The Clinton Era - The Good, the Bad, and the Debatable

[Halifirien]

And it shouldn't matter whether the perpetrator went out for the express purpose of beating up a minority or whether anyone in particular would do. The law is, in effect, punishing someone for a belief system.

Why shouldn't it matter? Do you think egging someone's house and burning a cross on their lawn should each be simple vandalism under the law? They're qualitatively different crimes and should have punishments to match.

 

[Lucki]

He doesn't even need to know the other person is Jewish to be charged with a hate crime. It could come out during trial (if it made it to court), and be charged with that there. That's, kind of, what happened to my cousin. He was with a group of his friends, they were drunk, and unknowingly ended up outside of a gay bar. Somehow they got in a fight with a couple of gay guys, a fight broke out, and people were arrested. It ended up in court where my cousin and his friends were going to be charged with a hate crime.

That whole law is fucking ridiculous.

 

[Raesvelg]

No, he didn't. He helped pay for the tests that single mothers could most likely not have paid for otherwise.


The technology would have existed without him, but the funding speeded things up quite nicely. Also, as I have said before, as you have ignored before, paternity testing isn't free but Clinton helped to make it affordable.

And I never argued that he didn't assist the process along. I do, however, not credit him with the entirety of it. The majority of the credit for that belongs to people other than Clinton.

So these dotcom sites created and run by 1 or 2 people created millions of jobs somehow? So crime went down because criminals think it was easier to run a website than steal and kill. Gotcha.

Nice, straw man. Haven't seen that in a while.

Atta boy. Way to side with both sides at the same time. You would make a good politician.

Objectivism is a curse. And I don't side with both sides. I believe that, within certain limits, it should be the choice of the parents (note the distinction) whether or not to allow a fetus to come to term.

I can, however, see where that might be an issue for other people, and how their position against it might have some validity.

Rather than, you know, simply blindly declaring them all to be wrong with little to no thought put into it.

I can lead a horse to water, but I can't make him drink. The info is there. Check my facts. Did I misrepresent anything?

The facts are there for how Clinton reduced the Federal workforce as well. Or do you simply prefer to make vague claims then attribute Clinton with all the positive things that occurred during his administration?

Because you still think you are right.

Ouch. That hurts my heart. I wonder why this seems to be upsetting you so much?

Is that to say democracy is a farce? Outdated? Doesn't work?

No, that's to say that politicians are not to be trusted to do anything more than seek re-election, through whatever means necessary.

If I slept with your wife, you have a motive. You killing me would be a direct response to something I did. If I am walking down the street and you want to kill a white boy that is unprovoked and totally random.

What if my great-great grandparents had been slaves to your great-great grandparents? Do I have a motive then? Does it matter that I was simply raised to hate anyone different than me? Who are you to determine what motive is sufficient to drive someone to commit murder?

Random murder with no motive. Same thing as a hate crime. It is considered worse because the only motivation fueling their actions is their own hate. Surely you can understand that is worse than a crime of passion or a crime of greed.

Murder is murder. Motive is irrelevant. We don't punish motive, we punish the severity of the crime. Now, if the hate criminal in question had made the death particularly heinous, then it could be argued that the severity of his crime was sufficient to warrant a harsher penalty.

Bear in mind that in this instance I do not approve of the code set down regardless. Murder, in my opinion, should have but one penalty.

The thing about this example is you are talking about the skin color of the person committing the crime. Where as hate crimes can be committed by any person regardless of skin color.

It's a simplified example, obviously. And it's expanded upon a few lines down, but apparently you didn't bother to read that part.

Why shouldn't it matter? Do you think egging someone's house and burning a cross on their lawn should each be simple vandalism under the law? They're qualitatively different crimes and should have punishments to match.

Interesting example, actually. I find myself in an awkward position, in some ways. Good choice.

There is a question whether the two crimes would carry the same simple vandalism charge, however, given the cultural context implied with burning a cross on someone's yard. There is an implied threat in cross burning, a "get out before we do worse" kind of situation. Of course, the reason why there is an implied threat is, of course, due to the repeated use of the act as a threat by racists hicks. Egging someone's house carries no such cultural connotation that I'm aware of.

Now, on the other hand, if two separate individuals placed signs on your lawn saying "Get out or we kill you", one because they hate whatever it is that you are, and another because they hate that you, for example, play your music too loudly, that would be a simpler example.

 

[Raesvelg]

Hmm... We're going pretty far afield at this point from the original intent of the thread. Going to drop it now, I think, simply to reiterate that not everything that happened during Clinton's administration can be attributed to him, unless we want to start attributing the blame for everything that went wrong as a result of his administration. In which case, we could argue that 9/11, the war in Iraq/Afghanistan, and our current economic crisis are all his fault. I mean, he had his shot at Bin Laden and didn't take it, he folded military actions whenever there were casualties on the ground, and his administration did indeed push for substantially more subprime lending.

 

[alanon]

Meh, it was my fault more than anybody's, but I think the original thread had long since run it's course. I think it was turned into a much more intelligent discussion.

 

[Tristam Green]

There; continue your extremely good debate that I'm enjoying the hell out of reading.

 

[Raesvelg]

There; continue your extremely good debate that I'm enjoying the hell out of reading.

Feel free to join in, lol.

 

[Trippyhippy]

Feel free to join in, lol.

At least we can agree on something :biggrin:

Break is over, I'll respond again when I get home.

 

[Tristam Green]

I will when I get home, lol.

Sadly, my political views were fairly skewed when Clinton was in the White House, and I didn't really get into reading it until I was out of High School in 2000 and even more so in the last decade, but I can offer this rather narrow POV about the Clinton Administration's years:

• The 1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission came to fruition, closing 32 US military bases worldwide, including many long-considered necessary strategic points (i.e., Naval Station Charleston). The locales that saw these closings woefully pleaded with the administration to not allow them to close, due to the direct income they brought to the areas.
• The 1995 Commission closed down an additional 31 bases. Again, their respective locales effectively begged for Congress and the Administration to stop the closings.
• I cannot speak for soldiers or airmen during this time, but sailors received their largest salary increases in years during the Clinton administration. In my father's case, it was the largest single pay increase of his entire 27-year career.

In retrospect, I was very judgemental about the Clinton/Lewinsky affair, but despite that, his administration did my house pretty damn well.

Arguably though, the BRAC commissions were probably convening about closing those bases long before he took office.

 

[smalls]

other than being at the right place at the right time bill has no qualifications to be considered a great president. in terms of the economy i guess you could say he was a good president, he certainly didn't do anything to screw it up. it would be a stretch to say he caused it though.

in terms of national defense i would say, hands down, he was the worst president ever. clinton ignored countless declarations of war by muslims, and instead just considered them common criminals. he flat out told people not to overreact to the 1993 world trade center bombing, and he called the attack "regrettable" like it was something that couldn't be avoided. ever cautious of re-election, he pretty much hoisted the white flag and retreated whenever the opportunity presented itself. if that wasn't enough he gave up not one but several opportunities to capture or kill osama, and even refused when osama was offered on a silver platter.

you could attribute every bit of America's economic prosperity to a direct action of Bill Clinton, but you'd still be crazy to consider him even an ok president. he was indecisive, cowardly, and pretty much single handedly failed to prevent an inevitable terrorist attack.

 

[Trippyhippy]

And I never argued that he didn't assist the process along. I do, however, not credit him with the entirety of it. The majority of the credit for that belongs to people other than Clinton.

Yeah, including a lot of people he appointed.

Nice, straw man. Haven't seen that in a while.

Glad you liked it. It was a failed attempt to get you to say "how it is" instead of just "how it is not".

[quoteObjectivism is a curse. And I don't side with both sides. I believe that, within certain limits, it should be the choice of the parents (note the distinction) whether or not to allow a fetus to come to term.

I can, however, see where that might be an issue for other people, and how their position against it might have some validity.

Rather than, you know, simply blindly declaring them all to be wrong with little to no thought put into it.[/quote]

That's the thing about the whole situation that bothers me. One side says the others are all wrong and the other side says everyone should decide what is right for them.

The facts are there for how Clinton reduced the Federal workforce as well. Or do you simply prefer to make vague claims then attribute Clinton with all the positive things that occurred during his administration?

Well, I kinda see your point there. The error is mine for saying "Clinton" instead of "The Clinton Administration".

Ouch. That hurts my heart. I wonder why this seems to be upsetting you so much?

I'm not upset at all. I made a smart ass comment, you asked a smart ass question, then I gave a smart ass answer.

No, that's to say that politicians are not to be trusted to do anything more than seek re-election, through whatever means necessary.

Ok Mr. Half Empty

What if my great-great grandparents had been slaves to your great-great grandparents? Do I have a motive then? Does it matter that I was simply raised to hate anyone different than me? Who are you to determine what motive is sufficient to drive someone to commit murder?

No you don't have a motive as a person can only be responsible for their own actions.

It doesn't matter that you were raised that way, it matters that you remain that way.

I was raised with a lying, crack head, theif for a father. I don't smoke crack, I don't steal and I rarely lie. You can use your roots as an example of how to be, or how not to be.

Murder is murder. Motive is irrelevant. We don't punish motive, we punish the severity of the crime. Now, if the hate criminal in question had made the death particularly heinous, then it could be argued that the severity of his crime was sufficient to warrant a harsher penalty.

We do punish motive. That's why there is a difference between rape, statutory rape and alamony. That's why there is a murder1, murder 2 or manslaughter. that's why there is possesion and possesion with intent to resale. We totally punish motive.

Bear in mind that in this instance I do not approve of the code set down regardless. Murder, in my opinion, should have but one penalty.

There are exceptions to every rule.

It's a simplified example, obviously. And it's expanded upon a few lines down, but apparently you didn't bother to read that part.

...

Equal protection under the law means that we cannot discriminate based on the color of our skin, the god(s) we choose to worship, or the people whom we choose to love. Sadly, that must also include the people whom we choose to hate.

The racist is not being afforded the same protection under the law. He is being singled out and punished more severely, not for his crime, but for his beliefs.

There you go coming down on both sides of it again. We can't punish someone for discrimination because it's discrimination.

Now, on the other hand, if two separate individuals placed signs on your lawn saying "Get out or we kill you", one because they hate whatever it is that you are, and another because they hate that you, for example, play your music too loudly, that would be a simpler example.

Though, neither of those things are hate crimes. Both would be prosecuted as a threat. It might be classified as a hate crime if one of the signs said "Get out or we will kill you, whitey".

 

[Lukas]

I would be hesitant to call any US president "great" - but I could tolerate Clinton a lot more than say the two Bushes or that cretin Nixon if we're spanning that far back. "Great" is a very relative term here - great in relation to what? I'm curious as to who the Clinton detractors would be comfortable assigning that moniker to.

Clinton fucked up hard with DOMA and Don't Ask Don't Tell. It pains me to say that he was probably the most gay-friendly president to date, largely because he was mostly evasive than friendly.

Despite that, he did consciously focus on reducing US federal debt and actually balancing the federal budget, rather than pumping billions of dollars into an already inflated military or promising tax cuts which were just unfeasible. I mean the US federal budget had not been balanced for generations before his administration. In terms of federal debt, no he didn't eliminate that completely (I don't think there has been a single moment since like... the 1830s where the US has been free of debt), but it was relatively controlled. W. Bush on the other hand, stepped into office with a federal debt of $5 trillion, and left the country after two terms with a debt of what... $10 trillion? That's insane. That almost matches your GDP.

I just find it confusing that there is such a push for large military budgets and tax cuts within the US, when government should really be worried about how the hell they are going to keep social security promises from haemorrhaging exponentially. Financially supporting the large number of retiring baby-boomers with the HUGE (and ever-increasing) deficit the Bush administration has left will be difficult enough. The most immediate concern on the international stage should not be "stability" or "democracy" in some obscure corner of the world... it should be loans, trade deficits. What the fuck is going to happen when China or Japan decide they don't want to lend anymore money? What will happen if they just dump their holdings in the US economy? The fiscal relationship there is more symbiotic than I make it out to be, but it really is a highly dangerous situation to be in.

Anyway, I'm derailing here. In conclusion, Clinton's appeal to me is emphasised by the fact that he was both preceded and succeeded in office by complete retards. That and he expanded (as someone pointed out earlier, this is the key word) on certain opportunities in an attempt to make the economy sustainable in the long term rather than digging the country into a deeper hole. He wasn't great, but he gave it a shot.


As for hate crime legislature being unconstitutional... wow. That totally sounds like something a straight, white male aged 20-40 would say. Wow.

 

[Raesvelg]

That's the thing about the whole situation that bothers me. One side says the others are all wrong and the other side says everyone should decide what is right for them.

Hence why I tend to think of them as ignorant, uptight hicks. The problem is that this is a question that's difficult to answer as simply as right/wrong. Their position is often rather idiotic, but there are abortion opponents who have rational arguments against it.

Well, I kinda see your point there. The error is mine for saying "Clinton" instead of "The Clinton Administration".

If you'd like to get even more correct, one could simply say "the government during the Clinton Administration".

Ok Mr. Half Empty

In all serious, right now (and it has nothing to do with politics, I rather like Obama), you have no idea.

No you don't have a motive as a person can only be responsible for their own actions.

So then you're saying that motive is irrelevant?

We do punish motive. That's why there is a difference between rape, statutory rape and alamony. That's why there is a murder1, murder 2 or manslaughter. that's why there is possesion and possesion with intent to resale. We totally punish motive.

With the except of that last one (which is typically a purely subjective judgment on the part of the arresting officer), none of those are questions of motive. They're all mutually distinct crimes. Rape, sexual assault by force. Statutory rape, sexual exploitation of a minor, no force involved. Murder 1 and Murder 2 can have exactly the same motive, what is punished differently is not the motive of the offender but rather the degree to which he was willing to plan the crime.

There are exceptions to every rule.

Justifiable homicide aside.

There you go coming down on both sides of it again. We can't punish someone for discrimination because it's discrimination.

No, you can punish someone for discrimination. You cannot punish one person for discrimination more than another. Though, in all honesty, there are very few laws on discrimination that are vague enough to punish people for more than gross physical or cultural discrimination.

At the bookstore that employs me, we discriminate. We refuse to hire people who wear sweat pants.

Though, neither of those things are hate crimes. Both would be prosecuted as a threat. It might be classified as a hate crime if one of the signs said "Get out or we will kill you, whitey".

Do you really think that, once the search warrant was obtained and the requisite houses searched, the white supremacists would not be charged with a hate crime?

Anyway, I'm derailing here. In conclusion, Clinton's appeal to me is emphasised by the fact that he was both preceded and succeeded in office by complete retards. That and he expanded (as someone pointed out earlier, this is the key word) on certain opportunities in an attempt to make the economy sustainable in the long term rather than digging the country into a deeper hole. He wasn't great, but he gave it a shot.

I don't consider it fair to deem George H. W. Bush as a "complete retard", any more than it's fair to deem Clinton a messiah or a retard either way. Bush inherited a rather difficult situation, and wound up getting crucified for breaking a campaign promise he made without realizing the impossibility of sustaining it. His foreign policy record is really not half bad, and while his domestic fiscal policy was perhaps unpopular, that didn't make it necessarily wrong.

As for hate crime legislature being unconstitutional... wow. That totally sounds like something a straight, white male aged 20-40 would say. Wow.

Way to stereotype. Perhaps you'd like a feather boa to drape around your neck while you watch "Queer Eye"?

Maybe we should make a new category of crime. We'll call it "Gay Crime", and it will mandate stiffer penalties for people who commit crimes and are considered "gay" by an arbitrary set of standards. Like, if they steal some particularly wonderful pair of shoes, and are later revealed to be a member of GLAD, we could fine them an additional $1000 dollars.

I'm not defending hate crime. I just find the very idea of a mandated stiffer sentence for the same crime to be ridiculous. If I walked up to you and called you a fucking asshole and threatened to kick your ass, I would be charged with assault. If I walked up to you and called you a fucking queer and threatened to kick your ass, I could easily be charged with a hate crime. With a difference of one word, which (I might add) cannot be legislated against as it is my Constitutionally-guaranteed right to call someone a queer, if I were a raging homophobic asshole.

Incidentally, I never did say how I characterize Clinton. The answer is "reasonable on domestic and fiscal policy, questionable on military policy, with occasional forays into disastrous on foreign policy". Overall, we could have done far worse.

 

[Halifirien]

I'm not defending hate crime. I just find the very idea of a mandated stiffer sentence for the same crime to be ridiculous. If I walked up to you and called you a fucking asshole and threatened to kick your ass, I would be charged with assault. If I walked up to you and called you a fucking queer and threatened to kick your ass, I could easily be charged with a hate crime. With a difference of one word, which (I might add) cannot be legislated against as it is my Constitutionally-guaranteed right to call someone a queer, if I were a raging homophobic asshole.

You can call people "queer" all you want, but you're not exactly straying into hate crime territory (only assholishness) unless the sole reason you chose your assault victim is their sexual orientation. If you're assaulting a guy and call him "queer" in the middle of it, a prosecutor isn't likely to make a successful case for it being a hate crime.

Here in West Virginia, we had that unfortunate case about those numbfuck rednecks who raped and tortured a black woman, but they weren't prosecuted under hate crimes statutes because prosecutors said the state penalties were more harsh. I don't really dispute that notion, but I appreciate that prosecutors higher-up on the federal food chain could prosecute if it looked like a bunch of good ol' boys were just going to sweep it under the rug because the victim was historically the right color.

I understand it bothers you that the government is taking a more active interest in protecting groups that have historically been victimized and shit on by the majority, but they seem to think they have a compelling interest in discouraging that type of behavior. I'm grateful for it, especially if it keeps some psycho from walking into a gay bar because he thinks society will approve of his decision to "clean house." Stiffer penalties are a good way to get a specific message across, similar to the way we have stiffer penalties for people who use guns during commission of a crime. Of course, you're now free to argue that robbery is robbery.

 

[alanon]

I understand it bothers you that the government is taking a more active interest in protecting groups that have historically been victimized and shit on by the majority, but they seem to think they have a compelling interest in discouraging that type of behavior. I'm grateful for it, especially if it keeps some psycho from walking into a gay bar because he thinks society will approve of his decision to "clean house." Stiffer penalties are a good way to get a specific message across, similar to the way we have stiffer penalties for people who use guns during commission of a crime. Of course, you're now free to argue that robbery is robbery.

You are using logic to argue the illogical. The people that go into a gay bar to spray bullets just because they do not like homosexuals are not dissuaded by a hate crime charge. Sick fuckers like that are just wired differently than people like you or I.

 

[Halifirien]

The people that go into a gay bar to spray bullets just because they do not like homosexuals are not dissuaded by a hate crime charge.

It doesn't have to be bullets or your over-the-rainbow psychopaths. I was thinking more along the lines of the guys who attacked the patrons of a gay bar in Galveston a few weeks back. They're not hardwired crazies who are beyond all reason. They're just homophobic assholes who didn't think anyone would care.

If their sentences are stiffened and the next trio of assholes think twice about committing such a crime because Texas made an example of these schmucks, I consider that a positive gain.

 

[alanon]

I just read that story. Found it amusing that the discussion being had here made it into the first few comments of the story:

This is certainly bad and the idiot P'sOS deserve the book, or some rocks, tossed at them.

But, at risk of getting hate mail, which would not be a hate crime since I am not a government-classified special subsection of humanity, I will say that the whole concept of "hate crimes" is a large load of crap.

The rock chunking morons deserve to be punished severely for what they did; could have easily ended in a murder(s). But if they had done this same thing at a Boy Scout meeting, or a school PTA meeting, or The Senior Ladies Quilting Society stitch-o-rama, exactly why should that result in a less emotion charged charge than attacking a homosexual or other so-called minority or special category?

Answer: it should not. The notion that attacking some people is worse than others is PC BS gone to extremes, and Gov. Rick Perry should be ashamed to have signed such into law in Texas.

 

[Halifirien]

If only those groups had a history of being violently attacked, I might agree.

 

[Raesvelg]

I understand it bothers you that the government is taking a more active interest in protecting groups that have historically been victimized and shit on by the majority, but they seem to think they have a compelling interest in discouraging that type of behavior. I'm grateful for it, especially if it keeps some psycho from walking into a gay bar because he thinks society will approve of his decision to "clean house." Stiffer penalties are a good way to get a specific message across, similar to the way we have stiffer penalties for people who use guns during commission of a crime. Of course, you're now free to argue that robbery is robbery.

It doesn't bother me from a moral standpoint. Personally I think the majority of violent crime should carry stiffer punishments than they do. What bothers me is the notion that we're punishing motive, rather than crime. The argument for the entire legal framework of hate crime legislation is to drive home the idea that some crimes are "less acceptable" than others. I understand that. I just do not concur. I do not believe that, just because someone hates some specific thing about you, makes it any less acceptable than if someone, for example, hated you personally.

And let's be realistic here. Someone crazy enough to shoot up a bar because he believed it to be largely populated by homosexuals isn't going to be doing so because he believes that society approves of it. I sincerely doubt that anyone really things that society wants them to go out and harass/kill a particular minority. They may believe that society should want them to do so, that they are somehow protecting "the American way of life", but they're wrong, and no amount of additional penalty is going to be what convinces them that they're being ignorant racist morons.

In fact, there's a certain irony in that it could be argued that hate crime legislation would indeed enforce the more deranged individuals' beliefs that they need to "save" America.

As for the robbery bit, much like Trippy, you're confusing motive with degree of severity. Punishments for gun crime are frequently more severe because guns kill people. That's all they do. By definition any crime involving a gun can be considered to have been carried out with at least the threat of deadly force.

 

[Halifirien]

No, I'm not confusing motive and severity. I'm using severity as an example of how extra punishment is meant to discourage specific behaviors; in this case, causing criminals to think twice about using a gun, similar to hate crime legislation upping the ante on punishment to discourage bigots from acting out on their beliefs.