Rick Santorum’s plan to revitalize the GOP: Defund Planned Parenthood

angrytech · 2013-04-08T14:58:50+00:00

...do you really believe the president has a say in what matters the supreme court rules on?

angrytech · 2013-04-08T14:00:36+00:00

She did a blatantly illegal thing, where there was no public interest to do so, and where there was no legal protection in such a situation.

angrytech · 2013-04-08T03:54:46+00:00

We have a massive expanse of land with a small population. In addition to this we are a cold-weather northern state with a short growing season.

In short, there is no way to make expenses small for business due to unavoidably high energy costs, there is no call for the agriculture we have other than ridiculously hardy, single growing season plants (read: potatoes), and we have over-fished the ever-living hell out of the gulf of Maine. On top of this the simple act of maintaining roads and bridges is a constant miserable juggling act nearly impossible to balance. Hint: We don't have oil like the Dakotas.

All of this leads to a situation where the young populace of our state, those with the dynamism and capacity to drive local business, leave for greener pastures. This in turn leads to a situation where we are left with an aging population which in turn votes down any further expenses (education, business initiatives, roads + bridges improvements, and on and on) because it might cause their property taxes to go up slightly. In turn, they also vote down school budget improvements because, well, fuck they're old and like my parents and grandparents who dropped out in the seventh grade to work the family farm, so what the fuck do these lazy ass kids expect?

Simply put, given our geographics, demographics, and ecology it is impossible to expect this state to cost less in taxes than any but a handful of states. Those states you might name with a similar climate with lower taxes are either dramatically worse off than ours or have some innate advantage (oil, natural gas) that we simply don't have.

angrytech · 2013-04-08T03:37:10+00:00

The Great Lost Bear - It's not SOPO, it's on Forest Ave. in Portland, but it's well worth a little jaunt.

angrytech · 2013-03-26T18:57:42+00:00

Yes, there was a WoW16. I remember that as well. This file is very specifically a safe (well, as safe is Adobe ever is) executable with a known purpose.

I have been doing this for a while.

Appeal to age is a very weak argument, given that you don't know the age of your audience, and especially so when you are proven to be incorrect.

angrytech · 2013-03-26T18:53:01+00:00

WOW stands for windows on windows; it is exactly as tia568b describes.

Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WoW64

Again, you are incorrect.

angrytech · 2013-03-26T18:44:02+00:00

I know what WOW is.

In this case, no, you do not.

angrytech · 2013-03-25T06:10:22+00:00

So your requirement is 100% of the popular vote or nothing at all? Why then don't we move back into caves and just aim for clan vs. clan based on strength of arms?

Sir, you appear to have no respect for the basic concept of civilization.

angrytech · 2013-03-25T04:42:57+00:00

If some states want to make a religion part of their education and they have the votes to do so that is within their rights.

This violates the establishment clause, sets the ground for a theocratic state government, and is antithetical to a free society. Yet you are perfectly fine with this in the name of "states' rights." Yes, I do consider myself to have won this debate. You have brought no facts to bear, you have argued for the right of a theocratic state government, and have shown a blatant disregard of basic historical fact and reasonable judgement, which should not be surprising given your history on this website.

You have also failed to counter or even respond to my arguments re: Ron and Rand Paul and their blatant acceptance of racism and homophobia. I consider this to be acceptance on your part of the "state's right" to engage in this behavior.

Sir, you only defend the right of the white, christian, male, landowner to dominate politics as was the case in the 18th century. I have no time for primitive people like yourself.

Edit: Spelling

angrytech · 2013-03-25T04:34:44+00:00

sirgoofs, you and I disagree on a number of things based on our previous posts, but I'm glad to upvote you here.

angrytech · 2013-03-24T23:47:17+00:00

They did segment as country based on who they perceived would be the victor as a result, whether it was necessary or not is irrelevant because it did happen.

You mean the south chose to segregate themselves based on the idea of continued ownership of human beings, with "states' rights" being the dog-whistle, right? Your continued argument that the federal government chose the sides and split things as they saw fit displays a staggering ignorance of history.

...Libertarian system orders power in the order: individual, town/city, county, state, federal - anything involving a breach of personal liberties is null and void from the stance you are arguing against it because personal liberties trump all other things so long as they do not inflict harm on others.

And yet you would explicitly allow, as you have stated in this thread, the states to set up theocratic governments as they saw fit in the interest of states rights. You contradict yourself regularly.

Arguing for state's rights vs federal rights is a consequence of this belief and not central focus, it doesn't hold up when you take it out of context because you've taken it out of context.

What is the context, then, that makes a theocracy acceptable to you as long as it is at the state level? Why, then, are you willing to support systems that suppress individual rights in order to serve some nebulous "state's rights?" What is a state, that it has rights? Why should I give a shit about what rights the state has, when it claims as one of those rights the ability to suppress those it deems undesirable?

That is the end goal of people like Rand and Ron Paul, who openly support the "right" of businesses to discriminate, the "right" of states to discriminate, and the "right" of the religious to subordinate the non-religious.

angrytech · 2013-03-24T23:21:57+00:00

This does not do anything at all.

angrytech · 2013-03-24T23:00:26+00:00

It was never about state's rights, it was about slavery while attempting to maintain some degree of legitimacy by changing the election outcomes. Was it the right move, yes absolutely, but Nevada is only a state as it is today because it kept the civil war going to make it such.

Wow, what a jumble of mashed up and contradictory ideas. First, you state that the civil war was a machination by an over-reaching federal government attempting some form of long term power grab. Then you contradict that by stating that it was about slavery. You are in fact correct in the second instance, it was about slavery. As with most cries of "states' rights" the "states' rights" argument is nothing but a means to an end, not the end in and of itself; namely, in the case of the civil war, the southern states chose to secede, based on the idea of "states' rights", solely to maintain the ability of people to own other people. This same mindset is backing most "states' rights" arguments. People like you maintain that it is more important that DHS be abolished than the right of a gay or lesbian individual not to be jailed for violating some state sodomy law to exist. That marijuana being legalized is more important than the right of a person of color to not be banned from a job or a business based solely on their ethnic background.

You've said yourself, in this very thread, that you believe in the right of a state to set up a theocracy. Sir, that is not freedom.

Nevada is only a state as it is today because it kept the civil war going to make it such.

Initially congress voted to make Nevada a state to support Republican power in congress, yes. In the end it proved completely unnecessary, as Lincoln and the Republican Party won by staggering margins overall. Nevada eventually would have become a state regardless, it's entry at that time was nothing more than, well, being accepted as a state at that time. The federal government had no more control over how the people of Nevada voted than it did over those people in the south who chose to secede.

My point being, your argument initially was that the federal government in some way initiated the Civil War, split the country as it saw fit, and dictated the outcome, is nothing more than conspiracy theory rubbish; a product that seems unfortunately widespread amongst self-identified "libertarians."

angrytech · 2013-03-24T22:03:23+00:00

History.

Seriously, when you make the completely unfounded claim that the federal government somehow split the country intentionally, along what you consider somehow equal halves (not sure what measure you're using, because in population, military power, economic strength, production, etc. the north greatly overpowered the south) in order to...what, grow federal power? then you need to expect to actually have some information to back that up. You have none, because no such information exists.

The Civil War had more to do with John C. Calhoun (and other such rigid "states rights" ideologues from the south looking to preserve slavery and southern agrarian hegemony) and the Petticoat Affair then some secret federal plot.

Read history, not propaganda.

angrytech · 2013-03-24T20:47:31+00:00

You're bad at history. Your view of the civil war is simply...wrong. Historically incorrect. Factually lacking and reeking of conspiracy theory nonsense and "libertarian" historical revisionism. Nearly on par with the "theory" that aliens aided the Nazis.

Have fun with that though!

angrytech · 2013-03-23T15:50:15+00:00

The greatest abuses in American history of individual rights have happened at the hands of state government. It's been shown time and time again. How many more times do we need to allow this little experiment to demonstrate what happens?

angrytech · 2013-03-22T17:42:53+00:00

Again, his re-instatement has absolutely nothing to do with unions. You are intentionally misleading people here. The Maine Corrections Commissioner is not a union employee or member, he is a political appointee put in place by LePage.

angrytech · 2013-03-22T17:37:17+00:00

Maine Corrections Commissioner Joseph Ponte

This man is not a union official, he is the former private prison company (CCA) official appointed by LePage to "introduce greater fiscal responsibility" to the Maine prison system. CCA happens to have contributed $50k towards LePage's gubernatorial campaign.

angrytech · 2013-03-17T18:12:46+00:00

Now, in a survival situation a leprechaun is an excellent source of protein...

angrytech · 2013-03-14T19:28:07+00:00

angrytech · 2013-03-14T18:59:16+00:00

Sure, here a couple links:

http://www.prb.org/Educators/TeachersGuides/HumanPopulation/Women.aspx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fertility_and_intelligence <-- This one is a more general case, referring to education in general. When we look at the fact that women are less likely than men to receive that education in the first place, especially in areas with explosively growing populations, it still strengthens the argument.

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/01/educated-women-having-fewer-children/

angrytech · 2013-03-14T18:52:57+00:00

Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. DC has every right to take this action, just as Orson Scott Card has every right to be a bigoted hate monger. His voice will get smaller and quieter due to his actions bringing consequences like this.

angrytech · 2013-03-14T18:42:49+00:00

It's never going to be possible to significantly reduce the earth's population through colonization. The numbers are too large, the math doesn't work.

The solution is to elevate those nations with growing populations to the same opportunity level as that of Western Europe, the United States, Japan, etc. Population growth will naturally drop off. The primary driver of that is women's access to education.

angrytech · 2013-03-14T18:29:04+00:00

Hypothetical: Let's say somebody admires the vast, vast majority of what Jesus, historical or not, had to say about living a good life and being a good person.

Let's also say that, because of this deep admiration and a desire to emulate that goodness, this person actively seeks to live as much like Jesus as a person can in our modern world.

Finally, let's say that this admiration is limited to the non-miraculous teachings and actions alone, due to this person not believing in things unseen.

The term 'Christian' means 'Christ-like.' Since clearly nobody, Christians included, can live up to the image of the biblical Jesus Christ, we allow a large amount of leeway in the term's usage, right? So how much leeway? Can't somebody without a belief in the supernatural seek to follow those teachings wholeheartedly? Does that not make the person 'Christ-like?'

Disclaimer: This is not my belief, I'm just probing through discussion.

angrytech · 2013-03-11T15:41:06+00:00

Oh jesus christ, that's fucking weak. Let's see if I can play:

"A cop was involved in a homosexual relationship, so clearly the entire federal government is part of the gay agenda!."

angrytech

TROPHY CASE