The Politics Thread - please direct all related posts here..

[Pharmcat]

repubs just lost the seat in ny 26

the most red part of ny to a D

wow

[duetta]

Thank you, Paul Ryan. Keep talking about your budget.

[GONYK]

Thank you, Paul Ryan. Keep talking about your budget.

Albatross doesn't quite cover what that Paul Ryan budget is, and they can't run away from it. They have to grin and bear it otherwise the Tea Party will lose their minds.

This is funny

[Nutty Nats Fan]

Nutty Nats..I don't represent the GOP why bring GOP or Democrats in the discussion..I was discussing my views...no need to bring partisanship into the debate...In my view our HC system is flawed, but certainly better than any other model in the world...Its not ignorant to hold this view, u may disagree but that doesn't prove me ignorant.

I wasn't calling you a member of the GOP, more on a soap box about how it is the GOP who claims the US can't have universal health case, because other countries do it and it is bad. Very poor reasoning.

A model that bankrupts people who need medical care, is certainly not the best in the world.

[seren]

Seren: I don't need to reference any source to state my case

Oh. Ok then. Good luck with your life.

[HarthorneWingo]

Thank you, Paul Ryan. Keep talking about your budget.

Albatross doesn't quite cover what that Paul Ryan budget is, and they can't run away from it. They have to grin and bear it otherwise the Tea Party will lose their minds.

This is funny

It is funny ... ever since Newt called the plan "social engineering from the right" on Meet The Press, and was called every name in the book for it (frankly I thought he was looking very reasonable and independent), republicans have been slowly running from Ryan's plan. And now NY 26. Wow. Now watch them really scramble.

Humina humina humina



People are wising up.

[ewingxmanstarks]

repubs just lost the seat in ny 26

the most red part of ny to a D

wow

put the Soviet flag down, its one regional election...the will of the ppl want obama care reversed...dems will lose seats in Nov

[ewingxmanstarks]

Thank you, Paul Ryan. Keep talking about your budget.

Albatross doesn't quite cover what that Paul Ryan budget is, and they can't run away from it. They have to grin and bear it otherwise the Tea Party will lose their minds.

This is funny

It is funny ... ever since Newt called the plan "social engineering from the right" on Meet The Press, and was called every name in the book for it (frankly I thought he was looking very reasonable and independent), republicans have been slowly running from Ryan's plan. And now NY 26. Wow. Now watch them really scramble.

Humina humina humina



calling the Ryan plan social engineering was beyond stupid...social engineering doesn't fit the bill any way one looks at it....changes to a medicare system that is on the verge of insolvency is not politically popular, and u may not agree with it, but its reforming an entitlement not to create social justice or change landscape....had Newt said I think the devil came up with this plan u would taught that would be very reasonable and independent.

[GONYK]

calling the Ryan plan social engineering was beyond stupid...social engineering doesn't fit the bill any way one looks at it....changes to a medicare system that is on the verge of insolvency is not politically popular, and u may not agree with it, but its reforming an entitlement not to create social justice or change landscape....had Newt said I think the devil came up with this plan u would taught that would be very reasonable and independent.

There is a difference between reforming Medicare, which everyone agrees needs to happen, and dismantling it.

If what you say is true, why don't the Repubs in the Senate push it like the ones in the House did?

Also, on another note, look at Wisconsin and especially Michigan. You wouldn't call that social engineering? In Michigan, they have essentially done away with elected officials.

[ewingxmanstarks]

The Ryan plan aims to replace the medicare system as we now it for ppl 55 and under with a voucher system which in theory would be able to shave a significant amount of debt..We are currently in a debt crisis...now even if its true that this idea is bad for medicare and the cuts go to far...that's fine, but in no way does right wing social engineering accurately describe the plan...Newt is a shrewd politican, perhaps the prominent intellectual in the party...he knew entitlement reform who be extremly unpopular..so he made a political calculation to go against the party and place him self with in good grace with the electorate, which is fine...the only thing is he went too far in unfairly miss characterizing the plan...Keep in mind it was Obama that said if there is going to be serious discussion on the deficit it must be centered on entitlement reform...when he talked about his plan all he did was use the same class warfare rhetoric he always uses, he never even mentioned entitlements...The Gop came up with a substance plan, and tackled entitlements, and they payed the price...I'm also not sure about the plan, but I know enough to not call it social engineering...Newt can't even explain why he called it that

[Nutty Nats Fan]

repubs just lost the seat in ny 26

the most red part of ny to a D

wow

put the Soviet flag down, its one regional election...the will of the ppl want obama care reversed...dems will lose seats in Nov

There is no Obama care, you are slurping from the trough of the GOP. Obama bent over and gave in to some of the GOP's demands, making the health care he passed a lot worse than it should have been. I don't recall there being a public option, like he wanted. Just more BS from the party of BS.

That soviet flag part is cute. That is an ignorant view.

[HarthorneWingo]

calling the Ryan plan social engineering was beyond stupid...social engineering doesn't fit the bill any way one looks at it....changes to a medicare system that is on the verge of insolvency is not politically popular, and u may not agree with it, but its reforming an entitlement not to create social justice or change landscape....had Newt said I think the devil came up with this plan u would taught that would be very reasonable and independent.

You wont be laughing come 2012, pal.

Newt was correct. The Republican plan is nothing more than social engineering. Separate the elderly from the young and watch the elderly have to beg for benefits. Rather than doing this why not expand Medicare to everyone and spread the cost?

Besides, there are smart changes and dumb changes. Ryan's plan fall in the later category and, if signed into law, would cause way more damage than do good. Ryan's plan is simply a part of the overall GOP strategy of "starving the beast." This has been standard operating procedure since the beginning of the 20th century.

It's time to face facts, taxes on the rich must be increased.

[Pharmcat]

its not just medicare

that plan decreases taxes for the rich

thats a no go for folks too

[HarthorneWingo]

The Ryan plan aims to replace the medicare system as we now it for ppl 55 and under with a voucher system which in theory would be able to shave a significant amount of debt..We are currently in a debt crisis...now even if its true that this idea is bad for medicare and the cuts go to far...that's fine, but in no way does right wing social engineering accurately describe the plan...Newt is a shrewd politican, perhaps the prominent intellectual in the party...he knew entitlement reform who be extremly unpopular..so he made a political calculation to go against the party and place him self with in good grace with the electorate, which is fine...the only thing is he went too far in unfairly miss characterizing the plan...Keep in mind it was Obama that said if there is going to be serious discussion on the deficit it must be centered on entitlement reform...when he talked about his plan all he did was use the same class warfare rhetoric he always uses, he never even mentioned entitlements...The Gop came up with a substance plan, and tackled entitlements, and they payed the price...I'm also not sure about the plan, but I know enough to not call it social engineering...Newt can't even explain why he called it that

We're not in a "debt crisis." We're in a "revenue crisis." Once again, the GOP is not in touch with middle America. That's because it lies in bed with corporate America.

Plus, as to healthcare, the key is reducing medical costs. The Ryan plan will increase medical costs because it provides for much less treatment globally.

How can you be so wrong about so many things?

[ewingxmanstarks]

^LMAO to there isn't a debt crisis...add just the interest for 5 years on the deficit and RAISE taxes to Clinton levels, and get back to me...stealing money from "the rich" won't solve the problem.

[HarthorneWingo]

^LMAO to there isn't a debt crisis...add just the interest for 5 years on the deficit and RAISE taxes to Clinton levels, and get back to me...stealing money from "the rich" won't solve the problem.

LOL.

Let's get out of two wars AND raise takes to the Clinton levels, and then get back to me.

Or we can go back to the Nixon or Eisenhower rates too, if you'd like.

From The Economist:

Have you ever heard of the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget plan? Neither had I. The caucus's co-chairs, Raul Grijalva of Arizona and Keith Ellison of Minnesota, released it on April 6th. The budget savings come from defence cuts, including immediately withdrawing from Afghanistan and Iraq, which saves $1.6 trillion over the CBO baseline from 2012-2021. The tax hikes include restoring the estate tax, ending the Bush tax cuts, and adding new tax brackets for the extremely rich, running from 45% on income over a million a year to 49% on income over a billion a year.

Mr Ryan's plan adds (by its own claims) $6 trillion to the national debt over the next decade, but promises to balance the budget by sometime in the 2030s by cutting programmes for the poor and the elderly. The Progressive Caucus's plan would (by its own claims) balance the budget by 2021 by cutting defense spending and raising taxes, mainly on rich people. Mr Ryan has been fulsomely praised for his courage. The Progressive Caucus has not.

Also:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democrac ... lth_reform

Comparing a budget plan to health reform

Feb 10th 2010, 19:15 by M.S.

ROSS DOUTHAT objects to the way I compared Paul Ryan's budget roadmap to Democratic health-care reform proposals. Mr Douthat writes:

(T)he difference between the cost-control proposals in the Democratic bill and the cost-control proposals in Ryan’s roadmap isn’t that the former are “complicated and really hard to understand” (read: smart) while the latter are simple, unimaginative and cruel. It’s that the Democratic bill wouldn’t come close to balancing the budget in the long run, and Ryan’s plan would.

Mr Douthat is right that it can be misleading to compare Mr Ryan's plan to balance the budget to Democratic plans to reform health care. The Democrats did not set out to balance the entire federal budget by reforming the health-care sector. Their plan aims to do two different categories of things. First, it aims to make sure that almost everyone in the country has health insurance, and that perverse effects like losing your insurance when you are fired, or when you fall sick, end. Second, it aims to begin controlling costs, and as Mr Douthat notes, it contains some promising measures. The Democrats start from the principle that if you control costs without first achieving fairness and universal coverage, you will most likely end up balancing the budget by slashing aid to poor people, since poor people are the ones who need aid.

Mr Ryan's bill, on the other hand, does not aim to achieve universal coverage or solve problems relating to affordability and accessibility. It aims only to control costs. And, indeed, it ends up cutting the deficit in large measure by ending Medicare and ceasing to provide health insurance for those who cannot afford to pay for it.

It is, however, also worth taking a look at just how effective Mr Ryan's roadmap would be at cutting the deficit. According to the CBO's analysis, if I read the figures right, the bill promises to have the federal budget in surplus by sometime after 2060. It would eliminate the federal debt by sometime after 2080. Here's the problem with that forecast:

CBO’s cost estimates generally apply only to the 10-year budget projection period, because the uncertainties about the budgetary effects of legislation (especially regarding health care) are simply too great beyond that span. In contrast, this analysis uses a 75-year horizon to offer a rough assessment of long-term trends under different policies. Even this rough comparison can be constructed for your proposal only because its provisions and additional specifications provided by your staff set predetermined growth rates for the key amounts of taxes and transfers; CBO does not have the capability to model more subtle changes in federal health programs, even in an approximate way, over that very long time span.

Imagine that the CBO had tried to project the 2010 federal budget deficit in 1960. Medicare and Medicaid didn't even exist yet; we were engaged in an arms race with the USSR. How accurate would such a projection have been? How many things are likely to change over the next 50 years? So what do we mean when we say that Mr Ryan's proposal "balances the budget in the long run"?

What we mean isn't really that it "balances the budget". We mean that it points strongly in the direction of reducing the deficit, compared to current trends. On a more meaningful timeframe, say the ten-year projection, Mr Ryan's bill cuts the deficit from 7.4% of GNP (under the CBO's "alternative scenario" of current trends) to 3.7% of GNP. But only 0.4% of that cut comes from reducing health-care costs. The rest of it comes from freezing non-defense discretionary spending in nominal terms. This is so drastic as to be impossible; but more important, it's not really relevant to Mr Ryan's health-care policies. Looking further out, Mr Ryan's major Medicare savings kick in in 2021, but even by 2040, he is still only getting about half of his spending cuts from Medicare and Medicaid. The other half comes from that nominal-dollars spending freeze.

In other words, Mr Ryan's health-care reforms don't actually balance the budget. He slashes Medicare and Medicaid drastically, but to balance the budget, he still has to project unrealistic cuts in everything else the federal government does (apart from defense, for whatever reason). And the burden of Mr Ryan's health-care cuts will fall on the poor and the sick, because he doesn't do any work to make the system more fair.

For all of these reasons and more, Mr Ryan's bill is never going to get a vote. And that, as Ezra Klein writes, is the real reason why it's not fair to compare it to Democratic proposals. The reason Democrats are working on complicated, detailed efforts to improve efficiency of care and eliminate perverse incentives is that without such improvements, Mr Klein writes, cutting spending is politically impossible:

Saying that you're going to slash the generosity of Medicare benefits isn't, in any sense, guaranteed to work. A bill that works in theory but can't pass is not a bill that works.

[ewingxmanstarks]

repubs just lost the seat in ny 26

the most red part of ny to a D

wow

put the Soviet flag down, its one regional election...the will of the ppl want obama care reversed...dems will lose seats in Nov

There is no Obama care, you are slurping from the trough of the GOP. Obama bent over and gave in to some of the GOP's demands, making the health care he passed a lot worse than it should have been. I don't recall there being a public option, like he wanted. Just more BS from the party of BS.

That soviet flag part is cute. That is an ignorant view.

I know the Soviet flag part is cute, even if that's not what u meant to say....Phamat should be a big boy....good natured ribbing....that's what he gets for cheerleading...Yes there is Obama care, and its worse than u can imagine....there is no better example of social engineering than Obama Care...u don't know better ask somebody.

[ewingxmanstarks]

^LMAO to there isn't a debt crisis...add just the interest for 5 years on the deficit and RAISE taxes to Clinton levels, and get back to me...stealing money from "the rich" won't solve the problem.

LOL.

Let's get out of two wars AND raise takes to the Clinton levels, and then get back to me.

Or we can go back to the Nixon or Eisenhower rates too, if you'd like.

From The Economist:

Have you ever heard of the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget plan? Neither had I. The caucus's co-chairs, Raul Grijalva of Arizona and Keith Ellison of Minnesota, released it on April 6th. The budget savings come from defence cuts, including immediately withdrawing from Afghanistan and Iraq, which saves $1.6 trillion over the CBO baseline from 2012-2021. The tax hikes include restoring the estate tax, ending the Bush tax cuts, and adding new tax brackets for the extremely rich, running from 45% on income over a million a year to 49% on income over a billion a year.

Mr Ryan's plan adds (by its own claims) $6 trillion to the national debt over the next decade, but promises to balance the budget by sometime in the 2030s by cutting programmes for the poor and the elderly. The Progressive Caucus's plan would (by its own claims) balance the budget by 2021 by cutting defense spending and raising taxes, mainly on rich people. Mr Ryan has been fulsomely praised for his courage. The Progressive Caucus has not.

Also:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democrac ... lth_reform

Comparing a budget plan to health reform

Feb 10th 2010, 19:15 by M.S.

ROSS DOUTHAT objects to the way I compared Paul Ryan's budget roadmap to Democratic health-care reform proposals. Mr Douthat writes:

(T)he difference between the cost-control proposals in the Democratic bill and the cost-control proposals in Ryan’s roadmap isn’t that the former are “complicated and really hard to understand” (read: smart) while the latter are simple, unimaginative and cruel. It’s that the Democratic bill wouldn’t come close to balancing the budget in the long run, and Ryan’s plan would.

Mr Douthat is right that it can be misleading to compare Mr Ryan's plan to balance the budget to Democratic plans to reform health care. The Democrats did not set out to balance the entire federal budget by reforming the health-care sector. Their plan aims to do two different categories of things. First, it aims to make sure that almost everyone in the country has health insurance, and that perverse effects like losing your insurance when you are fired, or when you fall sick, end. Second, it aims to begin controlling costs, and as Mr Douthat notes, it contains some promising measures. The Democrats start from the principle that if you control costs without first achieving fairness and universal coverage, you will most likely end up balancing the budget by slashing aid to poor people, since poor people are the ones who need aid.

Mr Ryan's bill, on the other hand, does not aim to achieve universal coverage or solve problems relating to affordability and accessibility. It aims only to control costs. And, indeed, it ends up cutting the deficit in large measure by ending Medicare and ceasing to provide health insurance for those who cannot afford to pay for it.

It is, however, also worth taking a look at just how effective Mr Ryan's roadmap would be at cutting the deficit. According to the CBO's analysis, if I read the figures right, the bill promises to have the federal budget in surplus by sometime after 2060. It would eliminate the federal debt by sometime after 2080. Here's the problem with that forecast:

CBO’s cost estimates generally apply only to the 10-year budget projection period, because the uncertainties about the budgetary effects of legislation (especially regarding health care) are simply too great beyond that span. In contrast, this analysis uses a 75-year horizon to offer a rough assessment of long-term trends under different policies. Even this rough comparison can be constructed for your proposal only because its provisions and additional specifications provided by your staff set predetermined growth rates for the key amounts of taxes and transfers; CBO does not have the capability to model more subtle changes in federal health programs, even in an approximate way, over that very long time span.

Imagine that the CBO had tried to project the 2010 federal budget deficit in 1960. Medicare and Medicaid didn't even exist yet; we were engaged in an arms race with the USSR. How accurate would such a projection have been? How many things are likely to change over the next 50 years? So what do we mean when we say that Mr Ryan's proposal "balances the budget in the long run"?

What we mean isn't really that it "balances the budget". We mean that it points strongly in the direction of reducing the deficit, compared to current trends. On a more meaningful timeframe, say the ten-year projection, Mr Ryan's bill cuts the deficit from 7.4% of GNP (under the CBO's "alternative scenario" of current trends) to 3.7% of GNP. But only 0.4% of that cut comes from reducing health-care costs. The rest of it comes from freezing non-defense discretionary spending in nominal terms. This is so drastic as to be impossible; but more important, it's not really relevant to Mr Ryan's health-care policies. Looking further out, Mr Ryan's major Medicare savings kick in in 2021, but even by 2040, he is still only getting about half of his spending cuts from Medicare and Medicaid. The other half comes from that nominal-dollars spending freeze.

In other words, Mr Ryan's health-care reforms don't actually balance the budget. He slashes Medicare and Medicaid drastically, but to balance the budget, he still has to project unrealistic cuts in everything else the federal government does (apart from defense, for whatever reason). And the burden of Mr Ryan's health-care cuts will fall on the poor and the sick, because he doesn't do any work to make the system more fair.

For all of these reasons and more, Mr Ryan's bill is never going to get a vote. And that, as Ezra Klein writes, is the real reason why it's not fair to compare it to Democratic proposals. The reason Democrats are working on complicated, detailed efforts to improve efficiency of care and eliminate perverse incentives is that without such improvements, Mr Klein writes, cutting spending is politically impossible:

Saying that you're going to slash the generosity of Medicare benefits isn't, in any sense, guaranteed to work. A bill that works in theory but can't pass is not a bill that works.

[ewingxmanstarks]

Wingo, I'm sure ur a good guy, but u represent a man that is the equivalent of a unbelievable dissgarace....snatch defeat from the jaws of victory...that ur genius plan in Iraq...btw when u and I r having a disscusion don't let a blog talk for u, its gay (sorry to offend u)...let's leave those ppl to the fate of radical islam, after we spent so much in terms of fiscal cost, life, time and energy...what we should do is take part of their surplus and oil, so morrons who don't understand the enemy or war ingeneral can chant no blood for oil...we really should, its part of war.......Ganistan, I agree let's get the F out of dodge, but not before we raid those lithium mines wr discovered over there...Do all the fuzzy math u want, but even the most disgraceful dems like ur boy admit that the government has mismanaged the basic entitlement programs we've come to rely on...SS, Medicare, Medicade...hey Wingoand the progresive caucus figured out the answer is peace, hugging trees, and getting those evil rich ppl...1.3 trill, that's the entire net worth of billionaires in the US, not even enough to cover the. Budget for this year if u confiscated it all...the deficit needs grown up solutions, don't be foolish (mark Jackson voice) ur better than that

[mugzi]

Xman, youve been fighting the good fight here and theres no one who appreciates that more than me. Ive been doing it for 2 plus years here on this thread.


All Im going to say is this. Its very easy for ideologues like Wingo, Duetta, Nats fan, seren, etc. to pop in on this thread and demagauge the GOP and anyone who doesnt cow tow to their myopic world view, but those who are intellectually privy to the truth know that as a nation we face very hard choices DIRECTLY CORRELATED to social engineering like the great society and other liberal wet dreams that have reared their ugly heads in the form of medicare and FDR'S social security that threaten to bankrupt this great CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC.

Thats where democrats show their ineptitude. They are devoid of solutions. They wish to promulgate the status quo and sustain their agenda by vilifying their opposition when it is they who offer NO SOLUTIONS to fiscal solvency or common sense because they only want to maintain power.

As much as I want to deport them to Russia where they belong, these people by and large arent evil, they have simply been brainwashed over decades by the media and academia to tow a party line that ultimately serves to benefit those in power and no one else. We see sycophants everyday via the media and elsewhere nuzzling from the democratic power teet.

I dont cheerlead for the GOP, I cheerlead for common sense conservatism. And those who oppose me do so because they are too bamboozled to know that the ideals they cherish are not even those that their party espouses. They are a sad caricature of a spiritually devoid culture hellbent on imposing widespread destitution.

I only wish that these people could see themselves for who and what they truly are. I neither loathe them or wish them harm, I pity them. For they are ultimately the sad punchline of a joke thats been played out since the beginning of time.

I know for a fact that if this nation was divided amongst red and blue the red state would emerge as the more solvent, morally, socially and fiscally within a few short years.

But what we will see is four more years of the great divider, which will gift wrap the presidency to the GOP in 2016. Thats what politics is in this country a swinging pendulum.


And the funny thing is, I will readily admit Ive been drinking tonight. Yet I nailed these mental fascists to a cross and called them out for everything they are and not one of them will respond to me in an intellectually equivalent manner because theyre incapable of doing so.