lost highway

Right, a well-worded explanation of why representative democracy is supposed to work. And I agree, to an extent. But do you think if popular vote took over we'd have disasters in Wyoming, South Dakota, and Montana? Would the Federal government leave them in shambles?

But it means that the individual does not have equal importance to other individuals.

In CO they send out a booklet. It seems to be just about as objective as a description could be, which can be confirmed by the fact that it is difficult to read, boring and full of legalistic logic writing. It is more or less a printed version of the proposed law, or amendment and a description of who/what it would effect, how much revenue it would gather, how much it would cost, what would be different from the former version etc. As for "in the bag", I do feel excited to vote in a state that is starting to swing. The electoral college is a weird argument. It's a question of how a regio

Romney is inconsistent. Smart, but not trustworthy. I still can't find any sound financial reasoning behind his tax cut/ military increase plan.

"We've been to your website governor, many times. And it still doesn't work."- Obama on Romney's economic plan.

There is a list of things we both believe in. I think that Obama is pushing for some version of these, but to a lesser extent than you and I would like. But here we are on page 68 of the thread about the Presidential Election, and you are still looking for a candidate to close down the Federal Reserve. For this above other reasons you do not see a difference in two candidates who are palpably different. I just mailed my ballot. I feel that the choices I made as a voter could have some significant effects on the future of my state, and my country.

You are cutting and pasting so fast that you are not prepared to defend what you are throwing on here. It stifles conversation instead of stimulating it (sorry hee). The 1920-21 Depression has been a pet example from the Austrian school of Laissez Faire economics enthusiasts because of the broad-based misconception number one that nothing was done, and the cyclical shift righted itself, and number two that it applies to any other depression since. It simply does not because it was purely monetary. In some ways it was intentional. The wicked deflation that caused it was an act of the Fed t

Except it didn't work. The Bush tax rebates didn't have their intended effect on the economy. They also lowered revenue which added to the deficit that was beginning to brew under a couple of middle east snafu's.

The Fed lowered the interest rates that they had previously hiked which had been one of the causes for the depression. While its true they lowered taxes, they collected more revenue by broadening the tax base. Hoover (then commerce secretary) added to the safety net for out of work people. They also drafted the Emergency Tariff of 1921 to subsidize farmers whose crops were less marketable in Europe than previous eras. They also raised taxes on imported agricultural goods. It was a protectionist measure which heightened the nationalization of the global market. What you aren't getting i

The causes and solutions for the Depression of 1920- 1921 seem to contradict your economic leanings as much as they affirm them. The three main causes of it were the pendulum fluctuation of inflation/deflation thanks to the formerly used gold standard, a major bump in the workforce population because of the ending of a war, and the Federal Reserve raising interest rates (the opposite of what they have been doing lately) One of the major solutions to the depression was to expand the tax base to recover revenue, and have the Fed decrease interest rates. All said, it can be compared to the r

This seems to be a pretty big misunderstanding of how a stimulus can work, and why we put it into action. The first mistake is it makes the assumption that all employment in our country, and the capital it provides individuals to spend on the market is private. The assumption that the garnered stimulus money is diverted from productive channels undermines several of your conservative economic perspectives; namely that the government uses capital that isn't really there. In other words the stimulus didn't mean that Bush, or Obama raped the pocket books of businesses that were still above wat

I just came across some recent conservative estimates have Romney increasing spending on the military by a trillion dollars.

Yeah, 7.8% of people looking for jobs can't get one. The rest are retired, full-time students or other. Statistics without proper analysis are worthless. There are people out there who don't want to work for whatever reason. That is not evidence of a fiscal cliff.

That was an amazing speech. Watch until the end of it everybody. For my money this stuff is the civil rights struggle of our time.

I want to vote for someone who makes gas cost a dollar, and while they're at it expands the dollar menu at Taco Bell. This is what a president is for.

It is true that the U.S. bombed Libya. It is also true that Libyan rebels overthrew a tyrannical government. The aftermath of most revolutions is not pretty, this is one of the few examples of American exceptionalism I can think of; our relatively graceful post-revolution transition. At this point Al-Qaida could be a game of "Whack a Mole". We may have destabilized, and crushed most of their central power, but terrorist organizations are successful because they are decentralized. Something they will want to call al-Qaida can rear its head as long as third world countries in the middle ea

Romney's bringing up Obama's pension in the middle of an immigration discussion seemed pretty desperate.

So then Sparky, how do you feel about Obama's military cuts in contrast to Romney's plan to restore it to its "former glory"?

What's interesting about that article is it doesn't really show Clinton finding anything to say as to why it's her fault. She takes responsibility but it doesn't explain what her mistake was. I think there is a ignorance-going-in, hindsight 20/20 element to this story. No one would have allowed for the attack to transpire had they any inkling it was coming. The confusion around the hate video, and the perception that the violence erupted out of protests shows just how confused intelligence was. Yes, security should have been better. It seems all too easy to attribute the lack of defens

Sorry to cut and paste, but I found this section particularly curious:

This is a really good article about what Romney, or Obama would actually do about the economy after the election. http://nymag.com/news/politics/elections-2012/obama-romney-economic-plans-2012-10/index2.html

It's interesting how it says "Biden never voted against funding either war." A double negative is usually a sign of rookery, tom-foolery and shenanigans (or as Joe would say 'Malarkey'). You're right Boon, that is some weird wording. But to be fair, my lamebrain didn't sus that out until you mentioned it more clearly.

^^ That was a weird exchange. Be nice Boon, Jules was just asking a question.

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