Seems like MarthaA, I want to agree with what you said in the last two posts.  I have to dig out the essence, however, of what you say.  Framing observed problems in an abstract narrative runs the risk of obscurantism.  So I will try to restate your story:

Having been a resident of California for decades, I vividly recall Reagan’s career from a tv adman for GE to President.  Conservatives love to recall what they consider Reagan’s virtues.  I was never impressed, nor ever liked any of his movies (mostly my mother adored him) he was already old by the time I saw them.  I won’t mention his descent into the world of the confused.  I did not know the particulars of the elections in which he ran, so thank you for that chronology.  Yes,I agree that Republican tenacity and defiance of a sorite (usually an impossibility), was the algorithm for success.  I agree that it was a methodical project to imprison American politics and they are the collective warden that forces its views and values on the American public. 

Your point about accountants is probably correct.  Although as a liberal, I still consider myself as fiscally conscious, only because there is a reality to the quantification of the US Treasury.  And I am quite discontent with the news this morning about the administration even considering a tax on the middle class! 

Conservative Removal is on one hand an attractive thought.  I believe Sepharad would join us in that sentiment.  I retain however that runaway spending must have brakes on and Democrats, or liberals, have little self-control.  At the other end, the Republicans are completely self-serving.  I believe in the two-party policing effect on spending.

But it is that EXTREMIST character that is the scary part of politics.  So the liberal element is necessary to regulate complete self-interest which the EXTREMISTS represent.  It is a matter of walking a tightrope with utmost peril facing us if we fall to the left or to the right.  Tricky.

Yes, unfettered capitalism does need regulations, it is only logical!  The devil’s dance between capitalism and socialism is what we are faced with if this huge country is to negotiate a rational existence.

Telling the truth as much as possible is a fine goal, fine in the best sense of that word.  But how one determines the truth without it becoming trooth is also tricky since truth is often hidden and impossible to ferret out.  I am a firm believer in the idea that nothing is ever as it seems.  I am almost an utter skeptic.  I did say almost. I retain hope.

I agree that the only choice the people have is to judiciously choose candidates in primaries and further in all local elections.

The financial nature of elections has made it impossible for third-party candidates to make real incursion into national politics.  There are a couple of third-party candidates serving in Congress.  If one takes a look at the history of the political party composition of Congressmen, we can see that the early 19th century had the highest number with from 28 to 43, but the last two decades show only a total of 11 in those 20 years!  Prospects look very dim. 

We do have a duopoly, and the two-party members seems to have realized they must cooperate to do what they will whether it is out in the open or surreptitiously, thus seemingly giving evidence there exists no real difference between them.  I submit if the Democratic Party wants to survive they must not only change that perception, they must change in reality.

Perhaps I am too much of a realist, but I think the artful technique of putting a perceived situation within the parameters of a story, such as calling groups Noble, Near Nobles, Common Populus, might be helpful to build a mental image of the dynamic at play, but real characterization is what is needed to actually make changes.

Shenonymous,

(Part 1 of 2 Posts)

Well, it won’t happen overnight.  Reagan was a Democrat and the Republicans made him a deal he couldn’t resist, so he switched from Democrat to Republican in 1962 and helped Barry Goldwater, then ran for Governor of California and was elected in 1967, stayed in for two terms, ran for President in 1968 and was defeated receiving no electoral votes, then was defeated again in his run for President in 1976 receiving only 1 electoral vote, but the Republicans had a deal and kept running him and they finally got him elected in 1980.

Republicans didn’t get in by whining, they got in by piling up those grains of sand.  The Republican Movement moved incrementally and did not get into full bloom until the Republican Convention in 1980, the year Reagan was elected, altogether from the planning of the Reagan administration to the end of the Bush administration was 46 years and had to have been planned before that, more like 50 years, they kept making incremental moves for the presidency and in Congress until they got a full chance to prove what they could do with the full power of the Presidency and Congress, and look what they did, because the RIGHT-WING is the EXTREME CONSERVATIVES, actually any political conservative is an EXTREMIST.  Accountants are fiscally conservative.  CONSERVATIVE Politicians are EXTREMISTS.  There should be no conservatives on the Left, because conservatives represent the Right’s agenda

After what the CONSERVATIVE EXTREMISTS on both the Right and the Left have done to the nation, it should not take nearly as long to return the balance to the Democratic Party as it did to take it away, because the people are hurting.  We just have to get on with the conservatives removal every time there is a vote.  We know who they are and we must remove them at every available chance.

As far as capitalism goes, it needs the regulations reinstated that were installed after the last depression that was also caused by conservatism. Capitalism uses Socialism.  Regulation of either Capitalism or Socialism can only be done when there is a balance in Congress.  If we don’t give up, we can remove all the CONSERVATIVES on the Left, Yes WE CAN. 

The best I can do it tell the truth as much as possible on these blogs because you can reach many more than you would standing on a street corner or in a church.
 
After all, most dumbed down church leaders in my area think they are CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICANS and actually encourage people to be conservative REPUBLICANS, they drank the Right-Wingers Kool-Aid and receive the majority of their money from tithes from members of the common population.  I find that to be sacrilegious.  I am not against tithing, I am against tithing to churches that follow right-wing political orthodoxy. 

So since we are politically aware, we in my family do what we can to get others politically aware and blogging seems to work fairly well for us.

Shenonymous,

(Part 2 of 2 Posts)

The Democratic Party by exclusively representing the 20% minority of the Professional Middle Class, the Nearly Noble, intentionally throw away representation of the 70% Majority Common Population, as what could be the voting strength of the Democratic Party, especially if combined with the 20% minority voting strength of the Nearly Noble Professional Middle Class.

However, just as Orwell says, the Nearly Noble Professional Middle Class will toady up to the Nobles and expect that the 70% Majority Common Population will vote for their Nearly Noble Professional Middle Class Agenda, because the Common Population has no other choice due to the institutionalized two-party political system.

The only choice of the 70% Majority Common Population of the United States is to select their own candidates in the Primaries and as an incremental process replace the Nearly Noble Professional Middle Class conservative-moderate toadies that infest the Democratic Party, and then use the Democratic Party as a political instrument to initiate a MULTI-PARTY POLITICAL SYSTEM.

The time is past for the 70% Majority Common Population to expect that the Nearly Noble Professional Middle Class will represent the class and cultural interests of the 70% Majority Common Population.

The 70% Majority Common Population are faced with what Orwell calls the Inner Party and the Outer Party of “The Party”.

“The Party” is the duopoly of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.  The Inner Party is the Republican Party and the Democratic Party is the Outer Party.  The 70% Majority Common Population as a class and culture has no institutionalized political party, and must of necessity consider the conservative-moderate Nearly Noble Professional Middle Class that infest the Democratic Party as their political enemies, that have to be replaced by 70% Majority Common Population candidates if the 70% Majority Common Population expects to be politically represented by the Democratic Party as an institutionalized political party that will represent the 70% Majority Common Population as a class and culture; in this manner the 70% Majority Common Population as a class and culture can have a seat at the table to make and enforce law and order that is in the best interest of the 70% Majority Common Population of the United States as a class and culture; there is no other way for the 70% Majority Common Population as a class and culture to get political representation by an institutionalized political party and have a seat at the table to make and enforce law and order that is in the best interest of the 70% Majority Common Population as a class and culture.

You may be right MarthaA. But tell me how many grains of sand will it take?  and it might take a variety of kinds of sand as well.  All sand is not equal.

I am saying, and I consider myself among the liberal Democrats, more on the social side than left-wing side, that we have to control our own greedy urges.  Therein lies the fallacies of communism.  Quite possibly an economic system that could work, in theory only.  That greed you speak of is ubiquitous among any powerful entity whether it is a dictator or a state.

I agree that sophistry is the tool of the powerful to control the uninformed many.  So it is our job, those of us who recognize this device, to counteract it, not on these blogs but in real life.  Orwell was writing for the masses not the few. 

What devices can “we” use to counteract the sophistry?  Why not sophistry of our own?  Some already are engaged in that.  It is something I find just as repgunant.  So what else is there?  Surely there are other tools.  Massive campaigns of troothtelling?

Ha!

Shenonymous,

It’s a process.  One grain of sand isn’t a problem, but through the process of moving grains of sand, one can cover anything up, even CONSERVATISM.

Politics is a process of incremental progress.  We have to keep the Liberal Movement going to effect change through incremental progress and forget Light Switch Politics.

Socialism’s definition from BLACK’S LAW DICTIONARY:  Any theory or system of social organization which would abolish, entirely or in great part, the individual effort and competition on which modern society rests, and substitute for it co-operative action, would introduce a more perfect and equal distribution of the products of labor, and would make land and capital, as the instruments and means of production, the joint possession of the members of the community.

Right now, the RIGHT-WING CONSERVATIVE EXTREMISTS are using Socialism for the few against the many.  George Orwell in his book “Nineteen Eighty-four” called socialism for the few, “The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism”. Socialism is a reality for the wealthy.  What we have just been through bailing out the economy is socialism for the few at the expense of the many, oligarchical collectivism.  When you go to get a job, and all industry and places of employment know if you have ever made a mistake, that is socialism for the few.  When you want auto insurance, but all insurance companies know that once you had an accident, that’s socialism for the few.  When you mess up on a bank account but are never able to obtain another bank account because all banks know about your mistake, that’s socialism for the few.  Socialism is being used mightily by the few, it’s the many that aren’t allowed to use socialism. How could socialism possibly be so bad for the many if it is so good for the few?  We must quit buying the propaganda and sophistry of the AUTOCRATIC RIGHT-WING CONSERVATIVE EXTREMIST REPUBLICANS and their minions in the Democratic Party.

Does this definition sound like a bad thing?  Not to me, but of course greed would have to be controlled, because greed is what turns governments against the people.

About the BlueDogs…These are Republicans in the covert grungy suitcoats of Democrats.  They have always been there, well, for a long long time, since Wallace in Alabama, if not the Civil War.  They are racist and were against civil rights, originally called the Boll Weevils (uh, make that BallsEvils, which is how they ought to be called today).  While there is something to be said for fiscal responsibility, and the mainline Democrats often have a runaway number of over-financed programs because everyone of those vacant minded also greedy socialists wants more than their fair piece of the porkpie, and definitely needs a halter put on their mouths, uh spending fingers, this is also a huge society where the Common Majority (as they are described by the often incisively perceptive MarthaA) does not get to enjoy the promises of the Declaration of Independence of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with freedom and justice for all (which was not written for an elite wealthy class, but as Thomas Paine put it for the ‘Common’ Sensical – yeah, my modification), and who are overly taxed not right along with the exempt retiring wealthy and the hugely phallic corporate giants who find the many holes that has been built into the system where they can crawl into with their many dollars and hide out from their responsibility to contribute to the country’s operation and care for its people.  Whew, that was a mouthful.  My spell checker keeps telling me the sentence is too long, but f’ it!

Back to the BlueDogs. Once having been New Deal and Fair Deal even the Great Society supporters, the ultra-conservative BallsEvils, also called Dixiecrats, deceptively call themselves Democrats, clever bastards aren’t they, and is the most misnomer if ever there was one.  It is a political strategy to throw off the political ballsgame.  Seeing how antithetical that support was, they did a turnabout face and began to call those social program supporters turncoats.  Thus ended the masquerade.

I agree with everyone who says the public option, not-for-profit, single payer health care program is the only sane road to take.  Problem is the greedy Republicans, and Democrats, are in positions of power and cannot be dislodged.  When the word ‘we’ is used it is used as a means of psychological support only since there is no real ‘we.’  The ‘we’ is not a cohesive group that can act, as Sepharad plaintively often begs for, in a way as to move the political domain in the direction that promotes those promises in the founding documents.  How to motivate a motley crew?  That is the huge Shakespearean question!  How to coagulate incongruity.  Who is its charismatic speaker that has the power to galvanize, shock with electricity the almost immovable igneous, pyrogenically impotent Common Majority?  Name one, I challenge!

It is asked that the BlueDogs be gotten rid of by their districts Democrats!  Oh yeah, just try.  They have their racist and ultra-conservative constituency so scared stiff that voting on election days is merely a superfluous routine act of shuffling their feet to the polls.

Less Than Perfect Health Care Reform
Posted on Jul 29, 2009 By Ruth Marcus

This title begs the question.

A more realistic & accurate title would be:

” Life styles create early grave conditions:

REAL Health Care means Self Care means PREVENTION “

Obesity leads to diabetes.

Smoking leads to lung abnormalities.

And finally, a pain in the ass that everyone should

understand: hemorrhoids.

What should be more natural & uncomplicated than a

bowel movement? Constipation due to improper diet &

lack of exercise cause fecal waste to dry up & get

stuck in the colon causing those affected to strain

to get the stool out, which causes the anal veins to

become swollen & painful. The MIPIC: MEDICAL

INSURANCE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX solution

ranges from laxatives, stool softeners, enemas,

suppositories,ointments, medicated wipes, to

surgery. The self help approach is to stop the

behavior that caused the varicose vein, drink more

water, eat more fruits & vegetables & the only times

to postpone a bowel movement: driving , riding in an

elevator & skydiving. The longer the fecal material

remains in the colon, the drier & harder it gets.

When nature calls, answer the call as soon as

possible. And for those curious about the

difference between an internal and external

hemorrhoid, the answer is about 1”.

I wish Obama would rally the people more to his causes, but no one is perfect.  He is tied up pretty well by fascism with too much CONSERVATIVE on the Left.

With 2 parties, we must clean up the one party that is to represent the Left and vote out ALL CONSERVATIVES and MODERATES from the Left so there will be balance. The Left’s Party is the Democratic Party.

When will we no longer be exposed to the farce that the U.S. is a Democracy with two parties, when almost everyone knows that America is an Oligarchy?
Furthermore, Obama has demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt, that he is owned & operated by WALL STREET & has screwed we the people 100% of the time.
As far as the health care hoax goes,it’s time for the populace to wake up to the fact that what we have now & what we will get is just a symptom management system that has nothing to do with health. The most popular medical money makers result from life styles resulting from brainwashing people into self destructive behavior such as gluttony,and the consumption of alcohol, tobacco,caffeine,breathing oil based air fresheners, & junk “foods” to name a few. Eating nutritious food in moderate amounts & regular exercise is what it takes to get & maintain health. The relationship between obesity & diabetes is well established.What happens is that the pancreas
can handle let’s say a 150 lb. body, but not a 300 pounder. MIPIC:MEDICAL INSURANCE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX treats diabetics as annuities & the protocol is drugs,testing, exams,amputations,etc., etc. until death.
Ruppert Murdock has a new program on FOX entitled “more of you to love”. It features 20 morbidly obese women competing for a date & possibly marriage with an obese bachelor. Naturally, pizza & hamburgers are sponsors.Blocked blood vessels resulting from excessive grease consumption & damaged lungs from inhaling toxic substances are physiologic reactions.
MIPIC treats the symptoms & owns these folks til the
grave. Dentists make a living drilling filling & billing because the populace is not educated in prevention. The only real health care plan is education, but the MIPIC lobbyists would never allow
the funds to be spent on education.
One final fact:“Medical system is leading cause of death and injury in US”, over 700,000 per year.
For more specifics Google that title.

Listening to the Blue Dogs and Republicans in the House, this a.m. it does not look like the public option is going to be in their bill.  And it doesn’t look like they are going to put single payer on the table either.  I hope I heard wrong.  It would be stupid of them.  If they don’t create single payer insurance then the government option is all that is left that will stop the obscene insurance and drug companies.

The people that care have to stomp relentlessly on their reps and senators to do what the people want.  Americans have been held hostage by the insurance and drug companies long enough.  I heard that Bill Frist will be on Charlie Rose tonight.  This is upsetting since Frist was convicted and kicked out of congress, why should this guy’s opinion count for anything?

Remember the old bromide about the “nose of the camel”.  If we can break the deathgrip that the for profit medical establishment has on us, then over time we may actually get a system as good as Canada has or “heaven forbid” as good as France.  We have to start somewhere and any breath of fresh air is better than none.  The key to this is the Public Option and if it is not in there then the deathgrip will only tighten.  Obama must threaten a veto on any bill without a public option.

The only plan that will work for everyone is public single payer Medicare for all, NOT Medicaid, perish the thought.  Medicaid makes you sign all your possessions away for your health needs, whereas Medicare doesn’t.  FREE PUBLIC OPTION FOR THE COMMON POPULATION.

The only medical plan that will work for everyone is public single payer health care like Medicare for all, NOT Medicaid, perish the thought.

Medicaid makes people sign all their possessions away to get health needs met, whereas Medicare doesn’t.  FREE PUBLIC SINGLE PAYER OPTION FOR LOW INCOME INDIVIDUALS.

Greedy CONSERVATIVES will push Medicaid, but Medicaid is not at all what anyone wants. No one wants to have to give up their possessions for medical care, because too many people will die unnaturally.

PUBLIC PLAN SINGLE PAYER HEALTH CARE that is not mandated like the auto insurance scam.

I’ve posted this list before but really, you’d think we’re out to invent the wheel when we could pick one of these country’s Single Payer solutions…. 
Argentina
Austria
Belgium
Bosnia & Herzegovina
Brazil
Brunei
Bulgaria
Canada
Chile
China
Costa Rica
Croatia
Czech Republic
Cuba
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Georgia
Germany
Greece
Hong Kong
Hungary
Iceland
India,
Ireland
Israel
Italy
Japan
Kuwait
Latvia
Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Malta
Mexico
Netherlands
Norway
Pakistan
Panama
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Saudi Arabia
Serbia
Seychelles
Singapore
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Korea
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sweden
Switzerland
Taiwan
Thailand
U.K.
Ukraine
Uruguay
Venezuela….and improve on the current fiasco.

We need a system divorced from employment and run by the federal government. Anything that HMOs and drug companies are into will cost us trillions, provide convoluted coverage and its administrative costs will still be over 30%.

Health care doled out by for-profit insurance companies is absurd on it’s face.

The math is simple. In order to make the most profit, it is in the insurance companies best interest to pay out as few claims as possible. The best case scenario for an insurance company is that the payer die before the company has to pay their claim.

To leave our health care in the hands of rich CEO’s and stockholders who have a vested interest in our death is beyond ridiculous!

The public option is the only way to go.

Don’t worry P.T. about errant question marks.  Our government and society are full of them.  It is quite mysterious how typing sometimes bites one in the ass here on TD.  Must be some default glitch in the programming, or as I have suggested elsewhere, da debble duhzit.

I am beginning to see the virtue of the single payer solution.  The more I read the posts here the more it is seeping in.  While I am not exactly sure how it would work, I have a hunch it is the right path, but I want regulations on the insurance companies and the prescription drug empire (as I enjoy calling it).  Now I realize the word regulation strikes terror into the hearts of the conservatives, especially those who are tied to dollars, (every last one of them?), but using their own word, Amen.

The Republicans and the “Blue Dog” Dems have a vested interest in dragging the farcical “debate” on for as long as possible.  As long as it goes on the bribe money from the Insurance and Big pharma lobbies keeps pouring in.  Why in earth would they want to compromise this sweet possession?  This is not a republican verses Democrat issue it is a Peoples Rights verses a corrupt government issue.

“The group finessed one hot-button issue, whether there should be a public plan to compete with private insurers, by giving states the option of establishing their own public plans and providing for the option of a federal plan if state-level efforts don’t work.”

The idea of a truly public plan is that one could retain their coverage if they change jobs or lose their job.  If it is left up to the states, theoretically, someone covered in New York who moves to Idaho could easily go from a state that provides a public option to one that does not. 

No way..  I’m sick of hearing about state rights.  We are one country and need a public option that covers everyone no matter where.

Why are we talking about these plans when we all know that the only plan that is feasible is the single payer plan?—Carol Bayard

I agree!

I don’t know why the question mark appears in my posts.  I tried reposting but the same thing happened.

Progressives should work to oppose any health care change that doesn’t include a public option. Sticking with the current system and letting it eventually collapse is better than an insurance company? bailout that mandates that people buy overpriced private insurance.

Progressives should work to oppose any health care change that does not include a public option. Sticking with the current system and letting it eventually collapse is better than an insurance company? bailout that mandates that people buy overpriced private insurance.

I don’t care how you dress up this Pig of the proposed health care bill.  It’s still a stinking pig. One the public doesn’t want.  Max Baucus is simply a stooge for the insurance and pharmaceutical lobbies and as long a he is the Senate gate keeper for this bill we will never get the health care bill that over 2/3 of Americans clearly want ie. Universal Single Payer.  It is the only solution that offers true cost savings and full coverage of all citizens. Obama said that the public doesn’t want a “Canadian” type system.  That’s an outright lie and an attempt to “Spin” the media.  Bill HR 676 is the choice Americans want, but the collusion corrupt politicians and blood sucking insurance and pharmaceutical interests are standing in the way.  Stop bull-shiting us with this crap about negotiating a workable solution.  One already exists, HR-676.

The Republicans want to start over.  Of course they do.  That is their perennial strategy.  It is their litany.  I constantly blanche at their self-serving postures.  And I hope when the Congressional election comes around the voters are made by the Democrats to be super conscious about the fact that Republicans and the Blue Dog Democrats do not want them to have #1 a decent health care system, and #2 will do anything to keep their comrades in the insurance industry and pharmaceuticals amassing the obscene wealth they have been scamming from the public for over half a century.  We all know wherein the problem lay: the insurance companies and the prescription drug empire. 

Everyone wants fiscally responsible government.  The fact is that for a decade the government has been irresponsible to the point of creating a depression with the financial and mortgage and health care scandalous behavior.  Even with news that things are getting better, it is going to be a repulsively long time before this country, and the world as well, will have something to sing about.

In a disparate two party system there is always the mandate for compromise and it is needed to keep a lid on from running amuck.  Some think amuck is the current situation, but I think the fixes put in place will work regardless of the pessimism levitating about.  So compromise away.  Just don’t compromise the good of the people away.