American Politics Thread 2013: I'm a cool Rodham grandma in the USA

They are also named "Eric son of Eric."

Maybe I'm putting too much weight into a simplistic reading of the TP phenom, but I think Most Americans will no longer have the ability to raise a family with dignity and freedom makes perfect sense if you read it like "White straight 'masculine' men like 'us' and like you have been conditioned to aspire to be will no longer have the ability to feel confidently superior to all other varieties of people, and will be under increasing pressure from society to change their way of thinking or be found undesirable/irrelevant."

In which case their actions are almost reasonable.

eric son of eric son of eric son of...

xp See, as a straight white male, I just think, "Eh, we had a pretty good run, we had this place locked down for a good 300 years."

I don't have the history chops to propose a concrete number but I think it's significantly longer than that?

I assume Phil's just referring to America there

the decline of straight white male dominance as a fundamental of conservative enmity cannot be overstated, but i feel like the huge increase in general inequality in the country over the last ~40 years is playing a big part in fueling the whole thing, traditional stright whites are feeling its effects and blaming that on their threatened place in the american hierarchy, i suspect that if we didnt have this inequality problem and the rising tide really was lifting all boats white mans would be having an easier time adjusting to new realities, which is not to say some of us wouldnt be mad but just that maybe not as many would be as mad

^^^ yeah, this. Plus, ginning up outrage is a GOP strong suit, and hyperbole like "no longer have the ability to raise a family with dignity and freedom" being repeated by the GOP noise machine is a big part of that.

can we take odds on whether Boehner is gonna burst into tears on camera at some point in the next 24 hrs

straight white males dominate gay chatrooms though :(

haha

boehner only cries over trivial things iirc

xxxp Anyway obv "white straight and masculine" blah blah is shorthand to some degree but u know the drill.

@lag8n: Yes, asbolutely.

People care a lot less what someone else is getting when they're getting enough to feel comfortable themselves.

yeah we got srs issues

I had a totally bizarre conversation with one of these anti-ACA crazies in the shop a few days ago - small business owner who was lamenting how the ACA was going to destroy small business because he couldnt afford to buy his employees health care so all the good employees were going to jump ship to someone who could. my external reaction was "uh huh" but my internal reaction was "well good you fuckin crybaby".

I had a bizarre conversation on ILX a few months back where no one really cared that my health care costs were going to triple next year.

Because, you know, my health care was going to be better.

Assuming I can simply afford it.

the funny thing is that inequality is a major issue is prob the thing the country agrees upon most but of course its impossible to do anything about it because the elites control everything, which is why we call them elites i guess

"thats the market at work eh" should have been the reply jjj

don I thought you were employed by a public school district...?

not employed, but they should pay me for the work I do

iirc obamacare doesnt even go into effect until the new year

yeah but I need to bitch about it now ;)

if you dont mind sharing id be curious to hear the particulars of your situation

that is the weird mind set with these people, they want to be all "I built this" bumpersticker about everything, but when faced with their own non-competitive ability to provide workers with basic needs, its not their goddamn fault, its the bootheel of government crushing the backbone of america. when big business is able to take BETTER care of their employees than you are, you basically are doing it wrong and fucking suck.

xposts

how small is his small business isnt there an exemption for upto 50 employees

"I have a small business" is the dumbest excuse ever.

Dunno what the floor is; for some federal laws it is 25 employees.

A stoner libertarian tried to engage me in the "Federal government shouldn't be trusted with healthcare because they've already proven that they're bad at doing, you know, STUFF" argument on Monday night. I excused myself citing a curiously empty beer that needed refilling.

People care a lot less what someone else is getting when they're getting enough to feel comfortable themselves.
--Tottenham Heelspur (in orbit)

Generally yeah, but even aside from the mechanics of the GOP "scapegoat the blacks" machine, you've got billionaire Randroids sincerely arguing that we should get rid of food stamps.

the decline of straight white male dominance as a fundamental of conservative enmity cannot be overstated, but i feel like the huge increase in general inequality in the country over the last ~40 years is playing a big part in fueling the whole thing, traditional stright whites are feeling its effects and blaming that on their threatened place in the american hierarchy, i suspect that if we didnt have this inequality problem and the rising tide really was lifting all boats white mans would be having an easier time adjusting to new realities, which is not to say some of us wouldnt be mad but just that maybe not as many would be as mad

― lag∞n, Wednesday, October 16, 2013 4:17 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this times 10000. the real story here is how the gop fooled these reactionaries into fighting obamacare and not the real policy issue(s) thats threatening the country - giving away the whole fucking store to the rich

yes! basically he is bitching because other mega corps have horned in on his industry that are capable of providing health care, but of course this isnt their fault or his, its OBAMAAAAAA!

xpost

The fed hasn't done a very good job with the VA hospital system (for a variety of reasons.)

Don, I recall that your situation is difficult, but I hope you're not suggesting that health care costs have never risen for anyone in prior years, and that no one has ever had issues with insurance companies in the US before.

or put another way, hes angry because the ACA will force large businesses to not treat their employees like shit, which in turn makes his employees realize that he has been treating them like shit for years.

xposts again

A stoner libertarian tried to engage me in the "Federal government shouldn't be trusted with healthcare because they've already proven that they're bad at doing, you know, STUFF" argument on Monday night. I excused myself citing a curiously empty beer that needed refilling.

― Tottenham Heelspur (in orbit), Wednesday, October 16, 2013 12:30 PM (49 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

medicare and medicare are consistently the highest rated health insurance providers, only surpassed by the veterans administration, the federal government already operates like all of the best healthcare systems

anyway, thats from what i can tell where a lot of the "ACA is unfair to small business" rhetoric comes from as far as i can tell.

The fed hasn't done a very good job with the VA hospital system (for a variety of reasons.)

― the rofflestomper (dandydonweiner), Wednesday, October 16, 2013 12:32 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it consistently polls as the highest rated healthcare provider by its users, and also grades out as the most efficient system costwise

The fed hasn't done a very good job with the VA hospital system (for a variety of reasons.)

― the rofflestomper (dandydonweiner), Wednesday, October 16, 2013 11:32 AM (1 minute ago)

I'm not convinced of this. My father, 100% DAV from his 1st hip replacement in 1974 until his death last year, occasionally had to deal with inconvenience, but overall it was a very good system for him.

xposts

However, the Veterans disability application and review process is completely backlogged. But some folks would rather tear down "Barrycades" than vote for increased funding for a federal agency that rules on Veterans disability claims

My situation sux but it is what it is. And as I've noted, I will likely get some direct benefits from Obamacare, even if not obvious or large. FWIW, my annual premiums had been rising at (I think) around 15% or so for the past few years. Maybe more.

Would love to see a source for that study lagoon, just for the fun of it. Better to know for sure that I'm not making things up...the reason I say it is not well run is via my own experience.

There was lots of media coverage awhile back of problems with the VA hospital in DC; but I think they have now addressed those issues.

Would love to see a source for that study lagoon, just for the fun of it. Better to know for sure that I'm not making things up...the reason I say it is not well run is via my own experience.

― the rofflestomper (dandydonweiner), Wednesday, October 16, 2013 12:41 PM (7 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i didnt read this article i just google and picked one but theres tons of stuff out there if you want to read up http://health.usnews.com/usnews/health/articles/050718/18va.htm

i mean im sure the VA has its share of problems but there just not as bad as commercial healthcare which has much bigger problems

There was lots of media coverage awhile back of problems with the VA hospital in DC; but I think they have now addressed those issues.

― curmudgeon, Wednesday, October 16, 2013 12:42 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah and that was just one hospital in a huge system

Honestly, public hospitals are easier to scrutinize than private ones...and it's an easy news story to show how poorly (or not) vets are getting treated.

Republicans who shut down the government in a bid to undermine President Obama’s health-care program would win no major changes to the law. But they would get additional safeguards to ensure that people who receive subsidies to buy health insurance are in fact eligible.

Alas, no additional safeguards re farm aid and various tax deductions though.

the United States’ world-record health care costs are driven by a combination of policy factors, both on the private and the government side. In 2010 Mariah Blake showed how a cabal of medical supply behemoths keep the innovations of smaller companies off the market. In 2011 Phillip Longman showed how getting Medicare out of the fee-for-service business would improve things, and earlier this year showed how a GOP effort that kept cost-benefit research out of Obamacare is harming the health care system. Finally, again this year Haley Sweetland Edwards showed how a secret committee of doctors heavily weighted with specialists fixes the prices of Medicare.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2013_10/americas_projected_deficit_is047340.php

care at the VA is highly site dependent from my limited experience

Brit Hume:

In conventional terms, it seems inexplicable, but Senator Cruz and his adherents do not view things in conventional terms. They look back over the past half-century, including the supposedly golden era of Ronald Reagan, and see the uninterrupted forward march of the American left. Entitlement spending never stopped growing. The regulatory state continued to expand. The national debt grew and grew and finally in the Obama years, exploded. They see an American population becoming unrecognizable from the free and self-reliant people they thought they knew.

And they see the Republican Party as having utterly failed to stop the drift toward an unfree nation supervised by an overweening and bloated bureaucracy. They are not interested in Republican policies that merely slow the growth of this leviathan. They want to stop it and reverse it. And they want to show their supporters they’ll try anything to bring that about. And if some of those things turn out to be reckless and doomed, well so be it