So why should I not be ticked off with the GOP right now?

[Upchurch]

Just because I don't feel it is being acknowledged, I'd like to reiterate the point that the ACA is already funded. The shutdown, in no way, impacts the functioning of the ACA or it's ability to fill its requirements.

It was never a factor in the CR until the Republicans made it so. Having utterly failed to repeal the law in the usual fashion dozens of times, the Republicans have engineered the threat of shutdown and it's eventual occurrence to extort a result that there just isn't enough support for, public or otherwise.

This is sour grapes multiplied by insanity and it rests entirely on House Republicans.

 

[Myron Proudfoot]

so basically the republican position is that they'll let the government reopen, all the Democrats have to do is agree to deny health care to millions of Americans for a year.

yeah, what could possibly be wrong with that.

And, and stuff the bit about "we're not denying anybody health care!" Yes, you are. By preventing millions of people from getting health insurance, you're making it financially impossible for many of them to go see a doctor or, if they do, to pay for expensive necessary treatments. People die because they don't have health insurance and anyone who goes as far as the republicans have to try and deny them insurance are contributing. screw them.


(and yes, I am angry. VERY.)

 

[Drysdale]

And it should be reiterated that Congressmen represent their districts and not just their voters. And more than this, they represent the country and should always have its best interest at heart.

But the most important point, and one which has been made better by ANTPogo already, is that this sort of hostage taking will destroy the country. All of our systems break down when a minority party is willing to find some unanticipated lever of destruction and use it to force concessions or threaten to hurt America on purpose. Again, is this were "defund Obamacare or we won't vote to confirm judges", that would be bad enough, because we need a functioning judiciary and in the past, winning elections has been agreed upon as enabling your preferred selections to proceed to a vote. But this is a whole different animal. This is a default on our debts which has never happened before, and the vast majority of economists believe will be a catastrophe. Americans will see their savings disappear, another recession will be triggered, and our credit rating will be downgraded which will cost us untold amounts of national treasure in the future. This is so outside the normative process that up until the Tea Party came around, such a thing was unthinkable. I shudder to think that this will start to become normal in the minds of the public. Obama is right to stand firm against this because it goes way beyond Obamacare.

Remember, as unpopular as Bush was, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid did NOT threaten default or shutdown when they took power in 2006. This is crazy behavior and we'll all pay a price if we don't stop it.

Why would they, Bush gave them everything they wanted pretty much geez.

 

[Bob001]

....
And, and stuff the bit about "we're not denying anybody health care!"
.....

This has been the Republican meme since the first discussions about health care reform: "Everybody gets medical care. If you don't have insurance you just go to the emergency room and they take care of you..." Of course, the people making that claim are legislators and commentators with great health insurance from their employers. The Republicans might have had a case if they had offered a legitimate alternative to Obamacare (although, as has been pointed out, the insurance-based plan was the conservative alternative to universal single-payer), but to just shout "No soup for you!" isn't a policy position and doesn't deserve to be taken seriously.

 

[Mike!]

You do know that a Republican placed exemptions in there, right?

Did I say anything different? Both sides are crooked lying bastards as far as I'm concerned.

 

[stevea]

Ah, good. An attorney is here. Please explain the illegalities.

So you have to be a lawyer to recognize a potential crime ? If you're going to be snarky at least say something intelligent.

Consider he extraordinary exemptions and waivers to the TAX wrt due process (or equal protection wrt state exchanges).

===

No, and offer is "here's what I want to give you", not "here's what I want you to give me". The House CR contains only the latter, and none of the former.

No - all deals are a quid pro quo. An offer defines both sides of the potential exchange (I give this and you give that). This is fundamental to all negotiations. We can't have a reasonable conversation so long as you fail to understand basics.

A) It's not an offer, and B) the Senate has already sent back to the House the version they revised. Sane House Republicans tried to get the whole House to vote on that, but the crazy wing killed any chances of that, and insisted on making continued demands with no offers.

A) It is an offer. YOU get an increase in the debt ceiling and in exchange ACA gets a delay and no device tax and ... Quid pro quo.
B) You shouldn't make up "facts". There have been no Senate votes since Sept 30, and that was to table a motion for a CR. No markup was sent back to the House.
https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/vote_menu_113_1.htm

You are guilty of exactly the same polarizing ad hominem and demonization as Obama. If you are so intolerant of opposing positions that your opponent are "the crazy wing" then you cannot participate in a reasonable negotiation. If your position is that people who oppose the ACA are 'ideological crusaders attempting to harm the ill and ruin the economy', then you are the problem. Stop imputing bad motives to others.

Why should the Senate pull the same dangerous crap that the House Republicans are doing? The Senate is wanting to pass, with no strings attached, the thing that both parties have explicitly said they want to avoid. It's the Republicans that are insisting on adding things to the bill that only they want, without offering anything to the Democrats in return.

Your position is biased. There is no default or center position in any negotiation. So it isn't that we have some accepted default and thaqt the Reps are ruining it by demanding more. Both sides want to avoid shutdown - but not at any cost.

You POV is also partisan. The Senate wants no change to the things they passed when they held the House & Senate a few years ago - but that era is gone, and they now might want to compromise to keep much of what they once had. I'm not suggesting the Dems don't have good counter arg nor that they should accept everything the Reps ask for.

From the "effective negotiations" class i took long ago - it looks like this impasse is b/c this has come down to one issue (ACA). That's very bad for progress. Normally you want several factors that the two parties value distinctly. If the Dems wanted a good compromise they should counter with an additional factor (like delay ACA for 6 months AND we cut oil subsidies by 50%). That's not a serious example, but they should put the Reps goodies on the table for chopping too.

The Dems don't want a negotiation, thus the demonization and insults. They believe they can rule w/o challenge when they don't hold the House. I think that's an error, but .. .we'll see.

No, it's disliked by a small segment of the population, who are vastly outnumbered by the people who either like it or aren't sure.

And the Republicans, who campaigned in 2012 on dismantling the ACA, were soundly defeated.

You don't get your own "facts",
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/10/01/cnn-poll-will-obamacare-help-you/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/01/healthcare-obamacare-affordable-care-act
40% or 52.2% is not a "small segment vastly outnumbered".
Apparently Tom Cruz and others were not soundly defeated.

If the House Republicans want to do that, they can propose separate bills for that and let everyone vote, and not force the entire apparatus of government to shut down unless they get their way.

We've been over this ;and so should your HS civics teacher. The Senate + WH can & have rejected changes (Harry Reid said he won't bring any mod bills to the floor) so now the House is trying to use the "power of the purse" tactic - right ? What's wrong with that ? Did you imagine that everything passed by Dem Congress would last once they lost some control ?

Here's a better analogy: say you and your roommate have to cosign on your rent check every month. Unless you both sign the check, you'll both get evicted. Neither you nor your roommate wants to get evicted.

However, your roommate refuses to co-sign the check for the rent, thus resulting in you both ending up homeless, unless you buy her a big-screen TV that she will get to keep in her room all the time.

Now, is she making an offer that you then have to come to some compromise on ("Okay, you don't have to buy me a big-screen TV. Just a new laptop. Or I won't co-sign the rent check")?

Or is she making a demand on you, taking something that you both want and wanting extra stuff that only she benefits from on top of that?

That's a failed analogy in several important ways. Your roomates changed in 2012, and your old DemHouse roomate was replaced by a RepHouse roomate. It isn't just rent - but you both pay for all expenses from a joint account. You and your new roomate disagree on several topics of expense & policy that your old roomate agreed on. You both want to stay in this joint account agreement but not w/o some compromise on the issues of disagreement. Your assumption that you get things 100% as they were with the old roomate is living in the past.

New roomate is not asking for some added TV/laptop expense, but demanding that you both slow down and reconsider the current policy as they can result in common expenses that neither should want (I am not suggesting that Reps have always been so reasonable). The new roomate would prefer that you eliminate certain expenses altogether.

----

Uh, the ACA has already passed, and made it through Constitutional scrutiny to boot. And it passed not by the Democrats demanding that it be made law or they'd force the government to shut down, but by a proper legislative vote.

SCOTUS ruled on one small aspect of ACA (personal mandate). They did NOT give some blanket approval as you imply. But I appreciate that you can recite partisan talking points.

Yes ACA passed, but apparently they did not (and could not) pass perpetually continuing budget allocation. For than matter Harry Reid has prevented any omnibus budget for ~4 years. The power of the purse was used to shutdown the Vietnam War in 1974, to put a timeline on Iraq .... So now the House is using this Constitutional mechanism of government to try to mod ACA. If you don't like Article I, Section 9, Clause 7, you can try to pass an amendment. Otherwise it's just whining that you don't like this tactic when it works against your interests.

Your other comments simply display your partisan position that the Dems deserve 100% of what they want with no compromise with those who disagree.

 

[DavidJames]

I'll boil your word salad down to the only two relavent points.

SCOTUS ruled on one small aspect of ACA (personal mandate).

They ruled on what they were asked to rule on. End of story. Full stop. You can rant on about other things related but they are 100% irrelevant and only thrown out there to make the word salad more impressive. It didn't work.

Yes ACA passed

Yes it passed end of story, Full Stop. Sorry, no "but" other then to improve your irrelevant word salad count.

We get it you don't like ACA. The fact that you can't get your (Boo Hoo) way through the appropriate process just means you're behaving like a spoiled 3 year old who just had his blanky taken away. Like I said before, grow up, act like an adult and deal with the fact that you lost.

 

[Spindrift]

So you have to be a lawyer to recognize a potential crime ? If you're going to be snarky at least say something intelligent.

Consider he extraordinary exemptions and waivers to the TAX wrt due process (or equal protection wrt state exchanges).

===



No - all deals are a quid pro quo. An offer defines both sides of the potential exchange (I give this and you give that). This is fundamental to all negotiations. We can't have a reasonable conversation so long as you fail to understand basics.



A) It is an offer. YOU get an increase in the debt ceiling and in exchange ACA gets a delay and no device tax and ... Quid pro quo.
B) You shouldn't make up "facts". There have been no Senate votes since Sept 30, and that was to table a motion for a CR. No markup was sent back to the House.
https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/vote_menu_113_1.htm

You are guilty of exactly the same polarizing ad hominem and demonization as Obama. If you are so intolerant of opposing positions that your opponent are "the crazy wing" then you cannot participate in a reasonable negotiation. If your position is that people who oppose the ACA are 'ideological crusaders attempting to harm the ill and ruin the economy', then you are the problem. Stop imputing bad motives to others.




Your position is biased. There is no default or center position in any negotiation. So it isn't that we have some accepted default and thaqt the Reps are ruining it by demanding more. Both sides want to avoid shutdown - but not at any cost.

You POV is also partisan. The Senate wants no change to the things they passed when they held the House & Senate a few years ago - but that era is gone, and they now might want to compromise to keep much of what they once had. I'm not suggesting the Dems don't have good counter arg nor that they should accept everything the Reps ask for.

From the "effective negotiations" class i took long ago - it looks like this impasse is b/c this has come down to one issue (ACA). That's very bad for progress. Normally you want several factors that the two parties value distinctly. If the Dems wanted a good compromise they should counter with an additional factor (like delay ACA for 6 months AND we cut oil subsidies by 50%). That's not a serious example, but they should put the Reps goodies on the table for chopping too.

The Dems don't want a negotiation, thus the demonization and insults. They believe they can rule w/o challenge when they don't hold the House. I think that's an error, but .. .we'll see.



You don't get your own "facts",
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/10/01/cnn-poll-will-obamacare-help-you/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/01/healthcare-obamacare-affordable-care-act
40% or 52.2% is not a "small segment vastly outnumbered".
Apparently Tom Cruz and others were not soundly defeated.





We've been over this ;and so should your HS civics teacher. The Senate + WH can & have rejected changes (Harry Reid said he won't bring any mod bills to the floor) so now the House is trying to use the "power of the purse" tactic - right ? What's wrong with that ? Did you imagine that everything passed by Dem Congress would last once they lost some control ?



That's a failed analogy in several important ways. Your roomates changed in 2012, and your old DemHouse roomate was replaced by a RepHouse roomate. It isn't just rent - but you both pay for all expenses from a joint account. You and your new roomate disagree on several topics of expense & policy that your old roomate agreed on. You both want to stay in this joint account agreement but not w/o some compromise on the issues of disagreement. Your assumption that you get things 100% as they were with the old roomate is living in the past.

New roomate is not asking for some added TV/laptop expense, but demanding that you both slow down and reconsider the current policy as they can result in common expenses that neither should want (I am not suggesting that Reps have always been so reasonable). The new roomate would prefer that you eliminate certain expenses altogether.

----


SCOTUS ruled on one small aspect of ACA (personal mandate). They did NOT give some blanket approval as you imply. But I appreciate that you can recite partisan talking points.

Yes ACA passed, but apparently they did not (and could not) pass perpetually continuing budget allocation. For than matter Harry Reid has prevented any omnibus budget for ~4 years. The power of the purse was used to shutdown the Vietnam War in 1974, to put a timeline on Iraq .... So now the House is using this Constitutional mechanism of government to try to mod ACA. If you don't like Article I, Section 9, Clause 7, you can try to pass an amendment. Otherwise it's just whining that you don't like this tactic when it works against your interests.

Your other comments simply display your partisan position that the Dems deserve 100% of what they want with no compromise with those who disagree.

I'm still not clear on why you don't like the Republican Healthcare Plan (aka ACA or Obamacare).

If Dems weren't interested in compromise they would have held out for Universal Health Care instead of adopting the Republican plan.

 

[uke2se]

If Dems weren't interested in compromise they would have held out for Universal Health Care instead of adopting the Republican plan.

Perhaps they should have forced a government shutdown in the middle of a war to get their way?

 

[Dymanic]

A) It is an offer. YOU get an increase in the debt ceiling and in exchange ACA gets a delay and no device tax and ... Quid pro quo

The "Godfather" equivalent of "making them an offer they can't refuse".

You shouldn't make up "facts". There have been no Senate votes since Sept 30, and that was to table a motion for a CR. No markup was sent back to the House.

You shouldn't twist facts. The Senate resolution passed on September 27 would pass the House right now if Boehner would allow a vote. They tabled the House amended version which includes the one-year ACA delay.

Your position is biased.

News flash: All of our positions are biased. (And the sky is blue, in case you were wondering about that).

The Dems don't want a negotiation...

Negotiations on the ACA were long and arduous -- and completed, with the result that it passed both houses of Congress, was signed into law by the President, and survived a test in the Supreme Court. If Republicans want to re-negotiate it, the same channels are available to them. What neither the President nor Congressional Democrats are willing to do is to negotiate that, or anything else, with a gun held to their heads. That's not the way our system was designed to work.

We've been over this ;and so should your HS civics teacher. The Senate + WH can & have rejected changes (Harry Reid said he won't bring any mod bills to the floor) so now the House is trying to use the "power of the purse" tactic - right ? What's wrong with that ?

What's wrong with using the "power of the purse" to threaten the entire economic foundation of our country? Let's see what Madison had to say about that in the passage from Federalist no. 58 that you omitted from our earlier exchange:

"This power over the purse may, in fact, be regarded as the most complete and effectual weapon with which any constitution can arm the immediate representatives of the people, for obtaining a redress of every grievance, and for carrying into effect every just and salutary measure. But will not the House of Representatives be as much interested as the Senate in maintaining the government in its proper functions, and will they not therefore be unwilling to stake its existence or its reputation on the pliancy of the Senate?"

Clearly, the Founders did not intend to give to any branch (or sub-branch) of government the unilateral power to hull the ship of state.

SCOTUS ruled on one small aspect of ACA (personal mandate). They did NOT give some blanket approval as you imply.

And a legitimate remedy for those opposed is to try to challenge it again in the courts.

Plus,what DavidJames said.

 

[stevea]

The senate counter is "you agreed to fund this. Now sit down and stop acting like children".

The PREVIOUS House agreed to pay for it. Just as some previous House agree to continue Iraq indefinitely until the 2007 House used the power of he purse to impose a timeline. These personalizations/humanizations of composite political bodies lead to nonsense thinking (I'm not blaming you - the Pres started this demagoguery).

It's equally probable this clown show is going to cost the GOP the House, not to speak about any prospects in 2016.

That doesn't counter my point that eventually Dems will eventually be out of power, and to the extent they impose a unilateral policy that excludes and insults any outside input, then it will see more continued opposition. Johnson's Great Society has noble intentions too, but was largely a failure, mostly gone in a decade. The last vestiges were eliminated in the 1990s.

It's unclear to me if this "clown show" will help or hurt Reps in the short run, but I tend to agree it's a very dangerous game politically. Maybe their outcome advantage is that they have the Dems sign up for no delay, no device tax reduction, many exemptions, no negotiations - and then the Reps get to hang any fraud or failure or problems on Dems alone.

 

[Spindrift]

That doesn't counter my point that eventually Dems will eventually be out of power, and to the extent they impose a unilateral policy that excludes and insults any outside input, then it will see more continued opposition.

The Dems are NOT trying to impose a unilateral policy (ACA). The policy is ALREADY in place. It's the Republicans that are trying to unilaterally undo that policy.

 

[uke2se]

The PREVIOUS House agreed to pay for it.

Yep. It was agreed upon, and signed into law. The new house (well, a part of it) has tried to undo it 41 times, and they have failed. Maybe you should read that word again, because you seem to be having trouble understanding it: FAILED. Suck it up.

That doesn't counter my point that eventually Dems will eventually be out of power, and to the extent they impose a unilateral policy that excludes and insults any outside input, then it will see more continued opposition.

First, that's not a point. That's an unfounded prediction. Second, the ACA isn't an unilateral policy. It was voted for by both sides. It's a compromise.

It's unclear to me if this "clown show" will help or hurt Reps in the short run, but I tend to agree it's a very dangerous game politically. Maybe their outcome advantage is that they have the Dems sign up for no delay, no device tax reduction, many exemptions, no negotiations - and then the Reps get to hang any fraud or failure or problems on Dems alone.

There will be no positive outcome for the GOP from this debacle. That's my unfounded prediction.

 

[elbe]

First, that's not a point. That's an unfounded prediction. Second, the ACA isn't an unilateral policy. It was voted for by both sides. It's a compromise.

I don't think stevea likes that fact.

 

[Upchurch]

There will be no positive outcome for the GOP from this debacle. That's my unfounded prediction.

I think this will help some Republicans with a small swath of hard core Tea Partiers and pretty much piss-off everyone else, including other Republicans from the association, from what I've heard.

 

[DavidJames]

I don't think stevea likes that fact.

He doesn't have much respect for any of the relevant facts in this case.

 

[12AX7]

So you have to be a lawyer to recognize a potential crime ? If you're going to be snarky at least say something intelligent

The "Law of so" trikes again.

You said some things looked illegal to you. I asked you to explain the illegalities. Please include precedents and case law.



PS- A hint for you. The ACA is law, upheld as constitutional.


ETA- DavidJames already summed it up.

 

[Frank Newgent]

I've heard that if the weeping Cheeto brought the equivalent of the Senate "clean" bill to the House floor it would pass.

 

[TellyKNeasuss]

That doesn't counter my point that eventually Dems will eventually be out of power, and to the extent they impose a unilateral policy that excludes and insults any outside input, then it will see more continued opposition. Johnson's Great Society has noble intentions too, but was largely a failure, mostly gone in a decade. The last vestiges were eliminated in the 1990s.

The Great Society programs have been eliminated? Wow, I need to watch the news more often. I thought that Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start, food stamps, and the Voting Rights Act were still in existence.

 

[12AX7]

I've heard that if the weeping Cheeto brought the equivalent of the Senate "clean" bill to the House floor it would pass.

"weeping Cheeto".

You owe me a keyboard.