Political Leaning (Poll)

• Centralized vs Decentralized: Primarily centralized at the federal level. Capitalism should be allowed to exist in industries wherein competition and consumer choice thrive, but any industry which is considered "too big to fail" or which a consumer has no choice in participating in, should fall under government control. Examples include: Banking, oil production, et cetera. If a corporation can't fail and I can't live without it, it's little more than an unavoidable private tax--and at least if that money goes to government, it can be used to pave a fucking road.

• Right to Choose vs Right to Life: Regardless of how I personally feel about it, women should be allowed to get an abortion whenever they wish. Their life came first, the life growing inside them is feeding off of them to survive--much like a parasite.

• Socialized Medicine vs Private Health Care: Let the government take it all. Mainly because this is downright psychotic. Maybe keep a few private laboratories around who can compete for federal grants to produce vaccines and the like--keep the reward incentive in place for ground-breaking science.

• Foreign Policy: Hawk or Dove?: Stay out in most cases. Countries should be allowed to establish their own cultures, which in turn means their own sets of laws. That being said, if a country ever decides that systemic genocide or similar mass atrocities are the answer, that government is no longer capable of serving its people and should be dealt with. Standing by and allowing evil to flourish in our midst is how we spawn nightmares.

• Globalization vs Protectionism: We should only trade with nations who engage in similar levels of labour standards as our own. (Eg: If a country employs sweatshops, that country no longer deserves our trade.) If a country currently engages in sweatshop labour or similar lower standards of labour, we should give them the opportunity to improve their standards over a few years so they can remain economically viable while modernizing. If the playing field is equal on both sides of the border, then I have no problem with free trade. Otherwise, protectionism is an invariably required inevitability. It would also prevent the issue of it being cheaper to import clothes made in China than simply buying them locally, because the more you think about it, the more idiotic it gets.

• Immigrants vs Natives: At some point, the concept of national borders will seem quaint and childish. Until then, monitor the local economy and determine the amount of immigration that would be discernibly healthy and/or sustainable, and set immigration numbers to that target. It would simply be more effective to help refugees rebuild their countries than to try and take them all in at once and construct two million additional homes in under five years.

• Separation of Church and State: Church and State should always be separate matters, and the State should never tax the Church except wherein the Church chooses to become a political entity, at which point it should forfeit its right to tax deductions. Treat it similarly to charity organizations, in that they shouldn't be a political entity.

• Free Expression vs Hate Speech: Complicated to answer, but hate speech codes should exist for the most extreme of cases. (Eg: Going out onto the street and literally telling people to murder each other.) That being said, it would have to be incredibly extreme anyway--so, in the vast majority of cases (such as politically incorrect humour or expression of unpopular political views), no, free speech should be respected.

• Collective vs Individual: The individual should be held sacrosanct above the collective in terms of human rights (one person over a group), whereas the group should be held above the individual in terms of social structure (the overwhelmingly wealthy versus the overwhelmingly poor). Eg: Democracy is for everyone and should be respected as such (social structure), no matter how popular or unpopular their views (individual rights).

• Weapons Legislation: Just put them onto a multi-tiered licencing system akin to driver's licences. Let seniority and profession determine access to firearms. Use the fees collected from licencing to operate mandatory safety and training courses, a firearms registry so we can accurately keep track of the number and type of firearms distribution across the country, and to operate a regulatory board whose job it is to oversee the protection of individual people's gun ownership from government interference. There were 7,000,000+ firearms in my country in 2010. The total number of fatalities in my country in 2010 was 554, of which only 32% were committed with firearms (or around 177 people). The homicide rate in my country in 2010 was 1.62 per 100,000 people. It's pretty clear that firearms are not a concern here, in spite of the nearly 1 in 5 rate of firearms to people.

Nilum said:

Democracy is for everyone and should be respected as such (social structure), no matter how popular or unpopular their views (individual rights).

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Enki said:

That is hard to support from time to time, so I hope you know that.

(I should re-do my own sheet. When I made it I was tired at the moment.)

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Natalija said:

Enki, this guy wuld make one hell of a politician! They also use many fancy words w/o realy saying anithing.

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Nilum said:

The road to civilization is paved in the cobblestone bricks of my ancestor's graves. I will carry their cause dutifully so the next generation has a longer road to walk than I, better made, and well lit with the knowledge gained from a lifetime.

If such a thing were easy, life would have no flavour.

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Natalija said:

Enki, this guy wuld make one hell of a politician! They also use many fancy words w/o realy saying anithing.

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Natalija said:

Enki, this guy wuld make one hell of a politician! They also use many fancy words w/o realy saying anithing.

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Enki said:

Tatsy. Sometimes you need to take a few easier steps to plan for a harder one. One can't hope to survive by being on the hard path constantly. Sometimes you need some breathing time during which to properly absorb the things that are going on around you, instead of merely a portion of it all.

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Enki said:

Hmm. This notion of yours sure does ring foreboding to the organs of hearing that I possess on my head. Perhaps I could also try finding certain attributes that make me stand out as an outré politician, aswell.

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Natalija said:

Oh definitly! Your alredy starting to pick up some of those bad habits. ;D

I give up... I need to go hit something before my brain turns to ice-cream. Grr.

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• Centralized vs Decentralized: The state is an unjustified hierarchy, created by those who would wish to rule over us as our betters. It should be abolished and replaced with a Mutualist commonwealth, or at least some sort of Confederation based upon directly democratic ideals; no representatives, no dictators; all votes are equal.

• Right to Choose vs Right to Life: Whatever happens, happens. I do think that it's an infringement of a female's rights to turn her body into a baby-vat, though.

• Socialized Medicine vs Private Health Care: As I stated above, the government is a plight on the people. However, that doesn't mean replace it with a corporation's disgusting money-making scheme. Healthcare should be based around a society's need, not a society's want to exploit the sick, unhealthy, and mentally ill.

• Foreign Policy: Hawk or Dove?: Why should we ever start a war? Never declare a sentiment of violence unless you're willing to take up a gun and shoot another human yourself. People forget that war is more than nation versus nation; it's also people versus people, and that means you too.

• Globalization vs Protectionism: It's a case-by-case basis. Whatever fulfills our society's needs is what we should do.

• Immigrants vs Natives: Borders are not real. The consequences of their existence creates a new class below the lower class, or rather, adds to it, strengthening the idea of an untouchable people. It turns everybody in society against another portion of it, and then this allows for easy scapegoating and false decision making to placate an angry populace. And then nothing changes. But then we allow more "immigrants" in and then the cycle goes on. Screw borders.

• Separation of Church and State: Screw laws. (Just kidding, haha.) But yeah, nobody should force me to do anything. If I want to participate in your religion, I'll do it. If not, I won't. If you shove it down my throat I'll barf it up and smear it on your expensive couch.

• Free Expression vs Hate Speech: You should never be coerced into staying silent. That's how we get a dictatorship of popular opinion, which while useful in some situations, (i.e., most people think murder is bad, and thus less people murder than would be expected.) however it can be used to silence a minority. No matter how major the majority is, a minority's voice should always have an equal weight of a majority's, no matter what they say.

• Collective vs Individual: While collectivism sounds great, it's a trap. While individualism sounds absolutely reprehensible, there are good sides to it. I propose mutualism. We both own our workplace, as long as we work there; I own the produce I create, but the land I made it on belongs to me and my co-workers.

• Weapons Legislation: An armed populace is the best deterrent of tyranny. Every member of society should be part of a local militia; it's imperative for your liberty.

Nilum said:

Centralized vs Decentralized: How much power should be vested into Government, and at what level should power be held strongest? (Federal vs State vs Municipal.)

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Nilum said:

Right to Choose vs Right to Life: Should a woman be allowed to get an abortion, and under what circumstances should they be allowed to get an abortion?

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Nilum said:

Socialized Medicine vs Private Health Care: Should the government be involved in health care, or should it remain the domain of private entities, or should it be partially subsidized/controlled by government?

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Nilum said:

Foreign Policy: Hawk or Dove?: Should modern first world nations (especially those within NATO) engage in military operations in war stricken countries elsewhere in the world? If so, to what extent? If not, why?

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Nilum said:

Globalization vs Protectionism: Should we engage in absolute free trade wherein anyone can conduct business anywhere, or should we engage in forms of protectionism (eg: Tariffs, Regulations, Import Tax, Local Business subsidies, so on).

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Nilum said:

Immigrants vs Natives: How far should we choose to engage in immigration, and should we limit it or stop it entirely? Why?

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Nilum said:

Separation of Church and State: Should any laws, whatsoever, be conducted against any religion (Islam, Christian come to mind) or in the support of any religion, to any degree? How do you feel about "In God We Trust" on the American currency instead of "E Pluribus Unum" as an example?

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Nilum said:

Free Expression vs Hate Speech: To what degree should we limit freedom of speech and expression in the name of combating hatred and systemic racism? Is there a place for Hate Speech codes? (Eg: If someone is shouting "death to the Jews!" in the streets, should anything be done about them?)

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Nilum said:

Collective vs Individual: Which is more important? The needs of the many, or the one?

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Nilum said:

Weapons Legislation: To what degree should weapons (knives, firearms, explosives, et cetera) be regulated or banned from use by the general public? How would you enforce such things, is it worth it to enforce such things, is it right to enforce such things?

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• Right to Choose vs Right to Life: Women should be able to choose. Forcing someone to be a parent when they don't want to/are not ready is a terrible thing to do to both the potential baby [i don't believe that fetuses have life until they are born].
  
• Socialized Medicine vs Private Health Care: Health care should be partly supported by the government. Private businesses get to construct their business. The government has it's own health care falities. The government pays the private bussnessies if people go for health care there. Basically the government pays for health care, but doesn't run all of it.
  
• Foreign Policy: Hawk or Dove?: Dove. War should be avoided unless it's threatining the country. If it's a threat, then go ahead, call in the hawks.
  
• Globalization vs Protectionism: We need laws and regulations, but not too much.
  
• Immigrants vs Natives: As long as immigrants are law-abiding citizens in their countries, then we let them in. If there is fair reason to believe they are violent/dangerous, we keep them out. We just need to clearly identify immigrants.
  
• Separation of Church and State: Laws should never intrude on religion... As long as those religions are not inspiring hate. Both Islam and the bible contain hateful elements of them. The only difference is the general mentality. Christianity has gone through a reform through the centuries, even though there are potentially hateful and violence calling messages in there.=. And in my opinion, Islam is only being used as an excuse to do terrible things and get people to do terrible things. It just needs the reform part.
  
• Free Expression vs Hate Speech: Freedom of speech also includes people with hateful opinions. I don't even get why people would argue against hateful people hating. Being clearly racist/anti-Semitic in our society is a big taboo. That factor alone would get them fired from their jobs [remember that FS only stops the government for punishing people for their opinions, not the social shame]. People who hate other groups of people will still hate other groups of people if hate speech is illegal. The only difference is that we wouldn't know.
  
• Collective vs Individual: Many > One, but we shouldn't ignore the one. Because remember, the ones make up the many.
  
• Weapons Legislation: Gun ownership should be very similar to cars. You should have to show that you can use them, that you are mentally fit to use them and that the government knows you have firearms. Weapons shouldn't be banned completely. Because remember, people wanting to kill people will get weapons in one way or another. Just like drugs. Many of them are illegal, but people get them anyways.