Word to the wise... if you're going to say you don't hate someone, don't immediately follow up that statement with derogatory insults that makes it look like you actually do hate them. This comes off as a very thinly veiled attempt at absolving yourself of any bias when indeed there is much present. Stop mucking around, fess up and say you hate the fellow, or don't traduce his name at all.

Considering that the average "middle class" American is drowning in financial debt, has probably used the equity in their house as a giant ATM machine over the last few years to pay for an unsustainable lifestyle, I would counter that the picture is not nearly as rosy as you paint, good sir. Also, are you saying that we should just forget about the "ghettos and drug infested neighbourhoods" and move on to the artificial, pristine suburbs while inner cities rot to hell?

Yes, a public education system that has been so starved of necessary infrastructure and funding over the last 30 years that many high school graduates are not actually considered functionally literate. This is the same gradual starving of healthcare that occurred earlier to open up the "industry" to private interests. Yes, a universal public education system will always be kept around in the U.S in some form, but more as a benchmark of failure that the private charter schools can point to and say "for just a little more money, you can ensure your kids never have to go THERE"

And now we get to the heart of the matter. In other words, what you just said was "I got mine, screw you" That's what it boils down to. The argument that since some people have succeeded, anyone who doesn't is clearly deffective and is so much detritus to be discarded on the side of the road. Nevermind that we should do the sane, rational, HUMAN thing and try to help our fellow man. Nope, life is all about stepping on other people's heads to get to the top and then if you get there, pull the ladder up after so no one can follow.

Yup, they sure will cost money. The current FIASCO in Iraq is projected to cost AT LEAST 3 trillion or more when all is said and done. That is a conservative estimate too. So, money for social programs, education, infrastructure = bad, money for more bombs so the U.S can continue ilegal, unnecessary wars of aggression and occupation = good. Gotcha.

The whole point of society is so that everyone takes care of everyone else. This whole argument about 'making it on your own' is a bunch of crap... you didn't make the clothes you wear did you? Did you personally construct the vehicle you drive or grow all the food you eat? Of course you didn't. Everyone NEEDS everyone else. That's the whole point of a civilization. Everyone falls on hard times now and then and needs help to get back on their feet. Once again, this goes back to your earlier point in which you asked what the hell was wrong with people who weren't succesful in life. This further illustrates your opinion that anyone who isn't "cutting it" in regards to succeeding in our unsustainable, material based culture should be cut loose and thrown to the dogs. One would hope that with so much evolution under our species' belt by now we would have figured out that if we take care of each other, everyone benefits.

 In regards to being fat, as a nation you're already there. Years of a sedentary, vehicular based lifestyle combined with processed foods packed full of massive amounts of sugar and fat have resulted in almost 2/3 of American adults being overweight!

You call it hating, but it's a true statement.

Verify that statement. Maybe I'm far above middle class, but I'm well out of debt.

But the public schools don't fail children. Children fail due to a lack of motivation. I'll speak for that. They ain't perfect, but they are functional.

But anyone who tries can get to say "I got mine, screw you!". It's not like it's impossible for anyone who tries to reach an decent level of success.

Lies. The war is perfectly legal. It's frowned upon, sure, but it's legal. The occupation is for Democracy.

Make it on your own. No, I didn't make my own clothes, but I paid money for someone else to make them for me. There is a difference from your communism and functional capitalism. There's no need. I don't need clothes, and I'm not so helpless I couldn't find my own food. The question is: Should I pay the shirtmaker so he can make shirts for everyone else when he's not working, instead opting to sit around smoking?

Is fat that horribly, totally bad? It's unhealthy, but if two-thirds of people can make it with their minds and skills, without needing their bodies, are they so bad off? No, we're more advanced.

Do you have proof of this?  You have seen him sneak or slither?

Really? Mr. Wright gave the same sermon for twenty years? What proof do you have of this?

Good point.  You have proven it well.

It's not literal. When you're talking about politicians, nothing is. Hillary's sniper fire, for instance. *SNICKER*

Yeah, but Obama should've left earlier if he'd heard it. But he probably wasn't in church anyways.

Makes a comment to whine about someone's whining says this. I LOL'd.

I think that's the whole problem with this rush to judement. If we are not there, then it's hard to say what went on there every Sunday. I have not been in one place for twenty years, but I have had religious leaders shock me with words or behavior. I think he was blind-sided.

So wait, you say I'm whining? Because I ask f/u questions to rhetoric? C'mon, answer a real question to real issue with concrete answers.

Mr. Wright preached the same Black Liberation Theology that espouses the destruction of the current social fabric, that believes that white people actively oppress black people, that "white government" has conspired to keep the black man down, that America deserved 9/11 and should shut up and take its lumps, etc., for 20 years while Obama sat there and supposedly didn't hear a single word of it.

Congratulations, and good for you! If that is the case then you are the exception to the rule as most folks are up to their eyeballs in debt. There's a wonderful movie you should see called "in debt we trust" The average American spends far more than they make in a year thanks to an over-abundance of predatory credit, the availability to use your home as an ATM with equity schemes and the like. The plight of the U.S consumer has been well documented in a plethora of sources. For a bit of funstuff go to http://www.indebtwetrust.org/

Okay. So classrooms with 30 to 40 students to 1 teacher isn't a failing? And a curriculum that is so basic, it succeeds in producing people who can perform the most cursory of tasks in reading and writing with no critical thought development whatsoever? Absolutely individual responsibility comes into play, but when the majority of kids are graduating high school with sub-par skills (push 'em through the system as they say) there is a systemic problem that goes beyond "lazy kids".

Indeed. The only lies present are the pack of lies that the war was sold on in the first place. The U.S, U.K and a few others invaded a sovereign nation that was not threatening them in any way. In regards to the "advancing democracy" argument the U.S has a long history (and still does to this day in some places) of supporting regimes around the world quite similar to the monster that Saddam was. Nicaragua, Chile, Indonesia, present day Kyrgystan and Uzbekistan, Pakistan, the list is very, very long.

First off, who said anything about communism? And yes, you do need clothes. Everyone does. And if everyone suddenly decided to be "self-sufficient" and go off on their own to find their own food, society would quite quickly collapse.

Fair enough. But I am the King of Spain so I can talk to whomever I want. That is the joy of the inter-webs!