[milwaukee mike]

since sbr john endorses newt gingrich, i thought it would be fun to see who the rest of sbr would endorse.

here's your choices, in order of current delegates/popular vote in the primaries

mitt romney, representing the great state of massachusetts
ron paul, representing the great state of texas
rick santorum, representing the great state of pennsylvania
newt gingrich, representing the great state of georgia

[shari91]

Need a "none of the above" option. 350 million people in the US and this is what they put forward... I'd almost think this was a Romanian soccer match.

Maybe next time someone who has a hope of challenging the Dems will run. I really thought it would be this time and I could try to rally up ex pat votes here for a great candidate. As if.

[Iced]

Shut up Shari... vote for Ron Paul or else. You're off on US population by about 40 million btw...

[john230]

I think the Massachusetts Moderate has the best chance to beat Obama. He may be a flip-flopper and his Bain Capital day's will be scrutinized, but I think he's got less baggage than Newt or Santorum. Ron Paul is a fad and I question if he even wants to be President.

[milwaukee mike]

Need a "none of the above" option. 350 million people in the US and this is what they put forward... I'd almost think this was a Romanian soccer match.

Maybe next time someone who has a hope of challenging the Dems will run. I really thought it would be this time and I could try to rally up ex pat votes here for a great candidate. As if.

there are more than 2 choices for president, you know.

just because the tv and newspaper tell you that only republicans and democrats can win doesn't mean you have to vote that way. always a constitution party, green party, libertarian, etc.

i think the best person to vote for in the 2008 election was cynthia mckinney and i voted accordingly, primarily because she was the only member of congress with the balls to say stuff like this:
"It is known that President Bush's father, through the Carlyle Group, had–at the time of the attacks–joint business interests with the bin Laden construction company and many defense industry holdings, the stocks of which have soared since September 11."

[d2bets]

None of them have much of a chance. Worse candidates than John Kerry.

[jarvol]

there are more than 2 choices for president, you know.

just because the tv and newspaper tell you that only republicans and democrats can win doesn't mean you have to vote that way. always a constitution party, green party, libertarian, etc.

[milwaukee mike]

d2bets, i'll let you out of our heat vs bulls bet at breakeven if you want.
you're up 2 in the loss column, but rose's toe might be a recurring problem after he eventually comes back.

[Glitch]

lets see- gamblers and substance abusers. who are they going to vote for? i would guess the guy with the most false promises of gambling and substance abuse for the masses. gonna put my money on Ron Paul as far as this poll is concerned.

[Iced]

lets see- gamblers and substance abusers. who are they going to vote for? i would guess the guy with the most false promises of gambling and substance abuse for the masses. gonna put my money on Ron Paul as far as this poll is concerned.

You prefer the status quo and fascism?

[shari91]

Shut up Shari... vote for Ron Paul or else. You're off on US population by about 40 million btw...

I can't vote for Ron. There are too many of his ideas I just don't agree with although there are a few I also like. And ty for the pop update... I was going by what they said on the news a week or so ago but I'm happy to be corrected on that one.

[Iced]

I can't vote for Ron. There are too many of his ideas I just don't agree with although there are a few I also like. And ty for the pop update... I was going by what they said on the news a week or so ago but I'm happy to be corrected on that one.

Fair enough. I don't think Ron is gonna win the nomination anyway, so it won't much matter. Obama vs. Mittens will be the likely match-up, and there aren't much differences between those two. Population source: http://www.census.gov/population/www/popclockus.html

[shari91]

there are more than 2 choices for president, you know.

just because the tv and newspaper tell you that only republicans and democrats can win doesn't mean you have to vote that way. always a constitution party, green party, libertarian, etc.

i think the best person to vote for in the 2008 election was cynthia mckinney and i voted accordingly, primarily because she was the only member of congress with the balls to say stuff like this:
"It is known that President Bush's father, through the Carlyle Group, had–at the time of the attacks–joint business interests with the bin Laden construction company and many defense industry holdings, the stocks of which have soared since September 11."

Oh I'm well aware... I was living in Florida at the time of "the" election and happened to vote for a certain Ralph Nader. Didn't really work out as I'd hoped. After that incident, I'm a bit gunshy at believing the smaller parties stand a chance and/or my voting for them is necessarily a good thing. We'll see though. I really thought I'd be voting Republican this time around, but I can't find one bloody person to vote for in good faith. Very disappointed about that.

[Glitch]

You prefer the status quo and fascism?

i prefer to meet in the middle. his way sounds like chaos and anarchy to me. give the power to the states? (as other R candidates are preaching as well)- that means you have to worry about 50 heads of the department in charge of doing whatever it is. (this is a good policy for some things definitely(state regulation))

politicians are so corrupt. lets just get some plans that involve production (jobs and exports), sound money (agree with paul here), a free market, peaceful and amicable foreign policy, efficient government hiring/ plan implementation, quality education and training for the masses.

-you cant just get rid of all the programs and departments. if they are inefficient just change them.

-you cant do what we did (and should never have done) in terms of the wars and then just think the answer is to fly everyone home immediately. we've made a mess- we need to clean it up and get out of there in a way that would preserve the most American lives.

-we need income taxes. you cant get rid of them- just decrease them and add them to the sales tax. get more people back to work and into a tax paying situation. we need an easy path to get more people off welfare and into this an abundantly opportune employment pool. the answer is not just to yank the rug out from under all the very poor people because its their fault.

-he wants to get rid of and completely cut out and lay off government workers and funding of the departments of energy, commerce, the interior, Education, housing and urban development plan etc

what happens next? when you think about it- it may be easy to see how dangerous some money-saving decisions might be. some may perhaps even be fatal.

[milwaukee mike]

glitch i agree with much of that but
1) "preserving the most american lives" would mean returning them all home immediately. we haven't declared victory in a war since 1945 so obviously the point of these things isn't to win.
2) we don't need federal income taxes. we had the most powerful and most respected country in the world without federal income taxes. we built all the roads and bridges in this country before federal income taxes.
3) some money-saving decisions might be fatal, but what's the alternative? we already owe more money than exists (think about that for a second) and we're adding trillions/year to that number.

[jarvol]

-you cant just get rid of all the programs and departments. if they are inefficient just change them.

Sure you can.

-he wants to get rid of and completely cut out and lay off government workers and funding of the departments of energy, commerce, the interior, Education, housing and urban development plan etc

what happens next? when you think about it- it may be easy to see how dangerous some money-saving decisions might be. some may perhaps even be fatal.

Alot of us want to get rid of those departments too. They have contributed NOTHING to America.

Americans had better come to grips with the fact it has made many mistakes and must start rectifying them. Embrace some voluntary aspects of social Darwinism and put some personal responsibility back onto individuals. If an individual's family, friends, tax-exempt churches and charities refuse to take of them then it sure as hell isn't the government's right to rob me in order to take care of them.

[PhillyFlyers]

Ron Paul is winning the SBR vote.

[jw]

there are more than 2 choices for president, you know.

Depends where you live .. last time around here in Tulsa .. there was a choice of two .. R or D .. nothing else.

[d2bets]

SBR endorsement should be based on the winner of this thread.

[19th Hole]

Need a "none of the above" option. 350 million people in the US and this is what they put forward... I'd almost think this was a Romanian soccer match.

Maybe next time someone who has a hope of challenging the Dems will run. I really thought it would be this time and I could try to rally up ex pat votes here for a great candidate. As if.

And to think that you have such a solid handle on tennis match-ups....

[milwaukee mike]

SBR endorsement should be based on the winner of this thread.

[dante1]

Oh I'm well aware... I was living in Florida at the time of "the" election and happened to vote for a certain Ralph Nader. Didn't really work out as I'd hoped. After that incident, I'm a bit gunshy at believing the smaller parties stand a chance and/or my voting for them is necessarily a good thing. We'll see though. I really thought I'd be voting Republican this time around, but I can't find one bloody person to vote for in good faith. Very disappointed about that.

Well Shari it warms my heart to know that in your heart you are a progressive, stop the charade telling us what R you would support. That would never happen to a person who at one time supported R Nader, not unless you had a huge political and moral shift. I doubt that.

[19th Hole]

Has anyone ever seen that fatass Newt Gingrich
and BigLardHQ in the same Inland Empire
trailer with the same skank,
at the same time??
I thought not...

[Carseller4]

Ron Paul is winning the SBR vote.

Ron Paul wins EVERY online poll.

It's what he does.

If word gets out to the Ron Paul websites, SBR will be overrun with new one-time members.

[Glitch]

Sure you can.

Alot of us want to get rid of those departments too. They have contributed NOTHING to America.

and why is it that "a lot of us" want to get rid of these departments rather than change them into cost-efficient and productive ones?

do "a lot of us" feel that education, energy and "the interior" do not deserve strategic guidance and oversight, growth/ quality control plans, standards etc? i have been wondering this for a while.

[Glitch]

glitch i agree with much of that but
1) "preserving the most american lives" would mean returning them all home immediately. we haven't declared victory in a war since 1945 so obviously the point of these things isn't to win.
2) we don't need federal income taxes. we had the most powerful and most respected country in the world without federal income taxes. we built all the roads and bridges in this country before federal income taxes.
3) some money-saving decisions might be fatal, but what's the alternative? we already owe more money than exists (think about that for a second) and we're adding trillions/year to that number.

1. that would be true until dr. paul brings this unfinished business to our backyard. this is sort of a joke but sort of not- i say we but some money into their hospitals, issue a public apology and policy change, stay Just long enough to guide them (whereever) into choosing a leader that the people want and then maybe if someone is a "terrorist" there is still special ops to deal very important individuals and cells.

2.yeah it really sucks that there are federal income taxes but its really the easiest way to get the most people to pay their taxes. even if you put it on a higher sales tax instead so everyone who Buys something has to contribute- you'll have people going around the system.

3. he is on the right track there in spirit. and he is absolutely correct about a lot of things. though many of his economic policies are extreme- it seems he may be the only one that understand or cares about the american economic situation in terms of changing right now before something bad happens.

its just that some of his plans are not feasible or difficult to pass or will have dire consequences or result in a lowering in the overall quality of american life.

his naivety is dangerous although his heart does seem to be in the right place.

[shari91]

Well Shari it warms my heart to know that in your heart you are a progressive, stop the charade telling us what R you would support. That would never happen to a person who at one time supported R Nader, not unless you had a huge political and moral shift. I doubt that.

I go with who I can believe in at the time. I gave up on being labelled a part of any party, regardless of which country I'm voting in, long ago. I've been casting ballots for more than half the time I've been alive. If you present a platform I believe in, I will support you. I don't care if your party is called I Hate shari91. I've become very disillusioned with the Democratic party for the past couple of years and if I'd placed a bet 6mths ago, I would've put $10k on my voting Republican because I need to protect what I have now, both through my own work and through my parents. I'm lucky that what I do have is decent but especially as a single parent, I am blatantly aware that this is my cushion for my child and I don't want to see it pissed away... especially when I'm not even living there to reap what few rewards there are for those tax dollars. However like I said in the other thread, the only candidate I could've supported - even though I disagree with his views about a woman's body - was Huntsman. He's gone so I'm stuck. It's all good though; next time we'll start the process all over and I'm sure there will be more for me to choose from.

[Iced]

and why is it that "a lot of us" want to get rid of these departments rather than change them into cost-efficient and productive ones?

Every politician under the sun promises to make bureaucracy more cost-efficient and productive. It never happens because bureaucracy is inherently inefficient because of a lack of incentives and profit-motive. Executives at Microsoft work hard to make the company better because they want to make more money. Bureaucrats just want to increase the size of the bureaucracy and keep their jobs, efficiency and cost-effectiveness is counter-effective to those goals.

do "a lot of us" feel that education, energy and "the interior" do not deserve strategic guidance and oversight, growth/ quality control plans, standards etc? i have been wondering this for a while.

Yawn. Learn to separate labels from the programs. A water bottle with a budweiser sticker on it doesn't turn the water into beer. The Department of Education has increased the cost of education and education scores have all gone down. Federal bureaucrats in DC don't know shit about educating kids, they just need the appearance of being able to do something in order to keep their jobs. Politicians also like the Dept of Education because they can label all opponents of the Dept of Education as anti-education, and the prole voters won't like that!

[SBR_John]

I love Ron Paul. Too bad he doesn't understand foreign policy. Even with those short comings he would be the best president ever except for Reagan. When he said basically 9/11 was our fault for antagonizing Al Quieda, well, I never took him serious again.

[milwaukee mike]

john we are surrounded by thousands of miles of oceans. these countries we invade have no intention or means of attacking us, they don't even have an air force or navy.

so we have to invent a threat since there isn't one, all of the major candidates understand this but none of them come out and say it.

even the 9/11 commission report said that the attacks were blowback for our "foreign policy" of doing whatever israel says. the people who benefit from a crime (military contractors, federal reserve, israel) are usually the ones committing the crimes.

[Glitch]

Every politician under the sun promises to make bureaucracy more cost-efficient and productive. It never happens because bureaucracy is inherently inefficient because of a lack of incentives and profit-motive. Executives at Microsoft work hard to make the company better because they want to make more money. Bureaucrats just want to increase the size of the bureaucracy and keep their jobs, efficiency and cost-effectiveness is counter-effective to those goals.

Yawn. Learn to separate labels from the programs. A water bottle with a budweiser sticker on it doesn't turn the water into beer. The Department of Education has increased the cost of education and education scores have all gone down. Federal bureaucrats in DC don't know shit about educating kids, they just need the appearance of being able to do something in order to keep their jobs. Politicians also like the Dept of Education because they can label all opponents of the Dept of Education as anti-education, and the prole voters won't like that!

yawn. i have read your post in its entirety and you havent answered my question sufficiently:
-if these programs are so inefficient and cost-defective- why would the solution not be to adjust these oversight standard groups into something less bureaucratic and more productive???

"its always been the way it is now" or "government employees like staying employed" are not good enough answers. hypothetically if they could just change the programs by magically appointing a guy who told people what to do- could this guy tell them to change these programs into something better if he had an actual plan?

this is not about putting a beer label on water; this is about pouring all the water out into the street for people to swim in at their own whim/discretion and trusting even more people to regulate who pees in the pool and who is stealing the water and who needs help swimming etc etc.

its not about a label- these departments are suppose to do very important things. we should not get rid of them, we should change them. even though that wouldnt save as much money on the front-end.

im talking about pouring out the water and finding some beer instead of tossing all of the beer-bottled water off a cliff.

[capitalist pig]

Personally I dont like any of the candidates.My vote just comes down to who has the best chance of defeating Obama, and Romney is the only one who will have a chance at that as things stand right now,JMO.

later

[SBR_John]

http://www.gallup.com/poll/152126/Ro...wn-Points.aspx

The race between Romney and Gingrich is going to get real interesting. Romneys's 37% to 14% lead of two weeks ago is now 30% to 20%. Let's what happens in the next 10 days before Florida.

[dante1]

Shari, Huntsman was a decent man and a real moderate R. You saw the support he got from the crazies, almost non existent except in NH. Shame when a real intellect, a real moderate and a guy that really had something to contribute is tossed on the garbage pile by so many. He was a good man and a decent candidate. Now they are left with crap, RP has some good ideas but the guy goes way too far. Even if elected his own party would stymie all his attempts. He might even get more support from the D in congress for much of his term.

[milwaukee mike]

http://www.gallup.com/poll/152126/Ro...wn-Points.aspx

The race between Romney and Gingrich is going to get real interesting. Romneys's 37% to 14% lead of two weeks ago is now 30% to 20%. Let's what happens in the next 10 days before Florida.

huge move by gingrich, does he know about the sbr endorsement?

john do you think either mitt or newt has a chance against obama? i personally think ron paul is the only one that would beat obama.

this might be the last chance for a republican president, minorities/mooches are becoming a bigger % of the u.s. population every day...