USA is a Banana Republic
06-03-2009, 11:05 PM
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Originally Posted by JetBlack5OC' post='900482' date='Jun 4 2009, 02:33 AM
We need checks and balances. A congress and presidency held by one party (democrat or republican) is not good.
06-04-2009, 07:12 AM
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Originally Posted by rogerj' post='900363' date='Jun 4 2009, 12:03 AM
[b]
All good points NC, but you are naive in many areas.
1. Our schools don't suck because the government runs them. In many states, our schools suck because the teacher's unions are as strong or stronger than the UAW. There is little accountability or standardization for teacher competence. In many states it is almost impossible to dismiss a teacher for something as serious as sexual assault, because of the teacher's unions. If you doubt this, check out John Stossel's report.
2. Health care is a tricky subject. I agree that socialized medicine is not the answer, but if you think putting health care solely in the hands of private providers/ investors is the answer, you are a moron. At 26 you have no idea. When your parents/grandparents health care decisions are being determined by private equity firms... instead of your loved one's doctor, you might change your tune... especially when they ask you to ante up 30 grand for the life saving treatment that the government no longer supports. This is all of course to maintain the solvency of the stockholders equity... not to save the life of your loved one.
All good points NC, but you are naive in many areas.
1. Our schools don't suck because the government runs them. In many states, our schools suck because the teacher's unions are as strong or stronger than the UAW. There is little accountability or standardization for teacher competence. In many states it is almost impossible to dismiss a teacher for something as serious as sexual assault, because of the teacher's unions. If you doubt this, check out John Stossel's report.
2. Health care is a tricky subject. I agree that socialized medicine is not the answer, but if you think putting health care solely in the hands of private providers/ investors is the answer, you are a moron. At 26 you have no idea. When your parents/grandparents health care decisions are being determined by private equity firms... instead of your loved one's doctor, you might change your tune... especially when they ask you to ante up 30 grand for the life saving treatment that the government no longer supports. This is all of course to maintain the solvency of the stockholders equity... not to save the life of your loved one.
There's nothing naive about trusting private parties to come to a better solution to a problem than the government. Under any system with government involvement it isn't my loved-one's doctor that's making the decision regarding treatment. The government has the final say. Under a private system, firms that casually deny services to patients would be driven from the market as consumers flocked to other companies. That's not how our system works now, primarily because, for most people, health care coverage comes from the employer, and there are few private options. Further, if it is someone from my family that needs an operation it would be my responsibility to help them get it. It is something I'm planning on for myself, and something I attempt to anticipate for my parents...although I have been assured they've planned appropriately. But heaven forbid, if I need to step up, I'll step up...but that is MY CHOICE. Asking me to step up every day for someone else...someone that didn't plan, didn't take care of themselves, even someone else who just had a stroke of bad luck, and telling me that if I don't I go to jail...is unethical, immoral, and is in direct opposition to the founding principles of this great country.
06-04-2009, 09:02 AM
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Originally Posted by craigm1841' post='899917' date='Jun 3 2009, 06:15 PM
8 years ago:
06-04-2009, 11:08 AM
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I'm an outsider here.
I just wanted to say that yes, times are tough in the USA right now. However, I do think that the American people are very resiliant and in a couple of years things will look better and the debt will be reducing.
China isn't doing nearly as well as the headline numbers suggest. On a per capita basis they have GDP closer to third world standards than the west. They have pitiful standards of infrastructure away from the industrialised centres and have only profited recently because they manipulated their exchange rates and illegally subsidised exports. That was never going to carry on for ever. India has a far more impressive set up altogether.
It isn't fashionable to say it but Americans (and Europeans) have to stop buying Chinese tat. It's become an addiction. The French are pretty sly - their government says all the right things about free trade but then individuals just go out and buy French made stuff.
I just wanted to say that yes, times are tough in the USA right now. However, I do think that the American people are very resiliant and in a couple of years things will look better and the debt will be reducing.
China isn't doing nearly as well as the headline numbers suggest. On a per capita basis they have GDP closer to third world standards than the west. They have pitiful standards of infrastructure away from the industrialised centres and have only profited recently because they manipulated their exchange rates and illegally subsidised exports. That was never going to carry on for ever. India has a far more impressive set up altogether.
It isn't fashionable to say it but Americans (and Europeans) have to stop buying Chinese tat. It's become an addiction. The French are pretty sly - their government says all the right things about free trade but then individuals just go out and buy French made stuff.
06-04-2009, 05:55 PM
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[quote name='Lancaster' date='Jun 4 2009, 02:08 PM' post='900977']
I'm an outsider here.
India has a far more impressive set up altogether.
Yes. We will be hearing a lot more from India with its 156+million Muslims...
I'm an outsider here.
India has a far more impressive set up altogether.
Yes. We will be hearing a lot more from India with its 156+million Muslims...
06-04-2009, 07:05 PM
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Originally Posted by EersNC' post='900730' date='Jun 4 2009, 11:12 AM
I agree with you regarding the teacher's unions...they are part and parcel of the problem with education in the country. It is also problem that would be ameliorated by reducing the level of government involvement in education and introducing a greater diversity of education providers. When thousands of schools around the country, and dozens of different ones in every locality, begin bidding to employ teachers, union membership will drop as the benefit to being in the union is eroded.
There's nothing naive about trusting private parties to come to a better solution to a problem than the government. Under any system with government involvement it isn't my loved-one's doctor that's making the decision regarding treatment. The government has the final say. Under a private system, firms that casually deny services to patients would be driven from the market as consumers flocked to other companies. That's not how our system works now, primarily because, for most people, health care coverage comes from the employer, and there are few private options. Further, if it is someone from my family that needs an operation it would be my responsibility to help them get it. It is something I'm planning on for myself, and something I attempt to anticipate for my parents...although I have been assured they've planned appropriately. But heaven forbid, if I need to step up, I'll step up...but that is MY CHOICE. Asking me to step up every day for someone else...someone that didn't plan, didn't take care of themselves, even someone else who just had a stroke of bad luck, and telling me that if I don't I go to jail...is unethical, immoral, and is in direct opposition to the founding principles of this great country.
There's nothing naive about trusting private parties to come to a better solution to a problem than the government. Under any system with government involvement it isn't my loved-one's doctor that's making the decision regarding treatment. The government has the final say. Under a private system, firms that casually deny services to patients would be driven from the market as consumers flocked to other companies. That's not how our system works now, primarily because, for most people, health care coverage comes from the employer, and there are few private options. Further, if it is someone from my family that needs an operation it would be my responsibility to help them get it. It is something I'm planning on for myself, and something I attempt to anticipate for my parents...although I have been assured they've planned appropriately. But heaven forbid, if I need to step up, I'll step up...but that is MY CHOICE. Asking me to step up every day for someone else...someone that didn't plan, didn't take care of themselves, even someone else who just had a stroke of bad luck, and telling me that if I don't I go to jail...is unethical, immoral, and is in direct opposition to the founding principles of this great country.
I am not convinced of my own opinion on this subject, but you seem to suggest that you are confident that accessibility to health care should be based on the ability to pay.
Large government programs like Medicare curtail costs by negotiating discount rates. Private payers often pay double the rate that Medicare has negotiated.
Private insurers with poor customer service/claim denials will eventually be eliminated. (At what cost? How many are willing to die over denied medical service to allow capitalism to work itself out?) How many lives are you willing to sacrifice to let capitalism work itself out? Maybe you will volunteer your own family for this noble endeavor?
06-04-2009, 08:58 PM
#37
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Originally Posted by CWS530' post='900820' date='Jun 4 2009, 01:02 PM
World Trade Center nine years ago:
C,
Nine years ago Clinton was in office.....the above pic of the WTC with the idiots flying into it could've been averted if he would've acted.....
I'm not placing blame, just trying to keep everything in perspective. There is plenty of blame to go around to both parties. See below
Aide: Clinton Unleashed bin Laden
Chuck Noe, NewsMax.com
Thursday, Dec. 6, 2001
Bill Clinton ignored repeated opportunities to capture Osama bin Laden and his terrorist allies and is responsible for the spread of terrorism, one of the ex-president?s own top aides charges.
Mansoor Ijaz, who negotiated with Sudan on behalf of Clinton from 1996 to 1998, paints a portrait of a White House plagued by incompetence, focused on appearances rather than action, and heedless of profound threats to national security.
Ijaz also claims Clinton passed on an opportunity to have Osama bin Laden arrested.
Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir, hoping to have terrorism sanctions lifted, offered the arrest and extradition of bin Laden and "detailed intelligence data about the global networks constructed by Egypt's Islamic Jihad, Iran's Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas,? Ijaz writes in today?s edition of the liberal Los Angeles Times.
These networks included the two hijackers who piloted jetliners into the World Trade Center.
But Clinton and National Security Adviser Samuel "Sandy? Berger failed to act.
?I know because I negotiated more than one of the opportunities,? Ijaz writes.
?The silence of the Clinton administration in responding to these offers was deafening."
06-04-2009, 09:17 PM
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Originally Posted by garylewa' post='901441' date='Jun 5 2009, 12:58 AM
Attachment 81144
C,
Nine years ago Clinton was in office.....the above pic of the WTC with the idiots flying into it could've been averted if he would've acted.....
I'm not placing blame, just trying to keep everything in perspective. There is plenty of blame to go around to both parties. See below
Aide: Clinton Unleashed bin Laden
Chuck Noe, NewsMax.com
Thursday, Dec. 6, 2001
Bill Clinton ignored repeated opportunities to capture Osama bin Laden and his terrorist allies and is responsible for the spread of terrorism, one of the ex-president?s own top aides charges.
Mansoor Ijaz, who negotiated with Sudan on behalf of Clinton from 1996 to 1998, paints a portrait of a White House plagued by incompetence, focused on appearances rather than action, and heedless of profound threats to national security.
Ijaz also claims Clinton passed on an opportunity to have Osama bin Laden arrested.
Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir, hoping to have terrorism sanctions lifted, offered the arrest and extradition of bin Laden and "detailed intelligence data about the global networks constructed by Egypt's Islamic Jihad, Iran's Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas,? Ijaz writes in today?s edition of the liberal Los Angeles Times.
These networks included the two hijackers who piloted jetliners into the World Trade Center.
But Clinton and National Security Adviser Samuel "Sandy? Berger failed to act.
?I know because I negotiated more than one of the opportunities,? Ijaz writes.
?The silence of the Clinton administration in responding to these offers was deafening."
C,
Nine years ago Clinton was in office.....the above pic of the WTC with the idiots flying into it could've been averted if he would've acted.....
I'm not placing blame, just trying to keep everything in perspective. There is plenty of blame to go around to both parties. See below
Aide: Clinton Unleashed bin Laden
Chuck Noe, NewsMax.com
Thursday, Dec. 6, 2001
Bill Clinton ignored repeated opportunities to capture Osama bin Laden and his terrorist allies and is responsible for the spread of terrorism, one of the ex-president?s own top aides charges.
Mansoor Ijaz, who negotiated with Sudan on behalf of Clinton from 1996 to 1998, paints a portrait of a White House plagued by incompetence, focused on appearances rather than action, and heedless of profound threats to national security.
Ijaz also claims Clinton passed on an opportunity to have Osama bin Laden arrested.
Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir, hoping to have terrorism sanctions lifted, offered the arrest and extradition of bin Laden and "detailed intelligence data about the global networks constructed by Egypt's Islamic Jihad, Iran's Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas,? Ijaz writes in today?s edition of the liberal Los Angeles Times.
These networks included the two hijackers who piloted jetliners into the World Trade Center.
But Clinton and National Security Adviser Samuel "Sandy? Berger failed to act.
?I know because I negotiated more than one of the opportunities,? Ijaz writes.
?The silence of the Clinton administration in responding to these offers was deafening."
If you are gonna blame any one department or administration for the FUBAR after the fact... then the award goes to Donald Rumsfeld. The biggest, dumbest, most arrogant Fu*# in the history of war. His tacticts and the administration that supported him will be taught for "what not to do" for generation's to come.
06-04-2009, 09:39 PM
#39
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Originally Posted by rogerj' post='901452' date='Jun 5 2009, 01:17 AM
C'mon Bro. Shoulda Woulda Coulda... Despite the clues, NOBODY thought this would actually happen. Enough blame to go around across many administrations. The arrogance and lack of communication amongst the intelligence communities deserve the most blame.
If you are gonna blame any one department or administration for the FUBAR after the fact... then the award goes to Donald Rumsfeld. The biggest, dumbest, most arrogant Fu*# in the history of war. His tacticts and the administration that supported him will be taught for "what not to do" for generation's to come.
If you are gonna blame any one department or administration for the FUBAR after the fact... then the award goes to Donald Rumsfeld. The biggest, dumbest, most arrogant Fu*# in the history of war. His tacticts and the administration that supported him will be taught for "what not to do" for generation's to come.
But I gave myself some wiggle room with this statement regarding your first sentence of the second paragraph: "I'm not placing blame, just trying to keep everything in perspective. There is plenty of blame to go around to both parties."
Always live in the gray area...............
And yes, Rumsfeld is an idiot.
06-04-2009, 09:44 PM
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clinton was good but sub prime lending started with him and fannie maye. thats half the reason our economy has gone to shit. im not saying bush or republicans do great things every time they are elected. im saying obama wont do shit. im not going to get into this whole thread because not one of us will convince the other one whats right or wrong. all im going to say is we will see about obama. if he does fuck things up worse then trust me i will be the first one to say i told you so. only time will tell. done posting in this thread