Say What? May 18, 2011 edition [Reader Post]

Liberals:

President Barack Obama concerning border safety: “Even though we’ve answered these concerns [that Republicans have raised about border security], I’ve got to say i suspect there’s still some who are trying to move the goal posts on us one more time. You know, they said ‘we needed to triple the border patrol.’ Well, now they’re going to say we need to quadruple the border patrol, or they’ll want a higher fence. Maybe they’ll need a moat. Maybe they’ll want alligators in the moat. They’ll never be satisfied.”

Christian Dorsey: “There is nothing that puts more money into the economy than unemployment benefits.” [Quoted from memory]

Kirsten Powers: “I don’t think the AP is a partisan organization.” [Quoted from memory]

Southern CA Democrat ad: “We minorities should stick together.”

Chris Matthews on Newt Gingrich: “I cannot believe there are young Republicans idealists out there, young people with hope who want our country to be good and have good politics to want to resurrect this element of Freddy Krueger, Nightmare on Elm Street politics.”

Chris Matthews: “Why don’t we have Cheney try that water board thingamajig of his on Karl Rove and Scooter to find our really who said what in that CIA leak case?”

Substitute judge in Milwaukee county Russell Stamper (from his facebook posting): “I was saddened.  You murdered a man.  For me, if the choice is condemnation of the CIA, DEA, FBI and IRS or Osama bin Laden, it’s an easy call.  I remain unconvinced that bin Laden committed the 911 attack, whereas we know the lettered government organizations are thieves, assassins, dope peddlers, government destabilizers, did I say assassins?, arms purveyors and various and sundry other planetary criminals.”

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said if Congress fails to lift the debt ceiling and the U.S. defaults on its obligations “this abrupt contraction would likely push us into a double dip recession…A default would inflict catastrophic far-reaching damage on our nation’s economy, significantly reducing growth and increasing unemployment.  Even a short-term default could cause irrevocable damage to the economy.”

Bill Maher, full-time comedian and part-time climate expert, speaks about the tornadoes throughout the Midwest and south: “This is global warming.  This is global warming – there’s more moisture – it’s what scientist always said. There’s more moisture in the atmosphere. It’s going to cause these giant disasters.”

Randi Rhodes: “Look, the conservatives, if Shakespeare were alive, and he went to the White House to get, you know, some sort of a reading, they would be outraged about him — talking about killing his brother, and the father had to go, and a mother he slept with — They’d be out of their fricking minds with this. They don’t understand culture! Or literature!”

Former member of the US House of Representatives Cynthia Anne McKinney: “As an American, I am upset with the policies of my country, but the measures adopted by the first Afro-American president of the United States has ashamed us all.  If there is no truth, there won’t be any justice, and today the US policies are rooted in lies, injustice and war.”  Give her points for consistency.

President Obama on the multiple attacks against Christians in Egypt: “…”

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Nina Totenberg, NPR: The trouble is there have to be some tax increases as well as spending cuts. You can’t do this over the long haul without some tax increases.

Mark Shields, PBS: Amen.

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Chuck Schumer giving Obama a lot of love: “Finally it should not be forgotten the job that President Obama did. His steely courage – his quiet courage was incredible.  I want to say something about this president, Mr. President. He’s not a chest-thumper. He’s not somebody who involves in a lot of rhetorical flourishes, he is serious, he is focused, he is factually driven, but let no one mistake the fact that he is fact-driven and often quietly contemplative for a lack of steel or a lack of courage or a lack of strength.”

Liberals from the past:

Columnist David Neiwart: “One of the reasons Fox News has become such a serious problem is that journalists as a profession have utterly failed in their traditional role of self-policing their colleagues. Journalists need to be speaking out about the truth that Anita Dunn pointed out in October: That Fox has ceased offering even a resemblance of a news organization and has become a propaganda channel 24/7.  Fox has largely been able to get away with it because its money and influence are so sizable that it has silenced with profession with a combination of threats and bribes: If you call them out, you get blackballed. On the other hand, if you play along, you get invited on their shows and get a fat contributor’s paycheck.  Among the most disturbing examples of this have been NPR’s Mara Liasson and Juan Williams, who have become such regulars on Fox that their identities are increasingly that of a typical Fox commentator. And in the process, they’ve deeply marred NPR’s hitherto-sterling reputation as a reliable source of accurate and unbiased news.”
Liberals being civil:

Email from a teacher at East Allen County Schools in Indiana, concerning school choice: “Why do you distribute this propaganda? Do you have a conscience? Do you really believe any of this? I am not a union member but feel that [Governor] Mitch [Daniel]’s agenda is killing Indiana. The education agenda is a holocaust against our children. Please understand I am speaking as a grandson of a Holocaust survivor. This is truly as bad or worse than what was done to the Jewish people only it is happening to innocent young people. It is frightening to me.”  Emphasis mine.

Liberals making sense:

Mara Liaison: “Medicare is off the table in those short-term negotiations. So are taxes, any kind of big tax reform.  I think if you’re a Republican, and you believe that you are going to get the Senate in 2012, which is a widely-held assumption in this town on both sides of the aisle, why should you compromise on taxes before you have a much stronger hand after the next election? And why would you allow Medicare, which is the one thing that might stop you from getting that majority in 2012, to be part of the discussion?”

Ted Koppel on the notion of democracies popping up all over the Middle east: “Democracy. Let’s dump it; toss it on the scrap heap of history. The concept remains worthy, but the word is rapidly being exhausted of all residual value.”

Crosstalk:

David Gregory: First of all, you gave a speech in Georgia with language a lot of people think could be coded racially-tinged language, calling the president, the first black president, a food stamp president.

Newt Gingrich: Oh, come on, David.

Gregory: What did you mean? What was the point?

Gingrich: That’s, that’s bizarre. That–this kind of automatic reference to racism, this is the president of the United States. The president of the United States has to be held accountable. Now, the idea that–and what I said is factually true. Forty-seven million Americans are on food stamps. One out of every six Americans is on food stamps. And to hide behind the charge of racism? I have–I have never said anything about President Obama which is racist.

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John D. Rockefeller IV, great grandson of oil tycoon, berates oil company CEO’s in Senate hearings: “I get the feeling that it’s almost like you’re — the five of you are like — Saudi Arabia.  That you’re caught up in your profits, you’re highly defensive…[you are] deeply and profoundly committed to sharing nothing.”

John Watson, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Chevron Corporation, responded with: “As we’ve described, we don’t receive subsidies, Senator, what we do require is a reasonable return on our invested capital. And I would tell you that I don’t think the American people want shared sacrifice. I think they want shared prosperity.”

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Rockefeller: “What about the fact that, in the case of ExxonMobil, that your effective federal tax rate is substantially 3 percent lower than what the average individual federal tax rate is? Does that mean anything to you?”

Rex Tillerson, CEO of Exxon-Mobil: “My effective United States income tax rate on my United States income from 2005 to 2010 was 32 percent. Now, if you look at any individual year, it could be as low as a single digit. It can be as high as 38 to 39 percent, because we don’t settle our taxes in — for that year in that year. We have tax filings that are open for multiple years, as we resolve issues with the IRS, they are recognized in the year we file. So in some years when our taxes appear low, it’s because we have recognized closing of issues with the IRS where we overpaid.”

Rockefeller: “And I understand. But still, do you understand the American — the average American’s feeling — that over between 2008 and 2010 your effective tax rate was about 20, about 17 percent, and theirs was about 20 percent?

Tillerson: “From 2005 to 2010 our effective tax rate is right at 32 percent.”

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David Gregory: “Did harsh interrogation help in the hunt of bin Laden?”

Tom Donilon: “I’m not- I’m not going to comment on specific intelligence except to- except to say the following, that intelligence was gathered from detainees. It was gathered from interrogation. It was gathered from one of the liaison services. It was gathered technically. It was gathered through human sources, right, over time. And it was gathered, by the way, and this is a very important point, I think for your viewers and for Americans generally to understand. This was an effort across two administrations. Indeed, many of the same professionals who worked for President Bush on this project work with us today, right. So it is not a matter of a partisanship. And indeed, one of the messages, I think, that goes out from this is this. That the United States, about its goals, has persistence and determination. That the United States does what it says it’s going to do, and very importantly last Sunday night, the world saw it has the capabilities to do so.”

Conservatives:

Newt Gingrich: “[President Obama is] the most successful food stamp president in history”

Newt: “This will be the happiest, most positive, most fun campaign of my lifetime.”

Bill Schultz (of Redeye): “Newt dot org sounds like a place where witches go shopping.”

Cal Thomas: “The media should not do its own polling—it’s a conflict of interest.” [Quoted from memory]

Dick Cheney: “I think you’ve got to give him [President Obama] a lot of credit for making the decision to have SEAL team 6 conduct the raid that got bin Laden.”

Defense Secretary Robert Gates: “Frankly, a week ago Sunday, in the Situation Room, we all agreed that we would not release any operational details from the effort to take out bin Laden. That all fell apart on Monday, the next day.”

Tom Edwards, the county attorney in rural Motley County east of Lubbock, said the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives was responsible on Tuesday for sparking a fire that consumed 150 acres, adding: “You can quote me on it: That bunch has a real corner on stupid.”

President Bush to President Obama on taking out Osama: “Good call.”

Rush Limbaugh: “We are the majority in this country — Tea Party conservatism — particularly if you look at the way people live their lives. We are categorized each and every day as the fringe, but we are not. We are the mainstream.”

Rush Limbaugh: “I have never once said, ‘What do I need to do to attract women?’ I do that naturally.”

Rush: “One of the truths of life is that the Republicans are never going to be able to outbid the Democrats with freebies. It’s never going to happen. To go down that road is an absolute loser, a total waste of resources and time.”

Rush: “You don’t talk about prosperity when liberals are running the show; that’s not how they advance their game. Shared misery is what they want.”

Rush: “Instead of going to El Paso and pushing for amnesty, shouldn’t Obama be going to Mississippi and all those other flooded states? I mean, he’s got the ability to lower the sea levels. Why does he not put it to use?”

Rush: “If Obama had leveled with the American people about what he had planned, he wouldn’t have gotten 30% of the vote. No liberal would! No liberal Democrat, if they were honest about their intentions for this country, would ever get 30% of the vote.”

Conservatives not making any sense:

State Sen. Shane Cultra: “It’s the parents’ responsibility that have obese kids.  Take the tax deduction away for parents that have obese kids.”  He has since tried to walk this statement back.

Newt Gingrich appeared with Nancy Pelosi in a stupid ad about climate change.   Rather than say, “This was a stupid mistake, and I got taken in by climate change propaganda,” spokesman Rick Tyler said in an email  “Newt does not apologize for trying to persuade his ideological opponents that his conservative solutions are the best solutions.  His attempt to work with Speaker Pelosi is another testament to Gingrich’s willingness to debate his conservative solutions with liberals, in this case Pelosi. As it turned out, Pelosi . . . and Gingrich still disagree about how to best protect the environment. But Gingrich will never shy away from debating those on the left on issues like the environment, education and healthcare that they think they own.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi6n_-wB154

From Conservative Review #178 (HTML)  (PDF)