It was the 8 delegates getting 1/2 vote each that I considered weird. Why not 4  with 1 vote each?

I have a detailed answer for you, Scott - though it'll have to wait, as I just got home, and have some more errands to run, but...

Here's my point - you're a Clinton supporter.  How is her plan that much different from Obamas?

I have to be honest, I smell some baloney here.

Ok - errands ran - now, where to start?

What I would like to know from Obama supporters is how Mr. Obama is going to save us from what Bush leaves us? 

Well, for starters, he's clearly the most intellegent candidate running, so, whatever he does, at the least, it will be well-thought-out, and implemented with a level of intellegence this nation hasn't seen since... uh... Lincoln, maybe?

Pull our troops out within 2 months now that things are finally starting to stabalize? 

Well, yes.  Isn't that the benchmark we're waiting for?  That they were stable and up to speed and don't need us anymore?

How about raising taxes to help the idiots who bought houses they couldn't afford (to the tune of $10 billion dollars)? 

Well, this one is tricky - first - have you heard something I haven't?  Does Obama's plan involve a bail-out for these people?  You may have some insight that I don't - but based on all I've read/seen, it's not that specific.  Now, on the other hand, will these people recieve the same federal protections that have been around for decades?  Probably.  Were these programs created by Obama?  Would Clinton or McCain dismantle these programs?  Riddle me that... And while you're answering things - I grant you - I feel little sympathy for these home buyers (certainly not the only people hurt by this economic depression, but let's focus on them) - all I heard for the last few years was "You got to buy a house!" - well, ha ha on them, right?  But... what do you suggest we do for them?  Debtors prison?  Execute them?  Deport them?  What's your plan?

Get us wrapped up in the Millenium Declaration which is a wonderful idea brought on by the U.N?  Obama talks about helping Americans, yet this Declaration will cost us around $850 BILLION dollars (from the US) in aid to "poor countries".  We see none of that $$ in return.  So exactly how does that help "us"? 

Oh, that's the big question - it helps us in all sorts of ways.  You should read Jeffrey Sachs' "The End of Poverty" to get a more detailed answer, but the quick bottom line answer - if everyone is doing ok, we're doing ok.  It's like the Marshall Plan after WWII.  And if we're out there, making sure everyone is at a base-line, out of the dire abject level of poverty that we can't even dream of in America, they're less likely to become the terrorists of tomorrow.  Also?  The short term way of looking at this is - oh, boo hoo, they're getting some of our jobs, but the long term plan is - they now have disposible income to spend on our stuff.  This is a good program that will benefit us in terms of finance and security.  I am fully behind this program.

Don't we have homeless people here?

Sure we do.  It's addressed in other plans.  I've been working with the homeless for over 15 years now - I wouldn't be supporting Obama if I didn't believe he had a good plan for that.

Oh yeah, that also comes with a side order of the Kyoto Protocol.  Another genius idea that a majority of the countries that signed it didn't adhere to the requirements. 

Ok, I'm no expert in environmental issues - what is your better plan?  What is Clinton's better plan?  I'm open to suggestions, but I will say up front, letting corporations dictate the plan is off the table.  Their intrerest is only in the bottom line, as it should be, as they are not people, but organizations.  They can not dictate such a policy, they can only react to policies created, and work with them to ensure deliverable bottom line results for their shareholders.

I especially like his wife's comments..[edited out long rambling diatribe]  Gotta love Socialist thinking!

Ok.  But this is the system in place in America - no President since FDR has not used it or has done away with it.  No candidate running is opposed to utilizing it.  What is your point?  Your writing suggests that it's a matter of the rich paying for the poor, but really, the way the system works is that everyone contributes, and everyone benefits.  We all utilize the polcie, the fire department, the military, etc, and the rich utilize tax money in corporate bail out and subsidies just as the poor utilize tax money to make ends meet.

I understand that some people just aren't pulling their weight - I would argue that the rich are abusing the system, personally, but putting that aside, I would encourage you to find this average poor person that you're so distainful of, so angry at, and look at their situation - I've lived my whole life around the poor (I'm like Jesus that way...) and while there is the occasional layabout, there are a lot of single moms, raising kids, trying to make ends meet by working multiple minimum wage jobs, there are a lot of soldiers back from war missing limbs and parts of thier mind who can't return to 100% of what they were before they left.  There are a lot of people who just made mistakes and want to try to fix things, but can not.  I can't look these people in the eye and tell them they're screwing over rich people with their requests for food stamps, college loans and the occasional assistance.  Those who can are different from me, but let's make something perfectly clear, all the candidates running, Obama, Clinton and McCain, will all continue to utilize these systems.

Did that answer your questions?

It's kind of foolish to be too concerned with the day to day minutia of which poll says what, and these false ideas of momentum and so on, but... I can't help but be pleased to see the latest numbers. 

"Gotta love Socialist thinking!  "

I know that I do.

It's a simple proposition - we pay taxes to maintain an ordered society. The richer, the more powerful someone becomes, the more they benefit from a strong centralized government with an effective police force, good doctors, solid basic education for all, minimal poverty and a large economic middle class.

People shift from primary industries ( food, raw materials etc) to secondary industries (factories, refined goods) to tertiary industries (service, health care etc) and onwards to entertainment and the like. The poorer the population, the more dominant the primary and secondary industries become, at the expence of the tertiary industries.

If a country has no service or entertainment sector to speak of, there's not much point of having money. There's precious little to spend them on. For all their decadence, the French pre-revolutionary aristocrats had very little culture and less medicine.

A redistribution of wealth by an "uneven" taxation system actually benefits the rich. After all, once you have a few million, have bought a house a car a boat etc,  what you really need are things that can only be manufactured and refined in a healthy consumer economy.  The more people occupy the economic middle class (or rather the portion of the population with a reasonable disposable income) the larger the incentive for innovation and progress.

People who exist at a subsistence level, with little access to medical services and other benefits of society, have precious little "invested" in society. Once you elevate "poor" people to the point where they have disposable income, and can participate more fully in the "pricey" part of society, they feel more included.

The more included people feel in society, the more "invested" they are in it, the less tolerance they have for crime and various abuses. Not just against others but against themselves. Many poor people are (as groups) apathetic in relation to the abuses they are subjected to, as they feel they have no recourse, no access to the laws that protect others.

With an uneven taxation structure, we all benefit. Now, bad politicians, bad policies,bad budget decisions and pork barrel spending that's another matter.

So, I love being a socialist (or specifically a Social Democrat)

I love your points, Knut - Norway sounds like it's got a great thing going - but understand, America is a lot more conservative in it's use of tax money.

Personally, I like the way Norway and other nations run their tax systems, but in fairness to my fellow Americans, I do also enjoy the system we have established here - where we have the freedoms of capitalism, but the safety net of socialism.  A carefull balance is needed to be maintained between the two - we can't let capitalism run out of control at the expense of the worker, nor can we become a hand-out society.

But America is different from Norway, and your points are very well taken, Knut - I envy your system; it sounds like a great thing.

Ah, but the plan isn't about transfering wealth - though it does involve an initial investment - though far less of one than is being asked for to support the Iraq occupation. 

I suppose we can argue semanitcs, but his book (& plan) is, in fact, an attempt to fix the problem, not the symptom - it would change how the first world deals with the third, and establish a long term solution to abject poverty. 

You may not agree with his plan, but I think it's pretty amazing. 

"I do also enjoy the system we have established here - where we have the freedoms of capitalism, but the safety net of socialism."

Oh, but that's what the Scandinavian model of the social-democratic mixed economy is:  Trying to meld the beneficial aspects of capitalism, socialism and liberalism (social and economic) while avoiding the negative aspects. Not always easy.

The big difference is that we approach it from the perspective of social-democratic concerns first. (Or at least that has been the prevailing perspective for most of the post-war era.)