OT - State of the Union Address

[fan2456]

I have to start going to Sabres' games again on Wedn. Unfortunately, this thread is much more interesting and thought provoking!

[Weave]

It's really a matter of priorities. Plenty of parents are actively involved in politics, I can name 2 sets of parents on my street alone who are constantly door knocking and handing out fliers. It's tough to take most people seriously when they complain about politicians when they do little to actually understand what it is they are complaining about.

 

Where do most of these folks get that info though? What percentage of the population has internet access in their home? Do they get their info from the media? That is laughable. Not much of any real substance is covered by most forms of the media and most of that is reduced to sound bite. You might think it irresponsible that most folks don't get better informed but the reality is a very large percentage of the population has rather limited access to real info and even more limited time and opportunity to gather enough of it to truly be informed.

[TrueBlueGED]

I use corporate as a blanket term. Unions, professional organizations, religious organizations all take advantage of this. I don't like any of it. I know the Supreme Court ruled that for campaign finance purposes corporations have the same rights as individuals. I hate what that decision is doing to politics. Look at the huge influx of SuperPAC money Newt just recieved as an example.

 

It's obviously too early to tell what the Citizens United case will do to campaigns, but it may actually have a benefit. With money easier to come by and more readily available, the theoretical strings attached to donations won't be as strong...a candidate will be less likely to "sell out" for a donation, if the candidate can just easily get the money from a different source. So while it may be easier to donate, it may be harder for those donations to actually buy influence. Research on the influence of money takes time to do, so we'll have to wait to see, but I think it's possible that Citizens United may not be as bad as it has been made out to be.

[fan2456]

Where do most of these folks get that info though? What percentage of the population has internet access in their home? Do they get their info from the media? That is laughable. Not much of any real substance is covered by most forms of the media and most of that is reduced to sound bite. You might think it irresponsible that most folks don't get better informed but the reality is a very large percentage of the population has rather limited access to real info and even more limited time and opportunity to gather enough of it to truly be informed.

Amen

[Weave]

It's obviously too early to tell what the Citizens United case will do to campaigns, but it may actually have a benefit. With money easier to come by and more readily available, the theoretical strings attached to donations won't be as strong...a candidate will be less likely to "sell out" for a donation, if the candidate can just easily get the money from a different source. So while it may be easier to donate, it may be harder for those donations to actually buy influence. Research on the influence of money takes time to do, so we'll have to wait to see, but I think it's possible that Citizens United may not be as bad as it has been made out to be.

 

I'm a natural born cynic. We'll see.

[TrueBlueGED]

No, the burden is on you !!!! Neener, neener, neener !!!

 

I don't really have "a candidate". I gave up my blue/red status a long time ago. My vote goes to the individual I most trust to represent me. And I realize no one candidate is going to be a perfect representative of my wishes so it is a compromise. What organizations have purchased influence is a consideration for me. It is not the only one. I doubt I'd ever find a candidate whose campaign doners I agree with totally.

 

You'll probably be disheartened to learn that interest groups tend to buy influence with whoever is in power. Just as a random example, the health insurance lobby donated heavily to both candidates in 2008. Also, once the election is over, interest groups tend to make donations to the winner. So even though a corporation may prefer the Republican candidate (and vice versa for unions and Democrats), once all is said and done, they don't want to be completely ignored if "their guy" doesn't win.

[fan2456]

I'm a natural born cynic. We'll see.

If anyone attempts even a minimal effort to stay informed, it is impossible not to be cynical.

[TrueBlueGED]

I'm a natural born cynic. We'll see.

 

Oh I'm very cynical as well, and my gut reaction is that unfettered money in politics probably isn't the best thing in the world. Just pointing out it may not be ALL bad.

[Weave]

You'll probably be disheartened to learn that interest groups tend to buy influence with whoever is in power. Just as a random example, the health insurance lobby donated heavily to both candidates in 2008. Also, once the election is over, interest groups tend to make donations to the winner. So even though a corporation may prefer the Republican candidate (and vice versa for unions and Democrats), once all is said and done, they don't want to be completely ignored if "their guy" doesn't win.

 

Oh I am very aware of this. And we wonder how health care reform turned into a government guaranteed market for the insurance companies?

[Eleven]

OK, what happened?

Are you saying Bush and McCain were equal, and the determining factor was Bush's campaign fundraising?

Yea like wingnutt, what did happen? I'll guess your guy didn't win? And I am not trying to be contentious.

 

I didn't have a dog in that fight. But McCain had the nomination in his hands. He was head and shoulders above the other contenders. All of the sudden, and seemingly out of nowhere, came Bush. He started with money and attracted more. And more. And more. And the rest, as they say, was history.

 

I still believe that had Republican primary voters not been dazzled by the fundraising steamroller that was the Bush campaign, we wouldn't have had to wait several weeks for the Supreme Court to declare a winner. I think McCain would have crushed Gore. And most of the Democrats in DC (where I lived at the time) thought so, too. They were thrilled to see Bush enter the race and destroy McCain's easy path to the nomination.

[TrueBlueGED]

Oh I am very aware of this. And we wonder how health care reform turned into a government guaranteed market for the insurance companies?

 

Not to mention, the pharmaceutical industry has waaaaaaaaaaaay higher profit margins than the insurance companies, yet still got off the hook with drug importation still being illegal (granted they cut about $120 billion in prices over a period of time, but that was surely cheaper than drug importation being legalized in the long haul). Coincidentally, they were the single largest campaign contributor to Obama. I don't think it was a simple quid pro quo agreement, but it certainly mattered.

[Weave]

I didn't have a dog in that fight. But McCain had the nomination in his hands. He was head and shoulders above the other contenders. All of the sudden, and seemingly out of nowhere, came Bush. He started with money and attracted more. And more. And more. And the rest, as they say, was history.

 

I still believe that had Republican primary voters not been dazzled by the fundraising steamroller that was the Bush campaign, we wouldn't have had to wait several weeks for the Supreme Court to declare a winner. I think McCain would have crushed Gore. And most of the Democrats in DC (where I lived at the time) thought so, too. They were thrilled to see Bush enter the race and destroy McCain's easy path to the nomination.

 

Bush won Iowa. McCain won New Hampshire. Bush won South Carolina in a nasty primary with alot of ugly innuendo. It was pretty much a done deal by then. McCain had little money to work with and Bush's campaign spent like mad in SC.

[TrueBlueGED]

I didn't have a dog in that fight. But McCain had the nomination in his hands. He was head and shoulders above the other contenders. All of the sudden, and seemingly out of nowhere, came Bush. He started with money and attracted more. And more. And more. And the rest, as they say, was history.

 

I still believe that had Republican primary voters not been dazzled by the fundraising steamroller that was the Bush campaign, we wouldn't have had to wait several weeks for the Supreme Court to declare a winner. I think McCain would have crushed Gore. And most of the Democrats in DC (where I lived at the time) thought so, too. They were thrilled to see Bush enter the race and destroy McCain's easy path to the nomination.

 

I'm not so sure the cause was money. Obviously fundraising matters, and I'm not going to pretend the money had no impact on the primary. But Bush was also clearly closer ideologically and policy-wise to the base of the party, and as voters gained more information about McCain's general stance as a moderate, that undoubtedly damaged his campaign. It's hard to break down causal direction with a lot of this stuff. Does more money make a candidate, or does the best candidate simply get the most money? There's a lot of mixed results from the research on the influence of money in elections, which generally leads me to believe it's a bit of both: having more money can certainly make a lesser-known or longshot candidate more viable, but it's unlikely money alone can get an inferior candidate a victory.

[Weave]

Not to mention, the pharmaceutical industry has waaaaaaaaaaaay higher profit margins than the insurance companies, yet still got off the hook with drug importation still being illegal (granted they cut about $120 billion in prices over a period of time, but that was surely cheaper than drug importation being legalized in the long haul). Coincidentally, they were the single largest campaign contributor to Obama. I don't think it was a simple quid pro quo agreement, but it certainly mattered.

 

You are not helping my digestion this evening. :P

[Eleven]

Bush won Iowa. McCain won New Hampshire. Bush won South Carolina in a nasty primary with alot of ugly innuendo. It was pretty much a done deal by then. McCain had little money to work with and Bush's campaign spent like mad in SC.

 

Bush won Alaska the same day he won Iowa, too.

 

But that process started in early 1999. Often, when there is no incumbent, the activity starts early. That election was completely nuts, though, and it started even earlier than normal (normal for a no-incumbent election). By the time Bush joined the fray (early summer?), McCain was the clear favorite over Mal Forbes, Gary (?) Bauer, Liddy Dole, Alan Keyes, and the rest of the crowd.

 

When Bush joined, the entire game changed. All of the money was diverted from McCain to Bush.

[TrueBlueGED]

Bush won Iowa. McCain won New Hampshire. Bush won South Carolina in a nasty primary with alot of ugly innuendo. It was pretty much a done deal by then. McCain had little money to work with and Bush's campaign spent like mad in SC.

 

And this makes total sense. Iowa is more conservative, New Hampshire more moderate, South Carolina more conservative. I think Bush won because he was closer to what most of the Republican Party looks for in a candidate. His fundraising ability certainly helped and may have been the difference if he and McCain were equal....but they weren't, Bush was closer to the typical primary voter.

 

You are not helping my digestion this evening. :P

 

Well look on the bright side..... :unsure:

[Weave]

Bush won Alaska the same day he won Iowa, too.

 

But that process started in early 1999. Often, when there is no incumbent, the activity starts early. That election was completely nuts, though, and it started even earlier than normal (normal for a no-incumbent election). By the time Bush joined the fray (early summer?), McCain was the clear favorite over Mal Forbes, Gary (?) Bauer, Liddy Dole, Alan Keyes, and the rest of the crowd.

 

When Bush joined, the entire game changed. All of the money was diverted from McCain to Bush.

 

I don't think it was Bush's money that changed the result of the Republican nomination process.. Like TrueBlue mentioned, I think it was his core platform of staunch conservatism that won it. But I do think he was brought into the fray simply because he was THE conservative with an immense ability to bring money into the process. McCain couldn't raise that kind of money and the Repubs wanted the war chest. I think McCain lost on his own merit (for lack of a better term), but the only reason he had Bush as an opponent to begin with was money.

[Eleven]

I don't think it was Bush's money that changed the result of the Republican nomination process.. Like TrueBlue mentioned, I think it was his core platform of staunch conservatism that won it. But I do think he was brought into the fray simply because he was THE conservative with an immense ability to bring money into the process. McCain couldn't raise that kind of money and the Repubs wanted the war chest. I think McCain lost on his own merit (for lack of a better term), but the only reason he had Bush as an opponent to begin with was money.

 

I think McCain would have raised the money that otherwise went to Bush. I wish I could pull up some of the articles from 1999 that I remember (or that I am convinced that I remember), but I don't know that I'm going to find a source that isn't subject to copyright protection (like Lexis or something like that).

 

Anyway. I do agree that the right, as of late, tends towards the more extreme, rather than more moderate, candidate, and that certainly was Bush over McCain (prior to McCain's eight years of re-education). But the money follows that same philosophy.

[radiomike]

Where do most of these folks get that info though? What percentage of the population has internet access in their home? Do they get their info from the media? That is laughable. Not much of any real substance is covered by most forms of the media and most of that is reduced to sound bite. You might think it irresponsible that most folks don't get better informed but the reality is a very large percentage of the population has rather limited access to real info and even more limited time and opportunity to gather enough of it to truly be informed.

 

I know it's hard to imagine, but at one time the worldwide interweb was not around - were people not informed then? Please, access to information is not the issue. People are too pre-occupied with other things, things which I'm sure are legitimate and worth the time and effort. With that said, formulating a reasoned and logical political stance and subsequent informed choice on a candidate is not rocket science, nor does it require broadband internet to realize. People may have different priorities, which is fine, just don't complain when you realize you had no idea what you voted for.

 

How do you define plenty? I'm too lazy to look up the exact number, but I believe it's between 5-10% of voters who take an active role in a campaign.

 

The point was that it's not utterly out of the question like many people love to suggest. Raising a family means you have to become civically disengaged?

[Eleven]

I know it's hard to imagine, but at one time the worldwide interweb was not around - were people not informed then? Please, access to information is not the issue. People are too pre-occupied with other things, things which I'm sure are legitimate and worth the time and effort. With that said, formulating a reasoned and logical political stance and subsequent informed choice on a candidate is not rocket science, nor does it require broadband internet to realize. People may have different priorities, which is fine, just don't complain when you realize you had no idea what you voted for.

 

 

 

The point was that it's not utterly out of the question like many people love to suggest. Raising a family means you have to become civically disengaged?

 

On the first point, at the super-local level, I think more people get information via word of mouth than anything. (I'm talking about town boards, school boards, etc.)

 

On the second, I would suspect the very opposite, and that people with families become more engaged.

[TrueBlueGED]

I know it's hard to imagine, but at one time the worldwide interweb was not around - were people not informed then? Please, access to information is not the issue. People are too pre-occupied with other things, things which I'm sure are legitimate and worth the time and effort. With that said, formulating a reasoned and logical political stance and subsequent informed choice on a candidate is not rocket science, nor does it require broadband internet to realize. People may have different priorities, which is fine, just don't complain when you realize you had no idea what you voted for.

 

No, people weren't informed before the internet, just as they're not informed now (although you do undersell the difficulties people have in accessing information). And as I've seemingly said over and over, people don't have to be informed to make political decisions in accordance with their preferences. And frankly, almost nobody has any idea what they're voting for if you are talking about specific policies--not even the most politically informed know this....actually, because of the way policymaking works, not even candidates know exactly what their policies will look like. Candidates run on ideals/values/principles/ideology, not specifics, so you could make the argument that not only don't people know what they're voting for, but candidates don't know what they're running for :o

[Ghost of Dwight Drane]

Bush won Alaska the same day he won Iowa, too.

 

But that process started in early 1999. Often, when there is no incumbent, the activity starts early. That election was completely nuts, though, and it started even earlier than normal (normal for a no-incumbent election). By the time Bush joined the fray (early summer?), McCain was the clear favorite over Mal Forbes, Gary (?) Bauer, Liddy Dole, Alan Keyes, and the rest of the crowd.

 

When Bush joined, the entire game changed. All of the money was diverted from McCain to Bush.

 

Alan Keyes is the brightest guy out there. I have given to him in the past even though there is no way he gets elected. If you want a laugh, watch him debate Obama in their run for Senator. It's like Lucic versus Pominville in a fight.

[inkman]

Something to think about. One of my co-workers was originally from Romania. He left that country in 1986 to get away from the Communists. Then he said, "...and now they're here!" (with emphasis on disgust).

No doubt this is a thinly veiled shot at the current administration. It seems as if some people love to regurgitate what their talking pundits tell them.

[Eleven]

Alan Keyes is the brightest guy out there. I have given to him in the past even though there is no way he gets elected. If you want a laugh, watch him debate Obama in their run for Senator. It's like Lucic versus Pominville in a fight.

 

Pominville took Lucic?!

 

EDIT: I do agree that Keyes is freaking brilliant. I don't necessarily agree with all of his politics, but I do know that he is a brilliant man. And that has nothing to do with debate skills, IMO.

[Ghost of Dwight Drane]

No, people weren't informed before the internet, just as they're not informed now (although you do undersell the difficulties people have in accessing information). And as I've seemingly said over and over, people don't have to be informed to make political decisions in accordance with their preferences. And frankly, almost nobody has any idea what they're voting for if you are talking about specific policies--not even the most politically informed know this....actually, because of the way policymaking works, not even candidates know exactly what their policies will look like. Candidates run on ideals/values/principles/ideology, not specifics, so you could make the argument that not only don't people know what they're voting for, but candidates don't know what they're running for :o

 

Politicians to the Country are like Ted Black is to the Sabres. They both really have little clue on the nitty-gritty. They are just here to tapdance for the public as the real decisions are made in a scotch-marinated room in the Hamptons.