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I would think the _latter_ serves more to clarify the former than the other way around. Generally that's the way it works. Surely, in a lifetime of communicat

by GHFigs 18y ago

I would think the _latter_ serves more to clarify the former than the other way around. Generally that's the way it works. Surely, in a lifetime of communication you have at one point or another misspoken or been misunderstood and had to clarify your meaning. Would it be fair for listeners to disregard your later statements entirely simply because they came later? Your casting a volunteer program as "forced labor" strongly indicates that you have a political opinion on what the interpretation _ought_ to be. It would be _convenient_ for you if that interpretation would be correct, but it would not be _accurate_. Not only is the latter in line with the plan (to require service in exchange for the tax credit) outlined well before the election, but it also has the advantage of actually making sense in context. Why would a page describing expansion of established volunteer services suddenly shift to mean mandatory service? And for students only? And then go right back to talking about voluntary services? It would make little sense to have the meaning of an entire page hinge on a single word in a middle paragraph, and even if it were an accurate representation of intent, the sentence itself is utterly bungled. Calling it obfuscation is senseless, too, given how freely the site expresses other plans that many find disagreeable. You want people to believe that the President-Elect is only willing to express major, substantial changes in policy via one word on one page of one site at one time, now past? Please.

yummyfajitas 18y ago
The latter version only tells you the goal. The former version told you the mechanism by which Obama will achieve this goal, namely force. That's information which has been removed. The new information in the latter version is that college students will be paid for their work. We will find out soon enough whether Obama really does support forced labor. I don't think it's an outlandish idea, however. Forced labor has quite a few supporters on the left (Rangel, Clark and McDermott, for instance http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:H.R.393 http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:H.R.393:). Anyway, this isn't really the place to discuss the merits of Obama's possible policy proposals. My point is this: at one time, change.gov advocated forced labor. The American people deserve to be able to easily look this up for themselves, and see what other changes were made.
- GHFigs 18y ago
  There are some who don't think it's outlandish that Obama might be a lizard person in disguise, and that where change.gov states that the new administration "will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55", that it is really advocating euthanasia and reprocessing into Soylent Green as a solution to both overpopulation and world hunger. Try as I might to propose alternative interpretations more in line with Obama's prior statements, they only see what they want to see. Whether you think it's an outlandish idea or not does not have any impact on whether it is actually true or whether the case you've made is actually reasonable. You're still insinuating that Obama advocates forced labor based on a redacted description of a program (the American Opportunity Tax Credit, by name) which was never before or ever since been described as mandatory, forced, or required. Implying that it bears resemblance to H.R.393 is an enormous stretch beyond the facts, as well, and the attempt at guilt-by-association is transparent. Rangel, Clark and McDermott are not Obama, representatives of Obama, or the authors of change.gov. Nor for that matter are any supporters of draft reinstatement who happen to not be Democrats. You say "this isn't really the place to discuss the merits of Obama's possible policy proposals", and yet that's exactly what you are doing and I am not. As I noted before, your political bias is obvious. You are clearly more concerned with associating Obama with the concept of forced labor than either ascertaining the correct interpretation of his stated plans or in encouraging others to draw their own conclusions based on the supposed "evidence". Though you feign doubt saying "We will find out soon enough whether Obama really does support forced labor.", that is little different from saying "We will find out soon enough whether Obama really has stopped beating his wife." You don't appear to be concerned with the answer so much calling it into question. In other fields this is known as "FUD". It does little good to advocate transparency for the sake of the American people when you do so by attempting to obscure matters even further.
  - yummyfajitas 18y ago
    I was originally responding to this: Some people will compulsively track every small change - and what this means is that the government will have to be extra careful before changing even a word. My point: there are important changes being made which deserve to be tracked. I provided an example of such a change. I also explained in another post (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=380300 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=380300) why I picked this example: by some ad-hoc means, I was able to dig up the original language. Also, your analogy is ridiculous. If early versions advocated euthanasia, and then it was changed to say "setting a goal to reduce the burden of old people on the social security system", I would be concerned. Unlike your euthanasia example, early versions of the website did unambiguously advocate forced labor. Here is a pdf copy: http://mensnewsdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/America_Serves_Change.pdf http://mensnewsdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/America_... By the way, your one man downmod squad is cute. Too bad this isn't reddit; plenty of people here like Obama (I used to myself), but we have few (if any) fanatical pro-Obama downmodders.

by GHFigs 18y ago

yummyfajitas 18y ago

The latter version only tells you the goal. The former version told you the mechanism by which Obama will achieve this goal, namely force. That's information which has been removed. The new information in the latter version is that college students will be paid for their work. We will find out soon enough whether Obama really does support forced labor. I don't think it's an outlandish idea, however. Forced labor has quite a few supporters on the left (Rangel, Clark and McDermott, for instance http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:H.R.393 http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:H.R.393:). Anyway, this isn't really the place to discuss the merits of Obama's possible policy proposals. My point is this: at one time, change.gov advocated forced labor. The American people deserve to be able to easily look this up for themselves, and see what other changes were made.

GHFigs 18y ago
There are some who don't think it's outlandish that Obama might be a lizard person in disguise, and that where change.gov states that the new administration "will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55", that it is really advocating euthanasia and reprocessing into Soylent Green as a solution to both overpopulation and world hunger. Try as I might to propose alternative interpretations more in line with Obama's prior statements, they only see what they want to see. Whether you think it's an outlandish idea or not does not have any impact on whether it is actually true or whether the case you've made is actually reasonable. You're still insinuating that Obama advocates forced labor based on a redacted description of a program (the American Opportunity Tax Credit, by name) which was never before or ever since been described as mandatory, forced, or required. Implying that it bears resemblance to H.R.393 is an enormous stretch beyond the facts, as well, and the attempt at guilt-by-association is transparent. Rangel, Clark and McDermott are not Obama, representatives of Obama, or the authors of change.gov. Nor for that matter are any supporters of draft reinstatement who happen to not be Democrats. You say "this isn't really the place to discuss the merits of Obama's possible policy proposals", and yet that's exactly what you are doing and I am not. As I noted before, your political bias is obvious. You are clearly more concerned with associating Obama with the concept of forced labor than either ascertaining the correct interpretation of his stated plans or in encouraging others to draw their own conclusions based on the supposed "evidence". Though you feign doubt saying "We will find out soon enough whether Obama really does support forced labor.", that is little different from saying "We will find out soon enough whether Obama really has stopped beating his wife." You don't appear to be concerned with the answer so much calling it into question. In other fields this is known as "FUD". It does little good to advocate transparency for the sake of the American people when you do so by attempting to obscure matters even further.
- yummyfajitas 18y ago
  I was originally responding to this: Some people will compulsively track every small change - and what this means is that the government will have to be extra careful before changing even a word. My point: there are important changes being made which deserve to be tracked. I provided an example of such a change. I also explained in another post (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=380300 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=380300) why I picked this example: by some ad-hoc means, I was able to dig up the original language. Also, your analogy is ridiculous. If early versions advocated euthanasia, and then it was changed to say "setting a goal to reduce the burden of old people on the social security system", I would be concerned. Unlike your euthanasia example, early versions of the website did unambiguously advocate forced labor. Here is a pdf copy: http://mensnewsdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/America_Serves_Change.pdf http://mensnewsdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/America_... By the way, your one man downmod squad is cute. Too bad this isn't reddit; plenty of people here like Obama (I used to myself), but we have few (if any) fanatical pro-Obama downmodders.