Republican National Convention

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by Pekka
OK I caught the last ~15 minutes.. from the Kerry 87 billion agree, wait a minute I don't agree part.

After that.. I listened carefully. What did he actually say, except: Freedom blaa blaa blaa Liberty blaa blaa blaa our allies are good blaa blaa blaa, 911 blaa blaa blaa? I consider that 0 content on future issues.

The first part of the speech that you missed dealt with the domestic agenda. It did lay out an agenda. Bush spoke of extending Pell Grants, creating business zones to help poor neighborhoods, making the tax cuts permanent, simplifying the tax code, reducing frivolous medical lawsuits, etc... So he did lay out some real ideas.

[Agathon]

If Bush wins, the US loses. Fine by me.

[Pekka]

With that speech, do you think? It was nothing but feel fest as much as I heard

Then again, that just might be it.... maybe Kerry is not doing such good job at it. Bush knows what it takes to get to be the president, so.. maybe he knows, their team knows that this is the way and Kerry's team just doesn't cut it. What do you think?

[Agathon]

It's great for the left. Everyone outside the US who sees that is going to know that Bush is a nutcase. All the better for electing governments that disassociate us from you loons.

Here's hoping this gets played again and again in Australia. Should do Howard's prospects a load of good.

After seeing this I am more convinced than ever that Bush is just a moron who's out of his depth.

[Pekka]

Well, I'm pretty neutral about Bush myself, little negative about Kerry, but this speech, I just don't know what he said. I don't know what he says he is going to do except 'freedom blaa blaa liberty'. This sentence means, that it is words without content. So don't get offended when I say liberty and blaa blaa in the same sentence

But my point is, what is he trying to say?

ALSO!!!!!

He made a HUGE mistake, well his speech writer did at one point, when he basically says, taht IF he gets elected again, he will support the troops. Doesn't this also mean, 'I'm not going to support the troops now, only if you vote me again?'..... that's a bad thing to say, he should have said 'I will keep supporting the troops like I have to this day. I have accepted a new budget, and will look to more increases in teh future as well'. THAT'S how you say it. NOT 'I will support the troops, if you elect me'. That's like you're not doing all you can already, while you ARE the president. So, -1 for the speech writer for leaving open attack for KErry with this.

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by Agathon
It's great for the left. Everyone outside the US who sees that is going to know that Bush is a nutcase. All the better for electing governments that disassociate us from you loons.

Here's hoping this gets played again and again in Australia. Should do Howard's prospects a load of good.

After seeing this I am more convinced than ever that Bush is just a moron who's out of his depth.

Bush and 271 electoral votes. Any chance Howard wins again? I heard he called for elections. Is that right?

[Pekka]

The Diplomat, AH ok.. thanks for the info. I did miss that part.

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by Pekka
He made a HUGE mistake, well his speech writer did at one point, when he basically says, taht IF he gets elected again, he will support the troops. Doesn't this also mean, 'I'm not going to support the troops now, only if you vote me again?'..... that's a bad thing to say, he should have said 'I will keep supporting the troops like I have to this day. I have accepted a new budget, and will look to more increases in teh future as well'. THAT'S how you say it. NOT 'I will support the troops, if you elect me'. That's like you're not doing all you can already, while you ARE the president. So, -1 for the speech writer for leaving open attack for KErry with this.

Now Pekka, you're making a big assumption here. Are you sure he just didn't read it right?

[GePap]

Originally posted by The diplomat


The first part of the speech that you missed dealt with the domestic agenda. It did lay out an agenda. Bush spoke of extending Pell Grants, creating business zones to help poor neighborhoods, making the tax cuts permanent, simplifying the tax code, reducing frivolous medical lawsuits, etc... So he did lay out some real ideas.

Yes, real Liberal Ideas like more federal spending for education, more federal spending for the poor, more federal spending for health care (which I heartily approve off), little if anything about reforming social security or tax policy...

And of course, under a conservative congress NONE of these things will get far, if happen at all. But its good to know that Bush will conitnue his policy of spend and borrow, and not return to the evil days of tax and spend, cause its much better for the Feds to pay for programs with loans from the Communist Chinese than with money from the backs of hard working folks.

[GePap]

I think the democrats should make a commercial comparing their key note, Barak Obama, and the republican key note, Zell Miller, and let people judge for themselves which message is trully more hopeful and optimistic for the future of America.

[Pekka]

dojoboy, No no it was the whole structure.. when he said that, it translated to my ears 'I'm not doing all I can right now'.

[Fake Boris]

God, what a ****ing moron this dude sounds like. It's just unbelievable that some people in this forum with cognitive abilities of any sort are going to vote for him.

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by GePap
I think the democrats should make a commercial comparing their key note, Barak Obama, and the republican key note, Zell Miller, and let people judge for themselves which message is trully more hopeful and optimistic for the future of America.

I think that would ruin Barak Obama for the future. Zell Miller, although a dinosaur, has too many connections. The Dems couldn't protect Obama from the machine.

[Fake Boris]

At least it was a good laugh before going to bed. Even better than a fellatio.

[Imran Siddiqui]

In a new term, we must allow small firms to join together to purchase insurance at the discounts available to big companies.

NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!!! I can't believe he's supporting this again! In the Department of Labor we call this a MEWA (Multiple Employer Welfare Arrangements), and they are horrible things! A bunch of small firms join together to get insurance and then one of the participants gets something HUGE and it bankrupts the MEWA, resulting in the plan participants basically losing their money.

The bigger problem is that it is very easy to defraud small companies by coming to them and saying you run a MEWA with very small premium payments. The promoters make their cash and then run when a big payment must be paid. And this is not something that happens rarely, but something that we see VERY often with MEWAs, which is why we tend not to like them at all.

The DOL is not a fan of MEWAs because what they invariably do is screw ordinary people over, resulting in large lawsuits which may not make the participants ever whole.

http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/Newsroom/fsMEWAenforcement.html

In further recognition of the importance of aggressive enforcement in the MEWA area, the Department affirmed MEWAs as one of the significant issues in its Enforcement Strategy Implementation Plan (ESIP) in the 1990s. In EBSA’s Strategic Enforcement Plan (StEP), EBSA has identified MEWAs as one of its longstanding national projects that it continues to aggressively pursue.

To date, the Department has:

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Initiated 622 civil and 113 criminal investigations affecting over 1.914 million participants and their beneficiaries and identifying monetary violations of over $140.5 million. There are currently 124 civil and 34 criminal investigations open.
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Filed 64 civil complaints.
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Indicted 95 individuals with 70 convictions.
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Published technical assistance materials, including a booklet explaining federal and state regulation of MEWAs.
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Issued numerous advisory opinions to assist state prosecutors and regulators to enforce state insurance laws against MEWAs.
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Convicted individuals have been sentenced total prison terms of approximately 201 years. Most of these investigations have been jointly investigated with other agencies, including the Department’s Division of Labor Racketeering, the FBI, the U. S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigative Division.

Way to go, Mr. President