Repeat After Me:
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I'm not sure, but I wasn't expecting SOPA, PIPA, and NDAA. I know SOPA got shelved, but it's only a matter of time before they bring it out again under a different name. I feel basically helpless about these things when the best I can do is vote in my choice between two millionaires who have lobbyists' best interests in mind, and then when these assholes go and vote like assholes all I can do is leave a voicemail expressing my displeasure. This feeling trickles down all the way from president to my local rep.
Also, I find myself getting more and more disgusted with what we're doing abroad. As it is now, I'm very grateful that I'm an American and am afforded the luxuries I have, but I no longer feel proud to be one (except when I'm watching the Olympics or Soccer), and that's sad. I used to want to fight for this country, I was this close to going to a service academy, and trained with my best friend for them. He ended up at the USMA, and I ended up not applying to any of them. I was proud when I worked for the Air Force and was doing research that was contributing to keeping IR missiles off our choppers. I mean, I'm still happy I did it, and it's probably going to keep my friend safe when he gets his own bird. But even then, I don't know, I don't want to contribute another iota of my life to the military machine, even if it's not in weapons dev. I don't support what we're doing abroad, and I think it's a big reason as to why I switched to medicine.
I'm not happy with what's going on at home or abroad, policywise. I've been trying to be as much of an activist as I can, but it just feels more and more hopeless every day. Seeing nonviolent protestors get the shit beaten out of them by cops is infuriating. Seeing Tunisia's uprising fail because of a lack of US involvement is disheartening. I want to be proud to be an American, I really do, but I just can't convince myself that I am.
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Okay, but that doesn't seem to be a laundry list of detailed policy complaints. I probably share your view on Afghanistan, at least in part, but that's hardly the only thing we're doing overseas. What about Iran? Israel? China? India? What about the free trade agreements? What about the war against Al Qaeda?
What about the 25 different domestic issues you could list off the top of your head?
You've got to measure what was proposed versus what got done, and then figure out why it didn't get done. I mean, I can be angry that there was no action on global warming, but that's not something I blame Obama for because that wouldn't jibe with reality. Or, I may think some of the high speed rail stuff is a boondoggle, and that would be more on the White House. I may think the economy sucks, and that more can be done, but that's a problem with about 1000 fathers, and many of the problems (Europe, for instance) aren't even something we can control.
This is always an exercise in assigning a grade, and on a scale. Nobody ever gets even close to what they want out of a politician.
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The amount of aid we give Israel really pisses me off. We (maybe) are murdering Iranian scientists, or at least supporting their murders in some way, regardless of what our media is saying. As a scientist, these assassinations absolutely disgust me. If it's the Israelis who are doing it, I'm appalled with our support of them. We can't go forward with the policy that we're the only ones that are allowed to have nukes. Once those nations in the Mid East get them, it's going to be a game changer, but it's something that we need to accept.
We don't have a monopoly on knowledge, and it's unrealistic to think we can police the world from getting this knowledge. I read a report that thousands of Iranian students changed majors to nuclear engineering in lieu of the latest murder, and I hope that there's some truth to it. You know a bunch of them are going to drop out after a few months of calc to switch to business, but whatever, hooray science.
China and India? Idk, seems like we're doing okay on that end, if we aren't, then it's something I'm unaware of. Free trade agreements? Again, too ignorant to speak on it. The war on al Qaeda is stupid. Yeah, let's send the American War Machine (along with trillions of dollars) on a "war" against an idea. Our time in Iraq and Afghanistan have done far more for the growth of aQ/hatred of American imperialism than bin Laden ever did. The terrorists already fucking won based on how we've been chipping away at civil liberties since 9/11. We need to back the fuck off, accept that we did things that pissed off a bunch of people and apologize. Until we do, generation after generation is going to be raised to hate us, and there will always be a potential 9/11 on the horizon.
As for the domestic issues, I don't have a gripe about global warming and our stance on it because I'm honestly too pissed off at the three bills I listed in the last post. I'm not 100% angry at this administration, Obama's taken bounds toward the recognition of nonreligious people, and for that, I'm happy. But this is a drop of clear water in a proverbial sea of shit because I care far more about whether or not our Constitution is being respected than being respected for my religious beliefs or lack thereof.
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The amount of aid we give Israel really pisses me off. We (maybe) are murdering Iranian scientists, or at least supporting their murders in some way, regardless of what our media is saying. As a scientist, these assassinations absolutely disgust me. If it's the Israelis who are doing it, I'm appalled with our support of them. We can't go forward with the policy that we're the only ones that are allowed to have nukes. Once those nations in the Mid East get them, it's going to be a game changer, but it's something that we need to accept.
We don't have a monopoly on knowledge, and it's unrealistic to think we can police the world from getting this knowledge. I read a report that thousands of Iranian students changed majors to nuclear engineering in lieu of the latest murder, and I hope that there's some truth to it. You know a bunch of them are going to drop out after a few months of calc to switch to business, but whatever, hooray science.
China and India? Idk, seems like we're doing okay on that end, if we aren't, then it's something I'm unaware of. Free trade agreements? Again, too ignorant to speak on it. The war on al Qaeda is stupid. Yeah, let's send the American War Machine (along with trillions of dollars) on a "war" against an idea. Our time in Iraq and Afghanistan have done far more for the growth of aQ/hatred of American imperialism than bin Laden ever did. The terrorists already fucking won based on how we've been chipping away at civil liberties since 9/11. We need to back the fuck off, accept that we did things that pissed off a bunch of people and apologize. Until we do, generation after generation is going to be raised to hate us, and there will always be a potential 9/11 on the horizon.
As for the domestic issues, I don't have a gripe about global warming and our stance on it because I'm honestly too pissed off at the three bills I listed in the last post. I'm not 100% angry at this administration, Obama's taken bounds toward the recognition of nonreligious people, and for that, I'm happy. But this is a drop of clear water in a proverbial sea of shit because I care far more about whether or not our Constitution is being respected than being respected for my religious beliefs or lack thereof.
The amount of aid we give Israel really pisses me off. We (maybe) are murdering Iranian scientists, or at least supporting their murders in some way, regardless of what our media is saying. As a scientist, these assassinations absolutely disgust me. If it's the Israelis who are doing it, I'm appalled with our support of them. We can't go forward with the policy that we're the only ones that are allowed to have nukes. Once those nations in the Mid East get them, it's going to be a game changer, but it's something that we need to accept.
Oh, I wasn't listing all of these places because I wanted you to weigh on all of them. I'm sorry. I was just saying that the scoresheet would be long and would involve dozens and dozens of issues and criteria.
As for the assassination, there's no way to know for sure, but it seems very unlikely that we had anything to do with this. What's more, it sounds like we tried to warn them off it.
And I'm not appalled by our support of Israel. But this is also different from the pervasive - and relatively new - version of this on the right, which is that everything and anything Israel does is what we need to support.
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I find the number of dollars we send them pretty appalling, too. 3 billion. A year. We stopped building stealth bombers, but we can give them this much?
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They have one of the highest standards of living in the world. They do not need foreign aid from the US. We also give China foreign aid, which in interesting since we "borrow" money from them.
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[The content of this post was censored due to SOPA/PIPA regulations]
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The House bill just lost three co-sponsors.
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There's nobody who thinks we should support Israel's actions, no matter what those actions are.
global warming is a political hoax. Temperatures fluctuate over the centuries. People like Heck and Vapor think
that the ice age melted becuase dinosaurs were farting, and cavemen had too many factories and SUV's all over the roads.
Bush was blamed for global warming because he didn't stop it. Obamao doesn't stop it either, but it isn't his fault.
See? Liberals are emotional politically. They don't have to make any freakin sense of reality. They are happy to make stupid stuff up,
and then they FEEL better.
That's why they demand their free speech, while hoping conservatives losing theirs, That's why they are sad about capital punishment,
but angrily support the wanton murder of unborn and born children. They demand their 1st Amendment, but they insist on us
losing our 2nd Amendment. That's why they pretend that the popular vote should determine the election winner, but only if it
would have gotten a lib a win. Otherwise, they staunchly defend our electoral college and why we have one.
That's why they hate the Tea Party for simply speaking out and having rallies... but they angrily support the
drugs, rapes, threats, arson, fleas, rats, and the pooping on peoples' porches and in their yards, and garbage all over,
and tents, and breaking and entering. Feel free to add to the list...
They agree with all that.
But you let a Tea Party rally say to lower taxes, and the libs go berserk over the abuse of the 1st amendment.
Libs/marxists/whiney asses - live in an emotional state on issues. Most of America thinks with their minds.
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Here you go, Vapor.
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Good read. I think I agree with much of what this guy has to say. There isn't going to be much of a difference in what happens no matter who is president. The president has to appease the other side of congress, and when both sides are pulling in completely opposite directions, with equal force, the result ends up being right in the middle. This is the case with most every hot-button topic, whether it be abortion, gun control, or gay marriage.
What this article did not cover, and he says so at the end of it, was the issue of civil liberties nor the role of corporations in government. These two topics are the ones I find the most important. I've already mentioned about how Uncle Sam has been chipping away at our civil liberties since 9/11, but I didn't talk about how dollars seem to count more than votes. On these two issues, Congress has been unanimous in the direction that they want to go, and I don't think that this direction is in the best interest of the people.
The relationship between the government and corporate America is one that sparked the Tea Party and Occupy movements. SOPA, PIPA, and NDAA are attacks on civil liberties that are pissing off people on both sides of the fence. It's invigorating to see the response on facebook to the google and wiki shutdowns today, and it makes me hope that we're really not headed toward a Huxley-an dystopia. I'm absolutely shocked at the number of my friends who are posting about calling their reps and senators. These types of things reek of class warfare, and I'm happy that large groups of people from across the political spectrum are turning out to protest it. Our government's supposed to be for the people and by the people, not for the elite.
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You sound more worried about Orwell than Huxley.
You sound more worried about Orwell than Huxley.
Yeah, at this point I am, but in the last few months I was worried that not enough people were going to be upset about this. Yesterday seems to have changed that. Also, I just worded that sentence in the last post very poorly.
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You sound more worried about Orwell than Huxley.
Yeah, at this point I am, but in the last few months I was worried that not enough people were going to be upset about this. Yesterday seems to have changed that. Also, I just worded that sentence in the last post very poorly.
Yeah, at this point I am, but in the last few months I was worried that not enough people were going to be upset about this. Yesterday seems to have changed that. Also, I just worded that sentence in the last post very poorly.
I'm worried more about Postman. I think he had it right. And wrong, but right in part.
I think closed information systems are the biggest threat. You can get tons of information now, and have it all catered to you. You can learn a lot about nothing. Or nothing about a lot.
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I've heard a rumor that they're going to rewrap SOPA as an anti-child pornography type of thing. If this happens, I hope the internet goes apeshit about it again.
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They can't hide something that big under a different title. That would fool nobody.
If it makes you feel better, Silicon Valley is now a major source of campaign funds, particularly for Democrats. They'll all be heard.
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In other news, megaupload got shut down. It had a bunch of pirated materials, but also a bunch of legitimate material. I know architects who would use it to upload and share files that were in the hundreds of megabytes. I've used it to share albums and songs I've recorded. That they were able to take down this website without SOPA or PIPA is bullshit and anonymous is protesting it thru DDoS attacks. fbi.gov, copyright.gov, riaa.org were down earlier today, universalmusic.com is still down. This is illegal, but when we've tried legal ways of protesting it (that music video) that unfairly get censored, it makes me happy that someone is fighting these assholes with underhanded tactics.
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Yes, it was despicable, and certainly the candidates should have said something. They should have told the people who booed to stand up and say how many times they've been to Iraq, or risked their lives for their country. It wasn't exactly a profile in courage. But what do you expect from Mitt Romney? A leader? Balls?
But let's be fair - not everyone was booing. It was only a few people. Plus, this helps the other side. Independents watch this and think, "What a bunch of assholes."
After all, the only real group of Americans that opposed repealing DADT were the older base of the Republican Party. Otherwise, it has widespread majority support. So if they want to hop on a losing issue and make themselves look like assholes in the process, fine with me.
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I don't think you posted where you think you posted.
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