Dick Morris

[StoopTroup]

just on The O'Rielly Report.

Says Romney will not only win.....but it will be by a good margin.

I'd like to know what vitamins he takes.

Also....next up....

Jay Leno vs Dennis Miller

If Bill thinks it's worth time on his show.....it must be some good stuff.

[landrun]

just on The O'Rielly Report.

Says Romney will not only win.....but it will be by a good margin.

I'd like to know what vitamins he takes.

Also....next up....

Jay Leno vs Dennis Miller

If Bill thinks it's worth time on his show.....it must be some good stuff.

I don't trust this guy. He served on Clinton's staff during his presidential campaigns and now says the dems are incompetent. I think he changes sides often.
He does a good job making his points because he seems to be a decent communicator. But in the end, I'm not sure he even believes what he's saying. I think he's just out to make a buck selling books etc..

[StoopTroup]

Could be.

[OU_Sooners75]

I am still undecided about dick morris. But didn't he say that Obama was going to win in 2008 and Bush would win in 2004?


The guy may seem sketchy to many, but seems to have a very good insight into politics.

[olevetonahill]

If hes right , Im start suckin Hos Toes

[MamaMia]

I don't trust this guy. He served on Clinton's staff during his presidential campaigns and now says the dems are incompetent. I think he changes sides often.
He does a good job making his points because he seems to be a decent communicator. But in the end, I'm not sure he even believes what he's saying. I think he's just out to make a buck selling books etc..Bill Clinton and Obama are not cut from the same cloth.

[olevetonahill]

Bill Clinton and Obama are not cut from the same cloth.

Yea, Ones a Whore mongerin sonofabitch. The other is a community organizin empty suit sonofabitch :beguiled:

[SanJoaquinSooner]

The pubs would have been better off with a true conservative, maybe that Minnesota lady or the pizza guy. Pubs cant get excited about a moderate pretending to be a conservative. It reinforces the "fake" persona of Romney.

[landrun]

The pubs would have been better off with a true conservative, maybe that Minnesota lady or the pizza guy. Pubs cant get excited about a moderate pretending to be a conservative. It reinforces the "fake" persona of Romney.

I'm a conservative and I'm not sure you're right. A bad repub is better than a good dem. As in, Bush was better than Obama.
I can't speak for others, but I'm more excited about Romney than I was McCain for certain.

[olevetonahill]

I'm a conservative and I'm not sure you're right. A bad repub is better than a good dem. As in, Bush was better than Obama.
I can't speak for others, but I'm more excited about Romney than I was McCain for certain.

Now how in hell would you Know that a bad Pub is better than a GOOD Dem?
There aint ever been a goodun to compare a Bad pub to.

[TheHumanAlphabet]

The pubs would have been better off with a true conservative, maybe that Minnesota lady or the pizza guy. Pubs cant get excited about a moderate pretending to be a conservative. It reinforces the "fake" persona of Romney.

With The Socialist sucking badly and getting Americans killed, people would rally behind a booger to vote The Socialist out. Romney will do well. Besides all those socalledmainstram polls over poll dims to make The Socialistlook better.

[Curly Bill]

Some people, not to mention any names, take things a lot worse than vitamins...

...just sayin.

[diverdog]

I'm a conservative and I'm not sure you're right. A bad repub is better than a good dem. As in, Bush was better than Obama.
I can't speak for others, but I'm more excited about Romney than I was McCain for certain.

Bush better than Obama? You guys collective amnesia is about as bad as I have ever seen. It is almost laughable.

You can lay the seeds of the Arab spring at Bush's door steps. Do you remember all the righties talking about Democracy in the ME? How you guys touted the elections in Iraq, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia? Need I go on? Obama has carried on W's pro-Democracy policies to the letter. This is a clear case of you better be careful what you ask for.

One of your conservatives frames it best:


Praise allah! GOP Platform Pimps Obama-Bush “Arab Spring” (http://www.debbieschlussel.com/53766/barf-gop-platform-praises-obama-bush-arab-spring/)By Debbie Schlussel (http://www.debbieschlussel.com/)
As I’ve said many times before on this site, Mitt Romney’s foreign policy will be no different from Barack Obama’s foreign policy, which is no different from George W. Bush’s foreign policy. There will be no change on Iran, with useless diplomacy and sanctions being the order of the decade. There will be no change in the Mid-East, where support for a Palestinian state and Arab Spring “democracy” to elect despotic Al-Qaeda/HAMAS/Muslim Brotherhood/Hezbollah forces is the order of the day. And the Republican Party platform (http://www.gop.com/2012-republican-platform_Exceptionalism/#Item26)–which was supposed to be dictated by conservatives–has this nauseating endorsement of the disastrous, destabilizing, anti-Western Arab Spring. They try to have their cake and eat it, too, by claiming that while they support democracy for the Islamic world, only if the democracy is not HAMAS or Hezbollah. Huh? Um, every single Arab Spring regime change has brought in some form of HAMAS or Hezbollah, even if it isn’t by that name. Welcome to Islamic democracy, chumps. How is the Muslim Brotherhood in power in Egypt not the same as HAMAS? It IS HAMAS. Do these morons actually know where HAMAS came from? The GOP Platform also says that Islamic terrorism has nothing to do with religion or Islam. Please tell me how this is different than Obama-Bush for the last 11.5 years.






"Our commitment to democracy is being tested in the Middle East," he said in a televised Washington speech in defence of US democracy.Mr Bush said dictators in Iraq and Syria had "left a legacy of torture, oppression, misery and ruin".
Turning to Iran, he warned that "the regime in Tehran must heed the democratic demands of the Iranian people, or lose its last claim to legitimacy".
But some governments in the region were "beginning to see the need for change", he said, citing Morocco, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and Yemen.


http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/shared/img/o.gif
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/img/v3/start_quote.gif Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/img/v3/end_quote.gif


President Bush

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/img/v3/videonews.gifWatch the speech in full (http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/events03/world/amer/nb_bush06nov.ram)

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/img/v3/inline_dashed_line.gif

Excerpts: Bush's address (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3248639.stm)
Democracy in the Mid-East (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3250773.stm)




He also stressed that "Islam is consistent with democratic rule" in his speech to the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington.
He said that to say Islam and democracy were incompatible was "cultural condescension".

[diverdog]

Dems Conceding Bush Was Right on Middle East



Monday, 07 Feb 2011 11:53 AM
By David A. Patten



Egypt’s perilous standoff over democratic reforms has put the Obama administration on the defensive, with no clear end in sight to a stalemate that has exposed the White House to fire from all sides of the political spectrum.

Some analysts have given President Barack Obama credit for managing a complicated, volatile crisis as well as anyone could reasonably expect.

http://www.newsmax.com/getattachment/7120cc94-1881-40e6-b6a9-0b24fffce545/egypt-protests.jpg.aspx?width=150&height=126But many other foreign-policy experts, worried about the historic wave of unrest now spreading across the Middle East, are reconsidering George W. Bush’s pro-democracy “freedom agenda,” which the Obama foreign policy team largely rejected as too simplistic.

The policy questions continued to emerge Sunday even as representatives of the Egyptian government met with opposition leaders and offered major concessions in an effort to quell the uprising.

The regime of Egyptian strongman and staunch U.S. ally Hosni Mubarak promised to release imprisoned protesters, end restrictions on reporters covering the crisis, and institute constitutional reforms.

The early reaction from the tens of thousands of demonstrators in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, however, suggested Egypt’s masses may not be satisfied until Mubarak is out of power, and possibly out of the country.

The Obama administration is drawing increasing fire for its apparent reluctance at times to bid Mubarak adieu:


Nathan Brown, director of Middle East studies at George Washington University, said on CSPAN’s American Journal on Sunday that administration officials “have been shifting positions and calibrating constantly, and it certainly looks as if it’s an administration that’s kind of reeling with the punches. But to be fair to them, what they’re trying to do is react to realities on the ground.”
Richard Land, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, who has just returned from a trip to Saudi Arabia, tells Newsmax that Obama’s soft-peddling of criticism toward Middle East despots has been “shameful.” “[George W.] Bush was absolutely right on his freedom agenda,” Land said. “He said the only way you’re going to fix this [terrorism] problem is to drain the swamp. … I think Obama’s whole human-rights agenda has been sadly missing. I mean, I know a lot of Democrats who are shocked by how Kissinger-esque it has been.”
Longtime Bush antagonist Maureen Dowd credited Bush in part, saying he “meant well when he tried to start a domino effect of democracy in the Middle East and end the awful hypocrisy of America coddling autocratic rulers. But the way he went about it was naive and wrong.” By contrast Dowd said Obama was “calling around this week to leaders in the region to stanch the uncontrolled surge of democracy in the Arab world.”
The New Republic literary editor Leon Wieseltier said Obama’s policy of engagement and multicultural globalism has had “the effect of aligning America with regimes and against peoples.” He added, “This was the case with our response to the Iranian rebellion in 2009, and it was the case with our response to the Egyptian opposition until a few hours ago. The striking thing about Barack Obama’s ‘extended hand’ is how utterly irrelevant it is to the epochal events in Egypt, and Tunisia, and Iran, and elsewhere.”
Stephen Carter, a Yale professor and left-leaning author, told The Daily Beast readers that the protests in Egypt prove Obama’s predecessor was right to push for democracy in the Arab world. The foreign-policy establishment largely derided Bush’s democracy push as naïve, but now some observers say it could have given the United States more credibility in the Arab world.
Elliott Abrams, a Bush-era deputy secretary of state, conceded that Bush’s actual policies didn’t always live up to his “freedom agenda” rhetoric. “But the revolt in Tunisia, the gigantic wave of demonstrations in Egypt and the more recent marches in Yemen all make clear that Bush had it right -- and that the Obama administration's abandonment of this mind-set is nothing short of a tragedy,” Abrams wrote in a Washington Post op-ed.
Conservative columnist Jeff Jacoby of The Boston Globe wrote that human rights and reform has clearly not been a priority of the Obama administration, adding: “It is unworthy of a nation as great and free as ours not to promote the values it most esteems. It shouldn't take an upheaval in the Arab street to remind us that it is always in America's interest to promote liberal democracy.”
In a story titled “Was George Bush right?” The Economist stated that “Mr. Bush was indeed a far more active champion of democracy than Mr. Obama has been,” but said Bush still bears responsibility for invading Iraq.


In a 2003 speech Bush stated: ‘Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe - because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty. As long as the Middle East remains a place where freedom does not flourish, it will remain a place of stagnation, resentment and violence ready for export."

The Bush administration often failed to act on its pro-democratic ideals however, particularly during the administration’s second term when it turned its attention to seeking peace in the Middle East.

Some observers believe Bush’s policies and the Iraq War actually delayed the onset of human-rights concerns in the Middle East, however.

Brown, the George Washington foreign policy expert, told CSPAN that the aftermath of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, which nearly triggered a civil war, raised fears in the eyes of many Arabs over the chaos that could accompany democracy: “The Iraqi situation made it possible for Arab regimes to be able to say to their own societies: ‘You really want to push this? You really want to push mobilization of people out into the street? This is where we may be headed,’” he said.


© 2012 Newsmax. All rights reserved





Read more on Newsmax.com: Dems Conceding Bush Was Right on Middle East (http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/egypt-bush-obama-middle/2011/02/07/id/385242#ixzz26bHB51Yw)
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now! (http://polls.newsmax.com/repeal/?PROMO_CODE=B683-1)

[diverdog]

73FwkRQ7ZnQ

[SanJoaquinSooner]

I'm a conservative and I'm not sure you're right. A bad repub is better than a good dem. As in, Bush was better than Obama.
I can't speak for others, but I'm more excited about Romney than I was McCain for certain.


Ultimately what matters are the swing voters in the swing states. A lot of them aren't crazy about Obama but may see Romney as an out-of-touch stiff. And the donks are bitch-slapping Romney on the medicare issue in Florida.

Shame on the pubs if they can't whip Jimmy Carter 2.0. How low could they go?

[LiveLaughLove]

The pubs would have been better off with a true conservative, maybe that Minnesota lady or the pizza guy. Pubs cant get excited about a moderate pretending to be a conservative. It reinforces the "fake" persona of Romney.
Wishful and thinking, but mostly wishful.

[LiveLaughLove]

Bush better than Obama? You guys collective amnesia is about as bad as I have ever seen. It is almost laughable.

You can lay the seeds of the Arab spring at Bush's door steps. Do you remember all the righties talking about Democracy in the ME? How you guys touted the elections in Iraq, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia? Need I go on? Obama has carried on W's pro-Democracy policies to the letter. This is a clear case of you better be careful what you ask for.

One of your conservatives frames it best:
Interesting.

Iraq's elections you can lay on Bush. The rest of 'em, Dear Leader's.

Until this week every dem loved the arab spring (some little American socialist wannabes even went over there and joined in, and almost got killed) and believed it started when Dear Leader spoke in Cairo.

Now that it's gone south, it's <drum roll please> Bush's fault! Yes, I said, it's Bush's fault.

What ya mean that excuse has been used 800 bazillion times? Use it again, and again and again.

Personally, I have no amnesia and I would take Bush 1000x over Obama.

[LiveLaughLove]

The Obama administration, which since the beginning of the Arab Spring has aided, directly or indirectly, the forces that brought down the dictatorial regimes in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen and Lybia, now finds itself in a position of helplessness.


One of the most recent such meetings took place a week ago, during a visit to Jerusalem by the acting Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs, A. Elizabeth Jones.

"The Americans were constantly trying to supply explanations and excuses for events in the post-revolution Arab states, and simply ignored the problems," one senior Israeli official said


A similar pattern emerged as to Israeli efforts to prevent a clause being added to the new Tunisian constitution outlawing normalization or contacts with Israel. The Foreign Ministry asked the United States to intervene, but was not satisfied by the response. "They told us, 'Don't worry, it's going to be all right, the clause will be left out,' but the clause is still in there," the official said.

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israeli-foreign-ministry-officials-say-u-s-ignored-arab-radicalization-1.465210

You're going to have a hard time convincing anyone this is Bush's fault.

Everything is pointing to our admin and the State Dept. being negligent in so many ways that it cost 4 men their lives.

We now have most likely, enemies in several places that we didn't have before Bush left office. Enemies that wield the sword of religious zealotry. And yet, we make apologies, blame a film no one has seen, and as this article says, bury our heads in the sand.

But it's Bush's fault. Oh and Romney shows he isn't worthy of being President because he points out the lunacy. That about cover it?

[LiveLaughLove]

dbl post

[SCOUT]

Any apology for hurt feelings in the face of public unrest is lunacy. There is a time and place for everything, but when the rubber meets the road you can't always be the passive apologetic.

In this instance, there isn't even a reason to be the apologetic. We were attacked. Period. End of discussion. Why they are pissed is immaterial.

[SCOUT]

I should add... Peace through strength is a military strategy attributed to Reagan but was coined by Sun Tzu. Apologizing doesn't achieve the desired goal in this type of situation. I appreciate the thought, but the reality is different.

[hawaii 5-0]

I missed the apology.

Did Libya apologize? Romney?

Link?

5-0

[StoopTroup]

I was thinking that President Bush had something happen that President Obama hadn't seen until last week. Personal Death threats by Arabs.

I'm thinking that once you have tried diplomacy after a President that even his Father had launched a War in an Arab Country and it all goes into the crapper as soon as some opportunists kill one of our Ambassadors in Libya and then use a YouTube Trailer that was available on the internet long before the murder of our Ambassador...that you might possibly change your approach to Foreign Policy in the Region.

I don't think what has happened in the last week is the President's fault. I don't think it's President Bush's fault either. Some Arabs used some of our planes to attack our Country 11 years ago. Things ain't been to chipper since and I'm really surprised this all didn't happen when President Obama strangled OBL with his bare hands. :D

[diverdog]

Interesting.

Iraq's elections you can lay on Bush. The rest of 'em, Dear Leader's.

Until this week every dem loved the arab spring (some little American socialist wannabes even went over there and joined in, and almost got killed) and believed it started when Dear Leader spoke in Cairo.

Now that it's gone south, it's <drum roll please> Bush's fault! Yes, I said, it's Bush's fault.

What ya mean that excuse has been used 800 bazillion times? Use it again, and again and again.

Personally, I have no amnesia and I would take Bush 1000x over Obama.

You have both a bad memory and a unique way of rewriting history. Unfortunately for you history is not on your side.

[diverdog]

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israeli-foreign-ministry-officials-say-u-s-ignored-arab-radicalization-1.465210

You're going to have a hard time convincing anyone this is Bush's fault.

Everything is pointing to our admin and the State Dept. being negligent in so many ways that it cost 4 men their lives.

We now have most likely, enemies in several places that we didn't have before Bush left office. Enemies that wield the sword of religious zealotry. And yet, we make apologies, blame a film no one has seen, and as this article says, bury our heads in the sand.

But it's Bush's fault. Oh and Romney shows he isn't worthy of being President because he points out the lunacy. That about cover it?


To be fair this is all part of a ****ed up US policy that dates to WWI. We have been in bed with so many dictators in that part of the world it ain't even funny. The US should pull all our embassy staff and all Americans from those countries. After that we declare them terrorist states, freeze all their assets and stop trade. Let them wallow in their own ****.

[SanJoaquinSooner]

Wishful and thinking, but mostly wishful.

Can you imagine how much fun a Bachmann vs. Obama race would be?

Obama is a slam dunk in California, so my vote won't matter in terms of who wins. I voted for McCain in 08. Not sure who I'm voting for this time. If that Libertarian New Mexico guy is on the ballot, maybe him.

[hawaii 5-0]

It's too bad there aren't 2 Moderates running.

Maybe then this country could move forward again.

5-0

[sooner n houston]

Diverdog and livelaughlove, thanks for those links, great articles.

[OU_Sooners75]

To be fair this is all part of a ****ed up US policy that dates to WWI. We have been in bed with so many dictators in that part of the world it ain't even funny. The US should pull all our embassy staff and all Americans from those countries. After that we declare them terrorist states, freeze all their assets and stop trade. Let them wallow in their own ****.

Wow...hell has froze over. Something I agree on with diverdog.

[TheHumanAlphabet]

I missed the apology.

Did Libya apologize? Romney?

Link?

5-0

No, The Socialists State dpartment apologized for the movie trailer andhurt feelings.

[KantoSooner]

I was wondering over the last week, why no one from either party simply said, "Look, we have freedom of speech in our country. Including freedom for people to say offensive, dumbass things. If you don't like being offended, stop watching, reading or listening to things that become offensive to you. Reacting with anger or violence to the words of idiots is infantile at best and reduces you to the level of idiocy of the producer of such offensive material." Instead we got these tormented formulations trying to prove what great guys we are to people who obviously don't have the mental tools to participate in meaningful conversation.

And then the pope weighed in with his personal idiocy condemning all speech that might make people mad or hurt people's feelings. What a ****ing moron. Shouldn't have been surprised, however. His org has been against open thought or discussion for the last 2,000 years.

And then we have the polls. Really unbelievable. A pet mouse would be thrashing Obama by 25 points any other election year. Romney can't manage to eke out a stable single digit lead. No! He's actually trying to lose the thing. Whether I agree with the Republicans or not is immaterial at this point. My inner politician is insulted by the incompetence of the party's leaders.

(drove to Houston and back over the past 4 days. Dodging texans in pickups made me cranky.)