A Great Victory for President Obama!

[mywan]

WW2 was trigered by Hitler invading Poland - everyone knows that. What caused WW2? What was on the build-up? Not Poland.

By the way, did you know that your beloved Soviets also attacked and occupied Poland, at about the same time when Hitler did so? Did you know that Hitler was so anti-communist that he and Stalin had no problem occupying Poland at the same time carving it up nicely like good pals do, and they even had a non-aggression pact, and that things only soured when Hitler stupidly attacked the USSR?

Did you know Hitler had non-aggression pacts with lots of nations he later invaded? Why? To avoid the two front war that his overconfidence eventually got him on.

Oh, by the way, when you say: "your 'beloved' Soviets" it is technically an ad hominem wrapped in a strawman.

[K_F]

WW2 was trigered by Hitler invading Poland - everyone knows that. What caused WW2? What was on the build-up? Not Poland.

Actually it was the Allies, in victory of WW1 making Germany pay economically damaging reparations for years, driving German poverty and the 30s depression. All contributed to a climate that enabled a radical lunatic like Hitler to come to power... Which is why the allies in victory of WW2 were quick to rebuild their conquests - they realised their WW1 mistakes (more after the next quote)

By the way, did you know that your beloved Soviets also attacked and occupied Poland, at about the same time when Hitler did so? Did you know that Hitler was so anti-communist that he and Stalin had no problem occupying Poland at the same time carving it up nicely like good pals do, and they even had a non-aggression pact, and that things only soured when Hitler stupidly attacked the USSR?

Main Kampf (Hitlers's theories of life) spelt out his ambitions long before he reached a political power base. Had anyone then, bothered to read the book (Stalin, Chamberlain.. etc) they would have known what he was going to do, and could have 'pulled the rug' early enough.
 ;)

[K_F]

..and that things only soured when Hitler stupidly attacked the USSR?

A bit of an understatement.. 

Actually, it was not a stupid move and it could have worked (Lots of IFs though), had he not been delayed by the Greeks for 3 months. Stalin was a great help to Hitler, The Great Purge left the Russians with very few able bodied military leaders, and a ruthless lunatic as it's head. The ordinary russian was more afraid of Stalin that Hitler - they had more experiences of Stalin. So much so that 10s of thousands switched sides and fought for the Wehrmacht. Had Hitler not interfered with military matters so much... it could have been a different story, and you and I might have been talking  German, Italian or Japanese.. :icon_mrgreen:

[Bill Cravener]

I thought China was a funny one.

[K_F]

Maybe China, and a few others know something we  don't 

Plodding through the numbers
600 0000 votes out of say 6 billion people  =>   600 000/6 000 000 000 => 0.0001

[anunitu]

The republicans have finely completely slipped off the cracker,and have entered the twilight zone

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/14/georgia-gop-lawmakers_n_2132263.html

You could never make something like this up.

"President Obama is using a Cold War-era mind-control technique known as "Delphi" to coerce Americans into accepting his plan for a United Nations-run communist dictatorship in which suburbanites will be forcibly relocated to cities. That's according to a four-hour briefing delivered to Republican state senators at the Georgia state Capitol last month."

[MichaelW]

And since Mother Jones says so, it must be true? Come on, this stuff is entertainment, not reality.

[jj2007]

And since Mother Jones says so, it must be true? Come on, this stuff is entertainment, not reality.

Yes, but you must admit that it's very entertaining and not so far from the real World of teabaggers ;-)

[mywan]

LOL. The "Delphi" technique essentially consist of the tactic I was referring to when I explained how Bill assigning anybody with some semblance of a pro gun stance to the gun lobby. A similar thing happens when a subset of the Christian right tries to exclude other religions. Then when they can't get away with it they exclude themselves to stop the others and labels it a war on Christmas, atheist activism, ACLU agenda, or any number of readily available labels. Basically it involves creating a false sense of public sentiment. If done intentionally its purpose is to discourage people with opposing views from speaking up for fear of being identified with the radicals that a characterization of their views can be lumped with. The left and right do it to each other, Christian right uses it to create a false sense of religiosity in the US, and pollsters slant their data to fit their preferred outcome to facilitate the same effect.

In general the "Delphi" technique has many many different faces and is almost ubiquitous in all perspectives. To a large extent the practitioners are merely operating from their own bias, rather than intentional deceit.

[jj2007]

In general the "Delphi" technique has many many different faces and is almost ubiquitous in all perspectives. To a large extent the practitioners are merely operating from their own bias, rather than intentional deceit.

Delphi is a respected technique in social sciences. Of course, it often gets misused by interested parties, but if the facilitator is really interested to know what "the truth" is, there is no better technique around.

The quality of outcomes can be very high if:
- the facilitator takes care to select a representative panel, i.e. includes experts from both opposed sides
- starts with an almost blank questionnaire ("what are your main thoughts about climate change, in three lines?")
- is very prudent when translating answers to that initial questionnaire into more structured questions (because that is the step where bias can take over)

Again, you can misuse it to confirm your own bias, but if you are really interested to get the most objective synthesis out of the brains of a bunch of distinguished experts, then Delphi is your method of choice.

[Bill Cravener]

. . .consist of the tactic I was referring to when I explained how Bill assigning anybody with some semblance of a pro gun stance to the gun lobby.

That’s simply nonsense. If that were true I’d fit in that class you refer to as the gun lobby and all those I know who are also hunters that agree as I do that guns are too easily obtainable here in America would fit into your misrepresentation of my comments in the “America and our love for guns” thread. How did a thread about President Obama get redirected to the subject of guns anyway? Please stay on thread topic.