Comments on: Obama: where are the fact-checkers?

By: Baklava

Baklava — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 06:06:31 +0000

oooh look ! John was wrong.

By: John Spragge

John Spragge — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 12:11:48 +0000

Wrong, Darth, Prime Minister Maliki has indeed endorsed the pull-out of American combat troops, and backed it up by refusing to negotiate a long term status of forces agreement.

By: Augean Stables » Barack Obama, the John Lennon Candidate

Augean Stables » Barack Obama, the John Lennon Candidate — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 18:57:20 +0000

[...] Belfast walls have come down? Neocon has more to say on the Belfast issue. South Africa is a model of success? (And let’s not forget what the end [...]

By: I R A Darth Aggie

I R A Darth Aggie — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 14:56:35 +0000

The Iraqi Prime Minister has called for a sixteen month timetable for withdrawing, and endorsed Senator Obama’s position pretty explicitly.

No, no, he hasn’t. Maliki, unlike Obama, is a consumate politician. And he understands that should his regime fall, his likely “retirement” will not be to Najaf, writting “elder statesmen” books. So the US will have a presence in-country for a lot more than 16 months.

By: amr

amr — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 21:47:36 +0000

I was wondering how any candidate could make written speeches with so many errors. One can see his problem with history by his off-the-cuff statements; but in a speech? Having 3 writers 30 or under speaks volumes ABOUT HIM for the reasons you put forth. Before I retires, as a manager I surrounded myself with people who were more knowledgeable than me in many areas and told them and my construction craft to challenge me. Yes, I told them, I had to make the final decisions, but if I was sand bagged, it was not just me that suffered.

By: John Spragge

John Spragge — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 10:10:50 +0000

A huge number of developments played a role in the development of peace in Northern Ireland, from the liberalization in the Irish Republic, to the clampdown on IRA fund raising in the United States. The generation of British soldiers who endured the burden of keeping some kind of limits on communal strife deserve their share of the credit.

It seems unlikely that the American Army will get the opportunity to carry out the same role in Iraq over the same time period; the Iraqi government seems quite unwilling to accept a status of forces agreement which would permit a permanent occupation force. The Iraqi Prime Minister has called for a sixteen month timetable for withdrawing, and endorsed Senator Obama’s position pretty explicitly. I do not think you have any alternative but to hope the Iraqis make a go of it.

By: Fresh Bilge » Summer of What?

Fresh Bilge » Summer of What? — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 23:39:20 +0000

[...] change relinquishes to change more fundamental.” What the hell is that supposed to mean? Have Obama’s callow speechwriters have boon moonlighting as green shills for corporate America? Why do people who seek to [...]

By: harry McHitlerburtonstein the COnservative Extremist

harry McHitlerburtonstein the COnservative Extremist — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 17:12:07 +0000

John Spragge: Is Belfast better off today than it was, say, 20 years ago? Think that just happened by itself?

Is not the condition now in Iraq better than uncontrolled ethnic and sectarian violence?

We do grasp that people harbor animosities against each other. What you need to grasp is that the cycle isnt going to end on its own without one side murdering off the other (and then maybe only after centuries of random violence). Since you do not put forth a viable alternative to what we’re doing, Im not seeing what lesson it is you presume to lecture us about.

By: SteveH

SteveH — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 15:12:02 +0000

To a modern liberal, all historical hindsight does is self evidently reveal humanity to be 180 degrees out of phase with what COULD HAVE produced utopia on Earth.

So the percieved alternative to the reality of 4,000 soldiers dying, is never 40,000 soldiers dying. Only that the utopian number of zero was at our fingertips if humanity would just listen.

By: Truth

Truth — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 10:59:33 +0000

“Eventually, we will all hate Obama too”

Often those who express their tiresome anti-Americanism will suggest, as do some of the more disingenuous anti-Zionists with regard to anti-Semitism - that they, of course, are not anti-American, and that no one really is. But, coming as I do from an Anti-American tradition that wasn't afraid to proclaim itself, I think I know where the corpses are interred. For example, the current production of Bernstein's Candide at the English National Opera is a classic of elite anti-Americanism, in which we are invited to laugh at the philistine invocation of “Democracy, the American Way and McDonald's”. The laughter that accompanied this feeble satire showed our proper understanding that we, the audience, had a proper concept of democracy, and would never soil ourselves with an Egg McMuffin