We're talking past each other.

Post #387,558 by Another Scott 3/15/14 10:28:14 AM Reply	We're talking past each other. I'm saying that you choose the candidates in the primaries, then choose the party in the general election. You're saying the candidates are crap and you don't want to vote for any of them. These aren't mutually exclusive positions. It doesn't matter if they're all members of an entitled, grifting, lying, psychopathic class. Maybe that we can agree that that has always been the case (did you like the kids running for class president?). But in that class, there are differences between the members. Even if one doesn't like any of the candidates, one has a responsibility to try to pick the better one and the better party. Given all that we have been through since the '68 election, and especially since 2000, I find it baffling that anyone who cares about politics could think that it's better to throw rocks at both sides than to try to push the arrow of progress a little closer to the better direction. If enough sensible people turn out, then dramatic progressive changes are possible. Contributing to the noise that causes people to stay home is counter-productive. No, I'm not saying "clap louder". I'm saying work your fingers to the bone (in your own way) to get your favorite candidate on the primary ballot and increase support for them. If they don't win the primary, suck it up and support the nominee. Sitting the general out is counter-productive (punishing your side won't make them become more progressive). Political progress is almost always incremental. As for replacing the system, I dunno. Either you let the people choose their leaders, or you don't. The people choosing is better. Maybe I'm misreading you, but that's my take. FWIW. ;-) Cheers, Scott.
Post #387,561 by hnick 3/15/14 11:19:34 AM Reply	We're agreed on people choosing is better. My point is that the current system does not allow this. The cost and the hoops to go through insure that only properly vetted corporate creatures get serious recognition. Outsider candidates would have trouble getting arrested, much less elected. People got leery of beltway insiders, so we got bums like GWB and Obama. Very competent corporate toadies, but useless otherwise. The two party system polarizes the population nicely so that the serfs on either side can be played against each other, but it doesn't really make for a useful society. We need to either get more parties or get rid of them altogether so choices do not come down to Boolean solutions. That is a seriously non-trivial proposition. The system is owned by the ultra rich and they will not give up control willingly. I see no solutions that are not ugly. My take. Sorry. I would love to be wrong.
Post #387,563 by Another Scott 3/15/14 12:07:28 PM Reply	Even if one accepts all that... The system is the way it is - it's not going to be replaced any time soon. It can only be changed from the inside, and that will happen over time as more people get involved. Choices matter. One has to hold their nose and not get discouraged. Discouragement enables those who don't want change. Consider the recent McAuliffe vs Cuccinelli race in Virginia - http://wonkette.com/...straight-marriage Some of these guys are worse than others... Cheers, Scott.
Post #387,579 by Ashton 3/15/14 7:28:45 PM Reply	Concur on all points you raised in this thread fwiw. (Where we may still disagree on the prognosis.. for ever reining-in the Spooks) maybe even more portentous are now the Corporates, as--as you have noted--Gov. secrecy/Lying has been with us since long before the Cheney Shogunate made it into an art-form. And ALL of Bizness is suffused with Lying, from the subtle-->humongous. It is inescapable. Now there are the Googlish who Say, Don't do evil as they proceed apace to expand the domain of Evil into previously inaccessible regions --all about obscene amounts of $$. What we are in-for, IMO is the Problem of Time, given the unprecedented Scale of the Planetary crises as dwarf all internecine battles-with-words. (Might as well wait ... and wait ... and Wait! (for that Revolution-thing)--as we wait.. and wait.. for emergency-class authentic work on The Nest of all.) I (still) have faith==0 in the creeping gradualism of attempting to work-with a System so premeditatively-Broken, as right now. Sane as are your points about actually Trying-to-vote amidst the flotsam and detritus of the ambitious, I can sign-on only to extent: YES, DO fucking-VOTE!, even when you realize that the deck has 100 Jokers planted by the Ruling 0.001% (and their toadies of the 0.01%) NOT-to-vote is: yielding to the (lowest) brain, the Instinctive one or the (middle?) Emotional brain, for a few moments of satis-fiction. Some other good stuff in those DG replies/and links! (including this cute 'test' link-about-linking on-site.) http://driftglass.bl...dget-by-1983.html IMO we'unses Must ... [a word I try to use rarely] strive to maintain equanimity in the bald-Face of the clear clinical madness now at the throats of all Muricans (and elsewhere on the endangered Planet.) Tuning-it-all-Out merits measureless-Shame, which will gnaw at the viscerals of any practitioner of mere avoidism. (It's also more Fun.. to See the daily allegory, yet/ distance-self from mindless stimulus<-->response negativity.) Cats.. I find.. help in this. Find Your Own 'cats'.

Welcome to IWETHEY!