Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Feel free to have one on me




... or a few.

Yeah, drinking that stuff really makes the conversations here really intelligent.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

You don't think it might have to do with the fact that people have been counted on to reliably vote for whichever monster happens to be the D or R, so long as someone can offer them a thread of excuse that the other monster will be worse? Need the fault for the situation you describe necessarily lie in the stars? When there's so many plausible explanations among yourselves?

A friend sent the following analysis to me.

I've said it before, I will say it again:The politics of today have become nothing more than a mutually shared faith based paradigm. It is, albeit unwittingly, the religion of America. As such it is removed from having to be held to the notion of cause and effect or empirical knowledge. Applying the notion of cause and effect one ought to be able to discern that the act of voting has created change. Empirical knowledge ought to reveal that the act of voting can alter the course of society. It has, in fact, only allowed for more of the same, with minor improvements being hailed as history making- while the military/industrial complex continues to rake in profit, to assume an ever more powerful sway in policy and legislation.

Originally Posted by princeofcats67

Not to worry, Eric. No more "Zzzzzzzzzzzzz"-responses.

Just relax and breathe-deeply. "Aummmmmmmm".



Prince

PS: Besides, I have a new "defense" now!

Oooh what a great picture. I like that one so MUCH better!!!

And to think The Rani was born under it........

[QUOTE=Eric the Green;448674]

Oooh what a great picture. I like that one so MUCH better!!

That peace sign used to actually stand for something. Now it's just a pretty piece of art.

“Three hundred fifty drone strikes by the U.S. have killed as many as 3,378 people including as many as 885 civilians, including women and children. Our drone strikes create sympathy for our enemies among the populations we bomb. Numerous academic reports have detailed that our policies are counterproductive and lead to increased radicalization.

“Yet, according to The Washington Post “targeted killing is now so routine that the Obama administration has spent much of the past year codifying and streamlining the process that sustains it.”

“According to these officials, the government expects to keep adding names to the kill list, now called a ‘disposition matrix.’ The Kill Matrix will continue at least another decade. The institutionalization of the kill/capture list should concern us all. This program has been created and expanded absent any oversight from Congress. With the Kill Matrix the ultimate decision to kill rests in the hands of a single individual: the President of the United States.
“Let’s take a moment to reflect. Targeted killing under international law is legal only under very narrow circumstances. Significant questions remain as to whether or not the U.S. is conducting these strikes in accordance with the law. Thus far, the evidence says otherwise. We have killed thousands of people. We have evidence that this policy creates new U.S. enemies, and our government wants to make this program permanent. We continue to kill ‘top leaders.’ How many times have we killed ‘Al Qaeda’s number 2?’ Will we keep killing until everyone who disagrees with us is dead?

“This short-sighted policy has been likened to mowing the grass. As soon as you stop cutting the grass down, it comes right back. Nations aren’t made of grass. They are made of people. Innocent civilians are being killed. We are not solving our problems or making the world safer. We are simply staining our own global image, undermining our ethical place to lead and descending into moral depravity.”

The Kill Matrix
***
www.washingtonpost.com

Originally Posted by Justin '77

You don't think it might have to do with the fact that people have been counted on to reliably vote for whichever monster happens to be the D or R, so long as someone can offer them a thread of excuse that the other monster will be worse? Need the fault for the situation you describe necessarily lie in the stars? When there's so many plausible explanations among yourselves?

That's more than a little simplistic, if you ask me. There has never been a pure nation, because there are no pure citizens to populate one. Given that, we are far from the country we should be, but also far from the one we could be, given our base instincts. And by 'our', I mean all of us.

So why would you expect that the one chosen to be the leader would be perfect? In fact, how would he* survive if he was?

Look at the blood-sport we make of hating our enemies. This is a majority preference, as far as I can tell. No President survives as a wimp, or even by being percieved as one. At that, Obama is already accused of wimpish behavior, yet you rend your clothes and declare him a murderer. Of course, you do realize that 'murder' is a political term, while 'killing' is purely functional. You hunt, so I know you understand the diffrenece. If someone is attacking you, you can kill them, but it's not murder, at least not as defined in the good old US of A. Paranoia has extended the reach of that concept to the ends of the earth, and the threat to anything that may try to harm us ... ever. In other words, We the People have declared a pox on All the Other People ... because we can.

Note: this doesn't make it right. I'm pretty pissed about it too. I just understand that this will go on until we make it stop, and the first step is to stop making it happen. We have a high degree of latent ... hell, blatant fear. One party feasts on it, and the other isn't innocent either. Until that mindset changes, we won't elect anyone who will turn the other cheek. The last guy to run on that platform was a war hero turned pacifist. He died just 4 days ago. He also got creamed.

__________________________________________________ ______
*So far, they are all men

Originally Posted by Justin '77

You don't think it might have to do with the fact that people have been counted on to reliably vote for whichever monster happens to be the D or R, so long as someone can offer them a thread of excuse that the other monster will be worse? Need the fault for the situation you describe necessarily lie in the stars? When there's so many plausible explanations among yourselves?

I've come to peace with this a little more... thank math.

Using the basic variables present in our constitutionally-defined electoral process, the system always reverts to a two-party equilibrium. If we smashed up the Republican and Democratic parties in to a thousand pieces, they would create new alliances and networks until they formed two major parties again in some slightly different configuration of beliefs. When the variables are fed in to a computer and the simulations are run, it happens again and again for enough elections that our sun would have already run out of fuel.

The choice is to

A) Pick a lesser of two evils
B) Go all in on a third party that can get big enough to replace one of the others (this also involves congressional races and destroying one of the established parties)
C) ... run away?

C) is probably the most logical solution for an average individual but B) is pretty fun too. If one of the parties fails to consistently maintain a viable threat to the other, a third will rise rapidly to take its place. The Republican party has a demographic problem that could be exploited in this context.

What the HELL is wrong with the GOP these days?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/1...n_2017734.html

Originally Posted by JohnMc82

I've come to peace with this a little more... thank math.

Using the basic variables present in our constitutionally-defined electoral process, the system always reverts to a two-party equilibrium. If we smashed up the Republican and Democratic parties in to a thousand pieces, they would create new alliances and networks until they formed two major parties again in some slightly different configuration of beliefs. When the variables are fed in to a computer and the simulations are run, it happens again and again for enough elections that our sun would have already run out of fuel.

The choice is to

A) Pick a lesser of two evils
B) Go all in on a third party that can get big enough to replace one of the others (this also involves congressional races and destroying one of the established parties)
C) ... run away?

C) is probably the most logical solution for an average individual but B) is pretty fun too. If one of the parties fails to consistently maintain a viable threat to the other, a third will rise rapidly to take its place. The Republican party has a demographic problem that could be exploited in this context.

This is only true in the United States, because we have an elected-king system. If we had a parliamentary system like all other sensible up-to-date democracies, and even the one we ourselves set up in Iraq, a multi-party system would work fine, and other voices would be represented outside today's duopoly.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

This is only true in the United States, because we have an elected-king system. If we had a parliamentary system like all other sensible up-to-date democracies, and even the one we ourselves set up in Iraq, a multi-party system would work fine, and other voices would be represented outside today's duopoly.

Right, it is specifically relevant to the variables outlined in our constitution. Until we change that, nothing really changes and third party operations from within in the system will remain statistically doomed to failure.

LOL, Eric ...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/1...n_2017482.html

Won't let me embed ...

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Umm.. no. By 'ruling class', I mean 'ruling class'. That's why I used the words "ruling" and "class" together in that order. If I had meant 'the voters', I would have used these words: "the" and "voters".

There's a neat trick to it; I can explain to you sometime if you've got a spare couple hours

As to the rest of your efforts to attribute thoughts to me based on words you come up with yourself...

Suffice it to say that, to me, murder is an inexcusable thing, no matter who the murderer is and no matter what justifications they can dream up. Imagine that as being among my first-principles (though to be honest, it's derivative probably at the second or third iteration -- but its predecessors aren't really significant at the level we're discussing) and maybe the stuff I say might make a little more sense to you.

Uh, sorry, not buying it. Voters elect our government leaders; they rule.

Whether they rule smartly is obviously a different question.

I think what people need to understand is that you're dismayed with the VAST majority of them; you just like to disguise that with alot of easy self-righteousness.

Cobert is on a roll these days -

Stephen Colbert Offers Donald Trump $1,000,000 to Charity 'If You'll Let Me Dip My Balls In Your Mouth'

The video is must-see Americana -

http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/...-trump-1000000

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Feel free to have one on me




... or a few.

OMG, I just went into spasms with that pic!

Now if I just find that cabinet key the wife keeps 'losing' for me.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

You don't think it might have to do with the fact that people have been counted on to reliably vote for whichever monster happens to be the D or R, so long as someone can offer them a thread of excuse that the other monster will be worse? Need the fault for the situation you describe necessarily lie in the stars? When there's so many plausible explanations among yourselves?

You know what M&L's pic did for me?

Sudden enlightenment.

You know what this entire lack of discernment is about, this whole lesser of evils begets evil, this let's go play magic pony land with 3rd parties?

It's sheer laziness

Laziness particularly of the intellectual kind but I also bet dollars-to-donuts the ones expressing it the most have never canvassed a neighborhood or manned a phone bank.

Sit back and bitch with your keyboard. Wow, that will move mountains.

Originally Posted by Deb C

This is the truth that so many of us don't want to see. While we turn a blind eye to what our *candidate* is doing to deconstruct our democracy, we focus on the other's faults.

Meanwhile, we turn on any one who doesn't have our point of view. This, at a time when we need one another more than ever.

Scenario - woman pregnant as a result of a brutal rape.

One side says tough shit, it was God's will; the other side drives her to a Planned Parenthood office.

If you can't see the difference, you're caught up in some magic pony land. It may be a magic pony land that's a lot uglier than the one where Justin lives (there the ponies poop out gold nuggets!), but it is still magic pony land. And your inability to see the discernment greatly undermines the higher plane of truth that you believe you reside above all those who actually get their hands dirty trying to make a difference in the real world.

Originally Posted by playwrite

Scenario - woman pregnant as a result of a brutal rape.

One side says tough shit, it was God's will; the other side drives her to a Planned Parenthood office.

If you can't see the difference, you're caught up in some magic pony land. It may be a magic pony land that's a lot uglier than the one where Justin lives (there the ponies poop out gold nuggets!), but it is still magic pony land. And your inability to see the discernment greatly undermines the higher plane of truth that you believe you reside above all those who actually get their hands dirty trying to make a difference in the real world.

Silly question. In your reality, do fascists ride magic ponies, or just sell them?

Originally Posted by B Butler

Silly question. In your reality, do fascists ride magic ponies, or just sell them?

The real fascists don't do anything with magic ponies. Instead, they take your lunch money, rape you and tell you its God's way, and then spew lies to convince you that they're no worse than anyone else so just go off and pout somewhere.

Imagine what kind of Supreme Court we will have after 8 years of Romney. It won't be America anymore, that's for sure. Sorry Justin, Seattleblue, Rani, et al., I find that hard to ignore.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Damn. I'd better vote Democrat then, so I don't get raped and pregnant.
That oughta do it.

ETA:
Uh oh, too late:
Romney Hits the 50 Percent Mark in New Natl. Poll

From what I've been able to put together, some Bayer aspirin between your knees outta cover you either way. You think the generic would work as well?

Originally Posted by The Rani

Drone of silence: the national-security policy that Obama and Romney won’t debate

Sorry Eric, but this is why your scare tactics don't work. It already isn't America anymore.

Yup, both love the drones, not much for debate. No one ever called Obama on his continuation of Bushco tactics. I am glad we took out some big bads, but I am queasy about a drone army.

The abject panic on the left is evident from this thread, so it doesn't require much commentary, except to say that it comes from the top down. Obama's attacks on Romney are becoming desperate. Yesterday he actually called him a "disease". Not the kind of thing you see in the last week of the campaign from somebody who's winning. It's very similar to Bush I's behavior at the end in 1992.

Anyway, yesterday the ABC/WP tracking poll had Romney +1. Today it's Romney +3, identical to Rasmussen and Gallup: Romney 50, Obama 47. How many of those 3% of undecideds are going to vote for Obama? Something very close to none.

*Compare to 2004 and 2008.

Originally Posted by playwrite

Scenario - woman pregnant as a result of a brutal rape.

One side says tough shit, it was God's will; the other side drives her to a Planned Parenthood office.

If you can't see the difference, you're caught up in some magic pony land. It may be a magic pony land that's a lot uglier than the one where Justin lives (there the ponies poop out gold nuggets!), but it is still magic pony land. And your inability to see the discernment greatly undermines the higher plane of truth that you believe you reside above all those who actually get their hands dirty trying to make a difference in the real world.

While the rape issue is important, so are the drones that kill innocent people. Not to mention NDAA that Obama put into affect. Now even a journalist who is interviewing a suspect can be held indefinitely. His kill list, where he sees anyone 15 or older in the area of a terrorist, is considered a militant. Even innocent people cannot go pick up the remains of their loved ones because of the danger of being considered a terrorist.

There are numerous crucial issues to be addressed that aren't even in our main stream news. Murder isn't even addressed if it's not within our borders.

Just a couple of issues, among many issues, that few on the Left want to see:

Election Day is around the corner. We can't be certain who will win, but we do know that austerity measures are comingwhether President Obama is re-elected or whether Governor Romney wins. As noted economist Dean Baker tells us, Obama said in the first debate that his position on Social Security is not much different from Romney who is proposing large cuts.


Repeat:

“A recent Washington Post article contains an unsettling confirmation of what many of us have feared for years; the United States is establishing state-sponsored murder as a permanent condition of foreign policy.
“Three hundred fifty drone strikes by the U.S. have killed as many as 3,378 people including as many as 885 civilians, including women and children. Our drone strikes create sympathy for our enemies among the populations we bomb. Numerous academic reports have detailed that our policies are counterproductive and lead to increased radicalization.
“Yet, according to The Washington Post “targeted killing is now so routine that the Obama administration has spent much of the past year codifying and streamlining the process that sustains it.”
“According to these officials, the government expects to keep adding names to the kill list, now called a ‘disposition matrix.’ The Kill Matrix will continue at least another decade. The institutionalization of the kill/capture list should concern us all. This program has been created and expanded absent any oversight from Congress. With the Kill Matrix the ultimate decision to kill rests in the hands of a single individual: the President of the United States.
“Let’s take a moment to reflect. Targeted killing under international law is legal only under very narrow circumstances. Significant questions remain as to whether or not the U.S. is conducting these strikes in accordance with the law. Thus far, the evidence says otherwise. We have killed thousands of people. We have evidence that this policy creates new U.S. enemies, and our government wants to make this program permanent. We continue to kill ‘top leaders.’ How many times have we killed ‘Al Qaeda’s number 2?’ Will we keep killing until everyone who disagrees with us is dead?
“This short-sighted policy has been likened to mowing the grass. As soon as you stop cutting the grass down, it comes right back. Nations aren’t made of grass. They are made of people. Innocent civilians are being killed. We are not solving our problems or making the world safer. We are simply staining our own global image, undermining our ethical place to lead and descending into moral depravity.”

The Kill Matrix
***
www.washingtonpost.com
Tue Oct 23 2012

Over the past few years, the Obama administration has institutionalized the use of armed drones and developed a counterterrorism infrastructure capable of sustaining a seemingly permanent war.

Originally Posted by playwrite

By "the ruling class" you mean the voters. Both parties have their caucuses and primaries to nominate their candidate. It may not involve the 100 million or so that vote in the general but it does involve 10s of millions of them. Money obviously plays a role but in the end, someone can't buy your vote unless you let them.

But those caucus and primary voters are conditioned by pro-Establishment framing to vote for Establishment candidates.

Originally Posted by The Rani

For those who didn't watch the whole video, all four of the "third party" candidates said that they would have vetoed NDAA.

Still considering writing in Huntsman. Write ins have an interesting past.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write-in_candidate