neutrinosalad

Yup. I don't get the same visceral reaction to Trump that a lot of the fellow readers here do. I think the build a wall stuff is pandering BS, same with the Muslim stuff. Wall Street Journal has been writing hit pieces on Trump and they did bring up two points that did scare me. Trump seems to really want to engage in major tax cuts (for personal benefit from what it seems) and he wants to put up all of these tariffs on countries like China and Mexico. Riding up national debt and engaging in trade wars could be a one two punch that could really hurt the US economy in the long run.

Just because I am having trouble resisting the urge to respond. You do have a point when it comes to the South. For a few years now, I have seen the South as a strange outlier that has resisted any form of technological or cultural change. I had a renewable energy class when I was getting my engineering degree, and I noticed that there was pretty much 0 proliferation of solar at the time even though the northeast and west coast had begun adopting it. Maybe you have a point when it comes to the platform, but not all Republicans beat that drum and many are more moderate about it. I don't see the Democrats as the devil incarnate, I just disagree with a lot of the ideas that come out of the left. Also, I would say politics works on a spectrum. I would say Eastern Europe from what I have seen is more right leaning than the US in some aspects whereas Western Europe is more left leaning than the US in some aspects. Edit: On top of this, there are some very noticeable regional differences within the US. The West coast is very progressive with cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco being beacons for modernity and progressivism. The same could be said of the North East and New York City. The South as a whole is highly conservative. Texas is seen as the Lone Star State. Utah is a hub for Mormons and is really the home of the Church of Latter Day Saints. Then you have the MidWest, which is right leaning yet not as audacious about being more conservative leaning as the South is. The breakdown isn't 100% correct, but it is what I have seen in the news, from people I have met, and various things I have read. Rural America vs urban America are almost like two completely different worlds.

Based on what I have seen in the world, the reason why California is so successful is a combination of environment and a long coastline. Most of the wealth throughout the world is developed along the coastlines. China is a great example of this. The country is mostly ethnically homogeneous (90% are Han), so we can skip a discussion about the positives and negatives of immigration and "multiculturalism" and get straight to the point. The coastline of China has the highest population density, the most developed cities, and it is where most of the wealth is generated. California success vs Wyoming success most likely has more to do with all of the many benefits of being near a coastline (trade and overall access to resources, which ends up attracting people) over education or political ideology. The cultural values is complicated, maybe I will dive into it on here eventually. You are arguing on the basis that spreading "knowledge" is something that society should achieve for moral reasons. Most people I meet do not care about knowledge, all they care about is being entertained and having a comfortable life. In addition to this, there is a practically unlimited amount of free information available online already. Universities are making their lectures free to access and you have a website like Wikipedia that is literally compiling as much information about science as history as possible. Personally, I have doubts that the value added by making public universities free will offset the additional cost to the taxpayer. The US is a very large country, so the logistics of this change would be difficult and in addition to that there are already a lot of people in college who are not really making any significant gains in either knowledge or useful skills. I know quite a few people that got a job out of college that required no degree and the "gains" they made was the ability to regurgitate ideologies that were taught to them in their sociology classes. Why should I or any other tax payer have to pay for a university education that does not lead to the person obtaining a higher paying job that leads to their contribution back to the economy and tax system offsetting the cost of their publicly funded education? A lot of this is coming from a personal belief where I think too high of an emphasis is being placed on college nowadays. Some people should really be going to a trade school or just skipping college altogether. I think it is strange how every single job out there has been consolidated under university education even though they don't require the intellectual rigor that universities have the capacity to provide. On top of this, people keep pounding out the point that colleges are where success begins and ends, even though gaining intellectual knowledge and achieving personal success takes into account factors that go beyond sitting down at a lecture. Also, I am leaving on a cliffhanger, but I am going to take a break in the discussion here. I am falling behind on work. Edit: One last thing. This Friday, I am going to get four books I ordered last week in the mail. Two of them are on GR and two are on QM. I am going to try and learn more about the math in both of those areas through a combo of going through the books, watching lectures, and doing homework that I can find on university websites. I may not get far, but I will try on my own volition. Later this year, I am going to switch my career path over to a combo of PHP web coding + entrepreneurship (starting an ecommerce website) without having a single class in PHP web coding or on how to run a business. I'll be 100% self-taught through reading books, watching lectures, and going out and obtaining experience first hand.

I don't disagree with publicly funded university level education. If it were to happen, they would have to tighten requirements though. Not all Republicans have an archaic view on welfare. Also, I am registered as an Independent. I side with Republicans over cultural issues. Cultural values for me personally supersede determining the function of the state.

I see that you have a point, but I am not sure if that covers the whole issue. Also, a huge part of the Republican constituency are blue collar workers whose jobs have been evaporating. On one side, they wheel and deal with corporations to retain jobs, but then on the other side not enough welfare is being provided and tax money being collected. Part of the American culture as a whole is that people derive their value from being able to perform a job that contributes something to American society. Receiving a check is not only money to put food on the table, but a form of validation that says that you are valuable. Increasing welfare benefits is necessary, but getting some check in the mail because you are poor does not have the same psychological or cultural rewards as doing a needed job. Also, I have seen the same behaviors in Democrats. It seems the financing wheeling and dealing behavior is something that goes beyond party lines. I think we agree, I just perceive the issue a bit differently.

Okay, you make a point. I don't really know much about Ted Cruz. I have just been thinking about his capacity to rule would be lately, so I have been lenient with some of his policies. Well, I am not sure that the Republicans purely serve corporations. Someone like Rand Paul is heavily ideological with his ideology being based in libertarianism. He seems to have strayed from it slightly, probably because rigid libertarian views lead to political alienation. I was reading through some of his history and he has actually filibustered against increasing foreign military efforts because he believes that an active military is an overextension of the government's power. So it seems that someone like him bases his success not on how well he serves a corporation, but on how much he can influence the ideology of the people and move the needle more towards a libertarian approach to governance. While I don't agree with libertarianism, I do think the government needs to spend its money carefully, so I do see that ideological view as a nice counterbalance to a more socialist approach. Welfare needs to expand over time, but we need to make sure that the government spends that money effectively. Also, while I was working to scrounge up some information to provide an alternative view, I found this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_of_Eight_(immigration) There are Republicans out there who are willing to take a bipartisan approach to make comprehensive reforms in our flawed system, in this case there are 4 Republican and 4 Democratic Senators working together to move forward comprehensive immigration reform. Edit: fixed link

The problem here Ten oz is that you keep changing definitions and conveniently altering the point of view so that no matter what, everything I say (or anyone who espouses a right leaning view) suddenly transforms to be wrong, incompetent or seriously flawed. And let's address the whole competence argument. The definition everyone is following is a contrived definition that Mr. John Cuthber arbitrarily created: Mr. Cuthber created arbitrarily created a premise upon which when followed through the "logical" steps, we come to the conclusion that no Republican could be competent. Real conducive to a discussion here. Also, ironically no establishment Democrat is competent following his own premise. Check this out: Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/dnc-allowing-donations-from-federal-lobbyists-and-pacs/2016/02/12/22b1c38c-d196-11e5-88cd-753e80cd29ad_story.html The DNC just disassembled the rules blocking corporate interests from infiltrating Super-PACs, so Hillary Rodham Clinton could get more money. The establishment on the Democrat side are being fed by the same people that feed the Republicans. These donors want lower taxes and less benefits. John's own premise makes it so that no Democrat is competent. The premise is flawed.

Well, there is a spectrum of competence here. Marco Rubio is towards the bottom of that spectrum. I think we need to look at other Republicans before we decide the whole party is as dimwitted as Marco Rubio.

Within the same wiki link for fascism: Banning "hate speech" on college campuses sounds eerily similar to the things that are bolded in the quote above. This is particularly true because "hate speech" could simply be anything that does not fit the progressive ideology that is highly present on college campuses. Hmm, not sure what to think about this. I just read some about his dad. It's like those televangelists on governmental power steroids.

From the beginning what I have been saying is that a man who a Harvard law professor has said was "off the charts brilliant" may be smarter than what you are making him out to be. "off the charts brilliant" coming from this article: http://www.whitehousedossier.com/2015/03/23/liberal-prof-dershowitz-cruz-charts-brilliant/ Focusing on the individual here, not on whatever ideological principles he espouses. Equating Cruz's desire to enforce legal immigration to Hitler's actions (which included the Holocaust) means that we are outside of what I would call rational discourse. Also, young liberals are sidling up with fascist ideals according to recent surveys: Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/liberal-but-not-tolerant-on-the-nations-college-campuses/2016/02/11/0f79e8e8-d101-11e5-88cd-753e80cd29ad_story.html An increasing number of liberal students want to enforce rules on college campuses that limit free speech in order to promote a singular ideology. If that is not fascist, I don't know what is.

Right now, I don't have any more good examples. I would say one place to look is the ideological divide between Justice Scalia and Justice Ginsburg has differing implications in whose culture is being accepted.

Phi for All, it is not an imagined perspective. When I see progressives rail against Catholicism because the Pope does not support abortion rights, I do not see that as supportive of the Catholic perspective on abortion rights. That is just one of many examples I could use. Bernie Sanders is actually the second choice for many people who want Trump to be president. Here is yet another video where John McCain brings up that interesting tidbit (skip to 1:10 if you don't want to watch the whole video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkMGrqNWxw0 Personally, Bernie Sanders approach seems to lack the animosity that some of the other progressives have towards socially conservative people. His focus has been on bringing the American people together.

He flipped his view on immigration: Right here: http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/06/politics/ted-cruz-immigration-2016-election/ He reversed his position on immigration after he saw that Donald Trump's "build a wall" speech was getting votes. I don't think he believes any of the crap he has been spewing about illegal immigration over the past few months. It's purely a political choice he made.

For the statement I highlighted, if I am reading it correctly, more men and women are dropping below the poverty line as time goes one. Charon, this is totally unrelated to the gender gap, but it is very interesting to think about. If you look at Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, and Google, they are all investing in artificial intelligence. The precedence being set here is that as artificial intelligence is deployed to provide automated solutions to jobs that were previously performed by humans, more and more of the income will be retained by the companies rather than distributed to the workers. We are on the pathway to widespread poverty if the US government does not apply corrective action by expanding the welfare state and using taxes to redistribute the income that was displaced through increases in automation. We don't have to discuss this as it is off topic, but it is very interesting to think about when you are thinking in the context of poverty and the future of workers in the US.

Part of the problem is that Democrats do not respect the culture or values of blue collar white Americans, which is a very socially conservative lifestyle. Jim Webb actually discusses this: This is a great video that goes over the problem. Blue collar workers are caught in a double-bind. Democrats do not respect their culture or values. Republicans do not respect their economic needs. For the blue collar Americans, culture "trumps" economic needs. By sidling up behind Trump, they are revolting against the establishment for ignoring their economic needs in an attempt to have their cake and eat it too.

Could he being saying that because he is dumb or is he saying it because he has underlying political motivations and is playing the politics game? I would suggest that it is the latter and not the former. I am not the biggest fan of Ted Cruz myself, but it's mostly because I see him as a lizard man who says things he doesn't believe in order to win votes. That doesn't mean he isn't bright and has some level of competence with regards to governing. Many of the Democrats are flip floppers and full of contradictions, so you are applying a double standard to Paul Ryan. Bill Clinton, God of the Democrats, says he is for women's rights while simultaneously having a history of being an aggressive womanizer of the highest degree. There are many more Democrats that would fail this litmus test if we went through every single one. Well, I will vote for alternatives to Neocons as often as I can. John McCain though, I personally like him and see him as an honorable man. I accept that his military background and history of being a POW blinds him emotionally in certain ways, so I would still vote for him to stay a Senator even though I disagree with his views on foreign policy.

Well in the modern world we have things like E-Verify in order to enforce legal immigration. E-Verify essentially checks if the the social security number matches the person based on what I know about it. Also, the only state that really truly enforced legal immigration over the last decade has been Arizona. The number of hit pieces against that state for enforcing the rule of law with regards to illegal immigration just shows you how partisan the mainstream media is. Interestingly enough, the bitchers were actually losing out on a better paying job due to migrant workers: Source: http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-thorny-economics-of-illegal-immigration-1454984443. This was another article I saved because it was a very good read. Native workers end up with a better paying job and more job options when illegal immigrants are expelled from the system. Also, it isn't up to businesses to enforce the laws. It is up to the states and many states have failed the American people with regards to illegal immigration. They didn't play ball when they chose to come here illegally and circumvent the laws we already have in place. We already have a legal immigration system that every other country in the world has to follow. We shouldn't be giving special privileges to people from Mexico or Central America just because they can jump a fence. Everyone needs to be held to the same standard. Just an idea to chew on. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Edit: On another note, I have thought about the other side of the line. Net migration from Mexico has been below 0 the past couple of years. Source: http://www.pewhispanic.org/2015/11/19/more-mexicans-leaving-than-coming-to-the-u-s/. This is another great article. So the whole, "Build a wall!" thing that Donald Trump has been blustering about is essentially a relic of the past. Mexico has reached industrialization levels that are almost in parity with the US, giving Mexicans little to no reason to continue migrating to the US illegally. Also, I do think we need to continue to put the screws down on Central Americans. They have started piling into the US illegally and it is patently obvious that they are economic migrants coming here illegally to take advantage of certain aspects of our welfare system (education and health care) in addition to seeking out a better life. Here is an article that goes over the whole list of things I just brought up: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/02/11/mexico-and-immigration-to-us/ The last thing, is that there is one way I see illegal immigration in a positive light. It is seen through the Cuban exodus that happened following Fidel's rise to power. When I went to Miami and saw the end result of all the illegal and legal Cuban immigration that happened, I definitely felt a little more positively about illegal immigration. Particularly when it allows the US to gain skilled and driven individuals.

For anyone who is wondering why Donald Trump is so successful in the polls, they should read this article: http://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trumps-america-1455290458 Here is a couple choice quotes from the article: I would suggest reading the whole article to anyone who wants to have a deeper understanding of the Trump phenomenon. Edit: it seems to now be restricted to subscribers when I check. Still, the quotes explain a little bit.

Ted Cruz is intelligent. It seems that his abrasive personality and lack of agreeableness is what is holding him back. Here is an article where his Harvard law professor, Alan Dershowitz, commented on how he was one of the most brilliant students he had: http://www.whitehousedossier.com/2015/03/23/liberal-prof-dershowitz-cruz-charts-brilliant/ Rand Paul is also intelligent and it looks like he is beginning to stray from hardcore libertarian ideals that his father, Ron Paul, professed. Paul Ryan comes off as reasonable to me. The hard ass front he puts on like at the State of the Union is so transparent it is almost laughable. He clearly is more of a moderate. He just seems inexperienced with corralling his own party. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ On another note, I would never ever vote for Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio. Why? Because they are fake conservatives. They both have strong Neocon ties and I will not vote for anyone who has Neocon ties. My frustration with these illegal immigrants is that the "moderate" position is to essentially give 11 million people a free pass for breaking our country's laws. If we cannot even enforce the rule of law, why have laws?

Charon, one thing to consider is that the State has solutions in place for the burden single mothers may face. For one, it is entirely possible for a woman to extract child care from a father unwilling to fulfill his duty as a provider. If he escapes this role, there are welfare programs available for single mothers if they qualify. It is still flawed, but the welfare state is still expanding. I read this article recently: http://Obama’s final budget proposal calls for $4.15 trillion in spending If you look at the graphic for social security, it becomes clear that federal government spending on social security is literally skyrocketing. Based on the way that social security funding is growing, my prediction is that the problem you are bringing up should be resolved by the welfare state growing sufficiently to economically replace men who have abandoned their children. One thing the state can't replace though is the psychological benefits a man can provide to the children in a cohesive family unit.

If Obama is a man of his word and is someone who will rise above the party lines, he will pick Sri Srinavasan. Mr. Goldstein himself said that he is the most qualified man for the job, so he is the one who should be chosen. We need to start making decisions based on qualifications, not based on political strategy.

iNow, this may come as a surprise given my recent commentary, but if Bernie Sanders ends up being the democrat's presidential nominee, I will vote for him.

I agree. Yesterday, I was looking through GR books and they were surprisingly inexpensive. I'm thinking of getting a couple and starting on the math part. Luckily, I have been exposed to some of the maths (like Maxwell's equations) through my engineering classes. As far as QM goes, every time I start watching a video or reading about it, my mind immediately jumps to the question of whether or not deterministic equations for QM are out there in the intellectual ether. Also, slowly learning the maths of GR and QM will give me something beyond politics to talk about on here.

What I am trying to point out is that there is clear evidence that there are biological factors at play that drive occupational choices. I am not saying that they apply to every occupation. I chose physical strength because it is less abstract than things like culture or how the differing hormonal makeup of men and women affect their behavior and life choices. I don't think these things can be proven either way until neuroscience progresses and the understanding of male female behavior moves from abstractions towards a deeper understanding of how the differing biological makeup affects our lives and life choices. I believe your expertise lies in the area of neuroscience, so you might know more than me. So I will admit, I do know outside of the physical strength/construction arena. It is still too abstract for me to make any concrete argument. Physical strength was the only thing that I had hard evidence to show that biological differences can affect occupational choice, so that's why I jumped on it. Beyond that I don't have proof of anything and I do not know why men and women move into different occupations. Also, yes, it is purely argumentative. If we were discussing this in real life, I would be able to go on for hours. Sadly, on forums, all I can do is make a few incomprehensible posts and then eventually give up.

Men and women are not equally capable. The clearest difference is that women have a womb and the biological capacity to produce human offspring within their bodies. Men do not have this ability. Please show me a man who has the biological capacity to produce offspring within his body. In construction it is clear why men far outnumber women. I found a scientific article that compares muscular composition of men and women: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00235103. Unfortunately it is behind a paywall, and I had trouble finding other articles. Still the summary is enough to back up my point: Men having overall increased muscular strength gives them an advantage at performing well in jobs that directly relate to physical performance. This is a strong explanation as to why men dominate construction and other physically laborious jobs. Edit: I am going to go even further and present an article that is possible evidence that women are superior to men in terms of empathy: http://ujpb.org/research/volume-7/are-there-gender-differences-in-empathy/ There is evidence that women have superior levels of empathy, which could be a possible explanation of their dominance in positions that require increased levels of empathy like nursing and office management. I have now presented evidence that explains part of the difference in occupational choices, please provide any evidence that contradicts my point.