patrick.net

Reality says

I already pointed out the vacuous nature of your so-called "form." In the latest exercise of your "form" you assumed the the political leaning of a city must reflect the top university there; that is obviously false. The very top example you gave was MIT in Cambridge, when MIT engineers are about the only registered Republicans (besides some Harvard Republicans) in a city that is 12:1 in registered D to R ratio.

Jesus fucking Christ...

My brother graduated from MIT as an engineering major. I've spent many an hour interacting with MIT engineers. If you think they are conservative or Republicans, you are completely fucking ignorant. It's laughably ridiculous.

Reality says

It simply wrong to bifurcate the society into liberals vs. conservatives, and ascribe all that is good and holy to one, and evil to the other.

Now that is a Straw Man argument.

Dan8267 says

I love it when people presume they know what goes on in my mind. It demonstrates that a simple mind will always see simplicity in a complex system.

I dont presume. I wrote my comment based on what you wrote. Liberals smart, conservatives dumb... Liberals = smart engineers that go to top prestigious schools, conservatives = dumb religious zealots.... that is essentially what you wrote. am I wrong?

Dan8267 says

Between 30% and 80% of religious conservative Americans believe that

- Creationism, not evolution, explains how life became what we see

- The sun revolves around the Earth

- Obama is a Muslim

- Witchcraft is real

- Demonic possessions are real

- Prayer can cure diseases

Try finding an atheist who believes any of the above crap.

Again, why do you automatically define the conservative party as religious zealots? This was the entire point I was trying to make. BTW, atheist by definition wouldnt believe any of the above... so whats your point? haha

Dan8267 says

Meccos says

The fact of the matter is that our politicians regardless of what side of the aisle they sit, are full of dumb, dishonest, irrational people

And no one would argue with that. However, based on ample empirical evidence, today's Republicans in Congress are dumber than their Democratic counterparts. Do I really need to quote Todd Akin or Ted Stevens? And the median Republican voter is dumber than the median Democratic voter, and given the "news" they listen to, that's not surprising…

Again here u go... liberals good, conservatives bad.

BTW if you want to talk about stupid voters.. here you go

http://www.youtube.com/embed/mm1KOBMg1Y8

Dan8267 says

Meccos says

ALthough you claim to be a "smart" engineer.... based on your previous comments and generalizations I find you all but smart and rather moronic.

I'm sorry, you must have me mistaken with someone who gives a damn about your opinion.

oh im sure you care just a little at least.

Dan8267 says

Evidently the link limit is 5, not 10, as the webserver states.

man how much time did you waste looking for all these links... you realize i wont read any of them

Meccos says

Again here u go... liberals good, conservatives bad.

BTW if you want to talk about stupid voters.. here you go

And no Obama supporter is a liberal. At best a liberal will vote against Obama's opponent because Obama is the lesser or the two evils. That's hardly support.

Oh, and none of those voters look like MIT engineers.

Meccos says

Dan8267 says

Evidently the link limit is 5, not 10, as the webserver states.

man how much time did you waste looking for all these links... you realize i wont read any of them

None at all. Just click on the user comment link, then right-click, repaginate unlimited, and control+F Obama [ENTER]. You see, some of us actually know how to use computers.

As for you not reading the links. That is neither surprising nor the point. The point is you demonstrated that you are a willfully ignorant ass by stating that you won't read them. This illustrates to everyone reading this thread why your opinions don't count for shit.

Dan8267 says

Meccos says

Again here u go... liberals good, conservatives bad.

BTW if you want to talk about stupid voters.. here you go

And no Obama supporter is a liberal. At best a liberal will vote against Obama's opponent because Obama is the lesser or the two evils. That's hardly support.

You are right.. no TRUE liberal would support Obama... nor any current democrat nor repub. With that said, your comments above regarding "liberals" speak volumes against what you say here.

Dan8267 says

Oh, and none of those voters look like MIT engineers.

no but they were democrats though...

Dan8267 says

As for you not reading the links. That is neither surprising nor the point. The point is you demonstrated that you are a willfully ignorant ass by stating that you won't read them. This illustrates to everyone reading this thread why your opinions don't count for shit.

No, its just that you are not worth that much of my time.... 30 mins is all I can offer you. good night!

zzyzzx says

Blacks admit to electing stupid people.

How often do whites admit to doing the same thing?

zzyzzx says

If you think engineers tend to be liberals, you obviously don't know any. Meaning maybe not even one.

BS. Actually, I have known quite a few, and they are more likely to be democrats. I won't say liberal, because for example 90% of democrats in fed govt and Obama for that matter, are to the right of where Nixon and Reagan were.

Only dimbulbs who are overly affected by the right wing entertainment complex and their own tribal or team mentality can't see how far to the right todays republicans are.

Engineers who are republicans tend to be really quiet about it. Because they know very many people who are more intelligent than them who are "liberal." They don't want to have a reputation for being a dummy, so they have learned it's best to keep their opinions to themself.

Besides, on some level they also know that their opinions are illogical and based on emotion and irrational thinking. So not only do they not want intelligent friends and colleagues to know, the truth is they do not even themselves want to be reminded of the total lack of logic behind their beliefs.

re: "Blacks admit to electing stupid people"

We all elect stupid people, so, ummm....?

The poster wth the Marion Barry quote is interesting. If Bush had said that, it wouldn't even make the list of the stupidist (or stupidist sounding)
things he said.

All those uber smart leftists that are constantly ragging on conservatives, sound very racist to me. The most conservative sects of american society are blacks and hispanics. Makes me wonder if the reason that the left repeats the meme that conservatives are stupid, is because they think non whites are inherently stupid.

Also, I always hear about how bad of a president bush and obama are/were. Rarely, if ever, do people criticize "the first black president", when he and his admin laid plenty the groundwork for the mess we find ourselves in today.

When "everyone knows" something, its usually wrong. The economy was so good in the 90s that nobody bothers to criticize the clinton years, but truth is, he was just as bad a pres if not worse

errc says

All those uber smart leftists that are constantly ragging on conservatives, sound very racist to me. The most conservative sects of american society are blacks and hispanics. Makes me wonder if the reason that the left repeats the meme that conservatives are stupid, is because they think non whites are inherently stupid.

Obligatory:

Meccos says

No, its just that you are not worth that much of my time.... 30 mins is all I can offer you. good night!

Whereas when I respond to you it's not for your sake but so that all others don't fall into the mistake of listening to a fool.

Dan8267 says

#8 Purdue University

West Lafayette, IN

Conservative

As an alum, I have to point out that Purdue isn't THAT conservative. By Bay Area standards it is, but for Indiana its moderate to left wing. Obama's campaign did a lot of organizing among Purdue students in 2008 and that may have been decisive in turning the state blue for the first (and probably last) time in my lifetime

bdrasin says

As an alum, I have to point out that Purdue isn't THAT conservative

Fair enough. I wanted to err on the side of overestimating the conservative nature of the top engineering schools to demonstrate that most engineers are liberals.

I'm still not sure what is STUPID about Marion Barry?

Is he DUMBER than any other elected official in some measure?

He got caught doing something illegal. He bounced back from it.

What he said in that quote is TRUE. He wanted to tell the facts in the way that cast the best light on his district. Because after all the job of a politician is to REPRESENT and be a booster for their constituents. I may not like it, but 99% of it is like advertising, it's bullshit. But is it a LIE or STUPID? No.

Does a politican EVER SAY "we are proud of our 32 murders this year"? No, they say "we are proud homicides are down X% from last year".

David Vitter of Louisiana got outed for frequenting prostitutes, and he's still in office. So did only black people vote for him? Or what?

White evangelicals seem to like a lot DUMBASS YOUNG EARTH CREATIONISTS who think the world is only 6,000 years old and have a lot of anti-science goop clogging their brains. So do "whites admit to electing stupid people" too?

This thread is racist.

Dan8267 says

Fair enough. I wanted to err on the side of overestimating the conservative nature of the top engineering schools to demonstrate that most engineers are liberals.

Surveys I've seen of engineers lean towards "fiscally conservative, socially liberal". But I expect there's some variation between say mechanical engineers and people on the "softer side" as engineering has expanded some of them are nearly management majors. I think of Industrial Systems Engineers like that.

Vicente says

Surveys I've seen of engineers lean towards "fiscally conservative, socially liberal".

Yep, I'd agree with that. "Fiscal conservatism" has absolutely nothing to do with "social conservatism". The former means living within your means, staying out of debt, taking only calculated risks, having a fiscal safety net (6 months living expenses). The later refers to the social politics of the right (anti-gay, anti-immigrant, anti-regulation, pro-hunting, pro-tradition).

In fact, why even refer to fiscal conservatism as conservatism when it has nothing to do with social conservatism, which is the big set of wedge issues between the two parties, and it has little to do with the fiscal politics of the Republican Party? With the exception of Ron Paul, there hasn't been a fiscally conservative Republican president since Eisenhower. Maybe Nixon was somewhat close, but Reagan and his Republican successors sure aren't.

Dan8267 says

Maybe Nixon was somewhat close [to being fiscally conservative].

Hardly. Nixon campaigned on a "secret plan to end the war" in Viet Nam, then escalated and continued it until he was forced to resign due to the Watergate scandal. Nixon also christened the "War on Drugs," which continues to waste billions annually. When Nixon's spending and other factors caused inflation to increase, he tried to take over the whole economy with wage and price controls, which of course didn't work so then he took the USD off the gold standard. Nixon was too greedy and paranoid and egotistical, as presented in Frost/Nixon, to adhere to the discipline of fiscal conservatism, which requires an essential modesty.

The basic premise of deficit spending is, "We know better how to spend the wages of future generations than they can ever know themselves." It is the same premise as the religious fundamentalists and pseudo-"liberals" who say, "We know better how other people should live their own lives than they can ever know themselves." Both of these false premises enable imperial patronage networks to rationalize maximizing their own power, which is the goal all along. Fiscal conservatism, and social liberalism, both reflect a philosophy more like what the founders of the republic believed, and that has more recently been called essentialism, i.e. the idea that we don't know everything, in fact we don't know nearly as much as we hope future generations will know, and so we try to promote liberty for people to pursue their own various destinies.

To the extent that founding philosophy was related to Christianity, it was in the basic principles of trying to see each person as created in the unique image and likeness of God, not "young earth" creationism or the dietary/clothing/sexual restrictions of Leviticus and Paul. But, there were profound disagreements about what individual states should do; Jefferson believed states should not promote religion, while Madison believed they should. That argument has been playing out ever since.

In the context of the OP, Nixon illustrates that white voters don't always make smart choices either. Even after the publication of the Pentagon Papers, which became the lead story on the evening news on every channel, and which were entered in their entirety into the published Senate record by the great and brave Senator Mike Gravel, nevertheless Americans re-elected Nixon by a margin of 20 points. Coincidentally, that's the same margin by which white voters 40 years later chose - almost incredibly - Romnesia. And Nixon was up against a white guy, Senator George McGovern, whom RFK had described as possibly the only decent man in the Senate.

Dan8267 says

Whereas when I respond to you it's not for your sake but so that all others don't fall into the mistake of listening to a fool.

Yes I am the fool, yet you are the one making moronic generalizations like this:

Dan8267 says

Liberals like me created the advanced technologies, not corporations. Individual engineers, human beings, are responsible for every single technological advancement ever made.

Furthermore, we engineers tend be to damn liberal and graduate from liberal colleges like MIT, CalTech, Berkeley. There aren't too many engineers coming out of the Jimmy Swaggart Bible College.

Smart, educated people tend to be rational, liberal, science-oriented atheists whether you like it or not. I'm the perfect example of this.

Oh cuz you know if you went to a liberal university you are automatically a liberal right? oh yeah and the only "smart" people in the world are engineers... hahaha this is laughable

curious2 says

Hardly. Nixon campaigned on a "secret plan to end the war" in Viet Nam, then escalated and continued it until he was forced to resign due to the Watergate scandal. Nixon also christened the "War on Drugs," which continues to waste billions annually. When Nixon's spending and other factors caused inflation to increase

Fair enough... So the last Republican president that we can claim was a fiscal conservative by any reasonable criteria is Eisenhower, over 52 years ago. So how are Republicans the party of fiscal conservatism?

Dan8267 says

Fair enough... So the last Republican president that we can claim was a fiscal conservative by any reasonable criteria is Eisenhower, over 52 years ago. So how are Republicans the party of fiscal conservatism?

Dan,

Although you point out the fact that repubs are not fiscally conservative, the fact is that NEITHER repubs nor democrats are fiscally conservative.

Meccos says

Yes I am the fool, yet you are the one making moronic generalizations like this:

You can assert as much as you want. I provided ample evidence to back up my claims. You have presented no evidence to back up yours. 'Nuff said.

Meccos says

oh yeah and the only "smart" people in the world are engineers...

Meccos says

Dan's implication that smart people are engineers

Unlike you, Vincente is smart enough to read my posts and realize that I've said, engineers are smart people, not all smart people are engineers.

Meccos says

Although you point out the fact that repubs are not fiscally conservative, the fact is that NEITHER repubs nor democrats are fiscally conservative.

I never claimed that either anywhere. You'd realize that if you would shut the fuck up long enough to read other people's posts instead of skimming them. You'd be a lot more intelligent if you listened more than you spoke. Plus, fewer people would realize how dumb you are.

Dan8267 says

Meccos says

Yes I am the fool, yet you are the one making moronic generalizations like this:

You can assert as much as you want. I provided ample evidence to back up my claims. You have presented no evidence to back up yours. 'Nuff said.

Yes your quote that I copied wasn't evidence at all (the quote you conveniently excluded in your reply).... and the fact that you simply state you provide evidence is enough evidence to back your claim...

Dan8267 says

Meccos says

Yes I am the fool, yet you are the one making moronic generalizations like this:

You can assert as much as you want. I provided ample evidence to back up my claims. You have presented no evidence to back up yours. 'Nuff said.

Meccos says

oh yeah and the only "smart" people in the world are engineers...

Meccos says

Dan's implication that smart people are engineers

Unlike you, Vincente is smart enough to read my posts and realize that I've said, engineers are smart people, not all smart people are engineers.

Perhaps you should heed your own advice and read what I read more carefully. I never said you said all smart people are engineers. Rather you simply state the following moronic statements:
Dan8267 says

Liberals like me created the advanced technologies, not corporations. Individual engineers, human beings, are responsible for every single technological advancement ever made.

Furthermore, we engineers tend be to damn liberal and graduate from liberal colleges like MIT, CalTech, Berkeley. There aren't too many engineers coming out of the Jimmy Swaggart Bible College.

Smart, educated people tend to be rational, liberal, science-oriented atheists whether you like it or not. I'm the perfect example of this.

BTW, i like how you take this "straw man" argument which someone used against you and try to make it your own.

Dan8267 says

I never claimed that either anywhere. You'd realize that if you would shut the fuck up long enough to read other people's posts instead of skimming them. You'd be a lot more intelligent if you listened more than you spoke. Plus, fewer people would realize how dumb you are.

you mad dude? Its quite funny you go on this rant about how I should read things more carefully when in fact you should actually read what I wrote.
All i did was simply point out this fact that both repubs and demos fail to be fiscally conservative in response to you pointing out the repubs are not fiscally conservative. My point was that BOTH parties are not fiscally conservative. So what exactly did I accuse you of claiming? hahah Chill out bro and dont get your panties in a bunch.

Dan8267, before wasting more time on Meccos, you might want to check some of his other comments.

curious2 says

Dan8267, before wasting more time on Meccos, you might want to check some of his other comments.

True, Meccos is proof that some loads were meant to be swallowed.

Dan8267 says

curious2 says

Dan8267, before wasting more time on Meccos, you might want to check some of his other comments.

True, Meccos is proof that some loads were meant to be swallowed.

haha keep deleting my posts...

Meccos is the reason incest is illegal.

Dan8267 says

Meccos is the reason incest is illegal.

hahah... when you start getting so angry, you've lost the argument...

Shut up, you'll never be the man your mother is.

Dan8267 says

Shut up, you'll never be the man your mother is.

getting so personal.. and so angry... hahaha

Keep alleging that I'm angry. I'm sure people will believe you.

This is what angry sounds like...
http://www.youtube.com/embed/P2vkiLHiTcY

Dan8267 says

Keep alleging that I'm angry. I'm sure people will believe you.

This is what angry sounds like...

keep saying you are not and im sure you will believe it also...

Vicente says

Dan8267 says

Fair enough. I wanted to err on the side of overestimating the conservative nature of the top engineering schools to demonstrate that most engineers are liberals.

Surveys I've seen of engineers lean towards "fiscally conservative, socially liberal". But I expect there's some variation between say mechanical engineers and people on the "softer side" as engineering has expanded some of them are nearly management majors. I think of Industrial Systems Engineers like that.

Vincente, this whole post is so retarded I dont even know why I continue to comment on this. Dan's implication that smart people are engineers and that most top engineering universities are at more politically liberal schools and therefore smart people are liberals is such a stretch through loose associations that it is complete comedy.