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07/25/16 05:20 PM

#3019

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

I will admit to being a bitch but I just can't help myself when I read some of these things. Tell me you're not voting for Trump and I might let it be. But if you are voting for Trump, or planning on just staying home on election day or not sending in your vote-by-mail ballot (which indicates you would just as soon let Trump get elected), it pretty well makes me lose respect for most of the political things you choose to say (write).

I think you said in one of your posts that you thought a single payer health insurance is a good thing. Is that true? You can't possibly think the Republicans are going to let that happen. They are totally on the side of the health insurance companies who simply are middlemen who add needless expense to our health care costs. They use much of their excess profits lobbying Congress. This is my one-sided opinion but it's the way I feel about it. If all of the money that people pay for health insurance right now were pooled into a single payer system everyone in the country could easily be covered and probably with much money to spare.

I'm going to add this meme. I'm sure you can think of a few more things to throw on the Hillary side but anything underhanded she may have done makes her a saint in comparison to megalomaniac (look that one up) Trump. Personally, I think I could add a dozen more negatives to Trump's list.

07/25/16 05:27 PM

#3020

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

80's hair, but great song. Do you think things are getting any better or are they going downhill?

07/25/16 09:26 PM

#3021

Gerd Eysser

Single payor system managed by the feds is NOT good! That's why I cited the ineffciencies and waste of the federal government. I even asked anyone to show me a program that was ever on time, on budget and had it's desire effect.

All Hillary did was send emails from her cell phone? Therein lies the problem. I guess you missed what the FBI director layed out in detail. National security secrets at risk and that doesn't bother you? smh

I won't go into all the other crap this 'woman' was involved in. Yeah, she's all for equal pay.....unless it's women who work for her. Yeah, she tells us that we should believe women sexual assault accusations and then calls those women accusing her husband as bimbos. Reminds me of the show, To Tell The Truth. Would the real Hillary please stand up!

The problem this go round is that there are only two realistic choices for president. And no, I won't be casting my vote for Hillary, even if she would be the first woman president (why that matters is beyond me).

I am going to have to vote for the lesser of two evils this go round.

07/26/16 10:11 AM

#3022

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

07/26/16 11:31 AM

#3023

Gerd Eysser

Agreed Char. Except, if presented with evidence, i will consider changing mind. I love evidence based medicine and root cause analysis. But I try to rely on facts, not accusations, thus my comment about Bush and the 'war' or the state of federally sponsored healthcare.

07/26/16 11:34 AM

#3024

Ken Hollen

Folks, back in 1971, when I registered to vote, I signed on as a Republican. While my core is Rebulican, I have never voted a straight Republican ticket. My thought was American first, Party second. This go around, I am not voting Republican for so many reasons. I am also happy with voting for Hillary.

My logic is pretty simple. The email thing began as a request of the State Department to see if Hillary had broken the law. Republicans jumped on it to try and gain points. Yes, she could have made better choices but there was no leaking of classified documents. Classified doctuments were not sent to people who should not see them. No laws broken, move on.

Benghazi? I was was stumped on this until I read Gowdy's Congressional Report and it became very clear that there is no way to hold Hillary Clinton responsible for these deaths. Tragic, but the blame would be better placed on the CIA or the Defense Department..

Then you have to look at the big picture. For more decades, people smarter than you (anyone reading this), more powerful than you, more money (tax payers money) than you, and hated the Clintons more than you have spent over $100 million to find anything to hang on them. There is nothing. Nada. So, all the small minded armchair quarterbacks who think the smarter people missed something, don't cry. Don't loot the stores, don't burn the building or shut everything down in violent protest, just move on or get medication.

We could use more "Clinton Presidency", everyone benefited. It would be better than another Republican tenure of the greatest terrorist attack on American soil, decade old wars, and destroying our economy in comparison to The Great Depression.

Yeah, I am happy to vote for Hillary Clinton as a lifelong Republican. Call me for the next reunion.

07/26/16 12:30 PM

#3025

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

Thank you, Ken, for your well reasoned and logical post.

All of my arguments with Gerd have lead me to believe that his underlying reason is that he can't stand the thought of a woman as president. I can see no other reason that a sapient person would vote for Trump. The top reason Trump is running at all is so he can say he's the most powerful man in the world and to inflate his ego to the maximum. If elected, he will just turn the job of running the country over to his flunkies to do what he tells them to - including building that stupid wall.

Paul Mero, a past president of the far right Sutherland Institue, writes in the Salt Lake Tribune often and his offerings usually irk me to no end. So I was pleasantly surprised to read his Op-Ed piece 4 days ago:

Paul Mero: Trump has chased me from the GOP, and you should leave, too

I am out of the Republican Party. With the rise of Donald Trump, the Republican Party has dumped the last vestiges of conservatism. Though party faithful scramble, spit and stutter to make the best of this intellectual disaster, it pains me to see so many otherwise reasonable people defending the indefensible. Mike Pence isn't running for president. Trump's kids aren't running for president. Newt, Christie, Paul Ryan and other more reasonable Republicans aren't the Republican nominee. It should tell us something that Trump's defenders must point to people who support Trump rather than pointing to Trump himself.

So I'm out of the Republican Party. I changed my state voter registration to unaffiliated. It's way easy to do. You just re-register online with your county clerk and, instead of checking the "Republican" affiliation, you check the "unaffiliated" box. All it really means, practically speaking, is that I won't be allowed to vote in state Republican primaries.

There is no lesser of two evils in the choice before conservatives. Both candidates are politically evil. I will not vote for one evil because I think the other is more evil. Bill Buckley famously held that he would vote for the most electable conservative. Neither Hillary Clinton nor Trump is conservative. I think building some gargantuan wall on our southern border is un-American. I think rounding up millions of people and isolating an entire religion are un-American ideas. Trump is not America first; he's cynicism first. He's fear and anger first.

The Republican Party was founded on the conservative sense of justice, lost its way mid-20th century and regained its identity during the Reagan years. With Trump, it is now gone. The national Republican Party is no longer conservative. No longer is there any bulwark standing between sanity and insanity. We're now simply trading between political correctness and fear and anger. We're trading with our worst selves.

Of course, unaffiliating is symbolic. I remain loyal to my friends. I remain loyal to politicians I admire, such as Gov. Gary Herbert, Sen. Mike Lee and a host of state and local officials. As a conservative first, I am loyal to people, not parties. But neither do I want to underestimate the symbolism. The Utah Republican Party is dangerously close to leaving behind many influential conservative voters. I'm unaffiliating on this basis, too.

All of the craziness, the obsession with constitutional minutia, the cultish worshipping of founding fathers, the purity tests and just plain emotional know-nothingness trending inside the state GOP are deeply disturbing to me. When Herbert and even Lee are accused by state GOPers of committing some sort of apostasy because they chose to gather signatures as well as attend the state convention, I'm flabbergasted.

I understand completely why many Republicans won't unaffiliate from the GOP. Elected officials really can't. I get that. But for people who can, I highly encourage you, now that state primaries are over, to unaffiliate. Your intelligence and political integrity will be challenged by Trump. And, here in Utah, the state GOP needs to find itself again, and one way you can help it do that is to vote with your feet and leave its company, even if temporarily.

You won't regret it. Now is the time for reasonable people to take a stand.

Paul Mero is president and CEO of Next Generation Freedom Fund.

07/26/16 05:17 PM

#3026

Candida Bettinson (Jensen)

07/26/16 05:19 PM

#3027

Candida Bettinson (Jensen)

Let's see: "Trumped up, power-hungry guy? or Evil, criminal (yes-definitely, you have your eyes VERY closed if you don't realize this) woman? WOW! You're doing just great, America!

07/26/16 07:55 PM

#3028

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

I'm sorry, I just don't see evil when it comes to Hillary Clinton. I see someone doing things by political expediency just like the men who sourround her. I won't say Orrin Hatch is evil even though I believe he is a slimy hypocrite. And he probably could have been president if he weren't Mormon. But Trump is a sociopath and he is evil. He's made me cringe ever since he bacame a "celebrity".

This is a good read if you will please take the time::

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/if-hillary-clinton-were-a-man/2016/07/25/b1592e36-5292-11e6-b7de-dfe509430c39_story.html?postshare=4721469550024409&tid=ss_fb

07/26/16 08:43 PM

#3029

Sue Kelson (Butcher)

I absolutely loved, loved, loved Candida's analogy!

07/26/16 09:18 PM

#3030

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

Here's another good article along with a very telling video:

http://www.blue-route.org/blog/blog/op-ed-2/why-liberals-buy-lies-about-clinton/

If there's a media bias it's definitely against Clinton.

And here's another one:

http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2016/07/24/you-female-and-running-for-president-you-better-perfect/pc48BL905o0tBwDAfTG4BN/story.html?event=event25

07/27/16 09:04 AM

#3031

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

I thought Bill's speech was beautiful and he couldn't have done a better job.

07/27/16 10:09 AM

#3032

Dale Charlie Salazar

I've been an activist most of my life. We wanted only our rights as Citizens of the US. As I listended to Bill describe his wife and her history of advocacy I became even more convinced that she is a powerful, sincere and willing leader for most of the cuases I hold dear.

I've often cited people like MLK or Cesar Chavez as heros but now I admit I've found new hero.

I hope you all enjoy eight years of Hillary.

Viva La Causa!

07/27/16 10:54 AM

#3033

Ken Hollen

Hey Dale,

I agree with you. I did watch portions of the DNC convention and much of what was aired on Tuesday night including President Clinton's speech. I was impressed with the sense of unity that all the speakers brought to the convention floor. I had previously also watch much of the RNC convention. The striking difference is the DNC convention is the DNC thinks America is great; and they are all about empowering everyone making the process inclusive; that you should have an ideology but you need to find that common ground to move the country forward; cooperation. The impression I get and got from the RNC convention is that America sucks; the only way up is to tear someone down, and "Screw you, I don't need your vote." Yeah, I am voting for America first and Party second.

07/27/16 11:44 AM

#3034

Gerd Eysser

I'll just hit a few bullet points from reading Char, Charlie and Ken:

DNC showed a sense of unity? Tell that to the Sanders' supporters who had their fears realized....the DNC was promoting and rigging the system in Clinton's favor. Unity? Gotcha.

DNC thinks its great that even at a 0% prime, the economy is still suffering. Middle incomes going down. More people unemployed than anytime in the history of our country (unemployed = if you are no longer on unemployment due to time limit, you are now employed....smh). Our friends around the world don't trust us and the enemies don't fear us. If you are fine with that, vote for another 4 years of that. Every poll shows that Americans think we are on the wrong path.

BTW..........do the names Barney Frank and Chris Dodd ring a bell. The financial collapse can be attributed a great deal to these two guys who passed legislation to allow people who couldn't afford to buy a house, to buy a house and then default.

Cooperation = do what we want.

Hillary is a sincere leader? I guess 57% think that statement is laughable. She lies. A sincere liar? Is that possible? From being shot at in Bosnia, to lying to victims of Benghazi to setting up a private server to conduct government business? Calling her husband's accusers a vast right wing conspiracy when it turns out they were right and he lied under oath? Right up there with MLK? Wow, that's a stretch.

Answer requested for this one: If Obamacare is so great, why did they have to lie to the American people to try and gain support, which they never did. Had it not been for bribes to two senators, it wouldn't have passed.

Char, yeah, I don't support Hillary because she is a woman. I would vote for Condi Rice, Nikki Haley, etc. Um. Kind of destroys that nonsensical notion. Nice try though. You get an "A" for credit.

No classified information was sent or received? I guess you missed the FBI director's presser.

And to blame 9.11 on Bush? Laughable. If I remember correctly, the Sudan had offered to give up Osama, but Clinton respectfully declined. Yeah, that was Bush's fault as well. I guess when you consider terrorists the JV team, these things happen.

I did enjoy reading your posts. Made my day and helps me understand how the other side of the political aisle thinks. Very useful.

07/27/16 01:51 PM

#3035

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

I'm getting weary of banging my head against your brick wall, Gerd, and I don't have the time today to do a point-by-point. I just looked up one. See below.

Dredging up old rumors, huh? This is from FactCheck.org:

Clinton Passed on Killing bin Laden?

By Joe Miller
Posted on January 18, 2008

Q: Did Bill Clinton pass up a chance to kill Osama bin Laden?

A: Probably not, and it would not have mattered anyway as there was no evidence at the time that bin Laden had committed any crimes against American citizens.

FULL QUESTION

Was Bill Clinton offered bin Laden on "a silver platter"? Did he refuse? Was there cause at the time?

FULL ANSWER

Let’s start with what everyone agrees on: In April 1996, Osama bin Laden was an official guest of the radical Islamic government of Sudan – a government that had been implicated in the attacks on the World Trade Center in 1993. By 1996, with the international community treating Sudan as a pariah, the Sudanese government attempted to patch its relations with the United States. At a secret meeting in a Rosslyn, Va., hotel, the Sudanese minister of state for defense, Maj. Gen. Elfatih Erwa, met with CIA operatives, where, among other things, theydiscussed Osama bin Laden.

It is here that things get murky. Erwa claims that he offered to hand bin Laden over to the United States. Key American players – President Bill Clinton, then-National Security Adviser Sandy Berger and Director of Counterterrorism Richard Clarke among them – have testified there were no "credible offers" to hand over bin Laden. The 9/11 Commission found "no credible evidence" that Erwa had ever made such an offer. On the other hand, Lawrence Wright, in his Pulitzer Prize-winning "The Looming Tower," flatly states that Sudan did make such an offer. Wright bases his judgment on an interview with Erwa and notes that those who most prominently deny Erwa’s claims were not in fact present for the meeting.

Wright and the 9/11 Commission do agree that the Clinton administration encouraged Sudan to deport bin Laden back to Saudi Arabia and spent 10 weeks trying to convince the Saudi government to accept him. One Clinton security official told The Washington Post that they had "a fantasy" that the Saudi government would quietly execute bin Laden. When the Saudis refused bin Laden’s return, Clinton officials convinced the Sudanese simply to expel him, hoping that the move would at least disrupt bin Laden’s activities.

Much of the controversy stems from claims that President Clinton made in a February 2002 speech and then retracted in his 2004 testimony to the 9/11 Commission. In the 2002 speechClinton seems to admit that the Sudanese government offered to turn over bin Laden:

Clinton: So we tried to be quite aggressive with them [al Qaeda]. We got – well, Mr. bin Laden used to live in Sudan. He was expelled from Saudi Arabia in 1991, then he went to Sudan. And we’d been hearing that the Sudanese wanted America to start dealing with them again. They released him. At the time, 1996, he had committed no crime against America, so I did not bring him here because we had no basis on which to hold him, though we knew he wanted to commit crimes against America. So I pleaded with the Saudis to take him, ’cause they could have. But they thought it was a hot potato and they didn’t and that’s how he wound up in Afghanistan.

Clinton later claimed to have misspoken and stated that there had never been an offer to turn over bin Laden. It is clear, however, that Berger, at least, did consider the possibility of bringing bin Laden to the U.S., but, as he told The Washington Post in 2001, "The FBI did not believe we had enough evidence to indict bin Laden at that time, and therefore opposed bringing him to the United States." According to NewsMax.com, Berger later emphasized in an interview with WABC Radio that, while administration officials had discussed whether or not they had ample evidence to indict bin Laden, that decision "was not pursuant to an offer by the Sudanese."

So on one side, we have Clinton administration officials who say that there were no credible offers on the table, and on the other, we have claims by a Sudanese government that was (and still is) listed as an official state sponsor of terrorism. It’s possible, of course, that both sides are telling the truth: It could be that Erwa did make an offer, but the offer was completely disingenuous. What is clear is that the 9/11 Commission report totally discounts the Sudanese claims. Unless further evidence arises, that has to be the final word.

Ultimately, however, it doesn’t matter. What is not in dispute at all is the fact that, in early 1996, American officials regarded Osama bin Laden as a financier of terrorism and not as a mastermind largely because, at the time, there was no real evidence that bin Laden had harmed American citizens. So even if the Sudanese government really did offer to hand bin Laden over, the U.S. would have had no grounds for detaining him. In fact, the Justice Department did not secure an indictment against bin Laden until 1998 – at which point Clinton did order a cruise missile attack on an al Qaeda camp in an attempt to kill bin Laden.

We have to be careful about engaging in what historians call "Whig history," which is the practice of assuming that historical figures value exactly the same things that we do today. It’s a fancy term for those "why didn’t someone just shoot Hitler in 1930?" questions that one hears in dorm-room bull sessions. The answer, of course, is that no one knew quite how bad Hitler was in 1930. The same is true of bin Laden in 1996.

Correction: We originally answered this question with a flat ‘yes’ early this week, based on the account in "The Looming Tower," but an alert reader pointed out to us the more tangled history laid out in the 9/11 Commission report. We said flatly that Sudan had made such an offer. We have deleted our original answer and are posting this corrected version in its place.

– Joe Miller

Sources

"1996 CIA Memo to Sudanese Official." Washington Post, 3 Oct. 2001.

9/11 Commission. 9/11 Commission Report Notes. 21 Aug. 2004. 17 Jan. 2008.

9/11 Commission. "Chapter 4: Responses to al Qaeda’s Initial Assaults." 21 Aug. 2004. 9/11 Commission Report. 17 Jan. 2008.

NewsMax.com. "Berger Flashback: Hard Spin on Sudan Offer," 19 July 2004.

Clarke, Richard. Testimony before the House and Senate Intelligence Committee. Lindsey Graham, Chair. 11 June 2002.

Clinton, William. Speech to the Long Island Association. Long Island, NY, Feb. 2002.

Gellman, Barton. "U.S. Was Foiled Multiple Times in Efforts To Capture Bin Laden or Have Him Killed." Washington Post, 3 Oct. 2001.

U.S. Grand Jury Indictment Against Usama bin Laden. United States District Court: Southern District of New York. 6 Nov. 1998.

Wright, Lawrence. "The Looming Tower." New York: Vintage Books, 2006.

07/27/16 01:59 PM

#3036

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

Paul, I'm disappointed in you. Libs not welcome?

I'm the one who requested that we didn't discuss politics and religion so long ago. I said it could get ugly. It has and I'm quite sad and frustrated about it.

07/27/16 05:04 PM

#3037

Charlotte Warr (Andersen)

07/28/16 10:48 AM

#3038

Dale Charlie Salazar

I agree Paul, enough. You and Gerd started the fight. I was content to send the BS and pick fun at politics. You and Gerd are dried in the wool and looking to convert, or perhaps to just throw mudd.

I didn't want to fight but I did and I'm angry with myself for stooping to your level.

I try to udnerstand and respect everyone and everything. I endured several Republican Governors in Utah and got to be friends with two of them. I was able to show some respect for thier views and they for mine. Even Orrin Hatch took a personal interest in me and tried for 30 years to convert me to his party, even with my activist attitudes. Seems I can't find that same sort of respect from my classmates.

Perhaps thats why my classmates aren't willing to run for office and sit in their own backyard and criticize.

So fellows, stand your ground and never give in. That was the promise I made in 1970 when I joined the People's Movement and protested for equal rights for Chicanos, Blacks, Women, the Disabled and Gay People. I was one of the first to protest for Gay rights and one of only a few of my Chicano Brothers to join that cause. My position was: anyone who is discriminated against deserves my attention and my fight.

"Respect for the Human" is my cause. A view I took from one of my role models, Thomas Monson.

My candidate, HIllary Clinton, has taken that same fight on a much larger level and changed things for more people in America than anyone else that comes to mind.

So until I hear some respect in this forum I likely won't participate any longer. Petty politics is not fun.

Have a good life.

07/28/16 11:43 AM

#3039

Ken Hollen

Paul, I agree. I was simply responding to others and I stated my position after listen to their diatribe. I will leave. Sorry to have hurt your sensitivities.

07/29/16 03:01 AM

#3040

Jeff Chivers

After reading over the forum diatribe from this past week, I am reminded of a basic frailty of human nature as articulated so well by the poet/philosopher Paul Simon:

". . . I have squandered my resistance
For a pocket full of mumbles such are promises

All lies and jests
Still a man hears
What he wants to hear
And disregards the rest . . ."

"The Boxer" 1969

My only hope is that we will all take the time to study the issues, the individual candidates and party platforms, then vote our conscience casting our ballot in support of those whose views and values most closely match our own. If we don't vote, or waste our vote supporting a candidate with no chance of winning, we (in my opinion) have no right to complain about the outcome.

Just my 2 cents . . .

07/29/16 12:26 PM

#3041

Frank Milner

Amen Amen

Jeff you are the man!!!!!!

Frank

07/29/16 01:14 PM

#3042

Jim Priskos

Is there some point in time when you all will get off of this political crap.

Dale, Char, Gerd et al thank you for turning this into your political sh++ show as opposed to the format we can talk about South High Graduates and our families.

Jim Priskos

07/29/16 06:54 PM

#3043

Dowie VanderWerff

Thanks Jim and Jeff, I agree with both of your comments.

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