Latest Palin take on history ...

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Well...

...this may be true, however she didn't invite the media (papparazi) to follow her around on this particular trip. As I am sure you have read, the media is quite upset to have not even received an itinerary.

Maybe they should concentrate their efforts on the several people that have announced they are running for an elected office...or try to get the current President to defend or explain his gaffes.

Seems to be a waste of time to me. Apparently the horrible economic numbers make for a slow news day?
 
Yeah, I hate being right....

about that one:sad:

Curious to see what Cato has to say. You know, the idea came up in the Reagan years and he expressed some concerns about it from the point of view that it could easily be hidden and masked as something else in the total purchase price of goods. He said something kinda profound (I thought I would never hear myself say that) to wit, that taxes should hurt otherwise we aren't aware of their size. This idea has certainly proved to be true in the case of employer provided health care-hidden to some degree and the true costs not really obvious to all.
 
Her contract with FOX

prohibits her fraternizing with the other newsy folk so she is playing this coy 'catch-me-if-you-can' routine. Just as she is playing the coy 'oh-maybe-I-will-maybe-I-won't' routine. I think this is evidence that our Sarah is just not a very serious minded person but rather a rank main chancer and opportunist. I have long suspected that she is actually after a separate Tea Party nomination. More money and more sabot-in-the machinery potential there and not even a slim chance of getting elected and actually having to govern.
 
Her track record as govenor...

was measured in months and if looked at dispassionately indicates that she is a socialist. She is not smart in any sense except gutter smart.and Obama's failures have not been ones of intellect but of courage. He at least knows the difference between something stupid and not stupid, he just has a hard time not doing stupid things. No, I can't quite explain it:shh:
 
When you say Pat ...

"She is the Paris Hilton of politics", do you mean she thinks Walmart sells walls as well?:sad:
 
Considering her answer to the Revere...

question, I would be terrified to ask:eek:

If olive oil is made from olives and corn oil is made from corn, what is baby oil made from Sarah?:whistle:
 
Paul Revere's ride

Apparently this story is the result of Mrs. Palin taking a tour of the Old North Church and being asked what she learned about Paul Revere's ride. Watching the video, I would say there is a real good chance she was paraphrasing things recently told to her by the tour guide. I have been on many tours of historical sites and the guides love to say something along the lines of "Everyone knows the story of insert favorite historical topic here, but did you know..." and then proceed to lay some uncommon knowledge on you... like this:

In Paul Revere's own words (Letter from Paul Revere to Jeremy Belknap, circa 1798), he recounts that he was caught by the British that night and did indeed warn the them that the Americans were gathering their forces.

In that letter, check page 4:
I observed a Wood at a Small distance, & made for that.
When I got there, out Started Six officers, on Horse back,
and orderd me to dismount;-one of them, who appeared
to have the command, examined me, where I came from,
& what my Name Was? I told him. it was Revere, he as-
ked if it was Paul? I told him yes He asked me if
I was an express? I answered in the afirmative. He
demanded what time I left Boston? I told him; and
aded, that their troops had catched aground in passing the River,
and that There would be five hundred Americans there
in a short time, for I had alarmed the Country all the way up.
Click to expand...

In the book "Paul Revere's Ride" by David Hackett Fischer (Oxford University Press 1994), there is this passage regarding the bell ringing and gunshots:

While the Tewksbury rider was galloping north, Paul Revere himself was on the road, traveling northeast from Charlestown to Medford. As we have seen, he had not planned to go that way, but once in the village of Medford, he went quickly about the task of awakening that community with remarkable economy of effort. He rode directly to the house of Captain Isaac Hall, commander of Medford's minutemen, who instantly triggered the town's alarm system. A townsman remembered that 'repeated gunshots, the beating of drums and the ringing of bells filled the air.'.... Along the North Shore of Massachusetts, church bells began to toll and the heavy beat of drums could be heard for many miles in the night air.
Click to expand...

Regardless of where Mrs. Palin got the info or how inelegantly she recounted it, she is basically on target.
 
It may be more the inelegance....

impression that she is, like, you know, 14 years old more than anything else. Not to mention her irritating habit of turning everything into a repetition of her bumper sticker sound bites. She cast this thing like it was some kind of Second Amendement question of "taking away our guns" and our freedoms, etc. etc. Apparently oblivious to the fact that the USA as such did not exist let alone its constitutional guarantees. And maybe more to the point is that there is just an unavoidable impression that she always, always winging it. Just scraping by on a fast mouth and much slower brain.
But that is at present her appeal. She is, perhaps for the first time in our politics, the candidate that ' is no better in any respect than the average of her supporters'. After years of reality TV and Oprah and the echo chamber of the internet and the narcisism of Twitter and Facebook there is a substantial minorty of voters who want someone who is just like them; no wonder, they are constantly being told or telling themselves that they are just pretty darn great.
 
I knew someone would roll out the 2nd amendment talking point. :)

Mrs. Palin was simply stating that the British were intending to take the colonists' weapons and the colonists were not going to allow that to happen. Mrs. Palin never mentions the USA or the 2nd amendment. You have created a straw-man argument here. You put forth the fictional 2nd amendment premise, assign it to your opponent and then tear the straw-man apart based on the words you put in your opponent's mouth. It's an age old debating technique deployed in lieu of a supportable argument.

Regarding the guns and ammo issue: Check out this paragraph from the The Paul Revere Heritage website:
The Redcoats had set temporary roadblocks as a security measure and on their way to Concord they encountered British soldiers. Prescott managed to escape; Revere was captured and Dawes tried to run away but was arrested shortly thereafter. The British held Revere and interrogated him with a pistol on his chest. He was asked about the plans of the militia and where they kept their ammunition. When asked where the Patriots were hiding he told them the truth and replied that they had 500 militiamen in Concord protecting them and 1500 coming. As they rode towards Concord he was told that if he tried to escape he would be shot.
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I suppose the British may have asked Paul Revere where the militia kept the ammo because they were afraid of tripping over it in the dark. However, a better guess is that the British intended to seize or destroy the colonists' ammunition stores so that those stores could not be used against themselves.

Mrs. Palin's statements in this video, including those on the weapons and ammo were most likely based on the Paul Revere story told by the tour guide or simply an informational display in the Old North Church. Someone later asked her what she learned and she answered the question. She may only known these bits of history because of her earlier visit to the Old North Church, I only know them now because of this story, but her answer is supported by various sources comprising the historical record of the event.

There are a lot of people who need to evaluate the fact that their "knowledge" of Mrs. Palin and her supporters is formed from the same agenda-driven information sources that produced this story.
 
And I think...

you are 100 times smarter and more nuanced that she would ever dream of being. I am agnostic on the Second Amendment Issue but she is not and every time she has a chance throw a little NRA soundbite in she does it.

She doesn't deserve a defender of your caliber (excuse the pun). You should be running, not her. She obviously doesn't even know what she is saying half or more of the time except that cleaves closely to her small bag of base enthusing bromides she will on occasion get it all to line up. Meaning it will appear that she knows what she is saying but it will actually be just chance. She is great example of a Gettier Problem.
 
Gettier aside.... what you are saying is that

even in the face of the evidence that Mrs. Palin made no reference to the 2nd amendment, and that her actual answer corresponds to the historical record, you remain agnostic on the issue. Couldn't you simply admit you didn't know the history and you were wrong?

Which brings is to the Gettier reference. The irony of you bringing up Gettier after basically telling me, in the face of the compelling evidence to the contrary, that you choose to bitterly cling to your "belief" on this 2nd amendment question made me laugh out loud.
 
This isn't argument about whether...

she mentioned the 2nd amendment-or if it is -then you win. I never said she did, but have it your way.
My point is she just talks a lot and whether any specific piece of her talk actually aligns with pertinent circumstances is a matter of chance.

Actually don't see much reason to keep talking about this, you seem to be taking offence at some kind of abstract level that Palin doesn't deserve. Maybe she knew what she was talikng about but her past utterances make me highly suspicious that she didn't and my instinct is to think she heard things in the museum that triggered little responsorial bells in her belfry. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe she is a deep student of all things Revere including the cookware-but something tells no.

Besides she is only good for light comedy and this is becoming way too, too serious. Like David Brooks said "..a minute talking about Sarah Palin is minute of my life I won't get back..." She really isn't worth the trouble if it isn't going to be fun.
And I repeat, you are too good for her. She would probably think a Straw Man argument was about someone in the Wizard of Oz and that Gettier is something to hold up her stockings.
I'm done, Over and out on this one.

Oh, and you are absolutely right-I don't know the history in detail and I don't care that I don't know it. it's just something that happened and is of no compelling interest to me. So on that basis you got me fair and square.
 
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Dan, I have two questions...

on this Cato plan
1) Does it actually raise sufficient revenue. I know that question begs another regarding the expense of government but let's say for illustration sake that the budget gets pegged at $3T, is there enough sales activity to support the non-payroll (SS) funded part of the budget?

2) One of the 'benefits' of the sales tax would be to encourage savings by eliminating capital gains taxation and, presumably, by discouraging buying. Is the discoragement part of this a good fit in an economy that is 70% consumer driven? I think this is a pretty important point because, as I'm sure you know, about 40+% of households pay no or very little federal income tax now. This would mean that whatever little savings they might make from decreases in capital gains would be vastly offset by the VAT that they do not pay now.

Another observation is that savings in a general sense seems like a good idea but one of the challenges facing Japan and to a lesser extent China is the glut of savings which tend to drive down and keep down interest rates and to artificially strengthen the currency.
I suspect these issues come up in the literature on the VAT but I'm not familiar with the whole concept at all.
 
usta in Portland said:
impression that she is, like, you know, 14 years old more than anything else. Not to mention her irritating habit of turning everything into a repetition of her bumper sticker sound bites. She cast this thing like it was some kind of Second Amendement question of "taking away our guns" and our freedoms, etc. etc. Apparently oblivious to the fact that the USA as such did not exist let alone its constitutional guarantees. And maybe more to the point is that there is just an unavoidable impression that she always, always winging it. Just scraping by on a fast mouth and much slower brain.
But that is at present her appeal. She is, perhaps for the first time in our politics, the candidate that ' is no better in any respect than the average of her supporters'. After years of reality TV and Oprah and the echo chamber of the internet and the narcisism of Twitter and Facebook there is a substantial minorty of voters who want someone who is just like them; no wonder, they are constantly being told or telling themselves that they are just pretty darn great.
Click to expand...

I think that about sums it up. What she said about Paul Revere was accurate but delivered in a way that is painful to listen to. I don't think she is stupid and I don't think she is even terribly ignorant but she comes across that way whenever she opens her mouth. I can't even watch her anymore it's just too embarrassing.
 
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