@77. goy:
> left wing vs right wing, liberal vs conservative, people who want Obamacare vs people who don’t want it.
>Those aren’t strategies, so… premise fail. Look, I’m happy to continue pointing out silliness of your own defeatist nonsense as long as you realize you’re outed as an Axelturfed Concern Troll. If that works for you, do read on…
I’ve had dozens of conversations with leftists. Their central theme is to talk about everything except the topic at hand. They’re attempting to distract.
The question you keep bringing up, of leftist vs conservative, tactics vs strategy, mindset vs strategy, you’re attempting to “define” the argument away without actually making an argument.
My point in these posts is to do determine what the best way ahead is for conservatives to deal with Obamacare. The problem is the usual thing, examine the environment, determine your goal, know where you are and then, once you’re sure of those things, figure out the best way to get there.
Your arguing over whether being a conservative is a mindset, a strategy or philosophy, is, IMO, totally irrelevant.
I’ve seen leftist do this all the time, they define words they way they want, argue that their opponent isn’t using that word in the way that they define it, and then declare victory.
It’s a shallow, non rational way to argue a point. I never do that, I don’t think conservatives should argue that way.
Goy, you’re in combat mode, where you feel you must “win” every debating point, no matter how trivial, because you think we’re fighting. We’re not. We’re on the same side. Calm down, take off your combat helmet and put your thinking cap back on.
As I’ve said, I’ve talked with many leftists. I’ve experienced first hand their insults. Nothing you say here will affect me. Resorting to insults is pointless.
>- Are you saying that having a conservative mindset means no correlation to financial success?
>That’s exactly what I’m saying.
I disagree with you.
In the past, leftists tended not to run businesses at all, or at best medium size operations. I could understand that, they really weren’t interested or skilled at running a business.
However, you only have to look around and see billions of dollars flowing to the largest entertainment, technical and financial businesses and see that they’re almost all run by leftists at the top.
I suspect this is because we’re in an age of technical change. Conservatives conserve and aren’t good agents of change. Leftists want to change the world, so they’re naturally inclined to run disruptive businesses. That’s why I suspect it was Steve Jobs, a very left wing person, who introduced the extremely disruptive iPhone. And high profits come with the introduction of disruptive technology.
>- Yes, I have done an extensive survey …
>When you publish your research, please post a link.
Leftists do this all the time. When confronted with data they don’t like, they deny it.
Let me put you on the spot. Google, Apple, Microsoft, Oracle, all Hollywood studios, almost all Hollywood actors and actresses, all financial institutions, the majority of law firms, they’re all staffed by leftists. You can use Google to do your own research. Schmidt, the CEO of Google, participated in the Obama campaign. Bill Gates and Steven Jobs are lifelong Democrats.
So, tell me the equivalent large, high profit companies run by conservatives? I can think of Carly and maybe Whitman. BTW, Carly was fired by HP and her severance package was about $50M, not $2B. Would anyone argue that Arnold is a conservative?
>- But you’ve ignored my most important and decisive data point, the 10:1 advantage in campaign contributions the Democrats attained in the 2008 election cycle.
>That’s just an observation. You never actually made a point, much less a decisive one. Meanwhile, the 2008 election was the most aberrant in our history, so it’s not clear how you think you can use it as a representative example.
That wasn’t an observation, it was hard data. You can’t ignore $1B for Obama and less than $89M for McCain. I assume since McCain chose public funding, he knew that he would have received less than $89M in private contributions, so the funding ratio was more than 10:1.
I know why you keep saying I haven’t made a point, even though I keep making it. Like I said, leftists always resort to denial when they don’t like something.
My point was this:
About 2/3 of Obama’s contributions came from wealthy individuals. McCain was unable to match those private contributions, nor were any Republican Senate or Congressional candidates.
My thinking is was this:
That is evidence that leftists have more money than conservatives in this current business era.
Why is that? Why has the Democratic Party reversed the decades long advantage that the Republicans had? In the past the GOP would routinely raise much more money than the Democrats, often 2:1, which is why the Democrats eventually insisted on the public option for funding. That was the only way they could match the GOP. Obama himself promised he would use public funding, until they discovered that they could raise far more than $89M and he reversed his decision.
Take note of that, Obama lied during the campaign and he still won.
>- But in fact, his political support was strong enough to pass Obamacare. I find that simply astounding.
>No you don’t. That would require having paid no attention at all to what went down the last few weeks.
Are you a mind reader now? Come on goy, raise your level of debate. Don’t argue in the gutter like a leftist.
Everything you said about how the Democrats rammed through Obamacare is correct. Using reconciliation, while strictly adhering to the rules (deficit had to be reduced) has never been used on such a huge piece of social engineering.
What I found astounding was that after a year of lying, political support for Obama and the Democrats still hadn’t fallen to the point where enough Democrats feared losing their seats in November.
Of course the poll numbers for Obama have fallen. But have you read the Cook report on the 2010 election cycle? About 50 Democrat seats are currently at risk, and then only by a few percentage points. Support for Obama is running about 46% approve, 53% disapprove. As anyone knows, Reagan and Clinton had worse numbers in the second year and were re-elected.
Had the poll numbers for the Democrats fallen below 40%, Obamacare would never have passed. As it was, the numbers weren’t bad enough to convince them to abandon Obamacare.
What I found astounding was that the level of deception by Obama and the Democrats was so far above what I saw during the Watergate scandal, yet the Democrats only suffered an 8% decline in support. Keep in mind that the margin of error in a poll is 3-5%.
Outright lies, then gaming the CBO, parliamentary tricks, back room deals like the Nebraska and Louisiana agreements, the public should have roared disapproval. It didn’t happen, there was a drop of less than 10% in public support for the Democrats.
I find that astounding. If you don’t, that’s fine, we’ll have to agree to disagree on that point.
But my larger point is this, whatever distasteful things the Democrats did to get Obamacare passed, their poll numbers only suffered a very gentle decline. It should have been precipitous, like Nixon, but it wasn’t.
> Everyone must surely know what Obamacare all about by now.
>Look, Ms. Concern Troll, even members of CONGRESS didn’t know what they were voting on. The leftists who supported it are only JUST NOW finding out that it doesn’t contain what they were told they were supporting. Don’t pretend to be an imbecile just for the sake of extending an argument.
I can see why it was important for you to correct the link. I was aware of the article that you mistakenly included. That article by
Jane Hamsher was written before Obamacare passed and summarized her own disappointment in the bill. However, since it was written before Obamacare passed, her article supports my point that everyone knows what is in the bill already.
Your second link is one that I had already read. The bill is an abomination, hastily written and almost certainly full of bad or crazy things. I’m sure as more people read the bill, more stupid _details_ will be found.
However, are you really going to argue that most people don’t already know the broad strokes of what the bill contains?
The federal government will be taking control of health care. They’ll be deciding which treatments are “efficient”, insurance companies will be told what and who they must cover, no one can be refused health care, people will either buy health insurance or they will be assessed a fine on their tax returns. Hospitals must apply to the HHS if they want to expand, new taxes on medical devices. New medical treatments must be approved by a government appointed committee.
To me, all of those things are bad. However, at least 40% of the people polled over the last year think the trade-off of more government intrusion into healthcare so more uninsured people will be covered, is a good thing.
To me, how Obama and the Democrats lied and then resorted to dirty tactics in passing the bill should have led to outrage and caused the bill to fail to pass. That obviously didn’t happen.
>- Leftists always (and I mean always) resort to ad hominem attacks, [i]which is exactly what you just did[/i].
>Look up ad hominem. It clearly doesn’t mean what you think it means.
>Don’t pretend to be an imbecile just for the sake of extending an argument.
Yup, I know exactly what ad hominem means. Do you?
Because calling me an imbecile and then exactly six lines later saying that my claim that you’ve engaged in an ad homimem attack is false is, well, pick from this list:
1. Ironic.
2. Very odd.
3. Inadvertently illustrates your true character and depth of knowledge.
4. Shows that you’re in combat mode, which always turns off rational mode.
I pick #4.
Look, we’re both conservatives and we both want Obamacare to be repealed.
Leftists are probably laughing at us right now, two conservatives arguing over what words mean and one of them calling the other names. The house is burning down and you want to fight me. I’m trying to figure out ways to defeat Obamacare and you’re calling me an imbecile. Yes, I’m sure Leftists are having a good time.
Ignoring the fact that leftists currently have a huge funding advantage is delusional. If we want to win this fight, the severe disadvantage in funding has to be addressed somehow. Burying your head in the sand and denying facts is a sure way to lose.
For some reason, lying worked. What that means is that conservative technique of exposing lies didn’t.
Obama lies all the time. Pointing it out didn’t hurt him very much, if at all. Conservatives have to find a way to persuade people that the Democrats and Obamacare must be defeated. Amazingly, proving that Obama and the Democrats are liars hasn’t done anything.
This is where I think things stand.
1) Leftists have a 10:1 funding advantage.
2) Poll numbers for Obama show about an 8% deficit. History shows that deficit can be overcome.
3) Obamacare has been talked about for over a year. The problems with the bill and the messy, probably unconstitutional way it was passed have been discussed and those issues weren’t enough to prevent the bill from being signed into law.
4) Conservatives have been calling Obama and the Democrats liars for at least since before Scott Brown was elected. Political support for the Democrats obviously didn’t fall enough to frighten the Democrats into abandoning Obamacare. That happened in 1994, support for Hillarycare fell to the point where the Democrats did give up.
The most recent Gallup poll scared me, it showed that after Obamacare passed Independent voters are split 50:50 on their support for the bill. That tells me that out of the gate, the Independent voters who will determine if Obamacare is repealed aren’t against it.
Conservatives must match the Democrats in funding. They must find a way to counter Obama’s lies, it’s not as easy as just calling him a liar. That’s not working.
Somehow, enough voters must be persuaded to oppose Obamacare so that Republicans can get to 60 Senate seats. The bad thing is that current polls show that GOP gaining at around 5 seats to 46 in 2010 and getting to maybe 55 in 2012. That’s simply not enough.
