Newt or Mitt VS Obama. Can either of 'em beat him?

[Faux Pas]

AK

Strong companies don't get taken over unless they wish to. Your attempt to cast a shadow on venture capitalists is a hollow one. Free enterprise is the the driving force of the US economy and always has been. Your inference that jobs of weak or inefficient companies should be retained or protected is about as misguided as your media sources. The Huffington post is a liberal rag with an aversion to the truth

[Eduard]

Clinton spoke tonight.  And while Democrats point out that his economic record was good, they fail to point out that Clinton did not believe in big government. 
 
What compels a Democrat to stand behind such a bad performance by a President?   

Bill Clinton is impressive - very smart. He thinks several steps ahead of most people. One must admire people like that. Me thinks that Hillary is already at that age where the election of 2016 is her last chance at the presidency. If R&R win in November she prolly won't have a chance in 2016. There might be other reasons too off course.

[tfcrew]

   And while Democrats point out that his economic record was good, they fail to point out that [Bill] Clinton did not believe in big government.   

 
 
Did...does.
 Hillary too.

[Faux Pas]

Bill Clinton is impressive - very smart. He thinks several steps ahead of most people. One must admire people like that. Me thinks that Hillary is already at that age where the election of 2016 is her last chance at the presidency. If R&R win in November she prolly won't have a chance in 2016. There might be other reasons too off course.

Clinton was impeached for lying. He couldn't point out the Obama's fallacies and lies fast enough when the nomination was between Hillary and Obama. Now he proclaims we should "trust" him. TFF

[Anotherkiwi]

AK

Strong companies don't get taken over unless they wish to.

I'm not arguing this point - my own company was doing extremely well, but the owners decided that a takeover offer was just too good to ignore.  The three years since the buyout have certainly been interesting from a work point of view.
 

Your attempt to cast a shadow on venture capitalists is a hollow one.

Please point out where I have done so.  I was merely responding to the part of Gator's post regarding compassion, and referring specifically to Romney - nobody else, so don't try to find inferences in my post that aren't there.
 

Free enterprise is the the driving force of the US economy and always has been. Your inference that jobs of weak or inefficient companies should be retained or protected...

Again, I'm not disagreeing with your first point.  However, in respect of the second point, I was AGAIN responding as above, although I do agree with your basic premise.  MY point here is that  I work for a good company, but the work skills that I possess are also transferable around the world.  If the worst should happen and I lose my job through redundancy, I should be able to pick up something comparable fairly quickly, even if I have to move overseas.  Unfortunately a lot of people don't have that same marketability, and many workers in companies that Romney took over would have been in that situation (as would happen in most takeovers).
 

The Huffington post is a liberal rag with an aversion to the truth.

What's wrong with being liberal?  And what part(s) of the article I linked are untrue?

[Anotherkiwi]

LOL.  At a rate where the line of the *many* separating from the *few* is nearly unrecognizable ~ of course you do.. 

Sorry, but I have no idea what you're talking about.

As for tenets of Christianity? Did you mean the story about the man and the fish and the lessons to fish? Or did you mean the saga of inquisitions, war, strife and destruction of entire civilizations, and lately - child abuse and molestation ~ defines the definition of your *Christianity*?

Certainly not the latter!  More along the lines of Jesus with the loaves and fishes, and the story of the Good Samaritan.
 

It's simply amazing how technology these days can afford anyone a venue to mainstream media and pretend they actually *know* what they're talking about a situation or region they've either never been to or hardly ever gone to.

Yeah, ain't it just?  We get force-fed so much stuff from your part of the world that it's very hard to ignore.  It may not be in quite the same detail as yours, but it's certainly enough.

AK...in case you haven't noticed, the soundbytes above are nothing more than ploy to deflect the obvious failure to produce any worthy segment of the last 4 years of the present administration. Pro-life/ Pro-choice had been debated for decades and what started out as a debate of moral values had turned into a political grandstanding.

 
Perhaps I should elaborate on my comment about Roe v Wade.  I'm well aware that your pro-choice/pro-life argument has been going on since the first abortion in history.  As a Catholic you would have been taught about the sanctity of life and how abortion is a sin - I'm not worried (or interested) whether you agree with that position or not because that's your business, not mine.  However, the information that I've seen recently indicates that there seems to be a big push within the Republican Party to seriously revisit this legislation with a view to overturning it.
 
I'm also well aware that Jerry Falwell and his multitude of followers and imitators have ensured that it now seems to be impossible for anyone to reach a high public office unless they're a committed Christian who attends Church every Sunday, come hell or high water (or, in Romney's case, an obviously religious person from another system of beliefs).  You know - all good Americans believe in God.
 

..you should really quit talking about things you have no clue on.

Stick to Chinese Gooseberry.

You're obviously a very intelligent man, GQ, and I enjoy the great majority of what you write.  But you're also sometimes a patronising PITA if somebody writes something with which you disagree.
 
Have a nice day! 

[Faux Pas]

I'm not arguing this point - my own company was doing extremely well, but the owners decided that a takeover offer was just too good to ignore.  The three years since the buyout have certainly been interesting from a work point of view.

Many people, including myself have had jobs that met the same fate. It is a fact of life in a free market system. Anytime a company goes public, it is in play for hostile or friendly takeovers
 

Please point out where I have done so.  I was merely responding to the part of Gator's post regarding compassion, and referring specifically to Romney - nobody else, so don't try to find inferences in my post that aren't there.

Here; you can deny it if if you wish but I'd wager 9 of 10 who read this got the same inference

As for compassion - how much of that did Mr Billionaire Romney show when he was putting thousands of people out of work while closing down their companies in the name of "efficiency?"
 

If there was no political undertone in that statement, why would you make it, here in a political discussion? Romney was a venture capitalist. The efficiency factor would being doing his job and protecting his shareholders, isn't it? It is not the position of government to protect jobs from takeover. Possibly in communism and other various systems of socialism but, not in a free market capitalist society.

Again, I'm not disagreeing with your first point.  However, in respect of the second point, I was AGAIN responding as above, although I do agree with your basic premise.  MY point here is that  I work for a good company, but the work skills that I possess are also transferable around the world.  If the worst should happen and I lose my job through redundancy, I should be able to pick up something comparable fairly quickly, even if I have to move overseas.  Unfortunately a lot of people don't have that same marketability, and many workers in companies that Romney took over would have been in that situation (as would happen in most takeovers).
 

Good for you that you have that flexibility, really. Many people and those that are victims of antiquated processes, businesses and industry don't have that flexibility. Neither Romney nor the free market system put those unfortunates in that position, they themselves did.

What's wrong with being liberal?  And what part(s) of the article I linked are untrue?

Nothing is wrong with being liberal. What's wrong with being conservative?

As for THP article, I didn't read it and I won't. I don't need to, to know what it contains. You can believe it as the holy grail if you wish. I know better and I have read enough of it in the past. THP is agenda driven disinformation.

You need to understand politics present day in America is polarizing. Most are squarely in one camp or the other and jump from one to the other when it pleases them. Nothing wrong with that. You have a habit, just as you have very recently in this thread of attempting to denigrate one side that you disagree with. Well, you've pissed off half of the Americans with your spreading said disinformation to outright lies just as you have in this thread. Then you want to act surprised when someone lobs one back at you over your bow.

You have no dog in this hunt. You have no vote that counts. You won't have to live here no matter who wins the upcoming presidential election. The fact that you attempt to play hack, lapdog and mouth piece for one side against the other very easily rubs some the wrong way. What makes it worse, much of your beliefs on the situation is derived from the disinformation outlets. You really do come off as stupid to ignorant on the subject. I know your not yet, you persist 

[GQBlues]

Sorry, but I have no idea what you're talking about.

Maybe in your world the needy are but a few and fleeting. What you do not understand since you do NOT live here amongst us is the number of those who had perfected the art of being 'needy. Talent handed down for generations. Being 'needy' is a proven and preferred way of life to a lot of our society's population. You may not mind your neighbor knocking on your door asking to share your bread..for a day, even for a week. I doubt you won't mind it when it becomes a 'religion'.
 

Certainly not the latter!  More along the lines of Jesus with the loaves and fishes, and the story of the Good Samaritan.

The proverb (it isn't religious, I don't think) of the *man, the fish and the lesson*, ironically enough actually goes like this...

""Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime; give a man religion and he will die praying for a fish."
   

Yeah, ain't it just?  We get force-fed so much stuff from your part of the world that it's very hard to ignore.  It may not be in quite the same detail as yours, but it's certainly enough.

Mark Twain once said: "If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed."

The perfect example of that is the following....
 

Perhaps I should elaborate on my comment about Roe v Wade.  I'm well aware that your pro-choice/pro-life argument has been going on since the first abortion in history.  As a Catholic you would have been taught about the sanctity of life and how abortion is a sin - I'm not worried (or interested) whether you agree with that position or not because that's your business, not mine.  However, the information that I've seen recently indicates that there seems to be a big push within the Republican Party to seriously revisit this legislation with a view to overturning it.

The Republican party happen to be Pro-Life so I find your denigration of Romney rather confusing. Ironically enough, I have a more 'liberal' position on this debate.
 

I'm also well aware that Jerry Falwell and his multitude of followers and imitators have ensured that it now seems to be impossible for anyone to reach a high public office unless they're a committed Christian who attends Church every Sunday, come hell or high water (or, in Romney's case, an obviously religious person from another system of beliefs).  You know - all good Americans believe in God.

I listen to Jerry Falwell with as much frequency as I do Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Not.
 

You're obviously a very intelligent man, GQ, and I enjoy the great majority of what you write.  But you're also sometimes a patronising PITA if somebody writes something with which you disagree.
 
Have a nice day! 

I don't believe we've even arrived to a position where we can either agree or disagree. I thought I mentioned this to you in another exchange in this thread, AK. "One can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into."

[GQBlues]

So the BIG 'O" spoke....the crowds were cheering and Obama was spinning...then all of the sudden he shouted two words that hushed the crowd to an eery silence you can hear crickets.

He shouted...."PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITIES...!!!"

::::::Silence:::::::

LOL, the funniest thing I've seen/heard since Joe Biden's chain remark.

[GQBlues]

So Obama and Clinton would like 4 more years to get the job done, eh....

Obama in 2010:

"Look, I'm at the start of my administration. One nice thing about the situation I find myself in is that I will be held accountable. You know, I've got four years. And … a year from now, I think people are gonna see that we're starting to make some progress. But there's still gonna be some pain out there. If I don't have this done in three years, then there's gonna be a one-term proposition."

Clinton in 2010:

"[Republicans] say: “They had 21 months. Put us back in.” The Democrats are saying something like this: “Look, we found a big hole that we did not dig. And we didn’t get out of it in 21 months, but at least we quit digging. So, don’t go back in reverse. Give us two more years. If it doesn’t work, you have another election in just two years. You can vote us all out then. But for goodness sakes, we quit digging. Don’t bring back the shovel brigade.”

[Anotherkiwi]

...Here; you can deny it if if you wish but I'd wager 9 of 10 who read this got the same inference...
If there was no political undertone in that statement, why would you make it, here in a political discussion? Romney was a venture capitalist. The efficiency factor would being doing his job and protecting his shareholders, isn't it? It is not the position of government to protect jobs from takeover. Possibly in communism and other various systems of socialism but, not in a free market capitalist society.

For crying out loud, I never mentioned the government, or job protection!    I simply asked how much compassion Romney showed for those people who were losing their jobs.  He wasn't a Gubernatorial or Presidential candidate at the time, was he, so what the hell is political about that?  I only know that these job losses happened - I don't know if he offered any public expression of sympathy for their plight, or if he arranged for his staff to try to find alternative employment for any of these people.  I would have exactly the same question for anyone - different venture capitalists could quite possibly have different ways of handling large-scale redundancies.

Good for you that you have that flexibility, really. Many people and those that are victims of antiquated processes, businesses and industry don't have that flexibility. Neither Romney nor the free market system put those unfortunates in that position, they themselves did.

You can't call them "victims" and then say in the next sentence that they put themselves in that position.  I'm well aware that I'm lucky to have certain skills, but it's sometimes very difficult for people to get themselves up onto that next rung of the ladder, especially if they're from a family where all the money goes on essentials and there's nothing left over for a rainy day.

Nothing is wrong with being liberal. What's wrong with being conservative? As for THP article, I didn't read it and I won't. I don't need to, to know what it contains. You can believe it as the holy grail if you wish. I know better and I have read enough of it in the past. THP is agenda driven disinformation.

Interesting - you're the first person I've come across who really can read minds!  Congratulations!   Of course I don't believe it as the holy grail - this just seemed to be an interesting article, related to the topic about which I was posting.  I'm so sorry that you've had some traumatic experience with THP in the past.
 

You need to understand politics present day in America is polarizing. Most are squarely in one camp or the other and jump from one to the other when it pleases them. Nothing wrong with that. You have a habit, just as you have very recently in this thread of attempting to denigrate one side that you disagree with. Well, you've pissed off half of the Americans with your spreading said disinformation to outright lies just as you have in this thread. Then you want to act surprised when someone lobs one back at you over your bow.

Yes, I certainly understand that!  As for denigration - you, Calmissile and GQ Blues do exactly the same to the Democrats and Obama, probably far worse in fact than anything I've ever written about the Republicans, so get your own house in order before you start lobbing stones at me.  I disagree with certain aspects of the Republican policy that are in the public domain, nothing more.  There are other aspects of their policies that I happen to agree with, just as there are probably Democratic policies that you can happily live with.
 

You have no dog in this hunt. You have no vote that counts. You won't have to live here no matter who wins the upcoming presidential election.

Quite true.
 

The fact that you attempt to play hack, lapdog and mouth piece for one side against the other very easily rubs some the wrong way. What makes it worse, much of your beliefs on the situation is derived from the disinformation outlets. You really do come off as stupid to ignorant on the subject. I know your not yet, you persist   

"Hack, lapdog and mouthpiece?"     One small set of posts, on one topic, and I'm suddenly Obama's bum boy?  Obviously my opinions are going to change the whole course of your elections - yeah, right!  Be afraid, FP, be very afraid!  As for beliefs, I've heard these people in live speeches (admittedly within news broadcasts).  How can that be disinformation?  And "stupid to ignorant?"  Stupid, no - ignorant, sure, in the true original meaning of the word.  But, if the Republican candidates are "stupid" enough to utter polarising comments in the public domain they must expect that people will react, even from the other side of the world.
 
 

[Anotherkiwi]

Maybe in your world the needy are but a few and fleeting. What you do not understand since you do NOT live here amongst us is the number of those who had perfected the art of being 'needy. Talent handed down for generations. Being 'needy' is a proven and preferred way of life to a lot of our society's population. You may not mind your neighbor knocking on your door asking to share your bread..for a day, even for a week. I doubt you won't mind it when it becomes a 'religion'.

Don't worry, I know what you mean now, because we have plenty of them here as well.  However, I was referring specifically to health care (especially hospitals) rather than unemployment or similar benefits.
 

The proverb (it isn't religious, I don't think) of the *man, the fish and the lesson*, ironically enough actually goes like this...

""Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime; give a man religion and he will die praying for a fish."

True, but I don't know if Jesus gave fishing lessons along the way.  Perhaps he left that to Andrew and Simon Peter.
   

Mark Twain once said: "If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed."

The perfect example of that is the following....

Nice quote, but you haven't refuted my point about the possible repeal of the legislation based on Roe v Wade.  Do you think that this is likely to happen if the Republicans form the Government?
 

I listen to Jerry Falwell with as much frequency as I do Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Not.

Glad to hear it.
 

I don't believe we've even arrived to a position where we can either agree or disagree. I thought I mentioned this to you in another exchange in this thread, AK. "One can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into."

As I posted earlier, you're a very intelligent man.  And, if you look above, you will see that we do actually agree on some things.  It's a start...

[BC]

So the BIG 'O" spoke....the crowds were cheering and Obama was spinning...then all of the sudden he shouted two words that hushed the crowd to an eery silence you can hear crickets.

He shouted...."PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITIES...!!!"

::::::Silence:::::::

LOL, the funniest thing I've seen/heard since Joe Biden's chain remark.

That's the 28 minute mark.

I did not note anything at all awkward.  Is your comment based on the transcript?

[Misha]

That's the 28 minute mark.

I did not note anything at all awkward. 

Same here. Thanks for posting the video.

[Gator]

Platitudes and demagoguery.   
 
I do not blame Obama for taking this stance.  He wants to be reelected, and he knows his supporters want to hear the socialistic platitudes.  They either don't care about the economy or feel that government not business will make the economy better.
 
What did I just say?  If you don't believe me, listen to this 4-minute interview of many DNC delegates.   
 

 
To be fair Schiff said on CNBC that only 50% of the interviewed delegates favored banning corporate profits.  Only 50%?!?!?!  Do these people not realize where most of the nation's jobs come from, and what motivates corporations to create jobs?  These are educated people too.  This speaks volumes much about the decline of America.
 
 
 
Notice that the video has an ad paid for by the Obama campaign.
 
 

[BC]

Lol Gator,

There are some doozies out there.. heck everywhere.

[BC]

This one was a bit disconcerting.  In many ways, but not all,  I liked what the candidate had to offer.

[Muzh]

The Polarization of America 
By CASS R. SUNSTEIN, Commentary
Published 8:23 p.m., Thursday, September 6, 2012
 
In 2002, New York University political scientist Russell Hardin wrote a brilliant essay called "The Crippled Epistemology of Extremism." Hardin contended that many extremists, including terrorists, are not stupid, insane or badly educated.
 
The real problem is that their information comes from a sharply limited set of sources, all of which are supportive of their extremist beliefs. Many extremists listen only to one another. They live in self-reinforcing information cocoons. Their "crippled epistemology" can lead to utterly baseless, but firmly held, convictions (and sometimes even violence).
 
Most Democrats and most Republicans are not extremists. But Hardin's argument offers lessons about 21st-century political campaigns in the United States — and about some of the most serious difficulties in contemporary governance.
 
How do you know what you know? You undoubtedly have firsthand knowledge about many things. But how do you know whether George Washington or James Madison really lived, whether matter consists of atoms, whether Bob Dylan wrote "Like a Rolling Stone," or whether Mars and Venus exist?
 
Most of what we know is what we learn from other people. By itself, that is inevitable and nothing to lament.
But here is the problem. When we listen mostly to people who already agree with us, our pre-existing convictions get fortified, and we start to think that those who disagree with us are evil, dumb or duped. Is it any wonder that our politics are highly polarized, so much so that it sometimes seems as if Democrats and Republicans don't merely disagree but live in unfathomably different universes?
 
A few years ago, I participated in some experiments designed to shed light on how people's political beliefs are formed. We assembled a number of people into all-liberal groups and all-conservative groups. We asked the groups to discuss three issues: climate change, affirmative action and civil unions for same-sex couples.
 
We requested group members to state their opinions at three stages. The first occurred before they started to talk, when we recorded their views privately and anonymously. In the second stage, we asked them to discuss the issues with one another and then to reach a kind of group "verdict." In the final stage, we asked people to record their views, after discussion, privately and anonymously.
 
On all three issues, both liberal and conservative groups became more unified and more extreme after talking to one another, both in their public verdicts and private statements. Discussions with one another made conservatives more skeptical of climate change and more hostile to affirmative action and same-sex unions — while liberals showed exactly the opposite pattern. After liberals spoke only with liberals, and conservatives only with conservatives, the divisions between the two groups grew dramatically.
 
Why do groups polarize in this way? One reason involves people's concern for their reputations. If you find yourself in a group of people who hate affirmative action, you might be reluctant to say that you like affirmative action, and your agreement with the group in a public setting might affect what you say privately.

The more interesting reason involves the exchange of information. In conservative groups, for example, people tend to offer a number of arguments against affirmative action, and very few in favor of it. Group members learn from what they hear. Having heard the set of arguments in their group, people become more confident, more unified and more extreme.
 
Can anything be done to address this problem? The most obvious answer is to break out of information cocoons. That is a central goal of the American constitutional system, which was devised to ensure that diverse people would speak with one another.
 
The Anti-Federalists, opponents of the Constitution, urged that self-government required homogeneity and that diversity could create paralysis and chaos. By contrast, the defenders of the Constitution, above all Alexander Hamilton, thought that diversity could be a creative force and that "the jarring of parties" could be productive, because it would "promote deliberation."
 
Political conventions are occasions for group polarization. This is inevitable and by design. But in the best cases, political campaigns get people to escape from their information cocoons — not merely because competing perspectives are available, but because citizens are really listening.
 
When escape proves difficult, it helps to insist on the importance of respecting technical expertise. In politics and government, a healthy respect for the technical expertise of scientists, lawyers and economists usually helps to anchor discussion — and to avoid a crippled epistemology.
 
Many of our political convictions are intensely held, especially in an election season.
 
Some of us are undoubtedly right. But an appreciation of how we know what we know should help to engender a healthy dose of humility, making political campaigns far more productive and sensible governance far more likely.
 
Cass R. Sunstein, the Felix Frankfurter professor of law at Harvard University, is a Bloomberg View columnist, former administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and author of "On Rumors: How Falsehoods Spread."

http://www.timesunion.com/opinion/article/The-polarization-of-America-3845991.php#ixzz25nDssXtL


 

[GQBlues]

Platitudes and demagoguery.   
 
I do not blame Obama for taking this stance.  He wants to be reelected, and he knows his supporters want to hear the socialistic platitudes.  They either don't care about the economy or feel that government not business will make the economy better.
 
What did I just say?  If you don't believe me, listen to this 4-minute interview of many DNC delegates.   
 

 
To be fair Schiff said on CNBC that only 50% of the interviewed delegates favored banning corporate profits.  Only 50%?!?!?!  Do these people not realize where most of the nation's jobs come from, and what motivates corporations to create jobs?  These are educated people too.  This speaks volumes much about the decline of America.
 
 
 
Notice that the video has an ad paid for by the Obama campaign.

Yeah, cap corporate profits! That just ain't fair. Funny. Peggy Joseph is still my favorite...there's far more of these folks, add in the union, than the opposition that'll be out there making sure their candidate gets to stay in the big house.

It is no surprised food stamps had peak this week to its highest level. Ever. Job Report comes out in an hour....it'll be interesting to see...

4.5 million private sector jobs just keep on coming!

That's the 28 minute mark.

I did not note anything at all awkward.  Is your comment based on the transcript?

No? I suggest you better watch it again, LOL.

[Faux Pas]

Good read Muzh. I warn people of the dangers of this often. Seems most people are convinced their information sources are impeccable, listening to only what they want to hear. Although that wasn't the point on topic, it is related

[Muzh]

Good read Muzh. I warn people of the dangers of this often. Seems most people are convinced their information sources are impeccable, listening to only what they want to hear. Although that wasn't the point on topic, it is related

Thanks, appreciate the vote of confidence.

[tfcrew]

....President Obama has been talking about the need for corporate tax reform, declaring that the system is too complicated and that companies pay too much.  "Simplify, eliminate loopholes, treat everybody fairly," Obama said in February.
 For those unaccustomed to the loopholes and shelters of the corporate tax code, GE's success at avoiding taxes is nothing short of extraordinary.  The company, led by Immelt, earned $14.2 billion in profits in 2010, but it paid not a penny in taxes because the bulk of those profits, some $9 billion, were offshore.  In fact, GE got a $3.2 billion tax benefit.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/general-electric-paid-federal-taxes-2010/story?id=13224558#.UEoQbqAjmSo

Nothing will change...if you must only choose, what kind of a choice is that?
GE, Mobile, Exxon & the communications giants have all the politicians they want in their back pockets.

Who is better off than they were four years ago?
Hundreds of thousands--even millions are.
That's why Barack-o will be re-elected I'm afraid.

The Bill Clinton administration held regulations over Wall Street.
This is one way it had good fiscal levels.
Then came the Bush -Chaney gang and lifted them so that their banker buddies could get their jollies.

[Gator]

Muzh,
 
A quick response as I must go.
 
You are an intelligent man.  Why would you think the explanation for polarization of America is anything new?  The dynamics and implications of herd and mob mentality have been explained by observers for centuries.
 
Also, your reference cited the issues of climate change, affirmative action, and same sex marriage.    I don't give a damn about these.  They don't affect me, other than climate change may affect my great grandchildren.  In fact, such issues have bored me, and the primary reason I have avoided politics. 
 
The economy concerns me as does the direction our country is headed.   America is declining rapidly as I referenced in the World Economic Forum report.  Why?  The WEF blamed it on bad political leadership and wasteful spending. 
 
Time for Obama and the democrats to go.  If Republicans sweep, God help us because the party has some extreme views.  However, I will still feel better because the economy will improve.
 
Obama had his opportunity.   I wrote many pages ago that when Ronald Reagan took office he had the same plurality as did Obama.  One key difference - Reagan sat down with Tip O'Neil and reached an agreement.  Obama did not. 

We need a leader for the whole country.  Obama is a leader only for a collection of minorities that outnumber the center.   Frankly, I don't know how well Romney  will do.    However, he will at least change the direction of where we are headed.
 
 

[GQBlues]

So despite all the other banter and silly rhetorics from both sides of the aisle, it's still all about "the economy stupid!" Come election time, the decision will be based on the devil you know or the devil you don't.

http://economywatch.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/07/13728411-weak-jobs-growth-beyond-governments-control?lite
 
The only question now remains which lobbyists of either party have more to gain/lose/spend in this election. Congress is up for auction once again....the bidding starts now and closes in November.
 

[Muzh]

Muzh,
 
A quick response as I must go.
 
You are an intelligent man.  Why would you think the explanation for polarization of America is anything new?  The dynamics and implications of herd and mob mentality have been explained by observers for centuries.
 

Consider it a Public Service Announcement; based on some of the comments I've read here and everywhere.
 

Also, your reference cited the issues of climate change, affirmative action, and same sex marriage.    I don't give a damn about these.  They don't affect me, other than climate change may affect my great grandchildren.  In fact, such issues have bored me, and the primary reason I have avoided politics. 
 

Those three examples may bore you but I've seen people almost come to blows when these three are mentioned AND NOT int the same sentence.
 

The economy concerns me as does the direction our country is headed.   America is declining rapidly as I referenced in the World Economic Forum report.  Why?  The WEF blamed it on bad political leadership and wasteful spending. 
 

Article is very timely indeed.
 
I just read somewhere that from Jan. 20, 2001, to Jan. 20, 2009, the DJIA fell by 25 percent, the Standard & Poor's 500 index fell by 39 percent, and the NASDAQ index fell by 47 percent.
 
By contrast, during the years of Obama's administration (Jan. 20, 2009, through Aug. 30, 2012), the Dow Jones Industrial Average has risen by 60 percent, the S&P 500 has gone up by 74 percent, and the NASDAQ index is up by 112 percent.
 
 

Time for Obama and the democrats to go.  If Republicans sweep, God help us because the party has some extreme views.  However, I will still feel better because the economy will improve.
 

Well, I believe that Wall Street would disagree with you based on the above numbers.
 

Obama had his opportunity.   I wrote many pages ago that when Ronald Reagan took office he had the same plurality as did Obama.  One key difference - Reagan sat down with Tip O'Neil and reached an agreement.  Obama did not. 

Ah yes, Tip O'Neil. What a classy gentleman. I don't think I ever heard him say that his primary goal was to make Reagan a one term President. Yes, indeed. Also, I believe the Democrats in those days were NEVER referred to as the Party of NO.
 

We need a leader for the whole country.  Obama is a leader only for a collection of minorities that outnumber the center.   Frankly, I don't know how well Romney  will do.    However, he will at least change the direction of where we are headed.

Yes. It seems there are many who believe that if Obama wins again every black man in America will have their way with all the white women.
 
As I said, consider the article a Public Service Announcement.