McCain/Palin v. Obama/Biden

[Morphyous]

It boggles me how Palin discounts Obama's credibility by saying that he was never a mayor/governor, yet McCain has never been one either.

I don't see how anything McCain's speakers spews out nonsense.

-Smaller government, but he will keep us safer from terrorists with less government? It is so vague.

-Both sides mention lowering taxes, but really every candidate says this so I consider them to cancel each other out.

-Either Huckabee or someone else mentioned that Obama is using foreign ideas and doesn't think about American values. Offshore drilling and especially nuclear power sound like European ideas to me.

-One of the speakers on Wed were saying that Abraham Lincoln was a great republican who fought against slavery. Then he goes on to say that Obama doesn't have experience, when Lincoln himself was in the legislative branch and a representative.

I hope McCain loses horribly. Unless of course conservative Republicans vote in full force :/

[Brutul Tarew Marr]

Originally Posted by Jedah

I don't really follow. It's not just a matter of diversity causing friction: our national and political histories are nothing alike, and theres also the matter that Iraq has a power vacuum.

I will give you that the Arab culture in general is probably more violent than the US culture, so you could rationally argue that a direct comparison of violent incidences is not representative of the degree of religious fanaticism. Since the number of violent incidences is many thousands of times greater however, I don't think you could totally discount that. The political situation in Iraq is obviously not directly comparable to the US so it is probably not a good place to compare to for this purpose but any number of Arab countries could be used for comparison and there is still no way that you could rationally defend the idea that the US has "JUST" as much religious fanaticism as the Arab world.

I unfortunately also don't have all day to debate this, so you all have the last word.

[Mistii]

Originally Posted by Morphyous

Smaller government, but he will keep us safer from terrorists with less government? It is so vague.

I love how they slam the Democrats as being 'big government' liberals, and yet no one talks about how the government has gotten even exponentially more powerful and wasteful because of this "terrorists vs us" mindset. None of their candidates even acknowledge this, they think that as long as they keep writing blank checks to the military, and adding layer after layer of bureaucracy designed to 'protect us', that all of our problems will go away.

They won't even openly admit that the reason that Iran is batshit insane is because we're surrounding their country on all sides. Under a Republican administration the wars would be validated and just keep going, it makes me sick.

[Itzena]

Oh dear.

Daily Kos: BREAKING: Court DENIES Motion to Seal Divorce Papers of Todd P. Business Partner (Updated x4)

[Etoille]

Originally Posted by Brutul Tarew Marr

What didn't I like about what you picked? You said that religion is as big a factor in choosing leaders in the US as it is in Arab countries. I think you are clearly wrong about that and the example that you used (Mitt Romney) is proof enough of that because of how far he made it in our electoral process.

I seriously doubt that the author of that article would say that the US is "JUST" as much religious fanaticism as the Arab world as he is probably at least marginally in touch with reality, so he probably wouldn't appreciate you saying that you're "taking his side" on this. You are arguing that religious extremism exists in the US. It does. What I am disagreeing with you on is that the degree is even remotely close to the Arab world.

That abstract mentions Abortion clinic murders. Obviously the worst example of religious fanaticism that has occurred in the US in recent years. Seven people total have died do to violence by anti-abortion extremists. All were within a 5 year period. All were more than 10 years ago. Do I really need to look up statistics to compare that to what happens in Arab countries? Iraq has 1/10th our population. On what measure could we possibly compare to Iraq and show more incidences of religious extremism than happen in Iraq?

Honestly, I usually enjoy your posts, but you really need some perspective because you're making a fool of yourself with this argument.

grobbee i tried to give you your thread back.

what you are not accounting for are several things that a few articles do mention.

i stated explicitly that we do not have the stats for this because of gathering and because not all fanatics here or any where are violent.

fanaticism manifests itself in the middle east often as violence because people do not have another recourse. here we have one: the ballot box.

if your definition of degree is how often religious fanaticism lends itself to violence in less developed countries i will wholeheartedly agree with you - because its that way with nearly almost any issue in lesser developed countries.

my definition of degree is pervasiveness within the population. its not solely based on violence. its based on how 'fanatical' the country actually is - that is to say how fanatical are its people. which isn't to say that nonviolent fanaticism isn't innocuous. on the contrary tyrany of the majority very much can be just as bad in terms of societal outcasts and consequences etc. add into it that sometimes here it DOES include violence...i dont see another possible conclusion.

my definition of fanaticism is: Fanaticism is an emotion of being filled with excessive, uncritical zeal, particularly for an extreme religious or political cause or in some cases sports, or with an obsessive enthusiasm for a pastime or hobby. (wikipedia)

we have been taught by our government that fanaticism always ends in violence.

its just not true.

and im sorry its pretty plain to see that when 58% of the electorate has a positive view of palin its NOT a stretch to believe that religious fanaticism is both tolerated and endorsed by a large percentage of this country.

if she were ANY other religion but christian those remarks by her pastor and her own remarks would have destroyed the ticket and been labelled as 'extreme' and 'fundamental'. (see grobbee im trying to come full circle here). thats my litmus test.

nearly 60% of this country is ok with a VP candidate calling the Iraq war 'a holy mission from god'.

if thats not an endorsement of fanaticism i just havent a fucking clue what is and i cant imagine that the pervasiveness of such fanaticism in muslim countries is much higher than that.

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

btw - i had no idea i had people that liked reading my rants. youre like the 10th person this week that has said that LOL. i mostly talk to hear myself think in this place. but its cool that people seem to at least like some of it :P

you might think im making a fool of myself in this thread. it wouldnt be the first time i made a fool of myself it wont be the last. but a lot of ppl said that to me too right before we invaded Iraq when support for it was retardedly high. i said there weren't WMD's either and people said i was way off.

[Zhaun's_Shade]

Originally Posted by Mistii

I love how they slam the Democrats as being 'big government' liberals, and yet no one talks about how the government has gotten even exponentially more powerful and wasteful because of this "terrorists vs us" mindset. None of their candidates even acknowledge this, they think that as long as they keep writing blank checks to the military, and adding layer after layer of bureaucracy designed to 'protect us', that all of our problems will go away.

Republicans don't want to admit thier failure in the area and Democrats can't easily attack it or they would get called "unAmerican" or "against protecting our country" or some shit.

[Soriak]

Originally Posted by chaos

So I just saw a poll that says roughly 4 in 10 voters think Palin has enough experience to be VP. I don't understand why they keep pushing the experience angle, it isn't working with the independant and moderate voters they are looking for.

Well, 4 in 10 is only 40% - many of those will vote for the Republican ticket no matter what. It'd be interesting what undecideds think. I've read that the Democratic base is larger this time than the Republican base, so it doesn't even have to work on half the undecideds to be a good strategy.

[emoo]

Originally Posted by Mistii

they think that as long as they keep writing blank checks to their friends and themselves under the defense budget, and adding layer after layer of bureaucracy designed to 'protect us', that we wont notice that the war on terror is just the latest and greatest extortion of America in terms of both civil liberties and raw wealth.

fixed

[Smocca]

Drama may be coming sooner than we thought: ABC News: Investigation into Palin Now on Fast Track

[Malakriss]

Originally Posted by Smocca

Drama may be coming sooner than we thought: ABC News: Investigation into Palin Now on Fast Track

So either there will be a buffer of three weeks for damage control, or an additional three weeks of "I told you so"

[Tyen]

Originally Posted by Smocca

Drama may be coming sooner than we thought: ABC News: Investigation into Palin Now on Fast Track

I worship the quicksand she walks upon.

[emoo]

Originally Posted by Brutul Tarew Marr

I will give you that the Arab culture in general is probably more violent than the US culture

I think you're probably wrong.

I know I see plenty of people get beat up each year, and hear several gunshots too. I think you'd be hard pressed to find that level of violence anywhere other than combat zones in Iraq, Afghanistan or during hot times along the Palestinian/Israeli border (where the guns and war were most recently introduced by England). And even then, I think the US still comes out ontop.

Edit: I am not advocating any gun control, but I am pointing out that I believe that American culture is more violent than Arab culture in general.

[Mymn]

Originally Posted by emoo

I think you're probably wrong.

I know I see plenty of people get beat up each year, and hear several gunshots too. I think you'd be hard pressed to find that level of violence anywhere other than combat zones in Iraq, Afghanistan or during hot times along the Palestinian/Israeli border (where the guns and war were most recently introduced by England). And even then, I think the US still comes out ontop.

Edit: I am not advocating any gun control, but I am pointing out that I believe that American culture is more violent than Arab culture in general.

Have you ever been outside of the US? Serious question.

[Tolanin]

Originally Posted by Mymn

Have you ever been outside of the US? Serious question.

obviously he has been to Israel to study how peaceful it was before the English introduced war...

[emoo]

Originally Posted by Mymn

Have you ever been outside of the US? Serious question.

I lived in Saudi Arabia for 7 years right after the gulf war. I've also visited most of Europe and several Asian countries.