U.S. election races...

[hectorberlioz]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

Hector: Haha! Awesome.

Nurv, I only critisize my fav politicians because they act like libs or dems...

...the Dems for the longest time have tried to cash-in over and over again on FDR. Now for the Reps it's Reagan...

Barack Obama (as you may have guessed), is my favourite presidential candidate. If I was American, I'd actually vote for Ralph Nader, but never mind.

Faced with a choice of Hillary (or Barack, either one since I won't vote for them anyways), McCain and Nader, I'd actually vote Nader. And I wouldn't feel guilty about it, since he wouldn't win anyways

Barack Obama is great. I like Hilary Clinton too because she's very intelligent, but I like Barack Obama more because he isn't as right-wing as she is.

Boy, are you right!...
Hmm...that should be: Girl, are you left!

Hillary, right-wing!...
Obama has a rating of 8% conservative*, Hillary has got to be only about 9.5%
(*With American Conservative Union)

I don't agree with him about gay marriage,

I wasn't aware that I agreed with him...wow, Barack, and the Rep Three are all pro? Weird.

but I do like that he actually has meaningful environmental policy on climate change and cleaning up the Great Lakes (he is the Illinois Senator, so it's right in his back yard).

Barely, they're more in The Canadian Yard than the Illinoisan backyard

In other news, Australian Prime Minister John Howard is an idiot.

I knew this was comin'...

He said that terrorists in Iraq would be praying for Democratic hopeful Barak Obama to become U.S. president.

..."or democrats in general"...

Like I said Australia, you have my sympathies. But it seems you did this to yourselves as Howard has been in power for four terms! Whyyyyy? *cries*

Perhaps why they haven't sunk too low into the pit?

Back to American politics, vote Obama, woo! Obama for President!

I wasn't aware that Canadians were allowed to voice opinions about American politics

[rohirrim TR]

Nurv...I hate to say but i'm kinda glad you can't cancel out my vote of course there are plenty of other people who will.

Hector: guess your glad Rommney anounced?

[brownjenkins]

I'm just happy that all the frontrunners in both parties are basically liberal from a social point of view. I can't think of the last election where I was happy if anyone won.

Of course, it's still early enough for some psycho-religious neocon to jump on to the stage.

[The Gaffer]

So what's going to become of the bible-basher vote if all the Rep candidates are pro-choice and pro-gay marriage?

[hectorberlioz]

Originally Posted by The Gaffer

So what's going to become of the bible-basher vote if all the Rep candidates are pro-choice and pro-gay marriage?

Well, the only thing about Mitt Romney is that he USED to support gay marriage, abortion etc...even recently. Thats why he's counted still as a liberal. Besides, he's from Massachussetts.

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

I'm just happy that all the frontrunners in both parties are basically liberal from a social point of view. I can't think of the last election where I was happy if anyone won.

Of course, it's still early enough for some psycho-religious neocon to jump on to the stage.

Oh don't worry, there's still plenty of time for a little drama before the primaries...I'm thinking Sam Brownback might try and shoot down Mitt Romney's star power (and hey, I'd vote for Brownback definitely)...but he won't be able to since he voted for the amnesty bill. Mitt Romney has recently "converted" though...

Originally Posted by RTR

Hector: guess your glad Rommney anounced?

Well, you know, he isn't my first choice...but if candidates like Brownback, Huckabee, Hunter, and the fabled Walter Williams don't get into the Real Sky quick, Mitt Romney is what's best.

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

with a pro-choice or pro-gay marriage stance. The primaries are designed to mobilize the base, which, at this point in time in the Republican party, is NOT fiscal conservatives, but social conservatives. So the eventual candidate is likely to be farther right, similar to what happened during the primaries in Lieberman's Senate campaign for the Democrats.

That leaves the Republican moderates looking at a possible schism, like the Anderson candidacy. And it'll be interesting to see whether Romney can actually collect the fundamentalist vote. There are some people who don't consider Mormon's Christian , and they vote.

Gonna be a challenge to balance the ticket geographically, although having two Texans, despite it being against the Constitution, didn't seem to hurt the last Republican ticket. Wonder if Romney would run for #2.

Long race. I'm not really looking forward to the dirt I expect to be seeing.

[Nurvingiel]

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

Nurv, I only critisize my fav politicians because they act like libs or dems...

Well, politicians should be scrutinised by the electorate over relevant things like their policies.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

...the Dems for the longest time have tried to cash-in over and over again on FDR. Now for the Reps it's Reagan...

Wasn't Roosevelt President in the 40s? How can they still be milking that?

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

Faced with a choice of Hillary (or Barack, either one since I won't vote for them anyways), McCain and Nader, I'd actually vote Nader. And I wouldn't feel guilty about it, since he wouldn't win anyways

Haha. Nader wouldn't win, but your vote would count for much needed and much deserved support.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

Boy, are you right!...
Hmm...that should be: Girl, are you left!

Hillary, right-wing!...
Obama has a rating of 8% conservative*, Hillary has got to be only about 9.5%
(*With American Conservative Union)

Interesting. I may have to re-evaluate my views of Ms. Clinton.

Of course, what the American Conservative Union considers to be "left" may not be very "left" to me.

After all, our Conservative party (and current government) is more left wing then your Democrats! Yes, I'm as shocked as you are.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

I wasn't aware that I agreed with him...wow, Barack, and the Rep Three are all pro? Weird.

Yes, Barack Obama believes that marriage is a Christian institution and also does not support gay marriage.

I like him anyway though.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

Barely, they're more in The Canadian Yard than the Illinoisan backyard

Illinois is due west of Lake Michigan, one of the Great Lakes. Ontario is on the north side, and Michigan is on the east.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

I knew this was comin'...

Knew what, that I'd weigh in on American politics? It's as sure as Old Faithful! Haha.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

..."or democrats in general"...

I'm sure he meant that, yes.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

Perhaps why they haven't sunk too low into the pit?

I meant, why would Australians elect this idiot four terms in a row.

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

I wasn't aware that Canadians were allowed to voice opinions about American politics

Of course we are! We just don't get to voice our opinions with ballots.

American politics is very important to Canadians, as you are our biggest trading partnert and neighbour. We're also military allies. We care about what goes on in your country, especially any changes to your foreign policy.

Nice job with the North Korean negotiations by the way. Let's just hope Kim John-il isn't screwing with you.

Originally Posted by The Gaffer

So what's going to become of the bible-basher vote if all the Rep candidates are pro-choice and pro-gay marriage?

I believe the term you're looking for is Bible-thumper. Imagine a Bible-bashing Republican! Haha.

I agree with Sistercousinandaunt about a pro-life or pro-gay Republican in the primaries though.

I had to delete a bunch of smilies to submit this post. Hmph.

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

but Ralph Nader is a megalomaniac lunatic who'll do ANYTHING, at this point, to get himself on the Sunday Morning news shows. He's a pitiful shadow of his own former self.

This is the platform he ran on. http://www.gp.org/platform/2004/ I could talk about it for DAYS, but I particularly like the call for Hawaiian "homelands" (anyone else hear "Townships"?) and the "affordable childcare and pre-school preparation" apparently necessary for securing youth rights.

And education. Oy. Someone should tell the Green Party that determining state funding levels in education isn't actually a federal, or presidential, responsibility.

And this FDR thing is all in Hector's mind. Unless it's a local phenomenon.

[Nurvingiel]

Your comment made me wonder why I regard the American Green party as this shining beacon of sound environmental policy when this is not necessarily the case.

I thought about voting Green in the last Canadian federal election, and was sadly disappointed to find such gems in their platform as a call to ban clearcuts. In the less extreme wording of their 2006 platform, they would "replace clear-cutting with selection logging and conserve old growth forest ecosystems"[link].

I'm all for conserving old-growth in the Coastal-Western Hemlock and Engleman Spruce-Sub-Alpine Fir zones, but I don't think this is what they are talking about. If they are, they really need to be more specific. Clearcutting is a perfectly responsible and sound harvesting system in old growth boreal forest stands, for example.

Also, I doubt there's a single member of the Green party that even understands what harvesting methods would be used as an alternative to clearcutting. I can think of three that would be appropriate on BC's coast alone - can they?

Plus, now the Green Party has a new leader. One who is anti-abortion. Yay. Good one May.

It's ironic that such a strong environmentalist such as myself will probably never vote Green.

Anyway, on to the American Green party. Hopefully they won't crush my hopes as the Canadian one did.

I will review a few key elements of their platform.

I started with section II. Social Justice, and was happy to note that the Greens are pro-choice in section A.1.g. as well as for safe, legal access of the Morning after pill.

In A.3. and A.4, the Greens outline broad policies around Aboriginal people with special attention to native Hawaiians. They are broad, but have some teeth, and leave a lot of room for meaninful negotiation. Awesome.

c. Elimination of displays of religious symbols, monuments, or statements on government buildings, property, websites, money, or documents.

d. Restoration of the Pledge of Allegiance to its pre-1954 version, eliminating the politically motivated addition of "under God."

On c. awesome. Note that this is just government buildings.

On d: if I was American, restoring the original Pledge would mean a great deal to me. As it stands, well, it's your Pledge. But if I recall correctly, "under God" was added during McCarthy's reign of terror on the basis that no Communist would ever utter the phrase "under God". I'm surprised Americans haven't already gotten rid of something that represents quite a dark chapter (not to mention extreme fear-inspired irrationality) of American history.

Also:

j. Young people should be kept free from coercive advertising at their educational institutions.

Excellent. I really like what I see so far.

So let's move on to an area where the Canadian Greens fail sadly, the forestry, and see how their American counterparts stack up.

Hm. Well, I don't know as much about your forests as I do know about ours, so I don't know whether or not halting logging in old growth forests is a good idea. What I do know is that "Ancient forests" (the term that immediately jumps out at me) is a term not based in science. Neither is old growth, actually. But "ancient" implies something older than an 800-year-old stand of Giant Sequoias.

3. Stop building logging roads in national forests at taxpayers' expense. These roads not only cost more than the revenue from timber sales that they expedite, but they also contribute to soil erosion and silting of streams, which ruin fish habitats.

Wait, tax payers pay for logging roads? Is this true? And you guys accused us of subsidising our lumber industry during the Softwood lumber dispute? (Actually, both of us subsidise logging, but that's another thread.)

10. Support the rights of people indigenous to the rain forest, and their ecologically sound use of the forest - such as rubber extraction, nut gathering, and collecting medicinal herbs. End the importation of rain forest beef.

This is awesome. I wish this would happen, but McDonald's would sadly stymie any efforts.

I was very happy to notice any abcence of a clearcut ban. This looks good.

Okay, they did miss the boat on their various education policies, as they are in fact determined by the state, but still. No ads in schools is pretty great.

The Green's environmental platform is their post important plank. (Hahaha, plank. Shouldn't that be made of hemp? )

The only weak point that I noticed (I didn't read everything) is on nuclear power. We shoudln't automatically rule out nuclear power as an alternate energy source. Instead, we should conduct research into the safe handling, storage and disposal of uranium so that we can use nuclear energy. When done right, it has a huge potential to decrease pollution.

Also, I know you don't like their stuff around Hawaiian independence, but I think that Hawaiians should at least be able to talk about independence. They have a case for it.

All in all, your Green Party is a lot better than ours.

[The Gaffer]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

I'm all for conserving old-growth in the Coastal-Western Hemlock and Engleman Spruce-Sub-Alpine Fir zones.

You got my vote.

Yeah, our green party have a similar disease: they seem to accumulate whatever nonsensical, woolly nonsense is the cause du jour. Banning animal testing and ruling out nuclear power would stop me from going there.

However, you'll notice that European Green parties do not suffer from this condition to quite such a debilitating extent (e.g. Germany). This is both a cause and and effect of them being taken far more seriously and having actual political power.

Maybe if more people over there voted for them, they would sort themselves out a bit.

[Rían]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

I believe the term you're looking for is Bible-thumper.

I was going to comment that most Bible-bashers are liberal Democrats

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

On c, for example. It's not "Just government buildings." It's not just "No public funds for Christmas trees in City Hall", or a ban on the White House Easter Egg hunt. Maybe that's collateral damage, in service of a noble goal. But it's also websites, monuments... long list.

Why would this be a problem, you ask? It's implied by the non-establishment clause, isn't it?

And the problem, I answer, is that people are crazy. Crazy enough that, if this was passed, we'd be in court IMMEDIATELY as the National Park service had to edit the inscriptions here http://www.nps.gov/archive/linc/memorial/memorial.htm#

Have to wonder what they'd do to eliminate religious display here http://www.nps.gov/glde
or here http://www.nps.gov/sapa

What would an equitable distribution (including new infrastructure) of Hawaii be? And who gets to decide?

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

Your comment made me wonder why I regard the American Green party as this shining beacon of sound environmental policy when this is not necessarily the case.

I thought about voting Green in the last Canadian federal election, and was sadly disappointed to find such gems in their platform as a call to ban clearcuts. In the less extreme wording of their 2006 platform, they would "replace clear-cutting with selection logging and conserve old growth forest ecosystems"[link].

I'm all for conserving old-growth in the Coastal-Western Hemlock and Engleman Spruce-Sub-Alpine Fir zones, but I don't think this is what they are talking about. If they are, they really need to be more specific. Clearcutting is a perfectly responsible and sound harvesting system in old growth boreal forest stands, for example.

Also, I doubt there's a single member of the Green party that even understands what harvesting methods would be used as an alternative to clearcutting. I can think of three that would be appropriate on BC's coast alone - can they?

Plus, now the Green Party has a new leader. One who is anti-abortion. Yay. Good one May.

It's ironic that such a strong environmentalist such as myself will probably never vote Green.

Anyway, on to the American Green party. Hopefully they won't crush my hopes as the Canadian one did.

I will review a few key elements of their platform.

I started with section II. Social Justice, and was happy to note that the Greens are pro-choice in section A.1.g. as well as for safe, legal access of the Morning after pill.

In A.3. and A.4, the Greens outline broad policies around Aboriginal people with special attention to native Hawaiians. They are broad, but have some teeth, and leave a lot of room for meaninful negotiation. Awesome.

On c. awesome. Note that this is just government buildings.

On d: if I was American, restoring the original Pledge would mean a great deal to me. As it stands, well, it's your Pledge. But if I recall correctly, "under God" was added during McCarthy's reign of terror on the basis that no Communist would ever utter the phrase "under God". I'm surprised Americans haven't already gotten rid of something that represents quite a dark chapter (not to mention extreme fear-inspired irrationality) of American history.

Also:Excellent. I really like what I see so far.

So let's move on to an area where the Canadian Greens fail sadly, the forestry, and see how their American counterparts stack up.

Hm. Well, I don't know as much about your forests as I do know about ours, so I don't know whether or not halting logging in old growth forests is a good idea. What I do know is that "Ancient forests" (the term that immediately jumps out at me) is a term not based in science. Neither is old growth, actually. But "ancient" implies something older than an 800-year-old stand of Giant Sequoias.

Wait, tax payers pay for logging roads? Is this true? And you guys accused us of subsidising our lumber industry during the Softwood lumber dispute? (Actually, both of us subsidise logging, but that's another thread.)

This is awesome. I wish this would happen, but McDonald's would sadly stymie any efforts.

I was very happy to notice any abcence of a clearcut ban. This looks good.

Okay, they did miss the boat on their various education policies, as they are in fact determined by the state, but still. No ads in schools is pretty great.

The Green's environmental platform is their post important plank. (Hahaha, plank. Shouldn't that be made of hemp? )

The only weak point that I noticed (I didn't read everything) is on nuclear power. We shoudln't automatically rule out nuclear power as an alternate energy source. Instead, we should conduct research into the safe handling, storage and disposal of uranium so that we can use nuclear energy. When done right, it has a huge potential to decrease pollution.

Also, I know you don't like their stuff around Hawaiian independence, but I think that Hawaiians should at least be able to talk about independence. They have a case for it.

All in all, your Green Party is a lot better than ours.

Maybe they are, in the way that AIDS is better than a Brain Tumor. But their platform is composed of the most COMPLETE pandering to any fringe concern they can cobble together into an attempt at coalition, with, apparently, no actual concern for whether it's relevant to the job of politics or not.

It's completely opportunistic. And Nader would know better, if he really cared.

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

It's ironic that such a strong environmentalist such as myself will probably never vote Green.

I did it twice and was so completely disappointed in how they used their votes that I'm bloody well never doing it again. Still, it is a bleeding shame, that the one green party you have is a bad watery copy of the socialists. The programme points on the environment they had were rather good, if a little unrealistic, but if they only come after a barrage of social issues and immigrant issues, almost as an after-thought, you do wonder whether they even know what green means...

[Rían]

*sneaks in, Moothugs Eärniel and Nurvi, and leaves*

[Earniel]

Thanks RÃ*an, it's not easy being green...

[sun-star]

Nurv, that was an awesome post

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

I was going to comment that most Bible-bashers are liberal Democrats

Bible-basher/Bible-thumper mean the same thing in the UK. I don't know what that says about us as a country...

[The Gaffer]

That we as a country don't go to church and are highly suspicious of people who harp on about it. Ironic, really, as we have an established church.

[hectorberlioz]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

Wasn't Roosevelt President in the 40s? How can they still be milking that?

The more distant the past, the milkier it all is

Of course, what the American Conservative Union considers to be "left" may not be very "left" to me.

*gulp*

After all, our Conservative party (and current government) is more left wing then your Democrats! Yes, I'm as shocked as you are.

Hmm...but are they really? Or are they only more left on environmental issues?

Yes, Barack Obama believes that marriage is a Christian institution and also does not support gay marriage.

Good for him. Hillary also believed that until recently

Nice job with the North Korean negotiations by the way. Let's just hope Kim John-il isn't screwing with you.

Apperantly Ol Kimmie is runnin' low on playstation 3's...

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

On c. awesome. Note that this is just government buildings.

Note that it would be unconstitutional for them to do so...

On d: if I was American, restoring the original Pledge would mean a great deal to me. As it stands, well, it's your Pledge. But if I recall correctly, "under God" was added during McCarthy's reign of terror on the basis that no Communist would ever utter the phrase "under God". I'm surprised Americans haven't already gotten rid of something that represents quite a dark chapter (not to mention extreme fear-inspired irrationality) of American history.

I don't understand why liberals, who love "living documents" want to take the Pledge back to the stone age..."Under God" may have been inserted for strange reasons, but that doesn't mean it ought to be tossed. Most people like the change that was made...

Originally Posted by sisterandcousinandaunt

And this FDR thing is all in Hector's mind. Unless it's a local phenomenon.

Read: William Galston's 1989 essay "Democrats and the Presidency"...my American Gov't teacher seemed to think it still applied...

[sisterandcousinandaunt]

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

I don't understand why liberals, who love "living documents" want to take the Pledge back to the stone age

Those were the days. When the only "reality TV" stars were the Flintstones.
*nostalgic sigh*

[Rían]

Originally Posted by hectorberlioz

I don't understand why liberals, who love "living documents" want to take the Pledge back to the stone age..."Under God" may have been inserted for strange reasons, but that doesn't mean it ought to be tossed. Most people like the change that was made...

ROFL!!!!

GREAT one, hector! Yes, liberals only love "living documents" when it's something THEY want to change!