BJean

kimaly, not to question your honesty and sincerity, but if you are a woman who is really happy with herself and cares about herself (no pity parties for you, huh?) why are you so fat that you need a Lap Band? Just wondering.....

Jack, is it any wonder that Obama's podium decor displays his website? I must say that I don't believe anything I see online though, what with all the photoshopping that people are doing these days. Before I buy into anything I research it - otherwise I try to ignore it. plain don't get me started. McCain's flipflopping started a long time ago. I don't have to back it up. If you aren't aware of it, that's your business. And you don't have to believe a word I say. That's also your business. I just post what I know to be true (like we talked about on another thread) and what I believe. Everyone's viewpoints have everything to do with their own politics (and I use that term in the broadest sense). I'm just happy if something I post makes someone think a little and pay closer attention to the candidates in action.

Omg, don't encourage me... :redface:

MicheleK- now that's funny!!

What's the defense for Bush putting his hand over his belly during the Pledge? That he was sick of having to salute the flag and it made his tummy ache? Seems like that's the logic of this discussion. And Plain, that may be the military code for what to do when the National Anthem is played, but it wasn't taught in public schools that we are supposed to put our hands over their hearts during the National Anthem. If it's being taught in schools nowadays, that's news to me - and I am pleased as punch that they're teaching it. But think about all the Americans we've observed at sporting events and public events where no one is putting their hands over their hearts during the National Anthem. Why do you think that is, if it is clear to all Americans that we are being unpatriotic if we do not put our hands over our hearts during the national anthem? All this B.S. about Obama not wearing a flag pen and not saluting the flag and reciting the Pledge of Allegience, etc., is political propaganda. Go to the Obama website where it clearly explains what his real feelings are and to what country he holds dear to his heart. Or go to Snopes.com and see how they debunk the stuff. Otherwise you're just accepting something someone says or some random photo as proof that he is an unAmerican Muslim sympathizer. Obama is not and never has been a Muslim. He is an American with just as much patriotism as you and I have. My father never served in the military and he was a healthy, eligible for the draft, young man during World War II. Does that make him inelligible to run for public office (which he has done) or ineligible to discuss matters of national security or matters of national defense? No, it absolutely does not. My father didn't serve because he was a railroad engineer. He moved the materials across country that were made into airplanes and weapons. He and his job were as vital to the war as John McCain's was in Vietnam. And he was every bit a wonderful patriotic public servant as John McCain. I resent McCain's public assertion that Obama is not qualified to discuss matters of national security. What kind of person would say something like that? A stupid person? A desparate person? If we believe all this garbage that is being peddled by clever right wingers who will do anything to smear the name and reputation of a fine American citizen, we are ignorant! Stick to the issues and to the truth about who the candidates are. If you do that, you will probably still vote for McCain because you share his politics, but stop trying to act like Obama is a bad person or is unpatriotic or is Muslim and those reasons are why you won't vote for him. It just doesn't stand up to any reasonable level of scrutiny and it is naive at best.

C'mon ya'll. I just read this thread for the first time. Someone just resurected it and it caught my attention. When was the last time you put your hand over your heart when the National Anthem was played? I was taught in Girl Scouts that you put your hand over your heart during the Pledge of Allegience and when the flag is in motion - during a parade or when bringing it into or when it is leaving a room. One was not required to place their hand over their heart during the National Anthem. Of course that was many years ago, but I think lots of people were taught the same way I was. Obama may have been one of them. I have been present at military affairs and observed that the military do place their hand over their heart during the National Anthem when they're inside a room. Outside they hold a salute. I believe that Chris's quote was from a military document because it speaks of "saluting" not placing hands over hearts. Whatever the real expectation is I'm darned glad that I'm not running for president because there would be possibilities of photos all over the place that definitely do not show me with my hand over my heart - football games, basketball games, baseball games and elsewhere. Play ball!! I think this kind of crap has done Obama much more good than bad. Many of us find ourselves doing our homework and defending the chap. And then there's the bonus of finding a photo of George W. with his hand over his bellybutton. Priceless!

"...digesting the media" That's a great way to put what we have to do.

Great little essay, Gloucester. Truth as I see it is very personal. My truth is what is true for me. The country's truth is what is true for me. Whether a man is going to make a good president depends upon whether I believe the things he says are true, for me. Everything in my life relates to me and my viewpoints revolve around what is good for me. I do care about others and I do care about the world and my country, but I cannot help but be influenced by how it all affects me. I am involved in charities and I give back to the community, but if I say that I am just doing it only for others, I'd be lying. For the most part, I do good deeds because of the way it makes me feel about myself. I have donated anonymously and have given gifts anonymously but the reason I do it anonmyously is because it makes me feel unselfish so again, it boils down to me. Am I different that everyone else? I don't think so. I do think I try very hard to be honest with myself - about my motives, about my goals, about my citizenship in the world. As long as I understand this, it helps me to not be as self-centered as I could be. That sounds like a contridiction, but that's the way it works for me. I love doing things for my children. I love the feeling of patriotism and the love of other Americans. Those things make me feel good about them, and me. Truth is whatever we make it. Many politicians do want to work to improve this country and for the betterment of all of our people. Some politicians are greedy, pure and simple, laced with very few altruistic endeavors. It is very hard to distinguish one type of person from the other. All we can do is measure their words and deeds as best we can based on our own experience and knowledge. We can be fooled. We have been fooled. All we can do is hope that our public servants understand their own motives and are at least a little truthful about them.

Hey folks, why do you think that we haven't been looking for better options since Jimmy Carter or anyone else has been in office? Do you think it is because Americans are just in love with gas guzzling cars? Seriously? Really? Jack just because Obama feels one country shouldn't be allowed to aid and abet a proven terrorist doesn't have one thing to do with holding people who are not prisoners of any war without being tried for their crimes. In fact, we aren't even sure if they have committed crimes. He isn't suggesting that we bomb Pakistan because we suspect them of something. I don't understand how you can consider this flip flopping. To learn of McCain's flip flops, all you have to do is listen to the news every day. You can see him doing it in action. He's been flip flopping since he began his journey to the White House and I don't mean a couple of years ago. I used to be a McCain supporter. I listened very closely and read all I could so that I could know the real person behind the facade. I started out thinking he was smart and a moderate. I was wrong. The one thing I know for sure is that he is not straight forward and he is not focused. He only becomes focused when it is in his best interest and his focus changes in whatever direction the popularity winds blow. I am so very over him. I'm already tired of hearing the constant rehtoric from the Dems regarding McCain being more of the same. But the fact is, McCain is no better than Bush and he is embracing the same plans and policies of the Bush administration. If you like what you've gotten for the past 7 years, by all means, vote for McCain.

Elenation: I haven't lived in Cuba, I'll certainly give you that. But I've lived in Canada and their health care system at that time was incredibly better than ours here in the U.S. And one poster, green, who lives there now is unfortunately being treated for cancer. She backs me up on the health care system in Canada being better than ours. I just can't help but wonder how long ago you lived in Cuba and wonder if things have changed any since you've been living in the U.S. I'm not doubting you, just wondering. You do sound quite adamant that you know for sure that the health care system here in the U.S. is affording all of our people better health care than the Cuban system is for all of the people in Cuba. As bad as it is here and as unavailable as it is here for many, many Americans, people must be dying everyday in Cuba for lack of decent health care. If so, I am truly sorry about that. As for Michael Moore, I (and others here) have agreed that he puts his slant on everything he does. But I also know that a whole lot of what he puts out there is absolutely true. You know I can't stand Rush Limbaugh and I have heard him lie through his teeth, but there's usuallly a small element of truth somewhere around something he claims. I never see him show clips to back up his claims, unless they are edited and taken out of context. My point is, there needs to be a counter-balance to both extremes. We must filter out what we know to be illogical and slanted in order to learn from them. We can do that unless we take everything Limbaugh or Moore says as pure gospel and above reproach. Drilling lots more oil wells is not the answer, near or far term, to our energy crisis. We are drilling wells everyday. We don't need to ruin our wilderness and shorelines to know that the quicker we run out of gas, the quicker we will have decent alternatives. Until we stand up to the corporate greed that keeps us where they want us, they will continue to manipulate us and keep us driving exactly what makes them money. We absolutely MUST put a stop to it. And we, the people, are the only hope. We have to get behind a man who sees it for what it is and get him and a new administration taking charge of the fight. Otherwise I promise you, things will continue to worsen and it will continue to be at the average American's expense. I feel I must add that I believe that just because things are better for the people in the U.S. than for people in many other countries, doesn't mean that we can't or shouldn't make it better. And when you're buying into the idea that we're paying less for gas, keep in mind that we subsidize oil companies and that we, the taxpayers, are paying those subsidies. I too, say all of this with a total respect for you Elenation, and anyone else who sees it differently. We all have a perfect right to our viewpoints and we all can learn from listening to people with whom we do not agree. I've certainly learned from reading your posts and I appreciate them very much. Seriously.

Angie parents don't get a book on parenting when they have kids. They are, afterall, just people - some with less smarts than others. You probably already know that their problems are probably within themselves, and it isn't really about you. They just take it out on you because they can. But that's no excuse and there's no reason why you have to put up with it. It is very empowering to cut the ties that truly bind you up. Good for you! We can't pick our blood relatives but we can pick our friends. And best of all, we can learn from our relatives mistakes!

You go Nazzy! Right on!

plain I'm obviously not that smart or I would be able to explain it so that you can understand it. Sorry, I don't know how else to say it. As for McCain crossing party lines, I don't want to sound mean, but in most elections the opposition calls it "flip flopping." John Kerry was accused of it ad naseum by Dubya. McCain has done more flip flopping than a freshly caught fish on the deck of a boat. Yep. I made that up all on my own. Sometimes I even surprise myself. :drool::confused_smile:

There are solutions to the gas problem - drilling more wells isn't one that makes any sense. We've kept drilling wells and it hasn't helped. Spoiling our wilderness and our oceans and shores isn't the answer. I will suggest that you watch "Who Killed the Electric Car" if you are serious about wanting alternatives to high gas prices. I believe that these higher gas prices, which no one has really been able to explain, have been thrown at us to get us outraged - and it certainly has. Now they are going to close the deal by getting us to agree to more drilling. How dumb do we have to be? If we don't call those greedy people in Congress and in the oil and automotive industries on this, we'll be looking at our children's children bellyaching about gas prices.

P.S. I have to agree to an extent about Michael Moore's movies. Although I do think that it is good that there is someone who is willing to buck the system and point out some of the horrendous ways that we've been sold down the river. Yes, he goes overboard, but he does make some very honest and serious points in the process.

I didn't hear the Bush speech this morning but I did hear about what he wants to do, with McCain's support, about drilling more oil wells off our coasts, etc. Anybody besides me think we've been set up? All these latest gas price increases have been done so that we will welcome their proposal with open arms... thrilled that new wells will bring the price down. Guess we look like we just fell off the turnip truck, huh? I'm sure Bush has promised one last great accomplishment for the oil companies before he leaves office and McCain wants them to know that he can be depended on and wants his cut. Thank goodness we have someone who is making sense running for office. I really don't think that there is a question about who we must vote for if we care anything about ourselves and the environment. And I'm not exaggerating, I really believe that with all my heart Obama should be elected and that he will help us turn this thing around.

Sorry. That's as short and concise as I can manage to make it.

I don't believe that Obama is suggesting an additional windfall profits tax. He is speaking to where the money should be spent. Other candidates have suggested doing away with the windfall profits tax completely. Which sounds like what you're suggesting, Jack. One thing you can't argue with is that the oil companies are making plenty. Three of them reported first-quarter earnings; combined, the total surpassed $27 billion! They have hardly passed that on to consumers. Our gas prices have gone up every month since then. My thought is that rather than taxing these companies more, it would be better to withdraw the $1.8 billion in subsidies being given to these exorbitantly profitable companies. And that was what I was referring to in my previous post. If we thought it was necessary, some of that money could be used to investigate possible price gouging. Investigators might ask why only from 81 percent to 85 percent of the nation's gasoline refining capacity was in use during April. When California suffered electricity shortages in 2000-01, firms such as Enron illegally manipulated the market by shutting down 12 percent of production capacity. Even that amount created a highly profitable crisis. Seeing oil refineries operating at even greater reductions is eerily familiar. As for drilling our way out of this crisis, as the president suggests, that's a smokescreen. The number of oil wells in this nation has increased by 66 percent over the past eight years. We don't need wells in wildlife refuges; we need better ideas. Obama understands this, which is why he has refused to embrace easy but flawed solutions to score cheap political points. Some of this information was taken from a newspaper report. Some is just thoughts of my own. As for the definition of windfall profits tax, all you have to do it search the 'net. There are tons of sources explaining it from every direction. And btw, the trickle down theory that Republicans embrace has never really worked. It doesn't have to do with government spending, Jack, it's the idea that large corporations make so much money that the poor and middle class benefit over time from the huge corporate profits. If only it worked! That would be fantastic. I would support it wholeheartedly. But it doesn't and we found that out during Reagan's presidency.

I don't think any of us has a desire to see companies' profits taken away. Do you really think that's a problem with oil companies, Jack? What we've been doing is subsidizing oil companies and Americans have been supposed to be thrilled with the fact that oil is less expensive and more readily available here than in many other countries. The fact is that with all the help we've given oil companies, we're probably not paying less - just less at the pump. I cannot understand why Americans think that by making corporations pay their fair share of taxes, that it is going to be unfair to them or do them harm. Many things were put into effect to incentivize them and by gosh, they have been incentivized to the max. Are you happy with all the enormous profits that they are enjoying now? Is it helping America? The Republicans have spent the last over 7 years making things ultra favorable to corporations in the U.S. And they love the idea of the "trickle down theory" which has never worked and never will. It's all about greed and the more they make, the greedier they get. It's time to slow it down a bit. Checks and balances are in order. I don't want the pendulum to swing back in such a way that wealthy Americans and corporations are being penalized - I just want them to give a little back so that we less fortunate folks don't have to give quite so much. And Plain I am sorry that you do not understand why I say "the Republicans" or "the Democrats" or "the Independents" instead of referring to an individual who is running for office. Each party has a platform that they adopt - things that they believe in and want to put (or keep) in effect. That's what the Republican party and the Democratic party and the Independent party stand for, each as a group. Yes, those groups are made up of individuals but it isn't one individual who is making the policy, it's a group. Therefore referring to them as a group is the only proper way to discuss what they stand for and what they endorse. John and Cindy McCain aren't the Republican party - they are only members of the party. They will do, in some cases, what the Republican party asks of them as representatives of the party. That's why if you like McCain, but dislike the party platform, and you vote for the man, you're still getting the party platform. Perhaps that's not very important to you, but it's important that we understand how this works.

Looks like Americans are going to demand an aggressive new policy on energy. Things have been swept under the run for far too long. Washingtonians like to blame the people for enjoying their cars, but we haven't had any reasonable alternatives in most parts of the country. Have any of you seen the documentary, "Who Killed the Electric Car"?

I do not believe that fertilized eggs have rights. I do not believe that fetuses have rights. Sorry if that is offensive to you, but them's my beliefs and they are just as valid as yours. They have no bearing on this issue really, because what we are talking about is women's rights. And women do have rights. They have the same rights as every other individual in this country. Let me paint a little scenario for you: If you were compelled to have sex, and let's assume it's against your wishes, and someone told you that because of that, you had to have a child, Mr. Man, and that you had to have a fertilized egg implanted in your abdomen, you had to take pills to ensure that your body provided the proper nourishment so that the egg grows and is healthy, have the baby-making process completely rule your life and your job and make you uncomfortable, physically distort your body, change your hormones and all that and then after nine long months you must then go through hours of painful labor and delivery; and then you had to support the baby once it's born and raise and nurture the baby, take care of all its' needs: food, clothing, shelter, education, protection from harm, take care of it through all of its' illnesses, miss work and have your job put in jeopardy because of the missed work, provide it medical care; then help it go to college and become a productive member of society, certainly help it learn how to love and marry well and then help it when it goes on to have babies... I don't know if your eagerness to ban abortion would be quite the same as it is now. Naturally there is no way you could possibly know how you would feel about it since you will never, ever be faced with any of that in a way that a real woman would. But that's not all you need to consider... then if the government decided that we need more children in this world, but only girl children because they can reproduce, and they decided that you had to try to become impregnated with a girl baby but you couldn't have a girl baby, and you must abort any boy baby you become pregnant with, would you still believe that it is within the government's rights to dictate what you must do when you get pregnant?

God Save the Druid Sacrifices.

Hey Ghost, thanks for the positive comments and the not so positive ones as well. And thanks a bunch for going ahead and reposting after having lost your original one. I've had that happen and it is extremely frustrating! I am married to a Republican. He's from a whole family of Republicans, all of whom I love dearly! Of course all Republicans aren't representative of the way I characterized them in my post. When I refer to the antics of the Republican party or of the current administration, I am not saying that each and every person who works at the White House or who is registered to that party, is guilty of that behavior. But I can say that the group is guilty of something as a whole, and be accurate. Just like I have to take it when people label all Democrats as extreme liberals who like to make the government bigger, collect and spend more taxes, take away all guns, hug all the trees and throw red paint on people who wear fur. Of course we aren't all like that. I'm sure not. So please when I'm referring to a group of people, don't think that I believe that everyone who is registered as a Republican believes that the war in Iraq was a brilliant move or that everybody should own machine guns and hollow-core bullets, or that global warming doesn't matter. We're all individuals. We do, however, sometimes work collectively for things we want to achieve for our country. And doing that sometimes causes us to belong to a group that we don't agree with 100% on each and every issue. That's just the breaks of the game. We have to take the good with the bad sometimes. And hopefully, we can make sure that more good than bad happens. If we disagree with the political tactics of our party, we can be vocal about it and disavow that behavior. It sounds like you are doing just that and I commend you for it! Thanks for your heartfelt post!!

P.S. I believe that the way for Americans to come together is for whites to understand what blacks have experienced at the hands of white people. By the same token, I believe that blacks need to understand that most young white people today do not feel threatened by black people and are not bigoted towards black people. Education, communication and understanding is the key. Also, we have to WANT to heal this open wound. Ignoring it will never make it better. Pretending the past never happened won't make it better. We need to acknowledge each others' misunderstandings and ignorance about each other. Get it out in the open and embrace each other as fellow human beings on this earth. Work together, not stay divided. I believe it can happen. I believe that we have already improved things in this country, but it didn't happen because time heals wounds. It happened because we forced the issue. We became knowledgeable and we acknowledged our own shortcomings and each others' ignorance.

Elenation I definitely believe that you and I both are being influenced by our political beliefs on this issue. I am glad that you approve of him backing out of the church and away from Rev. Wright. Some people have said that his walking away from Wright was simply a political move and that it didn't mean anything. As for my influences along the way, I lived through the race riots. I have known of lynchings of black men in the south at the hands of bigoted, hate-filled white men. I have been privy to information about the Ku Klux Klan and some of their hideous mob scenes that incite white against black... things like church bombings come to mind. I have read papers written by college kids who are black and who have experienced a bucket load of hate and discrimination at the hands of their white teachers and classmates. It is shocking to realize what some white people are continuing to do to black Americans. Perhaps you haven't been privy to all that. I am sure that many white people haven't been either and do not have a clue about what it means to be a black person in America. But most of us do know about the discrimination and bigotry. And yet amazingly, after knowing all this, some white people expect black people to just humbly bear it and not lash out in return. Not be angry. Not feel persecuted. They're expected to pretend it never happened, and that it is not happening even today. I don't believe that is very realistic or understanding. I think that is short-sided thinking.