Moderators: nate33, montestewart, LyricalRico
Spence wrote:It's no secret why Donald Trump is pushing this birther silliness -- most likely Republican primary voters believe President Obama was not born in the U.S. -- Source
nate33 wrote:I agree that the poll is shocking. I would have expected that many people would believe in some form of "intelligent design" based on some holes in Darwinian Evolution, but there's 40% who actually believe in straight, Biblical creationism - that humans have only been around for 10,000 years or so.
I was curious about the internals. I can find no internals on the most recent Gallop poll (which, incidently, says 40% believe in creationism, not 45%). But the internals on an older poll (a 2005 Harris poll) says that people over age 55 were "much more likely" to believe than those under 55. The article I read didn't provide an exact percentage.
In a nutshell, it seems like the bias toward creationism is largely rooted in an elderly population who are too old and too set in their ways to be convinced otherwise. Far fewer young people believe in creationism.
montestewart wrote:^
Voter fraud in Arlington, VA. Discuss.
nate33 wrote:All good points.
But when we focus on education, we need to consider our methods. We currently spend more per pupil than any other developed nation except Switzerland, but get much less for it. Our problem isn't the money spent, it's how we're spending it. I don't profess to have all the answers, but the people in the Department of Education clearly don't have the answers either. Education should be voucherized. Let the market decide the most efficienty and productive way to educate our youth.
In the CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll released Tuesday, roughly one in four Americans said they sympathize more with the Confederacy than the Union, a figure that rises to nearly four in ten among white Southerners.
When asked the reason behind the Civil War, whether it was fought over slavery or states' rights, 52 percent of all Americas said the leaders of the Confederacy seceded to keep slavery legal in their state, but a sizeable 42 percent minority said slavery was not the main reason why those states seceded.
"The results of that question show that there are still racial, political and geographic divisions over the Civil War that still exists a century and a half later," CNN Polling Director Holland Keating said.
When broken down by political party, most Democrats said southern states seceded over slavery, independents were split and most Republicans said slavery was not the main reason that Confederate states left the Union.
Republicans were also most likely to say they admired the leaders of the southern states during the Civil War, with eight in 10 Republicans expressing admiration for the leaders in the South, virtually identical to the 79 percent of Republicans who admired the northern leaders during the Civil War.
nate33 wrote:I don't see why this is shocking. Slavery wasn't the only thing the Civil War was about. And Republicans, being the party of republicanism, naturally are more in favor of state's rights - rights that were savagely curtailed as a result of the Civil War.
Also, the victors right the history books. There's a lot of history about the South that most people haven't learned. All most people know is that South = Slavery = Bad. It's much more complicated than that.
nate33 wrote:I don't see why this is shocking. Slavery wasn't the only thing the Civil War was about. And Republicans, being the party of republicanism, naturally are more in favor of state's rights - rights that were savagely curtailed as a result of the Civil War.
Also, the victors right the history books. There's a lot of history about the South that most people haven't learned. All most people know is that South = Slavery = Bad. It's much more complicated than that.
Nivek wrote:nate33 wrote:I don't see why this is shocking. Slavery wasn't the only thing the Civil War was about. And Republicans, being the party of republicanism, naturally are more in favor of state's rights - rights that were savagely curtailed as a result of the Civil War.
Also, the victors right the history books. There's a lot of history about the South that most people haven't learned. All most people know is that South = Slavery = Bad. It's much more complicated than that.
It's only more complicated in technicalities. The dispute between North and South hinged on slavery. The state "rights" in question were all connected directly to slavery.
Spence wrote:nate33 wrote:I don't see why this is shocking. Slavery wasn't the only thing the Civil War was about. And Republicans, being the party of republicanism, naturally are more in favor of state's rights - rights that were savagely curtailed as a result of the Civil War.
Also, the victors right the history books. There's a lot of history about the South that most people haven't learned. All most people know is that South = Slavery = Bad. It's much more complicated than that.
I don't find it shocking either, Nate, which is why I didn't indicate surprise. When we are being honest, I think most of us understand that the GOP is now largely the party of whites who disapprove of almost everything that has happened in this country since the Emancipation Proclamation. That being the case, of course present-day Republicans feel closer philosophically to Jefferson Davis than to Abraham Lincoln.
The new Constitution has put at rest forever all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions—African slavery as it exists among us—the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old Constitution were, that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with; but the general opinion of the men of that day was, that, somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away... Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a Government built upon it—when the "storm came and the wind blew, it fell."
Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition.
fishercob wrote:Can we use some of that hefty defense budget to nuke the South? What are the downsides?