And the System just keeps on working!
POSTED BY: Geezer
UPDATED: Thursday, August 3, 2006 21:59
VIEWED: 7375
PAGE 2 of 10
Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
Of course the system would be working, even more effectively, if the voters were more discriminating in the first place.
And if all politicians were honest. And if everyone has the same vision of a perfect world where we'd all live together in a big shiny castle on a hill with all the cotton candy and chocolate we could eat...and, and pony rides and fluffy bunnies, and...
Another benefit of the System is that, even if the voters aren't as discriminating as some might like, it moves too slowly to let massive changes take place in a short time. Things can't get irreversably out of hand before enough of the previoulsy less discriminating figure something's going off the tracks and vote for the other guys in the next election.
Later this year, we'll see if the voters' judgement improves, from your point of view.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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SergeantX,
I think Bush's administration has probed all the weak areas of the democratic process.
That would include signing statements, unitary executive, exploiting supposed "gaps" between US and international law, secret programs without informing congress, 'preventative' war, throwing elections with partisan Secretaries of State and election workers, re-classifying previously unclassified and de-classified documents, deliberately slowing up FOI requests, coercing and muzzling scientists and technocrats, etc ....
he's marked all the problems like big red x's.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Geezer:
...And if everyone has the same vision of a perfect world where we'd all live together in a big shiny castle on a hill with all the cotton candy and chocolate we could eat...and, and pony rides and fluffy bunnies, and...
...and let's not forget restarting a certain television series.
Quote:
Another benefit of the System is that, even if the voters aren't as discriminating as some might like, it moves too slowly to let massive changes take place in a short time. Things can't get irreversably out of hand before enough of the previoulsy less discriminating figure something's going off the tracks and vote for the other guys in the next election.
I suppose. It sure seems like a lot of irreversible damage has already been done. It'll be a hell of a long time before we can 'uninvade' Iraq for example. But yeah, I'll cheer for the system with you. It'll only ever work as well as we want it to though.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
That would include signing statements, unitary executive, exploiting supposed "gaps" between US and international law, secret programs without informing congress, 'preventative' war, throwing elections with partisan Secretaries of State and election workers, re-classifying previously unclassified and de-classified documents, deliberately slowing up FOI requests, coercing and muzzling scientists and technocrats, etc ....
he's marked all the problems like big red x's.
Maybe this could be seized as a real opportunity. Seriously, is anyone proposing actually shoring up our constitution to cover all the holes the neo-cons have found? It reminds of hiring playtesters for video games, with the specific aim of discovering game-breaking strategies and loopholes. We owe GW a great debt of gratitude for uncovering the weaknesses in our system. We could even throw in a pie in the face and a nice long prison term while we're at it. Sort of our way of saying 'thanks'.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:
Originally posted by Geezer:
Later this year, we'll see if the voters' judgement improves, from your point of view.
It seems unlikely. My guess, albeit a cynical one, is that they'll install a Democrat who will abuse our system in all the ways GW didn't get around to.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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BUSH WAS NOT ELECTED. And it has nothing to do with discrepancies between the popular vote and the electoral vote and everything to do with pervasive intentional fraud.
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Don't piss in my face and tell me it's raining.
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Quote:Bush dropped the hunt for ObL and went off in pursuit of oil. I would imagine that the moment Bush set his sights on Iraq and cozied up to Pakistan ObL sighed in relief. Talk about aid and comfort!
Wow, thats an ironic comment. "Treason" is specifically defined as 'giving aid and comfort to the enemy'. This in turn gives you hope that Bush will be tried for 'giving aid and comfort to the enemy'.
Quote:You're assuming that the detainees are "the enemy". In other words you've convicted them before they've even been charged. You call yourself a lawyer but you're just a right-wing moron.
The ruling your applauding is about 'giving aid and comfort to the enemy' in accordance with our treaty obligations.
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Don't piss in my face and tell me it's raining.
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SergeantX
I'm kind of hoping for that too - though I'm not sure there is either enough voter anger to fuel the effort, or the political mechanism to do that.
:fingers crossed:
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Quote:Geezer- You're still using circular logic because you haven't considered a situation where the evidence exists but an indictment or conviction doesn't happen... DOH!! That is exactly the case where the system DOESN'T work. Also, there are cases where the evidence doesn't exist but a person is convicted anyway. We know that never happens either.
If we get a conviction, based on evidence and the working of the legal process, it works! If we don't get a conviction, because there's not enough evidence to either start the process or convince a jury, it works!
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Don't piss in my face and tell me it's raining.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
Maybe this could be seized as a real opportunity. Seriously, is anyone proposing actually shoring up our constitution to cover all the holes the neo-cons have found? It reminds of hiring playtesters for video games, with the specific aim of discovering game-breaking strategies and loopholes. We owe GW a great debt of gratitude for uncovering the weaknesses in our system. We could even throw in a pie in the face and a nice long prison term while we're at it. Sort of our way of saying 'thanks'.
SergeantX
I'd never thought of it that way before. I like it. This administration is game-testing the Constitution. Simple. Accurate. And points to an opportunity - work on the bugs they have identified.
It reminds me of a saying we have in my community, "It's a feature. Not a flaw." Many times this is in the context of how to spin a product characteristic that the customer may not initially appreciate, and that would be expensive to modify, into one that they come to see as beneficial. More importantly it is used to remind us to revisit our assumptions and problem definition and figure out whether or not a given characteristic is really detrimental.
Instead of focussing in on all the wrong that this administration is doing, shift focus to how to make it right.
Nice, SergeantX. Nice!
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