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Thread: Political news?

  1. #1
    Kaylinn
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    Default Political news?

    What do you think is the most important piece of current political news that every person should know, or be informed about?

    Yeah...I'm taking a class. I know nothing. Absolutly nothing. I couldn't tell you who all ran for president last time. I despise politics with a passion, and have choosen to not pay attention to any of it. Which is now biting me in the ass. So I want to learn, and stay current...I'm open minded, maybe I'll find somethign about it all interesting, somwhere....but I don't know where to start. I tried reading c cpan, but I got completly lost and confused. It was like jumping into the middle of a conversation without hearing the begining.


    So as for current affairs, current political news....what's important to know right now? What's some good ways to aquire that information? websites, news channels, the local news paper?

    The attorney general...gonzolaz something...we are supposed to know about him to discuss him for class tomorrow. I googled him, found information, but honestly, didn't understand what I was reading.
    Can someone simplify it for me and tell me what he did in a language I can understand, LOL?


    This is so difficult for me to learn, because I can't understand what I'm reading. I don't understand the words or concepts. I read a paragraph, and spend an hour on dictionary.com looking up words. Then I have to look up the words that were used to define the words. I'm lost.

    Yeah...I realize how pathetic and dumb I sound right now.....
    But at least I'm willing to learn!

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    Default Re: Political news?

    Here is wikipedia................. se at your own risk.



    Attorney General of the US Alberto Gonzalez fired some US Attorneys. US Attorneys prosecute federal crimes. The attorneys are political appointees. That is the President chooses them and the appointment is ratified (approved by congress).

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    Presidential candidates from the Hopeful to extreme viewpoints in 2004.



    and the same for 2008.

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    Banned Melonie's Avatar
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    ^^^ well if you want to get your professor's attention, you can discuss the following re the resignation of attorney general Alberto Gonzales ... supposedly brought about by his firing of 8 US attorneys at the request of the White House.

    (snip)"As it happens, Mrs. Clinton is just the Senator to walk point on this issue of dismissing U.S. attorneys because she has direct personal experience. In any Congressional probe of the matter, we'd suggest she call herself as the first witness--and bring along Webster Hubbell as her chief counsel.

    As everyone once knew but has tried to forget, Mr. Hubbell was a former partner of Mrs. Clinton at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock who later went to jail for mail fraud and tax evasion. He was also Bill and Hillary Clinton's choice as Associate Attorney General in the Justice Department when Janet Reno, his nominal superior, simultaneously fired all 93 U.S. Attorneys in March 1993. Ms. Reno--or Mr. Hubbell--gave them 10 days to move out of their offices.

    At the time, President Clinton presented the move as something perfectly ordinary: "All those people are routinely replaced," he told reporters, "and I have not done anything differently." In fact, the dismissals were unprecedented: Previous Presidents, including Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter, had both retained holdovers from the previous Administration and only replaced them gradually as their tenures expired. This allowed continuity of leadership within the U.S. Attorney offices during the transition.

    Equally extraordinary were the politics at play in the firings. At the time, Jay Stephens, then U.S. Attorney in the District of Columbia, was investigating then Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski, and was "within 30 days" of making a decision on an indictment. Mr. Rostenkowski, who was shepherding the Clinton's economic program through Congress, eventually went to jail on mail fraud charges and was later pardoned by Mr. Clinton.

    Also at the time, allegations concerning some of the Clintons' Whitewater dealings were coming to a head. By dismissing all 93 U.S. Attorneys at once, the Clintons conveniently cleared the decks to appoint "Friend of Bill" Paula Casey as the U.S. Attorney for Little Rock. Ms. Casey never did bring any big Whitewater indictments, and she rejected information from another FOB, David Hale, on the business practices of the Arkansas elite including Mr. Clinton. When it comes to "politicizing" Justice, in short, the Bush White House is full of amateurs compared to the Clintons.

    And it may be this very amateurism that explains how the current Administration has managed to turn this routine issue of replacing Presidential appointees into a political fiasco. There was nothing wrong with replacing the eight Attorneys, all of whom serve at the President's pleasure. Prosecutors deserve supervision like any other executive branch appointees.

    The supposed scandal this week is that Mr. Bush had been informed last fall that some U.S. Attorneys had been less than vigorous in pursuing voter-fraud cases and that the President had made the point to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Voter fraud strikes at the heart of democratic institutions, and it was entirely appropriate for Mr. Bush--or any President--to insist that his appointees act energetically against it."

    Take sacked U.S. Attorney John McKay from Washington state. In 2004, the Governor's race was decided in favor of Democrat Christine Gregoire by 129 votes on a third recount. As the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and other media outlets reported, some of the "voters" were deceased, others were registered in storage-rental facilities, and still others were convicted felons. More than 100 ballots were "discovered" in a Seattle warehouse. None of this constitutes proof that the election was stolen. But it should have been enough to prompt Mr. McKay, a Democrat, to investigate, something he declined to do, apparently on grounds that he had better things to do.(snip) from

  5. #5
    Kaylinn
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    Default Re: Political news?

    Thank you so much guys.

    Melonie, I printed that article to take to class, to discuss and (hopefully) decipher it.

    Gah. I'm a wreck with this stuff.

    There is an optional trip to DC at the end of the year...extra credit if we go. Only $1500. We will actually be put to work during the 10 day trip.
    I figured...if I gotta learn this stuff, I'm gonna give it my best, throw myself in there, hopefulyl learn somethign interesting. So I'm looking foward to this trip...and refuse to be the dumb blonde ignoramus.

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    Just so you know both the previous posters have an extreem rightwing take on things and to be fair, I have a moderate to slightly leftwing view. You might consider using balanced points of view for use in your class.

    Probably the most important thing to know about Alberto Gonzales is that he
    wrote a memo that many feel set the stage for torture and other abuses in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. He claimed that the Geneva Convention III on the Treatment of Prisoners of War did not apply.

    The other big thing to remember is that he went to the bedside of the then hospitalized Attorney General John Ashcroft to recertify President Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program.

    At the time, Ashcroft was in an intensive care unit recovering from gall bladder surgery and Gonzales was Bush’s White House legal counsel. Ashcroft had transferred the powers of his office to Deputy Attorney General James Comey.

    Personally I lean more to the left than the previosu responders and so I think this link might be useful in your class discussion of Gonzales.

    I like the site in general for left leaning political coverage. If you want the rightwing spin on it try watching FoxNews.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Rinna View Post
    Just so you know both the previous posters have an extreem rightwing take on things and to be fair, I have a moderate to slightly leftwing view. You might consider using balanced points of view for use in your class.

    Probably the most important thing to know about Alberto Gonzales is that he
    wrote a memo that many feel set the stage for torture and other abuses in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. He claimed that the Geneva Convention III on the Treatment of Prisoners of War did not apply.

    The other big thing to remember is that he went to the bedside of the then hospitalized Attorney General John Ashcroft to recertify President Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program.

    At the time, Ashcroft was in an intensive care unit recovering from gall bladder surgery and Gonzales was Bush’s White House legal counsel. Ashcroft had transferred the powers of his office to Deputy Attorney General James Comey.

    Personally I lean more to the left than the previosu responders and so I think this link http://www.americanprogress.org/issu...1/b280963.html might be useful in your class discussion of Gonzales.

    I like the site in general for left leaning political coverage. If you want the rightwing spin on it try watching FoxNews.
    The most important thing to know about Alberto Gonzalez is that he was completely INCOMPETENT !
    The "torture memo" he wrote tried to say that since Taliban and Al Queda fighters were not members of a recognized armed force of a recognized country that they were not entitled to Geneva Convention protection. Technically correct and Constitutionally sound but radically inappropriate on both political and practical grounds- It makes the U.S. look bad internationally and torture is a very INEFFECTIVE technique for obtaining intel.

    For general political coverage watch "Hardball" with Chris Matthews and his Sunday show. "Meet The Press" ; "Fox News Sunday" and" This Week" on ABC are all fairly good." The McLaughlin Group" is an excellent roundtable discussion of political events. Read U.S. News & World Report; Time or Newsweek and you'll get a good overview of what's going on.
    Avoid Fox News and CNN until you get up to speed as both slant the news to the
    "Right" and "Left" respectively.
    Whatever you do, do not try to get your news from blogs and web-sites. NONE observe basic journalistic professionalism and all slant things to fit their particular agenda.

  8. #8
    Yekhefah
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    Default Re: Political news?

    Since when is Fox News "right-wing"? We must have different definitions of what a conservative is, because I haven't seen much conservativism from Fox News. CNN is so flamboyantly liberal it's nauseating; they will outright lie if they think it'll get them ratings. But both stations serve the dollar first and foremost, and any political leanings they may have are subservient to what they think will get them ratings.

    US News & World Report is a pretty good magazine, if a bit dry. Time is okay. Newsweek is humorous just for its incredible bias. I've been getting Newsweek for the past few months and it's enormously entertaining to read what they pass off as "news."

    Talk radio has been getting a lot of attention lately, ever since Nancy Pelosi suggested a couple months ago that the government start censoring it. You could get an interesting discussion going with that. Look up information on the Fairness Doctrine and why it was repealed, and why Pelosi thinks it should be reinstated (BTW, Hillary Clinton agrees with her). Apparently certain people only support free speech when it supports their campaigns!

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    Melonie I think I love you...

    I like the economist, and wake to NPR because it gets me so irritated I am wide awake in short order.

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    wake to NPR because it gets me so irritated I am wide awake in short order
    I can believe that ! Hey, at least you're getting something of value for your tax money re NPR !

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    Being an Atheist, Pro-Choice Libertarian makes me extreme right wing? Did I leap frog the moral majority or something?

    Inre: NPR
    Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Why does my tax money pay for a onesided point of view on every subject. Why can't a government news source be objective?

    Kaylinn,
    For an alternative to the Republicrats- Try the Libertarian Party. Feisty crowd.





    )

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    Inre: NPR
    Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Why does my tax money pay for a onesided point of view on every subject. Why can't a government news source be objective?
    Arguably, because if our tax money wasn't diverted to pay for NPR to present that onesided point of view, you couldn't find that onesided point of view anywhere else on the radio dial (i.e. Air America bankruptcy). The 'moderate to slightly leftwing' radio audience doesn't seem to be able to provide enough of an advertising / customer base for any commercial radio station to survive on.

    Of course, there are now discussions in Washington about reanimating the 'Fairness Doctrine' for radio, which would essentially force all radio stations to present programming with 'balanced' points of view on pain of losing their broadcast license, whether radio listeners want to hear those 'balanced' points of view or not. However, I don't think that a reanimated 'Fairness Doctrine' being applied to NPR was part of the discussion. Also conspicuously absent from the discussion was any mention of applying the 'Fairness Doctrine' to TV outlets i.e. CNN, CBS and the host of other 'moderate to slightly leftwing' TV broadcasters.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Yekhefah View Post
    Since when is Fox News "right-wing"? We must have different definitions of what a conservative is, because I haven't seen much conservativism from Fox News.
    Huh?? Are you sure you're watching Fox News???

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    Kaylinn, if reading about politics puts you in a trance, the fun way to get political info is to watch the Daily Show and the Colbert Report on comedy central. They make jokes about the news and cover pretty much everything in politics that makes it to the major news channels. They are left leaning shows, the Daily Show openly so and Colbert Report by being a satire of right wingers. Both are hilarious to watch and informative at the same time.

  15. #15
    Kaylinn
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    Quote Originally Posted by ArmySGT. View Post
    Being an Atheist, Pro-Choice Libertarian makes me extreme right wing? Did I leap frog the moral majority or something?

    Inre: NPR
    Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Why does my tax money pay for a onesided point of view on every subject. Why can't a government news source be objective?

    Kaylinn,
    For an alternative to the Republicrats- Try the Libertarian Party. Feisty crowd.





    )

    ohh, thank you. This sounds like me.



    Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I'm trying to learn....
    LOl....I registered to vote last year.....only to vote against the smoking ban...I lost....

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    So how did your class go? Also did you decide to do the Wash. D.C. trip too?

  17. #17
    Kaylinn
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    This class is going well. The teacher is very good at making it interesting, and I am learning new things.

    More info about the Washington trip hasn't been released yet, but hpefuly, I can go. Now that I have a real job getting the time off may be difficult, but we shall see.

  18. #18
    Jay Zeno
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    This forum is used as an opinion board. Therefore, the facts that you read in here will be skewed to the opinion of the person citing those facts. Think of lawyers in the courtroom presenting you radically different sides of the case, and you're the jury, except you have the ability to develop your own sources that you trust the most.

    Good luck in your class! I live under the presumption that if you don't vote, you forfeit your right to complain about how things are going, since you didn't make your voice known when you had the chance. And the way to produce a conscientious vote is to be informed. You're on the right track!

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jay Zeno View Post
    I live under the presumption that if you don't vote, you forfeit your right to complain about how things are going, since you didn't make your voice known when you had the chance.

    That's a flawed theory, Jay. Many non-voters continue to complain to this day, unhindered by your presumption as to their rights.
    "He will come in one of the pre-chosen forms. During the rectification of the Vuldrini, the traveler came as a large and moving Torg! Then, during the third reconciliation of the last of the McKetrick supplicants, they chose a new form for him: that of a giant Slor! Many Shuvs and Zuuls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the Slor that day, I can tell you!"

  20. #20
    Jay Zeno
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    Absolutely. Right you are. That's why I said "I live..." I can't control the logic of others' lives.

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    Banned Eric Stoner's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jay Zeno View Post
    This forum is used as an opinion board. Therefore, the facts that you read in here will be skewed to the opinion of the person citing those facts. Think of lawyers in the courtroom presenting you radically different sides of the case, and you're the jury, except you have the ability to develop your own sources that you trust the most.

    Good luck in your class! I live under the presumption that if you don't vote, you forfeit your right to complain about how things are going, since you didn't make your voice known when you had the chance. And the way to produce a conscientious vote is to be informed. You're on the right track!
    There are facts and there is "spin". Generally accepted historical facts and reputable data and stats are there for everyone. HOW they are used ; WHAT they supposedly show or support ; those are open to varying interpretations.
    Unless of course you're a deconstructionist who doesn't accept the value of anything; thinks objectivity and rationality are mythical impossibilities and thinks ALL opinions are equally valid regardless of whether or not they have any factual support. To those who disagree I say: "Fine. Please show me how Holocaust Denial has any validity. "

  22. #22
    Jay Zeno
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    Quote Originally Posted by Eric Stoner View Post
    There are facts and there is "spin". Generally accepted historical facts and reputable data and stats are there for everyone. HOW they are used ; WHAT they supposedly show or support ; those are open to varying interpretations.
    Unless of course you're a deconstructionist who doesn't accept the value of anything; thinks objectivity and rationality are mythical impossibilities and thinks ALL opinions are equally valid regardless of whether or not they have any factual support. To those who disagree I say: "Fine. Please show me how Holocaust Denial has any validity. "
    I'm not deconstructing anything, if that's what you're gently implying. I'm saying this particular section is not an optimum place to get information delivered dispassionately.

    "The thing to remember about Gonzales is that he was completely INCOMPETENT." Now, I might even agree with that statement (except for the "the" and "completely" parts) but it's not exactly a dispassionately delivered point of information.

  23. #23
    Kaylinn
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    huh?
    You guys lost me.

    Oh well, carry on.....


    I got a B on my first test, BTW

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jay Zeno View Post
    I'm not deconstructing anything, if that's what you're gently implying. I'm saying this particular section is not an optimum place to get information delivered dispassionately.

    "The thing to remember about Gonzales is that he was completely INCOMPETENT." Now, I might even agree with that statement (except for the "the" and "completely" parts) but it's not exactly a dispassionately delivered point of information.
    Aside from the fact that he didn't break or damage any public property while serving as Bush's Counsel and A.G (at least afaik),I am not aware of ANY success by Mr. Gonzales. He TRIED to be loyal to Bush but I "argue"; "assert" ; "contend" etc. that by doing so he was ultimately disloyal by not serving what ought to have been the true interests of the Bush Presidency i.e. The NATIONAL Interest.
    Furthermore, he is a Constitutional ignoramus or at least spoke and behaved like one.
    I think "completely incompetent" sums it up rather nicely.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaylinn View Post
    huh?
    You guys lost me.

    Oh well, carry on.....


    I got a B on my first test, BTW
    Jay was pointing out that this may not be the best place to get objective opinions on politics because the politically interested parties on this site seem to have pretty partisian points of view.

    imho, this is true with most any political discussions though.

    congrats on your first test grade That is very good, especially since your are fairly new to politics.
    "It is a fact that cannot be denied: the wickedness of others becomes our own wickedness because it kindles something evil in our own hearts."
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