If you seriously doubt that Annenberg Political is in the tank, go ahead and compile aggregate data on which side supposedly gets more “facts” wrong than the other. It won’t be close to an even split, and not because the Obama campaign is one iota more factually accurate. I’d love to see a “Fact Check” of Joe Biden’s Constitution, for example. You know, the version where Article I says the Vice President is an executive and has absolutely, positively nothing to do with the U.S. Senate. But they didn’t fact-check that, so that fact just doesn’t exist.

La-de-frickin’ da.

I’m sorry you’re not impressed, but I would think that a willingness to criticize someone — often harshly, and repeatedly — would tend to undermine the argument that you’re “in the tank” for that somebody. I expect the dumbass two-bit hacks to buy into that “if you’re not biased for me, you must be biased against me” sort of bullshit, but I generally expect better from you.

Sorry, I wasn’t aware that “the NRA’s attacks aren’t entirely accurate” is the same thing as “Barack Obama is the most pro-gun presidential candidate, like, ever.”

Sorry, I wasn’t aware that accusing someone of “lying to win” was the same thing as saying that their ads aren’t 100% accurate – even when they are.

You call it a “hatchet job” because they don’t parse things the same way you parse them,

No, I call it a “hatchet job” because that’s precisely what it is. Calling truthful statements “false” and accusing the other guy of “lying” is not parsing things differently. Ignoring one side’s painstaking research and taking the other side’s word is not “fact-checking,” it’s campaigning. Falsely claiming that SB 2165 is about local registration laws rather than bans is not “parsing.” Neither is falsely claiming that Obama supported anything approaching the Heller decision until after it had been rendered. Etc. etc.

and you say Fact Check is “in the tank” for Obama, yet if the spam filter weren’t so picky here I’d post a dozen links where Fact Check takes Obama to task.

La-de-frickin’ da.

I had forgotten about the AWB thing, but that’s never really been a hot-button issue for me (blasphemy, I know!). All other things being equal, I’d rather not see it reinstated, but to my mind it was so ineffective and riddled with loopholes that it really do much, anyway. I don’t claim to be an AWB expert by any stretch, but it seemed to me to fall more under the category of government waste than much in the way of rights infringement.

memomachine:

OK, I’ll put you down for “C” then. But, of course, your objection misses the point. SM and his ilk don’t refrain from complaining about socialism where it already exists, and the resource ownership arrangement he’s discussing is clearly socialistic. Just because that’s the way it is now doesn’t mean that it’s not socialistic.

Karrde:

IANAL (or even close), so I don’t know what happens with mineral rights if they aren’t explicitly discussed in the land purchase contract. My understanding (which could certainly be wrong) is that the mineral rights belong to the landowner unless the land is specifically sold without them, although it could be the opposite (i.e., you don’t own the mineral rights unless the purchase agreement specifically says that you do), and it could vary by state.

P.S. That comic’s one of my favorites, especially the hover text.

well, you’ve got alright taste in webcomics.

(And remember, someone is wrong on the internet…)

As an aside question:
I don’t know if you or SM are right about who owns oil reserves. Have either of you ever heard about houses (or other property) where the sale is everything but the mineral rights on the land?

I don’t know whether petroleum is covered under mineral rights, but I’ve heard stories of old mining towns where some company owns mineral rights for the land under half of the privately-owned houses in town.

If you’re talking about petroleum on land owned by the Federal Government inside the boundaries of the State of Alaska, the legality of who owns what (and who can put a duty fee on what) gets kind of murky.

@ tgirsch

“How about E, none of the above? I would have thought you private property types would think that whoever owns the land owns what’s underneath it. But apparently not when that position is politically inconvenient.”

Don’t be a bigger idiot than your mother made you.

The federal government holds that it, and it -alone-, is the ultimate owner of all land in the USA. It’s called -sovereignty- or haven’t you ever heard of it.

Fact is SM is entirely correct on his A-D.

Frankly all you offer are glib responses that lack thought.

Uh, have you actually read the position documents that your candidate has on his website?

http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/issues/UrbanFactSheet.pdf isn’t exactly hard to find and contains:

“He also supports making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent, as such weapons belong on
foreign battlefields and not on our streets.”

Maybe you should have educated yourself about his platform before voting for him, eh?

How about E, none of the above? I would have thought you private property types would think that whoever owns the land owns what’s underneath it. But apparently not when that position is politically inconvenient.

Xrlq:

Sorry, I wasn’t aware that “the NRA’s attacks aren’t entirely accurate” is the same thing as “Barack Obama is the most pro-gun presidential candidate, like, ever.” You call it a “hatchet job” because they don’t parse things the same way you parse them, and you say Fact Check is “in the tank” for Obama, yet if the spam filter weren’t so picky here I’d post a dozen links where Fact Check takes Obama to task.

Yes, some of the oil, timber, and other resources come from federal land, which is owned by all of us citizens.

The Federal Government gets their cut, but until they balance the federal budget, retire the national debt, and stop spending every last penny that falls into their hands, don’t expect a check.

-

My simple question to you is: “who owns those oil reserves?” I’ll make it multiple choice.

A. The residents of Alaska own those reserves.

B. The Great state of Alaska owns the reserves, Also, they own whatever percent of Alaskan citizens’ paychecks that they can get away with stealing. Their herd of citizens are a resource to be sheared. Occasionally they will need to be provided with bread and circuses to be kept happy.

C. The Federal government owns those reserves because they own the states. Those states joined the union, and the union can never be dissolved without the consent and agreement of the rest of the union.

D. Barack “hippie chick” Obama will own those reserves once he becomes anointed as President. From his temple mount at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue he will decree that the wealth will be spread around unevenly to benefit everyone.

I’m not aware that I’ve ever made ANY particular claims about Obama’s stances on guns.

SM:

I don’t think the difference is so vast as you claim. In both cases, the land is being exploited; the primary difference is by whom and who gets the money. And for what it’s worth, unless not a drop of Alaskan oil comes from Federal land, I’m wondering where MY money is.

And I understand the whole bit about mineral rights, but that doesn’t make it any less socialistic a concept.

vs.

Stealing crops produced by private individuals on private property and selling them so you can give coupons to women, for the benefit of infants and children and the unborn because they are too stupid to buy healthy food with with their food stamps and need Yet Another Government Program with Yet Another set of Government Regulations (written by Yet Another set of Government Employees) on which foods are appropriately to be purchased with “free” money from the governments.

Then again there are plenty of places in Virginia, West Virginia and Pennsylvania that have their own natural gas wells on site, so mineral rights reserved by the state is not universal.

Yup, Brady II would have pretty much destroyed gun rights/ gun ownership in this country. Quite frankly I find Tgirsch’s attempts to say Obama’s not all that bad on guns ridiculous. He IS as bad as the NRA is portraying him to be, and he’s far worse than Clinton.

You can walk into ANY hospital in America, and it is illegal for them to refuse treatment, even if you cannot pay.

Remember this is the same government that has fucked up the social security system and public education system so bad that they are almost bankrupt… and the same government that failed at running a whorehouse.

Your latest comment reveals a profound ignorance of the health plans the candidates are proposing. Perhaps you should go learn about them before you embarrass yourself further. Obama’s plan would simply expand who’s covered under an existing government health insurance program. Private health insurance plans, and employer-sponsored health insurance plans, would continue to exist as they do today. The doctors’ offices and hospitals remain in the private sector, as well, so there’s no worry of “the government” cutting a doctor’s pay. The only people who run the risk of making less money if Obama’s plan passes is are insurance companies and their shareholders, not doctors. (And I doubt that, too; in all likelihood, it would be a boon to the insurance companies.)

Standard Mischief:
I’m open to suggestions on how to more fairly distribute Alaska’s citizens wealth to it’s citizens

In other words, how to “spread the wealth around.” Obama ’08! Seriously, though, you’re making a collectivist argument concerning the ownership of Alaska’s natural resources. Think about that. Suppose Illinois declared that all the corn and wheat produced by the state, and so a portion of the proceeds from the sale of corn and wheat should be distributed to all of Illinois’ citizens — in a scenario like that, you’d be calling people Comrade!

OK, wait. The natural resources are owned equally by all of the people of Alaska, right? And this isn’t socialism exactly, uhh, how? (”It’s everybody’s oil, maaaaaan. Drum line forms over there, Kumbaya starts in 5 minutes…”)

I’m open to suggestions on how to more fairly distribute Alaska’s citizens wealth to it’s citizens, but it’s not exactly some kind of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need, when we spread other people’s wealth around we can buy a lot of votes”

OK, wait. The natural resources are owned equally by all of the people of Alaska, right? And this isn’t socialism exactly, uhh, how? (”It’s everybody’s oil, maaaaaan. Drum line forms over there, Kumbaya starts in 5 minutes…”)

I’m open to suggestions on how to more fairly distribute Alaska’s citizens wealth to it’s citizens, but it’s not exactly some kind of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need, when we spread other people’s wealth around we can buy a lot of votes”

sure a doctor might stop making $140,000 a year and drop to $80,000… but the cost of 12+ years of medical school wont go down any… so you will get less doctors, and crappier medical care.

but at least the doctor still gets paid…

if socialized medicine works so well then why did Hawaii get rid of it last week?

I’m a pragmatist. I’ll support whatever plan provides the best coverage to the most people, and I don’t particularly care how it gets done. If you can find a market-based solution to providing health care for virtually everyone who needs it, I’m all for it.

Obama already considers health care a right

I’m surprised that’s as controversial as it turns out to be, but whatever. I don’t think that health care should be a privilege of wealth, any more than I think education should be a privilege of wealth. Call me a commie, I guess.

that means that Obama believes that the fruits of someone’s labor (a doctor) should belong to the people as a right

Unless you think every doctor that ever treated you somehow owns you (or part of you), the fruits of a doctor’s labor are his pay, and in every health plan I’ve seen, including Obama’s, the doctor still gets paid.

Never said I didn’t. I found the statement interesting, but hadn’t really decided one way or the other. I guess I didn’t realize that we implicitly endorse everything we link to. By that standard, I’m guessing Xrlq would be pretty upset at some of the stuff he’s “endorsed.”

Alaska’s mineral wealth is owned by it’s citizens.

OK, wait. The natural resources are owned equally by all of the people of Alaska, right? And this isn’t socialism exactly, uhh, how? (“It’s everybody’s oil, maaaaaan. Drum line forms over there, Kumbaya starts in 5 minutes…”)

Kinda turns the idea of private property rights on its head, doesn’t it?

As an aside here’s something amusing.

A number of House Democrats are now talking about eliminating the 401(k) retirement plan. Now they want to roll all 401(k) plans into a new plan under the SSA, where the Democrats can pillage the money to their hearts content, and in the future implement a 5% mandatory payroll “deduction”, which is not a tax *laugh*, that will pay a 3% return on your “investment”.

I think it’s clear the Democrats have totally lost their minds.

‘Factcheck’ writers have proven they have a hard-on against the NRA now and are just pumping out crap to try and discredit them. Tgirsch’s linked article is more of an opinion piece than any sort of objective evidence.

The Annenberg foundaHtion is run by the Annenberg family including Leonore Anneberg who endorsed John McCain. Her husband, the late Walter Annenberg, was an Ambassador under Reagan and Nixon. Sounds pretty liberal to me.

Really vote fraud is a myth eh?

13 students temp in Ohio for Obama. All 13 fraudulently register to vote, 3 or 4 vote early, none are legal voters.

All 13 just cut a deal to avoid prosecution for voter registration fraud and *vote fraud*.

As for FactCheck.org. IMO you’d have to be a jackhole to trust FactCheck.org. Like any other website, particularly one paid for by a liberal foundation, it has it’s own agenda.

Obama already considers health care a right… how much further can he go?

By the way, that means that Obama believes that the fruits of someone’s labor (a doctor) should belong to the people as a right… that is the very definition of socialism.

A Feingold Democrat, a fact I’ve never tried to conceal. If you want to engage on the other issues, and why I stand where I stand on them, I’d be happy to.

Chris:

I’ve already criticized Obama once in this thread, and will do so for any issues where I disagree with him. His health care plan is crap (though not as crappy as McCain’s), and I’ve got no use for Obama’s support of ethanol subsidies, either. I don’t think Obama’s a perfect candidate by any stretch of the imagination. He’s just closer to my position than McCain is on the issues I care about most. You’ll almost certainly disagree with me on those, but that’s the beautiful thing about America — we’re entitled to peaceably disagree.

( i.e. Vinny accuses Sarah Palin of socialism.)

Vinny does, but you don’t, right tgirsch? Plausible deniability and all that.

Let me explain the concept of a commonwealth. Alaska’s mineral wealth is owned by it’s citizens. The citizens elect a government to manage the shared mineral resources. That government lets the oil companies extract and utilize that wealth for a fee. Those fees exceed the expenses of the government. (OK, here’s the really tricky part, so I’ll start a new paragraph)

That cash has always been owned by the people, therefore the wealth is distributed, not re-distributed).

And here’s a paragraph to explain what’s not happening. It’s not being used to line the pockets of the politicians. It’s not being used to replace the primary wage earner role in some form of family wrecking welfare state. It’s not being used to dream up new government programs that overlap already existing government spending (i.e. WIC). It’s not being use to create patronage jobs in order to buy votes. Oh, and it’s not being used to fund stem cell research (nothing against stem cell research by itself, I’ll be dammed though if I can understand why taxpayers should pay for research where there’s zero chance they will receive a dime of royalties if there’s ever any effective treatments marketed)

The mineral royalties are put into the Alaskan Permanent Fund where every year a portion of the profits are distributed to their rightfully owners.

Course its fair game when its a Democrat making the associations about opponents, but dare not criticize the holy obamamessiah.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJn5b8_weUY

Habeas corpus is a basic human right, in my estimation, not a uniquely American one. Forgive me if I expect our country to live up to its own (stated) principles. And lest you forget, at least some of the people detained at Gitmo (and denied habeas) were US citizens.

As to the searches, my link got eaten by the spam filter, but let’s see if it lets it through this way:

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/Story?id=5987804&page=1

Supporting the anti-gun guy who is also anti-free speech, anti-capitalist, anti-defense, anti-drilling, hell, anti all too many things, doesn’t strike me as a vote for any sort of freedom.

What type of voter are you? I’m not saying I’m voting for McCain myself, I’ll decide when it’s time to push the button. I know he’s Socialist Lite, but for gods sake, Socialist Lite is better the Socialist the Energy Drink.

that has worked really well so far, if you look around, we are about to have some 19 Chinese terrorists released into the US because of it…

and FISA… who has been illegally searched and seized??? give me names and cases?

Thing is though, I still need to eat. I still need to drive my car to work. I still need to hope my college loans don’t crap out on me. I hope that if I join the armed forces to pay for medical school, I hope the president knows what the hell he/she is doing when war comes around. I don’t want to be paying for gas forever and potentially hurting the environment, heck I’m frikin pre-ordering the Volt when they allow me to. So to me, it’s more than just the guns, it’s also about other issues. I’m leaning more towards Obama than McCain – but then think about this: The NRA did fine under Clinton, and at the time he was the most anti-gun of them so far, what, are you NRA guys suddenly not confident right now or something?

Who said anything about Bush? Certainly not me.

As to habeas corpus, McCain himself is on the record in opposition to habeas corpus for detainees, voted for a bill giving President Bush jurisdiction to strip habeas corpus (after a federal court ruled that he didn’t have it), and even filibustered a bill that would have restored habeas corpus rights.

On unreasonable search and seizure, what cave have you been living in? This is just one example of the kind of thing that FISA abomination, supported by both presidential candidates, has brought us. Sadly, neither party has the balls to fix that and restore the constitution.

[Original comment had links, but spam filter ate it.]

Who said anything about Bush? Certainly not me.

As to habeas corpus, McCain himself is on the record in opposition to habeas corpus for detainees, and even filibustered a bill that would have restored habeas corpus rights.

On unreasonable search and seizure, what cave have you been living in? This is just one example of the kind of thing that FISA abomination, supported by both presidential candidates, has brought us. Sadly, neither party has the balls to fix that and restore the constitution.

In his speeches and the Democratic Platform.

CCW bans, AW Bans, opening up Tiarht against the wishes of the FBI, FOP, and BATFE.

Really man, are you that blinded by the Lightbringer?

which candidate has suspended habeas corpus?

and unreasonable search and seizure? by what are you referring to? and who has been searched and seized that you can prove?

Stated where?

but a candidate willing to trample on one right will be willing to trample on many others

Like habeas corpus, for example? Or the right to freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures? (Note that both candidates have already trampled on that latter right…)

drstrangegun:

Hey, I’ve ridden along with you folks for quite some time now. It’s my people’s turn to drive for a while.

Huck:

Thanks for the sort-of vote of confidence.

gattsuru:
You’re not pro-gun just because you have a permit.

I never claimed to be particularly pro-gun, either. Unlike apparently just about everyone here, I don’t view pro-gun and anti-gun as black-and-white absolutes, with no shades of grey. Truth to tell, I’m generally on the side of gun rights (I don’t support gun bans; I think most gun control laws are ineffective and therefore unnecessary; I think that gun control is an attempt to treat a symptom rather than a disease, etc.), and I enjoy shooting for recreation (I don’t hunt, and I almost never carry for personal defense). But in all honesty the gun issue is just not a hot-button issue for me one way or the other.

What I will say is that I detest the attitude, common on gun blogs in particular, that “not as vehemently pro-gun as I am” somehow is equivalent to “anti-gun.” And for that reason, I think the label “gun nut” is in many ways an earned one.

but on the gun issue, it just makes you an asshole.

I would hope you’re talking about Schumer and not me. We’ve had our differences before, but you’ve never resorted to calling me an asshole…

You mean like Chris Buckley? Or the long stream of Republicans who have been announcing their support of Obama over the last week or two.

You’re not anti-gun, you just don’t think voting to keep a law that punished a man for defending his own life in his own home is perfectly hunky dory. Even with the man voting says it was to prevent chinks from appearing in the armor of a complete ban on guns.

You’re not pro-gun just because you have a permit. I hate to break it to you, but last I checked, so did/does Charles Schumer. I don’t want to badmouth elitists — some people actually are good enough on a particular topic to justify elitism — but on the gun issue, it just makes you an asshole.

Would you want this site to be like the liberal blogsites that only allow posts that agree with their spiel? Uncle, and I hope most of us who post here, is/are better than that.

Comrade Obama has already show a willingness to do that with his attempts to prevent TV stations from airing the NRA ads about his anti second ammendment rights record.

He obviously has no problem with trampling on the first two ammendments. What makes anyone think he has any qualms about trampling on the rest of them?

It looks like you and yours are going to get exactly what you’ve asked for in government, and more.

I sure hope you’re ready for it. Too bad you had to bring the rest of us along though…

gun rights isn’t the only issue when considering a candidate. Some may choose to be a “single-issue” voter and that’s their right. On the other hand, many will use that as one factor in a sea of many factors when deciding whom to support.

so as a proud CCW holder, that makes you a hypocrite

I just voted for whoever the NRA told me to!

I don’t know either.

There is no excuse to break the law. If we don’t enforce our important laws on the people, they won’t be safe, even if it kills them in order to follow the law.
……

This is perfectly logical right?

One minor correction: I’m not an “anti-gunner.” I’ve never expressed support for a firearm ban of any sort, and am a proud CCW permit holder, thank you very much. I’m not as rabidly pro-gun as many here, but that doesn’t make me anti-gun.

I’m more than willing to own “left wing,” however.

By the way, voted for Palin the other day. Felt good to be an ignorant racist bigot that wants to take away women’s rights and give guns to insane criminals from Enron.

Two words “Judiciary Committee”.

Charges were initially filed against him but later dropped after public outcry. Not a word about that. Wonder why? Demar was fined $750 and that’s not a ‘petty’ amount. Unless of course you also think $500 firearms are ‘disposable’.

So much for ‘factchecking’ on FactCheck.

come on, throw bullshit in someone else’s face… you arent gonna get any to stick here…

and they are somehow disagreeing with the NRA… boy there is a shocker!!!