You'll see soon that getting around the US Supreme Court's problems with the details of the decision won't be as easy as you're claiming.
In particular, the FSC's argument that they were simply resolving an ambiguity in the Florida statutes is very weak, and the USSC justices' questions in this regard were quite direct in a few instances. They pointed out that:
if a deadline seems rather short, then it's incumbent upon the canvassing board to obtain the resources necessary to meet that deadline. Large counties should be able to just bring in more vote counters if they intend to recount all their votes.
the Florida SC's moving of the deadline wasn't actually a solution to the problem, since there were still counties that didn't complete their counts before the new deadline.
moving the deadline for the protest period actually caused a new conflict with the time allotted for the contest period.
Because of all of this, the Florida SC's decision rather arbitrarily altered a whole scheme that had been set up by the legislators - a body that has the ultimate constitutional authority in determing the rules for an election. The USSC reiterated that ultimate authority in their decision, in effect saying, "If you mess with rules set up by the legislature, you'd better have a *damned* good reason."
P.S. Yes, I've seen the little anal posts asking everyone to use SCOTUS. When I intend to shorten the "Supreme Court of the United States", I'll use that acronym (or if I'm writing them or my congressman directly). Here on/., when I mean to say "United States Supreme Court", I'll just shorten it to USSC.:P
Yeah, Clarence Thomas - a Republican appointee - probably just loves to stick it to those black people.
Not that I agree with all of the conservative justices' opinions, but implications of racism and not getting a fair interpretation of the law by minority groups is unfair and uncalled for.
The Gore campaign withdrew their official support of that suit after they realized that it was a dog and that they had "uncovered" other more promising avenues of litigation.
Make no mistake: the Butterfly Ballot issue was their method for makeing a beach head. Their use of a tele-marketing company to ask their supporters to have "problems" with the Butterfly Ballot on the day of the election is a well documented fact.
Despite the hopes of many this does not hand either side a victory really. In some sense it is better for bush because it invalidates a ruling favorable to Gore but it does not nevessarily give him the victory.
It's not a final victory, but definitely good for Bush:
It turns the FSC's previous decision on its ear, claiming that their logic in arriving at it was erroneous - since the FSC's decision conflicted with the US Constitution and Federal statutes. The FSC is now in a rather tight box that limits the way that they can rework their decision. The USSC basically scolded the FSC for not considering the very arguments that the Bush team was making.
It explicitly reiterated the supremacy of the Florida legislature in making electorate decisions. Remember that the heart of this issue is the battle of power between the executive and legislative branches versus the judicial branch. The USSC explicitly reiterated that the legislative branch of Florida has more than just Florida constitution power here - it has a direct duty given by the US Constitution, one that the FSC can't just alter with impunity. This will also mean a great deal in coming days if the Florida legislature decides to flex its muscles and appoint the electors directly.
Finally, it adds more time to the process, and time is an ally to the Bush team on this one.
The U.S. Supreme Court could then review the new decision by the Florida Supreme Court.
Right, but the USSC isn't going to just let the FSC move a few words around in some disingenuous attempt at keeping their same conclusions without seriously reworking their arguments.
The USSC was obviously trying to both give the FSC a chance to save face while also enforcing conformance with the US Constitution and Federal Statutes. If the FSC doesn't back track a bit and try to avoid the appearance of changing Florida statutory law after the election, their decision will be vacated again or maybe even permanently reversed.
Do you honestly think that Bush's conduct has been any better?
Actually, Bush's conduct has been better. Once the 800 lb Gore lawyer and protester brigade descended upon Florida, Bush had to either wage a similar battle or roll over and give the election away to the "squeaky wheel".
In legal terms, Gore was the agressor who threw the first punch over that stupid "butterfly ballot" issue. Ever since then, Bush has been only trying to defend himself against the myriad "problems" that the Gore team has found. In our culture, self defense is not usually considered to be bad behavior, despite the fact that it may require similar tactics of the original attacker.
The fact that the polls indicate a shift in opinion since the election is a good indicator that Gore is doing things that even his own supporters are having trouble stomaching.
The truth is, both candidates are going to come out of this looking bad, and low on support. They're both going to have trouble with re-election.
Not really. Unfortunately, the American public doesn't have an attention span or memory that lasts long enough so that the first election contest affects the outcome of the second one.
Other factors - like whether or not this (and the world) economy goes into recession and can come out again by electin time - will be far more important.
James Randi was a street and stage magician who over the years focused his talents on debunking shucksters. He has written a number of books about individuals have attempted to scam the public, like "psychic" Uri Geller, that "faith healer" Reverend Popoff, and many others.
For those of you who have any degree of credulity regarding John Edwards, that "psychic" guy on SciFi, please go to Mr. Randi's site to learn more about the art of Cold Reading.
The James Randi Educational Foundation is a not-for-profit
organization founded in 1996. Its aim is to promote critical
thinking by reaching out to the public and media with reliable
information about paranormal and supernatural ideas so widespread
in our society today.
The Foundation's goals include:
Creating a new generation of critical thinkers through lively
classroom demonstrations and by reaching out to the next generation
in the form of scholarships and awards.
Demonstrating to the public and the media, through educational
seminars, the consequences of accepting paranormal and supernatural
claims without questioning.
Supporting and conducting research into paranormal claims
through well-designed experiments utilizing "the scientific
method" and by publishing the findings in the JREF official
newsletter, Swift, and other periodicals. Also providing
reliable information on paranormal and pseudoscientific claims
by maintaining a comprehensive library of books, videos, journals,
and archival resources open to the public.
Assisting those who are being attacked as a result of their
investigations and criticism of people who make paranormal claims,
by maintaining a legal defense fund available to assist these
individuals.
To raise public awareness of these issues, the Foundation
offers a $1,000,000 prize to any person or persons who can demonstrate
any psychic, supernatural or paranormal ability of any kind under
mutually agreed upon scientific conditions.
In a contest like this, it's naive to think that public, executive, and judicial opinion can't be swayed by some good old fashioned muck-raking.
Bill Clinton masterfully (and regretfully) brought political spin to a new level when he came onto the national scene. The Republicans have had to either keep up or be exterminated. The Florida debacle is just the latest victory for obfuscation in this new political environment.
The Bush campaign was caught in a dilemma: Stay on the high ground, and the Gore team will definitely win; Join in the fray, and the Gore team will point to similar acts of litigation and protesting.
As I recall the GOP has no qualms about calling voters on election day
As you "recall"? You must have access to news sources that I don't, since this hasn't even been whispered by Gore's supporters in all the news shows that I've been monitoring.
The Democrats hired a tele-marketing firm on the day of the election to create problems where there weren't any.
You can make up other first causes all you want, but the tele-marketing, in concert with the immediate decent of other Democratic heavyweights (Jesse Jackson, Wexler, etc.) upon Florida was really what created this mess.
There is ample legal precedent for counting dimpled ballots. Counting the voters' intent is even the law in backwards places like Texas now
Does it really matter what practices are used elsewhere?
For the past 11 years, Palm Beach County had a policy of explicitly not counting dimpled ballots.
A local run-off type(?) election 8 weeks before this presidential one yielded a winner with 13 votes. The same canvassing board decreed that a hand recount was not necessary.
Theresa Lapoor, a member of the canvassing board, is on record as saying that counting dimpled ballots is improper.
Changing the rules after the election is intrinsically unfair. Can any rational person deem it otherwise?
But the Bush campaign HAS and IS engaged in the same thing.
It's called a "response". If Bush's people had just sat on their hands and let Gore's 800 lb gorilla lawyers have their run of Florida, Gore would have won no matter what the ballots had said.
After the Gore team took the initiative in circumventing Florida's election system ON ELECTION DAY when they hired that tele-marketing firm to call people and ask them to protest, Bush's team had no choice but to respond.
There is a group actively examining and discussing the pros and cons of many new technologies like genetic modification and nanotechnology: The Extropy Institute.
- MAPS and ORBS don't deliver email.
- MAPS and ORBS never had a monopoly like the NSI had until recently.
- Spamming is an issue of privacy and improperly impossed hardship of spam recipients, not censorship. Yes, most spammers would like to play the victim. I don't think many people are buying it.
- "deem" should be replaced with "know" for MAPS, and ORBS doesn't worry about whether or not they're spammers, just whethor or not they're irresponsible enough to leave an open mail relay active.
But yeah, they're just like each other - they both have Internet connections.
Your immune system is designed to react to organic intruders, not synthetic ones. Modern medicine inserts (and leaves in) countless synthetic products into patients, including: screws, plates, needles, threads, pacemakers, sponges:), etc.
Your immune system is normally triggered by the presence of protein-based entities in your blood. The little nanosubs appeared to have the bacterial parts completely encased in the synthetic subs. Your immune system would probably just ignore it.
Don't dismiss the electoral college too quickly
on
eLection '04
·
· Score: 1
And why shouldn't they be? Exactly why should the vote of someone in one place count more or less than the vote of someone in another place?
I've been trying to decide how I feel about this whole electoral college thing too. Here are a couple of reasons why I think that we should keep it:
The President should support more than just the "straight majority" of our nation. He should also feel a little impact from diverse opinions around the country. The people in cosmopolitan areas tend to have very similar biases with each other about things like gun ownership, hunting, rights of animals, use of land for production, importance of the environment, abortion, and the role of religion. Those biases stem from the nature of living in big cities and dealing with day to day life there.
Correspondingly, rural citizens tend to have very similar biases, and considering that some of those rural citizens do important things like feeding the rest of us, should we really just be ignoring them?
Not everything in this nation is decided by a simple majority. We try to consider the rights of minority groups so that no group's voice is drowned out by the majority. Sure, it's a balance - since the minority groups shouldn't be leading us either - but that balance is important to maintain.
We can't forget that the United States of America is just that - a group of united states. They got together for the good of all by agreeing to the Constitution. In order to get some of the less populous states to join the union, the drafters of the constitution agreed to some concessions, including the number of senate representatives from each state, and the number of electoral college votes from each state.
If we get rid of the electoral college because minorities are over-represented, then we should get rid of the senate as well - since it's based upon the same theory of representation.
Late last night I watched the proceedings with much excitement. Finally, Gore called Bush to concede the election. A little while later, the Florida issue came to light and Gore called Bush back to recant the concession.
The Republicans are in almost complete control now. The Democrats majorly f'd up when they were in a similar position back in 93/94. Let's see what happens.
Will they come through on their promises to reduce the size and role of government? Or will they screw it up - raise taxes, put the ten commandments in all of our face, ignore the debt, and waste too much money on corporate subsidies and the military?
Your remarks show a remarkable lack of sophistication, or perhaps deliberate ignorance, of the issues.
If only you could stick your tongue out in your posting, your ad hominem would be complete, but your argument would still be heavily flawed.
Yes, the factors you mention would contribute to some shortcomings in their software industry, but a lack of any possible revenue due to ubiquitous software piracy means that they're more than just behind. Their software industries are doomed to never develop. A lack of respect for copyrights is the most important consideration in all this, and that was my point.
As evidence, look at their hardware industries. SE Asia has a thriving hardware industry... because you can't just photocopy/bit-copy hardware.
As I mentioned before, the damage to their software industries is largely self-inflicted.
It's partially the harshness of Islam, but I see it as more of just a third world mentality.
I spent a few months living in Hyderabad, India, back in 1995, so I feel that I'm somewhat qualified to have an opinion on this subject.
The common people in these countries are so down-trodden, and so ignorant that they really don't know up from down. They follow their popular leaders without question because they can't even begin to understand how the world really works - even to the point that they can be convinced that being even hotter and more uncomfortable in an already hot place is a good idea.
When we were there, we were absolutely amazed at the complete lack of even rudimentary health knowledge. Time and again, we encountered people who didn't even know how to clean a wound or the value of keeping animal urine off of their food.
These environments are ripe to the point of bursting for the takeover of religious fervor. When your whole life is just consumed by misery, promises of eternal happiness in the hereafter are just too good to pass up.
One committed a crime, immediately admitted to it, expressed regret, paid the fine, took all the responsibility upon himself, and eliminated the source of the problem (by quitting drinking) way before ever seeking elected office. I'd dare to add that he would never criticize the officer who arrested him.
The other committed a crime (sexual harrassment), spent millions of others' tax dollars trying to cover it up in addition to other indiscretions that were unearthed during the proceedings, used his unique position in America's government to spin the issue while stonewalling for months, refused to display the sense of shame over being caught red-handed that even Nixon demonstrated, set the example of getting away with a crime that you and I would be put in jail for, and had the unmitigated nerve to expect an apology from the people who were just doing their jobs prosecuting him for a crime. All that was accomplished while he held the highest government office in the USA.
Of all of the things that the government does wrong, I think that this isn't that big of a deal. If someone doesn't want to be a parent, I'm all for helping them to not be. Being a good parent is actually one of the most important long-term jobs in our society. The worst thing for us in the world is to force the most irresponsible segments of our society to be parents against their will because they don't have the money to have abortions. I'm definitely for chipping in to help with the whole abortion thing. I think that man will never overcome a lot of his faults until he takes control of his genes. That will only happen after parenthood is acknowledged as a priviledge, not a right.
As has been said: You need a license to drive a car, sell real estate, or own a gun, but any horny idiot can be a parent.
people who make over $100K don't deserve it
Said like someone who'll never make $100k/year because he never applied himself enough to not surf the net half the day reading/. and looking for porn.
What an enormously short-sighted statement you made. I've employed dozens of people in my life at my multiple businesses started with my own money that I originally made as an egineer. If someone had told me that there were no financial rewards for doing what I did, I would have taken a less taxing job - working less hours so that I could go home in the evening to look at porn, read/., and play video games. Luckily for those people I employed, you aren't running things.
You be sure to let us know when you've decided what the system should be for who deserves what, and we'll get to work implementing it.
I would classify myself much as you do: a fiscal Republican, social Democrat. However, I find the fiscal issues to currently outweigh the social ones. I think that Bush will be more likely to lower my tax burden, and that's what I care about most in this particular election.
It's hard to say what might happen in the supreme court. I'd rather not see abortion illegalized (I wouldn't mind seeing RU486 in the drinking water like flouride, for that matter) but that one issue isn't worth moving toward even bigger federal government. As our pal Nader points out: If Roe v. Wade is overturned, the abortion issue goes back to being a state by state decision, so it actually wouldn't be strictly illegalized. Is that so bad?
While many pundits will complain that Bush is the governer of maybe the worst-managed state in the Union
I would dispute that statement. I just moved to Houston, TX, at the beginning of 2000. I've now lived in California, Louisiana, Georgia, Florida, and Texas. Texas seems to be run no worse than any of those other states, overall: the schools are actually pretty good (unlike California), we feel safe crime-wise (unlike Louisiana), we have more access to parks and "green areas" than anywhere we've ever lived, and dealing with the typical government bureaucracy getting licenses and such has been less painful than anywhere else we've ever lived. In that comparison, it's especially important to know that TX has no state income tax.
One person's informed is another person's ignorant. Moore is ignorant of the lack of importance of his whiny point of view. The fact that he tries to focus people on the plights of killers rather than the victims of those killers - just to promote his candidate - is ignorant in the extreme.
His attempt to cloak such misguided ideas in satirical humor doesn't change the fact that he's trying to heavily push his political ideas.
Slashdot Mirror
In particular, the FSC's argument that they were simply resolving an ambiguity in the Florida statutes is very weak, and the USSC justices' questions in this regard were quite direct in a few instances. They pointed out that:
- if a deadline seems rather short, then it's incumbent upon the canvassing board to obtain the resources necessary to meet that deadline. Large counties should be able to just bring in more vote counters if they intend to recount all their votes.
- the Florida SC's moving of the deadline wasn't actually a solution to the problem, since there were still counties that didn't complete their counts before the new deadline.
- moving the deadline for the protest period actually caused a new conflict with the time allotted for the contest period.
Because of all of this, the Florida SC's decision rather arbitrarily altered a whole scheme that had been set up by the legislators - a body that has the ultimate constitutional authority in determing the rules for an election. The USSC reiterated that ultimate authority in their decision, in effect saying, "If you mess with rules set up by the legislature, you'd better have a *damned* good reason."P.S. Yes, I've seen the little anal posts asking everyone to use SCOTUS. When I intend to shorten the "Supreme Court of the United States", I'll use that acronym (or if I'm writing them or my congressman directly). Here on
(democrat, black, gay, moslem, budhist)
Yeah, Clarence Thomas - a Republican appointee - probably just loves to stick it to those black people.
Not that I agree with all of the conservative justices' opinions, but implications of racism and not getting a fair interpretation of the law by minority groups is unfair and uncalled for.
The Gore campaign withdrew their official support of that suit after they realized that it was a dog and that they had "uncovered" other more promising avenues of litigation.
Make no mistake: the Butterfly Ballot issue was their method for makeing a beach head. Their use of a tele-marketing company to ask their supporters to have "problems" with the Butterfly Ballot on the day of the election is a well documented fact.
It's not a final victory, but definitely good for Bush:
The U.S. Supreme Court could then review the new decision by the Florida Supreme Court.
Right, but the USSC isn't going to just let the FSC move a few words around in some disingenuous attempt at keeping their same conclusions without seriously reworking their arguments.
The USSC was obviously trying to both give the FSC a chance to save face while also enforcing conformance with the US Constitution and Federal Statutes. If the FSC doesn't back track a bit and try to avoid the appearance of changing Florida statutory law after the election, their decision will be vacated again or maybe even permanently reversed.
Do you honestly think that Bush's conduct has been any better?
Actually, Bush's conduct has been better. Once the 800 lb Gore lawyer and protester brigade descended upon Florida, Bush had to either wage a similar battle or roll over and give the election away to the "squeaky wheel".
In legal terms, Gore was the agressor who threw the first punch over that stupid "butterfly ballot" issue. Ever since then, Bush has been only trying to defend himself against the myriad "problems" that the Gore team has found. In our culture, self defense is not usually considered to be bad behavior, despite the fact that it may require similar tactics of the original attacker.
If you've been following the opinion polls on all this, everything is sharply divided
That's not quite accurate:
ABC news poll.
CBS news poll.
The fact that the polls indicate a shift in opinion since the election is a good indicator that Gore is doing things that even his own supporters are having trouble stomaching.
The truth is, both candidates are going to come out of this looking bad, and low on support. They're both going to have trouble with re-election.
Not really. Unfortunately, the American public doesn't have an attention span or memory that lasts long enough so that the first election contest affects the outcome of the second one.
Other factors - like whether or not this (and the world) economy goes into recession and can come out again by electin time - will be far more important.
James Randi was a street and stage magician who over the years focused his talents on debunking shucksters. He has written a number of books about individuals have attempted to scam the public, like "psychic" Uri Geller, that "faith healer" Reverend Popoff, and many others.
For those of you who have any degree of credulity regarding John Edwards, that "psychic" guy on SciFi, please go to Mr. Randi's site to learn more about the art of Cold Reading.
From the JREF web site:
The James Randi Educational Foundation is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1996. Its aim is to promote critical thinking by reaching out to the public and media with reliable information about paranormal and supernatural ideas so widespread in our society today.
The Foundation's goals include:
Creating a new generation of critical thinkers through lively classroom demonstrations and by reaching out to the next generation in the form of scholarships and awards.
Demonstrating to the public and the media, through educational seminars, the consequences of accepting paranormal and supernatural claims without questioning.
Supporting and conducting research into paranormal claims through well-designed experiments utilizing "the scientific method" and by publishing the findings in the JREF official newsletter, Swift, and other periodicals. Also providing reliable information on paranormal and pseudoscientific claims by maintaining a comprehensive library of books, videos, journals, and archival resources open to the public.
Assisting those who are being attacked as a result of their investigations and criticism of people who make paranormal claims, by maintaining a legal defense fund available to assist these individuals.
To raise public awareness of these issues, the Foundation offers a $1,000,000 prize to any person or persons who can demonstrate any psychic, supernatural or paranormal ability of any kind under mutually agreed upon scientific conditions.
Ah, the old "they MADE me do it" excuse.
In a contest like this, it's naive to think that public, executive, and judicial opinion can't be swayed by some good old fashioned muck-raking.
Bill Clinton masterfully (and regretfully) brought political spin to a new level when he came onto the national scene. The Republicans have had to either keep up or be exterminated. The Florida debacle is just the latest victory for obfuscation in this new political environment.
The Bush campaign was caught in a dilemma: Stay on the high ground, and the Gore team will definitely win; Join in the fray, and the Gore team will point to similar acts of litigation and protesting.
As I recall the GOP has no qualms about calling voters on election day
As you "recall"? You must have access to news sources that I don't, since this hasn't even been whispered by Gore's supporters in all the news shows that I've been monitoring.
The Democrats hired a tele-marketing firm on the day of the election to create problems where there weren't any.
You can make up other first causes all you want, but the tele-marketing, in concert with the immediate decent of other Democratic heavyweights (Jesse Jackson, Wexler, etc.) upon Florida was really what created this mess.
As with myself, a lot, if not a majority, of Americans vote for President and few other offices
The national average for voters who don't select a president is around 2%. Florida's no-votes for President is around 2%.
This whole "count the votes" is just an effort to shake the Magic EightBall(tm) and get a different answer for Al Gore.
Does it really matter what practices are used elsewhere?
Changing the rules after the election is intrinsically unfair. Can any rational person deem it otherwise?
But the Bush campaign HAS and IS engaged in the same thing.
It's called a "response". If Bush's people had just sat on their hands and let Gore's 800 lb gorilla lawyers have their run of Florida, Gore would have won no matter what the ballots had said.
After the Gore team took the initiative in circumventing Florida's election system ON ELECTION DAY when they hired that tele-marketing firm to call people and ask them to protest, Bush's team had no choice but to respond.
There is a group actively examining and discussing the pros and cons of many new technologies like genetic modification and nanotechnology: The Extropy Institute.
- MAPS and ORBS don't deliver email.
- MAPS and ORBS never had a monopoly like the NSI had until recently.
- Spamming is an issue of privacy and improperly impossed hardship of spam recipients, not censorship. Yes, most spammers would like to play the victim. I don't think many people are buying it.
- "deem" should be replaced with "know" for MAPS, and ORBS doesn't worry about whether or not they're spammers, just whethor or not they're irresponsible enough to leave an open mail relay active.
But yeah, they're just like each other - they both have Internet connections.
Your immune system is designed to react to organic intruders, not synthetic ones. Modern medicine inserts (and leaves in) countless synthetic products into patients, including: screws, plates, needles, threads, pacemakers, sponges :), etc.
Your immune system is normally triggered by the presence of protein-based entities in your blood. The little nanosubs appeared to have the bacterial parts completely encased in the synthetic subs. Your immune system would probably just ignore it.
I've been trying to decide how I feel about this whole electoral college thing too. Here are a couple of reasons why I think that we should keep it:
Correspondingly, rural citizens tend to have very similar biases, and considering that some of those rural citizens do important things like feeding the rest of us, should we really just be ignoring them?
Not everything in this nation is decided by a simple majority. We try to consider the rights of minority groups so that no group's voice is drowned out by the majority. Sure, it's a balance - since the minority groups shouldn't be leading us either - but that balance is important to maintain.
Late last night I watched the proceedings with much excitement. Finally, Gore called Bush to concede the election. A little while later, the Florida issue came to light and Gore called Bush back to recant the concession.
All I have to say is this:
Can't Gore ever keep his word?
Maybe just this once?
The Republicans are in almost complete control now. The Democrats majorly f'd up when they were in a similar position back in 93/94. Let's see what happens.
Will they come through on their promises to reduce the size and role of government? Or will they screw it up - raise taxes, put the ten commandments in all of our face, ignore the debt, and waste too much money on corporate subsidies and the military?
Your remarks show a remarkable lack of sophistication, or perhaps deliberate ignorance, of the issues.
If only you could stick your tongue out in your posting, your ad hominem would be complete, but your argument would still be heavily flawed.
Yes, the factors you mention would contribute to some shortcomings in their software industry, but a lack of any possible revenue due to ubiquitous software piracy means that they're more than just behind. Their software industries are doomed to never develop. A lack of respect for copyrights is the most important consideration in all this, and that was my point.
As evidence, look at their hardware industries. SE Asia has a thriving hardware industry... because you can't just photocopy/bit-copy hardware.
As I mentioned before, the damage to their software industries is largely self-inflicted.
It's partially the harshness of Islam, but I see it as more of just a third world mentality.
I spent a few months living in Hyderabad, India, back in 1995, so I feel that I'm somewhat qualified to have an opinion on this subject.
The common people in these countries are so down-trodden, and so ignorant that they really don't know up from down. They follow their popular leaders without question because they can't even begin to understand how the world really works - even to the point that they can be convinced that being even hotter and more uncomfortable in an already hot place is a good idea.
When we were there, we were absolutely amazed at the complete lack of even rudimentary health knowledge. Time and again, we encountered people who didn't even know how to clean a wound or the value of keeping animal urine off of their food.
These environments are ripe to the point of bursting for the takeover of religious fervor. When your whole life is just consumed by misery, promises of eternal happiness in the hereafter are just too good to pass up.
By all means, lets compare the two:
One committed a crime, immediately admitted to it, expressed regret, paid the fine, took all the responsibility upon himself, and eliminated the source of the problem (by quitting drinking) way before ever seeking elected office. I'd dare to add that he would never criticize the officer who arrested him.
The other committed a crime (sexual harrassment), spent millions of others' tax dollars trying to cover it up in addition to other indiscretions that were unearthed during the proceedings, used his unique position in America's government to spin the issue while stonewalling for months, refused to display the sense of shame over being caught red-handed that even Nixon demonstrated, set the example of getting away with a crime that you and I would be put in jail for, and had the unmitigated nerve to expect an apology from the people who were just doing their jobs prosecuting him for a crime. All that was accomplished while he held the highest government office in the USA.
it should _NOT_ be subsidized by the government
/. and looking for porn.
/., and play video games. Luckily for those people I employed, you aren't running things.
Of all of the things that the government does wrong, I think that this isn't that big of a deal. If someone doesn't want to be a parent, I'm all for helping them to not be. Being a good parent is actually one of the most important long-term jobs in our society. The worst thing for us in the world is to force the most irresponsible segments of our society to be parents against their will because they don't have the money to have abortions. I'm definitely for chipping in to help with the whole abortion thing. I think that man will never overcome a lot of his faults until he takes control of his genes. That will only happen after parenthood is acknowledged as a priviledge, not a right.
As has been said: You need a license to drive a car, sell real estate, or own a gun, but any horny idiot can be a parent.
people who make over $100K don't deserve it
Said like someone who'll never make $100k/year because he never applied himself enough to not surf the net half the day reading
What an enormously short-sighted statement you made. I've employed dozens of people in my life at my multiple businesses started with my own money that I originally made as an egineer. If someone had told me that there were no financial rewards for doing what I did, I would have taken a less taxing job - working less hours so that I could go home in the evening to look at porn, read
You be sure to let us know when you've decided what the system should be for who deserves what, and we'll get to work implementing it.
No, no, try Kabul, Afghanistan for a great place to live.
Never forget: The religious masses are full of stupid people.
I would classify myself much as you do: a fiscal Republican, social Democrat. However, I find the fiscal issues to currently outweigh the social ones. I think that Bush will be more likely to lower my tax burden, and that's what I care about most in this particular election.
It's hard to say what might happen in the supreme court. I'd rather not see abortion illegalized (I wouldn't mind seeing RU486 in the drinking water like flouride, for that matter) but that one issue isn't worth moving toward even bigger federal government. As our pal Nader points out: If Roe v. Wade is overturned, the abortion issue goes back to being a state by state decision, so it actually wouldn't be strictly illegalized. Is that so bad?
While many pundits will complain that Bush is the governer of maybe the worst-managed state in the Union
I would dispute that statement. I just moved to Houston, TX, at the beginning of 2000. I've now lived in California, Louisiana, Georgia, Florida, and Texas. Texas seems to be run no worse than any of those other states, overall: the schools are actually pretty good (unlike California), we feel safe crime-wise (unlike Louisiana), we have more access to parks and "green areas" than anywhere we've ever lived, and dealing with the typical government bureaucracy getting licenses and such has been less painful than anywhere else we've ever lived. In that comparison, it's especially important to know that TX has no state income tax.
One person's informed is another person's ignorant. Moore is ignorant of the lack of importance of his whiny point of view. The fact that he tries to focus people on the plights of killers rather than the victims of those killers - just to promote his candidate - is ignorant in the extreme.
His attempt to cloak such misguided ideas in satirical humor doesn't change the fact that he's trying to heavily push his political ideas.