cost a lot of money which the government doesn't get back. But maybe someone can show me how we can get everybody who gets a tax cut to use that tax cut to build a bridge.
The answer to the question at hand is this: Obama's plan will pay for itself. That's why it's an "investment". And not an investment in the stock market sense but an investment in the industry sense. A business buys a new piece of machinery, in turn they make more product which increases their TOP line. (That's the revenue line.) More Investment = More Revenue!!!
I would suggest that everybody go to www.recovery.gov and actually read the bill. The whole thing is up there for anyone to read. The investments that the bill makes is quite comprehensive. Just the incentives and money for alternative energy alone is really phenomenal. It could perhaps help in giving our country a leg up on this industry so that maybe our scientists and engineers will create products that will revolutionize the energy production. Imagine foreign countries once again turning to us for our innovative solutions. Talk about revenue.
But, hey, Perhaps I've got it wrong. Maybe the wealthy execs at Mobil would be willing to invest their tax cuts on wind energy. ??
I do have to agree with Dadloff on one thing though. Term limits. I actually believe that the president should be limited to one 6 year term. This would give them enough time to do what they would like to do, but would also prevent them from spending the whole of their first term campaigning for their second term. And congress needs to be limited too. Maybe 2 three year terms or something.
Anyway, I hope this clears up the confusion. I'd hate for all my GOP friends to keep thinking that their tax money is being sent to another galaxy on a rocket ship.
Here's how it works: Money gets spent on projects, (really anything at all), but let's say for arguments sake we're talking about building a bridge. The government hires a contractor to build that bridge. That contractor in turn hires sub-contractors who in turn hires workers in all sorts of industries to build that bridge. We're talking, architects, engineers, steel workers, electricians, pavement crews, sign makers, you name it, the list goes on and on. Thousands of people. All of those thousands of people are paid a salary. In turn that salary is subject to income taxes, so right off the bat, the government directly gets back anywhere from 15 to 30 percent of what they just spent! Now, the workers walk away with the other 85-70 percent. So what do they do with that money? Put it under a mattress? No, they spend it. They spend it on housing, food, clothing, electronics, health care, entertainment, a college education etc... Most of which is subject to some sort of tax. Sales tax, property tax etc... More money back to the Government. In addition there's a growth in demand for those very products that those bridge employees can now afford to buy. So the companies making those products see growth and growth = more hiring. And again, more employees = more tax revenue, and the cycle continues. Before you know it, the money the government spent on that bridge comes back to the government and then some. (Despite the likely prospect that somewhere along the line, some contractor might skim a little off the top, or some of that money may get mismanaged. It's an unfortunate bi-product of spending like this, but even if 80% of the money is put into this system the government will still get it's money back and then some.)
On the other hand trickle down economics advocates tax cuts (the more the better), little or no spending and very little oversight so that the rich people who now have all that money can go ahead and spend their money at will on our economy. Here's the problem, we've been doing that for the past 8 years and all we have to show for it is a stock market that got bloated selling paper possibilities, a crumbling infrastructure, health care system, etc. etc. etc. and unemployment that's higher than it's been in decades. Why? BECAUSE RICH PEOPLE DON'T SPEND MONEY ON BRIDGES!!! It's a simple fact of human nature, power and greed breeds more power and greed. All those people that were the beneficiary of Bush's tax cuts spent that money inflating the stock market so that they could turn their 1 million dollars into 2 million dollars. There's very little tax revenue the government can make on that transaction. Those tax cuts actually cost a lot of money which the government doesn't get back. But maybe someone can show me how we can get everybody who gets a tax cut to use that tax cut to build a bridge.
The answer to the question at hand is this: Obama's plan will pay for itself. That's why it's an "investment". And not an investment in the stock market sense but an investment in the industry sense. A business buys a new piece of machinery, in turn they make more product which increases their TOP line. (That's the revenue line.) More Investment = More Revenue!!!
I would suggest that everybody go to www.recovery.gov and actually read the bill. The whole thing is up there for anyone to read. The investments that the bill makes is quite comprehensive. Just the incentives and money for alternative energy alone is really phenomenal. It could perhaps help in giving our country a leg up on this industry so that maybe our scientists and engineers will create products that will revolutionize the energy production. Imagine foreign countries once again turning to us for our innovative solutions. Talk about revenue.
But, hey, Perhaps I've got it wrong. Maybe the wealthy execs at Mobil would be willing to invest their tax cuts on wind energy. ??
I do have to agree with Dadloff on one thing though. Term limits. I actually believe that the president should be limited to one 6 year term. This would give them enough time to do what they would like to do, but would also prevent them from spending the whole of their first term campaigning for their second term. And congress needs to be limited too. Maybe 2 three year terms or something.
Anyway, I hope this clears up the confusion. I'd hate for all my GOP friends to keep thinking that their tax money is being sent to another galaxy on a rocket ship.
PL RESPONDS TO DADLOFF ON OBAMA'S SPEECH, ETC.
Here's the thing, DL, I, too, have long felt that politicians have been so flawed during most of my adult lifetime that I have chosen to focus exclusively on facilitating positive change in the world one person at a time through the work that I do. But in Barack Obama, I see something different. I see someone who understands that leadership isn't about power for power's sake, not "power over," but "power for." And I see that he gets that rigid ideology is a crutch for the limited minds of the world. Finally, like all true leaders, he knows that his role is to inspire more leaders, not to inspire more followers.
DADLOFF ON OBAMA'S SPEECH LAST NIGHT
Dadloff's reaction to Obama's speech last night:
"Do you really believe that Obama can live up to all he was saying last night? If you think the republicans put us in debt, what in the world do you think all his proposed spending and tax cuts and giveaways will do to the national debt and also to us, who do pay our share of taxes? You say you are neither gop or dem, but are for the man and his ideas? Has he explained to you exactly how he is going to pay for all these things or where all the money is coming from? I suppose the government could just print more as it always does. Doesn't matter if they are gop or dem, they are all the same to me. Once they get into office they do the same old same old, all the promises fall by the wayside. I don't think I have seen a honest politician in my lifetime. Perhaps it is time to get rid of all congressmen, governors, mayors, etc. and elect all new people with term limits so that maybe we can get people to do the right things for this country, rather then spending a lot of their time and other peoples money try to get re-elected and not spending enough time and effort working for us and not the people who give them lots and lots of money to get elected. These are my words and thoughts. I am tired of all these promises and lies. I want to see things get done the way they are supposed to.
"Do you really believe that Obama can live up to all he was saying last night? If you think the republicans put us in debt, what in the world do you think all his proposed spending and tax cuts and giveaways will do to the national debt and also to us, who do pay our share of taxes? You say you are neither gop or dem, but are for the man and his ideas? Has he explained to you exactly how he is going to pay for all these things or where all the money is coming from? I suppose the government could just print more as it always does. Doesn't matter if they are gop or dem, they are all the same to me. Once they get into office they do the same old same old, all the promises fall by the wayside. I don't think I have seen a honest politician in my lifetime. Perhaps it is time to get rid of all congressmen, governors, mayors, etc. and elect all new people with term limits so that maybe we can get people to do the right things for this country, rather then spending a lot of their time and other peoples money try to get re-elected and not spending enough time and effort working for us and not the people who give them lots and lots of money to get elected. These are my words and thoughts. I am tired of all these promises and lies. I want to see things get done the way they are supposed to.
DRUNK DRIVER KILLS COMMACK COP!
COMMACK, Long Island (WABC) -- A veteran police officer, 45-year-old Glen Ciano, a father of two, on the Suffolk County force for 22 years, was responding to a call when a drunk driver slammed into his patrol car.
Ciano is dead.
Why?
What is a drunk driver? Ask yourself. Do you drive a car? Have you ever gotten drunk, or even tipsy? Probably. Would you do both at the same time? More than once? If so, your problem isn't alcohol; your problem is that you are ruled by destructive and self-destructive masochistic impulses that must finally end in an explosion of acting out.
It is not more tragic that the victim here was a policeman. But it is very telling. When you refuse to see the destructive path you are on, your inner GPS, your Higher Self, will make sure that before you check out, you get the message that your denials about your life are exactly that.
When I was a teenager, I got my father to give me his car one snowy night so I could supposedly go to a required religious ed class, which made driving at night legal for a 16 year old. I had no intention of going to that class, but was on my way to meet my friends instead, cool in my big wheels. I wasn't drinking, but I was deep into my masochism, so I slid down a snowy hill and plowed that car right into the car of our family's INSURANCE MAN!
You see, every masochist, just like every psychopath and criminal, wants to get caught finally. The question is, how high will the ante have to go up before it happens? In this case, the final bet was a life.
I was lucky, or maybe willing to see what I was doing ultimately. But the Universe is ruthless in getting us to see what we came here to see.
Think about it.
Ciano is dead.
Why?
What is a drunk driver? Ask yourself. Do you drive a car? Have you ever gotten drunk, or even tipsy? Probably. Would you do both at the same time? More than once? If so, your problem isn't alcohol; your problem is that you are ruled by destructive and self-destructive masochistic impulses that must finally end in an explosion of acting out.
It is not more tragic that the victim here was a policeman. But it is very telling. When you refuse to see the destructive path you are on, your inner GPS, your Higher Self, will make sure that before you check out, you get the message that your denials about your life are exactly that.
When I was a teenager, I got my father to give me his car one snowy night so I could supposedly go to a required religious ed class, which made driving at night legal for a 16 year old. I had no intention of going to that class, but was on my way to meet my friends instead, cool in my big wheels. I wasn't drinking, but I was deep into my masochism, so I slid down a snowy hill and plowed that car right into the car of our family's INSURANCE MAN!
You see, every masochist, just like every psychopath and criminal, wants to get caught finally. The question is, how high will the ante have to go up before it happens? In this case, the final bet was a life.
I was lucky, or maybe willing to see what I was doing ultimately. But the Universe is ruthless in getting us to see what we came here to see.
Think about it.
DUMB MONEY!
CHECK THIS OUT - This is an interesting perspective by Daniel Gross because it puts forth the proposition that it wasn't primarily sleazy psychopaths who screwed up the economy, but rather intellectual heavy weights who were acting stupid. I like this idea because a fact of character structure reality is that intellectualization is a defense mechanism, not a measure of true intelligence, so apparently smart people can often be found to be engaged in very dumb behavior.
Here's Daniel:
"Dumb Money: The villains of the financial catastrophe aren't criminals. They're morons."
By Daniel Gross
Feb. 23, 2009
"My book explains how during the late, great credit bubble, an Era of Cheap Money devolved into an Era of Dumb Money, and then into an Era of Dumber Money.
In the past few months, we've been riveted and disgusted by the exploits of scamsters like Bernard Madoff and Allen Stanford (characters who, if they didn't exist, would have to be invented by Tom Wolfe). It's both easy and convenient to hold them up as the ultimate symbols of the just-ended boom. But we shouldn't. While there was some crime in the mortgage industry, law-abiding, respectable, upstanding citizens caused the overwhelming majority of financial losses suffered thus far. Skeezy money managers and mobbed-up boiler rooms didn't create the economic catastrophe. It was visited on us by firms in the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500—companies that trace their origins back to the 1800s, run by graduates of Yale and Harvard. The people who blew up the system weren't anarchists. They were members of the club: central bankers and private-equity honchos, hedge-fund geniuses and Ph.D. economists, CEOs and investment bankers. And the (overwhelmingly legal) con they perpetuated on themselves, their colleagues, their shareholders and creditors, and, ultimately, on us taxpayers makes Madoff's sins look like child's play."
Here's Daniel:
"Dumb Money: The villains of the financial catastrophe aren't criminals. They're morons."
By Daniel Gross
Feb. 23, 2009
"My book explains how during the late, great credit bubble, an Era of Cheap Money devolved into an Era of Dumb Money, and then into an Era of Dumber Money.
In the past few months, we've been riveted and disgusted by the exploits of scamsters like Bernard Madoff and Allen Stanford (characters who, if they didn't exist, would have to be invented by Tom Wolfe). It's both easy and convenient to hold them up as the ultimate symbols of the just-ended boom. But we shouldn't. While there was some crime in the mortgage industry, law-abiding, respectable, upstanding citizens caused the overwhelming majority of financial losses suffered thus far. Skeezy money managers and mobbed-up boiler rooms didn't create the economic catastrophe. It was visited on us by firms in the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500—companies that trace their origins back to the 1800s, run by graduates of Yale and Harvard. The people who blew up the system weren't anarchists. They were members of the club: central bankers and private-equity honchos, hedge-fund geniuses and Ph.D. economists, CEOs and investment bankers. And the (overwhelmingly legal) con they perpetuated on themselves, their colleagues, their shareholders and creditors, and, ultimately, on us taxpayers makes Madoff's sins look like child's play."
GOOD-BYE YELLOW BRICK ROAD!
This is by Jeff Zeleny of the NY Times:
"President Obama is benefiting from remarkably high levels of optimism and confidence among Americans about his leadership, and a job approval rating of 63 percent, providing him with substantial political clout as he confronts the nation’s economic challenges and opposition from nearly all Republicans in Congress, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll."
This is by Jacob Heilbrunn on the Huffington Post:
"When Obama delivers the State of the Union address Tuesday, he will wield the one of the most powerful hands history has ever bestowed upon an American president. Obama will undoubtedly seize the opportunity to sketch out his program for American renewal, both in domestic and foreign policy. His speech, I predict, will not only be seen as a pivotal moment in restoring American democracy, but also an epitaph for the conservative movement that has finally run American into the ground."
This is from Senator Richard Shelby in Washington yesterday:
"Well, his father was Kenyan and they said he was born in Hawaii, but I haven't seen any birth certificate," Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., told constituents in Cullman County. "You have to be born in America to be president."
Hmmm...
SEE YA! WOULDN'T WANNA BE YA!
"President Obama is benefiting from remarkably high levels of optimism and confidence among Americans about his leadership, and a job approval rating of 63 percent, providing him with substantial political clout as he confronts the nation’s economic challenges and opposition from nearly all Republicans in Congress, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll."
This is by Jacob Heilbrunn on the Huffington Post:
"When Obama delivers the State of the Union address Tuesday, he will wield the one of the most powerful hands history has ever bestowed upon an American president. Obama will undoubtedly seize the opportunity to sketch out his program for American renewal, both in domestic and foreign policy. His speech, I predict, will not only be seen as a pivotal moment in restoring American democracy, but also an epitaph for the conservative movement that has finally run American into the ground."
This is from Senator Richard Shelby in Washington yesterday:
"Well, his father was Kenyan and they said he was born in Hawaii, but I haven't seen any birth certificate," Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., told constituents in Cullman County. "You have to be born in America to be president."
Hmmm...
SEE YA! WOULDN'T WANNA BE YA!
FEAR OF THE OTHER IS ALL THAT MOTIVATES THE EXTREMISTS!
I am going to say something brutally honest, radically direct and certainly provocative, but that's what I am compelled to do at times.
Here I go:
The primary motivation of what remains of the Republican Party and the right wing fringe in this country is no different than what drives all fundamentalist groups throughout the world - FEAR. Specifically, fear of the Other. The driving mania behind a ludicrous economic philosophy that presumes that welfare and socialism for the wealthy is good for the country, while the same for working class citizens is destructive is rooted in a primal terror - of all races other than one's own, of femininity in general, and sensuality overall, of the young and elderly, of artists, of truly spiritual people and of any whose overt sexual orientation is other than heterosexual.
Who does that leave, obviously? Pseudo religious, pseudo-straight fanatics between the ages of 35 and 65, lacking in any real depths of sensuality, artistic sensibilities or true spirituality, latently riddled with castration anxiety and misogyny, who are full of paranoid rage and the hormonal balance of a pubescent boy.
Oh... and Ann Coulter.
Here I go:
The primary motivation of what remains of the Republican Party and the right wing fringe in this country is no different than what drives all fundamentalist groups throughout the world - FEAR. Specifically, fear of the Other. The driving mania behind a ludicrous economic philosophy that presumes that welfare and socialism for the wealthy is good for the country, while the same for working class citizens is destructive is rooted in a primal terror - of all races other than one's own, of femininity in general, and sensuality overall, of the young and elderly, of artists, of truly spiritual people and of any whose overt sexual orientation is other than heterosexual.
Who does that leave, obviously? Pseudo religious, pseudo-straight fanatics between the ages of 35 and 65, lacking in any real depths of sensuality, artistic sensibilities or true spirituality, latently riddled with castration anxiety and misogyny, who are full of paranoid rage and the hormonal balance of a pubescent boy.
Oh... and Ann Coulter.
KEEPING LOVE AND PLEASURE ALIVE
Paul Newman's quote below, from an Oscar night memorial, says so much. I have often said that the difference between people is that some are working on themselves and some are not. Paul's quote tells us what the results of working on ourselves leads to.
Pleasure and love are the essence of life, and if you do the work necessary to clear away the baggage and debris accumulated over any number of years of living within the confines of a character structure, you arrive to pleasure and love.
To have seen Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward from a distance over the years was to see two people who've apparently kept pleasure and love alive in their lives. Their relationship has always been an inspiration to me.
Pleasure and love are the essence of life, and if you do the work necessary to clear away the baggage and debris accumulated over any number of years of living within the confines of a character structure, you arrive to pleasure and love.
To have seen Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward from a distance over the years was to see two people who've apparently kept pleasure and love alive in their lives. Their relationship has always been an inspiration to me.
BEST OSCAR QUOTE EVER!
"The biggest of all differences between people is between those who have had pleasure and love and those who haven't."
Paul Newman
Paul Newman
Today's Oscar Night Quote
"The instinct that pulls us toward art is the impulse to evolve, to learn, to heighten and elevate our consciousness. The Ego hates this. Because the more awake we become, the less we need the Ego."
Steven Pressfield
Steven Pressfield
THE PROFIT MOTIVE FROM THE PSYCHOPATHIC PERSPECTIVE!
I've got a great idea! I want to make a lottalottalottalottalotta money. I've got a product to sell, a product not unique to me, but my brand - let's call it a "Chevy" - if I can sell a lot of Chevy's, and make a profit on each one, I can become rich.
Cool! Let's call this system of making a profit "capitalism."
Now, I could make said profit by making my Chevy's really reliable, efficient and high caliber performance-wise, and sell them at reasonable prices, let's say 10 percent above what it cost to make it and sell it, and then as my brand becomes popular, voila! I would make sure, of course, that the workers making the Chevy's for me were satisfied in their jobs, both financially and in terms of working conditions, so they would give me their best effort at reasonable wages.
OR... I could make less reliable, less efficient, lower caliber Chevy's that mostly just look good, keep the prices regularly going up anyway, but get consumers to buy my Chevy's by using really slick, subliminal advertising campaigns that makes them think that buying my product over someone else's will enhance their social status and gratify their fantasy life. Of course, to really maximize profit, instead of hiring American workers at livable wages, I can hire Third World workers not so used to livable wages, and pay them not so livable wages. I can also use the threat of those Third World workers to get the workers in the U.S. to swallow lower standards of living, as well. Man, I'm really getting rich, now! And if I can get tax breaks and deregulation from people in government by shoveling money into their campaigns or by slipping goodies to them under the table, and I can get other big car manufacturers to keep prices high and wages low, too... man, I'm getting super rich!
Now, that's what I call capitalism!
Cool! Let's call this system of making a profit "capitalism."
Now, I could make said profit by making my Chevy's really reliable, efficient and high caliber performance-wise, and sell them at reasonable prices, let's say 10 percent above what it cost to make it and sell it, and then as my brand becomes popular, voila! I would make sure, of course, that the workers making the Chevy's for me were satisfied in their jobs, both financially and in terms of working conditions, so they would give me their best effort at reasonable wages.
OR... I could make less reliable, less efficient, lower caliber Chevy's that mostly just look good, keep the prices regularly going up anyway, but get consumers to buy my Chevy's by using really slick, subliminal advertising campaigns that makes them think that buying my product over someone else's will enhance their social status and gratify their fantasy life. Of course, to really maximize profit, instead of hiring American workers at livable wages, I can hire Third World workers not so used to livable wages, and pay them not so livable wages. I can also use the threat of those Third World workers to get the workers in the U.S. to swallow lower standards of living, as well. Man, I'm really getting rich, now! And if I can get tax breaks and deregulation from people in government by shoveling money into their campaigns or by slipping goodies to them under the table, and I can get other big car manufacturers to keep prices high and wages low, too... man, I'm getting super rich!
Now, that's what I call capitalism!
A NOTE TO MORNING JOE
I posted this note to Joe Scarborough who now has a column on the Huffington Post called "THE LOYAL OPPOSITION."
Joe, as you say of yourself: "Make no mistake of it. I am a proud conservative."
What is hard for you to realize, apparently, is that there can be no other kind of conservative these days. Conservativism was supposed to be a philosophy, not a team sport of some sort. The problem with being "proud" is that it prevents you from being truly open-minded. When you say, proudly, that you have liberals and democrats on your show, you sound like the guy who touts the fact that he has gay or black "friends" to prove that he's not homophobic or racist.
Being truly open-minded means being pragmatic, not political, objective, not dogmatic, humble, not proud.
I have watched your show, Joe. You're certainly not evil, and any vitriol coming at you is repulsive, of course, but you certainly do protest a bit too much about how even-handed you are, don't you think?
Joe, as you say of yourself: "Make no mistake of it. I am a proud conservative."
What is hard for you to realize, apparently, is that there can be no other kind of conservative these days. Conservativism was supposed to be a philosophy, not a team sport of some sort. The problem with being "proud" is that it prevents you from being truly open-minded. When you say, proudly, that you have liberals and democrats on your show, you sound like the guy who touts the fact that he has gay or black "friends" to prove that he's not homophobic or racist.
Being truly open-minded means being pragmatic, not political, objective, not dogmatic, humble, not proud.
I have watched your show, Joe. You're certainly not evil, and any vitriol coming at you is repulsive, of course, but you certainly do protest a bit too much about how even-handed you are, don't you think?
Today's Quote
"Your negativity is not a gift that the world needs. Be silent, learn, and let the rest of humanity repair the damage that you have done."
PL
PL
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