Jim Henderson wrote:
> He's not on in enough states to actually win, though.

	No, I think only 5 or 6 are: McCain, Obama, McKinney, Nader, and either
Bob Barr or Chuck Baldwin or both.

-- 
"I think not," said Descartes, and promptly disappeared.


                    /\  /\               /\  /
                   /  \/  \ u e e n     /  \/  a w a z
                       >>>>>>mue### [at] nawazorg<<<<<<
                                   anl

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On 02-Nov-08 18:48, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Darren New wrote:
> 
>> I think that's the most wonderful summary of US politics I've seen in 
>> ages. :-)
> 
> I don't know about anywhere else, but in the UK "politics" seems to 
> involve a bunch of grumpy old men sitting in a room jeering at each 
> other, rather like a bunch of 12 year old schoolboys. 

I think the parliamentary democracy is though to have been born in the 
UK, perhaps it never grew up.

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On Sun, 02 Nov 2008 12:27:33 +0100, andrel wrote:

> That may or may not be more true than my rule of thumb, but it almost
> destroys
> democrat <-> people/voters
> republican <-> nation
> For me the main value is that I do not live in the US, so the party
> lines have not been part of my upbringing. The problem for me (and
> possibly Andy, although it could also be his habit of living under
> stones) is that in my country the two concepts are not mutual exclusive.
> Indeed our republicans are republicans *because* they are fundamentalist
> democrats. Still, when I want to guess which party in the US wants to
> reform the medical system and which one is most likely to start a war,
> it helps a lot.

An outside view does always bring a different perspective - and that's 
the thing I find interesting.  I'd never thought about it that way myself.

I think most people are more complex than either ideology lays out - for 
example, I consider myself a fiscal conservative but not a social 
conservative.

Jim

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On Sun, 02 Nov 2008 11:49:11 -0600, Mueen Nawaz wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> He's not on in enough states to actually win, though.
> 
> 	No, I think only 5 or 6 are: McCain, Obama, McKinney, Nader, and 
either
> Bob Barr or Chuck Baldwin or both.

Yeah, I believe that is correct.

Jim

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Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sat, 01 Nov 2008 12:46:17 +0000, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> 
>>>> politics don't quite mix with geek humor... :P
>>> Oh, I don't know, I found the whole series to be very entertaining. :-)
>> Oh, it's *definitely* entertaining. I just have _no clue_ what the hell
>> they're on about... :-}
> 
> The politics of the 'net in the US was my read.  It helps to know that 
> Ron Paul was on the Republican ticket and is still running for president 
> but with a different party.
> 
> Jim

Had a long chat with the "supporters" of this guy on a science blog. In 
fact... They won't fracking shut up, even after pointing out to them 
that their "claims" that the government is supposed to only protect 
against things like fraud, theft, violence, etc., wouldn't have done 
anything to **stop** the current financial crisis, because nothing the 
companies that caused it did falls into **any** of those categories. In 
point of fact, what caused the problem was the government opting to 
believe the banks, when those entities told them, "We know the market, 
and know what we are doing", and opted to **not** regulate them, place 
any new limits on what they could do, or in any way restrain them from 
loaning out more money than they had, in absurd amounts, to people only 
an idiot would believe had the means to pay them back. Oddly, the only 
people that one could "claim" where committing, say fraud, for example, 
might be the people filling out the applications for credit, and most 
sane people would ask themselves, "Well, if the banks 'knew' it was 
fraud, why the hell did they accept the applications?!"

But, somehow, Ron Paul supporters, and other "Libertarians" still insist 
that the solution is smaller government, less regulation, privatization 
of *everything*, including, in the extreme cases of delusion for some of 
them, the military (apparently the Blackwater incident was something 
they missed completely), while the government, more or less, doesn't do 
anything at all.

At this point, the very idea that "any" of them will be elected scares 
the hell out of me. But, its just a choice between that, mild, empty 
stomach feeling you get when you think something is wrong, or a sweat 
soaked nightmare you get when you are sure you are about to be hurt 
**really** badly by an accelerating car, or a charging rabid animal.

Me, I opted to go for the only candidate with a chance of winning, who 
merely made me very uncomfortable. My parents.. have apparently both 
bought into the bullshit idiocy of the theocrats, who have spent the 
last 20+ years shoveling every sick idiot in the country onto the 
national news, whined about failing morality, and exaggerated every 
minor hiccup into a sign of the end of civilization, and are opting to 
vote for the ones who have made it their mission this election to kiss 
the asses of the same idiots that have been lying about these things for 
decades. I'd bang my head on my desk, but the bruise is already so large 
at this point that the next hit would probably do brain damage.

-- 
void main () {
   If Schrödingers_cat is alive or version > 98 {
     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

<A HREF='http://www.daz3d.com/index.php?refid=16130551'>Get 3D Models, 
3D Content, and 3D Software at DAZ3D!</A>

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On 02-Nov-08 20:35, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sun, 02 Nov 2008 12:27:33 +0100, andrel wrote:
> 
>> That may or may not be more true than my rule of thumb, but it almost
>> destroys
>> democrat <-> people/voters
>> republican <-> nation
>> For me the main value is that I do not live in the US, so the party
>> lines have not been part of my upbringing. The problem for me (and
>> possibly Andy, although it could also be his habit of living under
>> stones) is that in my country the two concepts are not mutual exclusive.
>> Indeed our republicans are republicans *because* they are fundamentalist
>> democrats. Still, when I want to guess which party in the US wants to
>> reform the medical system and which one is most likely to start a war,
>> it helps a lot.
> 
> An outside view does always bring a different perspective - and that's 
> the thing I find interesting.  I'd never thought about it that way myself.

> I think most people are more complex than either ideology lays out - for 
> example, I consider myself a fiscal conservative 

I don't know what that means (i.e. not a term used here.) Does that mean 
that you are against raising taxes? In favor of decreasing taxes for the 
rich? Or simply keeping the system as it is?

Anyway, this outsider (yes I am, to the point that I do think the US is 
international, a point unfortunately missed by Stephen :( ;) ) thinks 
that the current US government has directly and indirectly borrowed so 
much money from other countries that one day they'll have to pay back 
one way or another. Even McCain will have to raise taxes if he doesn't 
want to continue Bush's irresponsible politics. He knows that, and I am 
frankly amazed that large parts of the US electorate let him get away 
with attacking Obama because he is a 'socialist' and will therefor 
surely increase taxes. But I am just an outsider.

> but not a social conservative.

Which means you wouldn't mind if neighbours moved? ;)

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Patrick Elliott wrote:
> against things like fraud, theft, violence, etc., wouldn't have done 
> anything to **stop** the current financial crisis, because nothing the 
> companies that caused it did falls into **any** of those categories. 

Except to the extent they are regulated banks and the government already 
took over banking and money, yeah. I mean, given that you let the 
government control printing of the money, confiscating gold, and 
eliminating risk for banks, no, there's nothing they did that fall into 
those categories. One of the things Ron Paul (as I understand it) 
advocates is getting the government out of the business of trying to 
regulate the economy in the first place.

> or in any way restrain them from 
> loaning out more money than they had, in absurd amounts,

That's where the "fraud" part comes in, you see. Except the government 
already passed laws (back in 1916 or so) saying they're allowed to.

> But, somehow, Ron Paul supporters, and other "Libertarians" still insist 

Be aware that "libertarians" are like "pagans". There's maybe 3 points 
of agreement between any two people in those groups, and the rest is 
open to interpretation. :-)

> At this point, the very idea that "any" of them will be elected scares 
> the hell out of me. 

Also be aware that, GWB notwithstanding, the President doesn't make the 
laws in the USA. :-)

-- 
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)

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"andrel" <a_l### [at] hotmailcom> wrote in message 
news:490### [at] hotmailcom...
> I had a problem remembering who was who too. What helps for me is that 
> democrats put the need of the people first (or at least they suggest that) 
> while republicans put the need of the nation first (assuming that

That's an interesting perspective, but there are many situations where the 
two parties are the exact opposite of what you're saying here.

I find a more accurate description is their stance on regulation.  Democrats 
favor heavy regulation and Government involvement, Republicans want to be 
left alone.  Though this, too, is sometimes inaccurate.

Maybe if the parties made more sense, I'd be able to pick one and stick to 
it.  The way things are, though, I usually just pick the candidate that's 
going to do the least amount of damage.

...Chambers

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"Darren New" <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote in message 
news:490e1dc5$1@news.povray.org...
> Patrick Elliott wrote:
>> against things like fraud, theft, violence, etc., wouldn't have done 
>> anything to **stop** the current financial crisis, because nothing the 
>> companies that caused it did falls into **any** of those categories.
>
> Except to the extent they are regulated banks and the government already 
> took over banking and money, yeah. I mean, given that you let the 
> government control printing of the money, confiscating gold, and 
> eliminating risk for banks, no, there's nothing they did that fall into 
> those categories. One of the things Ron Paul (as I understand it) 
> advocates is getting the government out of the business of trying to 
> regulate the economy in the first place.

It sounds nice in theory, especially when you've studied Adam Smith and 
believe in the "invisible hand", but history has shown us that an unmanaged 
economy can get, quite literally, stuck in a rut(1).  In such situations, 
massive economic intervention is the only way to achieve anything close to 
normal(2) productivity.

(1) OK, I've only taken one semester of economics, but it was enough to 
convince me that Keynes was right about the Great Depression.  The economy 
got to a point where 1/3 of the population was unemployed, and on its own it 
would have probably stayed that way for decades.

(2) It varies, but most economists call full production a 5% unemployment 
rate (or thereabouts).

...Chambers

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On Sun, 02 Nov 2008 22:18:28 +0100, andrel wrote:

>> I think most people are more complex than either ideology lays out -
>> for example, I consider myself a fiscal conservative
> 
> I don't know what that means (i.e. not a term used here.) Does that mean
> that you are against raising taxes? In favor of decreasing taxes for the
> rich? Or simply keeping the system as it is?

I'm in favor of paying for what we "purchase" from the government.  I 
don't like the debt/deficit spending that the US is engaged in, and it 
troubles me that the government doesn't have a balanced budget (but in 
order to keep from being bankrupt, I have to).

> Anyway, this outsider (yes I am, to the point that I do think the US is
> international, a point unfortunately missed by Stephen :( ;) ) thinks
> that the current US government has directly and indirectly borrowed so
> much money from other countries that one day they'll have to pay back
> one way or another. Even McCain will have to raise taxes if he doesn't
> want to continue Bush's irresponsible politics. He knows that, and I am
> frankly amazed that large parts of the US electorate let him get away
> with attacking Obama because he is a 'socialist' and will therefor
> surely increase taxes. But I am just an outsider.

I think either candidate would ultimately look to cut spending and raise 
taxes in some way.  Who they raise taxes on and what they cut spending on 
is the difference between the two, really.

I think that Obama will probably raise taxes on the "rich" (and where 
that cutoff is will ultimately depend on a cost/benefit analysis that 
he'll have to do once he's got *all* the numbers, which I don't think 
either of the candidates really have - just a gut instinct on my part), 
and i think he'll probably try to keep taxes down for those who aren't 
"rich".

But even if my taxes do go up (and I'm well below the $250,000/$200,000 
mark), I think it is important to pay for what we do, which means paying 
the troops and giving them health care.  That's a damned dangerous job 
they do, and while I'm certainly not for the war in Iraq, those who have 
chosen to serve have my respect and I would absolutely show my support 
for them by paying their salaries and making sure their families don't 
have to give up their homes because they're deployed in a dangerous part 
of the world.

There are too many people over here who think that "support the troops" 
means "support fighting in Iraq", but who don't think that paying a 
little more in taxes in order to actually pay them is important.

I'll get off my soapbox before I go longer. :-)

>> but not a social conservative.
> 
> Which means you wouldn't mind if neighbours moved? ;)

LOL - given that we've got a lousy garage band next door, no. ;-)

But what I mean by that was actually well summed up on Real Time with 
Bill Maher by one of the panelists this week, something to the effect of  
"fix yourself and help others.  Not the other way around; you don't go 
around trying to fix everybody else."

Jim

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