Jenksismyhero

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 11:27 AM) Vis a vis what? Expectations after the 2008 elections? Everyone admits that they set the bar way too high, no getting around that. But how can you compare recovering from a financial tsunami to another other situation (always cyclical, not endemic system-wide failure) that has happened since the Great Depression? You can't. He hasn't lived up to expectations, the Dems sold the Affordable Care Act poorly (not unlike the Clintons, and every lobby in the world entrenched with keeping the system profitable for insurance and drug companies, hospitals, doctors, etc., threw millions into convincing people to be afraid of change or "death panels" which already exist in the sense that poor people who can't afford treatment or whose health insurance doesn't cover many experimental procedures often die)... But the fact is that NOBODY really was convinced that the GOP solution of trickle down economics had any chance of being successful. Nobody in the country really believes that the rapidly escalating inequality between the rich and "normal" middle class in America is a good thing, either. Most GOP voters had no complaints about Obama on foreign policy, either. For that matter, he's getting more flack from the left than the right. In the end, the unemployment rate was a bigger issue than health care, but you've got all these corporations (especially the oil companies) getting tax breaks and subsidies from the government when they're making profits hand over fist. And yet who wrote those tax breaks into place? Hmmmmm....not Obama. People just want a "fair opportunity," not guaranteed results or a hand out. They want to believe in the American Dream again. It was alive and well under the Clintons, until Bush destroyed it almost single-handedly in 2 terms. To say that "nobody" in the country believes that stuff is moronic. 49% of the country did. You guys are making it seem like this was an ass whooping revolution. It was nothing of the sort. Yes, a couple of states picked up gay marriage and legalized drugs. Those have been losing battles for the last decade. That doesn't mean conservatism is dead or dying, especially the fiscal side. And the bolded is laughable. You watch too much Maddow. That's pure Dem-speak.

Huh? So all of those tea party candidates that won didn't really win because Democrats put up the wrong message? Isn't that what i'm arguing right now just from the reverse side?

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 11:21 AM) Im not ignoring anything. Im saying that it doesnt matter what other people think, this is what I think. And I dont want to be doing things because we subjectively think they are right or wrong in the moment. Id rather do things based on utility. Whether you agree with that or not, its your choice. Death penalty argument has nothing to do with my argument and in fact would be supported by the utility concept. The potential mistake vastly outweighs the gain of execution. I dont care whether the death penalty is right or wrong, I dont think its good or bad. The argument wasn't about what you think is right/wrong, it's whether the government already does this or not. You don't want government to be making those types of decisions and yet they do, all the time, so who cares if they make a moral decision on abortion. Add it to the list.

Edit: I guess that means you're really ok with the death penalty? Because if you don't want the government deciding any moral issue, well then we'll just go with the facts and the laws we have and if they're determined to be guilty then that's the final word. The moral dilemma that they MIGHT be putting to death someone that's innocent should have no say in the matter.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 11:13 AM) Okay a lot of that makes no sense. Fire departments, police departments and hospitals arent because they are the right thing to do, its because the collective as a whole benefits from pooling their resources together. Most people could not afford to have their own fire department or hospital, thus they agree to pool resources together. No idea how that is moral. Now health care, poor and education could be moral, that I agree with. And Im absolutely against the govt doing these things for moral reasons. The only reason I think the govt should be involved is economic reasons, morality should play no part. I am for small govt, I dont like the govt being involved in most things. Tax code isnt moral, its economical. Adam Smith in Wealth of Nations outlined why a progressive tax system is economically necessary in a capitalist society. You pay the govt because you get a benefit, not because its good or bad. According to my system you can freely agree to pay for services. If you dont want the services of the US, you are free to go somewhere else. You're ignoring the end goal - we want people to be free from crime, free from health problems, whatever. We do that not because we can, or because it's easier to do it collectively, but because we think its' right.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:54 AM) Already been answered. If thats how you want to define morality, then so be it. Thats not the way I was using the word, and arguing semantics is just boring. The intention of the use was to differentiate the govt making decisions based on what people interpret as "good" or "bad". The point is government makes decisions all the time based on morals, based on what we as a society believe is the "right" thing to do - providing assistance to the poor, providing education, providing healthcare, providing other life services like ambulances or fire departments or police protection. That's based on our morals, not because it was mandated by a document.

QUOTE (Jake @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:47 AM) The thing is both parties say both things. D's - We are going to use tax revenue to give the poor the chance to live with dignity and give them and their children to get out of poverty. Additionally, you should be able to take care of yourself medically and retire with the same dignity that you had when you worked for a living. In the background, we believe in things like building up our country's infrastructure, which will employ some of our poor but more importantly gives us the structure from which private businesses build on. As far as how you live socially, we're not too worried about that. Don't buy illegal drugs, don't kill people, don't steal. Beyond that, we aren't going to tell you what to do. R's - We are going to tax you less and you WILL like that. Your poor friends don't deserve s***! Perhaps a short period to get on their feet, and if they can't get a job after X amount of time it is clearly their own fault (not the rich guys hoarding money nor are the poor sometimes victims of market fluctuation). Spending money on their education is also a waste of time. We would fix the debt with these de-investments, but instead we will grow the military and play chicken with Iran and whoever else wants to bother us abroad. Don't worry though, we certainly won't waste money on healthcare and living expenses for the elderly either, so at least our strangely prioritized, bloated budget will still run a deficit. Socially, the government is your moral guiding light. We seek to make sure the government enforces aging perceptions of morality and religion. Our country is harmed by the gays, the working woman, pre-marital sex, Muslims, and all kinds of other horrible people. We will do our best as a government to hold those folks down. Cliffs: Democrats - "we'll support your life via safety nets and structural improvements, but get the hell out of your social life" Republicans - "we trust the market to save your ass when you become poor, but we will remedy this by dictating mostly church-based morality to you" Do you see why the message that won, won? I believe if Republicans want to compete, they need to drop the latter part of the message in a big way. "The government needs to spend less and it starts with you paying it less" is a very attractive argument for them. Unfortunately, they distract from it with all the stupid social s*** they try to dictate and the poor way they communicate their fiscal message. You can try to say that the ultra-poor vote in Democrats, but it isn't true. Taxpayers are voting in the Democrats and those votes can be changed under the right circumstances, with the right argument. I'll say this: I believe in Barack Obama and generally, the Democratic platform. I believed that given the circumstances of the beginning of Barack's presidency, it makes sense that things did not go as well financially as we/I hoped. I believe that things are getting better. I believe that 4 years was not quite long enough for Barack's policies to show their worth. I believe that Obamacare's measures have to actually come into effect before I can even begin to assess whether it works as well in practice as it sounds in theory. With that said, I expect marked improvement at the end of this term. For the Democrats to get my vote back in 2016, our financial situation will almost certainly have to get better. Civil rights will need to continually be expanded. Our path out of debt should be clear. If not, they are not promised my support. Well I disagree with the church-based morality comment. Romney never made that a part of his campaign. That's how the left has painted the GOP generally, even when that's a small, but vocal, part of the party. And i've agreed the social message, as given, didn't work. There are ways to make the GOP position on gay marriage, abortion and immigration much better, while not totally conceding the issues. The messages (or lack thereof) were made worse by the awful candidates like Murdoch saying insanely stupid things. That's such an easy PR topic for liberals, just like the 47% thing. Again, stupid candidate, but the fiscal platform is not the problem. SS I seriously don't understand how you can say liberalism won when pretty much everyone that supported Obama acknowledged he hasn't done a good job and it's more of a lesser of two evils situation. That's not advocating for more liberalism.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:29 AM) Just pointing out the hypocrisy. Conservative women who've had abortions don't want others to have that option. you realize there are conservatives that are pro-choice, right?

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:27 AM) I wish they documented the political positions of women who actually get abortions. I'd bet conservatives would be shocked at how many of their own go through with it. Anectdotally, I know more than a handful of conservative women, including family members, who've had an abortion. It's ok for them but not for others. How is this relevant at all? Just because people do it doesn't make it right.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:20 AM) It was a solid night for liberalism in general. If you really think it's because "blacks only voted for Obama because he's black," or that latinos only did so because they mistakenly believe the GOP's only policy is "deport 'em all," or that single women only did so because of "free contraceptives and abortions," or anything to do with the "takers" who want "stuff" and "things" unlike Traditional Americans, I'm glad. You are living in fantasy land.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:18 AM) I could say the same thing about right wingers who believe in the death penalty. How can you let humans decide whether another human is deserving of life or death? So shouldnt I be really fearful of the direction of the country? The bottom line is that you can have your morals and I can have my morals. I dont make you kill fetuses, you dont make me kill potentially innocent prisoners. Seems fair. I guess that is the leap I cant make. I cant force my morals on other people. Just because I am adamant in my belief that I am right, I dont force other people to do it, because its not for me to decide. If you want to know what makes me fearful, its when people want to legislate morality. We need less people thinking that they should be telling people how to live their life, not more. Oh please, we do this all the time.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:08 AM) If abortions should be illegal, what should be the punishment for the woman? The doctor? What's the punishment for those same people for illegal abortions after the first trimester?

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:00 AM) With regards to abortion, we already have decided how we're going to handle this. See Roe V. Wade. 5 people decided that. Not the country.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 10:05 AM) He won 8/9 "battleground" states, most by comfortable margins. The Democrats increased their lead in the Senate by adding progressive Senators. More Americans voted for Democrats for the House, but the GOP retained their advantage because of gerrymandering (e.g. PA and OH are both somewhere around 15R-5D despite more D votes overall in the state). 14 million less people voted than 4 years ago. Obama didn't get the support he got last election in those very same states. Romney failed to get the same kind of votes McCain got. This entire election was about s***ty candidates, not about platforms. Just about every analyst universally agrees with this. Do you really think the senate races were because people believe in what Democrats are selling and not because there were crappy candidates on the other side? The basic platform we're talking about here is the same one they've had for the last 30 years, and if you look, Republicans (and Clinton) have done very well with it.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:54 AM) I am a "have." Millions of others who voted for Democratic candidates across the country are "haves." Some of the biggest receivers of government aid are the elderly and poor rural white people, both major conservative constituencies. The unemployment rate among Occupy supporters was only a couple of percent higher than the national average. I sincerely hope that the GOP continues to believe that people didn't reject their platform but that they just didn't run a good enough marketing campaign for it. You act as if this was a landslide victory. It wasn't. We're 2 years removed from that very platform sweeping the country. This election was about a bad candidate and some s***ty news stories (Murdoch, Sandy, etc.). It was NOT about people being overly excited about Obama and where he is leading this country. So I hope democrats continue to believe that.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:53 AM) And we can argue about these sort of situations until we die. I understand. My point is that these situations are so incredibly complex, that very reasonable minds will always, always disagree. So to sit here and debate it in some effort to reach consensus is foolish. Seems to me our efforts would be better put to use by seeking out more preventive measures. I agree with this but we also, at some point, have to decide how we're going to handle it as a society. And we further need to decide if government should be involved at all in those decisions (i.e., paying for those decisions).

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:47 AM) Was Terry Schaivo a human being like you or I that was "killed" when they finally unplugged the machines? Well, she was a human being but not like you or I given her medical status, and yes, she was "killed" when the machine was unplugged. But again that goes to my point - the baseline is that she is alive and a human being and she was killed by choice. We can then decide the moral decision of whether or not that was justified.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:38 AM) This viewpoint is why people across the country rejected the GOP. I hope they fully embrace the Randianism. How can you not agree with that? One of the main differences between the parties today is that one thinks the government should provide or assist, the other thinks they should get out of the way. If you have no job or are in massive debt and you have one candidate that says it's rich peoples' responsibility to pay back (and also that it's their fault they don't have a job) and it's government responsibility to create jobs, and you have another that says pull up your boot straps, who are you going to vote for? And in general, young people have no exposure to a lot of the issues that go into those policies. They don't own homes, they don't invest, they don't have their own businesses, they don't have kids...they don't have to deal with a lot of the issues that older Americans deal with. See also, the entire occupy movement - I have no job, f*** society, let me blog about it on my iPad! That principle is not the problem with the GOP's platform. The problem is in the messaging of it. The problem is allowing liberals to paint you into "look at the crazy old man talking about God causing rape!" camp because you pander too much to an extreme crowd that actually believes that nonsense.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:35 AM) SS, I have an extraordinary amount of respect for your intellect and your debating prowess. You usually seem to have a very good handle on most issues, and this one is no different. That being said, I just find this scientific/moralistic approach to be a bit grotesque. Look, we all know what nature's course is when a woman becomes impregnated. To attach some sort of timeline to the process in an attempt to make oneself feel better about when it is morally acceptable to artificially end that process seems to be sort of a cop out to me. I've always thought the more authentic approach is to be honest with ourselves about what is really at stake here and admit that creating a life brings an incredible responsibility to those (and many times not those) responsible. It is a tremendously complex decision as to whether or not the parent(s) and/or others have the resources, the ability, the education and maturity to handle such an awesome responsibility. Now I understand that many will say the life of the baby trumps all the other considerations, which is why we have gone down this path of making some sort of psuedo scientific/moralistic judgment as to when life actually begins - because these judgments have the ability to alleviate that conundrum. But that seems to me to really just be pulling the wool over one's eyes in an effort to displace or offset guilt. Why don't we just admit that as human beings we have some pretty awesome responsibilities that we have to become better stewards of? This isn't to say we should all go out and get snipped, but honestly, this situation is what it is, and what it isn't, is one where science should be able to make us feel better about looking the other way. There is a utilitarian approach to the issue, sure. We have justifiable homicides for the same reason. But we start with a baseline that murder is wrong, and work justifications from there. We don't start with "well, i mean is that REALLY murder? I mean, was that REALLY a person that was killed?"

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:23 AM) I haven't staked an opinion on this issue, because honestly, it has always been one that I didn't know where I stand. I can honestly say I have felt the same as people on both sides, at various times. Here are the only things I feel I can say with confidence... 1. The key to the issue, really, is whether or not you think an early-stage fetus is a "human life". That is the only true delineator here. 2. If you think human life begins at conception or at some point after, but before the limits of legal abortion, than I can completely understand how angry you would feel to know that abortions beyond that limit are occurring. To that person, it is murder. 3. If you think human life requires the ability to live outside the womb, than I completely understand your strong belief to protect the rights of women to control they bodies. Makes perfect sense from that perspective. 4. I will say this... if you truly believe that life begins at conception... then you cannot possibly be OK with rape exemptions, and probably not incest either. Because in either case, it has become life. If you believe life begins at conception, then the only exception you can possible accept from a moral standpoint is danger to the life of the mother (because then you have two lives in danger and must choose). I know #4 will piss off some people, but, it is the way I see it. Good post. I'm #2 for sure. I defy anyone to sit in a hospital room with their wife, looking at and seeing their unborn baby ESPECIALLY up to the 20 week mark, and seriously believe it's not a "human life."

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 01:00 AM) With the unemployment rate being so high in the 18-29 age group that ---ch-slapped both McCain and Romney in two consecutive elections, how can you explain Obama's appeal to those aforementioned young people? Just slick marketing? Palin and Ryan were roughly the same age as Obama or younger, why weren't they attractive enough to sway votes? Because for people looking for something (jobs, help with debt, etc) it's an easier sell to say "we should be helping you!" than "government needs to stop being so involved in our lives." The GOP message is geared more towards the "haves" than the "have nots." And that's a major problem in the next election, although hopefully the economy will be better and their will be more "haves."

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 09:18 AM) Like I said, call it what you want. But I have no doubt if the parties were reversed the race card would be played all over this issue. Kinda like how 93% of one minority voted for the same minority. Imagine if 93% of white people voted for Romney. Everyone's a racist!

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 08:15 AM) Living in a society where women can't choose what to do with their own bodies is very dangerous as well. So this statement has the fetus in mind? GMAB.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 08:59 AM) Yes, liberals have no morals, no ethics and hate life. Right-wingers fears' for the direction of this country are legitimate and rational, especially over the past three days. Your (and liberals, generally) apathy towards this issue is disheartening. The fact that you don't even question the mothers right signals to me that you view a mother's freedom to correct a mistake as more important than an unborn, yet living, life. I agree with you in the those exception cases like incest, rape or the mother's health. Not in general cases of "I don't want this thing" which even if rare, should not happen IMO.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 9, 2012 -> 08:49 AM) I'm gonna guess the trope about the founder of Planned Parenthood in the 20's being pro-eugenics. It's nonsense because allowing women to choose what to do isn't a genocide. It's this kind of obliviousness on minority and women's issues that is hurting the GOP so badly right now. And similarly, the complete lack of morals/ethics about life that cause said right wingers to be literally fearful of the direction of this country.