tvashtarkatena

The Indians just don't appreciate how much the Euros lowered the violence rates of primitive societies. Librul losers.

Don't even try. You're talking to a crazy person.

You're right. You werent' just talking about small donors being the key to saving the world. I'm insane. Thanks for letting me know.

You're kind of like an invasion of a new world, if you think about it.

Yup. Get busy, jb! lying piece of shit! if small contributors don't come through, fOrget it. We don't need the untold millions spent on sound-bytes. Many other countries have a more engaged, knowlaedgeable populations and spend a fraction of what we spend on elections. I don't know about what other countries spend on elections, but I'd go out on a limb to say that the most effective activist organizations in those countries, as in ours, are primarily funded by a small percentage of their wealthiest donors. That's just a statistical principle regarding fund raising, or any social connection, for that matter. If you've got alot of skin in the game, you stick with it more, through thick and thin, year after year. If you've given $5 - you basically don't really give much of a fuck. Next year, you're chasing after some new shiny bauble. Average contribution per member of all the save Darfur organizations on Facebook: 19 cents. Has Darfur been saved? Not so much.

because the institutionalization of corporations buying elections don't reduce your political power? You are clueless. spoken like an elitist who ignores how corporate media manufacture consents, how a perpetually dysfunctional government betrays constituencies year after year leading to disenfranchisement of ~50% of the population, etc .. The media is a tool to be used to one's advantage. Organizations that aren't effective don't know how to use the media for this - those that are, do. The media also loves to report train wrecks. Hence - excessive teabagger coverage. Things functioning smoothly are not titillating and therefore not 'news'. This principle hasn't changed in forever. Consumption of news also tends to be self selecting. Idiots watch standard network news. Tea baggers read their zombie blogs. Progressives read Noam Chomsky like a bible. Mostly, people find media outlets that will reinforce the beliefs they already have. They're simply looking for emotional strokes. Nice doggy! Do I think I'm smarter than most of the population? Yes. Does that make me an elitist? Probably. Does it matter? Not so much. What matters is the effectiveness of my participation in forwarding my political agenda as a citizen. Laws passed, court rulings made, candidates elected - all leading to the kind of positive effect on the lives on individuals I'd like to see made.

The ACLU is a corporation.

I think he's quite okay with that set of consequences from the Citizen's United ruling. It's the impartiality that's problematic. JayB and the other nincompoops have already forgotten about the Washington post article posted 2 pages ago showing that ad-hoc conservative organizations are outspending liberal ones 7:1, while most of their contributions come form large wealthy donors and corporations. Now we're getting to the heart of your objections. If the distribution of spending favored your side, we wouldn't be hearing much from you, methinks. Yup. Get busy, jb! As anyone who does fundraising already knows, the lion's share of any donor funded organization's contributions, regardless of political bent, comes from a relatively few wealthy donors. It's very rare when an organization is primarily funded by lots of small donors, who tend to be, let's say, fickle, not very loyal, and very costly on a per capita basis in terms of fund raising efforts.

I'm perfectly fine with exercising my amplified political power over my fellow, fallow, non-participatory man to forward my social agenda. And I'm perfectly fine with using money, and lots of it, to do just that. I'm also perfectly fine with forcing, through legal means, bigots out of the political process to protect and promote fundamental human rights. My will over theirs. Yup, I'm absolutely fine with that.

I don't go for any measure that reduces my political power as a citizen - whether they be gags on my free speech or limiting my ability to vote for who I want through term limits. That fact that I live in a country where half the population is operating from a barely functioning brain stem doesn't change that. That's what constitutional protections are for - to put a cyclone fence around a possible brain stem zombie uprising.

What I like about primitive societies is, when they don't appreciate someone's political views, they spear kill them. So much more...honest, you know?

Hey, if a bunch of faux libertariatards want to forego buying that new four wheeler and stuff their extra cash into a faux 'grassroots' compost pile, I'm all for it. If you're so concerned about it, mount a counter-fund raising campaign and Make That Movie That Will Change the World!

I'll get right on that!

OK, substitute 'campaigns' for 'elections'. Sophist. My last questions still stands. Who gets to tie the gag on political speech? When viewed from this perspective, the ruling takes on a much different light, doesn't it? Citizens, including citizens who work for corporations, should be able to express their political views freely.

Since the data you presented was basically impossible to gather for aforementioned reasons, your conclusions remain unsupported. There are other flaws in your thesis. Timing, for example. Over what time periods were these questionable stats gathered. Are they long term averages, over a societies 'worst year or years'... Furthermore, population scales are vastly different. Is it valid to compare a few tribes out of many with all of europe to determine the levels of violence of 'primitives' to 'europeans'? Why not compare the levels of violence between, say, Germans during WWII and I (high) versus the Toltecs during their worst years. You know, since we're cherry picking tribes to arrive an a predetermined, desired conclusion. What of the levels of violence amongs California coastal tribes (omitted) verses the NAZIs? All one needs to do is move the data sample one or two years in either direction to either include or exclude major wars, and the conclusions do a 180. That, and the data for primitive societies must be simply made up. Don't get me wrong, the Noble Savage idea is bullshit - angry hairless monkeys are what they are, but this kind of faux science would be an insult to a kindergartener. The key relationship there is the long-term fatality rate in a given society, which is a function of the frequency, severity, and duration of conflict in each. A small society that is engaged in constant skirmishes where a handful of people are killed each time there's a battle, raid, etc will generally see a significantly greater percentage of its population killed in war than a much larger society that engages in intense conflicts for limited periods of time. "Noble Savages" tend to kill an awful lot of each other relative to non-primitive societies.

It has not opened any floodgates to campaigns, which constitute 'coordinated', or direct contributions. That's an erroneous reading of the ruling on your part. It does allow uncoordinated contributions to political efforts that are independent of campaigns. It allows corporate contributions for Swiftboating, for example, but not direct contributions to any actual candidates or their campaigns. Should organizations independent of campaigns be able to speak their piece or should they be gagged by the incumbents in Congress?

I'm just curious about what exact language in the Citizen's United ruling you object to and why. And no, that isn't a question with a patently obvious answer.

Interesting statistics. Who kept them? Most of those tribes didn't write.

Term limits: "Stop me before I vote for who I want again!" Yeah, I want to be represented by a Noob, rather than a savvy legislator who knows everybody - and being an effective politician is all about the relationships. I don't favor anything that reduces my choices as a voter.

MFKR I didn't get to my computer before midnight...now its too fkn late. What is it, 36 years falling down the gravity well...and accelerating?

Palin/O'Donnell in 2012!

Required reading if you're gonna fuck Bellevue MILFs

Literal immortality is one of the many jokes you'll never get.

Simplest concept in the world, actually. Anything beyond first layer literal gets towed off the conservative brain information parking lot.

KKK could never be a comedian. Not that he wouldn't have an audience...Palin proved otherwise, but no owner's gonna wanna mop up that much drool off the theater floor after a gig.