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Random Political Thoughts

Started by MV/Liberace!, February 08, 2012, 10:50:42 AM

Quote from: RealCool Daddio on October 25, 2012, 06:57:42 PM
Nate Silver puts a lot of effort into his number crunching, taking into account state and regional polling as well as national polling, corrects for bias, includes projections from bookmakers, etc.  He correctly predicted 49 states in 2008.  He has Obama as a 2-1 favorite, even with the popular vote being extremely close.  Lot's of interesting info here, including his methodology.


http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/
His elections calculus is closely followed by both parties.

Note to gabbers:  I am well aware of what many conservatives think about the NYT. Read the methodology before freaking out.

This guy is sure into it, interesting stuff.

Quote from: The General on October 25, 2012, 11:07:10 PM
But when did they start huffing it, man?

Seriously, though, over half is a bit much.  If I had to guess, I would say that the actual number is maybe 30 percent.  Which is still way to damn high. ..

I grew up in a Christian church but am not in any way religious now.  I never heard one single person claim the earth was anything other than billions of years old (they said the 6 'days' it took god to create everything, the 'days' were very much longer than a 24 hour period).   I've never personally run into anyone claiming the earth was 6000 years old or anything like that, anywhere, ever.  Maybe that's just not the kind of thing that comes up in conversation.

Having said that, I've always lived on the West Coast and have never been to the South or Midwest or Texas or wherever the Bible Belt is, and only know a handful of people from any of those places.  But they mostly all seemed normal.  Is that really what people think other than a handful of kooks?  I'd be really surprised, but I've been surprised before.


Juan

This 6000 year old earth stuff is popular among churches that I would call Protestant fundamentalist.  Most of the churches seem to be of two types - denominational churches that have a more loose organization, some Southern Baptists, Assembly of God,  Church of God, etc.  - the other type are the non-denominational churches  that have become particularly popular.  In these churches, the pastor may be educated in an actual seminary, or may be entirely self-taught. 

IIRC, I first heard this 6000 year old stuff in the mid-80s.  Some preacher had gone through the old testament and added up the ages of all of the linage to Jesus and came up with the figure.  The initial folks who supported him were the same people who said The Bible is the only book needed in life. 

It's a most interesting group of folks.

Pragmier

Gallup has been asking the question for years, and the belief God created humans in our present form has consistently been the most common answer. See results here.

Folks certainly have a right to their opinions and I don't attack personal belief, but when a congressman is on tape boasting about how he bases his decisions on the bible, ridicules science, and that guy is on a scientific committee it's nuts. Let me ask, when did it become popular to mock education? That's scary.

Sardondi

I saw this and immediately thought I was watching the weird white-eyed kids from the old "Village Of The Damned" movie. I do not understand the people who made this. It is by far the creepiest, most repulsive political ad I've ever seen. Just who is this supposed to affect? Why would this make you want to vote for the guy who thought this was a great campaign ad? Where in the world would kids act like this...well, other than in North Korea?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fwlW4lx6TTo#!



Okay, I believe I've figured out who might think this was a great ad....

The General

Quote from: Sardondi on October 29, 2012, 12:09:45 AM
I saw this and immediately thought I was watching the weird white-eyed kids from the old "Village Of The Damned" movie. I do not understand the people who made this. It is by far the creepiest, most repulsive political ad I've ever seen. Just who is this supposed to affect? Why would this make you want to vote for the guy who thought this was a great campaign ad? Where in the world would kids act like this...well, other than in North Korea?
God Dammit.  Fucking child abuse.  That's all.
Sick twisted bastards. 

Yeah, Republicans want to poison the sky and the water. 
Teach your kids that.  That's great.
They don't come out and SAY it, but they don't need to.

Eddie Coyle


     See an ad like that and it boggles my mind that so many on the right are in opposition to abortion.

Pragmier

What is 'the future children project'? Children from the future? Their website just has this video posted with a list of children & adult credits. I googled some of the adult names and they appear to be San Fran based media/artist types.

Doesn't seem they are connected with The Future of Children from Princeton University, maybe i'm wrong.

Also, I voted Sunday and was surprised at the turnout. Line was about 50 deep but moved well.

Quote from: Evil Twin Of Zen on October 25, 2012, 08:39:11 PM
CHUCK LORRE PRODUCTIONS, #396

It appears as if roughly half the people in this country think that they're in mortal danger from their own government. That's a lot of people sensing a lot of malice and threat. I worry that I don't see it. Sure, I see inefficiency and incompetence, but I've always seen that - regardless of which party's in office. And frankly, I've always welcomed it. I don't like my big bureaucracies to be cold, calculating, profit-making enterprises driven by a steely, clear-headed singular vision. A cursory glance through history would indicate that well-organized governments tend to enjoy well-organized parades, followed by well-organized ethnic cleansing. Which is why I celebrate the magnificent, muddle-headed ineptitude of our democracy. As far as I'm concerned, a little confusion and waste may keep the trains from running on time, but it also keeps people like me from getting a one-way ticket in a cattle car. Are our tax dollars being misspent on poorly run social programs?

That is some bad cocktail party logic.
The best organized governments are Native American Tribes. They have a plenty of problems but no parades and no recent ethnic cleansing. But yeah don't mention that fact Lorre because that would go against your weak argument with no evidence and only association.
Mussolini's government was both large and inefficient. No hiding allowed there. Or maybe lots of hiding-they were able to fit in a resistance movement. Plenty of cattle cars. How efficient was the Nazi government? I'm not really sure. It was around for what 6 years before it became a wartime government?

Of course if you are Chuck Lorre or Goldman Sachs the government is going to kiss your dick, but the little guy gets crushed. The little guy gets their dialysis copayment denied. The little guy get a $4000 fine they can't afford for putting concrete up to repair the foundation of a shed that was damaged in a storm. The little guy gets turned away by the VA for psychological services.



MV/Liberace!

does anybody want to bet money on the election?  i'm putting up $50 $60.  if romney becomes the next president, the money is yours.  if obama serves a second term, you pay me $50 $40.  only serious inquiries, please.  method of payment is negotiable.


no fatties.

Pragmier

Go to inTrade.com you'll get a much better return.


Sardondi

Quote from: MV on November 01, 2012, 06:04:07 PM
does anybody want to bet money on the election?  i'm putting up $50 $60.  if romney becomes the next president, the money is yours.  if obama serves a second term, you pay me $50 $40.  only serious inquiries, please.  method of payment is negotiable....

Is that official results, or votes done "the Chicago way"? Because I think they might be different: http://washingtonexaminer.com/rnc-pushes-6-states-to-fix-machines-that-give-romney-votes-to-obama/article/2512362#.UJO8QYZMn_d

Funny, but I while I've read of voting machines in various states which miraculously report a vote for "Obama" when the voter chooses "Romney", I haven't read of a single occurrence of it happening the other way around. What are the odds, huh?

Juan

Quote from: Sardondi on November 02, 2012, 06:34:46 AM
Funny, but I while I've read of voting machines in various states which miraculously report a vote for "Obama" when the voter chooses "Romney", I haven't read of a single occurrence of it happening the other way around. What are the odds, huh?
I asked a good friend that - said good friend being a mouth-foaming Obama supporter.  He said that means the repukes are very sharp, that the Obama for Romney votes are false flags, and that Romney's son owning one of the voting machine companies means the repukes have already stolen the election.

I wonder how many 'undecideds' are going to break Obama's way based on his handling of Benghazi and Hurricane Sandy.

He's going to have to steal it to win it, and he will if he can.

Sardondi

Quote from: Paper*Boy on October 26, 2012, 12:54:18 AM

This guy is sure into it, interesting stuff.

But baseball, with hundreds if not thousands of samples, is a far different thing from one presidential election...one election.....on which to judge effectiveness. This link is a technical and non-partisan analysis, made from the perspective of someone who does research and handling statistics for a living. It's kind of a slog, but in essence says that we could only start to judge Silvers' accuracy sometime in the middle of the century, and that it is beyond ludicrous to claim his analysis is correct at this point. http://teddysratlab.blogspot.com/2012/11/comment-statistics.html

Think I'll go with Michael Barone, http://washingtonexaminer.com/barone-going-out-on-a-limb-romney-wins-handily/article/2512470#.UJRup4WhUeM. I'd rather trust someone who knows more data about US elections than anyone else on the planet, and who has statistically analyzed elections for a living for almost 30 years, over a baseball stat guy who in statistical terms hasn't even started looking at elections yet.

I never watch the TV news but I'm guessing no one there is comparing Obama's handling of Sandy with Bush and Katrina. 

Does anyone - anyone - think the Corupt Media would not be doing 24/7 comparisons - blocking out all other news - trying to tie a current President on the eve of an election to this mess if he were a Republican?

Romney should be all over the northeast just pounding Obama on this - fairly or unfairly - smearing, amplifying his incompetence and entire Big Government outlook, trying to pick off a few 'blue' states or at least make O spend time and money there to defend them, and local elected R's like Christie should all be on the same page backing him up.  That's what the D's would be doing.  That's all they ever do.

From Wikipedia:  "A natural disaster is a major adverse event resulting from natural processes of, or effecting, the Earth; examples include floods, severe weather, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and other geologic processes. A natural disaster can cause loss of life or property damage, and typically leaves some economic damage in its wake, the severity of which depends on the affected population's resilience, or ability to recover."

I don't know of any nation that has been able to prevent a "natural" disaster. Many take measures to mitigate the effects of said processes. sea walls, flood canals, quake proofing, early warning systems, etc. Look how Japan spent billions to protect their infrastructure and yet had a nuclear facility breached by such a natural disaster, creating secondary damages as large as the primary natural one.

I do not do the finger pointing or the shame with blame game when it comes to the natural disasters in the past decade or two. What little the government can do, WILL take a long time. It's how it is designed. It will do what it can as fast as it can, but it is what it is.

As far as the severity of this latest one... well... we don't have a strong enough economy locally or nationally to mitigate its effects to any great degree. There has been too much time and money WASTED on things that have nothing to show for what was spent. If you think I'm speaking of only the current administration, you would be very mistaken.

I guess the thing is, i depend on myself, then my family, then my local community for making sure I'M prepared for such things. I'd much rather the government stay outta my way and spend their resources on opening the roads, clearing the ports and keeping order on the streets when such events happen.

As far as the politics of all this, i'm sick of it. I'm not stupid and can see what is happening to the nation and it's easy enough to do thru viewing history. If you really want the truth, you're never gonna find it if politics drives which truth you find.

not sure if there is any point to be made in this post. sometimes when the mental shit hits the fan ya gotta smear it on the walls too.

Pragmier

While it's true Nate Silver has only predicted 1 presidential election, it bears mentioning he had the right winner in all but one state (Indiana). Plus: his model correctly called 34/37 senate races in 2010, saying the Reps would pick up 7 seats (they picked up 6). He predicted the GOP picking up 59 seats in congress; they picked up 62 (this was similar to other models and not particularly impressive). Again in 2010, Silver correctly picked 36/37 gubernatorial winners.

His reputation was not built on one election. But I would be surprised to see these kinds of results continue. Every model stumbles at some point.

Pragmier

Silver's 538 Blog has Florida almost dead even. He's giving Romney a 55% chance of winning with 49.9% of the vote versus Obama's 45%/49.5% share, well within the margin of error. It was a much wider Romney lead a few weeks ago. Warren now shows 94% chance of winning in Mass.

Sardondi

Quote from: Pragmier on November 03, 2012, 06:41:50 AM
Silver's 538 Blog has Florida almost dead even. He's giving Romney a 55% chance of winning with 49.9% of the vote versus Obama's 45%/49.5% share, well within the margin of error. It was a much wider Romney lead a few weeks ago. Warren now shows 94% chance of winning in Mass.

There is simply no way Obama is surging in Florida - it defies every law of the universe plus common sense. Obama is spending his time, and his credit (because he's out of money) trying to hold on to Virginia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. He won't get Ohio. The Obama Firewall is breached. My guess is sometime today or tomorrow his people will tell him it's over...that is, if there are any grown-ups left there.   

Pragmier

Quote from: Sardondi on November 03, 2012, 07:06:15 AM
Obama is spending his time, and his credit (because he's out of money) trying to hold on to Virginia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. He won't get Ohio. 

The Ohio comment is very bold, I don't think any pollster has Romney ahead there. We shall see. Rasmussen still shows Florida a toss-up with Mitt up 50%-48%. (for the record I do believe Fla will go Rep)

If you give Romney Fla & Ohio, and Obama keeps the 3 states you mention plus Nevada, that puts the president ahead 266-253 leaving Colorado, Iowa & NH. Quite a chess match.

Quote from: Evil Twin Of Zen on November 03, 2012, 04:35:08 AM
... I don't know of any nation that has been able to prevent a "natural" disaster...

I do not do the finger pointing or the shame with blame game...

As far as the politics of all this, i'm sick of it...

I could not agree more.  My point is that I'm tired of people with my point of view being name-called, lied about, and smeared constantly by people whose ideas can't stand up to scrutiny and whose ideas have a proven record of failure going back to the days of qnciet Egypt. 

Since the D's will not play on a level playing field - make that cannot - then it's time to play their game for awhile instead of always being on defense, always backing down and 'compromising' (which in 2012 means agreeing with their positions) in the hopes of getting along.  In other words, take their game to them sometimes.  Pull out Rules for Radicals and use those tactics on them for a change.

Of course Obama didn't cause Sandy and has limited tools to mitigate the aftermath.  Of course it's up to the states and individual communities first with FEMA as a backup.  Just like it was George W Bush with Katrina - but you'll never hear that.  Bush got smeared and lied about.



How about another example from the recent news.  Know how we've been hearing for 4 years how terrible the Rs are because they 'refused' to work with Obama - how that makde them 'racist' - and blah blah blah?  Yesterday Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D, Nev) said he would not be able to work with Mitt Romney should he become President.  And he is appluded by the Corrupt Media for his stand.

You think you're tired of it?

Quote from: Pragmier on November 03, 2012, 05:15:39 AM
While it's true Nate Silver has only predicted 1 presidential election, it bears mentioning he had the right winner in all but one state (Indiana). Plus: his model correctly called 34/37 senate races in 2010, saying the Reps would pick up 7 seats (they picked up 6). He predicted the GOP picking up 59 seats in congress; they picked up 62 (this was similar to other models and not particularly impressive). Again in 2010, Silver correctly picked 36/37 gubernatorial winners.

His reputation was not built on one election. But I would be surprised to see these kinds of results continue. Every model stumbles at some point.


That is interesting and bears watching.  To me, predicting all those states, Senate races, and House seats for one election is sort of like predicting the outcome and box score stats of one football game as opposed to a seasons worth of wins and losses.  But I'm really not sure.  He is definitely worth following if one is interested in polls.

Most Electoral State votes, House and Senate races can be picked correctly on the eve of the vote - it gets harder the further out from the vote one is.  Most races, not all.  I wonder if he uses his final predictions done maybe a day or so before the vote or his predictions done days or weeks before the vote, or if those numbers change much over that time.

The game the regular pollsters play is to lie abot the polling results in the weeks and months ahead of the vote in an attempt to get a certain number of people to think a certain side is winning to get them to want to join the winning team.  But not willing to be off too much, they 'tighten' the polls and start reporting truer less biased results as voting day gets closer so they won't be too far off and thus lose credibility in the next election. 

This is routine and purposeful, especially the polls done by the Corrupt Media.  It's amazing how far back certain candidates, say Reagan in '80 and Bush in '88 were up until just a couple of weeks before the elections.




Pragmier

How do you guys (and gals) see Romney governing if he wins? I really have no idea, i'm baffled by this guy. Is he going to be a Christian conservative and cater to that faction? Will he repeal/abolish all the agencies he said? Is he going to increase military spending? What % of Obamacare will he attempt to repeal? What will be his ultimate tax policy proposals - specifically? Is he going to be Massachusetts Mitt or the one from the Republican debates?

I cannot forget Huntsman's jab calling him a "Perfectly Lubricated Weather Vane".

Eddie Coyle

Quote from: Pragmier on November 03, 2012, 08:17:44 AM
How do you guys (and gals) see Romney governing if he wins? I really have no idea, i'm baffled by this guy. Is he going to be a Christian conservative and cater to that faction? Will he repeal/abolish all the agencies he said? Is he going to increase military spending? What % of Obamacare will he attempt to repeal? What will be his ultimate tax policy proposals - specifically? Is he going to be Massachusetts Mitt or the one from the Republican debates?

I cannot forget Huntsman's jab calling him a "Perfectly Lubricated Weather Vane".
Huntsman is correct. I live in Massachusetts, and Romney's time as guv here was full of bold talk, but little else. If anything, the left should be amused that gay marriage and "Romneycare" occurred while he was in office. I think he'd be closer to Bush 41 than 43. Which won't please the right.

         For a Republican to be elected at all in MA...that tells you how far Romney is to the right. Not very. Perhaps he'll surround himself with hard right cabinet members/advisors...but that will be superficial.

John Smith

Quote from: Pragmier on November 03, 2012, 08:17:44 AM
How do you guys (and gals) see Romney governing if he wins? I really have no idea, i'm baffled by this guy. Is he going to be a Christian conservative and cater to that faction? Will he repeal/abolish all the agencies he said? Is he going to increase military spending? What % of Obamacare will he attempt to repeal? What will be his ultimate tax policy proposals - specifically? Is he going to be Massachusetts Mitt or the one from the Republican debates?

I cannot forget Huntsman's jab calling him a "Perfectly Lubricated Weather Vane".

This is the truth, no one knows how Romney would govern because he is a political opportunist. Which position hasn't he flip-flopped on? My guess would be that he would try to govern from the center while occasionally throwing some red meat to "the base" to keep them from whining incessantly.

Juan

He will govern just at The Global Elite, The New World Order, the Illuminati, and "they" tell him to.

Funnyman Bill Maher on HBO's Real Time yesterday (Fri):

"If you're thinking about voting for Mitt Romney, I would like to make this one  plea: black people know who you are and they will come after you... oh I'm kidding, I'm kidding..."

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2012/11/03/maher-if-you-vote-romney-black-people-know-who-you-are-and-will-come#ixzz2BBgk41v0

I just don't understand this kind of 'humor' or the double standard (imagine someone making the same statement about Obama voters).

And I really don't understand anyone voting with these people, especially people who claim they are sick of the political fighting and division in this country.

Sardondi

Romney is merely the un-Obama. He's not even a conservative. He's never before taken many of the positions he's campaigned on. But he's still worlds better than Obama, who truly is on the road toward driving us into a depression which would dwarf the 1930's It still may happen, because we need to start NOW by cutting the budget 10% across the board - and that's a real cut, not just slowing the rate of increase which countless lying sacks of Congressional shit have had the effrontery for 30 years to tell us with a straight face was a "cut". Goddam liars.

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