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Love it or hate it......Obama is in

ElasticNinja said:
Whatever about your biases against the VA system, I AM NOT ON ABOUT GOVERNMENT RUN HEALTHCARE.

All I said is that medicaid/care is currently more efficient than the pure free market alternative. I think they are shitty systems but the point stands.

You constantly fail to read what I say in my posts. I never mentioned veterans hospitals or whatever (which IMO are a completely ridiculous concept in the first place, but whatever).
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and thats just simply not true

medicaid and medicare spend more money for less care than the free market alternatives and unlike the free market alternatives who are profiting.. both programs would be bankrupt if not for the unlimited funding they get from govt
 
Ok, too much to respond to, I'll just make a few points.

1-The democrats are not trying to "soak the rich, big time". Going back to Clinton era levels is not pre Nixon or pre Reagan. Not draconian at all. Poor little rich folk. Waaah.

2-I agree that raising taxes on the rich alone won't come close to raising enough money to fix the problems.But it's what they can get right now. It's not just the democratic base that won't accept tax increases on the middle class, it's the whole country. You can't get elected proposing raising taxes. Americans feel way too entitled, but we don't want to pay for anything. Plus Obama based his campaign on not raising middle class taxes, it would be kind of hard for him to go back on that now. Maybe he could get away with lowering or eliminating some deductions in a deal with the republicans. Personally I would have no problem with everyone going back to Clinton era tax levels, but once you give those tax cuts it's extremely hard to take them back.

3-There is absolutely, 100% , no way we can cut our way out of this mess. Anyone with a brain knows that. Even the group of CEO's of major corporations is calling for a combination of cuts and tax increases. Also, the same with the bipartisan super committee. Plus, basically any reputable economist. It's no secret what needs to be done, it's the political will that is not there. We need a large group of patriots willing to commit political suicide. The president can't do it. Congress is in charge of paying the bills. The president can only make proposals and use the bully pulpit.
 
copestag said:
and thats just simply not true

medicaid and medicare spend more money for less care than the free market alternatives and unlike the free market alternatives who are profiting.. both programs would be bankrupt if not for the unlimited funding they get from govt
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Wrong.
 
ElasticNinja said:
Whatever about your biases against the VA system, I AM NOT ON ABOUT GOVERNMENT RUN HEALTHCARE.

All I said is that medicaid/care is currently more efficient than the pure free market alternative. I think they are shitty systems but the point stands.

You constantly fail to read what I say in my posts. I never mentioned veterans hospitals or whatever (which IMO are a completely ridiculous concept in the first place, but whatever).
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You mentioned government run care. I brought up the VA because it is, by every definition, government run care and government provided free insurance. It's also complete and total crappy care. Our veterans deserve far better and we give them crap. Every American should be ashamed of the healthcare we provide our veterans. End of rant.

I will also add that while mentioned that the costs of Medicare haven't risen at the same rate that private insurance companies have neglects to mention the fact that Medicare is broke. It can afford to keep costs down because it operating at a loss and that's not sustainable long term.
 
ElasticNinja said:
If people do that when ratings are that low its a sure sign reform is needed.
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Not sure what reforms you could put in place to fix it. You'd have to take the power to vote for Congress out of the hands of the people. The problem is people think that everyone else's Congressman is the problem, but not theirs. So they vote for their Congressman and hate everyone else's.
 
A.Nonymous said:
Not sure what reforms you could put in place to fix it. You'd have to take the power to vote for Congress out of the hands of the people. The problem is people think that everyone else's Congressman is the problem, but not theirs. So they vote for their Congressman and hate everyone else's.
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Real term limit reform would fix the problem. But of course, the folks in charge of the reform don't want to reform themselves out of a job. Catch 22.
 
A.Nonymous said:
Not sure what reforms you could put in place to fix it. You'd have to take the power to vote for Congress out of the hands of the people. The problem is people think that everyone else's Congressman is the problem, but not theirs. So they vote for their Congressman and hate everyone else's.
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I am constantly suggesting reforms, but you ignore them.

  • Proportional Representation
  • Requirement for the President to command a Congressional Majority, possibly with a Prime Ministerial position a la France.
  • Reduce influence of lobbyists by banning corporate donations to parties and funding them via the government's coffers.

cmybliss said:
Real term limit reform would fix the problem. But of course, the folks in charge of the reform don't want to reform themselves out of a job. Catch 22.
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Term limits won't really help solve the problem. Its benefits would be relatively minor. You can also look at California to see the problems term limits create - inexperienced politicians abound. A politician being in the system for decades isn't necessarily terrible, although its important to bring new thinking in too.
 
None of that will fix the problem that people hate Congress but keep sending the same people back there every election.
 
ElasticNinja said:
Uhm... it quite possibly would. Certainly would get the approval ratings up past 20-30%.
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I have no idea how.

Proportional Representation is great in a multi-party system, but here we have a two party system so it makes no sense.

Having the President picked by Congress and not by the people would never happen. We have voted on our chief executive for over 200 years. You would never ever ever get enough people on board to make such a fundamental change in the Constitution. And that still wouldn't solve the problem that people keep electing the same morons year after year.

Reducing the influence of lobbyists definitely needs to happen, but it still won't make a difference in people voting for the same people every year.

Term limits is a good solution. Sadly you'd have to get Congressmen and Senators to agree to it which they never will. Even with term limits I'm not convinced it would entirely fix the problem, but it is a great start.
 
A.Nonymous said:
I have no idea how.
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Then you cannot think analytically?

A.Nonymous said:
Proportional Representation is great in a multi-party system, but here we have a two party system so it makes no sense.
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You have a two party system because you don't have proportional representation or the need for legislative majorities.

A.Nonymous said:
Having the President picked by Congress and not by the people would never happen. We have voted on our chief executive for over 200 years. You would never ever ever get enough people on board to make such a fundamental change in the Constitution. And that still wouldn't solve the problem that people keep electing the same morons year after year.
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Oh yeah, I never suggested changing that! In France though they have a President, and a Prime Minister appointed by him. Just an idea.

A.Nonymous said:
Reducing the influence of lobbyists definitely needs to happen, but it still won't make a difference in people voting for the same people every year.
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It would reduce disillusionment.

A.Nonymous said:
Term limits is a good solution. Sadly you'd have to get Congressmen and Senators to agree to it which they never will. Even with term limits I'm not convinced it would entirely fix the problem, but it is a great start.
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Well it would simply increase the number of inexperienced politicians as I said. If one simply had less power for lobbyists and less junkets corrupt politicians would be much less of an issue.
 
We have a two party system because we have no viable 3rd parties. It's not like there are dozens of 3rd parties clawing around 10% of the vote. You can add up all of the 3rd parties in the past election and they don't add up to 10% of the vote. They may not add up to 5% of the vote. Proportional representation doesn't change any of that. You would still have 3rd parties gathering 2-3% of the vote total. That's not statistically significant enough to warrant any sort of representation.

I have no idea what good would come from splitting the executive office. You could potentially have two executives from two different parties. That doesn't seem like it would improve things.

I don't think term limits would make things any worse. Many states have term limits at the local, city and county levels. They seem to survive just fine.
 
Term limits are one of those things that always sound better in theory than it turns out being in practice. You end up sweeping out the good legislators with the bad, and the new guys are usually not any better, plus they don't know what in the hell they're doing. By the time they learn the ropes, they're out. Then they usually just bounce around from office to office anyway, running for whatever they think they have a chance to win. I actually don't mind a divided government, it keeps either party from going too far. Until recently, reasonable things could get passed, now one party will block things they are in favor of just because the other party wants it. I think we need to make some changes to the filibuster rules.
 
A.Nonymous said:
We have a two party system because we have no viable 3rd parties. It's not like there are dozens of 3rd parties clawing around 10% of the vote. You can add up all of the 3rd parties in the past election and they don't add up to 10% of the vote. They may not add up to 5% of the vote. Proportional representation doesn't change any of that. You would still have 3rd parties gathering 2-3% of the vote total. That's not statistically significant enough to warrant any sort of representation.
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I have already explained why they're not viable. Please read my posts.

A.Nonymous said:
I have no idea what good would come from splitting the executive office. You could potentially have two executives from two different parties. That doesn't seem like it would improve things.
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Well the President would appoint the Prime Minister based on parties willing to form a government. They would have to agree on a platform of sorts. The President
 
Gmash said:
Until recently, reasonable things could get passed, now one party will block things they are in favor of just because the other party wants it. I think we need to make some changes to the filibuster rules.
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And that there is one of the biggest problems we have in our government. The Congress used to be able to pass things with a simple majority, you know, the way it was intended to work. Now we've got them using the filibuster, which in the past, had been reserved for extreme cases. Remember the days of cots in the hallways and representatives speaking until their voices were gone? Now we need a super majority to pass the smallest, least important bill. Both parties are guilty of it, though I would venture to say one is worse than the other. Get rid of the filibuster and severely limit lobbyists and we might stand a chance of moving this country forward.

I still like term limits, but they would have to be a reasonable length, say 12-16 years,and staggered so as to always have an experienced person from each state in office.
 
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