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On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams.
It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse.
The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program.
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People have ridiculous expectations of presidents... I think Obama did a fine job (would have been good except for a few things), I think Romney would also do a fine job.
We're not bringing in a miracle-worker here, we're bringing in a commander in chief. And Obama, GWB, and Clinton have all done much better jobs than any of us "pundits" could hope to do.
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On April 19 2012 21:39 FairForever wrote:
People have ridiculous expectations of presidents... I think Obama did a fine job (would have been good except for a few things), I think Romney would also do a fine job.
We're not bringing in a miracle-worker here, we're bringing in a commander in chief. And Obama, GWB, and Clinton have all done much better jobs than any of us "pundits" could hope to do.
True on all counts, although Romney would need to stop being beholden to the crazies in his party.
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On April 19 2012 21:38 Vega62a wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse. The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program.
I'm not familiar with that attempt by Republicans - credible news site support? I'm curious.
I think people always see things in two ways. An opposing view (not one I necessarily share, but I do respect) would be that public schools are ridiculously inefficient and not producing talent right now, so some kind of reform is needed.
It's always easy to take a biased opinion (which, if you were to admit, you do have a very biased opinion in favour of Democrats). And it's not necessarily wrong. But I think there's always an opposing side - contrary to popular belief, a majority of decisions are made with the constituents in mind.
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On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:31 neversummer wrote:
Mormonism a non-issue? Not a chance. Are you serious? I don't agree with Mormonism but as long as it doesn't affect his ability to govern and make decisions (hint: it doesn't) why the hell do I care?
Kennedy faced criticism for being a non-protestant in the 60's. Certainly times have changed, but Mormonism is far more radical than Catholocism. You may not care which religion Romney chooses to affiliate himself with (and nor do I), but to assume religion holds no bearing on a man's decision-making and rationale is illogical.
Religion aside, he is unfit for the presidency regardless.
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On April 19 2012 21:41 FairForever wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:38 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse. The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program. I'm not familiar with that attempt by Republicans - credible news site support? I'm curious. I think people always see things in two ways. An opposing view (not one I necessarily share, but I do respect) would be that public schools are ridiculously inefficient and not producing talent right now, so some kind of reform is needed. It's always easy to take a biased opinion (which, if you were to admit, you do have a very biased opinion in favour of Democrats). And it's not necessarily wrong. But I think there's always an opposing side - contrary to popular belief, a majority of decisions are made with the constituents in mind.
I agree - nobody makes decisions out of malice. They genuinely think they're doing what's right. The issue is that they frequently blatantly ignore the needs of people they've chosen to marginalize. In the case of the Republicans, they have intentionally marginalized the destitute. Since I am very close to a lot of people in that position, that infuriates me. It's not bias so much as where my priorities lie - Republicans' lie with shrinking the size of government, which will, they theorize, help everybody ten years down the road. Mine lie with helping people who will die in a month if they don't get their food stamps, which high level Republican contenders have attacked.
As for voucher programs, here's a general premier on the topic
Here's the Republican Party Platform for the state of Minnesota - page 5 for education.
While their platform doesn't expressly mention cutting funding for public schools, since they also oppose increasing property taxes (education's main source of revenue) and don't state that money for school vouchers comes from anywhere else, we can assume it comes out of the public education system. The general notion seems to be that Republicans want to shift the public burden of education to the private sector as much as possible, which is, frankly, an absurd platform that tends to hold with many national-level GOP stances.
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What the hell is with "Willard" Romney? At least use the name he goes by.
There's a 90% chance I'm voting for Obama. He and Romney have virtually the same position on almost every issue, though, so it's a lesser of two evils type thing.
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On April 19 2012 21:47 neversummer wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:31 neversummer wrote:
Mormonism a non-issue? Not a chance. Are you serious? I don't agree with Mormonism but as long as it doesn't affect his ability to govern and make decisions (hint: it doesn't) why the hell do I care? Kennedy faced criticism for being a non-protestant in the 60's. Certainly times have changed, but Mormonism is far more radical than Catholocism. You may not care which religion Romney chooses to affiliate himself with (and nor do I), but to assume religion holds no bearing on a man's decision-making and rationale is illogical. Religion aside, he is unfit for the presidency regardless.
What radical decisions do you think he has made as Governor of Mass. from being a Mormon?
I think he is very fit to be president - he brings a wealth of experience that would be very beneficial as commander in chief. Even if he "failed" (which I don't think he did, but it's apparently an opinion that Democrats have), it's experience that can be used to improve the next go-around. Failures in the startup world are considered a huge asset - I'd rather support someone who has failed 3 times than someone who has never tried at all.
That being said I also think Obama is fit for the presidency. I think both would do a great job, both have their strengths and weaknesses which will be displayed in public for the next few months.
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On April 19 2012 21:48 Vega62a wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:41 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:38 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse. The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program. I'm not familiar with that attempt by Republicans - credible news site support? I'm curious. I think people always see things in two ways. An opposing view (not one I necessarily share, but I do respect) would be that public schools are ridiculously inefficient and not producing talent right now, so some kind of reform is needed. It's always easy to take a biased opinion (which, if you were to admit, you do have a very biased opinion in favour of Democrats). And it's not necessarily wrong. But I think there's always an opposing side - contrary to popular belief, a majority of decisions are made with the constituents in mind. I agree - nobody makes decisions out of malice. They genuinely think they're doing what's right. The issue is that they frequently blatantly ignore the needs of people they've chosen to marginalize. In the case of the Republicans, they have intentionally marginalized the destitute. Since I am very close to a lot of people in that position, that infuriates me. It's not bias so much as where my priorities lie - Republicans' lie with shrinking the size of government, which will, they theorize, help everybody ten years down the road. Mine lie with helping people who will die in a month if they don't get their food stamps. As for voucher programs, here's a general premier on the topicHere's the Republican Party Platform for the state of Minnesota - page 5 for education. While their platform doesn't expressly mention cutting funding for public schools, since they also oppose increasing property taxes (education's main source of revenue) and don't state that money for school vouchers comes from anywhere else, we can assume it comes out of the public education system. The general notion seems to be that Republicans want to shift the public burden of education to the private sector as much as possible, which is, frankly, an absurd platform that tends to hold with many national-level GOP stances.
I think that's a bit exaggerated.
My personal opinion (but again, this isn't about me) is that anyone who has the ability to get a job should - the welfare program should be limited to those who are disabled. I personally believe that instead of simply giving money to the poor, the government should subsidize businesses that hire minimum-wage individuals for at least a year on some sliding scale calculation (not important right now) - the point is that instead of receiving $X for free from the gov't, the individual does have to work, but that significant incentives are put into place for the business to hire the individual (such as subsidizing up to 75% of the employment costs of the individual).
I think both Democrats and Republican congresses have pandered to their bases - Republicans do tend to focus more on the middle class/wealth while Democrats focus more on the less fortunate/middle class, but I don't think either actually hopes for the demise of another group.
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On April 19 2012 21:31 neversummer wrote:
Mormonism a non-issue? Not a chance.
It's not like he's Muslim or atheist or anything. He might as well be a token Christian. Mormonism really won't be a factor, considering Obama is always the one accused of being everything but a proper Christian.
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On April 19 2012 21:56 FairForever wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:48 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:41 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:38 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse. The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program. I'm not familiar with that attempt by Republicans - credible news site support? I'm curious. I think people always see things in two ways. An opposing view (not one I necessarily share, but I do respect) would be that public schools are ridiculously inefficient and not producing talent right now, so some kind of reform is needed. It's always easy to take a biased opinion (which, if you were to admit, you do have a very biased opinion in favour of Democrats). And it's not necessarily wrong. But I think there's always an opposing side - contrary to popular belief, a majority of decisions are made with the constituents in mind. I agree - nobody makes decisions out of malice. They genuinely think they're doing what's right. The issue is that they frequently blatantly ignore the needs of people they've chosen to marginalize. In the case of the Republicans, they have intentionally marginalized the destitute. Since I am very close to a lot of people in that position, that infuriates me. It's not bias so much as where my priorities lie - Republicans' lie with shrinking the size of government, which will, they theorize, help everybody ten years down the road. Mine lie with helping people who will die in a month if they don't get their food stamps. As for voucher programs, here's a general premier on the topicHere's the Republican Party Platform for the state of Minnesota - page 5 for education. While their platform doesn't expressly mention cutting funding for public schools, since they also oppose increasing property taxes (education's main source of revenue) and don't state that money for school vouchers comes from anywhere else, we can assume it comes out of the public education system. The general notion seems to be that Republicans want to shift the public burden of education to the private sector as much as possible, which is, frankly, an absurd platform that tends to hold with many national-level GOP stances. I think that's a bit exaggerated. My personal opinion (but again, this isn't about me) is that anyone who has the ability to get a job should - the welfare program should be limited to those who are disabled. I personally believe that instead of simply giving money to the poor, the government should subsidize businesses that hire minimum-wage individuals for at least a year on some sliding scale calculation (not important right now) - the point is that instead of receiving $X for free from the gov't, the individual does have to work, but that significant incentives are put into place for the business to hire the individual (such as subsidizing up to 75% of the employment costs of the individual). I think both Democrats and Republican congresses have pandered to their bases - Republicans do tend to focus more on the middle class/wealth while Democrats focus more on the less fortunate/middle class, but I don't think either actually hopes for the demise of another group.
Unfortunately, it's not as exaggerated as it sounds. Republican rhetoric has been soundly in favor of "poor people are just people who refuse to work."
I would love to see your suggestion implemented. For that matter, I would love to see government hire people themselves to perform public works projects as was done in the New Deal. Work is always better than simply receiving a check - it's better for human dignity, and it gives the person something to put on their resume. (It is absurdly hard to find a job after being unemployed for more than 6 months in a row.) The issue is that Republicans don't go that far in their rhetoric. They stop at "people should work," and have even put forth the notion of work requirements for food stamps and medicare. (2/3 of the way down, roughly.) If you put forth a work requirement (or even allow such a thing, as the Republican proposal would do) you must necessarily include job placement services, so that people who are willing to work can do so. If you simply say to somebody "find a job, and if you can't, you're off welfare," that is marginalization of people who have been fruitlessly searching for months or years.
I don't think I'm exaggerating.
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On April 19 2012 22:02 Vega62a wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:56 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:48 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:41 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:38 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse. The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program. I'm not familiar with that attempt by Republicans - credible news site support? I'm curious. I think people always see things in two ways. An opposing view (not one I necessarily share, but I do respect) would be that public schools are ridiculously inefficient and not producing talent right now, so some kind of reform is needed. It's always easy to take a biased opinion (which, if you were to admit, you do have a very biased opinion in favour of Democrats). And it's not necessarily wrong. But I think there's always an opposing side - contrary to popular belief, a majority of decisions are made with the constituents in mind. I agree - nobody makes decisions out of malice. They genuinely think they're doing what's right. The issue is that they frequently blatantly ignore the needs of people they've chosen to marginalize. In the case of the Republicans, they have intentionally marginalized the destitute. Since I am very close to a lot of people in that position, that infuriates me. It's not bias so much as where my priorities lie - Republicans' lie with shrinking the size of government, which will, they theorize, help everybody ten years down the road. Mine lie with helping people who will die in a month if they don't get their food stamps. As for voucher programs, here's a general premier on the topicHere's the Republican Party Platform for the state of Minnesota - page 5 for education. While their platform doesn't expressly mention cutting funding for public schools, since they also oppose increasing property taxes (education's main source of revenue) and don't state that money for school vouchers comes from anywhere else, we can assume it comes out of the public education system. The general notion seems to be that Republicans want to shift the public burden of education to the private sector as much as possible, which is, frankly, an absurd platform that tends to hold with many national-level GOP stances. I think that's a bit exaggerated. My personal opinion (but again, this isn't about me) is that anyone who has the ability to get a job should - the welfare program should be limited to those who are disabled. I personally believe that instead of simply giving money to the poor, the government should subsidize businesses that hire minimum-wage individuals for at least a year on some sliding scale calculation (not important right now) - the point is that instead of receiving $X for free from the gov't, the individual does have to work, but that significant incentives are put into place for the business to hire the individual (such as subsidizing up to 75% of the employment costs of the individual). I think both Democrats and Republican congresses have pandered to their bases - Republicans do tend to focus more on the middle class/wealth while Democrats focus more on the less fortunate/middle class, but I don't think either actually hopes for the demise of another group. Unfortunately, it's not as exaggerated as it sounds. Republican rhetoric has been soundly in favor of "poor people are just people who refuse to work."
And Democrat rhetoric has been soundly in favor of "rich people are just people who take advantage of the poor."
It goes both ways, and both are somewhat wrong and somewhat right (there are rich people who take advantage of the poor, and there are poor people who refuse to work and take advantage of the welfare system), but do not represent the majority.
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On April 19 2012 22:05 FairForever wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 22:02 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:56 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:48 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:41 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:38 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote:On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote:On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote:
What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. It is a little biased, but in fairness, their track record ain't good. Republicans tried to enact public education reform in my home state (MN) which was essentially "Give the lucky ones private school vouchers and cut a bunch of money from the public schools," of which the result would have been some lucky kids getting a good education and public schools falling apart even worse. The issue is that we don't need to curb entitlements, we need to control their costs. Many countries, for example, (err, all of them) have a health care entitlement program which is cheap and efficient. Republicans traditionally being the party of business would have much useful input on how to actually bring down costs, and would have much to contribute to a real discussion. But every Republican effort to bring down costs of entitlements has amounted to brute-force cuts, rather then intelligent streamlining, which only hurts the very poor. (Which, by the by, costs us more in the long run.) So you can't really call it a serious effort, nor one which would actually bring down costs, except in the short term, when measured by that one program. I'm not familiar with that attempt by Republicans - credible news site support? I'm curious. I think people always see things in two ways. An opposing view (not one I necessarily share, but I do respect) would be that public schools are ridiculously inefficient and not producing talent right now, so some kind of reform is needed. It's always easy to take a biased opinion (which, if you were to admit, you do have a very biased opinion in favour of Democrats). And it's not necessarily wrong. But I think there's always an opposing side - contrary to popular belief, a majority of decisions are made with the constituents in mind. I agree - nobody makes decisions out of malice. They genuinely think they're doing what's right. The issue is that they frequently blatantly ignore the needs of people they've chosen to marginalize. In the case of the Republicans, they have intentionally marginalized the destitute. Since I am very close to a lot of people in that position, that infuriates me. It's not bias so much as where my priorities lie - Republicans' lie with shrinking the size of government, which will, they theorize, help everybody ten years down the road. Mine lie with helping people who will die in a month if they don't get their food stamps. As for voucher programs, here's a general premier on the topicHere's the Republican Party Platform for the state of Minnesota - page 5 for education. While their platform doesn't expressly mention cutting funding for public schools, since they also oppose increasing property taxes (education's main source of revenue) and don't state that money for school vouchers comes from anywhere else, we can assume it comes out of the public education system. The general notion seems to be that Republicans want to shift the public burden of education to the private sector as much as possible, which is, frankly, an absurd platform that tends to hold with many national-level GOP stances. I think that's a bit exaggerated. My personal opinion (but again, this isn't about me) is that anyone who has the ability to get a job should - the welfare program should be limited to those who are disabled. I personally believe that instead of simply giving money to the poor, the government should subsidize businesses that hire minimum-wage individuals for at least a year on some sliding scale calculation (not important right now) - the point is that instead of receiving $X for free from the gov't, the individual does have to work, but that significant incentives are put into place for the business to hire the individual (such as subsidizing up to 75% of the employment costs of the individual). I think both Democrats and Republican congresses have pandered to their bases - Republicans do tend to focus more on the middle class/wealth while Democrats focus more on the less fortunate/middle class, but I don't think either actually hopes for the demise of another group. Unfortunately, it's not as exaggerated as it sounds. Republican rhetoric has been soundly in favor of "poor people are just people who refuse to work." And Democrat rhetoric has been soundly in favor of "rich people are just people who take advantage of the poor." It goes both ways, and both are somewhat wrong and somewhat right (there are rich people who take advantage of the poor, and there are poor people who refuse to work and take advantage of the welfare system), but do not represent the majority.
The difference is, when rich people are painted as those who simply take advantage of the poor, some rich people get slightly less rich. When poor people are painted as those who take advantage of the welfare system, a bunch of people living on food stamps lose their food stamps. I recognize the philosophical equality you're going for, but there's no practical way to equate those two things.
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Based simply on the two issues of the ongoing war in Afghanistan (+ rhetoric suggesting the high probability of future deployment to other areas of conflict) and unbridled spending on defense in lieu of social programs (particularly education and health care) there is no way that I can vote for any member of the republican party (although they did manage to weed all of the fringe candidates out).
The few things Obama has accomplished have been mostly positive and he seems to finally realize the legislative republicans have no interest reciprocating to his bi-partisan approach. We have seen that unregulated speculation by investors left to itself will lead not to a free market, but to corruption with the inevitability of economic collapse. We do not need more regulation, but more oversight to ensure that fair and free trade make the backbone of our society. The economy is still fragile, but I think it is much better off than it would have been had McCain been elected.
Romney himself actually has some pretty good ideas, but as we have seen in the past, an elected republican president will be controlled by the party agenda, which is to do as little as possible while throwing out scrap legislation to appease the majority when things don't work out. It will take a lot of positive legislation for me to even consider voting for a republican and I don't see it happening any time soon.
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On April 19 2012 21:53 FairForever wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2012 21:47 neversummer wrote:On April 19 2012 21:34 FairForever wrote:On April 19 2012 21:31 neversummer wrote:
Mormonism a non-issue? Not a chance. Are you serious? I don't agree with Mormonism but as long as it doesn't affect his ability to govern and make decisions (hint: it doesn't) why the hell do I care? Kennedy faced criticism for being a non-protestant in the 60's. Certainly times have changed, but Mormonism is far more radical than Catholocism. You may not care which religion Romney chooses to affiliate himself with (and nor do I), but to assume religion holds no bearing on a man's decision-making and rationale is illogical. Religion aside, he is unfit for the presidency regardless. What radical decisions do you think he has made as Governor of Mass. from being a Mormon? I think he is very fit to be president - he brings a wealth of experience that would be very beneficial as commander in chief. Even if he "failed" (which I don't think he did, but it's apparently an opinion that Democrats have), it's experience that can be used to improve the next go-around. Failures in the startup world are considered a huge asset - I'd rather support someone who has failed 3 times than someone who has never tried at all. That being said I also think Obama is fit for the presidency. I think both would do a great job, both have their strengths and weaknesses which will be displayed in public for the next few months.
None. The man doesn't have the conviction or the capability to make decisions himself. He simply appeals to whichever demographic is applicable to the upcoming election, then reverses his platforms and ideologies when it is favorable to him and in order to appeal to a new demographic.
I never said Mormonism guides Romney's thought. I said it is a concern in the upcoming election (hint: it is).
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http://www.examiner.com
is obama ineligible? well his own lawyers say his certificate (the one that was released last year) is fake, so it is not allowed as evidence in court...
make of it what you will
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GRAND OLD AMERICA16375 Posts
On April 19 2012 22:15 QuXn wrote:http://www.examiner.comis obama ineligible? well his own lawyers say his certificate (the one that was released last year) is fake, so it is not allowed as evidence in court... make of it what you will
To be president, you have to be born in America. If that article is true, then Obama is invalid and thus the last 4 years of his policys would have to be reverted.
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On April 19 2012 22:15 QuXn wrote:http://www.examiner.comis obama ineligible? well his own lawyers say his certificate (the one that was released last year) is fake, so it is not allowed as evidence in court... make of it what you will
you're retarded.
User was warned for this post
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I'd like to preface this rant by saying right now that I'm voting for Romney. The only reason I can imagine that the TL poll is so skewed in Obama's favor is because of all the European leftists voting for him. The reality is that most Americans are fed up with Obama's inactivity in office (seriously what has he done?). He got a Nobel peace prize for...... doing nothing.
He wants to try to violate the U.S. constitution by forcing people to buy healthcare, which, in my opinion, is absolutely criminal.
His approval rating is going up right now because the economy is slowly improving and because "he" killed Osama Bin Laden.
Obama's entire presidency has been a joke and it's time to end it before the punch line.
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On April 19 2012 22:15 QuXn wrote:http://www.examiner.comis obama ineligible? well his own lawyers say his certificate (the one that was released last year) is fake, so it is not allowed as evidence in court... make of it what you will
No. This is just another attempt by crazed conspiracy theorists to try prove that Obama wasn't born in the U.S. He was, this is a non-issue, and it's a shame it hasn't been put to rest yet.
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EPT
