Originally Posted by
Skroesec
Republicans are already preparing for that. Go check out RedState. And it's not hard to see why.
I voted for Bush in 2004. Politically speaking I'm generally center right. I'm conservative of the George H.W. Bush / Colin Powell variety.
The people calling themselves conservatives and republicans now are extremists. They hi-jacked the name, the cause, the icons to try and hold back a tsunami of change that has been going on in this country for decades. The America of John Boehner's youth is dead, and it's never coming back. This is a good thing.
I abandoned the Republican Party in 2008, and again in 2012, and I will in 2014 and 2016 because the Republicans in Congress right now are undemocratic, unpatriotic, untruthful, cowardly, corrupt and scientifically / technologically backwards.
Their crimes are many. From slashing NSF and NIH funding to even refusing to say out right "Barack Obama was born in the United States and is an American Citizen" in favor of John Boehner's much more nebulous "I take the President at his words".
People like that do not deserve any support. They deserve to be condemned.
Nothing tells you more about the how undemocratic and unpatriotic (yes I used that word on purpose) than the House's refusal to put legislation that the majority of the majority party does not support up for a vote. In the last decade, whenever Democrats controlled the House, they allowed any and all bills, even ones that the then-Democratic Majority was against, to come up for a vote. And since the corrupt days of Dennis Hastert and Tom Delay, Republicans to this very day do not reciprocate.
True democrats (small d) and patriots would not be afraid of standing for principle whilst losing a vote. John Boehner knows, if he allowed open voting, like the House has always done until 2000, the Tea Party caucus would be complete broken, Republicans scattered and the country would see far more legislative activity. These hostage taking scenarios would cease.
That in summary, is why I side with the man you call a joke. Because I believe in the wellfare of this country and coming to compromises more than I believe in adhering to some kind of ridiculous and rigid ideology. Ideology is the realm of small men with closed minds. Obama runs this country as a conservative twenty years ago would have. He pushes for laws proposed in the 1980s and 1990s by conservatives.
Now I do want him to, quite frankly, take away everyone here's guns, from hand gun to assault rifle to your pappy's shot gun, and melt them down into slag. I know that isn't at all a conservative position. And I know that isn't going to happen anytime soon. But I know I have a better chance with him than we any Republican. So he gets my support in this.
The Far Right Republicans are bracing for a dark age, because they see 2014 and 2016, and they know they're dying off and Obama's base is growing. So I'd consider your options in the future my friend. Obama's agenda is to clean up decades of grime and mismanagement, expand social justice and prepare this country for being supremely competitive in this century.
Your guns. Abortion. The Role of Religion. The size of government. All of them are stupid distractions and the obsession of limited men. Obama knows this, which is why he delegates these things out and personally oversees the big-picture solutions.
---------- Post added 2013-01-17 at 11:02 PM ----------
Which every other developed advanced economy in the world has. And by the way, the world in which we live, where an MRI costs $2000 here but $81 in Japan is a failure. A free market for healthcare has been an abject and empirical failure. Japan's government set rates, has first-rate quality of care, and no shortages. Price Controls on Heath Care work.
Almost all of this is delayed investment. This is what happens when the previous owners of the property, so to speak, don't keep up with the maitenence. Furthermore our population is aging (predicted in the 1990s), adding to costs.
This is a good thing and Taxes should increase even more. Sincerely, a conservative making more than you do, who wants this country to actually pay its bills.
The "Small Government" Obsession was over in 2002. The people pushing it today didn't get the memo. The argument is fundamentally a stupid one. The diachotomy between big and small government is so limiting and not a smart argument. What Bush, Clinton and Obama ALL advocate is for RIGHT SIZED government. Not too big. Not too small. But just right. Efficient and meeting its needs. That's the SMART path forward. Small Government, like the 19th century? Never. Going. To. Happen.
You ain't seen nothing yet.
and don't forget
This is a good one. I am a Republican. Well rather was. I abandoned our party. I've voted for Obama twice. Because I want effective, data-driven semi-technocratic government. Obama has been precisely that. I left the Republican Party because the people in it right now have completely discredited themselves on economic, fiscal, scientific, political and social matters. They're an old party of old men whose time has passed and they bring nothing new to the table.
It should scare the absolute crap out of Republicans that a man like Colin Powell, who back in 1996 many Republicans got down on their knees and prayed would run for President, and who before Obama, everyone was ABSOLUTELY SURE, was the only black man of national stature who could win the Presidency in our country, has voted for Obama twice, very publically, and assailed the Republican Party as it exists now.
The problem is you, and people like you oblivionx, inside the Republican Party. People like you drove people like me into the very open arms of a man, Barack Obama more like George H.W. Bush than like Bill Clinton. And I like it here. I don't think I'm going to leave. I dont think a lot of us are going to leave. When it comes down to it, I actually want us investing in technology, rather than cutting funding. I want us focusing on security in East Asia vs China, instead of some absurd pissing contest with Iran and another decade of Middle East / Israel crap. I want us actually educating our children to the highest Western standards, not letting schools get away with backwards creationism. I actually want my party filled with educated men, not foolish morons like Rand Paul who forgot the issue of nullification was settled in the Civil War.
So enjoy the bed you made for yourself as you and the extremist Republicans die of old age in it. Because that's your future.