Back to traffic...
I hate how when I try to merge, the oncoming cars speed up trying to prevent anyone from being in front of them. The other day on my way home I was merging with a 45mph speed zone. I was merging at a speed of 60mph and nearly got plowed over...and then the guy had the nerve to pass me and slow down.

I know exactly what you mean. That is why I never vote. There are never any good choices. They're all either bought or loons. It really would be nice if the party system hadn't taken over democracy. That way there would've been room for more than three main candidates, and maybe someone along the way would legislated runoff votes.

If we didn't have political parties, then the only people with enough money to run for office (since it costs quite a lot of money to campaign for any posistion beyond the PTA board, especially so in large cities) would be the wealthy. Parties allow funds for low to middle class people to be involved in the political process.

And let us not forget national officies. If we had multiple candidates running for office it would be nearly impossible to be elected to office with 50%+1 of the vote, which means the majority rule wouldn't happen. Now, we could switch to an electoral system similar to France's to solve that problem, except that it would require an amending of our Constituion (which likely won't happen), howeer since France's governmental structures over the last 200 years has been somewhat "fluid" (i.e. prone to collapse) we should probably be careful of changing our curretn stable system for something that may or may not work.

As for the issue of voting, not voting becuase you don't likethe choices shows all the maturity, wisdom, and reasoning ability of the four year old who refuses to eat dinner because they only want to eat cake and ice cream. Mooching off of the hard work and efforts of others, and then complaining about the results is no way to go through life.

Further, by not voting you allow a minority of people (those who do vote) to decide the laws of society for you. You are in effect activley supporting a ruling aristocracy. If you are so concerned about the quality of candidates then run for office yourself.

I have an uncle who told me at quite a young age the following...

"If you do not vote, you do not have a voice. If you do not have a voice, you can not come into my house and discuss politics."

My entire family follows the very same guideline.

As a young angry man I did not really understand what he was trying to convey. As an older more mature man, I understand exactly.

In their eyes, and in mine personally, if you do nothing, you do not have the right.

Just my opinion.

Spoken like someone who has someone (or at least a party) they feel is worth voting for. A lot of those people just tow the party line anyway.




Unfortunately, that isn't really saying much.

I vote for the candidate which best fits me morally, be it Democrat, Republican or other. By the way, just in case you did not know, there are others.



Maybe the way I view it is wrong but me personally, I would prioritize the above standings and vote for the person who best completes my views. It is true that you will not be able to please all the people all the time, so why should politicians try?

Guns to kill people, more wars to kill people, don't care whether an embryo lives or dies... more killing.. and support gay rights, none of which can procreate.

Just call it Anti life and be done with it.

( The above is just a joke people... Wanted to try to inject a little humor into the conversation. I have a few of the above views myself. )

in cases like this i slow down

here is my biggest rant

the purposeful killing of children for personal, politcal, military, or religous reasons

as far as i care anyone who does this or backs up the people that do this are COWARDS.

Just curious.

What is your definition of detained?

The U.S. has a bunch of detainees at Guantanamo. Not sure if I would rather be detained thank you very much.

As far as a rant. How about prescription and over the counter drugs? If you have a headache take this, its side affects are stomach problems... so you take something else to relieve the stomach and there is another side affect. When all is said and done you are taking 23 different drugs just to get rid of the headache and have no side affects. Also, they decided to put warning labels on medications that are supposed to help those that are depressed. It reads something like..... Warning, this drug could amplify your depression! What the heck is that? Just give me a gun would ya!

Lastly back to traffic... has anyone else noticed that on these 3 or 4 lane super highways, that when traffic begins to back up, the slow lane goes the fastest and the fast lane goes the slowest? What is that all about? I know the slow lane has the exits but it also has the on ramps! The fast lane has a bunch of people who want to keep going straight... so why do they go so slow? In most cases in northern VA it is because of the freaking rubber neckers. I mean if you are that interested, just pull over and get out and gawk, take a few pictures, break out the picnic basket, just don't slow down my commute!

I thought that might be the case as well but with further reasoning, logic would dictate that the other two or three lanes would suffer as well and go even slower from all the merging traffic coming from both the left of them and the right of them.

I think it is just one of those freak things of nature you know?

speaking of slow drivers in the fast lane.... one time i was zooming down the freeway in the right lane (fast lane) untill i was blocked by a stupid woman. This woman was driving slowly in the fast lane next to another vehicle driving slowly in the middle lane. I moved to the left lane (the slow lane) to pass when i noticed two cop cars comming in my rear view mirror. They were in a hurry to get to an emergency somewhare and were zooming down the fast lane (right lane) with motorists in front pulling left to get out of their way.

When the police cars caught up to the stupid woman i would have thought she would have finally decided to move out of the fast lane but to my suprise, no!

She just continued on merrily blocking the fast lane with the two police cars trapped behind her. I was still in the left lane at this point and i had backed off to leave room for the police cars to pass to the left of the stupid woman and her freind in the middle lane. The police stayed in the fast lane and began displaying a message on their message board thing - "keep left unless overtaking". They were flashing this message but the woman just ignored them.

Next the police staeted tooting their horn and i could see the stupid woman turning her head and swerving the car. She was clearly paniking and had no idea what to do! but still she continued blocking the fast lane!! I mean how stupid can you be??

At this point i was laughing my guts out, i had never before seen somthing so amusing on the roads, anyway, the stupid woman decided to very slowly creep forward from her just as stupid freind in the middle lane until she had enough room to move left - the whole excercise took about 10 minutes and just illustrates how some people have such a single minded determination to drive slowly in the fast lane.

I would agree with this point however that does not mean any mental diagnosis is perfect and would provide the appropriate advice on supervision?

Despite everything you say, these people are all adults and as such cannot be put ahead of children. At the end of the day children must come first and i have no sympathy for those that would harm them.