Letters to the Editor
Taliesan
Published Letters: 942 Editor's Choice: 19
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Roberta H
[Read the article: No Hail Mary for Hillary]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Well, lets see:
I have seen Hillary supporters accuse Obama supporters of being elitists, being latte liberals, of being naive, of being the loony left. All repeats of Republican attack lines from 2004.
I have seen Hillary supporters attack Obama and his wife based on patriotism (Him not wearing a flag pin, and his wife saying that this campaign is the first time she has been proud of being an American.)
I have even seen one example calling Obama's anti-Iraq speech traitorous.
I have seen a Hillary supporter talking about how Obama's mother might have been an atheist.
I have also seen Hillary supporters spreading urban legends as a form of attack. Check out Snopes' page on Obama.
I have seen Hillary supporters attack Obama based on him having a very common Muslim middle name, and on his father being foreign.
I have seen Hillary and her supporters playing up on their "Toughness" and preaching a hard line on talking to other countries.
About the only stock rightwing insults that those Hillary supporters haven't used are the variations on "-Hugger."
And I have seen Hillary supporters, after all of this turn around and pretend to be innocents under attack when Obama supporters respond.
This is not about all Hillary supporters. Most Hillary supporters support her for their own reasons, including healthcare, and her impressive work post 9/11.
It isn't even about all Hillary supporters who use personal insults. I do the same. It is which personal insults are used.
There is a definite segment which employs the exact insults and arguments most frequently used by the neocons. If it sounds like a duck, looks like a duck, and walks like a duck it is probably a duck.
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Jim H
[Read the article: Does Obama's baritone give him an edge?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Actually, the content is "unspectacular" because he doesn't go for the easy emotional buttons.
Take inner city unemployment. The easy button is "Illegal immigrants are stealing your jobs."
Here is what Obama said when asked about the issue:
"To suggest somehow that the problem that we're seeing in inner-city unemployment, for example, is attributable to immigrants, I think, is a case of scapegoating that I do not believe in, I do not subscribe to."
Now this is fairly consistent throughout his career. It is what people saw in him when he spoke out against Iraq, and it puzzles the shit out of the press.
His arguments, just should not work on getting the emotive vote. Quite simply, he shouldn't stand a chance because, ultimately he isn't using the traditional emotional pulls that politicians are expected to.
And it is precisely because he isn't using those pulls that he is ahead right now. It isn't his voice (And frankly, any Hillary supporter who calls this article out for being an example of the watchdogs in America's media humping Obama's leg has a point, because you know, not only is he now the good looking candidate but his voice is so dreamy *ugh*) it is his ability to put across the idea that he respects the voter.
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Spirituality, the way I see it.
[Read the article: The certainty epidemic]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Honest spirituality:
It is an attempt to build an equivelancy in importance between the real and the imagined.
This isn't as bad as it sounds.
The real, hard physical world is based around what is, and what was. Man is biologically incapable of flight.
Now to take us further than that, to what should be and what will be, we use our imaginations. Man, through the application of his knowledge and his imagination, created a machine in order to fly.
With a synthesis between the two, what we know and what we imagine, we end up with spirituality.
Dishonest spirituality:
A mechanism used by psychological quacks, conmen and frauds to seperate you from your money or otherwise avoid scrutiny.
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L.W.M.
[Read the article: The "Rezko" game]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Your post on page 15 is extremely easy to debunk.
http://letters.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/03/05/rezko/view/index15.html?show=all
Penny Pritzker resigned as Chairman from the Superior Bank in 1994. Seven years before the company actually went broke. This makes the third claim massively irrelevant.
The main high risk form of securitisation was introduced in the period 1994 to 1995. Prior to that, their securitisation issues were reasonably in keeping with standard practice.
Subprime securitisation started off in the 1970's.
http://www.dallasfed.org/news/ca/2005/05wallstreet_assets.pdf
The Superior Bank only appeared in 1988 - thus the second claim is an outright contemptable lie.
Which leaves the first claim, which is frankly, all negative fluff.
So what this all breaks down to is: Obama cannot choose a eminently qualified woman to serve near him because she once chaired a company that went bankrupt - seven years after her time as chairman.
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The operative word being "was"
[Read the article: Fred Hiatt's foreign policy "principles"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In the context of the story "was" could well just mean chairman from 1989 to 1994.
If you can link to a site listing the board of directors of Superior Bank at say, 1998, and it has Penny's name on it, then I will concede the point.
Because up until now you have a seven year old story which could equally well have been saying that Penny was on the board at one point - without actually meaning that she was on the board past her tenure as Chairman.
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Sorry, posted on the wrong thread (A bit of a cold this side.)
[Read the article: The "Rezko" game]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Anyway, what you have in essence got is an article where the operative word is "was." As in formerly.
If you can link me to a site where the board of directors of Superior Bank is listed as of say, 2000, or 1999, or 1998 or any time after 1994, when she stepped down as chairman I will concede the point.
Further, you have not responded to me pointing that securitisation on subprime lending dates back to the 1970's. A fairly central issue, considering that one of the charges made in that smear piece you posted (Though I concede you weren't the original author) says that Superior Bank helped invent the practice.
All you have done is demonstrate that Superior Bank entered the subprime market in the early 1990's.
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Sorry, my previous post was in the wrong article.
[Read the article: Fred Hiatt's foreign policy "principles"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]please ignore it.