Anyone voting for Romney after hating on EV's in debates?

[Lessss]

If you are religious then "write in" GOD for president because that's what GOD wants you to so.

The rest of you vote for whoever you believe will balance the F#$%#$ budget.

 

[Lessss]

If you are religious then "write in" GOD for president because that's what GOD wants you to so.

The rest of you vote for whoever you believe will balance the F#$%#$ budget.

 

[Chalo]

The dumbest idea to ever gain root is that income taxes are equitable. They aren't, both on a philosophical basis and on an administrative basis. Whilst I hate government interference that isn't necessary, I support universal healthcare and education, so I passionately support the need for taxes to fund necessary public services. But you don't do that through income taxes, you do it through consumption taxes such as Vat/GSTs and as you say fuel taxes.

Sales taxes as now implemented fail because working families and the poor must spend every penny they earn, while the rich can hoard most of what they take. So people of modest means wind up paying more tax, proportionally (and that they can't afford), while rich bastards get a pass. It makes sense for the winners to host the game, and progressive income tax is the most proven way to accomplish something approaching that.

Remember, the 1950s American economic miracle was accomplished during a period when the top marginal tax rates were between 80% and 93%. That regime resulted in the figurative rising tide that lifted all boats. The problem now isn't that we have a progressive income tax; it's that our tax code is highly corrupted in favor of the rich, and that it isn't progressive enough even without the loopholes and exemptions.

Here in the US, the structural problem is not folks who make $250k a year at their small businesses; it's folks who make $250 million a year distorting markets, gambling on risky financial instruments, exploiting corrupt public subsidies, and doing other comparable things of no net public benefit. There is no honest way to make irrationally huge amounts of money; folks who do that are just large-scale parasites and gangsters. So not at all surprisingly, the most successful parasites and gangsters use some of their ill-gotten treasure to buy influence and corrupt the tax system in their favor, because that's just the kind of people they are.

The guy making $250k through ethical enterprise gets absolutely hammered with taxes, the guy making $25k by his productive labor may get off pretty easy income-tax-wise while getting pinched by sales tax/property tax/licenses/permits/fees/fines, but the guy taking $250M through exploitation gets a fat and undeserved tax break at everybody else's expense. A surprisingly large percentage of the richest few Americans pay no income tax at all, and almost none of them pay as much proportionally as a middle-class person does. The results are plain to see in the form of rapidly and dramatically widening income disparity-- which is bad for society's stability, innovation, and real productivity.

So I'm with you on sales/value-added taxes-- only as long as basic necessities are exempt, but financial instruments, equities, and securities are all taxed. Just levying a small tax on those latter things would make discussions of government austerity a thing of the past, and would shift the focus of stock and commodities trading from crass price manipulations to real value.

Chalo

 

[auraslip]

I love ya auraslip but hearing this kind of attitude from you and others really makes me want to leave the country knowing that people would rather continue this ~200 years of democrat-republican dominance than change.

If you feel so upset with the political climate that it's very mechanations and processes through which it works disgusts you then leaving would probably be the only options because short of a revolution, I can't imagine a situation where it would change. Neither party is going to change the system to make room for third parties. I don't believe we'll ever reach a critical mass where enough people will become politically active enough to vote for a third party. And if they did then what? Would the third party that now has enough votes, change the system to make it easier for differing political views to take office? It'd be democrats vs. libertarians or socialist vs. tea party. Same dogs, different day.

Here's how I deal with it without allowing myself to become to depressed: vote locally. Republicans in my state are trying to defund education and introduce biblical myths into science textbooks. I focus on those issues, and even more locally in my home town. I try to ignore "protest politics" and other bullshit like that. You'd be surprised how much local government is willing to listen to concerned citizens that actually have something to say if it's reasonable. Most of the people that go to town hall meetings are nuts; so they are happy to deal with sane people. Me and my friends were successful in getting the new commuter train to run on the weekends because we wrote reasonable e-mails explaining why it's a good idea. We got bike lanes, sharrows, and bike friendly stop lights installed because we worked with the transportation officer. We got tax benefits for solar installations in residential homes. Meanwhile, I have friends that protest coal power plants, nuclear power plants, and capitalism. What do they get done? Nothing.

But yeah, I've fantasized about leaving the US many times. But I've also made sure to do my civic duty to be educated on the issues, vote, and stay in touch with the local government on issues I care about. I realize I can't make a dent in national politics, but you gotta understand that a few hundred voters in a swing state can make a huge difference on the issues you care about the most.

The citizens united decision was made in a 5-4 split down the supreme courts partisan lines. If you think either party is just as bad, you need to reevaluate that view.

 

[liveforphysics]

Neither party is going to change the system to make room for third parties.

Funny you say that, as it's not the job of the corportist party to make space for a 3rd party (more like their job to do everything possible to block it as they do a fine job of). In a democracy it's the job of the citizens to vote for what they want.

The corportist party doesn't have to "make room" for a thing as long as people believe like you do, that they are powerless and trapped to vote evil with no options.

 

[Harold in CR]

 

[Sancho's Horse]

A few things. A third party could have an effect but never a lasting role. The way our system is organized prevents it: specifically electoral college, and gerrymandering. Electoral college means that if no presidential candidate gets a clear majority, the House of representatives simply picks. So, unless we have a third party go from virtually non-existent to the dominant role in Washington, it would never sustain itself very well. Gerrymandering is at the state level and allows the controlling party to, on occassion, rewrite the district to their advantage (in most states). So, again, a third party would need to go from non-existent to dominant to prevent the dominance of the existing parties from eroding their chances. It is a bit like gambling in Las Vegas, but the house gets to occassionally stack the deck.

I support a third party, but not in Washington. The idea of people going off with my money behind closed doors already is happening enough. I think the third party we are looking for is with people using the existing framework of laws to organize charitable institutions with complete transparency (or as near to it as feasible) to serve the purposes they honor in society (whether it be education, social work, whatever). We have the ability to do this, and with technology as it is, it is achievable as it never has been before.

As far as corporate Washington, Citizens United, or patenting of human DNA, or the new rules on filing patents (which requires you not to be verifiably the first to develop a product or process, but just the first to successfully navigate the patent legal system...surely they won't make a currently daunting process to the lone inventor even more daunting, or fast track for the corporation) take your pick...Washington is becoming more of a corporate sponsored event. The supreme court has led the way. The reality is that the president can put people on the supreme court, can lead us into or out of a war, can maybe set the tone in Washington, and limited effects in other areas.

So, think about who best represents what you want for the country on these issues and vote.

 

[Beachcruzer]

The citizens united decision was made in a 5-4 split down the supreme courts partisan lines. If you think either party is just as bad, you need to reevaluate that view.

Exactly. If you think Democrats and Republicans are one and the same, you're ignoring the judiciary. Not just the Supreme Court, but the hundreds of federal judges who will be appointed to lesser courts in the next four years. Think about it: What was the exact moment when we were preordained to embark on a disastrous military misadventure in Iraq that to date has cost more than 100,000 lives, including 4,000 Americans; when we as American citizens became subject to warrantless wiretapping; when the government signed a blank check to the pharmaceutical industry; and when that government embarked on a series of tax cuts and spending sprees that turned a budget surplus into a trillion-dollar yearly deficit? That all became inevitable when the Supreme Court voted 5-4 on party lines to give a disputed election to George W. Bush.

If you want to know why you as a citizen of this country matter less than a corporation from any country, look to the Supreme Court. If you want to know how the laughable notion that money is the same thing as speech became law, look to the Supreme Court. If you care about preserving any of your rapidly diminishing rights and liberties, look to the Supreme Court. The judiciary are supposed to be the level-headed ones. In the bad old days when the Dixiecrats in congress were enacting ridiculous legislation to preserve segregation, the court struck it down. But the Supreme Court in even darker times gave us Dred Scott, which returned a man and his family to slavery so as not to infringe the property rights of his "owner." If you think something that odious can't happen again, wait until Romney gets elected and appoints two more conservative judges to lifetime terms on the court.

 

[Chalo]

Nixon appointees to the federal judiciary seem like they turned out better on average than Clinton appointees. And I'd bank that Obama's appointees won't average as good as Clinton's. That guy is working for somebody, but it's not you and it's not me. And in that regard, he is depressingly similar to Romney.

 

[biohazardman]

Sorry guys like others have said I think there is little chance of a third party winning the election any time soon. My votes have sometimes crossed to the opposition's candidate and I have no problem with this. I vote not for what they say nor what the extremely biased media depicts them as but for the person I feel is most moral. My three run ins with the media had them editing my words to say the opposite of what I said two of my three sessions with them. In the end, the more moral person, regardless of party lines, will slow down the eroding moral practices of our government the most. I think it's a bit late to stop the erosion though to much corruption in all the governments of the world for things to change that much. Oh, and it's not likely I would vote for a man who repeatedly apologized to the other countries for my country being as great or as Christian as it is.

 

[motorino magnet]

What about Marc Emery?

He loves e-bikes and smoking doobies too!

http://www.cannabisculture.com/blogs/2012/10/05/Marcs-US-Election-Excitement-Behind-Bars-Mississippi

i hope someone sticks mittens in a cage on top of his SUV after he loses the election!!!!!....take him home the rich pr!ck.....

We need a RE-love-illusion!

NRA!!!!!

 

[neptronix]

I feel like a sucker for continuing to live here. I feel like we are all suckers. Look at how degrading it is to think that all you can do is choose 1 of 2 turds and do nothing else. Being involved in local politics does not do it for me. The federal government is just too large and forceful right now.

And most people will continue to support it. That's the worst part.

How's that Roman empire workin out for ya.

 

[nechaus]

I still prefer Obama...


why?
Because he is president now, it seems like a crucial time in the world atm, he understand things cannot change over night.



I seen one of the latest debates, or maybe the final one, i dont know, and dont watch politics because its a waste of my time really.
they say the threat is iran/afgan ect.. I think the biggest threat is china town. In the sense they are so damm patient, they seem to be buying so much here in Aus and the US, They export like mad
They control their currency, underpay the people, and i think they are a more powerful country because of communism, United as one, playing as a big team.

I think they also have some pretty close connections to south Korea






neptronix you should come to the best country in the the world ! Australia, The land down under..

 

[Grey beard]

Seems like he name checked Tesla once or twice in multiple debates as wasteful government spending.

I'd like to hear thoughts from conservatives and people working in the industry about that. Is it Mitt just saying what ever he needs to get elected, or does he actually believe "battery powered cars" are dumb?

I don't think the reference was to battery power is dumb, it was in reference to using government money to support what there is no market to support. Mitt comes from a business background, as do I. If you are going to invest money, you want to have reasonable odds that there will be a return on the investment. If a company like Tesla, is in big trouble despite having one of the richest owners, you don't throw big money at it without investigating WHY it is in trouble.
Tessa is a high end product, in an unproven market. Henry Ford, with his $400 Model T proved a market for automobiles, and soon, wonderful high end cars emerged. With Telsa, we have it backwards. A high end product in an unproven market. Look around you and count all the "electric cars". It'll come someday, but we threw our money away today.
I've always wondered, if we changed every motorized device over to electric, where are we going to get the power? We have blackouts in some areas now just because of heat and ac use, what'll it be like when all those btus we burn to get to work are watts coming out of the grid?

 

[nechaus]

if you changed every car from ice to electric, pretty sure it would be fatal

in some way or another.. the fast change would ruin the economy, so if it happens its going to happen at a slow steady pace.
everyone will get effected, and i personally blame capitalism model, oil companies to the mechanics down the road could lose out big...
I can imagine some guy who has been working on ice for 20 years plus may not have the desire to start working on electric cars... who knows.. some will some wont
How would we produce the energy, i think that is step 1, creating or harvesting the energy in efficient ways and have more than we need, its all around us we just have to get it
if only we could make fusion reactions like the sun

 

[Beachcruzer]

Nixon appointees to the federal judiciary seem like they turned out better on average than Clinton appointees. And I'd bank that Obama's appointees won't average as good as Clinton's. That guy is working for somebody, but it's not you and it's not me. And in that regard, he is depressingly similar to Romney.

You're making my point for me. The entire spectrum of American politics has shifted radically to the right in the last 30 years. Look at their records. Nixon, who will forever be remembered as the meanest, dirtiest sonofabitch in the Republican party, was in fact more progressive than either Clinton or Obama. We're dealing with a new breed of politicians, which is why Congress is such a dysfunctional nuthouse. It's also why it is even more important to hold the line on judicial appointments. They are the one class of bastards we can't vote out. A federal judgeship is a lifetime gig.

If Romney gets in the balance of the court is going to be heavily conservative for at least a generation. That means Roe v Wade will be struck down. Citizens United and the related rulings that place the rights of corporations over people will be expanded and strengthened. The conflation of money and speech will be further entrenched. Civil rights gains will be rolled back (there's a test case on affirmative action before the court now).

 

[Grey beard]

You've been brainwashed my friend. Roe vsWade is the law of the land. I've heard that drivel every year, used against every Republican since 1973. Same o, same o. The truth is that the Supreme Court has been made up of more conservitives many times and this hasn't happened, and won't.
I guess when you have no record to run on, you turn all the propaganda into demonizing the other guy.
It was Hitlers propaganda mistier, Joseph Goebbels, that said" if you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth". Also, "When one lies, lie big, and stick to it. It is not the Task of propaganda to discover intellectual truths."

Please excuse me. At my age it is not difficult to get drawn away from the point of the thread.

 

[fizzit]

I don't think the reference was to battery power is dumb, it was in reference to using government money to support what there is no market to support. Mitt comes from a business background, as do I. If you are going to invest money, you want to have reasonable odds that there will be a return on the investment. If a company like Tesla, is in big trouble despite having one of the richest owners, you don't throw big money at it without investigating WHY it is in trouble.
Tessa is a high end product, in an unproven market. Henry Ford, with his $400 Model T proved a market for automobiles, and soon, wonderful high end cars emerged. With Telsa, we have it backwards. A high end product in an unproven market. Look around you and count all the "electric cars". It'll come someday, but we threw our money away today.
I've always wondered, if we changed every motorized device over to electric, where are we going to get the power? We have blackouts in some areas now just because of heat and ac use, what'll it be like when all those btus we burn to get to work are watts coming out of the grid?

What makes you think that Tesla is in big trouble? They are close to becoming cash positive. People want electric cars. They just don't want crappy Zap's and other lead powered go karts. A Tesla is a real car, and people have shown that they're willing to pay the price to get a next gen technology in their garage. Tesla has lowered the price of the Model S, and they will continue with this pattern as mass production gets cheaper, and eventually their cars will be affordable to all and we'll have a Model T electric car on our hands. Remember that the Model T was not the first car that Henry Ford sold.

 

[nicobie]

While I strongly agree with LFP regarding our shit 2 party system and with Philistine on what we could/should do to improve America, I do think that in this pres. election we are offered a choice.

Obamas wants national health care and Romney want to kill it. Everything else is bullshit. Some say that they don't want the govmnt controlling their health care. Are they happy with the insurance companies doing the same thing? I would trust the government, which can (possibly) be voted out, before the ins. industry and their 30%+ profit margins and money grubbing ways

 

[Grey beard]

Fizzit,
Im with you on one thing, the Tesla cars are probably very nice. It isn't the product that is worrisome, its the company.
Daimler bought in, and now have traded or sold their position. Honda bought in and are now out I believe. Tesla was selling tax credits they had for zev, not something you were going to do if you thought you were going to need them. Tesla went back to the energy dept and tried to borrow more money. Failed. They had to renegotiate payment for their loan because they weren't able to make it. The stock was near $40 in the spring, and had dropped over 25% by summer. A handful of mutual funds have gotten out. Maybe I've got these dates wrong but I believe that they were to deliver 5000 sedans last year and be producing 15000 cars per month this year. My understanding is that only 40 cars have been delivered. Now, they are looking at selling more stock to raise more money, which has investors upset because that will further depress the value of their stock, and not something that would be needed if they were going to be in positive cash flow soon.
Looking at all the above, I wouldn't invest there, but hey, buy some stock, its cheaper than it was, and prove me wrong. I'll be happy for you, and them.

Ps. It has been reported that it cost Government Motors between $75k and $80k to build the Volt. How do you suppose that Tesla can sell their luxurious sedan for $60 k, and make a profit?

 

[Chalo]

The real red flag with Tesla Motors was when Elon Musk bought it and fired their best people. It's a common occurrence with startup companies, but in my observation, nothing good can come of it. The people who get brought in after that are always of a lower grade than the founding crew.

 

[mdd0127]

neptronix, philistine, liveforphysics, chalo
You guys give me tiny glimmers of hope for this world.

Anybody spending any time playing into the two party system at all is either evil, or just a sucker. I love what chalo said about going off-grid and subverting!

Someone on another forum posted the pic below and I thought it was incomplete so I added myself into the picture in the upper right corner. I think it applies to this thread.

 

[mdd0127]

Another quick thought.
I go to this other forum that consists mostly of people that regular folk would consider hippies and the conclusion a lot of us over there came to is that we should all vote for Romney, or R-Money, so we can go ahead and get WWIII over with and move on. Quick painless death scenario, national seppuku if you will. Nothing forces change like a catastrophe and I think that Romney in the whitehouse would be a pretty big catastrophe.

The only vote I'm casting is with my labor and my dollars but if I was going to vote, I think that a vote for the ultimate magic underwear wearing evil would probably be the most productive.

 

[oatnet]

While we could vote out every senator and congressmen responsible for this mess, we are powerless to vote out Republicans or Democrats - their replacements will most likely come from the same two parties. I'm pleased to see so many people in this thread recognizing that campaigning or promoting either (any) party, means you are sponsoring the destruction of the American way of life.

Senator Arlen Specter (who died a few weeks back) wrote a recent book "Life Among the Cannibals" that chronicles bits of his 30 year career in the senate, and has an interesting perspective on the US congress and its slow but complete failure. He reported that that there used to be a group of moderates in each party, that would reach across party lines and work a compromise where each side gets some, but not all, of what it wants. In the past, this ability that was valued because it got things done. However, as each side radicalized, the parties started backing only candidates who could pass the "Purity Test" by voting strictly with the party; compromise, reaching across party lines, was an instant failure of the purity test, so the ranks of those moderates thinned, vanished. Now, every representative has a gun at their head - be pure and vote the party line, or get flushed out at the next election. Today we are left with two parties that are ideologically pure, but unable to compromise and get anything done.

Frankly, when we are faced with a political conundrum, I want to hear 535 different ideas from 100 senators and 435 congressmen, whittled down to the one that is best for the American people. Instead, we have two ideas, Republican and Democratic, that are good for their big business clients but bad for America, and the winner will be the one who did the best job of distorting the truth about the other.

I WANT a politition who votes against his party. I say that if a represenative is ideolically pure, s/he is working for a Political Party, and not the Americans who voted for them. This means Political parties are downright unAmerican - even George Washington was against political parties, saying if they emerged, they would be the end of the American system. We are seeing that today, eventually one side will take hold, and we will become a 1-party state like North Korea. So if you see someone who claims to be a staunch Democrat, or staunch Republican, shame them - they are terrorists engineering the destruction of America, they may as well be planting IEDs on Route 66.

However, as corrupt as America is today, maybe it is less corrupt than it used to be... in another note from Specter's book, he talks about prosecuting corruption in Philadelphia in the 60's. Apparently, the corruption centered around Judges in Philadelphia, who got appointments via the machine of the reigning political party. As a result, only (9) of the (28) Civil/Criminal judges in Philadelphia had actually finished high school. Only (1) of (28) was actually an attorney - how could they administer justice, if they don't have the facilities to understand the law? Such clueless nepotism sounds more like the opening of a "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" than a government of a major US metropolitan city, but that is the way it was, back then.

Funny that again it was our Judicial System that sold us out, and implemented the bloodless coup that finally felled the US government. It changed the US Constitution from "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights..." to "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men [and corporate entities] are created equal..." When a human has no moral component, s/he is a danger to others, gets put in jail or a mental hospital, and has his/her rights restricted. By definition, a corporation has no moral component - but we will let them control the country.

-JD

POLITICAL PARTIES ARE UNAMERICAN

 

[Beachcruzer]

Funny that again it was our Judicial System that sold us out, and implemented the bloodless coup that finally felled the US government. It changed the US Constitution from "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights..." to "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men [and corporate entities] are created equal..." When a human has no moral component, s/he is a danger to others, gets put in jail or a mental hospital, and has his/her rights restricted. By definition, a corporation has no moral component - but we will let them control the country.

Amen, brother. That's what I was trying to say higher up in the thread. The First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech, but thanks to Citizens United, nobody is going to hear what you have to say unless you have a few million to pump into the corporate media machine. The net result is that we don't have meaningful freedom of speech. We can spout off on E-S about a revolution, or shout out the window.

Before I drop this topic for good, here's a great article that lays it all out. The short synopsis is that a group called Citizens United wanted to show a hatchet job/documentary film on Hillary Clinton via cable-on-demand just before the 2008 election, but were barred from doing so because corporations were not allowed to run political ads within 30 days of an election. Citizens United appealed, and when the case reached the high court, their lawyer made a very narrow argument that the film ws not an advertisement. John Roberts, the chief justice appointed by George W. Bush, told him to come back later and make a broader argument, which Roberts and his conservative colleagues used to eviscerate what remained of campaign spending limits. This is what we can expect more of if Romney gets in, and I think it is the best argument to support the viable alternative to him if you live in any of the 10 or so states where your vote could plausibly make a difference. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/05/21/120521fa_fact_toobin

Apologies for veering off topic. To answer the OP's question, there are a lot of reasons I'm not voting for Romney. His cheap shot at EVs is just one of them.