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gags

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Everything posted by gags

  1. The trends are certainly frightening. However, the obvious question becomes where does one go that's better? I continue to believe that this country is worth fighting for and I think it can be turned around. Unfortunately I can also see that we are fast approaching the point of no return.
  2. The Economist does a decent job of looking at the likely effects of the new bill: "What will it mean for America? The short answer is that the reforms will expand coverage dramatically, but at a heavy cost to the taxpayer. They will also do far too little to rein in the underlying drivers of America’s roaring health inflation. Analysis by RAND, an independent think-tank, suggests that the reforms will actually increase America’s overall health spending—public plus private—by about 2% by 2020, in comparison with a scenario of no reform (see chart). And that rate of spending was already unsustainable at a time when the baby-boomers are starting to retire in large numbers." http://www.economist.com/world/united-stat...ory_id=15769767
  3. Controlling capital outflows from the US has been an ongoing effort for several years now. It's not surprising that this administration would take it to the next level.
  4. Are the nations and people of Africa just the victims of a long series of unfortunate accidents?
  5. This bill expands the Medicaid program and there are subsidies in it to assist anyone who is supposedly too poor to afford insurance. As is usually the case, I'm sure those subsidies will also cover some people who can afford insurance but make other economic choices. One of the big practical problems with Obama-Care is that it expands coverage while doing little to reduce costs. In fact, we all know what happens when we increase demand and reduce supply. Prices must increase. The only way the government can control healthcare costs under this scheme is by rationing. They will have to pay doctors less (resulting in fewer doctors, of course) and make it more difficult for people to receive care, especially expensive procedures. One can see where this will go by simply looking at Canada or Great Brittain. There is a reason why cancer survival rates in those countries are lower than they are here. This bill is going to kill a lot of Americans, all in the name of social justice and income redistribution.
  6. You need to start having conversations with people who are little more successful in life.
  7. I think you've made a better case in the current environment for joining the Republicans. Right now, the most pressing political imperative for anyone who loves freedom is to vote enough Republicans into power that Obama doesn't have carte blanche to do whatever he wants. As far as the Libertarians are concerned, over the years the party has been a complete and total electoral failure. A vote for a Libertarian candidate in all but the smallest local races is a wasted vote. When you are dealing with a statist of Obama's dismal character, our first priority should be to stop him and the way to do that is to ride the only horse with a chance of winning the race. Right now, that horse is the Republican party.
  8. I think this nails it down pretty well. He's a thorough statist who has little respect for individual rights. You can call someone an embezzler, a swindler, or a robber, but they are all thieves. This man is a thief and he believes that what you own should go to someone who is more "deserving". The fact that you worked to earn it means nothing.
  9. Everyone knows Bush was an incompetent fool, but he's gone now. As far as free market solutions go, the Republicans are far from perfect in this debate but they're the best chance we have to at least slow the current free-fall toward socialism. I can't believe people are going to sit by and do nothing to end the Democrats' control of Congress. I hope there's a country left when Obama, Reid and Pelosi are finished with it.
  10. I agree with you in that this will be virtually impossible to repeal until there is a new president and even then it will be extremely difficult. The best we can hope for is to end the Democrat's control of Congress and push the Republicans to fix the most horrendous parts of this mess.
  11. I plan to donate money to candidates who oppose supporters of Obama-Care in this next election cycle. I might also work for a candidate, assuming I can find one worth supporting with my time.
  12. He wasn't joking when he slipped during the election and told "Joe the Plumber" that he just wanted to "spread the wealth around".
  13. The 2,000+ page legislation and the "fix" for the Senate bill are loaded with this sort of convoluted and arcane language. It goes far afield from its original purpose by including a provision that kicks private financial institutions out of the business of making student loans and it imposes asbsurd new regulations like requiring restaurants to publish calorie counts on their menus. During the next 4 or 5 years we are all going to go through a discovery process as we find out about the thousands of new regulations and mandates this bill puts on all of us. The unintended and the intended consequences are going to take years to unravel. Thank you Chairman Maobama and Madame Pelosi for dumping this steaming pile of shit on America. I don't know whether that specific tax provision will pass muster or not, but it would be easy enough to change. If there's anything that Washington is good at, it's writing new tax laws. As far as the entire bill being declared unconstitutional, I doubt that will happen. The Commerce Clause has been twisted to justify the regulation of a ridiculous number of things. In fact, the commerce doesn't even have to be inter-state for the Feds to regulate it. Let's face it, the politicians have made the Constitution a meaningless document in many ways.
  14. To their credit, not a single Republican voted for this poison bill.
  15. Adding the expense of a massive new healthcare entitlement isn't going to help the situation. It's pretty disturbing.
  16. The world isn't going to an end tomorrow, however 10 years from now we are certain to have a worse healthcare system than we would have had if this package of controls, taxes, and other "reforms" wasn't passed. This legislation virtually guarantees fewer doctors, the rationing of care, continued increases in HC expenditures, and another fiscal disaster for the country that will make Social Security and Medicare look small by comparison. I don't know whether the American people will favor the Republicans in sufficient numbers during future elections. After all, there were actually some Objectivists who advocated voting for Obama in 2008. If Objectivists can't understand the danger presented by Obama and his followers, then I doubt the average American victim of our public education system will have that ability.
  17. What a disaster for America. This will be extremely difficult if not impossible to unwind with the current Leftist in Chief occupying the White House.
  18. Dr. Paul Hsieh has a nice opinion piece on how Obama Care will force doctors to violate the Hippocratic Oath. http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/obamacare-vs-...ppocratic-oath/
  19. I've never been a fan of poetry and our President's lackluster work hasn't changed my opinion of it.
  20. Wow. It would be a lot easier to understand your points if you paid just a little bit of attention to grammar and spelling. Based on what I think you might be trying to say, I wonder how swine flu compares with the regular flu virus in terms of fatalities and hospitalizations. My general sense (supported by no empirical data whatsoever) is that the whole H1N1 scare turned out to be far less than everyone expected. Let’s face it, the media and the government did a pretty good job of hyping up H1N1 and they did the same thing with Asian Bird Flu a couple of years ago. These kinds of scare tactics don't exactly lead to increased trust in our elected officials.
  21. There's no doubt that a government takeover of healthcare is a game-changer for politics in America. If it passes, future elections will be about who can promise the most benefits. It will also bankrupt this country.
  22. I don't think you can ignore the interlocking alliances and mutual defense treaties (some of which were secret) coupled with a general atmosphere of militarism that helped to draw countries into the Great War. As far as your thesis about Marxism is concerned, I've never heard that before. Not that it's implausible for that reason, but I don't think enough Marxists were in positions of influence to bring about the series of events that lead to WWI.
  23. They are caught between a rock and a hard place on this. It's increasingly difficult to see how we're going to be able to service the future obligations that politicians continue to pile on the backs of taxpayers.
  24. Paulson said: "I believe that if the system collapsed, we easily could've seen unemployment of 25 percent." Ok, well I don't think the "whole system" was going to collapse, so I too call bullshit on this.
  25. I get a huge kick out of the snowboarders. I've never even tried the sport and don't plan on it either, but the guys and the women do some really amazing tricks. Shaun White in the half-pipe last night was incredible.
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