^ Joe, what do you want to have happen in November?

If Obama puts out weak sauce negative ads, you go ballistic about him being a wimp, and doing everything he can to lose.

If Obama puts out a blistering attack (though he didn't have shit to do with this one), you're wishing a pox on him.

If you're looking for a mud-free election, talk to the Republican party.

If you're looking for a Republican-free White House, cheer for Democrats who've finally learned the value of negative campaigning.

Who're you campaigning for this season? Nader? McKinney? McCain?

Demo:
Barack
Repubs:
Mccain
Independent Green Party:
Chuck Baldwin
Libertarian party:
Barr
Green party:
Cynthia McKinney
Independent:
Nader

Check out Colorado's ballot. Apparently it is easy to run for president there.
By the way, expect long lines in CO and OH. The CO ballot is insane, and OH voters will have a ton to vote on. THREE pages.

http://www.co.pueblo.co.us/assets/0/187/191/716/29bae9c8-8df6-486c-9ac6-73693b47e85a.pdf
They have freakin'
"Boston Tea Party" and what looks to be a webpage ad, HeartQuake'08

John McCain / Sarah Palin - Republican
Barack Obama / Joe Biden - Democratic
Chuck Baldwin / Darrell L. Castle - Constitution
Bob Barr / Wayne A. Root - Libertarian
Cynthia McKinney / Rosa A. Clemente - Green
Jonathan E. Allen / Jeffrey D. Stath - HeartQuake ‘08
Gene C. Amondson / Leroy J. Pletten - Prohibition
James Harris / Alyson Kennedy - Socialist Workers
Charles Jay / Dan Sallis Jr. - Boston Tea
Alan Keyes / Brian Rohrbough - America’s Independent
Gloria La Riva / Robert Moses - Socialism and Liberation
Bradford Lyttle / Abraham Bassford - U.S. Pacifist
Frank Edward McEnulty / David Mangan - Unaffiliated
Brian Moore / Stewart A. Alexander - Socialist, USA
Ralph Nader / Matt Gonzalez - Unaffiliated
Thomas Robert Stevens / Alden Link - Objectivist

My ballot here in Ohio has:

John McCain (Republican)
Cynthia McKinney (Green)
Brian Moore (Socialist)
Ralph Nader (Spoiler)
Barack Obama (Democrat)
Chuck Baldwin (Constitution)
Bob Barr (Libertarian)
Richard Duncan (no party listed)

Plus write-in.

We also have an issue on the ballot for legalizing gambling.

uhm... not happening... neither for mcsame either. I'd rather vote for Cynthia McKinney than Obama anyday.

>> ^chilaxe:
Didn't we get ourselves into this situation in the first place by voting for Nader instead of the practical choice of voting for Gore? Would you have rather had Gore for the last 8 years than Bush?


That's why we should encourage conservatives to vote Barr/Paul.

...and cane people who vote for McKinney/Nader.

I would love 3rd parties to be viable, but the fact of the matter is that in our winner takes all system they just aren't. In a parliamentary system like they have in England, the 5-6% of the vote that the greens or libertarians get would mean that they also get 5-6% representation in the government. In America, your vote is in essence a political statement (which is fine and good) but at the end of the day, amounts to nothing more. Other Californians will pick up your slack anyway, so by all means, give your vote to anyone you like.

Beyond that, these tiny parties are disorganized and poorly run, because they just don't have the funding, experience, staff and organizational skills to get their act together. It's not their fault, the system keeps them down. They also often pick candidates based on name recognition rather than ideology. For instance, the libertarians are going with Republican Bob Barr this election, just like the greens went with consumer advocate Nader (rather than an environmentalist) for the last two elections and Democrat Cynthia McKinney this election.

The best strategy, IMO, is to infiltrate one of the 2 parties and co-opt it. That way you can use the infrastructure already in place, rather than have to build it from the ground up. This is happening in the Democratic party right now, which started with the election of Howard Dean to the DNC chair and now the candidacy of Obama. We are seeing a push to get rid of corporate Democrats and make the party into what it should be.

I'd love to see Ron Paul, who was the Howard Dean of this election, become the RNC chair and clean house. I'd love to see both parties live up to their own ideology and send the corporate fluffers home. Wouldn't it be nice if both parties had integrity and could get along?

Lastly, we've heard the 3rd party domino theory (2%, 8%, 20%, etc.) before from the greens, and it is pure fantasy. Third parties get very little brand loyalty. Their popularity is directly linked to the name recognition of their presidential candidate. Bob Barr will do much better than Baderink because everyone knows who he is, just as Nader did well in the last two elections. The greens will do worse this year because Cynthia McKinney does not have the name recognition of Nader. So, it's still a myopic popularity contest, just with smaller guest list.

If you want to be true to your conscience, why not write in Ron Paul? I assume he's the dude you'd like to be President. He's a great guy and there are no questions about his integrity. Why be a chicken little and vote for the 'officially sanctioned' non-libertarian, libertarian, celebrity candidate, rather than vote for the man who inspires you the most?

I've not seen Obama state that we need to give more support to Georgia. In fact, the charge was made that Obama's response wasn't forceful enough because, as Lieberman put it, it had a "moral ambiguity" as far as placing blame on either country (since Georgia isn't blameless).

I've also seen a lot of statements from the Obama campaign that "there's only one President", referring to a tradition of, well, not trying to undermine the President's authority in the midst of a crisis.

To the larger charge of their policy being the same, I think that's inaccurate -- they're similar in their view that America has a role to play on the world stage, and that our national interests involve places like Georgia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran.

The way they choose to deal with those challenges differs wildly.

Grampy McSame John McCain wants to forego diplomacy, and move straight into the military response phase with all of those guys (except Pakistan, oddly). Obama thinks diplomacy is in order, with military action being a last resort, not a first resort.

McCain believes in the right of the United States to act with total disregard of the international community, Obama seeks to work within the International community first, while reserving the right for unilateralism as a last resort.

It's true that both have a huge difference from Ron Paul's policy of total non-intervention, but I'm not sold on the concept that America should try to change instantly from it's current level of involvement to Switzerland in one go.

Obama moves us several steps towards Switzerland, McCain moves us closer to a Roman Empire model.

Much as I wish Ron Paul, or Bob Barr, or Ralph Nader, or Cynthia McKinney had a shot at winning, they do not. Either Obama or McCain will be our 44th President.

If you believe in what Paul has to say about foreign policy, Obama's your guy.

>> ^Irishman:
>> ^NetRunner:
Your definition of neocon is about as accurate as me calling Ron Paul an anarchist. They have a couple things they agree on, but they're definitely not one and the same. Pure flamebait, frankly.
Who do you think we should hand Iraq over to?

A couple of things they agree on. Like policy, and policy.
Obama is flying around the planet making speeches about fighting extremism, Iranian nukes, terrorists hiding in caves plotting to take over America, this is the same exact stuff we've had for 20 years now.
What is wrong with people's heads who can't see this. It's plain daylight stuff folks, the stuff Obama has been saying should really be scaring the shit out of people.
Wrong president America, wrong president. Europe and the rest of the world will NEVER forgive America for electing this man.


MrFisk actually preemptively gave much of my answer, which is that neocons and Democrats are in absolute opposition on domestic policy.

With foreign policy, Neocons are now in favor of a form of imperialism -- drum up casus belli, invade, substitute the old government with a new friendly one, and incidentally get some sort of contract to a material resource (like oil). That's why we invaded Iraq for WMDs that weren't there, while North Korea's nuclear test was met with mere diplomacy. It's why the same gambit is being run in Iran.

Obama just wants us to focus on just fighting to keep the Taliban from re-taking Afghanistan, and working with Pakistan to root out the Al Qaeda camps. Every other foreign policy issue out there, he wants to use diplomacy to solve, though he says he won't shy away from the use of military if necessary (to avoid appearing weak before the ravenous American populace).

As jwray said, all Obama does here is acknowledge that there is some threat, and in fact this is actually a clip of the very speech where he got attacked by McCain for downplaying Iran's threat, because he said it was less threatening than the Soviet Union.

McCain sings "Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran", makes a joke about killing Iranians with cigarettes, and clearly says there will be more wars.

As much as I wish third party candidates had a shot of being President, they simply do not. One of these two will be President.

Between the two, which worries Europe more, the candidate who occasionally talks about potential threats against a backdrop of talking about the need for diplomacy, or the one who cavalierly uses the language of fear every time a camera is stuck in his face, and attacks his opponent for wanting to talk to the leaders of other nations?

I think Europe will be able to forgive us for electing Obama over McCain.

If you're hoping for Cynthia McKinney, Ralph Nader, Bob Barr, or even Ron Paul, as much as I wish they had a fair chance of winning, they simply will not.

^ whatsa' matter, choggie? got the shakes? going into work-in-a-slam-on-Gore withdrawal?

give it up, man. Woody's not worth it.

all anyone would have to do, to know why her picture was used at that moment, is to search for her name at youtube.

did you happen to catch her on Bill Maher's show, like 2 years ago? yikes.
i tried to find it, just now, to sift it. can't find a single copy. pisser. you'd love it, chog.

still.

what a
speech, eh?

Cause she's a silly, reactionary? I dunno...
"I've never known him to have more than one black person around him at any given time."
-McKinney on Al(snake oil)Gore ,on snakey's 2000 election campaign-(The Goon's campaign responded by pointing out that flim-flam man's campaign manager, Donna Brazile, was black.)

why is there a photo of Cynthia McKinney at -4:04

Why this crap is the number 1 sift right now I'll never know. You could listen to the narcissistic whining of the troubles of being beautiful all day or you could stop and realize that the benefits vastly out weigh the oh-so-hard to deal with hardships.

I love that these "beautiful" people fell for Mark McKinney's expose.

Thanks for all the GREAT comments, everyone.

I personally believe that we should try to empathize with everyone, regardless of how trivial we perceive their problems to be, because maybe their problems really aren't so trivial. Yes, I can think of worse problems to have than being sexually objectified. Being horribly maimed or disfigured is just one example that I consider to be worse. Having severe mental illness is yet another, IMHO. However, we're in the 21st century and yet sexual harassment and the "glass ceiling" for women are still very real problems in the workplace, and pretty women are often the ones who find themselves in those situations. Also consider Marilyn Monroe. She struggled to get serious acting roles because she was often just considered "a face", and all her good looks didn't prevent her from taking her own life.

If you don't want to consider beautiful people as having any disadvantages, that's fine. However, I hope that after you've seen this video you'll look past the looks and try to learn more about attractive people you meet before you simply categorize them as "a face".

I'm also adding this to the *Canada channel, as I noticed that it was directed by KITH alumnus Mark McKinney, and it was also produced in cooperation with the National Film Board of Canada.

Yes, too short. In case you guys didn't catch this, it is Directed by Mark McKinney. McKinney who was a cast member of "Kids In The Hall"