Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by RedsBaron
Senator Byrd: "Hitler's originality lay in his realization that effective revolutions in modern conditions are carried out with, and not without, not against, the power of the State....Hitler never abandoned the cloak of legality."
Senator Byrd compared Republicans to Hitler, not Hitler's Nazis, although I can't see a huge distinction between compared to Hitler himself or the Nazi party.
It's troubling that the quote has an "..." in it. The "..." is a tool of some to distort what someone said. I can't find the quote in the orginal article posted. Can you give me a link to the article you got it from?
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by Redsfaithful
So you're okay with the "nuclear option" and doing away with filibustering?
I'm ambivalent on the so-called "nuclear option." The filibuster does allow the minority to prevent the majority from enacting its program, which someone will naturally think is a good thing if he or she is in the minority, although the most famous use of the filibuster was to prevent the enactment of civil rights legislation, hardly an honorable accomplishment.
I understand the argument of "you Republicans will be back in the minority someday so you'd better preserve the filibuster so you can use it then." However, as Senator Byrd himself noted in the 1970s in his speech which I earlier posted, one Senate cannot bind another procedurally. Even if the Republican majority leaves the number of votes necessary for cloture at 60, this won't prevent a Democratically controlled future Senate from changing the rules when Demcrats are again in charge.
We do use supermajorities for certain matters, requiring a 2/3 vote in the Senate to ratify treaties and to propose Constitutional amendments (3/4 of the states must then vote to ratify the amendment before it takes effect). Some conservatives have from time to time advocated supermajority requirements to pass tax increases. I'm not uniformly against all supermajority requirements.
In general, I favor majority rule, with certain protection for minority rights. Many representative bodies, here and abroad, including the U.S. House of Representatives, do not allow for filibusters such as are at issue in the U.S. Senate. I don't know that bodies are any less democratic than, or are inferior to, the Senate.
There is also the question of if you do require a supermajority, how big must it be? As I previously noted, during the filibuster of attempts to enact the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a 2/3 vote was required to invoke cloture (67 Senators). Seantor Byrd himself led a successful effort in the 1970s to reduce the requirement to a 3/5 vote (60 Senators). I really would like to hear him explain why 67 was too many, but 51, or say 55, isn't enough Senators for cloture to be invoked. Maybe 60 really is "just right" but why?
If I was a Senator, how would I vote on this issue? I do know that the so-called "nuclear option" would not be my first preference. However, I also know that for a minority to filibuster certain nominees to the lower federal bench for years, denying them a vote in the full Senate that they evidently would win, would not be something I would be inclined to go along with.
In the end, Senator Byrd's arguments would probably help me make up my mind. When someone compares me to Hitler, compromise is not the first reaction I have.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigRedHotPotato
It's troubling that the quote has an "..." in it. The "..." is a tool of some to distort what someone said. I can't find the quote in the orginal article posted. Can you give me a link to the article you got it from?
I found it at http://www.hughhewitt.com/#postid1420.
RF sais he has read all of Senator Byrd's speech, which he found to be "inspired," so if my source misquoted the speech, I'm sure RF will let me know.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by RedsBaron
I found it at
http://www.hughhewitt.com/#postid1420.
RF sais he has read all of Senator Byrd's speech, which he found to be "inspired," so if my source misquoted the speech, I'm sure RF will let me know.
Thanks for the link. I now have new insight how your opinions are shaped/formed by the extremist websites you visit.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigRedHotPotato
Thanks for the link. I now have new insight how your opinions are shaped/formed by the extremist websites you visit.
"Thanks" for the slam of the web site, one I've rarely visited. Did the blogger misquote Senator Byrd, or do you just want to hurl insults?
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Are you denying the website is on the extremist side?
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
From the discredited hack website GOPUSA (former home of Jeff Guckert, GOP reporter and gay escort)
Quote:
In his new book, "If It's Not Close, They Can't Cheat - Crushing the Democrats In Every Election and Why Your Life Depends On It," Hugh Hewitt writes that preventing Democrats from stealing this year's presidential election is a matter of survival for America. In the process, he strips bare the strategy of deceit that has been the win-at-all-costs hallmark of the Democratic Party for most of the last half-century.
Yup, real mainstream stuff. Democrats are trying to steal the election. ;)
http://www.gopusa.com/commentary/dpa.../dp_1019.shtml
There are more quotes from Hugh and his extremist views.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
It wouldn't be a RedsZone political thread without someone demeaning someone else's opinion because of a source they used for a quote or article.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigRedHotPotato
Are you denying the website is on the extremist side?
There are extremist websites on both sides. Can you show where the website RB posted distorted what Byrd said?
Here is the same quote from the NY Times and The Baltimore Sun...
"We, unlike Nazi Germany or Mussolini's Italy, have never stopped being a nation of laws, not of men," he said. "But witness how men with motives and a majority can manipulate law to cruel and unjust ends."
Mr. Byrd quoted the historian Alan Bullock, saying Hitler "turned the law inside out and made illegality legal." He said the plan to limit filibusters would have a similar effect.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/03/politics/03byrd.html
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nat...ck=1&cset=true
Are they partisan rags also?
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to undestand what Byrd was implying. Byrd is quite an articulate man. He knew exactly what he was doing and saying. Why even use the term "Nazi" in your analogy when discussing Repub's tactics on filibustering, if you weren't trying to imply something or another? Like I said, he knew what he was doing/implying. And now he, along with his various Democratic spokesmen are doing damage-control and re-explaining what he really meant.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Byrd must have an enormous campaign war chest. He, Helms, Kennedy and Metzenbaum are great reasons in support of term limits.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Yup, the NY Times and the Baltimore Sun are both part of the Corporate media. Isn't the New York Times the home of the reporter who is protecting a treasonious (sp) indivdiual who disclosed the name/identify of a covert CIA operative?
However, I'll admit the Byrd went overboard. But I don't think he was comparing "all" republicans to Hitler. He was comparing the Nazi Party (who Hitler was the leader) tactics to the tactics of the GOP senators today. I don't believe he said anything about putting 6 million jews to death or invading Poland.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigRedHotPotato
Are you denying the website is on the extremist side?
I don't know. As I previously posted, I've rarely visited the web site. I got the link from The Weekley Standard, which is a neoconservative :eek: newsmagazine.
Was Senator Byrd misquoted?
Since you are evidently more familiar with the web site than I am, what makes it extremist? Does it compare political opponents to Hitler?
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
I just glanced at it, but what turned me off was the description of Democrats as winning the "stupidity" award.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigRedHotPotato
Yup, the NY Times and the Baltimore Sun are both part of the Corporate media.
Corporate media?? Who then do you turn to for your objective and non-partisan news info?
Quote:
However, I'll admit the Byrd went overboard. But I don't think he was comparing "all" republicans to Hitler. He was comparing the Nazi Party (who Hitler was the leader) tactics to the tactics of the GOP senators today. I don't believe he said anything about putting 6 million jews to death or invading Poland.
You use Hitler in any analogy, knowing this man's history and atrocities, and you're asking for trouble. One needs to be careful.... Byrd wasn't. Because there is no comparison whatsoever, nor analogy to be drawn (Repub, Dem, etc). If he wants to disagree with the Repubs motion to change the filibuster law then that is fine. But don't use such ridiculous and extreme analogies when you know there's a chance it could come back and bite you. And especially when there are those in our society today who suffered greatly at the hands of the Nazi atrocities and really don't appreciate the term being thrown around so loosely.
I really don't know what is going on with these recent references/analogies over the last year or so to describe people, ideologies, beliefs to that of Hitler; but it's been going on quite frequently. Again, I think it's done for the effect it causes. And it is insulting.
It was proclaimed awhile back on here that Hitler was a Christian. And everyone who read the thread knew exactly where that individual was going with the statement (to somehow taqke a "slap" at people of faith).
Personally, IMO, it's uncalled for, and I wish people would refrain from doing so. Hitler and all he stood for was nothing short of evil. No one compares to him.
Re: Pork Barrel in the News
Quote:
Corporate media?? Who then do you turn to for your objective and non-partisan news info?
That's a problem. Isn't it? Redszone?