[GCFL-discuss] FW: Is America Really Going to To this?

Fri Oct 31 22:25:57 CDT 2008

HAHA something I actually know.
Juno allows you to set visual however you like. Sadly that doesn't transfer
over to your typing text. IF you edit your text color it should show it to
us... why it's not? No clue :(
Lance

On Thu, Oct 30, 2008 at 7:46 PM, Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies List
<gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> wrote:

>  OK, we're all on the same page then. Thanks for the exercise. Its been
> fun. A friend I forwarded the discussion too also had trouble reading the
> yellow text. On my email softward, I have the background set to brown, and
> my text to green. Highlighting in yellow looks fine with a brown background,
> but if the text comes out in yellow on a different background, it doesn't
> work out very well. When I receive, it is usually with my background, brown.
> But some messages, particularly Jeanene's, come in with a white background.
> Green and blue are OK on that, but not yellow. When text comes in, it is
> usually green, for me, but sometimes it comes in black, particularly from a
> friend in DC, and I have to highlight to read it on a brown background.
> greenBubble comes in blue, on a brown background, but occasionally in green.
>
> Siarlys
>
> P.S. This is Lance's area of expertise. He could tell us all what is really
> going on.
>
> On Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:11:22 -0400 "Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies
> List" <gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> writes:
>
> I felt it was worth sharing, if only to sit back and see how siarlys
> disected it, as i knew he would.
> As to the yellow text, i can't read it at all in yellow, so i convert the
> whole email into plain text, and then i can read it.
>
>  greenBubble
>
>  ------------------------------
> *Subject:* Re: [GCFL-discuss] FW: Is America Really Going to To this?
>
>  Au contraire, I think you SHOULD read these two articles in full, AND I
> think you should read one specific video paid for by Obama in full, and then
> you should analyze them, cross-check them, to your heart's content. I find
> these articles easy to discredit, but if you find them credible, so be it.
> We each have one vote. greenBubble thought this article was worth sharing. I
> thought it was worth dissecting. What I did note about both articles is
> that, LIKE materials that issue from any candidate's campaign, they BEGIN
> with a point of view they want to persuade the reader to, rather than
> beginning with a set of facts they wish to report.
>
> Siarlys
>
> Incidentally, a Lutheran pastor I forwarded the discussion to thought it
> was neat to put the citations in yellow text, because they were obviously
> yellow journalism.
>
> On Tue, 28 Oct 2008 11:21:34 -0700 "Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies
> List" <gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> writes:
>
> Wait, so 2 independent articles attacking Obama are being discredited
> because you find they have conservative tendencies. And then Claim their all
> lies (yet neither companies have anything to do with each other so 2 lies
> saying the same thing is in need of mathematical explanation).
>
> BUT believe I should watch videos PAID for by Obama and believe it to be
> all fact?
>
> Come on sir, I find this very hard to swallow.
>
> ~Lance
> On Mon, Oct 27, 2008 at 9:53 PM, Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies List
> <gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> wrote:
>
>>  Dear greenBubble and everyone,
>>
>> As you might expect, I can't find any merit in this article at all.
>>
>> The important reason is, why not?
>>
>> I note in passing that *The Spectator* and *World* magazine are somewhat
>> MORE partisan in their peculiar caterwauling than either of the candidate's
>> campaign organizations are. They have a right to express their opinion, but
>> there is nothing factually reliable there.
>>
>> I have a long term view of politics. Barack Obama became a plausible
>> candidate for president because he broke the decripit stereotypes that
>> American politics had been locked into. The artificial monstrosities of
>> "blue states" and "red states," the tired and almost meaningless terms
>> "liberal" and "conservative," the infatuation with cultural polarization
>> that accurately describes very few Americans. We are each much more complex
>> than either the media or the professional politicos give us credit for, and
>> we exist in much more complex webs of inter-relation to each other.
>>
>> Obama understands those complex interconnections that make us Americans,
>> and those voters who have supported him, and seem ready to do so again,
>> sense that, respond to it, look forward to leadership of the nature he
>> offers.
>>
>> Also, he has a capacity to think about what he is doing, or saying, and to
>> then answer decisively, as opposed to acting without thinking (the Bush
>> style) or dithering without saying or doing anything (the style which cost
>> John Kerry the 2004 election). He doesn't run away or go into loud denial
>> either -- for instance, he waded right into the Jeremiah Wright controversy,
>> and refused to cater to any loud demands from either admirers or critics of
>> Wright.
>>
>> The Rush Limbaughs and Ann Coulters of the world (and add Melanie Phillips
>> to the list) feel threatened by Obama, because their careers and influence,
>> such as it is, are built in the very hatreds and polarizations which Obama
>> is capably demolishing. So, rather than criticize him for what he is, they
>> are trying to demonize him with the same tired old characterizations. It is
>> not working, because these characterizations do not fit him, and a majority
>> of voters recognize that.
>>
>> This article you just posted is exactly the kind of desperate hysteria I
>> am referring to.
>>
>> By contrast, the *Chicago Tribune*, the most conservative Republican
>> major daily in the country, has probably endorsed a Democrat for the first
>> time in its history in choosing Barack Obama. The Tribune has been the
>> source of the most critical factual data about Obama's less than savory
>> associations with Chicago politics. The Tribune observes, however, that
>> having had the opportunity to observe his career close-up for many years,
>> before he became a national figure, and since, it is satisfied he is the
>> most qualified candidate this year. By all accounts from Illinois, people in
>> the state like a combination of vision with pragmatic political strategy,
>> and don't hold some compromises with whoever is in power against Obama.
>>
>> I believe the authors will be surprised at how Obama does in office. I
>> believe that his administration will not only be the end of
>> pseudo-"conservative" hysteria, it will be the end of liberalism as we know
>> it. Nancy Pelosi will just have to go along for the ride, because she
>> doesn't have any other options.
>>
>> Now, as to the specific matter of Israel, I am a little disappointed that
>> Obama has catered so much to the mantra required of American politicians to
>> loudly proclaim their commitment to Israel. I don't believe that the foreign
>> policy of the United States of America should be held hostage to any nation,
>> including Israel. It speaks poorly of our democracy when any ethnic voting
>> bloc can exercise a veto for its pet nation. (By the same token, I am not
>> offended that Jonathan Pollard felt impelled to spy on the U.S. for Israel
>> -- they are, after all, two distinct sovereign nations, and their interests
>> do not always perfectly coincide). I feel the same way about urban
>> concentrations of Slovaks, Serbs and Croats sabotaging George F.  Kennan's
>> diplomatic work with President Tito of Yugoslavia during circa 1960. This is
>> America, not a surrogate for any foreign power. I also feel the same about
>> President Reagan appointing an ambassador to the Vatican, which is not a
>> state except in its own pretensions.
>>
>> Israel does have a right to exist. Some of its policies are, in the long
>> run, going to jeopardize its own existence, and perhaps our nation should
>> firmly make that clear and refuse to give any Israeli government carte
>> blanche. Likewise, we should stop catering to brutal dictatorships in
>> Arabic-speaking nations, which simply turn the oppressed population hostile
>> to us, when we should be a beacon of hope to them. (Hosni Mubarak in Egypt
>> comes to mind, and our schizophrenic relationship to the Wahabi theocracy in
>> Saudi Arabia).
>>
>> But I expect President Obama will for the most part leave US policy toward
>> Israel about as it is. That is the safe thing to do, politically,
>> particularly during a president's first term. He may be able to help Israel
>> by reaching out more credibly to its neighbors.
>>
>> There are, in fact, millions of Arab-Americans, who have endured the
>> absurdity of being cast as second class citizens as Obama was accused of
>> being Muslim or Arab. As Colin Powell finally had the courage to point out,
>> "So what if he is?" He's not, but neither Muslim faith nor Arab descent
>> disqualifies any native-born American citizen from being president. A large
>> portion of Arab-Americans are fifth generation. Labor unions in 1900 had to
>> translate leaflets into Arabic, among a dozen other languages, because so
>> many Syrian and Lebanese immigrants were in the work force. Generally, these
>> Americans have not held candidates hostage by demanding that they denounce
>> Israel, or pledge military aid to whatever country their grandparents or
>> great great grandparents emigrated from.
>>
>> Is America really going to do this? I believe we are, and thank G-d for
>> it.
>>
>> Siarlys
>>
>
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