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Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

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Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

joecct said:
Do we want to back to the 70's - prior to bank deregulation?
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In general, yes we certainly do. The things that made the 70s suck were inflation driven by the Vietnam debacle and the oil shock, not the New Deal financial regulations that fueled the American middle class miracle for 40 years.
 
Kepler said:
In general, yes we certainly do. The things that made the 70s suck were inflation driven by the Vietnam debacle and the oil shock, not the New Deal financial regulations that fueled the American middle class miracle for 40 years.
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I agree with you, but can (will) we?
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

joecct said:
I agree with you, but can (will) we?
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Well, we can't go back, no, but as we go forward we can try to switch off the things that hurt us (deregulation, trickle down, Citizens United) and find equivalents to things that worked (21st century equivalents to unions, anti-trust, the GI Bill, early childhood assistance, the Church Committee hearings).
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

geezer said:
Watched Last Days in Vietnam the other night, it was pretty awesome. I had only seen bits and pieces of this footage in the past so It was enlightening to get a full dose.
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My earliest memory is the moon landing, but close to that is watching news broadcasts from Vietnam with my folks and hearing them (solid Cold War liberals who feared world communism) talk about what a terrible waste it all was.

Of course, from an economic and geo-political perspective, Vietnam is about one-tenth as destructive as the Iraq blunder. And yet coverage of that was so sanitized and censored that it was if it was a tennis match on Mars. That may be the most damaging legacy of Cheney and his thugs: the vast majority of Americans have no idea of the scale of the brutality we released (and in Pakistan are still releasing), so they simply can't compute why we've become a pariah state, if they realize it at all.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

Kepler said:
My earliest memory is the moon landing, but close to that is watching news broadcasts from Vietnam with my folks and hearing them (solid Cold War liberals who feared world communism) talk about what a terrible waste it all was.

Of course, from an economic and geo-political perspective, Vietnam is about one-tenth as destructive as the Iraq blunder. And yet coverage of that was so sanitized and censored that it was if it was a tennis match on Mars. That may be the most damaging legacy of Cheney and his thugs: the vast majority of Americans have no idea of the scale of the brutality we released (and in Pakistan are still releasing), so they simply can't compute why we've become a pariah state, if they realize it at all.
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The thing that struck me hardest with the Vietnam documentary was revealing just how emotionally invested the U.S. servicemen were in the Vietnamese people, both soldiers and civilians. Many Americans were willing to give their lives for them. Many of them came home with Vietnamese wives and children. The love and respect shown by our veterans in those interviews is very affecting. By contrast in talking to veterans from Iraq, the ones I know have a lot of disdain, even outright hatred for the Iraqis. Not exactly sure what it means, but morally it makes it feel like the Iraq War falls far shorter of being justified even than Vietnam.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

geezer said:
By contrast in talking to veterans from Iraq, the ones I know have a lot of disdain, even outright hatred for the Iraqis. Not exactly sure what it means, but morally it makes it feel like the Iraq War falls far shorter of being justified even than Vietnam.
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I work with many Iraq vets. They are angry with the Iraqis, who often betrayed them and harbored the very people who were putting down IEDs and killing them.

Remember, too, that we were just outright occupiers in Iraq -- they didn't ask us to come and they didn't want us there.

Such a brutal disaster, and completely an own goal. It's too bad we can't just ship the whole administration to the Hague and bring war crimes charges against them ourselves.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

geezer said:
The thing that struck me hardest with the Vietnam documentary was revealing just how emotionally invested the U.S. servicemen were in the Vietnamese people, both soldiers and civilians.
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Well, of course had there been no Vietnam this song would have been immeasurably poorer.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

Kepler said:
Well, of course had there been no Vietnam this song would have been immeasurably poorer.
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I know you like trolling & sarcasm, and I often find it funny, but when you smear a group of veterans like that, it is incredibly stupid. And no, this is not a "MILI-TUR-EE, 'MURICA, HUH DUR" complaint.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

FadeToBlack&Gold said:
I know you like trolling & sarcasm, and I often find it funny, but when you smear a group of veterans like that, it is incredibly stupid. And no, this is not a "MILI-TUR-EE, 'MURICA, HUH DUR" complaint.
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What? I have no idea what you're talking about. :confused: :confused: :confused:
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

Kepler said:
What? I have no idea what you're talking about. :confused: :confused: :confused:
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Kep, in your previous post, I got the vibe that you were implying that all Vietnam vets were just there for the Asian fortune cookies/easy puss. I hope that wasn't what you meant?
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

Kepler said:
I work with many Iraq vets. They are angry with the Iraqis, who often betrayed them and harbored the very people who were putting down IEDs and killing them.

Remember, too, that we were just outright occupiers in Iraq -- they didn't ask us to come and they didn't want us there.

Such a brutal disaster, and completely an own goal. It's too bad we can't just ship the whole administration to the Hague and bring war crimes charges against them ourselves.
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Nothing wrong with regime change. Some do it peacefully via the ballot box and some do it (way) less peacefully via the barrel of a gun. However, if you're going to subscribe to a regime change, make sure you've thought it out. We didn't. Didn't have it thought out when Diem got the chop and when Saddam got the noose.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

FadeToBlack&Gold said:
Kep, in your previous post, I got the vibe that you were implying that all Vietnam vets were just there for the Asian fortune cookies/easy puss. I hope that wasn't what you meant?
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Um, no. I meant Vietnam gave us FMJ which gave us that rap sample, that's all.

I'm pretty sure 95% of the guys in Vietnam were there because they got a letter from Uncle Sam and didn't have Cheney or Dubya's connections.
 
Re: Campaign 2016 - It's never too late to start all over again!

Kepler said:
I'm pretty sure 95% of the guys in Vietnam were there because they got a letter from Uncle Sam and didn't have Cheney or Dubya's connections.
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(I know you weren't serious but) That was a question worth looking up, since I perceived a sincere devotion to service among many of those vets. According to this site, it was 25% draftees. Other interesting stats there as well, 80% of those claiming to be Vietnam vets in 2000 census were not... makes me wonder about some people...
 
geezer said:
(I know you weren't serious but) That was a question worth looking up, since I perceived a sincere devotion to service among many of those vets. According to this site, it was 25% draftees. Other interesting stats there as well, 80% of those claiming to be Vietnam vets in 2000 census were not... makes me wonder about some people...
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Out of curiosity, I wonder how many were going to be drafted but volunteered instead?
 
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