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pyrrhite β Cariot's Pinky
Published: 2010-01-06 19:27:50 +0000 UTC; Views: 877; Favourites: 38; Downloads: 47
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nice drawing!
this one is very similar with my dog
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thank you~ you have a chow, don't you?
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yw^^
yes i have 2 chows..that one in ur pic was dead some years ago
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Reminds me of a dog I have that is a cross between a german sheperd and a labrador, we found him but he looks quite similar in coloring.
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I don't know what kind of dog Pinky is, she's from Puerto Rico, also found abandoned and abused. She was so lucky, and sounds like your dog is too.
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ah so many bad people out there who treat their dogs like punching bags or for christmass till they get bored. tis a real shame, but suppose those people arent worth much
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I agree those people aren't worth much at all. In my opinion animals are the truest innocents, and especially something like a dog who has no choice but to depend on us
for its livelihood, to abuse their hope and trust is truly evil.
So we have to be extra kind to our own, eh?
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Aye exactly, for me having a dog or even a cat is a bit like having a child, you have to be ready for the responsibility and dedication it will take, think alot of people think of these animals more like accessories or products that would be cool to have, rather than understand its a living breathing entity
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Yes, cute as puppies but as soon as they are noisy or destructive or needy they are discarded or neglected.
On the other hand some of us are crazy about our animals and spoil them rotten.
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lol well kids are destructive, noisy and needy too, tho suppose some people discard their kids also or just mistreat them. Actually recently they did some scientific research into a particular sheep dog and they found out that she had the same intelligience as a 7 old year old child, they arent sure if other dogs are the same or is it just this one.
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Oh, kids, I have one of those too.
Very interesting about the sheep dog, and watching a working dog herd, I can easily believe it.
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Ah cool, you have quite a collection then with dogs, horses and kids!
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Just one kid, lots of the other things though. Even a couple of snakes!
Well only one husband.
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LOL well thats good, I am sure one husband and 1 child is enough 
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A matter of taste, yes I imagine so.
I really like reptiles in general but don't care to keep any but snakes, and only a couple of those. They fascinate me and they are beautiful. Plus they only eat once a week, you can't beat that.
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cool, I am sure they are a beautiful animal, but dont think they would get on well with the cats nor dog. Their movements are very interesting tho and their skin very different to anything on 4 or 2 legs.
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they live in glass terrariums and luckily the cats and dogs don't pay much attention.
yes, they are very different and I would not want to run into a venomous one ever but mine re very quiet-tempered. Funny, the different snake species have temperament characteristics that you can actually count on and predict.
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cool didnt know that, I think from all the literature of snakes being devious and treacherious gives them the reputation more than the actual truth
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Well there's a bit of Irish lore, St Patrick and the snakes, right? Snakes as a whole are beneficial predators. Certainly there are dangerous ones, but not so many actively aggressive or big enough to eat you or your dog. Some though.
In the end they are just trying to make a living the only way they can, as they were designed to, quite devoid of evil intent or malice.
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Well I think the story of St Patrick driving the snakes out of Ireland was symbolic in Early Irish literature of the christianity driving out the evils of paganism, oddly enough nearly all early Irish literature was written by monks and it had alot of that same paganism in it, suppose the original documents were written by Irish only a generation or two of the change over the christanity so it was still very much alive at the time.
As for snakes, I have no ill feelings towards them to be honest, though it is strange for me when I see them abroad as we dont have any left here, they are in Britain not here, in fact unfortunately most of the old predators are gone now, like wolves, wild boar and bear, sadly hunted to extinction, the country is less rich without them.
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I didn't take St. Patrick's story literally enough to assume there really were no snakes in Ireland, were they really hunted and harassed to extinction or were there no native populations to begin with?
It would be hard for boar or wolves to make a go of it in modern Ireland I should think. Even here with vast quantities of land, there is strong feeling against top tier predators, and I don't believe there are native populations of boars anywhere, but I could easily be wrong about that.
The Book of Kells, there's another connection, I'd forgotten that. Monks and illuminated script.
That sounds much like the Church in South America where Catholic dogma inserted and blended itself into the existing native religions, strange bedfellows but with interesting results.
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I do believe there were snakes in Ireland once apon a time, I dont know what happened to them, would be hard to believe man would be able to hunt them all as they arent large. Aye tis sad to see the most beautiful of animals, those very same top tier hunters getting forced to extinction, there are still quite a few bears I believe in Europe, especially scandinivia (as very little of scandinivia is actually suitable for human colonisation) and Eastern Europe. I know in germany and france they are trying to reintroduce bears and wolves from Poland in germanys case, and from Italy with France. We do the same with some species, I believe there are some wild boar that have been let loose in the wild here of late, only to find they are already being gunned down by farmers when they are absolutely no threat to farming, hunting is something I also wish was banned, full stop.
Ah I am surprised you have heard of the book of kells, its a beautiful book, extremely intricate, I read the reason why the monks did that was it was a form of self torture to get closer to god, just as some monks beat themselves others did grueling tasks in art that would take them decades, not sure how much of that is conjecture tho.
I didnt know that about south America and catholicism, tis cool if that is the case, i am not catholic myself but its nice to hear that they are blending in with the natives again rather than in the time of conquistadors where they were wiping them out.
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We have the same problems with reintroduction of wolves, even in the national parks, cattle farmers raise a huge cry against it, but they have successfully brought packs back in Yellowstone Park at least, though they are still shot fairly often. There is sometimes talk of it here in New England always with the same outpouring of negative reaction, although there is plenty of room and wild land in Maine and parts of New Hampshire and Vermont.
Wild boar, fascinating strange animals, and not any kind of predator are they? I suppose they can be pretty fierce but also pretty shy and wary. Are farmers worried about their crops being harmed?
Hunting is such a dicey subject, here there is deer hunting, bear, moose and bird hunting, the deer have no predators to speak of and are hard on the forests with over-browsing, but I hate hunting season, it feels like an assault on my world in some ways.
The Book of Kells, again courtesy of my father, I remember when I was pretty young he bought a copy of it as a gift for his mother who had visited Ireland when she was in her 60s I guess. So he showed me the book and explained it some.
I hadn't realized it was meant as self torture, but art can be that way even now to be sure..
Yes, the Church wisely made headway with native South Americans by allowing a sort of co-mingling to happen, well i don't know if they allowed it or simply couldn't prevent it. I again don't know too much about it but apparently it was more that the population added Catholicism to their existing religions rather than properly converting in the typical sense, so that South American Catholicism is very unique and colorful as religion goes.
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Well Wild boar I am not sure what they eat, but when they were found to be here, scientists did come out and say they were no threat whatsoever to crops or farm animals, I think the farmers here often hunt as a hobby so anything they can kill they will, whatever excuse they can find is fine by them, but I am not sure what their diet is. I think wolves are the most glorious of animals, the most beautiful and I wish we had them here but I doubt that could ever happen.
Well the arguement for hunting has been said to be that they need to be kept down from getting too many, but I have always found the arguement a bit strange, as obviously we must have killed their predator and surely an reintroduction of that predator would be a better way of keeping them down than having to kill them ourselves. Also nature has been regulating itself for centries without human aid, I find it hard to believe nature needs it now. Well thats my perspective on it, I could very well be wrong.
Well I am not a religious person at all but I can understand the pull of it, its really cool to hear that something as stiff as catholicism was able to bend, seems they have gone full circle, I think they did that in the early centuries in Europe but changed unfortunately as it became more established. I must look into this south American Catholicism sometime, sounds cool. And aye art can often be torture in itself
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Wolves are fascinating, in their looks and in their social structure. What we have here are coyotes that are actually wolf hybrids, larger and more aggressive than western coyote, not often seen though sometimes heard, very eerie and strange at night. Really gets the dogs going to hear the coyotes howl.
I have long been anti-hunting but suburban living doesn't like to make room for the necessary predator base, meanwhile interest in hunting here is on the wane so the deer over-population problem remains. Starvation is about the only other option, and not such a bad one, that has been a natural control forever, unpleasant but nature never is sentimental.
I really think in South America the Church had no choice but to allow the melding of religions, it's how the people themselves received conversion, but if you do any reading about it at all you will know more than I do about it.
I'm not religious either despite being raised and schooled Catholic, by the time I was 14 none of it seemed credible to me.
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Ah I didnt know there was coyotes in America, thought they were only in Australia. Sounds like foxes here, well I am sure coyotes are bigger, but foxes eat pets and scavenge here, we believe that a local fox ate one of our last cats. Though I still think foxes are beautiful animals, cant blame something that is just trying to live, even though it was very sad to loose the cat. I didnt know the attack humans, might be in self defense though, I hear alot of predators only attack humans as if they believe themselves under attack.
Well I think one of my main reasons for hating hunting, besides the cruelty of it, is the fact that is taking pleasure in the killing of something, making a sport of it, and I think life deserves a bit respect than that, sure we had to kill before to eat but if you watch some Africans that still live that way they actually show alot of respect for the animal they kill and never cruel.
Ah cool, well I went to Catholic schools here, and my parents used to send me to mass, even though they themselves are not religious, but I like most people never had a strong belief in religion. But after saying all that, I actually think Jesus was a good philosopher of ethics, I dont believe the son of god thing, but I think his teachings are akin to philosophy and were revolutionary at the time like turn the other cheek, changed the way we think in the west forever, so I think parts of his teachings are worthwhile lessons.
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Yes, coyotes are very common in the west and east as well, even suburban areas some places. We have fox as well, I see them on our property in the warmer months, the dogs chase them and they lope away but never seem too concerned. I don't mind them at all but we do have cats and rabies is a concern so I don't like them to feel entirely at home in our dooryard. The coyotes don't usually attack people but as I said ours are wolf-hybrids actually and somewhat more aggressive as a result, but still I've only heard of two attacks, one at least, resulting in death, I think that happened in Canada. There is a resident population in my neighborhood but I have caught glimpses of coyotes twice in 30 years. And they take cats as well, I've lost several and assume most of them went to coyotes. But locally so far they aren't much trouble otherwise, we have sheep farmers who have never lost but a lamb or two at most over the years.
It's true most predators don't like to tangle with people if they can help it, certainly bears will defend their young pretty fiercely, but why wouldn't they?
But you do hear about mountain lions out west stalking and killing people, perhaps because there is a shortage of other prey available but perhaps humans are legitimate prey in the eyes of a big cat, and that's fair enough but not how I'd like to die...
As I've gotten older I have felt less fervently anti-hunting as such and more concerned that people respect and protect the earth, the land and its creatures together, which some hunters do most ambitiously. I kill very few creatures excepting things like ticks or mosquitoes or flies and don't eat meat, fish though a little. As you say hunting out of need and with respect is a far different thing from so-called sport hunting.
My father was a pretty observant Catholic and he used to allow exactly that, that putting aside whether Jesus was divine or not, his teachings were worthy and good.
Here in America most people are religious statistically speaking, which I understand puzzles Europeans? It puzzles me too, there are still legal battles in some states over whether evolution should be allowed to be taught in their schools, and whether the concept of Intelligent Design should be included in science textbooks.
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Oh ye have rabies, didnt know that, we dont have it here but its pretty common in mainland europe, there is very strict restrictions about bringing animals from Europe to Ireland as a result, and they have to go through strenious tests for a few weeks I believe if they are brought from abroad, which is fair enough and its why people dont bring their animals with them if they travel. I would like to see these coyote wolf hybrids, sound like they could be amazing to behold or even these large cats, I think most of the time they are shy of people and only hunt as you say if there is no food but even at that I presume there is methods of fightng or scaring them off. In the end I think these animals are as scared of us as we are of them, and when an animal smells fear i think they probably realise your a danger to them. I have seen wolves and bears dont attack each other and sometimes they quarrel over food but never kill each other, and I have seen a few examples of huskys playing with polar bears, like here:
[link]
Amazing really that other animals are able to sense these things and we cant, I suppose we have lost this ability since we became civilised.
I remember when I was younger we lived in the countryside and often our dogs or cats would be shot by farmers or get caught in traps set by them. Of course its not legal for them to do that but I have been surprised to find how many farmers are quite cruel to animals. As for hunting perhaps I will change my mind someday, but as I am now I just dont see the point, I think we do enough damage already to the planet by taking over everything why make it even worse, as Ghandi said:
"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. "
Yes I think one of things that puzzles Europeans mostly about America is this religious extremity in some parts. We see clips of those strange churches where people have fits when the priest touches them and believe they are touched by god, and hear that some parts of America dont want to teach Evolution. Which is crazy to us, because even the most conservative of religions, the catholic church, believes in Evolution. And we also have giant ads here on billboards and the like from the same religious organisations from America.
I did work with an American girl here before, and she was fiercely religious, didnt believe in Evolution and also didnt believe in concentration camps, and didnt believe that animals had souls. All three really annoyed me to my bone, and I was shocked to hear someone in the 21st century say those things, well I have heard others say the third one, but never the other two. She even said when she was young she played religous computer games, which I had only seen in the simpsons with Ned Flanders, and always took it as a joke rather than an actuality. But she was the only one, I had never thought someone like that could exist so when she said these things my jaw hit the floor. Besides that though she was genuinely a nice person, and I presume that the concentration camps thing she couldnt believe because she had such faith in humanity and that people couldnt do such things. Well thats my guess, even with that its not a great excuse, as I said to her that you cant say something didnt happen when the people who had it done to them said it was done to them and the people who did it said their only regret was they didnt kill more. But there world is full of strange people I am sure.
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That link to the huskies and polar bears is amazing, I couldn't even believe it at first. Still don't see how it's possible, but it is fascinating. Thank you!
I believe it used to mean a six month quarantine to get a dog into England, which resulted in many losing their homes, but that's from years ago, I think that's changed nowadays? And certainly rabies is not something you want to introduce if you can at all prevent it.
Mountain lions[link]
We used to have what were called catamounts, mountain lions in Vermont till the 1800s when they were hunted to extinction. Now you get reports of sightings from a distance or their tracks but it's never been confirmed so who knows if there are really any left or not.
Coyotes[link]
I don't expect you to read all that but it was one of the few sites I came across with up-to-date information and without an emphasis on hunting. Coyote hunting is legal year 'round and people can kill as many as they like.
I certainly agree with Gandhi in just about everything.
Yes, you're speaking of the Pentecostal religions as they are known, very fundamental and tend to the extreme, some even engage in snake-handling, not such a big deal except that they use venomous snakes.
That isn't representational though, religion here is usually not so odd and sensational. But many people identify as Christian and seem inclined to demand the same of others, including their politicians. When Kennedy was elected in the '60s he had to downplay the fact that he was Catholic, nowadays the presidential candidates have to wear their religious faith on their sleeves, absurd and inappropriate, even insulting to non-Christians or atheists.
The evolution debacles I feel safe in saying crop up pretty exclusively in the southern parts of the country. It does astonish me that people think they can cherry-pick or discard science according to their personal inclinations and beliefs. You can even buy textbooks that will argue the earth is only 6000 years old.
Your American co-worker has plenty of people who agree with her here on all counts, unfortunately. The eastern US tends to be more progressive and liberal in its thinking generally. The farther south you go the more conservative and extreme and insular social ideas seem to be, and now I'm sounded uncomfortably like biased myself, but logistically this is how it plays out. Of course it's always dangerous to generalize and there are plenty of southerners with compassionate and flexible minds as well as bigoted, thoughtless northerners.
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Ya its probably the same in the UK with rabbies, I hadnt asked anyone about it before. Strange how it skipped here and went to America, but suppose there are benefits from living on an island.
The mountain lions are beautiful indeed, I have seen them before in images, its probably better if people dont know that they are there to be honest, as it would probably put them in danger. wow those coyotes are extremely wolf like, not what I would think of a coyote looking like at all. A pity to hear about unrestricted hunting, I think I read something of late about hunting actually that it was worse for keeping the predators down as they normally only kill the old and slow wolves as they are the easiest to kill and these actually keep the younger wolves in check, without them the younger wolves run rampant or something along those lines.
I actually listened to Kennedys speeches before, online, were very interesting, the guy was very smart, very educated and very well read, its amazing how different things are now, not that the politicans arent so intellectual but they do seem to do the whole down to earth, average joe thing alot nowadays. I remember him having to defend the fact he was catholic and the pope wouldnt be giving him orders or telling him what to do, amazing how much things can change in such a short space of time. I never doubted that this religious extremity is not common, but I suppose the more wild and outragious things are the ones that sell newspapers or tv shows, so thats what we see the most unfortunately, as I said that whole watching insiders comment about what is happening inside to other insiders while being on the outside.
Actually this geographic thing in America seemed to hit home to me when I saw the second US elections that bush had, you had all the eastern and western coasts of america voting Democrat and all the middle between the costs vote republican. I think most of the americans that travel are from the east or west coasts so these would be the majority of the ones I had talked too and they all seem quite progressive and educated. But as you say its unfair to generalise and alot of good things came from the south, like blues, country music for one. Even in a small country like ours there is a some misunderstandings and conflict between rural and urban areas, so I cant imagine how much more it must be like this in a country so large as your own.
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Well, there isn't unrestricted hunting on wolves, they are protected in their US ranges, not so in Canada though I believe. But on the coyotes, yes.
What I have heard about coyotes is that they respond to hunting/poisoning pressure by having more frequent or larger litters. I don't know about wolves, makes sense though, they are very social animals.
Oh yes, when Bush was elected one of the things people said about him was that he seemed like someone you could sit down and have a beer with, while Al Gore seemed too...intelligent.
The whole Kennedy saga is pretty fascinating on a few levels, don't you think? Such a see-sawing between power, influence and tragedy. But seeming to be a collection of very decent-hearted well-intentioned people, whatever their personal dramas were.
The religious extremists are not so common but religion has been pushed very much center-stage in the US political arena these past ten or fifteen years. Now in Ireland the Church has wielded a great deal of influence, is that still the case? And does it affect political decisions or mostly social ones?
It is unfair to make sweeping generalizations and I would hate to step on toes, but there's no denying when you look at a map divided by voting blocks it is just as you say, we call them red states and blue states with a little bit of purple cropping up here and there.
Are the urban/rural conflicts in Ireland about land use or other things?
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Ah I didnt know the canadians were bad on the hunting but I suppose we dont hear as much about them as we do about the US ofc, I did hear when that vice president candidate with McCain that in Alaska they hunt wolves pretty bad, I think she even tried to get restrictions on hunting polar bears removed or did get it removed, she was very strange for us to look at, McCain might have seemed hard but atleast he seemed like a decent fellow in some ways, was scary to hear him talk about starting another war with Iran this time though.
Aye I can never understand this mentality nowadays that a politician should be down to earth, a man of the people, but I suppose this is as old as time itself, often the kings that were loved were the ones that were seen to be of the people, a man you could talk to and not feel belittled. But personally I would like to have the best and smartest be our leaders as I think they will do the best job. As for the kennedays yes they are very interesting, think part of their fame lies in the fact they were cut down so young, when they were far from finished or even starting, such hope, such potential, such a waste but I suppose it happened to alot of great leaders, especially ones of that era like Martin Luther King, another great shame, when he advocated a peaceful solution as well, perhaps these peoples visions are too large or great for some people to take.
Yes in Ireland we did at one stage hand way too much power over to the catholic church, I think catholicism had become an extremism here as I stated before it was tied to national identity and pride of who you are or where you came from. Of course after so long of being oppressed it exploded when let loose. I think with poverty too after independance and our trade war with the UK people turned to religion, and I think the early politicians used the church to unify the people during such a frail time. But nowadays, no the church is dying, very quickly over the last two generations, now must people might have been brought up catholic but either arent or arent that serious about it. It has no say in politics but did at one time, I think with the child abuse scandals they have destroyed themselves and the faith people had in them now. Though you still get extremists here, especially over issues like abortion, which is still illegal here.
As for urban and rural conflicts its mostly along lines of not understanding each other and having a distain for the other party. Most of it is harmless though but you would get hard core on either side who hate the other, nothing violent or anything. I do know that the land to country people isnt like it would be for some other places, its in their blood and one of the big components to the end of british rule here was the farmers revolting. A good movie to watch, which is based on a great play is "the field" with richard harris, it kind of sums up the feeling some members of the rural communities have towards the land.
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Canada has such vast reaches of wild land, I imagine they look on hunting in a different light but still it seems to me that they aren't much wiser or far-sighted in their management decisions than most nations unfortunately. And I can't say too much because I am not well-informed as to any of the particulars.
Sarah Palin, McCain's running mate, was a national joke by the end of the campaign but she is making a resurgence of sorts among conservative factions here and you hear talk of her running against Obama in 2012. To me she seems like a female counterpart to Bush, and if she makes any headway at all on the national stage my faith in the intelligence of the American electorate will evaporate.
Caroline Kennedy is still around and made an ill-fated attempt to enter politics last year. People like her well enough but previously has kept a low public profile. Now she doesn't seem to have the charisma of the others in her family, but maybe she just needs time and training on a public stage if she really wants to win an election.
The Church seems to be in tatters everywhere, I wonder if it will ever really recover.
I will look in to The Field, if it's not too somber I will watch it.
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Ah its a pity to hear that about Canada, I think it is a mistake to think like we did back when we started to destroy our natural habitats, that there is plenty there so its ok to take some, though I suppose mentalitys have changed somewhat since then.
By god I hope she doesnt even get nominated! Sarah Palin I think made the world shutter, the fact that she came so close to it too was scary, it was a huge mistake too for McCain. Well there is quite a few kennedys left no? Not the JFk generation but the one after I think? I thought they all had loads of kids, isnt arnold Schwarzenegger married to one?
Well the Church has crawled back from worse I suppose and they still have alot of power in other areas outside of the west, like south america, africa, some of the far east like the Philipines.
The Field is a bit old now, well acted though by Richard Harris, Sean Bean, John Hurt and Tom Berenger. It gives a good glimpse of old Ireland, in the first part of the 20th century. But yes it is not a happy movie that is for sure.
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Fort the record when I speak of Canada I speak from impressions and scraps of facts.
That's true when I speak about a lot of things unfortunately...
but my impression is pretty much as you say.
Quite a few Kennedys left, a huge family, but only a couple of the men remain involved in politics to my knowledge, and don't seem to carry the bucketsful of charisma that the brothers had. I believe it is Joseph Jr who is very active in the environmental movement.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is married to one, a head-scratcher in some ways, how do they discuss politics-? But for all that I find his movies and his accent annoying, he's pretty moderate generally and has a very sound record on environmental concerns.
I looked up The Field and it does sound somber but also very worth seeing, with lots of lovely Irish countryside as backdrop, thanks.
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Ah I hear Arnie does an ok job out there too, I was never a huge fan of him, but some of his movies were ok, if mindless, his best role was Terminator when he didnt talk much and just acted like a robot, which suited him. But he has done well for himself, climbed out of poverty to where he is now, so he has alot to be proud of, tho I hear he used to sexually harass women bad before, not sure about now.
Well I suppose the Kennedys have alot of pressure on them now, expectation, must be hard having the image of JFK and bobby looming over your career.
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I hope his wife sees to it that there is no more sexual harassment. She's a pretty capable woman from all appearances.
"Didn't talk much and just acted like a robot..."
Yeah, being born into what is referred to as American royalty, and with such tragic clouds looming over their heads. Maybe they are entering a quieter phase now.
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What is interesting too about the Kennedys is like the Irish here, its all about family, two brothers in Office, and I think alot of the guys around them were connected by marraige or blood, except Robert McNamara, who instead still had the Irish connection, kind of like the old clan system, still here too in a similar way but I see its quite common among Irish americans too. And this idea that family is more important than anything else, I might be talking in ignorance here and it might be in other races too.
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Really it's sort of a tribalism, when you put it like that, which I suppose a clan is more or less. I do think there are other cultures who place high value on family connections for better or worse. Better meaning the obvious reasons and worse meaning the pressure, influence and isolation that can result from really insular family ties.
But here I think families have almost gone out of fashion so to speak. Divorce rates being what they are and families separated geographically as well, I think to the detriment of our society. People are so lonely and unconnected.
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Well Divorce isnt so common here yet, it is accross the water in Britain, and in the European mainland but Ireland is a bit less progressive, if you think divorce is progressive. I think family is important and I like how important it is here in Ireland but I think politics it should be left out really. But after saying that who could blame JFK for having Bobby at his side, after all most people say Bobby was the more brillant of the two and the people around them were there for as much for merit as anything else. So in some cases it works I suppose.It is sad to hear tho, that this breaking apart of family and connections is happening in the states but I suppose it is so vast, it would be hard to keep from happening
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I think divorce, as rampant as it is now, is indicative of something askew in our culture. In the US the divorce rate is 50%. I think families are what we were designed for and feel the lack of a close one in my own life.
I was just reading a short article in a Boston newspaper about the end of the Kennedy era btw, really was just acknowledging the end of an era.
Yes, in the US when the shift was made from a farming-based to an industrial society, I believe is when families began to move apart from one another. People had to follow opportunity.
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Aye its a shame to see families torn apart, especially by divorce but it seems to me alot of people just avoid their problems or move onto something new than try to work it out. But I suppose I only know from the outside so I really shouldnt comment.
Ah I suppose with the death of senator Kennedy it ended what? 40 years of kennedy governance. I suppose they people wanted a change thats why they voted Republican this time.
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I think it must have been as simple as wanting a change, I can't quite explain it otherwise. People claim it was because of health care issues, that they didn't WANT a change in the system...but Massachusetts is still a democratic stronghold, and I believe most democratic voters are pro-health care reform, dunno. Politics and the stock market, you can't expect them to make sense....
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Well I have heard democrat and republican kind of change from state to state, ie a republican in california, is like a democrat in texas lets say, ie every politician extremity or leanings are relative to their state. If that makes any sense, sounds like a maths theory 
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Yes, that's true, regional differences certainly. I would venture to guess that on the whole an east coast republican is not too far wide of a southern democrat in many instances. er~sd or something I suppose...
How long can an Irish, prime minister, president? stay in office? (It always shames a little, how knowledgeable people from other countries can be about the workings of the US political system when I know next to nothing about anyone else's...and I don't think I'm completely alone in that failing.) Well I'm sure there are people here who vote according to the habits of their families, also straight-ticket voting meaning you vote for every candidate on the basis of party alone regardless of individual merit.
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Well suppose as they say all politics are local.
As for Ireland we have a president and she sits in office for 4 years, but she is the lesser of the two positions, our leader of parliament is called Taoiseach and the parliament is called DΓ‘il Γireann, it comes from early Irish law essentially, as the celts were democratic/republican ie people voted for their king or leader. The Taoiseach is nominated by his party, and he is the face of the party, as long as his party is in the majority or can form a coalition with another party to stay in power the taoiseach can lead. It would be similar to britain in that, essentially the leader could be in power forever, as long as his party kept him there, but normally they have to step down over controversies or their party votes for someone else to be their leader. I think each party votes within itself every once and a while to choose who their leader is. Its not a great system if you ask me, but then again I havent done massive research into it, politics in that level were always kind of boring for me, shamefully enough.
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Now this will sound stupid but I think it's cool that the titles are in Gaelic. Gaelic is such a great language visually, unpronounceable to an uneducated tongue of course but I love all those vowels.
I didn't realize the Celts voted for their leaders! Elected their kings? I don't really understand parliamentary systems but it seems pretty interesting. It puzzles me the way leaders can be removed and also the way elections can seem to spring out of nowhere. Though I shamelessly admit that politics generally bore me as well.
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Hey again seems I am always late. Right aye Gaelic is a nice language, very little similar with it and English, except for the occassional latin word. Actually Irish was the first of the modern languages to be written down, before french, german, english, spainish and even Italian. Its dying but it is still widely spoken, not like it was before, it has been dying a slow death since the famine. Nowadays its taught in school, its mandatory till your 18, people who can speak irish are supposed to be around 1 million, but every day only about 100 thousand, though those living in areas that only speak Irish would very little, these areas are called Gaeltachts, mostly in coastal regions.
Aye the Celts voted for their leaders, freemen in the tribe could vote but the real power lay with a small group of nobles who formed an inner parliament, the leader was voted in but I think it was for life. People often think the more barbariac people of Europe were more dictorial than the civilised like the Romans but in a tribe among the celts or Thracians or Germans the tribe had more control over its leadership than the Greeks and Romans, the big difference was urbanisation and writing.
Modern politics can indeed be puzzling, think its probably because of the long, long, long lists of laws and sub laws in which you would need a law degree to understand. I think as well people are becoming less interested in governance and politics these days, probably from a lack of faith, and probably because of all distractions, at one time people would have forced themselves to know all there was to know.
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Don't worry about being 'late' really. I am under the impression that you are trying to get an education.
I ran into a girl here a while ago who had a Gaelic phrase for her signature, I asked her about it and that's what she said, that she'd been learning it in school for years. I hope you are able to preserve it, hard when a language isn't in common use. Here the Native American languages are in danger of being lost, many already have been and you get people making major pushes to preserve what they can before all the native speakers die. Many tribes, many languages.
Very interesting about the Celts, I had no idea, never thought about it properly before. I suppose the close knit nature of a tribe would make a sort of democracy a natural, even necessary thing in some respects.
Yes, we get pretty removed from modern government, there are far too many of us for it to be at all a direct process. I know here and probably this is a common theme, people get disenchanted with the process because as you say, they lack faith or trust in the system, and feel powerless to affect it. Certainly how I feel, although on a local level, somewhere tiny like Vermont, the process seems a bit more direct and transparent.
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Aye we do study Irish here from about 5 - 18, its mandatory, unfortunately for me, I was never that good in school, was always trying to live rather than study, so my Irish, while I have bits and pieces, is fairly bad. There are alot of Irish speaking primary schools here, from 5 -13, anyone who goes to one of them is fluent as they do everything through irish, nearly all cities have one or two, so there are a fair few that would be able to speak Irish fluently, just dont use it everyday. Myself I went to english speaking schools, and as I said I was never that interested in school. All the signs here though are in Irish and in English and if you want you can do anything civil or governmental through Irish but in the cities English would still be king among people. There is alot of resistance to it here, especially from Dublin, who believe it to be a dead language and not worthy of keeping alive, I suppose it is like anything some believe tradition to be holding us back or a waste of time others see it as worthy of keeping. Though I do think the language is badly taught here, forced on people and the calibre of teaching the language is quite poor, if I knew when I was younger what I know now about Irish I would have been motivated to learn it, but ah well. Still in comparison to Scots Gaelic Irish is supposed to be doing very well, actually the best out of the Celtic languages to survive is the welsh, they have big tracts of wales still where people only speak welsh, or so I hear.
The most tragic of people is the north native americans, they seem to have such a rich and vibrant culture, it would be a pity to see it disappear. I always liked their music but I hear they own alot of casinos now? A good example of a people that have modernised and kept their company is actually the Japanese, they seem to have kept alot of what was and not let it hold them back modernly.
Aye sometimes I have to wonder whether the greeks got it right, just to have city states rather than nations, as in a city everyone can have their say and be directly involved in governance while in a nation its so seperate from the people, I suppose those in power prefer it that way, to have less interferance from the people.
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