Bush spent 8 years imposing government rules on our daily lives, taking away civil liberties, inherent human rights, and personal privacy, and has rounded out his term by buying up (e.g. nationalizing) huge swaths of the mortgage/finance/banking industries. If you want socialism, vote for the big-government republicans.
Your faulty assumption is that there's a difference between the two choices. BOTH are for a nanny-state.
It's as if this whole country has a collective memory loss and just keeps bouncing back and forth between two bad choices.
One thing the democratic party has brought is a sense that the solutions to our problems is something we have to bring forward as we accept responsability for our mistakes.
Why should the rest of the public be held responsible for the mistakes of a few risk-takers?
Yes, both parties are bad for us, big surprise there. Is your point that, "so what if Obama sucks - McCain does to - so I'm voting Obama!" Does that make any sense?
Unfortunately, like McCain, his "REAL platform" has no common foundation. They each have cherrypicked arbitrary voting blocs, and because there are no common principles behind these choices, they are left to resort to pragmatism: getting by one day at a time, guided only by the magnitude of the complaints coming from various groups.
This is not sustainable. Until we get a candidate that actually supports those "certain inalienable rights", we're going to continue to limp toward our downfall.
Why should the president, or the government, have a role in "making everyone smarter"? I also don't see how people can be "made smarter" when they are spoon-fed a pre-packaged education and are not driven to learn on their own - something they would be more motivated to do if we moved away from our current nanny-state that lets us get by without being informed about the choices we make.
As government is responsible for the maintenance of the currency system, money remains their property and they may ask for as much of it back in taxes as it wants for projects such as national health care.
What an incoherent view you have. Money may be made by the government, but it is not government property. Ideally, the government should own no property. Also, even if you claim that money is government property, the government trades that money for loans, old money, and (previously) gold, so they can't just take it back as if it's their own.
As long as you and your fellow citizens are voting in the political process, and the process results in higher taxes to pay for public needs, the system is working as intended.
Rights don't disappear simply by voting against them. Rights are still violated even if a majority vote for the violation.
We absoltely have a private system in the US! Just because Blue Cross/ Blue Shield has some gov't money behind it, is not the problem.
Quite an exaggeration. Our entire conception of insurance is based on BCBS's early government-funded monopoly. That is why we have single insurance packages that cover everything from emergencies to general medicine, and that is why we have companies buying insurance for their employees, removing any interest for the employee to find the cheapest, best possible insurance for themselves.
If you need filled in on the reasoning behind my claim, that does not make me an idiot - it makes you ignorant. I can write it out here, or you can read Locke's Two Treatises, for example.
Where's the choice not to pay towards the military, which takes by far the largest proportion of the national budget?
Ideally such funding would be voluntary, but at least the military is a proper role of the government, so I could go either way on that.
Being in a democracy means making compromises
We don't live in a democracy. We live in a republic, founded on principles and promotion of individual rights. Today, though, those individual rights have been thrown out the window through the desire to "make compromises and come to agreements". In a compromise with the devil, only the devil benefits.
The same place as your choice not to pay for schools, police, the fire service and the military.
Except that only one of these is the proper role of government, while the rest should rights be supplied through private means. That is the only way that does not violate individual rights, and it is the only sustainable way.
It's the choice not to participate in society. If you want to live in the country, grow your own food, and not use money then you don't have to pay any taxes. The rest of us think being a member of society has more benefits than costs.
False dichotomy. The ideal society has a government limited to the protection of individual rights. It is also a possible society, so there are more than just the two choices you claim.
You pay taxes, and part of your taxes go to health. Just like part of it goes to the military.
The difference is that the police and military force are part of the proper role of the government - to uphold and protect the rights of the citizenry. There is not and can be no right to healthcare, so for the government to enforce such a "right" can only serve to violate the rights that it was charged with protecting.
If the government won't pay for them, but hasn't outlawed them, just pay for them yourself (you want to do that don't you?)
I mean new treatments that the government won't allow me to pay for on my own, because they have not been cleared by the government.
Yet our country spends more per capita on health care than just about any other country on the planet, thanks at least in part to our for-profit system.
Do you really believe we have a private system in the US? It was the complete lack of competition that started with the government-sponsored monopoly of Blue Cross/Blue Shield, which in turn led to the complete distortion of the structure and purpose of insurance and healthcare, that has brought about the current system.
The current system in the UK, for example, offers both private and state healthcare, with the NHS free for all and private healthcare available if you want to pay a bit of money for a TV in your hospital room and a shorter wait for your elective surgery.
Where's my choice not to pay into your system, though? Or, my choice to use treatments not permitted by the government. There is no choice.
All I can really say is the obvious: That people don't believe that government is there mostly to just protect rights anymore (if that ever was really the case), so socialized healthcare will be a reality whether we (or I) like it or not.
The problem with concocting "rights" to healthcare, gasoline, a car, a home, a tax break, though, is that the promotion of such "rights" requires the violation of rights - life, liberty, property, privacy, etc. You can't have both a "right" to other people's property and a right to your own property. It only serves to strip the word "right" of all meaning.
Imagine your social security benefits in the hands of the people McCain trusted so much that he felt that less scrutiny and transparency was necessary. Now imagine your health care benefits managed the same way.
Alright, done imagining. Now imagine the reality of privatization - corruptible government oversight is replaced with private analysis - think "Consumer Reports meets VeriSign". The benefits are long-term stability, choice, variety, and best of all, no rights are violated in the process. We move away from pragmatism and toward principle, and in the process build a better future for each of us and for society.
Of course, neither Obama nor McCain will support this. McCain does no more than pay lip service to privatization, hoping to produce capitalistic benefits from statist actions. Whereas Obama promises to hold a gun to your head, McCain lets you choose what brand of gun he uses.
RTFA. Example credit card names include the fictional character John Galt from Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. His billing address? 1957 Ayn Rand Lane, Galts Gulch, CO 99999.
Or, you could do what Obama does and let the same person give multiple donations to you with the same credit card under whatever pseudonym you like, thereby bypassing any sort of campaign donation limit.
I'm sure McCain will follow suit as soon as he figures out "how to turn the damn thing on."
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Bush spent 8 years imposing government rules on our daily lives, taking away civil liberties, inherent human rights, and personal privacy, and has rounded out his term by buying up (e.g. nationalizing) huge swaths of the mortgage/finance/banking industries. If you want socialism, vote for the big-government republicans.
Your faulty assumption is that there's a difference between the two choices. BOTH are for a nanny-state.
It's as if this whole country has a collective memory loss and just keeps bouncing back and forth between two bad choices.
One thing the democratic party has brought is a sense that the solutions to our problems is something we have to bring forward as we accept responsability for our mistakes.
Why should the rest of the public be held responsible for the mistakes of a few risk-takers?
Yes, both parties are bad for us, big surprise there. Is your point that, "so what if Obama sucks - McCain does to - so I'm voting Obama!" Does that make any sense?
Alright, I'll make a correction: the world, and every nation in it, loses.
but on a REAL platform?
Unfortunately, like McCain, his "REAL platform" has no common foundation. They each have cherrypicked arbitrary voting blocs, and because there are no common principles behind these choices, they are left to resort to pragmatism: getting by one day at a time, guided only by the magnitude of the complaints coming from various groups.
This is not sustainable. Until we get a candidate that actually supports those "certain inalienable rights", we're going to continue to limp toward our downfall.
...America loses.
Implicit false dichotomy.
No I would not.
Why should the president, or the government, have a role in "making everyone smarter"? I also don't see how people can be "made smarter" when they are spoon-fed a pre-packaged education and are not driven to learn on their own - something they would be more motivated to do if we moved away from our current nanny-state that lets us get by without being informed about the choices we make.
The planet has no inherent value apart from the value that we assign to it. The Earth, to be of value, must be exploited.
Please do not lump together those who take the above view with those who believe they are acting rationally when they wastefully exploit the planet.
As government is responsible for the maintenance of the currency system, money remains their property and they may ask for as much of it back in taxes as it wants for projects such as national health care.
What an incoherent view you have. Money may be made by the government, but it is not government property. Ideally, the government should own no property. Also, even if you claim that money is government property, the government trades that money for loans, old money, and (previously) gold, so they can't just take it back as if it's their own.
As long as you and your fellow citizens are voting in the political process, and the process results in higher taxes to pay for public needs, the system is working as intended.
Rights don't disappear simply by voting against them. Rights are still violated even if a majority vote for the violation.
We absoltely have a private system in the US! Just because Blue Cross/ Blue Shield has some gov't money behind it, is not the problem.
Quite an exaggeration. Our entire conception of insurance is based on BCBS's early government-funded monopoly. That is why we have single insurance packages that cover everything from emergencies to general medicine, and that is why we have companies buying insurance for their employees, removing any interest for the employee to find the cheapest, best possible insurance for themselves.
We do not live in a democracy, but in a republic that was founded on principles such as the support of individual rights.
If you need filled in on the reasoning behind my claim, that does not make me an idiot - it makes you ignorant. I can write it out here, or you can read Locke's Two Treatises, for example.
Where's the choice not to pay towards the military, which takes by far the largest proportion of the national budget?
Ideally such funding would be voluntary, but at least the military is a proper role of the government, so I could go either way on that.
Being in a democracy means making compromises
We don't live in a democracy. We live in a republic, founded on principles and promotion of individual rights. Today, though, those individual rights have been thrown out the window through the desire to "make compromises and come to agreements". In a compromise with the devil, only the devil benefits.
The same place as your choice not to pay for schools, police, the fire service and the military.
Except that only one of these is the proper role of government, while the rest should rights be supplied through private means. That is the only way that does not violate individual rights, and it is the only sustainable way.
It's the choice not to participate in society. If you want to live in the country, grow your own food, and not use money then you don't have to pay any taxes. The rest of us think being a member of society has more benefits than costs.
False dichotomy. The ideal society has a government limited to the protection of individual rights. It is also a possible society, so there are more than just the two choices you claim.
Why would you want to opt out of the NHS?
Because I have a right to my income and property and would rather not pay into an inefficient, unsustainable system.
You pay taxes, and part of your taxes go to health. Just like part of it goes to the military.
The difference is that the police and military force are part of the proper role of the government - to uphold and protect the rights of the citizenry. There is not and can be no right to healthcare, so for the government to enforce such a "right" can only serve to violate the rights that it was charged with protecting.
If the government won't pay for them, but hasn't outlawed them, just pay for them yourself (you want to do that don't you?)
I mean new treatments that the government won't allow me to pay for on my own, because they have not been cleared by the government.
Yet our country spends more per capita on health care than just about any other country on the planet, thanks at least in part to our for-profit system.
Do you really believe we have a private system in the US? It was the complete lack of competition that started with the government-sponsored monopoly of Blue Cross/Blue Shield, which in turn led to the complete distortion of the structure and purpose of insurance and healthcare, that has brought about the current system.
The current system in the UK, for example, offers both private and state healthcare, with the NHS free for all and private healthcare available if you want to pay a bit of money for a TV in your hospital room and a shorter wait for your elective surgery.
Where's my choice not to pay into your system, though? Or, my choice to use treatments not permitted by the government. There is no choice.
All I can really say is the obvious: That people don't believe that government is there mostly to just protect rights anymore (if that ever was really the case), so socialized healthcare will be a reality whether we (or I) like it or not.
The problem with concocting "rights" to healthcare, gasoline, a car, a home, a tax break, though, is that the promotion of such "rights" requires the violation of rights - life, liberty, property, privacy, etc. You can't have both a "right" to other people's property and a right to your own property. It only serves to strip the word "right" of all meaning.
Imagine your social security benefits in the hands of the people McCain trusted so much that he felt that less scrutiny and transparency was necessary. Now imagine your health care benefits managed the same way.
Alright, done imagining. Now imagine the reality of privatization - corruptible government oversight is replaced with private analysis - think "Consumer Reports meets VeriSign". The benefits are long-term stability, choice, variety, and best of all, no rights are violated in the process. We move away from pragmatism and toward principle, and in the process build a better future for each of us and for society.
Of course, neither Obama nor McCain will support this. McCain does no more than pay lip service to privatization, hoping to produce capitalistic benefits from statist actions. Whereas Obama promises to hold a gun to your head, McCain lets you choose what brand of gun he uses.
I wish Nintendo would have thought of that first, so that I could put back together the Wiimote I threw through my TV.
RTFA. Example credit card names include the fictional character John Galt from Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. His billing address? 1957 Ayn Rand Lane, Galts Gulch, CO 99999.
Or, you could do what Obama does and let the same person give multiple donations to you with the same credit card under whatever pseudonym you like, thereby bypassing any sort of campaign donation limit.
I'm sure McCain will follow suit as soon as he figures out "how to turn the damn thing on."