Disgusting how many people on this page are rooting against their own country.

And before you get off on how "evil" we are, have you idiots ever thought about the hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese people were sent to re-education camps after we sold them out? Or do you just get all of your oxygen from Chomsky and idiots like him?

Try whitewashing the bloodstains out all you want, but calling us "evil" in comparison to the North Vietnamese is just a statement of profound ignorance.

So now anything science proved, and the church was forced to admit they were wrong about, gets a nice historical whitewash. Science tells us how the world works, and religion tells us why we better drink their koolaid or else you will burn in a lake of fire for eternity.

I'd like to see the people who come up with this crap in court, made to swear on a bible, and then put away for perjury in a lake of fire for eternity. That'd learn 'em.

Must-read articles:

New York Times: Attorney General of N.Y. Is Said to Face Pressure on Bank Foreclosure Deal
Glenn Greenwald @ Salon: Obama administration takes tough stance on banks
Matt Taibbi @ Rolling Stone: Obama Goes All Out For Dirty Banker Deal
Yves Smith @ naked capitalism: Corrupt Obama Administration Pressuring New York Attorney General to Support Mortgage Whitewash

Those troublesome Jews

Charles Krauthammer

Friday, June 4, 2010

The world is outraged at Israel's blockade of Gaza. Turkey denounces its illegality, inhumanity, barbarity, etc. The usual U.N. suspects, Third World and European, join in. The Obama administration dithers.
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But as Leslie Gelb, former president of the Council on Foreign Relations, writes, the blockade is not just perfectly rational, it is perfectly legal. Gaza under Hamas is a self-declared enemy of Israel -- a declaration backed up by more than 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli civilian territory. Yet having pledged itself to unceasing belligerency, Hamas claims victimhood when Israel imposes a blockade to prevent Hamas from arming itself with still more rockets.

In World War II, with full international legality, the United States blockaded Germany and Japan. And during the October 1962 missile crisis, we blockaded ("quarantined") Cuba. Arms-bearing Russian ships headed to Cuba turned back because the Soviets knew that the U.S. Navy would either board them or sink them. Yet Israel is accused of international criminality for doing precisely what John Kennedy did: impose a naval blockade to prevent a hostile state from acquiring lethal weaponry.

Oh, but weren't the Gaza-bound ships on a mission of humanitarian relief? No. Otherwise they would have accepted Israel's offer to bring their supplies to an Israeli port, be inspected for military materiel and have the rest trucked by Israel into Gaza -- as every week 10,000 tons of food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies are sent by Israel to Gaza.

Why was the offer refused? Because, as organizer Greta Berlin admitted, the flotilla was not about humanitarian relief but about breaking the blockade, i.e., ending Israel's inspection regime, which would mean unlimited shipping into Gaza and thus the unlimited arming of Hamas.
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Israel has already twice intercepted ships laden with Iranian arms destined for Hezbollah and Gaza. What country would allow that?

But even more important, why did Israel even have to resort to blockade? Because, blockade is Israel's fallback as the world systematically de-legitimizes its traditional ways of defending itself -- forward and active defense.

(1) Forward defense: As a small, densely populated country surrounded by hostile states, Israel had, for its first half-century, adopted forward defense -- fighting wars on enemy territory (such as the Sinai and Golan Heights) rather than its own.

Where possible (Sinai, for example) Israel has traded territory for peace. But where peace offers were refused, Israel retained the territory as a protective buffer zone. Thus Israel retained a small strip of southern Lebanon to protect the villages of northern Israel. And it took many losses in Gaza, rather than expose Israeli border towns to Palestinian terror attacks. It is for the same reason America wages a grinding war in Afghanistan: You fight them there, so you don't have to fight them here.

But under overwhelming outside pressure, Israel gave it up. The Israelis were told the occupations were not just illegal but at the root of the anti-Israel insurgencies -- and therefore withdrawal, by removing the cause, would bring peace.

Land for peace. Remember? Well, during the past decade, Israel gave the land -- evacuating South Lebanon in 2000 and Gaza in 2005. What did it get? An intensification of belligerency, heavy militarization of the enemy side, multiple kidnappings, cross-border attacks and, from Gaza, years of unrelenting rocket attack.

(2) Active defense: Israel then had to switch to active defense -- military action to disrupt, dismantle and defeat (to borrow President Obama's description of our campaign against the Taliban and al-Qaeda) the newly armed terrorist mini-states established in southern Lebanon and Gaza after Israel withdrew.

The result? The Lebanon war of 2006 and Gaza operation of 2008-09. They were met with yet another avalanche of opprobrium and calumny by the same international community that had demanded the land-for-peace Israeli withdrawals in the first place. Worse, the U.N. Goldstone report, which essentially criminalized Israel's defensive operation in Gaza while whitewashing the casus belli -- the preceding and unprovoked Hamas rocket war -- effectively de-legitimized any active Israeli defense against its self-declared terror enemies.

(3) Passive defense: Without forward or active defense, Israel is left with but the most passive and benign of all defenses -- a blockade to simply prevent enemy rearmament. Yet, as we speak, this too is headed for international de-legitimation. Even the United States is now moving toward having it abolished.

But, if none of these is permissible, what's left?

Ah, but that's the point. It's the point understood by the blockade-busting flotilla of useful idiots and terror sympathizers, by the Turkish front organization that funded it, by the automatic anti-Israel Third World chorus at the United Nations, and by the supine Europeans who've had quite enough of the Jewish problem.

What's left? Nothing. The whole point of this relentless international campaign is to deprive Israel of any legitimate form of self-defense. Why, just last week, the Obama administration joined the jackals, and reversed four decades of U.S. practice, by signing onto a consensus document that singles out Israel's possession of nuclear weapons -- thus de-legitimizing Israel's very last line of defense: deterrence.

The world is tired of these troublesome Jews, 6 million -- that number again -- hard by the Mediterranean, refusing every invitation to national suicide. For which they are relentlessly demonized, ghettoized and constrained from defending themselves, even as the more committed anti-Zionists -- Iranian in particular -- openly prepare a more final solution.

>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

The accusation that America is 'becoming Greece' is not unfounded. Greece is foundering because it has billions in unfunded liabilities and no effective way to pay them.

[snip]

"Austerity measures..." What a nice left wing whitewash of the fact that they are being forced by necessitiy to use (GASP!) conservative economic policy in order to prevent themselves from absolute self destruction. So to save it's @$$, Greece is having to privitize health care, as well as cut bloated, unsustainable social spending. Gee - where have we heard that before?

You gave a pretty much content-free "Grr, I hate liberals" comment there.

Not that you've ever shown any interest in facts, but here is a summary of the austerity measures the IMF is demanding of Greece.

They're not privatizing their health care, they're rolling back some recent pay increases for public sector jobs, they're raising the retirement age, and they're raising taxes.

Which is of course, one way they could have avoided the problem in the first place. Greece is in the middle of the pack in terms of government spending to GDP ratio within the EU. Where it does stands out is on the tax side of the equation...

The accusation that America is 'becoming Greece' is not unfounded. Greece is foundering because it has billions in unfunded liabilities and no effective way to pay them. This precise malady is already happening in the US. California, NY, Illinois, and other liberally controlled states are bankrupt because of huge social obligations they can't possibly pay for.

The U.S. has been headed this way for decades in a slow way, but it's ramped up rapidly under Clinton, Bush, and Obama. Medicare, Medicaid, and Social security are plummeting into insolvency. The Health Care plan increases federal obligations by billions. Cap & Trade constricts energy supply while increasing costs. Every act the federal government takes is one that pulls money from the private sector into the public sector.

The warning cry that America is heading towards a "Greece" style fiscal meltdown is blatantly obvious and even laypersons can easily see that unbridled, unchecked social spending is what has ruined Europe's economy.

This is - of course - exactly why left wing koolaid drinkers like this video guy are in a state of panic. The European collapse strips away the lie that they have been living in for decades. It proves cradle-to-grave liberal socialist states are only 3 hairs and some air away from collapse, and that capitalism is the solution. "Austerity measures..." What a nice left wing whitewash of the fact that they are being forced by necessitiy to use (GASP!) conservative economic policy in order to prevent themselves from absolute self destruction. So to save it's @$$, Greece is having to privitize health care, as well as cut bloated, unsustainable social spending. Gee - where have we heard that before?

So it's no surprise that leftist hacks like Krugman are in denial over this. The entire approach they've believed in their whole lives has been proven to be a total sham.

Most textbooks today already ARE whitewashed versions of actual history. Historical figures are presented and mythical hero's who either surpassed incredible odds at great peril, or were practical saints. Here's just a couple bits you will almost certainly never learn in a high school classroom.

a) Helen Keller - Blind and Deaf, everyone has probably seen the scene where she learns finally how to sign under the water from a pump. What you don't know was that after graduating from college she joined the Socialist Party and hailed the coming of Socialism. (She had good reasons for this, look her up if your interested)

b) Woodrow Wilson - Despite receiving a large black vote into office, the man created many policies that were as he was in fact, extremely racist. This cause at least in part, the large resurgence of white supremacist racism during the late part of his term and afterwards.

I could go on about the atrocities that Columbus committed as well. The plain fact is that US History as taught in high school today centers EVERYTHING on Europe having "accomplished" everything first. And this crazy overprotective moron wants to whitewash it even further.

Imagine how hard it was for Fox News to make this mass of dips look like people.

I expect they learned how to do it from CNN, MSNBC, CBS, & ABC by witnessing how they whitewashed out all the kooks from the Iraq War protests. I remember all too well how the news media was all fired up to make Cindy Sheehan look like a normal person. But it was awfully hard when every time she opened her big mouth she proved conclusively that she was absolutely, 100%, fling-her-own-poo, batcrap insane.

As to people voting for him now leaving. They need to wake up and realize the mans not a god. He wasn't gonna change the country into butterflies and rainbows with a snap of his fingers and an Alakazam.

Uh - Obama is plummeting in the polls with independants, moderates, and other 'normal' voters NOT because he isn't acting fast enough. The reason Obama has lost main street is because he was elected by people who THOUGH he was going to be a restrained, moderate, non-partisan president. But his first 9 months have shown Obama to be pretty dang close to exactly what the 'kook right' said he was... A tax & spend, big government, socialist leaning radical. That's not what America wants.

They don't want his stupid carbon tax scheme. They don't want his stupid nationalization of car companies, financial companies, and everything else he wants to take over to 'keep us safe'. They don't want his stupid attempt to re-make the AFL-CIO. They don't want his stupid plan to socialize the health care industry. Every time Obama opens his mouth he proposes yet another big government, radically leftist federal boondoggle. Obama has increased our deficit by over a trillion dollars, and he still wants to implement even MORE massive government spending. The people have had it, and that's what this protest was about.

If Obama wants to go down in history as the most popular president of all time, then he needs to scrap Cap & Trade, scrap Obamacare, scrap his union garbage, and stop trying to push big government. If he would just do that and balance the budget & pay down the deficit then he'd be popular. But he doesn't want to DO that because he's a prisoner of his leftist radical philosophy.

Lower taxes. Smaller government. Balanced budget. That's what the people want. Obama is focusing on all the wrong crap and he's paying for it in the polls.

Pennypacker, Bush and Hitler were both fixtures of the far right

I'm going to argue with you on this because you're using generalities that I consider inaccurate.

What it is you mean exactly when you say 'far right'? Strictly speaking, Adolf Hitler was a socialist. Socialism is not a 'far right' political philosophy. Hitler wanted to nationalize everything, put the government in charge, and cradle-to-grave German citizens with massive government health care, work programs, and so forth. From my perspective, this degree of socialism is a fixture of the far LEFT rather than the far right. From that perspective, Obama has far more in common politically with Hitler than Bush.

In the popular vernacular, 'far right' is used as a kind of catch-all term to describe hate groups. This means people like the KKK, Nazis, racists, anti-semites, gay bashers, skinheads, Christian cult 'compounds'... The list goes on. But generally speaking when a person says 'far right' they are talking about some sort of radical, fringe kook group that is demonstrably just way out there doing really wierd stuff.

But that's not how a neolib uses the term. When neolibs use the term 'far right', they use it as a slur to describe any and all groups that they politically disagree with. Pro-life, NRA, free-market, Christians, traditional marriage, small government... These are all perfectly normal, acceptable, every-day political and personal lifestyles that that the neoliberal left-wing maliciously smears guilt association using the term "far right".

So when you say "Bush and Hitler were both fixtures of the far right", I'm going to disagree with you. Bush may be a fixture of persons who want personal accountability, hold a pro-life opinion, and other aspects of what I would call a 'conservative' point of view (though - alas - he didn't follow through with small government). But he certainly is NOT a fixture of the "far right" kook fringe. That's nothing more than neoliberal whitewash. Bush never once advocated racism, violence towards others based on skin color, gay bashing, or anything of the sort.

That was the most noble act of Kanye's life. He should be admired for speaking his heart, and what was on the hearts of many at the time, instead of whitewashing the event by sticking to the script.

His pronouncements, inarticulate as they may have been, spoke more than all of the scripted comments put together.

This is my favorite video, but I will not upvote due to the title.

Hee hee. Apparently the "White" house used to be a lovely pink stone. Unfortunately the only way to remove the scorch marks was just to whitewash it.

Wise words and I totally agree. Sometimes people don't know where the line is and it takes comments like what you and others made in that thread for them to take heed (even if it doesn't make them stop, some people just can't be told!). And sometimes it's just a reactionary thing that is all about harbouring old grudges which I wouldn't take away from anyone even if I think it's a futile thing to do. So that's what I meant by I didn't mean to whitewash you, your comments were totally valid, I was just making the point that we should ignore it after a point and let people behave how they want to behave. I guess i'm just trying to be as tolerant as possible of as many people as possible

In reply to this comment by mauz15:
Very True. It is a sensitive subject and the tone mink used for that siftalk was wrong. The double standards is what bothers me. Humor has always been around this place, and it was amusing for pretty much everyone, including myself but up to a certain point. (90 comments and less than half of them about the topic while the rest is spam is just too much) Lots of different discussions take place here everyday and there is always humor, it is almost required, but there is always a certain balance to it. Spamming the shit out of a thread is a whole different thing, and then is not so amusing anymore.

In reply to this comment by alien_concept:
I didn't mean to whitewash over what you guys were saying. I agree that people were being childish. I think it's just MINK's overall attitude that has rubbed people up the wrong way and caused them to piss over his queries. I just think that we can rise above that type of shit and let them get on with it. It did amuse me in the beginning, so i'm probably pretty infantile myself. If I were everyone i'd just gloss over my comments

In reply to this comment by mauz15:
>> ^alien_concept:
Alright calm down! For anyone taking this thread seriously - which it should be, (except MINK has pretty much offended his way out of people easily swallowing his points of view) then just ignore the comments you don't like. This place is becoming way too serious, most of the time.
If people are trolling, what are you supposed to do?


Point taken I guess.

Very True. It is a sensitive subject and the tone mink used for that siftalk was wrong. The double standards is what bothers me. Humor has always been around this place, and it was amusing for pretty much everyone, including myself but up to a certain point. (90 comments and less than half of them about the topic while the rest is spam is just too much) Lots of different discussions take place here everyday and there is always humor, it is almost required, but there is always a certain balance to it. Spamming the shit out of a thread is a whole different thing, and then is not so amusing anymore.

In reply to this comment by alien_concept:
I didn't mean to whitewash over what you guys were saying. I agree that people were being childish. I think it's just MINK's overall attitude that has rubbed people up the wrong way and caused them to piss over his queries. I just think that we can rise above that type of shit and let them get on with it. It did amuse me in the beginning, so i'm probably pretty infantile myself. If I were everyone i'd just gloss over my comments

In reply to this comment by mauz15:
>> ^alien_concept:
Alright calm down! For anyone taking this thread seriously - which it should be, (except MINK has pretty much offended his way out of people easily swallowing his points of view) then just ignore the comments you don't like. This place is becoming way too serious, most of the time.
If people are trolling, what are you supposed to do?


Point taken I guess.

I didn't mean to whitewash over what you guys were saying. I agree that people were being childish. I think it's just MINK's overall attitude that has rubbed people up the wrong way and caused them to piss over his queries. I just think that we can rise above that type of shit and let them get on with it. It did amuse me in the beginning, so i'm probably pretty infantile myself. If I were everyone i'd just gloss over my comments

In reply to this comment by mauz15:
>> ^alien_concept:
Alright calm down! For anyone taking this thread seriously - which it should be, (except MINK has pretty much offended his way out of people easily swallowing his points of view) then just ignore the comments you don't like. This place is becoming way too serious, most of the time.
If people are trolling, what are you supposed to do?


Point taken I guess.

The rocket attacks resumed after IDF bombed the tunnel Hamas was building to kidnap and kill more soldiers.

This is no small matter. An IDF soldier taken in an identical 2006 attack is still captive.http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/1522370/Soldier-kidnapped-and-two-killed-in-Gaza-tunnel-attack.html

So let's not whitewash Hamas' rocket record. They were taking an operational pause to restock.