[Demonhood]

Feel free to add your own points to this list (or argue with mine, whichever).

This is what I've learned (or have had my suspicions reaffirmed) from this whole election nonsense:

1) Politicians are hacks. Robots. Golems. Empty vessels. The vast majority of them have no original thoughts in their head. They only regurgitate the party line. They hear a sound byte from their 'almighty leader' and they use that for every single argument about that subject for the next two weeks. When faced with a question that might require them to venture outside of this comfortable if empty box, they change the subject quickly so they can get back to ranting against the opposing party.

2) There is a need for a standardized ballot system. This butterfly crap with punching holes or the old old method of pulling levers is absurd. Each state should have at least upgraded to a simple 'fill in the oval scantron-ish' ballot by now. Or even electronic touch screens and online reporting. Anything would be better.

3) The electoral college needs to be reviewed. Not necessarily dismantled, just examined to see if it still fits the current needs of our country. Some will argue that the founders knew best and we should keep it, while others say times have changed and this election proves it. Well, the answer is in the middle somewhere. And while all of our politicians seem to be maneuvering towards the middle, very few of them are interested in true compromises based on logical arguments/thought.

ummm....more later.

>>What have we learned from this?>>

Vote Libertarian.

[suprz]

i agree with demonhood... amen brother!

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" I think,
therefore....IMAC

[Demonhood]

4) Hypocrisy is king. Politicians will never admit to engaging in blatently hypocritical activities even when confronted by the facts. See #1, facts are less important than the spin you put on the story you tell. Sadly.

[gumby5647]

i am watching the Fox news channel....and they showed the voting computer counters......and i swear it was running windows 3.11 !!!!!!!! WTF!!??!?!

Maybe im wrong.....or maybe that's what's wrong.

[MezzanineKid]

What have we learned? Hrm. Democrats are cry babies..... You let them see the ballot, they're fine. You let them vote, its fine. You let them have Gore winning, they're fine. You let them have Bush win..

HEYYY! >WAAHH!!< THATS NOT FAIR! WE DEMAND A RECOUNT!!!!

Yeah ok. Hand counting is MUCH more accurate than a machine.

****ing nimrods.

Ca$h

PS: GO HIGHER TAXES GO HIGHER TAXES! GO HIGHER TAXES! GO HIGHER TAXES

>pumps shotgun<

GO HIGHER TAXES GO HIGHER TA-
>KABLAM!!!!<

[Demonhood]

Umm...ok.

Does anyone have anything logical to add to this thread? I know you like to reply a lot Ca$h, but please keep your responses in my threads to actual arguments and not irrational screaming and shotgun noises.

Ca$h, do you *try* to get things right? People were complaining all day Tuesday, not after the results were known. And hand counting of card ballots *is* more accurate than machine counting due to the problem of half-punched holes. You know who else thinks hand counting is more accurate? Your man Bush, who signed a law in Texas mandating that recounts are to be done by hand.

But hey, why let facts get in the way of your irrational hatred for Democrats?

[elzinat]

But of course ca$h already new that Bush is far less intelligent than he is. because if he were less intelligent than Bush, he would be a vegetable in a hospital bed on an IV unable to post amusing messages here on this forum.

For your list, demon:
5) the American people value stupidity. almost half of the Americans who bothered to go out and vote went to vote for an idiot for pres. in other words, they think that they have the right to go ahead and screw over the entire world (and yes shrub will, if elected) just to have lower taxes (until he has to raise them again because the economy collapses and he has not been paying down the debt, and interest rates go through the roof and you can't get a loan to start a business). But they are happy because the less-well-equipped soldiers are more numerous.
It's all the fault of that dumb Jackson. Making the people think that it is good to have a president who is "one of them", "the common man", "not from Washington".
"fuzzy math... yeah, I failed Multiplication when I was in college too. dui... yeah, I drink and drive too. clean coal... yeah, I like breathing soot too. english... yeah, speak it can me also, if that it is english, which are to be speaked. This bush fellow, I can really identify with him. I think i'll vote bush, because he's the closest thing on the ballot to me."



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be happy!

[MezzanineKid]

Wait wait... let me get this straight, you think that voting for GORE will improve the military????

[Don Pickett]

Gore has the advantage of actually serving in the military and getting shot at by 7.62 and missed. More than Bush can say.

I think (hope?) both parties have learned they need to nominate candidates who are noticably different from each other. I think this election was a result of the Republicans trying to regain the center they abandoned eight years ago and the Democrats running an arrogant campaign and assuming they'd win.

The Republican party has done itself an enormous amount of damage in the last eight years, but they did realize they wouldn't win an election trying to court the religious right and the freaky right wing of the country. Unfortunately for the Democrats, they didn't do enough to distinguish Gore from Bush, and now we have this soap opera. Gore is a smart, able politican, but he doesn't have Clinton's charisma, and Cliton's charisma is part of what got him elected.

Don

[3gg3]

Originally posted by elzinat:
[B]But of course ca$h already new that Bush is far less intelligent than he is. because if he were less intelligent than Bush, he would be a vegetable in a hospital bed on an IV unable to post amusing messages here on this forum........

I think i'll vote bush, because he's the closest thing on the ballot to me."

/B]

As for Bush, Christopher Hitchens summed up my view perfectly when he described him as "unusually incurious, abnormally unintelligent, amazingly inarticulate, fantastically uncultured, extraordinarily uneducated, and apparently quite proud of all these things."

Doe$ the above remind you of $omeone who po$t$ here with maddening frequency?

We-e-ell, all right, delete the "incurious".

[elzinat]

Yeah ca$h, I know. it's hard to think about. but if you actually watched the campaigns and listened to what bush and gore said, bush said the military is a problem but proposed to do much less about it than gore, who said there is no problem. funny that, eh?
bush said the military needs to be "more ready to win war, and therefore prevent war" or some such atrocity of a butchery of this excellent language. he proposes skipping a generation of military technology, but getting more soldiers. in other words, he wants the US to have an army like China's. between you and me I do not think that that is *exactly* where the US's greatest strength is.
gore wants to invest more than $100 B in military research. this would mean that our armed forces would continue to have a technological edge far more significant than greater numbers of foot soldiers with pitchforks (IMnsHO). but maybe pitchforks in the hands of men with an inspirational idiot commanding them are more effective than lasers or whatever if the army is commanded by gore. I'm no expert.

then there is missile defense. gore wants to continue research to try to create something which would work. bush wants to build something which would not even be able to pretend to work. setting aside for a moment that it is simply a waste of money and resources to invest anything in a missile defense which will NEVER be useful AT ALL, bush's plan sounds even stupider than gore's.

also note: bush's planned tax cut =100% of the (unreasonable) projected surplus that has not been already spent by this Congress. in other words, ca$h, bush will either have to cut your tax cut, or levy new taxes against you. and his military will still be weaker anyway.

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be happy!

[Don Pickett]

Unfortunately, neither candidate had the balls to face down the Pentagon and admit that we do not, at present, have the technology to mount a real, anti-milssle system. So, instead of those billions of dollars going somewhere they could be used, they will be sent to Lockheed Missle Systems and GE to, eventually, be wasted. No anti-missle technology demonstration has ever worked, ever, in the twenty years they've been going on.

If you're looking for a model of how to run a lean, effective military, look no further than the Marines. They do more with less than any other branch, and probably have the highest level of operational readiness of any branch of the service. Every Marine is a rifleman - every Marine goes through basic and combat training - so every Marine can fight. They even make use of those old M-60s; got 'em decked out with reactive armor and are ready for a fight.

A larger question here is the shape of the military in a one-superpower world. Simply put, there is no country in the world with an armed forces to match ours, and while that's good news, it also raises the question of "what, precicely, are we doing with such a large armed forces when there's no equal force to match it against?".

This is why the Pentagon is reshaping the armed forces to respond to smaller, less intensive threats. It's also the reason why (except for the Marines) the armed forces are having problems hitting their recruitment goals. A lot of people (myself included) don't see the point of a 2 million person, standing armed forces when there's no threat out there which requires that much force. The only country with a standing army which could trouble us is China, and the chances of the U.S. and Chinese armies meeting is about the same as Steve Jobs dropping OS X and singing the praises of Windows.

Eventually some Chief Executive is going to have to face the question of what to do about our military structure. Unfortunately, I don't think either Gore or Bush will. Bush to too dumb, Gore was in the Army, and both are far too political animals to touch that problem.

Don

[DBursey]

Is there an ongoing backlash against intellectualism in the US? If Bush gets in, it really seems (from the outside)that you've elected a bit of a dimwit. Perhaps his media soundbites aren't doing him justice, but he seems quite ... uninspiring. Inarticulate, of mediocre intelligence, doesn't carry himself well at all. As someone here alluded, perhaps an attempt by the 'backwater boys' to elect someone of their own ilk. If he wins after all this hoopla, the US will be a bit of a laughing stock. No offense.

Two points for cash's consideration. One, the democrats did not request or initiate a recount in Florida. The recount was triggered automatically by state law when the results were seen to be within 1/2 of a percentage point. Hell, I knew that and I'm a 'foreigner' for pete's sake.

The second point has to do with your constant ranting on taxes. You have a nice Neon; your taxes go to build and maintain the roads you drive it on. And if god forbid you wrap it around a mighty oak one day, those taxes will also ensure lots of available hospitals in which to piece you back together. Your taxes go to build much that you take for granted in your society. Believe it or not you are still one of the lowest taxed citizenry in the western world.

"Is there an ongoing backlash against intellectualism in the US?"

It's a bit of a tradition here, unfortunately. With a few exceptions in our history, notably right after Sputnik when the U.S. went into a panicked cram mode for science, Americans tend to look down on intellectuals. Bush's appeal of "fuzzy math" was a calculated appeal to this majority opinion.

It's not universal. People in the large urban areas on the coasts, for instance, are often much less hostile to the ideal of intellectualism than are those in the great expanse of the midwest where do-it-yerself practical knowledge trumps that icky "book" knowledge.

This is probably also tied into the traditional American love of the underdog, where the intellectuals are seen as having an unseemly advantage and people laugh in delight when the dumb guy comes out on top.

It may also have something to do with a traditional desire to separate ourselves from our European ancestors, those wacky intellectuals, and revere our pioneering forebears who were too busy to read a book as they tamed a continent. This is a myth, of course, as people such as Thoreau disproved, but it's a myth loved by Americans who prefer the can-do guy to the smart guy.

[VRL]

For those debating the issue of the deterioration of our military, you may find these editorials educational, if not eye-opening:
http://www.hackworth.com/31OCT00.htm http://www.hackworth.com/archive.html

Maybe the next president of our United States will finally acknowledge that there are serious problems within our military (as well as in DC), take responsibility for those problems (even if he and his administration do not like how it may affect popularity polls), and have the fortitude do something about it!! No, I don't believe it's necessarily about money; it has more to do with QUALITY OF LEADERSHIP. My hope is that the next president has enough sense to surround himself with intelligent leaders who don't hide behind politics - who actually get off their butts to modernize/improve our National Defense, as well as remove self-serving and/or ill-equipped staff from the ranks of the US Military.

One final thought ... to even suggest that Gore (or GW Bush, for that matter) understands anything about military life - that is an insult to the hundreds of thousands of honorable men and women who have served and/or continue to serve in the US military, and an even bigger insult to those who have died while serving our country!

[MezzanineKid]

Actually, there IS a missile defense system that works. My uncle made it. He works for Aerojet, and i saw these videos of it. I could tell you about it, but I'd have to kill you. Anyway, it IS available, it just doesnt have the bugs worked out..

Ca$h

[Don Pickett]

I repeat, there is no functional anti-ballistic missle defense system, and there hasn't been for twenty years. There are anti-missle systems, of which the Patriot is the most famous and the English Seawolf the most effective (knowcked a 4.5 inch shell out of the air in a live ammo test), but these are not useful against ICBMs, which is what the idiots in the Pentagon wants. The technology just isn't there.

As an aside, even if there were one, it would have been ineffecitive during the Cold War. The greatest threat to the U.S. back then was from Russian missle subs thirty miles off the coasts. Missles fired from these subs would only be in the air for three or so minutes, which was not enough time for anyone to respond. This is the scenario which kept the Pentagon up nights, and the one for which the only deterrent was having us hunter killer subs constantly track the Russian subs, which they did, which led to several still-classified accidents and one probable sinking. Fortunately for us, now, this is no longer a problem, with most of the Russian fleet moored in their home ports and the Russians too busy trying to straighten out their country after years of neglect.

One final thought ... to even suggest that Gore (or GW Bush, for that matter) understands anything about military life - that is an insult to the hundreds of thousands of honorable men and women who have served and/or continue to serve in the US military, and an even bigger insult to those who have died while serving our country!

Nonetheless, Gore was actually on the ground for a full tour of duty in Vietnam, actually on the front lines (if that war could be said to have any) and therefore has more experience than Bush, who has never served in active duty. Gore has seen men die in combat, which is probably one reason he's not as hawkish as Bush. For him men dying in war in not some grand idea, but an ugly reality.

If you read about Gore, he is very forthcoming about how the war affected him.

Don

[MezzanineKid]

Uh.... THERE IS A ICBM DEFENSE SYSTEM.

Fine I'll tell you guys about it just so you know I'm cool.

I forget the name of it, it was some acronym (like usual) and its creed was Interballistic Kill Vehicle: Discriminate And Destroy"

It was cool, my uncle gave me a sticker of it (it had that motto on it) and I stuck it on my big ugly 1978 mercury marquis. It indeed was a kill vehicle, it could take out construction signs at 40mph without a scratch!!!!

Back to the thingy. it was a 4ft cube, with nozzles all over it. it was suspended on the ceiling via a big wire, and then underneath it was a big net. They light this roadflare a ways away, and hit GO ont he control panel of this thing.

It releases the cord, and the thing HOVERS there without using any rotors, just little "PFFTS" of rocket fuel all over, its spinning like crazy, but staying in the exact same place. Then, out of nowhere, ti runs into the flare and falls onto the net.

it lasted about ..hrm...10 second? Anyway, that was back in 1988, so I'm pretty sure its done now. Just needs $ to put them up into orbit.

Then we have a net of protector kill vehicles, designed to ram into enemy missiles.

Ca$h

[Don Pickett]

That's vaporware - did it function in orbit, in a hard vacuum, delineating between forty incoming signals to figure out which should be hit and which shouldn't? if it didn't, it didn't work. Making something float in the middle of the desert is simple. Making it work in the real world is something else. Fr'example, look at the M-16. When it was introduced it was a shambles, because the folks in the Pentagon made changes and never thought to test it in the conditions where it would be used, i.e., the jungles of Vietnam. It was a very expensive lesson.

No anti-ballistic missle system has ever worked in a real world test, in orbit, under actual conditions. None have ever come close. The "Star Wars Shield" has been a conservative wet dream - the ultimate easy answer - that has swallowed up billions of taxpayer dollars and never even shown one working prototype. As I said before, it was invalidated by Russian styrategies before it was even designed, because nothing could defend against a low-level ICBM shot from a Russian sub thirty miles off-shore - that's why there were always Russian subs thirty miles offshore, and that's why the U.S. Navy developed the world's best acoustic sensor technolgy.

Anti-missle systems on general don't work that well. The Patriot, despite progaganda, only had a 50% hit kill rate in the Gulf War, and the one functioning anti-missle system the U.S. has, the ship mounted M61s, let the warhead get real close before sending up a curtain of lead, something that won't work with zero G physics.

Dude, if you are that naive, I have a really nice bridge to sell you. It goes from Brooklyn to New York, and I promise you it can all be yours for only $10 million. . .

Don

[Arty50]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:
Fr'example, look at the M-16. When it was introduced it was a shambles, because the folks in the Pentagon made changes and never thought to test it in the conditions where it would be used, i.e., the jungles of Vietnam. It was a very expensive lesson.

The M-16 was a beautiful weapon (if such a thing exists). It was very accurate and never needed to be cleaned. Unfortunately the latter was only true when used with the proper ammo. Of course, the ammo that should've been used wasn't in Vietnam. Sadly the military didn't test the "new" ammo. Initially cleaning kits were not issued to our troops, many guns jammed, and in the end many of our men died. After a long time, cleaning kits were issued. Sad story.

No anti-ballistic missle system has ever worked in a real world test, in orbit, under actual conditions. None have ever come close. The "Star Wars Shield" has been a conservative wet dream - the ultimate easy answer - that has swallowed up billions of taxpayer dollars and never even shown one working prototype. As I said before, it was invalidated by Russian styrategies before it was even designed, because nothing could defend against a low-level ICBM shot from a Russian sub thirty miles off-shore - that's why there were always Russian subs thirty miles offshore, and that's why the U.S. Navy developed the world's best acoustic sensor technolgy.

Anti-missle systems on general don't work that well. The Patriot, despite progaganda, only had a 50% hit kill rate in the Gulf War, and the one functioning anti-missle system the U.S. has, the ship mounted M61s, let the warhead get real close before sending up a curtain of lead, something that won't work with zero G physics.

Actually there is a tri-level missile defense planned. Patriot for short range, THAAD for medium to high range (it could hit sub lauched stuff), and finally PLV for the big stuff. Success for each has degraded as you go higher in the atmosphere. THAAD has had some success. Basically though, none of these systems have been exceptional (ie. 100%).

And of course the problem with a nuclear missile defense is that unless you get 100% success you might as well not have tried at all. What good is stopping 48 nuclear bombs if the 49th and 50th get through? As the joke goes, one good nuclear explosion can ruin the whole day...

Besides, those of us who work in software development know how inordinantly difficult it is to get a sufficiently-complex system to be bug-free. It is safe to say that missile defense is sufficiently-complex.

Of course, there's plenty of money to be made in this area, so you can expect contractors to brag about how successful their efforts have been. After all, they want a piece of the cash cow too.

[Don Pickett]

The M-16 was a beautiful weapon (if such a thing exists). It was very accurate and never needed to be cleaned. Unfortunately the latter was only true when used with the proper ammo. Of course, the ammo that should've been used wasn't in Vietnam. Sadly the military didn't test the "new" ammo. Initially cleaning
kits were not issued to our troops, many guns jammed, and in the end many of our men died. After a long time, cleaning kits were issued. Sad story.

It's more complex than that. When Stoner designed the AR-15/M-16, he designed it with a chromed bore. Macnamara and his boys, when shoving the weapon through the development process, decided to cut the chromed bore because they didn't think it was important and they wanted to save money - they were arrogant enough to believe that it wasn't necessary, despite the fact that they were told the opposite, despite the US military's then-more-recent experience fighting in jungles in World War II.

If the chromed bore had been left in place the switch to "dirtier" ammo might not have been so catastrophic. But the combination of the two, and the ravages of Vietnam's weather on the unchromed bore (pitting, rusting, etc.) proved a deadly combo. The M-16 has matured into arguably the finest small arm in the world, but it had a rocky start, all because people who thought they knew what they were doing wouldn't listen.

Actually there is a tri-level missile defense planned. Patriot for short range, THAAD for medium to high range (it could hit sub lauched stuff), and finally PLV for the big stuff.Success for each has degraded as you go higher in the atmosphere. THAAD has had some success. Basically though, none of these systems have been exceptional (ie. 100%).

Exactly - THAAD has had some success. Some - not much. Hitting an incoming ICBM is like hitting a rapidly moving needle in a haystack. As of now, it's technologically infeasible, but that won't stop Lockheed Missle Systems and friend from spending billions trying.

We really don't need one now, anyway. There isn't another nuclear power with a proven delivery system. I know China has a space program, but it's one thing to have a space program and another to be able to drop a nuke from space without something going wrong. Unfortunately, I think MAD still exists to some extent, but I'm glad the US and Russian nuclear arsenals are on stand down.

Don

[MezzanineKid]

Actually, did you guys hear about that anti ICBM test out in the pacific this summer? There were two tests. One navy test, and one aerojet test.

Hehehe. The Aerojet one WAS my uncles missile. He built and designed damn near everything on it. Anyway, it failed. 10 million down the tubes. Stupid problem too. When the rocket leaves the tube, it has a wire on it that sends signals to the rocket for a bit, and then it rips out. Anwyay, the ripping out sent a small surge of electricity through it and messed stuff up, causing it to crash into the ocean.

Oh well.

Ca$h

[elzinat]

no offence, ca$h, but I hate your uncle and every other numbskull who has every wasted my money wanting or trying to build a missile defense system.

hear me loud and clear: there will NEVER EVER EVER be need or use for a missile defense system on this Earth. if anyone wants to blow up one of our cities, they would not be stupid enough to waste hundreds of millions of dollars developping rocket technology as the delivery. they would drive a truck into the US, leave it somewhere, and a few hours later no more city. that this country even thinks that there might be a use for a missile defense is tragic.

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be happy!

[Don Pickett]

Agreed.

There is Republican pork and Democratic pork, and this anti-missle shield has been the favrote bit of Republican pork for the last twenty years. Well, that and the B2 bomber.

Don

[3gg3]

Well, the topic got off to a good start, but reading the last dozen or so posts, I'd have to say the answer to the TOPIC is � not very much!

[Demonhood]

Yeah, that's how it seems. This defense talk isn't exactly in regards to something we've learned as a result of this election drama.

How about we stick to the topic at hand folks and move any talk about missiles to the ICBM forum. Oh wait.....

[Don Pickett]

Personally, I don't consider it a good thread unless it veers seriously off-topic at least once.

Personally I've leanred that the parties need to shape up and that you can't stop someone from nuking you if they want to.

Transferring to the ICBM forum. . .

Don