What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

[Ryker77]

What you're not going to hear tonight at the debate of the vice presidential candidates? Well, you're not going to hear me, because they exclude Nader/Camejo in the debates—in spite of the fact that 57% of the people in the United States want Nader in the debates. What that means, of course, is that they do not respect the will of the people. In fact they will not inform what is happening to our people. The fact that over 30 years, 90% have received no increase in their income. When adjusted to inflation, in spite of the greatest growth in the economy ever in the history of the United States, they will not mention that corporations are no longer paying their taxes, estimated to be as high as $300 billion per year. Enough to not only cut across the deficit but to create the potential for incredible funding for education, health care, and other important issues the American people face. They will not mention that state and local taxes have now become regressive throughout the United States, where the richest people pay the lowest tax rate. They will not mention that corporations used to pay 33% of our income and now only pay 7.8% in taxes; and yet they continue to try to lower their taxes, as John Kerry suggested.

You will never hear one word of how the US supported Saddam Hussein for twenty years, supplied him with poison gas, sent Donald Rumsfeld to Iraq to give him hugs and kisses, or George Bush's public statement about what a good job Saddam Hussein was doing in Iraq. The fact is that their policies through the whole Middle East will never be discussed. Only one thing: How to get control of Iraq, how the US military can get domination and consolidate the dictatorship that it is establishing in Iraq.

You will not hear one word of how every single country in Europe, the Arab world, Latin America, Asia, and Africa opposes US policy. And you will never hear mention that Ralph Nader's positions are those of the overwhelming majority of the people of the world regarding Iraq and the Middle East.

You will never hear one word of how the entire world supports the Kyoto protocol and the World Court and the United States alone opposes them—opposes even the concept of the rule of law in the world.

You will not hear anything about the fact that all of Europe has universal health care, but the United States, the wealthiest country in the world, doesn't have it.

Or even, the most important, in order to be able to deal with these questions, that we do not have free elections in America. There is no run-off so that people are really free to vote for who they want. If a party gets twenty percent of the vote, they don't get 20 percent of the seats, like in almost every country of Latin America and Europe. The United States stands alone with the most under-developed electoral system, one that denies the people a real voice, or to hear the real choices. And as you'll see in the debates, it's obfuscation and a show to give the impression of election when the decisions have already been made and the argument is about who is going to better implement the same platform.

A vote for Nader/Camejo is a vote to open up the electoral system to allow free elections in America.

Peter Miguel Camejo

https://www.votenader.org

[Ryker77]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

Just a few issues bound to be missing in Cleveland's debate without Peter:

The unconstitutional war in Iraq
Health care for all
A living wage
Kyoto Protocol
Repeal of the Patriot Act
Taxing wealth, not work
The bloated defense budget
Corporate accountability for corporate crime
The criminal injustice system
The failed "Drug War" tax wasting
Public school funding epidemic
Privatization run rampant in our prisons
Trade agreements that universally raise labor standards
Israeli/Palestinian Peace Movement
Africa's AIDS pandemic
Electoral reform
Reform of the Commission on Presidential Debates


I don't like a few of Naders idea's but most of them I really like.

[PL456]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

so vote for nader and then move to europe...
1. This president sought for and received congressional approval for the use of force in Iraq.
2. Socialized medicine yields mediocre care and is the antithesis of a free-enterprise, competitve healthcare and business paradigm.
3. Are you poor, living in a cardboard box on the street with your tin cup asking for spare change? I am not and Im thankful. I choose to work. Anybody who chooses to educate themselves (with loans or FREE governmental grants) can get a good job.
4.Kyoto protocol would horribly injure American businesses plus it would place a tremendous burden on paying for the changes so rapidly. President Bush has placed environmental regulations that are to be phased in more gradually, easing this burden on businesses.
5.As far as the Patriot Act goes, if youre not doing anything wrong, why worry?
6.You get wealth from work. How do you think wealthy people got wealthy? The vast majority worked their butts off, sacrificed, and used their heads. They didnt sit around looking for a check.
7.Im glad we have the defense budget we have. How else do you recommend we defend ourselves? Should we cut back on the troops' field supplies? How about fewer troops overall so the ones that are in have to stay even longer?
8. CEO's should and do go to jail when they are caught cooking the books. Look at recent history. The SEC, IRS, and other fed agencies scrutinize the top companies the most.
9. I assume youre going to say something about disproportionate arrests and sentencing for certain offenders? Ill let you elaborate on that before I respond.
10. We are winning the war on drugs.
11. Public schools should be required to adhere to standards of efficacy prior to receiving funding. If they are failing, the students should be able to move to better schools.
12. We have too many prisoners and not enought govt money to build jails, feed them, give them their cable TV, and pay for their lawsuits over too much peanut butter being on their PB&J sandwiches. We have to farm some of this out to private companies.


Im tired and am going to bed...

[Ryker77]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

8. CEO's should and do go to jail when they are caught cooking the books. Look at recent history. The SEC, IRS, and other fed agencies scrutinize the top companies the most....

Why only the top companies. Why not ALL of them?


Martha Stewart. She got to PICK her jail location. I can assure you that anybody making less than 80k a year would not be able to pick there jail location.

[Ryker77]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

5.As far as the Patriot Act goes, if youre not doing anything wrong, why worry?...

Sure and while I am at it I'll give up my other rights. Like the right to bear arms.

I'm sorry but my grandfather and his 4 brothers, my dad, and myself did not serve in the military so that the American freedoms can be taken away.



Bob Barr, former Republican member of Congress (“Patriot Act divides Bush loyalists,” Washington Times, 4/5/2005)

“The Fourth Amendment is a nuisance to the administration, but the amendment protects citizens and legal immigrants from the government's monitoring them whenever it wants, without good cause -- and if that happens, it’s the end of personal liberty.”

“I don’t care if there were no examples so far. We can’t say we'll let government have these unconstitutional powers in the Patriot Act because they will never use them. Besides, who knows how many times the government has used them? They’re secret searches.”


Rep. C.L. "Butch" Otter (R-ID) ("Otter to speak on Patriot Act dissent," Idaho State Journal, 11/9/2003)

"You cannot give up freedom, you cannot give up liberty, and be safe. When your freedom is lost, it makes no difference who took it away from you. (The terrorists) have won. What did they want to do? Take away our freedom. They've won in some cases."

[Ryker77]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

10. We are winning the war on drugs.
...

You must live a sheltered life.

http://www.commondreams.org/views/081500-105.htm



The war on drugs has many effects, some good, more, in my opinion, bad. I propose here to concentrate on a single effect, the cost in human lives.

The accompanying chart plots the homicide rate per l00,000 population from 1910 to 1989. (All figures are drawn from the "Statistical Abstract of the United States," and "Historical Statistics of the United States." ) There was a steady rise through World War I, and then an even steeper rise when the 18th Amendment prohibiting the production, distribution and sale of alcoholic beverages became effective. That rise peaked in 1933, the year in which the Prohibition amendment was repealed. The homicide rate then fell, at first rapidly, and then more slowly to the mid-1950s, except for a brief but sharp rise during and after World War II-repeating the behavior during World War I. In the mid-1960s, the homicide rate started to rise, and then soared after the war on drugs was launched by President Nixon and continued by his successors.

The second series in the chart, the number of prisoners received, for which data are readily available to me only from 1925, confirms the effect of both alcoholic prohibition and drug prohibition on recorded criminality, though unlike the homicide rate it has recently risen to far higher rates than during the 1930s.

http://www.druglibrary.org/special/friedman/mf2-01b1.gif

the average rate of homicides and of prisoners received by decades from the 1950s on. The difference between the homicide rate in the 1980s and in the 1950s, adjusted for the current population of the U.S., implies almost 11,000 extra homicides per year; compared with the 1960s, more than 8,000. Similar estimates for prisoners received come to more than 80,000 extra prisoners compared with the 1950s, nearly 90,000 compared with the 1960s.


Granted that the whole of the difference may not be attributable to the war on drugs. Many other things were going on during the decades from the '50s to the '80s. However, there seems little doubt that the war on drugs is the single most important factor that produced such drastic increases. Even if only half the effect is attributed to the war on drugs, 5,000 extra homicides a year and 45,000 extra prisoners is a high cost, and that price does not include the lives lost in Colombia, Peru and elsewhere, because we cannot enforce our own laws, or the lives lost through adulterated drugs in a black market, or the culture of violence, disrespect for the law, corruption of law enforcement offi- cials and disregard of civil liberties unleashed by the war on drugs.

No doubt there have been some favorable effects of the war on drugs. There does appear to have been a considerable reduction in the casual use of drugs. But it is hard to believe that the good effects come anywhere close to being large enough to justify the human cost of the war on drugs in terms of lives lost and lives destroyed.

[Ryker77]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

Some more real info on the war on drugs.


The direct cost of the War on Drugs is something like 40 or 50 billion dollars per year
the federal government will spend 19 billion dollars this year
state and local law enforcement will add another 10 billion
we spend 10 or 20 billion dollars each year keeping drug users in prison
Indirect costs are estimated at 200 to 400 billion dollars per year
crime
disease
lost wages
lost taxes
And then there are the intangible costs
The United States now has 2 million people in prison
Drug laws are widely disregarded and erratically enforced, which diminishes respect for law and government
Drug laws fund organized crime and corrupt law enforcement
The War on Drugs is tearing apart foreign countries, like Columbia, and communities within our own country
War is Hell
OK, so war is hell, and expensive, besides. Perhaps this is the cost of victory.

No.

This is the cost of defeat. We're losing the war on drugs. To see this, we only have to look at the drug business. Drugs are a business, and any business has two sides

Demand
Demand for illegal drugs in this country is small and constant
10 million of us use marijuana
2 million use cocaine in some form
0.5 million use heroin
These numbers go up and down from year to year, but they go up and down by 5, or 10, or 20%. They've never changed by 50, or 100, or 200%. And the variation that we do see is more plausibly attributed to changes in demographics and epidemiology, than to law enforcement and the War on Drugs. The War on Drugs simply has no effect on the demand for drugs.
Supply
On the supply side, the story is even simpler: supply is up. Over the last decade, street prices for drugs have fallen—dramatically—while the purity of the drugs has increased. Whatever else it's doing, the War on Drugs is not restricting the supply of drugs. One reason that we are losing the War on Drugs is that we don't want to win it. There is not, in this country, any broad-based, principled objection to the use of drugs. We have legal drugs

alcohol
tobacco
caffeine
aspirin
prozac

These drugs are widely used. They can cause health problems; they can be abused. We largely accept this. Even people who abstain from drugs, for personal, health, or religious reasons, generally regard that as—well—as a personal, health or religions matter. They don't seek to impose their abstention on the rest of society.

Neither is there any principled objection to the use of illegal drugs. They are illegal, but 100 million of us have used them. As a society, we've made these drugs illegal, but as individuals, we don't object to their use.

Bill Clinton used marijuana, and we elected him president
George W. Bush won't deny that he used cocaine, and we elected him president, too
The use of illegal drugs, in and of itself, is not an issue for people in this country.

In summary, the War on Drugs

costs a lot of money
does a lot of damage
doesn't achieve its stated goals
and we don't even want it to achieve its stated goals

It's not the drugs; it's the war
What's going on? Why are we doing this?

It's not the drugs
It's the war
Nothing about the War on Drugs makes any sense in the context of drugs
Everything about the War on Drugs makes sense in the context of war
We aren't running the War on Drugs because we want to eradicate drugs
We're running the War on Drugs because we want to have a war.
More specifically, we're running the War on Drugs because it serves the interests of people in this country.

The United States is a democracy. Nothing

this big
this expensive
this destructive
can go on in the United States—for decades—without broad-based political support. The War on Drugs has constituencies. It has groups of people who support it because it serves their interests.

These groups don't have to support the War on Drugs for the same reasons. They don't have to support it for good reasons. They don't even have to support it for coherent reasons. All that is necessary for the War on Drugs to continue is that enough people get something out of it, and that it doesn't seriously inconvenience the middle class, which it doesn't.

Constituencies
So who are these groups? Who are the constituents of the War on Drugs? Let's start with the obvious ones.

The War on Drugs is an employment program for law enforcement. The War on Drugs employs
everyone in the Drug Enforcement Administration
people in the FBI, the INS, and the border patrol
state and local police officers
judges, and prosecuting attorneys, and defense attorneys
prison wardens, and prison guards
The War on Drugs has a big payroll, and everyone on that payroll has some interest in seeing the war continue.
The War on Drugs supports the prison industry. Since we've put 2 million people behind bars, building, supplying, and running prisons has become big business. This alignment of government and business in running the prison system is called the prison-industrial complex.
The War on Drugs serves the government. The government needs bogeymen. It needs threats that can be used to justify
military intervention
foreign intelligence operations
greater domestic police powers
For many years, the international communist conspiracy played this role, but that hasn't been so credible since communism collapsed 10 years ago. Today, the government invokes the specter of international drug cartels when it needs to generate support for some extra-legal, unconstitutional, or otherwise ill-advised use of force.

The War on Drugs serves the military-industrial complex. President Clinton asked for, and received, 1.3 billion dollars to send to Columbia to help them fight our War on Drugs. Of course, we didn't send a billion three in cash to Columbia, or even something moderately useful, like food or medicine. We sent them weapons. Built, of course, by American companies.
The War on Drugs serves politicians. Politicians

need simple, emotional issues to drive their campaigns
need issues that make good sound bites
need issues that polarize discussion, so that they can claim the high ground, and label their opponents weak, or naive, or evil
These are some of the obvious beneficiaries of the War on Drugs. There are also groups that benefit in more subtle ways.

The War on Drugs is an instrument of racial oppression. You won't find the words black, white, Caucasian, or Negro written into the laws, but the way the government treats drug users depends on the color of their skin. People with dark skin are treated more harshly at every level
police make more arrests
prosecutors file more charges
juries return more convictions
judges impose longer sentences
In a country that is mostly white, we have created a prison population that is mostly black.
The War on Drugs serves those who maintain political control by disenfranchising minorities. Convicted criminals generally can't vote; the ACLU estimates that the War on Drugs has permanently disenfranchised 14% of African-American men. We used to use poll taxes and literacy tests to keep people from voting; now we have the War on Drugs.
The War on Drugs serves those who fear racial minorities. The history of drug laws in this country is a history of racial fear. Drugs were never outlawed because European-Americans were using them. Drugs were outlawed because minorities were using them
Chinese-Americans
Mexican-Americans
African-Americans
the '60s youth counter-culture
There are, today, people who fear minorities; the War on Drugs preferentially imprisons minorities; therefore, these people perceive that the War on Drugs serves their interests.

The War on Drugs serves a society in search of scapegoats. Historically, people who needed someone to blame—or hate—had their choice of racial, ethnic, and religious groups. As Tom Lehrer famously observed in the song National Brotherhood Week:
The Protestants hate the Catholics
The Catholics hate the Protestants
The Hindus hate the Moslems
And everybody hates the Jews
And if you needed a less parochial target, there were always the Communists. But the Communists have evaporated, and garden-variety ethnic bigotry has become mostly unacceptable in public discourse.

Today, the War on Drugs provides us with scapegoats. We identify drug users as dangerous, and evil. We blame them for the troubles of our society, and herd them into prisons. And as our troubles persist, we imprison more and more drug users, for longer and longer terms, under harsher and harsher conditions, thinking that if we can only punish them enough, then surely our troubles will leave us.

Now what?
So where do we go from here? How do we stop the madness?

We have to acknowledge the cost, destruction, failure, and ultimate futility of the War on Drugs. We have to commit ourselves to ending it.
We have to confront those in power: those who currently benefit and profit from the War on Drugs. This won't be easy. Support for the War on Drugs in this country is broad and deep, and the interests that it serves overlap and interlock in complex ways. Furthermore, most of the people running the War on Drugs don't think they are doing something evil. Most of them think they are doing their jobs. And they think those jobs are important and necessary.
We have to create a vision of an alternative. The War on Drugs has been going on for so long that most people can no longer imagine a world without it. And the rhetoric of war has been effective: there is a unspoken—and unquestioned—assumption that the alternative to fighting this war is defeat. But this is a war that we are fighting against ourselves. The alternative isn't defeat, the alternative is peace.
To end the War on Drugs, all we have to do is stop fighting it

take the laws off the books
release the prisoners
leave the drug users alone
We'll still have drugs; we'll still have drug problems. We just won't have the war. We have to create a vision that makes this a credible alternative for people in this country. If we can create the vision, then we can end this war.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Notes
2 million people in prison
giving us the highest incarceration rate on the planet
100 million of us have used them
A few years ago, I was at a party in an affluent suburb of Boston. Upstairs, the hosts were serving alcohol; downstairs, the guests were smoking marijuana. The next-door neighbor, who happens to be a police officer, was invited, and witnessed this; it wasn't a problem.
extra-legal, unconstitutional, or otherwise ill-advised use of force
Manuel Noreiga was an agent of the United States in Panama. He was on the payroll of the U.S. army and the CIA for over 30 years. When he no longer served the United States—when he became an embarrassment—our government invaded Panama, captured Noreiga, brought him back to the U.S., tried, convicted, and imprisoned him on...drug charges.
military-industrial complex
It's easy to talk about the prison-industrial complex, and the military-industrial complex, and imagine these big, faceless corporations using lobbyists and campaign contributions to get their way with congress. And doubtless, a certain amount of that goes on. But it's important to remember that corporations have employees, and employees live in congressional districts. Congressmen don't like to do things that put their own constituents out of work. The War on Drugs has political support on many levels.
label their opponents weak, or naive, or evil
President Clinton didn't send all those weapons to Columbia because he's specially concerned about Columbia, or the War on Drugs, or even about employment in the defense industry. He did it to protect Democratic candidates in the 2000 elections from Republican charges that they are "soft on drugs". He knew the attacks were coming: George W. Bush made his name in Texas by locking up drug users.
keep people from voting
There doesn't have to be an explicit conspiracy to do this. You needn't imagine politicians in a smoke-filled room inventing the War on Drugs to get African-Americans off the voting rolls. All that is necessary is that the War on Drugs has that effect; therefore, it serves those who benefit from that effect. The political system is adaptive: it protects the interests of those in power.
history of racial fear
The movie Reefer Madness stands as a reminder of the hysteria that is the foundation of our drug laws


Let review a few key points.
the federal government will spend 19 billion dollars this year
state and local law enforcement will add another 10 billion. Couldn't 29 billion dollars put more law enforcement on the street. How about securing the border or better staffing the INS. Perhaps that 29 billion dollars could have prevented 9/11

The War on Drugs serves the military-industrial complex. President Clinton asked for, and received, 1.3 billion dollars to send to Columbia to help them fight our War on Drugs. Of course, we didn't send a billion three in cash to Columbia, or even something moderately useful, like food or medicine. We sent them weapons. Built, of course, by American companies. - Once again that money could have been better spent. Hell the US military is still using a basic m16 that was designed in the 1960's Yet we can buy and give weapons to other countries.

[JsJs24]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

[QUOTE=PL456]10. We are winning the war on drugs.[QUOTE]

You made some very good points once again Pl456, however, #10 is far from being right. Please go find some proof to show me that we are "winning" the war on drugs. Also, busting pot dealers does not help our safety in the war on drugs, it's the crack, heroin, coke, meth, pcp, opiates, and other prescription drugs that are killing people. Either way though, with marijuana included we are not winning the war on drugs, and we NEVER will no matter who is in office. Sorry for being pessimistic but that's my honest opinion.

[mick-G]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

I agree Js, it is a multi-billion dollar industry. There are too many ppl involved, even the gov, and many decision makers or paid off. To be honest i don't know why they just don't regulate some of these drugs like marijuana and coke. Make legal dosages of it and sell the pot like cigarettes and the coke in powder form. If your caught driving while on it you get a DUI. If it is legal it will wash out most of the crime and trafficing, because youll be able to get it at the drugstore. They do it in Denmark and the Netherlands and there is less crime.

[JsJs24]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

I agree Js, it is a multi-billion dollar industry. There are too many ppl involved, even the gov, and many decision makers or paid off. To be honest i don't know why they just don't regulate some of these drugs like marijuana and coke. Make legal dosages of it and sell the pot like cigarettes and the coke in powder form. If your caught driving while on it you get a DUI. If it is legal it will wash out most of the crime and trafficing, because youll be able to get it at the drugstore. They do it in Denmark and the Netherlands and there is less crime.

Good idea mick, definately marijuana should be legalized imo.

[PL456]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

yeah, you guys are right. I got too tired to type alot about the dope. The problem as I see with the dope is nobody forces people to do dope, its a choice. It is a big problem. Too many people are dying, or killing over dope. One more instance that we are living in a fallen world and people will be people and they will choose to kill themselves for a rush.

[PL456]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

Also, I dont worry about the govt taking away the right to bear arms. That will not happen in the near future, IMO. Vote Kerry into office, it'll happen quicker. I stand by my opinion that ANYBODY can see anything I have as far as business transactions, etc. for governmental purposes if they need to check something out as far as terrorism goes...Im not doing anything wrong. We as Americans are a fiercely private group and do not want the feds messing with anything they dont need to be messing with...true. But in this day and age of terror, etc., Ill do my part to help, even if it means taking off my shoes in the airport or letting some feds check some stuff out to try and catch a bad guy. Is the fear here with this anti-patriot act thing that the feds will go too far? Is that what yall are worried about?

[JsJs24]

Re: What the VP's won't talk about in the debate

Also, I dont worry about the govt taking away the right to bear arms. That will not happen in the near future, IMO. Vote Kerry into office, it'll happen quicker. I stand by my opinion that ANYBODY can see anything I have as far as business transactions, etc. for governmental purposes if they need to check something out as far as terrorism goes...Im not doing anything wrong. We as Americans are a fiercely private group and do not want the feds messing with anything they dont need to be messing with...true. But in this day and age of terror, etc., Ill do my part to help, even if it means taking off my shoes in the airport or letting some feds check some stuff out to try and catch a bad guy. Is the fear here with this anti-patriot act thing that the feds will go too far? Is that what yall are worried about?

I'm not worried about anything. I just have different views on why we're at war, and since I am in Iraq as much as I'm here I am considering this debate much more seriously. NOt to mention, Kerry and Edwards have a better plan for health care and prescription costs imo.