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Clarence1898 <cla### [at] comcast net> wrote:
> According to the 12th amendment if no person has a majority of the electoral
> vote, the House of Representatives will choose the president from the three
> candidates with the highest vote.
So what exactly happened in 2000? (I have to admit I didn't follow that
debacle too closely.)
--
- Warp
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I couldn't find any quote of the proposed law (anyone?), so I have to
guess about its content. I assume, that it is a law govering allowance of
building religious buildings with a certain appearance resembling
"typical" minarets. I really wonder what defines that and if you build a
minaret with the appearance of a church tower if it doesn't fall under
that law.
So is this an aesthetical question? Because that is the only way this law
could be defined in a nondiscriminating way. If it is about forbidding
muslims to have a tower to signal the start of a prayer - like christians
do - than yes, I think this is xenophobic and the outcry of people in
whole europe is fully justified.
Am Wed, 02 Dec 2009 12:29:56 -0500 schrieb Warp:
> Stefan Viljoen <pov### [at] polardcom> wrote:
>> I see the Swiss apparently voted 57% "nay" on this.
>
>> And the entire world seems to want to take a crap on them about it...
>
> Of course the entire world takes a crap on them about it. It's
> "racism"
> and "intolerance".
>
> Naturally, at the same time prohibiting public display of crucifixes
> in
> Italian schools is not "racism" nor "intolerance" (but in fact, the
> contrary).
Why should the state take a stance on religious issues? In germany 32% of
the people don't belong to any organized religious group. Why should the
schools financed and used by this people buy crucifixes which don't mean
anything to them? Is the state only for the less than 68% of christs?
(Replace numbers by the italian ones - the basic problem doesn't change)
>
> Democracy and freedom of speech are a bad thing because it allows
> people
> to cast the "wrong" votes and express the "wrong" opinions.
Direct democracy might lead to emotionally charged unreasonable
decisions. Why do people assume each political question is so easy, that
anyone can answer it after having heard three talks? BTW one side effect
of direct democracy in Switzerland was the late introduction of womens
ability to vote - sure, if you are in the majority (of voters) you can
prevent the minority frome exercising their rights.
>
> And this is not just related to multiculturalism. It's related to
> everything.
> For example, the Irish people voted against the European constitution
> and everything that would have followed from that. Of course this was
> the "wrong" result, and thus unacceptable. What did they do to fix the
> problem? Easy: More "education" and a new election. This time it worked:
> Now the "right" vote resulted.
So what do you think happened? Did the people feel embarassed for voting
"wrong" the first time, "correcting" it the second time? Or could it just
be that in the time between those elections reasonable arguments were
made and people were *convinced*? While I agree, that elections should be
accepted and not repeated at will, I also think that after a reasonable
time or after some changes (AFAIK they didn't vote the same thiing, did
they?) people can be asked again. If you assume competence from the
people in the first (secret) election you should assume it in the second
election as well.
>
> That's a rather efficient (although quite transparent tactic): Keep
> organizing new elections until the right answer pops up eventually. This
> way the people are fooled into thinking that they actually have a saying
> on matters happening to their own country because, after all, they
> "voted" for it.
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Florian Pesth <fpe### [at] gmxde> wrote:
> If it is about forbidding
> muslims to have a tower to signal the start of a prayer - like christians
> do - than yes, I think this is xenophobic and the outcry of people in
> whole europe is fully justified.
Hence democracy is a bad thing because people can vote for the wrong
things.
--
- Warp
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Am Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:11:42 -0500 schrieb Warp:
> Florian Pesth <fpe### [at] gmxde> wrote:
>> If it is about forbidding
>> muslims to have a tower to signal the start of a prayer - like
>> christians do - than yes, I think this is xenophobic and the outcry of
>> people in whole europe is fully justified.
>
> Hence democracy is a bad thing because people can vote for the wrong
> things.
It's not democracy which is bad, but the people who want to get rid of it
by abusing it.
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On 2-12-2009 22:11, Warp wrote:
> Florian Pesth <fpe### [at] gmxde> wrote:
>> If it is about forbidding
>> muslims to have a tower to signal the start of a prayer - like christians
>> do - than yes, I think this is xenophobic and the outcry of people in
>> whole europe is fully justified.
>
> Hence democracy is a bad thing because people can vote for the wrong
> things.
>
Tom Lehrer in 'Send the MArines': And till they've seen the light,
they've got to be protected, all their rights respected, 'till somebody
we like can be elected.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93n-EmGknEU
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Warp wrote:
> Why didn't that happen in 2000?
It was a different argument. I don't think there was a tie of electoral
votes. There was a problem with the popular votes in a couple of states.
There's really only (approximately) one electoral vote per person in the
house and senate, so on the order of 550 votes, which would be trivial to
recount.
I think the argument in 2000 was that the votes for some states got messed
up, and they wanted to take the election again, and the court said "no, you
have to use the election you have, because everyone is required to vote on
the same day." I honestly didn't really follow the whole ruckus.
> Sounds rather complicated. Especially if it could happen that the person
> who people voted to vote for them changes his mind and votes for someone
> else.
Yep. It's messy.
Indeed, in at least one election (Lincoln, I think), one of the electors
cast one of his votes against the winning party, since that elector figured
that George Washington should be the only president unanimously elected.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Human nature dictates that toothpaste tubes spend
much longer being almost empty than almost full.
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On 12/02/09 15:11, Warp wrote:
> Florian Pesth<fpe### [at] gmxde> wrote:
>> If it is about forbidding
>> muslims to have a tower to signal the start of a prayer - like christians
>> do - than yes, I think this is xenophobic and the outcry of people in
>> whole europe is fully justified.
>
> Hence democracy is a bad thing because people can vote for the wrong
> things.
Don't know about the Swiss, but in the US, passing a law that targets a
particular recognized religious group would be ruled unconstitutional.
The constitution simply doesn't allow it - regardless of what the
majority says (unless it involves national security or something).
As someone on a forum elsewhere pointed out: If you can allow any laws
on the grounds that the majority wants it, then you don't have a
functioning constitution.
--
Even if you win the rat race, you are still a rat.
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Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
> Clarence1898 <cla### [at] comcastnet> wrote:
> > According to the 12th amendment if no person has a majority of the electoral
> > vote, the House of Representatives will choose the president from the three
> > candidates with the highest vote.
>
> So what exactly happened in 2000? (I have to admit I didn't follow that
> debacle too closely.)
>
> --
> - Warp
Without Florida's electoral votes, neither candidate had a majority. So whoever
won Florida's popular vote won their electoral vote and thus the election.
Since the vote count was so close in Florida, the big fuss was over the recount
of ballots. Some ballots were excluded because it wasn't clear which candidate
it was for.
Isaac.
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Florian Pesth <fpe### [at] gmxde> wrote:
> Am Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:11:42 -0500 schrieb Warp:
> > Florian Pesth <fpe### [at] gmxde> wrote:
> >> If it is about forbidding
> >> muslims to have a tower to signal the start of a prayer - like
> >> christians do - than yes, I think this is xenophobic and the outcry of
> >> people in whole europe is fully justified.
> >
> > Hence democracy is a bad thing because people can vote for the wrong
> > things.
> It's not democracy which is bad, but the people who want to get rid of it
> by abusing it.
Democracy doesn't mean "every minority must have its way". It means that
the majority decides what happens to them. It's that simple.
If minorities get precedence of the majority, that's not democracy anymore.
The current trend is that minorities *should* have precedence, and hence
democracy as a concept is a bad thing.
The reason why democracy has always been a good thing is that it creates
unity. When minorities get precedence over the majority, that only causes
discord and resentment, especially the more the minority groups there are
getting special privileges. You end up dividing the society, and such a
society cannot last.
The same trend also abhors freedom of speech for very similar reasons:
It allows people to express the "wrong", majority opinions, which some
minorities might find offensive (or, rather often, what multiculturalists
themselves find offensive on behalf of the minorities even though those
minorities themselves don't).
I'm sorry if upholding democracy and freedom of speech offends someone.
Personally I value them more than some minarets.
--
- Warp
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andrel <a_l### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93n-EmGknEU
Maybe the means are not always correct, but at least someone is *trying*
to do something about the world's problems instead of just sitting on their
asses doing nothing and just hoping that the problems will solve themselves
with enough appeasing and concessions.
--
- Warp
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