Who will be the next president?

motokid wrote:

Looking back at the people offered up to us over the years by the two-party system it's clear that they are floundering in idiocy.

Yeah... Lincoln. What a moron.

Truman. Another moron.

Kennedy. What a loser. Dare we muse how Obama would have handled the Cuban missile crisis?

Reagan - so popular that the term "Reagan Democrats" was coined, accompanied by two bipartisan landslide victories and a booming economy... oh, and the Soviet Union finally going under.

And most telling of all through all of this is the fact that, through it all, the USA has been and remains the overwhelming country of choice for would-be immigrants and refugees. Not Canada. Not Sweden. Not Norway. The USA. It's both amusing and pathetic that so many Americans born with the privilege and benefits of US citizenship can do nothing but cry about it, while immigrants and refugees from the worst part of the world come here to make successes of themselves.

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The sad thing is that the 40-60 million votes each candidate is likely to get this year will validate that these are the candidates the people want from these two lame-duck parties.

The really sad thing is the losers that actually think it is possible that somewhere, there is somebody that millions of people would agree is exactly what they want for their party or, more amusingly, all the independents. Even assuming every American had the same values and concerns, the same belief system, that would not be possible. How do you explain to these losers the concept that, no, these people aren't exactly a perfect match for our ideals and beliefs - Romney sure as hell isn't what conservative/constitutional Republicans wanted - but they're the ones that appealed the most to a majority of those in the party.

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The best way to change what the two-party system has to offer is to vote for a third party candidate.

Ah, that happy old myth. And an example that the myopic complainers are so tuned out they don't realize they've HAD three party candidates to vote for. In fact, I think the count is somewhere around five or six parties to choose from... and counting.

Yes indeed. Ralph Nader as the Green Party third party candidate is the most recognizable of those alternate parties, and sure shows how well that works. Then you have Canada... we owe a debt of gratitude to the NDP and Liberals for splitting the "progressive" left/socialist/statist vote between the two of them - allowing the Conservatives to win the last three elections and thereby run the country.

The idea that a three party system allows that third party to draw support equally from the other two is a nice fairy tale, but as Ralph Nader and Canada show, it just doesn't turn out that way. If Ron Paul were running as a third party in this election, does anyone seriously believe he would equally attract voters from both parties, instead of overwhelmingly from the GOP? Will Jill Stein draw her votes from the Republicans - or Democrats? Anyone who does should probably check into detox to get their drug abuse problems resolved.

What's equally amusing is the idea that these professional whiners won't get involved at any level to work towards a Republican or Democrat that reflects God-knows-what their ideals are... but if there were but a third party for them to support... OH YEAH BABY, THEN THEY'D GET POLITICALLY INVOLVED! Well, as we know, there's even more than just a third party to choose from - but they're still sitting there on the sidelines, doing nothing but bitching and whining they need a third party vote.

Surprise, surprise...

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Unfortunately both parties offer more of the same.

There is no "lessor of two evils" here.

You have to be pretty shallow and unprincipled to hold that view.

There's this thing in America called the Constitution. Some may have even heard of it. Many of us - including the president - have sworn to defend and uphold it. The idea is it is a rulebook that says what governments and politicians are and aren't allowed to do. It provides the limitations that are supposed to exist on governments and what they can and can't do to the individual citizen, with the emphasis being on individual sovereignty.

We have a sitting president who violates the oath of office he swears under the constitution to uphold the laws of this country. He not only doesn't enforce some of those laws - some of them he allows some states to willingly violate, while prohibiting other states from enforcing the laws that he himself won't enforce.

A president who violates the Appointments clause by declaring Congress to be in recess when it isn't, so the people who wants to appoint don't have to go through Congressional review and vetting.

A president who has stated that if Congress doesn't give him what he wants, he will do it without them - the separation of powers and the checks and balances contained in the Constitution clearly meaning nothing to him.

Ignore for a moment the economic differences between a raging Marxist spender and a successful businessman. It's hard - Obama’s own 2013 budget shows that as a result federal debt held by the public will double during Obama’s first four years as President. That means in just one term President Obama will have increased the national debt as much as all prior Presidents, from George Washington to George Bush, combined. Ignore that for a moment and just look at how the Constitution fares between those two, the instrument that supposedly guarantees our freedoms and keeps governments and politicians in check.

Romney would treat his presidential oath of office, the limitations on his powers as president, and the Constitution with as much contempt as Obama already has demonstrated?

Not a chance in hell, even though he may be a RINO Republican. And that in and of itself is a huge and important difference between the two.

If any further evidence is needed, one need only look to how Reagan dealt with threats on American lives from Libya and how Obama dealt with threats on American lives from Libya. "More of the same"??? Not hardly.

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The only logical choice is to vote "outside the box".

Well then, you can choose from Rocky Anderson, or Jill Stein, and whoever the America Elects party is running. Now there's striking a blow for freedom!

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The definition of insanity is repeating the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

The definition of insanity is crying for a third party when there are already third, fourth, fifth, and possibly sixth party options existing out there. And have been at least as far back as Ross Perot helped Clinton win the presidency.

The definition of insanity is crying about how screwed up the country is when a Convention refugee can land here unable to speak the language, with only the shirt on his back, and make a success of himself in a decade while a native born American spends that decade crying in his beer about how lousy the political process and the results are.

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Electing a democrat or a republican is simple insanity.

It's a funny thing about the insane - they're usually desperate to tell anyone who will listen that they're the sane ones; it's everyone else out there who isn't behaving like they are who are really insane.

But for these poor soles, we have all those other third party candidates to select from! Not a bad thing.

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Why continue down the same road we've been going down for decades now?

I ask Regressives and socialists that all the time. Why did we deviate from all the gains during the Reagan Presidency - despite being saddled with "Dead on arrival" Tip O'Neill running the House? Why did we throw away all those gains in reducing the size and power of government and a booming economy. George H Bush got elected on Reagan's coattails and then started the backwards slide, the Bush's being proud RINOs and anything but conservatives, but why did so many Americans adopt a love affair with big government, big taxes, big spending after that?

We now have a deficit that far exceeds our entire GDP - I think we're at somewhere around 125% now - and yet an endless number of people want more government spending, more programs, more employees, more food stamps, more government control over our lives, etc. It's "progressive" that a politician can now tell you how many ounces can be in your soft drink? That the president's wife can decree what we can and can't feed our kids in our schools. Really?

We're left with the sophomoric complainers that it's all the Dems and GOP's fault. But anyone else remember what Benjamin Franklin was recorded as telling the assembled delegates the day the Constitution was signed into law? Almost certainly not, so I'll help:

The Constitution is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other.

Tuesday, 6 November 2012 will be the day we decide if we've arrived there yet.

gatorfan wrote:

Anyway - I'm voting for Gary Johnson - Libertarian Party candidate!

That would be the same guy whose beliefs include his idea of a border is that a truck from Texas and a van from Mexico should pass each other on the highway going 60 mph? That kind of open borders?

Ummmm... no thanks. Bad enough a president who simply refuses to enforce immigration laws as his oath of office says he must. A president who believes the US should have an open door policy for all comers is pretty much untenable.

There is an amusing side to Johnson. Not that, like Ron Paul, he was a Republican until the Republicans wouldn't do things HIS way. Losers with neither the skill nor the patience to win the Republican nomination from within, in the face of opposition from the GOP and RNC establishment as Reagan did. But that he's (now, he claims) a Libertarian gnashing his teeth over government spending and government funding things they shouldn't be. But his focus in this election isn't to win - but to get over the magic 5% of the vote SO HE CAN GET FEDERAL FUNDING.

Now that is pretty funny. Food stamps for Libertarians...

The un-funny side is that in states where it may make the difference, Johnson is primarily going to take votes from people who otherwise would have voted Republican. Meaning, that is one less vote that Obama has to find a supporter's vote to just keep even. Instead, that vote goes towards putting him ahead.

There will be some supporters who won't have any impact - i.e. the potheads who will be voting for Johnson because he says he will legalize marijuana, people who otherwise wouldn't have bothered to go to the polls at all. But many of those votes will be otherwise Republican votes - for a man who cheerfully acknowledges he doesn't have a chance in hell of winning the presidency.

The rational I hear from some Libertarian/Constitution Party supporters is that this is a throwaway election. They aren't going to win, but if it gets them federal money/teaches the GOP and Dems they're a force to contend with, etc, then the election is a success. The problem with that is this isn't a "throwaway election". At least, not if you value a system of republican governance where the sovereignty of the individual is paramount. The Constitution and all that stuff.

Ignoring all the rest of Obama's track record (you know, the one that he'd rather talk about free condoms for everyone instead of talking about his record), there is also the fact that the next president will appoint at least one and as many as three SCOTUS justices. Does anyone think for a single moment that an Obama presidency will appoint even one originalist/constitutionalist justice. No, I didn't think so.

Instead, Obama will give us more of Kagan and Sotomayor. Far left statist judges who will rule in favour of increased government power every single time. So instead of the present 5-4 conservative split - which could be argued is actually 5-4 activist split when looking at Roberts' recent decisions - we're likely to end up with something like a 7-2 split in favour of an activist court rewriting the Constitution as they see fit.

And Sotomayor, Kagan, and whoever Obama appoints will be around for at least another 25 years. Ever consider how much damage such a court can do with 25 years to make decisions as the majority group? The Supreme Court never reverses itself, so barring some unlikely constitutional amendment, whatever that court holds in the next 25 years would become the unassailable law of the land. I expect the Second Amendment would be among the first to go, but it certainly wouldn't stop there.