The people I mentioned have given me guidance at times too, and being that they are in my network of friends, then they have influenced me, and made me who I am, in part, as well.
That said, I'm still not Gay, a drug user, an ex-felon, etc... BUT... I do understand them better than people who don't know such groups. To put this back on Obama, he said it very well himself, that some of these views are VERY common in minority populations. The mainstream does ignore them.
I don't want to sound like an Obama cheerleader, I'm just giving him the benefit of the doubt, just like I'm giving some of McCain's background the benefit of the doubt. I'd rather go individual actions, than the actions of people surrounding them. I don't have anything pointing to Obama being anti-American (running for the highest office, would kind of belay that point, I'd think), and nor do I have any evidence to be suspicious of McCain being corrupt (Keating 5), or as the media has been spamming lately, senile.
To balance things a bit, I don't think Obama was being 100% honest when he said he wasn't aware of Wright's inflammatory idiocy, it goes down with not inhaling as some of the most moronic damage control in modern political history.
Except Flickr and Del.icio.us, of course. I can see some nice possibilities with those two services integrating with Google.
All of the search bits though... Ugh. I hated Yahoo when it was the only big player in the search/portal market, I tried to avoid using it like the plague sticking to the crappy DMOZ, Hotbot, and Webcrawler alternatives. Though getting listed on Yahoo in the mid-90's was shades of awesome.
I don't think that not being tortured is a debatable "human right", and I actually get nauseous when I think that other people think its fine and dandy. When this debated started happening in earnest, was the first time I EVER felt ashamed of being an American.
Seriously though, I agree. Obama is as flawed as McCain, though I think the "experience" argument is a no-go for either side. Being in senate isn't really considered "leadership" experience, which is why we've only elected 2 or 3 senators, versus the bucket full of Governors.
Hmmm... I'd really had to be judged by my friends, and associates.
A couple of them are anarchists. A few of them use drugs (psychedelics and marijuana). A couple of them are libertarians. One of them is a neo-con. Some of them have served jail time, one or two prison time. Some of them are high school drop outs. A couple of them are homophobic/racist/sexist. 80% of them pirate music. Most of them look at porn more raunchy than Playboy. There is a couple Muslims, Jew's, and Christian fundamentalists. One or two of them are homosexual.
Oddly I am none of the above. What a weird world we live in, where I can associate with people who are different than me, and not share their views.
This crappy "you know someone with distasteful opinions" crap is getting DAMN old. If thats all you can think of to discredit someone, it is a credit to the person your trying to bash.
The problem is that McCain has moved left; in 2000 he was fairly solidly conservative. Since then, like the rest of the republican party, he's betrayed his roots. The republicans were left with little choice. Nearly every single elected republican official proved they weren't conservative.
The odd thing is that most liberals would disagree with you, and claim he moved RIGHT since 2000. In 2000 McCain was the perfect moderate, blissfully pissing off both parties at will. Now he's toeing the party line on almost every issue.
I, as a left leaning moderate, would have voted for him in 2000. Now, I can't with good conscience, since he somehow shed all of those "deeply held" convictions that had nothing to do with partisan politics.
I also, though, don't think that supporting torture can be seen as a move to the left.:)
I was right up there with you until he voted against that torture bill. He was hardline against even our perceived use of torture up until then. If the guy's willing to change his mind on that in the name of politics, I can't trust him.
The worse bit, is that it was one of his most "deeply held convictions", I can understand chanign your mind. But on something you rallied against for years? Something you've been outspoken on? Lord.
But then again, anyone who endorses torture should be forever banned from holding any public office. I mean its bloody torture...
Its actually encouraging. Recently the GOP was turning into the theocracy party, so its nice that both "values" candidates were rejected by the voters, and moving a little more moderate, instead of inhabiting "far right, totalitarian, Christian values for all, fascist" land, as they have been doing since the late 80s. It should also be taken as the refreshing fact that the republican "base" doesn't matter any more.
This isn't a snub against republicans, but there "base" was scary as hell.
At least in this election we can have debates on policy, instead of stupid values/wedge issues. That is if the media will let the two candidates has a substantiative debate.
I still stand by the analogy; "Hillary is to Democrat, what McCain is to Republican"... Meaning neither of them really are members of the parties they stand in front of. Hillary was a moderate Republican, and McCain is a... Moderate Rupublican.
When you need a single person, having one who selects a wide variety of peers to take advice from and actually listens to them would be nice. And for that you probably require mainly intelligence, a willingness to actually listen and the guts to actually make a decision and stand by it.
No disagreement there. But I still think we're both missing something, since you basically described the current president, and his cabinet.
And we can see how well he is doing.
I don't know what essential quality he's missing though. Perhaps he has too much conviction, and we should include flexibility in your criteria for a good head honcho.
I'm sure the "common man" didn't think much of you looking down your nose at him either, although I seriously doubt you've really dealt with that many. The problem with elitists is they never venture far from their own watering hole and only mingle with their own kind so they can preen each other's feathers and tell each other how much better, much more intelligent they are than the rest of the world.
Actually, you are quite wrong. I grew up solidly middle class, and my parents were (and still are) blue collar. Then I lived in one of the poorest areas of my city for years, and made plenty of disreputable friends. But I managed to pull myself out of it, and get an education above a GED. I still don't live in the richest area, and I doubt that anyone I consider a friend makes anywhere near six figures. I also am pretty much the best educated of anyone I associate, most of my friends haven't even stepped on a college campus in their lives.
Try not to make up imaginary backgrounds for people you don't know, and then argue against them. Its a fallacy.
If you a brain, you would have known that was not an rant against intelligence, but of those in the "intellectual class." There's a difference. These are the very same people who during WWII told us that Hitler really wasn't such a bad guy and that we shouldn't get involved.
But we don't even have an "intellectual" class involved in politics, that I see. Could you point them out, please?
And yes, it is a pretty big debate against intelligence, even if your statement was not overtly saying so, it still is nothing but a symptom of a larger problem in America. Americans are suspicious of anyone smarter, or more educated, than them.
As for Hitler (so much for avoiding the Godwin), it wasn't just the "intellecuals" who were against involvement, the average American was against involvement, which is why we avoided overt involvement until Pearl Harbor. Hitler was doing an amped up version of what we were trying to do, and actually modeled much of his early strategies off of the American, and British, eugenics movements. Antisemitism was also pretty much endemic in the US at the time too.
First off you cannot reason with the unreasonable.
There is no harm in first trying. You can't brand someone unreasonable, until you try to reason with them. I don't like the "shoot first, ask questions later" track we've been on post-WWII, it doesn't work, and generally makes situations worse, and gives us more enemies.
And we know WHY Al Qaeda and other terrorists hate us. They want to bring us down so they can create a world where their brand of Islamic fundamentalism is the law.
I have a feeling it is a MUCH more complicated beast than that. Rhetorically, did the IRA want all of the UK to be Catholic, or did they just want the British to leave them alone? We've been unfavorably involved in the Middle East for years and years, some people mike take umbrage at that. They want us to go away, and stop meddling in their affairs, and randomly bombing their countries. I don't want to bring Israel up, but regardless of your feelings on that matter, you can see that our support for them makes us REALLY unpopular in the region.
The religious aspect plays a roll, though. But it is but one of a full array of reasons behind terrorism. From the looks of thing, it plays a roll on both sides.
We virtually ignored the attack in 1993 and so left ourselves open for 9-11.
No argument there. We pretty much flubbed the emerging threat in the beginning, and are still paying for it.
' I think perhaps you'd be happier in a country with a autocracy or perhaps a absolute monarchy ruling. Can't get more elitist that someone born to the throne and that way you don't have to worry about all those "common folk" having a say-so.
Wrong. I'd be happy if the main metric for nominating a president was "folk appeal", since it has nothing to do with your ability to lead. I'd also be happy if stupid value based items (abortion, gay rights, evolution, what church you go to) were stricken from the public debate.
But then again I only literate people should be allowed to vote.
Your using elitist in a different sense than its being used in our normal "discourse", but otherwise I'd agree.
Though, I still would like someone who realized that he is more educated, smarter than most. Too much compromise is a bad thing, as is too much populism.
he elitist will always look after his own special interests just by the fact that his worldview leans that way.
Ahh.. you, sir, are correct. sorry about that, all I really remembered from slumming about Lowell in college (nice, but dangerous bike ride, beautiful short hike though) was the Flagstaff and Illinois connect. I stand corrected.
Actually, your half right. It also is a derivitive of the initials P.L., for Percival Lowell, the founder of the observatory. And it fits into the Greek God motif of the existing planets, especially since it is the god of the underworld, which is somewhat fitting.
The initial suggestion was based on the character, but the above reason were why it was actually selected.
Yes, a definition that was VOTED on, and mainly to keep the amount of "planets" to a neat, tidy, manageable level.
Last I checked, science wasn't democratic. Or can instate a vote to redifine "element" as to remove Plutonium, since its dangerous, and we already have too many of the silly things.
Who really cares if we have 30 extra planets. I didn't know there was a hard limit of 10 planets in a solar system. Can some one please cite where it says this?
For the optimal MMO experience, you want to get in while there are still plenty of new players coming in so you'll have people of the same level to quest, hunt and trade with, but after the major bugs have been worked out.
Amen, I started WoW about 2 weeks after launch, the early game was pretty fun, finding your market niche, playing the AH, exploring new instances with fellow newbs. I played my ally druid to 60, and promptly quit (school, and the fact that Raiding sucks) shortly after they opened Silithus up. I started playing again a couple weeks after BC came out, and rolled a new horde toon... It was much less fun, every item under 30 was massively overpriced thanks to twinks, but there was no market in ANY trade skill items, except high level stuff, and mid-level potions/enchants. Finding people to do most instances is impossible, unless there is a twink drop. That and the fact that all the 56-60 content is dead, which is a shame since some of the best instances are in that range (scholo and strat rocked, as did Onyxia/MC raids).
I quit about a year later, after leveling my shamie to 70, and getting a couple 60's. I didn't want to do the pigeonhole raid thing.
I miss it when there were very few cookie cutter builds, since people were still figuring out their classes, too.
I'm planning on trying WAR about a month after release, when the rush dies down, and some of the dire bugs get quashed. I might migrate back to WoW for a month or so after WotLK, just to see what they added, and join in some groups whose never actually run any 70+ instances. Being confused together leads to better grouping.
About six seconds after the constitution was drafted, there were taxes.
I am all about people opting out of taxes, but they are no longer allowed to use any services payed for by them, including roads, hospitals, police and fire protection, etc...
Out of curiosity, how is property a right? Where is this claimed? Can I just claim something as a right, then, like... say... "health", or "the basic necessities of life"?
If I can, I'd say these have a higher priority than base greed.
I'm an even bigger wacko... I have empathy for the poor, and don't want to see anyone suffer. I also missed the day when they were passing out the Ayn Rand kool-aid, and thus don't see pure greed as a valid ethical stance, and thus don't feel bad forcing inhumane people to act humanely.
People should always come first, period.
Granted I don't think we should elevate the poor to the level of the rich, or topple the rich to the middle class or below, achievement does have some worth, but there comes a point where too much is too much. Eventually greed begins to cost civilization as a whole, and at that point society should demand it fixed.
Often times libertarianism comes across as sociopathy. I have meet some sane libertarians, but they seem to be the exception, and not the rule.
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Looking at your moderation, I would include that they also are missing the gene for a sense of humor.
The people I mentioned have given me guidance at times too, and being that they are in my network of friends, then they have influenced me, and made me who I am, in part, as well.
That said, I'm still not Gay, a drug user, an ex-felon, etc... BUT... I do understand them better than people who don't know such groups. To put this back on Obama, he said it very well himself, that some of these views are VERY common in minority populations. The mainstream does ignore them.
I don't want to sound like an Obama cheerleader, I'm just giving him the benefit of the doubt, just like I'm giving some of McCain's background the benefit of the doubt. I'd rather go individual actions, than the actions of people surrounding them. I don't have anything pointing to Obama being anti-American (running for the highest office, would kind of belay that point, I'd think), and nor do I have any evidence to be suspicious of McCain being corrupt (Keating 5), or as the media has been spamming lately, senile.
To balance things a bit, I don't think Obama was being 100% honest when he said he wasn't aware of Wright's inflammatory idiocy, it goes down with not inhaling as some of the most moronic damage control in modern political history.
Except Flickr and Del.icio.us, of course. I can see some nice possibilities with those two services integrating with Google.
All of the search bits though... Ugh. I hated Yahoo when it was the only big player in the search/portal market, I tried to avoid using it like the plague sticking to the crappy DMOZ, Hotbot, and Webcrawler alternatives. Though getting listed on Yahoo in the mid-90's was shades of awesome.
I don't think that not being tortured is a debatable "human right", and I actually get nauseous when I think that other people think its fine and dandy. When this debated started happening in earnest, was the first time I EVER felt ashamed of being an American.
Torture is abhorrent, no matter how you paint it.
No one in their right mind
Nice.
Seriously though, I agree. Obama is as flawed as McCain, though I think the "experience" argument is a no-go for either side. Being in senate isn't really considered "leadership" experience, which is why we've only elected 2 or 3 senators, versus the bucket full of Governors.
Hmmm... I'd really had to be judged by my friends, and associates.
A couple of them are anarchists. A few of them use drugs (psychedelics and marijuana). A couple of them are libertarians. One of them is a neo-con. Some of them have served jail time, one or two prison time. Some of them are high school drop outs. A couple of them are homophobic/racist/sexist. 80% of them pirate music. Most of them look at porn more raunchy than Playboy. There is a couple Muslims, Jew's, and Christian fundamentalists. One or two of them are homosexual.
Oddly I am none of the above. What a weird world we live in, where I can associate with people who are different than me, and not share their views.
This crappy "you know someone with distasteful opinions" crap is getting DAMN old. If thats all you can think of to discredit someone, it is a credit to the person your trying to bash.
Amen!
er.... Damn.
The problem is that McCain has moved left; in 2000 he was fairly solidly conservative. Since then, like the rest of the republican party, he's betrayed his roots. The republicans were left with little choice. Nearly every single elected republican official proved they weren't conservative.
:)
The odd thing is that most liberals would disagree with you, and claim he moved RIGHT since 2000. In 2000 McCain was the perfect moderate, blissfully pissing off both parties at will. Now he's toeing the party line on almost every issue.
I, as a left leaning moderate, would have voted for him in 2000. Now, I can't with good conscience, since he somehow shed all of those "deeply held" convictions that had nothing to do with partisan politics.
I also, though, don't think that supporting torture can be seen as a move to the left.
I was right up there with you until he voted against that torture bill. He was hardline against even our perceived use of torture up until then. If the guy's willing to change his mind on that in the name of politics, I can't trust him.
The worse bit, is that it was one of his most "deeply held convictions", I can understand chanign your mind. But on something you rallied against for years? Something you've been outspoken on? Lord.
But then again, anyone who endorses torture should be forever banned from holding any public office. I mean its bloody torture...
Its actually encouraging. Recently the GOP was turning into the theocracy party, so its nice that both "values" candidates were rejected by the voters, and moving a little more moderate, instead of inhabiting "far right, totalitarian, Christian values for all, fascist" land, as they have been doing since the late 80s. It should also be taken as the refreshing fact that the republican "base" doesn't matter any more.
This isn't a snub against republicans, but there "base" was scary as hell.
At least in this election we can have debates on policy, instead of stupid values/wedge issues. That is if the media will let the two candidates has a substantiative debate.
I still stand by the analogy; "Hillary is to Democrat, what McCain is to Republican"... Meaning neither of them really are members of the parties they stand in front of. Hillary was a moderate Republican, and McCain is a... Moderate Rupublican.
When you need a single person, having one who selects a wide variety of peers to take advice from and actually listens to them would be nice. And for that you probably require mainly intelligence, a willingness to actually listen and the guts to actually make a decision and stand by it.
No disagreement there. But I still think we're both missing something, since you basically described the current president, and his cabinet.
And we can see how well he is doing.
I don't know what essential quality he's missing though. Perhaps he has too much conviction, and we should include flexibility in your criteria for a good head honcho.
I'm sure the "common man" didn't think much of you looking down your nose at him either, although I seriously doubt you've really dealt with that many. The problem with elitists is they never venture far from their own watering hole and only mingle with their own kind so they can preen each other's feathers and tell each other how much better, much more intelligent they are than the rest of the world.
Actually, you are quite wrong. I grew up solidly middle class, and my parents were (and still are) blue collar. Then I lived in one of the poorest areas of my city for years, and made plenty of disreputable friends. But I managed to pull myself out of it, and get an education above a GED. I still don't live in the richest area, and I doubt that anyone I consider a friend makes anywhere near six figures. I also am pretty much the best educated of anyone I associate, most of my friends haven't even stepped on a college campus in their lives.
Try not to make up imaginary backgrounds for people you don't know, and then argue against them. Its a fallacy.
If you a brain, you would have known that was not an rant against intelligence, but of those in the "intellectual class." There's a difference. These are the very same people who during WWII told us that Hitler really wasn't such a bad guy and that we shouldn't get involved.
But we don't even have an "intellectual" class involved in politics, that I see. Could you point them out, please?
And yes, it is a pretty big debate against intelligence, even if your statement was not overtly saying so, it still is nothing but a symptom of a larger problem in America. Americans are suspicious of anyone smarter, or more educated, than them.
As for Hitler (so much for avoiding the Godwin), it wasn't just the "intellecuals" who were against involvement, the average American was against involvement, which is why we avoided overt involvement until Pearl Harbor. Hitler was doing an amped up version of what we were trying to do, and actually modeled much of his early strategies off of the American, and British, eugenics movements. Antisemitism was also pretty much endemic in the US at the time too.
First off you cannot reason with the unreasonable.
There is no harm in first trying. You can't brand someone unreasonable, until you try to reason with them. I don't like the "shoot first, ask questions later" track we've been on post-WWII, it doesn't work, and generally makes situations worse, and gives us more enemies.
And we know WHY Al Qaeda and other terrorists hate us. They want to bring us down so they can create a world where their brand of Islamic fundamentalism is the law.
I have a feeling it is a MUCH more complicated beast than that. Rhetorically, did the IRA want all of the UK to be Catholic, or did they just want the British to leave them alone? We've been unfavorably involved in the Middle East for years and years, some people mike take umbrage at that. They want us to go away, and stop meddling in their affairs, and randomly bombing their countries. I don't want to bring Israel up, but regardless of your feelings on that matter, you can see that our support for them makes us REALLY unpopular in the region.
The religious aspect plays a roll, though. But it is but one of a full array of reasons behind terrorism. From the looks of thing, it plays a roll on both sides.
We virtually ignored the attack in 1993 and so left ourselves open for 9-11.
No argument there. We pretty much flubbed the emerging threat in the beginning, and are still paying for it.
' I think perhaps you'd be happier in a country with a autocracy or perhaps a absolute monarchy ruling. Can't get more elitist that someone born to the throne and that way you don't have to worry about all those "common folk" having a say-so.
Wrong. I'd be happy if the main metric for nominating a president was "folk appeal", since it has nothing to do with your ability to lead. I'd also be happy if stupid value based items (abortion, gay rights, evolution, what church you go to) were stricken from the public debate.
But then again I only literate people should be allowed to vote.
Your using elitist in a different sense than its being used in our normal "discourse", but otherwise I'd agree.
Though, I still would like someone who realized that he is more educated, smarter than most. Too much compromise is a bad thing, as is too much populism.
he elitist will always look after his own special interests just by the fact that his worldview leans that way.
I always thought that this was universally true.
Ahh.. you, sir, are correct. sorry about that, all I really remembered from slumming about Lowell in college (nice, but dangerous bike ride, beautiful short hike though) was the Flagstaff and Illinois connect. I stand corrected.
Actually, your half right. It also is a derivitive of the initials P.L., for Percival Lowell, the founder of the observatory. And it fits into the Greek God motif of the existing planets, especially since it is the god of the underworld, which is somewhat fitting.
The initial suggestion was based on the character, but the above reason were why it was actually selected.
Yes, a definition that was VOTED on, and mainly to keep the amount of "planets" to a neat, tidy, manageable level.
Last I checked, science wasn't democratic. Or can instate a vote to redifine "element" as to remove Plutonium, since its dangerous, and we already have too many of the silly things.
But... but...
Pluto was discovered at the Lowell Observatory, on Mars Hill, in Flagstaff, Arizona...
Not in New Mexico. New Mexico doesn't come into this story at all.
Percival Lowell, who started the search was from Boston. Clyde Tombaugh, who actually discovered Pluto was from Illinois.
Who really cares if we have 30 extra planets. I didn't know there was a hard limit of 10 planets in a solar system. Can some one please cite where it says this?
Short people are people.
Dwarfs are short.
Dwarfs are people.
Small planets are planets. (Mercury)
Dwarf Planets are small.
Dwarf Planets aren't... er... planets.
For the optimal MMO experience, you want to get in while there are still plenty of new players coming in so you'll have people of the same level to quest, hunt and trade with, but after the major bugs have been worked out.
Amen, I started WoW about 2 weeks after launch, the early game was pretty fun, finding your market niche, playing the AH, exploring new instances with fellow newbs. I played my ally druid to 60, and promptly quit (school, and the fact that Raiding sucks) shortly after they opened Silithus up. I started playing again a couple weeks after BC came out, and rolled a new horde toon... It was much less fun, every item under 30 was massively overpriced thanks to twinks, but there was no market in ANY trade skill items, except high level stuff, and mid-level potions/enchants. Finding people to do most instances is impossible, unless there is a twink drop. That and the fact that all the 56-60 content is dead, which is a shame since some of the best instances are in that range (scholo and strat rocked, as did Onyxia/MC raids).
I quit about a year later, after leveling my shamie to 70, and getting a couple 60's. I didn't want to do the pigeonhole raid thing.
I miss it when there were very few cookie cutter builds, since people were still figuring out their classes, too.
I'm planning on trying WAR about a month after release, when the rush dies down, and some of the dire bugs get quashed. I might migrate back to WoW for a month or so after WotLK, just to see what they added, and join in some groups whose never actually run any 70+ instances. Being confused together leads to better grouping.
About six seconds after the constitution was drafted, there were taxes.
I am all about people opting out of taxes, but they are no longer allowed to use any services payed for by them, including roads, hospitals, police and fire protection, etc...
Out of curiosity, how is property a right? Where is this claimed? Can I just claim something as a right, then, like... say... "health", or "the basic necessities of life"?
If I can, I'd say these have a higher priority than base greed.
If I had mod points... If only...
Brilliant statement.
We must constantly confuse the means for the ends. In money (mere means), and our peers (always the ultimate ends).
Viva categorical imperative!
but you people aren't my responsibility.
Nor is yours mine, anymore. I do hope you lose your job, and get critically ill. It'd be an interesting lesson to the rest of us non-sociopaths.
I'm an even bigger wacko... I have empathy for the poor, and don't want to see anyone suffer. I also missed the day when they were passing out the Ayn Rand kool-aid, and thus don't see pure greed as a valid ethical stance, and thus don't feel bad forcing inhumane people to act humanely.
People should always come first, period.
Granted I don't think we should elevate the poor to the level of the rich, or topple the rich to the middle class or below, achievement does have some worth, but there comes a point where too much is too much. Eventually greed begins to cost civilization as a whole, and at that point society should demand it fixed.
Often times libertarianism comes across as sociopathy. I have meet some sane libertarians, but they seem to be the exception, and not the rule.