AstroProdigy

So then the problem also dually lies in the Clinton administration. The Clinton administration made plenty of mistakes too, but that doesn't life Bush from blame. Besides some of the problems are a result of massive Republican resistance during the Clinton years to anything other than cutting and/or privatizing the already existing system further. It's the same busted ideology that constantly repeats "government is bad" to itself until its blue in the face so when they have power they turn it into a self fulfilling prophecy. Also Bill Clinton was famed as a compromiser. In this case he should have never compromised with Republicans since their only purpose was to bust the system to justify making it entirely privatized, but then again he didn't have much choice with their majority.

There's a reason people are poor and then their kids are much more likely to be poor. Is it the kids fault they have much higher failure rates than rich kids? You can't just blame an entire subset of society as natural failures and never bother to recognize nor bother to look into the reasons it happens that way. No laziness among one group over another is not an explanation.

I think the notion that Iran might flood the market with cheap oil, sold in euros, and thus crash the dollar is a real threat, but politicians won't bring that up because if we had a serious discussion on it then it would force us to address an economy based on debt and consuming much more than we produce. No one wants to commit that political suicide as Americans still want a quick fix to everything so they can go on borrowing more. That's why popular proposals to our problems are offshore oil drilling, blaming China, and building a wall between the US and Mexico. They want quick, easy solutions that are easy to understand and don't challenge what they're doing in life (even if that's part of the problem). Americans have been tricked into thinking debt is good and a country can grow indefinitely on consumption. The reason Iran is so easy to turn into an "existential threat" is because it's easy to put into a sound byte and Ahmedinejad is already hated due to a massive media campaign (despite him not being the ruler of Iran). If we actually addressed the real threat Iran poses by creating a surplus to start paying off our debt and becoming a producer country again so our money is backed by real value rather than how much we can dominate the world then there will no longer be a threat and we can stop having to listen to politicians lie to us.

You cite Brazil of all countries? Why thank you. Brazil considers people of mixed ancestry to be mixed. In the US if you are at all black then you are black. In the US if you are at all black you are automatically impure and have the same label no matter how much mixture you have. !@#$%^&* is the Latin word for literally "black". I know this is true for Portuguese, French, and Italian, but I'm not sure for Spanish. You have racial terms descended from colonialism in Portuguese, but only in America is someone who's half white and half black considered just black. It's a label that was put on people if they were just a little black which shows how Americans still see any African blood as something impure that makes you black only. It's kind of how you can't be half diseased because once you have that disease (in this case African ancestry) you are just diseased. It's changing somewhat, but still is strongly in place. Notice that someone who is half asian and half white isn't generally referred to as asian (!@#$%^&*uming people know they're half asian and half white).

I'm sure you did, and as have I on the DSB boards. Yet, I keep getting roped into it on this false hope that he will realise that his myopic think- ing is, if not wrong, then flawed After all, it is only based on an obvi- ous disliking of anything the US (or 'the West') supports. Such subjective thought rationalised in this manner will always be flawed. Anywho... As Iran is a signatory to the UN Charter it is bound by the decisions of the UN Security Council. Full stop. Of course it can ignore them, as it does, but were the Security Council to press the matter it is will within its competence to force Iran to comply. And I stand uncorrected. Thank you. The simple fact of the matter is Iran is under obligations arising from the NPT to comply with certain protocols. Rather than doing this, Iran contin- ues to stonewall the IAEA. Evidence of this can be found in the various reports issued by the IAEA where it notes that Iran continues to not pro- vide certain bits of information. With few exceptions, Iran is the only na- tion to adopt such an abstinent position. Even the greatest cynic would concede that if Iran were fully transparent with its nuclear activities that this matter would be resolved. The absence of this creates the current climate. To summarise, Iran's actions, or lack thereof, smacks of noncompliance. Even a less erudite observer would make the conclusion based on Iran's actions, or inactions as the case may be. Fox News redresses the imbal- ance in the American media. And comparatively the BBC is more objec- tive. -Hoch...I'll take my Nobel Peace Prize now. -Hoch This all ignores the point that what Iran doesn't comply with is what it's legally required to do so. IF a country signed the Geneva Convention and was then being asked to lay down its army by Geneva then it wouldn't be legally obligated to do so. You can significantly change the rules here, but that would require the countries of the world to sign a new charter and even if they weren't required to for it to take effect you'd have to have the IAEA monitoring every little detail of every nuclear program of every country the way we expect Iran to allow the IAEA to do. Now I may wish for the theocracy to be toppled, but the way the laws are being applied and some being made up from thin air specifically to any US adversary is very hypocritical.

Carter didn't put the clerics in power in Iran. They came to power by using the dissatisfaction of the Iranian people with the corrupt Shah who was put in power in place of the democratically elected leader because he didn't serve our interests. Also the questions Iran hasn't answered were ones that Iran isn't legally obligated to answer. Therefore, to the extent of existing laws Iran has complied.

I'm saying I was making the same points you did using sarcasm, but you didn't seem to figure out that I was using sarcasm. Maybe I need to practice it more. I used sarcasm to ridicule the notion that Obama can possibly be 46% Arabic. You don't have to tell me there are Arab Christians as I am fairly obsessed with ethnography. The point about the cartoon that it was trying to make was also sarcasm. Of course every part of it was based on lies. It was making fun of all the lies being made of Obama and his wife. Obama knew it was sarcasm so I was surprised he didn't let it go. Usually when an African American leader makes something out of nothing it's someone like Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton making a publicity stunt like with the black hole controversy in the other thread, but Obama is the type of guy who wants to avoid his race as an election issue because there is still a large percentage of Americans who would never vote for a black candidate combined with one that would if the alternative is an unpopular Republican Party, but is looking for excuses not to. The sarcasm wasn't as a racial attack. It was used as an attack on those who use racial attacks. Obama is half black in any other country, but in America he is black. If he was in Brazil he'd be described as mixed, but in the US having any black blood makes you "impure" so you automatically are black. It's part of why racism in America was never fully addressed, just largely swept under the rug.

Ok do you not understand sarcasm?

I don't need to come up with excuses not to vote for the Republican. They are by their very philosophy opposed to my own. The only way I'd vote for Republican is if they were especially reasonable and the Democrat really sucked. Obama being black actually hurts him more than it helps. Democrats have a 10 point advantage in the general election over Republicans yet Obama is more even with McCain. Does it have to do with McCain? Hardly since conservatives tend to not be excited about him. If Obama was white he'd ride the Democratic advantage to easy victory, but Obama is black so that keeps McCain compe!@#$%^&*ive. If a black candidate who does everything possible not to look threatening to white people that Obama does ran in an election where Republicans didn't have an overwhelming disadvantage he'd be way behind. The only reason he even has a chance despite being black is because he's a Democrat in an advantageous election year. Heck even 22% of Americans admit they would never vote for an African American candidate and people believe 39% of their friends and family wouldn't vote for him because he's black. Even Hillary Clinton who unites people on the right in their hatred of her has a big advantage against McCain in polling because she's a Democrat in a very advantageous election year. African Americans vote overwhelmingly Democrat anyway so all Obama can do with the reverse racism vote is increase turnout. I agree that you can argue Obama beat Clinton because he's black, but in the general election it's the big disadvantage that no one in the mainstream media seems to want to admit. In short you are full of something because your entire notion isn't based on real proof, but instead on your own bias. I do have hope, though, in the way younger people don't seem to have much of any problem voting for Obama because he's black. For the most part those people who won't vote for him and are young do it for other reasons. It's clear now that a post racial divide won't happen until most of the older generations brought up to be racist die off.

Illegal immigrants won't work? Do you have any idea what immigrant mentality is? It's when an immigrant comes to a country and realize they have to work because this isn't their country. That's only magnified with illegal immigrants because they aren't even supposed to be here so they really need to earn their keep. Immigration has been one of the biggest strengths of America and continues to be one today.

I hope you're joking because that's a picture of the Who, a band, not the WHO, an acronym for the World Health Organization. If you weren't joking then LOL!

If they want to lose weight meat isn't the thing they need to stop eating. That could aid them in exercising. They need to jack up the price of cookies for these girls and then subsidize a gym membership and some protein shakes.

Hahaha it's funny how they put a hispanic reporter on the scene to avoid looking racist. Looks like Fox News is playing the PC game too.

The study was published in 2000. We're bound to be way lower in the list by now. We have had Bush at the helm for almost 8 years after all.

2nd sentence appears to make no sense whatsoever.. ("decided the center is anything, but bull!@#$%^&* and ..." ??) are you saying that obama has magically turned into a centrist, or that he used to be a centrist? either is a bit laughable mccain isn't a right wing nut (try huckabee), he's just a nut. either way, mccain > obama because of supreme court and john paul stevens is almost 90 years old Sorry I meant decided the "centrist" view is mostly the way to try to set yourself up as the compromise candidate for everyone to vote for. Some side or another is usually right. Compromising by going to the middle of what people believe just means being half wrong (most of the time). Obama's playing politics which is disappointing, but understandable for the candidate running against a still huge racist grain of people looking for every excuse they can get not to vote for the black guy. Huckabee is actually further towards the center than McCain is on economic issues. See McCain is one of those supply side idiots who believes in a policy that never worked. McCain is better because of the supreme court? Sure if you want to have your rights stripped in the name of "fighting terrorism" for decades to come and want America to turn into Jesusland where the Bible is consulted before laws are made. I guess you're a Christian so you don't care, though.

So let's say a CEO makes millions therefore everyone else in the company gets paid plenty! That sounds so brilliant I'm going to have to take the class you've been taking because all my "liberal elitist" professors haven't been teaching me this new branch of logic.

And 4 years in a warzone is a short amount of time? McCain has been trying to get buddy buddy with him all throughout the campaign. I do agree about the cartoon, though. Obama's candidacy has turned into a disappointment since he's decided the center is anything, but bull!@#$%^&* and got rid of some of the promising aspects of his candidacy. Still, though, a centrist disappointment is leagues better than a right wing nut especially now that 20 years of on and off right wing economic policies have shredded our economy to bits and will continue to do so.

You think something like that would put to rest the idiotic notion that Obama is a liberal black supremacist similar to Jesse Jackson, but the people who believe it don't do it based on facts anyway.

The highest paid public employees make huge sums therefore all teachers get paid more than enough? Oh lord I do not want to have your brain doing my thinking because it'd probably destroy anything it touched.

Russia thought the Cold War was over, but the US didn't like peace and prosperity so it helped rape Russia of its resources in the 90s and then demonized Russia after 9/11 despite the clear common ground for oil interests so now Russia is an adversary again. We've been trying to make sure Russia under no cir!@#$%^&*stances could ever be a threat again. That's why we insisted on the Soviet Union's collapse and tried to turn all the other post Soviet states into US client states and completely collapse Russia to the point where its economy was in ruins and could pose no threat. Unfortunately it recovered and we're adversaries for it. This happened entirely as a US construct as is this bull!@#$%^&* that Bush is pulling now.

It's called an immigrant mentality. It involves the feeling that you have to succeed because you aren't in your own country and are being given an opportunity by being in this country. African Americans were brought in chains as slaves and were even willing to play the game after the Civil War, but it was followed by a hundred years of Jim Crow and lingering racism going on further after that. There's a reason Native Americans have high alcohol addiction rates and it's not because they're inferior. It's all related to the cir!@#$%^&*stances of their situation. No matter what they do the invaders who massacred them will have their land. It's the reason why Europe's Arab immigrants have so much trouble in Europe while American Arab immigrants don't. They don't feel like they can be accepted into the cultures because those cultures use multiculturalism as a veil for not wanting to accept Arabs as part of those nations ethnic group. France had those riots because Arabs feel economically discriminated, but at least France tries to !@#$%^&*imilate them unlike in the UK which has terrorist attacks because it purposefully avoids !@#$%^&*imilating the South Asian Muslim immigrants it has. This is why Mexican Americans are an upwardly mobile group. Despite all the redneck racists they're still a group that is capable of !@#$%^&*imilating even in huge numbers. Caribbean Americans and African immigrants have much better economic prospects because of their immigrant mentality. This has absolutely nothing to do with racial inferiorities. I don't want to sound like this is the reason to vote for Obama, but African Americans will have trouble blaming the man for their hardships if the man is black. It won't solve things, but its a start. Other things required would be fixing the inner city schools, providing more after school programs for African Americans youth so they have something productive to do, and helping all those single mothers who are especially prevalent and struggling in the African American community.

Well guys I was wrong and I admit it. When I said our human development index for 2007 was at 12th place and was 2 notches below France I was wrong and I'm sorry. The 2007 estimates were actually for 2005 so the US has likely been passed by a whole slew of other countries and is at around 20th place if not worse for 2007 estimates and that's not counting where we'll be by the end of the 2008 "not" recession. Again I apologize for not looking deep enough to see this and allowing NBVegita the chance to play devil's advocate to claim its all okay as long as we're better off Nigeria, Pakistan, Brazil, India, China, and Indonesia which, although all poor countries, have to surp!@#$%^&* us before we should consider changing our economic strategy simply because they are close to or above our absolute population size. Sure we've been surp!@#$%^&*ed by France, Britain, and Spain and probably also stagnant Italy and unification burdened Germany too at this point (or will be soon). Sure all these countries have large populations (around 45 million for Spain around 60 million for Italy, France, and the UK, and million for Germany), much higher population densities, much less natural resources per capita, and the dreaded social safety net. That's alright because Nigeria is poorer and despite the fact that its a completely different country culturally with endless ethnic and corruption problems its a better country for comparison simply because its population is closer to that of the US. Just because the population of those 5 countries in Europe combined is around the same of the US and the fact that the EU now serves economic management for an even bigger population than the US doesn't mean we should dare criticize the US's failure in comparison. Instead let's keep comparing our economy to Pakistan and until Pakistan is better off we're doing a good job. Anyway to repeat myself I'm sorry for the mistake. P.S.: As for the graph originally posted Aileron forgot to mention the big tax cuts by Kennedy, Reagan, and Bush that are the drops in percentage of the top individual tax bracket all required deficit spending, which increased the deficit, which, with the interest involved on that debt, required more money to be printed, and thus caused inflation and the !@#$%^&*ets of the lower and middle classes to deteriorate and thus the lower classes are the ones who actually payed for this in the long run. Now with Kennedy the top individual tax bracket was reduced from 91% to 70% which is still a large majority of tax revenues, he didn't spike military spending along with tax cuts, and we could afford it as a traditionally lender country at that time, but with Reagan and Bush this led to a great deterioration of the worth of money carried by middle and lower classes due to inflation and thus was paid for by them, but in the sneaky way that characterizes modern conservatives. Again this was paid for by deficit and in the long term by the poorer in the population who found their spending power reduced. I don't want to bash all Republicans as Bush Sr saw that Reagan's tax cuts were unsustainable and sacrificed his own political career to try fix it, thus leading to the longest economic boom in US history along with Clinton's policies which has been destroyed by Bush's tax cuts and heavy spending and the resultant deterioration of the economic situation of those who aren't rich. To put it plainly this graph is utter oversimplified bull!@#$%^&* that was created to further an utterly failed economy philosophy know as supply side economics Or to be provided with another explanation click here although it only explains part of the trick of the supply siders.

I'm waiting for the day Europe drops NATO for the useless US tool that it is and forms its own defense organization that's just as effective. That's pretty much the only way to get the US to quit trying to control Europe. If given a choice between a partnership with Western Europe or the US, Eastern Europe would pick Western Europe who they will have to live with over a dying empire. A European defense organization would also naturally be more accommodating to Russia and could conceivably be joined by Russia one day.

I once ran my bike into someone else's in front of mine, flipped over a full 360 with my head hitting the ground and got up with only scrapes on my arms and legs. I understand requiring helmets for motorcycles as its the difference between life and death and where I come from in Cyprus people die from not wearing helmets on their motorcycles all the time, but bicycles are hardly dangerous enough to require helmets. Then again that fall might have caused brain damage and I aint not thinking too good.

The edrama in this thread just made my boring internship interesting. Anyway, all this explains why I was forced to school Aceflyer in the world discussion board for his complete ignorance and willingness to take a strong stand on issues that he has no idea what he's talking about. He seems like the type who !@#$%^&*umes he must always be right. What zone is he sysop?