Fate of Io
Attn. Americans
Posted by Temporal at 2004/11/01 11:39:57 PST

[size="10"]VOTE[/size]

That is all.

2004/11/03 14:25:46 PST by mystik3eb [0/43]
[mystik3eb's avatar]

I must say, Kerry earned my respect by simply dropping the issue and not pursuing it when he's obviously lost.

Now, let's do something we should've done for the past four years and unite! Who cares who wins the Presidency? Once he's won, he's won! There's no point in arguing and getting mad at each other and seperating just cuz the person we wanted to win didn't. So let's unite under Bush (simply because he's the President) for the sake of unity.

Some of you might say I wouldn't say the same thing if Kerry had won. Actually I would, I've been saying it since before Kerry was even running. We just need to unite and stop ripping each other apart. Nobody's perfect; neither Bush nor Kerry are perfect, but I think they both would do a pretty good job in the Oval Office.

What say you?

2004/11/04 05:14:26 PST by 3Der [0/7]

I thought you people were from europe..o_0

2004/11/04 10:46:09 PST by Temporal [manager]
Edited at 2004/11/04 10:47:42 PST
[Temporal's avatar]

Why on Earth would I unify behind policies which I believe to be damaging our economy and destroying our respect abroad? No, I will continue to voice my discontent with Bush just as I would with any president whose actions were so absurdly myopic and arrogant.

And, no, 3Der, we're mostly American here.

2004/11/10 08:41:01 PST by Seraph [0/1]

I refuse to unite under Bush because he stands for basically everything I'm against, but I will unite under the name of America and what this country is supposed to stand for. I personally dont think that we should try to just agree with someone because they are president, I mean think about the first ammendment, voicing our opinion on the current situation of our nation is one of the biggest freedoms we have. However, I do agree that we should'nt be rude or mean about it. If someone has an opinion, we should respect it, because someone's opinions are their truth, it's what makes them who they are, and everyone should respect that.

2004/11/10 08:43:02 PST by Seraph [0/1]

Sorry, I did'nt mean to go off ranting and raving, I should probably spend more time on the game than talking about politics anyway. lol

2004/11/10 22:46:07 PST by mystik3eb [0/43]
[mystik3eb's avatar]

No, Seraph, you're doing exactly what I want most Americans to do. You don't have to agree with the President, but at least don't totally lash out at him and his supporters. I couldn't stand the fact that there was, for example, a tour about Voting for Change: For America Coming Together. Why do people think they can unite under a president if they won't unite under one anyway? It makes me mad that we can't just unite under whoever is president unless they're obviousy terribly evil and malignant and are making our country a dictatorship, which Bush hasn't and won't.

However, as you said, this isn't the place for political arguments and I won't continue my argument. I just wish we could all say "I don't agree with him, but I'll support him for the sake of supporting America and unity". After all, that's exactly what terrorists don't want us to do, right?

2004/11/12 01:34:57 PST by Temporal [manager]
[Temporal's avatar]

Unity behind bad policies only hurts America more.

"After all, that's exactly what terrorists don't want us to do, right?"

What the terrorists want or don't want us to do is completely irrelevant. We should do what's right. I am so, so sick of hearing about what the terrorists "want" us to do. 99% of the time it's not even something the terrorists care about, but just the opposite of what the speaker things we should be doing.

2004/11/14 11:13:35 PST by Bookmark19 [0/0]
Edited at 2004/11/14 11:13:57 PST
2004/11/14 12:53:46 PST by mystik3eb [0/43]
Edited at 2004/11/14 12:55:50 PST
[mystik3eb's avatar]

That site sounds like a bunch of bitter liberals trying to find some way to convince Americans of fraud that probably doesn't exist, though it could. Personally I can't stand when people buy into conspiracies and that kinda stuff; it's like these people need drama in their lives or something, cuz that's usually all it is.

And as far as "bad policies" goes: I have to disagree with you, Temp. I don't think he has bad policies. Can't say the same about the environment cuz I don't know enough, but with most everything else...yea. Based on my research (man that sounds formal...), when it comes down to it, people can really only argue for or against Bush based on morals, cuz he's not doing much of anything wrong otherwise. If he was, he wouldn't have had my vote.

2004/11/15 00:42:40 PST by Temporal [manager]
[Temporal's avatar]

*sigh* OK, then, here it goes:

Bush's horrible economic policy: Bush passed tax cuts which he paid for using deficit spending, and claims this will help the economy. Deficit spending does much, much more damage to the economy than taxation. Deficit spending causes inflation. Defict spending increases interest rates. Both of these factors greatly discurage lending in favor of holding property. The economy booms when lending occurs, not when people choose to hold property.

Bush's horrible foreign policy: Bush has made America into a bully. We go around saying "If you aren't with us, you're against us.". We tell the rest of the world that we don't care what they think about our actions, but then we bully them into doing what we say. His policies are, I believed, perfectly described by the phrase "cowboy diplomacy". This is not the way to get support in the world at a time when you need that support more than any other.

Bush on Iraq: Forget whether or not the war was justified. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. But, we would have been stronger in Iraq if we had more world-wide support. Bush, however, didn't care. He alienated the rest of the world by essentially telling the UN, "We don't care what you think. If we want to attack Iraq, we're going to do it regardless of what the UN says.". Then he tried to get the UN's approval anyway and -- surprise! -- found a lot of resistance.

Bush on terrorism: Bush honestly thinks that the best way to stop terrorism is to go and kill every last one of them. It doesn't work that way. To fight terrorists, you have to fight the conditions which breed them. And what are those conditions? Hatred towards the United States. And have Bush's policies increased or decreased that hatred?

Bush on moral values: In 2000, Bush beat McCain in the Republican primaries by spreading the rumor that McCain had an illegitimate black child. Google it. How's that for moral values? (I would love to have voted for McCain.)

Regarding blackboxvoting.org: I don't think they're going to find enough fraud to overturn the election. However, just because you and I don't think so doesn't mean it shouldn't be checked. Assuming you're right and Bush won legitimately, you have nothing to be afraid of, right?

2004/11/15 11:17:43 PST by mystik3eb [0/43]
[mystik3eb's avatar]

All right, and here's where all my thoughts come out. I won't have much to say on the topic after this, so here goes.

Economic: The jobs ratio of lost to gained is 1:9.0 I don't care how it happened, we've simply gained more jobs under Bush than any other president, and we gained FAR more than we lost. People complain about the tax cuts. They say it only benefits the rich. Well, it benefits leaders of companies, and when CEOs and those types are doing better, they can help their company do better, and with that opens more jobs. I believe that benefits the not-so-rich. Yea our country's in alot of debt. Alexander Hamilton did the same thing and it's a part of what saved our country early on. The country always seems to work off it's debts and go far beyond whatever debt we were in. With the opening of more jobs and a boost to the economy, I can't say for sure but I beleive we'll be able to defeat that debt without much trouble.

Foreign: When most the world's governments dislike us anyway, what is he supposed to do about it? He did try, yea, and we've helped other countries when they've needed it WITHOUT being asked countless times. Most of these countries are ungrateful and don't have much hope when trying to ask for help from them. Besides, I don't think Bush should've pushed the war off anyway. People were constantly dying every freaking day. The vast majority of Iraqis are eternally grateful for us and what we've done, and I don't think we're much worse off than we could've been if we'd waited any longer. Kerry pushed for diplomacy. Diplomacy is obviously the preferred manner to get things done, as Bush has said, but when it's obvious, after trying which he has, though I'm not sure how much, that diplomacy isn't gonna get anywhere, stop complaining about it and do SOMETHING that's gonna get the job done!

Iraq: There are more terrorists attacking us in there now than earlier on. More Americans are dying as time goes on. The resistance seems to always grow. Well of COURSE it is when the terrorist world realizes "Oh crud, they mean business, they're here! And look how fast they took out Saddam's powerful regime! We gotta stop them now or we're screwed!" They're all pouring into Iraq to try and defeat us now! We're surprised that the enemy is only fighting harder? The enemy wasn't only Iraq, Iraq was simply a powerful ally of the enemy. The war on terror is getting heated up, and though it sucks that we have to keep losing soldiers, they're dying for a righteous cause, I don't care what anyone says, and I'm proud of them. Note how most of them supported Bush? If they're not complaining, then why are we?

Terrorism: These terrorists have never been so threatened since before 9/11 because we've finally started fighting back. Why is hatred being caused? Because some religious sects out there are teaching it, not because we're causing it. We're being America, doing our job, which is to help people who are innocently being harmed, and to protect our country. People hate us for whatever reason, because our country is powerful in many ways, because we are free and can do whatever, they hate us for whatever reason. Most terrorists grew up with the hatred as a part of their lives. It's not our fault, it's the fault of the teachings. If we don't stop that, the hatred will never end. That IS the cause of the hatred. Other countries dislike us, but almost none will ever support an attack against us (except those that house terrorism, who Bush says he plans on taking care of, by the way).

Morals: I was unaware of the McCain thing. Then again, McCain goes both ways, so I don't know about him anyway. But as far as morals go, Bush supports all morals I support, which makes alot of people angry, of course. What I call moral issues are issues like gay marriage and abortion, that kinda thing. Those morals are based on religious beliefs, and Kerry and many others have criticized him for putting his religious beiefs before his politics. Well, as far as I'm concerned, if you belief something to be right, you push for it as best you can, and that's the best you can do. I personally put God before my country, but I could get in big trouble for saying that. However, that's just my thinking, which I'm allowed to have because it's a great country, and that's why I personally support his morals. And about the McCain thing: I would assume, though I obviously can't say for sure, it was a rumor he'd heard, and he really thought based on that rumor that it was true. Yes, he shouldn't have spread it without knowing the truth. Yes he should've and could've done other things better, like we could've paid some more attention to Iran and North Korea. Personally I don't think it's possible to focus that much attention on too many countries at once, and I don't believe anyone's perfect, do you?

Black box: I'm not worried, I'm just fed up. Sure it's their right to be all frisked up in trying to find some way to get a man they dislike out of the presidency, but talk about sore losers. I was disappointed both times Clinton won, but I didn't go around whining about it and trying to rally people against him and bring him down. That's a pet peeve of mine.

Oh, and for the record, I'm an independent, so I don't simply support Bush because most of the people in my religion do. I look at both sides of every argument and I'm willing to change my mind if I see proof that shows something to be true. I almost believed Michael Moore about some things, for example, until I had proof shown to me. I have that proof, if anyone wants it. If anyone can show me something that proves me wrong on any of the above argument, give me proof. And DON'T overwhelm me with all this liberal anti-bush crap, that's just a bunch of angry people writing their complaints. If I see proof against my arguments written by either a conservative or both sides, then I'll consent. I just don't like it when people only believe one side's story. Both republicans and democrats have corruption in their parties.

*phew* There, I think I'm done.

2004/11/15 14:13:23 PST by Temporal [manager]
[Temporal's avatar]

Mystik... I don't know how else to say this. You claim to have done research, but your post is so disconnected with reality it literally made me cry. Some of the hard facts I can refute easily, like so:

http://www.bls.gov/bdm/total_private.gif

As you can see, we have lost jobs under Bush. Bush is the first president to lose jobs since Herbert Hoover. I have no idea where you got your 1:9 figure, but it is the opposite of the truth. The really scary part is that there has been so much coverage of this fact that you'd have to be living under a rock not to know it.

You also claim that Iraq and Al Qaeda were allies. The 9/11 commission concluded otherwise. Again, there has been so much coverage of this that I can't even fathom how someone would still be unaware of it.

But the parts of your post that I find most disturbing are things that are hard to argue directly beyond what I've already said above. You seem to have this vision of the war on terror in which we say "Alright, terrorists, we're coming to kick your asses!" and the terrorists say "Oh crap!" and cry. In reality, the more we try to kill them, the more we piss them off, and the easier we make it for them to recruit more terrorists. The more we act like bullies, acting unilaterally against the will of the rest of the world, the more we breed hatred that causes terrorism. Is it really that hard to see?

The rest of the world did not always hate us. On 9/12/2001, everyone loved us. And even before 9/11.0.. World-wide hatred of us has never been as great as it is today. The reason for this is almost entirely because we invaded a sovereign nation based on a lie and directly against the wishes of most of the world. Whether it was justified for other reasons is irrelevant; the way we did it destroyed our credibility and our respect. Without those, we're going to have a lot of trouble fighting terrorism, or doing just about anything else that might require cooperation with other countries.

2004/11/15 17:09:53 PST by mystik3eb [0/43]
[mystik3eb's avatar]

And I can't help but say the same about your post.

Of course there's been coverage about the jobs lost. The vast majority of news stations and newspapers are INCREDIBLY biased in a liberal way. That picture you have only shows up to December of last year, almost an ENTIRE YEAR AGO. You go look around and you'll find that in the last year we've gained jobs. And it shows that jobs dropped at 2001.0 Well of course they did, 9/11 killed the economy. AND it was decling before Bush got into office, and that's a fact.

I don't believe your claim about countries or terrorists. I never said the terrorists cried and bla bla. They are hating us and want to kill us! They always have! You have any idea how many times they've tried to attack or claimed to have another attack in plan and we prevented it? I don't know where you got the idea that they "recruit" terrorists. And countries are mad about what we're doing because they disagree with us, not because we've "shut them down." They shut US down by doing nothing.

And there are several documents to prove that Saddam has protected many different terrorists AND harmed the lives of Americans several several times. I was afraid I'd have to whip out this article, but read it. It's not only about Michael Moore.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1164856/posts

I've gotta go or I'd keep going.

2004/11/16 05:47:15 PST by Temporal [manager]
[Temporal's avatar]

Unfortunately I can't seem to find the latest numbers on the BLS web site. However, there was a report released recently, and while you are right that we gained more than we lost in 2004, Bush's net numbers are still negative. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is not a biased source. And anyway, for your 1:9 suggestion to hold, that graph would have to look pretty crazy for the 2004 period.

I don't blame the recession on Bush. I blame the fact that it took so long to recover -- and that we still aren't doing very well -- on Bush. Fiscally conservative policy usually means cutting taxes and cutting spending. Fiscally liberal policy means increasing spending and increasing taxes. Bush is cutting taxes and increasing spending. This I call "fiscally stupid".

Why deficit spending kills the economy:

1.0 The economy booms when people are investing; that is, lending money. It stagnates when investment dries up.
2.0 People will lend money when doing so is likely to bring higher returns than other uses of that money.
3.0 If lots of inflation is occurring and you lend money to someone, that money will not be worth as much when it is paid back, since loans generally don't account for inflation.
4.0 If you invest that money in property, the value of that property will increase to match inflation.
5.0 Therefore (points 2, 3, 4), inflation will encourage people to buy property rather than invest.
6.0 Therefore (points 1, 5), inflation will cause the economy to stagnate.
7.0 Deficit spending adds money to the economy.
8.0 When a resource is more plentiful, it becomes less valuable.
9.0 Therefore (points 7, 8), deficit spending causes inflation.
10.0 Therefore (points 6, 9), deficit spending causes the economy to stagnate.

Also note that deficit spending increases interest rates because it means the government is competing for loanable money. In other words, more people loan their money to the government rather than other people, which also constitutes a fall in lending, hurting the economy.

Early in Clinton's term in office, he got Congress to agree to a deal in which they would raise taxes on the rich a bit, but would be forced to balance the budget within a few years. The deal instantly set off a fall in interest rates, eventually ended inflation, and pretty much caused the longest period of economic growth in the history of the country. Do you need more proof that that?

I don't know where you got the idea that they "recruit" terrorists.

What, do you think people are just born terrorists? Where do you think they come from?

The vast majority of news stations and newspapers are INCREDIBLY biased in a liberal way.

There are two possible explanations for this:
(1) There is a huge, far-reaching liberal conspiracy to feed the public information that is biased towards their side.
(2) The journalists -- who are, of course, some of the most informed people on the planet -- honestly believe that the liberal view is correct.

2004/11/16 08:02:40 PST by mystik3eb [0/43]
[mystik3eb's avatar]

About the deficit spending: I don't have any disagreements per say with your points. But I also don't think lending and investing in property is the only way money is spent in the economy, nor a huge part of the economy anyway, and probably why we're starting to improve in some ways recently in the economy. To be quite honest, I can't give you an exact source that shows where I got the 9:1 ratio, but I know that I've heard it many times by trustworthy people who don't assume anything. However I'll have to get back to you on that. The numbers I've heard are around 1.4 million jobs lost, and over 9 million gained. I'll see if I can figure out where these numbers are coming from.

With the terrorists, I see what you're saying. And to an extent, yes, I believe the vast majority of terrorists are raised with that hatred and the goal of someday being someone who can give their lives for their cause of destroying America. I saw a clip once of a middle-eastern child holding a gun, a real semi-automatic, and he was in a terrorist training camp. I can see what you're saying about recruiting people, but they can only recruit who already hate us, which is their own people for the most part. I'm not terribly surprised they hate us more for fighting back, but I'd rather they hate us more and be fewer and fewer in number than they pull another 9/11 or continue to be supported by powerful government groups (even if Iraq wasn't a huge supporter, though they had been under Saddam to an extent, besides his regime being a murderous tyranny in itself). I don't think terrorists can recruit anyone from other countries outside of the middle-east, like France or Germany or one of those major countries that are mad at us, but they might. I personally believe the number of terrorists out there has decreased by a very good number since we started attacking al Quaeda in Afghanistan, and is decreasing at a good rate, which is why I support how he's done things. Maybe someone can do it better, I'm not opposed to that idea. I did not believe Kerry was that person, however, and I don't have many problems, if any, with how Bush has done it. But I can see why it would bother many people, as you said, the way he went in and attacked. I just don't believe he could wait any longer in his right mind, which I probably couldn't either, and I think our position in Iraq and around the world could be alot worse.

Another reason most these other countries don't like us is simply because we're far more overall conservative than most the world, like with the Jews vs the Palestinians and other stuff. And yes, you're right, the world was pretty compassionate to us on 9/11.0 That was a good time, the first couple months after that. But once we started to take action against the world of terror and actually do something about it is when we started losing support. As far as I know, Bush didn't refute any country before trying to work with the UN, but he made it clear that Iraq was something that needed to be done, with or without other help, which made people mad, of course. So I probably agree there that it wasn't the best of tact. But he still tried and he had and still has support from several countries in this effort. Iraq's liberation in many ways has run smoother than we could've hoped, I don't know why people call it a total mess when every new area we liberate under our control is taken quickly and smooth, like Fallujah recently. We're losing soldiers, and we don't have much, I daresay most, of the world's support. Well, if they're not for us, then stay out of our way, don't expect to be handfed promises and agreements. In argument I can definetely see people disagreeing with me and more power to them. I just can't stand the thought of innocent people dying all over the place because of insurgent terrorists and Saddam supporters and us not doing anything about it because we wanna pass the "world test"...again a reason why I would prefer Bush over Kerry here.

And you were right about that first choice with the media, though not as dramatic as you put it. The media tends to be liberal and don't hide it. I've compared news stations Fox and CNN a few times, and I have a source that compares Fox and MSNBC all the time, and I can see that even though Fox has a conservative viewpoint that they are truthful and give both sides to every story and give every story while other stations mostly warp some things or don't even report some stories, like some successes we have out in Iraq. I never see any of those successes on most stations except one, and the one has video coverage and interviews, making it legit. So yea, I'd have to agree with your first choice. For example, that link I posted above was written by a journalist named Dave Koppel who works for CNN, apparently respected by both parties. He made it clear that he was not a Bush supporter but is not heavily anti-bush like many liberals, and here's a guy that went and did his research. Not all journalists are liberal, just most that we hear about/from, and I give conversative journalists just as much credit for being liable. A good reason journalists tend to become liberal could be that they look to joining a news group in the future and for a while CNN and others that were all liberal were the most respected news stations, and since they were liberal...well, the influence follows. That COULD be a reason, and it's a logical reason, influence has a HUGE role in where many, if not most, American's stand with...well, any issue. And personally, on comparing liberal and conversative, I don't think either extremes are right; I tend to fall somewhere inbetween (moderate) with most issues.

Well anyway...I'm glad this discussion kinda toned down a little bit...I tend to get carried away with these things, for one thing, and I don't really like arguments for another, but I don't mind a calm discussion about a disagreement. Let's hope it stays this way, if it continues for long.

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