Pangloss

You see Emanuel as a neo-conservative? Really? The architect of universal health care? Gee.

That is one of the ways "democracy" is defined in this day and age.

I believe they do.

So you'd be okay with an American running for your Prime Minister? If so I applaud your consistency but I don't think the majority of your fellow countrymen would agree. At any rate it's a moot point -- it's written into the constitution, so we can't elect an outsider even if we want to.

I think "the world" will have criticisms of Obama on some issues, but will also have many compliments on other issues. I think it's a matter of overall opinion. People do see these things as building up over time and multiple issues. I think a good example of this can be seen in the issue of the Kyoto agreement, which preceded 9/11. Had that been the world's only complaint about George W. Bush, he might well have departed his presidency with a high public opinion both at home and abroad, assuming he made other decisions that they agreed with. In fact I would even go as far as to say that had we only invaded Afghanistan, and not Iraq, he would have a much higher public opinion abroad (and at home).

I agree, and what you're looking at is one of those areas where Obama will be more moderate than many in Congress. They want to legislate a move to the left that is neither desirable nor good for Democrats. The airwaves are much more diverse and balanced than they were 40 years ago, so this is a very partisan thing, intended to silence opposition. And they're not going to fool anyone with their "when we have"'s and "when you've got"'s.

I didn't say they have to, I said they will.

Conan O'Brien said tonight that Palin was asked if she would run for President in 2012, and she responded that that was too far away to predict. After all, she might be a great-great-grandmother by then!

Cute. Here too Alaskan law is ultimately irrelevent, just as it was with regard to his conviction in Federal court. Ostensibly Alaskan authorities have a say in the matter, but it will likely be moot. The Senate will expel Stevens of its own accord. And that will be an interesting show in itself, because the Senate has not expelled a member since the Civil War. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_senators_expelled_or_censured

I have a 3G model. I don't want to bug you with endless questions about it, but if you could suggest some links for me to pursue I'd be much obliged -- maybe just some stuff to point me in the right direction? I really love it, btw. I'm even considering picking up a Mini just so I can mess around with some software ideas. I'm interested in exploring applets designed to interact with ASP.NET-based web sites, for companies that want/have MS web portals/infrastructures but throw iPhones at their field people. I'm also toying with the idea of games built with Torque, but that's mostly for teaching purposes.

It's an interesting idea gathering the military into a single unit, but think the effect of that move would not be significant change. As you point out, the military is already unified in purchasing, and the influences within the Pentagon that try to skew purchasing would not change under that arrangement -- pilots are still pilots, skippers are still skippers, ground-pounders are still ground-pounders. I think we could have some interesting discussions along these lines, though, and I don't think your suggestion is without merit. I'm not sure if the rest of the board is interested. I wouldn't mind pondering some serious change in military spending.

It sounds like you may also be proceeding on the false assumption that the concession speech carries legal significance. It is not part of the process in any way that I'm aware of.

You can point at me with "Obamaniac" comments if you want. I plead temporary insanity.

Doesn't that void my warranty or something? Or am I thinking of unlocking?

I think Bascule's Corrolary to Godwin's Law is like slavery. Yup, works.

The Federal Election Commission is responsible for certifying candidates. The charge at the moment is that the process is insufficiently thorough. I.E. they didn't actually inspect Obama's birth certificate (Berg charged that an image on a web site was insufficient and too easily faked -- his flaw of course being that he offered no evidence that this was the case, which is why I say the case was dismissed for lack of evidence, not because his claim was disproved).

I disagree. But even then there was at least some indication of his intentions ahead of time, which is not the case here.

Evidence of Obama's desire for moderacy and aisle-crossing came today in the selection of Rahm Emanuel for Chief of Staff. Emanuel is a prominent member of the centrist New Democrat Coalition and one of the bigger names behind the party's move to the center and sweeping up of persuadable moderate voters that produced Obama's victory. He's a House member at the moment, but was a senior adviser in the Clinton administration, and, in a fact which I'm sure will infuriate many, headed up Clinton's failed health care strategy. That will be an interesting battle, given that the issue of universal health care has become a moderate/centrist position and is no longer an extreme view, but now the question arises as to affordability given the vast deficits. In fact so dominant is the deficit issue at the moment that I expect we'll only see the health care issue addressed after the former (which is also what I think should be done). But we'll see what happens. http://www.reuters.com/article/vcCandidateFeed7/idUSN0550209820081105

Well by that logic he should STILL not have made a concession speech, nor can we call Obama "president-elect", because nothing is actually determined until the delegates meet for the Electoral College and cast their actual electoral votes. I believe that happens in December. I guess it wasn't mathematically impossible for him to win, but it is accurate to say that there was more than sufficient certainty there to declare Obama the winner. Note that the race was not called until the polls were closed on the west coast.

Well I'll concede that -- I don't think that question has been fully resolved yet, at any rate. The Opera story last week seems to acknowledge that point as well, in that it's not at all clear exactly what happened there. The initial story that they submitted it and it was rejected appears to be false, and in retrospect didn't make a whole lot of sense anyway, since Safari isn't sold, but rather is built-in, so for Apple to put it on the AppStore would cost them nothing.

It's funny you ask, because ABC News' John Stossel, who is known for his libertarian views, did a piece for 20/20 a few weeks ago about how the Dems and Repoobs have more or less locked things down. The piece was mainly about campaign finance reform but it also had some interesting bits about how difficult the two parties have made it to enter a race as an independent. http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Stossel/ The main problem is not so much the filing paperwork but the laws (mainly regarding contributions) that you have to follow once your campaign is in place. In terms of your question about a 32-year-old running for President, that one is specifically written into the Constitution so the paperwork would (I presume) just be rejected. If for some reason various authorities decided to allow it to pass, the question would be put before a court and rejected there. Even the Supreme Court couldn't grant that person permission to run for that office. The only legal remedy would be an amendment to the constitution, ratified by the states (2/3rds?). You hear that talked about with regard to Arnold Schwarzenegger sometimes (hey cool, Schwarzenegger is in Firefox's spelling dictionary, rofl).

Pure fear mongering. There's no logical reason to suspect such a thing.

I'm confused, why do you guys think McCain conceded too early? It was mathematically impossible for him to win when he came out and gave that speech.

On the "drooling idiot" subject I have to say I was surprised by my own emotional reaction last night. Maybe it's just me, but I worked very hard to make as objective an assessment as possible in this election and make my choice based on logic and intelligence and my basic ideology of middle ground and non-partisanship. So you could have knocked me over with a spoon when I found myself chanting "yes we can" at the television screen, like I was some sort of hypnotized zealot. But I dimly remember the way Ronald Reagan took the country by storm in 1980, and this is really not all that different. I think it's just been a while since a politician really captured our imaginations this thoroughly. But listen, I understand your reticence, and even applaud it. People SHOULD be skeptical. Skepticism is going to be just as important as it always has been. The last thing we want is to just swing the pendulum to the left as far as it will go and hope for the best. That won't cut it.

I agree, but that doesn't make it any less odd or incomprehensible to me. (shrug) Your slippery slope argument doesn't work (I know, because I used to use it myself), because we do specific grantings of exceptions under law in this country all the time.