Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
Pondering

forever without doing anything is not pondering well. Thinking without doing (or talking or feeling, or intuiting)

is just another form of small mindedness.

But haven't we had all the cultural lobotomies we need? Isn't our

addiction to stimulation lobotomizing? How about religious fundamentalism; the mental paralysis of fear; and excess

political partisanship? How about the aforementioned black and white thinking that dominates American policy these

days?

You are doubtless one of the better thinkers here, Belgareth. But it is worth noting that people who do

think poorly or unproductively love to tell others they "think too much". There's something to be said for figuring

stuff out.
Exactly right. You are pointing out one of the worst, most dangerous flaws of the Bush camp. If it

doesn't fit into their philosophy they reject it out of hand. A couple of good examples are stem cell research and

the Kyoto protocols. Rather than accept the fact that there are issues to be worked out, they reject them out of

hand to the detriment of society as a whole. They have even gone so far as to try and silence their detractors by

censoring sciencetific debate. It does not solve the problem, only makes the solutions more painful in the long

run.

At the same time, the dems attempt to solve every problem by throwing money at it (Yes it is an

over-simplification, but the problem is real) and by give-aways. That simply creates additional burden on the most

productive segments of society, which is a dis-incentive to increased productivity, without really helping the most

needy except in the short term. Giving the masses bread and circuses is not the answer either.

The problem stems

from our system that encourages politics to be based on the next election, they never have a reason to think beyond

the next four years. We need to change the mind set of our leadership to look at the problems and solve them rather

than to simply talk to get votes.

Religion has no place in running a government. It is no less mind numbing than

the over-stimulation and apathy caused by too much television. I don't want to side track your very valid points by

starting a religious debate so will leave it at that. I do believe that we need to put far more emphasis on teaching

people to think ofr themselves rather than to follow any group or belief system like a flock of sheeps to

slaughter.