In article , "DGDevin" wrote:

"Doug Miller" wrote in message
...

In article , Swingman
wrote:

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original concept of
only property owners being able to vote ... but damn would that **** off
the politicians and lobbyist.

I don't think I agree with that. Among other things, it would
disenfranchise
the working poor, while allowing the idle wealthy to retain the right to
vote.
That doesn't strike me as operating in the best interests of society.

I propose this as an alternative: The right to vote depends on being a
net taxpayer: paying more in taxes than you receive in government
handouts.

So if through no fault of yours you can no longer work (say due to illness)
and you receive public assistance, you would no longer be allowed to vote?
That strikes me as pointlessly unfair.

I'd certainly go along with making exceptions for "no fault of your own"
cases, perhaps assessing whether an individual is a net taxpayer or a net
leech on the basis of a five-year moving average. But I don't think that
anyone who is able to work, but simply refuses to, has any claim on either
society's resources or its decision-making processes.

How about the right to vote being contingent on passing a modest current
affairs test? If you can't provide one-paragraph outlines of four out of
seven major municipal issues and outline the positions of the candidates for
mayor and city council then you can't vote (instead you're required to spend
the day helping at a polling place or doing some other work of value to the
community--say picking up trash in the park with a sign on your back that
you're too ignorant to vote). At least then your eligibility is determined
by something you have control over. Citizens not able to communicate in
English would get *one* pass on that and be able to take the test in Spanish
or whatever--but in four years they test in English or they don't vote.
Naturally provisions would be made for the illiterate, the blind et al.

No argument there at all. I'm in favor of all of that.

However I'd also make voting mandatory, so those who can't be bothered to
acquaint themselves with the issues to a reasonable degree would still have
to give up a day of public service--intentional ignorance would not get them
off the hook.

The first needs to be in place before instituting the second. We have enough
of a problem now with uninformed, ignorant voters without *requiring* them to
vote. Thank goodness that a large number of the uninformed and ignorant are
apathetic as well -- I prefer that those people not vote.

"DGDevin" wrote in message
news

"Swingman" wrote in message
...

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original concept of
only property owners being able to vote ... but damn would that **** off
the politicians and lobbyist.

This idealistic "right of everyman to vote" will prove to be the root
factor in the eventual downfall of this country.

Sad, but true.

Bull, giving political power only to those with wealth is repugnant, you
couldn't come up with something that would make politicians and lobbyists
happier. The ability of the people to throw morons and crooks out of
office is one of the few things that keep the *******s in line.

Which country are you living in??? I have seen nothing but crooks and
morons for the last 40 years.

On Dec 30, 12:45*pm, Tim Daneliuk wrote:
On 12/30/2009 1:05 PM, Neil Brooks wrote:



On Dec 30, 12:01 pm, Swingman wrote:
On 12/30/2009 12:27 PM, DGDevin wrote:

*wrote in message
news:8uWdnRGuat4XwqbWnZ2dnUVZ_oWdnZ2d@giganews. com...

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original concept of
only property owners being able to vote ... but damn would that **** off
the politicians and lobbyist.

This idealistic "right of everyman to vote" will prove to be the root
factor in the eventual downfall of this country.

Sad, but true.

Bull, giving political power only to those with wealth is repugnant, you
couldn't come up with something that would make politicians and lobbyists
happier. *The ability of the people to throw morons and crooks out of office
is one of the few things that keep the *******s in line.

Are you going to tell a youth who volunteers to risk his life serving his
country in uniform that he doesn't get to vote because he doesn't have any
property? *If the mill closes and people lose their jobs and their homes
should that result in them losing the vote? *Do you seriously propose that
citizens who rent apartments are inherently entitled to fewer rights than
people who own houses?

No offense, but that is one lameass idea.

Tell that to your founding fathers, who first instituted the practice.

You mean ... of course ... the slave-owning founding fathers?

Do you have a calendar handy? *Do you realize this is ...
effectively ... 2010??

If you yearn for those times, I can list for you a HOST of emerging
nations whose systems much more closely resemble that of our earliest
days as a nation.

[nothing of relevance snipped]

Since you insist on harping on slavery, let me acquaint you with some
realities of slavery you're conveniently ignoring:

- Slavery in some form has existed in all of recorded human history.

- The slavery that brought Africans to the US was instituted BY Africans
* AGAINST Africans long before the Europeans ever showed up.

- African Muslim pirates (the Barbary Corsairs) attacked and enslaved
* white Europeans well before the Europeans ever engaged in slavery themselves.
* These *pirates operated from the 11th century through the 19th by
* some accounts.

- Of all major cultures ONLY the Judeo-Christian influenced Westerners
* *gave up slavery voluntarily*, whether by internal civil war or
* legislative decree.

- One of the two places in the world you can still buy slaves in large
* numbers is ... wait for it ... AFRICA. (Somalia and Mauretania to be
* exact. *The other is the white slavery going on in the Eastern Bloc
* and Islamic worlds.)

So, before you get too haughty about the eeeeeeeeeevil Founding
Fathers, you might want to ponder their context and realize that in
less than 100 years after the US was formed as a nation (1776-1865)
slavery was abolished. We got rid of something in a hundred years that
had been going on for 10 *thousand* before. It was EXACTLY because of
the ideals of these people and their fundamental principles of
government that slavery could not and did not survive. Dismissing them
as mere slavers with a corrupt morality utterly misses the point.

So, just why do you and your fellow politically correct travelers leap
at the opportunity to criticize the founders of the US - founders
that led us on a path of freedom for more people, more rapidly than
at any point in history - BUT you're entirely silent about the
millennia of slavery and human rights abuses in Africa and the rest of
the world?
world?

Eloquent, but ... sadly ... in the end ... pointless.

They also owned slaves. You may say that was "right for their times"
or ... something equivalent, but ... many "knew better," and the
practice was relatively speedily abolished.

The notion that others did it before them, or that it still goes on
elsewhere, likewise, does nothing to the argument.

It's a fools effort to declare that things that were right in 1776 are
therefore automatically right, now.

"J. Clarke" wrote in message
...
Leon wrote:
"Larry C" wrote in message
...
(snip)




The bigger issue, I believe, is that only a small percentage of the
electorate vote during an election.

The elected know that if they cater to a certain group than they
have a good chance of being reelected because that group will go out
and vote. If more people voted, then the "base" that we always hear
about would not be as defined.

It boggles my mind that people do not vote.

Larry C

You know in communist countries and dictatorships the people are
required to vote. Thank goodness we have the right not to vote.
Voting for the sake of voting IMHO sends the wrong message, I think
it tells the counters that you actually want one of the people
running for office.

Better yet, require that for one to be elected that they get a
majority of the registered voters vote, not just a majority of the
votes. If a majority of the registered voters don't show up, another
election is held with other candidates. Yes this will take time to
elect an official but don't we deserve someone we actually want?

But in the meanwhile we're stuck with the people we don't want. The
system
you propose would pretty much mean that an incumbent had a lifetime
appointment.


Like we have not been stuck with people we don't want already..
Because some one is not immediately elected does not mean that the person in
office gets to stay there until he is replaced. He leaves office and the
government maintains until some one is elected.

"DGDevin" wrote in message
m...

"Leon" wrote in message
...


You know in communist countries and dictatorships the people are required
to vote.

Some democratic countries (including Australia, Belgium, Switzerland,
Mexico, Argentina and Greece) have a similar requirement, and it seems to
work quite well for them.

The people or the government, seems to work well or what you have read?




BTW, have you noticed how few actual Communist countries there are left?

Thank goodness we have the right not to vote. Voting for the sake of
voting IMHO sends the wrong message, I think it tells the counters that
you actually want one of the people running for office.

All you have to do is deliberately spoil your ballot and you vote for
nobody, or there could be a "None of the above" choice.

Actually all you have to do is not vote at all.



Mandatory voting would be a modest infringement on our liberty, but it
would serve such a compelling public interest that IMO it would be worth
it.

Shortly behind that would be those people that make sure you vote they way
they want you to.

In article , Tim Daneliuk wrote:

Miller's right: If you don't pay taxes you should have no right to vote
and influence how that money gets spent. The only exception I'd make
is for people who've volunteered to serve the nation in the military.

I'd make a few more exceptions:

- the severely disabled: as a society, I believe we have a moral obligation to
provide for those who through no fault of their own are unable -- as
distinguished from unwilling -- to provide for themselves, yet that inability
should not disqualify them from voting

- the short-term unemployed: being laid off after years of working shouldn't
cost a person the right to vote

- those who volunteer to serve society in other ways besides the military,
e.g. in hospitals, soup kitchens, shelters for battered women or the homeless,
and so on

- the retired: while those collecting social security may be a net drain
*now*, most of them are certainly a net positive when considered over the
entire span of their working lives

On Dec 30, 12:33*pm, Tim Daneliuk wrote:

Uh huh, just like ACORN did to get people like Dear Leader and
Al "The Clown" Franken elected. *

It always elevates the rhetoric to begin casting aspersions like that.

Election fraud at some slight
level has been with us for decades. *It's smaller here than in
other places, but it will never be zero. *cf The JFK election.

I didn't mean that the Right had a monopoly on it, but ... what do you
recall about Database Technologies vis-a-vis the Bush/Gore election.
There clearly WERE some paid-by-the-piece ACORN folk who ripped off
the company, and -- in so doing -- harmed the process.

But I've seen no evidence it was condoned, sanctioned, sponsored, or
directed by the organization. If you recall the Database Technologies
story, then you'll know the same can't be said of that whole
situation.

What is interesting is that in the aftermath of Bush v. Gore,
even the Bush-Haters like the New York Times came to the conclusion
that Bush did, indeed, win FL in 2000. *

That doesn't address the issue of how.

This is unlike the case
of ACORN for where there is overwhelming evidence that they
are lying, cheating, and stealing on a massive repetitive scale.

I'd be interested in a citation for that. That doesn't comport with
the info that I've seen.

Out of curiosity, does the proponent of this not-good-not-new idea
also miss the Good Old Days of ... slavery?

You are deeply confused my friend.

Well, thank the Good Lord for what I clearly feel is the imminent
opportunity for YOU to set me straight!!!

The "slaves" today, are the half
the country that are paying taxes so the other half doesn't pay any.
The "slaves" are the business owners that have to go through all kinds
of government regulatory hoops, put their own capital at risk, hire
and fire according to today's PC culture, and then - after 30 years -
be told that they are "rich" and need to pay their "fair share". The
"slaves" today are the people who are being told what to do with their
personal property and their lives to satisfy the tender sensibilities
of whichever group happens to currently occupy power.

Meh. Easily countered bumper-sticker arguments. I'll pass on the
bait, though.

As for the rest of your post ... it's tantamount to a "Bush-Cheney" or
"McCain-Palin" sticker on a Suburban or Yukon: redundant and
superfluous :-)

On Dec 30, 1:15*pm, (Doug Miller) wrote:
In article , Tim Daneliuk wrote:
Miller's right: If you don't pay taxes you should have no right to vote
and influence how that money gets spent. *The only exception I'd make
is for people who've volunteered to serve the nation in the military.

I'd make a few more exceptions:

- the severely disabled: as a society, I believe we have a moral obligation to
provide for those who through no fault of their own are unable -- as
distinguished from unwilling -- to provide for themselves, yet that inability
should not disqualify them from voting

- the short-term unemployed: being laid off after years of working shouldn't
cost a person the right to vote

- those who volunteer to serve society in other ways besides the military,
e.g. in hospitals, soup kitchens, shelters for battered women or the homeless,
and so on

- the retired: while those collecting social security may be a net drain
*now*, most of them are certainly a net positive when considered over the
entire span of their working lives

Scrap all of that.

How about a minimum IQ standard???

wrote in message
...
Snip


IMHO people don't vote because there is no one that they want to try to
elect.

No, people don't vote because they're too lazy, as is their right in
any free state. Often they're too uninformed to have an educated
opinion, so *SHOULDN'T* vote.

So you believe that the choices we get every election are the best possible
candidates? ;~) Smirk.



Voting for someone that you don't want in office defeats the
purpose, don't you think?

No, voting for the "lesser of evils" certainly doesn't defeat any
purpose. You're never going to be 100% happy with another controlling
your life. Less is better than more.

Personally I will not vot for either evil... I'll not follow that flock of
sheep.

You don't have to be 100% happy but you should be at least 20% happy with
your pick.

wrote in message
...



What a presumptuous fool you are! I said nothing about what people
should believe or how they should vote, or even whether they should be
allowed to vote. I do believe that perhaps they shouldn't vote if
they haven't made some effort in understanding the issues. Most
don't, so we end up with a mess like we have currently.

With that comment, would you please not vote any more?

On Dec 30, 1:20*pm, "Leon" wrote:

No, people don't vote because they're too lazy, as is their right in
any free state. *Often they're too uninformed to have an educated
opinion, so *SHOULDN'T* vote.

And where might you propose they GET this education?

Anything short of source documents is pure partisan spin and
commercial crap.

What do you suggest people do -- what most Americans do -- read
NOTHING BUT things that support their partisan pre-conceived ideas of
the world (aka "Confirmation Bias")?

What good does that do?

"Larry Jaques" wrote in message
...

IMHO people don't vote because there is no one that they want to try to
elect. Voting for someone that you don't want in office defeats the
purpose, don't you think?

It has come down to voting for the lesser of several evils lately.
sigh


And to restate what I stated previously, why participate in such an
atrocity.

"DGDevin" wrote in message
m...

Making voting mandatory is an interesting idea, 32 nations have done so
and two-thirds of them enforce that requirement. Hmmmmm--don't vote and
you pay a substantial fine (pegged to income)--that should get people's
attention. Of course I'd also require that all ballots have a "None of the
above" choice.


I think you would make a good citizen in Iran

On Dec 30, 2:20*pm, "Leon" wrote:
wrote in message

...
Snip



IMHO people don't vote because there is no one that they want to try to
elect.

No, people don't vote because they're too lazy, as is their right in
any free state. *Often they're too uninformed to have an educated
opinion, so *SHOULDN'T* vote.

please watch the quoting - not picking on you but rather Google's
interpretation of you

So you believe that the choices we get every election are the best possible
candidates? *;~) *Smirk.

This has nothing to do with my point - IOW, a red herring.

Voting for someone that you don't want in office defeats the
purpose, don't you think?

No, voting for the "lesser of evils" certainly doesn't defeat any
purpose. *You're never going to be 100% happy with another controlling
your life. *Less is better than more.

Personally I will not vot for either evil... *I'll not follow that flock of
sheep.

So you'll just kibbitz from the sidelines: "Everyone else is wrong,
but me.".

You don't have to be 100% happy but you should be at least 20% happy with
your pick.

If you can't find someone to vote for that you're 20% happy with,
perhaps you'd better start looking in a mirror. Read any way you
choose to

"Doug Miller" wrote in message
...
In article , "Leon"
wrote:

Elected officials should not win because they simply got a majority of the
vote, they shoud get a majority of the registered voters vote. For
example
if there are 10 registered voters, only 3 show up to vote, and all 3 vote
for candidate "A", that is not good enough. Candidate "A" must get 6 or
more votes to win.

OK, but suppose Candidate A and his opponent B are both chumps, each with
lukewarm support from only one of the ten voters -- but A is *opposed* by
all
of the other eight. If the one voter that supports B, and five of the
eight
that oppose A, show up and vote for B, he's in, even though he's a chump.

Trying to keep up with that... ;~) I think if you simply did not vote
unless you wanted a candidate to win... If during that election if neither
A or B won, Candidates C and D would be up and so on untill one got 5 or
votes. Not a fool proof method with out problems but far better than what
we settle for now, IMHO. Remember the candidate had to get more than 50%
of the votes from registered voters. If 49% of registered voters vote
neither candidate wins.
I think that if we had candidates that we actually wanted rather than what
we are present with by each party we may be more inclined to actually go and
vote.




That's actually not as far-fetched as it seems. I think we saw something
similar in the 2008 primaries: Hillary Clinton has very high disapproval
ratings, even among Democrats, and I suspect that a substantial number of
the
votes that Obama received were votes against her, not for him. Meanwhile,
on
the Republican side, several of the candidates appeared to be nutjobs;
probably many of the votes McCain received were votes against them, not
for
him.

Not voting is a vote that the candidates are not wanted and should be cast
aside.

Better yet, require the choice "None Of The Above" to appear on every
ballot.
If NOTA "wins", have another election in which the losing candidates are
not
allowed to participate. Repeat until someone wins. Or leave the office
vacant.

There, you have my idea. I would go for that too.

On 12/30/2009 8:11 AM, Swingman wrote:

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original concept
of only property owners being able to vote ... but damn would that
**** off the politicians and lobbyist.

"I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but
the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to
exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to
take it from them but to inform their discretion."
....Thomas Jefferson

Sorry, Swing, but I'm with Jefferson on this one - I'm more inclined to
believe that the best thing we can do is to take all steps necessary to
ensure a well-educated and well-informed electorate.

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
DeSoto, Iowa USA
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/

In article , Neil Brooks wrote:
On Dec 30, 1:15=A0pm, (Doug Miller) wrote:
In article , Tim Daneliuk tun...@t=
undraware.com wrote:
Miller's right: If you don't pay taxes you should have no right to vote
and influence how that money gets spent. =A0The only exception I'd make
is for people who've volunteered to serve the nation in the military.

I'd make a few more exceptions:
[snipped for brevity]
Scrap all of that.

How about a minimum IQ standard???

Read "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould, and I think you'll
reconsider that suggestion. The *only* thing that IQ can be scientifically
demonstrated to measure is performance on IQ tests. Nonetheless, it's been
used in the past as a justification for some horrific acts of discrimination.
Among other things, such discrimination resulted in perhaps millions of deaths
in the first half of the 20th century, when vast numbers of people attempting
to flee the carnage of WWII, and the destruction by deliberate famine of the
Russian peasant class under Stalin[*], were not permitted to enter the United
States because of harsh quotas imposed by the Immigration Restriction Act of
1924, which severely limited the immigration of the supposedly congenitally
intellectually "inferior" eastern and southern Europeans.
[*] "I Chose Freedom" by Viktor Kravchenko is a compelling eyewitness account
of the horrors of Stalinist Russia. [Scribner, New York, 1946]

On 12/30/09 2:08 PM, Neil Brooks wrote:
On Dec 30, 12:45 pm, Tim wrote:
On 12/30/2009 1:05 PM, Neil Brooks wrote:



On Dec 30, 12:01 pm, wrote:
On 12/30/2009 12:27 PM, DGDevin wrote:

wrote in message
...

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original concept of
only property owners being able to vote ... but damn would that **** off
the politicians and lobbyist.

This idealistic "right of everyman to vote" will prove to be the root
factor in the eventual downfall of this country.

Sad, but true.

Bull, giving political power only to those with wealth is repugnant, you
couldn't come up with something that would make politicians and lobbyists
happier. The ability of the people to throw morons and crooks out of office
is one of the few things that keep the *******s in line.

Are you going to tell a youth who volunteers to risk his life serving his
country in uniform that he doesn't get to vote because he doesn't have any
property? If the mill closes and people lose their jobs and their homes
should that result in them losing the vote? Do you seriously propose that
citizens who rent apartments are inherently entitled to fewer rights than
people who own houses?

No offense, but that is one lameass idea.

Tell that to your founding fathers, who first instituted the practice.

You mean ... of course ... the slave-owning founding fathers?

Do you have a calendar handy? Do you realize this is ...
effectively ... 2010??

If you yearn for those times, I can list for you a HOST of emerging
nations whose systems much more closely resemble that of our earliest
days as a nation.

[nothing of relevance snipped]

Since you insist on harping on slavery, let me acquaint you with some
realities of slavery you're conveniently ignoring:

- Slavery in some form has existed in all of recorded human history.

- The slavery that brought Africans to the US was instituted BY Africans
AGAINST Africans long before the Europeans ever showed up.

- African Muslim pirates (the Barbary Corsairs) attacked and enslaved
white Europeans well before the Europeans ever engaged in slavery themselves.
These pirates operated from the 11th century through the 19th by
some accounts.

- Of all major cultures ONLY the Judeo-Christian influenced Westerners
*gave up slavery voluntarily*, whether by internal civil war or
legislative decree.

- One of the two places in the world you can still buy slaves in large
numbers is ... wait for it ... AFRICA. (Somalia and Mauretania to be
exact. The other is the white slavery going on in the Eastern Bloc
and Islamic worlds.)

So, before you get too haughty about the eeeeeeeeeevil Founding
Fathers, you might want to ponder their context and realize that in
less than 100 years after the US was formed as a nation (1776-1865)
slavery was abolished. We got rid of something in a hundred years that
had been going on for 10 *thousand* before. It was EXACTLY because of
the ideals of these people and their fundamental principles of
government that slavery could not and did not survive. Dismissing them
as mere slavers with a corrupt morality utterly misses the point.

So, just why do you and your fellow politically correct travelers leap
at the opportunity to criticize the founders of the US - founders
that led us on a path of freedom for more people, more rapidly than
at any point in history - BUT you're entirely silent about the
millennia of slavery and human rights abuses in Africa and the rest of
the world?
world?

Eloquent, but ... sadly ... in the end ... pointless.

They also owned slaves. You may say that was "right for their times"
or ... something equivalent, but ... many "knew better," and the
practice was relatively speedily abolished.

The notion that others did it before them, or that it still goes on
elsewhere, likewise, does nothing to the argument.

It's a fools effort to declare that things that were right in 1776 are
therefore automatically right, now.


Talk about missing the point.


--

-MIKE-

"Playing is not something I do at night, it's my function in life"
--Elvin Jones (1927-2004)
--
http://mikedrums.com

---remove "DOT" ^^^^ to reply

"Neil Brooks" wrote in message
...
On Dec 30, 1:20 pm, "Leon" wrote:

No, people don't vote because they're too lazy, as is their right in
any free state. Often they're too uninformed to have an educated
opinion, so *SHOULDN'T* vote.

And where might you propose they GET this education?

Anything short of source documents is pure partisan spin and
commercial crap.

What do you suggest people do -- what most Americans do -- read
NOTHING BUT things that support their partisan pre-conceived ideas of
the world (aka "Confirmation Bias")?

What good does that do?

You might want to readdress that to Keith, I did not say that.

wrote in message
...

You don't have to be 100% happy but you should be at least 20% happy with
your pick.

If you can't find someone to vote for that you're 20% happy with,
perhaps you'd better start looking in a mirror. Read any way you
choose to


Orrrrr not vote at all..

In article , Tim Daneliuk wrote:
On 12/30/2009 2:15 PM, Doug Miller wrote:
In article , Tim Daneliuk
wrote:

Miller's right: If you don't pay taxes you should have no right to vote
and influence how that money gets spent. The only exception I'd make
is for people who've volunteered to serve the nation in the military.

I'd make a few more exceptions:

- the severely disabled: as a society, I believe we have a moral obligation to
provide for those who through no fault of their own are unable -- as
distinguished from unwilling -- to provide for themselves, yet that inability
should not disqualify them from voting

- the short-term unemployed: being laid off after years of working shouldn't
cost a person the right to vote

- those who volunteer to serve society in other ways besides the military,
e.g. in hospitals, soup kitchens, shelters for battered women or the homeless,
and so on

- the retired: while those collecting social security may be a net drain
*now*, most of them are certainly a net positive when considered over the
entire span of their working lives

'seems fair enough.

There may be others, too, but those are the ones that spring most readily to
mind.

In article , Morris Dovey wrote:
On 12/30/2009 8:11 AM, Swingman wrote:

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original concept
of only property owners being able to vote ... but damn would that
**** off the politicians and lobbyist.

"I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but
the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to
exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to
take it from them but to inform their discretion."
....Thomas Jefferson

Sorry, Swing, but I'm with Jefferson on this one - I'm more inclined to
believe that the best thing we can do is to take all steps necessary to
ensure a well-educated and well-informed electorate.

I think those steps should include ensuring that the ill-educated and
uninformed do not participate in the election process _at all_. Those
conditions are, after all, fairly readily cured -- and with education
compulsory through the age of sixteen, and publicly funded, there's little
excuse for not acquiring at least a minimal understanding of how our economic
and political systems work.

Note "_at all_" in the above: an even more important consideration than
preventing those who are ignorant of our economic and political systems from
voting is preventing them from holding office!

DGDevin wrote:
"Doug Miller" wrote in message
...

In article , Swingman
wrote:

Best thing we could do to would be to go back to the original
concept of only property owners being able to vote ... but damn
would that **** off the politicians and lobbyist.

I don't think I agree with that. Among other things, it would
disenfranchise
the working poor, while allowing the idle wealthy to retain the
right to vote.
That doesn't strike me as operating in the best interests of society.

I propose this as an alternative: The right to vote depends on being
a net taxpayer: paying more in taxes than you receive in government
handouts.

So if through no fault of yours you can no longer work (say due to
illness) and you receive public assistance, you would no longer be
allowed to vote? That strikes me as pointlessly unfair.

How about the right to vote being contingent on passing a modest
current affairs test? If you can't provide one-paragraph outlines of
four out of seven major municipal issues and outline the positions of
the candidates for mayor and city council then you can't vote


Hell, lots of the candidates couldn't do that.


--

dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico

In article , "dadiOH" wrote:
DGDevin wrote:

How about the right to vote being contingent on passing a modest
current affairs test? If you can't provide one-paragraph outlines of
four out of seven major municipal issues and outline the positions of
the candidates for mayor and city council then you can't vote

Hell, lots of the candidates couldn't do that.

And that actually is an even bigger problem....

On 12/30/2009 2:45 PM, Morris Dovey wrote:

"I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but
the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to
exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to
take it from them but to inform their discretion."
...Thomas Jefferson

Sorry, Swing, but I'm with Jefferson on this one - I'm more inclined to
believe that the best thing we can do is to take all steps necessary to
ensure a well-educated and well-informed electorate.

No problem, Morris, and I respect your opinion in particular.

My contention is still that it is a direct result of this (idealistic)
concept that has, demonstrably and observably, insured the very
_absence_ of a well-educated and well-informed electorate.

Looking around, it is difficult to surmise otherwise?

It is a sad state of affairs, IMO.

--
www.e-woodshop.net
Last update: 10/22/08
KarlC@ (the obvious)

On Dec 30, 1:51*pm, (Doug Miller) wrote:
In article , Neil Brooks wrote:On Dec 30, 1:15=A0pm, (Doug Miller) wrote:
In article , Tim Daneliuk tun....@t=
undraware.com wrote:
Miller's right: If you don't pay taxes you should have no right to vote
and influence how that money gets spent. =A0The only exception I'd make
is for people who've volunteered to serve the nation in the military.

I'd make a few more exceptions:

[snipped for brevity]

Scrap all of that.

How about a minimum IQ standard???

Read "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould, and I think you'll
reconsider that suggestion. The *only* thing that IQ can be scientifically
demonstrated to measure is performance on IQ tests. Nonetheless, it's been
used in the past as a justification for some horrific acts of discrimination.
Among other things, such discrimination resulted in perhaps millions of deaths
in the first half of the 20th century, when vast numbers of people attempting
to flee the carnage of WWII, and the destruction by deliberate famine of the
Russian peasant class under Stalin[*], were not permitted to enter the United
States because of harsh quotas imposed by the Immigration Restriction Act of
1924, which severely limited the immigration of the supposedly congenitally
intellectually "inferior" eastern and southern Europeans.

[*] "I Chose Freedom" by Viktor Kravchenko is a compelling eyewitness account
of the horrors of Stalinist Russia. [Scribner, New York, 1946]

Mine was sarcasm ;-)

On Dec 30, 1:48*pm, Tim Daneliuk wrote:

Sorry, I didn't mean to come across as condescending. *I was actually
trying to be sort of friendly ...

Then my apologies -- sincerely.

The "slaves" today, are the half
the country that are paying taxes so the other half doesn't pay any.
The "slaves" are the business owners that have to go through all kinds
of government regulatory hoops, put their own capital at risk, hire
and fire according to today's PC culture, and then - after 30 years -
be told that they are "rich" and need to pay their "fair share". The
"slaves" today are the people who are being told what to do with their
personal property and their lives to satisfy the tender sensibilities
of whichever group happens to currently occupy power.

Meh. *Easily countered bumper-sticker arguments. *I'll pass on the
bait, though.

Go ahead, counter them if they are trivial arguments. *Explain to me
why it's OK to enslave me for 5 months a year.

Don't point that question at me, Man! It's loaded :-)

[and very much akin to me asking whether or not you've stopped beating
your wife yet.....]

As for the rest of your post ... it's tantamount to a "Bush-Cheney" or
"McCain-Palin" sticker on a Suburban or Yukon: redundant and
superfluous :-)

I liked neither. *However, the current Messiah's performance is guarnteeing
that I am going to do something I have not done in literally decades -
vote a straight, blind R ticket for the next several elections. *I'd even
take Gingrich-Palin over what we have now. (And I almost NEVER vote for a
Republican.)

I wonder how I made it through eight years of GWB without ever calling
him some horrid media-propagated nickname, despite having been
repulsed by virtually everything he ever did as the Leader of the Free
world.

And why those who -- generally -- claim to love this country "more
than all others," and have respect for its institutions feel so
compelled to act like kids when it comes to politicians they dislike?

Chosen One? Messiah? Socialism? Communism? Black president shining
Palin's shoes??

Nobody who ever invokes terms like that ... should ever wonder why
others pay NO attention to politics.

It's because that sort of behavior -- regardless of which side is
using it -- repulses sensible folk.

Now ... to help re-frame your question ....

Why should you pay taxes?

Because the collective good is served -- in some cases, better, and in
some cases, worse -- by the collective dollars spent for the 'general
welfare --' be it roads, safe cars, safe drinking water, an education
system that -- while in need of serious pimping -- is still ranked
highly in the world -- police protection, fire protection, libraries,
(inadequate) regulation that helps to extinguish Social Darwinism
where the strong may pray on the weak, a mighty military, satellite
navigation, etc., etc., etc., etc.

[And ... health care. A sick uneducated work force (worse than it is
now, I mean) is a one way ticket down on the latter of economic world
hegemony for the good old You Ess Of Ayyyy. We WILL be serving
cocktails, in flight, however.]

These things cost money.

In aggregate, these things also play a BIG role in the average
person's perceptions about why this is The Greatest Place In The World
In Which To Live (I like it, but ... would never go that far).

Take away the economic support for those things, and Social Darwinism
really takes hold. A quick peek: the item that taxes pay for, and
what happens when the wealthy are free from subsidizing it:

-Roads? Hell, I'll buy a Hummer

-Schools? I'll send my kids to private

-Water? I buy bottled

-Pesticides? I buy organic. Let THEM eat DDT

-Banking regulation? Hell, _I_ have an MBA and a high-priced lawyer.
F the rest of them

-Police/fire/public safety? I'm RICH and am covered by Sovereign Deed

and on and on and on.

Sounds okay?

Well ... if you're on this ng ... you're likely in the group that's
going to be screwed. Enjoy :-) I'll be your cabin-mate, Neil.

I'm actually a hobbyist woodworker, but ... because of a nagging sinus
infection ... have had to take a slight break from my two shaker-style
mahogany night stands.

I spend little time on this forum because -- like the craft,
generally, I'm guessing -- the demographic is painfully narrow.

Again: confirmation bias.

A bunch of people preening around each other, telling each other what
they already know, and are desperate to hear again (and again and
again).

Challenging our closely-held assumptions ... is a good thing :-)

So is wearing an N95 mask when cutting M&Ts in mahog or dado'ing my
baltic birch plywood ;-)

Cough, cough.... sniff, sniff....

On Wed, 30 Dec 2009 11:54:05 -0500, the infamous "J. Clarke"
scrawled the following:

Larry C wrote:
"Leon" wrote in message
...

"HeyBub" wrote in message

Well ... we can dream.

The problem is not the Congress, it's the voters who elected the
members. An approval rating of 23% really says "I don't like 80% of
me!" ('Does this dress make me look fat?')

We don't get the Congress we deserve - we get the Congress we elect.


The problem is "who" gets to vote, and the fact that congress does
not have to get a majority of the registered voters vote.

Elected officials should not win because they simply got a majority
of the vote, they shoud get a majority of the registered voters
vote. For example if there are 10 registered voters, only 3 show up
to vote, and all 3 vote for candidate "A", that is not good enough.
Candidate "A" must get 6 or more votes to win.

Not voting is a vote that the candidates are not wanted and should
be cast aside.


You file a ballot and you vote a blank for that person.

Enough blanks and the candidate may start to wonder. Even more
important, enough blanks and citizens may run against an incumbent
thinking they can be defeated.

IMHO you should always file a ballot, blank them all if you want, but
file a ballot.

Also, people need to educate themselves more about what is going on.
I saw a bumper sticker that read: "Pay more attention or pay more
taxes"

I'd like to see three options on every ballot for every office--"none of the
above", "shoot them all", and "abolish the office".

I think I could second that! Bwahahahahaha!

But think, if we abolished all the gov't we didn't actually _need_,
many additional millions would be out of work. I guess, as they've
thought of us, "It's only paeons (gov't workers), so why worry?"

--
It's a shallow life that doesn't give a person a few scars.
-- Garrison Keillor

"Swingman" wrote in message
...

No offense, but that is one lameass idea.

Tell that to your founding fathers, who first instituted the practice.

They tolerated slavery too, does that mean it was a bad idea to end the
practice?

I didn't say I liked it, I said what the idealism inherent in the "right
to vote for "everyman"" would result in ... in practice it will lead to
the eventual decline of this country.

Look around you ... the country is in decline, it is happening before your
very eyes, although many are too blind or ignorant to see it, mainly due
to the **** poor educational system foisted upon us by the very concept
itself ...

The reluctance to accept it as being at the root of the phenomenon is
understandable, but it will one day be as obvious as the nose on your
face. Count on it.

Again, sad, but true ...

Again, bull. People have been bemoaning the supposed decline of the country
as long as the country has existed, some folks just seem to enjoy
forecasting doom.

"Tim Daneliuk" wrote in message
...

Since you insist on harping on slavery, let me acquaint you with some
realities of slavery you're conveniently ignoring:

- Slavery in some form has existed in all of recorded human history.

So what?

- The slavery that brought Africans to the US was instituted BY Africans
AGAINST Africans long before the Europeans ever showed up.

So what?

- African Muslim pirates (the Barbary Corsairs) attacked and enslaved
white Europeans well before the Europeans ever engaged in slavery
themselves.
These pirates operated from the 11th century through the 19th by
some accounts.

So what?

- Of all major cultures ONLY the Judeo-Christian influenced Westerners
*gave up slavery voluntarily*, whether by internal civil war or
legislative decree.

Good for them.

- One of the two places in the world you can still buy slaves in large
numbers is ... wait for it ... AFRICA. (Somalia and Mauretania to be
exact. The other is the white slavery going on in the Eastern Bloc
and Islamic worlds.)

So what?

So, before you get too haughty about the eeeeeeeeeevil Founding
Fathers,

Are you capable of speaking in anything but slogans? Your posts are
peppered with buzzwords from the rabid-right, can't you function without
borrowing their group-speak?

As for your argument, pointing out that other cultures had slavery too, as
if that's a valid excuse to continue it in America, is a feeble notion.
You've also overlooked that Britain abolished slavery before the United
States, and they managed to do it without the U.S. Constitution, imagine
that.

"Leon" wrote in message
...

Which country are you living in??? I have seen nothing but crooks and
morons for the last 40 years.

There's no shortage of them, politics seems to have attracted that sort as
far back as history goes, it didn't begin just forty years ago. However it
remains that the crooks and morons being subject to dismissal is a valuable
institution, one I wouldn't care to give up.

"Leon" wrote in message
...

You know in communist countries and dictatorships the people are
required to vote.

Some democratic countries (including Australia, Belgium, Switzerland,
Mexico, Argentina and Greece) have a similar requirement, and it seems to
work quite well for them.

The people or the government, seems to work well or what you have read?

If voter turnout upward of 85% is a good thing (and I think it is) then I
think mandatory voting works. Of course if you don't like the results of
some elections and you'd rather certain people stayed home on election day
then I see how you'd think it was a bad idea.

All you have to do is deliberately spoil your ballot and you vote for
nobody, or there could be a "None of the above" choice.

Actually all you have to do is not vote at all.

Sure, if you didn't mind the $1,000.00 fine applied to your property taxes
(or whatever sanction is applied)--be my guest.

Mandatory voting would be a modest infringement on our liberty, but it
would serve such a compelling public interest that IMO it would be worth
it.

Shortly behind that would be those people that make sure you vote they way
they want you to.

Has that happened in Australia, Belgium, Switzerland etc.? No? Then what
are you moaning about?

On 12/30/2009 4:13 PM, DGDevin wrote:
wrote in message
...

No offense, but that is one lameass idea.

Tell that to your founding fathers, who first instituted the practice.

They tolerated slavery too, does that mean it was a bad idea to end the
practice?

I didn't say I liked it, I said what the idealism inherent in the "right
to vote for "everyman"" would result in ... in practice it will lead to
the eventual decline of this country.

Look around you ... the country is in decline, it is happening before your
very eyes, although many are too blind or ignorant to see it, mainly due
to the **** poor educational system foisted upon us by the very concept
itself ...

The reluctance to accept it as being at the root of the phenomenon is
understandable, but it will one day be as obvious as the nose on your
face. Count on it.

Again, sad, but true ...

Again, bull. People have been bemoaning the supposed decline of the country
as long as the country has existed, some folks just seem to enjoy
forecasting doom.

A country not in decline? You've seen Detroit lately, Bubba?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Hlbsw3bQy8

Did you think that you would ever see the likes of this in the USA?

Not in delcine, eh?

Now that _is_ "bull"!

--
www.e-woodshop.net
Last update: 10/22/08
KarlC@ (the obvious)

"DGDevin" wrote in message
...

Shortly behind that would be those people that make sure you vote they
way they want you to.

Has that happened in Australia, Belgium, Switzerland etc.? No? Then what
are you moaning about?


I was tininking more in terms of the countries that you left out. The
middle east countires where voter participation is required. Remember
Sadam?

"Leon" wrote in message
...

IMHO people don't vote because there is no one that they want to try to
elect. Voting for someone that you don't want in office defeats the
purpose, don't you think?

Plenty of people don't vote for the same reason they don't pay their child
support, don't show up for work on time, don't go back to school so they can
get a better job, don't stop hanging out with their loser buddies from High
School, don't stop spending all their spare money on dope and strip-bars,
don't fix the dripping tap in the bathroom, don't plan for the future and so
on and so forth--because they're losers who don't give a damn for much of
anything but their immediate gratification. Do we seriously expect such
people to take an interest in politics?

There are also people with poor education and little economic opportunity to
speak of who live paycheck to paycheck. They don't vote because their
parents didn't vote and they see no reason to break with tradition, their
life never seems to get any better just because the other party wins office.
Again, by what miracle should we expect these people to suddenly take a keen
interest in civic affairs? And when someone goes into the inner city (or
depressed rural areas) and registers such folks and helps them get to the
polling place then we hear the sort of arguments recently posted here--such
people shouldn't even be allowed to vote because they're not
property-holders--it's enough to make one wonder if we shouldn't sign the
country back to the British Crown.

"Leon" wrote in message
...

"DGDevin" wrote in message
m...

Making voting mandatory is an interesting idea, 32 nations have done so
and two-thirds of them enforce that requirement. Hmmmmm--don't vote and
you pay a substantial fine (pegged to income)--that should get people's
attention. Of course I'd also require that all ballots have a "None of
the above" choice.


I think you would make a good citizen in Iran

I think you take yourself and your political views a bit too seriously,
either than or you just enjoy taking a gloomy view of everything. There are
democratic nations that make voting mandatory and they haven't slid into
despotism as you predict, so unclench your teeth a bit sport, you'll hurt
yourself.

"Leon" wrote in message
...

The problem is "who" gets to vote, and the fact that congress does not
have to get a majority of the registered voters vote.

Elected officials should not win because they simply got a majority of the
vote, they shoud get a majority of the registered voters vote. For
example if there are 10 registered voters, only 3 show up to vote, and all
3 vote for candidate "A", that is not good enough. Candidate "A" must get
6 or more votes to win.

Not voting is a vote that the candidates are not wanted and should be cast
aside.

Why do I suspect that if six of the ten registered voters show up and vote
for the candidate you disapprove of that you'd still be ****ed-off?

"Dave Balderstone" wrote in message
news:301220091652408819%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderst one.ca...
In article , Swingman
wrote:

A country not in decline? You've seen Detroit lately, Bubba?

Try looking at Detroit through Google Earth.

It's incredible. Entire blocks with only one house left. Lots of entire
blocks...

I saw an article recently where farmers are reclaiming industrial land in
Detroit to grow crops. They say it is cheaper to lease the land there than
in farm country.

In article , Neil Brooks wrote:
On Dec 30, 1:51=A0pm, (Doug Miller) wrote:

Scrap all of that.

How about a minimum IQ standard???

Read "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould, and I think you'll
reconsider that suggestion. The *only* thing that IQ can be scientifically
demonstrated to measure is performance on IQ tests. Nonetheless, it's been
used in the past as a justification for some horrific acts of discrimination.
Among other things, such discrimination resulted in perhaps millions of deaths
in the first half of the 20th century, when vast numbers of people attempting
to flee the carnage of WWII, and the destruction by deliberate famine of the
Russian peasant class under Stalin[*], were not permitted to enter the United
States because of harsh quotas imposed by the Immigration Restriction Act of
1924, which severely limited the immigration of the supposedly congenitally
intellectually "inferior" eastern and southern Europeans.

[*] "I Chose Freedom" by Viktor Kravchenko is a compelling eyewitness account
of the horrors of Stalinist Russia. [Scribner, New York, 1946]

Mine was sarcasm ;-)

I guess I missed that.

wrote in message
...
On Dec 30, 10:53 am, "Mike Marlow"
wrote:
wrote in message

...

No, people don't vote because they're too lazy, as is their right in
any free state. Often they're too uninformed to have an educated
opinion, so *SHOULDN'T* vote.


What a presumptuous fool you are! I said nothing about what people
should believe or how they should vote, or even whether they should be
allowed to vote. I do believe that perhaps they shouldn't vote if
they haven't made some effort in understanding the issues. Most
don't, so we end up with a mess like we have currently.

Reference your very words above, which I had quoted in my reply. You very
clearly state the reason people don't vote. You further state that they are
often too uninformed therefore should not vote. That is what I called you
on. People vote on what is important to them. That is a very real part of
the voting process. You don't have to like it, but that's life. It's not
yours to decide if that qualifies them to vote, or to state that those who
do not vote are simply too lazy.

Voting for someone that you don't want in office defeats the
purpose, don't you think?
No, voting for the "lesser of evils" certainly doesn't defeat any
purpose. You're never going to be 100% happy with another controlling
your life. Less is better than more.

It most certainly can defeat the purpose. This has been demonstrated time
and time again, as Washington critters prove to be one and the same,
regardles of their party affiliation or their promises.

Nonsense. You propose that things can never be worse.

I propose no such thing. You need to stop trying to assign thoughts and
motives to other people. You only serve to embarass yourself when you are
wrong.

What an ass.

You are too transparent. Those who disagree with you must all be asses.

--

-Mike-