89 replies to this topic

[Shane Wahl]

The amount of voter fraud in the U.S. is negligible. This is part of a nationwide effort to trim the rolls of Democratic voters.

As for felons voting, I think that the more significant issue is why does the "greatest" country in the world also have the greatest number of felons, and why are so many of the felons people of color. And someone please explain how the war on drugs is working.

Also, because of the outdated electoral college, my vote won't count. I live in California, which will go for Obama no mater what. Indeed, the vast majority of Americans don't live in "swing states", so our votes for president don't have any impact. We are effectively disenfranchised.

The only good news from my perspective is that a Republican administration is going to save me a ton of income taxes. But I will be saddened by the upcoming rape of the poor and the middle class, with the exception of those stupid enough to vote for Romney. I have been giving most of my tax savings from the Bush tax cuts to feed poor children and families, but wish that there was some charity that served only the needy people who are smart enough to vote for their own self interest.

Glunn is spot on here. Voter fraud is a LAUGHABLE joke. It is so so rare. Purging voter registration is a much bigger problem (see Florida 2000 and Ohio 2004).

The war on drugs, like the war on crime, and certainly the war on terrorism are all complete shams. They aren't wars to end those problems, they are wars to exacerbate those problems. There is too much money in "corrections" and the military-industrial complex and drug trafficking.

The electoral college situation is merely another reason for Americans to demand powerful and broad electoral reform from limited financing to instant run-off voting to proportional electoral vote counts.

And yes the poor and middle class will be screwed and they WILL NOT KNOW it. They do not vote in their self-interest, which amazes me.

This is not to say that I am a big government fan. If you ever search my name you will find out why. The point is that there is so much manipulation while there is a squashing of real education in this country that effective democracy is completely obsolete. Evidence? That the people still vote for these assclowns again and again and again.

[Shane Wahl]

But look, small government libertarians who actually are conscientious . . . there is no hope AT ALL in that while voting for this war machine and this create-dependency machine. There will be no such thing as small government in America until it hits the fan hard. And both parties know this and one party lies blatantly about it. The other just rolls with the bunches and rarely stands up for anything progressive.

[diehardtwinsfan]

remember there was a lot of talk in left-wing circles about the manufacture of voting machines being linked to Republican backers after Gore v. Bush, but it seemed a bit tin-foil hat...though oddly viable at the time.

Exit polls, in part, due check in wide spread voter fraud on the other hand.

That's just it. They don't. The exit polls have been wrong in an unprecedented number of elections since 2004, not just at the Presidential level.

Here's the problem, there's no way to verify if these systems are accurate. A good implementation would have allowed machines to print out a written ballot that a voter must read and certify before they leave. Random machines are audited every election, and random precints are too. But instead, the process in most states is simply a connection to a black box DB where data is stored. This system isn't auditable. Countless places have shown that these machines are hackable as well, and there has been next to no peer review of the code.

the problem with this is that it only takes one or two to change an election, because one person can simply add hundreds or thousands of votes to a total. This whole voter ID thing pales in comparrison.

[Carole Keller]

I've often considered my vote as one of the lesser of two evils. It seems that if you want to vote for the person most 'for' the things you want you are just giving a vote to one you least want. The pitfalls of a two-party system. So I end up voting for the person who is most likely going to beat the one I find most reprehensible.

and in the end, you get nothing but an evil candidate. Since your vote won't change anything anyways, why not spend it on someone you actually like?

I think I answered that in the next paragraph of my original post.

[old nurse]

The amount of voter fraud in the U.S. is negligible. This is part of a nationwide effort to trim the rolls of Democratic voters.

As for felons voting, I think that the more significant issue is why does the "greatest" country in the world also have the greatest number of felons, and why are so many of the felons people of color. And someone please explain how the war on drugs is working.

Also, because of the outdated electoral college, my vote won't count. I live in California, which will go for Obama no mater what. Indeed, the vast majority of Americans don't live in "swing states", so our votes for president don't have any impact. We are effectively disenfranchised.

The only good news from my perspective is that a Republican administration is going to save me a ton of income taxes. But I will be saddened by the upcoming rape of the poor and the middle class, with the exception of those stupid enough to vote for Romney. I have been giving most of my tax savings from the Bush tax cuts to feed poor children and families, but wish that there was some charity that served only the needy people who are smart enough to vote for their own self interest.

Glunn is spot on here. Voter fraud is a LAUGHABLE joke. It is so so rare. Purging voter registration is a much bigger problem (see Florida 2000 and Ohio 2004).

The war on drugs, like the war on crime, and certainly the war on terrorism are all complete shams. They aren't wars to end those problems, they are wars to exacerbate those problems. There is too much money in "corrections" and the military-industrial complex and drug trafficking.

The electoral college situation is merely another reason for Americans to demand powerful and broad electoral reform from limited financing to instant run-off voting to proportional electoral vote counts.

And yes the poor and middle class will be screwed and they WILL NOT KNOW it. They do not vote in their self-interest, which amazes me.

This is not to say that I am a big government fan. If you ever search my name you will find out why. The point is that there is so much manipulation while there is a squashing of real education in this country that effective democracy is completely obsolete. Evidence? That the people still vote for these assclowns again and again and again.

I complete agree with Shane Wahl on something. this post

[PseudoSABR]

There's a video/tape that got leaked to day of Romney talkign to some donors, he says some pretty rightwing stuff, and I'm not sure if he's telling these people what they want to hear or if he really believes it, but it seems pretty damning to me.

Here's the money quotes:
[FONT=Helvetica Neue][/FONT][FONT=Helvetica Neue]
“There are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it,” [/FONT][FONT=Helvetica Neue]
[/FONT][FONT=Helvetica Neue]
“My job is not to worry about those people,” Romney said. “I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”
http://www.politico....12.html?hp=t1_3

The videos have a lot of interesting stuff in them, and oddly Romney shows much more personality than Ive ever seen him have.


[/FONT]

[TheLeviathan]

There's a video/tape that got leaked to day of Romney talkign to some donors, he says some pretty rightwing stuff, and I'm not sure if he's telling these people what they want to hear or if he really believes it, but it seems pretty damning to me.[FONT=Helvetica Neue][/FONT]

I fail to see what is so damning. His 47 percent is probably too high, but it's not that different than saying the Republicans cater to the wealthy. Neither side has much room to grandstand on that front - it's just politicians being politicians.

[PseudoSABR]

What's damning isn't the inaccuracy of his broad brush, but the sneering contempt he shows for such people. The fact that Romney gave a 10pm press conference I think indicates the kind of reverberations his statements are having. I'm not sure what kind of effect it will have in terms of swaying voters, but it certainly reifies the caricature of Romeny-as-Montgomery Burns.

This is the kind of fodder TV ads are made of...

Edited by PseudoSABR, 17 September 2012 - 09:53 PM.

[Brock Beauchamp]

This map couldn't be more poorly organized but the information is interesting. Most of those awful, no good, horrible tax avoiders come from *gulp* red states...

http://www.theatlant...cndPDZ.facebook

[Shane Wahl]

At minimum, probably 40% of that 47% are Romney voters (think old, retired white people and young people who are poor and somehow have no idea that voting for Republicans is not in their self-interest).

Romney is saying that 47% won't take personal responsibility for themselves. He actually said that. Only a vile person can think that (and someone who believes that "middle class" is $200,000 a year).

[gunnarthor]

Yeah, Romney's had a pretty bad couple weeks. Today's leak - that he doesn't think he can fix the middle east situation - will continue to burn him.

That 47% comment was really bad, though. There isn't a lot of good ways to get through that esp when, at best, his numbers weren't quite accurate and, at worst, were cooked. But it looks like he's going to double down on it again. I'm starting to think that Santorum could have been a more competitive candidate.

[Reginald Maudling's Shin]

That's why New York and California are completely out of play for republicans? The huge nanny states that are going broke?
Romney's "point" in this is correct: He will never get the people dependent on government to vote for him. It is sad that so many people have no income tax liability. If they made it 100% that would truly be "fair" not Obama's marxist definition of fair. How anyone can vote for this inept clown of a president is beyond me. For the first time I can remember the republicans are actually nominating someone who has been successful in life but he's being demonized by liberals because he's rich (and worse yet, people are buying into it). No wonder we have ****ty presidents.

[Shane Wahl]

That's why New York and California are completely out of play for republicans? The huge nanny states that are going broke?
Romney's "point" in this is correct: He will never get the people dependent on government to vote for him. It is sad that so many people have no income tax liability. If they made it 100% that would truly be "fair" not Obama's marxist definition of fair. How anyone can vote for this inept clown of a president is beyond me. For the first time I can remember the republicans are actually nominating someone who has been successful in life but he's being demonized by liberals because he's rich (and worse yet, people are buying into it). No wonder we have ****ty presidents.

Are you being sarcastic or serious?

If you are serious, I feel pretty sorry for you. Anyway, you do realize that those people not paying federal income taxes are primarily retired oldsters or the working poor who don't even make enough to pay federal income taxes, right? You are aware, right, that not paying federal income taxes does not mean that one is "dependent" on the government? Finally, of the 47% who don't pay federal income taxes, I would say 2/5 or even up to 1/2 would be likely Romney voters!!!

Stop calling Obama a Marxist. That is so far from the truth (and that comes from someone who wishes that it were closer to the truth!) it isn't even funny.

Romney is successful, how? He clearly isn't morally successful if he has such disdain and hatred for poor people and says that they don't take "responsibility for themselves." He sounds like a pretty despicable guy, actually.

--Note: I am not voting for Obama, so don't go there.--

[Shane Wahl]

An important point about how Romney talks in that video vs. how he talks in scripted campaign events where he just says stuff he knows he is supposed to say. Romney in the video is fluent, clear, doesn't stammer, doesn't pause, and actually IS speaking in an "elegant" way. That shows him speakly freely as he truly is and he is expressing what he really thinks.

[old nurse]

At minimum, probably 40% of that 47% are Romney voters (think old, retired white people and young people who are poor and somehow have no idea that voting for Republicans is not in their self-interest).

Romney is saying that 47% won't take personal responsibility for themselves. He actually said that. Only a vile person can think that (and someone who believes that "middle class" is $200,000 a year).

The statistics are there if those who want to can look. The 47% number was created by the 2009 law "Making Work Pay". That law has expired. The actual numbers of households that do not pay any federal income or payroll tax is between 14-17%. The Congressional office reported that the bottom 20%, with a household income near $19,000 pay on average 4% of their income to federal taxes.
The not voting for your self interest. From message boards to conversations, people say things like "welfare $##@$%^&%$%$ the government never gave me nothin" as justification of voting Republican. When you mention corporate welfare to profitable businesses costs the government more they will respond with a "So" It is a bit absurd. The difference between an entitlement and good budget policy is wether or not it benefits me. People can see the welfare person, the corporate world is foreign, thus it is easier to hate the individual.

[Shane Wahl]

At minimum, probably 40% of that 47% are Romney voters (think old, retired white people and young people who are poor and somehow have no idea that voting for Republicans is not in their self-interest).

Romney is saying that 47% won't take personal responsibility for themselves. He actually said that. Only a vile person can think that (and someone who believes that "middle class" is $200,000 a year).

The statistics are there if those who want to can look. The 47% number was created by the 2009 law "Making Work Pay". That law has expired. The actual numbers of households that do not pay any federal income or payroll tax is between 14-17%. The Congressional office reported that the bottom 20%, with a household income near $19,000 pay on average 4% of their income to federal taxes.
The not voting for your self interest. From message boards to conversations, people say things like "welfare $##@$%^&%$%$ the government never gave me nothin" as justification of voting Republican. When you mention corporate welfare to profitable businesses costs the government more they will respond with a "So" It is a bit absurd. The difference between an entitlement and good budget policy is wether or not it benefits me. People can see the welfare person, the corporate world is foreign, thus it is easier to hate the individual.

Exactly, exactly. I have students who won't stop talking about "welfare fraud" and then I have to devote special time with them looking through the budget of the United States, showing them what on earth is really being spent on what. And this is a community college with generally fairly poor students! I guess the point is to make poor people hate other poor people, though . . .

[old nurse]

[quote name='Shane Wahl'][quote name='old nurse'][quote name='Shane Wahl']At minimum, probably 40% of that 47% are Romney voters (think old, retired white people and young people who are poor and somehow have no idea that voting for Republicans is not in their self-interest).

Romney is saying that 47% won't take personal responsibility for themselves. He actually said that. Only a vile person can think that (and someone who believes that "middle class" is $200,000 a year).[/QUOTE]

The statistics are there if those who want to can look. The 47% number was created by the 2009 law "Making Work Pay". That law has expired. The actual numbers of households that do not pay any federal income or payroll tax is between 14-17%. The Congressional office reported that the bottom 20%, with a household income near $19,000 pay on average 4% of their income to federal taxes.
The not voting for your self interest. From message boards to conversations, people say things like "welfare $##@$%^&%$%$ the government never gave me nothin" as justification of voting Republican. When you mention corporate welfare to profitable businesses costs the government more they will respond with a "So" It is a bit absurd. The difference between an entitlement and good budget policy is wether or not it benefits me. People can see the welfare person, the corporate world is foreign, thus it is easier to hate the individual.[/QUOTE]

Exactly, exactly. I have students who won't stop talking about "welfare fraud" and then I have to devote special time with them looking through the budget of the United States, showing them what on earth is really being spent on what. And this is a community college with generally fairly poor students! I guess the point is to make poor people hate other poor people, though . . .[/QUOTE]

Hate motivates. One of the more disturbing trends of human nature.
Money motivates also. The book Freakenomics pointed out through drug dealing. The guy selling drugs on the corner was motivated to do the statistically most likely job to get you killed (1/7) because if they moved up in the chain far enough they would make a lot of money. Nowhere does it mention they go after the ones above them to move up. Eventual attrition through jail takes care of that. I propose the economically disadvantaged do not go after the more wealthy voting wise on the same principal. I am going to move up (through divine intervention?) so therefore I will not do anything that will disenfranchise those in a higher economic standing.
Welfare fraud. One conservative website said it might run 9 billion a year. Rates for catching welfare fraud run at about 34%. Picking on conservative websites, Medicare fraud is about 60 billion/yr. There are bigger problems than welfare fraud. Liberal sites claim 60 billion was lost/profiteered in the gulf wars. Forbes once reported on the 100 billion wasted since the start of the cold war on weapons that did not work. There are bigger problems than welfare fraud. People don't come into contact with it.
If you really want to scare them, obesity costs 190 billion per year for America according to Rueters.

Edited by old nurse, 18 September 2012 - 01:22 PM.

[Shane Wahl]

[quote name='old nurse'][quote name='Shane Wahl'][quote name='old nurse'][quote name='Shane Wahl']At minimum, probably 40% of that 47% are Romney voters (think old, retired white people and young people who are poor and somehow have no idea that voting for Republicans is not in their self-interest).

Romney is saying that 47% won't take personal responsibility for themselves. He actually said that. Only a vile person can think that (and someone who believes that "middle class" is $200,000 a year).[/QUOTE]

The statistics are there if those who want to can look. The 47% number was created by the 2009 law "Making Work Pay". That law has expired. The actual numbers of households that do not pay any federal income or payroll tax is between 14-17%. The Congressional office reported that the bottom 20%, with a household income near $19,000 pay on average 4% of their income to federal taxes.
The not voting for your self interest. From message boards to conversations, people say things like "welfare $##@$%^&%$%$ the government never gave me nothin" as justification of voting Republican. When you mention corporate welfare to profitable businesses costs the government more they will respond with a "So" It is a bit absurd. The difference between an entitlement and good budget policy is wether or not it benefits me. People can see the welfare person, the corporate world is foreign, thus it is easier to hate the individual.[/QUOTE]

Exactly, exactly. I have students who won't stop talking about "welfare fraud" and then I have to devote special time with them looking through the budget of the United States, showing them what on earth is really being spent on what. And this is a community college with generally fairly poor students! I guess the point is to make poor people hate other poor people, though . . .[/QUOTE]

Hate motivates. One of the more disturbing trends of human nature.
Money motivates also. The book Freakenomics pointed out through drug dealing. The guy selling drugs on the corner was motivated to do the statistically most likely job to get you killed (1/7) because if they moved up in the chain far enough they would make a lot of money. Nowhere does it mention they go after the ones above them to move up. Eventual attrition through jail takes care of that. I propose the economically disadvantaged do not go after the more wealthy voting wise on the same principal. I am going to move up (through divine intervention?) so therefore I will not do anything that will disenfranchise those in a higher economic standing.
Welfare fraud. One conservative website said it might run 9 billion a year. Rates for catching welfare fraud run at about 34%. Picking on conservative websites, Medicare fraud is about 60 billion/yr. There are bigger problems than welfare fraud. Liberal sites claim 60 billion was lost/profiteered in the gulf wars. Forbes once reported on the 100 billion wasted since the start of the cold war on weapons that did not work. There are bigger problems than welfare fraud. People don't come into contact with it.
If you really want to scare them, obesity costs 190 billion per year for America according to Rueters.[/QUOTE]

Yes and $9 billion is not even a drop in the bucket. That's a month in Afghanistan. And who knows why the fraud takes place. I have hard time believing that well-off people are committing the fraud--I assume it is more like marginal cases where people don't quite qualify? I see, big deal, the cut-off point is arbitrary anyway.

I am disgusted by the Romney-is-successful nonsense. How this country can associate success with money alone is just appalling.

[TheLeviathan]

If you are serious, I feel pretty sorry for you. Anyway, you do realize that those people not paying federal income taxes are primarily retired oldsters or the working poor who don't even make enough to pay federal income taxes, right?

We can quibble about 47% until the cows come home, of course the number is invented. Just like the Democrats have invented a "rich" group that is milking the economy. Neither is true, but they play to the bases. All Romney said is what Reg. repeated - there is a group of Americans dependent on the government that are hooked to a party that won't vote for him. Likewise, there is a group of people hooked to the Republicans that won't vote for Obama. If this (or the fact that what he says on and off camera are different) is shocking to you - you are really, really naive.

Romney is successful, how? He clearly isn't morally successful if he has such disdain and hatred for poor people and says that they don't take "responsibility for themselves." He sounds like a pretty despicable guy, actually.

He didn't say "poor people" - he said those dependent on government which, by definition, makes them irresponsible for themselves. What you're doing is not unlike what he did - just from a left-wing slant.

And note - this is coming from someone that is most likely going to vote independent.

[Frozented9]

I work in the mortgage industry and I run across people all the time who make 6 figures a year and pay no income tax. Are they dependent on the government?