Government Shutdown

[Tchocky]

Pardon me for what may be a stupid question - but wasn't the best time to fight the ACA when it was up for a vote?

Or voting for the guy who said he'd repeal it?

I'm just saying these were better days to fight. Not now, when the President won't sign a repeal, the Senate won't pass it, and 3/4 of the country opposes shutting down the government in order to hack at the ACA?

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

Pardon me for what may be a stupid question - but wasn't the best time to fight the ACA when it was up for a vote?

Or voting for the guy who said he'd repeal it?

I'm just saying these were better days to fight. Not now, when the President won't sign a repeal, the Senate won't pass it, and 3/4 of the country opposes shutting down the government in order to hack at the ACA?

If I'm not mistaken the GOP has been asking for a repeal for quite sometime(42 times). The Dems have closed ears then and still today.

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by Mr Quatro

Have you noticed the media reporting on the big shut down?

Oh yes. I'll check both left and right wing news sources just to see what both are portraying.

They are stirring it up big time, they are using both sides against each other, they are frowning and laughing and making gestures on who to blame.

Of course! It's

I just leave it on CNN

I used to rely on just CNN but no longer. I find they are just as biased as foxnews, only they are much more subtle about it. On that note, nowadays ill look at both, take notes of how either is portraying things, then make my own decision based on the comparison.

[Bilge_Rat]

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

If I'm not mistaken the GOP has been asking for a repeal for quite sometime(42 times). The Dems have closed ears then and still today.

That's not his point. If the american voters really wanted to repeal ACA, they could have voted in Romney, voted in a GOP majority in the Senate, even voted in a majority for the GOP house (1.7 million more votes for Dem candidates for the House than GOP candidates in '12), etc., etc...

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

That's not his point. If the american voters really wanted to repeal ACA, they could have voted in Romney, voted in a GOP majority in the Senate, even voted in a majority for the GOP house (1.7 million more votes for Dem candidates for the House than GOP candidates in '12), etc., etc...

they already had a majority in the house of rep since the 2010 elections where republicans were voted in and set a record for the largest republican victory EVER RECORDED since the civil war and in the last election they did vote in a bigger majority for the GOP house but it meant nothing since they didn't get enough seats in the senate to have any say in what bills get voted on there.

the American voters do want to repeal Obamacare but they cant because they are lazy and greedy and want get a government check every month and if they vote republican they might not get that free government check every month and have to go find a job.

I see people every day laughing because they get paid not to work.

if you lose your job and are depressed you get full disability because of depression and if you get a job you lose your disability so they sit home and watch soap operas all day collecting disability and food stamps.

caring for people is one thing and helping those in need is great but you need to make sure those getting help really need it.

this dependency on a government check means they have an incentive not to change the system so the free gravy train never stops.

the republicans allowed government handouts to get too far out of hand and the dems were laughing as they knew it meant no one would ever vote against free money so they would never lose power.

for these reasons and those reasons alone we have obamacare today

oh and everyone should stop calling it ACA because that's just a lie there is nothing that is affordable in the affordable care act. its not affordable, everyone will be denied all but the most basic care, and the government doesn't care if you live or die as in the case of that poor little girl Cathleen sevilias denied a lung transplant because the cost analysis chart said it didn't have good odds of success vs the cost risk.

thank god private donors found a way to pay for it to save the girls life that's your example of the oft denied government death panels already at work

[Oberon]

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

That's not his point. If the american voters really wanted to repeal ACA, they could have voted in Romney, voted in a GOP majority in the Senate, even voted in a majority for the GOP house (1.7 million more votes for Dem candidates for the House than GOP candidates in '12), etc., etc...

Obamacare is the exact replica of Romnycare sir. Kind of hard to win over votes stating you will repeal Obamacare when you have Romnycare in your own state.

[Tchocky]

Nevertheless, his explicit promise was to repeal it on day one. That he lost the election is relevant.

You can't use the House results to claim what the American people want while disregarding other election results.

[Oberon]

Also, people saying about the news stirring things up and playing both sides off against each other can't help but remind me of this:

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

Nevertheless, his explicit promise was to repeal it on day one. That he lost the election is relevant.

You can't use the House results to claim what the American people want while disregarding other election results.

Well then what can we claim on the House results?

[Tchocky]

You can claim that the elections produced mixed messages. That's about it. Lawmakers have to do their own thinking instead of dueling mandates which gets you precisely nowhere.

It's just like anything else - if the situation can be boiled down to a single sentence that blames one faction - then your sentence is almost certainly wrong.

One factor that skews the House elections in particular is increased gerrymandering since the 2010 redistricting. This is how you get a GOP majority out of a Democratic popular vote victory.

Almost none of the GOP House members represent a district won by Obama. They have little reason to compromise because their safe-seat constituents don't want them to.

You can't say it's obvious that the American people don't want the ACA to go ahead - as some are saying here.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

I used to rely on just CNN but no longer. I find they are just as biased as foxnews, only they are much more subtle about it.

People always give Fox grief for calling themselves "fair and balanced", but that's why they did it in the first place. They were the only service providing an alternative to CNN and friends.

Originally Posted by Tchocky

Nevertheless, his explicit promise was to repeal it on day one. That he lost the election is relevant.

You can't use the House results to claim what the American people want while disregarding other election results.

campaign promises are irrelevant and he cant repeal anything if he wanted to unless the legislation to do that passed through the house and senate in the form of a bill so he could sign it.


the senate has 100 senators but based on the last roll call numbers the house has 516 members so it is the senate that does not accurately represent the will of the people. not to mention they get elected for 6 year terms so you rarely get a chance to throw those bums out because of it. I think it was only around 18 senators that were involved in the 2010 elections, hardly a chance to make any wholesale changes but the republicans did pick up enough seats to make some dems very nervous about what may happen in 2014.


it is the senate that doesn't represent the will of the people since it is a very small number of elected representatives who are "supposed to" represent our views but never do.

in fact it is the house of representatives that shows the greatest will of the peoples intentions from voting because they only serve 2 or 4 year terms even if those who get elected often don't vote as they promise to do when they wanted to get elected.

Originally Posted by Tchocky

One factor that skews the House elections in particular is increased gerrymandering since the 2010 redistricting. This is how you get a GOP majority out of a Democratic popular vote victory.

Almost none of the GOP House members represent a district won by Obama. They have little reason to compromise because their safe-seat constituents don't want them to.

its your democrat leaders who invented and installed redistricting in the first place because they were losing too many seats in congress so they invented it to redraw the lines to favor democrats in the name of "fair representation of minorities" claiming their voice and votes were being canceled out by the majority so they weren't fairly represented.

when the republican governors got elected they got the ability to redraw the lines the way they saw fit to so your side invented the cheating now you want to cry about it. when republicans were elected in vast numbers all across America in the 2010 elections this changed who got to draw those lines so in some states they were redrawn in a fair way and in others they were drawn to favor republicans.

I actually agree its an abomination to draw squiggly lines all over like a tetris puzzle but you cant have it only your way. get rid of it altogether and follow the lines on the map to make even sided districts in every state.

[Tchocky]

My side?

Not an American.

My point overall is that electoral results are one way to look at the situation. It's important to see the limitations and caveats though, which is why I jumped in on what AVG said.