Well, logically no omnipotent, omnipresent being capable of creating a universe and life would reveal the knowledge behind it to a bunch of monkeys... They wouldn't understand. If I were a deity I'd just say "Yeah I made it, all by myself. Only took me a week. Now be good or I'll spank you." After giving humans the mental capacity to figure it out for themselves of course. And what religions are we even talking about? I'm sure there are some that don't exactly attempt to disprove science, New Age Spiritualism, Pantheism, Omnism, the list goes on, but it would all really be different names for the same thing. Just suggesting that evidence to support science isn't evidence to support atheism. In fact discovering that there is a means to creating a universe, in the case of the "god" particle, only reinforces the idea that we have a creator somewhere, somewhen.
The Drug War and public education are just two examples of problems the government creates which have detrimental effects to society. This is wasted money, and I like to use the Federal Department of Education as an example of the worst case scenario with these things. I isolated them with respect to their relevance to Gov. Johnson's platform, as contributing factors to income inequality, as Vice laws force millions of dollars of legitimate business underground, and essentially wasting tax money that could be doing something useful or be back in the hands of the tax payer. I guess there is an argument that these government created jobs are completely superfluous and when the government stops performing them the demand will disappear, leaving those employees with skills they couldn't possibly use anywhere else. Even so the amount of opportunities opening up in the states under a Johnson presidency would offset anything lost by the government. With no corporate, business-to-business, income, or capital gains tax, entrepreneurs would be scrambling to open up shop in our borders. There would be plenty of investment, especially since we would be paying back our debt, things wouldn't look so risky on an international level. Who would invest in something when they know they're not going to get their money back? What I'm hearing from this Keynesian thing is that you believe that the Government can increase demand? This seems strange to me... People's demand for goods and services will be there and whatever it is with or without the government. If anything Government, in forming monopolies on certain goods and services, reduces demand by taking potential jobs from competitors off the table.... Maybe I just don't get it. Even so you admitted that the quality of the service we're getting from this administration or that we would get from the Romney administration is poor, not in so many words, but you seem to agree on most of the issues that really create disparity in this country. So we should be trusting it to someone we know has already improved an economy? Like Gary Johnson? I mean, he has proof. It's literally the best record. You can hold them up next to each other. Can we count on your vote? If not you should admit to yourself at some point that you're knowingly not voting for the best odds at recovery.
So the Congressional Budget Office tells you that Congress has to spend as much money as they want or there will be another recession, and you're just going to take their word for it? all of the recessions we've had recently were caused by government created scenarios.
Romney supports the War on Drugs, which creates poverty and increases the size of a class of people who are environmentally forced to be dependent on the government. Increasing the size of government, ere go how much it spends, ere go how much we pay/waste on a problem the government is creating itself.
They are not. The Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson will be on the ballot in all fifty states as of now. There aren't any foreseen ballot access problems but at the least people in 48 states will be able to vote for him, and in the electoral college as well.
Hah. Oh man. There's a lot of stuff there I want to get to but I need to start at the last part that I read. The phenomenon you cite. Starting in 1979 the inequality in this country has been rising steadily, as you said. The reason for this is mostly the creation of the Federal Department of Education by Jimmy Carter. Just think about it. Since 1979 the average test scores of students in public schools have remained the same, or within a margin so small it might as well be. Before then the average was slowly rising. School is a business. No one would pay money for a school that didn't improve your child's test scores and intelligence... unless it's in their taxes. As a result of the failing stagnant education system that simply acts as a guaranteed jobs program to keep humans addicted to government, people who don't have the benefit of living in a good school district are screwed. People have been arrested for trying to send their kids to a better school. Why this staunch resistance to school choice? A system that has worked in every country it has been implemented? The government needs stupid, weak, easily manipulated people that need the government to justify its existence. Same drill with the Drug War. These things create poverty, and if they were eliminated the need for the kind of aid people talk about would be gone. Drastically reducing the cost of government. Gary Johnson is talking about ending the Drug War and the Federal Department of Education, in addition to advocating school choice. We spend more money on education than any other country and we're still failing, I think our methods need to be changed. I just want to point this out as an example of the kind of waste Johnson is talking about cutting.
The Federal government adds thousands of pages of regulations that businesses have to work around every year. State governments add thousands of pages of regulations that businesses have to work around every year. See what I'm saying? It's redundant, not to mention county regulations, and city regulations. There are states where if an Entrepreneur thinks he can provide a better service to customers that get that service from Unionized employees, then he is legally bound not to compete with the price at the customer's benefit. This practice started after slavery ended and Black people along with Immigrants from Mexico and Central America, etc. were entering the work force, asking to work for very little, less than the Unions which were White only at that time. If you want to live in a place where progress and cheaper, better goods & services take a back seat to this impossible safety net illusion Statists have, that's perfectly alright. That's why we have state's rights. At least with the Federal regulations loosened or gone entirely the giant corporations who bought all the politicians writing those regulations won't have such a massive upperhand on small business owners who get none of the tax credits or loopholes that stem from a faulty corruptible Income tax model, when the production and sale of everything you use your income on is already taxed. Oh hey Gary Johnson wants to scrap the current tax system. He's advocating with the fair tax right now, but it's really just a model to face the rigor of diplomacy between the branches of government. It's cool because used goods aren't taxed so there's a lot of initiative to recycle and for producers to make reliable goods. Not bad for the environment.
Some of the policy you're talking about it seems like you're not on the right web site. When Gary was the governor of New Mexico, he reduced the size of state government by over a thousand jobs without firing anyone. His was one of four states with a balanced budget when he left office, term-limited. We all know that if not for the two-term limit he, as the most popular governor of NM in the past several decades at least, would have been re-elected. He took state healthcare and reformed it, delivering better care at a 20% savings, and that's just money saved on the state application of healthcare which isn't the only tax money used on it in every state. This is ludicrous, why is he wrong to say that "There is a better way to take care of people, and its cheaper too."? This has proven true with every industry opened to the free market, why not with some of the stuff we traditionally assume as the government's job? Why can't we introduce elements of the free market into the way our government operates like with School Choice so that we can implement a level of accountability to the people paying for it and maybe see some results from this alleged do-gooder instinct.
You talk an awful lot about jobs but Johnson has done an awful lot about jobs. He has the best record out of any of the candidates on growth and unemployment. The Federal government still twists the facts they put out by things like not including people who have been unemployed over a certain length of time, etc. so it's impossible to tell where Obama really is in regards to his first term. But look at his record before he took office. What kind of success did Obama display in the Executive branch of government that made people think he would be a good president? Oh that's right- NOTHING. Romney's record is... unremarkable. Literally nothing to be mentioned worthy of praise. This alone makes Johnson the only sane choice for reasonable, logical voters. People keep throwing up this wall of Keynesian economics to tell us that we can't possibly spend less money than we are and get a better service for it, even though the price has been rising for years and it still hasn't gotten any better. Something is fundamentally wrong with that picture. Here's Gary Johnson, proven to run executive government to everyone's liking, to everyone's benefit, while lessening the tax burden on everyone, and you're trying to disprove his plan for the rest of the country with theory that has only led us into massive debt that someone someday I guarantee you will come to collect, from us, whether we like it or not. That's why I'm voting for Gary Johnson and why you should too.
well I guess I'll give the point to Red Hood. But Red Robin or Tim Drake is the best Robin of all time. Let's look at the facts, 1. Tim Drake figured out Batman's identity (albeit in kind of a weird way but whatever he's the only person in Gotham to figure it out). 2. "Come on Batman... where are the pants?" First Robin to not where a bikini bottom as part of his costume. 3. Owned the entire discography of Depeche Mode. The guy followed Bruce's steps around the world investigating this massive conspiracy when everyone else threw in the towel. He's the first Robin with his own mobile, and his own series AS Robin that lasted years. Now he's kind of like a red-headed stepchild because of Damian Wayne and his only job is the Teen Titans. Even so, he's the smartest Robin, and the deadliest, because he wasn't just trained by Batman but Lady Shiva too. All that shit that Jason Todd went through in the new 52 doesn't really compare because there's magic and spirituality mixed in there, Tim Drake is grounded in physical reality like Batman and Nightwing, guns and knives are a cheat anyways.
Obama's just afraid of Gary Johnson. That's where this whole Gay marriage issue with him came from. First it was more from Ron Paul but not as direct as Johnson's whole-fisted support for Gay Rights, as well as being named ACLU's top candidate in the defense of Civil Liberties. Now I think I sense a little pressure. Obama's just not going to be able to hold the people who are Left-leaning purely because of the social issues. Everyone on the right is afraid of Johnson spoiling the election for the GOP, but honestly at the very least he'll take as many votes from both. Unless of course Obama is going to pull through in a big way the next six months. But the DEA and the president have both made statements that the Drug War is working, and if anything they'll only increase the severity. Obama even said something about Nationwide drug testing laws. I'm expecting the same kind of avoidance and politicking we got in his 2008 campaign, that we got in his first term, and people will not put up with it again. People are too upset and displeased with this crap. Or maybe they'll all be so disillusioned nobody votes. Hahah. What if absolutely no one showed up one year? I know obviously somebody would buy votes for a candidate or whatever but just imagine. Isn't everyone else feeling that sick on election day?
Well... I'm a wizard, and the statement is fundamentally false. If we take "true" by its literal meaning, true Christians know legislating Christianity as law defeats the purpose of being Christian, the faith and free will part. What politicians are afraid of are the false zealots, people who have missed the point, and really a little less than half the voters. Just trying to avoid generalization, I'm sure there are plenty of Christians that don't care what WE do in our own beds, let's just not attribute to it the blame that really belongs to the average American's environment, which is essentially the basis for uninformed views like that: family, friends, etc.
As a matter of fact, the great depression lasted until some time in 1947. Neither the New Deal or WWII solved the depression. A steadily recovering economy solved its own problems. The New Deal and WWII bringing an end to the depression is one of the most widely spread pieces of misinformation. http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/
Well when you bring up Reaganomics be sure to include in your argument how Reagan did very little in accordance with Friedman's personal philosophy. Reagan increased pressure in the war on drugs, while Friedman advocated ending prohibition of all drugs. Reagan increased military spending and infrastructure while Friedman promoted the idea that trade should be the most obvious legacy of the U.S. or any country around the world. I'm sure he was also a fan of living within your means. The U.S. is facing a catastrophic devaluation of the dollar because of the deficit we have, and we can't keep spending more than our GDP if we want to turn around. It would be nice if the government could take care of everyone all the time, but as an individual entity the U.S. Federal government simply can not deliver sufficient healthcare to everyone who needs it. As a matter of personal politics, the local governments would be much more effective at delivering on this, especially since it's much easier for people to go to their local government to try and change policy. On the whole, private healthcare with fewer regulations and open trade would drive down the price of healthcare, so the minority of the population that can't afford healthcare is reduced and the price on the gov'ts tab is significantly lower. That's just one aspect of how Friedman's economic ideas work better than yours. Maybe people want universal healthcare and hand outs, who the hell wouldn't? But the U.S. is headed towards disaster if we don't start digging ourselves out of this hole, and social spending makes up the majority of it. Friedman wanted a small effective federal government in my country, that was not libel to the kind of corrupt corporate control that is so evident now. The less government has to do with business, the less control business will buy up from our politicians. This even playing field makes the market very competitive and focused on providing the best product to the most amount of customers for the lowest price. Like healthcare for example.
I think you down play the importance of Friedman's work to open trade up to countries who had not previously been so free. Introducing a free market to increase the amount of jobs and infrastructure of these countries. The man even tried to introduce a negative income tax to increase the amount of money the average worker receives on his pay check, to more than it would be even without an income tax altogether. You've just got rhetoric flooding out your gob, without any knowledge of how economies really work, or how for-profit businesses are motivated. They're not evil, they just want the most money. If we create this giant government to monitor everyone, of course some corporations are going to buy control of it trough politicians so the government can intercept capitalism with whatever they're selling. Like what's happened since Nixon started a trend of Big Gov Republicans. I'll state again, that a world as progressive as ours is trying to be, has no right to supplant natural selection, a system which has been at work for too many years to count, with this rampant interventionism that's lead us this far into our grave. It's evident in military policy, economic policy, social policy. And it needs to stop, not just here either.
I didn't call you English. But just for the record that's like saying "I'm from New Mexico, not Arizona." in the states. I only watched a portion of that Noam Chomsky guy, because he said "Privatization introduces a massive amount of bureaucracy" so obviously he doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about. What's bureaucratic about being able to buy something get a receipt and go home? Is he a student of Keynesian economics? It certainly seems that way, because that's the pile of horse crap that got the world in this mess in the first place, introducing government regulations that corporations can just buy off in order to run whole countries. That's where Keynes and Noam Chomsky got us. How about you listen to the man who got it right, but due to the long line of Big government elected officials that keep passing the "fuck Americans over" torch to each other, was pretty much completely ignored in his own country, but managed to bring peace and prosperity across the world by spreading capitalism and standard-of-life improving industry: Milton Friedman
See information about the Bucharest Early Intervention project: http://www.roconsulboston.com/Pages/
You can use any of those people. Except Freud, he was just a self-important coke-head with delusions of grandeur. If I'm going to listen to a drug addict philosopher it will be Aldous Huxley, or Tommy Chong. I would say I'm at least as intelligent as most of those philosophers. I had read their work and comprehended it some years ago, and I continue to expand my knowledge base to more contemporary "philosophers" such as they exist. I've never had a problem understanding anything I've read and I've never had to study for a test in my life. I didn't ace them all the time, but I never had to study. To me that proves significant mental competence stemming from a musical background since early childhood as well as a history of reading constantly. The idea that a baby without even basic motor skills is born with a set IQ that they could never escape is preposterous. Brains are all born the same but develop very differently depending on the stimuli provided in early childhood. That's why you see such a varying difference in multiple intelligences, because no two children go through exactly the same experiences.
Well, do you think that if the markets were truly free, there wouldn't be some enterprising young fellow who sees the need for a fact checking and investigatory service? Perhaps offering a seal of approval for safety and health concerns that consumers trust and buy more than products without? This way it's advantageous for a company to practice safe and responsible business practices. All I'm suggesting is that there are plenty of Free Market solutions to these problems that people have been supposing there is no solution to.
In today's United States, companies are a lot more transparent, and accountability is a lot easier to provide. I think regulatory measures for the most part don't work and only slow the process down. Maybe in the 1900's people needed to organize and form Unions to represent themselves, but that isn't the case any longer. It's been a long long time since unions accomplished anything worthy of praise. The fact of the matter is, we were still a developing country then, and technology was a lot more unproven and unsafe then. The way the world works, we would get a lot more accomplished with global free trade, open borders, and an unregulated market where the only "regulation" is a businesses wikipedia page and reviews that can spread like wildfire through the internet. Thanks to this wonderful communication device we're speaking on right now, any serious problems on the part of a business result in an almost immediate drop in sales as a disciplinary measure.
What I'm saying is, in a child's formative years their intelligence for the rest of their life depends on the parents stimulating them and providing an educational environment. This is a fact. The less parents push their children to succeed in academics the less intelligent they will be. The less parents read to their kids, and the longer they wait to teach them to read, the less intelligent they will be. The more a parent provides their child to grow with, like musical instruments, and workbooks, and lots of reading material, the better they will perform in school through out their life. This is a proven fact. Einstein was Autistic. Autistic people process information and see the world in a completely different way than "normal" functioning people, so you can't really compare Einstein to you or me. People physically develop differently because of their genes, but mental acuity is entirely under the control of the environment provided in their younger years.
You did make a personal attack. You keep supposing that European media and culture is somehow excused from the same kind of vitriol that comes at American media and culture. You can't even give a straight forward compliment to an American TV show, that does better to enlighten people than half the crap on air in your country. Hence the Daily show being broadcasted over pretty much all of Europe. By the way, I didn't say one of. In the United States, the Daily Show is the most trusted program for news and current events. This is a fact. You did single out American culture by starting this debate with "How does Fox News get away with this kind of behaviour?" I doubt you've even watched Fox News, probably just clips of O'Reilly and Hannity, probably on the Daily Show.
I also reject most of what you said about our government regarding healthcare and our isolationism. The notion that a country as large as the U.S. has the ability to Federally hand out care to everyone all the time, efficiently, is ludicrous. I don't even know why you bring it up in a conversation about culture and media. Yeah it's a shame more Americans don't get outside the country much, but you're forgetting that Disney World is in Florida not England. So where would we go?
I'll continue to insist that as a matter of fact, you are singling out Americans as fascist nutjobs, when the only thing that's going on here is a cultural divide in two minorities of the American population that even still watch news. It's a matter of fact that if you want to watch the news in the States, you have to put up with some kind of bias. Just because some people choose a different flavor of punch in the teeth, doesn't make them fascists. I would also contend that a lot of people watch all the news networks to get a general sense of what's going on. Fox News takes advantage of what they see as renewed interest in conservative thinking. As time progresses people will only get more progressive, and the more extremely Fox pulls against this, the more they lose credibility. I think in general I take offense to your supposition that the fine people in the news media shouldn't be allowed to get away with behaving like this, as you suggest in the original question. They have no less of a right to free speech than I do. You think what, someone's going to prosecute them for slinging BS? That we're going to, as a country, indict an industry norm, so that we can beat a trend that's just going to burn out eventually anyways? Besides these stations aren't even strictly news. Most of the programming is opinion, they're like editorial stations. Try watching ABC news, NBC news, FOX news local affiliates and national newscasters like Brian Williams. You're just pointing out how much you hate the politics on a politically based editorial station. That's ridiculous. Sorry you don't like it, I don't like the government wasting money on shit it can't possibly accomplish, but you seem to suggest it's the only sensible option like most of the other broke European countries on the verge of a banking collapse.
Difficult for someone who doesn't understand how people can think or say one thing and do another. In other terms, a simpleton. A lot more police than you probably think took the job because they wanted to help people, protect them, or maybe just because they didn't know what else to do and thought police work wasn't the worst. If their job of protecting our civil rights wasn't constantly voted down by the government then they would be our friends, our allies. The guys stopping by to make sure nobody gets trampled in a protest, and making sure nobody gets robbed. It's the legislature people have a problem with.
OH MY GOD! I just explained it to you idiots and you're still talking about genetics. First of all, that's pretty racist, to assume that based on someone's family they can be more or less intelligent. Second of all it's NOT genetics, you dumb asses just want something to blame instead of yourselves for not making full use of your potential when you were little kids. Now you're old and you didn't read enough or practice enough when you were little so you're stupid, and as a stupid person, you say "Oh, well it can't be my fault that I'm stupid it must be my genes!" Just like those fat asses who blame their weight on genetics instead of an unhealthy lifestyle. All brains are born more or less exactly the same. Depending on how your parents raised you in your toddler and childhood years, you will be smarter or dumber than other people. If your parents cared about your development enough to read a book, and taught you to read early and how to do math early and made you practice all the time, then you are lucky enough to be intelligent. If they sat you in front of a TV for most of your childhood YOU'RE DUMB! Because the brain develops more neurons and connections the more you use it as a kid. That is actually how it works. If you read any credible medical journal about the subject, that is what it will tell you. It has nothing to do with genes, or background, it has to do with DID YOU TRY TO BE SMART?
Well, in general the U.S. has a lot more people, so the audience base is a lot larger with a lot more combative viewpoints. Typically Americans feel a lot more strongly about issues than British people (mostly because of our culture and the reactionary way we take everything and turn it into a fight.) That said, British television doesn't really have the same environment that American television has, and in general British TV is a lot less entertaining. I mean sure, Doctor Who is fun, Black Adder was cool, Father Ted. But jesus have you tuned in to some of that crap? Top Gear? I mean yeah cars woo hoo! Whatever but that doesn't excuse every one of those guys from being a total puss, and they're so ignorant. At least as ignorant as anything on American TV. But we still have Dexter, and the Daily Show (which for your information is the most trusted source of news in the country) and really intelligent stuff. This attitude you're giving Americans about how uneducated and inherently dreadful our culture is, well it's bigoted first of all. This feeling of superiority you get somehow from coming out of the most posh country in the world. You know what posh means right? You know that your country doesn't always allow defendants to be tried in front of a jury right? We're the new world motherfucker. There are stupid people here and there are smart people, but there are more of both, and that's what you don't like. That so many stupid people are on the air. You realize that most people watch MTV to laugh at how asinine those people are right? Your attitude is so old world. I'm glad your country is effectively impotent in the world now. Fuck England.
You're implying that Unions improved working conditions. Unions did nothing to that effect. They organized the workers true, but the same thing could have arisen if one person took a company to court for not providing safe working conditions. The advance of technology through capitalism is what brought us these excellent working conditions we're comfortable with now.
I believe that a lot of my point was that Communism is simply impossible for the time being. It hast to come from the bottom up, and include everyone. Right now people are still trying to scramble up the socioeconomic ladder, a process only possible in capitalism. My big problem with the communist crowd that's around today, is that they keep espousing the evils of capitalism, when they really owe more to capitalism than any one person or visionary. Capitalism is the best way to get us from A (cavemen) to B (scientific and technological limits) because people want to earn something for discovering it, aside from just recognition. That's not how I feel necessarily but it is how most people feel. So yes, maybe in a few centuries, when everything that could ever be invented is, we can be communists and see that it's the only way to exist with things being like they will be. As for the here and now however, communism will simply not work. Capitalism may have some nasty pilot fish tagging along but it's the only reasonable way to achieve fast progress.
As for the soda thing, you have the power as a consumer to gather other consumers who enjoy the drink and ask the company to start selling it in your area again. What they're gonna say, "No, we don't want to make any more money, sorry, we're not going to sell it there." ?
You guys are all idiots except for whoever said it depends on how you were raised. Reading all of your responses about school and genetically inherited mental capacity, I was seriously trying to figure out where you got all that nonsense. Then after about the fourth or fifth "there" where there should have been "their" I realized, how would you know? Here's the facts. When you're little, about 2 to 6, it's different for everyone but around that range, you learn literally as fast as you try to. Kids who read a lot at that age show the best performance across the board but that's because reading affects your comprehension and memory as well as your language skills. Similarly kids who do a lot of math will be really good at math because they learn it as fast as you can teach them. Kids who only train the math parts of their brain when they are young would be good obviously, with number sense and faster altogether. Playing music and learning to play as many instruments as possible helps a kid develop coordination, good hearing and pitch, the kinds of things involved in playing music, as well as math skills. I read a lot as a kid, I was reading college level books by the third grade, and expanded from there. Never been great at math, but man can I ever play the drums. And drive. And fuck your mom. I can do that really well too.
Yeaaaaaah! Tell 'em boss! Nuclear energy has come a long way since the Cold War, and it has improved tenfold at least! The more we take advantage of it, the more advances we'll make and someday we may even discover how to safely produce energy with nuclear fusion rather than fission, which has unlimited potential for energy growth! In a world where no truth has ever been told wholly, why won't people just take the chance and try it.
I doubt that if I was shouting in your ear all day long that you wouldn't give a shit. You would be unhappy about it and take action to make me stop.
The "happiness" that allows people to sit and watch while the world turns to shit is not the sort of happiness I am after. Being superficially happy satisfies too many people if you ask me.
Take pride in your ability to "not give a shit" about things that would seriously disturb any sane person if you want. It's just a common form of cowardice if you ask me.
Thanks, your opinion on the subject is really valuable to me. No really, I love it when people call me a coward. I would just direct you to my enlistment papers as proof to the contrary but that probably wouldn't hold up for an enlightened individual like yourself. I can see from the way that your extremely analytical mind didn't pick up on my obviously humorous tone, (yes written speech has tone too) that you're a truly unhappy person. I don't give a shit, is merely layman's terms for I don't need society or anyone else to reflect my personal philosophy to be happy. The world is made better by people that laugh in the face of such adversity, like myself. I'm not saying I'm going to change the world or anything but attitude is definitely a part of your problem.
The guy who feels stifled and suffocated says "I'm extremely happy". Go figure
Go figure I'm able to hold more than one abstract in my head at a time! Amazing! Call Ripley's! Just because sometimes I feel like I'm surrounded by ignorance, doesn't mean I let it pull me down and win. It's just another challenge to overcome. Deep down I'm still looking on the bright side.
I don't think that's a truthful statement.
Yeah well luckily for me what you think and what you know about me are two different columns on your notes for createdebate. You don't believe me? Ever talk to me after a car crash, or my girl dumps me? No, you haven't. I have though, and if I may say so myself I handled it pretty well. You know, a smile and recitation of my mantra "Win some lose some."
No one can ever dislodge from reality. They might delude themselves into thinking they can, but happiness that stems from delusional thinking is not anything to aspire to. How would remembering the fact that we are animals help to not get so caught up in how fucked up society is?
Clearly you didn't experiment a lot in college. I was referring more to the suspension of disbelief you enter when you watch a movie or read a book. Sorry for not being as literal as you, I should have said "You can't ever just ignore a bunch of assholes." But seriously you should look into the 5th dimension and the fluid nature of reality. It's science. Well not yet. Also we're animals, this prison we've built up around ourselves and called "society" or "government" or "cities" has about as much importance as an anthill or a beaver dam. Sure if you ask an ant or a beaver about it they'll say it's the coolest thing since the other side of the pillow, but does that stop a storm or flood from destroying it? Does the storm or flood stop them from rebuilding?
It would be easy to prove that you really don't believe that statement.
I don't know how. I like animals more than most people I meet day-to-day. A single human life is just as precious as any other life. I don't really think like most people though. In my head the first thing I care about, is me, self-preservation, obviously. Then the second and last thing I care about, is the universe. Just the general state of it. We're all ants by the way. A tiny cancer growing in the blink of our sun's eye, and in a couple more blinks our presence will be completely eradicated. Just FYI.... dawg.
Human animals need a thing called hope.
Really? Because you don't seem to have any. I mean I do in a way I guess. I know what will make the world a better place, and I try to help it any way I can. Hope in the literal sense, realistically, is what idle dreamers use to excuse their sloth and inactivity. You know I'm right, that little idea that they'll win the lottery so they should just keep working at Walmart and not go to school? The girl who hopes this time when her husband comes home she won't be beaten, so she stays instead of packing her bags and leaving. If that's the same hope you're thinking of, then maybe that's why you're so unhappy.
The secret of happiness is to enjoy the little things, and the big things that you take for granted. I have food, shelter, clothes, that's all I need to survive, that is what I call content. My happiness isn't driven completely by material things or tangible assets, the complete opposite, almost. I am an animal, among many others, and my species has risen to the top of the food chain by killing everything we see at least once. Maybe some people get upset about it, about the nature of most humans to want more until there's nothing left to want. They're angry about the way humans exploit each other. But hey, they're all just animals, trying to eat as much as they can and protect their offspring. I have reached and become and surpassed zen. I have seen the top of the mountain, and do you know what's up there? The way down. Everything in due time, the world will get better, humans will get smarter and we'll all be a lot better off. But there will still be people like you, who out of envy and spite for a feeling you can't understand, misplace happiness with absent-mindedness, ignorance(and the bliss associated), and insane maniacal laughter, apparently. It's screaming out to me. I think you're just upset because you're so grounded in this maze of a life, you want everything to be better now, but even if you could control eery mind on the planet you wouldn't know what to do to make the world a better, working place. And don't delude yourself that you would. Just stop. I'm happy. I'm not dead, I'm not rich or a despot. I'm a nineteen year old kid with a rough background who escaped with meditation, yoga, and Grant Morrison. And I'm happy. There's nothing wrong with me. I'm active in politics, I'm a registered member of the Liberty part, I sign petitions every day and send them to people too. And I'm happy. Why can't you just accept that someone might be better at something than you? Or that the whole world doesn't see through your eyes? Because of the government? Because society is evil and bad and wants to rape you? So any sane mind takes to life with the same cynicism, pessimism, and aversion to positive feelings that you have? That's really selfish, and for someone that talks a lot about what's wrong with the world, maybe you should take a look at that giant empty hole inside you, brother. The one swallowing you and your happiness alive.
Man, aside from my actual point, the English teacher in me just wants to tear apart that sentence up there. Jesus. Anyways, Democrats seem to promote social spending and using the government as a tool to protect those that can't themselves. This in and of itself is not a bad idea. There are a couple simple facts that just make it irrelevant though.
1. The U.S. doesn't really have any money.... what are you suggesting we spend? Hey that Gates guy has a lot of money and likes to blow it on that kind of stuff, and blow. Let's ask him!
2. Some people don't need assistance, or need assistance due to personal mistakes. I hate to be so callous, but for a bunch of atheists espousing their chief responsibility to giving credit to evolution, they really seem to want to get in the way of natural selection. Are you implying that humans are the end all be all to the evolutionary process? And we're worth more than the other animals so we can't let a single human being be subject to the consequences of their mistakes, or even someone else's? Because that's a very arrogant and frankly moronic opinion to have. Don't worry though, the sentiment is shared by a lot of religious conservatives, YOU FRIGGING TOOL.
3. The federal government is simply not adequate at handling social spending. Maybe if the money was given out to the states, based on their populations, and the local governments handled medical care for the poor and people over 65, it would be a lot more efficient.
4. We've been trying to help everybody! It just doesn't work! How much more can you take!? You just keep ceding more power to the Federal government and all it does is grow for the sake of its own growth! It's like a tumor asking you for money to support its cigarette habit! We can fix this but we need to make some cuts, ugly, big, the bad man took my welfare check CUTS! Nothing else is going to get us out of it! What you want to tax the richest 1%? That's great! UNTIL THEY MOVE TO MONACO WITH THAT 98% OF THE COUNTRY'S WEALTH THEY CONTROL! And even if we taxed all those billionaires it would still take years and years of draining every last penny they make to get us out of the red. Face it, we need to reduce the size of the federal government.
Democrats seem to ignore these simple facts. They say "End the deficit!" and "Bring down unemployment!" but they hold signs saying "Don't touch my welfare!" and "Universal healthcare!" You can either be a successful country with a small federal government that spends wisely and takes its place as the owner of the American dream, or you can be Europe. And those assholes SUCK! Except for Portugal. They legalized all drugs. That's pretty cool. But Europe sucks! And for all their taxes and tight regulations their banks are STILL about to COLLAPSE. Jesus Christ wake up people!
The Karl Marx thing was a joke of course. I'm familiar with his manifesto and I know how to spell his name, I can clearly read after all. I've never subscribed necessity as the mother of invention. I think it's Frank Zappa. Another joke. Seriously though, desperation is what drives true change, especially in a worldwide economy where the fates of so many might hang in the balance of the fate of one corporation. Hypothetically, if we ran out of crude oil tomorrow, I guarantee that hundreds of companies would spring up in addition to those that are already there, to deliver alternatively fueled automobiles and the infrastructure needed to convert the world's economy to running on hydrogen or what have you. This is the beauty of capitalism. No system is perfect, and no system is going to give absolutely everyone a fighting chance for success. However capitalism comes a lot closer than any communist society would. It is proven to increase the standard of living everywhere it lands. Look at India, where a vastly impoverished population now has one of the fastest growing economies in the world. While there are still a lot of problems, and bureaucratic inefficiency, they are definitely coming out of the same kind of rut the U.S. was in, in the early 20th century/depression era. The common misconception I see is that unregulated capitalism caused the depression, poor working conditions, and the vast disparity between the upper class and lower class. This simply is not true. First of all, immigration drastically increased the population of the country, and most of the immigrants already had nothing or less when they got here. So yes, they worked in sweatshops, and were injured in factories, but most of all they saved, and saved and saved, and opened up storefronts and businesses across the country. Secondly, in this economically charged era, we were coming off the heels of the industrial revolution, if not still in the midst of it. This revolution which modernized so many aspects of our society, I'm sure I don't have to tell you, was spurred by capitalism: "How can we make more product, faster." This was a dangerous time to be an unskilled laborer, and it was hard, but through the hard work of the quarter a day workers and child laborers, the factory became a much safer place due to the fact that it simply is not profitable to have a dangerous work environment.
Your comment about open-source would be correct, maybe it will be in a few decades. The big problem I see with your idyllic analogy (I love free stuff too) is that you can't assemble a car on the internet. You can't mine coal, stitch a dress, or make a cheeseburger with a few lines of code that represent your contribution to the global collective. Real products need real ingredients, and tangible workers, skilled or unskilled. People seldom work as hard or as well when there's nothing in it for them unless they gain from the product as well, such as the case in open-source development. It's hard to prove an unskilled worker's gain from dealing with ignorant, selfish, and gluttonous customers in a drive-thru line when they aren't being paid. This is where the part about no system is perfect comes in. Yes, I would love to live in Star Trek too, where the human race has become enlightened and moved on from our petty squabbles and simple motives of having more than our neighbors. But we don't and people who believe communism is the answer simply do not have a grip on the way the world works, and the way progress is achieved. If Henry Ford's company had been bought up and made to comprise the entire automotive market, we would all be driving Model T's or something very much like it. I would say that, while cars have had a lot of additions due to government intervention, the cars themselves, the critical components, speed, performance, have never benefited. I can tell you if the government never intervened in the automobile industry there might be more automobile deaths annually, there may be more emissions, but the average persons car would probably cost about $500 as opposed to $15,000.
As for unions, I can tell you no industry needs unions and they never did to be honest. My dad is in the service industry, he owns his own corporation which has only ever had three employees, himself, my mom, and me. Because he refuses to pay someone to be able to do his job, many potential employers that have need of his valuable, but relatively cheap service can't and won't hire him, because they are contractually obligated to hire only union workers. Where does the worker benefit from that? My dad sure doesn't, pay money to work, or bust his ass to get the same amount of work? I know which choice most people would pick, the one that doesn't flatten their wallet. That's just a personal experience to shed light on my own feelings on unions. While I may be biased I think I'm pretty fair in saying that Unions only hinder progress by not letting workers have a right to their choice of hours, workplace, pay (If I'm on my own and only need to provide for myself I should be able to take a job for a lower salary than they offer if it will improve my chances of employment), etc. As for teachers, honestly if the current tax code were scrapped, replaced with fair tax and the government were much smaller (Gary Johnson 2012) I would say we should do away with teacher unions and the department of education. Privatize it! Suddenly an entire new industry pops up, and it becomes the goal of businesses across the country to give the best PRODUCT (Child's education) for the lowest PRICE. I think this would put less of a strain on people's wallets than is assumed, and would probably be an all around improvement to the way things work now. Parents suddenly become a lot more invested in their child's education when it's actually an investment. This creates a home environment where children everywhere, are pushed to their learning limits (of which there are none, for young kids).
As for your analysis on Capitalism's historical effectiveness I would just ask you to keep this in mind in the debate against/for communism. The Federal Government, as much as it would like to be, can't be everywhere at once. They can not possibly regulate all the bad actors out there, and most of the bad actors have bought the government anyways! Communism can only work in terms of the community. PEOPLE everywhere have to make the voluntary choice to support everyone in the community, regardless of their status. I don't know many people who would do that, some and believe me they're great people, but not many would right now. Maybe in the future. The bottom line is the government can't just write the rules like that and make everyone level, or as close as it can and say "Good enough." A. Because that's fascism. B. because governments are inherently inefficient and are incapable of that kind of global monitoring, and C. because for all his speeches and debates, whoever spear-heads this movement is still going to be placed in absolute power over everyone's assets and is going to take advantage of that. As we know, and have seen, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Communism doesn't work simply because human nature won't allow it to. Until it does, Capitalism is the best chance we have of getting further.
As for your statement about deregulation causing the current recession, this again, is simply not true. This is the classic mistake of seeing two events in sequential order and drawing a connection simply because one happened before the other. I'm sure I don't have to tell you that the main government institution for regulating the markets, the SEC, has been too busy with investment banks' asshole to do any actual regulating. Further this entire recession was caused by bad regulations, and the SEC's guarantee that when investments went south, the government would bail them out, in some sick attempt to avoid another depression. The banks had no real reason to avoid failure or measure risk sanely, because the only thing they had to lose was taxpayer money, and they don't give a fuck about that. I'll direct you here: http://reason.com/archives/2009/06/19/
You're almost completely dismissing Ron Paul, who probably has the most fanatic supporters, even over Obama pre-election. They're spreading too. Romney's a diplomat, people will see this more as the race continues, most already have. He skirts around the tough questions and says what people want to hear. Paul is a leader, he wants to do what's right for the country, even if it isn't popular and won't be until people see how well it works. I'm voting for him or Johnson (if he can get some god damn attention) so at least they'll force the prohibition issue on Obama, proving prohibitionists wrong with simple facts, then we can end that BS
The power to see emotion, intent, and life energy via a person's aura, all the time, with everyone. People could call me Jolly Roger, and I'd fight the black iron prison. And corruption. And have a loud activist voice against intrusive government that creates crime and then tries to treat it rather than curing crime by eliminating the need for it.
I mean, you can say there's something wrong with me if you want. You can shout it in my ear all day long. I don't give a shit. Maybe that's why I'm happy and you aren't. I know it's okay to relax and let go once in a while. I'm extremely happy, I also hate the state of my country and the widespread ignorance that stifles and suffocates me. I spout out Gary Johnson's qualifications to people, I talk about why weed should be legal, for all the good it will do, few people even listen, even fewer think about these things on their own. But you know what? I don't give a shit. The world can throw whatever it wants at me, and I still won't give a shit. Because if you're so caught up in society, and how fucked up it is that you can't ever just dislodge from reality and be okay with yourself, my money is on the theory that you've forgotten a fundamental fact about biology. Humans are animals. We're not anything special, of no more value than a dog, a cat, a snake, a mouse. I've got food, shelter, sometimes clothes. What more does an animal really need to be happy? If you're not missing one of those things and you claim to be unhappy, you're just a spoiled brat who wants way too much. That's it. That's the secret to happiness. We're all just a bunch of fucking animals.
Hey I couldn't find "What Real Communism Is" by this Carl Marks guy. I'm assuming that along with the asshats in D.C. right now, some of the idea is to control the markets. Pick winners and losers, subsidizing or paying for goods from the companies, state-funded, that get passed around to all the people. Which completely destroys any semblance of competition and improvement. Competition in the free market spurs innovation. The corporatist plots to save struggling companies that needed to go under in a healthy business cycle of what should be a free market, was opposed by virtually everyone. Yet there are still people blaming it on capitalists? Hey talk to the heads of those companies and they'll probably tell you it was a great idea, but they're the corporatists who came up with it. People, especially self-proclaimed "communists" always talk about the evils of capitalism. Let's talk about the evils of Unions for a second. Do you know in some states there's a costly review for service businesses that are just starting up, if there is a unionized group that offers the same service, entrepreneurs (the people that cause economy growth and standard of living improvements) aren't allowed to start the business. Did you know that shortly after the new deal, since Black people weren't allowed to join construction unions in some states, they would just offer their services for slightly less, providing competition in the market (the thing that causes economic growth and standard of living improvements) so the unions, who couldn't stand those niggers taking their jobs (see a parallel?) lobbied local governments into making it ILLEGAL to offer a service for less money than unions. Effectively putting all of these workers who were providing a valuable service at a better price out of work. Unions are pretty god damn bad organizations. In some states less than 1% of teachers are fired annually for performance-related issues. Are teachers really that good? Every university in the whole damn country must be pretty good at making teachers right? Or it's just impossible to fire a teacher even if they aren't teaching kids well enough. Anyone see how that might cause some problems for the kids they are educating? If one thing is clear about capitalism and communism, it's that capitalism can take anything and make it faster, cheaper, stronger, smarter, and with a nicer paint job, in half the time it would take a public sector. The period of incredible growth this country experienced when so many new technologies and sciences were born, literacy spread like pubic lice and the standard of living increase took our life expectancy to about where it is now, happened in almost completely unregulated, unmeddled, free markets, where businesses were free to live and die in the name of progress and had no influence over the government, or vice versa. And the companies that fucked up, got sued, in the wonderful court system we have that, at the time, wasn't crowded by people smoking a plant like people have done for four thousand years! YAAAAAAAAAY CAPITALISM!
So you're going to tell people what they can do with their own lives. If I want to fuck some guy, that's my choice. I don't, but what if the situation were reversed? What if, do to its frequent militaristic disciples, and the animosity religion generates. They outlawed prayer in public places. Now, I'm sure you would be all up in arms about that. "They're stepping on my first amendment right to believe whatever I choose!" and you would be right. Telling people they aren't allowed to live freely without hurting anyone so long as it offends a portion of the population isn't taking a "moral high ground" it's despotism. You would know that if you understood anything about living in a free society, or believed in the ideals of this country. Beyond that Issues like homosexuality don't belong in the white house. The government needs to be reduced drastically, by almost half, if we want to regain some sense of sustainability. And now, you a "Republican" want to police the fags? You probably want to put all Muslims on watch lists too. You freaking bigot. That's who hides behind "moral high ground" bigots who want everyone to be free...... to live exactly like they do.
Oi! Calm yourself. The entire media has been inducing a coverage black out on the only candidate with experience and a plan that can fix this country, and you're calling half of his voting base fascist nutjobs. You're vastly oversimplifying the situation, and you know it, or you're just as much of a rhetoric monkey, slave thinker as people who avidly watch any cable news network. People who watch fox news aren't fascist nutjobs. They're a group of people who feel alienated from other news networks and fox news has very cleverly wrapped all of that mistrust and misguided "freedom" love into a big dildo and shoved it up everybody's ass. But we asked for it. Look at what news has to compete with. Could you come up with pertinent information for news stories 24 hours a day seven days a week, and still be entertaining enough to draw people away from whatever other crap is on? Scratch that, could you and a roomful of your friends do that? I think not. People who watch news aren't psychopathic Nazis they're us. Anyone who is misguided enough to believe everything they hear on the news, (or the internet GARY77777) is our bad, all of us. Another score for the opiates of the masses, a loss to humanity's side. So don't talk like it takes total mental incapacity to sit through an hour of Fox news programming. Look at John Stossel, he's probably one of the only respectable newscasters that believes and talks about, at great length, liberty and small government. Judge Napolitano is pretty good and he's even had Gary Johnson on. GARY JOHNSON 2012. And fox has more reason.tv guests than CNN and MSNBC, and the people at Reason magazine are the only people out there laying down hardcore truth dickings to people like Bill... what's his name? Lumbergh? And people like him. NICK GILLESPIE 2016
*The police are given too much power. What are you referring to? Like the patriot act? Because I smoke weed all the time and cops stop me and my friends sometimes, we always get away scott free by being all "Yes sir, no sir." and not being retarded when they say shit like "I mean you can tell me man I know you're on something, I don't care, I'm not gonna do anything." Yeah they take a lot of liberties with that shit, and I'm pretty sure technically it's entrapment, but it's not serious. The real problem is the laws that they're enforcing, not the people enforcing the laws. Cops are good, in an ideal world. Oh did I say ideal? I meant to say Libertarian.
I don't get black humor. But economic contentiousness on the part of an entire generation of hippies and neo-cons that want to control my actions AND leave a mountain of debt on top of me with the already broken political system? Now THAT'S hilarious. Whatever, just another step closer to buying assless chaps, a car made out of roll cage, and a mohawk. I can deal.
Libertarian is for all intents and purposes Republican. What we call Republican is actually just a red democrat who believes the government should have a say in how we live our lives. The only hope I see for Ron Paul is if all the independents who like to talk the talk of being concerned with these issues actually register Republican and vote for him in the primaries. I think a lot of people in this country have a fundamental misunderstanding of the way the election works, and the two-party system. I was talking to a Democrat about registering Republican to vote in the primaries. It went something like this:
"Hey you should register Republican and vote for Paul or Johnson in the primaries, just to make sure like Bachmann or Romney doesn't get a shot at actually being president."
"Yeah well I'm a democrat so..."
"Well Obama's going to be up for reelection so if you still want to vote for him you can but the Republicans are having primaries and if we don't have a good candidate from the Right then we won't see any progress or change from the left."
"But I'm a registered Democrat so I can't."
"You know you can register online? And even just doing it in person only takes five minutes, you are a college student, they kind of make it easier for you."
"Yeah well Ron Paul won't get elected. I'm voting democrat anyways."
And so on, in a misinformed way. A lot of people don't seem genuinely interested in how to actually solve these problems and let people with rehearsed rhetoric from their campaign advisers do the thinking for them. It's really sad, and I'm starting to think 2012 is the last chance people have to start thinking for themselves and realize how unsustainable our Federal government is right now. Libertarian solutions are really the only solutions, since we've tried everything the main two parties are suggesting already. It's the only option left that's on the table (very tentatively at that). It's really just up to the non-registered and what I've heard called "Blue Republicans" democrats who recognize both parties aren't representing change, and are willing to register republican and vote for people like Paul and Johnson in an attempt to salvage the two-party system. These people will either have to buck up and vote or get fucked over again. If they don't do anything about it well... I hope they're happy when I rob their house after the riots start.
The two-party system is a giant turd sandwich, and we've all got to take a bite. Independent voters don't really exist. Everyone has a clear view of how they think things should work (at least at a very basic level, no matter how uneducated they are.) The reason there are so many independents now is because Republicans and Democrats represent two halves of the nastiest, dark brown with bits of green and yellow, melt in your mouth, drip down your throat, shit burger. That's a fact. Nick Gillespie/Matt Welch 2016!
Having the wrong argument. Well not wrong so much as you're having an ill-defined argument. The best tax system is fair tax. A flat rate on all consumption, scrapping the rest of the tax code, and the IRS. Low income families buy low priced goods and high income families buy high priced goods. Paychecks aren't taxed, so people get more money anyways, and with that money whatever they buy is more carefully considered, and whatever they have left after necessities (bills, mortgage, groceries, rent, etc.) is just a surplus of money they didn't have before, they can save it or blow it, but most people would probably feel the urge to save. Eliminating the corporate tax allows for smooth business operations, while large corporations are still paying taxes (their fair share) on all the goods (office supplies, gas, what the hell ever) they need to keep running. This also makes it easier for small businesses who aren't as profitable or large from the get-go to start up in the first place, they don't have that much business in the first few weeks, which is OK because they're only taxed on what they use. Fair Tax and flat tax aren't the same thing. For the record a Flat Fair Tax IS fair.
Belief in Aliens is the converse to belief in God. Like was said before me there are 10^21 starts in the sky, and even that is probably low-balling it. Most star systems have some form of celestial bodies in them. There is a group of students and professors at Oxford (I think, it's definitely a university in England) that are devoted to thinking of ways alien life might manifest. You don't have to subscribe to the Ancient Aliens theory to accept that the simple odds say that somewhere there's something else out there. So this is like the opposite of the God debate, as we understand science more we see God in the picture less and less, as we find out that the universe has all these rules that led to the creation of everything. With aliens, the more we understand about the universe, the vast distances, the massive amounts of stars in the sky, and now rogue planets which apparently escape the gravity of their own stars all the time, it becomes more and more likely that somewhere, somewhen there was life in outer space. I would define the "goldilocks" term for people unfamiliar, as the appropriate distance and orbit from a star, taking into account the different life-cycles and types of stars, for life as we know it to form on a planet. We've discovered several planets that fit into this category, and we know that all the elements present here that also helped life develop are common through out the universe. There is even a theory suspecting that the original single-celled organisms on this planet were actually frozen in an asteroid from some other ancient planet that crashed on earth billions of years ago and kick started life here; which is completely plausible. I have to say the odds and facts are with us on this argument. No we have never seen evidence of aliens (other than bacteria on mars, which renders this debate moot anyways), but neither have we developed the means to observe active, large alien life on other planets.
It is hard to think of the two terms as completely separate. I think the best place to start for me is a democrat idiom I heard once, I'm not really sure where it originates. "The government should do for people, what they can not do for themselves." Now with the world as heavily globalized as it is, companies that span the entire earth; and the state of medicine these days, I think pretty soon we're going to have to answer the question of what we can really do for ourselves. I don't think most people, or most people who deserve to be called people i.e. productive members of society, agents of progression, need the government for a whole lot. One aspect of the Security argument is healthcare. Feeling secure that if you need medical attention you will receive proper medical care. There's nothing really wrong with that idea, but I do think there's something wrong with a system of "universal" health care, where an obese patient receives free or discounted treatment for a health problem that is a result of their weight at taxpayers' expense, when it's their own fault for not taking care of themselves. The same goes for people with liver disease from drinking, or lung cancer from smoking tobacco. I'm not saying we shouldn't treat people like that, but they should pay for themselves, or rather their insurance should. If we're looking at this on a spectrum, like a line and security is on one side, freedom on the other, Freedom is going to look a lot more dangerous for various reasons. Mainly because we're separating it from security, which isn't always the case in real world situations. Take the police. If we're going with freedom, let's say the drug war is over. Everything is legal and sold in literal "drug stores." Maybe this leads to an increase in addiction among adolescents and adults, possibly an increase in drug related deaths. But, with the entire market for controlled substances legalized, there's no drug war. The drug war takes up so much of law enforcement's resources. Every police officer would now be spending 100% of their energy on the job responding to domestic violence calls, pulling over drunk (or otherwise inebriated) drivers, responding to accidents, and in effect, protecting our rights, rather than what I would say has been infringing on them in the current system. At this point with all the potential lives saved, and tax dollars that we can put into other things like, education or something, we've got a much larger and better educated workforce that can take care of itself, and pay it's own way, rather than the way it is now, with a much larger than necessary portion of the population relying on the government for one thing or another. Welfare, healthcare, work, what have you. It's a really complicated problem, and I don't think anyone can say that either extreme is really going to be the best, but I think, or hope, that if you give people more freedom to do the right things, the choice to live productive and progressive lives, over the choice to murder people, or spend all day getting high on the worst and most harmful drugs they can buy, that the overwhelming majority will see their chance to succeed and take it. And the minority, well.... You know how human's have reached a point where we have no natural predators so the population is just kind of increasing without any kind of quality control? I mean I hate to talk in callous terms like that, but can anyone tell me how it wouldn't help to have a few more subtractions to the lowest percentile of the population? Just for the sake of natural selection? I mean it's proven to work.
It's not exactly like there are widespread Muslim movements SUPPORTING the actions of radical Islamists. Any average Ahmed Islamic man in America is simply an average American with a job to worry about keeping and a mortgage to pay and three kids to feed. Maybe we should start a new debate called "Why are there so few Christians denouncing radical conservatives?" Have you taken the time out of your daily grind to walk to your local news station and tell them that you're denouncing the KKK and the people that bomb abortion clinics? Even the people that protest outside said clinics and humiliate/intimidate teenage girls with no means of supporting children? It's proven fact that radical Islam is a minority of the religion. Whether or not you are even part of a clandestine Islam-based organization has more to do with geography than religion in my opinion, and many of the people who are in these organizations are only there because they've been lied to for their entire lives by the people who run everything. That said, someone who is born in Palestine of the Islamic faith who leads a perfectly normal and moderate lifestyle has no interest in writing up a petition for like minded Muslim people who don't have wet dreams about killing westerners, about whether or not they support the radical Islamic movement, nor should they.
Obesity is a disease only in the respects that it is spreading and can kill you. The only doctor you can visit to cure you of obesity is a plastic surgeon. Anyone who blames their genes or environment for obesity is using the same logic as the person who uses their abusive parents as an excuse for beating their own kids. If you don't want to be fat, stop, put the doughnut down and go for a jog. It really is that simple. I don't know how anyone can argue seriously that it inhibits you from functioning normally, when functioning normally in fact cures you of obesity.
DC definitely has Marvel beat by a long shot. I don't know if anyone else is very familiar with Jim Robinson's run with Starman, but reading that series the first time around was incredible. The attention to detail, concerning the city that the characters lived in, was just phenomenal. Not to mention how much of the books talked about the collectibles that the protagonist sold in his store. That was just really cool and it was nice to see conversations in a comic book that weren't about the bad guy or the good guys, but about the city they lived in and the things (movies, books, TV shows, etc.) that these superheroes liked in their time not spent saving the world. (Where else will you find out what Batman's favorite Woody Allen movie is?) The villains in DC also seem to be better written, they're more interesting and deep. Sandman is definitely responsible for shaping the whole comic book scene at the time, and Vertigo in general has been pretty good about being original, not just mature. Then we have the Justice League International. In the late 80's/early 90's comic books were getting really dark and edgy, heroes were turning into anti-heroes, and in general they were a lot more violent and gritty for the sake of being edgy. It was really brave of DC to make a light-hearted series with characters making jabs at each other and joking, pretty much the whole time. On the whole I think DC has been a lot more influential than Marvel in terms of refreshing and producing new concepts in the industry. Don't even get me started on Darwyn Cooke, whose artwork in New Frontier was just plain beautiful.
