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Howard Dean to Guest Blog for Lawrence Lessig
Ethanol writes "Starting Monday, Professor Lawrence Lessig (whom we all remember from Eldred v. Ashcroft) is going on vacation, and his weblog will be guest-hosted by Democratic presidential candidate Governor Howard Dean. Could this be a sign that a serious contender for President (tied for first for the nomination in the latest polls) has his head screwed on right about copyright law?"
I have seen a few of his appearances, and I must admit I am quite impressed with this guy. Then again maybe is that after 2.5 yrs of Mr. Bush my expectations for POTUS have been dramatically lowered.
Why would anyone let someone else keep their daily journal for them? And giving it away to a politician - that just begs for deep, dark secrets to be revealed.
When you don't have a leg to stand on, don't even get up.
Check out http://www.selectsmart.com/president/
it tells you which president to vote for based on your stance on the issues. I tested it out and it's very accurate. It gave me a reccomendation for green party 100% and Dean 96%. Since I really want Bush out and 3rd parties don't win, guess who I'm voting for? I'll probably read a few of his entries on Lessig's blog, and unless he's really unkosher this seals the deal.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
Either sane copyright laws, with a socialist welfare state, or bad copyright laws, and imperialist invasion of countries?
Why do people continue to vote for republicans and democrats anyway?
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
Until some lobbyist backs up to his house with a truck full of campaign contributions
I actually kinda like Dean, but saying that someone is a serious contender for the 2004 election because he's tied for the nomination at this point is kinda like saying your kid has a serious NBA future ahead of him because he's tied for tallest in grade 3.
The Republicans are praying that Dean gets the Democrat nomination.
It will reprise the George McGovern fiasco. Say it ain't so--Arrggh!
Does this mean that Lawrence Lessig likes Howard Dean? If yes, why? What ideas? Are they friends? Does Lessig think Dean would be a good president? Does it mean that will see the "real" Howard Dean? What kind of traffic boost will Lessig's site get? Will people associate Lessig's ideas and writing with Dean's, and is that a good thing? What is Dean's real motivation behind this? As a geek, do you think this is a good idea? Will your grandmother care, and does it matter that she does not understand this blog stuff? What is your favorite color?
How to Download YouTube Videos
Glad that its not for his facial expressions ; )
There are two kinds of egotists: 1) Those who admit it 2) The rest of us
I celebrated July 4 by getting off my ass and carrying placards in parades and handing out literature for Howard Dean in two small towns in Iowa. I had never done anything like that before. I had to get up at 5:30 in the morning to do it, and it was worth it.
Don't get me wrong, I haven't exactly caught Dean Fever yet, although we see eye-to-eye on many issues and I'm really impressed with the level of grassroots support that he has. It would be nice to have a president that isn't already owned before getting into office.
But, then, I'd settle for a president that can use the word "imminent" correctly. I think Dean rises to that challenge.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
You choose between one of two candidates because the majority does as well. If all the people like you banded togethor, and we stopped pushing those that don't care to vote, third parties might win more often.
As for me, I'm a minor. Read: Taxation without representation.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
...Just what us dems need, another Mondale.
Al Sharpton ranked second on my list, right in front of Howard Dean. Should I be scared?
Howard Dean has the balls to be pro P2P?? If he has the balls to make a move such as this, I will vote for him on principle.
It seems these other politicians are spineless, but if he has the guts to do this, he deserves to be President.
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Dean is a moderate who has the balls to speak his mind, but when he was a governer his actions were very moderate.
He almost reminds me of Clinton.
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1) Socialism could be improved here. Higher taxes are a small loss compared to the gains in education, health benefits, and social security. Capitalism is beginning to corrupt.
2) Because they're the ones who put their name out the most. America isn't too smart, and the average citizen does not look at all possible candidates, only the main ones. IMO, we shouldn't have political parties, because people tend to vote on party lines without even thinking about the person they are elected beyond their party.
Just my 2.
When you don't have a leg to stand on, don't even get up.
Overall, he didn't do that bad a job. In some ways Dean is actually an interesting mix of left and right. He is a former doctor, which partly explains a lot of his very strong positions with regards to health care. He certainly has come across as one of the strongest left standing democrats in many ads and articles, but he has an A grade from the NRA as he was not at all anti-gun ownership in Vermont. He is also reasonably fiscally conservative. Our state didn't go too overboard with spending, and we actually still have over 10 million dollars in our "rainy day fund," for what it's worth. My biggest quibble with his term was actually in regards to education, but a lot of that was the fault of the legislature and the courts (which ruled our old method was unconstitutional). Of the candidates, we could do a lot worse (come to think of it, we have been doing a lot worse) then Dean. Having met him, and lived with him as head of the state, I think he has some good ideas. I was actually kind of pro-war, but Bush has screwed us so badly on the domestic front in virtually every field, from economics to scientific research (VERY important to me) to basic civil rights, that I would vote for virtually anyone over him. I would recommend people look at his stands.
If anyone in the Democratic field is an unelectable nutcase, it's Dennis Kucinich. He's pretty well bonkers. Dean seems pretty well-grounded. I like his issue positions and think he's a viable candidate. If he gets the nomination, he'll need a running mate with strong foreign policy skills; if Kerry places second, he's a good choice, or maybe Wesley Clark. Kerry's too cold, and Gephardt is too much a career politician. I'm going with Dean.
From the comment-section on LL's blog:
LL responds:
It's a win-win deal. LL gets someone to blog while on vactation, Dean reach out to a couple of thousand potentional voters. But interesting anyway. Looking forward to reading this blog.
Melius mori in libertate quam vivere in servitute.
We non-USians can look forward to a great Democrats vs Republicans /. flamefest.
So we care about this why??
Dean is a socialist, openly so at that. He is about the last person in the world you want associated with your agenda if you want to be taken seriously.
If you don't like Bush then at least vote for a serious contender like Liberman or Kerry. Voting for Dean is a vote for socialism and state control over everything. You haven't seen big brother until someone like Dean takes control.
zxz..zxz..zxzxxx.zxz...zxzxzxzz....zxzzxzxz
zxz.......zxx.zxxzxz..zxzx..zxzz..zxzx..zxzx
zxz.zxzx..zxz..zxzzx..zxzxzxzxzx..zxzzxzxxzx
zxz..zxz..zxz...xzzx..zxz....zxz..zxz....zxz
My point exactly.
Kerry has a several plans to create more jobs, lower the deficit, and improve education and lower the cost of college education. Dean's only economic package is lowering the defecit. Thats it! Go to his website and prove me wrong?
Dean is popular because alot of liberals are very upset at the whitehouse and Dean loves to bash bush. He is more liberal.
Kerry is more moderate and has better appeal for middle of the road voters and has a better chance at unseating Bush. But the primaries are not the elections. Moderates tend to have more plans outside their special issues. For example Bush's economic plan is just more tax cuts. Clinton who is a moderate had several plans which created jobs.
If a president is on the far left or right the primaries will usually throw in opposites from angry voters that sometimes are too extreme for the general public. Recent examples include
1.)Jimmy Carter-> He was very liberal and Reagan emerged from angry conservative voters. ( He won because he was an actor and a great speaker) Majority of Americans hated his policies but did not think of Reagan himself as an extremist even though he was.
2.)Reagan - > Mondale. Mondale was too far from the left.
3.)Bill Clinton -> Need I say more. Bush is the anti clinton as you can get. He only won because of a blowjob. Incredible! Lieing about a war is not as bad as a blowjob.
4.)Bush - > Dean. If dean wins the primaries he will probably lose the elections. Americans fear and loath Managed health care and the right to see their own doctor. How did the republicans came to power in 94? It was the government manadated health care that scared them. Go to an ER in Britian and watch the long lines. Yes more Americans can now have health care but the quality will go down for the rich and those who already have it. Infact even Canadians prefer our system to their's in critical care. General care its the other way around.
The pendulum swings from angry voters on the far left and right. However Bush did run as a moderate and turned out to be more conservative then Reagon himself. This might be a weakness but a far left candidate has just a less appeal upon middle road voters, that they will vote for Bush because they are comfortable with someone who is more experienced. 64% of Americans claim that they will probably vote for Bush unless a democratic candidate appeals to them according to CNN.
http://saveie6.com/
This isn't exactly about copyright, but it is when you think about who has been pushing for the majority of the copyright measures we know and disdain:
s .h tm
http://www.kucinich.us/issues/issue_corporation
Start Running Better Polls
He looks like a good guy, but his TV ad was pretty hilarious. Did anyone else see it on the Daily Show? "...And that is why I approved this ad"
It's happened before, and it'll happen again as long as we have the Electoral College. You don't need the most popular votes to win, simply the most electoral votes.
"Could this be a sign that a serious contender for President (tied for first for the nomination in the latest polls) has his head screwed on right about copyright law?"
Could this be yet another ploy by a politician, promising everything before the campaign, and delivering nothing after being elected?
I'd love to believe otherwise. Sadly, that ain't happening. May this guy, if he does manage to get elected, prove me wrong.
Shame on /.
/. should give a thumbs up to how he is doing biz..
Howard Dean has used the Internet, specifically blogs, better than any presidential candidate. Every day, you can read their official blog or countless other personal blogs that give up to the minute info on what doing on the campaign trail. I have never felt more involved, or informed in a presidential campaign until Dean's.
All this use of blogs and such as created a tremendous amount grassroots support. Unlike other candidates that have raked in 1000s of dollars from big interests, Dean's campaign raised more than any other Democratic candidate last quarter mostly via the web with the average donation being $66 dollars..
Anyway, I feel that no matter what Dean's positions are (btw.. I think they are great)
Something is very wrong with that... that doesn't sound like a healthy democracy.
(In case you care, the 100% match for me was "Libertarian candidate")
Ryan T. Sammartino
"Ancora imparo"
What the hell are you talking about socialist? Dean is the most moderate out of all the others, would you rather have a true socialist like Hilary Clinton, Al Sharpton, Dick Gephart?
Dean is moderate, he didnt raise taxes, read his viewpoints and ideas before you assume just because hes a democrat thats hes a socialist.
Bush is more socialist than Dean! Bush is the one providing welfare to Africa, Bush is the one who wants to spend all our money on rebuilding the middle east.
Talk about socialism, go talk to George Bush and teach him how to be a real conservative.
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So what if he does? The president is the head of the Executive branch, not a member of the Legislative branch. He does not make the laws. And his veto can't undo the dammage that has already been done. And while we could do a lot better with an elected president than with Bush, one issue hardly means the man would be a suitable leader or not destroy us with other policies.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Why has he been so closed lipped on technology issues. You can't find anything on his position on his site.
In US, the service sector produces 80% of the GDP. The service sector is based on human labor and IT infrastructures which, all together, consume less than 2% of the total US energy consumption. This is the new economy: low energy consumption, low environmental impact, high productivity.
This scared Mr. Bush (who first made money when he won a oil contract from Bahrain when is father was playing the first gulf war), Mr. Cheney (who was CEO of Halliburton and still gets money from it), Mr. Rumsfeld (who was director of ABB when it sold 2 nuclear reactors to North Korea) and Ms. Rice (who was director of Chevron).
They are doing everything possible to protect their old industry (energy, oil, nuclear) at the expense of our industry (information technology), the future of the US economy and the US environment.
I believe Howard Dean may be on our side.
Schools in Washington, DC are among the best funded in the nation and among the worst performing. You can't just throw money at problems and expect them to solve themselves.
This guy seems kinda cool and all, but have any of you guys seen him in an interview? I saw him on Meet the Press once and he was struggling to answer questions. But I'll give him a chance. Hopefully he'll prove himself in the upcoming months.
ok... so where are the people shouting about how Dean is getting the equivalent of a monetary donation that's not being given to other candidates? What is it that all the money that everyone on slashdot goes to fund? Media: ads, office staff, platform talks, getting their message out, etc. Lessig is more of less a political lobbiest of a special interest group, but many of the slashdotters believe the same thing he does, so it's ok in this case... we just need to shut up the ones we disagree with. If Rush Limbaugh were to run for office and stay on the air during campaign season, wouldn't all the CFR people whine that he has an unfair advantage? How about if he let a single candidate guest host his program for a whole week?
Don't leave your mind so open that your brain falls out. Don't close it so much that you cut off the blood.
Normaly this news would excite me, but the Howard Dean that is running for president is not the same man as he was as our governor. I just don't know what to make of him anymore. Initiatives he opposed in Vermont now have his support, and vice-versa. His tirade over the war (regardless of your position on the war) seemed over the top. I found him downright scary.
I've met our former governor three times (it's a small state, and my involvement in statewide 4-H events gave me the opportunity). He seemed very personable, but actions towards the end of his time here tended to disillusion me (and many Vermonters) about "Howard the Coward" as some called him (especially after he wouldn't sign the civil-unions law publicly, instead of behind closed doors). A man who easily won his first three elections, found the next two more chalenging (many think that, if the Republican candidate - the same woman both times - had been more likeable, he might have lost). It is possible he could not have won another (his hand-picked successor did not).
I just don't know what to think of this move, I fear it is more than likely a political ploy, something we have seen more than enough of in Vermont these last two terms. The Democrats are desperate for the voters that went Green last time, because they know they need them. In Vermont, though, Dean was always very business friendly, too much so for me to trust him on this now. Which is the real Howard Dean? That is the question.
I saw Dean in NH, and actually asked him about the DMCA and the Mickey Law. He told me I was the first to ask him about the subject, and he didn't have an opinion (or the knowledge) then. Looks like his political team discussed it - something positive to be forthcoming? Hope so - I'm all for Howard Dean!
Purchse the bandwidth for 100 out of work IT folks.
Ensure they post to Slashdot once every 4 days to keep the candidtats name on the web.
Purchase ISP cupons for supporters. Specifically AOL, Earthlink and MSN cd's with Hundreds of thousands of free seconds.
Ensure people understand the candidate is a fighter. Always looking out for the small guy.
Ensure the big money understands the candidtate is looking out for their welfare.
Profit.
http://www.geocities.com/trebor_92627/Bush.htm
1. TAXES & SPENDING (Check any and all statements with which you agree)
what if i am for reducing taxes to pay for social services? laffer and mundell should have taught us something.
A democratic shrill candidate wanna be filling in for Lessig. I respect Lessig less now. It's akin to Jerry Springer filling in for Peter Jennings.
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
nothing to see here
I believe that every Democratic candidate except Dean voted in favor of the Patriot Act. Dean didn't get a vote, but he was outspoken against it from the very beginning. Every other candidate was willing to vote for that egregious act because it was politically expedient at the time. That is not the kind of decision-making I want from the next President of the United States. Love him or hate him, Dean is the Democratic candidate best qualified to LEAD this country and not FOLLOW the whims of popularity. I will NEVER cast a vote for anyone who voted for that Act. Ever.
I am much more liberal than Dean, but his aggressive adherance to the facts and his penchant for standing up to the current administration have made me a solid supporter. I've been blogging for Dean (various sites) and have volunteered for his campaign for various activities including the New Hampshire Democratic Convention. For more information on Dean, check out Blogforamerica (Dean's official blog, Unofficial Dean Blog, The DailyKOS (Great left leaning blog that covers the primaries).
No gun registration, civil unions for gays. Maybe a candidate from there would be a good thing (for the average flaming /. libertarian).
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
You know, the guy who whines about States rights when sodomy laws are ruled unconstitutional, but then ignores those same states rights when a state votes to legalize medicinal marijuana.
In other words, someone who will make up the laws as he goes along, exercise his power to enforce them, and then 'disappear' anyone who he personally considers to be a threat to his personal sense of order.
FOUR MORE YEARS! FOUR MORE YEARS! FOUR MORE YEARS!
See if you can find a transcript for his appearance on the show. He pleaded ignorance plenty of times and yet Russert gave him a free ride every time. Weird, huh?
Why do we still have this man on our money?
As long as you're not a fucking republican.
If there were any justice in the world we'd round up all republicans, put them on an island and let them try to fuck each other over until they are no more. Since only white males need apply (we'd leave the tokens like Uncle JC Watts out) they would be gone in one quick generation.
A party that holds Regan, Bush (if he was so good why wasn't he re-elected?), GWBush, Thurmond, Lott, Army, etc, as their idols is of no use to anyone.
Ever wonder why when a democrat is in office things generally go well? Less war, less poverty, less crime, less republicans. Better policy.
1. Bush, George W. - US President (100%)
2. Libertarian Candidate (87%)
3. Phillips, Howard - Constitution (61%)
4. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (46%)
5. Lieberman Senator Joe CT - Democrat (46%)
6. Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat (42%)
7. Gephardt, Cong. Dick, MO - Democrat (32%)
8. Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat (28%)
9. Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat (28%)
10. Kucinich, Cong. Dennis, OH - Democrat (26%)
11. Graham, Senator Bob, FL - Democrat (15%)
12. Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol IL - Democrat (14%)
13. LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat (0%)
Watching Cowboy Bebop in my jammies, eating a bowl of Shreddies.
First of all, if the Republicans thought that Dean was a pushover, the LAST thing they'd do is true to warn the Democratic party. Remember? They want the Democrats to lose.
The issues that Bush is weakest on is the economy and the war in Iraq. Well, guess what?
Dean is a balanced-budget guru *and* his original anti-war stance on Iraq is validated further with each passing day.
Dean is uniquely qualified to thrash Bush on his two weakest issues and don't think that Karl Rove isn't aware that Dean's star is rising substantially with each new revelation about Iraq.
... that an ending statement like that is required by the new campaign laws. Dean's commercial is just the first to hit the airwaves.
"Spirit merges with matter to sanctify the universe. Matter transcends to return to spirit. The interchangeability of matter and spirit means the starlit magic of the outermost life of our universe becomes the soul-light magic of the innermost life of our self."
-- Dennis Kucinich
Dean wants to be the internet candidate. He can't afford to compete in other media so he is pulling this pseudo grassroots crap. It's too early for all this election crap.
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them
serioulsy, i must have had smoething funny in mind while writing that subject, seriously.
Many European countries have unsustainable systems (even more unsustainable than the US's Social Security system). They've realized this, and so are cutting back and reforming them, particularly the pension systems. This has led, if you've been following the news, to widespread general strikes in several countries, notably Greece and France.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
If he hadn't stumbled out of the gate after winning the primary, contradicted all of his previous positions by embracing old democratic party hacks and crooks like the previous Mayor Daley of Chicago and then the whole Eagleton affair where McGovern picked Eagleton as his running mate, then it came out that Eagleton had a history of mental illness including electro-shock. McGovern said that didn't matter, he supported Eagleton then turned around and contradicted himself a few weeks later, dropping Eagleton for Sargent Shriver. By then any sort of honest, straight-talking image he had was blown and the Eagleton affair had taken all of the wind out of his sales. Of course all that doesn't even mention some of the underhanded things the Nixon campaign was up to. McGovern vs Nixon could have been a very different story if it weren't for the stupid mistakes, infighting, dirty tricks, and dumb luck.
If he is not a liberal, just who is he?
To find out, we have to move past his political machine. Like Bush, Dean is very adept at associating himself with issues and causes that are important for his campaign. Thus for Dean we see his association with Lessig and an apparent concern for "the commons". Nothing could be farther from the truth.
Let's take a look at how Dean compares to Kucinich, a long time liberal Democrat.
Howard Dean, a subset of the comparison points:
Health care plan
Death penalty
Roe v. Wade
Kyoto treaty
Patriot Act
NAFTA/WTO
"Star Wars" ballistic missile system
Pentagon waste
Medical marijuana
War on drugs
We see that Dean is very much like a "lite" version of Bush. There is very little in Howard Dean that is liberal.
Bush would be delighted to run against Dean who is simply a watered down version of Bush. And Dean comes from Vermont, bringing only 3 electoral votes. Easy campaign, easy victory.
What Bush doesn't want to do is run against a real Democrat who actually represents the tough issues that this country is facing. Or have to deal with a candidate whose home state carries 21 electoral votes.
Howard Dean may look snazzy on paper and in the media, but in reality, he is merely the lite version of Bush and would do little or nothing to actually make America better for Americans. We'd have the same screwed up medical system, giant defense budgets, pollution, and corporatist America that we have with Bush. Voting for Kucinich or for the Greens is change. Dean is status quo, more of the same Bush Doctrine.
If you look at Fox News, or any of the other conservative news stations, they will say hes far left because they'd rather you vote for him than for Kerry or Gephart, the real far left.
Dean is actually a moderate, but thats what I want because I'm an independent, not a liberal.
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Universal healthcare just means I'll pay my taxes so some dumbass can get a bunch of prescription drugs they don't need. This country is seriously over-medicated, and if people didn't have to pay for their own drugs, it'd be much much worse. People really like hearing that they have some sort of syndrome -- it excuses all sorts of behavior and they don't have to take responsibility for their actions. So much so that more than half the people are now "abnormal" in some way (a ridiculous statement of itself!) and take medicine to "correct" the problem.
That, and I don't think I should have to pay for someone else's Viagra just so old people can have sex. Or someone else's fertility medication so people can breed more kids, when there are thousands out there in need of adoption already.
Now if you're going to limit this healthcare to actual necessary medical care, then I might go along with it. But that seems highly unlikely.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
That being said, like a lot of fringe candidates, Dean actually has a few good ideas - like copyright reform and his general clues with technology - that stand out from his normal wackyness. With luck, other candidates from *both* parties will take notice of Dean's relative success and adopt accordingly.
dear sir, please join #GNAA to receive your LIFETIME GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) membership!
To paraphrase Dean: "Talk about gun control in Vermont and you talk about taking people's hunting rifles away - talk about gun control in LA and you're talking about taking uzis out of the hands of gangbangers. Gun control needs to be decided at the local level."
Until the electoral college becomes a thing of the past.
Is there a web site you can go to to figure out which politicians will do what they say? How about one with a way to get people to vote on the issues, instead of on personalities?
Don't look at me... I voted for Kodoss.
obligatory simpsons quote
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
It's really quite funny to see the political bias of Slashdotters out in the wide open. Dean a centrist? Ha! That's why Nader thinks he's so keen, I suppose.
Bill Clinton was a left centrist, and he did a great service to the Democratic party by pulling it to the center away from the McGovern Left. Dean is a McGovern Democrat. That's what he meant when he said he was from the "Democratic wing of the Democratic Party." He's a left liberal like Paul Wellstone. The reason Dean is doing so well is because the Democratic party has swung back to the McGovern leftist base in reaction to Bush's election, and the crushing midterm elections. The party elected Pelosi to House minority leadership for cripes sake. PELOSI! The Democrat's answer to the midterm elections wasn't "gosh, people voted more for Republicans. Maybe we've gone to far away from the center", it was "gosh, people voted more for Republicans. Guess we just didn't get the message to the people, cuz we all know our ideas are the One True Faith!" Anger is energizing the Democratic base, but guess what kids? Your base isn't going to get anyone elected to the Presidency, because the base is the left liberal fringe that doesn't represent mainstream America.
Problem is, the people who participate in the caucuses to nominate the contender are the activist Democrats that are fringe left liberals. Bill Clinton was the first Democratic president in 50 years to be reelected. Didn't learn the lesson, obviously. If the Democrats nominate Howard Dean, Bush will pull a McGovern (or Mondale) landslide.
Derek
You mean all the jokes told in the last few years about the intelligence of Republicans are really true?
You use XP, don't you.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Bush calls his big supporters Pioneers and Patriots... Well us Howard Dean supporters, we've got a name too... We're called AMERICANS!
http://dean2004.meetup.com/
Blogs are so yesterday. Only losers blog. Get a life.
It means Dean is doing another lame publicity stunt. Come January he will just be a faded memory.
Most of us arent extreme liberals or conservatives.
I'm not a liberal or a conservative, I'm independent.
On the economy I think progressives have it right, on the domestic agenda, progressives have it right, conservatives have it right on some other issues, like abortion, I'm also against gun control, look if criminals have guns, I should be able to get one, I do think machine guns should be outlawed however, and bullet proof vests and other non lethal weapons should be easier to get than actual guns.(currently its easier to get a gun than a vest or non lethal weapon)
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Hmm, one of the things I didnt like about Dean was his anti-gun control stance, but if this is what he means I can respect that.
Scared that I agree with the NRA on a candidate...
I might actually vote for Dean.
Note: Dean's real position on gun control is roughly, "let the states decide individually what kind of gun control they think they need".
Tech Public Policy stuff
How come our country always goes heads over heels for ex-military men. Since George Washington, who had the founding fathers as his cabinet, there hasn't been a single decent one elected on the merit of military service - Grant? Ike?
"Absolute authority from the perspective of national defence?" Please. He led a NATO campaign bombing Yugoslavia. The US doesn't need soldiers, it needs people who understand why people hate the United States, and can take diplomatic and humanitarian tacts to ameliorate the situation.
There is one thing he has other dem candidates don't - he has not announced he's running. If he doesn't have the balls to take the plunge, why would you want him?
If the Dems want to win in 2004, they cannot and should not concede that the Republicans have authority on national defense. They should press the fight on every front, including an actual liberal domestic and foreign agenda(balance the deficit? I don't think that's what FDR did). This tirade, then, has only one natural conclusion. Kucinich for president! http://kucinich.us/
Valete!
Here is why I think Howard Dean can be elected:
1. He's swinging to the left in the primary to enegize the base. His anti-war, (almost) univeral health care, anti tax cuts for the rich, and pro civil unions stance will ensure that the liberal Democrats and some Greens will throw their support behind them.
2. Then, for the general he'll move to the center (much the way Bush did in 2000) by saying emphasizing (1) his position on the budget (he's a deficit hawk), (2) his position on education: special ed. is a huge unfunded mandate and the so-called, yet underfunded, "No Child Behind" takes rights away from municipalities, and (3) his states' right approach to gun control will help him in winnable western states (New Mexico, Colorado, and maybe Montana).
3. The way the economy is going, it might be *the* issue in the election, helping any Democrat.
4. National security: maybe not Dean's strong suit, but he can emphasize his first responder credentials (as both a physician and a Governor), blast Bush for not fully funding homeland security, and maybe even attack him on the Iraq decision (new poll show public support quickly eroding).
5. Meanwhile, Republicans are "misunderestimating" Dean's ability to do the above four, thus catching them off-guard and winning the "low expectations" game in the media.
6. I'll stop there even though the list goes on (use of Internet, perceived as straight-shooter, etc.)
Anyway, it's *way* too far out to say that someone can't be elected. So much happens in so little time in politics.
You call Dean a socialist yet you dont even research. You dont know Dean's viewpoints. You listen to him saying Bush is wrong on war, and suddenly hes a socialist?
Shut the hell up you ignorant socialist.
Yeah I can use the word too against people I dont like. I dont like your viewpoints, so you are a socialist. At least I took the time to read your viewpoints, unlike what you did when it comes to Howard Dean.
Liberman and Kerry are alot more left acting than Dean, especially Kerry, hes from my state and I knoww a bit about him.
Liberman is a censorship loving big government politician who doesnt even have a real agenda, he goes with whoever he thinks will win at the time.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Dennis Kucinich seems to be one of the more clueful candidates.. From his www site:
As President, I will repeal the Patriot Act to regain for all Americans the sacred right of privacy in our homes, our libraries, our schools.
He got a "66%" rating from the ACLU.
I couldn't find any ratings from the EFF on the various candidates, so I'm not sure where he stands on Tech Liberties.
>. The Democrats are desperate for the voters that went Green last time, because they know they need them.
The dems don't want him, they want their boy Gephart or *shudder* Lieberman. The DLC publically flogged Dean supporters by calling them "the activist elite" and tried to compare them to politcally impotent ultra-lefties. Dean supports responded back here.
The green vote simply isn't important. I'm sure that more than half of those votes are permanent third-party protest votes and regardless of what the Dems want you to think it was a bad ballot and a piss-poor Gore campaign that got Bush into office.
Regardless, everyone who isn't in the GOP wants an electable Democrat. I can't see why Dean wouldn't fit the bill, especially with Iraq turing out to be a quite the quagmire for Bush.
Sorry, but there's no ploy. Dean is fighting influencial (read: very wealthy and very connected) members of his own party right now and in interesting ways (appeal to the populace, net-based action, etc) just to get heard.
The last few times I've checked Lesig's blog he has his head compleatly up Deans behind.
Is there a track record of how he might vote on something like the DMCA?
If you saw Dean's appearance on Meet the Press you can't possibly be too comfortable with him as President. If he aspires to the job he has a LOT of homework to do.
My guess is that Lesig is among the hard core liberals (surprise!) and all members of that group would gladly vote for Adolph Hitler next time around if it mean revenge for 2000.
Blind rage over what they feel was a stolen election will drive them to do totally irrational things until 2004.
I think it is irresponsible to turn over your blog to anyone else, particularly someone who has tremendous internet resources of their own. This is pure partisanship and has nothing that I can see to do with Open Source, DMCA, RIAA or any other issues for which Lesig is notable.
Fiscal Plan PDF
Education Plan PDF
I think Dean has done a great job of providing a lot of information and resources on his webpage. I would urge Slashdot readers to browse through and sign up for the email newsletters. Any Democrat will need early support to deny Bush a 2nd term.
Where the Music Matters
Not to split this into multiple factions or anything, but I would prefer to be a member of the Motherfucking Fat Faggot Nigger Collective.
WAGGLY DONKEY DICKS!
Either sane copyright laws, with a socialist welfare state
Don't believe everything you hear on Faux News. Not everyone is the caricature the Right makes them to be, despite millions of dollars in media talking points.
Most Americans are liberal I'd say considering California has more people in it than Texas.
Most Americans however are independent, they vote for whoever is the best on the issues.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Note that voting green isn't a total waste. If you hate Bush and you really can't bring yourself to vote Democrat, it's better to vote green than not vote at all. Sure, you won't directly help get rid of Bush, but votes are the one thing (other than bribes, of course) that politicians pay attention to.
The same applies if you're (for example) an extreme libertarian who thinks the Democrats are worse than the Republicans, but can't bring yourself to vote for a president who is massively expanding the power of the federal government while stripping away constitutional rights. Or if, like what seems to be a majority of people, you just think both big parties are indistinguishable. There are usually plenty of independents running, nearly any of whom would be less insane than the present administration. It's always better to vote than not to.
An interesting article about Dean's use of the Internet.
A requirement of the granting to broadcasters the opportunity to have a monopoly on the use of a portion of the spectrum in a particular area is that the content must be in the public interest in several ways.
Lessig's blog is not a public resource.
The people pushing this war were the same people selling Saddam those weapons.
We didn't care about him killing his people when we were the ones selling him weapons. But now you think that it matters?
And where do you get off claiming that Bush is demonized more than Saddam? No one is saying Saddam is better than Bush (well, no one outside of Iraq).
The problem is that the CIA had already CHECKED the "information" MONTHS before Bush used it. The CIA even told the British that the info wasn't good. But Bush needed something scary to push this war so he used information that was known to be bogus.
As for this being another "Vietname" or "quagmire", check the body count since Bush claimed the war was "over".
No, we did not have any "moral, legal and political justification for removing Saddam Hussein".
We couldn't even get the UN to vote to support our invasion.
As for those Iraqis being "free" now, wait until the first "elections" are held. Wait until they elect a radical Islamic priest.
You'll never forget the image of those Iraqis and Saddam's statue. That's because our government doesn't want you to forget it. It was shot with a narrow lens so you couldn't see the US tanks and troops surrounding that "crowd" of Iraqis. It was all a publicity stunt.
And you fell for it.
http://www.counterpunch.org/statue.html
And you're the one talking about closed eyes?
You know he's never going to be able to beat Al Sharpton for the nomination...
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Wow, a democrat that's reviled by the Brady Campaign. That's almost enough to convince me to vote for him. However, where does it say that he got an "A" from the NRA? I see it cited in a lot of places, but I did a search of the NRA and got nothing.
Also, has this guy released position papers on spam and copyright?
But it doesn't go anywhere near far enough. Deciding who to vote on based on 13 issues? non-sense. There should be hundreds, or even thousands, of questions.
But, it, I think, does get a somewhat accurate general representation. Here's my results:
My results:
1. Libertarian Candidate (100%) Click here for info
2. Bush, George W. - US President (69%) Click here for info
3. Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat (58%) Click here for info
4. Gephardt, Cong. Dick, MO - Democrat (58%) Click here for info
5. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (57%) Click here for info
6. Lieberman Senator Joe CT - Democrat (55%) Click here for info
7. Graham, Senator Bob, FL - Democrat (51%) Click here for info
8. Phillips, Howard - Constitution (49%) Click here for info
9. Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat (49%) Click here for info
10. Kucinich, Cong. Dennis, OH - Democrat (39%) Click here for info
11. Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat (38%) Click here for info
12. Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol IL - Democrat (34%) Click here for info
13. LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat (0%) Click here for info
Yep, I'd say that's just about right. I'd definately vote for a Libertarian candidate, no question. If none is available, Bush is second on the list, because the issues on which I'm Democratic don't affect me much, but tax-breaks and better retirement plans do, which Bush supports (see LifeTimeSavingsAccounts.com).
Here's my breakdown of where the Libertarian party is right and wrong. I won't provide much justification, since I assume I'm right and anyone who disagrees is wrong; such is the nature of having an opinion.
Taxes & Spending: "Libertarians believe that if government's role were limited to protecting our lives, rights and property, then America would prosper and thrive as never before. Then the federal government could concentrate on protecting our Constitutional rights and defending us from foreign attack. A federal government that did only those two things, could do them better and at a small fraction of the cost."
Right, with one additon. The government should also provide the basic infrastructure needed for society, like roads.
Social Services Funding: "Let's get government out of the charity business."
Right. A Democrat is someone who likes to call himself a philanthropist because he spends my money on his "good causes".
Welfare: "The bulk of your welfare tax dollars goes to pay the handsome salaries of well-educated welfare workers. The poor get little from government welfare except meager handouts and a cycle of despair." "Private charities and groups do a better and more efficient job of helping the truly needy get back on their feet."
Right, for the most part. However, we should not leave the well-being of children up to the chance and generosity of charity.
"No one has the right to cover his losses at taxpayer expense -- and yet wealthy corporations demand exactly that. The federal government has bailed out railroads, banks, and other corporations with your tax dollars. This must stop!"
Right. For both corporations and individuals. Just because a corporation or person mismanaged their financial lives doesn't mean they have the right to pass off their debt onto the rest of us. This doesn't mean courts have no role in structuring debt arrangements, so that people aren't enslaved for being debtors. Part of the fault also lies with creditors who provide credit to those so obviously unable to provide it, and then whine when they can't get 18%.
Security & Terrorism: "The Libertarian National Committee has voted to call for the repeal of the USA/Patriot Act, charging that it "sacrifices" the liberties of American citizens."
Right.
Foreign Affairs: "The principle of non-intervention should guide relationships between
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
1. He opposed the Patriot Act from the start and speaks out against it now. 2. He opposes the FCC and Michael Powell's plan to relax restrictions on media ownership. 3. He is radically changing our politics by basing his campaign on campaign contributions coming from tens of thousands of people giving $10, $25 and $100. Which means if he pulls it off and wins the White House -- the people will actually own the damn place for the first time in decades. I'll take my chances on P2P with a guy and a campaign who at least knows enough to try to guest blog for Lessig. http://www.deanforamerica.com http://blogforamerica.com
I'm glad you brought up those other nations with the mass killings happening right now.
In Iraq, Saddam had UN inspectors and the world watching him.
The graves we're finding are old.
Meanwhile, in other countries, thousands of people are being killed and we're doing nothing about it.
So, why are we so concerned about thousands of people who were killed in Iraq in years gone by?
Why are we so unconcerned about thousands being slaughtered right now?
>Americans fear and loath Managed health care and the right to see their own doctor.
Much of the democratic base is part of that 40 million of uninsured Americans. Yeah, managed is a scary word yet what does the M in HMO stand for? Maintence/Management its the same thing. What plan does your company offer you? What plans do most companies offer? Highly managed plans.
Public healthcare, especially in a wealthy country like the US, is very doable. Its not just Europe's way or the US's way. From what I understand Dean's plan is more about expanding medicare to include children and poor people up till age 25 and helping small business insure its employees. Not exactly Denmark.
> Canadians prefer our system to their's in critical care
That's a pretty general statement. I'm sure they would be scared shitless if faced with the real possibility of not having insurance for years. Not to mention they have money in their pocket to spend on American specialists because they aren't paying through the nose on every doctor's visit or saddled with debt after some accident. The number 1 cause of bankrupcy is medical bills. Its also fiscally responsible to insure as many people as possible. Either way you're paying for it. Might as well get something in return.
Maybe Bush didn't have a paper to read the reports by the UN inspectors about how they didn't find any evidence of WMD's.
When we find the person responsible for paying the paper boy, he will be immediately fired, with only a minor severence package.
This adminstration will not stand for incompetance in critical areas of intelligence.
From Salon: "Clinton needed to look "presidential" for a day. He may even have needed a vacation from his family vacation. In any event, , and perhaps counted on the indifference of the press and public to a negligible society like that of Sudan, and killed wogs to save his own lousy Hyde (to say nothing of our new moral tutor, the ridiculous sermonizer Lieberman). No bipartisan contrition is likely to be offered to the starving Sudanese: unmentioned on the "prayer-breakfast" circuit."
I said it once before and I have to say it again.
I honestly don't think either POLITICAL party has the moral high ground, except when it furthers their own agenda: personal gain, power, influence.
So give the partisan line a rest already.
I know I've quoted the same article once before, but it is valid in comparison to the charges being made at Bush. Especially considering what is being said of our president.
I can only guess you meant to refer to large corporations, like M$.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
According to all the chicken-littles here in the US, Europe should have went broke ten years ago and all its people starving in the streets.
Universal healthcare can be done, either through traditional UH like in Europe, single payer/voucher plans, or expanding medicare to include children and the poor (Dean's Plan).
You can argue this point until the cows come how but the wealthiest country in the world is also the only western nation not to have some kind of universal healthcare system. That's simply wrong and these doctors agree.
Howard Dean has also made extensive use of such things as Meetup.com where Dean supporters from all around are meeting in their local area. On top of that he has Yahoo Groups for many areas of each state. Compare this with Bill Bradley where all one got was email invitations to campaign for him in New Hampshire, the difference is big.
Actually Bill Gates doesnt pay any taxes.
Learn how the tax system works before you comment.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
And what about those judges who actually decided the case (making "case law")? They're not legislators either! They're the judicial branch, and how do they get on the bench? Right, they are appointed by (ta-da) the president! The president's court appointments will have far-reaching effects not only on copyright but on every other branch of law. And Clinton, for all the good stuff he did (and there was quite a lot), was basically a tool of Hollywood as far as copyright was concerned. Bush doesn't appear to be any better.
It is exceedingly in our interest to get a president who has his act together about copyright and other legislative issues. They have a tremendous amount of influence in every area.
Well,
I've never been to Britain, and can't comment on the lines there but I've been in a US emergency room three times in my life and each time I waited 8+hours before I saw a doctor.
1) First I I had a seizure from some bad food I ate. I'm a professional working for a drug company, with a very complete medical plan.
2) My friend had serious bleeding problems the morning after a complicated surgery. She has a private medical plan paid for by her job.
3) Another friend's dad wasy having trouble breathing and suddenly became blind. He is 70 years old (and reasonable wealthy with about 2mil in assets.)
Seems to me these were real issues, not just someone who got frightened by a bad case of the flu! Healthcare, whether socialist, private, or whatever, is having a hard time giving care at a reasonable cost. Thus the lines. So before you go off with your typical republican scare tactic, please take a look at how things really happen in the US for the vast majority of people (not just poor people either.)
I can hardly imagine how rich you would need to be before you didn't have to wait so many hours!
Peace, or Not?
Peace, or Not?
Yes, how dare those pesky Greens actually try to run against Bush and Gore?! What were they try to do?! Get elected or something?!
I would've sooner chewed my legs off and fed them to weasels than voted for Gore, Yes, Bush is the devil, but that doesn't mean Gore is an angel. Far from it.
It really pisses me off that people still blame Nader voters for the Bush regime. For one thing, Bush didn't win. Secondly, if Gore couldn't beat a grade-A nimrod like Bush Jr., then he's in serious trouble. He was worse than Clinton; he waffled on every issue and ended up pleasing no one!
People like you are the reason the Greens have no chance of winning. If disillusioned Democrats just voted for the Greens we'd see actual positive change in this country. If the Greens got over 15% of the vote it would shake everything up. Either the Democrats would move towards the center (and die) or they would embrace the left and thrive. Either way, they need to stop rolling over and playing dead for the Republicans. As it stands, the Democrats are useless because they don't stand for anything; they just stand against the Republicans and they do a shitty job of it. Yes, the Republicans are assholes, but Democrats are weak. I can't vote for weakness and ineptitude; it's not what I stand for.
The two party system has made a travesty of democracy. I favor instant-runoff voting. And the next person who tells me I should vote Democrat, even though it's against my beliefs, gets a kick in the shins.
Electric Monkey Pants
Thanks for warning me.
Agreed 100%, my good man.
Abortion is advocated only by persons who have themselves been born.
--Ronald Reagan
More fuel for the argument that Slashdot is to US-centric
Melius mori in libertate quam vivere in servitute.
If not this President, then the last one should have.
If not our country, then another should have.
Or the UN should have.
Or we should have brought it to the UN.
Maybe approaching each of the campaigns would make sense. This isn't a small amount of people sitting around here, after all.
Only people like you would use something like Linux.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
>The fact is, the United States had moral, legal, and political justification for removing Saddam Hussein. The world is a safer place for both Americans and Iraqis today than it was a few months ago, and it cost fewer lives than anyone estimated.
Only USians think that way. You have completely lost touch with the rest of the world; yet you somehow feel justified in telling others how it should be run. That's crazy.
Get a grip and realise that your beligerent ways are scaring many first world countries, never mind the third world ones you add to belt. You are becoming the world's scary, evil superpower, just like the one you once "defeated" (converted is more like it). In fact, 45% of the world is scared of you, and 33% of your closest neighbours up North hold this opinion, so I'd say it's justified.
And yeah, I'm careful not to say "American" these days. I, like a lot of Canadians (and possibly others on this continent) want to distance myself from your country's insanity. You can't just walk into another country and take it over because it is easy, or because you disagree with what happens within their own borders. That's wrong. It always has been, and always will be. Period.
And, guess what... the overwhelming MAJORITY of the world agrees with me. 56% to be exact. And, to put the icing on the cake, 79% of the world feels the US will now make Iraq a permanent US colony.
>I'll never forget the images of those Iraqis beating that Saddam statue with the shoes off of their feet. It's a shame you have forgotten, or maybe you never opened your eyes up enough to see.
Neither will I forget. Those images stand for exactly what's wrong with the US's ways. Those people tore down that statue because they felt that the US was giving them freedom. Instead, the US is already divvying up the country to various corporations, and installing leaders with American ideals at heart, not Middle Eastern.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
Vote ficus!
Learn how the tax system works before you comment.
Teach me, oh great one, oh purveyor of IRS tax law! How do we know you know what you're talking about?
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
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Mmmmmyep.
Got go read what that politican has to say, yesiree.
Mmm hmmm.
Yup. I'm sure it'll be different, and, um, oh, I dunno...
(sigh)
I wonder if my Tivo picked up "Dead Like Me" tonight?
--- Ban humanity.
Hey, don't forget, Kerry was in Skull & Bones @ Yale (just like Bush) too! You really want some good old boys club of rich folks with secret handshakes getting office...AGAIN?:)
Clinton signed into law the 1996 Telecommunications Act which was a significant step in the homogenization of the U.S. media. I think this is considerably more important to the U.S. than his affair with Monica Lewinsky. But this event went unanalyzed in the mass media of the time and the signing of the bill into law happened at about the same time as an invasion and the Clinton-Lewinsky affair was getting major press. If I recall correctly, the affair got more coverage than the invasion.
Digital Citizen
Er, let's try that again with proper formatting, heh
._a, .#< _W#0# .00#, 4#dP "#, j#, _0#Wi *00P! "#L,
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http://www.rnc.org/Newsroom/risingtide/spring2003/ headquarters.htm
;)
According to the RNC, the average donation in 2002 was $36 dollars. Does that mean that Bush's campaign is even less fettered by "big interests" and more grassroots than Dean's?
By your definition, every other country in the industrialized world is "socialist".
He's also the closest thing to an anti-gun control candidate the Democratic Party has produced at the national level since JFK and Hubert Humphrey.
I suggest taking a closer look at his positions. His Website contains several of them.
As for hate-mongering, the left (of which I actually am not a member, speaking as a supporter of vouchers) isn't the group that automatically equates any criticism of Bush to treason. Note that my politics is based on pragmatism, NOT ideology... I pull from right, left, center, or Libertarian based on what makes sense. But I consider the right a fuck of a lot more dangerous, Ashcroft is NOT a Democrat.
I do have a suggestion to you, since you may be one of the few on either side of the political debate that is actually interested in finding out what the hell is really going on.
Check out the Open Sources Intelligence mailing list (OSINT-L). Subscribe in digest format.
Tech Public Policy stuff
You think a weak military keeps countries from being invaded and the level of civil liberties in countries hostile to the US are even in the same league as the US and then you call someone else stupid for quoting a comic book.
Well, it's quite simple, really. When the tax level on the upper class gets too high, the upper class simply move all their accounts overseas. Granted, it's a bit more complicated, but through loopholes and legal manuevers, it happens. It's one of the reasons why the government takes in more money from the wealthy when they cut their taxes. There's simply less incentive to dodge the IRS.
common sense: noun
What those who are ignorant of the subject matter think; usually wrong.
John Kerry is wishy-washy. He claimed to be against the war, but gave Bush the blank check to wage war. John Kerry has even claimed to be Irish, which he's not. John Kerry makes Al Gore look charismatic by comparison.
John Kerry was Michael Dukakis' Lt. Governor. If Kerry wins the nomimation, it'll be 1988 all over again.
No thanks. I'll take Howard Dean.
The logic of selecting the better of two evils has a certain logic. But the poster Daetrin misses the logic of the electoral college.
For example, I live in Massachusetts, and did in 2000. Of course I voted for Nader. There was not a chance in hell that Gore would fail to win the MA vote. Voting for the "50% candidate" instead of the "99% candidate" (I wouldn't agree with Green's quite 100%) is just throwing my vote away. By voting Green, I increase their visibility, and perhaps help them qualify for matching funds and the like. No matter what I do, the MA electoral votes go to Gore.
Now my friend who is unfortunate enough to still live in Colorado (where I came from) also voted Green, and for a similar reason. There was no chance that Colorado's electoral votes would go to Shrub. So for a slightly different reason, a vote for Gore is just wasted. The symbolism, visibility, and matching funds are the only thing he can get out of his Green vote.
On the other hand, if I lived in a close state--say Florida, Arizona, or Tennessee--I would most certainly have voted for Gore (despite feeling a bit unclean while doing so). Polls showed those states close enough that a voter could not be entirely certain of where the electoral votes would go. Obviously, FL turned out dramatically so.
I'm certainly not wont to argue that the electoral college is a really great setup... but it's the one we have in the USA. And voters should vote according to the actual rules (and understand them at a level greater than wish fulfillment).
Buy Text Processing in Python
Why would the major media report on something that benefits them so much? It was in their interest not to report on it.
War is necrophilia.
Dennis Kucinich is the real progressive candidate and is infinitely more electable vs. Bush than Dean.
Dean is simply (and somewhat regrettably) better at using blogging and other NewMedia-style tools to generate support among young voters.
Dean is in bed with the NRA and has embraced some serious conservative positions in his past. This makes him unelectable... Outside the Internet, demos understand (and will hear more about) the true Dean (a conservative) and of course repubs won't vote for him when they could get a more honest version of same in Bush.
For those who have not been following the election carefully so far, Dean first distinguished himself by opposing the war in Iraq. This position is looking rather good now that the Yellowcake scandal is brewing in the media. Yesterday he made the particulaly astute move of calling for those responsible for inserting the false claim into the Presidents State of the Union to resign. He is also backing up his claims with some excellent research on his website:
Then and now quotes
A timeline
A chart contrasting claims with evidence (pdf)
For a long time I have been impressed with Dean's use of the internet which includes the much publicized meetup (slashdot story). Dean now has by far the largest meetup with over 60,000 signed up: Dean Meetup
Dean's fundraising over the internet has also been exceptional - he raised over 800,000 in one day at the end of the last quarter. In addition the campaign manager, Joe Trippi, frequents the blogs - he will surely read this so be aware that any advice will be noted - and seems to have a keen vision and sense for how the internet can help the campaign.
Even if you don't agree with Dean's policies, it is probably worth watching just to see how political campaigns of the future might change with the internet.
Can you provide a link or two that shows where Dean made such a statement? I've looked around and found quite the opposite. As governor, Dean has strongly opposed even medical marijuana in the face of pleading by terminally ill patients.
The only concession that Dean made about drug policy when speculation on what he would do as president was to say that he would insist that further medical marijuana trials be pursued. How can you translated that into "end the drug war?"
As a matter of fact, if you look at Dean's homepage, you will see that his issues section does not even include the phrase drug war or any reference to drug law reforms. This is not a Dean issue. So, unless you have a link to back up your statement, I think you're making a hell of an assumption here.
wtf is that?
http://thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030707 &s=kucinich
So what exactly are you complaining about? We removed a mass murderer from power and made significant progress in preventing future terrorist attacks.
If there is anything that makes me sick, it is people who are so partisan in their politics that they attack anything that their political rivals do as evil, even when it is good, and defend anything those they are backing do, even when it is evil. If Al Gore had won and he'd been the one who ordered the invasion of Iraq I seriously doubt that most Democrats and other dyed in the wool lefties would be complaining one little bit. But when it's a Republican behind it they bitch to high heaven. The staged "outrage" seems less and less genuine every day, just like the right-wing "outrage" about Clinton's womanizing was obviously phony after a while.
If you want to complain about something that the Bush administration is doing, why don't you start here at home with the BS that Ashcroft and his crowd are trying to pull. Finding fault with Bush for winning a war and bringing the hope for freedom to a nation that has lived under a fiendish dictator for 30+ years isn't exactly the best way to convince anyone with a lick of common sense not to like the guy.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
All Bloging is gaming the system.
.. /.ers you are getting gamed. Go read the Register.uk and see what they have to say about "blogs"
There are a small numeber of weblogs "blogs" on the interent yet if you were to do a search on some subjects the top hits would all be to weblogs that are incestiuosly linked to each other. Bloggers are gaming the search engines and all this "political momentium" is simply bullshit gameing of google and other search engines.
Nice try no cigar.
I wouldn't elect Howard Dean to eat cat shit.
Just what the US needs as president the Gov of some state most people cant find on the map because it's smaller than most major US cities.
The county I live in is bigger than Vermont and has more citizens.
Deans claim to fame? Has he ability to govern and reach compromises to get laws passed? Is he a player from a state that has a major political contributions to the nation governance? Does any one know who the fuck he is? Yea the Bloggers do.
In Europe and Canada you may wait weeks, months or, years not hours for life threating conditions to be properly dealt with. Most US states require that hospitals treat anyone who shows up weather they can afford to pay or not. There is no rationing of health care. Health care in countries that mandaite state sponsorde health insurance ration care. That is the difference.
As you can see I don't care about my karma.
We want them to move overseas.
If they dont pay taxes and they only hire people overseas anyway why do we need them here in the USA?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Not really.
From Lessig's blog: Good point, and I should have made this clear: Dean's guest blogging says nothing about Dean's views about the issues I've been pushing here. I've never discussed these issues with any member of the Dean campaign.
Upset cause I submitted this story 6 hours earlier, but happy cause Howard Dean's effective use of the internet to generate buzz (and $$$) excites me.
hooray! it's a sex wiki
>He'll lose, but he'll guarantee no other democrats win either.
Oh please, this early in the game and you're announcing that the dems are going to lose if they chose Dean?
Lets face facts and agree that more or less the votes are going to come out as they did in 2000. About half the country will knee-jerk vote GOP and about the other half will knee-jerk vote Dem. Swing voters will probably be the biggest factor in 2004.
What Bush can't do is repackage himself. He can't play the "compassionate conservative" card now that his extreme-right wing agenda has been revealed. He can't keep agreeing with his opponent like he did with Gore during the debates.
Also, lets face facts and also agree that a significant number of swing voters are politically apathetic. They'll vote on hot-button issues and this presidency and the events of the last three years have not been "boring old politics." The GOP is going to be on the defensive for a lot of things.
I don't think it matters who the dems go with, the fight is already laid out: Dem challenger will call Bush on his controversial administration and Bush will play the "stay the course" card.
That's ignoring things like Iraqgate, Perle, Enron, Haliburon, secret energy meetings, the SOTU speech, etc.
I have no idea who will win, but its not going to be a shoo-in for anyone. Hell, they could run Jimmy Carter and still get a good fight.
God, thats funny
The NRA gives him a A rating, he's for the death penalty, in favor of the 'drug war', and wants a balanced budget.
He calls himself a social liberal and fiscal conservative.
And Nader has said (paraphrasing) that he liked Dean's speeches, but not his past performance in Vermont.
Nader won't run if Kucinich gets the democratic nomination, but most likely will if Dean (or anyone else) does.
This coming from a liberal, I love Dean's use of the internet, and the fact that he has more than a snowball's chance in hell of winning, but I like Kucinich's stance on issues better.
hooray! it's a sex wiki
"Yes, Bush is the devil, but that doesn't mean Gore is an angel. " ... Same goes for all extreme organizations ( Communists or Nazis)
Dude, I am sure you don't notice that but you do sound like some fucking Pat Robertson.
They tend to define everything in term of "good and evil"
Universal healthcare is doable with some limits -- you can't just pay for everything people want. But reasonably done, it's doable.
What isn't doable is a very generous government pension system, since it's essentially a Ponzi scheme.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Farm Subsidies are socialism. Please tell Bush to get rid of all Subsidies and not just the ones like housing Subsidies.
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xI'm convined that Social Security is the biggest scam in the history of mankind. Think about it. What other scam has screwed hundreds of millions of people out of 15% of their life's income only to give them a piddly amount back if/when the retire?
/w missing parents) and who have past their productive stage (the eldery).
Social Security is above all a "saftey net" so that children without both parents and those who are no longer productive (elderly) can be housed, clothed, and fed. It is really _not_ a retirement plan. It is a mechanism to prevent widespread poverty.
Social Security is a generational transfer, that is, you pay for the generation of your parents and grandparents (and disadvantaged children) for the society they have built. It has *nothing* to do with retirement, the money isn't locked in a box and isn't invested and isn't saved (although it is often used in the general fund as regular tax money...)
Social Security is an extra tax (15%) paid by the working class (after 80K you don't owe any more social security) so that the very wealthy don't have to shoulder the burden of those who are not yet (children w/o parent) or are no longer (elderly) productive members of society. In times where the take-in is very high and the pay-out is very low (the last 10 years), it is a *huge* boon to the very wealthy since the money collected goes directly into the treasury; with it in the calculation the average tax rate of your middle-income american is *far higher* than those in the million dollar brackets...
If one were to be fair about use of Social Security money, extra money should be used exclusively for the education of the children who later on will have to support you... ie, if you arn't spending it on those in retirement, it should be spent making sure that the next generation is educated enough to compete in the global marketplace so that they (collectivly) can provide the security net for you and your generation. Use of this money for the military and other general spending is a severe abuse of the whole idea.
So. I half agree with you. Social security is a scam to increase the effective tax rate of the middle and lower class with respect to the upper class. And that politicians talk about it as a "retirement account" is absolutely nonsense.
However, it has its purpose. And without social security really awful things would be common in our society... children w/o parents starving and those who have built our roads, infrastructure, and other societial assets being left in the streets to die... ick.
1. Social Security is meant as a humane way to handle those in society who are not yet productive (children
2. Social Security is a saftey net since
1. Social Security is nothing more than an extra 15% tax on those who make 80K or less Social Security is _not_ a retirement plan, money is not saved nor are you necessarly gaurenteed to get that money at any point; it is extra tax... tax that the wealthy don't pay.
The first thing to note is that Social Security is _not_ a retirement plan. The current generation pays for the previous generation.
Need Some PHP Coders
Please email your resume to outreach@deanforamerica.com if you know PHP and are willing do some volunteer coding on a few discrete projects in the next few weeks. Thanks!
His campaign managers really know how to make folks feel involved in a grassroots campaign, and yet still rake in the dough.
He'll probably get thousands of great resumes, from people who would love to volunteer for free; comparing him to say Bush, who would contract that out for big $$$.
hooray! it's a sex wiki
I just dropped a blog into the btoilet, and it was the size of a small bboy. If Howard Dean supports blogs, I'm all for it. I love a good, healthy bshit.
"Hannity is a religious nut..."
A religious nut? Sean Hannity is a freak. He ought to be declared criminally insane. He's pro-war for almost ANY reason, hates ALL denominations but Christians, routinely clames that he hates no-one while at the same time making broad sweeping negative generalizations about nearly EVERYONE but the far-right white Christian agenda.
Most infuriatingly, he's always claiming to win arguments, but he only actually lets guests speak if they're clearly fringe elements and not well-spoken.
Anyone who is well-spoken or brings actual statistics or facts onto the show gets routinely interrupted in mid-sentence and not allowed to get out half a word edgewise. When people complain, his cop-out is "No, I won't let you speak, it's my show. When you get your own show, then you can say whatever you want."
Nice way to "win" a debate.
I had a co-worker who listened to his show day-in and day-out and had a fellow group of office workers who supported him in his "right to listen to the truth."
This group of co-workers was the most bigoted, hateful, selfish group of people in the office. They would routinely call people things like "probably a Buddhist" or "probably as Muslim" as insults, slagged off on poor and homeless people all the time ("Let the lazy bastards die. It's no skin off my back. I have a job. No, don't save the children in poor neighborhoods either, what good will they come to? They've already been taught to be lazy bums by the welfare state."), were against freedom of speech and the press ("Yeah, the rich corporations are the ones who own the radio stations and TV stations, so naturally only their veiwpoints should be heard. What, you expect a business to put somebody else's viewpoint on? Get real! NPR for the alternate viewpoint? That's SOCIALISM, bud, if the alternate viewpoint can't turn a dollar, then it shouldn't be heard.") and would say things like "No, I'd never let my daughter marry a black man. I mean, I'm not a bigot or anything, but just look at statistics about neighborhoods that black people start moving into. It's not a race thing, but the numbers just don't lie."
The fact that people of this sort are the types who love Hannity speak volumes.
Hannity's brand of conservative fascism is one of the most scary aspects of today's Republican party and America's right wing and it's turning the less clear-headed members of our society into exactly what Al Qaeda members hate: Christian-imperialist social darwinists.
Scary, scary stuff.
wait till we socialize, bud... youre fucked
This means more Americans will vote. Because now they have a reason to.
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So, how do they get around paying for their income? You do know that simply opening a bank account in another country does not magically make that money tax free right? The IRS doesnt tax you exclusively on the money you have in your bank account, they tax you on your INCOME, and yes they know how much you make. If it was that simple, everyone would simply open up bank accounts in Canada, Mexico, etc. And with all that money overseas, how could they get a hold of it? Wire transfer? No, the IRS gets the records for anything over $1000. Could you post the link to where this complicated scheme is explained? I would love to see this.
Republicans controlled Cali up until Grey Davis, the Republicans before Grey Davis caused the 30 billion.
Remember, just like it was Clinton that caused the recession.
How do you republicans like me using your own flawed logic against you?
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Why is it that alot of americans only think of soviet russia when they hear the word socialism?
Socialism != big brother
Socialism == Free* healthcare, free* education...
*By free I mean funded by taxes
A *democrat* will be filling in for him! Who in the world would have ever guessed? I really don't pay much attention to Lessig, but my impression is that he's your typical full-of-themselves professor, and a socialist to boot.
John Kerry is a Joke!
The reason: the age structures are skewed. Remember, many European countries suffered heavily from 2 world wars in a row. After people got home from the war, there was little entertainment other than having sex like animals and thus lots of babies were made.
So now there's a big load of people getting ready to become pensioners in a few years. There's so many people that the new generation cannot support them properly. This is the situation in Finland, at least.
As for the social security systems being unsustainable... well, they've been sustained since 1960s or 1970s or something, still in effect. And their scope is much more than that of the US (at least in Scandinavian countries). But of course if you can save money you should try to do so. Social security is not about providing caviar and 5-star hotel rooms for people who are lazy, but helping those who have a hard time (such as a mother with 2 kids and a husband who drinks and beats the mother up, they can go to a safe house and get counselling).
(nt)
So... environmentalism is difficult to chew and bitter, while communism is sweet and delicious, so long as you spit out the anarchists, who otherwise cause bowel iritation?
Got it in one. Exactly. I love you.
Had UN had its way the way it was chartered, there would have been no september 11, no Yugoslavia, no Osama, no Iraq. But instead, UN was subjugated as a superstate showroom, where the policy is being dictated by the interests of the biggest. Meanwhile, other functions (like building wells to Africa and helping children in Laos read) are OK as long as they don't interfere with big boy politics.
What's with the sudden interest in Liberia anyway?
Ever wonder why UN troops are peacekeepers with the aim to stabilize the situation and can't proactively take part in fighting in the good old cowboy style? Think it had something to do with the old superpowers being scared of a supranational entity posessing armies capable of offensive?
UN was neutered because it could have made a difference. It still could. First let's get USA to pay its debt to UN, or move UN out of NY.
How is this "News for Nerds" *or* "Stuff that matters"? This has nothing to do with Lessig's views or copyrights.
It's naked, unpaid, partisan advertising which reveals the political leanings of the Slashdot gatekeepers. TISK!
Speaking also as an european,
I think it's just the same old problem:
Selfishness leading to an overall loss in quality of life for nearly everyone (except a few who are lucky).
Some people do not choose to get social/health insurance because they think they'll never get ill or they are paying some percents of their income for
nothing. They want to get something for their money. I've heard of many cases where people tried to betray their liability insurances, and they felt completely right... ("I'm putting all this money there and I want to get something back. So I wrote them I "lost" my camera... etc. pp.)
I don't want to sound arrogant, but many apparently do not catch the meaning of an *insurance*.
Sadly, a majority of people even here in europe seems to think that way.
I think health/social insurance should be one of the few things required by law. IMHO, this is no freedom issue. It leads to overall better quality of life.
It obviously doesn't work to let everyone "decide" if one wants an insurance or not. Because you have the "option" not to get an insurance, wages will level off so that it is hard for working class families to pay for an insurance.
Free market is good if one *has* a choice. Competition should end where it affects the very being.
Why the fuck do you all waste your time watching so much Fox if you hate it some much. Rusert is a Liberal shill for the pinko commie fag loving bleading heart liberal dominated media in this country. Fox is about as worth as much as U.S.A. Today. A total waste of time. Calling the Media right wing works on the lamers but people who study the media know where the bias is. It's On Broadcast Network News and CNN which is where 99% of the people get their news. Radio is dominated by brainless turd balls who say what ever the least common denominator listeners want to hear and doesn't count as news. If you listen to the news at the top and bottom of the hour it's still the same old Left leaning horse shit regardless on radio. The Left gets most of it's news out of news papers in anycase the print media is 99.9 bent left both in ownership and editorial content.
While I'm not crazy about everything Bush has done so far, I support him a lot more than any of these other democratic canidates. I think the appeal of the democratic party is fading out in a lot of Americans, they're now more interested in national security rather than domestic issues. If the economy is "good" & WMD/Saddam etc. is found by 2004, Bush will win in a land slide.
Another problem for the democratic party is that nobody knows any of the canidates. I've asked a few people I know (who are democrats) who'd they vote for, and everyone responds with "Is Hillary running?" or "Probably Gore".
Howard Dean needs to be more open about what he supports and what he doesn't, he's too worried about what people think of him. (Like on the Gay Marriage issue) If he isn't honest in these interviews, how can Americans trust him?
selectsmart biases are all over the place, not left/right
Kerry has a lot to say about foreign policy. He's been saying it for years. It's his issue. Deal with it.
Bush? They probably looked at his record as Governor and found little. Their info tends to be a little stale.
Anyway, looking at Shrub's statements as POTUS, what would you have them say on his behalf?
"Saddam Hussein was evil, so I bombed Iraq. Iran and North Korea are evil. The Taliban is evil, but I can work with Hahmid Karzai. Arafat is evil, but I can work with Abu Mazen."
Happy now?
"Bush, do you have anything to bomb for reasons that aren't so dripping in politics and ideology that it burns holes through the floor like the blood from one of Ripley's bad guys, or is this just more of the same old same old left versus right fiddling and warring while civilization decays and our enemies laugh?"
http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares
"Oftentimes, we live in a processed world--you know, people focus on the process and not results." --gwb on the world we live in.
'I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe and what I believe--I believe what I believe is right." --the ever articulate gwb
"There's an old saying in Tennessee--I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee--that says, fool me once, shame on--shame on you. Fool me--you can't get fooled again." --gwb.
"I am mindful not only of preserving executive powers for myself, but for predecessors as well."--gwb
I prefer Approval Voting. It has significant advantages over Plurality, IRV and (IMO) other ranking methods:
Wait until the Surpeme Court is a majority of your party.
Cheat.
When a recount is demanded appeal it all the way to your buddies in the Surpreme Court -- they cease it for you.
Profit.
http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares
Oooops, I forgot, that's a secret.
He also gets paychecks from the CIA.
But I am sure he can deny this vigorously.
If you consider that a bad thing, I hope for your sake you're not a Bush supporter. His entire administration has been based around such characterizations.
Ob. Python link: Mosquito Hunting
I follow the moth in the helicopter to lure it away from the flowers, and then Roy comes along in the Lockheed Starfighter and attacks it with air-to-air missiles.
A candidate may have the same stance as you on some issues, but then end up breaking his campaign promises anyway. The selectsmart thingy is only smart if the stance is going to be maintained.
Also, there are tiny issues that some people put a huge weight on which are not represented in the site's quiz, or to a great enough degree as high, medium or low.
It's a nice try, but choosing the right candidate is hard work and rightly so. Do not oversimplify.
I really disklike the apparently quick switch from pro-life to pro-choice (I suppose to make himself a more viable Dem candidate). That and civil liberties are my key voting points, so I'm not going to fall for a candidate who isn't solid on them, even if he does (oh the shock!) know how to use a weblog.
Note that the nations who most supported him are the very ones that opposed the war.
More in the same vein
http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe Better a smartass than a dumbass.
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
Funny, I don't see the word President in there anywhere. Dean may be the most enlightened politician in terms of intellectual property since Jefferson said an idea was like a flame shared from taper (candle) to taper. That doesn't mean much.
A good President could veto a bad copyright bill brought to his desk, but typically this is a very loaded thing to do. A really good President could draft some legislation or ask for good copyright law to be drafted, just as any corporation or lobbyist could do, but honestly, I don't like the idea of external drafts.
I'd rather the President focus on putting a leash on tyrannical law enforcement and reign in our undue influence (read: meddling) on other sovereign nations.
[
And if Saddam being in power isn't what the protesters wanted, then what on earth DID they want? WE all knew the UN sanctions weren't ever going to work, and that they were only starving his subjects. We all knew he wasn't going to step down of his own accord. And we all knew the UN wasn't going to oust him so long as most of the Security Council had a vested interest in keeping him there. So what's left?
http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe Better a smartass than a dumbass.
Actually I've always known that Saddam would remain to power for as long as the US wanted to and be removed from it without going thru international law (UN). I've always had the feeling the US chose to freeze the Iraq issue to strenghen it's relation with Saudi Arabia and win good deals for it's oil (had this thought long before this last battle). Keeping Iraq out of the circuit made shure it's good reservoirs were kept aside for future needs (Western, US needs) and gave the arabs some chills (troops, base camps, air strikes etc... right on the doorstep). That's what I thought when I wondered why Clinton didn't give the old satrap the final beating Bush Senior withheld (I was too young when the Gulf War exploded)
Mi domando chi à il mandante di tutte le cazzate che faccio - Altan
this is no freedom issue
It obviously doesn't work to let everyone "decide" if one wants an insurance or not. Because you have the "option" not to get an insurance...
You're an idiot. I don't even have to argue with you because you've already contradicted yourself in your own post.
Your socialist utopia has nothing to do with freedom; give it up.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Either that site's selection criteria are too vague or the candidates really are all the same. I ran through it and my top 6 matches (all > 80%) were:
Kerry, Kucinich, Gephardt, Lieberman, Bush and Libertarian Candidate.
Since I don't believe that Gephardt, Bush and Libertarians are anywhere near within 6% of each other on any set of issues, I can only presume that the selectsmart analysis criteria are just too small to be meaningful.
1. Kucinich, Cong. Dennis, OH - Democrat (100%)
2. Libertarian Candidate (98%)
3. Bush, George W. - US President (94%)
I think I broke your webpage.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Oh yeah. Declaring others as idiots. Well, you must have a clue!
What's he good for other then getting other people children killed.
On a side note, witchblade, the liberal media darling by succession went dyke. She's a girls' girl now.
Unlike his wife, who still practices medicine, Dean appears to be a politico from square one, not a doctor who just happened to drift into politics... there's a big difference. Ever wonder why a lot of physicians DON'T belong to the AMA? There are several reasons, one of which is this: it's often viewed as staffed by politicos more interested in their issues and pet political crusades than medicine. I dearly hope Dean doesn't trade on his "medical credentials" too much... a lot of other physicians colleagues I work with aren't impressed by his resume.
When you look at howard dean's resume, he practiced full-time out in the real world (with a partner) for exactly ONE YEAR (I'm not counting his three years of internal medicine residency). He even worked on Jimmy Carter's campaign as a second-year resident, and joined the Vermont legislature when he was a year out of residency.
Even aside from his sparse real-world experience, I have mixed feelings about his health care views. Having practiced in a Universal Coverage arena (the military) and in the Real World (private practice), I see some kind of economic triage as a very Good Thing(TM). It doesn't have to be large... a copay of just five bucks would do wonders to curb unnecessary abuse-of-the-system physician visits... and don't give me that "some people can't afford five dollars" line... not smoking for two days would easily cover a doctor visit. It's a matter of priorities; I have patients who go to the doctor for anything and everything (colds, hangnails, rashes they've had for a year), particularly when they've never paid a dime, and never will. It's a bad idea to completely hide the cost of medicine from people. If you think health care is expensive NOW, just wait until it's free.
The idea that we can do everything for everyone in the healthcare arena is a fallacy. There's not enough money or resources, and that's the bottom line. Unless, of course, you want an insane income tax rate, and a bloated federal agency to administer it all... You can game the numbers all you want, but at some point, it WILL come down to rationing if you go with a single-payer, univeral coverage model. Dean even mentions "univeral coverage" and "fiscally responsible" in the same sentence on his website... bold words.
Besides, some people choose to go without insurance for a time... I'm one of them. That's right... I'm a doctor, and I currently have NO health insurance, so I'm included in that "60 million" people who reportedly desperately need legislative help. Be suspicious of such numbers... they don't tell the whole story.
Dean also wants to expand medicare and medicaid to cover more people. Well... that's great... but the government has already slashed physician reimbursements to the bone (and beyond) in those programs, to the point that it costs some doctors more to file medicaid claims than it does to simply see the patient FOR FREE and write it off.
Even though he's technically a "colleague," I view Dean with the suspicion I reserve only for a politician, because that's exactly what he is.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
Interest is the only thing that would be taxed. In the case of Bill Gates, though, his money comes from income, which is taxed.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
Good, you're listening.
Let me spell it out for you.
There is nothing in your socialist programs, other than the fact that they are merely poorly-managed, thinly-veiled methods of fleecing the lower classes, that would require them to be mandatory.
Even if there were, requiring people to participate in them would not be an exercise in securing liberty; it would be an exercise in tyrranny.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Well, that's your opinion. I have mine. I think it's worthless to discuss this issue further :)
I'd like to point out that media consolidation that you are so concerned about was inserted in to the bill at republican insistance. The democrats, allowed it for a variety of reasons including, some democrats are as money hungry as their fellow republicans, and 2) it was the only way to get the rest of the bill passed. And if I recall, the Republican's controlled the house at the time of the passage of this bill...
AMEN!
It seems Rumsfeld wasn't at all concerned about WMDs in the 80's:
Most glaring is that Donald Rumsfeld was in Iraq as the 1984 UN report was issued and said nothing about the allegations of chemical weapons use, despite State Department "evidence." On the contrary, The New York Times reported from Baghdad on March 29, 1984, "American diplomats pronounce themselves satisfied with relations between Iraq and the United States and suggest that normal diplomatic ties have been restored in all but name."
Any candidate calling for an end to so-called "business method" patents, and anything else that scotches the simple transfer of methods from brick/morter as patentable, would get my attention.
I don't care who you vote for - I just want you to vote. The sad fact is that most /.ers won't. Only 40% of those eligable will bother to wander over to the polls and cast a vote. I don't see why /.ers would be any different, and maybe even worse.
If you want to wine about who won or who supports you possition, then at least take the time to participate in the process.
Then again, if you'll just stay home, it makes my vote even more important. That's right - you just stay home and I'll make the desision for you!
You probably think Stalin was a progressive.
Ever notice people so concerned about the environment drive SUV's?
Ever been over seas and notice you can't breath the air because it's so poluted?
Why does the left (the green weenies) want to take America back to the stone age with their Kyoto treaty?
Why do people think Abortion is the only issue that they should vote for? (both sides of abortion)
If a candidate is trying to impress you with his "environmental" record or his "abortion" record, you should seriously consider NOT voting for that candidate. They are lying to you. They are hiding something.
Go ahead, argue. You know I'm right.
e. Faust
Women are 3x more likely to violently sexually abuse children then men, I've seen cigarettes, curling irons, coat hangers, knives and so much more. It's *is* liberial media that surppresses this information and opts for the lone wolf campaign. Why would a *socially* responsible party use the arguement of peer presure as an excuse to keep one fact from entering popular media, and in the same turn enforce the same form of peer presure on another. The bible says something about beware of a person that comes with flattery on the lips, the liberials exemplify this.
Liberals representing womens' views is like an SS officer representing Jews. The liberial brought only self-hatred, suicide, and dependency. The TV says one thing, what's out my doorstep is an entirely different reality. It was a grand failure not a success.
Just look at their lasted endeviour. It's not your fault you eat to much, it's the corporations who are at fault. Our solution is to sell you less at the same price, "Sounds like a win-win situation to me". How the hell is that not disempowering, you tell me exactly what I want to hear, and pass off with little acknowledgement what I need to hear.
--Welcome me to another around the corner chat so that we can laugh about the short-falls--
An alternative way of viewing this development is that it reinforces the suspicion that, politically, Lessig is well to the left. Of the liberal Presidential aspirants, Dean is perhaps the furthest to the left.
A lawyer & digital forensics examiner. Also an expert on open source software (OSS).
Remember? We were told that Saddam would certainly hit us with all those WMDs as soon as we came too close to the capital. So we bombed his palaces, killed his family, forced him from power, ownzored his country, and there was never the slightest hint of a chemical or biological attack.
Some would say this is not surprising, since the only credible evidence we have comes from over 10 years ago, and the effective shelf life of those weapons is less than three years. But regardless -- if he had them, why didn't he use them?
The scenario that's being painted is, we put a gun to the insane dictator's head, he had weapons of massive destructive power, but instead of using them he let us destroy him. Something about that doesn't quite add up.
As Governor Dean's campaign manager I thought I could answer a few questions and make a comment or two as well. We have absolutely forbidden any staff from posting or writing anything for Howard Dean and then post it under his name. In other words everything the Governor blogs and everything he blogs for Lessig will be written and posted by the Governor himself. One of the reasons we thought Lessig would be a good place to guest blog is that it helps to build this trust that it is really the Governor doing the guest blogging -- and that the community will trust that Lessig would not have allowed it if it wasn't so. Any thoughts as to how to answer the issue of trusted identity would be appreciated. It is something we have been really trying to figure out -- as I have pointed out -- how do you know this is really me? And we are not trying to kid anybody -- particularly anyone here -- we know we ain't perfect -- and that we don't get it all -- but we are trying to get it -- trying to reach out to everyone using every tool we can -- because as someone who you will probably regard as a political hack -- who has worked on 6 Presidential campaigns -- I can tell you what you already know -- ITS ALL ABOUT THE MONEY -- The only way to put power back in people's hands is for the people to buy their government back. A million to two million Americans contributing $100 each or whatever they can -- will be a force that will not only win the Presidency -- but will also strike enough fear into everyone else in Washington -- that we can change our country's politics. The biggest challenge is to cut through people's cynicism -- nothing will change if we can not get beyond that and get people to participate in their self-government again -- and believe that together we have the power to protect our rights, and our civil liberties, and reclaim our government. That is what this campaign has been trying to prove -- that is why we are doing what we are doing eveyday to build a community that will carry that cause. That is why Howard Dean will guest blog for Lawrence Lessig -- to reach out -- in an authentic voice -- and see what happens. Why? Why the hell not? Joe Trippi campaign manager Dean for America
Slashdot is just about the only internet sanctuary left to all of the left wing loonies out there apart from the slightly smaller scale "Federation for the victory of anarcho-socialist forces against the globalist capitalist blah blah" type sites. You wonder if they do anything else than sitting in front of their computers dreaming about their Utopias and embarassing themselves in protests which bear a strange resemblance to rock concerts than coherent political speech.
partition asking Congress to look into this.
If you remember MoveON started as a movement with the purpose of lobbying for maybe there is more important things in this world tha a Presidential Blowjob.
They recently held the first Internet Prmary that gave Dean the top spot. Now this.
It is becoming a major political force,
Help fight continental drift.
What's pseudo about Dean's support? He's already raised $9 million dollars, mostly from individual contributions on the internet. That sounds like a legitimate grassroots movement to me -- and one that's giving him a budget to let him compete just fine in other media.
As for being too early -- you're right that he'll never be able to compete dollar for dollar with Bush, who's already raised more money than all the Democrats combined. But if you were going up against a $200 million dollar ad campaign, don't you think you'd want to get started early, too?
As Governor Dean's campaign manager I thought I could answer a few questions and make a comment or two as well. We have absolutely forbidden any staff from posting or writing anything for Howard Dean and then post it under his name. In other words everything the Governor blogs and everything he blogs for Lessig will be written and posted by the Governor himself. One of the reasons we thought Lessig would be a good place to guest blog is that it helps to build this trust that it is really the Governor doing the guest blogging -- and that the community will trust that Lessig would not have allowed it if it wasn't so. Any thoughts as to how to answer the issue of trusted identity would be appreciated. It is something we have been really trying to figure out -- as I have pointed out -- how do you know this is really me? And we are not trying to kid anybody -- particularly anyone here -- we know we ain't perfect -- and that we don't get it all -- but we are trying to get it -- trying to reach out to everyone using every tool we can -- because as someone who you will probably regard as a political hack -- who has worked on 6 Presidential campaigns -- I can tell you what you already know -- ITS ALL ABOUT THE MONEY -- The only way to put power back in people's hands is for the people to buy their government back. A million to two million Americans contributing $100 each or whatever they can -- will be a force that will not only win the Presidency -- but will also strike enough fear into everyone else in Washington -- that we can change our country's politics. The biggest challenge is to cut through people's cynicism -- nothing will change if we can not get beyond that and get people to participate in their self-government again -- and believe that together we have the power to protect our rights, and our civil liberties, and reclaim our government. That is what this campaign has been trying to prove -- that is why we are doing what we are doing eveyday to build a community that will carry that cause. That is why Howard Dean will guest blog for Lawrence Lessig -- to reach out -- in an authentic voice -- and see what happens. Why? Why the hell not? Joe Trippi campaign manager Dean for America please excuse the double post.
I haven't seen anything 'lite' about Dean. Whenever I actually look into his stance on an issue, I find that he's thought it through very carefully, and that he seems to be taking a principled stand -- while being open to discussion. He doesn't go for the simple answer -- he goes for one that makes sense to him, whether or not it looks good. It helps that I agree with many of his stances, once I understand them -- but it helps even more that I respect the way he thinks and speaks. That's one way that he comes in way beyond Bush in my book.
...
But the important thing is that his views usually make more sense once you look into them. For example, he's often labeled as 'pro-gun' -- because he thinks that Vermont, with roughly 3 murders a year, should have a different set of gun laws than New York. That's not entirely crazy, is it?
I've looked into a few other issues that you name:
"Pro-choice, but refuses to make Roe v. Wade a litmus test for federal judges."
I read that interview. Basically, he was saying that he would assess judges based on a wide array of issues, of which abortion was just one. Are you saying Dean is like Bush because he refuses to take a simplistic stance? Come on
"Kyoto treaty
Says we must "take another look," but has "concerns" about some provisions."
Specifically, that the treaty might go too easy on third-world pollution. Is that too soft on the environment for you?
"Patriot Act
Would repeal "parts," but also wants to expand intelligence agencies; praises Russ Feingold as only Senator who opposed the act, ignoring Kucinich's vocal House opposition, falsely implying no other candidate opposed the Patriot Act"
It is unfortunate that the House Democrats are so underplayed in general -- but now are you saying Dean is like Bush because he's going to apply standards of constitutionality to the Patriot act?
"Medical marijuana
Firmly opposed, although promises to abide by a proposed FDA evaluation."
So he's going to overcome his own prejudices, and apply the same standards of medicine to marijuana that are applied to other drugs. Shocked, shocked am I.
"Bush would be delighted to run against Dean who is simply a watered down version of Bush."
I simply don't buy that. Gore was watered down, the middle-of-the-road boring candidate. That seems to be what the Democratic Party wants again -- and I agree with you that such a candidate wouldn't stand a chance against Bush.
But Dean comes across as honest, intelligent, daring, and willing to take principled stands. He's neither boring nor, as you suggest, conservative. Although I think you've nailed the problem the democratic party faces, Dean is the solution and not the problem.
That is very unlikely. Gore would certainly have 'invaded' Afghanistan - although that particular 'war' was won more through bribes and politics than by actual fighting. That is the way to do it if you have the option of course.
It is highly unlikely that Gore would have gone into Iraq with Bin Laden still on the loose. The intelligence assements were that Iraq was a containable threat. North Korea and Iran are far more urgent situations - although in large part as a result of the idiotic 'axis of evil comment'.
It the immediate aftermath of 9-11 there was a window of opportunity to support the democratically elected moderates in Iran stage a coup against the clerics and the 'guardianship council'.
The problem with invading Iraq was never going to be the invasion part, it was the occupation that would be necessary afterwards that was always the issue. That was the reason that Bush '41 did not continue into Iraq.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
First a President who believes the ICC trumps the Bill of Rights has to get elected. Then 51 Senators who believe the ICC trumps the Bill of Rights has to get elected. Not bloody likely.
Watching Cowboy Bebop in my jammies, eating a bowl of Shreddies.
Although Dean has been trying to pass himself off as a progressive on everything from the war to intellectual property, a lot of it is spin. His record in Vermont shows that Dean's no progressive , that he'll cave to corporate interests when it's politically expedient. The real progressive presidential candidate is Rep. Dennis Kucinich , Chair of the Progressive Caucus in Congress. Not only is Kucinich's progressive vision and record unambiguous, he has also refused to take any form of assistance from corporations, like law firms and financial firms, in contrast to the other candidates. That's why I trust him to maintain his position on intellectual property rights *after* he's elected.
He recently wrote an article titled "The Case for Public Patents," in which he explains how public patents and nonexclusive licensing of publicly funded R&D could lower health care costs in the US. He likens the system he envisions to "an 'open source' system that makes data and findings publicly available, instead of held secret as proprietary data." He goes on to say: "Open source is how the Linux computer operating system has become a competitive force against Microsoft's Windows." When's the last time you heard a presidential candidate talking about open source and Linux? This position is also indicative of his view on copyrights and intellectual property rights more generally.
He got a late start (February), but he's been making some real strides lately. The MoveOn primary and a long string of endorsements have given a real boost to his campaign. Also, the grassroots network of volunteers is growing exponentially on the internet , where it looks like the primaries will be determined.
The Bob Harris piece linked to above is VERY one-sided.
Dean's a pragmatic progressive. He's not as liberal as Kucinich -- well, except for that tiny, itsy-bitsy bit about ABORTION -- but you know where Dean stands.
Which is why it's so sad that Bob Harris presented such a one-sided collection here. I refuted his points in this piece for the Dean Defense forces. Check it out if you want to hear the other side of the story.
It's handy to refer to the Meet the Press transcript, instead of the second-hand Weekly Standard article.
Dean was honest: "So I don't know how I'd vote on this bill right now, and I'd want to see the last amendments before it goes out the door."
Sounds like the kind of thoughtful, careful man I'd like to be President.
He's "tempted" to be for it because, despite being bad policy, it will prevent Republicans from trashing the federal budget like they've been doing since Bush got into office.
Dean explains again in an interview with NPR's Morning Edition:
Correctly, because he didn't know the anwser to a technical legal question. The right answer is that it will probably vary by state. States with "Defense of Marriage Acts" will almost certainly not recognize Canadian gay marriages.
From the interview:
Dean: I can't answer that question because it's a legal question, but I can tell you what I will definitely do. I will definitely make sure they have exactly the same rights as married people, which is what we've done in Vermont. I can't tell you about the marriage question. I think the answer probably is they are legally entitled to be recognized, but I don't without--I'm not a lawyer and I don't know the answer to that.
Russert: Would you--do you think they should be?
Dean: Well, that's a very difficult issue. The position I've always taken is that it's the church's business to decide who they can marry and who they can't marry.
And get trashed for being "mean" again? I think not.
If a US citizen commits a crime in Canada, the US can send him to Canada to be tried and sentenced and jailed.
We have treaties that allow for this.
Prisoners of the US have died while undergoing questioning.
Doctors who have seen the victims have said that they appear to have been tortured to death by the US troops.
In one word: UNELECTABLE
In eight words: Four more years of Bush, thanks
to Dean.
I agree. Dean's been the most innovative candidate using the web to orgainize grassroots volunteers in a decentralized fashion. His campaign is using Meetup.com (actually, the grassroots started that first), a high-quality video distribution service (howarddean.tv; Windows only), has a blog and was the first candidate to leave a comment on a weblog. His campaign manager, Joe Trippi is incredibly tuned in to what people are saying on the web.
And not a peep on this from Slashdot. Does this mean that the Washington Post scooped Slashdot on a technology story? That's pretty lame.
The dems don't want him, they want their boy Gephart or *shudder* Lieberman. The DLC publically flogged Dean supporters by calling them "the activist elite" and tried to compare them to politcally impotent ultra-lefties.
The DLC, and the ndol.org website you linked to is part of the New Democrats. That is the centrist Democratic coalition that was brought together by President Clinton. Neither group is "The Democrats", they are part of the Dems, but not the whole. The Democratic party is not really a organized well-oiled machine like the GOP, it is a coalition of a variety of interests of which the DLC and the New Dems play a signifigant role.
Regardless, everyone who isn't in the GOP wants an electable Democrat. I can't see why Dean wouldn't fit the bill, especially with Iraq turing out to be a quite the quagmire for Bush.
Wishing and hoping that Iraq turns into a bad situation isn't going to win you a Presidential election. You have to think and speak positively. Attacking might win you a congressional seat, but not the Presidency.
I'm a Democrat, but I'm not a Dean supporter. I don't like him, and I don't trust him. The campaign I see him trying to run is one of being opportunist, like the parent poster stated. His performance on Meet the Press was abysmal, and he simply cannot win a Presidential election.
And it is absolutely critical for the future of this nation that GW Bush is out of office come 2005. Never in my lifetime have I seen a President who has done more to harm this nation. Nixon and Reagan are looking like they should have their likenesses put on Mount Rushmore by comparison.
Sorry, but there's no ploy. Dean is fighting influencial (read: very wealthy and very connected) members of his own party right now and in interesting ways (appeal to the populace, net-based action, etc) just to get heard.
I think this is insulting, because Dean is also fighting people in his party who are intelligent and understand the issues and the politics. To win in 2004, you have to address national security concerns, and Dean is not doing that. But keep in mind that you can address this issue in a strong manner and still address domestic liberties and economic issues. The public as a whole is solidly behind the Democrats ideas regarding liberties and economics, and the key is to advocate those positions strongly, not cave into the GOP criticism and play to their game plan.
Protesting Iraq at this point and time is a non-starter, it won't win additional votes. Why? Because the votes Dean is going for are part of the Democratic base, and they're already committed. The votes which are critical are the swing-vote, the middle ground, the ones who could be swayed to vote GOP if the Dems don't show that they have better ideas.
If you feel the left-wing or the Greens are being ignored, they aren't. It's just that they are only part of the party, according to the ndol.org they represent 33% of the Democratic party, which itself only represents 33% of the nation. A third of a third, but you need a good solid half to win a Presidential election. That means some 35-40% of the nation in addition to the left-wing and greens has to be swayed by your arguments and I don't see Dean being able to do this.
Listen, Iraq is over, it happened and there is no turning back. At this point what it is critical for the Dems to do is take over the issue. Show not how they opposed the war, and their proof is that it's an utter disaster... but state that things are in bad shape, and it is clear that this Administration is bungling the job so we need new leadership to take over and carry forward with our nations promises to rebuild Iraq.
I've already made up my mind on who I want to see running, and he isn't in the field right now. Based on my understanding of the situation, I think he'll announce in about two months and come in looking like the adult to these children which will help us sweep the elections.
The on
Wow. Saddam didn't know we were going to attack? After we were building up troops on his border?
Maybe he didn't see our troops.
So Saddam had his people hide the weapons? Hide them where?
Well, that's obvious. They hid them somewhere where they couldn't get to them for days while the US troops advanced.
Iraq isn't that big. Hiding something on the other side of the country would only take a week.
So, the troops in eastern Iraq hid their weapons in western Iraq and the troops in western Iraq hid their weapons in eastern Iraq.
And they both promised not to use each other's weapons.
Yes, I can see how you'd believe that. Particularly since you believe that Saddam managed to "get millions of peace lovers around the world supporting him, even while he butchered his own people".
You're one of those "if you ain't fer us, you're agin us" types, aren't you?
It is possible to not support Saddam and still not support the invasion.
But you don't see that, do you? To you, it is better that the Iraqi civilians die free (when a US bomb hits their house) than live under Saddam.
References do not include the statements of some liberal supporter who's written an obviously biased argument. If you have any real references (like, numbers from the government), then provide them.
But, even if so, so what? Bill Clinton presided over an unrealistic economic bubble, supported by the dot-com and tech-stock craze. He didn't have to deal with terrorism, or with this economic recession that was caused by the irrational exuberance on wall-street.
The new entitlement programs -- such as the Medicare additions and the farm-bill -- are ill-advised and should be eliminated. That's part of the reason why GW Bush is only a 69% match for my vote (along with abortion and some other social issues). In regards to tax-cuts and the new retirement-programs that Bush has proposed, those are good both now and in the long-term, as they will allow Americans to save more money. Heaven forbid should the government actually have to cut back on it's spending a little bit.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
It is not a matter of opinion anymore ,dickhead.
It is a matter of proven track record.
I can't see the contradiction you mention. I think you may have simply mis-read his post, which you spent so much time critiquing...
Never trust a man in a blue trench coat, Never drive a car when you're dead
You really believe this is a grass roots movement?
Seems more like the outcome of a democratic stratigic meeting.
Plainly, simply and truthfully, it's another lie. This is why we don't like you. You can feel smug all you like about what ever you wish but from where I'm standing you look like an ass.
/. is now a powerful force in the tech industry and in the online world, and it does its fair share of politicking as well.
/. run stories having each of the candidates answer questions. Imagine, a /. election year series in which we here from Bush, Nader, Dean, Kerrey, Sharpton, Kuicinich, all the libertarian and constitution party people, etc.
/. and I bet it would surprise/educate quite a few regular readers/posters.
It would be very cool to see
It would be very civic-minded of
Yes, you are all thinking "politically". Well Dean's not getting the nomination. There's no "on-line" voting. There's no way you slashdot geeks are going to get outside and vote. Not to mention the fact that half of you are 13 years old! :P
Nor that it was attempting to develop them.
They had them because we provided them in the past.
They did not have them any more.
#1. UN inspectors could not find any evidence of WMD's.
#2. Saddam did not use any WMD's in the war.
#3. US troops did not find any evidence of WMD's after the war.
What is so difficult about that?
They couldn't find any before the war and he didn't use any during the war and we can't find any after the war.
#4. All evidence provided by intelligence agencies about attempts to acquire the materials has been shown to be false.
They didn't find, he didn't use, we cannot find and the evidence has been show to be false.
And still you have a problem?
Sounds to me like you have a religious belief in those WMD's that no amount of factual evidence will disprove.
"Taking care of those that are weak and cannot manage by themselves instead of taking advantage of them is really one of the key defining things of being a human."
Exactly. A government is not human. Individual people should be in the business of charity and love, not governments.
income taxes are capped. theres a limit.
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The US did give satelite intel to Iraq. But the US also provided biological samples and agricultural loans to Iraq. Those loans were used to develop Iraq's chemical weapons.
You also try to dodge the point on the killings that are happening right now. I'm not talking about mistakes in the past. I'm talking about how people get upset over killings that happened 10 years ago in Iraq, but don't care about killings happening last week in Africa. That is because this war was not about the killings.
No, the chances of finding WMD's are not slim. If those WMD's actually exist. The easiest way to have found them would be for Saddam to have used them on our invading forces. But he didn't.
Yes, Saddam had them in the past because we provided them. But the past is not the present.
Call it whatever you want. The facts speak for themselves.
Now as for your claim that Saddam violate the original cease fire that demanded he destroy his WMD's....... where are those WMD's that you claim he did not destroy?
Again, the facts seem to contradict your claims.
France and Russia would have serious problems back home if the UN inspectors had turned up any WMD's. But they didn't. That's the problem with a democracy.
Again, I have to correct you. People voting in a free election can elect to become a radical theocracy.
As for the media stunt, your claims just don't match with the pictures. Yes, the military would be the first to draw attention to it. Why do you even have to ask that?
Oh, that's one of those "rhetorical" questions, isn't it? It's one of those incorrect rhetorical questions.
You're the only person (anywhere, not just here) that I've seen link to the actual Green Party website, and not this one. Is there a reason for that? The confusion has been bothering me since the 2000 election, when the linked site released a party platform that included things like '100% income tax on all income over 10 times the minimum wage'. The site would have to be the most dedicated hoax in history if it weren't at least representing some other green party, but during the election the site thanked Nader on the front page, and their platform spread to every news program from CNN's live talkshow to Good Morning America, where Nader said, after being asked about the segment I mentioned, that the platform was released by a "dissident group." In my opinion, it did a lot of damage to the buildup that had been going on around his campaign. I had planned not to vote for him until Michael Moore himself responded to an email I sent asking how he could endorse a platform like that (this was before the GMA interview) and set the record straight.
Anyway, I don't suppose you have any other information?
It clearly illustrates the fact that no one liked Saddam.
Even in his own country there were thousands of people who would have been happy to kill him.
He couldn't travel from city to city without the body doubles and armor and body guards.
This guy was not a threat to the US. Not in the slightest way. He couldn't do a thing to hurt us.
Yet our government started the media blitz to build him into the worst dictator ever. Meanwhile, the killings were going on in Africa and we just skipped over them.
People who don't believe that our government could have lied about how bad Saddam was need to get over it.
Our government has admitted that Bush gave out incorrect information in his speech to the nation.
Face the fact, people. Your government lied to you. Your government admits it lied to you.
Just because Saddam was a bad guy who would have been killed in his own country does not mean he is worth a SINGLE US SOLDIER'S LIFE.
...it was widely reported not more than a month ago that the initial strike on a supposed leadership bunker was actually a strike on nothing. CBS reporters stood in the hole, in the dirt. The bunker never existed, and there wasn't even the slightest hint of debris from a building being hit. If you then take into account the reports after that strike that agents were on the ground, and had seen someone resembling Saddam being taken out on a stretcher from the building........maybe you should learn to be more skeptical in cases where the Government is the sole source of the news and information you shape your opinions on.
These days--especially for the purposes of gun legislation--"assault weapons" primarily refers to semi-automatic rifles with certain "military" characteristics. They're no more powerful than traditional hunting rifles; there is no functional difference.
The proponents of such laws go through ridiculous contortions of logic to justify their supposed necessity. For instance, the Brady Campaign has a few arguments: First, the "multiple assault weapon features". Under the US's 1994 Crime Bill, the law currently up for renewal, a semi-auto rifle is banned if it has two or more of the following features:
- A folding or telescoping stock
- A pistol grip
- A bayonet mount
- A flash suppressor, or threads to attach one
- A silencer
- A grenade launcher.
The logic of this law is curious[1]. A gun with a grenade launcher is not an assault weapon. Meanwhile, take a gun considered to be a legal hunting rifle. Add a folding barrel to make it easier to carry. You're still fine, still legal. Now add a silencer. (Why? Maybe so that if you miss with your first shot, the deer won't be spooked by the gunshot.) Suddenly the gun turns into an evil, infringing assault weapon. The addition or removal of a single feature makes all the difference. That's the entire basis of the ban, except for a few guns banned by name.(Of course, if a manufacturer removes those characteristics, bringing the gun into compliance, they accuse you of "evading" the law.)
The Brady Campaign also spews forth the following malarkey: "Maximize lethal effects through a rapid rate of fire"? They're normal semi-autos! None of their characteristics improve rate-of-fire! How does adding a silencer and a bayonette help you to fire faster? "Designed to be spray-fired from the hip"? Any rifle can be fired from the hip if you don't care about accuracy. I'd much rather be shot at by someone shooting from the hip.
Then they talk about "high firepower and ability to penetrate body armor." But assault weapons are no more powerful than "normal" rifles--in fact, many are less powerful.
[1] Assuming we define "curious" as "bone-headed".
Like Sweden's. Better health care than in the US, better quality of life than in the US, etc, etc. They know what 'humane' means, whereas we'd rather have our poor just go off somewhere and die so we don't have to deal with them.
Did you know that the US has the highest infant mortality rate among first-world nations? But I'm sure you don't care about that, because they're only really POOR kids who die all the time.
-fred
Sign #11 of Slashdot overdose: You see the phrase 'moderate Republican' and you wonder if that would be a +1 or a -1.
I would like to know where in the tax code this rule can be found.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
I think social security is needed because people are too stupid to save money. You know it, I know it.
Social security is a retirement plan, you know why? If the gov didnt take out 15% tax on everything, stores and companies would raise their prices so poor people cannot save any money, and the poor would have no money to retire with.
Social Security ensures that you'll have money to retire with, even if you work at MC Donalds
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I think most people are too dumb to save their money. Thats why the government does it for people.
IF people were smart enough to manage their own retirement we wouldnt need social security.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Just retire where its cheaper to live, outside the country, like in China, Japan, Africa, India.
Social Security if it does go bankrupt, will guarentee that I'll leave the country when it comes time for me to retire.
Why? The US is too expensive.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
I said that Saddam did not use WMD's in that war. You said he did, on the Kurds.
No he did not. Not in the that war. The Kurds were gassed years before that war started.
It seems that you don't even know what happened in which war.
And the fact that we haven't found anything yet does mean something. It means that our intelligence on the subject was not accurate.
You can keep claiming that there was "lots of evidence that Iraq had WMD's", but that evidence exists only in your mind.
In each and every single instance where the US sent US troops and US inspectors to check a suspected WMD site, nothing has been found.
At last admission, over 100 sites had been checked (the top 100 most likely sites accourding to our intelligence) and nothing has been found.
Don't try that religious argument on me. I'm looking at verifiable facts.
Now, to some people, the absense of any evidence indicating any crime and the proof that such "evidence" as was claimed was false would seem to indicate that there was no crime.
But not to you. That just indicates that someone is hiding something. Because you know that there was a crime. That is very typical of certain religious viewpoints. Never let facts or the absence of supporting evidence get in your way.
Take for example this BBC article about the French strikes, which calls them "nationwide strikes over pensions reform."
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
You say he had them.
But that he hid them from the inspectors.
He did this so the inspectors would not find anything and that would stop the US from attacking.
And you think this was "quite intelligent" of him?
After the US puts troops on his border.
After the US blows off the UN.
After the US gives him 48 hours to leave.
Well, you know, the US might not follow through on that. After all, you only tried to have Bush's daddy killed 10 years earlier. It probably isn't personal with Junior.
Junior just might not attack.
And you claim that Saddam was "quite intelligent"?
You'll see how good the spy sats were back in the 60's.
Check our our pics of Korea's nuke program. That's how good they are today.
We'd be able to see them burying thousands of barrels of agents.
I have a degree and I did not have to "work hard mentaly" to get it.
College for me consisted of a lot of parties and sex. But I didn't have to study much for the tests. Maybe I'm just naturally gifted or something.
But I do see a lot of middle managers with degrees that would qualify as "dumb". They're good at social and political games. The kind where you get support for your projects because you golf with someone higher up the ladder.
Kucinich is hardly "bonkers." His positions are very much in the mainstream of "progressive" thought. He is the only candidate with an explicit, rational and workable healthcare plan for instance. He proposes we take our extremely efficient, proven and popular existing national health insurance system, Medicare, and expand it to universal coverage. This would bring our health insurance practices in line with the rest of the developed world without the complicated legal and fiscal gymnastics the compromise candidates propose.
Kucinich may be unelectable, but only because of the broken electoral and campaign finance systems. His positions poll extremely well. In a recent moveon.org mock primary, he finished second to Dean with 24% of the vote. Over 317,000 people voted, more than turned out for the 2000 New Hampshire, Iowa, South Carolina primary/cuacuses combined.
It is cowardly, and a betrayal of whatever it means to be a Jew, to act as a white man
-James Baldwin
I didn't know that Canada and Mexico were also supporting Dean.
America happens to be the big chunk of dirt we are all on. I think it's called a continent.
There is north American and south America.
America is not a country.
The United States of America is a country.
America is a chunk of dirt surounded by water and ice.
Don't be stupid and lazy like the press and politicians. Use the right name.
Canadians and Mexicans are just as American as you are. People in Peru are Americans too.
Please use the correct name for your country not the word American or America. It's incorrect. Don't be wrong.
Proud citizen of the United States of America who can take the time to type it's full and correct name.
As you can see I don't care about my karma.
I submitted this article as a story some time ago, but
It is cowardly, and a betrayal of whatever it means to be a Jew, to act as a white man
-James Baldwin
" That's funny, the majority of privacy-invading laws are backed by the far right.
You are wrong human rights infringement is bipartisan. Liberals will tell you it's for the children. Conservatives will tell you it's for security. Neither excuse is good enough.
The push for masive invasion of privacy is just the latest instance of this weakness of both ends of the political spectrum. To bad they often agree when it comes to infringing rights.
As you can see I don't care about my karma.
Warren Buffet says the tax cuts allow him to live tax free.
Voodoo Economics
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He is, in fact, a centrist dem and not a far left evangelist.
Yeah, thats why, and I suspect many other people actualy like dean. I never thought of him as a kenuchick syle left-wing whacko, but rather a resonable pragmatist intrested in doing the best, rational thing. Who would claim that 'ballanced budgets' and 'fiscal responsibility' were left-wing issues?
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
"i hate ann coulter."
So do I. I am a right leaning, gun owing, Bush supporter. The only people who love her are a fellow Joe McCarthy loving mental defectives with repressive tendencies. It's funny how being on TV makes people think someone actualy gives a fuck for what people represent. The only safe place for this woman is on an island all by herself.
As you can see I don't care about my karma.
Since when did the waste stand for capitalism?
If you believe this, you dont understand what the west is truely about.
What you were dumb enough to SAY, but every Democrat BELIEVES but will not say, is that the great mass of the people are unfit for self government and must therefore be 'taken care of', being unable to care for themselves.
Its the truth, just like people are too stupid for a true democracy. I mean if the popular vote decided everything you are telling me you'd agree people are mature enough for it? If not sure up, you are an enemy of democracy.
The unspoken subtext is that there is a class of superior beings, here in the US known as Democratic Leaders, who possess a greater intelligence, knowledge and morality compared to the pitiful mass of the "The People" who are thereby justified in imposing their will by force on the obviously inferior people, "For their own good."
The Republicans believe the same thing, all politicians believe this. Thats why YOU dont make the laws, they do.
For if "The People" are "too stupid" to pick a retirement plan, how can they possibly be entrusted with the far more important and difficult prospect of choosing their own leaders and national policy? How can they be entrusted with sitting on Juries to determine the fate of their fellow Citizens or more bluntly, the fate of an annointed (Homo Superior) Democrat?
Not only that but people are also too stupid to know when to retire.
"How can they be entrusted with sitting on Juries to determine the fate of their fellow Citizens or more bluntly,"
IF people are really so responsible, Gore should be president because he won the popular vote, drugs should be legal, and guess what, the representative government should be destroyed in favor of having the people decide all the laws.
Of course we know the answer to these questions, having the example of 50+ years of Democratic misrule. We have an education system hellbent on doing ANYTHING other than educating, for an educated people might not want to be 'taken care of', while Party leaders send their own offspring to elite private schools so that they will be properly prepared to rule. Juries have been reduced to a vestigal role in courts while Judges have been given greatly increased powers to impose their arbitrary will and even to legislate from the bench.
You want class warfare? If education is not free, thats what will happen, either classwarfare, or most people in this country will move to canada.
People who barely can afford to pay their Bills and feed their kids cannot afford private school, hey most of them are too busy paying back college loans.
Next you'll want to get rid of community college because its too cheap.
The day when America is under the rule of pure Capitalists like you is the day I leave America.
Thank God George Bush is a socialist and not a true conservative, or else he'd have abolished public schools, and removed all the farm subsides, forcing all the poor farmers to move to Canada,
While people in the city would simply be priced out as rent rises too high, forcing us to move out.
Have fun in America, it wont be all too nice when you go to Mc Donalds and theres no one to work there, forget about garbage men, you'll h ave no one to do jobs like that because snobby people like yourself dont like to work hard and get your hands dirty.
But hey, without the so called socialist party, these people will leave, you wont have firemen, you wont have people to work at mc donalds, you wont have a working class.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Even though good ol' Ollie North is now some sorta of polictial hero in some circles, there was that whole little "Iran-Contra" arms thing. You know, were we were selling them Stinger missles and other fun toys. Of course, we "don't clearly recall" at lot of this under oath.
They were centrifuge parts, in particular they were a motor powerful enough to run 1 centrifuge which could separate u235 from u238. All they would need after that was the rest of the parts for the centrifuge, and then to take all that stuff and multiply it by 100, and you'd be able to get enough u235 to build in a nuke in, oh, 10 years or so. Hardly an immediate threat.
Also, everyone already knew about the centrifuge anyway. It was hardly a secret. And it had been buried for 12 years. It was no more a risk today then it was. Claming that they were 'nuke parts' is like claming a screw driver is a 'car part'. Having a screwdriver does not mean you'll ever have a whole car.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
"He proposes we take our extremely efficient, proven and popular existing national health insurance system, Medicare, and expand it to universal coverage."
You mean the system that often doesn't even pay anamount for a service performed that will cover the acual cost? The system that uses corecion to force doctors to accept medicare patients and payment for services that are under the cost of performing? The System that has inflated the cost of medical care in the US to where most can't afford it? I suggest we run away from this nutcase then.
Clark appears to be a gun grabber.
He can never win.
Having worked in the Medicare reimbursement field as a HICFA consultant to hospitals, I can assure you that the inflated prices come from the private insurance side. If it went away in favor of the single payer system Kucinich describes, costs would plummet. The poster was obviously referring to the administrative efficiency of the Medicare system, which leads the industry by a wide margin.
" Gore did beat Bush. It's hard to be better than the winner."
You are factually challenged. Read the liberal newspaper of choice the NYT Gore lost. He would have lost no mater what. Why do liberals like you piss on peoples legs and tell them it's raining.
" its called ZPG or zero pop growth, its what we want."
No it's called we are being taken over by fundimentalist Muslims from North African and Arabs because we have small dicks and low sperm counts.
You are having negative birth rates, your standard of living can't be sustained. You will have to work untill you are 75 because the welfare state can't afford to pay for your pension. JUst a reality check.
You claim that our spy sats aren't good enough to spot what is being moved, yet back in the 60's they were good enough to spot the missiles the USSR had on Cuba.
But now they aren't that good.
Damn, if only we had had 1960's era technology to spot the weapons Saddam was hiding.
"or even like the US heading up the UN Human Rights commission. Because the US are now actually worse violators of international human rights law than Libya."
Yea right people dissappear in the middle of the night in the USA and are never heard of again. Torture is a regular and everyday occurance here in the USA too. Public beating occur daily here. No one is entitled to a lawyer in court in the USA either.
Get a real job you UN fudge packer. Your idea of an effective UN is Rodesia.
But I think we have a good chance of throwing the fucker out.
That probably would have sounded more authoritative if I had spelled HCFA correctly.
The price of a sample of a biological agent is actually very cheap and a few small loans to work on the program (which the US gave iraq) doesn't add much financially, but can create a weapon that's worth 100,000 soviet tanks.
In other words its not the bottom line that matters but what was actually sold.
Also, just about every nation was against the war until it became obvious that going against the US meant less financial aid. You simply have a large sample set to construct a conspiracy theory with.
Uh.. how? I'm no expert but I thought that what distinguished a standard rifle from a machine gun was the bolt. A rifle doesn't need anything fancy, just a means of having the firing pin pierce the back of the round. A machine gun, on the other hand, needs a means of having the bolt slide back, remove the next round from the magazine, and chamber it.
Now, I agree it should be pretty easy in theory to turn a semi-automatic weapon into an automatic weapon -- afterall, both have the critical feature of a bolt which chambers the next round. But you say that a regular hunting rifle can be easily converted to a machine gun with nothing but a wire hanger and a torch?
Anyhow, as to the licensing and banning of weapons, what do you think about licenses for cars? Do you think that anybody who has access to a car should be able to legally drive it? What about pilot's licenses? There are certain devices which have the potential to cause enough damage that people should not be allowed to use them unless they're suitably trained and certified, don't you think?
And where do you draw the line when it comes to weapons? Should anybody who can afford a grenade be allowed to get one? How about land mines, or rocket-propelled grenades? At some point, the potential damage from misuse of something has to outweigh a person's right to own it.
You lament the fact that gun laws punish criminals far less than people who are otherwise non-criminals. That is a shame. But, at the same time, how often are guns misused? How often is someone shot in the heat of the moment, or is a kid killed when playing with his father's gun, etc? What is the ratio of gun misuse to gun use? I honestly don't know.
I happen to think that all guns should be illegal. I don't think people have an inherent need to hunt with guns, and I don't think they make a valid means of self-defence. The risk to the general public is just too high.
So what if guns are banned completely. The well-armed citizens of Iraq and Afghanistan proved very well that the US military is no match for a citizen's militia armed with handguns. If you think the government is likely to use the army against you, there are probably more effective things you can do besides stockpiling guns.
Go to the first post I posted. And look at the candidate that it says is my first choice: 100% Libertarian. So please RTFC.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
..if the slashdot community truly represents the majority of American thinking. Where I come from,[I am not in the US] there are huge disparities between different sections of the society and so almost never do my (techy-educated-middle-class) political viewpoints and choices tally with the results after the elections. I just want to see if the educated and technical working class thinks like the rest of America.
:-)]
:))
A Not-so-obligatory summary.
[Actualy I wish there were summary postings for all slashdot discussions so am posting one here.
- Kucinich seems to be a better choice than Dean since he seems to be more open and has stronger convictions than Dean who seems to soften/change his stand when the clime is not right. However Dean may be my bet for winning the elections in comparison to Kucinich because of just that he changes his stand when the clime is not right. [Kucinich seems to be the honest-working-man type and Dean seems to be the smart-politician-with-level-head type.]
- Dean must have an amazing campaign manager since he is one of the few candidates who was actually discussed so heavily on Slashdot and has reached out to this crowd (apart from Bush; but then Bush has an unfair advantage.
- If WMDs/Saddam/Laden is/are found Bush will win hands down I think.
- Slashdot readers seem to be swayed by Dean because he has tried to reach out to the techy community with technically savvy actions(gimmicks??) rather than because of his opinions.
Islam has been trying to take over the world since it was founded. What they are trying to do today is the same thing they were trying to do 300,500, 700, and 1000, even 1250 years ago.
To say that the United States can somehow "win the Islamic people" over is to overlook the fact that in their eyes we are decadent sinners. While we could be nicer to them, that isn't going to help us in the long run. Our destiny in their eyes is to ultimately be converted to Islam.
This is my sig.
You haven't mentioned libertarians. Do they have a good showing in elections? Or at least do their ideas dominate?
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
I call bullshit.
ER queues and treatment are not significantly different from the US to the UK if you measure like with like (i.e. big city hospital to big city hospital) since it's mostly a question of population density.
Some treatments are rationed in the UK, but if you don't have health insurance in the US for your particular disease (and I know b/c I've seen this situation, a g/f had a cancer) then you simply won't get treatment at all
If you'd ever heard Howard Dean speak about No Child Left Behind (And if you worked in education reform), you'd know that he is the most knowledgeable and outspoken among the Dems for completely overhauling that law.
IT'S A FUNDAMENTALLY FLAWED, UNWORKABLE PIECE OF LEGISLATION. Most politicians (including all the dems who voted for it) don't understand that.
and i'm a fan of high standards.
1920 or so?? you mean the stock market crash of 1929 that lead to the Great Depression??
Hey idiot, Social Security wasn't around then, and "the system" you blithely referred to had nothing to do with savings, it was a fuckup with the banking system.
God, why do you post so much garbage, and continue to think you are right?
While I very much doubt you are Dean's campaign manager, I'll give you two ideas anyway.
Note that neither approach proves that Howard Dean himself posted the message rather than delegating the task to one of his campaign members. However, it does prove that someone in the Dean campain posted the message. The digital signature approach lasts longer and is more resistant to attacks. The website approach is simpler and easier for the average Joe to understand.
Finally, you could combine the two approaches and simply sign page B.
While I'm posting, has the Governor considered placing his advertisements under a Creative Commons license?
To try to simplify things beyond reason. Libertarians are really Republicans, because -- according to you -- they prefer Republicans to Democrats, given a choice between the two.
The simple fact is, neither Democrats nor Republican have given me or anyone else much reason to have faith in them. The USA Patriot act was supported by Democrats too. So was the DMCA.
The reason I'd rather have Bush over his Democrat counterparts is that Bush supports superior economic policy. Lower taxes, vastly superior retirement accounds (see the page on LSA), and he will probably support the new Bankruptcy Reform Act, which exempts Roth IRA's from the claims of creditors. Furthermore, the anti-liberty social policies of Bush -- particularly, anti-choice and anti-gay rights -- are unlikely to go anywhere.
This is simply a case of Democrats lying to try to get more non-conformist voters. Democrats do not support freedom anymore than Republicans do. Pres. Clinton signed the DMCA into law, and also supported the anti-encryption laws. Sen. Hollings, one of the biggest enemy of digital freedom, is a Democrat. For the most part, when it comes to uniting against both the economic and social liberties of citizens, the Democratic and Republican parties are just two sides of the same coin.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
a) The moorish invasion of spain was justifiable to this day by many islamic people on usenet. They argued that spain was backwards and islam helped it. I said see this is why US can invade Iraq, because they are backwards... lol.
b) western christianity and islam are guilty of similar crimes. the egyptian gods were wiped off the map when egypt became an islamic state. western christianity had a reformation though and thus was born the idea that religion is not the ultimate answer to everything and out of that came separation of church and state.
c) there's not even any popular support for church and state separation in the middle east. you think republicans are bad because they want to put god and reagan on everything, just imagine a land where 95% of the people actually think that way, and support things like beheadings for crimes, where women are not allowed to drive, banks not being allowed to charge interest, etc.
Like, if you are suspicious of the American right wing, then how can you not be even trebly suspicious at the islamic right wing, which does daily burn americans in effigy, does daily refer to us as the great satan, etc...?
I just don't understand the logical disconnect. Just because they are not white christians does not mean that they are saints!
This is my sig.
Note though that while I say that we should not trust the Islamic states as far as we could throw one, that is not the same as saying that we should have a war with them. Far better is to put some form of alternative energy down with them, then unlink ourselves from trade with them, until they decide to at least advance out to the renaissance. For the price of the Iraqi occupation alone, we could be farther along in trying to build a working fusion reactor.
This is my sig.
Dean will not presume to teach you anything about the internet with his guest blogging. He's a doctor and politician, not a geek. You will see many more questions from him than answers. What we are seeing here is a Presidential candidate who has decided to seek a crash education on government policy and the internet, on the internet, and from the people best able to give it to him: geeks. Such willingness to put himself in the line of fire of some of the best minds in the field displays great intellectual courage and tremendous confidence in us, his constituents, to be his foils, his educators, and his policy team. The reason people don't know Dean's positions on many of the issues which concern us is because he doesn't yet have any worth mentioning - we are still 6 months from the earliest primaries, after all. This guest-blog is likely to be his deepest education on these topics to date and will likely help him form the very opinions, if not the very policies, he will carry into the battle for the Presidency. He knows that the positions many of you advocate are tested by intense peer scrutiny (unlike the product of most think-tanks these days), tested in the market place, yet leavened by the insights of technologists and philosophers. I hope every geek in the realm will be pounding madly at their keyboards to help educate Dean. What you say here may well find it's way into the policies advocated by a Dean Administration. You may be educating our future President, the first Internet President; don't let your President down.
See http://www.unicom.com/chrome/a/000294.html for more information.
All this talk about civil rights from the Democrats is crap if they don't want to repeal USA Patriot and abolish the Dept of Homeland Security.
If Dean promises to do that, he has this Republican dollar, no matter what else he stands for. But, Dems won't, and so, this election is already going to be about whose going be running the American Empire that no one wants, rather than, is the Empire right or wrong.
Come on lefties.. this is the issue you've been waiting for.
But honestly, all I really want is a sane political leader, for once, and not some goddamned cartoon.
This is my sig.
you get it into your think stupid fucking skull. Let me be clear. I am not a Democrat or a Republican. Period. End of discussion. There are many significant issues upon which I disagree with both parties.
So, either you simply cannot read and understand plain English, or you are choosing to ignore what I say to satisfy your need to be a mouth-foaming liberal screaming about the infidels who would dare not vote for liberals. Last time I checked, Libertarians were the most popular 3rd party, obtaining more votes than any other party. I see no reason why a Libertarian won't be on the ballot when it comes time to vote.
Bill Clinton most certainly supported draconian laws, such as anti-encryption laws and the DMCA. The point being, that on social liberty, Democrats are hardly any better -- if at all -- than Republicans. The opposite point is also for the most part true: in regards to economic liberty, Republicans are hardly any better, if at all, than Democrats. Democrats support bankruptcy for individuals, while Republicans support it for businesses; both of which steal money from those who were responsible with their finances, and give it to those who have proven that they can't handle money.
Again, you provide no evidence. Simply pointing to the Clinton era and saying, "that was good" does not prove -- or even suggest -- that Democrats have superior economic policy. The boom of the 90's had absolutely zero -- shit, nadda -- to do with fat Bill. It was an unrealistic boon, propelled by irrational exuberance regarding tech-stocks, and stocks in general. As long as history counts, the economy has run in cycles of ups and downs. Excess bull markets inevitably collapse under the weight of their own hype; while excess bear markets inevitably relent due to the unrealistic nature of pessimism.
Of course, if you weren't so stupid, you would realize this. You would realize that, in fact, the stock market is up over the past 10 years, and quite significantly. You would realize that now is in fact the perfect time to be investing money; I don't fault you for not realizing this, as most people are stupid and invest during the unrealistic heights of market-booms, and pull out of the market during the unrealistic lows. And, of course, you would realize that the US President has very little to do directly with the economy (if anything, the effects are secondary, and require the approval of Congress). Remember, the President can't do anything himself.
Even if I was to buy your inane idea that the DMCA is purely the fault of the democrats you really think that the DMCA is as bad as the patriot act or the TIA program? I suppose you do because the democrats are inherently evil right?
Did I say that the DMCA was purely the fault of Democrats? No, I didn't. I said Democrats were just as guilty of denying social freedoms as have been Republicans. The USAPA hasn't affect me much, and will not do so in the future; the DMCA has and does. Of course, the USAPA is not good. Neither Democrats nor Republicans are inherently evil. They simply don't believe in freedom.
A liberterian will run. You will not for him/her. You will not write in a candidate of your choice. You will vote for the republican.
Why don't you just shut the fuck up and put your foot in your mouth? You don't know a flying fuck about what I will or will not do. And, of course, like a typical nutjob partisan on the left or right, you have ignored everything I've said which discredits your case. I have pointed out that there are many Democrats who I would glady vote for, including Rick Boucher.
If there is so little difference then why not vote for the democrat? If you feel obliged to vote for somebody on the ballot and if there is no difference anyway then what do you care? Just vote democrat then you can be honest when you say you don't care.
People who actually have principles don't vote for someone because "they don't care who wins or looses". They don't just flip a coin and deci
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
> I may not think Bush is the best option, but the better of two evils Dean is not.
HAHAHAHHAHAHAHA -- nice one, Rove-plant. You think anyone here honestly can't deconstruct that you are a Bush fan and just using whatever semantic ammo you can to derail Dean?
It would be funny if it weren't so serious.
I challnege you:
PROVE you are from Vermont. Don't just google. Let's get something unique byt verifiable.
But I doubt you'll be back... The Rovian way is to drop the stinkbomb then flee the building -- damage already done... no value staying around.
"Let me be clear. I am not a Democrat or a Republican. Period. End of discussion."
Have you ever voted for a democrat?
I thought not.
Have you voted for a republican?
I thought so.
Have you voted republican more often then liberterian?
I thought so.
Just admit it man. You are republican. I admit I am a democrat. There is no shame in it.
War is necrophilia.
There are many people who believe no Human Being is Illegal.
There are also people who think that illegal immigrants should be gassed and experimented upon. I'd say the least we can do is send them home.
Stories of immigrants flaunting their ability to steal American jobs after being graciously let into and tolerated in our country won't win your argument.
they will continue to put the old tigers out of business until they (the Americans) could reduce their desires for unnaturally easy life.
That's great. This just means that they'll continue to have higher birthrates than we do and swamp our country with cheap labor until we stop letting them in. If we don't, they'll just continue to drag our country down to their level of living standards. The reason the third world is so poor is that they can't seem to get past the point in which a civilized society realizes that *not* having six children is a good thing.
How to avoid doublethink:
Step 1) Find a definition of freedom.
Step 2) Read it until you understand it.
Step 3) Compare it to the comment above.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Every time a libertarian's on the ballot, I've voted for him. In all other cases, I decide on it issue-by-issue. That makes me Libertarian. So why don't you just fuck off with your simplistic two-party thinking? There damn well is shame to being a republican or democrat -- neither of those parties supports freedom.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
[irony]
So what if a guy votes libertarian or republican. There's no cause and effect relationship there. It's a complex, long lasting interaction. And it's existed long before you were around.
You know what? You are a simple minded moron. You are unable to unserstand the complexities of life. Your brain is unable to process too many facts so you pick the most simple minded answer and grip it in your pea brain with all your might.
Republicans are evil, Libertarians are evil, dh003i is evil. You read simple minded sites and believe that their version of reality is the only one. You should travel and maybe learn some political theory. Read some philosophy and a few history textbooks (that aren't published in the US). Read about Colonialism, Anarchism, and Socialism.
[/irony]
This is left as an exercise for the reader.
Freedom is being allowed to do what you like, if it doesn't harm another. Thus liberals oppose freedom.
Are you being sarcastic? Am I just missing it? I think that to allow government interference in the sex acts of consenting adults, not decriminalizing drugs taken by those who want to take them, banning tattooing, and regulating the adult entertainment industry would be opposing freedom...
There are some positions taken by many liberals that run counter to freedom, but conservatives are just as, if not more guilty.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
Once again.
You have never voted for a democrat, you have often voted for republicans, you have sometimes voted for liberterians.
That makes you a republican.
There is no shame in admitting it.
War is necrophilia.
and I normally don't call people that.
(1) You don't know who I've voted for in the past, present, or who I will vote for in the future (I don't even know that).
(2) Nothing in my posts indicated that I was more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate in general than a Republican candidate. All I said was that choosing between Bush and the Democratic candidates currently in contention, I'd choose Bush.
(3) Every time the option was available, I've voted Libertarian. No exceptions, 100%. That makes me a Libertarian. So go fuck yourself.
(4) Even those who don't vote for their party of choice -- mine is Libertarians -- but instead vote Democrat or Republican...that does not make them Democrats or Republicans. That means they've chosen a different strategy; probably, their strategy is to pick a side that they think has a reasonable shot of winning, and use their vote to minimize damage, rather than the long-term goal of getting the Libertarian party more recognition.
(5) Who I've voted for or haven't voted for is none of your fucking business. Again, go fuck yourself.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Why do all civil rights type organizations have to be run by far leftists and cavort with same? Serious question.
I find that type to be despicable. Yet, i'll support the obvious goals of say, the EFF. It's not an incongruent position - perhaps I am a libertarian at heart. I simply can't stomach appearing to support the hackneyed likes of Howard Dean.
Sorry folks, no money from me.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
As of yet, I haven't found a Democrat who I like in NY; and I'm not going to go out of my way searchinig because some asshole like you insists on labelling me a Republican simply because I don't like Democrats in NY. Face it, most of the Democrats with good name-recognition (aside from Lieberman, who isn't liberal enough to get the nomination) are assholes. Quomo and Hillary Clinton in NY are good examples. Quomo mismanaged NY during his entire term, and Hillary is some out-of-stater who talks down to all of NY like she's above everyone else. As I said, I do, however, like Boucher and Lieberman, but both of them are out-of-state.
Yes, I do support public schools, despite what the Libertarian party says. I think that every child has the right to receive an education; without an education, you have no liberty and no future. Furthermore, without public schools, I don't see the children of poor parents getting an education (a Libertarian fanatic in the other post I mentioned insisted on maintaining that a woman making 7k/yr could support herself and her child, including education). It's called thinking for yourself, something you are obviously incapable of doing.
It's very simple. I have more confidence in myself than anyone else. If I thought I was wrong, I would change my position. If I don't like someone because they seem like an asshole to me, they're probably not worth voting for. I'd rather have a politician with whom I disagree with on some issues but who is respectable (e.g., Collin Powell on affirmative action), than an asshole who I happen to agree with.
Again, because you are obviously extraordinarily stupid -- like most far right and left-wingers, who insist that Libertarians are immoral-liberals or fascist conservatives, respectively -- I will explain it to you very slowly. (1) For the most part (becuase I, not the LP, think for myself), I hold libertarian values, thus tend to agree with the Libertarian party. (2) Every time a Libertarian candidate has appeared on the ballot, I've voted for him. (3) Thus, I am a libertarian (moderate).
But, since you are obviously too stupid to understand that, I guess I'll have to use some definitions:
Notice, that no where in there did they say anything about voting.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Because people with real jobs dont have time for this stuff? Its left to the limousine liberals who need something to do?
Thanks for the link to Mises.org. Very interesting read. I've read through most of the articles on the front page, and am now looking at Making Economic Sense, by Rothbard. An interesting book (and it's great that it's free online).
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
You would be much better off referring people to Mises.org instead of that cartoon-presentation.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
May be that subsidizing the education of poor women's children encourages poor women to have children (or rather, removes obstacles in the way of them doing that).
Rothbard says, "we can have exactly as much unemployment as we choose to pay for", and he has a point. In NY, a woman on welfare with two kids gets $32,500 a year in non-taxable money (the equivalent of about $45,000 in taxable income). So there's a huge incentive for women who can't make that much money to do what it takes to get on welfare.
The thing that, so far, is puzzling to unederstand is how -- presuming we eliminate all taxes -- the government can do it's one legitimate job: to protect our rights from both internal and external threats, to trial crimes, and arbitrate civil cases.
Quite frankly, the prospect of changing our current system to a libertarian form of minimal government is so daunting that it would seem easier to build an island on the ocean and start from there.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
This is actually an opportunity for wise investors. Of course, similar opportunities would still be there even if the cycles weren't as pronounced, because: (1) there would still be such cycles; (2) There will still be stocks which the market has undervalued and ignored.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen