Sure, if by "draft something at the president's request" you mean "take a bill written by Executive branch lawyers and pass it without actually reading it" like they did with the Patriot Act.
Yeah - there was absolutely no public discussion of the Partriot Act, was there?
When I don't know anything about the candidates,... when possible, I vote for a non Repubocrat - 3rd party, independant, etc.
I used to do that - till I started seeing people with agendas even worse than the incumbents as 3rd parties.
Voting is the ultimate exercise in compromise - we have to get used to that - make our choices - and get up the next morning to got to work to keep paying those taxes, no matter who is now celebrating his "mandate from the people" (to spend their money).
Torrents would be trivually easy if it was done from in a (legal) organized approach. Imagine the convenience of having your Myth/PVR box automatically serve as a torrent node for the entire time a particular show lived on your hard disk.
this would probably make each channel more expensive, not less
No, the more popular channels would be much cheaper - if fifty million subscribe to Channel X, then Channel X can afford to charge mere pennies - or Channel X can afford to pay for better quality shows - or both.
when that promise was made, nobody envisioned 200 niche cable channels. There isn't enough subcriber revenue to pay for all those when the audience gets spread around like that, and commercials make up the difference
Ah yes... the "it's good for this tiny group so we'll make the larger group pay for it" approach to life.
Apparently we have no threshold for calling an entire election invalid and redoing it, which is pathetic.
If we did have such a policy, when would the recounting be considered sufficient? When the "loser"'s body wasn't found one day?
The Founders didn't want federal officials elected by the public - the states would make those decisions, hence our entire electoral college... and ever since we've tried to go to a "everyone votes" system we've had these problems. Which is easier to monitor and ensure non-fraudulent - 100 million voters or 50 states?
You don't have freedom of the press anymore, and it's game over for democracy. It's been that way since Kennedy got whacked, and on a related issue, that was also our last real election:
Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley became a nationally known figure during the presidential election of 1960 when he "delivered" Illinois for John F. Kennedy. Charges of vote fraud in Illinois and Texas led to vote recounts in several states as well as to the appointment of at least one special state prosecutor in Illinois. On April 13, 1961, after an investigation that lasted several months, Special Illinois State Prosecutor Morris J. Wexler returned election-related indictments against... 677 people indicted by Wexler were later acquitted by Acting Judge John M. Karns. Some were acquitted because the judge found that the state had been "unable to make a case." Others were acquitted after the judge ruled that the prosecution had obtained evidence "by unfair and fundamentally illegal means" (Wexler had admitted he had issued grand jury subpoenas to approximately 200 people he later had questioned in the Criminal Courts building instead of the Grand Jury room. Karns called this a "very serious" case of prosecutorial misconduct, one that bordered on "contempt of the Criminal Court of Cook County.")
pretty much every state Supreme Court in the country has declared voter ID laws unconstitutional.
24 states and the District of Columbia currently have the minimum HAVA ID requirements - first-time voters who register by mail and do not provide ID verification with their registration must show ID before voting.
Meanwhile (September 21, 2006)...
"The House yesterday passed legislation that would require voters to show a valid photo identification in federal elections over the overwhelming objections of Democrats who compared the bill to segregation-era measures aimed at disenfranchising Southern blacks. The Federal Election Integrity Act was approved on a nearly party-line 228-196 vote. Republicans backed the bill 224-3, with three nonvoters; Democrats opposed it 192-4, with five nonvoters. They were joined in opposition by the House's one independent member."
Another way to look at issues is how time critical are the issues at hand
Well, you still left off the words "to me". The genocide in the Sudan is unlikely to affect the majority of the voters - in any country - regardless of the eventual outcome, hence it continues, to the tune of millions dead even - but what's a few million dead people - over 60% (2.5 million or so) of the Montagard tribe of Vietnam was exterminated after the peace loving Americans forced the US military to cut and run from Vietnam - but hey, they ended the war, eh. The situation in Iraq, etc., due to the rise of terrorism, the importance and quantity of oil, the historical and stated intent of the ruling elite (as we watch Iran pontificate now), and even the historical influence of the Ottoman peninsula, affects many people, and hence the interest. It's "easy" to liberate a Grenada, except for the shitstorm of "unbiased" press reports afterwards, but not so easy in Haiti, for example, nor in Iraq - but Iraq has much more influence, whether for or against, because of location, etc., to the US, and so is important.
I remember election night in 2000, I was watching CBS I believe. They called Florida for Gore.
The influence of the provably biased media on elections as they are occurring should be a shameful thing to us and disallowed. I know people who were standing in (a long) line in Florida and heard it'd been called for Gore and so didn't bother to vote (for either candidate) after that - talk about sanctioned disenfranchising.
If you really want election reform you have to make it in the best interest of the the Dem/Rep party. The best way to do that would be to have a third party victory
As long as we only allow "single vote per citizen" elections, then the eventual result will be a two-party system, and a declining participation rate. Neither party cares the slightest what the participation rate is - they care about being the one in power at the end of the day, and that only requires more votes than the other guy out of an ever smaller pool of interested people (so it's that much easier to influence those who bother to vote).
Slashdot Mirror
Now we have a bellicose Iran to deal with as well as an unrepentant and bellicose North Korea.
Ah, but now we've got those historically brilliant military supporters controlling the purse strings.
Oh wait.
"No more laws" is better than bad laws.
Laws should have a 5 year shelf life.
burrocrisy
Ahh.. and that would be what? Ruling by jackasses?
An education system controlled by jackasses?
Sure, if by "draft something at the president's request" you mean "take a bill written by Executive branch lawyers and pass it without actually reading it" like they did with the Patriot Act.
Yeah - there was absolutely no public discussion of the Partriot Act, was there?
When I don't know anything about the candidates, ... when possible, I vote for a non Repubocrat - 3rd party, independant, etc.
I used to do that - till I started seeing people with agendas even worse than the incumbents as 3rd parties.
Voting is the ultimate exercise in compromise - we have to get used to that - make our choices - and get up the next morning to got to work to keep paying those taxes, no matter who is now celebrating his "mandate from the people" (to spend their money).
You cannot be TOTALLY ignorant. You will know something.
You must be new here.
Don't forget Xbox. They sold 20 million units, but lost $4 billion to do it.
... $4 billion there ... pretty soon we're talking becomeing an established player in the bankruptcy court.
And established Microsoft as a player in the console market.
$4 billion here
$600 (for console, 1 game and tax) is a tough expense to justify regardless of income level.
It's a weekend at the beach after a two hour drive - i.e. nothing for a couple of parents looking to please Junior.
Has anyone stopped to think that the SUN output is HOTTER?
s cience-just-before-elections.
Please keep actual science facts out of any discussions of political-smut-jobs-published-under-the-guise-of-
Digg had this last week! (oh wait)
I'm emailing all my friends this link for Christmas.
In a free market, competition ALWAYS appears, even if the cost to enter the market is high.
Got any evidence of that? Have you got numbers from studying a 100% free market for eternity?
Evolution.
easier than messing around with torrents.
Torrents would be trivually easy if it was done from in a (legal) organized approach. Imagine the convenience of having your Myth/PVR box automatically serve as a torrent node for the entire time a particular show lived on your hard disk.
this would probably make each channel more expensive, not less
No, the more popular channels would be much cheaper - if fifty million subscribe to Channel X, then Channel X can afford to charge mere pennies - or Channel X can afford to pay for better quality shows - or both.
when that promise was made, nobody envisioned 200 niche cable channels. There isn't enough subcriber revenue to pay for all those when the audience gets spread around like that, and commercials make up the difference
... the "it's good for this tiny group so we'll make the larger group pay for it" approach to life.
Ah yes
For every 20 gun control moms in minivans, there's a crazy anarchist hippie with an arsenal ready to be passed around
Dad?
Democracy advocates what the people want more commonly.
Democracy, as practiced in the US, allows Paul to vote how much Peter will pay him. This has an inevitable meltdown as the eventual conclusion.
it should later be tallied and compared with the computer record to ensure that they are consistent
What do you do if they are not?
Apparently we have no threshold for calling an entire election invalid and redoing it, which is pathetic.
... and ever since we've tried to go to a "everyone votes" system we've had these problems. Which is easier to monitor and ensure non-fraudulent - 100 million voters or 50 states?
If we did have such a policy, when would the recounting be considered sufficient? When the "loser"'s body wasn't found one day?
The Founders didn't want federal officials elected by the public - the states would make those decisions, hence our entire electoral college
You don't have freedom of the press anymore, and it's game over for democracy. It's been that way since Kennedy got whacked, and on a related issue, that was also our last real election : Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley became a nationally known figure during the presidential election of 1960 when he "delivered" Illinois for John F. Kennedy. Charges of vote fraud in Illinois and Texas led to vote recounts in several states as well as to the appointment of at least one special state prosecutor in Illinois. On April 13, 1961, after an investigation that lasted several months, Special Illinois State Prosecutor Morris J. Wexler returned election-related indictments against ... 677 people indicted by Wexler were later acquitted by Acting Judge John M. Karns. Some were acquitted because the judge found that the state had been "unable to make a case." Others were acquitted after the judge ruled that the prosecution had obtained evidence "by unfair and fundamentally illegal means" (Wexler had admitted he had issued grand jury subpoenas to approximately 200 people he later had questioned in the Criminal Courts building instead of the Grand Jury room. Karns called this a "very serious" case of prosecutorial misconduct, one that bordered on "contempt of the Criminal Court of Cook County.")
pretty much every state Supreme Court in the country has declared voter ID laws unconstitutional.
24 states and the District of Columbia currently have the minimum HAVA ID requirements - first-time voters who register by mail and do not provide ID verification with their registration must show ID before voting.
19 states require ID for all voters.
2 states require all voters show photo ID
3 states request all voters show photo ID
2 states require ID of all first-time voters
source
Meanwhile (September 21, 2006)... "The House yesterday passed legislation that would require voters to show a valid photo identification in federal elections over the overwhelming objections of Democrats who compared the bill to segregation-era measures aimed at disenfranchising Southern blacks. The Federal Election Integrity Act was approved on a nearly party-line 228-196 vote. Republicans backed the bill 224-3, with three nonvoters; Democrats opposed it 192-4, with five nonvoters. They were joined in opposition by the House's one independent member."
Another way to look at issues is how time critical are the issues at hand
Well, you still left off the words "to me". The genocide in the Sudan is unlikely to affect the majority of the voters - in any country - regardless of the eventual outcome, hence it continues, to the tune of millions dead even - but what's a few million dead people - over 60% (2.5 million or so) of the Montagard tribe of Vietnam was exterminated after the peace loving Americans forced the US military to cut and run from Vietnam - but hey, they ended the war, eh. The situation in Iraq, etc., due to the rise of terrorism, the importance and quantity of oil, the historical and stated intent of the ruling elite (as we watch Iran pontificate now), and even the historical influence of the Ottoman peninsula, affects many people, and hence the interest. It's "easy" to liberate a Grenada, except for the shitstorm of "unbiased" press reports afterwards, but not so easy in Haiti, for example, nor in Iraq - but Iraq has much more influence, whether for or against, because of location, etc., to the US, and so is important.
I remember election night in 2000, I was watching CBS I believe. They called Florida for Gore.
The influence of the provably biased media on elections as they are occurring should be a shameful thing to us and disallowed. I know people who were standing in (a long) line in Florida and heard it'd been called for Gore and so didn't bother to vote (for either candidate) after that - talk about sanctioned disenfranchising.
If you really want election reform you have to make it in the best interest of the the Dem/Rep party. The best way to do that would be to have a third party victory
As long as we only allow "single vote per citizen" elections, then the eventual result will be a two-party system, and a declining participation rate. Neither party cares the slightest what the participation rate is - they care about being the one in power at the end of the day, and that only requires more votes than the other guy out of an ever smaller pool of interested people (so it's that much easier to influence those who bother to vote).
the Democrats have perfected stealing elections to an art
oppose proof of identification at voting places.