>> ^lucky760:
I really fear the Sift turning into a place like so many other sites (e.g., YT) where a member can abuse lots of others freely and knowingly face no consequences. I shudder to imagine a day where this is a kindergarten full of children that keep pouring sand over the heads of one another. It should be a safe haven where people come to relax and have fun, not where one should feel vulnerable and violated, always fearful of another sneak attack that will go unchecked.

I've been reading through all this and struggling with how to put my thoughts down until I read this. Lucky, you hit the nail on the head. I agree that the down-votes should be deleted and QM should be warned. If after that he decides to vote for Dubya a second time then he will get what he deserves...

I haven't voiced my opinion on this matter and I probably won't, especially when QM has yet to respond, but I would like to speak in general to the issue of abusing power.

I really fear the Sift turning into a place like so many other sites (e.g., YT) where a member can abuse lots of others freely and knowingly face no consequences. I shudder to imagine a day where this is a kindergarten full of children that keep pouring sand over the heads of one another. It should be a safe haven where people come to relax and have fun, not where one should feel vulnerable and violated, always fearful of another sneak attack that will go unchecked.

If something should happen in a situation like this, I think the downvotes should be deleted and the offender warned, only to be banned if they in any way use their powers to attack someone again. (Or the offender should just be banned outright.) To do nothing is to condone it, and condoning abuse of power is like voting Dubya in for a second term to undermine the fabric with which this community has always been woven.

xx, to some extent you're right, but we have one big fat loophole.

We sometimes allow a clip that's already contained within a larger clip because of the awesome nature of the edit you're dealing with. In this case, it's pure igloo - the other clip has other gags which dance around the point we're getting at here.

This is such a clip.

The scariest thing is that Dubya showed up on "Talking to" and called our Prime Minister "Jean Poutine" instead of "Chretien" (Poutine being a delicious french fry based meal).

<shudder?>

The hypocrisy of Dubya badmouthing drug-use. Seriously.

You want a "cost centre" - how about $8 billion spent on the drug-fighting industry.

Fighting the *lies I guess.

"In my line of work you gotta keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kinda catapult the propaganda." - Dubya, May 24, 2005.

that graph thing's a new tactic, works quite well. even when they've stopped talking about it - to play it on the other side of the screen whilst ron paul's talking kinda puts some forced negative slant on it all.

Hobart Institute of Welding Technology?

In reply to this comment by Doc_M:
Aych Ay Dubya Tee

Aych Ay Dubya Tee

Upvote for that absolutely astonishing dubya-tee-EFF'erry on the end there. It got 30!! Hooray! Now Rise, Great Red Neon Fish Background Prop.

They aren't the majority party anymore. Rove and Dubya screwed em but good.

for the amount of time the Fox News guys spend sucking it, I gotta figure Dubya must have one really sweet tasting cock.

I wish Mike Gravelle had a chance.
though I'd rather see this Perot 2.0 over any of the asshole dubya 2.0 bastards like Gulianni.

The way some of those kids stumble over their own words makes Dubya look okay.

...throws atheists to lions...

No, that was Bush Sr. I don't think Dubya could correctly identify a lion.

written by Krupo in that thread. (unless you've got it bookmarked you wouldn't know the thread was updated )

Good in '71 Bad in '72. It's a short track record. I'm not saying he was perfect, but have you considered that external governments could also try and screw with Chile and their currency? I haven't done extensive research into it, but it *is* a threat these days - IMF/WTO spook the global markets (because money is all about perception rather than reality), and the country in question is SCREWED.

And although the regime was accused of various things, those are accusations rather than convictions. I'm sure Chile has an impeachment process like any other country. Why should you get the military involved immediately, if at all? There's a reason you have elections - to foster an orderly handover of power. I'm sure millions of Americans would be pleased if some F-16's attacked Dubya, but that's not the way you do things.

In an effort to add a bit more depth, I poked around a bit more. Turns out you need a 2/3 majority for the resolution you refer to to have legal force. So using the word "passed" is a bit misleading - that's a 63.3% margin, close, but not legally binding (source is WikiTalk, but I'll buy it unless someone has evidence to the contrary).

Do check out that Wiki-talk page, looks like there's some lively to and forth on the topic.





In reply to this comment by reason:
Why not address these facts?

On August 22, 1973 the Christian Democrats and the National Party members of the Chamber of Deputies passed, by 81 to 47 votes, a resolution entitled "Declaration of the Breakdown of Chile’s Democracy", which called upon the military to "put an immediate end" to what they described as "breach[es of] the Constitution… with the goal of redirecting government activity toward the path of Law and ensuring the constitutional order of our Nation and the essential underpinnings of democratic coexistence among Chileans."

The resolution declared that the Allende government was seeking "...to conquer absolute power with the obvious purpose of subjecting all citizens to the strictest political and economic control by the state... [with] the goal of establishing a totalitarian system," and claimed that it had made "violations of the Constitution" into "a permanent system of conduct." Many of the charges came down to disregarding the separation of powers and arrogating the prerogatives of both the legislature and judiciary within the executive.

Among other particulars, the regime was accused of:

* ruling by decree, thus thwarting the normal system of adopting legislation
* refusing to enforce judicial decisions against its own partisans and "not carrying out sentences and judicial resolutions that contravene its objectives"
* ignoring the decrees of the independent General Comptroller's Office
* various offenses related to the media, including usurping control of the National Television Network and "applying ... economic pressure against those media organizations that are not unconditional supporters of the government..."
* allowing its supporters to assemble even when armed, while preventing legal assembly by its opponents
* "...supporting more than 1,500 illegal 'takings' of farms..."
* illegal repression of the El Teniente strike
* illegally limiting emigration

The resolution finally condemned the "creation and development of government-protected armed groups which... are headed towards a confrontation with the Armed Forces." Allende's efforts to re-organize the military and police, which he could not trust in their current forms, were characterized as "notorious attempts to use the Armed and Police Forces for partisan ends, destroy their institutional hierarchy, and politically infiltrate their ranks."


And as for the economic boom?

In 1972, the monetary policies of an increase in the amount of currency, which had been adopted by the Minister of Economics, Pedro Vuskovic, led to a devaluation of the escudo and to renewed inflation, which reached 140% in 1972.

Good in '71 Bad in '72. It's a short track record. I'm not saying he was perfect, but have you considered that external governments could also try and screw with Chile and their currency? I haven't done extensive research into it, but it *is* a threat these days - IMF/WTO spook the global markets (because money is all about perception rather than reality), and the country in question is SCREWED.

And although the regime was accused of various things, those are accusations rather than convictions. I'm sure Chile has an impeachment process like any other country. Why should you get the military involved immediately, if at all? There's a reason you have elections - to foster an orderly handover of power. I'm sure millions of Americans would be pleased if some F-16's attacked Dubya, but that's not the way you do things.

In an effort to add a bit more depth, I poked around a bit more. Turns out you need a 2/3 majority for the resolution you refer to to have legal force. So using the word "passed" is a bit misleading - that's a 63.3% margin, close, but not legally binding (source is WikiTalk, but I'll buy it unless someone has evidence to the contrary).

Do check out that Wiki-talk page, looks like there's some lively to and forth on the topic.