Republicans are suffering from devolution not evolution so to them Darwin cannot be right.

 kurtster wrote: 
Term limits is not the answer. It takes a couple years to learn the ropes of how to govern.

And what term limits gives you is corporations who take one of their lobbyists and put him in for a few years to tweak the laws in their favor and then when his term is up hire him back at a salary 5 times higher than what he made in Congress as a "reward" for job well done. 

The  corporatocracy  revolving door looks like this : LOBBYIST  >  CONGRESS  >  CORPORATE EXEC >LOBBYIST >CONGRESS >  EXEC.
Term limits would only accelerate the revolving door.

  I agree with bringing back the draft.  It would also make  the rich put some skin in the game.
But ironically, Bush got us in 2 wars and the rich were rewarded with tax cuts and very lucrative defense contracts! 

 ErikX wrote: 
Yep, maybe.  You forget the same dissatisfaction with FDR that led to the House flipping in 1938 just like with Obama and it flipped the same way last year. 

Want to help fix voter turn out ?  Term Limits.  Give the voters something really new once in awhile to vote for.  Without term limits its the same person vs a new one and 95% of the time, the same person wins, so what's the incentive to vote ?

Want another thing to lessen voter apathy ?  Bring back the draft, make people get some skin in the game.  That'll make people pay attention to affairs.  At least until they find out what their lottery number is.  Rangle (D) NY, introduces a bill to that effect on a regular basis.

The country is behaving like everyone got number 365 in the draft lottery, no one will ever have to fight for anything, someone else will.  But if you have never faced that lottery, you have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about.  A history book cannot teach that.

 islander wrote: 
Unfortunately my public speaking skills are way too poor for that. My passion is educating people about history and science which would not fit nicely on a sign.

My favorite thing is to go and "occupy" the hornet's nests of rightwing websites and message boards to educate as many misinformed people as possible. RP doesnt qualify for that, even though it does attract a few righties. ;)

 ErikX wrote: 
Fine, you've convinced me.  And since RP is such a vast bastion of liberal thought, maybe your efforts to enlighten the proletariat would be better spent out on the street with sandwich boards, flyers and a bull horn. Run along now and foment the revolution, we're right behind you.

 islander wrote: 
Yes it is. The reason voter turnout is so low now is because the people are confused. The Bush/Wall street meltdown unfortunately happened months before Obama took office. Its been incredibly easy for the Conservative propaganda machine to take advantage of Americans short memory and to bait and switch their memories.

By  1932 Americans KNEW who was in power during the 1929 Crash and who let the economy tank for 3 years thereafter.  
That solved low voter turnout and apathy. All Americans voted out the evil GOP with more gusto than ever in history. 

 ErikX wrote: 
That's not what I said.

 islander wrote: 
That's why FDR won in a landslide in 1932 at the lowest depth of the Great Depression. Twelve years of Republican rule had virtually brought our country to its knees. FDR turned it around in 1933 and had lowered unemployment from 25% to 12% by 1936. FDR had literally saved millions from starvation and potentially the country and capitalism itself. And so he was elected in landslides for 3 more terms.

By 50 years later America had forgotten and elected a 1920's style Republican in 1980, Ronald Reagan. And 28 years later of three Republicans the economy crashed hard again.

Unfortunately, the RW/corporate media by then had such a strong propaganda machine in place that Americans have already forgotten and confused the issue about  which party and its policies tanked the economy like they did in 1929. 

 OCDHG wrote: 
I do understand and sympathize.  But we are consistently offered this hobson's choice of candidates.  I think that's part of why turnout is so low - most people think it really doesn't matter.  If more people started voting for who they want instead of voting against who they don't, it would at least show the willingness to do so.

Perhaps we have a few bad cycles because of this. Maybe that's what it takes to bring about change and get the 40% who don't vote involved. Maybe I'm just bonkers, but what we're doing now doesn't seem to be working out very well so I'm up for change.

 islander wrote: 

 islander wrote: 


I get it. I agree on idealogical grounds. But the heart doesn't always listen to the head. If it ends up being Obama vs Bachman (for example) I have a hard time rationalizing that voting my conscience would't also "do a disservice" by (for all intents and purposes) putting Bachman in office. You know?


Uuuuugh.

 Prodigal_SOB wrote: 
  Love it ...

I think this is the funniest Daily Show piece I've ever seen.

 OCDHG wrote: 
Writing in, or voting 3rd party shows support for those entities. With shows of support comes legitimacy and future potential. It sends a message to the establishment that people want something different.

Voting for the "lessor of two evils" shows support for a two party system that effectively guarantees the status quo. It means that even if you win, all you have effectively done is throw your support to a group that you are dissatisfied with.

Vote your conscience, vote for what you *want*, vote for what you *believe*. Anything else is a disservice to you and your fellow patriots.

 sirdroseph wrote: 
 I feel like writing in too... but that will basically be the same result as voting for a Republican.  So what to do?

 cc_rider wrote: 
I hate dryer lint, I would never vote for it.

 kurtster wrote: 
 

 kurtster wrote: 

Not exactly. What BSG did was as the original series our species was evolved on planet Cobol and the lost tribe (us) migrated to Earth and the rest of the tribes went to a different system with each planet based on the astrological signs. Well, after the cylons attacked and killed almost all of the humans on these planets; they were forced to go out in the universe in search of a habitable planet or the mythical "Earth". Well, they found earth and it was appx. 250,000 years ago. They landed and the presumption is that they started educating the Homo Habilus which accelerated the evolution process to modern day humans. Very interesting theory, basically the same theory as the alien theorists, but the aliens being humans from long, long ago.

 sirdroseph wrote: 
If you've seen "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" you'd know we are all descended from the hairdressers that were stranded here..

 sirdroseph wrote: 
Didn't really get in BG myself, although I should, knowing me.  The main reason I didn't was because what happened to Farscape and it really pissed me off.  I was mad at SciFy and stopped watching.

But isn't this loop thing similar in a way to Hinduism (? IIRC) where there is a devine being that falls asleep every 24 or 26 billion years or so and wakes up and starts off a hole new big bang cycle of creation ?  And the cycle just keeps repeating with something different each time ?