Why Voting for Obama is a Mistake

[Professor S]

Originally Posted by Xantar

As you yourself have stated, Obama's positions on pretty much every issue are easy enough to find.

No, I said its hard to find because no one wants to give it to you, so instead you have to dig it up. I believe most people will not go to the effort to do this, right or wrong, and Obama takes advantage of the ignorance of the media.

Comparison charts between him and McCain (and with Hillary back in the day) are published regularly in magazines and newspapers. The reason he doesn't get into specific details about his policies when talking to a hundred thousand people is that you can't do it in front of such a big crowd. He does in fact get into a lot of detail when he's talking at small town halls, and reporters have even noted this. But the media finds that footage of him at a stadium draws bigger ratings than when he's in someone's living room (I have always said, by the way, that I think the media is not liberal so much as lazy and sensationalistic).

The media finds th footage that they like the best, an thats the footage that makes Obama look the best, because they like Obama. Honeslty, just do a cursory comparison of headlines if you don't think there is heavy bias.

Nothing I'm really going to respond to here. You either agree with his stance or you don't, and the thing to keep in mind is that the President isn't going to sway abortion policies all that much one way or the other.

So you either agree with infanticide or you don't? Well, I'll vote for the guy who is against it, and honestly so would most of America if they were informed or if this were made into the big deal that it should be.

That stuff is now the province of state legislatures and the Supreme Court. In all his eight years, the only thing George W. Bush can claim to have done for pro-lifers is appointed enough Supreme Court Justices to ban intact dilation and extraction (what politicians call "partial birth abortion").

Well why don't we call it what it REALLY is: Pulling a viable child out of the womb, but not all the way because then it would be a human being and not a lump of lifeless flesh, and then essentially decapitating it. "Intact Dilation nd Extraction" is a term used by cowards to cloud the truth of what the procedure really is, and thats simply disgusting.

And you pointed out what the big deal is: The President appoints the judges who make these decisions, and there are several judges due for retirement.

That may get a lot of people on both sides of the debate riled up, but the truth is that procedure only takes up a tenth of a percent of all abortions. The overall issue remains unchanged.

Well the fact that state sanctioned murder got people riled up is understandable in my opinion, regardless of what percent is quoted. There were children murdered in those percentatges. And keep in mind, I'm pro-choice and I'm disgusted by it.

And we're not talking about partial birth abortions, we're talking about a live human being lying on a cold metal doctors tabel, and Obama said its ok to kill it because the INTENTION of the procedure was more important than a living baby. Talk about human life meaning nothing. That issue alone is enough for me to never consdier voting for him.

I will point out, by the way, that during the primaries, Obama got a lot of flack from pro-choice groups for his "present" votes on a lot of bills that would have restricted abortions (he was actually employing a parliamentary trick, but that's hard to explain).

Well he'll say a lot of things to get elected. I'm more concerned with how he votes when he thinks no one is paying attention.

We don't really know that the surge has worked. There are way too many factors to know that. The decrease in violence may have happened because of the Sunni Enlightenment or because every neighborhood in Iraq has been ethnically cleansed and there's just not much killing left to be done. Meantime, 40% of Iraqis still think that attacks on U.S. troops is acceptable and 60% want the troops to leave.

The fact is the only thng we can really go by is pre-surge and post-surge numbers, and to believe that the turn-around and the surge taking place at the same time is just a coincidence, well, I don't know what to say to a statement like that

In any case, Obama didn't oppose the surge because he thought it wouldn't work militarily. He said at the time that the important thing was for political objectives to be met. It's highly debatable whether Iraq has made any political progress, and it's even more debatable whether that progress was due to the surge. Given that viewpoint, he would still oppose the surge because the facts he is concerned with haven't convinced him otherwise. Obama has also said that the cost of the war in Iraq is damaging our economy and that he doesn't believe it's worth it. Of course you may disagree with him, but that's a legitimate view held by a large segment of Americans.

I love how everything is "debateable" or "not known" when it doesn't suit a liberal talking point.

If you actually read the quote, he was making the political observation that many voters believe the government isn't going to do anything for them economically, so they vote based on social issues because when it comes to their pocketbooks, both parties aren't going to make any difference. That's not Marxism. It's pretty mainstream, actually.

No, at BEST what it is is arrogant and shows how little he thinks of a large amount of America. I stand by my comments and I have heard the speech, thanks.

The 2004 election depended on this idea. Obama himself is very devoutly religious — so much so that he's making a lot of liberals uncomfortable (you should have seen what was going on at DailyKos when he addressed a Christian forum). I suppose if you believe his faith is all an act then you can also believe that he really does have that much contempt for religion.

I think it was very politically expedient, yes.

I find that hard to believe given how fluently he quotes scripture and his stated support for church based organizations (also an issue that makes lefties squirm).

I never said he wasn't a hippocrite. For a man that is so religious, he has lied about his associations and presence in that church on more than one occasion, and he quickly dumped a man that was like a family member when he realized it would cost him.

It's also worth noting that at the time, the vast majority of Americans polled said they agreed with Obama. This included most of the working-class people he was actually talking about.

Give me ten seconds and I'll find six other polls that say otherwise, and you know that. You can get a poll for any point you want to make,l thats why I rarely use them in my arguments.

He has said that he wants to expand the Peace Corps and the Foreign Service and that he will make college scholarships available to those who pledge to serve in those capacities.

He also talked about collectivism and "asking people to serve" in a context that was a bit unnerving. I listened to the whole thing.

Unfortunately, we don't have much choice in the matter. Our national debt is so huge now that it's fueling inflation. The government essentially has to print more money in order to pay the interest on its debts (incidentally, the national debt isn't $1 trillion. It's more like $8 trillion). Either our economy is going to decline because foreign investors start calling in their debts or it's going to decline because of a tax hike. I prefer the latter because it does increase revenue (you once showed me some IRS numbers which back that up) and that money will at least be spent on the U.S.

Raising taxes the way that Obama is talking about never saved any economy, and in fact, led to much of the Carter insanity and likely push the depression on far longer than it should have. These taxes are INSANE and will KILL revenue becauase the money won't be taxed, it will be HIDDEN and not in the economy. Actions have unintended consequences.

Tax cuts do not pay for themselves. The Reagan years proved it and the Bush years proved it again. Even if both administrations hadn't drastically increased government spending, their tax cuts would have widened the budget deficit.[/quote]

Doubtful as revenue increased with those tax cuts. We've danced this dance before, and its the insane spedning, not the tax cuts, that created the defecits.

McCain wants to make the Bush tax cuts permanent (which is a reversal of his previous position, incidentally),

And you do remember why he voted against them initially, correct? Because they did not come with cuts in spending. See my above point. McCain would cut spending, and thats the difference.

You ought to go out and meet some community organizers. They do a lot of good work, and they're not necessarily liberals. And they also work hard and don't make a lot of money. It really is worth noting the opportunities Obama gave up in order to do that work. He was a black man at the top of his law class and editor of the Harvard Law Review. I work in the legal field, and I know that a person like that would have been fighting off job offers for positions starting at $200,000 as soon as he graduated. Instead, he went to work as a community organizer and he only paid off his student loan debts a few years ago.

I never said community organizers didn't do good work, but I'd elect the mayor of a community before I'd elect an organizer. This isn't about intentions or good feelings, its about the nation and the most important job in the world.

I personally don't think Obama is all that far to the left,

Compared to some...

especially compared to the other Democratic candidates he was running against at the time. Remember John Edwards, Chris Dodd and Dennis Kucinich? Anyway, Obama's claim to being a uniter is not that he hews to the political center but that he takes traditional Democratic positions and makes them less scary to independent and right-leaning voters. His stance on global warming is one example. He frames it as an issue not just of the environment but also of energy independence (we no longer have to bow to the whims of unstable Middle East regimes), national security (ditto) and the economy (the American economy does best when it is inventing new technologies, and since we're no longer the computer capital of the world, we need a new frontier). I am fully aware that John McCain supports a number of initiatives addressing global warming, too, but he doesn't frame it in the broad way that Obama does.

Thats all well and good, but Carbon is a known commodity and we know how to use on a large scale. We need it to bridge the gap, and McCain is the one that has been clearer on this issue, while Obama has used his famous "broad" language to confuse the issue and fit everyone's opinion, regardless of what that opinion is. You call it broad, I call it intellectually dishonest.

By the way, you are very good at hiding your political views under the guise of rhetorical analysis. I salute you!

If you want to talk about an issue they really disagree on, let's take a look at taxes. Obama's insight is that most Americans don't really hate taxes that much. What they hate is wasted tax money. Obama was able to oppose the gas tax holiday and win people over to his side by showing that the gas tax is actually one of the better spent items in the government budget: it goes directly to road maintenance and cannot be spent on other items like a bridge to nowhere.

Thats GREAT, he says he won't waste it, but historically higher taxes go hand in hand with increased waste. Just look at California and New York. I don't care what he says, unless he tells me exactly how he plans to do it.

I'm surprised at your naivete. No presidential candidate does exactly what he promised in his campaign. We're lucky if he attempts to keep half of his promises. Reagan portrayed himself as a friend of fundamentalist Christians but ended up doing absolutely nothing to further their cause. Ditto for George W. Bush. As for Clinton...do we really need to get into how many campaign promises he broke?

Thank you for proving my point. Experience and track record are what we need to base our voting from, not statements or campiagn slogans, and Obama has smartly chosen to run when he has little history that can come back to hurt him. So Obama can say whatever he likes, because he has lied that you can say he lied about. He is a blank canvas, and he can paint whatever picture he likes, but its what lies underneath that should concern everyone.

Maybe he'd be an amazing President, but there is nothing we can look to in his past that can inform that opinion. McCan is a known entity. At least we'd know what we're getting.

The character of a candidate and the way he approaches issues does matter. George W. Bush's biggest problem was not that he was a conservative (or neo-conservative) but that he based his hiring decisions on loyalty rather than competence (this is also why I eventually opposed Hillary) and was intellectually incurious. During this campaign, we find that Obama takes very nuanced positions that require paragraphs to explain and that his campaign machine runs like clockwork. He also surrounds himself with advisors from the academic world (I'm not saying that's a good or bad thing. I'm just saying that gives you a good idea of how he thinks).

yes, all 300 or so of them...

McCain has proven to be terrible at being a frontrunner and is only really strong when he's playing guerilla warfare. And given his reversals on the Bush tax cuts

Your ignorance on the tax cut decision really disappoints me.

and immigration policy and his hugely deceptive ad blaming high gas prices on Obama (even conservative columnists thought that was false), I don't really hold McCain to be as much of a straight talker as he claims to be.

I'm not happy with McCain's campaign either, by the way. Its a bit of a shambles as he is in pure reaction mode and made made several ill advised ads like the one you mentioned. His immigration policy is not a reflection of not being a straight talker, though, because he holds such an unpopular opinion. What is Obama's stand on immigration policy? I honestly haven;t heard it.

Anyway, I've talked long enough, and I know you've got a huge response to this post. To tell the truth, though, I'm too busy to get into a long debate with you. You can say whatever you want, and the chances are I'm not going to respond. All I wanted to do was lay out an argument for my side with more competence than I was seeing in this thread.

For someone who doesn't want to get into a long debate, you sure love long debates. I hope you read this, but several of your points in this thread disappoint me. You have made statements that I believe you know are misleading, especially on McCain's stance on the Bush tax cuts. Not good for public discourse.

[Jason1]

I say so what if the media is baised towards Obama? Good I say, the media cares enough to not want a shitty president.

But all that is Republican bullshit anyways, as is all the crap about Obama not having any "experience". Its just Republicans desperatley trying to dig up anything bad on Obama. Unfortunatley for them, thats all theyve got and Americans arent buying into the Republican lies.

[Bond]

This was going well for the majority of two pages, oh well.

I'll try again next week!

[KillerGremlin]

Originally Posted by Jason1

I say so what if the media is baised towards Obama? Good I say, the media cares enough to not want a shitty president.

But all that is Republican bullshit anyways, as is all the crap about Obama not having any "experience". Its just Republicans desperatley trying to dig up anything bad on Obama. Unfortunatley for them, thats all theyve got and Americans arent buying into the Republican lies.

I'm still confused...Obama's foreign policy strategy looks oddly similar to dubya's....

Only he wants an insurgency in Afghanistan....and, unlike Hilary, he voted for FISA:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FISA_Am...ts_Act_of_2008

I know, I know...immunity for telecom..yada yada, it's still a lot of power to give the government.

My point is, America is going to have a complex foreign policy problem for a long time regardless of who gets elected. America is going to have a complex economy problem too. Too complex for me to really understand.

So, what's your defense for Obama? Xantar made a pretty valid point, a lot of hot topic issues like abortion fall on the state for the most part. So, the guy we elect as President will be able to hopefully make a small impact with things like foreign policy, our global image, our economy, the social security system...etc.

And while I'm pro-choice, I think second and third trimester abortions are fucked up. Well, I think first trimester abortions are messed up too, but that would pretty much be a direct conflict of my pro-choice stance. I have my own thoughts on abortion, but that's for another thread.

I'm still not sold on McCain either....grant it, he's not going on this stupid crusade through Germany, but he's not exactly capturing the spirit of America in America...hopefully the Republican campaign guys can get everything sorted out by the time Obama and McCain get into a debate.

Edit: And don't tell me Obama is going to "change" the country or he is "new and uncorrupted" because those don't mean anything. Those are buzzwords, and they irrelevant to how Obama is going to solve the Iraq problem, not launch an insurgency into Afghanistan, keep Iran on political terms and not go to war with them, start bringing our economy out of its 8 or 9 trillion dollar debt, and repair our global image which is kind of bad right now. As a campaigning candidate he might be winning the heart of Europe...I wonder if he will maintain it when they find out his "withdrawal plan" for Iraq involves leaving 50,000-75,000 troops there, and that he wants to finish up America's beef with Afghanistan.

By the way, Jason1, you are an American...and if you are not paying taxes yet you will be. The 8 or 9 trillion dollar debt will come out of your pocket and my pocket for many years to come....needless to say that doesn't excite me.

[BlueFire]

Originally Posted by Bond

This was going well for the majority of two pages, oh well.

I'll try again next week!

Please do! While I don't participate much, I really enjoy reading political debates.

[Professor S]

Originally Posted by Jason1

I say so what if the media is baised towards Obama? Good I say, the media cares enough to not want a shitty president.

Thank you for helping to prove my point. You have always been a font of validation for my arguments. You're simply awe inspiring.

But all that is Republican bullshit anyways, as is all the crap about Obama not having any "experience". Its just Republicans desperatley trying to dig up anything bad on Obama. Unfortunatley for them, thats all theyve got and Americans arent buying into the Republican lies.

So its a lie to say Obama lacks experience? I thought it was a statement of fact. Regardless of whether or not you support Obama, you have to admit there is nothing in his track record that would make you think he was qualified to be President. In the end, we must depend solely on his speeches and interviews for this information, and he has been anything but forthcoming.

And KG, US states have very little control over the abortion issue since the Roe vs. Wade decision. Xantar is correct in saying that its largely a supreme court matter, but he is incorrect in believing that makes this an unimportant issue for the presidential campaign. The President appoints the judges and they make the ruling on whether or not a doctor can kill and new born simply becuase it wasn't supposed to survive. With several justices appraching retirement age, I can't think of a more important duty of a new president than appointing judges right now.

And again, I'll pick the candidate that says "don't kill the baby"

[Vampyr]

Originally Posted by Professor S

Thank you for helping to prove my point. You have always been a font of validation for my arguments. You're simply awe inspiring.



So its a lie to say Obama lacks experience? I thought it was a statement of fact. Regardless of whether or not you support Obama, you have to admit there is nothing in his track record that would make you think he was qualified to be President. In the end, we must depend solely on his speeches and interviews for this information, and he has been anything but forthcoming.

And KG, US states have very little control over the abortion issue since the Roe vs. Wade decision. Xantar is correct in saying that its largely a supreme court matter, but he is incorrect in believing that makes this an unimportant issue for the presidential campaign. The President appoints the judges and they make the ruling on whether or not a doctor can kill and new born simply becuase it wasn't supposed to survive. With several justices appraching retirement age, I can't think of a more important duty of a new president than appointing judges right now.

And again, I'll pick the candidate that says "don't kill the baby"

Obama never actually voted "no" towards the Born Alive Infants Protection Act, he voted "present".

His reasoning was:
"Whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the Equal Protection Clause or the other elements in the Constitution, what we're really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a -- a child, a 9-month old -- child that was delivered to term. That determination then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it -- it would essentially bar abortions, because the Equal Protection Clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an anti-abortion statute."

Later on, when the act was passed at the Federal level, this bit of wording had been added on (which is what brought in the support of pro-abortion democrats)

"Nothing in this section shall be construed to affirm, deny, expand or contract any legal status or legal right applicable to any member of the species homo sapiens at any point prior to being born alive as defined in this section."

Obama has since stated that he would have voted "yes" if that wording had been there when the Illinois voting took place.

Although I think I still disagree with his decision, it at least makes it a little more clear as to why he made it, and that it wasn't intended to be malicious towards babies.

At the same time, we also have to consider that neither candidate is going to have all the qualities that each of us look for in a good person/leader, as no two people are the same. For example, I could never like McCain as a person due to his stance on gay issues. I consider this to be on the same level as racism, no questions asked.

However, that's not the main reason I will be voting for Obama. I will be voting for Obama because I agree with him and support his stance on a vast majority of issues. I am not very "liberal" when it comes to gun control, but that is just one topic among many.

EDIT:
As for speaking to the Germans:
Yes, it was a photo-op, done primarily because you and others criticize his experience. He wanted to show that he has the ability to be a world leader and galvanize other nations into working with the United States. We are a pretty hated place around the world at the moment, and I think the rest of the world sees Obama as a reasonable person that they can work with, compared to what we've had serving the last 8 years.

As for putting troops in Afghanistan rather than Iraq:
I'm not in support of sending more troops anywhere. I think the Middle East is a lost cause, and that Jon McCain's plan to "WIN!" is incredibly stupid. We are never ever going to fix the problems they have over there. They have been fighting this war since the death of Abraham, we are -never- going to fix the conflict and strife that is happening there.

However, this was -supposed- to be a War on terror, instigated by the 9/11 attacks, and it -wasn't- Iraq that started all of that. America was lied to in order to get troops into Iraq, when Afghanistan was probably where they should have been sent in the first place.

It would be like if Germany suddenly attacked us, and in order to get back at them we blew up Canada.

[Professor S]

Vampyr, a few notes on your points:

1) Abortion - Thanks for the clarification. I better understand why Obama voted the way that he did. I still don't agree with it, but I better understand his viewpoint, even if I think he was reaching a bit in his explanation.

2) Your comments about the war in the middle east are typically misleading. No one was lied to to go to war with Iraq. At worst, our intelligence was wrong, and also the intelligence of every other major world power was wrong to. The argument never was whether or not Iraq had WMD's, it was what to do about it. There is a difference between being wrong and pirposely misleading an entire nation.

And your comparison of Iraq to Canada is a bit of a stretch. If you did want to foster democracy in the medle east, I know you don't agree, but if you did Iraq is the best choice with a modern infrastructure and an educated populace. Myself, I'm not as pessimistic as you, and I actually think that Iraq will succeed as a nation now, and within 18 months or so, but to give such a timeline is idiocy.

[Vampyr]

Originally Posted by Professor S

Vampyr, a few notes on your points:

1) Abortion - Thanks for the clarification. I better understand why Obama voted the way that he did. I still don't agree with it, but I better understand his viewpoint, even if I think he was reaching a bit in his explanation.

2) Your comments about the war in the middle east are typically misleading. No one was lied to to go to war with Iraq. At worst, our intelligence was wrong, and also the intelligence of every other major world power was wrong to. The argument never was whether or not Iraq had WMD's, it was what to do about it. There is a difference between being wrong and pirposely misleading an entire nation.

And your comparison of Iraq to Canada is a bit of a stretch. If you did want to foster democracy in the medle east, I know you don't agree, but if you did Iraq is the best choice with a modern infrastructure and an educated populace. Myself, I'm not as pessimistic as you, and I actually think that Iraq will succeed as a nation now, and within 18 months or so, but to give such a timeline is idiocy.

I have spoken to several people who say that when we first started the war in Iraq, they believed it was a direct retaliation for the 9/11 attacks. These people were typical Americans and not people who closely follow exactly what the government is doing. I'm not saying the government cooked up an elaborate conspiracy, I'm saying that the general American public was mislead by not having all of the facts laid out exactly as they were. I think there was some subtle deceiving that occurred that shouldn't have.

When it was finally made clear that Iraq did not have WMD's, and hadn't even been trying to develop them since 1991, and that Iraq was actually not connected to Al-Queda (or at least no evidence has been discovered yet) the American public became very confused, and quickly after that very angry. I can't help but suspect there were ulterior motives in going to war with Iraq, and I think we've all heard the stories and accusations enough for me to not have to repeat them. However, it is entirely possible that the Bush administration was given misleading evidence to suggest that Iraq was more closely involved with terrorism than they turned out to be.

But now that we -know- how things are and how things were, we should be trying to end this debacle as soon as possible, even if it means just pulling out. We are trying to force a Western philosophy onto a non Western people. We went into this war with the Westernized assumption that we could deal with them with Western reason, and that has failed. There are too many radicals that are clouded by their religion, and you can -never- change their minds, it is engraved into them as writing on stone.

We took down Saddam Hussein, but there will always be another like him ready to take his place. I know that you feel that we shouldn't abandon those people, but I honestly believe that we can't be that much more help to them, and all the while it is costing American lives and American dollars. It's easy for us who are not involved, either in the decision making or the actual fighting, to say "We need to finish what we started," but when everyday American men and women are dying because of what many, including myself, consider to be a lost cause, it is hard to feel like that can be justified in any way.

[Jason1]

Okay first off to Killergremlin: yes I do have a job and pay taxes. What does this have to do with anything? Do I like paying taxes? Not necissairly, but it must be done and I totally understand it. Taxes need to stay the same for the poor and middle class, and they need to rise dramatically for the extremely wealthy. Those that make over say 500,000 a year should be paying a much higher percentage than the rest of us. Now I realise they do pay a higher percentage, but it should be way higher than it is I dont feel like digging up the numbers. I struggle making 8 dollars an hour while my boss racks in the dough and makes record profits, and I get no raise. Its not fair, its crap and the Republicans will do nothing to change that. The minimum wage needs to be raised a lot higher than it is.

Also, you say that Obama isnt going to "change" the country...why the hell cant he? Bush changed the country a whole lot in 8 years, obviously for the worse. Who's to say Obama cant change it a whole lot for the better?

And as for ProfessorS, whos to say so called experience is necessary to be a good president? What necessairly "qualifies" someone to be president? In my opinion, nothing. You could serve your country for years in wars, in the government or whatever, and still be a shitty president. Just because Obama is comparativley young in comparision, they say he wont be a good president.

Also, Amen Vampyr. Lets end this war. Give peace a chance. Its totally a lost cause now, it was doomed from the very beginging. We only went to war in Iraq so Bush could finish what his father couldnt. That and Oil. Farienheit 911 anyone?

[BlueFire]

Oh dear.

[Professor S]

Jason, I honestly didn't know one person could fit that many cliches into so few words. Its almost as if you aren't even human, but a robot sent by MoveOn.org to repeat stale talking points.

Vampyr - We didn't go to war with Iraq until 2 years after 9/11. I think the Americans you talked to confused it with Afghanistan.

As for Bush lying after we realized Saddam either never had the weapons or moved them, I won't argue that and I think that was one of his biggest mistakes. He should have been honest about the situation.

As for pulling out now, well, that woiuld be the biggest mistake we could make. I know you don't believe it, but I think a democratic Iraq has a very good shot. The reason I believe this is because I've talked to several Iraq veterans, and they all were very proud of their service and many looked forward to going back. The reason they gave was because they believed in what they were doing and saw Iraq change and talked to the people there.

Pulling out would show the people we are trying to help that we truly don't care, show the people we're fighting we are weak and vulnerable and the sheer amount of death and geneocide that would follow would be staggering.

When we pulled out of Vietnam, 2.5 million Cambodians and Vietnamese were slaughtered (yes, AFTER we pulled out). We can't repeat the same mistakes.

[Jason1]

You know what, im completley done with this garbage. ProfessorS can go make out with Rush Limbaugh's fat ass. The end.

[Professor S]

Originally Posted by Jason1

You know what, im completley done with this garbage. ProfessorS can go make out with Rush Limbaugh's fat ass. The end.

Actually I can't stand Rush, but if it keeps you quiet while the adults have a conversation...

[Bond]

Okay, we were able to remain civil for 3 pages, but I think we're going down the shitter now.

I'm going to close this in anticipation of a new political thread in a few days.