"Seeing money can change behavior"

From the AP via Yahoo! News:

Kathleen Vohs, assistant professor of marketing at the University of Minnesota, and colleagues, conducted a series of nine experiments in which people were asked to do puzzles or other tasks and the behavior of people exposed to money was compared to others who were not prompted to think about it.

[...]

In another experiment 44 students at Florida State University were each given $2 in quarters — which they were told was leftover from a previous experiment — and asked to unscramble sentences that divided them into two groups, one that was reminded of money by the sentence and others that were not.

When they left, the researcher noted that there was a box by the door for donations for needy students if they wanted to chip in, but they didn't have to.

On average, students who had read neutral sentences donated $1.34 while those whose sentences reminded them of money kept more for themselves, giving an average of just 77 cents.

[...]

Vohs research was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the Canada Research Chair Council.

clickhereforallofit

I dunno, [something about capitolism]. Its a really interesting study, I recommend reading all of it. I'm not exactly sure how to interpret the results, but they don't really suprise me. What would we do without Canada?

Will the Dems suprise me?

From the AP:

Dem scrutiny of drugs, defense expected

[...]

Generally speaking, Democrats have said they will differ from Republicans by being tougher watchdogs of corporate wrongdoing and government spending and bigger defenders of consumers and labor unions.

clickhereforallofit

Here's hoping.

Fundamentals of an Acceptable Democracy (for the United States of America)

Government leaders should put social goals above economic goals; human interests are more important than business interests.

Political candidates should not be supported by private corporations; politicians should not be allowed to accept contributions from businesses--only individual citizens, and large donations should be investigated and/or scrutinized.

Government should provide at least two years of free education for highschool graduates.

Study of the humanities should be emphasized in public school curriculum.

If they appear on more than half of all the states' ballots, third party presidential candidates should be allowed to participate in presidential debates with major party candidates.

The public should be allowed to vote on major national budget issues, i.e. considerable cuts or raises in funding for any government programs.

Personal privacy should not be infringed upon, even in established or declared national security crises or "troubled times" or "high stakes."

The public should vote on declarations of war and/or any kinds of military invasion, occupation or force against another country. Government should not order offensive military action without the consent of the public (by means of the voting process).

A truely democratic country will not use military intervention to change another country's governmental system, leadership, or philosophy.

All basic human rights that a government observes within its national borders should be equally observed outside of its national borders; war crimes are unacceptable, even if the opposing country/government has already committed them (even in greater volume or with higher severity).

Using Saddam's sentence to boost Republican votes

From AFP (Agence France Presse):

US voters weight Republican fate on election eve

[...]

Candidates in down-to-the-wire races cranked up get-out-the-vote efforts and Bush launched a final three-state campaign swing, with polls showing a tightening of a race expected to heap pain on his fellow Republicans.

[...]

On Sunday, he taunted anti-war critics by holding up the death sentence handed down on former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein as vindication for the 2003 US invasion.

"My decision to remove Saddam Hussein was the right decision, and the world is better off for it," he said.

clickhereforallofit

Its no suprise that Republicans, especially Bush, would try to use Saddam's death sentence as a last minute vote booster. Everyone hates Saddam, but will the American people be convinced that the world is better off now that Hussein is going to hang?

Lets not forget that the search for WMDs showed up practically empty, and there's no evidence that they were going to start a nuke program or supply "terrorists" with weapons or anything that extreme.

Are the American people gullible enough to keep Republicans in power just because Saddam has been sentenced to death? He's been captive for like two years now, whats really the difference? Troops are still dying, and Iraq doesn't appear to be stabilizing at all -- "Oh yay, Saddam's gonna hang!..."

If Americans are happy about Saddam's death sentence, they should remember that EVERYONE in Congress wanted to go to war back in 2003. Well, they voted for it, at least. But is his death sentence a victory in this so-called war on terror? Yeah right.