Originally Posted by summer in the fall

OK, look. The PM's can cease. I don't care what the rumored background is between The Rani and Brian. I call BS when I see it. "a woman scorned" can be viewed no other way but within the context of a history of trivializing women. And because it was contrast to David the intended effect was to draw attention to gender. Best...

And you're a mind reader as well. Fantastic!!

Cheers.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

Originally Posted by summer in the fall

OK, look. The PM's can cease. I don't care what the rumored background is between The Rani and Brian. I call BS when I see it. "a woman scorned" can be viewed no other way but within the context of a history of trivializing women. And because it was contrast to David the intended effect was to draw attention to gender. Best...

And you're a mind reader as well. Fantastic!!

Cheers.

Why are you taking this personally?

Originally Posted by summer in the fall

Why are you taking this personally?

I'm not. I'm having a good laugh.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

Originally Posted by summer in the fall

Why are you taking this personally?

I'm not. I'm having a good laugh.

OK. Best...

I'm getting lost here by all this other stuff. Who wants to talk about the 2012 election and the candidates? David, James, Eric...Are you still there?

Originally Posted by summer in the fall

OK, look. The PM's can cease. I don't care what the rumored background is between The Rani and Brian. I call BS when I see it. "a woman scorned" can be viewed no other way but within the context of a history of trivializing women. And because it was contrast to David the intended effect was to draw attention to gender. Best...

Whether or not you choose to notice, the world does in fact include a number of stuck-up, snobbish wasps; overly macho men; flightly or over-emotional women; greedy people of the Jewish faith; lazy African Americans; alcoholic Irish; and mathematically clever Asians. (That list was supposed to be representative, not exhaustive.) What you seem to be saying is that because these are stereotypes, we are forbidden to point out individual cases in which they might actually be true. What I have found in my experience is that while within a group (Jews, for instance) people have no trouble identifying group members who have the stereotypical characteristics, they get sensitive when some one outside the group says exactly the same thing. (I even find that happening to me sometimes.) I think we should all be judged as individuals regardless of stereotypes. This comment has nothing to do with the Rani, as I have no familiarity with the facts of that particular case.

Originally Posted by ASB65

I'm getting lost here by all this other stuff. Who wants to talk about the 2012 election and the candidates? David, James, Eric...Are you still there?

Yea, I am still here. Just waiting for things to wind down.

James50

Originally Posted by James50

]... There is not enough money (except in PW's world ) to pay for a medical system that is already twice as expensive as the rest of the world and existing in a bubble blown up with unaccountable Medicare funding. James50

Let's put aside the crass nature of your hit-and-run here; I also won't ask you to explain yourself because I'm sure you can't.

Instead, let me be kind-hearted and once again introduce you to several aspects of reality.

When you say there is "not enough money" I'm sure you are not saying that the federal govt does not have enough paper/ink or electrons to credit Medicare providers with payment - saying that would obviously be too stupid on your part, right?

What you do mean is that by making all payments on all possible Medicare claims, both legal and fraudulant, has or would would lead to inflation. However, as defined by nearly all real economists, inflation is the sustained generalized increase in prices. Price increases in a certain sector, such as energy, food, medical care, that cannot be past on to other sectors does not result in sustained generalized increase in prices, i.e. inflation. People make adjustments including 'substitutions' e.g., they take less vacations to pay for their medical care and the prices dependient on those now-missed vacations tend to drop and counter the prices in the medical sector.

So what you are talking about is Medicare driving prices up in the medical sector. Typically, when prices are going up in select sectors, there is somethiing unique to that sector than just additional money supply provided by the federal government. You seem to think that it is a result of "unaccountable Medicare funding" as a sub-set of all Medicare funding but then how do you explain this graph -



or it's highly simplified version for our shared tired eyes -



Does this give you any clue that there may be something to health care cost increases other than Medicare payments?

You see, the beauty of MMT is it allows you to put aside the non-problems of federal expenditure, deficits and debt and deal with actual real-world problems of unemployment, natural resource constraints, AND lack of adequate supply in certain sectors of the economy.

Ignorance is only bliss to the mentally challenged or lazy.

Originally Posted by ASB65

I'm getting lost here by all this other stuff. Who wants to talk about the 2012 election and the candidates? David, James, Eric...Are you still there?

Yes, sorry, I am.

The economic news yesterday was also devastating. One significant fact: median income fell from 2001 to 2007, when things were supposedly improving. We have a mix of long- and short-term problems.

Now I'm going over to the health care thread where I hope James will comment on my post.

Originally Posted by KaiserD2

I agree that they are more about politics than economics--politics and ways of thinking. Of course I do not agree about the other half.

Your Establishment bias is showing again, David. 4Ts are about the INSTITUTIONS of society and their remodeling. Politics is just the froth at the surface. But it's hard to understand that if one is stuck in the Beltway Bubble.

Anyway, back to our discussion, James. Yesterday, I did comment on the "Where are GenX Democrats" thread, asking the question, Where are Boomer Democrats? I am truly amazed by some of the die hard liberal boomers in my life, who have suddenly switched sides. It's kind of creepy considering I know how strongly they have felt all their entire lives to suddenly do a complete turn about face. So I don't disagree with that there is a movement happening in this country where people seem to be floating more and more over to the Republicans right now, but I don't know how moderate that makes them. It seems the more people that they have moving towards them the even farther to right the Republicans are becoming. It's almost as if they are feeling is, "Well, we got them on our side now, lets just run with this as far as we can take it."

When the Tea Party candidates got elected in 2010, I figured this is going to be good theater. I'm going to pop some popcorn and sit back and watch. The Republicans will soon discover they created a monster and the long time Republican establishment will spend most of their time trying quell these new kids on the block with all their outlandish ideas. I didn't see it coming that they would just hand over the reins to the Tea Party folks and let them call the shots.

Politics these days doesn't look anything like what I would have predicted. So it's hard to even try and guess what will happen in the future.

Originally Posted by The Rani

I missed the debate, but saw the Ron Paul highlights and thought they were interesting.

It's clear to me that there was no "audience cheering" of the idea that we should let people die in hospitals. It was a couple of guys responding facetiously to (and laughing at) a loaded question. What they cheered was the idea of private groups helping the poor, and people helping themselves.

Beware the spin (a general comment, not intended for you personally.)

Ron Paul was IMO, the most interesting candidate on the stage. I'm not saying I agreed with every thing he had to say, but it seemed of all the candidates he was the only one coming from the "lets talk some common sense" stance. He wasn't trying to grandstand. Just trying to tell the American people like it is. He got booed by the audience on more than one occasion.

Originally Posted by KaiserD2

Originally Posted by summer in the fall

OK, look. The PM's can cease. I don't care what the rumored background is between The Rani and Brian. I call BS when I see it. "a woman scorned" can be viewed no other way but within the context of a history of trivializing women. And because it was contrast to David the intended effect was to draw attention to gender. Best...

Whether or not you choose to notice, the world does in fact include a number of stuck-up, snobbish wasps; overly macho men; flightly or over-emotional women; greedy people of the Jewish faith; lazy African Americans; alcoholic Irish; and mathematically clever Asians. (That list was supposed to be representative, not exhaustive.) What you seem to be saying is that because these are stereotypes, we are forbidden to point out individual cases in which they might actually be true. What I have found in my experience is that while within a group (Jews, for instance) people have no trouble identifying group members who have the stereotypical characteristics, they get sensitive when some one outside the group says exactly the same thing. (I even find that happening to me sometimes.) I think we should all be judged as individuals regardless of stereotypes. This comment has nothing to do with the Rani, as I have no familiarity with the facts of that particular case.

Listen, whatever you need to do to rationalize your stereotypical biases, that has nothing to do with using a public forum discussion on the 2012 election to call someone participating "a woman scorned."

Again, my apologies for this disruption.

Best...

Originally Posted by The Rani

Yeah, I noticed that.
A lot of people don't want to hear the truth.

Only when it fits within their own perception of what "the truth" is. Ron Paul is not the poster child for the Tea Party by any means. There are some things about him which fits within their views, like reduced government, but they don't want to see it cut like Ron Paul does. The people of the Tea Party (predominately being made up older Americans) do want to see social security reform, but only at the expense of the younger crowd. They don't want their benefits cuts. Ron Paul would do away with it completely, if it were up to him. They also really don't military spending touched. Here again, this is not at all the way Ron Paul sees it.

I'm sorry but, from what I can gather about the Tea Party, it's only wasteful spending when it's being spent on other people or programs they don't personally need.

Originally Posted by Odin

Your Establishment bias is showing again, David. 4Ts are about the INSTITUTIONS of society and their remodeling. Politics is just the froth at the surface. But it's hard to understand that if one is stuck in the Beltway Bubble.

1. Politics includes political institutions.

2. I haven't lived inside the Beltway for 45 years.

Originally Posted by ASB65

Only when it fits within their own perception of what "the truth" is. Ron Paul is not the poster child for the Tea Party by any means. There are some things about him which fits within their views, like reduced government, but they don't want to see it cut like Ron Paul does. The people of the Tea Party (predominately being made up older Americans) do want to see social security reform, but only at the expense of the younger crowd. They don't want their benefits cuts. Ron Paul would do away with it completely, if it were up to him. They also really don't military spending touched. Here again, this is not at all the way Ron Paul sees it.

I'm certainly no supporter of Ron Paul, but I will give him credit which I won't give any of the other candidates credit for -- the man is consistent and principled. Not the right principles for 2011 -- maybe 1811 -- but he doesn't change for public opinion polls or hold positions that are wildly contradictory with each other.

The Tea Party is only principled when it helps the Tea Party's primary demographics.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Or that they don't personally deem "necessary," such as the War on Terror.

And sometimes it's interesting as to what they perceive as necessary and what isn't. This is a quote from ex-stepmother given to me yesterday. BTW, she was a life long liberal Democrat who has suddenly turn Republican (or possibly senile). "People are really getting fed up with having to pay taxes for these schools for children. This is the parent's responsibility. Not mine"...It was one of those moments when I just sat there, stunned and thinking I'm not even sure how to respond to such a statement. Of course, she herself was educated in the public school system years ago...So what do we with all these children who's parents can't afford private schools? Which is the majority of the parents in this country? Do we just turn these kids loose and unsupervised on the street and let them grow up to be illiterate, non-productive adults? How is that going to help our country? Plus eventually, they are going to start looking for something to do and might just turn into mischief makers and or even little criminals and possibly start breaking into her house. Then she might think that maybe it would be better if they were in school.

Yep, the rationale of some people is just astounding sometimes.

Originally Posted by ziggyX65

I'm certainly no supporter of Ron Paul, but I will give him credit which I won't give any of the other candidates credit for -- the man is consistent and principled. Not the right principles for 2011 -- maybe 1811 -- but he doesn't change for public opinion polls or hold positions that are wildly contradictory with each other.

The Tea Party is only principled when it helps the Tea Party's primary demographics.

Which is why I kind of have to respect the guy, even if I don't agree with him on everything.

Originally Posted by ASB65

Politics these days doesn't look anything like what I would have predicted. So it's hard to even try and guess what will happen in the future.

The way presidential politics has worked for some time is that the candidates play to their base during primary season, but then move to the center for a general election. The one guy in my memory who did not do that was Barry Goldwater and he got shellacked in the general. What sold for Perry in Texas will not sell in a general election. Keep in mind he has never lost an election. If he is the nominee, you will see significant changes in his go-about as we near November. He will govern from the right as Obama has governed from the left, but will be pulled inexorably to the center. That's the way things work. There is incredible inertia in our political system. All of the recent presidents have found that out eventually. Bill Clinton was the best at navigating within this political inertia but of course he ended up with the moniker "slick Willie" as a result.

We are not going to abolish Social Security or Medicare although I doubt either will be as generous with the Boomers as they have been with the GIs and Silents. Also, there is not the political will to maintain the federal government at 25% of the economy. Absent a war or other existential crisis, there will continue to be incredible pressures on the budget process until that is returned to its historical 20%.

James50

Originally Posted by playwrite

Let's put aside the crass nature of your hit-and-run here; I also won't ask you to explain yourself because I'm sure you can't.

I apologize for the drive-by shooting. I really do not want to debate you on this subject.

James50

Originally Posted by James50

The way presidential politics has worked for some time is that the candidates play to their base during primary season, but then move to the center for a general election. The one guy in my memory who did not do that was Barry Goldwater and he got shellacked in the general. What sold for Perry in Texas will not sell in a general election. Keep in mind he has never lost an election. If he is the nominee, you will see significant changes in his go-about as we near November. He will govern from the right as Obama has governed from the left, but will be pulled inexorably to the center. That's the way things work. There is incredible inertia in our political system. All of the recent presidents have found that out eventually. Bill Clinton was the best at navigating within this political inertia but of course he ended up with the moniker "slick Willie" as a result.

We are not going to abolish Social Security or Medicare although I doubt either will be as generous with the Boomers as they have been with the GIs and Silents.

James50

It will be interesting to see what happens if he does get the nomination. His handlers will have to do a complete remake of him. But you know that the Democrats are going to go back through his record and find all kinds of interesting things. Plus his comment about seceding from the union will get brought up along with all the other crazy comments he has made and will have to account for them. Joe Biden has nothing on Rick Perry as far as being a gaff machine. In the 5 years that I have lived down here, I can't tell you how many times he has opened his mouth and I've sat there stunned thinking, "I can't believe he just said that." And it's got nothing to do with being partisan or not agreeing with his stances on certain issues. The guy just says crazy things.

Originally Posted by James50

The way presidential politics has worked for some time is that the candidates play to their base during primary season, but then move to the center for a general election. The one guy in my memory who did not do that was Barry Goldwater and he got shellacked in the general. What sold for Perry in Texas will not sell in a general election. Keep in mind he has never lost an election. If he is the nominee, you will see significant changes in his go-about as we near November. He will govern from the right as Obama has governed from the left, but will be pulled inexorably to the center. That's the way things work. There is incredible inertia in our political system. All of the recent presidents have found that out eventually. Bill Clinton was the best at navigating within this political inertia but of course he ended up with the moniker "slick Willie" as a result.

We are not going to abolish Social Security or Medicare although I doubt either will be as generous with the Boomers as they have been with the GIs and Silents. Also, there is not the political will to maintain the federal government at 25% of the economy. Absent a war or other existential crisis, there will continue to be incredible pressures on the budget process until that is returned to its historical 20%.

James50

Exactly. Examining Perry's record in Texas shows he is basically center right with few "hard right" positions. Some of his rhetoric may be though. An example would be calling Social Security a ponzi scheme and then when he explains what he wants to do is really just reforming it. Giving Illegals in state tuition is another example, hardly a "hard right" position.

Originally Posted by Weave

Exactly. Examining Perry's record in Texas shows he is basically center right with few "hard right" positions. Some of his rhetoric may be though. An example would be calling Social Security a ponzi scheme and then when he explains what he wants to do is really just reforming it. Giving Illegals in state tuition is another example, hardly a "hard right" position.

Perry has also rejected the Arizona "solution" for immigration, saying it's "not right for Texas." Whatever that means, but just throwing it out -- Perry's position on immigration is, if nothing else, to the left of Arizona's. Though that's not saying much.

Originally Posted by ASB65

The guy just says crazy things.

If he can't get his mouth under control, he will not be President.

James50

Originally Posted by ASB65

But you know that the Democrats are going to go back through his record and find all kinds of interesting things. Plus his comment about seceding from the union will get brought up along with all the other crazy comments he has made and will have to account for them.

But all of that craziness may become insignificant when the Republicans start their ads showing some of Obama's rhetoric next to his economic record since inauguration. The ads will practically write themselves.

James50