[All or Nothing]

(03-08-2012 12:51 AM)Brian Wrote:  

Iran is run by a fucking lunatic, and I dont know what your definition of "white" is but most Iranians aren't 'white,' especially that whack job running the place. Most Iranians w/money got the hell out of that place first chance they got, as evidenced by their huge populations in places like DC and LA. But if you want to go live there by all means have at it.

Bolivia is run by a leftist socialist named Evo Morales. Do a google search and you will see that he's not white, nor where Presidents before him.

Latinos aren't white, latino's are latino. they may be light skinned, but they're not white.

Well, let's see here. According to this Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caucasian_race, from where I found this graph: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co...0476a.jpg. It looks like Iranians have HISTORICALLY been white. Meaning for hundreds of years, before manifest destiny, before the Americas were discovered, Iran has been inhabited by white people!

Also, let's look at who falls under the umbrella of Latino. Latino is inclusive of all countries that primarily speak Spanish if we are going by the standard U.S. definition. This includes: Mexico, Central America, South America, and Spain. In case you didn't know, South America has very large populations of white people, same with Mexico. In fact if you didn't know this, Spain is almost entirely white people! Latino is something that essentially hearkens to anyone who has a connection to any landmass where the primary language is Spanish. It is a descriptor that is not even based on race!

Edit: I know I'm detracting from the topic, but it really irks me when someone can't even get basic definitions and landmasses right regarding race and ethnicity.

[BortimusPrime]

The irony here is that the racial stuff is precisely what has enabled the United States to maintain such a pro-elite political system for so long. Hell, it's still going on today. Look at how many people blame "The Mexy-cans" for taking all the jobs, as opposed to the government for not bothering to enforce the paperwork necessary to work in this country. Hell, the government's databases even allow for multiple names tied to the same social security number. I read an article where some guy found out through a credit agency that about fifteen people were using his social security number to claim citizenship and the government had it all on record and had done nothing about it, even resisting the guy's attempts to figure out who was using his ss number.

[Deluge]

Brian, I know Iranians who are so light skinned they could EASILY pass for French or Italian. White as sheets, whiter than "real white people" who have sun tans.
As for the Latino comment, G's post sums it all up.

I don't agree with the Super Rich being rich just because of racism though. In the Southern colonies, 75% of all white immigrants to the South were destitute indentured servants (slaves with a time limit) mostly from the South and West of England. While 10% of the whole South (including blacks) came from the landed gentry back in England from the same region. Basically the Royalist nobles (the Cavaliers) sailed off to Virginia after the English Civil War and brought along fuckloads of their farm hands with them as slaves with a term limit. Then, the "gentleman" of the plantation would keep knocking up his female servants to extend her time in his servitude (the length of her pregnancy was added onto her time). If you're of colonial white southern stock, then that's where your ancestors came from.

Combined with black slavery, this system had a small group of nobles become filthy rich off of the exploitation of people from both races in question.

Adding onto this, in the 19th century, they didn't have housemaids and cheap labour from Mexico, they had poor as fuck WHITE Irish Catholic immigrants instead. Even in the South, white Southerners by and large have always been poorer than average, especially in Appalachia.

The point I'm trying to make is; it's not about race. You can't go blaming every issue in America on it. The rich fucked everybody over, not just minorities.

Lastly, let's say you had a white millionaire family (the Romneys?) and they had the choice of having dinner with either a black family who were just as rich as them, or a white "trailer trash" family, who do you think they would pick? I'd bet on the former. Class lines divide more than

[Taciturning]

(03-08-2012 01:25 AM)Thomas the Rhymer Wrote:  

- One man one vote, and to ban the electoral colleges. This would prevent a candidate from winning the election by winning a state. This would make it much harder to spend money manipulating voting patterns, because you can no longer make strategic choices on manipulation by focusing on such-and-such states.

- A government is legally bound to respond to the needs and wants of the average public person, rather than business interests.

Whether or not the US will improve by adopting such a system, whether or not such a system is good or not, is probably an entirely different discussion. My personal knowledge of politics and the US is too weak to make a judgement call either way.

I believe this would not be an improvement.

As for the first point, the electoral college serves a purpose. It can, for example, prevent Mickey Mouse from being elected president, even if he wins the popular vote. An unlikely scenario, but ya never know these days. (he got 11 votes in 2008, btw...)

Secondly, it prevents those utterly flaccid "coalition governments" they have in Europe by encouraging the two party system. Think it's hard getting Republicans and Democrats to agree? Try watching the CDU, the CSU, the SPD, the FDP, The Linke, and the Grune parties (all currently represented in Germany's parliament) try to agree on anything. And every time the coalition falls apart over whatever, new elections! I'm not en expert on Europe's political systems, so correct me where I'm wrong.

Finally, by encouraging the two party system, you get better representation in your chief executive. People always bemoan the president only winning around 50% of the popular vote, "HALF the country doesnt want him!" But what if you had 10 parties running, and you only need a simple majority of the popular vote to win, a la direct democracy? That's about 11% (correct my math as needed, I'm bad at it). 89% of the country wouldn't have voted for the president.

I don't be-grudge the rich. They'll always exist, and I'm working to join their ranks. Change the political system, and you'll simply change who the rich people are. SOMEONES gonna get rich. As I said before, the better idea is to shrink government, especially at the federal level, so that the influence of the rich on government is a paper tiger.

If Roosh becomes a book magnate (Is This Beta Publishing House) and uses his considerable wealth to push G Manifesto (President Porfirio) into the White House for no other reason than that he's a sharp dresser and keeps the smell of sex in the Oval Office, would the rich be so evil then?

[46.]

I'd love to skip the race debate but IMO, that's pretty naive. Race has been part of the fundamental US construct since Day 1. Read De Tocqueville- he wrote "If ever America undergoes great revolutions, they will be brought about by the presence of the black race on the soil of the United States." It's always part of the question. Even today you can reverse-engineer racial statistics to get a decent prediction on education and future earning power.

Finally if you look at blacks in the .01%, they behave very differently...Oprah is obsessed with improvement and education; Robert Johnson (BET) is obsessed with developing Liberia. It's a different perspective that brings different actions, usually based on past experienced prejudices.

That being said, lefties completely hung up on race are soft, right-wingers who deny are delusional. It's becoming more and more of pure class game, (thank god) but we're not there yet.

What's interesting NOW about the horrifying, growing inequities in the US is that there won't be a revolution. Why? I think its because most of our basic needs are already met. I'm NOT saying this is ok, but when the poor have flat screens and cable and Wii and stuff, its safe to say the recipe for revolution has changed.

This isn't Marx or Dickens here; this is a new fangled post-modern situation with lots of electronic gadgets and lots of freedoms. At any rate, its a political question in my opinion; once congressmen and senators have their offices "Occupied" for taking too much money from the rich, we'll start to see some changes.