<p>We could talk first and foremost about pork from both sides of the aisle as mis-use of public funds. I’m not a partisan on this. I just want my money left to me.</p>
<p>Ditto zoosermom!</p>
<p>As far as SS–my mother worked her entire working life with the SSA—she saw a major waste of funds and major fraud with SSI.</p>
<p>“my mother worked her entire working life with the SSA—she saw a major waste of funds and major fraud with SSI.”</p>
<p>when was that?</p>
<p>Fraud is different than waste. Fraud is committed by US.</p>
<p>The number one reason I’d like to see some kind of universal health coverage is that the burden of providing health coverage would be lifted off the backs of business. Thousands of man-hours are burned every month on the work of health care, fighting through the system, arguing over paying for it, determining who gets what…not to mention the redundancy of rejected and re-submitted claims. Plus all the money business spends on employee health could be plowed back into the business, increasing growth and profits. Our competition overseas has an advantage because so many other competitor nations provide health coverage for their citizens. Yes, there would be a rise in individual taxes but the economic health of our country would be the better for a universal system.</p>
<p>Simba, she retired in 1990–25 or so years of service. The problem with fraud is that yes, it is committed by the people–but tolerated by the system. People that committed fraud were often not prosecuted, employees were not encouraged to pursue fraud cases and the way the system is set up, fraud is/or was at that time very easy to accomplish (putting assets in someone else’s name, hiding assets, basically “working the system”). With government disability, patients with terminal cancer were often not approved until after their death; but people who came in and filed with “nerves” or low back pain with no real physical evidence would be approved. After her years with the government, mother was more determined than ever not to support anyone politically who supported bigger government.</p>
<p>“This is a wealthy country and full of opportunity. If someone can’t take advantage of that opportunity and provide for his or her family, then money isn’t the answer.”
Then what is the answer?
Everyone in this country should have access to basic healthcare. It’s hard for me to believe that someone could argue this. The private sector will never get us there. Generous Americans will never get us there. We need to make wholesale changes to the system. And, yes, this will mean an initial investment of big $ and higher taxes. We need someone with smarts and discipline at the helm. And a reasonable sense of priorities. War? Healthcare? War Healthcare? Hmmm.
I have hope. We have good choices this time around.</p>
<p>ZM- I know you make a distinction between local and federal govt. I agree that many, many things should be the domain of local govt that the feds should stay out of. But unfortunately, local govt can also be very inefficient. In some ways more so than federal, because they lack economies of scale. Part of NJ’s problems are that there are way too many small towns with their own small and inefficient govts.</p>
<p>I am saying simply that govt (fed, state, local) needs to be looked at in a more positive way. We need it to do certain things. If we insist that it spend our money as carefully as we do, then because of the economies of scale we would actually get more out of our tax dollars than we could if we spent it ourselves. I am glad we have the government take care of providing us with the police, FDA, USDA, and of course the military. I am <em>happy</em> and proud to pay my taxes for those govt services. I just want that money to be spent carefully and not wasted. </p>
<p>The extreme example of the anti-tax position is of course that of Ron Paul. I find his libertarianism to be very seductive in theory but in today’s world, I think it is a bit impractical. Probably as impractical as the opposite extreme- communism. The right path for us is somewhere in between. </p>
<p>I strongly feel that this is not the time to cut taxes. We have had relentless tax cutting for the last many many years and no good has come of it. We are in a huge financial deficit, partly because of the tax cuts and partly because of this war that IMO should have been paid for by a war tax. I am in favor of spending cuts if they are made to improve efficiency. I against new and expensive govt. programs and I’m a bit skeptical about these health care proposals- they will need to be crafted in such a way as to keep costs down. But I just don’t want to see tax cuts. The government of me, by me and for me cannot afford another round of tax cuts.</p>
<p>Finally ZM- the total cost of the ‘pork’ that McCain makes a big deal of, is a very small fraction of the federal budget. Really, really small. I don’t have the numbers but the total amount works out to be equivalent to just a few hours of this Iraq war.</p>
<p>"Then what is the answer? "</p>
<p>It depends on the individual human being, the individual need, and the individual backstory.</p>
<p>“Everyone in this country should have access to basic healthcare. It’s hard for me to believe that someone could argue this”</p>
<p>I haven’t argued that. I don’t think you’ve read carefully. “Basic” healthcare is available to everyone, but as I said, I don’t agree with the how.
Phrased the way you just did, I think “basic” is as much as should be provided for people “in this country” i.e. illegal immigrants. I think one aspect of my posts is tripping you up. My distinction between what the federal government should be involved with and what should be done locally.</p>
<p>Just watched the local news and Obama was in Charlotte today. The newscaster introduced the segment by saying “the rock star candidate visited Charlotte today…”. This is one of things that just rubs me wrong about Obama (or I guess some of his fans). They showed people screaming, swooning, pushing paper for autographs…just looked more like mania than a gathering of politically interested potential voters.</p>
<p>" I agree that many, many things should be the domain of local govt that the feds should stay out of. But unfortunately, local govt can also be very inefficient." </p>
<p>Yes, but localities are much more readily accountable for an involved electorate. It’s also easy to forget to whom you are accountable from a great distance.</p>
<p>I respect your point of view (I hope you know that), but I think it’s always time to cut taxes. It’s not the government’s money, it’s not collective money. Only that which is absolutely necessary should be taken from the rightful earners. I would consider targeted tax cuts after real accountability, but not as the measure of first resort. I respectfully disagree about the economies of scale. In a nation as large and diverse as ours, there is simply too much difference between what is needed in different places for a centralized goverment to be efficient. I think almost everything could be done cost-effectively at the state level, if desired by the electorate.</p>
<p>Has anyone really giving any consideration to how much it would cost us in the long run if we did leave Iraq prematurely? Logically consider possible costs financially to us if not global ramifications. I’m not inferring scare politics.</p>
<p>I think this speech doomed Obama, or at least made things a lot more competitive for Hillary. In essence, he seemed to say, “Despite this guy being my pastor and mentor for 20 years, I had no idea he was going around saying all those hateful things. Besides, we all know lots of people who say stuff we don’t agree with but who are still good people.”</p>
<p>I’d guess that Hillary’s people are working overtime splicing videotape of the pastor’s rants and Obama’s rationalizations into some blockbuster TV ads. If she or her proxies aren’t doing it, McCain’s people will.</p>
<p>I don’t know that Obama could have chosen a different course, though. He certainly couldn’t endorse the guy, and to throw him under the bus would have made Obama look either very dumb (“I had no clue!”) or very disloyal.</p>
<p>I think you’re right Roger. The movement in the polls is striking. Hillary has the lead nationally for the first time in weeks, is blowing Obama out of the water in Pennsylvania and has erased his lead in North Carolina. Since she can’t catch up in delegates, I wonder how this will be resolved. </p>
<p>Not that I’m complaining.</p>
<p>The double standard is amazing. Noone said boo when McInsane and Bushevik was courting right-wing preachers who said 9/11 happend because of homosexuals, abortionists, and feminists.</p>
<p>Obama states that he was not present for the controversial speeches by Rev. Wright. So he can not " disown" his pastor-mentor of 20 years. However ,he goes on Don Imus show. Later, he discovers the racial remarks made by Imus and then announces he could never be a guest on his show. Where is the intellectual honesty? Hipocrisy!</p>
<p>“Noone said boo when McInsane and Bushevik was courting right-wing preachers who said 9/11 happend because of homosexuals, abortionists, and feminists”</p>
<p>I guess you weren’t paying attention when the rest of us were witness to the great outcry.</p>
<p>I don’t recall any outrage from Glenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh or the usual suspects. And I don’t recall it being on the mainstream media saying if they would start losing votes because of the truly evil and hypocritical people they were courting. Pat Robertson, Jerry Fallwell , Dobson, etc. Wait how are we alive? Didn’t Robertson predict there’d be some big hurricane last year because Jesus was mad at us?</p>
<p>re: the earlier posts about health care and gov’t spending - “access to affordable health care” doesn’t necessarily mean “provided by the government”. </p>
<p>There has to be some way that private companies can provide affordable health care for the masses without creating another huge gov’t bureaucracy. Yes, I agree that everyone should have access to affordable health care, but it doesn’t have to be our Federal Government’s role to provide it. Further, there isn’t much incentive for companies to get involved in the system if they will be competing w/ the government. It will have to be completely privatized in order to create the environment of competition, which, we all know, usually results in a better product & more efficiency. I feel the same way about education - the whole system should be privatized. Keep government out of it completely. But that’s just me - I’m a Capitalist - it’s a good system if allowed to exist properly. </p>
<p>But no - we’ve got people who think the gov’t should do everything for us. “Socialism” I think it’s called. Maybe “Communism”.</p>
<p>Just remember, before government can give anything to you, it has to take it from you first.</p>
<p>I think there are plenty of wackos in both camps. Politicians usually do have to seek support from people who have some views that are distasteful, or that they don’t share.</p>
<p>The tough part for Obama is that he apparently had a long-standing and very close relationship with Wright. It seems implausible that he could be that close to the guy for 20 years and never have an inkling of Wright’s beliefs.</p>
<p>I think if McCain told the world that Pat Robertson was his spiritual mentor and had been for the last couple of decades, he’d be done for in a week.</p>
<p>It’s a no-win situation for Obama, though. He probably played his best hand given the cards he was dealt.</p>
<p>It’s odd that Obama, who abstained on a lot of controversial votes with the apparent objective of not endangering his political future, wasn’t politically savvy enough to jettison Wright years ago.</p>
<p>RD - your last sentence - agree it IS odd. Also odd that Obama may have joined this church for somewhat political reasons (to create a constituency, establish contacts, become active in the community, etc.), and that very association could be his political undoing.</p>