Text 8070, 240 rader
Skriven 2008-11-02 18:07:00 av Bob Klahn (1:124/311)
Ärende: Sowell on an Obama presid
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EH> An Obama Win Will Be More Than Historic
EH> By THOMAS SOWELL | Posted Thursday, October 30, 2008 4:30
EH> PM PT
I read this in the Toledo Blade. It's Sowell's typical smoke and
broken mirrors.
EH> Some elections are routine, some are important and some are
EH> historic. If Sen. John McCain wins this election, it will
EH> probably go down in history as routine. But if Sen. Barack
EH> Obama wins, it is more likely to be historic -- and
EH> catastrophic.
If McCain wins it's more likely to go down in history as
catastrophic. McCain will continue the policies that have spent
this country into debt that can eventually bankrupt it. McCain's
devotion to an immoral war is likely to lead to the loss of the
real war, in Afghanistan.
...
EH> Performance is where Barack Obama has nothing to show for
EH> his political career, either in Illinois or in Washington.
And neither has McCain for that matter.
EH> Policies that he proposes under the banner of "change" are
EH> almost all policies that have been tried repeatedly in
EH> other countries -- and failed repeatedly in other countries.
EH> Politicians telling businesses how to operate? That's been
EH> tried in countries around the world, especially during the
EH> second half of the 20th century. It has failed so often and
EH> so badly that even socialist and communist governments were
EH> freeing up their markets by the end of the century.
Politicians removing the regulations that tell businesses how to
operate are responsible for the economic disaster we are now
facing. No where in the world and no where in history has any
economy operated without government telling business how to
operate.
EH> The economies of China and India began their takeoff into
India and China are turning more into Feudal societies than
anything we would want to emulate.
EH> Putting restrictions on international trade in order to
EH> save jobs at home? That was tried here with the
EH> Hawley-Smoot tariff during the Great Depression.
Which is a fraud. Restrictions on international trade have been
the hallmark of both America's and Japan's periods of growth and
widespread prosperity. Both countries have gone into economic
decline when they adopted globalization.
EH> Unemployment was 9% when that tariff was passed to save
EH> jobs, but unemployment went up instead of down, and reached
EH> 25% before the decade was over.
Yet Smoot-Hawley was effectively and largely repealed by
international trade agreements signed shortly afterward. Within
a few years it was effectively gone. Yet unemployment still went
up.
Smoot-Hawley affected a small percentage of the US GDP at that
time. There is no reason to believe it was responsibile for much
of any harm.
EH> Higher taxes to "spread the wealth around," as Obama puts
EH> it?
That part is a pure lie. Listen to the exchange with "Joe the
Plumber". Obama said he wanted to cut taxes for the poor and
middle classes to give them the opportunity to move up, as he
was led to believe, falsely, that Joe the plumber was doing.
snipurl.com/plumberjoe
EH> The idea of redistributing wealth has turned into the
EH> reality of redistributing poverty, in countries where
EH> wealth has fled and the production of new wealth has been
EH> stifled by a lack of incentives.
The idea of redistributing wealth is a basic principle of
capitalism. It is the opportunity to be rewarded for work that
redistributes wealth. The lack of opportunity, or suppression of
opportunity, leads to the gap between the poor and the rich.
Ireland under English occupation around the time of the famine
is a prime example.
EH> Economic disasters, however, may pale by comparison with
EH> the catastrophe of Iran with nuclear weapons. Glib rhetoric
Iran with nuclear weapons is a trivial risk compared to Al Qaeda
with nuclear weapons. And with the Taliban recovering in
Afghanistan, and advancing in Pakistan, that becomes more of a
real danger every day.
Pakistan has nuclear weapons today, not imaginary weapons maybe
some day. If Pakistan falls, the fundie Muslims have nukes from
day one.
EH> about Iran being "a small country," as Obama called it,
EH> will be a bitter irony for Americans who will have to live
EH> in the shadow of a nuclear threat that cannot be deterred,
EH> as that of the Soviet Union could be, by the threat of a
EH> nuclear counterattack.
Sowell is either a fool or a bigot in claiming that Iran cannot
be deterred. Israel could wipe Iran off the face of the earth in
one day. That alone is enough to deter Iran. The peopel of Iran
are *NOT* the fanatics Sowell wants to paint them. There is no
evidence the leadership is.
EH> Suicidal fanatics cannot be deterred. If they are willing
EH> to die and we are not, then we are at their mercy -- and
EH> they have no mercy.
Blatant bigotry on the part of Sowell.
EH> Moreover, once they get nuclear weapons, that is a
EH> situation which cannot be reversed, either in this
EH> generation or in generations to come.
It could be reversed in 15 minutes, half an hour maybe. There is
no way Iran is going to develop a large nuclear arsenal in any
short period of time. The people of Iran know they would be
destroyed if they presented a nuclear threat to Israel, or the
US. And Iran has more democracy than Iraq under the US imposed
regime.
EH> Is this the legacy we wish to leave our children and
EH> grandchildren, by voting on the basis of style and
EH> symbolism, rather than substance?
Is hate and fear and massive debt the legacy we want to leave
our children? Voting on the basis of bigotry and lies creates
that legacy.
EH> If Barack Obama thinks that such a catastrophe can be
EH> avoided by sitting down and talking with the leaders of
EH> Iran, then he is repeating a fallacy that helped bring on
EH> World War II.
If Thomas Sowell thinks that comment is meaningful he is a
bigger fool than I ever thought he is. Oh, and the fallacy that
brought on WWII was not talking to Hitler, but making a deal
that made another country pay the price.
EH> In a nuclear age, one country does not have to send troops
EH> to occupy another country in order to conquer it. A country
EH> is conquered if another country can dictate who rules it,
EH> as the Mongols once did with Russia, and as Osama bin Laden
EH> tried to do when he threatened retaliation against places
EH> in the United States that voted for George W. Bush. But he
EH> didn't have nuclear weapons to back up that threat -- yet.
And he will if he remains allied with the Taliban and the
Taliban takes Pakistan.
EH> America has never been a conquered country, so it may be
EH> very hard for most Americans even to conceive what that can
EH> mean. After France was conquered in 1940, it was reduced to
EH> turning over some of its own innocent citizens to the Nazis
EH> to kill, just because those citizens were Jewish.
No, they were not reduced to that by conquest, but by bigotry
such as Sowell promulgates. The French who colaborated with the
Nazis on that did so willingly, through the same sort of
prejudice Sowell shares.
EH> Do you think our leaders wouldn't do that? Not even if the
EH> alternative was to see New York and Los Angeles go up in
EH> mushroom clouds? If I were Jewish, I wouldn't bet my life
EH> on that.
When the Nazis demanded the Dutch turn over Jews the Dutch
refused. When the Nazis seized Dutch Gentiles and demanded the
Dutch trade Jews for Christians, the King said he would not
trade Dutch citizens for Dutch citizens to be killed. If Sowell
had that sort of integrity we might actually get through this
without turning Americans against Americans. Instead Sowell sees
Americans and Muslims. Colin Powell made the point, in his
endorsement of Obama, that there is something wrong with haveing
to defend Obama by saying he is not a Muslim.
EH> What the Middle East fanatics want is not just our
EH> resources or even our lives, but our humiliation first, in
EH> whatever sadistic ways they can think of. Their lust for
EH> humiliation has already been repeatedly demonstrated in
EH> their videotaped beheadings that find such an eager market
EH> in the Middle East.
And those beheadings were stopped, not by anything we did, but
by other Muslims who revulsion forced Al Qaeda to stop or risk
losing all support.
EH> None of this can be prevented by glib talk, but only by
EH> character, courage and decisive actions -- none of which
EH> Barack Obama has ever demonstrated.
Obama has demonstrated as much of all three as has McCain and
certainly Palin.
Unfortunately we have only two real choices, and neither is
perfect. However, while McCain has an add out asking if you
would fly with a pilot who has never flown a plane, we should
ask if you would fly with a pilot who has crashed 4 planes, with
the loss of three of them, and then lied in at least one case
about the cause of the crash. Or the pilot who, when captured,
gave the enemy information in return for medical care?
Did McCain demonstrate character when he walked out on his wife
after she was severly injured in an automobile accident?
Did McCain demonstrate character when he embraced Bush in 2004,
and adopted the same smear techniques Bush use to beat him in
2000, even hiring the same people to apply them.
In 2000 I supported McCain, and defended him against the
accusations of cooperation with the enemy, and the racist smears
against his family. However, I have lost all respect for him in
his embrace of the lowest of campaign tactics.
Was McCain decisive when he hesitated and dissembled over the
bailout? Was McCain decisive when he ran back and forth between
supporting abortion then opposing abortion?
Thomas Sowell has demonstrated a constant standard of right wing
deception. Sowell shows less character and integrity than either
presidential candidate.
BOB KLAHN bob.klahn@sev.org http://home.toltbbs.com/bobklahn
... Race is an idea whose time has passed. <New People Magazine>
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