Decision 2016

[Dysole]

Your link is not working for me DS.

~Dysole, not sure if it's on her end or the site's

[Dad_Scaper]

The one in the spoiler? It's this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRp1CK_X_Yw.

[Dysole]

The Johnson link.

~Dysole, who wasn't going to vote Johnson anyway and global warming might've been one of the issues that she wasn't too keen on him for but she forgets but had curiosity about what the link said anyways

[Nukatha]

I feel like my link from the bottom of page 19 was completely ignored.
I recommend everyone give it a read:
These people asked each candidate 20 questions and received direct responses from each candidate. No spin, no commentators, just answers directly from each candidate.

http://sciencedebate.org/20answers
http://sciencedebate.org/goods/2016answers.pdf

And I'll quote Gary's response on the topic of climate change here, to clarify what a few above have been saying with a response straight from the horse's mouth.

Originally Posted by Gary Johnson

We accept that climate change is occurring, and that
human activity is contributing to it, including through greenhouse gases like
methane, nitrous oxide, and carbon dioxide.
Unfortunately for policymakers the very activities that appear to contribute
to climate change also contribute to mankind’s health and prosperity, so we
view with a skeptical eye any attempts to curtail economic activity. We believe
that a motivated and informed market will demand efficiency and reduced
greenhouse gases, mitigating at least some of mankind’s effects. It is a virtual
certainty that consumer demands and the marketplace will produce tangible
benefits. It is not, however, certain that unilateral regulatory approaches by
the U.S. will, in fact, produce benefits that are proportionate to costs. Nor is it
certain that international treaties will produce benefits as developing nations
have the most at stake to continue industrialization.
As other countries industrialize, as they have the right to do, we recognize that
environmental trade-offs are inevitable. As extreme poverty wanes in places
like India and China, the poor will stop burning excrement or wood. And that
will reduce certain types of pollution, while certain greenhouse gases may
temporarily increase. But as countries become more developed, industrialized
and automated, we believe the marketplace will facilitate the free exchange of
new, efficient, carbon-friendly processes and technologies. And a Johnson-Weld administration will facilitate as much knowledge sharing as possible to
speed and spread sustainable, cleaner technology as nations develop.

[Dad_Scaper]

Ah. This, then.

Edit: I don't think the lengthier response from Nukatha is substantively different from "Let's do nothing, because the sun will destroy the earth eventually anyway." I'm glad to see he's refined the answer over the last 5 years, though. A free market will prevent new countries, industrializing, from using coal power, etc.? Another demonstration of how fantastic - and not in a nice way - libertarianism is. I imagine a free market will also pay for scientists to spend 15 or 20 years developing new antibiotics, etc., too. Somebody will pay them, right? Sheesh.

[Dysole]

It was hilarious that I happened to be skimming through this while waiting for a new link. I don't really trust the free market by itself to produce clean efficient energy but I'll readily admit I'm not sure what tack the government should take to encourage that route. I find the statement that "it is not certain that policy X will do what we want it to do" a bit... I dunno. We never have absolute certainty about what a policy will do because economics is one of those weird sciences that sometimes seems like complete voodoo. I share his lack of certainty that certain options (carbon taxes in particular is one I'm skeptical of) will produce certain results but I am very certain that the free market will not.

~Dysole, who thinks vaccines is the other issue where she knows she can't support Johnson

[wriggz]

Originally Posted by Dysole

We never have absolute certainty about what a policy will do because economics is one of those weird sciences that sometimes seems like complete voodoo.
~Dysole, who thinks vaccines is the other issue where she knows she can't support Johnson

The general issue with Economics is that it is based on models not observations... which is crazy. There is an old joke....


"Real world Observations indicate that policy "A" will have "B" result.
"But what does the economic model say?"


This is a very worrying trend in economics and one that leads to many issues in government policy.

[Rich10]

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

I would not go so far as to say, Rich, that reasonable minds could differ, when it comes to the hatred so many have for Clinton. It is, I believe, unreasonable.

Regardless, if you're voting against Trump, by voting for Clinton, that's good enough.

Lets just say that absent some unforeseen event (and I can't come up with a scenario), we'll be voting the same (at least for the top line) in November.

Just for the record, I don't hate Clinton. I don't even hate Trump. In elections, there is far too much of a tendency to demonize the other side. I look for a candidate's good and bad policies and qualities. I honestly believe that both Clinton and Trump think that their ideas are best when it comes to running this country. I also believe that both have displayed poor judgement. I think that Trump's poor judgement has been greater than Clinton's. Moreover, I am concerned that Trump's egotism will not lead him to take the council of people who know all of the facts. Hence, I will vote for the lesser of two evils. I have voted going back to the Reagan years and have voted for both parties. I have never been less pleased with my choice for president.

[Tornado]

I am curious if you would indulge me Rich10 but what was your voting pattern like?

I was devout Republican. Why you ask? Alex P. Keaton.

After GW's first term, I was done. Ever since then it seems like the Republicans only job to is to oppose and criticize the Democrats but never offer any alternate solutions.

[Swamper]

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

Dok addressed the attacks against Clinton, above. All the smoke around her looks more and more ridiculous, the closer I look at it. Her foundation is incredibly efficient at doing good work in the world. The email scandal is a whole lot of nothing.

The hate for her is simply not founded in reality. As dok said,

Spoiler Alert!

So when I vote for her, it will not be because she is the lesser of two evils, it'll be because she is the most qualified candidate in the race, and has been since the beginning of the campaign season. She is not perfect, but who is? Her reputation as a liar - like most of the charges against her - is not supported by real evidence.

When I vote *against* Trump, it will not be because he is the greater of two evils. It will be because he is a menace to the United States and, more broadly, to world peace. He has normalized the vilest part of the American underbelly, which is now empowered and acting out. Heaven help us all if he wins. He is a *documented* liar, and a racist, and a terrible, terrible human being.

But your vote is so precious that you can't choose between the two, and will throw in for some unqualified turkey, who isn't as qualified or prepared as Clinton, because you feel like you don't have anything to lose and you'd just as soon see it burn. Even though we have had eight solid years of stability and economic growth by any reasonable measure, you want your precious vote to say "hell with it all."

Well, go ahead, I guess. Believe your myths. Hopefully your vote won't matter. "People will only believe what they already know to be true. That is the Universal Form of Conspiracy." ~ Umberto Eco. Everybody thinks they're the first to discover cynicism.

I will, thank you. My vote will be making a statement, just like yours. Mine will say "I am fed up with both parties, I am not happy with either candidate, and I will not take part in some false choice to elect Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump." If that causes you to go into a tizzy, that's your problem. I don't particularly appreciate the tone of your response, but that's okay too. You're passionate, and I can understand that. Ultimately though, the way you addressed and phrased your objection to my opinion doesn't lead me to take you very seriously. There are ways to convey how you feel without being rude and nasty.

[Ranior]

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

Edit: I don't think the lengthier response from Nukatha is substantively different from "Let's do nothing, because the sun will destroy the earth eventually anyway." I'm glad to see he's refined the answer over the last 5 years, though. A free market will prevent new countries, industrializing, from using coal power, etc.? Another demonstration of how fantastic - and not in a nice way - libertarianism is. I imagine a free market will also pay for scientists to spend 15 or 20 years developing new antibiotics, etc., too. Somebody will pay them, right? Sheesh.

Agreed. While it's certainly more refined, it still is just absurd as it's basically saying "well climate change might be a problem sure, but not one we're going to do anything about". Just absurd if he actually was listening to the scientific community's take on climate change.

I also found many of his other answers not very satisfying to me, but ah well. He offers up interesting sounding stuff, but nothing seems rooted in actual policy suggestions or reality. this statement of Johnson's on the idea of scientific integrity really got to me for some reason:

Science is not democracy - results do not conform to popular or accepted opinion. However, we must respect the diversity of thought. The First Amendment does not stop at the doors of government, universities and research centers.
When government decides to fund A vs B, it has unavoidably put itself in the business of picking winners.

What does he think he is going to do? Fund everything? I mean how can you possibly avoid picking to fund certain studies over others? I mean if he had an idea on how to do that, great, but the rest of his answer goes into other parts and doesn't at all touch on how he would solve this supposed problem.



I found most of his answers in the thing Nukatha shared to be similarly vague. Lots of statements where I scratch my head about what Johnson is actually advocating for policy wise. I'm ill convinced he actually has real plans on how to govern. Going to his campaign website quickly also does not fill me with any confidence. Straight from his campaign's website for environment change comes this fun nugget:

Is the climate changing? Probably so.
Is man contributing to that change? Probably so.
But the critical question is whether the politicians’ efforts to regulate, tax and manipulate the private sector are cost-effective – or effective at all. The debate should be about how we can protect our resources and environment for future generations. Governors Johnson and Weld strongly believe that the federal government should prevent future harm by focusing on regulations that protect us from real harm, rather than needlessly costing American jobs and freedom in order to pursue a political agenda.

So first off they (him and his running mate) choose to continue hedging by saying probably so instead of a flat out yes, for sure, this is a real problem. They then double down on that stance by arguing that any future harm should be ignored in favor of promoting the current status quo.



The base idea behind the climate change debate is that we are abusing our planet's ecosystem beyond what it can handle, and we need to reign in pollution and effects today to help protect our future. They seem to have zero clue about that, or at the very least zero care. Their response seems to be along the lines of stating let's continue to keep things the way they are and continue pushing off this problem. I can see no reason to believe this is in any way a better stance than those who just state climate change isn't happening.



Overall, I've just ascertained what I already suspected, Gary Johnson isn't a candidate for me, and I think he would be a bad choice for president.


Looking at the other recent posts, I do find it a nice point that Rich10 brought up that during elections we often demonize the other side unnecessarily harshly. I'm probably even nitpicking Johnson more than I really think he's that bad. I also think that many times some Republicans have fine ideas. Just far too often many of them seem to ignore facts and on many issues that matter quite a bit to me. But really there are still plenty of moderate Republican politicians and friends I have where we have reasonable disagreements or agreements on certain topics. Overall I think even most politicians are trying their best and are doing an alright job.

[Ranior]

Originally Posted by Swamper

I will, thank you. My vote will be making a statement, just like yours. Mine will say "I am fed up with both parties, I am not happy with either candidate, and I will not take part in some false choice to elect Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump." If that causes you to go into a tizzy, that's your problem. I don't particularly appreciate the tone of your response, but that's okay too. You're passionate, and I can understand that. Ultimately though, the way you addressed and phrased your objection to my opinion doesn't lead me to take you very seriously. There are ways to convey how you feel without being rude and nasty.

For what it's worth, I agree with Dad Scaper (the shirt I may as print up and wear for how often I seem to say it). I will stand up and don't think he said anything rude or nasty. And if you choose not to take him seriously because you think he was excessive harsh or mean, so be it.

Your vote won't be making a statement. The two main parties will not be hurt by you not voting for them, as one will win, they will continue to be the only two real choices, and to them nothing will have changed if you chose to vote elsewhere. Also it's in no way a false choice. Those are your two options. You can vote elsewhere, but in the end it will be as if you didn't show up to vote for all it will effect the outcome.

Alas though. I've had too many of these conversations with many of my friends. I've had little success convincing 3rd party voters that they are effectively throwing their vote away. I will admit that from my pocket of the world surrounding by my generation of millennials, there are quite a few who are supporters of Johnson and are convinced that they can throw a wrench in the two party system by voting for a third party. I will at least admit that many more seem truly engaged and interested this time around compared to when I was voting in 08 and 12 (oh god, nevermind I couldn't vote in 08 yet, yikes sometimes even I make myself feel young). Could just be that as my friends start getting to be more early and mid 20's though that political engagement naturally rises a bit. But it's my hope that young people will show up strong in the voting booths. I know I've been trying my best to make sure people are going to actually vote. I do always find it odd how many political discussions I've shut down with friends when I see them complain about policies and then ask if they voted in the last election--sad how many times that can shut some of my friends up.