Griffin: Not every problem the US has had was a result of "not enough bombs". It seems like you think that every solution to today's problems involves killing all the people who aren't on our side, and that the correct solution to all of yesterday's problems would have been to kill all the people who weren't on our side.

As far as your "solution" to the humanitarian (AIDS) crisis in Africa goes: if we'd taken that philosophy after WWII, we wouldn't have Japan at our side today, and the global economy (and consequently America) would be much poorer without a strong Europe as well.

It's not always a sign of weakness to refrain from killing your enemy. On the other hand, the ruthless and unrelenting application of brute force and intimidation can be an effective long-term tactic -- Rome operated thusly -- but I think you'll find that not many people share your advocacy of such a policy.

[edit:  And we all know what happened to Rome once it was no longer the toughest kid on the block ... ]

To your last comment, I said "MIGHT" as in it is undertermied. You nor I have any idea how it would have turned out for sure, but at least we would have had a true say in how it happened. As it were, we had no say and the power is not with the people.

Second, if we went to a democracy, then everybody would have their say. Small and rual areas might not make majority vote, but at least they can try, through any means of media to convince the bigger markets to take a look at issues from their stance. Hey, did we get to vote on gay marriage? But the gays, the ones that it affects, are in the minority. How would they ever get a law passed in their favor? You see my point here? I hope so.

Since our voting system is "broken," how do you propose we fix it? Ghandi showed the world that boycotting and non-violent actions actually CAN make a movement just as lethal or even moreso than thee opposite. It takes a level of discipline and lack of selfishness that most are not willing to sacrifice for, but it really could work.

To tell me to vote, when nobody reasonably represents me or this society in a way that I find productive, is to show the true ignorance and sheep-esque persona that I see as more of a problem, and more dangerous to our brethern than our actual leaders.

Are you familiar with the term "tyranny of the majority"? The Founding Fathers feared it with good reason. It's a close relative of "mob rule". (No, not The Mob!)

As for the brokenness of our current set-up, I think that runoff voting would solve a lot of the problems.

@Lingyis, wind and solar are equally long-term investments, but both are more attractive than nuclear.

On the subject of energy, the cleanest energy are straight renewable emission free resources. Wind, tidal, geo-thermal, hydro, tidal and solar. Those are all extremely clean and sadly somewhat inefficient (Though hydro solar and wind are making some fairly large advances).

However nuclear fusion power falls into a nifty second tier of its own where the resource is so large that it is considered renewable (it would take ~1 billion years for us to use it all) and the emissions are fairly easy to deal with. However nuclear power does come with the risk of another Chernobyl type disaster which will always exist and is not confined to the Soviet Union as some believe (Three Mile Island occurred in Canada and was by mere chance not a Chernobyl, that partial core meltdown could have been so much worse).
Fusion has more advantages and more risks than fission but is by far the smarter choice in the long run, they just need to get the actual technique for running the reactors a bit more refined so they actually produce energy rather than use it.

Personally I would prefer for my country (New Zealand) to stick to the first tier resources for two reasons - 1. Its part of NZ's national identity, 2. We would be absolutely fucked by a nuclear disaster due to our size.

I don't see nuclear power and the likes happening. Not anytime soon. The oil lobby will strike it down.

 Peak oil will be within 5 years. Something has to replace it.

On a similar note, who else finds the election results in Hessen quite amusing?

I am really interested on how CDU and SPD will react and who will form a coalition with whom.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to contribute to the politics threads.

Very little of our electricity actually comes from oil, though.  Oil is primarily used to power transportation, with the lion's share of electricity generation coming from coal.  Nuclear power isn't likely to replace oil unless we all start driving electric cars.  I think going to ethanol is much more likely, especially given the recent advances in ethanol production from cellulose and other organic material (not corn).