Republican Wins Massachusetts senate race

[CaptainHaplo]

Torvald - while the Dems tried to play this off as yet another class battle (as you seem to indicate you believe) - this was more about the huge DEBT we as a nation have incurred, and the plans to continue adding to such debt with things like cap and trade, health care reform, etc.

It also doesn't help that the Dems are giving exemptions to their supporters in legislation (such as the unions not having to have their health care taxed for an extra 5 years, but everyone else will as scheduled), deciding who is going to get hit with "recover the TARP money" fees - namely banks - whether they took TARP money or not (which is inherently bogus to take from someone claiming your recovering the money you gave them, when you know they never took it) - as well as letting some groups - like Fannie and Freddie, as well as other groups in other sectors - like GM, not have to pay it back. That alone is like saying that well, Ford didn't take any bailout money, but they have to pay it back anyway....

The reality is that the majority of the people - of EVERY stripe politically - are by and large concerned with the direction of the country. This isn't isolated, other recent elections have shown the same thing. The problem isn't that people are standing up for this or that group - the problem is that the Democrats have been in control and claiming they are standing up for the "little guy" - but the reality is they are instead more concerned about their own power and agenda to even listen to the little guy. Ultimately, they have looked at the people and said "we know you don't like what we are doing, but shut up and sit down because we know what we are doing and your opinions dont matter" - or as Pelosi said - "We hear them, but it won't change anything". That is what has caused this backlash, and make no mistake, this is a HUGE blow to the Democratic party as a whole.

[MothBalls]

Brings a whole new meaning to 'paint the town red'. The Dems are about to paint the entire country red.

[Aramike]

Wow, does anyone realize how huge of a story this is? This practically overnight changes the very face of the healthcare debate, cap and trade, and even President Obama's mandate.

It also shows people for who they are - the Democrats, who I typically find to be far more emotionally driven rather than intellectually, have yet again proven that through their insistance at their mandate, and their claims of the other party being practically dead.

They just lost in the most fortified liberal stronghold in America, and they lost the very seat held by the so-called "Liberal Lion".

Wake up: Americans are pissed. The trillion dollar bailout, the FAKE claims about its successes, the claims of jobs being saved when they were only government employees getting raises, etc, have only served to make John Q. Public grow tired of the BS. Now we have clear promises of transparency broken and a group of politicians who care only about passing legislation that we can neither afford nor do we WANT, and the wake-up call has been issued.

Thank God - liberal arrogance is astonishing, considering that these people claim to be the most open-minded amongst us.

[August]

Coakleys negative campaigning turned a lot of people to Brown as well. Not to mention getting caught in an outright lie about treatment for rape victims of all things.

[nikimcbee]

Originally Posted by SteamWake

OMG a soda out the nose moment...

Hopefully this will be the high water mark for socialism in the US

[Jianaran]

Oh dear, yet more fearmongering at work...
I must say, I still find it pretty funny how what the US calls "left-wing" is the rest of the world's right, and as soon as a party tries to act left-of-centre, they're branded socialist. It'd be almost funny, if you guys weren't the biggest economy in the world.

Anyway, I hope for America's sake that Obama can get the health-care through and keep it up before he and his party are torn apart by the misinformed public. The fact is, America's healthcare system as it currently stands is one of the most expensive and least effective ones in the civilised world.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_...ry_comparisons
Look at those charts: The US is clearly spending a lot more than most other people. Look at the link: in general, they're getting less for it.
(there was a better diagram in the latest National Geographic, but I don't have a scanner and I can't find it online)

Whilst Obama certainly isn't perfect, he seems from here (australia) to be the best president you guys have had for some time. I also greatly respect him for moving away from the ultraconservative political view that America seems to have fallen into in recent decades. As I said earlier, trying to fix healthcare isn't socialism (which apparently = communism, which is apparently a very bad thing), it's merely a return to sanity.

[FIREWALL]

Where's China, India and other high population countries like the U.S on your graphs ?

Of course we spend more. We have more people.

[magic452]

Your graphs may or may not be accurate I really don't know, they most certainly do not justify passing a very bad reform bill.

Obamacare in no way does anything to improve the situation, but just the opposite makes health care spending rise dramatically, cuts benefits for many and does almost nothing to improve health care.

I'm retired and on Medicare and have been paying into it since it's inception and 1/10 for my social Security check goes to paying even more. Add the fact that I have to pay $200.00 a month in supplemental insurance to get even reasonably good health care coverage. Now this idiot wants to take away some of my benefits and give them to someone else for free.

He may seem good to you over 8,000 miles away in Australia but you don't have to pay the bill that this idiot has run up. He would look good to me too if he was 8,000 miles away on another continent and I wish he was.

The last idiot we had and this one we have now are actually making Bill Clinton look pretty good, could stand the man myself, but even though he didn't accomplish much he didn't screw up much either.

I have been around since the Eisenhower administration and in all those years I have seen some pretty bad politicians but nothing to compare to the slim balls we have running our country for the last year, and the previous bunch wasn't much better. Back to back idiots.

Just for fun go find a graph that shows percentage of tax paid in all those countries and see just how cheap health care really is.

Public option health care is not Socialisum but it's a very big step in that direction, one I don't care to take.

There are far better ways to repair health care than Obamacare. Let's start there and fix what we can than see about getting better care for those that can't get it or afford it.

Magic

Just for fun go find a graph that shows percentage of tax paid in all those countries and see just how cheap health care really is.

Tax rates in the first two countries on the graph .
#1. up to 39% plus up to 12%
#2. up to 25%

#1. up to 35% plus up to 10%
#2. up to 13%

#1. 15%
#2. nothing

#1. up to 10%
#2. up to 7%
Looks like yours is the more expensive

Of course we spend more. We have more people.

OK, what does percentage mean?

[magic452]

Switzerland??????
Try some of the ones that actually spend money on defense???? No offense to the Swiss.
Don't know where you got those numbers but there are millions in this country that pay no taxes and in fact get refundable tax credits.

OK, what does percentage mean?

You don't understand the theories of Economy of Scale or Diminishing Returns do you?

But yes we do spend too much on health care and too many people don't get what they need.

1) Until there is reform in the way insurance is sold, (intrastate only), Not being able to buy insurance any were in the country from any company only adds complexity and expense for no benefit and lack of competition also adds to cost. No where is this addressed by Obamacare.


2) Reform tort laws involving health care, ($100,000,000.00+ lawsuits which the lawyers pocket 30 to 50%) This is also missing from Obamacare.

3) Prescription drugs is no doubt one the fastest rising health care cost in this country. Foreign countries get US drugs at a fraction of the cost we pay, forcing all the R&D cost on us. Yet we don't get the same in return for non US drugs. Most of this is a result of free trade agreements.

I have seen my mom's drug expense more than double in the last 5 years.
She is reasonably healthy for 96 years but does take a few drugs. My neighbor has Dietaries and his drug expense is in the thousands per month and has also doubled in the last 5 years. # 2 above also applies here as well. None of this is addressed by Obamacare.

4) Fix Medicare and Medicaid before adding millions of new people to the list. And in the proses passing much of the cost to the states with no funding. That alone would bankrupt California ( but not Nebraska!)

These are just a few things that need to be addressed before going to a more comprehensive reform.

We have a broken health care system here but that is no reason to pass a very bad bill that makes the system even worse.

Not to mention the slime way this administration is forcing this abomination down our throats.

Magic

[SteamWake]

Besides its not all about health care

[Ships-R-Us]

Un f in believeale. I spent time in Ashland as a youngster as well as a summer cottage in Barnstable. My SS# begins with 001 and I am proud of it.....You need an Ohio Class sub, Trident 2's and MIRVS, and take the bas.... out......Ships.........PS: where do you live there August? Have a good one and go get 'em.

Switzerland??????
Try some of the ones that actually spend money on defense???? No offense to the Swiss.

A percentage of GDP spent on healthcare is a percentage GDP spent on healthcare.

Don't know where you got those numbers but there are millions in this country that pay no taxes and in fact get refundable tax credits.

Just like in other countries on the list then.
Though of course Switzerland is a prime choice as its rather famous as somewhere to avoid tax

You don't understand the theories of Economy of Scale or Diminishing Returns do you?

So with the application of that theory you should be able to perform better than countries with higher tax rates as their revenue would be more diminished....look at the graph in question, them famously high tax countries score much better than the US don't they.

[SteamWake]

WASHINGTON, Jan 20 (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama will stick to his policy agenda despite his Democratic Party's loss of a key Senate seat in a Massachusetts special election, a top White House aide said on Wednesday.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN2014253120100120

[GoldenRivet]

B.O.

wholly a fool is he.