Has the Republican party lost its collective mind?

[John Cuthber]

As you might imagine, I'm not that familiar with the behaviour of US politicians.

Can you provide a link to Youtube or something showing Biden to have lost his grip on reality please?

I can see some stories where he made dumb comments through lack of thought but there's a whole world of difference between thoughtless slips like those and a belief in dragons.

[Moontanman]

I honestly don't know what to tell you. When a man, Biden, standing only a heartbeat from our presidency; pulls off gaff after gaff and the only Democrat taking him seriously is the former governor of Virginia and a black man at that, little else can be said.

If thise guy from Minnesota gets into office and is as nutty as democrats make him out to be, then it's a blot on a district in Minnesota, "not on the United States."

 

 

Rigney if he was the only one you would have a point but the Republican party is currently fielding many people like this, in fact not believing in YEC is enough to prevent you from being elected as a republican...

[rigney]

As you might imagine, I'm not that familiar with the behaviour of US politicians.

Can you provide a link to Youtube or something showing Biden to have lost his grip on reality please?

I can see some stories where he made dumb comments through lack of thought but there's a whole world of difference between thoughtless slips like those and a belief in dragons.

Give me a quote from any reputable republican that can top any of the gaffs Biden has made and I will readily agree with Moonman. Biden's is sad commentary at best, dragons or no dragons. A mistake is something like Romney made when he presented Paul Ryan as the next president of the United States instead of VP, but then immediately clarified his blunder.

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/joebiden/a/bidenisms.htm

Edited August 19, 2012 by rigney

[Moontanman]

Give me a quote from either a democrat or republican that can top one of these and i will readily agree with Moonman. This is sad at best, dragons or no dragons..

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/joebiden/a/bidenisms.htm

 

 

Seriously rigney, you think these gaffs are the equivalent of believing the Earth is 6000 years old, dinosaurs and humans lived together and dragons are real? Biden might be seriously inept or even a dumb ass but this is not the same as believing in dragons. What's next, leaving out milk for fairies passed into law?

[rigney]

Seriously rigney, you think these gaffs are the equivalent of believing the Earth is 6000 years old, dinosaurs and humans lived together and dragons are real? Biden might be seriously inept or even a dumb ass but this is not the same as believing in dragons. What's next, leaving out milk for fairies passed into law?

Don't know Moon and I don't particularally give a shit who believes in what. So, just don't wrap all religious people in the same bolt of cloth as you do this Minnesotan and I promise not to do the same with all democrats, just Biden. I really do believe Joe still believes in the tooth fairy???? Edited August 19, 2012 by rigney

[iNow]

It's telling that you continue to do little more than evade the central request for examples and evidence, and proceed with the waffling, hand waving, and off topic nonsequiturs.

[John Cuthber]

Give me a quote from any reputable republican that can top any of the gaffs Biden has made and I will readily agree with Moonman. Biden's is sad commentary at best, dragons or no dragons. A mistake is something like Romney made when he presented Paul Ryan as the next president of the United States instead of VP, but then immediately clarified his blunder.

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/joebiden/a/bidenisms.htm

 

OK

 

http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/blbushisms.htm

 

or

''I like being able to fire people who provide services to me.''

 

—Mitt Romney, using an unfortunate choice of words while advocating for consumer choice in health insurance plans (January 2012)

and

''Carbon dioxide is portrayed as harmful. But there isn't even one study that can be produced that shows that carbon dioxide is a harmful gas.''

 

—Rep. Michelle Bachmann, April, 2009

 

 

But all of these are just slip-ups.

They are not in the same league as belief in dragons (Though Bachman might really believe what she said: it's hard to tell. If she does then she's got about as good a grasp of reality as the dragon guy.)

 

Perhaps the most striking quote is this recent one from Romney

" I did go back and look at my taxes and over the past 10 years I never paid less than 13 percent. I think the most recent year is 13.6 or something like that. So I paid taxes every single year. "

 

I guess it's near enough to true, but it means he thinks it's morally and politically acceptable to brag about paying a tax rate that would be appropriate if he were on about $10,000 per year.

According to wiki "As a result of his business career, by 2007, Romney and his wife had a net worth of between $190 and $250 million"

As far as I can tell, even if nearly all of his income is long term capital gains he should be paying 15%.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_gains_tax_in_the_United_States

 

I'm warming to the guy who believes in dragons.

 

 

Now Rigney, can you please show me the batshit crazy left wingers?

(or is your belief in them a bit like that bloke's belief in dragons, i.e. not actually based on reality?)

Edited August 19, 2012 by John Cuthber

[rigney]

It's telling that you continue to do little more than evade the central request for examples and evidence, and proceed with the waffling, hand waving, and off topic nonsequiturs.

Have to tell you INow, if I had the ability to mince words as you do, I'd be in politics. You simply missed your calling. Edited August 19, 2012 by rigney

[iNow]

Have to tell you INow, if I had the ability to mince words as you do, I'd be in politics. You simply missed your calling.

More off topic evasions from the actual request...

[Moontanman]

Don't know Moon and I don't particularally give a shit who believes in what.

 

I call BS on that rigney, can you really say you don't care what a political candidate believes in? What if he believes he was abducted by aliens?

 

So, don't wrap all religious people in the same bolt of cloth as you do this Minnasotan and I promise not to do the same with all democrats, just Biden.

 

 

I don't wrap them all in the same cloth, just the YEC's, you are not reading what I type dude... Being Christian or even religious in general doesn't make you batshit crazy, believing in things that are demonstrably not true makes you batshit crazy.

 

Every last one of the republican presidential candidates said they didn't believe in evolution, except for Huntsman and he paid the price for either not being a lair or not being crazy. They all profess to believe in stuff we know is not true or do not believe in stuff we know is true.

 

On a local level almost across the board republicans go for batshit crazy, I think this is an important point, I do not want someone that is disconnected from reality in government, it's difficult to believe you do...

 

The republicans have been fighting all across the US to have creationism taught in public schools, this is unacceptable, if someone believes this then teach it in church. It's also interesting that they don't want any other religious views taught in school, just theirs...

 

The whole religious agenda they want to force on everyone else is unacceptable but the fact that to actually want what they want to be taught as reality is either a lie or it makes them willfully ignorant, no other choice and they are using this lie/crazy to influence people who don't know any better...

 

As for Biden... compare him to Romney's running mate, a tea party darling, he would be a heart beat away from being president, now that is scary...

[Phi for All]

Give me a quote from any reputable republican that can top any of the gaffs Biden has made and I will readily agree with Moonman.

 

"My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed. You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don't think too much further than that. And so what you've got to do is you've got to curtail that type of behavior. They don't know any better.'' —South Carolina Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, arguing that government food assistance to lower-income residents, including food stamps or free school lunches, encourages a culture of dependence, Jan 24. 2010

 

''I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out under another, then under another Democrat president, Jimmy Carter. I'm not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it's an interesting coincidence.'' —Rep. Michele Bachmann , on the 1976 Swine Flu outbreak that happened when Gerald Ford was president, April 28, 2009

 

''The greatest threat to America is not necessarily a recession or even another terrorist attack. The greatest threat to America is a liberal media bias.'' —Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), June 4, 2009

 

''I guarantee it's one of their long-term goals, to have one sort of borderless mass continent.'' —Kentucky GOP Senate nominee and Tea Party favorite Rand Paul, on the future of North America, May 25, 2010

 

''If ObamaCare passes, that free insurance card that's in people's pockets is gonna be as worthless as a Confederate dollar after the war between the states -- the Great War of Yankee Aggression.'' —Rep. Paul Broun (R- Ga.), March 18, 2010

''We need to uptick our image with everyone, including one-armed midgets.''—Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, on the GOP's need for a hip-hop makeover, Feb 19, 2009

 

''She's a f**king raghead. We got a raghead in Washington; we don't need one in South Carolina. She's a raghead that's ashamed of her religion trying to hide it behind being Methodist for political reasons.''—South Carolina State Sen. Jake Knotts (R-SC), claiming that his Republican rival in the South Carolina governor's race, Nikki Haley, has been set up by a network of Sikhs and was programmed to run for governor by outside influences in foreign countries. (Haley is of Sikh descent, and is now a Christian.) Knotts later clarified his statement, saying he did not mean to use the F-word. (June 4, 2010))

 

''I hope that's not where we're going, but you know if this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies and saying my goodness what can we do to turn this country around? I'll tell you the first thing we need to do is take Harry Reid out.'' —Sharron Angle, the Tea Party candidate who won the Republican nomination in Nevada's Senate primary, floating the possibility of armed insurrection, interview with right-wing talk radio host Lars Larson in Portland, OR, January 2010

 

''He has no place in any station of government and we need to realize that he is an enemy of humanity.'' —Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ), on President Obama's decision to fund international family planning organizations that support legal abortion, Sept. 26, 2009

 

''If you're oriented toward animals, bestiality, then, you know, that's not something that can be used, held against you or any bias be held against you for that. Which means you'd have to strike any laws against bestiality, if you're oriented toward corpses, toward children, you know, there are all kinds of perversions ... pedophiles or necrophiliacs or what most would say is perverse sexual orientations.'' —Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX), arguing that a hate crimes bill passed by Congress would lead to Nazism and legalization of necrophilia, pedophilia, and bestiality, Oct. 6, 2009

 

''I've always been fascinated by the fact that here was a relatively small country that from a strictly military point of view accomplished incredible things.'' —Ohio GOP House candidate and Tea Party favorite Rich Iott, explaining why for years he donned a German Waffen SS uniform and participated in Nazi re-enactments as part of a group that calls itself Wiking (Atlantic interview, Oct. 2010)

I could do this all day long. Unfortunately.

[John Cuthber]

I remain disappointed by the lack of tragicomic videos about notable left wing politicians making absurd claims.

Even just a run-of-the-mill flat-earther or YEC would be a start.

Surely the entire Left wing can't actually be "really quite sensible"?

[swansont]

Remember: It's an horrific gaffe when the guy in the other party makes it. It's merely a mistake when someone in your party makes it. That makes the demonization so much easier.

 

I remain disappointed by the lack of tragicomic videos about notable left wing politicians making absurd claims.

Even just a run-of-the-mill flat-earther or YEC would be a start.

Surely the entire Left wing can't actually be "really quite sensible"?

The left wing has a whole host of whackaloons. Radical environmentalists, for example, or anti-globalists. They are generally far out on the fringe, though — they have not taken control of the party. Not a whole lot of Washington politicians running on an "everyone should be a vegan" platform, or even an anti-science new-age-crystals platform.

[John Cuthber]

It's amusing to note that wiki has articles entitled clintonism, thacherism, balirism obamaism, clintonism and so on which note the political views or movements of the politicians concerned.

The entry for Bushism lists examples of his inability to string a sentence together.

 

And yet, someone can ask, apparently in all seriousness for " a quote from any reputable republican that can top any of the gaffs Biden has made ".

[akh]

Remember: It's an horrific gaffe when the guy in the other party makes it. It's merely a mistake when someone in your party makes it. That makes the demonization so much easier.

 

 

The left wing has a whole host of whackaloons. Radical environmentalists, for example, or anti-globalists. They are generally far out on the fringe, though — they have not taken control of the party. Not a whole lot of Washington politicians running on an "everyone should be a vegan" platform, or even an anti-science new-age-crystals platform.

 

I honestly think there are equal anti-globalists from the right, they just tend to focus on different areas. Right wing anti-globalists tend to focus on keeping America #1 at all costs; Privileged and on top of the social-political order where all other nations are subjects.

 

But I also don't think there is a single left wing politician, I don't care how far left you go, that spins the level of fear, paranoia, and utter hatred that comes from the right. Not even close. You may think that environmentalism or mandating health insurance (and no, this is not even in the same ball park as any form of socialism) is misguided or just plain wrong. That's fine, if that is what you believe. But the Rights' continuous attempts to keep people ignorant and fearful, is more in line with the rhetoric of some of the most nefarious institutions known to history. Its inexcusable.

 

 

 

 

[swansont]

I also must point out that stating a whacky deeply-held belief is not a gaffe. It's having a whacky deeply-held belief. For example, Todd Akin's views on rape is not a gaffe. It's misogynistic lunacy.

[moth]

How could anybody top Cheney's "greeted as liberators" fantasy? His estimate of the cost of the Iraq war, or when he said the case for WMD in Iraq was a "slam dunk"?

I have to wonder if this moron knows what a camera is

.

Did you know women don't get pregnant if they're raped? real rape

 

Bat shit insane is too kind.

 

edit:Swansont beat me to it again

Edited August 19, 2012 by moth

[John Cuthber]

I'm really starting to like the guy who believes in dragons. It's roughly as plausible as Todd Akin's views on human biology, and a whole lot less offensive.

 

Surely there's someone out there who can find some footage of a Left winger making a total knob of themselves?

[Phi for All]

Surely there's someone out there who can find some footage of a Left winger making a total knob of themselves?

GovTrack.us lists Raúl Grijalva (House of Representatives from AZ's 7th Congressional District) as the farthest left member of the US House according to voting records. The craziest things I can find him saying are that 1) ""Saturday is National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day — prescription drug abuse is bigger than cocaine and heroin combined", and 2) since the discrepancies involved with the 2004 presidential election, he supports a request that the United Nations observe and certify major elections in the US.

 

The prescription drug remark caused a great deal of uproar, until fact checkers pointed out that what Grijalva said was 100% correct. Detractors on the UN vote certification can't really give a good reason why, other than our elections are our own business, not the world's.

 

I used the top hits I got on a Google search of "crazy things Rep. Grijalva said". I'll keep searching for others, maybe in the Senate.

[Moontanman]

I would have thought it was much easier to show a Dem talking insane crap, I mean they are the anything goes party aren't they? That's pretty much what Fox News says... no wait, maybe Fox can tell us some crazy stuff Dems say... They are so truthful and all I am sure they wouldn't spin it...

Edited August 20, 2012 by Moontanman

[akh]

I also must point out that stating a whacky deeply-held belief is not a gaffe. It's having a whacky deeply-held belief. For example, Todd Akin's views on rape is not a gaffe. It's misogynistic lunacy.

 

I am sure that this guy and the people who voted for him would be all to eager to point out the back asswardness of Islam. Might as well stone the woman for not having the strength to cross her legs tightly enough. What a sick f'.

 

And Akin serves on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology? What branch of hominid did he evolve from?

 

Ohh wait, this explains it all

Edited August 20, 2012 by akh

[swansont]

I would have thought it was much easier to show a Dem talking insane crap, I mean they are the anything goes party aren't they? That's pretty much what Fox News says... no wait, maybe Fox can tell us some crazy stuff Dems say... They are so truthful and all I am sure they wouldn't spin it...

From the vantage point of Fox news and their viewers, saying global warming and evolution are real is probably considered crazy.

[imatfaal]

The dragon-man plainly crazy - but on VP's words being similarly so ... Frankly when I read some of Paul Ryan's tax plans and then read articles like this one I don't think that Biden's comments about chains is that far off the mark. Trashing the safety net, reducing tax burden on the rich preferentially, and legislating to make voting (especially for black communities) more difficult; I would go along with Biden to a fair extent. OK so the words were deliberately inflammatory and an exageration - but speaking to a crowd for whom the situation may under R/R be made considerable worse and are being actively disenfranchised by the GOP it is acceptable rhetoric.

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/18/republican-voter-suppression-early-voting_n_1766172.html?utm_hp_ref=politics

 

 

 

Early voting started off a wildly popular, bipartisan element of voting reform. Indeed, of all the voting reforms this country has seen over the last decades, early voting is easily the most unassailable. It makes voting more convenient for the public and makes Election Day easier for election officials. Because it generally happens at board of elections offices, it takes notoriously unreliable volunteer poll workers out of the picture. But Republican leaders cooled on the idea after 2008. "It just so happened that this was the first time that early voting had been used in large numbers to mobilize African American and Latino voters," said Wendy Weiser, who directs the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

 

After the GOP won control of many statehouses in 2010, rolling back early voting became a top legislative priority. That meant reducing the period for early in-person voting in Florida from 14 to 8 days, and in Ohio, from 35 to 11. And no voting on Sunday before the election.

 

"I try to be an objective observer," said professor Paul Gronke, who runs the nonpartisan Early Voting Information Center at Reed College in Oregon. "But the objective facts indicate there seem to be partisan motivations behind the ratcheting back of early in-person voting."

 

Research by an Ohio voter advocacy group found that blacks made up more than half the early in-person voters in 2008, compared with about a quarter of people who vote on Election Day or by mail.

 

Research by political scientists at Dartmouth College and the University of Florida concluded that "Democratic, African American, Hispanic, younger, and first-time voters were disproportionately likely to vote early in 2008 and in particular on weekends, including the final Sunday of early voting."

 

 

 

[ewmon]

I also must point out that stating a whacky deeply-held belief is not a gaffe. It's having a whacky deeply-held belief. For example, Todd Akin's views on rape is not a gaffe. It's misogynistic lunacy.

Akin's remarks were grossly in error scientifically and grossly offensive to everyone. To say that Akin is a moron is an insult to morons. Comments like these make people wonder what other idiotic garbage quietly floats around in Akin's pea-brain.

 

It harkens back to 50 years ago and beyond when the narrow-minded idiocy was that, long story short, a rape victim's body lacked lubrication (because she wouldn't be sexually excited) and also "kegeled" itself shut, and so could not be raped, and that any woman who was penetrated probably let it happen, or had a gun to her head, or was knocked unconscious. I think Akin's remark is based on this ancient fallacy that "legitimate" forced penetration was next to impossible instead of some fallacy (that I've never heard) that forced penetration somehow prevented fertilization. I think that this "try to shut that whole thing down" idiocy refers to the dry kegeling.

 

Some websites are showing the statistics that 5% of rapes result in pregnancies which results in 32,000 pregnancies in America annually. I think it's scientifically sound to divide the 32,000 pregnancies by 5% to derive 640,000 rapes in America annually. Looking at the demographics, there's 156 million females in America, and combining these statistics, there's 1 rape in America annually per 244 females. Given that American females lives about 81 years, then on average, a female has about a 2 in 7 chance of being raped in her lifetime. That's beyond epidemic.

[zapatos]

I also must point out that stating a whacky deeply-held belief is not a gaffe. It's having a whacky deeply-held belief. For example, Todd Akin's views on rape is not a gaffe. It's misogynistic lunacy.

Proving that Claire McCaskill, Todd Akin's Democratic opponent, is no dummy, her campaign spent roughly $2 million to help Akin win the Republican nomination.

 

Mr. Akin won the three-way Republican primary earlier this month after Senator McCaskill tacitly tried to boost his candidacy, as her campaign considered him the weakest potential general-election challenger. As part of an effort to define her opponent, Ms. McCaskill’s campaign spent roughly $2 million on ads that called Mr. Akin the “true conservative” in the race. Mr. Akin won that contest by six percentage points, with 36 percent of the vote, and was polling slightly ahead of Ms. McCaskill at that time.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/19/candidates-comments-on-rape-draw-criticism/