Hmmmmm....I'm stayin' outta this one.....

Hope the weather's fine where you are, Monsieur Sky.
R for well thought out argument
(Still not at all sure who's right here)

Yikes sky you opening a bees nest I thought we had contained.
“Y’see Kosh, you doing that points up the fact that there
is much more to be said on this whole topic –
and the premises you’ve given here –
than fits within your parameters.”
~
Parameters, though, gotta sometimes be limited.
In order to fully juice up one’s premises.
Ah but it all in the premises.
~
And you gonna show us them , yikes.
~
Here: “votes given to Greens won’t change the outcome of the election one little bit. Not an iota.”
Ok.
A premise. A hard one for a so called savvy political watcher of , uh, cnn, to aver.
~
Hey wait now. What is this, now:
“You’ll encourage the development of a 3rd party from no viable voice to possibly getting a voice in future elections. And you avoid the dilemma of choosing between two evils. A win/win for you!”

Wellllllllllllllllll. Good for him I guess, but what about the rest of us?

~
Here is the thing, sky: I ..uh..oh fuck it. You make a fine case for..something or other.

I shall try to follow it…unless..kosh makes a crushing counterpoint.
hm

kosh? help me here...........

Your numbers don't seem right. In 2000 the ration of Gore to Nader votes was about 18-1 and it sure looks like it had an effect in Florida. This elections looks to be very close overall and in several states so a Green vote is hardly inconsequential in determining the winner.

Abrawang,

No, no, no, my friend. You'll not copy kosh's little trick of introducing info from another election with other candidates, under other circumstances, on this blog.

If you buy into Kosh's argument then you'll have to follow his rules too. Not the one's he followed; the ones he laid down for commenters.

Even if a Green might win election in one state, that says nothing at all about the end result of the election. And it says nothing at all about how Kosh should vote or how anyone not in a state where a Green candidate is doing well should vote. Kosh skipped back and forth between his own personal decision and the decision that other likers of Green might make so as to vote Dem instead of conscience.
.

In Florida, CNN’s exit polling showed Nader taking the same amount of votes from both Republicans and Democrats: 1 percent. Nader also took 4 percent of the independent vote. At the same time, 13 percent of registered Democrats voted for Bush! Again, Gore couldn’t hold his own base and because of this, he lost. The Democrats don’t say one word about the fact that 13 percent of their own party members voted for Bush.

In fact, by a huge margin, the people who voted for Nader were not ex-Democrats, but ex-Reform Party voters who supported Ross Perot. These people 1) vote third party or stay at home, 2) won’t vote for a D or R regardless, and 3) are conservatives not liberals.

When asked who they voted for in 1996, 1 percent of Nader’s voters said they voted for Bill Clinton, 1 percent said they voted for Bob Dole, and 10 percent said they voted for Ross Perot.

Here is the chart:

1996——All—Gore—Bush—Buchanan—Nader
Clinton—46——82——16———0————1
Dole——30——–4——93———0————1
Perot——–7——23——65———1———–10
No vote—12——50——44———0————7

Again, Nader’s support did not come from Democratic supporters. They were mainly non-voters and ex-Perot supporters, most of whom were conservatives who supported Bush anyway. Not only that, Nader took from Democrats and Republicans equally: one measly percent.

Further:

Perot voters trend conservative. In fact, by a 3 to 1 margin, Perot voters in Florida went with Bush. So, with Nader taking equally from voters who cast votes for Clinton as they did from Dole, and then 10 percent previously voting for Perot being split on a 3 to 1 margin to Bush, that shows that if Nader had not been in the race, the majority of those voters would have gone to Bush, by a 7 to 4 margin.

So not only does the data show that Nader did not cost Bush Florida, he took votes away from Bush. Again, this is reiterated as fact by CNN’s own exit poll.

Had Nader not run, Bush would have won by more in Florida. CNN’s exit poll showed Bush at 49 percent and Gore at 47 percent, with 2 percent not voting in a hypothetical Nader-less Florida race.

Even further, according to exit polls, only 25% of Nader supporters would have voted for Gore had Nader not run. Over half of the Nader voters would have stayed home, and the rest would have voted for Bush or another third party candidate.

Summing up:

Nader took votes equally from Ds and Rs
The amount taken was minuscule, and balanced each other out
The party who suffered the most was the Reform Party, by a factor of 10, compared to Gore

Reform Party voters tend to vote GOP, so Nader actually took votes from Bush, not Gore, and is reflected in CNN’s own exit poll.

Nader supporters couldn’t stand Gore, and never would have voted for him anyway, much like Anderson/Stein/Stewart 3rd party voters would rather stay home than touch Obama with a 10-foot pole.

Likewise, CNN’s own data shows that Gore would have lost by 2% if Nader had not run.

Now, does anyone have any actual poll data or hard numbers that refutes this?

http://my.firedoglake.com/jest/2012/08/26/debunking-pathological-myths-of-the-2000-election-part-1-cnn-exit-polls-prove-that-nader-did-not-cost-gore-fl/

-R-

I'll have more to say about the arrogance and hypocrisy of kosh later.

Only in the so-called "swing states" could one perhaps -- perhaps -- argue that a vote for Jill Stein is a vote for Mittens. Living here in California, it's perfectly safe for me to vote my conscience (that is, to vote for Jill Stein), since there's no way in hell that Obama isn't going to win all of California's 55 electoral votes in the bullshit Electoral College system anyway.

Of course, most Democratic hacks, being ignorant, don't even understand the Electoral College. A shocking number of them believe that the presidency is determined by the popular vote.

And while I recognize that Al Gore won the 2000 election fairly and squarely, and was robbed, the fact that he was such a mediocre candidate is why the election was close enough for the Repugnican traitors to be able to steal it in the first place. You can't blame that on Ralph Nader.

I voted for Nader in 2000 (it was clear that Gore was going to win California's electoral votes anyway), Kerry in 2004 (primarily out of my pure hatred for George W. Bush), Obama in 2008 (because I actually believed his promises of "hope" and "change"), and I most likely will cast my vote for my conscience this year. And that would be for Jill Stein.

Fuck the Democratic hacks who don't like it.

Very interesting clarification of some really muddy thinking, though I doubt if it will do any good. I don't think people have learned how to make rational choices how they vote for.

I am really fed up with people listing abortion rights as a reason to vote for Obama. Obama has effectively abolished abortion rights for most women (the poor ones). He has removed the expectation that insurance companies pay for them under ObamaCare, as well as effectively ending Medicaid coverage for abortion.

By the way, Koshersaalami should definitely read the interview with Mayor Bloomberg in the New York Times - which demolishes many of the arguments he puts forward. It was Biden, not Obama, that championed gay rights. Obama refused to touch it until Biden's overwhelming support forced him, too. Bloomberg also attacks him for failing to do anything about climate change.

It was mentioned on my blog that one of obama's most miserable legacies was the failure to prosecute the war criminal of the previous administration, setting a precedent for future "leaders," to which I responded:

"Were the situation reversed and involved forgiveness of Moslem war criminals, he'd (kosh) be a leader of the amen corner braying loudly that perpetrators be prosecuted.

In fact, I posed just such a related question to him on that horrid, horrid blog post, and he dissembled, weaseled and nearly broke his back in his attempts to NOT answer the question.

The result is that clearly, kosh feels that only jewish blood matters. As long as the blood spilled is that of the what he considers "chei kuck" (Lit. human dung), it's fine by him.

Schadenfreud personified.

I even offered the caveat in my comment to delete the comment and question if he was not prepared to give it a serious answer. Just as he chooses expedience over principles and morals, he chooses equivocation over objectively examining the real life moral ramifications of his words.

Thanks so much for visiting, X, and allowing me to vilify another of those, who choose to use the phrase; "Not in my name," selectively as it suits their purposes.

A nation asleep - a nation of sheep."

Oh, and the question posed that the lugubrious one couldn't seem to answer:

"Hypothetically, but analogous in my eyes. It's going to be a free election, Hitler versus Goering. You see Goering as slightly less malevolent than Hitler, who leads the polls. Goering is a lesser of two evils, shall we say.

There are two third party candidates are in the running neither have a chance to win:

"Irena Sendler was a Polish Catholic social worker. During World War II, she was a member of the Polish Underground and the Żegota Polish anti-Holocaust resistance in Warsaw. She helped save 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto by providing them with false documents and sheltering them in individual and group children’s homes outside the ghetto. As an employee of the Social Welfare Department, she had a special permit to enter the Warsaw Ghetto, to check for signs of typhus, something the Nazis feared would spread beyond the ghetto. During these visits, she wore a Star of David as a sign of solidarity with the Jewish people and so as not to call attention to herself. She cooperated with the Children’s Section of the Municipal Administration, linked with the RGO (Central Welfare Council), a Polish relief organization tolerated under German supervision. She organized the smuggling of Jewish children from the ghetto, carrying them out in boxes, suitcases and trolleys. Under the pretext of conducting inspections of sanitary conditions during a typhoid outbreak, Sendler visited the ghetto and smuggled out babies and small children in ambulances and trams, sometimes disguising them as packages. Despite being tortured and imprisoned by the Nazis, Sendler continued to do all she could to help Jewish children in Warsaw. In 1965 she was made ‘Righteous Among the Nations’, and died in 2008."

"Georg Ferdinand Duckwitz was a German member of the Nazi party who worked as a special envoy to Nazi occupied Denmark. Although Danish Jews were initially treated quite favourably by the Nazis, by 1943 it was planned that they would be rounded up and deported to concentration camps. Risking his career, Duckwitz made a secret visit to neutral Sweden where he convinced Prime Minister Per Albin Hansson to allow Danish Jewish refugees to escape to Sweden. He then went to Denmark and notified Danish politician Hans Hedtoft about the deportation. Hedtoft warned senior rabbis in the country, and in the following two months, over 6,000 Jews were ferried secretly to Sweden in boats. After his actions, Duckwitz returned to his duties as a Nazi official, refusing to reveal what he had done in case of losing his job or worse. After the war, he continued working as West Germany’s ambassador to Denmark. He died in 1973. Due to his actions, it is estimated that around 99% of Denmark’s Jews survived the Holocaust."

Granted, as I've mentioned, this is an extraordinarily hypothetical question, but I'd like a serious response or, please, delete my comment and question."

After Ralph Nader, who had a one track mindset, we saw our nation come close to destruction. No one is inclined to dilute our power by balkanizing it. The Greens are a one track party and our political system does not support third parties. The French and the Greeks have such a system and third parties do get seats in parliament. Then they can negotiate with the major parties.

The fact is this: a party has to be capable of managing the entire nation, all issues, all people and all the time. The Greens are just not ready for prime time. The Democrats incorporate as much green party ideology as possible while the Republicans do not. Vote Democrat and let things get done.

Hi Zuma!

Nice to see you here!

As to your comment, I'm afraid that you make the same erroneous assumption that others have made; that voting Green will in any way interfere with the Democrats winning the election (or losing it) and "getting the job done."

You compound that error in the same way as others by giving an example of other elections - in your case, of a European one - and you've ignored the information given by MarkinJapan as to the effect of Nader on an election - the opposite of what you imply.

Although I am not overjoyed by Mark's rant, I have no reason to doubt his figures.

;-)
.

sky, appreciate this. just a fast drive-by for now since I am at work but I noticed Al Jazeera article about third parties on information clearing house FWIW. I think I will share part of it with Rudy's blog and my last one, too:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article32813.htm

"US Voters: Not Spoilt For Choice

"While they may be running for the presidency of the US, most Americans would not recognise many of the so-called third party candidates representing the Libertarian and Green Parties running in this year's presidential election.

"Routinely ignored by both of the two dominant parties and the US media, they nevertheless appear on enough ballots to win - in theory - the all-important 270 electoral college votes needed to become president.

"And there are many more presidential candidates who also appear on many ballots around the US.

"However, in the country that is often claimed to be the greatest democracy in the world, they are all excluded from all of the televised presidential debates.

"This week, Green Party candidate, Jill Stein, along with her running mate, Cheri Honkala, were arrested while protesting their exclusion outside Hofstra University - the location of the second debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.

"It has become clear over the course of the election campaign that from the deficit to foreign policy, Obama and Romney share the same fundamental ideological framework. So, what sort of choice are US voters being given as they vote in November?

"The Commission on Presidential Debates has established three conditions that determine who gets to participate in debates.

"First, the candidate must be constitutionally eligible - at least 35 years old, a natural born citizen and a 14-year US resident.

"Then there is ballot access: The candidate's name must appear on enough state ballots to have a chance at the presidency.

"The Libertarian party's candidate Gary Johnson will be on the ballot in 48 states as well as the district of Columbia, all but Oklahoma and Michigan

"The Green Party candidate, Jill Stein is on the ballot in 37 states and DC

"The Constitution Party's Virgil Goode is on the ballot in 26 states and DC

"Rocky Anderson of the Justice Party is on the ballot in 15 states and DC.

"Finally, there is electoral support: the candidate must show that he or she can garner at least 15 per cent of the electorate. According to the CPD, this is determined by an average of five national organisations, using data obtained near the time of the debate.

"A poll conducted at the beginning of this year, found that:

"Nearly half of Americans believe it is time for the creation of a major third party

"68 per cent of those surveyed said they would definitely vote for or consider voting for a third party candidate that they agreed with on most issues

"Only 28 per cent said they definitely would not consider voting for a third party candidate"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"All of these things (healthcare, job creation, downsizing the military) are things that the American public is clamouring for and this is exactly why the Democrat and Republican parties feel they must control the microphone because the American public is already there. If they learn that they actually have a candidate that supports these solutions that people desperately need right now – all bets are off of what that impact might be on this election and beyond this election."
Jill Stein

end of quote

Isn't it interesting that we can get this rather basic and then statistical info from Al Jazeera. Sigh. Only "not in America" is reality and information available about America. WTF??? NewsHour won't talk about it, NYT, NPR, MSNBC, et al.

The Great American Ethical Freakshow continues!

best, libby

Rated. Good to try to change the minds of the 'always right narcissitic, wonder-of me types. " Go Sky. Likely futile.

Sky,
I've gone back to look at my use of first person pronouns, to figure out when I'd used which. I was about to apologize to you for having not paid attention but, on second look, I don't think I need to. I used "we" in my first point because I am obviously not the only voter who intends to vote Democratic primarily to keep the Republicans out of office. Hell, I'm not the only voter who has posted about that on OS and I'm far from the only person on OS who has expressed that opinion in Comments. I am defending others who have made the same decision I have. As regards the second point, when I said "Had Gore been elected, we can be reasonably sure that at least the following differences would have been evident," that "we" refers to you and me. The "we" in talking about the hypothetical Gore administration refers to those of us who voted for Gore, though it could also include progressives/liberals who voted for Nader. In terms of the case as a whole, I tried to restrict that to "I."

You make an interesting argument. On one hand, in all probability you're right in that the number of Green votes is likely to be so tiny that if I and others of my political leanings on OS decided to vote Green, it wouldn't make any functional difference, and so we might as well make the gesture to say to the Democrats: You aren't cutting it.

However, there are answers to this argument, though I wouldn't call them ironclad:

1. The 2000 election was decided by so few votes, particularly in Florida, that we're all afraid to assume that our vote will make no difference. That may be statistically silly, but we worry. The "we" in this case encompasses others who agree with my position. If the response I got on my post is any indication, there are a lot of us. To address your point further: I'm not arguing that my vote Will make a difference - I'm not quite that stupid, other evidence to the contrary; I'm arguing that my vote Could make a difference given what we learned from the 2000 election, and this vote looks to be an extremely close one.

"Not in comparative terms, in absolute terms"........
Poor choice of words on my part. What I was trying to avoid was the phenomenon of generalizing, which I've seen most of those who disagree with this post do: "There won't be any substantive difference" without so much as mentioning the differences I listed. I probably should have said "not in general terms, in specific terms." My apologies for being insufficiently articulate on this point. In other words, if someone argues that the differences are insignificant, I want them to either tell me that the differences I've listed are individually insignificant - womens' rights, gay rights, etc. are not sufficiently significant to worry about - or to tell me that I'm full of crap in thinking the candidates actually differ in these areas. Glossing over the entire point isn't persuasive.

I suppose I could get into specifics but, before I take the trouble to do so, I'd like to know that the areas of difference that I listed are disputed; otherwise, it's a pointless and rather labor-intensive exercise. One of the things that struck me most strongly in the responses to my post by those who disagreed with me was the lack of either disputing my claims or, failing that, disputing that those specific claims added up to anything. I begged for such responses and complained virulently that I wasn't getting either. General knocks of Obama, sure, but those knocks didn't address my argument, saying that it might make sense to vote for Obama even if one considered him Evil.

I have heard a little about the area of gay rights, with a commenter (I don't remember who or even if the comment was made on my blog, yours, or Tom Cordle's) saying that Obama made a pro-rights pronouncement because Biden forced his hand. That's not much of an argument given that 1. Biden is also on the ticket and 2. the presumed result of Biden's statement was a position on Obama's part. He got there. Romney didn't. I don't like how slowly he got there, particularly on marriage, though he was not nearly so slow about DADT.

2. This is, in principle, sort of an argument not to bother voting at all because, after all, one vote doesn't count. I can't assume that, at least not if the election is close, and this one looks to be absurdly close. Are you suggesting that we shouldn't bother voting for statistical reasons?

3. If the number of voters likely to vote Green is insignificant, and we have freedom to vote Green because our vote won't make a difference in the totals, our Green votes also wouldn't be sufficiently numerous to make a noticeable statement. If the vote is worthless, so is the statement. Now, I understand that this hypothetically a two-way street: If the vote is not worthless, neither is the statement. However, as I argued, I don't think they're of equal value, because one could in theory have a large effect on policy while the other is more limited in potential under any circumstances. I don't know, for example, if one can argue that Nader ultimately affected the platform of either major party, particularly in subsequent elections.

I'll have to look into Mark's information about where Nader's voters came from. It doesn't add to me intuitively but I could very well be making assumptions here, so I will not comment further on this area until I have. As to his other accusations, my crime is in expressing public support for someone he considers to be a murderer; his concerns are more about that than the specifics of my case or I presume he would have addressed my case more specifically. Well, that and I had the temerity to agree with Frank Apisa about something, not that Mr. Apisa influenced my decision at all; our interactions are rather sporadic and there are areas where our views do not overlap. As regards his hypothetical about Hitler and Goering, I gave him an honest, specific answer, though apparently not the one he wanted, and I defended my answer in a subsequent comment.

Perhaps I should address Mark's core issue further, because it will bring up something rather ugly about the American public. Mark is extremely concerned about the number of civilians killed by drones. At one point, when I figured out that that was really his primary objection to Obama, I wrote a post about it, really on his behalf, because I thought the issue was worth discussing and, at the time, it was being somewhat buried under what I might refer to as collateral invective. I did not express an opinion one way or the other; instead, I basically asked What do you think? Most of the reaction to the post was that commenters thought at the time either that the drones were part of a necessary effort or that other concerns regarding Obama, such as domestic policy, took precedence over that one. In other words, most of the reaction to the post was that the actions were either necessary (or, at the very least, justified) or not sufficiently important to warrant voting Obama out of office. I don't recall there being anything about the post encouraging any such reaction; if there were, there would have been no point in writing the post in the first place.

Would Romney be any different? Probably not; Romney certainly hasn't objected to Obama's use of drones in this fashion, even in the heat of the campaign, so I guess he or his people either believe it would not be a successful campaign issue or they don't want to tie his hands if he reaches office.

Now, this is a pretty strange discussion: Are we willing to vote for one murderer because he's less bad than another candidate would be in office who would presumably be a murderer in similar ways? I don't think most of the public defines it as murder. I don't know what they define it as, probably as a militarily necessary response to terrorism, a "better them than us," even when that's an inaccurate assessment. Whatever the case is, I could raise the issue, but raising it didn't make people care.

I don't know. Mark's not a very effective advocate for this position for a number of reasons but, at the moment, he is OS's primary advocate for it. The others on OS who are angriest at Obama and who are angry for Leftist reasons rather than Rightist tend to be at least as angry about other things, particularly economic policy.

Sky,
To get back to you, I am not about to tell you that you should keep your nose out of American politics. However, I don't know how inundated you are with the daily details of it and I do know you're used to a parliamentary system, so you may make assumptions about how things work here that are inaccurate, assumptions which may be due to inattention rather than lack of knowledge per se. Be careful. There are respects in which Obama faced some conditions which are, for all practical purposes, unprecedented, such as a massive budgetary problem and an opposition that was way more opposed to him on arrival than is normal here (and stated this up front with amazing frankness), using tactics such as the filibuster which was previously used very rarely. However, it took him too long to figure out that his conciliatory approach was utterly unsuccessful.

I hope I've answered most of your concerns.

Someone just sent me a link to a 3rd party candidates debate moderated by Larry King on Oct 23rd at 8 pm CDT. It will be carried by RT, Al Jazeera and possibly C-Span. Obama and Romney have been invited to participate.

They are looking for donations to cover costs - obviously they have no corporate sponsorship: http://www.freeandequaldebate.org/

In glancing around, two other points:

1. James Emmerling made a great point about making a gesture:

"Wellllllllllllllllll. Good for him I guess, but what about the rest of us?"

Really well said. There are times making a gesture can be self-indulgent.

James, my apologies for being gone today. I'm afraid sometimes there are priorities in my life that outweigh the imperatives of my presence here.

Considering one of Mark's points:
Actually, if we finally get to the two-state solution in Israel/Palestine, we can't really treat Muslim war criminals any differently than we treat Jewish ones because to even consider such a course of action would assure that agreement would never be reached. We aren't going to be able to go after either. So no, I will not be braying in the amen corner.

In terms of my arrogance, I laid out a case and tried to make it clear what it would take to shake me off it. I wouldn't call that arrogant, I'd call that doing whoever wanted to persuade me otherwise a favor. I still do not think it is unreasonable to ask that if someone answer me they actually answer me rather than presenting another laundry list that doesn't address my concerns at all, like I haven't seen dozens of them already. No one who agrees with the case I laid out would be shaken by one of said laundry lists.

If you laid out a case and said: "This is what you need to address if you're going to bring me to your point of view," I'd either address that directly or explain why I thought addressing something else would be more valid. So I in essence said "This is what will work and this is what won't work." And I got hit with a lot of what I said wouldn't work. Guess what? It didn't. How arrogant of me.

sky, I shared this on kosh's blog but I'll post it on yours, too.

4 Words Why I Am Voting Green: Thou Shalt Not Kill

The murderous military industrial security prison complex in this country.

The fact that every Tuesday Obama sits at a table with a stack of resumes of the supposedly most bad-ass terrorists in the Middle East which probably means the ones most nationalistic and unhappy with their country being turned into a failed state by the greedy and lying US/NATO and Israel and Mr. Obama decides who will be droned for THIS WEEK! No due process. Just this horrible heat sucking the air out of your lungs in an excruciating death. Yup. Obama gets to play God -- or Caesar. Life and death. Doesn't matter if you are American, either. It is supposed to matter especially, but somehow that is part of the lesser evil blank check he is being given by the terrified ones of Romney.

So, the resumes are provided by our intelligence agents. And of course, they never get anything wrong. Well, maybe the WMDs mistake that caused approx. 1 million Middle Easterners to die and over 3 million to be displaced, but that was just one little mistake dontchaknow. And the guys in Gitmo and detention black sites all over the world. Our operatives never detained or tortured anyone not deserving of being detained and tortured. Screw the Geneva Conventions btw. And some of those guys will die imprisoned, their only way to escape, because our government sure wouldn't want them blabbing how they were innocent and embarrassing any of the important top echelon.

So you don't think maybe this every Tuesday ritual might desensitize one and he might keep escalating the death numbers as he checks off who is to be killed since it is KILLER TUESDAY. I never thought of that day watching those Mickey Mouse Club days. Was that anything can happen day -- Tuesday? I know Friday was the cowboy roundup. Hmmmm.

I mean the more frustrated Obama becomes and the more the Repubs try to convince the country he is "soft on terrorism" the more killing!! Pavlovian. Like an addiction. And what a rush to kill Americans!!! I mean, to be getting away with that!!! What power. Evil. But still power. Macho. Yang!

Obama showed them he wasn't soft on terror -- had to kill twice as many which was such a good campaign strategy and it is all about gamesmanship not human decency! Bin Laden! What a victory there, huh? Not.

And all that droning. So what if the collateral damage is causing our troops so much blowback that they are getting punished and killed for our "deciders'" incompetence and hubris!

Obama no longer has just a bully pulpit. He has a killer pulpit!

"Thou Shalt Not Kill"!!!!

best, libby

The royal we here votes for Kosh - a combination of head and heart that is unprecedented in these corridors.

Sky,

As I said in a previous comment, I thought one of your criticisms of my post was valid. And so, I've done what I might call a Visible Edit. From my post:

"To ignore these differences is irresponsible, Period.

If it is your case, make it. Not in comparative terms, in absolute terms.

[Note on 10/22: Due to a remark by Skypixeo on his blog, I will amend that last sentence to read: "Not in general terms, in specific terms." The point here is that simply stating "they're too equivalent" amounts to ignoring these differences. If you choose to ignore these differences, I ask that you acknowledge the differences you're ignoring.]"

The portion in the brackets is in italics, which I don't know how to do in a comment.

Thank you for that. You were right.
In case you are wondering, I do respond.

Myriad,
Thank you. I really appreciate the support. I am trying. (Perhaps in both senses of the word)

Mine too. Shrill invective does not advance discourse. I always appreciate your clarity and courage in the face of dubious factual opposition.

Poor Woman,
Not to worry. Most of us who are involved in this discussion aren’t either.

James,
Thanks for commenting!

Mark,
Normally I prefer a discussion of principles to stay with principles and not enter into a contest of statistics. However, I’ve heard more than one person declare that Nader cost Gore the election. The statistical information that you provided, if accurate, shows that to be a false allegation. I will reiterate here that I don’t give a damn what happened during the Gore/Bush contest unless it is directly and immediately affecting the Obama/Romney election. So far, I’ve seen no evidence of that except for those who insist on inserting that information into this debate.

Robert,
You raise an important point about the presidency being determined by the electoral college NOT the popular vote. I’m surprised that no one else has raised this.

Not surprised that kosh and those who agree with him wouldn’t raise it; it sounds the death knell for the argument he made for voting Democrat instead of by conscience, but I’m surprised that others haven’t done so.


Dr. Branhall,
Thanks for your comment. I appreciate you taking the time to do so.

Libby,
Your points about the mass media not giving greater coverage to alternate parties is a good one. It is no surprise that the dominant parties ignore them and the reasons for that are obvious.

You do, I suppose, know that the Commission of Presidential Debates is a private organization that is wholly owned by the Republicans and the Democrats, jointly.

I cannot fathom why Jill – or any other candidate – would expect such an organization to welcome 3rd party inclusion in debates that they pay for. It is pretty clear that the rules they’ve established for inclusion in such debates are intended to see to it that they, and they alone, benefit by such rules. Yawn…… so what else is new?

Hi Lyle!

Kosh,
Well sir, as I had mentioned and as you have stated in your comment above, you DID use “we” in more than one manner and switched back and forth between “we” and “I” rather often enough to confuse.

You have numbered some parts of your comment so I’ll refer to those numbers….
1- You mention the 2000 election. This is flatly against YOUR own rules. You demanded that any comments on your bog be within the premises that you established. You have complained bitterly about commenters who did not, in your eyes, stay within the parameters you set. But you yourself didn’t stay within those parameters on your blog and you’re stepping outside them again here.

You have tried to make people ask only the questions you approved of while trying to show that your idea – that it is preferable to vote Dem than Green - was not necessarily a good one. Now, my friend, you just can’t do that. If people are only permitted by you to use YOUR points, then they can hardly be expected to arrive at any conclusion different to yours.

You demand that commenters either declare your points irrelevant or your conclusions wrong. As I said in my blog yesterday; given ONLY your points, your conclusions are quite correct. But there are points – apparently many of them – that you did not raise. And those points can indicate that your conclusions are not always correct.

2- This is flat out erroneous. I pointed out that 1 vote out of 50,000,000 votes does not have as much power as 1 vote out of 5,000 votes. There is nothing there to indicate that one should not vote because that vote makes no difference.

3- Who said that the number of voters likely to vote green is insignificant? Votes ALWAYS signify something. In fact a vote that the Greens get is substantially MORE significant in many ways than the same single vote for a party that draws large numbers of votes. The loss of 1 vote – 1/50,000,000th of its total votes – to the Dems is obviously not as important as the gaining of 1 vote – 1/5,000th of its total vote – to the Greens. (Numbers shown are not accurate and are for illustration purposes only)

Bringing up what Mark’s position was, on a blog of yours, is an example of you doing here just exactly what you ranted about others doing on your blog. Please sir, either establish your ethical right to ignore YOUR OWN rules when here or get rid of them on your blogs. You can’t have it both ways.

Kosh,
Everybody in the whole world has a vital interest in American politics. Not, I assure you, because we want to. Rather it is necessary because American governments, along with American businesses, blatantly interfere with both the governing and the economics of other nations in a grossly inappropriate way.

I happen to take a greater than usual interest in American politics. As a non-American, I’ll not claim to understand it to any unusual extent, but I will say that judging by many of the OS blogs and comments that I read, I am better informed about much of your politics than the majority of your own citizens! But then that’s not very hard, given the abysmal lack of political savvy on the part of citizens of the US. The same, I’m sad to say, applies to the citizens of my country.

All in all:
1- You have not convinced me that it is at all necessary to vote for Obama in order to stop Romney.
2- You have not convinced me that voting for expediency is preferable to voting your conscience.
3- And you have not convinced me that your vote is as important to the Dems as it would be to the Greens.

Your position might have strength if this were to be the last election ever held. That would mean that a defeat for the Republicans would be a forever defeat. The facts are that the Republicans are highly likely to win at some time in the not-too-distant future. So either you deal with them now, while they’re having internal problems with their Tea Party cadre, or you deal with them later when they are internally stronger.

The shifts to the right that the Democrats have made over the last 4 or 5 decades cannot be corrected by voting for them when they’ve just made yet another major shift to the right; a vote for them now just indicates approval of those right-ward shifts. Heck man, the Democrats are now somewhere to the right of where the Republicans were under Ike! This tells both the Dems AND the Repubs that the population supports a right-ward shift. If this keeps up the Dems will soon be as far to the right as the Repubs – whom you wish to defeat at all costs, including your conscience – are now! They’re already waaaaay too far right. Are you prepared to reward them with your vote for moving to the right like that?


Dr. Bramhall,
Thank you for telling us about that debate of 3rd party candidates. I’ll repeat your listing of the URL for sponsorship of it, but I’ll make it a ‘live’ click-on link…..
FREE & EQUAL DEBATE


Kosh,
Mark did what YOU DID. His “laundry list” is no different than yours except that it disagrees with yours.


Libby,
There is no head of state anywhere who can afford to abide by the rule of “Thou Shalt Not Kill” unless, and until, ALL OTHER heads of state agree to abide by the same rule. That any head of state will use military action to “protect its interests” (whether those “interests” are legitimate or not) is a given in our world. Like you and Mark, and many others, I’d like for that not to be so. Were I a voting American, I’d vote for any party that would forego that particular instrument.


Whew!
I hope I didn’t miss anybody…….. ;-)
My thanks to everybody who commented and my SPECIAL THANKS to kosh and libby for their major contributions. Peace.
.

"I gave him an honest, specific answer, though apparently not the one he wanted, and I defended my answer in a subsequent comment."

It is not that you didn't give me the answer that I wanted, it is that you evaded my question and answered things that were tangential to my question. In essence you obscured my question in favor of reconstructing it into questions you derived and then answered your own questions.

I set some parameters. I asked a single question concerning four hypothetical characters and asked who you would vote for.

I didn't ask for you to elaborate on my scenario, which is all that you did. Basically you engaged in a solo match of ping-pong, while refusing to address my question.

I'll start with Mark.

If I were faced with an election between Hitler and Goering, voting would be superfluous. I would think that my saying that I would attempt to emigrate or to join or found a resistance movement should indicate that voting would not be my inclination but, in case that wasn't clear, I'll clarify: I wouldn't vote.

Not as a matter of conscience, but because there would be no utility to it. At least not as presented.

Sky,

Firstly, giving me crap about first person pronouns, particularly after I give you a step by step tour of what I was doing, is superfluous. If you want to give me a hard time for the Hell of it, fine, I guess, but that's all it looks like.

The 2000 election? That's background to make a particular point, that point being that the last time many in the American electorate claimed that there were no significant differences between the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates, they turned out to be seriously wrong. It is relevant to this discussion because the claim that there are no significant differences between the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates is central to this discussion. That claim doesn't have the best recent history, and pointing that out is certainly germane.

The point behind my talking about rules is actually simpler than it appears to sound to you. One of the most significant arguments here, if not the single most significant argument, is that there aren't significant differences between the candidates, certainly not significant enough to warrant voting for either. Because the question of significant differences is absolutely critical to this argument - see my rationale and the rationale of an awful lot of my commenters, plus a few other blogs, such as those by Tom Cordle and the recent one by Abrawang - I wanted to make sure that whoever disputed my conclusions didn't gloss over what differences there actually are. That is, of course, what all of them/you have done anyway. I just want you to acknowledge the consequences of your actions. If Romney gets elected and your vote could have prevented that, which I'm afraid in this case means a vote for Obama and not for Stein, is it your contention that the differences between the candidates in the areas of

women's rights
gay rights
the economy in general
military spending
insurance for the poor and elderly
support for renewables
Supreme Court nominees

are insufficient to justify a vote for Obama in order to keep Romney out of office?

This is not a predetermined answer. I do not intend it to be. I will not give you a hard time for saying "yes, those differences are insufficient to justify a vote for Obama; I'd rather take the hits in all those areas than vote for Obama." We will agree to disagree, but at least I'll be sure you at least looked at those differences rather than dismissing them out of hand.

This sounds silly, but after over 120 comments so far, no one has said that. Why they're shy about saying this, I don't know.

They have an alternative. They could say "the differences you're referring to are all exaggerated and it is for that reason that voting for Obama is not worth it."

OK. That's a case. However, if that's your case, please make it.

In essence, the strategem I've seen over and over is to take a case which appears to be quite popular with most of my readers and......ignore it. Not answer it, ignore it.

That's all I'm trying to avoid.

As to your three points, I will give you the courtesy of answering them, which is a Hell of a lot more than I got from you on my blog. Not that it matters in this case, because you aren't going to vote for Obama under any circumstances - you can't. Or for Stein, for that matter. But OK,

1. If you think it's theoretically possible to stop Romney by voting for Stein or anyone other than Obama in this election, you don't know enough about American politics. Really.

2. I'm not expecting you to agree with me about voting for someone who has been, in key respects, awful. I wrote a pair of posts about moral ambiguity, and what I found was that most people didn't grasp what I was telling them, not that I expected most of them to agree with me, but I did expect most of them to understand that they actually were looking at moral dilemmas rather than moral expediency.

3. I don't understand why you're raising this point at all. I don't care whether a vote is important to the Greens, I care whether it's important to the result.

Kosh,
I, and a great many others CANNOT respond sensibly to your points because you do not allow that to happen!

Your title is: Why I'm going to vote democrat (and not Green) - if I recall correctly.

But your blog does NOT speak to that title. It goes all over the place giving your reasons for not voting - or much liking - the Republicans.

Aside from tossing the Greens a wee bone by stating that you'd prefer to vote Green but are so fearful that the Repubs might win that you are going to vote Dem so as to stop them.

Then you gave a laundry list of reasons why you will (and others ought to?) vote Dem instead of Rep and yet y0u insisted that other people "stay on topic" in their replies. Which topic? - The one in your title or the one in your blog?

How the fuck is it possible for either? Or rather how is that possible without just agreeing with you? You name your topic then blather on about another topic. You're doing the same thing here on my blog. Your list.....

women's rights
gay rights
the economy in general
military spending
insurance for the poor and elderly
support for renewables
Supreme Court nominees

....... says nothing about the Dem's policies on these topics. Nor does it say anything about the Green's policies on these matters. It's just a friggin' list!

But then you have the temerity to tell commenters that they must 'answer' one or both of two questions without going 'off topic' and raising other points that they might want to indicate affects their decision and rightly ought to affect yours too!

Now look Kosh. You set everybody up with your blog. By trying to bind everybody to your premises and conclusions, without letting them introduce other points, you effectively said, "If you answer my question without agreeing with me, then you're outside the parameters that I set."

Now put your smug arrogance back in its hole in your heart and try to understand a simple concept. "When you title a topic, you must speak to that title." You might add the corollary, that when you raise a topic for discussion you may not then tell people how they must answer it.

I notice that in your great exposition here, you've seen fit to ignore the points that I raised. Then you dare to say to me that "you'll do me the courtesy of answering my points.!" On MY fuckin' blog?! Your chutzpah know no bounds!

So, leaving all bombast - yours and mine - aside....

You have made no good case for voting Dem if, as you have stated, your preference is Green.

1- Your vote will clearly NOT be the deciding vote.

2- Your Electoral College will take care of that.

3- The expected number of votes for the Dems is waaaay more than sufficient to ensure a return of Obama to the presidency and that too will take care of that.

So put your ego away and vote your conscience. That will, as I've already shown - and you declined to answer - have more of an actual effect - if not an electoral one, than burying your one little vote in the tens of millions of other votes the Dems can expect.

In either case, your vote won't stop the Republicans from getting elected. Nor will it cause the Dems to get elected.

And keep in mind Mr. America, if you ever again take a swipe at me, on a blog of mine, for the fact that I'm Canadian, I'm going to blister your ass for you but good! Do that on your own blog if you wish - do it here again and you'll never get a comment left up on a blog of mine in the next hundred years. Your rudeness will NOT be tolerated here! This blog flies the CANADIAN flag, and don't you forget it!

PS
Any further comment you care to make here had better be polite and mannerly or it'll be deleted as soon as I see it. The same goes for your cronies.

.

Conscience??? Where was I when he said that? If he did say it, then, I can assure one and all that he moth-balled it for future considerations.

Let's call out posse: Oh where, oh where has kosh's missing conscience gone, of where could it be?

LOL over the concept or kosh ever having had a conscience.

I ran a quick check on Wikipedia to see what they had to say about Nader's role in the 2000 election - in this case the article on Nader himself. There are apparently conflicting accounts, which figures. The Progressive Review apparently did a study in 2002 in which they conclude, through pre-election polling, that Nader did not disproportionately affect one side. However, the article also states:

"Nader, both in his book Crashing the Party and on his website, states: 'In the year 2000, exit polls reported that 25% of my voters would have voted for Bush, 38% would have voted for Gore and the rest would not have voted at all.'"

Now, this does not prove that Nader was responsible for the 2000 election results. The contention that if Gore had inspired more of his own base he'd have won is absolutely valid. However, it does point to the idea that the role of Nader as an alleged spoiler is not an unambiguous canard. Though I believe Nader himself thought the idea of himself as spoiler was way off base, these are Nader's numbers. This is not to assign responsibility to Nader for Gore's loss, but there is a strong possibility that said responsibility can be assigned, at least in part, to some of Nader's voters who had the opportunity to keep Bush from office. Now, in all fairness, we did not have a clue in 2000 just how bad a president Bush would turn out to be; I doubt any observer in either party would have predicted his leaving a mess of quite this magnitude.

I should insert something about the Green Party in 2012: Given the discussions we're seeing here on OS, the contention that the Greens would draw as much from Republican voters as from Democratic voters strikes me as absurd. I'm hearing a whole lot of "Vote for Stein instead of Obama" as opposed to "Vote for Stein as opposed to Romney." I suppose I could ask Arthur or Uncle Chri if they've been approached by Green advocates seeking votes, but I have my doubts.

I brought Nader up on my own post for two reasons. One is for his possible role as a spoiler, the other for his contention that there was no difference between the two candidates. That contention turned out to be frighteningly off base. I am not arguing that there were not key similarities between Gore and Bush, as I am not arguing that there are not key similarities between Obama and Romney. The question in neither case is Are there similarities? but Are there differences that are significant enough to warrant voting for one in spite of our objections to both?

What I am hearing from the politically involved people on OS whose analysis I trust most is Absolutely to the point of You've Got To Be Kidding. And I'm pretty much hearing that from all of them.

What I'm hearing from those who are supporting Stein are No, the similarities shared by the two major party candidates are so horrific that a vote for either is insanity. (And, in case any of you had any doubts, in the course of last night's debate, the Obama policy that Romney supported virulently was.............drones. In other words, Obama is really, really unlikely to be worse than Romney in this respect. To put things in what I guess would be Mark's language, the choice is between a war criminal and a war criminal wannabee.)

But there's a problem here:

A vote for Stein doesn't actually prevent anything.

I'm sorry, but it doesn't, because she doesn't have enough of a shot, in addition to which voting for her in this election isn't even the best way to build the Green base. Voting for her is a gesture.

So, I'm faced with a choice, as are all voters far Left of Romney:

1. Prevent something (or realistically attempt to prevent something, which is a more accurate way of putting this)

or

2. Prevent nothing.

The most logical way to make this decision is to assess the value of what it is we're trying to prevent.

And it is this assessment I can't get out of any of you. I can get global statements about how the candidates are insignificantly different, but I can't get anything detailed.

Either you think that I am exaggerating the differences I and others point out or you think that, even if I am accurate, it is better to accept the consequences of the worse outcome of these differences than to be seen as supporting either candidate.

Even though we have a secret ballot, so you don't literally have to be seen as anything.

To me it looks like a math problem. I'm trying to get as positive an outcome as I can realistically get.

Given the odds, there are two places I can put my money:

I can put gas in my car to go interview for a job I don't think I'm going to like, knowing that the only other job in the area I'm qualified for I know I'm going to absolutely hate

or I can use the money to buy a lottery ticket.

The lottery ticket provides the best potential outcome by far.

That doesn't make it the logical choice.

Your logic is busted, kosh: Provincially, you sit, yet most of the world acknowledges that obama is a war criminal:


"War crimes

The world clamored for prosecutions of those responsible for waterboarding terrorism suspects during the Bush administration, but the Obama administration said in 2009 that it would not allow CIA employees to be investigated or prosecuted for such actions. This gutted not just treaty obligations but the Nuremberg principles of international law. When courts in countries such as Spain moved to investigate Bush officials for war crimes, the Obama administration reportedly urged foreign officials not to allow such cases to proceed, despite the fact that the United States has long claimed the same authority with regard to alleged war criminals in other countries."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/is-the-united-states-still-the-land-of-the-free/2012/01/04/gIQAvcD1wP_story_2.html 

AND from the same article:

"Secret evidence

The government now routinely uses secret evidence to detain individuals and employs secret evidence in federal and military courts. It also forces the dismissal of cases against the United States by simply filing declarations that the cases would make the government reveal classified information that would harm national security — a claim made in a variety of privacy lawsuits and largely accepted by federal judges without question. Even legal opinions, cited as the basis for the government’s actions under the Bush and Obama administrations, have been classified. This allows the government to claim secret legal arguments to support secret proceedings using secret evidence."

Are you gonna' tell me with a straight face that doesn't sound chillingly just like the third reich? 

Then with your use of the word "wannabee," you admit that NOBODY knows, but you suspect romney might be as bad or worse>.

Therein lies the conundrum you can't fathom. If there is going to be a choice between someone who IS a war criminal and someone who MIGHT be a war criminal, you examine your conscience, which I contend is missing, and what my question on your blog intended to illustrate and vote your conscience.

Have you read Dr. Stein's positions? Have you taken the time to listen to her speak?

I'll have no problems answering to the future as to what I did when all these unspeakable horrors were occurring.

You, on the other hand prefer to be a good German, and let expediency guide your vote. That's why the question I posed on your blog was placed within Nazi Germany; hoping you would see the aspect of complicity. But you just don't get it, kosh, do you?

C O M P L I C I T Y!

You, of all people, who thinks so deeply about the holocaust, instead of refusing to be a part, instead actively instigate and urge others to do so.

Now, I know you're gonna' say to me there is no way to compare the holocaust to today.

Try telling that to the dead PakAfghani children and dozens of children killed in obama's uncountable wars, covert and overt.

Over the years I've been amazed by you, kosh, but never more than now; hence my last blog title: "For you who value expediency over principles and morals"

That blog was aimed squarely at you (and cordle), structured similar to your abhorrent post. cordle stopped by and said nothing of substance.

You were too busy stroking yourself over on your blog.

Ever feel ashamed of anything you've done, kosh? Presuming so, if you don't feel shame NOW, then you are a lost soul, truly.

Are we still talking about voting, or is this a contest to determine whose is bigger? I still think Kosh is correct in this matter, but I've also learned that you and Mark don't much care for Kosh. Putting his name in the title made that abundantly clear.

Lezlie

A class in reading comprehension might help, l.

Kosh,

I deleted your second comment because it was irrelevant to this discussion and I found your egoism offensive.

I let your comment prior to that stand because it is on topic and makes some points that support your position.

It seems that you saw fit to bring up - again - another past election, that had different candidates, when America - and the world - was in a different situation, and has few, if any, relevant-to-today points. Romney is NOT Bush; Obama is NOT gore; and Nader is NOT Stein. I have pointed this out before now.

You went back over your original post's main points while desperately trying to paint my objections to it as misrepresenting your attitude toward Democrats. I have never even hinted that you might be in love with the democrats. one of MY main points has revolved around you NOT loving the Democrats; remember me mentioning that you ought to vote your conscience?

I have repeatedly objected to your arrogant claim that your "logic" was irrefutable. I have pointed out that you set up an "if this - then that" situation that disallowed others the right to enter new or different points from which they might argue your conclusions.

I point blank said - and you copied it yourself in one of your comments - that "given the premises of your argument, the conclusion you reach is the only one possible. IF your premises are the ONLY relevant ones!"

My objections are NOT about the minutiae of your blog. Nor are they about the accuracy of premises you establish. My objections are primarily about you not permitting anyone else to enter what they see as relevant points and then using their points to refute your conclusions. You tried to box people in to using only the points you made. Heck, you even tried to establish that there are only two ways that others can legitimately object to your premises or conclusions!!

I found your attempt to prevent any points of view that don't agree with your conclusions to be arrogant and childish. You still refuse to acknowledge that other have valid points to add to this discussion. You are grimly and determinedly hanging on to your wonderfully perfect argument, trying desperately to dismiss all other points as "not within your premises".

Of course they're not within your premises; your premises are missing a whole lot of other points! They only give the results you wanted when no other points are taken into consideration. As Dr. Bramhall pointed out, your thinking has been less than exemplary.

When I was very young, we used to have great fun posing questions to each other where we limited answers to "yes" or "no." Needless to say, the questions asked using that limitation, were designed to elicit an inaccurate, by being incomplete, answer. An example of that was the question, "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" If you said "yes" then you were admitting that you had been beating your wife and had now stopped. If you said "not" then you admitted to beating your wife still. Since you were not permitted to introduce the information that you had never beaten your wife, the wrong impression was established.

That is what you tried to do with your blog. You tried to force people to ONLY use your premises without introducing what they thought was missing information or other premises. In your arrogance, you even went so far as to state that they only had two possible answers to your conclusions.

By your disappointment that no one used your 'answers' to object to your conclusions, I see that you'd have likely had nice pat answers to hit them with if they had. I suspect that others could see that also.

You have again said that the only reason that you'll vote Democrat, whom you dislike almost as much as you dislike Republicans, is to stop Romney. All mention of the fact - yes, kosh FACT - that the small number of those who would, like you said of yourself, prefer to vote Green, but will vote Democrat for the purpose of stopping Romney, is insufficient to accomplish that purpose. Insufficient by a VERY LARGE margin!

First of all, that few who might actually do that are spread out all over the country - and it's a BIG country. Their impact on the outcome of the election will most probably be zero. Nada. Zilch. Nothing. It will be nothing more than an "unseen by anybody" grand gesture. It will part of a massive vote for the Dems and help the to think that their rightward trend over the last 4 or 5 decades is what you and everybody who voted for them wants.

Voting for Jill Stein - or any other candidate that your conscience tells you is more to your liking - offers that candidate the encouragement to keep on working hard to provide you with a stronger viable alternative to the "big two" in the future. It keeps your vote safely away from the Repubs. It encourages the development of viable alternate parties that might, in the future, offer you, and the next generations, viable alternatives. And it doesn't give the Dems the wrong idea about how much you like their swing to the right.

Your claim that voting for a party you dislike, in order to stop a party that you dislike even more, is the way to go, is based on the fallacy that your vote would make that happen. The facts don't support your conclusion that it would. The facts support the conclusion that you ought to put your support on helping build a viable alternative to those you dislike so that you and your progeny might not have to face this dilemma in the future.

And don't even think about getting on my case for taking you on in regard to your blog. I tried to let it drop. You, twice, challenged me to show that your reasoning was in error and that consequently your conclusions were inaccurate. I stated that your reasoning was NOT in error, IF your premises were accurate and complete.

They are accurate...but not at all complete. It is in that incompleteness that you fail to prove your point.

;-)

L in the Southeast,
I can't speak for Mark, but I can tell you that I like Kosh just fine. I also have great respect for him. That doesn't mean that I'll agree with very opinion he expresses or that I wan't call him on what I see as errors.

In fact, it is due to my respect for him that I took him and his blog seriously and pointed out to him where I think he is blowing it. The only time I lost respect for him was when he tried to imply that my nationality makes me ineligible to comment on an American election - does he think we select government leaders up here by "trial by combat" or something?

I twice mentioned that I was making every effort to take great care to differentiate between the differences in the electoral systems of our two countries.

American politics effect people in every country in the world, one way or the other - mostly the other - and so are followed by a great many people. This is specially true here in Canada. We are the economic tail on the US dog. When you fall in the river, we get wet too, so our interest is great!

As to kosh claiming that I'd need to live there before I could understand American politics: he might profitably have asked me if I ever have lived in the US, and for how long. Instead he just assumed that I hadn't. He can be a tad too handy with assumptions at times. I am 71 years old. It is not outside the realm of possibility - depending upon his age - that I have lived in the US for LONGER than he has.

;-)
.

I know kosh better than some may presume, and I don't like him. Our initial encounter was on horrid barbara joanne's blog, when he and the lying, always malevolent, the traveler, were discussing mideast affairs.

kosh is stubborn and not noted for apologies (nor is the traveler). kosh made the despicable contention that the intifada was pre-planned by the Palestinians. I labeled his words hasbara (israeli propaganda) to which he took great umbrage.

It was after I presented numerous sources indicating that the second intifada was a spontaneous reaction to an march on the Holy Mount by Ariel Sharon intentionally designed to arouse the Palestinians (so israel could wreak swift and hard "punishment" on them, and the fact that elections were but several months hence was a major factor in sharon's thinking; an election that he won - no coincidence there!) , that kosh conceded the point - no apology, but concession to FACTS.

After a short while, we corresponded regularly via PMs. I learned much about kosh's personal life and personality. I learned that when he is wrong he is loathe to admit it, but prefers to fight and maintain his position.

I have at times confessed to being wrong to kosh about a detail. he has only conceded a point when faced with irrefutable evidence. Note I said conceded a point, not admitted to being wrong.

This stubborn insistence of being right resembles that of fRANK, and I find it repulsive and despicable. I tried to cultivate a friendship, so to enhance honest dialogue with him and failed - bear in mind our PM relationship lasted several years and was relatively frequent.

I thin I know him better than anyone, other than the reprehensible blog-whore wolfman, and what I've learned is that he, despite his veneer of flexibility, is EXTREMELY inflexible and intolerant of others and their perspectives.

Mark and Sky et al., you seriously took it to the mattresses! Valiant work for sure.

I have shared I consider trying to refute "pragmatic" political strategy with bottom line morality are trying to make skew lines meet.

I'll go with bottom line morality. Decency. Dems are compromising on fundamentals. We discovered that the hard way after Obama won and the Books of Cheney and Greenpan were still being followed. corporate cronyism and profiteering uber alles. We must not reward the Dems until they stop compromising the fundamentals.

Obama has normalized high crimes and misdemeanors!

I do despair about my fellow Obama apologizers but I am glad I have a candidate whose principles I admire. Who is honorable and earnest and committed to humanity and the planet. By the time the Obamabots catch up ... well, that is a grim visualization and it is hard to forgive them.

Media branding has done so much in blinding so many to Obama's amoral and incompetent leadership. But those not blind but superciliously politically strategic factoring out morality are even harder to forgive.

best, libby

oops., correction, verb should be is not are in that sentence about skewed lines. sorry. :-)

libby,
If you'd like to correct your boo-boo, go ahead and repost your comment with the correct verb. Then I'll delete the one with the error.......Sky

sky, thanks for being so classy. I'll let it stand as a reminder to me to proof more! best, libby

Naughty, naughty, Libby!

:-)