John McCain vs Barack Obama Mega-Politic-Thread of super fun awesomeness.

[Kolar]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZ9bP_AqHPg

"I'm 65, and I've been covering politics... for a long time. That is one of the most pathetic pieces of tape I have ever seen for someone aspiring for one of the highest offices in this country." -Cafferty

[Galleleo]

The problem is that I don't try to "learn" a theory or idea or set of ideas. When it boils down to it I'm trying to make sense of things. Don't tell me I'm wrong because your book on economics said so - tell me I'm wrong because there's actually something wrong with what I said.

Actually, my book on economics assumes people are fully rational, and the economic theory (including capitalism) is based on this. I am telling you people are only bounded rational. I refer to Herbert Simon: Administrative Behaviour. I am telling you that a free market cannot work because people are bounded rational and thus are not capable of making the choices you would need to make for a free market to exist.

In that thread about healthcare or hospitals, or something, I gave you far more names and links about this. Here are some people who have done research into this, including Nobel Prize Winners: Daniel Kahneman, George Loewenstein, Amos Tversky, Colin Camerer, David Liabson.

Epi, if you are interested in Economics but don't consider it a real science because there is no experimenting, you might wanna check out above names too, they all work in the field of Behavioural and Experimental Economics. They take economic theories and test their assumptions. I can get you guys some articles about this, meaning I have published articles on my laptop if you want to know more about it.

[Galleleo]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZ9bP_AqHPg

"I'm 65, and I've been covering politics... for a long time. That is one of the most pathetic pieces of tape I have ever seen for someone aspiring for one of the highest offices in this country." -Cafferty

Dude, I saw that SNL skit on this interview and I thought that skit was highly overplayed and stuff.. but wtf, all they needed for the skit was to copy her exact words. She makes no sense at all.

[Soul Survivor]

Biden won. Palin came off as less of an idiot during the last part of the debate.

[the_paul]

Definitely safe to say that Biden got the upper hand here. The only part I caught personally was the first hour or so, and it was a no contest during that part. I hear Palin picked it up a bit at the end, though.

[Squeezer]

Pretty meh-worthy debate. No sparks but I guess that went right to plan for both campaigns. Biden is more informed than Palin and I think that came across. Sarah Palin is good at looking good and she knows it (smiling while she talks, winking at the camera, etc.). That was her best weapon tonight.

She didn't look like the buffoon everyone expected.

[Jerome Scuggs]

I am telling you that a free market cannot work because people are bounded rational and thus are not capable of making the choices you would need to make for a free market to exist.

but it does exist

so either your book is wrong

or reality is wrong

i'm gonna go with the former, as otherwise my existence would be, how do you say it, a lie

what you seem to fail to understand is that the particular school of economics i subscribe to took all these complaints you have about traditional economic schools of thought and turned them on their head. how many economics books have you read lately that reference Immanuel Kant? the only thing i assume is that humans do, in fact, act. how, why, and for what motives is up to the individual actor.

if i held the notion that all humans are rational then i'd reach the same conclusions as you. but i don't. as a matter of fact, 99% of my arguments against socialism/government/etc usually stem from the fact that humans are very (objectively) un-rational, which is why trying to plan and organize human activity will never work.

edit: and when you say "the free market will never work", what you mean is "the free market will never work like i want it to". the free market rarely, if ever, creates the sort of catastrophes that are the result of government intervention into a free market. trying to "plan" it or "use" the free market to attain "social goals" is the very sort of thing thing that assumes all humans are (objectively) rational, which is why it fails accordingly. if you'd like to argue that bounded-rational humans can never ultimately make the rational choices needed to make a free market work - i'll have that discussion, easy.

[Zerzera]

Most of the social aspects of our government are creating buffers for any mishap, be it by accident, human beings or by nature. There is nothing wrong in that unless you are superstitious and believe that people only get struck by misfortune because of incompetence or wrongdoing.
Free market doesn't even exist in nature.

Jerome can you explain to me how you would go about putting a free market in place. Because people have been able to make claims on recourses wether is has been by robbing or simply first come first serve. But what justifies their claims? In order to start a free market you would have to destroy the current systems world wide. How would you distribute worldy recources? Would it have to be revenue sharing to a certain amount? Any human being should be allowed to make a claim on worldly or cosmic recourses. Nobody legally owns them now because they were aquired in an unfair system. And so buying them would be buying them from every human being -ever- from now on.
And what about technology that we already aquired?

[Money]

why do these threads always devolve to Euros explaining American political culture?

edit: case and point.



This is not an accurate statement regarding US Politics since the late 70s-early 80s.

SO. FUCKING. TRUE.


sick of it since when have we EVER gave a fuck or discussed their countries affairs, never cuz they fucking bore us.

[Zerzera]

SO. FUCKING. TRUE.


sick of it since when have we EVER gave a fuck or discussed their countries affairs, never cuz they fucking bore us.

But I do care what you think, I even want to know how you think of the world you call Houston. That's why I am on these forums, it's not like I can have a decent conversation with you, I don't relate with anything you do or are.
I am not a conservative, I'm not in construction. I detest; weapons, gangster rap, fucking in the back of a car, doing drugs and acting like I'm something that I am not. I am not a nationalist, I am against war, abortion and the death penalty. I don't own a truck.
You don't know how to debate, most of your comments are off topic, uninformed and badly formed. Even I sound more coherent than you at times in a language that is yours. And I care more about the foreign policies or the policies that affect my pension funds than you obviously do.

But I don't hold it against you, I don't think I ever commented on it before, and often I am amused by you.

Am I not free to discuss these matters whenever I want? I believe I live in a free country and this forum is based in a free country and this is the right section to discuss matters the way that I discuss them, whether you feel it or not.

It's not really that it's always America vs Europe. Many times it has been Canada vs America and even China vs America. And had we had more 'nationalities' on these forums no doubt we would have had these kind of threads too.

Now if you would like to stop trolling Europeans, thank you.

[Liquid Blue]

Pretty meh-worthy debate. No sparks but I guess that went right to plan for both campaigns. Biden is more informed than Palin and I think that came across. Sarah Palin is good at looking good and she knows it (smiling while she talks, winking at the camera, etc.). That was her best weapon tonight.

She didn't look like the buffoon everyone expected.

Biden couldn't have made any huge sparks because he would have looked like a bully and lost voters. People know she's a dumbass, they don't want him to needlessly grind that point home, or brag about his level of experience.

Ever since the Katie Couric interview Palin has been told to memorize a list of talking points, and otherwise shut the fuck up and smile at the camera. Alot of the time she wouldn't answer the question, but rather turn it into a bridge that leads to one of her talking points. She's such a dumb bitch, especially when she said Bidens wife gets a spot in heaven for being a teacher.

[Cops]

Zerz is half right, no one has to give us permission to talk about American politics. What happens in China affects us, what happens in America also affects us. I don't believe my small nation really affects anyone but you have to realize Canada and America are humongous trading partners, so what happens in America really affects the Canadian economy. So of course I have a stake in this election, American stability goes hand in hand with Canadian stability.

Zerz justs needs to be less of a douche and not blame every citizen in America for a single administrations failings.

Money; If you were in Zerz's position you'd talk about American politics too, your countries decisions affect everyone. When your economy is in the shitter, we're in the shitter here too bro. Just because smaller European countries may not play a large role in the world does not mean these countries are somehow less important, these countries much like my own have rich history and a strong unique culture. Maybe Canada can't compare to the culture aspect of these countries, but I hope you get what I'm trying to say. The world is more than just the United States of America, I hope you realize this.

[404 Not Found]

Not that I care if people outside the U.S. comment on our election and govt. problems we face in the States. I also do the same for other countries....just look at the UK and the Gordon Brown PM status...will he survive or get ousted?

Too many people living in the States, that have never been outside the States, let alone the state they live in, have closed minds as to what & how other countries, governments & people view the U.S. in general.

It's especially interesting to hear it from our Canadian neighbors, as the impact on what happens here will have direct impact on their country as well in many areas.

[Zerzera]

Zerz justs needs to be less of a douche and not blame every citizen in America for a single administrations failings.

I just don't agree with that, and how does it make me a douche? I also think that we as Dutch people (government) may have to make up for things we did wrong long time ago if we haven't yet.
Like the Goudstikker case, slavery in our 'golden century' or screwing over colonies.
If you judge your enemies by that standard, at least judge yourself by the same. It's a little easy to shrug and say that you just didn't vote for that particular president. That's just no excuse a minority always rules if you let them. The statement was lost on you.

[Jerome Scuggs]

I'm at work so I can't go into the rest - but I do have an answer, it's just long. In the meantime, here's some food for thought:

Free market doesn't even exist in nature.

Neither does "society". Yet here we are. How?