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State of Denial
Talk about naive. The Union of Concerned Scientists apparently thought the Democratic and Republican national conventions would be appropriate events at which to bring up the awkwardly substantive topic of U.S. nuclear weapons stockpiles (6,000 or so) and policy (insane).
So, as part of a larger campaign of informative ads in the two convention cities, Denver and Minneapolis-St. Paul, they rented billboard space at the two airports and greeted travelers with ads depicting an aerial view of that city, with one of those ground zero bull's-eyes superimposed on the downtown area, and the words: "When only one nuclear bomb could destroy a city like (Minneapolis, Denver) . . . We don't need 6,000." Below the picture, the party's presidential nominee - one per city - was urged "to get serious about reducing the nuclear threat."
Well, OK. Perhaps you will not be surprised to hear what happened next: In Minneapolis, some people found the ad "scary," which it was supposed to be, and "anti-McCain," which it wasn't, but airports are the sovereign turf of Corporate America, which has quite a few values higher than free speech. Chief among them, I think, is "happy, happy."
And Northwest Airlines, the official airline of the Republican National Convention, which also controls the advertising space in Concourse G of the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, found the ad to be in clear violation of this value. So it requested Clear Channel Outdoor, a branch of the media conglomerate that originally sold the billboard space to Union of Concerned Scientists, to remove the ad.
Clear Channel, best known for homogenizing the nation's airwaves (it owns more than 1,200 radio stations, and pushes a lineup of right-wing talk show hosts), did Northwest one better. It yanked the ad in Minneapolis, then preemptively yanked it again in Denver, where no one had complained.
Phew - threat averted! Let the conventions proceed with all due hoopla and empty intrigue.
"By maintaining thousands of highly accurate nuclear weapons on alert, the United States perpetuates the only threat that could destroy it as a functioning society: a large-scale attack by Russia launched either without authorization, by accident, or by mistake because of a false warning of an incoming U.S. attack."
So UCS points out, in a statement on its Web site called "Toward True Security." America's security establishment remains calcified in Cold War paranoia and, incredibly, hair-trigger nuclear alert - and no one talks about it. What threat do we really face? By any rational assessment, the greatest danger to our survival is from nuclear weapons themselves. But we don't have the mechanism for such a discussion, at least not in the common spheres of national life: politics and popular culture. We continue to maintain and upgrade our nuclear arsenal and national life simply moves on around it. Yet:
"By giving nuclear weapons so large and visible a role in U.S. policy," the UCS statement goes on, ". . . the United States has increased the incentive for other nations to acquire nuclear weapons, and reduced the political costs to them of doing so."
Nuclear technology is more accessible than ever, and more and more countries feel the need to join "the club," fueling the arrival of what many observers consider a second nuclear age - far more "egalitarian" than the first. At least 40 non-nuclear states currently possess large quantities of highly enriched uranium, and the risk of terrorists possessing "suitcase nukes" is greater than ever. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which has been monitoring the state of global nuclear risk since 1947, recently reset its doomsday clock to five minutes to midnight.
No, this is not an easy discussion to have, but what is the cost of not having it? What is the cost of remaining in a state of suppressed disquiet, fearing some vague "threat level orange" and watching increasingly bizarre security measures - especially at the airport - tighten around us? What is the cost of not making a nuke-free world a political priority in the United States?
"By contributing to a climate in which possessing nuclear weapons is legitimate," the statement continues, "the United States has also undermined the ability of the international community to prevent more states from acquiring them. . . . The United States can, and should, take the lead in promoting an effort to clear the path to a world free of nuclear weapons."
Like I say, what was the Union of Concerned Scientists thinking - trying to put this matter on the agenda of America's major political parties as they meet to choose new leaders and determine our national direction?
"Eventually we want to live in a world free of nuclear weapons," UCS spokesman Aaron Huertas told me. But here's the thing. As Clear Channel and Northwest Airlines understood, we can live in that world right now just by taking that unpleasant ad down - no politics in the airport, please - and maintaining a state of impenetrable denial.
- Posted in
59 Comments so far
Show AllDid G_D have a brain phart when he/she created uranium ore? Was she/he distracted? How did it turn out that mortals (The Union of Concerned Scientists) turned out to be wiser? Sickness and death from beginning to end !!!
I agree.
God as a concept has a lot of problems.
We should probably just forget about using the frame of an all knowing all caring father figure in the sky. It just doesn't pan out.
For future reference to the unworkability of a good deity see incoming storm Gustav.
Well said...a lot of problems. The defeatism that is logical for believers (He will do what He wants...?) is a part of the problem. Realists (atheists amongst them) don't look to the sky, but understand that it's all about us. We can find solutions and none of them involve kneeling by your bed at night and repeating nonsense to some great power in the sky. But imagine the challenge on this planet when somebody like Tony Blair bleats the unbelievable stupidity that..."there must be some good to the war in Iraq, because God allows it to happen"!!!??? What a simpleton! So the Holocaust had it's silver lining (that we don't understand, of course) because God is good and all powerful, and He allowed it to happen.?????
Banning all nukes is never going to happen. It would be a very good thing to have the hair-triggers removed, it would be most cool if the usa and russia could reduce their arsenals to the bare number needed to maintain the mad philosophy.
But neither the usa nor russia will ever give these weapons up. The usa won't because other nations won't. Russia won't because they've been attacked a few too many times in their nation's history and are a bit paranoid. England and France won't give theirs up because they still have visions from the glory days of their empires. China has theirs because the usa and Russia have enough to wipe them out. India and Pakistan have them because the other side does... and Isreal, well I suppose that they fear another holocaust and, in the unlikely event of a next time, are determined to take everyone else with them.
The weapons themselves are mostly useless. Using them will see everyone die, but not having one - if you think your country is a great state - is worse than the potential death.
zaz, god didn't create uranium. Uranium was produced when stars exploded after going supernova some billions of years in the past. Not all stars produced uranium in those events, only very big stars that had burned iron...
"Banning all nukes is never going to happen."
I'm not sure I agree. Nukes make lousy tactical weapons and only an idiot would deploy them as such (such as the Bush Administration and their Pentagon lap dogs).
Nukes as a strategic weapon exist in the only role they can, as MAD psyops. As such, they can be replaced by bigger and badder doomsday devices. Perhaps in this way nukes can be eradicated. Its still a lose-lose proposition.
As said in the 1983 movie War Games, "The only way to win is not to play".
Good post.
Great quote.
"As said in the 1983 movie War Games, "The only way to win is not to play".
"The usa won't because other nations won't"
Wrong. It has always been the US that has refused to completely give up nuclear weapons. Russia has always tried to take the levels as low as they could get them.
Should have made that more clear,
'The usa won't based on the excuse that other's won't'
Russia has, has it? Somehow I doubt that's remotely true. The sov's built the things as fast as they could in an attempt to keep up with the us manufacturing. Russia hasn't wanted to pay for the overkill that was built up, and likes the idea that they can be seen as willing to disarm. However, they know what happens to countries that disarm better than most. They'll never drop the number of nukes they possess below what's needed to kill all life on earth.
I really think you're a bit harsh and that you possibly miss the point. Of course Russia has been invaded too many times to not protect itself. But if all nuclear weapons were to disappear from the planet, Russia as it is now would be very safe. It has the geography (Hitler and Napolean both found out how easy it is to take Moscow!), the number of soldiers, and...tanks. Tanks to roll over all of Europe if they need to. That they want to keep enough nukes to remove life from the planet is simply not reasonable for this nation of expert chess players.
If nukes disappear, Russia has every reason to feel nobody can harm it all that much. Nobody can checkmate Russia. With nukes, everybody could go. Checkmate all around.
Logic says they're more than willing to remove nukes from the planet, because then they can't lose. With nukes, everybody can lose. But they're too good at negotiating to move without absolute assurance of mutual destruction of nukes. The US should follow the same logic. With nukes, we can all go. Without nukes, the US is pretty safe.
Nuclear disarmament is like climate change in that both require a massive awakening of our common humanity for solution.
-- Roger Eaton
http://globalassembly.net
Amen!
Roger,
I just read through some of your websites. Very compelling. I have similar views and desires.
"Russia won't because they've been attacked a few too many times in their nation's history and are a bit paranoid"
Saturnalia's cavalier attitude toward paranoid Russia not only betrays usual "Western" arrogance but luck of attention as well. Russia DID surrender a good bulk of her nukes and many US nuclear plants now running on the fuel, reprocessed from warheads targeted the US cities. Ask Senator Nunn for details. What did she get instead? Looted country, American economic diktat and NATO stations in 60 miles from Leningrad.
Even more, Russia is threatened by the Puppet-In-Chief by full scale war, Cold or Hot, and universal condemnation with “Big countries do not invade small countries” comic line.
It is very regrettable that even here, among people with open minds and independent thought, we have to live with narrow-minded people, ιδιοτικος in Greek.
Russia got rid of the weapons that were obsolete, and that they couldn`t afford to maintain.
Cavalier? How many times have the lands of Rus been invaded or conquered in the last two thousand years? Armies have crossed the steppes of Russia more often than the usa has gone to war (or attacked some small nation or another) in the last two hundred years. If that sort of history doesn`t justify paranoia, nothing does. It is not idiotic to mention that the actions of other nations in the past will influence the (thinking) leaders of developed countries. While it`s also a good idea to get rid of the bombs, it`s not a good idea to use them as fuel. You still generate massive amounts of nuclear waste, run the risk of a meltdown and the transport of the material can be intercepted along the way (by accident, usually they`re well guarded).
As for Russia being looted, most of the looting has been done by friends of Yeltsin or Putin, usually by senior members of the old commy party (quell surprise, see M. Twain for his take on the result of a communist government). The diktats of the usa seem quite a bit less powerful since the invasion of Iraq, I wonder why(sarcasm)... NATO was a useful defence, 20 years ago. Today, with the behaviour of the `puppet-in-chief` it`s more of a risk for the members other than the usa than it ever was a defence. It`s time for that alliance to be ended.
Denver and Minneapolis, aka Disneyland. USA, aka Disneyland. Barack Obama, aka Dr. Pangloss. John McCain, aka Dr. Strangelove.
put this in the folder with the other delusions: god loves america, they hate our freedoms, it was a "lone crazed gunman", bin laden bin laden bin laden. 9/11, 9/11 9/11, mccain is a maverick, reagan was a great president
oh the bullshit that fans the empire
also let's remember that lots of countries would like an nucular (as bush calls it) arsenal to keep the gestapo nazi us stormtroopers from pulling and iraq on them
how fitting it was to see the chinese sign a 3 billion dollar oil deal with iraq today - looks like bush fucked that one up too
repeat after me: the surge is working
cheers, b
laughing
This article shows us at least one stark difference between Democrats and Republicans. The Republicans cannot stand anything that challenges their closed mind-set. They live in Disneyland and it's called the US of A. Fewer nuclear weapons? Scientists? My God what are they trying to do to our beautiful land?
At least Democrats are open to ideas that challenge the status quo. They see that the world can be better, that change is possible, and that we're not living in Fantasy land.
I saw the Democrats answer to 'ideas that challenge the status quo' this week. Its riot police and pepper spray. This is nonsense. If you'd been on the streets of Denver this week, you'd know it.
Near as I can tell, the only other ideas the Dems are 'open' to is the ones the Republicans have. Can't seem to keep Obama from running off to talk to the Republicans and visit their churches, and promise them cabinet spots and talk about how Ronald Reagan is his hero.
But, this week most of the movements to the left were here in Denver. Did Obama come visit and talk with any of them? When Iraq Vets Against the War led a march to the Pepsi Center, they were met with hundreds of riot police. After a long standoff in the streets when the vets refused to back down, they were finally allowed to deliver a letter to Obama. And that apparently was only because the Obama campaign was just bright enough to figure out that video of their riot police attacking vets in uniform wouldn't go over very well. Note very, very carefully that beyond just accepting the letter, the Obama camp still refused to talk to these vets.
Yeah, the Democrats are open to ideas that challenge their status quo. If you believe that, I've got some wonderful beachfront property I can sell you at a great price.
----------------------------
"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
www.samsonsworld.blogspot.com
PS ... if you want to see the Democrats give a very Republican-like response to someone who challenges their status quo mindset, just say 'Nader' to a Democrat. There's a whole thread on Nader here today where the Democrats are showing their true venom that they give in response to anyone who challenges them.
Well, anyone who isn't a Republican who challenges them. We all know all to well how enthusiastically the Democrats accept challenges from the Republicans and do whatever the Republicans (and corporate America) wants.
----------------------------
"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
www.samsonsworld.blogspot.com
Six thousand nuclear weapons in our arsenal, and research continues on better(?) weapons yet. How hollow rings our calls for peace and democracy when we hold so many destructive devices, how shallow we are perceived when we occupy a foreign nation while asking Russia to leave Georgia. How stupid we are when we say it is OK for some nations to have such weapons but it is not OK for others. Who are we to tell any what is good for them? Leading by example might work, dismantle a few thousand such weapons and ask that Russia and China follow suit.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
"Six thousand nuclear weapons in our arsenal, and research continues on better(?) weapons yet."
The US used to have 25,000 nukes in the arsenal. Things are looking up! :)
The research is largely not to make the package more destructive, but more efficient (ie make the payload smaller so the platform can carry more and be cheaper to build), improve reliability (nukes do not always provide 100% yield; a lop-sided trigger will trade-off blast radius for fallout production), and improve survivability (due to platform malfunction and inevitable earth-ward crash, or terrorist tampering).
The US has only a very limited neutron bomb program. The US nuclear arsenal is predominantly blast weapons.
"Better" is relative.
I didn't see this post when I commented the above reply.
Still, it amounts to arguing about the effects of double lethal doses of king cobra venom. Should one be lulled into a false sense of security with the knowledge that he/she will only receive 1.5 lethal doze?
Nuclear weapons were/are/will always be part of humanity's irrational side. There is no way to rationalize nuclear warfare.
I trust you are being somewhat facetious here....Or do you support the sterilization of our planet over some misunderstanding or madman's efforts?
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
"Leading by example might work, dismantle a few thousand such weapons and ask that Russia and China follow suit."
Mutual nuke destruction programs have been around since the 70's (SALT, SALT II). However, the Bush Administration has already abrogated on SALT II.
As I already stated, the US has already decreased its arsenal from 25,000 to 6,000 nukes. That's a start.
Excellent post on where we really are on nuculear weapons.
Still, the red-herring post says nothing about the size and efficiency of the 6000 versus the 25,000 as it changes the topic. It is quite possible that our new and improved 6000 WMD are more dangerous than the old 25,000 WMD.
Wow, I'm so happy. The fools have gone from being able to destroy the world twenty times over to being able to destroy it five times over. Such progress, gotta love those Dems.
Thank you Bill Clinton for working so hard to make sure we keep those 6000 nukes when we could have gotten rid of them instead.
----------------------------
"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
www.samsonsworld.blogspot.com
you just can't generate a new cold war and have some uninformed crackpot group suggesting that nukes are bad for corporatocracy... especially now that the US has successfully outsourced its military.
With the huge nuclear arsenal of the US government behind them, the US corporate oligarchy figures that it will be that much easier to intimidate other nations so that they will open up for plunder. Sure, they know that presents some probability (which is anybody's guess) of nuclear holocaust and human extinction, but they are willing to take that risk with their lives, our lives, and the rest of life on earth. Aren't they brave?
Here's a form of denial for us, albeit abstract: We are Eternal Beings on this plane, our inherent power of Thought can deny those harmful beings here their goals of madness. Our thoughts of Love overpower their thoughts of Fear. Join against them by believing (or at least hoping) it so.
And let's not forget the 200+ nukes the U.S. gave to Israel, which Israel STILL will not acknowledge, not will it comply with the NNPT. This brazen act has started an arms race in that most unstable of areas.
From the article: "What threat do we really face? By any rational assessment, the greatest danger to our survival is from nuclear weapons themselves."
The greatest danger to our survival are leaders such as George W. Bush or Richard Cheney and others heading many nations or religious sects and also the mega-wealthy, bank-systems, string-pulling masterminds throughout the world, all of whom fit the profile of psychopaths and fascists, and who draw to themselves others like them -- ambitious for power, morally blind and bankrupt or fanatically self-righteous -- who are more than willing to follow and carry out their orders and promote their sick visions and entrap, destroy, punish or kill those who dissent or who are not like them or who do not support them.
The greatest danger to our survival is the rigid ignorance of too many within various population segments here and around the globe who can never admit that there is another viewpoint other than their own or of the viewpoints of their chosen leaders, who they follow like lemmings blindly rushing toward the cliff's edge.
Our best hope always are the life-affirming curious who ferret out the facts and maintain a fluid critical thinking, who can admit when they are wrong or are flexible enough to share and modify their viewpoints and then act responsibly, heartfully, and courageously for the broadest possible common good.
We hung on the brink in the 1980's and then briefly there was a breathing space and progress made toward peace with treaties and accords that pointed toward the reduction and eventual elimination of nuclear weapons.
In these past eight years, instead of speeches that promoted the desire and the visions for a peaceful world, we have had a return to the vocabulary of vengeance, destruction, and victory over others and the drum beat of a WAR AGAINST TERROR meant to frighten and hence control our own U.S. population ... with anything goes again ... including nuclear/hydrogen bomb "exchanges" in the Middle East, as if somehow once that was over and victory achieved, we all could go back to shopping happily at the local mall.
The US has mobilized a naval and air armada off the Iranian coast, prepared to annihilate a country of 70 million people, likely with those new "upgraded hydrogen bombs" GW burbled about months ago. THE NEW YORK TIMES recently published an essay by a prominent Israeli historian, which advocates the nuclear incineration of Iran. Just another example of the sheer INSANITY that threatens us all.
John McCain, whose views dovetail with the Crazies in our current Ballpark must not be elected. That leaves a more reasonable, very intelligent Barack Obama who is our best hope, along with the obviously reasonable and very intelligent leaders of Russia -- President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin [recent statements and written positions available on the Net] to confer and negotiate with.
I respect and agree with Cynthia McKinney, Ralph Nader, Dennis Kucinich, and some of Ron Paul's positions, but at this crucial moment every vote or write-in we give to them, we take away from Barack Obama. Yes, I have reservations now, but I trust a sound and reasonable mind rather than a fevered-for-war addled one, coupled with an impetuous, volatile disposition.
Hopefully by this time next year our violent vocabulary will have changed to emphases on global peace and international cooperation leading toward secure and reasonable lives for all people on earth. AMEN
Why don't you worry about the democrats defecting to McCain instead of those who are not even democrats and thus don't want to vote for a democrat? Nader and McKinney supporters are a tiny bunch compared to democrat defectors. Everybody has a right to vote according to their principles. I don't approve of yours. Your vote for Obama is hurting Nader and you should be ashamed of yourself for stealing that vote from Nader. You have a duty to vote for Nader to save our country. Doesn't sound good does it? lizard
These sound like republican talking points...and the nasty tone is so Rovian. Cee Miracles post above is reasoned and cogent and hopeful.
'war mongering fascists in power' is a Republican talking point? Huh?
The way the Dems try to scream 'secret McCain supporter' at anyone who doesn't support their evil pro-war party is starting to be pretty hilarious.
Note very carefully how the Dems scream that you must ignore anyone who doesn't support their evil pro-war party. They don't challenge fact, instead they try to dismiss any who might try to contradict them with nonsense like this line about 'war mongering fascists in power' being a Republican talking point.
----------------
Of course, the bit about Nader-ites being an 'elitist' is pretty funny too. They guy who took his Ivy League law degree and didn't go into corporate law, but instead spent his life making cars safer for all of us and fighting for a clean air act and a clean water act and fighting to stop nuclear power. If that's an elitist, we need more elitists.
This bit about Nader being 'elitist' and a 'egoist' (working a lifetime to make the world better for others is being an 'egoist'?) are actually more like the Dem talking points. Its just another way of saying that we are all supposed to accept more corporate rule and more war and that we aren't even supposed to be allowed to think of voting for something different.
----------------------------
"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
www.samsonsworld.blogspot.com
Samson, you're a bit confused as to form and content. 1st about form: Madcow's article is lined up on the left with mine, which means that her comments are meant for Javier (directly above me, to whom I obviously directed my reply) so I'm offset to the right of Javier. So Madcow clicked on 'reply' to Javier and not to me, and so her "repug talking points" comment was meant for Javier, not me. You clicked on 'reply' to Madcow, so you're offset to the right of her article. (If 5 people were replying to Madcow like you, you'd all be lined up on the left, and each article must be read as a reply to Madcow, not to the article directly above it.)
Now for content. The rest of your article, after questioning Madcow's logic, is all directed at me, but you've replied to Madcow. No problem, I got it. I never at all called Nader an elitist or an egotist, and if my syntax failed me and it seemed like I did, I didn't mean to. I meant Javier and people of his ilk. And having messed around in leftist politics for decades, he's not an unusual or unique type. Most people who respond to these articles are obviously well-read and intelligent, but the place is crawling with intellectual elitists who cannot agree with anything written, no matter how left, astute, radical, etc. They must crap all over it because....they know better and have such a deeper analysis. The ultimate and oh-so-typical vanity of the sideline leftist.
I respect Nader deeply for his commitment (as you reasonably point out) and for what he's accomplished. He's not an elitist, but (while I didn't touch the subject before) you must agree he's an egotist...simply a person with a huge ego...likely not all that different from you and I. Anyway, whatever... Fringe types like him who have a lot of inspiring qualities and who take on the hero posture of fighting Goliath attract intellectual elitists who would desert him in a New York second if he ever acquired mainstream popularity.
But my point is that on this planet, perfection is the deadly enemy of good enough. Obama and the Dems have so many things that can be criticized but he represents a huge improvement over the alternative, and you know it as well as I. The Right keeps its ducks lined up, and look how successful they are with an agenda that goes directly and ridiculously against the class interest of the vast majority, while the Left is chock full of ridiculous idealists and intellectual elitists who must tear down everything that isn't perfect. That was my point against Javier and the swarms of cynical, smart-ass leftoids who cannot ever be satisfied and appear poised to allow (along with lots of other factors--media, dumbed down and confused electorate, etc.) McCain and the neo-con fascists to win again.
Nice talking to you.
Thanks for clearing up that mess. I feel just the same as you , only I think this site has been plagued by Rovian sock-puppets (to borrow a description), sent here to foment dissent on the left. It's the politics of division; and the nasty tone, and the extreme focus on democrats, gives them away. I'm sure your leftist perfectionist are here as well. I guess any form extremism takes can be harmful, though I never thought I'd say that about a leftist.
And just for the record, I've never said anything bad about Nader or his supporters. Nader is a great anti-corporatist and a fighter for the end of two party rule. But the contrast between fascistic, unconstitutional republican rule and imperfect democratic rule is too obvious and too stark for me. My vote goes to Obama. The best democratic candidate I have yet to see in my lifetime....
Here here! Well said. I agree completely.
More talking points
In the two thousand election the shortsighted dwelt on the 90,000 Floridians who voted for Nader. Some of us noted the six million registered democrats who voted for Bush and understood the increasing need for a third party.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
I'm more concerned with the 30,000 "felons" that were kicked off the voting rolls. Most were not felons, they just had names that sounded like they might be black. And they're doing the same thing now. Republicans can't win without cheating. They did it in Ohio in 2004 too.
You are , of course, correct, but a bit off topic. Our political history is replete with incidents of fraud perpetrated by both parties. Redistricting,as one example of a sort of kinder gentler voter fraud, is one of the first things a majority party does to ensure its re-election chances.
The issue is not which voter fraud we castigate and which we accept but that neither party responds to we the people only to that large corporate check.....thus the pressing need for a third party presence to keep the bastards somewhat honest.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
A great example of a realist vs. a self-flattering, holier-than-thou, confused, demagogic, illogical, silly idealist. Cee Miracles' point could not be any more logical and reasonable. Ideal solutions advocated by self-righteous idealists like you are not going to happen. But anything can be improved. The war-mongering fascists in power not only cause unbelievable pain and suffering but they rachet up the nastiness and the danger of the BIG BANG. While Obama is obviously not the perfect solution (such a thing does not exist) and he's not the end-all and be-all, he's a huge improvement over the alternative at every level. And he has a very real chance of winning...if everybody with a lick of sense would vote for him and dweebs like you would hush your pseudo-intellectual, vanity-driven drivel.
Upon close inspection, Ralph Nader is not the ideal solution that some of you elitists believe he is--and he doesn't stand a chance. REALISM. The notion that if enough people voted for him, the system would have to change is just that...another self-flattering notion. And...if he ever came close to power, people like you would desert him in droves with any of the nit-picking arguments available because your egotism demands that you be in a tiny crowd of the self-proclaimed radical intellectual elite.
Egotists like you just want to be off on the side with a self-satisfied, cynical grin tearing down everything else as not being up to your exquisite standards. You're not part of the solution; you're part of the problem. Grow up.
Getreal, follow your own advice and get real. Any opinion that fails to follow your own is, by your definition incorrect. My own close inspection of the words, actions and intent of Ralph Nader proves to me that my vote is cast correctly when I vote for him.
Your rather childish rejection of the decisions of others, made with a soul searching and investigative process unknown to you, and one you are too silly apparently to consider brands you and not those who vote for Nader.
Perhaps you might, in an uncharacteristic fit of maturity, note those reasons why your supposed "close inspection" rejects a Nader candidacy? But hypebole and not facts seem your stock in trade, do they not? In short, put up or, for heaven's sakes , shut up. This is not a High School level debating session, and your post cheapens the place.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
javier,
I don't remember reading anything that requires your approval of ANY vote.
I have a rope you can hang yourself with, or take the more acceptable path of admitting to being brash with words, preposterous in your arrogant pretensions and, conceptually, fossilized by too much Viagra.
$500.00 fine and 30 days confinement in the hole of shallow experience.
And 2 years of a forced diet of canned Chef Boy Ardee Spaghetti and Rat Balls.
Next case...?
I agree with Cee Miracles about voting for Obama with all my reservations about totally corrupted political system of the USA. All wars are result of miscalculations, starting from the very beginning of man: nobody ever went to war only to loose. It follows that intelligent swindlers are preferable to non-intelligent ones. I challenge Nader voters to prove me wrong.
So, you are happier with a Democrat who intelligently and deliberately goes around the world killing people over a Republican who unintelligently stumbles around the world killing people?
Just trying to understand the Democratic mindset, and when they approve of the mass murder of other people and when they don't.
So, I guess this week when the Pentagon kills 90 children in air-strikes, that's objectionable because it was done 'unintelligently'. While next year when the Pentagon kills lots of children in Afghanistan, it will be ok because it will be done 'intelligently'.
I'm sure the parents of those children will be so much happier that their young lives were snuffed out 'intelligently'.
Not all wars are the result of 'miscalculations'. That's just one of several flaws in your statement. In fact, I'd say nothing about say the Iraq war was a 'miscalculation'.
----------------------------
"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
www.samsonsworld.blogspot.com
Oh, there's just so much to get into here.
For instance, the way Bill Clinton and the Democrats refused to give us our 'peace dividend' after the end of the cold war. We could have cut our military budgets then. We could have taken our nuclear weapons off our hair-trigger alert status. The world was truly ready for peace then.
Instead, Bill Clinton and the Democrats spend the 90's helping the Pentagon search for 'new threats'. Remember how they kept trying to bill the narco cartels as the next great evil to fight?
Then of course there was the Democrats illegal war in Yugoslavia. Under the UN Charter, a treaty the US has signed and ratifies and which thereby is the highest law in the land, we can only go to war for 'self-defense' (defined as an immediate response to a direct attack that must occur before the Security Council can meet) or with the approval of the Security council. Clinton only got NATO approval for his illegal war, which is meaningless other than its spin value.
And of course, we bombed Iraq throughout the Clinton years. It just peaked everytime they needed a distraction from Monica.
Then of course we've got the Congressional Dems voting almost unanimously for the war in Afghanistan (thanks Rep. Barbara Lee for being the only NO vote). And even today we get to hear Biden and Obama beating there chests on how they are going to go fight this 'right war'.
Then of course the Dems voted to approve the Iraq war too. And since then they've all lined up and approved every supplemental to fund the wars and every bloated Pentagon budget.
Now we've got Obama promising more wars. The war in Iraq will continue. He's promised Israel that he'd attack Iran if Bush doesn't. Obama wants to rev up the war in Afghanistan with the bit of money and troops he'll pull out of Iraq. And he's fully supportive of the Bush\McCain policy of expanding that war into Pakistan. And, I'm sure you noticed how Obama picked up exactly the same anti-Russian line that Bush and McCain have been using with regard to the war Georgia started (using US weapons and training).
So, wow, I'm so sure I'll live in a much safer world with the Dems in charge.
Key point. The Dems have only been an 'anti-war' party for one brief moment in their history. This was when there was a revolt against the Vietnam war and the peace movement took over the Dem party for about two years between 1972-74 (the McGovern campaign). The Dems have hated McGovern ever since. And they continuously vow that their party will never be taken over by an anti-war movement again.
And then there's the peace maker that is former President Jimmy Carter who is a pariah in the party for his efforts. Note you don't see him giving any major prime time speeches. Which is very odd for a party with a living ex-President.
The one thing I am very clear about is that voting Democrat is a vote for more war. Voting Democrat makes these problems worse. If you want a real change, you have to vote for something different.
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"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
www.samsonsworld.blogspot.com
v. purto,
"All wars are result of miscalculations, starting from the very beginning of man: nobody ever went to war only to loose." This is your authoritative thesis, and basis, for your vacuous 'challenge?
First of all, you have no command over simple sentence structure and the difference between 'loose' and 'lose' to postulate any challenge, beyond your make believe categorical "miscalculations." Perhaps you could produce your Ph.D. thesis defending that assertion.
Shit, I'll accept, say, 15, naw, 5 documented, historical references by respected historians that have survived peer review proposing your thesis, beyond the polite introduction that always prefaces humanity's greatest folly.
That includes "starting from the very beginning of man." You may have some difficulty with this phrase as a thesis statement. All the anthropological evidence of the species 'homo sapien sapien' has dug as deep as two hundred thousand years, while evolutionary ancestors approach 4.5 million years. Her name, coined by paleontologists, is... Lucy. I will not humor your weak response.
Beyond this homework you have, please support your admonition of preference for "intelligent swindlers...to non-intelligent ones." Any logic, including that of the 'street' refutes this hilarious, goomba, bullshit. Unless You happen to be profiting from that intelligent swindler's work. If that scenario is being waved, and your lack of disclosure to reveal or deny involvement, places you directly in the description of criminal conduct known as "intentionally falsely representing credentials of another as your own."
Only that viable impostors don't wander around in public, babbling now-documented challenges that reveal their main weakness...ineptitude.
Until then, as in a court of law,...
Don't cry...
You have "no standing."
C M,
Your assumption that contemporary political logic is based on "the greatest danger to our survival" is tantamount to your personal fear of McCain being elected because the Constitution respects the right to vote someone's conscience rather than articulated fear of losing is...
The most sublime truth of life is that we have been lied to.
Absurdity, with the appearance of practical, rational thought, is, by definition, still-born absurdity.
There is no legal, logical, Constitutional requirement that any American's vote be ruled by practical, political expediency. In fact, the inverse is described. Leave the Machiavellian slop you have no control over at home when you go to the polls. Vote your historical time, your presence of mind, your identity, your knowledge, dreams, preferences, philosophy. If you feel fearful, you need to do your homework. Democracy requires a commitment that pales a 'love' induced marriage. Marriage, as in democracy, requires equal work for continuation.
And there is, historically, very damn little of that. Next question...