Businesses don't create jobs?

[pp4me3]

I was dumbfounded by this. I can't even imagine Obama saying something this stupid.

If this is going to be the next POTUS then all hope is lost.

http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2 ... reate-Jobs

[Libertarian666]

A Hillary presidency will certainly be good for some businesses, such as expatriation assistance.

[Pointedstick]

If this is going to be the next POTUS then all hope is lost.

If the Republicans want to prevent it, they'd better nominate someone who is not a walking, talking parody.

What is that supposed to mean? Why don't you just come out and criticize the idiot who made the comment instead of bringing Republicans into the discussion? Are you an apologist for all Democrats along with Mr. Moderator?

my guess, and probably the logical go to assumption, based on the political makeup of the forum, is that he is not one of the few democrats but one of the many libertarian leaning conservatives or one of the anarchist leaning libertarians, and the comment is anti progressive republican or anti establishment republican not pro democrat...

[moda0306]

I find both sides of this debate annoying.  People willing to purchase & work outside of a business-owner function certainly are massively important.  Our business owners of any sort of size have often put themselves in a position where they're extremely dependent on steady demand for their products and a steady supply of labor to work in their shops.

Business owners tend to deal with a massive amount of BS that other people aren't expected to, though.  They are held to a much, much higher level of responsibility & accountability than most people.

There's a lot of economic decisions that are abundantly necessary in our economy.  Business owners are one.  Roles within government (IMO) are another.  People willing to purchase durable and/or discretionary items with an uncertain future, and work 9-5 jobs, are another.  Trying to say anyone "doesn't create jobs" if they serve a valuable role is bullsh!t.  Whether you're a business-owner patting himself on the back while people (riskily) purcase his products/services for money, or someone who can't save a dime and wants to blame everyone else every time that comes back to bite them (namely, "rich business owners").

[Xan]

If this is going to be the next POTUS then all hope is lost.

If the Republicans want to prevent it, they'd better nominate someone who is not a walking, talking parody.

[Comment edited by CraigR.]

I interpreted it as a wistful longing for a nominee he can really get behind.

[I am asking polite-like that people do not attack each other and ignore any and all trolling comments.

With flowers and candy,

CraigR]


Edit from Xan: Wow, that makes it look like I said something really nasty to Reub, which I don't think I did.  I'll agree it didn't necessarily add to the conversation though.

[Pointedstick]

I interpreted it as a wistful longing for a nominee he can really get behind.

Bingo. I am no hippy dippy liberal. I would gladly, joyously vote for a decent Republican presidential nominee (and I in fact voted for the last one). I think Hillary is a dangerous snake who could be ten times worse than Obama due to her actually having any political skill unlike the current clown of a president who would be outmatched by a lump of coal in a political struggle. I think a Hillary presidency would be a disaster. Nearly any Republican would IMHO be preferable to her, but I'd like to vote for someone with excitement rather than while holding my nose.

The "walking, talking parody" comments were directed toward the last two Republican nominees, each of whom almost seemed to play right into liberals' fears and preconceptions. McCain was an elderly warmonger and Romney was a stuffy rich prick. Taken together, that pretty much encompasses what liberals think of conservatives. I long for the Republicans to nominate someone who can break out of the stereotypes and shake things up a little. Someone with more interest in freedom for all rather than bringing back a social vision that's long dead, or identifying enemies everywhere to kill. Maybe appeal to some people outside of the typical Republican demographics. Someone like… Rand Paul, perhaps.

[clacy]

I was dumbfounded by this. I can't even imagine Obama saying something this stupid.

If this is going to be the next POTUS then all hope is lost.

http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2 ... reate-Jobs

Are you going to send a message to Hillary by not voting again pp4me3?

[Benko]

The "walking, talking parody" comments were directed toward the last two Republican nominees, each of whom almost seemed to play right into liberals' fears and preconceptions...and Romney was a stuffy rich prick.

I'm no Romney fan by a long shot,  but what does  "a stuffy rich prick" mean?  evil capitalist dog (or is it pig?). 

If it were 10 or 15 years ago and you were broke down by the side of the road say in some out of the way place, who do you think more likely to stop and help you?

A.  ROmney?

B. the guy in the white house now?


It really sounds like you've bought the leftist cool aid on Romeny.

[Pointedstick]

I'm no Romney fan by a long shot,  but what does  "a stuffy rich prick" mean?  evil capitalist dog (or is it pig?). 

If it were 10 or 15 years ago and you were broke down by the side of the road say in some out of the way place, who do you think more likely to stop and help you?

A.  ROmney?

B. the guy in the white house now?


It really sounds like you've bought the leftist cool aid on Romeny.

I'm sure both men are very nice, love their families, and would help a stranded motorist. That's not the point. I'm saying that regardless of the substance, the image was that he was a perfect caricature of what leftists think of conservatives. His work at Bain Capital played perfectly into the "corporate raider" stereotype, and his infamous "47%" comments cemented him as an out-of-touch rich elitist in their mind. Then there's "I like being able to fire people," "binders full of women," the list goes on. Whether or not his work at Bain was a net positive, whether 47% of people do indeed not pay any federal income taxes, whether being able to fire underperformers is good, and just how many women he employed were all irrelevant; the point is that he played perfectly into liberals' hands and seemed to be just who they wanted him to be--someone very easy to demonize to their base.

Just the other day I was helping my mother with some computer problems and saw her email inbox was full of political spam from the Democrats. It's all the same stuff; their #1 strategy is to pigeonhole their opponents as haughty, out-of-touch, compassionless rich elitist billionaire corporate CEOs who aren't like you or me, don't understand our problems, are trying to buy the election, and want to reduce us to numbers in a huge machine designed to squeeze as much profit as possible out of us before we die. Propaganda-wise, it is practically the only thing that the Democrats know how to do, in fact. Nominating someone who is indeed a super-rich Wall Street corporate CEO type who fired a lot of people and got rich in the process is like handing them a pallet full of ammunition.

Rand Paul, or someone like him, would be much more difficult to do this to. Paul is a more complicated figure. He reaches out to leftists. He delivers speeches to majority black colleges. He talks about change in a way that doesn't scare conservatives. He is a doctor. He is not a multimillionaire with close ties to wall street.

Image is everything in national politics, and substance is close to irrelevant, especially if it has to be explained and involves a hint of nuance. That may be sad, but here we are, and you have to play the game if you want to win it.

[Benko]

the point is that he played perfectly into liberals' hands and seemed to be just who they wanted him to be--someone very easy to demonize to their base."

Ahh I get it and I agree. 


"her email inbox was full of political spam from the Democrats. It's all the same stuff"
Unfortunately, it works.    The Big Lie, brought to you for over 60 years.....

[Pointedstick]

There's also message dissemination; Democrats are good at it and Republicans fail utterly. Remember when Obama said "You didn't build that, somebody else made that happen!"

Here, re-familiarize yourselves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKjPI6no5ng

Watch it again! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKjPI6no5ng

What an incredible thing for a sitting president to say!

That clip should have been played on TV and distributed by every right-wing blogger for YEARS. It should have been turned into internet memes. There should have been bumper stickers, T-shirts, the works. It should have been burned into everyone's mind that the president thought that nobody deserved credit for their own successes--a shockingly offensive, out-of-touch piece of loony leftist garbage that is outrageously far out of the mainstream!

Instead, the Republicans let it die out in a few weeks. Opportunity lost. The Democrats don't let opportunities like that go. This thing with Hillary is another opportunity. Watch them flub it in the same way.

[Reub]

Yes Benko. To paraphrase,  Romney is a prick because the Dems cast him that way. Understand the perfect logic of that?

[craigr]

Edit from Xan: Wow, that makes it look like I said something really nasty to Reub, which I don't think I did.  I'll agree it didn't necessarily add to the conversation though.

Didn't mean to come off that way, I was just quickly editing comments and deleting other posts.

[pp4me3]

Are you going to send a message to Hillary by not voting again pp4me3?

Probably, but not just to Hillary. It'll be addressed to Hillary and Jeb or maybe Hillary and Mitt. Don't see much difference.

[Benko]

There's also message dissemination; Democrats are good at it and Republicans fail utterly.

Very true.

Rueb,

Reality is reality.  The left is extraordinarily good at demonizing the right.  If only they had other marketable skills....

OTOH if the right can manage real world business they should get a F'in clue about the left and how they have to be dealt with.  And PS should hire himself out as an adviser to someone or other.

And this is why I wonder if someone as "nice" and Rand Paul can win (not that I want him to given his immigration stand).  Reagan was wonderful and disarming the left verbally.  For all his faults, Newt is one of the few who can hold his own and not be taken apart by e.g. leftie moderators.  we need someone who is unflappable e.g. the way I've seen Christie be in responding to hecklers in debates (not that I want him either).

[Reub]

Benko it is very easy to be great at demonizing when you have virtually the entire press campaigning for you while pretending to be unbiased. So don't give them more credit than they deserve.

[Benko]

Benko it is very easy to be great at demonizing when you have virtually the entire press campaigning for you while pretending to be unbiased. So don't give them more credit than they deserve.

Reub,

Reasonable people who believe something have doubts, have other priorities in life, etc.  Many of the grassroots left are DRIVEN e.g. driven that the country must be converted to their priorities, etc. Yes, by any mothod.  They have much more drive than the right.  Why are they much more driven?  Let's just say that healthy impulses don't result in the desire to impose your will on everyone else "for their own good" by lying , cheating, etc.

[Pointedstick]

As someone who lives in a very red region of a very red state, and where my employer has Fox News on in common areas 24 hours a day, I hear the opposite view all the time.  And my staunch Republican aunt (and occasionally my mom) send me weekly email spam about Kenyan Muslims trying to destroy America.  Thankfully, I don't receive any of the Democratic Party propaganda that your mom gets.

So without much beyond anecdotal evidence, I have a hard time believing that one side engages in this tactic any more than the other.

Yeah, I agree with you. Both sides have their favorite ignorance-fueled propaganda they use to scare their bases. I wasn't meaning to imply that I thought Democrats lied to motivate the troops any more than I think the Republicans do. It's just good sense, after all. Most people, D or R, are totally uninformed on most political matters. Like a noxious weed, an appealing lie or juicy misrepresentation takes hold very easily in the barren soil of an ignorant mind. To be able to accomplish this is a terrible power, like the evil mirror image of a teacher whose aim is to banish ignorance.

[Xan]

Edit from Xan: Wow, that makes it look like I said something really nasty to Reub, which I don't think I did.  I'll agree it didn't necessarily add to the conversation though.

Didn't mean to come off that way, I was just quickly editing comments and deleting other posts.

No problem, and it probably helped the conversation for you to do it.  I just wanted to make sure people knew I hadn't gone off the deep end or anything!

[Xan]

Hey PS, where would we find that tremendously insightful post of yours where you describe how the left and the right each have different models of the world, both of which are wrong in different ways?  I think of it often but I'm not even sure how to search for it.  It should be sticky someplace.

[Pointedstick]

Hey PS, where would we find that tremendously insightful post of yours where you describe how the left and the right each have different models of the world, both of which are wrong in different ways?  I think of it often but I'm not even sure how to search for it.  It should be sticky someplace.

That sounds cool... but are you sure I wrote it? I don't remember that. Sounds like something I'd like to read, though.

[Xan]

Hey PS, where would we find that tremendously insightful post of yours where you describe how the left and the right each have different models of the world, both of which are wrong in different ways?  I think of it often but I'm not even sure how to search for it.  It should be sticky someplace.

That sounds cool... but are you sure I wrote it? I don't remember that. Sounds like something I'd like to read, though.

I'm pretty sure.  No idea how to find it though.  I'll keep digging.

[Benko]

There's also message dissemination; Democrats are good at it and Republicans fail utterly.

Fortunately all I have to do is quote PS who is being absolutely correct (above).  The democrats are much more effective at it.

You can bug or videotape tea party groups all you want and you will not see people doing what acorn was caught doing and what the group was caught earlier this week doing (voter fraud).  Forgot the idiots in washington, I'm talking about the people.

Not that I'm overly fond of the republicans, but dogma on this board that both parties are equally bad is right up there with all religions being equally bad i.e. Christianity is as "bad" as Islam. 

[Reub]

There's also message dissemination; Democrats are good at it and Republicans fail utterly.

Fortunately all I have to do is quote PS who is being absolutely correct (above).  The democrats are much more effective at it.

You can bug or videotape tea party groups all you want and you will not see people doing what acorn was caught doing and what the group was caught earlier this week doing (voter fraud).  Forgot the idiots in washington, I'm talking about the people.

Not that I'm overly fond of the republicans, but dogma on this board that both parties are equally bad is right up there with all religions being equally bad i.e. Christianity is as "bad" as Islam.

I'll say it. Both parties are not equally bad. The mantra on here by some that says the opposite is ridiculous.

[rickb]

I heard a quote the other day that I liked:
"I get my news from comedy channels, and my comedy from cable news."

Eerily similar to a pre-WWII Russian joke:  "Izvestia nye pravda, Pravda nye izvestia" which literally translated means "There is no truth in Izvestia and no news in Pravda".  Izvestia is Russian for "news", which was also the name of the newspaper run by the Soviet government.  Pravda is Russian for "truth", which was also the name of the newspaper run by the Communist party. 

A modern US equivalent (without the pun) might be "Fox has no truth, and PBS has no news".  Unfortunately, Fox does not call itself "News" (although it was owned by News Corp until News Corp renamed itself 21st Century Fox - so the pun almost holds here) and PBS is not actually owned by the government (and its name does not mean "truth").