That debate ended with a consensus that we needed health care reform, but not the type she proposed. That was about 17 years ago.

He's not listening because he's to busy playing Chicago Politics....
Obama Now Selling Judgeships for Health Care Votes? | The Weekly Standard

Perhaps I'm misreading you, Joe. On the one hand you seem to admire Obama because he is not the typical opportunist politician, on the other hand you seem to think he is scary because he actually believes in what he is doing. This doesn't clarify, for me, what you actually opine on the the health care bill. In another thread you pointed out that our economy is unsustainable. This health care bill is, to me, piling even more unsustainability on top of what is already unsustainable. The Keynesian economic model has evolved us into this situation, and Obama's policies are, to me, Keynes on steroids. I realize that many think that the free market is broken, that it doesn't work. I think that is a misconception of what a free market does. A free market does not provide "free" services. It provides the opportunity for individuals to provide for themselves, of themselves, by themselves. It guarantees nothing. Failure is inherent in freedom. The free market provides the opportunity to pursue life liberty and happiness. It does not guarantee those things. To say that the free market has failed because health care is not guaranteed to everybody is actually saying that you prefer something other than a free market, not that it has failed. If you prefer the mixed, Keynesian model, is that because it "works?" Again, it has evolved us into the present unsustainability. Is there some magical mixed economy that balances the government intrusion into the hard hearted market so that life, liberty, and happiness are guaranteed? Has that ever occurred? Have we passed that magical point, and are Obama's policies trying to steer us back to it?

I'd like to go around and around with you but I have to make shirts for Mass Bass or I'm going to on the dole too.

If I show up shirtless and without any money, can I just have a shirt for free?

Yes, it's called America. We have a system that works in 20 and 50 year cycles that move the flow of money up or down to bring stability (i.e. growth) over the long haul.

-spence

Can you make up two with impeach obama on it? Fishbones and I will be going together and Im sure we'll buy them. Dont worry, I dont talk politics in person, Im just an internet tough guy.

and if you had Michelle whispering in your ear................:jump1:

So then, hope and change are not needed.

Most people don't apply macro thinking to their own lives. During the smaller cycles I'd think that hope and change could be beneficial to the individual, even if they are insignificant in the big picture.

-spence

Up until your thoughts on the beneficence of hope and change to the individual, the discussion was at the "macro" level. And the inference was, obviously, to Obama's campaign motto and the impact of his unsustainable (in my opinion) policies on an economy that Joe feels is already unsustainable

My point is that Obama's policies won't likely influence the macro trends.

-spence

So if the macro trends are "20 to 50 year cycles that move the flow of money up or down to bring stability (i.e. growth) over the long haul", and if this is the "mixed economy that guarantees life, liberty, and happiness," then worries of unsustainability are unwarrented, and complaints of us being inches away from an Indian style class system are delusional. And if Obama's policies won't influence these happiness guaranteeing macro trends, then his health care and stimulus initiatives are just vote getting gimmicks since, due to the macro trends, there are no actual crises that we must hurry up and fix.

It's fine to be worried about unsustainable behavior, the point is that the system will more than likely correct itself. Obama's stimulus was perhaps inevitable, and I'd argue McCain would have done nearly the exact same thing. Bush, leader of the GOP was already well down the road...

-spence

You've yet to master basic sarcasm. The people I speak of don't even make it to the E-room. They die on the streets of this country, insane, inebriated, poverty stricken, totally disadvantaged.Or they die from basic health care from day one. Pick one, all, or more. Take a little stroll on the rough side of town to see how your fellow man lives.

OK...and this is not an attempt at sarcasm...WTF are you talking about???

people dead on the streets of this country.. "insane, inebriated, poverty stricken, totally disadvantaged"???..."dying from basic healthcare from day one"???

guess that social safety net ain't working out so good in your imaginary world is it?..what a waste of money...

this is mind boggling...this is how people like Obama get elected:uhuh:

I'm not a fan of the "system" to which you refer--no matter who is pulling the strings--Bush, McCain, Obama, Clinton, Carter, Nixon, Johnson, FDR, Hoover . . . whoever. And I certainly do not think it is sustainable. Once started, it must continue on the same path of expansionist government intervention or collapse. The idea that a little injection of Federal money into the market to artificially kickstart it, as you hint at, is not really necessary. The system, as is known, if left to itself, will correct. The fear is that the temporary "collapse" will be too painful for many. The problem, among other things, is that it has become a habit and expectation that the inevitable "failures" must be "corrected" by government, and by the same implication, the government must be at fault. Thus, having been given, or having taken, the mantle of responsibility, the government not only begins to assume the role of director not only with injections of money, but begins to restructure the "system" with regulations, laws, penalties, tax incentives and and tax burdens so that it DOES become part of the problem. And the "system" does skew to government intervention and control. And it eventually lapses from a more natural, evolutionary process into a planned, top-down directed, more static, theoretical house of cards that constantly needs government fingers in the dike. The process is inflationary, thus creating constantly more expensive and inevitable "fixes." And it constantly heads toward that tipping point of the inevitable percentage of the economy in the government's hand being too great for the private sector to sustain.

Look, scott the point that I'm trying to make is that not everyone has it as good as I and I truly hope you do. That's just a fact. I think that it's a shame we have homeless people living on the streets and in the woods in this State and this country, I think that it's a shame that soup kitchens need to exist and can't because of lack of funds. I think that it's a shame that we no longer have public schools innoculate our children as they did when I was a kid. That's WTF I'm talking about.

I don't think the bank bailout was about a little pain, but rather a real fear about the entire collapse of our economic system. The Stimulus package is more debatable, but there certainly are many economists that believe it was very influential in averting a depression or much deeper recession. That's not to say it had a favorable return of course, but soft benefits are always difficult to quantify.

As for government becoming "part of the problem" in these times...the government is already part of the system.We don't have a free market but rather a regulated free market. The American entrepreneurial spirit and freedoms make us the global engine of innovation, but left unchecked these same forces will rip us apart in the name of shareholder value.

Plus ca chance, plus c'est la meme chose.

-spence

The government has always been part of the system. The question is, how much a part should it be, and what kind of system will it be if it intrudes beyond a certain point. My earlier questions to Joe were sincere. "Is there some magical mixed economy that balances the government intrusion into the hard hearted market so that life, liberty, and happiness are guaranteed?" "Has that ever occurred?" Well, they were partially sincere. As the founders knew, these conditions could not be guaranteed, but they created a form of governance that would allow individuals to pursue their own happiness and to fight for and maintain their life and liberty. My last question to Joe asking if Obama's policies are trying to steer us back to that balanced moment was purely rhetorical. l obviously believe that huge government intrusion of massive public spending does not only obliterate any balance, but creates an even greater unsustainability than Joe fears.

How far do you go in checking shareholder value before it suppresses entrepeneurial spirit and the freedoms to innovate? And how large of a tax burden to pay for the votes of "the working class" to guarantee their unguaranteeable happiness can the entrepeneurial spirit sustain before Atlas shrugs? And what unleashed that American entrepeneurial spirit in the first place?

you are mired in typical leftist soup line America sucks and it is far worse here than the crappiest third world country propoganda...that's WTF I'm talking about :uhuh: go back and reread your posts....

I don't believe that it sucks here far more than the crappiest 3rd world country . Not at all and not by far. What I believe is that we can do a hell of a lot better than we are now, by far. After all we ARE the greatest country in the world, right? I truly believe so. Then it's time to put our money where our big mouth is. And that's not in some crook's pocket. That money, tax money, the people's money should serve the interests of the people (red citizens here), all of them. The reason we have so many on the streets jobless and homeless is that their chance at employment has either been sent overseas or overseas has been brought here. Some illegally. I don't remember in the 60s the feeling that I have now that a way of life is vanishing, or being stolen. That our government is not protecting the interests of the middle class, but rather big business. And business will tell their emplyees to their faces that they are the bitches of the company. I quit a job over that. And feel extremely lucky that I was able to quickly find a better job in less than a week. But I always have. In 40 years working I have never collected a frigging red cent from our government in umemployment insurance. Not one. But I am glad as all hell that it is there for those who need it. This country has never failed me. Others can't say that they've been so lucky. We are our brother's keepers.
BTW I regret the use of WTF in my last post, my apologies, It's not a civilized way to conduct a discussion.

Roman history, the downfall of a civilized society repeats its self again

[QUOTE=Backbeach Jake;752784]I don't believe that it sucks here far more than the crappiest 3rd world country . Not at all and not by far. What I believe is that we can do a hell of a lot better than we are now, by far. After all we ARE the greatest country in the world, right? I truly believe so. Then it's time to put our money where our big mouth is. And that's not in some crook's pocket. That money, tax money, the people's money should serve the interests of the people (red citizens here), all of them.

Jake, I can agree with many of the things you say, and I can definitely relate to much of what you feel. But I disagree with some of your perspectives. I believe we are a great country, perhaps the greatest, but we probably don't agree why it is. I believe that tax money would best serve the citizens if it was not confiscated from them.

The reason we have so many on the streets jobless and homeless is that their chance at employment has either been sent overseas or overseas has been brought here. Some illegally. I don't remember in the 60s the feeling that I have now that a way of life is vanishing, or being stolen. That our government is not protecting the interests of the middle class, but rather big business. And business will tell their emplyees to their faces that they are the bitches of the company. I quit a job over that.

After jobs were "sent overseas" and even while illegals took jobs because they worked for less than we would, our unemployment rate was still low. The current spike in unemployment is a result of other failures. The 60's were a transitional period in which a large part of its generation rejected the then current "way of life", transforming "conservative" educational institutions into the disseminators of "liberal" social and economic ideas which developed into programs such as the war on poverty. The 60's inherited the wealth of the post war boom and business expansion that had shed some of the New Deal regulations and in a fit of love and guilt created the philosophy to which you subscribe--that government should protect the interests of the middle class rather than big business. And it should use the people's money to spread the wealth. Class warfare was approved on a grand scale in the 60's, and I believe that is the greater reason for unsustainable economic conditions.

And feel extremely lucky that I was able to quickly find a better job in less than a week. But I always have. In 40 years working I have never collected a frigging red cent from our government in umemployment insurance. Not one. But I am glad as all hell that it is there for those who need it. This country has never failed me. Others can't say that they've been so lucky. We are our brother's keepers.

Was it luck that you were able to find jobs? I would guess that who you are and what you have to offer had a lot to do with your success. The vast, vast majority of citizens find jobs, if they wish to do so. A safety net for those without work is a good idea. And the vast, vast majority of employers are decent people who don't tell their employees that they are bitches of the company. And the government should not interfere with that relationship by imposing overburdensome redistributive tax and regulatory policies. And employees should not add to those policies by demanding compensation that make shipping jobs overseas so attractive.

Quote from Grand Bahamas! Did They ever thing at some point in their life thing about getting a job??

"When it is not about money, it's all about money."

rijimmy for pres

He has a hidden past

America is ready for it's first bisexual, libertarian president, no worries....:smash::buds: