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McCain's relationship is not casual. They might not have been close for twenty years, but from a political, not personal, perspective they are just as involved. McCain is a bit closer politically, since they have said these things at McCain events right in front of McCain.
I think Obama did a good job on this issue with his speech today (though I have only seen excerpts). He may have turned a negative into a net positive. I think his speech will be well received by Democrats and independents.
In any case Funchucks, there are too many important issues in this election to get sidetracked, EVEN FOR AMERICANS. "It's the economy, stupid", is far more true today than in 1992... especially given the extra-disturbing news of the past week or so. The economy is going to dominate this election. Even if Barack's last name really was Osama, he really was a muslim, he said he supported Wright, and said he is going to quintuple affirmative action benefits, no one would get distracted from the economy. This might not fit in with your ideas about Americans, which I can understand. The thing is, once their money is at risk, Americans can start being realistic.
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That is hilarious.
"Because they're worried about the economy, Americans would elect the socialist, no matter how much he seems like a dangerous faction's sleeper agent."
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Or... because they're worried about the economy, they'd go with the one who has a better approach on...the economy.
Though, no one ever went broke betting against the stupidity of Americans in elections, so you're entitled to your cynicism.
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The economy is going into recession regardless of who gets in the white house. How long it lasts and how extreme it becomes can be affected by government policies, but thus far the government has been working hard to keep the bubble economy inflated while hiding inflation (which is partially subsidized by foreign central banks' continued willingness to absorb dollars. When China starts getting off the dollar, watch the currency implode.) Obama's endorsement of additional government spending while promising middle-class tax cuts is a fairly disastrous policy which is sure speed up inflation, which incidentally is the most harmful to the poor. It's economic populism and your traditional bag of empty promises.
On the other hand it's difficult to see where McCain intends to make his promised spending cuts. He supports the military-industrial complex, dept. of education, entitlements PLUS tax cuts.
This crisis was created by overspending and debt, the solution isn't to accumulate more debt, and the Chinese are not going to bankroll American consumption forever.
" The wavelike movement affecting the economic system, the recurrence of periods of boom which are followed by periods of depression, is the unavoidable outcome of the attempts, repeated again and again, to lower the gross market rate of interest by means of credit expansion. There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved." Ludwig von Mises.
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Thus I cannot see how either candidate's economic policy will help the crisis. They both have Ronald Reagan tendencies to inflate their popularity by accumulating national debt. Unfortunately the situation today is much more serious, and the primary difference I see is Obama's tendency toward welfare spending while McCain is more likely to waste on military expenditures.
As for Orome's question if there were any candidate I'd support, it would be Ron Paul, who saw this crisis coming for a long time, and who is the only one of the candidates with a clue of why this happened.
In the near future the American people will have to accept a lower standard of living while they save up to repay the excesses of the past few decades. A lot of people will be hurt by this, and the unpopularity of this dose of realism is why no politician has the courage to accept these facts.
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I agree that Obama will not be able to fix the economy. Doing so is pretty much impossible, it is not a overnight fix... so not being able to do that is not really a flaw. However, it is a easy choice between him and John McCain. While Obama will not be able to do a miraculous turn around, it doesn't mean that McCain cannot be a whole lot worse.
I view Obama's spending as necessary infrastructure to make the country able to compete. America will not be able to compete in natural resources or in labor. That is why we need a progressive President. Our educational standards are so low, it is not wasteful spending to raise them. Without doing so you can be sure the country will be completely uncompetitive in the future.
Pertaining to the same goal, but in a more immediate fashion, is funding for science. It has been ridiculously poor in the Bush administration, and in addition to lack of funding, some people in charge of NIH grants have religious priorities. I'm sure everyone knows about the stem cell ban, and the interest in stem cells. That is the easiest example of what is happening, particularly in microbiology labs and environmental research. The US was poised to be a leader in that area, but instead, the research went overseas, as did American born scientists, and it reduced the quantity of imported talent, something quite valuable.
Increased spending in science is the exact opposite of wasteful.
Likewise for the alternative energy plans. It is something that will help our economy in the long run. It might reduce the economic impact of oil on our economy in the future, and it may be something that could be a beneficial national industry, since alternative energy is inevitable worldwide. Not to mention it would be also nice to have some infrastructure in place which will prevent a devastating collapse when there is a shortage of oil. I'd rather not revert back to the horse and carriage.
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On March 19 2008 07:34 Funchucks wrote:I will respond: 1) "GOD DAMN AMERICA!" 2) [picture of Obama with arm around same man] 3) [quotation of Obama describing this man as his personal mentor] + Show Spoiler +Everything about the pastor comes off as viewing the middle class white majority as the enemy, as this great evil force making life miserable for everyone else, inside and outside of America. That middle class white majority happens to be... um... a majority. And there's this vote coming up... "Hi. This is my mentor and spiritual leader. He thinks you're a disease that needs to be eradicated from the planet. Now that he's embarassed me in public, I have to claim to disagree so I can get elected, but I still think he's a swell guy. Anyway, you people made him like this with your racism and discrimination, so I think we should all cut him some slack. We have to remember that the real enemies here we can all hate together are the Jews (oops)... I mean the bankers (no wait, that sounds like an obvious code-word)... the rich! The important thing is that we choose the right minority scapegoat to unite against, ideally one with a lot of property we can seize tax and distribute amongst ourselves invest in our future, in the proud tradition of national social ism... programs. Anywho... let's just take this as a reminder that I'm a little black, and a little white, a little immigrant, and a little native, a little bit Christian, and a little bit Muslim, so my heritage and genetic makeup make me the superior symbolic choice for president. Based on that, vote for me: Barack Hussein Obama!" + Show Spoiler +You can say whatever pretty thing you like. When people don't trust you anymore, they'll hear something else. edit: Show nested quote +Ross Douthat and Ezra Klein are arguing about whether Jeremiah Wright's statements are comparable to those of Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and John Hagee's. To argue that they're not comparable, Douthat -- like most people commenting on this raging controversy -- conflates two entirely separate analytical issues:
(1) Given their close and long-standing personal relationship, does Wright merit more scrutiny vis-a-vis Obama than white, radical evangelical ministers merit vis-a-vis Republican politicians? and,
(2) Are the statements of white evangelical ministers subjected to the same standards of judgment as those being applied to Wright's statements?
Even if the answer to (1) is "yes," that doesn't change the fact that the answer to (2) is a resounding "no." ...and, in turn, that doesn't change the fact that (1) being "yes" makes Wright about 1000 times more relevant to the election than Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson. Anyway, people like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson make nutty spiritual statements to the effect that God has chosen not to protect the USA from her wicked enemies, from plagues and natural disasters, because Americans have been insufficiently pious and virtuous. Wright was making nutty political statements to the effect that the terrorists were justified because America has been acting as an evil force in the world.
I randomly skimmed through and found this post. I pretty much loved it.
edit: moltke, nice posts, too
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HonestTea
5007 Posts
Fuck
So Funchucks was right (although probably by accident)
This did become an issue.
Sick of politics.
AND yet nobody is mentioning McCain's ties with John Hagee and Rod Parsley (wiki that shit)
Sick of politics. Which is why I will support Obama even more.
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Our educational standards are so low, it is not wasteful spending to raise them. Without doing so you can be sure the country will be completely uncompetitive in the future.
The United States already has one of the highest spending rates on education in the world. The degradation of American education has relatively little to do with money. For the political aspect of this tendency, which is really the least important factor, I'll simply point out that:
1. Regulation of education does not fall within the province of the federal government under the constitution
2. Regulation such as the no child behind act has a pejorative effect on American education, by giving schools less flexibility to adapt to enviornmental needs, forcing education to overvalue artificial bureaucratic standards at the expense of real learning, and regimenting the curriculum
3. A universally regulated programme has no self-correction mechanism for bad policy. You are paying tax money for bad education, and if it fails, you have to pay more money to pursue the same policy. Washington cannot socially engineer kids into becoming "more competitve." It's also an illusion to believe one can regulate the teachers to be more competent. Diversity, on the other hand, does have this mechanism. Accepting this, funding for education should occur on the local level. Private options and home-schooling should be viable alternatives, as it's ridiculous to force bored or disinterested kids into a universal custodial institution until 16.
Therefore I see no positive role for the president on education apart from abolishing the presently harmful institutions.
The more important factors behind the decline of American education include the decline of the family and the increasing burdens on teachers as surrogate parents. Also important are the inflationary pressures of a democratic society whereby standards are debased in order to broaden the social demand for education, with the consequence that both in knowledge and employability, a college graduate today is the equal of a high school graduate 100 years ago. At the risk of presumption I would even fault pedagogic doctrine for switching to a broader focus on 'emotional and social development,' sex education, behavioural correction and a plethora of sociological functions rather than fulfilling their primary purpose, and switching to audiovisual-based 'modern learning methods' catering to (and causing) a generation of learners infected by ADD, further diluting the quality.
So in the long run I am quite skeptical of any 'progressive' amendment to education as well as recognizing that today the most people who are really educated are those who educate themselves, creating a new educated minority, which is society's natural adjustment to an inflated education system. The progressives' belief in education as the remedy for all sorts of social ills, (indeed, the fathers of American public education believed it would cost not a penny, due to the elimination of jails and workhouses which would follow in an enlightened society,) and their ultimate belief in the improvability of man through benevolent institutions rings hollower today than the simple Catholic doctrine of original sin which reminds us that we cannot become better than our own choices.
I wrote at such length here I haven't time to address energy, but the development of renewables by the private sector during the last decade has been satisfactory, renewable energy stocks have been rising at a rapid pace. The government could provide incentives, but there is no way it can afford to spend themselves and wind up with more debt, higher costs and less efficient investments. In the long-run, it would be helpful if people stopped consuming and started walking or biking more, and stopped living wasteful lifestyles. The promise of cheap renewable energy may prolong the hubristic illusion of perpectual 'growth' in a finite world, and like everything else reveal its own drawbacks in time.
Which is not an argument against renewable energy, but rather the notion of progress.
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I randomly skimmed through and found this post. I pretty much loved it.
edit: moltke, nice posts, too
I only replied after seeing funchunks introduce some life into this otherwise boring thread. (Apologies, but anyone with cable TV has already heard most of your political campaign analyses from people we generally dislike. It's quite a feat when the media keeps your attention on campaign gossip rather than issues and information.)
Now my right arm is incredible sore. Good night.
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Obama's saying "There is only one America, not white/ black America" is so huge. I never realized that it is the first step to changing America's identity as a white nation to a mixed nation. The change from a nation with white leaders and rich white people to a nation that cares about and is run by all different races is Obama's vision.
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On March 19 2008 12:08 MoltkeWarding wrote:Show nested quote +I randomly skimmed through and found this post. I pretty much loved it.
edit: moltke, nice posts, too I only replied after seeing funchunks introduce some life into this otherwise boring thread. (Apologies, but anyone with cable TV has already heard most of your political campaign analyses from people we generally dislike. It's quite a feat when the media keeps your attention on campaign gossip rather than issues and information.) Now my right arm is incredible sore. Good night.
Please do not masturbate to my political commentary.
+ Show Spoiler +
As a vulnerable 17-year-old slender green-eyed blonde who only goes on the internet with her hair in bunches, wearing matching black-and-pink striped thigh-high stockings, long gloves, corset, and choker, I find the thought terribly intimidating.
It makes me blush, bite my lip, try to cover myself with my hands, lower my face, and glance shyly up at the screen.
So stop it.
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You'll have to describe your family background, ideology, etc if you want a shot
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Obama's intense personal relationship with a political radical posing in the role of a Christian minister, in a cultish little black supremacist sect, is something new and shocking. His political viabiity just took a nosedive
How ironic.
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On March 19 2008 11:54 MoltkeWarding wrote:Show nested quote +Our educational standards are so low, it is not wasteful spending to raise them. Without doing so you can be sure the country will be completely uncompetitive in the future. The more important factors behind the decline of American education include the decline of the family and the increasing burdens on teachers as surrogate parents. Also important are the inflationary pressures of a democratic society whereby standards are debased in order to broaden the social demand for education, with the consequence that both in knowledge and employability, a college graduate today is the equal of a high school graduate 100 years ago. At the risk of presumption I would even fault pedagogic doctrine for switching to a broader focus on 'emotional and social development,' sex education, behavioural correction and a plethora of sociological functions rather than fulfilling their primary purpose, and switching to audiovisual-based 'modern learning methods' catering to (and causing) a generation of learners infected by ADD, further diluting the quality.
What you've described aren't problems. They're symptoms. The root of the problem is that the education system does not encourage competition among schools for the best teachers and students. Some kind of voucher system would work wonders.
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On March 19 2008 12:08 MoltkeWarding wrote:Show nested quote +I randomly skimmed through and found this post. I pretty much loved it.
edit: moltke, nice posts, too I only replied after seeing funchunks introduce some life into this otherwise boring thread. (Apologies, but anyone with cable TV has already heard most of your political campaign analyses from people we generally dislike. It's quite a feat when the media keeps your attention on campaign gossip rather than issues and information.) Now my right arm is incredible sore. Good night.
There's a lot of good information in this thread which you may have missed. And... it's okay, no need to apologise. If you were really sorry you wouldn't have said it.
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I know he's a "trustworthy guy", but I really, really doubt if Obama is going to push through his tax cuts plus all his spending if he gets elected. It's unrealistic and he knows it.
Fixing the economy doesn't have to take long as long as tough decisions are taken, and whoever's in the White House would rather have the recession over in the first two years than still going on in the last two years.
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What you've described aren't problems. They're symptoms. The root of the problem is that the education system does not encourage competition among schools for the best teachers and students. Some kind of voucher system would work wonders.
Although competition is preferable to regulation at this point, there can be absolutely no guarantee that education can be restored to their apexes, because the modern functions and doctrines of public schools which are self-debasing are largely what is demanded by the public, from single working mothers who expect the schools to emotionally coddle their babies to private childrens English schools in China which lose customers if the teachers use curricula more strenuous and 'boring' than playing games or singing songs. Making schools customer-oriented may give some elbow-room to serious students, but will by no means affect the attitudes the majority of the world has adopted toward education. Institutions mean very little without considering the minds and dispositions of the people involved.
In the long-run, democracy and elitism are mutually exclusive traits.* You can only get more of one by diluting the other.
There's a lot of good information in this thread which you may have missed. And... it's okay, no need to apologise. If you were really sorry you wouldn't have said it.
I was referring primarily the past half-dozen pages or so, and contrary to what your intuitions may say about online pleasantries, I never throw them out baselessly.
I know he's a "trustworthy guy", but I really, really doubt if Obama is going to push through his tax cuts plus all his spending if he gets elected. It's unrealistic and he knows it.
If you don't trust the platform how do you choose? On the basis of everyone else: race, gender, public speaking ability and PR efficiency. Which variables am I missing?
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i doubt obama has the political capital to push his policies thru. hes not like bush who has a gazillion of loyal servants. ^^
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EPT![[image loading]](http://image.bayimg.com/dajgiaabd.jpg)
