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Obama Launches Change.gov
mallumax writes "Obama has launched Change.gov. According to the site 'Change.gov provides resources to better understand the transition process and the decisions being made as part of it. It also offers an opportunity to be heard about the challenges our country faces and your ideas for tackling them. The Obama Administration will reflect an essential lesson from the success of the Obama campaign: that people united around a common purpose can achieve great things.' The site is extensive and contains Obama's agenda for economy and education among many others. They first define the problem and then lay out the plan. Everything is in simple English without a trace of Washington-speak. The site also has details about the transition. According to many sources, Obama's transition efforts started months ago. The copyright for the content is held by 'Obama-Biden Transition Project, a 501c(4) organization'."
First Obama
Now you can be ignored by politicians faster and more efficiently than ever before!
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Well posting this on slashdot should ensure that their servers get a proper stress-test.
The Long Now Foundation
I know this is probably gonna get me marked down from some of Obama's more, ehm, "faithful"--and I'm not excusing anything past politicians have done, in either party, oh no--but this seems too much like propaganda. "Ministry of Change", heh.
It also seems like he's unveiling things he didn't talk about that much:
The Obama Administration will call on Americans to serve in order to meet the nationâ(TM)s challenges. President-Elect Obama will expand national service programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and will create a new Classroom Corps to help teachers in underserved schools, as well as a new Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year. Obama will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55, while at the same time promoting youth programs such as Youth Build and Head Start.
Mandatory community service? Great, let's send a bunch of unmotivated kids to do stupid work. Hell, that kind of shit would have been a nightmare for me at that age when I had massive social anxiety and was extremely uncomfortable in such situations.
Of course, people will come out of the woodwork to say how because it's something that people "should" do (because helping people IS nice, after all...) that Obama should MAKE you do it. Please, someone explain to me how you justify that leap.
It has been a long time since that has happend.
This is the first installment of the government run media machine and how they will humor your requests http://www.change.gov/page/s/yourvision
"A claim for equality of material position can be met only by a government with totalitarian powers." Hayek
Shouldn't there be blogs and forums so users can actually communicate with each other and make their opinions known to each other? That would be a powerful force, as they could band together to keep Obama in line if he strays too far from his promises. The way it is set up currently, it simply is a bullhorn for Obama, while his users can "share their vision" with a recycle bin. I don't see much (yet) to get excited about. It reminds me of CNN's "talkback", which is heavily censored and filtered.
Yeah, how dare he inform the public of what is actually happening in one of the most important transitions that can happen in government!
Whether or not it should be .gov is really a technicality IMHO. He is the president-elect, after all.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
This is not an uncommon use of a .gov domain. Just look at the Dem and GOP House Caucus sites. The GOP caucus has a nice set of articles on "THE COST OF THE DEMOCRAT CONGRESS" and the Dem site, while not containing any hit pieces, has a lot of advocacy.
Not saying it's appropriate, just there's a precedent for it and it's not beyond any pale of anything.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
as well as many others, have fought important wars with drafted soldiers
"Mandatory community service? Great, let's send a bunch of unmotivated kids to do stupid work. Hell, that kind of shit would have been a nightmare for me at that age when I had massive social anxiety and was extremely uncomfortable in such situations."
so you have a problem with the fighting forces of world war i and world war ii? where we gave 18 year olds guns and made them serve on the front lines of mayhem and death? i'm just saying, you'd better have a problem with the idea of a military draft, for the sake of intellectual honesty
although, i've heard stories of many countries with mandatory military service as nothing more than a chance to learn smoking and peel potatoes. so mandatory civil service might prove stupid... or really good, can't tell
but i do like the idea of paying off part of your student loans this way. because it serves as a carrot and a stick. if your civil service effort is poor, you would be punished by having to still pay your loans in full, for example. this at least provides motivation
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The government is paying a good chunk of your tuition in exchange for 100 hours of community service. Sounds like a fair exchange for me.
Do you know what this program is? The government lets you to earn college credit while you are in high school. Many of my classmates were able to graduate with a bachelor degree a year before us chumps who didn't take uncle sam up on the offer.
How do you know this? Maybe it would have got you over it sooner. In fact, I wager most of the people in head start did it to get away from their high school foes and sit around people who respected smarts.
If you dont want to do it, pay full freight on your college tuition instead! Nobody is pointing a gun at your head saying "cash this government check!!"
http://www.change.gov/americaserves
Classic double-think
"When you choose to serve -- whether it's your nation, your community or simply your neighborhood....
Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.
Obama's chief of staff choice favors compulsory universal service
Obama and Hillary Call for a Draft Live on MTV
Text of H.R. 393: Universal National Service Act of 2007
Obama Calls For National Civilian Stasi
Constitution, what Constitution?
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
Joe the Plumber has launched:
http://www.secureourdream.com/
Yes, sadly now that his dreams of owning a plumbing business have crashed to the ground, he decided to become a political watchdog and "take it to the streets."
Who knows what we'll be saying about him 4 years from now? A 1 year "Freedom membership" costs a mear $14.95 .
Freedom, who among us is against that?
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
I already liked the guy, but I'm honestly impressed by this. Any information from the government can be suspected as 'propaganda'. At least this site puts forth their agenda in an easy to navigate, plain English fashion.
As for the 'submit your own idea' functionality, I think it's a great move. Even if they ignore most/all of the suggestions, isn't that the same results as not asking for them in the first place? At worst this is a waste of time and at best it's a huge step forward in citizen understanding of and participation in government.
story summary: obama and team put up website communicating their efforts
take home message, pro obama: all the good i feel about an obama administration is taking effect
take home message, anti obama: all the bad i feel about an obama administration is taking effect
its just a communication tool folks. last i checked, communicating what you actually intend to do is never a bad thing
for those of you who don't like obama, think of it as your enemy telegraphing his punches, allowing you to prepare your rebutal, or providing a convenient record for you to accuse him of not doing what he promised to do. see? its good all around
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I know you are new to politics so I thought I would let you know. Now that you have won, you can stop campaigning for about 3 years.
WHOO HOO! Change! We got change! Yes we can! F___ you, boss!
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
The Obama tax plan reaffirms the Bush tax cuts on all but the highest brackets past 2010; the salient change is that the $250k bracket simply returns to where it was when Bush took office: see here. In the end, the total tax rate of the country is still below where it was during the Reagan administration. It's astonishing to think we went through the first decade of expansion this century without collecting any money to pay down our debt; through the 50s, the highest brakcet had a marginal tax rate of over 90%, in order to pay down our war debt, and that was a tax code submitted by a Republican congress and signed by Eisenhower. At the time thus amounted to a huge wealth redistribution since the paper on the war debt was in war bonds, which were universally subscribed, not to mention the costs of the GI Bill and Marshall plan, which educated millions and could also be considered a form of debt repayment or infrastructure invetment.
It didn't help that he wasn't spending much; if we trim up taxation while spending gobs on infrastructure like in 1933. Of course back then, they didn't have $10 trillion in debt.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
As president, Barack Obama would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment, which restricts the ability of local law enforcement to access important gun trace information, and give police officers across the nation the tools they need to solve gun crimes and fight the illegal arms trade. Obama and Biden also favor commonsense measures that respect the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, while keeping guns away from children and from criminals who shouldn't have them. They support closing the gun show loophole and making guns in this country childproof. They also support making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent, as such weapons belong on foreign battlefields and not on our streets.
Repeal the Tiahrt Amendment- This would be a very bad idea go read up on why the Tiahrt Amendment exists that information should remain unavailable to the public for privacy reasons if nothing else. Also the reasons given there are incorrect at best.
Making guns in this country childproof- Safe storage is a good idea, but I have yet to see a good safe storage law.
Making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent- This is very bad.
I prefer this guy because he is better than the alternative, but I knew this was coming and it concerns me.
Of course, I tried e-mailing them yesterday to point out that their privacy policy looks to not match their actions (as they're linking to Google Analytics, so the cookies used to tracking people _are_ being shared with another website), and the e-mail address _on_their_privacy_ page bounced with an authentication error.
So I e-mailed postmaster@ptt.gov, and got:
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
land of the free. where freemen understand that freedom is protected by banding together, and fighting off threats to freedom. threats that exist abroad, in battle with evil ideologies that are antagonistic to freedom, or domestically, in poor areas of the country where freedom is threatened by economic misery
you are not free if you are poor. the battle for maintaining freedom is a domestic and a foreign battle. if you think it is only a foreign battle, you do not truly understand the nature of freedom
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Two years of debates, at least 20 in the primary and three in the general. Unremitting press coverage. Two books, one specifically on Obama's political philosophy, written by the candidate in his own hand. Huge websites with encyclopedic overview of everything the candidate intends to do. This country's (to date) most expensive political television ad compaign, with issue ads, attack ads, 527s, the whole schmear.
I admit I am having trouble finding the "promise of improvement," but then again I can never see the Angeles national forest when I drive through it: there's too many trees on either side of the road and they obscure the view.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
I find it kind of shocking how a good portion of slashdotters don't care much for Obama. But what is more shocking, is that these same semi-intelligent people think they can predict the future. quit your shit talking, and wait 4 years until we know for certain how things are going to pan out. you're not fucking Nostradamus.
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
i grew up rural, and i live urban now. i shot shotguns in the swamp behind the house with my granddaddy, a mile from our nearest neighbor, at gamebird and targets. i understand the need for your own form of protection when the police are half an hour away
now, living in an urban environment, i see the other side of guns. guns are not only tools of virtue. they are frequently tools of mayhem. guns are not always in the hands of those who intend good, nor is there some magic wand which can tell who should or should not have a gun. such that in an urban environment, it makes sense to let the police be armed, and everyone else to have suppressed gun ownership, amongst common people. it simply cuts down on needless death
and, as a side issue: no, arming only the police is not a formula for fascism. in fact, it is those who appeal to visceral force, who appeal to the gun, who are more likely fodder for embryonic fascist movements, not the police. really, read your history. random guys in the country is not a protection from fascism, it is the soil in which fascism grows
back to the larger point: gon control is the approach to guns as it exists in europe. europe is mostly urban. meanwhile, the usa has mostly been rural throughout its history, but is shifting to majority urban in recent years. therefore, it is natural that attitudes towards guns will shift from a rural attitude to an urban attitude, and experience a watershed moment in the coming years against gun ownership
and its simply a rural versus urban dynamic. currently, there are people dying in urban centers for the sake of a rural legal approach to gun ownership. in the future, there will be people dying in rural areas for the sake of an urban approach to gun ownership. its the majority deciding the legal approach. and either rural, or urban folk, suffer for the benefit of the other. for those of you want to keep your guns, urban blood is on your hands. for those of you who wish to curtail guns, rural blood will be on your hands. simple as that really
personally it would be ideal if you could own a gun in the country, but not in the city. but this is nearly impossible to enforce
and finally, the second amendment referred to posses in the countryside against native americans and british and french colonial forces. its completely taken out of historical context in reference to modern gun ownership needs, really folks. i don't know why the second amendment is so depended upon as a some sort of supporter of your right to have guns. are you the minutemen? the second amendment does not support the concept you think it does
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Looks like he's at least getting some decent web developers behind him.
Well, let's see:
Interesting commented-out content:
This isn't good HTML. It's HTML copied from several other sites and cobbled together by an amateur. Lame.
As brother posters on this thread have pointed out, the real disaster of Hoover was his austerity; the Federal deficit simply isn't as important as getting the economy operating again.
Yes the US $10 trillion, but over the last few months something like $30 trillion in assets has disappeared. The primary issue that must be adressed now is people's faith in investment, that the property they hold in the form of stock and the real estate is as secure in its value as any other appreciating/depreciating asset, and not subject to the vissitudes of manipulators and profiteers.
On what basis do you make that statement? Democrats have been consistent defict hawks for a decade, and have particular credibility since Clinton was able to bring the government into surplus, even given the anemic taxation levels of the 1990s.
That said, it would be a disatser if they made defict reduction a priority before the economy was growing again. So yeah, it'll disappear for a few years, in the way they peopl don't talk about their flu when they've just had their arm cut off.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
You should always vote for the best person.
People with small minds vote based on race. So do your best to put them in the minority.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Welcome to Slashdot - where everyone is an armchair economist.
no, what you really have is the desire that you don't have to help the poor at all
why should you care, right?
well, poverty is the breeding ground for ideologies which are antagonistic to freedom. they also breed unorganized threats to your freedom, such as petty crime like theft and robbery
the poor who live near you, tax you, no matter what. in direct and financial ways, or in indirect, existential ways. you can choose the nature of how they tax you (government programs with explicit policies that you have control over as a citizen of a democracy), or choose to have the poor tax you with random criminal acts and ideological movements hostile to the notion of freedom
you are taxed by the poor in your world no matter what. you do not get to choose not to be taxed, because taxes on your freedom will play out in one way or another by the poor. you simply have a choice about the nature in which the poor tax you. government programs that benefit the poor and lift them out of poverty is the best form of taxation, the CHEAPEST form of taxation (financial or otherwise) before you
choose wisely
most of us understand the value of altruism, how it actually helps us out in the end, instinctively. others, like you, have to be dragged kicking and screaming to common sense
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Anyone watch the news and see all the stories of the happy people who say that they are are finally on equal ground? The people saying that now they can be anything they want to be. Why they sudden change of mind? People were not thinking that way before? Those people who were thinking that because they are of a certain race (or not a different one) they are limited to do this small list of jobs are only defeating themselves. Why couldn't they think like that before the election? It is sad, truly sad. Those people were keeping themselves down and not realizing it. All the kids saying that now that can be anything even president, they always had that choice. They, like everyone else, has to work for it. Not everyone is born into huge piles of money and has everything they want handed to them.
"Homophobic" is newspeak. Does it ever occur to you that people who oppose adoption by gays, for example, may do so on the basis of principles they hold and not irrational fear?
I think of ancient Greece, which can hardly be considered a culture that discriminated against homosexuality, yet I know of no movement for gay marriage in ancient Greece. "Marriage" is a word that has meaning in our culture for a long time, having "gay marriage" is not giving equal rights, it is a radical redefining something that is considered one of the basic building blocks of society.
Everyone who opposes anything like this is labelled "homophobic" though. It's an attempt to eliminate discussion. "Islamaphobic" works the same way. Perhaps you would disagree with my position on adoption or gay marriage (neither of which I have given here because it isn't my point), but do you think it is possible that gay lobby groups could have a bad idea and that opposition to that idea could potentially be "sensible" rather than "homophobic".
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
What the fuck are you talking about?
Allowing gays to marry does not "get rid" of marriage.
Furthermore, it was not until the revolutionary period that Marriage was predominantly about love. Prior to then it was purely political. To say that marriage hasn't changed for all of human civilization is flat out wrong.
Or do you still believe it should be illegal for blacks and whites to intermarry? Or for anyone to become divorced and remarry?
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
It's not so much racism among black voters, as the racism of the Republican party. Hell, the Republicans would, if not for the racism thing, be a good pick for at least a portion of that voting bloc, as they frequently lean socially-conservative on plenty of issues. (Take Prop 8 in California, for instance.) But in attempting to appeal to their own racists--the white kind--who make up the party's base, they alienate everyone else.
Consider this: the election was heavily influenced by Latino voters, who were previously a very Republican constituency, especially in Florida. But due to the influence of Tom Tancredo, of Lou Dobbs, of Michelle Malkin, of the Minutemen and all their ilk, Latinos are now considerably more Democratic.
So, no, black people didn't vote for Obama because he was black. They voted for Obama because the other part is the party of white racists. I'm not saying that all or even most Republicans are racists, but there's one party that's made its bones by courting them, and there's one party that hasn't; it's not hard to tell which is which.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I'm not seeing how expanding the practice == "throwing it out".
I'm unaware of any procreative requirement for marriage. Those people don't generally have a problem with people getting married who are infertile due to age or illness, or who simply don't want children. I also fail to see how allowing homosexual couples to marry interferes with heterosexual couples carrying on as they always have.
Since there's no rational argument to support those positions, it kind of does mean that. Some of them reacting to a "yuck" factor. They think that homosexual behavior is gross, and they think that they will somehow prevent it by stigmatizing it. Others believe that their chosen religion forbids it and that they should act to stop others from doing it, regardless of whether the homosexuals in question are part of their religious group or not. The weird part is, nobody is expecting them, the gay-marriage opponents, to actually engage in this behavior, they're fixating on something other people do that they don't ever have to take part in themselves.
I strongly disagree. I've yet to hear any valid reasons to be against gay marriage. If you don't want to marry someone of the same sex, don't. But why stick your nose into someone else's personal life where you're not welcome or wanted?
Further, a nearly %50 divorce rate does not suggest that marriage works "extremely well". Really, a 50-50 success rate? You may as well say flipping a coin works "extremely well" as a method of predicting the future.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
When marriage is made illegal, only outlaws will have inlaws.