Just like the animals you see around you, when people are in a community in which they fit naturally, their natural drives for social status and their reproductive drives will from time to time drive to do work.
I have news for you: working 50 weeks a year, year in and year out, that aint necessarily a good thing. Yes, some people are twisted and greedy, and they often get rich and powerful and use that to manipulate and exploit their fellow human beings in order to gain more wealth, but that does not mean we have to do what they say.
My post specifically states that the Democratic Party AND the GOP (and the electorate) have been driven RIGHT by the rightwing propaganda machine. The Democratic Party is NOT a leftist organization. The only major Leftist political parties are in other countries. CNN/FOX/CBS et al can say whatever they want about the GOP and the Democrats. Those are not leftist parties. And the major media never talk about issues either.
I could hardly agree with you more. I only continued the narrow scope of the original poster (who seemed to me to be catagorizing the media as Republican biased).
Oh, really? Hmm. Here is what I wrote: Many on the American Left now accept that unless this inexorable flood of rightwnig propaganda is somehow countered or neutralized, electoral politicking (e.g., fighting to elect Kerry, or voting 3rd party) is somewhat moot, because this decades-old flood of propaganda has also moved the Democratic party to the right much the same as the GOP.
Hmm. THat is a very peculiar interpretation of what I wrote. Very peculiar and very wrong....
With respect to whether this country (that is controlled by Dems and GOP) has gone rightward or leftward in the last couple of decades, let's take a look at tax policy. Everyone agrees that liberal countries have progressive taxation systems, with high income earners paying high tax rates, and low income earners paying low tax rates. If a country gets more liberal, the tax rates go up, especially on high income earners. As countries get conservative, marginal tax rates go down, especially on high income earners. So you take a look at this chart of TOP marginal tax rates (what the richest people pay) and tell me whether we are getting more liberal or more conservative. And not to put a real fine point on it, but my argument is that the rightwing propaganda machine has "manufactured consent" for driving down tax rates.
Also, not shown are huge reductions in taxes on unearned income (stocks, etc).
We are moving away from progressive taxation (that "liberal") and towards regressive taxation (that's "conservative"!). No doubt about it.
In a regressive taxation system, those at the bottom of the income scale pay a much greater percent of their income to taxes than do those at the top. THat's a Bad Thing!
Do me a favor--actually READ some of the leftist books and articles out there. Go read Manufacturing Consent (excerpts can be found from my sig). Then go think about it for a couple of years.
I used to think the same way as you. I guess it takes a lot of time and experience added onto the knowledge for it to actually have some effect.
If I or Mr Cobb get a leftwing talk radio show, I can assure you that I will refer to it as propaganda. Propaganda is not necessarily a perjorative/derogatory term with me. It is simply an interpretation of the world with respect to politics. ALL good propaganda has some element of truth to it--from both the Left and Right.
And regarding victimhood, how should the lamb regard the lion? Let me assure you that unless you are well off, independently wealthy, or among the top 25% of earners for a long period of time, it would be wise and healthy for you to regard yourself as a potential victim. Becasue you are one. Try reading _Tunnel in the Sky_ by Heinlein. You aint as Big and Hairy as you think you are.....
I think it is now becoming conventional wisdom among the American Left that America politics as a whole has moved rightwards (more conservative) in the last 30 years. Among the most cogent analyses of the move to the right are those that trace the flow of money (over $2B) from the ultra rich and the large multinational corporations to conservative rightwing foundations and thinktanks (see for example the essays at www.tcfranks.com, and google "tentacles of rage").
The more visible component of this propaganda machine are the talk radio shows and the cable tv news shows. But they sprang from, and still largely depend on, fodder from the think tanks and foundations.
Many on the American Left now accept that unless this inexorable flood of rightwnig propaganda is somehow countered or neutralized, electoral politicking (e.g., fighting to elect Kerry, or voting 3rd party) is somewhat moot, because this decades-old flood of propaganda has also moved the Democratic party to the right much the same as the GOP. Also, the undemocratic structure of the electoral political machine in America (single member, winner take all districts, etc) would seem to disempower 3rd parties except for a spoiler role.
Given the situation outlined above, what good does it do to engage in 3rd party electoral politics?
And more to the point, what can American leftists do to move America to the left, given the power that 3 decades of rightwing propaganda has had on the American political mind?
Would it be more productive trying to land a talk radio gig somewhere?
Hey, it is not about getting the best for the citizens, it is about finding the best way to extract the most money from comsumers, and obtain the highest profits for corporations. Haven't you yet figured out what American is all about.
When the top levels of the government, the corporations, and the media have figured out the best way to disempower the consumer, then progress will be swift. Until then, just keep yer panties on!
well, I do not think it wise for any American to be a good citizen of the p2p networks. One must face reality. Americans who want to use the networks would bave to leech off of citizens in other --more citizen-oriented, as opposed to corporation-oriented -- countries. And those citizens of those citizen-oriented countries should let them leech.
"To each according to his needs, and from each according to his abilities." To be a good citizen of ANY community--p2p community or otherwise--one should abide by that maxim, IMHO.
The old kazaalite let you set your participation level to 1000, and then you could turn off sharing. It still works fine (or at least that is what a friend told me....).
BTW, given the current fascisto-legal environment here in America, I would not recommend that any American citizen share any copyrighted files on any p2p network, but especially not on bittorrent, as that network works with software that can tell any client on the network the IP of every uploader AND every downloader, and you cannot ONLY download on bittorrent.
Seems to me that the best alternative is to use the old version of kazaalite, turn off sharing, and set your participation level to 1000. I see no way for anyone using that configuration to be in any danger. Just my opinion. Anyone else have an opinion on that?
THat is likely google's motto. Somehow google is getting some sort of payment for this--some sort of access or license to operate is being granted, or something....
America was set up from the beginning to maximize investor profit, at the expense of the quality of life of the average person living in America. Well, just look at the early history of America--a great place to be a wealthy businessman--plenty of slaves and indentured servants and exploitable Indian hunting grounds; and with a Constitution set up to guarantee maximum investor profits--at the expense of the quality of life of said slaves, indentured servants and Indians.
And that SAME Constitution is around today. Every other western nation has gone on to modernize their government and system. And as a result they have a better quality of life. But here in America, the structure of our govt still enslaves us, by allowing corporations to do as they pretty much please. It is not as bad as it once was. At least that is their justification. Why, in a couple of minutes, some rightwinger will reply to this post, telling us how good we have it...compared to the 3rd worlders.
Anyway, by stringing us along with slow upgrades, wringing out of the consumer every bit of profit possible before moving on to modern infrastructure, the corporations make more profit. Same as it ever was....
you wrote: I'm pretty much as libertarian as they come, and my fans outnumber my freaks by better than 5 to 1. Now how exactly does that get explained by your theories?
That does not speak to my theory as stated above. My theory is that the American conservative movement is a decades long propaganda movement driven by well-funded think tanks and foundation ($2B of funds (google "tentacles of rage"). One aspect of this propaganda-driven conservative movement is the appeal to the more spiteful and meanspirited aspects of human nature. For some reason it is easier to push this spiteful, hateful, greedy, reactionary buttons of human nature, than it is to tap into the more thoughtful, rational, and trusting core fundamentals of Leftism/Liberalism. I know whereof I speak: when I was of age 28-38, I was a rightwinger, albeit of the Libertarian variety (the atheist flock to that end, and the believers flock to the GOP proper).
I propose that this spiteful aspect of American conservatism can be quantified by spidering the personal info links on slashdot.
You say you have more fans than freaks. That means that more slashdotters like your politics than dislike them. But that does not speak to my theory: my theory holds that rightwing slashdootters are more hateful than leftwing slashdotters. If you are more hateful, then you are more likely to classify another slashdotter as a FOE than as a FRIEND. Thus a rightwing slashdotter would have a HIGH Foe:Friend ration, and a Leftwing Slashdotter would have a LOW Foe:Friend ratio.
I would say that there are more rightwingers (i.e., conservatives/Republicans/Libertarians) on Slashdot than there are Liberals/Progressives/Democrats/Leftists. So, it is not surprising that you as a rightwinger would have a high Fan:Freak ratio.
To elaborate further my post above, if you were to write a script to spider through the friends/foes/freaks/fans of one liberal and one conservative, I would wager that if you assume that each friend of a liberal is a liberal, and that each foe and each freak of a liberal is a conservative (and vice versa for the conservative), then the ratio of friends to foes of any conservative would be lower than that some ratio for any liberal.
THis is the blog for most of the Democratic party activists. Some very informed people there. Also, some real leftists, although most are just typical centrists.
Badnarik wrote: I have to tell you that I'm skeptical of electoral college reform at the federal level. Yes, the system has flaws, but I haven't seen any alternative proposals that don't have serious flaws themselves.
How about one person, one vote? Too democratic for you?
Also, he wrote: Going to a straight popular vote would, perversely, represent the end of American democracy.
This is why I (a former Libertarian myself) say that the Libertarian Party is just a more extreme version of the GOP. Also: Candidates would be inclined to cater to a few urban areas where they can buy the most votes for their buck (or their promise), effectively disenfranchising rural voters. To the extent that the presidency is a representative office, it should represent Peoria and Birmingham as much as it represents New York and Los Angele.
Why not just have the president represent PEOPLE? Too democratic? Oh, the horror....
Every American should have to read Chomsky's _Manufacturing Consent_ . You can find excerpts of it here and here Much of his work and speeches can be found here
When I finally went right to the source, and actuully read chomsky , it helped me make sense of what I had seen and read on the news after 9-11 and during the run-up to the Iraq war.
Edward Herman also has a lot of excellent and insightful material on the media and politics.
The media act as a set of filters that propagate a particular set of ideas to the citizens. This set of ideas is just happens to be about the same as what the rich and the powerful believe and think. More about this here
Probably, they now that all the "Learn Programming in N Days" books are no longer such a big profit center, they are turning to the recreational side of technology, like so many former IT professionals who have been laid off....
Slashdot Mirror
Just like the animals you see around you, when people are in a community in which they fit naturally, their natural drives for social status and their reproductive drives will from time to time drive to do work.
I have news for you: working 50 weeks a year, year in and year out, that aint necessarily a good thing. Yes, some people are twisted and greedy, and they often get rich and powerful and use that to manipulate and exploit their fellow human beings in order to gain more wealth, but that does not mean we have to do what they say.
My post specifically states that the Democratic Party AND the GOP (and the electorate) have been driven RIGHT by the rightwing propaganda machine. The Democratic Party is NOT a leftist organization. The only major Leftist political parties are in other countries. CNN/FOX/CBS et al can say whatever they want about the GOP and the Democrats. Those are not leftist parties.
And the major media never talk about issues either.
Go to some other countries for that....
You wrote:
I could hardly agree with you more. I only continued the narrow scope of the original poster (who seemed to me to be catagorizing the media as Republican biased).
Oh, really?
Hmm. Here is what I wrote:
Many on the American Left now accept that unless this inexorable flood of rightwnig propaganda is somehow countered or neutralized, electoral politicking (e.g., fighting to elect Kerry, or voting 3rd party) is somewhat moot, because this decades-old flood of propaganda has also moved the Democratic party to the right much the same as the GOP.
Hmm. THat is a very peculiar interpretation of what I wrote. Very peculiar and very wrong....
With respect to whether this country (that is controlled by Dems and GOP) has gone rightward or leftward in the last couple of decades, let's take a look at tax policy. Everyone agrees that liberal countries have progressive taxation systems, with high income earners paying high tax rates, and low income earners paying low tax rates. If a country gets more liberal, the tax rates go up, especially on high income earners. As countries get conservative, marginal tax rates go down, especially on high income earners.
So you take a look at this chart of TOP marginal tax rates (what the richest people pay) and tell me whether we are getting more liberal or more conservative. And not to put a real fine point on it, but my argument is that the rightwing propaganda machine has "manufactured consent" for driving down tax rates.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>&g t;
Historical rates (married couples, filing jointly)
Table
chart is YEAR, TOP TAX RATE %, AND TOP BRACKET DOLLAR AMOUNT
1913 7 500,000 1914 7 500,000 1915 7 500,000
1916 15 2,000,000 1917 67 2,000,000
1918 77 1,000,000 1919 73 1,000,000
1920 73 1,000,000 1921 73 1,000,000
1922 58 200,000 1923 43.5 200,000
1924 46 500,000 1925 25 100,000
1926 25 100,000 1927 25 100,000
1928 25 100,000 1929 24 100,000
1930 25 100,000 1931 25 100,000
1932 63 1,000,000 1933 63 1,000,000
1934 63 1,000,000 1935 63 1,000,000
1936 79 5,000,000 1937 79 5,000,000
1938 79 5,000,000 1939 79 5,000,000
1940 81.1 5,000,000 1941 81 5,000,000
1942 88 200,000 1943 88 200,000
1944 94 200,000 1945 94 200,000
1946 86.45 200,000 1947 86.45 200,000
1948 82.13 400,000 1949 82.13 400,000
1950 84.36400,000 1951 91 400,000
1952-1963 92 400,000 1964 77 400,000
1965 70 200,000 1966 70 200,000
1967 70 200,000 1968 75.25 200,000
1969 77 200,000 1970 71.75 200,000
1971-81 ~70 200,000 1982 50 85,600
1983 50 109,400 1984 50 162,400
1985 50 169,020 1986 50 175,250
1987 38.5 90,000 1988 28 29,750
1989 28 30,950 1990 28 32,450
1991 31 82,150 1992 31 86,500
1993 39.6 89,150 1994 39.6 250,000
1995 39.6 256,500 1996 39.6 263,750
1997 39.6 271,050 1998 39.6 278,450
1999 39.6 283,150 2000 39.6 288,350
2001 39.1 297,350 2002 38.6 307,050
2003 35 311,950
>>>>>>
Also, not shown are huge reductions in taxes on unearned income (stocks, etc).
We are moving away from progressive taxation (that "liberal") and towards regressive taxation (that's "conservative"!). No doubt about it.
In a regressive taxation system, those at the bottom of the income scale pay a much greater percent of their income to taxes than do those at the top. THat's a Bad Thing!
Do me a favor--actually READ some of the leftist books and articles out there. Go read Manufacturing Consent (excerpts can be found from my sig). Then go think about it for a couple of years.
I used to think the same way as you. I guess it takes a lot of time and experience added onto the knowledge for it to actually have some effect.
If I or Mr Cobb get a leftwing talk radio show, I can assure you that I will refer to it as propaganda. Propaganda is not necessarily a perjorative/derogatory term with me. It is simply an interpretation of the world with respect to politics. ALL good propaganda has some element of truth to it--from both the Left and Right.
And regarding victimhood, how should the lamb regard the lion? Let me assure you that unless you are well off, independently wealthy, or among the top 25% of earners for a long period of time, it would be wise and healthy for you to regard yourself as a potential victim. Becasue you are one. Try reading _Tunnel in the Sky_ by Heinlein. You aint as Big and Hairy as you think you are.....
I think it is now becoming conventional wisdom among the American Left that America politics as a whole has moved rightwards (more conservative) in the last 30 years. Among the most cogent analyses of the move to the right are those that trace the flow of money (over $2B) from the ultra rich and the large multinational corporations to conservative rightwing foundations and thinktanks (see for example the essays at www.tcfranks.com, and google "tentacles of rage").
The more visible component of this propaganda machine are the talk radio shows and the cable tv news shows. But they sprang from, and still largely depend on, fodder from the think tanks and foundations.
Many on the American Left now accept that unless this inexorable flood of rightwnig propaganda is somehow countered or neutralized, electoral politicking (e.g., fighting to elect Kerry, or voting 3rd party) is somewhat moot, because this decades-old flood of propaganda has also moved the Democratic party to the right much the same as the GOP. Also, the undemocratic structure of the electoral political machine in America (single member, winner take all districts, etc) would seem to disempower 3rd parties except for a spoiler role.
Given the situation outlined above, what good does it do to engage in 3rd party electoral politics?
And more to the point, what can American leftists do to move America to the left, given the power that 3 decades of rightwing propaganda has had on the American political mind?
Would it be more productive trying to land a talk radio gig somewhere?
Hey, it is not about getting the best for the citizens, it is about finding the best way to extract the most money from comsumers, and obtain the highest profits for corporations. Haven't you yet figured out what American is all about.
When the top levels of the government, the corporations, and the media have figured out the best way to disempower the consumer, then progress will be swift. Until then, just keep yer panties on!
Seriously, most users are switching to some form of mozilla (NS or FF). I'm soaking in it right now...
I am having a little trouble following you....can you elaborate?
well, I do not think it wise for any American to be a good citizen of the p2p networks. One must face reality. Americans who want to use the networks would bave to leech off of citizens in other --more citizen-oriented, as opposed to corporation-oriented -- countries. And those citizens of those citizen-oriented countries should let them leech.
"To each according to his needs, and from each according to his abilities." To be a good citizen of ANY community--p2p community or otherwise--one should abide by that maxim, IMHO.
huh???
The old kazaalite let you set your participation level to 1000, and then you could turn off sharing. It still works fine (or at least that is what a friend told me....).
BTW, given the current fascisto-legal environment here in America, I would not recommend that any American citizen share any copyrighted files on any p2p network, but especially not on bittorrent, as that network works with software that can tell any client on the network the IP of every uploader AND every downloader, and you cannot ONLY download on bittorrent.
Seems to me that the best alternative is to use the old version of kazaalite, turn off sharing, and set your participation level to 1000. I see no way for anyone using that configuration to be in any danger. Just my opinion. Anyone else have an opinion on that?
THat is likely google's motto. Somehow google is getting some sort of payment for this--some sort of access or license to operate is being granted, or something....
see, there goes that meanspirited, intolerant, narrowminded Rightwing conservatism again.
America was set up from the beginning to maximize investor profit, at the expense of the quality of life of the average person living in America. Well, just look at the early history of America--a great place to be a wealthy businessman--plenty of slaves and indentured servants and exploitable Indian hunting grounds; and with a Constitution set up to guarantee maximum investor profits--at the expense of the quality of life of said slaves, indentured servants and Indians.
And that SAME Constitution is around today. Every other western nation has gone on to modernize their government and system. And as a result they have a better quality of life. But here in America, the structure of our govt still enslaves us, by allowing corporations to do as they pretty much please. It is not as bad as it once was. At least that is their justification. Why, in a couple of minutes, some rightwinger will reply to this post, telling us how good we have it...compared to the 3rd worlders.
Anyway, by stringing us along with slow upgrades, wringing out of the consumer every bit of profit possible before moving on to modern infrastructure, the corporations make more profit. Same as it ever was....
Aint that how that free enterprise thing works?
Aint America great!?
you wrote:
I'm pretty much as libertarian as they come, and my fans outnumber my freaks by better than 5 to 1. Now how exactly does that get explained by your theories?
That does not speak to my theory as stated above. My theory is that the American conservative movement is a decades long propaganda movement driven by well-funded think tanks and foundation ($2B of funds (google "tentacles of rage"). One aspect of this propaganda-driven conservative movement is the appeal to the more spiteful and meanspirited aspects of human nature. For some reason it is easier to push this spiteful, hateful, greedy, reactionary buttons of human nature, than it is to tap into the more thoughtful, rational, and trusting core fundamentals of Leftism/Liberalism. I know whereof I speak: when I was of age 28-38, I was a rightwinger, albeit of the Libertarian variety (the atheist flock to that end, and the believers flock to the GOP proper).
I propose that this spiteful aspect of American conservatism can be quantified by spidering the personal info links on slashdot.
You say you have more fans than freaks. That means that more slashdotters like your politics than dislike them. But that does not speak to my theory: my theory holds that rightwing slashdootters are more hateful than leftwing slashdotters. If you are more hateful, then you are more likely to classify another slashdotter as a FOE than as a FRIEND. Thus a rightwing slashdotter would have a HIGH Foe:Friend ration, and a Leftwing Slashdotter would have a LOW Foe:Friend ratio.
I would say that there are more rightwingers (i.e., conservatives/Republicans/Libertarians) on Slashdot than there are Liberals/Progressives/Democrats/Leftists. So, it is not surprising that you as a rightwinger would have a high Fan:Freak ratio.
To elaborate further my post above, if you were to write a script to spider through the friends/foes/freaks/fans of one liberal and one conservative, I would wager that if you assume that each friend of a liberal is a liberal, and that each foe and each freak of a liberal is a conservative (and vice versa for the conservative), then the ratio of friends to foes of any conservative would be lower than that some ratio for any liberal.
username dumpster_baby.
THis is the blog for most of the Democratic party activists. Some very informed people there. Also, some real leftists, although most are just typical centrists.
Also, kuro5hin.org
Originaldissent.com is also OK.
It's actually in the constitution. THAT is what our representatives are really supposed to be doing --promoting the GENERAL welfare.
Badnarik wrote:
I have to tell you that I'm skeptical of electoral college reform at the federal level. Yes, the system has flaws, but I haven't seen any alternative proposals that don't have serious flaws themselves.
How about one person, one vote? Too democratic for you?
Also, he wrote:
Going to a straight popular vote would, perversely, represent the end of American democracy.
This is why I (a former Libertarian myself) say that the Libertarian Party is just a more extreme version of the GOP.
Also:
Candidates would be inclined to cater to a few urban areas where they can buy the most votes for their buck (or their promise), effectively disenfranchising rural voters. To the extent that the presidency is a representative office, it should represent Peoria and Birmingham as much as it represents New York and Los Angele.
Why not just have the president represent PEOPLE? Too democratic? Oh, the horror....
Every American should have to read Chomsky's _Manufacturing Consent_ . You can find excerpts of it here and here
Much of his work and speeches can be found here
When I finally went right to the source, and actuully read chomsky , it helped me make sense of what I had seen and read on the news after 9-11 and during the run-up to the Iraq war.
Edward Herman also has a lot of excellent and insightful material on the media and politics.
The media act as a set of filters that propagate a particular set of ideas to the citizens. This set of ideas is just happens to be about the same as what the rich and the powerful believe and think. More about this here
Probably, they now that all the "Learn Programming in N Days" books are no longer such a big profit center, they are turning to the recreational side of technology, like so many former IT professionals who have been laid off....