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Has US Green Party achieved peak nuttiness?

D

Derec

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Joined
Aug 19, 2002
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Atlanta, GA
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atheist
Their presidential candidate is Jill Stein, a physician who is opposed to things like GMOs, vaccines, the use of computers in the classrooms and WiFi in general.
The vice presidential candidate is Ajamu Baraka, a black supremacist who thinks France deserves terrorists attacks on it, that Bernie Sanders is a "white supremacist" etc.
Both are opposed to Israel.

Then again, the 2008 candidate was Cynthia McKinney, so it's a close call.
 
I voted for McKinney for her staunch anti Israel stance.

This guy, who is a Jew by birth, has a great amount of knowledge...

 
Stein isn't anti GMO, or anti vaccines, but she does leave little wiggle statements around to slightly pander to those who are.
 
only wifi has a possible mechanism of harm, however tenuous...

Homeopathy is completely dilutesional.

 
It doesn't though - the offered mechanism, which is true for ionizing radiation or higher energy EM radiation, isn't actually a property of wifi.

It's like saying that getting hit by a gnat while crossing a street is dangerous because getting hit by a dump truck while crossing the street is dangerous. The quantity affects the quality in this case.
 
More nuttiness than the Republican party?

Impossible.

- - - Updated - - -

repoman said:
only wifi has a possible mechanism of harm, however tenuous...

Homeopathy is completely dilutesional.

Click to expand...


Yes it works by the placebo effect (a real cure) when it works.

So do antidepressants in some people.
 
Has the Republican party achieved peak nuttiness? No, probably not.
 
Derec said:
laughing dog said:
I am not a supporter of the Green Party, but the claim that Dr. Jill Stein is anti-vaccine is bogus. According to Snopes, (http://www.snopes.com/is-green-party-candidate-jill-stein-anti-vaccine/), that is false.
Click to expand...

Jill Stein and left wing antivaccine dog whistles
Click to expand...

From your cited article, a quote from Jill Stein
I don’t know if we have an “official” stance, but I can tell you my personal stance at this point. According to the most recent review of vaccination policies across the globe, mandatory vaccination that doesn’t allow for medical exemptions is practically unheard of. In most countries, people trust their regulatory agencies and have very high rates of vaccination through voluntary programs. In the US, however, regulatory agencies are routinely packed with corporate lobbyists and CEOs. So the foxes are guarding the chicken coop as usual in the US. So who wouldn’t be skeptical? I think dropping vaccinations rates that can and must be fixed in order to get at the vaccination issue: the widespread distrust of the medical-indsutrial complex.

Vaccines in general have made a huge contribution to public health. Reducing or eliminating devastating diseases like small pox and polio. In Canada, where I happen to have some numbers, hundreds of annual death from measles and whooping cough were eliminated after vaccines were introduced. Still, vaccines should be treated like any medical procedure–each one needs to be tested and regulated by parties that do not have a financial interest in them. In an age when industry lobbyists and CEOs are routinely appointed to key regulatory positions through the notorious revolving door, its no wonder many Americans don’t trust the FDA to be an unbiased source of sound advice. A Monsanto lobbyists and CEO like Michael Taylor, former high-ranking DEA official, should not decide what food is safe for you to eat. Same goes for vaccines and pharmaceuticals. We need to take the corporate influence out of government so people will trust our health authorities, and the rest of the government for that matter. End the revolving door. Appoint qualified professionals without a financial interest in the product being regulated. Create public funding of elections to stop the buying of elections by corporations and the super-rich.
Click to expand...

Perhaps you could educate me how that statement should be taken as anti-vaccine?
 
laughing dog said:
Derec said:
Jill Stein and left wing antivaccine dog whistles
Click to expand...

From your cited article, a quote from Jill Stein

Perhaps you could educate me how that statement should be taken as anti-vaccine?
Click to expand...
"...mandatory vaccination that doesn’t allow for medical exemptions is practically unheard of. "

This statement is curious and sounds a bit fence sitting. Of course there would be medical exemptions. Why wouldn't there be? So why even raise it, if not to allow to open up a false door later down the road. She then seems to expose what she is talking about. When I hear the term "medical exemption" I think child with leukemia who can't be vaccinated. But in paragraph two she is saying: "A Monsanto lobbyists and CEO like Michael Taylor, former high-ranking DEA official, should not decide what food is safe for you to eat. Same goes for vaccines and pharmaceuticals. We need to take the corporate influence out of government so people will trust our health authorities,"

This seems to suggest that "medical exemption" in her misleading use of the term is about safety of a vaccination, not whether a person has a condition that makes taking a vaccination dangerous.

While she isn't saying "vaccinations cause autism", there definitely seems to be some 'in between the lines' talk going on there. At least, I see some in it. And while her comments above do not extend to the ridiculous lengths of a Jenny McCarthy, they don't outrightly quash the debate either. Vaccines are safe, period. It shouldn't take two paragraphs to say that... hence, she appears to be hedging.
 
Well, the Greens are a fringe party. They need to take some fringe positions in order to attract members who can't find a place in the traditional parties because the traditional parties think that their positions are stupid. Some in the party may agree that the positions are stupid, so they find ways to phrase the positions which can kind of either support them or kind of not support them depending on how they're read, but they can't exactly be afford to be all that picky when it comes to people who show up and say they want to be members of the party.
 
Jimmy Higgins said:
laughing dog said:
From your cited article, a quote from Jill Stein

Perhaps you could educate me how that statement should be taken as anti-vaccine?
Click to expand...
"...mandatory vaccination that doesn’t allow for medical exemptions is practically unheard of. "

This statement is curious and sounds a bit fence sitting. Of course there would be medical exemptions. Why wouldn't there be? So why even raise it, if not to allow to open up a false door later down the road. She then seems to expose what she is talking about. When I hear the term "medical exemption" I think child with leukemia who can't be vaccinated. But in paragraph two she is saying: "A Monsanto lobbyists and CEO like Michael Taylor, former high-ranking DEA official, should not decide what food is safe for you to eat. Same goes for vaccines and pharmaceuticals. We need to take the corporate influence out of government so people will trust our health authorities,"

This seems to suggest that "medical exemption" in her misleading use of the term is about safety of a vaccination, not whether a person has a condition that makes taking a vaccination dangerous.

While she isn't saying "vaccinations cause autism", there definitely seems to be some 'in between the lines' talk going on there. At least, I see some in it. And while her comments above do not extend to the ridiculous lengths of a Jenny McCarthy, they don't outrightly quash the debate either. Vaccines are safe, period. It shouldn't take two paragraphs to say that... hence, she appears to be hedging.
Click to expand...
Well, it seems to me that
I think dropping vaccinations rates that can and must be fixed in order to get at the vaccination issue and
Vaccines in general have made a huge contribution to public health. Reducing or eliminating devastating diseases like small pox and polio. In Canada, where I happen to have some numbers, hundreds of annual death from measles and whooping cough were eliminated after vaccines were introduced.
is pretty much a straightforward endorsement of vaccines.

I think it is Dr. Stein is really addressing the question of falling vaccination rates due to the false perception that they are unsafe.

IMO, there are plenty of valid reasons to question Dr. Stein's and the Green Party's positions but vaccination is not one of them.
 
Tom Sawyer said:
Well, the Greens are a fringe party. They need to take some fringe positions in order to attract members who can't find a place in the traditional parties because the traditional parties think that their positions are stupid. Some in the party may agree that the positions are stupid, so they find ways to phrase the positions which can kind of either support them or kind of not support them depending on how they're read, but they can't exactly be afford to be all that picky when it comes to people who show up and say they want to be members of the party.
Click to expand...

The things the Republicans and Democrats actually do are fringe.

The Greens represent the majority in issue after issue.

Most people want universal health insurance and for the government to take climate change seriously.

These are rational positions.

For some a rational position is fringe.

What the Greens do not have is equal access to the media and equal treatment in the media, and equal money.
 
laughing dog said:
Derec said:
Jill Stein and left wing antivaccine dog whistles
Click to expand...

From your cited article, a quote from Jill Stein
I don’t know if we have an “official” stance, but I can tell you my personal stance at this point. According to the most recent review of vaccination policies across the globe, mandatory vaccination that doesn’t allow for medical exemptions is practically unheard of. In most countries, people trust their regulatory agencies and have very high rates of vaccination through voluntary programs. In the US, however, regulatory agencies are routinely packed with corporate lobbyists and CEOs. So the foxes are guarding the chicken coop as usual in the US. So who wouldn’t be skeptical? I think dropping vaccinations rates that can and must be fixed in order to get at the vaccination issue: the widespread distrust of the medical-indsutrial complex.

Vaccines in general have made a huge contribution to public health. Reducing or eliminating devastating diseases like small pox and polio. In Canada, where I happen to have some numbers, hundreds of annual death from measles and whooping cough were eliminated after vaccines were introduced. Still, vaccines should be treated like any medical procedure–each one needs to be tested and regulated by parties that do not have a financial interest in them. In an age when industry lobbyists and CEOs are routinely appointed to key regulatory positions through the notorious revolving door, its no wonder many Americans don’t trust the FDA to be an unbiased source of sound advice. A Monsanto lobbyists and CEO like Michael Taylor, former high-ranking DEA official, should not decide what food is safe for you to eat. Same goes for vaccines and pharmaceuticals. We need to take the corporate influence out of government so people will trust our health authorities, and the rest of the government for that matter. End the revolving door. Appoint qualified professionals without a financial interest in the product being regulated. Create public funding of elections to stop the buying of elections by corporations and the super-rich.
Click to expand...

Perhaps you could educate me how that statement should be taken as anti-vaccine?
Click to expand...

It's ct-speak.
 
Derec said:
Their presidential candidate is Jill Stein, a physician who is opposed to things like GMOs, vaccines, the use of computers in the classrooms and WiFi in general.
The vice presidential candidate is Ajamu Baraka, a black supremacist who thinks France deserves terrorists attacks on it, that Bernie Sanders is a "white supremacist" etc.
Both are opposed to Israel.

Then again, the 2008 candidate was Cynthia McKinney, so it's a close call.
Click to expand...

Opposition to Israel does not matter one whit in assessing a person's grasp of reality. I do NOT want to discuss Israel here (we have a bajillion other threads for that), but I must point out that there are two completely different types of claim here.

Without going into the rights and wrongs of each position, we can nevertheless divide statements into two classes - those for which a factual position can be determined, and those for which one cannot.

Opinion is perfectly fine on questions without factual answers:
What is the best colour?
What is the nicest food to eat?
Should the modern state of Israel exist in its current form?

Opinion is NOT fine on questions with known factual answers:
Are GMOs safe?
Are vaccines a net benefit to public health?
Does WiFi radiation cause cancers?

Opinion is acceptable on questions of fact for which answers are not yet available, but acceptable opinions exclude those already proven to be false:
Is there life in other Solar Systems?
Did life on Earth begin near hydrothermal vents?
Is Fermat's last theorem true?

In recent years, opinion has been elevated in public discourse, and it has become fashionable to claim that a person is entitled to an opinion on ANY matter. This is false. People are entitled to their own opinion, but NOT to their own facts.

If you believe that blue is the best colour; or that Leeds United are the greatest football team ever; or that the modern state of Israel should exist in its current form, then that's your opinion. Somebody who disagrees with you on the subject may or may not do so on perfectly reasonable grounds.

If you believe that GMOs or vaccines are dangerous; or that the Earth is flat; Or that RF radiation is carcinogenic; or that HM Queen Elizabeth II is a seven foot tall lizard in disguise, then you are simply wrong. You should expect no reasonable person to agree with you, and you should expect to be ridiculed if you make such a stupid claim in public.

IF Jill Stein opposes GMOs, vaccines and/or WiFi, then she is WRONG. Of course, given that all the US presidential candidates are (or claim to be) theists, this isn't really new information - we can tell straight away that none of them are entirely grounded in reality. Deciding which of them is least wrong on issues of importance is a matter of opinion.
 
bilby said:
Opposition to Israel does not matter one whit in assessing a person's grasp of reality.
Click to expand...

Also foreign affairs are a highly complex matter to understand. Can't really expect most people to be in the know about that.
 
GenesisNemesis said:
bilby said:
Opposition to Israel does not matter one whit in assessing a person's grasp of reality.
Click to expand...

Also foreign affairs are a highly complex matter to understand. Can't really expect most people to be in the know about that.
Click to expand...

I have very low expectations for 'most people'. And yet nevertheless, they continue to disappoint me. At this stage, I don't really expect most people to be in the know about how to tie their shoelaces.
 
bilby said:
Opposition to Israel does not matter one whit in assessing a person's grasp of reality.
Click to expand...

Not alone, but it can depending on the reasons cited for the opposition.
 
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