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Obama's Evolving Stance On NASA
mknewman writes "The Houston Chronicle is reporting a change in Obama's stance on NASA, saying his position on space exploration continued to evolve Sunday as the Illinois Democrat endorsed a congressional plan to add $2 billion to NASA's budget and agreed to back at least one more space shuttle mission."
If you adjust for inflation, NASA's budget is about half of what it was during the space race years in the 60's. You can't go to Mars on that. You probably can't even go back to the moon on that. And a paltry $2 billion isn't going to make much of a difference.
Obama is no more serious about NASA's lofty aspirations that Bush or Clinton. It's just political pandering for Florida. And I am tired of hearing promises from politicians that they know damn well they can never deliver on.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Just to give you an idea on how much $2 billion might help NASA, there are some stats for NASA's budget. In 2007 they had a budget of $15.861 billion and for this year they are using $17.318 billion. If you adjust for inflation, NASA has averaged $16.290 billion dollars per year which means this $2 billion would be about a 11.5-12.2% increase in its annual budget.
By comparison, the DoD budget was $439.3 billion in 2007 but my gripe with U.S. fiscal spending is probably a bit off topic here.
My work here is dung.
"Obama is no more serious about NASA's lofty aspirations that Bush or Clinton. It's just political pandering for Florida. And I am tired of hearing promises from politicians that they know damn well they can never deliver on."
Usually, I'd agree with that, however, I think you're ignoring the "new cold war" aspect here. China is developing an aggressive space program, and if they say they're going to the moon, they mean it.
Frankly, I think McCain is a little more inclined to beef up NASA precisely because of that aspect, and Obama will say damn near anything to win Florida. But it's also possible that he's reconsidered his positions on space because if he becomes President, he knows people aren't going to let him slide on the space race.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
It is interesting to me how when one politician changes his stance due to recognition of the will of the people, he is vilified as a panderer or "flip-flopper." Yet it is called evolutionary when the other does the same thing.
Could we not just as easily say that both are listening to the people who would put them in office? Or at least letting us think they are listening to us.
Is Obama's stance really evolving? I think it's clear that his policy on NASA is a result of intelligent design.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Yes, because it's much better to tell people we're going to go to Mars, and then not give them sufficient money to do so, resulting in other programs getting cut. Even John Glenn referred to Bush's "Vision for Space Exploration" as an unfunded mandate.
And it's not like this is the only unfunded mandate shoved down NASA's throat -- how much is HSPD-12 costing all of the agencies?
Disclaimer : I've been a contractor at NASA, and one of my projects lost their funding for more than year because of the Mars program ... by the time we got funding again, we couldn't get the team back together, because they had been assigned to other projects.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
He changed his mind! It's clearly pandering of the worst sort!
I really wish we could get rid of this ridiculous focus on changing views. Emerson summed it up nicely, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." In this case, it would have been foolish of Obama to be consistent -- he was wrong. He was persuaded otherwise. Is this somehow a bad thing, a moral failure? Yeah, it was advantageous of him to come to this conclusion, but it's almost always advantageous to change from a wrong conclusion to a correct one.
Reading the article, it really just comes across as Obama trying to push the shuttle layoffs to the right so they don't take place during his first term in office.
It's unfortunate, but I would really like to see him and McCain come up with a strong vision for space to spur international and private sector investments with a corresponding push in maths, sciences and engineering.
As trite as they may be, I could get excited about a candidate that pushed:
Note that I don't say "NASA". I think NASA has a very important role to play in the development of space technology but at some point they have to be out of the business of LEO (Low Earth Orbit) operations.
myke
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
I love how not being able to change your mind or agree with someone else's proposal is now a thing of weakness in a politician.
The thing I like about Obama is that he pushes for compromise, builds consensus, and isn't just out to fuck over the other party.
But no, no, the fact that he is open to funding something that wasn't a priority for him originally, is this HUGE FUCKING PROBLEM because OMFG HE CHANGED HIS MIND~!@!@$#~!
Fucking zombies.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I think the return the US gets for its NASA spending is greatly under calculated. The last space race caused the US to focus on creating engineers and scientists through education. Look around you for the benefits.
Today I sometimes feel we are raising generations of people who will order a "Bud" because they can't read or pronounce Budweiser.
Think Deeply.
Let's Put our Astronauts in Shuttles that don't use fuel and go green!
The exhaust of the main engines of the space shuttle is water.
I know I shouldn't feed the trolls, but I see a lot of this around. I don't understand how people can be so dumb as to think that Democrats are the heavy spenders. The Republicans have, ever since Reagan, been trying to outdo each other by lowering tax but raising spending. See here for a discussion. It is the Republicans, not the Democrats, who are the big spenders. And if you believe that you can run a deficit for decades without harming anything, then you're a fool. And McCain has admitted that the economy isn't his cup of tea, as evidenced by his proposed cuts to the fuel tax. At least Obama knew enough economics to oppose that.
Given the current crisis, I'd vote for Obama on that alone. What economic knowledge he's demonstrated makes him far more qualified a candidate than McCain or Clinton, despite some of his other failings.
It's perfectly acceptable to waste billions of dollars paying uneducated dolts to sit around and do nothing but create more useless babies.
But it's not acceptable to pay smart eggy headed scientists a whole lot less, people who have to be really fracking smart to actually work and do sciencey stuff using their brains and finding out stuff about the universe and world we live in.
Plus the scientists don't usually have a mess off leech-like children, if a NASA engineer does mate it is usually one child or two, which is below replacement levels. Plus their children are usually made to go to school and actually do somethign with their lives because the smart eggy headed scientist types are usually better at raising children that their child crapping counterparts.
I say, End all welfare programs and shovel all that money to NASA, we may have to worry about not having enough people, but by golly we will damned well have our permanent base on the moon, so when all of the breeding stock left on earth blow themselves up over their little sky god we can at least re-colonize the earth, or at least still preserve the best of humanity.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
As I recall last time I did some Googling, for what we have spent on Iraq so far we could have had something like 16 Apollo programs in today's dollars.
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
I would counter your 'gas tax holiday' argument (about which you're entirely correct) with everything else Obama wants to do with respect to gas prices. Windfall tax on oil companies? That'll drive prices up. Preventing drilling for domestic oil reserves? That won't help either. Pull oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve? That won't last long. Force the oil companies to drill the leases they already own? Gee, you'd think they would already be doing that if it would make them money. But it wouldn't, in large part due to government interference.
Obama claims that he will eliminate our dependence on middle-east oil in 10 years. Anyone who believes that is deluding themselves. At least McCain is willing to admit it's a weakness, rather than pretend he knows better.
Help find a cure for cancer. Join the [H]orde
Every couple of weeks the ideas change.
Citation needed. Other than his position on NASA, which changed months ago (this is only a minor evolution in his most recent position), I can't think of any specific examples to support your claim (not that they don't exist, I just can't think of any). Can you?
And McCain has admitted that the economy isn't his cup of tea, as evidenced by his proposed cuts to the fuel tax. At least Obama knew enough economics to oppose that.
Given the current crisis, I'd vote for Obama on that alone. What economic knowledge he's demonstrated makes him far more qualified a candidate than McCain or Clinton, despite some of his other failings.
Obama has demonstrated nothing. I agree with Obama's decision not to support a gas tax holiday, but Obama's flip-flop stance on releasing the Strategic Reserve to combat high gas prices proves that he's probably even stupider than the average politician. And that he proposed this strategy a mere month after announcing that he wouldn't, while criticizing McCain for his reversal after 8 years when the price of gas has increased by 6x, shows that he's the consummate politician-- and that's certainly no compliment.
The whole point of the Strategic Reserve is to be used for emergencies. Obama wants to withdraw light crude from the reserve and then refill it with heavy crude. This presupposes a drop in gas prices, which certainly is no guarantee. It also undermines one of the reasons why the reserve is important; say, a hurricane wiping out refineries. Replacing light crude with heavy crude which requires MORE refining runs counter to logic.
I'd have wished that Obama was smarter and opposed the gas tax holiday for sane reasons. Now, it just seems like he was trying to differentiate himself from Clinton and McCain.
I know this is hard to understand after 8 years of "the decider", but, this is *exactly* when you want him to open his mind and alter his positions. Right now, he is, in theory, pounding the campaign trail and, *gasp*, listening to people. Did it occur to you that, during such bouts of listening, he might've actually changed his mind on one or two things?
Regardless, it's been shown [washingtonpost.com] that Obama's tax cut plans would help the lower income brackets more than McCain's, and tax the rich more. This is obviously what a tax system is supposed to do.
A flat tax rate would tax the rich more than the poor (same percent of a higher income is more). Our system with a higher tax rate definitely taxes the rich more than the poor.
At what point does it stop being obvious that you need to take even more money from rich people and even less from poor people? When your tax rates get so high you're starting to cause your most productive workers to leave the country?
-- Support a free market in the field of government
He finds ways to justify all sorts of unconstitutional, unnecessary spending of the American tax payer's dollar (like his proposed $80B/year for international poverty), so why not NASA?
And how much has Bush spent on his initiatives for Africa, like AIDS reduction?
Fighting global poverty doesn't seem to be limited to Democratic Administrations and for that we can be thankful -- for all his other faults, GWB has actually done a few good things with his Africa policies.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Good arguments. Like I said, Obama's not perfect. However, as it stands, after all the Bush tax cuts, the oil companies are undertaxed. I agree that a windfall tax is probably the wrong thing (but maybe not as bad as it sounds; it's a complicated issue), but at least Obama wants to let the other tax cuts of the Bush administration expire.
Preventing offshore drilling is actually a good thing in my book. As analysts have said, it'll take years to benefit from it and it won't last long, either. Everyone agrees it's a short-term solution, only, and yet the oil won't even be available in the short term.
I should point out that oil companies not drilling where they have rights is a problem. If government regulations are stopping them, why can't someone like Obama (or McCain) simply change the rules?
Finally, I'd like to note that all the sources I see say that Obama has called for the US to eliminate its oil dependence in 10 years, but he hasn't promised it will be so. I read it like JFK's call to get to the moon before 1970. It's a goal for the nation, and maybe we'll make it, but it seems unlikely (like the moon landing did, not that I think we'll actually make it this time around).
OPEC supplies 53.8% of our oil imports (a little over 5.25 million barrels per day out of a little over 20 million barrels per day used).
The rest of our imports (the other 5 or so million barrels per day) come from countries like Mexico and Canada.
If people bothered to look up the numbers instead of just ASSUMING every damn thing, they would see that it isn't that difficult to fathom that in 10 years, if we cared to try, we could replace a QUARTER (not the 100% naysayers seem to want to believe) of our Oil with alternatives.
Such as T. Boone Pickens plan which ould eventually replace 38% of current oil consumption with Natural Gas.
That would be more than enough to NEVER have to buy another barrel of Oil from OPEC.
OPEC being the countries that, generally, may not have our best interests at heart.
Obama's plan is a hell of a lot better than McCain's that basically wants to drill off shore to MAKE YOU FEEL BETTER, but won't actually help things at all (at most, 200,000 barrels a day, versus replacing 5 MILLION BARRELS a day with Obama.)
People, it's simple math.
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/04/us-imports-of-o.html
"Don't be a martyr -- BE THE ONE WHO GOT AWAY!"
Gee, you'd think they would already be doing that if it would make them money.
But would it make them money? If the price of oil stays high due to a perceived lack of supply, that makes them more money per barrel, which means more profit. It makes sense for them to exhaust oil reserves in the middle east first, because these are the most dangerous to own due to the political climate in the area. How many oil fields were burned in the last Golf War? The price of oil is likely to go up in the long term, due to it being a finite resource, and keeping a big supply within the area of the greatest demand makes good long-term economic sense. No one is likely to attack the USA to take their oil, while the same can not be said for smaller countries (increasingly so when Russia and China start to get low on oil). Keeping oil in the ground in the USA looks like a good long-term investment. Why drill it now, when yo can drill it for the same cost but sell it for twice as much in a few years?
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I'm a staunch Republican, but, I think trying to characterize his policy shifts as a sort of a flip flopper is rather inconsistent with what he's trying to do. Obama is just a left wing pol trying to guide his opinion about how government should be run in response to an evolving set of facts on the ground and I really don't have a problem with him changing his mind as long as he stays consistent with his core beliefs of being a hardcore liberal.
Where Kerry had a problem was that he made a political career out of being a total pacifist, lead anti-war protests across the USA and was instrumental in ending the USA's commitment to Viet Nam, but then he turned around and voted for the Invasion of Iraq in 2002 to get pick up a few votes and then ran not as a Dove but as a Wartime leader during the Democratic convention. That's a huge flip flop.
But what Obama is doing is nothing of the sort. He might, ideally, like, to get rid of NASA because he'd rather spend the money on something else... a lot of Dems feel that way. Walter Mondale famously tried to gut the Apollo moon landings because he wanted bread and butter for the poor. So, its not a big flip flop for Obama to shift on NASA back and forth because the whole left wing has been doing it for a long time.
This is my sig.
I mean, the obvious issue that comes to most people's minds was the shuttle explosion, apparently caused by poor engineering decisions, and subsequent cover-ups of them.
Not poor engineering decisions, poor management decisions. In both cases, engineers warned of the problems, and were cockblocked by management, mostly due to funding issues. NASA is our most important program, and one of our worst funded.
The sad thing is, if the bloated life-sucking tick that is DoD were cut down to size, we'd have plenty of money for both education and Constellation. As I say in my sig, Five percent of one year's DoD budget puts us on Mars. Even at padded government rates, we could put a team of four scientists and infrastructure for settlement on Mars for about 30 billion dollars. (Zubrin has suggested a private firm could do it for only seven billion.) Space geeks who haven't read The Case For Mars should make it a priority. All of the info is online at the link above; the paperback is almost always on the shelf at my local B&N; and it's only $11 at Amazon.
Zubrin has outlined a straightforward plan to settle an entire other planet at relatively low cost. What the hell is the hold-up? How is it this is not the most obvious project in the solar system?
Can we get a mars.slashdot.org subdomain?
Five percent of one year's DoD budget puts us on Mars.
How is Obama replacing 5 million barrels a day tomorrow? Tuneups and inflating tires? McCain has made it pretty clear he is for all alternative fuel source AND drilling. With the inelastic nature of oil, any increase in the supply will lower prices and drastically. T Boone Pickens by the way is not a green guy, he is just for reducing the burden of foreign oil. He is also for off shore drilling, shale production and ANWR drilling. There is no reason we can't do everything. If we started drilling tomorrow there will be some online in 2-3 years, the democratic talking point is 10 years+ but that would be for all 100%. I am all for getting off oil but the simple fact is that it cannot happen overnight, but in the interim, there is no reason to be sending so much money out of this country.
I'm not not licking toads.
You have no idea what facts/information he had before his decision, and what facts/information he has now. Unless you're inside Obama's head, your presumption that he's pandering is just that, a presumption, and a partisan one at that.
J. H. Christ. This is almost as bad as the whole "if you don't support Obama, you must be racist" deal. Almost.
The fact of the matter is, Obama has in recent weeks has completely 180'ed his position on several key issues. There has been no indication of why he changed his position on the issues. For someone who basically won the nomination based on his oratory skills, don't you think he should at the very least be able to articulate what changed in the course of a week weeks- to months?
And the fact that people who call him out on such things are either labelled partisan or bigoted is outrageous.
You don't have to. All you need to do is keep it up for 8 years. Then the others will win, increase taxes and you can blame the others for the higher taxes and get elected again for 8 years.
1 step forward, 2 steps back.
You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time and that seems to be enough.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
This is obviously what a tax system is supposed to do. There are quite a few economists who would care to differ with that statement. A progressive tax (and welfare) system such as the one we have provides a degree of disincentive against earning more money, because the more money you earn, the greater percentage of it you pay to the government. In some places, such as France, it's so bad that for many people, it's more profitable to live off welfare than to work. While the main purpose of taxes is to fund government, it should also be structured so as to encourage people to become more productive and contribute more to the economy. Unbalancing the tax system beyond its current state will do precisely the opposite.
Yes, I'm sure if Bill Gates had any idea how much money he'd end up making I'm sure he'd have just said "fuck it" and taken a job at McDonalds. Poor bastard.
As long as the tax rate is less than 100% on the additional income, there is still incentive to earn more. Furthermore, if you subscribe to the school of thought that motivation to earn is relative rather than absolute, then this loss of incentive may be even smaller than is commonly thought.
The progressive tax system is necessary regardless of the effect it has on motivation, but because there are social costs that has to be paid. Costs which can not and are not internalized by market forces. It is only natural for us to require those that enjoy the fruits of our society more to contribute correspondingly more to it.
Even a flat income tax system that has a cut-off point (to not tax low earners) is progressive (a two-rate progressive tax).
Furthermore, welfare systems have problems with abuse, as with any other benefit system. Most systems now have time-limits on people qualified to work claiming benefits or social insurance. It doesn't mean that increasing the tax on the top 1% of the earners in the population will lead to more people on welfare. In fact, it argues the opposite in that we need to distribute the tax load more evenly and have other methods of motivating people to work and to improve productivity, including things such as modifying the way we distribute benefits.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
The exhaust of the solid rocket boosters is not... What's your point?
That we can clean up Washington in a environmentally sound way by
putting politicians under the main engines?
You can't just wish away regulations that are impairing. It requires both legislative and executive power to do so, and the chances are that environmental lobbyists will oppose removing the regulations that make it pointless to drill on these lands.
What's kind of silly is that we look at the problem as a dependence on oil. This isn't the real issue. America has a dependence on hydrocarbons, once you get past that perception hurdle, you'll realize how easy it would be to significantly reduce our dependence on oil. There is one hydrocarbon that America has extremely huge reserves of, that's cheap, and isn't too problematic to get to.
Coal.
Did you know that South America has a gallon of gas priced under $1 USD? They're not losing money on it, and it's not subsidized. How are they doing it? Simple, they're turning coal into oil products. South Africa also buys most of their coal from the US. How long do you think it would take to get a couple coal gasification plants?
Think about it.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
If I were going to be president six months from now, I'd make sure that we returned to the Moon, in force. I'd spend what it takes to put a permanent solar power base there, lasering back to a network of satellites and delivering cheap, clean power around the world. Once the base was staffed and ample power generated, I'd start mining the rare minerals that are going to run out on Earth within the next 20-100 years. I'd give contractors who are majority American owned, and use majority American subcontractors, the highest priority for taking part in the project, and aim at creating a space launch industry as dominated by commercial carriers as are airliners, while keeping a reliable government capacity operating, just like in air travel.
The US would start to look admirable around the entire world again. Except in the boardrooms and war rooms of our worst enemies, who are using our foreign oil dependence to enslave us and the world, who'd hate us as we put them out of business.
It took only 7 years for the US to go from subsonic jets to landing on the Moon, with a nation engaged in the Cold War, a hot war in Vietnam, a much lower economic productivity, a much smaller pool of engineers, much more primitive technology, and no proven example of going to the Moon to reassure us. Even before exploiting the Moon's resources industrially, we've already benefited hugely from the scientific, engineering, industrial and patriotic rewards of the visionary investment. We could return to the Moon, and lead the world out of so many problems we've helped create and are most threatened by.
--
make install -not war
So says the "Anonymous Coward".
Yes. But that anonymous coward is right on the money. FDR is the one responsible for that ponzi scam they call "social security". As well as the general rise in power of the government that was supposed to serve the people. Now they just serve themselves and their constituents that keep them in office.
Here's a snippet of a letter I received from Delta Airlines last month regarding the high cost of oil. The letter was signed by 12 airlines. "Twenty years ago, 21 percent of oil contracts were purchased by speculators who trade oil on paper with no intention of ever taking delivery. Today, oil speculators purchase 66 percent of all oil futures contracts, and that reflects just the transactions that are known. Speculators buy up large amounts of oil and then sell it to each other again and again. A barrel of oil may trade 20-plus times before it is delivered and used; the price goes up with each trade and consumers pick up the final tab. Some market experts estimate that current prices reflect as much as $30 to $60 per barrel in unnecessary speculative costs." Here is a link to the full letter.
The issue is not about Russia and Georgia engaging in a territorial dispute. The issue is about Russia seeking to re-establish it's sphere of influence through a projection of military power.
If the response to Russia's invasion of Georgia was muted / measured it is likely Russia would see that as a green light to implement (by force) a regime change in Georgia.
The only correct response was the W / McCain response (that also ultimately became the Obama position) which is to take a very hard line with Russia.
I would love to see the exact same story with his "evolving" position on giving telecoms immunity for spying on us. He voted for allowing it and he should change his position to oppose it and actively purse having this stopped.
How is Obama replacing 5 million barrels a day tomorrow? Tuneups and inflating tires? McCain has made it pretty clear he is for all alternative fuel source AND drilling. With the inelastic nature of oil, any increase in the supply will lower prices and drastically. T Boone Pickens by the way is not a green guy, he is just for reducing the burden of foreign oil. He is also for off shore drilling, shale production and ANWR drilling. There is no reason we can't do everything. If we started drilling tomorrow there will be some online in 2-3 years, the democratic talking point is 10 years+ but that would be for all 100%. I am all for getting off oil but the simple fact is that it cannot happen overnight, but in the interim, there is no reason to be sending so much money out of this country.
Again, you make fun of simple things like Tuneups and properly inflating tires BEFORE ACTUALLY READING A DAMN THING ABOUT IT.
While it wouldn't maybe help the INDIVIDUAL very much, the ENTIRE COUNTRY would benefit a decent amount.
In fact, if the ENTIRE COUNTRY did these LITTLE things, we could WITHOUT A DOUBT save the same amount of Oil McCain's 'Day Dream' of offshore drilling MIGHT produce 10 YEARS from now.
I'm afraid the same holds true for ANWR. I'm not super concerned about the envirnment up there because I don't think the handful of wells that would be drilled would hurt anything, BUT it wouldn't help us either.
It would certainly help the Oil Companies who could pull the oil out of the ground for PENNIES and sell it for top dollar.
For those who don't know, Oil is priced based on GLOBAL markets, not production cost. SO drilling in the Continental United States is a sweet proposition for Oil Companies because they can pull it out of the ground for nothing but the production costs, BUT CHARGE LIKE THEY BOUGHT IT OVERSEAS.
As long as a SINGLE barrel of oil comes from outside the United States, ALL OIL PRODUCED IN THE UNITED STATES WILL COST PRETTY MUCH THE SAME regardless of the production costs.
Speculators have driven the price up some, but not nearly as much as people blame on them. Besides, speculation has its purpose. Speculation is why you can lock in a price for heating oil NOW, and KNOW FOR CERTAINTY what you will be paying this winter.
This goes the same for McCain's ludicrous 'Gas Tax Holiday'. If you remove the Federal Gas tax (which is less than 25Â for gasoline), then gasoline distributors will simply raise their prices by the EXACT amount removed. There is nothing in the law to prevent this, accept a few, older, arcane price fixing rules that would be IMPOSSIBLE to prove.
All John McCain would have done (if the Democratic Congress hadn't stopped him) is robbed the Highway Department of revenue needed to maintain the countries road system.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26222711/
"Don't be a martyr -- BE THE ONE WHO GOT AWAY!"
Now, it may be true that Georgia was provoking Russia. But at a moment's notice, Russia launched a well-coordinated, overwhelming assault involving their army, navy, and air force, with fronts opened in South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The military assault was coordinated with computer attacks and a media propaganda campaign (see, for instance, the "2,000 dead" figure the Russian media kept repeating without ever providing any source or photographs to back up their claims). You simply cannot do what Russia did overnight. It takes weeks or months of planning. Georgia provided the trigger for the war, true, but Russia was clearly waiting for an excuse.
Russia/Georgia, Please solve this quickly.
Here's the underlying issue. Russia (or at least Putin) feels like border states, such as the Ukraine and Georgia, should be subservient to Russia, and not pursue political or military ties to the West. So as far as Russia is concerned, this is very much about the West (EU and NATO). And by invading and occupying a country that is on the flank of Europe, and with close political ties to the U.S., Russia is trying to threaten and intimidate the West. Now the West is in a delicate position- they can't really let this stand, but it's not clear how they can punish Russia either. Regardless, relationships between Russia and the U.S./EU have fundamentally shifted. It's not that a new conflict has started, it's that Europe and the United States are finally waking up and realizing that they're already in the middle of a conflict.
Getting to Social Security, you tell me ONE THING wrong with making sure people have something when they retire. I'm so sick of these 20 YEAR OLDS bitching because they are asked to contribute a fingernail slice of their income to help those who came before them.
Ok. I'm 30 something. Here's my ONE THING. I will probably never see a dollar of it myself. The system is intended to work for me when I need it. That's the "security" part of it. But now, the way it's headed, I'm really only seeing the "social" part of it. If they continue to fuck it up and leave it business as usual, I'll have paid a lifetime into a system that won't pay me a dime back. That's the problem. Social Security isn't supposed to be about duty and responsibility, it was supposed to be about insurance for the future.
You'd be pretty sour if you knew you paid car insurance all your life without an accident, and when you finally did have an accident, there'd be nothing for you.
You'll have that sometimes...
Getting to Social Security, you tell me ONE THING wrong with making sure people have something when they retire.
I'll worry about myself - I can invest my money better than the government can - but why should I help you retire?
I'm so sick of these 20 YEAR OLDS bitching because they are asked to contribute a fingernail slice of their income to help those who came before them.
Well, I was 20 well over 10 years ago and let me tell you - once you add ss with medicare, you're at 15.3%. You consider that to be a fingernail slice? You think it should be 20%? 25%? I for one would gladly give up every penny i've put in just to be able to get out.
That is as selfish an snobbish as those (not that I'm accusing you of this, BTW) who scream they'd go to Canada before being Drafted.
If we ever have to draft that just means it isn't worth fighting for - look at WWII - many people gladly joined because it was a cause worth fighting for.
NO ONE has any sense of DUTY or RESPONSIBILITY now days.
Damn right - if they were responsible we wouldn't need Social Security!
I agree with much of what you are saying. And that is the problem. The McCain of even a decade ago or even 5 years ago, is not the McCain of today. He has changed MANY of his beliefs just in the last 3 years. Obama does not strike me a flip-flopper but more of somebody who is still forming his opinion. In the end, I am not sure that it matters. What a candidate says on the trail is different than what they will do. And that is what I am concerned about. Who has the ability to make INTELLIGENT choices based on input from INTELLIGENT ppl. For example, McCain was castrated for saying that he is not the end-all in economics. I say BRAVO; A man that knows his limits and would count on those that know economics. Sadly, he has since changed his stance and now tries to sound like he knows it all. OTH, Obama has a much broader knowledge than does McCain and he openly counts on using his advisers input. In particular, for econ, he counts on top economists as well as ppl like Warren Buffet (a multiple hit businessman for many decades) vs. McCain's Whitman who is a one-hit wonder. Overall, Obama appears to have the BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST ppl on board. And he listens to their input. McCain jumped all over Russia WRT georgia, while Obama took an initial measured response and waited for input.
As to Obama's changes, while he is not bothered by the hobgoblins of the mind, where is McCain seems to live it.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
McCain's response was similar to a rapid dog. W's has been measured. W's response has more in common with Obama's than McCain. Even the majority of the pubs claims that W's response was like Obamas. Slow and measured.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
In fact, if the ENTIRE COUNTRY did these LITTLE things, we could WITHOUT A DOUBT save the same amount of Oil McCain's 'Day Dream' of offshore drilling MIGHT produce 10 YEARS from now.
Please provide STATISTICS to prove your POSITION.
http://fueleconomy.gov/feg/maintain.shtml
Again, it's simple math.
"Don't be a martyr -- BE THE ONE WHO GOT AWAY!"
"President Bush opposes the $2 billion in funding, saying it would be fiscally irresponsible."
A multi-trillion Dollar boondoggle in both Iraq and Afghanistan is somehow a prudent decision that history shall vindicate him for undertaking, yet two billion for NASA is fiscally irresponsible?
Here's what I'd say, but such a nuanced approach would almost certainly fail before evangelicals: Life begins at conception, but the government's interest in a citizen begins at viable birth. So while I might believe that a 2-month fetus is "alive", there is no practical way for the law to treat it independently of the mother...at most you could force a C-section and then it would die anyway.
The government, being a constitutional republic of free people, does not have the legal authority to force mothers to carry the baby until it is viable. If it did, it would ALSO have the power to force mothers to get pregnant in the first place, or to take children from their parents for no reason whatsoever. Abortion is legal not because anyone likes it, but because it is on one side of a bright line that we don't want government to cross.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
I'm personally not against Social Security, but calling it a fingernail's slice is perhaps disingenuous. The total rate paid into Social Security and Medicare is 15.3%. Half of it is hidden from you--the employee pays half and the employer pays half--but that's really just a shell game. If you ever self-employ, you'll realize the full sting.
The cap on the payroll tax is at $102,000 this year, so a person earning that wage or more will pay $15606 into Social Security. If this person is not self-employed, then only $7803 of that will appear on their W-2. But, really, $15606 was paid in. That's money that could have been put towards paying employees directly or funding a pension plan.
Interestingly, that's about the same as the 401(k) cap.
I happen to hit both caps every year, and I expect to get much more from my 401(k) than from Social Security. That's fine though, since they're meant for different purposes. My 401(k) is for me. Social Security is a safety net for everyone. My quality of life is better when society functions better and has a reasonable baseline standard of living, and that's the Social in Social Security.
Yep, I'm a bleeding heart liberal. Whatcha gonna make of it?
Program Intellivision!
I applaud your efforts, but doing as you say will return us to the Victorian times when the poor were left in workhouses, hopeless and destitute. Now at least, they're only left just hopeless. Dickens would be turning in his grave.
Solutions to problems usually cause their own problems down the line. However, we must take history into account and not revive the original problem by rolling back what was the original solution.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
As a commodity becomes increasingly scare, you'd expect to see increasingly complicated systems used to effectively distribute the last of it. The increase in speculation is an effect, not a cause, of our current oil crisis.
Given that you are posting on Slashdot, you're probably rather technically oriented and rather secure financially. Consider those less fortunate than yourself: people who grew up without an education, or without ever having seen a computer. Consider the people who work at Tim Hortons sixteen hours a day, go home, watch some hockey and sleep.
Sure, you might argue that they're not contributing to society. But would you not be in the same position if not for some accident of fate? Do these people deserve to live any less than you do? Don't they deserve to experience life just as much as you do? It's not as if they can't afford medical care through any fault of their own. (And even if they have made mistakes: well, who here hasn't a made a mistake that might have ruined his life?)
What you're advocating is Social Darwinism. That's a consistent, but empty strategy that ignores all human feeling and empathy. Sure, it makes sense, but it ignores what makes us human in the first place.
How is Obama replacing 5 million barrels a day tomorrow? Tuneups and inflating tires? McCain has made it pretty clear he is for all alternative fuel source AND drilling.
So, essentially what you're saying is that we should ignore actions that will actually have the effect of lowering demand by increasing fuel efficiency, and that can be done now by individuals, and instead we should go with the stupid fucking dittohead plan of offshore drilling, which has greater long term costs than gains, and has no short term gains at all?
Yes, lets drill drill drill. No, it won't do anything to help anyone. Sure, the resulting environmental damage will wreak havoc on all kinds of tourism and other important industries, but in the long term it will also have a statistically insignificant effect on oil prices!
I mean, what the fuck? How can you be so blindly, happily, willfully fucking ignorant? How can you simply bend over and let an elephant fuck you in the ass, screaming "Thank you" the whole time?
The world you experience is only a close approximation of reality.
We need term limits in Congress.
I was for term limits in California when they were first enacted, much for the same reasons as you. That said, they have been a plain and unmitigated disaster for this state because of the many unintended consequences they have produced.
First, there was gerrymandering. Since it was now impossible for an individual to hold a district for 20 to 30 years, the Democratically controlled legislature drew safe districts that would vote Democrat for the next 20 to 30 years. Republicans went along with this because the ones in power also got enough safe districts to hold up approval of the annual budget (which requires a 2/3 vote to pass).
Second, as a biproduct of gerrymandering, politics in the California became highly partisan. Since almost all legislative districts in California consistently vote 60/40 in favor one party, the real election became the primary. Of course, one wins the primary by appearing the fringes of his or her party. Thus, our state legislators and senators started to further toward both the left and right. Most moderates never made it to the general election.
Third, the rank partisanship, led to gridlock in the legislature, especially with the state budget. Democrats refuse to cut spending in tough times, and Republicans refuse to raise taxes, regardless of the need to do so. What should be a process of compromise, is reduced to an annual game of chicken because neither side wants to back down from their ideological rhetoric.
Fourth, these budget problems are exacerbated even further by the increased influence of lobbyist groups in the capitol. This is perhaps the most insidious consequence of term limits. Because legislators and senators are out after 6 and 8 years respectively, they often have very little time to learn the legislative process and become experts on the subjects their committees govern. Thus they have to rely on lobbyist groups for information and viewpoints. Think K Street in DC but much worse.
There are a host of other maladies that term limits have wrought on this state, like the political musical chairs our politicians play, but these four are by far the worst. Term limits is the best example of the law of unintended consequences. For every problem they solved did they created another equally bad or worse one.
The sun beams down on a brand new day, No more welfare tax to pay, Unsightly slums gone up in flashing light...
I think you've put your finger on the essential point here, which is the Russian desire to create a sphere of influence.
The problem I see with a "very hard line" is that it's not credible. You've got to imagine yourself in Putin's shoes (which are the ones that count). Take a blank piece of paper and draw a line down the middle. On the left hand side you list the advantages to meddling in Georgia. On the right hand side you put the disadvantages.
What, exactly, is the United States able to credibly add to the right hand side of the equation? Not bloody much other than tough talk, which, I'm afraid, is not going to scare Putin very much. Our military is already over committed. Our economy is weak and vulnerable to energy price fluctuations. Speaking of energy prices, Russia has our allies spread-eagled over the energy barrel. Even we import 762 thousand barrels of Russian oil a day, which is about 15% as much as we produce domestically.
It's going to take patience to address the issue of Russian meddling in other countries, and a lot more credibility than the US currently enjoys.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
> Why are we (US) so up in arms over Russia messing with Georgia?
We here in the US do _not tolerate_ a nation which invades and occupies another sovereign nation.
25% Funny, 25% Insightful, 25% Informative, 25% Troll
Actually, I work for my Father (my parents are divorced). He owns a Publishing company, who itself owns seven Newspapers.
Trust me when I say I do pretty well for myself.
However, I still do not WASTE money on garbage, as a lot of people who make a lot less do.
You can make fun of the fact that I live at home all you want, it doesn't change the fact that I pocket more cash than most people I know who make more than I do.
I simply didn't see the need to tie myself up with a house/apartment rent BILL when I didn't have too.
It has been my experience that the people who bitch most about bills are the ones who INCUR the most Bills.
You cut off luxuries (yes, they are luxuries, not necessities) of Cable/Satellite, DSL/Cable and then come talk to me about how much of a burden taxes are.
SO, your defense for being called out is to define yourself as a rich kid living at home.
Sorry man, you fail.
Maybe if you realized you were pushing your responsibilities off to your Dad you would get it. Yeah sure , YOU'RE not paying for the stuff you say other people waste their money on - your Daddy is.
Bragging that you're pocketing more cash than people who choose not to suck off their parents longer than they have to isn't really that impressive. You seem to have a lot to say about how well you are doing and how we should all follow your lead. The reality is your lead is actually copping out and pushing those responsibilities off to another person.
Yeah, that's enlightened.