Rip, mi gop

[archfan]

Interesting. I have Muslim friends justifying the attack and destruction of the Trade Towers, and the people inside.

Are they imaginary friends?

[Honky Tonk]

Are they imaginary friends?

No. I met them on YouTube. They made a video, speaking directly to me.

[oladub]

In the aftermath of our decisions in Iraq that resulted in tens if not hundreds of thousands of dead, innocent Iraqis, it was one political party that was trying to tell me that it was OK.

"Fiscal conservatism" of the Republicans is a joke, as we have watched the annual deficits rise while the Republicans controlled EVERYTHING for the first two years of the Trump era.

I largely agree. Bush lied about the WMD's but we mustn't forget his allies included many Democrats. Senator Clinton was a cheerleader for the Iraq war. Bernie, to his credit, voted against the Iraq war. Don't forget about Lyndon Johnson who got us into the Vietnam War in which 60,000 Americans died. Also, you neglected to mention that Obama/Kerry/Clintion overthrew Khaddafi and attempted to overthrow Assad causing additional hundreds of thousands of Arab deaths and added to the millions of refugees. When Trump mused about getting our troops out of Syria and half out of Afghanistan, he was driven back by neocons and Democrats who went silent.

I also agree that Republicans fell well short of fiscal conservatism. BushII doubled the national debt before Obama doubled it again. Obama raised the national debt by $120,000 for the average family of four. Trump is on track to run up the debt at the same rate as BushII. Canadian Visitor listed ideas about how to check spending. So far, we haven't heard of many ideas from Democrats. Which Democrat has proposed a plan to decrease the federal debt? I'm hearing free college, free health care, Green New Deal, providing for everyone crossing our open borders but so far nothing about shrinking the national debt.

[Meddle]

Gray
Old
Prudes


Can't go extinct soon enough for me.

[Jimaz]

How Fox News and Right-Wing Media Brainwashed This Dad and Destroyed a Family

• The Brainwashing Of My Dad

[Honky Tonk]

How Fox News and Right-Wing Media Brainwashed This Dad and Destroyed a Family

• The Brainwashing Of My Dad

As told by his brainwashed left-wing son.

[Jimaz]

How Fox News and Right-Wing Media Brainwashed This Dad and Destroyed a Family
The Brainwashing Of My Dad

As told by his brainwashed left-wing son daughter.

Fixed that for ya.

Okay, now you have unwittingly confessed to commenting on a link you hadn't even clicked.

Are any of your future comments even worth reading?

You had promise for a moment there but you botched it.

Deprogram yourself, Honky Tonk:

• TruthOut.org
• AlterNet.org

[Honky Tonk]

Fixed that for ya.

Okay, now you have unwittingly confessed to commenting on a link you hadn't even clicked.

Are any of your future comments even worth reading?

You had promise for a moment there but you botched it.

Deprogram yourself, Honky Tonk:

• TruthOut.org
• AlterNet.org

Speaking of programs, do you think anyone watches your 1 hour specials?
Physician, heal thyself.

[Zads07]

Of course this thread has gone off the rails.

It seems no one can actually stay on point and realize that the main fact in the article is that REPUBLICANS have unfairly tried to legally cheat the system in order to stay in power.

That shows a couple of things. First off, that although legal, the GOP has been caught cheating and second, that more votes and voters are skewing left, away from the right and it showed in the presidential election and it's showing in how gerrymandering will be gone.

Face facts here, the Republican party as we knew, prior to Trump, it is starting to go the way of the Dodo.

[Bigdd]

Of course this thread has gone off the rails.

It seems no one can actually stay on point and realize that the main fact in the article is that REPUBLICANS have unfairly tried to legally cheat the system in order to stay in power.

Unless you consider people promising to give away trillions of other people's money in exchange for votes as being cheating. [[Like they did again with Obamacare, where they steal from a small group and give to two large groups,.. as a means to buy their votes).

Nearly 50% of Americans now receive government checks of some kind. Pretty soon it will be impossible for a conservative to win an election, and we'll quickly spiral into Venezuela.



Can the nation be saved?

[Gistok]

Pretty soon it will be impossible for a conservative to win an election, and we'll quickly spiral into Venezuela.

Nice use of a slippery slope fallacy there with the Venezuela comparison...

Slippery slope is one example of a fallacy. It is an argument that suggests taking a minor action will lead to major and sometimes ludicrous consequences.

[Zads07]

Unless you consider people promising to give away trillions of other people's money in exchange for votes as being cheating. [[Like they did again with Obamacare, where they steal from a small group and give to two large groups,.. as a means to buy their votes).

Nearly 50% of Americans now receive government checks of some kind. Pretty soon it will be impossible for a conservative to win an election, and we'll quickly spiral into Venezuela.



Can the nation be saved?

Can you cite your sources for what you believe to be fact? You're going off topic, once again. Deflect, but can't defend the legal cheating. Please address the topic.

[aj3647]

This is Michigan State Senate District 14, represented by Ruth Johnson [[R):

https://www.senate.michigan.gov/2011...trict%2014.pdf

There's literally a section of it [[bottom right) that is connected to the rest of the district by a single intersection. Not gerrymandered though, right? That's just an obviously natural way to draw a contiguous district!

[Bigdd]

Can you cite your sources for what you believe to be fact? You're going off topic, once again. Deflect, but can't defend the legal cheating. Please address the topic.

Well,.. you could spend 2 min reading up on Obamacare for example.

One of many examples just in the ACA alone is;... It costs insurance companies 7x as much to insure an 80 year old as it does a 20 year old. But the ACA makes it illegal for insurance companies to charge the octogenarian more than 3x the 20 year old. [[Essentially, this acts as a massive wealth transfer to the elderly,.. who outnumber the younger generation,.. and like to vote).

They ACA also subsidizes the poor heavily. and there's lots of poor. So essentially those two massive voting blocks are being heavily subsidized by the 27 - 60 year old working people that make $80k a year or more [[A WAY smaller voting block than the poor and elderly combined). So the left buys themselves a lot of votes, while robbing a hundred million or more of their health "coverage".

Of course you aren't going to understand that last sentence,.. so I'll have to explain it.

Having "Coverage" is different than having "a plan". My family for example still has "a plan",.. [[I.E. I still have a plastic card in my wallet,.. which I pay $12,000 a year for),.. but now the deductible is $14,300. So it no longer actually covers anything.Pull out the card when your child needs their tonsils out, and you still pay 100% of the $8,000 cost. So to save money I have to tell doctor's offices that I don't have any insurance. That way I get the cash price of $1,900 and save $6,100.

So yeah,.. 20 million more people have "a plan",.. but perhaps 100 - 200 million people lost "coverage". [[Coverage being defined as the plan actually PAYING for stuff).

All done to buy votes for the left. So yeah,.. cheating is massive,.. but gerrymandering hardly makes the list in terms of importance.

[aj3647]

Having "Coverage" is different than having "a plan". My family for example still has "a plan",.. [[I.E. I still have a plastic card in my wallet,.. which I pay $12,000 a year for),.. but now the deductible is $14,300. So it no longer actually covers anything.Pull out the card when your child needs their tonsils out, and you still pay 100% of the $8,000 cost. So to save money I have to tell doctor's offices that I don't have any insurance. That way I get the cash price of $1,900 and save $6,100.

And that's the fault of Obamacare...how again? There's no individual mandate anymore, that's YOUR CHOICE to pay $12,000 a year for a High-Deductible Health Plan [[HDHP), AKA "garbage." You could put that 12K into a Health Savings Account and would probably be better off. And you clearly did NOT buy that garbage policy on the Obamacare Exchange, since those policies are required to meet minimum Actuarial Values. Even the lowest-tier bronze plans cap cost-sharing at 40% to the beneficiary.

Also, take a f'ing guess as to what the GOP "alternative" to Obamacare is for people like you? If you guessed "High Deductible Health Plans", ding ding ding you're a winner because that's their alternative. Allow insurance companies to sell junk HDHPs across state lines and charge you money while offering you almost nothing in return, that's the GOP's health care plan.

[Zads07]

Well,.. you could spend 2 min reading up on Obamacare for example.

One of many examples just in the ACA alone is;... It costs insurance companies 7x as much to insure an 80 year old as it does a 20 year old. But the ACA makes it illegal for insurance companies to charge the octogenarian more than 3x the 20 year old. [[Essentially, this acts as a massive wealth transfer to the elderly,.. who outnumber the younger generation,.. and like to vote).

They ACA also subsidizes the poor heavily. and there's lots of poor. So essentially those two massive voting blocks are being heavily subsidized by the 27 - 60 year old working people that make $80k a year or more [[A WAY smaller voting block than the poor and elderly combined). So the left buys themselves a lot of votes, while robbing a hundred million or more of their health "coverage".

Of course you aren't going to understand that last sentence,.. so I'll have to explain it.

Having "Coverage" is different than having "a plan". My family for example still has "a plan",.. [[I.E. I still have a plastic card in my wallet,.. which I pay $12,000 a year for),.. but now the deductible is $14,300. So it no longer actually covers anything.Pull out the card when your child needs their tonsils out, and you still pay 100% of the $8,000 cost. So to save money I have to tell doctor's offices that I don't have any insurance. That way I get the cash price of $1,900 and save $6,100.

So yeah,.. 20 million more people have "a plan",.. but perhaps 100 - 200 million people lost "coverage". [[Coverage being defined as the plan actually PAYING for stuff).

All done to buy votes for the left. So yeah,.. cheating is massive,.. but gerrymandering hardly makes the list in terms of importance.

Again, you didn't cite any sources. I am trying to have a discussion, but ranting without citing an actual source [[website) that you're getting this information from is what I'm looking for.

Again, stop deflecting and please address why you are defending the legal cheating of gerrymandering.

[Meddle]

Can you cite your sources for what you believe to be fact?

Can you just ignore Big Dummy?

[aj3647]

As for political parties buying votes with taxpayer dollars...

Annual budget deficit by year:
2014: $485 billion
2015: $438 billion
2016: $585 billion
2017: $665 billion
2018: $779 billion [[first full budget that belongs to Trump and the GOP)
2019: $985 billion [[actually on pace now for between $1 trillion and $1.4 trillion)
2020: $1.103 trillion [[projected)

$13 billion in welfare payments alone to Midwestern farmers, but that's not vote buying???

In case you were curious, last month [[March 2019) set the record for most deficit spending in a single month in U.S. history...ever. $234 billion in deficit spending in just one month. Not even at the height of the Great Recession under Obama were we spending that much more than we were taking in.

https://www.businessinsider.com/us-b...al-debt-2019-3

Our "booming economy" is being artificially fueled by record deficit spending. We're not supposed to be running deficit this massive when the economy is good. We are artificially accelerating the economy with a massive influx of borrowed Chinese money to the tune of over a trillion dollars a year now, this is how Trump gets those magical economic numbers...by putting us into massive debt to foreign creditors. Just like how he runs his businesses.

[Richard]

^ 13 billion in welfare payments alone to Midwestern farmers, but that's not vote buying???

Did it buy your vote? I hope so because the trickle down is the cost of putting food on your table.You benefited from it.

Either that or allow 2 companies to control our entire food supply.

That was not welfare to the farmers,that was money given to the farmers for payment of providing your welfare.

[aj3647]

^ 13 billion in welfare payments alone to Midwestern farmers, but that's not vote buying???

Did it buy your vote? I hope so because the trickle down is the cost of putting food on your table.You benefited from it.

Either that or allow 2 companies to control our entire food supply.

That was not welfare to the farmers,that was money given to the farmers for payment of providing your welfare.

No, genius, it was payment to soybean farmers and others to make up for lost international sales [[to China) as a result of retaliatory tariffs China placed on U.S. agricultural imports due to Trump's trade war.

Neither you nor I benefit from that $13 billion in welfare to the farmers, only THEY benefit from it because it compensates them for losses from FOREIGN [[not domestic) sales. Your ignorance of the basic economics involved with this issue is almost impressive.

https://www.npr.org/2018/07/24/63195...offset-tariffs

What you're erroneously referring to are traditional farm subsidies, which you've confused with the $13 billion in welfare payments given as tariff relief, which is an entirely separate issue. If you don't know what the hell you're talking about, maybe just keep your mouth shut.

[Bigdd]

No, genius, it was payment to soybean farmers and others to make up for lost international sales [[to China) as a result of retaliatory tariffs China placed on U.S. agricultural imports due to Trump's trade war.

[[Just in case anyone misinterpreted the sentence you wrote)

It should be mentioned that RESPONDING to CHINA's trade war is the president's JOB.

China has had horrific tariffs on our products going there for many decades. They break it down into a list of fees and duties,.. so the raw tariff doesn't seem so huge.

But for example [[and I witness this first hand,.. as I visit China a bit and have property there).

Anyway,..I was there in 2008 and a friend bought a Mercedes ML350. They're built in Alabama.

Here they would have sold for about $44,000. In China they're $120,000 after tariffs, duties and fees.

Some will try to decieve you and just quote one of those numbers, so as to make it seem like China only charges 25% or something,.. but in reality it's more like 185%,.. ON TOP OF the cost of the car.

Want to buy a 2010 VW CC as my sister in law did? If you get one assembled in China, it will cost you $22,000,.. just like they were here at the time. But buy a German assembled one, and it's more like $60,000.


So how long should the various presidents stab American workers in the back to help China? How many millions of manufacturing jobs should we give away? [[And keep in mind that manufacturing and energy extraction is the source of ALL wealth).

The proper solution is, we react with retaliatory tariffs. That escalates back and forth until finally both parties come to their senses and sit down at the table and work it out. Then we end up with a couple percent tariff this way on X product,.. and couple percent tariff that way on Y and Z products, and everyone''s happy for a decade or two.

If the president does nothing,.. he's abdicated his job.

Don't let the America and president hating pinkos on CNN fool you, China started this trade war.

The previous 3-4 presidents just cared more about massive corporations and how much profit they could make by shipping manufacturing overseas than they did about American workers.

And we're seeing the results of having a populist instead of a corporate lackey in the WH now. Manufacturing is moving back to the US, unemployment is at an all time low, and for the first time in decades,.. wages are finally starting to inch ever so slightly upwards.

[Richard]

^ okay Mr economics professor,Bham,tariff relief or not,did the farmers stick that 13 billion in the bank or did it flow directly back into the economy?

In your eyes the welfare would not have been necessary if amercians actually supported thier fellow Americans.

What Trump should have done was ban all Chinese imports,change the name from dollar store to a $5000 dollar store and spent the 13 billion reopening factories so Americans can make a livable wage.

My guess is that had he done that you would also be upset.