Rod Blagojevich (D)

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

...The brains all seem to be on the right-hand side of the aisle. So I hang with the smart guys.

So why do you think so many smart guys on the right-hand side of the aisle were investigated for corruption?

Below is a rundown of all 21 lawmakers, current and former. Ten of them are no longer in office. Investigations of seven are part of the Abramoff investigation. Seventeen are Republicans, four are Democrats.

http://www.propublica.org/article/po...gation-wrap-up

[TGRR]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

They make so good a case for the conservative cause that it's quite persuaded me. The brains all seem to be on the right-hand side of the aisle. So I hang with the smart guys.

You hang with them?



Yes, they will avoid smashing you flat, because you're on their side.

HAR HAR!

None of these Janus-faced assholes are on "your side", UG, and anyone who thinks they are should probably just stop pretending to have a spine.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

TGRR, you will never know the joys of ratiocination with an attitude like that. Your complete ignorance of National Review, American Spectator, Commentary, The New York Review of Books, The Christian Science Monitor, the World Jewish Review, and The Weekly Standard can only leave you in the condition of a dead fish washed up on the beach, high, dry, and part skeletonized. Not a condition to envy.

I am more vertebrate than you are, for I have the spine to reject the complex of poor ideas that seem to satisfy your mind and tastes, TGRR. You haven't the quality of thinking that could shake me -- indeed, none of the disputants reading this have that, and believe me they've tried. They've all found me extraordinarily tough, articulate, and able to say why I don't think they should hew to the ideas they brought with them any further.

Redux, do give sufficient mention to the corrupt culture of the Clinton Administration, with especial notice to its utter suborning of the Department of Justice under Janet Reno, whose time in office was largely spent running interference for the Clintonistas and the Clintons.

UG...the difference between us.

I say that power corrupts...you say its more of a party thing.

I've never said, nor would I defend, some of the questionable policies and practices of the Clinton admin.. But the abuses by the Bush administration certainly stand up to (and surpass, in the minds of many on the left and center) anything Clinton/Reno did.

Please cite examples of "the utter suborning of the Department of Justice under Janet Reno" and how they match these five by the Bush DoJ

Your defense of those practices does not show "adult thinking"....but rather blind ideology.

Not to mention (again) the corruption and ethics of those Republicans in the 109th Congress, including the K Street influence peddling was the worst in recent years....since the Abscam days.

Just calling our your bullshit for what it is....but feel to ignore the facts in my cites. You can hide from the facts...it won't make them go away.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

So why do you think so many smart guys on the right-hand side of the aisle were investigated for corruption?

Those numbers will change over the next 4 years. There is no doubt about it.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Those numbers will change over the next 4 years. There is no doubt about it.

I think there might be doubt...I wont presume.

The Democratic Congress did at least adopt the first ethics and lobbying reform bill in 20 years...as weak as I think it is, its better than what was in place when the Republicans were in charge.

The question is if they live up to the new standards.

But as I said, power corrupts, not party affiliation as UG suggests.

[TheMercenary]

4 years. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. History repeats itself. Happened under 8 years of Clinton.

Lets talk again in 2013.

[TheMercenary]

Don't worry, I will be posting them as they go down. And they will.

Be sure to provide factual cites and not biased editorials

[TheMercenary]

Don't think that has ever been a problem when people have been accused of corruption. I leave it up to the courts to provide the final blow, all it takes is the evidence to strike up an investigation and that is an inditement enough now days, I mean if you are holding up the Bush admin and Repubs as the standard. There have been plenty of Dems in that category over the last 4 years to not be throwing to many stones at that house of glass. I am confident the Demoncrats will rise to the occassion, just like any majority power. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Oh, I don't argue power's corrupting capacity is any respecter of party -- only that the respective demographics of the Big Two have differing levels of resistance to that corruption. And in the end, it's a matter of individual character. Now which party was it that definitely makes a thing of individual character again? And is this not measurable in the glee with which the opposition pounces upon any displays of flawed individual character, trying to advertise that this is altogether prevalent among this party? One suspects there is no integrity in such posturing. The nearest to integrity they come in this has been public remark that "Well, nobody expects that level of probity of one of us," leaving unsaid what they've been doing to lower the expectation.

I've heard no person of the center, nor anyone with a level head, excoriate the Bush Administration with justice. It seems strictly the province of the ill-advised and the lunatic, and these people patently have no justice at all. It leaves me skeptical as to the mental hygiene standards of the Left.

You can always start, I suppose, with AG Reno's not defending the Second Amendment from that Administration's encroachments, in particular the antigun provisions of the Omnibus Crime Bill of 1994. (Antigun lawmaking is quite pro-genocide, sayeth our JPFO -- and I think no Jew should be unaware of the JPFO's arguments and philosophy, be he never so liberal or never so Hasidic; one should know how to promote genocide and then take care never to tolerate such promotion.) She was in an excellent position to tell Bill Clinton his desired regulations ran athwart the Second Amendment, but no, there was nary a peep from her or her staff against being directed to enforce an unconstitutionality, and it wasn't like there were any progun partisans in the Clinton cabinet anyway. I'll dig up the cites, that's only fair; and if you can't recall the dubious behavior of the Reno attorney-generalship, I suppose I'll need to jog your memory.

Here's a page on JPFO's site setting out in compact form what the JPFO believes to be genocide's essentials and its preconditions. Israeli society seems to understand this very well indeed.

As far as I can recall, there was nothing unconstitutional in the '94 Omnibus Crime BIll.

Damn...is that your best shot?

The Miller Case in '39 had served as precedent (albeit limited in scope) for 60+ years. There was no basis for Reno to suggest to Clinton that the bill contained any provisions that were unconstitutional, including the assault weapon ban.

To compare the democratically elected and constitutionally guided government of the US with its checks and balances to the Young Turks, Nazi Germany, Communist Russia or China, Khmer Rouge, as suggested in your link, is simply ignorant fear mongering.

Sorry..you failed that one...mr adult thinker.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

No, it's my first shot. You will not be able to stand what I can bring to this part of it.

The finding in US v. Miller was also not well informed as to the martial uses of the short shotgun -- they were in fact completely ignorant of its use to date, which was a matter of Army record. Since 1939, the military shotgun's record has grown: they run to longish sawed-offs a couple inches shorter than legal in the barrel, cylinder bored -- no choke, used in close terrain more or less as a reusable claymore mine.

There was basis for Reno to suggest to Clinton that the bill contained any provisions that were unconstitutional,

I agree; there was basis, as you unintentionally wrote.

Assault "weapon" bans (you are seriously behind the technical curve if that's the most accurate term you have) are the most directly genocidal of all gun control "you can't have it" regulations. Antigenocidal gun laws would be to the effect of "you must have it." The freest approach to this is to neither forbid assault rifles on every mantle nor in any wise mandate them.

Keep firing, dude!

Hit me with your best shot