Also posted in the thread on "torture":

The torture debate in the Senate suggests a possible theme of Democrats in 2016: that if Republicans can be shown as enablers of brutality that violates Christian sensibilities, then Democrats can reverse many of their recent losses in due time.

Republicans have yet to distance themselves from the moral failures and bad economic stewardship of the Rove/Cheney/Bush era... and with few exceptions (I will give John McCain some credit, but he may be coming to the end of the line of his political career) the GOP has circled the wagons on torture. Maybe in 2010 and 2014 Republicans have won on the implicit threat that if people want any prosperity at all they had better support the absolute plutocracy that the GOP offers.

If Democrats can successfully cast Republicans as supporters of gangster-like behavior, then Democrats can win big in 2016. A political regime that can do such horrible things to foreigners as the Rove/Cheney/Bush Administration did can easily do such things to Americans who end up on the wrong side of such issues as labor-management relations, educational content, and religion. Anyone can become an "enemy of the People" -- or would it be "enemy of Prosperity" in a pure plutocracy -- during a Fourth Turning.

----

We Americans will have a big problem when things are so bad that our political reality is the material of nightmares. Guess what that does for the rest of the world.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Also posted in the thread on "torture":

The torture debate in the Senate suggests a possible theme of Democrats in 2016: that if Republicans can be shown as enablers of brutality that violates Christian sensibilities, then Democrats can reverse many of their recent losses in due time.

Republicans have yet to distance themselves from the moral failures and bad economic stewardship of the Rove/Cheney/Bush era... and with few exceptions (I will give John McCain some credit, but he may be coming to the end of the line of his political career) the GOP has circled the wagons on torture. Maybe in 2010 and 2014 Republicans have won on the implicit threat that if people want any prosperity at all they had better support the absolute plutocracy that the GOP offers.

If Democrats can successfully cast Republicans as supporters of gangster-like behavior, then Democrats can win big in 2016. A political regime that can do such horrible things to foreigners as the Rove/Cheney/Bush Administration did can easily do such things to Americans who end up on the wrong side of such issues as labor-management relations, educational content, and religion. Anyone can become an "enemy of the People" -- or would it be "enemy of Prosperity" in a pure plutocracy -- during a Fourth Turning.

----

We Americans will have a big problem when things are so bad that our political reality is the material of nightmares. Guess what that does for the rest of the world.

While I'm glad that the truth is coming out I don't see running against torture as a winning strategy for the Dems. in 2016. To begin with, sadly most Americans would willingly give up their liberty for promised security. Consider the gaining of a second term by Bush in 2004. Second, many Americans view themselves as potential plutocrats. They vote the economic interests that they want to have rather than what they have. Finally, the so called Christian vote is more precisely a largely Calvinist vote. They will back what they literally see as God's visible elite on earth regardless. It''s their hope for that pie in the sky.

Originally Posted by herbal tee

While I'm glad that the truth is coming out I don't see running against torture as a winning strategy for the Dems. in 2016. To begin with, sadly most Americans would willingly give up their liberty for promised security.

And prosperity. We all know what Benjamin Franklin said about sacrificing essential liberty for temporary safety.
Is prosperity that important? I expect the Right to offer copious threats (vote for people who will cut your pay, ravage the environment, and have you work longer under harsher management -- or you will be very sorry. Is there much ethical difference between "Your money or your life!" from a mugger and "Your toil or your life!" from a plutocrat or landed magnate? The latter is even worse. With a mugger one can put one's life back together... and the $100 or so that you were planning to spend in a nightclub that instead bought some heroin might go to a good cause -- like a fatal overdose for the mugger. (Did I ever say that I was in any way charitable toward criminals?) Peonage does not end after one bad incident; in Europe it lasted for centuries.

Consider the gaining of a second term by Bush in 2004. Second, many Americans view themselves as potential plutocrats. They vote the economic interests that they want to have rather than what they have. Finally, the so called Christian vote is more precisely a largely Calvinist vote. They will back what they literally see as God's visible elite on earth regardless. It's their hope for that pie in the sky.

It is regrettable that Bush, Cheney, Rove, et al still have high approval ratings among Republicans.

If I saw myself as a potential plutocrat I would still believe that being one rich person in a sea of misery would not be worth it.

Even with Calvinism, God's elite does not include evildoers such as gangsters. Someone making huge money off illegal and un-Christian deeds obviously acts without the blessing of God. Whatever tortures were going on in Iraq and at sites of 'extraordinary rendition' in no way look Christian.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

And prosperity. We all know what Benjamin Franklin said about sacrificing essential liberty for temporary safety.

Was it Franklin? I read somewhere once that it was Jefferson. Anyway, great idea too often forgotten.

Originally Posted by pb

If I saw myself as a potential plutocrat I would still believe that being one rich person in a sea of misery would not be worth it.

A lot of poor Southern boys died for the plutocrats between 1861-65. Many of them dreamed of somehow having their own plantation after the war.

Originally Posted by pb

Even with Calvinism, God's elite does not include evildoers such as gangsters. Someone making huge money off illegal and un-Christian deeds obviously acts without the blessing of God. Whatever tortures were going on in Iraq and at sites of 'extraordinary rendition' in no way look Christian.

Kansas.
And I don't so much mean that flat stretch of prairie sandwiched between Nebraska and Oklahoma as I do the concept that leads all three states to vote for who they vote for.

2016 could be a watershed year for new players who can present realistic and non-BS-laden plans to the Middle Class, to help move us out of the current severe pain. A few simple things could help enormously:
- Stop the quantitative easing and cease all attempts to print our way out of the Doldrums. It is not going to work, give it up. Deflation is already here. That battle has been lost.
- Forget about the consumer economy. It is the heroin to our addiction to economic self mutilation.
- Focus relentlessly on value added by manufacturing. That is the ONLY metric that matters. The ONLY one!
- Stop caring about how the poor in other countries are doing. Stop believing naively that the rising tide will lift their boats, turning them into global consumers that the US will benefit from. Hogwash. It does not work that way. The world is not a big free flowing economy. Most other countries control flows of capital in ways you will never be able to comprehend. The notion of a free flowing economy is a childish dream, never to be realized in This Universe.
- Immediately tax all activities done by US domiciled corporations overseas. Tax them to the hilt. And for those companies who flee US domicile, ban their imports. That's right. All of you Bermudan, Swiss and Irish "US" corporations will be disowned and cut off.
- Throwing a bone to Cynic Hero 86, massively beef up US defenses (and I don't mean the forces who chase down terrorists overseas). Full on NMD for the whole US. Complete revamping of nuclear forces. Bring back the draft. 5 million person regular forces. Etc, etc.
- Open the discussion about income tax brackets and look at an apolitical set of models for such brackets and what would actually be best for the overall economy and job creation. No sacred cows.

Originally Posted by XYMOX_4AD_84

2016 could be a watershed year for new players who can present realistic and non-BS-laden plans to the Middle Class, to help move us out of the current severe pain. A few simple things could help enormously:
- Stop the quantitative easing and cease all attempts to print our way out of the Doldrums. It is not going to work, give it up. Deflation is already here. That battle has been lost.
- Forget about the consumer economy. It is the heroin to our addiction to economic self mutilation.
- Focus relentlessly on value added by manufacturing. That is the ONLY metric that matters. The ONLY one!
- Stop caring about how the poor in other countries are doing. Stop believing naively that the rising tide will lift their boats, turning them into global consumers that the US will benefit from. Hogwash. It does not work that way. The world is not a big free flowing economy. Most other countries control flows of capital in ways you will never be able to comprehend. The notion of a free flowing economy is a childish dream, never to be realized in This Universe.
- Immediately tax all activities done by US domiciled corporations overseas. Tax them to the hilt. And for those companies who flee US domicile, ban their imports. That's right. All of you Bermudan, Swiss and Irish "US" corporations will be disowned and cut off.
- Throwing a bone to Cynic Hero 86, massively beef up US defenses (and I don't mean the forces who chase down terrorists overseas). Full on NMD for the whole US. Complete revamping of nuclear forces. Bring back the draft. 5 million person regular forces. Etc, etc.
- Open the discussion about income tax brackets and look at an apolitical set of models for such brackets and what would actually be best for the overall economy and job creation. No sacred cows.

With that, here are some actions:
1) STOP BUSH!
2) Question Clinton.
3) Prod Warren
4) Grass roots efforts to find better candidates now.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Also posted in the thread on "torture":

The torture debate in the Senate suggests a possible theme of Democrats in 2016: that if Republicans can be shown as enablers of brutality that violates Christian sensibilities, then Democrats can reverse many of their recent losses in due time.

Republicans have yet to distance themselves from the moral failures and bad economic stewardship of the Rove/Cheney/Bush era... and with few exceptions (I will give John McCain some credit, but he may be coming to the end of the line of his political career) the GOP has circled the wagons on torture. Maybe in 2010 and 2014 Republicans have won on the implicit threat that if people want any prosperity at all they had better support the absolute plutocracy that the GOP offers.

If Democrats can successfully cast Republicans as supporters of gangster-like behavior, then Democrats can win big in 2016. A political regime that can do such horrible things to foreigners as the Rove/Cheney/Bush Administration did can easily do such things to Americans who end up on the wrong side of such issues as labor-management relations, educational content, and religion. Anyone can become an "enemy of the People" -- or would it be "enemy of Prosperity" in a pure plutocracy -- during a Fourth Turning.

----

We Americans will have a big problem when things are so bad that our political reality is the material of nightmares. Guess what that does for the rest of the world.

Before liberals make complete fools of themselves and run on torturing terrorists, the liberals should ask Americans if they really do care about what happens to terrorists.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Before liberals make complete fools of themselves and run on torturing terrorists, the liberals should ask Americans if they really do care about what happens to terrorists.

The political system that can do horrible things to pariahs overseas can do so to those that that system deems pariahs at home. I am satisfied with the quick kill of Osama bin Laden. In view of his health he was not going to survive much torture if that had been started on him.

If God is just and treats evil-doers in kind... we can just use our imagination:

http://www.motherjones.com/media/201...bin-laden-hell

The liberal political cartoonist Mark Fiore must have about the same opinion of Three's Company that I have -- that it titillates and disappoints. Maybe not as bad as having one's soul gnawed by that of a very sinful dog as I suggest for "Der Phooey". I'll leave the imagination for eternal torment to God Almighty; Dante likely understated how bad things would be for the villains that he wrote about -- Judas, assassins of Julius Caesar, Mohammed (in the West he was reviled to no end). Dante did not prophesy Nazis, Stalinists, or ISIS, which deserve worse than anything that Dante could imagine for Judas Iscariot.

What is worst about torture? It debases US as a people. It causes foreigners to develop a loathing for America and Americans. It gives people who hate Americans who get their hands on a helpless Americans a pretext for doing the worst.

However bad other countries may get, let us keep some basic decency. If I am a senior military officer I want potential POWs to have no fear of US custody. The elder Bush did a good job of that. I thought that it was rather quaint that Iraqi soldiers were surrendering to CNN journalists. Naked, feces-smeared prisoners being led around on dog leashes is the antithesis of "quaint". We did not torture or enslave those that we defeated in World War II even if our captives had waged war on the side of some the most evil causes ever.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Before liberals make complete fools of themselves and run on torturing terrorists, the liberals should ask Americans if they really do care about what happens to terrorists.

If the American people think torture is OK then I am ASHAMED of being an American, and you should to, and so should anyone who is not a psychopath.

Originally Posted by XYMOX_4AD_84

2016 could be a watershed year for new players who can present realistic and non-BS-laden plans to the Middle Class, to help move us out of the current severe pain. A few simple things could help enormously:
- Stop the quantitative easing and cease all attempts to print our way out of the Doldrums. It is not going to work, give it up. Deflation is already here. That battle has been lost.
- Forget about the consumer economy. It is the heroin to our addiction to economic self mutilation.
- Focus relentlessly on value added by manufacturing. That is the ONLY metric that matters. The ONLY one!
- Stop caring about how the poor in other countries are doing. Stop believing naively that the rising tide will lift their boats, turning them into global consumers that the US will benefit from. Hogwash. It does not work that way. The world is not a big free flowing economy. Most other countries control flows of capital in ways you will never be able to comprehend. The notion of a free flowing economy is a childish dream, never to be realized in This Universe.
- Immediately tax all activities done by US domiciled corporations overseas. Tax them to the hilt. And for those companies who flee US domicile, ban their imports. That's right. All of you Bermudan, Swiss and Irish "US" corporations will be disowned and cut off.

So far, so goodl. Now, you go and ruin it below.

- Throwing a bone to Cynic Hero 86, massively beef up US defenses (and I don't mean the forces who chase down terrorists overseas). Full on NMD for the whole US. Complete revamping of nuclear forces. Bring back the draft. 5 million person regular forces. Etc, etc.

Uh, dude, the military budget of the US exceeds every other nation. It can be cut by closing a 100's of bases strewn all over the world. Next, how about closing pork bases here in the US which are there to buy off congress? If you want to draft folks, Cynic Hero'86 is first one in. Rags is too old to be drafted.

Originally Posted by XYMOD

1) STOP BUSH!

and stop the other Bush's wars. They are not achieving anything.

Next on weapons systems, cut spending for trash in the F-35. That project proves that pork flies, though not so well.
I think we should do something smart. We need to harden our grid and other infrastructure against cyber warfare. We suck at that one. Put sensitive internet connected equipment behind firewalls, upgrade firmware, demand security testing on all firmware for security bugs , demand encrypted connections between infrastructure components, etc. When it comes to cyber security , America is stupid. Just look what happened to Sony. They got pwned. Segment the grid into zones and set up firewalls between the zones as well. That way if something goes bad in one zone, the whole grid doesn't go down.

So, cut the pork out and make useful stuff like neutron bombs, decent fighter planes which actually work, all contracts are to be subject to blind bidding.

- Open the discussion about income tax brackets and look at an apolitical set of models for such brackets and what would actually be best for the overall economy and job creation. No sacred cows.

1. Scrap the current tax code entirely. It's fucked 7 ways from Sunday.
2. Do what you say above.
3. Abolish the FED. It's a private bank that does nothing but blow asset bubbles.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Before liberals make complete fools of themselves and run on torturing terrorists, the liberals should ask Americans if they really do care about what happens to terrorists.

They should care. What happens to *terrorists today, can happen to them tomorrow. If you toss out the current legal system and replace it with something like a troika, history shows that somehow the troika method gets expanded by broadening the definition of what a "terrorist" is.

*DHS definition of terrorism

Originally Posted by DHS

Any activity that involves an act that is dangerous to human life or potentially destructive to critical infrastructure or key resources, and is a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any state or other subdivision of the United States and appears to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion, or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping.

Go read the definition which is the law of the land and see if you still agree with what you posted above. I highlighted the weasel words to help you out.

Originally Posted by Odin

If the American people think torture is OK then I am ASHAMED of being an American, and you should to, and so should anyone who is not a psychopath.

Scary graphic re-posted. If it doesn't scare one, then one is morally blind. As much as I enjoy the ability to enjoy scenery and art, I would rather have the sensory handicap than the moral failure:





In view of this graphic, I shudder at how America has gone. Yes, I can register shame at the obscenely-large percentage of Democrats who think it acceptable to threaten the family members of the accused, stick someone in a coffin-sized box, threaten physical or sexual violence (sexual violence against a helpless person is one definition of rape), waterboard someone (although most Americans don't understand what it is), compel unwelcome nudity, slam someone into a wall (good for causing broken bones and cartilage), or deprive someone of sleep (a damaging act that leaves no physical scars but can truly mess a victim up).

Maybe we Americans have had it too soft in that we have never had experiences with a KGB, Stasi, Securitate, Mukhabarat, SAVAK (Iran under the Shah), BOSS (Apartheid-era South Africa), State Research Unit (Uganda under Idi Amin), CDR (Cuba) or DINA (Chile under Pinochet). I wish that someone with experience with life under fear of an unaccountable secret police could tell us what it is like to live in fear. OK, there was the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission that I added to the list of defunct secret police organizations in Wikipedia and explained how it fit among the KGB, Stasi, Mukhabarat, and BOSS -- questionable activity by an unaccountable organization subservient to unaccountable politicians. Mississippi was basically a single-Party dictatorship until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 took effect.

It is the REPUBLICANS who scare me. Maybe the older ones are from the Gerald Ford-Hugh Scott-Charles Percy era in which the Republican Party was a center-right opposition to a center-left Democratic Party. Torture usually serves a totalitarian, authoritarian, racist, or mad ideology. I can't quite place Idi Amin on the Left-Right spectrum, but he was certainly mad.

Republicans seem to hold rectal "feeding" excessive. Maybe they would also consider whipping, amputations, burnings, and summary executions excessive, too. They show a near-majority (48%) support for putting someone in a coffin-sized box for several days and majority support for every other abominable deed depicted as torture. Every one of those deeds is a crime.

Our political system operates on basically a majority-of-a-majority system on anything not specifically prevented in the Constitution or mandated by a decision of the Supreme Court, and now that Republicans are soon to have a majority in both Houses of Congress, have a majority of Governorships, and have majorities in a majority of State Houses...

It has taken me nearly sixty years to become a dissident; I always believed that the American system at least responded to the decencies of a majority of Americans. It has just responded to the viciousness of a current plurality of the voting public. How long will it be before the pariahs of the plurality of 2014 voters are Americans who 'voted wrong' in 2014 and insist upon change that is to forever be denied them?

I am glad that I have no children to become cannon fodder or cheap labor in what looks like a brutalized nation -- a brutalized nation whose people have brought it onto themselves. But if I did have children, then their Christmas (or Hanukkah) presents, had I gone that way, would have the markings "Rosetta Stone" on the package.

The 2016 election just took another step to "awful" by Jeb Bush's announcement that he is exploring the possibilities of running for president.

He has a good chance to win. I have predicted already here that he is likely to run and get nominated. He has a good cosmic score in his horoscope; better than Hillary Clinton.

From my point of view as a prophet who uses astrology as a major tool, I need to look at several factors. The main two factors that stand out in my study are the new moon before election (which ruling planet is highest, ascendant sign ruler/challenger or descendant ruler/party in power), and the charts of potential candidates, according to my research of which aspects in it are beneficial to election or not. In this case, the two indicators cancel out.

Another major factor is the Saturn Return (which happens to everyone at about age 58-59). Candidates who would experience it in the first 3 years of a term, are very unlikely to be elected to that term. Jeb Bush faced this in the last election; he didn't run. Now he is past the return, as is Hillary of course. No more problem for Jeb.

I have shown on this forum before the list of candidates who won and lost, and how these three factors figured. These patterns both hold up very well. Sometimes, very rarely, they conflict, however. In the case of 1988, the candidate with the better horoscope score (Bush) won, despite the new moon indicator that he would lose. But the gap between scores was much greater between Bush 41 and Dukakis, than between Jeb Bush and Hillary C. And Dukakis faced a Saturn Return too. Both Clinton and Bush have positive scores, but Bush's is better.

Dukakis had a decidedly negative score; Bush 41's score is about the same as his son Jeb's.

So if Bush gets the nomination, I'd have to rate the 2016 general election as a toss up. More people voting and a more diverse and female electorate would favor the Democrat; but as before with Jeb's brother, cheating could favor the Republican. Republicans may fix and gerrymander the electoral college and/or deny many ethnic groups the right to vote.

And the indicators favored Bush in 2000, both ways by a very narrow margin. Indications were that cheating would occur and that the election would be close, but that the challenging party and GW Bush would win. That's what happened, although at the time my own research was not yet thorough enough to be correct, and I predicted that Gore would win. That was wishful thinking too, of course. Some might say it is wishful thinking not to say outright that Jeb Bush will win in 2016. But after all, the indications are contradictory, and if anything, the new moon before election is the best indicator I have.

Well, you heard it here folks!

So what if Bush wins?

Jeb would no doubt be a better president than his brother; but that's not a high bar to cross. His chart is better for actual rulership than his brother's, although his brother's chart is better for getting elected. Bush 45 would have to yield in many cases to his more-reactionary congress in the late 2010s, and I don't see him resisting the repeal of remaining financial regulations, environmental, auto and carbon regulations, Obamacare, and partial privatization of social security; among other misdeeds, perhaps passed through budget blackmail as this month's misdeeds were. Given that cave-in this month, the outlook for resistance by a slightly more-Democratic Senate is shakey. His policies as governor suggest he would likely be another neo-con, although the difference from Hillary is not great in that respect. But another new US war besides those already ongoing is unlikely before 2025, according to the very-reliable war cycles. Jeb Bush favors immigration reform, but his congress would not pass it, any more than the even-less reactionary Bush 43's or Obama's congresses passed it.

The bottom lines are, if Jeb Bush wins in 2016, he's likely to remain president through January 2025, since he has a good score and the new moon before the 2020 election favors the incumbent. To beat that AND Bush's good score would be impossible. So if he wins, he's in for 8 years. The Republicans will finally be turned out in 2024 amid a rising tide of activism and disruptive behavior, and a more Democratic congress since 2020. Civil war would be the likely result, since the powers-that-be and the right-wing fringe would not accept the results of the election. But I see the good chance of a progressive victory in the civil war, and real reform returning one way or another in the 2020s. If Bush wins in 2016, this will be mostly delayed until the mid-2020s, and will be subject to resistance. But the long term outlook is still for progress from then onwards.

I also see some possibility that, since Bush is a moderate, he might bend to the political winds in the early 2020s and sign some legislation by a Democratic Congress.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

So far, so goodl. Now, you go and ruin it below.

Yes I agree, XYMOX's points are good (especially for some sort of neo-con; very good )
Except of course I don't think QE either helps or hurts very much.

Uh, dude, the military budget of the US exceeds every other nation. It can be cut by closing a 100's of bases strewn all over the world. Next, how about closing pork bases here in the US which are there to buy off congress? If you want to draft folks, Cynic Hero'86 is first one in. Rags is too old to be drafted.

and stop the other Bush's wars. They are not achieving anything.

Right you are.

Next on weapons systems, cut spending for trash in the F-35. That project proves that pork flies, though not so well.
I think we should do something smart. We need to harden our grid and other infrastructure against cyber warfare. We suck at that one. Put sensitive internet connected equipment behind firewalls, upgrade firmware, demand security testing on all firmware for security bugs , demand encrypted connections between infrastructure components, etc. When it comes to cyber security , America is stupid. Just look what happened to Sony. They got pwned. Segment the grid into zones and set up firewalls between the zones as well. That way if something goes bad in one zone, the whole grid doesn't go down.

So, cut the pork out and make useful stuff like neutron bombs, decent fighter planes which actually work, all contracts are to be subject to blind bidding.

Good points, although I don't think we need the neutron bombs.

1. Scrap the current tax code entirely. It's fucked 7 ways from Sunday.
2. Do what you say above.
3. Abolish the FED. It's a private bank that does nothing but blow asset bubbles.

I agree with XYMOX's point. But tax policy is not a big deal. It's not that "fucked;" it just allows the wealthy too much escape, because rates on them were lowered by Bush 43. And we need a central bank, of course; that's not the problem. The asset bubble was caused by unregulated speculation. That has now just been unleashed again. We are headed for a severe bubble and recession at the end of this decade. Thank you millies for not voting

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

So far, so goodl. Now, you go and ruin it below.



Uh, dude, the military budget of the US exceeds every other nation. It can be cut by closing a 100's of bases strewn all over the world. Next, how about closing pork bases here in the US which are there to buy off congress? If you want to draft folks, Cynic Hero'86 is first one in. Rags is too old to be drafted.



and stop the other Bush's wars. They are not achieving anything.

Next on weapons systems, cut spending for trash in the F-35. That project proves that pork flies, though not so well.
I think we should do something smart. We need to harden our grid and other infrastructure against cyber warfare. We suck at that one. Put sensitive internet connected equipment behind firewalls, upgrade firmware, demand security testing on all firmware for security bugs , demand encrypted connections between infrastructure components, etc. When it comes to cyber security , America is stupid. Just look what happened to Sony. They got pwned. Segment the grid into zones and set up firewalls between the zones as well. That way if something goes bad in one zone, the whole grid doesn't go down.

So, cut the pork out and make useful stuff like neutron bombs, decent fighter planes which actually work, all contracts are to be subject to blind bidding.



1. Scrap the current tax code entirely. It's fucked 7 ways from Sunday.
2. Do what you say above.
3. Abolish the FED. It's a private bank that does nothing but blow asset bubbles.

The things you mentioned seem pretty complementary. I can go with what you've noted.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

They should care. What happens to *terrorists today, can happen to them tomorrow. If you toss out the current legal system and replace it with something like a troika, history shows that somehow the troika method gets expanded by broadening the definition of what a "terrorist" is.

*DHS definition of terrorism



Go read the definition which is the law of the land and see if you still agree with what you posted above. I highlighted the weasel words to help you out.

What good does it profit us, if in fighting terrorists, we become terrorists ourselves?

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

The 2016 election just took another step to "awful" by Jeb Bush's announcement that he is exploring the possibilities of running for president.

He has a good chance to win. I have predicted already here that he is likely to run and get nominated. He has a good cosmic score in his horoscope; better than Hillary Clinton.

From my point of view as a prophet who uses astrology as a major tool, I need to look at several factors. The main two factors that stand out in my study are the new moon before election (which ruling planet is highest, ascendant sign ruler/challenger or descendant ruler/party in power), and the charts of potential candidates, according to my research of which aspects in it are beneficial to election or not. In this case, the two indicators cancel out.

Another major factor is the Saturn Return (which happens to everyone at about age 58-59). Candidates who would experience it in the first 3 years of a term, are very unlikely to be elected to that term. Jeb Bush faced this in the last election; he didn't run. Now he is past the return, as is Hillary of course. No more problem for Jeb.

I have shown on this forum before the list of candidates who won and lost, and how these three factors figured. These patterns both hold up very well. Sometimes, very rarely, they conflict, however. In the case of 1988, the candidate with the better horoscope score (Bush) won, despite the new moon indicator that he would lose. But the gap between scores was much greater between Bush 41 and Dukakis, than between Jeb Bush and Hillary C. And Dukakis faced a Saturn Return too. Both Clinton and Bush have positive scores, but Bush's is better.

Dukakis had a decidedly negative score; Bush 41's score is about the same as his son Jeb's.

So if Bush gets the nomination, I'd have to rate the 2016 general election as a toss up. More people voting and a more diverse and female electorate would favor the Democrat; but as before with Jeb's brother, cheating could favor the Republican. Republicans may fix and gerrymander the electoral college and/or deny many ethnic groups the right to vote.

And the indicators favored Bush in 2000, both ways by a very narrow margin. Indications were that cheating would occur and that the election would be close, but that the challenging party and GW Bush would win. That's what happened, although at the time my own research was not yet thorough enough to be correct, and I predicted that Gore would win. That was wishful thinking too, of course. Some might say it is wishful thinking not to say outright that Jeb Bush will win in 2016. But after all, the indications are contradictory, and if anything, the new moon before election is the best indicator I have.

Well, you heard it here folks!

In 2000, there were many Americans who really could not stand W and that includes many who are not Dems / of "the left." There were many in the GOP not to mention other parties who thought he was the typical establishment candidate and a major border busting, sovereignty hating globalist to boot. I was one of them. He actually turned my stomach. I think the only reason he won in both 2000 and 2004 was the lack of alternatives. In both elections the Dems put up complete clowns. After nearly 15 years of Bushbama, there has got to be a burn out factor regarding these types of leaders. The time for change is upon us.

Originally Posted by XYMOX_4AD_84

In 2000, there were many Americans who really could not stand W and that includes many who are not Dems / of "the left." There were many in the GOP not to mention other parties who thought he was the typical establishment candidate and a major border busting, sovereignty hating globalist to boot. I was one of them. He actually turned my stomach. I think the only reason he won in both 2000 and 2004 was the lack of alternatives. In both elections the Dems put up complete clowns. After nearly 15 years of Bushbama, there has got to be a burn out factor regarding these types of leaders. The time for change is upon us.

Complete clowns, not quite. They were decent candidates, if not ideal. But it would take a miracle for an ideal candidate to get elected in Amerika.

Unless Bernie Sanders by some miracle breaks through, the change is not upon us as of yet. But it's quite possible before the end of this 4T (which is definitely not due until 2028), that the duopoly will be broken and a new breed of politician can be elected.

But your concern over border busting is also a relic of the past, like other establishment obsessions.

The valid concern in that regard is cession of local economic sovereignty to global corporate capitalism.

Taking the prediction regarding the duopoly further, it seems to me now that a break-up of it is more likely if Hillary (or some other unlikely Democrat) wins in 2016. That's because in 2024 the new moon indicates a challenger victory. If the GOP still owns the White House in 2024, the people will still want to unite as Democrats to turn them out. If the Democrats own it in 2024, with the new moon indicating a challenger victory during a very progressive time, that would seem to indicate an independent/third party victory. BY then the GOP, unlikely to change, is going to be seen as the relic that it already is. Perhaps more wishful thinking on my part; we'll see. Much still depends on who the candidates are, of course.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

So what if Bush wins?

Jeb would no doubt be a better president than his brother; but that's not a high bar to cross. His chart is better for actual rulership than his brother's, although his brother's chart is better for getting elected. Bush 45 would have to yield in many cases to his more-reactionary congress in the late 2010s, and I don't see him resisting the repeal of remaining financial regulations, environmental, auto and carbon regulations, Obamacare, and partial privatization of social security; among other misdeeds, perhaps passed through budget blackmail as this month's misdeeds were. Given that cave-in this month, the outlook for resistance by a slightly more-Democratic Senate is shakey. His policies as governor suggest he would likely be another neo-con, although the difference from Hillary is not great in that respect. But another new US war besides those already ongoing is unlikely before 2025, according to the very-reliable war cycles. Jeb Bush favors immigration reform, but his congress would not pass it, any more than the even-less reactionary Bush 43's or Obama's congresses passed it.

The bottom lines are, if Jeb Bush wins in 2016, he's likely to remain president through January 2025, since he has a good score and the new moon before the 2020 election favors the incumbent. To beat that AND Bush's good score would be impossible. So if he wins, he's in for 8 years. The Republicans will finally be turned out in 2024 amid a rising tide of activism and disruptive behavior, and a more Democratic congress since 2020. Civil war would be the likely result, since the powers-that-be and the right-wing fringe would not accept the results of the election. But I see the good chance of a progressive victory in the civil war, and real reform returning one way or another in the 2020s. If Bush wins in 2016, this will be mostly delayed until the mid-2020s, and will be subject to resistance. But the long term outlook is still for progress from then onwards.

I also see some possibility that, since Bush is a moderate, he might bend to the political winds in the early 2020s and sign some legislation by a Democratic Congress.

Bush might end up slightly more to the Left than Obama, given Obama is not a pure leftist (and in fact, channels Reagan more than most leftists would ever care to admit). Nonetheless, Bush is still exactly how I characterized the past 15 years of Presidential leadership. He would represent a complete continuation of the current regime.

Originally Posted by XYMOX_4AD_84

Bush might end up slightly more to the Left than Obama, given Obama is not a pure leftist (and in fact, channels Reagan more than most leftists would ever care to admit). Nonetheless, Bush is still exactly how I characterized the past 15 years of Presidential leadership. He would represent a complete continuation of the current regime.

Obama is well to the Left by post-reagan conservative American standards. But Bush might end up being pushed to the left of Obama in actual legislation passed when we get to the early 2020s. In the 2010s, he will/would be pushed not only to the right of Obama, but perhaps to the right of W.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

What good does it profit us, if in fighting terrorists, we become terrorists ourselves?

:: Rags puts on Boomer hat ::
It obviously does no good at all. The driving force we're dealing with is a perverse soul sickness whereby any "offender" of any law, guilty or not must be punished. The road we'll be on is one of sorrow and ultimate self destruction. One can easily see the landmarks. They reside at Guantanmo Bay, Gitmo, other "dark sites", to Furguson and NYC.

Seeing that Christmas is near, let's reflect on the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come in "A Christmas Carol"




This is a haunting spectre indeed. Like Scrooge, if the US doesn't change its ways, its grave will be robbed as nobody will show mercy or sympathy.

So, there's my prophesy.

:: Rags takes Boomer hat off ::

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

So what if Bush wins?

Jeb would no doubt be a better president than his brother; but that's not a high bar to cross.

I would be a better President than Dubya even with my political inexperience. That is how bad I think Dubya is. I would never commit a war crime. I would never sponsor a speculative boom. I would never initiate a war based upon a personal grudge. I would never out a CIA operative.

Bush 45 would have to yield in many cases to his more-reactionary congress in the late 2010s, and I don't see him resisting the repeal of remaining financial regulations, environmental, auto and carbon regulations, Obamacare, and partial privatization of social security; among other misdeeds, perhaps passed through budget blackmail as this month's misdeeds were. Given that cave-in this month, the outlook for resistance by a slightly more-Democratic Senate is shaky. His policies as governor suggest he would likely be another neo-con, although the difference from Hillary is not great in that respect. But another new US war besides those already ongoing is unlikely before 2025, according to the very-reliable war cycles. Jeb Bush favors immigration reform, but his congress would not pass it, any more than the even-less reactionary Bush 43's or Obama's congresses passed it.

In short he would be a perfect stooge for whoever runs the GOP from behind the scenes. Such asks for a disaster -- crony capitalism that ensures an economic meltdown similar in intensity to 1929-1933 (the one beginning in 2007 had similar intensity for a sesquiyear, but we got out of it) and much longer than a year and a half for a recovery. A reactionary Congress (if he wins the Presidency, then the GOP still controls the Senate) would prevent any meaningful effort to allow a recovery; it would push the repudiation of the New Deal and the Great Society with consequences of political unrest.

Jeb would not be as bad as his brother, who basically telescoped at least ten years of the least-effective Presidents in American history (Harding, Coolidge, and the first two years of Hoover). He would be a new Herbert Hoover. For Americans to recover from a failed Presidency and a failed Congress, Americans would have a tough time dumping the GOP majorities in 2018 unless the South abandons the GOP. Such would imply that poor whites in the South would recognize allies on economic issues with poor blacks who are at least similar in culture. That is asking for something that shows no signs of happening.

The bottom lines are, if Jeb Bush wins in 2016, he's likely to remain president through January 2025, since he has a good score and the new moon before the 2020 election favors the incumbent. To beat that AND Bush's good score would be impossible. So if he wins, he's in for 8 years. The Republicans will finally be turned out in 2024 amid a rising tide of activism and disruptive behavior, and a more Democratic congress since 2020. Civil war would be the likely result, since the powers-that-be and the right-wing fringe would not accept the results of the election. But I see the good chance of a progressive victory in the civil war, and real reform returning one way or another in the 2020s. If Bush wins in 2016, this will be mostly delayed until the mid-2020s, and will be subject to resistance. But the long term outlook is still for progress from then onwards.

We could be in for hard times that make the 1930s seem benign by contrast in part due to the cruelty of GOP economics.

I also see some possibility that, since Bush is a moderate, he might bend to the political winds in the early 2020s and sign some legislation by a Democratic Congress.[/QUOTE]

Originally Posted by Odin

If the American people think torture is OK then I am ASHAMED of being an American, and (Classic X'er) should too, and so should anyone who is not a psychopath.

Second response, but fitting:

Welcome to Weimar America.

I have yet to figure how any good can come from sadism. It violates trust; it weakens social cohesion. To be sure, retribution for crime is an essential message to those who do unconscionable evil. Tough love that seeks to compel sobriety from a drunk or financial sanity from a gambler? We understand that.

Sadism is depravity. I can't say that I can think of an easy cure, but We the People need the cure if we are to solve any of our problems, this time originating in our vileness as a people. No foreign power imposed sadism into our character. No repressive regime forced it upon us. Mass media? We should choose more carefully what we allow in our households. If we would never allow a reeling drunk to wander off Skid Row to enter our houses and pose a vile influence upon children, then why should we allow our kids to see allegedly-realistic images of brutal interrogations?

If we Americans fail to divest our souls of their scorpions or if too many of us fail to do so, then others will -- just as we did to the Austrians, Germans, Italians, and Japanese. We are cowards if we fail to solve our own moral deficiencies.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

They should care. What happens to *terrorists today, can happen to them tomorrow. If you toss out the current legal system and replace it with something like a troika, history shows that somehow the troika method gets expanded by broadening the definition of what a "terrorist" is.

*DHS definition of terrorism



Go read the definition which is the law of the land and see if you still agree with what you posted above. I highlighted the weasel words to help you out.

There is a major difference as far as tolerance when it comes to what our government does to a foreign terrorist and what it does to an American terrorist like Tim McVeigh. As a general rule, I don't think Americans would ever support the idea or the right of government to torture its own. As a general rule, Americans are pretty big on their rights and aren't big on the idea of their government having the power to ignore or eliminate their Constitutional rights and protections.