OT: US President (US Dom Players only)

[licker]

Originally Posted by Cor2

one more thing,the republicans DID steal the elections, twice. But the democrats let them, so who cares?

Proof?

Seriously, everyone knows both sides cheat, and while that doesn't excuse any of the behavior pretending that one side actually holds some kind of moral high ground is simply not based in reality.

Obama and McCain are both qualified to be president, but neither seemingly brings what this country actually needs to pull it out of the funk it is in.

Leave aside the foreign policy concerns and focus on the internal issues, and explain how either of them actually address anything in a substantiative way.

McCain is no Bush, he is no continuation of the past administration, honestly, Obamas tax plans are actually closer to Bushes, but that's neither here nor their, since neither of them have what it takes to actually fix the system, all they do is pander to the public with useless band aid type fixes when a tourniquet is needed.

Obama tells you he will give you a tax break... never mind that the people he is promising this tax break to already pay zero income tax (not all of them, but the majority), so the claim that he is redistributing wealth is accurate. McCain is telling you that the wealthy and corporations need a tax break to keep job growth strong, never mind the evidence which suggests that this economy has more serious issues with the credit market in the first place making these tax cuts meaningless and likely damaging.

Yep, neither one is preaching any kind of sanity when it comes to the economy or the budget. Both are trying to scare you into thinking the other one will be worse, when the clear facts are that neither is going to be good.

So keep on voting for bad and pretend that that because your less bad is better than the more bad somehow you are doing good.

Or take the step and actually vote for a party or candidate who is not beholden to the existing power structure, vote for real change, vote for something actually good.

[NTJedi]

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

At what cost does this "experience" come? I honestly don't believe that anyone over 60 is going to be effectual at meeting the challenges of this rapidly changing modern world.

With age the body and mind slow down, but not to the degree you're thinking. Experience in taking a stand is important... not standing by and only voting "present" to pursue a career.

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

We need someone with flexibility and ingenuity far more than we need someone with some tremendous depth of experience

Flexibility... you mean by not voting for or against during tough issues. Yeah that's flexible... sit back and just vote present. Good career move not to upset anyone.
Ingenunity... you mean by sticking next to religious figures until those individuals start making him look bad and thus he distances himself from them. Both good career moves, but nothing which shows the nation strong character and strong experience.

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

I am totally mystified by this argument. Since it will be difficult to try to tax the (exorbitantly) wealthy, you would prefer to vote someone in who has already pledged to reduce taxes on those whom we seem to have trouble getting money out of in the first place?

As I wrote earlier I'm not pleased with McCain, but he knows trying to raise their taxes will not work. Myself or McCain doesn't have 3 hours to explain every little detail. There's too many loop holes in the tax system for the wealthy. If Obama, McCain or anyone was serious about fair taxes they'd either attack these loop holes OR introduce a flat tax.

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

Yes, it will be an uphill struggle to make massive multi-national conglomerate corporations, and their fabulously wealthy kings contribute fairly to the governance of the nation. However, to accomplish this goal, one must try.

An inexperienced career focused politician won't provide any benefit as president. I see him as a risk where other politicians from his party will try controlling him. Having a president who sits by and votes "present" on every issue is obviously a sign of bad news. At least McCain has a background of being self-sacrificing and doing stuff even his own party disliked which he felt was for the better good.

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

Only one of the two candidates who stands a chance to be elected is willing to try to fill loopholes, and raise the effectiveness of the system. The other candidate has stated quite clearly, time and time again, that he is in favor of reducing stated taxes on those who can afford them, and in creating more loopholes and deductions for them.

You haven't looked clearly at Obama's track record and don't wish to recognize Obama raising taxes won't change anything. Bill Gates paid ZERO in taxes during 1999, raising taxes is not the answer and if Obama doesn't know this he would be wasting our time/money, but at least he'd let us know he was "present".

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

"Tax the poor and feed the rich - and you can be quite sure that eventually the rich will be so wealthy, they will take pity on the poor, and take better care of them."


Trickle down failed so miserably, I am quite amazed that anyone with an income below 100k/year actually believes we can continue in this way.

Taxing the wealthy is not the answer, neither of the candidates are any good, but McCain has experience and takes a stand. Unlike Obama who sits back voting "present" while we pay him.

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by AreaOfEffect

Are you implying that those who don't vote for McCain are somehow less rational. Not only is that implication not sound, it is also invalid.

Your last statement sounds like a canned comment, but I'll indulge. I see little connection between favorablility and qualification. Please explain why she is suitable for any political position.

Make a choice. Which are we arguing qualifications or suitability?

You were asking people to investigate the candidates, thinking perhaps that if people did they would find Palin an absolutely unsuitable candidate.

Arguing qualifications for a moment - obviously, she met the qualifications. Our founding fathers put their faith in the common folk - specifically did not *want* a ruling elite, recall?

As for why palin is suitable - lets see. Renegotiated deal with the oil companies to extract HIGHER royalties from oil companies.
Broke with her own party to get a corrupt party official indicted.

And before you start spouting untruths about her, lets just lay to rest some internet fallacies, as debunked by snopes:
-Palin has never sought to have books banned, or burned.
-Has been praised by *many* of her political opponents for *not* advancing a prolife agenda.
-Did not cut funding for special needs kids - or education at all.

Finally, you seem to think that being popular is not germane. To the contrary, the ability to satisfy people across the political spectrum means that you address their common concerns and needs. It means that people believe you effectively address their concerns.

It is not the sole criteria for judging a political candidate -but how your opponents view you (favorably) is a pretty good indicator.

Now.. since you bring up the question of qualifications....
Palin has been mayor for something like 7 years, and governor for two or three.

Obama has.... good speeches - and exactly zero executive experience. So if you believe Palin is not qualified to be Vice President.. exactly how do you believe Barry Sotuero (you know, Baracks real name, before he changed it (as he admits in his book dreams of my father) to appeal to minorities) is qualified to be President?

[NTJedi]

Originally Posted by licker

Yep, neither one is preaching any kind of sanity when it comes to the economy or the budget. Both are trying to scare you into thinking the other one will be worse, when the clear facts are that neither is going to be good.

I completely agree

[JimMorrison]

Let me clarify, NTJedi. I don't believe that income taxes are in actuality the means to solve anything, flat or not. The system is much less abusable if we designate a specific point in the flow of currency in which to tax it.

Since I believe that this is not the individual, but rather the business, then we still come to the same point - McCain wants to reduce taxes on large businesses.

I believe the true answer to taxation, is to only tax the execution of business transactions - and never from the side of the individual. Therefore, income taxes and sales taxes would be removed. Taxes on the corporate side would be increased to balance the equation. Stated wages would obviously decrease, however we would no longer have this smokescreen of saying "didn't you know the top earners pay 65% taxes??", when obviously many of us know that those people pay much less than that (and supposedly, sometimes none at all).

To extrapolate from this, if all taxes were shifted to the business side of the economy, and few if any loopholes or deductions were left in place, then the average American should see their tax burden lightened, because if the stated relative balance between high/low income remains the same, the rich will be getting less than they did in the previous system. In effect, you will have a flat tax as far as the individual is concerned, because unless everyone is willing to watch the disparity in stated earnings grow even wider, with more and more billionaires, and more and more people at and below the poverty line - then the system will simply be measurably better than it was before.


We enacted income taxes in 1913. At that time, the bottom tax bracket (and it was easy to even still be exempt, at that time, due to low earnings) paid 1% in income taxes. The top bracket, paid 7%. Many would agree that sounded like a somewhat sane idea. However, considering how badly abused the system has become, and imagining that the same effect could have been handled by simply balancing existing taxes, rather than creating new ones - I am hard pressed to argue for anything other than an abolishment of federal taxes on the individual at all.

[DonCorazon]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

Now.. since you bring up the question of qualifications....
Palin has been mayor for something like 7 years, and governor for two or three.

Obama has.... good speeches - and exactly zero executive experience. So if you believe Palin is not qualified to be Vice President.. exactly how do you believe Barry Sotuero (you know, Baracks real name, before he changed it (as he admits in his book dreams of my father) to appeal to minorities) is qualified to be President?

While I am more concerned about a potential president's intelligence and character than specific experience, since I doubt any job prepares you to be president, I would just highlight for consideration that Obama has been a US senator for four years and state senator for 7 years representing a state of 12 million, while Palin has been governor of a state of 600,000 for two years and mayor for 6 years of a city of 10,000.

Obama was a civil rights attorney that graduated from Columbia University and Harvard Law School, and was president of the Harvard Law Review. Palin was a sports reporter, went to a number of schools and graduated with a degree in communications from the University of Idaho.

If I had those two resumes in front of me, I know who I would chose to be president.

[lch]

And here I thought Obama and McCain were the candidates. How silly of me.

But really, it's funny how everybody is writing off McCain already. "He's gonna die from a heart attack immediately after being elected", hilarious.

[Poopsi]

very soon we'll be living in Peronist Brazil.

uuhhhm... sorry, but you have just made one of those things that US citizens are stereotyped as doing (namely, confusing stuff about matters outside).

Juan Domingo Perón was president of Argentina, not Brazil.
And he was democratically elected too. AFAIK the current president of Argentina subscribes to Peronism (which, AFAIK, has a fairly loose definition, but still...)


For the record, from my outsider POV I hope that McCain doesn´t get elected because he has an ambiguous stance over embryonic stem cell research (and no, I don´t think that pursuing only adult stem cell research to avoid polemics is the way to go. Science doesn´t work like that). I dont think that *anyone* is able to hurt progress significatively, but everything helps. Better to have all avenues of research being pursued everywhere. Besides, you don´t want all those biotech companies in Singapore potentially monopolizing the techniçue, do you?
Other than that, I dont think there will be big differences. I doubt either of them will reform your healthcare system, or sweep off income ineçualities. For good or ill. I doubt that foerign policy will change significatively, either. I dont think that either of them will hurry into another Irak fiasco.

[NTJedi]

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

The system is much less abusable if we designate a specific point in the flow of currency in which to tax it.

I believe the true answer to taxation, is to only tax the execution of business transactions - and never from the side of the individual.
...

We enacted income taxes in 1913. At that time, the bottom tax bracket (and it was easy to even still be exempt, at that time, due to low earnings) paid 1% in income taxes.

Taxation of only business transactions is another solution, but we'd have to eliminate the current tax system completely to remove all the loop holes. In any case the tax system is a mess and benefits the wealthy and very wealthy... tax cuts or tax increases on the wealthy won't be changing their lives or our lives.

Originally taxes were suppose to exist only during times of war, unfortunately government corruption/greed existed even during these early years. Government today is so bad I have government letters arriving in the the mail telling me to only expect 70% of my social security and I hear its worse for younger generations.

The country does need change, but we'll see less change from someone with a strong history of avoiding issues by voting "present", instead of making a choice.

[Edratman]

McCain and his supporters are constantly touting his superior experience as a primary foundation of his qualifications to be President. I'm going to address "experience".

Fact: He was an officier in the US Navy. Does that mean that all former officers are superior tacticians, leaders of armed forces and an expert in all matters military? For the answer pick up any military history book and realize that in almost every battle, both sides had a leader with long experience and exposure to matters military. And one of them always loses!
(I am not saying Obama is/would be a better supreme commander, merely pointing out the thin validity of the experience claim.)

Another example regarding experience regards football head coaches. Just about every year, after a team wins the Super Bowl, the offensive and/or defensive coordinators are annointed as the next great head coaches. To be specific, look at the New England Patriots. A couple of years ago, both the offensive and defensive head coaches, Charlies Weiss and Romeo Crennel, went to Notre Dame and the Cleveland Browns, respectively, as head coaches. What happened then? Well, the Partriots, after losing these two "Great" coaches, never missed a beat and have been as successful as ever. Whereas the two teams with "Can't miss, gotta-be-great" head coaches have disappointed, to put it kindly. The obvious conclusion is that the Patriots head coach, Bill Belichek, is the actual source of leadership on the team and both assistants, while technically superior, relied on his leadership to get the players to do what they wanted them to do. Thus they were replaced by two other technically competent cogs and the equation for the Patriots remained unchanged.

My point is that time and proximity to a position has no relationship to an individuals skills and cannot serve as a predictor of success at the next position of responsibility. This is very true when a primary component of a position requires leadership.

True leadership ability is an extremely rare talent. There are countless definitions of leadership, but in my opinion, it comes down to one simple thing: the ability to get people to do what you want them to do. There are many ways that a person can achieve real leadership, the most common is fear; there are other and better methods, but they require better and more versitile skills to achieve success.

Think about your job. How many bosses are real leaders? How many meetings have you left and later enjoyed a laugh with your fellow co-workers at the absurdity of the next "plan-of-the-week", or received an e-mail detailing some poorly concieved and poorly executed program? Those are examples of failures in leadership and they are destined for failure because they will be only half-hearted supported by the staff.

For another example, I take you back to your jobs. How many times have you seen someone promoted beyond his/her level of competance? Most of the time you are unaware that the person will be beyond their level of competance until they actually get there. (Pride makes me refuse to even count the number of times I have made the mistake of promoting someone beyond their competance level.)

My point is that leadership is an elusive and impossible to predict asset. Experience and exposure in a lesser position is no guarantee of success. Of course, experience and exposure is infinitely better than absolutely zero experience, for the vast majority of people. Talented people will succeed without the experience and exposure, I cite Alexander the Great for one, but talented people are few and far between.

I am not touting Obama in this missive. His leadership is also still unknown and unproven. All I am intending to do is plant the seed that time and exposure is universally over-rated. One of my favoite expressions is "He does not have 20 years experience, he has had one years experience twenty times". And I would hope that you reflect on leadership at the same time.