Wow. The first serious world political post for more than a month and noone's interested. I guess we really are fangirl-centric here.
To somewhat rephrase the same question, issues such as gay rights and abortion and creationism, and to a lesser degree climate change (which all have fairly solid 'mainstream' following), seem unlikely to have any particularly large conversion rates, and though it seems reasonable that people will argue about them anyway, is the selection of issues which are forcefully argued artificially narrowed simply for the purposes of being more likely to be able to argue with any given lefty/righty? I seem to be discussing America mainly, here.
Sorry, don't follow.
Continuing on this theme, the neo-cons seem to advocate increased social control and increasing America's coefficient of global dominance as the solution to most problems (I've read enough to convince me of this, not enough to back it up). Does anyone not think they're fucking nutters? Is their policy smart even from a strictly selfish point of view?
It's the human condition. Conquer, colonise, collapse. The Romans, Greeks, English, Portugese, etc, etc all came and went. It'll happen to the US. It's a national thing that never succeeds but is always tried.
Would a reasonable knowledge of economics, global politics and history help me to become a better person? How?
Yes. It will aid your perspective, judgement and influence of others. Whether it improves your lot in life depends on how you use it.
Is fear an effective means of maintaining power in the long term? Is it good or necessary (I can accept it's effective in the short term) sometimes? It doesn't seem nice.
No.
As a politician, being cagey or deceptive seems effective, whereas being transparent would in theory be valuable (to 'the people'). Is this more or less the case?
Transparent politicians don't exist. The pre-selection process ensures that. In any case, transparency in our leaders may seem like a wonderful ideal but would never work in practice. There's always some amount of dealing, cheating, guessing that goes into the thing we call progress i.e. getting things done.
Is it possible to care much about events around the world without being involved in them? Is it good?
Yes and yes
Why is the matter of whether progress in Iraq is being made up to politicians and pundits to have an opinion on? Surely that's objectively measurable.
Some things can be measured, but every measurement will have various interpretations. For example, the current surge is producing more US casualties than ever before. Although an increase in casualties is not good, it doesn't follow that the surge isn't working and making Iraq a better place. (I suspect Iraq isn't a better place but that's just an unsubstantiated opinion)
Is there any chance that Rudd's actually got an opinion and is saving it until hopefully after he's elected? Are there any historical examples of this?
The most recent is JHo. Keating was on the nose with the elctorate, JHo knew that all he had to do was press a few negative buttons and lay low (i.e. don't release any major policies, but talk in fluffy, feel good generalities).
Is anyone going to do anything about Toshiba?
Yep. I refuse to buy one of their flat screens, if indeed they have any. Take that Toshiba
