Disgusted with Right Wing Apologists

• like_that

  

  Cue the "lol called it" response.
• friendfromlowry

  Jesus Christ you two.
• like_that

  

  Alright now that I slept on it, I can say COA and I let that get out of control. It's no secret we have similar personalities. Hands up I will take responsibility in that shit fest. I think we addressed enough about the sources, and I am just going to agree to disagree, however I would like to readdress Cruz's criticism now that I actually had time to dig deeper into it.
  
  You can look at the GOP primary thread. I think Cruz is a needledick, and it is no shocker to me that he always rubs people the wrong way. It is a shame, because he actually holds beliefs that TRUE conservatives and right moderates could get behind. Overall though, I think the criticism regarding this bill is not justified(and that goes to the others who voted against it). Wapo and CO are not telling the whole story.
  
  No matter how much I hate a politician on either side, it's hard for me to see any of them blatantly voting against something such as a bill to help people in dire need after a national disaster. None of them are THAT stupid. If someone voted against a bill that prevented people from murdering puppies, knowing how the game is played in DC, my first thought wouldn't be "wow this guy is a piece of shit," my first thought about be "what else was in the bill." If you actually look at the bill itself and take a look at how much and what they actually spent money on, here are some facts to consider:
  
  -The bill was advertised as an "urgent" bill to provide relief for hurricane sandy. This is very important considering how the funds were/are appropriated.
  -The budget control act (2011) already provided a loophole for emergency situations allowing congress to spend above appropriated funding for disasters for that specific fiscal year.
  -This bill was considered urgent, yet nearly a year later 74% of the bill remained unspent. The funds from that bill still have not been spent in its totality. How is that urgent?
  -$8M went to Homeland Security (an already bloated department) to buy cars and equipment. Isn't that what the Department of Homeland Security's original budget is meant for? How was this $8M used for urgent relief?
  -$16B to block grants. I am not going to open pandora's box on block grants, but a lot of them end up being bullshit and do nothing to help anybody. How was this 16B used for urgent sandy relief again?
  -$11B to mitigation projects. Very vague (like most of our spending bills) and just like any other "project," we most likely will never get to see the results.
  -$150M to alaskan fisheries. Why?
  -$41M to military bases. Again, the DoD is the most bloated department. Why do they need extra funding for this? Are you telling me the DoD has a yearly budget of 500B+ and they haven't set aside funds for a "rainy day" situation such as this? Also I know a couple people who worked at McGuire AFB (one of the closer bases that would be affected by Sandy), and neither said significant damage was done.
  -$5.2M to the DOJ. Why is the DOJ getting funding for national disaster purposes?
  -$4M to the Kennedy Space center in Florida. lolwut?
  -$2M to the Smithsonian institution in DC. Living in DC, I don't recall Sandy hitting DC that hard at all. Sure as hell not hard enough to cost the Smithsonian $2M in damages.
  
  Did Cruz exaggerated when he said 2/3 of the bill was pork? Probably. Was he wrong when he said the bill was full of pork when you consider it was an "urgent" bill for sandy? I don't think so consisdering where the money went and they didn't even spend all the money within a year. It comes down to the classic game that is played by Capitol Hill, where they advertise bills in a certain way that it would make any representative/senator look terrible on the surface for voting against it.
  
  I hate bills that are proposed and then they tie other shit to it that is outside the scope of the purpose of the bill. It is bush league politics and it is big reason why our government spends our tax dollars irresponsibly and why we are 20T in debt. I wish ever politician would vote against bills that try to tie in other bullshit. We all would be much better off.
  
  
  tl;dr: Cruz exaggerated, but he isn't wrong the bill was filled with bullshit. I don't think Cruz voting against the bill makes him a piece of shit.
• CenterBHSFan

  

  I'm not mad at Cruz over this. I suppose that you would have to be predisposed to be upset with whatever he does/doesn't do to begin with. Unfortunately this is how our political system has, over time, been hardwired into our minds. This is absolutely true over the last handful of years.
  Looking over the list of what was actually in the bill, I can't understand why or how anybody's hair is on fire over it. If you truly want our government to be financial responsible to itself and more importantly to "we the people", then we have to be able to look objectively at it; which can many times be excruciatingly hard to do.
• QuakerOats

  It is the continual use and misuse of Other People's Money by D.C. in order to buy votes and secure political futures. It is and has been, a damn disgrace. If we have a massive disaster, create a bill that funds the cleanup etc.....what happened related to the Sandy bill was disgusting; Cruz was right, again.
• Commander of Awesome

  

  like_that;1869412 wrote:Alright now that I slept on it, I can say COA and I let that get out of control. It's no secret we have similar personalities. Hands up I will take responsibility in that shit fest. I think we addressed enough about the sources, and I am just going to agree to disagree, however I would like to readdress Cruz's criticism now that I actually had time to dig deeper into it.
  
  You can look at the GOP primary thread. I think Cruz is a needledick, and it is no shocker to me that he always rubs people the wrong way. It is a shame, because he actually holds beliefs that TRUE conservatives and right moderates could get behind. Overall though, I think the criticism regarding this bill is not justified(and that goes to the others who voted against it). Wapo and CO are not telling the whole story.
  
  No matter how much I hate a politician on either side, it's hard for me to see any of them blatantly voting against something such as a bill to help people in dire need after a national disaster. None of them are THAT stupid. If someone voted against a bill that prevented people from murdering puppies, knowing how the game is played in DC, my first thought wouldn't be "wow this guy is a piece of shit," my first thought about be "what else was in the bill." If you actually look at the bill itself and take a look at how much and what they actually spent money on, here are some facts to consider:
  
  -The bill was advertised as an "urgent" bill to provide relief for hurricane sandy. This is very important considering how the funds were/are appropriated.
  -The budget control act (2011) already provided a loophole for emergency situations allowing congress to spend above appropriated funding for disasters for that specific fiscal year.
  -This bill was considered urgent, yet nearly a year later 74% of the bill remained unspent. The funds from that bill still have not been spent in its totality. How is that urgent?
  -$8M went to Homeland Security (an already bloated department) to buy cars and equipment. Isn't that what the Department of Homeland Security's original budget is meant for? How was this $8M used for urgent relief?
  -$16B to block grants. I am not going to open pandora's box on block grants, but a lot of them end up being bullshit and do nothing to help anybody. How was this 16B used for urgent sandy relief again?
  -$11B to mitigation projects. Very vague (like most of our spending bills) and just like any other "project," we most likely will never get to see the results.
  -$150M to alaskan fisheries. Why?
  -$41M to military bases. Again, the DoD is the most bloated department. Why do they need extra funding for this? Are you telling me the DoD has a yearly budget of 500B+ and they haven't set aside funds for a "rainy day" situation such as this? Also I know a couple people who worked at McGuire AFB (one of the closer bases that would be affected by Sandy), and neither said significant damage was done.
  -$5.2M to the DOJ. Why is the DOJ getting funding for national disaster purposes?
  -$4M to the Kennedy Space center in Florida. lolwut?
  -$2M to the Smithsonian institution in DC. Living in DC, I don't recall Sandy hitting DC that hard at all. Sure as hell not hard enough to cost the Smithsonian $2M in damages.
  
  Did Cruz exaggerated when he said 2/3 of the bill was pork? Probably. Was he wrong when he said the bill was full of pork when you consider it was an "urgent" bill for sandy? I don't think so consisdering where the money went and they didn't even spend all the money within a year. It comes down to the classic game that is played by Capitol Hill, where they advertise bills in a certain way that it would make any representative/senator look terrible on the surface for voting against it.
  
  I hate bills that are proposed and then they tie other shit to it that is outside the scope of the purpose of the bill. It is bush league politics and it is big reason why our government spends our tax dollars irresponsibly and why we are 20T in debt. I wish ever politician would vote against bills that try to tie in other bullshit. We all would be much better off.
  
  
  tl;dr: Cruz exaggerated, but he isn't wrong the bill was filled with bullshit. I don't think Cruz voting against the bill makes him a piece of shit.

  
  To your first part, I agree and also admit to throwing fuel on the shitfest essentially making my own thread unreadable.
  
  As for your second part, this was a solid A+ post, would read again. I would love to have a continued intelligent discourse. When I get some time tonight, I'll look into this. Assuming it's true (I have no reasons to assume you made up BS, not your MO) why the fuck can't Cruz message this better? Christ, doesn't he have a PR/Marketing person on his team?
• Heretic

  

  Commander of Awesome;1869436 wrote:To your first part, I agree and also admit to throwing fuel on the shitfest essentially making my own thread unreadable.
  
  As for your second part, this was a solid A+ post, would read again. I would love to have a continued intelligent discourse. When I get some time tonight, I'll look into this. Assuming it's true (I have no reasons to assume you made up BS, not your MO) why the fuck can't Cruz message this better? Christ, doesn't he have a PR/Marketing person on his team?

  If Cruz was good at messaging things, he wouldn't have gotten circles run around him by a half-wit reality star even worse than Hillary did.
• O-Trap

  

  Just saw this thread.
  
  
• BoatShoes

  like_that;1869371 wrote:Even a broken watch is right twice a day.

  This was basically how the liberal media reacted when Donald Trump finally appropriately condemned the fascists...
  
  Is it any wonder nobody gets along? bad faith is presumed in those with whom we do not share ideology - or so it seems.
  
  (And For the Record - Pelosi should have been ousted after her FIRST trouncing)
• BoatShoes

  HitsRus;1869269 wrote:^^^^I would have thought that GIF would be more applicable to boatshoes when I call out progressives for what they are.
  
  He rails against "White identity" politics... while his Regressive buddies(tHe Liburulz) play identity politics to the hilt....Didn't you know all republicans/conservatives are racist, sexist, bigots! They are all homophobes and Islamophobes too!
  but but but the NAZIs are so much worse than the oh so small number of radical fringe leftists!

  I don't agree with leftist identity politics. My point in the overly verbose post that no one will read is that you routinely act just like they do e.g. demonizing those with whom you disagree and blaming Donald Trump on liberals instead of acknowledging the GOP/mainstream conservatism's own abetting of Trumpism like antifa basement dwellers blaming white supremacy and oppression for their own failure.
• BoatShoes

  CenterBHSFan;1869414 wrote:I'm not mad at Cruz over this. I suppose that you would have to be predisposed to be upset with whatever he does/doesn't do to begin with. Unfortunately this is how our political system has, over time, been hardwired into our minds. This is absolutely true over the last handful of years.
  Looking over the list of what was actually in the bill, I can't understand why or how anybody's hair is on fire over it. If you truly want our government to be financial responsible to itself and more importantly to "we the people", then we have to be able to look objectively at it; which can many times be excruciatingly hard to do.

  Everyone's a socialist when disastrous peril strikes at home. Even James Madison acquiesced and signed the charter for the Second National Bank when it was necessary to deal with the financial turmoil following the War of 1812 and this was a founding father who argued that the First National Bank was unconstitutional! Ted Cruz is no different. His hypocrisy is only especially delightful because his douchebaggery and shamelessness are probably only rivaled in U.S. politics by Ohio's own Josh Mandel.
• O-Trap

  

  BoatShoes;1869455 wrote:... the overly verbose post that only one person will read ...

  FIFY
• BoatShoes

  Commander of Awesome;1869389 wrote:Back on topic, so trump picks former devry university dean to head US dept of ed unit meant to police fraud.
  
  Conflict of interest anyone?
  
  Same devry that settled with the FTC for $100M for defrauding student.

  Horrible choice by any possible reasoning - even if you don't even think the U.S. Department of Education should exist. And this is why the thread is different the the "Disgusted with Trump" thread. Because the response from GOP voters/People who Pretended to vote for Gary Johnson/Gary Johnson voters is so commonly "meh...Hillary would be worse + But Gorsuch! + LiBrulz hate America and are basically antifa + Whatabout the time Obama did X totally non-comparable shitty thing!"
• Commander of Awesome

  

  House Republicans looking at cutting almost $1 billion from disaster accounts to help finance Trump border wall:
  
  Timing & messaging GOP, timing & messaging.
  
  Also, LOL. Total waste of $$$
• CenterBHSFan

  

  BoatShoes;1869462 wrote:Horrible choice by any possible reasoning - even if you don't even think the U.S. Department of Education should exist. And this is why the thread is different the the "Disgusted with Trump" thread. Because the response from GOP voters/People who Pretended to vote for Gary Johnson/Gary Johnson voters is so commonly "meh...Hillary would be worse + But Gorsuch! + LiBrulz hate America and are basically antifa + Whatabout the time Obama did X totally non-comparable shitty thing!"

  I think this is true to a certain extent, but not because of why you think it is. If you take a look around at rural and/or industrial areas, you'll see the difference. The hierarchy of issues probably has education down at like 4 or even maybe 5 on a scale of one to ten. And there is a whole lot more of those areas than people like to think about. And because of that, they are more apt to think about finding a job, looking for your 2 hits of applications per week for unemployment, paying the electric bill and wondering if they can make the house payment and so on and so on.
  If we all lived at Walgreens we might find that the average Trump supporter (or Gary Johnson voter) would have education listed at #1. But that's a pipe dream even if you're living in an urban or upscale area IMO.
  
  For myself, I haven't given two thoughts to it yet.
• gut

  QuakerOats;1869424 wrote:It is the continual use and misuse of Other People's Money by D.C. in order to buy votes and secure political futures.

  Yeah, this explains a lot of why Congress has a 10% approval rating, but 90% re-election rate. Pork is what lets some dumb lawyer get in front of his constituents and talk about all this money he brought back home.
  
  Pork is how Nancy Pelosi or Mitch McConnel get everyone, or almost everyone, in their party to vote along partisan lines.
• gut

  CenterBHSFan;1869469 wrote: If we all lived at Walgreens we might find that the average Trump supporter (or Gary Johnson voter) would have education listed at #1. But that's a pipe dream even if you're living in an urban or upscale area IMO.

  Or maybe you think the Dept of Ed, at least federally, is unnecessary. Or maybe you think the Dept of Ed, at least federally, hasn't done dick in DECADES. Or maybe you think this guy isn't going to matter, anyway.
  
  Or it's all of the above. Or, hey, how about student loan forgiveness - at least I know that crock of shit is never going to happen.
• CenterBHSFan

  

  gut;1869472 wrote:Or maybe you think this guy isn't going to matter, anyway.

  I think you're more correct in your idea than I am in mine lol
• gut

  CenterBHSFan;1869473 wrote:I think you're more correct in your idea than I am in mine lol

  From where I sit, the federal organizations that have real power and real impact are: DOJ, CIA, Homeland, FBI, NSA....EPA, FCC, FDA, SEC, FTC. At the risk of grossly overgeneralizing, essentially the govt levers on freedom and capitalism.
  
  I'm a fan of NASA and the CDC, as well.
• like_that

  

  BoatShoes;1869454 wrote:This was basically how the liberal media reacted when Donald Trump finally appropriately condemned the fascists...
  
  Is it any wonder nobody gets along? bad faith is presumed in those with whom we do not share ideology - or so it seems.
  
  (And For the Record - Pelosi should have been ousted after her FIRST trouncing)

  Well, first the reaction was "it took him long enough!" and then it was the reaction I had. Pelosi has a 30 year history of being trash and saying stupid shit as a politician. Much like Trump, that type of reaction is justified.
• like_that

  

  BoatShoes;1869462 wrote:Horrible choice by any possible reasoning - even if you don't even think the U.S. Department of Education should exist. And this is why the thread is different the the "Disgusted with Trump" thread. Because the response from GOP voters/People who Pretended to vote for Gary Johnson/Gary Johnson voters is so commonly "meh...Hillary would be worse + But Gorsuch! + LiBrulz hate America and are basically antifa + Whatabout the time Obama did X totally non-comparable shitty thing!"

  Sooo the disgusted with Trump thread?
• O-Trap

  

  BoatShoes;1869462 wrote:Horrible choice by any possible reasoning - even if you don't even think the U.S. Department of Education should exist. And this is why the thread is different the the "Disgusted with Trump" thread. Because the response from GOP voters/People who Pretended to vote for Gary Johnson/Gary Johnson voters is so commonly "meh...Hillary would be worse + But Gorsuch! + LiBrulz hate America and are basically antifa + Whatabout the time Obama did X totally non-comparable shitty thing!"

  Bit of a broad brush for the painting you're doing, wouldn't you say?
• QuakerOats

  BoatShoes;1869460 wrote:Ted Cruz is no different. His hypocrisy is only especially delightful because his douchebaggery and shamelessness are probably only rivaled in U.S. politics by Ohio's own Josh Mandel.

  
  LOL ---- hysterical.
• QuakerOats

  Commander of Awesome;1869464 wrote:House Republicans looking at cutting almost $1 billion from disaster accounts to help finance Trump border wall:
  
  Timing & messaging GOP, timing & messaging.
  
  Also, LOL. Total waste of $$$

  
  We could eliminate one-third of the federal government and no one would miss a beat.
  
  
  Carry on with fun show.
• ptown_trojans_1

  

  QuakerOats;1869579 wrote:We could eliminate one-third of the federal government and no one would miss a beat.
  
  
  Carry on with fun show.

  LOL. I'm all ears on how that is possible and actual breakdowns of that...