Questions for American Atheists

[cratehorus]

Yes and I'll vote for Obama.

Romney is a worthless piece of crud and he was still better than any of the other fucking jackasses who competed for the republibertarianeo-conazi nomination.

I'd like to second this motion, and add this:

Libertarians= Neo-Nazis
Teaparty =KKK
people who don't vote=anarchist douchebags

[Reforged]

No matter what side you vote for you'll still get the same result. A candidate who will make handshakes with people who had power before he was in office, will gain power while hes in office and will continue to gain power after he has left office. These handshakes will determine his policies, his statements and his terms. This will have occured with his predecessor and will inevitably occur with his successor.
The candidates are puppets and the puppeteers are many, even should all of these puppeteers succumb to old age most will have a heir to their legacies or be replaced by a competitor.
So don't you worry your pretty little heads off about voting wether you live in America, Spain, France, Russia, Germany, England, Greece, Turkey, etc etc.
Democracy is a stage, the elections just another performance and your freewill a carefully constructed illusion.

[cratehorus]

Democracy is a stage, the elections just another performance and your freewill a carefully constructed illusion.

SO what exactly is your favorite form of government? What would you prefer? theocracy?

[Reforged]

Democracy is a stage, the elections just another performance and your freewill a carefully constructed illusion.

SO what exactly is your favorite form of government? What would you prefer? theocracy?

To date there has been no form of government created capable of functioning properly and caring for its people while accounting for mankinds selfish nature. Capitalism, unfortunately, reflects humanities base nature which is why it has been so widely adopted. Its all about gaining more than your fellow man, increasing your station and steadily consuming more and more. It is of course unsustainable and we all know it. Communism works in theory except that it fails to take into account human nature which results in a select few being far more "equal" than others. Ancient Greece came fairly close to what I would consider perfect democracy. The community as a whole voted on bills and motions, not representitives. However, this would require everyone to be very well informed and in a modern day setting where media influence is as powerful as it is biased I am uncertain if it would not simply shift the reins more firmly into the grasp of the corrupt.
Any system created will always fall prey to the natures of those who create them. I therefore conclude that inorder to create a system that works we would need to change human nature to be intelligent, inquisitive and benevolent... which is unlikely to happen as such people are rare and would not be able to pass on their genes and memes more than the vast majority who, and lets be fair to them, are complete fucking morons.

[Cato]

my guess is that forfeiting a campaign promise in light of learning more about the effects of moving too swiftly or unilaterally, is a show of intelligence. people who don't change, show me that they're not open to new information or feel like they already know it all. president is not dictator, he tries to rule by committee which isn't doing him any favors, because repubs block so much of his work. and they do it with a very upfront and outspoken agenda, starting with grover nordquist's pledge. how much sense does it make to sign a pledge from some guy upon entering elected office? you corner yourself from negotiations right off the bat.

the reason it seems to me, that min invoked mccain is that the complaint is how slow obama is traversing his list of promises, versus what would've gotten done if he didn't win. i agree with what he said and i have no way of knowing if it would've been right, but this is a discussion forum and for coversation's sake, based on just the links he posted, it makes sense. yes, you can't keep saying it's all bush's fault, unless it is. when we're put in a predicament like his administration put us in, you don't pop out in 3, 4 or maybe 8 years, with shiny new pearls but you chip away at it until it clears up. you need to tear shit up worse sometimes, to fix things. i think he is the best chance of keeping things on that path in november.

Your political messiah doesn't give a shit.

i wish i was privied to the info that you are, to be able to make a comment like that.

My use of the word 'messiah' was intentional and referenced the unyielding fealty Min has for the Democrat party, perhaps too much poetic license...I'll leave it to you.

Everyone understands the turd that President Obama was given, but at some point you have to stand up, turn around and flush the turd. You talk about the 3, 4, or 8 years required to enact change. If there were some semblence of change, as promised, in the first 3 to 4 years I would be inclined to do my part to ensure the man got to continue the mission to the 8th year. The problem is that nothing has changed. David Patraeus is a perfect example. Bush's General darling that is now the director of the CIA...all Obama. There was a Democrat, might have been Hillary but I forget, that got some stick for referring to him as Betrayus. My brother that's in the Army laughed it off saying that people in the Army had been calling him that for years, yet he becomes the director of the CIA.

You claim that the Republicans have hampered Obama. No shit. This has been the case since the Constitution was ratified and the obvioius result of a two party system. My problem is that this is spouted as if to also say that Democrats in Congress never hampered a Republican president's ambition. What about the first two years where Obama's party had control of both houses of Congress? Yes, I know that the Democrats didn't have the requisite 60 votes in the Senate to prevent filibuster, but they rammed through the Affordable Health Care Act right? Why not anything else? Why not troops home, that didn't require action by the Congress? Obama's last budget proposal got rejected 99-0 in the Senate. This hardly smacks of pure Republican obstruction.

Your reply regarding McCain is simply a rationalization. McCain being part of the discussion is nothing more than a non-sequitor. McCain has never been president; therefore, any conclusion made on the premise 'if he was' is meaningless.

I will assume that we don't see things much differently politically; however, I use effectiveness as a measure of success from our President; whereas you are ok with the unrealized ideal. Reagan and Clinton were both very effective Presidents, both for most of their tenures worked with political opposition majorities in the Congress.

[cratehorus]

SO what exactly is your favorite form of government? What would you prefer? theocracy?

To date there has been no form of government created capable of functioning properly and caring for its people while accounting for mankinds selfish nature. Capitalism, unfortunately, reflects humanities base nature which is why it has been so widely adopted. Its all about gaining more than your fellow man, increasing your station and steadily consuming more and more. It is of course unsustainable and we all know it. Communism works in theory except that it fails to take into account human nature which results in a select few being far more "equal" than others. Ancient Greece came fairly close to what I would consider perfect democracy. The community as a whole voted on bills and motions, not representitives. However, this would require everyone to be very well informed and in a modern day setting where media influence is as powerful as it is biased I am uncertain if it would not simply shift the reins more firmly into the grasp of the corrupt.
Any system created will always fall prey to the natures of those who create them. I therefore conclude that inorder to create a system that works we would need to change human nature to be intelligent, inquisitive and benevolent... which is unlikely to happen as such people are rare and would not be able to pass on their genes and memes more than the vast majority who, and lets be fair to them, are complete fucking morons.

Communists took over Europe, and if it wasn't for few select events they might have run the world. They killed Hitler, take a second look at the facts and DO NOT get suckered into the modern McCarthyist propaganda

......and what's all this changing human nature crap? Sounds like eugenics...........

[Reforged]

To date there has been no form of government created capable of functioning properly and caring for its people while accounting for mankinds selfish nature. Capitalism, unfortunately, reflects humanities base nature which is why it has been so widely adopted. Its all about gaining more than your fellow man, increasing your station and steadily consuming more and more. It is of course unsustainable and we all know it. Communism works in theory except that it fails to take into account human nature which results in a select few being far more "equal" than others. Ancient Greece came fairly close to what I would consider perfect democracy. The community as a whole voted on bills and motions, not representitives. However, this would require everyone to be very well informed and in a modern day setting where media influence is as powerful as it is biased I am uncertain if it would not simply shift the reins more firmly into the grasp of the corrupt.
Any system created will always fall prey to the natures of those who create them. I therefore conclude that inorder to create a system that works we would need to change human nature to be intelligent, inquisitive and benevolent... which is unlikely to happen as such people are rare and would not be able to pass on their genes and memes more than the vast majority who, and lets be fair to them, are complete fucking morons.

Communists took over Europe, and if it wasn't for few select events they might have run the world. They killed Hitler, take a second look at the facts and DO NOT get suckered into the modern McCarthyist propaganda

......and what's all this changing human nature crap? Sounds like eugenics...........

Read what I said about communism again. I wasn't saying it was good or bad, I was stating a fact that human nature twists it. It was good in theory because it was a good system, humans don't do equality though. Its not how we've evolved, its not how we've survived. We are predisposed to attempt to out do each other, this is no longer a sufficent means of survival.

Eugenics would certainly be a means, yes. Of course ever since Hitler looked it up in a dictionary, decided he didn't like that definition and created his own people have been less than receptive towards it. I presume thats the light you're casting it in.

This wasn't what I was suggesting but at the end of the day, what would be wrong with it? So you've altered a few chromosomes to make your child smarter, so what? Now you've altered a few more to make him kinder and a few others to safe-guard against genetic diseases and defects. Perhaps make him more athletic too.
At what point is any of this a bad thing?

[jackman]

The problem is ...Betrayus.

lol. yeah, i don't get that one. at least they got him in a position where his expertise is used but not so clearly calling shots on the ground. you may know better what his range as director of cia is, as it relates to the military. that's not my thing.

... but they rammed through the Affordable Health Care Act right? Why not anything else? Why not troops home, that didn't require action by the Congress?

yeah, he slammed thru the health care act but gave away one testicle (the bigger one) in the process. he could've done that with the troops i suppose and i wish he would've chose that option.

Your reply regarding McCain is simply a rationalization. McCain being part of the discussion is nothing more than a non-sequitor. McCain has never been president; therefore, any conclusion made on the premise 'if he was' is meaningless.

true, it was just an opinion i shared and stated as such.

I will assume that we don't see things much differently politically; however, I use effectiveness as a measure of success from our President; whereas you are ok with the unrealized ideal. Reagan and Clinton were both very effective Presidents, both for most of their tenures worked with political opposition majorities in the Congress.

likely we don't see them much differently. i can partially agree that his term to this point seems unrealized, but that doesn't mean to me that he's gotten nothing solid accomplished. very easy to find a list of what he's gotten done in his time (ie., http://obamaachievements.org/list). relative to his hope and change jargon, it does look like his accomplishments are slim, but he's getting the wheels greased behind the scenes.

[Minimalist]

McCain lost the election.

And it is a fucking good thing he did. Let me spell it out for you since you obviously did not get the point.

McCain has only one answer for any international issue. Drop bombs on the other guy. He would have continued the insane war in Iraq and would never leave Afghanistan.

The only two realities we had were Obama (not great) and McCain...infinitely worse.

Oddly this time we have the same choice with Mitt Fucking Romney cast in the role of the boring war monger.

Get it now?

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Communists took over Europe,

Well no,they didn't actually. The USSR was in in Eastern Europe,and was a totalitarian dictatorship,with little to do with Communism.. The rest of Europe has never been 'Communist' (except East Germany)

Ideal form of government? The notion is Utopian nonsense. I'm happy enough with what we have in Australia; a form of regulated capitalism with some socialist elements.

Every political,social and economic system ever invented has been temporary.