what do you think of america now?

[xelp]

im just curious as to how you view us now...

the pres has said your on your own...and not just to the world
but to even are parliament...

im curious if you know how important that is?

is he right?

i would love to know what you think...lol

 

[jw4833]

Well...first of all...I am not a big participant when it comes to political and religious beliefs because they tend to become pretty heated discussions when the participants feel their opinions are not considered the way they perceives them. However...I will give my comment to this one..and again..this is just my opinion...I support the President 100% on this matter because I can't understand why some individuals find it to be horrible or disgusting that he would like for every American to have health insurance no matter what their background or situation is. There are other countries that do have this kind of health care and they are doing just fine with it. What I tend to have a problem with is how our Congress tends to want to shut down whatever proposal that the President wants to pass. It's like little, spoiled children playing this ignorant game as to we are not going to pass any of his bills unless he agrees to our terms. This is a tactic that I find to be very disrespectful and inconsiderate as a whole toward the leader of the United States. I have never heard of a Presidential candidate in the years that I've been on this earth that had endure this kind of treatment yet alone behavior. It's as if whatever turn he takes for improvement, they have issues with it which I find to be deplorable on their part. Many times since the President has held the office, whenever this give and take situation has presented itself with his proposals for improvement, he has given in to their actions which had previously annoyed the hell out of me. This is something he did in order to keep the peace with all parties involved. Therefore, since this being his last term in office, I completely understand why he is standing firm with his decisions without giving into their terms because as I've mentioned earlier, he is the President and he should be treated as his title whether you agree with him or not. It's about giving him the respect he deserves for that position and the respect that they have given former leaders who had done way further damage than what they are accusing him of.

 

[bigsal]

I agree with you dear JW.

It is strange that a country that wants to export democracy to the world, does not guarantee the health of its poorest citizens.

 

[cacc]

It ain't what it used to be.

 

[lhardwick69]

these people that were voted in to serve the people isn't doing what they were put in office to do---its not obamas fault--its these people trying to bully their way into getting what they want--but the thing is they still take taxes out of our checks while shut down..these politicians are still getting paid but not these other people out here serving their country or the ones that work for the government..


these assholes should be fired for what they have done..how are we supposed to teach kids not to bully others when these people are the biggest bullies of all

 

[lhardwick69]

they are a disgrace to this country and our founding fathers would roll over in their graves if they knew what was going on in this country--as I said its not obamas fault--the problems in this country began yrs ago when Reagan made it possible for businesses to go over seas and not have to pay taxes--to bush 8 years in office when gas was going up bush family was getting rich as their family is into oil bigtime--so the more gas costed and people paid for it the richer they got--so while they are sitting on their nestegg we are suffering the biggest problem in this country ever-- job security isn't good anymore as you never know when companies are going to close like they did in the beginning causing jobless people to go higher----

I am not saying Obama is perfect but shit he cant do anything with house and senate against anything he wants to do for this country-- the usa is only big country out there with no health care plan--its the all mighty dollar and if the rich aren't going to get richer from it--they don't want to let it happen

 

[clh_hilary]

America is the best country on earth because it gives us Milegend Cyrus.

 

[littlebob]

The United States has gone through a rough time recently, all because of a certain political party that can't stand the fact that he won the presidency twice. Shame on them.

 

[dimensio]

Pathetic that your congress men still collect their pay check while the government employees have to survive on their savings, they need to get the country back to normal asap.

 

[cut93550]

This IS the United States. The 2012 election didn't elect a policy it elected a man. Not a Monarch or a Dictator. 52% of the vote does not guarantee you 100% of your way 100% of the time. This government was created with 3 branches of government for a reason. Checks and balances. Remember school? Good bad or indifferent our government is operating precisely the way it was designed. A lot of people forget Congress was elected too. The vitriol may be distasteful but that goes back to the founding fathers, John Adams was infamous for this. The fault is in those who refuse to talk or negotiate. Those who refuse to come to the table are the ones at fault. As for the health care issue I am an adult dealing with my own budget. Why should anybody be forced to buy something they do not want at this time? Right now my priority is getting out of debt. In 13 months I will be debt free yet for my partner and I we have to come up with an additional $800 a month or have our tax returns attached. That's fairness? The President swore to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States. Health care was passed by Congress and signed into law by the President but so were immigration laws and The Declaration of Independence. Why are our borders not being secured? Why are law enforcement officers here in California not enforcing the law when it comes to immigration? You can't pick and choose which laws to enforce. Like Ronald Reagan said "If you are going to pay people to be poor you're going to have a lot of poor people". That ladies and gentlemen is the newly created Entitlement State.

 

[Dendood]

In one sense, Reagan was absolutely right.

If the Republicans, Papa Johns, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, have their way and continue to block increases to the minimum wage, weaken Unions and promote a host of other anti-middle class policies-as they have, they WILL continue to "Pay" (as in paycheck) people to be poor.

And if you're paying people to be poor (just look at China), you are going to have a lot of poor people.

It is time to support a LIVING WAGE. As well as policies and legislation that improves the financial well being of the middle and lower class.

These are the #1 best solution for fighting poverty, reducing entitlement rolls and everything else that ails us in a stagnant economy. The entitlement/takers argument is nothing but a ruse.

Trickle down was a failure.
The middle class has not seen its earning power increase for most of our lifetime.
"Tax rates" is the false indicator used to suck in the gullible for ages. -Adjusted Gross Income is the thing that matters. -That's where your quality of life resides. Not lowering taxes. (Stupid morons.)
If you can't 'afford' feeding children you can't afford marching around the world killing the parents of children.
Get big money and the influence of big money out of Politics.


What do I think of America? I think we are exactly what the average French citizen thinks of Americans... "you fucking stupid people...." At least we are coming to a head with some of Stupid being called to the carpet. They actually believe tripping over the debt ceiling is no cause for concern. -I would give them nothing but the part in my ass to kiss. Which is exactly what I would have done if I were that Park Ranger confronted by that jerk of a Congressman. She was way too polite.

I so wish he pulled that bullshit on me...

 

[Dendood]

And as for acting like a Monarch....

On the day of Obama's Inauguration term one, the leaders of the Republican Party met with corporate business leaders in a Washington restaurant and planned their strategy for obstructing everything and anything Obama would try to do. Day one, before he had proposed or suggested a single law.

On the day of Obama's second Inauguration, the leaders of the Republican Party met yet again to plan strategies to foil him in his second term.

"IF" he were a Monarch, like say... Henry VIII, that would have been grounds for taking a few son's a bitches off to the Tower for treason.

So I guess, no, he's not quite the "Monarch" you make him out to be.... He still has to sign legislation PASSED BY CONGRESS to make law.

A shame....

 

[absalom]

Like Ronald Reagan said "If you are going to pay people to be poor you're going to have a lot of poor people". That ladies and gentlemen is the newly created Entitlement State.

Strange then that the USA has (percentage wise) a lot more poor people than many West European countries. Sweden, the Entitlement State par excellence, is doing a lot better in this respect than the USA.

And don't forget: Reagan and his neoconservative allies planted the seeds of the bank crisis.

 

[Dendood]

Now I'm wired and I can't get to sleep......


First on the issue of 'talking', coming to the table, etc. etc.

As for Health Care, there was talk. It took 3 years for the Affordable Care Act to come into being. That's 36 months of talking. (And much of it was painful... "Death Panels" etc. etc.) The Speaker was there. He has a mouth. If he couldn't get his points out then, what the hell does he have to offer now?

Give and take. There was nothing but 'give' on the Affordable Care Act. What liberals wanted was single payer. They 'gave' that up, and a host of concessions in order to get the bill over the super majority hurdle. So the R's took concessions then and now have forgotten those concessions and cry because no one is giving them new concessions. "Waaahh."

Even though they got New Concessions.... a re-work of the budget, 30 billion dollars less than what Dem's wanted for spending. And just 20 billion dollars off the proposed Ryan budget, which at the time he proposed it was seen as draconian. -Even that concession was not enough of a concession.

So now they rail over legislation that was originally the brain child of a Republican think tank.

And yet, they have proposed no alternative plan for fixing health care. They just want to 'set aside' the law for 'a year'. Like, at the end of next year they will happily let it take effect.... Yeah, right. And what other bullshit do you want me to buy?

Of course, I know there's a Republican plan for Health Care. It is the same 'plan' they have for every social ailment:

IT SUCKS TO BE YOU.

 

[Dendood]

The U.S. has a lot of poor people because the poor have sucky Lobbyist. Power gets things done and people without power fall to the wayside.

There has been a long, successful strategy in America to pit the poor against each other. And in doing so, to convince people to vote contrary to their own interest. For years this fell along racial lines. People of color were getting something for nothing. Entitlements were cause of public debt. When in fact the top earners and Corporations were busy writing tax policy and lowering their tax burden. It has been falling and falling since the 1950s. While at the same time, the U.S. Military complex has been expanding exponentially from the Cold War forward. It is when one combines those two things with Entitlement that you get our present budget woes. But rather than ask big oil to sacrifice... or cut back on a military 40x the rest of the world (hyperbole, somewhat...), they'd rather go after that much smaller chunk of change that has propped up an economic model that favors the wealthy or workers. So now its not just those black folks who are takers. Even working white folks are takers.

So far, it is a world view that minorities aren't buying. Nor are gays. Nor are women. So we're in a strange world where Straight White, mostly southern, rural, western men feel left out in a country where for most of its years of existence they called all the shots.

I am hopeful, despite our present cirstances. Thankfully everyone with any memory of WW11 is almost dead. Thank god. We took that noble cause and ran it into the ground with some perception that everything we did or do with our Military is blessed by Jesus and sanctioned by God. -And we could do it on borrowed money with not a soul worrying about its impact on the deficit. So the sooner all that John Wayne bull gets six feet under the better all of planet Earth will be.

Greed and selfishness from on top is beginning to wear thin. If I had to pick the 2 big issues in our future, it is going to be water -and living wages. The only thing that kept the middle class alive the past 30 years was 2 family wage earners. Mom got out and got a job because she had to. That and the housing bubble. But the housing bubble burst because personal worth in one's home did not mean a lot if it was all buried in the cost of a new one. So now the only way out, the only way to personal wealth is a living wage.

 

[Tjerk12]

What you call “Obamacare” was introduced in The Netherlands in 1941, by the Nazi’s. It was called “Ziekenfondsenbesluit”. It was a public law institution; compulsory insurance for people with low income. The fees were paid directly to the care providers.

In 2006, the so-called health insurance law was introduced, a mandatory health insurance for every citizen. No public law institution, but the executives were private institutions, insurance companies.

In itself all fine, but the system poses challenges. The hospitals, the specialists, the doctors and the care institutes are private institutions. They have an interest in making profits. And they did that job very well. The care industry grew rapidly and thus the cost, so much so that the system seemed to be priceless.

The government intervened and organized a control device. Understandably, but unfortunately it made the system so complicated that there was no cost-reduction at all. Everything, and thus the insurance fee-just got even more expensive. The idea that private insurance companies would cause cost-reduction because of competition didn’t work either.
At the moment the government is re-organizing the sector. A lot of people in health care are losing their jobs. Bad news for them, but I must admit that they have to do so; otherwise the whole system would collapse.

Sick people are vulnerable, so it is an easy job to abuse them. A system based on free market operation frees evil forces.

“Obamacare” is without any doubt a “must” for a civilized country, but please be “Obamacarefull” with its organization!

 

[Dendood]

Challenge is the operative word for all of Humanity. We are all challenged and the problems will become greater in the next century. Look across the globe and there are issues of strife, ecology. The only safe place these days seems to be Canada.

I get wired and hostile to the opposition these days because I'm tired of fighting stupid. As a young person, it is natural to give respect, honor and deference to the elders of the world, even when you disagree with them. One assumes they know more, they know what they're doing. Now I'm old enough to see them for what they are: human's who put on their pants the same way I do. Who twice or more a day sit on a can and take a dump just like anyone else. So the deference I once gave to the Catholic church, Conservative Politics over Gay Rights, I don't give them that deference anymore. They are fucking wrong and they have spent years controlling our lives and making our existence miserable. Between not having a lot of years left in life, and a clear understanding of the flaws in the position, I don't feel 'kind' towards them -AT ALL.

The disrespect they have shown Gay people is the same disrespect they show our first Black President. And if they had their way, they strike down every advancement he makes. And they'd strike down every advancement Gays have made. They would just as soon write Constitutional Amendments to block Gay Marriage and Gay Equality on every level of Government. With the same glee and passion they write Anti Abortion legislation.
There was a time in my youth I would have respectful of the Yale and Harvard degrees, the tailored suits, the big money that lines their pockets.

Those great Ivy League schools gave us George Bush.
Those big dollars of the Koch brothers are used to suppress votes, block gay rights and block any agenda that is contrary to their own.
So piss on all that.

Their positions are false and their measures shallow. We live in a time when the effective tax rates are as low as they've been in our modern era. -So if taxes were the key to financial well being, why don't people on the forum here feel richer?
We live in a time where the debt of the United States is falling faster than any time in the past 30 years. -So why isn't anyone on the forum feeling better off? We live in a time where the DOW is at an all time high. Ever. Reflecting wealth upon wealth upon wealth. -So why isn't anyone on the forum raving about good this makes them feel?

 

[Dendood]

As for the 'outrage' of being forced to buy something... I don't get that either. But I know exactly how they should have dealt with it, without any issue of "Government Overreach" ever coming up.....

Every day, these outraged people wander off to do shopping. And every day they walk up to product for sale where items have a price, and a lower price for "Preferred" customers. -Where's the outrage???

If there is one improvement that could be made to the Affordable Care Act, this is the one I would offer: It's all semantics. Just drop the whole 'penalty' wording. People get their undies in a bunch over it. What you do is have the IRS set a 1% increase to the tax table. Then, you write into the 2014 Tax form:

Customers who have purchased health insurance get a "Preferred Customer" tax break of 1%. Have you purchased Health Insurance? Check yes or no. If you have checked yes fill out section 12D and use tax table A to calculate your taxes. Or you can let the IRS calculate your preferred savings for you. People who have decided not to become a preferred customer live with a higher price. Your choice.

"So wait? Are you saying if I buy health insurance -I get a TAX BREAK along with it??? SWWWWEET!"






I'm so smart.

 

[tonka]

The rage that's behind a lot of this is the last gasp of an old order. Their time is past.

The rich have cast their lot with the crazies, but even they must be having second thoughts, None of this is good for business.

In the end, we voted the crazies in. We can vote them out. It will take a few election cycles, but I have hope.

 

[Dendood]

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

It looks like the Republican party is coming to its senses. (IF it had any....)
I blame the pollsters. They weren't supposed to let them know just how much damage they were doing to the Republican brand.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO)!!!!!!!

I had my bowl of popcorn all set and ready to watch them jump over the fiscal cliff and crush the brand of the Republican party for a generation. But thanks to Wall St. arm twisting and poll numbers in the toilet, rational(?), well maybe 'self interested' minds are stepping forward. Ted Cruz is about to be kicked to the curb.

-It has been like watching The Titanic. But without the love story.

But fear not, The Tea Party crazy has a lot more crazy hiding in the brush.
Keep your popcorn at the ready.