US Politics Mega-thread - Page 8242
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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please. In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. | ||
plasmidghost
Belgium16168 Posts
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WolfintheSheep
Canada14127 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:13 xDaunt wrote: Alright, so I am an enterprising trial attorney, and, whenever I catch a whiff of a company violating consumer protection statutes, I start to get a little hard. What would be a good example of a company that sells a supplement nationally and falsely advertises what that supplement does and no one has sued them yet? Apparently a lot of these ones: https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/03/sidebar-whats-in-those-supplements/ From 2015, so no idea if they've been sued in the meantime. If you can round up a lab for testing, you'll probably find a lot more. | ||
Plansix
United States60190 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:18 plasmidghost wrote: For hose not following Defcon (the huge hacker convention in Vegas), they're doing a test on electronic voting machines commonly used in the US and the results are... not good https://twitter.com/VotingVillageDC/status/891008725342765056 https://twitter.com/VotingVillageDC/status/891012608177852416 Everyone knew this. We should really just stick to paper ballots. You can’t hack paper. | ||
plasmidghost
Belgium16168 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:19 Plansix wrote: Everyone knew this. We should really just stick to paper ballots. You can’t hack paper. It seems strange to still have to do that in this day and age, but I agree That leads to another problem though, given that there are so many electronic voting machines in use right now, how do we revert back to paper-only? | ||
mozoku
United States708 Posts
On July 29 2017 03:49 Gorsameth wrote: It's almost as if my regard for the Democratic Party might plummet if they actively sought to hard people for their political seat. But no, it must surely be tribalism... In other words, you're a fly-swatter. Not an exterminator. The job market for fly swatters should tell you something about how useful fly swatters are. And that's because they don't address the mechanism that keeps generating flies. | ||
IgnE
United States7681 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:13 xDaunt wrote: Alright, so I am an enterprising trial attorney, and, whenever I catch a whiff of a company violating consumer protection statutes, I start to get a little hard. What would be a good example of a company that sells a supplement nationally and falsely advertises what that supplement does and no one has sued them yet? 1) i don't think supplements manufacturers are even required to disclose the exact percentages or amounts of whatever they say is in there so suing them for saying "gingko baloba" when they have 1% of a norma dosage isnt likely to be successful 2) claims as to effectiveness are always disclaimed in small print on the bottle making fraud claims difficult to pursue the short of it is that we need a new statutory regime | ||
WolfintheSheep
Canada14127 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:21 plasmidghost wrote: It seems strange to still have to do that in this day and age, but I agree That leads to another problem though, given that there are so many electronic voting machines in use right now, how do we revert back to paper-only? We have some softwood lumber if you folks are in need of paper. *Cough* | ||
Plansix
United States60190 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:21 plasmidghost wrote: It seems strange to still have to do that in this day and age, but I agree That leads to another problem though, given that there are so many electronic voting machines in use right now, how do we revert back to paper-only? All the states have systems in place for if the voting machines fail. It wouldn’t be hard. The digital age is just facing its limits. I still demand paper copies of all my bills, because not relying on some company’s digital record keeping. Or PDFs they email me. Paper is cool, kids. | ||
ZerOCoolSC2
8986 Posts
On July 29 2017 03:09 IgnE wrote: if you had looked up the ingredients like a rational person you would have known there were risks. amphetamine derivatives/analogues were known to be in the pills. who buys random pills without researching the ingredients? hydroxycut is actually an example where they were selling what they advertised. the product worked. it just also happened to have a serious risk profile and be susceptible to abuse. I didn't forget about you buddy. Hydroxycut recalled their product and was off the market for a year because...? PEOPLE WERE DYING. They may have sold what they labeled, but that doesn't excuse the fact that without FDA oversight, they could put in whatever they wanted. "This product is not approved by the FDA" is what they have to put so that the FDA does not get sued. They fixed their formula and came back. Sales are still strong afaik. People expect the shit they buy to not kill them. Having to do diligent research on everything you purchase is asinine to expect. | ||
Gorsameth
Netherlands21713 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:25 mozoku wrote: In other words, you're a fly-swatter. Not an exterminator. The job market for fly swatters should tell you something about how useful fly swatters are. And that's because they don't address the mechanism that keeps generating flies. The problem is human nature, your saying you want an exterminator. I agree, if we kill all humans then bad politicians will no longer happen. Sadly society has deemed genocide on a planetary scale undesirable. | ||
ZerOCoolSC2
8986 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:41 Gorsameth wrote: The problem is human nature, your saying you want an exterminator. I agree, if we kill all humans then bad politicians will no longer happen. Sadly society has deemed genocide on a planetary scale undesirable. LMFAO at that last sentence. Man, this thread produces gems from time to time. | ||
zlefin
United States7689 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:25 mozoku wrote: In other words, you're a fly-swatter. Not an exterminator. The job market for fly swatters should tell you something about how useful fly swatters are. And that's because they don't address the mechanism that keeps generating flies. an exterminator may be better than a fly-swatter, but a fly-swatter is stlil better than nothing. you really haven't remotely made you rcase yet mozoku; and you're changing the case you make. now your argument isn't that the republicans are worse, just that the proposed methodology is inadequately good and is therefore pointless, which is another fallacy (i forget the exact name of this one). you need to brush up on your argumentation. teh analogy also isn't that good as it doesn't correlate to the actual situation well. if you want to discuss systemic solutions, we'd be happy to; but that doesn't mean the lesser partial solution of opposing people doing bad things is unacceptable. also, we're random voters here on the forum, not people in a position to actually effect deep change. as such, changing our votes is one of the more available methods of donig something. | ||
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KwarK
United States42804 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:09 Doodsmack wrote: Is there anyone reading this who doesn't think this is a literal endorsement of extrajudicial abuse of suspects by law enforcement? | ||
Karis Vas Ryaar
United States4396 Posts
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KwarK
United States42804 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:30 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote: People expect the shit they buy to not kill them. Having to do diligent research on everything you purchase is asinine to expect. But surely if companies sell shit that will kill their customers then those companies will lose market share to better companies and go out of business. Only by removing all regulation and maximizing the opportunity for the rational consumer to make an informed decision between all options, some of which may kill him, can we be truly free. /s | ||
WolfintheSheep
Canada14127 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:57 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote: found this gem https://twitter.com/AriMelber/status/891004732470431745 From the perspective of human traffickers, this is technically true. | ||
IgnE
United States7681 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:30 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote: I didn't forget about you buddy. Hydroxycut recalled their product and was off the market for a year because...? PEOPLE WERE DYING. They may have sold what they labeled, but that doesn't excuse the fact that without FDA oversight, they could put in whatever they wanted. "This product is not approved by the FDA" is what they have to put so that the FDA does not get sued. They fixed their formula and came back. Sales are still strong afaik. People expect the shit they buy to not kill them. Having to do diligent research on everything you purchase is asinine to expect. their new formula doesnt contain ephedra anymore. it wasn't fixed so much as rendered impotent. the product doesnt work anymore, despite the sales | ||
mozoku
United States708 Posts
On July 29 2017 04:41 Gorsameth wrote: The problem is human nature, your saying you want an exterminator. I agree, if we kill all humans then bad politicians will no longer happen. Sadly society has deemed genocide on a planetary scale undesirable. Come on. Is this not the most intellectually lazy post you've ever heard? Suppose there's a known problem. And someone goes "Meh, it's just human nature. We can't do anything about it." ...Really? Have you given any though, whatsoever, to possible solutions before you came to that conclusion? And then try to make a joke out of the other guy's (apt) metaphor and claim he's trying to suggest we begin a genocide. an exterminator may be better than a fly-swatter, but a fly-swatter is stlil better than nothing. you really haven't remotely made you rcase yet mozoku; and you're changing the case you make. now your argument isn't that the republicans are worse, just that the proposed methodology is inadequately good and is therefore pointless, which is another fallacy (i forget the exact name of this one). you need to brush up on your argumentation. teh analogy also isn't that good as it doesn't correlate to the actual situation well. if you want to discuss systemic solutions, we'd be happy to; but that doesn't mean the lesser partial solution of opposing people doing bad things is unacceptable. I haven't changed my argument one bit. I've said two things: 1) The problems in politics are systemic; individuals have limited agency. 2) Consequently, criticizing primarily the individuals is irrational and a waste of time. Because Gorsameth is participating in (2), when (1) and (2) are readily apparent, I attributed it to tribalism (the most obvious reason). When Gorsameth claimed he wasn't a tribalist and would drop the Dems if they were evil, I said he was still wrong in criticizing the GOP because he's now merely a fly swatter instead of a tribalist. Which is still irrational. I don't know why you're talking about logical fallacies because we're talking about the real world. By your "lack of fallacy logic", picking up pennies when there's hundred dollar bills on the ground is "still rational." It's not. It's fine, imo, to lament that what's going on in Congress is idiotic. To have 10 pages of liberal echo chamber pilling on about how the GOP is a group of evil people putting politics over policy is obviously wholly unproductive in that it's politically polarizing, tribe-creating (even if the tribe is willing to change names once every 50 years or so, as the D's and R's have done), does nothing to promote or discuss actual solutions, and only serves to make everyone involved feel good about how smart they are that everyone apparently agrees with them. I'm also of the opinion that calling fallacies by their name or proclaiming "that's a fallacy!" in an internet argument serves no purpose in 90+% of cases. If you think someone's argument is invalid, then you should be able to explain why. In English. Calling it a "fallacy" and maybe throwing in a little Latin adds literally nothing to the validity of your post. Besides, people's rush to use these fallacies often them being improperly called out anyway. ------------------------- But anyway, Gorsameth's post and you both begged the question: what can we do besides point to "human nature" and call it a day? I hadn't discussed this until now because you don't propose a solution until the person you're talking to understands the problem (i.e. criticizing individual politicians is useless in most cases). I don't claim to have "the answers", but here is where I think a productive discussion might start. Others may disagree and that's fair. 1) It's well understood that society is not a bunch of un-influence-able, independent, rational actors, and that media has a gigantic effect on how society as a whole thinks and perceives things. Clearly, Fox News, Breitbart, internet echo chambers, the NYT taking sides in an election outside of their editorials, etc. are not good things for society. We can start by thinking of how to manage the massive media problem that America is currently facing. 2) The two-party system, and FPTP. 3) Perhaps campaign financing? 4) This is getting radical, but does the system that our Constitution established over 200 years ago even make sense anymore? The Founders wanted to have elected officials accountable to their constituents, but feared making them "too accountable", which is why they made the Electoral College and the Senate the way they did. The changes to those institutions to make them more electoral were maybe good ideas at the time, but with the current Twitter and 4-hour news cycle, does the current system still maintain the right (if any?) balance between politician independence and the whims of his constituents? Maybe analytics has made politics too efficient. And there's a host of other productive discussions that could be had along those lines. | ||
zlefin
United States7689 Posts
we already entirely did understand the problem, your claim to the contrary is unfounded. and is only showing oyur own bias again. we've also already addressed the topics you raise quite extensively, we've already discussed amending quit ea lot, the flaws in fptp, campaign finance, and media influence. if you have something new to add or wish to go over them, by all means. but you didn't start by trying to have a productive discusison, you started with an unproductive one. if you want to have one now, fine, let's do that. but own up to the fact that it's NOT what you opened up with. you also have to realize that a lot of people try to make excuses for misconduct; and it's hard to tell the difference between your argument, and someone who's just trying to defend the misconduct of republicans by using a tangential argument. much like "states rights" is often a cover for another actual intent, some people argue to ignore the misconduct of republicans simply because they're trying to minimize the apparent badness of the conduct, not because of some sort of actual productivity. you also didn't really address my argument about agency, as they're not in truly dire straits, the penalties for them acting in a godo way are not truly onerous, not nearly enough so to override the validity of moral judgment of their actions. don't let the perfect become the enemy of the good. | ||
ZerOCoolSC2
8986 Posts
On July 29 2017 05:31 IgnE wrote: their new formula doesnt contain ephedra anymore. it wasn't fixed so much as rendered impotent. the product doesnt work anymore, despite the sales Point is, that with the FDA gone, you'll get people prescribing and selling opiates as a cure to opiates. This happened at the turn of the 20th century. Doctors were prescribing cocaine to get rid of cocaine addiction. FDA was the result of that. As was stated previously, the process and institution could use an overhaul and streamlining effort, but to wish for it to be disbanded makes no sense. | ||
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