How about comparing election results in Florida to the % of registered Democrats/Republicans and the voter turnout. There were counties in Florida where there were a vast majority of registered Democrats, 70% turnout and Bush won the county with 66% of the vote. The common bond between these counties was the electoral vote machines who maker guarenteed would win Ohio, where the machines were also used. Counties without the voting machines were closer to the norm. Also the three highest population Democratic counties were using the other system of voting.
Here in Iowa Democrats votes for Kerry 93/7 and Republicans voted for Bush with the same consistency. I find it hard to believe that Democrats in Florida would vote a minority for their own party.

You make serious assertions, indeed. Be specific with your information. Tell us which counties, the actual number of registered repub/dems. in same, and so on?

Also, if you have information that the machine maker conspired to defraud the American people, contact the Justice Department immediately. Otherwise, as Nixon said in '60, Kennedy cheated fair & square. Why is so hard to accept that kerry lost ? It's not the end of the world. Four years will pass. Let go of the anger, grasshopper.

Why do the elite circles of "world citizens", e.g., U.N. Sec. Kofi, irrationally despise this Country?

Speaking as one of the "world citizens" not from the USA, I'd say despite is too strong: disappointment is more accurate. As for irrationality here's a quick list of non-military grievences:

- fair or not, the USA is associated with the World Bank and the IMF and their mostly disastrous attempts at reforming other nation's economies according to the US example with little regard to local realities
- the USA is just as big an obstructionist as the EU with respect to agricultural subsidies: your farmers are supported far out of line compared to the value of what they grow to the huge detriment of smaller, mostly agricultural economies
- your approach to so-called free/open trade is rarely that, e.g., you've blocked Canadian beef against all scientific reasoning from entering the USA or your constant tariffs against Canadian lumber which have been thrown out of every multinational committee and your own FTC yet you persist on holding onto the seized funds and refusing to lower the barriers or your new regime of direct competitive subsidies where industries that complain about non-US competition have their competitors products subject to tariffs and those funds going directly to the complaining companies
- you insist on other economies harmonizing their intellectual property laws with your own, regardless if other nations see them as too draconian, anti-consumer and/or culturally insensitive, e.g., the DMCA

The usual fiscal conservative view is that the elimination of poverty, corruption and pollution is tied to an economy's ability to generate wealth for its citizens. Likewise conservatives believe that the freer people are to pursue wealth, the more likely they are to choose a more democratic, open society.

How are the above grievences consistent with this?

hitparade:

Let me ask a question here. If there were voting "irregularities" are you saying "just them go" or wouldn't you like to fix them? I mean, some of the nonsense was extreme. Some districts had 4 voting machines for 500 voters registered and some had 1. Some places "conveniently" lost records forcing provisional ballot use. Some voting machines registered votes for the opposite of the candidate selected.

When do we as citizens get it? That there needs to be STANDARDIZATION of voting, with everyone using the same ballot and each state allowing the same amount of time for voting?

Now, with the Republicans in power......do you think we'll get it?

I don't believe in practicing/preaching my politics from the lofty view of having my head in the clouds. I am grown up enough to understand that are no magic wand solutions. Accordingly, for me, the fundamental issue is whether America, as a world power, is a source of good or evil? Is America a shinning city on a hill, or is it the big bully you paint it out to be?

For sure, some people have it better than others in the world. Bill Gates tops the list. Some are taller, sharper; some are born in affluent societies, others in impoverished societies. There simply will never be utopia, for a variety of practical reason. The bar will always rise beyond reach.

Individual political & economic liberty is the American ideal. America is a relatively young society. America's supposed draconian approach to 3rd world development is premised on a model different from the colonialism of Old Europe that is for sure. While once true, Americans do not enslave people to build its economy.

India is an example of a society trying to improve the economic lot of its people by cultivating market forces to its economic advantage. There is considerable state guidance for sure. Since embracing modern economic concepts and principles, the caloric intake of the people of India, as throughout the most of the world, has considerably increased. This seems good. No?

Is the world perfect? No. Why not blame the French? Surely, they act in their National self-interest. NO? What about the country from which you hail.? What is its value system, and what is its economic model for sustenance, growth?

The common ground question, in essence, boils down to whether America wields its concededly disproportionate power responsibly, morally, fairly? Apparently you don't think so.

Crispe:

I don't want a fusillade of wild accusations!

"There is, however, one further step of analysis that is possible within the framework of social-scientific theorizing. This an attempt to clarify the relation between theoretical insights (all of them subject to empirical testing and therefore never final) and praxis based on this or that value. Put differently, the social scientist can make statements of an ‘if/then’ type: 'If your values are X, then situation Y will accord with your values more than situation Z.' Or: 'If you hold value A, then, given the empirical state of the world as I have reason to believe it to be, practical option B will probably be more useful to you than practical option C.' This is not the stuff of which myths are made or by which heroic actors will be inspired. But is in precisely such dry, pedantic, and invariably probabilistic statements that the social scientist can make distinctive contribution to public discourse." Peter L. Berger, The Capitalist Revolution. ISBN: 0-465-00867-4.

Marxism is dead. Only the daily grind of toiling out a living is left. Different standards of living is an inevitable reality. Technology, born out of capitalism, seems to have evened things up a bit.

Reply #5 By: hitparade - 11/6/2004 9:55:41 AM

I'll assume you're replying to me.

Is America a shining city on a hill, or is it the big bully you paint it out to be?

This is a startling naive point of view nowadays -- I think everyone is aware of power politics. My judgement of "disappointment" isn't further negative in realisation that the USA is just using its dominant position to further its own interests ahead of altruism (probably in the idealistic view that whatever's good for the USA is ultimately good for everyone else). However, it isn't more positive because I'm part of the world that's being asked to bend over.

There simply will never be utopia, for a variety of practical reason. The bar will always rise beyond reach.

This is an old argument whose reduction depends on whether you choose a pessimistic or optimistic point of view. Since you're someone preaching "a shining city on a hill" I would've thought you would be inclined towards optimism and strive towards hope. However you're tending towards the cynical and a private utopia of being on top.

America's supposed draconian approach to 3rd world development is premised on a model different from the colonialism of Old Europe that is for sure. While once true, Americans do not enslave people to build its economy.

Many in the third world hugely resent the attitude of "open your economic borders since that's only fair to allow American goods in", while proclaiming "don't send your cheap, foreign goods to us." Being an economic slave to capital outflow isn't equivalent to personal slavery, but it sure isn't a hopeful state.

Since embracing modern economic concepts and principles, the caloric intake of the people of India, as throughout the most of the world, has considerably increased. This seems good. No?

Yes, but this is largely irrelevent to the discussion at hand. Did India open up its economy due to US guidance? No. Vajpayee (then Prime Minister) was always a fiscal conservative and the reason his party won was largely due to the population's rejection of the old, corrupt, state-everything government. People around the world hardly need their neighbours (or further away) to tell them things could be better if things were different.

Is the world perfect? No. Why not blame the French? Surely, they act in their National self-interest. NO?

Indeed they do. But is it the French pounding on their chests proclaiming their "shining city on a hill" as an example to the world?

What about the country from which you hail.? What is its value system, and what is its economic model for sustenance, growth?

Surprisingly similar to yours on the micro level, of course. But there are a lot of surprising differences nowadays (e.g., gay marriage). In fact, especially in the intellectual rights arena, we're freer as citizens in Canada than you are in the USA.

The common ground question, in essence, boils down to whether America wields its concededly disproportionate power responsibly, morally, fairly? Apparently you don't think so.

Again, power politics says "who cares" to both morality or fairness. If you take this cynical view then the USA is doing exactly what it is expected to do. For those looking at the "shining city on a hill", we were possibly expecting better.

hitparade:

So....all of these reported abuses, they are a fusiallade of allegations that are unproven and untrue? C'mon, you're brighter than that. Abuses occur, on both sides, we see them every election and mostly dismiss them only to have them occur over and over. Is this the Shining light to the world? We got problems which we don't deal with, so be like us?

Reply #4 By: CrispE - 11/6/2004 9:50:31 AM hitparade: Let me ask a question here. If there were voting "irregularities" are you saying "just them go" or wouldn't you like to fix them? I mean, some of the nonsense was extreme. Some districts had 4 voting machines for 500 voters registered and some had 1. Some places "conveniently" lost records forcing provisional ballot use. Some voting machines registered votes for the opposite of the candidate selected.

If this was in fact true then the left wing media that hate GW would be ALL over it. And they aren't. Ergo there was no voting irregularities.

Reply #4 By: CrispE - 11/6/2004 9:50:31 AM hitparade: Some voting machines registered votes for the opposite of the candidate selected.

This is ABSOLUTELY false. The FEC would not allow that. "If" this was true the FEC would have forced a revote in FL.

"Disappointment." What is the allocation of economic resources premised on? In a nutshell, your circular argument boils down to "expecting better" from America. Why? Seriously, what do you want, expect? You resent America because you are forced to "bend over". Your Country should shed America's economic yoke of repression. Why not boycott America. 90% of your goods and services are realized by way of crossing the border to access our markets. Stop crossing the border for to put your greedy paws on American goods and services . Your Country unabashedly drains American resources without making any meaningful contribution to the freedom and prosperity you enjoy as result of the America's "disappointing" behavior. Your universal access to the best medicine in the world is the direct result of corporate America's R&D. I have been in villages in which the father/elder of the village had not traveled beyond a two mile radius of the village. And yet seeing an American spread a big smile across his face, as he uttered, in broken English, the word freedom. The concept of freedom was not associated with France, or Canada, but with America. Begrudge this American from elatedly feeling pride in that? In a shinning city on a hill.

drmiler:

The FEC? C'mon, once more you think a Federal beauracracy controlled by a Republican administration is going to investigate the state where the President's brother is governor and the state government is Republican too? Oh my, whatever you're smoking, is it available nationwide?

CrispE:

Counting large numbers of votes accurately seems not to be so much a problem plagued by wonton mishcief, but rather one of system overload. Naturally, I desire an honest, reliable, and as accurate result as possible. Intutitvely, I suspect gliches, mistakes, in the end, cancel each other out. Who knows?

Reply #13 By: CrispE - 11/6/2004 11:37:01 AM drmiler: The FEC? C'mon, once more you think a Federal beauracracy controlled by a Republican administration is going to investigate the state where the President's brother is governor and the state government is Republican too? Oh my, whatever you're smoking, is it available nationwide?

Do you see a conspiracy behind "every" door?