$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('fossilnut2', '
') George junior wasn't a mystery in 2004. If George had run in my country he'd have rec'd about 10% of the vote and about the same in most other democratic countries in the world. The Americans haven't had anything 'taken' by this regime but twice quite willingly (and shockingly to most of the world) 'given' resources, freedom (and their sanity) up to this regime.
PeakOil is You
Oil firms' profits too high
Re: Oil firms' profits too high
by DesertBear2 » Fri 04 Nov 2005, 18:39:11
You are correct that the American citizenry have elected a disastrous bunch of idiots.
However, the Democratic Party has not given us much of an alternative. They have lost the initiative and are not even able to exploit the most incompetent and scoundrelous Bushco policies. During the 2004 Presidential campaign, Kerry tried to outBush Bush with various odious displays of phoney patriotism and scurrilous shows of religious varmintry. He had no strong policies or incites of his own. And the party stands for nothing and has no forward-looking policies of consequence.
Now the Demos are about to field Hillary Clinton...as if the voters would every allow Bubba near the White House under any circumstances. And Hillary is running around making Hitlerian military threats against the Iraqi insurgents and telling everyone how she is a "praying person". Where's the Pepto Bismol?
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Re: Oil firms' profits too high
by fossilnut2 » Fri 04 Nov 2005, 18:42:53
Emerson that may be true but that's the system the USA, a democratic country, has chosen to adopt to express the will of the people.
The sad part of the mess the USA is in is NOT that it's an authoritarian society in which people are shut up or refused expression, etc. The sad part is that it is a very free society in which that freedom is cherished at one level but willingly given up by the citizen at another. The death of Rosa Parks reminds the world that the USA, for most of it's history, was on a progressive quest for making every citizen's life have a value.
The sad part of the mess the USA is in is NOT that it's an authoritarian society in which people are shut up or refused expression, etc. The sad part is that it is a very free society in which that freedom is cherished at one level but willingly given up by the citizen at another. The death of Rosa Parks reminds the world that the USA, for most of it's history, was on a progressive quest for making every citizen's life have a value.
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Re: Oil firms' profits too high
by emersonbiggins » Fri 04 Nov 2005, 19:25:26
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('fossilnut2', 'E')merson that may be true but that's the system the USA, a democratic country, has chosen to adopt to express the will of the people.
In all actuality, America is a constitutional republic. In essence, it's the exact opposite of a democracy: it's the power of the nation to protect the rights and ideas of one. In a balanced system, with a tendency towards centrism, the system works best - not perfect, but well. In our current system, the right-wing makes up the ruling majority of the Legislature, the White House and, soon enough, the Supreme Court. This is dangerous - not because it's right-wing, but because it's uniformly following one ideology. That's why it matters that 48% (at least) of the people hate the current system. The Supreme Court, in all fairness, would be a check on the powers of the government, but even that's in jeopardy now. This is very much a plutocracy at work.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('fossilnut2', 'T')he sad part of the mess the USA is in is NOT that it's an authoritarian society in which people are shut up or refused expression, etc. The sad part is that it is a very free society in which that freedom is cherished at one level but willingly given up by the citizen at another. The death of Rosa Parks reminds the world that the USA, for most of it's history, was on a progressive quest for making every citizen's life have a value.
I can't argue with that.
"It's called the American Dream because you'd have to be asleep to believe it."
George Carlin
George Carlin
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Re: Oil firms' profits too high
by dub_scratch » Fri 04 Nov 2005, 22:13:54
It's amazing how we all love free market windfall profits when it comes in the form of real estate price inflation. Nobody seams to have a problem with them profits, do they?
But when oil companies have their turn with a tremendous payday-- money from an energy product that has been unsustainably cheap-- everybody gets angry at those tightfisted capitalistic dogs. How dare they make money on a limited high quality energy source that we have no viable substitute for!
I like to tell people that if they really want to appreciate how valuable & cheap $3 gasoline is, they should try pushing their car for the same distance. "Imagine if someone gave you $3 for that", I'll tell them. Or anyone can try to hire a group of Mexican illegal aliens to push their car and see if they would accept a paltry $3 for the effort. Or anyone can pay someone to pull the stupid thing with a team of animals. Either way, we will learn how ridicules it is to take so much energy and throw it away on our dumbshit boxes (a.k.a. cars).
If people are really angry about the oil companies making such a killing, they should act by reducing their driving drastically. They should demand our government to loosen their drive for car dependency USA. They should try to put the auto industry out of business by refusing to buy another car. Wouldn't that be a productive consumer response to what they see as an unjustified profit margin?
But when oil companies have their turn with a tremendous payday-- money from an energy product that has been unsustainably cheap-- everybody gets angry at those tightfisted capitalistic dogs. How dare they make money on a limited high quality energy source that we have no viable substitute for!
I like to tell people that if they really want to appreciate how valuable & cheap $3 gasoline is, they should try pushing their car for the same distance. "Imagine if someone gave you $3 for that", I'll tell them. Or anyone can try to hire a group of Mexican illegal aliens to push their car and see if they would accept a paltry $3 for the effort. Or anyone can pay someone to pull the stupid thing with a team of animals. Either way, we will learn how ridicules it is to take so much energy and throw it away on our dumbshit boxes (a.k.a. cars).
If people are really angry about the oil companies making such a killing, they should act by reducing their driving drastically. They should demand our government to loosen their drive for car dependency USA. They should try to put the auto industry out of business by refusing to buy another car. Wouldn't that be a productive consumer response to what they see as an unjustified profit margin?
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Re: Oil firms' profits too high
by bbadwolf » Sat 05 Nov 2005, 17:49:17
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', '
')In all actuality, America is a constitutional republic. In essence, it's the exact opposite of a democracy: it's the power of the nation to protect the rights and ideas of one. In a balanced system, with a tendency towards centrism, the system works best - not perfect, but well. In our current system, the right-wing makes up the ruling majority of the Legislature, the White House and, soon enough, the Supreme Court. This is dangerous - not because it's right-wing, but because it's uniformly following one ideology. That's why it matters that 48% (at least) of the people hate the current system. The Supreme Court, in all fairness, would be a check on the powers of the government, but even that's in jeopardy now. This is very much a plutocracy at work.
')In all actuality, America is a constitutional republic. In essence, it's the exact opposite of a democracy: it's the power of the nation to protect the rights and ideas of one. In a balanced system, with a tendency towards centrism, the system works best - not perfect, but well. In our current system, the right-wing makes up the ruling majority of the Legislature, the White House and, soon enough, the Supreme Court. This is dangerous - not because it's right-wing, but because it's uniformly following one ideology. That's why it matters that 48% (at least) of the people hate the current system. The Supreme Court, in all fairness, would be a check on the powers of the government, but even that's in jeopardy now. This is very much a plutocracy at work.
We Canadians have a different method than you American fellows. We are masters of the "minority government", where we dilute the power of the elected government with 3 or 4 other parties such that the total of the opposition actually has more seats than the governing party. The government continually has to make deals and alliances to be able to 'do' anything and the resultant constant infighting between the parties drastically restricts their ability to do anything at all, reducing the damage the scumbags are capable of.
Bush tried to bully Canada into participating in his missile defense system and our Prime Minister told him that he couldn't do that since the voters wouldn't allow it. Bush didn't understand why the government simply didn't do it anyway!!! But here, our minority government style and the fact that the government can be disposed of by a vote of no confidence fairly quickly ensures that the electorate is heard, no matter how stupid they are.
So instead of relying on the incompetence of our government, we rely quite directly on the stupidity of the people.
-bbad
[edit] The above sorta makes it look as if I'm in favor of the missile defense system, while nothing could be further from the truth. It is a rare case of the electorate being right.
Last edited by bbadwolf on Tue 08 Nov 2005, 15:41:29, edited 2 times in total.
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