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RJjr
Joined: 17 Aug 2006
Location: Turning on a Lamp
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 Posted: Sun May 10, 2009 8:10 am Post subject: |
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| dporter wrote: |
dems vs repubs is a false paradigm that gives the illusion of choice.
in reality, the parties are simply two faces of a pro-war, pro-big business, anti-liberty monster. |
You're exactly right. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sun May 10, 2009 5:39 pm Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| Quote: |
| Who are my guys, exactly? |
The ones who play for the 'other' team? |
I would be behind Obama if Obama had said, "Instead of plowing billions of dollars into the auto companies and into dubious projects, I'm going to spend that money on public health care and entitlement reform (particular emphasis on medicaid, medicare). Instead of lending trillions of dollars to the banks on borrowed and invented money, I will sell public land off to nationalize a few banks and absorb the bad loans."
For me politics is extremely subservient to actual policy. You know I haven't said a word against Obama's foreign policy. Could it be I agree with exactly what he's doing? |
I was disappointed in Obama's failure to target the budget deficit spending into massive outlays to develop a green energy base, much like JFK's get to the moon in 10 years strategy. I think it would have harnessed national emotional energy into a positive forward-looking plan. I still have my fingers crossed that he will do this next year.
I don't like what he did with the banks either, but I don't see that he had much choice. He won a decisive majority but no mandate to change the banking system fundamentally. A radical solution would have earned him the charges of socialism that he's been charged with anyway, but he's trying to rescue the system, not transform it in that way. Obama is playing the conservative on this issue. Once things stabilize, I hope he gets more proactive in banking reform, although it may be too late politically by then.
What I do like about him is that he is using the tools of government to address problems. I don't necessarily like the details of what he is doing in each instance, but he is solidifying the concept of an activist government. He has created the feeling that things are happening, which I think accounts for his popularity. I'm used to not getting exactly what I want in everything in every detail, but as long as I feel things are moving in the right direction, then things are acceptable. This may be the result of having been unplugged from TV for the last 15 years, so I don't have to have everything wrapped up nicely in thirty or sixty minutes. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sun May 10, 2009 5:44 pm Post subject: |
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I realized after posting the following under a new thread title that it really belonged here:
Nate Silver has a very interesting poll result here: Bush May Haunt Republicans for Generations
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/05/bush-may-haunt-republicans-for.html
It starts with the partisan gap for each age, but the really fascinating one is the second [one] where they laid the graph over one indicating who was president when that age group reached 18. There is an interesting correspondence. It looks like there is a persistant lingering effect of which party was in power at the time a person comes of age politically. |
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Pluto
Joined: 19 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 11:14 am Post subject: |
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Obama may not be socially liberal enough for the under 30 crowd.
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When the generation of Americans under the age of 30 gets around to realizing that this handsome young president might not be nearly as cool as they�d hoped, it won�t be hard to affix a date on when the milk began to sour. It was March 26, 2009, when Barack Obama conducted a live town hall press conference featuring questions submitted online.
Near the beginning of this hip and mildly groundbreaking interaction, the president said this: �We took votes about which questions were gonna be asked.�Three point five million people voted. I have to say that there was one question that was voted on that ranked fairly high, uh, and that was whether legalizing marijuana would improve, uh, the economy and job creation. And, uh (chuckles), uh, I don�t know what this says about the online audience (laughs), but I just want�I don�t want people to think that�this was a fairly popular question; we want to make sure that it was answered. Uh, the answer is, no, I don�t think that is a good strategy to grow our economy.� |
Whether or not drug liberalization will help the economy is besides the point. Especially when there are people rotting in cages and being branded as convicts for simply taking a few hits from a bong. I seriously think the only people who care about keeping pot illegal are the DEA, law & order types and those who get all of their news from Bill O'Reilly. Nobody in any of those groups would ever vote for BO in a million years. If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 2:26 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
Any stats on the percentage of stoners who get it together enough to vote on election day? |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 5:24 pm Post subject: |
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| Pluto wrote: |
| If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
Why not? Where else are they going to go?
Successful politicians tack center. And Obama was laughing off drug liberalization as economic policy, not drug liberalization per se. |
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bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 5:58 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| Quote: |
| If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
Any stats on the percentage of stoners who get it together enough to vote on election day? |
Because only stoners would favor drug liberalization??
That being said, I think Obama's got the under 30 vote regardless of drug liberalization. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 6:07 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| I don't like what he did with the banks either, but I don't see that he had much choice. He won a decisive majority but no mandate to change the banking system fundamentally. A radical solution would have earned him the charges of socialism that he's been charged with anyway, but he's trying to rescue the system, not transform it in that way. |
This is one of my biggest objections to Obama's actions, honestly. Trying to rescue rather than transform a system which caused the problems it needs rescuing from is foolish.
There was an excellent chance here to mend problems in our financial sector, and the public was certainly open to it. That chance was passed over, and passed over at great expense no less. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 6:48 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| I don't like what he did with the banks either, but I don't see that he had much choice. He won a decisive majority but no mandate to change the banking system fundamentally. A radical solution would have earned him the charges of socialism that he's been charged with anyway, but he's trying to rescue the system, not transform it in that way. |
This is one of my biggest objections to Obama's actions, honestly. Trying to rescue rather than transform a system which caused the problems it needs rescuing from is foolish.
There was an excellent chance here to mend problems in our financial sector, and the public was certainly open to it. That chance was passed over, and passed over at great expense no less. |
Yes, I agree, I agree. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue May 12, 2009 2:02 am Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| I don't like what he did with the banks either, but I don't see that he had much choice. He won a decisive majority but no mandate to change the banking system fundamentally. A radical solution would have earned him the charges of socialism that he's been charged with anyway, but he's trying to rescue the system, not transform it in that way. |
This is one of my biggest objections to Obama's actions, honestly. Trying to rescue rather than transform a system which caused the problems it needs rescuing from is foolish.
There was an excellent chance here to mend problems in our financial sector, and the public was certainly open to it. That chance was passed over, and passed over at great expense no less. |
During the weeks, possibly months, that it would take to get the legislation through Congress laying out the new system, what would the banks have done during Jan., Feb., March? Any chance they would have just closed up shop in protest? Pulled a Galt? Are you certain that all those people shouting 'Socialist!' from the rooftops would have sat still for a major reform in the middle of the crisis? How many cops were killed in that one week because Obama was going to take away their guns?
Anyway, you two seem to be in synch with Arianna:
"Back at the end of 2008, the banking class was terrified by the prospect of serious reform of the financial industry. Populist anger was rising, and it looked like the political will to rein in Wall Street was taking hold. But here we are in May and while we've gotten some impressive talk from Obama's economic team about the need to fix the financial system, there has been no real push for reform -- only the ongoing express delivery of few-strings-attached taxpayer dollars to Wall Street."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/wall-street-dc-and-the-ne_b_201899.html
I too worry that the window for reform is fast closing, but I'm not so confident it could have been done without some unexpected and major problems. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Tue May 12, 2009 2:14 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| During the weeks, possibly months, that it would take to get the legislation through Congress laying out the new system, what would the banks have done during Jan., Feb., March? Any chance they would have just closed up shop in protest? |
That would actually have been the ideal result. Part of any true reform of our economic system would be the removal of gigantic financial institutions upon which our economies become too dependent. The government actually acting to break up such entities could be difficult and time consuming. The large banks voluntarily "closing shop" would be excellent. |
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Pluto
Joined: 19 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue May 12, 2009 6:52 am Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Pluto wrote: |
| If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
Why not? Where else are they going to go?
Successful politicians tack center. And Obama was laughing off drug liberalization as economic policy, not drug liberalization per se. |
I was thinking they may just abstain. Bucheon Bum is right that the under 30/civil libertairian types will not go for the republican party in their current state. However, many ppl were hoping to see a change in these policies which judging from Obama's and Yata's sophmoric responses, they won't. The drug war has been a collosal failure, and it isn't just stoners who realize this. Obviously, there is no hope with the R's, but apperantly there is no help coming from the D's either. Where would the Under 30/civil libertarian crowd go? Nowhere, they'll just abstain. |
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bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Tue May 12, 2009 9:16 am Post subject: |
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| Pluto wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Pluto wrote: |
| If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
Why not? Where else are they going to go?
Successful politicians tack center. And Obama was laughing off drug liberalization as economic policy, not drug liberalization per se. |
I was thinking they may just abstain. Bucheon Bum is right that the under 30/civil libertairian types will not go for the republican party in their current state. However, many ppl were hoping to see a change in these policies which judging from Obama's and Yata's sophmoric responses, they won't. The drug war has been a collosal failure, and it isn't just stoners who realize this. Obviously, there is no hope with the R's, but apperantly there is no help coming from the D's either. Where would the Under 30/civil libertarian crowd go? Nowhere, they'll just abstain. |
Yes, there is the chance of abstaining.
And in regards to reforming the financial system, well if they don't do something, we might see another economic crisis before 2012. In that case, Obama will pay for not having the foresight of pushing reform.Right now the current "recovery" in the stock market is a sham if you ask me. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Tue May 12, 2009 11:49 am Post subject: |
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| Pluto wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Pluto wrote: |
| If the dems and Barack Obama seriously want to keep the under 30 cohort, then they shouldn't be laughing off drug liberalization. |
Why not? Where else are they going to go?
Successful politicians tack center. And Obama was laughing off drug liberalization as economic policy, not drug liberalization per se. |
I was thinking they may just abstain. Bucheon Bum is right that the under 30/civil libertairian types will not go for the republican party in their current state. However, many ppl were hoping to see a change in these policies which judging from Obama's and Yata's sophmoric responses, they won't. The drug war has been a collosal failure, and it isn't just stoners who realize this. Obviously, there is no hope with the R's, but apperantly there is no help coming from the D's either. Where would the Under 30/civil libertarian crowd go? Nowhere, they'll just abstain. |
I'm for drug liberalization as sound social policy.
But Obama's response was clever, he didn't address the ultimate issue b/c the questionner presented drug liberalization as a possible economic issue.
This isn't the final word the administration will have on this issue. But he's right that he'd be out of sync with our current priorities to be addressing drug liberalization now. However, I also will say Obama seemed the most reticent of all the serious Democratic candidates to change the drug status quo, so . . . |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue May 12, 2009 2:58 pm Post subject: |
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Pluto,
Some points you might want to consider:
1) Historically, the young are the least likely to vote.
2) In spite of all the hype about voter turnout last fall, it was only up a few points.
3) The % of the population that has even tried weed is only about half; the % that is really into it is even less.
4) Many voters are not single issue voters.
5) Legalize pot = stir up the conservative opposition. If you've noticed, Obama is largely avoiding the culture war issues.
There are good arguments to be made for legalizing, but wanting 'to keep the under 30 cohort' isn't a particularly significant--or effective--one. What will lock in that cohort is fixing the economy so they can find jobs and get started in life. |
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