Short and simple. Who do you want for president, Obama or Mitt Romney?

[Esau of Isaac]

You can't but that's when you realize death penalty is silly - like us Europeans.

When I suggested that the government murders innocent people over the topic of firearms did you think I was talking about the death penalty?

After that you limit the access militaries and other government agencies have to their weapons. Like us Europeans.

Limit how?

And hey, the entirety of Europe minus Eastern Europe has like a quarter of the murder rates of America.

Which proves to you that it's guns that cause crime? Despite that there are countries with high gun ownership per capita that have comparatively low crime rates?

The Earth is experiencing global warming. There are fewer pirates on the open sea. Must mean global warming is killing off pirates, right?

[Excellen Browning]

When I suggested that the government murders innocent people over the topic of firearms did you think I was talking about the death penalty?

Limit how?

Which proves to you that it's guns that cause crime? Despite that there are countries with high gun ownership per capita that have comparatively low crime rates?

The Earth is experiencing global warming. There are fewer pirates on the open sea. Must mean global warming is killing off pirates, right?

1. Well what else could you talk about? Your government killing it's own citizens? Like, lulz let's kill our country? You mean like a situation

2. Already told you. Don't take fire arms home, leave them on the job. Train them to not grab for the gun. In the Netherlands - where I live - per example, police using their guns very sparingly, and it's usually reported in national newspapers when it happens. Usage of fire arms is frowned upon by the general public here. And Dutch police gets to break up football-related riots pretty regularly - without ever firing a shot. Quite different from America where grabbing the pistol seems to be the cop's way of getting control of a situation.

3. Well unfortunately for you, there's not so much different between the two general cultures that could explain the quadruple murder rates. Because, although there are some differences in general philosophy and customs, customs are arbitrary and we live under the same kind of regime with the same philosophy behind it and the conditioning that comes with it. Western europe and america have (combined) industries of comparable size, with comparable division (northern territories tend to have higher GPD) . Western european society is generally egalitarian with exception of the UK, though I wouldn't know this about America. This also means that in our countries the rich are taxes more than the poor, or that rich and poor are taxed equally. And I suppose this is a difference with America. And I suppose that American culture and philosophy seems to be more atomized than European culture, this doesn't necessarily lead to increased murder rates but IMO makes an increase make sense, though not quadrupling of it.

Let's see other differences. It might be argued that, because we Europeans had WW1, WW2 and a whole shitton of other wars happen over the centuries (way more than America in its short existence), we have developed an anti-violence culture, but American soldiers went and fought in both wars, in Europe and elsewhere so it can be argued they experienced the same kind of experience, but then again not the rebuilding and "that feeling when" you lost a lot of relatives, maybe your entire family, friends and all your friends lost a lot of people too. So this could be a reason.

Another reason we could find in either religion and racial tensions. Americans are known as religious zealots to Europeans though this applies to the south more than it does to the north east. Overall weekly church attendance is estimated at 43% (weekly church/synagogue attendance http://www.utsandiego.com/uniontrib/20060502/news_lz1n2thelist.html)

If we compare this to Western Europe, france has 12%, Austria 18%, Ireland 46%, the UK 14%, Italy 31%, Belgium 7%, Greece 27%, Portugal 29% and so on and so on. General trend is that the further up you go, church attendance decreases, with Ireland as an outlier.

Now to compare murder rates. Per 100,000 people. (All american murder rate data taken from http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/murder-rates-nationally-and-state)

America: 4.8

North East: 4.2

South: 5.6

Just out of interest:

American states without death penalty statute: 4.01

American states with death penalty statute: 5.00

Interesting.

European murder statistics are harder to come by because eurostat only gives the total recorded number per country and the cruddy table I'm gonna show you.

Funny how Lithuania and Estonia influence the eastern european average so much. I now have a better opinion of eastern europeans. In any case, it's obvious to see that even in the countries with comparable church attendance rates, murder rates are much lower. Religiousness is ruled out as a cause for murder.

Next up, racial tensions. European countries are relatively racially homogeneous,

America is described by the CIA world factbook as (figures are rounded off):

white: 80%

black: 13%

Asian: 4.4%

Other: 2.6%

If we compare to the Netherlands, France and Italy(Culturally diverse by European standards):

It's not even fucking listed anywhere, seriously. No one ever gave a shit to figure it out.[/spoilers]

Fortunately there's still the general etnicity, though I've now decided to

Netherlands, actual values and percentages

Total: 16.5mln (100%)

Dutch: 13.2mln (80%)

Total immigrants: 3.3mln (20%)

European immigrant: 1.4mln (8.5%)

Total western hemipshere immigrants: 1.5mln (9.1%)

Total non-western hermisphere immigrants: 1.8mln (10.9%)

Non-western hemisphere immigrants can be divided in several general, large groups: Indonesian, , Moroccan, Netherlands Antilles and Aruba, Surinamish, Turkish and former USSR.

What we first will have to assume is that racial minority = ethnic minority, and while I don't think they're exactly the same, I think they're close enough. So we now know that the Netherlands and America have about the same minority make up, though the Netherlands a much lower murder rate. This can't be directly translated into "ethnic/racial make up has no effect

and then I went boarding because I was pretty bored with writing, and ended up falling very hard so I'm gonna stop writing.

[Esau of Isaac]

1.) I mean like military conflict. Why wouldn't you trust a countryman to hold a firearm, but a countryman wearing a suit to control firearms?

2.) How is any of what you said, barring the very beginning, a limit on access to firearms? You're talking about a difference in culture, which has nothing to do with guns.

3.) Where to begin...

Well unfortunately for you, there's not so much different between the two general cultures that could explain the quadruple murder rates. Because, although there are some differences in general philosophy and customs, customs are arbitrary and we live under the same kind of regime with the same philosophy behind it and the conditioning that comes with it. Western europe and america have (combined) industries of comparable size, with comparable division (northern territories tend to have higher GPD) . Western european society is generally egalitarian with exception of the UK, though I wouldn't know this about America. This also means that in our countries the rich are taxes more than the poor, or that rich and poor are taxed equally. And I suppose this is a difference with America. And I suppose that American culture and philosophy seems to be more atomized than European culture, this doesn't necessarily lead to increased murder rates but IMO makes an increase make sense, though not quadrupling of it.

http://www.nationmaster.com/compare/Switzerland/United-States/Crime

Both have guns, one has comparatively low crime. Lower crime than your own country, might I add.

Let's see other differences. It might be argued that, because we Europeans had WW1, WW2 and a whole shitton of other wars happen over the centuries (way more than America in its short existence), we have developed an anti-violence culture, but American soldiers went and fought in both wars, in Europe and elsewhere so it can be argued they experienced the same kind of experience, but then again not the rebuilding and "that feeling when" you lost a lot of relatives, maybe your entire family, friends and all your friends lost a lot of people too. So this could be a reason.

That is certainly possible. This would invalidate your country as an example, though, wouldn't it? In World War I and II America lost several dozen times more citizens and military men than yours.

Another reason we could find in either religion and racial tensions. Americans are known as religious zealots to Europeans though this applies to the south more than it does to the north east. Overall weekly church attendance is estimated at 43% (weekly church/synagogue attendance http://www.utsandieg...n2thelist.html)

If we compare this to Western Europe, france has 12%, Austria 18%, Ireland 46%, the UK 14%, Italy 31%, Belgium 7%, Greece 27%, Portugal 29% and so on and so on. General trend is that the further up you go, church attendance decreases, with Ireland as an outlier.

Please. Please tell me you aren't being serious when you state that church attendance is equal to religious zealotry.

Next up, racial tensions. European countries are relatively racially homogeneous,

America is described by the CIA world factbook as (figures are rounded off):

white: 80%

black: 13%

Asian: 4.4%

Other: 2.6%

If we compare to the Netherlands, France and Italy(Culturally diverse by European standards):

What we first will have to assume is that racial minority = ethnic minority, and while I don't think they're exactly the same, I think they're close enough. So we now know that the Netherlands and America have about the same minority make up, though the Netherlands a much lower murder rate. This can't be directly translated into "ethnic/racial make up has no effect

Do you seriously believe that there is as much of a clash of cultures and ethnicities in the Netherlands as there is in the United States of America?

Edited October 2, 2012 by Esau of Isaac

[Lux Aeterna]

My parents literally built up what they had from almost nothing, and they relied on hard work, not the government.

Why does nearly every Republican I meet use /this/ as ammunition? I'm not either party. I'm not old enough to be. And I'm not particularly impressed with the Democrat party, but Republicans /really/ don't help their cause when they say things like this.

Is it that the Republicans believe that all government should do is prevent society from descending into total anarchy and murder? Do they believe the government should have nothing to do with us beyond that? Maybe that's it. Democrats want to help others, Republicans want to help themselves. Or at least, that's the way it comes off from the fact that Republicans keep priding themselves as wanting no help from governments.

Maybe the Democrats are selfish too and I'm just not seeing that. But they generally don't say "and I didn't a take a /dime/ from the government!" Again, neither party is particularly pleasing. Not like the Democrat party is amazing. But, Republicans sound silly when they say things like that (however inflammatory that may seem, it's not intended as such). It just makes me inclined to take--as CPP put it--the lesser of two evils.

[Guy Starwind]

Isn't there a firearms section in the serious discussion?

For who I want to be the president? I'll say what I say to the people who keep calling me asking the same question and that's I have to read up on it. Once the voting comes into play I'll read up on both candidates. I'm a registered Republican but I'm not so narrow minded to see what the other guy has to offer. Heck if I find what he has to say more appealing to what my party's rep has to offer I'll vote for him. Once again I have to read up on everything before I choose who I want.

[Ciarre]

Personally, I'm voting Obama because he also supports schools, and he seems like a genuinely nice guy. Like, I'd hang out with him on a weekend at the park or something. Even if he acts kinda dumb about certain things, like the economy, he seems like he's genuinely trying to fix the country, for whatever that's worth.

This, pretty much. And also because he's more liberal.

[tenkiforecast]

Every time I hear someone mention, "We didn't get help from the government, we did everything ourselves," my reaction is this:

Did you use roads for your buisness/job? Because the government built those roads.

As for the WWI and WWII comment... yes, during World War II, the US did the bulk of the fighting in Western Europe after 1944. However, that was not the home for American soldiers. The psychological impact is vastly different if you witness your own country and your own homes being destroyed than returning to prosperity. I would expect more cognitive dissonance from the American soldiers, and far more PTSD not only in the soldiers but civilians. The occupied country that endures war suffers far more than the occupier...or at least whoever else's soldiers are fighting. Why exactly have the French stopped a lot of their military spending when, historically, they were one of the most active and _FEARED_ countries in Europe? WWI, trenches are still visible. WWII, occupation by Germany and the Vichy (spelling is wrong) Government that supported Hitler. The French resistance was pretty damn courageous, they fought damn hard. The cultural memory, however, is of complete destruction and humiliation. That was felt by every continental European country that was involved in WWII, except for the USSR. Their countries were in ruins. The US was not. It is as simple as that.

I would expect that explains part of the cultural aversion to firearms in Western Europe. Seeing your country and continent reduced to ruins would do that to you.

[CrashGordon94]

You can't but that's when you realize death penalty is silly - like us Europeans.

Yes, because locking people up for the rest of the lives to have a miserable and unproductive existence is so much better...

[Excellen Browning]

1.) I mean like military conflict. Why wouldn't you trust a countryman to hold a firearm, but a countryman wearing a suit to control firearms?

2.) How is any of what you said, barring the very beginning, a limit on access to firearms? You're talking about a difference in culture, which has nothing to do with guns.

3.) Where to begin...

http://www.nationmas...ed-States/Crime

Both have guns, one has comparatively low crime. Lower crime than your own country, might I add.

That is certainly possible. This would invalidate your country as an example, though, wouldn't it? In World War I and II America lost several dozen times more citizens and military men than yours.

Please. Please tell me you aren't being serious when you state that church attendance is equal to religious zealotry.

Do you seriously believe that there is as much of a clash of cultures and ethnicities in the Netherlands as there is in the United States of America?

1. http://en.wikipedia....rmy-issued_arms

Interesting read. Was originally planning to also make a pointer on how you can't fairly compare Switzerland and America in terms of murder rate based solely on gun ownership. That's because the Swiss go about owning and selling and allowing guns in public in a very different way from Americans. In Switzerland, general consensus is "guns are dangerous; their use should be restricted, and weapons that are not government-issue are not allowed to have too much killing potential. We should build a culture around gun ownership that is neutral or approves of it, but very much looks down upon use that is not safe.

2. Never said anything of the like I think and the evidence doesn't support it anyway

3. And yet Europe was the land being occupied, Europeans got to enjoy the general feeling of being opressed and saw the destruction it caused and were the ones to bury the bodies and see the graves. Furthermore, just saying "America lost more soldiers than you guys" is just flawed statistics. Considering we only had 9 mln people in comparison to your 132mln. Added to that was that the war only lasted for 5 days for the dutch.

4. I live in the Netherlands and immigrants seem to have more or less the same status as certain racial minorities over in your country. AKA poor, much more likely to be a criminal, doesn't do well and drops out of school etc etc etc.

It's not outright racism. It's a negative opinion of them as a group, the group failing to break out of the negative spiral and the unwillingness of the general population to help them with that.

@Crash, yea because executing 10 people when you know one of them isn't guilty is such a great thing to do in a political system which in it's basis values life above anything else.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Daigoji Excellen

[CrashGordon94]

@Crash, yea because executing 10 people when you know one of them isn't guilty is such a great thing to do in a political system which in it's basis values life above anything else.

And it'd be just as awful to lock them up forever, worse even because you're wasting resources that could be used to maybe help free people live and giving them an awful, miserable life.

Valuing life in the basis of it means nothing, principles are just that: Principles, nothing more. Sticking to them even when they make no sense is the domain of extremists and fanatics, not something to be admired.

Plus a better justice system could probably reduce the number of innocents subjected to these punishments greatly, even if not it's very VERY unlikely that they'd be freed later on, and having them live such a miserable life is little better (probably considerably worse, actually) than just killing them, especially when the resources used to maintain these people could be used for better purposes.

[I.M. Gei]

I don't know too much about politics

Oh believe me, it shows.

See, this is why I find most modern Republicans pretty abhorrent; they tend to be gigantic "Fuck you, got mine" crybabies who often aren't willing to recognize the many breaks and chances that got them to be successful in life to begin with. You're really terribly privileged and naive in the worst kind of way if you thump bootstraps as the answer.

[Excellen Browning]

And it'd be just as awful to lock them up forever, worse even because you're wasting resources that could be used to maybe help free people live and giving them an awful, miserable life.

Valuing life in the basis of it means nothing, principles are just that: Principles, nothing more. Sticking to them even when they make no sense is the domain of extremists and fanatics, not something to be admired.

Plus a better justice system could probably reduce the number of innocents subjected to these punishments greatly, even if not it's very VERY unlikely that they'd be freed later on, and having them live such a miserable life is little better (probably considerably worse, actually) than just killing them, especially when the resources used to maintain these people could be used for better purposes.

1. Yes because proving they're not guilty when they're dead is really useful to them.

2. Principles(assumptions) are everything in a political system. It's what they're based on, everything else flows from it. Keeping to these principles validates the system

3. You're assuming assumptions and far away ideas when you really have no solid idea of what's wrong or inefficient, why it is wrong or inefficient and why it's done anyway. This is not an argument - not really. It's just flying the assumption of "if things were better/the world were perfect, then x" and leaves it at that. That sort of statement fails to realize that people are killed or imprisoned innocently in the now and definitely the short term future(couple of years), though probably also the long term future (decades to centuries) because this kind of fundamental change comes very, very slow. Which is of course an irrevocable injustice being done, instead of say, imprisonment.

[Anouleth]

I'm a bit surprised at the overwhelming number of democrats here. Is it an age thing?

Partially, but it's important to note that there are more democrats than republicans in America. The reason why elections can still be close is because of lower turnout among democrats: democrats tend to have wider support amongst demographics that are less active, such as minorities and young people, while republicans have wider support among the elderly.

I just recently turned 18, but I'm going to vote for Romney. Sure, he's said some stupid things (the whole 47% thing, while widely misinterpreted, probably put the last nail in the coffin for Romney's campain, imo), and he's not perfect, but really, anyone's better than Obama at this point imo.

Obama's whole idea of redistribution to me is pretty sickening. He's really going overboard with it, what with Obamacare taking a great deal out of Social Security, and the like. My parents literally built up what they had from almost nothing, and they relied on hard work, not the government.

Actually, the PPACA doesn't affect Social Security at all: and Social Security is itself the biggest redistributive scheme in the world. However, it does take a significant proportion from Medicare Advantage.

That being said, Obama did harm the long-term solvency of Social Security in his 2011 payroll tax cut. Is that what you're talking about? Or are you talking about the longstanding practice of borrowing from the Social Security Trust Fund?

Besides that, I believe a businessman could probably help the economy better than what Obama could. I don't know too much about politics, and I'd probably have to research more about the two's policies before voting, but what I think of right now.

That's questionable. Of previous US presidents, only five had previous business experience: Harding, Hoover, Truman, Bush 41 and Bush 43.

Of course, this probably doesn't change the fact that unfortunately, Obama's probably got the election in the bag. Romney's ideals and direction are great, but his public speaking isn't.

It doesn't have that much to do with public speaking. In general, Democratic policies (such as immigration reform towards an amnesty system) are just more popular among the electorate than Republican policies (such as voucherised Medicare). As voters become more informed in the run up to the election, Obama will probably increase his lead.

In general, Obama's victory was somewhat inevitable. Even now, he's still viewed favourably by a majority of the US population. Close examination of the economic fundamentals suggest that he is getting a slight boost from the economy. He's an incumbent. And his campaigning is strong. Even if Romney Super PACs have enough money to buy out all the airspace between now and November, Obama has a better ground game (which imo is more important).

After Obama blew off meeting the Isreali Prime Minister (can't remember his name), to guest star on The View with Whoopi Goldberg...I'm really not sure

Link? Because looking at the schedules, Obama appeared on The View on September the 25th, while Netanyahu was only in Washington on the 27th and 28th.

(and his name is Benjamin Netanyahu)

Like how Mitt Romney says that "47%" of the voters don't matter because they aren't working Americans and live on "government handouts." That 47% includes the elderly living on Social Security, which is money they've paid into for decades just to get a fraction back. It also includes people on disability, like disabled veterans and people who've been handicapped by accidents, and a lot more. So Mitt may as well say "fuck you" to everyone.

It also includes Americans who pay into Social Security through FICA taxes, but don't earn enough to pay income tax, or who have tax deductions, and pretty much everyone in the country also pays state taxes, which include sales tax. As well as students.

And Obama is draining Social Security to finance his Obamacare. My Dad's paid into Social Security for his whole life, and taking from that is no better than theft. Obama steals from the elderly. :p

Link? Because there's no mention of such as thing in the PPACA, as far as I can tell. It seems to be primarily funded by taxes on certain high end insurance policies and by cutting funds from Medicare Advantage rather than somehow taking money from the Social Security Trust Fund (which as far as I know isn't even possible).

And they are both content to force their policies onto us against our will. So yeah, fuck them both.

Well, almost 70 million people voted for Obama. That's a pretty clear mandate for him to implement his policies.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Anouleth

[I.M. Gei]

On a side note, "anyone but Nixon" didn't work for McGovern; "anyone but Reagan" didn't work for Mondale; "anyone but Clinton" didn't work for Bob Dole, and I think most people here remember how well "anyone but Bush" worked for Kerry.

[tenkiforecast]

That's questionable. Of previous US presidents, only five had previous business experience: Harding, Hoover, Truman, Bush 41 and Bush 43.

Building off that, Harding is recognized as one of the worst presidents in American History, Hoover did absolutely nothing to help alleviate the Great Depression, and Bush Jr. took us from teh largest surplus in American History to one of the largest deficits. Truman ran a failed business, so his experience would have been negative for him. Of those, only Bush Sr worked well with his business experience, and even then that is arguable.

Honestly, Harding and Buchanan are, by historians, tied as the worst presidents in American history. Hoover is pretty dang close to the bottom as well.

I would also like to mention, by quoting Clinton's DNC speech, the current Republican plan would not only raid Medicare but put even more cuts to it. This does not surprise me, given the attitude Romney and Ryan have towards anyone who is not a millionaire or billionaire.

I'm not surprised taht there are more democrats on this forum. Video Game forums tend to lean towards liberal, one reason is younger age (most younger people are liberal/democrats...at least the majority. Exact statistics, I do not know).

[Esau of Isaac]

1.) Right. The idea is not that guns are harmful, but that misapplication of guns is harmful.

3.) Even accounting per capita America lost more men than the Dutch.

4.) That doesn't answer my question. Do you think that the Netherlands' situation culturally is seriously comparable to the United States as a whole, simply because you have some parallels that can be drawn to one stereotype?

[Excellen Browning]

1.) Right. The idea is not that guns are harmful, but that misapplication of guns is harmful.

3.) Even accounting per capita America lost more men than the Dutch.

4.) That doesn't answer my question. Do you think that the Netherlands' situation culturally is seriously comparable to the United States as a whole, simply because you have some parallels that can be drawn to one stereotype?

1. and because a culture is very difficult to radically change, I would recommend outlawing or very much limiting gun ownership in the US until this change of culture has been brought about.

2. what is your point with this,anyway? I don't see it leading anywhere useful.

3. I cannot be certain because I haven't spent years in America to get to know the true culture, but I do see that at least superficially all the symptoms are the same. Which in my opinion validates some limited comparisons. Directly comparing the two countries is sheer stupidity because the Netherlands has never known the same widespread terrorism of minorities by the majority the US has known, and the Netherlands itself has not known slavery even though the Dutch traded in slaves.

If you somehow think I was simply comparing america to the netherlands, then you are wrong because first off it should be obvious that I tried to split the cause of your higher murder rates into several social phenomena in which the countries are different and then try to reduce it into causes by eliminating those phenomena in which we are similar as causes.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Daigoji Excellen

[Constable Reggie]

Why does nearly every Republican I meet use /this/ as ammunition? I'm not either party. I'm not old enough to be. And I'm not particularly impressed with the Democrat party, but Republicans /really/ don't help their cause when they say things like this.

Is it that the Republicans believe that all government should do is prevent society from descending into total anarchy and murder? Do they believe the government should have nothing to do with us beyond that? Maybe that's it. Democrats want to help others, Republicans want to help themselves. Or at least, that's the way it comes off from the fact that Republicans keep priding themselves as wanting no help from governments.

Maybe the Democrats are selfish too and I'm just not seeing that. But they generally don't say "and I didn't a take a /dime/ from the government!" Again, neither party is particularly pleasing. Not like the Democrat party is amazing. But, Republicans sound silly when they say things like that (however inflammatory that may seem, it's not intended as such). It just makes me inclined to take--as CPP put it--the lesser of two evils.

My post was probably a bit broad, but it doesn't mean I believe the government snould only do the absolute bare minimum possible. My parent's likely got some government help (never really asked them about their early life), but during the gist of it, they relied on themselves, not the government. People, to a certain extent, need to stop relying on the government for everything and start doing things themselves. Increasing the unemployment benefit period by almost four times as much, or forcing everyone to buy health insurance (to the detriment of medicare) isn't going to do that. Don't try and use a straw man argument to criticize my ideals, please.

Every time I hear someone mention, "We didn't get help from the government, we did everything ourselves," my reaction is this:<br sab="1475">Did you use roads for your buisness/job? Because the government built those roads.

This would be a better example if we didn't have to pay for use of those roads. Regardless, there's a difference between general economic improvement and outright reliance on the government.

See, this is why I find most modern Republicans pretty abhorrent; they tend to be gigantic "Fuck you, got mine" crybabies who often aren't willing to recognize the many breaks and chances that got them to be successful in life to begin with. You're really terribly privileged and naive in the worst kind of way if you thump bootstraps as the answer.

What I don't even

What was the point of your post? To slander every republican as greedy assholes who only think for themself?

Edited October 4, 2012 by Davinatorman

[Anouleth]

My post was probably a bit broad, but it doesn't mean I believe the government snould only do the absolute bare minimum possible. My parent's likely got some government help (never really asked them about their early life), but during the gist of it, they relied on themselves, not the government. People, to a certain extent, need to stop relying on the government for everything and start doing things themselves. Increasing the unemployment benefit period by almost four times as much, or forcing everyone to buy health insurance (to the detriment of medicare) isn't going to do that.

So when the government directly takes people's money and spends it on health insurance for them without asking them, it's okay, but when the government simply tells people to buy whatever health insurance they want as long as it meets certain minimum requirements, that's a gross invasion of individual freedom?

[Esau of Isaac]

1. and because a culture is very difficult to radically change, I would recommend outlawing or very much limiting gun ownership in the US until this change of culture has been brought about.

2. what is your point with this,anyway? I don't see it leading anywhere useful.

3. I cannot be certain because I haven't spent years in America to get to know the true culture, but I do see that at least superficially all the symptoms are the same. Which in my opinion validates some limited comparisons. Directly comparing the two countries is sheer stupidity because the Netherlands has never known the same widespread terrorism of minorities by the majority the US has known, and the Netherlands itself has not known slavery even though the Dutch traded in slaves.

If you somehow think I was simply comparing america to the netherlands, then you are wrong because first off it should be obvious that I tried to split the cause of your higher murder rates into several social phenomena in which the countries are different and then try to reduce it into causes by eliminating those phenomena in which we are similar as causes.

1. This teaches nothing regarding safety of firearms, just that people should not be allowed to have them.

2. That the notion that people are not able to be trusted with guns by their nature is a foolhardy one; you're transferring ownership of weaponry from one group of people to another group of people. Neither of them are more or less people. If you want to stop people killing people then you need to forget about guns. They're a tool that murderers use, not a creator of murderers. You can argue that you should reduce the number of tools in the hands of murderers, but don't pretend that because a country has less guns there are inherently less killers.

3. My point has been that your assumption that they are comparable because of very, very light similarities is a falsehood.

[Constable Reggie]

So when the government directly takes people's money and spends it on health insurance for them without asking them, it's okay, but when the government simply tells people to buy whatever health insurance they want as long as it meets certain minimum requirements, that's a gross invasion of individual freedom?

Social security tax isn't paid specifically for yourself, it's used to ensure people who can't work can still live. Being forced to pay for your own health insurance is not the same, no.

[Ein]

What I don't even

What was the point of your post? To slander every republican as greedy assholes who only think for themself?

That's just CPP being CPP. It's literally all he does.

[Caliban of Sycorax]

Romney's ideals and direction are great, but his public speaking isn't.

The Human Rights position would like to disagree with you.

[Constable Reggie]

I didn't even realize Anouleth responded to my post. Too many opposing views to respond to, so I'm gonna stop here.

I'd really like to hear from other people supporting Romney/not being so blatant in anti-Romney, but that's that. The presidential debate also supported my uneasiness to Obama's policies and methods. Using "evidence" from the opposite side or just blatant slander isn't really going to change that.

edit: let me clarify that my family's not rich or anything, we don't own a business, I was speaking more in terms of money saved up and the conditions we're fortunate to live with. Didn't realize what I said could have come off that way.

Edited October 4, 2012 by Davinatorman

[tenkiforecast]

My whole point is that the government can provide a Public Good--roads are the best example. Going into my own profession, the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration is another. In some way or another, every business *has* been helped by the government. Do we pay for it in taxes? Yes. I, however, would rather spend tax money on keeping our transportation infrastructure maintained because that would lower shipping costs.

My biggest issue with Romney/Ryan aside from their stance on education is their proposed economic policy. It runs off the idea that tax cuts for major business owners and deregulation will lead to more jobs, more employment, and benefit the economy. My problems with this are not based on some ideological philosophy of "Punish the wealthy", my problems are based off of knowledge of history and the most basic demographics.

1. Cutting taxes on the wealthy is risky because they can supply a high amount of money for the government's money. The money to spend will need to come from somewhere else--you cannot cut ALL government spending, and massive cuts across the board will hurt the economy. As a result, taxes are raised on those who earn less. I believe the cutoff line is 250,000 dollars. The problem is that this is a net decrease in money for government spending, and a net decrease in money spent on the economy. The reason that Occupy Wall Street chose the slogan "We are the 99%" is because that is close to accurate. I do not know the number off the top of my head, but the amount of people who would benefit from tax cuts like this directly are, as a rough guess, 1-5% of the American public. They are the outliers as well, they are the ones that skew the average income of an American citizen. Even if more people are employed, there is a net decrease in money being spent on the economy because the overwhelming majority of Americans have less money.

This exact situation has occurred in history. The most extreme example, when this practice was carried out for over a century without other sources of wealth to fund the country's spending, is Pre-Revolution France. The poor, the "one percent" if you will, were burdened with ALL of the taxes, and all of the government spending. Those who were rich and wealthy did not pay a single frank. I am not kidding. This, combined with Louis XVI's support of the American Revolution, bankrupted France. The results of this were the execution of Louis XVI and his wife, installment of pseudo-mob rule, the Jacobins, and the French Reign of Terror which lead to the deaths of over 30,000 French citizens. Also Napoleon.

2. Deregulation, and regulation, are not automatically good or evil. Far too many regulations stifle business and innovation. Far too little regulations allow risky practices and exploitation of the rules to make a higher profit. There needs to be a balance. There is a point where businesses can thrive under regulations to ensure that they are not making decisions that will potentially cost them, say... 50 percent of their net worth. That is not just bad for that business, that is bad for everyone who has stocks in that business. Far too little deregulation is one of the major contributing factors to the two worst recessions in American history. One of these was the Great Depression. No regulations on banks or business meant they could do whatever they wanted, and when the bubble burst, many crashed. The other occurred in 2007. If there were regulations to control the degree of risks businesses could take, the sub-prime mortgage fiasco would not have happened. That occurred only because there was no one watching the banks to make sure they did not do something unethical or absurdly risky. The degree of deregulation proposed by the Republican Party scares me because throughout American History, it has led to recessions. As a history nerd, the arguments made by Romney/Ryan make no sense to me.

Dear god another wall of text.