DNC Plays Race Card?

[Dr. Shane]

(Howard Dean, DNC Chairman) "If you look at folks of color, even women, they're more successful in the Democratic party than they are in the white, uh, excuse me, in the [laughs] Republican party."

[Neil D]

(Howard Dean, DNC Chairman) "If you look at folks of color, even women, they're more successful in the Democratic party than they are in the white, uh, excuse me, in the [laughs] Republican party."

Let's see...If Obama were republican, and this stuff were on the other foot....How would the Republicans handle this?

Let's see.....Howard Dean is also playing the gender card as well...Look at how well Hillary did in the primarys...

Hmmmmm.....We can't joke [in a good way] without something called a 'race card' being played in politics????

Evidence of a sucessfull black man in the republican party...how about former secretary of state or the current secretary of state? Powell and Rice?

Obviously, Shane, you are offended by this....Tell us why you are offended...

[Dr. Shane]

This thread is not about Shane. Shane is not the topic. Shane is another member of the forum involved in the arena of ideas.

Actually, I think calling the Republican Party the "white" party was just a slip of the tongue. I don't think that is what he intended to say. Since he was talking about race already, I would think it was an easy mistake to make. Kind of like calling one of your children the wrong name. A simple mistake.

I would have to see more evidence regarding the success and participation of minorities and women in the various parties. Consider this hypothetical example:

• 500,000 blacks are involved in the Democratic Party and 5,000 of them hold elected office.
• 50,000 blacks are involved in the Republican Party and 1,000 of them hold elected office.

In this hypothetical example, 1% of the blacks involved in the Democratic Party hold office while 2% of the blacks in the Republican Party hold office. Even though the gross numbers show five times as many black Democrats in office than Republicans, a black Republican would have a better chance of advancing in his or her party than a black Democrat - according to this example.

[Tom Wetmore]

This thread is not about Shane. Shane is not the topic...

Well, that's easy enough to fix...

Tom

[Neil D]

Originally Posted By: Shane

This thread is not about Shane. Shane is not the topic...

Well, that's easy enough to fix...

Tom,

You ARE so helpful....oops, this post isn't about Tom.....

[Jeannieb43]

Originally Posted By: Shane

This thread is not about Shane. Shane is not the topic...

Well, that's easy enough to fix...

Tom

No sooner said than done!

[Tom Wetmore]

Well Shane, since you do not like to be the topic of discussion, you should be pleased that few seem interested in talking about you now that the topic IS about you! :smile:

One benefit of this little exercise is that it demonstrates a great way to kill a discussion... especially one that needs to be put out of our misery...

But since I have the floor now and since this topic really is all about Shane now I will now go into "Duh!" mode and show my mastery of the obvious.

Shane, there is one thing on which you lack credibility. You have repeatedly proclaimed that you are a moderate, politically speaking. That is as credible as the Fox Noise motto of "fair and balanced" news reporting. The problem is that the substance of what you invariable focus on, the conclusions you reach, the opinions that you express and the spin you put on every story is invariable somewhere straight out of the Republican/conservative playbook, swerving hard to the right.

That's all...

Tom

[Dr. Shane]

It all depends on where one stands in the spectrum. I suspect that John317 views me as being somewhat of a liberal. People that are conservative look at me and accuse me of being a liberal. Liberals look at me and accuse me of being a conservative. Are they both wrong? No, not really. I am to the left of the conservatives so to them, I am a liberal. I am to the right of liberals so to them, I am a conservative.

I work part-time as a reporter and a columnist for my town's newspaper and for a regional news magazine. Within our newsroom I am considered the "militant moderate".

[Bravus]

Remember, Tom, Shane's in Texas (and not Austin)... for there, he's pretty much a raving pinko!

[John317]

Hey Shane, you got that right-- "somewhat of a liberal."

But compared to the people I will be with in about 36 hours, you are very conservative. Everything's relative, as Einstein used to say.

I'm going to Denver in a little while. I'll be making video and still shots and interviewing. A close friend of mine lives within blocks of the convention center and the park where the people will be setting up their tents.

Those people are out of their minds. You ought to read what they are saying in their websites and propaganda. Of course they are anarchists and Marxists (so-called!).

I'm conservative now but I have not always been. I used to be with the people who are going to be in Denver. I just know what their kind of thinking leads to.

By the way most of these demonstrators will vote for Obama if they vote at all. They favor most of the things Obama favors-- just that they wish Obama would hurry up and do them FAST. They want free abortions, free medical care, end the war, and redistribution of wealth. And lots more.

[Bravus]

Except for the free abortions, all of those things sound grand to me.

[Bravus]

Biblical, too.

[John317]

Biblical, too.

It sounds like forced redistribution of wealth is Biblical and OK with you? For the government to take what you have worked for and give to other people? Don't you think you have a right to decide whether to give your money away? Or would I have a right to come up and take your money?

That is not what the Unites States government was formed to do-- to be in the business of redistributing the wealth. That is an idea right out of Karl Marx.

[carolaa]

That is not what the Unites States government was formed to do-- to be in the business of redistributing the wealth.

Hmmm....that's pretty much what our tax system does.

[John317]

Originally Posted By: John317

That is not what the Unites States government was formed to do-- to be in the business of redistributing the wealth.

Hmmm....that's pretty much what our tax system does.

Yeah and we're supposed to want more of the same? I sure don't. If people want to give their money away, they should be free to make that choice. Taxes should not be a burden. We had a revolution largely over that very issue.

[Dr. Shane]

As much as Shane likes FOXNews, he enjoys Al Jazeera English just as much. So the question becomes, do conservative or liberals like Al Jazeera English? I see them trying to do the "fair and balanced" thing as much as FOXNews. And that is in contras to the objective thing.

There are two schools of thought.

1) Objective reporting reports a story without promoting one side or the other. It tries to report the news without trying to tell the consumer what to think. It is "just the facts" reporting without opinion.

2) Fair and balanced reporting reports a story giving both or multiple sides of the story. Competing voices tell the consumer what to think about a given story. The consumer hears the various sides and decides for him or herself.

FOXNews and Al Jazeera English both embrace the latter while many mainstream news organization still try to embrace the first.

[Bravus]

If people chose to give their money away, no tax system would be necessary. They don't, so it is. Check the Bible on wealth and poverty, and on the consequences for those who don't care for the poor in their midst. Then look around America and tell me the country has nothing to worry about on that score.

[John317]

If people chose to give their money away, no tax system would be necessary. They don't, so it is. Check the Bible on wealth and poverty, and on the consequences for those who don't care for the poor in their midst. Then look around America and tell me the country has nothing to worry about on that score.

I've lived in the United States pretty much all of my life, except a few years spent in Mexico and Europe. I've been in most of our states, much of my travel being by foot, hitch-hiking, and riding both freight and passenger train. I lived in New York, Chicago, San Diego, New Orleans, Seattle, Los Angeles, Omaha. I served in the nation's military during the time of the draft so that I lived in barracks along with several hundred men from virtually every state, race, religion, educational background, and socio-economic status. When I hitch-hiked and rode freight, I met thousands of poor people. I met rich and poor and middle class Americans. We have a wonderful country and a wonderful people. I am not ashamed to say I love my country and am proud to be part of the American experience and experiment. Bravus, you are wrong about America and Americans. Come on over here some time and I will show you the America I know and love. It's everywhere.

Don't come before the end of August because I'll be in Denver at the Democratic convention until then.

Meantime check this out:

Americans give record $295B to charity

Church collection plates must've been full this year as Americans donated $96.82 billion to religious organizations.

NEW YORK (AP) — Americans gave nearly $300 billion to charitable causes last year, setting a record and besting the 2005 total that had been boosted by a surge in aid to victims of hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma and the Asian tsunami.

Donors contributed an estimated $295.02 billion in 2006, a 1% increase when adjusted for inflation, up from $283.05 billion in 2005. Excluding donations for disaster relief, the total rose 3.2%, inflation-adjusted, according to an annual report released Monday by the Giving USA Foundation at Indiana University's Center on Philanthropy.

Giving historically tracks the health of the overall economy, with the rise amounting to about one-third the rise in the stock market, according to Giving USA. Last year was right on target, with a 3.2% rise as stocks rose more than 10% on an inflation-adjusted basis.

"What people find especially interesting about this, and it's true year after year, that such a high percentage comes from individual donors," Giving USA Chairman Richard Jolly said.

Individuals gave a combined 75.6% of the total. With bequests, that rises to 83.4%.

About 65% of households with incomes less than $100,000 give to charity, the report showed.

"It tells you something about American culture that is unlike any other country," said Claire Gaudiani, a professor at NYU's Heyman Center for Philanthropy and author of The Greater Good: How Philanthropy Drives the American Economy and Can Save Capitalism. Gaudiani said the willingness of Americans to give cuts across income levels, and their investments go to developing ideas, inventions and people to the benefit of the overall economy.

Gaudiani said Americans give twice as much as the next most charitable country, according to a November 2006 comparison done by the Charities Aid Foundation. In philanthropic giving as a percentage of gross domestic product, the U.S. ranked first at 1.7%. No. 2 Britain gave 0.73%, while France, with a 0.14% rate, trailed such countries as South Africa, Singapore, Turkey and Germany.

Mega-gifts, which Giving USA considers to be donations of $1 billion or more, tend to get the most attention, and that was true last year especially.

Investment superstar Warren Buffett announced in June 2006 that he would give $30 billion over 20 years to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Of that total, $1.9 billion was given in 2006, which helped push the year's total higher.

Gaudiani said that gift reflects a growing focus on using donated money efficiently and effectively.

"I think it's also a strategic commitment to upward mobility exported to other countries, in the form of improved health and stronger civil societies," she said.

The Gates Foundation has focused on reducing hunger and fighting disease in developing countries as well as improving education in the U.S. Without Buffett's pledge, it had an endowment of $29.2 billion as of the end of 2005.

Meanwhile, companies and their foundations gave less in 2006, dropping 10.5% to $12.72 billion. Jolly said corporate giving fell because companies had been so generous in response to the natural disasters and because profits overall were less strong in 2006 over the year before.

The Giving USA report counts money given to foundations as well as grants the foundations make to non-profits and other groups, since foundations typically give out only income earned without spending the original donations.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[Bravus]

I do understand all that, John, I honestly and really do. I know and understand the generosity of Americans, and among other things dream of working in an American university where there are bequests and endowments for funding rather than only government funding. I know there are people on the left, and people in Australia, who are reflexively anti-American, and I'm not.

But I still think a well funded public education system, for example, is a public good that is worthwhile for government to be involved in. I think voucher systems just mean (a) parents pay for the same thing twice and ( the rich get good education and the poor don't. Because vouchers will be complemented with large amounts of cash in private schools, making them even wealthier, and will pull resources away from the schools that are already struggling because they serve communities that are struggling. Different people draw their lines of where governments should be involved in different ways, and education is one of mine. But good public education is inherently redistributive.

I also have lived in countries with very functional public health systems - Australia and Canada - and know that fewer people fall through the cracks. I have a good friend in America who has had brain cancer, owes $600,000 for the medical care but due to her disability can only work in newspaper delivery. That doesn't happen in Australia and Canada. Sure, we complain about our systems sometime, but we do not automatically see government involvement in providing health care to citizens as a Marxist-communist plot - we see it as common sense.

So look at America and tell me two things - in the recognition that I do understand all the good stuff about the country already. Tell me there is no-one living in poverty - poverty that could be alleviated with money but is not being. Tell me there are so few of those people that it's irrelevant, or tell me that they chose their poverty. I don't think you can. Then tell me that there is not obscene, conspicuous consumption, and that the wealthiest cannot afford to share some of their wealth with the poorest.

I'll say it again: when there are no poor, then we can say voluntary giving is working. Jesus said 'the poor are always with you', but it was an observation, not a command, and the Bible has over 3000 texts about our responsibilities toward the poor. Of course there are worse countries and worse systems, but given that government is inevitable, I would be much happier if they turned taxpayers' money to health care, education and help for those in poverty and disability (and perhaps 'supported the troops' with decent health care when they came home), rather than buying some more missiles and bombers... or if not rather than, as well as.

Will post a little something on Republicans and 'small government' below, but the above is the core of my lack of horror and fear at these 'Marxist' ideas and ideals.

[Bravus]

The large-print section above looks at private philanthropic giving but fails to look at government aid programs, where the figures are pretty much reversed and the US is 30th or so in the world.

[Bravus]

Bravus:

When Republicans talk about 'small government' they mean 'small service side of government, massive enforcement side'. More prisons (although those are also largely being privatised), more military, more surveillance, more interference in private citizens' lives (although their claim is the opposite). So yes, running the service side of the government into the ground while massively building the coercive side.

Splitcoil:

Near miss. What it really means is privatizing as much as possible, so that the number of civil servants declines, while budgets actually climb at a higher rate over time. This because the functions are privatized and given to contractors (who have lobbyists, whereas civil servants don't), so that government actually doesn't get smaller. Just the number of government employees. So they get to claim reduction of government while actually handing out more budget money and collecting more campaign contribs, all at the same time. The ultimate political vote-getting machine, and all you have to do is sell the country's soul for it.

Bush the Senior really started this self-fueling political hotrod machine, but it was perfected under Clinton. Gore actually wrote the protocols for giving civil service jobs to contractors and collecting the resulting campaign contributions. Gore was the best gift the neocons could have asked for. They picked up where he left off.

It is what it is.

Uberdog:

Are you saying that they do this merely to further line their pockets becuase there are less ways in which the spoils must be divided?

Or are you suggesting that they wish to purpose the surplus budget toward some other cause?

I still say there is more of an ideology behind it, whether they use it for rationalization or for actual dogma, I cannot say.

perhaps they are much the same.

The Minx:

There's no surplus budget, it's paid to corporations (of which perhaps the odd politician is a shareholder?) rather than to employees. Like hiring Blackwater to "help" after Katrina, or having federal prisons operated by corporations rather than the penal system.

Same amount of money (or more), apportioned differently but with the "fewer government employees" that they like to champion. Spin, spin, spin.

Splitcoil:

Bingo.

[Tom Wetmore]

And basic government services become politicized... The dominant party's corporate buddies get the inside track in the awarding of contracts. And the trickle down effect is also that home districts of the dominant party get more of the benefit of government services and contracts.

Tom

[Tom Wetmore]

Biblical, too...

...I'll say it again: when there are no poor, then we can say voluntary giving is working. Jesus said 'the poor are always with you', but it was an observation, not a command, and the Bible has over 3000 texts about our responsibilities toward the poor.

And if the erstwhile religious right had it right, the emphasis , both in rhetoric and resources, would be Biblically proportionate in issues of concern. The issues they deem so important barely get a Biblical mention by comparison to caring for the destitute, disadvantaged and down-trodden.

Tom

[Dr. Shane]

Quote:

I think voucher systems just mean (a) parents pay for the same thing twice and ( the rich get good education and the poor don't. Because vouchers will be complemented with large amounts of cash in private schools, making them even wealthier, and will pull resources away from the schools that are already struggling because they serve communities that are struggling.

We have the voucher system now on the university level. The government awards pell grants to low income and they can take those grants to any school they want- private or public. It is a system that works well. It has not caused public colleges and universities to suffer at all.

[Tom Wetmore]

Originally Posted By: Bravus

Biblical, too.

It sounds like forced redistribution of wealth is Biblical and OK with you? For the government to take what you have worked for and give to other people? Don't you think you have a right to decide whether to give your money away? Or would I have a right to come up and take your money?

That is not what the Unites States government was formed to do-- to be in the business of redistributing the wealth. That is an idea right out of Karl Marx.

The theory of marxism and socialism in the purist sense come closer to the Biblical model of heaven's economy than Capitalism. Unfortunately greed and lust for power corrupted it just as happened to the OT mandated theocratic economy.

Perhaps you might consider the OT Year of Jubilee concept where all debts were cancelled, land aquired was returned, prisoners were set free, slaves were freed. It was the official proclamation of the Jubilee that Jesus' used to announce his mission of salvation here on earth. And his actions and words tracked that ancient harbinger of his coming. The first shall be last and the last shall be first. The greatest will serve the least. Unto the least of these...

Yes, John, mandated redistribution of wealth is very Biblical.

Tom