Thank you, Scott Brown! (Gratitude from a Progressive)

[Gfactor]

Moved from The BBQ Pit to Great Debates.

Gfactor
Pit Moderator

[gonzomax]

@Blalron

That is a steaming pile of bullshit. They delayed the health care bill for MONTHS trying to get Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, or Charles Grassley on board (as far as I know, the only Republicans who would even agree to negotiation). But they didn’t budge (Snowe voted for it in committee, only to later vote against it on the floor for some mysterious reason). If they wanted to ram it through, they could have done it this summer. But they didn’t.

They weakened the bill several times to get some Repubs on board. They met in conference and gave in over and over making it a bad bill for everybody. It was a mistake.
Obama came out today with a remodeling of the banks. If he did that last week, Coakley would have won. Since she did not, Obama can not float along doing middle ground crap that will please nobody. They will get murdered for being Republical Lite in the next election. They may be finally getting the message.

[BrainGlutton]

@elucidator

I’m assuming you don’t mean a simultaneous mutual buggering? Which isn’t possible. Right? That isn’t possible, right?

You are ignoring the glorious potentials of genetic engineering.

What a wonderful time to be alive!

[Ludovic]

@BrainGlutton

You are ignoring the glorious potentials of genetic engineering.

What a wonderful time to be alive!

GFY.

– Dick Cheney

[Princhester]

@BrainGlutton

What a wonderful time to be alive!

Exactly. I mean, simultaneous mutual buggering is one thing, but necrophilic simultaneous mutual buggering is just wrong.

[sleeping]

Um, by the way conservatives, ya might wanna take a gander at these numbers:

*53% of Obama voters who voted for Brown and 56% of Obama voters who did not vote in the Massachusetts election said that Democrats enacting tighter restrictions on Wall Street would make them more likely to vote Democratic in the 2010 elections.

*51% of voters who voted for Obama in 2008 but Brown in 2010 said that Democratic policies were doing more to help Wall Street than Main Street.

*Nearly half (49%) of Obama voters who voted for Brown support the Senate health care bill or think it does not go far enough. Only 11% think the legislation goes too far.

 If [you oppose the healthcare reform bill], do you think it goes too far or doesn’t go far enough?
Obama/Brown Voters 	NOT ENOUGH 	TOO FAR 	NOT SURE
ALL 	                       **36%** 	    23% 	 41%
DEMOCRATS 	       **49% **	    18% 	33%
REPUBLICANS         11% 	      61% 	  28%
INDEPENDENTS      ** 38%**   20%   42%

http://pol.moveon.org/brownpoll/

(Bolding added for emphasis.)

Instructive.

So much for conservative pipe dreams of:

@FatBaldGuy

Where in any of the health care debate so far have the Democrats shown any willingness to compromise? By having a 60 vote majority they were able to steamroll their bill through the Senate without regard to any dissent whatsoever.

Now that the “super-majority” is gone, there may actually have to be some give and take between the two sides of the aisle in order to get a workable bill that can be agreed on.

and

@Sam_Stone

The result: 58% said they wanted smaller government with fewer services, and only 38% said they wanted larger government with more services.

The same poll asked people to identify themselves as liberal, moderate, or conservative. The result was 25% liberal, 34% moderate, and 38% conservative.

You’re just going to have to face the fact that you live in a center-right country, where most people are skeptical of big government and conservative or moderate in outlook. And that the real liberals are actually a fairly small percentage of the country.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12008070&postcount=30

[jayjay]

@FatBaldGuy

Excuse me? Where in any of the health care debate so far have the Democrats shown any willingness to compromise? By having a 60 vote majority they were able to steamroll their bill through the Senate without regard to any dissent whatsoever.

I don’t even know what world you’re living in here. The Democrats have bent over backwards trying to make this bill palatable to the Republicans, who absolutely positively were NEVER going to vote yes on it from Day One. The bill has been so watered down that the not-center-left has been calling for the bill to be killed because it doesn’t actually DO anything, really.

Now that the “super-majority” is gone, there may actually have to be some give and take between the two sides of the aisle in order to get a workable bill that can be agreed on.

There have to be two parties willing to give and take for that to work, and the Republicans forgot what “compromise” meant the minute Obama was elected.

[Der_Trihs]

@jayjay

There have to be two parties willing to give and take for that to work, and the Republicans forgot what “compromise” meant the minute Obama was elected.

They didn’t care about compromise before he was elected either. They demand absolute compliance, and accept nothing less.

[Ludovic]

@jayjay

The bill has been so watered down that the not-center-left has been calling for the bill to be killed because it doesn’t actually DO anything, really.

That’s the BEAUTY of it!

– Dick Cheney

[septimus]

@Hamlet

Not a good way to run a country.

This strikes me as a severe understatement. It’s more like a parody of a Three Stooges movie. Given the importance to America, and the importance of America to the rest of the world, it’s hard to keep laughing. Question to historians: has there ever been anything really like this? I know politics is hardball, but this sustained bullshit insults everyone’s intelligence. Even Joe McCarthy was eventually collared by his own party.

@Blalron

[example of Republican gibberish] is a steaming pile of bullshit. They delayed the health care bill for MONTHS trying to get Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, or Charles Grassley on board…

Blalron, you’re responding to nonsense as though you think facts are relevant to these guys; instead truth is turned inside-out before it even airs on network news. There are exalted Professors spouting nonsense; imagine the ignorance level of the “little guys”? (I had a brief economics debate with an American who thinks of himself as intellectual recently, and mentioned Krugman’s Nobel Prize. “Never heard of Paul Krugman” was the answer.)

One thing that surprises me is that centrists and progressives aren’t screaming in rage(*). I live a contented retired life in an isolated place with little TV; I think stress would be aging me prematurely if I lived in America.

(*) Straight Dope is a very intelligent forum. I know there are other forums to view if I’m looking for screams of rage. Unfortunately, many such “left-wing” screams also seem foolish (though nowhere near as foolish as those from the right).

[BrainGlutton]

@sleeping

I don’t know if it’s really *that *difficult. If he steers strongly toward the left while explaining how conservative policies favor corporations and then putting it in a historical context…all the lefties will be out in full force, and even the white proles will back him.

Hear, hear!

[BrainGlutton]

See also here and here.