[clue-talk] How do CLUEbies vote?

[Nate Duehr]

David Rudder wrote:
> CLUE members seem to be primarily gun owners and liberatarians.  Not me, 
> but many of you.  Personally, I'm a big fan of the nanny state, but 
> that's just me.
> 
> I don't see any political figures that match the general CLUE 
> sensibilities.  Who did y'all vote for in 2004?  Who will you vote for 
> in 2008?  I bet it's the Republican candidate, even though it was GWB in 
> 2004, because you won't vote for the Dems.

Personally, I'd vote for ANYONE from any party who would truly 
follow-through on making government smaller and reducing taxes.  I 
wouldn't consider myself a Libertarian, really -- but I have leanings 
that way.  (I like having roads to drive on.  LOL.)

True-blue "conservative" Republicanism used to at least give lip-service 
to things I'd like to see from government, but have since taken up other 
causes, realizing that they don't really want to end their own jobs. 
They're all about big government and big spending by Corporate 
"citizens" now.

(Isn't it nice that a piece of paper called a "Corporation" has exactly 
the same rights under the law as you do?  Doesn't anyone else find that 
twisted and wrong?  Isn't it also convenient that the real people 
controlling that piece of paper are usually shielded from liability -- 
unless they do something so aggregious that no one can stand it anymore 
-- Enron, cough -- but rarely can a normal citizen afford to take on a 
corporation anymore?)

It would probably help if we'd stop electing lawyers to run the 
country... or at least thin that herd a bit... Government of the 
lawyers, by the lawyers, and for the lawyers.

Neither Republicans nor Democrats meet my goals, and Libertarians just 
don't win because while what I like to call "Small L" Libertarians are 
relatively sane, while "Big L" Libertarians are convinced they can do 
things that simply will never ever happen.  Too many Libertarians 
can't/won't compromise.

Real-world example coming up soon of current Washington thinking:

FCC is auctioning off large swaths of RF spectrum (arguably a "public" 
resource, right?) in January.  They stand to make multiple Billions of 
dollars.  Big B.

I'll be getting whatever would normally have been spent on running the 
FCC by Congress -- back on my taxes next year, right?  Bwahaha... sure.

(The FCC started doing spectrum auctions and went from a regulatory 
"overhead" agency, to a revenue-generator for the Federal government, 
and no one seems to mind that... hard to regulate when you have no 
engineers anymore, and most of the place is run by MBA's, counting the 
incoming cash from huge corporations.  They're now utterly corrupt, and 
it started prior to and then really picked up steam with Colin Powell's 
kid running the place!)

> Personally, my top choice isn't running yet.  Michael Bloomberg.  Second 
> would be Richardson, then Obama, then Hagel, then Gore, then Edwards and 
> if none of those people are available, I'll hold my nose and vote for 
> Hillary.

Yeah, great.  Health care.

You want it cheaper, with goods/services faster to market, with better 
quality... so let's bring in the Government!

(Yeah, that makes sense.)

> For all of the liberatarians in the group, will you hold your nose and 
> vote for someone who wants to tell you who to marry?  What religion to 
> practice?  How you can die?  Has eight years of being spied on, lied to 
> and ripped off been enough?

I have to hold my nose to vote for either major party, most of the time. 
  There's arguments against the Dems that are just as damning as against 
the Republicans.

> Maybe it's a professional thing.  I'm a programmer and most of you are 
> administrators.  That means I'll be more likely to cling desperately to 
> standards and governing bodies, even if they suck (*ahem* JSR process 
> *cough*).  So, yeah, I want a standard authentication protocol, even if 
> JAAS sucks, and someone to say that you can't feed cows diseased beef, 
> even if the FDA is a bloated piece of diseased cow meat.  So, I vote 
> Democrat.

3rd party private certification companies could do what the FDA does, 
and they'd have a reputation to uphold.

The FDA can screw up over and over again, and never have any consequences.

Mmmm, some more tasty E-coli laden veggies this week, anyone hungry?

Apparently the FDA hasn't figured out how to monitor for it yet.

As one of the podcasts I like to listen to puts it...

"[Government Healthcare] conjures up pictures of Doctors with the speed 
of the Post Office, the safety of Amtrak, the science capabilities of 
the EPA, the cost-efficiencies of the Pentagon and the thoroughness of 
FEMA, all wrapped up in the compassion of the IRS."

Yep.

No votin' for Dems this time around... they're too wrapped up in this 
Government Healthcare thing to see straight.

Nate