To read the headlines here you'd almost forget that Americans were not exactly unanimous in clamoring for Mr Obama's almost-trillion-dollar "stimulus" package.

Indeed, a cynic could probably make the case that the second stimulus bill was only passed--aside, of course, from the generous political patronage/pet projects/boondoggles it could generate for Democrats--in order to satiate anticipated public anger once it was realized that the first bailout--you remember, the $700 billion that both Senators Obama and McCain voted to give Hank Paulson and his buddies, with no oversight whatsoever, in order to "save the economy," har har--actually had nothing to do with the overall American economy, but rather was more about finalizing the now-decades-long effort to permanently entrench an "American aristocracy" within our financial/political class. Remember Nixon's short-lived, garishly-festooned "White House Guard"? Well, now they own your mortgage and the entirety of all your children's future labors, from now until we're all long dead, at the least.

I read today that only 8% of the stimulus has been spent so far. And yet everyone in my sphere of observation still arose this morning, breathing and moving...some of them even happy, seemingly.

...and I can say with authority that, in the absence of a bleached-blond mullet, ubiquitous wraparound shades, and a dream-catcher tattoo on his bicep, this man's claims to be who he says he is are highly suspect.

He might have been right about stopping America's war machine, ending government secrecy, and promoting civil liberties, but his insanity is easily demonstrated by his failure to grasp the inherent superiority of America's economic system over the last seventy years.

I mean, seriously, even John McCain and Barack Obama agreed last October on the urgent need to prop up our existing economic structure by giving Goldman Sachs' ex-CEO $700 billion in taxpayer dough with no oversight or accountability. Dr Paul voted against that life-saving piece of legislation, just like the raving lunatic that he is.

If shielding wealthy corporatists from negative consequences for any actions whatsoever doesn't justify ever-increasing taxes funneled to our principled politicians and their friends, what does? We need more taxes, and our federal government needs even more power over the financial lives of Americans. They just shouldn't extend that unquestioned power to domestic surveillance, foreign policy and military matters. It's easy to draw the line, right?

Ron Paul is a nut.

I know that he served as an active agent for a foreign government (the Israeli Defense Force) while the USA was at war with Iraq in 1991 but I did not know he was religiously observant.

Good to know.

He believed in a limited federal government and the primacy of an unrestricted marketplace in determining production.

He did not believe that the state should interfere with, or take control of, private enterprise. He would never have nationalized entire sectors of the economy such as banking and manufacturing, and he would have been filled with unbridled disgust at the idea of a government official, say, firing the CEO of a car-manufacturing company and installing someone more politically favorable instead.

So the idea of calling Hitler a socialist is clearly absurd.

How about if we all, myself included, cut the bullshit for a minute and acknowledge the reality: the last forty years of high-gear "American Empire" politics have rendered the terms "left" and "right" (which were initially defined in pre-Revolutionary France for Christ's sake) dialectically useless?

Who the hell is conservative or liberal anymore? "Liberals" who support corporate welfare, pre-emptive war, drug prohibition, torture, detaining American citizens indefinitely without trial, and unlimited government surveillance? Or "conservatives" who support corporate welfare...and pre-emptive war, drug prohibition, detaining American citizens indefinitely without trial, torture and unlimited government surveillance?

Which is which, everybody? Help me out.

Define "socialism" and then outline Hitler's policies while in control of Germany.

If "fascism" is right-wing by definition, then right-wing has no meaning anymore. Because we live in a fascist country, replete with a hidden police-state apparatus, zero government accountability, and full state sponsorship of entrenched private corporations at the expense of individual citizens.

And, while I enthusiastically acknowledge that much of this happened under "Republican" watch, a significant amount of that has also occurred under a "left-wing" party, the American liberal Democrats. I hear rumors that Obama's new health care "reform" will include a provision LEGALLY REQUIRING me to buy insurance from a private "health care" company. Thanks, Comrade! Or Fuhrer, or...er, whatever. Just please don't disappear me for speaking out.

a) Some nut shoots an abortion doctor in Kansas

b) Some nut shoots a couple of teenage US Army recruits in Arkansas

c) some nut shoots a security guard at the Holocaust museum in Washington DC

e) It all depends on if they voted 'D' or 'R'

d) All these events represent isolated criminal activities that have no significance except to illustrate how America's political class is literally tearing this country apart at the seams

If you answered 'D', congratulations, you are probably already on a Federal watch list of dangerous dissidents.

and e comes before d....oh hell, obviously I've been on this site for way too long.