Slashdot Mirror
Getting Accurate Political Information?
XMorbius asks: "With the elections coming up in a few months, I (along with other Slashdot readers, I hope) want to get more informed about the candidates. But, where does one turn to get accurate (or as accurate as possible) information about them, while at the same time not having to review long logs and records of various hearings over the last decade or so? This seems like a nice compilation of information, but something tells me that it may not be very accurate. I've seen factcheck.org but I feel like there is more knowledge out there to be acquired. What does the Slashdot community recommend?"
you can get it delivered right into your living room.
opensecrets.org has a great amount of information on campaign contributions. Since we're nearing the end of the 2004 Presidential Elections, it's a great time to take a look at the top contributors to Bush and Kerry. (Note, the site doesn't list Bush's acceptange of $75 million in federal funds yet).
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
"1) The war was about oil.
.. because .. er... ahh.. we are at war here. NOT because we want to make more money or anything. Just like we HATE to sell the constitution down the river, but evil Saddham and his close friend Osama have left us no choice ... really
... it's one of the few rights you have left that aren't complete lip service ....
First of all, oil prices were much, much cheaper before the war."
Which is exactly the point. The more expensive the oil, the more money Bush and his cronies make. Oil prices are up
"5) The Bush-Bin Laden connection.
Again, total misunderstanding on the facts."
And yet, the exact same methods were used to claim the Saddam-Osama connection. I think you missed the tongue-in-cheek nature of this. You have just pointed out how absurd Bush's claims are and why. Think Mr. Moore might have been waiting for you to fall into his trap, perhaps?
If you like the police state this country is in and want to see the Bush stranglehold grow stronger, then by all means vote for him
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Disinfopedia
They're pretty good, or as I have heard. They link their stuff to sources so you can check it out yourself. Some people say they have a liberal bias since they released a book called "Banana Republicans" which is not flattering to the party in question.
I have to admit though, it's difficult to find good non-biased political info on the net. Maybe the best thing would be to just read both sides instead and in that way make up your mind. It's tougher than just getting from one source, but I think it's the only good way right now...
What's so bad about being lazy? What if there was a war and nobody showed up?
I don't think you're going to find any single source that's never been accused of bias. There's just too many viewpoints out there-- and any source that tries to go straight down the middle of the road, like CNN, tends to be pretty dry.
So, my solution: Read a lot. I mean, a lot, and, by exposure to many viewpoints, you'll be better off when it comes time to form your own opinions.
If you're asking about specifics, I try to take in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Drudge Report, Slate, Salon, Al-Jazeera, the International Herald-Tribune, and the Guardian. Of course, all of the above have their strengths and weaknesses.
If you don't want to spend the time on all of those, though, I recommend Slate. It leans slightly left, but has good analysis from both sides of the aisle.
Read, read, read. Don't assume you're getting the whole story from a single source.
to compile your own. The Washington spin artists make it hard to see through all the smoke and evalute canidates on what matters to you. No canidate will serious tell you their strengths *and* weaknesses, so you have to become your own source.
Go to the closest headquarters for each canidate. There will be at least one in all but the smallest communities. Ask them what they think their strengths and weakness are and be prepared to hear a lot of bull shit. Ask them why you should vote for them and not for the other guy. Then take that information to the other guy's headquarters and ask the same stuff. Take a good look at what they say about themselves and their opponent, and this will give you a nice base to start at.
Then read the major newspapers and watch the Sunday morning political lineup. Be careful to note the leanings of each, i.e. Nytimes == Liberal, Wall Street Journal == conservative. Radio political talk has a right leaning, and Tv political talk often is leftist.
After doing this for a couple weeks you'll have enough to start on if you want to do some serious reseach at the library. The most important things to remember are there is no unbaised source, gets information from as many sources as possible, and make you own descision (ie beware of groupthink). If you put some descent effort into you'll have more then enough to decide who to vote for.
Why, o why must the sky fall when I've learned to fly?
I forget the http address, but the University of Pennsylvania has a group that does political ad tracking and follows up on the "factual" claims made in them (factual in quotes on purpose). Eg, checking up on a negative ad's claim over so-and-so's voting record and putting quotes back into proper context. They also include things like spending by group/party/candidate by state/locality, etc. IMO, newspapers should include such analysis (especially the ad-checking) on a weekly basis, daily on the week leading up to Nov 2.
The group is under their Annenberg Institute for Communications (i think thats the name - I do know it has something to do with annennberg).
wikipedia as usual ?
Kerry
Bush
--
www.jmeeting.com - meet friends.
For some information, check out the ACLU's scorecard: http://scorecard.aclu.org/scoremain.html/
Well, duh, I get all my political informatino from fark.com, doesn't everyone?
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Support Indy Music. Buy
The Washington Monthly
The Daily Kos
The Columbia Journalism Review Campaign Desk
The Center for American Progress
Talking Points Memo by Josh Marshall
Tom Toles political cartoons
Ben Sargent cartoons
Pat Oliphant cartoons
Jamie Zawinski's freinds
Ed Fitzgerald's blog
more to follow-up...
I couldn't give you any two of those, let alone three.
Wikipedia makes it their #1 policy to maintain a neutral point of view. Failure to do so in an article may form the grounds for a dispute, and it may be changed: on multiple occasions revisions of these articles have been so challenged. Have at these URLS, and from there a plethora of resources you shall find linked, for both the incumbent and the contender.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Please.. also read other media than the American. Every country's media is probably biased in one way or another, but a good mix can give you more details so that you can decide yourself what is more likely to be the truth...
:-)
In my recent vacation in the US I was stunned that nobody saw a world-famous picture with US troops guarding the ministry of oil. It was printed in a lot of world press newspapers. A quick search on google couldn't turn up the image, but there is a reference here. No idea what this source is (I did a very quick search). Apparantly US media is biased or censured, so make sure you check all possible sources of information... It is hard to convince Europeans that the Iraqi war is not about oil when a picture like that is in the paper...
I loved NYC & New England, and I'm not an anti-American guy...just want the facts straight
Which is exactly the point. The more expensive the oil, the more money Bush and his cronies make.
The article that you're quoting isn't talking about the price that consumers pay for oil--it's talking about the price that the oil companies pay. If you read a bit further, you get to the part that says "oil was cheaper for US oil companies and the world as a whole under the UN's Oil-for-Food program. Now that Saddam is gone, this program no longer exists. If this war was about oil, you'd see either an extension of the program, or even sanctions lifted (in return for secret deals to use Iraq's oil). Yet, neither happened."
In other words, it now costs US oil companies more to buy oil that they can process and sell to the consumer. Sure, the oil companies will pass that excess price on to the consumer, but they won't be making more money because of it.
http://www.vote-smart.org/
They have biographical information, issue positions provided by the candidates (where available), campaign finance information (links over to Open Secrets), interest group ratings, voting records, speeches and statements in an organized format.
-- Mr. Furious
In politics there are no facts. It's all doublespeak and haziness.
Politics is about looking at the candidates, figuring out what makes each candidate a scumbag, and then deciding which scumbag is more likely to not screw things up.
"In other words, it now costs US oil companies more to buy oil that they can process and sell to the consumer. Sure, the oil companies will pass that excess price on to the consumer, but they won't be making more money because of it."
Right
Read my lips
I'd type "enough said", but those who refuse to see the corruption won't see it. There is little sense in saying anything at all to those who would rather live their life wrapped in the safety of lies
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
More expensive oil bought, means more expensive oil sold. Most likely the profit margin stayed constant in percentage points (it actually increased, see SEC reports of Shell, Chevron, etc). Even at constant it means more absolute dollars in the oil company's pocketses. It is better for them to sell it more expensive, higher oil proces also mean, that they can tap reserves, which were too expensive to tap beforehand (think arctic).
All is well, and business is booming. Especially when you can sell oil 2-3 times the going rate to the army, essentially funneling away taxpayer moey to corporate profit...
Code poet, espresso fiend, starter upper.
There is much talk and sites about national people like Bush and Kerry but little info is known about local ones. Where should I look to find out the issues of my local mayor or state rep? Yes it depends on the locale but or there any sites that can at least help?
Why don't you guys have friends or journals?
http://www.motherjones.com/
...is a good addition to the list. As with any source, use it as a counterpoint. It's a lot like the Consumer Reports of American politics in that you'd never call it two-sided, which makes it an advocate as much as a media source. But, they see themselves as antithetical to big media, not neccesarily just a view from the left.
Amateurs discuss tactics. Professionals discuss logistics.
http://www.johnfkerrysucks.com/
-Tolerate my intolerance
Don't trust one source. Read right and left publications. Follow up -- the web and Google are your friend. Remember that it's not "information" if it doesn't have a surprise in it -- if you agree with everything you read, you're not learning anything.
Remember what the Buddha said:
"Believe nothing.
No matter where you read it,
Or who said it,
Even if I have said it,
Unless it agrees with your own reason
And your own common sense."
If everything you read is on one side of the spectrum, you're not thinking, you're parroting.
Institute for Public Accuracy
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting
I knew I was forgetting those from my bookmarks -- I get their regular emails and recommend anyone with an interest in this topic sign up on their lists.
especially if one of those secret deals were made.
If the Big Oil players wanted to make secret anticompetitive deals to widen their profit margins, they would not have needed a war in order to do so. I'm pretty sure that a a controversial war which puts their business practices under the microscope and could seriously affect their supply of crude is precisely what they would not want.
The site you are thinking of is already cited in the Slashdot story: FactCheck.ORG from the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. Great site, but very limited focus. There is no examination of the underlying problems. In this case, that is a BIG shortcoming.
By far the biggest issue is one about which former Supreme Commander of Allied Forces and former Republican U.S. President General Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us in a famous speech. He said that we should beware of the "military-industrial complex". Here are quotes:
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
"We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes."
The problem he warned us about has been happening big time for many years. The U.S. government has engaged in 24 wars since WW2. The system of violence works by creating fear so rich people can profit.
Every important speaker at the Republican convention spoke of keeping America safe. Every important speaker was reading speeches written for them by marketing consultants like Karl Rove. "Keeping America Safe" is code for "keeping America fearful by promoting violence so the rich can get richer". It was despicable when Bill Clinton did it, and it continues to be despicable now that George W. Bush is doing it. Possibly many of the nation's leaders are not fully aware of the circumstances. It seems that only a very small percentage of citizens realize the extent of the violence of the U.S. government.
The only really good way to educate yourself about the U.S. government is to read books about it. Here are reviews of 3 movies and 35 books: Unprecedented Corruption: A guide to conflict of interest in the U.S. government. It's necessary to gather enough information that you can make your own informed conclusions, and not just copy the conclusions of others.
Don't like the books I found? Find your own. It's your duty as an adult to participate in the political issues of your country.
In the UK, the BBC is independent of the government and is supposed to maintain an independent stance of e.g. political parties by law (with certain exceptions where British interests are concerned).
Of the nespapers, the centre-left Guardian is pretty good -- they print regular corrections, and are owned by a trust so they can print what they want.
Of the papers on the Right, the best (in terms of accuracy, not politics) of a bad bunch is probably the Torygraph.
www.freerepublic.com
This'll probably get modded down, but consider that there are more than 2 points of view. Now, you may feel that the left is being underrepresented and all the media is pro-Bush - but the Free Republic people feel otherwise, and will show you the other side. Even if you don't like it, it's interesting to see what kind of stories are out there.
"Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
The more expensive the oil, the more money Bush and his cronies make.
Oh, really? Check the PFDR for FY2002 (the FY03 ones aren't available yet). The President doesn't get any income from any source that's affected by the price of oil. He has some interest-bearing investments, a couple of IRA's, some real estate, a stock portfolio and a boat-load of T-bills. You might as well say that the president's wealth depends on the price of routers because he owns stock in Cisco.
I dare you to find any evidence of an actual financial incentive for the president, or anybody in the executive branch for that matter, to keep the price of oil high.
And yet, the exact same methods were used to claim the Saddam-Osama connection.
By whom? Nobody in a position of authority ever said there was a Saddam-Osama connection. There was, however, a rock-solid, no-questions, if-you-don't-see-it-you're-an-idiot connection between Saddam and Islamist terrorism. Which is why he had to go.
If you like the police state this country is in
Sigh. If this country were half the police state you accuse it of being, you'd be dragged off in chains.
I write in my journal
In other words, it now costs US oil companies more to buy oil that they can process and sell to the consumer.
The Canucks actually want this oil price rise to continue. That way, the US will move to "domestic" supply (even though it is nowhere near as sweet - will employ 5 or 6 construction/engineering companies for about 11 days, however). There are those that say that Canada's untapped oil reserves dwarf those that are predicted to remain in the Middle East.
Red Adair just passed-on, maybe the next generation of hardcore oil guys will be Canadian or Texans that are cold-averse. Should weed-out the wannabes in either case.
Do NOT, i repeat, DO NOT look to journalists. what you want now is an economists.
the media has been relegated to a game of he said she said; back and forth. the media never bothers to find out of a candidate is actually lying. they simply report what each candidate says.
the job of a journalist is to make stories.
the job of a ECONOMIST is to understand fiscal policies, markets, and (growingly important:) social costs.
if you want to understand your government, find an economist who can tack points to the bottom line ($) and reduce it to something you can understand.
Nick Confessore has a nice article talking about hte rise of economist as a source of information, and in particular the Paul Krugman phenomena. I highly recommend these read, parituclarly in conjunction with some Paul Krugman himself for reference.
you can either figure out what a candidate is REALLY supporting, or you can be just another single issue voter.
If you read books about the issues, you may come to the conclusion that by far the biggest underlying issue in the present political campaign is U.S. government violence. You probably won't know this unless you read books.
The present system of violence in the U.S. and Britain started in the 1940s. In the 1940s, it was decided that the U.S. government could act in secret in foreign countries to preserve the profits of U.S. and British companies. It was decided that the U.S. government could not only act in secret, it could break the laws of the foreign country. It was decided the the U.S. government could even arrange the murder of the leaders of foreign countries. Agencies like the CIA were created for secret accomplishment of largely secret foreign policy.
Only an estimated 2% read non-fiction books not connected with work. The system of violence works partly by keeping U.S. citizens ignorant. It is not necessary that all citizens be ignorant, just a large percentage of the voters. Actually, there is plenty of information freely available in books, but only an estimated 2% of American citizens read non-fiction books not connected with their work. It is easy to understand why. United States citizens are the hardest-working in the world, with the exception of the Japanese. Many U.S. citizens have only two weeks of vacation every year, and they need that to rest. They simply don't have time to read books.
However, the only way to understand something as complicated as politics is to read books extensively. The issues are too complicated to express in a few words.
By far the biggest issue in the present political campaign is this fundamental one, about which former Supreme Commander of Allied Forces and former Republican U.S. President General Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us in a famous speech. He said that we should beware of the "military-industrial complex". Here are quotes:
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
"We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes."
The problem he warned us about has been a major influence on both the politics and quality of life of the United States. The U.S. government has engaged in 24 wars since World War II. The system of violence works by creating fear so rich people can profit.
Very few U.S. citizens know the full history of the war against Iraq. This short article is a summary: History surrounding the U.S. war with Iraq: Four short stories.
The events leading up to the present "war on terror" and the two wars against Iraq began in the 1950s, when hidden elements of the U.S. government overthrew a democratically elected president of Iran (Mossadegh) because he wanted to reduce the profits of U.S. and British oil companies doing business in Iran.
The U.S. government supported a very weak man, the Shah of Iran, who became very violent toward his own citizens. Eventually, people in Iran overthrew the Shah. The U.S. government's actions de-stabilized the country and encouraged the violence that came after. The U.S. government supported Iraq against Iran, supplying weapons to Saddam Hussein at a very high profit for the rich owners of U.S. weapons companies. To give a present example, the Bu
Twirlip:
Show me even one mistake in what I said, and I will fix it.
At present every time someone sees something they didn't know already, they call it "radical".
Sorry, I hit the return key accidentally. Please disregard my previous comment.
Twirlip:
Show me even one mistake in what I said, and I will fix it.
It is becoming common that when someone sees something they didn't know already, they call it "radical".
The entire point of my comment, and the entire point of the article to which I linked, was that a former Supreme Commander of Allied Forces and former Republican president was correct. Everything else was only the details of how it works.
Was General Eisenhower a radical leftist? Thinking about that makes me laugh. "Well-known radical leftist and General and Republican President Dwight David Eisenhower..." LOL.
I posted a more complete comment here: Only one way to understand: Read books. Again, if you can find an error, I will investigate and fix it.
By the way, was CBS News wrong when they found that Bush's education improvements were fraud?
Yeah, Comedy Central is the best source of US political news now. And it's funny, yet. But there are two serious problems with it:
...
1. They only really deal with major national candidates, mostly the presidential candidates. It takes some major news for them to pay attention to state or local candidates. Understandable, because they mostly have only half an hour four evenings a week (though they upped it to an hour last week, due to the huge humor potential of the RNC).
2. Their web site sucks. Too bad; it has such potential. I've read a number of discussions of why their site works so poorly (if at all) iin most people's browsers. They only deliver in Real and WMA formats, both of which have rather flakey browser plugins. And CC's HTML is so confused that many browsers just can't decipher it sensibly, and lots of luck trying to extract the clip URLs yourself. On my Mac PB, their video clips work fine in the Real Player and Windows Media Player when I can find the URL for the clip. But they both fail almost every time when invoked from within a ComedyCentral.com web page. Even Real's fancy new browser fails on these web pages. This apparently isn't an attempt to shoot down Mac and linux viewers; Windows users also report garbled or blank videos.
OTOH, lots of political blogs are picking up on Comedy Central, and they often provide direct URLs to the videos. If you can find them, they usually work.
You might also look at theonion.com. They have some good political news. It's usually a lot more honest than the mass media, because their approach is to quote what the politicians were thinking, not what they actually said.
They recently had a headline about the New Jersey homosexual who had tearfully admitted to being the state's governor
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
You also seem to have forgotten that the Government/Good-Ole-Boys network owns all the (metaphorical) microscopes. Michael Moore would probably disagree with you on that one.
You could probably spend months analyzing just *one aspect* of these guys.
Here's all you need to know: did you think the war was a good idea? Vote Bush. Otherwise vote Kerry.
If you're unsure about the war, go for the guy that you'd most like to have as your dad (the "gut check").
If you're interested in 3rd-party candidates, don't waste your vote, flip a coin between these two *because only one of these two will win*. I know that's tough for a lot of slashdotters who actually *do* relate more to some 3rd party folks, but too bad, that's how the system works.
Is anything else really going to be that different??
The government will still grow (as it always has in the past).
We'll still be in Iraq (it would be really stupid to cut and run now).
Homeland security will still have too much power (no president would have the balls).
We'll still be afraid of terrorism (as we should've been 20 years ago.. on 9/11 WE changed, not the world). The war in Iraq will probably cause more terrorism.
The economy will most likely improve, unless you're in the middle class and find it difficult to learn new skills (it's cheaper to send jobs overseas, and companies aren't charities).
Don't waste your time with the details, is all I'm saying.
Spinsanity is a good site that takes some pretty hard swipes at each side.
"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh." -Voltaire
I subscribe to both factcheck and spinsanity's email lists. Spinsanity puts out fewer emails but they are of slightly higher quality. But both are excellent.
It's funny you mention that, as I have been surfing their webpage all day today (in fact, I had it up in another tab when I went to slashdot and saw this story). My system for surfing their site is to use konqueror 3.3, go to the page where the video should be embedded, use View->View Mode->Embedded Text Editor, search for "wmv", copy and paste that line into wget in konsole, grep for mms in the resulting file and then copy&paste that into mplayer. Works like a champ! Who says *nix isn't user friendly!??!? :-P In all seriousness, it sucks horribly but doesn't take as long to do as it does to describe.
(Disclaimer: IANAAmerican. Your political processes might be different and thus the above advice completely wrong).
The goddamn motherfucking BBC. All other media bows down to its impartiality and general wonderfulness.
By summer it was all gone...now shesmovedon. --
Uh, they did find WMD's in Iraq, multiple times.
/. bitches about "censored" news stories, but stuff that actually supports the war and kicking ass in the middle east also gets dropped or overlooked.
p ?I D=14638
We found some sarin in a roadside bomb that exploded, and some Polish troops found 15 shells with cyclosarin. Search google news for sarin to find stories on both events.
They never promised nuclear weapons, and we knew they had bio and chemical weapons, we just had to find them.
And don't give me the tired old "it is only enough to kill a few thousand people" crap. A WMD is a WMD. One is to many, and we have found around 20 shells, so far.
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.as
John Kerry Issue Positions
George Bush Agenda
Despite the naive cynicism here and in the press both candidates do stand for something. Their position papers are pretty clear, maybe some fluff but generally they are trying to tell us what they want to do. It is difficult to find their actual positions anywhere else, and if you compare them in their own words you can cut through the rhetoric and form a pretty solid opinion.
Usually the LOUDER an organization proclaims its objectivity - the more biased it is. Most old media (large city papers, network TV, PBS) tilt left. CNN, MSNBC tilt left, Fox tilts right. Talk radio - right, NPR left.
My two cents is to look for news sources that are up front about their biases. Then fact check them your self. Personally I like a weekly called "The Economist". Their reporting on science and technology is usually pretty accurate - which is fairly rare in the mainstream media. On political matters they tilt towards the (British) conservatives. Their coverage of world news and of U.S. news is excellent.
[Insert pithy quote here]
Fox News?
All the political news that I, or any other God-fearing, flag-waving, SUV-driving, red-blooded American needs is at http://www.foxnews.com/
I can tell how good they are because I agree with everything they report.
Here come da fudge!
Or install Kaffeine and make it the default media player for all video and just plain click the links and it plays (you need kaffeine mozilla plugin too). Very easy. And lets you save streams.
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CodeRed, the lower user #. No relation to SirCam.
The above is a pretty good site. Please mod up.
If you live in Ohio or California try this site:
http://smartvoter.org
It can be a little bland since it takes no stance but it has always been a great starting source for me and shows me what will be on my ballot.
Yes he is. I think a good first step towards any kind of dialog is to leave the labelmakers at home.
Notice that the majority of political conversations degenerate quickly into shoving someone into a particular catagory.
"you can either figure out what a candidate is REALLY supporting, or you can be just another single issue voter."
Or you can observe the differences between what one says, verses what one does, and ask yourself, Why?
Most people running for president already have a political career. Former civil servant. Look at that, and more importantly look when they believed that no one was looking.
I second your recommendation of "The Economist".
It's pricey, at $130/year (and a still-steep $77/year at the rate offered to us college students on campuses by various subscription orgs), but certainly worth reading in the library or subscribing if you can afford it...
Is Capitalism Good for the Poor?
If you're looking for a great aggregate of news sites put into context, I highly recommend The Note. While the ABC News site itself has a leftward bias, The Note stands out for being pretty impartial, and extremely thorough. Now that college is back in session, I don't have time to visit it as often, because it's a long read, especially if you follow all of the links.
For a good analysis of things, I prefer the Christian Science Monitor. The bias vacillates, simply because of the variety of guest columnists.
You zap the moderators with a wand of humor! The moderators resist!
I wonder if any political blogs use slashcode. It would be interesting to see how a site that used moderation and meta-moderation might help foster political discussion, especially if the moderators were seeded with a capable set of folks from different points on the spectrum.
All those MT and blogger sites out there just have hopeless comment sections, which are ravaged by more trolls than even a Microsoft post here.
Wikipedia cannot be said to be completely accurate, but you will get a very good overview, based upon a mixture of expertise and community thoughts.
Extreme views tend to be put to one side in an effort to strip away spin and leave the facts.
Political history, and other details are available as links. The two articles change very often, now that the campaign is underway.
George Bush Presidential Campaign
John Kerry Presidential Campaign
Also it is worth checking out the article discussions, for opposing views, challenges and related links.
This comment was written with the intention to opt out of advertising.
This is the site I've been looking for! I stumbled onto it some time ago, but lost my bookmarks in between then and now. Thanks!
The verbal rhetoric is pretty much worthless
Look at the record of their past actions, be it Senate voting records or executive orders.
For each of the actions, read the arguments made both for and against the position.
Then you can decide whether you generally agree or disagree with each of the candidates.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Get Your War On
I dare you to find any evidence of an actual financial incentive for the president, or anybody in the executive branch for that matter, to keep the price of oil high.
In two months, or four years and two months, when they all get high-paying sinecures with energy companies, you'll have your evidence.
How do u measure "accuracy" ? Who is the arbiter of what is or is not biased ? Is it really necessary to know how accurate each political candidate is on each issue ?
All media is biased, one way or another. The only differences are in direction and how honest the media outlets are about their biases.
This said, the best thing to do is try and research the same subject from multiple sources with as diverse a set of biases as possible. The truth will be somewhere in the middle of the biases you find.
National Review is ideal if you're looking for a right-wing source to balance the usual suspects. You'll be a LOT less confused about the right-wing American viewpoint if you read it. Between that, my local newspaper (here in the People's Republic of Ann Arbor), and Yahoo! News (or Google News) I get fairly comprehensive coverage of the entire political spectrum without spending an insane amount of time.
Note that NR has, in addition to the free daily online-only articles, a Digital Edition of their dead trees mag for $20/year. They did it right too, each issue is one big HTML file and back issues (since the Digital Edition began) stay online. Very, very convenient.
Any time you ask someone else to condense information you're likely to get their spin, or at least their vision of what is important. It's more time consuming to view original sources, but it's the only way you can get truly accurate information.
Project Vote-Smart has a ton of unbiased information, including profiles of politicians such as VP Cheney.
Government Information Awareness (cached copy; the site has been dodgy lately) is "a research effort by the Computing Culture group of the MIT Media Lab. It aims to provide software and data to help citizens understand the complexities of their government". I find it entertaining, at least.
Blackboxvoting.org is the best source for any election-machine info (such as which party's contributors run Diebold).
Greg Palast is an American living in England who writes news for the London Sunday Observer.
I also check out, Indymedia, CNN, The BBC, and Google News.
The fact is that Every source you turn to is biased. I'm of the opinion that there is no such thing as unbiased journalism becuase journalists are people with finite amounts of time on their hands and finite column-inches to fill. They have to decide who they interview and how much of that material to use. I doubt that most of them (save those at Fox News) go into it with a definite story in mind and ignore all evidence to the contrary. Nevertheless, biases appear in reporting. Couple this with the fact that all news outlets have a distinct audience and that their preceptions of that audience shapes their reporting to the extent that they wish to attract new audience members and avoid losing old ones. This qorks out differently for Indymedia than it does for CNN but the pressure is still there.
The bottom line is that all you can do (as others have pointed out) is to cast as diverse a net as possible and then to look, as much as is possible, for the nuggets of truth in each one. Just be wary for many people the line between reality and fiction is no longer a barrier.
As to government documents, I wouldn't diss them. They are the one true source of info that we have about the workings of our government. And, so long as Some People can be held in check
www.ontheissues.com
What? Are you out of your mind? Saddam is a torturer and scoundrel, yes. But Iraq's government is essentially secular, no? Saudi ties to Islamic terrorism are much, much stronger. Why aren't you saying that the royal family "has to go?"
CSPAN is a great source of information free from sponsorship, commentary, and likely contains the least bias of televised media. In the past three weeks they've covered a great deal of events that corporate media won't touch with a 10 foot pole:
The Republican National Convention Protests Badnarik (Libertarian) vs. Cobb (Green) Debate Nader's Acceptance of the Reform Party Nomination
Your best bet for a single source of non-biased news is NPR and PBS. A recent study by the non-partisan PIPA found that NPR/PBS listeners/viewers had the best understanding of the situation in Iraq. By contrast, the more people watched Fox, the less they understood.
Of the mainstream news stations, Fox, and the Murdock and Scaif newspapers, are the only ones that have biases that interfere with their coverage. These stations and papers lean hard right and make a ton of money. As a result, media companies like MSNBC are starting to emulate their approach and are therefore going to lean slightly to the right. NPR and PBS, and to a lesser extent the New York Times get badmouthed by conservatives, but really don't spin their stories. There are some liberal news sources, but they tend to advertise that in their name (like, say, the Socialist Review).
Your best bet for finding out candidate information is to check out the various watch-dog sites that slashdoters have pointed out. Also, services at google and yahoo give you a pretty representative cross section of the day's news coverage.
I only listen to Rush Limbaugh, he knows everything and told me that he'd do the thinking for me, why should I go anywhere else?
--A Proud Dittohead
(Note to mods: I am SO kidding.)
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
Wow. Time warp. How'd this comment from early 2002 end up in this thread?
I write in my journal
Most important: THINK FOR YOURSELF
"Teleporting Rodents with D-Cell Battery Displacement" theory -- IgnoramusMaximus (692000)
This is pretty easy, there are tons of bloggers around who watch the news constantly.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/ is a popular one, leans conservative.
http://www.drudgereport.com/ is another, leans libertarian.
Everything else i've seen posted so far is pretty leftest, let's get some balance here (ie, this should balance this out).
And yet, the exact same methods were used to claim the Saddam-Osama connection.
By whom? Nobody in a position of authority ever said there was a Saddam-Osama connection.
"We know he's got ties with al Qaeda."
Please don't try and argue that a Saddam-al Qaeda connection is not the same as a Saddam-Osama connection. It only makes you guys look stupid. If you'd like to argue that the President is not in a position of authority, then you may be on to something.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
First I want to second OpenSecrets.org and VoteSmart. Good sites specific to cadidate/election data.
Really though, the best way to get accurate info I've found is diff articles from different sources covering the same story. All propaganda is based on facts. What you have to do is compare/contrast the different sources to distill where they are the same and where they are different. Then look at the different bits to see if it's speculation, editorial or non-sequitors. Finally, for the bits that are the same and the facts in disupte, I use Wikipedia and The CIA World Factbook to check them out. Failing those I use a google news search.
All media is biased by nature. Articles are just starting points. If you want the truth, you have to get it yourself.
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
I have a website. It's about Macs.
I had a freind who worked for Project Vote Smart before she headed off to Washington. Great site, and it gives you information about local as well as national officials. You can even enter your zip code and it will tell you who your officials are. The site is dedicated to giving just facts. I recommend it.
(See title)
--
CPAN rules. - Guido van Rossum
Not to criticize js7a--he gave you fair warning--but his list leans to the left. I don't know if I have the definitive right-leaning counterexample, but here's a list of guys who are biased right but seem to be fair in their analysis...
mainstream media:
Best of the Web Today
Andrew Sullivan
The Corner
blogs:
Instapundit
oxblog
JustOneMinute
Daniel Drezner
Captains Quarters
cartoons:
Cox and Forkum
Day by Day
All are blogs and/or openly opinionated. They are generally right wing. This is in no way a complete list, and should not even be considered the "best of", since I haven't spent a lot of time exploring. YMMV.
I'd actually be interested in hearing from people who knew of right-leaning blogs not on this list that they recommended. I am not trying to start a flame war about who's better or why Instapundit/Daily Kos is a snooty liar.
Yet, to initiate the war in Iraq...
Why would he mention September 11th? I think he believed they would find documents to prop up what the entire administration believed and implied every day before the invasion: Saddam Hussein tactically or monetarily supported the terrorists of September 11th.
In fact, they focused so much on the thin ties between Al Queda and Hussein, Cheney waffled and lied about it.
You may want to check out some of the Canadian media. All media is biased, of course, but there's certainly less of a vested interest in skewing things in a partisan way as it pertains to US politics up here (read: no need, it's fairly f*cked as it is without skewing, IMHO).
Some sites:
TV/web - Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
Newspaper - The Globe and Mail
This wasn't just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it. - Dorothy Parker
I do not believe it is possible to find completely truthful information. I think the best thing a person can do is read all sides of the debates and make up their own mind. Education is the key. Besides wikipedia, here is Politics1. Politics1 gives you links to all of the varying ideologies of the current debates. Maybe this will help.
Uhmm... It is not accurate at all.
This piece is widely known, and easily found via Google: Fifty-nine Deceits in Fahrenheit 9/11
And sufficiently reveals the film for what it is, pure entertainment (fiction) and a 'mockumentary'.
All you'll end up with is the propaganda that each side pushes.
White propaganda == facts
Grey propaganda == half truths / partial stories
Black propaganda == lies
Collecting grey propaganda from both sides just means you end up with lots of grey propaganda.
Here is a good source of information:
http://www.vote-smart.org/
The following is from their website -
"Thousands of candidates and elected officials. Who works for you? Who is seeking your vote? Project Vote Smart, a citizen's organization, has developed a Voter's Self-Defense system to provide you with the necessary tools to self-govern effectively: abundant, accurate, unbiased and relevant information. As a national library of factual information, Project Vote Smart covers your candidates and elected officials in five basic categories: biographical information, issue positions, voting records, campaign finances and interest group ratings. What would you like to know? Access our library of information through either the menu on the left hand side or the links above.
To find out more about PVS, click here or call our Voter's Research Hotline 1-888-VOTE-SMART with any questions."
In late September, they will be sending their NPAT (National Political Awareness Test) questionaire to every candidate for Federal office. Vote-Smart will post the candidate responses, so that you the voter can decide which candidate best represents you.
You can find out how the system works by doing a search for a candidate named "Bellis".
This will bring to the information they have posted regarding my campaign and my NPAT answers after I submit them.
The Tyranny of Words
by Stuart Chase
It will help you sort out the content-free "blab" words (patriotism, family-values, etc). Unfortunately, most "political" talk is full of such crap.
Excellent daily polls on the all important Bush/Kerry race in addition they do state by state polls, the current electoral college position and many many other relevant questions... It is ideal political geek food, a ./ must, enjoy:-)
Look at voting records for senators. Attendance records for commitees, and other "hard fact" information. All this is avaliable directly through the government. If you rely on the media or campaign disinformation, the truth will likely be somewhere in the middle of both sides. Remeber this is an election often used car salesmen like people run the show, so buyer beware.
If Kerry was the answer, it must have been a stupid question.
The UN - The largest "political" cause of death.
Kerry isn't Bush.
It's a joke, mods
So many sources, so little time. But this one is run by a former Republican hack who is familiar with the tricks of the trade. Good for debunking the myth of the "liberal media".
http://mediamatters.org/
Is to read each candidates website, but ignore anything they say about the other candidate unless its positive.
. pdf K's here: http://www.johnkerry.com/pdf/our_plan_for_america. pdf
Read what Kerry has to say about Kerry.
Read what Bush has to say about Bush.
Because the candidates tend to be more honest about the positive things about themselves.
Don't read in the media about a speech, read or watch the speech yourself (and again, ignore anything they say about the other candidate). cspan.org, the parties themselves, or the candidates websites are good sources for speeches. (Weirdly, the Bush campaign streams Kerry's acceptance speech)
I got involved seriously in researching politics for myself on the internet because I went to the state department website and signed up for the email of the briefing transcripts. Same with the DOD.
I was shocked at just how badly skewed the mainstream media coverage really is, how fundamentally incompetent they are. Now I don't mean to say that everything the administration says is correct. What I mean to say is that almost anything the media says the administration says is incorrect. That is, they're not even good stenographers.
I was also shocked at how stupid the questions were. Sometimes I thought the reporters were intentionally trying to start a war.
That's a good place to get started.
The next level is that you can go ahead and read the negative stuff, but only after you lookup the response from the candidate on their website. So you have charge/comeback. Don't let unsubstantiated charges go by. Neither candidate is lily white when it comes to honesty in their negative moments. In my experience, Kerry has been a little less truthful, but you need to draw your own opinions.
After that, download and review the platforms. W's is here: http://www.georgewbush.com/media/agendaforamerica
(Don't be put off by the length of the Kerry one. W's is actually more detailed because its in bullet point form, while K's is padded with a bunch of speeches and attacks on Bush).
For domestic issues, the parties agree more then you might think about what the problems in America are, the differences are in philosophy about how to go about it. The Democratic response is always pro-labor, pro-lawyer, pro-government, the Republican always pro-business, anti-lawyer, pro-free-market.
For foreign policy issues, I recommend the magazine Foreign Affairs. Its a little dry, but its where the foreign policy establishment in America (both parties) discusses what's _really_ going on. Again, you have to kind of filter out the bias of the author, but its the most indepth.
Personally, I do all of the above, plus I read a lot of weblogs and write my own: http://www.opinionatedbastard.com/
Finally, don't take it too seriously. The people who are really involved in politics are their own versions of geeks. (If you watch any of the conventions, that's really obvious, its like a Comiccon where everyone wears ties.) All this stuff is a very complex game, that ultimately, we use to test the candidates. People who are good leaders manage their campaign well, and inspire and motivate their people, which helps them win.
For a conservative sources, I suggest:
The Federalist Patriot
National Review Online
Above all: Read, watch and listen! C-SPAN is invaluable for exposure to ideas and viewpoints that one would not seek out for himself.
campaigndesk.org
The Columbia School of Journalism set up a blog dedicated to review the quality of the political coverage done by various news adgencies.
They are taking news outlets to task for keeping alive misconceptions that are readily debunked by some elementary fact-checking.
The Campaign Desk doubles as an effective source of news because ecause their tip-of-hat section keeps links to the best news articles available. They are also very good at documenting their sources, and at keeping ahead of the spin and the echo chamber that permeates most of the news sphere.
This post was compiled with `% gec -O`. email me if you need the sources
Libertarian candidate Michael Badnarik's issue papers:
They have an excellent website at www.lwv.org/voter/geteducated.cfm
You can check out issues and candidates, whether local, statewide or national. Or contact the LWV in your state. (And no, you don't have to be a woman to benefit from the service.)
Sig? We don't need no steenking SIG!
Now of course, you have to consider whether you believe what the candidates have to say about the issues, but that's another topic :-)
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
This thread was about "Getting Accurate Political Information?", so I don't think you should mention Michael Moore. ("Accurate" and "Michael Moore" in the same sentence do not mix.)
Slashdot - Where the slash is most definitely to the left.
I haven't seen this one mentioned so I thought I'd throw it in.
http://boortz.com/nuze/index.html
"We know he's got ties with al Qaeda."
Please don't make me give you the whole history lesson. Please let me get away with simply pointing out that al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden are not synonyms. Al-Qaida is a loose, global organization of terrorists. Osama bin Laden was a high-ranking member of al-Qaida (some say one of its founders, others say he came along later). Osama bin Laden was never, to the best of our knowledge, in Iraq. Members of al-Qaida, however, set up shop there in 2001 with the consent and assistance of the Iraqi military intelligence ministry and Saddam himself.
Please don't try and argue that a Saddam-al Qaeda connection is not the same as a Saddam-Osama connection.
I'm not trying to argue it. I'm pointing it out as a fact, one that you should have known already.
It only makes you guys look stupid.
There's no doubt in my mind that I look like a fool for bothering to refute your unbelievably idiotic spasms, but what can I say? I have a soft spot for morons.
I write in my journal
I agree with you. I was just pointing out that there are people such as Moore who scrutinize corporate actions, and yet are not part of the government or the the traditional good-old-boy network.
See there...i warned you. Now you just look stupid.
Let me diagram the alleged connection for you:
Saddam-Iraq-Al Qaeda-Osama
And the 9-11 Commission's Finding: "No 'collaborative relationship' between Iraq and [al Qaeda]"
I'm not trying to argue it. I'm pointing it out as a fact, one that you should have known already.
See, right there is the big difference between you and me: I offered a citation - proof to back up my claims. You just made a claim and declared it to be a fact. That's a problem a lot of Republicans seem to have.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
what can I say? I have a soft spot for morons.
Well, that explains the egomania.
which has all the same content as the print edition. I never keep magazines anyway, so it saves paper.
The most objective collection of information I've ever seen is at issues2002.org The site collects article snippets from all parties for all issues and all candidates and offers direct quotes instead of slant. I couldn't ask for anything more.
No 'collaborative relationship' between Iraq and [al Qaeda]
You left out the rest of the conclusion. There was communication and contact between Iraq and al-Qaida. The reason we went into Iraq when we did was to prevent the emergence of collaboration.
I offered a citation - proof to back up my claims.
Which you apparently did not read.
Besides, even if Iraq had never heard of al-Qaida, there's still the little matter of the Abu Nidal Organization, or Jund al Islam, of HAMAS, and so on and so on and so on.
Your argument seems to be "But Saddam never actually participated in an attack carried out by these particular terrorists." Which should make you so deeply ashamed that you crawl under your bed and never, ever come out.
I write in my journal
Yeah, it is more real than the so called "real" news put out by Ran Dather and Contains No News..
: //www.prisonplanet.com/o rg/
Go here for some news Ran Dather wont' tell you about..
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
http
http://www.counterpunch.
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.lp.org/
Throw away the TV while you still have a mind..
http://tinyurl.com/globalwarmingisascam
It's pretty clear that you're not British, and you've never lived there. The BBC is in fact not funded by taxpayers, but rather by the monthly licence fee paid by everyone who owns a TV in the U.K. Thus, the BBC is financially independant of the government, and it's governance is fairly arms-length (the directors are appointed on the advice of ministers), so it's unfair to call it an "arm of the . . . government". Indeed, if it was, all the Hutton nonsense could probably have been avoided.
The upshot of all this is that the BBC is, structurally anyway, the most independant news source out there: in theory, it's free from both market and government coercion, and it can concentrate on its mandate as a public interest broadcaster.
And as for all that other stuff, I honestly can't be assed to follow all the links, but I'd suggest two general principles:
On the right:
[Insert pithy quote here]
Actually, I just looked. C-Span does have video of both conventions.
And the 9-11 Commission's Finding: [cnn.com] "No 'collaborative relationship' between Iraq and [al Qaeda]"
actually, you're quoting CNN's interpretation of a pre-release working paper. So it's already a noisy channel.
If you follow the same CNN story and it's followups, you'll find Lee Hamilton (a Democrat and co-chair of the commission) saying that there was no conflict between the Commission's findings and what Cheney said.
Actually, this is a very nice example of why you need to get at more than one source, and compare and contrast.
The most obvious tie is that Saddam was funding the PLO, and funding suicide bombers on a retail basis (with, eg,big payments to their families).
As to your other point, how do you know he isn't? Saying "Saddam must go" isn't exclusive to saying "the House of Saud must go."
Of course there are some distinctions: the Saudis weren't violating a cease-fire agreement, starving an ethnic subgroup for political purposes, and hadn't been trying to assassinate an ex-President.
Buzzflash
--
make install -not war
Maybe I am just feeling superior, but I am surprised that /.ers actually find it news that, as one poster put it, the mainstream media is not even a good stenographer ? Challenge: find the earliest ref to this; probably in ancient greece or babylonia
/. to personally check. WMDS - how many of us have the pyschcological and technical and language skills to go through the 1,000s of page of documents on this ?
Then there are these posts that suggest taking in a wide variety of sites (such as drudge) to get a balanced point.. ludicrous. At some point, you have to be an adult, and make a judgement that some sources of information are mostly useless. There might be somthing usefull and true on druge, but why spend the effort, when there are more sites of higher quality then you could look at in 100 lifetimes ?
Beyond this, there is a broader problem - most of the issues discussed are far beyond the ability of anyone on
This is an unsettling point of view because it implies we have to live with a lot of uncertainty, but it raises the interest ing question, how much do you need to know to make a decision >
If this was truly the police state you depict Zero, slashdot would not exist.
I totally agree. Many people issue that you must "read both sides" but that really doesn't accomplish nearly as much as collecting facts. Context helps, so you might find yourself reading political opinion from across the spectrum; you must not take the opinion, spin or bias from the source though. Just the facts ma'am.
If you aren't getting the facts, move up the source chain until you do.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
. . .because you're really, really dumb. Or at the very least, your reasoning is. Let's begin with a glaring appeal to ignorance:
You readily admit that you don't know anything about the BNP, other than that they're a political party (which is evident from their name). You want outrage? Google News has over 150 stories mentioning them, none particularly complimentary; a search on The Guardian's website finds almost a page's worth of stories in the last week alone, and a search at the dreaded BBC News site finds 27 pages of results. The BNP aren't small, or stealthy, or unknown, and the outrage against them isn't small, or stealthy, or unknown either. Certainly, knowledge of the BNP is prerequisite to commenting on contemporary British politics. Your strategy of justification is an appeal to ignorance (you haven't heard the outrage against the BNP, so it must not exist), and in the end, all that it proves is your own ignorance. And it's offensive that you use a quote that you misattribute to Malcolm X to defend an organization that publishes articles like The Islamic Menace.
Now, let's tackle your fundamental misunderstanding of the BBC and the TV licence. The TV licence isn't a one-time tax collected by the government at the point of purchase (as you assert on the basis of, it seems, absolutely nothing), but rather, a monthly fee, collected by the BBC. So your arrow diagram falls flat. It is, of course, collected with the authority of the government, but all sorts of private and arms-length public bodies collect money from users with the authority of the government: toll roads, utilities, that sort of thing. I also think you fundamentally misunderstand the nature of the BBC: in no sense is it "private sector": it's owned by the crown, but its revenue and its governance is independent. To suggest that this arrangement is "by definition" fascism totally misunderstands fascism: the BBC isn't subject to central control by an anti-democratic despot; rather, it often works as an important part of British democracy, holding the government to account (as you did note later on). Fascism isn't so much about formal structures, but rather what's done with those structures, and the BBC certainly doesn't act in a fascistic manner. And as part of their charter-renewal process, the BBC is looking at the future of the TV licence. As I understand it (and I've moved away from the U.K., so I'm not keeping up as much as I was), they want to keep the licence, but there are alternative proposals being put forth, and while the BBC is lobbying to keep the licence, it hasn't "denounced" anyone.
Anyway, my main point is this: you've gone off, in an authoritative way, stating "economic definitions" (whatever the hell that means), and opinions about the "definition of fascism" and the legal status of the BBC, from a professed position of ignorance
You left out the rest of the conclusion. There was communication and contact between Iraq and al-Qaida. The reason we went into Iraq when we did was to prevent the emergence of collaboration.
You're putting the cart before the horse. The conclusion was that even though there was communication and contact, nothing came of it and nothing was likely to come of it given their opposing ideologies.
Besides, even if Iraq had never heard of al-Qaida, there's still the little matter of the Abu Nidal Organization, or Jund al Islam, of HAMAS, and so on and so on and so on.
So where's the proof that any of these other organizations were plotting with Saddam against the US? You have none - you're just trying to draw attention away from the real issue, although i must admit you're better at it than Bush & Co.
Your argument seems to be "But Saddam never actually participated in an attack carried out by these particular terrorists." Which should make you so deeply ashamed that you crawl under your bed and never, ever come out.
Stop trying to put words in my mouth - you suck at it. My argument is that the administration built its case for war on the false premises that there was a collaborative link between Iraq and al Qaida (including hinting that Iraq had something to do with 9-11) and that Iraq was a threat to the US because it had stockpiles of WMDs. Neither of these is true, so now you and the administration look stupid.
There were lots of good reasons to go after Saddam, but those aren't the reasons that Bush used to persuade the world that war was necessary. Now over 1000 of our soldiers are dead and we have nothing to show for it except increased instability in the Middle East and a reputation for being bullies who can't get their facts straight because not only did Bush use the wrong reasons for going to war, he had no real plan for the aftermath of the blitzkrieg.
But hey - Halliburton got billions of dollars out of the deal, so i guess it's not all bad, right?
He and the rest of his administration routinely lies or states incorrect information as fact in order to manipulate the country into doing what the most extreme elements of his party wants. Which is better anyway - the idea that they are liars, or that they're incompetent? Where does the buck stop? Who is responsible for the failures of this administration? Even if you agree with 100% of his stated values, how could you vote for someone who operates this way?
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
So where's the proof that any of these other organizations were plotting with Saddam against the US? You have none
Uh, he has been trying to attack us since the first Gulf War. We have foiled numerous Iraqi terror plots against us, including an attack on Radio Free Europe in Prague, and an assassination attempt of a former President. He has been working with some of the most notorious terrorists in the world in this campaign, including Abu Nidal and Carlos the Jackal. Our intelligence showed that Iraq was plotting more attacks against us, and this was corroborrated by other countries. What more proof do you want? Iraqi suicide bombers in New York?
And your argument doesn't even make any sense. You cannot fight a war on terrorism while ignoring one of the biggest state sponsors of terrorism in the world.
My argument is that the administration built its case for war on the false premises that there was a collaborative link between Iraq and al Qaida (including hinting that Iraq had something to do with 9-11) and that Iraq was a threat to the US because it had stockpiles of WMDs. Neither of these is true, so now you and the administration look stupid.
Your argument is wrong. The Bush Administration said that Iraq supported terrorists. There is no way you can deny that. Iraq wanted to attack us. There is no way you can deny that either. He had active WMD programs and infrastructure. Again, you cannot deny that. If you do not see that as a threat to us, then I am very glad that you are not in charge of our national security.
"The defense of freedom requires the advance of freedom" - George W Bush
The conclusion was that even though there was communication and contact, nothing came of it and nothing was likely to come of it given their opposing ideologies.
That's not an accurate summary of the 9/11 Commission's report. Go read it again.
So where's the proof that any of these other organizations were plotting with Saddam against the US?
None of them were.
Look, you seem to be missing the key idea here. Terrorism is bad. Okay? Let's start with the simple stuff, the stuff that no sane human being could argue with. Terrorism is bad.
On 9/11, we went from "terrorism is bad" to "terrorism must be stopped." The use of terrorism, both as a tactic and as a strategy, must be ended. Because terrorism is one of those things that has a way of getting completely out of control really fast. We went from 9/10, thinking that terrorism was bad but not really that bad, to 9/11, watching thousands die on television. With nothing in between. So terrorism itself must be stopped.
Every so often, history conspires in such a way as to put an unreasonable burden on a generation. My great-grandparent's generation had to fight the civil war. The Union was tested, slavery was ended. My father's generation fought the Nazis and the Japanese Empire. Fascism was defeated. My generation "fought" the Cold War. Communism was defeated.
Now our kid's generation has to fight terrorism. We didn't choose it, but we're not going to shrink from it either.
Now, in that light, would you like to look back over your statement about how Abu Nidal wasn't a threat to the US and apologize for being the world's biggest dumbass?
There were lots of good reasons to go after Saddam, but those aren't the reasons that Bush used to persuade the world that war was necessary.
LOL. What planet are you living on? The Bush administration didn't try to persuade anybody of anything. They put the facts out there and said, "This is why."
The fact that you're either too much of an idiot or too unwilling to pay attention to understand doesn't come into it.
You make it sound like you were deceived, like you were tricked into giving your consent. You were not asked. Got it?
But hey - Halliburton got billions of dollars out of the deal, so i guess it's not all bad, right?
Check the financial statement that just came out last week. Turns out they lost money on the deal. But don't let that get in the way of your conspiracy theory, okay?
He and the rest of his administration routinely lies or states incorrect information
You don't have a single example of a lie on the part of the administration. You know it, I know it, and everybody else here knows it. So just take a step back and cool it, okay?
Christ, you're an idiot. I'm completely floored by the depth of your idiocy. You're not a garden-variety idiot. You're a hard-core, no-kiddin', professional idiot.
I write in my journal
If i'm a professional, then you must be in the fuckwit hall of fame. Let's cut to the chase and end this.
You make it sound like you were deceived, like you were tricked into giving your consent. You were not asked. Got it?
Got it. That must be my mistake - i thought this was a democratic republic. I thought i was being asked in 2000 when i and the majority of other voters didn't vote for Bush, but the Supreme Court told us that we were wrong. I thought i was going to be asked again this year.
2,792 dead on 9-11 despite numerous warnings, including the Aug. 6 briefing.
Record deficits.
CEO salaries still rising while average income shrinks.
1.3 million more people below the poverty line this year.
1.4 million more people without health insurance.
Afghanistan falling back into chaos.
More fighting happening in Iraq today than during the invasion. 1000 US soldiers dead and more on the way.
Al Qaeda still a threat. Bin Laden's whereabouts still unknown.
Who wants 4 more years of that?
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
It's easy to see that one doesn't *have* to fully reference all clauses. Why did the second Bush Administration choose to include that unnecessary clause?
Because it further propogated the lie that Saddam Hussein was involved with September 11th.
So explain to me what I'm missing?
Here's a source which contains a summary in Q&A with references of the Economy, Jobs, Environment, Education, War and Poverty of our country. Many important issues listed, very interesting reading...
Yes, facts is exactly what the orginal poster is after - but when do you know that a fact is just that.
Often, they seem like facts because they are written down or broadcast by what appears to be a reputable source yet even the BBC and the big US Newpapers have all had to admit that they failed to be sceptical enough in recent months and have accepted what turns out to be spin as facts.
During the Falklands conflict there was a now famous incident when the BBC started referring to the Britiach Government and then using the term "according to" to ensure that the viewer could see that it was an assertion from the Government and therefore not absolutely a fact thta they had witnessed. Thatcher went ballistic because it undermined the propaganda war, a proper function of Government. However not necessarily a proper part of an independant news organisation.
Recently, we have seen the opposite, where new organisations have taken propaganda and reported on it as fact.
It's all very tricky to see a way out unless all records of government, business and the civic world were permanently and immediately open and transparent yet this would cause all manner of new unforseen problems, some disasterous. Maybe not.