Elections 2012 [third-party candidate option added]

[Fippmam]

I'd vote for Mitt Romney, only because my parents are rooting for Obama

I have no real interest in politics. I'm a horrible citizen.

[sinewav]

The real questions about Obama are who was his father, and what did he do when he was allegedly attending Colleges where nobody ever remembers seeing him on campus.

whodafuckcares, seriously.

If you want to know more about that, google is your friend.

No, Google is not your friend. See Filter Bubbles. And even without confirmation bias written into search algorithms, there is still the fact that a lot of nonsense get posted to the web by hysterical people. Example: a quick search for "smart meter dangers" gives an endless stream of websites talking about how smart meters are going to give you cancer and whatnot. Fact: Smart meters are completely safe and you aren't in any danger whatsoever. End of story. I actually did some research on smart meters since I couldn't find a website with any real scientific information and wanted to stop my friend from being crazy. After I exposed this friend to the truth about her safety,* she stopped talking to me. Damn me, brainwashed by science and spreading lies!

Personally, I view the Democrats/Republicans to be Brand X/Brand Y of the tyranny that they wish to implement after the coming Global Economic Collapse.

Really? Tyranny? All our US politicians want a global economic collapse so "they" can have ultimate power over a devastated global economy? Why would anyone want to control an economic wasteland? Wouldn't you want to control a vibrant super power instead of a country with little to no economic growth? Seriously, where do you come up with this nonsense?

We are overdue for some third party to rise up and knock out one of the 2 big parties.

Awesome. Then the cool third party can form a new, better government, for the real people like you and me! We can call it The People's Republic for America!

I am merely pointing out that if people voted according to their conscience, instead of how they are told to vote, elections would be quite different.

No one is told how to vote. It's just that half of the US population are drooling morons and most of the rest are disinterested and apathetic. I meet people everyday with such horrible, bigoted, misguided, selfish, idiotic ideas that I often think "phew, thank heavens we don't actually get to pick our president."


* There was a single, non-reproducible experiment where radio frequencies at a certain range and frequency caused proteins to realign themselves for the duration of the exposure. However, for a smart meter to cause you harm it would have to 1) be broken, 2) be giving out 3-10 times more power than it was designed for, and 3) would only slightly increase your risk of minor health problems while you were sitting on it since the effect would be localized to an area a fraction of an inch from the meter's active component. And as soon as you walked away, so would the "danger." So don't use one as a pillow.

[compguygene]

The real questions about Obama are who was his father, and what did he do when he was allegedly attending Colleges where nobody ever remembers seeing him on campus.

whodafuckcares, seriouoLby.

Obviously not you. After all, nothing about the background of a president should ever matter....


And anytime I post about anything that might possibly challenge your beliefs, you can only yell back and take apart things piece by piece. Fine. Why argue. I am an idiot and totally wrong, and a paranoid one at that. Let's just end it with that. After all, I could spend the next 10 posts or so trading back and forth with you and Phytotron, but to what end. We all know that you in particular sine, are the end all be all of knowledge and opinion around here.
I only await your next post that will say something to the effect of "see, I told you, he has no evidence". So, go ahead, I should not have posted anything like I did above. After all, the Global Economy is just getting better, and things in the USA have nothing but a positive outlook. Nothing to see here, just move along.

[Kijutsu]

And do you even know the totality of Ron Paul's positions?

Yes.

Most of his supporters don't.

Proof?

What the hell do you care, anyway?

Oh, sorry for caring about politics.

You hate America.

Guilty!

Or just trolling again?

No



Anyway, if Obama gets reelected, it'll be funny to see stormfront have a meltdown again. d:

[Word]

After all, I could spend the next 10 posts or so trading back and forth with you and Phytotron, but to what end

You also did that in this "inside job"-topic...I'd encourage you to try that for once. A discussion doesn't work when one party claims something like "I have tons of evidence but I'm not going to show you because you're too dumb to get it anyhow, you don't tolerate when someone challenges your beliefs." If sine actuallly replies "see, I told you, he has no evidence" he'd conclude what everyone else would (I doubt he'd reply at all, because that conclusion is so obvious). Maybe you need to clarify that you don't refrain from this because your own beliefs are challenged, because that's what it looks like.

[compguygene]

Ok word.

First, election fraud 2008. I am just going to post some links.

http://articles.cnn.com/2008-10-22/poli ... M:POLITICS

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/vir ... _blog.html

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 78178.html

Now the argument has always been that these are isolated incidents and have nothing to do with any real fraud. Another argument is that it's just Republicans having sour grapes. However, let's look at the 2000 presidential election. Here are some links.

[compguygene]

I can only put 6 links per message...so here is part two of this post.

This is not a major media source, but summarizes all the research and books that have been written on this topic.

http://www.votefraud.org/election2000_scam.htm

Here is a more credible source: Peter Phillips is a Professor of Sociology at Sonoma State University and Director of Project Censored. Dennis Loo's report "No Paper Trail Left Behind: the Theft of the 2004 Presidential Election," can be viewed at http://www.projectcensored.org/newsflas ... fraud.html

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0813-29.htm

Here is a webpage that describes how some of the fraud was likely accomplished. I would really encourage you to read this. There are several technical details that are covered here that would show anybody familiar with technology that the process of how the Diebold voting machines was flawed at best and most likely fraudulent.

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Articles9 ... -Fraud.htm

The fun twist on all this, the Republicans appear to be using charges of voter fraud to disenfranchise votors.

http://washingtonindependent.com/9136/d ... voter-laws

I am not saying that one given party always manipulates the election. I am saying that our elections are manipulated, period.

I will answer to more of what I stated in my much earlier post in a future post. This is probably more than enough for the moment.

[Phytotron]

I will only say this, given who appears to be Obama's actual father, there are no questions as to constitutional legitimacy as President. ... The real questions about Obama are who was his father, and what did he do when he was allegedly attending Colleges where nobody ever remembers seeing him on campus.

This is forking nonsense, rooted in racism. Period. "He's so exotic, he's the Other, no way could he be a real American."

Personally, I view the Democrats/Republicans to be Brand X/Brand Y of the tyranny that they wish to implement after the coming Global Economic Collapse.

This is forking nonsense. Just stop. Honestly, there are not nefarious, malevolent Fates living in the Dark Forest.

No conspiracy discussion here. No point.

Oops, too late.

We are overdue for some third party to rise up and knock out one of the 2 big parties.

Agreed. Although, I would say parties, not party.

Unfortunately, the tea party, which was started as an independent, libertarian focused group...

Not.

...was co-opted by the Republicans.

Um, no, you have that backwards. The off-the-rails right-wing extremist lunacy that is the Tea Party has taken over the GOP.

Both the Democrats and Republicans have done a lot ... to co-opt and absorb...

That has been the history of the predominant national parties in this country from Day One of this Republic. The most powerful and effective role of Third Parties has always been to push the predominant national parties and have them adopt their platforms. The abolitionist movement, women's suffrage, labor rights, civil rights, conservation, all began with third parties, themselves beginning at the local and state levels, to be subsumed by one or both of the major parties of the time. That's a victory for third parties. That's precisely what a large part of Nader's Presidential runs were about. Unfortunately, he didn't have the success we would have liked, as the Democratic Party has continued to be a spineless, business money-ridden, middle-of-the-road, even center-right party--and that includes Obama. And this has had the terrible side-effect of allowing the Republicans to lurch even further right into mindless extremism. At the same time, that has been the victory of the Tea Party.

...in the last 40+ years...destroy any serious competition that comes along.

This is what's different now, as the Democrats and Republicans on all levels have put up various unreasonable barriers to third party campaign participation and ballot access that didn't exist previously. (Although your timeframe isn't quite right, it's more since the mid-80's, and especially since '92 with Perot's impact.) This has been made more difficult by the increasing prevalence of the influence of money in campaigns over this period, only compounded by the Citizens United ruling. But your beloved Tea Party adores Citizens United.


I'm not going to parse all of your voter/election fraud links; there are too many things to address. (This isn't to say I'm taking issue with all of it; some of it is correct. It's just a lot to tweeze apart from the bogus.) But for a bit of fun in truth, let's look at this Daily Show clip (two parts). (I link to HuffPo because the video on Comedy Central's own site won't play for me, for some reason.) Also, I would discourage you from using op-eds, such as your one by that sleaze John Fund, as evidence for anything. Here's a better example of what qualifies as empirical evidence: http://votingrights.news21.com/article/election-fraud/

I would also advise you to be more careful with your use of terms such as "fraud" and "manipulation," "voter" and "election." Don't conflate different things.

Republicans appear to be using charges of voter fraud to disenfranchise voters.

Finally, clarity! So here's the thing: If you really are concerned with the legitimacy of elections, how about you get out there and lean on the Republican election officials and your Secretary of State who are actively suppressing the vote there in Ohio. That's the kind of actual, real life thing you should be outraged about and active against, not myths about widespread individual voter fraud, or all your fantastical conspiracy theories.

Note, when I use the word "active," both in reference to myself and you, I don't mean posting stuff on websites.

And just in case, Glen Beck lies to you. Speaking of charlatans lying....

Lies

You're so boring. Your act so tired.

[compguygene]

Lovely, you rip apart the points that I said I would address in later posts. You say almost nothing about the links I posted.....and you people wonder why I regretted saying a damned thing?

Like I said, I am just a lunatic who has no perspective. Only Phytotron and Sinewave have any knowledge or wisdom about politics or current events. Nothing to see here, just ignore the crazy guy. He has proven himself wrong before and has done so again.

[Ratchet]

blah blah blah random ignorance post blah

[Word]

Once again, if you have counter-arguments, why don't you write them up? Why not try to rip apart what Phytotron said if it's all wrong? You can still address those points.

(note that Phytotron didn't even rip the whole thing apart and the three longer passages in his post couldn't be more respectfully formulated, considering that he agreed with the changing importance of third parties)

@Ratchet: I don't want to tell you that for the 100th time but if you can't read, understand and follow the rules like everyone else did you shouldn't be Ww's teamleader. Sine wasn't arrogant anywhere, and it's already honorable that he took the time to tell you how to sign up in a way that was even more idiot-proof than the ladle rules are. Apparently even that didn't help. If you have a minority complex because other people seem to know more than you, change it.

I don't tell you this, just because you disagree with the rules. You disagree with them just for the sake of it. It's a bit like stealing a car and then saying that you didn't know that stealing a car is wrong and that you don't like that part of the law, because you broke it, and that all the people who don't go around stealing cars are arrogant idiots.

[Phytotron]

Lovely, you rip apart the points that I said I would address in later posts. You say almost nothing about the links I posted.....and you people wonder why I regretted saying a damned thing?

Like I said, I am just a lunatic who has no perspective. Only Phytotron and Sinewave have any knowledge or wisdom about politics or current events. Nothing to see here, just ignore the crazy guy. He has proven himself wrong before and has done so again.

Sigh. And that kind of reactionary, self-martyring attitude is exactly why you believe the kind of nonsensical conspiracy theories you do. It's pathological. Paranoia, alienation, anomie. You've mentioned Neuroscience for Kids before, so I take it you have some interest in how the mind works. I sincerely encourage you to do some thorough reading on the psychology behind the mind of a conspiracy theorist. We all have to take account of ourselves now and then. I'm sad for you more than anything, but don't take any of this as being condescending or patronizing. You're obviously a well-intentioned individual. You're interested in and care about what's true and right, both factually and morally. Justice is important to you. You're just bogged down by all this crap. Liberate yourself, my man.

Note, I haven't called you "crazy." I don't think you're mentally defective or clinically insane. But sadly, I'm afraid you'll insist on believing I and others have because it serves to bolster your sense of self and place.

They're just the all-knowing Gods (mostly Sine, Phyto seems to be much, much more down to Earth).

Um, thanks?

[compguygene]

Well, if we are going to actually debate these things, I have created separate, new topics to separate this out into 2 issues.

http://forums3.armagetronad.net/viewtop ... =1&t=22714

and

http://forums3.armagetronad.net/viewtop ... =1&t=22715

[Kijutsu]

I agree with compguygene, you know almost nothing about your president's history and people are scared to question it because "ooh it might come across as racist because he's black!" (phyto already said something was racist about cpg's post even though it's not.)

[Word]

not sure if that's your real opinion, but I'd say that most people that have seen a university from inside don't care about it. I've seen many students whose name I know but couldn't say anything else about them. that applies especially for the smart ones. if you try to be the best, you don't have a lot of time left for other stuff (even if you don't try, see PRU).