So How Do I Reply To This?

I need some help with a Facebook debate that began with a guy from my old hometown posting this link: Reaganomics Vs. Obamanomics: Facts And Figures


I said: 

Odd how that article doesn't mention that Reagan ended up raising taxes 11 times. Because after his initial tax decrease on the rich from 70% to 28% - by 1983 the debt, skyrocketed from $700 billion to $3 trillion. Have you read Douglas Brinkley's Reagan bios? I have. As Brinkley says, "Ronald Reagan was never afraid to raise taxes.", "He knew that it was necessary at times. And so there's a false mythology out there about Reagan as this conservative president who came in and just cut taxes and trimmed federal spending in a dramatic way. It didn't happen that way. It's false." The 1983 payroll tax hike went to pay for Social Security and Medicare (So Reagan raised taxes to pay for government-run health care)

 In the end, Reagan's tax increases didn't completely wipe out the effects of that initial tax cut. But they did eat up about half of it. He wasn't happy about raising taxes, and part of the reason was to work with a non-compliant Congress - but Reagan did what was right to help. He swallowed his pride, and he compromised. Trickle down economics trickled down alright on the poor and working classes except it wasn't with jobs or wealth - it just felt wet.

Then he said:

He had to fight the liberals in congress at the time so a compromise was necessary. A president doesn't raise taxes, congress does and he had a boatload full of ignorant liberals to fight. As for Brinkley. Good God man, he he helped an idiot like Carter win a Nobel prize. That alone should qualify him as a fool. Not to mention his dalliances with Kerry. Keep dreaming your dreams David, your party is full of idiots. As for the debt increase. Quantify the debt. Did it help destroy the Soviet Union. The beloved homeland of your party? How did the Poor pay? Your party has caused more destruction of minorities and the impoverished than anyone. 

Then my reply:

‎"the Soviet Union. The beloved homeland of your party" O_o I thought the Democratic party was established in America by Martin Van Buren and a bunch of anti-whig politicians, farmers, urban laborers, and Irish Catholics in support of Andy Jackson? If I had been living in the 1870s to 1910 with the same sensibilities and beliefs as I do now, I'd have been a Republican.

You're right Congress levies taxes, but the pres. budget's suggested them, Reagan and Tip O'neilll had beers together, found common ground - staff, committees and Congress battled it out - then Reagan signed them. I guess the main crux of my point wasn't so much the taxes, as the system of communication and compromise that just doesn't exist anymore - grinding the gears of democracy to a halt. Both parties are to blame. 

THEN his reply:

Well over 50% of the democrats that held appointed office during the 40's and 50's were mentioned in KBG reports as associates of the Communist party. i.e. McCarthy was right. Bush tried to communicate and reason with liberals but they turned on him as they seem wont to do.The democrats of today are turd kickers. They have no values. None. The evisceration of a fetus is their primary plank. Want to see a picture?

This is my shocked response:

 

McCarthy was a discredited paranoid. Where are you getting your facts? I mean. I just... I'm speechless. I don't have anything to say. There is nothing to say. You can't honestly believe these things. I mean, no offence, but I mean these are things that an expositional character in a Brad Metltzer pot boiler would espouse or Mel Gibson's character in that 90s movie Conspiracy theory. I just don't understand what you are saying. This is akin to me debating whether the style of a door is art nuvo or Arts and Crafts and then getting back as a response the dimensions of a window in the Vatican in ancient Etruscan. I'm truly stunned.

Ok. So, what should I have said? How do I reply to something like that? What do I say?

A Few Thoughts on the Debate and Sarah Palin

After watching the grand theatre that was last night's Vice Presidential Debate, I have a few thoughts I'd like to share. I've  finally figured out exactly why I don't like Gov. Palin, she is exactly like G.W. Bush. She has this ugly and condescending, sarcastically arrogant side that clearly isn't earned, just like Bush. Arrogance in any form is never pretty, but none bothers me more so than unearned arrogance. 

Bush has unraveled our economy, gotten us into two wars, ruined our international reputation, squandered the capital of international good will after 9/11., ignored the growing crisis of Global Warming and spent four years (2001-2005) actively creating a police state mentality. This is the present NOT the past. This is the mess that the worst President in American history has gotten us into. I don't want someone dealing with foreign policy and dignitaries by cramming the night before and not being able to deviate from talking points. For me, I want my President and VP to be the smartest people in the room.

When it comes to Sarah Palin, here’s what I do care about.

I care that Sarah Palin thinks that the war in Iraq is part of God’s plan.

I care that Sarah Palin thinks religious creationism should be taught as science in public schools.

I care that Sarah Palin thinks dinosaurs and people may have lived at the same time.

I care that Sarah Palin doesn’t know enough about foreign policy to know what the Bush Doctrine is . . . and that she seems to think she has foreign policy experience because “you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska.” (Or, as Tina Fey put it, “I can see Russia from my house!”)

I care that she lies, repeatedly, about whether she sought and accepted pork barrel money from Congress for her town and her state. I care that her only government experience is as a city council member of a town of less than 10,000, as mayor of said town, and as governor of Alaska for less than two years. I care that, as Matt Damon put it (yes, you heard me, Matt Damon — it’s an amazing video and you’ve got to watch it), the prospect of a Palin presidency is “like a really bad Disney movie.” I care . . . oh, you get the picture.

Then there are all the unnerving things that keep coming out about her. How she was an arrogant Mayor who left her town in debt. How she tired to fire her ex-bother-in-law. How she was for the Bridge To No Where before she was against it. How she accepted gifts over the dollar limit since being Governor. How she tried to ban books in her hometown Library while she was Mayor. How she tried to BAN BOOKS in her hometown Library!! How she cites foreign policy experience by pointing out her states' proximity to Russia. How she signed into law an act charging rape victims in Wasilla for their rape kits, (even though she claims not to know if it did or not. Her signature was on it. It's her responsibility to read the laws she signs as Mayor or Governor.) How she approved a law on aerial hunting of wolves and other wildlife!

I care that the McCain campaign and the Republican party were so sloppy in vetting her that they keep getting ambushed with new outrages and inanities about her, every day of the campaign. I care that their thought process in picking her was apparently not, “Who might be qualified to be President if the 72- year-old McCain dies?” but, “How can we get evangelicals and disaffected female Hillary supporters to vote for McCain?” I care that Palin was nominated, in large part, because the GOP (a) wanted to get women voters, and (b) thinks women voters are idiots. I care that they view their Vice- Presidential nominee as, essentially, Dan Quayle in a dress. I could go on, but again, this person has no business being where she is.

I like and respect John McCain. I don't like his campaign this year. The tone is very Bush and the stakes in this election are far too high. If McCain would have gotten the nomination over Bush in 2000, I would have voted for him over Gore. Just so you know, I'm not one to tow a 'party line". I vet the best person for the job, for my values and for my Country. I would normally end this as I have in the past by saying just vote, I don't care who for, just vote. I'm NOT going to say it anymore. It's too important. It really really is. This is an election for our future, our children's future and our World. Please look past race, look past party, look past agendas, look past diatribe and please vote Obama/Biden. Please! The choice seems so obvious. Please open your mind, your heart and read, research and evaluate. The urgency is clear. Your not just voting for the next four years, but the future of humanity, our world, our country, our economy, our safety, our future.

No one will ever know you did. You can publicly deny it later, but in the privacy of that booth; please pull the lever, push the button, punch the card, darken the circle for a better, safer and saner future. Please? Peace.

Photo: Reuters/Jim Young

Wordle Text Clouds of McCain's and Obama's Words From the September, 26th Debate

 
McCain's Words

 
Obama's Words