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US Presidential Debate #2 Tonight: Discuss Here
The second U.S. Presidential debate kicks off in about a half-hour (9PM ET, 6PM PT, 0100 UTC) from Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. Incumbent Barack Obama and challenger Mitt Romney will take questions from an audience of allegedly undecided voters. A live stream of the event will be available from a number of sources (C-SPAN, CNN, ABC, and PBS), and it will be broadcast nationally on the major networks. The flash-less and television-less can use rtmpdump to catch the debate from C-SPAN. It won't preempt the more important telecasts, like playoff baseball. Candidates from smaller parties again went uninvited (e.g. Gary Johnson from the Libertarians, Jill Stein from the Greens, Virgil Goode from the Constitution Party, and Rocky Anderson from the Justice Party). In fact, Jill Stein was arrested for attempting to enter without credentials (her side of the story). Assuming she's out of jail by Thursday, she and Gary Johnson will be participating in an online debate hosted by IVN.us. While tonight's debate is in progress, Politifact will be fact-checking the candidates in real-time (while CNN has demonstrated their journalistic capabilities with a debate drinking game). Feel free to weigh in with your commentary on the debate below — it would be helpful to provide timestamps or other context when referring to particular statements. As before, we're posting this here in a vain attempt to keep the political discussion out of other story threads tonight. If either of the candidates spontaneously concedes the election or catches fire, we'll do our best to update you.
The problem though, is Mitt Romney's "good-ole American capitalism" is part of why so many people are out of work right now. Bain Capital's entire business is buying up businesses, dismantling them, and selling them for parts to pay off debts incurred in said purchases. How is this good for the USA?
He may understand more about the economy, but I bet he's unwilling to fix it, because simply put, keeping it the way it is makes more money for big business.
$1k per month for health insurance? Jeezus, what kind of policy is that? I'm in my 40's and BCBS quoted me about $250 per month (actually slightly less) for a moderate ($2,500 deductible) policy with prescription coverage. I could cover that with unemployment insurance, and not even have to touch the $30k plus in my savings. Do you have an artificial heart or something?
Anthem Blue Cross health insurance for a 50 year old male:
$288/mo = $3500/year
$6000/year deductible
$3500 out of pocket maximum (after deductible)
As long as you don't need healthcare services, it's "only" $3500/year. But if you need to use your insurance, then you could be paying $9500 just to get to the deductible where insurance starts paying... then you could be paying up to $12,500 for the year.
It's quite simple really. Excessive taxation stifles economic growth reducing revenue and by the way reducing opportunity for all citizens to participate in the economy (meaning have jobs).
The Laffer curve has two sides.
Air support and soldiers on the ground advising rebel forces and helping to call in air strikes...
A military action by any other name is just as significant, and the fact remains that whatever term you use for what we did in Libya is not being done in Syria where the same reasoning applies.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Stop repeating that lie. Between the GOP delaying Franken's entry to the Senate through frivolous court challenges, followed by by Ted Kennedy's sickness and death, the Democrats only had a few months of filibuster-proof majority. They used it to pass Obamacare.
A vote for third party is a vote for the incumbent.
No, a vote for a third party is one less vote for the candidate you would have otherwise voted for if you got off your high horse and realized government and politics are about compromise and practicality (and that "you" is not you the poster, I think we agree with the point that third party votes in this elections are basically making a statement at the expense of your future...)
He didn't even finish the term he was elected to.
Im not sure if you are lying due to lack of scruples, or are ignorant. According to wikipedia (and, im sure, public record),
Romney filed to register a presidential campaign committee with the Federal Election Commission on his penultimate day in office as governor.[225] His term ended January 4, 2007. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitt_Romney#Tenure.2C_2003.E2.80.9307 , last line before the next section)
Heres the real irony / hypocrisy: Barack Obama really DIDNT finish out his term due to the presidential election. He was elected in 2005, and resigned in 2008-- only halfway thru his term. Normally, this really isnt a big deal, and noone I know (even republicans) made a stink about that because its not unusual for presidential candidates.
But I point it out because of the hilarity and hypocrisy-- you accuse Romney of something that not he, but Obama did. Its actually kind of like how Obama blamed bush for "unauthorized wars" (despite them being authorized), and then launched an unauthorized military action of his own.
Stop repeating that lie. It's over 6 months from Franken's TrunkO'Votes' seating on July 1 2009 to Scott Brown's seating on January 19 2010.
Obamacare was introduced to the House on October 26 and passed on November 8. Even though your concerns about Senate members don't apply here, what was done in July, August, September, most of October, most of November, and in December?
Working hard there, I see.
The Senate created a version of that bill inside another bill on November 18, and passed it on December 24. What did they do during July, August, September, October, half of November and half of January?
I guess a budget would be too much to ask for.
Out of interest, do you vote for them? Or another small party?
I'm not an American (I'm a NZer), and New Zealand now has a (semi-)proportional system now (so that if 34% of people vote for a party, they'll get 34% of seats in parliament), but we used to have a similar system which lead to just two viable parties.
Rather than voting for the lesser of two evils (whether you consider that Dem or Rep), if you think they're both bad, vote someone else. It won't be a wasted vote, because you're supporting the party you support - so what if they don't get in? If you don't want to vote for the Democrats or the Republics, the only wasted vote is a vote for one of them.
I think this is a message that the smaller parties should be pushing, even parties on the opposite sides of the political spectrum. It should also be emphasised to the "I don't bother voting, they're all crooks" crowd as they're a reasonable proportion of the population.
What the Senate was doing by month:
July: Kennedy was too sick to do his job
August: Kennedy was too sick to do his job, and died at the end of the month
September: Kennedy's seat was vacant until Kirk was finally seated at the end of the month. The rules of the Senate say even with 99 total senators, you still need 60 to break a filibuster, so an empty seat is essentially a vote to keep the filibuster going.
October: Intra-party negotiations trying to get the Democrats to unanimously vote for the bill. Lieberman and Nelson were the big stumbling blocks.
November: Lieberman agrees to support the bill in exchange for dropping the Public Option. This negotiation took a long time, as the Democrats tried to a lot of compromises (the "Rockfeller option", the "opt-out" option, the "opt-in" option, the "Medicare buy-in" option, etc.), but Lieberman wouldn't budge. Nelson keeps the filibuster going.
December: Slimebag Nelson finally bought off with the Cornhusker Kickback, which would have given extra money to Nebraska for no particular reason. Obamacare finally passes the Senate. The Kickback is later removed during the reconciliation process.
January: The Senate typically takes most of this month off. They convened on January 19th. Scott Brown took office a week later.
In short, the Democrats had three in-session months of filibuster-proof majority, all of which were spent trying to get Lieberman and Nelson to break the filibuster.
You hit the nail on the head. I don't agree with the entire Green Party platform, but their candidate was ARRESTED for trying to get into the debate. Why wasn't she (or any of the other 3rd party candidates) included? Because they are not high enough in the polls. Why aren't they polling well? I expect it's because they cannot get media coverage for love nor money.
The whole damn political system is owned, rigged, and horribly corrupted. But because the worst of the corruption is legal, we're supposed to turn a blind eye to it.
The polling threshold is set at 15%, which would have excluded all third-party candidates for the last hundred years. The debates used to be run by the League of Women Voters, who kept them open, transparent, and honest, and who set a reasonable threshold for third-party candidates, such as being on enough state ballots to be able to theoretically win.
Ever since Bush I stumbled at a town hall debate in 1992, the "town hall" debate format switched to pre-screened questions with no followups because the handlers fear letting their candidates out of their hermetically sealed rhetorical bubble. These days, they negotiate a contract that explicitly bars third-party candidates with the "Commission on Presidential Debates," which is chaired by party hacks-turned-lobbyists and funded by private corporations.
Bush I let Perot into the debate because his campaign thought that Perot would steal votes from Clinton, who didn't want him in. When the opposite happened, Clinton suddenly welcomed Perot into the debate. They even struck a deal to schedule one of the debates during a baseball game because neither side wanted to draw a big audience to the debate because it was too unpredictable. Now, third-party candidates are seen as wild cards, and are systemically excluded from the debates exactly because they might do something unexpected, put one of the major party candidates on the spot, or otherwise disrupt the carefully-choreographed kabuki theater that is presidential politics.
How many republican primary debates where there? 27? 28? So why only three presidential debates? Why no third parties? Why no spontaneity? It blows my mind how effectively campaigns manage to limit every discussion to the recitation of talking points, focus-grouped spin, and how effectively they manage exclude new ideas and substantive arguments.
Actually, I wrote my thesis on life experience.
I suspect that the top 5% gather a lot more than 60% of the income.
They don't. They make ~35% of the income.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
The mainstream press is liberal almost to a (wo)man
Liberal - it doesn't mean what you think.
Not limited to or by established, traditional, orthodox, or authoritarian attitudes, views, or dogmas; free from bigotry.
Please find another word as your political term-of-abuse.
Stop repeating that lie. Between the GOP delaying Franken's entry to the Senate through frivolous court challenges,
The court challenges were frivolous, but they did produce a Franken win - I'm surprised you aren't more enthusiastic. Maybe it was the tainted nature of the win?
York: When 1,099 felons vote in race won by 312 ballots
In the '08 campaign, Republican Sen. Norm Coleman was running for re-election against Democrat Al Franken. It was impossibly close; on the morning after the election, after 2.9 million people had voted, Coleman led Franken by 725 votes.
Franken and his Democratic allies dispatched an army of lawyers to challenge the results. After the first canvass, Coleman's lead was down to 206 votes. That was followed by months of wrangling and litigation. In the end, Franken was declared the winner by 312 votes. He was sworn into office in July 2009, eight months after the election.
During the controversy a conservative group called Minnesota Majority began to look into claims of voter fraud. Comparing criminal records with voting rolls, the group identified 1,099 felons -- all ineligible to vote -- who had voted in the Franken-Coleman race.
Minnesota Majority took the information to prosecutors across the state, many of whom showed no interest in pursuing it. But Minnesota law requires authorities to investigate such leads. And so far, Fund and von Spakovsky report, 177 people have been convicted -- not just accused, but convicted -- of voting fraudulently in the Senate race. Another 66 are awaiting trial. "The numbers aren't greater," the authors say, "because the standard for convicting someone of voter fraud in Minnesota is that they must have been both ineligible, and 'knowingly' voted unlawfully." The accused can get off by claiming not to have known they did anything wrong.
Still, that's a total of 243 people either convicted of voter fraud or awaiting trial in an election that was decided by 312 votes. With 1,099 examples identified by Minnesota Majority, and with evidence suggesting that felons, when they do vote, strongly favor Democrats, it doesn't require a leap to suggest there might one day be proof that Al Franken was elected on the strength of voter fraud.
And that's just the question of voting by felons. Minnesota Majority also found all sorts of other irregularities that cast further doubt on the Senate results.
The election was particularly important because Franken's victory gave Senate Democrats a 60th vote in favor of President Obama's national health care proposal -- the deciding vote to overcome a Republican filibuster. If Coleman had kept his seat, there would have been no 60th vote, and no Obamacare. . . More . . .
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Greek debt: Bailout concessions not nearly Spartan enough
Under the bailout, Greeks must now work until they are 67 years old. Up until now, they have been able to retire with pensions at -- take a guess -- 65? Nope. 62? Lower. 57? Keep going! 53? Bingo!
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Except of course that is not how it works under our current President. Since Obama has taken office he has proposed budgets which have been rejected soundly by Congress. The House passed a budget that was written in the House after the Republicans took control, but the Senate has not passed a budget since Obama took office, even though it is legally obligated to do so. The Senate only voted on Obama's budget proposal because the Republicans managed to force the issue, at which point Obama's budget got zero votes.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
The bar was raised from 5% to 15% in 2000, as soon as it became clear that Ralph Nader (Green Party) was exceeding the 5% threshold, and would have to be included in the debates, along with Bush and Gore.
I suspect that this threshold will be continually raised as soon as there is a danger of a 3rd party breaking through, just as copyrights keep getting extended just as Mickey Mouse is about to fall into the public domain....
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Turns out he was even lying about his Binder Full Of Women: http://wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/33756576903/mirror-of-mind-the-binder
The real story is that the binder was created by a bipartisan group of women BEFORE the Massachusetts governor election was decided. They planned to give it to whomever won. Mitt won so he got the binder. He didn't go searching for the women after decrying the lack of female candidates. It wasn't his recruiting effort at all. He's taking credit for someone else's work.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.