[QUOTE=Zambini57]
You have no way of knowing if that is true.
[/QUOTE]
You’ll understand why your OP is immature drivel when you fully grok the fact that none of us have any way of knowing if anything at all is true, and that life involves making judgement calls based on best guesses.
“My judgment call might not work out, so I’m just going to do nothing like a useless sack of shit” is a fine motto for twats, but most of us see a need to do the best we can with what we’ve got.
[QUOTE=Zambini57]
Did you support William Jefferson Clinton? Remember when he was elected and TIME magazine depicted him as a knight riding in on a white horse on it’s cover? Can you honestly say your expectations were met? If you can, then you are a deluded ass.
[/QUOTE]
I don’t get this part. What was there to be unhappy about from Clinton’s presidency? HIs failure to act decisively in Rhwanda is my biggest problem with him. Other than that, it was a time of prosperity and relative peace in the world. If you’re this very troubled because he got a blow job, you’re a nutball.
You know, I’m thinking that people who DON’T follow politics, but still vote, are a lot farther down the moron scale.
Also, if we could convince people to follow politics with as much zeal as they follow celebrity gossip, we’d probably have better representation.
As a note, I’m one of those assholes who thinks that if you are eligible and don’t vote, you give up all right to bitch about the elected government.
Ditto. My problem is with uninformed voters with conflicting demands causing politicians to behave in a way we say we don’t want, but our polling/voting says we do.
[QUOTE=Zambini57]
You have no way of knowing if that is true.
[/QUOTE]
Which? That the Democrat won’t disappoint me as badly as the Republican will? I don’t know for sure, but based on the last few administrations and the fact that the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, I have high confidence in it.
If you can’t take the occasional risk, you’re going to find yourself paralyzed and unable to act.
Aw, come on people, don’t give Zambini57 such a hard time.
Everybody I know who follows politics and votes are morons. Particularly myself.
Every election I read up on candidates and ballot initiatives. Every election I vote the way I think is right. And every election something like 95% of the votes go against me.
And yet every election I repeat the process, knowing full well how it’s going to come out.
If that’s not a moron, I don’t know what is.
By your rationale, perhaps one should vote for the candidate promising genocide, staggering inflation and a Yugo in every garage. Why don’t you test that theory, on the local level of course, and get back with us about your satisfaction with the results.
[QUOTE=Oregon sunshine]
Well, it’s true that all the mainstream, major party candidates are bought and paid for by the same interests. Our entire system is in a shambles because actual human beings do not run anything important anymore.
[/QUOTE]
Even the ignorant OP of this thread wasn’t so ignorant as to suggest that the parties are the same. It seems like every time I open up a political thread these days, there you are, Oregon Sunshine, telling us all how there is no difference between the political parties and how the news is all just bullshit from the man, etc.
That’s fine. If that’s your schtick, cool. You’re in good, if discredited company. And its even slightly less obnoxious than some of the other one-trick ponies. But what really grates is that you never respond to anyone who tries to engage or correct you or offer any kind of substantive argument. If you’re not going to respond to people that try to fight your ignorance, please stop dropping this shit into threads. At least with other one-trickers, there’s occasionally an interesting debate, or maybe some lurker learns a thing or two. With your recent spate, you’ve had no such redeeming value.
[QUOTE=lieu]
By your rationale, perhaps one should vote for the candidate promising genocide, staggering inflation and a Yugo in every garage.
[/QUOTE]
You don’t quite grok the logic. A candidate will promise sweet things, and say things he thinks people want to hear. Maybe schools should teach a course from one of the Dale Carnegie books.
[QUOTE=Richard Parker]
Even the ignorant OP of this thread wasn’t so ignorant as to suggest that the parties are the same. It seems like every time I open up a political thread these days, there you are, Oregon Sunshine, telling us all how there is no difference between the political parties and how the news is all just bullshit from the man, etc.
. . .
At least with other one-trickers, there’s occasionally an interesting debate, or maybe some lurker learns a thing or two. With your recent spate, you’ve had no such redeeming value.
[/QUOTE]
If you have some free time, you should read Anthony Downs’ “An Economic Theory of Democracy”. It’s an old book, and not entirely current, but it sort of suggests a similar thing.
It argues, basically, that in a two party democracy where public opinions generally fall in a bell curve (with the majority of the population moderate and extremist minorities), it’s rational for the parties, in order to maximize their support, to endorse policies near the center of popular opinion. So, he says, in a two party system, the two parties will tend to have, while not identical views, very similar ones.
[QUOTE=ZipperJJ]
Damn dude, who pissed in your cornflakes today?
[/QUOTE]
It’s not just today. Zambini’s cornflakes are perpetually urine-soaked.
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing]
If you have some free time, you should read Anthony Downs’ “An Economic Theory of Democracy”. It’s an old book, and not entirely current, but it sort of suggests a similar thing.
It argues, basically, that in a two party democracy where public opinions generally fall in a bell curve (with the majority of the population moderate and extremist minorities), it’s rational for the parties, in order to maximize their support, to endorse policies near the center of popular opinion. So, he says, in a two party system, the two parties will tend to have, while not identical views, very similar ones.
[/QUOTE]
Downs '57 is probaby the first formulation of median voter theory, but you definitely don’t have to slog through the entire book to understand it. There are more recent treatments that are more useful.
But what the OP is talking about is the “credible commitment problem”, sometimes known as the “sovereign dilemma”. This is not exactly a new problem in political science.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Yeah. If only we just voted for nobody, that would show 'em!
[/QUOTE]
I would love to have the option to vote for None of the above, so long as the rule was that if None of the above won, then a new election had to be held in, say, 12 weeks with an entirely different slate of candidates.
Or maybe 4 weeks. Have to allow for the possibility that we could have multiple elections with None of the above winning. Hmmm. We’d need to ban all prior candidates from subsequent elections for the same position/term, too.
[QUOTE=D_Odds]
It’s not just today. Zambini’s cornflakes are perpetually urine-soaked.
[/QUOTE]
Well, when you’ve gotta go…
Call me sentimental, call me a fool for falling for the American myth, but I vote in part because I personally know people who’ve had friends and family members disappeared and/or totured for being activists for democracy in their home countries. It’s a far from perfect system, but my God, how spoiled to you have to be to not vote at all? (There are other candidates besides the two major ones. There are many, many other elections besides the Federal ones.)
[QUOTE=Zambini57]
That’s just it. You don’t know who will pull the least amount of shit. People voted for Bush because they wanted someone they thought was “Mr. Morality” after the shit Clinton pulled. And look what they got, and look what he’s done.
[/QUOTE]
Don’t blame me, I voted for Kodos.
And I was happy with Bill Clinton. So what do you have to say about that?
My guess is that most people who vote for none of the above would vote for none of the above in subsequent elections. People like Zambini57 simply cannot be pleased by any crop of candidates, so why even try?
[QUOTE=niblet_head]
(There are other candidates besides the two major ones. There are many, many other elections besides the Federal ones.)
[/QUOTE]
This is a great point, and if everyone who would be so interested in voting for “none of the above” would vote for a third party candidate, things might be shaken up a bit.
Thinking about it further, if you really cannot choose between any of the major or minor party candidates, I would wonder if a candidate could be found to meet your particular needs. If so, how likely would it be that they would meet the particular needs of another voter?
[QUOTE=The Flying Dutchman]
Okay. So what do you recomend your fellow Americans do instead?
[/QUOTE]
Follow sports.
I hate following politics.
Total sucker’s game.
People think the benefits they get from having “their guy” elected makes some profound difference in their lives because it’s DEMOCRACY.
Bullshit. The benefits you get from getting “your guy” elected are no more substantial than having “your team” win the Superbowl. It’s just bragging rights that your tribe is the best.
And, the belief that your vote makes a difference is the biggest hornswaggle of all.
I’m so glad American Idol is finally on again. I sincerely believe that a good pop star can make more people happy than a good politician.
[QUOTE=The Flying Dutchman]
Okay. So what do you recomend your fellow Americans do instead?
[/QUOTE]
Masturbate. Drink. Play video games. Paint a sunset. Go SCUBA diving. Whatever floats your boat, you know? You live in one of the freer countries in human history. Enjoy yourself.
[QUOTE=appleciders]
So what? We should passively accept the shit that will get elected if we don’t vote? Our options for change in this country are 1. vote the bums out or 2. violent revolution. We’re not at 2 yet.
[/QUOTE]
You get the same “shit” whether you vote or not. So yes, passively accept it. Also, we’re not at one yet either. Check out the turnover rate of the U.S. Congress. And gerrymandering. And corporate-government ties. And…
[QUOTE=wolf_meister]
Less than half the US citizens who are eligible to vote actually do so. What happens? For the last 2 presidential elections, the citizenry has elected a moron. All he had to do was keep mentioning God, visit Bob Jones University, appoint lawyers from Pat Robertson’s Law School, state that he believes that the “jury is still out” on evolution, etc. This must work because it appeals to the people who actually do vote. That in itself is enough to convince me that a Hell of a lot more people should vote.
[/quote]
For its entire history the United States has been a deeply religious country. Hell, before it was even a country. It shows few signs of letting up. How do you think more people voting will help things in this regard? You need to familiarize yourself with past political campaigning, pronto. Ever hear about Manifest Destiny?
No, the POTUS would be whoever the Democratic and Republican parties put forward and who got the 5% or whatever.
Richard Parker is correct to point out the two parties aren’t the same, although I think he doesn’t appreciate the (general) foreign policy consensus or their (general) authoritarian bent. It is interesting to study the differences, not unlike reading about internal disagreements in China or the USSR or some tropical banana republic or some other totalitarian system between factions which although may have similar goals have different strategies of going about them.
Aquila Be offers a good reason to vote: because it feels good. That’s fine. But if one more liberal gushes to me about how Obama will bring change I am going to punch someone.
[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
I don’t get this part. What was there to be unhappy about from Clinton’s presidency?
[/quote]
You’re right that conservatives made up a lot of scandals which were either flat out false or, even if they were true, would be unremarkable for a House representative, let alone the most powerful position ever created by human beings. That, or you know, he lied about a blow job and where he enjoyed putting his cigars. They went after that angle instead of, say, authoritarian policies. War on drugs. Increasing militarization of the police. Extraordinary rendition. Economic policies like NAFTA and continuing the disastrous policies of the so called neoliberals. Or bombing people. Or his Iraq policy which was killing Iraqis by the trainloads. Materially helping Turkey ethnically cleanse their Kurdish areas. The environment. Continuing to send weapons and aid to all sorts of thugs. Stuff like that.
Of course, it would be quite correct to point out that the economy was good and we were all materially comfortable. And guess what? This holds true today. Yet somehow, I doubt liberals will stop complaining about Bush until I drop dead. And rightly so.
Same thing I’d say to a Bush or Reagan or LBJ supporter: hey, whatever makes you happy, as long as you can sleep at night.
Sadly, I agree with Trunk. We end up with the politicians we deserve, because as a whole, the people do not take the time and effort to try to make things better. Instead, we vote in one corrupt incumbent after the next. We don’t hold our politicians accountable for their actions (and I am talking about both sides of the aisle). Then we allow our politicians to do their best to keep any opponent out, be it through gerrymandering, using the office itself to get re-elected, or increasing the number of roadblocks to keep independent candidates off of the election ticket. We accept half-assed sound bites as position statements, and don’t force a solid stance when a politician talks from both sides of his/her mouth trying not to lose a vote.
That said, sadly, the U.S. is one of the more informed democratic electorates, and has one of the cleanest votes in the world.