The Official Inauguration Thread.....

[Luvin Da Blues]

I'm going to keep my blab shut on political and economic topics for awhile. (Yes, I know, about time. And I won't talk religion either. )

I'm lucky and a bit atypical in being able to debate any topic without confusing criticism of my ideas with attacks on me as a person. What I too often forget is that many people just can't distinguish the two. Since I don't want to seem to offend people, I'll just shut up for while.

By the way, please don't construe this as an apology. I'm not apologizing because when I do, people accuse me of being insincere.

Wise words, Debates on politics, economics or religion are ones that that no one side will ever win.

[GMichael]

I'm going to keep my blab shut on political and economic topics for awhile. (Yes, I know, about time. And I won't talk religion either. )

I'm lucky and a bit atypical in being able to debate any topic without confusing criticism of my ideas with attacks on me as a person. What I too often forget is that many people just can't distinguish the two. Since I don't want to seem to offend people, I'll just shut up for while.

By the way, please don't construe this as an apology. I'm not apologizing because when I do, people accuse me of being insincere.

Doesn't seem like an apology to me. Does that mean we're good?

[Feanor]

Doesn't seem like an apology to me. Does that mean we're good?

We're good !!!

[kexodusc]

I'm going to keep my blab shut on political and economic topics for awhile. (Yes, I know, about time. And I won't talk religion either. )

I'm lucky and a bit atypical in being able to debate any topic without confusing criticism of my ideas with attacks on me as a person. What I too often forget is that many people just can't distinguish the two. Since I don't want to seem to offend people, I'll just shut up for while.

By the way, please don't construe this as an apology. I'm not apologizing because when I do, people accuse me of being insincere.

Hey Feanor, I hope you'll still provide comments...The discussions are generally interesting and thought provoking and your opinions and sense of history are often fair and accurate. I think people agree with you here as much as they disagree.

I would just ask you try balancing your comments with tolerance and a bit more respect.
I.E., lose words like stupidity, calls for shame, and pair of one fingered salutes. That stuff goes beyond the realm of debate, and approaches slander. You can say that the US shouldn't have picked Bush without calling them stupid, ya know? I know we all get emotional or excited at times, but your message gets lost in the scorn, diluted by bias, and such rhetoric can't help but be offensive, intended or not.

FWIW I'd suspect no less than 50% of Americans share many of your opinions, and certainly the US wouldn't be the only country in North America to have a bad leader who got in with less than half the popular vote. ($64 billion deficit? what happened to that $100 million dollar surplus, we were promised in October anyway?)

No hard feelings...

[Feanor]

...
and certainly the US wouldn't be the only country in North America to have a bad leader who got in with less than half the popular vote. ($64 billion deficit? what happened to that $100 million dollar surplus, we were promised in October anyway?)
...

You're right about that!

[nightflier]

All that being said, I think it bears reminding that we Americans are not that knowledgeable about the world outside our borders. Whether this is a cumulative failure of several decades of chipping away at education, or that the news outlets are just not reporting real news anymore, or simply that we are no longer interested, it is still a fact that we are slipping. The test scores of high school graduates in this country are now some of the lowest in the Westernized world. Adults are probably not far behind. Even College graduates are severely deficient in anything outside their majors. The point being that it would be a fallacy to presume that this does not affect our voting habits.

These factors also pose severe restrictions on our ability to lead, innovate, and maybe even survive as a world superpower. Military might can only go so far in maintaining that supremacy. At some point, our generals need the smarts to make the right decisions too. So it is with some anticipation that most of us should interpret a new direction for education in this country. Simply put, what we've had hasn't worked, folks.

The Bush Jr. administration deserves criticism for failing to address this effectively, and we as a nation deserve some rebuke for letting him get away with doing this for two terms straight. You can say what you want about Clinton and Carter years, but test scores rose by the end of their administrations while they fell by the end of the Reagan and Bush administrations. This doesn't give anyone the right to call us all stupid and raise middle fingers, especially since many good people tried to combat these trends during the down years. But it also does not acquit us all of blame. As voters, we all had a hand in it, myself included.

[Rich-n-Texas]

Hey Feanor, I hope you'll still provide comments...The discussions are generally interesting and thought provoking and your opinions and sense of history are often fair and accurate. I think people agree with you here as much as they disagree.

I would just ask you try balancing your comments with tolerance and a bit more respect.
I.E., lose words like stupidity, calls for shame, and pair of one fingered salutes. That stuff goes beyond the realm of debate, and approaches slander. You can say that the US shouldn't have picked Bush without calling them stupid, ya know? I know we all get emotional or excited at times, but your message gets lost in the scorn, diluted by bias, and such rhetoric can't help but be offensive, intended or not.

FWIW I'd suspect no less than 50% of Americans share many of your opinions, and certainly the US wouldn't be the only country in North America to have a bad leader who got in with less than half the popular vote. ($64 billion deficit? what happened to that $100 million dollar surplus, we were promised in October anyway?)

No hard feelings...

I think kex, as always, hit the nail square on the head with every statement here.

[kexodusc]

I'm not one to be too critical here, in person I've been guilty of foot-in-mouth far too often. I know how easy it is to get carried away without intent to harm.
Nobody's perfect.

[Auricauricle]

I continue to put my foot in my mouth, but I still love a good thick, juicy steak now 'n then...

[02audionoob]

Wise words, Debates on politics, economics or religion are ones that that no one side will ever win.

No one ever wins a debate on solid state vs. tubes, either.

[bobsticks]

I'm going to keep my blab shut on political and economic topics for awhile. (Yes, I know, about time. And I won't talk religion either. )

I'm lucky and a bit atypical in being able to debate any topic without confusing criticism of my ideas with attacks on me as a person. What I too often forget is that many people just can't distinguish the two. Since I don't want to seem to offend people, I'll just shut up for while.

By the way, please don't construe this as an apology. I'm not apologizing because when I do, people accuse me of being insincere.

Yeah, Kex hit it on the head, it's the ad hominems that cross the line. Feanor, you seem to me like a cat I could sit down with, throw some Bach on the Maggies, have a cup o' joe, and argue all day long--and probably have a fine time doing it. While often nettlesome on a personal level you never engage in an uninformed argument. I respect that.

At the same time folks have different perspectives and have seen different things that are formative of their opinions and practices. Even Americans. Perhaps one of the consequences of being relatively prosperous, free and alive all at the same time is that you have take a certain amount of crap from the rest of the world. It ust gets a little difficult when often times (though not in your case) it's the same people that have their hands out. The cumulative effect can be upsetting.

You and I rarely agree on the role of government or taxation. Fine. I suspect your view might be different if you were in America paying over sixty percent of what you make into a system from which you derive no greater utility that the vast majority who pay nothing. I italicized "in America' because it's an important qualifier. If you want to see shameful waste spend some time perusing this old chestnut: http://www.cfda.gov/

Americans are often one issue voters. The problem arises in that there are only two parties with fairly different agendas. I suspect if you polled us you'd find that an overwhelming majority would be in favor of either scrapping the system or bolstering the ability of third parties to make some headway. Perhaps the most recent voter turnout is indicative of a trend toward progressive political involvement. In any case, too often the choice boils down to the lesser of two evils or the least ugly sister. That diversity can make for strange bedfellows.

The point is, Bill Bailey, you seem like a good character and I'd hate to see your involvement lessen. I enjoy our occassional jousts and always learn from the different perspoective. We might disagree but you remind me, from time to time, that I need to be grateful for who I am, where I'm from, and my place in this world...and, yeah, maybe I need to enhance my calm and be more mindful of my fellow man...just don't call me names while I'm doing it.

Peace,
Sticks

[Auricauricle]

Beautifully said, 'Sticky Man!

[Luvin Da Blues]

Beautifully said, 'Sticky Man!

He haz a wae wid da werds, don't he.

JM & Mr.P, does he talk this eloquently in person??? Inquiring minds wanna know.

[Pat D]

Bush was also not being inaugurated during the worst economic disaster since the great depression. Obama has made our economic woes his #1 priority. Am I the only one who thinks the money spent on "this" inauguration seems to be excessive during this time? Regardless of who had been elected, if that person has spent this kind of money with our economy in the tank, I would still be blasting him/her. Obama said in several of his recent speeches Americans are going to have to tighten up their belts and make some sacrifices to get through these bad economic times. Well, he has started out by setting a great example.

Again, DC business as usual.

There were quite a few people in the capitol for Obama's inauguration, so with that in mind, the expenses don't seem so out of line.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/poli...ry/865947.html

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Yeah, Kex hit it on the head, it's the ad hominems that cross the line. Feanor, you seem to me like a cat I could sit down with, throw some Bach on the Maggies, have a cup o' joe, and argue all day long--and probably have a fine time doing it. While often nettlesome on a personal level you never engage in an uninformed argument. I respect that.

At the same time folks have different perspectives and have seen different things that are formative of their opinions and practices. Even Americans. Perhaps one of the consequences of being relatively prosperous, free and alive all at the same time is that you have take a certain amount of crap from the rest of the world. It ust gets a little difficult when often times (though not in your case) it's the same people that have their hands out. The cumulative effect can be upsetting.

You and I rarely agree on the role of government or taxation. Fine. I suspect your view might be different if you were in America paying over sixty percent of what you make into a system from which you derive no greater utility that the vast majority who pay nothing. I italicized "in America' because it's an important qualifier. If you want to see shameful waste spend some time perusing this old chestnut: http://www.cfda.gov/

Americans are often one issue voters. The problem arises in that there are only two parties with fairly different agendas. I suspect if you polled us you'd find that an overwhelming majority would be in favor of either scrapping the system or bolstering the ability of third parties to make some headway. Perhaps the most recent voter turnout is indicative of a trend toward progressive political involvement. In any case, too often the choice boils down to the lesser of two evils or the least ugly sister. That diversity can make for strange bedfellows.

The point is, Bill Bailey, you seem like a good character and I'd hate to see your involvement lessen. I enjoy our occassional jousts and always learn from the different perspoective. We might disagree but you remind me, from time to time, that I need to be grateful for who I am, where I'm from, and my place in this world...and, yeah, maybe I need to enhance my calm and be more mindful of my fellow man...just don't call me names while I'm doing it.

Peace,
Sticks

I hope you run for President. Can I be your Chief of Staff? Very well said!

[bobsticks]

I hope you run for President. Can I be your Chief of Staff? Very well said!

Bro-o'-mine, I coudn't even make it through the first round of questioning unless it was some kind of atavistic, third party Freak Power endeavor...

...but should it come to pass, you're the man with the plan.

[Feanor]

Yeah....
Even Americans. Perhaps one of the consequences of being relatively prosperous, free and alive all at the same time is that you have take a certain amount of crap from the rest of the world
...
Peace,
Sticks

I think there is a certain analogy between attaching a person's ideas and attaching him/her personally, and attacking the policies of the U.S. government and attacking American as a nation.

I've tried with limited success to point out that I greatly respect the American nation while despising the Federal administration, the most recent one in particular. A lot of people outside the U.S. feel that way. And bear in mind the the U.S. is the elephant in the room: almost every area of government policy affects the rest of the world to some degree.

Given the diversity of opinion within the U.S. itself, its seems irrational that quite a few Americans so resent any & all external criticism of its government's policies.

[02audionoob]

We're all fond of analogies in this forum, so how about this one...An outsider criticizes your brother. Says he's arrogant, narrow-minded and nosy. How do you feel about that? More than one person in this forum chooses his words very carefully and posts replies that require me to use the "define:" command in the Google search box. But I'll just say what's on my mind...thesaurus or not.

People outside the US and even some inside the US criticize our government in a way that certainly sounds like a criticism of all of us. ForeverAutumn wrote in this forum that the Canadian media presents a certain image of Americans that doesn't sound like something that would make me proud. Our reputation precedes us in probably every country in the world. When I walk into any place outside the US I sometimes wonder...have they spotted me?

I saw earlier in this thread what read like an apology by an American for the level of education in the US. Fine...so a kid in Texas can't find Norway on a map. OK...he can't find Kansas on a map. We are who we are. We don't have a responsibility to the entire world to educate our children. We owe it to ourselves to educate our children. Although I live in a red state, I'm a college-educated urban-dweller. As demographics would predict, my political leanings are leftward. So you'd probably think I'm appalled at the state of education, especially in my home state. Well, maybe. Maybe not. Does the grapefruit farmer in the Rio Grande Valley need an education for the US to prosper? I doubt it. Will he be unhappy because of his lack of education? I doubt it. I've got fairly close experience with the education thing, being the first man on my mother's side of the family to go to college. I'm proud of my family and we're all proud to be Americans. And no...we can't find Norway on a map.

[Grendel2000]

I suppose this is a good time to introduce myself.

I have known "Mr. Sticks" since we were young lads. In fact, I've known the man since around the fifth grade and we were best friends for a goodly portion of that time. We recently reconnected after about a 14 year absence - it was me he was visiting when we went to Mr. P's place to check out his system (Hello Mr. P! Thanks for the hospitality!).

All I'll say is that "Bob" is an enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded by a mystery. Sometimes I've thought he may be the Devil himself but lately I think he may be working for the other side after all (one can hope, right?). He's one of the smartest, most interesting people I've ever met and I'm sure you already realize that you're lucky to have him here.

That being said - HE WILL NEVER BE PRESIDENT! Just trust me on this one folks. NOT GONNA HAPPEN!

With that said, and a hearty hello to all, I will open the floor to questions regarding the semi-mythical "Mr. Sticks". I shall answer them to the best of my ability, keeping in mind of course that I am not known for my objectivity or truthfulness.

WHOOPS!

Bob left himself logged in on my machine when he was here - The previous post should have been from MY account!

Many apologies!

[bobsticks]

WHOOPS!

Bob left himself logged in on my machine when he was here - The previous post should have been from MY account!

Many apologies!

Hey Slapnuts,

Give me a call....and stop stealin' my schwagg...

[nightflier]

Slapnuts? Been listening to AC/DC again, huh?

BTW, Sticks, that was a mighty long post (not your usual fare).

[GMichael]

Styx has been a victim of the latest new crime wave called, accidental identity theft. It's all the rave these days.

[Auricauricle]

From the looks of it, he's become...me!

Oh, God....That means....(Gasp!)

[Grendel2000]

What have I gotten myself into?

Heh...

[Auricauricle]

Better look before ya leap, G!