Not to offend anyone but that wouldn't surprise me if it was the truth.

Define 'the whole developed world'.

Also, when it comes to Adrian; you can blame him for lots of things, but I doubt a low IQ is one of them. And I didn't see anything racist in his earlier post either, but maybe people here are referring to another posting (I haven't read the entire thread).

I agree with you that it's a first step in the right direction, though I fear for Obama's life as well.
I think the reason for America developing this slow is because 'they' (the important politicians etc.) still think America is impossible to defeat and invincible. Now they brought themselves down thanks to that behaviour and dragged the whole world with them.

America wasn't loved in the world because of George Bush and now this crysis they started puts them even more in a downwards flow.

I hope Obama can do some good. That people will accept that he can't walk over water and that he might need at least 8 years to undo all the crap Bush has done.

I salute you,
Thunderstrucker

With the whole developed world I mean mostly western Europe. Though not every citizen is fond of the gay-marriage, almost all countries (of western europe) accepted and approved it.

I salute you,
Thunderstrucker

I can't believe you are saying something like that. And as far as I remember, you are a teacher. I sure do hope this is not what you teach your pupils. Cause that would explain a lot of what is being discussed later in this tread.

I think that's the very first time I read such bullshit from you Mouse... you may of course not like or trust Obama, but that's just a really ignorant statement to make.


Ponrauil

I keep politics out of the classroom so get a grip. I am also entitled to my opinion thank you very much! Ignorance is thinking that this guy is actually good for this country. Imo of course!

Hope you don't attempt to belittle anyone in the classroom for having a differing opinion either.;)

So if it was up to you, America and the world as well, would be stucked with a 72 year old senior and a woman who doesnt have any knowledge of anything at all and you actually think that would be good for America ?

Really....Do I need to say anymore...

I salute you,
Thunderstrucker

I'm sorry if you felt offended by my comment as I'm sure that you have noticed that I have been very much supporting McCain...as much as my brain allowed. Everybody should be entitled to his own opinion, I agree. Though I think that as rational beings, this opinion should be based on facts rather than sentiments. And as much as I support free market, small governments, tax cuts, and liberal (I'd even call them neo-liberal) values, at some point I had to look at the facts. And Obama was the better candidate, no doubt. Obama will bring fresh air into world politics and as skeptical as I am about his results and deliveries, I would never say something as irresponsible as: "Ignorance is thinking that this guy is actually good for this country". During his entire campaign, McCain has been adapting and changing according to his electorate. This was a mistake which he only realized during his final speech. It was a great speech, where he honestly and genuinely accepted Obama to be the legitimate winner of this elections. I do hope that for once, his voters will change according to him.

And coming back to your Marx comment. That is an opinion indeed. Similar to somebody saying "Pigs are the fastest birds". You are entitled to it. Just that nobody will take you serious, and you can't expect anyone to take you serious either.

I challenge anyone to find ANYWHERE any hint of racism in any of my posts. Bring it on. As I've said a million times before, putting the H is his name is just like calling Lincoln's assassin John WILKES Boothe or Kennedy's Lee HARVEY Oswald. Hell, I've even called George Bush GWB on more than a few occasions.

And my comments about treason have been applied equally across the political spectrum, not just to BHO. I've probably called Bush a traitor more times than any Democrat, simply because he's had more face time.

Here's hoping that he does a wonderful job and governs this country within the Constitutionally defined limits of our government. If he can follow the Constitution, I will be his strongest supporter. If he doesn't, I'll be the first and loudest voice.

Adrian

I'll be honest and say that I don't know much about politics, so I'm just asking here - but hasn't the constitution had ammendments to it? Presumably that means that when an old law/right is out-dated, it is brought up to the modern day - right? How long can you stand behind something which is already 200 years old, and thus written in a very different time.

Do you believe that it would have been written exactly the same way given the way we live today?

And what sins exactly was Marx guilty of? Short of providing ideas which were grossly perverted?

I read of republicans voting for Obama so he is the one who needs to clean up the mess so that the republicans come when issues are dealth with and they can mess it up again.
And Adrian, you are talking like we already have had 4 years of Obama and nothing happened, that is very narrow-minded. Just wait and see what he will bring and hopefully you will be surprised and don't cry before you got hit in the future.

I salute you,
Thunderstrucker

His sin was a complete lack of understanding about how humans operate. There has never been a true (Marxist) Communist government in the history of the world because it just could not work (If I'm not mistaken, "Communist government" is an oxymoron). Who wants to let go of absolute power?

That's not exactly a sin in the technical sense of the word, is it?

And I'm fairly positive Marx never advocated a Communist Government (which, as you said, is an oxymoron). He predicted there'd be a worker's revolution, which would lead to a gradual eroding of the need for a state. Obviously this is unlikely to happen, but I'm not sure that someone being wrong about something is cause for eternal damnation, do you?

Nah I was being a bit facetious. The problem is that his ideas were then taken and used as an excuse to set up dictatorships, which he kind of advocated. He just thought that they would be temporary (show everyone how to work together for the greater good and then the government would gradually relinquish power because they were no longer needed -- yeah right).

So not a cause for eternal damnation but perhaps a little bit like playing with matches. ;)

Yes it was but if you noticed when he praised his opponent during his speech, his audience started booing. When Obama gave his speech and he praised his opponent his audience (which was way larger) applauded.

To me just that small "snapshot" is exactly what I have come to expect from Republicans. They should at least have the manners to give their opponent a nod of respect for a campaign well run.

I was up late last night and I had to work early this morning but I am more hopeful than I have been in a long time about my country. I can only hope that he (and the people he chooses) lives up to the promise.

people didn't vote the way i wanted to i hope america gets reamed?

that's one of the most undemocratic and unamerican things i've ever read.

I see your point, the only thing is that Marx was not just a dreamer like other philosophers who are considered initiators of certain movements. He was an instigator, he was someone who would have applied everything he wrote, and who wouldn't have thought twice about achieving the proletarian revolution. Also, lots of stuff he wrote is very applicable and written to be applied. Just read some excerpts of his biographies.

Of course, blaming him for all the evils of the Soviet Union, communist China, etc. is largely inappropriate. But he denounced God so the burning in hell part would be right if there was a heaven, a hell, and all that was written in the Bible was correct :P

You are right Kathleen. Though, from personal experience, it's much easier to cheer when you won, then when you lost.

And McCain immediately stopped them, said "No no no!" which seemed really genuine. That was what impressed me most. It was like admitting that Obama was the better candidate, it was like saying "support him! he'll need it!". Maybe I am over-interpreting the whole gesture, but that was what I found to be most impressive. It's so difficult to be a good loser. Terribly difficult.

Yep, 27 of them. Mostly useless stuff like freedom of speech or the right to trial by jury. Oh, and the right to bear arms. Yes, it's not, I repeat, NOT in the constitution.

Ice

That makes me wonder how many Americans then, like Adrian who will happily die defending it's original form, have even read the damn thing.

I wonder why anyone would want to defend a document which has already been ammended 27 times :? Presumably it can be ammended again then, right?

At least it has been amended, as opposed to being left as it was, which would be leagues worse.

This same pile of BS keeps getting recycled election after election. It was, and remains, an internet hoax - http://www.snopes.com/politics/ballot/stateiq.asp

The journal Intelligence (an actual scholarly journal - http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/jou...95/description) contains the following article which attempts to estimate state IQ scores rather than just make them up to suit one's agenda - http://www.people.vcu.edu/~mamcdani/Publications/McDaniel%20(2006)%20Estimating%20state%20IQ.pdf

Compare the estimates for traditional blue state California and traditional red state Wyoming in that article and in the chart above.

As I said, I never claimed it was real because I only found it on another forum - I was just posting it here. Presumably if there are real IQ statistics though it would be possible to compile a real one?

Let me be bitter and ignorant for one day. My normal self will return tomorrow! Hehe

There goes my lunchtime! LOL I'll give it a whirl. (Of course, I live in a "stupid" red state, so someone might want to check behind me. ;))

BTW, I do not know if that journal article is widely accepted or not. This isn't my area. All I did before posting it was verify that it was written by a professor at a widely-known university and published in what appears to be a scholarly journal -- one with a lengthy editorial board.

Ahhhh! All right! That's the Mouse I know :D

Maybe I should try to compile one after our next election. Of course, I live in good old Australia with 6 states and 2 territories.:p

For the record, I also live in a stupid red state. :lol:

It seems like so long ago that I watched Barack Obama on that cold morning on February 2, 2007, when I watched him announce that he was running for President. I'm happy to say that I'm proud to be an American today. A new wave of change is on it's way and with my life finally starting to move forward, it comes at a good time. I congratulate John McCain for his service and a hard-fought campaign. Congrats President Obama! To change the mood a little bit though, I'm sick and tired of bitter McCain voters claiming that Obama is a terrorist and that this country is going to go straight to hell. They act like it's the end of the world. For God sakes, we had 8 years of Bush and could have had more. I am also bothered by McCain voters blaming the African-American voters of ignorance and that they are the only reason President Obama won. Lets look at the facts, the biggest African-American population is in the South. North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi...... All of them, went to McCain. So did it make that big of a difference? Doesn't really look like it (Yes, they are normally conservative states). Anyways, I'm done ranting... Time to move on. I can see great things on the horizon.

Ryan

I'm really excited about our 50 states right about now . . . NOT. :rolleyes:

Just had some time on my hands... so I check the IQ issue. Here is the real deal from here:

http://services.alphaworks.ibm.com/m...ha6cGEMGuwWF2-

And here:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/


State IQ Candidate

Massachussets 101.5 Obama
North Dakota 101.4 McCain
Vermont 101.2 Obama
Montana 101.1 McCain
South Dakota 101.1 McCain
New Hampshire 101 Obama
Minnesota 100.8 Obama
Wisconsin 100.3 Obama
Wyoming 100.2 McCain
Iowa 100 Obama
Idaho 99.9 McCain
Main 99.9 Obama
Nebraska 99.7 McCain
Virginia 99.7 Obama
Ohio 99.6 Obama
Washington 99.6 Obama
Colorado 99.4 Obama
New Jersey 99.3 Obama
Kansas 99.2 McCain
Oregon 99.1 Obama
Michigan 99 Obama
Utah 99 McCain
Connecticut 98.9 Obama
Delaware 98.8 Obama
Missouri 98.7 McCain
Alaska 98.6 McCain
Pennsylvania 98.6 Obama
Indiana 98.5 Obama
Kentucky 98.3 McCain
Illinois 97.8 Obama
New York 97.8 Obama
South Carolina 97.5 McCain
North Carolina 97.4 Obama
Maryland 97.2 Obama
Texas 97.2 McCain
Oklahoma 96.9 McCain
Rhode Island 96.8 Obama
West Virginia 96.7 McCain
Tennessee 96.6 McCain
Arkansas 96.5 McCain
Georgia 96.5 McCain
Florida 96.1 Obama
Arizona 95.9 McCain
Nevada 95.2 Obama
Louisiana 95 McCain
California 94.7 Obama
New Mexico 94.5 Obama
Alabama 94.4 McCain
Hawai 94.4 Obama
Mississippi 93.3 McCain

Top state:Massachussets 101.5 Obama
Bottom state: Mississippi 93.3 McCain

Top state Obama:Massachussets 101.5
Top state McCain:North Dakota 101.4

Bottom state Obama:Hawai 94.4
Bottom state McCain:Mississippi 93.3

Obama states average IQ: 98.5
McCain states average IQ: 97.9

These stats pretty much seems to show IQ is not a really significant factor... it's not as clear a cut as in the post that first mentioned this... BUT when you consider that McCain leads 13-12 in the 25 bottom states and Obama leads 16-9 in the 25 top states... it does show that the "smarter" states actually made the difference this time around.


Ponrauil

Okay, it turns out that I'm smart enough to create the chart, but I'm not smart enough to figure out how to post it here. If I don't do some real work, I'll be an unemployed semi-smart person, so I'll have to try to solve that problem later.

The chart still has concentrations, but it is hardly the solid blocks of blue and red that the earlier chart suggested.

EDIT - problem solved. Thanks, Ponrauil.

I was just bored enough to put your figures in a SPSS data sheet and tried some correlations. Nothing is significant, ergo all is chance. Taking the face-value in this case is simply misleading.

I DO NOT, repeat DO NOT hope he destroys our country. I do hope people come to realize what a profoundly bad decision they made. A nice dawning "oh shit" moment in about 2 years would be nice.

Adrian

I hate to burst your IQ ideas but there's no statistically significant difference in an IQ of 101.5 and an IQ of 93.3. The average IQ is 100 and anything between 90-109 is considered Average. In order for a difference to be significant, it has to be a standard deviation which is 15 points. If the top state had an IQ of 108 and the bottom had an IQ of 93, the difference would matter, but both scores would still be considered average. As it is, the difference in the average scores for the states are more likely a reflection of socioeconomic status. Children who live in rural areas will do more poorly on an IQ test than those who live in more populated areas. I can't discuss in detail because of test security, but there are photographic items in some of the major IQ tests that are biased against rural children because those children not likely to have ever seen these things. That doesn't make them stupid. It makes them disadvantaged.

That difference could not be any more meaningless.

And for the record, I have a Master's degree in psychological testing and have given at least a thousand IQ tests in my career. I assure you I know what I'm talking about on this subject because I know the tests and the way they are normed and I know the bias I see every day in testing.

Unfortunately for me, the election isn't truly over here in Georgia. In order to win an election in this state, a candidate must get a majority of the vote, not just a plurality. There was a Libertarian candidate on the ballot for the U.S. Senate race, and he pulled 3.4%. In a close race, that was enough, though. Right now, with 99% of the precincts reporting, the candidate in first place has 49.8%. <sigh> In all likelihood we're headed for a run off between the top 2 candidates and 4 more weeks of incredibly ugly campaign ads. Fabulous.

:bad-word:

Rest assured, I don't think you're bursting anything serious. :)


Ponrauil