Hygiene, my ass, they’re just masturbating with plumbing.
I should have added “under normal conditions”. OTOH going over the debt ceiling is going to be overwhelmingly hurtful to the Republicans rather than the Democrats.
I agree its very much a case of YMMV but Democrats may be able to gain more votes (such as suburban moms) then they’d lose by tackling background checks and a conservative Republican like Pat Toomey was willing to sponser such legislation. That said the issue is pretty much at the bottom of my priority list.
Admittedly one of my more unique political views is an emphasis on promoting national culture.
Most other countries set their drinking age at 18, without causing an unusually larger number of accidents.
If it costs them certainly.
And zat is not cleanly, barbare?!
Yes, that isn’t what I am responding to. It’s the recurring desire to pay for more and more social programs by raising taxes only on those that make more than a certain amount of money.
I don’t know what you are saying with the percentages.
It would be interesting to know if all that many people are getting advanced degrees any more. Most folks who go to four or more years of college graduate with a lot of debt, and (if lucky these days) go into a job that really doesn’t pay all that much, compared to what they are going to need to pay for. It will if they stay with it and move up, but in the mean time there’s those student loans, car payments, rent/mortgage and of course who waits to have kids until they can afford them any more? And then there is all this talk that if they do make it, their taxes take a big jump. That just doesn’t look like incentive to me.
No, I am just talking about what people in here say now, not what has been going on in the past.
It seems we have a really large military budget … Besides, I’m not talking about the deficit, I’m talking about all the social programs that Qin Shi Huangdi wanted to add.
I believe he was talking about being willing to see tax increases across the board, to which I said that I think he’d be alone (on this board) on that.
curlcoat writes:
> It would be interesting to know if all that many people are getting advanced
> degrees any more.
Unfortunately, the websites with the information that would be in the clearest form are unavailable at the moment, since they’re federal government sites and are down for the furlough. However, the fact is that the percentage of people getting advanced degrees (in the U.S.) is not decreasing. It’s slowly increasing, just like the percentage of people getting high school degrees and the percentage of people getting bachelor’s degrees. Everybody knows that education is increasingly important for getting a good job. There is thus a slowly increasing percentage of people reaching any particular educational level.
Good news! That’s exactly what they’re already doing. You thick fuck.
Do you know, is the poor education of public high school graduates country wide or is it just something we have a problem with locally? I just can’t imagine that these kids who cannot spell, do math or write a letter are able to get into anything other than a community college or trade school.
Well here’s a few things to do:
- Legalize marijuana and tax it. More revenue in, less spent on imprisoning non criminals.
- Issue a general amnesty for all people convicted of drug use except for those who also committed violent crimes. Basically get the addicts out of jail and move to medically-derived treatment programs rather than jail time. Will greatly reduce our expenses and prison population which will allow us to:
- Get rid of the private prisons. They are simply loathsome – economic slavery. We do not want anyone to be PROFITING from putting people in jail, it’s a totally stupid idea.
- Tax corporations and the rich, pass laws making it unprofitable and legally dangerous for individual CEOS and boards of directors (jail terms, not fines) to hide money overseas.
- Penalize corporations that move jobs overseas, reward those that create jobs in the US.
- Pass a law requiring that all sex offender registries apply only to repeat offenders of the most heinous kind: violent rapists, serial rapists and child abusers. People who pee in public and teens who get it on should not be on any such list.
- Cut the pork from the Defense Department. You will hear a lot of squawking over this one, but the Defense Department is full of waste, fraud and abuse.
- Get money out of politics. A huge majority support this and it’s tremendously to Democratic advantage. But the Supreme Court supports money in politics and will declare any law that attempts to limit political campaign donations unconstitutional. There’s only two solutions: a Constitutional Convention or packing the Supreme Court with leftist judges who will be relentlessly litmus-tested on this issue. I suggest that packing the Supreme Court is the far easier solution.
- Use the money saved and the revenue earned by enriching the middle class, possibly by simply mailing them checks every month. The middle class and the poor will spend the money, enriching the economy greatly and getting the recovery going on a sustained basis at last. (I know putting the money into infrastructure is the popular answer here, but I suspect that pumping money into infrastructure will mostly enrich the people who own and control infrastructure related corporation, not middle class folks. The money has to go to them as will spend it.)
- And speaking of prosperity, now that money is out of politics, jail the worst Wall Street offenders from the 2007 crash. It’s never a good idea to leave the crooks in charge, as we have done. Give them big show trials, make it public, most Americans hate those guys and will eat the trial coverage up. Then reinstate Glass Steagall and put in some controls over CDOs and similar instruments. Do not be disturbed by the squealing of the piggies as you do this. They always squeal, it means nothing.
- Legalize prostitution and tax it. Another victimless crime bringing in good revenue instead of costing us money. Also, an amnesty for all convicted of prostitution. Between that and drug offense amnesties, should empty out the women’s prisons to a great extent. More money saved.
That should do for starters, popular programs that Americans will love and conservatives will hate and that will get the economy going again. Can I get an “Amen!” brothers?
curlcoat writes:
> Do you know, is the poor education of public high school graduates country
> wide or is it just something we have a problem with locally?
There’s no evidence that high school graduates are any less educated than they used to be. You’re not even bothering to find real statistics. You’re just listening to people sit around and complain about how much better things were in the old days.
Seemed a pretty simple point… difference in impact.
You would be wrong in making that ass-umption, or possibly in trying to think, as that poorly advised attempt seems to have preceded your erroneous, “whole board” conclusion.
However, turnout by millenials was lower. They don’t like Republicans, but Obama wasn’t the guy they thought he was. He was merely a typical politician rather than the agent of change he portrayed himself as.
Democrats never win the House by only winning by 0.8%. Barney Frank<Nate Silver:
Now. When they had control, the only way legislation didn’t get done right the hell now was if Republicans filibustered.
Again, the President wanted a health care bill before Congressmen had to face the voters back in their districts. That’s not how you do bills of that import.
It is, sometimes, if you actually want a bill to pass. The Republican leadership is on record having had made the decision to oppose everything Obama did, even if he used some of their ideas. Knowing that, it was wise for Obama to try and get things done as quickly as possible.
That’s actually not true. While they did oppose his signature initiatives, they have worked with him on a variety of issues. The idea that this is an obstruct-at-all-costs party is 70% myth. The Peru and South Korea free trade agreements, the student loan fix, and of course any deals they’ve made with him, such as the Budget Control Act. And even on health care, there were Republicans interested in working with the Democrats, but the two sides were just too far apart. When you’re too far from where Olympia Snowe is, it’s hard to blame the GOP.
On a minor issue, I was really proud of Tea Party Republicans and many Democrats when they first took office in 2011 for getting rid of the second F-35 jet engine. There’s actually a lot of common ground between Tea Partiers and reformist or civil liberties Democrats on various issues like earmark reform, government spying, and waste.
Wait, I’m not understanding what you’re saying here. There was an election in November 2008, which Democrats overwhelmingly won. After a year of debate, the ACA was signed into law in March 2010.
Are you saying that the government should have waited for the 2010 elections, then restarted the debate in early 2011 with the hopes of passing the bill before the 2012 elections? You’re saying that this is how bills of that import are done?
Tell me I’ve misunderstood you, because that’s the single most fucking stupid thing I’ve ever heard you say.
He wanted it in July. I don’t have a problem that it passed in March, at least not in terms of the speed of its passage. They went home, they heard from their constituents, there was a special election in Massachusetts between the time Obama wanted the bill and the time he signed it. Plenty of public debate. I was satisfied. But that doesn’t mean I give the Democrats credit, because it was the Republicans who stretched out that debate long enough for the public to engage.
Yes it is. They are on record- for example, McConnell’s “our most important priority is to prevent Obama from getting a second term”.
On every major piece of legislation, like health care, immigration reform, economic stimulus, etc., the Republicans have obstructed with every move they could make.
The ACA used many Republican ideas. It’s not credible to claim that a plan very similar to that which Bob Dole and Mitt Romney supported in the 90s was too far to the left- the Republicans, as documented by Robert Draper (among others), decided opposing Obama at every turn was the most important thing.
First, that does not necessarily mean obstruction, since obstruction is a tactic and defeating Obama is an outcome.
Second, words and actions are not the same thing, especially when we’re talking about politicians. Their self-interest comes first, so if obstructing Obama is not in their self-interest they won’t do it, even if that’s what they promised to do.
Judging by their actions, obstructing Obama has been a very high priority. Pairing that with the statements, it’s not a stretch to say that this is still part of their plan.