In President Obama and Mitt Romney, we have a choice between someone who understands the complex world we live in and someone who doesn’t.
Source: The World We’re Actually Living In – The New York Times
Category: Government, Policy, & Politics
Why I Refuse to Vote for Barack Obama – The Atlantic
The case against casting a ballot for the president — even if you think he’s better than Mitt Romney
If two candidates favored a return to slavery, or wanted to stone adulterers, you wouldn’t cast your ballot for the one with the better position on health care.
Source: Why I Refuse to Vote for Barack Obama – The Atlantic
I think the concept that everyone has a line past which they would in fact vote for neither of two choices is quite interesting. Also, is voting for Obama better than voting, for example, for Gary Johnson (or any other candidate that has a statistically insignificant chance of winning the election)? Does voting for a “loser” (e.g. voting non-Republican in Texas or non-Democrat in Rhode Island) send a message about being dissatisfied with the going-to-win party’s platform without risking them actually losing, assuming you feel the other guy is even worse?
Hey, Brother, Can You Spare a Hubble? DOD: Sure! Have Two – The Atlantic
That’s right. Our military had two, unflown, better-than-Hubble space telescopes just sitting around.
This is the state of our military-industrial-scientific complex in miniature: The military has so much money that it has two extra telescopes better than anything civilians have; meanwhile, NASA will need eight years to find enough change in the couches at Cape Canaveral to turn these gifts into something they can use. Anyone else find anything wrong with this state of affairs?
Source: Hey, Brother, Can You Spare a Hubble? DOD: Sure! Have Two – The Atlantic
Democracy Is for Amateurs: Why We Need More Citizen Citizens – The Atlantic
America can’t afford to leave its government in the hands of professionals.
Source: Democracy Is for Amateurs: Why We Need More Citizen Citizens – The Atlantic
This needs: Hope springs a trap | The Economist
The power of positive reinforcement is *huge*.
Lessig’s One Way Forward / Boing Boing
At the core of Lessig’s reasonable manifesto is the corrupting influence of money in politics, a corruption that predates the notorious Citizens United Supreme Court case. Lessig ascribes to this corruption the outrage that mobilizes both Occupy and the Tea Party, and he believes that the corruption can’t be ended until both the left and right realize that though they don’t have a common goal, they do share a common enemy, and unite to defeat it.