The country is 50/50

[b_slow]

On the plus side, Bush only has 4 more years, and won't be able to run for re-election

....according to today's constitution, that is. And we all know what the current administration thinks of paying attention to silly documents like the constitution :-(

It's funny you mention that, because last night I half-jokingly said that I wouldn't be surprised if this was only the 2nd (but not final) term for bush. There's talk of republicans wanting to abolish the rule mandating that you need to be American-born to be president (watch out for Arnold!?!!).

Well, at least Jon Stewart will have plenty of Daily Show ammo for a few more years.

[yaronsh]

Re the turnout: Though it's the highest since Kennedy vs. Nixon, it's still pathetic compared to most democratic nations.

Re the electoral vote: The numbers are currently skewed in favor of the Midwest and Southwest. In the good days of the 90's, many people moved out to those areas, seeking a piece of the "American dream": A large house on a large plot of land, amidst the rolling prairies, perhaps with a mountain view. But when it came tumbling down at the outset of this decade, and when no relief seemed in sight, people returned to the big cities, under a mistaken notion that there are more jobs there. The Year 2000 Census, which determined the current Congressional makeup (and thus the electoral numbers), came at the tail end of the expansion, just before the retreat to the cities.

Re "On the plus side, Bush only has 4 more years, and won't be able to run for re-election": Unless Congress, which is now completely Republican-run thanx to the 2000 Census and gerrymandering, repeals the two-term limit. And if they don't, then what? Cheney? Schwartzenegger? Hastert? The only prospect I can stomach is McCain, but he has a history of being whipped around.

[darkman]

Bush is the first president to win by greater than 50% of the vote.

OR

Bush conceded more votes to his opposition (Kerry, in this case) than any other presidential candidate that won in history.

The list of these goes on.

As far as voter turn out, I think you all go it wrong. Unfortunately, a large turnout means a divided nation. Last election was considered an anomally, now we have two anomallies in a row.

The scary part is is now congress is run by the same party as the president. Even though they all got there by the skin of their teeth, I'm sure they see it as the overwhelming American populous wants sweeping changes....

[Steph_B]

Even though this was a tight race, the re-election of Bush will send a strong message to the rest of the world: that the Americans approve his politics. I am not sure that this will make the world a safer place.

Terrorists are not evil. They are just a bunch of young guys and girls desperate and hopeless. With no future in sight, it is easy to point the finger and blame another race/country for your own misery. Hate ensues, and with hate, rash and stupid actions. Religion is just a catalyst.

Those who are taking advantage of these desperate souls are to blame. They are the real evils. Those that put weapons in their hands and dreams of eternal salvation in their heads. These are the people we all need to fight.

I do not think that military action is the right answer. For each terrorist killed, how many innocent civilians have lost their lives (100,000 Iraqis civilians so far)? and for each of these civilians, how many new terrorists will emerge to 'avenge' them? It is a vicious circle. I was hoping that a Kerry victory would show the will of the American people to look for long term viable solutions to the terrorit threat. Instead, approving Bush politics will just convince some more that Americans are bad people who are looking only to their own interests.

Well... Enough with my diatribe. I guess I am just bitter with the 2004 decision. I hope I am not offending anybody here! If I do: I apologize. I just hate violence of any sort (physical, psychological and economical) and somehow I do not see any hope for the next four years.

One a brighter note, my Halliburton stocks are going to go up!
They for sure are taking the American taxpayers for a ride!

Cheers!

Steph.

[another view]

By the way, regarding elections before 2000 in which the popular vs. electoral results didn't jive, I'd think there are at least a couple of people here who may remember Kennedy vs. Nixon...

Ya know, I thought that sounded familiar but... http://www.archives.gov/federal_regi...ores.html#1960

[Michael Fanelli]

Remember, I'm old, (ancient compared to you), and I've been voting since 1980 (before some of you were born!) As your signature line used to read "I"ve been around the block a time or two". Just an old guy putting in his two cents worth.

Uh... Before claiming old age be aware that my first vote was in 1969! You silly kids...

[Gerry Widen]

What is amazing how the rest of the world views the United States. There was a survey in Canada our closest ally and 65% of the people wanted Kerry elected. Supposedly in England another ally the newspapers are bashing the results. I can just imagine what some of the other people in other countries think.

[paulnj]

I may need to move to ENGLAND ;)

[schrackman]

What is amazing how the rest of the world views the United States. There was a survey in Canada our closest ally and 65% of the people wanted Kerry elected. Supposedly in England another ally the newspapers are bashing the results. I can just imagine what some of the other people in other countries think.

Who cares what other countries think? Their buildings didn't get blown up by two airplanes flown by whacko terrorists which killed thousands of our people in one swoop. When they experience that, then they can have an opinion that counts.

Furthermore, there isn't a country in the world that is as generous to the rest of the world as is the United States. We fund more, we spend more, we expend more of our time, resources and energy to help the world, and this is how they treat us when we need their support. With allies like that, who needs enemies?

As far as I'm concerned, the only good use for the paper from those rags that insulted more than half the voting citizens in our country is to be put on a toilet seat.

Ray

[walterick]

Otherwise we'd be one photographer short of a Viewfinder.

Yes, when I awoke the next morning, I considered slitting my wrists. Or hanging myself from the oak tree out back. But then I realized those were the irrational delusions of a frustrated mind.

So I've decided to seced from the Union instead

That's right, my little apartment at the corner of Blake Lane and Jermantown Rd in Oakton, Virginia is no longer a part of the United States of America. It is now it's own separate legal entity which I now call "Newtopia." "Newtopia" is governed by laws of love, respect, and lots of facial hair. I figure, if I can get enough Americans to move into Newtopia and seced from the union with me we'll eventually have enough people to take over... oh, let's say... Rhode Island and create a Newtopia commune in which we dance around naked all day eating twigs and berries and remain distinct from the United States until we see fit to reintegrate ourselves into the "new conservative" America.

Warning: United States Citizens attempting to break into Newtopia will be chained to a redwood tree and forced to eat raw tofu while singing John Denver songs (acoustic.) You've beeen warned.

Now, seriously, we all know we made a big mistake last Tuesday when we elected for the first time George W. Bush into office. But it's like I said earlier; it's better to get it all out in the open so that when we finally return to our previous streak of... well... evolution... there will be no doubt in anyone's mind that we're doing the right thing. I mean, hey, you gotta see what's out there first. Do a little window shopping, right? Nothing wrong with that! Human evolution can wait another 4 years. I'll wait...

Here's my last political venting on this board for awhile (unless someone else says something juicy ) then I'm going to leave it alone and go do something else...

1.) It's okay to be gay.
2.) It's not okay to take rights away from people or deny them the greatest union ever bestowed upon a couple.

3.) It's okay to bring bad people to justice.
4.) It's not okay to kill people in the name of showing that killing people is wrong.

5.) It's okay to be in love with your country.
6.) It's not okay to think your country is the best.

7.) It's okay to fight to defend yourself and your loved ones.
8.) It's not okay to attack someone else because you're afraid they might attack you someday.

9.) It's okay to be proud.
10.) It's not okay to arrogant.

It's okay to feel angry about 911
Killing people is not going to stop your hurt.

More people have died in Bush's war than died on September 11, 2001.

Ten fold.

Fighting terror is like f*ing sex. What do you think you're accomplishing? As long as there are rich countries and poor countries, there will be terrorists. This is not a military problem. You can fight until you run out of ammo. This is not a political problem. You can elect many different presidents to attack terror in many different ways. This is not a religious problem. My god says one thing, your god says something else.

This is a problem that lies deep in our souls, deep down past what we think we know about life and what it's all about. This is a matter of love and respect, faith and knowing, truth and lies; living as one versus living as many. As long as there is an "us" and there is a "them" and WE have the best and THEY do not, there will be terror. At home and abroad. Seek to bring down the walls between "us" and "them" and you will begin to see a lot less terror in your life. Until then, if you choose to cling to your wealth as "yours" and they "don't deserve it" then you will always be living with the terror that there is someone out there trying to take it all away. The gap between the "haves" and the "have nots" is what is sponsoring terror. Have you heard any government-sponsored discourse on the cause of terror? Of course not! Because we're not willing to give up what we have in order to insure everybody has it! Such is the pompousness of our "civilized" society. If we gave openly everything we had, shared it with the world, why there ever be anyone trying to take it away from us? What would they have to gain? But as long as it seems that ALL the power, ALL the money, ALL the comfort, ALL the happiness is in ONE PLACE and that place is OVER THERE and I'M NOT ALLOWED IN then of course you're going to have terrorists always trying to break in, break it up, bring it down to their level. Such is the nature of the human spirit. Don't you agree?

...

Now remember, I'm just stating all this for fun, right? Not to be taken too seriously. Just remember that it's "Rick going off on another one of his tangents again!"

Have fun you all, and please be good!

Rick

[walterick]

some large percentage of American's don't even know where Canada is> LOL

Funny headline there!

[Gerry Widen]

Just to add to the Daily Mirror cover take a look at the pose the editors selected. From among thousands of available "stock" photos of bush they selected this one. Just put a mustache on him and you know what I mean. Whether you agree or disagree with the cover, whatever your political beliefs, there is no denial that this is how our President and our country is perceived throughout much of the world. I don't see how this can be good.

[schrackman]

Just to add to the Daily Mirror cover take a look at the pose the editors selected. From among thousands of available "stock" photos of bush they selected this one. Just put a mustache on him and you know what I mean. Whether you agree or disagree with the cover, whatever your political beliefs, there is no denial that this is how our President and our country is perceived throughout much of the world. I don't see how this can be good.

This is a clear example of irrational fear and hate-mongering, by likening Bush to Hitler. When has our president ordered the gassing of anyone, or making lampshades out of their skin, or performing operations on live victims? When has he ordered the conquering of a nation in order to rule it by a foreign government? When has he done anything remotely close to what Hitler did? The facts are he hasn't, and anyone with a rational and unbiased mind would not perpetuate such exaggerations and distortions and cause further divisions in this country.

In WWII when we were fighting to defeat Nazi Germany, countless scores of innocent civilians died in the process. Before and after D-Day alone around 19,000 civilians lost their lives to allied bombing. It was an unfortunate circumstance of war, but it was necessary to defeat the enemy in terms of military warfare. Those aren't pretty facts, but they are the facts. Similarly, we have to expect that civilian deaths will occur in the war on terror and in the war in Iraq. It just can't be avoided. But simply because it happens that in and of itself does not make Bush anything like Hitler. To assert any such a thing is beyond ludicrous.

No one is asking you or anybody else to like Bush or even any of his policies, but at the very least try to be fair and balanced about it what is going on in the war. And if it is at all possible for you, try not to be irrationally fearful.

Ray

[Gerry Widen]

Ray, I'm not saying I agree with the Daily Mirror's assessment of portraying bush as Hitler. Nor am I comparing anything bush does to Hitler. As a Jew there is a deep hatred within me of what happened before and during WWII throughout Europe. But it is important whether we agree or not to know how others in the world may view the United States. Nobody made them put that image on the cover.

But it can not be denied that we went to war based on false information about weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist, without the approval of the United Nations and without any other major country except Britain which in reality only supply about 10% of the troops over there. We are basically going it alone.

The 19,000 unfortunate lives you mention pales in comparison the over 100,000 citizens in Iraq mostly women and children who have died in the past 20 months of our invasion. Although some of these lost lives are due to local terror acts the vast majority are due to our "shock and awe" approach to "liberating" the country.

[darkman]

Who cares what other countries think? Their buildings didn't get blown up by two airplanes flown by whacko terrorists which killed thousands of our people in one swoop. When they experience that, then they can have an opinion that counts.

Furthermore, there isn't a country in the world that is as generous to the rest of the world as is the United States. We fund more, we spend more, we expend more of our time, resources and energy to help the world, and this is how they treat us when we need their support. With allies like that, who needs enemies?

As far as I'm concerned, the only good use for the paper from those rags that insulted more than half the voting citizens in our country is to be put on a toilet seat.

Ray

You're right. We didn't give a rats ass when terrorists blew up planes or buildings in their countries.... It had to hit us in the face first. Remember all the whining republicans when the former president tried to go after bin laden (twice, that we know about)? Or the republican whining when Clinton went into the balkans to stop mass genocide?

I'm having problems with your second statement. It's probably true in absolute dollars. I'm not convinced this is true in dollars per capita. Remember, us americans want to spend trillions of dollars to fight terrorists and we want tax cuts too. Military spending is more than twice the next two cattegories combined. btw.

And what about the american press? Look how hard the the republicans and press went after clinton for getting oral sex (concentually). Now, the current comander and chief won't stand up and take responsability for Abu (among other things and as a ceo of any company would have to). Instead, he shuffled this around his cabinet, and now to just a couple of privates and first leuitenants. The press is so worried about being percieved as patriotic that they just let this become backpage news. So we have pow's being sodomized, among many other things, as OK, and clinton getting a #$ as the end of the world so we needed to impeach him. The list with bush goes on. He's as bad as slippery dick. Fortunately, for him - as he wanted, go read his comments from his days as gov or rove's comments - he got his war.

Then the news tells us bush got elected on moral values? Who's are those?

What happened to his promise after he lost to gore? You know, the one about bringing americans together? He's sure done a good job at polarized us even more.

[paulnj]

OK ..... WELL SAID BTW

Let me add this..

My mother passed away on October 9th due to a MAJOR screw up by a doctor!(the reason I have been low key lately)

I am EXTREMELY MAD/HURT/HEART BROKEN about that! Yet I don't hate DOCTORS who practice MEDICINE because of it ;) Kill that doctor?....HMMMMMMM I wouldn't shed a tear, but all doctors.... HE!! NO!!

[Steph_B]

Furthermore, there isn't a country in the world that is as generous to the rest of the world as is the United States. We fund more, we spend more, we expend more of our time, resources and energy to help the world, and this is how they treat us when we need their support. With allies like that, who needs enemies?

And yet the whole world hates you... I wonder why.....

The US foreign policy has been that of economic domination and, yes, of terror (who funded and trained Bin Laden to fight againt the Soviet Union? ... who funded and helped Saddam to fight against Iran?).

As everybody know, it is not the amount of money you give to those in need: it is the fine prints at the bottom of the contract which count. Trust me, if 'helping' others was not a lucrative operation, the US for sure would not take part in it. After all, this IS a profit-based society.

[schrackman]

in comparison the over 100,000 citizens in Iraq mostly women and children who have died in the past 20 months of our invasion. Although some of these lost lives are due to local terror acts the vast majority are due to our "shock and awe" approach to "liberating" the country.

Gerry, I'm not sure where you got those numbers from. Please check here for a more accurate count: http://www.iraqbodycount.net/



This means that more civilian people died on and around D-Day than has currently died in Iraq war all the while since we invaded.

Ray

[Todd Patten]

I find it interesting when we compare body counts between wars. You simply can't compare. We're talking huge bombs that wiped out everything compared to precision weapons. Major difference.

I'll tell you what. No matter the religion, a country wrapped in religion is dangerous. When you convince a population that a higher power is calling the shots and that a higher power has chosen it's citizens, you have a blank check. It does not matter if that country is Muslim or Christian. The results have always been the same and will always be the same.

[Gerry Widen]

Ray, The 100,000 figure is widely acknowledged and accepted.It was determined by a joint effort of Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. The research was done by going door to door in Iraq. This information came out during the latter stages of the presidential election and wasn't even disputed by the Republican party. If you do a google search you can find information on the internet that suits any argument but that doesn't make it to be true.

[schrackman]

Ray, The 100,000 figure is widely acknowledged and accepted.It was determined by a joint effort of Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. The research was done by going door to door in Iraq. This information came out during the latter stages of the presidential election and wasn't even disputed by the Republican party. If you do a google search you can find information on the internet that suits any argument but that doesn't make it to be true.

Gerry, this was a rushed research job designed to get out before the election and sway voters, so I am highly skeptical of its objectivity. The report stated that only 1000 families were interviewed. Makes one wonder how they came up with the 100,000 number out of that few families. To get that number, each of these 1000 families would had to have lost at least 100 family members! Furthermore, this report included deaths that were not even directly attributable to our bombing of Iraq, such as heart attack, infant deaths, or deaths caused by lack of medical care, etc. If such a standard were applied to WWII, we would likewise see a higher death rate than what has actually been reported as "civilian casualties". Frankly, what this report has done is simply redefine "civilian casualties" for you, so that you think the number is higher than it actually is.

Consequently, the Iraq war is a far less bloody war than WWII ever was. The actual civilian casualty rate in Iraq for the past 20 months has only equated what happened in ONE or TWO days in Normandy. Given this fact, I think we ought to be a whole lot more grateful than critical, don't you think?

Ray

[Gerry Widen]

Ray, You're right I guess the war was justified since only about 15.000 civilians were killed. My Bad.

And my dam kids. Both are straight A students and they are waisting their time trying to go to colleges like Columbia or Johns Hopkins. I'll have to talk to them. And Ray while you are at it why don't you contact the Republican party since they must of missed the reports of 100,000 people dieing. Since they never disputed the findings.

[Trevor Ash]

I want you to know that I enjoy reading what you're writing but it looks like some of you are getting pretty worked up and I don't see this as the kind of place where we can end with "resolution" and "agreement"

In my opinion, everything we "know" and hear are lies anyway so it's useless quoting "figures". Don't waste your energy trying to prove numbers to me because I'm numb to it. You all know we can make numbers look like anything we want them to be and twist facts to support arguments. I'm young, but I've learned that much.

We believe what we want to believe. Anyone that doesn't realize that isn't being honest with themselves. Beliefs are NOT worth arguing. Very rarely can you change someone's beliefs during argument an argument. If it does change, it's usually over time. So what you say now could matter but probably not for a while.

In other words, don't get your blood pressure up over reading these posts. Try mellowing out a little bit and spend more time understanding the reasons people feel the way they do rather than trying to convince them they're wrong.

My one wish is that people would quit generalizing so damn much. "Everyone" this and "we all" that.

[walterick]

What do we all say we put this thread to sleep? All in favor say "aye" and then stop posting in it

Lotsa love to everybody for playing in my poll.

Thanks,
Rick

[walterick]

What can I say except you have my fulllest condolences! Any loss is tough but to have it be because of a screwup must make it horrible. I am very sorry to hear about your loss. You're certainly entitled to anger if ever anyone has! At the least you're dealing with it properly - just take out that one doctor, leave the rest to be LOL

Good to see you're back up here at least temorarily though. I'll save a seat for you in Newtopia ;)

Carry on brotha.

Rick