DescentBB

SilverFJ wrote:Little kids haven't tasted the awesome, rockin' adventure ride that my life has been so far .

you realize that this is starting to sound awfully Charlie Sheen-like?

SilverFJ wrote:If you're on a straightaway on a clear day with no other cars around and you're Dale Jr. it would be absolutely R&P for you to travel at 130mph if you wanted..

and, of course, being Dale Jr., at least 5 cars would pass you before you got to Missoula.

Well I don't follow the celebrity stuff, so I don't know what he sounds like.

callmeslick wrote:and, of course, being Dale Jr., at least 5 cars would pass you before you got to Missoula.

burn!!!

The real reason our nation, and the middle class, is in trouble, death by a thousand cuts.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_no_taxes

Egoists/Ayn Randees = Wannabees that don't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting super rich but still think it's possible = Screw all those who can't help themselves because of resentment = Tea Party.

http://www.nhteapartycoalition.org/tea/ ... john-galt/

tunnelcat wrote:Egoists/Ayn Randees = Wannabees that don't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting super rich but still think it's possible = Screw all those who can't help themselves because of resentment = Tea Party.

I think your equation overlooks that the whole movement is driven by a handful of greedy, well-off individuals behind the scenes, playing those wannabe rubes for all they can. My equation would be along the lines of:

money+salesmanship+huge numbers of gullible saps= Tea Party.

Then again, we've seen Know Nothings, Luddites and other wacky movements, so it all just falls into the great American political tradition. Some day, most of the Tea Party folks will wake up and realize they've been had, just like folks who follow the TV preachers. It will be a sad realization, but all too predicatable.
With luck, the rest of us won't have to pay too high a price for their foolishness.

callmeslick wrote:

tunnelcat wrote:Egoists/Ayn Randees = Wannabees that don't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting super rich but still think it's possible = Screw all those who can't help themselves because of resentment = Tea Party.

I think your equation overlooks that the whole movement is driven by a handful of greedy, well-off individuals behind the scenes, playing those wannabe rubes for all they can. My equation would be along the lines of:

money+salesmanship+huge numbers of gullible saps= Tea Party.

Then again, we've seen Know Nothings, Luddites and other wacky movements, so it all just falls into the great American political tradition. Some day, most of the Tea Party folks will wake up and realize they've been had, just like folks who follow the TV preachers. It will be a sad realization, but all too predicatable.
With luck, the rest of us won't have to pay too high a price for their foolishness.

You do realize Slick, that people who went to the tea party rallies didn't do so because they were looking form a new political party. They went to protest a fat bloated govt. that in the last 4 or 5 years the debt increased 8 trillion dollars under the control of a Dem. controlled house and senate. The porkulous bill and finally the health care bill were seen as the final straws and the tea party people peacfully made their displeasure known. If a third party forms so be it. You can try the tired old liberal mantra of demonizing them but it won't work here. The real saps are all those who think govt. welfare is a honorable profession and will lead us to prosperity.

callmeslick wrote:I think your equation overlooks that the whole movement is driven by a handful of greedy, well-off individuals behind the scenes, playing those wannabe rubes for all they can. My equation would be along the lines of:

money+salesmanship+huge numbers of gullible saps= Tea Party.

Ok, I was wrong…Slick is not a liberal…he’s a straight up dyed in the wool Democratic operative.

Spidey wrote:Ok, I was wrong…Slick is not a liberal…he’s a straight up dyed in the wool Democratic operative.

really? you think anyone who disagrees with the tea party is a democrat?

dude you slay me.

Really, do you always think what a person believes is based on the one single quote that provoked the statement?

woodchip wrote:You do realize Slick, that people who went to the tea party rallies didn't do so because they were looking form a new political party. They went to protest a fat bloated govt. that in the last 4 or 5 years the debt increased 8 trillion dollars under the control of a Dem. controlled house and senate. The porkulous bill and finally the health care bill were seen as the final straws and the tea party people peacfully made their displeasure known. If a third party forms so be it. You can try the tired old liberal mantra of demonizing them but it won't work here. The real saps are all those who think govt. welfare is a honorable profession and will lead us to prosperity.

I know why people got angry and went to the initial rallies. And, I've watched as they've been twisted into a completely different ideal by folks with a pre-set agenda. I had great hopes, at first, with the idea of the Tea Party movement, simply because it might get folks thinking about and involved with their government. Sadly, it turned into yet another populist smokescreen that will help prolong the process of building a national consensus on what kind of nation we wish to be, what sort of social safety net we wish to maintain, and how to pay for it all fairly.

callmeslick wrote:

woodchip wrote:You do realize Slick, that people who went to the tea party rallies didn't do so because they were looking form a new political party. They went to protest a fat bloated govt. that in the last 4 or 5 years the debt increased 8 trillion dollars under the control of a Dem. controlled house and senate. The porkulous bill and finally the health care bill were seen as the final straws and the tea party people peacfully made their displeasure known. If a third party forms so be it. You can try the tired old liberal mantra of demonizing them but it won't work here. The real saps are all those who think govt. welfare is a honorable profession and will lead us to prosperity.

I know why people got angry and went to the initial rallies. And, I've watched as they've been twisted into a completely different ideal by folks with a pre-set agenda. ...

What has changed from the initial message they sent?!? Maybe I haven't noticed but the signs look the same, the interviews with them sound like the same talking points: "Spending, spending, taxes, spending..." the so called Tea Party conservatives that were sent into office in the last cycle are taking grief from the Tea Party for not pushing for enough spending cuts ...

So where is the big evil conspiracy manipulation that took their original complaint and "twisted into a completely different ideal by folks with a pre-set agenda" ?!?

By the way, "a preset agenda", as spooky as you try to make that sound, is not a bad thing in and of itself. NASA has a preset agenda, my wife with her shopping list has a preset agenda every time she goes to the store and god knows everyone who tries to accomplish anything in politics has a preset agenda including your precious Obama!
Musicians impress me with improvisation, comedians sometimes pull it off, lovers can thrill you with it but don't try to scare us with the idea that someone trying to shape the law actually had a plan before they acted, OK?

callmeslick wrote:

woodchip wrote:You do realize Slick, that people who went to the tea party rallies didn't do so because they were looking form a new political party. They went to protest a fat bloated govt. that in the last 4 or 5 years the debt increased 8 trillion dollars under the control of a Dem. controlled house and senate. The porkulous bill and finally the health care bill were seen as the final straws and the tea party people peacfully made their displeasure known. If a third party forms so be it. You can try the tired old liberal mantra of demonizing them but it won't work here. The real saps are all those who think govt. welfare is a honorable profession and will lead us to prosperity.

I know why people got angry and went to the initial rallies. And, I've watched as they've been twisted into a completely different ideal by folks with a pre-set agenda. I had great hopes, at first, with the idea of the Tea Party movement, simply because it might get folks thinking about and involved with their government. Sadly, it turned into yet another populist smokescreen that will help prolong the process of building a national consensus on what kind of nation we wish to be, what sort of social safety net we wish to maintain, and how to pay for it all fairly.

What is interesting is how the opposition (left) responds to a tea party assembly. Funny how I haven't seen such vulgarity from the tea party members. Even more interesting how Media Matters commented on the O'reilly segment without showing the video of the protestors:

It would be nice if we had a “social safety net” that wasn’t a trap for generations on people and didn’t create thousands of lonely old people who are discarded by their families because “they have social security”.

I think we in fact, have created a more inhumane society in many ways due to the unintended consequents.

One that was properly functioning, wouldn’t create so much political drama either.

callmeslick wrote:

tunnelcat wrote:Egoists/Ayn Randees = Wannabees that don't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting super rich but still think it's possible = Screw all those who can't help themselves because of resentment = Tea Party.

I think your equation overlooks that the whole movement is driven by a handful of greedy, well-off individuals behind the scenes, playing those wannabe rubes for all they can. My equation would be along the lines of:

money+salesmanship+huge numbers of gullible saps= Tea Party.

Then again, we've seen Know Nothings, Luddites and other wacky movements, so it all just falls into the great American political tradition. Some day, most of the Tea Party folks will wake up and realize they've been had, just like folks who follow the TV preachers. It will be a sad realization, but all too predicatable.
With luck, the rest of us won't have to pay too high a price for their foolishness.

You're equation does make more sense. They're gullible people that have genuine concerns about the state of our country who are being manipulated by powerful and wealthy individuals like Dick Armey and his Freedom Works organization and The Koch Brothers and their Americans for Prosperity propaganda front group. They got started by Rick Santelli, a CNBC commentator, in his infamous rant on TV that blamed the mortgage mess on homeowners (but, as it turns out, was in essence the big banks own, greedy, damn fault). Tea Partiers may want an Ayn Randish American utopia of liberty and personal freedom, but they're just being manipulated into thinking government is the big, bad wolf, when in reality these wealthy Laissez Faire Capitalists are the real problem when they steal from all of society to line their own pockets. They're making us all poorer, and it's not due to those lazy, parasitic poor people that Ayn Rand so vilified. It's a shell game they've fallen for. I'd have more respect for Tea Partiers if they had started their protests on Bush's watch, but nary a peep until a Black Democrat gets elected president, then it's all about "Kill that big government"! Well, that big government really got going on Bush's watch, they should have spoke up then! They are unprincipled, gullible people!

Want to hear gullible? Ask any American why gas prices are going up. Who do you think they blame? I'm willing to bet OPEC and Libya would top the list of answers, but it's not the right answer. Now if they said it was due to speculators, you'd have the right answer. All the rise in commodity prices lately is due solely to speculators and hedge funds trying to make profits off yours and mine bottom line!

Now we have Paul Ryan trying to make Medicare a voucher system, in other words, privatized. How in the hell is that going to benefit everyone? Well except for the rich CEO's of those already rolling in dough health insurance companies that will clean up even bigger with huge profits if this abomination of an idea ever gets traction.

Now this layers with Christianity and the alliance with Republicans and the Tea Party. Paul Ryan in an Ayn Rand worshiper, but he's also a member of C-Street, a Christian organization that many Republicans, and some ConservaDems, happen to belong to. I'd like to know how in the hell this unholy marriage is even possible. Christianity is the very polar opposite of Ayn Rand. Rand even holds a vicious disdain for religion in general, especially Christians. I just don't get this unprincipled and evil combination of egoism, Christianity and Laissez Faire Capitalism that permeates the Republican and Tea Parties. Someone is being used, and it's all of the Tea Party. Suckers!

Wallace talks with Rand

http://www.newswithviews.com/baldwin/baldwin431.htm

Jesus cleaned out the money changers from the Temple, so if you're a Christian Republican, follow what Jesus would have done.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleansing_of_the_Temple

tunnelcat wrote:Jesus cleaned out the money changers from the Temple, so if you're a Christian Republican, follow what Jesus would have done.

your saying you want us to throw out the Democrats for defiling the government???

“They're gullible people that have genuine concerns about the state of our country who are being manipulated by powerful and wealthy individuals…”

Wow, like you can’t say that about everyone that belongs to a political party.

................

I do agree that the Paul Ryan plan is just plain stupid regarding medicare.

tunnelcat wrote:[ I'd have more respect for Tea Partiers if they had started their protests on Bush's watch, but nary a peep until a Black Democrat gets elected president, then it's all about "Kill that big government"! Well, that big government really got going on Bush's watch, they should have spoke up then! They are unprincipled, gullible people!

to be completely fair, the beginnings of the Tea Party/Patriot movement DID start during the latter part of the Bush term, and it wasn't a monolithically conservative group. It's been coopted, as I stated in a thread I started elsewhere.

Want to hear gullible? Ask any American why gas prices are going up. Who do you think they blame? I'm willing to bet OPEC and Libya would top the list of answers, but it's not the right answer. Now if they said it was due to speculators, you'd have the right answer. All the rise in commodity prices lately is due solely to speculators and hedge funds trying to make profits off yours and mine bottom line!

Bingo! We have a winner! Although, everyone knows that the true reason is that Obama has killed domestic production through his communist policies. Of course, the fact that our puny domestic production has increased for the past two years is just an annoying fact.

Now we have Paul Ryan trying to make Medicare a voucher system, in other words, privatized. How in the hell is that going to benefit everyone? Well except for the rich CEO's of those already rolling in dough health insurance companies that will clean up even bigger with huge profits if this abomination of an idea ever gets traction.

This idea will ultimately obliterate the GOP, I suspect, once actual thought is given to it by voters in the 35-55 year old age group. Not to worry, they'll be replaced, as were the Whigs and the Democrat-Republicans. However, unless things change, not just the Tea Party, but the bulk of the American populace will continue to be suckers. They don't see the real picture: America is run by the same families that have run it for generations. They make huge money from every Crash and burst Bubble. They send their kids to the schools that feed the Law Firms, the Courts, the Finance and Investment world. They own the bulk of the land. And, in terms of the current generatons of those families, greater numbers of them have lost the sense of noblesse oblige that kept them from fecking the whole lot of you over with greater regularity. As long as America's broad electorate fights over far left, far right issues, as long as the gridlock continues, the noose tightens. Class warfare? Don't make me laugh. The war ended around the late 1700's sometimes and the winners are still running the show.

CUDA wrote:

tunnelcat wrote:Jesus cleaned out the money changers from the Temple, so if you're a Christian Republican, follow what Jesus would have done.

your saying you want us to throw out the Democrats for defiling the government???

Yeah, so you'll vote for the other party that worships Laissez Faire Capitalism above all else? THE MONEY CHANGERS of Wall Street? Lets put the coyote right back in the hen house again. Sure the Dems are corrupt as well, I don't deny that, but they don't espouse social conservatism and unfettered Capitalism as core tenets. I wish they would stick to their core ideals. You're a Christian Republican, I'm guessing, so got a better response to that oxymoron?

In the mean time, Republicans and Tea Partiers are overreaching their authority all across the country. You think the Dems are bad, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder now decides when a municipality can't run their own affairs and finances, so he fires all their duly elected officials and lets his own personally appointed Emergency Manager decide what's best for their city finances. Sounds like Communism to me. I thought Republicans HATED having the state tell the people how to run their lives or what to do?

http://michiganmessenger.com/48333/bent ... s-reaction

In the meantime, Republican cuts to education are making it almost impossible to afford college. The new Conservative mantra, keep the poor, downtrodden and working class people of this country stupid and broke, they're just parasites anyway. Let only those who are rich and strong make it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/12/educa ... llege.html

Spidey wrote:“They're gullible people that have genuine concerns about the state of our country who are being manipulated by powerful and wealthy individuals…”

Wow, like you can’t say that about everyone that belongs to a political party.

Well, I can't argue with you there. So what does one do? The Tea Party has been co-opted, so that's out as a viable option now.

callmeslick wrote:to be completely fair, the beginnings of the Tea Party/Patriot movement DID start during the latter part of the Bush term, and it wasn't a monolithically conservative group. It's been coopted, as I stated in a thread I started elsewhere.

Maybe, but not one person I would call a member of the Tea Party made one little bit of stink publicly when Bush was taking away many of our civil liberties, growing government exponentially and creating the debt from hell. The liberals were screaming and protesting publicly all over the place back then, but nary a word from anyone with Tea Party ideals even spoke up. The time to have spoken in protest was when the crap was starting to hit the fan, not after.

tunnelcat wrote: ... Want to hear gullible? Ask any American why gas prices are going up. Who do you think they blame? I'm willing to bet OPEC and Libya would top the list of answers, but it's not the right answer. Now if they said it was due to speculators, you'd have the right answer. All the rise in commodity prices lately is due solely to speculators and hedge funds trying to make profits off yours and mine bottom line!

Please provide any documentation you can that the rise in gas prices is "due solely to speculators". There are dozens of factors that affect the price of gasoline from day to day. The chief reason for the general trend in rising gasoline/oil prices has been the closer and closer alignment of demand with available supply in the markets. This is primarily because of the increasing demand from Asia (mainly China and India) that has been occurring as their economies have responded favorably from being unleashed from the strong state centered control that was more the story in the last half of the 20th century. In the absence of what used to be a larger buffer between demand and available supply, all kinds of even minor supply issues can now have largely outsized effects on the price of oil, and hence gasoline; i.e. it doesn't take much of a hiccup any more to send prices out of whack. Sure, speculating on futures contracts is a part of what's happening, as it is in any other commodities market, but it's far from being the sole controlling factor.

tunnelcat wrote: ... Now we have Paul Ryan trying to make Medicare a voucher system, in other words, privatized. How in the hell is that going to benefit everyone? Well except for the rich CEO's of those already rolling in dough health insurance companies that will clean up even bigger with huge profits if this abomination of an idea ever gets traction.

Terrific, so I take it then that you have an alternative to the Ryan plan and the Bowles-Simpson Commission's recommendations. Awesome. Where is it so I can read about it. As it stands right now, keeping with the status quo will not work, because spending is continuing to increase, handwaving by the government notwithstanding. Also. let's keep in mind that the real money is not to be found in the "rich", but in the middle class.

At some point, yes, they (the government) will also come for you.

tunnelcat wrote:

CUDA wrote:

tunnelcat wrote:Jesus cleaned out the money changers from the Temple, so if you're a Christian Republican, follow what Jesus would have done.

your saying you want us to throw out the Democrats for defiling the government???

Yeah, so you'll vote for the other party that worships Laissez Faire Capitalism above all else? THE MONEY CHANGERS of Wall Street? Lets put the coyote right back in the hen house again. Sure the Dems are corrupt as well, I don't deny that, but they don't espouse social conservatism and unfettered Capitalism as core tenets. I wish they would stick to their core ideals. You're a Christian Republican, I'm guessing, so got a better response to that oxymoron?

So I'm noticing you don't have a sense of Humor TC

follow what Jesus would have done.

OK I will the next time I catch anyone buying and sell and defiling God's House, I'll be sure to kick them out

tunnelcat wrote:...

callmeslick wrote:to be completely fair, the beginnings of the Tea Party/Patriot movement DID start during the latter part of the Bush term, and it wasn't a monolithically conservative group. It's been coopted, as I stated in a thread I started elsewhere.

Maybe, but not one person I would call a member of the Tea Party made one little bit of stink publicly when Bush was taking away many of our civil liberties, growing government exponentially and creating the debt from hell. The liberals were screaming and protesting publicly all over the place back then, but nary a word from anyone with Tea Party ideals even spoke up. The time to have spoken in protest was when the crap was starting to hit the fan, not after.

You are amazing! You begrudgingly accept the fact that the Tea Party origins were built on people as mad at Bush as they were at the likes of Ted Kennedy etc. and it happened before Obama was President. Then turn right around and claim no one with Tea Party ideals spoke up against any of it until the black guy got in power!
There is no point in debating with you because you just ignore reality. You aren't looking for a discussion you are looking for like minded people who will help prop up your perceptions in spite of those perceptions being full crap founded solely in democrat party rhetoric.
The only question left to ask you is, do you believe the crap you spew or are you just trying further your cause and have no shame about the way you do it?

dissent wrote:Please provide any documentation you can that the rise in gas prices is "due solely to speculators". There are dozens of factors that affect the price of gasoline from day to day. The chief reason for the general trend in rising gasoline/oil prices has been the closer and closer alignment of demand with available supply in the markets. This is primarily because of the increasing demand from Asia (mainly China and India) that has been occurring as their economies have responded favorably from being unleashed from the strong state centered control that was more the story in the last half of the 20th century. In the absence of what used to be a larger buffer between demand and available supply, all kinds of even minor supply issues can now have largely outsized effects on the price of oil, and hence gasoline; i.e. it doesn't take much of a hiccup any more to send prices out of whack. Sure, speculating on futures contracts is a part of what's happening, as it is in any other commodities market, but it's far from being the sole controlling factor.

Give me a break! Ever since the turmoil in the Middle East, the price of oil has been going up, far faster than just demand would dictate. It's way too volatile. The pigs are at it again, just like in previous oil price spikes. The oil companies and commodity traders are profiting, not the local station owners or the customers. We're being taken for saps. Before it was mortgages, now it's commodities. Spread the profit taking and risks around broad areas of the markets to make more and more profits and hide their shenanigans, especially since they don't like the way the Fed is handling things.

http://www.heatingoil.com/blog/global-e ... rices0408/

In fact, the prices of commodities in general are spiking. Why? This theory makes more sense than anything else:

http://traders-talk.blogspot.com/

dissent wrote:Terrific, so I take it then that you have an alternative to the Ryan plan and the Bowles-Simpson Commission's recommendations. Awesome. Where is it so I can read about it. As it stands right now, keeping with the status quo will not work, because spending is continuing to increase, handwaving by the government notwithstanding. Also. let's keep in mind that the real money is not to be found in the "rich", but in the middle class.

At some point, yes, they (the government) will also come for you.

Yes, I agree the status quo is a recipe for failure and no, I don't have an easy fix. But Ryan's fix for privatizing Medicare with a voucher system would put a large burden of the costs on those who can least afford it, namely our senior citizens. Our mothers and fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers. Putting health care insurance companies into the mix will drive up prices exponentially just to pay for those profits the insurance companies demand. Medicare Part D, the Bush solution, is just a huge welfare program for big pharma and has made medications far more expensive for patients because the government cannot negotiate prices. Talk about collectivism. Privatization is the new form of "Death Panels", coldly calculating who gets medical care and who doesn't based solely on wealth. I don't see that as humane, but as something Ayn Rand would embrace as a way to weed out the sick, poor and infirm. We as a society better decide soon which way we are going to treat the poorer and sicker members of our nation if we are to be a noble and humane nation. Either we have a system that helps all, or one that helps only those that can afford it. When things melt down, we'll have a resolution, one way or another I guess.

And how is the government going to come for me? Private insurance will have bled me dry by then anyway. Big Corporate Brother has already come for me. I'm not even worried about the damned government.

Will Robinson, prove to me that the people that formed the Tea Party were upset with Bush and that they would have gone out and yelled and screamed and protested at Republican town hall meetings to let their displeasure be known to all. I saw none of that back when Bush was in office. All I saw were pissed of liberals.

CUDA, you're a Christian hypocrite oligarch demagog who doesn't even follow the altruistic tenets of your own religion.

Spidey wrote:“They're gullible people that have genuine concerns about the state of our country who are being manipulated by powerful and wealthy individuals…”

Wow, like you can’t say that about everyone that belongs to a political party.

to some extent true.....

................

I do agree that the Paul Ryan plan is just plain stupid regarding medicare.

nice agreeing for a change! By the way, whereabouts the Philly area are you from? As I think I stated along the way, I'm out in Berks County, but work in Horsham. Philly politics are a special breed, by the way.....I've never seen a setup so badly corrupted and incompetent on so many levels(we lived in Philly for 3 years, and fled before daughter reached school age).

Born and raised in North Philly, now living in the lower NE area.

tunnelcat wrote:...
Privatization is the new form of "Death Panels", coldly calculating who gets medical care and who doesn't based solely on wealth.
...

And the alternative that you support by your blind allegiance to the other half of the problem is letting the government consume the wealth, and I do mean consume not re purpose on our behalf. They simply consume something like 75% of every penny they take in the name of spending it on our behalf! So to follow your example of affordable healthcare the only result is less people will be able to afford the care and the government won't come close to being able to fund the Obama plan so the government will ration care based on what ever criteria they want to use. Voila! Death panels. D's= death panels. R's=death if you can't break the wealth barrier. So do you want to toss a coin to see if they let you have care or do you want to try your luck at making enough to survive?
Death is death no matter who delivers it to you.

They will bankrupt their brand new healthcare system right away. Their own accounting says so.
Consider the way they have squandered every bit of money they get their hands on don't fool yourself into thinking this will be different! Why would it? Because it's a new program?!? Ha!
It is doomed from the beginning because a realistic plan wasn't set in motion. A bunch of promises loaded with a bunch of pork spending was put where a plan should be so you would vote for them! Yes they think you are that stupid. Your neighbors made them think that because so many of them are that stupid.

Here is something I wish all voters would consider. A simple common sense test of intelligence and your true sense of justice and compassion:

If, instead of America's situation this same situation was a picture of your own household. Imagine the governments ability to print money is your credit cards, etc., because of your excessive spending your income is coming up short by the same ratio their revenue stream is and your current debt ratio mirrors the governments. I think it is safe to say you wouldn't try to solve things for your family by anything close to the methods this administration and congress are using (and yes we know Bush and other repubs caused it too).

Admit that much at least, that you would make harder choices and do what is right for your family.

And if you have the integrity to acknowledge that fact then how dare you vote to implement either, disaster R, or disaster D, upon us all just so you can have your team win an election!!! What the F#@^ have they ever done for you to be able to turn you into such stooge?!?

Will Robinson wrote:And the alternative that you support by your blind allegiance to the other half of the problem is letting the government consume the wealth, and I do mean consume not re purpose on our behalf. They simply consume something like 75% of every penny they take in the name of spending it on our behalf! So to follow your example of affordable healthcare the only result is less people will be able to afford the care and the government won't come close to being able to fund the Obama plan so the government will ration care based on what ever criteria they want to use. Voila! Death panels.

no real fan of the Healthcare compromise here, but I'll offer the fair way to do things: Medicare, as currently designed, from cradle to grave. No more special childrens program, no need for special Medicaid program. Given the proveable fact that, despite lingering issues with fraud, etc, Medicare is about 5 times as efficient as any private insurer out there, coupled with the full range mix of the healthy with those not-so-healthy, the cost to the average person would end up FAR less than they and their employers pay now for health coverage. Employers would be free to compete without guessing healthcare expenses, should be able to pay slightly higher wages, and no one in this nation would have to worry about going into bankruptcy because they lost health insurance. No one would go without minimal coverage. It could be done, it should have been done, and the fact it wasn't is a testament to both the stupid gullibility of folks who cannot study the issue for themselves and spineless politicians unwilling to try and sell it.

Spidey wrote:Born and raised in North Philly, now living in the lower NE area.

some nice neighborhoods there. I have a few co-workers in that part of Philly. I don't really go into town much except for dinner, museums or the theater/concert thing, but, as cities go, it has a lot to offer.

callmeslick wrote:

Will Robinson wrote:And the alternative that you support by your blind allegiance to the other half of the problem is letting the government consume the wealth, and I do mean consume not re purpose on our behalf. They simply consume something like 75% of every penny they take in the name of spending it on our behalf! So to follow your example of affordable healthcare the only result is less people will be able to afford the care and the government won't come close to being able to fund the Obama plan so the government will ration care based on what ever criteria they want to use. Voila! Death panels.

no real fan of the Healthcare compromise here, but I'll offer the fair way to do things: Medicare, as currently designed, from cradle to grave. No more special childrens program, no need for special Medicaid program. Given the proveable fact that, despite lingering issues with fraud, etc, Medicare is about 5 times as efficient as any private insurer out there, coupled with the full range mix of the healthy with those not-so-healthy, the cost to the average person would end up FAR less than they and their employers pay now for health coverage. Employers would be free to compete without guessing healthcare expenses, should be able to pay slightly higher wages, and no one in this nation would have to worry about going into bankruptcy because they lost health insurance. No one would go without minimal coverage. It could be done, it should have been done, and the fact it wasn't is a testament to both the stupid gullibility of folks who cannot study the issue for themselves and spineless politicians unwilling to try and sell it.

Sounds at least reasonable. All you have to do is flush the current crop of thieves before they get to draw up the budget for it, otherwise....

tunnelcat wrote:

dissent wrote:Please provide any documentation you can that the rise in gas prices is "due solely to speculators". There are dozens of factors that affect the price of gasoline from day to day. The chief reason for the general trend in rising gasoline/oil prices has been the closer and closer alignment of demand with available supply in the markets. This is primarily because of the increasing demand from Asia (mainly China and India) that has been occurring as their economies have responded favorably from being unleashed from the strong state centered control that was more the story in the last half of the 20th century. In the absence of what used to be a larger buffer between demand and available supply, all kinds of even minor supply issues can now have largely outsized effects on the price of oil, and hence gasoline; i.e. it doesn't take much of a hiccup any more to send prices out of whack. Sure, speculating on futures contracts is a part of what's happening, as it is in any other commodities market, but it's far from being the sole controlling factor.

Give me a break! Ever since the turmoil in the Middle East, the price of oil has been going up, far faster than just demand would dictate. It's way too volatile. The pigs are at it again, just like in previous oil price spikes. The oil companies and commodity traders are profiting, not the local station owners or the customers. We're being taken for saps. Before it was mortgages, now it's commodities. Spread the profit taking and risks around broad areas of the markets to make more and more profits and hide their shenanigans, especially since they don't like the way the Fed is handling things.

http://www.heatingoil.com/blog/global-e ... rices0408/

No, I'm not going to give you a break. Nice article. Did you even read it? The title was "Global Energy Leaders Identify Speculation as a Cause of Spiking Oil Prices"; "a" cause, NOT "the" cause, but "a" cause. Your statement was that speculators were "the sole cause". Even your article agrees that this is not correct -

Josh Garrett wrote: At a conference of international leaders in the oil industry, the clear consensus was that oil prices will almost certainly continue to move higher in the near future, but beliefs about the causes of ongoing price increases were varied. Within the discussion of climbing oil prices, however, several conference attendees agreed that speculation and other financial influences are leading causes. ... offered four different potential causes for the jump in oil prices over the last two months: political turmoil in the Mideast, demand growth, domestic tax rates, and out of control speculation on oil markets. ...

Does any of this mean that speculation is not involved in the current runup? Of course not. My point is that it is the presence of all these other fundamental factors that makes it possible for speculators to bid up the market as they are currently doing. Oil is fundamental. They want security of supply, so if they have the money, they bid up the contract price. If there was reduced demand for petroleum, if peace and fuzzy bunnies suddenly broke out all over the world and everyone decided to hold hands and sing "Kumbaya", then there is no way that speculators would be able to continue to bid up the price of oil. The price came down after the last spike in 2008. Why. Was it because speculators suddenly became stupid and incompetent and couldn'r bid the price up further? Or was it because the advancing recession and people reducing their demand due to the higher price signal led to lower overall demand for petroleum?

Hey, we could always go to the opposite extreme - price controls. Remember how well that worked back in the '70's? You ready to spend hours and hours again waiting in long lines just to be able to buy a couple of gallons of "cheap" gas? Yeah, as your article links to it, the CFTC needs to address whether there is anything they can do to set regulations (maybe some kind of "uptick" rule or somesuch) that might help to reduce market volatility. But there are frequently unintended negative consequences from even the best intentioned government meddling in a market.

tunnelcat wrote:In fact, the prices of commodities in general are spiking. Why? This theory makes more sense than anything else:

http://traders-talk.blogspot.com/

Were you referencing a specific article?

tc wrote:

dissent wrote:Terrific, so I take it then that you have an alternative to the Ryan plan and the Bowles-Simpson Commission's recommendations. Awesome. Where is it so I can read about it. As it stands right now, keeping with the status quo will not work, because spending is continuing to increase, handwaving by the government notwithstanding. Also. let's keep in mind that the real money is not to be found in the "rich", but in the middle class.

At some point, yes, they (the government) will also come for you.

Yes, I agree the status quo is a recipe for failure and no, I don't have an easy fix. But Ryan's fix for privatizing Medicare with a voucher system would put a large burden of the costs on those who can least afford it, namely our senior citizens. Our mothers and fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers. Putting health care insurance companies into the mix will drive up prices exponentially just to pay for those profits the insurance companies demand.

How does this exponential stuff work. Whether you buy your insurance with a government voucher or buy it on the Obamacare exchange, what difference is that make for the exponential rise in insurance costs. It's all still a bunch of insurance companies bidding for your business.

tc wrote: Privatization is the new form of "Death Panels", coldly calculating who gets medical care and who doesn't based solely on wealth. I don't see that as humane, but as something Ayn Rand would embrace as a way to weed out the sick, poor and infirm. We as a society better decide soon which way we are going to treat the poorer and sicker members of our nation if we are to be a noble and humane nation. Either we have a system that helps all, or one that helps only those that can afford it. When things melt down, we'll have a resolution, one way or another I guess.

There, there. Continue to be numbed by the soothing Orwellian doublespeak of the Obamacarians and their benign Independent Physician Advisory Board - who is responsible for keeping the costs of Medicare down. How do you suppose they are going to accomplish that. Let me know how it works out for you.

tc wrote:And how is the government going to come for me?

Well, you obviously still have access to a computer and electricity. I'm sure the government can pawn your PC for a few bucks just before they farm you out to the collective.

callmeslick wrote:no real fan of the Healthcare compromise here, but I'll offer the fair way to do things: Medicare, as currently designed, from cradle to grave.

Please define "fair".

cms wrote:No more special childrens program, no need for special Medicaid program.

You're obviously a heartless Republican bottom-dweller, robbing from children and the poor.

cms wrote:Given the proveable fact that, despite lingering issues with fraud, etc, Medicare is about 5 times as efficient as any private insurer out there, coupled with the full range mix of the healthy with those not-so-healthy, the cost to the average person would end up FAR less than they and their employers pay now for health coverage.

Please provide links to sources that verify these several claims.

Employers would be free to compete without guessing healthcare expenses, should be able to pay slightly higher wages, and no one in this nation would have to worry about going into bankruptcy because they lost health insurance. No one would go without minimal coverage. It could be done, it should have been done, and the fact it wasn't is a testament to both the stupid gullibility of folks who cannot study the issue for themselves and spineless politicians unwilling to try and sell it.

So what happens to the pool of individuals who want to become doctors, now that they see that medicine is being relegated to a lower and lower wage profession? (cue the assembly line doctor) Will there be fewer or more people who choose to do it? Will the quality and skill of the applicants go up or down? Where is this system currently functioning now, and where everyone is happy with their outcomes?

dissent wrote:

cms wrote:No more special childrens program, no need for special Medicaid program.

You're obviously a heartless Republican bottom-dweller, robbing from children and the poor.

I think NotsoSlicks' comment was sarcasm but I could be wrong.

Heretic wrote:I think NotsoSlicks' comment was sarcasm but I could be wrong.

That's great - so was mine.

Heretic wrote:

dissent wrote:

cms wrote:No more special childrens program, no need for special Medicaid program.

You're obviously a heartless Republican bottom-dweller, robbing from children and the poor.

I think NotsoSlicks' comment was sarcasm but I could be wrong.

no, it wasn't. With cradle-to-grave Medicare, you don't need extra programs for children's health insurance,
or Medicaid, as the affected individuals would be covered by the national program.

Oh, and per the request by Dissent for links: I am not going to provide links to data which has been common, public knowledge for over a decade. Look it up for yourself if you doubt it.

Mawhahahahaha you're just another one of those where you just have to believe what I say people.

So then Medicare becomes straight up socialism*, and no longer a pseudo insurance program, where the people who pay into it get the benefits?

*or whatever term suits you.

Yea, that will help it become more “efficient”.

Heretic wrote:Mawhahahahaha you're just another one of those where you just have to believe what I say people.

no, but I am not going to accept that perfectly(seemingly) intelligent people are unable to double check my facts, nor am I going to link every piece of what should be common knowledge.

Spidey wrote:So then Medicare becomes straight up socialism*, and no longer a pseudo insurance program, where the people who pay into it get the benefits?

um, you could pay nothing into it, at present, and get benefits at age 65. What changes?

Yea, that will help it become more “efficient”.

it is, by way of definiton more efficient. No stockholders to pay, no profit margin to aim for, no executives to pay 7 or more figure salaries to.

Part A requires that you have worked at a job for at least 10 years that paid into the system.

Unless things have changed.

Part B requires a premium, kinda difficult for an infant.

And adding 65 more years to a person’s eligibility, was mostly what I was referring to in regards to “efficiency” I do understand the inherent efficiency in the system, that’s why I said what I did in reguards to Ryan’s plan.

callmeslick wrote:

Heretic wrote:Mawhahahahaha you're just another one of those where you just have to believe what I say people.

no, but I am not going to accept that perfectly(seemingly) intelligent people are unable to double check my facts, nor am I going to link every piece of what should be common knowledge.

We have checked your "facts" before and found you omitted critical sections of the paragraph that contradict the spin you were putting on it so maybe not being so arrogant when someone asks for a simple link would help you as much as the person requesting it.