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Islam is an evil religion that tells them to kill non muslims. They would use it if teh could get away with it.

Sorry, whatever protection you have against terrorists is highly inefficient. The only reason you aren't dead is because no-one rellay wants to kill you.
So no, you are wrong. Most muslims are good people that doesn't want to kill anyone.

Exactly. Chrisq's commentary is based on utter ignorance. There was a large Gallup study about the Muslim community, the largest ever conducted about this topic, published as a book in 2008. In a nutshell, the study shows that Muslims are as peaceful as other people and share amazingly many views with e.g. most Americans. And, not very surprisingly, the very small militant minority among them is primarily motivated by political -- not religious -- reasons just like most other militants.

The Department of Homeland Security is a mess, mind you, but that's as much implementation as anything else, it's designed to make it possible for Congress to monitor the security pork better, which had previously been scattered through the Federal Government, and therefore had no single cabinet secretary that could be brought in to testify and question, and no single budget bill to cut deals over. The problem is not the department, as much as it is that the United States has a pervasive fear in its population. For example, take a look at this gallup poll trend over the years on perceptions of crime: http://www.gallup.com/poll/150464/Americans-Believe-Crime-Worsening.aspx and then compare it to actual violent crime rates. Americans by a large margin believe that crime is getting worse, when, in fact, violent crime is going down. Note that the graph strongly corresponds to rhetoric on crime, and to personal economic, as opposed to physical, insecurity.

It does not matter what the department is called, as long as Americans vastly over-rate the chances of dying in criminal or terrorist attacks, particularly in crimes committed by strangers or foreigners, as opposed to the far more likely case of being killed by someone they know. Statistically speaking, suicide is more common that homicide, and among homicide categories, being killed by a current or former romantic partner outweighs all other categories. But that's not what DoHs monitors by and large. Instead looked at in an unbiased fashion, for example this post at Reason magazine, http://reason.com/archives/2006/08/11/dont-be-terrorized terrorism is a lower risk that we run going out to drive, or consuming ordinary products.

Of course, spreading the idea that it is a mainstream Christian belief that the entire universe is 6000 years old does help to make Christianity look silly, which is why this argument is always propped up by non-Christians.

Are you aware that a Gallup poll taken less than a year ago (December 2010) shows that 40% of Americans believe that the Universe and humans in their present form were created by God in the very recent past (less than 10,000 years ago)?

You and I may both wish that this were not the case, but the Young-Earth viewpoint is not a fringe idea that is held by a small number of zealots.

The first one (temp) seems to have peaks at 10 or 20, 130, 240, 325, and 410 or so.

These glacial oscillations have gone on for the past 3 million years; the Vostok core is just the tail end of it (and easy to cite). They are extremely regular for a geological process (they are overlaid by some other processes, which accounts for the variability). They are, in fact, gradually lengthening and deepening (like a grandfather clock running down). You really need to stop being lazy and do some reading yourself so that you can actually understand what you're looking at.

There is something serious going on here, but so badly overstating the precision of the results is no way to convince even moderately intelligent people (who passed their high-school math classes) of anything.

That's because you still aren't thinking clearly about the arguments. The length or structure of the cold periods doesn't matter much to us (although it has been remarkably regular for dozens of cycles). What matters is that they are long and civilization destroying, that the warm periods are invariably brief, and that we have been in a warm period for about 10-20ka. The Vostok core illustrates this four of those cycles. It also shows you that temperatures and CO2 concentrations have been as high as predicted by IPCC for this cycle if we don't do anything, yet earth entered another long cold spell anyway.

So, explain to me, since earth hasn't escaped from this regular cycle for millions of years, at higher temperatures and higher CO2 concentrations, why should it do so now? And even if human activity could cause such a change in global climate, why wouldn't that be a better outcome than another 80000 years of vast ice sheets covering the northern hemisphere?

As for convincing people, people seem to be coming around, with 48% now saying that the concerns were exaggerated (up from 31% in 1998) : http://www.gallup.com/poll/126560/americans-global-warming-concerns-continue-drop.aspx

Yeah; I've seen those figures somewhere. ;-)

Obviously, you didn't understand them at all then, since you responded to my comment about glacial oscillations with a comment about a putative 30 million year ice age cycle. Therefore, again, do some reading and try to understand this stuff.

While it doesn't mean much directly (as the two major parties are self-interested groups rather than liberal or conservative in my view), Tennessee is actually a Democratic leaning state (remember Al Gore here in Nashville, during the recount?). Currently a Republican governor, but the mayor of Nashville, Memphis and all other cities with populations over 100k are all Democrats, with one independent.

The state as a whole tends to lean Democratic: http://www.gallup.com/poll/114016/state-states-political-party-affiliation.aspx

20% of physics students, at this university level, thought that humanity had traveled beyond the Moon? And some thought that we routinely use the shuttle to travel to the moon...

That's a lot easier to stomach than the fact that 75% of Americans with postgraduate degrees (and 84% overall) believe that a mythical being was involved in created humanity
(source)

Capitalism

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Socialism

Capitalism

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Socialism

Capitalism

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Socialiam

What's odd in this case is there there's so little respect for science and the scientists that do it.

The first clue would be that less than 40% of Americans believe in 'the natural selection of the species' (a.k.a. evolution). If people reject something that is so widely accepted in the scientific community, it isn't surprising that they will willingly choose to ignore scientists in other areas when it suites them. Especially if the people they elect (e.g. George W. Bush) are proud of the fact that they are uninformed or selective in what they want to hear.

The way some talk you'd think most of the country believes in the literal interpretation of the creation story. If that were the case why haven't I met anyone who believes that by now? Most of the people I know are closer to being agnostic than anything else, like myself, but I know a few people who are very religious and they completely embrace science. For them there's no question that evolution is real and that the world is billions of years old.

I'd be curious to know how that poll was conducted, how far they probed. Did they what aspect of the Adam and Eve story people believe? Literal or figurative. The number of people who believe might be high, I would expect that the people who believe it literally is a lot lower. Or maybe people have somehow mashed together ideas so that humans evolved from apes into Adam and Even and then went on from there? Who knows? But the picture certainly isn't clear.

The funny thing is that you have people on one side of the fence who want to demonstrate that people are still religious, and on the other you've got those who want to show how stupid people can be. So it's possible loaded questions will get asked that lead, interestingly enough, to the same results.

Polling methodologies are not this issue, here. Polling organizations are fully prepared to support their methodologies, especially this one. And according to this poll a stunning 53% of the US population "believe that God created man exactly how the Bible describes it." The same poll also revealed that a staggering two-thirds of the US population thinks that creationism is definitely true or probably true. (39% and 27%, respectively.) Institutionalized idiocy via religious indoctrination is the political reality in the US at this time; instead of waffling about polling methodologies, I suggest you take a stand for rationality and against religion, or stfu and stay on the sidelines in this debate.

The way some talk you'd think most of the country believes in the literal interpretation of the creation story. If that were the case why haven't I met anyone who believes that by now? Most of the people I know are closer to being agnostic than anything else, like myself, but I know a few people who are very religious and they completely embrace science. For them there's no question that evolution is real and that the world is billions of years old.

I'd be curious to know how that poll was conducted, how far they probed. Did they what aspect of the Adam and Eve story people believe? Literal or figurative. The number of people who believe might be high, I would expect that the people who believe it literally is a lot lower. Or maybe people have somehow mashed together ideas so that humans evolved from apes into Adam and Even and then went on from there? Who knows? But the picture certainly isn't clear.

The funny thing is that you have people on one side of the fence who want to demonstrate that people are still religious, and on the other you've got those who want to show how stupid people can be. So it's possible loaded questions will get asked that lead, interestingly enough, to the same results.

Polling methodologies are not this issue, here. Polling organizations are fully prepared to support their methodologies, especially this one. And according to this poll a stunning 53% of the US population "believe that God created man exactly how the Bible describes it." The same poll also revealed that a staggering two-thirds of the US population thinks that creationism is definitely true or probably true. (39% and 27%, respectively.) Institutionalized idiocy via religious indoctrination is the political reality in the US at this time; instead of waffling about polling methodologies, I suggest you take a stand for rationality and against religion, or stfu and stay on the sidelines in this debate.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/27682/onethird-americans-believe-bible-literally-true.aspx

1/3 of the US are literalists. That's not a small number. And they are motivated.

And they are telling you and me that we are going to Hell.

--
BMO

Not quite. It's actually worse than that. 1/3 of Americans feel that they must say that they believe the bible literally. They don't. They believe in this as much as they believe that professional wrestling is real and their local politicians are telling the truth. But they feel pressure to say that they do. They go to the community church and sing the blessings of Jesus, but could just as well be at a Nuremberg rally. The message doesn't matter so much. That is what is scary.

Now how many people in the vocal minority that spend tons of money getting out "the good word" actually believe what they are spewing? Very few. Anyone who is making money from the movement, from writers of books to TV evangelists to politicians are all suspect.

That does not mean that there aren't some people who actually truly believe these bible stories. But they are in a very small minority.

>Only a very small fraction of Christians - even evangelical Christians - insist on taking every word of the Bible literally.

Between 40-50% of adults in the United States say they believe in YEC, depending on the poll.[7] According to a Gallup poll in December 2010, around 40% of Americans believe in YEC, with 52% among Republicans and 34% among Democrats. The percentage falls quickly as the level of education increasesâ"only 22% of respondents with postgraduate degrees believed compared with 47% of those with a high school education or less.[8]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Earth_creationism

PRINCETON, NJ -- About one-third of the American adult population believes the Bible is the actual word of God and is to be taken literally word for word. This percentage is slightly lower than several decades ago. The majority of those Americans who don't believe that the Bible is literally true believe that it is the inspired word of God but that not everything it in should be taken literally. About one in five Americans believe the Bible is an ancient book of "fables, legends, history, and moral precepts recorded by man."

http://www.gallup.com/poll/27682/onethird-americans-believe-bible-literally-true.aspx

1/3 of the US are literalists. That's not a small number. And they are motivated.

And they are telling you and me that we are going to Hell.

--
BMO

Unfortunately it looks like you need to have a talk with some of your co-religionists.

Those poll results are kind of frightening.

I was raised in a Protestant household. I now lead a Protestant household (Baptist). I've been to several churches, camps, meetings, and various gatherings. I have never, ever met a preacher or other leader that believed the EarthSunMoonStars were 6000 years old. Now, I'm sure that these people exist and use religion as their reasoning, but there are nutjobs in every group. Saying that because of the occasional nutjob believes it, all or most must believe the same thing is no different that saying because the occasional Muslim wants to kill all humans then all Muslims want to kill all humans.

HERE. Would it be fair for me to say that many NASA scientists are spies? Of course not. Then why is it fair for you to stereotype any other group based on a few nutjobs who mental illness is in no way related to whatever group you are using them to belittle?

Unfortunately it looks like you need to have a talk with some of your co-religionists.

they report the news in ways that look good for the Democrats

If that's what they're trying to do, they're astoundingly incompetent.

Polls (such as Gallup) currently put approval rating of Democrats and Republicans at about 30%. That means that right now we actually have a plurality of voters that disapprove of both major parties but have nowhere to go.

40% of people in USA "believe in a strict interpretation of creationism" (Gallup 2010). That includes 47% of people with no more than a high school education and 60% of people who attend church weekly.

Try some facts next time.

Here ya go... Abortion, Public Option, Environment.

The environment vs. economy numbers have slipped in the last couple of years, as the economy fell off a cliff. But before that, they were just as I said.

Considering such a small portion of the people trust congress I suggest we not have them make any changes at this point.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/141512/congress-ranks-last-confidence-institutions.aspx

Another thing I'd like to see before discussing such a task is to have anyone point out ONE SINGLE law that has been created in the last 30 years that is as brief, clear and understandable by the common person as the constitution. Even with the strange wording from 200 years ago it is more clear than any recent legislation I've seen. Maybe it's the lack of special interest clauses or graft or maybe it's because it wasn't written predominantly by lawyers.

Deep breath...

You do realize the Fukushima Daiichi plant is 40 years old, right?

Yes, and I'm also aware that the plant was supposed to have been decommissioned already, per the regulatory code you cite. It just wasn't because that regulatory code was ignored for the sake of profit and convenience.

The code wasn't ignored, it was overturned. The regulators were telling the Japanese government that it was unsafe for the last 5 years. They were also talking about the falsified safety records in the plant. Nobody lied, this was public information. It was just completely disregarded by the Japanese government.

There are a lot of plants built during that time, sure, but every plant that I know of keeps up with the current safety standards and are under constant, continuous monitoring to make sure everything is safe.

And with all the lies about the state of Fukishima while it was occuring, how can I trust anything you say about these inspections? Are the inspectors on the take from the industry? Did they used to work in the industry? Are they ignoring this hairline crack or that little problem because "it'll be OK"?

The inspectors are not financially influenced by the industry at all. IAEA, which is the security organization that was warning Japan of the issues regarding Fukushima Daiichi, reports directly to the UN. Their focus is peaceful uses of nuclear technology as well as regulate nuclear safety and security. This industry also has at least two more regulatory councils; WANO, (which was established after Chernobyl by IAEA, the UN, and independent governments/nuclear plants, whose focus is nuclear safety and efficiency) as well as WINS (established in 2008 to influence the safe handling of nuclear material and facilities). I would absolutely hope they used to work in the industry, I can't imagine anybody more qualified to inspect a nuclear power plant than someone from the field. The inspectors don't ignore a single hair, let alone a hairline crack. I've been through inspections before, they are properly thorough. Besides, if one of them lies, they'll be caught red-handed by either of the other two and wouldn't be trusted again.

I don't trust the regulators. I don't trust the industry. They both lie. How can I have any trust for any part of it when they lie?

Neither the regulators nor the industry lie. There's no incentive for the regulators to brush over something, they don't get bonuses for passing more plants, they themselves are regulated by the UN. The last thing they want is to break international law. The liars are the governments. They're the ones that have to sink money into plants that need repairs/reconditioning. Japan happens to be a very proud country and ignored the warnings given. This is what has to stop.

At least I know the coal industry isn't lying to me. I know what the dangers are and I trust that people are aware. I do not trust any booster of nuclear power anymore. With so many lies, how can I? And you don't even bother to address that point at all, which tells me you don't actually care that they lie.

The coal industry is most certainly lying to you. They spend MILLIONS in advertising and attempts at covering up the death numbers. But more importantly, you make a very dangerous, and erroneous, assumption. If you assume people know of the dangers (which is not true, as evidenced by this article stating that ten years ago, one out of five people believed the sun revolves around Earth) you're putting more faith in mankind then they deserve. People live ignorantly by choice.

The danger and scope of Fukishima was consist

Oh for goodness sake.

Source for following statements
A recent gallup poll shows 54% of people who claim to be "very familiar with the patriot act" are either satisfied with it, or want it to go further. 65% of people "somewhat familiar" with it have the same opinion, and 62% of people not familiar with it have that opinion.

In all, 62% of americans do NOT think it has gone too far.

Regardless of whether or not you think the patriot act goes too far, calling for a revolution because you disagree with the majority of americans is going rather too far. This is a democracy, not an anarchy.

Feel free to express your opinion and lobby for change, but good gracious tone down the rhetoric. The government "pissed off its populace" far more when Obama issued the Executive order on abortion in his first week in office (Source, showing 58% disapproval and 35% approval of the order); but for some reason I didnt see people clamoring for a revolution over that; to cry for armed rebellion over a mere ~%40 disapproval seems ignorant and hypocritical.

Oh for goodness sake.

Source for following statements
A recent gallup poll shows 54% of people who claim to be "very familiar with the patriot act" are either satisfied with it, or want it to go further. 65% of people "somewhat familiar" with it have the same opinion, and 62% of people not familiar with it have that opinion.

In all, 62% of americans do NOT think it has gone too far.

Regardless of whether or not you think the patriot act goes too far, calling for a revolution because you disagree with the majority of americans is going rather too far. This is a democracy, not an anarchy.

Feel free to express your opinion and lobby for change, but good gracious tone down the rhetoric. The government "pissed off its populace" far more when Obama issued the Executive order on abortion in his first week in office (Source, showing 58% disapproval and 35% approval of the order); but for some reason I didnt see people clamoring for a revolution over that; to cry for armed rebellion over a mere ~%40 disapproval seems ignorant and hypocritical.

You say it is a lie but 40% believe in strict creationism and another 38% believe in a god-driven evolution. That's the scary part.

Source: http://www.gallup.com/poll/145286/Four-Americans-Believe-Strict-Creationism.aspx

Hey, speaking of rhetoric, the whole public school failing thing is rhetoric. Rhetoric produced by people in the name of FUD and school vouchers. (Also, if you think a $7,000 voucher is going to get little Joe Underprivileged in the same school as Billy Gates IV, you're out of your goddamn mind.)

But wait! Everybody knows that the public school system in this country is a dismal failure. Everybody says so and it's in the news constantly. Nooope. Everybody thinks it's *someone else's* public schools that suck. Actual approval parents have for their childs public school is quite high. You want to see the power of rhetoric though: here it is.

In a country where 40% of the population still doesn't accept the theory of evolution, there is no such thing as "duh" science.

Fortunately, I expect that their inability to also grasp the reality of AGW will eventually remedy the situation in a manner suitable to please this childless, atheist misanthrope.

I found the link going back to 1970 even more interesting.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/1663/Media-Use-Evaluation.aspx

I wonder what started happening in 1976-present that caused the decline in media trust? I"m not sure about 1976-1980, but my guess for 1980 onward would be: Reaganomics and the rise of mega-corps with quarterly profit motives, media ownership concentrating under the hands of a few of those mega corps, the advent of cable news who was not beholding to providing news as a public service, as the primary three public airwave channels were required to previously, the success of 60 minutes showing how profitable news could be, etc...

"Distrust in U.S. Media Edges Up to Record High"

For the fourth straight year, the majority of Americans say they have little or no trust in the mass media to report the news fully, accurately, and fairly. The 57% who now say this is a record high by one percentage point.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/143267/distrust-media-edges-record-high.aspx

yet am in the market for an iPad - and I'm not the only one l know like me.

By some estimates it's about ten percent

Yeah, I'm not convinced by it. As TapeCutter pointed out they may only be interested in US citizens (doubtful though considering they mention world market share). It's not just that though - they seem to have reversed it in order to draw their conclusions. Sure there may be more "liberal"* Mac users by % than Windows users, but does that mean that liberals are more likely to be Mac users than PC users? Considering the difference in market share (89.2% : 10.8% according to the infographic) the data isn't representative. Also, the breakdown of users surveyed (52% : 25% : 23% - Windows : Mac : "other/those who don't define themselves as either") seem to suggest that the actual breakdown is "liberals" who use Mac is 14.5% (58% of 25%), "liberals" who use Windows is 18.72% (36% of 52%), "others" (non-liberal doesn't necessarily mean conservative) who use Mac is 10.5% (42% of 25%) and "others" who use Windows is 33.28% (64% of 52%) with "non-aligned" (presumably "no preference/both/Linux, BSD etc") people making up the remaining 23%. Assuming my calculations are accurate, that makes the split of those surveyed (who are either Mac or Windows users since they don't give data for the "others") 43.1% "liberal" to 56.9% "non-liberal", which would seem to suggest that those who were surveyed were a particularly liberal bunch considering most Americans seem to describe themselves as conservative or moderate (according to this article the % liberals is actually about 15-25% of the population assuming nothing drastic has happened in the last 2 years).

*"Liberal" is in scare quotes since it is self-reported and what someone claims to be and what they actually are can be wildly different. Different people use different definitions for things.

The same can be said of the "4 year college degree" bit as well. Windows degree = 28.08%, Mac degree = 16.75, Windows !degree = 23.92%, Mac !degree = 8.25%, with the rest, again, being "other". This data is even less useful than the political alignment as it can be pretty much be written off by the fact that Windows is extremely dominant in market share (i.e. the masses generally use Windows) and that, generally speaking, Windows computers are cheaper than the equivalent Macs (degree = higher chance of high payed job -> more likely to be willing to spend a lot of money on a computer).

There also seem to be some other rather suspect figures. They have placed "Win users are more likely to be suburban/rural" opposite "52% of Mac users live in a city". Those are connected but not directly comparable figures (what about urban town dwellers for example, and what are the actual figures for Win users/ non-city Mac users). The fashion/aesthetics clothing section doesn't give any direct comparisons, and under food & drink, I don't see how any of it is relevant other than possibly the vegetarianism bit. The newspaper preference is also not directly comparable (unless by "The Times" they mean "The New York Times" - considering there is a "The Times" paper, in the UK/on the internet at least, that would at best be misleading) and from websites down to magazines they simply list items (which are presumably "preferred" by that group, but without knowing the selection criteria the data is useless; that also applies to most of the food and drink section).

Interestingly, the figures on the bar chart at the bottom which shows preferred computer type has different figures than the main infographic. That's probably down to rounding though as the graph also includes a "skipped" option (when that is removed the numbers almost correspond).

All in all, the whole thing screams of data dredging, whether intentional or not, and is certainly skewed by the fact that all respondents were visitors to the Hunch rather than members of the general public, and that the creator of the infographic is a Mac user (although the same would likely be true in reverse for a Windows user - the only way to be truly unbiased in a situation like this is if the creator is not a computer user).

this is the beginning of the end of nuclear power in japan. maybe the usa. probably europe

I doubt that, and I have numbers to back me up Majority Americans Say Nuclear Power Plants Safe Americans are fear mongers and still think nuclear power is safe after the incident. Since Japan loves futuristic tech and had no problems with it before the incident I doubt the fear will stick as much as you think it will. What is your basis for such a high level of fear?

6 in 10 Americans don't even believe in evolution. How could they have any respect for the biological sciences? http://www.gallup.com/poll/114544/darwin-birthday-believe-evolution.aspx

I believe GP refers to that yearly Gallup poll where they get a figure of about 40% (highest ever was 47% in 1999) of Americans asserting that Young Earth Creationism is true. So, while he is trolling, he's not that far from truth on that particular point.

According to the latest Gallup poll on homosexuality, 48% of the US population believes that homosexuality is immoral. That's more than 44% who believe that doctor-assisted suicide is. Yeah, you could pander to homosexuals and remove the app, and then offend the other half of the country by thus giving implicit support to an activity they consider immoral. That's the problem with "offensive" censorship: everything offends someone. Once you start censoring, you can't really stop until you censor everything. Or, of course, Apple could assume that all iPhone users are left wing and the rest of the population's opinions do not matter, which seems to be what happened.

But does Unborn Child = Born Child?

Doesn't matter.

And at what point during the pregnancy does the magic event happen where the unborn child = the born child?

Immaterial. When the unborn child has a heartbeat and brain activity, it can be protected under law.

The rest of us, no matter what gender do not get a say.

Don't be such a pussy. We ALL get to have a say. If you want to opt out of yours, be my guest.

Not you, not me, and not Scott Roeder, the hero of the pro-life movement (although none will admit it).

Scott Roeder's actions were penny wise and pound foolish. Yes, Tiller will not kill another baby again but his death will be valuable propaganda for the pro-aborts. It will make it more difficult to reverse Roe v Wade.

Your god does not get a say either, by the way.

Tell us, what's my God's name? What does my God command of me? If you don't know, then you're just talking out of your ass.

So the fact that a growing majority of Americans believe that abortion should be legal is something that you disregard?

I disregard all of the pro abortion lies.

And you are lying.

More Americans are pro-life.

According to the poll, 57% believed abortion should be legal in "all or most cases", and 88% believed it should be legal when the life of the mother is at risk.

The poll that you just made up is less accurate than the poll conducted by Gallop.

23% believe abortion should be illegal in all circumstances. 22% believe abortion should be legal in all circumstances. 53% believe that abortion should be legal under certain (rape/incest/life of the mother) circumstance. In other words, 75% of Americans favor more abortion restrictions.

49% of women are pro-life. 44% of women are pro abortion.

54% of men are pro-life. %49 of men are pro abortion.

Now you get to tell me how "Americans once believed slavery should be legal" and I'm going to say "But your argument was that "The only pepole who are pro-abortion are radical feminists, blah blah".

Think again. Now is when I recap and tell you that you're full of shit and making up numbers doesn't compare to published poll results.

Are you saying the majority of Americans are radical feminists, uninformed leftists and men who want to use women for sex?

The majority of Americans that you imagined are. In the real world, not so much.

LK

Even if we don't go to referendum, I'd say a democracy requires representative and senators to vote in line with popular opinion. Examples: healthcare (at varying points, polls showed majority of American opposed to), Patriot act (I'll guess that most would oppose), and currently most Americans feel that cutting programs and the number of state employees is better than taxation. Granted, polls aren't votes, but perhaps they can give us an idea of how people would vote, and illuminate the fact that our government isn't a true democracy: it's only a democracy insofar as we decide who controls our lives.

The "Tea Party" is nothing more than the traditional socially conservative and upward redistributionist Republican base.

Really? You quite obviously don't read much news do you? Let me provide some current news that points out how full of shit you really are.

Can Republicans cut defense spending?

But some Republicans, primarily those associated with the Tea Party, have started to push back against their colleagues. Former House Majority Leader Richard Armey, who has worked closely with the leadership of the Tea Party Movement, told The New York Times, "A lot of people say if you cut defense, you're demonstrating less than a full commitment to our nation's security -- and that's baloney." House Speaker John Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor have signaled they are willing to consider the Pentagon's budget in discussions.

The most recent crowd elected. You know, the ones the liberals like to trash talk. Are for cutting national defense. They do not consider national defense to be off the table.

Now, if you ask the common citizen. You know. Liberals, conservitives, independents? That is a different matter.

Americans Oppose Cuts in Education, Social Security, Defense

PRINCETON, NJ -- Prior to the State of the Union address, a majority of Americans said they favor cutting U.S. foreign aid, but more than 6 in 10 opposed cuts to education, Social Security, and Medicare. Smaller majorities objected to cutting programs for the poor, national defense, homeland security, aid to farmers, and funding for the arts and sciences.

You need to qualify your statement. Actually, everyone here that is making these general statements need to qualify their statements. Are you saying that specific political party's are saying no to cutting defense? Your fucking assholes if you are. But if your saying the general pulibic is saying no, then you have some truth in that statement. And please note, NOWHERE did that pole single out any specific party when it poled the general public.

I have no idea how good Harris is. If you like Gallup, Gallup 2005 says 25%, so that might be more accurate.

I said it was almost to the point where it feels that way. Intentional hyperbole aside, I think it's clear that dissent of all flavors (particularly against actual government positions and actions) are slowly being vilified. Refer to recent Napolitano (and others) quotes over the last two months as an example of where they're headed.

Anyway, I'll see your Islam and raise you an Atheist.

+ Atheists are the least electable persons in the country (source: 2007 Gallup poll).
+ Atheists are the least trusted people in America (source: UMN study).

Ninety percent of respondents thought whites and blacks could share their vision of society. About 80 percent said the same of Hispanics, Jews and conservative Christians. More than 70 percent said it of immigrants, and 64 percent said it of Muslims. Atheists had the lowest rating at 54 percent.

Asked whether they would disapprove of a child's wish to marry an atheist, 47.6 percent of those interviewed said yes. Asked the same question about Muslims and African-Americans, the yes responses fell to 33.5 percent and 27.2 percent, respectively. The yes responses for Asian-Americans, Hispanics, Jews and conservative Christians were 18.5 percent, 18.5 percent, 11.8 percent and 6.9 percent, respectively. (source)

I would certainly hesitate before letting anyone get the idea that I was an atheist. I probably wouldn't mention it to my neighbors. I wouldn't mention it to a girlfriend's family. I absolutely would not mention it to an employer or colleague or would avoid inadvertently giving the impression that I was. People react viciously and with great prejudice toward it and it is not a stretch to imagine that a "believer" would can your ass for it. Or at least, treat you with great disfavor within the work place.

And, no, I don't necessarily buy that being associated with Islam makes you the most likely to be disappeared within this country. I steadfastly assert that it's anyone voicing too much dissent that crosses the attention of the wrong official. Now, you might be accused of ties to Islam or some terrorist group as part of the justification of harassing or disappearing you (like the guy in Portland a few years ago and several others in the last half decade), but that's more a scapegoat than a reason.

Those who buy Apple products, such as the iPad, tend to be younger college student types, and to draw a correlation, overwhelmingly liberal.

I don't know what the iPad demographics are other than anecdote--they aren't just for younger people.

But to your point--Those younger people will be growing up after buying iPads will become more conservative as they age to 30 years old. http://www.gallup.com/poll/120857/conservatives-single-largest-ideological-group.aspx

I say it's near perfect marketing if your hypothesis of younger people buying iPads is correct and the simple Gallup demographic information is correct.

Given this Gallup Poll then perhaps the backers of science ought to be worried. After all it is the domain of the liberal,elite, socialist atheist fascists. All god-fearing Christians know that everything is described in teh bibul, no need for this science nonsense.

Sorry if I was unclear. By votes, in this sense I meant the votes of legislators. Yes, the people vote for the legislators fairly well. Then those legislators sell their policy votes to the highest bidder.

Concerning your statement, "Just because your party didn't win doesn't mean the system isn't working the way the majority of the voters want."
1. I do not support any party, since political parties inherently coopt politicians away from the interests of the people.
2. The majority of voters did not get what they want. Congressional Confidence has been below 40% since at least the 1970s. No matter what party is in charge, they are letting the people down.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/141512/congress-ranks-last-confidence-institutions.aspx

Don't ask don't tell is being repealed, its happening. Just slower than you;d have liked.

Nevermind that it should have happened in Obama's first month in office. Nevermind that Obama could have halted the policy with the stroke of a pen. Nevermind that his public position - "DADT will be ended on my watch" - is directly contradicted by the DOJ's appeal in favor of continuing DADT. Nevermind that the proposed "fix" leaves the "repeal" up to the Pentagon - leaving it free to resume the discharges at a later date. Nevermind that there is no chance in hell that the Republicans will vote for a repeal now that they've picked up a bunch of Senate seats and taken over the House.

Obama's record on DADT is a gigantic FAIL, like most of his presidency. He could have accepted the lower court ruling that DADT was unconstitutional, while halting the policy via executive order, and pushed for a Congressional repeal as well - just as states have repealed their interracial marriage laws after they were all struck down by the Supreme Court.

Obama could have had an easy win-win-win: made a part of the Democratic base happy, kept well trained troops in the military while we are still bogged down in two wars, and established open service as the status quo instead of one of homophobia. Instead, he's got himself another loss-loss-loss while the Log Cabin Republicans are at the forefront of DADT repeal and even a majority of Republican voters favor ending the policy.

Now that's some weak-assed weak leadership.

Why would you think that? If parent poster did so, would you indeed engage with the argument? Looks to me like they don't think you would.

Perhaps it would be easier to debate a more limited statement: "Biology has a well known Liberal bias", perhaps?
http://www.gallup.com/poll/27847/majority-republicans-doubt-theory-evolution.aspx

False. Recent polls show over 60% of Americans disapprove of Obama's accomplishments.

That's as high as the disapproval was for Bush. To claim the average american is just fine-and-dandy-and-happy, is simply not true.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/106741/bushs-69-job-disapproval-rating-highest-gallup-history.aspx - Not even close.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/3742/new-poll-gauges-americans-general-knowledge-levels.aspx

Here is a good example. Look at the "what country Americans won their independence from" question. The answers other than US indicate people who didn't understand the question. Many of them probably thought "well we won independence in the revolutionary war from the british, I'm not sure who we won it from AFTER the revolutionary war... the French sound likely" some of those probably knew the french were our allies so it must have been someone else.

The "no opinion' category is 19% which is incorrectly interpreted as people who don't know the answer. The reality is that these are mostly people who are afraid any other answer will trigger a round of followup questions. Anyone who said "I don't care" was likely put in this category.

So you get closer to the number of Americans who know the answer to this question if you add up those who answered correctly and the "no opinion".

So 76% + 19% = 95% knowing the answer and a huge portion of the other 5% being tricked by the question.

So I was wrong almost half don't believe in evolution I'm still a sad panda :(

Spouting ignorance and rumor as if the source is valid statistics? Doesn't that make you as bad as those you seek to demonize? Or at least as bad as the network news anchors?

Gallop is a recognised and respected polling/opinion gathering institution..

They conducted a poll

http://www.gallup.com/poll/3742/new-poll-gauges-americans-general-knowledge-levels.aspx