Math is the main requirement for engineering. If you can’t do basic math, it’s incredibly unlikely you could earn a degree in any kind of engineering. If your wife couldn’t write a sentence I would also doubt any journalist credentials she claimed, if she couldn’t do basic arithmetic I would doubt any degree she claimed. There are basic minimum requirements to graduate that you don’t seem to meet. So much for your stupid rebuttal.

Clearly it’s not…but what is? Not math. Not critical thinking. Not history.

As I’ve said repeatedly, clearly, and directly, no. I don’t think he’s achieving as much as even I hoped for in my unbounded cynicism, and I never had high hopes from him, he’s not my choice….but I understand exactly why he’s not getting much done and don’t hold him 100% accountable for much of it. Without a functional congress, his hands are tied on many fronts.
Foreign policy, that’s on him. I wish we had soldiers in the Ukraine so Russia would be forced to attack America if they want to attack the Ukraine….like we said we would when they gave up their nukes by treaty.

I invite you to explain how I’m wrong at any time, but without facts and reliable sources to cite you’ll likely fail like so often before.

? Grand master? I pointed out a basic fact, GDP under Obama was double GDP under Trump. What delusional fantasy are you railing against now?

Didn’t watch. Guaranteed it was more informative and less self aggrandizing than any Trump “press conference” ever, with fewer exaggerations and outright falsehoods.

Incomprehensible. Take a deep breath and try again. Use your words.

Massive debt, unequalled corruption, isolationism, nationalism, and division certainly don’t make America better, and that’s the Trump legacy. Investment in America makes it better, Biden’s already done that and wants to do more.

Excellent. But, I have a reaction to your (Green's?) text in the description.

1. Nostalgia is a motivator. But I think it tends to be a *strong* motivator only of individuals, not of collective societies. If Trump has nostalgia for fossil fuels (personally I think his motivations lie elsewhere), the good news is that that nostalgia won't be very contagious to American citizens. At least not for long.

People like Elon Musk / Tesla are making it clear that electric and renewables are the sexy high-tech future. That appeal to our vanity will be much more effective as a "carrot" motivation, as compared to a "stick" with carbon taxes etc.


2. This essentially boils down to an industrial version of Isolationism. Trump represents a bigger push in that direction by far compared to being motivated by nostalgia. BUT, I think that trying to explain that resistance in him and others purely through that anti-globalization lens misses some things.

Just as nostalgia is a better motivator for individuals than societies, altruism (if you believe it can exist) functions the same way. And that's 90% of what the Paris Accords are: altruism.

On paper, it makes sense for us as individuals in the US to acknowledge that we got a disproportionate level of advancement out of fossil fuel usage through our history. As individuals, we can see the undeniable truth in that. But ask us to act -- collectively -- on that and watch as our collective altruistic tendencies are drastically reduced compared to the sum of our individual altruistic tendencies.

That's not really evil, that's just human nature. But it is precisely the reason that I feel that encouraging people like Elon Musk is by far the superior way to lead us into the future. Tesla makes cars that are better than competing ICE vehicles for many/most use-cases. And not "better" in the sense that our individual sense of altruism gets triggered to reward our brain's pleasure center because we've prevented some Pacific islander's house from getting wiped out in a sea level rise by buying one. No, better in real, measurable criteria: less expensive to operate, better performance / top speed / acceleration, features ... potentially even panty-dropping sexiness. That shit can motivate us as a collective society much more reliably than altruism.

And that's why I think it is more important to encourage the Elon Musks of the future than it is to get TOO overly concerned about the Donald Trumps of the present. Although admittedly, there's certainly ways to try to do both.

The first person to cry 'racist' is usually the racist him/herself-
Japan
Ethnicity
Race?
Fuck Racism.

*edit-Another question? If I had written, 'Fuck Australia' after bashing her culture's shortcomings would you have been as quick to use the the 'cry racism' model so easily considering her peoples are a compendium of a mixed-bag similar to the America you expatriated from, equally as complicit in crimes against humanity at large and isolationism? You got yer crazy bag of fucks there as well expat, check a mirror.

I hold no racist views towards the Japanese, I am trashing a culture's savage and mundane aspects Mr. Official warning, and whom or what did I offend I would ask? YOUR sensibilities sir?

The Japanese suffer as a peoples because of the backlog of baggage they carry into the future-I do not discount their contributions to the planet, the shining aspects of their culture, HOWEVER. I do recognize their dysfunction and regret and lament their dwindling numbers, the erosion of families, their skewed sense of sexuality and their treatment of the female within their culture. Ask any Japanese woman of the age of 20 and not one will tell you that she has not been sexually exploited or violated in a public place. Sure, it's fun to watch and giggle at their television, their obsessions and odd social practices but form whence does the spectacle arise, from what psychological mindfuck that reaches much further back than Hiroshima or Nagasaki?

Oh the IRONY of someone so self-important and all-powerful as to pass judgement on intent or meaning without first inquiring as to the motivation for the word.

Fuck em I suppose, is what set you off Dagmar-Pretty strong a statement I suppose but not so much in the context of the motivation behind my problem with their culture-on-the-skids.

Evolution IN Action

By that measure though have any major aid groups been 'responsible' in Haiti. I fear your position leads to arguing that virtually none of the groups that attempted meaningful assistance should have done anything in the first place. Given what they each spent out of pocket without much hope of equivalent return kind of just leads to isolationism.

>> ^renatojj:

Despite those obvious benefits, I guess bashing on states rights is quite popular these days.

Funny how the only time I ever hear anyone talk about states rights are when they want to do something retarded. So bash away, AFAIC.

>> ^renatojj:

I know it feels unfathomable to you right now that your political views might be wrong, or that you might be the one with a "backward world view", but realizing that isn't moral relativism, it's admitting that you're human, fallible. Politics is a complex subject, I'm not saying there are no right answers, just that you should be wary of those who claim to have them.


There's a difference between political differences (socialism v capitalism, authoritarian v liberal) and fundamental human rights. You want to argue the relative merits of isolationism vs interventionism? Go nuts. But I have a serious problem with people equivocating on subjects like this as if it's an academic topic for debate.

And btw, you can leave the condescending "I know you don't get it now" tone out of it. Neither of us know anything about the life experience of the other. For the record, my politcal stances have changed many times, from anarcho-capitalism to socialism to somewhere in between, but once again, this is not about politics.

>> ^Grimm:

RP wants to end all the needless wars. If any war is worth fighting then he would only require that Congress "declares war" as it is outlined in the Constitution.


Exactly, I think that would answer some of @bcglorf 's hold up on isolationism. Like isn't so black and white, especially on matter of war. Which is why he is an advocate of declaring war, not the president just going in willy nilly. We can never really answer the question of if a particular war is good or not morally for every person at once, but we don't want to leave that moral choice in the hands of one man for no good reason other than self defense. My like the recent stop to the SOPA legislation due to pressure from the outside, the same kind of pressure could of been used to help in Libya..but only if the supporters of that action could sway enough people to support that decision...just like a democracy should. And I don't think hiding behind things like NATO or the US should undermine our Presidents responsibility to us, he works for us first after all. Like in most questions of this nature, there isn't really a right or wrong when the action is taken or not taken in the most strict sense...only what was the most supported.

I think it is a little, in that light, to say that we couldn't declare war on the Libyan government. We are just so used to the President going to war for us, that we have basically abdicated our responsibility in this area. That is one of the major dangers I see in Statism is when you outsource responsibility, you usually don't relegate much thought to it. The plumber fixes my pipes, I don't concern myself with how they work. Likewise, when you place all sorts of powers in agents hands, you tend to concern yourself with the goings ons...till they break. I think a Statism and Libertarianism have the same net effect if the people don't take an active concern in all forms of domestic affairs. I think that Statism might have a higher entropy, though, because it invokes an active outsourcing of all matters of life to agents. While that could work if you are always haggling your agent to make sure he is doing his best, and not up to shenanigans, why not just cut out the middleman and keep up with the basic concern yourself?

I think the idea of the Democracy is starting to fail, not because of some flaw in it that wasn't already widely known, but the culture we find ourselves in. For a Democracy to exist in a healthy way, each citizen has to see his role as a citizen to provide enrichment for the body politic. In this way, the Wests focus on individual rights and Libertarian ethics sorts of causes entropy on this notion. We would much rather be watching a movie, or some other form of playboy recreation, then running down to our local City Council and partake of our duty (not only to others, but ourselves).

I don't mean to ramble, but I wanted to make that point, that it doesn't matter if you are a federalist, or a anti-federalist. If your voting body is poor in intellect, will, and a toxic cultural environment, then no matter of political philosophy will save you. I think Jefferson foresaw that this entropy, and the saying, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." comes from; that things have to get really bad enough for us to actually care about democracy for it to work again for us, and more importantly, us for it.

But more to @bcglorf 's point on genocide, and cowardice. I don't think it is fair to say cowardice when your only course of action is making more widows and orphans. And more importantly, it is an entirely different thing for some president to commit you to that course of action without any "due process", in this case, a declaration of war. I don't think it is cowardice, persay, to not want to kill someone that doesn't want to kill you, and might have a legitimate claim to kill the person they want to kill. But that is neither here nor there, a moral question that most likely will never see commonly, the point is, that each of us should have a voice in the action we collectively have to take, action or inaction. The benefit of defaulting to inaction is that it doesn't stop someone morally convicted like yourself to fund operations of support for whatever side. That is why I usually side with Libertarian answers for complicated issues, sometimes, you don't need one answer for everyone. Sometimes, dare I say most times, it is actually better to let those whom are convicted on the goodness of something to take the risk themselves and not try and hedge everyone in with them.

>> ^Yogi:

>> ^artician:
I'm so curious to why people reject that notion. Is it purely fear of other religions and cultures? Are that many americans actually for invading other countries? I've never encountered that state of mind before, at all. From my experience most people are pretty quick to equate War with Evil.

I have a theory that most Americans know pretty much what we're doing. The fight between the indoctrinated (both the right and the left) is actually a fight about how we should go about doing what we're doing in the world. Indoctrinated Democrats have no problem with bossing other countries around and getting our way, we just have to be nicer about it and do it carefully so that we at least LOOK like we're good. Whereas the indoctrinated Republicans believe we are "Special" and should not only do it but do it with complete disregard for what ANY else thinks or says.
This is just a theory based on what I've seen from what our presidents do. Democratic presidents aren't any better on war crimes than Republican presidents. They just seem to be in the business of trying to tell everyone they're being nice and when they have to do something awful it's all the other countries fault.
I mean look at Bush and Obama...Bush locked up people indefinitely and said they deserved it and he does it because they're they enemy. Obama doesn't bother he just assassinates them. If Bush assassinated more like Obama he'd come out and take full credit and say it was AWESOME that he was doing it...Obama not so much, more hand wringing and deflection.
This is also helped along by the media who play their role well. It's just a theory but I like it.


Wow Yogi, we agree on something .

I think your view is pretty much bang on. The only difference between Dem. and Rep. presidents is the reasons they give for acting purely in their own self interests(which very often coincides with making decisions that are in America's self interests).

Where I disagree with Ron Paul's conclusion is about what the answer to all this should be. I don't for a second believe Ron Paul would be any different than all those before him. Instead of selfish wars he'd maybe follow the course of selfish isolationism. Take the recent example in Libya. America had two selfish options, go in or don't. Not going in would mean keeping the President's hands clean and money in America's pocket, and Ron Paul insists that what he'd have done. It also would have meant leaving thousands of Libyan civilians to Gaddafi's death squads. It would mean a Libya still ruled today by Gaddafi, with a newly subdued and less numerous population.

I don't see a clearly white/black obvious ethical choice in most geopolitical decisions, it's always messy. The Iraqi's that hate America the most(the Sadrists) don't hate them for all the things that America did to them, but for America's failures to act. The hate America for it's failure to push into Baghdad in the first Gulf War. In lieu of that they want revenge on the Sunnis. They want to commit their own eviction of all Sunni's from Iraq, or in it's stead to kill them for what Saddam had done with their aid. Was America wrong to stick around in Iraq after evicting Saddam and trying to stand in the middle, stopping a civil war driven by revenge against the Sunnis?

Ron Paul and Chomsky are generally agreed on minding our own business is the only ethical choice. It's hard to make that argument for Libya. It's impossible to make that argument for Rwanda. There are situations in our world were the ethical choice IS to go to war and stop something even more evil than war inherently is. What Ron Paul and Chomsky understand though is that no matter how grave the evil you oppose, your actions will create people who hate you for interfering. War makes it inevitable that your own forces will commit crimes against innocents, and their families will hate you. Ron and Chomsky conclude that means never get involved, I call that cowardice and insist there are situations that demand paying that price and coming to the aid of our fellow man when faced with terrible evils like genocide. In theory, every signatory nation to the convention on genocide agrees with me on this point too.

I find it interesting that the Embargo basically caused Pearl Harbor to happen. GOOOO isolationism.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'ron paul, mccain, education, isolationism, neoconservative' to 'ron paul, mccain, republican, debate, iraq, education, isolationism, neoconservative' - edited by my15minutes

>> ^imstellar28:
does it really matter? anyone who is voting for either party has already lost sight of what's really at stake.
can anyone explain to me the differences between Obama/McCain's stance on:
1. preemptive warfare
"McCain supports the Bush Doctrine and Obama opposes it"

2. increasing the size of government
McCain talks the conservative game of smaller government but has supported all of Bush's expansion of the national government
Obama wants to expand healthcare and other social programs, but says that will come at the expense of other programs (subscribves to PAYGO philosophy)
Not so clear on this one

3. FISA
Obama pissed off liberals with support of FISA
McCain seems to be obfuscating his opinion

4. federal bailouts of businesses (such as feddie mae/frannie mac)
Obama - help homeowners shore up mortgages rather than bail out companies
McCain- too big to fail, bail out companies not speculative homeowners who are whining now

5. the federal reserve
neither cnadidate represents change on this issue (although it is a bit fringe for most americans to care about)

6. personal liberties
is this the FISA question again, or are we talking abortion? too vague to disinguish differences

7. bringing all troops home from all 741 military bases
Ridiculously leading topic that assumes that isolationism is the correct strategy

8. foreign policy in afghanistan
Obama - get Bin Laden, secure AFghan/Pakistani borderlands
McCain - get Bin Laden, but not in Pakistan. Iraq matters more

9. stance on the georgia/russia conflict
Obama - 'there needs to be active international engagement to peacefully address the disputes over South Ossetia and Abkhazia, including a high-level and neutral international mediator, and a genuine international peacekeeping force – not simply Russian troops.'
McCain - Georgia conflict is the ‘first serious crisis internationally since the end of the Cold War.’ [RIGGGHHHT?!?] Russia's evil!

10. the ICC
Obama - consult with military commanders and examine the track record of the Court before reaching a decision on whether the U.S. should become a State Party to the ICC
McCain - 'the ICC was not set up for countries such as the U.S.'

11. inflation
gonna guess that they're both against it

12. income taxes
McCain- continue Bush cuts for wealthiest Americans, give a few pennies to those at the bottom
Obama - let Bush tax cuts expire, give tax breaks to 95% of Americans
graphical representation

13. the war on drugs
Obama - reduce sentences for dealers, needle exchange, nothing about foreign policy
McCain - stronger borders, tougher penalties and sentences, funded wars against drug producing countries (i.e., Colombia)

14. offshore drilling
Obama - can be part of energy plan if it helps gain approval
McCain - we're gonna drill our way outta this in just 2 years, wait 5 years, no 10 years (ok... never)

15. the patriot act
Obama - YES to re-authorization, NO to expanded wiretapping
McCain - YES to re-authorization, YES to expanded wiretapping

16. the graham-levin amendment
Obama - no guantanamo, yes to habeas corpus, no torture, no forced testimony
McCain - no guantanamo, no habeas corpus, no torture (but not really)

17. supported school of economics
Obama - Chicago school of economics
McCain - admitted he doesn't know much about economics

18. creationism
Obama - "religious commitment did not require me to suspend critical thinking" from Audacity of Hope
McCain - doesn't believe in it but VP Palin sure does

19. agricultural subsidies
Obama - limit subsidies, try to get them to small farmers and not corporations
McCain - opposes subsidies, gets in the way of free trade agreements

20. social security entitlements
Obama - remove $97K cap, no privatization, no new commission
McCain - personal savings accounts, maybe raise the cap above $97K

21. the bureaucratic class
Got bored just thinking about researching this

22. national debt
Obama - repeal Bush cuts, end Iraq War, pay-as-you-go system, balanced budget
McCain - debt bad, balanced budget, stop pork and earmarks

I am more informed now, hope you are. Although that took way too long and I am a bit tired of it. If you want more, you can always start here: On the Issues.

Bye Bye angry guy. Thank God. Rudy won't make VP either... almost for sure. Both races are down to the most central, moderate candidates. This gives me a happy face being a centrist. Of all the GOP candidates, the only ones I wanted to lose outright were Paul and Guiliani (Paul for his isolationism and some of his really extreme ideas none of which would ever get through congress anyway, Guiliani for the fact that I think he has too great and too short a temper and too military an attitude... perfect NYC mayor, awful USA pres.)... and I got both wishes. McCane is as liberal as republicans get and Romney is pretty balanced on the right. Obama is pretty Left, but Hillary is on the fence. We're looking at a moderate V. moderate election. My only remaining serious concern is that Hillary might win. God help us, in my eyes, that's the freaking end. Obama? I like him even if I don't agree with his issues.

Latest polls say McCane beats both Hillary and Obama by 6-8 point margins in a 1200-person poll. They didn't publish Romney numbers. As for VP options, Hillary won't take it, Edwards will, Kucinich is still too left and too unattractive for most public voters. On the GOP side, Thompson would be all about it being a real conservative and more than a tad on the laid-back side, Paul is too controversial and oppositional, and Romney and McCane are at each others' necks, so Thompson looks like the perfect VP on the right. My money says Obama/Edwards V. McCain/Thompson with McCain winning. Any takers?

>> ^bdschuman:
He's a good speaker, but come on - the guy is completely nuts. Eliminate the Department of Education? Get out of NATO? If isolationism and unfettered capitalism is your cup of tea, then by all means vote for Ron Paul.

This is why RP has such an uphill battle. Your average Joe hears a lot of common sense in what RP has to say and then they hear "eliminate the department of education" and they automatically think "that's crazy talk".

But is it? Most people don't even realize that there was no DE until 1980. So does that mean that education in this country was shite for the 200 years before that? Some people would argue that education in this country has gotten worse since then...maybe not because of the DE but the DE certainly doesn't seem to have "fixed" or "improved" education in this country.

So if we did not need the bureaucracy of a 5,000 employee DE before 1980 and it doesn't seem like they have had a noticable positive effect on education since 1980...just maybe we would be better off without it. It would save money and return all the control on education back to the state and local level were it had always been and should be.

Regarding NATO...I think the problem RP and many people have with NATO is that the Constitution is very clear on what is required for our government to do if it is going to commit to a war. Some people think we should be bound to our constitution and not to a treaty or UN resolutions when it comes to going to war. Is that really such a "nutty" idea?

He's a good speaker, but come on - the guy is completely nuts. Eliminate the Department of Education? Get out of NATO? If isolationism and unfettered capitalism is your cup of tea, then by all means vote for Ron Paul.

"I'm not an isolationism."

Well thank you, Mr. Paul, for clarifying that question for all of us.


Upvote for the abrasive and whiny tone that comes naturally to that little garden gnome.

I find this little piece of comic protectionism to be both quaint and justified. If we export all of our comedy along with all of our bad Bruce Willis action films, then who will ever visit the great America again? Aussies need incentives, too.

On a less cheeky note, I wonder how much of this is tied up in the entertainment writers' strike that is taking place right now? If comedy writers accrue benefits in the form of residuals, there could indeed be a very serious consequence to freely streaming all of their (quasi-intellectual) property so that your random dot.ru can zip it and burn it onto pirated CDs and DVDs.

I do like the message, but there is more going on here than simple isolationism, I fear.