OT: We the people?

On Feb 2, 9:36 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> J. Clarke wrote:
> > Garage_Woodworks wrote:
...
> >> Please, you're kidding yourself. All we get is "My health care
> >> plan
> >> this ..., his health care plan that..." We could get these
> >> 'details' mailed to us in a brochure or given in a few 60 minute
> >> debates. They don't need to tour around the country like some kind
> >> of hippy rock band to give us the 'details' we need.
>
> >> Did we get all of the 'details' on W? Like the 'details' of his
> >> foreign policy?

There's not a lot of detail to isolationism. It is a great policy
for
people who have nothing of value to offer on the subject.

>
> > What, you mean "if somebody blows up the World Trade Center I'm going
> > to for God's sake do something, even if it's the wrong thing"?
>
> ... and what was wrong with the actions taken to bring down those
> governments that support and promote terrorism?

Nothing.

Had we done more of that, and not invaded Iraq, we might
be better off today.


> After all, appeasement has
> worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's appeasement
> policies had on the Iranians.

Unlike Reagan, he did nothing to appease them.

--


FF

On Jan 31, 4:48 pm, "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote:
> > Or make us like Italy with a hundred parties. Each one with "their"
> > candidate.
>
> I never suggested that. You could keep the same number of parties, the
> difference is everyone gets to vote for their guy.
>
> > If you will not accept the outcome of a democratic process, how can you
> > claim you favor democracy?
>
> This democratic process that I favor doesn't always appear very democratic
> to me.
>
>

It's democratic enough, if you're a multi-millionaire. I'm starting to
slant towards the Brit system, with a 90 day limit on campigning
before the election--actually, I started tilting that way years ago,
and this frigging two plus year campaign puts the seal on it.

We probably need to stipulate, too, that any candidate who uses more
than xx,xxx dollars of his own fortune cannot get money from anywhere
else.

The problems we see with the Electoral College are those created by
money, not built-in lack of choice, IMO. When it costs more than a
quarter billion dollars (this time around, one helluva lot more) to
win the Presidency, it's time to cheapen the process in just about
every way possible. Sort of like making all Senators, Congressmen and
upper level bureaucrats ride in nothing larger than Chevy Impalas.

In article <[email protected]>, Rod & Betty Jo
<[email protected]> wrote:

> We specifically get most of our oil elsewhere, with Canada and Venezuela as
> major suppliers.

<http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_
level_imports/current/import.html>

In November 2007 we Canuckistanis were the #1 oil importer (both crude
and overall petroleum) to the US. We are not OPEC members.

Overall, the top 10 for November 2007 was:

Canada
Mexico
Saudi Arabia
Venezuela
Nigeria
Iraq
Russia
Algeria
Virgin Islands
Angola

--
Help improve usenet. Kill-file Google Groups.
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Garage_Woodworks wrote:

> My guy dropped out before I had a chance to cast a vote. This is inherently
> wrong.

So you think the system is broken because the person you wanted to vote
for no longer wanted to BE voted for?
Take that up with your quitter candidate, not the electoral system.

On Feb 4, 10:55 pm, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> > On Feb 4, 8:24 pm, "Rod " <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> ...
>
> >> The only valid issue is whether the cost in both blood and treasure
> >> is worth the price to the U.S.......Nonetheless the actual cost to
> >> remove him was affordable.... it is the effort to establish a Iraq
> >> democracy and allow enough time to build the basic social
> >> infrastructure, to allow self determination in a area without such a
> >> history, that has proven expensive. Rod
>
> > It may yet prove that the single greatest expense was the
> > loss of assets from the South Asia theater, especially Predator
> > UAVs which, unlike our ground forces, can operate in Pakistan.
>
> Not likely...I'd suggest with current military spending both theaters have
> sufficient resources.....not to mention last week we took out a prominent
> al-Qaida leader(in Pakistan with one.

It may not be likely that had we not withdrawn some of the
Predators from we would have killed bin Laden by now, but
can you sensibly argue that it would not have been MORE
likely?

If the resources in Afghanistan were sufficient, why did so
much of the country revert to Taliban control? Why do
we have to rely on NATO troops deployed out of theater?

If you think that is adequate, what might consider deficient
must be terrible indeed were it based on the situation
in theater, rather than in the White House...

--

FF

On Feb 4, 9:48 am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
> ...
>
> >to war mongering,
>
> Yes it always better to ignore the despots of the world

As you know it is a false dichotomy to suggest that we had to
either invade or ignore him. Containment had rendered him
impotent outside of his own borders and even in the Northern
Third of his own country.


> .....long term it has
> always worked out. In fact I suppose the Iraq embargoes should have been
> canceled and the 50,000 troops containing Saddam should have been brought
> home as well.

IOW, you are well aware that he was NOT being ignored.


> Not to mention overthrowing the Taliban was largely a waste.
> After all how many building would they have really toppled if we had just
> ignored al-Qaida as was Clinton's policy.
>

No, ignoring al Queda was Republican policy. They
called attacks on bin Laden and his assets 'wagging
the dog.' Clinton made no fewer than four (4) publicly
acknowledged attempts to kill or capture bin Laden.

Bush not only made NO attempts on bin Laden but
his response to the intelligence blaming bin Laden
for the bombing of the Cole was to remove his
name from the State Department's list of 'terrorists'
and to disband the group tasked with hunting him down.

Bush's appeasement didn't end until September 11, 1991
and then Powell had to talk him into retaliating against
bin Laden and the Taliban. Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz
almost convinced Bush to continue ignoring al Queda
and to use the attacks as an excuse to invade Iraq
instead. Ultimately they prevailed, but at least in
the short run Powell got him to do the right thing when
it was needed most.

--

FF

On Feb 5, 4:35 am, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
> Lew Hodgett wrote:
> > First,let me say I'm glad to see your wife has recovered.
>
> > Your experience with the medical insurance program points out a lot of
> > what is wrong with the present system, IMHO.
>
> > The present system focuses on paying for care AFTER the medical
> > problem has been identified rather than paying for preventative health
> > care BEFORE the problem develops.
>
> What? My insurance program stresses preventative medicine.

Of course. Few people deny that those of us with insurance have
access to great care.

The issues that was raised was preventive care for people without
insurance. The laws that require treatment only require it for
acute care. The system will pay to treat a patient dying from
metastacized breast cancer but not for routine mammograms
to catch the cancer early.

--

FF

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> How is this "We the people ..."? I never got a chance to vote for who I
> wanted for president because he dropped out recently.
>
> What a crock... What an antiquated and broken system...
>

So you desire 300 million candidates right on up to Nov. so everybody can
vote for their candidate of choice? Or do you desire all 50 states to be
first in the primary race? Or you just don't think losing candidates should
be allowed to drop out?

It may be antiquated (is that a bad thing?) but broken? When was the last
time that the most popular candidate did not come out on top? Obviously
winning does not always guarantee job competence<G>.

Are you sure the sour grapes isn't just the fruit of "your guy" not making
the cut? Rod

"J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Rod & Betty Jo wrote:
>>
>> It may be antiquated (is that a bad thing?) but broken? When was the
>> last time that the most popular candidate did not come out on top?
>
> 2000. And from the looks of things it may be shaping up that way in
> the Democratic primaries as well.
>
> Note, I voted for Bush, so don't accuse me of "sour grapes".
> --John

The context and intent was primaries and the primary process......Speaking
of 2000 though, I never expected in my lifetime to see a "electoral college"
victory...a nifty example of state rights trumping a federal monolith. I
never expected to have a volcano blow (MT St. Helen) 50 miles away
either...life has such cool surprises<G>....Rod

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>>Or do you desire all 50 states to be first in the primary race?
>
> How about have it done the way it is done in the general election? Why
> should Iowa, Wyoming and New Hampshire get to decide who runs for
> president? Why should I have to move to Iowa in order to have a voice in
> this election?
>
> "We the people..." Not "We, Iowa, Wyoming and New Hampshire..."

What your suggesting is simply a national primary.....the looming "Super
Tuesday" with 21or 22 states voting should at least make you halfway
happy<G>..... Nonetheless no typical slate of Presidential aspirants could
afford a out of the gate national campaign of the scope or breadth to truly
inform the national public....realistic on the ground parameters including
fundraising, candidate organizations and general support all point strongly
to the need of a few states providing the "proving ground" of the
wannabe's....If anointed king<G> I'd keep the traditional early
contests(tradition) and have a lottery (for each Presidential election)
allocating the order for the remaining states......regional votes spread out
over the primary season might prove most effective as well.

>> Or you just don't think losing candidates should be allowed to drop out?
>
> No. They shouldn't have TIME to drop out before I have a chance to cast
> my VOTE.

So you would rather have any vote instead of a informed vote that the
traditional rigor of the primary process allows.

>> It may be antiquated (is that a bad thing?) but broken? When was the last
>> time that the most popular candidate did not come out on top?
>
> Does the name Al Gore mean anything to you?

The subject or context was primary elections.

>>Obviously winning does not always guarantee job competence<G>.
>>
>> Are you sure the sour grapes isn't just the fruit of "your guy" not
>> making the cut? Rod
>
> No. I think everyone "We" should have a chance to vote for their
> candidate. Not just Iowa et al.
>

I suppose I understand your frustration but it bears noting that a primary
election is less about voters choice, but rather simply whom the party will
present for the voters choice (a fundamental difference in scope and
practice)......realistically if one truly desires a early voice or impact it
requires early voluntary involvement in party logistics and politics. Rod

J. Clarke wrote:

> Rod & Betty Jo wrote:
>> "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> How is this "We the people ..."? I never got a chance to vote for
>>> who I wanted for president because he dropped out recently.
>>>
>>> What a crock... What an antiquated and broken system...
>>>

No, the original system was fine; this idea that independents and/or
cross-over voters (depending upon the state) have the ability to help
decide the parties' candidate is troubling. What is especially troubling
is that this lassaiz faire attitude toward who gets to vote in primaries is
predominant in early primary states and has the ability to skew the results
and candidates for the rest of the country. Look at who voted for McCain
in the various primaries that allowed either independents or cross-overs to
vote. Same issue could apply to the dems as well; this serves to weaken
the parties' platforms and their ability to maintain a cohesive message.

... snip
>

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

"BDBConstruction" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:1ddec59f-21c9-45e6-b5b0-994f6af5fe65@m34g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
On Jan 31, 2:37 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:

>This is the lockeroom mentality that has sadly made the US a second
>rate nation, and we are. CEO's all over the country publicly state
>that fact daily.


Second rate to whom? As the worlds wealthiest, most powerful, most
productive, most envied and feared power in the world I trust you must
believe in some alien super power we haven't heard about?

Are these the same CEO's that gave us Enron, the dot com collapse or
possibly the sub prime fiasco or way too many excesses to bother listing?
Rod

Jeff wrote:

> On Feb 1, 5:01 am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> "BDBConstruction" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>
>> news:1ddec59f-21c9-45e6-b5b0-994f6af5fe65@m34g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
>> On Jan 31, 2:37 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> >This is the lockeroom mentality that has sadly made the US a second
>> >rate nation, and we are. CEO's all over the country publicly state
>> >that fact daily.
>>
>> Second rate to whom? As the worlds wealthiest, most powerful, most
>> productive, most envied and feared power in the world I trust you must
>> believe in some alien super power we haven't heard about?
>>
>> Are these the same CEO's that gave us Enron, the dot com collapse or
>> possibly the sub prime fiasco or way too many excesses to bother listing?
>> Rod
>
> If you guys are going to continue this thread, then you better define
> what it is you're measuring. What attributes make a first rate
> country, i.e., education levels, per capita GDP, strength of currency,
> percentage of people in poverty,

If you are going to define as percentage of people in poverty, you better
define what "poverty" mean. Being poor in the US is orders of magnitude
different from being poor in a 3rd world country and considerably different
than in some countries like Italy or France.


> etc. Then determine how the US
> compares with the rest of the world. Anything else is nothing but
> conjecture.

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

"TonyH" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Boy, somebody has been lapping up the propaganda the news media is trying
> to
> force down everyone's throat.

When? The normal message seems to quite to the contrary. When was the last
time you heard that we were the worlds largest exporter?

> If we are the wealthiest, most powerful nation
> then why are we held hostage by the few nations of OPEC and their control
> of
> our oil importation?

We specifically get most of our oil elsewhere, with Canada and Venezuela as
major suppliers...nonetheless the world itself is quite dependent on oil
since even at current price points it is the most economical energy
alternative available.....simply put certain Middle-East countries own a
valuable resource that the world deems worth buying.

Incidently medical cost inflation is a considerably worse short term
problem, with energy..... competition eventually plays a moderating role.

If we are the most productive, then why are all our
> jobs going overseas?

With less than a 5% unemployment rate "most jobs" might be a tad
overstated......approx. 20% of our jobs are manufacturing, obviously some of
those are quite sensitive to the radically lower wages of other countries.
Nonetheless we still export more product than any other country in the world
but we buy more as well.

> Everybody rants and raves about this so-called economy stimulus package.
> How
> is it going to stimulate "our" economy when most people will just run down
> to Wally's world and buy something made in china?

Because the production cost/profit of a product is only a part(sometimes a
very small part) of the eventual retail price.....ports, trucking, warehouse
and retail are all domestic jobs.....and 80% of the economy has nothing to
do with manufacturing imports or otherwise.....

However no tax rebate can reasonably be expected to truly stop a actual
looming recession...they have happened like clockwork almost every 7-12
years for the past century and the sheer size of the economy dwarfs any $100
billion giveaway but under current circumstances it may delay the inevitable
stumble.

> Before I stray too much, those CEO's were probably the ones from Exxon
> announcing record profits while our gas prices keep going higher and
> higher,
> causing the little people lose more of that great American wealth.

I guess the "little people" had better buy shares of Exxon....Rod

"Dave Balderstone" <dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca> wrote in message
news:010220082151289015%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca...
>
> In November 2007 we Canuckistanis were the #1 oil importer (both crude
> and overall petroleum) to the US. We are not OPEC members.

That's why I have to be especially nice to my Canadian brother-inlaw.....get
on his bad side and I may have to walk<G>....Rod

Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>> Or make us like Italy with a hundred parties. Each one with "their"
>> candidate.
>
> I never suggested that. You could keep the same number of parties, the
> difference is everyone gets to vote for their guy.
>
>> If you will not accept the outcome of a democratic process, how can you
>> claim you favor democracy?
>
> This democratic process that I favor doesn't always appear very democratic
> to me.
>
>
>
>
I'll try this one more time: Every registered voter may donate up to
$100 per year maximum to any candidate(s) or ballot issue or combination
of his choice. This means no PACs, corporations, unions, church groups,
bar buddies, etc.

"But HOW can I possibly be elected with so little money?!", he wailed.
Well the entire campaign process lasts two weeks for the incumbent and
four weeks for the challenger.

This means that I have as much access to a candidate as anybody. Oh and
understand that the millionaire candidate can donate up to $100 per year
to himself if he wants.
grumble,
jo4hn

jo4hn wrote:

> Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>>> Or make us like Italy with a hundred parties. Each one with "their"
>>> candidate.
>>
>> I never suggested that. You could keep the same number of parties, the
>> difference is everyone gets to vote for their guy.
>>
>>> If you will not accept the outcome of a democratic process, how can you
>>> claim you favor democracy?
>>
>> This democratic process that I favor doesn't always appear very
>> democratic to me.
>>
>>
>>
>>
> I'll try this one more time: Every registered voter may donate up to
> $100 per year maximum to any candidate(s) or ballot issue or combination
> of his choice. This means no PACs, corporations, unions, church groups,
> bar buddies, etc.
>

This is one of those ideas that sounds good on the surface, but when you
look at it in more detail, the end result will be to allocate an even
greater amount of power to the main stream media elite crowd since they
will be the only people by law allowed to publish "news" about these
candidates and their positions. Now, I suppose that is OK if you are one
of the "right-thinking" people who agree with the perspectives of Pinch
Solzberger, Dan Rather, or Chris Matthews and want to make sure the
majority of voters aren't exposed to any other facts or viewpoints that
might possibly interfere with their right-thinking conclusions and mess up
the election possibilities of their chosen candidates who support those
positions. This will assure the election of the "right-thinking"
candidates while suppressing the views and opinions of the majority of the
citizens since multiple studies have shown that the media hold views
significantly left of the mainstream of the population.

> "But HOW can I possibly be elected with so little money?!", he wailed.
> Well the entire campaign process lasts two weeks for the incumbent and
> four weeks for the challenger.

Yeah, let's make sure the voters have very little time to delve into
details about the person who is going to lead the country for the next 4
years. I spend more time than that deciding what kind of table saw or
router to buy -- and those tools aren't going to try to "re-distribute" my
income by taking it from me at the point of a gun.

>
> This means that I have as much access to a candidate as anybody.

No, what it means is the candidate(s) are going to focus the short amount
of time they have on those places with the largest electoral results. This
will lessen, not increase candidate access.

> Oh and
> understand that the millionaire candidate can donate up to $100 per year
> to himself if he wants.

Our first amendment grants all citizens the right to assemble and free
association as well as to petition the government for redress. As the
country has gotten larger than in the early days, the ability for one
person to interface with all constituents has become unachievable. PACs,
lobby groups, etc, are a means by which citizens with similar grievances or
interests can pool their resources and provide a single point of contact
with a candidate or government official. I would postulate that for almost
any given issue, there is a group that would represent your interests, so
rather than grousing that these groups exist, find those that support those
interests you hold most dear and join with others who hold those views.


> grumble,
> jo4hn

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Mark & Juanita wrote:
> jo4hn wrote:
>
[snip]

>> to himself if he wants.
>
> Our first amendment grants all citizens the right to assemble and free
> association as well as to petition the government for redress. As the
> country has gotten larger than in the early days, the ability for one
> person to interface with all constituents has become unachievable. PACs,
> lobby groups, etc, are a means by which citizens with similar grievances or
> interests can pool their resources and provide a single point of contact
> with a candidate or government official. I would postulate that for almost
> any given issue, there is a group that would represent your interests, so
> rather than grousing that these groups exist, find those that support those
> interests you hold most dear and join with others who hold those views.
>
>
>> grumble,
>> jo4hn
>

You can certainly join any group you see fit and to pool your $100 fees.
I am sadly not surprised when people advocate a system where vast sums
buy access to a candidate. We seem to agree on most points except on
what the dollar cap should be. My point is that if it is low enough,
then Joe Sixpack has a shot at making a difference. Or at least to feel
that he is.

We can boost the cap to perhaps $250 although this is above a lot of
budgets. Extend the time limit? OK but understand that elections
should be more important than the last minute electioneering (read
cramming). Keeping up with current events and your elected politicians
between election times is not all that difficult. An hour or so per day
with a decent newspaper or the internet should more than suffice.

jo4hn

jo4hn wrote:

> Mark & Juanita wrote:
>> jo4hn wrote:
>>
> [snip]
>
>>> to himself if he wants.
>>
>> Our first amendment grants all citizens the right to assemble and free
>> association as well as to petition the government for redress. As the
>> country has gotten larger than in the early days, the ability for one
>> person to interface with all constituents has become unachievable. PACs,
>> lobby groups, etc, are a means by which citizens with similar grievances
>> or interests can pool their resources and provide a single point of
>> contact
>> with a candidate or government official. I would postulate that for
>> almost any given issue, there is a group that would represent your
>> interests, so rather than grousing that these groups exist, find those
>> that support those interests you hold most dear and join with others who
>> hold those views.
>>
>>
>>> grumble,
>>> jo4hn
>>
>
> You can certainly join any group you see fit and to pool your $100 fees.
> I am sadly not surprised when people advocate a system where vast sums
> buy access to a candidate. We seem to agree on most points except on
> what the dollar cap should be. My point is that if it is low enough,
> then Joe Sixpack has a shot at making a difference. Or at least to feel
> that he is.
>
> We can boost the cap to perhaps $250 although this is above a lot of
> budgets. Extend the time limit? OK but understand that elections
> should be more important than the last minute electioneering (read
> cramming). Keeping up with current events and your elected politicians
> between election times is not all that difficult. An hour or so per day
> with a decent newspaper or the internet should more than suffice.

Again, the issue here is the definition of "decent newspaper"; you have 3
news organizations (Reuters, AP, and AFP) providing every newspaper in the
country with the newsfeeds they use -- i.e, 3 organizations (in Great
Britain, BBC could be added) are determining the news that's fit to print
and how it is presented. It's been pretty obvious that all of those
organizations have a specific bent, message, and agenda and they will mold
the facts to fit the agenda. In many cases, the only recourse many people
have is through the various PACS and other issue-driven organizations that
can provide the alternate viewpoint to that of the "right-thinking" people
in the media.

>
> jo4hn

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

J. Clarke wrote:

> Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>>> Yeah, let's make sure the voters have very little time to delve
>>> into
>>> details about the person who is going to lead the country for the
>>> next 4 years. I spend more time than that deciding what kind of
>>> table saw or router to buy -- and those tools aren't going to try
>>> to
>>> "re-distribute" my income by taking it from me at the point of a
>>> gun.
>>
>> Please, you're kidding yourself. All we get is "My health care
>> plan
>> this ..., his health care plan that..." We could get these
>> 'details' mailed to us in a brochure or given in a few 60 minute
>> debates. They don't need to tour around the country like some kind
>> of hippy rock band to give us the 'details' we need.
>>
>> Did we get all of the 'details' on W? Like the 'details' of his
>> foreign policy?
>
> What, you mean "if somebody blows up the World Trade Center I'm going
> to for God's sake do something, even if it's the wrong thing"?
>

... and what was wrong with the actions taken to bring down those
governments that support and promote terrorism? After all, appeasement has
worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's appeasement
policies had on the Iranians.

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:

> On Feb 1, 4:45 am, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> ...
>>
>> No, the original system was fine; this idea that independents and/or
>> cross-over voters (depending upon the state) have the ability to help
>> decide the parties' candidate is troubling.
>
> Primary elections were not part of the original Presidential
> election system. They still aren't, in some states.
>

The original presidential election system was to have the voting citizens
(usually limited to land-owners and taxpayers -- a concept that would do us
a world of good today by the way) vote for electors who then voted for the
president. Are you recommending returning to that system?

>
>> What is especially troubling
>> is that this lassaiz faire attitude toward who gets to vote in primaries
>> is predominant in early primary states and has the ability to skew the
>> results
>> and candidates for the rest of the country. Look at who voted for McCain
>> in the various primaries that allowed either independents or cross-overs
>> to
>> vote. Same issue could apply to the dems as well; this serves to weaken
>> the parties' platforms and their ability to maintain a cohesive message.
>>
>
> _A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.

No, if one has a two-party system, doesn't matter what one calls the
parties, that has an essential dichotomy of view toward the role of
government, then it darn well does matter that the primaries are partisan.

>
> One alternative is impose a reasonable high bar, in the form
> of the number of signatures on a petition to get on the ballot,
> so as to limit the candidates to a dozen or so. Then hold a
> series of elections to eliminate the candidates from the bottom
> up, similar to how they are eliminated in the Iowa Caucases,
> until one gets more than 50% of the vote. This was done for
> state and local elections in OK (maybe still is) and there were
> seldom more than two elections needed to arrive
> at a winner.
>

That is certainly one way to approach things; but that is just it, it is
*a* way that has may have some benefits but will also carry some detriments
as well.

> There is no Constitutional requirement that states have
> Presidential primaries or even Presidential elections.
>

OK. But they do, and that is the system under discussion. Some of the
states, particularly the early voting states allow both cross-over voting
and undeclared voters to vote in party primaries. The issue here is that
this tends to be detrimental to both parties (with the biggest detriment to
the Republicans in this election cycle) as it weakens the fundamental
message of each of those parties regarding their stand on the role of
government and tends to winnow out those candidates with strong messages
early in the process due to the influence of those outside the party.

> So think hard before you suggest amending the Constitution,
> else you have better be especially tough.

Where on earth in my postings did I ever mention anything remotely
resembling amending the Constitution?

>
> --
>
> FF

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:

> On Feb 2, 9:36 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>> J. Clarke wrote:
... snip
>
>
>> After all, appeasement has
>> worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's
>> appeasement policies had on the Iranians.
>
> Unlike Reagan, he did nothing to appease them.

Your revisionism is so funny it is laughable. So you don't think a letter
to the Ayatollah, begging him, as a man of faith, to release the hostages
and essentially pledging not to do anything from a position of strength was
not appeasement and did nothing to prolong the hostage issue nor embolden
the Iranians? The Reagan arms deals had at least a minimum of quid pro
quo attached.

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Robatoy wrote:

> On Feb 3, 3:11 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> > On Feb 2, 9:36 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >> J. Clarke wrote:
>> ... snip
>>
>> >> After all, appeasement has
>> >> worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's
>> >> appeasement policies had on the Iranians.
>>
>> > Unlike Reagan, he did nothing to appease them.
>>
>> Your revisionism is so funny it is laughable.  So you don't think a
>> letter to the Ayatollah, begging him, as a man of faith, to release the
>> hostages and essentially pledging not to do anything from a position of
>> strength was not appeasement and did nothing to prolong the hostage issue
>> nor embolden the Iranians?
>
> Was that 'unchristian' of Carter? He went with his beliefs.

But failed to recognize the proper role of government in even a Christian
society. i.e., the power of the sword is reserved to the government for
the purpose of maintaining a peaceful society in which its citizens can
live quiet, peaceful lives. By attempting to apply fellowship principles
to a hostile government, he actually made things worse instead of better
and provided an opportunity for that hostile government to harm citizens of
his own country.

> The Christian schooling I received in The Netherlands, including High
> School, taught me a lot about what Christianity stood for.
> And if I were to be so bold as to stand Bush beside Carter and compare
> notes on what *I* was taught (and still hold as true) as 'closer' to
> Christ's teachings, I think you know where those conclusions would
> lead to.
> Your man Bush wouldn't do so well. I'd much rather break bread with
> the likes of Carter and Huckabee...

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Garage_Woodworks wrote:

>>
>> Your revisionism is so funny it is laughable. So you don't think a letter
>> to the Ayatollah, begging him, as a man of faith, to release the hostages
>> and essentially pledging not to do anything from a position of strength
>> was
>> not appeasement and did nothing to prolong the hostage issue nor embolden
>> the Iranians?
>
> :Was that 'unchristian' of Carter? He went with his beliefs.
> :The Christian schooling I received in The Netherlands, including High
> :School, taught me a lot about what Christianity stood for.
> :And if I were to be so bold as to stand Bush beside Carter and compare
> :notes on what *I* was taught (and still hold as true) as 'closer' to
> :Christ's teachings, I think you know where those conclusions would
> :lead to.
> :Your man Bush wouldn't do so well. I'd much rather break bread with
> :the likes of Carter and Huckabee...
>
> Well said. It's funny how non-Christian the Christian right really are.
> From no-health care to tax-cuts for the wealthy to war mongering, the list
> goes on and on.
>

Let's hit these one at at time, shall we?

No health care? Has the Christian right ever said that you shouldn't get
health care? Nope, didn't think so. On the other hand, the idea that the
government should make me (or one of your neighbors) involuntarily pay for
your health care is a distinctly non-Christian and frankly unethical idea.
It's not charity when you are using someone else's money, and Washington is
using other peoples' money.

Tax cuts for the wealthy? This is a very tired and silly canard. First,
if you aren't paying taxes, then any tax cut is going to help someone other
than yourself. It isn't going to hurt you (after all, you aren't paying
taxes). Second, if you are paying taxes, you are getting exactly the same
tax break as the "wealthy"; your taxes are going down the same percentage
amount. Finally, if you are "wealthy", you are paying the largest share of
taxes just by nature of the way the system is already skewed. The top 25%
of taxpayers are paying 86% of all federal income taxes. Of course they
are going to get more benefit from a tax cut -- THEY PAY MORE @#$%'n TAXES
TO BEGIN WITH!. Just to point out that the "wealthy" apparently didn't do
as well as you think with this taxcut for the wealthy BS: In 2000, the top
25% of taxpayers were only paying 84% of all federal income taxes in 2000.
Same with the rest of the so-called wealthy category, the top 50% pay 97%
of all federal income taxes, the top 1% pay 39%, up from 37% in 2000. So
much for them benefiting disproportionately.

War mongering? You've got a group of people saying they want to kill or
convert you, so by attacking that group, *we* are the one's warmongering?
Yeah, OK.

Christian charity? That is one thing -- it's not charity when it is done
with the force of government. The whole idea of redistributing wealth is
disturbing. What's more disturbing is the fact that many people hold that
it is not only a good thing, but it is their entitlement to do so and to
vote in the people who will make this happen. That's neither Christian,
nor ethical, it's just a band of passive thugs voting in people who will do
their robbery for them.




> interesting article:
> http://www.alternet.org/story/18378/

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:

... snip
>>
>> >> What is especially troubling
>> >> is that this lassaiz faire attitude toward who gets to vote in
>> >> primaries is predominant in early primary states and has the ability
>> >> to skew the results
>> >> and candidates for the rest of the country. Look at who voted for
>> >> McCain in the various primaries that allowed either independents or
>> >> cross-overs to
>> >> vote. Same issue could apply to the dems as well; this serves to
>> >> weaken the parties' platforms and their ability to maintain a cohesive
>> >> message.
>>
>> > _A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.
>>
>> No, if one has a two-party system,
>
> We do NOT have a two party system. We have a system that
> preserves the freedom of association that permits the formation
> of parties, and an election system that tends to make more
> than two parties unviable.
>

... and right now and for most of the country's history, there has
effectively been a two-party system. Whigs & Tory's, Republicans and
Democrats, this has been the historical context in which things have shaken
out for this country. Someday a viable third party may come into
existence, that is not the reality of the here and now.


> I don' t have any problem with parties choosing and supporting
> candidates. My objection is to different rules for ballot access
> for candidates of the two largest parties vs everyone else.
>

Why? Each of the parties should be able to define the rules for how its
members select candidates. Why should someone who is not a member and thus
not bound by either affection or common vision be allowed to dictate terms
to something to which they are not a party? If someone feels that strongly
about something, then they should have the fortitude to be willing to make
a declaration and actually join one of the parties.


>> doesn't matter what one calls the
>> parties, that has an essential dichotomy of view toward the role of
>> government, then it darn well does matter that the primaries are
>> partisan.
>
> _That_ is the problem, the reduction of so many issues to a false
> dichotomy. Grouping those dichotomies into only two sets compounds
> that problem.
>

A third party that bounds the problems differently is certainly welcome to
joint the band. After all, only *one* person achieves office and people
better know what the fundamental views of that person are. It used to mean
that people in the Democrat party were tied to a platform and philosophy
that viewed government as the solution to problems, advocated increased
government involvement in all aspects of life, with the attendant increased
regulations on business and individuals. The Republican party by contrast,
viewed government as the problem and pushed for more action at the state
level and a less powerful federal government. To say that these lines have
become blurred is an understatement.



>>
>> > There is no Constitutional requirement that states have
>> > Presidential primaries or even Presidential elections.
>>
>> OK. But they do, and that is the system under discussion. Some of the
>> states, particularly the early voting states allow both cross-over voting
>> and undeclared voters to vote in party primaries.
>
> Yes. It is a state issue.
>
>> The issue here is that
>> this tends to be detrimental to both parties (with the biggest detriment
>> to the Republicans in this election cycle) as it weakens the fundamental
>> message of each of those parties regarding their stand on the role of
>> government and tends to winnow out those candidates with strong messages
>> early in the process due to the influence of those outside the party.
>
> And not allowing them disenfranchises people who refuse to join
> either party, violating THEIR freedom of (non) association as well
> as their equal protection.
>

That is a ludicrous statement. Why in the world should anyone who doesn't
have the willingess to join a certain party be allowed by that party to
participate in the decisions of that party? That is akin to me walking
into a meeting of the Elks or a Moose Lodge and demanding that they change
their policies to allow me to select members and who they choose as their
leaders.

There is no reason why a political party should expect that its policies
and positions should be dictated by those unwilling to join or support it.


> It ALSO makes no sense to have anyone but a patry member choose
> candidates for that party.

It further makes no sense to have anyone but party members choose who is
the candidate for that party.

.. snip
>
> FF

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Robatoy wrote:

> On Feb 3, 9:59 pm, Fred the Red Shirt <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>
>> Care to revise any of that?
>>
>
> I find it interesting that parallels are often drawn between serious
> incidents and the leaders during their time of occurrence.
> But in recent history, only once has it happened on US soil. On
> Bush43's watch.

Oklahoma City could be considered a serious incident.


> Prior to 9/11 he was briefed by a CIA agent at his ranch which drew
> this response from Bush: "okay, now you've covered _your_ass..."
>

Please, not another truther.

> Everybody KNEW The Cole was at risk, as were the Marines in Beirut
> simply by their locations.
>
> Bush blew it at home. He has decimated Reagan's Party as well as all
> the other damage. I wonder how many Conservatives will go across the
> isle this coming November.

Number of conservatives crossing the aisle? Zero. One doesn't vote for a
big-government statist stalinist just because the current person in office
has not acquitted themselves well as a conservative. You don't support
someone who stands for everything you oppose just because the person who
was in office didn't do a good job advancing that agenda. That would be
absolutely silly. If the person on the other side of the aisle is
advancing an agenda, for example, for the government to take over 1/7 of
the economy to apply all the efficiency and compassion of the MVD and the
speed of the Post Office, conservatives are not going to flock to that
candidate.

Number of conservatives sitting this election out if McCain is the
nominee? Probably a big number. It's a tossup who will do the most damage
at that point. The only thing that might make a few more conservatives
turn out for the RINO would be the greater danger that a stalinist (and no,
I'm not using that term lightly, I know what it means and I know what
Hillary stands for) with supreme court nominees could do.



>
> --
>
> r

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Well said. It's funny how non-Christian the Christian right really are.
> From no-health care

Bush's prescription drug plan filled a real need.....The U.S. has lots of
health care, people are not dying in the streets...anybody that needs it can
get it and currently anyone whom can't truly afford it will receive it.
Which current health care proposal actually fills any real need? The true
problem is runaway costs, any mandatory plan currently proposed by the Dems
(user pays incidentally) will do nothing for cost escalation.

>to tax-cuts for the wealthy

That 3% cut was really a giant giveaway($50 billion a year out of a $2-3
trillion a year budget)....why was the then 37% top rate the magic or
correct number? why not 30% or 40% or 50% or heck 100%?

>to war mongering,

Yes it always better to ignore the despots of the world.....long term it has
always worked out. In fact I suppose the Iraq embargoes should have been
canceled and the 50,000 troops containing Saddam should have been brought
home as well. Not to mention overthrowing the Taliban was largely a waste.
After all how many building would they have really toppled if we had just
ignored al-Qaida as was Clinton's policy.

the list
> goes on and on.
>
> interesting article:
> http://www.alternet.org/story/18378/
>
But factually wrong as he largely misrepresented "other than his" religious
and political views.....Oddly his abortion views would make him a very good
Nazi, it is morally wrong but okay anyway. Sadly he was a disappointing
President albeit largely ineffectual and has largely as well been a
disappointing ex President although I really respect his habitat for
humanity promotion.....Rod

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>> Bush's prescription drug plan filled a real need.....The U.S. has lots of
>> health care, people are not dying in the streets...anybody that needs it
>> can get it and currently anyone whom can't truly afford it will receive
>> it.
>
> Not really. Only those that can afford it can get it. Those that can't
> afford it...well...they take other measures sometimes:
>
> http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=3485812

Cute......If you think that story is truly about what the guy could afford I
have a bridge to sell you.......Nor does it have anything to do with Bush's
drug plan.

>> Which current health care proposal actually fills any real need?
>
> Mine fills my need. I get to see a dr when I want and my copay for meds
> is ok.

Of which every citizen already has the same ability.....

Incidentally 8 years ago I was diagnosed with a very rare disorder(no cure)
I had expensive diagnostics and life saving surgery and I face a lifetime of
required medications for control.....while I was self employed I indeed had
a medical plan( by choice)......Subsequently I have not been able to run the
small biz(closed) and the wife is now our "breadwinner".......If I had been
so foolish not to have a medical plan I would have received the same medical
treatment......obviously I would have been saddled with debt as I should for
foolish choices.....at certain medical costs and income points Medicaid
would fill the gaps. The problem is not availability but the
cost......mandatory national medical coverage as proposed does not address
costs.


>>The true problem is runaway costs,
>
> NO, the "true" problem for the millions of Americans is NO health care
> coverage.

Well golly I'm now convinced in spite of your rather unconvincing
argument......there are several basic reasons why someone doesn't have a
health plan.....

a. They simply prefer to pay out of pocket as need arises.

b. They are too cheap to pay for a rather expensive service

c. They can't afford a rather expensive service

d. They do not perceive a need for a rather expensive service

Just a hunch but price does seem to matter in our purchase choices.

Historically the country has never had 100% of the public enrolled in some
sort of medical insurance, since the poor and anyone with a serious illness
can and will receive any and all needed care, why other than your politician
of choice has "told you so" is the issue important?.......Now if we have
serious efforts at controlling costs via competition and increased supply
any of the above might just take care of themselves.

>> That 3% cut was really a giant giveaway($50 billion a year out of a $2-3
>> trillion a year budget)....why was the then 37% top rate the magic or
>> correct number? why not 30% or 40% or 50% or heck 100%?
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/08/washington/08tax.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Other than ignoring my query I don't see how that link demonstrated much of
anything other than my position, if I may quote it

"The top 20 percent of income earners paid 67.1 percent of all federal
taxes, up from 66.1 percent in 2000, according to the budget office."

>> Yes it always better to ignore the despots of the world.....long term it
>> has always worked out. In fact I suppose the Iraq embargoes should have
>> been canceled and the 50,000 troops containing Saddam should have been
>> brought home as well. Not to mention overthrowing the Taliban was largely
>> a waste. After all how many building would they have really toppled if we
>> had just ignored al-Qaida as was Clinton's policy.
>
> Are you one of those Iraq was connected to 911 dudes?
Is your zealotry so strong as to impact basic comprehension skills? There
was nothing in my paragraph linking the two. Saddam's history, his future
goals, his crimes against humanity and/or his own people, his previous
expansion wars against his neighbors, his clear violation of the cease-fire
agreement, his violation of multiple UN security council resolutions and
even his fiscal support for Palestinian suicide bombers, clearly build a
reasonable case that his removal was in the worlds best long term interest.
The only valid issue is whether the cost in both blood and treasure is worth
the price to the U.S.......Nonetheless the actual cost to remove him was
affordable.... it is the effort to establish a Iraq democracy and allow
enough time to build the basic social infrastructure, to allow self
determination in a area without such a history, that has proven expensive.
Rod

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On Feb 4, 8:24 pm, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> a. They simply prefer to pay out of pocket as need arises.
>>
>> b. They are too cheap to pay for a rather expensive service
>>
>> c. They can't afford a rather expensive service
>>
>> d. They do not perceive a need for a rather expensive service
>>
>
> You are omitting (on purpose I presume) what may be the single most
> common reason.
>
> e. After paying for rent and food, hey don't have enough left to pay
> the premiums for health care.


What do you think C was?

> Some single non-custodial parents
> don't even have enough for rent and food after child support is
> deducted. My next-door neighbor who was employed full time
> had $10/month left in his paycheck after taxes and child support.

There is no question bottom tier income groups cannot afford(without help)
medical care nor even child support<G>.....In 1976 a west coast HMO cost
$25.00 per month for a single person with $2.00 co-pays, today the same
coverage would be closer to $400 with $20 co-pays.....the medical affordably
problem in this country is entirely medical inflation, of which has little
in common with normal inflation. Sadly this inflation has been driven by
greed, 3rd party payees and certain standards we expect (new shiny medical
buildings, staffing levels, paper work, liability etc.). In fact under
expected market forces with modern (post 1980's) imaging , drugs and
specific procedures medical costs probably should have declined or at least
leveled.

> Isn't Walmart the largest employer in the US? Isn't it the case
> that Walmart does not offer a health care plan to its workers?

Not true at all.... One cannot believe much of the anti-Walmart
propaganda.......Rod

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On Feb 4, 8:24 pm, "Rod " <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> ...
>>
>> The only valid issue is whether the cost in both blood and treasure
>> is worth the price to the U.S.......Nonetheless the actual cost to
>> remove him was affordable.... it is the effort to establish a Iraq
>> democracy and allow enough time to build the basic social
>> infrastructure, to allow self determination in a area without such a
>> history, that has proven expensive. Rod
>
> It may yet prove that the single greatest expense was the
> loss of assets from the South Asia theater, especially Predator
> UAVs which, unlike our ground forces, can operate in Pakistan.

Not likely...I'd suggest with current military spending both theaters have
sufficient resources.....not to mention last week we took out a prominent
al-Qaida leader(in Pakistan with one. Rod

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>> Yes it always better to ignore the despots of the world
>
> As you know it is a false dichotomy to suggest that we had to
> either invade or ignore him. Containment had rendered him
> impotent outside of his own borders and even in the Northern
> Third of his own country.

No false dichotomy but rather simply being facetious....however because of
short term self interest by various parties including the UN oil scandle the
embargoes etc were crumbling and had little long term chance of
survival.....Incidently the U.S. Iraq containment effort was one of Osama's
recruiting tools.

>
>> .....long term it has
>> always worked out. In fact I suppose the Iraq embargoes should have
>> been canceled and the 50,000 troops containing Saddam should have
>> been brought home as well.
>
> IOW, you are well aware that he was NOT being ignored.

Of which was almost a sole U.S. effort at U.S. expense.....and still begs
the question of how long we should have continued the
effort.....Incidentally if Saddam was not worthy of removal why was he
worthy of containment?

>
>> Not to mention overthrowing the Taliban was largely a waste.
>> After all how many building would they have really toppled if we had
>> just ignored al-Qaida as was Clinton's policy.
>>
>
> No, ignoring al Queda was Republican policy. They
> called attacks on bin Laden and his assets 'wagging
> the dog.' Clinton made no fewer than four (4) publicly
> acknowledged attempts to kill or capture bin Laden.

Four? All of which were half assed and ineffective and in no way lessoned Al
Queda's looming power or organizational growth..... I'm sure when we blew up
the antibiotics plant in the Sudan Osama was shaking in his boots.

> Bush not only made NO attempts on bin Laden but
> his response to the intelligence blaming bin Laden
> for the bombing of the Cole was to remove his
> name from the State Department's list of 'terrorists'
> and to disband the group tasked with hunting him down.

Simply BS without actual historical fact, your mistaking the rearrangement
of administrative deck chairs with substantive diminished concern
.....nonetheless soon after Bush's close electoral win he did not have the
publics support for any quick or substantial Middle-East
adventure.....Presidents may be powerful but new Presidents must work their
way up to invasions etc.....

> Bush's appeasement didn't end until September 11, 1991
> and then Powell had to talk him into retaliating against
> bin Laden and the Taliban. Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz
> almost convinced Bush to continue ignoring al Queda
> and to use the attacks as an excuse to invade Iraq
> instead. Ultimately they prevailed, but at least in
> the short run Powell got him to do the right thing when
> it was needed most.

Such silliness Powell never got anybody to do the right thing.....to his
core he was and is a dove. As a administration talking head he did present a
case before the UN to justify invading Iraq albeit a non convincing poor one
at that. Rod

BDBConstruction wrote:
> On Feb 4, 4:48 am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Bush's prescription drug plan filled a real need.....The U.S. has
>> lots of health care, people are not dying in the streets...anybody
>> that needs it can get it and currently anyone whom can't truly
>> afford it will receive it.
>
>
> You need to get out and about a bit more. Here in rural WV bingo
> fundraisers are a common affair for people with all sorts of medical
> problems and no cash to treat them. Last year there was a fund raiser
> for a woman, cancer, no insurance, no treatment until she could come
> up with her share of the bill. Needless to say she is now gone.

Have you never heard of Medicaid? The fundraisers could very well be for
living expenses, when sick it is hard to pay the rent.

> There are people who die daily because they cant afford the treatment.
> There are people who's cancer metastasises while they are trying to
> find a facility that will administer charity care. There are people
> who are simply refused payment unless they can come up with a major
> percentage of the costs and then put there property up against the
> remainder.

Who are these people when Medicaid is available?


>
> The koolaid colored glasses may allow you to think people arent dying
> in the streets, and of course there arent actual bodies in the
> streets, but none the less people are going in the ground daily while
> profit taking abounds in the medical profession.
>
> Mark

I don't need to get out....My 79 yr. old mother passed away from
cancer....Medicare and my dad's medical supplement picked up the $100,000
tab..... my father-law(86) and mother-in-law(80) both died from cancer and
Medicare/Medicaid picked up the entire tab, surprisingly the kids inherited
the house. A 59 yr. old cousin died of Kidney cancer on Medicaid's tab and
his millionaire brother got his house(again surprised) a 60 yr. old aunt
fought cancer for nearly a decade again on Medicaid's tab......The reason
people are dying daily is simply cancer kills and true cures are few and far
and death at best is often simply delayed......In fact many or most working
or insured people once sick enough cannot maintain insurance or employment
anyway, the existing Medicaid program is the ultimate coverage for
most....at least before pronouncing such koolaid accusations you should know
what your talking about...... Rod

"Doug Winterburn" wrote:

> In 2005, my wife went through a near death experience as she had a
95%
> blockage in her right carotid artery. The reason it was a near
death
> thing was that about 17 years before she suffered a stroke and
unknown
> to us, her left carotid was blocked and had calcified over the
years -
> no blood to the brain isn't a good thing. But I digress. She ended
up
> having an operation which opened the carotid, stripped it out and
put it
> back together with a patch as her veins/arteries are very small.
There
> is more to the story, but that doesn't matter as she had great care
and
> is doing well.
<snip>

First,let me say I'm glad to see your wife has recovered.

Your experience with the medical insurance program points out a lot of
what is wrong with the present system, IMHO.

The present system focuses on paying for care AFTER the medical
problem has been identified rather than paying for preventative health
care BEFORE the problem develops.

This is the most expensive form of medical care that can be provided.

Also, allowing the insurance providers to "cherry pick" the customers
they will insure doesn't help problem since it results in a group of
uninsured who probably have the highest need for medical care.

Socialized medicine such as found in the UK isn't going to get the job
done here in the US; however, using the US gov't as a guaranteeritor
of plans developed by the private sector that cover 100& of the
population has some merit.

Yes there would need to be some limiting controls or you end up with
the "fox in the henhouse" type of
part D program presently in place.

Spreading the risk across 300 million (The US population) has a way of
minimizing the risk problems.

Private enterprise is just not capable of handling something that
large without gov't involvement.

Computerizing and standardizing a secure data base of medical records
would also reduce overhead costs.

Lew

"Doug Winterburn" wrote:

> What? My insurance program stresses preventative medicine.

You are very fortunate.

> and the same system
> takes care of those who don't have a clue or a plan and won't think
far
> enough ahead to do the same as I have

Especially those minimum wage workers in a place like SoCal where the
rent for a one bedroom apt can often be $1K/mo, or those who have
regularly paid their health insurance premiums, only to be denined
payment when medical services were required.

> Do you really
> think that adding more government will reduce the cost?

As a matter of fact, it will probably be a wash, especially when the
necessary reforms are implemented.

Reforms such as competitive bidding for drugs and secure
computerization of medical records as a beginning.

Think of it as a investment, just as you would any infrastructure
investment such as a bridge, highway, etc.

Yes, the overall health care investment will increase; however, the
unit cost will decrease and the benefits will help to create new
wealth in the process.

Providing the environment that allows a healthy and well educated work
force to grow and flourish is a function of gov't.

That healthy and well educated work force provides the business that
chooses to locate in that environment a competitive advantage.

Those businesses grow the GNP, create new wealth, and yes, pay taxes.

Providing that environment requires an investment, an investment that
provides significant returns to the overall society.

Getting the health care mess cleaned up is going to require gov't
intervention, which in the overall scheme of things, will provide a
more efficient program.

Having the gov't become a service provider makes no sense at all;
however, providing standards and oversight is quite another matter.

> I have no problem taking care of those who through no fault of their
own
> are unable to do what I and many others have done

Sounds like you are willing to underwrite WalMart among others health
insurance programs.

- plan ahead, but I
> have zero compassion for those who expect to be taken care of even
> though they won't plan ahead far enough to take care of themselves.

I'm reminded of the old saying:

"It's tough to remember your objective is to drain the swamp when you
are up to your ass in alligators"

Lew

"Fred the Red Shirt" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:e0b84f7f-b247-4e41-88d3-2029e4651f07@i72g2000hsd.googlegroups.com...
>> What do you think C was?
>
> Evasion.
>
> The absence of affordable alternatives was neither stated nor
> implied.

That is just plain silly.... what part of "can't afford" didn't you
understand? Affordable alternatives, your kidding right?

"c. They can't afford a rather expensive service"

> The costs of many drugs and most imaging methods
> have dropped.

And yet per capita medical costs rise by roughly 10% or more yearly

> If the largest private employer in the US in not
> Walmart, then whom?

Largest employer is not in dispute nor is it propaganda nor in this context
is it particularly relevant

> And what do we know about their health care plan?
> FF

That they have one!!!!!!! and that you claimed that they did not.....Your
confusion probably comes from those normally complaining about Walmart, in
their ignorance they do not seem aware that an employer can't afford the
entire cost of a $400 medical plan for part time employees....and that many
part time employees want to be part time employees....and that Walmart has
many many thousands of full time employees. Also that by tradition and need
routine retail jobs across the entire industry(all employers) tend to be
fairly low paid, have few benefits and have lots of part timers including
students, teens, housewives etc..... Rod

"Fred the Red Shirt" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:055cd8dd-3a37-4e51-ae1f->>
> It may not be likely that had we not withdrawn some of the
> Predators from we would have killed bin Laden by now, but
> can you sensibly argue that it would not have been MORE
> likely?

No evidence to suggest that.....One can "what if" Ad nauseam .....maybe if
we had mobilized the entire country and fielded a 15 million man army and
invaded Pakistan we might have found him.....somehow that solution might
have a bit to be desired as well.

> If the resources in Afghanistan were sufficient, why did so
> much of the country revert to Taliban control? Why do
> we have to rely on NATO troops deployed out of theater?

From the "get go" we did not want to be a foreign occupying force in
Afghanistan .....The Soviet Unions 10 yr. occupation did not work out well,
there is a rather long historical failure of foreign occupiers in that
country.....from the invasion onward we tried to provide assistance with a
very small footprint.....Using NATO or multiple countries is simply to avoid
that imprint......Afghanistan and Iraq are very different situations. Rod

BDBConstruction wrote:

> On Feb 4, 9:05 pm, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
>>snip>
>
... snip
> or not given access to benefits to ensure your cost of goods. At 16K/
> yr ($8/hr 40hr/wk) almost everyone is going to have a hard time
> breaking off 300 a month (a weeks pay gross) for health care if they
> can even get it for that. It just aint gonna happen.
>

Well, it appears that people making less than that in California have had
no problem breaking off $2000 (or whatever the maximum allowable amount is)
to donate to the Clinton for President campaign. Maybe somebody ought to
talk to those chinese busboys and kitchen workers about their money
management techniques, it could be quite helpful for this kind of
application.



--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:

> On Feb 6, 3:52 am, tough guy or gal Mark or Juanita
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>> BDBConstruction wrote:
>> > On Feb 4, 9:05 pm, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >>snip>
>>
>> ... snip
>> > or not given access to benefits to ensure your cost of goods. At 16K/
>> > yr ($8/hr 40hr/wk) almost everyone is going to have a hard time
>> > breaking off 300 a month (a weeks pay gross) for health care if they
>> > can even get it for that. It just aint gonna happen.
>>
>> Well, it appears that people making less than that in California have
>> had
>> no problem breaking off $2000 (or whatever the maximum allowable amount
>> is)
>> to donate to the Clinton for President campaign. Maybe somebody ought to
>> talk to those chinese busboys and kitchen workers about their money
>> management techniques, it could be quite helpful for this kind of
>> application.
>>
>
> How did you come by that information?
>
> --
>
> FF

<http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2007/10/clinton_defends_fundraising_am.html>,
just one link from an ask.com search for "chinese restaurant workers
clinton campaign" This story surfaced 3rd quarter last year and was
quickly ignored by the mainstream media



--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

BDBConstruction wrote:

> On Feb 5, 10:52 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>> BDBConstruction wrote:
>> > On Feb 4, 9:05 pm, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
>> >>snip>
>>
>> ... snip
>> > or not given access to benefits to ensure your cost of goods. At 16K/
>> > yr ($8/hr 40hr/wk) almost everyone is going to have a hard time
>> > breaking off 300 a month (a weeks pay gross) for health care if they
>> > can even get it for that. It just aint gonna happen.
>>
>> Well, it appears that people making less than that in California have had
>> no problem breaking off $2000 (or whatever the maximum allowable amount
>> is) to donate to the Clinton for President campaign.  Maybe somebody
>> ought to talk to those chinese busboys and kitchen workers about their
>> money management techniques,  it could be quite helpful for this kind of
>> application.
>>
>> --
>> If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
>
> These sort of shady contributions (proxies) have long been issues for
> all campaigns and are rarely the fault of the campaign but rather the
> fault of an unsavory citizen trying to loophole the laws. I dont say
> this to defend the Clinton campaign because I dont support her and am
> hoping she doesnt succeed. That said, if this is a scab you really
> want to start picking you had better be prepared to buy bandaids by
> the tractor trailer load for both parties and most all campaigns. This
> is a perfect example of how koolaid fogs ones objectivity.
>
> The likely reason the story fell by the wayside is that the republican
> party is far more intelligent than your post. In their sleep they know
> better than to even *touch* that can of worms, much less open it. Its
> a no brainer. With regards to campaign contribution improprieties,
> both parties are stationary targets and in recent years they all cover
> their asses by returning the money as soon as impropriety is
> suspected. Thats not to say all infractions are always caught.
>

I wasn't even referring to the republicans pushing this issue. How fast
do you think this issue would have fallen by the wayside with the
mainstream media if the name Rudy Guilliani or, 4 years ago, George Bush
had been the beneficiaries of such donations?


> The real story you are hoping for, and in the way you frame the
> information, is to somehow insinuate that the Clinton campaign
> actually told the "backer" (likely the employer) of these restaraunt
> workers how to get around the limits by giving thier employees
> $1000.00 bonus cheks which could only be used as a Clinton
> contribution. This is how proxy contributions have commonly been done
> in the past. Its so rudimentary its been in movies. Your problem lies
> in that your information, nor any at the time or to date, was able to
> make such a link. Again, koolaid fog has led you astray.
>

I'm drinking the koolaid? I think not. The problem here is that this is
not the first or isolated instance. Buddhist nuns, Charlie Tri, Norman
Hsu -- there seems to be a pattern here.


> What even further complicates this accusation is that many immigrant
> populations (not just chinese) operate on cash economies, live in
> communal (low overhead) arrangements, and savings rates can be
> extremely high. This would mean it may not be uncommon for a low wage
> worker to have a lot of cash in savings. This is very common in China
> and Japan where even very low wage workers will buy outrageously
> expensive ceremonial ceramics or other items for thier homes from
> savings. They simply have differnet fiscal priorities than we do in
> the states. However returing the contributions was likely the safer
> option.
>

Again, who's drinking the koolaid now? Alright, given the frugality of
this culture, what on earth would possess them to part with those carefully
squirreled away funds to make a donation to a candidate for the president
of the US? When you are that frugal, you are looking for a return on your
investment, how could these people think that anything a presidential
candidate could ever do make a return on that large an investment? Note
also that many of the people referenced could not even be located. I saw
the same excusing article, not buying it.

> Mark

--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

On Jan 31, 2:37=A0pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> If your guy decided to stop running after he hit a little adversity
> then maybe next time you should go for a somebody who's not a quitter.
>

This is the lockeroom mentality that has sadly made the US a second
rate nation, and we are. CEO's all over the country publicly state
that fact daily. What is sad is we have a broadcast station founded
with the expressed intent of maintaining, and in fact fertilizing,
this delusional concept that individual fortitude has anything to do
with ones ability to gain, or hold, elected office in the US. Eight
years of this mentality, when tallied by history, will have retarded
our progress by 20 years, and that's if we are extremely lucky. It is
confirmed daily, from all sources, both sides, that we have been in an
overall state of decline for years. Some individual indicators have
been positive over this time but the overall has pointed to this
outcome clearly. However, only now, in the final hours, are both sides
admitting that they have seen these problem for quite some time and
are distancing themselves as best they can. Pathetic.

The system is rigged. Everyone on US soils knows it and has known it
for years but cash soothes all wounds. Even though this has been
grinding on the nerves of the US voter for the past 20 years the
soothing cash and the distraction of debt is too abundant to allow any
overwhelming change. Our electoral process has absolutely nothing to
do with moral conviction, perseverance, tenacity, or any form of
"calling". It has to do with cash and corporate connection. Our system
is setup to keep the average american numb through consumption and
debt resolution. For the average citizen there is no time for anything
other than those two things and that's the way the gvt. designed it.

What is truly pathetic, is that all who voted for GW should feel
completely comfortable in voting for HC. They are one in the same.
Hillary is more educated, more intelligent, has a better command of
the English language, can form full sentences, and conduct herself
better in press conferences and in public, but substantively they are
one in the same. They are party liners. It doesnt matter Dem or Repub.
they are US gvt. party liners. They will work endlessly to support the
current system, as it stands, til death, period. They will do this
because IT supports them. There will be no change between her and GW
other than subtle, trivial, policy issues. So cast your vote. They are
one in the same.

There is no conservative and liberal anymore. Our current spending
record for 7+ years has been liberal to say the least. We are broke.
Hillary's will likely be no different other than a few relatively
minor issues. What we need now, is a truly non government party to
compete with the (cliche) career politicians. Even if he/she is a
total novice. Who cares, we are in the hole and swirling around the
drain. Fresh meat, fresh blood, new perspective. Obama isnt even new.
Paul isnt new.


Mark

On Feb 1, 11:25 am, "George" <[email protected]> wrote:
> ...
>
> Remember the old system where the states sent delegates to the convention to
> tout their "favorite sons" for the first few ballots? Things weren't
> predetermined to the extent they are now. Makes me wonder why the wasted
> time and money on conventions.

Groupies.

--

FF

On Feb 5, 10:52=A0pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> BDBConstruction wrote:
> > On Feb 4, 9:05=A0pm, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
> >>snip>
>
> ... snip
> > or not given access to benefits to ensure your cost of goods. At 16K/
> > yr ($8/hr 40hr/wk) almost everyone is going to have a hard time
> > breaking off 300 a month (a weeks pay gross) for health care if they
> > can even get it for that. It just aint gonna happen.
>
> =A0 Well, it appears that people making less than that in California have =
had
> no problem breaking off $2000 (or whatever the maximum allowable amount is=
)
> to donate to the Clinton for President campaign. =A0Maybe somebody ought t=
o
> talk to those chinese busboys and kitchen workers about their money
> management techniques, =A0it could be quite helpful for this kind of
> application.
>
> --
> If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough

These sort of shady contributions (proxies) have long been issues for
all campaigns and are rarely the fault of the campaign but rather the
fault of an unsavory citizen trying to loophole the laws. I dont say
this to defend the Clinton campaign because I dont support her and am
hoping she doesnt succeed. That said, if this is a scab you really
want to start picking you had better be prepared to buy bandaids by
the tractor trailer load for both parties and most all campaigns. This
is a perfect example of how koolaid fogs ones objectivity.

The likely reason the story fell by the wayside is that the republican
party is far more intelligent than your post. In their sleep they know
better than to even *touch* that can of worms, much less open it. Its
a no brainer. With regards to campaign contribution improprieties,
both parties are stationary targets and in recent years they all cover
their asses by returning the money as soon as impropriety is
suspected. Thats not to say all infractions are always caught.

The real story you are hoping for, and in the way you frame the
information, is to somehow insinuate that the Clinton campaign
actually told the "backer" (likely the employer) of these restaraunt
workers how to get around the limits by giving thier employees
$1000.00 bonus cheks which could only be used as a Clinton
contribution. This is how proxy contributions have commonly been done
in the past. Its so rudimentary its been in movies. Your problem lies
in that your information, nor any at the time or to date, was able to
make such a link. Again, koolaid fog has led you astray.

What even further complicates this accusation is that many immigrant
populations (not just chinese) operate on cash economies, live in
communal (low overhead) arrangements, and savings rates can be
extremely high. This would mean it may not be uncommon for a low wage
worker to have a lot of cash in savings. This is very common in China
and Japan where even very low wage workers will buy outrageously
expensive ceremonial ceramics or other items for thier homes from
savings. They simply have differnet fiscal priorities than we do in
the states. However returing the contributions was likely the safer
option.

Mark

On Feb 3, 7:55 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> > On Feb 1, 4:45 am, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> ...
>
> >> No, the original system was fine; this idea that independents and/or
> >> cross-over voters (depending upon the state) have the ability to help
> >> decide the parties' candidate is troubling.
>
> > Primary elections were not part of the original Presidential
> > election system. They still aren't, in some states.
>
> The original presidential election system was to have the voting citizens
> (usually limited to land-owners and taxpayers -- a concept that would do us
> a world of good today by the way) vote for electors who then voted for the
> president. Are you recommending returning to that system?
>

That proposal never made it out of the Constitutional Convention.
It is not possible to 'return' to a system that was never used.

>
>
> >> What is especially troubling
> >> is that this lassaiz faire attitude toward who gets to vote in primaries
> >> is predominant in early primary states and has the ability to skew the
> >> results
> >> and candidates for the rest of the country. Look at who voted for McCain
> >> in the various primaries that allowed either independents or cross-overs
> >> to
> >> vote. Same issue could apply to the dems as well; this serves to weaken
> >> the parties' platforms and their ability to maintain a cohesive message.
>
> > _A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.
>
> No, if one has a two-party system,

We do NOT have a two party system. We have a system that
preserves the freedom of association that permits the formation
of parties, and an election system that tends to make more
than two parties unviable.

I don' t have any problem with parties choosing and supporting
candidates. My objection is to different rules for ballot access
for candidates of the two largest parties vs everyone else.

> doesn't matter what one calls the
> parties, that has an essential dichotomy of view toward the role of
> government, then it darn well does matter that the primaries are partisan.

_That_ is the problem, the reduction of so many issues to a false
dichotomy. Grouping those dichotomies into only two sets compounds
that problem.

>
> > One alternative is impose a reasonable high bar, in the form
> > of the number of signatures on a petition to get on the ballot,
> > so as to limit the candidates to a dozen or so. Then hold a
> > series of elections to eliminate the candidates from the bottom
> > up, similar to how they are eliminated in the Iowa Caucases,
> > until one gets more than 50% of the vote. This was done for
> > state and local elections in OK (maybe still is) and there were
> > seldom more than two elections needed to arrive
> > at a winner.
>
> That is certainly one way to approach things; but that
> is just it, it is *a* way that has may have some benefits
> but will also carry some detriments as well.

Yep. Any system will have pros and cons. If it is a political
system, the politicians will no doubt provide most of the
cons, in more way than one.

>
> > There is no Constitutional requirement that states have
> > Presidential primaries or even Presidential elections.
>
> OK. But they do, and that is the system under discussion. Some of the
> states, particularly the early voting states allow both cross-over voting
> and undeclared voters to vote in party primaries.

Yes. It is a state issue.

> The issue here is that
> this tends to be detrimental to both parties (with the biggest detriment to
> the Republicans in this election cycle) as it weakens the fundamental
> message of each of those parties regarding their stand on the role of
> government and tends to winnow out those candidates with strong messages
> early in the process due to the influence of those outside the party.

And not allowing them disenfranchises people who refuse to join
either party, violating THEIR freedom of (non) association as well
as their equal protection.

It ALSO makes no sense to have anyone but a patry member choose
candidates for that party.

One way to address those two problems is to eliminate
partisan primaries per se (the parties can still hold internal
elections if they wish--that's their business just leave the
government out of the loop) and use a runoff-elimination
system. IF there are two strong parties then the final
election will come down to a contest between one candidate
from each no matter how many of each start off at the bottom
tier. And registered voter gets to vote at every stage.


>
> > So think hard before you suggest amending the Constitution,
> > else you have better be especially tough.
>
> Where on earth in my postings did I ever mention anything remotely
> resembling amending the Constitution?

SOMEBODY suggested a national primary. THAT would require
a constitutional amendment taking from the individual states
the authority to determine thier won ways to choose electors.

--

FF

On Feb 4, 11:25 pm, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> >> Yes it always better to ignore the despots of the world
>
> > As you know it is a false dichotomy to suggest that we had to
> > either invade or ignore him. Containment had rendered him
> > impotent outside of his own borders and even in the Northern
> > Third of his own country.
>
> No false dichotomy but rather simply being facetious....

Its good to know you thought about it but I daresay there are
way too many who do think that way.

> however because of
> short term self interest by various parties including the UN oil scandle the
> embargoes etc were crumbling and had little long term chance of
> survival.....

It is one thing to smuggle out oil for money, it is quite another
to spend than money to violate the import prohibitions. North
Korea is one of the poorest countries on the Planet, yet they
were able to develop nuclear weapons. It is not primarily a
question of finance.

> Incidently the U.S. Iraq containment effort was one of Osama's
> recruiting tools.

However effective that may have been, have you any
doubt that invasion and occupation are far more effective?

>
>
>
> >> .....long term it has
> >> always worked out. In fact I suppose the Iraq embargoes should have
> >> been canceled and the 50,000 troops containing Saddam should have
> >> been brought home as well.
>
> > IOW, you are well aware that he was NOT being ignored.
>
> Of which was almost a sole U.S. effort at U.S. expense.....and still begs
> the question of how long we should have continued the
> effort.....Incidentally if Saddam was not worthy of removal why was he
> worthy of containment?

Non Sequitor. Hussein was 'worthy' of removal. The same is
true of Bashir, Mugabe, Kim Jung Il, Musharriff, King Abdullah,
the Burmese junta, or any number of others. There is con-
siderably more to consider.

>
> >> Not to mention overthrowing the Taliban was largely a waste.
> >> After all how many building would they have really toppled if we had
> >> just ignored al-Qaida as was Clinton's policy.
>
> > No, ignoring al Queda was Republican policy. They
> > called attacks on bin Laden and his assets 'wagging
> > the dog.' Clinton made no fewer than four (4) publicly
> > acknowledged attempts to kill or capture bin Laden.
>
> Four? All of which were half assed and ineffective
> and in no way lessoned Al Queda's looming power
> or organizational growth.....

At the very least, unlike the invasion and occupation of
Iraq, those actions did not contribute to the growth of
al Queda.

> I'm sure when we blew up
> the antibiotics plant in the Sudan Osama was shaking
> in his boots.
>
> > Bush not only made NO attempts on bin Laden but
> > his response to the intelligence blaming bin Laden
> > for the bombing of the Cole was to remove his
> > name from the State Department's list of 'terrorists'
> > and to disband the group tasked with hunting him down.
>
> Simply BS without actual historical fact, your mistaking the rearrangement
> of administrative deck chairs with substantive diminished concern
>CNN, 4/30/2001

"The State Department officially released its annual terrorism report
just a little more than an hour ago, but unlike last year, there's no
extensive mention of alleged terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden. A
senior State Department official tells CNN the U.S. government made a
mistake in focusing so much energy on bin Laden and 'personalizing
terrorism.'" -- CNN 4/30/2001


> .....nonetheless soon after Bush's close electoral win he did not have the
> publics support for any quick or substantial Middle-East
> adventure.....Presidents may be powerful but new Presidents must work their
> way up to invasions etc.....

Especially after the attacks on the US on September 11, 2001
he should have finished in Afghanistan and Pakistan instead of
diverting resources and attention to the Middle-East.

>
> > Bush's appeasement didn't end until September 11, 1991
> > and then Powell had to talk him into retaliating against
> > bin Laden and the Taliban. Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz
> > almost convinced Bush to continue ignoring al Queda
> > and to use the attacks as an excuse to invade Iraq
> > instead. Ultimately they prevailed, but at least in
> > the short run Powell got him to do the right thing when
> > it was needed most.
>
> Such silliness Powell never got anybody to do the right thing.....to his
> core he was and is a dove.

Do you also think he is a liar?
He said that on the evening of September 11-12, 2001 he
convinced Bush to retaliate against Afghanistan and not
Iraq.


> As a administration talking head he did present a
> case before the UN to justify invading Iraq albeit a
> non convincing poor one at that. Rod

Yes, he made the best argument possible without
making statements he knew to be lies, though
some of the information he as given were lies.
As you note, that argument was not convincing.

--

FF

On Feb 2, 4:36=A0pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> J. Clarke wrote:
> > Garage_Woodworks wrote:
> >>> =A0Yeah, let's make sure the voters have very little time to delve
> >>> into
> >>> details about the person who is going to lead the country for the
> >>> next 4 years. =A0I spend more time than that deciding what kind of
> >>> table saw or router to buy -- and those tools aren't going to try
> >>> to
> >>> "re-distribute" my income by taking it from me at the point of a
> >>> gun.
>
> >> Please, you're kidding yourself. =A0 All we get is "My health care
> >> plan
> >> this ..., his health care plan that..." =A0 We could get these
> >> 'details' mailed to us in a brochure or given in a few 60 minute
> >> debates. =A0 They don't need to tour around the country like some kind
> >> of hippy rock band to give us the 'details' we need.
>
> >> Did we get all of the 'details' on W? =A0Like the 'details' of his
> >> foreign policy?
>
> > What, you mean "if somebody blows up the World Trade Center I'm going
> > to for God's sake do something, even if it's the wrong thing"?
>
> =A0 ... and what was wrong with the actions taken to bring down those
> governments that support and promote terrorism? =A0After all, appeasement =
has
> worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's appeasement=

> policies had on the Iranians.
>

Yup. MUCH better to sell them arms, eh?

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On Feb 4, 4:29 pm, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>>
>>
>>>_A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.
>>
>>Often more than one person from a political party wants to be that party's
>>candidate for an office. Primaries are the way the party decides which one will
>>be its candidate. Why is that a problem? Are you suggesting a party should not
>>be entitled to choose its candidate?
>
>
> No. I am suggesting that the primaries used to whittle the number of
> candidates down for the general election should not be partisan.
>

But that's what the primaries ARE - they're the way the political parties choose
their candidates from among those who would like to be their party's candidate.
The only way for a primary to be something other than partisan would be to let
people who are not Democrats choose the Democrat candidate (same for Repubs).
So it sounds to me like you just said "yes" and "no" to my final question in a
single sentence.

"Mark & Juanita" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
>>> Well, it appears that people making less than that in California have
>>> had
>>> no problem breaking off $2000 (or whatever the maximum allowable amount
>>> is)
>>> to donate to the Clinton for President campaign. Maybe somebody ought
>>> to
>>> talk to those chinese busboys and kitchen workers about their money
>>> management techniques, it could be quite helpful for this kind of
>>> application.
>>>
>>
>> How did you come by that information?
>>
>> --
>>
>> FF
>
> <http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2007/10/clinton_defends_fundraising_am.html>,
> just one link from an ask.com search for "chinese restaurant workers
> clinton campaign" This story surfaced 3rd quarter last year and was
> quickly ignored by the mainstream media
>

Those workers Buddhist? Even their monks have lots of money.

On Feb 6, 4:40 am, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>...
>
>
>
>
> <http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2007/10/clinton_defen...>,
> just one link from an ask.com search for "chinese restaurant workers
> clinton campaign" This story surfaced 3rd quarter last year and was
> quickly ignored by the mainstream media
>

Thanks.

That looks like an interesting site.

--

FF

On Feb 6, 10:26=A0pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:

> How fast > do you think this issue would have fallen by the wayside with t=
he
> mainstream media if the name Rudy Guilliani or, 4 years ago, George Bush
> had been the beneficiaries of such donations? =A0

Likely just as fast had they returned the money. I personally dont buy
into this vast left wing consipiracy philosophy that is commonly
aspoused. Nor do I believe the vast right wing conspiracies that the
left spouts off about. The simple fact of the matter is that you
filter information differently (I would say poorly) when you lose
objetivity following strict party lines. People out at the extremes
are extremely poor sources of information. They are all wastes of my
time, from ORiley to Garafalo, two idiots who are one in the same.
Virtually identical. The extremists are what is wrong with the whole
process.

I have a different perspective on why a republican would likely be
looked at a bit more harshly in the public eye with regards to
something like this but I dont feel that it is a conspiracy.

> Alright, given the frugality of
> this culture, what on earth would possess them to part with those carefull=
y
> squirreled away funds to make a donation to a candidate for the president
> of the US? =A0

To advance an agenda that they feel (or have been told) will benefit
them and their kind.

> When you are that frugal, you are looking for a return on your
> investment, how could these people think that anything a presidential
> candidate could ever do make a return on that large an investment?

I have no idea and these very points are likely why the money was
returned. An argument in court could easily be made, and would likely
be upheld, that they simple felt they were supporting a candidate
which would advance issues they felt important. No different than any
of us. As to the percentage of their savings, my only direct knowledge
of what I said is that I have a background in ceramics. I have had
numerous conversations individuals who have had apprenticed for year
in the orient, and had work shown in galleries in china and japan. It
was very common for these people to comment that it wasnt only the
ellite who purchased work at these shows. It was not uncommon for very
"common folk" to "invest" in a piece. Like I said, different
priorities. And again, not a solid enough position to not return the
contribution.

While I dont want to sound prejudice, this "pattern" you speak of
seems to me to more clearly be an ethnic pattern rather than a pattern
caused by any campaign. Again, I am wary of the prejudice, but coming
from a different culture where rigging the system is common place (I
could name a few US companies) they are likely simply trying to pull
the same sh*t here as is done in their native country. They should be
punished harshly. Most campaigns suffer from these issues and go to
great lengths to insure the money they recieve is legal. I would
guarantee that if you put as much effort into looking into all
campaigns, or spoke to the campaigns directly they would all have
caught bad contributions regularly.

Mark

On Feb 4, 7:34 pm, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
>at least before pronouncing such koolaid accusations you should know
> what your talking about...... Rod

I wont make another sugary glasses references but having to post this
in the first place is rather sad.....

The ease of eligibility is very far from your spin. Eligibility varies
wildly from state to state and there are basic criteria that, within
minutes of sitting down at DHHR, flatly disqualify many individuals
any from coverage. It is not called one of the biggest bureaucracy's
for no reason and furthermore its not there to insure the uninsured in
the first place. The simple fact is many people dont come close to
qualifying period, but of course I shouldnt have to explain this to
you as you are well versed in Medicare.

Young, single, no young children, asset issues, a working spouse or
able to work, own land, have savings, and so on. Even with spending
down (if you have even been able to stack up bills to qualify)
eligibility can be difficult and in many cases impossible.

Pertaining to our area:
______________________________________
WV's eligibility criteria:

Except in the case of pregnant women and children up to age 19 years,
eligibility for Medicaid is based on categorical relatedness, income
and assets.

Categorical relatedness means that an applicant must be a member of a
family with a child who is deprived of support due to the absence,
incapacity or unemployment of a parent(s). If the applicant has no
children under age 18, the individual must be age 65 or over, blind or
disabled.

The second factor considered is an applicant's income and assets.
Income is any money a family or individual receives such as wages,
pensions, retirement benefits or support payments. Assets include
money in the bank, property other than the homestead, and the cash or
loan value of certain life insurance
_______________________________________

**Read above**: "If the applicant has no children under age 18, the
individual must be age 65 or over, blind or disabled." Start doing the
math.

In WV AFDC Limits assets to $1000.00, In spend down it is increased to
2k for one person and 3k for two. More math.

These criteria alone render the vast majority of those under 65 and
uninsured ineligible. The fact that I even have to spell this out is
ludicrous. If medicaid were a viable option for the uninsured we
wouldnt even be having a political debate on health care. My OP never
said anything pertaining to age, or income level. The woman I spoke of
was in her 40's, children over 18. She was not disabled and up until
the end she was able to work and therefore had income. If she were
eligible she would have been enrolled. These simple criteria exclude
you from most options for care unless you have insurance. Once you
exhaust the facilities willingness to cover your expenses its pay or
play. But again, I shouldnt have to tell you this.

Though she didnt work there, a good example would be "welcome to the
world of a Walmart employee". While the company is pulling down
$20,000.00 per minute in shear profit (fact) their average employee
will likely be denied any form of medicare, freecare, or charity care,
at any hospital due to their whopping 16K/year income. Now please dont
start about Walmart beginning to extend availability of benefits to
workers (only after years of scathing PR). They have gotten rich off
the backs of their workers and now in their ultimate benevolence will
offer the 16k/yr employee an insurance plan they can never afford.


here are some others:

DHHS:
"Medicaid does not provide medical assistance for all poor persons.
Even under the broadest provisions of the Federal statute (except for
emergency services for certain persons), the Medicaid program does not
provide health care services, even for very poor persons, unless they
are in one of the designated eligibility groups. Low income is only
one test for Medicaid eligibility; assets and resources are also
tested against established thresholds."

2002 MedPac:
Medicaid limits access to quality care. Due in part to Medicaid's low
reimbursement rates and burdensome bureaucracy, fewer physicians are
agreeing to accept Medicaid patients. A 2002 Medicare Payment Advisory
Commission (MedPac) survey found that "approximately 40 percent of
physicians restricted access for Medicaid patients

Derek Hunter, "Government Controls on Access to Drugs: What Seniors
Can Learn from Medicaid Drug Policies,"
In order to control spiraling costs, many Medicaid programs restrict
access to treatments and services. This is particularly visible in how
states ration access to prescription drugs within Medicaid. States
have devised a variety of approaches, such as restricted formularies
and monthly limits, to impede enrollees' access to prescription drugs.
This can be especially problematic for enrollees with multiple health
problems. Those with mental illnesses, for example, may find that the
limited formulary restricts their ability to find the best choice for
them within a class of similar drugs. Policymakers should find ways to
give enrollees, and their physicians, greater control over treatments
and services.

Mark

On Feb 4, 9:05=A0pm, Doug Winterburn <[email protected]> wrote:
>snip>

I couldnt agree more with regards to personal responsibility and
accountability. While your examples are framed in a context that
surely angers all of us who work for a living and pay our way, there
is a shear lack of detail as to why they were there, free care,
disabled, child born in the US even though the parent is not a
citizen, on and on. What was the facilities charter. You may not agree
with it but if they were rightfully there enrolled in some part of the
system then thats the system.

The simple fact of the matter is even most with coverage should
clearly be able to see that there are hundreds of thousands of
individuals out there who will likely have a very difficult time
paying todays insurance premiums. Forget about the ones who flat out
cant. The Walmart employee in my last post is a perfect example. Deal
with it, they are there, in that store, daily, to deliver you your
cheap goods, and for the forseeable future they will continue to be
there. They are paid at a rate that allows those goods, they are given
or not given access to benefits to ensure your cost of goods. At 16K/
yr ($8/hr 40hr/wk) almost everyone is going to have a hard time
breaking off 300 a month (a weeks pay gross) for health care if they
can even get it for that. It just aint gonna happen.

Perhaps you should look at paying there way as part of the cost of
those cheap goods. Some one has got to pay it. At their current
payscale they cant, their employer is clearly not interested in paying
it,...... Cheap goods, or a slightly higher priced goods in trade for
an insured workforce that is not a burden on the health care system.

I dont buy a thing from Walmart, but they are still getting my money
as I am subsidising their employee healthcare plan.

Mark

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> >
>> If your guy decided to stop running after he hit a little adversity
>> then maybe next time you should go for a somebody who's not a quitter.
>
> My guy was not given a fair chance. "We" never cast our vote.
>

OR, you were effectively outvoted? If your candidate had received enough
votes, believe it, no withdrawl would have happened. Obviously s/he wasn't
popular enough.

On Feb 3, 12:30 pm, "Mike Marlow" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "George" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
>
>
> > It's not money buying candidates that troubles me so much as candidates
> > buying votes - with _my_ money.
>
> How is it your money? You either gave it away, or had it taxed away.
> Either way, once it's out of your possession, it's no longer your_money.
>

You forgot to add "at the point of a gun."

--

FF

On Jan 31, 2:12=A0am, "Dave in Houston" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Jeff" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
> > Hey - Moonbeam boned Linda Ronstadt back
> > when that meant something...
>
> I can still see her laid out in a red teddy on the bed in the piece Rollin=
g
> Stone did about her. =A0OUCH!
> -
> Dave in Houston

I don't know what you're talking about......

http://www.ronstadt-linda.com/rs78-2.jpg

> So you desire 300 million candidates right on up to Nov. so everybody can
> vote for their candidate of choice?

That's silly.

>Or do you desire all 50 states to be first in the primary race?

How about have it done the way it is done in the general election? Why
should Iowa, Wyoming and New Hampshire get to decide who runs for president?
Why should I have to move to Iowa in order to have a voice in this election?

"We the people..." Not "We, Iowa, Wyoming and New Hampshire..."

> Or you just don't think losing candidates should be allowed to drop out?

No. They shouldn't have TIME to drop out before I have a chance to cast my
VOTE.



> It may be antiquated (is that a bad thing?) but broken? When was the last
> time that the most popular candidate did not come out on top?

Does the name Al Gore mean anything to you?

>Obviously winning does not always guarantee job competence<G>.
>
> Are you sure the sour grapes isn't just the fruit of "your guy" not making
> the cut? Rod

No. I think everyone "We" should have a chance to vote for their candidate.
Not just Iowa et al.

>
>
>

>> I don't know other state's laws, but here you have to be a registered
>> write-in candidate, otherwise the vote is just thrown out. People write
>> in Mickey Mouse, Pluto and whatever strikes their fancy. They not only
>> lose that vote, but it is not tallied and no one even gets to laugh about
>> it (other than the poll workers).
>>
>
> Well, when it comes to that, "We the people" never did mean that it was
> the voters who decided who wanted to run for office.

What year was the constitution written and how many states where there at
the time? This is what I mean by ANTIQUATED. It don't work no more.

My guy dropped out before I had a chance to cast a vote. This is inherently
wrong.
"We the people..." does not mean "We, Iowa, Wyoming and New Hampshire..."
I think everyone "We" should have a chance to vote for their candidate.
Not just Iowa et al.

I think it should be done like the general election.

>
>
>

>
> If your guy decided to stop running after he hit a little adversity
> then maybe next time you should go for a somebody who's not a quitter.

My guy was not given a fair chance. "We" never cast our vote.


>
> --
> --
> --John
> to email, dial "usenet" and validate
> (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)
>
>

>
> The parties could just pick somebody without any kind of primary.
> There's nothing in the Constitution that requires the candidates to be
> selected by popular vote.
>
> If your guy decided to stop running after he hit a little adversity
> then maybe next time you should go for a somebody who's not a quitter.

By the way. Lack of media attention has a lot to do with my guy dropping
out.
I would like to thank the media for narrowing the gap to just Hillary and
Obama. Job well done!


>
> --
> --
> --John
> to email, dial "usenet" and validate
> (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)
>
>

>
> OR, you were effectively outvoted?>

How could I be outvoted if I never voted? 'I' am included in 'We', am I
not?

>If your candidate had received enough votes, believe it, no withdrawl would
>have happened. Obviously s/he wasn't popular enough.

Maybe if 'We' had a chance to vote he would have been. Aren't you making
an assumption that the voters in Iowa, Wyoming and New Hampshire et al. are
representative of the country?

Doesn't it upset you that only a few states get to decide the fate of the
country? To get a vote I shouldn't be forced to move to Iowa.

Those that don't have the money to stay to the end, lose. I know I'm
stating the obvious, but it is still wrong. Why can't all the states vote
within a small time frame like the general election? Wouldn't this level
the playing field more and give it back to 'We"?

> Or make us like Italy with a hundred parties. Each one with "their"
> candidate.

I never suggested that. You could keep the same number of parties, the
difference is everyone gets to vote for their guy.

> If you will not accept the outcome of a democratic process, how can you
> claim you favor democracy?

This democratic process that I favor doesn't always appear very democratic
to me.


>

> Yeah, let's make sure the voters have very little time to delve into
> details about the person who is going to lead the country for the next 4
> years. I spend more time than that deciding what kind of table saw or
> router to buy -- and those tools aren't going to try to "re-distribute" my
> income by taking it from me at the point of a gun.

Please, you're kidding yourself. All we get is "My health care plan this
..., his health care plan that..." We could get these 'details' mailed to
us in a brochure or given in a few 60 minute debates. They don't need to
tour around the country like some kind of hippy rock band to give us the
'details' we need.

Did we get all of the 'details' on W? Like the 'details' of his foreign
policy?

>> What, you mean "if somebody blows up the World Trade Center I'm going
>> to for God's sake do something, even if it's the wrong thing"?
>>
>
> ... and what was wrong with the actions taken to bring down those
> governments that support and promote terrorism? After all, appeasement
> has
> worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's appeasement
> policies had on the Iranians.

This is really bothersome to me. Reminiscent of a recent Rep debate when
the candidates were all asked " was the war in Iraq a good idea worth the
cost in blood and treasure we have spent?"

ALL (with the exception of the only sane republican candidate, Ron Paul)
thought invading Iraq was the right decision. Very sad indeed.

source:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/us/politics/24text-debate.html?_r=1&pagewanted=11&bl&ei=5087&en=a0d7bd56323e1b26&ex=1201582800&oref=slogin

or

http://tinyurl.com/ypu5mo

>
> Your revisionism is so funny it is laughable. So you don't think a letter
> to the Ayatollah, begging him, as a man of faith, to release the hostages
> and essentially pledging not to do anything from a position of strength
> was
> not appeasement and did nothing to prolong the hostage issue nor embolden
> the Iranians?

:Was that 'unchristian' of Carter? He went with his beliefs.
:The Christian schooling I received in The Netherlands, including High
:School, taught me a lot about what Christianity stood for.
:And if I were to be so bold as to stand Bush beside Carter and compare
:notes on what *I* was taught (and still hold as true) as 'closer' to
:Christ's teachings, I think you know where those conclusions would
:lead to.
:Your man Bush wouldn't do so well. I'd much rather break bread with
:the likes of Carter and Huckabee...

Well said. It's funny how non-Christian the Christian right really are.
From no-health care to tax-cuts for the wealthy to war mongering, the list
goes on and on.

interesting article:
http://www.alternet.org/story/18378/

...
>> Well said. It's funny how non-Christian the Christian right really are.
>> From no-health care
>
> Bush's prescription drug plan filled a real need.....The U.S. has lots of
> health care, people are not dying in the streets...anybody that needs it
> can get it and currently anyone whom can't truly afford it will receive
> it.

Not really. Only those that can afford it can get it. Those that can't
afford it...well...they take other measures sometimes:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=3485812


> Which current health care proposal actually fills any real need?

Mine fills my need. I get to see a dr when I want and my copay for meds is
ok.

>The true problem is runaway costs,

NO, the "true" problem for the millions of Americans is NO health care
coverage.

>any mandatory plan currently proposed by the Dems (user pays incidentally)
>will do nothing for cost escalation.
>
> >to tax-cuts for the wealthy
>
> That 3% cut was really a giant giveaway($50 billion a year out of a $2-3
> trillion a year budget)....why was the then 37% top rate the magic or
> correct number? why not 30% or 40% or 50% or heck 100%?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/08/washington/08tax.html?_r=1&oref=slogin


>>to war mongering,
>
> Yes it always better to ignore the despots of the world.....long term it
> has always worked out. In fact I suppose the Iraq embargoes should have
> been canceled and the 50,000 troops containing Saddam should have been
> brought home as well. Not to mention overthrowing the Taliban was largely
> a waste. After all how many building would they have really toppled if we
> had just ignored al-Qaida as was Clinton's policy.

Are you one of those Iraq was connected to 911 dudes?

On Jan 30, 5:06 pm, "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote:
> How is this "We the people ..."? I never got a chance to vote for who I
> wanted for president because he dropped out recently.
>
> What a crock... What an antiquated and broken system...
>
> I kind of feel like Pacino from a Scent of a Woman:
>
> <The following quote was modified/tortured to better fit the context of my
> dismay>
>
> "I'm just gettin' warmed up. Now I don't know who founded this country
> Thomas Jefferson, John Penn, Sean Penn-whoever. Their spirit is dead; if
> they ever had one, it's gone. We're building a rat ship here."

I live in Pennsylvania now. We're about dead last in the primary
system. I haven't voted for a candidate I wanted since I left
Manhattan. The last primary that mattered was '92 when I voted for
Moonbeam over Slick Willie. Hey - Moonbeam boned Linda Ronstadt back
when that meant something...

On Feb 2, 12:01 pm, "George" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> Interesting to note that Canada pumps oil from the Arctic and recovers it
> from shale, but we'd rather buy it from them than do the same.

If we keep that up, someday we may be the only country
left with untapped petroleum reserves. As you note,
interesting...

--

FF

On Feb 5, 8:05 pm, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Fred the Red Shirt" <[email protected]> wrote in messagenews:e0b84f7f-b247-4e41-88d3-2029e4651f07@i72g2000hsd.googlegroups.com...
>
> >> What do you think C was?
>
> > Evasion.
>
> > The absence of affordable alternatives was neither stated nor
> > implied.
>
> That is just plain silly.... what part of "can't afford" didn't you
> understand? Affordable alternatives, your kidding right?

What part of 'rather expensive service', did you expect me to
ignore?

>
> "c. They can't afford a rather expensive service"
>
> > The costs of many drugs and most imaging methods
> > have dropped.
>
> And yet per capita medical costs rise
> by roughly 10% or more yearly

That is because wth more service available,
people get more service each year. Doctors
are a lot more likely to order a CAT scan or an
MRI today than they were 15 years ago.

>
> > If the largest private employer in the US in not
> > Walmart, then whom?
>
> Largest employer is not in dispute nor
> is it propaganda nor in this context
> is it particularly relevant

I made two assertions, it was not clear which of
the two you disputed.

>
> > And what do we know about their health care plan?
> > FF
>
> That they have one!!!!!!! and that you claimed
> that they did not.....Your confusion probably comes
> from those normally complaining about Walmart, in
> their ignorance they do not seem aware that
> an employer can't afford the
> entire cost of a $400 medical plan for part time
> employees....and that many
> part time employees want to be part time
> employees....and that Walmart has
> many many thousands of full time employees.
> Also that by tradition and need
> routine retail jobs across the entire industry
> (all employers) tend to be
> fairly low paid, have few benefits and have
> lots of part timers including
> students, teens, housewives etc..... Rod

So, which is it, do they HAVE health care plans
or do they not, or do they have one that most
of the full time employees cannot afford after
they pay for rent and food?

--

FF

On Feb 7, 3:26 am, tough guy Mark <[email protected]> wrote:
> BDBConstruction wrote:
> ...
>
> > These sort of shady contributions (proxies)
> > have long been issues for
> > all campaigns and are rarely the fault of the
> > campaign but rather the
> > fault of an unsavory citizen trying to loophole
> > the laws.
> ...
> > The likely reason the story fell by the wayside is that the republican
> > party is far more intelligent than your post.
> > ... With regards to campaign contribution improprieties,
> > both parties are stationary targets and in recent years they all cover
> > their asses by returning the money as soon as impropriety is
> > suspected. Thats not to say all infractions are always caught.
>
> I wasn't even referring to the republicans
> pushing this issue. How fast do you think
> this issue would have fallen by the wayside
> with the mainstream media if the name Rudy
> Guilliani or, 4 years ago, George Bush
> had been the beneficiaries of such donations?

A number of scandalous stories about Guilliani
have come and gone, none of them stuck, and
the only reason the press turned against is the
American casualties in Iraq.

>
> ... The problem here is that this is
> not the first or isolated instance. Buddhist nuns, Charlie Tri, Norman
> Hsu -- there seems to be a pattern here.

The Clintons have a long history of accusations of
corruption, especially involving money laundering --
you forgot to mention Hillary's spectacular success
in the cattle futures market. Though none of it ever
sticks, I tend to think that where there's smoke,
there's fire. The OIC didn't send a score of their
associates to prison on innuendo.

--

FF

On Feb 4, 12:02=A0am, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> Robatoy wrote:
> > On Feb 3, 9:59=A0pm, Fred the Red Shirt <[email protected]> wrote:=

>
> >> Care to revise any of that?
>
> > I find it interesting that parallels are often drawn between serious
> > incidents and the leaders during their time of occurrence.
> > But in recent history, only once has it happened on US soil. On
> > Bush43's watch.
>
> =A0 Oklahoma City could be considered a serious incident.

Not an international one. No more than Columbine or VT. Disallowed.
You simply cannot have intelligence when dealing with lone wolves/
kooks.

>
> > Prior to 9/11 he was briefed by a CIA agent at his ranch which drew
> > this response from Bush: "okay, now you've covered _your_ass..."
>
> =A0 Please, not another truther. =A0

How does that make me a truther? Have you no other defenses?
Whenever somebody points out ANYTHING that doesn't fit your mindset,
you call them liberals, leftists, truthers or anti-semites. No support
for those labels, mind you, but it does make you look silly when you
pull out that big brush and start slopping labels all over those who
have a different or more informed viewpoint.
I guess it is your version of sticking your head in the sand. And by
taking an assertive right-wing stance and refusing to debate
intelligently, you must be one of those nazi skin-head ultra-right-
wing McVay-ites? Do *I* approach you in that fashion?


>
> =A0 Number of conservatives sitting this election out if McCain is the
> nominee? =A0Probably a big number. =A0

Those who won't vote are casting a vote for the opposition.


r

PS

Those who believe the 9/11 commission's report to be true are truthers
too.

On Feb 2, 9:45 am, Han <[email protected]> wrote:
> Charlie Self <[email protected]> wrote in news:00e49b2b-45b4-40b8-bdcb-
> [email protected]:
>
> > Sort of like making all Senators, Congressmen and
> > upper level bureaucrats ride in nothing larger than Chevy Impalas.
>
> Those limos should not be bulletproofed either, in order to more easily ...
>

Part of the point being that if the hotshots can't ride in taxpayer
supplied limos, they might act a touch more like people instead of
bloated plutocrats, not make them easier to assassinate.

AFAIK, only a few o fthe limos are bulletproofed anyway.

On Feb 1, 4:45 am, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> No, the original system was fine; this idea that independents and/or
> cross-over voters (depending upon the state) have the ability to help
> decide the parties' candidate is troubling.

Primary elections were not part of the original Presidential
election system. They still aren't, in some states.


> What is especially troubling
> is that this lassaiz faire attitude toward who gets to vote in primaries is
> predominant in early primary states and has the ability to skew the results
> and candidates for the rest of the country. Look at who voted for McCain
> in the various primaries that allowed either independents or cross-overs to
> vote. Same issue could apply to the dems as well; this serves to weaken
> the parties' platforms and their ability to maintain a cohesive message.
>

_A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.

One alternative is impose a reasonable high bar, in the form
of the number of signatures on a petition to get on the ballot,
so as to limit the candidates to a dozen or so. Then hold a
series of elections to eliminate the candidates from the bottom
up, similar to how they are eliminated in the Iowa Caucases,
until one gets more than 50% of the vote. This was done for
state and local elections in OK (maybe still is) and there were
seldom more than two elections needed to arrive
at a winner.

There is no Constitutional requirement that states have
Presidential primaries or even Presidential elections.

So think hard before you suggest amending the Constitution,
else you have better be especially tough.

--

FF

On Feb 5, 1:28 am, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
>
>
> > On Feb 4, 4:29 pm, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >>Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> >>>_A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.
>
> >>Often more than one person from a political party wants to be that party's
> >>candidate for an office. Primaries are the way the party decides which one will
> >>be its candidate. Why is that a problem? Are you suggesting a party should not
> >>be entitled to choose its candidate?
>
> > No. I am suggesting that the primaries used to whittle the number of
> > candidates down for the general election should not be partisan.
>
> But that's what the primaries ARE - they're the way the political parties choose
> their candidates from among those who would like to be their party's candidate
> The only way for a primary to be something other than partisan would be to let
> people who are not Democrats choose the Democrat candidate (same for Repubs).

Wrong. I'm talking about leaving to the Democrats, Republicans,
Greens,
Libertarians, etc to decide whom and how many candidates they run
for any particular office, and making them all compete with each other
for a slot in the general election on an equal basis.

> So it sounds to me like you just said "yes" and "no" to my final question in a
> single sentence.

The alternative is a runoff-elimination system. Throw all
candidates who make the cut based on petitions in together
in the primary and eliminate them from the bottom up, using
the same method used in the Iowa caucuses.

--

FF

"Fred the Red Shirt" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:522386c6-3aab-4066-ad5f-963ca2e9fb0f@c23g2000hsa.googlegroups.com...
> That is because wth more service available,
> people get more service each year. Doctors
> are a lot more likely to order a CAT scan or an
> MRI today than they were 15 years ago.
>

Defensive medicine, though from long experience, the use of rule-out tests
rather than differential diagnosis bears a direct relationship to the limit
imposed by the individuals' insurance, regardless the patient load in the
ER.

"Standard of care" is what is used in malpractice suits, and the bar rises
with each award. All you can do is hope the outcome, using the current
standard of care, is favorable. A lawyer will create a new one if not.

On Jan 31, 2:17 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
> ...
>
> The original plan was that the people would vote for electors (the
> elector's name would be the one on the ballot) and the electors would
> then meet and decide who among the whole population of the US should
> be President, and if he didn't want the job draft him anyway.

The original plan was to leave it to the states to determine how
their electors were chosen. That is still how it is done.

Forty eight states have each candidate who makes the ballot,
or their respective parties, nominate a slate of electors. The
slate corresponding to the candidate who wins the popular
vote then represents that state int eh electoral college. Two
states, Maine and Iowa, have a more complex approach that
allows their representative to be split among two or more
candidates.

A state could have its electors appointed by the state
legislature and forgo a general election altogether. Not
likely, but entirely constitutional.

--

FF

On Feb 2, 3:51 am, Dave Balderstone <dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca>
wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>, Rod & Betty Jo
>
> ...
>
> In November 2007 we Canuckistanis were the #1 oil importer (both crude
> and overall petroleum) to the US. We are not OPEC members.

ITYMTS exporter to, assuming you were writing in the
King's English and not some obscure Northern dialect.

And thank you very much for that oil, for protecting
our diplomats in Tehran, for fighting alongside us
in two World Wars, for harboring our dissidents
and fugitive slaves, and for keeping us supplied
with whiskey during prohibition.

The current high price of petroleum has made
extraction from Canadian oil sands economical.
I'm not sure whom to thank for that.

--

FF

On Feb 4, 4:48=A0am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:

> Bush's prescription drug plan filled a real need.....The U.S. has lots of
> health care, people are not dying in the streets...anybody that needs it c=
an
> get it and currently anyone whom can't truly afford it will receive it.


You need to get out and about a bit more. Here in rural WV bingo
fundraisers are a common affair for people with all sorts of medical
problems and no cash to treat them. Last year there was a fund raiser
for a woman, cancer, no insurance, no treatment until she could come
up with her share of the bill. Needless to say she is now gone.

There are people who die daily because they cant afford the treatment.
There are people who's cancer metastasises while they are trying to
find a facility that will administer charity care. There are people
who are simply refused payment unless they can come up with a major
percentage of the costs and then put there property up against the
remainder.

The koolaid colored glasses may allow you to think people arent dying
in the streets, and of course there arent actual bodies in the
streets, but none the less people are going in the ground daily while
profit taking abounds in the medical profession.

Mark

"Just Wondering" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Gerald Ross wrote:
>> Just Wondering wrote:
>>
>>> Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>>>
>>>> How is this "We the people ..."? I never got a chance to vote for who
>>>> I wanted for president because he dropped out recently.
>>>>
>>>
>>> You can still vote for him. Ever hear of a write-in candidate? There
>>> have even been times (not often, to be sure) when a write-in candidate
>>> won an election.
>>
>>
>> I don't know other state's laws, but here you have to be a registered
>> write-in candidate, otherwise the vote is just thrown out. People write
>> in Mickey Mouse, Pluto and whatever strikes their fancy. They not only
>> lose that vote, but it is not tallied and no one even gets to laugh about
>> it (other than the poll workers).
>>
>
> Well, when it comes to that, "We the people" never did mean that it was
> the voters who decided who wanted to run for office.

Nor did it mean that the limited number of enfranchised voted directly.
Founding dead white guys didn't trust the masses to do better than to vote
for the guy who bought him a drink at the polling place.

That part hasn't changed....

On Feb 4, 8:24 pm, "Rod " <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>...
>
> The only valid issue is whether the cost in both blood and treasure is worth
> the price to the U.S.......Nonetheless the actual cost to remove him was
> affordable.... it is the effort to establish a Iraq democracy and allow
> enough time to build the basic social infrastructure, to allow self
> determination in a area without such a history, that has proven expensive.
> Rod

It may yet prove that the single greatest expense was the
loss of assets from the South Asia theater, especially Predator
UAVs which, unlike our ground forces, can operate in Pakistan.

--

FF

Gerald Ross wrote:
> Just Wondering wrote:
>
>> Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>>
>>> How is this "We the people ..."? I never got a chance to vote for
>>> who I wanted for president because he dropped out recently.
>>>
>>
>> You can still vote for him. Ever hear of a write-in candidate? There
>> have even been times (not often, to be sure) when a write-in candidate
>> won an election.
>
>
> I don't know other state's laws, but here you have to be a registered
> write-in candidate, otherwise the vote is just thrown out. People write
> in Mickey Mouse, Pluto and whatever strikes their fancy. They not only
> lose that vote, but it is not tallied and no one even gets to laugh
> about it (other than the poll workers).
>

Well, when it comes to that, "We the people" never did mean that it was the
voters who decided who wanted to run for office.

On Feb 3, 8:52 pm, Robatoy <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> Was that 'unchristian' of Carter?

"I like your Christ, I do not like your. Christians.
Your Christians are so. unlike your Christ."
---- Mohandas Ghandi

--

FF

"Just Wondering" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> >
> You can still vote for him. Ever hear of a write-in candidate? There
> have even been times (not often, to be sure) when a write-in candidate won
> an election.

Not here, NC doesn't put a write in line on the ballot. No Independents
allowed either, gotta be either a Rep. or a Dem.

On Feb 3, 10:44 pm, tough guy or gal Mark or Juanita
<[email protected]> wrote:
> Garage_Woodworks wrote:
> ...
> > :Your man Bush wouldn't do so well. I'd much rather break bread with
> > :the likes of Carter and Huckabee...
>
> > Well said. It's funny how non-Christian the Christian right really are.
> > From no-health care to tax-cuts for the wealthy to war mongering, the list
> > goes on and on.
>
> Let's hit these one at at time, shall we?
>
> No health care? Has the Christian right ever said that you shouldn't get
> health care? Nope, didn't think so.

No, AFAIK you're happy to see anyone get all the health care
they can afford.

> On the other hand, the idea that the
> government should make me (or one of your neighbors) involuntarily pay for
> your health care is a distinctly non-Christian and frankly unethical idea.
> It's not charity when you are using someone else's money, and Washington is
> using other peoples' money.

Well how about if we ask each voter what percentage of his tax
money go for health care and let that be the budget? Or instead
we could just elect representatives to represent our views on the
subject. We might call them Congressmen, for instance.

...

>
> War mongering? You've got a group of people saying they want to kill or
> convert you, so by attacking that group, *we* are the one's warmongering?
> Yeah, OK.

You mean like when the group that not only threatens
us but also actually attacked us in in Afghanistan and
Pakistan, and go and then invade Iraq, a country where
the only thing resembling al Queda was a small band
in Kurdistan that was implicated in attacks on the
regime of Saddam Hussein?

Yes, that's war mongery.

>
> Christian charity? That is one thing -- it's not charity when it is done
> with the force of government. The whole idea of redistributing wealth is
> disturbing. What's more disturbing is the fact that many people hold that
> it is not only a good thing, but it is their entitlement to do so and to
> vote in the people who will make this happen. That's neither Christian,
> nor ethical, it's just a band of passive thugs voting in people who will do
> their robbery for them.
>

As opposed to voting in a band of thugs that will plunge
another nation into a civil war that kills hundreds of thousands
of their innocent citizens? I suggest that 'robbery' by taxation
is at worst, the lesser sin.

--

FF

On Feb 3, 3:11=A0pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
>
>
> > On Feb 2, 9:36 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> J. Clarke wrote:
> ... snip
>
> >> After all, appeasement has
> >> worked so well in the past -- look what an impression Carter's
> >> appeasement policies had on the Iranians.
>
> > Unlike Reagan, he did nothing to appease them.
>
> =A0 Your revisionism is so funny it is laughable. =A0So you don't think a =
letter
> to the Ayatollah, begging him, as a man of faith, to release the hostages
> and essentially pledging not to do anything from a position of strength wa=
s
> not appeasement and did nothing to prolong the hostage issue nor embolden
> the Iranians? =A0

Was that 'unchristian' of Carter? He went with his beliefs.
The Christian schooling I received in The Netherlands, including High
School, taught me a lot about what Christianity stood for.
And if I were to be so bold as to stand Bush beside Carter and compare
notes on what *I* was taught (and still hold as true) as 'closer' to
Christ's teachings, I think you know where those conclusions would
lead to.
Your man Bush wouldn't do so well. I'd much rather break bread with
the likes of Carter and Huckabee...

On Feb 1, 5:01 am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "BDBConstruction" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> news:1ddec59f-21c9-45e6-b5b0-994f6af5fe65@m34g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
> On Jan 31, 2:37 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >This is the lockeroom mentality that has sadly made the US a second
> >rate nation, and we are. CEO's all over the country publicly state
> >that fact daily.
>
> Second rate to whom? As the worlds wealthiest, most powerful, most
> productive, most envied and feared power in the world I trust you must
> believe in some alien super power we haven't heard about?
>
> Are these the same CEO's that gave us Enron, the dot com collapse or
> possibly the sub prime fiasco or way too many excesses to bother listing?
> Rod

If you guys are going to continue this thread, then you better define
what it is you're measuring. What attributes make a first rate
country, i.e., education levels, per capita GDP, strength of currency,
percentage of people in poverty, etc. Then determine how the US
compares with the rest of the world. Anything else is nothing but
conjecture.

On Feb 5, 7:40 pm, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
> Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> > On Feb 5, 1:28 am, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >>Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> >>>On Feb 4, 4:29 pm, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >>>>Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>
> >>>>>_A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.
>
> >>>>Often more than one person from a political party wants to be that party's
> >>>>candidate for an office. Primaries are the way the party decides which one will
> >>>>be its candidate. Why is that a problem? Are you suggesting a party should not
> >>>>be entitled to choose its candidate?
>
> >>>No. I am suggesting that the primaries used to whittle the number of
> >>>candidates down for the general election should not be partisan.
>
> >>But that's what the primaries ARE - they're the way the political parties choose
> >>their candidates from among those who would like to be their party's candidate
> >> The only way for a primary to be something other than partisan would be to let
> >>people who are not Democrats choose the Democrat candidate (same for Repubs).
>
> > Wrong. I'm talking about leaving to the Democrats, Republicans,
> > Greens,
> > Libertarians, etc to decide whom and how many candidates they run
> > for any particular office, and making them all compete with each other
> > for a slot in the general election on an equal basis.
>
> But each party already runs who they want in the general election. How is that
> different from the way things already work?
>
> It would be foolish in the extreme for the Repubs, for example, to field three
> candidates in ths same general election; the Repub votes would be split among
> the three, and if the Demos fielded a single candidate the Demos would win every
> time.

NO.

Assuming the electorate is split almost evenly
between Republicans and Democrats and the
Republicans are almost evenly split among
the three Republican candidates then:

In the first round one Republican loses.
In the second round, another Republican loses.
That leaves one republican running against one
Democrat in the General election.

If there were many more Republicans then
Democrats in the elecotrate, you could have
Two Repubicans running against each other
in the General election.

--

FF

On 2/2/08 10:40 AM, "jo4hn" <[email protected]> wrote:

> I'll try this one more time: Every registered voter may donate up to
> $100 per year maximum to any candidate(s) or ballot issue or combination
> of his choice. This means no PACs, corporations, unions, church groups,
> bar buddies, etc.
>
> "But HOW can I possibly be elected with so little money?!", he wailed.
> Well the entire campaign process lasts two weeks for the incumbent and
> four weeks for the challenger.

This makes too much sense to ever be enacted.

How about an intermediate step? Disallow all campaign funding except from
individuals. I see no reason that corporations, PACS, unions and other
organizations should have any part in the elections. They don't get to vote
after all.

Shorten the campaigning to two months for primaries and three months for the
general election. And include ALL campaign advertising, including the
"issue" ads that seem to sneak by the election reform laws.

Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
> On Feb 5, 1:28 am, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>>On Feb 4, 4:29 pm, Just Wondering <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>>>Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
>>
>>>>>_A_ problem is that primaries are partisan in the first place.
>>
>>>>Often more than one person from a political party wants to be that party's
>>>>candidate for an office. Primaries are the way the party decides which one will
>>>>be its candidate. Why is that a problem? Are you suggesting a party should not
>>>>be entitled to choose its candidate?
>>
>>>No. I am suggesting that the primaries used to whittle the number of
>>>candidates down for the general election should not be partisan.
>>
>>But that's what the primaries ARE - they're the way the political parties choose
>>their candidates from among those who would like to be their party's candidate
>> The only way for a primary to be something other than partisan would be to let
>>people who are not Democrats choose the Democrat candidate (same for Repubs).
>
>
> Wrong. I'm talking about leaving to the Democrats, Republicans,
> Greens,
> Libertarians, etc to decide whom and how many candidates they run
> for any particular office, and making them all compete with each other
> for a slot in the general election on an equal basis.
>
>
But each party already runs who they want in the general election. How is that
different from the way things already work?

It would be foolish in the extreme for the Repubs, for example, to field three
candidates in ths same general election; the Repub votes would be split among
the three, and if the Demos fielded a single candidate the Demos would win every
time.

"Robatoy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:a04b1c31-29f0-4d73-add6-cb010e3269c6@j78g2000hsd.googlegroups.com...
On Feb 4, 4:48 am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
>
> news:[email protected]...
>
> > Well said. It's funny how non-Christian the Christian right really are.
> > From no-health care
>
> Bush's prescription drug plan filled a real need.....The U.S. has lots of
> health care, people are not dying in the streets...

Only those who are falling through the cracks in the ghettos. The ones
who chose a life of crime/survival because to them the 'Dream' is
bigger wheels and they also don't care HOW they get what they want.
Large sections of the once-fabulous city of Toronto are going that
way. Our medical system is carrying the weight of drug overdoses,
crack babies and gunshot wounds now too.

> anybody that needs it can
> get it and currently anyone whom can't truly afford it will receive it.

I am up to my eyeballs surrounded by medical professionals on both
sides of the border.
Here, in Sarnia, Ontario and 5 minutes from my house, Port Huron,
Michigan. When the dollar was strong in the US, a large group of
medical staff went to work across the river. Now, they all want to
work here again, now that there is no economic benefit for them to do
the humiliating border inspections on the US side.
My company deals with a lot of people in that sphere, mostly by word-
of-mouth advertising. My wife runs a stroke clinic at one of the local
hospitals, when I have an impromptu BBQ, half the attendees are in
scrubs.

When my sister took a fall down the stairs and broke her neck, my BIL
was in Texas doing a job for an oil company, so while he was busy
getting his affairs in order, I managed my sister's affairs from our
emergency department, across the border to emergency facilities in
Michigan.

I have seen it, lived it, done it, been there, got the T-shirt and
coffee mugs along with the action figure.

Because my sister had mega-millions in insurance and in general terms
they are quite wealthy, I saw what money can buy in Michigan.
Absolutely fabulous. Carpeted hallways. Wow! Las Vegas style elevators
even.

I also saw what happened when the insurance company started to make
medical decisions in order to stop the spending.
I am also aware of what 'support' and 'treatment' your war vets get.
That's just plain disgusting.

My observation? If you got the money, you're better off in the US.
If not, the Canadian system is way better.
If you're lower income, the US system is sub-standard.

So why would the people with the big insurance packages that work in
positions of power give a shit about the little people?

A: When they're trolling for votes.


The only hope any of us have, is to start within the walls of our
homes. Teach them right. Spank the little assholes if you must. And
those clowns who want to enforce laws that 'protect' the children,
spank their asses too. Make 18 months of military service mandatory
before you can even LOOK at a university... (Include in that 18 months
some schooling on how the be a human being and toss in some classes to
teach them how to study.) but then give them the first year schooling
for free, and co-pay year two etc. Restart proper trade schools.... I
could go on...


BRAVO!!!!!!!!
--


"Anybody can have more birthdays; but it takes
balls to get old!"

"Fred the Red Shirt" wrote in message
> On Feb 1, 4:49 pm, Mark & Juanita wrote:
> >
> > ...
> >
> > If you are going to define as percentage of people in poverty, you
better
> > define what "poverty" mean. Being poor in the US is orders of magnitude
> > different from being poor in a 3rd world country and considerably
different
> > than in some countries like Italy or France.
> >
>
> No shit!
>
> The majority of poor people in the US own televisions and cars,
> have access to food, emergency health care at the very least
> and 12 years of school for their children.
>
> Compared to my life, they have it rough and I don't mean
> to minimize their difficulties. But our poor would be
> middle class in the Sudan, Burma, or Haiti.

For some reason the picture that sticks in my mind going past the local
elementary school every morning sez it all: kids, in $120/pair basketball
shoes, bussed in early to take advantage of the free breakfast.

I certainly don't begrudge any kid a good meal, but there' something wrong
with that picture ... but even worse that it's PC to pretend not to notice,
or mention.

--
www.e-woodshop.net
Last update: 12/14/07
KarlC@ (the obvious)

Lew Hodgett wrote:

> First,let me say I'm glad to see your wife has recovered.
>
> Your experience with the medical insurance program points out a lot of
> what is wrong with the present system, IMHO.
>
> The present system focuses on paying for care AFTER the medical
> problem has been identified rather than paying for preventative health
> care BEFORE the problem develops.

What? My insurance program stresses preventative medicine. I see
nothing wrong with my program or the entire system (other than folks who
won't see far enough in advance to take care of themselves) - it did and
does exactly what I expect it to. I pay for coverage and they take care
of medical issues that arise with me and mine - and the same system
takes care of those who don't have a clue or a plan and won't think far
enough ahead to do the same as I have - and you and I get to pay for it
already as it's included in the cost of medical care. Do you really
think that adding more government will reduce the cost?

I have no problem taking care of those who through no fault of their own
are unable to do what I and many others have done - plan ahead, but I
have zero compassion for those who expect to be taken care of even
though they won't plan ahead far enough to take care of themselves.

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...

> Those that don't have the money to stay to the end, lose. I know I'm
> stating the obvious, but it is still wrong. Why can't all the states vote
> within a small time frame like the general election? Wouldn't this level
> the playing field more and give it back to 'We"?
>

Or make us like Italy with a hundred parties. Each one with "their"
candidate.

If you will not accept the outcome of a democratic process, how can you
claim you favor democracy?

I have heard about that idea myself. I have heard it attributed to both
Franklin and Jefferson and was based on Athenian democracy. My memory does
not go in to enough detail to give a reference to it except for a Rod
Sereling Twilight Zone episode.
"Just Wondering" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> J. Clarke wrote:
>
>> Just Wondering wrote:
>>
>>>Gerald Ross wrote:
>>>
>>>>Just Wondering wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>Garage_Woodworks wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>How is this "We the people ..."? I never got a chance to vote for
>>>>>>who I wanted for president because he dropped out recently.
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>You can still vote for him. Ever hear of a write-in candidate?
>>>>>There have even been times (not often, to be sure) when a write-in
>>>>>candidate won an election.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>I don't know other state's laws, but here you have to be a registered
>>>>write-in candidate, otherwise the vote is just thrown out. People
>>>>write in Mickey Mouse, Pluto and whatever strikes their fancy. They
>>>>not only lose that vote, but it is not tallied and no one even gets
>>>>to laugh about it (other than the poll workers).
>>>>
>>>
>>>Well, when it comes to that, "We the people" never did mean that it
>>>was the voters who decided who wanted to run for office.
>>
>>
>> The original plan was that the people would vote for electors (the
>> elector's name would be the one on the ballot) and the electors would
>> then meet and decide who among the whole population of the US should be
>> President,
>
> So far so good.
>
>> and if he didn't want the job draft him anyway.
>
> Well, now, pardner, I reckon I have to call you out on that one. How
> about a reference supporting that statement? 'Cause that's the first I
> ever heard that one.
>
>> It didn't work out that way. Personally I think we should try it. Along
>> with a rule that anybody who declares himsef a candidate for President is
>> automatically disqualified.
>>

"Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Dave Balderstone" <dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca> wrote in message
> news:010220082151289015%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca...
>>
>> In November 2007 we Canuckistanis were the #1 oil importer (both crude
>> and overall petroleum) to the US. We are not OPEC members.
>
> That's why I have to be especially nice to my Canadian
> brother-inlaw.....get on his bad side and I may have to walk<G>....Rod
>
Interesting to note that Canada pumps oil from the Arctic and recovers it
from shale, but we'd rather buy it from them than do the same.

Mark & Juanita wrote:
> Jeff wrote:
>
>
>>On Feb 1, 5:01 am, "Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>>"BDBConstruction" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>>
>>>news:1ddec59f-21c9-45e6-b5b0-994f6af5fe65@m34g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
>>>On Jan 31, 2:37 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>This is the lockeroom mentality that has sadly made the US a second
>>>>rate nation, and we are. CEO's all over the country publicly state
>>>>that fact daily.
>>>
>>>Second rate to whom? As the worlds wealthiest, most powerful, most
>>>productive, most envied and feared power in the world I trust you must
>>>believe in some alien super power we haven't heard about?
>>>
>>>Are these the same CEO's that gave us Enron, the dot com collapse or
>>>possibly the sub prime fiasco or way too many excesses to bother listing?
>>>Rod
>>
>>If you guys are going to continue this thread, then you better define
>>what it is you're measuring. What attributes make a first rate
>>country, i.e., education levels, per capita GDP, strength of currency,
>>percentage of people in poverty,
>
>
> If you are going to define as percentage of people in poverty, you better
> define what "poverty" mean. Being poor in the US is orders of magnitude
> different from being poor in a 3rd world country and considerably different
> than in some countries like Italy or France.
>

For many (admitttedly not all), being poor in the USA today is better than being
middle class was half a century ago.

Boy, somebody has been lapping up the propaganda the news media is trying to
force down everyone's throat. If we are the wealthiest, most powerful nation
then why are we held hostage by the few nations of OPEC and their control of
our oil importation? If we are the most productive, then why are all our
jobs going overseas?

Everybody rants and raves about this so-called economy stimulus package. How
is it going to stimulate "our" economy when most people will just run down
to Wally's world and buy something made in china?

Before I stray too much, those CEO's were probably the ones from Exxon
announcing record profits while our gas prices keep going higher and higher,
causing the little people lose more of that great American wealth.

"Rod & Betty Jo" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "BDBConstruction" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:1ddec59f-21c9-45e6-b5b0-994f6af5fe65@m34g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
> On Jan 31, 2:37 pm, "J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >This is the lockeroom mentality that has sadly made the US a second
> >rate nation, and we are. CEO's all over the country publicly state
> >that fact daily.
>
>
> Second rate to whom? As the worlds wealthiest, most powerful, most
> productive, most envied and feared power in the world I trust you must
> believe in some alien super power we haven't heard about?
>
> Are these the same CEO's that gave us Enron, the dot com collapse or
> possibly the sub prime fiasco or way too many excesses to bother listing?
> Rod
>
>

"Garage_Woodworks" <.@.> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>> Which current health care proposal actually fills any real need?
>
> Mine fills my need. I get to see a dr when I want and my copay for meds
> is ok.
>
>>The true problem is runaway costs,
>
> NO, the "true" problem for the millions of Americans is NO health care
> coverage.
>

Let's be fair. Health care is available to anyone who cares to spend the
money. Not so in the socialized countries, where you can get ripped for
going outside the national plan and treating on an as-needed (and paid),
rather than as-allowed and when-allowed basis. Even our mini-version,
medicare, doesn't accept an MD decision over a bureaucratic DRG allowance.

J. Clarke wrote:

> Just Wondering wrote:
>
>>J. Clarke wrote:
>>
>>>The original plan was that the people would vote for electors (the
>>>elector's name would be the one on the ballot) and the electors
>>>would then meet and decide who among the whole population of the US
>>>should be President,
>>
>>>and if he didn't want the job draft him anyway.
>>
>>Well, now, pardner, I reckon I have to call you out on that one.
>>How about a reference supporting that statement?
>> 'Cause that's the first I ever heard that one.
>
> Since it never came up there's no reference.

Well, if it never came up and there's no reference, how do you know that was the
original plan?

> What do you think would
> happen if the Electoral College told Joe Schmoe, "Hey, Joe, you're
> President" and he said "No, I'm not"?
>
Under that "what if," I think Joe Schmoe would not be President.

Dave Balderstone wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>, Rod & Betty Jo
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> We specifically get most of our oil elsewhere, with Canada and Venezuela as
>> major suppliers.
>
> <http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_
> level_imports/current/import.html>
>
> In November 2007 we Canuckistanis were the #1 oil importer (both crude
> and overall petroleum) to the US. We are not OPEC members.
>
> Overall, the top 10 for November 2007 was:
>
> Canada
> Mexico
> Saudi Arabia
> Venezuela
> Nigeria
> Iraq
> Russia
> Algeria
> Virgin Islands
> Angola
>

We also get a lot of (natural) gas from you ;-)

"Mike Marlow" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "George" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
>>
>> It's not money buying candidates that troubles me so much as candidates
>> buying votes - with _my_ money.
>
> How is it your money? You either gave it away, or had it taxed away.
> Either way, once it's out of your possession, it's no longer your_money.
>
> --

Law of the jungle, eh?