A reader emailed a good point. I’ve been paying into Medicare for three decades now, and the GOP has decided to basically shitcan the program for anyone under 55. Fine, how can I expect my refund for the tens of thousands I’ve paid in to Medicare to be reimbursed? Will Paul Ryan and friends just have the treasury cut me a large check? Will they just give me a credit and I won’t have to pay any taxes for a couple years? Will they send me a couple large every year until we are even?
Or is this my “shared sacrifice,” and I’ll be told to eat a bag of salty dicks while they cut taxes for the Koch brothers and the rest of their fat cat donors and big business?
singfoom
Yes.
Bruce S
Under Ryan’s plan you will have options. You might want to try the lightly-salted or salt-free dicks.
Ash Can
Hey, even the wealthy have expenses to worry about, bucko. Gold toilet seats aren’t getting any cheaper, ya know.
jwest
Would you like some fries with your Salty Dicks, Sir?
(I’ve got to learn to type faster)
Elizabelle
Very honestly, I don’t think Ryan et al have thought ahead that far.
It’s a Potemkin Plan, but enough to take in our Professional Journalist Villagers.
Hermione Granger-Weasley
It is the wisdom of the market, John.
You cannot hope to understand.
Failure, Inc.
Hope you like salt.
KyCole
You know what really sucks? I’ll be 54 this year.
soonergrunt
You, civil servants, government and military retirees, and anyone else who is not in the top 1% will not eat a bag of salted dicks. That costs money that could otherwise go into the pockets of Paul Ryan’s benefactors.
You’re just supposed to work yourself to death.
trollhattan
@ John Cole
Yup, pretty much. Except for the refund bit. “Democrats spent it.” Next chapter: handing Social Security over to Goldman Sachs for…ya know…safekeeping.
dan
Yeah, the last thing. Sacrifice, bitch. It’s what’s for dinner. In fact, it is all that is for dinner.
thomas Levenson
More and more, this does seem like the GOP’s last stand. Win this or go the way of the Whigs.
I don’t Scott Brown’s leap of enthusiasm for this is going to do him that much good in MA, that’s for sure.
Martin
Ah, see. The plan is quite simple. You were promised a defined benefits plan to pay into. The GOP is swapping that out for a defined contribution plan, so that if Medicare is broke by the time you hit 65, tough shit, you don’t get your voucher.
See, the GOP always asks citizens to pay up front and promises nothing later. They do that because when you steal someone’s money they can point to something that they’ve actually lost – and that’s a problem. This way, when they steal your money, you were never promised anything anyway, so you’ve technically had nothing stolen.
Maude
This is the same scam as privatize Social Security that Dumb Bush tried to sell. It is to put monies that are now used for people into the hands of Wall Street. Ryan might not say that, but that’s the whole idea of free market.
I do think the Repubs are going to hit the wall with this one.
Emerald
And let’s not forget that Ryan wants to eliminate the capital gains tax altogether. Now, most of your überrich types do not work for a living. They eke out their existences on their capital gains. (Only highly paid entertainers and sports heros get their millions as earned income, and the Rs don’t care about them.)
The Republican dream: the rich pay no taxes at all, just like most of the corporations.
Keith G
I am quite sure that this will be yet another supporting argument for our side that the Obama folks will not use lest they appear….argumentative.
TJ
Pretty much, except you have to use your own salt.
dan
How come they don’t have to pay for Medicare, but I have to pay for aircraft carriers?
4tehlulz
This worked for private pensions, why wouldn’t they try it with public ones?
Martin
@KyCole: Guess what, you’re going to die a poor and horrible death.
Sorry, that was a joke. But the republicans thought it was hilarious.
Shoemaker-Levy 9
You’ll get a voucher, redeemable at over 400 Rick Scott’s Voucher-o-Rama locations throughout Florida. West Virginia is close to Florida, right?
jrg
Not going to happen. As soon as the next generation reaches the age where they would have become eligible, they’ll move the age limit again.
This is no different than the borrowing they incessantly whine about. It’s just an attempt to avoid the political backlash that will occur. The current crop of pols just hope they can play a shell game until it’s someone else’s problem.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
dear john;
why hast thou forsaken me?
sincerely,
shit sandwich.
p.s. the more bread you have, the less shit you have to eat.
Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)
Dude, I could buy a lot of T-bone steaks with what I’ve paid in.
freelancer
No matter how you slice it, there’s no way that this can’t be called “redistribution of wealth”. It’s just toward men of wealth and taste.
Moonbatman
Reminds me of when I told the wingnut Teabaggers that since they dislike Big Government /Socialism they should not collect SS or medicare.
You know what butthurt I got from the greedy SOBs?
Peace Out The Power is Yours.
Davis X. Machina
The additional Freedom™ you and the other voucher-getters will receive far outweighs the monetary value of your accumulated Medicare deductions.
(Freedom™ is a registered trademark of the Republican National Committee. Used with permission. All rights reserved.)
JPL
John, Now you know how they plan on paying for the Bush Tax Cuts with your Medicare taxes.
This is also a stimulus plan if you think the middle class is not important. Consumer spending for durable goods will suffer because the populace has less money to spend but stocks will go up as people continue to gamble.
Moonbatman
John, you sound like a wingnut told since they dislike Big Government /Socialism they should not collect SS or medicare.
Peace Out The Power is Yours.
Rommie
Two different judges here in Michigan have called the 3% deduction to state employee paychecks that started last year for “health care” unconstitutional. One of the reasons? Because it’s not a pension plan, and some future governmental entity could easily substitute the salty bag of yummies, instead of health care, to those paying this 3 percent.
So yeah, I’m not anticipating getting a refund along with the salt, and at least 2 members of Johnny Law are in agreement.
So, if we’re going to pay into the new not-Medicare system that may or may not provide any benefits when the time comes to claim them, depending on the whims of our Galtian Overlords of the hour, I have to guess some more people in the Johnny Law club will have a dim view of that arrangement.
Elizabelle
Do you think this might be Peak Wingnut?
I cannot tell if this is the light at the end of the tunnel, that the GOP is so burned out that even some low information voters will get that.
Or are we living through a slow motion Weimar Republic, where we can see the danger but those in power are oblivious?
PS: not speaking here of Obama. I think he’s doing the best he can with a foundering political system and unified, irrational opposition.
But I don’t think those doing well financially realize how transient that might be. That capitalism off the rails takes a lot of victims, and not just the obvious ones.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
Do not worry too greatly. There is only a less than 95 percent chance, tops, that President Obama will actively support any of Rep. Ryan’s proposals, and even if he does he will do so with fierce and photographically majestic reluctance, and only for the sake of reasonable bipartisan compromise.
.
.
fasteddie9318
@TJ:
And, by the time he’s 65, probably your own dicks too. Start saving them now!
Rock
The math demands that you get screwed.
I understand rich bastards like McArdle and the Koch brothers believing that. I’m saddened that so many poor people it. If the serfs believe they should be serfs there’s not much hope or change.
geg6
I am fifty-fucking-two years old. If you’re pissed about this, imagine how I feel.
Paul Ryan should DIAF. And I don’t fucking give a damn how uncivil that is. Paul Ryan should be glad that I can’t show him first-hand how uncivil I can be.
Maude
@Elizabelle:
We are nothing like the Weimar Republic.
I think the Repubs are just too crazy to figure out and there may not be a Peak Wingnut. It seems as if the hatred for the middle class and the poor is increasing every week.
Let’s see what they come up with next.
Jay in Oregon
Hello, you must be new here…
The Political Nihilist Formerly Known As Kryptik
@thomas Levenson:
Honestly, the more and more this goes on, the more it feels like it’s the Dems facing their Whig moment. Because honestly, if they really can’t get it together at this point, if they can’t fucking slap this shit down despite the GOP almost openly advocating the total dismantling of every American institution except the NRA and the Sons of the Confederacy, then they are beyond useless, and we may as wel prepare for the total Lib Purge come 2012.
As you can tell, I do not have high hopes for the future, near or long-term.
jl
First time in my no so short life I wished I were a few years older. Then I would be all for the plan.
It would be fun, getting all that subsidized nedical care on JOHN COLE MONEY! Woo-hoo!
Baucus has said that Ryan’s plan is a joke, and is going nowhere as long as he has any say about it.
So, at least one Democratic official (and a surprising one) is calling the new GOP Medicare scam for what it is, a stupid dangerous and dishonest scam. That is one good sign, though people like Baucus will need lots of reminding about his initial (and correct) reaction to this proposed and perfectly avoidable disaster.
JAHILL10
Okay, people. This is well and truly a shitty plan, but what in the world makes anyone think that it is going anywhere? You think this Randian jerk-off dream gets out of the Senate alive? That Obama would sign such a bill? I am with Tom Levenson. This feels like the last desperate ploy of a bunch of nihilistic assholes who want to screw everyone over before they are shown the door.
Skippy-san
@KyCole: So will I-which is why I will be in the streets if need be, with signs and / or Molotov cocktails. Paul Ryan can suck my salty dick.
Brian S (formerly Incertus)
You actually think you’re getting salt with your dicks? You might not even get dicks with your dicks. You’ll probably get processed dick substitute.
toujoursdan
@Maude: And they can get away with it as long as the poor and middle class keep voting for them. Increasingly, it looks like more and more are doing just that (particularly in ageing rustbelt white communities in the upper Midwest.)
You’d think after a 40 year long proof that trickle down economics, corporate outsourcing and resentment based politics is screwing these people over, they stop voting for their abusers, but it’s a mass case of Stockholm Syndrome.
Culture of Truth
We can’t tax the rich because they’re the job creators. And you’re going to need a job when they cancel Medicare.
Comrade Javamanphil
@Brian S (formerly Incertus): “Salted dicks is (old) people!”
andrea
geg6, you got more room on that bench?
jayjaybear
@Rock: But the serfs DON’T believe they should be serfs. That’s the Republican secret weapon. As long as they can keep the serfs believing that someday, somehow, they’re going to be Lords of the Manor themselves, they’ll do NOTHING to limit the power and wealth of those Lords.
I’ve often thought that was the fatal affliction of the United States…that persistent, fantastic, utterly unreal hope that anyone can become a millionaire, at least. It’s like the people who think we’d be better off going “back to the land” or coming under a monarchy again…they see themselves as being either the wealthy landlords or the feudal lords of such a system, and for the vast majority of the population, neither one will ever happen.
Joe Beese
Priceless.
http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/04/05/obama-rejects-gops-one-week-stopgap-path-to-shutdown-clear/
Dave
@JAHILL10: Exactly. They want to pat themselves on the back and, when they get shitcanned in 2012 (and they will), they can ride off into the Wingnut Wefare Program sunset, knowing that even though they failed, they succeeded. Because they, they, were the Real Americans who fought the good fight.
A more delusional, deranged and venemous bunch of assholes there has never been.
Corner Stone
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
Uncle Clarence Thomas, when President Obama fiercely compromises to pass this budget plan, what do you think the halo background will tell us?
geg6
Meanwhile, at the White House:
h/t Greg Sargent
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/gop-has-again-moved-goalposts-for-budget-compromise-dems-say/2011/03/03/AF5wrIkC_blog.html
Maude
@toujoursdan:
Don’t you think that the far left’s drumbeat of it’s all Obama’s fault plays into that trend? It seems that Obama is put in a negative light enough to be believed by the stupid who vote for Repubs.
FlipYrWhig
@JAHILL10: Because way too many blogosphere liberals get off on the thrill of being early adopters of the new iDespair. “Wow, this Rage Display is even brighter, and more spittle-flecked!”
Mark S.
@JAHILL10:
If Obama were to sign this bill, he would without any doubt have a primary challenge. He isn’t that suicidal.
The GOP, on the other hand, is. They are truly fucking themselves forever.
toujoursdan
@Maude: Yeah, and I have lost friends when I have told them that.
Obama is a President, not a dictator. He can’t wave a magic wand and give us sprinkles and rainbows. If people want real change they have to elect a Congress that will give it to them.
But working for that is hard and it’s easier to whinge.
FlipYrWhig
@Joe Beese:
Firedoglake is such a cesspool. They could simply say that Obama was pointing out that Democrats have offered their own cuts, many of which have been unpopular. Instead they float a turd about “apparently forgetting.” Such a pack of fuckfaces over there.
PurpleGirl
@Martin: …by the time you hit 65,…
I believe the plan also includes raising the age to 67.
danimal
Can we force a vote on this “plan” in the Senate? I know actual budget votes have to originate in the House, but there’s gotta be a way to put the GOP on record. You know, before the GOP takes a look at the polls and no one can locate Private Ryan?
“Ryan, never heard of him. I don’t know anything about this Ryan plan…”
Brian S (formerly Incertus)
@FlipYrWhig: Joe Beese never fails to amuse with his ability to remind us that he’s an asshole.
Culture of Truth
ha ha. No wait, “out there” has a meaning too
Frank M
John, Let’s put it this way…I hope you’re not on a low sodium diet.
Martin
@geg6:
Yeah, now tell me again that they aren’t two caucuses. The tea party is ripping the party apart, and Boehner is prioritizing the solidarity of the GOP over the welfare of the nation.
Chyron HR
@Joe Beese:
His story checks out.
catclub
@Emerald: neither did the nobility in eighteenth century France.
PurpleGirl
@Elizabelle: There is NO such thing as peak wingnut. The event horizon keeps moving to ever crazier and dizzying environs.
Gin & Tonic
@geg6:
I’m 56, so I can guarantee I feel a whole lot better. (Sorry, the joke had to be made, but even though I’m on the “lucky” side, I also recognize this is a complete rock of shit.)
Martin
@PurpleGirl: Ah, thereby extending ACAs health insurance mandate that the GOP said they were so strenuously opposed to. Well played.
jwest
Geg6,
Speaking for the right, we figured someone has to get fucked in this deal, so why not you?
JAHILL10
@Mark S.: This is basically the same crap they tried to pull with Bush’s privatization of SS in 2005. Throw something absolutely outrageous out there, get pats on the back for being “serious about entitlement reform” and hope that some numbnuts Democrats take the bait and offer a bill that is only slightly less insane and draconian. Fat chance. Why do you think they wanted Pelosi out of the minority leader spot in the House so badly? Because she was the one that told them “Never” was when she was going to offer a compromise SS proposal. And my guess is she has a retort all ready for them when they ask her about the Democratic counter proposal to gut Medicare and Medicaid. The Villagers may think Ryan is dreamy but his bill is DOA.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@toujoursdan:
“If people want real change they have to elect a Congress that will give it to them.”
Oh, if only at some point during his presidency Obama had control of the House of Representatives and 60 Senators. What wondrous accomplishments he would have had! Cap and Trade, a public option, ending the war in Afghanistan–the sky would have been the limit!
Culture of Truth
“Paul Ryan’s budget is a positive step”
By Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles
Grrrrrrrrrrrrr
Zifnab
@toujoursdan:
They’re making these decisions based on scare tactics that revolve around the preservation of entitlements. Republicans spent all of ’09 and ’10 running on “Don’t take our Medicare! Don’t take our Social Security!” The aging voter base doesn’t like the Wall Street banks and it doesn’t like the government at large. They’re not above throwing the bums out one more time, like they’ve been doing for the last six years running.
Dave
@Martin: Definitely NOT defending the Tea Party here. But the GOP is enabling them to do the ripping. Any party worth their salt would have combated this kind of bullshit by changing primary rules and vigorously fighting the excesses. But since they threw in as early as 2006 with hating brown people, they simply decided to double-down and pander to insanity.
jl
Slightly off topic, but related to the related topic of the awful state of US health care finance in general.
I am beginning to more than half seriously think that health care finance and accessibility in the US is becoming a human rights issue. As I mentioned yesterday in comments here, there are almost 20 high income developed countries that get as good or better population health statistics (life expectancy at birth, at 40, at 60 and 65), lifeyears lost to preventable illness, and total healthy lifeyears in the population than the US, at far less cost to the nation, and somewhat to far less out of pocket costs for individuals.
The few countries who fall short in some measure (eg, Denmark, or Belgium) know why (middle agers smoking like stacks, especially women) and are trying to do something about it. The laggard among the group, Portugal, with all its delicious not very healthy food and Port, is rapidly improving and will soon do better than the US at providing good health for its population with a national health care system.
But the US cannot manage it. Why? Because of corrupt corporate crony capitalism.
The Obama backed health care reform bill is a half measure that will patch up a self destructive self disintegrating system for a few years. It is, as many have noted, the GOP plan from that past, except made worse with more crony capitalism. Whether that was what Obama intended, it makes no difference in terms of results, for that is what came out at the end.
The only major opposition party’s proposals are dishonest schemes to throw the US into the lower ranks of middle income countries in terms of providing modern health care to the population.
It is a disgrace, makes me ashamed of my country on principle, and makes me look for work overseas on prudence.
Any of you kids here who are looking for a do it yourself home social science project can verify the facts by going to the OECD health statistics site, and downloading the free spreadsheet with key statistics, or plunking down 119 bucks to buy the CD ROM that has the whole data set.
Anyone who gets a kick out of sick humor should pay for the CD ROM, since the more detailed statistics you get, the more tragic and hilarious the facts are revealed to be.
http://www.oecd.org/document/30/0,3343,en_2649_34631_12968734_1_1_1_37407,00.html
Chris
@Moonbatman:
Sure they would.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@The Political Nihilist Formerly Known As Kryptik:
Amen brother.
toujoursdan
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Oh, if only a dozen of those Senators weren’t conservative Blue Dog Democrats from places like Indiana, Nebraska or Colorado who opposed all those things, like most of the constituents did.
It may be completely shocking to you that all Democrats don’t march in lockstep, but it doesn’t make it less true.
brendancalling
i’m going to call Pat toomey’s office and ask. I’ll report back.
Dave
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
There, fixed that for ya.
Martin
@Dave: Yeah, I agree. I think they were in sufficiently dire demographic trouble that they really had no choice but to make this move. What’ll be interesting is what happens when the check comes due for all of this in 2012, when independents see the GOP as a bunch of fucking lunatics and the tea party still controls the primary reins.
GregB
Any chance that we can at least get some vouchers for the purchase of those bags of salted dicks?
Master of Karate and Friendship
@toujoursdan:
Yeah, they should oppose that by voting for Obama, who reveres Ronald Reagan and put one of the country’s busiest outsourcers as head of his Council on Jobs.
debit
What about all the money employers paid in matching funds over the years? If I were a business owner, I’d kind of like it back.
NonyNony
@Elizabelle:
First rule about Peak Wingnut – there’s no such thing as Peak Wingnut.
If you find yourself asking “could we have finally achieved Peak Wingnut?” remind yourself that you’re more likely to be looking at a unicorn than Peak Wingnut.
Because until we’re living under the feudal system – where serfs are tied to the land under the “protection” of a “benevolent” aristocracy, the wingnuts will keep pulling us to the right. And the only reason that THAT would even count as “Peak Wingnut” is because at that point the wingnuts would have marginalized themselves and no longer have any way to pull anyone to the right anymore.
They’re trying to pull us back to the ’50s – the 950s.
jwest
@Culture of Truth:
C of T,
Ryan’s middle of the road proposal is just a first step. As a moderate, slightly right-of-center congressman, he put forth a modest budget accommodation that most reasonable people recognize as a move in the right direction.
Depending on the amount of democrat losses in 2012, a more serious attempt at cost cutting can be considered.
We can only hope.
Zifnab
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
He never had control of 60 Senators. At any given moment he maybe had control of 40 Senators and change. But Lieberman? Bayh? Nelson? Nope. They were totally beyond his grip.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@toujoursdan:
Yeah, and Obama really wanted voters to challenge those Blue Dogs, didn’t he? We all remember when that was proposed.
meh
tell me this shit doesn’t get more appealing everyday
Ash Can
@JAHILL10: I’m also of the opinion that this punchbowl-floater is going nowhere, but I think it’s a good idea to make a ruckus over it in the meantime. The more people realize what a clusterfuck Ryan and his cohorts are trying to foist on the American public, the better. Granted, throwing a fit just here on this site is nothing more than preaching to the choir, but throwing fits in general can help draw much-needed attention to the problem.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Zifnab:
Look, someone said “it’s not Obama’s fault because his party doesn’t have Congress.” I was simply responding to that.
Captain Haddock
Good thing most of the assholes calling this a brave, ingenious plan happen to be over 55…
toujoursdan
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
How exactly would that work?
Did you want Obama to put a progressive candidate into a purple district so that they would get trounced altogether?
Brilliant strategy.
debit
@Zifnab: And let’s not forget Blanche “Isn’t there some way we can reach out even more to our Republican colleagues?” Lincon.
Corner Stone
@Culture of Truth:
That is one fantastic op-ed by the co-chairs.
Really hits the spot, ya know?
toujoursdan
@Master of Karate and Friendship: It was a nonsensical response.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Ash Can:
“I’m also of the opinion that this punchbowl-floater is going nowhere”
Just like the Republican health care counter-proposal of 1993 went nowhere.
Chris
@jayjaybear:
This, with slight modification: Republican voters believe that they WOULD be Lords of the Manor if only we’d stayed true to the Invisible Hand blueprint that the Founding Fathers gave us.
Alas, in the 1960s, the liberals screwed with society in such a way as to unfairly benefit “colored” people. And that’s the reason for everything that’s wrong with society today – from cost of health care to high unemployment to kids having sex to the fact that Mister Win G. Nut is dissatisfied with whatever his lot in life is.
That’s where the fantasy gets spiced up with a little (okay, not little) touch of resentment that drives them angrily to the polls year after year after year to flip the bird to the uppity liberals.
numbskull
@toujoursdan: Bullshit. I worked hard and spent a lot of time and money to support the election of Democrats. Have you forgotten that we at one time had the House, Senate, and Whitehouse?
They simply are not interested in making some things happen. While it’s true that the modern GOP is not your Dad’s GOP, neither is the modern Democratic Party the party of LBJ.
Bruce S
Ryancare is a proposal for insurance exchanges, partially funded by federal vouchers, that will consist solely of folks 67 and up – which means almost everyone will have “pre-existing conditions,” not to mention the highest health care costs of any demographic – trying to buy coverage from private insurers, whose overhead is more than 3 times that of Medicare.
How Ryancare is anything other than a recipe for disaster is beyond me. Why the hell isn’t Obama on my TeeVee – talking to a group of seniors out in Wisconsin – telling the truth about this crap, rather than acting “the statesman” concerned about “bi-partisan negotiations” when Boehner has kicked sand in his face. This is very disheartening – not just because the GOPers are insane nihilists, but because the Dems aren’t fighting back with full force. I don’t expect Dems to go down into the FOXoid gutter of total hysteria or to hew to the ideological purity of the TeaBagged GOP, but make a good clean fight of it or “negotiations” are just on the terms of crazy, destructive opportunists who don’t have an honest or analytically competent bone in their bodies.
As Ezra K pleads today in his WaPo column, “Fierce f***ing urgency of now!” for Chrissakes…
My local Organizing for America is hosting a brown bag lunch to talk to small business people about the virtues of the ACA insurance reform this week. That’s it. I’ve talked to them about outreach into the community around the budget battles and they’re not interested. I’m not kidding. While Ryan is pushing this garbage driven by the TeaBaggers, the “grassroots” organizing to pushback from the Dem side is AWOL. In a more perfect world, that outreach to small bizfolks would be very nice. But what the hell happened to the “organizing” to move an agenda forward, rather than tepid defense of last years legislation ?
We had an incredible opportunity and totally blew it. And I have to say that when I get their emails about sending money and getting involved in the 2012 campaign, I’m very cool to any of it. I’ll work to get out the vote, but my $$ is going directly to congressional candidates who are decent, have at least half-a-chance and will show some signs of life. I’ve been a staunch defender of the President – and still support him and think he’s done a lot of good against great odds with a filibustered Senate – but he’s also blown his best shot at fulfilling the promise by failing to reach out the the American people with an inspired, but adult, message the way he did during his campaign.
http://titanicsailsatdawn.blogspot.com/2011/04/wheres-fierce-urgency-of-now.html
Poopyman
@Gin & Tonic: Yeah. Just to be clear, geg6, we over–55s can recognize a divide and conquer scheme when we see it.
You won’t be alone on the barricades.
Katie5
@JAHILL10: It’s movement of the Overton window. Propose something completely over the top and the Democrats move ever rightward in their counter proposal.
Frankly, I wouldn’t be shocked if people thought that vouchers sounded like a good idea. Unless and until they actually had to get a doctor with one of those slips of paper. Or convince their new insurance overlords to insure their #1 pre-existing condition–that of being old!
Midnight Marauder
@JAHILL10:
I honestly find it confounding when people–especially liberals and Democrats–take this kind of approach to odious legislation posed by Republicans. Was this the Republican approach to the Affordable Care Act? Was it their approach to the Dodd-Frank Act? Or any piece of legislation ever proposed by the Democratic Party in the history of their existence?
If you honestly don’t believe the legislation is going to pass, then that should give you extra incentive to get out there and demagogue the shit out of it and all of its supporters. You rail against these clowns proposing a wholly unserious piece of legislation that would strip away fundamental elements of what makes this nation so great. You don’t fucking throw up your hands and say “Oh, well it’s a piece of shit, so it won’t pass.”
For fuck’s sake, that’s not even where the battle is being fought by the opposition.
eemom
@JAHILL10:
I said the same thing a few threads ago. Also too, even Max Baucus the great bipartisan compromiser has said, in essence, “Over my dead body.”
This is just (1) the latest emmessemm bright shiny object, and (2) further proof, as if any were needed, that the republicans really are out to fuck over everybody in this country except the super-rich.
The Raven
@Elizabelle: “Do you think this might be Peak Wingnut?”
The next two years, yes. After which we will simply have another decade or so of conservatism until Americans decide to do something about it.
This isn’t Weimar; Weimar was the 1990s.
JAHILL10
@Ash Can: No, I agree that pointing out how truly bad this would be for the vast majority of the people in this country is a good thing for progressive policy. But like you said, it needs to be pointed out to people who don’t necessarily read political blogs. I just get a little weary of all the hysterics and the Republican paid trolls who jump on a thread like this to convince us The End Is Nigh!
Yog-Sothoth
The Ryan budget doesn’t have a chance of passing now, but it is the blueprint for the budget that we get after the Second Crash. You know, the one that happens after the banks (everything worthwhile is a bank nowadays) take on crazy leverage and loot all they can until some world event happens which crashes the system?
Then when we bail out the banks again there will be no money left for Medicare or anything else except military spending and tax cuts for the rich, and they can roll out the Ryan budget as a starting point.
Whether the GOP or the Dems win 2012 doesn’t matter if they can bankrupt the government – they will get to sweep all those pesky entitlements away. The rise of the middle class was a temporary aberration anyway.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@toujoursdan:
So you’re solution is “there’s not a single thing anyone can do about anything.” I guess we could try that.
If you want to whine about how Congress isn’t letting Obama do all the great things he wants to do, then when someone suggests putting some elbow grease into a better Congress you whine about how that will never work, then I guess all you’re good for is whining. Hey, if you’re good at one thing, stick with it.
What’s really funny is, you think Democratic representatives would have been trounced had they supported liberal legislation. Say, did you happen to see the results of the 2010 elections?
Culture of Truth
@numbskull: neither is the modern Democratic Party the party of LBJ
HE would’ve gotten 60 votes to end the war!
Omnes Omnibus
@Master of Karate and Friendship: Who do you support for president in 2012? Let’s hear a positive statement in favor of something or someone. Or are you only here to bitch?
jibeaux
You’re missing the point. Salted dicks, especially bags of them, cost a lot of money. You’re not getting nothing in this exchange. I mean, what would you charge to lop off your dick and salt it and put it in a bag? Right much, right? Right.
toujoursdan
@numbskull:
So when you worked for all this ,you ignored the fact that the Democrats have never, in modern history, been a party where everyone is in lockstep.
I’ve got news for you. The Democratic Party is nothing but an adhoc coalition of people who generally don’t like each other much: African American preachers and gay people, white urban hipsters and Hispanic farmworkers; liberal Catholics, Jews, mainline Protestants and militant atheists, rural white farmers, union workers and university academics.
We will never be like the modern GOP. Never.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Yog-Sothoth:
This.
meh
@Katie5:
lacp
Hey, it was your own goddam decision not to be a hedge fund manager. Consider yourself lucky to get that bag-o’-dicks.
rikryah
This is absolutely ridiculous.
toujoursdan
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
So those 2010 elections brought in 60 progressive, single payer-supporting Senators?
Really?
Corner Stone
@Zifnab:
Yes, I dwell in hell, but it’s a hell that I can grip
I tried to grip my family
But I slipped
To escape from the pain in an existence mundane
I gotta 9, a sign, a set and now I gotta name
Read my writing on the wall
No-one’s here to catch me when I fall
Caught between my culture and the system….genocide!
Read my writing on the wall
No-one’s here to catch me when I fall
If ignorance is bliss, then knock the smile off my face
Yeah!
If we don’t take action now
We settle for nothing later
Settle for nothing now
And we’ll settle for nothing later
If we don’t take action now
We settle for nothing later
We’ll settle for nothing now
And we’ll settle for nothing later
This moment of RATM brought to you be GE. We bring good things to life!
JAHILL10
@Katie5: Any adult who has dealt with the insurance industry will run screaming from this proposal. $15,000 a year? Who are they kidding?
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Omnes Omnibus:
If I could pick anyone, it would be Liz Warren.
Anne Laurie
@Martin:
The Republican’s evergreen Red Queen Safety Net: “Jam tomorrow and jam yesterday, but never jam today.”
I’ve been listening to Republican promises for 40+ years now, and the ones that weren’t lies were delusions. Which is why, even though I am 55, I’ll be right out there with you kids protesting this, should some Democrat’s centrist inclinations let this idiocy rise above the HELLA NO barrier.
Chris
@catclub:
Here’s one for people who like historical precedent: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fronde.
During the XVIIth century, there was a small civil war in France that arose out of the French monarchy trying to balance the budget after Richelieu’s wars. The nobles had enough influence to avoid being significantly taxed: as a result, the tax burden fell onto the commoners. Then, the nobles used the resentment from that to stir the commoners up in a revolt against the monarchy, in order to regain the privileges they’d lost under the previous king.
Who says history doesn’t repeat itself?
batgirl
@numbskull: Given that all I have right now is a modern GOP and a modern Democratic party, I’ll take the modern Democratic party and a Kagan and Sotomayor over the GOP and a Roberts and Alito, thank you very much. Yes, the choices suck, but they do not suck the same.
Bob Loblaw
Is there ever a day that goes by where something isn’t Obama’s fault in the juiceosphere? His name is being brought up an awfully lot for something he has absolutely nothing to do with.
Oh wait, I forgot, he secretly can’t wait to deny health insurance to people, all of one year after making the hallmark of his presidency giving health insurance to people. Yes, that’s probably it.
jwest
@toujoursdan:
You will never get 60 progressives elected for anything. If you want single payer, make it attractive to conservatives.
brendancalling
… and no one’s answering the phone at Toomey’s place, but at least i can leave a voicemail. That’s more than I can say for Ryan’s office.
Chris
@NonyNony:
BC.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Zifnab:
That’s true, Obama really worked so hard to get Lieberman’s vote.
Lieberman: Obama Never Pressed Me On Public Option
And Obama really wanted his Yes We Can people to force Congress to back liberal legislation so he could do what he REALLY wanted to do.
The friction was laid bare in August when Mr. Emanuel showed up at a weekly strategy session featuring liberal groups and White House aides. Some attendees said they were planning to air ads attacking conservative Democrats who were balking at Mr. Obama’s health-care overhaul. “F—ing retarded,” Mr. Emanuel scolded the group, according to several participants.
Obama didn’t want to reanimate the corpse of a bad Republican health care reform idea, he HAD TO do it!
Omnes Omnibus
@Master of Karate and Friendship: Is she running? No? I thought not.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Bob Loblaw:
“Is there ever a day that goes by where something isn’t Obama’s fault in the juiceosphere?”
We know, we know, the president has no power over anything, so it’s not fair to blame him, ever.
Maude
@Ash Can:
It is important to shout about this because otherwise they will get away with it.
The far left is doing the usual how awful Obama is, yada yada.
The Republican are out to destroy the middle class and the poor.
vtr
OT. Ryan is from Wisconsin. The Wisconsin State Journal reports today that the Walker Administration hired the son of a GOP lobbyist. 27-year-old Brian Deschane went to UW Madison for two years, the worked for a couple of GOP lawmakers, and then had a part-time job for a building association his dad ran. He’s making about 81,000 to oversee environmental regulation and supervise several workers. Details at Madison.com.
JAHILL10
@toujoursdan: Thanks for pointing this out. The modern Democratic Party looks like a nice cross section of people who live in the U.S. The Republican Party looks like a cross section of people who meet at a whites only country club. You know why they are so on message and unified? Because they are all the SAME! Hello! The liberal way is messy and off-message, but at least everyone has a voice. It’s a strength we need to run with.
toujoursdan
@jwest:
It will be attractive to conservatives in a few years’ time when American business can no longer afford to give employees health coverage and dump the entire cost onto them.
I work in HR at a major company (where the company currently pays 2/3rds of the cost) and we all know it’s coming.
When even upper middle class families are paying as much for health insurance as their mortgage, change will happen.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Omnes Omnibus:
Did I say she was?
What would be nice would be if enough Democrats would stop pulling the wool over their own eyes and judge Obama based upon reality, so there would be a pool of support for someone like Warren. Then we might get elected officials would actually try to fix things.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus:
Absolutely classic fucking response friend.
Throw down the childish Stuckian taunt that anyone who disagrees with Obama must be forced to name someone they’d prefer to run. Then when they do, you pull this nonsense.
Midnight Marauder
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
In what reality is Elizabeth Warren a legitimate presidential nominee?
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
This is pretty hilarious considering no honest assessment based in reality would have Warren running for POTUS in 2012.
JAHILL10
@Bob Loblaw: When did you become a reasonable person? I had been in the habit of scrolling by your posts and then I started noticing that you are making a lot of sense! No offense intended…
jwest
@toujoursdan:
You’re absolutely right.
So why haven’t business-loving conservatives embraced the single-payer plan to shed all those healthcare costs?
FlipYrWhig
@Bruce S:
Are you seriously already upset that there isn’t more being visibly done to work against something, the new Ryan proposal, that has existed for less than one day? I hope you’re piggybacking already-existing frustration with the current budget discussion onto a new provocation about the next budget.
I assume, given how they have handled previous battles, that the Obama people are intent on looking constructive and reasonable _so that_ Republican intransigence looks all the more obvious. There’s a critical mass of people, including regulars here, who _loathe_ that choice. But we all have to remember that people who don’t follow this stuff like we do never hear the details and continue to assume that both sides want to work together — when it was polled, IIRC, a large proportion of _Democrats_ wanted to see negotiation and compromise from their party.
Even my own O-bot eyes, I accept and believe that it’s frustrating to see the reasonable/constructive/even-keeled/compromise strategy in action. Fights are more cathartic and “kinetic” and ballsy. But it does look like there’s a widespread sense out among the public that Republicans are acting in an extreme fashion (polling doesn’t show them gaining any ground), and some of that probably arises from Obama’s willingness to play the reasonable broker instead of the asskicker-in-chief.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Midnight Marauder:
Yeah, why would anyone vote for the most well-known and highly-respected middle class advocate in the country? People love big banks and Wall Street, so someone who fights them wouldn’t stand a chance.
FlipYrWhig
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
I bet he didn’t work hard to get Jeff Sessions’s vote either. Because he was obviously fucking opposed to it.
jwest
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
“Yeah, why would anyone vote for the most well-known and highly-respected middle class advocate in the country?”
Sarah Palin?
Just Some Fuckhead
@Bob Loblaw:
I agree, there’s nothing he can do. Easily the most helpless President we’ve had since Carter. Of course, Carter had to actually own his shit.
FlipYrWhig
@jwest:
This is going out on a limb, I realize, but I’m going to go with… because they’re flaming, gaping assholes. Same reason they do most things.
Bob Loblaw
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
I didn’t realize that he had control over the opposition party’s budget. Man, he is one cool, manipulative motherfucker.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@Corner Stone: @Corner Stone:
.
.
That balloonbaggers were fucking right.
.
.
toujoursdan
@jwest:
Because people are generally short-sighted, aren’t aware of all the healthcare issues; many still believe that free markets are magic and they fear an expansion of government.
Even with a couple dozen countries showing that single payer is more efficient, better for business and better for the consumer, many Americans still don’t believe it can work. Bizarre.
JAHILL10
@Master of Karate and Friendship: Lieberman killed a Medicare buy in proposal for the simple reason that Democratic Senators LIKED the idea. Do you think an asshole that big is going to change his stance because the Prez gives him a phone call? Lieberman comes from one of the biggest insurance company hosting states in the Union. There’s why you don’t have a public option. Pure and simple.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Joe Beese:
This is why people who support someone like Obama are suckers. When you move closer to the other guy’s position, he is going to move further in that direction. For 30 years the Democratic party has been edging toward the Republican position, and in that time Republicans have become more reactionary. But that hasn’t stopped the Democratic party from continuing to move closer to the Republican position. You can call it “compromise” or “unity” or “bipartisanship” or whatever other hooey makes you happy. The end point is Republicans keep getting what they want.
“Obama isn’t quite as bad as the Republicans.” Hey, give him time!
Midnight Marauder
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Now, I get that you are aiming for hyperbole and all that, which is fine. But here’s a serious question for you. Why would you want Elizabeth Warren to run for the POTUS (a race she absolutely would not win. At all.) versus going after Scott Brown and his Senate seat?
Why, exactly, do you think Elizabeth Warren would be more beneficial as President of the United States, and not as an ally in the Senate to the current (and future) President of the United States?
Because that seems like a really fucking dumb strategy to me.
Chris
@jwest:
I was DRINKING, and now there’s Diet Coke all over the keyboard. Ah, what the hell, it was worth it. Thanks.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@JAHILL10:
“Do you think an asshole that big is going to change his stance because the Prez gives him a phone call?”
Man, I’ve *never* seen a bigger bunch of quitters than on this blog. “it might not have worked, so he was right to not try.”
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Bob Loblaw:
“Opposition budget?” What the hell are you talking about?
soonergrunt
@Brian S (formerly Incertus): What’s assholish about loving pie so much? Granted, it gets tiresome to constantly see him and the others go on and on and on about it, but at least he makes more sense, and appears more grounded in reality than he used to.
Jay C
Got it in one, John: I knew there was a reason I liked this blog…..
Katie5
@JAHILL10: But that cute boy, Ryan said vouchers. Vouchers sound like a good idea. Sounds like choice to me. I like choices. That’s freedom.
Besides, if you can’t get by with $15,000 a year for insurance, you’re a loser.
Sorry, just trying to get inside the head of someone who hasn’t lost all his marbles but buys into this stuff. Do you think people who are struggling to pay for health insurance already will make the connection to Ryan’s proposal? I’m not being cynical. I just don’t get why people wouldn’t automatically see Ryan’s proposal for the horror it is.
Ash Can
@Bruce S: Obama was on my TeeVee today, telling the entire nation that the Republicans are charlatans and their budget proposals are horsecrap. Sorry you missed it.
rapier
For better or for worse Medicare has always been a pay as you go program. There is no pretense that your contributions are being ‘saved’ in any sense.
It does raise a question however. Does the Ryan plan envision the payroll deduction continuing? He would have to I think or that $15K a year per person would come right out of the budget.
Well it doesn’t really matter. This is just another marker in the long game. The money to keep Medicare going at anywhere near the current service level isn’t going to be there. It’s been decided.
Midnight Marauder
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Wow. You are dense.
Opposition party’s budget. Does President Obama, a Democrat, have any input on the Republican-controlled House of Representatives’ budget?
That’s a pretty straightforward question even you should be able to figure out.
petesmom
“Or is this my “shared sacrifice,” and I’ll be told to eat a bag of salty dicks while they cut taxes for the Koch brothers and the rest of their fat cat donors and big business?”
Ding ding ding ding! We have a winner!
Davis X. Machina
I suspect I know why they wouldn’t. I’m guessing it’s because they’ve never heard of her.
The most well-known and highly respected middle class advocate in the country at any given time is about as well known as the Pittsburgh Pirates’ #2 starter.
FlipYrWhig
@Katie5:
Few people ever hear about the proposal itself. They’ll hear that someone made a proposal that involves the country getting its house in order by tightening its belt because we’re broke, and that’ll sound vaguely good, so they’ll see no reason not to keep voting the same way they always do, because the Democrats are
ni-diversity-loving queerbaits and commies who want to give their stuff toni-lazy moochers.Master of Karate and Friendship
@Midnight Marauder:
“Why, exactly, do you think Elizabeth Warren would be more beneficial as President of the United States, and not as an ally in the Senate to the current (and future) President of the United States?”
Well, it would be nice to have a president who didn’t prolong pointless wars and put Wall Street flacks like Geithner and Summers in vital positions. And it would be nice to have a president who doesn’t open up vast stretches of offshore drilling, and prosecute more whistleblowers than any other. Basically, the answer is “why would you want her as president and not Senator?” is because the president has a heck of a lot more power.
“She absolutely would not win” huh? So, you see the field of Republican challengers as a real muderers’ row that can’t be beat? Newtmania! Pawlenty fever!
Ash Can
Whereas those promoting the idea of Elizabeth Warren for POTUS in 2012 are thoroughly realistic and responsible.
JAHILL10
@Master of Karate and Friendship: Yeah, quitters…did the bill pass? After 40 years of failing to pass a bill, if I remember correctly, the bill passed. You are like the left’s equivalent of the right’s death panel squads. Forget that the foundation has been laid for universal health care, forget that 15 million more people who weren’t able to get insurance will now be able to get it. Forget all the other progress that was made. It wasn’t exactly what you wanted so it’s a failure.
FlipYrWhig
@Midnight Marauder: See, if he really WANTED to, he could have an impact on it, because, like, the president bully pulpits.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Davis X. Machina:
There is one thing we know with absolute ironclad certainty: a person can not go from “little-known” to “president of the united states” in a short time.
FlipYrWhig
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Um, do you know Elizabeth Warren’s stances on foreign policy? I don’t. But it wouldn’t be beyond the pale for someone to be the nation’s most outstanding consumer advocate and also a fervent supporter of humanitarian intervention.
ETA: I mean, it’s not like Obama himself didn’t rise to prominence as a critic of the Iraq war.
Midnight Marauder
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
It’s kind of crazy how all of your same arguments apply to the Senate, an institution we all recognize as being inherently broken and in desperate need of fresh liberal influence.
I’m pretty sure senators have a lot of fucking power, as well. And I’m pretty sure a good portion of the current senators use that power to directly fuck you over.
Especially the esteemed gentleman from Massachusetts.
Now, I know this might make Corner Stone upset, but I would love to see you lay out Elizabeth Warren’s path to the presidency, which would, of course, defeating President Obama in a primary. You can explain how this could happen, right? It isn’t just a whimsical fantasy you whipped up because you are incapable of grabbling with the discouraging nature of reality, right?
EDIT: What I really think is most revealing about this comment is how it showcases just how much damage W’s Imperial Presidency did to liberals in the last decade. “THE PRESIDENT HAS ALL THE POWER! ALL OF OUR GOOD PEOPLE SHOULD AIM FOR THAT OFFICE!” As though no other positions in our system of government are capable of being used to institute widescale change.
This is why we keep losing.
MarkJ
@jibeaux: You’re assuming they’d be human dicks. They could be pig dicks, or cow dicks. Last I checked a bag of hot dogs came pretty cheap.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Ash Can:
LOL. you people are just laughable. “Who would you like to run for president?”
“If it were up to me, Elizabeth Warren would run.”
“OMG WTF you are promoting Liz Warren as president!1! Your crazy! whats wrong with you?!?!?”
People, please, just read what is actually written. If you want to make things up, try a fan fiction website.
Jeffro
This is possibly the funniest BJ thread I’ve ever read…gallows humor will do that…
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Midnight Marauder:
“It’s kind of crazy how all of your same arguments apply to the Senate, an institution we all recognize as being inherently broken and in desperate need of fresh liberal influence.”
Actually, none of what I said applies to the Senate. The Senate didn’t extend the war in Afghanistan or appoint Wall Street tools like Geithner, or open up new areas to offshore drilling, or choose to prosecute whistleblowers at a historic pace.
“I’m pretty sure senators have a lot of fucking power, as well.”
Wow, good observation! If anyone here had actually said otherwise, you’d have checkmated them with that.
Amir_Khalid
@MarkJ:
Cow dicks? No such thing, dude.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
.
.
This is an important point. President Obama’s (and all Democrats’) current strategy of constantly compromising with a constantly rightward-moving target guarantees epic failure, of them personally as well as of the nation.
.
.
Bruce S
“the new Ryan proposal, that has existed for less than one day?”
Ryan’s proposal has been out – albeit not official – for many a moon. What’s frustrating is that the Dems have moved their NEGOTIATING POSITION to what Boehner was asking in the first place. I don’t fault the White House for having a layered strategy – but it doesn’t appear that they do. And I am furious that Organizing for America was deliberately turned into a lapdog rather than the grass-roots movement that it, in fact, was to a great extent during the campaign.
Obama used the FDR-A Phillip Randolph story – “Make me! – about holding his feet to the fire once he was elected because he knew the Oval Office was a position of compromise and finding a “center.” But his team threw away the best shot at moving that center to the more liberal side, with energy and enthusiasm at the grassroots. I’ve been persistent in defending Obama to lots of my glib lib friends, but it’s increasingly hard to defend the overall strategy when I see what a bunch of smug wimps constitue the OFA staff and that they are doing little-to-nothing on the ground. Many folks who put a lot of energy into the campaign feel like they were abandoned, in favor of “DNC with a smiley face” BS.
We had hundreds of people locally, ready to do grassroots issues work, and that initiative was left to wither by the “organizers” as soon as OFA was folded into the establishment Dems.
“Standing with the President” isn’t an agenda. It’s like if the 49ers “stood with Joe Montana” rather than formed a line and kicked some butt out in front to protect him while he did his job. The TeaBaggers took center stage, while Obama supporters went home. It didn’t have to be that way. This is elementary stuff – and the campaign will suffer in ’12 because if the organizational structure is alienating people like me – who were on board early, spent a lot of hard earned dollars and have defended the President’s real achievements against detractors to his left – they’ll not get those kids out who knocked on doors in Iowa, etc. Maybe they don’t give a sh*t, but that’s pretty damned cynical even for pros like Plouffe, Messina and Axelrod.
Master of Karate and Friendship
@FlipYrWhig:
“a fervent supporter of humanitarian intervention.”
Yes, Afghanistan is a real well of humanitarianism. Just look at its lack of corruption, its dearth of innocent casualties, the absence of “kill teams”…yessir, we’re doing the Lord’s work there.
Midnight Marauder
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Are you now attempting to argue that Elizabeth Warren has greater name recognition now that Barack Obama did before launching his presidential campaign?
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@Yog-Sothoth:
After whatever Uber Evil is coming in A-stan. The fire will start in A-stan and burn right though to Israel.
Do you come here often?
I’m a parttime Lovecraftian.
Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn
Master of Karate and Friendship
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
You put it better than I did. You should speak up in court more often, Clarence!
FlipYrWhig
@Master of Karate and Friendship: Right, that was the point. You don’t know that Elizabeth Warren is skeptical of wars the way you are. She may well be a “liberal interventionist.” So it seems kinda funny that one of the important reasons why she’s better than Obama is something that you have no idea about. How do you know you’re not just projecting that someone whose views you like on one set of issues also holds views you like across the board?
Katie5
Erick Erickson’s tweet:
“Lefties already attacking P Ryan’s budget for making sick old ppl negotiate a medicare policy. The left would send ’em to death panels.”
Why is this good messaging for the right? If you don’t want a death panel, we’re suggesting that you sick old ppl negotiate a medicare policy?
Guess I’m not thinking low enough in terms of low information voters.
Midnight Marauder
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
So, the Senate has no role in foreign policy matters like Afghanistan? The Senate did not, in fact, hold confirmation hearings on Timothy Geithner’s nomination to United States Secretary of the Treasury? The Senate never takes any votes on offshore drilling? The Senate doesn’t have any business with whistleblowers being prosecuted “at a historic pace?”
This is a pretty disingenuous argument. You may not have explicitly stated otherwise, but in your unrealistic preference to see Elizabeth Warren unseat President Obama, you certainly conveyed such a sentiment.
Jay C
Lots of reasons, but the main ones are:
1. A large number of those “business-loving conservatives” are in the healthcare and/or healthcare-insurance business: and since the “business” that they love the most is their own, are willing to spend vast sums (tho still chump-change compared to their profits) on buying legislative action/inaction to preserve their
government-financed gravy-trainmarket share.2. “Conservatives” in general have spent decades promulgating (and swallowing) the Official Line that “socialized medicine” (i.e., one where subsidies don’t benefit the Big Health industry) is Bad, Wrong, Evil and Un-American to the XXXXXth degree. Which is taken, pretty much as an article of faith which won’t – or can’t – be backpedalled on.
Of course, the notion that the only models for healthcare and healthcare insurance in this country are the existing one (American-Exceptionalist Perfection) or Bulgaria c. 1955 is pretty foolish. But that’s where it, sadly, seems to stand.
eemom
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
it’s so sweet how all the trolls luvs each other.
Ash Can
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Hey, you’re right:
Totally not promoting. My bad.
FlipYrWhig
@Master of Karate and Friendship: You have to weigh right-left against dogmatic-“reasonable,” though. You’re right that actively compromising with the right moves things to the right. But there are also benefits to projecting an image of “reasonableness” as against one of intransigence. Does being intransigent from the left keep things from moving to the right? Not necessarily. Being uncompromising from the left is _not_ rewarded in American politics.
Like I said, even people who vote for Democrats and self-identify as Democrats, when polled, say that they want to see Democrats and Republicans working together to find common ground. They _don’t want_ Democrats to be as cocksure and dogmatic as Republicans are. Democrat-supporting people who post on blogs like that fighting spirit more than, well, normal Democrat-supporting people do. That sucks, but that’s part of why the party behaves the way it does.
Person of Choler
Well, Mr. Cole, the Government giveth and the Government taketh away. Welcome to the group from whom the Government was takething away while givething it to somebody else.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Bob Loblaw:
Not until Grover’s checks start to bounce.
les
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Welcome to lala land. Again. Fuck me to tears.
My Lieberman. Let me show you it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: Master of Karate and Friendship was being critical of people for voting for supporting Obama, not being critical of Obama. I want to to see if the Master had a positive vision, as opposed to the purely negative one usually displayed here.
Tax Analyst
John, you of all people should know how bad salt is for you. All those salty dicks are just terrible for your blood pressure. You could wind up with a stroke.
When Rick Scott in appointed Surgeon General I’m sure he’ll recommend salt-free dicks for those currently under 55.
Triassic Sands
One of the best parts of Ryan-don’t-Care from the Wingers’ standpoint is that it takes a huge bloc of elderly voters and turns them into millions of individuals. Wingers like to kill unions because people are always weaker when they are forced to act as individuals. Likewise, taking Medicare recipients, all of whom get more or less the same thing from the program, and distributing them across a gigantic field of private insurers, all of whom will offer differ products at different prices, means that seniors will be so busy trying to keep from getting screwed by private insurers (and most, if not all, will fail) they will cease to be a coherent group with the same needs. No longer will advocates be able to speak for and to the needs of elderly health care recipients, because everyone will have something different.
United we stand. Divided we fall. And the Wingers want to make sure we’re divided.
JPL
fyi..according to TPM
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office’s initial analysis of the House GOP budget released today by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) is filled with nuggets of bad news for Republicans.
In addition to acknowledging that seniors, disabled and elderly people would be hit with much higher out-of-pocket health care costs, the CBO finds that by the end of the 10-year budget window, public debt will actually be higher than it would be if the GOP just did nothing.
hahaha…where are the trillions in savings??
Tunch
مجد الله. جون كول من قيمة القطعة من برعشيت. انني أشبه بالضرب smelly الكلب له اني للضعف في البكاء. وأضاف أن تخفيف فروغ صيحات وألم نفسي. ثم انني حمله يمكن فتح من سمك التونة.
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@Triassic Sands: yup. Fight. or bend over for another ass-raping.
Observer
@Midnight Marauder: General observation: it would be good to separate a situational analysis or assessment from an electoral action plan.
If you don’t agree with the situation, then it’s hard to argue about plans.
where @Master of Karate and Friendship stands, I don’t know but to me “Obama did a bad job on X” is an assessment. As is “the current Dem behaviour of compromising hasn’t worked well over the past 30 years”.
You and others always seem to move straight past any agreements on the assessment to the “oh yeah well we can’t elect anybody who thinks as stupidly/naively as you” sentiment.
So I guess my question is, future elections notwithstanding, do you think the current events and momentum of current Repub legislation across many states repudiates the Obama Dem tactic of compromising and seeking “bipartisanship” and do you think that Dem passivitiy has emboldened Repubs to propose even more outrageous legislation like trashing Medicare? So an assessment of events not an assessment of future electoral strategies.
One foot before the other.
singfoom
@JPL: Well, the CBO score is obviously partisan. I’m sure Ryan will have Republican facts to deflect those dreaded CBO facts soon.
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@Tunch: hai tunch, add ma emmak neketo la bayyak men tizo, hebil fik men bayadto.
joo should mail me Cole.
JPL
@singfoom: Ryan has unemployment at 2% and 5% annual growth. Some folks say he has magic ponies and others say he has been smokin something.
singfoom
@Observer:
I’ll answer for myself. Yes, I think the Democrats have been too passive and have allowed the Republicans to frame the debate. Obama’s seeking of “bipartisanship” has not produced anything useful. You can’t work out a deal when the other side wants you destroyed.
I find that assessment correct. Now, after that assessment is judged correct, where do we go?
Electorally, regardless of the correctness of that assessment, there’s not a lot to be done that’s not already being done…
singfoom
@JPL: It’s free market prosperity ponies all the way down!
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Observer:
For the first question, nope. Seeking bipartisanship makes Obama look like the adult in the room, which is what most Democratic and independent voters are looking for. Check the polls.
For the second question, nope again. 2010 was the 27 Percenters in panic mode after the shit sandwich that was the Bush administration and Obama election, bolstered by independents concerned over bailouts and the government monkeying with their health care, and all that on top of the usual who the fuck cares mentality American voters regard mid-term elections.
JPL
@singfoom: Since it is now known that his mentor Ayn Rand used medicare, what would she think?
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@JPL: IGMFY, of course.
JPL
@Observer: Our President needs to take a few lessons in how to confront bullies.
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@singfoom:
nice. ;)
Midnight Marauder
@Observer:
I would disagree with your classification of my sentiment. I don’t really see it as a situation where “we can’t election anybody who think as stupidly/naively as you.” Rather, I would classify it as “show me how your action plan materializes in the real world.” If we are having a reality-based discussion of Democratic electoral prospects in 2012, it would be the height of foolishness to start with any plan that has Obama being primaried. Now, that isn’t because I think President Obama is the greatest who can do no wrong and has never disappointed anyone; rather, it is because I do not believe the electoral support exist for another Democrat to make a legitimate challenge against President Obama. That person just doesn’t exist.
Moreover, I feel like your position largely neglects the question I asked regarding why Elizabeth Warren would be more valuable as POTUS than as a senator, where she actually stands a realistic chance of winning an election and being able to affect real change from a position of great prominence. Not only that, but she would be doing it in an institution that liberals vehemently believe is long overdue to experience a radical transformation.
No, I don’t think it repudiates any of the things you mention at all. I think what the aftermath of the 2010 elections has demonstrated to us is just how much damage and mayhem Republicans can unleash when they are confronted with an apathetic, fractured, disinterested opposition. I don’t think Alex Sink lost her race for the Florida Governor’s mansion because President Obama and the Democrats in Congress kept compromising and seeing “bipartisanship”; I think she she lost because the voters of Florida failed to do their due diligence on Rick Scott and fell hook, line and sinker for his big con. And I would say the formula is the same all across the country.
It’s the same with Kaisch in Ohio, Walker in Wisconsin, Snyder in Michigan, LePage in Maine, and to a lesser extent, Jan Brewer in Arizona.
I think Republicans are emboldened to eliminate Medicare because, on a large scale, the populace of this country has repeatedly demonstrated they do not have the attention span or critical thinking skills to see Paul Ryan’s plan for exactly what it is and punish them accordingly.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
Meanwhile, Debbie Wasserman Schultz gets the nod for DNC chair, but I’m sure that’s all part of the Great Democratic Sellout too.
Corner Stone
@Midnight Marauder: The burden you keep trying to heap on there is ridiculous.
There are absolutely zilch people anywhere saying Obama will not be the D nominee for president. It’s beyond utter disgrace that some keep asking who should replace Obama, and delineate that path.
Just fucking garbage.
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig:
IIRC, President Obama stepped in pretty fucking hard and got the Bush Tax Cuts extended for all.
Or did “The Deal” not come from him after all?
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus: And you see the disingenuous slagging that came from it, what what?
Apparently now he’s crafting a campaign speech for Warren where she references Bobby Kennedy’s run.
Corner Stone
@JPL: Why do you think they’ve spent the last 18 months attempting to destroy the CBO’s reputation?
Midnight Marauder
@Corner Stone:
Now, there may not be anyone saying President Obama won’t be the Democratic nominee, but there are plenty of people (particularly on this site) who want to see him primaried, believing the notion that it would somehow serve as a constructive act.
So I don’t think it’s unfair, when confronted with individuals who are so adamant about the failure that is the Obama Presidency thus far, to ask them what would be their ideal remedy if they could have their way in 2012.
The fact that those remedies are entirely untethered from reality is a personal problem for them.
And it’s really weird that you would make this comment while following up on a string of conversation featuring someone whose best option for the White House is Elizabeth Warren, an individual progressive and liberal groups have been targeting for a Senate run for over a year now.
Bruce S
“Ayn Rand used medicare”
That should be a bumper sticker…
Observer
@Midnight Marauder:
Okay, so if we keep going on this and again if we just limit ourselves to analysis of past events without regard to future elections, then…
One incident of a behaviour is an anecdote, the “same all across” the country is a data point. Is it really accurate to say the public is at blame if the same thing is repeated across the country? People believe what they hear. They seem to believe what Repubs are saying so it’s not fair to say they are uninformed or even misinformed if the Dems never tell their side of the story.
Would you agree that its the Dems who are the problem since we have a data point not an anecdote and that Dems are particularly bad at either a) campaigning b) messaging c) picking candidates or d) some other explanation.
Isn’t blaming the public a cheap and easy way out of identifying and confronting a problem?
jcricket
The whole thing is a lie from top to bottom, yet barely a ripple goes by in the press. This plan will destroy Medicare (making it so seniors go broke for healthcare costs like the rest of us), Medicaid, increase taxes on the middle class, remove insurance from the estimated 15 million people that would have access under the ACA in the next decade – and on top of that, will increase the deficit. Top of the top of that it’s all based on false assumptions and shoddy math. Yet the press is reporting it like it’s all real.
Republicans have figured the game out. Say whatever you want, and as long as you stick to your guns, no one calls you on it.
But if Dems have any sense, they’ll do the same (lock-stop opposition). Make it clear and simple. Republicans are killing Medicare, Medicaid and raising taxes on everyone except the already insanely rich. Hell, skip the last part. All that matters is stopping this.
If Dems do anything like they did during the SS privatization debate we might have a chance, but that seems like a fluke to me. Even the press could barely believe the Dems achieved that, since they seemed all gaga over Bush’s bullshit SS-killing ideas.
The unions are waking up – teachers are waking up – Dems can harness this energy and ride it back to power (or at least keep the Senate and WH and claw back a few House seats) in 2012. Or we can sit here with our thumbs up our asses cowering in fear because we don’t look “serious”.
Corner Stone
@Midnight Marauder: Who wants him primaried? That’s also garbage.
I’ve seen lots of toss off “if there’s Boots Onna Ground ™ then I’m done with him!” bullshit but c’mon. Who has said there’s a primary in Obama’s future.
It’s a wingnut tactic to draw out an answer from a hypothetical and then slag it as being unSerious.
jcricket
@Observer: I agree with you – Republicans are to blame for being lying cheating hacks. The public is somewhat to blame for not investigating. But equal to the Republicans in blame are the Democrats for failing, time and again, to make it clear who we are and what we stand for.
We bend over backwards to avoid talking about adequate taxation, and the proper role of government, and all it gets us is a country moving further to the right because the right wing is motivated and the coalition of the Dems stays home.
Dilbatt
At least you will get your salty dicks. I really hate them without salt.
Redwood Rhiadra
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
Even if every Dem had voted in lockstep in 2009, Obama never had 60 Senators. Kennedy died only six weeks after Franken was finally seated, during which he was too sick to vote. There were never more than 59 functioning Democratic Senators.
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: I will admit that it did not go well. I am just tired of people projecting pure negativity. Don’t like this politician? Name a viable replacement. Don’t like a policy? Suggest a better one. We are living in the real world and perfect policies and politicians do not exist.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus: The real world dictates Obama will be the D nominee. And he’s going to do what he’s going to do as a politician.
So what are people who are frustrated and angry about real issues supposed to do? Not talking about people who want an executive order to cleanse their palates.
Talking about people who have deeply held convictions that have been utterly destroyed by the previous admin, and seemingly left in the creek bed by the current one.
Those people should STFU if they can’t map out how HRC II beats Obama to the nomination in 2012?
Midnight Marauder
@Observer:
Um, yeah. I think it is fair to blame the public if the same ills befall them all over the country. “People believe what they hear.” Is that a serious argument? Are we now going to disabuse people of the notion that an educated, informed, engaged populace is something we desire as a country? I mean, look at the argument you are making right now in defense of people voting against their self-interest year after year, decade after decade:
Yeah, it’s pretty fucking fair to say that someone who believes what Republicans are selling this day and age is uninformed or just does not give a fuck about being a decent human being. What I find really weird is this notion that it is the responsibility of the Democratic Party to inform the citizens of this nation as to the fact that Republicans are craven lying charlatans. I can’t let the voting populace of this country of the hook that easily. At some point, you have to make a conscious decision to aggressively challenge the world around you when you find that the information and beliefs you hold dear no longer match up with reality, if they ever did at all. That is not entirely, or even mainly, the fault of the Democratic Party. People need to learn to accept the fact that the voting populace of this country is largely ignorant of public policy matters (big and small), and that isn’t only because Democrats don’t do a good enough job pushing out their message. At some point, people have to start seeking out the message for themselves, or taking it upon themselves to create their own message to fill the vacuum.
I have said repeatedly and often on this site that the Left is terrible at long-term campaigning on public policy issues, as well as just everyday messaging. We are terrible about these things. But that by itself cannot be the entire problem, as it completely takes any responsibility away from the voting populace of this country for their unfathomably abysmal decision making over the past year.
No, because the public is just as much the problem–if not a larger share of the problem–than the incompetence of the Democratic Party’s messaging machine. I am not sure why you find it so disconcerting to blame the public for having horrendous judgment and voting against their own self-interests time and time again.
EDIT: Also, I just wanted to address this point specifically:
Yes. Because there are a lot of stupid, lazy, uninformed people in this country. This should be rather unsurprising.
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: As you said, the real world dictates that Obama will be the 2012 Dem nominee. What can people do? Find a good Congressional candidate. Start looking for the charismatic liberal to be the standard bearer in 2016. I know some of it is just venting frustration; I am doing it too.
Wolfdaughter
@Martin:
Yes, I like their idea that my working most of my life and paying into my pension and SS and now collecting same, is “stealing” from them. I’m always astonished at the glibertarians, (mostly young men), who accuse great-aunt-Cathy of stealing from them.
Corner Stone
Some things are hard.
Wolfdaughter
@Master of Karate and Friendship:
AAAARRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!
How can you post that? Obama NEVER had that kind of control. I remind you that Franken’s election was contested to the bitter end. Then Teddy got brain cancer. If both of them had been in the Senate simultaneously, then there would have been 60 nominal Dems in the Senate. But a couple of those are pretty much DINOs only. OTOH, the only way I can understand the Dems allowing themselves to be steamrolled on the filibuster thing is that a number of them are just as much on the take as almost every Repub.
We need to throw our fullthroated support behind Dems like Franken, and my own Rep, Raul Grijalva, and do our best to get some real Dems elected instead of the Blue Dogs.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@Omnes Omnibus:
.
.
Puh-leeze, balloonbagger. Don’t you understand that we are living in the real world, and that there is no such thing as pure negativity?
The politician is irrelevant. S/he, or any replacement, is expected to do the job they were elected to do, and to keep the promises that won the election.
Oh, like maybe single payer? That gets you arrested by Dems. Perhaps you were thinking of the Public Option, traded away by President Obama himself in a secret backroom deal. Ending the Bush tax cuts for the filthy rich? Enforcing the Geneva Conventions? Acting in accordance with the Constitution? Prosecuting all lawbreakers for their past lawbreaking? Reining in Wall Street banksters? Preventing global warming? Making big business accountable? There are no end of good suggestions being made – and ignored.
Those of us actually living in the real world evaluate real-world politicians and real-world policies by evaluating real-world results. In the real world, plausible deniability, secret backroom deals, un-Constitutional actions on the job, the acceleration of secrecy, violence, injustice and unaccountability, and compromising capitulations with depraved Republicans and other right-wing sociopaths, even though accompanied by a flowery speech, supposed good intentions and a toothy grin, are not acceptable substitutes. Those indicate real-world fuckups who are fucking up the real world. Really. My advice to you? Get real.
.
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Observer
@Midnight Marauder:
I hope this isn’t getting tedious and I suspect this conversation will have to move to some other thread at some point but I think we have a legitimate point of divergence of opinion in the assessment of events. So this is what I mean by one foot at a time. I can’t speak for anybody else but I don’t believe this view:
…is universally held by Dems. It is, in my opinion, completely and totally wrong but rather than argue the merits I would posit that those like @Master of Karate and Friendship would disagree with you and those who seem to be Obama “defenders” would agree. But that’s a hypothesis and may be totally 100% wrong and I’m not wedded to that position, it’s just a guess or a surmisation, a conjecture as it were.
I think it’s totally wrong and is an indicator of a wider disagreement more structural and I’d bet if you were to be flipped on that, you would flip on a lot of other things as well. But again it’s just a conjecture.
…Anyways, the reason I think it’s wrong is because an election is a sales contest. If you can’t get the sales because the mark is uninformed then you figure out how to get them informed. The onus is always on the sales org to make the sale. He who benefits and all that.
Yes the onus is on the consumer to be well informed if they want to buy a quality product, but (and I think this is where there’s confusion within your viewpoint) within the context of a sales meeting where your competitor just outsold you blaming the loss of a sale on an uninformed consumer still means it’s your fault and that the other side has a better sales force. If you needed to get them educated, then you should have found a way to have gotten them educated. So within the context of deciding which sales team VP runs a better sales org, then you suck.
So within the context of an assessment of Dems, you are telling me that you agree that the Dems suck eggs and don’t know what they’re doing. I realize you probably won’t agree with that last statement, but in terms of what I just outlined, that’s what “the public is uneducated” line means.
I’m not saying you’re going to flip but you should strongly consider that and again thats within the context of determining which sales team is better.
Wolfdaughter
@Captain Haddock:
Just sayin…
THIS 65-year-old wants all others who’ve contributed to get theirs back. And help for those unable to work.
Not all of us grayhairs are selfish ignorant assholes like the TeaBaggers. I also have no children or grandchildren, but I recognize that education benefits us all except the Galtian overlords. Actually, it benefits them too, they’re just too blinded by avarice and general selfishness to recognize it. I have a bumper sticker which says, “Everybody does better when EVERYBODY does better.” Liberal, generous, open-hearted, and proud of it!
Tax Analyst
@Wolfdaughter:
Nicely put, if I do say so my 61 year old self.
Midnight Marauder
@Observer:
Well, I would be the first to tell you that position isn’t held universally by Dems, but it certainly seems to come up a lot in threads of this nature. Nonetheless, I find your analogy of the sales contest interesting, and I think it represents a fine venue for me to further elucidate my differences on this matter:
Now, where I differ with you is in my perception of the sales contest. We aren’t talking about a bunch and one-off, “hit it and quit it” sales contest. We are talking about an perpetual, always evolving sales contest in which the same actors often reprise their roles. As such, marks who are regularly participants in the sales contest should have some knowledge about the various actors on each side and their respective history in the sales contest. This is the same standard we desperately want for the Traditional Media, and I can’t imagine why people would not want it adopted by the populace as a whole.
Continuing, if the mark has a knowledge base of the participants in the sales contest, then there is a certain burden on the mark to remember who offered them a decent, respectable (if not complete) deal last time, and who robbed them fucking blind and then set their car on fire.
Where I disagree here is that it takes two parties to make the transaction complete. If we take your example, we are talking about one sales force that may have more talent, but also has a history of lying right to your fucking face and fleecing you in every deal. At some point, the onus shifts from the other sales force trying to convince you that you are getting a bad deal, to you as an individual repeatedly accepting and enabling a bad deal. I think your position also neglects the fact that you cannot educate people who have no desire to be educate. Informing the populace is a two-way street. Yes, the Democratic Party needs to improve its messaging, but the voting populace of this country also needs to be able to name more than one sitting Supreme Court justice if they want to be taken seriously.
Yes, I agree the Dems have a horrible messaging machine. I also would submit that a vast percentage of the voting populace is much more inclined to spend their free time voting for American Idol contestants than they are to spend a little time researching the nuances of the Affordable Care Act. You know, that law that 1 in 5 Americans believes was repealed. Can it be a situation where the inept Demoractic Party messaging machines shares equal blame with the utter intellectual apathy of the American public?
And my entire point is that if you think the sales team sucks, then you should go to work taking over the sales team and staffing it with your own people. At every level–community, local, state, national.
That is precisely what the Republican Party did over the past few decades and look at the dividends it paid off for them.
Wolfdaughter
@Bruce S:
I, too, am disappointed in some of what Obama has been doing. I’m on the fence about Libya. I wish he’d hung tough about the trials in Gitmo being moved to the U.S. proper as civilian trials, but I don’t think that the fact that they will be military trials is an automatic assumption that they won’t be done correctly. I wish he’d reinstated habeas corpus more vigorously. I wish…for all sorts of things.
But we libs/progs have 2 choices going into 2012: work to re-elect Obama and as many Democrats as we can, and then start using the Internet bully pulpit, ActBlue, MoveOn, etc., to lean on those who aren’t as committed to justice, mercy, better situations for the little guy. Or we sit on our hands or vote for 3rd party candidates with a snowball’s chance in Tucson of winning, and let the Repubs again take over by default. When it comes to a choice between getting some of what we want and working harder to get more, vs. being “governed” by bugfuck crazy, I’ll go for the 1st option.
I have no problem with working to create a viable 3rd party, but that will require many years to come to fruition. It’s not a realistic option in 2012.
Wolfdaughter
@Tax Analyst:
Thank you! (Modest blush).
jake the snake
@Brian S (formerly Incertus):
Soylent Dicks are tasty.
Paula
@Midnight Marauder:
The next response is gonna involve something about “polls” and how the American public really, really does support progressive legislation, only secret-like.
Polar Bear Squares
I’m thinkin’ salty ashy dick surprise. With a side dish of “you didn’t enjoy it? It must be your fault.”
FlipYrWhig
@Observer:
I would answer “no” to both. In fact, I would say that — and you’re not going to like this — the fact that Republicans have behaved as they have may well _vindicate_ the Obama strategy of seeking common ground, taking half a loaf, and all those frustrating things that the blogosphere hates. Republicans refuse to compromise. Republicans, in fact, find creative new ways to say “fuck you” to whole classes of people. They didn’t run on that. In fact, they ran almost on precisely the opposite: they ran on Democratic overreach and on Obama ramming things down the American throat. Then, after being rewarded for that, they immediately commenced an absolute orgy of Fuck Yous.
Middle-of-the-road voters don’t like that. The kinds of Democrats who flirt with voting Republican in key elections don’t like that. It’s hugely risky for the future of the Republican party to act like assholes to the degree that they have. In the liberal blogosphere we all long for Democrats to say, fuck you right back. But the general public actually doesn’t go for that.
We’ll see how it goes, but given all the mess that has come down since Obama took over, I have to think that the willingness to be constructive and to hammer out distasteful, yes, compromises, the act that consistently irritates the blogs, is part of what’s keeping him aloft.
Observer
@Midnight Marauder: took me a while to get back to the computer ….is there some protocol for continuing this in another thread or something?
This isn’t true. And I don’t mean that in a “IMHO I think this is wrong” way, I mean it in a “factually speaking, this is incorrect” way. You had it right earlier:
It’s a contest with only two combatants. The “mark” is a spectator. In this contest the mark is the dependent variable and the actions of the different sales teams are the independent variables. At the same time that this is going on (and this is where your position is confused) the voter is also conducting an ongoing experiment to determine “product satisfaction” from previous decisions. There are two different but overlapping things going on at the same time.
One is a contest and the other is a perpetual feedback loop decision evaluation system. It’s like if you go to a ribs event every year. There’s a ton of vendors: you’re looking for the best ribs. At the same time, the ribs vendors are competing to induce you to buy from them. But these are two separate but overlapping things. So from the perspective of the contest amongst vendors and evaluating who’s doing a better job, you *cannot* say “it’s up to the consumer to know more”. that’s besides the point in determining the winner of that contest. The level of consumer education is a dependent variable from the perspective of the contest. So I hope this makes sense to you.
=========================
I completely agree and believe that’s what others like @Master of Karate and Friendship have been trying to build a consensus on and have been met with non-sequitors about future elections. First steps and all that. You have to agree on the situational assessment first.
Observer
@FlipYrWhig: It took me a couple of reads to figure out why I knew something was off in your reply but I did figure it out.
You’ve cleverly (and not necessarily on purpose) switched the topic in a bait-and-switch. The question calls for a situational assessment *now* in terms of wanting an explanation of today’s Republican behavior in relation to past Dem behavior. Your reply took today’s Republican behavior as a given, and then preceded to assess whether past Dem behavior will be vindicated and result in future electoral success. The almost the opposite of what’s being asked.
Very sneaky Flipper. presumably not on purpose but that’s what you did.
The question is why did they do that after the election. Don’t talk about Obama’s future election. Why do you think they did that and does it have anything to do with Dem passivity and compromise. If not, then what? (Saying “that’s what Repubs do” doesn’t answer the question). And remember the question related to Repub Governors more than just the national party. What’s your assessment?
Tim in SF
JC, I LOL’d when I read this. I hope you don’t mind but I stole it for a comment on Slate. It was too good not to repeat.
Mr Furious
@FlipYrWig
I don’t need, want, or expect Obama to reply to a plan like Ryan’s with “Fuck you, too!” but I also need to know he and the rest of the “negotiators” aren’t going to throw Ryan’s plan up on the other side of the scale and start moving towards it.
Ryan’s plan needs to be treated as illustrative of the GOP’s plan to burn the country down, and nothing more. It can NOT be treated as one half of an eventual compromise.
Forget all about Medicare and all that projective CBO bullshit. Just hammer away at the fact under Ryan’s plan, that the top bracket drops to 25% and every normal taxpayer loses the only tax deductions they ever used (mortgage, charity and state income taxes).
But make no mistake about it. If Obama doesn’t do it, no one else will “inform” the public. I heard this Ryan plan treated as legitimate on NPR all goddamn afternoon yesterday. Just like that fucking Catfood Commission.
Mr Furious
And I don’t want to hear any more about the public getting better educated and informed on the issues. How exactly is THAT supposed to come about? The GOP lies with impunity and immunity during every campaign, and then when they finally show any cards as Ryan did yesterday, the worthless except for protecting their own wealthy asses media responds with a collective, “Fuck it. I can live with this plan. Run it up the flag pole for him!”
Again, NPR covered this breathlessly yesterday. Is the public supposed to read Ryan’s plan and every 25,000 page piece of legislation for themselves?