Newgrounds.com — Everything, By Everyone.

At 12/14/08 04:11 AM, Garthredbunlove wrote:
"all that shit" Real classy.

Get off it bunlove what the fuck is this tea time at the grey poupon open? Fuck off AND ALL THAT SHIT fucktard.

At 12/12/08 10:38 PM, Conspiracy3 wrote: The main thing I hate is when I see a twenty year old complaining about racist events from fifty years ago. They weren't even alive back then, so what right do they have to complain about what happened to your ancestors. I am white, many of my ancestors were racists, many were slave holders. However, I fit neither category. One person shouldn't blame another person for what one person's ancestors did to another person's ancestors.

coming from someone who probably benifitted from what his racist ancestor's did to the other person's ancestors who most likely is still trying to climb out of the economic, cultural hole that period of history put him in.

The past matters, because it DETERMINES the future.

There is no black and white.

This is one of the dumbest piles of crap I've even skimmed through. Try explaining that to a child. Concepts have to make sense on a fundamental level, idiot. Why bother having colors at all? Maybe... cuz... they... exist? l2raceaware

As for the cultural issue, blacks have been "free" for 150 years. There has been affirmative action for 40, yet schools in Detroit are graduating 25% of their students from high school? Perhaps there is no PHYSICAL differences in intelligence and capability, but the culture sure is different, and it's obviously been that way for a while. Things aren't going to just change. Perhaps if Barak Obama is one of the best presidents ever, white people may come to expect more from black people, but will that change anything? We can only hope so. However, I still think that one black man's accomplishments are not going to encourage millions of black people to stay in school and out of prison, when that's been the culture for hundreds of years.

This has little to do with "black" culture (whatever that means) and all to do with the wealth or lack of it in their communities, if you take poor whites and compare them to poor blacks you find their upward mobility is similar, IE it sucks. "black" culture is white culture, we gave it to them when we kidnapped them and forced them to abandon their own. Blacks are often loudmouth aggressive assholes because whites are aggressive loudmouth assholes. The difference is that some whites channel it into a middle class middle management authoritarian utility (like my dad does), and poor blacks just get to yell at each other and beat their wives, the same is true of poor whites.

The diffence is that when whites see blacks being aggresive they get all scurreded and upset about it, and when blacks see angry whites they just say, "Sure thing boss, sorry about that." or think to themselves, "Damn, pulled over for driving while black again, ok Carl be cool be cool, don't want to turn a traffic stop into a twenty year vacation."

At 12/11/08 09:58 PM, Silverchaos wrote: It is to save face. The thing is, sometimes America has an ulterior motive for "attacking" a country in the first place (thankfully, not often though).

ROFL

At 12/11/08 03:59 PM, InsertFunnyUserName wrote: Well, as a bisexual person myself, the reality is that I'd rather have them accept me due to social stigma than brutally reject me.

The only people I have a problem with are the people who are overly sensitive about the subject to the point that they're freaking out over things that are the slightest bit politically incorrect.

As a bisexual man myself I often find the attitudes to be far worse toward me than they are toward gays, I also find that many gays are intolerant toward me, a wonderful bit of hypocracy there. I remember just a little while back seeing a report saying that bisexuality doesn't exist, and then there are the commentaries basically saying that bisexuality in women is great but in men is disgusting, a perspective expressed by women and men. Well at least my wife doesn't care one bit, even though she's a straight ace.

I am not stupid and I am not blind. It's easy to see how you can turn a democracy into a dictatorship, without every giving up the democratic elections. The people don't see it, they think they live in a democracy, that much is a simple technicality. Do you really think if the people decided to turn against Chavez he would quietly step down, or give a congratulatory speech to the winner and leave? That would be Zimbabwe 2.0. they would simply call "rigged election" and toss out the results.

You may not be blind but you certianly have a strong imagination, so here you're basically condemning chavez for crimes he's going to commit or would commit if he weren't so damn popular.

Anyway, I'll give you plenty of time to dig through all this and try to brush me off as an ignorant redneck that watches fox news... which I don't. I don't watch the news, I don't read newspapers and I only listen to National Public Radio on my way to and from work, which is a combined 30 minutes of radio per day.

I listen to red radio all the time, it's entertaining, also useful to see what the media wants me to think.

It was allowed to to have it license expire? why was it not allowed to renew its license? Its the same thing as shutting them down, except it took longer. Once you learn the more subtle points of politicking, you'll realize that if Chavez would have actively shut down all opposition stations, all at once the people would have revolted.

Hey some people see faces in tea leaves, maybe im just not in tune enough with the universe to se a spade as a diamond yet sorry. 1. Shutting down a media outlet for supporting a violent coup is totally legitimate and probably should have been done earlier. 2. the people revolted to put chavez back in power after the 2002 coup, i don't think they would have rerevolted if he got rid of an agent of that coup who had undone the democratic will of the people and installed a business junta that declared martial law and suspended the democratically ratified constitution.

Instead he does the clever thing, let them remain on the air until the license expires, then refuses to allow the license to be renewed. This way you pick off the stations slowly while averting the wrath of the people.

So in the great example to how nations should be designed the USA do major networks have the right to say whatever they want on TV or radio oh wait no theyre not the FCC liscenses them, and theyre all funded by elite business, so exactly how is venezuela falling behind the US on media reflecting the interests of the people?

Now that all of the Venezuelan media is pro Chavez, the others cannot get their message out. It's just like modern day Russia. There is opposition to Putin/Medvedev, but the Russian media isn't going to go very far in advertising this fact because the Russian government is so heavily controlled by a single party that they can simply have them shut down, either actively, by revoking their license and forcing them to shut down or passively by simply letting the license expire and not renewing it.

So much for your claim that all the stations are prochavez, since the station was only cut off from broadcasting and now continues to operate under cable and satellite, as the most popular station in the country.
"Since its return, RCTV has become the most watched channel in Venezuela (despite being on cable). Only 30% of houses have cable in Venezuela but the total amount that view RCTV is higher than all viewers of TVES, Venevision, and all other channels. In Caracas and in Valencia twice as many people view RCTV than Venevision"

Are you going to admit your wrong here or should I just assume you refuse to agknowledge anything that undermines the narrative in your head?

In the legendary words of Queen Amidala, "You assume too much." I don't watch television. period. Television is a piss poor way to get information. I scour the internet for my news. I don't even have a television in my home. That and I think Bill O'Reilly is an loud mouth idiot. Not all people who are not rabid leftists pray to Fox news for guidance.

So... you go to the online surrogates of fox news for your info instead, I'm guessing the Politico is in your favorites? You really think theres a big difference?

The path is similar, but that doesn't mean that the means are.

ok... what path? Any society that tries to help their poor is evil? Is that teh essential distillation of evil marxist policy?

How can you have a democracy without open access to information? all of the media chant praises to Chavez, regardless of what he does. They have to, or their license won't be renewed. It's easy to control the minds of the populace when all the media outlets are tuned in to the exact same message.

I don't know where youre getting this propaganda state concept from, clearly the kind of heavy handed controls on media you would expect in your 1984 fantasy are not there.

Also, This Is what I call power politics! You call THAT democracy? I sure as hell don't. "If my party loses that election, I'll use military force to ensure that my party stays in power anyway!" Is what he is really saying. Defend the people my ass. you don't defend the people by threatening military force if you don't vote for those already in power.

I looked into this, I think what Chavez inferred about military intervention was pretty disgusting, but the person he was talking about did lose, and he didn't intervene with military force, so he said something really stupid, probably the worst thing I've ever heard him say, but didn't carry through on it, probably himself realizing it was a retarded thought. He's not jesus that's for sure but he's better than anything we have in the states, at least his policies are democratically supported, not like in the US where you have Bush carrying out unpopular policy for breakfast and Clinton pushing through NAFTA against his own party and the public in general.

I view politics in a different way than most. I see the USSR and Venezuela being similar in the fact that the way it is set up does not allow, under any circumstances, for the ruling party to lose power. If the people don't like the ruling party, they have no effective means to change it. It is there to stay until someone forces them out. This also comes to mind.

You mean it's set up so that voters continue to get what they want? This is similar to the USSR how?
If the people don't like the ruling party they can vote tehm out, independent poll watchers certify that the elections in venezuela are free elections, I don't understand why you keep saying down is up and black is white (oh wait that'd be the right wing internets priming you sorry forgot) So you're essentially saying you support another violent coup, because dammit democracy just isn't agreeing with you.

If the amendments are ratified by the public next month in a referendum, they will extend Mr. Chavez's term of office from six to seven years and lift a two-term limit on the presidency.

Meaning he will effectively be the president until he dies. How? Look below.

Umm this was already voted down in referendum, so not sure why you torture to death what it would have done. Also it doesn't mean he would be president until he dies, he would be president until the voters say he can't be anymore. If they had chosen to not have term limits that's their choice, it was also their choce not to revoke them.

Now, the obvious question is THIS. "If Chavez has the power to order tanks to enter a city in the event his party does not win an election. what could stop him from simply declaring an emergency when his party loses, seizing the assets of the opposition candidate, and throwing him in the clink and then silencing the media from reporting it?"

what stops our president from doing this?

the answer? Nothing. You have, effectively, turned a "Socialist democracy" into a single party authoritarian government that can control everything. Who can declare a state of emergency? Chavez himself? yes. Whether or not he has to have the consent of the National Assembly, because they are all under his thumb. If he says he wants it, he will get it.

So basically the same controls the US has for this sort of thing, a congress that can say no, but that's only good enough for you in the US, in other countries they need a coup to install a prowestern leader then a "peacekeeping force" left behind to prevent any popular reversal of our action is that about right? (how many superembassies are we building in Iraq?)

There is a difference between a black person and a Nig(g)er. A black person is no different from your average minority. They generally work harder and are much smarter because they have to be, they face adversity that pushes them to it. However, a N-word is an American creation. Through peer pressure, a history of racial bias and a strong sense of the older black generation to keep the younger ones down, nig(g)ers were born. They are creatures that now define pop culture. They think being uneducated is cool. They like thug life, street life, prison life, gangster life, hood life, ghetto life, and others that I'm forgetting. They are the major reason black people have problems today.

No they glorify these things because the toughest guys in their nieghborhood epitomize them, the same way many whites idolize the military, police and firemen, and sports stars. Youre blaming the result of poverty for causing poverty. "Theyre poor because they have bad values and are ignorant." No..... they're ignorant and have bad values because theyre poor. Not sure why you're ignorant and have bad values, are you poor too or an outlier?

At 12/10/08 07:46 PM, Bolo wrote:

At 12/9/08 07:04 PM, Korriken wrote:

:stuff

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/12/04/p oll.troops/index.html

the new poll shows only a 52 to 46 support for Obama's plan this is hardly overwhelming. which proabably also means democrats are against it even in a poll probably framed within the "OBAMA"S redepolment into afghanistan" prefacing. If you just asked, "Do you support the US war in afghanistan? You almost certainly would lose support from the public, reducing it to a split or slight popular opposition to any military involvement there.

Generally Americans have been against any military interventions that have recieved the wide support of US administrations, they don't like us being in other country's business and wasting our money trying to represent all over the world, rockin out with our cocks out. I looked for a little while for more polling info on this subject for awhile and couldn't find any, my guess is this is a primed poll intended to steer responders to the pro position

the only reason we mess around in afghanistan is to control the oil pipelines that run through it, nothing else has anything to do with it, theyre just justifications, the concept of a 3rd world threat from technologically backward people is just an exuse to enforce the will of our empire in places without the epowerment to resist us. The highjackers and Osama were not afghanis they just helped us and were trained by us in afghanistan during a seperate phase of our empire games, the afghan people have nothing to do with threatening us.

At 12/9/08 07:39 PM, AapoJoki wrote:

At 12/9/08 06:27 PM, XaosLegend wrote: theres that word pragmatic that's everywhere now, it's pragmatic if they agree with it, ideological and reckless if they don't

Would you, personally, recognize genuine pragmatism, even when it disagrees with your political ideology?

If I thought it was pragmatic it would BE MY POLITICAL IDEOLOGY, and still completely subjective to my point of view. If you can recognize true pragmatism ie the very best right thing to do in a given case without the possibility of being wrong than YOU ARE GOD, otherwise you're just ideologically supportive of the policy you've "recognized" as "geniune" pragmatism.

Everything I think about politics is ideological just like everything you do is, it's complex sometimes and many of a person's ideologies compete with one another to create nuanced conclusions but that makes them no less ideological. There are sources for ideology that may be more or less legitimate, but that's another matter, Like taking all your public policy from the flying spaggeti monster bible and supporting a ban on sliverware for that reason would be less legitimate than taking the best science of the day and concluding something must be done about global warming.

At 12/9/08 11:20 PM, Korriken wrote:

At 12/9/08 10:38 PM, Contipec wrote:

idiotic dribble

you have no idea what youre talking about you assbasket. The media outlet you're talking about was allowed to have it's liscence expire years after it helped stage a coup against chavez that was nearly successful, where America the democracy loving nation tried to violently unseat a democratically elected leader of another sovreign nation. If CNN tried to help stage a coup against an american president whoever was responsible at the network would have been sentenced to life or death for treason. The freedom of media in Venezuela is stronger than in the US not weaker, and if you listened to anyone but Billo the clown for your info you might know that, but you don't, youre an ignorant slut.

Venezuela is not on the same political economic path as the USSR was. The USSR was a hyperhierarchy with only a tiny group of military leaders making all of the decisions, a centralized command economy and polity. Venezuela is attempting to create a greater degree of direct democracy than america has and form a much more participatory economy where workers have far more say in the companies they work for. This is not the USSR model, the only similarity is populism, a concept that has innumerable manifestations, one of which was the america model vs it's predecesors at the time of it's creation, and the capitalist model's success is widely attributed to it's diffusion of hierarchy and participation in the economy, allowing for innovation and an organic reward system. Venezuela is trying to push these elements further than the US has, but otherwise has a superb democracy and freedom of the media and speech, with almost no record of human rights violations, something that cannot be said for the US.

At 12/9/08 06:08 PM, marchohare wrote: Did anyone else notice he was out on a $4,500 bond?

I've seen higher bail set for someone caught with a joint in his pocket.

We must have our priorities, mustn't we?

The law is for controlling the masses not the controllers.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3660

article from probably my favorite news site about how the media have been putting words in Obama's mouth about his Iraq policy.

"that Obama would somehow kind of reflexively and literally stick to this 16-month timetable, that's gone. I mean, he's a pragmatic guy. I mean, the war is ending mostly because of a surge he opposed, but worked."

theres that word pragmatic that's everywhere now, it's pragmatic if they agree with it, ideological and reckless if they don't

"The impression left by the event at a downtown Chicago hotel ballroom was of a political leader converting to governance from electioneering."

Basically that it's appropriate to do unpopular things as an office holder even if you campaigned on the opposite policy. (which would be pandering, apparently it's derided to support anything the public wants)

"Obama's decision to keep on Defense Secretary Robert Gates has angered the anti-war left, as it signals that Obama is prepared to drop his pledge to withdraw U.S. combat troops from Iraq within 16 months--two brigades per month--of taking office.... Now the question is: When did Obama know he would not honor his hard timeline pledge--during the primary, as I suspect, or over time, as the Bush/Gates troop surge brought about increased security in Iraq? Either way, Obama is where he should be on the issue."

this is even though Obama has multiple times since the gates announcement reiterated that he intends to stick to the 16 month withdrawl time. It's clear what much of the media wants Obama to do, and those aren't opposed to fudging the facts or making wild interpretations with what they have.

You presented the facts:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/2008120 8/pl_politico/16292

No he presented a source, a commentary from the politico, the fox news of the internet, this would be as if I provided a link of Billo and called it the "facts" portion of my arguement. A source can only be used as "facts" if that source contains alor of facts, this one is deeply interpretive and asserting a certian point of view, I suppose it's a "fact" that the right wing is trying to provide as much cover for Obama to implement their favored policies as possible, but as a consumer one should be wary of the difference between "facts" and expedient reasoning.

Used logic to interpret the facts:

Obama demonstrates pragmatism and prudence and his political allies attack him as a pawn of the right, and a continuation of the status quo.

This is not logic, this is assertion. He's using assertion to interpret assertion, a valid form of expression but not a rigorous one. Saying that what Obama is doing is "pragmatic and prudent" is a seeded phrase being reused over and over again in the media, because ideologically his moves have alot of support there, I have totally different opinions on what he should do, which are just as ideological as what he's doing now, but at least I'll admit that a spade is a spade, policy is ideology, personnel is policy, this isn't difficult stuff to understand.

You can have a topdown recovery (trickledown) or a bottom up recovery or something in between, where you stand is an ideological choice. Thinking one of these choices is not ideological merely because you think it's correct is still ideological (unless youre God and know everything) or else being prochoice isn't ideological, because you know that giving women this right is the best for the overall outcomes of our economy and culture.

And it stops there. You have yet to make your own conclusions or reply to any other comments. Nothing against you, just wanted to know where YOU stand. Late.

He's clearly indicated his preferences, which is why he doesn't think what he's saying is ideological, just prudent and pragmatic.

Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice...you...I won't get fooled again.

He didn't really fool me much I said to people all along not to get their hopes up, I still believe that between Mccain Hillary and him he's probably the best or just similar to what Hillary would have been.

Seriously, is this not what anti-Obama people have said during the entire campaign? That no one really knows who he is or what he stands for?

I knew what he stood for it was this: http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/11/o bamas-agenda-difference-between.html

essentially a center left platform. That's what he stood for, as in what he advertized himself as, what he really in secret supports as policy is a whole nother story, in general politicians run on more left of center non-social issue positions then they end up governing on, because tehyre not really beholden to population, but to elite supporters and contemporaries.

But honestly, they can't be all that upset. He's going to spend billions on mostly pointless "improvements" domestically for the sake of giving people jobs, and he's still going to pussy-foot with Iran to the detriment of American power abroad. Isn't that what his supporters wanted in the first place?

nooooooaaaah... his supporters wanted universal healthcare withdrawl from Iraq, and a restructuring of the reward system of our economy (IE at least a repeal of the Bush tax cuts) the things he said he would do, things most of his cabinet appointees would be against.

Also Mr.Hoover it's wonderful that you still think we aught to cut back spending during a recessionary period, even though the last time we did that it deepened the depression.

The one thing Oliver North was ever right about: Personel is policy, once again we have a democrat who's governing policies could easily be republican. Of course Mccain would have been 3x worse but I don't really care, I demand truth in advertizing.

At 12/8/08 04:59 PM, SmilezRoyale wrote: Isn't as crazy as he should be...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/2008120 8/pl_politico/16292

Obama demonstrates pragmatism and prudence and his political allies attack him as a pawn of the right, and a continuation of the status quo.

I have nothing personal against people attacking Obama, as long as the reasons are justified.

Dude people disagree about this stuff, saying that something is pragmatic and prudent just because you agree with it doesn't make it so, just because it's centrist doesn't make it nonidealogical people talking about his moves as pragmatic and prudent are just saying that because idealogically they agree with it., or like it more than something more left of center he might have done.

If his moves so far are surprisingly center right politically people who supported him on the left have the right to be angry that he misrepresented himself during his campaign to get their support.

Asians and jews don't go compalining because they perform better than avg in the US economy than the avg person, there are some issues but overall theyre pretty happy, blacks on the other hand are poor ass bastards, per capita they have like 1/5th the wealth of whites.

Theres's a seperate history between blacks and other minority groups, these other groups by and large do not descend from the slaves of US citizens. (Some exceptions with native americans and defacto for the chinese) Blacks still only make about 1/2 the income of whites and the relative wealth is even worse (I think it's like 1/5th I remember it being really dramatic) Now you can go into all sorts of subjective reasons why this happens, but being a black person comes with alot of baggage that must be dealt with by that individual, and the reality that racism still exists in strong ways.

Many of the people that control the economic outcomes of people in this country are quite old they control business policies that can either help blacks or hurt them (which policy is justified is another subjective thread) these people grew up at times when blacks were very much second class citizens, and they continue to train the next generation of the powerful. Attitudes tend to be sticky within a single lifetime and even accross many generations. I would say most of these older white people are still significantly biased against blacks even if theyve made significant improvements within their lifetimes.

I'm white as white can be, and see how eager my family and other whites are to DECLARE UPON THE MOUNTIAN that racism is dead and should be dropped as a valid issue. This rabid eagerness strikes me protesting too much, there is no clear end point to racism, and valid incidents of it's existence demand attention to prevent a reversal of the positive trend. It's clear to me that being black is not the major problem of blacks in the economy anymore, it's mostly their starting economic positition in life that determines the quality of their influences, their opportunities. It's bad to be any race and born poor, but being black does have additional negatives. While many people consider themselves not to be racists they still would not be happy with or attempt to prevent their children from dating blacks. I know my wife's family would probably have strong reservations about it if I had been black. This kind of attitude is a sign of the risidual biases against skin color that effect all social interaction, social interactions that determine most things in human life.

Yes yes the point of the stock market is so that companies can efficiently get investment, This could be done in many other ways without the major negatives I already mentioned.

hey could take out more loans, or take on more partners, which would be awful because then theyd have to share decision making with a larger community hmm... wait...

They could offer profit sharing to workers in exchange for lower initial wages in effect netting them virtual capital to work with.

The US could pass a universal investment system whereby each citizen would be alotted a couple thousand dollars worth of investment money each year which they could then invest in a stock market with equal power to all other citizens, and if their investments panned out they would get the difference in value if it went down or stayed the same tehy'd get nothing, or they could opt not to participate and the amount everyone else received would increase to compensate for the market's need. Oh wait that'd put democracy into the economy, what an awful Idea.

At 12/7/08 05:40 PM, KeithHybrid wrote: I never really understood why the stock market exists. It doesn't seem to serve any practicle use, and really hurts the economy, since when stocks drop, people panic. Even more so when recessions are declared.

Can anyone help clear this up with me?

I think your conclusion is quite correct but your reasoning leaves something to be desired, if it weren't a stock market falling that caused panic it would be some other metric of economic health.

The stock market is stupid and bad because it's basically a giant casino that allows people to make money without performing any work, or producing any useful product or service that society makes use of. It also has the effect of giving investors a per dollar influence on the behavior of business, essentially creating an democracy of purely one dollar one vote within the economic system which determines the majority of how the majority of people in these systems will spend the majority of their time on the planet, working in these fiscal democracies.

I think she should be hailed as the fulfillment of the feminist dream, showing that it is no longer just incredibly stupid men who can lead the major political parties. It's not whether exceptional women can make it but if women as dumb as GW Bush can that shows how far we've come.

No no, it's only similar if you can actually prove that's what happened and why he got busted. I'm pretty sure you can't, and that's the issue with conspiracy theories. I can see the train your logic went down here, and it's possible and perhaps even plausible that's what happened...but provable? As the bard said "ah, there's the rub".

http://discuss.epluribusmedia.net/spitze r_was_whacked_warning_taxpayers_of_finan cial_crisis

interseting article to back up my assertion here, not saying I can prove it, but not everything has to be provable to be useful for discussion, I'm just saying it's highly probable.

kind of tired of the whole knee jerk use of the "conspiracy theory" indictment. I see things that fit very closely, I see the pattern, roll my eyes and say hey this look awfully likely to be more member in my anus by the powers that be, maybe I just fell on carrot again, but I could swear that it felt too fleshy for that.

Article talks about Spitzer's direct conflict with lenders and the Bush administration, trying to protect consumers and regulate predatory lending. These people needed not to be held responsible in any binding way, to have the issues brushed off as a uncontrollable widespread phenomena, stupidity and not criminal abuse.

Spitzer was one guy who opened up the chance for real prosecutions of this lot, follow the money, see the patterns. It wasn't any harder for this to come out to take down Spitzer than it was to make reverend wright a huge news story against Obama, was that a conspiracy, or just a typical political ploy?

I know what it is like helping to disarm them, its hard and your breathing is ragged. But I helped because of the children who have been maimed or killed by these bombs. It's enough to make your heart break in sorrow.

Keep fighting the good fight man, glad to hear you've actually done something to stop the landslide of inhumanity in the world.

He did break a law, this isn't Nevada, prostitution and soliciting the services of a prostitute is illegal in NY state. Also there's the whole fact that he based his political career on cracking down on that sort of vice. He becomes a hypocrite and people hate that. The idea that it's a setup (and it could very well be somebody had a reason to want him taken down) doesn't work as absolution to me because he did the deed, he admitted to doing the deed. Other politicians probably have and do engage in the same type of activity, but they're smart enough not to get caught, and probably smart enough not to rail so hard against an activity they regularly engage in. I think those laws should be repealed, but as long as their in evidence, Spitzer did commit a crime and that's the end of it, he admitted to it, no absolution grantable

I'm not saying he's innocent whatsoever, unless his wife and he have an open relationship he's a total prick just for the reason of adultery (Which sucks even beyond betrayal since youre opening up your partner to VD's you might catch) Also as you say he's a total hypocrite, however his outing was highly convenient for the financial sector as much of what spitzer was looking into doing were prosecutions for rampant abuse in that sector.

Ayup.

The only other thought I had to add here is I tend to think Unions aren't as great as many people make 'em out to be. Depends on the management of it and what not I guess. When I worked at Shop-Rite I tended to feel our Union was pretty bad. You paid in and yet people were still able to get fired contrary to Union rules and the store did nothing. I attempted to advance and was booted back down because of circumstances beyond my control (poor training and they fired the person that was going to replace me in my former job. Suddenly now I have to be sent back there). They did nothing to help me when I brought this to their attention. So yeah, maybe some unions are good, but at least in this case, Unionization didn't really do a damn bit of good as I feel they just took money from me for a good year and I got no real protection or benefit for it (the raises they also periodically negotiated were also laughable pittances).

My union experience was with the carpenter's union in california. I spent a few years doing commercial concrete work, originally finding work through them. So They basically found me my job and my compensation package was about 22$ an hour after only a year on the job ending at around 27$ at the end of my stint. (This fizzled witht the housing crisis drying up construction) I had had no experience previously and while it was a tough job I thought the pay was pretty remarkable (after 4 years you get up to a 55$ an hour package 15% of that benefits and not counting retirement) for the crappy wages youre generally impressed into accepting by the job market when you dont have a degree or high society connections. (Been going back to school since to get a little moer viable with the former) Of course the carpenter's union is one of the stronger ones in the country (if not the strongest) so that's not going to be the case with all unions. Unions themselves I don't think are the problem, the problem is anitunion policies by our government. They pass crippling laws like the "right to not pay dues laws" and don't enforce the union protection laws letting companies target union activists without penalty. (1 in five gets fired for union organizing with no consequence to the company)

It wasn't a setup. He actually banged the chick. What I wonder is why does anyone care? It was consensual and he broke no law.

Clearly they do.
They get taken down because they are stupid enough to get caught.

He did break the law, as aviewaskewed remarks he was a pretty hypocritical in doing so having been a prosecutor on similar cases in the past. My point here is however that wether or not he should have been brought down by this he was brought down by it in a case of political assasination. He was the most powerful critic in the country of the financial sector as a time when the bailout was being formulated, they did not want him effecting the crafting of that bailout, or standing in it's way so they got rid of him. This is similar to how if it hadn't been for an organized effort by the republicans to take B. Clinton down for getting head he wouldn't have been dragged into the public on it regardless of the shoulds of it.

Very oversimplified. Saying that it is inefficient is completely false. Decisions are made much faster with a dictator than with any other form of government. Saying that it is bad without backing it up is ridiculous. Every system of government has advantages and disadvantages.

So a centrally planned communist state or monarchy runs a better economy than a capitalist one?

Again you just say something is bad without backing it up. Saying something is bad even if you do back it up is pretty ridiculous, as the world isn't a simple comic book with a "good guy" and a "bad guy." Can you back up the statement that a decentralized capitalist society is the best one?

It's called an assertion, I make some and sometimes I cite evidence, I do some of both as all writers do, you also make assertions without any backup yet you are a hypocrite by getting angry at me for what you do over and over agian in your responce.

Not really true. The financial bailout is supposed to give the money to the people and to the companies, not to the leaders of the companies. As a matter of fact the CEOs are getting major pay cuts as a direct result of the bailout.

Theyre getting pay cuts because their companies are tanking, they wouldnt even have companies anymore if not for the bailout. In the end the same people who screwed up the market will continue to run it with even more centralized power with our money in their control, how much of that they siphon off for themselves each gets to decide for themselves.

This isn't exactly true. People are motivated towards success in capitalist society as well as many other societies, so that isn't really a true advantage.

If the capitalist incentive mechanism doesn't promote higher motivation than like community respect in communist society I think that pretty much kills it as an economic system.

There aren't virtual monopolies. There are multiple independent companies in every industry.

Microsoft? pharmacueticals? Say that in a business class and get an F?

Actually they change strategy very fast. The strategy of one year is almost always different from the strategy of another year. Large corporations can actually innovate more effectively than small businesses because they have the money to hire larger teams of scientists and get better equipment.

Like the auto companies have? Seems to me the big innovations have mostly come from government funding (that R&D you mention) and new companies (who's innovations happened while they were small, not while they were large) there are exceptions, Wall mart doesn't innovate they continue the strategy they've had since they became a big company, that might be effective but it's not innovation.

That is where the competition in the industry comes in. The competition encourages them to create a better product so more people will buy from them. The biggest problem with today's society is not anything you mentioned, but that people are more likely to buy the product with the most advertisements rather than the better product. Advertising is where the control really must be put.

I agree that advertizing is the root of alot of evil especially in it's role of controlling the private media. My point is that when each actor in a society only cares about profit they stop caring about how they get it, I also agree we should limit advertizing severely.

Why exactly must a company be small and decentralized? Large centralized corporations are very successful.

Of course theyre successful, theres reasons for that, one is called the iron triangle (which isn't a good reason to be successful) others are the virtual monopoly, some of which is the ability to negotiate supply prices more strongly than smaller actors, this also isn't a good reason to be more successful, since this could be easily replicated through small company cooperation.

To prevent that you need stronger regulation.

Somewhat though I think alot of the need for regulation would dissipate with a more participatory economy, though this gets complex to get into in between the lines here

That's how unions USED to be. Now a lot of unions are owned by the same groups the companies are run by. Today unions are just a way to keep workers in line, so they think they are protected.

well not owned, but controlled or diminished in influence to the point of nothingness yes. I think that without them however the wages of most workers would be reduced strongly over time, in union and nonunion workplaces since the labor market is interconnected, reduce a union autoworker's wages and the nonunion guy has no alternative to his job paying less.

I don't support a communist system for unrelated reasons, but would you rather the current structure of American society where the average CEO pay is $60 million a year and the average wage is around $30,000 a year?

Which crappy system to choose? Well, I choose neither and don't turn away from what I feel would be better policy merely because something else could be worse. CEO pay is stupid I agree, it's a talented hardworking guy from a wealthy background mostly with the hardworking talented guy from the low class background making 50-60k on the shop floor with 99.99% chance the most he'll ever make at the company topping out at 115K if he's incredibly lucky.

No arguing here.

and I thought you were going to find a way to be contrary about everything I said...

Still haven't made a convincing argument towards this effect.

I made mostly assertions so if I didn't crack your world view apart that's fine.

The financial sector is not being destroyed by consolidation of companies. The financial sector is being destroyed because of the corporate structure encouraging short term growth as opposed to long term growth because in the long

No it's because the neoliberals have written the rules of the game, socializing risk and keeping profit private. Alan Greenspan went to the 'Wall Street' (movie) school of morality "Greed is good!" articulating over and over again that regulation is bad and that the free market is a "superlative force for good." The essential premise of capitalism that everyone being greedy and selfish in the end produces the greatest imaginable good, that the biggest assholes in the world lay the golden eggs for us all to lick till we get to the creamy happiness center.

http://www.slate.com/id/2205995

Great article here by the prostitute soliciting former governor of NY Eliot Spitzer which essentially bores down to some conclusions that I agree with.
(His scandal I think was clearly a setup, people this powerful don't go down for paying chicks to sleep with them, probably the majority of them do it, they get taken down for things like this because there are enemies in the thicket with sniper rifles that don't like what theyre doing)

1: centralized power = BAD, whether it's a dictator a "people's junta" or the CEO of microsoft it's an inefficient actor in the economy.

2: capitalism works when it's decentralized IE small business = good, giant virtual or real monopoly = bad.

3: The financial bailout essentially rescues the villians and promotes them to even more centralized positions of power through rampant consolidation.

Capitalism's strengths are that it spurs innovation and efficiency of the ecnomy through competition for the carrot of financial reward.

When virtual monopolies are created through huge control of market share and intercompany cooperation the efficiency part breaks down.

When companies become so large they change company strategy as fast as that 600 lb woman with a walker in front of me at the grocery store walks down the aisle the innovation part breaks down, and often becomes focused not on innovation that creates a better product, but innovation that games the customer into giving them a higher percentage of profit margin without giving any extra real value to them (creative loans anyone?).

Of course some things can't be done on a small scale, an airline that owned just one jumbo jet would be a massive company, and a certian level of efficiency is derived from having the right size for your industry beyond the tiny. (I ran my own company for awhile, and while it went ok underinvestment is a bitch) Though I do think that modularization and asset sharing could be employed here to reduce company size in these instances as well, IE eg 20 companies that are distinctly seperate each own portions of the airfleet or even portions of individual planes and cooperate to run thier portion of the market together, while still having strongly decentralized authority structures.

In the end this is however about authority structures, will there be one owner of a 100 billion dollar marketshare or 50? and which is better? I would argue that if feasable the more fragmented it can be and still have that minimum investment to be feasible the better. Much harder to create virtual monopolies, much harder to create oligopolies, and less centralized private influence on politics to prevent gaming the taxpayer and the electorate.

This is the reason I like unions as much as I do, they diminish the concentration of power in industry forcing companies to share some decision making with workers, kind of like the way a division of powers in the government is supposed to prevent abuse, a somewhat adversarial system promotes more rational economic decisions, and having stronger ties to democratic authority mechanisms makes these systems more legitimate, more innovative, and more efficient (auto workers do not make 70$ an hour omfg who the heck believes that when they hear it? (it's 28$ an hour for a hard job and still only 10% of the sticker price of a car)) .

Some might question the efficiency attribution citing that union workers make more money than nonunion, but the same arguement could be leveled at capitalism that a communistic flat compensation policy would then be most efficient since then you dn't have to pay CEO's any more than janitors. I don't think the latter holds whatsoever, efficiency is about popular gratification over the long term. This means that what promotes the greatest level of overall fulfillment for people while still maintaining the viability of an economy is the most efficient.

The worker being treated like a mere cost the same as a market priced material, then calculating the efficiencey as lower paid workers + materials + capital costs (loans, dividends) + location and energy + taxes VS profit for the tiny group of executives shareholders and the owner is the totally undemocratic way business efficiency is calculated as though there is no interest in higher wages for workers beyond the market demands for labor costs, basically the predominant view that it's only good to pay as much as you have to to workers because they aren't part of the family to be rewarded at the company only the livestock to be raised and shaved for wool.

In the end I believe more heads thinking about solutions to company problems is better, and you get that by diffusing some of the traditionally centralized power, and you move away from that by consolidating more and more which is exactly what's going on right now in the financial sector, the industry most likely to hurt you the economic participant.

I dunno I figure if people aren't allowed to own guns it just makes fascism that much more viable, as well as a person's sense of security and real security being infringed to some extent. The numbers say youre much less safe in a country with a right to own guns than those without, so it's more of a balance between reality and perception and how much people enjoy hunting and target shooting that justifies their ownership.

I don't feel strongly either way but the polling is pretty clear, about 2/3 of people want strong limits on who can get their hands on guns but also want the right to own them for lawful citizens upheld. I'll support the democratic process on this one and stay nuetral otherwise.

http://www.minesactioncanada.org/peoples _treaty/index.cfm
show your support by going here and signing the petition

At 12/4/08 02:36 PM, Conspiracy3 wrote: I belive that gays will attain equal rights eventually with or without those measures. Simply look at the fact that.

1. Young people are far more likely to support gay rights than old people (and old people are going to die soon)

2. Over the last fifty years gays have gradually gained rights. Fifty years ago if someone came out as gay they would have been thrown in a mental institution. Today they aren't treated nearly as poorly.

Well that's the much delayed option 2 with maybe only a 1/2 undemocratic strategy, keep in mind that for most of the country to get to a majoritarian progay rights position it's probably going to take at least 20 years if not 50, and for the whole country to get into the swing I'd double those numbers, with another 20 to 50 years for them to get to the acceptance level blacks are at now. Of course this is assuming that civil rights support continues to follow a linear progression, which if our economy becomes substantially less robust over that period is somewhat likely to stagnate or regress.

The dissapointment is coming in full with his appointments.

They basically confirm what I told people all along about Obama: He's not going to change much of anything. His appointments say he's a Bush 1 on militancy, and a clinton on demostic policy which means he'll still be heavily engaging in "nation building" (IE antidemocratic dictator/junta supporting), while perhaps not being as tactically stupid as Bush 2, and if he had it to do over again he'd invent NAFTA himself, and in that vein will do next to nothing to recede it's effect.

As the psychopath Oliver North said, "Personnel is policy." and all the explaining away of Obama's infuriating apointments is just elitist cowing of the herd.

I have a certian somewhat unique stance on the gay rights issue in that I'm 100% in favor of gays being treated as equals with everyone else and if that means gay marraige sure that's all good too, however I hold strong opposition to undemocratic devices in government and society for anything.

I would go to a gay rights rally or help out with their political campaigns (using my freedom of speech to try to change people's minds)

but I would also get involved in political action to diminish the power of constitutions and judicial governance. (as an implementer of agreed on standards of law theyre fine, but not when they decide political issues entirely on their own, standardization and fairness are important, but legislation from the bench is not.)

Aside from that position it strikes me that the most important and legitimate way to promote gay rights is by aquiring popular support for it (This might seem obvious but our judges and constitutions would beg to differ)

One of the best ways to get there it seems to me is to promote populist measures in our society, which happen to already have popular support. Minimum wage increases, universal healthcare, universal higher and lower education rights, a more employee involved workplace that gives employees more participation in decision making. (and thereby increasing their avg wages most likely)

If you do these things a couple of bonuses for the gay right movement emerge:

1: more college educated folk a large majority of which support gay rights.

2: higher avg wages, people making more also support gay rights more. (this overlaps with the first)

3: you only have to push for policies that are already supported by the public and thereby change the public's support for a social issue.

This strategy makes a few assumptions that may or may not hold up 100%. It assumes that people are intolerant in large part because theyre poor or uneducated or both. I think within a single generation it would have a more modest effect than in the next generation as attitudes are likely to be more "sticky" for someone who started out poor then began to make more money, or started out uneducated and then wen't back to school. If we look at more egalitarian societies (european socialism mostly) you tend to find greater support for gay rights.

There is also the problem in that the leadership of the gay rights movement tends to be fiscally conservative (or greedy conservative), some even being log cabin republicans, a more substantial group than any correllary in the black community. (for good reason, gays make more money than avg people or at least gay men do) Though in the electorate of gays you probably still have solid support for most or all of these populist measures as even if there are more wealthy gays than the demographic avg they are probably still made up of a large majority of lower paid individuals. (the jewish community is like this as well, the stereotype is the rich jewish guy, but in reality the avg jewish guy is lower middle class or lower class along with the rest of americans)

This strategy appeals to my democratic nature, you support one democratically supported set of measures and then get your social policy through more democracy and not through antidemocratic constitutional and judicial action. The other strategy is a double antidemocratic one. You try to gaurantee gay civil rights through the courts and constitutions with the help of antidemocratic representatives voting in state legislatures against the will of their constituents, all the while continuing to oppose or be nuetral on populist policy that is also popularly supported.