The Partisan Divide on Issues

[pbrower2a]

(10-24-2021, 02:49 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-22-2021, 01:26 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(10-21-2021, 11:15 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-19-2021, 08:19 PM)taramarie Wrote: You seem to assume things of me that you have no proof about. I did not expect you to start guessing without any proof to your claims.

They've had a very bad habit of doing dangerous stuff like that with other people for many years now. They've pretty much dug themselves a hole that they won't be able to get out of at this point. I say dangerous because people are known to get hurt for doing what they've been doing  other people on a regular basis.

You vaccine deniers, you believers in choice at the expense of all others, you are digging a hole for all of us, and we are all falling into it. YOU irresponsible embeciles, you do not value life, our life today, or any life in the future. You are contemptible.

According the information you gave me, it's actually 46,300,000 reported cases resulting in 750,000 deaths (1-2% of reported cases) so far. I assume that you assume that all cases have been reported to authorities so far. Me, I assume there are about as many unreported cases as there are reported cases like most medical experts these days. It's kind of funny how today's misinformation as you say or as your told becomes tomorrows truth/fact that you have no alternative other than to ignore these days.

Idealistically speaking, one death is to many. Realistically speaking, 0-1% /1-2% death rate is acceptable and does not justify the removal of our individual rights. I don't care if you and the others hand over your rights in exchange for peace of mind. You're right, I'm the devil according to your warped Liberal mind. You're about as warped minded as the Islamic radicals who refer to us as the Great Satan. So, get in line with them.

Would you take a trip by car if you thought that you had a 1% chance of dying during the journey? In 50 trips you would have about a 40% of dying. That is a very poor survival rate. Naval aviators have about a 23% chance of dying in a 15-year career as such even without combat. Combat is even more dangerous, adding other risks that I need not express.

Speaking of journeys, here is one place that I am sure that you would avoid. It is one of the worst slums in America, the Kensington "community" in Philadelphia. Watch at your own risk. It looks like a "Needle Park". It is unlikely that the people "shooting up" are diabetics using insulin.






Would you take risks on a heroin or meth habit? I don't know which is more dangerous -- IV drug use or COVID-19. You just showed me an estimate of 750,000 deaths, and -- yes, I have a calculator available. The death rate is about 1.6%. I know, of course, that such is a low rate in contrast to the death rates for cancer, strokes, and heart attacks, but those take time to develop. COVID-19 takes about a month to go from infection to death. Yes, you are taking a greater risk of death from lung cancer alone with every puff of a cigarette, but it takes a huge number of puffs from coffin nails to increase one's death rate from lung cancer by 1.6%. That is not a trivialization of smoking as a health risk; it is a bad habit with no obvious mitigating factors.

Stupid risks are for fools.

[Eric the Green]

(10-20-2021, 10:47 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-19-2021, 06:01 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(10-19-2021, 03:51 PM)taramarie Wrote: Only speaking to bob atm so dont waste your time. Of course if bob continues to state i should not have basic rights he can bugger off too with the rest of you dictator boomers. If that is the way you guys are going, i cant wait till dictator boomers just die off.

My summation is that progressives are or ought to be in favor of democracy, human rights and equality.  So yes, I'm in favor of human rights.  What is dubious is when someone claims a right which infringes on the rights of others.  In the three American crisis we were fighting to dismiss kings, to not be victims of colonial imperialism, to free slaves, to allow the industrial revolution to proceed, to regulate the economy, and to move away from isolationism.  The current crisis includes reducing to eliminating structural racism, curing disease with honorable mentions to saving the environment and rebuilding infrastructure.

Not all of the above addresses democracy, human rights and equality directly.  In fact there is often an idealistic motivation which addresses the three, and an economic motivation which more directly involves the elites.

Now the issue of the moment seems to be in curing disease.  In generally, if one does not want to be cured, fine.  I won't oppose any supposed right to kill one's self.  But you have to balance individual rights against the general welfare of the people.  If for some reason you are against the vaccine this would be fine if you took all the other precautions, if you showed considerable care for the well being of others.  This does not generally seem to be the case.  At least in the US, the anti vaccination crowd is also generally the anti mask and anti other precaution folk.  I do not support the right to murder others.  Mandatory vaccines are supported by the Supreme Court and were a big part of past cures.  The right to murder people is entirely recently created and to my mind abhorrent and does not exist.

Now many governments seem to be looking for a monopoly on delivering vaccines on their own turf.  In your case, moving between countries and preferring the policy of the previous country is understandable, but you made a choice.  I can sympathize.  I can wish for an individual ability to chose from the many available treatments.  But, alas, we are not going to make government go away this crisis.  In the US, we have to choose between those treatments given emergency use authorization by the government.  You are stuck with a different territory.

But I will repeat the right to murder others is a delusion, does not exist.

Dude, there is no cure for COVID. I sure hope you don't believe that the vaccine you received is a cure for COVID.

The covid vaccines prevent covid from developing. The covid pandemic in the USA now is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. People should not have a "right" to go unvaccinated, unless they have medical proof that it would give them a harmful reaction. It is not a question of my body, my right. It is a case of protecting the other's body from my misconduct.

[David Horn]

(10-25-2021, 04:17 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(10-20-2021, 10:47 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Dude, there is no cure for COVID. I sure hope you don't believe that the vaccine you received is a cure for COVID.

The covid vaccines prevent covid from developing. The covid pandemic in the USA now is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. People should not have a "right" to go unvaccinated, unless they have medical proof that it would give them a harmful reaction. It is not a question of my body, my right. It is a case of protecting the other's body from my misconduct.

Wherein comes the rub. Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed. If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding. We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit. That may end at some point.

[pbrower2a]

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 04:17 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(10-20-2021, 10:47 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Dude, there is no cure for COVID. I sure hope you don't believe that the vaccine you received is a cure for COVID.

The covid vaccines prevent covid from developing. The covid pandemic in the USA now is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. People should not have a "right" to go unvaccinated, unless they have medical proof that it would give them a harmful reaction. It is not a question of my body, my right. It is a case of protecting the other's body from my misconduct.

Wherein comes the rub.  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

Rights without responsibility is either a command system at its worst or a destruction of the system. If I can demand anything of someone without some positive return, I can only impoverish or destroy that other.

I am delighted to recognize that someone else has read Albion's Seed and drawn some valid conclusions from it. American politics has typically been coalition politics in which a pragmatism that suggests that everyone gets some good while knowing and accepting the price is a necessity. The prime example of such was the New Deal which solved a great mass of problems from regional poverty to instability of the capitalist system. The New Deal is not the destructive "every man for himself" which inevitably leaves much ruin among the least ruthless that at least one side offers.

What went wrong in American politics? The Religious Right. It is no more moral than the rest of America despite its pretensions to such. If one dislikes abortion, then the liberal side that tolerates abortion has fewer abortions. The people who think that sexual superstition saves people from the "sin" of fornication so long as their faith is fervent enough are the ones whose daughters get gulled into having unprotected sex and have an inconvenient pregnancy. The Mountain South (basically the descendants of the Scots-Irish settlers of the Backwoods from Pennsylvania to Georgia) went from a benign Presbyterianism to a hyper-Calvinist "Southern Baptist"* Church that endorses (like Calvinism) a jungle capitalism devoid of mercy in which only the winners can consider themselves blessed, and in which science is suspect. People who lack scientific knowledge are vulnerable to exploitative superstition. If your religious faith sees evolution as a diabolical trick and lure, then it promotes ignorance, superstition, and failure. (Presbyterians long ago abandoned the jungle capitalism and the assumption that poverty was divine punishment... it's hard to expect anyone to accept the whole package of Calvinist doctrine as a guide to a wholesome world-view.

If I had daughters I would want them to know as much as possible without having sex. The more that people know, the safer they are. Sons? That they expect such of the other gender (and if the kids are LGBT, it is a bit more complex, but workable). We can all accept that people can be extremely successful economically while doing great harm (Let us say the Mafia crooks in Goodfellas) and that many people for reasons beyond our understanding are nearly destitute despite their extraordinary toil (like migrant farm workers).

*Let's get this straight. The Religious Right has insisted that its kids read the Bible, and many who do accept the more charitable prescriptions of Christian faith. There are Christian fundamentalists who are fervent in faith, yet not self-righteous. The division of Humanity into economic winners to be admired and losers to be exploited is not a valid teaching. I look at the Sermon on the Mount and I see teachings that people have an obligation to alleviate the hardships and indignity of poverty.

[nguyenivy]

(10-24-2021, 02:49 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-22-2021, 01:26 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(10-21-2021, 11:15 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-19-2021, 08:19 PM)taramarie Wrote: You seem to assume things of me that you have no proof about. I did not expect you to start guessing without any proof to your claims.

They've had a very bad habit of doing dangerous stuff like that with other people for many years now. They've pretty much dug themselves a hole that they won't be able to get out of at this point. I say dangerous because people are known to get hurt for doing what they've been doing  other people on a regular basis.

You vaccine deniers, you believers in choice at the expense of all others, you are digging a hole for all of us, and we are all falling into it. YOU irresponsible embeciles, you do not value life, our life today, or any life in the future. You are contemptible.

According the information you gave me, it's actually 46,300,000 reported cases resulting in 750,000 deaths (1-2% of reported cases) so far. I assume that you assume that all cases have been reported to authorities so far. Me, I assume there are about as many unreported cases as there are reported cases like most medical experts these days. It's kind of funny how today's misinformation as you say or as your told becomes tomorrows truth/fact that you have no alternative other than to ignore these days.

Idealistically speaking, one death is to many. Realistically speaking, 0-1% /1-2% death rate is acceptable and does not justify the removal of our individual rights. I don't care if you and the others hand over your rights in exchange for peace of mind. You're right, I'm the devil according to your warped Liberal mind. You're about as warped minded as the Islamic radicals who refer to us as the Great Satin. So, get in line with them.

You may want to check that maths again: assuming everyone in the US will face the virus someday, a 1 to 2 % death rate implies 3.3 million to 6.6 million deaths. Globally it works out to 80mn & 160mn. These would be in addition to all other causes of death that still happen. Looking at the numbers, I would say the restrictions were necessary, especially prior to the vaccines. I still wonder how much the vaccines cut the death rates by if everyone on Earth got them. Maybe it's enough to not need restrictions provided everyone got their vaccines.

[Classic-Xer]

(10-24-2021, 08:43 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Would you take a trip by car if you thought that you had a 1% chance of dying during the journey? In 50 trips you would have about a 40% of dying. That is a very poor survival rate. Naval aviators have about a 23% chance of dying in a 15-year career as such even without combat. Combat is even more dangerous, adding other risks that I need not express.

Speaking of journeys, here is one place that I am sure that you would avoid. It is one of the worst slums in America, the Kensington "community" in Philadelphia. Watch at your own risk. It looks like a "Needle Park". It is unlikely that the people "shooting up" are diabetics using insulin.






Would you take risks on a heroin or meth habit? I don't know which is more dangerous -- IV drug use or COVID-19. You just showed me an estimate of 750,000 deaths, and -- yes, I have a calculator available. The death rate is about 1.6%. I know, of course, that such is a low rate in contrast to the death rates for cancer, strokes, and heart attacks, but those take time to develop. COVID-19 takes about a month to go from infection to death. Yes, you are taking a greater risk of death from lung cancer alone with every puff of a cigarette, but it takes a huge number of puffs from coffin nails to increase one's death rate from lung cancer by 1.6%. That is not a trivialization of smoking as a health risk; it is a bad habit with no obvious mitigating factors.

Stupid risks are for fools.

I take a risk of being killed in a car accident or dying from something else every day of the week dude. Americans take risks with their lives all the time.

[Classic-Xer]

(10-25-2021, 04:58 PM)nguyenivy Wrote: You may want to check that maths again: assuming everyone in the US will face the virus someday, a 1 to 2 % death rate implies 3.3 million to 6.6 million deaths. Globally it works out to 80mn & 160mn. These would be in addition to all other causes of death that still happen. Looking at the numbers, I would say the restrictions were necessary, especially prior to the vaccines. I still wonder how much the vaccines cut the death rates by if everyone on Earth got them. Maybe it's enough to not need restrictions provided everyone got their vaccines.

The numbers are based on known/reported cases only and don't take into account the number of us who have had it who didn't know it at the time and didn't report it or get  tested to determine whether they were positive. We went for months without accurate testing and public testing sites and the vaccines were made available to the public.

Me, I had it before we knew anything about it along with several other people that I know (family members and friends and casual acquaintances) personally. With that said, the number of people who have already had it is more likely much higher than the numbers that you and the others are going by here and the actual death rate is more than likely less than a percent of those who have had COVID so far.

[Classic-Xer]

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 04:17 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(10-20-2021, 10:47 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Dude, there is no cure for COVID. I sure hope you don't believe that the vaccine you received is a cure for COVID.

The covid vaccines prevent covid from developing. The covid pandemic in the USA now is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. People should not have a "right" to go unvaccinated, unless they have medical proof that it would give them a harmful reaction. It is not a question of my body, my right. It is a case of protecting the other's body from my misconduct.

Wherein comes the rub.  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

[pbrower2a]

(10-25-2021, 04:58 PM)nguyenivy Wrote:

(10-24-2021, 02:49 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-22-2021, 01:26 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(10-21-2021, 11:15 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-19-2021, 08:19 PM)taramarie Wrote: You seem to assume things of me that you have no proof about. I did not expect you to start guessing without any proof to your claims.

They've had a very bad habit of doing dangerous stuff like that with other people for many years now. They've pretty much dug themselves a hole that they won't be able to get out of at this point. I say dangerous because people are known to get hurt for doing what they've been doing  other people on a regular basis.

You vaccine deniers, you believers in choice at the expense of all others, you are digging a hole for all of us, and we are all falling into it. YOU irresponsible embeciles, you do not value life, our life today, or any life in the future. You are contemptible.

According the information you gave me, it's actually 46,300,000 reported cases resulting in 750,000 deaths (1-2% of reported cases) so far. I assume that you assume that all cases have been reported to authorities so far. Me, I assume there are about as many unreported cases as there are reported cases like most medical experts these days. It's kind of funny how today's misinformation as you say or as your told becomes tomorrows truth/fact that you have no alternative other than to ignore these days.

Idealistically speaking, one death is to many. Realistically speaking, 0-1% /1-2% death rate is acceptable and does not justify the removal of our individual rights. I don't care if you and the others hand over your rights in exchange for peace of mind. You're right, I'm the devil according to your warped Liberal mind. You're about as warped minded as the Islamic radicals who refer to us as the Great Satan. So, get in line with them.

You may want to check that maths again: assuming everyone in the US will face the virus someday, a 1 to 2 % death rate implies 3.3 million to 6.6 million deaths. Globally it works out to 80mn & 160mn. These would be in addition to all other causes of death that still happen. Looking at the numbers, I would say the restrictions were necessary, especially prior to the vaccines. I still wonder how much the vaccines cut the death rates by if everyone on Earth got them. Maybe it's enough to not need restrictions provided everyone got their vaccines.

That depends upon people not getting inoculated or the vaccine failing (or the SARS-2 virus which causes COVID-19 got. 'keeping up' with inoculations.  Typically the most dangerous viruses mutate into those less likely to kill their hosts, but more likely to cause infection. This is tricky, though. Trivial variants that sicken people for a couple days after which people are back to normal don't get the heroic attention that something so horrible as SARS-2 received.

The death toll looks like what one would expect of a very bad conventional war.

[David Horn]

(10-25-2021, 11:49 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 04:58 PM)nguyenivy Wrote: You may want to check that maths again: assuming everyone in the US will face the virus someday, a 1 to 2 % death rate implies 3.3 million to 6.6 million deaths. Globally it works out to 80mn & 160mn. These would be in addition to all other causes of death that still happen. Looking at the numbers, I would say the restrictions were necessary, especially prior to the vaccines. I still wonder how much the vaccines cut the death rates by if everyone on Earth got them. Maybe it's enough to not need restrictions provided everyone got their vaccines.

The numbers are based on known/reported cases only and don't take into account the number of us who have had it who didn't know it at the time and didn't report it or get  tested to determine whether they were positive. We went for months without accurate testing and public testing sites and the vaccines were made available to the public.

Me, I had it before we knew anything about it along with several other people that I know (family members and friends and casual acquaintances) personally. With that said, the number of people who have already  had it is more likely much higher than the numbers that you and the others are going by here  and the actual death rate is more than  likely less than a percent of those who have had COVID so far.

You may be right that, intentionally or not, we vastly undercounted the number of COVID illnesses -- especially in the early months.  Less inaccurate are the number of COVID deaths, which is at least the official number of 737,526. That's 1 of every 450 Americans, and much worse elsewhere in the world. Most of us are not so isolated that we don't know at least one victim personally. We might be able to say the same about traffic fatalities too, except COVID has done is dirty work in months, not decades.

[David Horn]

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: ...  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you. The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

[Eric the Green]

(10-26-2021, 12:59 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: ...  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you.  The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

Agreed. The blue part of the USA is where the brains are, the money, the tech innovation, the industries of tomorrow, and still some agricultural land too. The red states take the most from taxes and give the least. They have most of the military bases, which is unnecessary welfare.

The blue side has more population, but the red side can't be counted out. They have the willingness and ability to take away democracy, to replace election officials with partisan hacks, to empower legislatures to choose presidential electors, to suppress and make it harder to vote. They have gerrymandered state and federal districts. They conduct unfair voter purges. They have the filibuster, supported by two purple Democrats, to keep voting rights at bay so far. They have the Supreme Court which has or will approve many of these tactics. They demand and get border closings. They have an advantage in the electoral college, enough to win by cheating in Arizona and Georgia with this suppression of democracy, and then just 10,000 or so votes to change in Wisconsin. Meanwhile the Democrats elected a vice president who cannot win the presidency, serving under a 79-year old president with few if any other alternatives willing to run. So, the red side can't be counted out, even without considering their potential to organize a militia that could mount a larger, wider, more-violent, well-armed, and longer-lasting version of January 6th.

In the long-run, it could be that demographics mean that a new civic generation and more people of color as old white males die off shift the USA blue. But how long or how far the blue side can keep the new voters is not certain.

So far, it looks like the red side is safe from higher taxes, thanks to their filibuster and their DINO senator from AZ. Eventually they will need to be raised, and if the blue side pretty much takes over then it will happen. I hope Classic Xer's taxes go sky high and put him and his fellow fanatics out of business and in need of welfare. I doubt that will happen, but certainly their fear that it will happen, will happen. May they be afraid; very afraid. May they overplay their hand, and have it and their arms (in both senses) cut off.

[Eric the Green]

(10-26-2021, 12:46 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 11:49 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 04:58 PM)nguyenivy Wrote: You may want to check that maths again: assuming everyone in the US will face the virus someday, a 1 to 2 % death rate implies 3.3 million to 6.6 million deaths. Globally it works out to 80mn & 160mn. These would be in addition to all other causes of death that still happen. Looking at the numbers, I would say the restrictions were necessary, especially prior to the vaccines. I still wonder how much the vaccines cut the death rates by if everyone on Earth got them. Maybe it's enough to not need restrictions provided everyone got their vaccines.

The numbers are based on known/reported cases only and don't take into account the number of us who have had it who didn't know it at the time and didn't report it or get  tested to determine whether they were positive. We went for months without accurate testing and public testing sites and the vaccines were made available to the public.

Me, I had it before we knew anything about it along with several other people that I know (family members and friends and casual acquaintances) personally. With that said, the number of people who have already  had it is more likely much higher than the numbers that you and the others are going by here  and the actual death rate is more than  likely less than a percent of those who have had COVID so far.

You may be right that, intentionally or not, we vastly undercounted the number of COVID illnesses -- especially in the early months.  Less inaccurate are the number of COVID deaths, which is at least the official number of 737,526.  That's 1 of every 450 Americans, and much worse elsewhere in the world.  Most of us are not so isolated that we don't know at least one victim personally.  We might be able to say the same about traffic fatalities too, except COVID has done is dirty work in months, not decades.

With what happened in New York early in the pandemic, with many dying covid patients never making it to the hospital or any place to be tested, and the fact that many red states are in effect third world countries, I would not doubt that the covid death is also an undercount in the USA, and certainly it is in places like India and Brazil.

[Eric the Green]

(10-25-2021, 11:07 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-24-2021, 08:43 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Would you take a trip by car if you thought that you had a 1% chance of dying during the journey? In 50 trips you would have about a 40% of dying. That is a very poor survival rate. Naval aviators have about a 23% chance of dying in a 15-year career as such even without combat. Combat is even more dangerous, adding other risks that I need not express.

Speaking of journeys, here is one place that I am sure that you would avoid. It is one of the worst slums in America, the Kensington "community" in Philadelphia. Watch at your own risk. It looks like a "Needle Park". It is unlikely that the people "shooting up" are diabetics using insulin.






Would you take risks on a heroin or meth habit? I don't know which is more dangerous -- IV drug use or COVID-19. You just showed me an estimate of 750,000 deaths, and -- yes, I have a calculator available. The death rate is about 1.6%. I know, of course, that such is a low rate in contrast to the death rates for cancer, strokes, and heart attacks, but those take time to develop. COVID-19 takes about a month to go from infection to death. Yes, you are taking a greater risk of death from lung cancer alone with every puff of a cigarette, but it takes a huge number of puffs from coffin nails to increase one's death rate from lung cancer by 1.6%. That is not a trivialization of smoking as a health risk; it is a bad habit with no obvious mitigating factors.

Stupid risks are for fools.

I take a risk of being killed in a car accident or dying from something else every day of the week dude. Americans take risks with their lives all the time.

Being saddled with a Dixie, in the old Confederacy and in most rural areas and some exurbs as well, is as great a risk to the future of America and the world than anything else I can think of.

[pbrower2a]

(10-25-2021, 11:07 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-24-2021, 08:43 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Would you take a trip by car if you thought that you had a 1% chance of dying during the journey? In 50 trips you would have about a 40% of dying. That is a very poor survival rate. Naval aviators have about a 23% chance of dying in a 15-year career as such even without combat. Combat is even more dangerous, adding other risks that I need not express.

Speaking of journeys, here is one place that I am sure that you would avoid. It is one of the worst slums in America, the Kensington "community" in Philadelphia. Watch at your own risk. It looks like a "Needle Park". It is unlikely that the people "shooting up" are diabetics using insulin.






Would you take risks on a heroin or meth habit? I don't know which is more dangerous -- IV drug use or COVID-19. You just showed me an estimate of 750,000 deaths, and -- yes, I have a calculator available. The death rate is about 1.6%. I know, of course, that such is a low rate in contrast to the death rates for cancer, strokes, and heart attacks, but those take time to develop. COVID-19 takes about a month to go from infection to death. Yes, you are taking a greater risk of death from lung cancer alone with every puff of a cigarette, but it takes a huge number of puffs from coffin nails to increase one's death rate from lung cancer by 1.6%. That is not a trivialization of smoking as a health risk; it is a bad habit with no obvious mitigating factors.

Stupid risks are for fools.

I take a risk of being killed in a car accident or dying from something else every day of the week dude. Americans take risks with their lives all the time.

This is now a bicycle trail and not an automobile route. It has been bypassed along a safer highway.



Yes, it used to be a highway in Bolivia. Truckers needed to say their prayers before they drove this road, as they wouldn't have time to do so while driving it.



I'd say that this is the sort of highway (known locally as el Camion de la Muerte) that one has about as much danger of dying just because of the road. It is now closed to motor vehicles. If you drove this road you needed a guardian angel but instead were more likely to meet the Angel of Death.



Red is the cycle trail, and pale green marks the route for motor vehicles.

[Classic-Xer]

(10-26-2021, 12:59 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: ...  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you.  The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

Biden is down to thirty some percent support nation wide and you're telling me the percentages are heavily in your favor. The Blue side or Progressive side only amounts to 30 some percent of the country these days. How many times have I've told you/ referred to that over the years? So, who is going to fight the Blue sides upcoming war with America? A bunch of crooked bureaucrats/politicians/political activists, ghetto slugs/hoodlums/petty thieves, urban gang banger's, pot heads/drug addicts, clueless/naive teenagers (mainly younger women), crazed/indoctrinated SJW's who have never really seen large scale violence or real warfare and single mothers/women?

I'm not a Red. I'm a hardcore American. How many times have I told you or reminded you of that fact over the years? If you loose the bulk of the country, the bulk of its economy, the bulk of its military and it's tax base, what does the Blue/Progressive side have left at that point? We are stuck with the piece of shit that you and the others elected but the cool thing is that America doesn't have to stick with him and go down with him. America is free to part ways, declare its independence and reestablish itself  and begin taking the law into it's own hands. The old laurels that kept the country together no longer exist these days. The Left has pretty much destroyed them by no longer honoring them.

[pbrower2a]

(11-01-2021, 01:09 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:59 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: ...  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you.  The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

Biden is down to thirty some percent support nation wide and you're telling me the percentages are heavily in your favor. The Blue side or Progressive side only amounts to 30 some percent of the country these days. How many times have I've told you/ referred to that over the years? So, who is going to fight the Blue sides upcoming war with America? A bunch of crooked bureaucrats/politicians/political activists, ghetto slugs/hoodlums/petty thieves, urban gang banger's, pot heads/drug addicts, clueless/naive teenagers (mainly younger women), crazed/indoctrinated SJW's who have never really seen large scale violence or real warfare and single mothers/women?

Governing is messy, especially when one side frustrates everything. We all know about the American exit from Afghanistan to which President Trump committed us. Donald Trump has far more trust for rogues than is appropriate. All in all I have no problem with Nixon opening China -- but that was the one diplomatic achievement that he could make because everything went right. Of course, Donald Trump never had anyone like Henry Kissinger in his service, as Trump went through Secretaries of State like record labels go through garage bands. Joe Biden couldn't keep up the Trump work with several vile despots at once and did not try because President Biden would have gotten America and its allies burned. We are now stuck with the Taliban in Afghanistan, and mark my words: the US Armed Forces will be back in Afghanistan after some fresh outrage.

America still has a divide between a plutocratic elite that has ideas from the middle ages but a love of modern technology in communications, military prowess, surveillance, and productivity... and people fully modern in their ways. That elite is little different in values from those of the tycoons in Weimar Germany. Basically,

He who owns the gold makes the rules.

That is a corollary of the neoliberal era that believed in keeping prices low by ensuring that the majority of people could not fully participate in the consumer society although they were obliged to work long hours just to survive. When we have mass death from a viral infection we have a sudden loss of hundreds of thousands of people from the workforce, then the assumptions that lead to price stability no longer apply.

But back to the polarization. We have two Parties refusing to let the other get away with what they want. We still have political gridlock. Worse, one side just showed its contempt for the niceties that make democracy possible. Can you still see the January Putsch as an honorable way in which to do politics? Is it up to the incumbent President to decide the results of an election are to go? We have laws to establish who wins and who loses. The same rules that decided that Donald Trump could be elected President with less than a plurality in 2016 determined that he would lose in 2020.

Let a few things go right for President Biden, and his approval ratings will rise. I know that you believe that he is freakishly incompetent just as I believed (with justification) that Donald Trump was not only inept at political give-and-take built into our system but perverse in his methods.  

Quote:I'm not a Red. I'm a hardcore American.

I call BS on that. You are a true believer in Donald Trump and his agenda, and should he be no longer available you will support anyone who adopts his agenda and techniques, except that you will be delighted to have as your political idol someone even more ruthless in crushing what you consider the Left. Hard-core American? People very different from you in ethnicity and religion consider themselves just as American as you consider yourself.

David and I have taken seriously one explanation of American history that defines America regionally: Albion's Seed. I suggest that you read it some time. It can explain some political divides between and even within states. Basically there were four pre-Revolutionary mass settlements in America:

1. Aristocratic Cavaliers who settled from the Tidewater region of Chesapeake Bay down the Atlantic coast to Georgia, who sought to establish an aristocratic order of "gentleman" planters who needed to import large numbers of peasants, found to their chagrin that the peasants weren't going to take the dangerous trip across the Atlantic just to endure more of the same that they knew in southwestern England in a climate that became brutally hot and humid in the summer. Those planters then offered a deal to indentured servants: work under harsh terms for a specified time, and get a considerable grant of land. About when the planters started having to grant land to those recently-freed servants they chose to import people who would remain slaves.

2. the Puritans brought to New England the sort of world that they wanted to see form in southeastern England, something more commercial... and orderly. The Puritans came to New England with middle-class values that one still heavily associates with New England, like respect for formal education (Harvard College was formed in 1636), elected legislatures (the Massachusetts General Court, the Massachusetts state legislature today, is the oldest continuous elected body of representatives in the world), and a reliance upon courts of law to settle disputes instead of brawls, lynchings, and duels. New England had stony farmland that made large-scale agriculture impossible, and the thin soils made New Englanders turn to fishing for much of their food. There were no First Peoples to subjugate and exploit, and with few exceptions New England was ill-suited to the survival of African slaves. There were no lodes of precious metals to mine and no lucrative cash crop. New England was completely unattractive to people other than those who actually settled it.

3. The Quakers and Swiss or German Pietists found the Delaware Valley attractive. In climate, it is more similar to northern Virginia than to New England. Southeastern Pennsylvania would be extremely attractive to people of the English Midlands who were more proletarian than the Puritans. They valued toil and eschewed excess, so they had a huge gap between themselves and the Cavaliers. Quakers had much the same core beliefs in religion as the Swiss and German Mennonites

4. People of Appalachia seem to this day comparatively wild, yet politically and culturally conservative. They came from the wild far north of England and southern Scotland. Many were herdsmen, and herdsmen have livestock as their capital. (Note that "cattle" is a cognate of "capital"). It is far easier to steal livestock than to steal commercial wares, and this is where the cattle rustlers were. There is room for economic activity, but in the harsh terrain of mountain valleys such activity has often been clandestine, as in moonshine. Educational standards were (and remain) low. Xenophobia is rampant.

These basic patterns moved west. The Puritans assimilated the then-small "Dutch" settlement of New Amsterdam early; first of all, the Dutch were a minority in the population, as New Amsterdam had many French and Belgian Huguenots, religious refugees from New England, Germans whose ancestors had come over to be soldiers and Scandinavians to do the sailing, and Portuguese, Italian, and Spanish Jews in flight from the Inquisition. New York City has been cosmopolitan from the time when the Dutch settled it. Puritans moved west through the the Great Lakes region to establish cities like Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Omaha, Denver, and Seattle and took over the small French settlement in Detroit and the Spanish mission-garrison hamlet of San Francisco. Salt Lake City and most of Utah reflects a religious tradition, Mormonism, that developed in New England and upstate New York.

Quakers moved west through the Corn Belt in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois just south of the Puritans, establishing Cincinnati, Indianapolis, and Kansas City while taking over St. Louis.

Cavaliers took their plantation way of life, and their slaves, as far west as Texas. Backwoods Americans took their ways in Appalachia and imitated those in the Ozarks of Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma.

If you don't believe me, then watch the speech patterns.

Quote:How many times have I told you or reminded you of that fact over the years? If you loose the bulk of the country, the bulk of its economy, the bulk of its military and it's tax base, what does the Blue/Progressive side have left at that point? We are stuck with the piece of shit that you and the others elected but the cool thing is that America doesn't have to stick with him and go down with him. America is free to part ways, declare its independence and reestablish itself  and begin taking the law into it's own hands. The old laurels that kept the country together no longer exist these days. The Left has pretty much destroyed them by no longer honoring them.

Plenty. We have the wealth that comes from intellectual property. We have Hollywood. We have the publishing houses of New York City. We have most of the top-notch colleges, universities, and professional schools. We are the ones who prefer rational thought to superstition. "Red America" is much poorer even if one adjusts for race and ethnicity. The states that do worst in poverty, health, crime, employment, and educational achievement are in a swath from New Mexico to South Carolina. The only "Blue" state that does so badly is New Mexico. 

Here's a video assessing the worst-rated states in America.






I've seen other videos by Briggs. He is clearly a conservative.

[David Horn]

(11-01-2021, 01:09 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:59 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: ...  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you.  The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

Biden is down to thirty some percent support nation wide and you're telling me the percentages are heavily in your favor. The Blue side or Progressive side only amounts to 30 some percent of the country these days. How many times have I've told you/ referred to that over the years? So, who is going to fight the Blue sides upcoming war with America? A bunch of crooked bureaucrats/politicians/political activists, ghetto slugs/hoodlums/petty thieves, urban gang banger's, pot heads/drug addicts, clueless/naive teenagers (mainly younger women), crazed/indoctrinated SJW's who have never really seen large scale violence or real warfare and single mothers/women?

I'm not a Red. I'm a hardcore American. How many times have I told you or reminded you of that fact over the years? If you loose the bulk of the country, the bulk of its economy, the bulk of its military and it's tax base, what does the Blue/Progressive side have left at that point? We are stuck with the piece of shit that you and the others elected but the cool thing is that America doesn't have to stick with him and go down with him. America is free to part ways, declare its independence and reestablish itself  and begin taking the law into it's own hands. The old laurels that kept the country together no longer exist these days. The Left has pretty much destroyed them by no longer honoring them.

Biden's popularity, or lack of it, is almost insignificant as a Blue marker.  He was and is a placeholder, put in place by another geriatric politician, and showing his and their communal age.  Biden wil not run again, even if his approval rises to 90%, because he knows he's already pushing the bounds of what an 80-year old can do.  And your idea that Democrats are somehow not Americans, but, apparently, Republicans are, is simply silly.  Add ten years to the present, and see who runs the show.  It won't be the geriatric Left or Right.  It will be the young.

And now once again, you note the intent of "America" to part ways with America, presumably.  Easy to say; hard to do.  I will conceed, there are plenty on both sides happy to join hands in making the break, but, as alwasy, the devil will be in the details.

[pbrower2a]

(11-01-2021, 02:34 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(11-01-2021, 01:09 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:59 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-25-2021, 07:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: ...  Today's right is so fixated on individual "rights" that any talk of communal responsibity is either ignored or actively opposed.  If you read Albion's Seed, it's a problem baked into the country since its founding.  We're essentially a divided nation trying to stay together for mutual benefit.  That may end at some point.

You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you.  The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

Biden is down to thirty some percent support nation wide and you're telling me the percentages are heavily in your favor. The Blue side or Progressive side only amounts to 30 some percent of the country these days. How many times have I've told you/ referred to that over the years? So, who is going to fight the Blue sides upcoming war with America? A bunch of crooked bureaucrats/politicians/political activists, ghetto slugs/hoodlums/petty thieves, urban gang banger's, pot heads/drug addicts, clueless/naive teenagers (mainly younger women), crazed/indoctrinated SJW's who have never really seen large scale violence or real warfare and single mothers/women?

I'm not a Red. I'm a hardcore American. How many times have I told you or reminded you of that fact over the years? If you loose the bulk of the country, the bulk of its economy, the bulk of its military and it's tax base, what does the Blue/Progressive side have left at that point? We are stuck with the piece of shit that you and the others elected but the cool thing is that America doesn't have to stick with him and go down with him. America is free to part ways, declare its independence and reestablish itself  and begin taking the law into it's own hands. The old laurels that kept the country together no longer exist these days. The Left has pretty much destroyed them by no longer honoring them.

Biden's popularity, or lack of it, is almost insignificant as a Blue marker.  He was and is a placeholder, put in place by another geriatric politician, and showing his and their communal age.  Biden wil not run again, even if his approval rises to 90%, because he knows he's already pushing the bounds of what an 80-year old can do.  And your idea that Democrats are somehow not Americans, but, apparently, Republicans are, is simply silly.  Add ten years to the present, and see who runs the show.  It won't be the geriatric Left or Right.  It will be the young.

President Biden will at most be the Man of the Moment due to his age alone. He has little generational constituency, as most of the Silent generation is already deceased. He has obvious limitations due to age. He may have most of the same principles of younger liberals, but there are far more young liberals who will follow him. The essential matter of the moment in November 2020 was to defeat Donald Trump before he could destroy American democracy.

He will not solve all of America's problems once and for all. Nobody can. That will be for others to do, one legislative session at a time.But we did solve one problem, did we not? Donald Trump is no longer President, and he can no longer drive America into a dictatorship as he sought to do. America gets a little breathing room, time in which it can contemplate what is wrong with much of the country.

Quote:And now once again, you note the intent of "America" to part ways with America, presumably.  Easy to say; hard to do.  I will conceed, there are plenty on both sides happy to join hands in making the break, but, as alwasy, the devil will be in the details.

America's biggest problems are not going to be solved by under-educated people. However rough life might be in Cleveland, Detroit, Milwaukee, or Philadelphia, moving to the Rural South is no solution.The public schools suck. Poverty is the norm. The jobs aren't there. People who lack the education suitable to high-tech activities will not be the needed labor force.

[Eric the Green]

(11-01-2021, 04:57 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(11-01-2021, 02:34 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(11-01-2021, 01:09 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:59 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(10-26-2021, 12:25 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: You better pull your head out because we are in the process of ending that relationship right now. The Democratic side better figure out how they're going to afford to pay for all their shit, all their people and some how or another defend themselves without the support of most of America down the road. So, what's the benefit of sticking with today's Left? Sorry dude, America will be better off without today's Left. Can you say the same about today's Left? The Left is largely dependent and pretty needy these days. The American Right is largely independent and able to fend for itself.

You keep making these claims, but the numbers are against you.  The Blue side is still a larger percentage of the country and resides in the areas that are wealthier and frankly more strategic. "Most of America" lives Blue, not Red.

Biden is down to thirty some percent support nation wide and you're telling me the percentages are heavily in your favor. The Blue side or Progressive side only amounts to 30 some percent of the country these days. How many times have I've told you/ referred to that over the years? So, who is going to fight the Blue sides upcoming war with America? A bunch of crooked bureaucrats/politicians/political activists, ghetto slugs/hoodlums/petty thieves, urban gang banger's, pot heads/drug addicts, clueless/naive teenagers (mainly younger women), crazed/indoctrinated SJW's who have never really seen large scale violence or real warfare and single mothers/women?

I'm not a Red. I'm a hardcore American. How many times have I told you or reminded you of that fact over the years? If you loose the bulk of the country, the bulk of its economy, the bulk of its military and it's tax base, what does the Blue/Progressive side have left at that point? We are stuck with the piece of shit that you and the others elected but the cool thing is that America doesn't have to stick with him and go down with him. America is free to part ways, declare its independence and reestablish itself  and begin taking the law into it's own hands. The old laurels that kept the country together no longer exist these days. The Left has pretty much destroyed them by no longer honoring them.

Biden's popularity, or lack of it, is almost insignificant as a Blue marker.  He was and is a placeholder, put in place by another geriatric politician, and showing his and their communal age.  Biden wil not run again, even if his approval rises to 90%, because he knows he's already pushing the bounds of what an 80-year old can do.  And your idea that Democrats are somehow not Americans, but, apparently, Republicans are, is simply silly.  Add ten years to the present, and see who runs the show.  It won't be the geriatric Left or Right.  It will be the young.

President Biden will at most be the Man of the Moment due to his age alone. He has little generational constituency, as most of the Silent generation is already deceased. He has obvious limitations due to age. He may have most of the same principles of younger liberals, but there are far more young liberals who will follow him. The essential matter of the moment in November 2020 was to defeat Donald Trump before he could destroy American democracy.

He will not solve all of America's problems once and for all. Nobody can. That will be for others to do, one legislative session at a time.But we did solve one problem, did we not? Donald Trump is no longer President, and he can no longer drive America into a dictatorship as he sought to do. America gets a little breathing room, time in which it can contemplate what is wrong with much of the country.  

Quote:And now once again, you note the intent of "America" to part ways with America, presumably.  Easy to say; hard to do.  I will conceed, there are plenty on both sides happy to join hands in making the break, but, as alwasy, the devil will be in the details.

America's biggest problems are not going to be solved by under-educated people. However rough life might be in Cleveland, Detroit, Milwaukee, or Philadelphia, moving to the Rural South is no solution.The public schools suck. Poverty is the norm. The jobs aren't there. People who lack the education suitable to high-tech activities will not be the needed labor force.

I don't see another politician besides Biden available now who could beat Donald Trump, or even several other likely Republican candidates. If he is a placeholder, who is he holding a place for? Trump? Another Republican? That is practically all there is to replace him with. If McAuliffe fails tomorrow, where does that leave him? And us?