Latest about NASA AKA My Disgust with the GOP

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I wasn't aware that Orwell really cited a lot of facts. He mostly attacked you on Clinton's role in NAFTA. As for Clinton out-Reaganing Reagan, that's actually a claim made by guru Arthur Laffer.

http://curiouscapitalist.blogs.time.com ... fer_about/

"I don't believe that Bill Clinton was luck. I think Clinton did a great job as president. ... And then he became more Reagan than Reagan: He got Nafta through Congress, against the unions, against his own party. He reappointed Reagan's Fed chairman twice. He signed welfare reform, that you actually have to look for a job to get welfare. He cut government spending as a share of GDP by 3.5 percentage points. No president ever has come anywhere near him on that. He had the biggest capital gains tax cut in our nation's history in '97. He got rid of the retirement test on Social Security. This guy was a great president and I voted for him twice."


So, he is good at rhetoric.


So..... just meaning well is sufficient enough? I dunno, I mean, I would think that higher qualifications are needed, because I doubt that anyone goes into office intending horrible things. And really, is intending the size of government as important as intentions for the welfare of the people or some other metric?

I never said anything about Bill Clinton being luck. May I remind you that Bill Clinton's administration followed that of a man who pretty much based his presidency on riding Reagan's popularity, but didn't entirely follow the agenda as I'm sure you realize.

What I did say was that at the time all this is mentioned that he was doing these things, he also happened to be doing them with a GOP congress run by one of Reagan's foremost students: Newt Gingrich. Newt had a plan called the Contract with America.

and btw...it's worth noting that back when I used to take Mr. Rush Limbaugh very seriously, I subscribed to his letter, and he had an interview with Newt in there. Basically, I hate to tell you this...but the entire agenda that Newt Gingrich managed to get Clinton to agree upon...was Reagan's.

Worth noting briefly that not all of a certain President's agenda may necessarily be implemented while he's in office. Little known fact: much of JFK's agenda got implemented by LBJ after his assassination....which wound up assassinating LBJ's approval ratings.

Again, Clinton did not pursue any of this agenda until the GOP regained majority of Congress. And you know the disastrous bills that got his party kicked out of Congress up to that point.

Oh...and don't forget: at the time Reagan was in office, he was dealing with a major Democrat majority in Congress.

In fact...many times his advisors warned him about pushing for tax cuts, as they insisted "they're never gonna go for it". And Reagan said "I have to try"

One other thing about your precious Clinton. Consider his party, and consider who the last guy in his party that was in office. Pretty much at that time, I'm more than positive--especially after the GOP retook Congress, Clinton was likely scared sh!tless of the possibility of heading into Jimmy Carter territory, and seeing a GOP congress, realized he kinda had to "go with the flow", otherwise it'd be another notch against his party.

And Carter was an utter disaster...one of which you cannot at all disagree with me on.

When I say Reagan was extremely naive, I mean that in many cases, he believed in the goodness of people to do the right thing....such as the idiotic reasons he had for agreeing to the Payroll Tax hike of 1983 "I'll raise taxes, but you folks in Congress must agree to cut spending". We all know how that worked out....

He also honestly believed FDR's intentions were indeed acceptable, and did everything possible to preserve FICA in process of his tax cuts...which in the process may've cut the tax cuts "down to size" a bit, unfortunately....

I would think that republicans, being nationalistic to "some" extent, consider NASA as one of the great achievements of Americans because it also shows how "advanced" are the USA in a scientific domain. =.= (Meh, just speculating)

To a large extent NASA is a great intellectual achievement and Republicans in general are not particularly intellectual.

But they do take pride in whatever "good" achievements come out of the USA, do they not?

You mean, for instance, Social Security?

well in fairness, comedian Mark Russell once made a speech where he referred to the Democrats as the "brainwashed", and Republicans as the "braindead"

Yeah....sounds about right to me.

I think that's probably the gist of it. The space program is a source of a lot of national pride and the belief of American exceptionalism. I do think there is a lot of real value in it as well but can you guys(Americans at least) imagine China planting their flag on the moon or even landing on Mars before we could? For as great of a human achievement, it would be devastating for a lot of Americans.

Last edited by Jacoby on 31 Jan 2010, 4:19 am, edited 1 time in total.

To attribute any type of brain at all to either party is to assume something not yet demonstrated.

well, this actually brings me to a quote I came up with some time ago:

"in order for one to trust government to do the right thing, one must first trust those that elect government to do the right thing"

That's like expecting a bubble gum machine to taste like bubble gum. The voters produce the legislators but obviously the voters haven't any idea about what should be done.

Last edited by Sand on 31 Jan 2010, 4:27 am, edited 1 time in total.

well, that's not exactly a new occurrence, my good man.

Aside from objecting to your condescension I wasn't realloy trying to express a novelty. Merely stating the obvious.

I actually wasn't trying to be condescending good sir; my apologies if I came off that way.

Right. Sorry I misinterpreted.

One would think that Obama would be more supportive of the space program. But with the US economy in the dumps, the space program is likely not the top priority right now.