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Democrats Take House, Senate Undecided
Every news publication on earth is saying mostly the same thing. The Democrats have taken the house picking up a sizable number of seats. But the Senate remains a tossup with a few undecided seats holding the balance. Concerns of voter fraud have been heard from around the nation as well.
Or just keep them from getting worse.
That would be a great disturbance in the Farce.
Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see. - Mark Twain
Successful votes: 46%
Unsuccessful votes: 2%
George Bush: 52%
Any idea if the stock market will rally or tank on the news that the Democrats have taken over Congress?
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
You fell right into Karl Rove's Dieboldian scheme of Haliburtonist warforoilism! You fools!
This
Yes, it's good for everyone, even the citizens that call themselves Republican.
Let me explain what was happening before. The Republicans owned all three branches of the government--House, Senate & Presidential seat. They didn't have 2/3 majority in both the House & Senate but it put the rest of the country in a really bad spot. You see, the three branches were put in place so that no one party/person could go nuts and foul up the country.
What has been happening as of late, is that bills are flying through all three branches and being approved. Some of these are good for Republicans, some aren't. Some of the things George W. Bush has been doing are aligned with his party and some weren't. The problem is that since "his party" was the majority, they were expected to pass whatever he proposed.
Compounding on these problems, it seems the Democrats were resigned that this would happen after their defeat in a lot of prior elections.
The fact is, I don't want anything to fly through the process of passing bills. I want there to be a large discussion before it becomes law. Recently, I've seen headings that say, "Bill passed that allows president to do X" and my response was, "When the hell was that even proposed? Oh, six days ago? That's aweful fast!"
The Democrats have a majority in one branch now, I don't care who gets the Senate. Let's just keep a nice balanced government. I'm not naive enough to think that this process actually works but I do know that as of late it's been really crappy--probably for both parties. I'd like to see the Republicans take the Senate, the Democrats have the House & let whatever nut jobs we want to be president.
So if you call yourself Republican, just remember that the other half of the country is Democrat--and it benefits you to keep them happy. A balanced government is more important for my health than balanced meals.
My work here is dung.
Rove let the Democrats win so fixing the 08' elections will be more plausible...
I still think Diebold arranged this one...
Like NO-ONE knew this already.
...will not be pleased if the only thing to come out of the House in the next two years is a bunch of investigations and impeachment hearings. (ha, you thought I was going to say something abuot overlords, didn't you?)
Now that the Dems control the House, and will have a solid say in what happens in the Senate (regardless of outcome in Montana and Virginia), I want to see some action on real issues.
(BTW - can you really call Liberman a Democrat now? I mean he votes with the Republicans and the national Democrats gave him the finger earlier this year. I wonder if he will consider switching parties? That woul d be the ultimate up-yours, especially if the Dems get both tight races left - as his switch would put it at 50-50, and "the duck" would then cast all tie-breaking votes)
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I blame Rove!
Go somewhere random
As a believer in liberty, limited government, and rule of law, I'm no fan of the Democrats. BUT I do recognize that with a divided government, less gets done. And the less that gets done, the better off all of us are. Fewer wars are started. Fewer liberties are infringed. Fewer taxes get raised. Fewer vile "regulations" get passed. Fewer obstacles are placed in the path of economic growth and prosperity. Hence, although I'd never have voted for any Democrat, I'm still glad they took at least the House.
Nonaggression works!
It seems to me that, even with a house majority, the democrats won't be able to change much in the next two years. They won't be able to override vetos and may not even be able to pass much of their dream legislation in the first place because of the number of conservative democrats who were recruited and elected. The one thing that will certainly happen though, is a minimum wage increase. Most republicans will not dare to vote against that, even though they were happy to prevent it through the ploy of never bringing up legislation in the first place.
Democrats now have a mandate.
America has handed them a huge amount of political capital.
Would a voting verification system that took a a good bit of prep m,silicon, money ,and lots of hardwired programming be worth an accurate election?
You mad
Hello United States of America!
Maybe You should consider inviting the UN for supervising the next election like any other Banana Republic out there?
Oh sorry - You couldn't take a joke ;-)
What's the diff? Republicans and republicans lite. They all share a similar agenda anyway.. they mostly support a christian agenda (you have to in the US) and are opposed to changing the status quo (e.g. bringng in medicare like every other developed nation)
were in ur house, beetin ur repz!
that no Nancy Pelosi sex tape emerges for oh so many reasons.....
Monstar L
Let me explain what was happening before. The Republicans owned all three branches of the government--House, Senate & Presidential seat.
And let me stop you right there; those are not the three branches of the government. You might want to go take a remedial civics class (or wikipedia) before continuing to "explain" anything.
posting Republican wins...
People voted for the Democrats because they want them to fix some things; especially the war in Iraq. There's no magic bullet for that one. No matter what anyone does, Iraq will be a mess. The consequences of cutting and running will be just as bad as those of staying the course. The world relies on oil from the middle east and it looks like there will be turmoil there for many years to come. In other words, we can't just abandon the situation. The only solution is to reduce our dependance on oil and that isn't going to happen over night.
The budget is also a disaster. Our foreign debt is huge. We aren't going to be able to afford the social security and medicare that we will need when we retire. The Democrats can raise taxes, which won't be popular and runs the risk of borking the economy, or they can abandon social security and medicare, which also won't be popular (at least with the grey hair set, which is where we're all going if we're lucky).
Two years from now, at the next election, the public is going to perceive that the Democrats haven't fixed the ills that beset us and consign them back to the wilderness.
So far, in the close Senate races (Tester Vs Burns in Montana and Webb Vs Allen in Virginia), the vote counts all favor the Democrats, leaving the incumbant Republicans in the position of legal challenger. In percentage terms, the advantage for the Democrats is much higher than in Florida 2000's presidential election, so the benefit of the doubt before the votes are checked will be very high for the Democrats taking the Senate.
I'm actually very glad that we have such close races in this election - this makes for one of the best possible cases for both parties to demand drastic changes in the standards needed for the voting process. Especially in the case of the 'electronic' voting machines and optical scanners using software like GEMS, and with extremely lax enforcement of standards across the board. Even without the expected cases of shennanigans, I hope we can expect some level of bi-partisan smackdown of these dangerously flawed voting systems.
Ryan Fenton
What? So now nerds aren't allowed to have a political interest?
Get over yourself, and let the rest of us enjoy the "News"-part of the slogan, kthnxby
Blog -
Given the record of the Clinton and Bush admins on technology, I think that total gridlock is the best solution. "No more laws" is better than bad laws.
you never want one party controlling congress and the office of the president. the less that gets passed, the better!
Gone!
It should read, "Concerns of election fraud..."
Voter fraud is people voting under false identities. It rarely happens. Election fraud is the kind of mass voter suppression and dubious vote counting we've been seeing in this country. Even the most celebrated examples of "voter fraud" are really election fraud, such as Chicago Mayor Daley allegedly engineered dead people voting for JFK.
You remember how you were going to send pro-war democrats a big message and kick Lieberman's sorry ass out of the senate?
Well, the way the senate results are coming down, guess what: you just made Independent Joe Lieberman the most powerful man in the Senate.
How do you like them apples?
With love,
-- Irony
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
US border agents noted a surge in US citizens returning from extended stays in Canada...
We're all hypocrites. We all have hidden parts, it's the contrast between them that make us more a hypocrite than others
...as gay marriage was casted away in a lot of states. Tinky Winky would be very sad to hear this conservative view on what should be anybody's own business - not that of Mr. and Mrs. Fundamental Conservative.
THEY'RE ALL POLITICIANS!!!
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I did vote, but I'm not really sure why I bother. As an Illinois resident, you can vote either way and you'll end up with a corrupt money grubbing official. Before someone decides that I'm flaming, keep in mind that both the Democrats and Republicans (in Illinois) are guilty as sin. I was mildly optimistic about Barak Obama, but his shady land deal has taken his shine off. Is it even possible for an independent to find a good canidate in Illinois?
Aside from your error in naming the three 'branches' (as others have helpfully pointed out), I mostly agree; I don't think it's particularly great for either party to control both houses and the presidency. The "fast track" is generally a bad thing, stifles debate, and results in poorly thought-out legislation.
That said, I would have preferred that the Republicans retain the House and the Democrats take the Senate, than the other way around; the House was already acting as a check to the President in some respects, by being more conservative than him. For example, it was the Republican-controlled House, not the Senate, that was blocking Bush's unpopular "immigration reform."
My preference is for the Senate to be more liberal than the President, and for the House to be more conservative/populist; this way if the executive starts to swing too far in either direction, you can have a brake to slow him down by.
I can still see a lot of bad legislation coming out of the arrangement that looks like it will happen, based on yesterday's election.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
No, just kidding, of course she didn't say that. We all know there's only problems with voting machines when Republicans get elected.
(shamelessly stolen from qando.net)
But seriously, while I generally support Republicans, the current batch has been almost entirely useless over the past several years, so perhaps this will serve as a wake-up call.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Come January, if Nancy Pelosi becomes speaker of the house, she will be two heartbeats away from the presidency. Should both Bush and Cheney die suddenly, she would be next in line to become president.
A macacaphonic chorus.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
welcome our Democratic overlords.
Oh wait, I'm not an American. Never mind...
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
Lose Cheney and Rumsfeld.
As an ex-Republican (Bush created a lot of us) who still leans conservative at least on economic issues, this is no surprise to me. What is interesting to me is that a party that includes some pretty intelligent people seems to primarily target idiots in their rhetoric.
;)
For example, most conservatives I know could care less about gay marriage. It is not a huge issue for me, I find myself being for it. I have no reason to oppose it so it just seems fair. Yet Rove and co. keep making this a cornerstone of their "get out the vote" campaign. The Christian fundamentalists do not have enough numbers that you need only focus on them to win, especially when it comes out that your own party might be covering up for a gay (the horror!) teen-predator who inexplicably held a co-chairmanship in the "missing and exploited children caucus". That probably did not play well in the bible belt.
Corruption anyone? Of course this is a cyclical thing and I fully expect the Republicans will probably regain Congress in a few election cycles after the Democrats turn out to be just a corrupt. And the cycle will go on and on because corruption is not a party issue, it is a requirement for office in DC.
Then you have Iraq, the elephant in the room that none of the Republican commentators wanted to touch (no pun intended). Again, you would have to be a totally uninformed moron to think that everything is going great and we need to "stay the course", yet that has been the message for years, flying in the face of reality (with its well known liberal bias
But the most ridiculous thing to me has to be the "listen to mommy and daddy you stupid little children" approach the Republicans have taken in warning us what would happen if the Democrats win. Probably plays well to those who only get their information from Rush/Hannity/etc., but for those of us who are not spoon fed our beliefs by paid mouthpieces it is insulting. "The terrorists are cheering the Democrats on", "The Democrats want us to lose", "If the Democrats win, we will lose the war on terror", "The future of civilization rests in the balance of the election"
Give me a break, both parties are pro-America and want the best for us, they just differ on how to get there. To suggest otherwise is fear-mongering of the worst kind.
Then you have the issue of how far Republicans have come from the "94 take over" years. Go back and re-read the "Contract With America", it is chock full of some really good stuff that I could really get behind. However, it is as far from the Republican party as you can get.
A good number of us are not religious/social conservative fanatics (or as I like to say, Shiite Christians), but that seems to be all the Republicans are targeting. Many of us ARE fiscally conservative and you will not find a more fiscally irresponsible government that the Republican controlled federal government of yesterday. Almost none of us are willing to join Bush's delusion regarding Iraq anymore. The WMD scam, the clueless management on the part of Rumsfeld, and the "la la la, I can't hear you" approach Bush takes to any news that is not positive has clearly taken its toll.
Personally, I hope the Democrats take the Senate for a clean Congressional sweep. I still disagree with many of their positions, but more important that that is my belief that checks and balances between the two branches of government is preferable to a mono-culture.
I am Finkployd, and I approve this message
Was anyone else disappointed by the election results in Texas district 10 (http://www.opensecrets.org/races/contrib.asp?ID=T X10&cycle=2006&special=N)? I really thought the Libertarians had a shot at that one...
Much Madness is divinest Sense --
To a discerning Eye --
Much Sense -- the starkest Madness
Concerns of voter fraud have been heard from around the nation as well.
WTF was this little gem thrown into the summary? Not only does the article not mention fraud at all (if it did, I blinked...), but according to CNN, Number of civil rights voting complaints 'low'.
With a summary like that, seems like the editor is angling for a new job at Fox News...
Because it would contain Nancy Pelosi.
*shudder*...
Wow. After a long search, there really is something better(?) than Austin Powers' "Margaret Thatcher naked on a cold day..."
Forgive me as I go remove the part of my brain responsible for conjuring images like this. And gouge out my eyes, just in case...
Unless the action is an exit strategy that lands US troops in Afghanistan to finish the job the Canadians and others have been trying to finish, I won't be satisfied either.
Oh You POS
To me, here are the big questions as to what the Democratic victory means: 1. Illegal alien amnesty - Bush is for it, more Dems than Rep are for it. Will it happen now? 2. Force withdrawal from Iraq by cutting off funds - I don't see how they can force Bush to pull troops out except through that method. More informed people can tell me if there is another way. 3. Investigationpalooza - Should everyone in the CIA, FBI, DOD, Pentagon be getting their documents in order and bending over for easy access? 4. Impeachment mania - Pre elections lots of dems (not to mention the Kosites) were making noises about impeachment. Will that happen or will cooler heads prevail? Seriously, if about a quarter of the American electorate really thinks that the planes flying into the twin towers was an inside job then how much pressure will they put on the Dems to pull the trigger on impeachment?
There are tons of smaller issues and questions, but to me at least these are the central questions about how the next two years are going to go.
Well, the Democrats got a favorable outcome, so I guess that means they don't think there was any voting fraud this time.
Great, the coin was tossed and it came up tails instead of heads.... Great victory for us all.
It's not going to solve anything and until people get out there and realize that we need SERIOUS competition where Coke can not play off against Pepsi and Pepsi can not play off against Coke we're not going to have the "real solutions" people keep touting that their party has.
Democrat? Republican? I stand up for common sense, not a party line.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Stephen Colbert promised a red balloon drop if the republicans won. Now those two children he brought on his show are going to be heartbroken :(
"Karl Rove somehow also controls how quickly the justices age or how healthy they are"
Where's my tinfoil hat?!?!?
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
...they didn't ask or check your voter's card or driver's license. I signed my name as "Daffy Duck".
Synchronize your calendar and mobile phone via text messaging.
..while you can, monkey-boy!
Yes, our custom Tie-Fighter may look like it's spinning out of control, but we'll be baaaaack! And if you thought the old model Death Star was cool...
...they just wanted a different outcome to keep them off-guard on all the other election cycles.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
The Republican majority has never understood or respected Congress. They literally believe that it should do as little as possible. That's what they came into power on in 1994. Immediately they cut oversight hearings in 1/2 (Yes, they only spent 1/2 as much time doing oversight of the Clinton administration as the Democratic Congress), and it has been on a downward trend to oblivion ever since. They spent 10x as much time investigating Clinton's Christmas Card mailing list as they did Abu Ghrab.
This is because Republicans have always viewed Congressional hearings as merely a club to attack the other party with when they are truly essential to a well running government. A lot of our problems would have been avoided if they had kept fulfilling that role, but they are phobic about saying anything bad about other Republicans. Let's just hope that there are enough old hands in Congress that can remember how this is supposed to work!
Does this mean House Democrats will actually vote Democrat? After they've been voting Republican for the past 6 years?
Let's not forget that the Democrats voted for the PATRIOT act, too. Everytime you hear of Bush & Co. invading our personal liberties, remember that it was both the Democrats and the Republicans who passed the legislation allowing him to do so. The Republicans voted their conscience, however poorly formed it might be, while the Democrats simply betrayed both their principles and their constituents.
The primary difference between a Republican and a Democrat is that a Republican votes according to the principles which got him elected, where a Democrat doesn't care how he votes, as long as he can blame the Republicans should something go wrong.
This really means nothing. The Republicans are still running both the House and the Senate; they can always count on their "Democrat friends" to vote Republican.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
In America, America changes control of Iraq.
In Soviet Russia, Iraq changes control of America!
Hmm looks like no big gay wedding for Big Gay Al in Colorado. Or anywhere else for that matter. The Discordian in me wants to introduce some measures along the lines of "Marriage is between one WHITE man and one WHITE woman" in the next election. That's where we would have drawn that line 40 years ago. And it looks like Mr... Pardon me, Mrs. Garrison will finally get her wish to "Get rid of all the Mexicans." It'll be a white Christmas after all, Mrs. Garrison.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
"we'd be better off relying on strange women lying in ponds distributing swords as a basis for a system of government."
Makes no difference where the politicians tell their lies. It's all the same to me.
Where were you when the voynix came?
...the founding fathers intended.
But this won't really make any difference. What really has to occur, to make real change, is a house cleaning of all branches. On one of the cable channels last night, they interviewed John McCain (or McCain.gov) and he talked about all the corruption, abuse and waste in government. McCain has been campaigning against waste his entire career. He specifically mentioned 'earmarks'. Earmarks (designate) funds it appropriates (revenue) to be spent on specific named projects. They're attached to spending bills and they are the favorite tactic of pork purveyors. They are used as currency in the House. Committee chairs and Bill sponsor allow them to be attached in return for support. So if Joe Rep wants $1M spent on a new study of newts in his home state, he gets the okay from a sponsor whose Bill has several billion in funds, and attaches his earmark carving out a small slice of the pie for himself.
I didn't intend for this to be a campaign ad...but in '08, I intend to support McCain for president. If you think what I've discribed above is complete BS, you should too. Go to the sites I've linked and learn about the man. His ideas and priorities are just what we need in the executive office.
This is at the very least informative and deserves a more obvious place in this discussion.
Thunderclone: ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE! ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE!
Bush is making an effort to be on good terms with Nancy Pelosi, and invited her to lunch today. This whole thing about democrats taking over the house is obviously a disapproval for Bush in Iraq, the leader of not only our country but the republican party.
The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments. - Nietzche
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
I voted for Kodos.
If I take anything away from this outcome, it is that most American's have a better sense of politics than I had previously given them credit for.
As I have over the years watched the political discourse across the net, one truism seemed to stand out. People across the globe seemed to distrust the American government, but appreciate the American people in general. As recently as 2004 this appreciation of the American people began to change.
I do not feel like going into a great defense of this position, but I think most readers hear could understand and most likely echo that sentiment.
Let me be clear, I do not think that the American people allowed global opinion to "greatly" sway their decision making when it came to voting this cycle, but I do think it played a role. This must provide at least some level of comfort to those around the world who had become disenchanted with America AND its people.
IMO, the world (America included) needed this outcome to begin to heal some of the divisiveness that has cropped up over the last few years.
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
Lieberman has already come out and said that he will caucus with the Democrats.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
No matter the circumstances, no matter the election, people will always cry fraud, because they realize now thats an outlet for them to try to change the things they don't like.
And they said zombies weren't real!
To be up front, I will state that I am a conservative and vote along that ideology. Even so, I am pointing out the lies and hypocrisy of the "Repugnacan" Party.
:-)
:-( Will the Demoncrats live up to their promises of affordable, quality healthcare? Will they do something to steady the flow of American jobs to overseas slave labor countries? Will they repeal the "Patriot" Act? Will they restore the legal protections that Americans had under the Constitution? The most likely answer to all of these questions is likely not just no, but HELL NO!!! Remember the Democrats' promise when they ran against George Bush Senior? They railed against the republicans about their eagerness to send American jobs overseas (to repressive countries such as Red China). When in office, they did nothing to stem the flow of American jobs overseas. In fact most voted for the North American "Free Trade" Agreement. Healthcare costs also skyrocketed during the Clinton era. There were also the uncoinstitutional intrusions on peoples freedoms. Will there be any real changes in the way we are governed in the next few years? HELL NO!!! It will be business as usual.
The Republicans had control of both houses of congress, the presidency, and "right wing" majority in Supreme Court. In other words, they had a monopoly on power in the United States? Did they live up to their "party platform?" NO THEY DIDN'T!!! Rather than reduce the size and scop of government they have made the government size and scope the largest in U.S. history. As far as abortions and "gay marriage," the carnage continues at abortion mills, and NO LAW was passed to prevent "gay marriage." In fact, the Bush administration has appointed the largest number of openly gay people to office. The Republicans claim that they were tough on Muslim extremeists, yet they voted to outsource our nation's security to Arab companies while at the same time passing unconstitutional laws that intrude upon American freedoms. Christians and other moral majority type people fell for the Republican con plain and simple, and the Republicans did not keep their promises as a party. As a result, FED UP voters rightfully threw their sorry asses out of office
The problem I have with the election, however, is the fact that Demoncrats were elected in their place
I call the state of American politics the "swinging pendulum of sameness." When voters become fed up with the lies, deceit, and corruption of the Democrats, they fall for the lies, deceit, and corruption of the Republicans. It is the same game, but with a different name. The main difference between each political party is which group of voters they target with their empty campaign promises and lies, deceit, and corruption. Each election, voters are still stupid enough to actually swallow these lies. It is the stupidity of voters that allow these assholes to get away with all their crap. I am sure that this post will be modded down or catagorized as a troll. So be it. However, that still does not change the fact that the American voters as a whole are still stupid. Most believe that they have no choice but to vote the "Lessor of Two Evils." ost are also too lazy to do research on the candidates on the ballot even when sample ballots are available weeks in advance. If they would actually take about 15 minutes to do research, they would see that they never even heard of the majority of the candidates on the ballot. This is because the vooice of these candidates are squelched by the mainstream media. In fact, most media outlets will not even list them as being in the race.
I did my research this election, and I found several alternative party or independent candidates who had very good ideas. I also found quite a few who were plainly kooks. I told people about the candidates that I like as well as the other alternative ones. Most people's reactions were, "but they have no chance of winning. You are throwing away your vote." I say that they are throwing away th
Futures indicating a drop; the fortune tellers are trying to fit different narratives on it; the surprise in the size of the upset victory, the recounts adding "a climate of uncertainty," legislative gridlock, etc.
i d=ahcGD2TgdAds&refer=home
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&s
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I for one welcome our new Democratic overlords
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Parent is not a Troll. Just a Conservative. Which I suppose some Slashdotters feel is a troll.
The brains of a chicken, coupled with the claws of two eagles, may well hatch the eggs of our destruction.
If Lieberman switched parties now and declared himself a middle-ground republican, and could run as VP with McCain on the republican presidential ticket for 2008, they could win bigtime, even squash Hillary with ease. Don't think that this scenario isn't going thru both Lieberman and McCain's heads right now.
All the Muslims on the entire planet would go apeshit nutso if we elected a Jewish VP who was one heartbeat away from the Whitehouse. And just for that effect, I think we should.
My best friend is in Afghanistan with the US Army as we speak. The US is there, and is building more bases of operation so we can find the remainder of the Talaban, the leaders of the Terrorist groups, and Osama bin Ladin.
who will have the opportunity (and use it) to make millions from their political connections while drawing a huge salary and pension? Yeah. Ouch. Those poor bastards. Make no mistake, the only good thing to come out of this win is gridlock (and for the record, I'm a Democrate). The Dems want to screw you over just as much as the Reps, they're just not as good at it. They're the washouts from the Republican party. The ones who weren't good enough politicians to make it as Republicans.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
...what are those "house" and "senate" all publications *on earth* are talking about?
In other news: Comment moderated off-topic because one person mentioned that many people thought "Oh crap we are screwed" when they found out that the Democrats took house. Reports of anti-Democrat bias swept as another non-Democrat post was left unmoderated.
Erutangis ym si siht.
It really doesn't matter how much democrap socialists over come the House, they still need to contend with the Senate and the President. After all, democraps really didn't win by any landslide! The country is still divided. Maybe the Republicans won't take things for granted anymore and clean their side of the house, and senate. Oh, expect high taxes America!
the opinions i heard yesterday during the day (on CNN) was this: the stock market likes stability. if congress is split between two parties, that could lead to a lot of uncertainty. the market likes to have an idea what will happen in the future (duh). having one party controlling everything is somewhat predictable, so is total gridlock. those are things the market likes. i am not sure if this will work out to be gridlock or unpredictable instability. i forget how that is defined. possibly that was a President from one party (with the veto power) and Congress slightly tipped towards the other party (but not enough to overturn a veto). that may be what this shakes out to be?
/. this question, so i am guessing you will be fine at least in the long term.
the idea of market performance under Republican or Democrat control in DC is not really an issue. it may matter with specific industries, but the market overall does not care. things like big oil, defense contractors and pharmaceuticals may have more trouble, but things like alternative energy will get more attention. if your money is invested in some well diversified retirement fund, it will not care what happened yesterday. if you pick and choose individual stocks to make quick (2 years or less) turnarounds.... then you may have to do some more reading on those companies. i am assuming that if you were that kind of short-term investor you would not be asking
I thought the Diebold voting machines were rigged, and the dishonest Republicans were going to steal the election. Does that mean that the Diebold machines aren't rigged? And that the Republicans are honest?
-Loyal
I aim to misbehave.
Would she make a worse president that Bush or Cheney?
Yes, she would be a much worse president than either Bush OR Cheney. In fact, I believe she would be even worse than Jimmy Carter(*).
* While I do admire Jimmy Carter for his Christian ethics and the fact that he was probably the most honest nice guy we've ever had in the Whitehouse, he was a terrible president because he was a wishy-washy milquetoast in office. A president needs to be tough and mean and "in-your-face" and won't back down ever from a fight.
George "macaca" Allen hasn't been declared a loser yet. He's in one of those 'too close to call' races.
.... going to answer for all their deceptions then?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I will not vote Republican again until there is atonement for:
I did not support the invasion of Iraq before it occured; I thought it was foolish. I did however, support the invasion of Afghanistan. Now we have a bellicose Iran to deal with as well as an unrepentant and bellicose North Korea. We are in deep shit.
You might as well just remove the "Democratic" part. Democrat. Republican. Pot. Kettle. Black.
A politician by any other name still stinks of corruption, special interests, and selfishness to get through to the next election. When they have a few spare seconds not stuffing themselves with pork, maybe they'll do a few things for the taxpayers, like fund an Alaskan bridge to nowhere. I'm waiting for the TransPacific-California-Hawaiian Railroad next.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
As an American, I can say that you're pretty much accurate there. The voting system has led to a two-party system, which has led to bitter, bitter partisanship like you describe - despite the fact that the Duopoly is essentially a single monster with two heads. Now that the election is over, it will return to being the back-patting good ol' boy club.
The OP is right - divided government is good. So then why can't we get some stronger third parties? I, for one, would love to see no single party with a majority in either house. A coalition government seems like it would be much slower to pass new laws as well, which is a good thing for freedom. Nobody in this country looks beyond the "us vs them" of election day to the deeper (though mundane) issues of voting methods that could actually fix the problem we all complain about. All my fellow Americans know how to do is swing the pendulum back and forth. The system itself doesn't allow (much less encourage) real challenge to occur. Voting doesn't make much difference, because there are no choices, so the USA has one of the lowest rates of involvement of any free country.
My analysis is that voters wanted a change. They rejected the leadership of GWB and took it out on Congress, but it isn't necessarily an endorsement of Democrats. I think there are a lot of disillusioned Republicans out there, that would have taken the opportunity to vote Constitution or Libertarian if the media had bothered to inform them of these alternatives. But the media seems to be in collusion with the Duopoly, because those bitter two-way feuds make good news.
Constitutionally Correct
"The Democrats didn't start this war, but we were meant to think that they did."
Nancy-wan Pelobi: "The welfare state surrounds us...guides us...is part of all life."
Empress Pelopatine: Now you will see the true power of this fully armed and operational battle station!
Darth Pelosius: No, George. I am your daddy.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Ofcourse the House can come up with a veto-busting majority (60% I believe), which isn't unimaginable given the Dems control a clear majority and would only need some moderate Cons to defeat any presidential vetos; think federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research, immigration etc.
Is that silence what I am hearing?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
"Don't fuck it up".
Seriously, they have a chance to at least put a brake on one of the most incompetent and reactionary administrations in US history (worse even than Nixon).
They better make good use of it.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
We just traded one set of macacas for a different set. We didn't trade up exactly.
Oh well, no new laws is better than nothing. Just wait until they start firing up the independent inquires to get some pay back. It'll be same as it ever was.
I wish that a statistical tie would encourage other voting systems that work better in such a case.
Instant runoff could help avoid such a "tie" situation.
Especially if there is a moderate third party.
And you can end up with someone who is not disliked buy half of the voters.
I have favored the Republican side since they were more hands-off but the last several years, I have not been happy with the Republicans. Can you say Patriot Act, Real ID Act to name a few. They did not see it as important to make the tax cuts permanent such as getting rid of the death tax permanently. In 2011, it is back with full force and vengenace.
One of my favorite Congressman is Rep. Ron Paul. We need ore poeple like him.
Since the Democrats now control Congress, we need to see about getting rid of the Real ID Act - get it repealed. Passed without discussion, without debate.
By the way, it's 'bint', not 'bink'. Bint is British slang for a woman, probably derived from the Arabic word for 'daughter'.
Nobody is forcing you to read it.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Stupid slashcode, stripping out the angle brackets...
Constitutionally Correct
The one thing that will help any organization achieve great things is unity -- people united behind a common goal. If you accept the premise that both parties are bad for the county, then sure, having a balance of power between them is the probably the best case because they won't be able to implement either bad plan. However, I don't accept that premise. I would much rather have Republicans in control of all 3 branches, just as many would rather have a government filled with all Democrats.
I can think of an illustration in business. There are anti-trust laws to limit monopolies, but simply having a huge market share is not illegal. You have to have price fixing, predatory pricing, or some such. Just as a monopoly is not necessarily a failure of the free market system, a "monopoly" of elected officials from one party is not a failure of our system of government unless that party is doing something wrong to keep other parties out. In both cases, it may represent an opportunity for a new party to step in and compete!
Having one party in control of multiple branches doesn't negate checks and balances. Just look at the last 6 years. I have to say, I haven't seen many bills "flying through" as you say. To what bills are you referring? On the contrary, I've been surprised at how little republicans been able to get done, and how much has been done that I consider more in line with the Democrat agenda. The control wasn't that great to begin with -- there was only a narrow majority in both houses and not all representatives of a party vote in lock step. For that reason, I don't think this turnover will change things all that much. Sure, the majority party in the house gets some extra powers and privileges, but there still isn't a huge majority. Of course, we'll have to just wait and see.
I don't appreciate your implication that I am naive if I think our system of government works. I concede that it is not perfect (any human system will be imperfect), but look at how many people in the world "vote with their feet" for it.Prov 9:8 Do not rebuke mockers or they will hate you; rebuke the wise and they will love you.
Some very good points. I would disagree about the U.S. not being a sovereign nation in 20 years, though certainly I won't say that it's impossible.
The "You're throwing away your vote!" garbage gets me real steamed. You should always vote for the best person (not necessarily candidate, as some would take that as being someone who can win) according to your beliefs. If that happened, we wouldn't be in the messes we are in now. We have a "Extreme right wing" president who is afraid of or undesirous of standing up for conservative principles. We had a Republican Legislature trying to forward the concept of a Mommy-state while spending all of their time trying to figure out how to "bring home the bacon". Supposed "Conservatives" who supposedly cherish our System but refuse to ensure the enforcement of laws regarding immigration, pass bills restricting our privacy and freedoms, and appear to be just as beholden to various industries and organizations who obviously can't win them elections with financial support.
On the other hand, the Democrats will be no better. They are beholden to the same industries and organizations. They will have the same lobbyists courting them. Sure, they will try to rapid-fire impress some folks with a few quick moves. But even if they take the White House in 2008, we won't see much real change.
Except that when your parents pass away and leave you the house, you will magically owe the government money.
I agree that the only way to fix this, barring a leader who has the will and charisma and popular support of the people who can force change in the party, is to support alternative parties. Unfortunately, many promising people feel it is easier to take a party over from within, and push it to victory. This is sometimes the case, and certainly parties can be moved by strong personality to effect real changes. Ronald Reagan, for example, was able to shove the Republican party and create a short term change in their true tack. But often, once that personality leaves, the river starts to return to its original course. Here's a history tip for the young among you: Republicans weren't always enamored of tax cuts. Nor were they proponents of reducing the size of government. As you can see, some tax cutting attitudes remain. But the government reduction now seems to have been reduced itself to a talking point.
If Republican candidates hadn't drifted so far from the right, the Conservative base would have kept the party in full control. If people ignored the ridiculous campaign ads, educated themselves, and voted their conscience, we probably wouldn't have the Republican and Democrat parties in power, or at least the parties themselves would be vastly different.
Vidar
The brains of a chicken, coupled with the claws of two eagles, may well hatch the eggs of our destruction.
Just so we're clear: it is not hard in America to become an influential lobbyist *or* the staffer for a Congressperson, if you were so inclined.
...
I've worked on a campaign for a state legislator - the people at the top (the consultants who end up on congressional staff, the directors, etc) are mostly just like me, but with two differences: they were a lot more involved in politics throughout college (running for Student Senate, joining groups, etc) and most of them were eager beaver, suit-wearing boring clods. (Not that I'm not boring or a clod, but they took the cake.)
The people who get on national campaigns are only slightly more respectable. Add in a law degree and you can be a lobbyist, too.
In fact, here's a simple 10 Step Process To Becoming a Congressional Staffer:
1) In high school, be "politically" active. Run for student government, be a joiner, do the club thing (be President of at least one), join FBLA. Also, learn Spanish. And actually learn it, don't just sit in the classes.
2) Become an Eagle Scout. It's ridiculously easy, and it's great for networking. For girls, do a lot of volunteer work.
3) In college, repeat: join a lot of clubs, run for student government.
4) Write for your college newspaper. Especially the political section. If the main newspaper won't take you, right for one of the student-run alternatives. Or start your own (even better!)
5) Get a degree in political science with a minor in communications. Any liberal arts degree will do, but political science is as an easy way to
6) Network within your university. Ask all of your teachers and advisors about internships and positions on campaigns and staff.
7) Get involved in real politics around your college. Volunteer for the Democratic or Republican party headquarters in your area. Attend townhall meetings and generally get your name out there (business cards are great.) At actual elections, sign up to be a poll worker (you get paid $150 in Texas to do this.)
8) Once you've graduated, head to your party headquarters with your hat in your hand, and ask for a job on a staff. They will hook you up (I worked on 3 campaigns before switching fields.)
9) Focus on what you're really good at within the campaign. Good at math? Crunch poll numbers and offer strategies on how to be more efficient with your campaigning. Good at IT? Build websites, manage e-mail newsletters, keep track of donors, create systems to manage the campaign. Good with people? Be the PR flak, or coordinate the volunteers. Good with words? Be a speechwriter. Find your strength and hone in on it.
10) Wait 10 years. By the time you're 30, you'll be in a Congressional office, as long as you don't totally screw up. And even then, all of that networking will probably get you something cushy.
This strategy absolutely worked for me up to stage 8, when I decided I'd rather build websites for regular people and businesses than campaigns.
Democrats take control of the House!
See? I told you people cared about the evils of eating horses!
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
You are 100% correct, and I would NEVER argue otherwise, that a non-American has NO place in American politics.
That being said, and if you agree with the importance America currently plays in the world, then an American voter cannot/should not dismiss out of hand world opinion when making political decisions.
As any American, 'I' make the decision on who will represent me, but HOW they represent me, and WHAT I want them to represent is shaped by my own world view.
IF I decide, after careful consideration, that MY opinion on MY government's policies reflects the current world view, so be it.
My point was that, as it stands right now, the majority of American's world-view seems to more closely resemble that of our allies across the globe.
With that, there MAY be an opportunity to work with our allies to fix some of the real challenges we ALL face (North Korea, Nuclear Proliferation, sudan, etc...).
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
we won't get third parties because its more rational for two similarly aligned parties to group up than for them to all be for themselves. See Nader in the 2000 election and Perot in the 1992 election. While there may be enough support for a third party at either end of the spectrum (or in the middle), splitting the votes on one side of the center divide wouldn't give either party on that side enough votes to win. Thus, it is better to have large coalitions of similarly aligned voters on any given side of the center than to have multiple divided parties on a side.
This can only change if there were multiple fractures on both sides, and then after one party comes to prominance, the fractured similarly aligned parties would do well to group up.
All this is a result of the single-member plurality districts that the US uses. There are ways around it (see Canada), but for the most part countries with that style of elections have 2 parties (the UK is another good example, 2 very strong parties and a weaker 3rd)
11 was a racehorse
12 was 12
1111 Race
12112
Remember, you heard it here first.
How about sending Elaine Chao packing back to China and replacing her with someone less tainted?
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Of course it's the Republicans who are nominally Toryoids (conservatives) and the Democrats who are nominally Whigoids/Progressives (liberals). Too much posting, too little coffee -- sorry to get that backwards.
I copied Trade Sports's chart from 12:32 a.m. to 1:56 a.m. to my blog.
Looks like the plunge happened at 1 a.m.
If you need text styles to communicate then you don't have a message.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
The People are the trunk. Without them it's not a tree, just some sticks lying on the ground.
You are reading a copy of my copyrighted post.
checks and balances. If Democrats don't win control of the Senate, there will be a significant portion of Republican who jobs go up for election in 2008 and will think twice before following Bush's lead. It looks like the government will work right for the next 2 years.
You don't have to be smart to use a Mac, you just have to be smart enough to buy one
I don't think I was saying anything about "Revolution" here. We all know too well that 'R' and 'D' mean little with regard to actual policy differences these days.
My point was the American public quite resoundingly said, "status-quo is no longer working". I don't think this was a vote FOR Democrats, and I don't think this was a vote AGAINST Republicans. I think this was a vote AGAINST current American policies (both foreign AND domestic) and the perceived corruption of incumbent politicians.
I hold no hopes that anything of any importance WILL actually get resolved right away. I am merely commenting on the "will of..." aspect of this election cycle.
The people who MIGHT be fooled by the outcome of this vote is the politicians themselves. If they infer from this election result that the people are accepting one parties full agenda, they will be missing the point entirely.
IMO, the country as a whole SEEMS to be moving closer to the center, and people (Joe SixPack) are becoming slightly more aware of politics(both foreign AND domestic) and the importance of it. This can only be good for everyone.
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
>> Concerns of voter fraud have been heard from around the nation as well.
You want to post a link to that or are we just supposed to take that on faith?
Just in case you all aren't Apple users ;) ....Dell financed President Rove's (the actual President of the USA) election campaign. Will your next computer be a Dell? Well if you feel President Rove's approach to killing Democracy and turning the USA into a Nazis like empire - to rule for the next thousand years - by all means vote Republican next time... too.
While they officially list Virginia and Montana as "undecided" in this data, browsing their individual county figures shows all districts 100% in with both states.
The smallest margin is montana with roughly 2000 votes lead for the democratic candidate.
Barring an upset in a recount (which has been judged by expert analysts to be highly unlikely in leads over the hundreds) and the conclusion you come to is they essentially have only formalities standing between them and official control of the senate.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
I don't even think I will spoil it, as Google will give you the answer
The brains of a chicken, coupled with the claws of two eagles, may well hatch the eggs of our destruction.
*I* voted for Kodos!
C'mon, SOMEBODY had to say it.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
Your taxes are going to go up because the Republicans have been cutting taxes and spending like drunken schoolboys for the last six years. Just because they didn't pay for it then doesn't make it the fault of the people who inherit their mess.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Resounding Victories In All States, Counties, Cities, Towns
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
What the hell were these conservatives supposed to run as if not democrats? Certainly not as a third party! The two main parties have a strangle-hold on money and national level visibility. Lieberman may have gotten in as an independant, but he is on a completely different level than some of the new blood, who have no name and no constituency. No, the only choice these folks had was to run under the democrat banner and get that national fund infusion into their campaigns. This country needs at least 2 more political parties, but that will be the last thing that the demoncrats and repugnacans will allow.
They didn't tell you that "Green" stands for Get Republicans Elected Every November?
No, no, no, dig up stupid.
The days of the digital watch are numbered.
Fool him once, shame..shame on...you. Fool him twice...won't get shamed again.
The liberal hoards are out again this morning. Modding insightful and inteligent posts as offtopic. :P
I am not so sure an amnesty bill is a foregone conclusion. The democrats have a sizable core block (unions) who are strongly opposed to amnesty. Also, the dems probably noticed that the Republican amnesty proponents in the Senate alienated their "law and order" core block with the issue. This election resurrected moderate democrats and led to a house, and likely a senate majority. How they got there will not be ignored. The rest of your predictions are right on. Expect some impeachment noise, but I doubt if there will be hearings.
an ill wind that blows no good
He and his globalist Korporate Krime Krew just invent stuff out of their megalomaniacal fantasies and go and do whatever anyway. Remember, he's "The Decider", not the public, not congress, not any court anywhere. They do what they want to do. And even with passed so called "laws", he issues his opinion, a "signing statement", on what they mean, and usually it is pretty far off the mark of the intent of the law.
I'm personally hoping that if they fire Rumsfeld from being SecDef, that they'll make him the new White House Press Secretary.
You have to admit, he's entertaining. C-SPAN won't be nearly as interesting to watch without his press conferences.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
and that is your willingness to pay higher taxes to PAY for what you are proposing.
When the big talkers, like you, also demand to PAY for their plan, then by all means lets have a debate. Otherwise, your plan isn't worth considering.
USA is a 1st world economy but a 3rd world society. The new Banana Republic!
Indeed; or, as my father used to say: "America, the world's fastest-growing third-world country."
I guess we haven't really hit rock-bottom yet though, since it still seems like a whole lot of people from actual third-world countries want to come here. When I start seeing Californians swimming south across the Rio Grande, then I'll know we've arrived.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
How else can we explain the continuation of warrantless wiretaps, Guantanamo, etc?
"why does the Green Party get so much support as opposed to the Libertarians"
nuff said!
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
Once upon a time, war was the (almost) exclusive purview of uniformed armies fighting other uniformed armies.
Later on, as victory became less about the actions of groups of determined men carrying sharp and pointy things, and more about the ability to mobilize and deploy highly mechanized forces (the three best American generals of WW2: General Foods, General Motors, General Electric) it was almost as important to deny an enemy the use of his industrial production base as it was to defeat his armies in the field. This ushered in an era where targeting essentially civilian enterprises was militarily acceptable if it resulted in damage to military production. Merge this with the concept that the state had the right and ability to conscript every male between 16 and 55(ish) into military service, and you have 20th century Total War.
Total War is, indeed, brutal and ruthless, as you are effectively pitting the entire population, technical, agricultural, and industrial capabilities of states against each other.
But more recent actions are not about all-out state-vs-state contests. Instead, you are looking at state-vs-uninstitutionalized factions, where victory is not measured by reducing an opposing state's armies and industrial centres to ash, but rather, in converting an undecided third party (the "normal" citizens of the host state) into seeing things your way and conducting themselves accordingly.
This is "hearts and minds" stuff. You aren't in the game of killing everything in sight. Instead, you are in the game of reducing the freedom of your enemies to act and denying them support, while simultaneously trying to improve the quality of life of the citizens of the host nation.
It is in the conversion of the host people that the game is won or lost. If everybody wants the insurgents to win, then they will - you are an army of occupation and they will eventually bleed you dry. If everybody wants the insurgents to lose, then they will - insurgents rely on the support of locals to survive. And when you have an undecided populace, where some support you and some support the insurgents... well, then you have Iraq and Afghanistan today.
And experience has shown that heavy-handedness - "kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out"; "those that run are VC, those that stand their ground are well-disciplined VC" - plays into the hands of the insurgents, as every injustice done to an innocent creates support for the insurgents.
A man who supports you and who wants to see the insurgents stopped will change his tune when a 1000lb bomb dropped on the "insurgent stronghold" across the street flattens his home and kills his family - even if there really WERE insurgents across the street that were legitimate targets.
Tactics that were entirely acceptable in the Total War days are now not only unacceptable in the Three Block War days, but are actually counterproductive.
The main goals in Iraq have to be the restoration of basic infrastructure, the training and fielding of an effective, corruption-free Iraqi police force, the cleanup and rebuilding of damaged and destroyed buildings, and the establishment of effective government. Until those are done, you cannot win.
Is there still a need for troops? Hell yes - all those infrastructure and reconstruction efforts will be actively opposed by insurgents, and there is a dire need for security and protection for those actors. But that's a different role than a massed armoured spearhead charging into the Fulda Gap.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
Hey all of the talk on /. in the days preceding these elections had the GOP stealing the election.
/.?
Where are all of the voting machine controversey proponents and dont say the other topic on
Where is all of that paranoia now, what since the Dems won the house and possibly the senate, you liberals are all ok with that, no problema here?
Of course, you won since the outcome was a stark contrast to all of the conspiratorial ranting in these last days on this forum, you have nothing to offer along the lines of the election was stolen before it was even completed.
Diebold this, GOP that blah blah. Bunch of bullshit from a bunch of bullshitters. Its no wonder I have become an ideologue and will be planting that seed to all who will listen. No go on and start fucking things up.
Oh and its time to get your chicken suits back on, its on to 2008
How can there be voter fraud if the Democrats are winning?
"hey, could you pass me a paper towel? er.. I mean... DEPLOY ABSORBTION PANEL!"
We have a 2-party system. For some reason those on the fringe seem to think that all of our problems would be solved if we just had more parties.
That wouldn't solve anything. In fact, it would make things worse.
We'd have Presidents elected with 25-30% of the popular vote. How does that make our government more representative?
There are only two solutions to that. One, is a 2-stage election w/ a runoff. In which case you're still, in effect, given 2 choices. It's no more likely for, say, a Green to be elected thru this system than it is thru our existing system.
The other solution is a coalition government like in Israel. That would mean the end of the imperial presidency and it's not going to happen in America.
No matter how you put it, I don't think a President that 75% of the people didn't vote for is a good thing.
How is this a conservative agenda? Every important item in your list is about telling others how to live! A true conservative agenda is that basically people should be as free as possible from government interference.
Government should be minimal. People should be free to pursue life, liberty and happiness - remember that line?
sigs are for losers (except to point out that sigs are for losers)
He's not a conservative, he's a fundamentalist. i.e. "the enemy". After extremist foreign terrorists are wiped out, it's going to be a tooth and nails fight with our homegrown funamentalist nutbags, and it's going to be a dirty fight.
, so I ended up voting Socialist Party for Senate.
FWIW, the incumbent Democrat won...
Remember "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters"? Help make it a reality again! http://soylentnews.org
Lose Cheney...
Pelosi is going to be two heartbeats away from the Oval Office, do you really want to make it one?
Think about it, a new vice president would have to be approved by the Senate. If MT and/or VA goes to the Dems, there's no way they would approve anyone, they'd just sit on their hands like they're going to with judges.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
The Republicans had control of both houses of congress, the presidency, and "right wing" majority in Supreme Court.
Um, no.
They did not have enough to cloture in the Seante. And the "right wing" majority in the Supreme court that you speak up is not there. There is a moderately conservative majority there, but certainly not right wing.
Now, shift back 14 years. Clinton had control of the House and Senate and tried to pass national health care via his wife.
Have you read my journal today?
The "You're throwing away your vote!" garbage gets me real steamed.
;-)
You might want to steer clear of game theory, then. Might I suggest topology instead?
You should always vote for the best person (not necessarily candidate, as some would take that as being someone who can win) according to your beliefs.
So do you want me to vote for a write-in in every election? There are a couple hundred million Americans eligible for office, and I don't think I've ever seen the best people among them named on a ballot.
No, thanks. I think I'll continue to compromise my beliefs and vote for candidates that have a real chance of winning - i.e., whenever I perceive a major difference between two candidates who are leading in the polls but still polling close to each other, I'm going to be voting for one of them, no matter how much I'd prefer the Libertarian getting 2%.
If you don't like that policy, great! I don't like it either. But it's an inevitable consequence of the spoiler effect in plurality voting: a candidate who is similar to the Condorcet winner of an election can split that winner's segment of a plurality vote, causing an opponent who is preferred by a minority of voters to win office. That's not the voters' fault, that's just reality.
If that happened, we wouldn't be in the messes we are in now.
To bring things back to a practical example: If every Nader voter who preferred Bush over Gore had voted for Bush, and every Nader voter who preferred Gore over Bush had voted for Gore, Gore would have won by a large margin even in Florida, a majority of voters would have been happier in 2000, and we wouldn't be in so many of the messes we are in now. Trying to convince people to vote idealistically instead of pragmatically just leads to mistakes in a plurality system - as a majority of Nader voters figured out by 2004.
If you want people to vote idealistically in a system which punishes idealism, you don't have a chance in hell of changing most voters, so you ought to try to figure out how to change the system.
... welcome our new democratic overlords.
----- There are two kinds of people in this world, my friend; those with loaded guns, and those who dig.
Instead, Bush will simply twist in the wind for the next two years, solidifying his record as America's worst president...
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
If you see a Republican voter, give them a hug. We took a collective dive yesterday to put Bush in check and get our party back on track.
On the whole I am pleased that the Democrats won control of the house. I am a registered Libertarian, but am so moderate that I'm not sure that I belong there. Still, this gave me an unusual motivation -- I voted for gridlock. Any party controlling two branches of government is bad enough, but the Republican's lack of principle compounded the problem making it magnitudes worse.
However, now that the dust is starting to clear and I can examine the details, the initially semi-sweet victory has left a bit of a sour aftertaste. I'm far from an expert in every house seat that changed hands, but I see three unsettling major types of democratic pickups.
1) Scandal ridden districts. The seats of DeLay, Ney, Foley, and several with smaller scandals went Democrat. It's good to see the scumbags gone, but I feel their boost to Democrats is mostly temporary. For example, Sekula-Gibbs, who was a write in, got 42% of the vote in DeLay's old district. 42% for a write in?!?! With a republican actually on the ballot in two years, will a Democrat really be able to hold on?
2) Moderate Republicans in the North East. Despite flaws, I like many of them, and their defeats make me uneasy -- moderate republicans were already an endangered species (and they've been in hiding for the last few years to boot) but it was open season last night. Take New Hampshire for example. Admittedly, I haven't been watching it for too long, but both of its house seats went blue, and the state has gone that way more often. Is this temporary, or are New England Republicans on the way out for good? Will pro-choice republicans like Bass be replaced? Driving the GOP even further to the right by getting rid of the moderates is a bad idea.
3) Socially conservative democrats. Ellsworth, Donnelly, and many more. With the social conservatism comes some fiscal conservatism, and I like that -- someone should balance the budget. But I'm not sure enough fiscal conservatism came with them, and I think social conservatism mixed with liberal spending is the worst of both worlds. Hopefully that doesn't happen, but that may be where things are heading (apparently "compassionate conservatism" isn't dead).
Maybe I've just picked out the wrong races to look at or I'm simply a pessimist. We may have to wait until 2008 before it really becomes clear.
Speaking of, why does the Green Party get so much support as opposed to the Libertarians (which from what I can tell, seem much more "mainstream" in that if you asked someone their thoughts, would probably fall in line with them)?
Most people I know dislike Libertarians because they're seen as economically too right-wing. That is, the whole personal economic freedom thing is great, but people want social economic responsibility enforced as well, i.e. a social safety net of some sort, which the libertarians don't seem too fond of. The greens are more economically moderate, and as you'd expect from just statistical distribution, most people have moderate views of some sort or another.
Incidentally, I'd say that what we call "socially liberal" is actually quite socially moderate, hence it's popularity; only a few of the most radical anarchistic liberals say that "people should be able to do whatever the want to long as they aren't harming others, and there should be no system in place to catch those who do try to harm others and protect those in danger of coming to harm". Fewer still say simple "people should be able to do whatever they want, period, even if it hurts others". Most everybody favors the existence of some sort of police, and emergency services like firefighters, and nobody wants complete anomie; all of which would be more liberal positions than even libertarians hold.
Which doesn't make them better positions mind you, at least in my book - there has to be a proper balance between personal freedom and social responsibility and too little of either (or conversely, too much of the other) will give equally bad results. Too much "social responsibility" - when you start not only supporting the needs and general wellbeing of a society, but also giving in to it's arbitrary whims - leads to authoritarian tyranny of the majority, and is just as bad as the anarchy in the above extremes. (Consider it analogous to giving your child what it needs, which is a responsibility and thus somewhat a limit on your freedom, versus giving your child everything it demands, which would go beyond mere responsibility and make you a whipped parent). Apply this same line of reasoning (something the likes of which I suspect lies in the back of most people's minds) to economic issues and you'll see why more moderate economic stances are more popular than either of the extreme capitalist or extreme socialist positions.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
As the controlling party, weren't the republicans supposed to fix it so that the diebold machines gave them the vote? Looks like somebody screwed up by the numbers.
I am not happy with Bush or MOST of the Repugnicans, and I would not have been happy with Gore an most of the Demoncrats. Neither is more harmful than the other. Both are basically the same despite their rhetoric.
The main problem with democracy is that is prevents normal people from rioting in the streets when the government starts abusing them - these are fanatics, going against the "will o' the people" the media will say. The will of the people is something of a democratic myth to start with - society is built from competing groups with potentially different agendas - should getting 51% of the vote really mean anything compared with 49%? However the big problem comes in mature democracies - such as the US - where there are a limited number of highly entrenched political parties, with not much to choose between them. This gives us all the effects of dictatorship, with reduced ability for the people to mobilize against them. Is there any reason for Americans to retain loyalty to the Feds?
in her press conference that finished just 10 minutes ago, Speaker Pelosi has said that the democrats will enforce all of their main initiatives within 100 hours (that's 4.16 days) and social security preservation initiative indefinitely... :) hehehe let's hear what he has to say!
hey, we're getting a very fast returns over here... anybody has an idea of how that's done? what did she mean by 100 hours?
Bush's "defeat speech" to start in exactly 30 minutes
Check out Pandora by Music Genome Project
Where are the sources? Try here.
It is your personal duty to fight for what is right on a daily basis. Ignoring injustice is identical to approving
The Republicans are the liberal party presently, by the standards of just a decade or so back. JFK was to the right of the modern Republican party on most issues. The Democrats - rhetorically at least - are a bunch of hysterical greens, unionists, racial provocateurs, and social engineers. Who knows what policies they may come up with?
"So the Republicans just weren't reactionary and Fundamentalist enough you mean?" No, I mean that this is the platform that they ran on in order to woo Christian voters. I'm not stating that I agree or disagree with "gay marriage" or abortion. I am saying that these are lies that the Repugnicans used to get Christians to vote for them. I'm not advocating an issue here. I am pointing out a lie.
1) Trends over the years show that almost always in mid term elections in the second term of the president - the other side wins. So what is the big surprise here? [From an op-ed in usa today. saw the same on cnn "To be sure, midterm elections have not been kind to presidents or their parties. For example, since 1862, there have been 36 midterm elections held during the first or second terms of an administration. In 33 of those 36 elections, the opposition party gained strength in the House."]
2) Republicans were on a 12 year streak of control of both houses. When the dems break that record then you will have something to talk about - till then it's just a "reaction" or "protest vote". America is not turning left just yet.
3) News outlets are saying that the dems got a protest vote - people were angry about Iraq and corruption. This suggests that no one was really interested in traditional democratic values such as social action.
4) According to Elliot Wave theory every movement is made up of 5 waves. 3 up and 2 down. So the dem victory had to happen. No upward movement lasts forever w/ out a brief retreat. Since the dominant trend over the past years has been for a republican lead America the dem victory can be seen as a corrective wave before the next one begins. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliot_wave
Notice no one ever bets if the weather will be sunny today over Africa or not. With out ups and downs there is no game. So a democratic victory is part of a necessary process of a greater republican gain.
Sanity is the trademark of a weak mind. -- Mark Harrold
Cultural conservatism entails the realization that all societies have standards of behavior - even the Democrats are not yet in favor of repealing the repressive rules against having sex in public, separation of the sexes in public toilets, etc. Some standards of behavior build thriving, creative cultures. Other standards lead to decadence, falling birth rates, and cultural failure. Most of the west, primarily thanks to US::liberalism, is falling/has fallen into decadence.
Be prepared for a lot of tax bills.
.com bubble burst hurt the tech industry? Wait until a Democrat is elected to the White House in 2008...
The President will attempt to veto all of them, but some may slip through.
You thought the
As always, just by $0.02 worth.
But I do know that the people who where supposed to run our local poling place never showed up, much to the confusion of the owners of the place. I don't know if they moved it to another location, but there where no signs or anything directing voters to a different location at the original location. I live in a fairly progressive area, and you just have to wonder if the local republicans had something to do with this...
As far as abortions and "gay marriage," the carnage continues at abortion mills, and NO LAW was passed to prevent "gay marriage."
Hey, dumbass, even Kansas doesn't want to outlaw abortion. Way to pick a winning fight there.
And the DOMA was passed in 1996, you idiot. States don't have to recognize the same sex marriages of other states. That's about all the Federal government can do about them.
In fact, the Bush administration has appointed the largest number of openly gay people to office.
It's not just the Bush Administration. The amount of openly gay Republican Congressional staffers would amaze you.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
All three branches of the government jealously guard their constitutional prerogatives. You'll notice that almost all of the signing statements assert exemptions for "foreign relations, national security, or the workings of the executive branch" or words to that effect. Every modern administration, both Democratic and Republican, have asserted constitutional "executive privilege" or reserved executive powers (under the separation of powers doctrine) in those areas. The Bush Administration just happens to be more vigilant (or strident) in asserting those doctrines, even in relatively trivial or arcane instances, because they never want to set a precedent of surrendering any of the Presidency's constitutional powers.
So you are accusing me of being a fundamentalists and an enemy simply because I am pointing out the lies preached by the repugnicans? Wow talk about insecurity! I was just attempting to show some of the lies that the Repugnicans used to woo Christian voters. Just to point out to you, I also mentioned low-cost healthcare as a demoncratic issue to expose the lies that the demoncrats tell. (Healthcare is between you and your healthcare practioner - government should not be involved. However, if you want to know where I stand on these issues, then I'll tell you: People, including preborn have a RIGHT to life, liberty, and persuit of happiness. I guess you want to pick and choose who has these rights. You said "After extremist foreign terrorists are wiped out, it's going to be a tooth and nails fight with our homegrown funamentalist nutbags, and it's going to be a dirty fight." I guess anyone who disagrees with you is a nutbag. You want to impose your values or lack thereof on the rest of society and not allow people to have their own values. In that case, your are just as much of a nutbag as what you accuse me of being. To tell you the truth, marriage is between a man, woman, and God. Government has no place in the marriage business. If you and your lover want legal protections, you already have that right. People should not finance behaviour that they disagree with. Are you going to force a Christian (btw, I'm not a Christian) businessman to provide monitary benefits to gey couples if he disagrees with homosexuality? If so, then you are imposing your views on someone else. Your attitude and words indicate that you want to force your belief system on other people. You even suggest that those who disagree with you should be "wiped out." That puts you in the same catagory as the Islamic extremeists. If you
Haha.
can you hear me now?
we can now get away from greed and ideology and get back to greed with no ideology!
Those are exactly the problems with the voting system that I'm trying to describe.
Whenever you form a political alliance or coalition, you sacrifice something. It's the nature of compromise. Parties shouldn't have to compromise - they ought to be able to stand for their principles. Once you get someone in office they may have to compromise in order to craft legislation - that's how the game is played. But simply to field a candidate with a fair chance shouldn't require compromise. The principles the candidate stands for may make him unelectable, but the system itself shouldn't be stacked against him simply because he's not an incumbent or doesn't have the right label after his name.
Absolutely. I don't have a problem with single-member districts (for Congress*) but plurality voting is about the worst voting system imaginable. The only thing it has going for it is simplicity. But really, preferential systems (like Condorcet) are not that difficult to figure out - can you rank the candidates in the order you like them? Sure, I knew you could.
*Another idea for reform, in the state legislatures, is to introduce Proportional Representation in one house. Most follow the bicameral model of Congress, but forget that Congress has different modes of representation in each house. Having two houses slows things down a bit, but if you're only going to look at bills the same way two times, it serves little point. In Congress, the People (House of Reps) look at it, then the States (Senate) do too. At the state level it would make sense to do similarly. Have localities (districts) look at it to make sure it works for all areas of the state, and have ideologies (parties) look at it to see if it fits a diverse range of political views. Purely districted representation guarantees that minorities (ideological minorities, which in my opinion are more salient than skin color or some other criteria) aren't represented. You may have someone local to go and complain to, but if they'll never come around to your POV, are you ever truly represented?
Constitutionally Correct
The way that Iraq has been handled has turned it into a disastrous failure, with no apparent path out. Two years into the occupation of Germany, German police had taken over general policing and border control duties. The occupying force in Germany was under 20,000 men within two years of V-E, while three and a half years into Iraq the 140,000+ American troops in Iraq continue to be pulled back into fortified megabases as the rest of the country slips toward anarchy.
...and the people who refuse to see what is being done in their names continue to raise a hue and cry about issues that don't matter while corrupt men continue to pervert the ideals that America stands for.
Total postwar combat casualties in the American occupations of Germany, Japan, Haiti, former Yugoslavia: Zero
On the domestic side, I continue to be shocked by the inaction of our elected officials as major elements of the Federal Government continue to do everything they can to remove transparency and accountability from the political process. I was brought up to believe that Republicans supported limited government, but I haven't seen much evidence of that since before 1996. Secret laws, intimidation of critics, ballooning federal deficits, blinding and willful incompetence at all levels of the governent... it's like a nightmare. All of the people who stand to benefit from a corrupt government are silent-- media, government contractors, officials, large corporations. The people who are afraid to lose their reputation and livelihood are silent. The media are fractured, manipulated, and have their own concepts of fairness and balance used against them to weaken their message.
The Bush Administration has been a disastrous failure for America, and for the world we should be an example to. I wish I could trust that the Democratic victories in this election will produce a change, but I don't have a lot of hope for improvement in the near future unless we all work together to demand it.
"We have to go forth and crush every world view that doesn't believe in tolerance and free speech." - David Brin
Hey you stupid smuck. You're such a robotic idiot.
I didn't see where cyberscan said that HE was for outlawing abortions (although his word choice would indicate that he does not like abortion). What he is pointing out is the utter hipocrisy of the republican party. He is only bringing up a promise made by republicans to their Christian voters.
"It's not just the Bush Administration. The amount of openly gay Republican Congressional staffers would amaze you."
And this is the party of Christian values. It is time that the Republican party either stops promoting that it is pro Christian or start walking the walk. The same goes for many Christian preachers.
Rumsfeld stepping down, GOP officials say.
Wait a second. You are claiming that people mad about the Republicans not outlawing abortion and gay marraige retaliated by voting for Democrats? That's ridiculous.
Judicial (the courts, which are populated with career-long judges that are typically in office well past the duration of the administration that nominated them, which usually means a pretty mixed group, philosophically)
Note that 7 of the current 9 justices have been appointed by Republicans.
If you want to call that "a pretty mixed group..."
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Speak of the devil: http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/11/08/rumsfeld.ap /index.html
the system was designed to force the parties to compromise. Madison noted that having people at the extremes get their way would be worse than having a slow moving, more thoughtful congress. Not much is going to get done in the next couple years, no matter how the senate falls. And that's how its designed. What does get passed through both houses is forced to be moderate
11 was a racehorse
12 was 12
1111 Race
12112
Why do Communist protest in the US? With Cuba so close, it's like going to Wendy's and demanding a bucket of chicken!
That's like implying that libertarians should move to Somalia.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
How is this a conservative agenda? Every important item in your list is about telling others how to live! A true conservative agenda is that basically people should be as free as possible from government interference.
You are confusing "conservative" with libertarian (or "classical liberal", or sometimes even just "liberal" though it's more of a 18th century meaning of the word) which means "that basically people should be as free as possible from government interference". thus "liberal" as in "liberty".
Conservative on the other hand means you like things the way they are or used to be in the fairly recent past. You want to "conserve" what is good about society and you are pessimistic about the likely benefits of proposed reforms. It's essentially political pessimism, or if you prefer, humility. A belief that society is unknowably complex and grand changes to our social structures even when they sound good on their face are likely to have unintended bad consequences. Conservatism in this sense has been described as an "antiideology" because the policies it defends may not be logically consistent (since it's just the way things happen to be, not as they would be if they reflected a coherent political ideology)
The united states was founded on liberal (in the old sense of the word) principles so conservatives in America tend to be defending classically liberal policies and ideas, and to adhere to a classically liberal political philosophy (albeit inconsistently). Opposing gay marriage, which is a pretty radical change to *very* long-standing social convention in the name of a logically consistent egalitarian political ideology is very rightly called "conservative". Abortion is less about liberal/conservative in this sense since the nature of the government intrusion involved is one that even the most libertarian would agree is within the proper sphere of government intrusion (protecting someone from bodily harm). The point of disagreement is about whether or not unborn children are entitled to that protection. You can be a perfectly logically consistent hyper-libertarian and still be pro-life if you are of the conviction that unborn children are entitled to that government protection.
I am not happy with Bush or MOST of the Repugnicans, and I would not have been happy with Gore an most of the Demoncrats. Neither is more harmful than the other. Both are basically the same despite their rhetoric.
And that's a reasonable position to take, even if I'd disagree with this particular instance of it. There were a few three-way races in Texas where I felt free to vote for a good-but-longshot Libertarian candidate because I felt that the Republicrat offerings were either just as good as each other or just as bad.
But really, you've got to be pretty far away from mainstream political thought if that kind of situation happens to you all the time. For most people, there are at least half a dozen important issues on which the Democrats and Republicans usually differ, and nobody wants to lose their opportunity to vote on those issues just because there's some guy getting a hundred votes whom they would like even better. We need a system where you can vote your preference for a longshot without abdicating your ability to express a preference between the leading candidates.
Even if your politics are so far out that you'd never want to vote for a Republicrat, wouldn't you at least appreciate a system that makes it easier for nominally Republican and Democrat voters to also vote for candidates you'd prefer? Maybe you'll never vote for anyone but a Socialist; wouldn't you still see it as an improvement if your Socialist candidate had a lot of votes from nominally Democrat voters? I'd certainly be thrilled if small-government Republicans had the chance to vote for a libertarian without the risk of inadvertently helping elect a Democrat. Ranked voting systems can let that happen.
Your tongue will get a lot of use.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Partisan bias obstructs cleaning up the electoral process.
0 7107726851
Don't let your always short-lived victory lodge your head in your ass. Now with the Republicans smarting maybe they can be encouraged to get behind some improvements?
Your "democracy" is owned by private interests. Your vote barely counts. Fix it.
One way your vote doesn't count:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-72367912
Organizations to support for change:
Black Box Voting
Open Voting Consortium
Don't forget that they also failed to take a stand in favor of cervical cancer like the Family Research Council wanted them to.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
>Pelosi is going to be two heartbeats away from the Oval Office, do you really want to make it one? :-)
Technically, it's only about 1.5, remember this is Cheney we're
talking about
If Cheney goes as he should, can replace with Rice, easy confirmation,
and Pelosi is back to 2 hearbeats away.
And this is the party of Christian values. It is time that the Republican party either stops promoting that it is pro Christian or start walking the walk. The same goes for many Christian preachers.
Yeah, because we all know what Christ said about gay people!
*crickets chirp*
Oh, come on. Surely he said something. I say we track it down and do exactly what he says.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
How many boards would the liberals hoard(v.t., to gather) if the liberal hordes(n., a large swarming group of people) got bored?
I support massive increases of funding for education, so that people stop confusing homophones, as the parent did. (See the Ben & Jerry's Oreo animation for ideas on where we can pull that funding from.)
...meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
I found it yesterday.7 7175242198&q=genre%3Ahorror
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-43127302
Because everyone is hypnotized by the idea of "not throwing away their vote" so they vote for a candidate they don't like in one of the two big parties.
So, somehow, voting for someone you don't like is not throwing away your vote.
Or something.
Strong on national defense, fiscally conservative, and socially liberal.
Nope libertarians, at least when I last looked at them, were isolationists.
Neither of these assessments are correct. Libertarians seek maximum freedom, both economically and socially.
This means specifically NOT subsidizing the military-industrial complex (aka "national defense"), and it means genuinely free trade (not the WTO/IMF/OECD/World Bank regulated variety) in a global market.
I can't speak for all signatories, but in *my* Army, the Convention is taken very VERY seriously with enormous penalties for those who violate it.
If I caught any of my guys violating the Convention, particularly the sections on the mistreating of prisoners, I'd nail their ass to the wall, and I expect my chain of command would support that.
The Convention isn't just a nice idea; it's the LAW.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
Proving once again that if your leaders aren't doing a good job, just pay them more money.
We need a healthy right wing. I hope the Republican Party takes this opportunity to take a scalpel to the gangrenous corruption and cancerous growth of Executive power.
>All my fellow Americans know how to do is swing the pendulum back and forth.
And if you want to know where that leads, read Edgar Allan Poe.
With voter turnout ranging from 30-50%, you can decide an election by turning non-voters into voters. The quickest, sleaziest way to do that is to appeal to prejudice and enrage people. Same-sex marriage is a useful issue for doing just that. I don't believe for an instant that the party actually cares.
Treating voters like they have below-average intelligence is also a winning tactic. Half the people do have below-average intelligence, and they're the ones who are easy to persuade because they believe what they see on TV.
The US is there, but not to the degree they should be. What probably happened is that the American government reasoned that they were certainly going to lose the war in Afghanistan, so their exit strategy was Iraq. They aren't going back in adaquate numbers to ever finish the work just a scant few thousand troops are doing now.
Oh You POS
>Aug. 5: The military cannot add to its files any illegally gathered intelligence, including information obtained about >Americans in violation of the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches.
>Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can tell the military whether or not it can use any >specific piece of intelligence.
The Constitution gives Congress, not the President, power to set regulations for the armed forces. The President can command them in battle because you can't command by committtee but he does not get to make the rules.
>Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can place restrictions on the use of US armed forces, so the executive branch will construe the law ''as advisory in nature."
The Founders made it crystal clear that letting the same person command armies *and* start wars was too dangerous to contemplate. They specifically said they wanted to avoid creating an executive like the British King. The President can deploy troops under a Congressional declaration of war, to meet an emergency like rebellion or invasion until Congress can declare way, and that is it.
I thought that correlation does not equal causation, even in the presence of a (potential) mechanism - people tend to come up with mechanisms to rationalize outcomes, but the presence of a mechanism doesn't disprove the existence of another mediator correlating with the variables of interest, or of a reversal of the arrow of causation, or of other scenarios. We prefer simpler theories over complex theories that explain the same things, but the desire for simplicity doesn't constitute evidence.
That being said (being a Democrat), I would have a hard time buying a causal relationship between political bias and economic outcomes of companies, or one exists, could be causal in either direction.
My analogy:
We're all at a great big table at a restaurant. The drunken schoolboys have been running up an enormous tab for the table that will eventually have to be settled. Then they start a fight and the bouncers throw them out. Now someone responsible at the table is going to have to ask everyone to cough up a few extra bucks to cover their debt.
Who do you blame, the ones that spent the money or the ones asking you to pitch in to pay for it? I'd call it a Dine 'n Dash scheme if they weren't kicked out instead of running away on their own.
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
Maybe you just created the "bink" sub-catagory of bint, defining it as describing a tart of the watery persuasion. Hop over to Wikipedia and create your own article to start the process.
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
I agree, approval voting would be a great improvement.
Now give us a plan for getting it implemented.
Looking at this discussion from the other side of the Pacific, I have to say I am surprised about the amount of cynicism about government (as opposed to politics). I have never really understood the position that small government is by definition better than small government (or vice versa, for that matter). Perhaps I am naive, but at its best, government should exist as a force for good, to assist all citizens to live a better life and improve the human condition. Of course, this requires that the government should be "for the people and of the people". Unfortunately, many citizens ignore the "of the people" part. This means that to affect change, people need to get involved in the process. And at the basic level, that means to get informed and to vote. A democracy where a majority of eligible voters do not exercise their right cannot be in a healthy state.
If you look at Virginia's results by locality http://sbe.virginiainteractive.org/nov2006/l_02.ht m you can see that the counties with the most votes still to come in tend to be Republican by the current percentages.
I've just put this data into Excel and extrapolated the likely outcome for each locality, and if you add up the results, it puts the Democrats ahead by just 500 votes - much less than the current totals suggest.
For twelve long years stupid reigned in Washington. Anti-science, anti-reason. In 2000, stupid reached its apotheosis in G.W. Bush. Now, let's hope, reason has remounted its throne. Let's hope we get an intelligent president in 2008. The world's too complicated for any more boobs.
PATRIOT passed the House 357-66 and the Senate 98 to ONE...I know it's fashionable to call Reps the Root Of All Evil Through All History and Dems the One True Path To Enlightenment And Peace, but get your facts straight. Evil/rubberstamp politics is hardly confined to Reps...
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
Moderate == Liberal according to some. Which is odd, as I have been moderate for years and it says Republican on my voter card.
I'm sure he was voted in by the ignorant but extreme right wing, but Bush himself has never been that far from the center. Remember that he got into office on a platform of "compassionate conservatism." Perhaps in analogy we look at Clinton. The right-wing has always accused Clinton of being an extreme leftist who has literally gotten away with rape and murder, but his policies tended to be somewhat centrist.
It's inaccurate to say American politics are driven by either conservatism or liberalism, but that it's driven by variants of the Third Way, fascism. However, the masses aren't keen on the name of fascism, so they're given the dog and pony show of right-wing versus left-wing campaigning.
As for the Libertarians, they need to be much more pragmatic, while at the same time not sacrificing the core of their principles: civil libertarianism fused with fiscal conservatism. A pragmatic version of libertarianism would almost certainly make inroads with much of the population segment that are not extreme leftists nor extreme conservatives.
I agree completely. Libertarianism sounds so attractive today because we are moving in such an authoritarian direction: rampant government spending and excessive taxation (either now in the form of taxes proper or later in the form of national debt) and a growing Christian fundamentalism, political correctness, fear of terrorism and "think of the children"-itis eroding our civil liberties. So a push in the opposite direction, toward less fundamentalism and reactionary social constraints, and more fiscally efficient and streamlined government, is a welcome change given that background.
But as you say, it has to be pragmatic. Nobody (outside certain fringe groups) is suggesting that we ought to have so much civil freedom that we do away with all law enforcement and emergency management entirely. That's what I was saying about what we consider "socially liberal" actually being "socially moderate" - there's an even more liberal extreme you could go to that most people are sane enough to see the danger of. Likewise, going too extreme on the economic axis (referring to the familiar Nolan Chart here) by doing away with all taxes and government-funded programs would be equally crazy, leaving the poor at the mercy of the wealthy just as pure anarchy with no law enforcement would leave the weak at the mercy of the strong. But some libertarians advocate just such a thing.
Looking at the Nolan chart again, I'd say that almost all mainstream debate today is really happening on the lower half of the chart, between the upper parts of the populist quadrant (socially moderate, economically collectivist) and the lower parts of the right-wing quadrant (socially collectivist, economically individualist). Almost nobody is seriously advocating the various anarchic and anarcho-capitalist positions that would rightly belong where Nolan placed the "left-wing" and "libertarian" quadrants. (No offense to anarchists of any sort here; your position is a welcome counterbalance to the growing fundamentalism in the world today).
What we call Libertarians aren't really where Nolan puts them on the chart, but more in the upper (more socially moderate) part of the right-wing quadrant. A more pragmatic Libertarianesque party would throw out the extreme right-wing part of their platform as well, and frame their debate as "sane preservation of personal and economic liberty without going overboard" versus "those damn crazy fundamentalists and communists". They've got the "versus" part down right... but I think they're overreacting a bit too much in the economics department, and throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Recently I heard the phrase "everything I ever need to know I learned in kindergarten", and it struck me that my moderate political stance can be nicely summed up in kindergartener-friendly terms:
1. Don't start fights - no initiation or escalation of violence.
2. Stand up against bullies - support the maintenance of civil order, ala police.
3. Don't play with fire - no reckless endangerment of the public.
4. Protect your friends - support emergency services, ala firefighters, EMTs, etc.
5. Don't steal or break things - no theft or vandalism.
6. Stand up against bullies (again) - support the protection of private property.
7. Don't make a mess - no pollution or destruction of public resources.
8. Share with the class - contribute to the availability of public resources and goods.
Other than that, just have fun.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
http://www.amazon.com/Postwar-History-Europe-Since -1945/dp/0143037757/sr=8-1/qid=1163033992/ref=pd_b bs_sr_1/102-5298520-0829739?ie=UTF8&s=books
We occupied the country in 1945 with 500,000 Americans, plus over a million troops from Britian, Russia and -it was kind of a joke- France. There was a vibrant insurgency with 1,000s of combat deaths following the ceastion of hositilites in 1945. Peace wasn't declared until 1951. Although the rebuilding of the country was relatively quick because only 20% of industrial production over 1938 levels was destroyed. In Iraq, the infrastructure has been utterly destroyed over 50 years of mismanagement and 10 years of economic sanctions. What's more, Americans desperately wanted to go home then as well. We just couldn't risk West Germany slipping into Civil War with the Soviet Controlled East Germans. Roosevelt said that the Americans would stay less than 2 years --We stayed 40.
You sound like something of a nut, but I thought I would at least point out that the basis for your success criteria is silly. Just because Germany couyld police it's own borders in 2 years, doesn't mean that I raq should be able to. Afterall, Germans didn't have terrorists threatening to kill them if they actively supported the rebuilding of their country. --Well, the Eastern Germans eventually did, but that is another incredibly sad story.
It's called approval voting. Instructions for voter: tick all the boxes corresponding to candidates that you would want to run the country. Instructions for voting machine maker: replace radio buttons with check boxes. It maintains most of the simplicity of first-past-the-post (and exactly the same algorithm for counting votes) while capturing a more complete picture of the preferences of the voters, and though it can be gamed, it's much harder to game than instant run-off or FPTP. (In the special case where each voter is happy with only one candidate, it becomes FPTP.)
If the government has no place in the marriage business, then why aren't conservatives or Republicans opposing legally-sanctioned heterosexual marriages? Why do most Christians take out a legal marriage contract, rather than just being informally married by the Church alone?
I have not heard any protest about the government being involved in opposite-sex marriages. In fact, many conservatives call for more government benefits to married families.
... and then they built the supercollider.
So what? How is national health care a "left wing" agenda? It's a moderate position. A lot more moderate than some of the positions being espoused by Supreme Court judges lately.
... and then they built the supercollider.
How is national health care a "left wing" agenda?
:)
I only have one word for you. "Muhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha". I can't believe you said that with a straight face.
Cheers.
Have you read my journal today?
"If the government has no place in the marriage business, then why aren't conservatives or Republicans opposing legally-sanctioned heterosexual marriages?"
The answer to that is based on thousands of years of precedent. That is what marriage is - a union between a man or woman (women in some cases). I however believe that marriage is between God, a man, and his wife. I personally believe that government has no place in marriage (I do not and will not consider a homosexual union marriage). Most other people also believe that it is necessary for society to have certain standards of decency in order to survive. If you believe that I am in a minority, please take a look at voter initiatives in many states that ban gay "marriage." The people have spoken on this issue and have spoken very loudly. In all but Arizona, these initiatives passed. People who believe in a Surpreme Creator (not just Christians) are sick and tired of being pushed around and bullied by those who wish to force acceptance of a lifestyle that many consider abominable. The same also goes for other moral issues. The Tanak, Bible, Qu'ran, Talmud or many other religious text specifically condemn sodomy. People who read these books and believe their contents have just as many rights as homosexuals do, and they are tired of their rights being ignored!
I am against, and will be against modifying the U.S. Constitution in order to regulate marriage. However, that power rests within the hand of the states. If you want to participate in a homosexual union and insist on having benefits as a married couple, then by all means move to a state such as VT or MS where such unions are recognized. Don't try to force me to accept and reward a lifestyle that goes against my religious beliefs by forcing me to provide marriage benefits to homosexual couples. I will not do so. Forcing me to do so violates my rights guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution. Before the stereotyping begins, please not that I AM NOT a Christian or an evangelical. I do however rely on thousands of years of tradition, precedent, and standards.
The candidates that promised to uphold certain values got elected based on their promises. When they ignore their base voters, they in effect broke their promises. Therefore they got fired. I am glad that the Repugnican party lost the election. I say GOOD RIDDANCE. Now it is time to work on doing the same to the Demoncrat Party. If your ar a socialist, then by all means vote for candidates of the Socialist Party. If you lean towards the Green Party, then by all means vote for candidates of the Green Party. If you are truly Libertarian then by all means vote for candidates in the Libertarian Party. I respect your vote. However I will try to discourage you from voting for anyone in the Demoncratic-Repugnican Party because they're devoid of principly and for the most part are only in it for the power and money.
Approval voting is easier to count (O(n)) than IRV (O(n!)). An approval race among eight candidates can be counted as eight separate races. Even Condorcet (which uses the same ballot form as IRV) can be counted with only 8*(8 - 1) = 56 registers, as its pairwise preference matrix is O(n^2). An IRV ballot, on the other hand, has 8! = 40,320 possibilities that are not separable in the same way approval and Condorcet are, as each ballot must be reexamined in the iterated runoffs to see where the votes should pass, and the reexaminations must happen in parallel among all polling places.
President Bush is a consensus builder. You may not believe it, but watch. He'll try to work with Pelosi and Reid. He may exercise the veto pen once or twice at first, to make sure they're listening, but not after that. He wants to sign things.
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
(Similar to "mod parent up")
While I don't agree with several of the items on that list, I found the PDF (which is quite long) to be so interesting and insightful I literally spent several hours reading it. followed by a number of google searches to verify enough of it that I was confident that it could be true.
Spoiler: The paper, among many other things, indicates that a massive Israeli lobbying group (which I had never even heard of) could be a primary reason that we ended up invading iraq!
Mark of the Coder fades from you. You perform Opening on World of Warcraft. Warcraft crits GPA for 4. GPA dies.
As a believer in liberty, limited government, and rule of law, I'm no fan of the Democrats.
Why, they are infinitely superior to the current batch of Repulicans in those reguards.
And the less that gets done, the better off all of us are.
Which would be great if we didn't need government to take action on important issues. You know, the reason we have a government in the first place. Examples: food and drug saftey, disaster prepardness, public infrastructure, national defense.
Fewer taxes get raised.
Reagan and the Bushes have given us the most monumental tax increases in the history of this country, by giving us trillion dollar defecits. The only question is when it comes. And the longer we wait, the worse it will be.
Fewer obstacles are placed in the path of economic growth and prosperity.
A certain amount of regulation is necessary for both.
Democrats lost no govenorships, state legislatures or national races in which they were defending. The Republicans on the other hand, lost big time. Oh yeah, and plenty of other blog backed candidates cruised to victory. Yes, you have your little opportunist Lieberman to throw some bones your way now and then, but you'll be faced with supoenas from both the Senate and the House. How do you like THEM apples?
love,
reality
Both are basically the same despite their rhetoric.
That was a stupid thing for Nader to say in 2000, and the last six years have proved him to be a complete moron.
Ooh, so we exchanged a party in favor of the Little People being made slaves to the giant corporations, for a party in favor of the Little People being made slaves to the giant nanny-state government.
Wake me up when we get a party that doesn't want to enslave the Little People at all.
(P.S. - I am a conservative. Not a neocon. And I'm sorely disappointed in Bush and his ilk. They have seriously let me down, and I think they deserve to be drummed out of office. I'm just not convinced that the Democrats deserved to be drummed into office, that's all.)
"Alcohol, Tobacco, & Firearms" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
There is a lot of wisdom in voting with political goals in mind. That's why most of us vote for the candidates who promise to do things that we want if they're elected.
But with third party candidates, the political goal is limited. The grassroots support for these people is often so anemic as to preclude any chance of their ever being elected. Candidates who run in that situation are well aware of that, as are the people who vote for them. So in their vanity, they run anyway in order to direct attention to certain issues, or (worst of all) to go on this self-important crusade to point out how limited and "broken" the two-party system is.
In that way, the act of voting is reduced to noting more than a mere forum, the votes themselves cast for empty speech over meaningful action. But voting is so much greater than that. It's supposed to be a way to elect people who will have an effect in the political sphere. It's disgraceful, because the rest of us are busy trying to elect people who will raise the minimum wage, lower interest rates on student loan debt, pay off the national debt, and in general improve the lives of everyone but the absolute wealthiest among us. While these nutjobs vote for their hopelessly unelectable, one-issue candidate, the rest of us suffer.
Whenever I've tried to enter entities, they are stripped out too.
Hmm, tested that with preview. I guess lt and gt must be treated differently than other entities. :P Lame, slashcode, lame.
Constitutionally Correct
The last 6 years have proven him to be correct. In the last 6 years, government has grown, spending has increased, security has not improved, and our jobs continue to go overseas. The Demoncrats would not have done significantly better.
The issue was actually that I had never heard of IRV/STV without loser elimination. Wikipedia seems not to mention it in the article Instant runoff voting.
So is Condorcet (pairwise) counting.
So is Condorcet counting. I have the feeling that you're actually talking about something closer to Condorcet counting.
The last 6 years have proven him to be correct. In the last 6 years, government has grown, spending has increased, security has not improved, and our jobs continue to go overseas. The Demoncrats would not have done significantly better.
Um, no. Gore might not have been able to stop the 911 attacks, but he damn sure wouldn't have sat on his ass for 20 minutes while we were under attack. Gore and Kerry also would not have added trillions to the defecit, and wouldn't have invaded Iraq. Nor would they have gone for warrantless spying, indefinite detentions, torture, or suspending habaes corpus. They would have raised the minimum wage a long time ago.
Look, this is like the Richter Scale. Claiming there was no difference between Gore and Bush was ludicrous back in 2000, when Gore had spent his whole adult life in public service whereas Bush had done nothing but fail at business until he was elected govenor. But each year it gets more and more obvious that Nader was more wrong than any person has been on this planet, and making the "no difference" claim gets more and more stupid.
It was stupid in 2000, it was 10 times as stupid after 911, 10 times as stupid as that in 2002 when the Administration ran around demonizing anyone who questioned the "War on Terror", 10 times as stupid as that when we invaded Iraq in 2003, 10 times as stupid after Valirie Wilson, 10 times after we learned about NSA wiretapping, secret prisons, Abu Garib, waterboarding, indefinite detentions, pushing 3,000 dead in Iraq, and so on and so on.
You've spent the last six years insisting there is no difference between night and day.
But, government size and power would continue to increase. There would be more attacks against our Second amendment RIGHTS, people would more likely have to get a permit to cut down a tree on their own property, taxes would still be likely to go up, ther would be more first Amendment attacks such as the CDA, etc.
I'm right, there is no difference between a "Demoncrat" and "Repugnican." The Demoncrats had their chance, and so did the Repugnicans. It is time for a real change.
But, government size and power would continue to increase.
The Federal government shrunk during the Clinton Administration.
There would be more attacks against our Second amendment RIGHTS
Gun control as an issue went away with the high rates of urban crime.
people would more likely have to get a permit to cut down a tree on their own property
Riiight.
ther would be more first Amendment attacks such as the CDA, etc.
Both parties are quite capable of "we must protect the children" hysteria, yes. But the Communications Decency Act isn't on the same planet as legalizing torture and indefinite, secret detentions with no trail or attorney.
I'm right, there is no difference between a "Demoncrat" and "Repugnican."
You are not right. You are an idiot. You continue to insist that there is no difference between night and day despite all the evidence in the world to the contrary. Quite frankly, I'm amazed you have enough brain cells to keep your lungs functioning, much less use the Internet. Please do not breed, ever. Have a good day, sir.