Babak, the fantasy Republican part that does not exist can only exist by reforming and supporting the current Republican party. Sadly. What true Republicans want is not what is available, but the shortest distance between NOW and FANTASY is party reform, and not a new party or supporting/empowering the opposite ideology.

On NPR... I really like them and yes they are academic.. which is beautiful. And they do a pretty good job of representing both sides and really seem to care what people have to say... I'm just saying they clearly lean left, and you can be pretty sure that all NPR newspeople are probably liberal. I still like their stuff though I mean, I lean liberal myself so I'm pretty much right in agreement most all the time. I love NPR... I love it a lot. Lol.

Um... and honestly my opinion is that higher education does indeed cause a lot of people to become more liberalized. And why not?

@Van Jones Comment: This is per wikipedia: webdiplomacy.net/forum.php?threadID=476223#476223

1. He was part of 911Truth.org which said the US government bombed the World Trade Towers
2. He says he is a communist
3. He joined a Marxist revolutionary group focusing on revolutionary democracy, third world communism, and other things (typically non-American)

He has some good accomplishments if you believe in/agree with the 'green' movement. And if you don't, he's made his mark on racial equality.

But in no way would I ever ever in a million years consider him an American Hero. List your top American Heroes and he won't hold a prayer to them.

A good person, sure. Not a hero though.

well, for one thing i hate how much debt our country is in and all the democrats seem to want to do is spend more and more money :/

the biggest issue for me is abortion, and it's such a big issue for me that i could never vote for someone who supported it

politics is not the ambition of my life though - i seek change through christianity rather than through government. that's not to say government doesn't have it's role, it certainly does and that is affirmed by the Bible (in fact, I would go so far as to say it is ordained by the Bible).

Just because I agree with republicans on those issues doesn't mean they're necessarily that much better than democrats :/ our political scene is so devoid of integrity that it is laughable. Of course, looking at people like Ted Haggard you could make a similar argument against Christianity! :(

@ Steven C. A bit late on this but honestly Glenn beck is the laghing stock of Newcasting

Yeah, Beck thinks that using a sarcastic, high pitched voice is a substitute for argument, apparently he was better on radio.... my roommate says.

@ Jacob
The democratic party has a decent amount of diversity, its definitly the "big tent" party, i mean look at the blue dog democrats. Mississippi (my state) has 3 Dem. reps that are all Blue Dogs. And every one of the is against legislation supporting abortion... much to my dismay, lol.

Too bad I have to eat in a the Thad Cochran Center at my university. sigh @ awful senator. I wish Ronnie Shows could get back in the game here and run for Senate, He's a Blue Dog too if I remember correctly [/Mississippi Politics]

ag - true... but if the republican party had ANY statesmen left, they'd stand up to the Glenn Becks and Rush Limbaughs of the world. but instead, Republicans have taken to groveling at Rush's altar and kissing Palin's feet. if the party can get past this, maybe it will be worth reviving... if not, it will be subjected to the dust-bin of history just as the Whigs and Know-nothings were before them.

ag - on Van Jones... he made ONE comment about 9-11 casting doubt. he was not a full blown truther. and so what if he was... as for him being communist or marxist... at this point, many in your party are calling the likes of Arlen Specter a Marxist... so really, throwing around labels is not going to get you far anymore. What mattes is what Van Jones belives and what he has fought for... Social Justice, Environmental Justice, Equality of Opportunity, among many other efforts... and thats the thing... he's not a one-trick pony.

He is the Ralph Nader of this generation (the Nader of the 1970s not 2000 and 2004). The Nader that got us seatbelts and the like.

As for him being a hero - he is a progressive hero now... but in my opinion, he has the talent and the drive to be a National Hero on the scale of Cesar Chavez, Upton Sinclair, or even King. i agree he still has many years ahead of him.

I find that NPR has an obvious liberal bias, and I use the word ‘liberal’ here, which I usually avoid, deliberately. They don't have a *partisan* bias; they're scrupulously neutral, and you can mostly trust them on the facts. (If anything, I find they leave out more anti-corporation facts than anything else, but that's just an impression that I haven't thought through very carefully.) But when they go into commentary, especially when you move from the reporting shows like All Things Considered to the discussion shows like Fresh Air, then you can tell (or at least I can tell) that almost everybody thre views things from a liberal perspective.

Call it academic if you like, but then read this:
http://chronicle.com/article/Taking-the-Right-Seriously/48333/
This is from another publication that I think has a liberal bias (but this opinion piece is an exception) and which obviously has an academic bias. If the only thing that you've heard about ‘liberal bias’ in academia is from the likes of Glenn Beck (or even Thomas Sowell), then you will find this a great change, even if you disagree with it.

I don't think that NPR is at all aware of their liberal bias. (If they were, then they would probably correct for it, since I think that they do strive to be intellectually honest.) Just like Acosmist is not at all aware that he sounds like a complete nutter.

@ Timmi88:

>a feminist, atheist, unitarian universalist, and gay rights supporter that lives in the "bible belt" in Mississippi

You have my sympathies! I am also a feminist, atheist, UU, and gay rights supporter, but it's all right in Nebraska (the university town, Lincoln, not the western ranching areas) where we are outnumbered but do have friends. (To be honest, I no longer live in Nebraska, nor do I have the same political opinions now as I had then, although I still fit into all of the categories listed.)

@Babak. I wasn't throwing around labels. Those labels he labeled to himself. Read up on it. I don't care either way, but a real American hero (GI JOE!) doesn't call himself a communist. It's oil and water. Like I said, I don't care either way. The entire thing is a pyramid scheme in my opinion, but you can just chalk it up to mis-information, unedumication, ignorance, and religious bias. He even laughed when the White House called him about the position.

Jacob -

well, matters of faith, I can not argue with you on. We disagree on those social issues no doubt... but my point to you would be that those social issues should remain in the private lives of each American... their family, their pastors, their church... and that the Government should not cater to one set of theological beliefs over another. which would include Abortion rights (or lack there-of).

On the fiscal issues, you've got the wrong party attached to 'wasteful spending' in your mind... if one studies recent history - just the last 40 years, you can see that Republicans should not be trusted with America's fiscal purse. Reagan and W were the biggest deficit spenders in our history... Reagan and Bush the father raised taxes...

Republicans administrations have brought us the most wars, and most expensive wars. they have also brought us the most de-regulation which has cost us economically. remember, when W took office, we had a 5.5 trillion dollar debt and a $230 billion surplus (in 2000-2001 fiscal year - Clinton's last budget). when W, and his Republican Congress were done... our debt was up to $10.5 trillion (and thats before TARP and AIG)... with a $1.1 trillion deficit for fiscal year 2008-9 (Bush's last budget).


As for what Democrats have achieved for this country - the list includes the 40-hour work week. the concept of having weekends off. vacation days. workers compensation. A social safety net that provides minimal standards of living for our society including Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, the progressive income tax, pell grants and stafford loans, among other social goods.

did you know the BIGGEST detriment to American business' competitiveness in the world economy is the huge health care burden our company's carry? when our company's have to pay for their employees' health care while in every other industrial country in the world takes that cost off its employers' shoulders... you know that means? a 3-5% premium cost for Labor here in the US.

did you know that our Education system is producing some of the worst educated labor pools in the 1st world while globalization is making the labor market even more competitive. you know why? because our Education system is based on local property taxes and because our higher-education system is run for-profit instead of being accessible to our labor pool for free (as it is in most European countries).

We are woefully behind the rest of he world Jacob... and if we dont catch up - The US will NOT be a dominant force economically nor militarily in 25 year's time. If we continue down the path of Republican fiscal policy that we have pursued for 40 years now, I fear there will not be much of a country to hand off to our grand kids Jacob... I dont think we can afford NOT to follow the progressive fiscal policies that actually produce the labor pool and social safety net we need to thrive in the 21st century.

Gosh, but you guys have a different sort of conversation than I'm used to on the FB forum.
Couple of things:
1. Does ANYONE on this site take Fox News seriously? (Recommended read: Mother Night, by Kurt Vonnegut, about (among many other things) the Nazi propaganda appparatus.
2. Jacob: I am Extremely pro-choice. Nonetheless, I do not thing the abortion issue should be taken littly...it's tough..gosh knows it is. But: I think the Repubs have very little real interest in abortion. I honestly believe it's just an issue they have glommed onto to dupe well-intentioned Christians.

good old FDR!

I haven't heard the thing about the businesses in the US shouldering the cost of health care, or rather I didn't realize that was not handled in some of the single payer systems.

not handled by businesses at all in single payer systems*

I'd like the echo Phaedrus and say this is a pretty pleasant discussion... usually politics devolves into a flamewar in less that 3 posts on the internet...

TY Timm. Read Mother Night! You will love it! (Presumably, a story w/a WWII background will appeal to Dip players, and it is Brilliantly written, one of his best.)

well, let me at least respond to the abortion issue. it is not simply a theological concern. this is not an abortion thread so i will try not to make it one, but i could argue against abortion all day long without ever bringing the Bible into it...

I'm not thrilled with the Republican spending either. I think that our country's initial response to 9/11 was admirable, but we knew from the start Iraq was not responsible for 9/11 and we were quickly in a situation that was no longer about responding to 9/11... Gotta love how your boy Obama hasn't gotten the troops out though and how your "unbiased" media COMPLETELY stopped talking about it...

I'm not a fan of our educational system at all. And surely you can't be saying that we should do away with privatized higher education? In favor of what?? Wait, let me guess, the government should run it???? I'm sorry, but our government run public schools are in shambles and it is a wonder that any of our children come through there with any kind of sanity and intelligence.

health care obviously needs reform, but I feel that there has to be a better way to tackle it than to just have the government take it over. that is a disaster waiting to happen. I think one more fruitful avenue to explore would be to do something to minimize the effect that medical litigation has on healthcare costs. I'm out of my depth and expertise in that arena, though, so perhaps that idea does not have much merit. However, I don't have to be an expert on health care to know that the government isn't going to make it better by taking it over...

And are medicare, medicaid, and social security really the beacons of shining light you make them out to be? I think not! =) Our cultural stigma that we have attached to large families is doing a number on social security. We don't have enough young workers to support the baby boomers... But hey, we can always just run up our national dedebt some more I guess so that I can get my whopping $500 or so dollars when I'm old and gray and inflation has made that worth about $100 in today's money...

@phaedrus
I think you may very well be right about abortion. I saw a poll during the last election that was polling what people's top issues were. The economy was at 62%. I don't remember the rest of the list, but once they got down below 3% or so they stopped listing things.

Abortion wasn't even on the list......

It is so atrocious, and so sickening, and so downright evil it makes me want to vomit again and again. I feel that this issue is akin to slavery in terms of the moral atrocity we are committing. If we ever are able to rid ourselves of abortion I believe our descendants will look back at this time and shake their heads in amazement that we let this go on.

Personally, I am ashamed that I have not done more myself...I keep thinking that I have to get more involved in this issue that I care so much about.

Jacob...I'm pretty much a "Screaming Liberal" (to quote a Repub (son of a Physician) friend), but...but...Okay...it is a unique DNA...but...so many unique DNA spontaneously abort...God...why am I discussing this? We're supposed to be talking about Self Standoffs and Timely Stabs. Okay: To sum up. Let's keep abortion completely legal and try to create a world where keeping an unwanted pregnancy to term becomes more attractive. Guess that's about it.

Abortions went up during Bush from the Clinton era.

we're talking about Acorn - and this is a natural offshoot from that...er...ok, sorry, I hijacked another thread and turned it into an abortion debate....

sorry!! =)

"Abortions went up during Bush from the Clinton era"

I'd be interested to see your source on that. Abortions only recently dipped below the 1 million per year mark. They were at their height in the 90s.

oooh... Jacob I have so many responses to your well formulated (but I think incorrect conclusions) issues you raise... but its 1:30am here and I'm dead beat.

will write more tomorrow... i do like this discussion though ;)

well, don't hold your breath for my response - I'm going to the land of liberals tomorrow (california) and won't be back until Monday. Honestly I don't even know why I'm still up either...I should be in bed. I guess there's just been too much stress lately :( I think maybe I'll just blame my stress on Obama :P

I am going to start an abortion thread if anyone wants to debate that. You guys keep on talking about videos of acorns here.

@Phaedrus "Gosh, but you guys have a different sort of conversation than I'm used to on the FB forum. "

This forum was the reason I switched from facebook. I played my first ever game on facebook but I posted my end of game statement here because the discussion was so much better here :)
The standard of play is better here too.

@Babak - Watch it. Some of us from Greater Cincinnati are proud to call ourselves Kentuckians, but would hunt you down and torture you for implying that living anywhere in Greater Cinci means we like the Bungles ...er... Bengals. I'll take the Bears or Steelers any day over the Bungles. :-)

lol @ Draugnar... you have to go all the way to Chicago to find a team you like - ouch indeed ;P

as long as you dont say you like the Cleveland Browns, I'm fine with that (a bit of my Baltimore upbringing there)

@ Babak Only as far as Indy, or are you trying to forget that we stole your Colts.

yeah... well, that was WAY before my time... so I'm alright with that.