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Well, I’ve managed to successfully avoid getting into conversations about politics online for quite a while now, and have found it quite refreshing. I’ve also steered clear of them in person for the most part, with some brief exceptions.

One of the exceptions occurred tonight, and while (I felt) it was civil and respectful all around, it did serve as a gentle reminder of why I have decided to avoid them as a general rule.

The main reason is that they are rarely beneficial to anyone involved. I don’t know if that’s due to a failure in my ability to communicate, a lack of open-mindedness of one or more parties involved (including myself), just the nature of the subject, or all of the above.

When it comes to politics, there are a variety of complex issues that go into the decision to vote for a particular candidate (for example). Unfortunately, (in my experience at least) conversations about politics are usually not held around the broad base of that information, but focused on individual issues that are likely to be controversial and / or easy to attack.

It might be interesting to explore approaching these conversations with the angle of finding the things that we agree on, but I’m not exactly sure how that might go either. In the end I think it might be best just to acknowledge the differences and focus on things that are either more important or less divisive (or even both).

I think it would also be wise to keep in mind that (in contrast to the way political media likes to line things up), people often don’t agree on every single issue with the particular party or candidate that they are backing, and probably shouldn’t. If we find ourselves in such a position of unwavering allegiance, I’d suggest it’s probably time to question our own filters that we may have placed on our understanding and ability to look at things from multiple points of view.

For you guys who were involved in the conversation tonight, (since most of you will probably read this), I would clarify that my desire to refrain from these conversations shouldn’t reflect negatively on you or on my opinions of your views or how you presented them. I think it’s safe to say that we respect each other’s intelligence, that we realize that different people have different theories on (among other things) how government should work, and that it’s OK to disagree about them.

Personally, I’d just prefer to not get into it in the future and focus on other subjects that would either be more beneficial or at least more entertaining. Life is too short to waste it arguing. While the history of the comments here on this blog (at least as it was in the past) stands as evidence that I haven’t always heeded that advice, I hope to change that going forward as much as I possibly can.

WASHINGTON (AP) — As Congress debates new rules for government eavesdropping, a top intelligence official says it is time that people in the United States change their definition of privacy.

Donald Kerr, principal deputy director of national intelligence, wants Americans to redefine privacy. Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguard people’s private communications and financial information.Kerr’s comments come as Congress is taking a second look at the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Lawmakers hastily changed the 1978 law last summer to allow the government to eavesdrop inside the United States without court permission, so long as one end of the conversation was reasonably believed to be located outside the U.S.

The original law required a court order for any surveillance conducted on U.S. soil in order to protect Americans’ privacy. The White House argued that the law was obstructing intelligence gathering because, as technology has changed, a growing amount of foreign communications passes through U.S.-based channels.

The most contentious issue in the new legislation is whether to shield telecommunications companies from civil lawsuits for allegedly giving the government access to people’s private e-mails and phone calls without a FISA court order between 2001 and 2007.

In other words, “we’re not spying on you, because we’ve changed the definition of what constitutes spying”. Next up: “redefining” torture, invasion and occupation, and patriotism.

But, on the bright side, congress keeps telecoms on the hook for illegal spying:

Full House and Senate Judiciary Committee Each Pass Bills with No Amnesty for Warrantless Surveillance

Washington, D.C. - Both the full House of Representatives and the Senate Judiciary Committee voted Thursday to keep telecommunications companies on the hook for their role in illegal government spying on millions of ordinary Americans — at least for now.

Senate Begins Real Push on Habeas Corpus - from The Nation

Today the Senate Judiciary Committee passed an important bill to restore habeas corpus, the sacrosanct Constitutional right to challenge government detention in court, by a vote of eleven to eight.

Habeas corpus was revoked by last year’s Military Commissions Act, which has been assailed as unconstitutional and un-American by leaders across the political spectrum. Today’s habeas bill was backed by the Judiciary Committee’s Democratic Chairman, Patrick Leahy, and its Republican Ranking Member, Arlen Specter. “The drive to restore this fundamental right has come from both sides of the aisle,” said Sharon Bradford, an attorney at the bipartisan Constitution Project, in response to today’s vote. “Restoring America’s commitment to the rule of law is not a partisan cause; it is a patriotic one,” she added.

With the recent comments made by Barack Obama regarding considering running in the 2008 race, and the constant speculation about Hillary Clinton running and Rice on the Republican side possibly being interested at some point, it makes me consider an interesting (and very unfortunate) question.

It’s my opinion that American society has unfortunately not progressed to the level that the sex or race of a presidential candidate would not be a factor (and a negative one, at that, if they are anything other than an old white guy).

I guess the real questions (assuming you’d acknowledge / agree that some segments of the American population would never vote for a woman or a non-white man in a presidential election) are what should the party (Democrats, in this case) do in light of that? Should they play it safe and not endorse these as their leading candidates, since they would be guaranteeing themselves lost votes, or should they be brave and promote the most qualified candidate, even if they happen to fit into one of these categories?