Posts made by Smacktard

Tricky question. What if you foiund out your kid is going to have cerebral palsy? You may be morally bound to correct the problem through genetics.

Would it be wrong to tweak my kids genes so he has blond hair? Probably not. Make it a boy instead of a girl? Genius instead of average? Musical prodigy? Gifted athelete?

The problem I see going down this road is parents “customizing” their children. And what if the parents aren’t happy with the outcome? Who are they going to blame? themselves or the child they thought would be “best” for them?

Theyre so similar its splitting hairs.

Egoism is fascinting though. Is it possible to do a nonselfish act? Or is everything we do to gain pleasure/avoid pain? Even a mother sacrificing her life for her child could be viwed as a selfish act- deep down, maybe she knows she can’t live with the guilt of letting her child die. So even self-scarifice is guided by the pain/pleasure principle.

@a44bigdog:

Obama’s stance on the 2nd Amendment will not get him very far in the south.

Dems don’t even need the South to win anymore. The population centers in this country are all on the E. and W coasts.

Look here: http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/results/electoral.college/

See that sea of red? All Kerry needed to win was Ohio.

Winning New York, Califonria, Pennslyania and New Jersey gets you 122 delegates. just those four states. and you only need 269 to win.

@Gamer:

@Smacktard:

There would be no benefit to picking Huckabee. Huckabee’s appeal is limited to the Bible Belt. Republicans have had a lock on that for years. Huckabees ultra-religious message will also not sit well with moderates and independents.

The only way Mccain can win this is if the Democrats implode and kill themselves at a brokered convention, ala 1968.

Well, it’s looking more like 1968 every day that goes by.  I don’t see Hillary quietly fading into the night if Obama continues his current momentum.  She still has hooks in a substantial number of superdelegates, and she has a BUNCH of delegates potentially available from Florida and Michigan that are not currently being counted that collectively might be enough to put her over the top.  I can easily see a scenario where neither Obama nor Clinton has won a majority of delegates going into the convention, which sets the stage for a fight to count the Florida and Michigan votes.  And, a la Gore in 2000, Hillary will cast herself as on the side of the “people” trying to make sure every vote is counted, when all she really wants is every vote FOR HER counted.

But that said, I’m not sure I agree the general election is a slam dunk for either Obama or Clinton.  McCain is a formidable general election candidate, make no mistake.  The hard part for him has always been getting by the red-meat right wingers in the party in order to secure the Republican nomination.  Barring a major catastrophe, that appears to be all but a foregone conclusion, as Huckabee is running out of “Bible Belt” states to win, Texas being the notable exception.

The superdelegates are politicians as well. If it looks like the winds of change are blowing, and Obama is the best to run against McCain, they’ll give him the nod.

Obama’s position is a bit more federalist

"He said he would support civil unions between gay and lesbian couples, as well as letting individual states determine if marriage between gay and lesbian couples should be legalized.

Barack Obama did vote against a Federal Marriage Amendment and opposed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996.

http://lesbianlife.about.com/od/lesbianactivism/p/BarackObama.htm

Also, Mccain predates Baby Boomers. Baby Boomers were born between 1946 and 1964. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_boomer

McCain was born in 1936, which is well before the baby boom generation.

@Cmdr:

You did a very good job of describing Hedonism.  You need to go back and read up more on Utilitarianism however.

If you can avoid causing harm/pain, then that trumps any level of pleasure you give by your action.

Allowing two people to die by not killing a third is the more ethical argument under Utilitarianism.  Under Hedonism, however, you should murder to save 11 lives. (The average corpse has enough material to save 11 lives, at least that’s what I’ve been told.)

Remember, this is the GREATEST GOOD.  Not how much good can be done if we just allow ourselves to do harm.  The only time it is ethical to do harm is if, and only if, all choices result in harm and then it is ethical only to do those actions that cause the least amount of harm.

Hedonism and utiliarianism are very closely related because they both place “pleasure” as the end goal. Heodnism, though, is very self-centered. Under hedonism, I should kill Bill Gates and steal all his money, to bring about the most pleasure for myselkf.

Utilitairnism is doing the act that brings about the MOST pleasure. under utilitrianism, I should kill Bill Gates and distribute his money to as many people I can to bring about the most pleasure. A utilitarian would reprimand a hedonist who simply stole the money for their own benefit- thats not bringing about the most pleasure!

Also, a hedonist would kill someone and harvest their organs for their own beneift. A utilitarian would do so with no benefit at all to themselves, as long as the number of lives saved outnumbers the people killed.

Since we usually have qualms abot killing people for theior organs (even if more lives can be saved), utilitarisnism has some problems, which is why you see “rule” and “act” utilitarinsim.

http://www.utilitarianism.com/ruleutil.htm
http://www.utilitarianism.com/actutil.htm

http://www.utilitarianism.com/hedutil.htm

I thought Bush might pull it off, but it didn’t happen. the budget deficit will be around $400 billion this year. I thought Bush might break the 10 trillion level on the national debt, but he’ll be just a little bit shy at around 9.6 trillion.

And the democrats want universal health-care, which will cost 100-200 billion a year, conservatively. enjoy it while it lasts folks, because the first baby boomer hit 65 a few months ago. Got about six more years before the well runs dry, and S.S. and Medicare start calling in their IOU’s.

There would be no benefit to picking Huckabee. Huckabee’s appeal is limited to the Bible Belt. Republicans have had a lock on that for years. Huckabees ultra-religious message will also not sit well with moderates and independents.

The only way Mccain can win this is if the Democrats implode and kill themselves at a brokered convention, ala 1968.

there are some problems with Utilitarianism. Killing Bill Gates (painlessly) and distributing a million dollars to 34000 people would make a lot of people very happy. Mr. Gates family members would suffer, and he of course would be dead, but that bit of suffering would pale in comparison to the joy of making 34000 people millionars. do you want to say that we SHOULD do that?

Also, under utilitarianism, if you can kill a person and harvest their organs to save two or more lives, you should do so. Even as theyre begging you not to kill them, utilitarianism requires you must do so, to save the most lives.

And then there is the probelm of defning “happiness”. Lets take two possible worlds: World A’s population consists of just one “happy” family. Nice, normal content people. Not a huge amount of “happiness”.
World B has a billion sado-masochists with 24 hour access to nonstop torture porn.
Just by sheer numbers, the amount of “happiness” in World B would eclipse the amount in World A. If we had to choose which world to make real, utilitarianism tells us we should make world B the actual world.

because of some of these problems, utilitarianism has split into two camps: act and rule utiliatarianism. And theres also “consequentalism”, which doesnt focus on pleasure or happiness as much as the consequences of an act.

Whatever happened to personal respbsility? did these people have guns to their heads when they signed their mortgage papers? The rest of us shouldnt be punished by higher taxes for the stupidity of others.

thats not to minimize the crisis (which is very much real). a drop in equity directly correlates to decreased consumer spending, and the credit/insurance crisis is still inthe opening act.

but thats not to say we should print money and hand it to people (which is essentiuallu what the “Stimulus package” is). if the people i work with are any indication of the public, the money from those rebate checks in june will go straight to china and Japan. Hello Sony Flatscreen!

On the Republican side, Illinois has 70 delegates http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P08/IL-R.phtml#0205
Florida normally has 114 (cut in half this year to 57).

Not exactly “four times more”.

@Cmdr:

Campaign Finance Reform
No Child Left Behind
Minimum Wage Increases
Colin Powell
Scooter Libby
Karl Rove
Denny Hastert
Albert Gonzalez
etc

Like those pieces of liberal legislation, and unwarranted attacks on persons to get them to retire instead of doing their job.

Youre kidding right? Scooter Libby was part of the democratic agenda? Prosecuted by a Republican, convicted by a jury, commuted by Bush. Was duke cunningham also part of the democratic agenda? Jack abramof? Larry “wide stance” Craig? Tom “the hamper” Delay? Was Nixon also part of the Dem agenda? i’m not sympatheitc to the Dems, but this is pretty lame.

And what on Earth do Karl Rove and colin Powel have to do with the demoicratic agenda? Alberto gonzales was caught lying so many times he was practically forced out of office.

This is what the dems want: socialized medicine, retreat in iraq, higher taxes, amnesty, and repeal of the Patriot Act. Thats essentially their core platform. The list you gave was nonsnse. Bush has been a failure, but its his veto pen and the republican margin in the senate has stopped the dems cold. they made all these promises to get elected in 06 and one has come to pass: a meaningless minimum wage hike.

If they capture the presidency and keep congress, their agenda (the real agenda, not the “unwarranted personal attacks”) will finally be realized.

@Cmdr:

Democrats were in the minority from 2000-2006 and got everything they wanted passed.

:?

Like increasing the minimum wage? universal coverage? timestables on iraq? tax increases? dont kid yourself- they already passed one of those. if they get the presidency, the other three will follow. the only thing stopping the dem agenda is the 60 vote margin in senate and Bushs veto pen.

hillary far left??? she voted for Iraq, vowed to keep troops in iraq for years when shes president, voted to label the iranian revolutionary guard as a terrost organization and has taken more money from defense lobbyists than any other candidate AND publicky defended taking money from lobbyists.

if edwards stays in it, hillary takes the nomination.

@Cmdr:

@Guerrilla:

I don’t think your thread was deleted for it’s originality or initial post but for content posted after it…

GG

Usually it’s locked, not deleted. :P

Wonder who said what in my thread!  Anyway, was just offended that someone was getting credit for the idea I posted yesterday.

I wouldnt lose any sleep over it if I were you.  :lol:

So the answer to our 9 trilion $ national debt is collect on loans from europe from 60 and 90 years ago? and if they dont pay I guess well point some ICBMs at them?

Frances budget last year was 300 billion euros. Germany’s was 260 billion. Britain recently paid off its ww2 debt.

since were in lala land, how would the repayment schedule for these countries look?

Another whippersnapper mouths off. Jk  :lol: you’;re right. still a 22 yr old has only lived in the real world a short while. theres much to learn young jedi.

The dollar is a mjor concern. did you see the Canadian dollar passed us up? we NEED countries to buy our bonds & fund our extravagent spending. if they start dumping dollars, were screwed.

I was glancing through the have/ have not discussion. 25% of the homeless are vets.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,309416,00.html
unbelievble that we would let our veterans down in such a way. i guess they should have invested in the market.

the problem with just looking at the post-9/11 post recession recoevry of the dow is that its short term thinking. Had the dow dropped to 2,000, then rebounded back to 4,000, jen would probably declare it a victory (its more than doubled its value!). looking at the picture long-term, it would be a disaster. long-term views lead to different conclusions:

historically the dow averages 9% growth. from the peak of the bull market of the 90s (11700), the dow has done horribly. its grown 1% in the LAST EIGHT YEARS.

Now part of that is a natural corection to an artifical run-up during the 90’s. but as NCS pointed out, there are fundamentals of the econonmy that are troubling. if we want to look short-term, as Jen likes to:
DOW near end of 2003: 11,000
DOW near end of 2007: 13,000
16% growth over a 4 year period. well below the historic 9% growth rate per year.

and the dow is only one component of the picyture. Median income still hasn’t recoverd from 1999. thats far more telling than how the corporate world is doing. offhand, I cant think of a time period where median income has been stagnant for such a long period of time (8 years). maybe during the late 70’s-early 80’s? that is troubling for a consumer driven economy like ours, with housing collapsing and gas skyrocketing.

Balung, youre 22. I was voting for Reagan before you were born. grow a little chest hair before you question my belifs.

As a side note, isnt intetersting how everyone on the internet is as good as Warren Buffet, but in real life most people carry thousands in credit card debt and cant balance a checkbook? funny how that is.

@Cmdr:

Especially considering that the original poster most clearly wanted this to be a political slam against the current administration given his time frame, which he probably forgot actually hits the last TWO administrations. :P

I’m not talking politics, never was.

please leave my thread. you contradct yourself, have nthing useful add and hve the colosal ego to assume that everyone who ignores you agrees with you.

sometimes its just not worth the time.

@Cmdr:

not currently the 11th Hour of the 11th Day of the 11th Month where I am, but happy Veteran’s Day to all of us Veterans!

Tomorrow is the remembrance for the banks, at least in my area.  Funny, some snot nosed brat who barely passed high school and knows how to use a calculator gets the day off, but I have to go to work.  :|

But hey, maybe I’ll ditch….nah, I can’t tomorrows my Red Cross Certification Exam, sigh…I can’t even play hooky!

arent you a teacher?  :?