Republicans & Conservatives: Archives

How right you are. I’m a newcomer to blogging, and I have to say I’ve been somewhat disappointed at how much some of the threads resemble an AOL chat room, with people bashing each other for no better reason than because they know they can. It saddens me to think that even those who attempt to inform themselves of the world are still not above pettiness and dogmatism.

I hope I’m not one of the ones who feels like saying “I told you so.”

Dawn,
I like your observation about how dumb the conservatives and liberals make their arguments. They seem to accept the facts that only support their view point while disregaurding equal facts that tend to show their point of view in contrast. For this reason, most Americans are seperating themselve from the two major parties each year. Now, all America needs is an Independant that is ready to run on the reality that Americans face for our future. Speaking from the truth of the facts seems to silence each side’s extremists and bring the moderates to help find a solution.

This election means four more years of hiding from the fact that the Democrats and Republicans don’t have a vision that is bigger than life itselve. Until we get a person who can energize the populace to build the future we have all dreamed about than America citizens and the world will have to settle for the same BS.

Welcome Alejo !

Good post Henry. Bravo. Has your roof caved in yet? Mine hasn’t.

Nope! Have faith that Americans will do the right thing once we know the truth about any issue. The problem is getting our elected officals to understand that. Not everything can be a Win-Win-Win solution, sometimes someone has to lose. That’s when our government needs to offset those side effects.

I expect most people to just ignore this and go to another topic since I didn’t give a lot to argue about.

Dawn

If you have read my posts, you know that I usually support you and that I am moderate in my attacks, although strong in some of my opinions. In this case, I think you may have missed the point, however. The blog is a place for people to sharpen their arguments and to have fun arguing. I would rather run smack into opposition rather than have someone say something like “we all have equally valid opinions”. When I play games, I would rather lose than tie. This is a game.

Fortunately, in the real world people are more accommodating in practice, if not in rhetoric. I will vote for GW Bush. I will work for him and defend him. I will point out the many flaws in John F. Kerry’s character and policies. But I know Democrats aren’t bad, only misguided and I don’t really believe the world will end if it is Kerry who is sworn in next January.

I am convinced that both Kerry and Bush (and Nader and the others) are men of integrity. In America we are lucky that way. All the major candidates want to do what is best for the USA. Of course, this is the last time I will admit that about John Kerry.

Way back when I was in school the teacher had us play a game with cards. One card had a picture of a tank, the other a flower. Each player could decide to hold up the tank or the flower. If one held up the tank and the other the flower, the tank got two points and the flower got nothing. If both held up the tank, neither got any points and if both held up the flower, both got two points. If you wanted to maximize total points, the best strategy is always for both players to hold up a flower. Most of us boys tried to “game” i.e. use the tank when we thought we could get away with it. The teacher was appalled. She said we were aggressive and should learn to be more cooperative. She forgot that it was only a game. If she was handing out real money instead of points, we would collude to do the flowers, but in a game … well let me quote a famous Italian philosopher, Vince Lombardi, “Winning is not the most important thing; winning is the only thing.”

Jack,
What is winning if winning is losing your soul?

Henry

My point was that in game situations we should always try to win AND try to play fairly. Some of life is in fact a game, some is not. I suspect that I define more of life a game than you do. That has its good and bad aspects. One the one hand I never hold it against anyone who beats me fairly and I don’t crush opponents after they are out of the game. On the other hand, the insouciance bothers a lot of people. In politics you should be fighting for what you believe in and you should be fighting to win. But you have to recognize that you are probably wrong in many of the details. In the long run, society is statistical. It takes a lot of different and conflicting ideas to create the synergy needed to make us all successful.

You were right in your post. I think you were referring to Matthew and it is something we should all keep in mind so I include the quotation.

For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. (Matthew 16:24-27 AV)

Jeack,
Thanks, I knew somebody a lot smarter I said it better, but we as a society need to explain to ALL EXTREMIST that THINK that they are right almost are always wrong. And that makes us that KNOW we are right just plain mad. Common Sense, Logic, and Facts should drive the debates on the issues. Compasion and forgiveness should be the result of finding a solution. I thunk many of us loose sight of these things as we make our point of views known to others.

Jack,
When I was in 6th grade we had a class president election as a learning exercise. We had a class with more girls than boys.

I didn’t particularly want to run, but supported the boys. We chose a candidate that was cogenial and popular. I acted as a campaign manager and wrote his speeches. We knew we had to win a few girl votes to win.

The teacher intervened and told us that the candidates had to write their own speeches, after our candidate stumbled over a speech I had written. He wasn’t very eloquent. So we set about subverting the process and I carefully and secretly crafted his speeches in his own vernacular.

I came up with an idea for a suggestion box to give the class a voice in field trips, since both candidates were talking about vague ideas of good leadership…yada.yada, yada, to swing some votes with something tangible for the class.

We won. Our candidate sucked as president and the girl candidate would have been a better choice. I’ve been cynical about politics ever since.

This lesson has always informed my politcal thoughts.

Jack,

On the home page of this site it says :

“Let’s face it, politics is confusing. Sometimes it’s difficult to know who to believe, who to listen to and who to support. We’re here to help.”

You said :

“The blog is a place for people to sharpen their arguments and to have fun arguing.” and “This is a game.”

The difference in those two statements is why I think you missed my point.

I’m sure you recall the old saying … “It’s not whether you win or lose. It’s how you play the game.” I don’t think anyone ever believed it didn’t matter if they lost. I can’t say I know anyone who likes to lose.

I play a game. Twice a week. Bowling. I have been doing this for 25 years now.
I have always been way up there in the standings. Usually in the top 5 for average.
I moved to a small town from a place 5 times the size when I was about 21. I found the bowling center and joined a league right away.
They put me on a team of people I did not know and made friends with pretty quickly. I was having trouble making other friends. I had no idea why. I hadn’t done anything to them.
I would try to talk to people. They were polite but that was it.
I thought it was because I was new in town and there were people who were blaming us for taking their jobs. My Dad was relocated.

Turns out that it was because I was a good bowler. Sounds silly.
There was and still is a group of people who are made up of some of the better bowlers and their friends that pretty much run the place.
People were not speaking to me because since I was a better bowler they thought I was part of that group.
Over the years people have come to realize that I talk to everybody. I may be a better bowler, but that does not make me better than them. I beat just about everybody out there. It doesn’t bother them because while I am beating them I am also helping them to get better. People now say, “I like it when we bowl your team even though you always beat us.”
The group that I was referring to does not have the power they once had. No one tried to take over and replace them. We didn’t need to. They are the ones that changed. They realized that people were talking, knew what was going on, and they were about to lose their control over them. Bowlers were threatening to quit and some went through with it. At first they acted like they didn’t care. I think they woke up and realized it would not be easy to replace them - No Bowlers - No Job. They no longer just set all the rules and make people think they are better than them. They take into account what everyone thinks. They are even liked by most people now.

To me that is a win win situation.

Maybe Vince Lombardi was a little vague. After all, he didn’t have someone to interpret what he really meant when he said that.

Dawn, that’s a pretty good article.

On a mundane note, I’d like to see more links supporting people’s positions. I know I’m sometimes guilty of assuming people know about the things I reference in my posts. I’ll try to be better.

On a more partisan note. I’d love to see more articles on this side that actually inform.

• I’d love to see a conservative explain how Bush’s health care plan is a winner.
• I’d love to see a conservative explain Bush’s Iraq strategy step-by-step and explain how it’s going to make Iraq a liberal democracy.
• I really want to see a conservative talk about conservative foreign policy as practiced by Bush.
• I’d love to see a conservative explain why Bush’s energy policy is the best we can do.
• I’d like to know how conservatives believe Bush’s tax policies affected our economy, and why they should be made permanent.

I almost never see issues discussed on this side of the page. I’ve actually resorted to blogging them myself, because contributers on this side seem to be content writing nothing but “I hate Kerry” articles.

In fact, I’d just be happy to see an “I hate Kerry’s ??? plan” article if it’s too hard for you guys to defend Bush’s policies.

AP,

I will be the first to admit that I don’t know everything.
Sometimes I think people go on the defense quicker than they need to and then others join in.
Issues. That would be nice.
One of the reasons I joined this site.

I would like to know things about Kerry.

It would be nice if a candidate’s views could be shared without the other being bashed first or in the process.

Maybe it isn’t as fun.

Now for the view from the other side. I don’t see very many stands for Kerry that don’t include personal attacks on Bush in the Dem’s department either.

I wanted to know how Kerry would get the countries that are not helping in the war at all to help and answers I get are mainly bash Bush answers.
I liked the one where I was told that things will be different in the months ahead so how can I expect him to say what he will do?
At the same time we hear about how Bush’s plan isn’t working and won’t - but Kerry doesn’t have to lay out a plan because he doesn’t know exactly what the situation will be.
Funny.
You want a ‘step by step’ for Iraq. I don’t think either one of them can do that.

Maybe some of your questions will be answered - after all, that last statement probably flattered everyone.

I don’t see very many stands for Kerry that don’t include personal attacks on Bush in the Dem’s department either.

I see Republicans playing pretty loose with the definition of “personal attack”.

If I point out that Bush is making some pretty crappy policy choices, that’s not a personal attack. If I say Bush is making bad choices because he’s dumb as a stump, that’s a personal attack.

I try to focus on the issue attacks, but every once in a while, I feel like giving in to the Bush bashing. :)

I’ve blogged on a bunch of Kerry’s proposals since I started writing for WatchBlog - feel free to check ‘em out in the archives.

As for Kerry’s plan to internationalize Iraq, I addressed that in my latest article but it bears repeating:

Kerry will give those countries a stake in making Iraq successful. He will open up bidding on reconstruction projects, and he will allow them - through the UN - greater control over the Iraqi institutions that we currently control exclusively.

Bush has so far refused to do that.

AP,

You said, “Kerry will give those countries a stake in making Iraq successful. He will open up bidding on reconstruction projects, and he will allow them - through the UN - greater control over the Iraqi institutions that we currently control exclusively.”

What if Iraq doesn’t want that? Would that make Kerry a liar?

Iraq should decide who can come into their country and profit from it. Do you know for a fact that this isn’t Bush’s intention? (Iraq deciding that is.) I would think that some things have not been made public yet for different reasons. Kerry can go around saying whatever he wants - maybe there are some things that Bush just can’t have made public yet -

Maybe the Iraqi people don’t want France and Germany in their country profiting from their reconstruction when they weren’t there to topple Hussein.
Maybe they would welcome them with open arms because they want to show they are joining the ‘civilized’ world and want to be able to work with all countries.

I watched Allawi at the UN. I tried to catch which countries had empty tables. (I was also helping my daughter learn to read at the same time - since Bush hasn’t showed up yet to do it for me.)
Do you know?

Dawn,
People thought before 9/11 that America was safe and our government was on top of things. Guess what? They were wrong.

Today more than ever each citizen needs to pay attention about their surroundings. I have personally have had to report to the police things that didn’t seem right at the time. Imagine that you are taking your child to school when all of a sudden you see an 18 wheel tanker setting on a side road 100 yards from the school. What do you do?

Henry,
Here is how I answered that in “Group Wins Battle Against ……” in the Third Party section.

Seems like a rhetorical question.

Call me crazy - that does not compare to news reporters taking things on flights in their carry on bags or in their luggage only to come on television and let the world (and the terrorists) know where our weak points are.
I would be happy if that was reported to the proper authorities and not to me.

In that situation I could have waited until the end of the story - ‘we did this and they fixed it this way’ …. the media can use something like that as leverage to get things done. ‘Fix this problem or we will let the people know you aren’t doing your job.’ or even - ‘We found this out 2 months ago and we waited to tell the American Public until the plan to fix it was set in motion for fear of tipping off terrorists to our weakness.’

Seems to me that sometimes America’s ‘Right to Know’ does not out-weigh what the consequences may be. Maybe people forget that the ‘bad guys’ watch television and surf the net the same as we do.

Common sense and good judgement seem to be things that need to be used here also.

******
I would also like to add this …

Our government asked us to use our imaginations to come up with ideas for possible terrorist attacks.

I have done just that.

The thing is … I would never post it on this website or any other and I would never go to the media with it first.

Why ? Someone may have already come up with the same idea and it is already in the works to prevent it.

Blurting it out to everyone could spoil an investigation that may already be in progress that I had no idea about AND it may keep people from going about their daily lives and quite possibly hurt the economy.

What would you do?

Dawn,
I asked you what you would do about the tanker setting by the school and you refused to abswer me on the grounds of “Seems like a rhetorical question.” I’m sorry you feel that way and it probably explains you being scared of the ‘bad guys.’ Yes, any place can be attacked with little effort if you know where to look. In fact, this past summer Texas had 6-7 refiner expolsions that to this date has not been covered by the media except to say they happened. Ever wonder why the news never got close to this places?

No, the answer is simple and straight forward. As before 9/11 and even after 9/11 citizens is the biggest weapon the US has in fighting crime and terrorism. The tanker may be broke down, waiting to make a local delivery, or have a million other reasons for being there; however, if you as a citizen is not sure of why the tanker is near the school you have three chooses. 1) Do nothing and think your government has everything under control. 2) Contact local officer and inform them of the tanker. 3) Be a brave American and approach the driver of the tanker and ask him what he thinks he is doing. The latter I would expect from a man although I know many women that would walk up to the driver in a heart beat.

Being an American citizen requires a person to be brave and responsible for not only their own actions, but of their community as well. I might think that the left may want to pass on getting involved with the law; however, the right is always talking about taking responsiblity. Isn’t your child safety worth sticking your nose in where it does not belong?

Sorry Henry.
I guess because I knew what I would do, and what I expect anyone else to do, you would know what I meant when I said that. I wasn’t refusing to answer you.

I pick door #3. I am one of those women who would actually go up to the truck to see if the driver needed help - though I wouldn’t simply walk right up - I would see if anything looked odd or out of place to me as I did it.

I would actually have to be in the situation before I can tell you if I would go ahead and drop my daughter off first - though if I dropped her off first I could inform someone else of the truck and that I was about to go see about the driver and they could call the police.
I wouldn’t necessarily call the police immediately - though I could since I have a phone in my vehicle -

Hard to answer. I know I wouldn’t blow it off.

Dawn,
Very good! You must have been involved in your community for a while. For some of us it is easy to envoke our rights as a citizen when we need to. Thats because we have been taught what our rights and duties are as a citizen of this great country.

However, it’s sad to say that most parents will not get involved let alone stop what they are doing and take action themselve. No, they leave to other people “More Qualified.” Some do have a good story to tell about how they got caught up in the system or something, but many more hide just by natural instincts.

By allowing the pubilic to be part of the system, our local leaders can make informed decission. It’s surprising just how little they know on any given subject. Therefore, the public needs to educate the council so that they can debate behind closed doors on what the best way is to proceed.

Just like the Senate and House Committee meetings are both open and closed to the public, so is any government hearing. Although the entire decission and actions is not released to the pulic, the general information is released as soon as possible. That is the reason once in a while you can hear a Senator say that they can not comment on a subject or an issue.

Kerry can go around saying whatever he wants - maybe there are some things that Bush just can’t have made public yet -

Ahh, the old “the president has secret information” placebo. I remember hearing that about Saddam’s WMD after Blix said he didn’t think it was likely there were any. Turned out Blix was right.

Dawn, if that makes you feel better, go on believing it. But there are no secrets in Washington DC.

BTW, here’s a list of the top 100 terrorist targets in the United States.

And chances are, if you’ve thought of a particularly gruesome terrorist tactic, it’s probably already on the internet. Try googling it, I’m curious. :)

AP,

Let me get this straight …

I should or anyone should go ahead and blurt something out because it is probably already on the internet.
The terrorists probably already thought of it so that makes it okay too.
I’m not saying they haven’t. They have been at this much longer than I. At least 4 years.

There are no secrets in D.C. although Bush is accused of keeping and hiding things from us. Oh wait. That was a dream I had last night.

Hypothetical … Your son is on the S.W.A.T. team. They have been given an assignment to take down a drug operation and they know the criminals inside are heavily armed. The team is surrounding the house and will make their move in less than a minute.
NEWSFLASH on TV —- A reporter announces that the bust involving your son is about to go down.
The criminals are inside watching this - the police aren’t - they grab their weapons and kill 3 officers - one is YOUR son.

Still want everything announced on TV because they probably already know???

Those are the type of ‘secrets’ I was talking about.

There are no secrets in D.C. although Bush is accused of keeping and hiding things from us.

You mean the participants in the energy planning? It was Ken Lay and a bunch of other energy mogols. We all know that, the only thing missing is the meeting notes.

You mean who betrayed Plame? We all know it was “Scooter” Libby. The only thing missing is the Abu Gharaib torture of Bob Novak until he testifies.

Which “secret” are you thinking of? :)

Still want everything announced on TV because they probably already know???

Dawn, I’m just saying that info is probably already out there. Did you google it?

I had similar feelings the first time someone challenged me to back up my assertion that the Iraq invasion diverted troops and resources from Afghanistan. My first reply was that the guy must be a terrorist for wanting to know. It turned out that all the info was available to anyone with a dial-up connection.

Dawn,
AP is right on the availablity of information through out this nation and the world. Yes, even your raid is done out in the open of everyone. Look at your community and state and you will see it every day in the newspapers, media, and even comments made by people. Reading between the lines has become so common place that people don’t realize they are doing it.

For example, Bush this past week said that everything is fine in Iraq. Although most Americans laugh at this, Bush is trying to say that he thinks things will work themselve out over the long run.

Watch the news, read a newspaper or article, or listen to the way someone say what’s happening, all these people will try to put a spin on the issue or problem. The trick for most of us is to learn how common sense and logic enters into the conversation. Do you want a reporter to allow a story out before some an event happens? No, but legally our government has no way of stopping it (1st Admendment). However, over the years reporters and the news agencies have worked with law enforcement to get the rights to the inside scoop of the story.

Right guys.
People aren’t stupid. The information is available. I still say that there are some things that we can wait to know about until it is over and it won’t hurt us to do that.

The thing is that there are many people who do not have the time to sort through everything. Don’t spend any time in blogs (like there isn’t any fact sorting here). Don’t look up the facts for different reasons.

They rely on what they hear or read. It would be nice if they didn’t have to figure out what is truth and what is spin.

SO many analyze and give opinions. People don’t answer direct questions. How many times have you heard “What he meant by that …” after the fallout from a statement didn’t go very well .. so then comes the spin.

Someone says something and one sentence is taken from the whole speech. Either to promote or discredit. Both sides do it. Then comes all the screaming about words being taken out of context.

People turn on their sets and hear part of something - they take it for truth but it was someone doing a ‘what if’ or spinning something to help their candidate and they didn’t hear that part. They thought they put on the ‘news’.

Most of what we call ‘news’ is not. It is people talking about something and sticking their own 2 cents in. The media needs to do a better job of separating the news from the spin.

I don’t have a problem with Bush trying to tell people that we will make things work out in Iraq. That the terrorists are not going to win.
It won’t be any easier for Kerry if he gets the job and there is nothing wrong with him trying to make people think that he can get it done.
My problem with Kerry is why didn’t he help before he started running? Because he knew he was running and needed the problems Bush has to be there so he could point them out? If Bush wouldn’t listen to him directly he could have used someone else to get his ideas to him if they are so great.(I’m not saying he did that for sure.)
It is sad that our parties won’t work together to fix things. Especially when all they worry about is their own political gain.

Dawn,
Kerry has been blasting Bush since last year for his (Bush’s) lack of sharing the burden of rebuilding, small troop deployment, lack of responsiblity, and a host of other issues.

Here is just one article from USA Today back in March of 04. Kerry’s Arguments about the way Bush is handling the War in Iraq

Sorry try http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/president/2004-03-17-kerry-speech_x.htm
Kerry

Henry,
Why did you have me read that?
Sounds like it is anti-Kerry to me. Of course I could be prejudiced.

I was wondering about the 40,000 troops a couple days ago. Mentioned it to my husband. Is that send 40,000 troops? or increase the number of our troops overall? I’m definitely not up on that one. Don’t have time to go ‘google’ it.

Some of that from the article was brought up in a discussion about the election today.

AP,

I don’t understand why you think I should ‘google’ it.
Do you have a specific website where people are posting their ideas on what terrorists may do? I’ll look at one of those.
I did do something else though. I made the phone call. Turns out it may be a good thing that I did.

Dawn,
The 40,000 troops are to be special forces. Our country is short on special forces, military police, and civil engineers. In fact, if Iran or North Korea would start to build up their forces along their borders, America does not have the correct forces to deal with both at the same time.

On the article, I thought you would realize how scared Bush and Company was back in March about Kerry winning the primary. You see Kerry has been talking about what we need to do in Iraq for a long time. I can’t remember the exact date, but the time period was April or May just before the turn over of Iraq Kerry explained how he would handle the problem and Senate Forgien Relation Committee backed him up when Bush’s administration deputies showed up and said they didn’t know what was going on.

By the way, who did you talk to on the phone?

Henry,

You mean new troops. How does he plan to do that? He can’t make people do it. That would be against what he is saying now.
He could offer them big salaries, I imagine, but how would he pay for it? He is supposed to cut spending.
Train people already in the military, but without salaries that compete with civilian jobs, they would opt out as soon as they could. This would mean new people would have to be trained and we wouldn’t have the full force all the time.

I would still like to know why he didn’t do more as a Senator.

I would rather not say exactly who I called but it was law enforcement.

Dawn,
The number of special forces is limited by law. Either the president or a house representive must begin this debate. In fact, back in 94 the military started asking for more special froces, reoutfitting our troops, and expanding our nation rebuilding units. However, the republicans stopped every development of beefing up our ground troops ability in exchange for such defense spending as the F-22, Star Wars Defense System, and a few black book projects we will leave alone.

I’m glad to see you asked a law ebforcement agent a question and got the answer you were looking for. However, you can see what we been talking about if you are willing to ask them how many crimes have they stopped or criminals they have caught without citizen assistance.

Henry ….

I know that citizens need to help … how many don’t because they think they won’t be believed or what they say may not be important or they just don’t want to get involved … now a person has to have a lawyer when they are a witness for a case.

People have stopped being ‘good samaritans’ for fear of being sued -

Everything is messed up.

When it comes to Iraq —- I do not want them to be like us - I want them to be better than us. I believe we have lost ‘respect’ in the world for a lot more reasons than invading Iraq.

Dawn,
You are right about America losing respect in the world, but you should never sell our country short. Yes our political leaders have fell from grace. Yes, we have people that want to bad mouth this country. And yes, we have citizens that are clueless to what is going on in the world.

Yet, no where else on earth has so many been given their God given right to Knowledge and Freewill. Although our political and religious leaders do not always openly speak up for the vision our forefathers had for this nation’s civilization, “We the People” of this land have the “Almighty Power of Civilization” to bring this world together. How and why this event is happening in our life time I do not know. Yet, look down on the humans on earth. 40 or so years ago the world political leaders was ready to pull the pulg on mankind. The norm of our society was M.A.D. Than something happemed in this country back in 1969-74, our parents woke up and realized that the gloom and doom of our civilization was due to our collective fear about the future of our children’s childern. Therefore, they set out a 30-40 year plan to change our nation from a dirty industrial nation into a service driven society so we would not have to keep toiling(sp) the soil.

Today, we have come a long way from the life our parents have lead. Yes, life moves a lot faster than it did 15-20 years ago. Yet, would you change the lifestyle you and your family have?

The problem America faces is bigger than terrorism, crime, or any political election. Like a good flock that has always had faith in the American Spirit, “We the People” have forgotten the way. JFK, Reagan, and even Clinton knew that Americans need a direction, a goal, a dream to follow. Bush and Cheney was given the opportunity to change the World and failed. No one can state differently. Kerry and Edwards has a vision for the future of this country and our leadership in the world.

By rethinking our collective future, we can save this great American Spirit and spread our wings around the world. We just have to learn that no one person is better than a person who leads their life with honor, dignity, and respect for all life forms. Yes, each of us have our own pride, needs, and wants; yet do you really need the red carpet treatment everyday of your life?

I wasn’t selling our country short - not really. Some of us - politicians and there cronies included - need to grow up a little bit and stop the name calling and whining on both sides.

No I wouldn’t want to give up the things I have -but I don’t go around crying that what I have isn’t enough.

Red carpet treatment ??? Don’t know ? Never experienced that myself - might be nice but would get boring to me.

I can’t agree with you that there is no vision at all in what Bush is doing. People can agree on a goal without completely agreeing on how to achieve that goal.

Just like I agree with what you said -
“By rethinking our collective future, we can save this great American Spirit and spread our wings around the world. We just have to learn that no one person is better than a person who leads their life with honor, dignity, and respect for all life forms.”

We may have to push and shove our way to that goal, disagreeing along the way, but the goal is what matters.

Dawn,
What I meant by Bush/Kerry lack of a vision is their lack of imagination of looking into the future and challanging the American Spirit. Their ideas either deal with the next January or puts off things like renewable energy, space exploration, and debt repayment out 10-20 years from now. What America needs is a workable goal that we can obtain in 5-10 years which betters everyone’s life.

What I meant by Bush/Kerry lack of a vision is their lack of imagination of looking into the future and challanging the American Spirit.

I all giddy over Kerry’s vision for energy independence. He wants to implement an Apollo-like project to make America independent of foreign oil within ten years. It includes his 20/20 plan for America to get 20% of it’s energy from renewable sources by 2020. Very exciting.

I’m also a big fan of his plan to make health care affordable for everyone. If individuals can afford their own health care insurance, it takes the burdon off of business. And you don’t need to change plans every time you change jobs.

AP,
I am aware of Kerry’s 15 year plan on renewable energy, but what I am saying is America could do it in 5-10 years thus hughly influencing the market.

On health care I think that the people, businesses, and government need to explain to the health industry that for the next ten years every working American will recieve basic health care cover plus workmans comp for about $2.00/hr or $344.00/mth By making it part of the minimum wage process we will be able to cover 95% of the population with their own money. This bill would leave only 5% of the population to be covered by medicare. It should help ease part of the problem on taxes as we figure out how to deal with the umemployeed and the need for welfare.

I am all for someone ‘fixing’ the healthcare issues in this country.
Our premium - which we pay ourselves - has gone from about $289/mth to $510/month in less than 5 years. We are still the same # of people and we are still considered healthy.

We have been part of the unisured also. At that time I had to have a c-section done. The bill went from a prepaid $2200 to a whopping $14,000!
I left the hospital a day early because I did not want it added to the bill. I found out later that it wasn’t even necessary - another story.

When I had our 2nd child we had insurance. We were mistakenly billed for a c-section. It is UNBELIEVABLE the discounts that are given to insurance companies while the hospitals expect the uninsured to pay full price. Then they complain that part of their rising costs are because the uninsured don’t pay their bills.

Maybe I should copy and paste this and start a new topic???

Thanks for clearing that ‘vision thing’ up Henry.

Dawn,
Hoped you and your family got to watch the debates. Now you should be able to see how both handle the truth.