Can someone explain to me in simple terms. USA elections

[ihatethecold]

What are the main differences between Obama and romney?
Is Obama like labour and Romney like very right conservative?

Why does Romney say he will get rid of the healthcare bill that Obama brought in.

Did it not work?
why wouldn't you want people without insurance to access healthcare ?
Thanks

Is it generally considered normal to believe in the inheritance of acquired characteristics?

Yeah, to say "This is a man who is one step down from being his cult's pope" is a profound misunderstanding of the structure of the Church of Latter Day Saints.

No, PigletJohn. I remember our biology teacher discussing it, as a matter of fact. I don't know anyone who believes that.

'Math WRT "formative sexual experience" You are seeing this from a safeguarding/child protection perspective? We were talking about teens in high school, so I meant the "normal" i.e. not abusive or pathological sexual behaviour between teenagers, or pupils discussing their relationships, being pregnant or suspecting that is the case, and similarly personal issues. If you're thinking of the young child who blabs out something sexual or asks an age-inappropriate question which implies something's the matter at home, then that is a completely different situation. Of course parents may not be told in line with child protection procedures in this case.'

No, I'm not seeing it from a child protection perspective.
'So a Muslim, conservative Catholic, Sikh or Mormon whose son/daughter tells a teacher they are having sex at 15 is prurient for wanting to actually be informed of this, which they see as a major moral issue in keeping with their beliefs?'
I do see it as prurience and I am baffled by it. I see fear there too. Do parents have so little faith in the way they bring up their children that they think the minute they reach sexual maturity they are going to turn around and have sex? If you are a responsible parent of any stripe you will have done your best to inculcate your values in your children. You will have provided your children with a sense of ambition for themselves beyond seeking the status of having a girlfriend or boyfriend or baby, and on the practical side you will have pointed out that the consequences of having a baby before you can afford it are profound and usually borne unequally by the mother.

'in lieu of statutory intervention schools could issue individual guidance that the teachers are not there to be a confidante for the concupiscent youth, particularly when parents don't share those "metropolitan elite liberal" moral standards. I know of one place in this country where 90% of pupils are from Muslim/Hindu/ Charismatic Black church/SDA or other traditionalist families but the deputy principal provides secret support to them on intimate sexual matters and has produced a sex ed policy which doesn't mention marriage, purity, abstinence, or similar concepts ONCE. I said this was an anti-family imposition of a sophisticated white liberal Christian elite woman's morals on children and teens from several tightly knit conservative communities. Surely you can't defend her?'

A teen having sex at 15 or whatever age is so much more than a moral issue.

I think I would trust the judgement of the principal that the listening ear/shoulder to cry on that s/he provides is a service that the students need. I think it is highly unlikely that the principal is advising students to go out and have sex and to heck with the consequences. Marriage, purity, abstinence and similar concepts have clearly not impressed the students even though they come from homes where those ideas are held important if they are seeking out teachers of the principal to confide sexual matters to.

How is it 'sophisticated', 'white' (????), 'liberal', 'Christian', 'elite' or 'women's morals' (or combinations of those adjectives) to recognise reality and provide practical support? If the students felt they could approach their parents with the details of their lives they probably would not be confiding in teachers. In a world where so called honour killing is sometimes carried out I think a principal who left teens to the mercy of their families a teacher has a duty first to the children. Even without 'honour killing' a teacher's duty is to the children imo.

Teachers try their hardest to teach even the children of the Irish Traveller community that whips children out of school at age 11. Should they bother? The girls will never have a job. The role envisaged for them is to be mothers and keepers of the house. Their training starts at 10 or 11. The boys will follow whatever trade their father follows. Some Traveller families place no priority on sending any of their children to school and are constantly in trouble with truancy officers. Should LEAs bother following them up and getting the children enrolled and making sure they go? The Travellers think of school and the culture it represents as a place that is alien to their culture. Should they have to send their children there? Or should government allow them to stay home and never learn to read or write?

If teens in high school feel the need to talk with someone then imo they are welcome to talk. If teens are able to find and form a positive relationship with a teacher they can relate to I see that as a very good thing in a teenager's life. Same goes for neighbours, family, friends, parents of friends, relatives. I like the idea that a community is available and willing to support and influence a teenager. I don't see influence from outside the family or the church as an automatic negative.

Why not 'inflict' the views of Amanda Marcotte on anyone? I know a child who comes out with a lot of the sort of ideas (in childish terms) she has blogged. She and her family are former neighbours of mine. They visit occasionally and hopefully we will return the favour some day. Their DD and my youngest DD were friends from the time they could talk. DD shrugs when her little friend calls Christmas Fishmas. They shrugged when DD tried to teach their DD the Hail Mary. (DD also taught her to read in contravention of their Steiner principles, and there was no putting that particular cat back into the bag.) Children tend to go along with whatever their family believes. The Steiner child mentions gnomes when she talks about her maths class. DD talks about the funny joke Fr. X told when he visited her class. Teens are going to be thinking their own thoughts no matter how much you want to isolate them. I have a sister who is basically a Buddhist at this point in her life, having found over the years beginning in her teens that what she was brought up with wasn't relevant to her.

You can't legislate opinion or relationships. The most you can do is respect the framework that allows everyone to hold whatever opinion they hold and to express it freely and not abuse that freedom by calling those who disagree with you names.

I think that either Ian Paisley is closer to the centre than I thought he was or you are closer to Ian Paisley than you realise on social issues, Extro. Maybe it's the use of language that has people bamboozled as to your feelings -- when you claim to be at the centre yet use the language and hopping angry tone of Rush Limbaugh and his ilk there is a disconnect somewhere.

(I agree CheerfulYank)

The issue of Romney being a Mormon will not play a part in the election except via underground and very indirect channels. On the surface, it is a non-issue just as the issue of Obama being black is a non-issue on the surface. Religion cannot be used to attack candidates -- it's a sort of unspoken rule. The right to have a religion and to play a part in whatever religion you adhere to is guaranteed in the constitution. There is still a bit of a bad taste left in the mouth after the openly anti-Catholic elements of opposition to JFK. Any criticism of a candidate's views that seem to be based on religion has to be done obliquely. It can be done but not directly.

The closest the campaign got to mentioning Mormonism in a negative light so far was Newt Gingrich's oblique reference to Romney's mandatory Mormon missionary stint when he highlighted his ability to speak French.

You mean when he conveniently dodged the draft for 2 years in France.

It was mandatory to go and serve his country in Vietnam with the other young men but he instead ran off to socialist France. and considering that his father was running for President at the time you'd of thought he would have shown willing to serve his country or stayed to support his father in the election campaign but no, In order to avoid the draft he ran to France

nightlurker are you a Mormon?

Well that explains your bending of the truth.

Novack, don't start with the mormons again, will ya?

Well, Novack, you've already bent the truth WRT Romney's standing in the Mormon church structure, so you're hardly one to be criticising others about bending truth, are you?

I'm a bit puzzled

If it's your duty as a Mormon to go evangelising, and it's your duty as an American to report for call-up, do you get to choose which duty you obey, or do you obey them both?

IME, no matter how long ago issues have been 'settled' they are still there. Look at the fact that African Americans have had civil rights since the 60s and ask whether there are still people who hold racist views.

Math "No, I'm not seeing it from a child prot. perspective"
So why did you say that you'd prefer a teacher who was a "professional with CP training" hear if one of your DCs wanted to discuss a sexual experience than someone else?

"I do see it as prurience and I am baffled by it. I see fear there too. Do parents have so little faith in the way they bring up their children that they think the minute they reach sexual maturity they are going to turn around and have sex?"
I never said all conservative parents expect this or even fear it, but no matter how strictly you bring a child up there is always a possibility they will have sex or do other things behind your back (drinking, using porn, cutting classes, vandalism, etc.- anything you have taught them is wrong.) So this is when the girl HAS done something and told the deputy principal who set herself up as "approachable" on these issues. When there is an actual disclosure, not just fear your DCs might be up to something you disapprove of.
I still can't conceive of how you would see wanting to find out if your children were living up to your standards is prurience... if you wanted to find out explicit detail then that would be creepy, but anyone in school who'd listen to that level of description in the first place seems unprofessional.

"How is it sophisticated, white (????), urban elite, liberal, Christian, or woman's morals or any combination of those adjectives..."
I was referring to the particular woman in charge of school sex ed policy, who also happens to be the child protection officer, in the example I mentioned. None of these are universal.

But "sophisticated... urban elite" is due to the fact that the more affluent and educated do not as frequently hold traditional values. They are generally more liberal in religious views if they have any at all. Most of them would prefer their dcs had a series of sexual relationships between mid/late teens and 30+ while going through high school/college/university and building their career then married at 30-something to a partner they'd already been living with for some time than bring someone home to meet them at 20 and propose without yet having gone further than a kiss ("You're way too young to commit, you haven't lived yet!" or similar). As few sexually functioning adults are going to abstain until 34 or thereabouts, there is little hope of those who see young adulthood as a time for footloose and fancy-free exploration, self-discovery, higher education and planning for a high end career being abstinent until marriage; this is exactly what metropolitan sophisticates would see it as unlike the cash-poor, deeply spiritual communities from deprived inner cities which send their children to the school in question. It's a disconnect between those who put spirituality first and so make sacrifices to follow the moral code and those who put worldly fulfilment first and do whatever gives them pleasure.

"White" as in the UK apart from Northern Ireland, those who hold to these sort of values are a minority: they are typically found either in white-dominated rural areas such as the West Country, north Wales and the Scottish Highlands and Islands or in inner cities and satellite towns where the population is mainly of first through third generation immigrants from Asia or Africa. The most active extremist Christian churches are nearly always in Black communities in every large city in the UK. The older fundamentalist establishments of Free Presbyterian, Bible Baptist, Gospel Standard Baptist, independent Bible Church, etc. set up by indigenous Brits centuries ago by those who thought the established Church of England to be heretically over-liberal are lucky see a small turnout of greying faces every Sunday. Unsurprisingly, the other faiths represented at the school were almost exclusively non-white though the odd Caucasian convert to Islam exists here.

"Christian" as opposed to Muslim/Sikh/Hindu/Adventist (quasi Christian). What I was getting at is between social class, ethnicity and religion the teacher has a very different profile to the parents so she may be imposing a mentality that differs dramatically from what they expect, abusing her authority as a senior staff member and the trust that parents implicitly place in her to do the job she is being paid through their taxes for.

that's far too long and rambling to follow, extro.

Is it your opinion that a person aged X years is not entitled to privacy and confidentiality?

(the question of what "X" might be is a different question)

If my 15-year-old DD were to get pregnant, and for whatever reason felt she could not approach me first with this, then I would FAR rather she sought information and advice from a qualified school nurse than from the internet. Which seems the likely place she'd turn to without a school nurse.

However, I really don't think this issue is going to swing the US election one way or the other.

@Piglet "confidentiality" is something I believe in to an extent but not when pupils are telling teachers/pastoral staff they're having sex or in a relationship as a blatant end-run around parents who they know quite well would not approve. That is just exploiting it. Confidentiality in school is supposed to be about preventing unauthorised access to data the staff require to do their jobs i.e. records/professional conversations not an excuse for people to pass secrets on.

If they are seeing a school nurse then that's different, it's a healthcare issue and there is a stricter level of scrutiny required before a health professional is allowed to break confidentiality. As I said in my example from UK it was the deputy principal and in the Amanda Marcotte I quoted it mentioned teachers doing sex ed in school (not healthcare workers).

or are you going to defend a teacher with no medical role acting as "an experienced adult" for pupils to unload their intimate secrets on without parents having a hope of finding out? That goes up to 11 on the Spinal Tap extreme liberalism meter...

Yeah, this won't swing the US election. Don't know if Romney even supports a parental rights amendment/ parental rights legislation.

I'm not talking about bringing children up strictly. I'm talking about bringing them up equipped to make good decisions for themselves, to think about consequences for themselves and for others before they make a decision.

I do not live in fear of what my children will get up to behind my back. They are aware of my opinion on porn (feminist anti porn), drinking (nothing wrong with sensible drinking but DO NOT DRIVE), cutting class (highly unlikely -- all headed for Ivy League or equivalent), vandalism (the thought would not cross their minds - it is simply not done). However, they are not children once they get to 14 or so. They are capable of understanding right and wrong and making decisions based on that for themselves.

How come you are thinking of a situation where it is a girl who is engaging in sex and confiding in a teacher? Why not a boy? Would the parents you have in mind be more likely to police the sexual behaviour of daughters than sons?

'But "sophisticated... urban elite" is due to the fact that the more affluent and educated do not as frequently hold traditional values. They are generally more liberal in religious views if they have any at all. Most of them would prefer their dcs had a series of sexual relationships between mid/late teens and 30+ while going through high school/college/university and building their career then married at 30-something to a partner they'd already been living with for some time than bring someone home to meet them at 20 and propose without yet having gone further than a kiss ("You're way too young to commit, you haven't lived yet!" or similar). As few sexually functioning adults are going to abstain until 34 or thereabouts, there is little hope of those who see young adulthood as a time for footloose and fancy-free exploration, self-discovery, higher education and planning for a high end career being abstinent until marriage; this is exactly what metropolitan sophisticates would see it as unlike the cash-poor, deeply spiritual communities from deprived inner cities which send their children to the school in question. It's a disconnect between those who put spirituality first and so make sacrifices to follow the moral code and those who put worldly fulfilment first and do whatever gives them pleasure. '

Sweetest Jesus come and squeeze us...
Do you honestly believe that a child who is secure in his or her family would have sex just because that was the prevailing wind in society or because the principal of the school could be assumed to hold different beliefs from those of the parents? Where does that sort of fear come from?

How many students plan 'end runs' around parents? What could be the purpose of such an 'end run'?

What is the home life of such a student (assuming she exists) like?
Girls who act out sexually as you suggest are not happy and their homes are not nice places.

Where is this focus on teen pregnancy and the sex lives of teenage girls in the poorer parts of inner cities coming from anyway, and how is it relevant?