# GOP / movement conservatives: Bad decisions are a business model **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 17, 2014, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819 "2014-11-17T00:35:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/81 "2014-11-18T21:40:14Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > What are you not pitting? The OP originally posted this in Great Debates. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/82 "2014-11-18T21:54:49Z")
> [@marshmallow](#): > > A sucker’s born every minute. But of course, every community has a cottage industry. They don’t think they’re suckers. They buy what they like. The conservatives you deride think you’re the sucker trapped in your own mediatainment bubble. The UFO enthusiast laughs at both, the stupid sheeple. Somewhere, a hipster buys a Vote Ron Paul t-shirt. So it goes. Heh. You’re right. > [@EdwinAmi](#): > > Again, we’re pretty much headed for bankruptcy already. > [snip] > I’m a realist, that’s it. And I work from the values of human freedom in the not-bring-fucked-with sense, with a much less important but still important let’s-try-not-to-let-anyone-get-too-fucked social safety net policy, kept in check with FISCAL REALITY. You never took macroeconomics, I bet. Here’s a hint: CNBC and Fox News don’t actually understand state-level economics. One is a bunch of gamblers, the other an organization specifically created to make someone other than ABC News to wear the label of “the right wing network.” > [@EdwinAmi](#): > > I’ve read people regularly die waiting for care, which is unconscionable when you force people to pay for care beforehand. People regularly die waiting for care here. Which you just said wasn’t unconscionable. Are you against health insurance? That’s “paying beforehand.” > [@](#): > > Nick Gillespie on reason magazine wrote an article about How France’s healthcare system (his wife is French) is way better, and way cheaper for what it does, because it’s PARTLY subsidized, LOW TORT, and VERY free market. Any student of economics know that any such welfare system would have to have those elements, combined with cut offs for qualifying for high incomes. > Our mixed system is NOT more “free market” in any sense: all the incentives are powerful and perverse. We would need more of what France has, particularly, ending the health care as income exception, and ending the weird medicare and Medicaid systems that help jack up prices by their weird fucked up mixed pricing system (seriously, when you read it, it’s like it’s DESIGNED to jack up prices), along with the same tort reform, and also mandates on municipalities’ powers to regulate medical buildings. Medical spaces are severely limitd for no reason. I think you and I actually largely agree on our health care supply issues; we could agree on solutions if you could accept public subsidy and investment in infrastructure as superior, not inferior, to raw deregulation. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/83 "2014-11-18T22:00:07Z")
> [@DinoR](#): > > Unanimity is a higher standard than used for climate science. Free trade being a good thing is clearly a strong consensus among economists. It’s just about the poster child for economists agreeing. And yet “free trade pacts” are not so much about pure, book-theory free trade as about protectionist policies reaching into other sovereignties’ jurisdictions. Strong interests in First World countries use them to undermine laws in other countries. Note that the USA still has a sugar monopoly, but Mexico’s maize farmers have been put out of business by US corporation Monsanto. “Free trade agreements” are not the free trade of the theorist, but a scam. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/84 "2014-11-18T22:10:46Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > This thread started out with low expectations–it looked like it was just one more partisan slug-fest, but I figured that it was worth attempting. > > Now that it has moved from partisan slug-fest to personal slug-fest, I am sending it to its proper home. Just as well. Nice to see that Net Neutrality and AGW disappeared from the thread, to be replaced with fantasies of frivolous lawsuits. \*\*Bricker \*\*_et alii_, I welcome you start another thread debating the English Rule, which has [del]almost[/del] nothing to do with my thesis. **EdwinAmi** , you worry me, son. Anyway, covenant marriage is not a live issue, unlike Net Neutrality and climate change. You’re what we call a sucker, voting for a platform that will never actually fulfill its false promises to you. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/85 "2014-11-18T22:33:49Z")
> [@EdwinAmi](#): > > what? I’m not talking about gay marriage. Anyone with a brain knows that gay marriage in particular is a farce of an issue. The real issue is the marriage laws suck, and it’s impossible to get really married. You know, like, with AN OBLIGATION. You know, like how marriage is supposed to be? Ok, first off, that’s one opinion, and clearly a minority opinion. People clearly want marriages to be easy to obtain and dissolve. Just look at your multiple-times married Republican leaders and entertainers. You think any of them WANT to be forced to remain in a marriage? Gay marriage is not “a farce of an issue”, and no one with an actual functioning brain thinks it is. It is a freedom and equality issue. Remember that whole ‘equal treatment under the law’ thing? How about the whole ‘pursuit of happiness’ thing? > [@](#): > > Suggest that maybe marriage should have some actual obligations, and the leftists scream and holler that you’re 50’s misogynist tyrant who wants all women in the kitchen, and something about rape and abortion too. Sure. Come up with a bill and put it to a vote. Or try to get the required number of signatures for your ballot measure. We’ll talk if you actually get a microgram of traction on that idea. Otherwise it is nothing more than your angry demanding opinion that the vast majority of Americans don’t share. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/86 "2014-11-18T22:52:56Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > Just as well. > > Nice to see that Net Neutrality and AGW disappeared from the thread, to be replaced with fantasies of frivolous lawsuits. > > \*\*Bricker \*\*_et alii_, I welcome you start another thread debating the English Rule, which has [del]almost[/del] nothing to do with my thesis. > > **EdwinAmi** , you worry me, son. Anyway, covenant marriage is not a live issue, unlike Net Neutrality and climate change. You’re what we call a sucker, voting for a platform that will never actually fulfill its false promises to you. Yeah, **Bricker**. People are busy here debating whether Republicans are really, really bad or just really bad. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2014, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/87 "2014-11-19T00:52:04Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > There is broad consensus among economists that free trade is beneficial - [cite](http://dailysignal.com/2013/02/01/politicians-should-listen-to-economists-on-free-trade/), [cite](http://www.nytimes.com/1993/09/17/us/a-primer-why-economists-favor-free-trade-agreement.html), [et](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=10&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CGMQFjAJ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fideas.repec.org%2Fa%2Ffip%2Ffedlrv%2Fy2002ijan.p1-22nv.84no.1.html&ei=T15qVIOYG4aUNoyWgagH&usg=AFQjCNFRuL_UOjS4urEwWFZuPOP-PEzv8w&sig2=Cnu5ZdRJ3FsTl0krPX8nyQ)c. There are [dissenting](http://www.amazon.com/Bad-Samaritans-Secret-History-Capitalism/dp/1596915986/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1416358111&sr=1-4&keywords=ha-joon+chang) [viewpoints.](http://fpif.org/kicking_away_the_ladder_the_real_history_of_free_trade/) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2014, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/88 "2014-11-19T01:05:00Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > It works in those places because it would work just fine here: meritorious claims would continue; extortionate practices would cease. I’ve been practicing plaintiffs’ personal injury law exclusively for six years now and I have never yet encountered nor heard of one single “extortionate practice” by attorneys or plaintiffs in that field. Usually, a PI case involves documenting the tortfeasor’s liability and the plaintiff’s injuries and suffering, and negotiating a reasonable settlement with the tortfeasor’s insurer. It’s all an arm’s length negotiation on the understanding that we’ll go to trial if we can’t settle, which is rare. Rarer still for plaintiffs to get rich off such litigation (attorneys might, but off a career of it, not off one case). And believe me, I’ve never met a single client, even one who gets a big settlement or judgment, who would not prefer the injury never happened. Tort reform, like a lot of conservative priorities, is a solution in search of a problem. The way I see it, PI lawyers are socially valuable anyway. We serve as a sort of private auxiliary negligence police – just because we’re there, stores know they had better keep their floors clean because they could be liable for slip-and-fall accidents, manufacturers know they had better safety-test everything before putting it on the market, etc. As for motorists – well, they know what they know, but some people are always going to be careless idiots sometimes – when they are, at least with PI lawyers around those they hurt can get some fair compensation. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2014, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819/89 "2014-11-20T19:38:53Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Usually, a PI case involves documenting the tortfeasor’s liability and the plaintiff’s injuries and suffering, and negotiating a reasonable settlement with the tortfeasor’s insurer. Or, with the client’s own insurer, if there is an uninsured-motorist claim. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gop-movement-conservatives-bad-decisions-are-a-business-model/704819.md?page=4)