Governing through Reason
Open Mic November 2
I’m Not Going Back Outside Till November! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The big news this week was Hurricane Sandy, an event which may have a tremendous effect on Tuesday’s election. Or maybe not. It did bring the President and Governor Christie together, much to the chagrin of conservatives — some of whom still question a federal role in disaster relief. But other things happened, too. Syria continues to be a flashpoint. Halloween in Madrid proved fatal. Another year of baseball ended. While we watched all that, we missed high drama in space. There must be other things we missed. What would you like to talk about?
Don’t see an article on a particular topic, but want to talk about it somewhere? This is Open Mic. Talk about whatever you want, but stay respectful.
We create a new Open Mic every week to give a clean slate, but feel free to add to this topic at any time.
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#102 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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#105 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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#106 written by shortchain 6 months ago
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@shortchain… mathematically those folks are not merely irrational, they’re actually transcendental.
Okay, that was titillating enough to force me to look up “transcendental numbers.” Now my head hurts.
Though only a few classes of transcendental numbers are known (in part
because it can be extremely difficult to show that a given number is
transcendental), transcendental numbers are not rare. Indeed, almost all real and complex numbers are transcendental, since the algebraic numbers are countable while the sets of real and complex numbers are both uncountable. All real transcendental numbers are irrational, since all rational numbers are algebraic. The converse is not true: not all irrational numbers are transcendental; e.g., the square root of 2 is irrational but not a transcendental number, since it is a solution of the polynomial equation x2 − 2 = 0.OW!!!
You left-brain mathematics types have to be truly exotic animals. How can a person’s head even HOLD stuff like that?
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Hey GROG… Dick Morris is re-thinking!
November 02, 2012
Dick Morris Sees Danger Signs
Dick Morris, who just days ago predicted a landslide for Mitt Romney, may be wavering.
“With that caution in mind, a danger signal comes from the latest Rasmussen Poll reflecting a two point gain for Obama. Whereas before the storm, Rasmussen showed Romney two ahead, he now has the race tied at 48–48. That is troublesome.
“And, in Pennsylvania, Romney led on Wednesday night by two points but on Thursday night’s polling, he was tied. We have also seem slippage for Romney in Michigan.”
“More troubling, Rasmussen shows a two point gain for Obama in job approval rising from 48% to 50% in the current poll.”
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#116 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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#117 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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#118 written by Max 6 months ago
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#120 written by Max 6 months ago
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#121 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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#124 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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This is what this election boils down to.
Is it okay to lie? If you lie about everything, can you win?
If you refuse to acknowledge the truth, if you claim something that is false, and continue to claim it is true even when everyone knows it is false, can you still get people to vote for you?
If Romney wins, then we will have politicians forever after making shit up and refusing to acknowledge truth. That is what is at stake.
And we will have America voting on lies.
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#129 written by DrFunguy 6 months ago
Quote of the day:
“…this is America, where we are well beyond economic research or labor statistics or believing people who are paid to research things. Everybody knows anyone who disagrees with Republicans is just a liberal in a labcoat. Plus, “evidence” sounds an awful lot like Sharia law.“Wonkette
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#131 written by Mule Rider 6 months ago
“get rid of 1–2 billion people“
Absolutely 100% false. No idea where you came up with that. But I have a good guess where it came from. A bodily orifice that smells.
“Iron Age bartering”
I talk about a responsible Central bank and monetary policy and you come back with this tripe? And you wonder why I think — nay, know — you’re less than worthless to discuss economic matters with? Seriously, piss off and keep your mouth shut if that’s the best you can do because you’re just embarrassing your own “side” when you volunteer as a representative mouthpiece with such garbage.
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#134 written by Mainer 6 months ago
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#135 written by Armchair Warlord 6 months ago
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#137 written by shortchain 6 months ago
Just in case any advertising people happen by this blog and (even more unlikely) read the comments:
- Having Pat Boone (or some antediluvian guy who apparently was a soldier 70 years ago) do an ad for a candidate isn’t likely to sway any voter younger than 85. Putting the ad on in a rotation every ten minutes, 24 hours a day, is likely going to turn off more voters than you could possibly attract, given the demographics of the population. Hey, I’m not young, but seeing Boone’s face come on during the news I thought they were announcing the onset of the zombie apocalypse.
- If you are going after “undecided voters” at this point you need to be a little bit more subtle, a bit more indirect, and you need to try and hit them where they are tender. It does absolutely no good to simply assert “this is Obama’s economy”, as it’s moderately likely they don’t understand the term “economy”, and the pictures of those nice-looking, clean, well-dressed white people in the ad are likely going to make them think good things about Obama. And having it on in a 24⁄7 every-ten-minute rotation doesn’t enhance understanding.
- I don’t know what, in the end, an “undecided voter” is left thinking after watching the barrage of ads. My own conclusion is that there’s far too much money, far too little intelligence, and a complete lack of honesty in the GOP advertising organization this election. The impression I get is that these people believe that money conquers all.
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#138 written by Mule Rider 6 months ago
“Metals went out a few thousand years ago.”
Funny, I could swear there’s still a flourishing market for gold, silver, platinum, etc. out there TODAY. But mouth-breathers like yourself tend to ignore reality, so I’m not surprised that fact escapes you.
“It would probably help your point if you focused more on a static money supply and less on a particular commodity.”
I’ve said numerous times that a static money supply — via responsible Central Bank and monetary policy — is my only desire, not a return to a precious metals standard. People who keep bringing that up and focusing on it with schoolyard taunts — *cough*DC*cough* — are just setting up an unnecessary straw man to avoid discussing the issue seriously.
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#139 written by Max 6 months ago
It was with a bit of irony watching Steven Tyler perform “Dream On” with other Aerosmith members on last nights fundraiser.The song’s lyrics certainly seemed much more appropriate to a 64 y/o Tyler, than the 22 y/o Tyler who wrote them over 40 years ago:
Every time when I look in the mirror
All these lines on my face getting clearer
The past is gone
It went by, like dusk to dawn
Isn’t that the way
Everybody’s got the dues in life to payI know nobody knows
Where it comes and where it goes
I know it’s everybody sin
You got to lose to know how to winHalf my life
Is books written pages
Live and learn from fools and
From sages
You know it’s true, oh
All these things you do come back to youSing with me, sing for the years
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tears
Sing with me, just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good lord will take you awayDream on
Dream until your dreams come true -
#140 written by mclever 6 months ago
@shortchain
Your comment #137 captured exactly my impressions living here in a swing state. I’m seeing 5 or 6 Romney/PAC ads for every Obama ad, but the Romney ads are forgettable same old same old political ads running ad nauseum every commercial break. It’s the dreary black-n-white images with bold red scare letters, over and over and over. Obama’s ads tend to be more memorable and better targeted. It’s like Republicans think they can use a scattershot approach, firing up as much cheap lead as possible and hoping they score a hit, while the Obama campaign is using a laser-sighted sniper rifle with copper jacket bullets in comparison. (I’m not that much of a gun person, so hopefully Max will forgive me if the analogy isn’t perfect.)
Also, Romney ads seem to be still aimed at general persuasion with a message of “Obama bad” and hammering the same “economy, jobs, debt” message that they’ve been on all along. They could have run these same ads in August, and we wouldn’t know the difference. While the Obama ads have distinctly changed in character since Debate #3. Now, they are aimed at closing the deal, with the ads aimed at convincing people to vote, period. There’s the “What are you going to tell your friends, that you couldn’t be bothered?” ad and the one that I think of as Obama’s closing message, where he follows up highlights of economic progress with a few bullets about the future and his “can’t go back, keep moving forward” line.
Also, the Obama ads have distinctly different flavors depending what I’m watching. The ads during NBA games are more likely to be the “go vote!” ads, while the ads on CNN are more likely to be the Bill Clinton ad or another “closer” ad.
And, this doesn’t just apply to advertising. I get robocalls from the RNC and Romney campaign that have absolutely no hope of persuading me. I’m bombarded with daily “Obama is destroying middle class families” calls and “Debt will burden your children” calls that have only intensified. But I already voted as a registered Democrat. The Obama campaign knows that, so they call once a week to ask if I’ll volunteer instead of still trying to persuade me.
My friend (I’ll call her Joan) voted on Wednesday. Prior to that, she was getting Obama calls touting his concern for women’s health and equality issues, issues that mattered to her. After she voted, she got an email thanking her for voting. I know, because she expressed her surprise that the Obama campaign had stopped hounding her and asking me if I knew how to get the Romney calls to stop, too. I told her Romney was still calling me, and she burst out laughing.
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Mule,
I could swear there’s still a flourishing market for gold, silver, platinum, etc. out there TODAY.
Of course. What I believe he meant was metals as a source of currency. And, no, it wasn’t a few thousand years ago that they “went out”; it was within the last century.
Metals still have value because we make so many things out of them. And some of them have additional value for the same reason paper with Washington’s face on it has value: enough people agree that it does.
I’ve said numerous times that a static money supply — via responsible Central Bank and monetary policy — is my only desire
Then don’t let yourself get drawn into the metal discussion. Return it to static money supply.
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shortchain,
2.If you are going after “undecided voters” at this point you need to be a little bit more subtle, a bit more indirect, and you need to try and hit them where they are tender.
Both camps abandoned the undecideds right around the debates. Everything since then has been about motivating the base to get out and vote. It seems to me that Obama has done a better job there, but I don’t know if it’s enough to flip any of the states.
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#143 written by Mule Rider 6 months ago
“Then don’t let yourself.…”
See comment 80 from DC where he responds to a statement where I specifically state a return to a Gold Standard isn’t necessary, just a responsible Central Bank and monetary policy, with a vacuous and neanderthalic response about “Iron Age bartering.” I assume, then, that you agree with me that DC is not trying to have a serious discussion when he trots out something so inane?
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#145 written by Mule Rider 6 months ago
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#146 written by channelclemente 6 months ago
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Mainer, Maybe at height of warm season. Really anywhere with the right conditions and it may be another facet of warming, range expansion. They are interchangeably called great white herons and surely act like them.
Looks like you at least have snowy egrets http://www.birdingmaine.com/photo-of-the-day-snowy-egret-flying-away.htm
Bucksport rocks. Fort Knox is astonishing, an old bit of millitary industrial complex from another time.
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If only this Mitt Romney had shown up for the last year and a half, we’d be having a very different discussion right now.
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New WaPo/ABC poll results. The internals on enthusiasm are interesting.
http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-vs-romney-wash-post-abc-poll-november-2–2012-11