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Science, Nature, and Popular Mechanics have all published "Candidates on Science and Technology" articles.
From which you can learn that Fred Thompson is an idiot, Huckabee is a superstitious idiot, Mitt Romney is a political opportunist who traded his brain for a chance at the superstition vote, and Barack Obama is the callow victim of a Poli. Sci. degree.
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[quote spearmint]2. The Republicans represent fiscal responsibility
That is one of the most absurd statements I've seen here. Fiscal responsibility means that you only spend money that you earn...i.e. revenue = expenditures (you know, the setup we had under the Clinton administration). The republicans have been deficit spending like drunken sailors (especially on this ridiculous uncalled for war). It is incredibly irresponsible to increase spending while cutting income (taxes). Based on this statement I suppose you think that keeping your credit cards maxed out is good personal finance.
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>Based on this statement I suppose you think that keeping your credit cards maxed out is good personal finance.
Minty regularly maxes out his debit cards.
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[quote x-uri] Science, Nature, and Popular Mechanics have all published "Candidates on Science and Technology" articles.
From which you can learn that Fred Thompson is an idiot, Huckabee is a superstitious idiot, Mitt Romney is a political opportunist who traded his brain for a chance at the superstition vote, and Barack Obama is the callow victim of a Poli. Sci. degree.
Unfortunately, Nature and Science are not open-access, which is why I didn't link to them. (Biotechniques is a free subscription, and the analysis I posted above was sent out through one of their free weekly newsletters.) Pop Mechanics is not bad, but didn't summarize it in the nice way that Biotechniques had.
As for your analysis of the candidates above, I don't totally disagree with your assessment-- which pretty much limits the viable choices...
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I was not criticizing your choice of linkaged, PeterB, just pointing out that -- after 7+ years of faith-based government -- people are very interested in the science and technology policies of the candidates.
There are also a couple of reviews of the candidates policies on space exploration here and here.
The Republican party has been so thoroughly colonized by the forces of ignorance and superstition that there is no viable choice on that side. Giuliani is probably the most enlightened candidate, but he is keeping quiet about science policy for fear of censure from the "I ain't descended from no monkey" constituency.
On the Democratic side, Senator Obama is the most problematic, but it mostly seems like nobody in his campaign thought to prepare any Science and Technology talking points for him. Offsetting his science education plan by de-funding NASA, though, is fairly dumb-assed and cowardly. Going after NASA to appear fiscally conservative has the stink of a focus-group.
If you go down the "Science Education" column in the Popular Mechanics "Geek the Vote" matrix Clinton and Edwards are the only ones making concrete policy statements, and Edwards edges out Clinton by having a somewhat broader vision (although they coincide on most points).
Edwards gets my (tentative) support because he appears to be the only candidate who is making Science and Technology policies part of his standard campaign recitation.
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[quote x-uri]I was not criticizing your choice of linkaged, PeterB, just pointing out that -- after 7+ years of faith-based government -- people are very interested in the science and technology policies of the candidates.
There are also a couple of reviews of the candidates policies on space exploration here and here.
The Republican party has been so thoroughly colonized by the forces of ignorance and superstition that there is no viable choice on that side. Giuliani is probably the most enlightened candidate, but he is keeping quiet about science policy for fear of censure from the "I ain't descended from no monkey" constituency.
On the Democratic side, Senator Obama is the most problematic, but it mostly seems like nobody in his campaign thought to prepare any Science and Technology talking points for him. Offsetting his science education plan by de-funding NASA, though, is fairly dumb-assed and cowardly. Going after NASA to appear fiscally conservative has the stink of a focus-group.
If you go down the "Science Education" column in the Popular Mechanics "Geek the Vote" matrix Clinton and Edwards are the only ones making concrete policy statements, and Edwards edges out Clinton by having a somewhat broader vision (although they coincide on most points).
Edwards gets my (tentative) support because he appears to be the only candidate who is making Science and Technology policies part of his standard campaign recitation.
No, I didn't take it as criticism of the linking choices, don't worry... 
Unfortunately, I'm not sure that "after 7+ years of faith-based government -- people are very interested in the science and technology policies of the candidates" (I myself obviously am, but I think I'm in the minority) ...
As Hillary pointed out last night, back in 2000, people chose someone they felt they could "have a beer with" and then later regretted it. I was kind of surprised she said that, because obviously she just hugely insulted a good part of the constituency (despite it being the truth, what she said). The problem with this country is that there is a strong anti-intellectual and anti-rational thinking trend, which has seemingly been holding sway since the 70's. (Remember back to when it was last "cool" to be into chemistry, or rocketry? Well, that needs to be "cool" again.) We had a very intelligent, rational candidate back in 2004, and we didn't elect him. We had a very intelligent, rational candidate back in 2000, and we didn't elect him either. Instead, a good portion of this country chose to re-elect a bumbling idiot that they could have a beer with...
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The graph I have shows revenues increasing as a result of tax cuts. People spend more when they have more and the economy expands to have a lesser rate equal more tax receipts. Reagan and Kennedy particularly proved this. Laffer Curve. It works.
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[quote spearmint]The graph I have shows revenues increasing as a result of tax cuts. People spend more when they have more and the economy expands to have a lesser rate equal more tax receipts. Reagan and Kennedy particularly proved this. Laffer Curve. It works.
Yes - but the problem is that even with increased revenues, Congress almost always manage to spend even MORE. Not too sure what this or drinking beer with a candidate has to do with their views on sci/tech, though.
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As [Senator Clinton] pointed out last night, back in 2000, people chose someone they felt they could "have a beer with" and then later regretted it. I was kind of surprised she said that, because obviously she just hugely insulted a good part of the constituency (despite it being the truth, what she said).
I don't think she insulted anyone but the pundits who decided that people would rather have a beer with a shallow, thoughtless, and mean-spirited thug of a frat boy than with an erudite and accomplished wonk.
The problem with this country is that there is a strong anti-intellectual and anti-rational thinking trend, which has seemingly been holding sway since the 70's. (Remember back to when it was last "cool" to be into chemistry, or rocketry?
Speaking as a life-time member of the Don Herbert Fan CLub, and a signatory to the Estes Rocketeer Pledge, I can state categorically that these things were not "cool" in the 1970s.
We had a very intelligent, rational candidate back in 2004, and we didn't elect him. We had a very intelligent, rational candidate back in 2000, and we didn't elect him either. Instead, a good portion of this country chose to re-elect a bumbling idiot that they could have a beer with...
Well, actually, the rational candidate won in 2000. The election was stolen from him.
As for 2004 -- I am unconvinced. Who knows what Diebold did to the voting machines in Ohio.
AFAICT, nerdiness is cooler today than it has ever been. From Willow the cool-nerd witch in the Bufffyverse, to the proliferation of crime solving nerds on cop shows, to rock musicians (!) making music on laptops, the coolness of being a nerd in popular culture is at an all time high.
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>>1. President does not spend money. Congress does, and the rebuilding of the military and the war have required heavy spending. Clinton cut manpower in the military manpower 40% in a time of chaos.
8 years later - its still clinton's fault.
>>2. The Republicans represent fiscal responsibility
I'm really curious how long it will take for this one to die.
>>3. My latest favorite graph demonstrates
Your graph doesn't demonstrate anything except the ability to make up a story which correlates with some numbers. All time highest taxes doesn't mean much since our country _should_ be continuously growing. As for the May 2003 event - I was born in May so I will take all credit.
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