Donkey vs Elephant vs Universe: Who ya got?

Hello me it's me again. Haven't been here in a while. Hope you enjoy the new lunacy!

so whaddya think this year?

republican?

democrat?

or maybe you reject the entire premise of the article as a misguided and simplistic attempt to reduce the complexities of the social-cultural-political philosophies of the many diverse and non-consistent conglomerations of human loyalties and ideals that comprise the coming together of these various polical parties in opposition to one another as yet another symptom of the media's attempt, but really humanities inability, both psychologically, philosophically, and politically, to portrary or understand the multi-faceted nature of the complexities of these loyalties and ideals in any form but a binary, dualistic, utterly fallacious because of it's specious two-fold simplicity, the fallacy of false dichotomy for you symbolic logicians out there, form that is easily digestible and understandable to the simplistic human layman who is so overwhelmed by the pressures and the responsibility of competing against, and thus being alienated from, the entire rest of his fellow humanity and the universe in this post-industrialist information age because the requirements of capitalistic economy modern man is forced to participate in by making himself into a commodity whose value is determined by the new gods, the arbiters of fiscal value, the credit determining agencies, so that man's value in himself is thus determined outside of himself, according to the flucuations of the market, the new sisters of Fate, so that man's very existence is reduced to various sets of simple yet false binary oppositions, like republican vs democrat, good vs evil, active vs pledge, good credit vs bad credit, etc. vs non-etc., that the truth of existence, the unity of the entire universe within itself and the determining of one's value from inside of oneself by examining the deepest parts inside of one's own mind-soul and finding there hugging and kissing and laughing and crying with you, the divinity of the entire universe, as taught by the ancient teachers of the one unified super spirit of the universe, is replaced by the nihilism of the soul and existence itself and allegiance to the new God of humanity, one's credit score, which will ultimately determine whether one winds up in the new afterlife, the lowest tax bracket at the bottom of hell, the largest tax bracket in the middle of purgatory, or the smallest tax bracket in the heights of the heavens, and whether one worships and sacrifices at the altar of goodwill, the secret cult of Bergdorf Goodman, or at the megachurch of Walmart, like I do?

so whaddya think?

it's 4am and I got 2 hours of work left, think i'm going to have some coffee.

in case you didn't know, I've been reading Erich Fromm, can't you tell?


TAXES The Democratic platform calls for extending the middle-class tax cuts for the 98 percent of American families who make less than $250,000 a year, and makes a promise not to raise taxes on them. The platform claims a typical family has saved $3,600 during Obama's first term. "Now he's fighting to stop middle-class families and those aspiring to join the middle class from seeing their taxes go up and to extend key tax relief for working families and those paying for college, while asking the wealthiest and corporations to pay their fair share," the platform says. The Republican platform would extend the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, pending reform of the tax code. It also says the party would try to eliminate taxes on interest, dividends and capital gains altogether for lower- and middle-income taxpayers. It also would work to repeal the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax. ___


ABORTION The Democratic platform states that it "unequivocally" supports Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision that made abortion legal, and "supports a woman's right to make decisions regarding her pregnancy, including a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay." The platform states: "Abortion is an intensely personal decision between a woman, her family, her doctor and her clergy; there is no place for politicians or government to get in the way." The Republican Party platform bans abortion in all cases, even rape, incest and when the life of the mother is endangered. Republicans say "the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed." It opposes using public revenues to promote or perform abortion or to fund organizations that perform or advocate abortions. ___


GAY MARRIAGE The Democratic platform supports the movement to get equal treatment under the law for same-sex couples. The platform says: "We also support the freedom of churches and religious entities to decide how to administer marriage as a religious sacrament without government interference." The platform opposes "federal and state constitutional amendments and other attempts to deny equal protection under the law" to same-sex couples. The Republican Party platform affirms the rights of states and the federal government not to recognize same-sex marriage. It backs a constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. ___


IMMIGRATION The platform states that "Democrats are strongly committed to enacting comprehensive immigration reform." Immigration overhaul would include bringing "undocumented immigrants out of the shadows," requiring illegal immigrants "to get right with the law, learn English and pay taxes" to get on a path toward citizenship. It also calls for a visa system that meets the country's "economic needs, keeps families together and enforces the law." It acknowledges that administrative fixes are not permanent. "Only Congress can provide a permanent, comprehensive solution." The Republican platform opposes "any form of amnesty" for those who intentionally violate the immigration laws, demands a halt to Justice Department lawsuits against states that have enacted tough immigration measures, would deny federal funding to universities that provide in-state tuition to illegal immigrants and advocates making English the official national language. ___


MEDICARE Democrats say the new health care law makes Medicare stronger by adding new benefits, fighting fraud and improving care for patients. It notes that nearly 50 million older Americans and those with disabilities rely on Medicare. Over 10 years, the law will save the average Medicare beneficiary $4,200, the platform says. "Democrats adamantly oppose any efforts to privatize or voucherize Medicare," the platform says. The GOP platform pledges to move Medicare away from "the current unsustainable defined-benefit entitlement model to a fiscally sound defined-contribution model." It supports a Medicare transition to a premium-support model with an income-adjusted contribution toward a health plan of the enrollee's choice. ___


CAMPAIGN FINANCE The Democratic platform criticizes the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, which lifted restrictions on independent political expenditures by corporations and unions, and calls for "immediate action to curb the influence of lobbyists and special interests on our political institutions" — with a constitutional amendment, if necessary, in the cause of campaign finance reform. "We support requiring groups trying to influence elections to reveal their donors so the public will know who's funding the political ads it sees," the platform says. The Republican platform supports the Citizens United decision as a free speech issue. ___


HEALTH CARE The platform pledges to continue building on the new health care law. It says accessible, affordable, high-quality health care is part of the American promise, that Americans should have the security that comes with good health care, and that no one should go broke because they get sick. "No law is perfect and Democrats stand willing to work with anyone to improve the law where necessary, but we are committed to moving forward," the platform says. The GOP platform says that a Republican president on his first day in office would use his waiver authority to halt progress in carrying out the health care act. It calls for a Republican plan based on improving health care quality and lowering costs and a system that promotes the free market and gives consumers more choice. ___


DEFENSE The platform says Democrats have responsibly ended the war in Iraq, put the al-Qaida terrorist organization on the path to defeat with the killing of Osama bin Laden and reversed the Taliban's momentum to set the stage for the drawdown of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. "As a consequence of the president's decisions and the brave work of our military and intelligence professionals, bin Laden can no longer threaten the United States and al-Qaida's senior leadership has been devastated, rendering the group far less capable than it was four years ago," the platform said. "The al-Qaida core in Afghanistan and Pakistan has never been weaker." Democrats back further reductions in the nuclear weapons stockpile, building on the hard-fought U.S.-Russia treaty that Obama got through the Senate in December 2010. Democrats also say they have an "unshakable commitment to Israel's security," and Obama will do all in his power to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. Democrats say they want to maintain a strong military, but argue that in the current fiscal environment, tough budgetary decisions must include defense spending. They noted that Democrats and Republicans agreed last summer in the deficit-cutting plan to reduce military spending. Republicans, in their platform, criticizes the Obama administration as holding weak positions toward such countries as North Korea, China and Iran and for reductions in military spending.


Brad responded and said:

What is false is that you think this is a binary choice, when it is not. There will be a third candidate on the ballot in all 50 states. The libertarian candidate is Gary Johnson. Know your choices. I think more people would be on board with his platform if the media didn't lead the public to believe there are only 2 choices.


I responded to Brad and said:

nice burbun, thanks for the response.  the last time a third candidate had a realistic chance was 20 years ago with ross perot, when i was in junior high, but maybe he just took away the republican vote from george bush so clinton could win, so maybe he never really had a chance either.  Is it the media or is it the people or is it both or is it neither? I had some ideas about some of this stuff today while I was thikning about your response brad, so whaddya think of these.

so a lot of this election is about taxes, i was thinking that not only should we raise taxes on the wealthy, we should raise taxes across the board on everybody and use that money to pay off the national debt and get usa back on some sort of hard currency, and tell the truth about what our past presidents did with all the gold that's no longer at fort knox, brad meltzer.  we dont' need to close the fed, but if we had some sort of hard standard to buttress our paper money, that would help sheild us against greece whose about to go down and economically blow the whole f+#ing world up a 2nd time here in the next few months.  once the debt is paid off and we have our governmental fiscal house in order, then we can talk about taxes being below 10% for everybody and under 20% for the wealthiest of us, but until that time, wealthy people pay 50%, middle income pay 25%, get our currency and debt in order and then we'll reform the tax code and debate a percentage point here or a percentage point there.

so the republicans want to ban gay marriage and abortions across the board, no exceptions and they want to pass a constitutional amendment making it so, like jean luc picard going to warp speed, well then, let the democrats pass 2 consitutional amendments adding the right to healthcare as one of those protected freedoms like speech religion in the consitution, so the government would be required to protect people's civil rights by mandating some form of universal health coverage, get the damn numbers people to figure out some way to do it, their smart, they'll figure it out, so that's the first one, and the 2nd, pass a ban on lobbying and big money in washington and finally clean up the fiscal corruption that's caused the financial crisis in the first place by not regulating the derivatives market and letting certain banks risk their money on the market.  we should go back and have a strict seperation of banks that can and banks that cannot do derivatives and other risky sh+t like that, so as to not put the economy in risk again.  they get their sanctity of marriage and life, democrats get healthcare for everybody and big money influence out of washington.

here's another solution, instead of specific policies.  what would happen if we gave control of all social programs, thinks that republicans hate like medicare, caid, food stamps, etc., etc., we'll just give that all to the republicans and let them do what they want with it, but in return, the republicans have to give complete control over the tax code to democrats, so they can make sure everybody is paying their fair share and so that they will be able to fund the new republican medicare and caid programs, and abstitence and heterosexual reeducation programs for those perverts among us, now that gays can't marry but they will have healthcare for life.  i think this is a great idea and would either work great or completely destroy the government.  but it be interesting to see what would happen.

we can do what the republicans want as well with immigrants, ship them all home to mexico, but then let the democrats reform the legal immigration code to expand it and improve it to let people come here legally, not illegally which gets republicans all riled up. 

i can do this all night, but i think i'll end it there.  good to hear from you brad, thanks for your 2 cents. anybody else?

.