466 replies to this topic

[process]

Eff Thorium, let's get those fusion reactors up and running! 2019 can't come soon enough.

[BCCanuck]

RedHairDave, on 15 August 2012 - 05:15 AM, said:

just throwing in my 2 cents. i live in canada, and i think i can speak for a good part of canada when i say, mitt scares me. Obama did the best he could given that half the government is trying to disrupt the other half at all times in your country. it doesnt even seem to matter if they agree with each other, they seem to have to try to make life harder. i dont know why politics needs to be so adversarial.

i also dont get why anyone but the top 1% of the economic envelope in the usa would vote for mitt, he only seems to care about them. it also seems he is intent on turning most of the rest of the usa into a "indentured servitude" type of thing. its wacky! but also hilarious. if he gets in, at least you have no one but yourself's(usa citizens) to blame

Isn't that the beauty of propaganda though? To be able to convince poor ignorant red necks that voting for an elitist is in their best interest.

It truly does not matter who is elected. Te problems the US are experiencing are not because of bush or because of Obama, unfortunately it's a much deeper problem.

Jimmy carter said it best

Edited by BCCanuck, 15 August 2012 - 08:29 AM.

[Catamount]

Thorium is an interesting avenue of research, from what little I know of the subject (clearly not as much as some, I wasn't aware it had such a nasty biproduct), but I'm frankly more interested to see if EMC2 corp and the US Navy are able to produce real results with Polywell fusion over the next half-dozen years (which is the claimed timetable to have a working, commercial product). They're under a USN information embargo right now, so for all anyone really knows, they might be sitting around doing nothing, but the fed keeps tossing them money, and the little scraps of information that do come out seem to keep confirming that bigger and bigger reactors are confirming the scaling they hope will give net power with a sufficiently large -yet still surprisingly small- reactor.

Edited by Catamount, 15 August 2012 - 08:34 AM.

[Douglas Reichel]

ChargerIIC, on 14 August 2012 - 11:58 AM, said:

I wondered where the "If I was overlord.." post was

And where is that exactly? I merely pointed out what needed to be done. It's not as if I'm going to be in charge. If it's a lottery based on qualifications, I can't even be a candidate. If I got the necessary degrees to make myself eligible, I have only as much chance of winning as I do of becoming a millionaire with one little ticket. In no way did I imply that only I can do it, or that it was even possible to accomplish, really. Frankly, I think we're just screwed, and that no one will ever be able to turn any of it around in any way. Again, all I did was point out what was the best option. Everyone's incentivized to be a douchebag right now, the best thing to do is to take away as much of that as possible so those in office merely do their jobs like everyone else. When they grow up enough after a few generations to handle the responsibility properly, then go back to some form of democracy.

Lightdragon, on 14 August 2012 - 01:02 PM, said:

this ****** read my mind

I'm not sure how to take that. What else is in your brain-can?

Murph, on 14 August 2012 - 01:12 PM, said:

Uhhh no! What we need is to get a bunch of people to read the constitution. Inside and out. Understand what everything means and to understand what powers they do and do not have under the constitution. Then we give 'em all those 3 foot long table-leg shaped sexual apparati, let 'em loose in the two houses of congress and have them beat the living crap out of everyone who has voted for a law in blatant violation of the constitution with said rubber *****. Then we run a new special election installing an entirely new government. Noone who has previously held public office on the federal level is eligible.

You apparently also haven't read the Constitution. For instance, assorted absurdities like the 2nd amendment, which actually allows individual private citizens to own nuclear warheads. I'm not saying the Constitution is bad, but it is outdated. What's actually in the Constitution is largely irrelevant. There are good points, but much of it is deeply and severely outdated. Even the bits that are usable require extensive revision and refinement of language and definitions for current times. The real treasure of the Constitution, the true awe-inspiring beauty of it, lies in its structure and function, not its content. It was specifically designed to be mutable, to be the ultimate shape-shifting legal document. There is nothing, nothing at all in the Constitution that cannot be changed by the proper passing of an amendment.

While it would be an absurd thing to do, it is still perfectly legal to create an amendment that takes away a right. No part of the Constitution is unchangeable in that fashion. Constitutional amendments are always Constitutional if they were passed legally, no matter what it says. Things have changed such that the Constitution can't keep up anymore, and desperately needs to be overhauled and updated to meet the demands of 21st century society. The Founders knew things would change, but not when or how. So they gave us the opportunity to fix things as needed over time. They knew we wouldn't stick forever to the same principles and ideologies they held at the time. So they gave us a foundation to work with, a baseline we could change when we needed to do so. We've just been too stupid to make use of it lately. And now I think it's too late.

Also, in what way is your method at all productive? Are you just trying to get a lot of people killed? Granted, I think armed conflict is ultimately inevitable at this point, but this would just be a wasteful farce of effort toward that. My assumption was that you weren't being literal, but I just can't be sure of that.

- - - - -

I think what's most telling about the comments in this thread is the lack of focus on definitions; on making them clear and consistent. For instance, the concept of "rights" is absurd in its current form. Nobody has a right to anything. A right is a right only if it can't be taken away, and there's nothing that can't be taken away from you, nothing at all. They're privileges, privileges protected by a sanctioned military force voluntarily supported by those who wish to continue possessing those privileges, and that military force's voluntary interest in helping society by making sure as many members as possible have access to those privileges.

It's in society's best interest overall for all of its members to be healthy, happy, cooperative, and productive. It's in society's best interest that those members not at the proper level, be helped up to it by the rest so they can, in turn, help others up; rather than simply discarding all those who don't measure up. The more of us there are to do the things that need doing, the more we can accomplish. That's the purpose of a society, to do as a group that which no individual can ever accomplish by oneself. To share knowledge and resources among the whole that parts may not otherwise have access to, for the benefit of all.

It is the purpose of the military to protect society from similar groups that possess hostile intent toward the society that supports that military. And it is the purpose of diplomats to successfully merge societies together peacefully to raise our capacity to accomplish goals. And without a military and diplomatic corps to facilitate these necessities, a society dies...period. Our "rights" exist solely because of the fact that we have more weaponry and more ready impulse to use them than those who would seek to violate those "rights", and because of diplomats who add to society by welcoming those who wish to both contribute to and benefit from this society.

Proper infrastructure, both physical and political, is essential to a worthwhile society. Right now, our physical infrastructure is in near ruins, and our political infrastructure has just plain gone down in flames. It's time to shore up the real bones of the Constitution and strip away the dead flesh that's killing our society, to replace it with something fresh, and robust, and appropriate to the environment it finds itself in today. Fortunately for us, it was designed to be capable of exactly that, and that's what we should thank the founders for, not the principles they set down in it that they themselves knew would become obsolete one day.

[SakuranoSenshi]

Douglas Reichel, on 15 August 2012 - 08:35 AM, said:

You apparently also haven't read the Constitution. For instance, assorted absurdities like the 2nd amendment, which actually allows individual private citizens to own nuclear warheads.

LOL This was too hilarious to pass up! It doesn't. Not even with the most liberal reading realistically possible!

Look, I'm pretty big on supporting that amendment, I think it's abundantly clear what it means and recent court decisions agree with my line of thinking. Now, I don't want to see us arming seven-year-olds in schools "for self defence" or anything, nor do I think unrestricted concealed carry of pistols is a good idea, as it happens but I do think it's pretty obvious that amendment means civilians can have access to small arms, including the kind that would be useful and used by organized militaries. Militaries do not employ nuclear weapons. The USA is the only nation to date to actually use them in war (and has basically had to apologize for that since, let's not re-hash that one though, it was done), not even every nation even has the capability to make them. So, there is no conceivable way to interpret the constitution as meaning I should be able to get a nuclear warhead.

[Slab Squathrust]

Maire Devylin, on 15 August 2012 - 05:20 AM, said:

Why? Are the mormon beliefs really more insane than the catholic ones? Why would having a president who, at all times, you would know is wearing his magic underpants be so radically different than a catholic who would have to believe that the Flintstones was not a cartoon but an animated historical documentary, be so much worse?

I don't care what their faith is as long as they remember that, as an American, I have the Freedom From Religion and that includes their religion and its 'morals'.

You do realize the pope has acknowledged evolution. Your Flintstones comment is simply a straw man. Ignorance (woeful or otherwise) is equally disappointing no matter from which side it comes...

Gingo, on 15 August 2012 - 05:33 AM, said:

Now, you see, for communism to work, truly work, it needs to be worldwide and needs at least 3-5 generations to start up.

Yes because over that time we could breed out the selfish nature of humans, and remove all potential effects that arise from the tragedy of the commons. Also you had better get used to the surplus shortage nature of a command economy. Just hope the surplus is in food and not graphics cards. Man cannot live on MWO alone. Until we have a perfect understanding of the current and future needs of a society, this will always be a risk. (note: can humans ever have perfect information on such a large scale?)

McScwizzy, on 15 August 2012 - 06:59 AM, said:

America is a REPUBLIC. With a republic you have rights and a constitution that the government cannot impose on and has to abide by. Democracy involes the government making rules for the greater good of the public. Majority rules. Too bad not even most of our jackass politicians know the difference anymore.

EDIT: This URL will explain it better more than I could. http://wiki.answers....and_a_democracy

I'm surprised it took until page 6 for this to come up. While the USA has some democratic elements, we are at our core a republic. Many democracies tend to lead to a tyranny of the majority. The intent of the US Constitution is to ensure certain basic rights for all citizens.

Now to get to politics, I would love to see Ron Paul become the president of the United States. Obviously, some of his domestic views are fairly radical. I view the federal reserve as a useful tool for managing the economy that fiscal policy alone could not accomplish. However, I view his ideas on foreign policy quite favorably. Obviously we could never return to the isolationist policies of the previous century, but a smaller American footprint around the globe would benefit all.

I am sick of the current campaign. Romney seems to stick his foot in his mouth (similar to Biden) every time he speaks. However, I am not happy with the complainer in chief. He did not inherit this mess. He conveniently forgets he was a senator before taking office as President. This body oversaw the loosening of lending requirements that led to a bubble of "sub-prime loans". Instead they all squabble over non issues such as Bain Capitlal instead of their plans for the next four years if elected.

[SakuranoSenshi]

Ronmey 2102!

[dwbear]

Catamount, on 15 August 2012 - 08:17 AM, said:

Congratulations on that, Sakurano



I'm not sure I quote agree with the logic here. Judging the whole of a president's effects based on a couple of gun-related issues is just not a very sound way to go about politics. What about economics? What about energy? Environmental concerns?


Economically, it's hard to judge Obama. Positive job growth of note wasn't going to happen in the aftermatch of the 2008 collapse, and in the past two years, Congress has stonewalled any efforts to do much of anything. With that said, there are some studies that have shown he might have literally prevented the loss of millions of jobs (http://www.propublic...n-creating-jobs)

More importantly, though, I think looking at where jobs did well over his presidency is revealing. Of course, Obama has his supporters like to toss around charts like this one, but what's more revealing than just the average of the past several years is that job performance seemed to be best when we were actually following Obama's policies. During the periods of greatest stimulus spending, job increases were highest; they've since leveled out, yes, but note that that's as that spending slows down, and Congressional Republicans stagnate the government. Correlation isn't a guarantee of causation, true, but it's clear that when we were actually doing what Obama wanted, things were going okay, and on the whole, they could be doing worse. I just read an article about a month ago (that, naturally, is now buried in the interwebz forever) that said the US has been doing better on jobs than our European counterparts for the most part. So we've been doing better than many of our peers in a similar situation, or at least an unspecific article in some news source that I allegedly read claimed as much

And of course, lest the inevitable cries of "runaway spending" erupt, despite the huge stimulus, Obama has actually presided over one of the smallest spending increases in recent history. I think achieving what we've seen without a huge increase in spending is a showing of, at worst, some level of competence on the part of the president.


His environmental policies haven't been the Second Coming, or anything, but they've been better than we've gotten from any Republican administration by a long shot, in a long time. This is the first administration in a long time (ever?) to take any tangible steps towards mitigating anthropogenic climate change, if not through big changes to carbon emissions. Instead, the focus has been on smaller groups of nations, specifically the Climate and Clean Air Coalition, which are targeting albedo-affecting black carbon and methane emissions, the biggest steps in the right direction we've taken in the US since, well, ever. Fuel economy for vehicles has also increased. He hasn't done anything groundbreaking, but existing protections have been maintained or strengthened, and so, it's been a competent showing.

In the related area of energy, solar and wind production have increased about half again (which is quite huge), investments have been made in actual research, something we haven't seen in a Republican president since...(ever?), from stimulus funds for Polywell fusion to creating ARPA-E. These have all been smaller steps than any sane person would like, but they've been the biggest steps we've taken in a decade. Again, I guess the word to describe the policies here might not be amazing, but competent certainly fits.



There's also foreign policy to consider, but I won't pretend to be in a position to comment intelligently there. I study ecology, not geopolitics.


I don't think Obama is the greatest thing since sliced-bread, far from it, but there are areas where he has put up a competent showing. That's about all anyone can ask of most presidents.

I don't know what the poster has been smoking but how does going from 10 trillion in debt for 250 years to 15 trillion in debt in 4 years be considered the smallest increase in spending.

We are supposed to be a republic not a democracy. Rule of law as opposed to mob rule. As to voting rights "opening up a can of worms" only the people paying taxes were supposed to vote. Imagine the people paying the bills having a say as to how it was spent.

This all changed with the admendment to allow for direct election of the senate. The House was supposed to represent the people. The sentate was supposed to be elected the the states legislature and represent the states.

People really need to read and understand the Constitution.

[Jmb]

Do have one final question: Who else wants to ditch the Electoral College for direct vote (ie One person/One vote). The Electoral College was fine when we didn't have computers to track the results, but it is now an archaic and outdated system.

[SakuranoSenshi]

Jmb, on 15 August 2012 - 09:07 AM, said:

Do have one final question: Who else wants to ditch the Electoral College for direct vote (ie One person/One vote). The Electoral College was fine when we didn't have computers to track the results, but it is now an archaic and outdated system.

Actually, yes.

[cateran]

Jmb, the Electoral College is one of the methods that the Constitution uses to try to prevent a tyranny of the majority.

If anything, we need to have the news media refrain from reporting poll results until after all polls have been closed nationwide. It has been noticed that voter participation tends to drop off in the western states (later time zones) when news reports show one candidate or another leading in the poll results from the eastern states.

[Slab Squathrust]

Jmb, on 15 August 2012 - 09:07 AM, said:

Do have one final question: Who else wants to ditch the Electoral College for direct vote (ie One person/One vote). The Electoral College was fine when we didn't have computers to track the results, but it is now an archaic and outdated system.

I want to see an electoral college tie at least once in my lifetime. Some have speculated it may be possible in the upcoming election. Even if your guy loses it has gotta be more palatable. You didn't vote for the loser, your guy just got screwed out of office. You are then entitled to sulk for 4 years!!!!

[Catamount]

dwbear, on 15 August 2012 - 09:04 AM, said:

I don't know what the poster has been smoking but how does going from 10 trillion in debt for 250 years to 15 trillion in debt in 4 years be considered the smallest increase in spending.

This is a logical fallacy, known as an undistributed middle, with essentially the following reasoning:

Premise 1: The deficit is increasing

Premise 2: When spending increases, it can cause deficit increases

Conclusion: Spending must be increasing


You don't seem to understand the relationship between spending and deficits, so let me explain.

The deficit and spending are not the same thing, because a deficit (or surplus) is the difference between tax revenue and government spending. Obama has, in fact, presided over a very tiny increase in spending (even a slight decrease if inflation is taken into account), and you'd see that if you bothered to look at the link I provided.

But the deficit can still go up without more spending if less revenue comes in. Because we're in an economic recession, tax receipts are much smaller, so the government has much less money to work with, at a given tax rate, than it otherwise would, causing the shortfall. That decrease in receipts has nothing to do with spending policies (well, one can affect the other, but they are most certainly not the same thing).

You're trying to claim that one component of the budgetary balance is doing badly because the other component is causing problems, solely on the basis that they can both affect the same thing, hence the logical fallacy.

Edited by Catamount, 15 August 2012 - 09:24 AM.

[Vladdaimpaler]

The problem isnt the politicans, its you voters who keep voting them in. Instead of voicing your opinions on here go door to door convince your friends and neighbors that your view is correct. Use the intelligence God gave you to persuade others to do the right thing.

[Evil Hamster]

Celldoor, on 13 August 2012 - 03:28 PM, said:

Mitt Romney chose good running mate Paul Ryan, Voted BIGGEST BROWN NOSER in high school, lol, Also reported he has never worked 1 hour on a real job.. He will be right at home in Washington, DC. For those not from US, They are presidential canidate and running mate.

I absolutely don't like romney. The repubs couldn't have made a worse choice if they tried.

That said, nobody could possibly be half as corrupt as obama.

Nobody could be responsible for outsourcing 1/10 the jobs to foriegn countries as obama.

obama has run up more debt in 4 years than all previous presidents in the history of this country combined.

[SakuranoSenshi]

Who's this 'God' bloke?

[Vladdaimpaler]

God is the possibly fictional creator that is used to describe one's natural abilities. I chose that phrase because it ****** off some people to even see that word and well that makes me smile.

[dwbear]

Catamount, on 15 August 2012 - 09:21 AM, said:

This is a logical fallacy, known as an undistributed middle, with essentially the following reasoning:

Premise 1: The deficit is increasing

Premise 2: When spending increases, it can cause deficit increases

Conclusion: Spending must be increasing


You don't seem to understand the relationship between spending and deficits, so let me explain.

The deficit and spending are not the same thing, because a deficit (or surplus) is the difference between tax revenue and government spending. Obama has, in fact, presided over a very tiny increase in spending (even a slight decrease if inflation is taken into account), and you'd see that if you bothered to look at the link I provided.

But the deficit can still go up without more spending if less revenue comes in. Because we're in an economic recession, tax receipts are much smaller, so the government has much less money to work with, at a given tax rate, than it otherwise would, causing the shortfall. That decrease in receipts has nothing to do with spending policies (well, one can affect the other, but they are most certainly not the same thing).

You're trying to claim that one component of the budgetary balance is doing badly because the other component is causing problems, solely on the basis that they can both affect the same thing, hence the logical fallacy.

That is the fallacy. You can't increase the debt without spending. You don't have the income you don't spend, What you are saying is that Obama has the smallest increase in gov't spending but it is still an increase when he has a decrease in revenue. Then the Federal Reserve keeps printing money to service the debt ie making our money worth less which in its own right is a hiddin tax on our citizens. It is a direct result of his fiscal policies is that he doesn't have the revenues in the first palce.

[SakuranoSenshi]

Vladdaimpaler, on 15 August 2012 - 09:39 AM, said:

God is the possibly fictional creator that is used to describe one's natural abilities. I chose that phrase because it ****** off some people to even see that word and well that makes me smile.

Works for me. I was just being... well slightly provocative, I admit. The people who get up in arms at any mention in stock phrases annoy me too and I'm a 'non-believer'.

[Eternal Hunter]

TLDR - tried - head imploded.
Anyway politicians are all corrupt power mongers, so we're screwed no matter who's in charge.
I'd be more in favour of a "benevolent" dictatorship myself, at least you know who's to blame for everything