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keeper of the grave

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Haha, reminds me of Florida.

So why are we attacking him again? I assume the results were very much tampered with, but if you think these ridiculous results are accurate (like Raven seems to), then what are we fighting for? The people have chosen their own government, so its not like we're freeing them from oppression. And sure he's trying to get WoMD, but we already have them, don't we? We have nukes (and we're the only ones ever to have used them), we have chemical and biological weapons (and we've tested them on unknowing human subjects).... what gives us a right and not them? The only legitimate reason for invasion would be to enforce past UN resolutions that Iraq hasn't obeyed, and that would have to be done with a UN taskforce, not some rogue self-proclaimed policeman state forcefully asking permission to attack on its own.

I see little has changed in my absence. The same old favourites Penguin. A UN taskforce, novel!!! It will be just like a EU taskforce that never happened either. I guess those Europeans are not much for projecting power.

But hold on. A taskforce governed by 105 completely non-democratic nations, and 84 democratic to semi-democratic nations, excellent idea!!! Maybe we could lend Saddam a reactor too while we are at it. That is, after we have elected him to the UN human rights comission, and prosecuted Denmark for gross violations. If we were daring and progressive enough, we could even create a world wide welfare infrastructure. What do you peepz think?

That is, after we have dealt with rogue states like the United States, Canada, and Australia. We should perhaps punish France for her infidelity...Or was it INFIDELS? I forget. But you know, blowing up Indonesians and Australian tourists is the most effective resistance to the United States brutal dictatorial hegemony. Gee I think the little kids who died would have thought so too.

Lets not forget Mother Earth is partly to blame, that is why it is perfectly reasonable to blow up Super Tankers. But if you can't blast 'em, you can always kill French technicians in Pakistan. If you can't find a caucasian, just kill any Pakistani Christian.

Down with the rogues, and up with those who won a clear election majority without having to count the chits!!!

Evil Penguin

Bla bla bla. Elect him to a human rights commision? I said we should prosecute him, jackass. You know, credibility? Ever hear of it? I say they should prosecute all the opressive fuckers that rig elections and make kids sew wallets for export. But that wouldn't work cus the nations that are actually powerful enough and free enough to make a difference don't give a damn about international law. And yeah, that does make us a rogue state. That's what "rogue state" means. Iraq's worse, obviously, and there's no question Saddam has a shitload to answer for, but two wrongs don't make a right, which I should hope (in vain) is also obvious. Even the most benevolent tyrant is still a tyrant.

Oh, and has it occured to you that the fact that Europeans (and especially French and Germans) are so reluctant to go to war is a good thing? I mean, shouldn't violence be a last resort? Consider the circumstances. The old know what it means to be at war far better than Americans or Canadians hopefully ever will. They've seen Western Civilization itself nearly toppled in their own homes in a catastophic, unlimited and incredibly brutal war of hatred that spanned an entire continent... twice. The young have grown up in the aftermath, either under the the brutal opression of the Soviet Bloc or its opposite, the reactionary liberalism that trumpets peace above all else yet doesn't give an inch in appeasement. I think they have damn good reasons for not rushing blindly into war. Your ridiculous bigotry is disgusting, and if I thought it made two shits of difference where one's ancestors came from I'd tell you to fuck off for lumping my whole family into some imagined stereotype of "bleeding hearts," those same bleeding hearts who died in the millions at the whims of hawkish, jingoistic powers and faced near-certain death among the Resistance with pathetically heroic defiance rather than live comfortably under an evil regime. You know what? Fuck off anyway.

keeper of the grave

Paranoia will destroy you, and you got a lot, maybe too much for me.

Wow, things are heating up!!! What a response!!! You completely ignored what I actually wrote, and decided you would dredge up old complaints. What tone!!! Here ladies and gentlemen is a man who can channel raw emotions into each and every post. That was pure art Penguin!!! Never before have I felt such pure anger resonating from a short story, I mean post. Booker Prize? Anyone?

I would not want to speculate on the root causes of Penguin's anger. Maybe it is my blatant Western imperialism, the way I trample all over the rights of Palestinians, the way I "group" people. I don't recall grouping people at all or even mentioning Penguin's family in my post, but now"it's a family affair, and I swear I'm seeing dead bodies everywhere."
One day he is telling me what a worthy opponent I am, the next, he tells me to "screamed expletive" off. What a fickle mind!!!

I could moderate on that post, but I am not a power nazi. I feel no joy when an opponent is so hopelessly beaten he resorts to THAT type of writing. Don't make this personal Penguin.

It is time you recognized Penguin that there is no "international law" only the law of the jungle. In this world, those who neglect to defend themselves citing international law will be overpowered by those who don't give a damn about these so-called "laws." Get used to it.

Penguin, do you know the reason why there was such a horrific war that raged over Europe? I hate to say this, but it is because people like you relied on crutches that were no more than dust. They relied on pieces of paper, on "international agreements," and on THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS. They appeased Hitler when they could have destroyed him.
They reneged on the obligations they had to defend their people. Why? To win elections.

Evil Penguin

You've said numerous times that you hate Europeans. My ancestors were all (as far as I know) Europeans. As your last post didn't really contain any arguments in itself (only smug allusions to stuff you've said before), I figure it's fair game to bring up that which you are apparently alluding to. Yeah, you're a worthy opponent. You're also a hypocrite.

And why did the League of Nations not work? Because people like you ignored it. Why can't there be international law? It's the law of the jungle, you say. Those who obey are at a disadvantage to those who ignore it, you say. Hmmm. Sounds a lot like Federal laws under the Articles of Confederation... or maybe Keeper's Kanada.... how could we ever solve such a dillema?

keeper of the grave

There could not be much of a dilemma if you have already stated it sounds a lot like "keeper's kanada."

I think we have discussed Keeper's Cities already, and found by fairly general consensus that decentralization is not, in fact, a bad idea in many cases. If you want to reargue that, just go back to my posts on it. Otherwize, keep it to yourself.

As for my first post today, I don't see how arguments are any less relevant whether they are a day, a year or a century old. My point is that you have no arguments.

As for my hatred of Europeans, I am sure that is extensively documented. I think I will keep it on my "to do" list.

Ima hypocrite, youz a hypocrite, we all hypocritz. Hypocrite must have Greek roots, what do you think Penguin?

Oh yes, the League of Nations "laws" were certainly flouted...by Japan, by Italy, and by Germany. But, appeasers ignored those gross violations, just as you ignore Iraq's today. America tested syphilis on African Americans, they tested nerve gases right here in Saskatchewan. But, guess what? The deeds of the OTHER SIDE are too foul to mention.(Too numerous too)

Penguin, I have never been one for waging agressive war, but if it is necessary to the well-being of my country, by all means. Your cheap below the belt shots are annoying me.

Evil Penguin

And so we go full circle. I'm not suggesting appeasement by ignoring Saddam's violations. I'm suggesting we do exactly the opposite, enforce them through the organization that imposed them in the first place. What you're (apparently) defending is a kind of vigilantism. Neighbor beating his kids? Don't call the cops; kill him and take his stuff! Justice at its finest!

Oh, and decentralization and anarchy are two entirely different animals, my friend. The former only works if the central government can intervene. The latter is the result if it can't.

keeper of the grave

In case you had not understood my point which was so blatantly obvious in my first post, the UN would never take appropriate action with 105 dictators wondering when they will be next.

The UN is useless, sorry Penguin, your life dream is all a lie.

The organization has not improved one situation in its entire existence.

Evil Penguin

Tell me how Milosevic is different from Saddam.

keeper of the grave

Quite correct Penguin, Milosevic IS just like Saddam. So why was bombing Milosevic's Serbia more justifiable than bombing Saddam's Iraq?

Gaggin

Milosevic was a much easier target than Saddam. We didn't have to worry about nukes being loaded up on trucks and detonating in Poland, now did we?

I agree that the U.S. shouldn't go attacking countries when there's an international 'police force' that inforces international law. However, I also agree that the current 'police force' isn't very effective at what it does, so maybe it's best that the U.S. do its job for it.

Edit: btw Keeper:
They appeased Hitler when they could have destroyed him.
What exactly did you mean by 'destroying' him. What could they have done?

keeper of the grave

Believe me, I have intimate knowledge of this chapter of history. From 1932-1939, the allies(France, Poland, England-they could have gotten support from Soviets, Czechs, Romania, Hungary, and Italy pre-1935/6) had the capacity to win a war against Nazi Germany. Had they attacked Germany, most accounts, and most believe the Nazi regime would have been completely undermined, and Germany would have surrendered. You just have to read the accounts of Churchill, de Gaulle, and surviving Wermacht generals to know that. During the invasion of Poland, France had 5 times as many divisions on its border with Germany as the Wermacht did. Not only that, the French divisions were better equipped. An unlimited French invasion of Germany would have led to an end to Germany-this could be verified in the memoirs of numerous German generals.

That's the sort of solution I like, and it's what would have happened had there not been men of straw in command positions.

THAT kind of solution would have ultimately save tens of millions of lives.

Just like a well organized invasion of Iraq would, in the end, save lives. Just think of all the people of Iraq who will die if that regime continues to rule. That should be relatively sobering for most.

Gaggin

Hmm... attack Germany? That doesn't sound quite right. I mean, then history would not have recorded the allies destroying the evil fascist regime headed by Hitler, but instead an uncalled for invasion of Germany. That's one of the reasons why the U.S. and Britain and the rest of the world didn't just go in and kick Germany's ass in the first place. Who's to know of Hitler's plot to murder the Jews? Who knows it would've gone so far? Such an invasion would've created a different situation in Europe, but hardly a better one. So they kick down Germany again? It'll get back up again. Then, once Britain is faced with another war with Germany along with Poland and Frace, it'd be pretty hard to convince other nations to help them. What's Britain gonna say to the U.S.? 'Hey, remember when we invaded Germany and started a war based on the fact that Germany might start a war? Well, it wasn't a good idea, but come help us THIS time!'

True, giving Germany the Sudetenland wasn't a bright idea, but it would've been quite hypocritical for them to attack Germany just because Germany MIGHT attack them.

Zaknafien

Doesnt that sound kind of like Iraq?

Gaggin

Aye, it does, except Iraq's been killing Kurds and whatnot for awhile now, and he has nukes, which complicate any situation. Makes you wonder when one part history stops repeating and another starts. I mean, the situation can be compared to Germany, but it can also be comopared to the U.S.S.R.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by Gaggin
Hmm... attack Germany? That doesn't sound quite right. I mean, then history would not have recorded the allies destroying the evil fascist regime headed by Hitler, but instead an uncalled for invasion of Germany. That's one of the reasons why the U.S. and Britain and the rest of the world didn't just go in and kick Germany's ass in the first place. Who's to know of Hitler's plot to murder the Jews? Who knows it would've gone so far? Such an invasion would've created a different situation in Europe, but hardly a better one. So they kick down Germany again? It'll get back up again. Then, once Britain is faced with another war with Germany along with Poland and Frace, it'd be pretty hard to convince other nations to help them. What's Britain gonna say to the U.S.? 'Hey, remember when we invaded Germany and started a war based on the fact that Germany might start a war? Well, it wasn't a good idea, but come help us THIS time!'

True, giving Germany the Sudetenland wasn't a bright idea, but it would've been quite hypocritical for them to attack Germany just because Germany MIGHT attack them.

NO!!! History is always written by the victors, they didn't have fucking idiots like you back then. They would have recorded a Germany that broke every single section of the Treaty of Versailles, they would have recorded a Germany responsible already for the deaths of tens of thousands of people. Jews and political prisoners. History would have shown a nation already preparing at the highest possible speed for a war of agression.

If you put the support of the "international community" above lives, you have already compromised the last vestiges of your humanity.

As for me, I think a "better situation" is any one which does not involve 50 million bodies. Can you even imagine that number? All the people, the faces, the dreams, the families.I have lost family, I have lost friends, and I know what it is like. Can you even imagine a thousand corpses Gaggin?

I can't even believe I am hearing this. You make me sick, you disgust me. I actually can't describe the revulsion I feel right now;I am not trying to be theatric, you make me sick.

I'm stunned, I am speachless.

Evil Penguin

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
Quite correct Penguin, Milosevic IS just like Saddam. So why was bombing Milosevic's Serbia more justifiable than bombing Saddam's Iraq?

Why is it less? As I recall you did quite a bit of ranting on that subject. Could it be that your objections are not based on circumstances but rather the fact that the figurehead of that action was your prince of evil, Bill Clinton?

As per your question, it isn't. The question IS over circumstances. Kicking Milosevic out was a movement supported by pretty much everyone but Milosevic himself. Say what you want about Europens, but they have no tolerance whatsoever for even the appearance of genocide. Iraq differs immediately in that the motives for invasion are much more suspicious. The U.S. would have quite a bit to gain by turning Iraq into a puppet government, which is apparently the only reason we insist on going in ourselves, in a conflict between two nations instead of an international mandate against one. I mean, honestly, what if every country behaved that way? Germany sees Sri Lanka as a threat to the stability of the subcontinent so they invade and turn it into a puppet regime. China sees President Bush as an imperialist and world tyrant, so they have hime assassinated. It's just not the way to go about things. By all means, throw out Saddam, but for Allah's sake do it under some kind of credible authority.

keyknowte

Gaggin you are a fool. I will not hesitate in this use of strong language because it is completely justified. Let me ask you something Gaggin: Do you have any knowledge of history besides a few fragments you`ve picked up? If you have ever read Mein Kampf, I hope you will see the stupidity of the post you just read. Hitler`s objective was to gain Lebensraum(as he called it) for Germany. His first action on coming to power was liquidation of opponents, imprisonment of dissidents, and oppression of Jews. Once accomplished, he made laws which turned Germany`s entire economy into a war machine(breaking decrees of the Treaty of Versailles). Then, he invaded the Rhineland in 1935(thus breaking another statute in the Treaty), in 1937 he began the subversion of Austria through the funding of Nazi terrorists in Austria(when this did not work, he invaded Austria, most of his armour broke down of the road to Vienna proof of his weakness at that point), in 1938 Hitler began the year with threats to Czechoslovakia for the "return of the Sudetenland," then came the Munich conference where Hitler bullied a meek France and a credulous England into selling Czechoslovakia for:"Peace in our time," then came threats for the return of Danzig to Germany in 1939, naturally Poland refused so Germany invaded, bombed Warsaw into dust, and opened the Second World War. Do you see anything interesting in this Gaggin? Like maybe a path of German aggression? Just to let you know Gaggin, Hitler had already begun to slaughter Jewish people in the mid 30`s well before the start of the Second World War, he only "refined" the practice in the Second World War. Are you going to tell me that Germany had a reason to invade Russia? They were allies at that point, and Stalin was doing everything in his power not to provoke the Germans. Surprise, surprise Hitler managed to dredge up a lame provocation for invading Russia. When looking back at history, it is fools like you Gaggin who prepare the world for a repeat. Before you "debate" any more on this forum, I suggest you read up on your Pre-World War Two, and World War Two history. Hardly a better europe than the one under Hitler? Somehow I am not surprised. How could a free Europe be better than a one where Hitler was slaughtering hundreds of thousands, and eventually millions of people?:rolleyes: How would it have been hypocritical to attack Germany? They had already warned Germany that if it invaded another country, they would use force to stop Hitler. There is a difference between attacking a country which is wholly innocent, and attacking a country that has already twice invaded countries, and has butchered citizens from those two countries non-stop since the invasion. On another tack, there were capable leaders that existed in Germany who could have replaced Hitler with a democratic and fair government. Replacing Hitler and his cohorts early on would have saved Germany(and Europe) from the pollution it stills suffers from today.(I am using pollution as another word for Nazism) Attacking Germany would also have saved the Eastern European countries from Communism. Attacking Germany before it attacked again would have saved the lives of fifty million people.(a huge proportion of them civilian) That in itself justifies an attack on Germany. I hope you never take a moral standpoint on anything Gaggin, because you seem to the most cold-blooded people I have ever heard. It is evident that you have never had to suffer, and thus you care not for the sufferings of others.

"Gotta get my tummy fed,
at one point it was filled with hot lead,
by an entourage"

Evil Penguin

Whoa, he just meant that attacking before they did anything wrong would have been hypocriticaal and history would have considered us the bad guys. It doesn't mean he's a Nazi or he doesn't care the millions of people killed, so there's no need for melodrama. This new policy of "preemptive defense" in my opinion looks suspiciously like the kind of rationale Hitler or Stalin employed, even if it is well-meaning. Basically it means we get to attack whoever we want, meting out punishment for crimes that have not been commited. I don't know about the rest of you, but I find that extremely unnerving, and I'm not even on the potential receiving end.

McLeod

Actually the history has shown that invading Germany while it was rather weak would've spared millions of lives. What hypocricy, who cares? This doesnt mean that preemptive strikes are always justified, what it means is that there is no absolute rule for such situations.

keyknowte

First of all Penguin, I did not call Gaggin a Nazi. Are you sure you really read everything written? Secondly, Iraq is guilty of crimes, please do not ignore them. During the late 80`s and all throughout the 90`s Saddam Hussein has been slaughtering Kurds. He has used chemical weapons, massacres, and the likes against the Kurds. He has started a war without provocation, he has defied the U.N. too many times to count. He continues to starve the people of his country while becoming a billionaire himself. He has duped you into believing so many lies it is unbelievable.
Did I hear someone on this forum call the elections in Iraq democratic? Democracy is where the people have the power to decide who will represent them. An election is un-democratic as soon as the people do not choose for themselves who they elect. When someone is standing with a gun a few feet away, and when if you put an X in the No column you have to go into a special room surrounded by soldiers to say who you want. when the people are not allowed to choose representatives, but have a sole representative chosen for them it is not democratic. When you write No on your ballot, you know you will not be returning home tonight, you know an election is undemocratic. When there is an atmosphere of coercion, the thought of an election being democratic is ridiculous. The "elections" in Iraq do not fit the definition for democratic.
and on and on and on......

Evil Penguin

And maybe you should read my post. Did I mention Iraq? No. Of course he's guilty of crimes. But this new "preemptive defense" policy is hardly limited to Iraq or Saddam. The U.S. has effectively reserved the right to attack whoever we want whenever we want without providing any concrete justification, and that is what I have a problem with. And no, you didn't hear anyone call that "election" democratic.

Gaggin

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Whoa, he just meant that attacking before they did anything wrong would have been hypocriticaal and history would have considered us the bad guys. It doesn't mean he's a Nazi or he doesn't care the millions of people killed, so there's no need for melodrama. This new policy of "preemptive defense" in my opinion looks suspiciously like the kind of rationale Hitler or Stalin employed, even if it is well-meaning. Basically it means we get to attack whoever we want, meting out punishment for crimes that have not been commited. I don't know about the rest of you, but I find that extremely unnerving, and I'm not even on the potential receiving end.

I'm glad someone understood the point of my post. I'm not saying attacking Germany wouldn't have been the thing to do, I'm just saying that it probably didn't seem like such a great idea 'at the time'. No one can really say what would've happened. Sure, NOW we know it would've saved a bunch of lives, but what about wars after that? We cannot say, can we? We can only speculate. I'm sure attacking Russia seemed seemed like a good idea to alot of people during the Cold War, but it turns out it would've been disastrous. See, there's a difference between what we knew then and what we know now.

I can't even believe I am hearing this. You make me sick, you disgust me. I actually can't describe the revulsion I feel right now;I am not trying to be theatric, you make me sick.

Hmm, that's quite interesting Keeper, especially coming from someone who criticises people for putting emotional outbursts into their argument. Once again, you prove to be even more of a hypocrite.

As for me, I think a "better situation" is any one which does not involve 50 million bodies. Can you even imagine that number? All the people, the faces, the dreams, the families.I have lost family, I have lost friends, and I know what it is like. Can you even imagine a thousand corpses Gaggin?

Oh my, you sound like you've been through alot. Apparently comparaed to your life-long struggle my life must be peaches and cream. Well, did you ever consider that maybe you're not the only one to have lost family and friends? You have no idea what struggles I have been through, and I will not discuss them here, as they are a personal matter that has nothing to do with this thread. Besides, I'm sure both of our struggels are nothing compared to people such as War3_Kicks_Ass and Veegee, so spare me your ranting, I can imagine a thousand corpses as well as you can. Nowhere in my post did I say I was for the extermination of millions of Jews, or that WW2 was a good thing. I'm just saying that not every situation can be solved by killing someone before they kill you, because you never know what the potentials are.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keyknowte
Gaggin you are a fool. I will not hesitate in this use of strong language because it is completely justified. Let me ask you something Gaggin: Do you have any knowledge of history besides a few fragments you`ve picked up? If you have ever read Mein Kampf, I hope you will see the stupidity of the post you just read. Hitler`s objective was to gain Lebensraum(as he called it) for Germany. His first action on coming to power was liquidation of opponents, imprisonment of dissidents, and oppression of Jews. Once accomplished, he made laws which turned Germany`s entire economy into a war machine(breaking decrees of the Treaty of Versailles). Then, he invaded the Rhineland in 1935(thus breaking another statute in the Treaty), in 1937 he began the subversion of Austria through the funding of Nazi terrorists in Austria(when this did not work, he invaded Austria, most of his armour broke down of the road to Vienna proof of his weakness at that point), in 1938 Hitler began the year with threats to Czechoslovakia for the "return of the Sudetenland," then came the Munich conference where Hitler bullied a meek France and a credulous England into selling Czechoslovakia for:"Peace in our time," then came threats for the return of Danzig to Germany in 1939, naturally Poland refused so Germany invaded, bombed Warsaw into dust, and opened the Second World War. Do you see anything interesting in this Gaggin? Like maybe a path of German aggression? Just to let you know Gaggin, Hitler had already begun to slaughter Jewish people in the mid 30`s well before the start of the Second World War, he only "refined" the practice in the Second World War. Are you going to tell me that Germany had a reason to invade Russia? They were allies at that point, and Stalin was doing everything in his power not to provoke the Germans. Surprise, surprise Hitler managed to dredge up a lame provocation for invading Russia. When looking back at history, it is fools like you Gaggin who prepare the world for a repeat. Before you "debate" any more on this forum, I suggest you read up on your Pre-World War Two, and World War Two history. Hardly a better europe than the one under Hitler? Somehow I am not surprised. How could a free Europe be better than a one where Hitler was slaughtering hundreds of thousands, and eventually millions of people?:rolleyes: How would it have been hypocritical to attack Germany? They had already warned Germany that if it invaded another country, they would use force to stop Hitler. There is a difference between attacking a country which is wholly innocent, and attacking a country that has already twice invaded countries, and has butchered citizens from those two countries non-stop since the invasion. On another tack, there were capable leaders that existed in Germany who could have replaced Hitler with a democratic and fair government. Replacing Hitler and his cohorts early on would have saved Germany(and Europe) from the pollution it stills suffers from today.(I am using pollution as another word for Nazism) Attacking Germany would also have saved the Eastern European countries from Communism. Attacking Germany before it attacked again would have saved the lives of fifty million people.(a huge proportion of them civilian) That in itself justifies an attack on Germany. I hope you never take a moral standpoint on anything Gaggin, because you seem to the most cold-blooded people I have ever heard. It is evident that you have never had to suffer, and thus you care not for the sufferings of others.

"Gotta get my tummy fed,
at one point it was filled with hot lead,
by an entourage"

Hitler didn't slaughter Jews until 1939, at which time it was limited to Eastern European Jews, Western European Jews were only slaughtered starting in 1941 after the American's entered the war do to Hitlers beleifs that the US was controlled by Jews and all though they were "inferior" because Americans (I presume Canadians as well) are a bastard race of mixed heritage, he didn't want them doing any thing.

Would I pick at this point regularly, no, but if you confess to being a persons superior in History, it is never a very good idea to make blatant mistakes.

keyknowte

Spliff, will you please tell me what happened on Krystalnacht? I`ll let you answer that if you have even heard of it. Then please state the date on which it occurred, so that you may understand. Oh, I`m sorry Spliff, Hitler was only using forced labour, starvation, and shootings before 1941. Spliff, I have visited three concentration camps in Europe already, two of which were in Germany. Germany already had concentration camps in 1935, and you are going to tell me that people didnt die there? Hitler always intended to eliminate the Jews, however after his check in Russia, he put forth a plan for the fastest possible elimination of all the Jews in Europe. Many thousands of Jews in Germany, Austria, And Czechoslovakia were killed before 1941. Are you going to tell me that thousands of deaths dont represent a slaughter? I`m afraid it is you who are very much mistaken. Since killing large numbers of people in generally referred to as slaughter, I used the term. I am not concerned with exact numbers, the proof that many thousands of German Jews perished well before 1941, should be enough. As well, Hitler also started exterminating all people deemed mentally retarded and homosexual in Germany in 1935. Historical proof shows that that was when German families started getting info saying their mentally retarded relatives had died of T.B, Meningitis, Gangrene,etc...AKA Bullets to the head. Do not sit at your computer console and lecture one whos historical knowledge seems to be much more in depth than yours, especially when you attempt to correct something which is in fact right.

keyknowte

Here is a little something for you Spliff.
A tribute to Kristallnacht - November 9, 1938

On that night in Berlin and other cities throughout
Germany and Austria, Jewish businesses were
destroyed and Jewish families were dragged from
their homes and sent to concentration camps.

As the night rang with the terrifying music of
breaking glass, thirty thousand people were sent
to the long slow death of imprisonment at Dachau,
Buchenwald and Sachsenhausen.

I must assume that you know that people were killed for the most minor offenses in concentration camps. If you read my original post, I only said slaughter. As slaughter means mass killing(killing 25 people constitutes a slaughter), I believe I was correct in using it.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Yes I have heard of the crystal night. You can hardly call that slaughter, and to call the prisons concentration camps hides what the concentration camps really were, they were death factories, not prisons where some people died. Concentrations camps were places where tens of thousands died daily. The idea that any thing that the German Jews had to face prior to '41 could be lumped in with what the Eastern European Jews were facing and what they would be facing after '41 is absurd.

Evil Penguin

I wouldn't be condescending to Spliff if I were you...

Anyway, none of this is the point. What we did or didn't know about what Germany was or wasn't doing at various points is so far from relevant it's actually painful. The point is you can never accurately predict what a person or a nation is going to do in the future, and punishing someone for a crime you think they are probably going to commit sometime in the future is ludicrous, horribly irresponsible, and the perfect springboard justification for the kind of abuse of military power carried out by, yes, Hitler. That's what the Bush foreign policy now dictates, that we reserve the right to attack anyone at any time without even having to pretend that they've actually commited some offense deserving of it, only speculation that they might. If you've really studied history this should sound sickenly familiar.

Not to say that Saddam Hussein hasn't done enough to warrant extreme action against him, and it could very well be that invasion is the only answer. However, we (the United States) are treating invasion as a first resort instead of a last and are doing it by ourselves in a situation that doesn't affect us specifically. That's why there's international outrage - not because they want to protect Saddam but because we're exploiting a very serious international situation for our own goals, at the expense of millions of lives, heedless of potential danger, and refusing to even consider any other plan. The quest for international support is an obvious charade, as it is perfectly clear that we will behave in exactly the same manner whether everyone agrees with us or the entire world is opposed. I'd be pissed off, too.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

I think I can reasonably predict that Iraq will not over run Poland, France, the low countries, then push on Moscow. Then again, Keeper may know differently........

keyknowte

Next time you call those "prisons" in this forum I am going to snap. Read up a little on your pre-war history, before you go around pretending that Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen, and Dachau were prisons. Prisons where between them 1.5 million people died? 40 000 in those three before 1940? Prisons where in 1935, they put halters of barbed wire on prisoners and made them pull 1.5 ton bales of barbed wire around? Prisons where you didnt even need a pretext to shoot a "prisoner"? Prisons where people had "scientific" tests done on them? Prisons from which no one was ever released? What does it take to break through your self-assurance and get you to see reality. Tell the families of the murdered that there spouses died in prisons? I visited Sachsenhausen, it was one of the most saddening things I ever did. Dont fucking tell me that concentration camp was a prison. You are annoying. For this research, go a little more in depth. A grade ten general purpose history of the world book wont do. It wasnt just jews who died either, it was Catholic priests, protestant priests, writers, poets,homsexuals, gypsies by the scores, retarded people,.and on and on and on. After 1933, Germans could be sentenced to death for saying anything bad about their leader. Any way you turn it, mass killing is slaughter(i`m sorry if I didnt use the words you wanted me to use, such as "emprisonment to death")

Penguin, please butt out, stop currying favor, and go cook some curry! Spliff chose to be condescending first, I just retaliated.

Spliff, it doesnt matter what country Hussein attacks, it matters that Hussein has already attacked twice. Keeper`s koncern and reasoning is a little deeper than you think(which begs the question:Do you?). The parallel he is drawing between the two are that people like Hitler dont come once in a world, in truth there are lots of them. Hussein happens to be similar to Hitler in that he has a way of breaking promises, pushing until somebody pushes back, and generally being a territory-seeking, mass-murdering, rigged-election holding, country-invading tyrant. Hitler believed England would never go to war with him, because they were in his view "reasonable." Hussein believed the United States wouldnt care who sold oil to it...Ooops, maybe they actually care about more than themselves....Oops, maybe Churchill was looking out for all of Europe`s future, not just his own. Anaylze this:"England did not have to go to war with Hitler, in fact Hitler did not want war with England, he believed that as long as England retained controll of her colonies she would be happy....Oops, Churchill had a conscience..Hitler did not...Ooops, Bush has a conscience...Saddam does not. The problem with Saddam and Hitler is that they did not realise that people do not think solely on the basis of logic, we also take into account humanitarian reasons-thus emotion-concern for our fellow man. Something Hitler couldnt fathom in 1939, and Saddam can not fathom today. Am I wrong? I hope not, but if I am please explain using reason, why I am wrong. Dont say stuff like "Saddam wouldnt have sold oil to the Americans," before the Gulf War America was nominally Saddam`s ally. Why? Because America was choosing what seemed to be at the time the lesser of two evils. Perhaps they were wrong, but they acted in good faith, and as often happens when people act like that they get slighted.......

Please read all of the post, I do so very hate it when people argue with things I never wrote. Or take things out of context.

Well, I`m sure Spliff and Penguin, you will be denigrating my arguments and coming up with ones you think are better soon..alas I do not care..

Evil Penguin

No, I'm ignoring your arguments, because as I already pointed out, they have nothing to do with anything but you and Spliff trying to out-trivialize each other, and it certainly has nothing to do with the topic or current events. I think it's interesting that you would write huge long posts trying to discredit one minor anecdotal argument Gaggin made days ago while completely ignoring the real point he was making, not to mention everything I've said except for one sentence telling you not use completely unnecessary and childish personal attacks.

Gaggin

Originally posted by keyknowte
Next time you call those "prisons" in this forum I am going to snap. Read up a little on your pre-war history, before you go around pretending that Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen, and Dachau were prisons. Prisons where between them 1.5 million people died? 40 000 in those three before 1940? Prisons where in 1935, they put halters of barbed wire on prisoners and made them pull 1.5 ton bales of barbed wire around? Prisons where you didnt even need a pretext to shoot a "prisoner"? Prisons where people had "scientific" tests done on them? Prisons from which no one was ever released? What does it take to break through your self-assurance and get you to see reality. Tell the families of the murdered that there spouses died in prisons? I visited Sachsenhausen, it was one of the most saddening things I ever did. Dont fucking tell me that concentration camp was a prison. You are annoying. For this research, go a little more in depth. A grade ten general purpose history of the world book wont do. It wasnt just jews who died either, it was Catholic priests, protestant priests, writers, poets,homsexuals, gypsies by the scores, retarded people,.and on and on and on. After 1933, Germans could be sentenced to death for saying anything bad about their leader. Any way you turn it, mass killing is slaughter(i`m sorry if I didnt use the words you wanted me to use, such as "emprisonment to death")

Penguin, please butt out, stop currying favor, and go cook some curry! Spliff chose to be condescending first, I just retaliated.

Spliff, it doesnt matter what country Hussein attacks, it matters that Hussein has already attacked twice. Keeper`s koncern and reasoning is a little deeper than you think(which begs the question:Do you?). The parallel he is drawing between the two are that people like Hitler dont come once in a world, in truth there are lots of them. Hussein happens to be similar to Hitler in that he has a way of breaking promises, pushing until somebody pushes back, and generally being a territory-seeking, mass-murdering, rigged-election holding, country-invading tyrant. Hitler believed England would never go to war with him, because they were in his view "reasonable." Hussein believed the United States wouldnt care who sold oil to it...Ooops, maybe they actually care about more than themselves....Oops, maybe Churchill was looking out for all of Europe`s future, not just his own. Anaylze this:"England did not have to go to war with Hitler, in fact Hitler did not want war with England, he believed that as long as England retained controll of her colonies she would be happy....Oops, Churchill had a conscience..Hitler did not...Ooops, Bush has a conscience...Saddam does not. The problem with Saddam and Hitler is that they did not realise that people do not think solely on the basis of logic, we also take into account humanitarian reasons-thus emotion-concern for our fellow man. Something Hitler couldnt fathom in 1939, and Saddam can not fathom today. Am I wrong? I hope not, but if I am please explain using reason, why I am wrong. Dont say stuff like "Saddam wouldnt have sold oil to the Americans," before the Gulf War America was nominally Saddam`s ally. Why? Because America was choosing what seemed to be at the time the lesser of two evils. Perhaps they were wrong, but they acted in good faith, and as often happens when people act like that they get slighted.......

Please read all of the post, I do so very hate it when people argue with things I never wrote. Or take things out of context.

Well, I`m sure Spliff and Penguin, you will be denigrating my arguments and coming up with ones you think are better soon..alas I do not care..

Hmm, it's funny how you keep saying that Hitler didn't think England would attack him because Churchill's reasonable. I mean, from your vast historical knowledge, it's obvious you understand that Hitler believed that Churchhill would be in a state of self-preservation. Hitler seemed to think this of Churchill all the way up of 1939, when the war started, right? Well, I'd like to point this out to you, since you seem so insistent on researching a topic before commenting. The fact is, Churchhill didn't even become PM until 1940! He didn't get into power until AFTER the war started. Please remove that head from your ass, it's totally messing up your thoughts.

Ah yes, I know a thing or two about these prisons. You see, back in 1935 the prisons for Jews might've been there, but no one really knew exactly what went on in these prisons for some time. In fact, the 'slaughter' in these prisons didn't really become evident until after the invasion of Poland. I like how listed all the types of people the Germans killed in these prisons, yet you left out the 2nd most frequently type of person killed in the prison: Russians. Yes, when the Auschwitz prison opened its doors, it was home to millions of inmates throughout the war, mostly Jews, Russian POWs, and about 10,000 gypsies(not one of those gypsies survived). Auschwitz was a very efficient prison, for it managed to house hundreds of thousands at the time, and mass killings were a frequent ceremony. If I remember correctly, they set a record, sending about 20,000 bodies to the crematorium in one day. Note that although most of these prisoners were already dead, elderly and infant inmates were simply burned alive. Yes, these prisons were quite horrible places to begin with, but the full tragedy didn't even start until well after the war started. And even then, how can the U.S. be aware of the atrocities within these prisons? After all, it's not like these prisons had reporters crawling around in them asking prisoners how prison life is like. So you see, the prisons you mentioned in Germany were pretty horrible prisons, but they were nothing like the Auschwitz prison in Poland.

Oh wait, did you say they're not prisons? Oops. :P

Oh, and don't try to tell me to butt out like you did EP. I mean, how can ignorance so blatant as yours be ignored?

keyknowte

Gaggin you are ridiculous. I said England would be reasonable. It was with Churchill`s pressure that England went to war. If I have to state the obvious for people like you with little history background, and bent on proving me wrong, then I might as well not write. You are a thoroughly disagreable person. Quite contrary. I dont normally have to state that with the people with whom I converse. they know. Did I say something about taking my writing out of context? You again thought I was wrong though again I am not. Have you ever heard Churchills speech of defiance? Have you ever read any biographies of churchill, I didnt say Neville chamberlain because he was not as strong as churchill. churchill was the one who rallied England.

Oh, lord what will I do with you Gaggin. You misunderstood the point of my second part. I was explaining to Spliff that concentration camp would be a more apt word. By the way Gaggin, have you ever been inside one of those "prisons," I have I have seen two of them. Do not tell me about them, if you wish to know I will tell you. But do not write about them for the sole purpose of attempting to prove me wrong.(when indeed I am not) Are you illiterate? I mean this not as an insult but did you make sure you understood what I wrote before you replied. Did you think objectively? Or did you just write that post to prove me wrong? Be honest with yourself at least, I dont need an answer. OH, I do believe you have missed the message and attacked the writer. Really I am sorry, because if the holocaust can not teach you more than talking about efficiency, I am truly sad. I do not jest.

Gaggin

Next time you call those "prisons" in this forum I am going to snap. Read up a little on your pre-war history, before you go around pretending that Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen, and Dachau were prisons. Prisons where between them 1.5 million people died? 40 000 in those three before 1940? Prisons where in 1935, they put halters of barbed wire on prisoners and made them pull 1.5 ton bales of barbed wire around? Prisons where you didnt even need a pretext to shoot a "prisoner"? Prisons where people had "scientific" tests done on them? Prisons from which no one was ever released? What does it take to break through your self-assurance and get you to see reality. Tell the families of the murdered that there spouses died in prisons? I visited Sachsenhausen, it was one of the most saddening things I ever did. Dont fucking tell me that concentration camp was a prison. You are annoying. For this research, go a little more in depth. A grade ten general purpose history of the world book wont do. It wasnt just jews who died either, it was Catholic priests, protestant priests, writers, poets,homsexuals, gypsies by the scores, retarded people,.and on and on and on. After 1933, Germans could be sentenced to death for saying anything bad about their leader. Any way you turn it, mass killing is slaughter(i`m sorry if I didnt use the words you wanted me to use, such as "emprisonment to death")

Hmm, looks like you attacked some writor here for using the word prison, and you threatened to 'snap'. Interesting.

Penguin, please butt out, stop currying favor, and go cook some curry! Spliff chose to be condescending first, I just retaliated.

Well, another attacked writer here as well, looks like Penguin. Hmm...

Spliff, it doesnt matter what country Hussein attacks, it matters that Hussein has already attacked twice. Keeper`s koncern and reasoning is a little deeper than you think(which begs the questiono you?).

Wow, yet another attack! Well well...

OH, I do believe you have missed the message and attacked the writer

Oh, I do believe I got the message, loud and clear. You're once again being so hypocritical, and for no reason either. Of course I attacked you, that's what debaters do. It's called a rebuttle. And you must've totally missed my point on the whole 'Auschwitz Prison' thing. I only did it to make fun of you. I'm mean like that. :)

Unlike some people, I don't deny that I'll go out of my way to attack someone, nor will I condemn those that do. I'll simply point out those who think they're better than everyone else by considering themselves above such things, which is silly to begin with. I don't care if you've seen the concentration camps, I can still comprehend the fact that millions dead isn't good.

EP's right, we've really got way off the subject here. I hope the next person will lead us back onto it...

keeper of the grave

Haha, keeper will respond when he sees fit, but presently keeper is very very busy, and keeper does not need distractions like this forum at the moment. You see, keeper has a job, and means he has some comittments, which left unfulfilled, you get the picture. No more paycheck, and no more evenings out for keeper.

I think the reason you are so naive is the fact you spend all your time inside the forum instead of out meeting people in the Real World. Note, "interacting" is not sufficient, plus, it is a sterile term.

As the years go
I change my opinions

What was once a stem has now become a wrist
And with two joining hands the brood has been crushed
As the face with leaf shaped eyes reveal,
Planets to exploit our dreams through shields
Its the words we can never block that make us think
Synchronized thoughts of the child that moves
outside the house the roof stops the rain
But inside, you know mothers build on pain
Life is in the length of tomorrow
Narrow is the mind that's shallow
Walls are a religion of perfection
Hate is an infection, and I feel no guilt
This is a mastery of soul
Where once there was beauty there is only brick
Society bombs this opinion cus this world is sick
As a teenager we act as if we know it all
But now as an adult I only try to forget
Regret is the poison that we all live in
In the mind of a child is the only time we're free
Return to me

I know y'all think I am just a hip hop groupie, and I know what I think of you.

Damn Gaggin, you really are dumb. I did not expect you to make the same mistake about 4 times. I am not going to explain to you why you are wrong, but I do suggest you read Churchill's memoirs and find out. You will ignore this, and then laugh at a someone who evidently knows his history.
The full tragedy is that our society allows non-entities like you to exist. I do wish abortion had been much more common, oh, 17 years ago. You and Penguins are perhaps the greatest arguments FOR abortion I have ever met.

Yo Keynowte, nice name, are you a student, or are you employed?

But, like I was saying, I don't halve thyme write know two right.

Penguin, when you complain about people "changing the subject", why don't you just ignore your response to MY FIRST POST in this topic. I still don't know how you managed to involve your family in this discussion.
Penguin and Gaggin, you ressemble Sisyphus.

I think we need to restate this debate though. This debate is REALLY about the UN. You say it is a useful organization, I know otherwise.

I suggest any organization which has Lybia and Syria on its "human rights comission" can not be taken seriously, you suggest all it needs is a little more power, more comittment. I counter with the argument giving power to wicked nations is foolish, you then go on to claim the power does not end up in the hands of the evil people.

I wisely note there are 104 member nations with completely un-democratic(thus could not possibly respect people's rights) forms of government, and only 89 with any semblance of democracy.
Of course, you claim those figures are a red-herring. Not important. I beg to differ. This argument can be stated in the form of a question, "how do you propose a majority of un-democratic vested interests will react to attempts to democratize?"
You somehow believe they will go along merrily enough, suggesting 51 convicted murderers, and 49 law abiding citizens would all vote to increase punishment for murder. A highly believable scenario.:rolleyes: But, if you believe it is possible, you can join the Penguin nut-riding fan club on a limited time offer, they will join such other great visionaries as the Rove an Theory dick ridin
band of biters.
If you are skeptical, a logical response, Penguin will bombard you with more of the same.
He will reiterate all it needs is a little more power.

Penguin, have you ever seen someone hold a gun to a person's head or chest, and then calmly pull the trigger? I don't suppose you have, even in your worst nightmares about keeper.(yes that was you screaming like a girl)
My point is the individual who does such a terrible thing can neither be trusted, nor cured.(except with a lethal does of lead or TNT)
But, more to the point, a person who has put a gun to the head of another without just reason, has also put, figuratively, a gun to his own head. A murderer can not abdicate power, and simultaneously abdicate responsability for the crimes he comitted with that power.-This should be fairly obvious. The point: is a dictator suddenly surrenders himself to the will of his people, he is unlikely to receive mercy. Like the fabled queen who rode the tiger, he knows his descent will lead to more than just a loss of ultimate power(I mean the power over another's life)but also the loss of his life, his family, and all his possessions.

How many people condemn themselves to death Penguin? How many? Perhaps they would even volunteer to witness against themselves at their trials? :rolleyes:

Those conclusions should also be fairly easily made.

So, you have 104 people riding tigers against 89 who maybe are not, and you wonder why the UN is such a marginalized organization, why it has so little credibility; for the very reason two of the worst "human rights offenders" can be found on the "human rights comission." Just like the Durban Conference against Hate and Racism, became exactly the opposite of that: a forum for un-diluted racism and hatred.
I don't think I need to explain the UN's inability to succeed.

But there goes Penguin, "they need more power," or, "it's because of people like you." Finger-pointing, and undefinable needs.

No Penguin, it is because of people like you; people with no respect for human life or dignity, and certainly none for freedom. People who attempt to sideline every debate, and manipulate others with out-out lies and catchphrases.

I am not done yet. Penguin suggests the UN's credibility could be restored by giving it more power, and giving it a free-hand. I'm not sure how he intends to circumvent the little problem of dictatorial majority, maybe with an unfair dictatorship of his own devising. What do I mean? Explain yourself Keeper...Ok, ok. I mean that as long as the UN remains an organization where votes by member nations determine something, nothing will be accomplished. I am not suggesting we eliminate free-votes; in fact, they are what gives the UN the slightest veneer of continued accountability.

No, my honest opinion is the UN is a waste of money in any manifestation, and Penguin's dream of a United Earth is economically unfeasible.

As the clincher, I would like to add there is nothing more amusing than a fool Gaggin, but they do become tiresome.

Go back to highschool, form some views of your own, and then come crawling back sonny.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keyknowte
Next time you call those "prisons" in this forum I am going to snap. Read up a little on your pre-war history, before you go around pretending that Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen, and Dachau were prisons. Prisons where between them 1.5 million people died? 40 000 in those three before 1940? Prisons where in 1935, they put halters of barbed wire on prisoners and made them pull 1.5 ton bales of barbed wire around? Prisons where you didnt even need a pretext to shoot a "prisoner"? Prisons where people had "scientific" tests done on them? Prisons from which no one was ever released? What does it take to break through your self-assurance and get you to see reality. Tell the families of the murdered that there spouses died in prisons? I visited Sachsenhausen, it was one of the most saddening things I ever did. Dont fucking tell me that concentration camp was a prison. You are annoying. For this research, go a little more in depth. A grade ten general purpose history of the world book wont do. It wasnt just jews who died either, it was Catholic priests, protestant priests, writers, poets,homsexuals, gypsies by the scores, retarded people,.and on and on and on. After 1933, Germans could be sentenced to death for saying anything bad about their leader. Any way you turn it, mass killing is slaughter(i`m sorry if I didnt use the words you wanted me to use, such as "emprisonment to death")

Penguin, please butt out, stop currying favor, and go cook some curry! Spliff chose to be condescending first, I just retaliated.

Spliff, it doesnt matter what country Hussein attacks, it matters that Hussein has already attacked twice. Keeper`s koncern and reasoning is a little deeper than you think(which begs the question:Do you?). The parallel he is drawing between the two are that people like Hitler dont come once in a world, in truth there are lots of them. Hussein happens to be similar to Hitler in that he has a way of breaking promises, pushing until somebody pushes back, and generally being a territory-seeking, mass-murdering, rigged-election holding, country-invading tyrant. Hitler believed England would never go to war with him, because they were in his view "reasonable." Hussein believed the United States wouldnt care who sold oil to it...Ooops, maybe they actually care about more than themselves....Oops, maybe Churchill was looking out for all of Europe`s future, not just his own. Anaylze this:"England did not have to go to war with Hitler, in fact Hitler did not want war with England, he believed that as long as England retained controll of her colonies she would be happy....Oops, Churchill had a conscience..Hitler did not...Ooops, Bush has a conscience...Saddam does not. The problem with Saddam and Hitler is that they did not realise that people do not think solely on the basis of logic, we also take into account humanitarian reasons-thus emotion-concern for our fellow man. Something Hitler couldnt fathom in 1939, and Saddam can not fathom today. Am I wrong? I hope not, but if I am please explain using reason, why I am wrong. Dont say stuff like "Saddam wouldnt have sold oil to the Americans," before the Gulf War America was nominally Saddam`s ally. Why? Because America was choosing what seemed to be at the time the lesser of two evils. Perhaps they were wrong, but they acted in good faith, and as often happens when people act like that they get slighted.......

Please read all of the post, I do so very hate it when people argue with things I never wrote. Or take things out of context.

Well, I`m sure Spliff and Penguin, you will be denigrating my arguments and coming up with ones you think are better soon..alas I do not care..

Churchill had a conscience....... Tell that to the people of Dresden, tell that to Iraqi's gassed by the RAF in the interwar period for the purpose of putting down a rebellion. I wouldn't, because talking to things that no longer exist is slightly delusional, but you have your prayer.

I call them prisons because they were set up as prisons, most of those that were arrested on the Crystal Night were released, the purpose was harrassment to cause emigration. In the forties the purpose of policy was not emigration it was extinction, there fore the policy changed, prisons became factories of death for the sole purpose of killing all who entered, which is my definition of a concentration camp. I know the difference, relatives went in and out of prison for being communists and/or pacifists, a couple didn't come back from where ever they were sent in the forties when they refused to fight. Then again my grandpa in the RCAF might of accidentally bombed them.

Raven of Narnia

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Neighbor beating his kids? Don't call the cops; kill him and take his stuff! Justice at its finest!

And what would be the alternative? If the cops (like the UN) is useless and non-effective, wouldn't it be in the best interest of the kids to stand up to the parents as a good semaritan? I think it is. I don't know about you, but I don't like to stand idly by while people suffer in the name of a dictatorship. If they choose to, then they should have the right, but until they say they like it how it is, somebody should be willing to step in.

If all people (Americans) are created equal under OUR constitution (with no regard for race, creed, sex, sexual preference an so on, they why Penguin, do you believe that all people that are not Americans shouldn't have the same equality? Isn't that against all that we as Americans believe and what our constitution provides us?Perhaps you think it is selfish to act, but wouldn't it also be selfish to watch as innocent people suffer and do nothing?

Evil Penguin

Ahhh!

The hypocrisy in here has an almost tangible quality, like a thick fog. Anyway, starting with the most recent:

Raven: The "police force" is ineffective because we, the most powerful and very necessary member of that force, refuse to operate within the law and instead carry out "justice" outside of it, when it suits us and to our own advantage. It would be so simple to do otherwise. I do think its amusing that you are accusing me of ignoring the rights of non-Americans, though. This from the guy who condones killing civilians and said he wanted to bomb the Japanese. The whole point is to ensure the rights of everyone.

Keeper: Oy. Your first post didn't have substance, there wasn't much to ignore. What it did have were glib, sarcastic allusions to other things you've said, which yes, I found quite offensive. There were only so many times I could listen to you trash Europeans for being "bleeding heart racists," or whatever you think they are. Anyway, it was still on topic, because the debate is whether it's a good idea to rush wildly into military domination, and who should be involved. Or at least much more on topic than your (oh, I'm sorry, "keyknowte"'s) endless argument with Spliff and Gaggin. Whoever was right about those facts doesn't matter even one tiny bit to the current situation, yet not only was it pursued as if it were absolutely crucial, but it was more personal insult than argument, anyway.

The UN is a necessary diplomatic organization, forcing everything out into the open and encouraging cooperation and a closer world community. Not to mention preventing World War III, but hey, details. You're right, no dictator will ever step down willingly, but you seem to be missing the concept. It doesn't have to ensure democracy. It would be better if it did, but you're entirely right that that is impossible, at least for now. What it can do is effectively establish real international laws and enforce them. If the UN had overriding sovereignty, like the U.S. federal government has over states, for instance, it would literally mean an end to war, a vastly improved global economy, and a code of basic human rights that is actually enforceable. You wouldn't need a "kleptocracy," as you love to put it. Why do you suppose America's or Japan's economy is so strong while Nigeria's or Ghana's suffers so much? It is because they are isolated, in separate economies, and it is almost impossible for a nation to escape the third world if there are so many first world nations that dominate all. Unfortunately dictators couldn't be gotten rid of at first, but then, neither could slavery at the founding of the United States. Progress follows cooperation, and you can't expect every problem to be solved at once. There were those who thought dreams of a united Germany, or a united Italy, or a united America were completely unfeasible, too. No respect for human life or dignity? Please. You're the one advocating doing nothing.

Everyone else: chill.

keeper of the grave

I fail to see how any assembly dominated by dicators would ever willingly enforce any "good" international laws. They have not yet. I just do not see why we should put our faith in an organization whose failure rate touches 100%, why do you?

As for World War 3, nuclear weapons prevented that, not the UN. Do you think the Soviets or Americans gave a damn it?

World War 3 may not have happened yet, but there are still dozens of wars going on every year here. The UN has not been very effective at that, has it?

I will not explain to you the economic unfeasability of one currency to you, or the dreadful effects regional subsidization because you just wouldn't understand. There is no "GLOBAL ECONOMY" Penguin.
Acrtually, the reasons for Nigeria and Ghanas poverty are manifold. There is the corruption, the inflation, the taxes, the government, the lack of trade between cities, the lack of manufacturing that takes place, and the lack of law and order. Third world cities must trade with each other, and protect themselves from 1st world imports.
Your meagre grasp of economic systems has not been aided by the even more flawed illusions journalists conjure up.

If the United States were "such a successful economic unit," American cities would be responding more effectively to their trade deficits. Too bad about that unified currency; it's called faulty feed-back.

I have never advocated "doing nothing" Penguin, unless "doing nothing" was preferable to "doing something." It has always been my most firm belief that peace must be achieved with the least loss of life and property possible. "Peace at all costs" holds nothing for me.

As for the United Germany, we see what a mistake that was.

I put that on the clan you just wouldn't understand
That's the hip hop kclan you just wouldn't understand.

"These nutz,
And the hip hop kclan!!!"

Raven of Narnia

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Ahhh!

The hypocrisy in here has an almost tangible quality, like a thick fog. Anyway, starting with the most recent:

wow, that's nice that you can say something like that. I assume you don't include yourself in that? It's also hypocritical not to.

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Raven: The "police force" is ineffective because we, the most powerful and very necessary member of that force, refuse to operate within the law and instead carry out "justice" outside of it, when it suits us and to our own advantage.
[/B]
So, you're saying that the US is to blame for trying to enforce the laws that the UN makes but will not enforce itself? Going outside the law? I honestly think that is the STUPIDEST comment on this serious forum I have ever seen. We are going outside the law by enforcing what laws the UN made. That's brilliant Penguin, seriously...and would would happen if the "good side" of the world followed the UN and the "bad side" did not?

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
It would be so simple to do otherwise. I do think its amusing that you are accusing me of ignoring the rights of non-Americans, though. This from the guy who condones killing civilians and said he wanted to bomb the Japanese. The whole point is to ensure the rights of everyone.
[/B]
Tell me what the difference is between civilians who kill innocent people and soldiers who kill innocent people? Only the law. Why should they not both be punished? But, that is another topic that has already been discussed, although you chose to decide that you were right and that was the end....you are like a fillibuster, Penguin. Bore people and be repetitive until they give up trying to discuss anything with you. Great debationary tactics.

And [b]to "ensure the rights of everyone" is an injustice to the people who obey the rights of everyone else and provide protection for those who don't.[/]b Staying within the rights of the UN law is about as ineffective as saying to Saddam, "Please stop, let's all be friends" while he kills us. No Penguin, the worst thing we could do is let guilty people go. And coincidently, look who just FREED "guilty people", Saddam Hussein...So, apparently, since you agree with Saddam Hussein about working "within the law" even if the law is ineffective and letting guilty people run free, you are about as bad (or good as you think) as a terrorist and wepaons dealer. So, to recap, you would be Saddam and according to you, I am Al'Qaeda. So, now that you have or almost have WoMD, where can I pick those up and how much will it cost me? You are about as much of a hypocrite as I am, so stop your "holier than thou" attitude

Zaknafien

"So, you're saying that the I am to blame for trying to enforce the laws that the US makes but will not enforce itself? Going outside the law? I honestly think that is the STUPIDEST comment on this serious forum I have ever seen. I am going outside the law by enforcing what laws the I made."

We're a part of the UN....shouldnt we be therefore enforcing their laws? Its not just us, other people pitch in to, but is it SO illogical that we should help the organization were part of?

keeper of the grave

I'm not sure what Zak was trying to say there, but I think he was saying that Raven and I are right, and Penguin is wrong. That would be the only logical response.

Gaggin

I think Zak is trying to say that since the U.S. is a major part of the U.N., it should be justified in enforcing violations of the laws set by the U.N... makes sense, right? Well, unfortunately, alot of the U.N. members are against enforcing these laws for whatever reasons. The problem here is that the laws are no longer being enforced by the 'United Nations', but rather one powerful nation that's taking the law into its own hands. The purpose of the UN is to stop psycho rulers like Saddam from doing the things they do, but it is also there for the purpose of solving problems as a united International front.

So I think it's pretty clear that the UN needs some serious revamping... not only to make it more effective in solving issues, but more effective in keeping a united front on situations. Many people complain about the U.S. being too involved in international issues, but in truth, it has to be, because the rest of the UN isn't holding up its end. War with Iraq seem imminent now, but had the UN been a bit more organized to begin with, war wouldn't have been an option in the first place.

keeper of the grave

Any changes empowering the UN will come at the expense of our freedoms. If you are willing to forego them in exchange for an idyllic fairy tale dream of world peace, all well and good. If not...

Gaggin

That's the universal key to Governing. The more more your Government works for you, the more freedoms you have to give up. So you have to ask question; Is the improvement in heading towards world peace(No, world peace isn't atainable, but we can definately progress towards it) worth the freedoms that we'll be giving up? Besides, only our nation's freedom will be touched in such a reorganization. Our individual rights still remain the same. And if a nation doesn't like giving up those rights, it doesn't have to stay in the U.N.

You see Keeper, world peace may be just a dream, but bettering the world's situation is not. If peace is such a lost cause to you, why do you even care?

Evil Penguin

Whose freedoms? Mine? Yours? No, those freedoms would be ensured. The only freedom that would be forfeit is the freedom of opression and domination. I think we can do without those.

Raven of Narnia

I don't think we are giving up any freedoms. I think the idea of us acting is to protect our freedoms. We take the freedom of those who seek to take ours. If we did anything else, we wouldn't be protecting ourselves. We stand up for the freedoms that the UN decided all law-abiding people should have. Until someone infringes on that, there would be no reason. Once that plane of law has been crossed, they forfeight theirs. The only real way to punish them is to take theirs, whether that be the right to live where you wanna live, or even the right to live. However, I myself do not consider those rights, I consider them privilieges. When you take another man's life, you forfeight your privilege to live. Our government and our military are here to protect us from people who want to hurt us. I don't know why anyone would think that does not apply in today's age of tribal warfare and terrorism. The answer is not to respond to an attack, but to prevent one. Why shouold we not take the freedoms of guilty people before they hurt innocent people?

keeper of the grave

Whose freedoms? Mine? Yours? No, those freedoms would be ensured. The only freedom that would be forfeit is the freedom of opression and domination. I think we can do without those.

Pure speculation, the only evidence either of us has is personal opinion, hardly enough to debate over. You will continue to tell me how much better the world would be with a huge centralized government, and I will continue to tell you it is both economically unfeasible, and will infringe on personal freedoms very quickly.

It probably does not matter who is right because no one in the world wants to sacrifice his or her sovereignity for a white elephant.

My personal opinion is: if it does not work now, giving it more money and power will not make it work any better for us.

Your personal opinion: I love the UN, but aside from that, we need a huge centralized government so my inculcated zombieish attachment to world peace may some day become a reality.(I want to thank my teachers, and my parents, and all my sponsors...)

"They who would give up liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security ."

Benjamin Franklin

I like Gaggin and his little, "if we can even save one life," line. I think you meant to say, "the more you work FOR your government, the more indebted you feel towards it." Not to mention the preserving the big government factor so as to preserve one's job, or one's mummy or daddy's job.

Gaggin

No no, I never said anything about saving just one life. I was talking about making progressive steps to building a better world society.

And it's not a matter of feeling indebted to your Government. It's the natural balance that affects all Government ever since the ancient days of Hammurabi. The closer you get to an authoritarian government, the less freedom you'll have, but you'll be taken cared for more than a government that leans towards an anarchal government. But with the latter, you'll have more freedom. Less law, less protection, more law, less freedom. It's a double-edged sword.

keyknowte

Interesting theory there Gaggin. The reality though seems to be that the more power you give a government, the more it will work for itself...Lets take communism in Russia as an example shall we? Have you heard of the Nomenklatura Gaggin? The Nomenklatura were the bureaucrats created by the communist system. In the beginning, some of the bureaucrats might(just might) have thought they were helping the people, but as time progressed, people in Russia became bureaucrats for the perks. The bureaucrats spouted the same lame lines(we are a government of the proletariat blah blah blah), however by the 1940`s they no longer believed what they said(and took every opportunity to enrich themselves). Just like Lenin never ever believed what he said. But anywho, when governments become more powerful, their ability to dispense wealth is increased(i.e. they take more money from the citizens in the form of taxes, etc..), and therefore bureaucratic positions become more sought after, and the people seeking them no longer care a good god damn about the people they are supposed to serve. Thus, the bigger the government, the smaller the chance you are being represented or cared for.. it is not a double edged sword, you lose one way, you win the other. The winning way happens to be the one involving the smaller government. Big Brother is not watching over you to protect you, he is watching over you to protect himself. Would you say the people in Communist Russia, Iraq, Communist China, communist Korea, Syria, get taken care of better than we do? Interesting concept....Really, I also fell a lot better protected here in Canada, as I am not worried about agents knocking at my door at night if I say something against the state.

Evil Penguin

The federal government protects individual rights, does it not? It doesn't allow states to legalize slavery, or carry out unexplained executions, or silence the press. Or invade each other. Now imagine how nice the whole world could be.

McLeod

Well your federal government also invades and bombs other countries, as well as finances rebels and marionette dictators across the globe. So I wouldnt be so sure about that. :)

Seriously though, I think we are slowly edging towards a centralized world government. Just look at EU. While I dont see it happening at least for another century, eventually we'll get there. The real question is wether it will be huge and bureaucratic, or smaller and de-centralized to some degree. Looking at how bigger in-human Kafka-style governments did in the past, I'd say the choice is obvious. A smaller human-oriented system, the more horizontal in its structure the better. Vertical systems tend to turn countries into police-states, real fast too.

Gaggin

You have to find the right balance. If there's no Government, you have complete freedom, but there's nothing to stop people from killing you without consequence. In some cases it is a matter of being taken care of too much. You don't need the Government to tie your shoes for you, but in an extreme situation the Government would do it for you anyway. Too much control is not good, but not enough control isn't good either. Yet the balance remains. The trade-off of freedom for power is always there, but not all trade-offs are good (or bad). And this isn't some theory I thought up, it's one of the first things I learned in AP Government.

Evil Penguin

Originally posted by McLeod
Well your federal government also invades and bombs other countries, as well as finances rebels and marionette dictators across the globe. So I wouldnt be so sure about that. :)

Seriously though, I think we are slowly edging towards a centralized world government. Just look at EU. While I dont see it happening at least for another century, eventually we'll get there. The real question is wether it will be huge and bureaucratic, or smaller and de-centralized to some degree. Looking at how bigger in-human Kafka-style governments did in the past, I'd say the choice is obvious. A smaller human-oriented system, the more horizontal in its structure the better. Vertical systems tend to turn countries into police-states, real fast too.

Indeed it does, which is why global government would be an improvement. Then they can bomb other planets and marionette the asteroid belt.

As for the other part, I agree totally. Most things should be taken care of locally, but the whole point is that there are universal, enforceable guidelines, and when push comes to shove no individual nation can defy them all.

keeper of the grave

I think I will research the European Union, and find out just how good these conglomerated bureaucracies really are.

Raven of Narnia

yeah, well you guys try to convince those gang warfare middle eastern leaders who capitalize with power and money by war. Let's see how well you can convince them and many others to have a central government for the world. It's not gonna happen, not in 10 years, not in a 1,000

I mean, just look at the US. Many of us at least agree on what constitutes fairness and equality, but even with that in common, there are a lot of anarchists. We have every spectrum of ideology in the world, do you really think a centralized government would work here if we started it tommorow? Most people would probably say no, the only reason we have one now is because we started it a long time ago. If we had to decide on a government for the first time nowadays, we wouldn't be one country. We wouldn't even be able to make the population of the US protected under a centralized government. What makes you think the world would?

McLeod

You've got to look at it on a global scale. People were much more different 100 years ago around the world than they are now. There is this thing called Globalization going on. With super-fast progress in information and communication technology our cultures are coming closer together. That is a fact and there is no turning back, because its a natural process and we all are in fact humans.

As for political extremism, I dont see how will it stand in the way of a global government. I think in few decades we all will agree that liberal democracy and free elections are the way to go for now. Yes, even China will get there eventually. The hardcore Islamists either will be all killed or hiding in underground, or will turn sane with time (the first is more likely looking at current developments). Religious extremism will die out, because it is born out of lack of education and uncontrolled hatred. Eliminate the reaosons and you will eliminate the consequences.

BUT.

The world needs to look at its driving idea. United world will not work, if this idea is Greed. Wild capitalism will fail. Class diferentiation will lead to nasty things like global hatred and terrorism. We will have to share with eachother, wether some of us like it or not. Its in our best interest too, because globalization is our only chance to avoid nuclear wars, global terror and other bad stuff, associated with intercultural differences and miscommunications. The age when we could just get drunk on ale and go on a crusade if some outlanders were pissing us off are over.

As for EU, it works. The structure might not be working at its peak efficience yet, but its still in development. Just look at Euro, transparent boundries and new liberal employment laws. I first fully appreciated it when a bunch of friends got together and we just flew from Cologne over to Turin to see a Juventus game. No visums, no currency exchage troubles, no annoying border control. Its great. And seeing as problems with inflation are gone, it will get even better.

keyknowte

Cultures may be getting closer together, but that just seems to be leading to more conflict. Relations between China and the West are about at where they were at the begginning of the 20th Century.. Muslim and occidental cultures dont seem to be melding quite so well either....Then there are the "little" tribal conflicts in Africa. The number of wars around the world really has not diminished much either.

Mcleod, reality check! If all the countries in the world had liberal governments what the fuck would be the purpose of a Global Government. What if some countries would rather make their own decisions? How would democracy with billions of voters? How would the interests of thousands of ethnic groups and countries be represented in this government? How much in taxes would you have to pay for an extra level of government? What about civil wars? Global government on every front is ridiculous and disastrous. Im not resisting change, I`m resisting riduculous change. What if the Americans dont want to join? Or Canada? Are you going to force them to join? I guess that eliminates the idea of world peace...... Something tells me I would rather have my own corrupt politicians ruling than some corrupt politicians from somewhere else. I know this fanciful idea has been pushed by the U.N., George Lucas, Socialists, and other people of limited credibility. I guess we will just have to try a World Government....:rolleyes: As Benjamin Franklin said; experience is a hard teacher, but fools will have no other. This seems like the dream of socialists to finally be able to create their world communist Frutopia.... Really, have you even thought(using real economic theory and practice), about the consequences of such a "Union." What is the point of a World Government anyway?

The federal government protects individual rights, does it not? It doesn't allow states to legalize slavery, or carry out unexplained
executions, or silence the press. Or invade each other. Now imagine how nice the whole world could be.

Some federal governments do that Penguin, some federal governments... Some federal governments also deny personal liberties, also silence the press, and what not. The influence of the Federal government should be limited to Military, Customs and Immigration, Environment, and making some laws. The more governments intervene in our lives, the more they claim they provide, the poorer we get, and the less liberty we have.
The lesson of the U.N.`s failure is not that we werent audacious enough(i.e. World Government would work even if the U.N. doesnt), it is that the whole idea is too audacious and too foolish.

It seems we have evaded nuclear war pretty well so far McLeod. McLeod, you can say a fucking government is for anything, but that doesnt mean it is. Russia claimed is was a dictatorship of the proletariat, but in fact it was a dictatorship over the proletariat. McLeod, contrary to the beliefs of some, not everyone on this planet is good, or has good ideas, there are people who only yearn for power and influence. And it seems those those are the people who make it to the top the most. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Now, would a world government classify as an entity with aboslute power? Almost everyone is influenced in a bad way by power, it is just the force of it. The people below you flatter you to get better jobs, and you start to believe their flattery. You think you deserve the power that you yield, and that you in fact should yield more power...Do you see a problem?

Just look at European Union, it works :rolleyes:
Somehow I dont think that explains the huge numbers of unemployed across Europe, or the lack of growth in European economies. The European Union works for...pause for effect...the bureaucrats employed by it :eek:
That also doesnt explain the numerous problems in all of the European countries. I bet you islamo-facists are saying the same thing"no border controlls, is great." But really, when I have more time, I will really tear the EU to shreds.

Evil Penguin

haha, that what you economics professor told you? The number of wars hasn't diminished much, no, but they have moved from mainstream, globalized, powerful nations to extreme, mostly right wing, isolated nations. Did you know no war has ever been fought between two countries with a MacDonald's franchise? No, it won't happen soon, but it will happen.

How does a democracy work with billions of voters? Well, how does one work with millions? Most things are taken care of locally, and the higher the level of government, the less involvement it has but the more power to override lower decisions if necessary. Like no country can employ slave labor. Taxes would go way down if we didn't use half the world's revenues on militaries...

What's the point of world government? I think we already went over that. Be more specific.

Yes, some federal government provide that. Like mine, yours, and most others integrated into the modern world community. The fact that not all do is kind of the point. They could.

I would claim a world dictator as one with absolute power. Luckily there's a big difference between that and a constitutional representative democracy with extensive civil rights and powers limited mostly to enforcing those rights and keeping the peace. Maybe next semester you should take some political science courses.

McLeod

Keeper, what problems are you talking about? I dont remember ANY problem getting worse or anything major emerging because of the forming of the EU. Also, just so that you know, Europeans already pay extra taxes for EU structures. They arent complaining about it either.

All countries will never have liberal governments, thats why you need ONE above all. Thats the point. :rolleyes:

And no, outlandish Islamo-fascists will not attack Europe anytime soon. Why? Because we are not bombing countries into stone age just because our governemts are financed by global corporations who need some oil to make an extra buck. When Austria elected an extra right wing politician as their president, EU pressured him until he stepped down. HINT, HINT: EU works! You see, we try to keep it reasonable here. Heh.

keyknowte

Political science is a paradox. In that, political science is not a science. Thus such science loving people as you should not really like it. But really, I guess it depends who teaches the political science classes, doesnt it? My teacher might tell me about the evils of such an idea. ;)

imagine what would happen if you democrats lost the world elections for the U.S.? Gore, "The elections for a representative for the U.S were clearly rigged, we want the world electoral college to personally handcount the results."
It would be terrible..... No one would know who had really one for months, even then, even if you lost you would still claim victory...
I would just like to ask about the problems such a government migh cause. Would there still be countries? What if all the voters of China (wait, they dont vote), voted for Deng Xiao Ping? Im sure the 3/4 billion voters of China would have a huge say in worldly affairs. Instead of Tian Men Square it might be.....well, you guess. Ill write a real post whenever I have time, I`m much too jovial at the moment to right anything serious, or in depth....

On the Islamo-Facist note, what happened in bali Mcleod? Oh, yeah a lot of Europeans died. I dont think a single American or Jew died in that attack. Do you know why? Because they arent just targeting Americans and Jews... They are targeting anyone who is not their perceived image of a Muslim. Was it a French tanker that was attacked? I`ve already forgotten, please remind me. Does Al Queda sponsor the Albanians against the Macedonians, and the Chechens against the Russians? Really McLeod, it doesnt seem like they are targeting countries who blah blah blah you wrote. I thought Bali would bring you europeans around to the truth, but it seems that when you really dont want to believe the truth you can ignore the blatantly obvious.

So peace to the place where the sun sets,
And Im out

McLeod

About Bali: I thought a lot of Australians died? Either way, thats not the point.

The point is that we are back to religious extremism and global terror. We are back to Al Quaeda. We are back to the group which was financed by hawks in your congress and pentagon. We are back to the point that messing around and trying to solve problems with force hits you back. It hits you back big time too. I wonder when will people finally get it.

This is why Europe is trying to block the current resolution in SC. This is why England is not carpet-bombing Dublin and Belfast. This is why Spain is not carrying out pre-emptive strikes on Santander. Because we know it wont solve anything.

keeper of the grave

Here's a little snippet of, as Dilayted Peeples would say, "things to come:"

The death of the nation state

Hugo Gurdon

Friday, October 25, 2002

Yes means yes and no means maybe -- at least among Europe's new masters. Which is ironic, because the continental bien pensants would shudder if they heard this excuse for harassment and manipulative control in another circumstance. But when it is only democracy that's getting screwed, they don't mind a bit.

Which brings us to why we should care about last weekend's Irish referendum ratifying the Treaty of Nice. Its supporters say it simply paved the way for 10 former Communist countries to join the European Union. They celebrate the sight of recently freed nations entering what is depicted as a secure, democratic and free-market fold.

The truth is different. What really happened was that the European Union moved past the tipping point -- its development into an anti-democratic, anti-free market, anti-national sovereignty superstate will now be a downhill canter rather than an uphill struggle.

It has admitted new members three times since the Irish joined in 1973, but this was the first time Ireland needed a referendum. That's because Irish law demands that voters give their permission before sovereignty is drained from their national Parliament. And the Treaty of Nice involves a massive transfer of power away from the people of Europe and their elected representatives to an unelected authority in Brussels.

How can a referendum be undemocratic? Here's how. The Irish voted two years ago to reject Nice. But only "yes" votes are regarded as permanent in modern Europe; the people building a multilateral state on the other side of the Atlantic see "no" votes as temporary aberrations in which the plebs got the answer wrong and have to be asked the question again after a period of re-education.

So, when the Irish unaccountably said they'd like to continue governing themselves, the "yes" camp did what it did when the Danes rejected the treaty that created the EU in 1992 -- mounted a vast, tax-financed campaign to change minds. This time, Dublin also rigged the vote. On the last day before its Christmas break in 2001, when many legislators had gone home, Parliament rushed through an amendment to the referendum law ending Dublin's obligation to give voters both sides of the argument. And the ballot question tied approval for Nice to a vote for non-participation in an EU army, thus herding people who wanted to keep Ireland's traditional pacifism into the "OK" corral.

The treaty and its passage demonstrate the ruthless determination and dishonesty with which the EU is demolishing national sovereignty. It scrapped veto rights in 39 policy areas, so member nations can neither opt out of nor prevent continent-wide standardization. It begins with harmonizing criminal law, so offences in each nation will no longer be based on the mores, traditions or democratic judgment of that country's citizens.

Member nations can now even be stripped of their vote in EU affairs if they breach its human rights standards, the nature of which may be judged by a 1990s decision that ordered Britain, on human rights grounds, to scrap laws banning sadomasochistic torture. The centralizing EU elite can be expected to disenfranchise nations that impede the creation of the superstate.

The EU project began as an effort to enfold Germany in a warm constitutional embrace and prevent it plunging Europe into war again, but has turned into an overweening drive to subordinate member states to a Franco-German command in Brussels. The suppression of national sovereignty has become the cardinal aim, for it is what makes the EU a power to be reckoned with globally.

It is the EU leaders, France and Germany, that most vociferously oppose America's right to decide for itself that self-defence and enlightened self-interest make it wise to take military action against Iraq, unilaterally if necessary. The EU is also the strongest backer of the Kyoto climate change treaty, seeing it as a tool to undermine national sovereignty. The content of these disputes doubtless pleases Canada's anti-American left, but if their concern for our national sovereignty is real rather than a facade, they should worry about the EU's machinations.

Two years ago next month, President Jacques Chirac, of France, speaking at the Hague about Kyoto, praised "this unprecedented instrument, the first component of an authentic global governance ..." The builders of the EU are burying the nation state not just on their own continent, but are also working toward the imposition of global governance. EU power blooms amid multilateral structures that militate against nation states.

The primary target is the United States -- the greatest force of good for a century past -- but that's because countries like Canada are regarded as easily picked off or already in the bag. Canada and the United States understandably tend to regard European unity as A Good Thing because we were drawn into terrible wars when Europe was irreconcilably divided. But the lens of war is now an impediment to seeing the EU for the malign thing it is.

McLeod

Thats the biggest load of bull I've read this month. Keeper, I think you are an intelligent person, but if you believe in this crap, I'm not so sure anymore...

Do I need to remind you how many times did the referendum about the independence of Quebec take place? I mean really, hypocricy at its finest.

And I wont even touch the subject of Kyoto treaty and stripping the states of their votes if they REPEATEDLY VIOLATE THE HUMAN RIGHTS. Bah, how is either of that a bad thing?

Gaggin

Originally posted by keyknowte
Political science is a paradox. In that, political science is not a science. Thus such science loving people as you should not really like it. But really, I guess it depends who teaches the political science classes, doesnt it? My teacher might tell me about the evils of such an idea. ;)

imagine what would happen if you democrats lost the world elections for the U.S.? Gore, "The elections for a representative for the U.S were clearly rigged, we want the world electoral college to personally handcount the results."
It would be terrible..... No one would know who had really one for months, even then, even if you lost you would still claim victory...
I would just like to ask about the problems such a government migh cause. Would there still be countries? What if all the voters of China (wait, they dont vote), voted for Deng Xiao Ping? Im sure the 3/4 billion voters of China would have a huge say in worldly affairs. Instead of Tian Men Square it might be.....well, you guess. Ill write a real post whenever I have time, I`m much too jovial at the moment to right anything serious, or in depth....

On the Islamo-Facist note, what happened in bali Mcleod? Oh, yeah a lot of Europeans died. I dont think a single American or Jew died in that attack. Do you know why? Because they arent just targeting Americans and Jews... They are targeting anyone who is not their perceived image of a Muslim. Was it a French tanker that was attacked? I`ve already forgotten, please remind me. Does Al Queda sponsor the Albanians against the Macedonians, and the Chechens against the Russians? Really McLeod, it doesnt seem like they are targeting countries who blah blah blah you wrote. I thought Bali would bring you europeans around to the truth, but it seems that when you really dont want to believe the truth you can ignore the blatantly obvious.

So peace to the place where the sun sets,
And Im out

There's a difference between a terrorist sect attacking Europe indirectly and a direct attack by actual nations. No Islamic nation would dare attack Europe, but instead would indirectly support one side of a conflict to their likings. It's a big political war game that most nations use, noteably the U.S.

China does in fact vote, but only on a local level. However, just because China has 1.2 billion people doesn't mean they're gonna have 1/6 of the power in a national Government. There are many ways to balance power in a global Government, and I don't think the plurality vote is the right one to use. If the Chinese voted for Deng Xiao Ping, then good for them. It's not he's gonna run the rest of the world. And what happened at Tiennamen Square is completely irrelevant to a global Government. A global government would have a hand in preventing such fiascos. Plus, the body count at Tiennemen would be very small compared to teh possible civil strife that would've occured in its place.

The EU isn't one of Europe's better ideas. There's a reason why Britain refuses to join. the EU may be Europe-friendly, but it sure isn't nation-friendly. The economic gains from the smaller countries would somewhat hurt the bigger countries, while the political power the bigger countries gain could leave the littler countries much more vulnerable. Britain doesn't want European fishing boats moving in where British fishing boats make their profit, which is just an example of the freedoms a nation gives up by joining this union. I personally thought Europe was doing just fine without such a union. Countries such as Germany and Switzerland already were flourishing economically before the EU, and now that they have to maintain a national economy without having a national Government to protect its interests.

Evil Penguin

lol "Ireland's traditional pacifism"

Sorry, that article just made me smile.

I tend to think the EU is the best idea Europe's had in quite a while. If you think its structure or elements of its policy are flawed, that's one thing, but don't blame the idea itself. Europe is a much safer, more stabile, and yes, more democratic place to live since they've started cooperating so much more. Not to mention it is the only entity capable of standing up to the U.S. with any credibility, and one country, no matter how democratic or stabile, should have power over all others. A benevolent tyrant is still a tyrant.

Lou Cyphre

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Not to mention it is the only entity capable of standing up to the U.S. with any credibility, and one country, no matter how democratic or stabile, should have power over all others. A benevolent tyrant is still a tyrant.

Huh? Did you mean to say "shouldn't have power..."?

McLeod

Originally posted by Gaggin
The EU isn't one of Europe's better ideas. There's a reason why Britain refuses to join. the EU may be Europe-friendly, but it sure isn't nation-friendly. The economic gains from the smaller countries would somewhat hurt the bigger countries, while the political power the bigger countries gain could leave the littler countries much more vulnerable. Britain doesn't want European fishing boats moving in where British fishing boats make their profit, which is just an example of the freedoms a nation gives up by joining this union. I personally thought Europe was doing just fine without such a union. Countries such as Germany and Switzerland already were flourishing economically before the EU, and now that they have to maintain a national economy without having a national Government to protect its interests.

The idea is to create a single European economy. There will be no national economies in future, therefore there will be no need to protect them. The transition will be hard and every country will have to sacrifice something. Some more than others. But thats how it works and I'm glad that in this case politicians have enough brains to take on this challenges, because ultimately it will prove to be more than worth it.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
lol "Ireland's traditional pacifism"

Sorry, that article just made me smile.

I tend to think the EU is the best idea Europe's had in quite a while. If you think its structure or elements of its policy are flawed, that's one thing, but don't blame the idea itself. Europe is a much safer, more stabile, and yes, more democratic place to live since they've started cooperating so much more. Not to mention it is the only entity capable of standing up to the U.S. with any credibility, and one country, no matter how democratic or stabile, should have power over all others. A benevolent tyrant is still a tyrant.

Thats the biggest load of bull I've read this month. Keeper, I think you are an intelligent person, but if you believe in this crap, I'm not so sure anymore...

If you believe I care in the least what your assessment of my intelligence might be, or I care at all about my intelligence, you are very much mistaken. If that was supposed to be some sort of appeal to my intellect, you have failed resoundingly.
As for believing what is patently untrue, I could level a similar accusation at you. You claim the European Community averted some sort of disaster in violating the rights of a nation to choose its own leader. I am referring of course to Joerg Haider, a so-called "right winger" of European politics who was virtually forced to step down from the Austrian government. Why was he forced to step down? He was labelled by the media as a racist hatemonger, and then the EU stepped in, and demanded Haider abdicate lest they punish Austria with sanctions. Was he a "hatemonger?" Certainly he said some inappropriate things, but since when has that been grounds for an unelected body from another nation to decide his fate? If you claim he was anti-semitic, then you had better depose almost every European so-called leader because they all share the same anti-Jewish ideologies masqued as some sort of self-righteous defence of Palestine. That is a clear violation of the rights of Austria's electorate. Nor is that the only case. Italy's new President was purportedly a right-winger as well, if any of you remember with your highly selective memories, he too was threatened with EU action-he was not allowed to make certain decisions as the government that had once been a sovereign nation. The rights of the voters of Italy have been violated grossly.

Penguin you are an unrepentant jackass, I am well aware of that, and I know very well that you would sacrifice individual liberties for what you suggest is the greater good. But, how can the good of the people be tied to the removal of their rights? That is clear grounds for the state to move in and become progressively(regressively) more autoritarian. The best interests of the people are not best served by an autoriatarian government which decides everything for them, THEY ARE BEST SERVED BY THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE DEMOCRATICALLY WHATEVER THEY WANT MOST. Demo- Kratos, not Auto-Kratos.

You deny this is the path Europe is taking, but it is clearly being outlined in my posts, and in Hugo Gurdon's article, and in every day life. You know already that in many European countries, freedom of speech has been severely compromised under the guise of preventing "hate speech." Seems innocent enough until the government decides to allow a broader definition or re-interprets the constitutional defintion. What about Germany's laws banning political parties deemed "far right" does that best serve democracy? Like politics in a circle, by moving further away, they only move farther towards what they purportedly do not want. When will other parties become banned too?

You are quite correct about the European Union benevolent tyranny, I quite agree. No one nation should have power over another, nor should any organization have power over a nation when its mandate is not clearly decided by the people of that nation.

The European Union, credibility? There's your credibility for you.
You know who I hate more than Europeans? People who admire Europeans.

Evil Penguin

Hitler was democratically elected. If Europe had been organized in a coherent union in 1931, the extreme persecution of Jews, the totalitarian regimes in Germany and Italy, the jingoistic invasion by Germany of most of Europe, the deaths of tens of millions, and ultimately even the Cold War would never have happened. Rule by one nation would indeed be tyranny. Rule by all nations is democracy. I would never sacrifice individual liberties that do no harm to others, and you know that perfectly well. What I am perfectly willing to sacrifice are the "liberties" of one particular unit of government to opress and dominate. It is simply trading one democracy for another, more practical one. Think of it in terms of individuals. If everyone had individual "sovereignty," then anyone could do whatever they wanted. Want to slash someone else's tires or maybe spread around some toxic waste? You can! It's your sovereign right! But what if everyone got together and voted not to allow that sort of thing? You know, laws. You might still want to do those things, but it is no longer your right, as the people have voted not to allow it. You've lost some of your personal sovereignty to a larger one, and yet everyone is better off. Imagine that.

McLeod

So you prefer a Hitler-in-the-making to be a president of a country which actually did produce Hitler? The Europeans you hate so much obviously think otherwise and wow, looks like you are wrong and they are right. :rolleyes:

As for the freedom of speach: bullshit. Any facts supporting your ridiculous claims? Thats right, none.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by McLeod
So you prefer a Hitler-in-the-making to be a president of a country which actually did produce Hitler? The Europeans you hate so much obviously think otherwise and wow, looks like you are wrong and they are right. :rolleyes:

As for the freedom of speach: bullshit. Any facts supporting your ridiculous claims? Thats right, none.

"Oh! Foolish, foolish Olivia."

NO, I believe you are the one with no facts, so analyze this bitch.

I think one of the cornerstones of democracy is presumption of innocence, don't you? Innocent until proven guilty. SO, unless you have proof Joerg Haider is Hitler, and he has comitted crimes, I think I am right and you are WRONG. And you say democratic principles will not suffer, come on. You guys are pathetic, miserable, venal, so narrow-minded... Who do you think you are? I have told people so many times, " I have seen everything I have wanted to see," they say, "what?"
You should learn to be more observant-see with those eyes, analyze the information, compile the data, compute the numbers, but for heaven's sake, don't be presumptious.

This is remarkably funny, you people say we shouldn't depose Saddam because we don't know he will do something wrong, even though he clearly did wrong in his past, but you say an emphatic YES! to deposing a DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED MAN who has never, as far as you know, done anything wrong in his life-on the supposition he is just like Hitler.

You have all the insane logic of a demented madman, and that is no reasoning at all.

Evil Penguin

Yes, and if Iraq were part of an organization that had agreed to those rules, then that organization has every right to take whatever steps it deems necessary to...

WAIT A MINUTE! Iraq is a member of such an organization! The United Nations! And the United Nations has a right to deal with it. Some random other member doesn't. Just like France or Germany alone couldn't dictate the actions of other EU nations. See how much that makes sense?

McLeod

Gaggin

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
"Oh! Foolish, foolish Olivia."

NO, I believe you are the one with no facts, so analyze this bitch.

I think one of the cornerstones of democracy is presumption of innocence, don't you? Innocent until proven guilty. SO, unless you have proof Joerg Haider is Hitler, and he has comitted crimes, I think I am right and you are WRONG. And you say democratic principles will not suffer, come on. You guys are pathetic, miserable, venal, so narrow-minded... Who do you think you are? I have told people so many times, " I have seen everything I have wanted to see," they say, "what?"
You should learn to be more observant-see with those eyes, analyze the information, compile the data, compute the numbers, but for heaven's sake, don't be presumptious.

This is remarkably funny, you people say we shouldn't depose Saddam because we don't know he will do something wrong, even though he clearly did wrong in his past, but you say an emphatic YES! to deposing a DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED MAN who has never, as far as you know, done anything wrong in his life-on the supposition he is just like Hitler.

You have all the insane logic of a demented madman, and that is no reasoning at all.

Well, as far as Europe knew, Hitler wasn't going to kill millions of Jews and take over the continent. At least, they had no evidence of such claims. Yet you believed that not only should Hitler've been ousted, but have the entire nation of Germany invaded! You also called me cold-hearted and uncaring, and said I couldn't imagine a thousand corpses... like it's THAT hard. And now you're complaining because some Austrian leader had to step down because he said some stupid things, and shared some of Hitler's tendencies. What, does he need to be German to be considered a threat in your mind?
Now, I'm not saying he should've been thrown out. Much of Europe, noteably France and Britain, are incredibly rascist and often anti-semetic, at least by American standards. Britons and the French blame black and muslim immigrants for stealing their jobs, which is bullshit considering that the immigrants are legal and the unemployment rate is very high, despite the fact that the population is slowly lessoning in Europe anyways. And it's funny how the British Government can criticize Israel when they have their own MPs getting assassinated. Hey everybody! Look! Look at Israel! No, not N. Ireland, Israel! :rolleyes:

And the EU may not be the most efficient form of European Government, but last time I checked, no natin HAS to join it either. it's a choice of that nation, and if it doesn't like trading in certain power for certain privileges, then they don't have to. How can that not be Democratic.

And we'd better be careful when we talk about who's elected democratically. Saddam was elected democratically. So are Chinese leaders (technically). The same in Mexico. The fact that they are democratically elected doesn't always mean they're a legitimate leader.

keeper of the grave

Saddam was not democratically elected, he was "elected" in a so-called democratic process he had thoroughly subverted, same thing with Hitler. Hitler used a hell of a lot of violence and intimidation to win the German elections, and it was still a near run thing.

If the process is tainted, the election process can not be deemed fair or democratic-a democratic election must be in the hands of the people, not the state.

Joerg Haider broke none of the EU laws, no Austrain ones, had no one tortured, no one killed, did not subvert the election process, did nothing wrong, and Penguin and Mcleod say it was reasonable to boot him because he was the next Hitler. There is a double-standard, and it is not mine. Haider did not violate the EU rules, that is the kernel, and yet he was still forced to step down. What that means? Rules can be twisted by those in power-what does that mean? None of your rights are safe unless assured by the state. In Europe, they are not-you see, there are exceptions to rules-you can excercize free speech, but you don't have the right to "discriminate against a group"-you have the right to freedom of association and political choice, but only if that group or that party is sanctioned by the state.

That is not real liberty.

In Canada, you will be arrested if you spread material against abortion, why, because a law says that you only have that freedom in certain cases.

You want some profanity? Fine. Now listen up, you sad fuck. Europe will not wait for Heider to kill a million or two jews and start another world war. Are we stupid because we dont wake up in cold sweat and scream "Oh no! Heider was DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED! What have we done!" No, we dont care. Unlike you brainless war-monging conservative fucks, we care more about the future of mankind than anything else. Is that hard to understand, bitch?

Also, you didnt provide any facts of EU opressing the freedom of speech. So either come up with something to back you up, or shut the fuck up.

To everyone else, sorry for swearing, it had to be done. I guess.

Austria as the next world dominator, a likely tale-with her impressive industry and 8 million people, Austria is strategically placed for global domination. Or not...:rolleyes:

Yes you are stupid if you do not wake up and see Haider was democratically elected in a fair process. You are very stupid, and what is worse, you are unliberal to deny Austrian people the right to choose their government.
Gee, having lived 15 years of my life in one of the worst regional conflicts in the world, I must be a real "warmongering fuck." Oh yes McLeod, I love war. I must not care about the future of "mankind," I must be attending a Republican convention as an unfeeling, heartless conservative.
There is a difference between caring and doing McLeod, and I could care less whether you care. I am all for improving the human situation, but I will not have it done the same way Hitler so-called did it-with subversion of rights to the will of an unaccountable state. No, I would rather humans had the freedom to choose what their future could be; I, for one, do not want some asshole trying to force me into peace when peace is war and war is horror. Go slobber and love over someone else McLeod, but I don't want you to think of me as a "brother."
If you would compromise democracy for a dream, then you are stupid.(plainly put) Democracy may be a terrible form of government, but consider the alternatives.

By the way, I look forwards to more insults from you; I do not want respect from a miserable worm like yourself.

keeper of the grave

"There's a lot of talk, no walk
Users an losers, no doers
Foolz who complain an bicker
Youz the weakest kits in the litter
Crews that is never go-gitter
I flow cause I love music
But I still want more cheddar
Revenge in bandanas
No comunicates video antennas
Bitch made half mans all
If I leave it without a start
An ask why they hate hate
When hate is
People's bastards at heart
Aint bastards at all
With the style that aint his
You sure goin faint, peek this
Sad when I grab the open mic
Finish you an paint this
If you rap bout gats then you hard
If you rap about alot then you gone"

McLeod

Humans tend to choose wrong leaders at times. Gee, you didnt see that one coming, didnt you. Or are you implying that a nation has never elected a wrong leader? Seeing your level of intelligence I think you are. So let me spell this out for you: world peace and basic human rights are more important than our right to choose our leaders. You wont get it anyway, because you are too fucking arrogant and not willing to "trade your 'rights' for a dream". Imbecils like you will drive this planet to its death and then say: "Hey, at least we had a strong economy and good profits until all hell broke lose".

Also, you dont know shit about Europe. Only extremist parties get banned, any marginally constructive force never had problems with registration or whatever. You see, we dont want hatemongers and nazis spreding their propaganda to our children. Europe had enough of that crap and we are not willing to make the same mistakes. Freedom of speech is guaranteed, but just like in the US and Canada it has its boundries. And those boundries are much more loose. We dont ban music and literature here because of its content, for instance. I now numerous skinnhead bands who do their gigs and release their cd's, but they cannot preach their shit on the streets - and who is to say that its a wrong ruling? Only someone like you keeper.

And finally: I dont give a flying fuck about what do you look forward too, nor about what do you think of my persona. Thank you and fuck off.

Gaggin

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
Here's a little snippet of, as Dilayted Peeples would say, "things to come:"

The death of the nation state

Hugo Gurdon

Friday, October 25, 2002

Yes means yes and no means maybe -- at least among Europe's new masters. Which is ironic, because the continental bien pensants would shudder if they heard this excuse for harassment and manipulative control in another circumstance. But when it is only democracy that's getting screwed, they don't mind a bit.

Which brings us to why we should care about last weekend's Irish referendum ratifying the Treaty of Nice. Its supporters say it simply paved the way for 10 former Communist countries to join the European Union. They celebrate the sight of recently freed nations entering what is depicted as a secure, democratic and free-market fold.

The truth is different. What really happened was that the European Union moved past the tipping point -- its development into an anti-democratic, anti-free market, anti-national sovereignty superstate will now be a downhill canter rather than an uphill struggle.

It has admitted new members three times since the Irish joined in 1973, but this was the first time Ireland needed a referendum. That's because Irish law demands that voters give their permission before sovereignty is drained from their national Parliament. And the Treaty of Nice involves a massive transfer of power away from the people of Europe and their elected representatives to an unelected authority in Brussels.

How can a referendum be undemocratic? Here's how. The Irish voted two years ago to reject Nice. But only "yes" votes are regarded as permanent in modern Europe; the people building a multilateral state on the other side of the Atlantic see "no" votes as temporary aberrations in which the plebs got the answer wrong and have to be asked the question again after a period of re-education.

So, when the Irish unaccountably said they'd like to continue governing themselves, the "yes" camp did what it did when the Danes rejected the treaty that created the EU in 1992 -- mounted a vast, tax-financed campaign to change minds. This time, Dublin also rigged the vote. On the last day before its Christmas break in 2001, when many legislators had gone home, Parliament rushed through an amendment to the referendum law ending Dublin's obligation to give voters both sides of the argument. And the ballot question tied approval for Nice to a vote for non-participation in an EU army, thus herding people who wanted to keep Ireland's traditional pacifism into the "OK" corral.

The treaty and its passage demonstrate the ruthless determination and dishonesty with which the EU is demolishing national sovereignty. It scrapped veto rights in 39 policy areas, so member nations can neither opt out of nor prevent continent-wide standardization. It begins with harmonizing criminal law, so offences in each nation will no longer be based on the mores, traditions or democratic judgment of that country's citizens.

Member nations can now even be stripped of their vote in EU affairs if they breach its human rights standards, the nature of which may be judged by a 1990s decision that ordered Britain, on human rights grounds, to scrap laws banning sadomasochistic torture. The centralizing EU elite can be expected to disenfranchise nations that impede the creation of the superstate.

The EU project began as an effort to enfold Germany in a warm constitutional embrace and prevent it plunging Europe into war again, but has turned into an overweening drive to subordinate member states to a Franco-German command in Brussels. The suppression of national sovereignty has become the cardinal aim, for it is what makes the EU a power to be reckoned with globally.

It is the EU leaders, France and Germany, that most vociferously oppose America's right to decide for itself that self-defence and enlightened self-interest make it wise to take military action against Iraq, unilaterally if necessary. The EU is also the strongest backer of the Kyoto climate change treaty, seeing it as a tool to undermine national sovereignty. The content of these disputes doubtless pleases Canada's anti-American left, but if their concern for our national sovereignty is real rather than a facade, they should worry about the EU's machinations.

Two years ago next month, President Jacques Chirac, of France, speaking at the Hague about Kyoto, praised "this unprecedented instrument, the first component of an authentic global governance ..." The builders of the EU are burying the nation state not just on their own continent, but are also working toward the imposition of global governance. EU power blooms amid multilateral structures that militate against nation states.

The primary target is the United States -- the greatest force of good for a century past -- but that's because countries like Canada are regarded as easily picked off or already in the bag. Canada and the United States understandably tend to regard European unity as A Good Thing because we were drawn into terrible wars when Europe was irreconcilably divided. But the lens of war is now an impediment to seeing the EU for the malign thing it is.

I do hope that you're aware that the European Parliament is elected.........

Bryndon

This is just a message from someone who has been around since this site started up (no, i wasnt registered, but I think I can remember when dmitri only had about 50 posts and I watched all the people every day...)

I digress. Im just asking for someone sane on this forum to remember that this page is made for long, thoughtful discussions with no flaming or spamming. This is simple idealism - showing the self-restraint and intelligence to sit down and make your case without personal remarks to the other.

You don't have to agree. I'm not a moderater and all the involved parties are, so I cant even report this to one of you.

So, I'm going to say give me sanity or give me a ban cause this place has gone so far down since I was first here.

keyknowte

Jeorg Haider---the next Hitler....I doubt it.
When Jeorg Haider went to a convention of German War Veterans, he was saying,"German war veterans deserve as much recognition as other war veterans." Is that wrong? Perhaps, inexcusable? Deffinitely not! Jeorg Haider may want to slow down immigration, however that is not a Nazi policy. There comes a point when countries as small as Austria become overcrowded. As people in here love culture, I will appeal to culture. I imagine many Austrians want to keep their culture alive. Just like the quebecois wanted to keep their culture alive when England flooded them with British immigrants. You must take a closer look at wht Haider has actually said, I understand German, and it seems a lot of news services have not been "entirely accurate" in their description of his comments. At the gathering of German WAr Veterans, he was supporting them, however I am not sure if he knew there were SS soldiers in the crowd. I bet you ninety-nine percent of the people in this forum have not bothered to do research about Haider`s real propositions, or his full comments, not those taken out of context to smear him. It really does not seem like Haider could be the next Hitler does it? What is he going to do? Invade Germany(a country of 80 million) with an army of 60 thousand. I doubt it. What is he going to do? Murder the few hundred Jewish people in Austria? I doubt it. What I really think is happening here is that the Social Democrats are worried about a conservative coming to power in Europe because heaven forbid his ideas might be better than theirs. That heaven forbid conservative parties in their countries might come to power and replace them. That heaven forbid, they might be investigated for their lying and robbery. So what is the most successful tactic? Call your opponent a Nazi, discredit him, force him from power with the weight of an international body and breath easy and hope the "good times" will last. Really, what we are looking at is just another example of the use of slander in politics. Mcleod`s retarded comment about Haider coming from the same place as Hitler is completely irrelevant, as is much of his post. None of you have yet to offer any proof Haider is a Nazi, you just roll along repeating it endlessly as if it is a given... Hmmmm, debates are usually decided on the basis of fact, this one seems to hold none at all. Frankly I am not surprised, i have long seen people act as the trumpets of others, being mislead by the media and politicians. Try learning the hard way for once.(like looking up some info, and noter bene dont just go to pages which are clearly biased.

Evil Penguin

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Yes, and if Iraq were part of an organization that had agreed to those rules, then that organization has every right to take whatever steps it deems necessary to...

WAIT A MINUTE! Iraq is a member of such an organization! The United Nations! And the United Nations has a right to deal with it. Some random other member doesn't. Just like France or Germany alone couldn't dictate the actions of other EU nations. See how much that makes sense?

Look at me! I'm the key point!

The EU pressured Haider into stepping down with threats of sanctions, not a forceful removal. BIG difference. And though he technically broke no laws, the EU reserves the right to impose whatever economic sanctions it deems necessary for maintaining stability and keeping potentially agressive members in line. Hell, we could have done the same thing. And after all, nobody forced Austria to join. If you disagree with the decision, fine, but there's nothing wrong with the mechanism.

McLeod

Originally posted by keyknowte
Jeorg Haider---the next Hitler....I doubt it.
Frankly I am not surprised, i have long seen people act as the trumpets of others, being mislead by the media and politicians. Try learning the hard way for once.(like looking up some info, and noter bene dont just go to pages which are clearly biased.

Haha, and this from the guy who is copy/pasting more than a half of his arguments straight from "not biased" web sites and papers. Talk about a "retarded comment". :rolleyes:

As for the rest of your post - you know its bull. Austria and Bayern have the biggest number of neo-nazi groups per population. And those groups dont just love their culture, they hate other's as well. The area can errupt any moment under a leader like Heider. This is why EU stepped in.

And no, there is no Social-Democrat conspiracy. Most of the national parliaments and governments in EU states are central/right wing. Look it up. They just happen to dislike hatemongers like Heider.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by McLeod
Humans tend to choose wrong leaders at times. Gee, you didnt see that one coming, didnt you. Or are you implying that a nation has never elected a wrong leader? Seeing your level of intelligence I think you are. So let me spell this out for you: world peace and basic human rights are more important than our right to choose our leaders. You wont get it anyway, because you are too fucking arrogant and not willing to "trade your 'rights' for a dream". Imbecils like you will drive this planet to its death and then say: "Hey, at least we had a strong economy and good profits until all hell broke lose".

Also, you dont know shit about Europe. Only extremist parties get banned, any marginally constructive force never had problems with registration or whatever. You see, we dont want hatemongers and nazis spreding their propaganda to our children. Europe had enough of that crap and we are not willing to make the same mistakes. Freedom of speech is guaranteed, but just like in the US and Canada it has its boundries. And those boundries are much more loose. We dont ban music and literature here because of its content, for instance. I now numerous skinnhead bands who do their gigs and release their cd's, but they cannot preach their shit on the streets - and who is to say that its a wrong ruling? Only someone like you keeper.

And finally: I dont give a flying fuck about what do you look forward too, nor about what do you think of my persona. Thank you and fuck off.

Apparently our European intellectual paternalistic brethren will deign to hear us as long as we agree with them. The only diversity they won't tolerate is the only kind that mattters: diversity of opinion, and of thought.

McLeod, you never were very perceptive. The only nations on this planet where so-called "human rights" are respected have democratic governance(ie the ability to choose leaders themselves), strong economies, and generally respect personal liberty to some extent.
"Human rights" are the meaningless slogans of those who have not the wit to understand what is the real catalyst of progress, real rights. Gee...Which nations have always been at the forefront of progress? Ummm, maybe those supporting democratic freedoms, the ones that did not subscribe to your fairy tale dreams when they declared independence, or fought for their rights. Strong profits bring something poverty and tree-hugging never will, and excess guaranteed by markets that drive change.

Yes, yes, humans do make mistakes. In fact, WE make a lot of mistakes. We make mistakes every day, and every way. And, oh yes, people do have a tendency to make the wrong choices for so-called "leaders," that is why there are 80 odd semi-democratic or democratic nations, and 105 completely tyrannical dictatorships. I don't see how the election of a bad leader able to impose on the entire world is any less probable than the election of a good one. I have no idea why you just seem to...what?...want us to believe humans in developped countries who are less ignorant, and less numerous, and still choose bad "leaders" often,will, when combined with third world ignorance, create the perfect electorate that will always make the right choice. How do you see that happening? Just one bad "leader" could do more damage than a thousand bad ones across history. Coupled with modern informatics technology, and an irrepressible military and police force with complete jurisdiction, we would be hard-pressed to ever get rid of such a tyrant. Tyranny today would be 200 times worse than tyranny 50 years ago. Can you even imagine the entire planet in the hands of a strong man? It would take just one, and you could see entire races, cities, nations, erased from the planets. People just have to vote once the wrong way. Not to mention the social and economic effects of this. Cities would be harmed even more than they are today-forced to subsidize far larger regions, unable to receive any reliable economic feedback, world leaders would live under the intellectualistic illusion that just because combined there would be a lot of production around the world, it would be thriving. Gee, I guess I did not see that coming.(idiot) You just supplied a compelling argument AGAINST world government. An error in one nation is generally not likely to affect the world all that aversely, what happens when a world government makes an error?

Yes, I prefer the imperfect world I live in today, to your shallow
crusade. This has nothing to do with arrogance, and everything to do with experience. It has been my experience in Sudan, and in Canada, that governments attempt to gain access to as much power as possible-it is a natural function of government. I for one, have never seen a government give up power willingly-perhaps the only example I can think of is THE MAGNA CARTA, and that was extracted from King John at sword point. Not surprisingly, it also jump-started progress all around the globe, introducing a more effective English parliament, and finally, democracy in England. England brought democracy to more nations than any other around the globe.(as a final result)

I have always preferred concrete things to the intangible illusions you carp over. Get real, meet people, maybe try to understand them, and then think over your answers.

Need I mention Georgia in this. Oh yes, they have instituted "ressource sharing" the typical Georgian way, a few leaders "share" all the ressources, while nationalized industries lead the nation to new economic lows, and failure, pollute the landscape, and return nothing to the employees. I wonder if anyone is even paid these days in Georgia, if they are, inflation must be a real killer.

Your simplistic understanding of "capitalism", which you happen to be a manifestation of, unless you are sharing that computer with Georgia's poor(something I highly doubt given the time you spend on it) does you no credit in the least.

The most ironic thing here is that most of you people in here are not equipped to get real world jobs. You are attracted, needless to say, to the so called "employment" "intellectuals" always prefer-comfy desks, and sometimes devoted minions. Practical skills, you have none, and the irony, you profess to love the practical low income people you could never understand. No, you are the favourites of welfare "earners," bureaucrats, and regressive and repressive governments, red tape, and laws, and gigantic plastic-bound expressions of the will of the few, incomprehensible to the majority.
You don't represent the poor, none of you do. You represent the priviledged classes of our society-the new feudal overlords. Not one of you is even directly related to anyone with a REAL job.

And McLeod, won't you please say something more about Joerg Haider, please? So you can prove the EU was not excercising powers that are beyond its normal jurisdiction. And you tell me the so-called "hate speech" laws will only be aimed at Nazis. Now the next time a real Nazi does take over, he can silence critics...legally, ban them, whatever. Apparently in Europe, you now have to register if you want to speak out, that was the gist of what McLeod was saying anyways.
Perhaps the greatest irony of McLeod's rant: the repressive laws he claims will silence the Nazis, are the same legislative abuses the Nazis themselves perpetrated.

Evil Penguin

I think you missed something...

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Yes, and if Iraq were part of an organization that had agreed to those rules, then that organization has every right to take whatever steps it deems necessary to...

WAIT A MINUTE! Iraq is a member of such an organization! The United Nations! And the United Nations has a right to deal with it. Some random other member doesn't. Just like France or Germany alone couldn't dictate the actions of other EU nations. See how much that makes sense?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Look at me! I'm the key point!

The EU pressured Haider into stepping down with threats of sanctions, not a forceful removal. BIG difference. And though he technically broke no laws, the EU reserves the right to impose whatever economic sanctions it deems necessary for maintaining stability and keeping potentially agressive members in line. Hell, we could have done the same thing. And after all, nobody forced Austria to join. If you disagree with the decision, fine, but there's nothing wrong with the mechanism. It's not a dictatorship, it's a heavily structured cooperation. And a democratic one, I might add.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Look at me! I'm the key point!

The EU pressured Haider into stepping down with threats of sanctions, not a forceful removal. BIG difference. And though he technically broke no laws, the EU reserves the right to impose whatever economic sanctions it deems necessary for maintaining stability and keeping potentially agressive members in line. Hell, we could have done the same thing. And after all, nobody forced Austria to join. If you disagree with the decision, fine, but there's nothing wrong with the mechanism.

We are just saying the UN has already shown itself incapable of dealing with every problem it has been faced with. Has yet to in any way make any useful movement against terrorism, actively supports terrorists in Palestine, and is not near making a resolution against Iraq.
Penguin, you know very well what the French resolution is.(do you not?) You also know it is the useless half-measure that has never succeeded before. How can the world body really know what weapons Iraq has been building if it is not allowed inside Saddam's palaces?(which cover more than 67 SQUARE MILES) How can they know what is going on if they have to give advance notice of inspections, and must receive approval from the Iraqi state for the inspections? Does that sound useful to you? Do you really not expect any acts of bad faith from Saddam Hussein himself?

Like Oedipus, Haider would rather lose his position than see cataclysm affect his nation. He made the honorable choice when forced to a difficult decision. How could you say those threats of sanctions were not forceful? It is essentially the same as saying drop Haider or we invade, international blackmail, and a cowardly tactic by an unaccountable organization. There is something wrong with any mechanism which can be so abused.

In Conclusion: I was not avoiding the point, I was elucidating my own point. That is, international organizations have not been successful in dealing with problems world wide. More to the point, the European Union acted outside its authority to remove Haider, and the UN appears unable to act with authority. Why? The problems have been clearly outlined, and I question your absolute faith in these bodies which are presently not accountable, and not entirely in the hands of honest and decent people. Who elects the UN??? As for the European Union, it could have shown world wide leadership in several situations, and gained credibility, isntead it did nothing. I am speaking of the up and coming Byelorussian elections, and the EU's refusal to monitor them, I speak also of their lack of protest when Mugabe fudged Zimbabwean elections, and their decision to opt out of a European Defence Force.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by McLeod
Haha, and this from the guy who is copy/pasting more than a half of his arguments straight from "not biased" web sites and papers. Talk about a "retarded comment". :rolleyes:

As for the rest of your post - you know its bull. Austria and Bayern have the biggest number of neo-nazi groups per population. And those groups dont just love their culture, they hate other's as well. The area can errupt any moment under a leader like Heider. This is why EU stepped in.

And no, there is no Social-Democrat conspiracy. Most of the national parliaments and governments in EU states are central/right wing. Look it up. They just happen to dislike hatemongers like Heider.

Bullshit!!! If you had ever lived in Germany for long periods of time, you would know where all the German neo-nazis are. They are in the North, in Schleswig Holstein especially-along with the east, East Saxony, Berlin, etc...
Having lived with a family in Germany,(the North) I have had many discussions over this. These people have told me there are more Nazis in the North, they are not proud of it, but it is fact.

Nice idea trying to fudge arguments McLeod, but I lived in Germany for 3 months, so I think I know. Even small towns in the NOrth have the characteristic club 88, signifying the Norse Runes HH, or also Heil Hitler. I never took the train or the subways anywhere in Germany because I was genuinely afraid of the groups of 30 or more Neo-Nazis which seemed to be present in areas where unemployment was highest-unfortunately for you, that does not characterize Bayern. You are really mad because a very competent Bavarian premier almost won the German elections, too bad for Germany he did not.

Evil Penguin

I don't think the French resolution is enough either, but that doesn't give us the right to ignore it. "I didn't agree with that law" rarely holds up in court.

The point is they didn't order him to resign, they just set conditions - perfectly legal economic conditions allowed by and agreed upon by all EU members upon joining. So yes, he resigned to save his country from disaster, as he should have. "Like Oedipus." Kind of like we set economic sanctions on Cuba, because Castro won't step down, or how we did on Nazi Germany, because Hitler wouldn't. Their justification was simply that they considered Haider potentially aggressive and his record showed he was quite willing to suppress rights and distinguish between minorities legally, something no "free" nation should allow.

keeper of the grave

Please enlighten me as to his "suppression of rights," and "indiscriminate attacks on minorities."

Either the UN deals with Saddam, or the entire West loses all credibility, and we become even greater targets. Terrorists will believe they can attack us with relative impunity.

Look, I realize those European Nations signed over their sovereignities willingly, I am pointing out that maybe we should take a step back before we do the same. Not to mention it won't be long before the EU is in a severe financial state. And I didn't say "economic, " I said financial, although, the decline of European cities should accelerate more quickly.

McLeod

Umm, Keeper who ever said anything about the President of the World? Hello? There are other forms of government?

About Germany: yes, I've lived there too. In Bayerische Alpes they still have Hitler's pics hanging on their walls. They hate blacks/arabs and dislike foreigners in general. North is conservative as well, but nowhere near to the retardness of Bayern.

And stop posting nonsense, you know perfectly fine that I meant registration of political parties, not everyone who wants to speak out.

Georgia: umm, what? Yes, I do not "share" with the poor in your sense of the word. However, I am supporting the idea of higher income taxes and bigger wellfare programm. You see, this is the way people share in the modern world. Of course you can go out on the streets and give some bum all your money, but some people think that there are more effective ways. You'll have to fight off the corruption that is reigning here at the moment first, but that's a different story.

McLeod

Random quotes from Mr. Haider:

"You know as well as I do that the Austrian nation was a miscarriage, an ideological miscarriage."

"In the Third Reich they had an orderly employment policy."

"The punishment camps of National Socialism" - referring to concentration camps.

"There are still decent people of good character who also stick to their convictions, despite the greatest opposition and have remained true to their convictions until today." - In an address to World War II veterans including former members of Adolf Hitler's Waffen SS.

"The Waffen SS was a part of the Wehrmacht (German military) and hence it deserves all the honour and respect of the army in public life."

Despite his struggles lately to improve his image (as if its possible anymore) and many "explanatory" speeches, it is obvious who he is and what kind of electorate stands behind him. Europe says NO.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by McLeod
Umm, Keeper who ever said anything about the President of the World? Hello? There are other forms of government?

About Germany: yes, I've lived there too. In Bayerische Alpes they still have Hitler's pics hanging on their walls. They hate blacks/arabs and dislike foreigners in general. North is conservative as well, but nowhere near to the retardness of Bayern.

And stop posting nonsense, you know perfectly fine that I meant registration of political parties, not everyone who wants to speak out.

Georgia: umm, what? Yes, I do not "share" with the poor in your sense of the word. However, I am supporting the idea of higher income taxes and bigger wellfare programm. You see, this is the way people share in the modern world. Of course you can go out on the streets and give some bum all your money, but some people think that there are more effective ways. You'll have to fight off the corruption that is reigning here at the moment first, but that's a different story.

You know, I think we have found something all Germans seem to have in common-their hatred for foreigners, but wait, that is not the real Germany. Germans are marginalized by a minority(mostly unemployed so-called welfare "earners") walking around with clubs, and are scared of neo-nazis, and, turks-people they believe they no longer have control over, and who do not seem to be integrating very well.
Most Germans are not racist, or Nazis, that should be obvious from the huge membership of Germany's Hip Hop community-most underground groups from America spend way more time doing rave concerts in Germany than they do in Canada, for example. Afterlife Recordz, all the way from LAC, spends months in Germany every year doing concerts to crowds they simply can not command in the United States.
Let me assure you McLeod that people in Bavaria do not, in general, have photos of Hitler on their walls, nor do most Schleswig- Holsteiners, your whole characterization of the region of Bavaria and Austria as being neo-nazi was blatantly prejudiced, and I forced you to reveal that prejudice, hahaha. AHhh, yes, Bavarians, uncultured brutes, unemployable, racists, all. Yes McLeod, I think I know who the real bigots are-people like you. You are so easy to bait. Hear that everyone, EVERY BAVARIAN IS RETARDED.!!!!!!!! The region is an explosive powder keg, and Bavaria, coupled with the military might of Austria could ignite the world!!!! Who is the real scaremonger McLeod, who is the real hatemonger?

Now, we all agree Haider has probably said some foul stuff, although McLeod has never heard Haider speak personally, we will take him at his "word."

Intellectual Georgia speaking...

Yes, with our higher taxes, we can scare away the last few dozen successful people who actually live in Georgia-that way there will be less to share, but it will be shared equitably. Instead of some people being worse off, we can all be worse off. Hurray for Georgia!!! And while we shrug off our non-existant birth rates, drug and alchoholism problems, we will also "not worry and be happy!!"
Instead of directly giving our money to bums, we find it much more useful to have more bureaucrats, and then finance the bums indirectly.
If you are from Georgia, you should know your country can not afford welfare programs, and should first worry about dealing with staggering crime, unemployment, and corruption, not exascerbating the situation. Commmerce hardly even exists there any more, it is more like barter. I would like to know of one successful city in the entire region.

Creamy~Goodness

It seems to me the EU has essentially done exactly what keyknowte pointed out- deposed a democratically elected leader who they feared for his different ideas. God forbid a conservative be elected in Europe! As for the EU, it could be a good idea, but it isn't worth sacrificing the democracy of a nation (namely Austria) for some neo-utilitarianist ideals, ones that are only fueled by questionable political movements and the power hold liberals have on Europe.

It amazes me sometimes that people truly would want to sacrifice their own voting process for the "greater good," simply so the group it sacrifices for is mainly in existence to hold the United States in check (or so I gather from the arguments I've read above, I doubt that is actually true).

The countries that could not economically deal with the EU sanctions are held in check by those that truly endorse the EU- while those that could (Britain) are largely ignored. Is it truly hard to grasp that the citizens of a country would have their own countries best interest in mind, and perhaps even their own? I don't claim to be an expert on the creation of European governments, but I'd be willing to bet they were founded by people. I wonder, would many countries truly join the EU if they could afford not to?

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by Darkwolf Reloaded
It seems to me the EU has essentially done exactly what keyknowte pointed out- deposed a democratically elected leader who they feared for his different ideas. God forbid a conservative be elected in Europe! As for the EU, it could be a good idea, but it isn't worth sacrificing the democracy of a nation (namely Austria) for some neo-utilitarianist ideals, ones that are only fueled by questionable political movements and the power hold liberals have on Europe.

It amazes me sometimes that people truly would want to sacrifice their own voting process for the "greater good," simply so the group it sacrifices for is mainly in existence to hold the United States in check (or so I gather from the arguments I've read above, I doubt that is actually true).

The countries that could not economically deal with the EU sanctions are held in check by those that truly endorse the EU- while those that could (Britain) are largely ignored. Is it truly hard to grasp that the citizens of a country would have their own countries best interest in mind, and perhaps even their own? I don't claim to be an expert on the creation of European governments, but I'd be willing to bet they were founded by people. I wonder, would many countries truly join the EU if they could afford not to?

There is a slight difference between conservative, say Chirac, and a Xenophobic NAZI sympathizer, like Haider. Or take away the NAZI part and have Le Pen. I find it quite ironic that the "immigrant" and "minority member" Keeper would like either. These aren't Neo-Liberals trying to do away with fifty years of "socialist" "mismanagement", these are what amount to facsists, as they are Xenophobic, quite often anti-semetic, and against liberal economics. Why do you neo-liberals like him at all?

keeper of the grave

They are actually what amount to racists Spliff, fascism is all in the practice.

Chirac is a "right winger" just as I am a socialist, or is it the other way around. Chirac is all about the status-quo. Le Pen was a socialist goombah, who had nothing going for him. Haider had some good policy ideas at least.

The main point is that you are stereotyping me by believing I have to react a certain way to something. Sheesh, talk about prejudice. The only irony I see here is your brutal attempt to paint me as being non-African Canadian-you are stereotyping immigrants, and me, and I really do not agree with that. Try and play that card on someone else.
As for Haider, his policies did seem like attempts to do away with "socialist mismanagement," after all, all he did was cut taxes, cut government jobs, and de-nationalize some television station. I don't remember any attacks on minorities though, do you?
I don't so much like Haider is I dislike people who think they should get rid of a democratically elected ruler just because he said some things.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
They are actually what amount to racists Spliff, fascism is all in the practice.

Chirac is a "right winger" just as I am a socialist, or is it the other way around. Chirac is all about the status-quo. Le Pen was a socialist goombah, who had nothing going for him. Haider had some good policy ideas at least.

The main point is that you are stereotyping me by believing I have to react a certain way to something. Sheesh, talk about prejudice. The only irony I see here is your brutal attempt to paint me as being non-African Canadian-you are stereotyping immigrants, and me, and I really do not agree with that. Try and play that card on someone else.
As for Haider, his policies did seem like attempts to do away with "socialist mismanagement," after all, all he did was cut taxes, cut government jobs, and de-nationalize some television station. I don't remember any attacks on minorities though, do you?
I don't so much like Haider is I dislike people who think they should get rid of a democratically elected ruler just because he said some things.

I'm stereotyping immigrants as people who dislike Xenophobes who wish to end immigration....... In my experiance this is pretty much correct and in no way negative.

As for your own background, I don't have a clue about your true background, your story is just brought in to question when you insist on policies that are known to increase the poverty rate, and basicly help only the rich, then defend racists and nazi sympathizers. Then you go on talking about drinking forties with natives. Your stories simply don't fit.

You pretty much sound like some white collar suburbanites brat child who's been given the best in life and raised by your class with ideals that help your class. You listen to hip hop and pretend to be black because you think it makes you cool. You go on tangents about being poor to add credibility to your defense that really your politics with help the poor unlike mine (despite the obvious differnce in poverty rates of say the US and Sweden (what 3-5% to 15%) that disproves it).

You attack socialists as conformists, to compensate for the fact that the over whelming majority of our generation has been sold by politicians and corporations as to the wonder of neo-liberalism, just like you.

I could be wrong, but since you called me a teacher and mother residing in Toronto, I don't feel bad saying any of it.

keeper of the grave

One thing I have over you Spliff is I am honest, and I do not try to veil(thinly, no doubt)insults in my posts. That post had nothing whatsoever to do with the subject at hand, and was just as deliberate as my abusive attack on Penguin. I have the excuse of slight mental instability, you can hardly explain yours away. :)

I am not about to respond to the negative aspects of that post; to do that would dignify them.(they deserve no such honour)
I understand why you attempted that attack, you were mad because I was "out of line" writing what I did about Penguin.(I think)

But, I am not an "immigrant," I am a Canadian citizen, and proud of it. Yes, I came to Canada 9 years ago from Sudan, but now I am Canadian.

As for the rest of your ridiculous post-I want to foster poverty, I am rich white collar little kid, I live in the suburbs, I listen to hip hop because I think it makes me cool, and all the rest of your sloppy allegations- you left me speachless.

I am in a position to know what poverty is; not only can I not be classified as "high income," or even "middle income," I have worked many solidly blue collar jobs-pouring cement, autobody work, cook, etc...Your characterization of me as white collar was just another attempt to place me in some social stratum; you really should spend less time determining others, and try to understand yourself.
But, that insult to me was even more bold, and ignorant than you understand-question any real blue collar worker, and you will find it is not "health care" which is at the top of his/her agenda, most want to live without so many taxes. Do you think I am lying? How do you tell a guy making $8 an hour you are about to remove almost half his income, even though he has a wife, two daughters and a son to support. He makes $8 an hour for Christ's sake, how can you do that to someone? You don't even know the misery I have experienced, or the life of poverty that so many Canadians live.
You then accuse me of not having "native" friends. Yeah, my friends are all Indians, and proud of it. They live in the hardest areas of town, and their lives are often very difficult. There are 20 000 descendants of the original population of Canada in this city, and though I do not know even a fraction of them, I know many.
I meet them because I write graffiti, there are many of them into that, little kids who are finally doing something they themselves can respect. They never knew people respected them, and you can't understand the joy they feel when people like me show them respect, and treat them kindly. Most people would rather cross the street than talk to an Indian, but I have never felt that way, I find them to be far more nice, and much less self-centered than caucasians. They don't have that aura of superiority we all unknowingly have. Yeah, I have drunk 40s with Indians in Barlowe tunnel, under the Iron bridge here in Saskatoon, at the 20th Street free wall, I always find myself talking to Indians, I have tons of Indian friends: Lance Night, Cohen Night, Jordan Corregall, DJ Kris-P, 24 K, Came 2, and many more.
No Spliff, for you "drinking 40s with "natives"" does not fit, but I tend to like Indians, so I could care less how pieces in your puzzle fit. This just shows I am that much less predictable than you; I like to retain a high degree of unpredictability.

As for "fostering poverty," I would say paying teachers 50-68 000 a year "fosters poverty" more than cutting income taxes for the poor, and eliminating sales taxes.
I would say paying judges 200 000 a year fosters more poverty than a voucher system for schooling.
I would say the outrageous costs of university foster and perpetuate poverty more than creating an environment favourable to business, and allowing development.
Is it any surprise that Alberta with such low business taxes and income taxes is a more desirable place to live in than Saskatchewan with our high taxes, and increased spending on everything?
Don't tell me the oil makes Alberta rich, by that logic the people of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iraq would be the richest in the world.
No, good government makes people rich, commerce makes people rich, and reasonable treatment of the poor allows them to climb from the bottom of the economic ladder.
Spliff, you say I am so against improving people's situations, but who goes to private schools in Canada these days, who goes to university? Yes, the comparatively wealthy, and the rich.
With a voucher system, anyone could go to a good school, and anyone intelligent enough could go to university. Am I so wrong to want that?

Spliff, the only thing your silly ideas has done for "the poor" is made them more numerous, and even more unhappy. Give it a rest, your mom probably makes twice as much as I do, and I don't have mummy and daddy to depend on.

You don't even know who my generation is, or what my generation is? You are just degenerate.

So here is Keeper, the horrible capitalist, who would like to make GOOD SCHOOLING genuinely accessible to ALL PEOPLE, who wants NO TAXES for low income people, who is extremely environmentally friendly, does not like the way our government and corporate ass holes suck up to each other, who wants more liberty for people, who wants a more business friendly atmosphere, who wants to decriminalize marijhuana, who would like to increase the severity of criminal justice, who believe in direct democracy, who would like to decrease welfare benefits(as welfare benefits no one), would like to restructure the way medical care is delivered in this country, and reasonably expects people who immigrate to Canada to integrate after a certain amount of time, and I am called a Xenophobe(although I am Xeno), I am a rich capitalist pig, unfeeling, and a whole round of other insults.

Well thank you Spliff, but I bet not everyone sees me that way.

Gaggin

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
I have the excuse of slight mental instability, you can hardly explain yours away. :)

I knew it! :eek:

No taxes for the poor? That's news to me, but don't be talkin that jibba-jabba. Everyone pays taxes, it's a harsh fact of life.

As for decriminalization of weed, preach on mah brotha.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by Gaggin
I knew it! :eek:

No taxes for the poor? That's news to me, but don't be talkin that jibba-jabba. Everyone pays taxes, it's a harsh fact of life.

As for decriminalization of weed, preach on mah brotha.

"What's the explanation for my skitzofrenik's state?"

But, some people should not be taxed, should they? What I don't understand is why people say they "care" so much about poor people, they want to "reduce poverty," and then make sure poor people pay a lot of taxes. Does not make a lot of sense, "we wish to eliminate poverty throught the taxation of the poor." Sounds more like feudalism.

We would not have to tax people so much if we cut useless government jobs like "co-administrators of urban development," and many many more. I bet the Canadian federal government could cut 100 000 jobs without a noticeable decrease in services for the average Canadian.

Gaggin

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
"What's the explanation for my skitzofrenik's state?"

But, some people should not be taxed, should they? What I don't understand is why people say they "care" so much about poor people, they want to "reduce poverty," and then make sure poor people pay a lot of taxes. Does not make a lot of sense, "we wish to eliminate poverty throught the taxation of the poor." Sounds more like feudalism.

We would not have to tax people so much if we cut useless government jobs like "co-administrators of urban development," and many many more. I bet the Canadian federal government could cut 100 000 jobs without a noticeable decrease in services for the average Canadian.

Poor people pay less taxes than rich people. And people who are really poor don't pay any taxes at all. People who have dependents pay less taxes. Are you saying it's the taxes that make people poor? Or is it the fact that their job can't support their lifestyle. Or they didn't stay in school, so they're stuck with crappy jobs. Whatever the case, as long as they live in their country and are earning a reasonable dollar, they're responsible for paying their taxes. Nothing in life is free.

If you want to reorganize the Canadian Bureacracy, be my guest. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt any.

Evil Penguin

And again with your salary problems. 50,000-68,000 a year for teachers? I don't get it. Are you saying that's too high? Paying teachers more means you get better teachers, thus better education, thus a more productive society. That's economics, not charity. And yes, I am biased on that subject, but I also know more about it. I know exactly why there's a teacher shortage in NYC, and I know exactly why kids in the burbs do so much better on standardized tests, and I know exactly why they get into much better colleges. Because they pay more, and the most qualified go to those jobs, leaving NYC teachers, who make pitiful amounts, as the least qualified and least educated. Smart people don't become teachers because they could make more elsewhere, and education suffers.

As for school vouchers, it's a photo op proposal that's not at all well thought through, but it works politically because it resonates with voters who haven't thought it through, either. You're not getting money from nowhere. The school voucher money comes out of the schools themselves. And where are all these people with vouchers supposed to go? The schools are all full, remember? There's no room to move around without causing horrible overcrowding in the "good" schools (thus making them bad) and abandoning all funding to the "bad" ones, thus making them much worse. It's not fixing anything. Taking money from where it's needed and putting it where it isn't, in the process making everything worse. And I'm not even mentioning the parochial school factor, having the government pay kids to go there and therefore basically funding churches with tax dollars. No, it's not a solution, it's a corrupt politician's excuse for not having one. If there's a problem with only the rich affording the good private schools and going to the best colleges, and even the public schools in richer areas are better, than nationalize. Oops, that's a dirty word for you, I realize, but I think before you jump down anyone's throat you should take a look at the education system in France. All schools are supported by federal taxes, so the quality differs little from rich areas to poor areas. High schools are chosen by the student, not based on quality of the school (there's no difference) but on the particular area that school focuses on (schools for the arts, science and engineering schools, etc.). University admissions are based entirely on merit, and there is no tuition. And the French consistently smash both Americans and Canadians in standardized tests.

I won't talk much about the other stuff because I'm not a Canadian and it's none of my business or expertise, but I couldn't let the education stuff go. Just a couple quick thoughts (you can assume I agree with most of the rest of what you said):

Welfare benefits no one (well, not no one, but does more harm than good) only if you do it wrong, which Canada apparently does. The U.S. system is much better and does imeasurable good.

I doubt someone making $8 an hour could come close to affording medical care for a family of five. Tax him less, sure, but tax those who can afford it more to compensate.

The people of Kuwait pretty much are the richest in the world, and that's with nothing but oil...

Are you actually proud of yourself for encouraging vandalism? Did I misunderstand you (BTW, if I did, just correct me, don't correct me and call me a fascist)?

keeper of the grave

Ayyy, peep this...Penguin, you are biased, and the the implementation of the things I support is proven to work-why don't you check out Milwaukee?

You Cannot Build a City with handouts...

John Norquist, the Democratic mayor of Milwaukee, Wis, who spoke to a Winnipeg audience recently, bluntly warns that a city's sustainability cannot be built with handouts. His book, The Wealth of Cities, cautions against the American style of revenue-sharing. "The effect of this residue of federal aid is not so much to build cities, but to keep mayors wandering in the wilderness, waiting for the bread to fall from on high." He argues instead for policies that maximize the natural advantages of cities-they are tremendously efficient engines of wealth creation - and build a framework for independent prosperity.
Among the recent wave of reform mayors in the United States, Norquist stands out for his no-nonsense approach. After four terms in office, his city is blooming. The downtown has blossomed with development and the population is growing. All this happened through smart policy, without outside help and subsidies. An admirer of Canadian cities, Norquist abhors the damage easy federal money and subsidies have wreaked on US cities and warns civic leaders about the danger of assuming that more money is an appropriate remedey for the ills of the city.
Norquist's successs in Milwaukee- he reduced property taxes by 20% over eight years- took two tracks which have only been reluctantly embraced by Canadian cities. First, he re-invented operations at city hall. He ended internal administrative monopolies by allowing cvivic departments to purchase from external suppliers. Services were redesigned to focus on outputs and outcomes rather than inputs and process. His old-fashioned frugality, a refreshing character trait in a liberal Democrat, inspired him to follow what has become famous as "Norquist's Law," that increases in city spending be held below the rate of inflation.
Nordquist distrusts outside transfers and subsidy programs and thinks cities should focus on fundamental by creating excellent and affordable services, good schools, and public safety. A hardliner on crime, he aggressively pushed frontline community policing in Milwaukee. It paid off, he says, with higher property values, business expansion, and job creation, restored cultural and civic life and a renewed sense of community.
Nordquist is also critical of traditional welfare programs which perversely discourage people from working by tilting benefits towards those who are unmarried and without jobs. He touts Milwaukee's New Hope project, which supplemented the wages of low income workers(a good idea) and assisted with their transition until they rose above the poverty line, as a competitive, outcome driven model of welfare reform. Three-quarters of them ended up in full-time work.(better than the usual welfare success rates)
For N., the public school system is an unproductive sector depressed by government policies on choice and competition. About 1,000 Milwaukee school-children receive vouchers of $4,200 each so they can escape low-performance, inner-city schools. Norquist wants to broaden the program to drop its low-income restrictions and to allow parochial schools to accept vouchers. Offering a full range of school opportunities, he says, would eliminate artificial constraints and unlock the value of cities.
N.'s appreciation of markets extends to his critique of traffic planning and urban zoning and housing policies. He elimintated one-way streets to create a more driver friendly driving environment in Milwaukee's downtown. He called for the repeal of zoning codes that discourage density by restricting the development of multi-use neighbourhoods. Cities grew and thrived as polygos but seamless mixes of housing, business and services. Separation by fiat of these life functions through rigid zoning rules forbids cities to express their natural value.
N's central message is compelling. Seeking a productive role for government to identify and counter impediments to the natural flow of people and capital allows cities to make the best of their natural advantages of diversity and specialization. The consequent prosperity takes care of the fiscal problems at the same time.

"You can't build a city on pity," quips Nordquist. He sees INTELLIGENT policy reforms as the key to unleashing the potential of cities.

Penguin, when the median income in Saskatoon is closer to $18 000, there is a problem. Saskatchewan, and Saskatoon can not afford all the salaries. Why? Because sensible development, and people were forced away by anti-growth people like yourself. In the long run, that happens to be fatal to cities.

If our government eliminated services it has no business providing, "free health care" could be provided excellently, and consumers could be taxed less.

I can't believe you live in New York, and you don't even know what a free-wall is-'tis no wonder you can't understand hip hop music when you can't even understand one of the most important elements. Just because your city is intolerant of an emerging art form, and I am sure you don't recognize it, does not mean that some cities don't make an effort to beautify themselves. I don't suppose you have ever seen the docks in Hamburg, or Munich's mayoral office? Yes, graffiti murals there, and several German government offices have had enormous murals painted by prominent originators like DAIM, LOOMIT and BEDOK. The largest graffit collabo is on the Hamburg docks.

As for so-called vandalism Penguin, why don't you have a look at some of the FX crew murals in Brooklyn, Queens, and Harlem(they are legal by the way) and see what a positive influence graffiti can have. Believe me, I might not know many people literally "saved" by hip hop, but my brother does, and in the words of one man, "hip hop, if it were not for you I'd prolly stalk the streets, carry glocks and heat and be on some ill shit you would not believe." The song is "Killafornia to the Belly of the Beast", and it details the problems facing young heads in LAC. He discourages violence in the strongest terms, and campaigns for better education, and and end to racial profiling.(ironically enough)

Or peep "Atomsphere,"

I wanna be bigger than Jesus n bigger than wrestling
bigger than the Beattles and bigger than breast implants
Call me the biggest thing to hit these little kids
Bigger than guns, and bigger than cigarettes."

If you heard the song, you would understand.
Graffiti is an important, and great artform-many art Professors have come to our sites-visualorgasm.com, or 50mmlosangeles.com-they admire graffiti, sure they do not like tagging, but neither do I. I would never tag, it is like a dog pissing on a tree, a primal marking of territory-taggers also tend to end up dead, shot by tag-bangers.(not in Canada or New York mind you) Hip hop has got soul, especially the "underground," not that mainstream violence n guns bullshit you all watch on MTV, no the underground stays true to the roots, and is down with all the elements.

Or 2Mex, medication, money is meaningless, countercloudwise

Deep beneath these electric stars, counter cloudwise
yes ,yes, cloud nine

Of Mexican Descent is actually
Indians at full capacity
Counter Cloudwise, counter cloudwise
And then I dreamt
That I had a dream
And in that dream
I musta dreamt
that I was exempt
From contempt
The innocence
of being dense
The violins of violence
Shudder by the subtle science
Of the silent
Some sort of silly surgery
Life's lottery
Has taken a lot of me
Automated army
Armories
First cast my future is fiery
But I know this side of me
Would never lie to me
See myself one-sidedly
Then thoughts flow free
Style, substance then story
Condescending in the end
But don't pretend
You don't bend
Or should I even die trying
To the point that I would even try dying
Blow satan away like a dandylion
Nothing left of me, start flying
As in the stipes of the General's suit
Young boy in a hot pursuit
SInce my story begins like this
Criminal activity at the age of thirteen
Crying along the sidewalk
Weeded out a little too young
Looking for that special sun
Always in love with the female gender
I surrendered myself to the streets
Picked up the name render
In love with graffiti
Trying to find a beat
I was a contender
In the hip hop game
You know
I showed up
to the Regent hotel
It was 83
When I discovered me
Flipping the lyrics along my tongue
And now in the 99
Trying to find my devoured science
See, the way I rolled into this beat
Towards the feeling of heat
I had missed
I waited there just silent
Trying to understand what was goin on
Looking around for someone
Until I found myself there
And then blood cells
Were more like jail cells
When you find your board sells
COnfusing me
Something that happens to everyone
Who's been writing a long time
Without paper you know
Writing inside of the mind
You find your lines
They twist you up
its memories inside of a cup
And mine spilled
Falling on all West end people
I started to speak
In this hallway
we called the catwalk
When we were kids
In the catwalk long away
As I passed it
Noticing there along the other side
A dead body
It was somebody
I must have been fourteen
I stopped, alone,
And the smell was disgusting
And the streets started bucking
Night down, street light
Witnessing something nobody had
Seeing,
Its people the same colour
The same place
Killing each other
Money lovers.

Cloud nine, under these electric stars

Counter cloudwise

Or "Everything" by a bunch of respected undergrounds heads,
Everything, yeah

It don't matter how rich you be
how much your chairs and tables cost
How great your luxury
It aint home to me
Though it be a palace of a king
Until your soul is wrapped
Wrapped round everything.

Everything, yeah.

SOme folks think that money means everything
But there's alot of folks who got money
And still don't have no peace of mind.

Evil Penguin

????????????

That apparently was a reply to me, yet I don't see how it has anything to do with my last post.

"School vouchers" have done nothing at all to improve education in trial areas. The only thing they accomplish is let politicians paralyzed by special interest donations pretend they're doing something.

If it's legal, it's not graffiti. If it makes the city look better, makes me laugh, or makes me think, I got no problem with it. Unfortunately, here in an actual city where the grafitti is real, it's mostly giant signatures, gang signs, and pointless obscene insults. Not art.

keeper of the grave

"School vouchers" have done nothing at all to improve education in trial areas. The only thing they accomplish is let politicians paralyzed by special interest donations pretend they're doing something.

Penguin keep the claims; I don't want them. Why don't you present me with some supporting evidence.

You rejected that because you did not agree, not because it was untrue. That is foolish, just like your presumption of Switzerland's military strength, I suggest you find the latest version of the DIRECTORY OF THE WORLD'S WEAPONS, whichever JANE'S book deals with world armies, and PLACE DE LA CONCORDE SUISSE-which, you need not worry, is in English so you won't have to stumble through Babel Fish like you did last time.

If it's legal, it's not graffiti. If it makes the city look better, makes me laugh, or makes me think, I got no problem with it. Unfortunately, here in an actual city where the grafitti is real, it's mostly giant signatures, gang signs, and pointless obscene insults. Not art.

It is still is graf no matter whether it is legal or not; it began that way, and it will always be graf. Just like we are writers, not painters.

Ahhaha, you think graffiti is "unreal" here? How come you haven't even bothered to go to http://www.visualorgasm.com yet? You make all these presumptions, how 'bout you take a step back, and start drawing conclusions from actual evidence.
But, that is your approach to everything, "I know better, I won't even consider evidence." Your loss, not mine buddy.
I can't believe you are from the city where graffiti originated, and you don't even know what it is. I bet you haven't even mastered the literacy part of graffiti-ie reading the letters.
I also can hardly believe you don't even know who the FX crew is. I can tell you are far removed from the real scene.
You still are not telling me the whole story, do you think I am a fool?
"In the great words of Rick tha Rula, stop lying."

You wanna take it there son, I'll be waiting.

keyknowte

Actually Penguin, by paying teachers more you lower their quality; because people who teach because they love teaching are not in it for the money. You start paying teachers more, and people will start becoming teachers for the same reason they become civil "servants," for the money. For dedicated teachers, 50,000-70,000$ will undoubtedly satisfy. Those who are not dedicated(i.e. not in the job for the love of teaching), will complain that they "only" make 75$ an hour. If you want to turn teaching into a paper-chase, go ahead raise their salaries, and watch as teaching worsens.
Teachers are not exactly hard done by on the money side of things. Perhaps if we were all very rich they would deserve to make more, but with Canada`s stagnant standard of living, paying teachers more will only increase the burden on those who make a more meaningful contribution to the economy. Those who believe education is what distinguishes winner economic countries from loser economic countries are dead wrong. Mentality is the true breeder of success. Sadly, fools assume that going to university is the only option, and that doing skilled manual labor is degrading. As far as I am concerned, there is nothing more morally degrading than being a bureacrat....

I cant believe how you suckers whine about the miseries of capitalism, and then demand more pay raises for "civil servant" in the next breath.
You know what fuck teachers, they are not important, I was home schooled, and I am doing much better in University than most of those sad fucks who went to Public School, and dont bring out all the bullshit about homeschooled kids not having a social life, its called sports, community activities, and the like. There is nothing I hate more than people who werent home schooled surmising that those poor home schooled kids must not have a social life.... Teachers are not worth what they are paid, giving them a pay raise is just as stupid as paying dump truck drivers 70,000$ a year for driving a dump truck around.

Evil Penguin

Keyknowte, that's the biggest load of crap I've heard in a long time, and you know it. It's not actually a requirement that you have to disagree with me on everything, you know. You can let some things go. I can't speak for Canada, but here in the U.S. quality of education is directly proportional to teacher salaries, almost exactly, so guess what? You're wrong.

Keeper, you're a fool. You have quite the romantic and unrealistic notion of what New York is actually like, and think by writing on walls you can somehow pretend you don't live in freaking Saskatoon, Canada. "Ooh, I can read grafitti and I listen to hip hop! I must not be in a cultureless wasteland!"

keeper of the grave

Call me a fool Penguin, but you still have not provided any evidence to demonstrate how a voucher system can not work under any circumstances.
You also know, as well as I do, you have lied to me, and to people on this forum. I am content, I do not have to resort to lies to "prove" my points.
Now, I know both your parents are civil servants, and I know you don't understand hip hop, graffiti, or very much of anything for that matter, but there is no need to call Saskatoon a cultural void.
Why won't you go to visualorgasm.com, and why would I care whether I lived in New York or Saskatoon? Why would you care, for that matter? Real hip hop heads recognize you can't determine where you are to be born; it only matters if you've got love. That is why a hip hop artist can have friends from LA to Halifax. For once though, quit stereotyping me and the culture.

Call me a fool, but I am satisfied with my life, my family, and where I am from. You really don't have to take it there Penguin.

Evil Penguin

Neither one of my parents are civil servants. My mother teaches in private school and my father is an entrepreneurial marine surveyor. And you can't just vaguely accuse someone of lying and leave it at that. So please, go on. This should be good.

I can't prove vouchers wouldn't work in any situation, I can only prove that it hasn't worked every time it's been tried and there's no reason to believe it could. There exists no reasonable theory that could show how it might improve education.

I've never been to Sasktoon, but if it's anything like you describe, then yeah, it's a cultural void. There are few things more pathetic than envying ghetto life. Or even worse, thinking because you listen to hip hop and spray grafitti that you've somehow "achieved" it.

Gaggin

Originally posted by keyknowte
Actually Penguin, by paying teachers more you lower their quality; because people who teach because they love teaching are not in it for the money. You start paying teachers more, and people will start becoming teachers for the same reason they become civil "servants," for the money. For dedicated teachers, 50,000-70,000$ will undoubtedly satisfy. Those who are not dedicated(i.e. not in the job for the love of teaching), will complain that they "only" make 75$ an hour. If you want to turn teaching into a paper-chase, go ahead raise their salaries, and watch as teaching worsens.
Teachers are not exactly hard done by on the money side of things. Perhaps if we were all very rich they would deserve to make more, but with Canada`s stagnant standard of living, paying teachers more will only increase the burden on those who make a more meaningful contribution to the economy. Those who believe education is what distinguishes winner economic countries from loser economic countries are dead wrong. Mentality is the true breeder of success. Sadly, fools assume that going to university is the only option, and that doing skilled manual labor is degrading. As far as I am concerned, there is nothing more morally degrading than being a bureacrat....

I cant believe how you suckers whine about the miseries of capitalism, and then demand more pay raises for "civil servant" in the next breath.
You know what fuck teachers, they are not important, I was home schooled, and I am doing much better in University than most of those sad fucks who went to Public School, and dont bring out all the bullshit about homeschooled kids not having a social life, its called sports, community activities, and the like. There is nothing I hate more than people who werent home schooled surmising that those poor home schooled kids must not have a social life.... Teachers are not worth what they are paid, giving them a pay raise is just as stupid as paying dump truck drivers 70,000$ a year for driving a dump truck around.

Teachers are unimportant? Well, I don't know what kind of Whackass educational system they have up where you live, but here in America teachers are pretty damn important. Teachers are given a huge responsibility in society, and aren't paid all that much for it. On average, teachers get paid about $45,000 a year, not a whole lot for the D.C. Metropolitan area. The only finincial joy a teacher may have is a steady job, as no one's gonna 'downsize' teachers. And if you think teachers aren't gonna be able to do their jobs better with higher salaries, you're wrong. In fact, just about anyone will do their job better if they're higher paid, for not only is it a motive, but it's also a stress reliever. Now, you may have been homeschooled, but I've been both homeschooled and been in public schools, and public schooling is way better. Despite what activities you do outside the house, you just don't get the social skills that kids in classrooms do. Kids in school are better enculturated than kids who are homeschooled, and that's just the way it is. Now, depending on how crappy your schools are, you could probably get a better education at home than at school, but homeschooling also costs big bucks. And at home you don't have the support of the educational community that teachers and staff at school can give you.

Going to a university isn't the only way, but it's often the best way.

keeper of the grave

Originally posted by Evil Penguin
Neither one of my parents are civil servants. My mother teaches in private school and my father is an entrepreneurial marine surveyor. And you can't just vaguely accuse someone of lying and leave it at that. So please, go on. This should be good.

I can't prove vouchers wouldn't work in any situation, I can only prove that it hasn't worked every time it's been tried and there's no reason to believe it could. There exists no reasonable theory that could show how it might improve education.

I've never been to Sasktoon, but if it's anything like you describe, then yeah, it's a cultural void. There are few things more pathetic than envying ghetto life. Or even worse, thinking because you listen to hip hop and spray grafitti that you've somehow "achieved" it.

I don't think you have read Jane Jacobs yet, tsk, tsk.

Needless to say, special interests voucher systems will not be effective. Of course, I have rarely seen any system directed at special interest groups which is useful or "fair."

But seriously, any evidence of any failure of any school voucher system would be a good start. I would like, though, a description of how the entire program was instituted or implemented. Otherwise, whatever else you may provide is useless.

There are some theories which are rather relevent to this debate. Economic theories, for example, economic theory predicts market failure when: a single producer controls an entire market. Market failure happens to be the inefficient use of ressources by the way.

I don't remember describing Saskatoon as a cultural void; you must have assumed it. There is nothing more pathetic than mistaking admiration for an art form for something else, and indeed nothing more pathetic than attacking something you don't understand.

QUOTE]Why won't you go to visualorgasm.com, and why would I care whether I lived in New York or Saskatoon? Why would you care, for that matter? Real hip hop heads recognize you can't determine where you are to be born; it only matters if you've got love. That is why a hip hop artist can have friends from LA to Halifax. For once though, quit stereotyping me and the culture.[/QUOTE]

I thought I had made this point already. I have never known anybody so proud just because he was born in New York city. What do you want us to do? Applaud you? I'd much rather live in Saskatoon or La, cities where people are not arrogant; you have so little to offer for everything you could take advantage of. You could have taken up an art form, instead of criticizing others for doing something you did not have the courage to do.

Don't borrow style because you disrespect the poetry Penguin. For everything you had, I had far far less, and yet, I have more.

as babies, we wake up crying
are we really tuned to dying?

Evil Penguin

The voucher systems that were in trial in the midwest and those proposed by President Bush consist of each student using a tax credit that can go towards a school's tuitition. The only significant changes that took place were a slashing of funds for impoverished school districts and a skyrocketing employment in parochial schools paid for by government money, a funding of the church by the state. Needless to say standards immediately dropped radically.

Once again, I urge you to look at the system in France. All schools are tuition-free and merit based, all schools are well funded, and the tax money only pays for the actual education, not sports teams or other stuff. Even if you hate the French (and I know you do), it's worth a look. The "single producer" controls the whole "market" there, and they seem to be doing quite a bit better than either the U.S. or Canada.

Applaud me? Hell no. Nobody chooses where they live. But pretending you live a lifestyle that you obviously don't is stupid. It's like the kids in Greenwich, Connecticut who try to dress like gang members. Stupid stupid stupid!

So now you're criticizing me for not writing grafitti, here in the grafitti capital of the world? I hope you realize this city has quite a bit more to offer than that. It's also the jazz capital of the world, for instance...

keeper of the grave

Really? It is the jazz capital? I did not know that...:rolleyes:
Believe me, I am a jazz maniac, I know where Stacey Kent hails from.

Parochial schools would not have posed a problem if all schools had been expected to meet certain standards. If all this catering to special interests was ended, life would be easier for everybody.

The French and German systems divide the student body based on intellect or ambition. Germany has three school systems, Realschule, Gymnasium and either Wirtschafftgymnasium, or maybe Haupschule. From grades 1-4(5, or 6, I forget) all the students go to the same type of school which I believe is Grundschule, but I forget that too. One of the systems(Gymnasium) is for students who want to go to university, one(Realschule I think) is intended for students interested in the trades, the other one(Hauptschule) is for absolute dummies.

The French have the Lycee? and Polytechnique? Anyhow, one is for students who want to continue studies, and one is for the dumb ones.(not literally, it is what they think)

So, I have to admit I like the way they do things; it means classes flow much more smoothly, and teachers do not have to waste time explaining and re-explaining. All students are very near the same level.
The way they do university is very good too-you have to be smart to go to university, not rich.

Yes, the Europeans, particularly Germans and French, organize their schooling very well. Unfortunately it would not go well here with all the political correctness and all. No one wants to admit Little Johnny, well, is...ummm...retarded.

What lifestyle do I profess Penguin,
What gangs do I claim I am in,
What ghetto is there here for me,
In Saskatoon where I live.

What is hip hop to you?
To me its like the first breath
The milk in a mother's breast
The pain in a young boy's chest
The medicine to cure a nation
Precipitation to rain
On arid terrain
The first feeling of fame
Its an insane thing
The power to reach the city
The ninth member of the comittee
Completion, in its purest form
The minute before the storm
No need to bring the fire, alarm
Survival of the fittest
Battle of the wits
Of the have and have nots
Gravity to the astronaut
The main outlet to thought
The last crawl before a baby walks
The last cry before a child talks
Spare change to a transient
The satellite's ambience
The lovely feeling of butterfly
You've even heard all the lies
Here's the truth an the pride

Hip hop is pure.

Evil Penguin

Yes, it is the jazz capital, which is an actul art form, one which happens to be putting me through college (in more ways than one).

Yay! We agree on something!

keeper of the grave

By my count, we agree on at least 3 things. Life is not so bad.:)

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
Really? It is the jazz capital? I did not know that...:rolleyes:
Believe me, I am a jazz maniac, I know where Stacey Kent hails from.

Parochial schools would not have posed a problem if all schools had been expected to meet certain standards. If all this catering to special interests was ended, life would be easier for everybody.

The French and German systems divide the student body based on intellect or ambition. Germany has three school systems, Realschule, Gymnasium and either Wirtschafftgymnasium, or maybe Haupschule. From grades 1-4(5, or 6, I forget) all the students go to the same type of school which I believe is Grundschule, but I forget that too. One of the systems(Gymnasium) is for students who want to go to university, one(Realschule I think) is intended for students interested in the trades, the other one(Hauptschule) is for absolute dummies.

The French have the Lycee? and Polytechnique? Anyhow, one is for students who want to continue studies, and one is for the dumb ones.(not literally, it is what they think)

So, I have to admit I like the way they do things; it means classes flow much more smoothly, and teachers do not have to waste time explaining and re-explaining. All students are very near the same level.
The way they do university is very good too-you have to be smart to go to university, not rich.

Yes, the Europeans, particularly Germans and French, organize their schooling very well. Unfortunately it would not go well here with all the political correctness and all. No one wants to admit Little Johnny, well, is...ummm...retarded.

What lifestyle do I profess Penguin,
What gangs do I claim I am in,
What ghetto is there here for me,
In Saskatoon where I live.

What is hip hop to you?
To me its like the first breath
The milk in a mother's breast
The pain in a young boy's chest
The medicine to cure a nation
Precipitation to rain
On arid terrain
The first feeling of fame
Its an insane thing
The power to reach the city
The ninth member of the comittee
Completion, in its purest form
The minute before the storm
No need to bring the fire, alarm
Survival of the fittest
Battle of the wits
Of the have and have nots
Gravity to the astronaut
The main outlet to thought
The last crawl before a baby walks
The last cry before a child talks
Spare change to a transient
The satellite's ambience
The lovely feeling of butterfly
You've even heard all the lies
Here's the truth an the pride

Hip hop is pure.

You realise that the Canadian and American school system does the same thing, just in one biulding, like how there is Math IB/AP, Math Pure 10, Math Applied 10, Math 14 (now some thing else, not sure what) in Alberta high schools.

What I said is my opinion and still is, few immigrants live in Saskatoon, few share your beleifs, few trivialise things like you do (though that is some what beleivable since Saskatoon has what amounts to no organised crime, and you`ve likely never seen people with hand guns to defend their grow ops from rivals) and very few people who don`t make up personas for them selves on the internet accuse others of doing so, or do you not remember refering to me as a teacher from Toronto who doesn`t like her kids schooling (had I already gained a degree my writing skills would be far superior).

Simply put your arguements are attacks on others and never deal with any thing they actually said. It pisses people off and makes them not want to be here.

Any point you actually make is often a massive exageration if not an out right fallacy (no one who is paid eight dollars an hour pays fifty percent taxes, it is slightly better pay than I make, likely with more hours but I doubt it would cause them paying like twenty times the tax I do). And it is simply a fact that is irrefutable, America has a poverty rate three to five times large than Sweden. Have you ever fucking been to Calgary like you say you have, I doubt it, this city actually has couples, with two incomes and no kids who can`t afford a place to stay, it likely has a larger poverty rate than most any where else in Canada. You come here and tell me how the vast discrepency between the rich and poor doesn`t exist, how every body makes end meat and has a nice job. You don`t have fucking clue about Alberta. And yes it is rich because of Oil, when oil prices go up provincial coffers fill up, it isn`t a very good economic plan either, because when prices drop the government starts running out of money and a lot of people become unemployed which starts a chain reaction and the province is in a reccesion. Now seriously tell me why Sweden has almost no poor while forty million Americans are fucked if they have a heart attack and can barely afford to survive. Then tell me that the answer (socialism) is bad for the poor.

Creamy~Goodness

Originally posted by Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp
Now seriously tell me why Sweden has almost no poor while forty million Americans are fucked if they have a heart attack and can barely afford to survive. Then tell me that the answer (socialism) is bad for the poor.

What's your point? Socialism isn't bad for the poor, it probably would help them, in the short term. But it doesn't help everyone else. Since when are the poor the most important people in America? I can tell you for sure: never. Why? Isn't it obvious? Socialism only makes everyone poor. Sure, it will improve the poor's quality of life for a time, but it will just be a dead end eventually.

Sure, its a cold, cynical, calculating, or what have you way of looking at things. But can you really say socialism will benefit everyone? Or even the majority? I don't think you could even say that.

keeper of the grave

Spliff, Darkwolf is right. In the end, socialism only serves to make everyone poor. 50 years from now, Swedes will wish they had not been socialists today.

Socialism is short term gain.

McLeod

Originally posted by keeper of the grave
Spliff, Darkwolf is right. In the end, socialism only serves to make everyone poor. 50 years from now, Swedes will wish they had not been socialists today.

Socialism is short term gain.

What makes you think that? Socialism is a way to distribute resources among population more equally than in capitalism, without going into extremes of government controlled economy and other communistic ideas. I see nothing "short term" in that.

Gaggin

Originally posted by McLeod
What makes you think that? Socialism is a way to distribute resources among population more equally than in capitalism, without going into extremes of government controlled economy and other communistic ideas. I see nothing "short term" in that.

Think of it this way: If someone gives me 100 bucks, I'll spend it on clothes or whatever, and then be right back where I was before within a week or two. But if someone gives me a job, I'll be making money every week, reaping little profit for myself in the beginning, but in the long run being finincially secure. Then I can buy myself something every week.

We need the short term solutions, but we also need the long term solutions. And giving poor people money isn't a long term solution.

Creamy~Goodness

In socialism, what is limited is innovation, and competition. Why work to be better, if you don't have to? If you can do a job for less work than someone else, with equal pay, and do so simply because socialism allows you to get by, you are a drain on resources. In capitilism, fewer people are allowed to drain resources, thus keeping competetition going. Of course, you will argue that socialism won't stagnate competition, and lead the country into a dead end, because innovation won't drop off. But as time has shown, competetion drives innovation, and with weakened competition, comes weakened innovation.

Ultra_punk

Nobody hands you money in socialism. I dont think you realize that. The government hands you social services, but you work at a job and pay 80% income tax. That is all. THe tax goes towards well funded schools, proper military, universities, urban planning and naything else teh gov't usually pays for. Its not, give you some money hope you do some work. No thats Utopian Communism, where they hope you do work because you want to and you help people because you want to, so they give you everything because thats a nice thing to do. Socialism isnt about handing out money because i think you're poor. If you're poor, we give you a job, and then you get back on your feet. If you're rich, we tax you silly. You think, thats bad... but hey middle income folk also get taxed silly. The only people who dont, are the ones that have no income. And then you scream out "double standard"! Well... what is there to tax if they're dirt poor? No instead they just give them a job. There's a lot more government control over the economy. So then you will scream out stagnation of the economy! Well, its highly regulated but you still have free market system. WHich is kind of a wierd way to say it, but what it really means is that small businesses are protected from monopolies of large companies, so that every person in the country can try to take a go at business. Welfare is something that has been created here, and was not an idea of socialism or communism. It was a stop gap measure against the spread of such ideas. Give the poor a few bucks now, so they shut up and you can wipe out communism. Well, really what shoudl be done is giving them jobs... finding them jobs. Innovation is limited...why? Because the government will actually uphold anti-trust laws? Alright then. Maybe you are looking at socialism like this.

Socialism = welfare + free money + free social service + no need to work

Well its not. Thats stupid messed up society of stupidity. Anyways, i dont go yes for communism because i know it doesnt work. I have an idea of how it should work but this isnt the topic for it.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Your taking a system where one in five children are below the poverty line and telling me that in the long run more advancement will be acheived there then a system where education is provided on the basis of ability? You two completely fail to see that companies do not advance shit. Doctors, scientists, teachers, these people aren't in it for the money, what was Einstein doing when he wrote the theory of relativity? There is also no lack of competition in a socialist state.

It is absurd to refer to what has ammounted to seventy years at the peak of all indexes as short term. Or some thing that merely benifits the poor. In Socialism the middle class grows and prospers, in a free market economy history has shown us that the middle class dwindles and only a miniscule few are benifited by it.

keyknowte

By indexes, I think spliff must be referring to the Human Development index perchance? What a reliable source of information Spliff!!!:rolleyes:
Did you know that past the point of an average income of 8,000$ per person, the Human Development Index no longer recognizes and difference in standard of living? Where does that make a difference? In countries like Switzerland and the United States where the average income is between 30,000-35,000$ U.S. The whole idea of the index was to make socialist states look like Utopias, which in fact they are not. I mean Canada even topped the damn thing for god`s sake. From what I`ve heard about Winnipeg, Regina, and Saskatoon, it seems like we really do not deserve such a position. Take the fact that we seem to ignore the existence of our Native people. It is probably the issue of most importance in Canada, however Keeper has been the only one to bring it up. Seems like no one else really cares. As long Canada sits on its throne of self-righteouness, we will never be able to benefit this world. I was at a seminar for the Frasier Institute, and some stupid socialist brought up the Human Development Index, I have to admit it was funny when she got torn apart.

On the whole teachers side of thing, I fail to understand you logic Penguin, and I would like some concrete evidence which supports your argument. Have you ever thought it might be good to pay teachers based on the performance of their students??? That way Good teachers get paid for their success, and bad teachers get punished for their failure. I can tell you that we have been paying teachers more every year in Quebec, and instruction has only gone downhill. Students are so ignorant these days that is ceases to amusing. I was helping one of my friends write an essay in English for his English class about how to fix our Medical services in Canada, and he told me he hadnt even thought about how to do it. I`ll give every one here credit for at least thinking about solutions, and contributing those solutions in an atmosphere of debate.

Spliff, about your attacks on Keeper, I`d just like to tell you about prejudice. Go to the Stats can website, and look at the figures for immigration to Saskatchewan(which is, I believe where Saskatoon is situated) You may find that you are slightly mistaken in you prejudice about the number of immigrants there. Secondly, about organised crime, a member of Indian Posse(a gang from Saskatchewan and Manitoba), tried to kill "Mom" Boucher. Also, I believe there is a Hell`s Angels chapter in Saskatchewan. Saskatoon, Regina, and North Battleford, are all very high on the violent crime index in Canada. In fact, Saskatoon or Regina may be first in Canada. there are around 225,000 people in Saskatoon, 40,000 are native or metis. NExt, on the hip hop issue, I think you suffer from envy; failures in your social life may have made you attack those of other people. Also, there are two kinds of people who listen to rap in Canada, and two kinds of rap. There is mainstream suburbanite white kid rap, and there is underground hip hop. note: not many suburbanite white kids are very good at graffiti or emceeing, in fact many of them never do it. I think your character profile belongs beside that of the Media for the Washington Killer. Perhaps you have brilliant intuition, and you are right, but most suburbanite white kids who listen to rap are just as socialist as you.(note this is why they live in suburbs aka children of bureaucrats, its the same everywhere) From the point of view of someone(myself) who works ten hour days painting and welding, most of the people(classified as poor) including the immigrants, just want fewer taxes. So, stop doing armchair investigation, and think outside the box, instead of being confined to looking at one(aka your computer). Really Spliff, you sound like one of those guys who has never contributed to industry or any other sort of manual labor, I very much doubt you live in inner city Calgary(and if you do, it is in a posh neighbourhood), I think you are a vacuum for ideas. You spit out shit you hear from your less than brilliant parents, attack people for attacking people, while making attacks, and generally engage in all the subterfuge, cheating, lying that you accuse others of. I dont spend my day on a computer so, I must be off now. It is sad that when you run out of ideas, you must stoop to attacking people. How very honorable, and I`m sure you care for the poor :rolleyes: You bitchmade suburbanite white rap listener.

Evil Penguin

Do you have any idea how ridiculous you sound? Have you bothered to look any of this stuff up at all? "Perhaps you have brilliant intuition, and you are right, but most suburbanite white kids who listen to rap are just as socialist as you.(note this is why they live in suburbs aka children of bureaucrats, its the same everywhere)" LOL Go back to sleep.

My logic? It's not my logic, it's the way things work. Look at quality of educaton in different areas of the U.S. Now look at teacher salaries. Now look at at sudden increases or decreases in teacher salary, followed by changes in quality of education. Look at teacher salaries in different areas as related to education levels in teachers. Everywhere you look you get almost exact correlation. That's my logic, keyknowte. You know, actual events.

Gaggin

Originally posted by keyknowte
By indexes, I think spliff must be referring to the Human Development index perchance? What a reliable source of information Spliff!!!:rolleyes:
Did you know that past the point of an average income of 8,000$ per person, the Human Development Index no longer recognizes and difference in standard of living? Where does that make a difference? In countries like Switzerland and the United States where the average income is between 30,000-35,000$ U.S. The whole idea of the index was to make socialist states look like Utopias, which in fact they are not. I mean Canada even topped the damn thing for god`s sake. From what I`ve heard about Winnipeg, Regina, and Saskatoon, it seems like we really do not deserve such a position. Take the fact that we seem to ignore the existence of our Native people. It is probably the issue of most importance in Canada, however Keeper has been the only one to bring it up. Seems like no one else really cares. As long Canada sits on its throne of self-righteouness, we will never be able to benefit this world. I was at a seminar for the Frasier Institute, and some stupid socialist brought up the Human Development Index, I have to admit it was funny when she got torn apart.

On the whole teachers side of thing, I fail to understand you logic Penguin, and I would like some concrete evidence which supports your argument. Have you ever thought it might be good to pay teachers based on the performance of their students??? That way Good teachers get paid for their success, and bad teachers get punished for their failure. I can tell you that we have been paying teachers more every year in Quebec, and instruction has only gone downhill. Students are so ignorant these days that is ceases to amusing. I was helping one of my friends write an essay in English for his English class about how to fix our Medical services in Canada, and he told me he hadnt even thought about how to do it. I`ll give every one here credit for at least thinking about solutions, and contributing those solutions in an atmosphere of debate.

Spliff, about your attacks on Keeper, I`d just like to tell you about prejudice. Go to the Stats can website, and look at the figures for immigration to Saskatchewan(which is, I believe where Saskatoon is situated) You may find that you are slightly mistaken in you prejudice about the number of immigrants there. Secondly, about organised crime, a member of Indian Posse(a gang from Saskatchewan and Manitoba), tried to kill "Mom" Boucher. Also, I believe there is a Hell`s Angels chapter in Saskatchewan. Saskatoon, Regina, and North Battleford, are all very high on the violent crime index in Canada. In fact, Saskatoon or Regina may be first in Canada. there are around 225,000 people in Saskatoon, 40,000 are native or metis. NExt, on the hip hop issue, I think you suffer from envy; failures in your social life may have made you attack those of other people. Also, there are two kinds of people who listen to rap in Canada, and two kinds of rap. There is mainstream suburbanite white kid rap, and there is underground hip hop. note: not many suburbanite white kids are very good at graffiti or emceeing, in fact many of them never do it. I think your character profile belongs beside that of the Media for the Washington Killer. Perhaps you have brilliant intuition, and you are right, but most suburbanite white kids who listen to rap are just as socialist as you.(note this is why they live in suburbs aka children of bureaucrats, its the same everywhere) From the point of view of someone(myself) who works ten hour days painting and welding, most of the people(classified as poor) including the immigrants, just want fewer taxes. So, stop doing armchair investigation, and think outside the box, instead of being confined to looking at one(aka your computer). Really Spliff, you sound like one of those guys who has never contributed to industry or any other sort of manual labor, I very much doubt you live in inner city Calgary(and if you do, it is in a posh neighbourhood), I think you are a vacuum for ideas. You spit out shit you hear from your less than brilliant parents, attack people for attacking people, while making attacks, and generally engage in all the subterfuge, cheating, lying that you accuse others of. I dont spend my day on a computer so, I must be off now. It is sad that when you run out of ideas, you must stoop to attacking people. How very honorable, and I`m sure you care for the poor :rolleyes: You bitchmade suburbanite white rap listener.

Paying teachers based on their student's performance sounds like a good idea, but in reality it's not at all. The fact is, no matter what a teacher does, kids who go to the rich schools will test higher than kids who go to the poor schools, even though teachers definately have to deal with alot more shit at the poor schools than the rich schools. So even though those teachers are working harder, there's no way for their students to even compete with the those of the rich schools. Besides, standardized tests for measuring performance are highly inaccurate anyways, i.e. I have to take a standardized history test for a class I don't even take because I'm in a more advanced class.

I'm a surbanite white kid who listens to rap music, and I'm not socialist... and neither are my white friends... you see, there's really not much of a correlation between your political views and your taste in music. And no, my parents aren't bearoucrats either. You oughta stop with the stereotypes and assumptions, and start thinking outside the box yourself.

keeper of the grave

Most of the suburbanites I know belong to the public "service" sector, no joke. The location of the suburb is also important though too-westside suburbs have few civil servants, east side suburbs ARE civil servants.

Canada is not like the United States in this regard Penguin. Civil servants are literally a "class" here. In fact, they make up an astounding proportion of the upper middle class. There are millions of civil servants, and government depedency here is on a scale the United States do not near approach-only the most socialistic senators in the US would want a "utopia" like Canada.

Our utopian system is bought at some cost though. First of all, despite our amazing quantity of ressources, we still lag the United States in standard of living-the Toronto Dominion Bank suggests we are 40% below the American standard of living average wise. But why? How could this be? An extremely socialist system, and amazing quantities of ressources? How could we fail, well, all levels of government do absorb an astounding 44% of our nation's product, compared to 33% the Americans manage. A 30% difference.
"So what you are saying Keep is that Canadians lag the American standard of living considerably, and that their government spends far more, and redistributes ressources more evenly, but what about the UN human development index?" Well, the index is bullshit as keynowte informed us.

Socialism does discourage success. There is no reason to produce anything more than what is required, so that is all that is produced. There is no need for further scientific development, and no money for it.
Vladimir Fitzko, my good Ukrainian friend has instructed me well in Russian affairs. He gave me this delightful quote, "we pretend to work, they pretend to pay us."

In other news, I had barely touched the newspaper yesterday when I saw a story in the Financial Post-apparently there is a factory in Ontario which pays employees per output, and does not pay them for time they spend fixing mistakes they made. Employee morale is way up, employee incomes are way up, profits are way up, and employees are known to show up 2 hours before they have to.
Socialist theory does not really explain this, but then, it is some of the most poorly formulated "theory" ever.

In still other news, I read an alarming story about Germany. Growth there is nearing 0%(not a very high rate), so the the national bank has decided it should cut interest rates when, mercy me, it is not allowed to. Why not? Because the European Union has decreed the interest rates shall be at 3.25%, and Germany NEEDS a rate of 1.75% for any growth to occur.(so says the National Banker)

What about paying teachers based on how well they teach students? Why not?

As for Ultra Punk, a "proper military" for a socialist is no military at all. As for "giving" people jobs, that may explain Soviet Russia's amazing 100 000 000 boot surpluses per year, and singular lack of winshield wipers.
You can not "create" jobs and expect them to be useful unless there is demand for those jobs, and if the government decides to just provide more services and tax more, talented people who don't like being taxed just go elsewhere-note our "brain drain" to the United States. No one likes giving away 60% of one's income to non-productive members of society.

I look at socialism this way->ignorance + optimistic idealism + laziness =socialism + faltering economy

Welfare is necessary to some extent, welfare is not irksome to me-> governments "creating" jobs annoys me-> it is not the government's job to find people employment. Jobs are not the problem, there are enough jobs for everyone->laziness and selfishness, those are problems.

keyknowte

Gaggin
My version of socialism is different than your version. In my eyes, your ideas represent social-ist ideas. Thus you have proven my point in attempting to disprove, if your friends are like you, in my eyes and my definition(I have right to my own definition do I not? anyways it is hard to find some general principles to really class socialists by, but you fit some of them) Your definition is necessarily different than mine, however they are both legitimate. So you do live in the suburbs, listen to rap music, and are also socialist in my eyes. So my "stereotype" is not wrong. ;) You may have noted that Spliff attempted to stereotype Keeper of the Grave, though I do believe without much success....

On the teacher side of things, what you said is not very true. The real reason "poor" kids perform worse than better off kids is because teachers stereotype them, and expect less from them. Dont tell me I am not right, they did a massive study on it. Here are the broad(no percentages) results. This was done at the beginning of a semester in a number of public schools in the United States.
Part 1 of study.
Some teachers were told they had a class full of "poor" students, other teachers were told their class comprised students who were "better off".
Noter Bene: All of the students were randomly picked for the classes, not rich or poor.
Part 2 of study
Some teachers were told their classes were full of "smart" children, some were told their class was full of "average" children, and some were told their class was comprised of "below standard students" Noter Bene: All students had nearly the same performance on test before they were put in this study. No distinction was made between students.
RESULTS
In study 1: the classes full of "better off" children did significantly better than those full of "poor" children. The Moral: Your delightful teachers stereotype, and make decision based on those stereotypes.
In study 2: Same thing, the students in the "advanced" classes did significantly better than those in the "Average" classes, and those in the Average classes did better than those in the "modified" classes.
This whole "enquete" was reviewed extensively in my psychology class.
Conclusions drawn: Teachers who thought they had advanced kids, put a lot more effort in to their teaching, expected more from their students, waited longer for answers from the students, encouraged them more, and generally gave a much more positive atmosphere for teaching. Teachers with average and below average students spent less time explaining problems, expected less from their students, didnt wait for an aswer from the students, did not give little quizzes and activities to improve knowledge and solution finding abilities, and in general put less effort and enthusiasm into giving their classes.
The same actions were visible in teachers who had "rich" or "poor" students.
What did you say about stereotypes there Gaggin? Did your teachers tell you that they are one the most important elements in our society? They must have been worried about job security, or expecting another pay raise...... At the CEGEP in St. Foye the teachers tried to get the students to hold an anti free trade rally. They cancelled school for it. there are 6000 students at the CEGEP, guess how many showed up? 100. Why was this held? The teachers were worried about private schools, and holding onto their jobs. St. Foye has some of the lowest standards for a CEGEP in Quebec....
But really, what am I driving at? Not that teachers are useless(which they certainly are not), but that teachers are not being trained right, nor are they given any motive to succeed. Teacher`s pay is determined on how many degrees they have: be it in Women Studies,Handcrafts, or First Nations studies. `
Teacher`s pay is not determined by the performance of their students(which it should be)In other words by their own performance. You are right, this is not a perfect solution, however it certainly is much better than encouraging teachers for their failure. Anyways, for me being a conservative resistant to change, and you guys being liberals who like change, you seem oftly slow to ever propose change; its always more of the same for you. Pour more money into Health Care to fix the problem, pay teachers more to fix the problem, pay more to the state to have better standard of living. Am I wrong, or is there a singular lack of innovation in your ideas? Try something new!! And no, putting more money into something isnt new, its been going on for years with little or no positive effect. Are poor people more stupid than rich? Are they victims? Is it normal that they should perform worse in school? The problem(and the answer) must fall on the shoulders of teachers, who find it is easier to blame their students shortcomings on their social status rather on their less than perfect methods of instruction. My friends have told me about teachers who expect the same high standard from all their students and have confidence in them, and you know what? They all perform better because of it, from those with the least money to the most rich. And who does it benefit the most to have high standards? The poor...However, you must also teach for your students to learn, and along with high standards, teachers must give optimal education to all, not just to some. I think we should have three different types of schools in Canada too. There are those of us who wish to do manual labour, and there are those who would rather sit at a desk. But the most important is that we should give the same amount of dignity to the janitor as to the CEO, and if both do their jobs well, the same amount of respect because someone has to do even the dirtiest and most unwanted jobs(I was a janitor, it really isnt that bad).

Just because someone is incompetent in how they operate standardised testing doesnt make standardised testing wrong. Its like if their is something wrong with what an engineer designs, it doesnt make it wrong, you just have to find the error(or errors plural for that matter) and fix it. Enough with treating the less well off financially as victims, they arent victims, they are people, and they can perform as well as all others. Stop making excuses for them, and you may see those worse of then you rise to be above you. Have confidence in them for Christ`s sake at least.

It is all about mentality people. Give someone the success mentality or the work mentality and they will perform. In the Peninsular War, the English officers expected a lot from "the dregs of society" literally the poorest of the poor, and do you know what? They became the finest infantry in europe and the most disciplined. Give someone hope, success, and expect a lot from them, and you would be suprised what they can accomplish. Gee, I wish I gave those seminars they give to the teachers instead of incompetents who talk about special needs children and wonder why more drop out every year.... On the other hand, give someone the failure or victim mentality, and watch them live down to their expectations. Hope: A german jewish psychologist who survived the Holocaust said those that believed in someone something or some higher power, and had a reason to live survived much better than those who did not. I am not saying this will work in 100% of the cases, but I do think we would see very favourable improvements. And stop calling them poor for fuck`s sake!!! They arent poor in ideas, they arent poor in spirit!! They have less money than us, but they are capable as just as much. Another thing, what is the logic behind taxing the poor at all? Another thing, raise the personal exemption for income taxes to 30,000 a year instead of 8000. When you take 16% of 8000 plus taking away money for the CPP(which they will never get anyways) and EI, there isnt a whole heck of a lot left. For every 600$ paycheck I earned, 100$ was taxed or taken away, and I will never see it again......... What is a hundred dollars to someone who make 8000 dollars? A hell of a lot of money, so let them keep it, and shame on anyone who thinks it is just to tax the poor.

keeper of the grave

You GO!!!! :)

I think that would fit the definition of the "double whammy," eh ehheehe.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keyknowte
By indexes, I think spliff must be referring to the Human Development index perchance? What a reliable source of information Spliff!!!:rolleyes:
Did you know that past the point of an average income of 8,000$ per person, the Human Development Index no longer recognizes and difference in standard of living? Where does that make a difference? In countries like Switzerland and the United States where the average income is between 30,000-35,000$ U.S. The whole idea of the index was to make socialist states look like Utopias, which in fact they are not. I mean Canada even topped the damn thing for god`s sake. From what I`ve heard about Winnipeg, Regina, and Saskatoon, it seems like we really do not deserve such a position. Take the fact that we seem to ignore the existence of our Native people. It is probably the issue of most importance in Canada, however Keeper has been the only one to bring it up. Seems like no one else really cares. As long Canada sits on its throne of self-righteouness, we will never be able to benefit this world. I was at a seminar for the Frasier Institute, and some stupid socialist brought up the Human Development Index, I have to admit it was funny when she got torn apart.

On the whole teachers side of thing, I fail to understand you logic Penguin, and I would like some concrete evidence which supports your argument. Have you ever thought it might be good to pay teachers based on the performance of their students??? That way Good teachers get paid for their success, and bad teachers get punished for their failure. I can tell you that we have been paying teachers more every year in Quebec, and instruction has only gone downhill. Students are so ignorant these days that is ceases to amusing. I was helping one of my friends write an essay in English for his English class about how to fix our Medical services in Canada, and he told me he hadnt even thought about how to do it. I`ll give every one here credit for at least thinking about solutions, and contributing those solutions in an atmosphere of debate.

Spliff, about your attacks on Keeper, I`d just like to tell you about prejudice. Go to the Stats can website, and look at the figures for immigration to Saskatchewan(which is, I believe where Saskatoon is situated) You may find that you are slightly mistaken in you prejudice about the number of immigrants there. Secondly, about organised crime, a member of Indian Posse(a gang from Saskatchewan and Manitoba), tried to kill "Mom" Boucher. Also, I believe there is a Hell`s Angels chapter in Saskatchewan. Saskatoon, Regina, and North Battleford, are all very high on the violent crime index in Canada. In fact, Saskatoon or Regina may be first in Canada. there are around 225,000 people in Saskatoon, 40,000 are native or metis. NExt, on the hip hop issue, I think you suffer from envy; failures in your social life may have made you attack those of other people. Also, there are two kinds of people who listen to rap in Canada, and two kinds of rap. There is mainstream suburbanite white kid rap, and there is underground hip hop. note: not many suburbanite white kids are very good at graffiti or emceeing, in fact many of them never do it. I think your character profile belongs beside that of the Media for the Washington Killer. Perhaps you have brilliant intuition, and you are right, but most suburbanite white kids who listen to rap are just as socialist as you.(note this is why they live in suburbs aka children of bureaucrats, its the same everywhere) From the point of view of someone(myself) who works ten hour days painting and welding, most of the people(classified as poor) including the immigrants, just want fewer taxes. So, stop doing armchair investigation, and think outside the box, instead of being confined to looking at one(aka your computer). Really Spliff, you sound like one of those guys who has never contributed to industry or any other sort of manual labor, I very much doubt you live in inner city Calgary(and if you do, it is in a posh neighbourhood), I think you are a vacuum for ideas. You spit out shit you hear from your less than brilliant parents, attack people for attacking people, while making attacks, and generally engage in all the subterfuge, cheating, lying that you accuse others of. I dont spend my day on a computer so, I must be off now. It is sad that when you run out of ideas, you must stoop to attacking people. How very honorable, and I`m sure you care for the poor :rolleyes: You bitchmade suburbanite white rap listener.

Saskatchewan has chapters of the Hells Angels like shit does.

Yeah I fucking know the difference between Eminem and local shit, do I like either no, do I know people who do the latter, yeah. You reiterate shit that comes straight from keepers mouth, this "underground", do you people know what underground is. In Calgary there are parts of this city where graffiti is marking terratory, Keeper does not see shit like that in Saskatoon, and the way you're talking you don't either.

And yes Saskatchewan gets shit for immigration, ever been to Vancouver, Toronto, hell even Calgary. No one goes to Saskatchewan, they come from Saskatchewan. You look at Stats Can, it is one of two provinces with shrinking populations.

Spliff Smoking Lab Chimp

Originally posted by keyknowte
Gaggin
My version of socialism is different than your version. In my eyes, your ideas represent social-ist ideas. Thus you have proven my point in attempting to disprove, if your friends are like you, in my eyes and my definition(I have right to my own definition do I not? anyways it is hard to find some general principles to really class socialists by, but you fit some of them) Your definition is necessarily different than mine, however they are both legitimate. So you do live in the suburbs, listen to rap music, and are also socialist in my eyes. So my "stereotype" is not wrong. ;) You may have noted that Spliff attempted to stereotype Keeper of the Grave, though I do believe without much success....

On the teacher side of things, what you said is not very true. The real reason "poor" kids perform worse than better off kids is because teachers stereotype them, and expect less from them. Dont tell me I am not right, they did a massive study on it. Here are the broad(no percentages) results. This was done at the beginning of a semester in a number of public schools in the United States.
Part 1 of study.
Some teachers were told they had a class full of "poor" students, other teachers were told their class comprised students who were "better off".
Noter Bene: All of the students were randomly picked for the classes, not rich or poor.
Part 2 of study
Some teachers were told their classes were full of "smart" children, some were told their class was full of "average" children, and some were told their class was comprised of "below standard students" Noter Bene: All students had nearly the same performance on test before they were put in this study. No distinction was made between students.
RESULTS
In study 1: the classes full of "better off" children did significantly better than those full of "poor" children. The Moral: Your delightful teachers stereotype, and make decision based on those stereotypes.
In study 2: Same thing, the students in the "advanced" classes did significantly better than those in the "Average" classes, and those in the Average classes did better than those in the "modified" classes.
This whole "enquete" was reviewed extensively in my psychology class.
Conclusions drawn: Teachers who thought they had advanced kids, put a lot more effort in to their teaching, expected more from their students, waited longer for answers from the students, encouraged them more, and generally gave a much more positive atmosphere for teaching. Teachers with average and below average students spent less time explaining problems, expected less from their students, didnt wait for an aswer from the students, did not give little quizzes and activities to improve knowledge and solution finding abilities, and in general put less effort and enthusiasm into giving their classes.
The same actions were visible in teachers who had "rich" or "poor" students.
What did you say about stereotypes there Gaggin? Did your teachers tell you that they are one the most important elements in our society? They must have been worried about job security, or expecting another pay raise...... At the CEGEP in St. Foye the teachers tried to get the students to hold an anti free trade rally. They cancelled school for it. there are 6000 students at the CEGEP, guess how many showed up? 100. Why was this held? The teachers were worried about private schools, and holding onto their jobs. St. Foye has some of the lowest standards for a CEGEP in Quebec....
But really, what am I driving at? Not that teachers are useless(which they certainly are not), but that teachers are not being trained right, nor are they given any motive to succeed. Teacher`s pay is determined on how many degrees they have: be it in Women Studies,Handcrafts, or First Nations studies. `
Teacher`s pay is not determined by the performance of their students(which it should be)In other words by their own performance. You are right, this is not a perfect solution, however it certainly is much better than encouraging teachers for their failure. Anyways, for me being a conservative resistant to change, and you guys being liberals who like change, you seem oftly slow to ever propose change; its always more of the same for you. Pour more money into Health Care to fix the problem, pay teachers more to fix the problem, pay more to the state to have better standard of living. Am I wrong, or is there a singular lack of innovation in your ideas? Try something new!! And no, putting more money into something isnt new, its been going on for years with little or no positive effect. Are poor people more stupid than rich? Are they victims? Is it normal that they should perform worse in school? The problem(and the answer) must fall on the shoulders of teachers, who find it is easier to blame their students shortcomings on their social status rather on their less than perfect methods of instruction. My friends have told me about teachers who expect the same high standard from all their students and have confidence in them, and you know what? They all perform better because of it, from those with the least money to the most rich. And who does it benefit the most to have high standards? The poor...However, you must also teach for your students to learn, and along with high standards, teachers must give optimal education to all, not just to some. I think we should have three different types of schools in Canada too. There are those of us who wish to do manual labour, and there are those who would rather sit at a desk. But the most important is that we should give the same amount of dignity to the janitor as to the CEO, and if both do their jobs well, the same amount of respect because someone has to do even the dirtiest and most unwanted jobs(I was a janitor, it really isnt that bad).

Just because someone is incompetent in how they operate standardised testing doesnt make standardised testing wrong. Its like if their is something wrong with what an engineer designs, it doesnt make it wrong, you just have to find the error(or errors plural for that matter) and fix it. Enough with treating the less well off financially as victims, they arent victims, they are people, and they can perform as well as all others. Stop making excuses for them, and you may see those worse of then you rise to be above you. Have confidence in them for Christ`s sake at least.

It is all about mentality people. Give someone the success mentality or the work mentality and they will perform. In the Peninsular War, the English officers expected a lot from "the dregs of society" literally the poorest of the poor, and do you know what? They became the finest infantry in europe and the most disciplined. Give someone hope, success, and expect a lot from them, and you would be suprised what they can accomplish. Gee, I wish I gave those seminars they give to the teachers instead of incompetents who talk about special needs children and wonder why more drop out every year.... On the other hand, give someone the failure or victim mentality, and watch them live down to their expectations. Hope: A german jewish psychologist who survived the Holocaust said those that believed in someone something or some higher power, and had a reason to live survived much better than those who did not. I am not saying this will work in 100% of the cases, but I do think we would see very favourable improvements. And stop calling them poor for fuck`s sake!!! They arent poor in ideas, they arent poor in spirit!! They have less money than us, but they are capable as just as much. Another thing, what is the logic behind taxing the poor at all? Another thing, raise the personal exemption for income taxes to 30,000 a year instead of 8000. When you take 16% of 8000 plus taking away money for the CPP(which they will never get anyways) and EI, there isnt a whole heck of a lot left. For every 600$ paycheck I earned, 100$ was taxed or taken away, and I will never see it again......... What is a hundred dollars to someone who make 8000 dollars? A hell of a lot of money, so let them keep it, and shame on anyone who thinks it is just to tax the poor.

We don't want to tax the poor, we want to tax the rich, you bitch about this. What is a heart attack to some one who makes eight gees in the US and is a part of the forty million?

That is such utter Bullshit that goes against all history, much like the trickle down theory in economics, it doesn't happen and never will. Now, you're ignorant of most things, so let's include the US education system as a part of this. In Canada we don't have inner cities, we just have areas in various parts of town of differing wealth status. In the US, the rich people live in different education areas than the poor, the schools have less money, less teachers, they're paid less, etcetera, in the poor areas. Now the most skilled will more often than not, want to go where there is more money and better conditions, they'll get these jobs in the suburbs (some thing that doesn't really exist in Calgary, not that you'd know) the people with less skill will be regulated to teaching the poor. Like the voucher system paying by performance would only lead to vaster discrepencies between rich and poor schools and teachers who teach AP or IB and those who teach those that will likely drop out.

Like privatised healthcare, you might think it'll be more efficient, but it actually just screws over every one but the immensely wealthy by making sure they end up with the best doctors, nurses and material. Most of the populace will end up with far worse service. Now who wants such things, strangely it is people who cozy up to corporations more than people.

And you haven't a fucking clue what a socialist is if you think Gaggin is a socialist. Infact I doubt there is a Canadian alive who could confuse that with socialism, what part of Quebec do you live in, the anglophone part known as Texas?

keeper of the grave

Spliff, you should not really be calling anybody out for ignorance; your record is hardly exemplary in this regard. Inner cities? I think Toronto probably has quite the inner city areas, Van city certainly does.

What I am wondering, I am curious enough, is how gangs figure into this discussion at all-any argumentation over this subject was settled by Penguin and I. The general consensus is, in the words of Charlie Connors when asked whether he cared where someone was from as long as that person respected hip hop, "Hell naw not 1 bit'never." Fairly conclusive, so what is all this beef about? "ohh Keeper, you are fake because you listen to hip hop, write graffiti, and yet don't live in the ghetto," am I the fake, or are you the fake trying to speak for people living in "the ghetto." Are you fake when you attempt to speak for people you do not represent? Yes, so shut up, and let them do the talking.

Ahh Spliff, you referred to Vancouver in your post, and then you said Canadian cities do not have "inner cities." Well this article I have here tells me differently-in fact, so-called "marginal" areas of Vancouver have schooling considerably below accepted teaching norms in BC. In Saskatoon, it is a well known FACT that the best teachers, and best performing students all gravitate towards the "east side." In Toronto, all students are equally poorly served as far as I can tell. Apparently the school board there is intentionally wasting money to get back at the province-really responsible, and they are supposedly adults? They don't even have enough money for books in some areas.
As for a voucher system, how will rich kids fare better than poor ones if they are all given the same sum? Say a yearly voucher is worth $5000, you could easily prevent a school from charging more than $5000 a year for teaching a student. Bear in mind this is an example. Gap between the rich and the poor? The only gap I see is between the rich and the poor in ideas.

What about paying teachers based on how their students perform Spliff? Why don't you answer the question, is that not fair? In Canada, we could easily do a European-like system, and we could pay all teachers based on the performance of their students on standardized tests.

I think Keyknowte explained the impoverished are no less capable than
the middle classes, or the wealthy. Why do you persist in treating them as if they are?

Evil Penguin

Aaahhh! But how would it work? Give each kid $5000. Then what? Everybody signs up for the rich school. It gets overcrowded and the quality of education declines without even coming close to absorbing all the students who want to attend. 95% are stuck in the same schools they always were, just with 5% less funding. Vouchers do very little, and nothing positive. It's a perfectly reasonable economic theory (competition benefits the consumer) taken wildly out of context and applied to something it has nothing to do with. It's never worked and there's no reason to believe it would.

But trying to attract better teachers? Oh no! That's ridiculous! :rolleyes:

Dieter

I haven't read the whole thread but I thought I'd give my view on the American education system here.
It's unjust. The problem is that it isn't statefunded, which means students that go to college have to pay tuitions and stuff like that. If you can't afford it... you're screwed.
Over here (Sweden), things are a little different. Education is 100% free. No tuitions, nothing. You even get special subsidies from the government for studying. Everyone has a right to education and rich people don't hold all the cards, they hold none. Grades determine who gets into the most popular colleges and universities, all thanks to state fundings. And still the standard of Swedish education is one of the highest in the world.
All this at the prize of... yes, higher taxes. But it's well worth it for everyone to get a chance at education.

keyknowte

You didnt think that response through very well did you Penguin? Everyone goes to the rich school, and it gets overcrowded......or maybe they enlarged the school with the money from the vouchers...hmmmmm....no that couldnt be....maybe there was a school shooting and they got rid of the overcrowding.....or maybe people started up their own schools and attracted customers with excellent service and new ideas.....no that couldnt be.....no one started any new schools when they were allowed to, no one did anything smart, they all just went to one school and the quality of education went down drastically, and there were still x number of kids..... Umm, Penguin explain your philosophy to me, please?
`

As to Spliff: your offensive style is annoying me, however what I really dont like is the fact that you really didnt say anything of value or prove anything. Your whole response is barely comprehensible, you seem to have trouble specifying what you are objecting to. It was your usual;"You are ignorant, I know better, my version of socialist is the correct one....." Have you ever heard of the French Socialist party? Some of Gaggin`s ideas would certainly fit quite nicely in their election platform. Just as you motherfuckers classify me as a fucking conservative, I am gonna label worthless individuals like you Spliff "socialist."
If you and Gaggin object to the term socialist, you might start to think that maybe I object to the term conservative, asshole. You know Spliff I have heard the phrase, "I suffer fools gladly," you are one of those fools who seems capable of having the opposite effect. You are waring through my patience

I cite facts, fools like you cite theory. Dont tell me that psychological survey is bullshit. I`ll get the name of the survey from my professor and you can read it. What you really hate is evidence Spliff, because you know you are wrong, but with that knowledge, you become more fanatical, more vicious but singularly ineffective.

First Spliff, you seem to have a little problem with Stereotypes, "you sound like you are from Texas." "Keeper you cant be from Saskatoon, there are no black people in Saskatoon, and even though I didnt cite valid statistics, I still know you are not black because even though I have never stopped in that city for more than five minutes, I know....." "All Canadians are smart, and know what MY definition of socialism is." I am really sorry if the defintion I got from my sociology professor calls my province a socialist system."
"Teachers in poor areas are paid less" Is it just me Spliff or do the teachers in Northern Quebec communities(reserves) make 15,000-25,000 more than other teachers? It must just be me..... Or the fact that here in Quebec city all teachers are paid the same on the consideration of seniority and degrees, and the ones in the "lower wealth" areas still deliver less to there students. I am sorry if School boards in Vancouver, Toronto, and Saskatoon classify some schools as inner city schools. There is more of your stereotyping, assuming that Canadian cities dont have inner-cities because for you an inner city is where black people roll carrying heat(which is also a stereotype). I also have an interesting report on big government which should suprise everyone around here, except for "conservatives."

Stop fucking around Spliff, take a look around, see the big picture. How many months have you spent overseas? I have only spent three months in Germany, 6 months in France, and a month in Isreal. Plus multiple visists to the U.S. By the way, did you see what happened in the elections in the United States? Seems like the "conservative" Republicans gained a majority in both the Senate and the Congress.... But really I am shocked...

For someone so intelligent as yourself Spliff, you do a lot of stereotyping based on assumptions. I could not find a single legitimate argument in that whole pile of shit you wrote. Really Spliff, I find you quite annoying. You are the kind of person with whom it is impossible to engage in dialogue with. Your rhetoric is quite familiar to me, it is rather too common in Quebec. But, things are changing, the Adequistes may win, then things will be different. By the way Spliff, I am going to sterotype your weak ass: You are a person who is clearly not worldly, clearly overvalues his own intelligence, you live in a suburb(sub-urban area), (When I was in Calgary the one time I stopped over, it sure seemed like there were fenced in or walled in communities, but maybe I am wrong, however I think you may hear people talk about toronto`s suburbs, or Montreal`s suburbs, or Winnipeg`s suburbs, or Vancouver`s suburbs, and it seems to me suburban is becoming the norm). Cars and the burbs go together like cram cheese and bagel.
Which leads to my next stereotype, I think your education has not been of an "haute calibre," which would explain your trouble and confusion with definitions. I think you lie an awful lot, I think you hint at things you`ve never done or seen. I think YOU are fake. As someone who has been to all of Canada`s major cities(most numerous times), I think I have a pretty clear idea where I am coming from. Here is a good quote: If you arent a socialist by the time you are twenty, you dont have a heart, if you arent a conservative by the age of fifty, you dont have a brain. I think you are someone without any real grasp of international politics or affairs, a person of ignorance, and a person who has an overbloated sense of self worth. I think I have the advantage of rather more advanced education than that which you have had. Spliff you could have said I was someone from anywhere in the States after looking at the results of last night. Monsieur l`Abbe and I sat up enjoying the good republican performance till about three o`clock in the morning. So I guess I could be from Texas couldnt I? Strangely Dieter, your country`s economy doesn`t seem to have profited from your free"education" Why dont you start realising that education really isnt that important?.....Too bad y`all dont listen to my stressing of the importance of mentality, but I guess you can ignore because your mentality is so fucked up.

Gaggin

Paying teacher by how well their students do on Standardized tests is a horribly unfair way to gauge a teacher's salary. As pointed out, teachers can be biased towards their students, but their bias is often sadly true, and can't really be helped anyway. The sad fact is, students in inner cities will always score lower, because those areas are filled the dirt poor and most of the involuntary minorities. You see, involuntary minorities are born into a culture that harbors a hatred for the 'system'. Their attitudes towards the school system aren'ts the same as ours. While most of us see high school as an important part of our future success, most of those kids really don't see it that way, and for good reason. A man named Phillippe Bourgois did an anthropological field study working with Coke dealers in East Harlem for 4 years. In his study he found that while many of his informants dropped out of high school, it nevertheless played an important part in their life, not by teaching them to read and write, but by letting them develop and hone their skills needed for the streets. Therefore, the rich kids go into school with a much more positvie attitude than the poor kids, and this makes it easier for the rich teachers while much harder for the poor teachers. One has to teach students who are model children for society, the other has to teach delinquents who live a life of drugs, violence, and poverty. Which one should get paid more here? And not only is this variation present from school to school, but from class to class as well. The kids in my IB classes are much easier to teach than the kids in the slower classes.

This also holds true in many other parts of the world as well, including New Zealand, Japan, and even Britain.

And besides all this, they'll never find an efficient standardized testing system to implement this anyway.

BTW, if you insist that we should treat the poor as just as capable as the rich and middle classes, then how do you feel about taxing them based on that princible? After all, we wouldn't want them to feel inferior by not taxing them to the best of their capabilities, would we? :rolleyes: