Let's have a bit of straight talk.

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This thread is rather wordy for me. I just want to say that if you think there was no difference between the Bush administration and a potential Kerry administration you probably shouldn't bother voting. I think you're very wrong. Voting does matter.

Perhaps the most important thing is that John Kerry wouldn't have chosen John Roberts to replace Chief Justice Rehnquist. That appointment alone is likely to have a huge effect on the future of this country for decades to come. Even if you think the Executive branch has very little effect on us directly, the Supreme Court makes rulings every day which permanently affect our way of life.

Or maybe you're saying that as an excuse so you won't be to blame for the horrors of the second Bush administration. Do you remember the economy crashing, the mishandling of Hurricane Katrina, or the torture of insurgents? I'm not saying John Kerry would have done everything right, but certainly his reactions on waterboarding and the two wars would have been different. Regardless of which side you are on regarding these issues, there would have been major differences if John Kerry had won, and to imply otherwise is misleading.

Actually, that had very little to do with it. I'm not denying that I'm to blame for the Bush thing, along with several other million people. And I disagree thoroughly with a great many actions taken by the Bush administration. However, If you wanna blame someone for Roberts' appointment, howabout Congress? You voted for someone, in all likelihood, who voted to approve Roberts' appointment. The President proposes appointees. Congress approves them.

However, my post was not a revisionist defense of neo-conservatism. What is was was as much of an attack as I could muster on just about everything about this country's economy, administration, and media, especially the media. It was an examination of facts and statistics, as compared to what we are told.

And as for not bothering to vote... Forgive me, but just because my opinion differs from yours, I should not exercise my one sad little shred of power in this country? And no, I didn't say I thought tha vote itself was completely meaningless inherently. What I meant was that it has become mostly meaningless thanks to the two part system and the structure of modern elections.. And I also considered my voting for Bush a mistake and would've rather voted for a third party, had I not been taught that that was a mistake.

Also, I did not say that Bush and Kerry were not different people. What I said was that not very much would have changed. Obama and Bush are very different people. However, Guantanamo is still open, instead of torture, we have drone strikes (And the proposition of possible executing them on American soil), and we're still in two wars, and still have few decent jobs. I don't think all the blame is entirely on Obama. But the fact is, the world is not that different than it was on Nov. 1, 2008.

You're looking at how things are--not how they might be. There are multiple approaches to the questions of corruption and cronyism. Canada has a complete ban on corporate and union donations to federal political parties, and strict caps on personal donations. Singapore pays its public officials salaries that put them beyond the reach of corporate cronyism. Criminal prosecution and public inquiries for bribery and malfeasance are ready mechanisms to confront misconduct by public officials and by those who would seek to suborn them. They are not perfect responses, to be sure, but they will go a long way to mitigating the mischief that you see presently.

Where do you think social security comes from? Public pension funds have to earn revenue by investing contributions just like private pension plans have to. If you have ever made a social security contribution, then you have invested money in publicly traded investments. Indirectly, to be sure. But invested nonetheless. You have a personal stake in the success of banks, too. Government also has a role in ensuring that you are able to participate--by using tax policy to shift the burden onto high income earners, government can provide you with more room to save and to invest.

Small scale capitalism will never benefit anyone beyond the immediate business owner. Until capital contribution is pooled and public, the benefits are closely held. The current market place is key to aggregate well being, and it is government's place to see that the benefits are fairly distributed.

The two party system is a myth. Anyone who wants to run for president can. It is the voters that are to blame for the lack of choices. That is how they want it. I voted for the libertarian candidate this past election, and if everyone else had he would have won. It is the voters that are to blame, not the system. Now, there are parts of the system that make it more difficult to win as a third party candidate, such as the Commission on Presidential Debates, but this is not a governmental rule, it is an alliance between the Democrats and the Republicans. There's nothing unfair about that as long as the people let them get away with it. Blame us.

It isn't Congress' job to appoint justices, just to decide if they are qualified under the guidelines provided by the Constitution. And I would argue that drone strikes have replaced wars, not waterboarding, which seems to be an improvement.

I did. I blamed everyone, I thought my initial post made that pretty clear. Including myself.

But really. The system, on paper, allows anyone to run for president. Great, that's terrific. However, in practice, that is not the case. The Media provides absolutely no coverage for any of the third party candidates. The funding goes to the candidates that belong to the major parties. Thanks to the lack of funds and lack of exposure, the only effect that third party candidates actual have in the real world is to weaken the major party that they most resemble. Libertarian and social conservative third parties draw votes away from the Republican party and socialist and green parties, the democrats. In order to compete, the amount of money that an individual has to put up is astronomical, when a major party candidate can run on comparatively little. Practice rarely matches up with what's on paper.

And yeah, it's our fault. It's entirely our fault, because we let the system evolve into this mess. The most important part of my initial post was the question "What can we do about it?" What can we, as individuals, do about it? We can vote for a third party. However, we do so in the knowledge that in all likelihood, that is strengthening the opposing party. It's a quandary.



You're right. It isn't Congress's job to appoint justices. That's not what I said. What I said was that Congress decided that Roberts was qualified, so they are to blame as well.

And how have drone strikes replaced wars? America has troops on the ground, still fighting, still dying, in two nations. Drones, at absolute best, are a new weapon. They haven't marked the end of traditional war. What they have done is put a ridiculous amount of power at the fingertips on one branch. On paper, before declaring war the President requires congressional approval. Not that that means much anymore. However, a drone strike is not a declaration of war. The President can use them as he pleases, without congressional approval, not even having Congress get butthurt. They provide absolutely no opportunity for arrest and trial, or interrogation, in a war scenario. They also have a remarkably high rate of collateral damage. And finally, related to the previous "arrest and trial", they permit one man to act as judge, jury, and executioner. I have to salute Senator Paul's filibuster last month, because without that, the Executive branch may never have ceded the power to use them on American soil. The answer to the question of ending wars isn't to build a sexy, powerful new weapon. It's to gradually adopt a non-interventionist stance. Simple as that.

But that's an aside. What I meant was that torture has been replaced by drone strikes as the presidential controversy du jour. Out with the old, in with the new.

First of all, the two-party system is not in the Constitution. Just wanted to point that out.

Second of all, welcome to the depressing reality of America, fueledbycoffee. It sucks. We have some good ideas, but we can't make them work because we're humans, unfortunately. And the media and corporations have the power because they know how to manipulate your average, gullible, impulsive joe.

Sure, we're better than some countries - China, the Middle East, Latin America, to name a few. But we have a lot of big problems, and we are not in a paradise. That's the truth of life, I suppose.

For one thing, we need to stop getting ourselves involved in all of these wars, like the OP originally stated. As Bill Maher put it, "... we've been at war for 217 of our 236 years."

I would go on, but I don't have time to. I'll post some more later.

The libertarian party draws votes away from both sides, moreso than the others. I voted for Obama when they ran that hypocrite Bob Barr. To say a third party vote helps the "opposing party" just shows your way of thinking is enslaved to the two-party system. There is no opposing party. Vote for the best candidate.


Only two nations, we have no troops in Egypt or Libya. That easily could have happened under the Bush doctrine. I see the drone policy as an improvement towards non-interventionism.

Yes, the constitution doesn't specify we must have a two party system, or any parties for that matter.

But we have it and its basically self-perpetuating. Its basically impossible for third party candidates to receive federal matching funds for presidential elections. That makes them financially at a major disadvantage, in addition to all of the other obstacles they start out with. Who made these laws? The two major parties.

In any case the two major parties will never go away on their own because the simple fact is, again, that to gain power in America you need as many people with you as possible. Only the side with the most support wins. In such a system people naturally coalesce into large groups in order to maximize their chances of winning, or at least to maximize the chances of someone with a viewpoint as similar as possible to their own of winning. For the same reason large groups tend to stay together and not fragment - if one party split, but the other didn't, the one that didn't would dominate.

Only need to get 5% of the vote in the previous election to receive federal matching funds. If not even 5% of us want a third party then I guess we deserve what we get. As far as never going away, I think the Republican party is on its way out. They will never win a national election again if they refuse to compromise or allow moderates into their party.