Thursday, October 14, 2010
Another Nutty Statement by Chris Matthews
Leave it to one of the propagandists at MSNBC to take an inspirational story, such as the event in Chile, and turn it into an ugly statement against those he doesn't agree with politically. Here Chris Matthews, talking with union boss Richard Trumka, says that if the tea party had been down in that mine, they would have killed each other. Trumka, of course, agrees and goes on to say that this is a perfect example of the Republican Party.....
The Republican Party and Chile?
They then go on to list what are generally proper functions of government, safe drinking water, safe airplanes etc. Of course, they don't mention all those other little details of day-to-day life that government has taken over.
Next, Matthews will claim that the tea-partiers would have bombed the mine shut and left all the miners down there.
Sounds pretty silly to me.
ReplyDeleteIf I were a former miners union president, after allowing a decent interval for celebration of the men's safe return, I would begin to raise some questions about the safety procedures and practices of the company that owned the mine. I might, secondary to that line of inquiry, point out that rabid denunciation of "government regulation" that "kills job creation" would allow many more workers to pay for those jobs with their lives.
But what is cited here is foolish. Why do they think that the way to get ahead is to talk like bombastic narcissist talk show hosts? Why don't they try to be a little better? Have they forgotten Barbara Lee's admonition not to become the evil they oppose?
Barbara Lee? You are quoting Barbara Lee?
ReplyDeleteIf I remember her name correctly... the East Bay congress rep, who cautioned not to respond to 9/11 by becoming the evil we deplore, or words to that effect.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that Chris Matthews might keep that in mind, when dealing with talk show hosts of opposite persuasion, and not use methods which make him part of the evil he deplores.
gules: your word verification is a heraldic color term.
On the other hand, rabid calls for more regulation, more oversight, more government controls lead to more stifling of commerce, more rules and policies, more graft and corruption, more waste and ineptitude, and, in the end, more loss of life.
ReplyDeleteI was just reading about the arcane moribund systems and procedures in the Medicare and Medicaid system. Some 10% of the payments are fraudulent and 40% of all payments are "questionable.". Yet in the private VISA MasterCard world, there is less than 1% lost to fraud and they process billions in transactions every day.
Congress, today, can't get data more currrent than 2007 for costs, best practices, etc. yet FedEx and UPS track tens of millions of packages in real time every single day.
Free enterprise, competition and less restrictions simply work better than strangulating regulation masquerading as "oversight."
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Miggie, are you a parrot? I just got it straight that you're male, now I don't know if you're human or not.
ReplyDeleteBarbara Lee was the only member of Congress to vote against our military response to 9-11.
ReplyDeleteThat's right Gary, we are both talking about the same congress rep. Personally, I think a sharp, fast, military mission into Afghanistan was the right thing to do, and we had to have some boots on the ground or nobody in al Qaeda would have had any respect for us at all.
ReplyDeleteIt didn't hurt that there was an army of veterans hardened by thirty years of continuous warfare on the northern fringes of the country, just waiting for a nice superpower to supply them with ammunition and give them tactical air support. George Bush's error was to try to indulge in nation building, which got us stuck with Hamid Karzai, a man unworthy of the sacrifices of our troops. In and out in six months, then leave our newly empowered "allies" to sort things out their own way, not on our dime, would have been the way to go.
But, all that said, Barbara Lee presented her opposition in the very phrase I suggested Chris Matthews might profit by. Self-styled "liberals" should not become the self-styled "conservative" evil that they deplore.
Besides, liberals just can't do Rush or Sean they way Rush or Sean do it. They need to come up with a schtick of their own.
Like you, I have had it with nation-building. It's a fool's errand.
ReplyDeleteAh, now we come to the delicate question. What should President Barack Hussein Obama do about it?
ReplyDeleteThe "right wing" praised him with faint damns for committing to a "surge" in Afghanistan, while those who flatter themselves that they are his "base," (they're not) denounced him for selling them out.
You and I agree that we are getting nowhere with "nation building." Should the president simply pull out? After all, we may need the manpower to invade Iran... Or should we "stay the course" with "nation building" because it would look like we cut and ran if we pulled out? After all, we can't safely denounce Karzai until AFTER our troops are out of there...
Or we could cut a deal with the Taliban: we let you take out Karzai, you promise to let women go to school, and not to let foreign al Qaeda folks back into your emirate, and also you promise not to shoot at us as we leave.