It's all a matter of priorities...

[MrScorpio]

[Hoyt]

1. We could learn a lot from Denmark.

[pansypoo53219]

2. denmark is a very very nice place + happy people.

i do not think i heard a siren once. clean. good roads. heck. i do not think i saw a cop at all. even the drug dealer in the park was polite.

[jtuck004]

4. Did you have any occasion to interact with the

Folk High Schools, or run across anything about N.F.S. Grundtvig? I read a bit about those and was part of an association of those here a few years ago.

And in their public schools I think they get more engaged with the civics of the country than we do now in schools, at least that was my assumption from afar.

[whathehell]

11. It's also about the size of New Jersey..

and far less diverse than America.

Just sayin'

[pansypoo53219]

12. yet, in the small town i was in, the lady i was with, she brought there a dakota native american wh

american who married a dane. an african who i think stayed + married, a south american who stayed. then there was the hoard of little chinese girls that 1 day. but yes. whiiter.

[freshwest]

3. Unfortunately, his message went unheeded. Just as he will be in 2016, I fear.

If Bernie runs as a Democrat in 2016, as he's indicated he might, he'll get my vote in the primary. If nothing else, he will bring important issues to be debated.

But America is morphing into a different country every month. Who knows if anyone will care about him in 2016, and what the next two years will bring other than increased destruction?

[djean111]

5. I taught a few software classes in Denmark (Arhuis) about 15 - 20 years ago.

Lovely place. One thing I remember is that during breaks and lunch, the people in my class mostly talked politics. These were mostly computer operators and programmers, at the telephone company. Awesome office building, by the way, full of courtyards, wide corridors, even bicycles for those who had to go from one end to another, big place. The employees had a say in everything, they voted on what the fabulous cafeteria served, too, things like that.

At the time, there was an upcoming vote on whether to join the EU. I was told that they could see some advantages, but that they would never cede control of their currency to Germany, and so they were going to vote against using the Euro. Heh, walked by the tiniest demonstration in the world, in Copenhagen, saw more CNN folks than Danish citizens, and when we got back to the hotel and turned CNN on, CNN made it look like a huge demonstration by bringing the cameras in very close to the fifteen people we saw who were just holding up signs. First time I saw for myself how the news is not what we are told it is.

A thing I brought away from being there is that everybody did feel that they were entitled to a say in how things were done by the government. That they were a part of the government, and that they counted.

[merrily]

6. I am not shocked, that Sanders chimed in, but it's bullshit, no matter who joins

the Greek chorus of finger pointing at the people least able to effect change in this country, namely the average American voter, not the professional politicians, paid with our taxes, or the professional strategists paid with our donations.

If turnout is so damned important to professional politicians, how come they do so damned little to make sure it happens--and when the fuck are they going to take responsibility for ANYthing, even keeping their own jobs? Yo, professional Democrats, how about you do something about turnout, besides berating us? I

If people like the campaign promises of a new candidate AND believe the candidate can and will fulfill them, they will turn out.

If people see that an incumbent has been working his or her ass off to better their lives and their lives of their families and fellow Americans, and getting results, they will turn out.

If people have ways that are acceptable to them of holding incumbents who fit neither of the above descriptions year after year, they will either show up to vote them out or stay home. If they have no way acceptable to them, they will likely give up.

If you enact laws showing you think voting is important, people will turn out. For just one thing, how many times are Democrats going to yell "Another stolen election" after the fact, then do nothing, before Democratic voters think voting is a lost cause? Requiring paper ballots or machines that give the voter a record of the vote might be a good start.

If voting is so damned important to the nation--and it is-why doesn't a federal law mandate either ample early voting opportunities or several hours off on election day? The super of my building works two jobs in Boston, one of which starts at 7 am and the other of which ends at 11 pm. However, he cannot afford to live anywhere near Boston as he can live much further out.

He is not going to choose his residence based on election day, nor does he have the time or energy to focus on absentee ballots. Voting in Boston or voting during his lunch hour are not possibilities for him. (We very blue state and blue city Bostonians still can vote only on election day, though that changes in 2016, yet Boston counts a lot in elections held in Massachusetts. What the hell took you all so long, if voting is so important to you?)

Americans work hard, maybe two or three jobs, all year to send tax money to D.C. so that incumbents can have lots of pampering and luxuries and what--work on the business of the nation a few days a year? Spend most of their time fund raising, to protect their own damned jobs? Then spend time in office making sure their donors are happy enough to donate next time?

Have super majority rules and do the DC kabuki so that it takes a lot of time to try to figure out who was really responsible for what? Time and energy people working hard while they try to keep their families intact just don't have?

And who are the only ones who get blamed when this chicken and egg game doesn't go the way one side or the other wants it? The average American, not the ones who rigged the system or made campaign promises they could not or would not fulfill, etc. It's bullshit.

Besides, this has happens to the Party of the President during the term of EVERY two-term President. It's utterly predictable, ffs. So, what the hell did all the professional politicians and the professional strategists they pay so well with our donations do to avoid it? Rush to kill ACORN during Obama's first term?

IRS not for profit applications and then, televised Congressional hearings over how the IRS treated those applications, told everyone who paid attention that Republicans has a humongous, very organized voter registration and voter education campaign going, down to nationwide conference calls every Sunday night (reminder at church?) to share tips and experiences with each other to encourage each other.

That did not come about spontaneously. Obviously, some people with big ideas and big bucks and big plans to crush Democrats at the polls "built that."

What did the Democratic Party, the party of GOTV is everything for us, the party that was scrutinizing those applications since January 2009 do new and different to try to compete with what it KNEW for a fact the Republicans were up to with all those 501(c)(3) applications for voter registration and education organizations? Knowing that 2014 was coming and was likely to be very bad for the Party of the President, what did Democrats do?

chicken and egg, folks, chicken and egg. And guess which part of that equation gets paid very nicely to worried about the vote. Hint. Not the average American voter, but the professionals who are trying to shift all blame to the average voter.


Sorry, putting all the blame on Americans is bs, whether Bernie does it or a DUer does it.

[djean111]

7. Yes. I am tired of electing people to do a job, and then be told it is my responsibility to make

them do their job. After they campaigned on what kind of a job they were going to do. Looks to me like when most of them get to Washington, they just do what the RNC, the DNC, and the banks and corporations tell them to do.

And blame everything on the voters.

[merrily]

8. Yep. BTW, we don't only elect them, we pay their salaries and perks and support the entire operation

Limousines, gyms, dining rooms, secret service protection, plane fares back and forth to the home state to fund raise, "fact finding" trips abroad, all the D.C. real estate, the building maintenance staff, the light bill, the $50 muffins, the staff trips to Vegas to bond over dance lessons. Big and small, all of it, every blade of grass, every brick, every phone line, every staffer, etc.

But, when it comes to GOTV, it's up to volunteers to figure it out on their own and motivate people to vote and then drive them to the polls in their own cars on their own drivers' insurance and their own legal liability.

And if something goes wrong, it's not their fault that they didn't motivate the electorate, nor the fault of the professional strategists, it's the fault of the people the professionals failed to motivate during their two to six years in office. And the finger-pointing by the professionals is supposed to motivate the unmotivated to vote next time?

[djean111]

9. That's why have have pretty much no respect for an awful lot of them.

I don't see why getting elected automatically entitles anyone to respect - they have to work for it, IMO. Also, they have to work.
What a fucked up system.

[merrily]

10. +1