Obama Wins Election

[Sarin]

I agree with Darkpriest, this topic has been jacked...but still I feel obliged to reply on some Echizen's statements...

Your problem is that you mostly speak about technology that is experimental and is far, VERY far away from practical use. You can't just rush deploying something just because it looks promising. I will give you an example  that should be very dlose to you. Some years ago, Europe started widely supporting biofuels. It looked nice-renewable alternative for fossil fuels until we find better source of power. It wnt on for a year or two, and you could see biogas almost at every gas station. Then...it was revealed that by planting, harvesting and processing crops for biofuel you use up more fuel than you gain from it, and also they burn less effectively, resulting in increased pollution. FAIL. That is what you get from rushing the untested technology. Atually lots of "ecolological" tech ends this way.

I don't deny there were and are scenarios how to start war. But it doesn'ŧ meant it has been or will be carried out. It's like you would be walking down the street, look at nice girl, and get arrested (or at least accused) for raping.

Again...you are idealistic. Money are in fact measure of materialistic possibilities. When a project would cost more than it's entire budget of US, nobody will be able to try it.

Now for the patents...look. If you develop a patent for something that can increase your profits, and not use it for, I think 50 years till patent goes off, you had no profit from it. And after those 50 years, everyone would use it, because they already developed it too but couldn't use it because they weren't allowed by you. But now, they can use it, they don't have to pay you for it...and what profit you had from that? 0.

Wind and water powered cars are again just in process of development, and encountering similar problems as other, supposedly ecological technology.

Your "alternative" as you describe was actually tested. The experiment is now known as Soviet russia.
Yes, what you describe IS communism, it's the estabilishment Marx and Engels wrote about. You know, that needs some unreal conditions to be fulfilled before it is implemented. The most impotant you noted. Profit motivation. And here is the problem. We had it before we invented the money. Our ancestors had it before they crawled out of the sea. It is one of driving forces for all living beings, the self-preservation. Money is just one form of its expression. It is highly unlikely that we will EVER be completely free of it, and totally impossible that it is going to happen in a next millenium...

Well that is it, now back to the topic.

You know...I'm actually pretty sure that at least some of presidents/first ministers/etc... of european countries have some minorities in their ancestors, like Obama is half-black. It's just the black minority is somewhat...more visible. In Europe, most minorities don't differ by look, but by customs, etc...and most of them are actually so naturalised so there's no difference except origin.

[EchizenR]

Some years ago, Europe started widely supporting biofuels. It looked nice-renewable alternative for fossil fuels until we find better source of power. It wnt on for a year or two, and you could see biogas almost at every gas station. Then...it was revealed that by planting, harvesting and processing crops for biofuel you use up more fuel than you gain from it, and also they burn less effectively, resulting in increased pollution. FAIL. That is what you get from rushing the untested technology. Atually lots of "ecolological" tech ends this way.

I don't deny there were and are scenarios how to start war. But it doesn'ŧ meant it has been or will be carried out. It's like you would be walking down the street, look at nice girl, and get arrested (or at least accused) for raping.
...
Your "alternative" as you describe was actually tested. The experiment is now known as Soviet russia. Yes, what you describe IS communism, it's the estabilishment Marx and Engels wrote about. You know, that needs some unreal conditions to be fulfilled before it is implemented. The most impotant you noted. Profit motivation. And here is the problem. We had it before we invented the money. Our ancestors had it before they crawled out of the sea. It is one of driving forces for all living beings, the self-preservation. Money is just one form of its expression. It is highly unlikely that we will EVER be completely free of it, and totally impossible that it is going to happen in a next millenium...

Yeah, and the UN condemned biofuels as a "crime against humanity" because it was causing most of the rise in food prices.

Well, I guess there WERE WMDs in Iraq and those plans for an Afghanistan invasion weren't sitting on the president's desk before 9/11.

I thought I qualified myself when I introduced my "alternative" presented in www.thezeitgeistmovement.com . No doubt it will sound like communism, I guess I need to elaborate. Under communism, there is still a ruling elite functioning in a monetary system and the elite use a command economy to control the country. In this technological age, we could wipe out scarcity and abolish money because when everyone has been satisfied (when there is an abundance of energy and food), the desire to preserve oneself by exploiting others is gone. You could well say that it is true communism, in an age without money. At the same time, because everyone is well  off (not a phoney goal like under communism with technology), there is no need for government. It will be truly a society that is geared towards human progress not profits. All made possible by technology. But money is such an age-old institution (that is made obsolete by technology) that people cannot consider a world without it.

Idealistic, but we have the capability and it'll surely be a more humane world than the present.

[Sarin]

Idealistic, but we have the capability and it'll surely be a more humane world than the present.

We have not yet, and it is very questionable that it will EVER work.

To elaborate...first, you don't really see it. Energy and food will never be free. Becaue behind every loaf of bread, every watt of energy is human labor. And even if you somehow manage to secure that, for example via robots, and robots doing that is sound of far future, more and more things will become basic needs. Shelter, heating, soft bed, internet...at some point you will always need human work. So you will need some rules, and who makes rules? Government. And you will need also some way of enforcing these rules. If you had not, lots of people would do nothing. You will always have people doing art, R&D and other interesting things, but you will have nobody to do uninteresting, but nescessary work. And it can't work that way...

You overestimate power of our current technology...and also you underestimate the need of "driving force" for humans.

Ninja edit: and I will ignore your wannabe sarcastic comments, because they are partly true in a nonsarcastic way.

[EchizenR]

To elaborate...first, you don't really see it. Energy and food will never be free. Becaue behind every loaf of bread, every watt of energy is human labor. And even if you somehow manage to secure that, for example via robots, and robots doing that is sound of far future, more and more things will become basic needs. Shelter, heating, soft bed, internet...at some point you will always need human work. So you will need some rules, and who makes rules? Government. And you will need also some way of enforcing these rules. If you had not, lots of people would do nothing. You will always have people doing art, R&D and other interesting things, but you will have nobody to do uninteresting, but nescessary work. And it can't work that way...

You overestimate power of our current technology...and also you underestimate the need of "driving force" for humans.

But energy and food is in abundance today by virtue of technology, like I pointed out in my previous posts. Without money, there will be a revolution in consciousness so much as that it'll be almost impossible to imagine such a system. I know most people may say that humans will lose their motivation. When the profit-driven motive disappears, I'm sure humans will find another incentive. Perhaps exploring the oceans or outer space? Regulation and laws would have be approached differently since without money, most of our social ills disappear. The regulation of the system could very well be done by supercomputers.

True, this system needs to worked out in more detail but given that the Singularity is approaching, it is vital that people are aware of this potential change.

Please visit www.thezeitgeistmovement.com , this IS the change we need.

[BTAxis]

NOW as for Obama.... The Europeans have criticized Americans for being a racist nation for years and years... Keep in mind these are the same people that brought you slavery and endentured servitude... However... Did you know that not 1 single European country has had a minority leader not a single one.. not spain not portugal not switzerland not france not england or germany or poland or austria not norway or finland or Sweden not the czech republic or slovakia not belarus not lithuania not ukraine....... So the next time your european brothers start shouting american racist make sure they're well aware they havent put any minorities into the seat of power of their .... ahem... Small GDP countries... compared to the biggest economy in the world..

Now that's just not fair. Just because there are no minority leaders doesn't mean they're racist. You can't compare. For one thing, the populations of North America and Europe are completely different. Racism has little to do with politics. And even less with the GDP.

I would also like to point out that Europe never had anything like the "back of the bus" things, never had any segregation of colored people from white people. We were civilized. We did it with jews. (Joke!) Today the color of skin isn't an issue in Europe anymore. America still has a fair degree of racism in that sense today, though it's a lot less than it was. In a few decades it'll probably be so marginalized it's not even a theme anymore, same as in Europe. However, Europe has moved on to nationalism. People are grouped and prejudiced against depending on the country they or their parents are from, and this can get pretty nasty.

[Sarin]

Amusing. This is actually how communism began and how it evolved to the communism we know. Utopia...but we need to work on some details. Erm...we have to make some compromise to make people behave like they should, but it is only for a while till they learn. And again. And again and...*bam*. See? Even if you had the tech to do it, and I repeat we are still far away from that no matter what you think, first problem will be transit between estabilishments. And that is actually very first of problems...

You are very wrong when it comes to tech. Lots of things work in lab. But only very small percentage of them are usable in real. All that redeeming technology you mentioned here is only a laboratory technology that is far from normal use. And most of it will not make it into normal use for a long, long time.

You are also totally wrong about money. You think money is a source of greed and all sins . But money is only EXPRESSION of the competetive nature of humans, and life itself is of competetive nature. Look around yourself and you will find another expressions of it...power, success, respect...money is just one of many ways how did the natural selection estabilished itself in human world. Instead of being eaten, you're just being poor (please, take this as a VERY simplified explanation). Humans will find other ways how to compete, because there will always be things to be fought for. Even if you remove all materialistic needs, there will be some you can't remove. Love is one of most obvious examples.
So think about it. Money are most common way of competition because of its wide exchangeability.

[ManicMiner]

I suppose the next step for the Republicans and Neocons needs to be to accept that they lost, quit with the sour grapes, and look at why they lost.

Here's a good list of reasons:

1. Dirty campaigning. According to the posters on neocon websites like FreeRepublic, Obama's campaign was dirtier. It didn't look like that from this side of the Atlantic and I suspect it didn't look like that to many Americans who voted for Obama. John McCain himself had to defend Obama on rallies from claims that were so blatantly untrue that repeating them harmed the Republicans more than it harmed Obama. And as for booing Obama's name during McCain's concession speech.... nasty.

2. Foreign affairs. Another administration who would pick a fight, then have to look at an atlas to find the country they're picking a fight with. Someone send those nutjobs a copy of Sun Tzu and maybe, just maybe, they'll understand how to do it properly.

When the prospective VP posited the idea of going after Russia you just knew that under her watch America's military might would be split on even more fronts, and even less likely to win any one of the conflicts it starts.

Bush proved that the neocons are too attention-deficit to ever finish one mission before starting the next. Daddy's unfinished job in Iraq was more important to Bush, than isolating Al Qaeda and the Taleban in Afghanistan and then turning its attention onto Saddam.

3. Free market. The sacred cow of neocons is that any restrictions on free enterprise are a bad thing. Excellent! That's why 3Com is being bought out by China (much to the consternation of the Pentagon), and that's why the media was able to be so unashamedly pro-Obama. Way to hoist yourselves on your own petard!

4. Religious Fundamentalism is a liability, not an asset. Sarah Palin thinks the world is younger than frozen woolly mammoths, that non-Christians are the enemy, and that if you say "God is on our side" often enough, he will be.

That puts her on level par in intellectual terms, with radical Islamists who think that God is always on their side, non-Moslems are the enemy, and all science is bad.

[Duke]

@EchizenR:
Thanks for posting the link to the solar stuff.
I have read the article. It's about scientists that created a few molecules of a material, that has

...a theoretical potential of almost 100% efficiency. Commercial products are still years away,...

Now let's look what you made of the above:

...and solar (for which there is now a 100% efficient solar panel, while consumer types are only 14-20%).

Quite a difference...and you don't need to know a thing about the technology to see the difference.

As I do NOT want to imply that you did that at will to 'betray' your readers, I conclude that the conversion happened silently in the back of your brain.
That is a behaviour of the human brain that most people are more or less vulnerable to. We tend to see only what we want to see...

[TrashMan]

I guess outside the U.S., more than 90% would have voted for Obama. He's smart. I'm all for him. There's a lot of hope and expectations put on him. Quite a burden. Time will tell how much he can actually *change*.

90%? Where did you get that number? I hear he is more popular outside of US than MCCain (mostly cause people think McCain=Republican=Bush .. and that's probably the main reason why he lost), but not by that big a margin.

My preference was Hillary, McCain, Obama... in that order. Obama just strikes me as untrustworthy..like he's someones puppet. I'd be glad if time proves me wrong...well, pretty muhc everyone would be glad

[TrashMan]

About the whole consipracy thing:

I've read and seen a lot of things from countless sources. At the end of the day I can only say - I know jack s***! There are so many confilicting "facts" thrown around by everyone, so many half-truths and "what if's" that the only conclusion I could reach was - I don't know. And poking around more isn't god for my sanity.

There may very well be a giant conspiracy theory. I know there are a few of a lesser scale done all around the world. I for instance know some of the worlds powers are trying to re-write the history of my country (cause I was there. Outright lying about some event I witnessed first hand for instance.. like the action Međački Džep. You can read about it on the Wiki but it's a whole load of bull***)

Anyway, I'm open to pretty much anything. I doubt most of those stories are true, but I wont' just dismiss them completely. Stranger things have happend, and the world is a funky place...

[Duke]

90%? Where did you get that number?

I already stepped back from that guess a few posts later. It was a *guess*. Probably because I never personally met a single person who did like G.W.Bush. (I haven't been to the US while he was president).

And YES, it's probably that "McCain=Republican=Bush"-thing why Europe would vote for Obama.

[Darkpriest667]

Now that's just not fair. Just because there are no minority leaders doesn't mean they're racist. You can't compare. For one thing, the populations of North America and Europe are completely different. Racism has little to do with politics. And even less with the GDP.

I would also like to point out that Europe never had anything like the "back of the bus" things, never had any segregation of colored people from white people. We were civilized. We did it with jews. (Joke!) Today the color of skin isn't an issue in Europe anymore. America still has a fair degree of racism in that sense today, though it's a lot less than it was. In a few decades it'll probably be so marginalized it's not even a theme anymore, same as in Europe. However, Europe has moved on to nationalism. People are grouped and prejudiced against depending on the country they or their parents are from, and this can get pretty nasty.

oh no you never had the back of the bus thing... you simply didnt allow them to be citizens in your country or to join the empire as a full fledged member represented in parliament.. maybe you forget india or any number of colonies in africa you totally raped for resources while suppressing the population..

Ive always been offended by the European thought that because we had segregation we were somehow more racist than Europe.. Excuse me europe you were the ones that began the importation of slaves to the Americas...... As far as nationalism goes... I equate it with racism... you werent born on this side of the line therefore you are evil inferior and must be destroyed.... Its the same thing.... you dont ever hear that happening in the Americas... Sure we make jokes about the canadians and mexicans just like they make jokes about us... however.... We will probably become one Solidary nation within the next 50 years... I dont see that happening in europe for a long long time...

Also.. Ill have it noted that there has only been 1 war between any nations on the north american continent in which the europeans werent involved.. and there has only been 1 rebellion (american civil war) however.... The europeans had several wars on our continent... Spanish-Mexican War American-Spanish war French- Indian war... etc... once we got rid of the europeans we stopped having wars on our continent (it certainly didnt stop us from getting involved in other european based wars.. WW1 WW2 Korea (french) Vietnam (french) ... compared to about 500 wars in Europe just in this millenium...

i have nothing against europeans.. but they seem to like talking bad about each other and killing each other... They are quite good at it... not as good as the chinese mind you but they are pretty good at starting wars..

Excuse my ranting BTAxis but... the whole racism/nationalism thing is a touchy subject with me.. as I see the north american union one of the first steps towards ending nationalism...   so can you tell me Axis why India was denied a far representation in english parliament or perhaps any of the african nations... and lets not forget apartheid :-)

[Darkpriest667]

Trash man you trust hillary more than mccain and obama?? you cant be serious... The clinton-bush oligarchy is what has gotten us into this mess... 20 years of letting them run our country into the dirt and selling everything to china for the lowest common denominator...


No no.. I trust obama and mccain far more than ill ever trust a bush or a clinton...


I honestly would have been happy with either mccain or obama.... less than satisfied with palin... than with Biden.... but neither of them were named bush or clinton... thats all that mattered to me..

Again as a conservative person i voted for obama.. and id do it again....

[BTAxis]

Excuse my ranting BTAxis but... the whole racism/nationalism thing is a touchy subject with me.. as I see the north american union one of the first steps towards ending nationalism...   so can you tell me Axis why India was denied a far representation in english parliament or perhaps any of the african nations... and lets not forget apartheid :-)

You're stuck in the past. Yeah, stuff happened. Slavery happened. Exploitation happened. Apartheid happened Altogether, a lot of bad things happened, and it was Europeans who made it happen. But that was WAY in the past. Concessions have been made, responsibility has been accepted, apologies have been made and the chapter in history has been closed. Nothing you've mentioned bears any relation on present day society. American racism is happening TODAY. That's the difference.

[EchizenR]

By the way, I admit I "hijacked" this topic but my first post here was on topic as far as it concerns the president-elect Obama. I simply said that he is just like the previous presidents before him with regard to corporate credentials. But people started bashing me for having dissenting opinions before even checking the validity of my statements or the evidence offered.

@ Trashman
So regarding my stand on Obama (on-topic here), and the evidence offered, it is assumed that it is all lies or "half-truths" even before anyone looks at them? If people are uncomfortable with the word "conspiracy", I won't use it. Let's just call it oligarchical collectivism, as Orwell did.

"A ruling group is a ruling group so long as it can nominate its successors. The Party is not concerned with perpetuating its blood but with perpetuating itself. Who wields power is not important, provided that the hierarchical structure remains always the same."

If you took a look at my evidence, which has also been reported by the mainstream media, then you'll realise that Obama is no different than any corporate-bought president. By the way, as a sidenote, I can't believe how all of you ignored Operation Northwoods given it being (blatantly) in the historical record and not needing any so-called leap of faith.

@ Darkpriest
Glad you mentioned the North American Union (SPP signed without congressional approval, which is being implemented by stealth and eroding the sovereignty of the US. If you've heard about the NAU, and look at other sovereignty-eroding institutions like the EU, the AU and the coming Asian Union, doesn't this signal a move away from national sovereignty to supranational sovereignty that concentrates power in a small group of elites? Lord Acton remarked that "Power corrupts; and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

@BT
Regardless whether a black man has become the president of the United States, (white) people still regard coloured as different and thus, subconsciously, still engage in discriminatory behaviour, whether significant or trivial. I couldn't help noticing you were from the Netherlands. I'm sure Geert Wilders would be a good example of this, not that I necessarily disagree with him. But people tend to alienate people that are different, or hold different beliefs from them. Moreover, if blacks become (hypothetically) more out-spoken against white because of this, it may provoke even more racial strife.

@ Duke
I made a mistake with the solar panel as you pointed out. I apologise. Looking beyond that, is this reason to disregard everything else I posted? Let's say I don't say anything and just give you a news article that shows the 10 most corrupt politicians of 2007 by Judicial Watch of whom Obama (again, on-topic) is one of, including Hillary Clinton.

http://www.judicialwatch.org/judicial-watch-announces-list-washington-s-ten-most-wanted-corrupt-politicians-2007

If everyone likes to defend their worldview so much, and rejects all challenging views, then please come to your own conclusion. Not that I'm a pessimistic $%#@, but I'm reiterating my stand (see above) on an Obama presidency which so many have erroneously (in my opinion) think represents "change" and are in irrational raptures.