Maybe they have the beliefs and knowledge first and that is why they went into the industry.
I would hardly call GWB a baseball genius, but he used to own the Texas Rangers.
I still do not see "BIG OIL" as being some evil empire. They are corporate entities trying to make money for their shareholders. They earn just below corporate American averages EBIT front so they are not raking anyone over the coals. They spend more on R&D than they get in tax breaks so they are not posketing government subsidies.
I am with you on the media thing, I just perceive it from the other side. I do not like cable news and i try to avoid it as much as possible.
I agree about out ability to elect representation, that is why I hound my representatives about that very fact. I have sent them letters explicitly stating that they are to vote in the best interest of their district, NOT IN THE BEST INTEREST OF THE USA. Their job is not to take care of the world, it is to take car of their constituency, for me that is Florida, Congressional district 7. I do not think the Federal Government is responsible for everything and I believe the closer to home that things are managed the better. If a city government can address the issue it should. If not, county, then state, then federal in that order.
It is my belief that we defer to the greater population in hopes that the anonymous people out there, somewhere else will take care of us, but human nature is that we resent having to take care of anonymous people.
We are the most generous nation on earth. We give freely and willingly to charity at an amazing rate. We as Americans should be proud of our Per Capita GDP and our willingness to distribute that wealth around the globe. for those two reasons, I do not feel we must mandate a distribution of wealth.
Having FEMA is a luxury, not a right. It is great that we can have a federal agency, but living in Florida has shown me that the State is way more efficient at handling natural disasters.
Despite our appearant differences of opinion, I think we agree on some foundational points. Fortunately those foundational points are the ones outlined in our constitution. I feel we would be better served if we were to get a bit closer to our original governmental premise and shy away from this idea that we are on nation with one government. We are a Federal Republic, which is fundamentally different.
hmmm... I am in now way defending Christianity here. States operating as Christian states have horible track records as well. That is why our founding fathers wanted to eliminate the possibility of a church driven state.
The US has NEVER invaded a country with the intent to convert it to their religion. Nor has the US EVER invaded a country with for the purpose of suppressing a religion.
As a matter of significant importance in all the cases you site, the countries invaded were exited soon after hostilities ceased and the country remained independent. This is not the stated goal of Iran nor has it been the track record of Islamic regimes in the past.
I think we should try democracy in an Islamic country. Let us see how it works out. it may fail, but we already know the other models do not work in the long run so why try them again.
Lobbyists are good at raising capital, isn't that one of the primary functions of a major political election organization.
Seems to me former lobbyists would be good people to have around.
Are they influening John McCain? I don't know, humans are human most of the time so I am sure they speak up over dinner if not in the boardroom.
I would guess that most lobbyists have open as explicit agendas, which is better than having them hidden. Perhaps McCain only selected lobbyists whos positions he agrees with, in which case how is this bad or even meaningful?
and there is no difference between someone who gave up years of his life serving his country in the millitary and someone who did community organization.
These are clearly two people from very different backgrounds and to compare them as apples to apples is irresponsible.
I would suggest we look into how much of McCain's "wealth" comes from marriage. You know Cindy McCain is no slouch. She may be responsible for the McCain real estate. I personally do not keep track of the things my wife keeps track of, I do not neet to double manage everything. She is an adult and has the legal right to manage our houshold assets.
... 3. Obama does not pander to Jerry Falwell or any of his imitators. It's America, so he has to recognize the religious element, but he doesn't associate with the fundamentalist nutcases....
no, just MoveOn.ORG and various Hollywood nut jobs.
No Thanks, both are not good, but that is a poor rational unless you acknowledge both lobbying sides.
...If you're serious about ending terrorism, you have to engage the enemy dipomatically and address the conditions that lead to it....
I grew up in the Middle East. I speak from some position of experience when I ask:
What historical evidence are you using to support this idea.
You can look back from today until the begining of Islam and find that Islam has been used as an excuse to ignore reason for as long as it has been around. These people do not want to be reasonable, quite the contrary. Their agenda is not one of increased security or profit. It is one of dominance and hurting others. If you want to reason with them then you have to provide them a sacrificial lamb.
Look up what they did to Tunisia back before the turn of the first millenium. They chopped down all the olive trees and took all the gold, then left for 30 years until the olive trees grew back. Then they came in and did it again. They could have easily left the cash cow alive, but they were more interested in destruction than profit or power.
There is a pattern and it is 1400 years long.
You are dilusional if you think talking with Iran will get them to put away their nuclear aspirations.
Until there are Islamic states that answer to something other than religious institutions, this will not change. That is where the Iraq plan has some benefit. If Iraq becomes a western style democracy, maybe the others will see that there is benefit to working WITH you neighbors instead of just feeling compelled to wipe them out.
I say maybe. It has never been successfully implemented in history so maybe doing something new till yeild new results.
FYI, the Europeans tried diplomacy before and during the great crusaids, you can see how that worked out.
Again, I as you to support your position on some sort of historical evidence because I believe the evidence strongly conflicts with you premis.
Yes I do believe we would be in Iraq right now, we just would have entered later, but then again we would not likely have had 8 years of Gore so... maybe the '04 election would have been about getting out of Iraq.
You are fooling yourself if you think Saddam Hussein would have ever gone along with the UN resolutions. We were destined to fix that problem millitarily, like it or not. Europe and the Middle East cannot seam to fix their own problems.
I feel like a Fox mind in a PBS world, but I agree with you to a large extent.
The executive branch should be a check and ballance against the house and courts. Line Item veto power seems a bit much to me.
Unfortunately we cannot seem to elect congressmen and Senators that act in a responsible manner.
I am at a loss on how to fix the problem. I know I write my state representatives to remind them of their jobs on occasssion. I feel my congressman has my districts best interests in mind, but my Senators are absolutely horrible.
I only get one vote (two if you count the fact that my wife and I vote the same way). So my power to influence this is limited.
I would trust some Presidents with line item power, but not most of them.
I think I am on the other side of the fence from you Shakrai, but I agree on this point entirely.
...Democracy requires an informed electorate to function just as capitalism requires informed consumers. The same level of truth in advertising laws should apply.
Democracy does not require informed electorates, it just does much better with one. This is part of the reason we have an electoral college. It minimizes the impact of an uniformed electorate.
As for capitalism. Capitalism works because ther is a feedback loop and bad actions get automatically punished (financially) while good actions get rewarded. The intelligence of the consumer is irrelevent. If people buy it, good, if not, bad. Their intelligence or more specifically predictability would only make things easier on the capitalists. It is not essential.
...I'm in favour of a nice, simple system where if a politician makes a promise before an election and then breaks it, a court can remove him or her from office....
That exists today, it is called impeachment. In some cases it is a court, in others it is Congress.
Fortunately/Unfortunately, it is a slow process so the next round of voting usually happens befor impeachments can conclude. Then the voters get to enact your plan directly.
... it's still the top of the ticket that calls the shots.
I do not understand this statement. What power does the executive branch hold that "calls the shots".
I do not see the President or Commander in Chief having much of a role here.
The president can veto stuff, but the Congress is the ones that make the bills. In which case the congressmen and Senators wield much more power in this regard. On top of that, they too have limited ability to influence things as topics like net nutrality are effected by foreign countries that do not answer to US politicians.
You guys on/. attribute way too much power to our government when it comes to technology. The tech industry and perhaps even this site have more influence over the future than the President of the USA.
What I do not really understand about the plan is that they are putting the boats in national waters 12 miles. Would that not put them within the protection of the nation in question? That would lead me to believe taxes would quickly follow any plan to profit from that.
How do oil wells manage that aspect when they are in national waters?
I have a personal relationship with many of the people I spend 40 hours a week weith.
I sometimes ask their opinions about things too.
If I ask a colleague what I think another colleague meant by a certain comment in a meeting, that is not conducting business, that is me feeling out a situation off line. It may as well have been a conversation in the parking lot.
conservative economists may flock to corporations too. The paychecks are better and tied to performance. Are academia economists held to some sort of performance metrics?
I have no idea about the answer to that question so do not assume I am showing a position there. I honestly would love to know how academic economists are evaluated for performance.
No Democrat is more upset about the Republican Congresses fiscal track record than registered Republicans.
You will not hear me argue that the Republicans have held their end of the bargan. Personally, I like my Republican Congressman, but loath my Republican Senator.
OH, by the way, your logic starts out correct and then your bias takes you off the deep end. You state that Bush IIs tax cuts were designed to increase revenue. That is correct and they did. The President has limited ability to impact spending, that is Congress's job (yes he can veto the whole bill, but he cannot trim pork). The tax cuts weree not going to solve the budget deficit. At least that was not the stated objective per se. It was an expected outcome, but then the Republican congress got a hold of the additional revenue...
Well, you can see how impressed republican voters were with that congress. How many incombants were reseated in 2006?
Sorry gstoddart, that is simply the way the futurs market works.
The price will come down simply because there is going to be a new supplier who will appear to the investors as willing to just suck all their oil out and sell it to the worlds largest consumer.
The truth is that the bigger economic impact will be that the trade deficit will be impacted in the positive. There is not exactly a lot of goods flowing back to the mid-east from the US in exchange for all those dollars we give them for oil. Certainly not enough. We need to stem that tide if we want long term economic impact.
So... Drill now or even make drilling soon possible will impact the economy of the US positiviely both short term and long term.
Staying at a Holiday Inn Express is probably smarter than a Hilton too, for more than economic reasons.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah we saw a windfall of oil by going into Iraq. We even saw a bunch of oil by going into Kuwait.
Oh wait no we didn't we actually saw the reverse.
if we are going to war to get oil we are doing a horrible job of it.
chicken or egg?
Maybe they have the beliefs and knowledge first and that is why they went into the industry.
I would hardly call GWB a baseball genius, but he used to own the Texas Rangers.
I still do not see "BIG OIL" as being some evil empire. They are corporate entities trying to make money for their shareholders. They earn just below corporate American averages EBIT front so they are not raking anyone over the coals. They spend more on R&D than they get in tax breaks so they are not posketing government subsidies.
I do not see where thee hub hub is coming from.
Shakrai,
I am with you on the media thing, I just perceive it from the other side. I do not like cable news and i try to avoid it as much as possible.
I agree about out ability to elect representation, that is why I hound my representatives about that very fact. I have sent them letters explicitly stating that they are to vote in the best interest of their district, NOT IN THE BEST INTEREST OF THE USA. Their job is not to take care of the world, it is to take car of their constituency, for me that is Florida, Congressional district 7. I do not think the Federal Government is responsible for everything and I believe the closer to home that things are managed the better. If a city government can address the issue it should. If not, county, then state, then federal in that order.
It is my belief that we defer to the greater population in hopes that the anonymous people out there, somewhere else will take care of us, but human nature is that we resent having to take care of anonymous people.
We are the most generous nation on earth. We give freely and willingly to charity at an amazing rate. We as Americans should be proud of our Per Capita GDP and our willingness to distribute that wealth around the globe. for those two reasons, I do not feel we must mandate a distribution of wealth.
Having FEMA is a luxury, not a right. It is great that we can have a federal agency, but living in Florida has shown me that the State is way more efficient at handling natural disasters.
Despite our appearant differences of opinion, I think we agree on some foundational points. Fortunately those foundational points are the ones outlined in our constitution. I feel we would be better served if we were to get a bit closer to our original governmental premise and shy away from this idea that we are on nation with one government. We are a Federal Republic, which is fundamentally different.
That worked for what, a couple years.
hmmm... I am in now way defending Christianity here. States operating as Christian states have horible track records as well. That is why our founding fathers wanted to eliminate the possibility of a church driven state.
The US has NEVER invaded a country with the intent to convert it to their religion. Nor has the US EVER invaded a country with for the purpose of suppressing a religion.
As a matter of significant importance in all the cases you site, the countries invaded were exited soon after hostilities ceased and the country remained independent. This is not the stated goal of Iran nor has it been the track record of Islamic regimes in the past.
I think we should try democracy in an Islamic country. Let us see how it works out. it may fail, but we already know the other models do not work in the long run so why try them again.
none, they are former lobbyists.
Lobbyists are good at raising capital, isn't that one of the primary functions of a major political election organization.
Seems to me former lobbyists would be good people to have around.
Are they influening John McCain? I don't know, humans are human most of the time so I am sure they speak up over dinner if not in the boardroom.
I would guess that most lobbyists have open as explicit agendas, which is better than having them hidden. Perhaps McCain only selected lobbyists whos positions he agrees with, in which case how is this bad or even meaningful?
and there is no difference between someone who gave up years of his life serving his country in the millitary and someone who did community organization.
These are clearly two people from very different backgrounds and to compare them as apples to apples is irresponsible.
I would suggest we look into how much of McCain's "wealth" comes from marriage. You know Cindy McCain is no slouch. She may be responsible for the McCain real estate. I personally do not keep track of the things my wife keeps track of, I do not neet to double manage everything. She is an adult and has the legal right to manage our houshold assets.
They're all rich white men
You mean, except the one RICH black guy, right?
emphasis and additional word is mine.
I did not know the President of the US got to rule over net neutrality.
I do not see that power listed in the Constitution anywhere.
... ...
3. Obama does not pander to Jerry Falwell or any of his imitators. It's America, so he has to recognize the religious element, but he doesn't associate with the fundamentalist nutcases.
no, just MoveOn.ORG and various Hollywood nut jobs.
No Thanks, both are not good, but that is a poor rational unless you acknowledge both lobbying sides.
...If you're serious about ending terrorism, you have to engage the enemy dipomatically and address the conditions that lead to it. ...
I grew up in the Middle East. I speak from some position of experience when I ask:
What historical evidence are you using to support this idea.
You can look back from today until the begining of Islam and find that Islam has been used as an excuse to ignore reason for as long as it has been around. These people do not want to be reasonable, quite the contrary. Their agenda is not one of increased security or profit. It is one of dominance and hurting others. If you want to reason with them then you have to provide them a sacrificial lamb.
Look up what they did to Tunisia back before the turn of the first millenium. They chopped down all the olive trees and took all the gold, then left for 30 years until the olive trees grew back. Then they came in and did it again. They could have easily left the cash cow alive, but they were more interested in destruction than profit or power.
There is a pattern and it is 1400 years long.
You are dilusional if you think talking with Iran will get them to put away their nuclear aspirations.
Until there are Islamic states that answer to something other than religious institutions, this will not change. That is where the Iraq plan has some benefit. If Iraq becomes a western style democracy, maybe the others will see that there is benefit to working WITH you neighbors instead of just feeling compelled to wipe them out.
I say maybe. It has never been successfully implemented in history so maybe doing something new till yeild new results.
FYI, the Europeans tried diplomacy before and during the great crusaids, you can see how that worked out.
Again, I as you to support your position on some sort of historical evidence because I believe the evidence strongly conflicts with you premis.
Yes I do believe we would be in Iraq right now, we just would have entered later, but then again we would not likely have had 8 years of Gore so... maybe the '04 election would have been about getting out of Iraq.
You are fooling yourself if you think Saddam Hussein would have ever gone along with the UN resolutions. We were destined to fix that problem millitarily, like it or not. Europe and the Middle East cannot seam to fix their own problems.
5% is probably enough to get the major parties to react.
I feel like a Fox mind in a PBS world, but I agree with you to a large extent.
The executive branch should be a check and ballance against the house and courts. Line Item veto power seems a bit much to me.
Unfortunately we cannot seem to elect congressmen and Senators that act in a responsible manner.
I am at a loss on how to fix the problem. I know I write my state representatives to remind them of their jobs on occasssion. I feel my congressman has my districts best interests in mind, but my Senators are absolutely horrible.
I only get one vote (two if you count the fact that my wife and I vote the same way). So my power to influence this is limited.
I would trust some Presidents with line item power, but not most of them.
I think I am on the other side of the fence from you Shakrai, but I agree on this point entirely.
...Democracy requires an informed electorate to function just as capitalism requires informed consumers. The same level of truth in advertising laws should apply.
Democracy does not require informed electorates, it just does much better with one. This is part of the reason we have an electoral college. It minimizes the impact of an uniformed electorate.
As for capitalism. Capitalism works because ther is a feedback loop and bad actions get automatically punished (financially) while good actions get rewarded. The intelligence of the consumer is irrelevent. If people buy it, good, if not, bad. Their intelligence or more specifically predictability would only make things easier on the capitalists. It is not essential.
...I'm in favour of a nice, simple system where if a politician makes a promise before an election and then breaks it, a court can remove him or her from office. ...
That exists today, it is called impeachment. In some cases it is a court, in others it is Congress.
Fortunately/Unfortunately, it is a slow process so the next round of voting usually happens befor impeachments can conclude. Then the voters get to enact your plan directly.
... it's still the top of the ticket that calls the shots.
I do not understand this statement.
What power does the executive branch hold that "calls the shots".
I do not see the President or Commander in Chief having much of a role here.
The president can veto stuff, but the Congress is the ones that make the bills. In which case the congressmen and Senators wield much more power in this regard. On top of that, they too have limited ability to influence things as topics like net nutrality are effected by foreign countries that do not answer to US politicians.
You guys on /. attribute way too much power to our government when it comes to technology. The tech industry and perhaps even this site have more influence over the future than the President of the USA.
What I do not really understand about the plan is that they are putting the boats in national waters 12 miles. Would that not put them within the protection of the nation in question? That would lead me to believe taxes would quickly follow any plan to profit from that.
How do oil wells manage that aspect when they are in national waters?
What model Star Car?
I have a personal relationship with many of the people I spend 40 hours a week weith.
I sometimes ask their opinions about things too.
If I ask a colleague what I think another colleague meant by a certain comment in a meeting, that is not conducting business, that is me feeling out a situation off line. It may as well have been a conversation in the parking lot.
Maybe the President has less actual impact on the economy than we give them credit.
sorry for posting anonymously, I do not want to seem the coward.
I have 3 kids so... I pay more in state/county taxes than federal taxes... and I live in Florida.
I doubt either candidate will impact my federal taxes by much. Well, the Bush tax cuts and child credits were significant to me.
Which candidated want to wipe those out? I will vote the other way on that, it was thousands of dollars my family used effectively.
conservative economists may flock to corporations too. The paychecks are better and tied to performance. Are academia economists held to some sort of performance metrics?
I have no idea about the answer to that question so do not assume I am showing a position there. I honestly would love to know how academic economists are evaluated for performance.
No Democrat is more upset about the Republican Congresses fiscal track record than registered Republicans.
You will not hear me argue that the Republicans have held their end of the bargan. Personally, I like my Republican Congressman, but loath my Republican Senator.
OH, by the way, your logic starts out correct and then your bias takes you off the deep end. You state that Bush IIs tax cuts were designed to increase revenue. That is correct and they did. The President has limited ability to impact spending, that is Congress's job (yes he can veto the whole bill, but he cannot trim pork). The tax cuts weree not going to solve the budget deficit. At least that was not the stated objective per se. It was an expected outcome, but then the Republican congress got a hold of the additional revenue...
Well, you can see how impressed republican voters were with that congress. How many incombants were reseated in 2006?
Sorry gstoddart, that is simply the way the futurs market works.
The price will come down simply because there is going to be a new supplier who will appear to the investors as willing to just suck all their oil out and sell it to the worlds largest consumer.
The truth is that the bigger economic impact will be that the trade deficit will be impacted in the positive. There is not exactly a lot of goods flowing back to the mid-east from the US in exchange for all those dollars we give them for oil. Certainly not enough. We need to stem that tide if we want long term economic impact.
So... Drill now or even make drilling soon possible will impact the economy of the US positiviely both short term and long term.
Staying at a Holiday Inn Express is probably smarter than a Hilton too, for more than economic reasons.