If there is really one definitive difference I can find between cons and libs its that cons have a blind loyalty when it comes to party affiliation.

They will defend politicians and policies if they perceive him/her/it as being part of their team.

Libs do not do this and while that may have cost the libs some elections it is foolish of the cons to expect libs to behave like they do with blind partisan loyalty.

I am still mystified by Obama's stance on FISA. The only explanation anyone has offered is that it was politically expedient of him to vote yes - when it quite obviously wasn't.

I doubt he will lose many votes - since he is running against a war-mongering bag of old mis-matched socks - but I am sure he is losing money.

burndtdan:i think he probably skimmed the bill, had a meeting about it once, and didn't spend much more time on it.

I don't buy that either. The guy clearly has no trouble with reading comprehension and, unlike you and me, is used to deciphering legalese.

This became a controversy in plenty of time for him to reread it. There is something else going on here.

Ultimately what this bill does is prevent prosecution of the current administration since Telcos don't have to release their records.

There is something going on behind the scenes here, and it would be sheer conjecture as to what, but something doesn't smell right.

Churchill2004:Oh, wait...

So you're a Kucinich fan too!

Churchill2004:At least he's relatively honest.

I know what you mean.

Realistically though we know that our elected officials are not actually running things. We may not know who actually is in charge or what they look like but it certainly isn't public figures. Once you get to the level of POTUS though I'm sure you find out.

I never had any illusions that Obama (or Kucinich) could change that but I did think it was important to get the Clinton's and Bush's out as figureheads. If shadowy cabals are going to control everything I want to see them work for it. Using the same old puppets over and over makes it too easy for them.

Churchill2004:I don't think there is any one really "in charge". It's just one big mess of bureaucratic inertia.

I think there are several competing interests. The Rothschilds, for example, have never really gone away. There are obviously a few Saudi families pulling some strings and FSM only knows whats going on in China. For a long long time the Catholic church was a major player and was big enough to take on the families who started out as robber barons. Many of those families rose to power right after the Black Death.

There has not been anything since the plague, of a sufficiently cataclysmic nature, to upset the power structure for some time. World War 2 came close and would have done the job if it wasn't for the fact that the US was supplying Europe with grain - which prevented the kind of widespread famine/disease that truly equalizes a society back to the stone age.

I don't imagine that there is one cohesive group running things but there is certainly high level thuggery and massive resources.

It is fairly easy to threaten a compassionate person into capitulation when you have the resources to wipe out an entire populations if it suits your purposes.

Another possibility is that Obama didn't want to look weak. That he didn't want to be seen as capitulating to the raving internet hordes who are his key base. That in spite of his willingness to listen he can't actually put aside his ego.

The reason I don't give this theory too much weight is because of his earlier stated stance. he could easily have retreated back to his earlier position without a loss of face.

There was just no reason to take such a public stand on this issue that makes any sense. Its not like it was a close vote. If he wanted it to pass and keep his base happy all he had to do was vote no and do a little jig in private when it passed.

Katie98_KT:dunno. maybe the congresscritters know something we don't know?

Well - technically - these are Senators and I am sure they know things we don't but that still doesn't explain why Obama voted as he did.

It would have passed without him so the politically expedient thing to do would have been to vote no. This is an election year and his vote is going to cost him with no discernible advantage to himself or the party.

It makes no sense.

burndtdan:i seriously doubt he had the time to read and analyze the full bill between campaign activities.

Oh come on now. You don't think he has anyone on staff who could paraphrase it for him?

His whole campaign has been built on the base of support from the net. His own website is, as you mentioned, exploding over it.

Some people can read very very fast. I'm one of them. If there was some sort of competitive reading sport for speed and comprehension I would be a top contender. I'm hardly unique though. I just don't buy the "he didn't really know what he was signing" angle.

He'd been staying informed on the bill since the beginning. Its not like it just showed up out of the blue.