[TampaDeveloper]

First let me say I am far from being a Bush supporter. Honestly, I'm sick of having dismal choices when it comes to who should run our country. But last night I learned some new information about Kerry that made me sick to my stomach.

Kerry voted for the war but then changed his mind about it. He subsequently voted down numerous bills to give our troops supplies needed to defend themselves. War-or-no-war is one vote. But once you loose that vote, its another issue; needless loss of human life.

Then, to make things worse, he voted down a bill to give hazard pay to our troops. Many of the people over there were reserves that have jobs and families. These men and women were forced to take pay cuts and perform duties that could very possibly get them killed. The troops didn't vote to go to war, congress did (and he did). The families (and especially the children) of soldiers didn't vote to go to war either. Why is it then, that they are the ones that take the hardships of it? At least give them the pay they were making before you forced them off to fight your war.

[Krusty]

Please cite the article/source for what you are saying or back up your claims with something other than "last night, I learned some new information". Coulda been Bubba at the bar telling you this for all we know.

[Millennium]

Kerry is not evil. He may be misguided -this is debatable, but that's the whole point of having elections in the first place- but he is not an evil person.

Bringing children into the debate doesn't help your cause, either. Appeal to emotion is a logical fallacy.

[davesimondotcom]

Again, Millennium brings some common sense. Kerry isn't evil. Neither is Bush.

Where has politics gone from disagreement to personal hatred? It's ok to disagree with someone without hating them. I disagree with my wife all the time!! But she has the right to her opinions. As does John Kerry. As does President Bush.

I would hope that in our process, there would be room for less than a soundbite about how Kerry voted against this, this and that. I wish he could say, "Yes, I voted against that, but here's why..." However, that doesn't happen on either side.

Fear mongering happens on both sides. I've heard people say that Bush has nothing to run on but fear. That may or may not be true. But exactly what have Democrats traditionally been doing when it comes to playing on environmental fears, fears of women losing the right to choose, fears of elderly over medicare, etc.?

I went off on a tangent. But I totally agree with Millennium on this. John Kerry isn't evil, you just disagree with him.

[TampaDeveloper]

Originally posted by Millennium:
Bringing children into the debate doesn't help your cause, either. Appeal to emotion is a logical fallacy.

I'm sorry, without love, we have nothing. If thats a logical fallacy, then so be it. I guess theres people that insist on being cold-hearted so they can remain "logical fallacy free", and theres those that just look at things and see when somethings not right.

Bah, poop on logical fallacy. Love is king.

[TampaDeveloper]

Originally posted by Krusty:
Please cite the article/source for what you are saying or back up your claims with something other than "last night, I learned some new information". Coulda been Bubba at the bar telling you this for all we know.

I'm referencing Zell Miller's speech last night. He's a Democrat from Georgia.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by TampaDeveloper:
I'm sorry, without love, we have nothing.

And all too often, we lose everything for love's sake, often ending up without even that. History is full enough of such events that even the most hopeless romantic should be given pause. Love is a great force for creation, but it is also a great force for destruction. This is why love should be tempered with care.

You are correct that love is important. But it is not the only important thing. If something cannot be done for whatever reason, it cannot be done, and the wise thing to do is try and find another means to the same end rather than stubbornly cling to an outright impossible or possible but unsustainable course of action. That may mean that sometimes there are problems which simply cannot be solved at the present time; this is a great shame, but if it cannot be done then it cannot be done. Even so, it is best to keep the problem in mind, so that if a viable solution presents itself in the future then the problem might be solved at that time.

Love means much in a cold world like ours. Let your heart drive you to act, but let your brain decide how to act. Buddhists have a saying: "Faith and logic are like a good pair of shoes; you will get much farther wearing both than only one." It is the same with the heart and the mind.

[BlackGriffen]

To save repetitive typing, please note that everything in this post is under the disclaimer "If I Recall Correctly." I'm going by memory because I don't have time to re-research this stuff.

Originally posted by TampaDeveloper:
First let me say I am far from being a Bush supporter. Honestly, I'm sick of having dismal choices when it comes to who should run our country. But last night I learned some new information about Kerry that made me sick to my stomach.

Be careful taking anything you hear at the RNC at face value. I've heard Repubs claim that the platform itself is meaningless, so I have a hard time thinking of it as a source of unbiased information.

Kerry voted for the war but then changed his mind about it.

Not quite. Kerry's story is that he voted to use the serious threat of force to get Saddam Hussein in line. He's also once said, "I didn't know that Bush was going to fcuk it up so bad," or something about like that, when asked if he regretted voting for the authorization to use force. So, in his mind, he didn't vote for a war, but the serious threat thereof, and doesn't regret that a war occurred so much as the fact that the Bush administration bungled the execution of everything but the "major combat phase."

He subsequently voted down numerous bills to give our troops supplies needed to defend themselves.

And who's fault is it that the soldiers needed additional appropriations for their supplies despite the fact that they were in the region gearing up for months? Who's lack of planning put them on the spot, in bad need of supplies? Who ignored the advices of multiple generals, even forcing Shinseki in to early retirement for testifying his honest opinion before congress, on the matter? Who told the American people that the war and peace could both be won with minimal amounts of troops and at minimal expense? The answer - ultimately Bush, but probably also Rumsfeld.

Again, Kerry's claim is that he had a nuanced stand. He wanted to actually pay for the $87 billion by rolling back some of Bush's tax cuts on the ultra wealthy. That's the version he voted for. Bush threatened to veto any such bill, and the Republicans voted against it. IIRC, he also wanted some other provisions that would require Bush to spend the money responsibly, and Bush wanted a blank check. So the Republicans voted against the version Kerry supported before they passed what Bush wanted.

They voted against the $87 billion before they voted for it. Sound familiar?

Then, to make things worse, he voted down a bill to give hazard pay to our troops. Many of the people over there were reserves that have jobs and families. These men and women were forced to take pay cuts and perform duties that could very possibly get them killed. The troops didn't vote to go to war, congress did (and he did). The families (and especially the children) of soldiers didn't vote to go to war either. Why is it then, that they are the ones that take the hardships of it? At least give them the pay they were making before you forced them off to fight your war.

I'm not familiar with whether Kerry voted for such a bill or not. Would you care to point to the bill so that we can look up the voting record, and possibly who proposed it? IIRC, there was a stink a while back about a bill Bush supported cutting (but not eliminating) hazard pay. Bush has also cut a lot of other monies and programs meant to directly benefit our troops and veterans, again, IIRC.

Be careful making a decision listening to only one side of the issue.

BlackGriffen

[TampaDeveloper]

Originally posted by BlackGriffen:
And who's fault is it that the soldiers needed additional appropriations for their supplies despite the fact that they were in the region gearing up for months? Who's lack of planning put them on the spot, in bad need of supplies? Who ignored the advices of multiple generals, even forcing Shinseki in to early retirement for testifying his honest opinion before congress, on the matter? Who told the American people that the war and peace could both be won with minimal amounts of troops and at minimal expense? The answer - ultimately Bush, but probably also Rumsfeld.

Regardless of who's to blame, its not the troops' fault. Thats the problem I have with it.

Originally posted by BlackGriffen:
Again, Kerry's claim is that he had a nuanced stand. He wanted to actually pay for the $87 billion by rolling back some of Bush's tax cuts on the ultra wealthy. That's the version he voted for. Bush threatened to veto any such bill, and the Republicans voted against it. IIRC, he also wanted some other provisions that would require Bush to spend the money responsibly, and Bush wanted a blank check. So the Republicans voted against the version Kerry supported before they passed what Bush wanted.

They voted against the $87 billion before they voted for it. Sound familiar?

Ok. I'll buy it. That puts reasonable doubt in my mind. Why can't politicians just tell the truth rather than slanting the information?

Originally posted by BlackGriffen:
I'm not familiar with whether Kerry voted for such a bill or not. Would you care to point to the bill so that we can look up the voting record, and possibly who proposed it?

Its okay. You made your point and I think its probably likely that we've been corn-swaggled again.

Originally posted by BlackGriffen:
Be careful making a decision listening to only one side of the issue.

BlackGriffen

I will not associate with any party which mis-represents the facts. I change my stance... Now if we only had a 3rd political party. Anybody interested in starting the "Non-Liar" party?

[TampaDeveloper]

Originally posted by Millennium:
Love means much in a cold world like ours. Let your heart drive you to act, but let your brain decide how to act. Buddhists have a saying: "Faith and logic are like a good pair of shoes; you will get much farther wearing both than only one." It is the same with the heart and the mind.

I'm with you. But my argument was directed at your statement that people should do a keyword search on "children" in somebody's comments and discount what they have to say if we find any hits.

[Secret__Police]

Originally posted by TampaDeveloper:
First let me say I am far from being a Bush supporter. Honestly, I'm sick of having dismal choices when it comes to who should run our country. But last night I learned some new information about Kerry that made me sick to my stomach.

Kerry voted for the war but then changed his mind about it. He subsequently voted down numerous bills to give our troops supplies needed to defend themselves. War-or-no-war is one vote. But once you loose that vote, its another issue; needless loss of human life.

Then, to make things worse, he voted down a bill to give hazard pay to our troops. Many of the people over there were reserves that have jobs and families. These men and women were forced to take pay cuts and perform duties that could very possibly get them killed. The troops didn't vote to go to war, congress did (and he did). The families (and especially the children) of soldiers didn't vote to go to war either. Why is it then, that they are the ones that take the hardships of it? At least give them the pay they were making before you forced them off to fight your war.

I also heard he likes to bathe in the blood of newborn babies.

[BlackGriffen]

Originally posted by TampaDeveloper:
Regardless of who's to blame, its not the troops' fault. Thats the problem I have with it.

Agreed wholeheartedly.

Ok. I'll buy it. That puts reasonable doubt in my mind. Why can't politicians just tell the truth rather than slanting the information?

Because then they'd lose to politicians who do. As access to information and fact checking gets better, ie the internet and sites like Spinsanity and The Columbia Journalism Review, it should make it harder and harder to misrepresent like politicians have become accustomed to doing.

I will not associate with any party which mis-represents the facts. I change my stance... Now if we only had a 3rd political party. Anybody interested in starting the "Non-Liar" party?

Sounds like you will not associate with any party, then. Also, I don't think we'll be able to get third parties in until we change the voting system. The winner-takes-all in districts thing and the vote for one guy and that's it thing literally makes the two party system rock solid stable. Using other ways to vote (eg ranking the candidates) and/or using proportional representation would permit third parties to gain seats in state and federal congress, gaining the viability needed to run for the executive offices (governor and president). Since these things require state level reforms, they're theoretically pretty doable.

They also have a couple of side benefits. First, the elimination of districts eliminates gerrymandering. Second, when voters have more than just two choices, attack politics doesn't work. The attacker and the attackee generally drag each other down, and the people switch to supporting one of the other candidates. We saw it happen in Iowa when Dean and Gephardt took each other out, and Kerry and Edwards won.

So this two party system isn't some immutable law of nature, the stability of it is just a consequence of how we vote.

BlackGriffen