PERMA-FLAME GOODNESS!!!

*grabs popcorn*

I disagree with your political stance, and have horrible things to say about your mother.

/last post

But... I love my mother :(

MusicMakeMyHeadPound: But... I love my mother :(

we know. we have the video :D

IXI Jim IXI
we know. we have the video :D

Note to self: review the idea of using the internet to safeguard secrets. Possibly bad idea. Consider charging admission? Pick up milk on the way home.

Well, the tally's in for the Iraq war resolution- 17 GOP dissenters, 2 Dem dissenters, and 6 non-voters:

GOP DISSENTERS:
Michael Castle (DE)
Howard Coble (NC)
Tom Davis (VA)
John Duncan Jr. (TN)
Phil English (PA)
Wayne Gilchrest (MD)
Bob Inglis (SC)
Timothy Johnson (IL)
Walter Jones (NC)
Ric Keller (FL)
Mark Kirk (IL)
Steven LaTourette (OH)
Ron Paul (TX)
Tom Petri (WI)
Jim Ramstad (MN)
Fred Upton (MI)
James Walsh (NY)

DEM DISSENTERS:
Jim Marshall (GA)
Gene Taylor (MS)

NOT VOTING:
Brian Baird (D-WA)
Charles Boustany (R-LA)
Jo Ann Davis (R-VA)
Dennis Hastert (R-IL)
Frank LoBiondo (R-NY)
Jerrold Nadler (D-NY)

I don't care what your opinion is, mine is better.

neapoi, Gsm136

With the frequency at which people were posting here, it seemed like it may well have been.


Gosling: Ron Paul (TX)

Hooray!

Gosling:Dennis Hastert (R-IL)

Booooo!

MusicMakeMyHeadPound: Note to self: review the idea of using the internet to safeguard secrets. Possibly bad idea.

I'm gonna try to actually make a relevant post in this newly minted, though sparsley populated poolitical Forum, aHEM; "Wow, if only Pres. Bush, V.P. Cheney, ect. had done this math before making the C.I.A. post all that captured intel from Iraq on the intertubes, yanno, and not inclueded the SECRET PLANS ON HOW TO BUILD A NUKE PROGRAM."
/This concludes the relevant post.
//This slashie is not relevant.
///but I like it.

Spelling mistakes could be intentional. But prolly not.

As obvious terror supporters, the Dems with their 'non-binding resolution' are just attempting to undermine our progress in Iraq. We are so close to victory, with this new maintaining force Baghdad will feel the heavy burden of Bush/Cheney oppression! Err, freedom, or whatever.

/Mission accomplished!

Gosling: DEM DISSENTERS:

Why do you think there's only two?

To think there are Democrats who still support this piece of crap...

I couldn't vote for it. Just couldn't summon the conscience.

MEMO TO TERRORISTS:

Hang in there....

Keep killing our brave soldiers....

Eventually the American people will tire of the war, demand that the politicians end the war and you will win.

It doesn't matter if we have the most powerful military on the planet because when the American people and politicians give up we can't even win against suicide bombers and roadside bombs.

-----------------------------------------

Congrats to the Dems for undermining the US Military and helping to make it more likely that the terrorists will win this war.

Has anyone see the Half Hour News Hour show on Fox News? It is really quite funny how bad it is.

dottedmint: Congrats to the Dems for undermining the US Military and helping to make it more likely that the terrorists will win this war.

Right! Cause those bastard Dems lowered the troop numbers over the last 2 years, causing the imbalance of troops versus insurgents. Throw em out of office, the lot of 'em.

I predict this will not end well.

CAT THREAD!!

As long as you relent that Bush needs to be impeached, tried for war crimes and tossed down the Tarpeian cliff, you'll do fine here.

I know you are, but what am I?

Manic_Repressive: I know you are, but what am I?

A repressed asshole? Or are you a politician?

Personally, I'm just looking forward to the next brawl on the floor of the Senate chambers. Haven't had one of those in a while. Should give us plenty of entertainment.

Oh, and my only problem with the Non-binding resolution is the whole non-binding part. If you're going to say you disagree with some action, give it some teeth.

Whidbey I knew I would find you over here.......

Last night, anyway. My guess is that he's communing with nature & f-stops

This pic is begging for a photoshop contest. Came from GIS

dottedmint: Eventually the American people will tire of the war, demand that the politicians end the war and you will win.

Actually, I'd imagine the terrorists want this war to continue. It adds fuel to the flame of anti-Americanism and alienates us from those who would otherwise be our allies. The terrorists are winning this war worse than we think, and it's not because the Democrats want to pull out.

This isn't a football game, buddy. There are other ways to win a war which we are too arrogant to consider.

Jamespoon: There are other ways to win a war which we are too arrogant to consider.

Like admitting that there really aren't "terrorist actions" of concern other than what our country has been doing for the past decade.

Like admitting that this country really isn't about peace at all.

whidbey: Like admitting that this country really isn't about peace at all.

Like admitting that our country has hijacked religion just as much as religion has hijacked their country.

/this isn't a Christian Nation
//i'm also not saying it should be one

blinkin: /this isn't a Christian Nation
//i'm also not saying it should be one

If this were a christian nation, we wouldn't be fighting all these wars now would we?

/Not that kind of christian
//the good kind
///the one they told us to be when we were kids

This can't be a happy place, can it?

I fear much strife.

Tell me whidbey, is politics discussed here reasonably and without personal insult?

"Calmamity: Let's go around the room and introduce ourselves."

Not a bad idea.

I am a conservative with a couple of moderate and perhaps libertarian stances.

I don't have a problem with helping people who "NEED" help. I do have a problem with people who decide they would rather have the government provide everything for them instead of trying to improve themself and being able to provide for themself.

(I have met people like that)

A great teacher should get paid more than a Pro athlete but a bad teacher should not have their job protected by the Union.

As a parent I think I should be able to decide where my child goes to school.

I think law abiding people should be able to carry a gun for protection but I agree you probably do no need a 50Cal to hunt deer. BUT.... I should be able to own a 50Cal if I wish.

BTW... I hunt deer.

We have TONS of gun laws already on the books. Until the current ones are enforced there is no reason to pass more.

I think it is very bad policy to have a MINORITY of taxpayers being forced to pay for the majority of taxes.

Profit is not evil.

I think every able man and woman should be able to serve in the US Military. This would include gays.

I think gays should be able to adopt.

But not marry.... I think marriage is between ONE man and ONE woman.

I supported going into Iraq but I think there have been mistakes on how it has been handled.

I think it would be a BIGGER mistake to pull out too soon.

People who burn the Flag in protest are idiots (IMHO) but I think they have a right to be idiots as long as the Flag that they are burning is their property.

IF they try to burn MY Flag things might turn a bit "ugly".

While I don't smoke, drink or do drugs I do honestly question why "pot" is illegal but it would be legal for me to get blind drunk.

I know that human life begins when the egg is fertilized but I would not support a 100% ban on abortion.

I have nothing against people who want to come to this country LEGALLY but I think we should shut the boarders down 100%.

I strongly disagree that Bush is the worse President ever but he is anything but the best.

Neither the "right" to have an abortion nor the phrase "seperation of Church and State" can be found in The US Constitution.

I've read it...

Have you?

And by the way.....

9/11 was NOT planned by the US Government. There were no explosives planted in the towers. There were no rockets or remote controllled planes.

"Calmamity: Let's go around the room and introduce ourselves."

It's introduction time? Ok, I'll give it a shot.

I can be called a Socialist. I believe that the organization of resources can be best interpreted as occuring at the level of a community or society. While I believe that the rights, identity, and agency of individual human beings must be recognized and affirmed by higher social systems, material resources belong, in the end, to the society and not the individual.

I am an atheist. I believe that religions are systems of social governance similar to political states but using distinct structures and mechanisms to legitimize and enforce their policies.

I believe that the idea of the nation-state as a system of social organization is dead and has been since the mid-20th Century. I interpret many of the current conflicts and problems affecting our global society as manifestations of this death and our transition to other systems of social organization. This includes the concepts of globalism, the actions of some extremist groups like Al-Qaeda, regional and global agencies and coalitions, and the trend of states to surrender power to superstate organizations.

While I am tempted to make this post into a general manifesto of my socio-political beliefs, I feel that such a manifesto wouldn't benefit discussion in this forum to any great degree. I am willing to address specific questions as they appear in any future discussion.

KarmicHoax: Tell me whidbey, is politics discussed here reasonably and without personal insult?

It's been pretty cool so far. A lot of folks testing the waters. I'm planning on being civil here.

As for my own leanings, I'm interested in the awareness that we've got to do better as a species. This goes beyond nations, political chutes and ladders, and tiptoeing around the powerful elements of capitalism.

We've come farther as humans than ever in the 21st Century, and yet there are still insane disparities between the haves and have-nots. This country believes it's the most advanced society in the world, and yet we keep getting ourselves dragged into conflicts and temporary bouts of nationbuilding. We serve the interests of the very very rich before the rest of the populace gets a share. There's always that 1% that owns everything, insulated by apologist statements like "well, they EARNED it" ensuring the power struggle stays in place without question and don't you dare suggest another way to do things that will detract from pie-in-the-sky profiteering.

And suffice it to say, every leader we elect kowtows to this concentration of power.

I'd like to think that Americans are capable of making better political choices, I still haven't given up on this, especially now that we're much better connected through the advances in media technology.

A Presidential candidate could run his whole campaign on the Internet, bypassing the antiquated ineffective two-party system and the proverbial smoke-filled rooms.

We really could wake up and change, actually start living the lives we imagine and follow the ideologies that have always captured us. This is the future we could have a hand in...

And so on...at the heart of it, that's the kind of musing you're going to get out of me in these discussions:

Pro-people, anti-war, very much an environmentalist/naturalist, earth before big bucks kinda dude....:)

And I hate the terms "liberal" and "conservative"--"liberal" to me implies "liberty" as in telling the government to f*ck off. A better term would be "progressive" or *shudder* "Social Democrat."

And it goes without saying the Republicans aren't "conservative." The whole "War" on "Terror" paranoia proves their need to intrude in people's lives in the name of "security" or "decency." Actually, both political parties suffer this grey area.

rppp01a: A repressed asshole?

Wait, WTF brought that on? Do I even know you? Fark you.

And I'm sure that could have been ignored or taken care of with an e-mail, Manic.

Calmamity

Let's go around the room and introduce ourselves.

Hi, I'm Calmamity, and I'm a Centrist with leftward leanings.

..Hi Calmamity..

I believe that our government should butt out as much as possible, but I also don't believe that Bidness should be able to make children work 12 hours a day and dump toxic waste in the groundwater just because doing so is good for business.

I think that greed outweighs morality all to often and that the Free Hand gooses the people how deserve it least.

I believe it is the height of hypocracy to stand on step 8 of a 10 step ladder and tell the people at the bottom to lift themselves up by their bootstraps. By the same token, I believe that people who are trying to better their station in life by running a small business bear too much of the burden and deserve a break.

Sometimes I believe that an armed society is a polite society, but sometimes I believe that there is such a thing as reasonable gun control. I go back and forth on this.

I definitely believe nobody needs a 50 caliber rifle for deer hunting.

I am firmly pro-choice. Nothing you will ever say to me will convince me that it is somehow moral to force a woman to bear a child.

I believe that the Bush Administration is the worst thing that has happened to this country in a long, long time and that they are fuking up so badly that we'll be in a World War soon, unless someone very good comes along to fix it. I don't nessasarily believe that person is a Democrat. They piss me off, too.

I miss the Republican party pre-NeoCon and Fundamentalist hijacking, because the older I get the more I think I could have gotten along with them, but these new kids? No.

Well, that's all for now, gotta get back to work.



Hi, i'm at80eighty

Hi, at80eighty!

I like boobies.

*room nods collective heads in agreement*

Vote for me

*surveys room as the new Preznit*

Ahh! A 24-hour flamewar! Lovely.

"Aesc2525 While I believe that the rights, identity, and agency of individual human beings must be recognized and affirmed by higher social systems, material resources belong, in the end, to the society and not the individual."

I'm curious what that actually means.

What???

Anything that I actually make belongs to society?

It might sound nice in theory but in reality it is not logical.

Society does not create goods.

Individuals create goods.

Society doesn't farm the land to create the food that we eat.

Therefor the goods that are produced by the farmers belong to the farmers not society.

whidbey,

Your ideas on Internet politicking intrigue me, as do most of your other posted positions. I will look with interest on your future posts.

Unfortunately, I fear that any attempts to wrest power from that 1% you mentioned with a majority of the resources may involve more than grassroots democracy. It's a conundrum worth thinking over.

I am rather amazed and excited by the idea that we as a global community are in the midst of several profound changes in human society and civilization. It will be a rocky period, but if we can involve ourselves in working to overcome the demons raised by these changes, what better time to be alive?

dottedmint,

Look around you. Look at the information on the screen you are viewing now. Few if any of the products you use, the resources you enjoy, or the information you share were made by individuals acting alone. The creation of many of the products and concepts we value today could only have been accomplished through the work of a society. The things you produce for others only have value because a society exists to give them such value. The food a farmer grows in excess of his or her own needs is only valuable because a society exists to bestow value upon it, otherwise it is wasted.

You (and I or any of us all) are an individual with rights, agency, and inherent value that must be recognized. However, you cannot exist as you do now without the intervention of a social structure or system from which you can attain the resources you need to survive and prosper.

So, when you as an individual make a thing and expect profit from it, where do you think that profit comes from? How do you think you got the tools, materials, or knowledge necessary to make that thing? What allowed you the free time and energy to devote to creating that thing, and to what goal is the use of that thing directed?

dottedmint,

I'm sorry if my last answer was a bit too vague, so here is an attempt to be more direct.

You wrote "Anything that I actually make belongs to society?" My answer is this. The resources you used to make that thing you obtained from society (through a grant, purchase, or by some other means). You then acted upon those resources yourself, using tools and information you also received from society. After your work is done, you either use that item made for your own subsistence, or return it back to the society.

Your 'ownership' of those resources is, in any case, only temporary. You use them to keep yourself healthy and happy or to further the goals and interests of others around you (society). Since it is in the society's interest to keep you healthy and happy, your even doing society's work in that. So you're always really working inside of (and for) society using resources you obtained from that society.

"Aesc2525 The resources you used to make that thing you obtained from society (through a grant, purchase, or by some other means)."

Not at all.

Society did not create/produce the seed that I will plant in my garden this spring.

Society did not create/produce the snowblower that I have been using lately.

Society did not create/produce the gas that fueled that snowblower.

Society did not create/produce the house that I live in.

Society did not create/produce the shirt on my back.

"The creation of many of the products and concepts we value today could only have been accomplished through the work of a society."

No. They could only have been accomplished through the hard work and creativity of individuals.

"The things you produce for others only have value because a society exists to give them such value."

Again.... No. The things I produce only have value because other individuals exist to purchase them.

dottedmint,

'Society did not create/produce the seed that I will plant in my garden this spring.'

True enough. A plant created that seed. So, how do you know that it is to be planted in a garden, to give you the plant you desire?

Society did not create/produce the snowblower that I have been using lately.

Indeed, a subsystem of society (in this case, a state registered corporation operating a snowblower factory) created it. They used parts they gathered from other subsystems of society and tasked one or more of their component systems (in this case, employees) to assemble those parts as per instructions given them.

'Society did not create/produce the gas that fueled that snowblower.'

You're right, the action of millions of years of geology upon dead plant and animal matter created the oil that was later refined. So, how did we determine that this substance was useful, how was this knowledge retained, and how did we learn how to refine this substance into gasoline, and how was that knowledge retained?

'Society did not create/produce the house that I live in.'

Who designed your house, and upon what basis did they do so? How did they know how to design your house, and where did they get the materials? How did you determine what components to include in your house, and who was responsible for creating those?

'Society did not create/produce the shirt on my back.'

Who grew the cotton, processed it, wove fabric from it, assembled it, shipped it to a store, and presented it for your consideration to purchase? Why are you wearing a shirt, and why that particular kind of shirt?

'They could only have been accomplished through the hard work and creativity of individuals.'

How did these individuals learn to accomplish such hard and complex tasks? In what way do we retain these abilities, and what structure ensures that we can perform these tasks safely and in relative peace, without worrying about how we will survive from day to day?

'The things I produce only have value because other individuals exist to purchase them.'

How do these individuals know that you're offering your wares? How do they understand the use and function of these items, and the way in which to purchase them? How do they have the free time, energy, and resources to look over your wares and consider a purchase, without worrying about finding the basics of survival?

The statements you made are factual, but they discount the role that society plays in enabling them. Even now you and I are only able to converse because we have a mutual understanding of the social constructions (language, history, etc.)to do so and have been allowed to use an system created by many other systems (governments, research centers, universities, armed forces) of the larger society.

Remember that even you are a system of sorts, and part of a larger set of systems. When I talk about society, I usually mean systems on a national, regional, or global level, but the models of interaction I'm proposing work even when the system is composed of just a family or even just two people.

I am enjoying the opportunity to discuss this with you, and look forward to your responses.

dottedmint: MEMO TO TERRORISTS:
Hang in there....
Keep killing our brave soldiers....
Eventually the American people will tire of the war, demand that the politicians end the war and you will win.


/ the war has/had nothing to do with terrorists. It was that bush thought Iraq had WMD's and now we are the police of a civil war!

whidbey: And I'm sure that could have been ignored or taken care of with an e-mail, Manic.

Where's the fun in that?