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U.S. Presidential Candidates Answer ScienceDebate 2016 Questions

posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday September 14 2016, @01:07PM   
from the interesting-but-not-surprising dept.

slash2phar writes:

Three of the four major candidates for United States president have responded to America's Top 20 Presidential Science, Engineering, Technology, Health and Environmental Questions. The nonprofit advocacy group ScienceDebate.org has posted their responses online. Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, and Jill Stein had all responded as of press time, and the group was awaiting responses from Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson.

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Original Submission

• Re:lameness filterRe:lameness filter (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday September 14 2016, @05:02PM

  by Thexalon (636) on Wednesday September 14 2016, @05:02PM (#401897)

  1) Stein is currently polling at about 4%. That doesn't sound like a lot until you realize that's about 10 million people. She's the 4th most popular presidential candidate right now, so give her some respect.
  2) Both Clinton and Stein are obviously pro-science.
  3) I agree Johnson needs to do better as a candidate. He really missed an opportunity with "What is Aleppo?".

  --
  "Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin

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• Re:lameness filter(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 14 2016, @08:42PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 14 2016, @08:42PM (#402003)

  3) I agree Johnson needs to do better as a candidate. He really missed an opportunity with "What is Aleppo?".

  He could've at least gave some vague politician answer instead of outright demonstrating his ignorance. Or he could have handled the aftermath by saying that what happens in some third world shithole is less important than the violence and issues back home, indicating that he's opposed to preemptive warfare.

  But he, like you said, wasted the opportunity. It's frustrating that Johnson seems to squishy and bumbling in an election year where he could probably get a significant amount of votes by third party standards if he wasn't handling everything so ineptly. It's almost like he doesn't think about anything or do any preparation whatsoever.

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• Student debtStudent debt (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 14 2016, @09:22PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 14 2016, @09:22PM (#402013)

  There are 43 million USAians with student debt (over $1 trillion in total).
  Dr. Stein advocates zeroing-out that and adopting the Scandinavian model.
  If all those folks would simply vote in their own self-interest, they'd vote for Jill.
  Instant plurality?

  -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

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  • Re:Student debtRe:Student debt (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday September 14 2016, @09:56PM

    by Thexalon (636) on Wednesday September 14 2016, @09:56PM (#402025)

    If all those folks would simply vote in their own self-interest, they'd vote for Jill.

    One of the basic facts about US politics is that most people do not vote for their own self-interest. Fredrich Engels (y'know, Karl Marx's homie) observed over a century ago that all the US needed to do to turn itself into a socialist nation was for the working classes to realize they were the majority and vote for their self-interest. So you can be darned sure that those with power have done everything they can to prevent that outcome.

    --
    "Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin

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    • Re:Student debt(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday September 15 2016, @03:48AM

      by Reziac (2489) on Thursday September 15 2016, @03:48AM (#402122) Homepage

      "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largess out of the public treasury."

      --atrrib. Tytler et al.
      http://www.lorencollins.net/tytler.html [lorencollins.net]

      --
      And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.

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  • Re:Student debtRe:Student debt (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 14 2016, @10:49PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 14 2016, @10:49PM (#402044)

    I would be in favor of free higher education on the condition that we require the colleges and universities that qualify to have extremely high standards; nothing like what we have now where just about any know-nothing loser who has just enough motivation to get through a few years of schooling can get a degree. The gap between the top schools and the mediocre and worst schools should not be so tremendously large.

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    • Nothing New...(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 15 2016, @01:35AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 15 2016, @01:35AM (#402099)

      If the colleges were better, if they really had it, you would need to get the police at the gates to keep order in the inrushing multitude. See in college how we thwart the natural love of learning by leaving the natural method of teaching what each wishes to learn, and insisting that you shall learn what you have no taste or capacity for. The college, which should be a place of delightful labour, is made odious and unhealthy, and the young men are tempted to frivolous amusements to rally their jaded spirits. I would have the studies elective. Scholarship is to be created not by compulsion, but by awakening a pure interest in knowledge. The wise instructor accomplishes this by opening to his pupils precisely the attractions the study has for himself. The marking is a system for schools, not for the college; for boys, not for men; and it is an ungracious work to put on a professor.

      - Ralph Waldo Emerson

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