BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'

Subject: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: dianavan
Date: 11 Nov 04 - 03:14 PM

A Canadian perspective on the election. Something to think about.

http://www.vancourier.com/issues04/112204/opinion/112204op3.html

d

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: CarolC
Date: 11 Nov 04 - 03:23 PM

Interesting article. The future belongs to those who will lead the world in the direction of sustainable energy sources.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Genie
Date: 11 Nov 04 - 11:58 PM

HOW they "won" matters a lot more than WHO won.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Bobert
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 12:25 AM

While for the most part this writer's view of America is true, what he doesn't take into his perspective is The US's ability to fight. I'm not talking about fightin' people for their resources. Yeah, both Bush and Kerry agree that Iraq's oil is well worth fight in' for...

No, I'm talkin' about the America that went to war on the 40's againswt the facists. I'm not sure this America is still alive enough to fight for an energy policy that is renewable but at some point in time it will have to...

And guess what? It will also take an energy policy, unlike the Bush/Kerry ones, that is based primarilly on conservation and not on consumption. And its going to take an investment in mass transit and "work, live, play" mentality that doesn't require folks having to commute to jobs...

And its going to mean smaller homes and less SUV's and, and, and....

These shouldn't be hard choices. I mean, there is a real possibility that the oil will run out in the next 30 or so years and with a population that will be double ours in 30 years???? Whoa!!!...

So, no, given the choices between Bush and Kerry there was no real choice...

Nader in '08...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Ebbie
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 12:30 AM

We all lost. Some of us just don't know it yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: chris nightbird childs
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 12:33 AM

Yes, big difference between old/new, Bush/Kerry, but we have to show them the difference the PEOPLE of America can make!

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 11:47 AM

Right on, Ebbie!

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Amos
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 11:55 AM

Bobert:

I suggest to you that the problem is ALREADY conservation of energy being over-emphasized. This is a failure in imagination or the result of direct suppression by oil-interests.

Oil iis terrific -- its portability, energy-density ratio and (up until lately) availability make it a natural choice as a means of energizing our industrial sites including trucks and cars.

But to imply there is a crisis of energy while we live in a universe that has nothign else in it BUT energy is absurd.

I concur absolutely that enviro-friendly energy (renewable) is critical.

But rather than reduce consumptionl would the world not prosper more if there were systems in place capable of producing 100 times what anyone ever needed? Suppose you could travel by car for a penny a mile? Better? Absolutely. Suppose we could take a crate the size of a small car and install it in a remote village and thus generate unto it all the energy it could possibly need?

These capabilities are just over the horizon, technologically. They require determination and imagination and freedom from oil-fixated oligarchists, in order to be realized.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Bobert
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 12:26 PM

I agree, Amos, but with one comment. Until Americans are faced with the reality of consuming less they will not be overly motivated to invest in alternative energy sources. First things first. As long as the party is still going full swing, no reason to tell the band to go home...

BTW, this is one thing that the Repubs have done well ever since Reagan. Keep the party going. Consume, consume, consume... And just say "charge it".....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 12:41 PM

Can't agree about conservation being over-emphasized--opposite is true in the US, where the trend is towards over-consumption, and has been ever since the invention of cars.

Also, petroleum is a filthy, polluting source of energy that is the cause of more problems than it solves either in transportation or heating and electricity.

The infrastructure economies based upon the mobile car society are also much more expensive than infrastructure required for societies with a large investment in mass transit.

Eventually, we will end up with a transportation hybrid, that utilizes some low level polluting energy source for small private transport vehicles that are hooked up to a mass system.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Once Famous
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 12:49 PM

Hand wringing.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Genie
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 10:31 PM

Yes, both the Dems and the Repubs are too much in bed with big corporations, including the oil, coal, timber, and mining industries. But the Dubya administration is peculiarly anti-science and anti-conservation of any sort.

More importantly, had the Democrats taken contol of either house of Congress and/or the White House, real election (voter rights) reform would have had a good shot at passing. A bill requiring a paper trail for e-voting machines was introduced by Russ Holt a couple of years ago and it had over 50% -- bipartisan -- support, but the Repub leaders of the House and Senate kept the bill from being brought to the floor for a vote/

I fear that with the Republicans -- their extreme neo-con right wing, to be specific -- in control of all three branches of our government plus most of the radio and TV media, we are pretty close to being a one-party government. If/when that state of affairs fully materializes, democracy is dead.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Nov 04 - 01:18 PM

"More importantly, had the Democrats taken contol of either house of Congress and/or the White House, real election (voter rights) reform would have had a good shot at passing."

You are joking, right? Neither side is going to pass electoral reform legislation because both sides fear losing their built-into-the-system advantages, as was proved by McCain-Feingold.

Don't forget the Republicrats raised as much money as the Republicans this year, and that was AFTER the campaign finance reforms.

And then there is redistricting. Plenty of the redistricting was done by the courts, because the politicians couldn't reach fair, bi-partisan agreements.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Genie
Date: 14 Nov 04 - 12:43 AM

Call it plain ol' self-interest if you want, but I think the Dems got burned badly enough in 2000 and 2002 that they realize a more transparent, honest voting system is their only real shot at ever being anything but a minority party again. Big business is MORE tied to the Republicans than to the Democrats, and the TV and Radio media are now "liberal" only in the sense of hawking sex and drugs and giving lip service to "political correctness." (The media do not advocate for environmental causes, smaller government, reproductive "choice," education reform, gun control, or against capital punishment, repressive sentencing laws, etc.)

The Dems also know that generally the poor, the under-educated, the under-employed and racial minorities (except maybe Asians) tend to support them. Taking steps to ensure that inner-city voters, native Americans on reservations, etc., have as easy access to voting as suburbanites and rural America do is clearly to the Democrats' advantage.

If the Democrats, as a whole, thought having untestable e-voting and vote counting by private corporations would usually help them steal elections, I have little doubt they'd fight the reforms as much as the Republicans are doing now. LBJ and Richard Daly certainly did their share of ballot box stuffing back in the day. But times have changed.

I think the majority of our representatives on BOTH (ALL) sides of the aisle favor real election form.   All it takes, unfortunately, is the committee chairmen to keep the issue from coming up for a vote, and ever since 1995, those chairmanships have been Republican.

Genie

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: dianavan
Date: 14 Nov 04 - 07:50 PM

There are no Democrats and there are no Republicans. There is only corporate interest. Democracy in the U.S. is dead. Capitalism rules.

d

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Little Hawk
Date: 14 Nov 04 - 08:23 PM

That is correct Dianavan. The only reason those 2 parties exist is so that the $y$tem can convince the public that they still have a choice. It works this way. One party rules and serves the oligarchy until such time as it has very badly discredited itself. Then the other party takes over and serves the oligarchy in much the same fashion. They both try like hell to win, of course, because they relish winning and enjoying the perks of power...but at the end of the day they both serve the oligarchy, period.

In 1964 the public voted for Johnson, the "peace" candidate as opposed to Goldwater, the guy who was pictured in people's minds as the "war" candidate. What did they get when Johnson won? A war. A big one. That's what happens. It makes no damn bit of difference which set of scoundrels you elect in the USA, they do basically the same thing regardless, while promising not to. It's a fraud. It's as fraudulent as the old elections in the Soviet Union. There you had a choice to vote between various communist candidates, but they were all communist, and appointed by the $y$tem. In the USA you have a choice to vote between various corporate candidates and they are all capitalists, and servants of the oligarchy, appointed by the $y$tem. And who is the oligarchy? The bankers and the biggest corporations and the mass media owners. People like the Bushes, the Rockefellers, Kissinger, Conrad Black, the Kennedys, the Clintons, the Bronfmans (in Canada), the House of Windsor (in the UK), the Rothschilds, the Rand Corporation, Disney, Time-Life, the TriLateral Commission, etc, etc, etc.

Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans will EVER deliver the American public from this lot of tyrants, because they are funded by them.

It's divided up into Democratic and Republican to fool the poor sucker who votes into thinking that there is actually an alternative out there...and to keep you people divided against each other, which wastes your energy to no purpose.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Gypsy
Date: 14 Nov 04 - 09:29 PM

That's fer shure. have been saying for days now, what difference does it make?

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 04 - 09:29 PM

Little Hawk, oligarchy is much too kind a word for these folks. Kleptocracy or Fascisti more suitable.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Peace
Date: 14 Nov 04 - 10:01 PM

Kleptocracy

Right. They thought they'd take something for it and they did: they took the American people.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 04 - 01:17 PM

Elections only matter to those who are in it for the political spoils, and even then, only to the tribal chiefs distributing the spoils to their tribal loyalists.

Bill Moyers keeps harping about the new gilded age we are in, but I don't here that sort of analysis coming from anyone else. Since he will not be with us for much longer, I'm not sure who will lead the charge to clean out and exile big business interests from the halls of government the way it had to be done in the FDR era. But this is the cycle here in the US. Business interests take over government, corruption and graft reign supreme for a couple of decades as they did in the late 19th and early 20th century, and have been for the last couple decades of the 20th century (it really got going big time as soon as the Republicans got back in under Reagan), and continues now.

We'll have to have another Depression before it gets better.

Subject: RE: BS: Why it doesn't matter who 'won'
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Nov 04 - 05:08 PM

Agreed, GUEST. I was being very kind to just call them an oligarchy. How about "fascist murderers incorporated", then?