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Is it just me, or has anyone noticed the onslaught of stupidity and ignorance that seems to permeate the airwaves and pollute the sensitivities and common sense of a once brilliant nation?

It is campaign time in the US, and everyone is emotional 4 years after the most emotional Presidential Innauguration I have witnessed in my entire life. I was eating dinner the other night in a restaurant when the NCAA Basketball Game was played aboard the Navy Aircraft Carrier USS Carl Vinson. An old woman acrosss the dining area was explaining to her even-elderly-er husband (with a walker) who coudn't see the TV from his seat. It was Veterans Day, so this game was a special event.
She began to explain to him what was going on, how the flight deck of the carrier was set up with a court and bleachers, etc. At that moment President Obama walked out to the court to deliver a Veteran's Day speech. He and upon the sight of him on TV, she became extrememly emotional. He is the Commander-in-Chief of the US Military of course, so it was very respectful and honorful to the Veterans.

She became loud, ranting and raving, full of contempt and hate. She acted sarcastiaclly impressed when the National Anthem was played, she commented that she was surprised he knew which hand to hold over his heart. Things any US 1st grade child knows how to do.

Then this thought occurred to me:

I wonder what percentage of people like her who enthusiastically hate President Obama, (and I know several, personally) the duly elected President of the United States of America have ever actually listened to him speak, or read what he believes in? The hatred is so intense in some of these people, they refuse to listen to him even give the State of the Union address. What is their hateful opinion based on? If they have no facts to base an opinion on, do they just rely on TV and radio talking heads opinions?

All opinions here WILL BE respected, I have my own, but I want intelligent debate. Give your opinion, but tell us WHY.
The only rule is to respect others' opinions please.

Mr. Obama.....well...he needs a new set of advisors. Me personally. I respect the office but not the man. I start respecting him when he starts axing some idiot's from his circle

well,back during voting,i looked over the main issues and read what both sides (plus a guy named bob.) were going to do about this issue. i didnt agree with obama on any,so therefore i knew i didnt want him as president. as the years moved on and i saw him more,i just didnt like his views on things,so didnt like him being the president. personally,i dont hate him,but dont want him president.

Good point Jihadin, I felt the same way about Dick Cheney my whole life.

Dick Cheney lost some major um....well....I recommend the Darwin Award.....for the hunting accident

lord commissar klimino wrote:well,back during voting,i looked over the main issues and read what both sides (plus a guy named bob.) were going to do about this issue. i didnt agree with obama on any,so therefore i knew i didnt want him as president. as the years moved on and i saw him more,i just didnt like his views on things,so didnt like him being the president. personally,i dont hate him,but dont want him president.

Ok good, you are normal, you vote based on your own self-interest. We all do that. You took the evidence, weighed it against your needs/wants and made a decision. That is the definition of higher cognitive human decision making.

This woman at the restaurant and more like her have not used any thought process. If they have, I want to know the reasoning.




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Jihadin wrote:Dick Cheney lost some major um....well....I recommend the Darwin Award.....for the hunting accident

Yeah dude, that was some kind of cover-up. A quail is the size of your fist at best, he shot a dude's face off!

There are alot of reasons one could hate Obama for. Personally, i dont like him as a person or a president much, but he has my respect, as he is the president of the United States.
Back to reasoning. First off, I think he takes too much credit on things he doesnt deserve, and then blames the rest on Bush. Id rather not get into Bush politics right now, so ill just put it that i think its very unprofesional.
Second, one could say that he shouldnt have won the election. A large portion of his vote was the african american, latino, and basically non caucasian community, who voted biasly towards Obama for obvious reasons.
Third, maybe this lady liked McCain for specific reasons and was raw that he didnt win.
Fourth, as said before, his advisers are pretty bad, and it feels like he cant get anything done.
Myself, these are four of the basic reasons im not a big fan of him.

@Jollydevil thanks, It is interesting, I hadn't considered the "shouldn't be elected" bit, I haven't even heard that before now.
Isn't it good to get voters from more of your population? at least those people are more likeley to vote again in the future?
A "true" election should be from the true population right?

dsteingass wrote:@Jollydevil thanks, It is interesting, I hadn't considered the "shouldn't be elected" bit, I haven't even heard that before now.
Isn't it good to get voters from more of your population? at least those people are more likeley to vote again in the future?
A "true" election should be from the true population right?

Oh of course, however its bad if those voters all decide to vote on a candidate solely by the color of skin.
However, youre right that hopefully these voters will come back again after being encouraged by the last election.

I distinctly remember a comedian (Carlos Mencia IIRC) atributing McCain's policies to Obama and vice versa and people agreed with anything "Obama" said.
After the election in the months leading up to his inauguration I used to tell people that I may not like what he says, but I love the way he says it. Over the course of the last 3 ish years we've gotten to see him go off script a few times and the results are never pretty. His policy has been uninspired and filled with finger pointing and name calling, not just at Bush and the Reps, but even his own party. The most telling was before the midterm elections I remember him saying the Republicans could sit in tha back and come along for the ride or something to that effect, the man has made no attempt at compromise and now the intransigence of congress is the response. It's unfortunate that universal healthcare will bear the brand Obamacare, it could have been a step in the right direction. He appears to me to advocate class warfare. He openly admits to attempting to circumvent the legislative process on the issues of his job bill and gun control. I can sum it up like this: Listened to him, don't like him, don't trust him, won't tolerate him.
It's not so simple as Red and Blue and I don't dislike Obama simply because he is a Dem. Max Baucus is probably the closest thing in national politics to my personal beliefs, but he's a pretty solid Blue Dog and a Montana Dem. The separation between the two is vast.
I would love two see a party split, probably won't happen this electoral cycle, between the Republican extreme right and it's moderate core, and the Democrats extreme left and IT'S moderate core. To give us the extreme left and right crazy wackjobs that give each party a bad name, and two similar but slighty diverse names on the ticket most of America really wants. I may have waxed a bit OT.

Well, I come from a family and area of the Country known as White-bread NW Ohio where passive ignorant racism is the norm. I endeavor to be a part of erasing it from history when these generations die with it. Until then, there isn't much we can do except not teach it to kids like we were taught it. I know that skin-color is an issue with many people on this issue too.

But is that all it is? Race?


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@AustonT thanks man, keep in mind, I am a terrain-maker by-hobby (see my threads if you're into that sort of thing) , so I spend all my free time in that respect. I usually have the History or Military channel on TV as background noise. I haven't followed the pundits at all, just the 6:00 news.

You make so many points I want to think/discuss.

The blame game gets mentioned a lot. But the financial mess wasn't a direct result of any one Presidential Policy, from any Administration it is a National shame brought on by rampant greed on many levels. Some policies have contributed in opening small loopholes, then Slimy lawyer-types find the loopholes and corporations use the loopholes.

Then there is the core problem IMHO. It takes money to campaign for office. The corporations are the only ones with enough money to give, then once elected, politicians need to repay the favor with policy that obviously pays dividends to the corporations in the end. There is nothing we can do about this either.

I think President Obama won with more than just new, non-white votes, I think he won on his principals. But now the debts are coming due. How can anyone get anything done in that environment? I think he had to compromise his principals somewhere in the last 3 years. The cold, ugly reality of the system caught up.

IMO I do believe race had a major influence in the voting block. Also the "Time for change" concept appealed to a lot of younger generation to. I did know whoever was going to be the next PROTUS was going to hit a grind. Basically one can say whatever they're going to do once they're in office is different once they're in office ie a slice of pie to a whole pie.

I also want to expand axing advisors and people to start axing members of congress. I just think we need a whole lot of new blood in congress and congressmen/women with the educational/experience in dealing with issues of the US

Right now the US is going through a fairly ugly period in it's politics, as we're waiting for the nadir of the Southern Strategy to finally hit. It's important to remember that this isn't ahistorical though, plenty of other periods in US history have had incredibly nasty political fights.

Jollydevil wrote:Second, one could say that he shouldnt have won the election. A large portion of his vote was the african american, latino, and basically non caucasian community, who voted biasly towards Obama for obvious reasons.

The obvious, and only correct reason is that he's a Democrat. In 2004 88% of black voters voted Democrat, and it was more than that in 2000. In 2008 the number was barely higher, at about 95%.

Now, exactly why black voters support the Democrats so heavily, with an answer lying in part with historical reasons (Democrats and the Civil Rights movement), and in part with the failure of the Republicans to appeal to black voters.


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AustonT wrote:I distinctly remember a comedian (Carlos Mencia IIRC) atributing McCain's policies to Obama and vice versa and people agreed with anything "Obama" said.

You'll see this with any politician. Sad fact is most voters are what they call 'low information voters'. That is to say they don't know much about the actual policy proposals of one side or the other, and they certainly don't know enough to know if those policies would actually work. So instead they go on personality, if a person seems confident or smart, then their policies probably work. If a person has an impressive life story, then they'll probably act admirably in office.

We don't like to think that our views are decided by things that really are that superficial, so instead we sit there nodding as policies are mentioned, thinking we're giving an informed consideration when really we're just deciding if we like the person behind it or not.


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dsteingass wrote:The blame game gets mentioned a lot. But the financial mess wasn't a direct result of any one Presidential Policy, from any Administration it is a National shame brought on by rampant greed on many levels.

Absolutely. The financial mess is the product of a commitment to deregulation that was not only supported by both parties, it was supported by just about every major political party across the planet. It was a global mistake, and while it'd be easy to say Bush, or Clinton, or the other Bush, or Reagan did it, the truth is a lot messier than that.

But Obama was left with the mess, and there's no point pretending otherwise.

I think President Obama won with more than just new, non-white votes, I think he won on his principals.

He won because we'd just had Bush as president, and people didn't like that guy, and the country was falling into recession in the wake of the GFC. The reason McCain stood out as a candidate in the first place is because he was the only guy with a reputation that rose above the Republican brand, which was utterly poisonous in 2008, but even that wasn't enough to get him over the line.

Now it looks like the opposite might happen.

But now the debts are coming due. How can anyone get anything done in that environment? I think he had to compromise his principals somewhere in the last 3 years. The cold, ugly reality of the system caught up.

I think he's always been a politician of compromise. I don't think that's a bad thing, but it has meant that his results could never have been enough to appease the more idealistic voters that turned out for him in large numbers in 2008.

Look at healthcare as an example, the system is primarily a cost control measure, that came out of Republican policy initiatives. That's never going to appeal to the idealistic leftwingers, who wanted a single payer system giving the same coverage to absolutely everyone. What's surprised everyone has been the hostility with which the Republicans have fought against their own policies being brought forward.

On the Healthcare issue, I know personally, that even as a working adult with Health Insurance, the bills afterwards for a simple set of tests can be enough to break the most stable family. I don't really care how they do it, I just want to be able to be healthy and have enough money left for my hobbies. Did you know that the ONLY large construction projects in my town in the last 3 years have been Humongous hospital expansions? 2 different Healthcare conglomerates have built or expanded 300%! This is how New Yorkers felt in the 1930s when people were starving and they built the Empire State Building regardless.

On the GOP not supporting Blacks...I think the GOP does exactly what their aging constituents want them to do in this case. Except now they do it behind closed doors, in hushed whispers and nods. Since the Civil Rights movement began, they can no longer be open about it.

dsteingass wrote:On the Healthcare issue, I know personally, that even as a working adult with Health Insurance, the bills afterwards for a simple set of tests can be enough to break the most stable family. I don't really care how they do it, I just want to be able to be healthy and have enough money left for my hobbies. Did you know that the ONLY large construction projects in my town in the last 3 years have been Humongous hospital expansions? 2 different Healthcare conglomerates have built or expanded 300%! This is how New Yorkers felt in the 1930s when people were starving and they built the Empire State Building regardless.

Funnily enough, medical costs in the US are so expensive that as an Australian I am required to have travel insurance to go there. I mean, I can head off to Thailand or somewhere actually, you know, dangerous, and travel insurance is advised but not required. But the risk of getting a bang on the head while skiing and being hit up for half a million in healthcare costs is enough that I am not allowed on a plane to the US without travel insurance.

Seriously, your healthcare costs are insane.

On the GOP not supporting Blacks...I think the GOP does exactly what their aging constituents want them to do in this case. Except now they do it behind closed doors, in hushed whispers and nods. Since the Civil Rights movement began, they can no longer be open about it.

I think it's a bit more complicated than that, and a lot of it comes down to Republicans generally fighting against things that black voters generally want, particularly when it comes to the size of social services. But I do agree that if the GOP directly panders to racists, and does so as an official policy to pick up disaffected voters that left the Democrats after the Civil Rights Bill, they really shouldn't get to complain that an overwhelming majority of black voters are picking the other side.

dsteingass wrote:I wonder what percentage of people like her who enthusiastically hate President Obama, (and I know several, personally) the duly elected President of the United States of America have ever actually listened to him speak, or read what he believes in? The hatred is so intense in some of these people, they refuse to listen to him even give the State of the Union address. What is their hateful opinion based on? If they have no facts to base an opinion on, do they just rely on TV and radio talking heads opinions?

Why do you assume that they haven't read what he believes in, listened to him speak, or given him a chance to earn their support? Why do you assume that the only people who dislike the President do so out of ignorance rather than understanding what he stands for?

edit:

dsteingass wrote:On the GOP not supporting Blacks...I think the GOP does exactly what their aging constituents want them to do in this case. Except now they do it behind closed doors, in hushed whispers and nods. Since the Civil Rights movement began, they can no longer be open about it.

You do know that the Republicans were big in supporting the Civil Rights movement, right? And that it was Democrats who opposed the Civil Rights acts?

You're right...
Great Britain isn't what it used to be..

American politics scares me.

Well, the old GOP fell apart live on TV after Nixon, they were done. it wasn't until the GOP had a holy mind-meld with the religious right and blurred the lines of morality and fascism that we have this monstrosity today. People look to Historic Legends and their beliefs like Kennedy and King Jr. when they identify with the Dems idealogically IMHO.

@Biccat - that's what I mean, the parties have somehow switched magnetic poles. from their idealogical smbolism. And because know people who hate him, but refuse to listen to him, stubbornly. I am not kidding. Ask them, they wil ladmit "no, I won't watch that !!@!@" if asked why, just because he's a "socialist" That crap reminds me of the McCarthyism of the 1950's! That is scary.

To get votes, politicians have always played upon people's fears.

biccat wrote:Why do you assume that they haven't read what he believes in, listened to him speak, or given him a chance to earn their support? Why do you assume that the only people who dislike the President do so out of ignorance rather than understanding what he stands for?

Because he described the person as immediately sounding off about the President, and not listening to what he had to say...

Meanwhile, in this thread dsteingass has read the responses, respected and acknowledged each point made as being reasonable reasons to not like Obama.

Really, your comment there was just miles off.

You do know that the Republicans were big in supporting the Civil Rights movement, right? And that it was Democrats who opposed the Civil Rights acts?

And as a student of politics, you'd know that political affiliations change. What matters in determining the black vote is what came after the Civil Rights movement, when disaffected Democrats left the party, and the Republicans initiated the Southern Strategy, picking up most of those voters and swinging the South to being a Republican stronghold.

sebster wrote:I think he's always been a politician of compromise.

I can't help but disagree, he says the same thing over and over again and expects everyone else to compromise. We can agree to disagree on this one.

dstiengass wrote: On the GOP not supporting Blacks...I think the GOP does exactly what their aging constituents want them to do in this case. Except now they do it behind closed doors, in hushed whispers and nods. Since the Civil Rights movement began, they can no longer be open about it.

Had you said "conservatives" instead of the GOP you would have been more correct. If any one party started the civil rights movement it was the Republicans. You may remember we fought a war over it. The heart of the 1964 Civil Rights Act was passed in 1875 (by The GOP) and struck down by SCOTUS. The Democrats, by name one Lyndon Johnson, gutted the 1957 Civil Rights Act the parts filibustered out of that legislation would find it's way into the 1964 Act. JFK was the Democrat that reached across party lines to bring Civil Rights into his party. After nearly 100 years of supporting the Civil Rights Movement the party that was it's strongest partner became it's enemy when a Democrat, one Lyndon Johnson, signed the CRA1964 into law and all the staunch historically racist conservative Democrats jumped ship.
Republicans: freed the slaves, passed the first civil rights legislation, attempted to desegregate government services (sound familiar?), finally desegregated schools, passed more civil rights acts.
Democrats: blocked civil rights at every turn since before the Civil War, then passed the most monumental civil rights legislation essentially lifted from Republicans.

In more contemporary politics your statement is accurate as since 1964-ish the Republicans have opposed the Civil Rights Movement, but to be honest that's pretty late in the game. Strom Thurmond is a good lightning rod for when and why the segregationists flipped. Sorry to reach into the way way back machine.

Shhh . . . Biccat, the public education does not want anyone to know that many if not most Republicans supported the civil rights movement.

They want to teach the parties are static and have not changed in views over the years as well.

Frankly I am a little fed up with both sides of the isle, but my distaste with the President was when he told the attorney general not to enforce a law (yes the gay marriage law" because he "thought" it was "unconstitutional". I don't think the executive branch makes those kind of decisions.

However he is my president, and I would never disrespect him while he spoke in pubic, for the OP

IMHO, the 1950s in the US has to be the worst time ever. We were messing with nuclear weapons before we understood the consequences. When innocent people reported radiation sickness symptoms from fallout (un-reacted isotopes of Uranium and dead-killy stuff) came during the testing process, anyone who questioned if the sicknesses were related to the tests were branded as "Communists". The US seems to me from history to be a very opressive place to live during those times. I don't want to live in an opressive, Orwellian society. To me, that is the definition of hell. The GOP to me, gives me that same, opressive feeling. And yes, I can't help but associate the GOP with the 700 Club, the seperation is not visible to the public if it is there.

I don't want the government, or a church, or anyone to tell me what is moral. That is my business.

McCarthysm infuence on that I believe

I don't want to live in an opressive, Orwellian society.

speaking in a general sense, both parties are guilty of moving us in this direction but on different issues.

just throwing this out there Obama sucks, never liked him never will, i dont want to go in depth because it makes me emotinaly angry


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sorry i didnt see the rules, so basicly im pissed that he turned the greatness of us into the laughing stock of the world

Rogue Wolves wrote:just throwing this out there Obama sucks, never liked him never will, i dont want to go in depth because it makes me emotinaly angry

obama sucks at what? as a person and a father,im sure hes a great guy,but as president.......

Oh that's just Rogue, he doesn't mean no harm
He is a friend of mine, but he edited with his qualification, agry about our National pride. A valid gripe.

but if you want it really, sort of like what commissar said, i dont like what he's doing and untill he does something he has no respect from me

Rogue Wolves wrote:just throwing this out there Obama sucks, never liked him never will, i dont want to go in depth because it makes me emotinaly angry


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sorry i didnt see the rules, so basicly im pissed that he turned the greatness of us into the laughing stock of the world

I hardly think you could credit Obama with turning America into " The laughing stock of the world"...the world was laughing at us long before he got in office.

dsteingass wrote:@Biccat - that's what I mean, the parties have somehow switched magnetic poles. from their idealogical smbolism.

Really, they haven't.

dsteingass wrote:And because know people who hate him, but refuse to listen to him, stubbornly. I am not kidding. Ask them, they wil ladmit "no, I won't watch that !!@!@" if asked why, just because he's a "socialist" That crap reminds me of the McCarthyism of the 1950's! That is scary.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you don't remember McCarthyism of the 1950s. I'm also going to assume everything you know about Joseph McCarthy is based on some middle-school textbook.

dsteingass wrote:To get votes, politicians have always played upon people's fears.

Yes, see particularly the Democrat party during the 2000's. Remember the movie about killing a president? That was awesome.

Bastion of Mediocrity wrote:Shhh . . . Biccat, the public education does not want anyone to know that many if not most Republicans supported the civil rights movement.

True, it breaks up the story that Republicans are the worst evil EVAR!