magekillr

Andrew Sullivan isn't feeling good: More here: http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/05/a-death-blow-to-the-tory-party.html

I'm rooting for Ed Balls, Ed Miliband or (in a dream) Jon Cruddas. David Miliband (Ed's brother), who appears to be emerging as the favorite, is a Blairite tool and must be stopped.

The video is from Missouri; those sorts of raids are not uncommon. And it not being legal funnels money to crime syndicates, and ruins the lives of millions. This isn't about getting pot, that's not hard to get.

Intelligence isn't the same thing as being educated, though. A stupid person is not necessarily ignorant, and an ignorant person is not necessarily stupid. Nonetheless, what I've seen is that on the whole atheists are more intelligent. It also comes down to open-mindedness, and religion restricts your ability to be open to new ideas. It's the dogmatic nature of it, mixed with the fact that people base their entire lives on their religion, that they will defend it to the very last drop even when it's obvious that they're wrong. I mean, if my entire life was based around the creation story, I could see myself being dogmatic and outright rejecting evolution. If my entire life was based around that, it would fall apart if I accepted that. So people who are more susceptible to the dogmatic nature of religion are, in general, less intelligent than those who are not.

Probably not, but it's possible. I'm not terribly interested in his/her existence. Chances are if he/she is real, he/she doesn't really give a [cabbage] or is off in some other part of the universe. However, when religious Jesus Freaks affect the lives of others, that's when I get involved. Christian fundamentalists and their obsession with fetuses and gays, Zionist fundamentalist Jews/Christians who use the Bible to justify their occupation, Muslim fundamentalists with the recent Muhammad spat and Sharia Law; I'd rather they all just drop their religion and keep it to themselves. I think religion can be helpful at times in our society. The driving force behind MLK's advocacy was his religion. I think it can serve a purpose in our society, especially when I don't see it going anywhere anytime soon. Global warming isn't a problem, huh? Your basis for saying that is...what, exactly? Your hatred of science? The dislike of having to possibly give up some of your overindulging lifestyle? Or maybe it's Jesus: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7h08RDYA5E

Good posting from the New Yorker about proportional representation: Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/hendrikhertzberg/2010/05/all-worked-up-about-pr.html#ixzz0nIg2xsQ9

Paw, here's what I mean: http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/04/this-tory-president.html And besides, Obama's proposed a deficit reduction commission which is going to rob our Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, while leaving our insane and bloated defense budget alone. The stimulus was cut so that state's have massive budget shortfalls (as their constitutions require them to balance the budget every year), and our education and Medicaid got slashed in the process. Anyway, off topic again lol. Back to the election: I'm not sure what's going to happen now.

Paul Krugman's thoughts: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/07/hung-over-in-britain/ So it depends on your perspective, Serephurus. As Krugman states, the Tories are probably more liberal (on the whole) than our Democrats (on the whole). I'd say that Barack Obama is governing how a Tory would. And the sad part is that I have to be grateful about it, otherwise the far-right Republicans get in.

It's owned by the same man, so yes, it's like Fox News.

You'd think that, my fellow Norwegian, but that's not how it is here. I support that, but most people here don't; I even have trouble convincing liberals to take my stance on this issue. I'm of course talking about the voter disenfranchisement of prisoners. Felons have their voting rights taken away here, and in some states it's permanent. I support the right of people to vote, even when they're in prison. Engaging them in the political process encourages good behavior and can serve as a means to integrate them back to society. I also think we should have voting by mail like they do in Washington (the state). Gets more people to vote.

So wait, you're automatically registered on your 18th birthday in Norway? Here in America you have to register to vote, sometimes with a particular party (depending on the state). The 2008 election I registered over 400 people, which in a county where less than 35,000 people voted, that's a significant amount of registrations.

Results map as they come in: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/interactive/2010/may/06/uk-election-results-map

Hmmm, not sure what to make of this as the results aren't in yet: ~David Cameron

http://www.economist.com/blogs/bagehot/2010/05/election_night_live_blog_0 Simply put, I wouldn't trust the exit polls.

Yeah, Brown is done no matter what. I still feel sorry for him, much like Matthew Yglesias:

That's [cabbage]. What state services? Schooling? Access to driving on the roads? Lol. As I've stated before, they pay their fair share of taxes to use the schools, and it helps our economy even if they didn't. They also paid $13 billion into Social Security this past year and only collected $1 billion. You know they probably don't pay taxes, given that they are illegal immigrants. Whether or not that means they should be denied basic services is another issue entirely, but still. And I think we're drifting a bit off topic here. This is the UK election thread remember, lets at least try to [bleep] about our corrupt politicians here, not american ones. Yeah, sorry for the tangent. And no, they actually do pay taxes except for federal ones. They pay most state and local taxes.

Honestly, voting for a corporatist Democrat is just as bad as voting for a corporatist Republican. Besides, Democrats and Republicans really aren't as different as you would imagine. No, lol. It's definitely not as bad. Republicans are beyond corporatist. Sure, half of the Democratic Senators are shilling for a particular industry, but only like 10 of them are bold enough to break with the party and vote in favor of their industry over party unity. Mary Landrieu, Blanche Lincoln, Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson, Tom Carper, Evan Bayh, Kent Conrad will all buck the party for their own industry. Sure there's a lot more Blue Dog corporate [bleep]ers than the ones I listed, but the ones that I listed are the main problem children. The others might balk every once in a while, but for the most part they won't make that big of a fuss. The biggest peon is definitely Ben Nelson; I don't even know why he's a Democrat. The Republicans, on the other hand, will shill for any industry any time anywhere. Their entire ideology is based around corporatism. They're also all sexist Jesus Freaks and waging a war against science. They actually are very different. The only people who don't see a difference are the libertarians, because the parties are fairly similar in all of the issues that libertarians' care the most about (the wars, the drug war, the bailout). When you look at all of the issues, they're VERY different, especially in the House of Representatives. Put it this way: A Democratic administration and controlled Congress will look FAR different than a Republican administration and controlled Congress. The poor will get [bleep]ed to oblivion under a Republican and the deficit and debt will grow exponentially. Ironic, considering all they seem to talk about is "we can't afford it!" all of the time. It's actually not ironic, as they want to make the deficit and debt so high that we have no choice but to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. That's their goal, and it's why they're never fiscally responsible. That's [cabbage]. What state services? Schooling? Access to driving on the roads? Lol. As I've stated before, they pay their fair share of taxes to use the schools, and it helps our economy even if they didn't. They also paid $13 billion into Social Security this past year and only collected $1 billion.

Drug warriors, this is your war: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbwSwvUaRqc This is the blunt-end result of all the war imagery and militaristic rhetoric politicians have been spewing for the last 30 years—cops dressed like soldiers, barreling through the front door middle of the night, slaughtering the family pets, filling the house with bullets in the presence of children, then having the audacity to charge the parents with endangering their own kid. There are 100-150 of these raids every day in America, the vast, vast majority like this one, to serve a warrant for a consensual crime. But they did prevent Jonathan Whitworth from smoking the pot they found in his possession. So I guess this mission was a success. ~Radley Balko

We have proportional representation already, but we elect politicians themselves, not their parties. As tortilliachp mentioned, House of Reps/Senate. However, again, as he also stated, rural areas are overrepresented. There are too many solidly Republican states that are overrepresented in the US Senate. It's not fair that Idaho gets just as much say as California in the Senate when you can block the agenda of the majority party with just 40 votes. It's also not very nice when we have a party that's so far to the right that I will do everything in my power to elect the most corrupt corporate [bleep] in the Democratic party just to keep them out of office. I don't understand how ANYONE could still be a Republican. I can understand if you're conservative, but I cannot understand if you're a Republican. My fellow citizens of the world, I don't think Barack Obama will lose in 2012, but we're about to elect some people into our Senate who are your equivalent BNP people this November. Not necessarily as Nazish...but Utah, Kentucky, Indiana, Arizona, and maybe Florida are all going to turn sharply to the right, and I mean SHARPLY to the right. I didn't see how that was possible in Utah or Arizona, but it's going to happen. I don't get it. It's like the American people have [bleep]ing amnesia. We've just seen a financial crisis not seen since 1929, an environmental apocalypse, and we actually have 30% of this country saying "deregulate more!" I fear for my country these next election cycles. It's going to be scary as hell. I mean, that oil spill you're hearing about? You'd THINK that this would make my country be like "Ok, no offshore oil drilling for a long time" (I'd like it to be never). But no. The Republicans refuse to support an energy bill without it, so now there probably won't be climate change legislation passing. I didn't think they'd support it anyway, seeing as their goal is to block, stall and do everything they can from allowing the government to function, but there was a slight chance at least. There is like 2 to 5 senators in their coalition who believe in climate change. The remainder don't believe it. The remainder also doesn't believe in evolution. Seeing as you guys elect parties, it shouldn't be terribly bad if you were to have balance with a Senate/House. Plus with PR you'd have 3 parties. We have it and still only have 2. This is why we need instant run-off voting. Then I could happily vote for Ralph Nader and not be scared of wasting my vote whereby bat[cabbage] insane Republicans get into office.

Are you for real? We aren't even allowed to drill more than 10 miles off our own shore.... And by the way the guy who owns the rig..... that would be BP, a British company. And it was built by a non-American company.... No offense but I really hope you were joking. This is factually inaccurate. BP does not own the rig, they leased the rig from Transocean Ltd. Anyway, they're only liable for $75 million in damages, which is ridiculous. This is going to kill tourism and fishing for years. In a just world BP would be go under from paying off these damages. That would sure as hell end any drilling and get Exxon and their ilk developing alternatives quick enough.

Here in the US we need run-off voting much like he showed in the video (Nader-1, Obama-2, McKinney-3, Republican..erm, don't want). Much fairer, and I don't need to vote for the Democrats all of the time.

Speaking of electoral reform, Mr. John Cleese: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSUKMa1cYHk That was from 1983.

Well if it's any consolation, the Tories in this position will be forced to take a butcher knife to the budget and make harmful cuts. They'll be out of power relatively quickly after that, and no one will want them back.

Here's my prediction: A parliament where Liberals/Labour cannot form a coalition, which forces Conservatives to govern from a minority. This is a Tory nightmare scenario, but it's what I'm predicting.

I think they'll side with whomever will get electoral reform through. That seems to be their most important issue.