I view those distinctions as immaterial in the context of the discussion, since the outcome's the same. They're two close points - one might say "married" or symbiotically operative observations or perceptions - under the umbrella of voter frustration.

It's rational to not vote when you know that you won't get anything useful from either candidiate.

If you perceive a vote for X and Y is going to give you near identical results neither of which you desire, how is it rational to vote for either?

True, but should he choose to go, he'll have cheap and environmentally friendly biofuels to make the trip more affordable.

No, they really aren't. If your vote doesn't matter in the outcome of the election, there is no reason to pay attention to politics or vote.

If there is no distinction between the candidates, but you were the ultimate decider (i.e. your vote "counts"), the solution is to get new candidates, rather than of not voting. Or, alternatively, if you are the ulimate decider and there are any (even small) differences in the candidates, it is again rational to vote to be able to exploit those differences.

Again:

• Instead, voters are likely to fall prey to systematic errors in considering political information. As Bryan shows in detail, this helps explain why the majority of voters routinely fall prey to gross fallacies in their analysis of public policy

crap wrong button

Which means nothing in the context of a voter who does understand the differences and the fact that voting Dem or GOP won't make a difference to him.

To accept that point you have to accept that voters are as misinformed as the author suggests. It is next to impossible to determine how many voters "misunderstand" political information and to what extent they do. The assumptions built into such a study are challenging no doubt, and interesting, but hopelessly academic.

Which is why they're debated here. Frank Rich tried to make a similar case with his book about Kansas. Try to sneak his methodology through even the low standard of a Daubert hearing.

It's nice to think we're all victims of bullshit or confusing dissemination (I recognize your point involves perception as opposed to the quality of information provided, but for purposes of discussing politics, assuming the information offered is true or anything but opaque makes this debate senseless). This allows one group who think it knows better to feel pretty good. I don't quibble with the notion Americans don't know much about politics, but its wildly academic and not much else to suggest their vote makes a huge difference in their lives given the slates of nearly identical boaugh and paid for candidates we have on both sides.

Semantics... a distinction without a difference. If you get none of what you want, and a lot of what you don't, the packaging is immaterial.

If the differences are so de minimus and don't affect you, the use of gas and time expended to get to the polls is irrational.

It's nice to know among the myriad variations of narcissism from which I unquestionably suffer I am spared at least one.

While you may well be as correct as the author, it IS a different thing you suggest is also rational. The author contends that, when voting, it is rational to be ill-informed; you contend that, when well-informed, it is rational to not vote. They may both be true and may be an extension of each other, but they are distinct points.

I suspect they are not hopelessly impossible, but admit that they may be beyond the discourse here.

In the universe of the authors, it is not mere semantics. there is a real difference from a logical point of view between you vote not counting and your choices lacking meaningful distinctions. And, again, if you vote "matter" even de minimus difference are reason enough to vote. Thw distinction is next to no cost to you (e.g. gas to get to the polls) against no cost to you at all.

Argh. The ablative of minimus is minimis

Thank you for fleshing my point out for me.

Take off the lawyer hat for a second and, though this may blow your mind, assume I am allowed in this forum to expand the author's point to a broader commentary, which I did.

The result in either situation is identical. Your technical distinction is exactly that.

I contend primarily that when well informed, one cannot reach any conclusion other than that he would receive nearly identically unsatisfactory results from either party, and therefore, not voting is rational.

I also agree that when ill-informed, a category into which almost everyone falls in re politics given the inherent dishonesty and vacant soundbite nature of the information provided in the process, not voting is also rational. But it's an accidental exercise of rational behavior, which I guess would have to be retitled "good luck," in that you were lucky enough to not have wasted an hour of your day engaged in something futile.

Sebby is Roger Daultry's Sock?
 

• The rocker, who used to sing about my g-generation, added: "My answer is to burn all the f***ing oil as quick as possible and then the politicians will have to find a solution.”
  

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,4-2007230155,00.html

Sebby is Roger Daultry's Sock?
 

Daltry... Daltry.

Townsend's always had my proxy in describing the difference between elected "bosses." Nice to see Roger has a brain as well.

Rumsfeld's Rules
 

Romney leads in Iowa
 

I wouldn't have guessed it, and it's still early, yet he does.

Romney's penchant for pretty dramatic flip-flopping and pandering to whoever's holding the microphone has been exhaustively documented already, and while I found it disturbing, I guess I've got to consider the fact that many (likely Republican primary voters) don't. Perhaps, as Yglesias speculates, it has something to do with whether the newly-flopped position is something with which you already substantively agree anyway. If so, then maybe you see it less as "pandering," and more as "seeing the light."

Gattigap

immigration
 

I don't know much about the new immigration deal. Mark Kleiman says:

• The Republicans' cynicism is showing. They seem to have held out for "guest-workers" as the one piece they wouldn't budge on. That's the piece that's most advantageous to exploitative employers, and most disadvantageous to low-skilled U.S. workers. And it creates a pool of potential new "illegals": some people will overstay their guest-worker visas who wouldn't have risked crossing the border illegally. At the same time, the absurdly long citizenship process for the newly-regularized immigrants does nothing to reduce their labor-market or social impact, but it does a lot to protect Republicans' partisan interest in not creating new Latino voters.

linkyu

Gonzo Gonzales
 

So, any bets on when Golzales is Gonzo?

Specter said yesterday he'd soon be gone, but the Pres. has now weighed in defending him again - how many times does he get to sign this refrain?

Gonzo Gonzales
 

Depends on how important W views the DOJ.


George Will: Gonzales can stay on as attorney general just as long as “you’re indifferent to the damage done to one of the most important departments in our government.”

http://tpmcafe.com/blog/specialguest..._monday_may_21

Gonzo Gonzales
 

Isn't W just glad people are talking about something other than Iraq?

Gonzo Gonzales
 

Has Giuliani voiced an opinion on the Gonzales Justice Department?

eta: I see that before Gonzales testified, Giuliani said he should receive the benefit of the doubt. I haven't found anything from Giuliani addressing the issue since then. Why haven't reporters been asking him about this? I'd be interested in his perspective as a former USA.

come to mama
 

This may be an olive branch to bring Penske to the table?

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...=1178708655924

• Egypt: Fatwa allows breast-feeding among adults
  
  Al-Azhar University, one of Sunni Islam's most prestigious institutions, ordered one of its clerics Monday to face a disciplinary panel after he issued a controversial decree allowing adults to breast-feed.
  
  Ezzat Attiya had issued a fatwa, or religious edict, saying adult men could breast-feed from female work colleagues as a way to avoid breaking Islamic rules that forbid men and women from being alone together.
  
  In Islamic tradition, breast-feeding establishes a degree of maternal relation, even if a woman nurses a child who is not biologically hers. It means the child could not marry the nursing woman's biological children.
  
  Attiya - the head of Al-Azhar's Department of Hadith, or teachings of the Prophet Muhammad - insisted the same would apply with adults. He argued that if a man nursed from a co-worker, it would establish a family bond between them and allow the two to work side-by-side without raising suspicion of an illicit sexual relation.

Excellent news! We're going to start training Iraqi troops to take control of their own country.

• President Bush and his senior military and foreign policy advisers are beginning to discuss a “post-surge” strategy for Iraq that they hope could gain bipartisan political support. The new policy would focus on training and advising Iraqi troops rather than the broader goal of achieving a political reconciliation in Iraq, which senior officials recognize may be unachievable within the time available.
  
  The revamped policy, as outlined by senior administration officials, would be premised on the idea that, as the current surge of U.S. troops succeeds in reducing sectarian violence, America’s role will be increasingly to help prepare the Iraqi military to take greater responsibility for securing the country.
  
  “Sectarian violence is not a problem we can fix,” said one senior official. “The Iraqi government needs to show that it can take control of the capital.” U.S. officials offer a somber evaluation of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki: His Shiite-dominated government is weak and sectarian, but they have concluded that, going forward, there is no practical alternative.

David Ignatius, via Sadly, No!

Well, if not their country, at least Baghdad. Best not to set our sights to high -- this conflict is just getting started, right?

This makes so much sense that you wonder why no one thought of it before.

I thought they said they had trained 300,000 Iraqis. Where did they go?

They really exist, but were moved to Syria.

Classy.
 

• After the incident, there were recriminations over what [James] Comey portrayed as an attempt by Bush's top lawyer and chief of staff to "take advantage" of a very ill man. Comey didn't tell the Senate panel that the bad feelings were stoked even more the next morning when White House officials explained the hospital visit by saying Gonzales and Card were unaware that Comey was acting A.G.
  
  ....Just days earlier, Justice's chief spokesman had publicly said Comey would serve as "head of the Justice Department" while Ashcroft was ill. Justice officials had also faxed over a document to the White House informing officials of this. When a Gonzales aide claimed the counsel's office could find no record of it, DOJ officials dug out a receipt showing the fax had been received. "People were disgusted as much as livid," said the DOJ official. "It was just the dishonesty of it."

Newsweek

Classy.
 

I know the No Confidence vote is just a message to strongly urge Fredo to resign, but he's not getting eat. Just impeach the motherfucker already.

Classy.
 

Yeah, but they didn't produce evidence that Gonzales' dog DIDN'T EAT that fax, did they? Huh? No. I didn't think so.

I hope he gets the nomination. By Ron Paul:

• Regardless of what the media tell us, most white Americans are not going to believe that they are at fault for what blacks have done to cities across America. The professional blacks may have cowed the elites, but good sense survives at the grass roots. Many more are going to have difficultly avoiding the belief that our country is being destroyed by a group of actual and potential terrorists -- and they can be identified by the color of their skin. This conclusion may not be entirely fair, but it is, for
  many, entirely unavoidable.
  
  Indeed, it is shocking to consider the uniformity of opinion among blacks in this country. Opinion polls consistently show that only about 5% of blacks have sensible political opinions, i.e. support the free market, individual liberty, and the end of welfare and affirmative action. I know many who fall into this group personally and they deserve credit--not as representatives of a racial group, but as decent people. They are, however, outnumbered. Of black males in Washington, D.C, between the ages of 18 and 35, 42% are charged with a crime or are serving a sentence, reports the National Center on Institutions and Alternatives. The Center also reports that 70% of all black men in Washington are arrested before they reach the age of 35, and 85% are arrested at some point in their lives. Given the inefficiencies of what D.C. laughingly calls the "criminal justice system," I think we can safely assume that 95% of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal.
  
  If similar in-depth studies were conducted in other major cities, who doubts that similar results would be produced? We are constantly told that it is evil to be afraid of black men, but it is hardly irrational. Black men commit murders, rapes, robberies, muggings, and burglaries all out of proportion to their numbers.

http://www.nizkor.org/ftp.cgi/people...92/gannon.0793

keeping SS's post count down.
 

A few months ago I wouldn't think this worth posting, but now that i understand the bar on what constitutes a "scandal" clearly this needs to go up. When will they impeach this guy?



http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...434/1009&imw=Y

• Bush caught driving without a seat belt
  
  WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush found himself in a flap Tuesday over seat belt use, a day after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began a campaign to encourage drivers to buckle up.
  
  Cameras caught Bush without his seat belt while driving a pickup on his Texas ranch last weekend, giving a tour to NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.

keeping SS's post count down.
 

Bush drived, people died.

keeping SS's post count down.
 

That was Laura.

keeping SS's post count down.
 

Maybe she should be the go-between with Teddy Kennedy?

keeping SS's post count down.
 

I thought the second time was farce.
 

Niall Ferguson:

• ... George W Bush's dominant character traits, his decisiveness and tenacity, at first appeared to be strengths. But once he had been convinced by his advisers that the attacks of 9/11 furnished a pretext for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, these became weaknesses.
  
  As in Macbeth, King George was soon "in blood stepp'd in so far" that turning back seemed no more attractive than wading onward. Remember: the corpses that litter this stage can already be counted in the tens, if not the hundreds, of thousands.
  
  And, as in King Lear, the whole catastrophe has stemmed from a fatal confusion at the outset between the true and the false, enemy and friends. Lear succumbs to the flattery of the ugly sisters, Regan and Goneril, and casts out the blunt but honest Cordelia (not to mention the straight-talking Kent). The mistaken identity in the tragedy of King George was that of the real enemy in the post-9/11 War on Terror.
  
  It is almost certain that the 19 hijackers hailed from Saudi Arabia (15), the United Arab Emirates (2), Egypt (1) and Lebanon (1). The chief architect of the plot, Osama bin Laden, was also a Saudi. Contrast this list of countries with the list of members of the "Axis of Evil" identified by President Bush in his famous speech of January 2002 as "regimes that sponsor terror [and] threaten America... with weapons of mass destruction": North Korea, Iran and Iraq. President Bush was quite right to target Afghanistan in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, since the Taliban regime was sheltering al-Qaeda's leadership. But the decision to overthrow Saddam was one of history's great non sequiturs.
  
  The real enemy in the Global War on Terror is not the Axis of Evil but the Axis of Allies. Today, the countries most likely to produce another 9/11 are not Iran, much less North Korea, but countries long regarded as (after Israel) America's most reliable allies in the Greater Middle East. Step forward Saudi Arabia (almost certainly still the biggest source of funding for radical Islamists) and Pakistan (very definitely their one-stop shop for nuclear weaponry).
  
  There is, in short, a twist in this tale. Before the curtain can fall on The Tragedie of King George, we need at least three more scenes to decide the fates of three crucial characters - the only principals still left standing aside from King George himself.
  
  First, we need a scene in Israel. Since the failure of the war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's popularity has been in free fall. His current approval rating is around 2 per cent, by comparison with which King George is a pop idol. Somehow, despite the resignation of his foreign minister, Mr Olmert is still clinging to political life. But he surely cannot last much longer. What happens next will be crucial, for if Binyamin Netanyahu returns to power, the probability of a military confrontation with Iran goes up above 50 per cent.
  
  Remember, Mr Netanyahu is on record as comparing the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, with Hitler. "It is the year 1938," Netanyahu recently declared, "and Iran is Germany." I suspect his private views are not so very far removed from those of the renowned Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld, the professor of military history at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
  
  Van Creveld is deeply pessimistic about Israel's future, menaced on one side by an increasingly violent and fissiparous Palestinian population and on the other by a would-be nuclear Iran. But he expects his country at least to go down fighting.
  
  "We possess several hundred atomic warheads and rockets and can launch them at targets in all directions," van Creveld declared in an interview in September 2003. "We have the capability to take the world down with us. And I can assure you that this will happen before Israel goes under."
  
  Then we need a scene in Saudi Arabia. Here the key figure is Prince Bandar bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz al Saud who, as Saudi ambassador to the United States, was one of the leading advocates of the attack on Iraq. Since October 2005 he has been back in Riyadh as Secretary-General of the National Security Council, where he is said to be lobbying hard for another attack: this time (you guessed it) on Iran.
  
  Finally, the action needs to shift eastwards to Pakistan, where it is the future of General Pervez Musharraf that hangs in the balance. Eight days ago, 40 people died in rioting in Karachi, apparently as a result of attempts by pro-government forces to discourage a rally by disgruntled lawyers, who have been incensed by Musharraf's decision to oust the head of the Supreme Court.....

link

Middle East or Middle America?
 

So, a devotee of Jerry Falwell planned to blow up a gay rights protest group at Falwell's funeral yesterday. Did he get this idea from evangelical training or bin Laden?