nerdgirl

The core issue is more than just who is or isn't enfranchised, by what criterion enfranchisement is granted, and who gets to craft/implement such policy. The underlying issue goes to whether participation in a democratic republic is an *inalienable right,* an *entitlement* or a *privilege*? Government (ideally and is supposed to) derives its just (and limited) powers from the people. Under the US government, the people do not derive their rights from the government. The distinction is incredibly important. The Ninth Amendment: "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people" was written to prohibit the government from infringing on those implicit and natural rights (to make them entitlements or privileges or deny them.) Jefferson's first draft of the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independant, that from that equal creation they derive rights, inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these ends, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles & organising it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness." Jefferson saw a fundamental connection amongst universal suffrage (to white men at that time), limiting tyranny of the government, and education. He wrote: “It has been thought that corruption is restrained by confined the right of suffrage to a few of the wealthier of the people: but it would be more effectually restrained by an extension of that right to such numbers as would bid defiance to the means of corruption” “But of all the views of this law none is more important, none is more legitimate, than that of rendering the people safe, as they are the ultimate, guardians of their own liberty. Apprising them of the past will enable them to judge of the future; it will avail them of the experience of other times and of other nations; it will quality them as judges of the actions of other men; it will enable them to know ambition under every disguise it may assume; and knowing it, to defeat its views. In every government on earth is some trace of human weakness, some germ of corruption and degeneracy, which cunning will discover, and wickedness insensibly open, cultivate, and improve. The people themselves therefore are its only safe depositories. And to render even them safe their minds must be improved to a certain degree. This indeed is not all that is necessary, tough it be essentially necessary. An amendment of our constitution must here in aid of the public education. The influence over government must be shared among all the people.” Our government, the Constitution, and the citizenry are strong enough to prosper with universal suffrage. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

something along those lines yes, except expanded beyond simple military service, society needs more than soldiers and the soldier experience to guide it. What percentage of the population has served in the military? The flip side is what percentage of the population are you proposing to disenfranchise? Is that really an effective strategy to address the inceasing civil-military divide? (And that's not just my assertion, GEN Petraeus and SecDef Gates have written/spoken on the topic). Since our government is based on rule of law, how about the criterion be that only those educated and certified (i.e., passed the bar) be allowed to vote? VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

this is a silly question.. the government ofc.. the same one who establishes every other criteria you live under in this country. how is more difficult.. who is easy. Fair enough in that there may have been some silly-ness in the rhyming. At the same time, someone is likely to resurrect Heinlein's Starship Troopers voting criterion. The "who" is neither "easy" nor evident to me. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Nope, two separate flights into DCA. Two separate pilots. Multiple announcements, including a 10-minute potty warning. VR/Marg p.s. that's why I put “no one may be out of their seat 30 minutes prior to landing” in quotes.

Who gets to establish the criterio? You, me, Mike Huckabee, or Bill Maher? This morning’s NPR "Weekend Edition" had a story about Sarah Boltuck, a 17-year old from Bethesda Maryland who was so motivated, interested, and informed (to know voting practices in her State for the last 100 years) in voting that she led a successful effort to have the State reinstate a practice allowing 17-yo’s who will be 18 by next year's general election to vote in this week’s primary. Another story from local news: http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/1207/482181.html. That’s fantastic! When somewhere around 50% of the eligible voting electorate voluntarily exercises their right to apathy/not vote, here’s a young person so excited about exercising the right to be engaged in the process! VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Anyone know when & why it returned? Last Monday night and again on flight up tonight, the captain made the “no one may be out of their seat 30 minutes prior to landing” announcement. The rule was suspended back (once) in July 2005 when Sec of DHS Chertoff announced his (first) re-organization of DHS: TSA press release. Did not hear that once during all of 2007 or single Jan 2008 flight into Washington National. Flight attendant did not have any specific information – indicated they re-started it on landings into DC last Friday. Quick search of TSA website (& Google) did not provide any answers. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

It's my understanding that the prime motivation behind the One Laptop per Child Project is education. Does the founder have a wider vision to development, perhaps? There may be additional non-obvious connections: The guy who started OLPC founded the MIT Media Lab ... which is where Mike Best did his PhD and worked as a research scientist prior to his current affiliation. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

If that were my area of expertise, my strategy would first be to look at the success stories and the places that are struggling – at times very slowly – toward success (e.g., Angola). Just as the US is not Mexico is not Canada … so Morocco and the Western Sahara are not Democratic Republic of Congo is not Tunisia is not Botswana. The latter is where I would start – look at Botswana, which got independence from Britain in the 1960s and which has had the highest per capita growth rate of any country world wide over the last 35 years, e.g., see KSG’s report from 2001 or the more recent CFR report “Botswana: An African Success Story Shows Strains.” Another case – Somaliland – a breakaway state (almost city-state like, in the UAE model) from Somalia, e.g., “Somaliland is an overlooked African success story,” which has had almost no international support and very little coverage. Why is Mauritius succeeding? I don’t know. My speculation is that the critical variable between success and breakdown (perhaps, such as is being observed in Kenya) comes down to the strength of institutions (& not just the usual ones) and governance. There’s some evidence that one factor to increase likelihood of successful transition to democracy correlates with internet penetration, see e.g., Mike Best’s “The Internet and Democracy: Global catalyst or democratic dud?,” which concluded: "We approached the question of how the Internet affects democracy from a quantitative standpoint. By means of various statistical studies over an eleven year dataset (1992 to 2002) we found that the Internet was not able to explain significant variation in democracy cores. In contrast, our 2001-2002 results indicated a substantial relationship between Internet usage and democracy. We also found evidence that this Internet-democracy relationship is not absolute; for instance, consider the variability amongst regional results. We find that this correlation maintains even when we control for a nation’s geographic region, economic level (we use GDP per capita), and social development (we use literacy rate as a surrogate measure) – at least for our 2001-2002 data. Our findings suggest that an extra 131 [connections - nerdgirl] per 1,000 people corresponds to a one point jump on the 14 point [standard Freedom House - nerdgirl] democracy index while still accounting for region and socio-economic development. Overall, we find that Internet penetration explains more variation in level of democratic development within a country than does literacy rates and some of the geographic regions. We suggest that the influx of government transparency and NGO efficacy - which the Internet affords - is behind much of the Internet’s statistical success.” Who would have thought that? … but it does make sense when one thinks it through. One country that Best is studying in more depth is Liberia, which only recently emerged from armed conflict. In that case, it’s not just the spread of the internet but mobile telephony. Liberia’s President, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, has lauded the role of information and communications technologies in the post-conflict reconstruction and development of her country. This connection is something that DoD has recognized: BG Paul Capasso wrote about efforts earlier this year on the USAFRICOM ‘blog’, “InfoTech Revolution Empowering Africans, Breaking Down Barriers”: USAFRICOM hopes to support African efforts in implementing their programs and initiatives to forge long-term stability, security, and economic growth through the use of enabling information technologies and effective partnerships. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

So now what? Will anything change? What would you recommend? Honestly asking. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Thanks for the heads’ up, particularly the one that linked to Miranda’s 10-page memo. Reading the full memo - with which I largely concur - I would posit that this is further evidence of the need for pro-active, intentional SSTR operations. Now. Miranda, for right or wrong, directs his critique at the Foreign Service Corps – the diplomats. Foreign Service Officers (FSOs) are *not* selected to do reconstruction. He argues for more autonomy and a more risk-tolerant (or perhaps even, *risk-embracing*) posture and overcoming the knowledge-hoarding. (Wish he had included a proposal for a solution …). Miranda’s distilled main point and recommendation, throughout, is that the State needs to hire more folks … especially younger folks who “think outside the box.” He’s neither the first nor the only one to have made that argument: SecDef Gates (Mar 07, quoted from official DoD transcript): “Part of the problem -- quite frankly, I think we have two significant problems in this country and in this government in terms of dealing with these kinds of situations, both in Iraq and Afghanistan. When I left government, [US]AID [at State Dept] had 16,000 employees. It has 2,000 now. We used to have this kind of a deployable expeditionary capability in the government. That's what these folks did. We don't have that anymore. Now it's more or less a contracting agency. … critical components of the kind of work that needs to be done in both Iraq and Afghanistan have disappeared as assets of the United States government. And so now we're trying to replicate them through volunteers both from the private sector and inside the government, but it's clearly not as fast and not as robust as if -- as when we had those capabilities in-house.” I concur with Miranda that that FSOs are not the folks to do transition & reconstruction operations. Security & stability operations are explicitly the the responsibility of Defense; how fully that Directive is being embraced is another -- but intrinsically connected -- topic. That DoDD also extends to transition & reconstruction. New Army operations manual issued recently states: “Army doctrine now equally weights tasks dealing with the population — stability or civil support — with those related to offensive and defensive operations. Winning battles and engagements is important but alone is not sufficient. Shaping the civil situation is just as important to success.” My recommendation is to staff adequately, empower, and move (even if only temporarily) the Active Response Corps (ARC), Stand-By Response Corps (SRC), & Civilian Reserve Corps (CRC) to DoD (from State), a recommendation w/which I realize some of our former military folks here disagree ... VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Would you expand on the correlation & the observations? I'm genuinely curious. Thanks. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Throwing out a couple of pennies (maybe a nickel) worth of my thoughts ... mostly ancillary ... While I do not agree with much of the politics and policy choices of both, I also find much in the path of Dr. Rice to look to as a role model and have been flattered by Justice Thomas. When I was doing my graduate work, a mutual acquaintance was serving as Federal Marshall for Justice Thomas when he was in the circuit to which he was assigned (at that time, St Louis). Eventually I became a topic of regular inquiry, and when I finished my PhD, Justice Thomas penned a congratulatory note (attached). That was kind & very cool. Prof Rice was on the initial dissertation advisor for very good friend of mine. When Rice went to the DC to be National Security Advisor, my friend had to get another primary advisor; Rice remained on her committee. It was Rice who interceded and encouraged her to stick with it (while NSA) when she was considering leaving with a terminal masters. That was very cool of her. Disagree with (some of) the politics but find value in the people. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

From the linked news story, it isn’t clear to me what exactly “transgender” means in this case, e.g., sex chromosome abnormality or something else. W/r/t abnormalities to the observed normal genetic sexual dimorphorism, ... yes, primates have similar sex chromosomes, and yes, I am aware of cases in which occasional XO or XXX variants have been observed in primates (e.g., chimpanzees, bonobos, and gorillas) …. & other mammals too (e.g. horses). See “Evolution of primate chromosomes” Science, 1997 & “Evolution of Sex Chromosomes in Mammals,” Annual Review of Genetics, 1969. Now that’s genetic/chromosomal sex differences … I’m not aware of any correlation w/observed phenotype differences (physical appearance) in non-human primates … which is sometimes applied the short-hand of “transgenderism.” There may be … I’m just not aware of them. While not primates, a few years ago (2000) there was a study published in Science on "evidence for ecological causation of sexual dimorphism in hummingbird” (Temeles, Ethan J; Pan, Irvin L.; Brennan, Jillian L.; Horwitt, Jedediah N. Science, Volume 289(5478) 21, July 2000, pp 441-443) Obviously humans aren't hummingbirds, can one make an analogy between ecologically-driven phenotypic sexual dimorphism (& they're used the term as far as average masses and average sizes of beaks) in one species to another? I don’t know. W/r/t the original case … more questions than answers … regardlees, a lot of sympathy and compassion for the kid. Being a kid today seems hard enough – I hope the kid has a solid supportive family. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

I like to ask questions. Sometimes they're the hard questions ... which are sometimes the "wrong" questions (i.e., that get me in trouble & piss folks off). And actively solicit input from those who know more than me and those who think differently than me ... which are sometimes "wrong" people (in the opinion of those in charge/asserting a strong opinion, etc) to try to get info from all across the spectrum and orthogonal to it. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

W/r/t to the larger electrorate and voting patterns, I'm cool with that. The validity of the original assertion (possibly straw man?): remains un-affirmed. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Religion has more opportunities for free choice as opposed to sex or race. Also that was not the original assertion that was put forth as fact w/r/t plural group of individuals posting on dz.com. A "better reason": yes, because the voters had a preference for one candidate's issues, proposed policies, approach, & leadership potential. (Otoh, I acknowledge that I don’t have overwhelming evidence to support that causality w/r/t the Georgia primary either ...) In Georgia, Sen Obama reportedly received 67% of the overall vote in the Democratic primary. From the local Atlanta Journal Constitution: “Illinois U.S. Sen. Barack Obama won an overwhelming victory in Georgia Tuesday with strong support from young and middle-age voters. “About 77 percent of voters ages 18-29, about 74 percent ages 30-44 voted for Obama, according to exit polls. [Senator Obama appears to have the less than 44 age demographic, how does one explain that?] “The only age group going for Hillary Clinton was voters 60 and older, according to the exit polls. “Obama received more than 60 percent of the vote from both men and women. “Clinton beat Obama among whites, 57 percent to 39 percent, while Obama polled 88 percent of the black vote, according to the poll.” Similar, but not exactly the same numbers, from another source: “In Georgia, exit polls showed black voters made up 52 percent and Obama captured 86 percent. But Obama also won 43 percent of the white vote, a sharp increase over the South Carolina results, a trend that could mean problems for Sen. Hillary Clinton in other states.” So it looks like across the Georgia Democratic primary voters, there was a mixed absolute correlation (result) w/r/t sex & race of candidates & voters, but still no overwhelming evidence w/r/t causality. Is there an assumption being made that black voters will vote based on race rather than characteristics, issues, etc of the candidate? Why is that considered a valid assumption? Similar for women. The NY Daily News reported on the issue, which seems to reflect many folks assertions: “Many voters in Georgia said Tuesday they were moved by Obama's message more than his skin color. "‘I didn't want to vote for Obama just because he was black,’ said Jacqueline Jenkins, 42, a black administrative assistant and part-time college student who voted outside Albany [GA]. ‘I didn't want to vote for Hillary just because she's a woman. I think both bring a lot to the table. I just think Obama would be a better choice.’” While it is interesting to consider voting demographics in Georgia’s primary (at least to me since I live here), it’s still not evidence to support the original assertion. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

What you assert you are seeing "all over in DZ.com," I'm not. What am missing? And I don't mean that sarcastically or snark-ily. I provided three specific examples & one general (i.e., whole thread) counter-example. The original assertion was explicit (& let's extend it even more broadly: or even implicity) assertion by a plural group of individuals claiming they are voting for a person specifically because the candidate is "black" or "female." Is there any evidence or is that a strawman argument? VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Just furthering [warpedskydiver]'s comments, it's most probable that the detector picked up a non-explosive chemical compound (a false-positive) that was had some chemical signature (e.g., similar part of structure) to that of of nitro-glyercin. Was it one of the "puffer" style detectors, e.g., General Electric's Entry Scan or Smiths Detection's Sentinel? Both are known to have issues specifically w/glycerin-containing lotions. False positives is a technical challenge to any detector. There should be an "orthogonal" detector, such as X-ray or human intervention to exclude false positives, which is what it sounds like was the case. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Bill - Similar to the question I posed to Mike, is this a strawman or do you have evidence to support your assertions? VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Mike - Concur with the sentiment of the 2nd paragraph. Point of clarification (w/r/t 1st paragraph): are you asserting that as an actual observation or something else? If the former, would/could you point out a few examples to support that assertion? Otoh, we've had at least one whole (long) thread in which the most gender-based characterizations were made by non-liberals: E.g., Maybe something like: "It's that time of the month boys; who can I blow up this time?" VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Lighting & audio postitions are available. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

I think the Framers were very precise with their language. Providing for the common defense and promoting the general welfare do not carry the same level of involvement or priority. See the difference?

Continuing in Article 1, Section 8 "Powers of Congress "To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years; "To provide and maintain a Navy; "To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces; "To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions; "To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;" VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

I'm obviously not [tkhayes] ... Two places: The Preamble: “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." And Article 1, Section 8. “The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;” Those same lines have been used to justify/rationalize missile defense {multiple times}, to support science & technology for defense applications, to criticize President Bill Clinton’s defense budgets, and to criticize President George Bush’s defense and foreign policy strategy. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Thanks for starting this thread. Interesting topic & very interesting questions, IMO. Moreso given the globalized nature of 21st Century world. While I'm not sure if I represent a typical or an a-typical American, I am always always interested in and willing to hear comments, criticisms (yes, even criticisms), perceptions (which are sometimes mis-perceptions that than hopefully present an opportunity for clarifications), and outside observations on the American experiment. VR/Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying