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Bush vs. Kerry on Science
chrisspurgeon writes "The science journal Nature put 15 questions to Senator Kerry and President Bush. Read the candidates' responses on topics such as stem cell research, greenhouse emissions, and manned spaceflight to Mars."
1st Corollary : Any slashdotter who cannot spell Religion is unlikely to have informed, intelligen opinions on the subject.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Each political party has agendas. Each party will use science to support their agendas. However, when there is no real science to support their agenda, or when real science contradicts the agendas, bad science will be created or the importance of science will be lessened.
Both political parties are guilty of the above. Merely because the right believes in invisible beings who control our destiny, doesn't make it worse than the left, who believes that creating a permanent welfare culture will end poverty.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Yeah, too bad we're stuck with only two candidates. I'd rather see this question asked:
Interviewer: "Can either you, President Bush, or you, Senator Kerry, describe to us how your views differ on corporate elitism?"
(Tumbleweed rolls by)
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Says who? Religion and science are not mutually exclusive, although most slashdotters' simplistic attitudes fail to reflect this. That's like saying that someone who enjoys music couldn't possibly be any good at nuclear physics.
I'm studying biology and chemistry in high school; I also happen to be a Christian. Science and religion simply cover different aspects of the world. As elegant as science is, and as helpful as it has been to the world around us, it has no room for things like morality.
That's simply ridiculous to say. I'm not W lover, but c'mon. The Catholic church is doing some spectacular astronomy research; and last I checked they read the Bible for guidance in decisions. Religion and science don't have to be at odds.
'The poets are strangely silent on the subject of cheese...' - Gilbert Keith Chesterton
While I will ignore the lack of proof in your comment to back it up (Even if it is in TFA) I must point out that looking to the bible for help does not necessarily indicate a person is not pro-science.
Being agnostic myself, I obviously don't do this...however, it is my opinion that religion as a whole is designed to instill hope, etc in a person. So what's wrong with reading a book while looking for a little help/inspiration/whatever?
Why are the answers in tiny-little barely-readable Flash movie? That must be the worst abuse of bad web design principles I've seen all year -- and on a reputable journal!
Bush's supporters have been shown to vote for him soely on moral ground. The poorest county in america voted more then 80% for Bush. Why you ask? Because Bush has the Christian Right, a sizeable population. Bush can screw the enviroment, tax people into the ground, reinstate the draft, declare war on canada and mexico and still have the christian right's vote.
If people will wake up and realize that voting for Bush without understanding the issues is killing our country, then perhapse they will change... but until then bush can look forward to having all the bible thumpers under his belt, and abusing his power more and more. Ah well, personally, I think you should have to have a slashdot account to vote this year.
In nature, there are neither rewards or punishments, there are only consequences.
Nothing to see here...
the responses are political canned responses, most likely passed off to higher ranking lackeys in both organizations...
keep moving, nothing to see here.
#include sig.h
Religion and science are not mutually exclusive
Religion and science? Perhaps not. Religion and the Bible in particular? Definitely.
The Bible is not self-consistent. The Bible makes claims that contradict observable phenomenon. The Christian faith requires people to make assumptions against available evidence. The Bible is inherently anti-science.
As elegant as science is, and as helpful as it has been to the world around us, it has no room for things like morality.
You are missing the point. Nobody is saying that science can replace religion. The previous poster's point was that the Christian faith in particular requires an attitude that is directly in opposition to the scientific process.
Any president who reads the bible for help making presidential decisions cannot be pro-science
+5 Insightful??? Are you saying science is a substitute for religion, or those who practice religion should be dismissed as scientists? President Bush's actions in expanding the funding of NSF, NASA and many other agencies suggest that he is pro-science. Would you have said the same thing about Jimmy Carter who was also devoutly Christian? How about Albert Einstein who was a practicing Jew, or Donald Knuth who is a devout Lutheran.
an ill wind that blows no good
First of all, it is regularly pointed out [admittedly by Republicans] that Nature is politically far left. This generalization in the introduction to these questions from the site just stopped me from reading anything else:
" scientists [read as educators/professors] at universities have become unfriendly territory for Republicans"
Professors at universities have NEVER been Republican - republicans ask for accountability and aren't necessarily for higher teacher pay. The teacher associations are the single biggest democratic support = bias
AND
"Bush accuses the Kerry campaign" - with no followup - Kerry accuses Bush campaign remarks = bias
I'm not just accusing Nature of being bias either.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
He's also pro-life AND pro-war, go figure.
A clever person solves a problem. A wise person avoids it. -- Einstein
...and prepare for another 4 years of Bush if one decides to vote third party.
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
I really don't see the point of this kind of 'interview.' Basically, each candidate is asked a series of questions, each of which has a 'good' or 'bad' answer. The results will shock you.
You mean the fact that, even on the fairly open questions, they bot do their best to hedge their bets and say as little as is possible with as many words as possible? Yes, that's what happens when you interview professional politicians, and I have begun to wonder about the point as well.
Why do we put up with interviews that simply give these politicians a platform to speak, rather than interviews that actually question them in depth? How about trying to actually fish a position and some definitive words out of them, instead of letting them answer with the usual nice sounding but empty rhetoric.
Okay, to be fair to Nature this was a written interview, so they didn't really have much choice, but this style of political interview is pretty much all you see in the US.
1. Politician is asked a question.
2. Politician gives a stirring mostly pre-prepared speech that may even have some vague relevance to the question asked.
3. Interviewer moves on to the next question.
What's with that?! Watch some BBC interviewers - I'd love to see nice half hour or hour interview of Kerry or Bush conducted by some of the BBC political interviewers. I think I would learn far more in that half hour than I have in all the election coverage so far.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
This is interesting: "what would you do to ensure that your administration receives genuinely impartial scientific advice?"
Both essentially answer: "It is really important to get impartial advice, that's why I will take only impartial advice."
Both don't get at all into the problem - which is "how do you know what advice is impartial?".
Both answers have nice parts like Bush's world class sentence "I have sought out the best scientific minds..." - completely ignoring that the question was "how do you deal with the problem that it is hard to know what good science is?"
Kerry's reasoning is equally interesting when he says "[Hey, how do I ensure that I receive impartial advice?] My administration would never utilize biased advice."
That's true Mr. President. You can very well be sure that you receive impartial advice when you just don't utilize the biased advice!
JUST ALWAYS BE SURE THAT YOU PERSONALLY SEEK OUT THE BEST SCIENTIFIC MINDS!
Both candidates didn't say anything about the problem itself stating trueisms of the worst order.
You can attach boosters to anything. It just costs more. -
Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 07, @12:26PM
The aforementioned term springs from the same mindset from which the term "World Series" is applied to a US-only baseball league.
Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?
They ask an interesting question about star wars here. Bush claims that the program is working, and will be much more fully operational soon, Kerry says that more research is needed. However, the question only focuses on the scientific aspects of the system, not on it's stratagic usefulness. The world is much different than it was during the Soviet era. During the soviet era, outside the possibility of submarines the only way for the Soviets to attack the US was through missiles, because we hardly did any trade at all with our "enemy", but today the world is much different.
Suppose North Korea really wanted to nuke the US. They have missiles that could potentially reach Alaska, MAYBE California, and will soon have the nuclear technology to make weapons, if they don't have it already. But if North Korea really wanted to attack the US, why would they use a missile whose source can be detectable when they could just sneak a missile on one of the thousands of Chinese ships that come to the US each year that go virtually unsearched by customs? North Korea would have to be morons not to have spies working in the Chinese shipping industry(unbeknowst to China of course).
We are just dumping money down the drain on a system that is questionable both scientifically and strategically.
Monstar L
My favourite US-ism from recent times is that some of the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are charged with "attempting to kill Americans." Apparently it would have been ok if their intended victims were Canadian. Cue lame anti-Canada jokes...
Read Pynchon.
At least a Christian has (ideally, I realize this is not always so) a somewhat consistent set of morals to base their decisions on. Whether GWB is adhering to those is a different bowl of kibble, but my point is, guidlines, right?
I would be fairly scared (regardless of the fact that I'm a christian) of someone in power who had no set of beliefs other than "Do what you can rationalize to yourself", which strikes a string on most athiests I know.
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
that this time your president will be the one who actually wins the election.
Throughout his time in office, President George Bush has been slammed by environmentalists for avoiding steps to reduce global warming. Climate experts recommend cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions - and John Kerry pledges to take a greener stance.
Kerry is also very careful to not actually commit to anything. He'll consider options, but potentially he could continue right along with Bush's current policy, and it would not actually contradict what he said.
Jedidiah
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
How good would it be to see an interviewer sit down and totally grill Bush or Kerry for a good hour, with no aides or press secretaries, or time limits to force them to move on, and with no fear of losing 'access' and no drip-fed policy announcements and spin.
I often think about this. I think I have decided that open press conferences should be consitutionally mandates. The President should have to face the public and the press at least once a week throughout his term, and during the campaign there should be both compulsory debates and compulsory open press conferences. None of this stage managed bullshit.
Doonesbury says it well.
Read Pynchon.
Well, there are a few questions that do tell you where the candidate is coming from. For example, when asked about the threat of global warming, Bush's ghostwriter basically replies: "Naw. Nothing is proven, so there's nothing to worry about", while Kerry's says "The threat is real and we'll deal with it." Other points where they differ is research into new kinds of nukes, rushed deployment of a missile defense system, and manned missions to Moon and Mars.
Of course, we didn't really have to read the answers to know the candidates' stance on these issues. They are basically only reaffirming what we already know.
The work was needed, according to a confidential Pentagon document, to determine whether the United States' earth-penetrating nuclear weapons could be used to destroy deeply buried bunkers in other nations that might house chemical or biological weapons.
In addition, Bush argues that the work will invigorate the minds of nuclear-weapons scientists and help them to respond more quickly to new threats. Such researchers have been consigned to maintaining the nation's stockpile of nearly 9,000 weapons since the end of the cold war.
So you mean to tell me that the 9000 nuclear bombs we already have that can destroy the human species 100,000 times over isn't enough? I guess we need bigger and better bombs so we can take out EVERYTHING, even cockroaches.
And what would either of those questions have proved? That neither Bush nor Kerry are scientists?
Bush and Kerry do not make policy, they are just the public faces presenting the policies of their respective parties.
Whether the creation of personality politics where you vote for the most attractive public face ("Oh, I don't like him, he has a parking ticket, I'll vote against him") rather than on parties and their policies is a good or bad thing I'll leave for you to decide.
Any president who reads the bible for help making presidential decisions cannot be pro-science,
As opposed to Kerry, who tries to affiliate himself with the Catholic Church to garner votes, only to be told by the Church itself to buzz off. Guess what? They're BOTH Politicians, and the parties really don't differ that much -- and the few things they differ on are divisive indeed. What they'd like you to ignore are all the similarities -- they're both plutocrats..
My point is, don't bank on a politician to be the source of change for the better. You can do more yourself, in a single day, to positively affect your own life and those around you than either Bush or Kerry can in 4 (or 8!) years.
A computer without Microsoft is like ice cream without ketchup.
Yes, that is because you are a wise person. However, most of the world is not as wise as you are. Some people, on both sides, believe religeon and science ARE mutually exclusive. There are people out there who think that their religeon is the truth of the world and that there was an Adam, an Eve, a great flood, a parted sea, etc. There are also some people who think that religeon is usless as a set of moral guidelines to live a better life because science is right, making religeon wrong.
I've never met him, but it appears to be that our current president is in the first category. That is the cause of much of the anger against him from the scientific community.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
Political diversity can only be good for a country like the US.
Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?
First, it's a Bush vs. Kerry piece on slashdot concerning science, a definite fire hazard. And to make the situation all the more flammable, the assertion is made that pro-science and pro-religion are mutually exclusive ideas.
Science and religion can co-exist, for evidence I submit Isaac Newton, as a classic example, and Dr. Donald Knuth, as a more modern one. Donald Knuth has written a number of papers and books on the topic of computer science, as well as having written "3:16", which offers analysis of Chatper 3, Verse 16 of every book in the bible.
One need not reject science to be religious, and one need not reject religion to be scientific.
I have discovered a truly remarkable sig which this margin is too small to contain.
I'm an athiest, yet I don't need a set of rules written down in a book to know what is right and wrong. My morals are consistent also.
I've heard this argument before, but I just don't get it. Do you honestly feel that an athiest is some kind of wild-man who runs around in a totally sociopathic way?
Come on...
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
Religion and science are not mutually exclusive
On the contrary, they are mutually exclusive. Religion means building a view of the universe based on myths, old-wives tales and cult brainwashing. In religion, nothing can be questioned or challenged, for example Christians cannot challenge what is written in the Bible, even if it is obviously false. Religion tries to explain things by making up absurd stories about gods rather than looking for the simplest logical explanations. Even when these stories are found to be false, anyone claiming such is persecuted.
Science on the other hand builds a view of the universe by observing it and constructing logical theories to explain it. If a theory is shown to be false, it is changed, scientists seek a better theory rather than sticking to the old one even when it has been proven false.
This is why science and religion can never co-exist. Science means challenging long-held theories whereas religion means having 'faith' in them no matter what.
As elegant as science is, and as helpful as it has been to the world around us, it has no room for things like morality.
Neither does religion. Religions can't make people more moral, all they do is brainwash people in thinking certain actions are moral and certain actions are immoral. Whether they are or not is irrelevent, if that's what the old religious leaders who wrote the Bible, Koran etc. thought, that's what you have to think yourself if you follow the religion. There is no room for actually deciding whether something is moral or not, you just follow the dogma and persecute anyone who doesn't.
Linux will succeed on the desktop the day you don't need the CLI to install a driver.
You may be enlightened enough to realize that religion and science can "get along", but your statement about science "not having any room for morality" makes me think you are just posturing. Ever heard of Bertrand Russell? Religion doesn't have a monopoly on ethics or morals. It just acts like it.
Please don't take my lack of flaming you and your fellow theists as holier than thou ignoramouses as an indication that I don't feel that way.
It's possible to lead someone without having authority over them. In fact, that's the way leadership usually works. Anyone can command somebody who has to obey them. But true leaders encourage, inspire, and persuade people who don't *have* to follow them.
That's how captains of athletic teams are usually picked, and why middle linebackers are so important to the performance of a football team's defensive backs. The US military picks its combat leaders based on their performance *before* they have authority, not after.
The leader of the free world, if the US President abandoned that role, could just as well be French President Jacques Chirac or Nigerian President President Obasanjo.
Jon
-- http://www.cerastes.org
I wish the Bush administration could have done exactly that with the Iraq issue two years ago.
By supporting Arlen Spectre over his challenger, Bush basically guaranteed that any of his allegedly anti-abortion judicial candidates would be "Borked" again. It was Spectre, a republican, that went off like a rabid attack dog on Bork when IIRC Bush senior was trying to get him approved. And do you know what the irony of it is? Bork is the kind of conservative that would have ripped Microsoft a new asshole on its anti-trust case if it had gone to the SCotUS.
Between his support for spectre, illegal alien amnesty, spending like a stripper with a stolen credit card, new entitlements and his equivocation on supporting Israel he stands to lose the Christian Right from the comments I've been reading on right-of-center sites. Most of them are not commentary sites either, but forums like FreeRepublic.
Unfortunately most of these guys will be deusch bags in 2004 and would stay home rather than vote for Petruka the Constitution Party candidate. Why? If it ain't the big guy, and it ain't their big guy, no point in voting. Most of them are probably working class or barely in the middle class because they cannot connect two simple facts: if they came out and voted LP or CP instead of voting for Bush, the minor parties would get so many votes that the RP would be howling in pain in 2004 and would be whoring itself out to the right to get its base back. But they won't do that, so why should the Republicans give a flying fuck about the Christian Right anymore?
As I have often quipped, we libertarians are the principled on the right, the "christian right" aren't principled, their voting habits show it. Rather they are merely the spoiled brats of the right.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
Okay, this isn't really directed at the previous poster, but I'd like to keep it in the same thread.
What do you say you guys butt out of our election? I mean, I understand you being concerned and all... but, honestly, I'm not your best forum for change. I feel a lot of countries really feel like we should all be a global nation and everyone has a say in everyone else's government.
What do you say I elect my president, you elect yours (this is assuming the post is coming from a democracy/republic) and we let them work it out. You have a problem with who I elect? Deal with it. This has never been more of a US internal matter regardless of the Bush administration's foreign policy.
My favorite phrase: You have 5 Moderator Points! Use 'em or lose 'em!
...but you cannot have a religious fundamentalist oil baron as president and expect him to respect pure science. I would take it a step further and say that you cannot have a truly religious person be impartial, unbiased, and untainted when making any type of policy-wide science-related decision. It's oil and water; religion and science just don't gel. Oh yeah, people say then can and do, but those people are usually of the religiously inclined, who are trying to stay true to their belief system without looking like a progress-hating ignoramous.
Slightly off-topic but relevant, I was having this discussion with a colleague. I posited that in a perfect political system, a politician would not be allowed to run for president; instead, we should only nominate and elect outgoing, well-versed, and apolitical scholars, with advanced degrees in areas pertinent to running a nation, such as economics, sociology, or whatnot. My colleagues rebuttal was that such people would not want the type of lifestyle that comes along with being El Presidente, thus would never even enter themselves in the running. Therefore, we continue to elect former actors, pure politicians, and shady businessmen to our highest office, thus perpetuating our current kakistocracy.
Suckage begets suckage.
Governments are not necessary.
This is all very interesting...but the "Church" has nothing to do with Bush...as he's not even Catholic but adheres to a much more rigid form: Born-Again Christian. The Born-Again Christians whom I've met in person and have had many talks with belive that the Church is the spawn of Satan...I'm not making that up folks, no joke.
While being an athiest, I DO see where you're coming from and it would certainly be an interesting evening if you and I were to sit down and have a conversation...but I've yet to have an interesting one with a "born-again" who feels in the absolute truth and validity of the Bible and everything...EVERYTHING in it.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
First off, this is NOT insightful. What tripe!
I know a good many scientists who are very religious also. I may not agree with their particular views on religion, but there is nothing in them that makes them non-scientific or non-religious.
As far as I see it, religion and science are simply two different domains, as they are generally seen. Science is the rigorous search for facts. Religion is the rigorous search for hope, and probably even trying to be a better person.
That said, there are certain religions that violate this: my own religion, for instance, lays claim to all "truth", regardless of its source. That is, we accept as true, those scientific theories and laws which are reasonably well established.
As for reading the Bible (biblios in greek, I believe, which simply meant BOOK!) for help in making presidential decisions, I can only say that there are worse sources of information. After all, he could be reading hustler for advice, which seems to be what a certain other president was doing. (it's a joke).
The Bible has some really interesting insights into decision making and human interaction. Some of it is very old advice, and some of it seems contradictory, but I think many of Bush's detractors would agree that a little more of the "love your enemies" part of the Bible is not such a bad thing.
Sorry, being pro-science is not defined by your willingness to use the bible or not. That is the worst type of non-scientific illogical thinking.
As a side note, having Read the Fun Article, I am disturbed by the way they openly state that they edited Bush's comments, but in reading those comments there are no ellipses, nor other denotation that they eliminated any information. I expected more from a mag. like Nature, and am truly dissappointed. From the viewpoint of a graduate student working on a thesis, I would be ripped to shreds for that type of work. Editing comments should be avoided at all cost (after all, the site was equipped to deal with longer replies), but when necessary it should be obvious where and how.
"We don't know what we are doing, but we are doing it very carefully,..." Wherry, R.J. Personnel Psychology (1995)
In answer to just about every single question, Kerry pledges to do more, fund more, oversee more, and spend more.
Sure, that is all well and good, but if he is actually elected he will realize that it will surely be impossible to do all that he has pledged, even with all the increases in Taxes that he has planned.
I saw Bush's answers as much more definative and realistic.
geremy
I have a website. It's about Macs.
Not even close. I'm an American (actually I have dual-citizenship, but that's neither here nor there) and I think that many non-Americans are very poorly informed about the issues involved in this election. I read the foreign papers (I speak French and Portuguese), and the analyses I have found therein are extremely cursory and often irrelevant. I had a discussion on Iraq with my cousin who is not an American and he spouted off this nonsense about war for oil. My brother is currently living in France and is inundated with idiots who think Bush is Hitler (and who apparently have no understanding of their own history).
Whatever side you come down on in this election, Americans believe that this is an extremely important one. And not just for foreign policy reasons. The country is making a choice between a candidate with strong socialist leanings (wanting to nationalize healthcare) and one with more capitalist ones (Medicare expansion notwithstanding). Quite frankly, the American issues you care about are only a small fraction of the ones I care about. Taxes, school vouchers, Social Security reform, healthcare, tort reform, and judicial appointments matter to me. There is no way that these issues matter to you in the same way.
If non-US citizens could vote, they would select the candidate that emasculates American military and cultural influence the most in order to shift the worldwide balance of power in their favor. Based on America's interests both domestically and abroad, I am confident that Americans will not vote in the same way.
Well, I thought that Kerry's answers were generally a stark contrast to Bush's. Where as the Bush answers tended to be the standard ambiguous crap that usually comes out of his Whitehouse, the Kerry answers offered some firm decisions on some matters and ones that will make some officials sweat profusely if he wins.
For instance, on further Nuclear weapons, he was straight to the point. I paraphrase, "We will discontinue research for next-generation Nuclear weapons, they are not needed."
Also, he was very firm on all questions regarding international matters that America needs to work as part of the international community and not alone (read: not invading countries without the support of the UN or abandoning important treaties like Kyoto). It was good to see such positive assertions.
I also wonder why he's so consistent in referring to 'John Edwards and I'. Perhaps he wants to underline that he won't be a lone ranger?
This guy might actually be a reasonable dude. Of course, we all know that power corrupts, so it will be interesting to see if he (and John Edwards) stick to his (their) guns if Kerry does become the next president.
But whether Kerry can beat Bush probably comes down to whether people believe that Kerry will "kill those darned terrorisms that perpopulate the global world order and need exterminating by sending Arnie to war". Which is quite a sad indigtment of American politics. I don't know why I complain, British elections seem to pivot on who the Sun, Mirror, and Star (ie. the 'gutter' tabloids) tend to support. That and Blair is better than any current alternative.
Which makes me wonder... I wonder how Bush would do in a Prime Minister's Question time that Blair blazes through every Wednesday. (If you don't like Blair, you should watch PMQs, he's really rather good at verbally destroying anybody who attempts to attack him.)
Free Gamer - Free games list and commentary
Um yeah.... If they were attempting to kill non-US citizens on non-US territory, the US would have no right to hold them. That doesn't mean it would be "ok", but it would be Canada's job to arrest and hold them. And don't think that they wouldn't.
Addlepated - punk & metal
Everyone on the planet will be "influenced" by the results of this election. Whether it be a continuation of the "send troops first, try diplomacy last" policy of the current administration, to the U.S. continuing to use WAY more than our fair share of energy (and producing WAY more than our fair share of CO2), to the U.S. being seen as a bully to the rest of the world instead of being seen as a friend to the rest of the world -- Yes, everyone will be influenced.
If you thought the last presidential was divisive, this one will be ten times more so...
I'm sorry to rob you of your illusions, but there's some nations out there with less schoolyard killing-sprees than the US sees and without terrorists (let's not elaborate on USAs "shock and awe" war that killed a good number of iraqui civilians), and those nations are getting fed up with the USAs unilateral policies.
Yeah, i know France is not too popular in the USA now since they had the guts to stand up against Bushs private war on Iraq (for which still no legitimation exists: there were no WMDs, Bin Laden has better connections to Saudi-Arabia and the Bush Family than to Iraq, and had this really been about evil dictators with WMDs the war should have taken place in Vietnam). Neither is Germany, or the Chinese, those evil commies (the hysterical american reaction to anything that reeks of communism is really funny).
The USA are pushing through their foreign policy without any scruples, even by war if they think it'll get them to their goals. There's lots of nations perceiving the US in that way and not all of them are radicals and terrorists.
Do go on and mod me down if you can't stand criticism, i don't care.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
You think possibly the fact that not a SINGLE person in the senate voted (95 to 0) that the Kyoto treaty as it stood was acceptable, might also be a reason why he didn't persue entering into it?
In fact Bush has said that he supports the concept of the Kyoto treaty, (which would basically contradict what you are trying to say that he doesn't believe that humans can cause issues) but like ALL the other senators (remember every single one said don't sign it, Dem & Repub) has issues with the writing.
And it's not just all the US Senators, here's an open letter from SCIENTISTS also concerned with the content of the Kyoto treaty. http://www.envirotruth.org/openletter.cfm I'd say that a number of nations were rushing to "pat themselves on the back" rather than actually solving the issue.
I don't believe for a second that Bush could even successfully read his responses in there, much less understand what they mean.
Clearly the questions were provided in writing where others could answer, not verbally where they had to answer for themselves.
That makes both sets of answers largely meaningless.
http://www.fairvote.org/turnout/preturn.htm
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0781453.html
http://www.fec.gov/pages/htmlto5.htm
http://www.multied.com/elections/
Look at some of the figures on that last link. The last time the turnout went above even 70% was 1900 - and that was a 2 party election. Hell the turnout 1896 was almost 80%, and that was a 2 party election too. So I'm legitimately curious about this, guys - if what I'm saying is a bunch of crap then why in the last century have voter turnouts held around the 50%-60% range? Are we waiting for something? The right issue, or set of issues? The right guy? The right scandal? I'd honestly like to know.
That's why it looks like a bit like the vote is sort of wasted on just the US voters.
What media source would you suggest for a genuinely interested non-US, so that they can become more informed about the real issues and not see a crazy texan and the dullest man in the world slag each other off?
I watched much of the Newsnight (BBC) coverage from both party congresses, and really enjoyed reports from genuine republican, democrat heartlands which seemed to address real history, background and issues. Also candid interviews with delegates, to see how their beliefs differ from the 'party line'. I feel,hope I understand some of the republican cause slightly more now as a result of this and some in depth articles in the papers.
You have to forgive people for thinking that the motivation for the invasion of Iraq had something to do with oil.
Because as it has become apparent, it certainly had nothing to do with weapons of mass destruction, nor with 'liberating' the Iraqi people. Or if it did, it was executed so incompetently that claiming an ulterior motive is almost charitable.
None of the evidence that has come to light so far paints the actions of the current US administration in a positive light, inasmuch as it relates to the wars it has started. As regards other international affairs, it has actively fought any steps that would impinge upon the short-term benefit of large US corporations, for example in the arms industry, drug manufacture, agriculture. And of course there is the blatant disregard for the US' contribution to global warming.
Policies based in religious thought, not science, shape the US' position when looking at international family planning and poverty issues; the US has thrown its political weight around in trying to stymie UN policies on education and family planning which touch on contraception.
In international policy the US has been consistently belligerent; even now it is unilaterally trying to bully Iran on nuclear issues. It has strained relations with major allies, and amazingly has made itself even more disliked in the middle East.
So there are very good reasons why people outside the US have a very low opinion of Bush. Calling him a modern Hitler is hyperbole, but such low opinion of him is not unfounded.
Aids research has been going on longer than that. Perhaps we should stop that too, it MUST be a lost cause then. CAncer research has obviously been a complete waste of time according to your theory. Come on that is simply idiotic.
Secondly, I would expect there to be more results from a fully funded parallel research as opposed to one that is nearly completely choked off. That's simply commonsense.
That's a tiger rock.
Homer: Not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol must be working like a charm.
Lisa: That's spacious reasoning, Dad.
Homer: Thank you, dear.
Lisa: By your logic I could claim that this rock keeps tigers away.
Homer: Oh, how does it work?
Lisa: It doesn't work.
Homer: Uh-huh.
Lisa: It's just a stupid rock.
Homer: Uh-huh.
Lisa: But I don't see any tigers around, do you?
[Homer thinks of this, then pulls out some money]
Homer: Lisa, I want to buy your rock.
[Lisa refuses at first, then takes the exchange]
Just because you haven't suffered another attack doesn't mean that your country is safer, or Bush has done his job. I'm not saying he hasn't, but you're attributing to causality what you can only attribute to correlation. It's like me BLAMING Bush for the attacks because there weren't any attacks on the U.S. before he came along.
You may be right about your understanding of internal american affairs, but let me tell you, you're wrong about your assumptions on non-US citizens.
You're talking of a world where countries "emasculate" each other, where there's a "shift of power", "military influence". It's your right, and Bush's too, to see international relations as a perpetual conflict, with a winner wielding power.
In this case, I can understand that you'd like to be in the winner's team.
There are also people who think that you can see things otherwise. Equilibrium. Mutual understanding. Trying not to get infuriated when contradiction comes. That's called adult behaviour, when you don't forcibly want to show others that you got the longest dick.
Oh, by the way : the issue at stake is the same in both private and international relationships.
the how I've had actual americans describe the last election is...
***you have bush over here, and gore over here... neither is good but you gotta choose either one.***
which is pretty much the thing that is fucked - there is no choice(well, of course there is choice but thats chosen inside the party in a small group.. but that's like saying that communist china is free).
I really hope you guys elect Dubya again
"Again"? They didn't elect him the first time...
Bush's supporters have been shown to vote for him soely on moral ground.
And? Why shouldn't somebody need to be moral to hold a position of great responsibility?
The poorest county in america voted more then 80% for Bush. Why you ask? Because Bush has the Christian Right, a sizeable population.
This is an odd argument. I hadn't noticed that the poor and uneducated of the inner cities, for example, were voting Republican. It's also a rather offensive, sneering argument that relieves you of the need to think, ironically.
Bush can screw the enviroment,
He has done no such thing.
tax people into the ground,
Um, he's the guy who cut taxes. Kerry wants to raise them, er, repeal the cuts, er, something, unless you actually ask him, or something.
reinstate the draft,
That is a Moore-ian fantasy.
declare war on canada and mexico
Are we into Saturday Night Live now, or what?
If people will wake up and realize that voting for Bush without understanding the issues is killing our country, then perhapse they will change... but until then bush can look forward to having all the bible thumpers under his belt, and abusing his power more and more. Ah well, personally, I think you should have to have a slashdot account to vote this year.
That this sort of bigotry is considered "insightful" is just pathetic.
I like how scientists are called "impartial" in this report. Bush is slammed for not signing the Kyoto Protocol, something many consider junk. Yet, it is typical for a group of scientists to consider their position as "the" position. Global Warming is a theory, and not a unanimous one. Yet, we would hold someone's feet to the fire on it? Puhleez.
Most of Bush's answers seem to not make much sense or have major terminology errors...
But in the answer to question 6... "ITER is a critically important experiment to test the feasibility of nuclear fusion as a source of electricity and hydrogen." (emphasis added)
Perhaps one of the many scientific reviewers that parsed his comments before sending them to nature should've let him know that fusion actually consumes hydrogen?
Oh and on question 3... is "fissile materials" really a word?
I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!
I haven't seen US territory get hit with another major attack in the last three years.
This is not meant as a troll--although this is the hardest topic to avoid starting one in--but if we were hit, would you change your vote?
I ask because I firmly believe that we will be hit if Uncle Al thinks it'll help his goals, and I don't think that we can prevent it if Uncle Al cares to execute it. But then the question becomes: a) does Uncle Al prefer to see Bush or Kerry in control? I believe that there are arguments for either, which I'll probably have to elaborate on in the thread below; and b) would an attack make Bush more or less re-electable? Americans would surely feel the same wave of patriotism that they did the first time, and rally behind the commander-in-chief; otoh, Bush has credited himself with making the world and the US in particular much safer since he's the guy in charge. If Uncle Al puts a lie to that, are Americans likely to hold him accountable?
It's hard to me to guess, since I'll be voting for Kerry regardless of what happens. So I'm interested to hear from a "leaning-to-Bush" kinda guy to know if your vote could be flipped by an attack. I'm guessing that it couldn't be--but it seems like you've predicated your decision on his ability to make us safer, and if it's demonstrated that he really hasn't, I wonder if your opinion will change.
(Just to make sure this gets modded as a troll--I can't believe Cheney's latest statements, to the effect of: vote for Kerry and we'll be attacked; we've made the world safer, as we haven't been attacked since 9/11 due to our response. Either they know a lot more about Uncle Al's capability than I do--entirely possible--or they're doing a lot of wishful thinking and whistling past the graveyard. Uncle Al has already shown a willingness to influence the democratic process, so to challenge them to do it again seems like a stupid stupid stupid thing to do. I think it would have been much smarter to say "re-elect Bush as he's the only guy with the gumption to complete the job that's been started but to say that the job is over when it clearly isn't is just boggling. Didn't they learn from the Bring It On and the Mission Accomplished tough talk?)
--
$tar -xvf
I disagree... Bush clearly states bills he's signed in the past and what he plans in the future, and in some cases is clearly more realistic than Kerry...
For example, on the stem cell question, Bush makes it quite clear that people should stop thinking of stem cell research as a solution to all medical problems, and especially NOW, at the current time, we shouldn't be giving false hope to people who have recently been diagnosed. Bush also talks about what he's actually done a lot more than Kerry, who has had 20 years to actually take the initiative on something.
As far as the nuclear weapons (and the missile defense question) go, here is where we start to see a stark difference in answers, and so it depends on which side of the fence you are on... both gave reasonable and direct responses, I just happen to support the President's side of those issues, especially now that North Korea has nuclear weapons and probably the conveyance to get them to U.S. soil. Moreover, in the past few years, we've seen other countries become nuclear powers... including India and, if I'm not mistaken, Pakistan. It behooves us to stay ahead of the curve.
By the fifteenth question, I was actually getting annoyed at the "John Edwards and I will pass..." respones. Really? You can sidestep congress and just pass those things on your own? Well, learn something new every day.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
It happened. And Bush and co. were pissed.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
I follow space stuff pretty closely but I can't speak to the rest. Kerry's response is boilerplate stuff that he's said before. Bush's stance on space is flawed but a whole lot better than Kerry's in my opinion. From what I can tell Kerry thinks of space as a place to do international diplomacy publicity stunts, do drug research, and talk about how great it is. Not much more.
Not to hijack the topic but NASA has needed direction more than money and that's what Bush has given it. the engineers will fine tune the details like mission plans. the president's job is go give them broad-brushed policy. humans plus robots in space as appropriate is a-ok with me.
Blaze a trail to the New World
The theory that a vote for Nader/Badnarik is a vote for Bush stems from the idea that people who vote for change are probably voting for Kerry and not for Bush.
When the choice is between a candidate from Party A who supports invading Iraq, opposes gay marriage, and thingks the FCC should have additional censorhip rights and a candidate from Party B who supports invading Iraq, opposes gay marriage, and thingks the FCC should have additional censorhip rights, the only vote for change is Part C.
Kerry == Bush.
If non-US citizens could vote, they would select the candidate that emasculates American military and cultural influence the most in order to shift the worldwide balance of power in their favor. Based on America's interests both domestically and abroad, I am confident that Americans will not vote in the same way.
That is right. I am French and I would vote for Bush. He wants a strong america and proved to be incompetent. From an european point of view, it is clearly "4 more years!" that should do unanimity.
I don't think that my fellows believe their best interest is in a weak america. Our economies are too strongly tied. We just fear international terrorism, economical crisis and backward diplomacy (realpolitik as say some). On these issues Bush clearly showed his incompetence.
Yeah, instead of false hope, it's much better to give them NO hope at all.
Of course right and wrong can change. What society one day considers to be right can become wrong the next. Western countries no longer practice slavery or racial segregation. Women are allowed to own property, to vote and to serve in the military alongside men. You will not be arrested and forced to undergo "treatment" if you are gay. The list is long and varied, yet these are all things that were once considered "right" or "wrong" at one point.
Ummm
It's not as if the only people who have been detained were provably in the act of actually trying to kill US citizens on or off US territory.
A lot of the detainees in Guantanamo were actually non-US citizens found in a non-US territory who have yet to have been proven to have any intention of killing US (or otherwise) citizens. The government has refused to provide any evidence outside of closed military tribunals to back this up. They've just said 'unlawful combatants' and said the Geneva convention doesn't apply.
The person who you were responding to was pointing out this very same thing.
So, er, what right to hold these people is this actually acting on again? Certainly not for having actually found them in the act or demonstrated what they're accused of.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Because the US pays a disproportional cost for UN activities?
Is this the same US that refused to pay any UN dues recently? The same US that gives less per head through government aid than almost any other western nation?
Even if what you had claimed bore any relation to the truth, twisting foreign aid so it furthers your religious views rather than actually being focussed on delivery the most aid is morally reprehensible whether you pay the most or not.
Oh, and I would disagree that there is no diference between 70% and 90%, it's probably 100 million people and most of those that would have changed their opinion would be the most educated and influential of those populations, in fact the ones most likely to support the west.
Calling him a modern Hitler is hyperbole, but such low opinion of him is not unfounded.
His raging militarism alone would justify such a comparison. Expansion of government power at the expense of civil liberties; secret extra-judicial detentions; and the sanction of inhuman treatment of prisoners from the highest levels of government (only a fool could ignore the evidence that this was premeditated) only make it more apt.
I'm really disappointed the answer to so many of these questions is "Oh, we'll spend more, of course". Kerry's speech at the DNC was much the same. There he started out saying he'll balance the budget and then 90% of his speech is what he'll spend more on. I didn't get to see Bush's speech, but I imagine it was much the same. If politicians weren't allowed to be such flim flams maybe we would start seeing actual solutions being proposed like ending the war on drugs, tossing out the nuke stockpile, breaking up the two party system for something more democratic (lol, ok fat chance on that one), etc..
What the [Catholic] Church needs to do is step back and say one way or the other "The Bible contains passages which may be metaphorical" or "The Bible should be taken literally at all times." If you're willing to admit the former, you need to be willing to allow the individual to judge what is Metaphorical and what is not for themselves. Obviously the Church has it within her power to take exception to this from time to time through the Pope's power of speaking Ex Cathedra.
The Catholic church has never held the view that the Bible must be taken literally at all times, but that "Scripture and Tradition take equal weight". In fact, the Catholic/Protestant split arose because the (soon to be) Protestants insisted the Bible was the literal Word of God, and it contradicted certain Church teachings and practises. The Catholics countered that the Word of God comes directly from the Pope, and not the Bible which is, after all, a Church-assembled anthology.
Anyway, if the Pope came up with something radical like you're suggesting, all he would do is cause another schism in the Catholic Church; some would follow the new teaching, some wouldn't, and nothing would be clarified. Least of all for the Protestants, who have no equivalent office to the Pope, and are hardly likely to take to the Pope's view into account.
-- Nick "Hallo this is Beel Gates, und I pronounce weendows as
Stem cells are not all equal - adult stem cells are partially differentiated, which embryonic stem cells are completely undifferentiated. Guess why stem cells are so useful/versatile/powerful? Yup, they're undifferentiated. So do you want the embryonic ones, or the half-assed adult ones that are only good for a few situations?
And there's a heck of a lot of research that's been going on for more than 20 years that hasn't delivered yet.
Your Prayers Have Been Answered.
Stream
Use Real, Real Alternative, Quicktime or VLC. Not sure about WMP.
A real interview with the President. With a real jounalist from Ireland. From late June 2004 with Irish broadcasting.
OMG do he look incompetent. This is the little known but infamous interview where he claims that Pakistan is a democracy!
From the transcript:
[My emphasis]
Well as you will understand after viewing that; there is a reason why this is the only lenghty interview with non-preapproved questions he will do with a decent journalist asking real questions not just picthing.
Melius mori in libertate quam vivere in servitute.
"Bush makes it quite clear that people should stop thinking of stem cell research as a solution to all medical problems, and especially NOW, at the current time, we shouldn't be giving false hope to people who have recently been diagnosed."
Let's turn that around, shall we? Replace "oil exploration" with "stem cell research".
Bush makes it quite clear that people should stop thinking of [oil exploration] as a solution to all [energy] problems, and especially NOW, at the current time, we shouldn't be giving false hope to people who have recently been [paying jacked-up oil prices].
One more time, with "ballistic missile defense system".
Bush makes it quite clear that people should stop thinking of [the ballistic missile defense system] as a solution to all [national security] problems, and especially NOW, at the current time, we shouldn't be giving false hope to people who have recently been [attacked by terrorists]
See, when you divorce the logic from the religious dogma held by some re: stem cell research, it's sounds incredibly stupid doesn't it?
The Gospel of Mark, however, is understood by all Christians to be a historical narrative.
Christians differ over what parts they think refer to historical narrative.
Therein lies the problem. If the Bible was so clear, there wouldn't be 1600 sects of Christianity. Face it. The first liberalization of the bible was the New Testament, and it'll keep going until (I hope I see the day) the United States is just like Europe - where people believe some parts and ignore others, and combine other religious principles as well.
And, since every line of the bible is open to interpretation, the places where the Bible coincides with other history (which it should, since it was written during or after), do not mean that the rest of the bible is true. Okay, Egypt had slaves! That doesn't man a stave can turn into a snake.
Meanwhile, half of the Christian organizations in the world lie daily to con middle-class, the poor, and vulnerable seniors out of their hard earned money. Over at World Changers, the two head pastors have matching Bentleys and matching private jets. I have a feeling if Christian "non-profits" were forced to have transparent accounting, the people who make $400 a week would keep a little more in their own pocket.
Remember, Christ walked the world with no posessions. He never asked for money. He preached love and tolerance. He spent time comforting the addicts, prostitutes, and the unloved and unaccepted. But today nearly every organization (ahem, 700 Club) calls these people sick and evil.
http://www.cbn.com/communitypublic/ -- Check it out! Pat's Age Defying Shake! Word of god, my ass.
I'd also like to point out that you'll find complete idiots in the US, so you would have to compare educated people on both sides. Similarly, contrast US foreign reporting to what you find in French papers and it's fair to say that they have you beat- or for that matter, Canadian or British media.
You are right that most of the world would not vote for Bush. This is not to emasculate your country so much as the fact that on almost any issue mentionned in the article, Bush seems to be against the world majority.
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
I completely agree. Bush sure makes it easy to say there were no reasons other then economic gain for invading Iraq because he continues to lie about the reasonings for the war in the first place.
The facts are pretty simple. We had been saying for years that any WMD programs Saddam did have were moved out of country. There army was completely crippled from the early 90's. They had no proven links with the terrorists. Yet we are suppose to be stupid enough to believe they were a threat to the well being of us in the US?
Truth is Iran and Saudi Arabia are the two countries most involved with the terrorism. Iran admits to having a WMD program. We have proven they funded people like Bin Ladin. We have discovered that all of the major terrorist leaders either live in Saudi or Iran. Course you don't see us lined up to fight them do you? Saudi leaders are Bush family friends and we would want to jeopardize the military bases we have there (there are more US military bases in Saudi Arabia then any other country other then the US). Iran is actually organized well enough to fight a war if we showed up, and the economic gain from fighting a war with them wouldn't be nearly as high.
We would have been far better off spending the billions we have spent in Iraq to fix problems on our own soil, or to cut down on some of our debt. Instead we spend get to spend billions on Iraq and Bush wants to cut taxes. It doesn't take a smart person to realize that is a terrible idea. Which is of course why we have never ever had a tax cut during a war.
Kerry probably isn't the best person to lead the US. But Bush has proven he is a terrible person to do the job.
I don't typically vote Democrat, but I sure as hell will in this election.
The first assumption has no value - whether the Earth is cool or not compared to most of it's history doesn't matter. It suits us and our civilisation.
On the second assumption - almost all scientists involved in any kind of climate research would maintain that human action is very likely to be responsible for this. It's only in the US (out of the developed world) where there is any political disagreement on this...
Interesting... I didn't see the video, but I read the transcript, and it sounded like good questions and good answers. There was some interrupting, which happens in every good interview, but Bush did seem to get around to the points he was trying to make, and Bushes responses to the interruptions could have been better.
Maybe the video shows him bumbling and stumbling a bit more than the text of the interview shows?
Still, I'm sure I'm not the only one who doesn't think this was a bad interview for Bush. After all, why would the Whitehouse website put it up if it was?
I think you are looking at it through Kerry-colored glasses and seeing the messenger bumble, perhaps, without actually seeing the message... he gave good responses, IMO.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Yes, it would be so very interesting to watch baseball teams from other nations compete with baseball teams here. eheheh. You know, back in 1903 (when the first 'world series' was held) every professional baseball team in the world was eligible. If there are now professional baseball teams outside north america (because it isn't just US teams, you dipshits, don't forget the Canadians like you people who trot out the tired old 'world series' blast always do) that want to compete, maybe they should...I dunno...get popular and good enough to do so. Then, perhaps, they'd be invited to attend. However, much like basketball, any player from outside the US (which many, many US ballplayers are, something which is almost always left out of the same old anti-US bullshit you're spewing here) who has real talent has already moved to the US to play. Ichiro comes to mind. Hey, but once someone moves to the US, they're immediately US-centric jerks just like the rest of us apparently are. If the world series were opened to the rest of the world, it would still be two American teams facing each other in the finals, unless that was expressly prohibited, in which case the one American team would win each game by 15 runs or so. Nice try, though, it sure sounded good when you typed it out, I bet. Perhaps you should have realized that people have been throwing variations on your comment out since 1903. Find a new (and, if it isn't too much to ask, relevant) aspect of American society to ride, dillhole.
http://xkcd.com/386/
Your country has the nuclear capability to fuse North Korea into a sea of black glass ten times over now, how is twenty going to make you any safer? Answer: it won't. It does however impact the the way the rest of the world sees and relates to America, and not in a favourable way. Incidentally, India and Pakistan have had nuclear weapons for a long time so in terms of their being a "threat" or new on Bush's watch you are indeed quite wrong.
Really? You can sidestep congress and just pass those things on your own?
Yeah, by resorting to tactics that passed the PATRIOT Act like the Bush administration did. By using national tragedy to push though legislation that infringes upon rights with no guarantees and vague security goals.
Simply print a 300-some page document late at night and ask people to vote on it first thing in the morning, and see how many people are willing to vote against something with that name. Kudos to the 79 who did.
By the way, It probably took you till the fifteenth question because he didn't actually use the terms you supposedly found and quoted. Try these direct quotations:
Question 6: "John Edwards and I support a strategically balanced..."
Question 7: "John Edwards and I are committed to increasing funding..."
Question 8: "John Edwards and I would increase Federal funding..."
Question 9: "John Edwards and I believe that we can protect..."
I'm actually happy that Kerry realizes the universe doesn't revolve around him, and chooses to name his running mate.
--
"Extra Anus Kills Four-Legged Chick" -- Headline
For example, on the stem cell question, Bush makes it quite clear that people should stop thinking of stem cell research as a solution to all medical problems, and especially NOW, at the current time, we shouldn't be giving false hope to people who have recently been diagnosed
Well, that's a bit of straw man isn't it? You don't have to have a cure for Alzheimer's NOW to justify research on a future stem cell based Alzheimer's treatment NOW.
Suppose a concerted stem cell research effort (not just getting out of the way, but active promotion) might lead to cures in, perhaps, ten or twenty years. Twenty years is within the expected lifetime of most Americans, and many would stand to benefit if successful therapies are devised. Even if stem cell research does not result in viable therapies in the lifetime of most Americans, it will still advance the basic science needed to find other avenues of therapy.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
So there are very good reasons why people outside the US have a very low opinion of Bush. Calling him a modern Hitler is hyperbole, but such low opinion of him is not unfounded.
... or listen to off-the-record commentary by friends and acquaintances stationed there (none of the folks I know actively serving in the miliarty ... admittedly the several I do know are not a statistical universe, but nevertheless ... will be voting for Bush)].
... a price the Bush's and the Republicans are only too happy to pay.
Calling Bush Hitler is not only Hyperbole, it is also a disservice. Differences between Bush and Hitler abound, including but not limited to Hitlers legitimate election vs. Bush's coup d'etat of 2000, Hitler's staging of a terrorist attack vs. Bush's exploitation of a real attack, Hitlers murder of millions vs. Bush's murder of tens of thousands, Hitlers antisemetism vs. Bush's uncritical support of Sharon, and Hitlers devout Catholocism vs. Bush's devout Methodist(ism).
Bush is far more comparable to Milosevic. A toxic leader, with a toxic idealogy and a toxic agenda, who has no compunction about starting wars in smaller countries he ultimately cannot win, perpetuating atrocities on a relatively minor scale (Abu Ghraib, Gitmo), disregarding international law and norms to the point of alienating an ever dwindling number of friends and allies, stripping his own people of what civil rights and priveleges they once had in the name of "defending against [insert threat here]", leaving his own soldiers to die by the hundreds (or thousands) for no other purpose than to delay the inevitable defeat a timely amount (say, until after the November elections, or in Milosevic's case, until the end of negotiations), and ultimately leaving his country destitute and discredited in the world, to the point where its own citizens become reluctant to admit to their citizenship while travelling abroad.
Bush Junior isn't a Hitler. He is a Milosevic couched in a slightly different rhetoric, and he is in the process of teaching complacent Americans the same ugly lessons that Milosevic taught the Serbs a decade ago.
What is really depressing is how the Bush's and the Republicans have maneuvered themselves into a win-win situation with respect to the fiasco in Iraq through their delaying tactics in keeping Americans unaware of the ugly fact that we have already lost the war. [Yes, I know you folks in most of the rest of the world already know this, but keep in mind that our media is actively downplaying the fact that we're losing the war: most people here aren't even aware that most of Iraq, including most of its major cities, are in insurgent hands, and our troups virtually holed up in their bases under siege. One has to go to the German, French, Russian (thank you babelfish!), and other foreign media to get any inkling as to what is really going on over there
Delay Americans' realization that Bush started a war he lost until after the November elections. If Bush wins, they win the presidency and can withdraw, with four years to get the American people to forget about what he has done (probably by starting a whole new mess we'll be concerned about instead). If he loses, he leaves Kerry with an untenable situation, Kerry pulls out, and the Republicans can spin it as "weak Democrats who didn't see it through."
The only cost are a few hundred American lives, and a few thousand Iraqis
I would weep for the future of this country, if there were one. I fear it resembles that of Yugoslavia only too closely.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
You are wrong too.
It is the Legistlature job to write laws(bills).
It is the Executives job to write laws(executive orders).
It is the Judicial job to write laws(judicial activism).
Here is my problem with John F. Kerry. He has had 20 something years in the Senate to author any legislation he thinks is good for America. Exactly what is his record on producing such legislation. Name 10. Name 9. Name 2. He has been sitting on his ASS for 20 years. 20 years of Senate, and still we don't know where he stands. It seems as if he is for and against everything. Prolife and prochoice. Pro Gun, anti gun.
Here is my problem with George W. Bush. He takes a stand, right or wrong, and "stays the course". We have a record of how things have been done for 4 years, and it is clear where he stands, like him or not.
Which is why I am voting LIBERTARIAN. With overriding moral platform of LIMITED Government AND Personal Responsibility. Government cannot replace responisibilty and the responsible don't need governance.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
If you honestly believe that either major-party candidate will (or even has the power to) "emasculate American military and cultural influence", then you'll be deciding your vote for entirely the wrong reasons.
On stereophonic equipment, the monaural sound obtained through multiple channels will enhance your listening pleasure.
AMEN. The "John Edwards and I will pass..." respones were annoying. Kerry's answers were exactly what you would expect from a campaign. They offered no real insight, just stuck to safe statements that the majority of his potential voters likely agreed with.
To be objective, Bush's responses were much the same, in that they were targetted at his supporters. the key difference I saw though was he did back up his statements with examples of his actions. So at least he has concrete examples of doing something.
With Kerry the "will do"'s remind me a lot of the kids running for class president, saying they will get us longer lunch periods, longer times between class, and cheaper parking stickers. When we all know that the position has neither the mandate nor the authority to do any of those things.
Also, the nuclear weapons issue made me cringe. we have had the power and the technology to blow ourselves up many time over for the last 60 years. What has kept us from doing so is 1. staying ahead of the pack, and 2. continued research.
If we shelve everything we will just full behind, or apear to full behind. Then we would apprear vulnerable and thus become an even more appealing target to our enemies. I say "appear" because the likely scenerio is that the nuclear programs would be officially scrapped, then shifted to some blck budget operation so we look clean, but in reality it is the same old story. Just like when the bilogical weapons and chemical weapons were supposedly dismantled in the 60's and 70's.
Anyway, if Kerry were actually to follow through on the nuclear arms issue, we would be much worse off, by continuing to pursue those weapons technologies, the programs will at least remain more public and not be forced "underground". The more public it is the more checks and balances their will be in place to safe guard the use. If is secret, then the potential for abuse is much greater.
All in all this interview was IMO an excellent example of how naive Kerry is (or at least is appearing to be). Did he do anything as a Senator to back up his stated opinions? Did he sponsor any legislation that would fit with his agenda? Perhaps he did, and if he did why didn't he support his arguments with examples of actions?
-MS2k
> the candidate that emasculates American military and
> cultural influence the most
Ah, are you implying then that they'd vote for the candidate who tied up the U.S. military in an unnecessary war (Iraq), leaving us vulnerable to a resurgent Al Quaeda (going into Iraq forced us to give less attention attention to re-building Afghanistan), an increasingly aggressive N. Korea, not to mention other "Axis of Evil" members?
Or are you implying that they'd vote for the candidate who would squander the world-wide goodwill expressed towards the U.S. post 9-11 via ham-fisted diplomacy and the above military action?
Or maybe they'd vote for the candidate whose fiscal irresponsibility has driven the nation into an unprecedented degree of debt, all the while without a net creation of jobs (the latter of which no president has accomplished since Hoover, who presided over the Great Depression).
BTW, nice slur against Kerry - implying that a willingess to acknowledge and work with other nations towards mutual benefit is "emasculation", as opposed to intelligent foreign policy!
I hope that you're proud of your talking points!
No, you are wrong.
Researching it involves taking embryos that weren't going to turn into humans, anyway.
Saying that it kills embryos is like saying that masturbation kills sperm.
It would be pretty hard to distinguish these two guys without the clues like "John Edwards" or "current administration's mishandling of the problem".
I think both candidates are pretty clueless in science, surely neither is as smart and erudite as Clinton was (who, among other things, admitted in 1999 the possibility of human immortality and stated that it should be our goal).
The questions by Nature weren't too interesting either. The only thing that we can learn from this article is that both candidates have good support stuff who can bullshit people very well.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
Then it seems to me that the moral delimma is an even greater issue. Presumably, the way to get new lines is to get some sperm and egg donations, perform some invitro fertilization, then harvest the resulting embryos. (Please correct me if I'm wrong, IANAMB.)
The argument is that you have created a person (a unique human individal), and you are going to experiment on it.
Personally, I don't agree with that. An embryo, undifferentiated, in no way viable, should not be considered a protected entity. But I do understand the view point that this is "creating human life in order to destroy it". And for many people it is morally wrong. I don't really think it's a religious issue. Few people would support performing medical experiments on human beings. But from a certain perspective, this crosses the line into that territory.
So I think Bush made a reasonable compromise in order to provide funding that was not available before, knowing that he was under pressure to not provide funding for any kind of stem cell research.
To me, the funds should be available without those restrictions, but everybody's taxes are being used to provide the funding, so I see the need for compromise. And calling it a "ban on stem cell research" is disingeneous political posturing, and not conducive to an honest debate. The issue, I think, is that research facilities using federal funds for stem cell research are banned from creating new embryos.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
And not even then. I am a Southern Baptist who believes in the literal truth of the Bible. I also believe that phrases like "a thousand thousand angels" means "more people than I've seen in one place during my life in a sparsely-populated desert region", and "a thousand years" means "a period of time longer than my cultural upbringing has prepared me to comprehend".
Put another way: suppose God spoke to me and said "here is the timeline of Creation. See that dot? That's you. See that dot? That's the end of the Universe as you understand it. Go tell people.". Say I was a shepherd that had never heard of a number larger than "one thousand", and that was referring to a flock of sheep large enough to really impress me that "thousand" means "a whole lot". I'd probably come back with something like "the Universe will end after thousands of thousands of years". I would be speaking the literal truth within my ability to express the concepts that I had never encountered before.
When someone tells me that it's 10:45 AM, I don't think that it's really 104500.000000UTC. Why people assign arbitrarily precise values to bits of information that are inherently imprecise, either to prove that their interpretation of the Bible is The One True Way or that the Bible is a self-contradictory load of BS, is completely beyond me.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Bye! Don't let the door hit you on your ass on the way out, you spineless worm. If you don't like something in your country, take a stand and try to change it.
... an island of sanity in a nation consumed with neurosis), but I fully empathize with the poster who has had enough and is leaving, and feel nothing but the deepest contempt and disgust for the toxic politics and philosophies of people like yourself that have made it necessary.
I can't speak for the guy going to Vancouver (I'm actually going there on vacation next month, and may even get a summer home there if I like it enough), but I've been fighting the pendulum swing to the right since I first started voting in '84. Twenty years later, and the nonsense I keep hearing about "the pendulum will swing back eventually" rings truly hollow. It may be true in the very long term, but it sounds more like the Jews telling themselves "this too shall pass" (it did, but not until after most of those telling themselves that had been murdered). [cue the usual Godwin's law trolls]
I'm tired of fighting a losing battle against mindlessly nationalistic, irrationally religious idealogues, and other right wing zealots like yourself.
I'm tired of contributing to a society whose international agenda can only be described as toxic and deeply irresponsible.
I'm tired of living among people whose politics and philosophies I have learned over the years and decades to despise.
I'm sick of seeing a country I love destroy itself from within so profoundly and so completely.
I'm sick of a culture that has chosen, systematically, and with ever more zeal, to sell out its basic ideals (freedom, human rights, free expression, and so on) in exchange for short term profits and greed.
Indeed, I'm sick of being a part of a culture that has deified greed and disregarded basic human cooperation and caring, having forgotten that it is cooperation, not competition, that is the foundation of civilization.
In short, I'm sick and tired of being a part of an ever less civilized society, and I am deeply ashamed of what idealogues such as yourself, and the complacent and cowardly fools who follow you, have made America into.
I'm not planning to emigrate anytime soon (I have a job I like and work with good people
And should I lose my job like so many millions of others have (most of whome conviniently no longer appear in the unemployment statistic now that their benefits have expired) I probably will emigrate, assuming any country on the planet will have anything to do with displaced citizens of a toxic, militaristic, and irresponsible superpower as it fades from prominence, probably with similiar results but none of the grace, of Russia.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
The ones which provide results. Oh, that would be adult.
Get a free ipod.
Most research money does not come from federal grants....The reason the drugs cost so much has absolutely nothing to do with the cost of marketing. It is almost entirely due to the cost of research and developmen
Care to back that statement up with some numbers? Because Marcia Angell, who was editor of The New England Journal of Medicine for twenty years, disagrees with you and agrees with the poster. She's just published The Truth About Drug Companies . The core thesis of this book is that Currently Americans spend a staggering $200 billion each year on prescription drugs. As Dr. Angell powerfully demonstrates, claims that high drug prices are necessary to fund research and development are unfounded: The truth is that drug companies funnel the bulk of their resources into the marketing of products of dubious benefit. Meanwhile, as profits soar, the companies brazenly use their wealth and power to push their agenda through Congress, the FDA, and academic medical centers...Drug companies, she shows, routinely rely on publicly funded institutions for their basic research; they rig clinical trials to make their products look better than they are; and they use their legions of lawyers to stretch out government-granted exclusive marketing rights for years. They also flood the market with copycat drugs that cost a lot more than the drugs they mimic but are no more effective.
If you're looking for more than the book blurb, The New York Review of Books has a footnooted, condensed version of the book's argument, noting:
In the past two years, we have started to see, for the first time, the beginnings of public resistance to rapacious pricing and other dubious practices of th e pharmaceutical industry. It is mainly because of this resistance that drug companies are now blanketing us with public relations messages. And the magic words, repeated over and over like an incantation, are research, innovation, and American. Research. Innovation. American. It makes a great story.
But while the rhetoric is stirring, it has very little to do with reality. First, research and development (R&D) is a relatively small part of the budgets of the big drug companies--dwarfed by their vast expenditures on marketing and administration, and smaller even than profits. In fact, year after year, for over two decades, this industry has been far and away the most profitable in the United States. (In 2003, for the first time, the industry lost its first-place position, coming in third, behind "mining, crude oil production," and "commercial banks.") The prices drug companies charge have little relationship to the costs of making the drugs and could be cut dramatically without coming anywhere close to threatening R&D.
Second, the pharmaceutical industry is not especially innovative. As hard as it is to believe, only a handful of truly important drugs have been brought to market in recent years, and they were mostly based on taxpayer-funded research at academic institutions, small biotechnology companies, or the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
and
At least a third of drugs marketed by the major drug companies are now licensed from universities or small biotech companies, and these tend to be the most innovative ones.
"Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
That said some points: This definition of "pregnancy" was initiated to accommodate the introduction of the process of in vitro fertilization, where fertilization takes place artificially outside the mother in a petri dish, and then the embryo is artificially introduced into the woman's uterus so that implantation of the embryo can take place.
Unless they vastly improved their methods, in vitro fertilizations means artificial fertilization of a number of eggs. A part is then placed in the uterus (where most simply die off) the rest is frozen for some time to see if they are needed and end in the trash after that. Mass murder.
As the well-known neurological researcher D. Gareth Jones has succinctly put it, the parallelism between "brain death" and "brain birth" is scientifically invalid. "Brain death" is the gradual or rapid cessation of the functions of a brain. "Brain birth" is the very gradual acquisition of the functions of a developing neural system. This developing neural system is not a brain. He questions, in fact, the entire assumption and asks what neurological reasons there might be for concluding that an incapacity for consciousness becomes a capacity for consciousness once this point is passed.
Ok, if this neural system might already be a sign of consciousness he'll still have to explain how there should be consciousness before the cells start differentiating (somewhere around day 6 iirc). So the morning-after pill should be all right.
Now if you're not one of the pro-life pet-scientists you should agree that consciousness before about week 20 is ridiculous.
To put it in other terms, would you rather invest $100 in an investment with a 6% return or one with a 37% return?
a 6% investment because 37% sounds LIKE SOME INVSETEMENT HAILALE MBUNGA EXPRESIDENT OF NIGERIA WUOLD SUGEST TOO YU
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
Maybe the video shows him bumbling and stumbling a bit more than the text of the interview shows?
No. No bumbling (I don't recall saying he did). It did show the clash of styles though - Coleman looked very frustrated when Bush refused to actually enter into a conversation, and Bush looked decidedly annoyed by her interjections. What came across to me (being mostly familiar with European style poltical interviews) was that Coleman wanted to conduct a conversational interview, responding to points as they came up, and digging down into issues. In contrast Bush seemed more inclined to simply give speeches. He seemed to have a variety of pre-canned anecdotes and short speeches, and tended to use the question to springboard into those (which then potentially drifted off into making a different point).
Still, I'm sure I'm not the only one who doesn't think this was a bad interview for Bush. After all, why would the Whitehouse website put it up if it was?
Interesting question. It was the Whitehouse who sent a formal complaint to the Irish embassy and cancelled Coleman's next scheduled interview. Presmably you don't do that if you think it went swimmingly well.
I don't think it was a bad interview for Bush - it may have been in the hands of a more forceful interviewer (Coleman mostly let Bush run over top of her the few times she tried to interject a question), but as it was, it simply showed the difference in style. US politicians are mostly used to givign pre-canned speeches, and not actually being probed on an issue.
I think you are looking at it through Kerry-colored glasses and seeing the messenger bumble, perhaps, without actually seeing the message...
I don't think so. I'm no fan of Kerry, and I would expect him to perform pretty much the same - mostly canned speeches that he extemporises around to fit it to the question. That's generally how US politicians work, because the people who rise in US politics are the people who are very good at doing just that.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
Did John Kerry actually write his answers in ink, or did he use pencil for later waffling?
Actually, CBS found his answers in secret memoes written around 1972 on an amazingly advanced Selectric Typewriter.
No, seriously, he probably just submitted his list of questions to the UN, so they could tell him how to answer.
(Hey, it's as 'insightful' as the previous response.)
-Styopa
Clueless?
Interesting that you call me clueless when you just trot out the same crap you see on Fox news.
It is not an American charity, if it was to be described that way then it would be more accurate to describe it as a European charity. The European nations contribute more per head of population and have a larger total population than the US. It is not an uncaring and socialist (why socialist is used as an insult I will never understand) organisation, it has problems and is often hamstrung by some of it's members particularly the US. Being a bit more secular and liberal we tend to look more at the benefit to the recipients rather than see it as an opportunity to enforce our religious views on others.
With respect to the survey results - Egypt does not have 500 million inhabitants but I was applying this across the entire middle east. My assertion that the 20% that swapped were pro-west originally is simple logic and onviously beyond you. If they hadn't been pro-west then both survey results would have been 90% hating the US. And generally in the middle east it is the educated and wealthy that support the West.
I read through the first ten questions. I was surprised -- Bush was aware of the issues and gave pretty good answers. However, his answers contradict what his actions have been. Kerry, on the other hand, often avoided answering the question. For example, the question about whether Americans should consume less, he answered that we should be diligent about avoiding pollution. I prefer Kerry's approach -- if he's bothering to weasel, that probably means what he says has some bearing on what he'll do.
I'm impressed by just how many topics they manage to be aware of and have an opinion on.
"Hmm...FOX News not aligned with the right...."
Dear heavens. Why does this nonsense always pop up? FOX is "!rightwing" because it presents news at an angle you don't like?
besides, what about New York Times with the "left"? I don't hear you whining about that ? Because you like that bias, perhaps ?
"Besides, FDR was acting with world support against a common foe, while Bush eschewed world support against a 3rd world country that harbored no ties to Al Qaida or had any chance of launching a missile outside of their own back yard. But it's the same thing."
Nonsense. There was a tremendous opposition to joining in on the WWII in the USA before Pearl harbour, which was ironically partially provoked by PDF himself beforehand. The american people did not want to repeat the disaster of WWI. Regardin "international support", many nations praised Hitler's initative, especially in social areas, even Mohandas Ghandi and the then Catholic Pope! And yes, dammit, even W. Churchill himself (before germany started strong-arming Poland). Saying that FDR was a benevolent dictator while Bush is an evil one (which isnt true, dictatorwise anyway) is revisionism and should be unveiled for what it is.
Not so. In Lisa's example, Tigers DO exist. They aren't invented, there just aren't any there.
In situations like this, it's hard to prove causality, and it's all I'm trying to point out. While it's true that there are definitely enemies of the US lurking both outside and inside its borders, there's no guarantee that it's the Bush administration's policies that are keeping them at bay. Perhaps they're working on new strategies for attacking, or perhaps they're waiting for a more strategically advangageous time to attack. Neither of us can know exactly why they're not currently blowing something up, so it's unreasonable to make such assertions.
I was very careful to say that I don't know if Bush has helped or hindered the situation - that's not my place to say.
As for your final analogy, I'm afraid it doesn't work like that with terrorists. You can threaten a country into submission, but by their very nature, Terrorists don't respond well to threats. Anybody that is willing to throwthemselves in the line of fire with a bomb strapped to their body isn't going to pay much attention to the rock that you're brandishing, no matter how large.
Most of the question answer pairs go something like this: Nature: If elected, how will you balance [some issue - e.g. the environment] with [some conflicting issue - e.g. industrial growth]? Candidate: I plan on a adressing [issue one] without sacrificing [issue two]. sadly this is probably too late on the board to save anyone the trouble of actually reading the pseudo-interview, but hey, I tried.
not everything is a science experiment!
It can make war more humane while making our military force more powerful.
Mod this up + 5 funny!!
The history of weapons development is littered with hopes that a weapon will make a war "more humane", going back at least to the Gatling gun.
One side effect of our current crop of smart weapons that I haven't seen anyone discuss is the temptation to use them in a "pre-emptive" (read aggressive) war, since they will supposedly minimize civilian deaths. "We're not going after the people of Country X (read Iraq), we want to help them. We're only going after the military of Country X (read Iraq)." The problem we are seeing today is that when the people of Country X don't want you there in the first place, you still have to occupy it with soldiers using conventional weapons. Precision weapons, whether nuclear or not, cannot occupy a country nor "pacify" a population. You need boots on the ground for that.
When we realize the need for boots on the ground, and we realize that those boots are going to have to be there for a long time, taking casualties, maybe we won't be so quick to launch a "pre-emptive" (read aggressive) war.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
As for whether we are killing human beings, or executing prisoners for their organs, nothing I say to you is ever going to convince you that a human life does not begin as soon as a sperm fertilizes an egg (nice web site by the way, I wasn't aware that some Libertarians were pro-life, I would have thought the woman's rights had some value to Libertarians) and nothing you say to me is going to convince me that a collection of cells does not a human being make and that the rights of the woman to choose to carry those cells should not be decided by the government.
Because its bullshit. Anyone who can't see a marked constrast between having ANYONE and George Bush in the White House is living in la la land. The Onion had it exactly right when Bush was elected with the headline "At last, our long nightmare of Peace and Prosperity is finally over." While I would rather have someone who more closely represented my own personal views, which are pretty liberal, the people seem to want a lot of red meat and a little policy wrapped up in some more red meat. Too much information and the candidate is a "wonk," too much playing nice and the other guys steamrollers you with illegitimate black babies, spousal drug abuse and secretly funded attack teams which lie about your war record.
I'm not sure what use proving each candidate has weak areas of knowledge would prove.
You don't have to accept that for the position of a single most powerful person on the planet! There are brilliant people in the world, politicians with powerful minds, rational, capable of perceiving the whole systems at once, with erudition to rival the Library of Congress, with personal integrity, courage, honesty, the desire to change the world for the better, a vision for the future and the ability to motivate people. And you settle for a choice between a functionally illiterate retard and a boring guy, whose redeeming qualities are that he married a ketchup queen and won a purple heart thrice, and who is only marginally better.
This is stupid, really stupid. Heck, I am sure if you asked Fidel Castro or Saddam Hussein whether Pakistan is a democracy, what language do they speak in Mexico or how many US troops are stationed somewhere, they will have boatloads more clue. Say what you want about their political ideas and management style, but at least they are competent.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
I'm pretty sure I'd be uncomfortable with the foreign policy of a national leader who was really familiar with fallout shelter design....
~Idarubicin
True. But remember Clinton was against the Vietnam War while Bush and (I think) Cheney was for it. If you believe something is worth fighting for and yet you're willing to let others less fortunate than yourself who don't have your conviction risk themselves instead, then I'd have absolutely zero respect for you. If I met someone like that on the street I'd consider it my duty to spit in their face. Unforgiveable.
Kerry has his faults, but for some people to hold his actions involving Vietnam beneath those of Bush (who openly said that Kerry was more courageous) and a lot of his cabinet takes a type of moral double-speak that I simply cannot comprehend.
Happy people make bad consumers.
The difference is that there has been evidence of planned attacks which have been thwarted.
That wouldn't be evidence collected by the same people who told you there were WMDs in Iraq, would it?
Saying it was "for the oil", as if the oil was a spoil of war we could easily ship back to the US in one fell swoop, is disingenious. It was for control of the oil so that the withholding of it cannot be used as a weapon against us to strangle our economy (and perhaps to use as a weapon to strangle other economies that threaten to overtake ours).
Control of the oil supply is actually a pretty sensible goal. However, that is not how the war was sold to Congress or the American people. Basically, they lied to us about the reasons for going to war, and are still lying.
Granted, if they had been straight forward, they wouldn't have been allowed to enter a war of aggression, but that's how democracy is supposed to work.
Another problem with lying to push policies through is that the liars seem to eventually believe their own lies. Thus, when the Iraqi people didn't accept us as liberators and dance in the streets, our leadership wasn't prepared (and still doesn't seem to be). There was no plan for winning the peace. If the administration had been honest about it's goals, one would hope they would also have a realistic plan for occupation.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Ok quick question, how is stem cell research any more wrong than using tax dollar to build weapons to kill people..
do you think the kurds could have got gassed by Saddam without your tax dollars..
most weapons are only for retaliation.. 1000 tomahawk missles will not stop one.. rougue fighter.
and sending thousands more people to die has yet to bring one person lost in the towers back to life.
heck hows is that afghanistan operation doing anyhow?..
sorry bout the ramble..lol
-S
Unfonuded claims? Which ones?
Bush puts his wacko beliefs on top of any real science.
If you think this will not benefit other countries (South Korea and the UK for example have done all the pioneering work in human cloning) you must be smoking some very fine herb.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I looked pretty deep
Details please, the devil is in the details, as they say. If you want to make authoritative statements, please cite the authority. If not you are merely wasting everyone's time with your soap-box antics.
I began to find that Evolution Science was as full of holes as a swiss cheese
Right so you are obviously more intelligent and better informed than every biological scientist since Darwin released his "Origin of the Species". Kudos, well done, when you get your nobel, will you remember your friends?
I really don't get this abject horror that some people have that we are descended from "monkeys", and before them from "rats". I mean, that smacks of the kind of racial supremacy that has been responsible for a whole lotta trouble. Evolution posits that mankind is descended from a branch of hominids which closely resemble modern monkeys. These creatures fought like hell, tooth and nail to survive and then prosper, and grew smarter because of their efforts, regardless of the obstacles and threats a profoundly hostile environment threw their way. I am proud to declare myself the descendant of such indomitable spirits, and I apsire to the heights which they achieved.
I'd much rather we hauled ourselves out of a puddle of mud than some divine entity handed us the keys to the kingdom, and the abdication of responsibility that that entails. Because ultimately, that is what religion is. Just a little boy looking in horror at the smashed window, yelling "It wasn't me!"
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
I'm not going to tell you, because I don't know where exactly to draw the line myself. It depends on how we define "human," I suppose.
I guess it does come down to a moral decision, as you said. Whether or not you arbitrarily assign the label of "human" to the embryo, you still have to decide whether or not it's moral to destroy it. People must make such decisions without invoking religion, though, if they expect to convince others to agree with their conclusions.
[javac] 100 errors
I see two occupations. One group uses systematic processes. For their conclusions to be taken seriously, they must expose (1) assumptions, (2) observations, and (3) reasoning. In theory, and often in practice, anyone can come along behind them and retrace their footsteps to arrive at the same conclusion. Scientist, as it were, must play with their cards on the table.
The other group (pastors) do not operate with this constraint. Any idea can be presented so long as scripture is spinned correctly and the idea itself jives with the audience's expectations. Fringe represenatives of this group (witchdoctors, cult leaders, etc.) can claim Special Revelation from Above (or Below or Within) that nobody else has access to.
Maybe the pastor sees further than the scientist, but the latter seems to produce knowledge that is more strategic in the real world (viz., for winning wars, conquering disease, exploring space, bridging rivers, understanding weather, etc.).
Your point that "all are biased" is trivial. Knowledege is an extremely tricky and difficult terrain to navigate, but some biases are much more effective at boosting accurancy than others. At its core, science is just a process that tries to correct for known human tendencies; this process can and has been practiced by people of all religions and those of none.
-1, Too Many Layers Of Abstraction
Since I'm on the fence like the typical mugwump, I wouldn't have minded reading the (probably non-)answers from these two jokers.
But all I get is an instant white screen and the single word "done" in the mozilla status bar.
Ypu'd think those folks, as ofetn as they've been slashdotted before, would by now have enough iron to serve the masses who are interested far more in the man today, that what he was in 'nam, forgeries by CBS notwithstanding.
Seriously, if this little hoohah doesn't send a message to TPTB at CBS News that the general public isn't going to led around by their latest model of a Judas Goat, I don't know what will.
Frankly, I'm sick of the attitude that people in power think the Bill of Rights only applies to them, and not to the masses who often as not, vote with the tv remote until such time as they can step into the voting booth for real and throw the bums out.
Cheers, Gene
And while you might trumpet the lesser of two evils, I pity you for your shortsightedness and lack of character.
As I pity you for yours.
Really, it's just a difference of priorities. IMO the most important thing is to get Bush out, mainly because he'll take Cheney, Ashcroft, and the rest with him. The action most likely to achieve that is to vote for Kerry.
I may disagree with Kerry on a few issues, but I think he'll be a fine president. I don't need, or even want, a clone of myself or a puppet who just parrots my beliefs. What I want is someone capable of independent thought, who's not so blinded by their ideals that they can't at least give consideration to the opposing viewpoint.
I see those qualities in Kerry, and therefor conclude that he will be a fine president. Yeah I have some disagreements with him, but I have equivalent or stronger disagreements with every third party candidate I know anything about. A thoughtful man can be reasoned with, and is capable of changing his stance when he finds the available facts warrant it. So, I pick the one most likely to unseat Bush, which, if you recall, is my primary goal in this election.
Since I'm sure you're wondering what I meant in my opening sentence, here it is: Your shortsightedness is you apparant failure to recognize the extent of the damage Bush and company will do, not just in America but all over the world, if given another four years. Your lack of character is your refusal to do what's necessary to prevent that.
Remember, the only thing necessary for evil triumph is for good men to do nothing. I think you are a good man (social liberal + fiscal conservative = good in my book) who has allowed himself to be blinded by his ideals.
I don't mean to flame you necessarily, but it has always been my opinion that anyone taking so aggressive a stance has clearly missed something, and needs to be hit in the face with an opposing viewpoint.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
You're not talking about Christians.
You're talking about "Bible Believers".
Most of those pretty much refer to themselves as Christians. In my opinion, as a Christian, who has read the bible, but who does not believe that it is the infallible and complete Word of God, a person can base their faith on the concept of an All Powerful Creator, or a person can base their faith on what is described in the Bible. Any challenge to the precision of that description can upset their entire view of Reality.
So OF COURSE such people will be hostile to facts or reasoning that conflicts with the Bible.
Such people are really guilty of idolotry. They worship the Bible. Not God. They put all emphasis and effort into trying to twist reality into their Worldview. They're staring at the finger, pointing, instead of at the moon.
Those believers who do are not heavily invested in Biblical inerrancy often have doubts about specific things, often have fears, often have periods where they're not sure what they believe in. Sometimes they go astray. The story in the Bible tells of a people called "Israel", which is an Hebrew word meaning "Struggles with God". Above all others, these people are favored and treasured. Those prodigal sons who stray and return are valued above others. That's the lesson contained in scripture. Not "God hates fags".
One thing's certain in my mind. If far more people focussed more on God, and less on scripture (whether it's the Bible, or the Koran, or whatever), and less on what their neighbors may or may not be doing in the privacy of their own homes, and less on how to make more money than they need to live comfortably, there'd be a shitload less violence in the world.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
A religious politician (one who always spews "God bless" this and that) is never good for science.
For example, Bush's limitations on stem cell research..
Quite frankly, I think it's about time we actually separate church and state. I'm sick of politican's personal religious beliefs affecting something that effects everyone else.
If you don't believe in stem cell research because you feel that scientists are playing god, well, then it's kinda tough shit, because science really needs something like this.
We have secretly replaced these Slashdot mods' sense of humor with a rusty nail. Let's see if they notice!!
If we only funded sciences that gave immediate results, we wouldn't have much of ... well, anything, right now.
Many scientists feel there is potential in embryonic stem cell research. Maybe they are right, maybe they are wrong... but one thing I guarantee, they know more about their field than you do. Scientists get credibility and reputation for working in areas that produce results. Those results may come in baby steps, and wrong turns may be taken along the way. But I think those scientists are in a better position to know whether its worth investing in embryonic stem cell research than we are.
(And lest you feel there may be some kind of conspiracy to 'get funding'... labs & institutions that don't produce interesting research lose credibility in the community and funding. It isn't in their best interest to pursue a field if they truly think its a doomed project, they would just be tarnishing their own reputation.)
Um, no. Stem cell research is not a 20-year-out technology. Injecting stem cells into a wounded area, such as an injured spinal column and manipulating them to regrow functional tissues may be a 20-year out technology. But one of the main uses of stem cells is as a much-improved model for human tissues. Current non-stem cell lines used as research models come from cancers that have been harvested (such as HeLa cells) or from non human mammals. These are of limited use as models, since cancer cells and normal tissue cells are fundamentally different, often in ways that can't be anticipated. Stem cell research will provide researchers of human diseases a much more useful and accurate model *immediately*. That is not an exaggeration. Labs are set up and ready to go for this stuff, and we may well see cures or treatments advanced by years or decades when the restrictions are removed. That may mean the public sees results as near to immediately as one could fathom (read: as soon as the treatments pass through FDA trials and testing).
Fundamentally, I think this is a case of gross misrepresentation of the issue at hand by interested parties, which is not an uncommon tactic, and I certainly wouldn't go waving my hands around about a 'conspiracy' or anything. El presidente has cast the issue into a strictly moralist light, confusing the public into believing that there's questionable science and benefits to stem cells (they aren't questionable--ask any biologist involved in disease research), while also making it appear to be a clear-cut ethical choice (it's not--the fetuses are already being thrown out at fertility clinics). In sum, stem cell research is extremely promising 20 years out, but is every bit as promising on the order of a month out (from when their use is condoned), and present no more of an ethical dilemma than using, say, a car accident victim's organs for the benefit of another human being.
If you don't believe me, fine, go read about it for yourself. But learn how to read a scientific journal, talk to a biologist, talk to an ethicist, a priest, or a rabbi, or whatever; don't just take the president's word for it during a time when potentially life-saving technologies are being used as ammunition for politics.
Knowledge is power. Power corrupts. Study hard, be evil.
If the unicorns are invisible, then how can they be pink?
-- -Keith
Since there are good , scientific reasons to believe that the embryo is a human being, then there is a strong case to be made against embryonic stem cell research.
If that's true, then there's an even stronger case to be made against in-vitro fertilization (aka test-tube babies, aka reproductive therapy).
To save money, the doctors always make a bunch of embryos at once, then implant them one at a time until one starts growing. Once the pregancy is going well, the leftovers are just thrown out. MURDER! And it's hundreds of times as common as stem-cell research would be. We must ban it right away!
Akham's razor... which is more likely?
Bush has the whole world convinced he is a moron (intentionally!), but actually is some sort of genius.
-or-
Bush really is a total dumbass.
Methinks the more likely scenario is the latter, but you're welcome to your delusions.