Harrry Reid, the new McCarthy

[Merc14]

There is, perhaps, no more loathsome individual in politics than Harry Reid:

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/376401/harry-reid-mccarthy-our-time-victor-davis-hanson

April 24, 2014 12:00 AM

Harry Reid: A McCarthy for Our Time

The senator is a throwback to a type of American politics better left forgotten.

By Victor Davis Hanson

We should ask Senate majority leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) the same question once posed to Senator Joseph McCarthy by U.S. Army head-counsel Robert N. Welch: “Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?”

Reid is back in the news for denigrating the peaceful supporters of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, a popular critic of the Bureau of Land Management policy, as “domestic terrorists.”

McCarthy in the 1950s became infamous for smearing his opponents with lurid allegations that he could not prove, while questioning their patriotism. Reid has brought back to the Senate that exact same McCarthy style of six decades ago — and trumped it.

During the 2012 presidential campaign, Reid slandered candidate Mitt Romney with the unsubstantiated and later-refuted charge that Romney was a tax cheat. “The word’s out that he [Romney] hasn’t paid any taxes for ten years,” Reid said.

Later, when asked for proof, Reid offered a pathetic rejoinder: “I have had a number of people tell me that.” One wonders how many names were on Reid’s McCarthyite “tell” list — were there, as McCarthy used to bluster, 205 names, or perhaps just 57?

When asked again to document the slur, Reid echoed McCarthy perfectly: “The burden should be on him. He’s the one I’ve alleged has not paid any taxes.”

Article continues http://www.nationalreview.com/article/376401/harry-reid-mccarthy-our-time-victor-davis-hanson

[+and-then]

I think the people of Nevada have a lot of 'splainin' to do.

[Beany]

Hanson is a fellow on the conservative think tank, the Hoover Institution. The institution fellows also came up with the idea of supply-side economics, which has pretty much proven itself to be a failure. Given the conservativism of both Hanson & the institution, it would be odd if a different conclusion had been reached. Biased sources are usually not the best sources of information, because that information will be slanted towards a particular political ideology. Go onto the Hoover Institution website and you'll see that their politics are pretty clear. Not making a judgment on that, just that it, and anyone working for them has a bias.

Edited April 27, 2014 by Beany

[Merc14]

Hanson is a fellow on the conservative think tank, the Hoover Institution. The institution fellows also came up with the idea of supply-side economics, which has pretty much proven itself to be a failure. Given the conservativism of both Hanson & the institution, it would be odd if a different conclusion had been reached. Biased sources are usually not the best sources of information, because that information will be slanted towards a particular political ideology. Go onto the Hoover Institution website and you'll see that their politics are pretty clear. Not making a judgment on that, just that it, and anyone working for them has a bias.

The source, biased or not, doesn't change what Harry is saying about citizens of the US. He is calling peaceful protestors terrorists which is a naked attempt to use all the force of government against them. This is a leader of the same party that said "God bless them!" (Pelosi) about the violent and destructive Occupy Wall Street crowd.

As far as supply side economics, please show me the failure point? When it was tried the economy grew, when Keynesian economics are tried the economy blows up just as it is now with $17T in debt and a very stagnant, p*** poor economy and employment picture. Real unemployment is still above 12% in this country and has been for years. Now that is failure.

Edited April 27, 2014 by Merc14

[Merc14]

http://nypost.com/2014/04/27/the-media-is-turning-on-president-obama/

[Beany]

http://nypost.com/20...resident-obama/

The New York Post is an affiliate of Fox News, as is Goodwin. However you feel about Obama or any other politician, none of those are non-biased sources. All you need to do is go out to the Post website, it's obvious they have an agenda. You might agree with it, fine, but it is not a non-biased news source. BTW, McCarthy, who was a Republican and whose aide was Richard Nixon, held House hearings to determine whether a particular individual was a communist, and twisted the arms of a lot of people to get testimony that may or may not have been truthful. People who used their 1st amendment rights often saw the inside of a jail, including the writer Dash Hammett. I see from cruising the internet that there is a concerted attempt by conservatives to rehabilitate Joe, that maybe he wasn't such a bad guy after all. I posted a link to the Wiki article about McCarthy, HUAC, and the Hollywood black list.

HUAC and McCarthy's red hunt was an organized, systematic operation that went on for at least a couple of year, at least. Some people in the entertainment industry were permanently black listed and lost their ability to support themselves. So I don't see how Obama calling Bundy a domestic terrorist can even be equated with McCarthyism. And Bundy is not in jail, is her? And apparently Goodwin hasn't get gotten the news that McCarthy is in the process of being rehabilitated.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism

Edited April 28, 2014 by Beany

[Yamato]

I've been looking for an unbiased source all my life. It's not ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, Fox News or Bloomberg. It's not Alex Jones, The Young Turks, or Mox News. It's not BBC, Guardian, Daily Mail or Al Jazeera. It's not the pubs I drink in like Adam vs the Man or Peter Schiff. So I have to conclude that the criticism of "That's biased." is meaningless as criticism because everything applies.

[Sakari]

Reid is back in the news for denigrating the peaceful supporters of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, a popular critic of the Bureau of Land Management policy, as “domestic terrorists.”

He is calling peaceful protestors terrorists

By definition, they are terrorists. And they are far from " peacefull ".....

All ready proven/discussed on the Bundy topic.

I think the people of Nevada have a lot of 'splainin' to do.

6 months old to 42 years old......All Nevada.

What do you want explained?

[Yamato]

How much pork has Harry brought home to his district for the past 40 years?

[Merc14]

By definition, they are terrorists. And they are far from " peacefull ".....

All ready proven/discussed on the Bundy topic.

6 months old to 42 years old......All Nevada.

What do you want explained?

Must suck to be cefending the likes of Harry Reid. What violence have they done that makes them terrorists? Are teh Occupy folks also terrorists? Afterall, there was some real violence and destruction of propertyy yet they are embraced by the left. Why?

[Beany]

The source, biased or not, doesn't change what Harry is saying about citizens of the US. He is calling peaceful protestors terrorists which is a naked attempt to use all the force of government against them. This is a leader of the same party that said "God bless them!" (Pelosi) about the violent and destructive Occupy Wall Street crowd.

As far as supply side economics, please show me the failure point? When it was tried the economy grew, when Keynesian economics are tried the economy blows up just as it is now with $17T in debt and a very stagnant, p*** poor economy and employment picture. Real unemployment is still above 12% in this country and has been for years. Now that is failure.

I saw that photo of a civilian sniper on a bridge taken during the standoff at Bundy's ranch. And many of those peaceful protesters were fully armed. Don't know what's peaceful about that. Obama wasn't the first to call that gang domestic terrorists, and again, the magnitude of the perceived offense is no where near the systematic and organized activities of McCarthy & HUAC.

As for supply side economics, or what the Bush administration called "voo doo economics", there's plenty of info out on the internet. And there unbiased sources out there. They're not easy to find, especially these days, since the big political machine is cranking up for the next election cycle. My point is, when I see a piece from Fox News, the New York Post, or any of its affiliates, knowing their bias, I'm not going to give it as much weight as others, and I will go out and source the information. Actually, that's true of all the major networks & their talking heads. There's so much garbage out there it's hard to wade through all of it to find something that actually might be informative.

[lisaloveslilia]

From the OP and the 2 human examples of why Harry Reid is a scum bag for judging...CLIVE the racist and MITT the elitist. If I've got that much pinned down, what else are we looking at here?

[lisaloveslilia]

How much pork has Harry brought home to his district for the past 40 years?

No idea! Probably not leaps n bounds more than any other senator, though. I'd venture to say.

[lisaloveslilia]

Must suck to be cefending the likes of Harry Reid. What violence have they done that makes them terrorists? Are teh Occupy folks also terrorists? Afterall, there was some real violence and destruction of propertyy yet they are embraced by the left. Why?

I have been working a lot over the last year and a half. I know its no excuse for not keeping up with the news. Or maybe I've been following the wrong news (being liberal n all). Wonder if you could pitch me a link to the news about the Occupy folks being violent and causing damage. Because I didn't get that. I think I remembered them loitering too long or some bs. Mostly I remember they were kind of inneffective. And their message wasn't conveyed very well.

[Merc14]

I saw that photo of a civilian sniper on a bridge taken during the standoff at Bundy's ranch. And many of those peaceful protesters were fully armed. Don't know what's peaceful about that. Obama wasn't the first to call that gang domestic terrorists, and again, the magnitude of the perceived offense is no where near the systematic and organized activities of McCarthy & HUAC.

As for supply side economics, or what the Bush administration called "voo doo economics", there's plenty of info out on the internet. And there unbiased sources out there. They're not easy to find, especially these days, since the big political machine is cranking up for the next election cycle. My point is, when I see a piece from Fox News, the New York Post, or any of its affiliates, knowing their bias, I'm not going to give it as much weight as others, and I will go out and source the information. Actually, that's true of all the major networks & their talking heads. There's so much garbage out there it's hard to wade through all of it to find something that actually might be informative.

A rifle is not violent, it is a rifle and owning one is perfectly legal in Nevada and most other states. Pointing it and shooting at a person is violent but as fas as I know, that never happened. The feds brought snipers and armored "troops" to collect overdue grazing fees who then tasered several people for various reason, destroyed property and killed livestock. I would think a lien by the IRS would've sufficed but the BLM chose the violence route for some reason.

The rancher may be an idiot in regards to his thoughts on race but that doesn't change what is happening with the federal government and its bullying of citizens. The IRS stopping the Tea Party and other conservative PACs form receiving their 501c3 status so as to influence and election should chill everyone, left or right, because it represents something fundamentally evil, the willingness of a powerful governmental agency to punish people strictly because of their flavor of politics. What's next, religous beliefs? Pro-Life? Now the IRS has its hands in healthcare and one wonders how far-fetched it is to see certain individuals receiving preferential healthcare and others being denied because of certain beliefs.

You might secretly cheer the IRS's treatment of conservative PACs or bullying of knuclehead Bundy but remember that eventually a tyrannical government abuses everyone, not just the original targets.

[Merc14]

I have been working a lot over the last year and a half. I know its no excuse for not keeping up with the news. Or maybe I've been following the wrong news (being liberal n all). Wonder if you could pitch me a link to the news about the Occupy folks being violent and causing damage. Because I didn't get that. I think I remembered them loitering too long or some bs. Mostly I remember they were kind of inneffective. And their message wasn't conveyed very well.

Since you are a liberal I am not sure what sources you are open to but if you simply google "Occupy turns violent" you'll get 100's of links and can choose the sources you approve of.

[Yamato]

Since you are a liberal I am not sure what sources you are open to but if you simply google "Occupy turns violent" you'll get 100's of links and can choose the sources you approve of.

Violent? LOL How many died, Merc? Mountain out of a molehill again? So those people need to be locked up before somebody gets hurt then? What's your point? Liberals are violent people?

Steve Buscemi is a liberal too. "I think the Republicans in Congress are holding the country hostage."

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/oct/20/steve-buscemi-shutdown-elections-boardwalk-empire

But you choose an avatar that's somebody pretending to be something he's not. Which is perfect, I have to admit.

[Bama13]

The New York Post is an affiliate of Fox News, as is Goodwin. However you feel about Obama or any other politician, none of those are non-biased sources. All you need to do is go out to the Post website, it's obvious they have an agenda. You might agree with it, fine, but it is not a non-biased news source. BTW, McCarthy, who was a Republican and whose aide was Richard Nixon, held House hearings to determine whether a particular individual was a communist, and twisted the arms of a lot of people to get testimony that may or may not have been truthful. People who used their 1st amendment rights often saw the inside of a jail, including the writer Dash Hammett. I see from cruising the internet that there is a concerted attempt by conservatives to rehabilitate Joe, that maybe he wasn't such a bad guy after all. I posted a link to the Wiki article about McCarthy, HUAC, and the Hollywood black list.

HUAC and McCarthy's red hunt was an organized, systematic operation that went on for at least a couple of year, at least. Some people in the entertainment industry were permanently black listed and lost their ability to support themselves. So I don't see how Obama calling Bundy a domestic terrorist can even be equated with McCarthyism. And Bundy is not in jail, is her? And apparently Goodwin hasn't get gotten the news that McCarthy is in the process of being rehabilitated.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism

Senator McCarthy didn't hold any hearings in the House because he was a Senator, not a Representative. Also he was right fairly often, as proven by the Venona Project.