I will call any troll on their use of words from now on because they use them as a poor substitute for reason and more often than not, get away with it.

“It’s the lies, stupid.”

It’s this:

They pass a new bill to protect consumers, then they exempt 98% of banks from being subject to the new regulations. It’s just theft, fraud, corruption, and the repetition of all of the above.

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com:80/2009/10/word-of-day-exemptions-98-of-banks.html

The problem is we recognize an embarrassingly small range of skills as culturally and politically worthy.

LisaB,

This struck me at the beginning of your post. The knowledge and skills that make a person “worthy” as a politician seem to me to now be exactly the knowledge and skills we should rule out in the politicians we elect.

Do you know how to be two-faced and to talk out of both sides of your mouth? Do you know how to spend gazillion dollars that are not dollars you have earned in any respect? Have you had a lot of book learning and theory learning but no practical experience? Do you live and work in a “community” of only people like you? Are all those people you associate with fat-headed egotists? If you answer “yes” then you are currently a politician and should not be re-elected.

I was only a little girl, but I can remember my father and his friends talking during the 1952 election. They liked Ike because they didn’t like the “egghead” description of Stevenson. My family were mostly those farmers you mentioned earlier. They wanted someone who had practical knowledge.

Later, as I grew up to be somewhat of a bookish egghead myself, I thought a lot about this. At first I was a little hurt that my book knowldege and my education would be held against me if I decided to run for office. But as I got into my studies, I realized that I might be the last person I would vote for if I ran for office. I was interested only in my field.

This is from the Wikipedia article about the ‘52 election:

Incumbent President Harry S. Truman decided not to run, so the Democratic Party instead nominated Governor Adlai Stevenson II of Illinois; Stevenson had gained a reputation in Illinois as an intellectual and eloquent orator.

So this time the Democratic Party rejected a Truman-like straight talker, one who could let the buck stop at her desk for the “intellectual and eloquent [gag me with a spoon] orator” from Illinois. (Too bad the election didn’t turn out like the ‘52 election, IMHO.)

Yes, Obambi is doing nothing to further his great intellectual cause by calling the people he must convince stupid.

Those little mommie’s-basement-living, kool-aid-drinking obots don’t care about the healthcare issue anyway. They just want it to pass without having to work for it because they think it will mean they don’t have to buy insurance, can pay the fine for not buying it, and get their emergency care free. And those “old folks” should HAVE to pay for their care anyway, as far as they are concerned.

We need reform. We need it to be done the right way when it is time to do it the right way. This administration’s and this Congress’s way is not the right way, and this is definitely not the right time.