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Congratulations to the U.S. which just moved a little bit closer to joining the rest of the developed world in providing its citizens with a modicum of healthcare.

olympia wrote:Woe to the U.S. which just moved a little bit closer to joining the rest of the Communist world in stripping its citizens of the right to healthcare.

Fixed your post for ya!

***This message brought to you by Citizens Worried about Healthcare, a totally grass roots organization that isn't funded in any way by the Insurance Lobby***

Polonius wrote:

olympia wrote:Woe to the U.S. which just moved a little bit closer to joining the rest of the Communist world in stripping its citizens of the right to healthcare.

Fixed your post for ya!

***This message brought to you by Citizens Worried about Healthcare, a totally grass roots organization that isn't funded in any way by the Insurance Lobby***

Indeed. When healthcare was introduced in Ireland after WW2 there was much gnashing of teeth about how the country would turn communist. That was sixty years ago.

What is funny I almost posted this myself but you beat me to it.

Keep in mind that I am registered as a Republican, but I believe that the time has come when this is necessary. In fact, I'm going to break the party line completely and say that we MUST have a public healthcare option in reform.

Social Medicine is not something to be feared! FFS! What is this scaremongering based on? The standard of careprovided by the NHS is generally very good (for free, anyway) - they have saved my life twice. So the furnishings may not be as plush as american hospitals, big deal! There is no treatment you can recieve in the US that you can't recieve in the UK for free IIRC. Waiting lists? Ok, not ideal - but if you have an immediately life-threatening condition, you will be seen instantly (speaking from experience). NHS staff are unbelievably hard-working and caring, and it pisses me of when people believe the right-wing american propaganda about the NHS. Don't listen to Palin! She thinks 'Africa' is a country! Would you really trust her opinion on a complex issue such as health-care?
The stupidest thing is... you DO have a choice! You can go private in the UK (it's still cheaper than the USA...), Harley St has some of the finest doctors in the world and there are BUPA hospitals everywhere.
But no, better to believe that 'death-panel' crap.

Albatross wrote:Social Medicine is not something to be feared! FFS! What is this scaremongering based on? The standard of careprovided by the NHS is generally very good (for free, anyway) - they have saved my life twice. So the furnishings may not be as plush as american hospitals, big deal! There is no treatment you can recieve in the US that you can't recieve in the UK for free IIRC. Waiting lists? Ok, not ideal - but if you have an immediately life-threatening condition, you will be seen instantly (speaking from experience). NHS staff are unbelievably hard-working and caring, and it pisses me of when people believe the right-wing american propaganda about the NHS. Don't listen to Palin! She thinks 'Africa' is a country! Would you really trust her opinion on a complex issue such as health-care?
The stupidest thing is... you DO have a choice! You can go private in the UK (it's still cheaper than the USA...), Harley St has some of the finest doctors in the world and there are BUPA hospitals everywhere.
But no, better to believe that 'death-panel' crap.

I believe in we need public health care in the United States, and I don't think many people realize that having universal health care doesn't mean you can't have private insurance. But I don't believe you understand where Sara Palin is coming from. No, I don't agree with her, but I think you're dismissing her as an idiot, where in reality it is very obvious she has struck a chord with some people. I think people in this country need to ask why she's struck a chord with people.

Because the people she's struck a chord with are also idiots? Seriously, who says something like 'I will NEVER apologise for America' - that's Ultra-Nationalist. What about extraordinary rendition?, torture?, the killing of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan? If a British minister said something like that, they would be sacked within a week.
Sarah Palin is only taken even remotely seriously as a politician in the USA - outside she is a laughing stock.

Apparently in Washington all hell is breaking loose over this. There's still plenty of time for this to get killed, but healthcare reform wasn't supposed to get this far.

Keep in mind it barely passed, and will undoubtedly die in the Senate due to filibuster...

I wouldn't say that its a forgone conclusion, but it is likely.

Well considering Sen. Snowe has already said she will likely vote against it when it comes to the floor is a big nail in its coffin. Why she is suddenly switching is beyond me. I will continue to stand against it for the most important reason: we CAN'T afford it. Another $829 billion bill will be our own undoing. Its basic economics guys, you have got to admit this...

Edited for cost correction, I accidentally made it a lower cost...

JEB_Stuart wrote:Another $829 billion bill will be our own undoing. Its basic economics guys, you have got to admit this...

Its not really (I think we're still something like a trillion under our previous maximum GDP excess), and its not simply a matter of additions to the current budget. There's certainly a line of reasoning which promotes a kind of bait-and-switch; passing healthcare, and then cuts defense research under the onus of necessary budget cuts.

Could that be part of the administrations strategy though? Do they want to put as much pressure on the economy as possible, to have a reason to move out of Afghanistan later? Maybe I am am reaching here, but it sort of makes sense. Having a reason seemed to be Obamas platform from the get go, it seems like his support has run out of steam a bit though. If he makes one big change (if it is healthcare, and something "special" comes out of it for instance, aside the standard stuff that I would be outraged if it were to fail) he could pick that momentum up again, and make at least 3 more big changes, making him not only not GWbush-n-stuff, but a pretty heavy hitter.

Add all that up, and I really think that he would sweep the next election; perhaps finding a less friendly congress, but with a record which speaks for itself. Not a bad route, I must admit. Stability, plus some, is what I expect from Obama; and frankly, I would be surprised if he came out of this year empty handed.

All times of crisis are, after all, times of opportunity for those that can figure it out.

dogma wrote:Its not really (I think we're still something like a trillion under our previous maximum GDP excess), and its not simply a matter of additions to the current budget. There's certainly a line of reasoning which promotes a kind of bait-and-switch;

Well since the dollar is no longer the world's reserve currency, countries are hesitant to buy up our debt, and we can only pay for it through printing more money, I am gonna say it is not doable. It surely is unsustainable.

dogma wrote:passing healthcare, and then cuts defense research under the onus of necessary budget cuts.

Lets be realistic, that is not gonna happen, especially when we are involved in two wars.... And the dems have enough problems looming on the next election cycle, they don't need "cut the military's budget" to be another one.

Wrexasaur wrote:Could that be part of the administrations strategy though? Do they want to put as much pressure on the economy as possible, to have a reason to move out of Afghanistan later? Maybe I am am reaching here, but it sort of makes sense.

Interesting idea, but not likely. President Obama isn't so stupid as to waste millions of dollars in fuel and resources in getting 30,000 troops over there only to have to spend even more to bring them and the rest of our troops there back.

Albatross wrote:Social Medicine is not something to be feared! FFS! What is this scaremongering based on? The standard of careprovided by the NHS is generally very good (for free, anyway) - they have saved my life twice. So the furnishings may not be as plush as american hospitals, big deal! There is no treatment you can recieve in the US that you can't recieve in the UK for free IIRC. Waiting lists? Ok, not ideal - but if you have an immediately life-threatening condition, you will be seen instantly (speaking from experience). NHS staff are unbelievably hard-working and caring, and it pisses me of when people believe the right-wing american propaganda about the NHS. Don't listen to Palin! She thinks 'Africa' is a country! Would you really trust her opinion on a complex issue such as health-care?
The stupidest thing is... you DO have a choice! You can go private in the UK (it's still cheaper than the USA...), Harley St has some of the finest doctors in the world and there are BUPA hospitals everywhere.
But no, better to believe that 'death-panel' crap.

QFT.

I salute you sir.

JEB_Stuart wrote:Interesting idea, but not likely. President Obama isn't so gaudy as to waste millions of dollars in fuel and resources in getting 30,000 troops over there only to have to spend even more to bring them and the rest of our troops there back.

Fixed that for you.

If he decided that the information at hand, leaves him that option, I see no reason why he would not consider it at the very least. Now, I am not necessarily saying that they would directly plan in such a... well, strange way, just that Obama is a pretty crafty guy. Push a bit here, and pull a bit there, and as long as he delivers positive changes without dropping an insane jump in (wasted) taxes, he should start to even out a bit more in his ratings.

JEB_Stuart wrote:Well since the dollar is no longer the world's reserve currency, countries are hesitant to buy up our debt, and we can only pay for it through printing more money, I am gonna say it is not doable. It surely is unsustainable.

The dollar still makes up 64% of global reserve currency, so that's not a huge issue. Foreign nations are less willing to purchase US debt than they once were, but certainly not unwilling to do so.

Respectfully, sustainability is a word that should be taken out back and shot as it doesn't really speak to anything pertinent to the actual functionality of economics (which always confronts, on a philosophical level, its nature as a struggle against entropy). The assumption of debt is an investment in yourself. Now, it may not always be a wise investment (here we get into the differences between the US economy during the Big D, and now), but it isn't something that really factors into sustainability.

JEB_Stuart wrote:
Lets be realistic, that is not gonna happen, especially when we are involved in two wars.... And the dems have enough problems looming on the next election cycle, they don't need "cut the military's budget" to be another one.

Healthcare won't pass , if it passes, for at least another year. Any budgetary adjustment would come after the mid-term.

JEB_Stuart wrote:
Interesting idea, but not likely. President Obama isn't so stupid as to waste millions of dollars in fuel and resources in getting 30,000 troops over there only to have to spend even more to bring them and the rest of our troops there back.

More importantly, the theoretical timetable for a withdrawal from Afghanistan is pushing 3 years. It would be well into his next term before that plan would come to fruition.

Albatross wrote:Because the people she's struck a chord with are also idiots? Seriously, who says something like 'I will NEVER apologise for America' - that's Ultra-Nationalist. What about extraordinary rendition?, torture?, the killing of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan? If a British minister said something like that, they would be sacked within a week.
Sarah Palin is only taken even remotely seriously as a politician in the USA - outside she is a laughing stock.

I think you've hit the nail on the head, but not for the reason you intended. Do you call everyone who disagrees with you an idiot? Do you think that is a pretty lousy way to change people's opinion, that is, buy insulting their intelligence. That is the reason people are voting the way they do, I think. You might consider these people idiots, but they're smart enough to know when someone is making sport of them. How do you think that feels? Do you not think an attitude like that would cause people to band together rather than come to your way of thinking?

JEB_Stuart wrote:Well considering Sen. Snowe has already said she will likely vote against it when it comes to the floor is a big nail in its coffin. Why she is suddenly switching is beyond me. I will continue to stand against it for the most important reason: we CAN'T afford it. Another $829 billion bill will be our own undoing. Its basic economics guys, you have got to admit this...

The $800 billion figure is very misleading, as that's the total expenditure in the bill over ten years. More importantly, it doesn't account for revenue brought in - and latest estimates from the congressional budget office see the billls effect as a net saving of around $80 billion over the next ten years.

Grignard wrote:I think you've hit the nail on the head, but not for the reason you intended. Do you call everyone who disagrees with you an idiot? Do you think that is a pretty lousy way to change people's opinion, that is, buy insulting their intelligence. That is the reason people are voting the way they do, I think. You might consider these people idiots, but they're smart enough to know when someone is making sport of them. How do you think that feels? Do you not think an attitude like that would cause people to band together rather than come to your way of thinking?

I totally disagree with you, and yes... in this life, there are most definitely morons... just to be clear.

The reason that people vote the way they do is because of many things. Primarily most people vote with their emotions, or their "gut", which could be a six-pack, or a kegger. Sarah Palin is not the kind of politician I want to see on the game field, and I have absolutely no qualms with what Albatross said. That little Palin cult can go ahead and sulk in the corner, while all the angry libs throw veggies for all I care... welcome to the world of politics, not the land of candy and lollipops.

In my view Sarah Palin is a kind of female version of George W Bush.

She doesn't have too much upstairs, but that doesn't matter because she is sound on the the important issues (sex before marriage and so on) and will be able to be guided by her advisors once in office.

Kilkrazy wrote:In my view Sarah Palin is a kind of female version of George W Bush.

Dear lord Kilrazy... what have you created.

Wrexasaur wrote:

Grignard wrote:I think you've hit the nail on the head, but not for the reason you intended. Do you call everyone who disagrees with you an idiot? Do you think that is a pretty lousy way to change people's opinion, that is, buy insulting their intelligence. That is the reason people are voting the way they do, I think. You might consider these people idiots, but they're smart enough to know when someone is making sport of them. How do you think that feels? Do you not think an attitude like that would cause people to band together rather than come to your way of thinking?

I totally disagree with you, and yes... in this life, there are most definitely morons... just to be clear.

The reason that people vote the way they do is because of many things. Primarily most people vote with their emotions, or their "gut", which could be a six-pack, or a kegger. Sarah Palin is not the kind of politician I want to see on the game field, and I have absolutely no qualms with what Albatross said. That little Palin cult can go ahead and sulk in the corner, while all the angry libs throw veggies for all I care... welcome to the world of politics, not the land of candy and lollipops.

No, I disagree strongly with that. I see no rational reason to adopt that kind of stance when you disagree with someone. Is the point of political discourse not to try to sway people to your belief? I know if someone comes at me like that, I'm not going to be inspired to see their point of view.

I believe that this sort of antagonism is the reason things have gotten so nasty lately. What at all is wrong with stating your opinion in a calm and persuasive manner

I am not sure where to go with this really. At what point is the political discourse in the U.S. supposed to be based on taking into account every whacky opinion in the entire spectrum.

By your logic I should try to convince truthers that they are in fact not delusional, but necessary to providing positive change in this country. I could care less that Alex Jones exists, but for diggity damn sure he needs to be pelted every once in a while with some rotting fruit.

Sarah Palin is as Sarah Palin does, and after all who knows more about Russia than Sarah Palin, palin... noooo they be stealin' my bucket.

Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin.




The horror indeed...

Wrexasaur wrote:I am not sure where to go with this really. At what point is the political discourse in the U.S. supposed to be based on taking into account every whacky opinion in the entire spectrum.

By your logic I should try to convince truthers that they are in fact not delusional, but necessary to providing positive change in this country. I could care less that Alex Jones exists, but for diggity damn sure he needs to be pelted every once in a while with some rotting fruit.

Sarah Palin is as Sarah Palin does, and after all who knows more about Russia than Sarah Palin, palin... noooo they be stealin' my bucket.

Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin.


The horror indeed...

No, I'm not suggesting that you agree with every opinion that is presented to you, or even require you not to think it is foolish. I certainly don't agree with many or even most things Sara Palin says, but I am capable of expressing myself as a mature adult. I think you're losing sight of the whole point of expressing opinions, namely, to explain why you believe you are correct.

There is no reason you can't explain your position calmly to "fringe" groups, the same way you would to more "centrist" individuals.

There is also no reason for me to even delve into conversation with truthers either.

What opinions has Sarah Palin expressed that particularly showed her political prowess? Lack of experience, lack of oratory ability, silly anecdotes at every turn... and that makes her a politician to be listened to?

I really do not want another Bush in our acceptable boundaries of what imho, is needed to keep things in a reasonable direction. Even John McCain basically regretted having her as a running partner, she is a talking head, in a sea of more effective talking heads.

Her politics (some of them at least) are no more or less important than anyone else who shares her more reasonable views. She is in a nutshell, a celebrity politician, that I would not be surprised (relieved more likely) if she were to drop off the face of recognition before the next election.

Grignard wrote:There is no reason you can't explain your position calmly to "fringe" groups, the same way you would to more "centrist" individuals.

Again, there is no reason for me to attempt to wrangle a rabid gorilla into a rational conversation. It is this, and only this at all times... be aware, be very aware. .

Standing behind a statue only gets you so far, and I hardly support any politicians anymore, and that has nothing to do with their fantastic rhetoric.

Wrexasaur wrote:There is also no reason for me to even delve into conversation with truthers either.

What opinions has Sarah Palin expressed that particularly showed her political prowess? Lack of experience, lack of oratory ability, silly anecdotes at every turn... and that makes her a politician to be listened to?

I really do not want another Bush in our acceptable boundaries of what imho, is needed to keep things in a reasonable direction. Even John McCain basically regretted having her as a running partner, she is a talking head, in a sea of more effective talking heads.

Her politics (some of them at least) are no more or less important than anyone else who shares her more reasonable views. She is in a nutshell, a celebrity politician, that I would not be surprised (relieved more likely) if she were to drop off the face of recognition before the next election.

Grignard wrote:There is no reason you can't explain your position calmly to "fringe" groups, the same way you would to more "centrist" individuals.

Again, there is no reason for me to attempt to wrangle a rabid gorilla into a rational conversation. It is this, and only this at all times... be aware, be very aware. .

I'm not saying that governor Palin has expressed anything worthwhile at all; I don't think that I mentioned that anywhere in my post.
In fact, I recall the thread being about healthcare reform. Someone else chose to bring Palin into the conversation.

No, there is nothing forcing you to wrangle anyone in to conversation. But I just don't think it is necessary to call people idiots and morons because of a political belief.

This is why it pays to avoid talking about religion and politics.

People take this whole thing very seriously, and tbth, dragging Palin into this, was little more than a move to force an emotion out of people.

At a certain point, a line is already in the sand, and I don't recall calling you an idiot, I just said that there are idiots out there. If you support Palin, that is fantastic, but saying that Albatross is stating more than slightly hyperbolic common knowledge is just silly. Have you seen her supporters interviewed? Fancy cutting or no, Republican or no, I simply cannot imagine everyone having a good laugh at some of Sarah Palins soundbites.

Wrexasaur wrote:People take this whole thing very seriously, and tbth, dragging Palin into this, was little more than a move to force an emotion out of people.

At a certain point, a line is already in the sand, and I don't recall calling you an idiot, I just said that there are idiots out there. If you support Palin, that is fantastic, but saying that Albatross is stating more than slightly hyperbolic common knowledge is just silly. Have you seen her supporters interviewed? Fancy cutting or no, Republican or no, I simply cannot imagine everyone having a good laugh at some of Sarah Palins soundbites.

No....I'm not a Palin supporter, as you should have read in my previous posts. What I don't like is when someone says that someone I know personally and care about, who I happen to disagree with, is an idiot because of their political affiliations. I think the problem with this country right now is how people dehumanize people who they disagree on a political point with. People who strongly disagree with someone have a nasty tendency to look at the "other side" as an enemy to be humiliated and marginalized, when if those same people met in other circumstances, most of them would treat one another with respect.

I think once you start looking at people as "the opposition" instead of human beings whom you disagree with, that is the first step on the road to killing abortionists or bombing logging companies.

Isn't that the way politics in the USA has been moving for a long time?

Attack ads on TV and so on?