I would venture to say that most of us, Republican, Democrat, or Independent, find several things going on in government that we want to change.

Most of those here are interested in change in copyright laws, and at the very least, want legislators like Lamar Smith and Orrin Hatch to cease what appears to be a never ending attack on file sharers.

Instead of our government becoming more reasonable, they have gone in the opposite direction. Why should "protection of intellectual property" be the number three priority of the FBI.
Why should 40 state attrorneys be trying to bully P2P software companies and networks?

Every bit of this is anti-consumer as CodeWarrior has pointed out in the past. State attorneys and the FBI are supposed to work for us, the American public. It is clear that their allegiances lie elsewhere.

Is it a matter of being "paid off"? Who has more money than the majority of consumers? Because, after all, that's where the money comes from to run the government. Is it a matter of political clout? Who has more political clout than the voters of the United States? The idiots like Hatch were PUT THERE by American voters, and are kept there by American voters.

The point is this. We as voters and consumers like to THINK that we have power, but in an outcome based world, we seem to be fighting a losing battle.

We are trapped in a system where we have to write letters to congress people, almost as if we are begging a favor for them. When you do that and get a canned response back, does that make you feel like they are listening to you?

There are no solutions in this article. I have no magic key to unlock a more optimistic future.

What I AM trying to ask is this. Are we just deluding ourselves that we still have input?

I remember some time ago that some people here were handing out flyers, demonstrating outside record stores, and being proactive.

The lawsuits continue, and there is even more pressure to shut down peer to peer systems than ever before.

They (the politicians) are not listening to us.

Truth no longer has any purchase. Creation of jobs is going lower and lower, and when addressing the fact that in July, only 32,000 jobs were created and way over 200,000-300,000 were expected, Bush said this indicated steady growth and the economy was continuing to improve.

Politicians today (as in the past) are just saying whatever they want people to believe without regard to whether it is true or not.

This is not meant to be a partisan article. There are Democrats like Carl Levin who have attacked Peer to Peer as well. Do letters make them stop?

My assertion is that our government, like some runaway horse, is out of control. It is no longer responding to input from citizens. Oh sure, they attempt to present the illusion that they care, but it is merely that, an illusion. If a positive feedback system ever existed between government and "we the people", it no longer does.

I believe they see themselves as autonomous. How else can one explain the re-election of Orrin Hatch year after year. His penchant for attacking consumers, even to the point of suggesting big media should be allowed to hack into, or destroy individual's citizen's computers in the name of fighting copyright infringement, shows just how little he cares about how consumers and voters feel.

When a government acts without regard to public input and even goes forward in eliminating their rights and freedoms, forcing them to sustain warrantless searches of their homes, to provide identification on demand, even without probable cause, bad things are in store for the population.

Can we change things? I leave that to be answered by the days and years to come.

ހ婀

Time for a little revolution.
Time to water the tree of liberty...

We are only going on record so that we can say, "we told you so." This battle will not be won in our lifetimes or even turned in our favor. It will be up to the generations that come after us. We just need to keep screaming in the dark.

The artists of the future, the real content providers need to be swayed by our rebellious voices. That is where we will have an effect. On the fringes of society where the artists are.

The English colonists overthrew the English for various things, including taxation without representation. Are we REALLY being represented anymore? We know we are being taxed...but representation has become a good and reasonable question.

raoulduke1, NO! Forget this next generation bullcrap! You want to change a system, you begin from the roots and expand it upwards. We can change this system. NO industry nor corporation can continue this assault except with attitudes saying "give us a hard one up the rear."

Yes, I've seen that there are connections between rich people becoming richer and poorer people becoming poorer. I've seen that Iraq was taken over for oil. I've seen that "American" interests are what are dominating the world.

But those things take time to change. We may not be able to change every little transgression. But I'll be damned if I just give up for any reason!

There are a lot of things going on in the US that take precedent over music law suits. I dont like the RIAA anymore than most of you here do, but lets face it the RIAA has been suing people for downloading music for nearly a year. This site like its counterpart Dmusic are very educational sites, but they are about boycotting the industry. Boycott means not purchasing their music, it does not mean getting on a file sharing system and downloading their product.

As I stated before, the music industry has been suing people for over a year now, while I do feel sorry for people that got nailed with law suits in January, hell even Feb and March, the fact of the matter is that by this time everyone knows the risk they run if they share RIAA music. Sorry, but issues like the war, jobs, wages, health care, education, and social security are more important than whether someone recently got sued for downloading music, especially when the filesharing law suit campaign has been well documented.

No, in the USA, the people are not represented anymore. Many of the most important decisions that touch a nation and its people are now made by non-elected officials. For example, who determines health care policy in the USA? Big corporations. Who determines retirement policy? Big corporations. Who determines energy policy? Big corporations. These corporations are not run by elected officials and they make decisions based on what is best for themselves (the few at the top), not the public in a general sense. Democracy is slipping out of the hands of the American public and that is a sad thing.

these people lie to get in office in the first place

the chances of tis even being enforeced ios a trillion to one
in our cruippling economy
i seriously doubt theyll even catch anyone or sway children to no fileshare in shcools
even if tis bill passes ill still fileshare
noone takes my right to freely share what i pay for
even if its passed ill still fileshare
what are they gonna do
put cameras in my house to see if im ripping my paid for stuff
since whan does my paid for property have half ownership
if thats the case then i suggest you stiop charging people money to buy it
your stealing peoples money saying you own it after we pay for it
your wrong


the people own the music its the public who holds financial control
not riaa
this is an attempt to use music to felonize our nation
and so politicians can stay in power
wake up america
this is bullshit

HammerofJustice

Yes .. issues like the war, jobs, wages, health care, education, and social security are important.

But here's the other side of that. The government wants to keep you focused on all those things..keep you spread thin on all the micro management stuff. The've been goin on about how they are gonna fix that stuff for years. Nothing has changed.

The importance of this scuffle we are having with the RIAA...isn't as insignificant as some might percieve. They way the government has been bending over in every direction to help them out regardless of what consumer have to say...iis exposing them for what they really are and who they are in bed with.

Again i agree that the things you mention are important...but even the government think that the passing around of so-called copyrighted material is of such importance that it's 3rd on the FBI's list. Because its hitting them on a very important nerve. A nerve we should be taking real notice of.

They won't do anything fix the issues you want to see fixed...but by god when we are seemingly breaking something of theirs they are quick enough to penalize us.

I personally believe this issue is exposing their greed and showing who they really care about the most. If you want to see change in things such as jobs, wages, health care, education, and social security....its sad to say, but this underlying problem we are fighing against here on RIAA (and corporate greed in general) has to be dealt with first.

For those who doubt this article, the FCC has, under the table, allowed the MPAA to corrupt cable tv standards to steal your home recording rights. While things like the "broadcast flag" involve only over the air, there are no lawsuits agianst the fcc for the "plug and play" standards which call for encryption of cable and satellite feeds which nullify existing recording devices and call for mandatory DRM'ed recording on all others. The standards are outright exclusionary on pc's, and otherwise call for restrictions such as shows which are "copy never".. no recording at all.

Nobody knows.. at all.. except our lovely officials.

Black, using our particular issues as the example, you hit the nail on the head as to why so many people in this country don't even bother to vote. Your article is pessimistic and cynical, but I forgive you for that because it is also true and accurate. I have no "magic bullet" answer to this dilema either, I don't think any of us does. The only thing we can do is to persist in our seemingly ineffectual kicking and screaming until it really does come time to take up arms in revolution (I fear we the people actually may have to someday all too soon.)

To all who care, hang in there baby. Rome wasn't built in a day and yada yada.

Shmoo, of Electric Gypsy
Support Local and Independent Music!

Thanks for the "pep talk", Shmoo.
Rah, rah, sis-boom-bah, yada, yada, yah.

I once responded to a similar thread with the following logic...

Clinton v. Bush (Sr.) left us with Clinton in the White house with a less than majority vote. Actually, he won with 46%. Bush got 39% and Perout got 10% with the rest going to all the others.

Now we factor in that only about 30% of the voting age population bother at all.

If Ross Perout can get 10% (causing Bush the election?) by addressing the issues that we discuss here, so can someone else. This leaves us with some campaining to do. Now I'm not proposing we support any candidate in particular. I'm instead proposing that we campaign on the simple principle of voting out "business as usual".

To do this, we only need 10%. This is out magic number. Think about it. If the independent got 10% on his own and we convinced an additional 10% (this would come from each of the major parties) then he would have 30%, From that election, that would leave only 29% for the Republicans and 36% for the Democrates. Now add to this an additional 10% from those that are not voting. This would give the Independent in excess of 40% of the voters who vote.

I know the math needs a little mnore work, but you get the idea. We are not trying to change everyone's mind...Couldn't if we wanted to. We only need to influence 10% of the people we know.

Now I don't know about you, but I would feel pretty deficient if I couldn't influence 10% of the people I know on this most important election (as a matter of fact, I have almost accomplished this goal with acouple of months to go).

Personally, I see Kerry winning (not what I want, but most likely to happen). It really doesn't matter if the choice is only between these two because they both have the same mind set.

But this would only serve us in the next election...Which we should begin to prepare for after this one completes. We already have a wealth of facts that can be presented on why the Republicans should not be allowed to lead. We will simply build the same library on the Democrates.

I do believe that it is not too late to influence the local and state goverments. We should be finding out where they stand on the issues and spread the word. Most people vote locally simply because they are already at the poll. We need to give them something to think about before they pull the handle. By gaining more none major party representatives, we put pressure on the federal government to be more careful with what they do. THis can have a chilling effect on the next couple of years activities that may be perceived as anti-citizen (remember, the House has elections every two years so they are much more sensitive to what the voter thinks of their actions).

Even if we get another talking head in the white house, it takes a majority in both houses of Congress to pass a law. It also takes Congress to create them. This is where our focus should always be. Departments like the DOJ can ill afford to become the private legal staff for the labels if they have no funding for it (controlled exclusively in the House). By voting carefully in this space we can effectively kill (or at least neuter) the rest of this crap.

Sorry for the long windedness of this, but I am not now, nor have I ever been a quiter. Even if we get another four years of GW, we can still win in the end by making sure he is the most (and earliest) lame duck president to occupy the job.....Focus on the House votes.

I asked my dad to run against Bill Frist for Senator in Tennessee in 2006. (Frist said he wasn't gonna run again, but I don't believe that... unless Bush drops Cheney as VP "for health reasons" and puts Frist on the ticket.)

...Dad said "no" but I will keep at him for the next year or 2 and see if I can get him to change his mind.

As far as a presidential candidate, I have "jokingly" always pushed for a Codewarrior/Ziemann ticket, but I honestly think we should beg Tom Barger to run for a major political office. He has some clout on the hill and works EXTREEMLY hard for the issues/agenda that concerns us. Maybe there is a chance in this day and age. Hell, Howard Dean almost had the democratic nod by taking advantage of the power the people could tap into via the internet,
so, why shouldn't we field a REAL canditate for our issues and start taking this country back from the corporations.
(And ignore the fact of whether the candidate is more "republican" or "democrat" ...party affiliation is a STUPID reason to vote for anyone.)

POWER TO THE PEOPLE!

Shmoo, of Electric Gypsy
Support Local and Independent Music!

Well Said!!!!

the only way the people can take the nation back from these greedy micromanaging backstabbing sons of bitches is to take up arms.

Until this occurs nothing will change.

awher -- agreed. We've gone past the point where simply trying to vote and speak our minds will make enough of a difference.

The past 40 years has seen the acceleration of the decline of our freedoms and ideals. And it'll continue to decline until enough people finally reach the breaking point and another American Revolution has started.

Interestingly enough, from what I've read through independent sources, our Founding Fathers went to war for less than what we go through now. How is that for ironic?

awerhr, you are talking "last resort" type of stuff. Please do NOT give up (yet) on the political process that YOU are included in.

Yes, we NEED radicals too. (I am one myself in mind and heart if not action)

But NO VIOLENCE.

There may be a "higher" ideal than OURS even if our ideal is OUR own. (...but that does NOT mean sit down, eat shit either.)

A call for violence is premature. War and fighting in SELF defense is justified, but fighting for gain is simply EVIL.

(fighting is the tool of the unintellectual desparates, the evil, or the defending who are attacked.)

... aw, fuggit, gimme a gun.

Shmoo

how about intellectual desperates.

the last reply i got from a congressman was about the wrong bill. (i had written him about a completely different bill)
Nonetheless, his letter condemned the public domain!

I dont know about you but i'm just waiting for a time when the force i can add will make a difference.

It cannot be any more obvious that; the United States is one of the great democracies and that people like yourselves are not happy unless that democracy allows you people to disobey well established laws like copyright. Whilst this is the essence of democracy the generally vitriolic rejection of any opposing view here hardly completes that balance.

copyright, as you call it, was "established" by the british crown as an excuse to smash anyone who used a gutenberg press against the interests of the crown.

now, its original purpose is being renewed by the MPAA/RIAA as an excuse to smash the internet and computers.

Copyright, as it is today, is not established, its current level of power is new, and very invasive of personal property rights and the concept of capitalist competition.

Though it has not always been, it is a tool of luddites.

By the way, god punishes those who mock and proliferate the misery of others. Think of that every night when you go to sleep, and especially on your death bed.

"Whilst this is the essence of democracy the generally vitriolic rejection of any opposing view here hardly completes that balance."

Codeworrier:
You seem to typpify vitriolic rejection of any opposing view.

While we provide logical reasoning behind our views, your posts are designed to insult, and you refuse to provide anything but shallow rhetoric to prop up your arguments.

If you want to speak of "balance", i suppose since our views are supposed to be "null and void" or "too radical", than yours must be as well.

This article sure does a good job in making an argument for public participation in the running of our country. It also provides an example of aggressive polarization that is occurring within our society. If you go to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, sure enough you will find on the front center of the home page, Payroll Employment: +32,000(p) in Jul 2004. But when you start fumbling around the site, you will find this statistic - Total Employment and the Labor Force (Household Survey Data) Total employment rose by 629,000 to 139.7 million in July.

So - was there only 32,000 jobs created in July, or was there 629,000 job created in July.

---- info from www.BLS.gov ---

CPI:
+0.3% in Jun 2004

Unemployment Rate:
5.5% in Jul 2004

Payroll Employment:
+32,000(p) in Jul 2004

Average Hourly Earnings:
+$0.05(p) in Jul 2004

PPI:
-0.3%(p) in Jun 2004

ECI:
+0.9% in 2nd Qtr of 2004

Productivity:
+3.8% in 1st Qtr of 2004

U.S. Import Price Index:
-0.2% in Jun 2004


Nonfarm employment was little changed (+32,000) in July, and the unemployment rate was essentially unchanged at 5.5 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Employment levels in most of the major industry sectors were little changed over the month. Unemployment (Household Survey Data) Both the number of unemployed persons, 8.2 million, and the unemployment rate, 5.5 percent, were essentially unchanged in July. The unemployment rate has shown little movement since December 2003. The jobless rates for the major worker groups--adult men (4.9 percent), adult women (4.9 percent), teenagers (17.6 percent), whites (4.8 percent), blacks (10.9 percent), and Hispanics or Latinos (6.8 percent)--also were little changed over the month. The unemployment rate for Asians was 4.3 percent in July, not seasonally adjusted. (See tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)

Total Employment and the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)

Total Employment and the Labor Force (Household Survey Data) Total employment rose by 629,000 to 139.7 million in July, and the employment population ratio--the proportion of the population age 16 and over with jobs--increased to 62.5 percent. The civilian labor force also increased over the month, rising by 577,000 to 147.9 million, and the labor force participation rate rose to 66.2 percent.
— ---- snip -----
The crux of the situation is that if you are not interested enough to go to the BLS web site and verify for yourself that the actual job rate increase in July was 629,000 - you probably are not interested in doing much about changing the government.

If you can’t say - ‘32,000 on the front page and 629,000 on page 2, what’s the problem BLS?’ (Notice it’s the BLS problem.) If you can’t ask what’s the problem with the BLS, you probably won’t be able to do much about changing the governent.

By virtue of one visiting this site, I feel that their aptitude towards doing something is above average. I see too much of politics driving the argument, rather than trying to find out how the politics are diving the issue.

I still believe the worse thing that ever happened to this site was to show our aggressive political feelings. Candidates judge groups on support - not whether or not they are in agreement.

Interesting fact - ‘George Washington only had 37% of the population’s support to fight the British’.

(Code, Andrew - anybody up this early on Sunday morning should be talking abut their Sunday School lesson.)

i find it interesting that the "average" hourly earnings went up even though the majority of those 629,000 jobs were at an average of 1/2 the original wages of the workers.

That means the executives got YET ANOTHER PAYRAISE.

by the way.. i believe the 629,000 jobs were "gross" and not "net"

there is a difference between frictional and structural employment statistics.

the 629,000 comes from people moving job to job..

save for the 32,000, which were people actually rejoining the workforce.

so in order to throw the average earnings up when the majority of people's new jobs pay half as much, that means the ultra rich are getting all their lost wages!

Also, the CPI went up, meaning further penalty to our middle class in inflation.

And they expect us to buy HDTV's? HAHAHA.

"(Code, Andrew - anybody up this early on Sunday morning should be talking abut their Sunday School lesson.)"

easy for you to say. While i'm a techie and will circumvent the latest efforts to hold back the ocean by the MPAA, my family knows NOTHING about tech, and will be hurt by what is going on.

Forgive me if im kept up at night lamenting the abuse they must endure. It's like being in the holocaust again.

Tell me about earning a living. In Jan 1993 I got let go from the power company and it has been a struggle ever since. With medical insurance going up another $20 a week, and two or three other outlays this year, I would be glad to go back to my '95 or '96 earnings.

There has been one politicians that I have always been against - the one that want's to improve un-employeement compensation.

"codeworrier" needs to do his/her homework.
The US is NOT a "democracy" but is, instead, a "constitutional republic".
Look at the Constitution and Declaration of Independence. We are a "republic", not a democracy. Maybe you were confusing the US with Athens.

I'll reiterate -- The Founding fathers went to war for less than we go through. So why are we uspposed to just keep hoping that things will magically change? I've gone through "the system" for years. Literally, not once has the pblic welfare every been taken into account. Wether it be copyright laws, the Patriot ACct, the U.N., I'm always met with letters that ramble incessently--never, and I mean never stating that the congressman or congresswoman is looking out for the people.

Like Thomas Jefferson said, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." The problem is, that tree hasn't been refreshed in a while because most people don't care. Everyone takes for granted that in America, it's impossible for anyone to overthrow our Constitution. Tell that to the Germans who blindly followed Hitler as he took his country;s personal liberties and started bullying other countries. (Sound familiar, G.W. Bush?)

I may sound radical. But maybe it's more people that are "radical" that are needed who want to get rid of our government officials, and not more letters to Congress. Besides, if the letters really worked, do you think we'd have half of the Draconian laws we have now? Would there be "free speech zones" to cage people's right to speech? Would we have corporations being allowed to sabotage fair use rights? Hardly!!!!

Although there is talk of a "democratic tradition", even the CIA lists our government as a constitution-based federal republic
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html#Govt
Government United States
Country name:
conventional long form: United States of America
conventional short form: United States
abbreviation: US or USA
Government type:
Constitution-based federal republic; strong democratic tradition
Capital:
Washington, DC

Let's look at the Constititution
http://www.house.gov/Constitution/Constitution.html
The word "democracy" does not appear in the Constitution
The word "democratic" does not appear in the Constitution

The word republic does appear.
Read Article IV, Section 4
"Section. 4.
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence. "

A democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on whats for dinner.

codeworrier, as with your other drivel, you show an astounding level of ill preparation on this board. You apparently don't even know how to Google for facts. In a battle of wits, not only are you unarmed, but you have both arms and legs tied behind your back and are on a heavy dose of Thorazine and having tardive dyskinesia as a side effect.

End of story.

he has the amazing ability to write fallacies so smoothly you pass right over them.

That is an amzing ability.. its too bad he'd never lobby for our cause.

Wit, no. verbosity, yes.

He is what people in the trade call a "pseudointellectual", or one who pontificates over nothing / with no basis.

I do apologize for earlier using that term against mroop. His ad hominem attacks were at least partially based or had some relevance, which is what differentiates him from worrier i suppose.

To those people who have ridiculed my spelling/typos.... i have to confess that the text i type in this browser is no more than 3 mm high, and i sit 2.5 feet away from the monitor..
It's like using binoculars to read the NASA logo on the lunar landing craft left on the moon.. =) you can stop pouncing on me now ^___^.

In spite of the Democrats trying to paint the condition of the country as if we are in the midst of another Great Depression, conditions are simply too comfortable for most people for them to get excited about exercizing the power they have. this would require a lot of effort -- getting off the couch, maybe giving up some time playing poker and watching football, getting out and talking with people about the nation's problems and how we might solve them -- or at least how to find ways to be represented so that our preferences would find their way into law, instead of being thwarted.

But as long as people are comfortable, they will not do it.

The problem, as I see it, is with the candidates. By the time any one of them gets to elected office, unless they only want to have a one term career, they are already so beholden to various moneyed interests and special interest voting blocks, they probably feel they can't really represent the majority and remain in power.

The "little people" need to raise up their own candidates from the grass roots, ones who aren't in the pocket of the kingmakers in both parties and the rich people who finance them. Governor Jesse Ventura in Minnesota was an example of this kind of grassroots candidate, I think. I'm not aware he was indebted to any special interest groups when he got into office. No one expected him to win -- he came out of nowhere and won because of the support of the people, not because of some well-financed party machinery.

Jesse Ventura is not a perfect model, but it does illustrate what I'm talking about. People will have to get busy and do an end run around the system. Otherwise we'll keep getting candidates like Bush and Kerry, which at least half the people in their respective parties are not enthusiastic about.

codeworrier, if you are going to expound on copyright, and democracy, perhaps you should go back to the US Constitution to understand the purpose of copyright.

If you think current copyright laws serve the purpose enumerated in the Constitution, then I invite you to post an essay to persuade us of that point of view.

If not, then you are simply defending the indefensible, and as such your comments serve no purpose here except to offer us some comic relief. Like the Village Idiot in the Monty Python sketch, you perform a "valuable psycho-social service, in providing an example that almost everyone can look down on." In other words, your idiocy makes us all feel better about ourselves. Keep it up, boy.

I like Jesse Ventura. He speaks his mind. And...he was in the original version of Predator. Did you ever stop to think that TWO actors from the movie PREDATOR, went on to become governors?

Wether the public has power or not isn't important as long as the public doesn't use this power. The vast, vast majority of people are content to watch the news occasionally, a few hours of TV a day, go to work or school and generially live their lives without caring too much about larger issues. Occasionally - not often - they will vote for whichever candidate they think is best, usually either the one with the best speech or the one which promises to do the most for them personally (tax cut!). As the media thrives on sensationalism, there is usually minimal chance of an individual of 'the public' even hearing about any issue with an outcome more than a year away. Similar problems prevent them hearing about issues of niche intrest, or which the news company would rather they didn't know about. We are in all three catagories.

I think the party system is antiquated and needs to be removed. Every man or woman should run on his or her merits. No more Democrats or Republicans. The reason being is the leaders of these political parties apply pressures to get what the leader wants. Thus, you have only a few at the top running things.

In Washington you cut deals: If you want this for your constituents, they you had better vote for MY package. If you don’t play by their games they ruin you and since the wolves guard the henhouse, it will never change.

Our founding fathers would be rolling over in their graves if they saw what our political system has evolved into!

Sorry... I meant...

If you want this for your constituents, then you had better vote for MY package.

I think we're a 'toothless tiger' until we collectively raise hell. It's too bad that it usually takes violence of some sort. Compared to the amount of pride that most Americans have in their freedoms, we're a bunch of weeners afraid to do anything. The potential for change still exists, but who knows what it would take. If you're talking voting, writing letters, etc etc, then no, we don't have much influence.

"Our founding fathers would be rolling over in their graves if they saw what our political system has evolved into!"

now having said that, read up on the foreign interests group that will be monitoring the US elections this fall. I'd post a link but I'm too furious to even go back and look at the article. just go to cnn and you can see it yourself. That bullshit has insured I will never vote for another god damn democrat again as long as I live.

ok I'm still pissed but read it here anyway

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/08/08/international.observers/index.html

I'll be raging quietly for a while

Anyone here feel safer knowing that the Europeans are overseeing our elections? Let's see, what can we give up next? how about this - instead of paying our taxes to Washington let's just have a standardized deduction taken out and given straight to Sony. How about we just do away with elections all together? Somebody in Brussells can decide who should be running things.

I agree with captdunsel.
And, I wanted to thank everyone for such great dialogue on my simple article, and first contribution.
Cheers

Now you know how Mexico, Venezuela and all those other countries feel when we send our people to watch their elections.

It doesn't feel very good to have people questioning how we run our democratic process of running an election, does it? Yet we do it to other countries all the time.

As far as I am concerned, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Anyway, we don't have anything to hide, right? I say let them come and see how democracy is done! Maybe the UN can learn something!

I heard the other day that 93% of all Iraqis are registered to vote (the other 7% must be off planting bombs) That compares to 47% in the US. Know someone who hasn't voted? Get their ass registered. Tell them to vote.

Too many American's look at their elected officials as "maids" > Ok we hired them now its their job to clean up the mess. Problem is way to many of us have a tendency to ignore what they do and not offer guidance as to what we want. Let them know you feeling on the issues they are addressing, or issues they aren't that you are concerned about.

I"VE SAID IT A 1000 times at least, if they don't get elected they don't get the perks and the lobby money. They want your vote, without it the are a single line in a register somewhere.

"Now you know how Mexico, Venezuela and all those other countries feel when we send our people to watch their elections."

The difference is that they don't have elected officials who are sworn to uphold our political sovereignty asking other countries to come in and watch us to make sure we do it right. (as if...)

and as far as us being over there doing it to them I haven't ever supported that kind of bullshit. the only reason we are there is because some corporation(s) want to exploit money from them and you don't have to look far to find my stance on corporate government.

I resent the fact these SOB exist to monitor election in –

Aruba,
…
Canada,
…
England,
…
France
….
Ireland,
…
Mexico,
…
Spain.
…
and damn sure resent their presence in The United States of America.

Just because your scuz bag, sleaze ball, lying, cheating, ignorant, ___ (fill in the blank with anything else you can call a person) candidate don’t win an election, doesn’t mean the election was rigged or manipulated by a central committee. Hell, we’ve had 50 or so presidential elections, and ever single one has been by the constitutional election process and power transferred, when appropriate, without police or military intervention (NOTE – without police or military intervention).

To me, I don’t know of anything that brings us any lower than having these sob’s here

So the United States is not a democracy codewarrior? Is that another inconvenient fact or has the rest of the world got it wrong again?

Recall this dialogue from American history:
Question: "What have you wrought?"
Answer: "A (constitutional) republic, if you can keep it."

No mention 'per se' of "democracy" or "democratic" in our Constitution.
Ours is a representative form of government; it is not a direct or pure democracy.

I wrote: "Ours is a representative form of government; it is not a direct or pure democracy."
I should have written: "Ours is a representative form of federal government, but not a direct or pure democracy."

so the united states is not a democracy demand relevance? Yes or No?

autodidact exposes all that agree with him/her name calling is not what most people view as debate. There has been a great deal of talk about debate etc but only when it suits people like him/her. When it does not mysteriously we lapse to name calling

Our form of government is a republic "of the people" -- a representative (indirect) democracy.

did you say democracy demandrelevance....there wasn't so hard

I didn't just say "democracy."
The two phrases "constitutionally-based federal republic" and "representative (indirect) democracy" -- both are needed to describe our system of government -- these cannot be simplistically distilled into your one word "democracy", though you may wish/ To do so is to be very incomplete.

Some people may want an easy word to be all-inclusive, but there isn't any. This may be the most accurate sentence you will find for America's political system:
"Our form of government is a constitutionally-based federal republic designed to serve its citizens who participate through representative (indirect) democracy."

I still think that in the USA of today, the most important decisions on public policy are not being made by elected officials. They are being made by private corporations and are based on maximizing the profits for the miniscule minority that are running them. You can call the govt. of the USA a democracy or a republic or whatever, but for me it seems a lot like feudalism.