The Misinformed Among Us Are Obama's Only Hope

[MeBelle]

George W. Bush inherited a strong economy, a budget surplus, and a nation at peace. <snip>

A nation at peace?

1993 World Trade Center bombing...
1998 U.S. Embassy attacks...
2000 U.S.S Cole bombing...

These three bombings had one thing in common.

Thanks for proving my point.

None of those were wars costing trillions of dollars.

I didn't prove any point for you.
I pointed out that this nation was under attack.
I also don't play the partisan game.

But...
allow me to play devil's advocate for a moment.

Pretending that our CIC at the time of these three bombings had stepped up and struck back at the common denominator....what would have happened? A war?
The WTC would still be intact and thousands of lives would have been saved?
And there would be no 'surplus', because it would have been spent on defending our country?

Thoughts please.

 

[ladyliberal]

You go right ahead and keep buying the kind of information these people specialize in....but I recognize it for what it is. Maybe if you learned to question everything, maybe double-check their opinions and compare them with other sources you'll learn to be more cynical of their viewpoints.

You raise a fair point. The results of any particular survey may not reflect the body of findings in the field. Check out the five studies (five studies, not five separate organizations) reviewed in PolitiFact | Jon Stewart says those who watch Fox News are the "most consistently misinformed media viewers" for more results.

The studies mostly focus on the correlation between knowledgeability/misinformation and media sources, but they also look at party ID. The results are somewhat idiosyncratic. For example, one study identifies a number of pieces of misinformation with partisan implications (eg, Obama's birthplace, tax cuts in stimulus). Unsurprisingly, some of these were consistently misperceived by Republicans and others were by Democrats. On general knowledge questions they don't seem to have identified huge differences between the parties, though they do seem to have identified differences based on preferred news sources.

Again, I'm not sure why you find the result (Republicans seem to be slightly more knowledgeable than Democrats) suspicious, unless you expected Democrats to be overwhelmingly more likely to be misinformed.

 

[mudwhistle]

Since when is the budget the job of the president?

It isn’t.

But the OP and others on the right will contrive any nonsense if they believe it to be politically advantageous.

Let's not be completely unfair. I've known conservatives to present valid argument and sound reasoning, or at least arguments that were something more than empty air and blatantly false statements.

It's just that Mudwhistle isn't one of them.

Yeah...all those conservatives are cool but not Mud.

The problem is everything you said in dispute of my OP was an angry rant so why should anyone bother trying to be reasonable with a little tuss-bucket like yourself.

 

[mudwhistle]

You go right ahead and keep buying the kind of information these people specialize in....but I recognize it for what it is. Maybe if you learned to question everything, maybe double-check their opinions and compare them with other sources you'll learn to be more cynical of their viewpoints.

You raise a fair point. The results of any particular survey may not reflect the body of findings in the field. Check out the five studies (five studies, not five separate organizations) reviewed in PolitiFact | Jon Stewart says those who watch Fox News are the "most consistently misinformed media viewers" for more results.

The studies mostly focus on the correlation between knowledgeability/misinformation and media sources, but they also look at party ID. The results are somewhat idiosyncratic. For example, one study identifies a number of pieces of misinformation with partisan implications (eg, Obama's birthplace, tax cuts in stimulus). Unsurprisingly, some of these were consistently misperceived by Republicans and others were by Democrats. On general knowledge questions they don't seem to have identified huge differences between the parties, though they do seem to have identified differences based on preferred news sources.

Again, I'm not sure why you find the result (Republicans seem to be slightly more knowledgeable than Democrats) suspicious, unless you expected Democrats to be overwhelmingly more likely to be misinformed.

I don't think I ever raised that issue.

I simply said that conservatives and liberals alike tend not to pay attention. My OP didn't focus on any party in particular but instead specific ethnic and age groups which I used in my examples. Not that it only goes on in those segments of our society......but it seems to be happening everywhere.

 

[Dragon]

Yeah...all those conservatives are cool but not Mud.

Let's not go overboard. You're not the ONLY disingenuous twit on the right. It's just that not EVERYONE on the right fits that description.

The problem is everything you said in dispute of my OP was an angry rant so why should anyone bother trying to be reasonable with a little tuss-bucket like yourself.

I wasn't, and still am not, in the least bit angry. As I said, I find this amusing.

And as you are never reasonable with anyone, obviously the answer to your question makes no difference.

 

[Chris]

A nation at peace?

1993 World Trade Center bombing...
1998 U.S. Embassy attacks...
2000 U.S.S Cole bombing...

These three bombings had one thing in common.

Thanks for proving my point.

None of those were wars costing trillions of dollars.

I didn't prove any point for you.
I pointed out that this nation was under attack.
I also don't play the partisan game.

But...
allow me to play devil's advocate for a moment.

Pretending that our CIC at the time of these three bombings had stepped up and struck back at the common denominator....what would have happened? A war?
The WTC would still be intact and thousands of lives would have been saved?
And there would be no 'surplus', because it would have been spent on defending our country?

Thoughts please.

One month before 9/11 Bush received a document entitled "Bin Laden determined to attack America." He did nothing about it.

Bush dropped the ball.

And Clinton did strike back. He missed Bin Laden by 15 minutes with a missle strike.

And it didn't cost trillions of dollars.

 

[grunt11b]

Start a discussion at work about the Occupy Wall Street crowd and see how many different opinions you get explaining who is really responsible for our lagging economy.

I sometimes start asking people at work what they think is the cause of the bad economy and very few really know.

Blacks almost always say Obama is heading us in the right direct. Things were bad before and they feel confident that he can do something if those Republicans would just get out of his way. The Democrats in the Senate have disappeared, and now, according to them, only the Republicans run our government. They only want to boot him out of office. They don't care about the country. All of the evils that Democrats were guilty of during the last years of the Bush Administration has been assigned to the GOP. Many of them when you mention the Tea Party think they're terrorists and racists. They forget that the Tea Party just wants us to quit spending. Any criticism of Obama causes them to shut down and stop responding.

Blacks aren't alone. Other ethnic groups are just as lost on the issues. A Senior Citizen told me that Obama tried to stop the Republicans from passing the Stimulus. She claimed that Bush signed it into law, forgetting that not only did Obama sign it but no Republican voted for the thing. Most of them have forgotten that the reason we can't buy toilet paper at DPW is because Obama hasn't passed a budget since he's been in office.

It can sometimes get frustrating dealing with folks that aren't engaged. They only halfway pay attention to the news which means they're usually so wrong you wonder where they've been. I would have to say that most people here on this site are much more informed then anyone at work that I talk to.


In my opinion Obama's greatest asset is misinformation. He confuses the issues thus he confuses the public. He wants to act like he's the solution rather than problem. He's beginning to promise the world again like he did before he was elected and hopes we fall for it yet again. That's his only hope....because if the unvarnished truth was given to the voters Obama wouldn't have a chance of an ice-cube in Hell of getting re-elected.

The media has a major role in all of this. The other day a caller told Rush Limbaugh during his radio talk-show that he witnessed the burning of the Air Force ROTC building at Kent State University on May 5th, 1970. He claimed the media covering the event gave advice to the arsonists that set the building ablaze. The protestors found it difficult to get a wooden annex to keep burning. Eventually the camera crew that was covering the event started giving advice on how to get it to light and stay lit. After 4 attempts they were finally successful, thus a better story that served the media's interests rather then the public-interests was invented.

There are numerous reports of the media actually participating in OWS protests and acting in conjunction with them to present a better image to the public.

The blame for most of the misinformation out there is a biased press, but much of it can be contributed to the complex nature of issues. I think most of it is the habit of much of the public to take things for granted without fact-checking. It doesn't help much that you really have to dig deep to find the truth. Not all of the press is left-leaning, but most are. Over 70% of them voted for Obama. Unless you work for Fox News you have to keep your own personal politics to yourself unless you're a liberal. You could find yourself out of a job.

Most of the confusion is understandably the fault of the media, but much of it rests with the apathy most Americans inherently carry with them. Life has been good for most of us. Living during a time of decent economies and excellent job growth for the last 20-25 years has spoiled us. Now we have serious problems and it's clear that Obama isn't going to do what needs to be done and the GOP can't make him do it. He has nothing new to offer other than slogans and bumper-sticker ideas.....the exact same thing his campaign is accusing Herman Cain of.

Obama's latest catch-phrase is "We Can't Wait For Congress To Act, So I'm Gonna Act On My Own". He is attempting to make it look like he's the only hope we have, but it's clear to anyone who's been paying attention he is partly if not greatly responsible for the poor economy. Problem is most of us aren't paying attention.

Control the message, control the masses. It was a hitler/stalin and Obama thing.

 

[Chris]

Start a discussion at work about the Occupy Wall Street crowd and see how many different opinions you get explaining who is really responsible for our lagging economy.

I sometimes start asking people at work what they think is the cause of the bad economy and very few really know.

Blacks almost always say Obama is heading us in the right direct. Things were bad before and they feel confident that he can do something if those Republicans would just get out of his way. The Democrats in the Senate have disappeared, and now, according to them, only the Republicans run our government. They only want to boot him out of office. They don't care about the country. All of the evils that Democrats were guilty of during the last years of the Bush Administration has been assigned to the GOP. Many of them when you mention the Tea Party think they're terrorists and racists. They forget that the Tea Party just wants us to quit spending. Any criticism of Obama causes them to shut down and stop responding.

Blacks aren't alone. Other ethnic groups are just as lost on the issues. A Senior Citizen told me that Obama tried to stop the Republicans from passing the Stimulus. She claimed that Bush signed it into law, forgetting that not only did Obama sign it but no Republican voted for the thing. Most of them have forgotten that the reason we can't buy toilet paper at DPW is because Obama hasn't passed a budget since he's been in office.

It can sometimes get frustrating dealing with folks that aren't engaged. They only halfway pay attention to the news which means they're usually so wrong you wonder where they've been. I would have to say that most people here on this site are much more informed then anyone at work that I talk to.


In my opinion Obama's greatest asset is misinformation. He confuses the issues thus he confuses the public. He wants to act like he's the solution rather than problem. He's beginning to promise the world again like he did before he was elected and hopes we fall for it yet again. That's his only hope....because if the unvarnished truth was given to the voters Obama wouldn't have a chance of an ice-cube in Hell of getting re-elected.

The media has a major role in all of this. The other day a caller told Rush Limbaugh during his radio talk-show that he witnessed the burning of the Air Force ROTC building at Kent State University on May 5th, 1970. He claimed the media covering the event gave advice to the arsonists that set the building ablaze. The protestors found it difficult to get a wooden annex to keep burning. Eventually the camera crew that was covering the event started giving advice on how to get it to light and stay lit. After 4 attempts they were finally successful, thus a better story that served the media's interests rather then the public-interests was invented.

There are numerous reports of the media actually participating in OWS protests and acting in conjunction with them to present a better image to the public.

The blame for most of the misinformation out there is a biased press, but much of it can be contributed to the complex nature of issues. I think most of it is the habit of much of the public to take things for granted without fact-checking. It doesn't help much that you really have to dig deep to find the truth. Not all of the press is left-leaning, but most are. Over 70% of them voted for Obama. Unless you work for Fox News you have to keep your own personal politics to yourself unless you're a liberal. You could find yourself out of a job.

Most of the confusion is understandably the fault of the media, but much of it rests with the apathy most Americans inherently carry with them. Life has been good for most of us. Living during a time of decent economies and excellent job growth for the last 20-25 years has spoiled us. Now we have serious problems and it's clear that Obama isn't going to do what needs to be done and the GOP can't make him do it. He has nothing new to offer other than slogans and bumper-sticker ideas.....the exact same thing his campaign is accusing Herman Cain of.

Obama's latest catch-phrase is "We Can't Wait For Congress To Act, So I'm Gonna Act On My Own". He is attempting to make it look like he's the only hope we have, but it's clear to anyone who's been paying attention he is partly if not greatly responsible for the poor economy. Problem is most of us aren't paying attention.

Control the message, control the masses. It was a hitler/stalin and Obama thing.

I think you are being controlled.

Wall Street destroyed the world economy with a Ponzi scheme.

 

[mudwhistle]

Thanks for proving my point.

None of those were wars costing trillions of dollars.

I didn't prove any point for you.
I pointed out that this nation was under attack.
I also don't play the partisan game.

But...
allow me to play devil's advocate for a moment.

Pretending that our CIC at the time of these three bombings had stepped up and struck back at the common denominator....what would have happened? A war?
The WTC would still be intact and thousands of lives would have been saved?
And there would be no 'surplus', because it would have been spent on defending our country?

Thoughts please.

One month before 9/11 Bush received a document entitled "Bin Laden determined to attack America." He did nothing about it.

Bush dropped the ball.

And Clinton did strike back. He missed Bin Laden by 15 minutes with a missle strike.

And it didn't cost trillions of dollars.

Oh, yeah....Bill Clinton's essay on terrorism.

Too funny.

 

[mudwhistle]

Start a discussion at work about the Occupy Wall Street crowd and see how many different opinions you get explaining who is really responsible for our lagging economy.

I sometimes start asking people at work what they think is the cause of the bad economy and very few really know.

Blacks almost always say Obama is heading us in the right direct. Things were bad before and they feel confident that he can do something if those Republicans would just get out of his way. The Democrats in the Senate have disappeared, and now, according to them, only the Republicans run our government. They only want to boot him out of office. They don't care about the country. All of the evils that Democrats were guilty of during the last years of the Bush Administration has been assigned to the GOP. Many of them when you mention the Tea Party think they're terrorists and racists. They forget that the Tea Party just wants us to quit spending. Any criticism of Obama causes them to shut down and stop responding.

Blacks aren't alone. Other ethnic groups are just as lost on the issues. A Senior Citizen told me that Obama tried to stop the Republicans from passing the Stimulus. She claimed that Bush signed it into law, forgetting that not only did Obama sign it but no Republican voted for the thing. Most of them have forgotten that the reason we can't buy toilet paper at DPW is because Obama hasn't passed a budget since he's been in office.

It can sometimes get frustrating dealing with folks that aren't engaged. They only halfway pay attention to the news which means they're usually so wrong you wonder where they've been. I would have to say that most people here on this site are much more informed then anyone at work that I talk to.


In my opinion Obama's greatest asset is misinformation. He confuses the issues thus he confuses the public. He wants to act like he's the solution rather than problem. He's beginning to promise the world again like he did before he was elected and hopes we fall for it yet again. That's his only hope....because if the unvarnished truth was given to the voters Obama wouldn't have a chance of an ice-cube in Hell of getting re-elected.

The media has a major role in all of this. The other day a caller told Rush Limbaugh during his radio talk-show that he witnessed the burning of the Air Force ROTC building at Kent State University on May 5th, 1970. He claimed the media covering the event gave advice to the arsonists that set the building ablaze. The protestors found it difficult to get a wooden annex to keep burning. Eventually the camera crew that was covering the event started giving advice on how to get it to light and stay lit. After 4 attempts they were finally successful, thus a better story that served the media's interests rather then the public-interests was invented.

There are numerous reports of the media actually participating in OWS protests and acting in conjunction with them to present a better image to the public.

The blame for most of the misinformation out there is a biased press, but much of it can be contributed to the complex nature of issues. I think most of it is the habit of much of the public to take things for granted without fact-checking. It doesn't help much that you really have to dig deep to find the truth. Not all of the press is left-leaning, but most are. Over 70% of them voted for Obama. Unless you work for Fox News you have to keep your own personal politics to yourself unless you're a liberal. You could find yourself out of a job.

Most of the confusion is understandably the fault of the media, but much of it rests with the apathy most Americans inherently carry with them. Life has been good for most of us. Living during a time of decent economies and excellent job growth for the last 20-25 years has spoiled us. Now we have serious problems and it's clear that Obama isn't going to do what needs to be done and the GOP can't make him do it. He has nothing new to offer other than slogans and bumper-sticker ideas.....the exact same thing his campaign is accusing Herman Cain of.

Obama's latest catch-phrase is "We Can't Wait For Congress To Act, So I'm Gonna Act On My Own". He is attempting to make it look like he's the only hope we have, but it's clear to anyone who's been paying attention he is partly if not greatly responsible for the poor economy. Problem is most of us aren't paying attention.

Control the message, control the masses. It was a hitler/stalin and Obama thing.

I think you are being controlled.

Wall Street destroyed the world economy with a Ponzi scheme.

Let's look at that silly idea closer.

Why would Wall Street want to destroy the economy?

The economy is their Golden Goose. Why would they want to destroy it?

Answer: They'd have no reason to. Why cut their own throats?


Then again, why would a Marxist and a Progressive want to destroy the economy???

Answer: To install what they call "Transformative Change" or to destroy Capitalism and replace it with Socialism.

 

[Dragon]

Let's look at that silly idea closer.

Why would Wall Street want to destroy the economy?

The words "want to" did not appear in the post you quoted, of course. Here you are presenting another sort of worthless bit of rhetoric devoid of logic that I didn't list in my first post on this thread: the straw man, the deliberate misrepresentation of someone else's words so that you can refute your misstatement of them, and thus create the illusion that you have refuted what was actually said.

In order to claim that Wall Street did not destroy the economy, whether or not it "wanted" to, which is what was actually claimed, you would have to use valid reasoning and actual evidence. You could have claimed that this was hyperbole, insofar as the economy still exists and so has not been "destroyed." Or you could have presented an alternative culprit, such as the government.

But instead, you used a blatant fallacy. It's as if you're dishonest even when honesty would have been easier and served better, as if it is, with you, a noxious habit, a kind of drug.

 

[The Rabbi]

Let's look at that silly idea closer.

Why would Wall Street want to destroy the economy?

The words "want to" did not appear in the post you quoted, of course. Here you are presenting another sort of worthless bit of rhetoric devoid of logic that I didn't list in my first post on this thread: the straw man, the deliberate misrepresentation of someone else's words so that you can refute your misstatement of them, and thus create the illusion that you have refuted what was actually said.

In order to claim that Wall Street did not destroy the economy, whether or not it "wanted" to, which is what was actually claimed, you would have to use valid reasoning and actual evidence. You could have claimed that this was hyperbole, insofar as the economy still exists and so has not been "destroyed." Or you could have presented an alternative culprit, such as the government.

But instead, you used a blatant fallacy. It's as if you're dishonest even when honesty would have been easier and served better, as if it is, with you, a noxious habit, a kind of drug.

So yuou've just proven that "Wall St" (whatever that is) did not destroy the economy.
Good job, lunkhead.

 

[Dragon]

So yuou've just proven that "Wall St" (whatever that is) did not destroy the economy.

Yes, I did. At least, not literally, as we still have an economy and therefore it has not been "destroyed." What of it?

 

[The Rabbi]

So yuou've just proven that "Wall St" (whatever that is) did not destroy the economy.

Yes, I did. At least, not literally, as we still have an economy and therefore it has not been "destroyed." What of it?

So your posts are BS.
Glad we got that established.

 

[mudwhistle]

Let's look at that silly idea closer.

Why would Wall Street want to destroy the economy?

The words "want to" did not appear in the post you quoted, of course. Here you are presenting another sort of worthless bit of rhetoric devoid of logic that I didn't list in my first post on this thread: the straw man, the deliberate misrepresentation of someone else's words so that you can refute your misstatement of them, and thus create the illusion that you have refuted what was actually said.

In order to claim that Wall Street did not destroy the economy, whether or not it "wanted" to, which is what was actually claimed, you would have to use valid reasoning and actual evidence. You could have claimed that this was hyperbole, insofar as the economy still exists and so has not been "destroyed." Or you could have presented an alternative culprit, such as the government.

But instead, you used a blatant fallacy. It's as if you're dishonest even when honesty would have been easier and served better, as if it is, with you, a noxious habit, a kind of drug.

Are you done spinning?

I can give plenty of examples that proves you're on the wrong side of this issue.

The folks most likely to want to crash the economy are the ones most likely to benefit from the crash. The Wall Streeters tend to jump out of very high windows when the economy crashes, where as the Obama supported OWS would cheer it.

 

[Dragon]

So yuou've just proven that "Wall St" (whatever that is) did not destroy the economy.

Yes, I did. At least, not literally, as we still have an economy and therefore it has not been "destroyed." What of it?

So your posts are BS.
Glad we got that established.

It would be amusing to see what else you think is "established" and on what basis.

You might want to look back and see who it was who claimed that Wall Street "destroyed" the economy with a Ponzi scheme.

Hint: it wasn't me.

 

[Dragon]

Are you done spinning?

You don't seem to be done posting, so no.

I can give plenty of examples that proves you're on the wrong side of this issue.

I can give plenty of examples that prove you don't have a clue what "side" of "this issue" I'm on, or even what "this issue" is, and that even if you did you would be constitutionally incapable of giving a straight statement about it.

The folks most likely to want to crash the economy

See, here's the thing. Only one person on this thread has talked about ANYONE "wanting to crash the economy," and that's you. The guy you quoted earlier claimed only that Wall Street HAD crashed the economy, which in no way implies that they did it deliberately. That "wanted to" business is your straw man. It's pointless to even bring that up, except as a red herring, which is of course why you did.

 

[Mr. Shaman]

The Misinformed Among Us Are Obama's Only Hope

.....And, we Dems DO appreciate you Teabaggers showing what kind o' nut-jobs are constantly criticizing him!!!!

(.....But, you're still a minority o' the voting-public.)

​

 

[mudwhistle]

Are you done spinning?

You don't seem to be done posting, so no.

I can give plenty of examples that proves you're on the wrong side of this issue.

I can give plenty of examples that prove you don't have a clue what "side" of "this issue" I'm on, or even what "this issue" is, and that even if you did you would be constitutionally incapable of giving a straight statement about it.

The folks most likely to want to crash the economy

See, here's the thing. Only one person on this thread has talked about ANYONE "wanting to crash the economy," and that's you. The guy you quoted earlier claimed only that Wall Street HAD crashed the economy, which in no way implies that they did it deliberately. That "wanted to" business is your straw man. It's pointless to even bring that up, except as a red herring, which is of course why you did.

Sorry, but willful ignorance won't save your ass here.

You want to parse words and lie do it at your own risk.

You're a real bad-ass on the net, aren't you.

Tough guy.

I'm laughing at your silly ass.

You can't argue the merits of my OP simply with calling it lies.

Prove it's lies or all your doing is pissing into the wind.

 

[Soggy in NOLA]

what was the rights answer to our problems?

A debt ceiling fiasco that caused us a finacial downgrade.

How can you be so wrong, so often?