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Obama's presidency has been one of abject failure and economic misery, scarred by scandal. The only jobs the admin has "created" are part time jobs. Incomes, savings, and standard of living has fallen during the Obama administration, and we have three more years of this downtrend to endure.
2016- How are the libs going to promote four more years of liberal "rule" after this debacle? Will Americans be dumb enough to vote for another liberal and doom the nation to four more years of economic misery? Has the electorate become conditioned, via government treats for votes programs, to simply vote democrat, regardless of performance and personal voter economic misery?
Libs- If liberal policy is so great, why do we have greater numbers of unemployed (or underemployed), lower incomes, lower savings, and more people on food stamps? The only people that appear to have prospered under Obama is the "1%ers"- oddly the people that Obama purports to hate.
By voting in another Democrat! We need a good run of 16 years with the presidency to correct the debacle that has become the supreme court...
Ahhh, the "It's all Bush's fault!!!" argument. I love that one. It makes it so much easier to tell which side of the aisle the other person is coming from.
Are conservatives blameless? Not by a long shot. However, stating that liberals are consistently against anything is a fallacious statement. If liberals are against the Patriot Act, why did Obama not only uphold it but broaden its scope? If liberals are against preemptive war, why do we have drones circling Libya and killing children under Obama? For that matter, Obama has had plenty of opportunity to suspend torture, stop the war on terror, and shut down homeland security. He hasn't done any of it.
Get off your high horse, the liberals are as much to blame as the conservatives for the police stat the America is becoming.
I thought the Patriot Act was a terrible mistake when it was first passed. I was dismayed when President Obama lent his support to continuing its provisions. I've posted on several threads about the dangers of invasion of privacy posed by the NSA and the Patriot Act. I am a liberal. Unfortunately, I don't control the government.
I suspect that there are realities which we the people are unaware of that direct some of this policy. I also suspect that the complex manner in which our government is funded plays a role. There are currently several lawsuits challenging the government's overreach in terms of information-gathering. I would point out that those lawsuits are spearheaded by groups that are generally labelled as "liberal", though I've never thought much of such labels. And there are several Congressmen involved with legislation to repeal parts of the Patriot Act. And those Congressmen would generally be labelled as conservatives.
There are plenty of issues which we can all agree on. And no insults or name-calling is necessary.
Ahhh, the "It's all Bush's fault!!!" argument. I love that one. It makes it so much easier to tell which side of the aisle the other person is coming from.
Are conservatives blameless? Not by a long shot. However, stating that liberals are consistently against anything is a fallacious statement. If liberals are against the Patriot Act, why did Obama not only uphold it but broaden its scope? If liberals are against preemptive war, why do we have drones circling Libya and killing children under Obama? For that matter, Obama has had plenty of opportunity to suspend torture, stop the war on terror, and shut down homeland security. He hasn't done any of it.
Get off your high horse, the liberals are as much to blame as the conservatives for the police stat the America is becoming.
I didn't say it was all Bushes fault. It is the fault of conservative ideology mostly and scared Democrats.
Because President Obama is not a liberal.
conservatives will never look at the sickness in their hearts that made them support all of those unAmerican policies. conservatives were cheering for torture. They were cheering for Gitmo with the idea of holding people there forever without charging them with a crime.
They supported the idea of pre-emptive war with nation's that weren't a threat, but that might be one in the future.
They supported the creation of homeland security, they supported the Patriot Act, they supported fighting a war on terror, they supported the disastrous Iraqi war.
At every turn conservatives made the wrong choice. Yet, now that President Obama has to clean up a lot of this crap they want to now claim both sides do it.
It is plain as day that if another terrorist attack happens and President Obama has dismantled any of the things conservatives erected to fight terrorism that will be used to crucify him.
Nah, the war on terror in proof of the sickness that is at the heart of much of conservative thinking. It is fundamentally anti-American.
conservatives don't advocate for a smaller government that is less intrusive. You know you they don't. Why must we pretend that just because people say they believe something when we can see that they'd expand the government in all kinds of ways.
conservatives believe in a huge military, that expanding government. conservatives believe in no abortions that is expanding government, conservatives believe in more voter laws that is expanding government, passing a law that bans homosexual marriage is a huge expansion of government, wanting immigration laws like the one passed in AZ would be a huge expansion of government, etc and so on.
The ways that conservatives want to cut government spending has to do with who government spending helps.
If the government spending helps groups of people that conservatives hate than that government spending is always cast as too big government.
If the spending benefits groups conservatives don't hate then the spending is ok. This is why conservatives support the three largest government expenditures by far Social Security, Medicare, and the military.
To me conservatives don't support a smaller less intrusive government or less government spending, they support cutting off funding that helps groups of people that they hate and they support a large and intrusive government.
Civilized debate is what it is, but we have to look at reality and the reality is that conservatives have very ugly motives for their expressed political beliefs and when elected and in power they pursue policies that are aimed at hurting specific groups of Americans in various ways.
All good points. But if we were to look at reality, there is a reality as well that liberals sometimes have ugly motives for their political positions, and they have also pursued policies that are aimed at hurting specific groups of Americans in various ways.
Neither party is ideal, neither party lives up to the ideals it espouses. The government is a strange dichotomy. It is a place that aspires to ideals, but in order to function, which it must, it has to compromise the ideals for the sake of practicality.
All good points. But if we were to look at reality, there is a reality as well that liberals sometimes have ugly motives for their political positions, and they have also pursued policies that are aimed at hurting specific groups of Americans in various ways.
Neither party is ideal, neither party lives up to the ideals it espouses. The government is a strange dichotomy. It is a place that aspires to ideals, but in order to function, which it must, it has to compromise the ideals for the sake of practicality.
No, name the policies that liberals pursue that would hurt groups of Americans? Please
We have to stop with this false equivalency thing. conservatives right now are radical. conservatives right now don't support a smaller less intrusive government.
I listed the various and numerous ways that conservatives seek to greatly expand government.
Please if you want to debate lets debate, but the conservative position on the issues shows that what I say is 100% correct.
Please name on program that helps old white people, or rich people or married white people that rank and file conservatives want to cut and that they perceive as too big government?
Please list the programs that rank and file conservatives do want cut and do criticize, what is their key component, it is not based on how much money the program spends, conservatives go after teeny tiny programs that spend very little.
No it is based on who conservatives perceive to be getting that money. It is ugly, but it is what motivates their anti-spending rhetoric.
I wish this were not true. I wish in the immigration debate that conservatives weren't openly saying we can't let these undocumented immigrants become legal because they'll just vote for Democrats, but they are saying these repulsive things.
I wish the conservative party wasn't attempting in state after state to make it more difficult to vote.
I wish the conservative party wasn't attempting to stop all abortions period. I wish the conservative party didn't pass anti-sharia laws and pro christmas ordinances, but they do.
I wish conservatives spoke about income inequality, or the cost of healthcare or college or stagnating wages, or anything that has any interest to me, but they don't.
No, name the policies that liberals pursue that would hurt groups of Americans? Please
We have to stop with this false equivalency thing. conservatives right now are radical. conservatives right now don't support a smaller less intrusive government.
I listed the various and numerous ways that conservatives seek to greatly expand government.
Please if you want to debate lets debate, but the conservative position on the issues shows that what I say is 100% correct.
Please name on program that helps old white people, or rich people or married white people that rank and file conservatives want to cut and that they perceive as too big government?
Please list the programs that rank and file conservatives do want cut and do criticize, what is their key component, it is not based on how much money the program spends, conservatives go after teeny tiny programs that spend very little.
No it is based on who conservatives perceive to be getting that money. It is ugly, but it is what motivates their anti-spending rhetoric.
I wish this were not true. I wish in the immigration debate that conservatives weren't openly saying we can't let these undocumented immigrants become legal because they'll just vote for Democrats, but they are saying these repulsive things.
I wish the conservative party wasn't attempting in state after state to make it more difficult to vote.
I wish the conservative party wasn't attempting to stop all abortions period. I wish the conservative party didn't pass anti-sharia laws and pro christmas ordinances, but they do.
I wish conservatives spoke about income inequality, or the cost of healthcare or college or stagnating wages, or anything that has any interest to me, but they don't.
We have to look at reality.
Anyone who claims to be 100% correct has no desire for debate. Set your ideology aside and look at both sides of the aisle objectively. You'll start to notice that there isn't much difference.
The prediction I got from a "right" leaning organization/conference. . .
1) Democrats will most likely win the presidential election. not about candiate, about demographics
2) Jerrymandering is paying off, with house and senate largely unchanged though there could be some risk that both house/senate could go slightly republican.
3) very little evidence that that slight edge would do much, since they wouldn't break a filibuster
I think the below reflects a broad miss-understanding of American politics, to think that speicfic issues or events may help their candidate win or lose and not the demographic base. No matter how bad you may think "democrats" are doing. . .you aren't going to win the votes you need based on the voters who will show up in 2016
#myprediction2016
so we can search for it later
Quote:
Originally Posted by hawkeye2009
Obama's presidency has been one of abject failure and economic misery, scarred by scandal. The only jobs the admin has "created" are part time jobs. Incomes, savings, and standard of living has fallen during the Obama administration, and we have three more years of this downtrend to endure.
2016- How are the libs going to promote four more years of liberal "rule" after this debacle? Will Americans be dumb enough to vote for another liberal and doom the nation to four more years of economic misery? Has the electorate become conditioned, via government treats for votes programs, to simply vote democrat, regardless of performance and personal voter economic misery?
Libs- If liberal policy is so great, why do we have greater numbers of unemployed (or underemployed), lower incomes, lower savings, and more people on food stamps? The only people that appear to have prospered under Obama is the "1%ers"- oddly the people that Obama purports to hate.
No, name the policies that liberals pursue that would hurt groups of Americans? Please
We have to stop with this false equivalency thing. conservatives right now are radical. conservatives right now don't support a smaller less intrusive government.
I listed the various and numerous ways that conservatives seek to greatly expand government.
Please if you want to debate lets debate, but the conservative position on the issues shows that what I say is 100% correct.
Please name on program that helps old white people, or rich people or married white people that rank and file conservatives want to cut and that they perceive as too big government?
Please list the programs that rank and file conservatives do want cut and do criticize, what is their key component, it is not based on how much money the program spends, conservatives go after teeny tiny programs that spend very little.
No it is based on who conservatives perceive to be getting that money. It is ugly, but it is what motivates their anti-spending rhetoric.
I wish this were not true. I wish in the immigration debate that conservatives weren't openly saying we can't let these undocumented immigrants become legal because they'll just vote for Democrats, but they are saying these repulsive things.
I wish the conservative party wasn't attempting in state after state to make it more difficult to vote.
I wish the conservative party wasn't attempting to stop all abortions period. I wish the conservative party didn't pass anti-sharia laws and pro christmas ordinances, but they do.
I wish conservatives spoke about income inequality, or the cost of healthcare or college or stagnating wages, or anything that has any interest to me, but they don't.
We have to look at reality.
Rather than paint all conservatives with the same paintbrush, why don't we consider a specific conservative and look at his policies and proposals? And discuss the positives and negatives of those policies. That seems to me to be the civil and reasonable thing to do. Your antagonism toward an entire and very large group of people that actually represent a wide range of ideas and perspectives doesn't seem reasonable at all.
I agree with you that conservatives don't prioritize issues in the same that liberals do. I might also point out that rich people don't prioritize issues in the same way that poor people do. And that rural people don't prioritize issues in the same way that urban people do. Issues don't touch all people in the same way, and that's why you aren't interested in the same issues that conservatives are. You're not touched by those issues. Nuclear power hasn't been an issue for the majority of American voters for a few decades. But let the government propose a nuclear power plant in your backyard, and suddenly it shoots right up to the top as a priority for you, while for others not so much. Guns might not be an issue for you, but for people who own guns and who use guns, gun control is an issue. I don't know which issues are important to you, and which are unimportant, because I don't know you, but I suspect that the issues that are important are issues that touch on your life, or have the possibility of touching on your life. I know that many people on the East Coast are very much in favor of developing high-speed transit lines, and would like the federal government to pay for them. People in Wyoming don't want to pay taxes to build high-speed transit lines that won't benefit the people of Wyoming. Every issue is like a coin. It has two sides. Both sides have valid perspectives. And if the government is to act in a fair manner, it has to listen to ALL perspectives. So we need to live in a world where ALL perspectives have a voice.
Nearly 60% of American families are wholly dependent upon government for salaries, pensions and / or entitlements.
To expect them to vote against their own self-interest is folly.
However, penalizing the donor class while rewarding the recipient class has consequences that generally involve a break down or collapse.
Under the current system, no candidate will be elected that does not espouse the proper "tax them and bribe us!" philosophy.
Rather than paint all conservatives with the same paintbrush, why don't we consider a specific conservative and look at his policies and proposals? And discuss the positives and negatives of those policies. That seems to me to be the civil and reasonable thing to do. Your antagonism toward an entire and very large group of people that actually represent a wide range of ideas and perspectives doesn't seem reasonable at all.
I agree with you that conservatives don't prioritize issues in the same that liberals do. I might also point out that rich people don't prioritize issues in the same way that poor people do. And that rural people don't prioritize issues in the same way that urban people do. Issues don't touch all people in the same way, and that's why you aren't interested in the same issues that conservatives are. You're not touched by those issues. Nuclear power hasn't been an issue for the majority of American voters for a few decades. But let the government propose a nuclear power plant in your backyard, and suddenly it shoots right up to the top as a priority for you, while for others not so much. Guns might not be an issue for you, but for people who own guns and who use guns, gun control is an issue. I don't know which issues are important to you, and which are unimportant, because I don't know you, but I suspect that the issues that are important are issues that touch on your life, or have the possibility of touching on your life. I know that many people on the East Coast are very much in favor of developing high-speed transit lines, and would like the federal government to pay for them. People in Wyoming don't want to pay taxes to build high-speed transit lines that won't benefit the people of Wyoming. Every issue is like a coin. It has two sides. Both sides have valid perspectives. And if the government is to act in a fair manner, it has to listen to ALL perspectives. So we need to live in a world where ALL perspectives have a voice.
You are just ignoring actual conservative positions. But I'll play your game.
Let's look at the Paul Ryan Budget that conservatives supported.
Paul Ryan’s budget would spend $5.3 trillion less over the next decade than President Obama’s budget. Part of this is health care: Ryan would trim Medicare and Medicaid for a portion of his savings. But he’d also spend $2.2 trillion less on everything else. So what, specifically, is Ryan planning to cut?
Over the next decade, Ryan plans to spend about 16 percent less than the White House on “income security” programs for the poor — that’s everything from food stamps to housing assistance to the earned-income tax credit. (Ryan’s budget would authorize $4.8 trillion between 2013 and 2022; the White House’s would spend $5.7 trillion.) Compared with Obama, Ryan would spend 25 percent less on transportation and 13 percent less on veterans. [Update:See below for more on veterans.] He’d spend 6 percent less on “General science, space, and basic technology.” And, compared with the White House’s proposal, he’d shell out 33 percent less for “Education, training, employment, and social services.”
I asked Third Way’s budget expert David Kendall if he could update some of his numbers for Ryan’s budget. Under Ryan’s plan, for instance, spending on transportation would be 26.1 percent lower in 2014 than it is today. If that size cut was applied to, say, air-traffic control programs, Kendall notes, “there would be 3,092 more flight cancellations and 68,683 delays annually. At the U.S. average of 49 passengers per flight, that’s enough to strand 151,503 more people at the gate and make 3,365,685 more people late every year.”
Likewise, spending on natural resources and the environment would be 14.6 percent lower under Ryan’s budget in 2014 than it is today. Assuming those cuts hit all programs in this category equally — and, again, this is for illustration purposes — then this is how it would affect weather forecasting. “Our weather forecasts would be only half as accurate for four to eight years until another polar satellite is launched,” estimates Kendall. “For many people planning a weekend outdoors, they may have to wait until Thursday for a forecast as accurate as one they now get on Monday. … Perhaps most affected would be hurricane response. Governors and mayors would have to order evacuations for areas twice as large or wait twice as long for an accurate forecast.”
CUTS FOOD STAMPS BY $133 BILLION: Ryan’s budget would send the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps) back to the states as a block grant and cut the program by $134 billion. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, “an average of almost 10 million people would have to be cut from the program in the years from 2016 through 2022 to achieve the required savings.” If the cuts were to come from benefits, rather than kicking families out of the program, “All families of four — including the poorest — would see their benefits cut by about $90 a month in fiscal year 2016, or more than $1,100 on an annual basis.” Ryan continually claims that the food stamp program is “unsustainable,” even though the numbers show that’s simply not the case.
2. CUTS MEDICAID BY 1/3: Ryan would treat Medicaid in the same way: transform the exiting matching-grant financing structure into a pre-determined block grant that will not keep up with actual health care spending and send it back to the states. This would shift some of the burden of Medicaid’s growing costs to the states, forcing them to — in the words of the CBO — make cutbacks that “involve reduced eligibility for Medicaid and CHIP, coverage of fewer services, lower payments to providers, or increased cost sharing by beneficiaries—all of which would reduce access to care.” The reductions to Medicaid kick in right away: between 2013 and 2022, the budget makes $1.4 trillion in cuts to Medicaid —a 34 percent reduction. As a result, states could reduce enrollment by more than 14 million people, or almost 20 percent—even if they are were able to slow the growth in health care costs substantially.
. CUTS PELL GRANTS FOR 1 MILLION STUDENTS: Ryan consistently claims that increases in financial aid are driving up the cost of higher education, even though evidence doesn’t back him up. The budget Ryan authored, according to an analysis by the Education Trust, would eliminate Pell Grants entirely for one million students. In 2011, 74 percent of Pell Grant recipients had family incomes of $30,000 or less. These cuts would come despite the fact that the price of a college degree has skyrocketed 1,120 percent over the last three decades.
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