Senator Fred Thompson is taking formal steps toward a presidential bid.

Great Debates
101

[QUOTE=Apos]
Well, I haven’t seen the film, and I’m open to the possibility that it exists (since I don’t have a high opinion of the depths of Moore’s leftism), but I’ve so far seen no evidence that Moore kissed up to Castro om a way that would justify someone lecturing him about Castro being a dictator. If anything, the tone of his commentary has been “why is it that these backwards places can provide medical care to all, but we can’t manage it in the richest nation in the world even for those people we keep calling our super duper heroes” If he had praised Castro on human rights the way Mother Teresa praised dictators giving her money, that WOULD be a fair point. But Thompson never provided any evidence of that. As such, his finger wag simply wasn’t particularly justified or on point.
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The idea that Castro takes better care of his people than the US system does (even with all its flaws) is absurd, and Moore is nothing more than a stooge and a dupe for projecting that propaganda. Millions of Americans may not have health care insurance, but that doesn’t mean that any of those people can’t walk into a hospital and get treated.

102

[QUOTE=John Mace]
The idea that Castro takes better care of his people than the US system does (even with all its flaws) is absurd, and Moore is nothing more than a stooge and a dupe for projecting that propaganda. Millions of Americans may not have health care insurance, but that doesn’t mean that any of those people can’t walk into a hospital and get treated.
[/QUOTE]

For a heart attack, sure. And then subsequently sent a bill for half their yearly salary. But for a chronic condition, for any sort of preventative medicine, for a complex and expensive disease? Come on.

If you can provide evidence that Moore praises Castro unequivocally or is completely uncritical about Cuba’s system, then maybe you could justify calling him a stooge. But you haven’t done any of the legwork to justify that sort of rhetoric as far as I can tell.

Just as an example from what I just googled:

Moore from Time Magazine: "Moore states “As for Cuba, yes, when I’ve got a film crew there, they’re going to show us their best. But there’s a reason the World Health Organization ranks their health-care system [among] the best in the Third World and that people from Latin America come there for their health care. There’s also a reason Cubans live on average a month longer than we do. I’m not trumpeting Castro or his regime. I just want to say to fellow Americans, “C’mon, we’re the United States! If they can do this, we can do it.”

A reviewer describes one of the Castro scenes thusly: “A woman, formerly with a good job, bankrupted by her medical bills and forced to live in the study of her daughter, has to pay 240 dollars a month for her cancer medication but gets the same pills on Cuba for… 10 cents.”

Seems like a decent enough prima facie case that a) claiming that Moore supports Cuba is trading in falsehoods, and that b) he’s not unequivocally praising Cuba, but rather pointing out that if a third world country can provide a system in which people don’t have to go bankrupt, America can work out a solution as well.

I’m open to better evidence and argument on this, because I can’t fully trust a guy who really thinks that government RUN healthcare is ultimately a good idea in a democracy and capitalism, but running around calling people stooges and dupes just isn’t cutting it.

103

[QUOTE=Apos]
A reviewer describes one of the Castro scenes thusly: “A woman, formerly with a good job, bankrupted by her medical bills and forced to live in the study of her daughter, has to pay 240 dollars a month for her cancer medication but gets the same pills on Cuba for… 10 cents.”
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Since this thread has been hopelessly hijacked already, I just want to point out that ten cent cancer pills kill any sort of incentive for the development of newer, better cancer pills.

We pay 240 bucks for cancer pills, because that’s what the value of the pills is when considering things like research, development, and the impossibility of recovering expenses and making a profit from countries like Cuba.

Castro pays 10 cents for cancer pills because his government ignores the patents on them. We can ignore patents too, but I’d take the consequence of paying 240 bucks for cancer pills over the consequence of stalled medical development.

104

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
Tying this back to Fred Thompson, it seems he’s either smart enough to dodge this problem, or his advisers are. He says that if he runs, he won’t be doing the traditional style of campaign. Rather, he’s going to use the internet to go straight to the people and try to build support in the primaries by showing that he has major support across the country. Expect to see lots of Thompson videos on youtube and on blogs, and lots of grassroots organizing through thet net. It’s an interesting strategy, and it just might work.
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Fred Thompson using the Internet to go straight to the people:

It gets even more hilarious from there on the Libby/Plame front. It’s got to be read to be believed; it’s the sort of stuff only the mouthbreathing Kool-Aid drinkers could swallow.

Plus a few words on church-state issues:

First of all, the Founding Fathers would have been unfamiliar with the concept of “public schools” from the get-go, so I guess that would have surprised them.

But the FFs were quite aware that if the state isn’t protected from the church, then a well-positioned church can use the power of the state to shove its religion down everyone’s throats.

So I’m looking forward to more of Fred Thompson’s efforts to communicate directly with us over the Interwebs. It should be quite the comedy.

105

[QUOTE=Apos]
For a heart attack, sure. And then subsequently sent a bill for half their yearly salary. But for a chronic condition, for any sort of preventative medicine, for a complex and expensive disease? Come on.

If you can provide evidence that Moore praises Castro unequivocally or is completely uncritical about Cuba’s system, then maybe you could justify calling him a stooge. But you haven’t done any of the legwork to justify that sort of rhetoric as far as I can tell.
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I never said he “unequivocally” supported Cuba, and you don’t have to “unequivocally” support Cuba to be a stooge for Castro.

Comparing anything in the US (or any western style democracy) to a parallel system in a dictatorship with a command and control economy is just laughable. It says nothing about the US’s healthcare industry, but serves as a nice little showcase for Castro. If Moore wants to make the case that Canada or France or even Poland has a better healthcare system than the US, then that might make sense, since we probably could copy their system (or part of it) here. And Moore does focus on Canada’s system in Sicko, too. Most any country that is a police state and command and control economy can pick one or two things to do really well, and there will always be people naive enough to propose: Hey, if they can do this, why can’t we?

Cuba has some of the best healthcare statistics in Latin America, but that was true before Castro took over.

Even though…

So, I really don’t care what Cuba has done or not done, in the same way I really don’t care that China has been able to control it’s population growth. Both systems are just far too different from our own to make a comparison applicable.

If you want to continue this discussion, let’s not hijack this thread any further, bu resurrect the thread specifically about Moore’s movie and the Cuba connection.

106

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
So I’m looking forward to more of Fred Thompson’s efforts to communicate directly with us over the Interwebs. It should be quite the comedy.
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Comedy, my butt! This is scary! This guy’s words are music to the ears of the tightie righties. Yes, only the mouthbreathing Kool-aid drinking knucklewalkers will believe it. But there are enough of them that if they come out and vote en masse, he could very easily win. It would be nice if the press started calling him on this stuff but don’t hold your breath.

107

[QUOTE=BobLibDem]
Comedy, my butt! This is scary! This guy’s words are music to the ears of the tightie righties. Yes, only the mouthbreathing Kool-aid drinking knucklewalkers will believe it. But there are enough of them that if they come out and vote en masse, he could very easily win. It would be nice if the press started calling him on this stuff but don’t hold your breath.
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Well, if the Republicans want to put forth an “even more of the same” sort of candidate, that’s a fight I would prefer to have. I would think it more difficult to contend against someone who would be able to sell a story of change to the voters. The problem for the Republicans is that they don’t particularly like change - they aren’t satisfied with the candidates that they have who are kind of different from what we’ve seen.

If the Republicans want to go with a message of “Hey, if you liked the last six years of conservative government, you ain’t seen nothing yet!”, I say that they ought to go for it.

108

[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
If the Republicans want to go with a message of “Hey, if you liked the last six years of conservative government, you ain’t seen nothing yet!”, I say that they ought to go for it.
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Suppose they win? Can you imagine 16 years of Bush-Thompson picking the Supreme Court justices? I’d rather they run someone that we could stomach if he wins.

109

[QUOTE=BobLibDem]
Suppose they win? Can you imagine 16 years of Bush-Thompson picking the Supreme Court justices? I’d rather they run someone that we could stomach if he wins.
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I do not believe I would much like the country we would become. I hope very much hope Thompson loses the nom. Hopefully he takes down the other conservatives with him.

Jim {Still voting Rudy at this point, what’s the old saying, I will vote early and often for him? :wink: }

110

[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
Well, if the Republicans want to put forth an “even more of the same” sort of candidate, that’s a fight I would prefer to have. I would think it more difficult to contend against someone who would be able to sell a story of change to the voters. The problem for the Republicans is that they don’t particularly like change - they aren’t satisfied with the candidates that they have who are kind of different from what we’ve seen.
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I think it’s more accurate to say that both parties are trying to get back to a time when they think things were better. We have the Dems offering us recycled Clinton and Pubs looking for a Reagan Republican, which is how Thompson is presenting himself (and how Gingrich will, too, if he decides to run). The Republicans are not looking for a Bush clone-- they’re not that stupid.

It’s a mistake to think that only right wing nuts think we’ve gone too far in taking religion out of the public sphere. Thompson’s view on the sepraration of Church and State, flawed as it might be, is more aligned with mainstream Americans than is the more secular vision pushed by the Democrats.

111

[QUOTE=John Mace]
It’s a mistake to think that only right wing nuts think we’ve gone too far in taking religion out of the public sphere. Thompson’s view on the sepraration of Church and State, flawed as it might be, is more aligned with mainstream Americans than is the more secular vision pushed by the Democrats.
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True, but I was more worried about his asinine defense of Scooter Libby and his pooh-poohing the whole Valerie Plame incident. He made it sound as if Wilson was lying about the Niger story rather than exposing the Bush lies and that outing his wife in retribution was the natural, patriotic thing to do. That’s scary.

112

[QUOTE=John Mace]
If you want to continue this discussion, let’s not hijack this thread any further, bu resurrect the thread specifically about Moore’s movie and the Cuba connection.
[/QUOTE]

One wonders why you’d add this after spending several paragraphs continuing the discussion here.

113

[QUOTE=John Mace]
I think it’s more accurate to say that both parties are trying to get back to a time when they think things were better.
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The democrats don’t necessarily need to be that complicated. They just need to say how they will move away from the current shithole we are in. They do have the ability to harken back to the halcyon days of President Clinton if they like, but that’s just gravy.

I’m sure they aren’t, although they are currently having a godawful time breaking away from him right now. I’m not talking about the framing they’ll put up, I’m talking about the relatively easy (in my opinion) frame that the Democrats will be able to set up - this guy doesn’t even sound like a “compassionate conservative.”

I think you are wrong both in the sense of what “mainstream America” is in favor of and what the Democrats are “pushing.” Can you back up either element or the assertion on the whole? I’ll be surprised if you can, because in polling results on social issues, typically majorities favor Democratic positions.

114

[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
I think you are wrong both in the sense of what “mainstream America” is in favor of and what the Democrats are “pushing.” Can you back up either element or the assertion on the whole? I’ll be surprised if you can, because in polling results on social issues, typically majorities favor Democratic positions.
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You’re kidding, right?

115

[QUOTE=Apos]
Personally, I think he needs to ditch the phony pickup truck shtick.
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I don’t see Thompson’s personality as “phony” - recall that he was born in a small Alabama town and grew up in middle tennessee. His family apparently wasn’t from the upper classes since his bio (at wikipedia) claims both parents worked to put him through school. Would be surprised if his family, early friends, and near relatives all were ‘good ole boys’ who owned pickup trucks.

116

It’s phony when he doesn’t actually drive one anymore, and uses it as a prop. It doesn’t matter what his roots are.

Problem is, if we decide to never vote for a “phony politician” the list gets rather short. I think people generally use that type of an excuse to just cut the debate short. No need to talk about the issues-- he’s a phony. Right?

117

Amazingly wrong, Mr. Gallup. Do I really need to get into how religions need to be protected from each other for anyone here? Seriously, I will, but I think John knows better than that.
I think Mr. Gallup is being a little disingenious… because many of those Americans that favor prayer in school, in, say, Minnesota, I think it was? Would, of course, be very upset if it was anything but a proper Muslim prayer.

118

What did i tell you!http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/florida/sfl-601complaint,0,1736460.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines

119

[QUOTE=E-Sabbath]
Amazingly wrong, Mr. Gallup. Do I really need to get into how religions need to be protected from each other for anyone here? Seriously, I will, but I think John knows better than that.
I think Mr. Gallup is being a little disingenious… because many of those Americans that favor prayer in school, in, say, Minnesota, I think it was? Would, of course, be very upset if it was anything but a proper Muslim prayer.
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Huh? There aren’t enough Muslims in the US to skew a poll like that. Every poll I’ve ever seen has shown that Americans think the SCOTUS has gone too far in eliminating religion from the public sphere when it comes to things like prayer in school, or the 10 Commandments. 83% want prayer in school and you can be damned sure that 90% of those responding are not Muslims or Jews. They’re happy to ignore the fact that some schools might have Muslim prayers, because they know they have little chance of being affected.

This is not rocket science, here, E-S. And we’re not talking about what I want, but what most appeals to mainstream Americans. I ain’t mainstream.

120

[QUOTE=John Mace]
You’re kidding, right?
[/QUOTE]
No. I’m sure you don’t define separation of church and state simply as prayer in school, do you?

I’ll grant that that appears to be one issue that the secularism the Democrats are “pushing” (and I keep quoting you on “pushing” because I don’t believe the Democrats have the guts to “push” anything of the sort, but do act in defense on occasion).

I had more general evidence in mind, such as the following:

http://www.religioustolerance.org/sep_c_st5.htm

http://pewforum.org/docs/index.php?DocID=153

On specific issues involving religion and the state:

http://pewforum.org/docs/index.php?DocID=150

In general, I think on issues like abortion, stem cells, general separation of church and state, the Democrats are very much in keeping with the will of the majority of the people. I don’t think there’s much evidence to support your statement that the majority of the people share Thompson’s view.