Crazy people in office

[Alondro]

Well, I stumbled across this in my search about a new 'consensus' amongst the animal rights lunatic squads that since big cats can't be saved in the wild, they should just be allowed to go 'gracefully extinct' since captivity in any form is inherently 'cruel' accoording to their demented reasoning.  I think that view is based on a simple-minded nilhist philosophy devoid of any scientific basis or logical reasoning.  But that's not the point here.

The point is that we have one of that crew of wack-jobs in a high office now.  Obama has picked a true AR nutcase for the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.   Cass Sunstein wrote this passage in a 2004 book The Second Bill of Rights: Animal Rights: Current Controversies and New Directions, authored by him: "[A]nimals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law ... Any animals that are entitled to bring suit would be represented by (human) counsel, who would owe guardian like obligations and make decisions, subject to those obligations, on their clients' behalf."

Ok... animals filing lawsuits.  This is patently absurd; something I expect to be found only in fantasy and science fiction when dealing with something along the lines of Dr. Moreau, not in official government and law.  Even the brightest animals on earth barely approach the mental capacity of a preschooler, and the species that do reach that level number exactly 6: dolphins, gorillas, chimps, elephants, African grey parrots, and possibly orcas.  None of these species is likely to be represented by the belief being proffered.  It is most likely to be used to try to ban animal testing and meat production.  They do not have equal mental capacity, they cannot be awarded identical rights because they cannot attain the ability by any means to comprehend such rights.  While I agree that species each have a right to live and exist, they cannot be held with the same value as human life, though that does not then give humans the unequivocable right to torment and slaughter animals wantonly.  Indeed, humans that treat animals thusly often graduate to violent crimes against humans in time, thus all life does need to be given some measure of respectful treatment if for no other reason that to prevent the inherent tendancy to violence in the human psyche from fully manifesting into the ravening beast that slumbers deep in the recesses of most minds.

And, as an empathetic species capable of understanding pain and suffering to the fullest extent, we have a duty to minimize such suffering whenever an animal is in our care, as to not do so is to throw away the very things that make us truly human.

But this does not mean that we begin either raising animals up to our level NOR does it mean we should lower ourselves to their level (by which I mean giving into carnal lusts without a second thought.  The ability to consciously resist instinct is also a rarity, nay, possibly unique among all life on the planet.)

Another of his quotes was less crazy, as I know of many people who feel the same and are just bleeding-hearts who won't even squish flies: "We ought to ban hunting, I suggest, if there isn't a purpose other than sport and fun. That should be against the law. It's time now."  I'm rather on the fence about this myself.  Killing for fun does give a very uneasy feeling, and I certainly never trust people who do so on a regular basis, as you never know when they'll decide that people are more fun to shoot (ie, The Most Dangerous Game).  But then, predators (despite what is often believed) will sometimes kill for what just seems the heck of it, not even eating what they kill.  We see that with cats and dogs, both tame and wild.  They enjoy it.  Should they be banned from doing that?  Can prey sue them for cruelty?  Oh yes, that'll be next, animals suing other animals for cruelty. 

Then all animals will have to become vegetarian, as some of the most flagrantly retarded of the animal rights crowd have suggested.

It's bad enough when these people are given air time to voice their ignorance and stupidity, but this guy is in control of an office with the power to regulate practically everything.  It is not a position that should be given to someone who believes animals have the right to sue.

I won't bother getting into the other very dangerous people put into power by the Obama administration.  For one thing, that would get too off-topic.  For another, the list is far too long and includes practically every single appointee (I have found socialist/communist trappings and much more on every one; some have openly stated that they would like to eliminate individual rights).  And for a third, it's unpopular to criticize Obama.  And we all know that popularity is the most important thing of all!   

[Rafe]

{A bunch of stuff

You seem to be very thoughtful and observant.  Congratulations.

A couple of observations:
Ever notice how some people can't seem to go through their day without trying to say and do something along the lines of "You poor unfortunate, stupid [minorities, children,uninsured, animals, trees, climate, etc.], you are obviously suffering and need someone to control your life and punish those who would hurt you.  Give your money and freedom to make decisions like a normal adult to ME!  Only I am wise enough to solve all of your problems!"  It used to be that only those who couldn't say "I don't want your help.  Go away." (like trees and animals) ended up being "helped" by these power-hungry busybodies.  Now you see what happens when they get control of the entire government.

The other thing.  Despite all the glowing press reports, Obama's poll numbers are way down.  For the last two months at least, his numbers are lower than Bush's were for the same period.  People are seriously pissed at what the current government is doing, to the point that millions of them were protesting on April 15th.  My guess is the same thing is going to happen on July 4th.  If you're interested in what's actually happening, ignore the mainstream U.S. press.  To get most of the news you have to look at the British newspapers sites, radio, and other more independent sources.  Seriously, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, MSNBC coverage sucks to the point of incompetance. 

I'm not just talking about right vs. left here.  I listen to NPR and Pacifica, and things like Radio Havana Cuba and China Radio International.  Maybe I'm a masochist, but I like listening to extremists.  They may be biased, but at least they admit it.

[Alondro]

That's why we need Fox.  The only station with bias going the other way! 

[Noone]

That's why we need Fox.  The only station with bias going the other way! 

Frankly, I think that no station even comes close to the heights of bias Fox news reaches. I tend to find that left-wing stations tend towards selective reporting rather than the blatant factual distortion that Fox attempts.  And no, they're not the only source of media that has a starkly right wing bias either, Wall Street Journal is one good example, though since you seem to be talking about TV news, I might add that even CNN has been accused of having a right-wing bias. I suppose if you consider Fox to be center, then everything else has an extreme left leaning bias. But frankly, Fox news is a joke, I honestly find the Onion to have more factual content, and I fail to see how Fox adds anything to the media.

I won't bother getting into the other very dangerous people put into power by the Obama administration.  For one thing, that would get too off-topic.  For another, the list is far too long and includes practically every single appointee (I have found socialist/communist trappings and much more on every one; some have openly stated that they would like to eliminate individual rights).  And for a third, it's unpopular to criticize Obama.  And we all know that popularity is the most important thing of all!

I really don't know where you're getting the communist trappings with every single appointee, I mean, how are people like Robert Gates in any way like Stalin? Or any of the other communists that people think of when the word is used? Using such a definition is untrue on so many levels, as the Obama administration, while they have advocated policies that intervene in the market economy, they are far from a total command economy. Not that a pure market economy works very well either.
It's perfectly reasonable to criticize Obama and his administration, but there are legitimate criticisms, that he's a Socialist(If you use the Conservapedia definition anyways), and Communist, are not among them. In fact, I was against the auto-bailout, since it didn't target the real problem in the American auto industry. I've never had problems levying such statements however, but I do find it's unpopular to say things like 'He's a communist', largely because such claims have little passing acquaintance with facts. There are a whole plethora of other claims about Obama, and I find that reasonable criticisms get far warmer reception than the ridiculous ones.
Also, since your topic is 'Crazy people in office', I fail to see how going through his other appointees is off-topic.

It's bad enough when these people are given air time to voice their ignorance and stupidity, but this guy is in control of an office with the power to regulate practically everything.  It is not a position that should be given to someone who believes animals have the right to sue.

Actually, no, they can't. Congress has to approve laws, in fact, they have to start and pass them in the first place before the executive branch can even do anything with them. Of course, one could always influence their party to try and pass regulations, but that an office appointment gives one person the power to regulate 'practically everything' is completely incorrect.
Actually, if you look at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, which is a sub-office of the Office of Management and Budget, you would realize that all they do is produce a report of the president's budget. Now of course, they could alter things to produce a palpable bias, but ultimately, they don't have any power over the president to affect regulation, and the president's only legislative power is the veto. The president can't do anything without congress.

[Tezkat]

The point is that we have one of that crew of wack-jobs in a high office now.  Obama has picked a true AR nutcase for the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.   Cass Sunstein wrote this passage in a 2004 book The Second Bill of Rights: Animal Rights: Current Controversies and New Directions, authored by him: "[A]nimals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law ... Any animals that are entitled to bring suit would be represented by (human) counsel, who would owe guardian like obligations and make decisions, subject to those obligations, on their clients' behalf."

Why, yes... you can make people sound crazy by taking their words out of context...

"My simplest suggestion is that private citizens should be given the right to bring suits to prevent animals from being treated in a way that violates current law. I offer a recommendation that is theoretically modest but that should do a lot of practical good: laws designed to protect animals against cruelty and abuse should be amended and interpreted to give a private cause of action against those who violate them, so as to allow private people to supplement the efforts of public prosecutors. Somewhat more broadly, I will suggest that animals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law."

He's suggesting that, since public prosecutors lack the resources and/or the will to properly enforce current laws, we should offload some of the burden and responsibility for combating animal rights violations to private citizens. Animals wouldn't be getting any new rights, merely new people to enforce statutes that were supposed to be protecting them in the first place.

Ok... animals filing lawsuits.  This is patently absurd; something I expect to be found only in fantasy and science fiction when dealing with something along the lines of Dr. Moreau, not in official government and law.  Even the brightest animals on earth barely approach the mental capacity of a preschooler, and the species that do reach that level number exactly 6: dolphins, gorillas, chimps, elephants, African grey parrots, and possibly orcas.

Mental capacity is a requirement for legal protection now?

Another of his quotes was less crazy, as I know of many people who feel the same and are just bleeding-hearts who won't even squish flies: "We ought to ban hunting, I suggest, if there isn't a purpose other than sport and fun. That should be against the law. It's time now."  I'm rather on the fence about this myself.

I mostly support hunting as a lesser evil. Gun-toting redneck factor notwithstanding, hunters have a front seat to the effects of habitat destruction and climate change. When rising temperatures bring the deer down a month before hunting season even opens, that affects not only the sport but the livelihoods of all the people and businesses dependent upon it. So, naturally, they have a reason to do something about it.

Hunters are great conservationists. Ducks Unlimited has conserved millions of acres of wetlands--just so that people who like shooting ducks have something to shoot at.

I'm a big believer in supporting environmental causes by costing the externalities into the system.

We like lions around here, right? Lions kill cattle. Maasai need cattle. Maasai poke lions with sharp sticks until they stop killing cattle. Not so good for the lions. But put a dollar value on the lions--say $50k-100k for a 5-year-old trophy male--and suddenly the lost cattle are a lion-feeding expense rather than a loss of livelihood. Once an animal becomes a unit of production, people have an incentive to protect and develop it.

Now, the bleeding-heart panda-huggers will of course whine that institutionalized animal murder is the wrong way to go about conservation. They've got a point, but let's face it: Humans as a whole aren't particularly good at caring about what happens half a planet away, let alone outside of our species. We now interact with the natural world primarily through our investment and purchasing power. Until someone comes up with a better system for running the world than capitalism, the best way to save the planet is to make a good business case for it.

It's not as if hunting can't be conducted in a sustainable manner. That's what rules are for. As long as they're enforced, of course.

(Maybe by giving animals the power to sue? )

Then all animals will have to become vegetarian, as some of the most flagrantly retarded of the animal rights crowd have suggested.

"And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox."

I'm not just talking about right vs. left here.  I listen to NPR and Pacifica, and things like Radio Havana Cuba and China Radio International.  Maybe I'm a masochist, but I like listening to extremists.  They may be biased, but at least they admit it.

There's something to be said for news sources that wear their bias on their sleeves. The notion of "fair and balanced" reporting is disingenuous at best. All reporting is inherently biased. After all, it's a reporter's job to filter news for us.

I happen to like gathering news from a variety of viewpoints, even (especially?) ones with a strong bias towards one side of an issue or the other. Analyzing multiple sides of a debate makes it easier to make up my own mind about issues.

Frankly, I think that no station even comes close to the heights of bias Fox news reaches. I tend to find that left-wing stations tend towards selective reporting rather than the blatant factual distortion that Fox attempts.  And no, they're not the only source of media that has a starkly right wing bias either, Wall Street Journal is one good example, though since you seem to be talking about TV news, I might add that even CNN has been accused of having a right-wing bias. I suppose if you consider Fox to be center, then everything else has an extreme left leaning bias. But frankly, Fox news is a joke, I honestly find the Onion to have more factual content, and I fail to see how Fox adds anything to the media.

All of the cable news channels are a joke, really. Fox was merely the first to stop taking news seriously.

I do think that the Wall Street Journal has excellent reporting, though, and the quality hasn't dropped much since Murdoch took over. They have the good sense to keep their blatant political bias where it belongs--on the op-ed pages. That's more than I can say for a certain other well-known New York newspaper.

[AngelSephy]

Tells me I need to keep up with politics more often. I wasn't aware Obama was bringing another nutcase into government.

And while I do feel animals have certain rights, I'm with you on the fact that they don't need rights that would suggest they were equal with humans on mental terms. As for the hunting issue? The only time I feel it necessary would be for when populations are swelling to the point of threatening stability in any one place, or for food. Though I refuse to ever wear real fur because I am a bleeding heart, I don't condemn the ones who do.

I had something else... but exhaustion makes my mind go *ploof* inside...

[Baal Hadad]

Though I refuse to ever wear real fur because I am a bleeding heart, I don't condemn the ones who do.

There need to be more people like this.  It's too easy to cross the line from "doing what you feel is right" to "condemning everyone who DOESN'T do what you think is right."

[Rafe]

How's this for a new level of bias in the media - the pro-Obama news coverage bias has gotten so huge and obvious that even the liberal flagship Washington Post (yes, I read that one too) is reporting it.  Full article here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/31/AR2009053102079.html

Some excerpts:

Obama has inspired a collective fawning. What started in the campaign (the chief victim was Hillary Clinton, not John McCain) has continued, as a study by the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism shows. It concludes: "President Barack Obama has enjoyed substantially more positive media coverage than either Bill Clinton or George W. Bush during their first months in the White House."

The study examined 1,261 stories by The Post, the New York Times, ABC, CBS and NBC, Newsweek magazine and the "NewsHour" on PBS. Favorable articles (42 percent) were double the unfavorable (20 percent), while the rest were "neutral" or "mixed." Obama's treatment contrasts sharply with coverage in the first two months of the Bush (22 percent of stories favorable) and Clinton (27 percent) presidencies.

Unlike George Bush and Bill Clinton, Obama received favorable coverage in both news columns and opinion pages. The nature of stories also changed. "Roughly twice as much of the coverage of Obama (44 percent) has concerned his personal and leadership qualities than was the case for Bush (22 percent) or Clinton (26 percent)," the report said. "Less of the coverage, meanwhile, has focused on his policy agenda."

Bias or not, the job of the media is to report on what's happening as far as government policies and all their potential problems and effects.  They should be talking about where all this gigantic mass of power and money is going.  Instead, seems like all they focus on is the personalities of the party that used to be in power, and how everything is obviusly their fault.  The Republicans are powerless and gone.  How about spending some time looking at what's happening NOW?  No, they can't seem to do that to any degree, as the Post points out.

[rabid_fox]

The problem with fur is that it's not only classy and well suited to any social situation, it's also really nice to rub your ballsack across.

[Alondro]

Tezcat, the lion shall only eat straw AFTER the stuff in Revelations happens.  We ain't there yet!  The burning star has not plunged into the ocean and turned the waters into wormwood, nor has the mountain crashed down turned 1/3 of the waters to blood and burnt 1/3 of the grass and so forth. 

God will have to re-engineer their digestive systems to process plants and require less protein.

I didn't see that the entire quote changed anything.  The belief of that single sentence that animals is that the animals have the right to bring suit.  Even though we all know it'd be the humans actually bringing the suit, it represents a huge shift in judicial policy and would greatly empower groups like PETA and ALF to flood the system with frivilous lawsuits.

I also found this article today on another outrage:  Voter intimidation ok for Panthers

Now, wouldn't a single white man harrassing a black man in a similar way be thrown in jail, with cries going out for charges of race crimes?  But the reverse is apparently ok.  These people were not just random protestors, they were the Black Panthers, a group historically known for violence.  It'd be akin to three members of the KKK in full Klan regalia... and you can bet they'd have been in jail now!

Any and all voter intimidation should be prosecuted.  It should not be simply shrugged off.

[Noone]

I didn't see that the entire quote changed anything.  The belief of that single sentence that animals is that the animals have the right to bring suit.  Even though we all know it'd be the humans actually bringing the suit, it represents a huge shift in judicial policy and would greatly empower groups like PETA and ALF to flood the system with frivilous lawsuits.

The entire quote didn't change anything? I'd like to take a closer look at the two quotes taken.

"My simplest suggestion is that private citizens should be given the right to bring suits to prevent animals from being treated in a way that violates current law. I offer a recommendation that is theoretically modest but that should do a lot of practical good: laws designed to protect animals against cruelty and abuse should be amended and interpreted to give a private cause of action against those who violate them, so as to allow private people to supplement the efforts of public prosecutors. Somewhat more broadly, I will suggest that animals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law."

"[A]nimals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law ... Any animals that are entitled to bring suit would be represented by (human) counsel, who would owe guardian like obligations and make decisions, subject to those obligations, on their clients' behalf."

Let's discard that the initial quote was started in the middle of a sentence, rather than at the start, and the '...' that may span a few lines, or paragraphs, in between. Next, take a closer look at the two quotes, read in full.
In the first, as I read it, the author's point is that current cases of animal abuse are not being prosecuted. If his point is that cases of illegal animal abuse are not prosecuted, and that they should be, then his point sounds much more reasonable.
In the second, the author appears to want animals themselves to take legal action, which they cannot take, and it makes the author sound crazy. In fact, the whole piece that was omitted, 'My simplest suggestion is that private citizens should be given the right to bring suits to prevent animals from being treated in a way that violates current law. I offer a recommendation that is theoretically modest but that should do a lot of practical good: laws designed to protect animals against cruelty and abuse should be amended and interpreted to give a private cause of action against those who violate them, so as to allow private people to supplement the efforts of public prosecutors.' Simply omitting that whole section completely butchers what the author was trying to say, and I would be curious to see what is in that '...' section myself. It's a very good example of quote mining.
http://rationalwiki.com/wiki/Quote_mining

And yes, this does give rise to the possibility of frivolous lawsuits, but then again, so does anything regarding expanding upon things that people can prosecute for. Would you want to refrain from prosecuting people for murder, theft, or other crimes because they might be innocent and it would be a waste of time and resources to put them and everyone else through the trial? Of course not. A more reasonable example would be the situation with healthcare, there are a lot of frivolous lawsuits being filed in that field, yet, what about the legitimate claims? If you shut that down entirely, it gives patients no protection in the case of real malpractice. Now of course, they are few and far between, but taking all rights to prosecute away wouldn't give good results. By definition, power does come with the ability to abuse, that doesn't necessarily mean that power in of itself is a bad thing.

I also found this article today on another outrage:  Voter intimidation ok for Panthers

Now, wouldn't a single white man harrassing a black man in a similar way be thrown in jail, with cries going out for charges of race crimes?  But the reverse is apparently ok.  These people were not just random protestors, they were the Black Panthers, a group historically known for violence.  It'd be akin to three members of the KKK in full Klan regalia... and you can bet they'd have been in jail now!

Any and all voter intimidation should be prosecuted.  It should not be simply shrugged off.

How is this relevant to the previous discussion? (Or to the topic 'Crazy People in Office'?)

[Tezkat]

Tezcat, the lion shall only eat straw AFTER the stuff in Revelations happens.  We ain't there yet! 

I'm merely pointing out that the ideal of vegetarian lions predates PETA by several millennia.

I didn't see that the entire quote changed anything.  The belief of that single sentence that animals is that the animals have the right to bring suit.  Even though we all know it'd be the humans actually bringing the suit, it represents a huge shift in judicial policy and would greatly empower groups like PETA and ALF to flood the system with frivilous lawsuits.

So we should allow PETA being asshats to affect public policy now?

Random people wouldn't be able sue some guy they see kicking a puppy. The Constitution and a mountain of legal precedents define who and what constitute injured and interested parties. Having "the mental capacity of a preschooler" has never been among the requirements. The representatives of corporations, children, and the disabled file suit all the time. Hell, even dead people are winning lawsuits these days. If you're entitled to the protection of the law, you should be entitled to representatives willing and able to enforce it. Otherwise the law has no meaning.

Animals deserve protection from abuse.

The laws of the land should be enforced.

The status quo doesn't satisfy these conditions, resulting in a de facto loss of the few legal protections animals supposedly enjoy under the law. Sunstein's suggestion that the definition of injured parties be expanded to include the animals themselves specifically addresses the enforcement gap, something he makes quite explicit at the end of the chapter:

"A serious problem under the principal national protection against animal suffering--the Animal Welfare Act--is that the Department of Agriculture lacks sufficient resources to enforce it adequately. At a minimum, the act should be a amended so as to create a private cause of action by the affected persons, allowing them to bring suit against those who violate the act. A serious problem with current animal welfare statutes, including the Animal Welfare Act, is an absence of real enforcement--a problem that stems partly from limited government resources. At least when a violation of the statute is unambiguous, private parties should be permitted to bring suit directly against violators. This system of dual public and private enforcement would track the pattern under many federal environmental statutes; it should be followed for statutes protecting animal welfare."

Is that really so radical? The framework already exists. For example, a company that makes the financial sacrifice to ensure that its animals are treated humanely could sue another company for competitive injuries if that competitor saves money by abusing animals in violation of the law. That's the type of private enforcement Sunstein would like to see formalized in animal protection statutes. We've already amassed considerable precedent in similar cases of civil liability for environmental damage.

There are, of course, alternatives. For instance, we could simply dole out the necessary tax dollars to fund a mandate for prosecuting animal abuse. After throwing a trillion dollars at failed banks and auto companies, what's a few million here and there to protect cute furry things?

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

I'm merely pointing out that the ideal of vegetarian lions predates PETA by several millennia.

Several? Two at most, and I was under the impression that 1500 was a closer figure, given the semi-apocryphal status of most of the "books" of what the average christian these days would call "the bible" (as distinct from the many and varied accounts that have been written by all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons...)

[Valynth]

The problem with fur is that it's not only classy and well suited to any social situation, it's also really nice to rub your ballsack across.

I believe you've just encompassed the entire furry community in a nutshell...  Bravo sir.

[Tezkat]

Several? Two at most, and I was under the impression that 1500 was a closer figure, given the semi-apocryphal status of most of the "books" of what the average christian these days would call "the bible" (as distinct from the many and varied accounts that have been written by all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons...)

I quoted from Isaiah 11:7 (KJV). It's a sufficiently popular passage that I didn't feel it needed attribution. Isaiah lived and preached in the 8th century BCE. Even if you support the multiple author theory for that book, the first chapters are usually ascribed to him. So... nearly three millennia, actually.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Ah, old testament. Right. Yes, that's different. Fair enough. Sorry, my mistake.