Hmm, maybe we could make it so that only people who own land vote? Or perhaps people that pass some sort of IQ test, like a written poll exam. Maybe we should exclude people who are of a certain heritage, religion or occupation. I got it, lets make people pay to vote. I mean, we don't want just anyone voting.

These are great ideas, ones that should be tried.

Stupid extrapolation from what he said, made more stupid by repeating it uncritically.

Obvious attempt to smear the guy who pointed out the utterly undemocratic state of affairs in the Imperial Presidency.

Sheesh. Is this the best you can do???

tubby, you're really getting boring. You've become the definition of wasted bandwidth. I hope you at least have the courtesy to hit Ace's tip jar.

So which party stands for democracy?

Good stuff! Holding Republicans to account violates their rights.

You have to love this. Three and a half years ago members of the New Hampshire state Republican party, the Republican National Committee and others entered into a criminal conspiracy to disrupt Democratic get-out-the-vote activities on election day.

That's not just me using that language. Two of conspirators pled guilty. Another, a then-employee of the Republican National Committee, was just convicted on two counts stemming from the scheme. For almost two years now, the state Democratic party has been pursuing a suit against the state party seeking redress and, mainly, to find out what really happened since at the beginning the Justice Department wasn't seriously pursuing the case.

Now, in recently filed court papers, the Republican State Committee’s attorney, Ovide Lamontagne, is claiming that the Dems' suit is "in attempt to use the court system to interfere with the (GOP’s) constitutionally protected election activities." There's a certain amount of sense to this, I suppose, since the Republican party, in its current incarnation, does seem to rely heavily on law-breaking as an electoral tool. Still, I've never heard it alleged that such criminality is constitutionally protected.

Go read it.

Republicans are shredding the Constitution.

I hate you all.

I'll be back in five minutes with more ammunition from other Lefty sites and continue to spam Ace's blog. What do I care? I don't pay for it.

Pfft. And Bush is doing such a good job, nuh? Repeating the same action and expecting a different result is illogical. Casting about for alternative methods seems reasonable. Or actually promoting going back to the tried and true methods of letting career beauracrats do thier job and actually listening to what they have to say instead of stovepiping data into the CEO's office and makin g fit whatever the f you want it to say.

I'm with Turbino, if cherry picking statements out of context the best this blog has to offer, I'm not impressed.

Many people (and not just liberals) often think of the democratic process as a "recipe" that should, in the end, lead to the "proper" result. If the result isn't the "proper" one, they assume the recipe is at fault and wish to tinker, or to simply bypass the process by fiat and impose the "proper" result.

A democratic system simply guarantees a representative government, not necessarily a good or fair government. Democracy is an algorithm in this sense: it takes a multitude of inputs (votes) and gives an averaged output (policy). That's it.

Policy wonks always think voters are too stupid to be trusted with running the country. It's not even a party-affiliation thing -- there's something about government air that rots your brain.

Monty - It's not government air, it's government power that rots the brain.

joeindc44 - The left would say you have the right idea, just the wrong tests - the only people who should vote are (i) subscribers to the nyt, (ii) phds and phds-in-waiting in 'soft' subjects, (iii) government employees and (iv) welfare drones. My guess is that most of our trolls are a combination of (ii) and (iv).

tubby -

Hatred is not good for children and other living things, but it's interesting to see your bigotry and intolerance in action. As I've previously posted, the left has morphed into a version of the John Birch Society - the code words are different, but the hatred and bigotry and intolerance of dissent are exactly the same.

Also, I don't know anyone who is shredding the Constitution, but I've found a group who's been slashing at it - http://www.michellemalkin.com/mt/oct05-tb.cgi/3591

Alright! I got quoted! I take back what I said to Larry the sophisticated urbanite.
But, seriously, a democracy where votes are ignored? Sounds like the EU.

This whole "How DARE Bush ignore the career beauracrats!" meme that dems are spreading is mighty telling. Carville and Co. (or whoever is trying to advise these morons on the Left) better redouble their efforts to get dems to stop letting the mask slip and reveal their totally anti-democratic heart of darkness. I mean, coupled with their Brezhnev Doctrine on judicial precedents (once a liberal decision has been rendered from on high, it must NEVER be questioned or reversed AGAIN), people might get the idea that democrats really don't give two shits what the electorate thinks.

You're all wrong, but close. The type of democracy that the leftists want is one like this. They do want to let people vote, and then ignore it. But the leadership is composed solely of a heirarchy of various grades of clerics (journalists, professors, judges) who have been ordained as the keepers of the secret knowledge (leftism, affirmative action, penumbras and emanations) and trained in the special liturgical language (PC doublespeak). At the top of the heirarchy is a set of Judges who rule for life, and whose word is final, especially over all other government branches and sacred texts.

In a phrase, a theocracy of leftists. Tehran-on-the-Potomac.

To get into the clergy, you have to be ordained in one of the special seminaries (known as J-school, Law-school, and the Arts and Social Sciences). Once ordained, you get to decide what is good for everyone else.

Tubby, anonymous and other various lefties, a simple question for you. Try not to post a link from Talking Points or firedoglake or give someone else's view. I am interested in your thoughts.

The director of the CIA has commented on James Risen and his outing of the Merlin and similar projects. He said that Risen revealed classified projects and tactics and endangered the lives of agents and assets still in the field. My question to you is do you believe Risen should be vigorously investigated the way you supported the Plame investigation? If guilty should he be charged with treason?

Simple question.

joeindc44,
You realize, of course, that you gave a succinct recap of Democratic party policies for the last 175 years, don't you?

"In a phrase, a theocracy of leftists. Tehran-on-the-Potomac." - Mark

Yes, and the current High Priest and Priestess are Bill and Hillary, and their leading worshippers are the msm.

O'brian, I just realized one policy that even Democrats can agree is just plain wrong. Requiring ID's for people who show up to vote. That sort of stuff is fascist.

Current d'Emocrat ideology seems to be the will of the people is absolute. Except when they are in the minority and then of course it is unconstitutional.

From the interview:

And so you had the–the–the principles–Rumsfeld, Cheney and Tenet and Rice and many others–who were meeting constantly, setting policy and really never allowed the people who understand–the experts who understand the region to have much of a say.

Couric: You suggest there was a lot of power grabbing going on.

God, what a bunch of stupid fucks leftists are.

Oh, my God look at those Republicans passing laws and setting policy n' shit! They're POWER GRABBING!!!!

Just wondering. If we have so many experts in the beauracracy how did the middle east ever get to be such a fucked up place?

I seem to remember tubino posted a lot of hot air about how anyone who blows a CIA agent's cover is the worst kind of traitor ever. I'm just absolutely certain tubino continues to stand by his own arguments that he made back then, because he has assured me that he's credible about stuff.

Risen on why the leakers leaked:

And they believed that for whatever reason the Bush administration was skirting the law. Now, that'll be something that we can all debate about whether or not they did skirt the law.

snip

these people came forward for the best reasons. This is, in my opinion, the complete opposite of the Plame case. These are people who came forward in order to tell the American people the truth in--as they saw it. And I think they were truly American patriots.

There you have it. They told the truth AS THEY SAW IT. Doesn't matter if they were right or wrong. Doesn't matter if they leaked classified information. Doesn't matter if they harmed their country.

Their truth is the "right" truth. That makes them patriots to Risen.

I'm beginning to believe that leftism truly is a mental disorder.

I don't think you all have read what Jane Hamster had to say about it today at firedoglake..

but it is compelling. and rich

Al these lowlife reptiles support is a socialist goverment run by the United Nations

but it is compelling. and rich

I always thought that's where Spurwing got his material. Seriously.

The latest leftist to whore their story on the Today Show, Risen, says: "you had the–the–the principles–Rumsfeld, Cheney and Tenet and Rice and many others–who were meeting constantly, setting policy and really never allowed the people who understand–the experts who understand the region to have much of a say."

Then Tubino (not so much a leftist whore as our own neighborhood leftist slut) spews this bullcrap:
"Obvious attempt to smear the guy who pointed out the utterly undemocratic state of affairs in the Imperial Presidency."

Yes Tubs, utterly undemocratic. The nerve of of duly elected presidents appointing their own people, who are then confirmed by the duly elected senate, and then the incredible gall of them all to set policy without consulting the unelected functionaries who just so happen to agree politically with the defeatist pieces of crap that are the American Left!

I wonder. Do lefties actually stop and think about what they spew, or is it completely reflex, like a dog licking up it's own puke?

I posted earlier that I believe the Left has morphed into a version of the John Birch Society.

And look what I just found this morning:

"In an online poll on the John Birch Society Web site, 69% agree with the proposition that President Bush should be impeached "because he lied us into war, has used the NSA to eavesdrop on the conversations of Americans without a court order, and has violated the Constitution in other ways."

http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/

Tubby, all I ask is that you put in Ace's tip jar the same amount that you're paying in dues to the John Birch Society.

"Remember When Liberals Used To Support American Democracy?"

"Remember when Republicans were not traitors to the American Constitution?"

Remember when you took a stiff throbbing cock up your ass for the first time?

I do.

Me too.

Ugh. I'll bet he'll remember the ear-splitting screech of WRONG HOLE longer than I'll remember the rest.

And what is that whole thing with The Nudge in the morning? You know, THE Nudge.

Mr. Risen has been watching too much of the BBC comedy Yes, Minister or its sequel Yes, Prime Minister -- and then missing the point.

"Do not imagine, comrades, that leadership is a pleasure. On the contrary, it is a deep and heavy responsibility. No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?"

George Orwell, "Animal Farm"

Casting about for alternative methods seems reasonable.

This is the reason we have elections.
A few elections don't go your way, and so the whole system has to be scrapped?

A system which has created and maintained the most successful and powerful Republic in the history of Man?

You must be very very frustrated and impatient.
I find this to be a delicious state of affairs.

Missed it by that much!

We know what Risen is getting at--it's been said quite clearly by ex-number 2 State Department bureaucrat chief of staff whatzhiszname: when the Vice President and the Secretary of Defense ignored the bureaucracy it was not a mistake, not an imprudent attempt to govern without institutional resources and memory, but, a "cabal" pure and simple.

Elitist neo-Confucianism plus rabid pseudo-populism--yeah, let's let those guys drive.

"stupid extrapolation" from what risen said, for sure.

c'mon, ace.

Right.

ALL liberal hate America.

What is this, a meeting of the "dumb club"???

That should read "ALL liberals hate America"...looks like you found the right club.

Oh, another "typo" guy.

No response, no discussion of a thoroughly inane headline.

Just what the blog needs.

Keep up the excellent work.

No, he's a make-a-joke guy.

And what is that whole thing with The Nudge in the morning? You know, THE Nudge.

It's all about the morning wood, my dear.