Slashdot Mirror
Sarah Palin's Stance On Technology Issues
Revolution Radio writes "BetaNews has a short description of what we might expect from Governor Palin regarding technology issues. She demonstrated her familiarity with the internet by initiating an online education program for state workers, using the web for government transparency, and a supporting the general concept of 'long-distance distribution of services' (similar to net neutrality?)."
We've previously discussed Senator Joe Biden's tech voting record and compared the technology platforms of Obama and McCain. In addition to the above story about Palin, Betanews also has analyses of Obama, McCain, and Biden regarding tech policy.
When asked during a televised debate in 2006 about evolution and creationism, Palin said, according to the Anchorage Daily News: "Teach both. You know, don't be afraid of information. Healthy debate is so important, and it's so valuable in our schools. I am a proponent of teaching both."
The key here is healthy debate. While I think creationism is not even worth being called science, what is worse is the knee jerk reaction to not teach it. The US education system needs to teach critical thinking and you can not teach critical thinking by ignoring or banning things you disagree with.
Another action that is a very big plus for the next Vice President of the U.S. is directly from the article you linked.
But after Alaska voters elected her, Palin, now Republican John McCain's presidential running mate, kept her campaign pledge to not push the idea in the schools.
This is perhaps the best part of the article. She made a pledge and has kept. Unlike so many other politicians who make campaign pledges such as Obama's choice to not accept Federal matching funds and the limits that come with them or McCain's pledge to not fly on corporate jets.
So she has been honest with her opinion and at the same time kept her word.
-- Slashdot, making the Left look conservative since 1997.
Okay, as mayor she tried to fire the town librarian (went so far as to give her a letter announcing she was fired) for not banning books from the library that people Palin knew found offensive. Can we look forward to a Net with all the offensive stuff removed, or else?
Perhaps to her small credit, Palin backed down from firing the librarian. She went ahead, however, with firing the police chief. There had been a bunch of serious drunken driving bashups. The bars in Wasilla are open until 5 a.m. The chief proposed the closing time be moved to 2 a.m. The bar owners where friends and backers of Palin.
The chief sued for unlawful termination. It went to the Alaska Supreme Court. They threw it out on the basis that in Alaska a mayor can fire a police chief at pleasure, without any requirement for justification.
At first, this may seem unconnected to tech policy - unlike Palin's desire for censorship. But consider how much of the Net is devoted to selling drugs. The Wasilla area is the meth capital of Alaska. Now, if you know small towns with drug problems, you know the patrons of the bars are also the patrons of the meth labs. How else do you expect them to stay up drinking until 5 a.m., before they go off to crash their trucks? Palin's in good with these country folks.
So for the Net under Palin, bottom line: less porn, more drugs.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
I'd like to see the Theory of Evolution addressed in religious settings.
It is in at my university. I attend Wheaton College (IL) and most, if not all of the science faculty (not sure about the rest) "believe in" macroevolution and are also hold to old earth theories (as do I).
The problem here is that we're dealing with government primary and secondary schools, so no one can agree on what to teach with taxpayer money. Some affluent parents have chosen to send their children to religious schools where they may or may not teach 6-day creationism, and that is fine and dandy for them. Unfortunately, this option is not available to the vast majority of parents who are not as affluent, so their children are stuck in whatever government school they are zoned for. Thus, "teach both" really isn't a lasting solution because someone is always going to complain about one side or the other, let alone the church/state issues about which people will complain. The real solution to this problem is school choice, letting the parents decide where to send their children. People will still complain but they may choose to send there children to a different school.
Also, it would be quite improper for state governments to mandate curriculum for private schools, religious or not. A large reason private schools exist is to escape and rise above the government monopoly and bureaucracy.
Hope this helps. I'm certainly not trying to start an argument or even be unfriendly.
Its = possessive. It's = "it is"
her strong libertarian views means she would leave it up to states and local regions to decide what they teach.
Her other views -- and more importantly, McCain's other views -- make it highly likely that they'll be appointing more judges to the bench whose readings of the law allow *increasing* amount of power vesting in the federal executive and congress.
Do you really think they're going to pick people who are going to go with state's rights on abortion?
If you think habeas corpus and other procedural rights and civil liberties are important, do you remember how close Hamdan vs Rumsfeld actually was?
This is before we even touch the problems with Palin's qualifications as a candidate to even be in the whitehouse.
I think moving power more locally is a great idea, but I don't think handing the Presidency to Palin is really going to do the job.
Tweet, tweet.
Sen. Barack Obama has made government transparency part of his platform. Gov. Palin has indeed taken that a step further by actually taking action in Alaska government. Currently, any check written by the state government over $1,000 is posted to the Division of Finance Web site.
I am intrigued to see if this act spreads any. Having government spending records more freely available to the public is always good in my opinion.
This one is soooo cool:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=184086&title=Sarah-Palin-Gender-Card
You know, I don't care if they are right or left or nuts or both. But double standards are double standards and the right wing conservatives have a lot of issues where doublethink is required.
Disclaimer: I used to like McCain back in the 90s when I read some smart foreign policy stuff and when he was working for campaign finance reform and generally across party lines. But I am not sure if he would make a better president than Obama.
Ah, but they each have a different creation story, which is very frequently one that is incompatible with either creationism or intelligent design. Many have mankind springing or gods springing from food items, or being created by talking animals, or any number of ways that don't fit with an intentional creator, or with the creation story told in creationism.
Just because the word creation or intelligent design is used doesn't make it anything like most of the religions in the world. And that makes it an establishment of religion.
Ryan Fenton
Read this if you want to understand her management style. I would never work for a boss like her.
And if you have read any of the many books about problems in the Bush administration, you'll know that this paranoia over loyalty is one of the things that has made Bush such a terrible president. Bush hires cronies instead of people who know what they're doing, which is how we got to "Heck of a job, Brownie!"
At least there, you can make a stark contrast with Obama. His campaign has had the least internal drama of anyone and all the reports about how he manages people say that he does exceptionally well, as you can read here.
I don't know about anyone else, but I want a leader who doesn't think serving the community doesn't count as experience, but telling people "it's my way or the highway" does.
Even speaking as an atheist, I have no problem with teaching *about* creationism, different religions, etc. because it never hurts to have knowledge of other methods of thinking. (Frex, in my junior high anthro class, we learned about ancient Egyptian gods. What's wrong with knowing about that??)
However, I would have a problem with any of them being taught as Correct Thought.
As to stances on technology, I found this more disturbing than Palin's lack of same:
http://www.betanews.com/article/Where_does_Joe_Biden_stand_on_technology_issues/1219872202
"Biden's pro-business stance is evident in his efforts to expand copyright legislation, often siding with the entertainment industry. His pen has produced significant pro-copyright legislation, and most notably in 2002, he asked the Justice Department to take a tougher stance on those who commit copyright infringement."
OTOH, this is noteworthy (from TFA of today):
"[Palin] used the Internet to make Alaska government more transparent. Sen. Barack Obama has made government transparency part of his platform. Gov. Palin has indeed taken that a step further by actually taking action in Alaska government. Currently, any check written by the state government over $1,000 is posted to the Division of Finance Web site."
I see shining a bright light on how gov't spend our tax dollars as a GOOD thing.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Dude you are a spaz!
First your morals of right or wrong is actually completely social based. Case in point, steal in Islam countries hand is coped. Muslim countries allow multiple wives. I am not saying that Islam and Muslim are wrong since that would be saying I am right and they are wrong. It is my point to illustrate to you that there is no absolute right or wrong.
Ever watch a wolf pack? dog packs? Or how about an elephant herd? They have some pretty amazing morals and right vs wrong.
We keep multiple dogs and there are some very interesting morals...
1) the female in the pack when outside the house typically does not greet the dogs first, the alpha dog does.
2) If the alpha dog disapproves of contact with another dog, then the pack will not greet the dog.
3) One dog will always remain on alert and on noise will start storming around.
4) When one dog of the pack is injured or scared the other dogs will attack or storm the problem - This one actually amazed me...
When you keep a single dog the normal dog behaviors seem "gone". I think most people don't understand the "morals" or socialization of a the dog world. Yet if you raise multiple dogs from pups in a pack with your family they are completely different.
Christian
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.
--Obama
This is the viewpoint on religion that earned my vote.
The internet today is an open platform where the demand for websites and services dictates success. You've got barriers to entry that are low and equal for all comers. And it's because the internet is a neutral platform that I can put on this podcast and transmit it over the internet without having to go through some corporate media middleman. I can say what I want without censorship. I don't have to pay a special charge. But the big telephone and cable companies want to change the internet as we know it. They say they want to create high-speed lanes on the internet and strike exclusive contractual arrangements with internet content-providers for access to those high-speed lanes. Those of us who can't pony up the cash for these high-speed connections will be relegated to the slow lanes.
Allowing the Bells and cable companies to act as gatekeepers with control over internet access would make the internet like cable. A producer-driven market with barriers to entry for website creators and preferential treatment for specific sites based not on merit, the number of hits, but on relationships with the corporate gatekeeper. If there were four or more competitive providers of broadband service to every home, then cable and telephone companies would not be able to create a bidding war for access to the high-speed lanes. But here's the problem. More than 99 percent of households get their broadband services from either cable or a telephone company.
So here's my view. We can't have a situation in which the corporate duopoly dictates the future of the internet and that's why I'm supporting what is called net neutrality.
--Obama
This is why he earned my vote on technology. It was recorded 2 years ago, so he isn't just acting nice for the election.
He was fighting against the war since not long after it started (I can forgive being blinded by the situation, everyone was.)
I'm not going to say I agree with all of his views... immigration and gay marrige for example (though to be fair, he's been good with his views on homosexual couples except for being pro-civil union). However, he's 100x better then McCain and his puppet woman.
Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master.
Granted, in normal usage I have no problem with "a task from God" or "God's Will," but when you start to use them to justify military actions (or really anything political) it starts to get scary.
"She's very much her own person
As an Aussie watching the circus from a far, I agree. I belive she was picked because she is pro-life, pro-creationist, and anti-gay. She will draw the vote from a certain demographic that votes for the person their church tells them to. The demographic is not huge but they are an important minority because they will enthusiasticly jump on the church bus at polling time.
In other words McCain is throwing a bone to the far-right religious crowd, he doesn't share their values but he has given them a voice that makes it possible for them to vote for him in good faith (pardon the pun).
IMHO he has shot himself in the foot with a bazzoka.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
I never said it does mean that. I see evidence every day all around me that we aren't here by accident and that the whole environment (terrestrial and non-) is here for us instead of us being here because of it.
To quote the late, great Douglas Adams:
"... imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in, fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for."
Weeks of coding saves hours of planning.