Five for one

[BoSoxGal]

oops - Johnson and surely Tyler gets some credit even if he chose the wrong side?

Admittedly my knowledge of presidential history isn't encyclopedic, but I wasn't aware either of them ran for public office after the presidency, and Wiki isn't helping me clarify. Can you?

[Lord Jim]

Tyler was elected to the Confederate Congress from Virginia after Virginia seceded (that's what Meade refers to by "the wrong side") however he died before he actually took his seat...

Andrew Johnson returned to the Senate from Tennessee in the 1870's...

As I recall he didn't live very long after that election either...

[BoSoxGal]

Ahhh, okay. I looked up the wrong President Johnson, and overlooked the bit about the Confederacy in Tyler's Wiki entry.

I used to be able to name all the Presidents in order of their presidencies. Oh, to have the memory ability of a youth again.

[MajGenl.Meade]

Oh, to have the memory ability of a youth again.

Of a what?

[Econoline]

This is relevant to the nominal subject of this thread.

I'm just going to post this without comment:

(source1)
(source2)

[Sue U]

Stupidest Man on the Internet still stupid.

[Econoline]

Finally! Someone on Fox News who I can agree with!

[Sue U]

But but but ... it would be irresponsible not to speculate!

[BoSoxGal]

Wow - I didn't realize any amount of reason still existed at that channel! Thanks for sharing that clip, Econoline.

[Crackpot]

Shep has a history of going rouge when the rest of the channel goes too far off the rails.

[Joe Guy]

Shep has a history of going rouge when the rest of the channel goes too far off the rails.

He certainly does have his own make up.

[Lord Jim]

Going Rouge

Wasn't that the autobiography of a cross dresser who made a living doing Sarah Palin impersonations?

[rubato]

1 voice of reason vs 9 (I think that was the count in the video but its not exact) screaming republican jackasses. One out of ten total so we get a percent composition of reason of 1/10 or 10% reason.

FOX is 10% reason! 90% Hysterical Republican Bullshit.

Better than usual for the all-GOP channel.

And we proved it with science and numbers and stuff!



yrs,
rubaot

[Lord Jim]

I've been meaning to catch up on this topic...

A few thoughts...

First of all, we don't have to "speculate" as to whether or not Bergdahl deserted his post; that's an established fact...

An army investigation conducted in 2010 determined that, and some of the folks who have been "yackety yaking" are members of his unit who were there serving with him when he deserted his post, and to a man they say he deserted his unit...

Now, whether or not what he did constitutes "desertion" rather than "going AWOL" under the UCMJ remains to be determined, but clearly it must be one or the other...

My guess, (well okay, "speculation"... ) is that when this is finally sorted out, the argument his attorney will make will be a "diminished capacity" defense (given the emails he sent, that would seem to be the way to go)

(Accusing him of being a "traitor" certainly seems over the top; given the fact that he was held in isolation without any other POWs, and that his Taliban captors are the only other witnesses to his behavior in captivity, a charge of "treason" would seem somewhat problematic to me...)

I expect his lawyer will argue that he had given lots of indication that he should have been removed from his unit, and that the Army should have taken him off the line for a psych evaluation...


Moving along...

I saw where The President said this week that a "prisoner exchange" is what happens at "the end of a war"...

Really? Is this war over? Has anyone told the Taliban? The last time I checked, they were still shooting at us...

And then of course there's the fact that The President flagrantly violated the law...(Interesting that we don't see any of the folks who had their hair on fire over "Iran -Contra" upset over this...)

Under the law, he was legally required to give Congress 30 days notice before he released any prisoners from Gitmo; in this case he released five high ranking Taliban officials with no notice at all, even to the Chairmen and ranking members of the Senate and House Intelligence Committees...(He's even managed to piss off Diane Feinstein over that...)

The Administration, and Obama himself, is going to have to answer for that one...

And on the topic of "no soldier left behind"...

That's an important principle, but it's not an overarching be all and end all principle...

What if, in order to "not leave this soldier behind" the Taliban had insisted on enriched uranium, or weaponized antharx?

I suspect the Administration would have declined...(Though after the way they bungled Syria, it's tough to know what the outer boundary for crazy incompetence is with this bunch...)

And finally, on the issue of hypocrisy....

There are obvious "Blame Obama all the time no matter what" idiots out there, (like the fellow who Econo provided links for) who make their living feeding off of anti-Obama sentiment...

But I have seen some in the liberal media try to put John McCain in this group...

In February, McCain said on Anderson Cooper's show that if a prisoner swap was offered for Bergdahl, that it was something that "should be considered" but that he would need to "see the details"....

So now he's seen the "details" (the five highest ranking Taliban officials we're holding being released) and the "details" well, suck, and he's opposed to it...

No hypocrisy there...

The bottom line is that somebody in the Administration thought this would be a triumphant moment, (thus the Rose Garden Ceremony) and it has turned out to be a complete cluster fuck...The victory cigars they thought they were lighting up turned out to be exploding cigars...

My personal suspicion is, (as I have mentioned before) that like all second term Presidencies, Obama no longer has his "A Team" working for him, ( neither his political A Team or his Cabinet A Team; they've all moved on) and he is being ill-served by the advice he is getting from the second-stringers...

If David Axelrod were still in The White House, he'd have said to Obama, "Mr President, this five top Taliban leaders in exchange for a POW with a dodgy story is a really bad idea. You shouldn't do it."

But there's no one in The White House now who has that kind of gravitas any more...

[BoSoxGal]

1 voice of reason vs 9 (I think that was the count in the video but its not exact) screaming republican jackasses. One out of ten total so we get a percent composition of reason of 1/10 or 10% reason.

FOX is 10% reason! 90% Hysterical Republican Bullshit.

Better than usual for the all-GOP channel.

And we proved it with science and numbers and stuff!



yrs,
rubaot

I have missed your particular brand of clever, rubato.

[Lord Jim]

I have missed your particular brand of clever, rubato.

I enjoy it every day...

Yes, he certaintly has a "particular brand of clever" ...

[rubato]

1 voice of reason vs 9 (I think that was the count in the video but its not exact) screaming republican jackasses. One out of ten total so we get a percent composition of reason of 1/10 or 10% reason.

FOX is 10% reason! 90% Hysterical Republican Bullshit.

Better than usual for the all-GOP channel.

And we proved it with science and numbers and stuff!



yrs,
rubaot

I have missed your particular brand of clever, rubato.

And I have missed you, but I had hoped you would find a more healthful, clever, and nurturing community of friends than this. I still do.



yrs,
rubato

[Gob]

And I have missed you, but I had hoped you would find a more healthful, clever, and nurturing community of friends than this. I still do.



yrs,
rubato

[Joe Guy]

FOX is 10% reason! 90% Hysterical Republican Bullshit.

Fox is a bit Hysterical but I believe it's more of a case of anti-Obama people getting too excited and suffering from Premature Expectoration.

[BoSoxGal]

FOX is 10% reason! 90% Hysterical Republican Bullshit.

Fox is a bit Hysterical but I believe it's more of a case of anti-Obama people getting too excited and suffering from Premature Expectoration.

Ha ha ha - Joe Guy, your brand of clever can be pretty hilarious, too!

I only see FOX in clips on the web and on The Daily Show/Colbert Report; I can't imagine what it would be like to work in a bar or otherwise be somewhere that it played ALL DAY LONG.

It's mind-numbing propaganda meant to brainwash those who lack critical thinking skills - and it's clearly terrifically effective, at least on the people I see on a daily basis in this 80% Republican rural Montana county.