The reveiws are in on Clint Eastwood's speech

[missjo]

[Felix]

Hitler at the top of his game was the equal of the General Staff. He was almost a savant in his capacity to absorb and process massive amounts of detail in all the different facets of government. In the early days of the 3rd Reich his leadership was energetic, out of the box and successful at all turns and often against the advice of the more conservative General Staff.

it's pretty scary to realize just how smart that guy was on so many different levels.....our saving grace is that he essentially fell off the deep end and we had some dedicated, bad-ass soldiers determined to stop that crazy fuck

[Van]

Hitler at the top of his game was the equal of the General Staff. He was almost a savant in his capacity to absorb and process massive amounts of detail in all the different facets of government. In the early days of the 3rd Reich his leadership was energetic, out of the box and successful at all turns and often against the advice of the more conservative General Staff.

it's pretty scary to realize just how smart that guy was on so many different levels.....our saving grace is that he essentially fell off the deep end and we Stalin had some dedicated, bad-ass soldiers determined to stop that crazy fuck

Pretty much.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

But we're all in agreement that smackaholic is an oxygen stealing mongoloid, right?

[smackaholic]

I paid good money in taxes for that oxygen, so GFY.

I stand by the statement that he was a crazy loser with a knack for demagoguery. Germany became a world power due to a lot of hard working very bright folks called germans. It still holds true. They have a reasonably successful economy now despite their having to carry the EU on their shoulders.

[mvscal]

I stand by the statement that he was a crazy loser with a knack for demagoguery.

That's because you're an ignorant dumbshit.

[smackaholic]

Hitler at the top of his game was the equal of the General Staff. He was almost a savant in his capacity to absorb and process massive amounts of detail in all the different facets of government. In the early days of the 3rd Reich his leadership was energetic, out of the box and successful at all turns and often against the advice of the more conservative General Staff. His 'Downfall' was primarily drug related. By 1943 he was tweaking balls 24/7, eating poorly and made a fucking dog's breakfast out of Germany.

I

So, he was a pretty good government hack with hella reading comp?

No questioning his energy. dude had off the charts energy.

If by "early days of the 3rd reich", you refer to early battles against the frenchies and pollacks, well sure his ideas worked. It's easier to look good when your army is 1000X better than your foe.

His downfall was partly due to drug use, but, I would think that it was "primarily" due to being closed in on by massive well equipped armies from both directions that didn't speak french.

Are you suggesting that had he kept his head he would have held off the allies?

[Dr_Phibes]

I stand by the statement that he was a crazy loser

I'm trying to imagine the faces in OKH if someone said, 'Hey kameraden, let's invade Afghanistan'

[Dr_Phibes]

What you need to find out, is if Mitt would have backed the risky, unconventional, untried approach put forward by von Manstein, or leaned toward people like von Kluge. Then translate your findings into a practical strategy for Afghanistan.

[mvscal]

Are you suggesting that had he kept his head he would have held off the allies?

He certainly would have been in much better shape to do so if he was making more rational decisions rather than flying off on meth-fueled rages and tangents.

You don't seem to realise how physically and mentally debilitating an addiction to speed is. He was tweaked out of his gourd and I think it's safe to say that tweakers aren't generally known for their prowess in wise decision making.

[Felix]

He certainly would have been in much better shape to do so if he was making more rational decisions rather than flying off on meth-fueled rages and tangents.

no doubt you have a much better understanding of Hitler than I do, but when I've read books about world war II it's kind of frightening to think just how powerful germany was....a series of tactical blunders that made no sense whatsoever on hitlers part were the saving grace of the rest of the world....germany could have won the war and many people simply don't know how close it was.....his failure to press his advantage at Dunkirk and annihilate the british forces there was a huge tactical error.....concentrating on bombing british cities rather than trying to take out the RAF was another error....his failure to invade and take over britain provided staging grounds for the US and operation overlord....his attack on russia was another mistake, especially when he split the armies and decided to attack Kiev and Leningrad rather than going straight for Moscow....russian winters are harsh and rather unforgiving and the russians proved rather merciless when the tables were turned.....germany suffered defeats in russia they would never recover from....his obsession with development of the V-2 rocket while all but stopping production of the Messerschmitts was head scratchingly stupid.....the Messerschmitt was an amazing fighter plane yet Hitler seemed oblivious to it's tactical advantage....our saving grace is the guy was a drug addled obsessionist, overwise we might all be eating Sauerbraten.....if not for the resolve of british and american forces things could have turned out a lot different than they did....

[Wolfman]

Clint Eastwood--------------> sauerbraten. What a board this is.

[R-Jack]

Only at T1B can a thread about awkward speeches quickly morph into talks of meth-snorting paranoid dictators almost taking over the world.

[smackaholic]

He certainly would have been in much better shape to do so if he was making more rational decisions rather than flying off on meth-fueled rages and tangents.

no doubt you have a much better understanding of Hitler than I do, but when I've read books about world war II it's kind of frightening to think just how powerful germany was....a series of tactical blunders that made no sense whatsoever on hitlers part were the saving grace of the rest of the world....germany could have won the war and many people simply don't know how close it was.....his failure to press his advantage at Dunkirk and annihilate the british forces there was a huge tactical error.....concentrating on bombing british cities rather than trying to take out the RAF was another error....his failure to invade and take over britain provided staging grounds for the US and operation overlord....his attack on russia was another mistake, especially when he split the armies and decided to attack Kiev and Leningrad rather than going straight for Moscow....russian winters are harsh and rather unforgiving and the russians proved rather merciless when the tables were turned.....germany suffered defeats in russia they would never recover from....his obsession with development of the V-2 rocket while all but stopping production of the Messerschmitts was head scratchingly stupid.....the Messerschmitt was an amazing fighter plane yet Hitler seemed oblivious to it's tactical advantage....our saving grace is the guy was a drug addled obsessionist, overwise we might all be eating Sauerbraten.....if not for the resolve of british and american forces things could have turned out a lot different than they did....

As I said, Germany was light years ahead of everyone else, militarily in 1940. It would have been game, set and match in Europe if that stupid motherfukker had simply finished bussiness before deciding to take on the Russkies. It's fortunate for us that he was such a strategic and sometimes tactical fukkup and that we had someone with a ginormous set of brass balls to hold down the fort in England until the calvary got there.

It's a shame that the monkey we got running the show today boxed up the bust of that dude and shipped it home when he got into the white house.

[smackaholic]

Only at T1B can a thread about awkward speeches quickly morph into talks of meth-snorting paranoid dictators almost taking over the world.

It's what gives this place its charm.

[Diego in Seattle]

Germany might have taken the lead, but wouldn't the development of the A-bomb turned the tables anyways?

[Wolfman]

It's a good thing we won WW2. Had we lost, we'd have had to buy German and Japanese goods and play host to their tourists.

[Bizzarofelice]

Only you're old enough to say "we" in reference to WW2.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

Only you're old enough to say "we" in reference to WW2.

I think Wolfman is old enough to say "we" in reference to The Battle of Tours...

[Bizzarofelice]

Only you're old enough to say "we" in reference to WW2.

I think Wolfman is old enough to say "we" in reference to The Battle of Tours...

but he probably hates those filthy French. but he didn't back then because it wasn't the right wing zeitgeist at the time.

[smackaholic]

I think we have a few that could say "we" regarding WWII, but, I think wolfie may be the only one old enough to remember it.

What grade were you in at the end of the war, wolfie?

[Diego in Seattle]

It's a good thing we won WW2. Had we lost, we'd have had to buy German and Japanese goods and play host to their tourists.

In Yosemite we had hordes of both.

[R-Jack]

If this is going to turn into a discussion on how we use the word "we", I'm moving this thread to BTPCF.

[smackaholic]

[LTS TRN 2]

Hitler at the top of his game was the equal of the General Staff. He was almost a savant in his capacity to absorb and process massive amounts of detail in all the different facets of government. In the early days of the 3rd Reich his leadership was energetic, out of the box and successful at all turns and often against the advice of the more conservative General Staff.

it's pretty scary to realize just how smart that guy was on so many different levels.....our saving grace is that he essentially fell off the deep end and we had some dedicated, bad-ass soldiers determined to stop that crazy fuck

Hey look, Mall Cop the (barely) closeted Nazi is breaking cover. Typically he's completely and utterly full of shit, reciting some ludicrous tract he picked up at some militia meeting of similar creeps.

The actual military acumen of Hitler is exactly why the Germany failed in its attempt to rule Europe and beyond. There is not a single example of his expertise or shrewd planning, and PLENTY of examples of his bizarre and incoherent analysis and policy resulting in disaster and defeat. A responsible book examining the man behind the mouth is "Hitler And The Aesthetics Of Power" by Frederic Spotts.

Back to Clint and his rambling embarrassing display. His (unintentional) criticisms of our going into Afghanistan in the first place were interesting and entertaining, and his attempts at the empty chair gag mildly weird. And he's certainly entitled to question Barry's record--though he seemed unwilling or unable to articulate anything in detail. But his most disingenuous turn came when he sought to dismiss Joe Biden as a lightweight. In fact, while Biden does have a classic politician auto-grin, so what? Ever see Boehner break a grin? How about Mitch McConnell? Bottom line, Joe Biden can speak without notes or preparation at a dissertation level on virtually any area of U.S. policy over the past fifty years. Clint has never uttered any sort of unscripted comments on any subject with any substance or depth. And Palin, for whom Mall Cop voted in 2008? Well....just forget it...

[mvscal]

...a series of tactical blunders that made no sense whatsoever on hitlers part were the saving grace of the rest of the world....germany could have won the war and many people simply don't know how close it was.....his failure to press his advantage at Dunkirk and annihilate the british forces there was a huge tactical error

An error that was only evident with the benefit of hindsight and Hitler was far from being solely responsible for that. There are a lot of misconceptions about the Wehrmacht and the French for that matter. Some people (morons) believe that the Wehrmacht was an invincible mechanized juggernaut that swept all from its path and the French were a nation of cowards who ran away at their first sight of these six and half feet tall, fire breathing German landsers. Wrong. The Battle of France was far from the triumphal cakewalk that tards such as sucksawholedic seem to believe.

The first misconception is the state of German mechanization. Germany invaded France with 140 divisions only ten of which were armored. The other 130 divisions had a smattering of trucks between them but, for the most part, they were legging it. Another misconception is the state of German tanks in 1940. In a word, they were pure crap. Small, lightly armed and armored. The French had more and better tanks. What the French didn't have was a modern tactical doctrine and their communications were appallingly primitive. In modern operational thought there is a concept called the OODA loop. It is a decision matrix (Observe, Orient, Decide and Act). The Germans concentrated their armor, tore a hole in the French lines at Sedan and punch into operational depth. So far, so good. They were inside the French loop. The French were reacting to circumstances that no longer applied.

The problem was that this speed was taking a high toll on the armored units. It made logistical support extremely difficult and, more worrisome, it opened a huge gap between the mechanized forces and the leg infantry which exposed the valuable panzer divisions to annihilation. That wasn't just Hitler's view. It was the consensus view of the German officer corps. When Goering (another dope addled dipshit) stepped in and oversold the Luftwaffe's ability to reduce the Dunkirk pocket, the deal was sealed.

...concentrating on bombing british cities rather than trying to take out the RAF was another error...

I believe that the term blunder is often misused in relation to the study of military history. Blunders are always apparent in hindsight. What might appear to a reader 50 or 100 years after the fact a blunder might actually have mitigating factors. The Battle of Britian isn't one of those. This was a straight up fuck up. The attacks on the radar stations and airfields had the RAF on the ropes.

his failure to invade and take over britain provided staging grounds for the US and operation overlord....

That wasn't a failure. That was a nod to reality. The Luftwaffe failed to establish air supremacy over the Channel. That is the fundamental prerequisite for a cross channel invasion and, without it, you have no chance. We had it in 1944. The Germans didn't 1940. Deeper than that, Hitler really didn't want a war with Britain.

his attack on russia was another mistake,

That wasn't a mistake that was the program, the mission, the entire purpose of the Third Reich. They were going to exterminate the Jews and enslave the mongrel Soviet empire. Everything else they did was done to set the stage for this confrontation.

especially when he split the armies and decided to attack Kiev and Leningrad rather than going straight for Moscow....

Another common misconception is that the capture of Moscow would have resulted in Soviet collapse. I don't buy that at all. Napoleon captured Moscow for all the good it did him. Moscow was an important objective and rail center, but it was far from the last ditch for the Soviets. I don't have any problem with Barbarossa as conceived. The Germans inflicted 4 million casualties on the Soviets in the first 100 days of fighting. I think it's understandable that they thought that would be enough to take the fight out of the Soviets. Who else could survive that kind of horrific mauling? The didn't just survive, they counterattacked in December with fresh troops from Siberia.

I think the more critical error was splitting Army Group South in 1942 and trying to take the Caucasus and Stalingrad simultaneously. The final coffin nail on the Ostfront was Citadel in 1943. Even Hitler knew better but he just couldn't help himself.

if not for the resolve of british and american forces things could have turned out a lot different than they did....

Sure it helped, but the Russians did the heavy lifting against the Germans. They most of the killing and most of the dying.

[mvscal]

There is not a single example of his expertise or shrewd planning,

Other than embracing embracing cutting edge military theory which was not adopted by any other major power until demonstrated successful by his armies, the reoccupation of the Rhineland, the Austrian Anschluss, the annexation of Czechoslovakia, the adoption of an obscure officer's plan for the Battle of France etc. etc.

As usual, you remain pitifully ignorant, embarassingly uneducated and irremediably stupid.

[mvscal]

I'll let the experts chime in on this, but wasn't Germany on the verge of A-bomb development?

No, they weren't even close.

[LTS TRN 2]

I'll let the experts chime in on this, but wasn't Germany on the verge of A-bomb development?

No, they weren't even close.

Really?



Do you know what this is? Of course you don't. Well, it wasn't to be used for popping corn. And of course the Nazis were on the fast track to nukes. Here's the real story, you pathetic total fraud.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/military/n ... -bomb.html


As far as Hitler actually poring over maps and giving orders, yes he certainly did that--straight into Russia, etc.--to the complete and unrelenting chagrin of his military leadership. Hitler was barely a competent corporal and was not in any way trained or disposed for actual large scale planning. You are such an utter fraud it's a joke.

[LTS TRN 2]

Bottom line, Joe Biden can speak without notes or preparation at a dissertation level on virtually any area of U.S. policy over the past fifty years.

So now you are a comedian. All he has to do is copy someone else.

Joe plagerizes Bobbie . . .

Ol' Joe's a quitter in '87 for plagerizing

I think you have found your calling, a real funny guy.

You completely miss the point as usual, "roach." Sure, Biden did indeed borrow the eloquent--and accurate--statement of RFK as it aplied to the vile agenda of Reagan, but at issue is not simple speechifying or sloganeering. No, what Biden can do is actually speak authoritatively on any subject of U.S.--and foreign--policy and history of the past fifty years--without notes. Okay? Do you think Mittens could do that? How about Reagan? Ryan? How about Clint?

[LTS TRN 2]

Okay, a hollow and idiotic simplistic misapprehension from a desperately scared White Power survivalist on Cleveland's West side. Dan Quayle was in fact the best golfer to ever grace the top ticket, but he was basically a wind-up GOP robot whose gaffes and awkward attempts at spontaneity were duly noted and laughed at by the nation. Do you really know anything about Biden?

I'm not saying I necessarily support him--is there really a difference when we consider both parties support the Permanent War, the fake apartheid state, big oil, Wall St., etc.--but he is in fact extremely articulate and possessed of an encyclopedic sort of mind. Don't believe it?

[smackaholic]

I'll let the experts chime in on this, but wasn't Germany on the verge of A-bomb development?

No, they weren't even close.

That'll happen when you attempt to exterminate your biggest talent pool. Just another example of Hitler's monumental stupidity.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

Okay, a hollow and idiotic simplistic misapprehension from a desperately scared White Power survivalist on Cleveland's West side. Dan Quayle was in fact the best golfer to ever grace the top ticket, but he was basically a wind-up GOP robot whose gaffes and awkward attempts at spontaneity were duly noted and laughed at by the nation. Do you really know anything about Biden?

I'm not saying I necessarily support him--is there really a difference when we consider both parties support the Permanent War, the fake apartheid state, big oil, Wall St., etc.--but he is in fact extremely articulate and possessed of an encyclopedic sort of mind. Don't believe it?

Of course Biden in intelligent.

Do you think Kadima would plant a moron in the White House as their liaison?

[mvscal]

I'll let the experts chime in on this, but wasn't Germany on the verge of A-bomb development?

No, they weren't even close.

Really?
...of course the Nazis were on the fast track to nukes. Here's the real story, you pathetic total fraud.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/military/n ... -bomb.html

I guess we know why you never cite any sources in your posts. Here you managed to kick your own ass with the opening sentences of your own source.

How close were the Nazis to developing an atomic bomb? The truth is that National Socialist Germany could not possibly have built a weapon like the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

Germany never achieved let alone sustained a critical reaction. They couldn't produce graphite of sufficient purity to moderate a reaction and were forced to rely on heavy water as a moderating medium and their only source for that was Norsk Hydro in Norway which was a total bust. The Norwegian resistance mangaged to get their existing stocks of heavy water out of the country and the allies bombed the plant.

The German nuclear program was a complete joke. They had neither the resources nor the expertise to pull it off.

[mvscal]

Do you really know anything about Biden?

Yes. He is a complete moron and providing assassination insurance is the only reason he was placed on the ticket. His overwhelming stupidity is on public display every time he opens his dicksucker.

Personally I think he should be miked up 24/7.

[smackaholic]

What ^^^^ said.

A liquored up Dan Quayle would look like Shakespeare next to that mong.

[Diego in Seattle]

Here's why our economy is in the shitter....

IN the rancorous debate over how to get the sluggish economy moving, we have forgotten the wisdom of Henry Ford. In 1914, not long after the Ford Motor Company came out with the Model T, Ford made the startling announcement that he would pay his workers the unheard-of wage of $5 a day.

Not only was it a matter of social justice, Ford wrote, but paying high wages was also smart business. When wages are low, uncertainty dogs the marketplace and growth is weak. But when pay is high and steady, Ford asserted, business is more secure because workers earn enough to become good customers. They can afford to buy Model Ts.

This is not to suggest that Ford single-handedly created the American middle class. But he was one of the first business leaders to articulate what economists call “the virtuous circle of growth”: well-paid workers generating consumer demand that in turn promotes business expansion and hiring. Other executives bought his logic, and just as important, strong unions fought for rising pay and good benefits in contracts like the 1950 “Treaty of Detroit” between General Motors and the United Auto Workers.

Riding the dynamics of the virtuous circle, America enjoyed its best period of sustained growth in the decades after World War II, from 1945 to 1973, even though income tax rates were far higher than today. It created not only unprecedented middle-class prosperity but also far greater economic equality than today.

The chief executives of the long postwar boom believed that business success and workers’ well-being ran in tandem.

Frank W. Abrams, chairman of Standard Oil of New Jersey, voiced the corporate mantra of “stakeholder capitalism”: the need to balance the interests of all the stakeholders in the corporate family. “The job of management,” he wrote, “is to maintain an equitable and working balance among the claims of the various directly affected interest groups,” which he defined as “stockholders, employees, customers and the public at large.”

Earl S. Willis, a manager of employee benefits at General Electric, declared that “the employee who can plan his economic future with reasonable certainty is an employer’s most productive asset.”

From 1948 to 1973, the productivity of all nonfarm workers nearly doubled, as did average hourly compensation. But things changed dramatically starting in the late 1970s. Although productivity increased by 80.1 percent from 1973 to 2011, average wages rose only 4.2 percent and hourly compensation (wages plus benefits) rose only 10 percent over that time, according to government data analyzed by the Economic Policy Institute.

At the same time, corporate profits were booming. In 2006, the year before the Great Recession began, corporate profits garnered the largest share of national income since 1942, while the share going to wages and salaries sank to the lowest level since 1929. In the recession’s aftermath, corporate profits have bounced back while middle-class incomes have stagnated.

Today the prevailing cut-to-the-bone business ethos means that a company like Caterpillar demands a wage freeze and lower health benefits from its workers, while posting record profits.

Globalization, including the rise of Asia, and technological innovation can’t explain all or even most of today’s gaping inequality; if they did, we would see in other advanced economies the same hyperconcentration of wealth and the same stagnation of middle-class wages as in the United States. But we don’t.

In Germany, still a manufacturing and export powerhouse, average hourly pay has risen five times faster since 1985 than in the United States. The secret of Germany’s success, says Klaus Kleinfeld, who ran the German electrical giant Siemens before taking over the American aluminum company Alcoa in 2008, is “the social contract: the willingness of business, labor and political leaders to put aside some of their differences and make agreements in the national interests.”

In short, German leaders have practiced stakeholder capitalism and followed the century-old wisdom of Henry Ford, while American business and political leaders have dismantled the dynamics of the “virtuous circle” in pursuit of downsizing, offshoring and short-term profit and big dividends for their investors.

Today, we are all paying the price for this shift. As Ford recognized, if average Americans do not have secure jobs with steady and rising pay, the economy will be sluggish. Since the early 1990s, we have been mired three times in “jobless recoveries.” It’s time for America’s business elites to step beyond political rhetoric about protecting wealthy “job creators” and grasp Ford’s insight: Give the middle class a better share of the nation’s economic gains, and the economy will grow faster. Our history shows that.


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/03/opini ... d=fb-share

[LTS TRN 2]

The article's point is well taken. The current desperate slash and burn mindset of the GOP is disastrous even for the tiny percentage of corporate fuckstains reaping unprecedented wealth. And this toxic attitude of the GOP has not been developed through any responsible theory or thinkers, but from the simplistic monkey-gagging gack of frauds like Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman--as being mouthed by the stunningly simplistic Tea Bagger types like Ryan.