# The Race for the GOP Nomination - Post-Thanksgiving Thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 28, 2015, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819 "2015-11-28T12:40:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 22
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/421 "2016-01-13T16:56:08Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The policy also leads to less prosperity, since even though people get leave, women especially are less likely to advance in their careers if they take frequent leaves. That leaves them poorer. > [@adaher](#): > > Yeah, but men won’t take it as much. And there will be more of a stigma for those who do. > … The obvious solution to these social pathologies is not to accept them as inevitable like sunrise but rather to fix them by becoming the enlightened human-centric society we all want rather than simply glorying in ignorance, tradition, and business-centric greed. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/422 "2016-01-13T17:06:51Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Caring for children is not “no work” – it’s work, and from what the parents I know tell me, a whole lot of work. Telecommuting is often not compatible with caring for children. Of course it’s work. And I guess we should all pay for it. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/423 "2016-01-13T17:09:26Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Of course it’s work. And I guess we should all pay for it. You mean like we all pay for police, and judges, and senators, and public health officials, and the CDC, and military personnel, and many more? Yeah! Sounds good to me. Let’s work out the specifics. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/424 "2016-01-13T17:24:52Z")
Okay, what shall we stop paying for to make this work? Get me a cost estimate and we can work out the details. has CBO scored a bill on paid leave yet? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/425 "2016-01-13T17:42:39Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Okay, what shall we stop paying for to make this work? Get me a cost estimate and we can work out the details. has CBO scored a bill on paid leave yet? Cut military spending; increase revenue through top-bracket income tax increases; eliminate the cap on social security taxes; cap the mortgage interest deduction; increase minimum wage (which will bring in more tax revenue through greater incomes and more workers making enough to actually pay taxes); and more that I can’t think of. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/426 "2016-01-13T17:46:51Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Okay, what shall we stop paying for to make this work? The military. (Edit: I hadn’t seen **iiandyiii** ’s post when I wrote that.) No, wait: I’ll let you keep the military. Just gradually reduce the budget to bring it into line with other nations. Seriously: childcare is already a cost borne by society. It is a necessary cost, because zero children means the end of society. The question is, do we want to offload 100% of that cost onto the parents? The typical Conservative view is that yes, the individual must bear any and all costs associated with his or her life, except the ones that get ignored (infrastructure, etc.) The typical Liberal view is to view the system more wholistically, and see parents and children as a part of broader society rather than competing for scarce resources. The fact is, we have enough wealth to subsidize some individuals in order to make their lives a bit easier. Right now, we subsidize some sectors (e.g. the military, if not necessarily the salaries of the rank-and-file) and ignore others (higher education). I think it’s worth recognizing that we are already DOING this, and then deciding how best to do it, rather than pretending that we don’t and any change is a radical departure from all we stand for. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/427 "2016-01-13T18:09:51Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Cut military spending; increase revenue through top-bracket income tax increases; eliminate the cap on social security taxes; cap the mortgage interest deduction; increase minimum wage (which will bring in more tax revenue through greater incomes and more workers making enough to actually pay taxes); and more that I can’t think of. No. There is plenty of spending that is not nearly as important as family leave, or at least I would assume so. Cutting our military more in a time of war and raising taxes is a non-starter. I mean, if we were in Congress negotiating and all.😃 But seriously, if my side is in the majority and you want this, I’m willing to give it to you. But you have to cut non-security spending to get it without tax increases or an increase in employer costs. Plus some of your ideas are already earmerked for other priorities, at least going by candidate rhetoric. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/428 "2016-01-13T18:12:48Z")
How’s this: parental leave IS security spending. Which youths are more likely to become criminal or terrorist? Those: 1. who live in poverty 2. whose families are so busy making ends meet that they can’t supervise adequately 3. who feel disconnected from / not invested in their communities A great way to reduce the security risk would be for the community to invest in at-risk youth from early childhood. You’d get more return on your dollar that you do on adventures in the Middle East, I guarantee. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/429 "2016-01-13T18:17:47Z")
Oh lord. Everything is security spending to liberals except for security spending. “Schools not jails”. None of that worked until we started putting criminals in jail and kept them there. And parents being able to spend more time with their kids isn’t going to do anything to stop ISIS either. The government spends money on literally hundreds of things domestically. I’m sure you’d be willing to part with some of them if this is really that important. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/430 "2016-01-13T18:20:11Z")
It’s just that you offered “security” as a sacred cow, without defining what you meant by “security.” ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/431 "2016-01-13T20:09:59Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > You mean like we all pay for police, and judges, and senators, and public health officials, and the CDC, and military personnel, and many more? Yeah! Sounds good to me. Let’s work out the specifics. But that’s socialist. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/432 "2016-01-13T20:46:33Z")
[Pro-Jeb! super PAC shuts down](http://www.politico.com/story/2016/01/vamos-for-jeb-2016-closes-217713?cmpid=sf) ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/433 "2016-01-13T21:46:46Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > …None of that worked until we started putting criminals in jail and kept them there… So, once we learned the error of our criminal coddling ways, then those things began to work? Are they still working? But would stop working if we change our minds? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/434 "2016-01-13T22:32:18Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Oh lord. Everything is security spending to liberals except for security spending. It’s more a matter of spending nearly as much on national security as the entire rest of the world does. We’re no longer playing Cold War games with the USSR. The threat that’s supposed to strike fear into our hearts these days, ISIL, is a bunch of guys in trucks with rifles. They’re about as much of a threat to us as those crazies out in Oregon are. We’re not any more ‘in a time of war,’ as you put it, than at any time during my adult life. There’s always _something_ going on in the world that involves people we don’t like being violent to people we like. The only way we’re ‘in a time of war’ is if every damn war in the world is our freakin’ business. But we’re not in a war with ISIL so much as a ‘police action,’ and the phrase really fits here, unlike Korea. We’re helping contain ISIL and helping the actors on the ground reduce its territorial control, with the goal of causing the bogus caliphate to collapse under its own weight. But that only requires a small fraction of our military resources. It wouldn’t make much difference to our military budget whether we were ‘at a time of war’ or not, and it’s absurd to pretend otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/435 "2016-01-13T22:46:05Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > It’s more a matter of spending nearly as much on national security as the entire rest of the world does. We’re no longer playing Cold War games with the USSR. The threat of Russia is diminished, not gone. And you should be gearing up for another Cold War with China. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/436 "2016-01-13T23:29:23Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > The threat of Russia is diminished, not gone. And you should be gearing up for another Cold War with China. Even though I’m pretty sure you’re whooshing me, the reality is that Russia’s ground game got bogged down in Ukraine. They do still have their nukes, of course, but so do we, and maintaining our nukes is pretty much all we can do about that. And I suspect that China has become way too dependent on trade with the West to start anything big. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2016, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/437 "2016-01-14T07:21:25Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Well, besides not finding the return key 🙂 , I think you are missing also that the quotes and links provided show that the left (and most Republican scientists BTW) already think big. > > Sadly, the propaganda from the Right wing media and also the corporate one frames the discussion by automatically denying also what it was actually said about embracing the achievements, the very point of accepting a 2 degree increase is based precisely on acknowledging that we can not quit our emissions cold turkey, we have to change gradually; but change we must, and it does not mean that the left is denying progress. > > The right wing and the corporate one are convincing many that this is not the case because they do concentrate on nutpicking, that is that they only show the very extreme environmentalists that in reality are not minded much, if at all, by the Democrats. On this issue the framing of the discussion is so distorted that the middle of the road approach taken by many Democrats and liberals has been turned into a radical one by the Republicans that are in the pockets of one industry. I don’t deny that the approach advocated by most mainstream Democrats/liberals is moderate and sensible-my main point is that certain extremes of anti-population growth rhetoric has racist/classist implications. > [@adaher](#): > > While I have no use for the Zero Population Growth crowd, I don’t think the government should be subsidizing the decision to have children over the decision not to either. Not for any environmental reasons, but simply because it’s hard to say that all reproductive choices are equal while only subsidizing one of them. I don’t think all reproductive choices are equal-people who do choose to have children are being more socially useful then those who are not. > [@adaher](#): > > Yeah, but men won’t take it as much. And there will be more of a stigma for those who do. > > I"m not against paid leave. If a company chooses to do it. I support the FMLA, but I don’t think paying people to do no work when they actually have a job is good policy. In the modern age, Kasich is right. We should be encouraging more telecommuting. It’s pro economic growth and pro environment at the same time. Except the whole point of paid maternal leave is to pay people because they won’t be able to do their jobs and because even if they could, they should be able to have some time off. > [@adaher](#): > > No. There is plenty of spending that is not nearly as important as family leave, or at least I would assume so. Cutting our military more in a time of war and raising taxes is a non-starter. > > I mean, if we were in Congress negotiating and all.😃 > > But seriously, if my side is in the majority and you want this, I’m willing to give it to you. But you have to cut non-security spending to get it without tax increases or an increase in employer costs. > > Plus some of your ideas are already earmerked for other priorities, at least going by candidate rhetoric. Its quite simple really-all the Democrats need to do is offer it as part of a package where all funding to Planned Parenthood is cut (with funding to other maternal health services being doubled) and essentially dare the Republicans to prove whether they are more pro-life then plutocrat in their inclinations. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2016, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/438 "2016-01-14T13:38:00Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > I don’t deny that the approach advocated by most mainstream Democrats/liberals is moderate and sensible-my main point is that certain extremes of anti-population growth rhetoric has racist/classist implications. And the point was that as Anthony Watts is a Republican denier it should had been clear to you by now that a lot of the Republicans are the ones that are using those racist/classist implications. Or to be more precise they are projecting, by claiming that it is the democrats/liberals the ones who are doing it, **that** is a big Republican/denier lie. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2016, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/439 "2016-01-14T13:51:11Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > I > Its quite simple really-all the Democrats need to do is offer it as part of a package where all funding to Planned Parenthood is cut (with funding to other maternal health services being doubled) and essentially dare the Republicans to prove whether they are more pro-life then plutocrat in their inclinations. I think 99% of Republicans would jump at that deal. I wouldn’t, as planned parenthood funding is small compared to the costs of paid family leave, but your dare would be met head on if that was the offer on the table. ---
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2016, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819/440 "2016-01-14T16:00:25Z")
[RCP now shows Trump averaging slightly ahead of Cruz in Iowa.](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ia/iowa_republican_presidential_caucus-3194.html)Cruz is sliding after getting up to +10 on Trump in the state, and with the eligibility question not settled, and now this unreported Goldman Sachs loan - I think he might be done. If Trump wins Iowa, its game over. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819.md?page=21) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-race-for-the-gop-nomination-post-thanksgiving-thread/738819.md?page=23)