11-06-2011, 08:29 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-06-2011, 09:03 PM by FireIceTalon.)
(11-06-2011, 08:37 AM)kandrathe Wrote:(11-05-2011, 06:50 PM)FireIceTalon Wrote: Our political culture in general is a joke...I think you over-estimate the number of single issue voters. Pro-life/Pro-Choice may account for as much as 10%. Toss in "defense of marriage"/Gay rights and you may get to 15%. There are probably just as many single issue pro-choice, gay marriage, and environmentalists on the left, and contrary on the right. The studies I've seen break them out to about 19% in total, and they are pretty equally split between left and right. By examining some studies of the electorate, you'd find that the bulk of them actually have a series of priorities that guide their voting. And... I doubt "beer drinking buddy" made the top twenty. Here is a good article about why American voters are different. I would highlight a couple;
1) our system is very complicated, with local, state, and federal levels, each emphasizing different issues. Judges, for example, are not affiliated with parties, and are not allowed to campaign, so how do we know which judge would support our way of thinking? How well do you know your county Soil and Water commissioners? How about the local school board? At the last caucus I attended, we had over 60 initiatives to discuss and vote on and finally adjourned after 5 hours of meeting.
2) in our daily lives, we don't really need to know much about "Uzbecka-becka-becka-stan-stan". The US is increasingly doing more business with the outside world, but for most of us it is not a part of our routine. And, as for travel, I don't know many people in my father's generation who left the US except during their military service. More traveled during my generation, but now its reduced again due to the difficulty traveling and the forced weakness of the US dollar. For my work (and some pleasure too) I've been to Europe, Africa, Asia, Central, and South America, but I've still not visited my cousins living in Alaska. I've never been to Hawaii, or a bunch of other cool places here in the US. I've never really seen the best parts of Canada, or Mexico either (really just the scummy parts).
As for "birthers", I think you are reaching on that one. As of May 1st 2011, 86% said he was born in the US, 9% said not in the US, and 4% had no opinion. Of the not US group, only 1% were certain about that.
You seem to spend a bunch of energy hating your own country. You might want to look around and see if there is a different one that is more Marxist, with more of the qualities you are looking for, where you can take an extended visit. Get a work visa, and spend some time living in another system for awhile. You might find you like it, or you might find the US is not as bad as you think.
Some may say that you are the pot calling the kettle black. Many people use the word "got" as a substitute for the word "have", and many people feel they have to salt their prose with expletives for incendiary effect. Me? I understand, although I find it a bit arrogant. Others might find it coarse.
(11-06-2011, 08:17 AM)eppie Wrote: Also in the Netherlands these are often not very important issues, but it is a fact that a significant part of CDA voters (a party that is economically center but has a christian background) do this because of a more conservative view on abortion and gay rights etc. (even though the real conservatives vote for smaller christian parties.....but which in total are still around 3 to 4 % of the voters). Of course with an increasing number of Muslim immigrants the old christian values become more popular again (a reasonable number of Muslim voters votes on christian parties because they are closest to their ideas).Well, I like to look at numbers...
Gallup World Poll
The US doesn't rate that badly. The Netherlands and Canada are on the top of the spectrum. But, you might want to be more concerned with some of your eastern neighbors, and the whole of Africa. For the US, the city where I live is rated #1 gay friendly by "The Advocate". Although, the legislature just put a DOMA constitutional amendment on our 2012 ballot.
I lack patriotism or nationalism, for which I have my reasons. But equating that with hating the country is dubious. Truth is I'm indifferent about it. I have a very different set of values and principles that most of my fellow Americans. Hardly means I hate it though. Just means I don't buy into the so-called 'American exceptionalism' that most everyone else seems to subscribe to. I pride myself in being an independent thinker, and I don't easily conform to mainstream views based on conventional values and politics that we are taught from a very young age. America is no angel. Neither is Iran, or Turkey, or Cuba, or Germany.
You guys should do this if you haven't yet.
http://www.politicalcompass.org/
Pretty cool scale they use, and I like their methodology. My results - Economic scale: -8.50, Social scale: -7.50....pretty much what I expected, I'm a Libertarian socialist.
https://www.youtube.com/user/FireIceTalon
"Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class, made into law for all, a will whose essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of the existence of your class." - Marx (addressing the bourgeois)
"Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class, made into law for all, a will whose essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of the existence of your class." - Marx (addressing the bourgeois)