I think one thing not mentioned yet is that the positive things Ron Paul is promising were already promised by the current president (to an extent):

"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama Campaign Promise - October 27, 2007

Yes, the last troops did come home last December, however an enormous private security presence remains - up to 20,000 people costing America ~$3.5 billion a year.
http://newsjunkiepost.com/2011/12/18/iraq-war-us-troops-are-out-but-blackwater-and-halliburton-will-stay/

...and America is expanding it's wars and troop presence in other countries, e.g. in the Asia Pacific, including here in Australia (FU), and trying to escalate the situation with Iran.

So the war has morphed into something else, and the spirit of his statement has been broken, you don't promise to end wars if you plan on just starting others somewhere else.

He also made plenty of other promises, for example @MonkeySpank about stopping corporate lobbying:
“You said the time has come to tell the lobbyists who think their money and their influence speak louder than our voices that they don’t own this government – we do. And we are here to take it back.” (Sen. Barack Obama, Remarks, Des Moines, IA, 1/3/08)

Here's some more broken promises of his:
http://www.politisite.com/2012/01/05/obamas-failed-promises/

So the point? They are both politicians, they can say whatever they want and continue to do the exact opposite, all they have to worry about is a few people sleeping in a park, there is absolutely no accountability in Washington. Obama got far closer to highlighting many of the issues that face America than Ron Paul ever has, and look at the result, all Ron Paul will bring is fewer broken promises, so the only reason to vote him in is if you want to be 'let down less'.

However I think he has been clearer about the fact all troops need to be brought home, not just some troops involved in a specific conflict, so in that regard I think Yogi is right in that there would be some serious consequences from the establishment if he tried to do that, so it would be impossible for him, even if he is actually telling the truth about wanting to do it. As for the policies he wants to introduce that will have far reaching negative consequences for the vast majority of Americans (e.g. dropping/lowering corporate taxes), those will get passed easily.

Haha, I totally played that game five days straight... I mean I didn't play it - I LIVED IT!

And it was awesome. I hit a bug on the main quest, did everything else and went back and patched it finally a week ago and finished the main story - I really only had one hour left on the main quest, not much reason left to play it anymore except to see some of those awesome main quest segments where weird contraptions morph and open and up in the most bizarre ways.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

I remember that episode with the morphing words - it made an impression on me too. I've even told my kids about it.

This one wasn't too bad for its time. Interesting that the glitches looked a lot like analog videotape errors. Different visual cues for a different time. There was a whole alternate universe in that guys matrix-stache.

>> ^spoco2:

I have this episode burned into my brain as it was one of a few 80s Twilight Zone episodes the my dad had taped off the tv, so I watched this, plus the one where the man slowly loses the ability to speak english (to him and us it starts seeming like everyone is using the wrong words for things), and one where a food critic does a bad review of a Chinese Restaurant and is doomed to eternally eat there when he gets a bad fortune cookie.
Yup, that's it for me and the Twilight Zone of the 80s, just those stories, burned in there!

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Donald Fagen's Morph the Cat
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morph_the_Cat

So that's where they got the voice of Morph from!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSMRPKM1evk

Really good sift, thanks for sharing this geo321. Take home message, occupy needs to morph into resist and no currently electable party is going to save us.

This video has been nominated as a duplicate of this video by radx. If this nomination is seconded with *isdupe, the video will be killed and its votes transferred to the original.

*dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Women-in-Film-morph-of-75-actresses

This one's for you Morph!

A. Overly simplistic, and you're confusing to some degree what is Keynesian. A central tenant of Keynesian economics is counter-cyclical budget deficits. When there's a recession, the government should run deficits, and the larger the recession, the larger the corresponding deficit. That's been a non-stop, although admittedly abused, government policy since the Depression. Also, Keynesian economics had components in it for monetary policy as well. Keynes advocated for lower interest rates during times of recession along with increasing the monetary supply. Yes, he did believe that during more severe recessions that monetary measures would not be enough, but he nevertheless advocated for the various monetary policies. These align up with most recessions as far as what the gov't did from the Great Depression on. Just because Keynesian policies disappointed during the 1970's, the ideas were not altogether abandoned ever since. The simple fact of the matter is aside from 2007, there hadn't been a particularly severe recession since the 1970s, so it's reasonable to assume that direct employment wasn't deemed necessary, not that it was seen as bad policy in all cases.

B. It happened to me by the hand of Microsoft. I'm pretty sure they didn't have flunky MBAs. ;-)

C. There are a lot of similar issues involved. My point was only that you can't just tie requirements to it, and that's that. There are a huge myriad of issues that would come hand in hand with stipulations to unemployment. Your idea is still something I'd be onboard with if those devils in the details were addressed. I do see as an example that some people become unemployed because of structural changes to the economy that causes their jobs to never come back. As a case in point, textile factory workers who lose their jobs due to offshoring are suddenly in a position where market forces have no remedy. They lack the skills to get jobs in areas of growth such as more in depth computer skills, and likely lack the financial resources to get the education and training to get said skills because they're unemployed. This is a perfect example in my opinion where the market and free trade fail from time to time, and some force, likely the gov't, needs to step in for the good of everyone. These people would benefit from retraining, so they can get a good job, business owners benefit from increasing numbers of workers who can do the jobs they're needing people to do, and it becomes a win win situation.

D. The last time we tried no deposit insurance, it failed miserably. Banks lent money for people to buy goods and services they couldn't afford, and stocks on the margin. People stuck their money in banks anyway. The only difference is when fear hit the market after the crash, a lot of people, many irrationally, pulled their money from banks, causing a collapse in the banking system, which tanked the entire economy even further.

People lack the time and/or motivation to stay informed on all kinds of issues from local politics, to PTA meetings. I don't see how they could begin to assess what loans their banks were making as far as riskiness. And the typical American when it comes to finances? Yikes! Next to no savings, can't understand how much they should be regularly investing, etc. And it's not just the stupid people. Most Americans don't even know what a mutual fund actually is. How could they possibly make intelligent decisions about the riskiness of their banks' portfolios? I consider myself smarter than the average bear, but even I'd be paralyzed with fear selecting a bank based what little info I could find of their portfolios. Instead, I make sure they're FDIC insured, because that in and of itself entails objective benchmarks to even get that insurance.

And honestly, I don't see many people making decisions about their banks based on rates alone. As a case in point, very few people I know put money in online high yield savings accounts instead of the local credit union, bank, or large megabank, despite the fact that in most cases online savings account providers such as ING Direct pay 2-3 times the interest. I don't believe that's what caused the madness in the banking industry at all. At the very least, there's a massive list of causes well above FDIC insurance, and even if FDIC insurance did play a role in causing the crisis, it also served well in preventing runs on the banks in general that would have compounded the crisis further.

>> ^bmacs27:

@heropsycho
A. Because we've been leaning on monetary policy as our intervention of choice. Direct employment has been called socialism for 30 years. That doesn't suggest a dominant Keynesian ideology. Really it's been this mix of monetarism and supply-side economics which morphed into some mutilated crony-capitalism.
B. I suppose it could happen, but it would take a rough business climate, or some flunky MBAs. In that situation I'd try to increase my business (i.e. make $200,000).
C. That's why we have food stamps. It isn't a perfect solution, but the kid starves if her folks spend the whole check on smokes too. Vices aren't the kind of "demand side" stimulus I'd like to see (one flaw in the Keynesian argument given the current living conditions of the American poor).
D. I really do believe that if the FDIC didn't exist, "the market" would not have allowed deposits to be leveraged by banks investing in exotic financial instruments. Like you said, even the bankers didn't know what the hell they were doing! Without the FDIC people would very quickly ask, "what the hell you doin' with my money?" Rather, since their money is backed by the government they ask, "what sorts of rates are you offering?" It's that pressure from the distorted marketplace that pushed banks into more and more leverage to stay competitive. Those rates were realized by making massively leveraged bets that were only possible by hedging with exotic instruments. Once upon a time people knew their banker. I think that's the best FDIC there could be. There might be some legal patchwork of the Glass-Steagall flavor that might make it work, but chasing down all the unintended consequences would be a challenge. Certainly figuring out how to unwind all the securitized mortgages that already exist makes that sort of policy direction seemingly prohibitive.
F-. Dude, Peter Schiff is a quack.

@heropsycho

A. Because we've been leaning on monetary policy as our intervention of choice. Direct employment has been called socialism for 30 years. That doesn't suggest a dominant Keynesian ideology. Really it's been this mix of monetarism and supply-side economics which morphed into some mutilated crony-capitalism.

B. I suppose it could happen, but it would take a rough business climate, or some flunky MBAs. In that situation I'd try to increase my business (i.e. make $200,000).

C. That's why we have food stamps. It isn't a perfect solution, but the kid starves if her folks spend the whole check on smokes too. Vices aren't the kind of "demand side" stimulus I'd like to see (one flaw in the Keynesian argument given the current living conditions of the American poor).

D. I really do believe that if the FDIC didn't exist, "the market" would not have allowed deposits to be leveraged by banks investing in exotic financial instruments. Like you said, even the bankers didn't know what the hell they were doing! Without the FDIC people would very quickly ask, "what the hell you doin' with my money?" Rather, since their money is backed by the government they ask, "what sorts of rates are you offering?" It's that pressure from the distorted marketplace that pushed banks into more and more leverage to stay competitive. Those rates were realized by making massively leveraged bets that were only possible by hedging with exotic instruments. Once upon a time people knew their banker. I think that's the best FDIC there could be. There might be some legal patchwork of the Glass-Steagall flavor that might make it work, but chasing down all the unintended consequences would be a challenge. Certainly figuring out how to unwind all the securitized mortgages that already exist makes that sort of policy direction seemingly prohibitive.

F-. Dude, Peter Schiff is a quack.

@draak13 Actually, he's quite right. It is the definitive way of speaking, spelling and language in, at the very least, Singapore. They have used those "mispronunciations" for so long now that it really has morphed into it's own brand of english, mandalay and chinese. I've had the pleasure of knowing a number of the younger generation specifically from Singapore, and if you tell them "no no, it's not 'oren tzu', it's 'orange juice'", they will just laugh at you. In those southeast-asian countries it's not our language anymore! Kekekekekeke!

Because political correctness is poison and power corrupts, this new policy will quickly morph from promoting gays-as-equals to promoting gays as a new protected class with special privileges and rights.

Also, it is not believable in the slightest that the resulting effects--both positive and negative--of openly serving gays was studied seriously and objectively.

I am oversimplifying things a bit here, but here's how I see it.

========================================================================

I am a merchant with a peach orchard, and I want to sell the best peaches to the market.

You are a farmer who knows how to grow peach trees, and pick all the peaches and throw them in a basket.

I hired you to make best peaches to sell to the market. But lately I've been getting some bad batches. Most are excellent peaches, but some were too tart. I address the issue and tell you that some of the batches were bad.

You, the farmer, tell me that all your batches are of excellent quality, and the batch you have today is all excellent. So I, as a merchant, pay you for your work and sell the peaches at the market. Again, some good peaches, and a few bad ones. Now word is going around that people who eat my peaches get stomach aches. Nobody wants to buy peaches from me anymore.

I goto you and tell you that I want the best quality peaches. Farmer says there's nothing he can do about it because peaches all look the same to him, and he just picks them from a tree and throw it in the basket.

I, as a merchant, want quality control. So I now hire a professional picker who can tell the difference between good peaches from bad ones when he picks them from the trees.

You, as a farmer, is upset because I've now hired this extra person into the farm who takes away from our profit margin. But I, as a merchant, tell you that we have to keep quality control if we want to keep our customers. Otherwise, I will have to stop doing business with you and find another peach farmer.

You are upset because I am intruding your rights into your job and expertise. I am upset because you refuse to control the quality of your peaches. And I am forced to impose quality control because you are not doing your part of the job as the producer.

=============================================

This is how I see the situation. The community must actively differentiate themselves from these bad seeds instead of hiding them and defending them. By doing so, you are protecting the very thing that are out to hurt you. If you fail to differentiate yourself, then we have no choice to take all of those involved with the same assumption. The community may argue that these people are crazy and these radicals have nothing to do with them. And yet, these radicals are still within their community. Nobody within the community is willing to fish them out, because they see it as turning their backs on their own kind.

And there lies the irony. The community may say they are different, and yet they still won't fish out the bad guys within the community, treating them as part of their family. It is the community's responsibility to look after its members, including keeping quality control. By refusing to keep control, you are avoiding responsibility. And someone else, whether you like it or not, will have to take up the duty.


I've made a detailed comment here: http://videosift.com/video/NYPD-is-Morphing-into-the-CIA#comment-1279011

If you disagree with what I've just said, feel free to read the extra comments and then respond.

Listen yogi, you may not believe this, but I've observed your posts for some time now. While I'm loathe to label anyone with permanence, most of the time you act like a hothead and internet badass. I've seen you disrespect sifters who would probably agree with you they don't like me. I don't really know marinara and doubt he agrees with much of what I have to say, but he was kind enough to defend me against PC nonsense.

It's not my job to offer you an attitude adjustment, only suggest one. You can be passionate without being in ATTACK MODE at all times.

I have EVERY right to call out sh1tbirds like GNOMESANE. Race his nothing to do with it, especially on Judge Judy. Per legacy's post, people of ALL kinds game the system. GNOMESANE is hardly an exception. The clown has no concept of self-responsibility or wrongdoing.

The System itself is sh1t, it's morphed into something beyond control and accountability and it's bankrupting all of us. Do you understand that for every GNOMESANE, someone else who deserves help is denied?

This is the sift. Your attempts to make things personal are a waste of time.

lv,

qm





In reply to this comment by Yogi:
>> ^quantumushroom:

I feel guilty for all the people who bust their asses at work, then have their money seized and pissed away on shitbirds like this, so lefties can allay their manufactured guilt at events two centuries old.
Three years of "kollij" and GNOMESANE still can't speak proper English.
Be PROUD, Liberal. You made him.

>> ^Boise_Lib:
>> ^quantumushroom:
"Vermin" is easier to type than "parasite".
Judging by skin color is racist.
Judging by content of character is also racist?
What's left?
>> ^Boise_Lib:
Vermin?
The Nazi's called Jewish people rats, the Hutu called the Tutsi cockroaches (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_Genocide); and the wingnuts called anyone who disagreed with spending trillions to invade and occupy a country, which did not attack us, un-american and un-patriotic.
This guys not too bright, but calling people vermin crosses a line.
What's your definition of vermin? Anyone you dislike?


Why are you bringing up racism? Guilty conscience?



Ya know what welfare also pays for? The old lady across town who is starving. The children who don't get breakfast in the mornings so they spend all day not being able to pay attention in class.

If you're against something you can find examples of it not working or working poorly, especially a large and complex system known as welfare. So I guess because someone is exploiting the system everyone who relies on that system should be tossed off it. Fuck them right?

You're a piece of shit QM.