Damn straight. Two incredibly eloquent posts tonight. Bravo.
Yes.
adding in sound effect of applause
I’m pondering that whole notion of separate states as semi-sovereign entities, where different ideas about social structure are experimented with. Can’t help but picture Mississippi, circa 1964, when just such an experiment was boiling. Should Federal force be applied to cancel such experiments, to crush the time-honored traditions of a free people?
Yes.
Emotional blackmail-lovely.
“Because you disagree with me, I’m going to give money to a group I think you oppose. They get my money, and it’s all your fault!”
Well, he’s already blaming liberals for paving the way for a future hypothetical tyrant, so why not?
The reason the federal/state divide is being eliminated is not “the Banquet Bear mentality”. It’s the fact that people are more mobile and more free to travel and communicate than ever before. Distinctions between states are breaking down because they make very little sense in this context.
Indeed. Usually, Bricker’s ‘Baby’s First Rhetoric’-level tactics are at least somewhat amusing to witness, but this is really of one piece with ‘would be a shame if something happened to it’, blaming the opponent for (what they are bound to perceive as) Bricker’s negative actions. See also: ‘now look what you made me do!’, ‘stop hitting yourself’, and so on.
But at the very least, it should disabuse anybody of the notion that Bricker is in any way interested in fair debate.
In what possible way does this constitute unfair debate, but the multiple instances in this thread in which are thrown accusations of immorality and sociopathy are hunky-dory?
No. “Because this disagreement highlights the importance of the outcome I seek, I’m going to give money to a group that furthers the outcome I seek.”
I’m not scared of your voice. I’m scared, terrified, that the outcome you desire – the elimination of American states as sovereign political entities – will come to pass.
So you see the ACA as a threat to this sovereignty as I understand it, but eliminating it will cost X number of people their lives. What value of X would be too high, in your estimation, to justify upholding this principle of state sovereignty?
It’s a kind of a hobby for me to monitor and take issue with mainstream-conservative thinking and I encounter lots of horrific things. The mere desire to keep federal and state powers in their assigned driving lanes barely registers. From NZ you possibly can’t see the 50 different state administrations at work, but that’s what we have, that’s what ultimately delivers the benefits of federal legislation to the people. The federal government sends large checks here and there and runs its own Veterans Administration to benefit people who served in the armed forces. Otherwise, the states handle their own health care business.
How they are handling it, how conservatives see health care spending, how they are likely to oppose all social spending for any reason that’s handy, that’s the stuff I wonder about along with many others. But you will get nowhere here in the 50 states trying to persuade people that the separate states thing has gone out of style.
…for all your complaints in this thread that you have been mis-represented, it is absolutely astonishing that you think that “the elimination of American states as sovereign political entities” is my goal. I suggest you read my posts again. That isn’t what I said at all. “Evolution” does not have to equal “elimination.” You can keep States as sovereign political entities and provide affordable healthcare for all of your countrymen. You don’t have to pick one or the other.
Th idea of federalism is not to give the states carte blanche. There is the 14th amendment, and preventing citizens from voting, without due process, is no bueno, as the Founding Padres were fond of saying. Beyond that, the Jim Crow South was a literal Apartheid regime. Federalism does not prevent the feds from stepping in to correct that situation.
Remember, the idea is that States can do anything that is not forbidden. That does not mean the States can do anything.
That is not happening. It has certainly been reduced, but it’s not being eliminated. The fact that you would even think that is rather telling.
In that what you’re doing has a concrete real-world effect facilitating outcomes that your opponent would view negatively, while the rest are just words on a screen that I’m sure an adult like you can handle.
If that were all there’s to it, you could’ve just given the money without ever mentioning it. But you choose instead to inform everybody of it.
But of course, what you’re doing with these replies is just what you’ve been doing throughout this thread: open up irrelevant sideshows to tie up the debate into ever more fragmented and disconnected issues, say by the usage of vague/ill-defined terms like ‘wise’ or ‘lowest common denominator’, which you then ‘define’ using yet more vague verbiage, such that ultimately the actual issue at hand becomes completely obfuscated, hidden under the layers of chaff you throw up. And once you’ve gotten to issues irrelevant enough, you even might concede some of them, so that everybody sees what a reasonable debater you are.
I’m fully aware that this reply only aids you in that fragmentation; but just to be clear, I’m not going to provide any further material.
Oh, this is the burniest of burns…
Again, my question was related to “unfair debate.” The words on a screen were part of the debate. Were they fair?
Mentioning it also highlights the importance of the outcome I seek, and we tend to share the things that are important to us. Look how many posts I have made about Voter ID and how many posts I have made about Harry Styles’ debut album. See which topic occupies more of my interest?
I am a reasonable debater. See?
I will - somehow - struggle on bereft of your valuable insight.
Lots of people do electronic transfers – I do myself for most bills. But I have checks! Ran out a while ago when I needed one, in fact.
But – so far as you’re aware, when I write a paper check, and mail it to them – they get the money, right?
If you wish to impugn a poster’s motives, the Pit would be the place to do it. Don’t do this here.
[/moderating]
…you misunderstand what I found horrific.
“This is the perfect times to realize we have fifty pteri dishes. That’s the strength of the model. We can experiment and see what works.”
50 individual experiments on healthcare? To see what works? In 2017? This isn’t about the mere separation of federal and state powers. This is about playing games with peoples lives in the worst way possible.
I was reading the storyabout a guy whose older brother stole fish antibiotics to help him when he got sick. A friend of his got stabbed (working as a bouncer) and they closed the wound with duct tape. This was normal for him: until the ACA came along, and he had access to proper healthcare for the first time in his life.
“A lot of us got healthcare for the first time. We stopped dying so fast from such incredibly stupid shit.”
If you take that healthcare away from him, and if you take it away from him because of the incredibly weak arguments presented in this thread, then you don’t have to worry about me trying to persuade people that the “separate states thing is going out of style.” I’ll be the least of your worries. People had learned how to live without healthcare. But for them to finally get healthcare after a lifetime of hardship, then have it taken away? You guys have no idea the monster you are about to unleash.