Joel Pett for November 08, 2010

(removed comment to Canookie cuz he didn’t see it)

back to toon:

It struck me recently that there’s at least one generation of younger people that no longer knows what “news” is supposed to be and why it’s protected specifically in the 1st amendment. Could be because there’s so little of it to be found these days. What is clear is that they don’t trust government, they don’t trust media, they don’t trust period.

I would think, though, that some real knowledge of the country’s history, its cycles, its political cycles, its economic cycles would help them realize where we’re headed and want to get involved. But if they don’t trust that it matters …

^^individuals commit crimes. National governments start wars.

It may be heresy to say this, but I believe so many people voted for Obama as president because they had the opportunity to elect a black president, not because of his policies. I still remember Oprah coming out draped in the flag after he won, and I also remember the unvarnished glee on the face of the local black newscaster, both on election night and on inauguration day. The next time they will come out in such numbers is to elect the first woman president. As with Obama, it will not matter that she may be incompetent, just that she is female. And that is so very sad.

I wish I knew why people don’t vote.

I may be skeptical that the count will be right, since the Republicans bought the voting machines, (since the middle 90s) but I have participated almost every time since the 70s.

I do not vote early. Some of those ballots are not counted until days later, if at all.

“The next time they will come out in such numbers is to elect the first woman president.”

You know, it’s probably true that a lot of people voted to elect Obama because he is part black. It’s also probably true that a lot of people are in opposition to Obama because he is part black (e.g. Birther B.S.). Just the way it is.

I voted for Obama because Hillary lost, and heck if I was going to help elect Bible Spice.

^ Depends on how far left and with what. Too far left is just as scary as too far right.

Many people hate what I will say here, but I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that even young soldiers back from Iraq didn’t bother to vote.

People lose faith in western democracies (dog catchers and waste management directors are elected, but the president’s advisors and Wall Street tycoons are not. Yet who has the most power?). And the 24-hour media shows so much mud about candidates, how can you repect any of them to vote for one side or the other?

^^^ If people don’t feel their vote changes anything they won’t do it, which is sad because in the end it doesn’t by them not doing anything. Self-fulfilling prophecy.

My son is a young soldier back from Iraq, and it was very important to him to get his ballot returned- he lives- as many military do- outside his voting precinct but votes from his permanent address.

I haven’t missed voting in a single election since getting shot at to defend the right- maybe if more Americans DID get shot at, they’d more fully understand what that right means?

Many young people say

A) I don’t vote it just encourages them B) Nothing changes. see Afghanistan, Guantanamo, deficit C) One vote doesn’t matter D) and if truthful I don’t know enough to cast an informed vote.

^ What Libertarian1 is saying can be applied to the young (and the old, for that matter) on either side of the aisle. Don’t forget we have some fairly stupid people, too. I’m sure you’ve seen the Daily Show a couple of times, they’ve pointed out the idiocy on our side a few times when pointing out the Conservatives’.

^ How about Jay Walking on the Tonight Show. Very painful to watch.

CF, you should really stop trying to predict what Americans will do, especially veterans. It’s obvious you don’t have a clue when it comes to the US. Stick to what you know, whatever that might be…

@dtroutma I would like for you to tell more about the conference you attended on the environment. It must have been on a large scale?

My limited arguments here are with homeowners taking out plants in our common backyard ponds, which are there for mitigation purposes. Also people catch what I call “amdrofish” from the ponds, and they are supposed to throw them back but some people eat them!

The cormorants are back this year, so it is only a few weeks until the white pelicans return.

White pelicans are so interesting in the way that they fish. They swim along in a line, then close in as a circle. and all of the individual birds, maybe 15, dip down to feed at the same time.

Awesome

Rock, cormorants are neat, also we have a pelican rookery on a lake not far from here- on the high desert, which tends to freak folks out. That is the benefit of restoring wetlands.

The conference was actually National Park Rangers and not that big (something over 100).We had the current Interior science advisor, and a number of others in the biological science community as speakers. One of the keys is that while people look to National Parks and Refuges as “preserving” species and biological diversity, they aren’t nearly sufficient alone. As you’re aware, most species are migratory (like your pelicans) or require much larger habitat areas than a park, refuge, or even a single national forest can provide. The impacts of prey-predator disturbances are severe in several eastern states, runaway elk populations in the west, bison, bears etc, Throw in botanical damage from climate change like pine nuts for grizzly and grasses for grazers, and well- problems.

The impacts of climate change have been observed for some time in these areas though, and “deniers” who try to focus only on atmospheric gasses don’t have a clue, and don’t care. The evidence has been around for a long time, a lot of folks, going back to Dasmann and others in the 1950’s have noted human impacts on climate, first in the Mediterranean, then globally.

The REAL problem is that there isn’t a single piece of politics that will in the end trump the science. It’s interesting that even the majority of religions and religious leaders ACCEPT science (Like the Dalai Lama, Pope and College of Cardinals). It is only the extreme fundamentalists that ignore the facts of the damage those fundamentalists have done over the centuries. Where Islam once led science, the current “nutsos” deny their own heritage, just like their western counterparts. It’s interesting that in the Old Testament, the concept of preservation, as in leaving fields fallow every seventh year to allow “nature” to recover, was recognized– then over 2,000 years later we thought “crop rotation” and “rest rotation grazing” was “new”.

“None are so blind”. I think that’s part of something someone said a long time ago?

^^ I believe in God, not religion.

I’ll believe in (monotheistic) religions when they get sane again.