As opposed to [insert group here] who are universally tolerant of their opposition, and assume them to be principled and honest and intelligent but differing in their views.
bolding mine:
Would that really be so bad?
I got laid off over a year ago. I’m working now (thank Og) but not for any benefits at all. How about an insurance option for me?
If I go into the kind of work I’d like to do, I’d be working for myself. How about an insurance option for me in the future?
Why is it that being unemployed or being self-employed has to mean that I have no affordable access to health care of any kind?
It’s not that it’s bad, it’s that it’s not good enough. Medical costs keep rising, and it’s not just lower income people who cannot afford the expense.
I think it can be honestly said that [insert group 1 here] is more cognizant of the fact that [insert group 2 here] merely have different philosophies and attitudes and ways of looking at things than they do. Group 2 however, seems utterly incapable of accepting that there can be legitimate reasons for disagreeing with it, and that any and all such disagreement must therefore be the result of stupidity, greed, selfishness, evil, etc.
Thanks, luce, but I was doing a fine job of making my point anyway. I do appreciate the help though.
And I’m sure everyone here, regardless of political persuasion, would consider themselves to be in group 1.
Really, to consider it a “defining characteristic” of any group, when obviously most fall to this type of thinking, is pretty silly. There may be a valid case that specific groups are more guilty of this than others - but a defining trait, as if it were uniquely limited to one group? No way.
I’ll concede that that my reaction may have been overstated on my part. However, please understand that I see this issue as causing financial ruin and death to tens of thousands of American citizens every year. To my way of looking at it, the senators who voted against that amendment may as well have affirmed their support of said financial ruin and death. Obviously, opinions and interpretations differ. Some see this as a moral crisis (such as myself and others). Some (like yourself) see things more dispassionately.
That is because opposition to a even the compromise of a public option is indeed the result of stupidity, greed, selfishness, evil, etc.
Here is a message to Max Baucus:
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/09/28/baucus-targeted-by-liberal-groups-in-new-ad/
‘But I can’t afford to take the long view, my competitors won’t let me.’
Without some level of goverment oversight, business will always favor short term profit to stay ahead of it’s competitiors. There are a lot of things I’m prepared to let rise and fall solely on there business viability, but health care isn’t one of them. The cost, to me, of poor health care in general, is much higher than the price.
**
Starving Artist**, did you want to take a crack at answering my question, why do public and private colleges seem to be working, but public and private health care insurance wouldn’t?
No, in all honesty you weren’t doing a fine job of making your point. No one knows what your point is. Please make your point. Make it in one short sentence.
You ain’t from 'round here, are ya?
It seems lately that my passion for lengthy argument around here has started to wax and wane somewhat (or at least when compared to my previous posting habits :D) and right now I’m in a waning phase so I hope you’ll pardon my not going into much detail, but to me the phrase “apples and oranges” doesn’t begin to describe the difference.
Perhaps I’ll be feeling more like fleshing this out later tonight or tomorrow (and come to think of it, this might be part of the problem – I’ve fleshed out my objections to government health care many times around here before and now even I am beginning to grow tired of posting them ;)) but for now I think I’ll just coast around the board a bit and see what’s going on elsewhere.
And thanks for your post, hobscrk777. I would suggest, however, that the difference between our views lies not so much in my being dispassionate about the issues as it is that I am passionate about different aspects of it than you are.
And kaylasdad99 and Polycarp, thanks for the advice on the removal of quotation marks before posting “Fixed that for ya” gags. I’ve asked Gfactor about it in another thread and hopefully will get a ruling soon.
And on preview:
Okey-doke. Here ya go:
“Conservatives think liberals have bad ideas; liberals think conservatives are bad people.”
This is why the majority of vitriol, condescension, name-calling, and assessment of ignoble motives over the last several decades has emanated primarily from the left, and it is what has brought us to the point where we are now where each side hates, loathes and despises the other rather than working cooperatively with each other in order to solve mutual problems.
That damn commie Limbaugh!
I know what you’re saying, but consider that Limbaugh was in the vanguard of what many on the right are now doing, which is attempting to fight fire with fire. Prior to Limbaugh’s rise to prominence in the early nineties, and his success in having bred other right-wing commentators, the right really had no voice on the public stage. Without talk radio and cable television, we still wouldn’t.
Also consider the way conservatives on this board talk to and about liberals vs. the way the board’s liberals talk to and about conservatives. My point could not be more starkly made.
OK. Thanks for putting it out there. I don’t think you are entirely wrong, but I don’t think you are a “bad person” either.
You have to agree though, that this position is not a healthcare issue, but a partisanship issue, right?
If we could just dissagree on one issue at a time, I’m sure we’d make some headway. 
Thank you. 
I would agree that it is largely a partisan issue. Liberals by and large favor government solutions and conservatives do not. Still, to be fair I think that genuine health concerns do drive many on the left, and then being liberal, they naturally gravitate to the government solution.
But there are so many issues and so little time.
(I keed, I keed… :D)
It would be nice if we could get back to being a country where civility was a hallmark in achieving social change. It’s fine to be passionate and determined when fighting for a just cause I would point to the civil rights demonstrators of the fifties and sixties as examples of social change achieved through passion and determination but without name-calling and hatred being the focal point of their efforts. (And of anyone in this country’s history who would have been justified in using those tactics, it would have been them. But they knew that such an approach would only alienate people who could otherwise be persuaded to support them. They were wise and their approach was effective. Much more so than the approach being used by the left today with regard to government health care, which appears to be a philosophy of trying to insult people into supporting it.)
“Stark” is the word that leaps to mind, for sure.
That was you making a point? I thought someone left a spoon in the garbage disposal.
:D:D:D
(I hate when you do that.)
kaylasdad99 and Polycarp, I just heard from Gfactor. You are correct in that quotes without quote tags can be altered by striking through certain portions or words and replacing them with others. The quote tags themselves seem to be the problem.
Thanks to you both and to Gfactor for clearing it up and showing me where I was in error.
So, when Newt Gingrich sent out a memo urging Republican candidates to use words like “decay” “sick” “pathetic” “lie” “betray” and “traitors” to describe their Democratic opponents; when Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell blamed the September 11 attacks on the ACLU, feminists, gays, and other liberal groups; when Ann Coulter published a book titled Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism; when Sarah Palin talked about certain (reliably Republican-voting) areas of the country as being the “pro-America areas” of the country; and when various right-wing tea-baggers compare Obama to Hitler; they’re just disagreeing with the ideas of the liberals?
Bullshit.