It's not quite a fair comparison. The Canadian one is of currently elected officials. That US thing is for leadership of one party, if I understand correctly. Those always seem to be a bit of a circus.

Meh. How about you try and answer your own questions.

Would YOU blame Bush?

No? because he's only one person who doesn't have absolute control over congress or the fiscal policies they put forth?

Recently, you've mentioned how K Street lobbyists have their claws in everyone..

Does that include all 301 Republicans currently in Congress?

Or are those people magically exempt from the influence of: millions in campaign donations, gifts/perks, & guaranteed, cushy, post-congressional careers?

If so, would Democrats automatically become immune from corruption if they switched parties?

Omg, one party solution! China was right.
(I'm mean.. except for the dirty Commie thing.)

If we just eliminate Democrats and liberals, everything will be fixed!
*pat pat* You're a genius! little buddy.

As you wrote " As has been mentioned above, you must simply have no idea what socialism is if you think America is even headed in that direction, we're headed the other way buddy" shows your lack of understanding of political systems.

You can 100% government control on 1 side and 0 government power at the other end

At the 100% you would have labels such as Communism
Socialism,Fascism and such. At 0 would be Anarchy


Our government is in the middle but sliding towards more and more government control and morphing into some for of Oligarchy by buying votes via socialist programs promised by the left.
Then the pudendum swing back and the republicans buy votes by promising to "undue" what the left has done.

Either way the people loose because nothing get totally undone. More and more government control ensues.



1 Yes I would like there to be ZERO dollars donations by corporations and people. Since the government owns public airways and grants them via FCC, hence ABC, CBS, NBC etc let these station allot public time for equal debate for ALL parties and persons. TAKE the money out of politics.

2 I do agree what you indicated by the Republicans and did this week was reprehensible. A passing a trillion + bill and and worse the extra "shit" to help banks and such. But to be fair to republicans , Democrats over screw corporations and republicans attempt to unscrew them.

3 school lunches - Government should not be in regulating school lunch- it should be a local thing. Republicans are just undoing Michelle Obama failed school lunch program. Just more finger pointing points for bloggers to use.

4 Federal government controls the laws in DC Its their little kingdom. They can re ban pot all day long.

Generally speaking there are 5 types of government:
Monarchy - rule by one - never truly exits
Oligarchy - ruled by few - most governments today
Democracy- rule by majority - Majority rule is a failed system.
Republic- rule by law - Law limits Government powers
Anarchy - every man for himself- Always short lived due to power vacuum.


You say " America is sliding away from socialism, and into corporatism" Well they are basically neighbors in the political spectrum which would be some form of Oligarchy. Neither necessary serve the people freely.


Both Democrats and Republicans are sliding headlong towards Oligarchy. One party is just trying to get there quicker than the other party.


Both parities have utterly failed its people. There is only 1 party that desires to steer this country back towards a Republic and that is the TEA party. They get stronger and stronger every time their party fail its constituents. Were not all right wing lynching nuts. That's just a myth promoted by left wing media to color you thinking to stay on the Democrat plantation.
Truth of the matter is that four in 10 Tea Party members are either Democrats or Independents. Go to a rally and see for you self.

I'm glad I don't pay for that stuff anymore. Thanks to all the legal ways you can avoid it that have been legislated by "our friends in congress." (Maybe I should attend a Pelosi fundraiser, as a thank you, given that the only thing "our" representatives are good for, is keeping those loopholes and exemptions open... and, y'know, maybe a bit of 'crowd control' to prevent any semblance of a revolution by pitting one party against the other.)

You, of course, are free to do whatever you want with your money.

Bill and Sam specifically acknowledged that criticism of Islam often gets conflated with racism. But if it's ok to criticize Christianity (as we often do here on the sift) then it's ok to criticize Islam.

Just because racists don't know the difference between dark skinned people and a religion doesn't mean we don't

Lantern53 just recently tried to pull the same stunt and claimed that "police officer" is a race and thus criticizing them was racism.

It's the same thing with political parties. I think parties should be abolished, they needlessly divide the nation, but that doesn't mean I think they're equal in any way. One party is less bad the other. I'm not "racist" towards the party I don't like.

To be fair, I understand where you're coming from. criticizing Islam CAN be a disguise for racism. But that's not where Bill or Sam are coming from. There is a huge difference between making legitimate criticisms and simply bashing Islam because many dark skinned people practice it.

We are fully aware that there are plenty of people who practice Islam and are peaceful. There are plenty of peaceful Christians too. Does that mean I can't criticize Christianity?

This is about the religion, not the people.

In an odd way, The conservatives are right. They often complain that we criticize Christianity, but Islam gets a free pass. Well in that regard, sometimes they're right. (of course there is a reason for that. Americans by and large are not affected by Islam as they are by Christianity simply because Christianity is the predominate religion in America)

And to be fair, after 9/11 there was a lot of hate crimes committed against peaceful Muslim Americans and I think the only reason the crimes were committed were because the victims were dark-skinned I doubt there were many white Muslims attacked.

So because of that phenomenon, I think people are afraid to criticize Islam because they don't want to be conflated with the racist rednecks

Guess what, they were right, Bill and Sam are being conflated with the racist rednecks.

But it doesn't get more simple than this: If it's ok to criticize the bad parts of Christianity despite the fact there are many peaceful Christians out there that don't hold those particular beliefs. Then it's ok to criticize Islam in the same way.

"Hamas....and Isreal are both equally to blame" Just absolute grade A bullshit. Israel is the cause of the conflict, the aggressor, the expansionist, the bully, the big stick, and (you'll love this) the Nazi in this situation. Hamas is born from Israel's actions as a misguided attempt at retaliation/defense.
When deaths are 30-1, with over 80% of the 30 being civilians (and 0% of the 1 being civilians, there's no such thing as an Israeli civilian), one side is far worse.
Once again, because you can't seem to understand, complaints about one party in a fiasco do not equate to support of the other party's methodology. Jumping to that conclusion is the epitome of ignance (once again, meaning intentional, un-fixable ignorance).
OMFG, really?!? Hamas uses their casualties as "propaganda", equated to Israel's over sold lies about their unconscionable actions that CAUSED those avoidable civilian casualties? Damn, you really have your head up Israel's ass so far you can't see reality at all, huh?
For it to stop, the perpetrators must see themselves for what they are, the perpetrators. That is why fault must be assigned properly, only the perpetrator can stop what they are doing, and they must understand their own horrendous actions to want to stop. Assigning them blame at least gives them the opportunity, if they could only open their ears and minds enough to see past their side's propaganda. Yes, I mean Israel.

I love the wheelsuit, I've seen him for about a decade now slowly upping his game. That said, I DO care that the bike isn't trying at all, why bother having a 'race' if one party rides the brakes the whole time?

So I'm curious how libertarians feel about how conservatives/Fox News poo poo on legalization and slap the liberal-as-an-insult label on it when really it's a liberal AND libertarian viewpoint that marijuana should be legalized.

Does this shake the libertarian "both sides suck at precisely equal levels and not one party is better by even the most minuscule amount" viewpoint at all?

Or do they just not care because at no point does Fox News ever bash libertarians for supporting legalization or other stances that liberals and libertarians might agree on?

Well here's something to think about, since the uselessness of answering these questions which seem so important to yourself, these issues which would simply tend to correct themselves should dumb assess who light-upon them who can't seem to figure it out actually DO something with all their frustration.

There are other more pressing fundamental issues to consider when you think about how real "CHANGE" could come overnight if both fanatics dems and repubs could get their heads out of their own assess.

Most of these issues you are so passionate about and continually abuse the meaningless, "one-team-against-the-other" argument for, are simply diversions to keep you inebriated with (by design) while the rapists and abusers of culture, politics and special interests, military and police, and corporate oligarchies fuck you from behind without lube.

For instance: THIS video offering after 30 hours in the queue has garnered 6 votes. It speaks to one of the many fundamental ass-fucks being perpetrated on the American People and one insidious presidential cunt republican and one equally as sinister mountebank currently in office has created the framework for this egregious violation of rights and culture, but nobody seems to give a fuck.

INSTEAD, people that continually paste these kind of trite news-bobble sound bites of worthless information pitting one party against another seem to be absolutely clueless as to the mechanics of the insidious mechanism keeping them in a state of unconscious somnambulatry hypnotic drunkenness while the entire time, not utilizing the power they have to alter the course of the destiny of the planet-Instead that wasted energy is used to jack off at the mouth.

Simple fix for the so-called drug problem as it relates to criminal cartels (like the FBI, LIKE the CIA, like the "cabal who control government."???

Legalized marijuana, heroin, cocaine, while at the same time criminalizing the machine set-in-place to quote/unquote, "fight the war on drugs"..Fight the war on terrorism", etc. There is no goddamn war except the one for your mind,and from reading this horseshit on this particular post, it seems that more than a few people here have had their minds hi-jacked already.

It's up to you to wake-the-fuck-up. Republicans are no better or worse than democrats, because both are complicit in the hijacking of your lives, your livelihoods, and the work and sweat and blood of your lives as you toil incessantly to continue to promulgate their diseased programs of slavery of both your bodies and minds.

Any and all retort to similar diatribes of my own are predictably met with derision and defensiveness, and a SHITLOAD of passive-aggression in the form of convoluted and meaningless banter.

I fucking detest this charade of pitting conservatives against liberals, one "party" against another.

The only party that exists is the one behind closed doors as they laugh at people like yourselves.

@chingalera ahh the "both parties are equally bad" fallacy.

tell me? What's the Democrat equivalent of the denial of same sex marriage?
What's the Democrat equivalent of telling women they must keep their rape babies? What's the Democrat equivalent of trying establish a state religion even though we are a country of many (or no) religions. What's the Democrat equivalent of Republican's persistent denial of this pesky thing called science. What's the Democrat equivalent of the Republican body count due to starting unnecessary wars?

Don't get me wrong. Democrats fuck up all the time. They believed the 2004 election would be a slam dunk. They can often be naive and miscalculate political realities. I'm not convinced they won't fuck up the 2016 election somehow despite the Republicans' current problems. I really don't think Hillary should run. To quote Doctor Who: "Don't you think she looks tired?"

Both parties should be abolished to get away from this political nonsense, but to suggest these are somehow equal to Republican misdeeds is absolute lunacy unless you dare to back your claims up.

Hell, arguing the opposite of my claims is still more rational than this "OMG they're equal" nonsense. If you capable of making a value judgement, one party matches your values better than the other. It's impossible for them to be equal in that regard.

@alcom No hard feelings. I'm starting to get used to this. Please let me try to explain one more time, because I feel like I have an important point:

Videos like this are great for the people who are already in agreement, but it's my belief that they're intended to educate and bring positive change.
My belief is that we need to get people who disagree entirely with the subject and message to absorb the information if we actually want to make that change.
We're communicating with people who, for all intents and purposes from our point of view, are completely irrational. 'They' believe the same about people with our perspective. If you're going to approach them for a dialogue, it only takes ONE mistake, misquote, or sense of being manipulated to lose them, and then you're back to square one.

So the reason I criticize this video is because I could see someone who was ignorant of this information easily turning it off as soon as it got to the dramatic music and the matter-of-fact narrative presentation, or the misalignment with their Empirical analogies.
I'm sure you've seen enough mainstream media today to know that as soon as something smells fishy to one party or another, they hang onto that, no matter how trivial whatever that thing is, and it's the only excuse they need to stick fingers in ears and "La la la I can't hear you! You're wrong!"

I feel like I'm turning into exactly that kind of manipulative, psychoanalyzing communicator, which makes me sick. But my whole motivation is to clear the bullshit away, that's all. Thanks for your reply.

Disagree:

One party - the Democrats - want to preserve the status quo, but tweak it just a little.

The other party - the Republicans - want to privatize all levels of government, and service the rentiers.

30 years of money moving into the hands of fewer and fewer people is not because of "both sides". It is because of the overwhelming force of one side, and the weak capitulation of the other.

If i'm mistaken, The two in power have made it so that there is no possibility to have a third party in the USA. Unless majority of people is behind this third party, it will not gain those privileges that are granted in almost every other democratic country to all parties. As it is now, you are forced to campaign without any visibility and you are not allowed to enter debates.

IMHO, it is not democratic if you have only two options. Yea, it beats the dreaded one-option million-to-one but it's still just one step towards democratia. Without a third option what you see in the USA is exactly what was to be expected.

With three or more parties, the changes of reaching optimal solutions increase and the changes of corruption decreases. With two, it seems that corruption is as high as it would be with one-party systems.

Solutions: make campaigns funded from the public funds and outlaw any kind of private funding. Make this option available to ALL parties and give all of them equal chances. Dismantle "lobbyism" and stop revolving door completely.

The largest problem with the "free market" is that all people have ALL of the information they need to make good choices. And sure when people make deals or barter (Most of the time) they are doing it to enhance their end of the bargain. Most people don't care about win win, they care only about "do I win?" This means that if one party has more information than another about a particular bargain then free market capitalism breaks down. This is why we have insider trading laws. If anything government regulation should be stepped up to include those evil investment strategies where investors sell you one thing and then bet against that thing, hoping/knowing it will fail.

He is right that the free market is not like Darwinian evolution (I get irritated when people say that they are similar). In Darwinian evolution populations of organisms adapt to their environment and occupy a "niche space" the place in the environment they are adapted for. A corporation is like an individual consuming everything in its path. Corporations can also change the rules of the game. An organism in nature cannot change the laws of nature.

Lastly he clearly missunderstands the phrase a "dog eat dog" world. They idea behind that turn of phrase is that conditions are so tough in the world that dogs are eating other dogs.

Jebus this guy acts smart and hoity toity but sure seems ignore some obvious flaws in his arguments and touches on things that are neither here nor there.

and he, wore a haaaaat
and he, had a jooooob
and he, brought home the bacon
so that, No One Kneeeeewwwwwwwwww.......

Yogis' intelligent enough to have called bullshit on bullshit as far as I can tell-Wanna have a go at my particular deficiencies as perceived by the driver of that buckboard, A10anis?? What's wrong with chingy's take on shitty, fucking news-bobbleheads or anyone claiming one "party" is better than the other??

Diversion, idiocy, a fucking waste of your brain pan's contents-