The Young Turks: Cenk Uygur: Dick Cheney The Living Embodiment of Dwight Eisenhower's Greatest Fear

Source:The New Democrat

Darth Vader Dick Cheney on the loose. So no I don't like Dick Cheney or have much respect for our former Vice President. But Cenk Uygur in this video is the perfect example of why I don't use The Young Turks as a credible news source other than to hear what the far-left and the rabid partisan left-wingers in the country are thinking. Dick Cheney didn't say we should pay for our defense and national security at the expense of everything else in that interview. He said that "national defense should be our number one national priority. Not Food Stamps or infrastructure". Which is a huge difference.

Now here is where I agree with Cenk. Dick Cheney is "the living embodiment of what President Dwight Eisenhower's feared" in his Military Industrial Complex speech. That some people especially in the military and people who have worked with the military as Dick Cheney did first as Secretary of Defense and then later as Vice President of the United States. Someone who would put no limits on what we should spend when it comes to national defense. "That there is no such thing as waste in the defense budget. And there aren't many if any limits to what our military can do in the world."

The Young Turks: Cenk Uygur- 'Bill O'Reilly: Downright Sane Next to Laura Ingraham'

Source:The Young Turks- Cenk Uygur: not exactly a spokesperson for sanity.

Source:The New Democrat

“Bill O’Reilly is pegging Laura Ingraham’s opinion of using mass deportation to address illegal immigration as a “draconian” idea that would “destroy the Republican Party.”

From The Young Turks 

I disagree with Cenk Uygur on at least one thing here: Bill O’Reilly is not that much of a radical, or Tea Party radical on immigration either for political reasons, or in general. He is actually in favor of some type of legal status for the 10-15 million undocumented immigrants in this country. Cenk seems to think that is just for political reasons. Fine, but O’Reilly makes a good point here that he shared with Laura Ingraham (who was a roommate of Michele Bachmann and Ann Coulter at the nuthouse) when O’Reilly said that: “if the GOP takes this draconian approach towards illegal immigrants, they’re done.”

The reason why O’Reilly says that because he’s read the polls and sees the changing demographics. Today’s Republican Party is an Anglo-Saxon-Protestant male party that is located primarily in the South and to a certain extent in the Midwest. And rural areas in the Mountain West. With the libertarian-right that doesn’t have much influence over the GOP Leadership when it comes to policy at least as it relates to social issues, immigration and foreign policy.

The GOP is not even a Caucasian party even though Anglo-Saxons are Caucasian, but an Anglo-Saxon party with other non-Protestant Caucasian ethnics tending to be Democrats or Independents. The Christian-Right Tea Party base in the GOP want to keep the GOP the way it is at all costs even if that means everyone else becoming Democrats. So instead of looking for ways to reach out to their non-traditional base of the party and the elected officials in their back pockets look for ways to prevent non-Republicans from voting, or even coming into the country, they pass bogus (to be nice) Voter ID laws and mass-deportations are a couple of examples of that.

If the GOP Leadership tries to do what Laura Ingraham suggested that they do in this video and they do it before the elections this year, we’ll see Democrats win back the House and hold the Senate. Why, because that would bring the Latin-American vote out for Democrats who normally do not vote in large numbers in mid-terms voting for Democrats. It would probably bring African-Americans out to vote as well again another population that doesn’t tend to vote heavy in mid-terms. Bill O’Reilly is smart enough to understand that, Laura Ingraham is off of her medication apparently and doesn’t get it. 

The Young Turks: John Iadarola & Cenk Uygur: 'Is President Obama Right About Marijuana?'

Source:The Young Turks- President Barack H. Obama (Democrat, Illinois) 44th President of the United States.

Source:The New Democrat

"In an interview published Sunday by the New Yorker, President Obama said pot is no more dangerous than alcohol — and that marijuana legalization in Colorado and Washington state is an "important" move towards a more just legal system. "I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life," Obama told reporter David Remnick. "I don't think it is more dangerous than alcohol." In fact, the president went on to admit pot was actually less dangerous "in terms of its impact on the individual consumer." Obama also dived into the vastly disproportionate effect marijuana arrests and incarcerations have on non-white Americans...".* Cenk Uygur and John Iadarola (host of TYT University and Common Room) break it down on The Young Turks." 

From The Young Turks

As Cenk Uygur said, Barack Obama is not a leader, but a politician. And I don't mean that if a negative way, necessarily. I mean we all get the politicians that we elect and reelect, but the idea that even a few of them are ever willing to take a strong stance that could hurt their reelection, you might as well be praying for snow in South Florida in July. Goes way beyond wishful thinking. President Obama like any other good politicians, knows that marijuana prohibition is very unpopular with young voters and that's who he's trying to appeal to here.

Source:The New Yorker- President Barack H. Obama (Democrat, Illinois) 44th President of the United States.

Keep in mind, this is coming from one of the safest politicians at least in modern American political history. Who is well-known for looking at all sides and considering all opinions before making a final decision. Whose run his last race for political office and now has the freedom to basically say what he wants with few diplomatic exceptions. 

What President Obama has done here I believe is not just look at the facts when it comes to marijuana, but acknowledging them as well. For a change, I agree with a lot of what Cenk Uygur said here. But what I would add is that President Obama is a politician before a leader. He’s a leader, just a safe one who generally doesn’t want to be the first person to go out on a limb and take a big stand on a big issue. 

Actually, President Obama he has led on big issues before. The Great Recession when he first took office, health care reform, Wall Street reform, all uses where he’s paid a big price for. But that have worked out and we're the right things to do at the time. But generally, politicians are thinking about their own popularity and careers first, doing the right thing regardless of the politics, second.

The Young Turks: Ana Kasparian & Cenk Uygur- 'HBO's Game Change Preview'

Source:The Young Turks- actress Julianne Moore as Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, in HBO's Game Change.

Source:The Daily Press 

“A trailer of HBO’s ‘Game Change’ is reviewed by Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks. Tell us in the comment section below if you will be watching the movie?” 

From The Young Turks

I saw the movie last night about an hour of it actually. I think Ed Harris did a good job of playing Senator John McCain and Woody Harrelson did a good job of playing Steve Schmidt and Sarah Palin was clearly not up to the job of Vice President, or President right now.

We knew that Sarah Palin was not up from prime-time four years ago, so even the facts that were in the movie were not new. We knew that the McCain Campaign didn’t do a very good job of vetting Sarah Palin. Basically a little known Governor of Alaska, who may feel she lives in a foreign nation, because of how isolated Alaska is with the Continental United States.

I do have a hard time believing that Steve Schmidt and company would only spend 72 hours researching someone they barely knew if at all, because these people are way too smart for that. And that Senator McCain wouldn’t know how little research they did on his vice presidential nominee. The most important decision that a Presidential Nominee will make.

To take this movie at face value, you have to assume that the McCain Campaign was throwing a Hail Mary. Expecting to lose the presidential election to Barack Obama and that they needed someone who the Republican base would like personally, someone who could match Barack Obama when it comes to personality. Someone that would be seen as a political celebrity. If that’s what their goal, then they’ve more than succeeded. Because Sarah Palin is a political celebrity today, thanks to Senator John McCain. She has 100% name ID and is probably the most liked Republican in the party personally.

The McCain Campaign paid a heavy price for picking Sarah Palin politically with Governor Palin not being able to answer questions that a high school or college student could answer. Like what is the Federal Reserve and making statements that a high school or college student know aren’t true. Like the Vice President being the Leader of the Senate.

Julianne Moore is a fine actress, but way too upscale to not sound like an elitist not intentionally to play Sarah Palin. They would’ve been better off using Julia Dryfuss or even Tina Fey to play Palin. Not a very good movie and definitely a movie not a documentary. And probably light on facts as well.  

The Young Turks: Cenk Uygur- 'Did Senator Reid Screw Senate Dems?'

Source:The Young Turks- U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Democrat, Nevada)

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has angered Republicans with a controversial maneuver that weakens the power of the Minority party. Did he do this because he believes Democrats will soon be the Minority party? The Young Turks host Cenk Uygur explains." 

From The Young Turks

I'm about to write a fairly wonky post here designed for political junkies such as myself and able to put the rest of the population to sleep. So you now heard my warning and like they say in the movies, this is not attended to all viewers and viewer discretion is advised. 

This post is about the U.S. Senate (the upper chamber in Congress) which is an actually bicameral legislature. (Newsflash for leftists) And how the Senate operates and how it's supposed to operate and how the Senate Republican Leadership has abused its rules in order to stop the Senate Democratic Leadership from doing anything. And to give this impression of the Senate that it's locked in gridlock. 

Thanks to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and his Senate Republican Conference, as well as I'm sure Senate Democratic obstructionism when they were in the minority, the Senate needs to reform its rules, not to make it more like the U.S. House of Representatives, but to still respect minority rights in the Senate, like they should be respected in the rest of the country. 

The Senate needs to be able to function, brings legislation to the floor, votes on amendments, including alternatives from the minority party, but then debate and vote. Especially on non-controversial legislation, so that the minority party leadership could still block legislation, but that they just can't prevent legislation from being brought to the floor, debated and amended and then after the debates, if the minority leadership has the votes, then they can block legislation, they just can't prevent legislation from being brought to the floor, amended and debated that the Senate would be able to conduct its business. 

What Senate Leader Harry Reid did Thursday night and I actually saw the debate and discussion, because again I'm a political junky, was bring and pass a motion with a 51-48 vote (of course) a party-line vote, that would prevent any Senator from bringing non-germane amendments to the Senate floor. 

With Leader Raid's motion, no Senator can bring an agriculture amendment to a defense bill. And Leader Reid did this because Senate Republicans have brought countless non-germane amendments to legislation that Leader Reid has brought to the floor, knowing that they didn't have the votes to pass them. But just to slow the debate down and make the Senate Democratic Leadership jump through more hoops in order to bring a Senate debate to an end with the cloture rule. Which I'll explain later. (Hopefully you are still awake at that point) 

So what Senate Republicans have done and I'm guessing under the leadership of their Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, is every time Senate Democrats bring legislation to the floor, Senate Republicans bring as many amendments to the legislation that they can in an attempt to drag on the debate as long as they can and they've done this on anything that Senate Democrats bring to the floor. Including on legislation that ultimately passes with bipartisan votes. 

As a result of all of this obstructionism, Leader Reid has decided that he's seen enough, even though I believe it's a little late in the game for this. He's should've done it in the last Congress when he had 59 votes, but this is a good move in attempt to get the Senate moving again. Especially on things like the American Jobs Act, where Senate Democrats are going to make a huge push to pass it. After they amend it and even pay for it with a tax hike on millionaires and above to pay for it. Which of course Senate Republicans would try to block and try to pass this legislation. 

Even if the Republican House doesn't pass a jobs act of their own, but then Senate Democrats will at least be able to say that they are in charge of the Senate and its Congressional Republicans that are in their way. But the Senate needs to go farther to make the Senate more functional. Like eliminating the motion to proceed rule, which takes 60 votes, or at least amend it to 51 votes for the Majority Leader to bring up legislation and just to debate anything. As well as limiting blocking of legislation with the cloture rule to just the final votes on legislation. 

Instead of the U.S. Senate being the "most deliberative legislative body in the world" it's become a debating society (and has given the United Nations a great name) where all they do now is talk about how they are going to talk. Meaning how they are going to debate and they are going to consider. Which is why they need these rule reforms and even go farther like having a real rules committee like in the House , but different, make it bipartisan. Instead of spending time debating how they are going to debate on the Senate floor.