jryan

That doctor doesn't check to see if anyone actually supported the bill before he gives treatment. Also, you can't take the leap that he is a racist by using a completely different scenario where the person really was racist. You can label the doctor as anti-Obamacare because of the sign in his window... and he would agree with you. But he isn't a racist as Grayson claims.

Ah.... it was lost on me! This is a dicey thing given that many people are in the middle of a heated debate, and only the user shows up as omgponies. I figured you and Paranoia were have fun at my expense! Oh the shame. Reminds me of the fun we had on another site with a pluging that would replace [you] with the name of the viewer. So I could say "I really love [you]" and it would be a compliment to everyone... the oppoiste was more often used though.

Nice to see public ridicule by the management here. It reminds me why I can only take this place in short doses.

I do advocate it, Mr. Skeptic. I am simply pointing out that claiming that the laws are at fault here is wrong. These people chose to risk jail time for a stupid high. Here is a rather complete statistical breakdown of drug use. If you scroll down to table 1.26a and onward there are the pertinent numbers for 2005 and 2006. 1.27a in particular shows that the unemployment/underemployment/non-employment rate among pot smokers is 29.9% (part-time+unemployed+other divided by total) in ages 26+. Given that the retirement age (65+) has the lowest usage rate (7.2% lifetime), don't think that retirement contributes that much to "other" either. I'm not, that was their parents choice. As for what parents tell their children, I am simply going by what I know of habitual pot smokers, and those parents left behind to fend for the family. They, like you, fail to properly assign blame for the plight of the family and children. To them the parent in jail is a victim of the system rather than an idiot that couldn't get their priorities in order. So you agree that making drugs legal won't keep these people out of prison? What's the point of making drugs legal then? They were in large part those who felt they were the victim of the law, rather than of their stupid spouse/parent. Most raised their children to make the exact same mistakes they made and wind up in the exact same predicament as their parents. Running through the play list of your average urban radio station will also give you a good clue of the target population's thoughts on who the heroes and villains are in the drug war. And this cuts across race and ethnic barriers in the ghettos and poor populations, too. Sure we do, but those standards have little to do with what you teach them about drug use and personal responsibility. The irony is that if Glaxo or Phillip Morris started selling marijuana people would like them... but selling actual medicines and cigarettes have them equally hated. But that was OT.. on the reduction in pimps and prices and prostitution: I wouldn't be so sure about that. The prostitutes I dealt with as a social worker needed to turn tricks to afford bread and beer, much less marijuana, heroin, etc. The interesting side effect of legalizing prostitution is a great many prostitutes could be out of business or remain under the thumb of black market pimps... and the price would sky rocket. See what happened in Nevada with legalized prostitution. I won't link you to "menus" for these brothels, but suffice it to say they are prohibitively expensive, and black market prostitution still exists. You would be hard pressed to argue that computer use is as dangerous as drug use. You haven't proven your point beyond pure emotion that jail time is more damaging than having a drug addicted parent in the home. Granted, I am arguing the same line, but I have considerable experience with both.. and in most cases the children were better of with dad (or mom) in jail. So does recreational drug use. But you aren't. You are kidding yourselves. The parent that risks their wives and children's lives for marijuana have given clear evidence already that they are not suitable to be parents. Going back to your previous computer example, if the government were to outlaw computers under penalty of jail time I would stop using computers. I wouldn't start arguing for the repeal of the law, but I wouldn't be so calloused as to jeopardize my children's safety by using computers before the law is repealed. There are a laundry list of reasons why not living with a drug user is better than living with one. For marijuana, one of the most common (ubiquitous) effects on children is the mental damage caused to their parents by continual use... not to mention the increased likelihood that the children will become early users... which in turn exacerbates the chances of psychological damage on the child in later life... leading to troubles for that child's children, and so on. Then legalize it. I am just telling you it's a very bad idea and the reasons for legalization are spurious and based on faulty assumptions.

And I would argue that that is not the case. It simply trades one death for another. It would be hard to argue that few people have died from Alcohol since the repeal of prohibition than died during it. Similarly, if you banned tobacco tomorrow there would be a surge in black market tobacco and violence, but even a 20% decrease in new smokers would mean an aggregate drop in tobacco related deaths. Going back to whether it's worse to have a user in prison than in the home, I'd like to point out that watching your parent or family member kill themselves with substance abuse is not as great as some here seem to think it is. Increased rates of cancer that WE ALL need to pay for now, higher rates of mental illness which we ALL need to pay for now, lower job dependability which we all already have to pay for. It's hard, especially with out drift into a full nanny state that marijuana abuse doesn't effect other people. I'm not a pure libertarian any more than I am a pure conservative. I do find, however, a purity in true libertarianism that supports every-man-to-his-own-vice "freedom" as at least a true libertarian wouldn't want to saddle me with the health care bills of a substance abuser. In practical terms though -- as a person who has seen to many lives ruined by substance abuse of all kinds -- I can't in good conscience support the legalization of what would be the death of many people. Seeing those who managed to escape before killing themselves and still carry mental and physical scars from habitual use of many drug, I don't consider jail, or even death as the worst of all possible outcomes. Furthermore, dealing with many drug councilors that went through addiction themselves -- many whom detoxed for the last time in prison -- I don't find the idea of letting people kill themselves legally very compelling.

Then don't smoke pot. It seems like a rather obvious solution to me! Guess how many of those pot dealing hubbies were good contributing parents outside of prison. As for how much worse it is for children... well, that depends on the parents. If the other parent instills in their child that pot is bad for everyone and that the other parent imperiled their own family just to get high, maybe that child will grow up to be the kind of person that doesn't imperil their children for the monumentally selfish goal of getting stoned. I would beg to differ. Those who engage in illicit drugs are not the sort that stay out of trouble otherwise. Dealing with clients with long term marijuana abuse (schizophrenia, depression, suicidal thoughts, and so on) gives you a different perspective. I would rather the parent go to jail and the child learn a lesson than have the parent pass on their belief in the harmlessness of marijuana to their kids. Of course, the parent left behind to raise the children is usually an abuser themselves, so kids rarely have a good place to turn for sanity. The idea of "we created drug dealers and pimps" is false. Legalizing the drugs or prostitution doesn't mean there will suddenly be no pimps or dealers. They just do it legally... but the negative effects of prostitution and drug use don't vanish... and the black market would still exist. I'm not all that keen of legalizing something because organized crime deals in it anyway. The argument wouldn't sound reasonable for any other illicit trade of organized crime, so it doesn't for drugs. Yeah, we should also legalize home theft and muggings too... it's amazing how little crime you get when everything is legal! Well, unless your conscious choices impact those around you negatively. I have little care for a single burnout with no wife or kids... they ruined their own lives and can deal with the consequences. But when you find it more important to get high than to protect your souse and children from harm then excuse my if I feel compelled to stop you from doing it... just the same as I would (and have often) call 911 on any motorist I see driving erratically. No, because drug abusers (and alcoholics for that matter) are almost universally self centered and can never understand why those around them have a problem with their choice of slow in-your-face suicides.

I'm pointing out that the answer, regardless of it's outcome, wouldn't contribute much to the debate.

Well, before we go to far, are you arguing FOR legalized drugs or AGAINST legalized alcohol? It would seem to me that showing that alcohol is just as conducive to further experimentation as pot isn't so much an argument in favor of pot, but an argument against alcohol. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged In the same way that prohibitions on embezzlement have ruined lives. Not that I support embezzlement, but arguing that a law that people willingly break is at fault for the people breaking the law is not at all accurate. It's a point I liked to make with my pot smoking clients: if pot is not addictive, then why risk your family to smoke it? Obviously, if it isn't addictive, you COULD walk away from pot at any time... yet still many still ruined their own families while fully aware of the consequences, simply to get high. People with that level of commitment to their families, in my professional opinion, aren't destined to create healthy families anyway. Of course, if marijuana is addictive -- which seems the case given the willingness of people to risk everything to smoke it -- then the rationalization for legalizing it is even weaker than it is already.

That's true too, Syntho-sis. I worked with a lot of heavy pot users as a social worker, and the drug is far from harmless.

That's a good question, but from my days in social work I can say that Medicaid reimbursement only covered that portion of the medicaid spending that was within federal guidelines. I would make an educated guess that that portion of the added medicaid expense that arose from federally qualified recipients (through outreach programs, etc.) would be reimbursed at 50%, but recipients that only qualify under state rules would not be. Many states make their own Medicaid rules that add more eligibility (like California's MediCal) because they are allowed to by law and it saves them the cost of creating a whole new bureaucracy to meet some state level campaign promise. I see in the state budget site that they expect an additional $600 million in Federal reimbursement for Medicaid in 2011 from the Health Care reform bill. But then that is just taking poor state planning in their health reform and dumping it on the federal deficit spending for he national program... which has been my point all along. We as a nation are essentially just going to foot the bill for Massachusetts' bad plan, and now 49 more Massachusetts Health Care plans.

Glenn Beck has been a Libertarian for quite a while now, and Stossel has always been a Libertarian. As such, their support for marijuana legalization isn't exactly shocking. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged That is an interesting question. I would guess that heroin, cocaine and meth would likely not find a legal manufacturer willing to take the risk, but it would likely still be sold on a black market by unlicensed dealers. Well, the other argument is that there IS alcohol, yet many people still buy coke. The trouble is that the effect that people seek is generally directly related to the danger of the drug. Psychedelics tend to be safer than mood altering drugs like heroin... but someone seeking a heroin high will most likely not settle for marijuana. Most likely not, for the reasons I stated. Each drug has a different effect on the person, and what that person chooses to take is driven more by what they are seeking than what is legally available and safe.

And I am pointing out that without the health care reform Massachusetts would have a balanced budget, or a surplus. Rereading your post I have to then disagree with your assesment of $3 billion over 3 years. That number is incorrect. The program offloads a good deal of it's cost onto state Medicaid, which went from $6 billion annually in 2005 to $9 billion annually in 2009.. you can't blame that on a 0.7% population growth rate. So the total cost starts at $4.2 billion annually, without counting the tax implications Where did you get those numbers from? I see in the Massachusetts Budget office that the total state budget is $31.9 billion, with health care expenses totaling $12.8 billion (the largest department in the state by far.. eating 40% of the states budget all on it's own). From that I can determine that the $4.2 billion in added cost from state health care reform is 13% of the total state budget today.

You might find the answer in how they count borrowing against Social Security and Medicare. This is also a debt, but not always counted in public debt. For instance, Clinton is considered to have balanced the budget and achieved a surplus in the last two years as president, but when you count the money borrowed from Social Security and Medicare he only squeaked out a surplus in one of the two years. Still quite a feat, but it's a good illustration of how budget numbers change when you include the Medicare and Social Security debts for the given year. Over all debt in those two is a mess though... I'll look it up when I get more time, but we have something like $107 trillion in IOUs in those programs. Edit: Here is the depressing article I got the $107 trillion figure from.

I've just read the article now as it was blocked at work. Now I see what you are saying. Though I still am having a hard time believing there is any meaning to the graphs for the population at large, rather than just the population that uses a particular online dating service, or even dating services in general. On a side note: Has there ever been a study as to the accuracy of dating site data versus real world people? Wouldn't there tend to be a biased towards ages being higher than reported, and ideological responses trend towards desire bias (ie. "this is what the ladies want to hear")? That is to say, while the study is neat, I wouldn't necessarily hang my hat on OkCupid personal ads, or statistics derivatives there of. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged Or desperate enough to use internet dating sites.

IOW, the Health Care program is the difference between deficit spending and paying down their debt. Also, since when is a 5% growth in total debt annually a minor concern?

Well, first, the population of Massachusetts has increased about 50,000 a year for the three years since their health program began (or 0.7% annually), the public outlays for the health program more than doubled between 2007 and 2009 ($630 million in 2007 to $1.3 billion in 2009 or 53% annually). Texas, on the other hand has had sky rocketing population numbers, yet they remain one of the lowest per-capita debt states in the union. Sure, you can argue that the bulk of all the other excessive spending that Massachusetts does is equally contributing to their fiscal woes, but it is hard to ignore the fact that Massachusetts, in 2008 as an example, had a $1.4 billion deficit while their new health care program was costing them about $900 million while failing to provide better care and costing the average person in Massachusetts more money and failing to control health care cost. All of this was well known long before the national plan was a gleam in Harry Reid's eye. Massachusetts is expected to run a $2.75 billion dollar deficit in 2010 while the cost of the Massachusetts Health Care program will be topping $4 billion as well (which is a combination of the $1.2 billion in direct expenses and the $3 billion increase in Medicaid since inception.. see "failing to control health cost" link above). There is no doubt from the numbers that Massachusetts would have been in MUCH better standing financially had it never passed their Health reform plan.

I think that is a bit of a stretch based on the evidence provided. The only real conclusion I can draw from that is that the majority of fiscal conservatives are pro-life, and to a lesser extent anti-gay marriage. What do the curves look like for affirmative action, or CO2 emissions, or any number of other social issues for which the skew is most likely in the other direction?

Why would I care about this again? I'm not a water carrier for the Republican party. If they are claiming that the Obama bill isn't based on the failed Massachusetts bill then they are wrong. Hell, the Republicans are better served distancing themselves from Massachusetts and Romney. This article is not all that valuable. Note the level they have to scrape to get an imposing list. "Some Republicans were against the foot on desk while BUSH DID IT!".. not to mention that bit of evidence is so bottom of the barrel that it is third-hand and even second hand fails to reference who the email was even from. Not knowing who said it, I would have to wonder how accurate the report is that Unknown-possible-republican#1 didn't say the same thing about Bush... or Ford. So yeah... your source is rather prone to wild accusation.. this doesn't bode well... Or the difference between "unlawful enemy combatants" and the use of the term "prisoner of war" by one Republican (Sessions) in one statement in one hearing. Any samurai would covet a blade that cuts so fine. By such a statndard I suppose HAHA Obama thinks their are 57 states in the Union and the Health care Bill will save 3000% on Employer health expenses. Numerous Buchanan quotes as if he is somehow even considered main stream Republican anymore. Anyway, as I argued in the thread on hypocrisy, defining someone as a hypocrite does not invalidate the rules they failed to follow. Obama can tell people not to smoke while continuing to smoke and I would not claim that smoking is therefor good because Obama is a hypocrite... but so many people make the same bizarre leap with other acts of hypocrisy. Let's see.. I only have so much time for these, but they're fun to read... Immigration reform... well, that's a funny choice to bring up since the first immigration reform was shot down by Democrats in the 110th congress 38-9, and buy Republicans 26-20. So no, the Republicans were against Immigration reform then and now. But left out was also a key ingredient... what's the current proposal versus the previous proposal? Why are Democrats so fired up about reform now when they weren't then? Does your TPM blogger bother asking that questions... let me check.. hmmm.. no. Shocker! Steele complaining that GITMO isn't close... this is misinformation by the TPM blogger, and his link. Steele was bringing up GITMO as an example of Obama's naivete with regard to GITMO and asking why, if Obama was so fired up to close GITMO , why he hasn't closed it yet. It's certainly a fair question. Obama heavily misjudged the need and purpose for GITMO, and is now learning that all the campaign rhetoric in the world doesn't change the realities once you are in charge. Selective bolding of the Steele quote doesn't change the meaning. The Mirandizing of the Show Bomber -vs- The Mirandizing of the Underwear Bomber.... I don't/didn't think either should have been Mirandized as both were enemy saboteurs. But the lack of an outcry against Bush would be hypocritical, sure. As is the time given to respond (three days versus six according to HuffPo). Etc. etc. That thing is padded to all hell with it's own layers of hypocrisy and the occaissional knock against Bush that I agree with. I suppose I could show the Democrats railing against Buchanan... and then loving him when he was opposed to the war in Iraq and opposed to support for Israel. Oh, they're so hypocritical! Anyway, read through that page yourself some day. I don't have time to comment on all of it... but it has more filler than a 10¢ hotdog. And it isn't even MOSTLY about Republican policy being later opposed by Republicans. I have already said time and time again that in the case of this health care bill the Republicans have a model they can point to and say "See, it doesn't work". You are arguing that the Republican experience is trumped by... what exactly? Because the "Republican" plan in question was tried on a much smaller scale and failed to achieve it's goals. Why are you finding this so hard to understand?

The article is behind a pay wall. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedHere is the same article on WSJ absent the pay wall: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704117304575138071192342664.html I'm really not sure what it is that you are arguing when you off that as your evidence. All it is saying was that the Republicans were frozen out of negotiations, and that the Democrats arrived at their current bill through wholly partisan negotiations. This has nothing to do with whether the bill resembles Massachusetts' health care reform plan.. which is does. Both plans are predicated on mandatory health care purchase by the individual and government subsidies to those who can't afford the insurance. But it does do a great job at showing how partisan and opaque the Democrats actually were during the whole process. They just arrived at a bill on their own that is demonstrably ineffective at accomplishing any of it's goals long term and mostly ineffective in the short term as well.

It's interesting also that the predictions of the end of the recession, driven largely by jumps in GDP, were themselves driven largely by a drop in the trade deficit... which was itself driven by a weak dollar. 2009 Exchange rates Somewhat ironically, the trade deficit will most start to grow again in Q1, and continue in Q2 due to the rebound of the dollar on the world market. It seems somewhat counter intuitive that a strong dollar is bad news, but for an economy banking on the recovery signals on Q3&4 of 2009, it could be very bad. A drop in exports will lead to a drop in GDP growth (though probably not an actual decline) in Q1 of 2010, and a possible actual return to declines in Q2. The timing for this couldn't be worse, as there is also the oncoming wave of foreclosures on the horizon... this time not due to stupid loans, but rather lack of jobs. Obama has proposed another stupid fix for this.. pinning the loan payment to 31% of income for 6 months... but this will just take the burden off of the home owner and dump it on the banks, who will respond, as they did in 2009, by slowing lending to cover short term losses. So look for another round of bank failures, housing price declines, and drop in GDP in Q2 and Q3 of this year. So the CBO, to bring my point back to relevance, is banking on poor estimates on both ends of their calculations.

Ok, follow me here Bascule: Accepting that the bill is a larger version of the Massachusetts bill, and that the Massachusetts bill was signed by a Republican Governor, does not make the national bill a Republican bill. Indeed, any Republican can say quite honestly "WE (Republicans) tried this before and it doesn't work." The national bill is most assuredly NOT a Republican plan because they can already tell you that it doesn't work in Massachusetts, will almost assuredly not work on a larger scale, and therefor they all voted against it. In this same way, if the Republicans gained control of the House, Senate and White House and filed a resolution to intervene militarily in Vietnam it wouldn't be a Democrat plan even though Democrat majorities once intervened in Vietnam militarily... especially is no Democrats vote on the bill. Also, on a more specific note, Constitutional conservatives (like me) have always seen health care regulation as a state issue, not a federal one. So conservatives (like me) could support the Massachusetts bill (insofar as it is constitutional) and reject the national version of the very same bill because it bestows too much power on the federal government over the individual states without even a hint of hypocrisy. Massachusetts is free to render their economy FUBAR to their hearts content based on their own state charter.

It should also be pointed out that your assertion that the cost can be addressed is not an objective quality of the cost and can not be demonstrated as you suggest. It has not been brought under control so assumptions that it CAN be brought under control has no basis in fact. Creating a bill that mimics a bill that has not performed any cost saving function in what amounts to a test program in Massachusetts on the grounds that on a larger scale it will save money is actually the meat of the hyperbole surrounding this bill. The bill in Massachusetts failed to provide the cost savings that it planned to provide. Ergo it is a bad bill. I define a bad bill as one that fails to accomplish it's goals. This same bill is now slated to be rolled out nationally, ergo I consider it to be a bad bill as well. We can also add in the requirement of the Massachusetts bill that it wanted to reach 95% coverage for it's citizens... which in the short term it did. But I don't see evidence at the moment that that is sustainable for the state if left to itself. It needs external injections of cash to remain solvent, it is not self sustaining... so the goal to cover 95% of it's citizens has not been met yet in perpetuity.

I am well aware that Mitt Romney signed that bill. He even used it as a selling point in his primary bid. Who says I support Mitt Romney? He became unelectable as soon as his compromise plan in Massachusetts went haywire. But arguing that Mitt Romney signed a demonstrably bad bill does not make it OK for the whole nation to adopt a demonstrably bad bill. Here's another nugget: The Republican compromise of 1993 on the Hillary plan was very similar to Romney's plan in Massachusetts... that still doesn't change the fact that the Massachusetts plan is untenable and is ruining the state financially. That is the nice thing about being conservative. Since I evaluate programs based on how they have performed in the past, I can learn from Republican and Democrat mistakes alike. Obama and this crop of Democrats seem unable to learn from any actual "teachable moments" and run full steam into programs that are shown to be bad and deem them a success based solely on what might happen if the planets align.

The traditional definition of conservatism is the support for programs and societal structures that develop organically. Although I think that is accurate, I think there is a better way to say it. But I think you need to define Progressives at the same time to really understand the definition of conservatism. So, my definition would be this: Conservatism evaluates proposed change through the lens of history, the Progressive views proposed change through the lens of posterity. I think that encapsulates the two positions very well. As a conservative I immediately consider an idea based on how the idea worked historically while the progressive in more apt to think first about what a proposed change may accomplish in the future.

It was the assertion by Bascule in post #55, but his full non-paraphrased quote is: "They (Republicans) care more about winning political victories against the Democrats than they do about improving the country" Which is not true at all. They believe that stopping the Health Care bill is better for the country and are acting accordingly. Likewise, they had their own health care reform ideas, but rare was the moment that the Democrats even feigned interest during the process.