News websites and political resources thread
Moderators: Alyrium Denryle, Edi, K. A. Pital
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- Sith Marauder
- Posts: 3539
- Joined: 2006-10-24 11:35am
- Location: Around and about the Beltway
antiwar.com Paleolibertarian and paleoconservative, with occasional populists and liberals putting in their two.
counterpunch.org fairly left wing, attacks both conservatives and liberals. Some of the material is pretty far out by my standards, though.
counterpunch.org fairly left wing, attacks both conservatives and liberals. Some of the material is pretty far out by my standards, though.
Turns out that a five way cross over between It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, the Ali G Show, Fargo, Idiocracy and Veep is a lot less funny when you're actually living in it.
- Dominus Atheos
- Sith Marauder
- Posts: 3903
- Joined: 2005-09-15 09:41pm
- Location: Portland, Oregon
Complete vote-by-mail resource guide:
Cheesy Video.
Oregon Elections Commision's complete resource for vote by mail.
The Mechanics of Vote by Mail:
Cheesy Video.
Oregon Elections Commision's complete resource for vote by mail.
The Mechanics of Vote by Mail:
The Vote-By-Mail Project, an organization created to implement vote-by-mail in every state.When are ballots mailed?
Ballots are mailed between 20-22 days before election day.
They are mailed bulk and ballots are not forwaded.
What is in the ballot envelope?
Your ballot envelope also contains two envelopes - a return envelope and a secrecy envelope. And of course your ballot.
What do you do with the ballot?
Well vote obviously. But HOW?
Ballots are filled out with a #2 pencil and are the optical scanner variety (like the SAT test - you fill in ovals next to your candidate).
You fill out your ballot and then place it in the secrecy envelope.
You place the secrecy envelope in the return envelope. You sign the back of your return envelope swearing you are who you are.
You then can either mail the ballot in or drop it off at county elections offices or the numerous official drop off sites around the county like libraries, public squares, supermarkets etc.
For those looking for a more traditional voting experience can head to their county elections office where actual ballot booths are still available. The mechanics of the voting system are the same.
You have to have RETURNED your ballot by 8:00 p.m. on election day. Postmarks do not count.
Great you voted, but what happens then?
When your ballot is received at the elections office they first check your signature. All voter registration cards in Oregon are scanned into a statewide voter file. The county elections staff call up each ballot received to check the signature versus the registration card.
How do they know who you are? Next to your signature on the back of the return envelope is your basic info and a barcode so that they can quickly pull up your registration card.
If the signature matches then you are marked as voted in the system and the secrecy envelope containing your ballot is removed and stored in a secure location. The secrecy envelopes are NOT opened until election day.
If the signature does not match then the county elections officials calls you and ask you to come down to the elections office to double check your signature and verify the ballot.
When are the ballots counted?
As I previously stated they are stored in a secure location until election day. On election day they begin counting ballots at 8:00 a.m. This means that many times by the times "polls" close at 8:00 p.m results are almost immediately available.
- Dominus Atheos
- Sith Marauder
- Posts: 3903
- Joined: 2005-09-15 09:41pm
- Location: Portland, Oregon
Ghetto Edit: Forgot to add this:
Vote-by-Mail: The Real Winner Is Democracy
While many states were embroiled in fights over touch-screen voting machines and provisional ballots and struggling to find enough people to staff polling places, Oregon once again quietly conducted a presidential election with record turnout and little strife.
Oregon's vote-by-mail system has proved reliable and popular. Critics said that vote-by-mail is prone to fraud. But signature verification of every voter before a ballot is counted is an effective safeguard against fraud.
Curtis Gans of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate contended that vote-by-mail would suppress voter participation. But record numbers of Oregonians registered to vote, and almost 87 percent of them cast ballots.
Critics argued that vote-by-mail eliminates the communal experience of voting on Election Day. But community activities promoting voting were readily available to Oregonians on Election Day and in the days leading up to it. With two weeks to conduct public education and get-out-the-vote efforts, Oregonians were surrounded by civic engagement reminders. Oregonians have also started a new communal experience: voting at home, showing their children the ballot and talking to them about how important it is to vote.
Vote-by-mail is voter-friendly, and high turnout in every vote-by-mail election shows that voters like the convenience. Oregonians receive ballots in the mail two weeks before Election Day, allowing ample time to research issues, review and mark the ballot, and eliminating the need to stand in long lines waiting for a polling booth.
Voters are busy, but voting fits their schedule if they may return their ballot at any time during those two weeks and up until 8 p.m. on Election Day. Voters may mail their ballots or save a stamp by dropping them off in person at any of the official sites located throughout the state. The earlier that ballots come in, the more time election officials have to check for any problems and to process the ballots to ensure that every vote counts. With a large number of ballots received before Election Day, the first tally released on election night contained nearly 50 percent of the vote and proved to be an accurate predictor of the final numbers.
Vote-by-mail provides an automatic paper trail. Every vote-by-mail ballot is read by reliable optical scan machines, and the paper is available should a hand recount become necessary. Mailed ballots are not forwarded by the post office, and the constant updating of voter rolls provided by returned ballots allows Oregon to have accurate and updated voter rolls without the risk of partisan purges.
Without polling places, vote-by-mail eliminates the expensive and time-consuming recruitment and training of poll workers. As a result, the cost of a vote-by-mail election is nearly 30 percent less than the cost of a polling place election.
Centralized supervision and control of ballot processing by elections officials in county elections offices, instead of dispersed polling places, maintains uniformity and strict compliance with law throughout the state.
An impressive percentage of Oregon's registered voters cast ballots in this election. Each of those voters can be confident that the mechanism of democracy in Oregon suits their needs, runs smoothly and fairly, and, most importantly, protects their votes.
The answer to the nation's voting anxiety is not a national standard that imposes new rules on an outdated system of polling places. The answer is a low-tech, low-cost, reliable and convenient system that makes it easier to vote and easier to count votes. The answer is vote-by-mail.
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- Village Idiot
- Posts: 906
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Here's some links relevant to the mortality studies of pre- and post-war Iraq by the British medical journal The Lancet
2004 study
2006 study
Wikipedia article
2004 study
2006 study
Wikipedia article
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- Youngling
- Posts: 146
- Joined: 2007-07-25 12:29pm
- Location: otherspace
- Contact:
site with information on just about thousands of dead and former politicians in America (excellent category selections)
http://www.politicalgraveyard.com/
http://www.politicalgraveyard.com/
S.I.T.H.: Seeks Illicit Teachings and Heresies
Breaking news: News Channel13's helicopter has crashed. News Channel13 is first on the scene...
I bid you Dark Greetings....
Breaking news: News Channel13's helicopter has crashed. News Channel13 is first on the scene...
I bid you Dark Greetings....
Re: The News Site Thread
Most news website make one wade through pages of extra formatting, pictures, video, and ads. In contrast, my favorite site efficiently links to the top several dozen stories all on one page.
It is like the firefox or google of the internet news world with 30 million visits a day: The Drudge Report
It is like the firefox or google of the internet news world with 30 million visits a day: The Drudge Report
Re: The News Site Thread
If Google was run by a conservative conspiracy nut and admitted 20% of its stories were bullshit. Drudge is about as reliable as the shouting hobo down the street.It is like the firefox or google of the internet news world with 30 million visits a day
Re: The News Site Thread
The bulk of the stories are the same as almost any other news site minus extra frames and ads. There is no simply "reliable" website anywhere for all stories to be mindlessly trusted, but one should read everything with a little bit of questioning considering sources and outside support. (Although a tangent for another thread, I could give a few examples from BBC). Sometimes a few stories are published on Drudge Report which would not be seen somewhere like this board, but there would be little intellectually healthy about a sheltered mind pained merely by glimpse of such. Even in some cases where I disagree with an implicit focus, understanding what some are hearing doesn't hurt.Bounty wrote:If Google was run by a conservative conspiracy nut and admitted 20% of its stories were bullshit. Drudge is about as reliable as the shouting hobo down the street.
- The Yosemite Bear
- Mostly Harmless Nutcase (Requiescat in Pace)
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Re: The News Site Thread
yes, but most people won't listen to the crazy guy screaming on the street corner.
The scariest folk song lyrics are "My Boy Grew up to be just like me" from cats in the cradle by Harry Chapin
- SirNitram
- Rest in Peace, Black Mage
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Re: The News Site Thread
I'm just going to say this: Drudge was pimping a Nickelodeon Kid's Poll on his site and proclaiming how terrified the Obama HQ was. An online, non-scientific poll, of people who can't vote.
Manic Progressive: A liberal who violently swings from anger at politicos to despondency over them.
Out Of Context theatre: Ron Paul has repeatedly said he's not a racist. - Destructinator XIII on why Ron Paul isn't racist.
Shadowy Overlord - BMs/Black Mage Monkey - BOTM/Jetfire - Cybertron's Finest/General Miscreant/ASVS/Supermoderator Emeritus
Debator Classification: Trollhunter
Out Of Context theatre: Ron Paul has repeatedly said he's not a racist. - Destructinator XIII on why Ron Paul isn't racist.
Shadowy Overlord - BMs/Black Mage Monkey - BOTM/Jetfire - Cybertron's Finest/General Miscreant/ASVS/Supermoderator Emeritus
Debator Classification: Trollhunter
Re: Political Resources List
Perhaps we should compile a list of news source to avoid? Fox News is one such news source, although I have no idea why did Yahoo! continue to treat Fox News as a credible news source.
Humans are such funny creatures. We are selfish about selflessness, yet we can love something so much that we can hate something.
- Einhander Sn0m4n
- Insane Railgunner
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Re: Political Resources List
Add Chycho to that list too, apparently.ray245 wrote:Perhaps we should compile a list of news source to avoid? Fox News is one such news source, although I have no idea why did Yahoo! continue to treat Fox News as a credible news source.
Lesson Learned: RTFA before instaposting based on seeing a screaming headline.
Re: Political Resources List
I think we need to add 'The Sun' to the list as well. They have 'reported' many news without any sort of verification at all.
Humans are such funny creatures. We are selfish about selflessness, yet we can love something so much that we can hate something.
Re: The News Site Thread
Respectively; if this is the proper thread could I have the following added to Einy's OP;
Who reads the papers?
From Yes, Prime Minister. It's a handy guide for judging the bias of anything posted from a British paper. And funny too!
Who reads the papers?
From Yes, Prime Minister. It's a handy guide for judging the bias of anything posted from a British paper. And funny too!
Η ζωή, η ζωή εδω τελειώνει!
"Science is one cold-hearted bitch with a 14" strap-on" - Masuka 'Dexter'
"Angela is not the woman you think she is Gabriel, she's done terrible things"
"So have I, and I'm going to do them all to you." - Sylar to Arthur 'Heroes'
- Force Lord
- Jedi Council Member
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Re: The News Site Thread
This is a rather interesting site:
World War 4 Report
They basicaly debunk any irrational ideas, be it from neocons or what they call the idiot left (basically communists) and analyze news that that the mainstream media sometimes ignores.
EDIT: Eliminated the copy-pasted Site Mission section, so I would not look as promoting this site.
World War 4 Report
They basicaly debunk any irrational ideas, be it from neocons or what they call the idiot left (basically communists) and analyze news that that the mainstream media sometimes ignores.
EDIT: Eliminated the copy-pasted Site Mission section, so I would not look as promoting this site.
An inhabitant from the Island of Cars.
- Force Lord
- Jedi Council Member
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Re: The News Site Thread
EDIT 2: Checked the site, and I found that it also subscribes under the anti-nuke bullshit. That's one flaw I've found up until now.
An inhabitant from the Island of Cars.
Re: The News Site Thread
AFCEA Nightwatch, Prepared most weeknights by Editor John McCreary. A significant American slant, but a useful aggregator of global geo-political news.
"I believe in the future. It is wonderful because it stands on what has been achieved." - Sergei Korolev
- Einhander Sn0m4n
- Insane Railgunner
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- Location: Louisiana... or Dagobah. You know, where Yoda lives.
Re: The News Site Thread
Reddit for news found on the internet. There are hundreds of subreddits; Science and Politics being particularly noteworthy. World News is very enlightening as well.
- Force Lord
- Jedi Council Member
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Re: The News Site Thread
EDIT 3 (Very belated): I meant anti-nuclear energy, if anyone misunderstood what I meant.Force Lord wrote:EDIT 2: Checked the site, and I found that it also subscribes under the anti-nuke bullshit. That's one flaw I've found up until now.
An inhabitant from the Island of Cars.
- Razorgeist
- Youngling
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- Joined: 2009-10-29 06:30am
Re: The News Site Thread
Wasn't sure where this should go but Jon Stewert had Marc Theissen on the daily show last night.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
You can check out the full 3 part intereview at the website. I think Jon should have been harder with him . Wasn't it effectivly debunked that water-boarding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed stopped any further terrorist attacks?
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
You can check out the full 3 part intereview at the website. I think Jon should have been harder with him . Wasn't it effectivly debunked that water-boarding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed stopped any further terrorist attacks?
"You have to believe in God before you can say there are things that man was not meant to know.
I don't think there's anything man wasn't meant to know. There are just some stupid things that people shouldn't do." - David Cronenberg
"Doesn't Rush Limbaugh remind you of one of those gay guys that like to lie in a tub while other guys pee on him?" - Bill Hicks
I don't think there's anything man wasn't meant to know. There are just some stupid things that people shouldn't do." - David Cronenberg
"Doesn't Rush Limbaugh remind you of one of those gay guys that like to lie in a tub while other guys pee on him?" - Bill Hicks
- The Yosemite Bear
- Mostly Harmless Nutcase (Requiescat in Pace)
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Re: The News Site Thread
yes, and we got better intel from him, before we violated international law at a rate of 46 times in one month.
The scariest folk song lyrics are "My Boy Grew up to be just like me" from cats in the cradle by Harry Chapin
- General Mung Beans
- Jedi Knight
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- Location: Orange Prefecture, California Sector, America Quadrant, Terra
Re: Political Resources List
Let's see here.
New York Times-The American newspaper and usually is a notch higher in detail than most other news sources. http://www.nytimes.com/
Los Angeles Times-Another American national newspaper. http://www.latimes.com/
The Economist-An international news periodical and largely beats Time in that respect. http://www.economist.com/
PBS NewsHour-The best television news show in America although it isn't updated much. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/
National Review-Centre-right periodical and often drives in some sense to conservatives (ie over the issue of the Federal Reserve) http://www.nationalreview.com/
New York Times-The American newspaper and usually is a notch higher in detail than most other news sources. http://www.nytimes.com/
Los Angeles Times-Another American national newspaper. http://www.latimes.com/
The Economist-An international news periodical and largely beats Time in that respect. http://www.economist.com/
PBS NewsHour-The best television news show in America although it isn't updated much. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/
National Review-Centre-right periodical and often drives in some sense to conservatives (ie over the issue of the Federal Reserve) http://www.nationalreview.com/
El Moose Monstero: That would be the winning song at Eurovision. I still say the Moldovans were more fun. And that one about the Apricot Tree.
That said...it is growing on me.
Thanas: It is one of those songs that kinda get stuck in your head so if you hear it several times, you actually grow to like it.
General Zod: It's the musical version of Stockholm syndrome.
That said...it is growing on me.
Thanas: It is one of those songs that kinda get stuck in your head so if you hear it several times, you actually grow to like it.
General Zod: It's the musical version of Stockholm syndrome.
Re: News websites and political resources thread
http://churnalism.com/
In a nutshell, it's an adaptation of the technology used in anti-plagiarism software applied to news articles.Churnalism.com's FAQ Page wrote:What is churnalism.com?
Churnalism.com is an independent, non-profit website built by the Media Standards Trust (charity number 1113680) to help the public distinguish between original journalism and ‘churnalism’.
...
How does churnalism.com work?
The site compresses all articles published on national newspaper websites, on BBC news, and Sky news online, into a series of numbers based on 15 character strings (using a hash function) and then stores them in a fast access database. When someone pastes in some text and clicks 'compare', the churn engine compresses the text entered and then searches for similar compressions (or 'common hashes'). If the engine finds any articles where the similarity is greater than 20%, then it suggests the article may be churn. Churnalism.com is powered off the back of the database of over three million compressed articles in journalisted.com.
There are hardly any excesses of the most crazed psychopath that cannot easily be duplicated by a normal kindly family man who just comes in to work every day and has a job to do.
-- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)
Replace "ginger" with "n*gger," and suddenly it become a lot less funny, doesn't it?
-- fgalkin
Like my writing? Tip me on Patreon
I Have A Blog
-- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)
Replace "ginger" with "n*gger," and suddenly it become a lot less funny, doesn't it?
-- fgalkin
Like my writing? Tip me on Patreon
I Have A Blog
- Soontir C'boath
- SG-14: Fuck the Medic!
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Re: News websites and political resources thread
http://www.aljazeera.com/ I suppose it can be said it is the BBC of the Arabic world.
I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season."
- General Mung Beans
- Jedi Knight
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Re: News websites and political resources thread
http://welections.wordpress.com/
Excellent blog offering detailed demographic and geographic analysis of elections all over the world. One of my favourite websites of all time.
Excellent blog offering detailed demographic and geographic analysis of elections all over the world. One of my favourite websites of all time.
El Moose Monstero: That would be the winning song at Eurovision. I still say the Moldovans were more fun. And that one about the Apricot Tree.
That said...it is growing on me.
Thanas: It is one of those songs that kinda get stuck in your head so if you hear it several times, you actually grow to like it.
General Zod: It's the musical version of Stockholm syndrome.
That said...it is growing on me.
Thanas: It is one of those songs that kinda get stuck in your head so if you hear it several times, you actually grow to like it.
General Zod: It's the musical version of Stockholm syndrome.