Naw, just a few well-crafted queries to Google and years at arguing politics in various venues.



I believe you have a college education, so I'm thinking it's very possible you were exposed to courses in Logic and Debate? So, you're probably familiar with the Latin term 'tu quoque'? (For those who haven't taken such courses, it translates to 'you too' and in this context is used to show possible inconsistencies in an opponent's argument, in that the same criticisms the opponent levels at the person/position/actions apply equally to his own). So while I think Obama's fundraising and possible influence peddling is certainly fair game for scrutiny, I'm not so sure you're being a fair and unbiased arbiter by virtue of your profession and it's own lobbying arm.

Let's face it, a conservative Rebublican president would probably be more to your liking and a better friend to the profession. Still, RPAC is probably reading the tea leaves and sees a Democratic sweep in the making and wants to hedge its bets by giving slightly more money to the Democrats during this cycle.



Somehow, I can't picture Thomas Jefferson or any of the founding fathers saying something similar. Granted, those were different times, but we've all heard in civics class that they apparently thought little of the two party system and the career politician. To me, lobbyists are one-in-the-same-- indeed, many career politicians _become_ lobbyists when the voters put them out to pasture.



Yes, that's one promise Fast Eddie has failed to make good on, isn't it? Still, it seems to me that the housing bubble bursting is a far better explanation for the difficulties than playing the "Pin the Tax on the Donkey". Cheap money and fraud did far more damage than taxation ever could.


-Kerry O. "Politics, n., A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage."- Ambrose Bierce in 'The Devil's Dictionary'

Sailor, I see you're a Realtor. So I know you're a member of the National Association of Realtors. And I know the NAR has their own PAC called RPAC.

A little Googling came up with the following:

1) If a non-member tries to find out from the NAR/RPAC website who RPAC supports and how much was spent on whom, the website restricts access to that information only to members.

2) An mission statement published on the website Political Base for the NAR:

"The NAR aims to help its members become more profitable and more successful through lobbying, research, professional development opportunities, and networking conferences."

(Uh-oh, the dreaded 'L' word!)

3) If one goes to Open Secrets and looks at the "Heavy Hitters" list that says "Here you'll find total contributions for the 100 biggest givers in American politics since 1989--information that exists nowhere else", you'll find that the NAR comes in at 3rd place with $32,336,506.

4)Open Secrets says, of the NAR lobbying efforts: " One of its biggest issues in recent years has been a move toward deregulating the financial services industry." Well, we all know that what that begot (can you say"BearStearns"), and probably the members of the NAR benefitted more than most on cheap and easy subprime mortgages.

5) Also from Open Secrets: "One of the keys to the group’s success: It supports Democrats and Republicans almost equally."


And then there was this:

"FEC COLLECTS $78,000 CIVIL PENALTY
FROM THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS 527 FUND

WASHINGTON – The Federal Election Commission (FEC/ the Commission) announced today that it has reached a settlement with the National Association of Realtors 527 Fund (NAR 527) in connection with violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act (the Act/ FECA) during the 2004 election cycle. The fund, which is associated with the Chicago-based National Association of Realtors (NAR) will pay $78,000 to settle charges that NAR 527 failed to register and file disclosure reports as a Federal political committee and accepted contributions in violation of Federal limits and source prohibitions.

During the 2004 election cycle, NAR 527 received $2.9 million from the National Association of Realtors and received no other funds. NAR 527 spent approximately $2.8 million to create and distribute various public communications that clearly identified nine Federal candidates. Almost $2.3 million of that amount financed dozens of direct mail pamphlets and newspaper advertisements. The Commission concluded that certain of these direct mail pamphlets and newspaper advertisements expressly advocated the election of federal candidates and that NAR 527’s spending indicated that its sole purpose was to advocate the election of federal candidates.

If an organization receives contributions or makes expenditures in excess of $1,000, and its major purpose is involvement in Federal campaign activity, it must register with the Commission and abide by the contribution restrictions and reporting requirements of the Act. These include limits on the amounts that can be contributed to the group and prohibitions on receipt of funds directly from corporations. NAR 527 registered with the Internal Revenue Service as a “Section 527” organization – a tax exempt group whose function is to influence the selection, nomination, election, or appointment of any individual to Federal, State, or local public office or office in a political organization, or the election of Presidential electors. NAR 527 failed to register as a political committee with the FEC even though it met the statutory threshold for political committee status and had Federal campaign activity as its major purpose.

NAR 527 agreed to pay a civil penalty, register as a political committee and disclose its activities to the public in reports filed with the Commission."

You might want to watch where you're throwing that boomerang, Sailor. :)

-Kerry O.

I don't suppose the words "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" apply to your having called me a 'jackass' in these threads some time ago, eh? And as far as libel, methinketh thou doth protest too much as you stood complacently by while it went on right under your nose recently in that homosexual poll thread you started some weeks ago. Or how about reporting some of your brethern when they post about unbelievers being 'sad souls'?

Give it a rest. And follow your _own_ rules that you made a grand show of posting here recently, too.

-Kerry O.

Well, Fans of Irony, isn't this special? The same conservatives who about go ape over the thought of two consenting adults of the same sex having relations to the point of wanting to see them go to jail for it are all worried about their own tomcatting with people _under_ the age of consent getting them the same kinds of penalties?

Wow...

-Kerry O.

I like to think of this phenomenom as 'Ralph Kramden Christianity.'


-Kerry O.

'Carnal' mind? You _really_ don't know me if you think that. But then you're just looking to hit back, aren't you?

-Kerry O.

So, if you're so happy with your choices, why are you here pounding your fist on the proverbial desk? How does my agnosticism impede your understanding and worship of what you perceive to be god?

See, I think you just can't stand someone not agreeing with you and your cookie cutter world and it makes you go postal. Ever hear the saying to the effect that you can catch a lot more souls with sugar than with bile?


-Kerry O.

And were I to meet you in person, I would feel no obligation whatsoever to convert you away from a belief system that seems to work well for you. To do so would be violating your boundaries.

As Einstein said in his General Theory of Relativity, different observers moving under the influence of different forces on different vectors will make different, but equally valid observations based on their frames of reference and motions. You have evidently experienced something I may not have, and vice versa. Isn't it just enough to leave it at that, and call it a day?

"Your daily life is your temple and your religion... And if you would know God, be not therefore a solver of riddles. Rather, look about you and you shall see him playing with your children. And look into space; you shall see him walking in the cloud, outstretching his arms in the lightning and descending in rain. You shall see him in flowers and then rising waving his hands in trees." - Kahlil Gibran in "The Prophet"


-Kerry O.

Gee George, coming from a religious family, don't you think I've heard this about a million times before? Do you know what Einstein said about trying the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?

Bible thumpers generally don't have stellar reputations outside their small spheres of influence, and not without good reason-- they haven't learned how to _listen_. It's their way or the highway to hell, boundaries be damned.

And they'll think nothing of ignoring signs on private property to wake one out of a sleep to answer one's door so they can preach at one. And when one is polite and tells them one is an unbeliever, "No thanks, have a nice day", they see that as a challenge and get all haughty. If not downright arrogant and abusive.

Sheesh, why can't you accept that NO means NO.

-Kerry O.

Whoa. Just because I don't believe as you do, that doesn't make me evil, unenlightened or anything else you judge harshly. I got to work most days (even work a lot of Sundays), I pay my taxes, I obey the laws of the land and I am by concious and considered choice an agnotic and secular humanist. I'm sorry the binary thought patterns that go hand in glove with religious fundamentalism blind you to the fact that such narcissism turns a lot of people off. Like the Bible tells you, know what you can change and accept that which you can't and STOP getting in people's faces with statements like you've made above. That's why you get blowback when you proselytize so singlemindedly, NOT because people are evil or stupid.

-Kerry O.

He started his career being a Democratic operative who worked for both Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Mario Cuomo.

Maybe NBC should look at someone from Fox's "Fair and Balanced" stable? I can just hear it now:

:::::cue Meet the Press Music:::

...with your host, Sean Hannity."

:::::sound of phonograph needle skating across record:::::

Naw.

Wait. Wait. I know. Howsabout...

:::: rewind sound then 'Meet the Press' theme coming back up to speed::::

".... with your host, Ann Coulter."

Yeah, that should erase anyone's doubt that NBC was part of the left-leaning MSM.


-Kerry O.

Microsoft Works.

-Kerry O.

I've always found that the opening to M. Scott Peck's "The Road Less Travelled" to be pretty spiritual:

"Life is difficult. This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it."

2. What do you think about Jesus? Who is Jesus?

An exceptional human being whose memory and teachings have often, unfortunately, been transformed into something resembling an Amway franchise.


3. Do you believe in heaven or hell?

I believe in the racial memory. Hell is what human evil creates right here on earth.

4. If you died right now, where would you go?

Been there and back. Nothing special to report.

5. If what you believe isn't true, would you like to know?

Cogito, ergo sum. Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici. Likewise, I'm sure. Oh, and sorry, no sale.

-Kerry O.

I got just about that far, too, same deal. Then I had a Tonto moment, thinking "What's this 'we' crap, Kimmasabbe?" Then I got to thinking about this old post from a Usenet group I used to frequent. Frames the rebuttal rather nicely, I think...
=========

6.50 AM. Dawn. Small town with a grassy hillside sloping up behind it.
Helicopters buzz overhead, and the lights of emergency vehicles flash.

A black car draws up. Tall, dark, handsome priest gets out, followed by a
beautiful red-haired nun. (Though only an expert eye could identify her
suit and blouse as the habit of the Sisters of St Thomas the Doubter.)

They duck under a striped tape barrier.

Friar Mulder (striding up the slope): It's a Presbyterian heresy, you know,
that angels have no free will.

Sister Scully: I don't know, Fox, there's nothing about that in Calvin,
or Luther, or ...

Mulder: Hah! Yes, and you won't find the words 'vapour canopy' or 'C14
decay' in the _Institutio_ either, but would you deny that Creationism
is a specifically Presbyterian heresy?

Scully (quietly): Seventh Day Adventist, actually.

Mulder: Same thing. In the good old days, Mommy would have had them both
burned at the same stake.

Sister Scully looks skywards with a 'God give me strength' expression.

Fire-fighters and other rescue workers pass in the opposite direction,
carrying large pieces of white marble.

Scully: So what has all this to do with what we have here?

Mulder: Lot of fundies in the military. They're the only sort of people
who could chase an angel at Mach 2 and actually bring it down.

They reach the top of the slope and look down the other side. In the
grassy hillside a marble statue of an angel with a 100-metre wingspan
appears to have crashed face down and shattered into a million pieces,
which rescue workers are removing one by one.

A more senior cleric is standing beside Mulder and Scully. Smoke
puffs from under the brim of his hat.

Cigarette-smoking priest: The story is that the statue was being flown
in over the coast when the pilot had to jettison it ...

Mulder (laughs harshly): Statue? Like the flying Christ in _La Dolce
Vita_? At Mach 2? This size? Don't make me laugh.

: Mach 2?

Scully: We've seen the radar traces. We have tapes of the chase.

: You *had* tapes of the chase.

He drifts away.

Mulder (shouting after him): Some day you'll slip up, Cancer Man!

Scully: Now, that's something even *I* wish I could believe.

========

-Kerry O.

Yet, "The Atheist and The Marine" thread is still here, a thread that openly condones violence against fellow human beings??

"Who is John Galt?"

Telling a woman to 'get her head out of her ass if she doesn't like the smell' and then following up later on in the thread by suggesting she's exposing herself by saying she should 'pull down her skirt'? THAT's not only abusive, it's downright CREEPY. If that's your idea of Christian humor.... oh well.


-Kerry O.

None of which excuses your rule-breaking behavior, like making scatological/sexual innuendo when someone calls you on hijacking a thread with off-topic posts you certainly know the audience you yourself targeted wouldn't be interested in hearing. Care to ask the mods about the rules pertaining to that? No?

It looks like your abusive posting just drove off someone for whom you claim to have made this forum. Congratulations, you 'won'.

-Kerry O.

^^^^^^^^^^^^
Ah, the Trojan Horse opens and (to no one's amazement) the proseltyzing just pours out like the ocean in hopes of making another conquest while cloaked by the night.

I don't how you intended to hold any discussions with the people for whom you claim you created this space when you post such narrow-minded essays like this one. Yes, we get that you're on a mission from god to save we poor stooopid unbelievers from ourselves, protestations to the contrary. Trouble is, you've been told many times that we're not interested and if you REALLY wanted to strike up meaningful dialgue, you'd STOP LISTENING WITH YOUR MOUTH.

Of course this is going to cheese you off to no end, but if you could? Please don't whine when about getting paid for your works of deception in the appropriate currency.

-Kerry O.

IMO, that's one of those 'stop thinking here' type platitudes thrown about when someone wants to give that in which they believe credit for all the good things that happen in the world while at the same time shirking any of the blame.

My ancestors had a rather different, grittier saying:

"Wish in one hand and **** in the other and see which fills up first."


Example: World Peace.


-Kerry O.

Case in point, note how the Uber Religionists always hold secular humanism in as high a regard as a brothel.


-Kerry O.