I think I may not have been clear about what I meant in my statement. I believe we're talking about two different segments of the same problem.

I absolutely agree with you that there has been very poor management of the U.S. debt over the past few years, especially in over the financial bail out/sub-prime mortgage/housing bubble fiasco. And yes, some (many?) of those individuals culpable are working with the current cabinet.

However, my thoughts were more to the fact that 1/2 the American national debt (some $5+ Trillion) is interest. I see this as a crime no single individual could commit over night. Yes, the last few years have had fuck-ups and thefts of the common purse on a colossal scale, but the majority of the (compound) interest on the the U.S. debt was accumulated before the bank bail out. I see those responsible as being the people who permitted the system with a privatized central bank. Money is now created by private companies through debt which the taxpayer is charged compound interest on.

NEW YORK -- Here's a new way to think about the U.S. government's epic borrowing: More than half of the $9 trillion in debt that Uncle Sam is expected to build up over the next decade will be interest.

More than half. In fact, $4.8 trillion.

If that's hard to grasp, here's another way to look at why that's a problem.

In 2015 alone, the estimated interest due - $533 billion - is equal to a third of the federal income taxes expected to be paid that year. /CNN, 2009.

>> ^notarobot:

@NetRunner, @GenjiKilpatrick, It is unfair to blame any single person in recent memory. Not Bernake, not Greenspan. They were making the best choices they knew to make given the system they have inherited.
The people at fault are no longer alive today. I'm sure I don't know American history as well as Americans, but I know that similar issues are being faced by pretty much every country that has left the management of the nation's money supply in the hands of private interests. For myself, in Canada, I'm pretty worried.
"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild
“Once a nation parts with the control of its currency and credit, it matters not who makes that nation's laws. Usury, once in control, will wreck any nation. Until the control of the issue of currency and credit is restored to government and recognized as its most conspicuous and sacred responsibility, all talk of the sovereignty of Parliament and of democracy is idle and futile.”
-William Lyon Mackenzie King, former Prime Minister of Canada.


The people at fault are very much alive because they could've done something to prevent it years ago. They're in Obamas cabinet now.

@NetRunner, @GenjiKilpatrick, It is unfair to blame any single person in recent memory. Not Bernake, not Greenspan. They were making the best choices they knew to make given the system they have inherited.

The people at fault are no longer alive today. I'm sure I don't know American history as well as Americans, but I know that similar issues are being faced by pretty much every country that has left the management of the nation's money supply in the hands of private interests. For myself, in Canada, I'm pretty worried.

"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild

“Once a nation parts with the control of its currency and credit, it matters not who makes that nation's laws. Usury, once in control, will wreck any nation. Until the control of the issue of currency and credit is restored to government and recognized as its most conspicuous and sacred responsibility, all talk of the sovereignty of Parliament and of democracy is idle and futile.”

-William Lyon Mackenzie King, former Prime Minister of Canada.

“Once a nation parts with the control of its currency and credit, it matters not who makes that nation's laws. Usury, once in control, will wreck any nation. Until the control of the issue of currency and credit is restored to government and recognized as its most conspicuous and sacred responsibility, all talk of the sovereignty of Parliament and of democracy is idle and futile.”

-William Lyon Mackenzie King, former Prime Minister of Canada.

I'm gonna step out here and defend the Puritans. In the early 17th century the Puritans in England were not happy with the Church of England (which they were a part of at the time). They saw that its reformation had not gone far enough, meaning, it was still way too close to Catholicism. Above all else, Puritans despised Catholicism, the Pope, and everything the Catholic Church did and they didn't want the Church of England to be anything close to it. When they tried to further the reforms within the Church of England, they were blocked. Though protestant, King James I refused to allow the reforms and told the Hampton Court that he preferred the status quo and that the monarch should rule the church through the bishops. The Puritans felt alienated by this move. In 1625, Charles I became king and he tried to dissolve Parliament entirely to neutralize his enemies, which included plenty of Puritans. This, coupled with the Thirty-Years War (Catholics vs. Protestants), which had over 8 million casualties, now being in full-swing prompted the Puritans to flee to the New World.

The Puritans weren't trying to establish a religiously free society. Roger Williams, who wanted separation of Church & State, was banished and founded Rhode Island. However, the Puritans did want their own society where they weren't underneath the authority of the monarch, the Church of England and where they didn't fear for their lives because of what they believed.

That, and the movie. Mostly the movie.

>> ^Reefie:

>> ^Morganth:
November 5th, really? Okay, those people obsessing over V for Vendetta really need to get over it.

November 5th is the date that Guy Fawkes attempted to blow up parliament in the UK back in 1605, Brits celebrate the occasion every year and it's hard to find someone who doesn't recognise the phrase "Remember remember the fifth of November". I don't think Anonymous chose the date because of a film, I believe it was chosen because of the significance of the date from a historical perspective.

>> ^Morganth:
November 5th, really? Okay, those people obsessing over V for Vendetta really need to get over it.


November 5th is the date that Guy Fawkes attempted to blow up parliament in the UK back in 1605, Brits celebrate the occasion every year and it's hard to find someone who doesn't recognise the phrase "Remember remember the fifth of November". I don't think Anonymous chose the date because of a film, I believe it was chosen because of the significance of the date from a historical perspective.

NZ uses an MMP (Mixed Member Proportional) system. Essentially, everyone gets two votes: one for your local candidate and one for a political party on a national scale. This means that even if a party doesn't have enough people in one district to win a seat, if it has enough votes nationally, it still gets allocated some seats based on it's percentage of the vote. So, for example, the Greens didn't win any electorates, but they still got 7% of the national party vote so they get ~7% (9 actual seats) of the seats in parliament. Where it gets tricky, is that a party must get at least 5% to get any votes unless it wins an electorate seat. So in this case, the right wing ACT party won one seat, got 3% of the vote and still got 5 seats. Worse, the party that won the most seats (National) joined with them to form a government, which means that a party with 3% of the national vote gets a ministerial portfolio.

Overall though, it's a much better system than FPP

Yeah, I gotta say... even as someone from a country being heavily attacked by speculators (Portugal's rating was downgraded to junk level by Moody's a couple of days ago for absolutely no reason, when there is political consensus, a majority in parliament and the government has not only agreed to do what the IMF asked, but beyond. Oh, and we're not Greece, and no one is protesting in the streets) this video is just full of moronic ideas, and personal beliefs (and some of them down right insulting towards certain nationalities).

Wow so this is what happens if a country clings to two parties.



Here I vote for the green party and they get into government or opposition. In the US, into obscurity.
So Germany is not in Irak, gets out of nuclear power, has a working economy, fairly good welfare, free university, and very few gun-owners.

Yay mixed-member parliament!

@Opus_Moderandi Agreed. I think one thing that needs to be considered is that the Boston Tea Party happened after all other legal recourse had been taken to try to get Britain to not only repeal the tea tax but also get representation in Parliament for the colonies. In other words, they had exhausted all other possible options. Civil disobedience is great for when you've exhausted all other possible options.

What options did these people exhaust? Did they petition to get the law changed? Did they write their representatives in government to demand it be changed? Did they try to raise awareness (through leaflet distribution, billboards, commercials, web campaigns, etc.) of the problem? Did they offer to run for election themselves to try to get the law changed?

No. They said "F*ck all that, it sounds like too much work. I'll just take a few hours to inconvenience everyone who wants to reflect quietly at the memorial and pretend I'm a hero fighting for justice."

@dystopianfuturetoday Slacktivism. Never heard that word until today, but it is the most awesome and apt description of what is happening here.

When civil disobedience is your first choice for reforming laws you disagree with, you've lost all perspective of how democracy and freedom work. When you think your rights or freedom are being violated because you cannot dance everywhere and anywhere, other people be damned, you've lost all perspective on what the words "rights" and "freedom" mean.

EDIT: Spelled dystopianfuturetoday's name wrong

EDIT 2: For a great read about the philosophy of civil disobedience (including a rationale for why civil disobedience should be a means of last resort) see http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/civil-disobedience/

The public responses I find more disturbing are from within Pakistan's National Assembly and Senate hearings. Articles from the Pakistani news outlet "The News" can be found here and here. Here are some of the deeply disturbing comments being made by members of Pakistan's National Assembly and Senate:

Deputy leader of the JUI-F, Mufti Kifayatullah said "We assure the world that Pakistan is not a killing field for the Muslims. Osama is a hero and we consider such incidents an attack on the sovereignty of Pakistan".

Dr Khalid Soomro of the JUI-F said "Who can believe that Osama was living in Pakistan and Pakistan was unaware of it," He later said a warning had to have been given before the operation and the operation was launched subsequently and questioned what Pakistan had received as a result of cooperation with the US against bin Laden.

Professor Khurshid said heads must roll for not fulfilling responsibilities towards Pakistan’s security and integrity. “The intelligence agencies and Army who take a big share of the budget are answerable to the people and parliament,” he said.


It seems a very large number of top ranking Pakistani officials are agreed that Osama could not have been hiding there without the help of the ISI and/or military. That it is an outrage that the ISI and/or military allowed Osama the operation against Osama. And their outrage isn't the harboring of a terrorist responsible for killing tens of thousands of Pakistani muslims, their outrage is that Osama was a muslim hero and how dare the ISI and/or military betray such a hero. I find that infinitely more disturbing than these celebrations.

*sigh* Vote for someone else! Doesn't matter who. Just not Harper. Brilliant. That's currently the Liberals' strategy too. There's currently a minority government. If bad decisions are being made, I blame parliament. Not just one person or party. I also blame citizens for not being more involved in politics. If you have a fucking problem with what's happening in parliament, speak to your MP (you know... the guy you actually voted for in the last election).

>> ^ponceleon:

I have to say that I'm out of touch with Canadian Politics so I really have not concept of this guy, but to an outsider this really doesn't seem that meaningful. He used a few words the emperor used and not even in the right order. Heavy handed.


We're going to the polls because his minority government lost a vote of confidence after being found in contempt of parliament. *quality *scifi mashup!

The most common alternative to FPP systems - MMP - comes with its own set of problems. We end up with people in parliament or even in government who have not personally received any votes at all, they are there thanks to their party winnning a certain number of seats in parliament.

Even worse, you can get a narrow race between the two major parties and suddenly some dumbass little third party with 7% of the vote gets to decide who the government will be - i.e. whoever they form a coalition with.