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IT Workers Split For McCain, Obama
antipeon alerts us to a presidential preference survey, done in late February and early March, indicating that Obama and McCain lead among IT workers with 29% each. Clinton follows with 13%, just ahead of Huckabee (11%) and Ron Paul (9%). The Computing Technology Industry Association commissioned the poll, and the article notes that this trade group claims the population of IT workers is four times as large as the Bureau of Labor Statistics thinks it is — the better to make a voting block whose views must be attended to.
Jenny's got a new number! 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Don't forget Hageee's whole idea that the goal of US foreign policy should be to promote apocalyptic war in Israel so Jesus can return and take all the white strait people away in the rapture.
The United Church of Christ along with any number of denominations are regularly investigated by the IRS. I find church ads generally offensive. That doesn't mean that in this race, it capitulates Obama. I think the whole 501c3/6 political endorsement mess is just a way to hassle churches, if from the pulpit. When religious orgs use funds to publicly endorse, then they go beyond the pulpit and their reach of free speech becomes unbalanced against the public's. Still, what of Swiftboating, and the morass of phantom orgs?
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
>Personally, I think these types of attack vectors are silly. People make all kinds of friendships and relationships
>throughout their lives, and to be held responsible for all the beliefs and actions of those friends or associates is just ridiculous.
Certainly, a candidate shouldn't be judged on their friendships alone, nor should those friendships be evaluated out of context. But McCain has publicly accepted the endorsements from Hagee, Parsley, and other unsavoury characters. These are not simply business associates or friends, whose political views he happens to disagree with. McCain publicly calls them his "spiritual guides". That seems like poor judgment at best, and hints that he might have some private views which voters should get to know more about before granting him control of the most powerful military on the planet.
The same standard should apply to all candidates, not just McCain and Obama, but also Hillary Clinton, whose connections with "The Family", a church group from the rightwing Dominionist movement, deserve similar scrutiny.
I don't like what Obama did either, but for a different reason. Check out the extended versions of Jeremiah Wright's sermons on Youtube. The media picked out parts that would sound inflammatory on their own, but in context they don't sound completely unreasonable. His 9/11 sermon is particularly moving. It actually includes examples of racial discrimination against non-blacks. The point of the sermon is to urge people to a greater self examination in the aftermath of the attacks. In other words, look at what you've done before you start getting mad at others. IIRC that is straight out of the Gospels, and even though I am not a religious person, I think it is still sound advice. Moreover, much of the sermon is devoted to Wright telling people not to get so mad that they end up supporting any sort of brutish vengeance in response. Again, I think in light of events since, we probably would have been better off listening to the Reverend.
Similarly, the "God Damn America" is not unreasonable viewed in its proper context. Wright argues (oddly enough for a preacher) that the law of God is inerrant, whereas the laws of men are not. In other words, he thinks we should not take the law of any particular nation above the law of God (or morality for that matter) and that any country which violates God's laws will be damned. In the speech he makes the same point about other states, particularly the British Empire. I don't think asking people not to submit blindly to the state is an unreasonable thing to ask. The "God Damn America" comment is made in this context, specifically with reference to the idea that the Biblical prophets rail against the injustices of the state in the name of a higher morality. Both are pretty damn good sermons as Wright is an exceptionally gifted preacher. I'm an atheist, but listening to them made me want to attend Wright's church, and I am not the only person who ended up thinking that way.
Please take time to watch the comments in context. You can find the extended sermons on Youtube. While I might not agree with everything that Wright says, I feel he has been the victim of an electronic lynching by the mass media choosing to deliberately misrepresent his comments. It realy is depressing, whether or not you agree with Wright. Obama didn't help by giving the impression that the Reverend was accurately presented in the media.
"by that I mean people who don't sit on slashdot all day wondering why everyone else isn't building robots" DECS
Oh no, he got an endorsement from a kook.
He didn't associate with Hagee for twenty years. He didn't admit last year to running every major decision by Hagee. He didn't get married in Hagee's church, and Hagee hasn't worked for his campaign.
also, while Hagee has a negative opinion of Catholics, he has not said the horrible racist and conspiracy-theory-idiot things Jeremiah Wright has. I've seen video of the man claiming the government knew about 9/11, claiming Israel was involved in 9/11, and that the government lied about Pearl Harbor. In addition, he's apparently said HIV/AIDS is a government conspiracy to kill black people.
That's a whole hell of a lot more vicious and personal than "omg u catholics are teh suck." The Protestant/Catholic divide is pretty mean-spirited as is. The last thing this country needs, however, is a president in thrall to a racist lunatic. (I know someone will post something or another about how GWB is, but he's not on the ballot, and his term is coming to an end.)
McCain co-sponsored every nasty evil domestic internet wiretap bill for the entire period of time between Congress' discovery of the Internet and the 911 "Patriot" act. He even tried to ban strong encryption like PGP.
Proven courage and loyalty under fire to whom? Not me! Not the America I would be proud to bleed for!
I'm still waiting for the apologies to come out about associating with Rummy.
--- Nothing clever here: move along now...
The current wars (occupations) are already going to be costing the US upwards of $2 Trillion when all is said and done, and McCain wants to increase the number of fronts we will be fighting on, and you think he somehow will reign in spending?
Heck, his current campaign is already over the legal spending limits of a law he helped write . If he can't control his own campaign spending, how do well do you think he will handle the finances of an entire country?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWe7wTVbLUU
He said exactly that -- that the bitter racism, from either side, is not productive. He just pointed out that entirely *ignoring* existing resentment isn't productive either. It's useful to examine the roots of all resentment, on all sides, and to work on the core issues that cause those resentments. That's the only way we will ever really solve the core problems, that underlie these false (but not baseless) resentments.
He also happened to point out how the politicians of the last few decades, Repubican neo-cons in particular, have exploited racism on both ends to accomplish their real goals -- which can be summarized as setting the Corporation above the Worker, in all senses. They channeled all that racist fear, hostility, and knee-jerk reaction into votes. Yes, they are an equal opportunity exploiter, but that's not to say that they're not also racist. The Republican majority today is all based on the "Southern Strategy", from Nixon on. It was continued by sustaining the same fears that the white majority had back then -- that somehow a gain in the black community is automatically a loss for the white community. That has never been true.
The politics of fear all fail to acknowledge an important truth: that helping your neighbor -- by whatever label of race, creed, or color -- is almost always a help to yourself. When you raise the bottom of society, all of society rises with it. The main failing of Republican politics, in the past few decades, has been to overlook that truth, and to exploit their more ignorant constituents, who never had any opportunity to learn that truth in their lifetimes. I think in that speech, Barack Obama proved that he is the one candidate who can raise America out of its long ignorance. John McCain, in his appeals to the religious right, the neo-cons, and the old Republican guard of Southern Strategists, has already proven to be the exact opposite kind of politician -- he is much more likely to keep us in ignorance, as long as it is politically expedient.
Barack Obama is the one candidate with the guts to come out and say what we were all already thinking, and even provided some hints, on how to escape our long-held ignorance. OTOH if Obama manages to get gov. Richardson as his vp., candidate, that would definitely make it a tougher choice. Then does Richardson's recent announcement, of his endorsement for Barack Obama, sway you yet?
http://news.google.com/news?q=Bill+Richardson+endorses+Barack+Obama&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&hl=en&sa=X&oi=news_result&resnum=1&ct=title
Dude, you don't even know what you are talking about. International competitors do not have the same health insurance as we do in the USA because they ration health care to deal with scarcity wheras we charge more for it. To put it simply: my mother in law received an open heart bypass that she would not have received in the UK, but she had private health insurance and it paid the entire $100,000 tab. My grandfather had a heart bypass on the NHS in the UK a while back. He's not the only one, it seems 28,000 people a year have them (that's the free ones, you can pay if you like -- you'll get nicer food, and a private room while you're recovering, but likely the same surgeons doing the operation). It costs about £5000-£20000 ($10000-$40000).